14 comments/ 28963 views/ 3 favorites Green Fairy Dream By: MichaelWest "After the first glass of absinthe you see things as you wish they were. After the second you see them as they are not. Finally you see things as they really are . . . ." ― Oscar Wilde ***** I. As We Wish Things My husband held my hand as we walked from the restaurant towards a bar to meet his biggest client for drinks. This was a historic part of town with uneven sidewalks yet to be redone and streets still paved with cobble stones and I sort of wobbled as I walked in my rather high heels. Admittedly I had chosen a very sexy pair, these had a sort of wide strap that buckled over my ankles and were otherwise just a web of straps with a pointed heel, instead of something practical. But my husband had also implored me to dress to impress tonight, so I did. "I told him all about you," my husband said in a bragadocious tone as we walked the block from the restaurant we just had dinner for two at to the bar we were meeting him at. "I told him you are the greatest!" My face always blushes when I am flattered. "What sort of person is he?" "Well," my husband laughed, "you know the difference between crazy and eccentric?" "No," I laughed in reply. "Money," he winked, "and he is eccentric!" "I see," I pretended to be surprised. "But I think you will actually like him," my husband said more seriously. He had suggested that I dress very sexy tonight and had even laid out this particular dress, my cinched waist white silk cocktail dress with a deep v-neck that offered a nice view of my smaller chest and of course my legs, it was his favorite. "This is his car," he said and gave my hand a squeeze. We stopped and I looked over the thing that was parked carefully by the Valet right out front. It was all black and glistened like a polished hematite, that shiny black of dark water, it was curved, organic, dare I say feminine, and even sitting absolutely still it seemed to be in motion. "See the license plate?" It said: "MWest1". "What kind of car is it," I asked naively. "A Ferrari," he answered. "Ask him about this car and he will tell you the story," he gave a half-laugh, "it is almost unbelievable." "Okay," I said with laughter again. "Good evening," the Valet interrupted us politely. "The bar," my husband answered some as yet unasked question. "Down the stairs," he replied. The bar was in the basement of the building at the bottom of a steep stone staircase. Although I love the history and character of such historic buildings, having already had a few glasses of wine with my dinner I was not nearly as amused as I carefully stepped down the uneven stairs in my high heels one ginger step at a time. The door was a very dark wood with an opaque glass inlay and a tarnished brass handle. Inside the bar was quite dark and had the same feeling of permanence that an ancient ruin does. Dimly lit, only whirling ceiling fans to cool us, and a décor lifted from some slightly dilapidated Chateau, the "Green Fairy" was an oddly Bohemian night spot that felt ripped out of some European city and slipped into our new world. "We are with Mister West," my husband answered the Hostess. She waived her arm towards the very back of the place. "Thank you," he added. The long bar was made of white marble that seemed to luminesce like soft moonlight in the shadowy lighting. A few patrons sat at the bar that we passed on the way towards the back of the place, deeper into a highly gentrified back-alley atmosphere. "I think I see him," my husband whispered to me as his hand gripped my arm with a slight squeeze. My eyes groped through the moody darkness broken only by dim shaded lamps and small burning candles and I saw nothing but private booths tucked into alcoves with tied back drapery that made each booth seemingly completely private and entirely divorced from the rest of the world. "Michael," my husband called out in a quiet voice. "Yes," a quiet toned yet strong voice sounded in answer from the end booth. A man dressed in black tie stood from the booth and casually re-buttoned his jacket before offering that hand to my husband in greeting. They exchanged a very quick convivial greeting and then this man offered his hand for mine. "This is my wife," my husband introduced me with a friendly yet formal voice. Michael took my proffered hand in his and lifted it to his lips to place a rather continental kiss at my knuckles without saying a word. His eyes however had found mine and never left them. His was not a stare but it was an unbroken look. "Very pleased to finally meet you," he said charmingly, "I have heard so very much about you." His eyes sort of sparkled as he did not hesitate to look directly into mine for another second as if he searched for something, and then he introduced me to his date, lowering my hand without letting go. "This is Christine," he spoke her name with affection. She was a buxom natural red-head with impossibly pale skin and bright emerald eyes. She looked so very beautiful in her dark burgundy dress and almost too sexy as my eyes followed her marvelous freckles down from her smiling face to her deeply exposed