Naked Portraits Pt. 01

"Wishful thinking on their part," he said. "And what's your name?" Hawk asked of the redheaded model.

"Venus," Red said with a smile.

"Apt name," Hawk said. He turned to Betty and said, "I'm intruding so I'll meet you later?"

"I'm almost done. Hang out," Betty told him.

I'm standing up here naked! He can't stay! I wanted to scream but didn't. In quiet horror, I watched Hawk settle in a chair near Betty.

"Back to the pose," Betty commanded.

With a face probably as bright as a tomato, I dropped my arm from my chest and removed my hand from below.

"He's really cute," Venus whispered to me as I returned to the pose.

That was an understatement. In my opinion, Hawk was sculpted perfection, his body lean and athletic. He wore khaki shorts, t-shirt and Birkenstock sandals. His long, sandy, sun streaked, blond hair framed a handsome, smooth face with just the perfect edge of ruggedness.

Betty's boyfriends hardly ever lasted more than a few months but this Hawk guy was an interesting anomaly. Not that he'd lasted longer than any of the others; he'd only been around for about three months himself. It was the fact that the guy was not Japanese that made him interesting. It was an unspoken rule with Betty's mother that her boyfriends had to be from prominent, local, Japanese families or at least a local family that came from money or power. This Hawk guy was a rare and serious open show of rebellion on Betty's part.

That all aside, I found myself in a confused state of total humiliation and sexual arousal with Hawk's presence. Every time I looked his way, he was looking at me.

After a few minutes, Venus asked for a break, stepped down off the posing platform and walked over to see the painting. The chick didn't bother with her robe and I notice Hawk's eyes dancing up and down her naked form. Irrational jealousy flushed through me at his blatant ogling of Venus. His eyes shifted to me and for several seconds I stood stock still, secretly enjoying his gaze and happy that he looked at me and not at Venus.

"I think it's done," Betty announced.

"You should see this," Venus said.

Hawk looked away from me, breaking the spell. My usual self-conscious mode kicked back in and I stepped down from the platform, rushed to my clothes and quickly dressed, worried about what Hawk must be thinking of my brazen behavior, yet happy when I saw him sneak a peek as I dressed. When fully dressed, I stepped around to look at Betty's painting to see Venus and I standing in front of the red Karmann Ghia with dark, moody trees behind us and a gray, cloudy sky looming above. I stared, astounded. The painting looked like something right out of the Baroque period, even with the anomalous sports car.

"You both look great." Hawk said as his eyes flowed over the real naked Venus and not the painting.

Why won't the chick put on her robe? I thought with a great deal irritation.

To Betty I said, "I'm late for Hawaiian art history. Can you clean up for me and take my stuff back to my studio?" I didn't wait for an answer, grabbed my backpack and bolted out of the room, my mind a confusing jumble of emotions.

*****

In just panties and a bra, I stood on a hotel balcony looking out at the ocean. It was night and a cool breeze brushed my skin. My head was muddled like I had just woken from a deep sleep. An obvious question formed in my head. Where am I? Although it was night, I could easily tell that I was in a Waikiki hotel. Then the next obvious question formed How did I get here? I turned and walked to the balcony door behind me and slid it open. The night breeze stirred the light drapes and the soft drone of an air conditioner met me as I stepped into the darkened cool room. The only light in the room came from under a closed door off to the right. I could just make out a silhouetted figure sitting on the bed.

"Quiet, she's sleeping," the silhouette said, her voice was strangely familiar.

"Who's asleep?" I asked.

"Venus," said the silhouette.

"Is that you Betty?" I asked.

A soft laugh followed.

"Not quite," the silhouette said as she got up from the bed. In the weak light I could see she was naked. "Come," she said and walked to the door with the light underneath. When she opened the door I saw that it was the bathroom. The darkened room flooded with bright light. I turned away from the light and looked at the bed and saw naked Venus lying on her side, asleep, her long, red hair obscuring her face like a veil. Shielding my eyes from the harsh light from the bathroom, I followed the mystery figure in and she closed the door behind us. The bright light really hurt my eyes as I watched the naked woman drop the toilet seat and say, "Sit please." I did as she asked. She stayed standing, leaning against the sink facing me.

"What the fuck?" I said softly. The woman was clearly me but with a sharper, better toned body.

"You look great," I said stupidly. I couldn't have helped but notice that she had a nicely trimmed bush too.

