Cometh Hither

I broke with tradition and managed to get the Henry V part of the paper over early. By Friday that week I had pretty much completed it. I was anxious to get to work on the part that really interested me. I wouldn't see Molly again to the following Tuesday, but riding my bike to the Student Center on Saturday I did see her playing tennis. That explained why she looked so fit. I admit I slowed down a bit for some good old-fashioned ogling. I remembered there was a water fountain at the corner of the tennis courts so I pedaled nonchalantly over to get a drink.

My knowledge of tennis was meager at best, but I could see there was some kind of break in the action. She was yelling something across the court to the guy she was playing with and laughing. Again, a pang of jealousy. Stop it, just stop. I realized I was looking at her when she started waving to me. That woke me up and I waved back and smiled. She turned back to her partner who looked like he was setting up to serve and she gave me one more quick little wave and put her hand back on the racket. Something about that simple gesture was so intimate to me. She took her attention away from an imminent serve to give me that last little unnecessary wave. Was it simply attention from women I was so drawn to? I recalled the delicious feeling of Cynthia's willing, hungry eyes on me and as I hopped back on my bike, I realized my story was already forming in my head.

At first I thought about somehow trying to write it like Shakespeare, but quickly realized I was complete shit at trying to write like Shakespeare. About the cleverest thing I could come up with was "cometh hither eyes of Heather Thomas" (Heather Thomas being the bikini-clad subject of the pinup poster on the ceiling I got caught jerking off to, her skimpy bikini, her look like "dive right in, fella, it's hot and wet"). Not all that clever. I did like cometh hither though so I kept that for the title page separating my yawn-inducing Henry V analysis and my hopefully not lame attempt at self-analysis through erotica. I intended it to be kind of a jokey beckoning into the world of the story beyond. Cometh, har har. Get it?

I imagined the red pen, "mediocre pun, needs work."

As the words started flowing, however, I found that building the story was thrilling in almost the same way the original events were. I knew full well I was telling a story about my life, in full sexual detail a la Anais Nin, to a woman I was attracted to. Not just, "this happened, this is how I felt." No, I was making it as explicit as I could, using words I'd never put to page before. Cock. Erection. Masturbate. Come. Or cum, I hadn't decided yet. This was exhibitionism through words and it was proving to be just as arousing. Literary exhibitionism of literal exhibitionism with an older woman for an older woman? Like the old Double-Mint commercials. A double-great feeling, double the pleasure, double the fun.

Or so I hoped.

So I wrote. I re-wrote. I had an early word processor back then with a tiny CRT screen. I wrote and deleted. When it was complete, I had written the story of Cometh Hither, the story of me getting caught masturbating to a pinup poster by a friend's mom who that same day orchestrated events to get me into a revealing swimsuit with a painfully obvious erection and which ended with me naked in her bed, masturbating until I came for her while she sat right next to me. I discussed my conflicted feelings about it, how I had started to think it seemed abnormal and weird, and how a story contained in Delta of Venus helped me feel I was fine. Well, relatively. In my story, I wrote Anais Nin in as a character, sort of a Shakespearean chorus who just shrugged and said things along the lines of "good job, kid," as if she found it all rather pedestrian. I almost deleted those parts. Pretentious stoner nonsense? I figured I'd leave it in though in the hopes it would at least amuse Molly.

When it was finished, the story was almost as long as the Henry V section. I had only intended to write a few pages, but I find myself enjoying the process immensely. Writing about every detail of that day for and audience of one felt so intimate. A lot of the times when I wrote papers for school, I didn't really think about whoever was going to read it. It was an assignment, maybe I had good ideas, maybe it was a 3AM pile of shit. I knew when it sucked and when I was not going to get a decent grade, but I didn't really consider the audience. With this story, however, I paid every word far more attention. They started flowing out as the story progressed, but I took care to get them right. It felt the same as wanting to put on a show that Cynthia wanted to see while I was naked on her bed. I felt just as naked putting the words to paper for Molly. I wanted her to see me, know me. Intimately, through my words. I wasn't sure what the reaction was going to be, but I wasn't dreading it. After I was satisfied I was as finished as I could be, I printed the paper on my dot matrix printer and hid it in my underwear drawer. I did not need this thing getting released into the wild for the shits and giggles of my housemates and their girlfriends. This was between me and Molly and I was going to make sure it stayed that way.

