Laura's Expanding Horizons Ch. 01

The wave of thick and enveloping steam reached them as they opened the wooden door of the sauna. Laura and Giorgio overcame that wall of heat and waited for their gaze to adapt to the dim light of the environment. They entered decisively, looking around to see if there were other people in that small room.

Laura was glad not to find anyone. They had that environment for themselves only, at least for the moment. And it would have been easier to overcome the embarrassment of the almost necessary nudity.

The sense of freedom, the oppressive but reassuring heat that pervaded the air, the awareness that her skin was getting rid of impurities, everything gave her a sense of pleasure and well-being. She had become accustomed to that, and every once wished to recreate that feeling. She had at last accepted that inside a sauna she had to stay completely naked, but she always needed that Giulio, her husband, convinced her to free herself from the towel in which she was wrapped. That light cloth allowed her to maintain her modesty and some help was always needed to overcome it.

It was part of her. She could not do without it.

And that time too it was. Giulio had barely taken a few steps inside the room and had immediately undressed, placing the white sheet on the wooden boards and lying down, naked. Obviously satisfied with the situation.

Laura, of course, kept her own towel instead. It was like a role play: she knew that he would insistently ask her to remove it and also that, finally, she would agree to do so. But only after countering, at least for a while. She needed it, to overcome and put aside years of habits too easy was impossible for her.

And, in fact, Giulio, who was also aware of the role he was playing, gave her a questioning look. He smiled at her with a vaguely winking intent and glanced with an imperceptible movement of his head the knot that held the cloth tied over her breasts. Laura accepted that game of glances and turned to him as if she did not understand the meaning of that silent request. Obviously, he understood it very well and held the position for a few seconds, then snorted, pouting, and moving his hands towards that knot that he kept looking at.

She then lowered the cloth, uncovering her breasts, and in a few seconds she found herself almost naked as well. After all, she was happy to let her body invaded by the fire of that humid and fragrant air of wood and essences. She could not deny that she too liked intensely that freedom, making her feel projected into a world pervaded by a sensuality that was new and unusual for her. Those sensations were strange, as strange and contradictory as those she felt towards her husband.

After all, she was grateful to him for staying with her along that road, which was so far from their habits. Grateful to see in his eyes the appreciation and desire for her body so generously and freely exposed. Grateful also for the complicity that those situations managed to create between them, certainly announcing the even more intimate moments that would come later.

But, at the same time, there was still something she did not understand. How could her husband accept that she could expose herself to the gazes of unfamiliar men who, at any moment, they both knew, could enter? Men who would have found themselves in front of her female body, unreservedly shown. Would they become excited looking at the curves of her breasts, at the softness of her adult woman hips, at the slight swelling of her mons pubis? Would they intercept her embarrassed gaze?

A man, a Sicilian man, had to necessarily feel some form of stinging jealousy in knowing, and in seeing, his life partner subject to inevitably lewd looks. The exposed nakedness would have made more insistent those glances, legitimizing them to linger on every inch of skin until "social" habits would have forced them to look elsewhere. To return, after a few moments, confident of finding again that world of beauty and sensuality, available and offered to the eye.

On the contrary, he seemed to have anything against offering her to the glances and desires of unknown faces and presences. She should have felt offended, betrayed, perhaps even degraded... Or could she rather accept the game that he offered her as flattery, a particular and non-trivial form of love, possible only in a trustful and secure couple? After all, she knew the answer: she had felt it since Giulio had started to suggest behaviors and actions that were not always understandable and acceptable to her.

And here, once again, she had let herself be carried away. She was inside that sauna, half-naked, thanking the heavens for being alone. And she was aware that, if someone had entered, she could not have done anything but remain as she was, exposed to the looks of some stranger. She was just beginning to think about this possibility when a shadow was projected behind the glass of the door as she, as if in slow motion, saw the handle turn and the door inexorably open.

The man who entered, that she still did not see, greeted in a friendly and light voice while arranging his towel on the bench. He was ready to take his place in that small space, which quickly became the scene of a forced, but so natural, intimacy. Laura gathered her courage and, looking up at the intruder, parted her lips to respond to the greeting as if being half-naked in that room was the most natural condition in the world.

But her voice stopped in her throat. Of all the men who could have entered, it could not have been worse. Only a few hours earlier, in fact, she had gone to the reception of the wellness center to book the massage that her husband had given her. She had been greeted by a kind South Tyrolean girl who, once the reservation for the next morning had been made, had nonchalantly informed her that her masseur would have been Marco.

"The best in the center", the girl added with a mischievous smile.

A MASSAGER? No, she could not have a man massage her, she would not be comfortable. She had tried to object, but it was clear that she would have been considered the typical backward woman of the South. Thus, despite herself, she had swallowed the bad news. She had had to convince herself that, if it was considered normal here, she had to necessarily adapt to the rules of the place. She had limited herself to ask, as if it were a simple curiosity, if she had to show up for the massage in a bathrobe or a swimsuit or if there were different rules in that place. And, meanwhile, she had said to herself:

"If this beautiful girl tells me I have to stay naked, I will go immediately to the police station and have them arrested all, these debauched people".