The other me laughed. It was soft and musical...and sexy. The laugh set something off in me and I wanted, hell I needed, to touch her. As I stood I said, "This is one freaky dream,"

"I'll say," the other me said with a bemused smile.

With my right hand, I touch her left breast, hypnotically zooming in on the faint little mole an inch below the small, dark brown nipple. Automatically, I looked down and fingered the mole on my own breast. I felt her drawing near, positive she was going to kiss me. I liked the idea and hoped that she would. She didn't kiss me though. All she did was whisper into my ear.

"Goodbye."

My eye lids suddenly grew way too heavy with the need to close them so I closed them.

When I opened my eyes again I found myself standing in the figure painting studio. A single spotlight illuminated the easel with Betty's painting on it and Betty stood off to one side, just out of the pool of light.

"You like it?" she asked.

"I hate it," I lied.

Betty laughed and stepped into the light. I was shocked to see she was topless and wore just black panties. Absurdly she said, "With an angel's face." Seconds later a totally naked Venus joined her in the light.

"I thought you were asleep?" I said lamely to the impossibly tall, beautiful, naked woman.

Venus gave me a sweet smile and then pulled Betty into her arms and the pair engaged in a full-bodied kiss that hissed with lust.

"I better go," I said, confused and embarrassed, but they didn't seem to hear me and I couldn't think what else to do but watch them.

The kiss ended. Betty looked at me and said, "Just like you and me in Sonoma."

I blushed, not knowing what to say to that. I focused on the painting.

"What the Hell?" I blurted out in surprise. The painting had changed. Both figures were gone and only the red car and dark sky remained. Then, just as impossible, a painted topless Betty stepped into the post-modern Baroque landscape and got into the car behind the wheel. The Karmann Ghia's distinctly high revving engine barked to life, the tires squealed and the car disappeared off the left edge of the painting. My eyes darted around the room to look for the real Betty but she was nowhere in sight and only Venus stood by.

Shaking with confusion, I walked to the canvas and touched its surface; my hand came away sticky with gray and blue paint from the sky. I felt a presence behind me then a pair of hands brushed my hips. I looked down expecting to see Venus's hands but the hands were those of a man. As the hands slid to my front, I leaned back against a lean, hard, athletic body, immediately encountering a steely erection. Whoever was behind me was clearly naked and, so I noticed for the first time, was I. Unabashedly, I pushed one of the hands feeling my breasts lower down.

As the hand worked its magic on my clitoris, I felt compelled to confess, "I'm a little bushy. I haven't trimmed for a while." Thankfully, my mystery man seemed not to care about that and my passion built with every movement of his exploring fingers. "May I kiss you?" I asked, then spun around not waiting for permission. A part of me was totally sure it I'd be facing Hawk Detrick Heinz but shockingly, I found myself face to face with Venus.

"If you can kiss Betty, you can certainly kiss me," she said with a thin smile.

I put a hand to her face and pushed her away, leaving a blue-gray hand print where I touched her.

"Chicken shit," came Betty's voice from the painting.

"Fuck you," I said and to prove how UN-chicken shit I was, I stepped into Venus's arms and covered her mouth with mine. The kiss was strangely airy, spacy and elusive. As we kissed, the woman put a hand between my legs to pick up where Hawk (or whoever my mystery man was) had left off.

"May I?" came a deep male voice from behind me.

I turned away from Venus and found myself on my knees facing an erect penis. Mechanically, I gripped the thing with my right hand then looked up as Hawk looked down at me with the sweetest of smiles. After smiling back, I encircled the head of his penis with my mouth. Venus dropped to her knees beside me. The bright, blue-gray hand paint on her faced glowed with drifting clouds. More paint from my hand had transferred to Hawk's penis too. I closed my eyes briefly and when they opened again I found myself looking into Hawk's sky blue eyes with him laying on top of me on the model's platform, his pretty, cloud covered penis deep inside me.

"Kiss me," I demanded still deprived of that pleasure.

Instead of kissing me though, he spoke, but his voice was drowned out by the roar the car engine coming from the painting. I grunted in frustration and demanded my kiss but the roar of the engine got louder.

"I'll kiss you," Venus said from nearby, clear as a bell.