Tuesday came. Shakespeare. Molly. My paper was in my backpack under my chair. I was sitting there trying to listen but all I could think was that there was no way I could hand this thing in. No fucking way. I was going to remove the last half starting with the stupid Cometh Hither title page. As class ended, papers were turned in. Once again I waited until the room cleared out and I went to talk to Molly who had a smile like she was expecting this.

"So, how did the paper go?" she asked. "Chicken", I thought to myself.

"Great. I think. I—uh. Hang on." I looked in my bag, found the cover page for Cometh Hither, and held onto that section as I brought it out to hand to her, tearing the entire last half from the paper. A shred hung from the staple. She looked at me and then at the paper. I must have looked more than a little weird. I handed it over.

"It seems a bit... light," she said as she turned the pages to the end. She turned it over. "And there doesn't appear to be anything... extra."

I sighed. "I know. I just ripped those pages out."

Now her look contained concern.

"But why?"

I paused. Her eyes implored. I said quietly, almost a whisper, "I—I don't want you to think I'm a perv."

With that she took my hand in hers and shook it. "I would never think that." She looked in my eyes with what I might have read as anger any other time, but it wasn't anger. Firm resolve I would think later, that's what it was. "Never. Everything here is between us and us alone. To be honest, I asked myself if giving the book to you was a good idea. But my point was sex isn't something to be ashamed of and it sounded like you had something to say. I like what you write, I think you're good at it, and it seemed like a good way for you to express what you needed to. Work things out, like you said." She smiled at that, as did I.

I reached into my pack and pulled the pages out. She grabbed her stapler and I handed to the pages to her. She stapled Cometh Hither to Henry V and I exited stage left, pursued by a bear.

Well, not really. She took my paper and placed it in her planner, not with the pile of other students' papers on her desk. She zipped the planner closed and gave me a nod, like "that's that, nice and safe" and I knew that it was. We said goodbye and for some reason I thanked her.

"You are very welcome."

Our next class was Thursday. Generally, the papers wouldn't be graded until the following week, so I wasn't sure what to expect as I entered the room that night. I was a little later than usual, not accidentally. I hemmed and hawed until I was sure to not be the first and not be the last in the room. I wanted to be in the middle. Still, when I walked in Molly looked up and locked eyes with me. I reflexively darted my eyes away but then immediately looked back. She was still looking at me. I gave her a quick and low one-handed wave and she smiled and gave me a nod and then looked back out over the class.

In that two hours, I basically heard nothing except my heart pounding and all the words in my brain tumbling around trying and failing form any coherent ideas. My housemates and I enjoyed watching the movie Koyaanisqatsi while high. "Life out of balance" indeed. That's what it felt like. I felt like everything around me was a stoned, topsy-turvy, time-lapse blur.

Then class ended. Once again, I dawdled. I fumbled with my backpack. I felt light-headed.

Molly came over.

"Rough night last night, you look like you're going to pass out," she said.

"I'm okay, I'm okay."

She looked like she was choosing her words. "I think I know why."

Shit.

I had no words to choose from.

"What you wrote. Was—is... wow. I have never had anyone write anything like that for me." She stopped like she was trying to figure out what to say. "I thought I had figured out what I was going to say to you, but now that you're in front of me..."

"I didn't think it was THAT good," I said. I felt flushed.

"Some of the grammar is iffy," she said. "And dialogue is written oddly sometimes... and you use a lot of ellipses. But the honesty, your story... It was very erotic and I really, really enjoyed it."

She paused and looked at me.

She leaned forward and whispered, "Boy, did I cometh." She fanned her face with her hand. "Whew," more of an exhale than a word. Her sly smile grew wide, showing her teeth.

The clouds parted, an angelic chorus blasted its song from the skies.

