The Alexandra Series (6 page)

As she taunted me with her blatant womanhood, she taught me pleasure I never dreamed possible. She began to finger herself in rhythmic movements—not hard and fast as I often needed, but gently. I could feel her climax building, slowly, determinedly, until with little effort she tripped the switch of her orgasm and her body went taut. Her voice lifted into the air with the sumptuous sounds of orgasm.

She left me speechless, having drawn me into her moment of glory, while I’d done nothing at all.

What a magnificent gift to see such pleasure so effortlessly exposed. I didn’t know what to do or say, or how to feel, or what to think. When her spasms finally subsided, she crawled to me, still cat-like, and laid her head on my chest.

“Oh, my dear Alex,” she whispered, her voice hushed and deep and resonant.

I realized then that I needed to say nothing. She made me believe that even though I hadn’t laid a hand on her, I’d been as much a part of her pleasure as she was of mine. For a long while, we remained on the couch like spent lovers enjoying the aftermath of good sex.

“You’ve made this so satisfying,” she whispered at last.

“How do you mean?” I asked, even though I knew the answer.

“What a silly question. I could feel you with me.”

“But I didn’t touch you!”

“Oh, but you did,” she sighed, “with your eyes and your desire. You would have joined me soon enough. But that didn’t matter, not tonight.”

She was right. I wish I hadn’t held back, but nonetheless, we still made love. And for my part, it was as much as I could handle. I was beginning to feel the bliss she felt, beginning to understand what she meant by pleasure. Sex is more than just the motions, more than orgasm. She’d stripped herself wide open before my eyes. Never had I been part of anything so profound. Never had I given myself to another person as I did that night. I guess we had made love.

“Oh, Alex, I am going to miss you,” she said, sighing deeply.

What was that?
“Miss me? Why miss me?”

She pulled herself away from me and sat on the floor as I reclined on the couch above.“I’ve been offered a theatre job in Florida. I’m leaving next week.”

I sat up stunned, feeling as if she’d slapped me in the face.

“I’m sorry it has to end this way, so quickly, just when we were getting to know each other.”

“This is ending? I can’t believe that,” I said in disbelief. “It’s so abrupt.”

“I know.” She looked at me kindly.
As if that would make it all right.

All the beauty that had been between us withered away in that instant. I felt betrayed and hurt, as if she’d used me then stabbed me in the heart.

“You knew you were going to leave? Why did you even bother?”

“Because we both wanted it.”

“At least you could have told me first.”

“And risk you backing out? You’re skittish enough, and I wanted too much.”

“Wanted me for an easy one-nighter.”

“Oh, come on. That’s not being fair. Besides it was perfect, wasn’t it?”

“It
was
perfect.” I felt my anger starting to burn in me.

“Alex, hon. I think you’ve become too attached to me. You want more than I can give.”

“I thought you cared about me.”

“I do.”

“You call it caring to lead me on, get what you want then take it all away!” I bolted upright and grabbed for my clothes. All I wanted to do was leave.

“Alex, please, stop, you can’t leave like this.” She came up to the couch, laying a sure and steady hand on me, as if to flee would be the worst thing I could do. I pushed her hand away. “We both found the pleasure we were after. Sometimes that’s all a night can be, but it’s enough.”

It wasn’t enough for me.

“Don’t go wrapping this up in some sappy relationship,” she went on. “That’s not what tonight was about.”

“And what’s wrong with a relationship?”

“Nothing, nothing at all, except that I don’t have relationships. I have sex and pleasure. I love the people I’m with when I’m with them, and I take with me fond memories when I go. Besides, you don’t need me now, you need a man. You’ll have that special someone and hopefully thank me for helping you on your way.”

It was hard to argue with her logic. I did want a man. And if I were to have scoured my feelings at the time, I would have realized that she was just a substitute for my real desire.

She smiled so affectionately, that at least for the moment, it seemed to wash away some of the hurt.

“Here,” she said, as she handed me a Kleenex, “I’ll get us something to eat.”

She was on her feet before I could say another word, her smooth womanly body gliding about the kitchen pulling things from shelves to fill a platter. She brought back more wine, and an array of crackers, cheese and fruit. She bent down and affectionately kissed my lips. Her long, lingering kiss reminded me how much I loved being with her, and then again, how terrible it was that she was leaving.

“Alex, I know you may not want to hear this from me right now,” she said as we were finishing up the food, “but if you don’t mind…a bit of advice…”

I didn’t stop her.

“You have so much locked up inside you, so many desires, you need to explore them fully. Seek them out. Tonight’s just a beginning. Don’t try to find a husband or a steady lover too soon or you’ll never discover yourself. You’ll get bogged down by the other person. For God’s sake give yourself some time to get to know
you
.”

As angry as I’d been, I didn’t want to be angry now. I wanted whatever I could have of her, even if it was just a few wise words over a plate of crackers and cheese and a glass of wine. I tried to savor what I had of her and forget that it would be our last night together.

Chapter Five

When the door closed after me, it was over.

I walked down the long flight of stairs alone, basking for a few precious moments in the tenderness and sexuality of the night; but as each step led me away from my enchanting Jane, and from all that I’d remember her by, the loneliness increased. With each step the empty feeling inside me only seemed more dismal. I picked up speed going out the door of the apartment building. The cold chilled me to the bone.
“Damn her!”
I shouted to myself, why did she have to go away, why couldn’t she be here forever, or even just another night? One more night with her would have been all I needed—so I thought.

Tears streamed down my cheeks as I drove block after block, street after street, eleven o’clock at the night and nowhere to go. I thought perhaps I’d roam the city forever in my hurt. It was a rich hurt. Far more feeling than I’d felt in years. Better than the insidious gnawing pain of just being alone. This was a sharp and angry pain; and that mixed well with the aching in my heart.

