Piercings

©2006 Randall George

Allison put on the break-up song CD she'd made for a friend of hers -- she never thought she'd be the one to use it next -- and gathered up the pictures she had removed from photo albums. "Love Stinks" blared from the speakers. She took out a pair of scissors and a paper grocery bag and poured herself a glass of Beaujolais. "Russell, be gone," she incanted. First she stuck one blade from the scissors into his 8 by 10 glossy that he had given her -- of course --

stabbing him in the heart. Then she began slicing the other photographs of him into slivers and depositing them into the paper bag. She swirled the Beaujolais in the glass while Bonnie Raitt sang "You're No Good." She found a photo of a sunset in Aruba—she in a black string bikini that matched her long hair, and him in a ragged Metallica T-shirt and cut-off jean shorts looking scruffy as usual. He thought it made him look rugged. Allison cut his head off first, and then sliced vertically through his shorts. A smile settled on her lips for the first time that day. She took a sip out of her wine glass, and held the liquid in her mouth, tasted the fruit and felt it tingle on her tongue. She could sense the elixir warming her throat as she swallowed, and the tension slipping away. Russell posing with a football—He always posed in some athletic tableau as if he were some kind of superstar. In reality he was couch potato. Allison folded the picture into quarters and then cut diagonally. "Cut from the team," she said out loud, and took another sip of wine. Enthusiastically Ali went through the pile and cut, and then tore the photographs into Kodachrome confetti. Getting near the end, she heard Gloria Gaynor begin to sing triumphantly, "I Will Survive," when she was roused from her reverie by the telephone.

"Door County? I'd love to," she told her friend, Margaret, who'd invited her for the weekend. It was early in the season, two weeks before Memorial Day, and it would be quiet up there. Maggie was her college roommate—best friend she'd ever had. Magg's husband, Danny, was a bit of a bore, but he usually left them alone to reminisce and party a bit. Allison still smoked the occasional joint, and though Danny disapproved, he wouldn't do anything to stop them, and usually he'd even go to the store for them so they wouldn't be driving under the influence. All in all he was a lot better deal than goddamned Russell, and she'd stuck it out with him for over a year. If he hadn't been so good in bed she'd have dumped him a long time ago. Not only did Allison have a few joints stashed away, but Maggie and Danny's cabin in Wisconsin was a great place to have a bonfire. Russell had left a few old T-shirts, including the torn Metallica one, and his old jean jacket that meant so much to him in her apartment. She was going to enjoy watching those go up in flames along with the photographs. "Burn, baby, burn," she thought. By the time she had finished with the wine and the photographs, Allison was happy, relaxed and ready for bed. She just felt a little horny. Damn Russell for leaving her horny. She fell asleep with her hand between her legs.

Friday at noon Allison cut out of work early to go up to the cabin. She took the last photograph she had of Russell out of her desk drawer, cut it into ribbons, and clutched it in her palm, then dumped it in the paper bag she had stashed in the car along with her suitcase and some trail mix for the ride.

Two hours out of Milwaukee she stopped for gas in Kewaunee, and looked out at Lake Michigan, the water green and a bit surly. It looked and smelled differently up here: Fresher and more robust. It was windy and warm. This early in May it was already pushing eighty. Allison was about due for a new car. She thought about a convertible—she could picture herself with the top down and some young stud riding next to her—a younger man, maybe one who would appreciate her a bit more than Russell. Cleaner, though, she thought, than the clerk at the Shell station. He had pierced his nose and eyebrows, and his hair rose in spikes as if his head was some kind of flamboyant abstract sculpture. He didn't speak as he handed her a pen and the credit card slip, and after she had signed it he returned her credit card with a disinterested nod.

"Thanks," she said out of habit.

"Yeah, whatever," he replied.

The rest of the drive took her mind off her troubles as she entered and exited towns in the same breath. She watched the clouds drift and dissipate, Lake Michigan her inconstant companion, as the road veered to and from the shore. Then she ejected the Dave Mathews CD she'd listened to the last fifty miles, and put in Prince, because tonight she was "gonna party like it's 1999."

