Images in Henna

"Hey, Ragini. How about if we order pizza? You'll have to pay the driver when he shows up of course." Tasha laughed.

"Unless we all want to give the driver one hell of a tip!" Angela gave her bare ass a wiggle on the stool she was sitting on. Her face plastered with a lewd grin and her eyes a twinkle. "What'd you say, girls? Shall we give the pizza boy a night he'll never forget?"

Before I could speak Jennifer piped up. "How do you plan to do that and not mess up the henna? Even yours isn't fully dry yet." Then Jen gave up a grin herself. "And what's to say that the pizza will be delivered by a guy? What if it's a girl? Or are you willing to give her a good time for a tip too?"

"Ah, not just no, but oh hell no! There is too much delicious cock out there, yet to be sampled, for me to fall back on fingers and dildos. Besides," Angela placed a henna cover hand over her lower belly, "It would take me forever to get the lipstick out my pubes."

"EEWW!"

As the other ladies in the room joined in the seemingly universal opinion I got to my feet, looked at my henna stained gloves. Careful not to touch half-dried paste to skin, I shed them and left them in the trash by my counter.

"Ragini?"

"Hum?" Looking to Madeline, I keep my face neutral. "Just taking a bathroom break while Jen finishes your leg." Looking down at Jen, I nodded "You're doing great. Keep it up, I'll be right back."

I knew eyes followed me. It was not an uncommon feeling. And as it goes, it's better than having no one be willing to look at you. That had felt far worse. Those few steps to my restroom, under the eyes of my friends, were nothing compared to the long walk down a muddy road with no one acknowledging me. Not willing to even look me in the eye.

** ** ** ** ** ** ** **

Henna dries slowly.

Naked women, talking about anything that came to mind, filled my shop with laughter as often as not. The heavy smell of my art, that wet hay scent, even overpowered the smell of pizza. As the only woman with clothes on I felt as odd and out of place as I normally do, but this was different. Dream like even. Surrealist moments of embarrassment and pleasure interweaved within me. I wanted them to stay forever letting me enjoy seeing their bodies in such relaxed a moment. Soon even Madeline relaxed with being naked. Her prudery forgotten once the henna hid part of her skin so completely under the many intricate designs. She could not see that it more accented her curves, accentuated her beauty than hid anything. Maddy also did not know what to look for in the designs, the symbols. If my friend could read the Devanagari letters of my childhood she would see so many words now covered her body, hidden as simple designs. Words like love, passion, lust, and desire.

My words.

The words I dared not speak to her, even when the desire to do so ripped at my body like knives. Madeline with her lovely eyes, her beautiful smile and the body I so desired to feel next to mine in the night. To awaken next to in the morning. To make respond to my touch.

"Ragini!"

Hearing my name, I looked up. "Yes?"

"Off in some Hindu dream land?" asked Tasha. "I called your name three times."

"Sorry? Do you need something?"

"Some of my henna flaked off when I moved." She had an apologetic look to her, like she had stolen a sip of my soda. "Do we need to fix it?"

Getting up, settling my long kurti blouse to where it should be, I moved over to take a look at the designs. Where I had placed a flower upon the palm of her hand and inner wrist--taking advantage of the lighter skin there to make the larger design more flamboyant--some of my lines had dried and had begun to flake away. The skin under was now stained a burnt orange. As it should be.

"Oh, well it's ruined." I shook my head and sighed dramatically. "We will have to start over."

Tasha's dark eyes, under that headful of long, braided, pink hair went wide as her jaw dropped, and then she saw the twinkle in my eyes. Her pink painted lips pursed and her eyes narrowed making her wide nose wrinkle. She picked up a bamboo backscratcher from beside her.

"I am going to beat you so hard you will have bruises to wear for the wedding."

Laughing, I dodged around my shop for a moment with the naked African-skinned woman chasing me, Tasha's braids flying in a pink storm of whips and several other naked women laughed delightfully. It was a wonderful feeling. Like my childhood re-remembered. The time before the odd feelings took me to dark places. Dark times.

"Hey." Madeline Sudden voice stopped bother of us. "That's true, I didn't think of that. Ragini, who will do your henna?" She looked to Jen, then asked "Can you do it?"

Jen started to nod even as I smiled and shook my head.