The police had not been necessary, much to her relief, because the girl had reassured her by telling that each one had the massage as they preferred and that there was no particular dress code in their center.

"Of course," she then added with her winking way that every ten seconds she came back to cheerfully unsheath, "if you want the best from a massage you have to leave your body free and ... the masseur free to move on it".

In front of the shocked gaze of Laura, who had let herself be taken by surprise, not being able to show that tranquility that just didn't belong to her, the girl had gone out of character. She had let herself go to an open laugh, sufficiently complicit and friendly to finally make her nice. Laura was still suspicious, however, that those allusions might have some element of truth. But the decision was made, she would be a modern woman, confident and uninhibited. Or at least, she would have tried and, in any case, she would have kept as little inhibitions as possible ...

That determination had then become somewhat more acceptable to her when, exiting the reception, she had bumped into a beautiful blond boy. With a calm and penetrating look, the boy had apologized affably and, holding out his hand, had introduced himself smiling:

"Hello, I'm Marco! Can I be forgiven by recommending the best massage in the valley?"

Laura had heard the voice of the reception girl behind her:

"Calm down, Marco, there is no need to advertise! I've already provided that and this beautiful lady will be entrusted to your loving care tomorrow morning". In the meantime Laura had introduced herself, once again accepting those playful allusions as if everything were perfectly normal for her ...

It was him, thus, the Marco who would have massaged her the day after. She had blushed to her hair thinking that she had opted for the type of massage that the girl had called "an out of the ordinary experience, which will reconcile you with life and with every cell of your body". Every cell in her body? She couldn't leave ALL the cells of her body in that boy's hands... And she wouldn't do it, she repeated to himself. If those savages did not know modesty, she was an evolved and aware person and would have known how to interpose the necessary distances if some limit, insurmountable for her, had been put to the test.

And now that boy was there, completely naked in front of her, with his statuesque physique and his gaze free to linger on her body, which in turn was half-naked.

"Hello! Laura, right? " he addressed her in that kind way she had just met.

"Yes," she replied, almost flattered, "you remember well" and then, as if to justify that unexpected acquaintance to her husband, she introduced him:

"He is Marco, the masseur of the wellness center. We have met before when I went to book the massage for tomorrow".

"Hi, I'm Giulio, the husband of ... Laura" he answered introducing himself, just a moment before perceiving a storm of neurons, which began to process in his head with the speed of a super-computer.

"Marco? A masseur?"

So tomorrow it would be a man who would give his wife the massage and, besides, this man was already seeing her half-naked today in the intimacy of that context.

"And what a man!" he had to admit to himself, recognizing the objective attractiveness of the guy.

And it was precisely this awareness that made him generate an evil idea, which was projected in front of him almost becoming animated with a life of its own: what if Laura had been alone in that room with "her" Marco? How intensely would the intimacy of that situation grow? If he had lingered even a few seconds more, he knew that common sense would take over, but this time he didn't want that to happen. He was aware that that wasn't exactly a good idea, but ... he decided it was okay ...

Rising quickly from the bench on which he was lying, he turned to his wife, pretending to hold a tired face and warning her that he would go out and wait for her outside, inventing a discomfort that did not exist. Laura started to move to follow him, worried he was really sick, but he stopped her immediately. He reassured and firmly invited her to complete the sauna, where, after all, they had only stayed for a few minutes only. Having resolved the doubt that he was really ill, the condition in which she would remain appeared to her in all its gravity: practically naked, alone with a man, also naked, in a sauna.

Was her husband really crazy?

She immediately had her confirmation that it was really like this when she saw her husband, a second later, to stop for a second in front of the door, to turn to look at her and, without being seen by the other guy, to wink at her, smiling.

No! He had done it on purpose! He had found an excuse to leave her alone with that man, even knowing that she would have died of embarrassment!

Laura felt a strange rage that, mixing with the excitement that those events were arousing in her, instantly transformed her into an even more diabolical being than her husband. Just a second before he closed the door, she thus replied:

"Okay, see you in a little while then. I'm in very good company here", pretending that tranquility that she would have really liked to feel.

And soon, breaking the chains of common sense too, she slipped her cloth off her hips, remaining completely naked.

Giulio had first caught his wife's answer with amusement and satisfaction, only to be petrified one second later in catching that movement out of the corner of his eye. No, he couldn't have seen it right, he was sure. Had she really got rid of the cloth in front of that man? Had she really remained as naked and exposed as he thought he saw? He couldn't believe it, surely he had misunderstood.

And yet he knew that he could not go back to check ...

He spent five minutes sitting outside the sauna in a whirlwind of emotions. His wife had deliberately undressed in front of another man, a man who the next day would give her a massage!

He knew he had no right to object since he was the one who had started the strange game. He felt jealousy mounting inside him, his bowels rolling up in tension, but, at the same time, he could not deny that the excitement he felt at that moment was greater than any sensation he had ever felt before.

