Spanish Eyes

"Perhaps if I try to stand..." I began, swivelling my feet to the floor then yelping in pain as my bottom and the backs of my thighs took my weight.

"Relax," the man insisted. "We can call your friends and explain what's happened. The I will take you to them in my car - or to your home if you prefer. Perhaps you'd better tell me your name. I'm Ramon."

"Irene," I smiled, slightly embarrassed. "And thank you. You are very kind."

***

Too bruised to make the walk the following day, it was two days later when I took a taxi to the café to give my sincere thanks to Ramon.

He had been a perfect Gentleman for the rest of the morning; calling my friends to make my excuses then, when I felt more stable, escorting me to his car and driving me home.

I refused his suggestion that he take me to the hospital first; I could feel myself beginning to heal and knew that a trip to Accident and Emergency would last the rest of the day.

When he came home, Oscar was horrified to see the saucer-sized bruises on my buttocks and upper thighs and wanted to know every detail of the man who had been my saviour. I was pleased to oblige.

"I'll have to go and thank him tomorrow," my husband exclaimed but I stopped him.

"I will go," I insisted. "It was me he was so kind to so it should be me who thanks him."

"Well as long as you feel well enough," Oscar conceded.

"I'll be fine," I assured him.

In the end I was too bruised to make the trip the next day; I needed an extended siesta instead so it was actually the day after by the time I returned to la Rambla.

Ramon was nowhere to be seen when I stepped out of the taxi and limped towards the café. A feeling of disappointment filled me which to my surprise, went further than simply having had a wasted trip. I sat at a table of the pavement, wincing as my bottom touched the hard chair and waited for the waiter to arrive so I could ask where my rescuer was.

A moment later, my heart thumped when the café door opened and Ramon himself came to my table. The smile on his face was both warm and genuine; a similar smile crossed my own as he greeted me - with a polite peck on both cheeks which it did not occur to me to refuse.

"How are you feeling today?"

"Battered and bruised," I smiled ruefully. "I just wanted to thank you in person for taking care of me. I'm sorry I couldn't come yesterday; you were sweet and a real gentleman. You made me feel safe."

"It was my pleasure," he smiled again, pouring the coffee. His expression suggested that the encounter genuinely had been a pleasure for him. "How was the celebration?"

I told him I had missed a good party, but that it would have been impossible to keep in my seat with my bottom hurting so badly. I winced as I indicated the parts of me that still hurt.

"I'm sorry to hear it," he said, apparently sadly but suppressing a grin. "Perhaps a little brandy would help?"

He ushered me through the café and into the private room at the back, calling to one of his staff for coffee and real French Cognac as we passed. The room was as it had been the previous day; clean, tidy and cool if a little old fashioned and threadbare in places. It was a comfortable room; a room to be at peace in.

"Please," he said, gesturing towards a small round table with two upright chairs. "Or if you would prefer..." He indicated the sofa on which I had laid down the day before.

I chose the sofa and sat as neatly as I could, my bruises sending aches all down my bottom and legs. Moments later a large pot of coffee and two cups arrived, along with two brandy bowls, generously filled.

My rescuer took the tray and placed it on the table then sat opposite me, smiled then looked me straight in the eye and asked me to tell him all that had happened.

I sipped my coffee and brandy and the next hour and a half passed more pleasantly than I could remember time passing for many years. Unusually for any man, let alone the local Catalan men, Ramon didn't just talk about himself, he asked questions about me and - uniquely in my experience - actually listened to the answers.

To my surprise, within a short time I found I had told him all about the accident, my bruises (some of which I even showed him) before embarking on the history of our family, my husband, our children, where we lived, what our ambitions were and even the colour I wanted to paint the newly installed kitchen.

I learned quietly that he was about my own age, that he too was married but that his children lived in Madrid and his wife was currently living in Mallorca, the island from which they originally came and where his wife's ancient parents lived. At their advanced ages, she had to be almost a full-time carer but, he hinted with a sigh, it would probably not be for long.

The island wasn't too far away but what with the pressures of the business, he seldom saw her or the kids.