"I don't wanna kiss you, I wanna kiss him. If he kisses me, I'll come." I said, positive of that fact. I looked at Venus and the blue-gray paint had spread over all of her face and I could barely discern her from the painting behind her. The roar of the car engine increased, getting louder, more annoying and persistent.

Slowly, Venus and the canvas behind her turned an odd textured white. The sound of the car engine had changed too; it was high and shrill now, no longer a deep rumbling roar. I blinked several more times and realized I was staring at the textured ceiling of my seedy Waikiki apartment. The persistent, high, shrill sound was my cell phone ringing on my nightstand. With a great deal of effort, I answered the phone.

"Gwen Yoshimura, it's almost noon and you're still asleep? How decadent," Betty Nagata said in my ear.

"I'm not the one kissing goddesses," I said feeling strangely relieved to hear her voice. As surreal as the dream was, it was also weirdly vivid and I almost asked Betty what size Hawk's penis was to compare my dream with reality.

"You smokin' pakalolo this early in the day?" Betty asked with a laugh.

Her laughter cleared the last of the dream from my head.

"What you need Nagata?"

"Well Yoshimura, can you get your roommate's car and pick up the sushi platters for the party?"

"Can do. Where at? Safeway?" I asked knowing full well I was wrong.

Betty laughed, "No, stupid head, Suntory's. Five platters, they'll be ready after four o'clock."

Suntory's was the best sushi house in Honolulu and, knowing Betty, she got the premium platters that ran $200.00 or more. It still amazed me, even after all these years, the financial divide between Betty and I.

Trying to sound casual I asked, "Will Hawk be there at the party?"

Betty laughed.

"No, He's off island but he said that he enjoyed seeing you naked today."

I groaned.

"You gotta dump him. No way can I face him again."

"Get out of bed, lazy ass," Betty said with more laughter and hung up.

I ran my fingers through my messy, bed sculpted, dark brown hair. A huge yawn split my face. Last night I stayed up past three painting in my private studio on campus. Fuck this, I thought and went back to sleep.

Sometime later, my phone rang again. I picked it up and answered rudely, "What?"

"Gwen?" It was Betty again.

"I promise to get the sushi. Please let me sleep," I begged irritably.

There was a long pause then she said, "What did we do at the hotel after we left the vineyard party in Sonoma?"

Why was she bringing this up now after all this time?

"You know what we did," I said. "And I thought you never wanted to speak of it ever again?"

"I need you to tell me now," Betty said. She sounded upset and that woke me up fast.

"You okay?" I asked with concern.

"Yeah. Please? Just humor me and tell me what we did."

After a short silence I said, "We kissed."

She went quiet too. After several long seconds Betty said, "I have to go, see you at the party tonight." She hung up.

What was that all about?

Fully awake but still dog-tired, I crawled into the shower. I had just about forgotten about that kiss and yet here I was thinking about it twice in the same day. I stepped out of the shower and dressed. Betty's peculiar phone call on top of my weird, naked dream with Hawk and posing nude for Betty's painting put me in a strange state that I couldn't shake. Feeling restless, I got out of the house.

Whenever my roommate was out of town, she let me use her car. Taking advantage, I drove all over town shopping for art supplies and running errands. After my last errand I looked at the dashboard clock and freaked. It was close to six and the sushi for the party had been ready at four.

I rushed over to Suntory's to pick up the platters. The tires of my roommates car squealed as I made the turn a little too fast into the parking lot of the restaurant that it shared with a strip mall. As I got out of the car, my eyes met those of a totally stressed out Asian woman staring at me from the passenger seat of the car parked next to me. Another woman sat in the driver's seat but she had her head down and I couldn't see her face. The woman in the passenger seat just wouldn't look away. I gave her a nervous smile and rushed into Suntory's. That was weird, I thought.

At the front counter, I asked for Betty's order and the guy behind the counter asked for the pick-up ticket. I said I didn't have it and gave Betty's name again. He gave me a dark look and started to look at the tickets of the to-go orders to see which one was Betty's.

"Mo' easy if you have the numba," the guy groused as he looked, causing me to double my effort to find the ticket in my purse. As I searched, I heard the door opened behind me and I was afraid to turn fearing that the whacked out chick from the parking lot had followed me in.

"Gwen?" A soft voice said.

I turned, surprised to see that Betty had just entered the restaurant. With a frown I said, "Sorry I'm late picking up the platters and I think I left the pick-up ticket at home." Then I saw that her face was puffy, eyes red, she had been crying. "Hey? What's up?" I asked.

