While You Were Out

It starts when you're getting ready, or maybe even before that. No, definitely before that, because as soon as you casually mention that you might go out after your show, I feel a little jolt--a nerve-twitch of sexual response. Images of you--dolled-up and looking incredible, on the town--flood my brain. In fact, the immediacy of the response proves that the images are never filed away too deeply, and that there are neural pathways that my mind has worn very, very smooth between moment to moment existence and your smoldering presence. I was thinking I might go out after my show tonight...is that OK?

It will always be OK.

You usually come home between. Why? You look incredible after your bellydance shows. But you maintain high standards for your nights out--which just makes all this even hotter, of course. Sometimes I like to watch you get ready, and other times I lie in bed just listening, but know this: I'm never asleep. I listen to the click of your brush on the counter, the rustle of fabric (usually tight) on your body, the pop of the cap on a lipstick, the scuffle of shoes (always sexy ones on these nights). All of those sounds, every one of them, has a meaning, and the meaning is I'm attractive, I know it, and tonight others will know it; and not just know it but enjoy it; maybe not just enjoy it but become a little dizzy over it, and I'm going to enjoy that. Without fail, the last sound I hear before you go out the door is the air kisses you send my way whether you think I'm asleep or not.

Sleep, ha. On one of these nights, I will not sleep before you are home--or if I do, it's a fitful half-sleep suffused with a combustible mixture of arousal, desire, jealousy, curiosity, and, above all, anticipation. I hear you shut the door, start the car, drive away; and I mark each movement until I can't hear the car any more. Then it's pure imagination.

What are you thinking about as you head to wherever you are going? The care you took with your appearance means you're not just going out to passively watch a show or listen to music, so I imagine you feeling your own little spark of anticipation. You know you will catch some eyes, because you always do--literally every time. I can tell you, by the way, that you draw more eyes than you know. Some of us are very discreet about looking at attractive women, but we are doing it just the same.

Maybe you are hoping to dance a little (now that your dance show is over, ironically). You claim you don't remember much about the time you went salsa dancing, but I remember it. (There is an ad for salsa nights that runs sometimes in one of the alternative papers. The photo shows a gorgeous woman's leg hooked over her dance partner's leg. Did you do that, on that hot salsa night, my love? I don't think you did, because that, you would have remembered. That is a very saucy move for a married woman to make with someone she's not married to; but it is legal in salsa, there's no helping that.)

Maybe you're not planning to dance at all; maybe it is just the freedom of a few hours without any kids around, the world of adults, a time and place for relaxation and letting go of small irritations.

Or, maybe you are planning to dance a little and relax a little, but what's really making you wriggle in the driver's seat (and this is where you knew this was going, right?) is the anticipation of a good old-fashioned spicy flirtation. Oh, you have set the stage well, with flawless dress and makeup, a disarming but highly alluring smile, and most important of all, an air of confidence and desire. You have flirted before and you'll do it again--maybe tonight.

And so the movie plays out in my head. I toss and turn, I endure (without minding too much) raging hard-ons. Somtimes I turn the light on and read some of the stories you've written about past adventures. What a Pandora's box you opened the first time you admitted to having flirted while doing your show! I have savored that little moment ever since, and will to my last day on earth--the look on your face as you hesitated just a bit before saying it, the pure happiness afterward when I responded positively (I believe I fucked your brains out more or less immediately following this little confession of yours). When it comes to pillow talk, there is nothing so sexy as the confession or the admission. The little hesitation, or sometimes the question (Do you really want to know about this? or Are you sure you won't be jealous?), creates the most delicious anticipation and wave of desire for you. In your stories, you and your flirt partner naturally become we (We got up and danced... we exchanged delightful lingering glances and half-smiles…). There is a scandalous thrill in that tiny pronoun, isn't there?

The night you came home from your hot little flirt at that middle eastern club (you know which one I mean), I pretended to wake up as you got in bed. I can still breathe in and call up the scent you brought back that night--part smoke, part wine, and something else that might have been incense; and just the memory of that scent is enough to turn me on. The next morning, you said with a flirtatious grin, I have a little story to tell you!

The later it gets, the more turned on I become. If you come home before midnight, chances are the evening didn't live up to your hopes (or my imaginings). But if one o'clock passes and your side of the bed is empty, it is likely that you're having a good time, and a slightly higher level of sexiness in my fantasies is validated. Usually I picture you dancing, and if you're out dancing past one a.m., it could be that some major-league flirting is heating up your dance. A little touch of the fingers; a lingering glance; a quickening of the heart. (Do you get turned on, actually get wet when you're flirting? For the sake of your enjoyment, I hope you do, at least a little. If I didn't get aroused by my occasional flirtations, they wouldn't be much fun. What kind of lover would I be if I would deny you the same pleasure?) I smile at the minor heartbreak you're going to cause when you leave to come home tonight.

Sometimes I hear the clock strike two. By this hour I know I'll be a wreck in the morning, but it's worth it--oh, is it worth it! After two, my mind is apt to venture to slightly darker places. How far would you take a scorching flirtation? What if slight touches of fingertips became more intentional, more prolonged? If the object of your flirtation tried to hold your hand, would you let him? A flirt for its own sake is a little thrill; when it is coupled with genuine attraction it can be downright volatile.

I imagine the darker places where your own mind might be pulled. How do you know exactly where to draw the line? If things went a degree or two beyond innocent flirtation, would you still tell me about it? Does the darker part of you ever wonder what it would be like to kiss him? Is there a little part of you that wishes you could find out? Maybe you hope that, from the safety of dreams later this night, you'll have a hot tryst; one that you can confess with no guilt and lots of sexy detail--or not confess, and keep as your own hot little secret. Maybe this dream tryst would involve only kissing, or maybe there would be some wandering hands and disheveled clothing. Or, would it go straight to sweaty, rough, delirious sex--good hard fucking that leaves you breathless and tingling?

Often I'm startled out of my own mind-movies by the sound of the door shutting downstairs. Now that you are back, I try to interpret every possible piece of information. If you take a while downstairs, the dark part of my mind wonders if there is evidence for you to deal with before coming upstairs. (The part of my mind that goes spelunking in those dark places is not about wishing you would do any of the truly dangerous things it pictures; but picturing those things adds some fizz to the champagne, some spice to the chili, when you tell me about what you actually were up to. It makes explicit what is usually only implicit, the undercurrent that powers and propels the enjoyment of a good flirt story.)

But then, at sweet long last, you join me in bed: object of my desire, center of my fantasies! Sometimes I pretend to be asleep, sometimes not. I've learned that if your toe seeks out my leg, we'll have sex; if your hand reaches first, odds are that we'll kiss a little and fall (finally!) asleep. At least once, you climbed into bed after one of your nights out, and without a word (or a probing toe), poured yourself onto me with a cascade of hot, passionate kisses, our embrace melting effortlessly into an incredible fuck that left both of us happily wrecked and more profoundly than ever in love.

And that is how I am now, and will be forever. Hot flirting woman, you are beyond my wildest dreams!

I love you.