Maggie and Danny's cabin was just north of Valmy, on Clark Lake. As soon as she'd gotten used to the odor of the cow manure, the farms gave way to quaint little shops and restaurants. Only a few cars traveled the road, and most of the summer-only cottages were still boarded up from the winter. Spring in Door County smelled like lavender and smoke -- Fish Boils were opening today across the peninsula. Maggs said they had just opened their place up for the season. Ali's tires squished up the muddy dirt road to the cabin. There was a guy down by the lake setting up the piers. He was young, barely legal and nothing special -- tousled brown hair, a little skinnier than Allison preferred, but the moment she looked at him she thought, "I'd do him." She wondered where that came from. Then the little tingle that flickered between her legs reminded her. Horny. No Russell.

"Fuck him," she thought. I'm not going to let that asshole ruin this weekend for me. She took one more look at the guy on the pier and shook her head. "Nothing special" she said to no one in particular. Certainly not loud enough so he'd hear. She grabbed her suitcase out of her car and walked up to the cabin.

Maggie threw open the door for her and yelled, "Ali, Ali, oxen-free." It put a smile on Allison's face as she and her college roommate flung their arms around each other. Maggs had cut her hair a bit, but it still hung halfway down her back. She had gained a couple of pounds since college, but still looked amazing.

"So do blondes still have more fun?" Ali asked.

"You bet your ass they do." Maggie and Ali slapped their hands together in a greeting from their old days.

"What's this?" Danny asked, poking his head in from the kitchen. "Am I all alone in the woods with two young coeds?"

"Beers," Maggie ordered.

"I've got something better," Allison said, holding up a joint.

"You still doing that crap?" Danny asked.

"Hush, husband," Maggs said. "You know how it gets me, so just buck up and take it like a man. And bring the beers, too. You want one, Ali." Maggie sat on the couch.

"Damn straight," she said, lighting the joint with a pack of matches she pulled out of her shirt pocket. "Russell is gone and it's bonfire night tonight."

"He was an asshole," Danny said. "Not that it's any of my business."

Allison walked over and kissed him on the lips. "I love you," she said, holding the joint to his mouth.

"Not for me," he said. "But you girls go and get happy. I'll get dinner started."

"So tell me all about it," Maggie said. "I hope you threw him out on his ass."

"I told him to screw himself," Ali said, sitting next to Maggie on the couch. "But damn if I don't miss that cock of his. He wasn't good for much else, but he could fuck like a banshee. Made me scream like one, too." She took a drag off the joint and handed it to Maggie who puffed until she coughed. Danny handed each of them a bottle of MGD, and Maggs took a couple of gulps to soothe her throat. The combination of the pot and beer and Maggie made Ali feel wild and horny.

"Dime a dozen Ali, you'll find someone better. God, remember that bonfire we made when I broke up with Julian? Remember what happened?"

"Can we do that again?" Ali's eyes lit up like sparklers. It was what she had hoped for. She drew closer to Maggie.

"Wait until Danny's asleep. Stay in your room," she whispered. "I'll come and get you."

"I've got all his shit in the bag."

"I've got some candles. The witches of Waukesha conjure again." Their eyes gleamed with excitement as they passed the joint back and forth.

"Dinner's ready," Danny yelled, and they both laughed so hard they fell off the couch.

"Be there in a sec," Ali said. "I've got something to get from the car."

A few minute past midnight Maggie pushed open the door Alison had left ajar. She was wearing only a blue University of Wisconsin T-shirt and carrying a bottle of Jose Cuervo tequila and two candles. "Let's do it," she whispered. Ali was wearing Russell's torn Metallica T-shirt and held up a joint.

"Ready."

They tiptoed out of the cabin and around to the back where the wood was stacked up. Each of them seized a couple of logs, and Maggie opened a wooden box and pulled out a bundle of kindling. Alison stopped by the car and pulled out the paper bag she had stashed in there. As they walked down to the lake they bumped their hips together. By they time they were done they would feel like gods -- lusty, sensuous gods -- and they knew it. "Here," Maggie said, and she gently dropped the wood down on the sand.

"You're sure Danny won't wake up?" Ali asked.

"He sleeps like the dead," Maggs replied, and took a pull off the Cuervo bottle. "Let's set it up," she said, and handed Ali the bottle. Ali could feel the tequila burn all the way down. She was ready for anything, and she knew that Maggie was too. In a few minutes the fire was blazing and the bottle was one-third down. Alison lit the joint, took a drag, and handed it to Maggie. Her world had turned liquid and sensuous.