I have already described how physically attractive he was, from his fit, athletic build to the deep brown eyes that seemed to enchant me even more that day, but after ninety minutes of conversation I realised I had underestimated the man's true appeal.

It had been a very long time since I had enjoyed the full, undivided attention of any man, let alone such a good-looking example. Time flew by as we talked - or more precisely I talked and he listened.

After so many years of marriage, I had all but forgotten how good it made me feel.

When I finally and reluctantly left the café to go back to work, I was very late but was feeling very good about myself. What's more, I had a definite invitation to continue our unfinished conversation the next day.

Despite my stiffness and bruises, there was definitely a spring in my step as I sashayed along the road.

I struggled to get Ramon out of my mind for the rest of the day. That night I could barely sleep, all I could think of was seeing him again the following lunchtime; a fact made plain by the tiredness in my face in the morning.

I had to take extra care with my make-up to compensate.

The morning at work passed so slowly I thought lunchtime would never come but eventually it did. Making some excuse about having to go home for something, I left my colleagues at the office door and, making sure I wasn't being followed, made my way quickly and a little guiltily to the café.

Ramon was clearly pleased to see me; we retired to the back room again and, with the help of more coffee and two more large brandies, passed the ninety minutes talking about everything. From politics to pensions, from children to churros, the subject did not seem to matter; we just seemed to connect and to enjoy each other's company.

"Aren't you losing customers, spending all this time here with me?" I asked.

"I have brought in an extra member of staff to let me do exactly this," he replied with a twinkle in his eye. "Serving food or talking to a beautiful woman? It's not a difficult choice."

I wasn't sure whether he was serious, but the thought made me feel even better about myself in a way that hadn't happened since my first few weeks with Oscar. No man had paid me this much real, adult attention for many years.

We were both disappointed when it was time for me to return to work. We kissed each other goodbye on both cheeks.

***

"If anything, it makes you look even sexier," Oscar said a week later as I stood in front of the bedroom mirror inspecting the dying remnants of my bruises. "You'll be a sensation on the nudist beach."

I wasn't so sure. I still ached and found the yellow tinge to my tanned skin a bit revolting but my husband seemed genuinely to like it.

"When you've fully recovered, we can get on with your sexual awakening," he added to my continued annoyance. "I've thought about it a lot. You'll really enjoy it because..."

I switched off while he extolled the many benefits both of us would receive from bringing another man into our sex life and congratulated myself on my recent decision to keep secrets.

Beyond that first visit to give him my thanks, I had not told my husband anything more about Ramon, though our lunchtime meetings had now become daily. It wasn't good for a wife to keep secrets from her husband, but I knew that if I mentioned Ramon at all, Oscar would immediately want to know all about him and how I felt about him.

If he knew that Ramon and I had enjoyed each other's company over lunch every day for over a week, I could imagine what else might go through his mind. There was no way he would believe we only talked.

If he had been a traditional Catalan man, Oscar's first reaction might have been to try and kill the man who was challenging his Alpha Male status. Although I couldn't imagine Oscar as that kind of person, I couldn't be completely sure.

Much more likely I believed, was that he would see my new friend as ideal material with which to bring me the sexual awakening that had become almost an obsession with him, and which was now an almost daily aspect of our conversation.

Neither of these was in any way desirable. But then telling Ramon I couldn't see him again was unthinkable too so, I had decided to keep that little piece of my life secret. I told myself it wasn't because I had started to have the kind of feelings for Ramon that a married woman should only have for her husband; no, I was keeping it secret to protect my husband from unnecessary upset.

I kept it secret throughout the next week's visits too, now entering the café through the hidden side door to avoid the disapproving eye of the regular lunchtime customers. Coffee now inadequate for our needs, we had started having lunch together at the large table in the café's private dining room upstairs. Every day Ramon would bring me a large single dish or tapa, whatever he considered to be the finest on the main menu that day and we would share it.