Dear Penthouse Letters...

She was smiling at me and I didn't know what to do but smile back as my head quickly filled with images of her reading my story, lying in a big warm bed, my faded dot matrix words in one hand, the other moving down, down... inside her panties, touching herself until--

"Are you free right now?" she asked.

That brought the Boner Express back down to Earth in the nick of time. "Uh, yeah?"

"Come with me to my office?"

"Okay," I said. What else would I say? Nah, no thanks.

We packed up and left the classroom. Her office was in the same building on the floor above. It was early evening but there were still people in the halls.

"I didn't read the Henry part of your paper yet, but if you put half as much thought into it as your story, that'll be an A."

I look over at her and smiled. "Thanks." I thought I should say more. "You, well, you're inspiring."

"Oh, I really hope so."

We arrived at the door to her office and she turned to me.

"After I close the door, take a seat on the couch and not a word." She spoke low and quietly. No one would hear. "Not one."

I nodded. Not a word.

We entered the dim office, lit only by the slowly twilight sky outside her window. I sat on the couch as she asked.

She crossed the room, set her papers and bag on her desk. She unzipped her planner and pulled out what I assumed was my paper and then sat in a brown leather chair by a bookcase opposite the leather couch I was sitting on. She was looking directly at me as she opened my paper to its latter half. She looked down and read for what seemed like an eternity but probably was thirty seconds. She raised her eyes back to me.

"The story you wrote about is one of my favorites," she said.

I started to say something and she cocked her head and pursed her lips.

Right. Not a word.

"Maybe not for the same reasons. You identify with the young man. It's written from his perspective of course, but the woman's motivations are just as intriguing, I think." She reached into a bag at her feet that I hadn't really noticed and produced a familiar black paperback along with my paper. Seeing her holding both of those in her hands gave me a curious pleasure. My inexperienced words next to those of a pro...

"I bought a new copy today. You keep my original," she said.

I gave a thumbs-up in thanks and she grinned. She opened the book and flipped through the pages until she found what she was looking for. She started reading out loud.

"She was sitting on her balcony watching me, completely unashamed, and something drove me to pretend that I was not noticing her at all," she read, slowly. She seemed to savor the words. She touched the tip of her tongue to her top teeth as her eyes skipped ahead, "being watched by her gave me the most extraordinary pleasure... on the third day I had an erection."

Having her read this to me in the dim room was starting to have a similar effect on me. She reached over to small lamp on a table beside her chair and turned the light on. A couple clicks and it was down to the dimmest setting.

She returned to the book. "From where I lay I could see her very luxuriant form." I gazed back at her and let my eyes soak her in, traveling down her body, down her bare legs. She kicked each shoe off and I looked up. She was looking at me. She shifted into what seemed like a more comfortable position on the chair, lower, settling in.

"Luxuriant," she repeated. "I love that word here." I did to, that one word evoked such a striking image. I also loved the way she said it, sounding as luxuriant as she looked right now. She was looking at me pointedly with the tiniest of smiles, her mouth turned up at one corner. Using a finger to hold her place in the book, she picked my paper up from her lap and paged through it. One last sideways glance, and back to the page.

My page! And right to the good stuff, apparently.

"She was looking at my Speedo again, my erection straining at the material, then back to my face. I slowly eased myself onto my back, quite conscious of how it must look to her. She smiled. I could feel her breathing through mattress, see the rise and fall of her chest."

Molly smiled at me and skipped ahead. Her voice saying "my erection" kept repeating in my head.

"And so the curtain raised on my performance. I slid my right hand under the waistband of the Speedo and caressed myself for her... I felt brazen and deliciously wild."

My words. Me.

She paused and looked directly at me.

"Brazen... Wild... And so the curtain raised on my performance," she repeated, enunciating every word.

She whispered, "Deliciously wild..." and placed the paper in her lap. She cocked her head slightly and raised her eyebrows.