cleavage marked with the same darker spots that filled the deep cleft there. "Please join us," he continued. Michael directed me to the entrance of the curved booth where he had sat, and I took his lead, moving to sit and then sliding into the booth as he aided me with his hand at mine. My bottom slid over the careworn leather and I moved closer in to sit beside Christine. My husband took the other side and Michael sat in beside me, placing me between him and Christine, opposite my husband. "Your order," the prompt arriving Waiter asked our host. "Absinthe;" Michael said almost matter of fact, "and the cheese platter." "Very good Sir," the waiter replied as he made a mental notation and then excused himself with a slight bow of his head. Upon receiving the order for absinthe, the waiter disappeared and we continued our trivial exchange of pleasantries and introductions. Under the table I brushed my dress to straighten it after my motions to sit had hiked it up my legs a touch too far. The booth was smaller and we sat tightly in close to one another. I felt Christine's soft hips against mine and our shoulders glanced. Michael's firm leg brushed against mine. "Have you ever had Absinthe before," Michael asked me pleasantly. "No," I smiled. "I thought it was illegal." Michael merely smiled. "It was, and it was feared for being a taboo drink, a magic fairy inside the bottle, full of horrors." He laughed quietly with a pleasant smile. "It was rumored to cause hallucinations and of course unlock the inner demons." Nervously my lips trembled: "But it is safe, right?" "After the first glass of absinthe you see things as you wish they were," he whispered as if he were telling us a secret. "Oscar Wilde then said that after the second you see things as they are not, and finally you see things as they really are." He just smiled again. After those few minutes of conversation our Waiter returned with a silver platter and presented us with a deep almost black dark green bottle, four suitable glasses, a bowl of sugar cubes, ornate silver spoons with pattered slots in them, and a carafe of iced water that already sweat in the humidity. A second waiter placed our cheese platter on the table. The Waiter then distributed the glasses and left. "Traditionally," Michael spoke to us as he opened the bottle and poured a measure of emerald green liquid into the bowl of each of our beautiful glasses, "absinthe is prepared by placing the spoon on the glass," he lifted a spoon to my glass and then pinched one cube, "and placing it like so." Carefully he then set one spoon over each of the remaining glasses and added a sugar cube. "Iced water is then poured slowly over the sugar cube to both melt it and displace it into the absinthe." He poured the cold water over mine first, the cube began to dissolve and a milky opalescence formed as my glass filled slowly to the top. "The louche," Michael whispered towards my ear, "the release of the hidden essence coincides with a perfuming of aromas and flavors that blossoms," he continued in a poetic voice. As if told to do so, I leaned over my glass and inhaled. "You can taste the subtleties that are otherwise muted within the spirit," he whispered a little louder for everyone to hear, "this is perhaps the oldest and purest method of preparation, often referred to as the French Method." "Go ahead and drink yours," Christine said in a gentle, almost girl like voice, "you will find it a little bitter but quite nice." The absinthe tasted bitter and not at all sugary sweet like my preferred cocktails. I sipped at my glass as he prepared one for her and then my husband and finally one for himself. We all drank and tasted from the platter of cheese. It also had fresh fruit and clusters of grapes, a selection of crackers and slices of apple. Still full I only nibbled and took a few grapes. "Do you like it," Michael asked with a hint of curiosity. "It tastes like licorice." "Very adult candy," Christine said with a slow feminine rhythm to her words. "I rather like it actually," I nodded and smiled at him. "It is an acquired taste," he answered, "but I am glad you enjoy it." "My husband told me that I should ask about your Ferrari," I sort of blurted out. He looked into my eyes and began to speak. I sipped my drink again and looking back now I recall Christine and my husband seemed engrossed in a side conversation as they barely glanced at him or me, even as he casually spoke loud enough for us all but focused his eyes only on me. And as he began to tell me the story he seemed to transport himself to another place and another time. ***** "You are a winner," the words whirled in my head. And what words to be told, or to hear, or simply to know. To be a winner is what it is all about anymore, but what does it mean to be a winner? In my case, to be a winner was the Lottery, one of the biggest Powerball jackpots in history to be more precise, the holder of the only winning ticket for over one-hundred million dollars when all was said and done. In that instant I became a winner, a filthy rich winner in the American dream. My story should be of hard work or talent or other