Maggie inhaled deeply, clasped her hands on Ali's shoulders, and exhaled into her friend's mouth. "We are sisters," she intoned. "Sisters in spirit and sisters in blood." After Alison exhaled, the two former roommates joined in a long and luscious kiss, their lips wet and their tongues swirling. They each took another hit off the joint, and another drink from the bottle. They arranged the firewood in a teepee and lit the kindling. They watched as the flame fluttered and grew, then engulfed and consumed the kindling, finally setting the logs ablaze. The smoke smelled like rapture. Ali put the two candles in the sand at opposite ends of the fire, and lit them. Everything in her tingled.

Ali repeated the incantation, "We are sisters. Sisters in spirit and sisters in blood."

Maggie twirled, her arms out her heart racing. "It's time, it's time," she cried.

Ali took one more puff off the joint and laid it down. Her head was spinning faster than Maggie's twirls. She took a deep breath and grasped a hole in her Metallica T-shirt with both hands and tore it open, tore and ripped until the shirt was in shreds and she was stark naked, her black hair blowing in the breeze, her skin paler than the sand. Her heart was beating hard and fast. She threw the remnants of the shirt into the fire, and danced around it as the flames licked its threads into ash.

Allison danced in front of Maggie and embraced her, her hands roaming over her friend's breasts, and waist, and lower. She felt under Magg's UW shirt, caressing her between her legs, and then slowly lifting up. "I hate to see this go," Maggie said. "But it's for a good cause." And with that she pulled off her shirt and threw it into the fire. Then she grabbed Ali and they both danced around the inferno, their bodies bumping and sliding against each other, their lips finding each other, their tongues darting and probing. When they finally broke the kiss, they gazed into each other's eyes unwavering.

Maggie grabbed the paper bag, and then Ali's hand. "Do it," she said, her eyes blazing. She seemed possessed. "Do it."

Ali took the bag from her and spun round and round, whispering, "Russell to hell, all is well. Russell to hell, all is well. Russell to hell, all is well," and then tossed the bag into the fire. She watched the flames engulf the bag, and heard the bag pop and saw the shredded pictures fly as if they were trying to escape, but the fire was relentless and pulled the shards of photographs back toward the flames and consumed them. Ali felt Maggie's hand reach from behind her and caress her breasts, her hips, and her mound. She felt her friend's breath warm on her neck. Maggie's hands pulled Ali's lips apart down there, her breasts pushing against her back. Alison put her own fingers in her slit, and joined with Maggie's.

"Burn, baby burn," Maggie whispered in her ear. "Burn baby." It was too much for Allison, and at the same moment the bag and Russell's things were consumed she came onto her and Maggie's fingers, felt a shudder that began in her hips and traveled down through her legs and up through her stomach and breasts. When the shaking subsided, she turned to Maggie and pulled her tight to her, breast to breast and eye to eye. She hugged her head and pulled it to her, Maggie's blonde hair in tangles over her shoulder. Exhausted, they sat down on the cool sand and let the labored sounds of their breathing echo over the lake.

Ali lit what was left of the joint. She looked up and could see stars twinkling above. "We've still got it," she said. They sat and finished the joint, and then each took a few more sips from the bottle of Jose Cuervo. Then they just sat and watched the gentle waves lap in on the shore.

Maggie kissed Ali on the cheek. "You okay?"

"Never better. You?"

"I'm good, but exhausted. I'm going back to the cabin and get some sleep."

"You go ahead," Ali said. "I'm going to stay out here for a while."

"You sure?"

"Sure."

"Demons' gone?"

"Gone, gone, gone."

"Goodnight sweetie," Maggie said, kissing Ali sensuously on the mouth. Her hand rested one last time between Maggie's legs. "I'll see you in the morning."

Ali sat under the stars and polished off the joint. She found Orion's belt and the two Dippers, Ursa Major and Ursa Minor. As she walked, stumbling a bit, she waded out into the water. When she had ventured out too deep to walk she laid her body against the water and swam, gently, enjoying the release that she felt in her mind, body and spirit, the coolness of the water, the peacefulness of the night. She luxuriated in the water surrounding her and flowing around her hips, breasts and thighs. It saturated her hair and gave it weight. It massaged her toes and fingers. She floated naked in the water and watched the stars and the moon. She stayed there, in paradise for what seemed like ages and then swam to shore.