Those five minutes were enough for him to come to terms with his emotions and to decide that he could not show anything to his wife. Laura, he was sure, would have expected to find him out there, ready to "save" her from the embarrassing and scandalous situation they had found themselves in. Instead, with a light head and as if in a trance, he decided to get up and not be seen, as if challenging her to get out of that intriguing mess by herself.

In the meantime, Laura, in the sauna, was going through equally contradictory sensations. She felt pervaded by a heat that not even the eighty or ninety degrees of the sauna could justify. It was a heat that rose from her neck to her head and made her blush with embarrassment and anger at the awkward situation in which her husband - "that asshole", could not help thinking - had left her. What is worse, however, she could blame him only up to a certain point, having herself made that circumstance even worse with the recklessness of her shameless gesture. She was now trapped in nudity from which she could not escape, at least until the sauna was over. She too needed a few minutes to come to terms with reality, after which she decided that, having no escape route, she might as well grasp the positive aspects of that experience and "enjoy" the company of that splendid specimen of a man. She then decided to overcome the residual inhibitions of a woman who had always been accustomed and educated to guard her body against male gazes and agreed to let events lead her.

Marco seemed to understand her need to get used to that state of mutual nudity and waited some minutes before speaking to her. His habit of massaging female bodies had taught him to perceive the signs of the embarrassment of a woman undressed in front of him. He was now very good at seizing the moment in which, from that embarrassment, one could seamlessly move on to an intimacy that the absence of clothing made grow to the limit of sensuality. He thus waited, ready to attack, and when the time came he began to talk to her, ask her questions, distract her with quiet conversation and keep his gaze fixed on her eyes. Constantly fixed, except when, with studied slowness, he lowered it on her breasts, on the pubis covered by an abundant but well-groomed hair, giving her time to feel that look penetrating her. And then he would return to look into her eyes as if nothing had happened.

He was too experienced and aware for Laura to have any chance of defending herself. She remained there, totally at the mercy of that game of glances, subdued by the sensuality of that man who had now managed to transfer the heat that pervaded her to another part of her body, much lower. The vague sensation of arousal had now turned into a pungent desire, which, as if the embarrassment inside her was not already beyond all the limits, made her nipples harden and swell, and even, she perceived with horror, moisten that area between her legs which was becoming warmer and warmer.

As God wished, those twenty minutes finally passed, and, together, they got up, picking up their own towels to go out of the wooden room. Laura was unable to earn that exit without avoiding that, having to turn her back to him for a moment, the exhibition of her body was complete ...

Having reached the central room of the wellness center, the one on which the different rooms, the showers, the small mobile bar with the different infusions were available to customers, Laura breathed a sigh of relief, satisfied to have successfully overcome the challenge that the husband had placed on her. She scanned around looking for him, anticipating the surprise that he certainly would not have been able to hide seeing her leave that room completely naked.

But nothing. He was not there.

She immediately understood that Giulio didn't want to give her the victory and that the challenge between the two of them, all made up of silences, gestures, and surprising raises was not over. In fact, she saw him lying, with absolute tranquility, on one of the beds arranged around the hot tub located outside the center, sipping a tea, or some other concoction, which she could not help but wish him would remain on his stomach ...

And, in that crescendo of challenges, she then made her decision, accepting the hand that Marco had held out to drag her towards the showers, sheltered by a stone wall on which a skilfully illuminated veil of water flowed.

"A good sauna isn't really complete without a cold shower," he told her reassuringly, almost technical. There was, however, nothing reassuring in that situation, and Laura wondered, dazed, how she could find herself naked, in a public place, dragged by a man, who was also naked, and who was certainly not her husband ...

She accepted to be led into that shower as if in a trance, thus discovering the new environment that the soft and variously colored lights made almost magical. Feeling the cold water running over her body, seeing at few tens of centimeters, in the cubicle in front, the body of Marco hit by a jet that, touching his skin, broke into tiny drops that bounced in all directions, everything created incredible sensations, which Laura could not remember ever experiencing.

The sudden transition to such a different temperature shook her from that state of suspension, making her regain full control of herself and her sensations. She then took back the cloth she had mechanically hung on one of the hooks that adorned the wall and covered herself, regaining much of the tranquility that the game, almost unconsciously started with her husband, had taken away from her.

However, that newfound control did not prevent her from finding the company of that man interesting and even gratifying, who had strangely decided to continue to take care of her. After leaving the shower, in fact, he invited her to follow him towards the bar and began to explain to her how important it was to restore the correct content of liquids, so abundantly expelled during the sauna.

"You see, your skin has been subjected to severe stress, which has dilated its pores and then quickly contracted them with the jet of ice water."

And while he was saying this he passed his hand over her uncovered shoulder, with a gesture that wanted to appear simply explanatory and which, however, resembled a damn soft caress.

He then explained to her the virtues of the individual herbal teas, the importance of drinking water at the right temperature, and instructed her on the correct sequence of saunas and showers.

A sequence that meant only one thing: twenty minutes had passed since they had gone out, and thus it was time to return to the sauna for the second hot-cold cycle which, he said, was absolutely essential to try. Abandoning his quiet and reassuring courtesy for a second, he did not allow Laura to object, extinguishing her reaction with a forceful look.