"I've already done mine." Pulling my kurti to the side, I showed them the designs on the tops of my breasts that I had done in reverse using a mirror. "I've worked on it for the last few days. Except for my hands." I shrugged. "I left them till I was sure all of yours were done. I'll finish that here in a bit. "

"Can I do your hands?" asked Jennifer, eagerly.

I grinned at her. "Yes, you may. But ... be careful, henna is addictive."

Jen grinned.

** ** ** ** ** ** **

Their artwork dried, the other women left. With many a thank you and comments about how lovely my work was and how they could not wait to see the shocked faces at the wedding tomorrow afternoon. I gave them instructions about how to use coconut oil to darken the stain and to protect it from water. They fluttered out of my shop like a cluster of butterflies, similar no doubt to the ones in Madeline's stomach as she went to spend her last night as a single woman.

Jennifer was still here and, despite her henna being dry, she had decided to stay naked. As I cleaned up she sat watching me. Her eyes following me around my shop.

"You don't want to go to the wedding, do you?"

Looking back at her startled, I shook my head. "Of course, I want to go. Why wouldn't I?"

She gave me a look. "Well, I know if I was in love with someone I wouldn't want to see them marrying someone else."

"What? I hardly know Jim. I'm in no way in love with Madeline's fiancé!"

Jen smiled and shook her head. "Not who I meant and you know it. Maddy." Her lips quirked into a self-deprecating smirk . "Not that I'm immune to her beauty myself, but Madeline makes everyone fall in love with her. Most innocent people do that to us ... that are less than innocent."

My heart in my mouth, my pulse pushing it there thump by thump, I clenched my hands on the minor hope I felt surge through me. "I don't know what you mean. I care for Madeline, but she's a girl ... a woman, like myself. We can't have anything beyond friendship."

Jen's answer was a short chuckle. "Well, as you wish, Ragi. Let's get started on your hands. Shall we?"

Ragi?

Moving to the seat that so many naked bottoms had graced today I eased into the chair, glad for once that I was clothed in the presence of another woman. In fact that Jen was naked made me uncomfortable, a strange sensation. As if her nudity and my clothes made us reversed in control. When she took my hand and began to wipe down my skin, I simply sat. Too stunned by what she had said to react. Mentally ambushed? Yes, a mental ambush from out of nowhere. Her question hitting when I was in a comfortable place, driving to the heart of me. To the place where secrets are kept.

Then she began to work on my hand.

Oh, the memories that came flooding back to me at that time. How long had it been since another woman held my hands and applied henna to me? How many long years where I drifted alone in a place so far away from those memories. Lost alone. Jennifer had managed only a few simple lines when the full weight of it all hit me. Hit me as sudden as her questions had. Madeline's marriage, my loneliness, the banishment from my family, even this simple act bringing me back to the place I so longed for. All of it was too much.

A wet tear fell upon my hand, splashing over the fresh line. Wet henna paste ran down in a trail around my thumb.

My face was lifted up and Jennifer's eyes were on mine, hers sparkling with a shared glitter of sorrow.

"I know," she said.

And with that, the emotional dams broke. Jen pulled me to her and I was enwrapped around her, my hands filled with warm bare skin. I cried. I cried as years of need poured through me, and she accepted all of it. Took it from me in a way that I had not felt in my life since my Nani had last held me. But this was not the comfort of a kinswoman; no this was a woman that knew what I was and didn't draw back as the women of my family had.

I held her. I could not have turned loose of her, not till I was empty of emotion and my eyes were as swollen as they had ever felt. Not even in the days after I had been cast out was I this emotional devastated. Then I had been in shock, my life was stolen, and the wounds fresh. Not the bone-deep hurt of loss like I felt now but the rawness of a fresh cut.

"I know. I know."

That was all Jen said, and all was that she had to say as I cried myself out.

** ** ** ** ** ** **

Jennifer used my keys to open the door of my apartment. The henna on my hands was still too wet to let me touch things. Holding them away from me, as if I was burned and afraid to touch anything lets it hurt, I let her take my life in her hands. She placed my purse on the counter, hers next to it, closed the door behind us and took my arm. I smiled when she guided me to my own couch as if I was an invalid. Jen grinned at me, recognizing the same thing.

"How do they do this in India? All the women of the household with wet henna hands! What if someone has to go pee? Who wipes?"

I laughed. "We use water to clean, not paper and then a sponge or towel to dry ourselves."

"That still doesn't answer who wipes."