We talked and laughed and enjoyed our food, adding first one glass of wine to the occasion, then a second. Ramon was both charming and increasingly daring in his conversation and I matched my temperament to his. We talked cinema, art, music and of course the obligatory subject for any Spanish man; football. All except the last were passions of my own, along with classical literature and the other obligatory subject for Barcelona; architecture.

And all the time, our eyes kept locking onto each other, Ramon's deep brown pools making my insides melt a little more each time they met mine. Occasionally our hands would brush against one another as we talked more and more animatedly; from time to time our thighs would accidentally touch as we swivelled in our chairs.

I left each day on a high, finding the whole experience flattering, uplifting and I have to admit, more than a little arousing despite both of us being so obviously married.

It was hard to get back to work for the afternoon after such a break but I managed to avoid suspicion - at least I believed so. How long this would last was beginning to be a concern; each time when we parted, our goodbye kisses were becoming a little more involved and my heart was fluttering more and more, preventing any serious concentration.

And of course, almost every night I had to endue Oscar's continued insistence that what our marriage really needed was for me to gain more experience in bed. That if I knew what sex with other men was like, we would both enjoy our own love life more and our marriage would be enriched.

"Where do you get these ideas from?" I demanded in exasperation on Wednesday evening. "It's not normal, Oscar. Most husbands would kill any man who tried to have sex with their wives."

"Then most husbands are selfish idiots," he replied calmly. "I just want what's best for both of us - but especially what's best for you. You need to be fucked by other men; you need to know what it feels like. I love you too much to try and keep you all to myself; I can't let you go your whole life not knowing what sex can really be like."

It was the strangest proclamation of love I had ever heard. I spent half the night awake thinking about it.

***

It was the following Thursday when it happened. At the time it seemed accidental; unintentional but looking back, it had been an inevitability ever since I had returned to Ramon's café the second morning.

Lunch had gone exceptionally well, the likely completion of the city's famous cathedral being the most contentious topic. I was all for it; the final steps in a process that had taken almost a century. Ramon was playing devil's advocate, challenging both the cost and the possible ruining of its unique place as the world's only unfinished cathedral.

The food had been superb, but the debate had been so passionate that I hardly noticed. I also hadn't noticed the third time Ramon had filled my wine glass, so I was unusually tipsy by the time I had reluctantly to return to work for the afternoon.

Ramon showed me to the back door as usual, and we turned to face each other for the usual two-kiss goodbye but something went wrong. Perhaps I was a little unstable on my feet. Perhaps Ramon was too but the result was the same; instead of kissing me on the cheek, Ramon's lips fell firmly on mine and he kissed me.

There was no-one there to see, but to any observer it could just have been a small kiss as if saying goodbye to an old friend. But up close it was nothing of the sort.

Then he did it again, on my lips, his eyes locked onto mine, my fingers squeezed in his hands.

It was a kiss with meaning; a meaning I understood immediately. A kiss I had wanted for longer than my conscious brain had realised. A kiss that as a married woman I should not have even imagined let alone received.

It was a kiss I should not have closed my eyes for; a kiss I should not have responded to by opening my mouth and letting in his tongue; a kiss that should not have lasted for so long a time.

It was most certainly a kiss during which I should not have rubbed myself against his strong masculine form.

But I did all of these, and more. I felt his tongue in my mouth and met it with my own; I released his hands and raised my arms round his muscular neck, I felt the raw masculinity of his swelling erection against my belly.

My body was betraying me too; my nipples were firming, my belly was fluttering, my vulva was lubricating, my entre feral femininity preparing itself for...

STOP!

The realisation flashed through my brain like an electric shock. This was wrong! This was so wrong! However much I thought I wanted this, it had to end now before it was too late!

NO!

Breaking our embrace, I pushed Ramon away, tears beginning to run down my cheeks and fled from the cafe, leaving my jacket and handbag where I had left them. There was no time to stop and think; if I was to save my fidelity I had to go and go now!

"Irene, please..."

Ramon's voice followed me through the open back door and out into the hot air of the street where, despite my heels, I half ran through the crowds back to my work.

It took a long time in the office ladies' room to straighten my clothes and undo the damage my tears had done to my face.