I could have smacked my forehead. For the second time in my life, I was being asked to masturbate for a woman. This woman had read my story and how I felt about the events of that morning. She read my attempt at being titillating, words I had used to describe myself, my body, my arousal, in no uncertain terms. How I felt doing something so private for someone else, with someone older, not a peer. The story was quite clear about how I felt, filled with imagery of skin and lust and erections and orgasmic explosions. My erections, my orgasms. My come. Cum. I still didn't know which sounded better. Either way it felt smutty and taboo and she obviously had no problem with any of it. At all. Suddenly being so conflicted about it seemed far, far away. I smiled and slid my legs up onto the couch. Now this weird couch seemed perfect. I kicked off my sneakers and socks and then, looking at her, unbuttoned my jeans.

She returned to the book and repeated Nin's words: "being watched by her gave me the most extraordinary pleasure."

Extraordinary is right. Watching her, I unzipped my jeans, my erection tenting my underwear, pushing its way out as the sides opened. Molly watched, bemused, as I slid them down and off. They fell to the floor.

"Did it excite her to watch me?" she read. Her eyes were on me. My penis was of course hard as rock, visibly straining at my underwear. Molly's eyes lingered for a moment and then went back to the book.

Again Nin's words fell from her lips. "I feared that if she knew I was aware of her she might leave." She looked back at me. I made a show of looking away, looking at the ceiling.

I whistled quietly to myself nonchalantly. Doo dee doo.

She giggled. "Psst," she got my attention, "his shirt is off too." I quickly stripped off my t-shirt. I was close to being fully naked in front of her and I was loving it. I was trying my best to play the part of the exhibitionist in the story and I think I was doing okay, especially with her stage direction. I also had one more experience under my belt than the guy in the story.

And then the words weren't Nin's. They were my words, words I knew so well because the scene had played over and over in my head since the day it happened:

"I was hungry for her gaze on my naked body now, I had to show her everything... I longed for her eyes on my bare skin, my erection," she breathed.

Waves of warmth rushed over me hearing her speak those words to me. I hooked the waistband of my underwear with the fingers of both hands. I looked at Molly and she was watching with a smile, my story again in her lap. I slowly pushed the waistband down, lingering momentarily, then letting it slip past the tip of my penis. I slid the material slowly down over the head, then the shaft, slowly exposing all of myself to her. It felt amazing to be doing this for her. I pushed the underwear down my legs and off and then slowly laid back on the couch. Now I was completely naked in front of her. But I didn't touch myself. As in the story, I pretended I didn't know I had an audience, acting as though I was totally unaware of her presence. Study of a young man in repose, naked with a raging hardon. I was so hard it was defying gravity, flexing involuntarily, raising itself tautly so it hovered just over my lower abdomen. I made a show of peeking at her through one eye and she laughed.

She theatrically cleared her throat and read from the book:

"Looking straight at her now..."

I opened my eyes and turned my head to look directly at her. I knew what came next.

"I played with my sex."

Then my words:

"She was staring openly at me now, at my hard cock. She was breathing heavily, I thought I could even feel her breath on my skin."

Molly too was staring openly. Her lips were parted, gone was the smile. I could see the maddening curves of her breasts rising, falling through her dress. I wanted to kiss them, just like that, my lips pressed to her dress, feeling her nipples through the fabric, I wanted to run my hands up her thighs, raising her dress to--

I grabbed myself and began masturbating, not just for show, I wanted to come. It was almost too much. I didn't want this to be over fast, but I could not help myself. I was so turned on. I knew by heart what came next in both stories. Nin's narrator and I played with ourselves with the women watching our every movement, and just like them I was very aroused and would come easily. It seemed like the guy in the story came in seconds. I surely could also. Molly's eyes were on my grasping, stroking hand. Was she playing the part or was she also enjoying it?

Repeating the words of Nin's storyteller that Molly had spoken herself just minutes ago, and breaking her rule, I asked out loud, "did it excite her to watch me?"

They were the first words I had spoken since we entered. Nin's voice through me, to Molly.

Instead of finishing with the words on the page ("it must have") she simply said:

"Yes."

Her words, her voice. I wonder if my speaking had broken the spell and I stopped my movements on myself.