Ali fell asleep, still naked on the sand for a few minutes, her hair wet and matted. When she woke up, everything seemed a blur, even the shadow that rose across the lake. As she focused a bit she saw that the shadow had form and substance, and she saw that it was a man, as naked as she was, his cock swinging between his legs. The man walked into the water and began swimming in her direction. She watched the movement of his body in the lake, transfixed by his form. As he swam a bit closer she recognized him as the guy who had been working on the pier earlier.

She got back in the water and swam toward him. It was a choice her body had made, something removed from conscious thought. She didn't know what she would do when she reached him. She didn't know if he had seen her. She didn't know why he was here. Was it the pot? The tequila? The ceremony? Ali was usually so cautious and deliberate, but now she moved on instinct alone, the water of the lake slipping in a wake around her breasts, her nipples hardening. She could feel her clitoris throbbing as she glided through the water.

He was miles away, it seemed at first, and then rapidly he came to her. He had changed his course a bit until he was headed straight toward her. Now she stopped and treaded zen-like in the water. Now she could see his head bobbing up and down as he raised his head to breathe and then dove back into the water for speed. Now he was close enough for her to watch his butt rise and fall, like the waves, and now she could hear the breaths he took. She had only one thought, and that was to draw him to her, to take him in the water. As he came closer she could see that his lean frame was carved with long sinewy muscles, his back and peck muscles well defined, his blue eyes piercing.

As he approached she heard him gulp out a bit of water that he had swallowed -- he was only yards away, then feet, then inches, and she put her hands on his shoulders and pulled him close. He began to speak, and she did not want to hear it -- not his questions, not his thoughts, not his name. She put her index finger across his lips and watched his face until she was sure that he understood, and then she put her mouth on his, the two of them treading water and joined in a kiss. She felt his lips open a bit and his hands grasping her wet and tangled hair. She grabbed his ass in the water and pulled herself closer, until she felt a weight on her tongue that she didn't understand. As she pulled back he opened his mouth to reveal a silver tongue stud.

What surprised Ali at that moment was that as soon as she saw it she wanted him more. She drew him back to her, and extended her tongue as fully as she could into his mouth, and every time her tongue slipped across metal her mind reeled and her vagina pulsed. She was almost unconscious when he took hold of her wrist and pulled her with him as he began swimming back to shore. For a while they would swim, and then she had to have his tongue in her mouth again and she would stop and pull him toward her. It seemed they went on for hours like that -- swimming a few yards, kissing: the intense eroticism of the metal ball on her tongue -- swimming, kissing, swimming, kissing.

When they reached the shore he picked her up out of the water. He might have been skinny, but he was strong enough to lift her straight out of the lake and carry her past the sand and onto the grass where he lay her down. Immediately his mouth went to her left nipple, and slowly curled around it. At first she could only feel the tip of his tongue, thick and slow, then more rapidly, then exploring the round flesh of her breast, where it met the flat of her chest, then rising back up to the nipple, and then, oh god, she felt the hard ball of the tongue stud on her nipple, and she could feel the spasms in her crotch. He moved to her right breast and repeated each movement -- his tongue ravishing her breast, her nipple, the intense contact of his tongue stud on her breast. She reached down and put a finger on her slit and then drew it up to her clit as her pussy shuddered and throbbed, her butt thumping on the ground.

Quickly she pulled herself out from under him and moved toward his cock. She lifted it up and licked the base where it joined his balls, and wrapped her hand around his shaft. He tasted of the lake, but his own sweet and musky flavor permeated her nostrils. She put one of his balls into her mouth and held it while gently swirling her tongue. She felt him squirm and heard his soft moans. As she released him from her mouth she pushed it out with her tongue and licked along his thighs. She could hear him gasp. She took the other ball into her mouth and sucked a bit as she slid her tongue under it. She gripped tighter on his cock and felt it grow and harden in her hand.

Ali opened her mouth until it was a bit smaller than the ball she had in her mouth and slowly pushed it out with her tongue. Then she kissed the base of his penis and moved her tongue in swirls around the tip. It grew longer and thicker, and she pulled her hand down to the base of his cock and plunged her mouth down until she had most of him enveloped. She moved her head up and down, reaching under his butt and digging into his ass cheeks with her fingernails. She would have gone on but she wanted his cock in her pussy, and she could tell by his squirming that he wouldn't be able to take much more of this without cumming. Reluctantly she let him slip out of her mouth and began kissing his belly button and moving up his abdomen toward his chest, kissing and lightly biting his nipples, his shoulders, his neck, and then burying her tongue in his mouth, searching for the round metal stud that had become her obsession.