She stepped forward and hugged me for an awkwardly long time. Finally she backed away and said, "It's a mother Camille thing. You know how it gets. She can be a real bitch sometimes."

I nodded. Betty's mother could be a real bitch all the time I thought.

"Did you drive here?" I asked and looked out at the parking lot, relieved that the car with the crazy woman was gone.

"No," she said. "It was getting late and I thought you forgot to pick up the sushi for the party. Nicky drove me here then I saw your roommate's car so I asked him to drop me off." Out in the parking lot with the loads of sushi Betty said, "Let's go get Misty and get this party started."

I didn't argue with her.

Chapter 2

Betty's Party

Betty behaved strangely at the party. Her smiles and cheerfulness seemed forced. She was definitely on edge and I tried several times to get her to tell me what was up but she kept insisting that she was fine. I cornered Misty Omoto, the third arm in our sisterhood of mayhem.

"It's gotta be something with her Mother," Misty said. "Only Mother Nagata can put Betty in a such a fucked up mood. That woman can be a real asshole sometimes."

I nodded in agreement.

"But at least she likes you," I said. Misty laughed.

"I'm the granddaughter of the former Honolulu police chief and a police officer myself so what's not to like?" Misty gave me a sympathetic look for she had witnessed Betty's mother open hostility toward me over the years. With a thin smile she said, "Why does that woman hate you so much?"

"I exist," I said glumly. Misty laughed.

"My theory is that you're a bohemian artist with an out of control drug habit having wild, unprotected sex with other bohemians."

"What? I don't use drugs. I hardly even drink and I'm not even dating!"

"That's how Camille Nagata sees you. As a possible liability to her political career," Misty said. Then with a sly smile added, "You are a total slut when it comes to the Fernandez boys."

"I am not!" I protested.

"You're all over them like Spandex every time you're near them."

"I am not!" I said again, trying not to laugh because it was kinda true. I did have a thing for Aaron especially.

"What is she denying?" Betty asked, stepping into the kitchen to deposit some drinking glasses into the sink.

"That she has a thing for Aaron and Nicky," Misty said.

"You're a total whore when it comes to those two," Betty said as she scanned the tray of sushi on the counter for a morsel she liked.

"Well I'm too much of a bohemian loser for them," I said, mostly joking.

"No you're not. They think you're cool and envy your artistic talent and your courage to follow your heart," Betty said, stone serious. She found a sushi she liked then and said, "And so do I."

I was taken aback by this unexpected candidness.

To break the strangeness of the moment, Misty asked Betty, "You been smokin' pakalolo?"

"Not with a cop in the house," she said.

"I have no jurisdiction here in the islands whatsoever," Misty said.

And she was right. Melanie Omoto (Misty to all who loved her) was here on a rare visit from San Francisco where she lived and worked as a police officer. Four-year college, grad school and careers had scattered us to the winds and it was nice to have us all together in the same room. Misty, who hardly ever drank, seemed in a celebratory mood and kept up with Betty and I glass for glass.

"I love your new condo," Misty said.

"Thanks. It was a graduation gift from my parents," Betty said nonchalantly.

"My parents gave me an organizer," I said.

Betty put her hand on my arm and said in a patronizing tone, "It was a very nice organizer."

"Fuck you, rich bitch."

"Hippie bohemian," Betty shot back. Uncommonly drunk, Misty laughed way too hard at our banter.

My eyes fell on a painting of a fish on the wall over the small kitchen table. The painting style made me think of an Edouard Manet still life. In the painting, a silvery fish rested on a wooden board and beside the fish was a sharp looking kitchen knife with a black handle. Faint Japanese characters were painted into the handle in silver.

"Where did you get that odd little painting?" I asked.

Betty looked at the painting in question.

"It belonged to an aunt from Maui."

"Your Aunt Greta?" Misty chimed in.

Betty nodded.

"It hung in her house for years. I always liked it and out of the blue she just gave it to me. The words on the handle say fish cutters."

I squinted and translated the Japanese characters on the knife handle into English. "The lovers screamed their passion."

"What the hell?" Betty asked. She and Misty got up to get a closer look at the painting. Betty's Japanese sucked and I knew she couldn't read written Japanese to save her life but Misty knew the language well enough and she confirmed my translation.