Smiling, I shrugged, not really wanting to talk about it. A silence fell when I did answer and looking at Jen I could see she was willing to sit all night waiting for an answer. I decided to break it by asking a question of my own.

"How did you know about me?"

Jen shrugged. "Do you have bottled water?" At my nod, she went to the kitchen and brought back two. I eyed the one she sat next to me and then held up my hands. She just gave me a quirky smile while taking a sip. "I'll help with that. Well, I have been watching you since we met. I do that with everyone around me. My mom taught me to do that. I know that you love Madeline from the way you look at her. I know that you love women from the way you react when it comes up. Like this afternoon. I tossed that out to Angela almost to get that response you gave. But I was also watching the other ladies to see how they reacted. I think Tasha has been with women before as well. She gets this little quirky smile whenever it comes up. That I've got a secret kind of smile."

"Really?" The idea of that lovely woman with another woman was arousing. My mind instantly began to wonder if that other woman had been as dark skinned as Tasha? I could picture such sugar-brown skin brushing against equally dark flesh. But of course, when I thought of it, I knew I wanted it to be my skin.

"Um, huh. Yep. Just look at her whenever women-on-women gets mentioned." Jen gave me a sad smile. "I hate to burst your bubble, though. I'm afraid I think Madeline is a bit of a homophobe, just based on what I've seen.

"Well, I know she is a bit of a prude but ..."

"No, it goes beyond that. I could hardly believe when she told me she was having a nude wedding. This is Jim's idea and I promise he pushed her into it. I worry about her, really. She is too easily pushed into such thing by that man. She gave him control of herself almost from their second date. I don't have high hopes."

All I could do was shrug. I had met Jim only twice and was not thrilled with the man obviously due to the feeling I have for Madeline. I had noticed him do things like ordering her drink and dinner without questioning what she might like. Now in a long time couple, he might have clues what she would like, but they had only been together for eight months.

"I worry about her. Not her marriage."

Admitting that was tough.

Jen nodded. "Yeah. But she will not listen. She wants to be married and have the white picket fence and the two point, three children. Maddy wants that bad enough to let herself be shackled. Eagerly be shackled." Jen took my water bottle, opened the top and held it up before my face. At my nod, she brought it to my lips. "Don't let me soak you."

The cold water flowed past my lips and at my minor nod she tipped the bottle back. "Madeline wasn't like this in college. She was the one who took the lead. She was the planner."

"Yes! And then her mom started putting pressure on her for grandchildren. I was there and heard some of those conversations. You would have thought that Maddy was in her late thirties, not her mid-twenties. Her mom was terribly pushy. Every guy she knew had to be dated."

Sitting back I nodded remembering that time myself. My take on it was a bit different; to me, it was a time when my friend was suddenly not available when I called. Not to go anywhere or do anything together. Madeline always had a date. It was also when her mother began to not give my messages to her daughter.

"I remember," I said.

Jen nodded. "Tomorrow will be her mother's victory." She held up her henna-covered hand, the stain still an orange, but darkening. "I'm part of it. All I can hope is that the whole Nude Day Wedding, Jim wants, will be a good slap in that woman's face that her daughter is now being led by the nose."

"Why is he doing this? Do you know him well enough?"

Jen sat back and snuggled up into my couch cushions, sighed, then nodded. "Oh, yeah. See Jim's an ass. Complete and total. Like us both, he sees Madeline as beautiful. Now we see the inside part of her, but I don't think he sees beyond her body. Tomorrow, to all his friends, he is going to show off that body and braggingly wave his own dick, all at the same time. Here's the woman I have gotten, and you won't ever see better in your bed." Jen looked down and shook her head. "I would weep if I could but find the tears."

In the silence that followed, I could find a few tears for my friend Madeline. But, I think I wept them for myself.

** ** ** ** ** ** **

My henna was dry. The midnight hour had passed and still Jen and I sat in my living room talking. So many secrets I had held tight to my breasts I willingly gave to her. She held out her hands and took them without judgment. Then she gave me back secrets of her own.

Jen was bisexual. Had been since she was in early high school. She hides that she likes women because the women she has called her friends were not the type to accept that side of herself. To keep friends, Jen became only half of herself. Allowed only half to be seen.

Jen wanted Madeline herself, but she admitted it was pure lust on her part. Not love.

Jen had a crush on me!