***

Unsurprisingly, the incident dominated all my thoughts that afternoon and throughout the evening. I was so withdrawn even Oscar noticed it, pausing in his eulogising of extramarital sex as we lay in bed, to ask if anything was wrong.

My negative reply had been unconvincing, even to me but for the moment it seemed to satisfy - even please my husband who fell asleep soon afterwards.

I tried to do the same but sleep was not for me. Conscience is a powerful enemy and as I lay awake in the darkness, mine would allow no self-delusion. Every time I closed my eyes I saw Ramon's fit, athletic body; his warm handsome face; his deep brown eyes.

Driven by arousal, lust and infatuation, I had wanted Ramon to kiss me. I knew that; he knew that. I had responded when his lips had touched mine. I had loved the touch of his hands on my body and had wanted him to go further; much further.

I tried to tell myself it had all been Ramon taking the initiative; that I had been a victim of his desire. There would be no more secret lunches; no more private conversations. I was Oscar's wife, the mother of his children and would remain so.

But my conscience would not allow a lie so big to remain unchallenged. My belly was alive with excitement at the memory of what had happened, my heart was fluttering and the way Ramon had made me feel and despite all my silent prayers for fidelity, my tingling, shamefully-lubricating body was preparing itself for what it wanted to happen next.

Over breakfast, the dark circles under my eyes told the story of my sleepless night to anyone who was looking, but besides a casual comment from my husband, no-one noticed what I believed were obvious rings of guilt.

The morning passed in sheer agony. Work was next to impossible as I tried to convince myself not to go to the café again; to end whatever had started with Ramon before it became too serious; too out of hand.

But again, my body betrayed me as badly my fixated mind.

The more I thought of him, the more my heart fluttered, and my nipples became stubbornly erect, their teats stimulated by the smallest movement of my bra or my top. Worse still, the lubrication constantly seeping from between my thighs had started to leave a damp patch on the back of my skirt and even on the seat of my chair. At times I could have sworn I could smell myself too.

By the time siesta break arrived I was a quivering, emotional, highly aroused and even more confused bundle of female hormones. Knowing that every step might be leading to the biggest mistake of my life, I made an excuse to leave my workmates and half ran along the busy city streets until I reached the café.

Ramon was nowhere to be seen, and I didn't know what I was going to say anyway. I slipped around the side of the building to the private door, turned the handle, held my breath and stepped inside.

It was dark but I knew the way: along the short, hot corridor towards the door at its end; the door to the private room. Reaching it, I stood still for a moment, my ear pressed to its wooden panels.

There were sound coming from within; Ramon must be in there.

My conscience screamed that this was my last chance to go; to leave with my marriage vows intact; to remain an unsoiled, faithful wife.

But my body was in charge, screaming out that this was the best, perhaps the only chance I might have in my life to learn what being with another man might be like. And not just any man as my husband would have; the most attractive, most interesting man I had possibly ever known.

As I turned the handle and pushed the door quietly open, Oscar's often-spoken words rang around my brain.

"I love you too much to try and keep you all to myself; I can't let you go your whole life not knowing what sex can really be like."

Ramon was there. In his chinos and smart new polo short he looked if anything, even more sultry and handsome than in my broken dreams.

I stood in the doorway to the private room, looking at him silently, my mind racing. Why had I come? Why hadn't I just kept away, at home where it was safe? Why hadn't I stayed away from temptation?

"Irene? I thought you wouldn't come. I thought I had upset you and..." he whispered.

No words could express what I needed to say so I said nothing. I simply closed the door, turned the key in the lock and returned to where Ramon was standing, dumbfounded.

"Irene?" he turned sharply to look at me, his voice hushed. "Are you okay?"

Still unsure of myself and my decision but determined not to go back, I lowered my eyes to the floor and slowly began to lower the side zipper of my skirt.

I could hear a soft gasp in front of me but dared not raise my eyes in case my nerve failed. As the zipper reached the bottom of its travel and the garment became loose around my waist, my pulse was racing as fast as my mind.