How I found my way back to my Lincoln Shores Apartment, I don’t remember. I don’t remember how I found the hallway door or the stairs to the second floor. I remembered nothing except the jumbling thoughts that whirled inside my head and the hurt deep in my gut. I remembered nothing until my foot suddenly caught the loose stair – the one I’d begged my landlord to repair. My knee came crashing down on the metal edge of the stair above and a searing pain shocked me into recalling who I was, and where I was, and why I was so hurt.

Everything seemed to spill out all at once – the tension of the past months with Jane so near, my fantasies coming to life, the bar, the tavern, the men and the wild high, and the shock of Jane’s sudden departure. All of it, all of it came crashing down on me with a force I simply couldn’t handle. Tears flowed freely from my eyes, dark mascara ran into my hands. I felt so trapped in my sweet little world. With Jane I’d had some courage. Without her, I didn’t know how I’d find my way. I still needed someone to take me by the hand, someone to push me, someone to rescue me. I simply couldn’t do this alone, but I had nowhere to turn.

As my tears finally subsided, I fingered the old gritty stairs. They’d been made of wood, reinforced with metal at the edges, then strips of non-skid paper had been tacked across them to prevent slipping. Funny, I thought to myself, I’d slipped anyway. The confident woman I was trying to become dangled before me, mocking me and then disappearing.
Damn!

Someone in the building was playing jazz, and that lazy rhythm only reminded me of my night with Jane. She was the outrageous siren. Me? Still the naïve innocent. But there was a siren in me, too, although at the moment, I felt like a puppet caught between two fucking bitches!

The seedy stairway, the crumbling linoleum of the corridor, the threadbare carpet, all had that tacky sort of class that had attracted me to this place and gave it such character. That night, I belonged in that threadbare world. Things couldn’t have been more bleak. I wished there could be some angel to pull me out of the humbled mess. Another Jane. What a silly thought!

The ancient steps that rudely jolted me from the horror comforted me in a small way. I probably wasn’t any different than a thousand, no a million other woman who cried over lost loves during lonely nights. I knew my life would continue, that I’d survive the night, and the next, and the one after that.

I looked up to the crude bare bulb that lit the staircase. Its glaring light was blinding as I stared straight into its white, glowing orb. However, the light didn’t go far beyond that bare bulb…the space around me was dim and drab and overwhelmed with shadows.

Maybe in the morning things would look better. Maybe I’d understand it all then. But for the moment, I was frozen where I sat.

I imagined myself getting up, walking to my apartment, closing the door and leaving the night and the hurt and confusion behind. I imagined myself undressing in silence and slipping into bed, falling asleep and waking in the morning, happier. It seemed easy in my thoughts, but I couldn’t move. I was afraid to go to bed, to lay my head on my pillow. I was afraid of the half waking world where I created visions and fantasy and dreams that made my body come alive. Even if I could find some pleasure in that, if I could masturbate over and over again to raunchy fantasies, I couldn’t ignore the fact that I was alone.
And, damn it! I didn’t want to be alone.

I couldn’t cry anymore. There was nothing more to ponder. It seemed silly to stay in that forlorn stairwell, but I simply couldn’t move. I didn’t expect any answers, but I just couldn’t move. My mind was off in my fantasy again – if my imaginings could conjure up
The Tropics
and the
Red Rose
, perhaps it could conjure up a champion. Maybe fate or some mysterious force was conspiring to bring me my deepest longings, and this mysterious force, realizing my need for companionship, was at that moment bringing me someone who could help me through the next hours.
Oh, if only I were so lucky!
And yet, strangely, in the heavy shadows of those apartment stairs, as I was at last prepared to pull myself away and return to my apartment, a voice spoke. For just an instant it sounded like an angel, its existence so utterly unexpected. I wasn’t sure it was even real.

“Is it one of the benefits of having an apartment in this building, that I find you crying your eyes out on the stairs?”

I turned around, half expecting to find no one at all. But looking up, there quite human, I gazed at a man…flesh and blood, with slender legs and a tight waist and muscles bulging from underneath a t-shirt. Magnificent was the first word that entered my mind. His hair was brown and just slightly graying. His soft eyes were filled with energy, with light, with joy and lust and youth.

I must have looked like a clown with my bloodshot eyes and puffed up nose. Damn! What a fool I was, weeping on the stairs like a baby. How long had he been there? What had he heard? Why could he not have been a sweet little old man, or the bespectacled woman next door, or even one of the silly buffoons of men that I managed to attract to me? I could have handled that kind of angel.

But he was not an angel; the eyes that stared at me so intently, with no less compassion than anyone’s, were eyes that belonged to a body that assaulted my sexual desires. He only reminded me that I was alone and guys like him were not the kind that were attracted to a naïve, uptight, slightly damaged woman like me.

Chapter Six

He wasn’t quite like any guy I’d ever met – artist, musician, actor, that sort of vibe. Although he could have sold securities for all I knew. He was simply dressed in baggy black trousers, open sandals and an armless red t-shirt. A tiny gold earring gleamed in the light from the overhead bulb. He was magnetic, far beyond the calculated sexuality of most men I knew. In fact, he reminded me of Jane, the way he was so physically well proportioned, so sensually confident, his body the male version, melting into the atmosphere around him, one with everything, displaying a fluid fire that caused an immediate response in my body.

“You caught me at a bad time,” I said.

“I guess so,” he answered with just a hint of amusement.

“I’ve had a bad day,” I added. “And now I’ve jammed my knee against this rotten step.” I realized then how much my knee was throbbing with a dull ache that went throughout my entire leg. “Frankly, if I died right here, right now, I wouldn’t mind.”