My eyebrows rose to my hairline and she giggled herself into a fit when she told me that and saw my reaction. She waved off my embarrassed stuttering. "It's lust as well. You are one incredibly sexy woman, and so exotic it gets me hot."

I could not find words. My own feelings for women were more a desire to taste the ultimate forbidden fruit. To offer my own self to another for such a feast as well. Did I feel true lust for other women? What I felt for Madeline was desire, deep in my bones desire. She filled my mind in every waking moment of the day. Seeing her naked today had been a dream come true to my desires. And yes I wanted to do more than simple touch Madeline, but was it lust?

And looking at Jen, knowing what she looked like under the simple outfit, did I feel any lust for Jen? Were my desires for women directed simply at the woman I had once touched, tasted--and lost my family for--and the woman I wanted but couldn't have?

My confusion must have been plastered all over my face.

Smiling, Jen got to her feet. Closing the distance between us, she leaned in and kissed me before I knew what she was about. Her lips, far sweeter than the white wine we had been sharing, were hot, wet and gone just as suddenly.

"I should go. Big day tomorrow." Jen ran a hand through my black hair. "Or I guess I should say today. Get some rest, huh? Naked time will be here soon enough. Happy Nude Day, right?"

She went to walk away and I caught her hand. I wanted to say things but I could not make the words form. Without them, all I could do was tug at her fingers drawing her back to me. Jen knelt down till she was looking into my eyes.

"Yes?"

"I've ... I've only ever been with one woman." The woman before me gave me a sweet smile and squeezed my hand. "A family friend. We had to share a bed one night; her family came to our home due to a big holiday. I ... touched her, that night. She didn't seem to mind. She let me explore how I wanted. I even tasted her, once. Then the morning came ...."

Jen hugged me to her, and for a second time this day I was in her arms. My mind went instantly to the differences, her lack of clothes the first time, and I needed even more. When she pulled back, I didn't want to let her go.

"Ragini, you need to move past that event. You need to find someone and simply have some fun." She smiled and winked at me. "And yes, if you like, I will do a lot more than simply let you explore. You are too nice a woman to be alone dwelling in the past and on bad things."

"I don't know what to do."

Jennifer brushed my cheek, wiping away a tear. "I do."

** ** ** ** ** ** **

I've never felt more nervous. My hands shook, my whole body trembled. When we walked into my bedroom my pulse jumped. And yet I was so badly wanting this to happen.

Jen turned to look at me, gave me an understanding smile.

"Come here."

I stepped willingly into her arms and turned up my mouth to her lips. Her kiss was so very sweet. Her touch, hands caressing my back through my blouse, aroused me in a way that nothing ever had before. My memories of that forbidden night back in my parent's home fell to nothing at the simple feeling of her lips on my neck.

"Relax."

"I'm trying. I can't ... I don't," I could not even make the words form.

"Shhh. There is only need and satisfaction of it here. Pleasure asked for and pleasure given." She grabbed hold of the bottom of her shirt and pulled it over her head. Then she tugged at mine. "Come on, lovely. You've seen me naked all day, time to balance the scales."

All my young life I ran naked. Even into my teens, I thought nothing of bathing in front of my family. In fact that casual nudity had been part of the problem that led me to this place. Seeing the beautiful women of my family and the many guests that often came to visit. Slowly, hesitantly I took hold of my kurti blouse and with a sense of unease pulled it up and over my head. Would she like how I looked? I was certainly different in body from the other ladies I had been around today. Except for Tasha, my skin was far darker than theirs. Only Angela had nipples larger than mine, and hers were nowhere near as dark. And none of the ladies had nearly as thick and dark pubic hair as me.

In fact, I wasn't sure I was even willing to take off my pants here and now. Jennifer was clean shaven down there. I had not been that bare since I was a little girl and for her to see me with my thick bramble! Was bare what she liked? Would she be disgusted by me? Would she be ....

"Don't stop," Jen grinned. "Or, would you rather I did it for you? Or went first?"

I nodded, not really sure which question I was nodding to.

Jen stripped off her pants without hesitation and then her panties followed just as quickly. There was again before my eyes that smooth patch of skin, that swollen mount that makes me breathe so quickly to see. When she moved towards me I bit my bottom lip and stood still when my mind was screaming at me to flee. Her hands touching my lower belly, unbuttoning my pants, hands in places I have not felt in decades. I jumped when the button popped open. She was looking me in the eyes as the zipper purred down. I gasped when she knelt.