more noble success, I had been successful and I had failed, I have made money and lost money, yet fabulous wealth was simply a wink from Lady Luck. I had once struggled to achieve the Horatio Alger myth, yet in that instant of fate, an oddly American twist to destiny, I was simply lucky. The great black shark, a grand tourer, the miles pouring out behind me, five-hundred and forty horsepower, six liters, twelve cylinders, a six-one-two Scaglietti by Ferrari. "Costs more than a nice house," I think almost out loud. It is a wonderful machine, and there was no doubt in my mind I was in a superior machine. Even standing motionless at the curb it looked like a jet fighter, primed for flight, yet it is quiet, surprisingly quiet, luxurious, refined, yet I feel like a playboy rather than a gentleman. A carefree playboy when I drop a gear and tap the accelerator it can scream like jet too, that unmistakable high whine, a lustful need for speed. Now I feel like a modern American zombie, ignorant of travel, barely aware only of the destination. Highway miles disappear behind me as more present themselves before me. The architecture of the freeway is garish and overblown so it appears enticing at seventy-five or more. Another bright yellow "M" and all manner of surreal lighting meant to draw your attention from between the unbroken white lines and flashing interrupted yellow ones. It all started somewhere on Decatur Street, on the edge of the Vieux Carré, when the scent of coffee began to take hold. I felt a bit lightheaded, that was the Bloody Maries. I had lingered more than an hour and drank several. Old Absinthe House, first thing this morning, and I thought something like this: "Maybe I should drink some coffee." Café du Monde! "And beignet." I said to no one but myself. Then like a village drunkard in some cliché Irish novel I stepped into some antiquated market. On a lark I bought my ticket. And I made a fateful deal: "If you pray for me to win," I said to the cute girl behind the counter, "I will buy you a new Cadillac." She smiled at me as she put my twenty in the cash register. "I prefer a hybrid," her voice lilted with youth and enthusiasm. "Deal," I said confident. Of course I was confident that my fickle mistress, Lady Luck, her charms never truly given in full would once more only wink at me teasingly. It was Fest, I came every year, that day was April 22, Arbor Day. No longer the great tradition I recall from when I was just a boy, the modern day celebration of nature now feels more like a glossy veneer added to that older tradition. Much like the Quarter, a flashy tourist clap-trap called Bourbon Street living on the older city, and I felt like a tourist, wandering over the same paths, gawking at the same sights, enjoying being in this piece of the city no matter that it was just a destination to drunken debauchery for so many others. "I drink too much," I mused to myself as I wandered towards my coffee. Twice each day at least, chicory coffee, with milk, café au lait, and a plate of beignet buried in powered sugar, first in the morning and the next near or after midnight when I cannot sleep. Another tourist haven perhaps, crowded even at late hours, but so connected to its place that it remains genuine even in overwrought popularity, gimmicky yet real, artifice yet sincere, like a fiction story, threads of truth hidden in a fabric of pleasant falsity. Of course I eat that third beignet, after two one can no longer pretend to have a pious appetite. And I finish my coffee, gazing at the wall but seeing past it to the river, my walk along that crescent as the sun rose always gets me ready for the day. "And at least one good bloody," I remind my liver with a jovial laugh. Big smells, seductive and exotic, zippy zydeco music or more soulful sounds, the energy of the Quarter is always electric, even as you do no more than sip at your iced tea in the shade. Somewhere I learned that Luzianne iced tea is blended just for icing. And in New Orleans the tea is not sweetened as I had learned to adore from my Southern-born wife years ago. I eat six times a day and drink twenty-four. This is New Orleans. "Nawlins," I unconsciously adopt the local ways and speech. If I didn't walk everywhere I went I would be the bloated corpse of Nero Wolfe. And I drink Absinthe. Writers drink. At least that is the myth, and great writing comes from hard drinking. From Ernest to Hunter, like them my head swims at times, only I prefer the green liquor when I cannot find the prose. My muse is a green fairy. And I write to set my imagination to paper, commit my dreams to substance, and expunge demons. Perhaps it is the music that I feel in me that inspires my Elvis impersonation. He was famous for giving away more than one Cadillac, and if I had that sort of easy money, so would I. "I want to give away a Cadillac!" I proclaim it to Old Man River, as good a deity as any other in my mind. II. Things Not As They Appear "Did you buy her the Cadillac," I asked as I sipped the last drop of my drink. His eyes grew melancholy: "Sadly my pretty young cashier was no where to be found," he said with a tint of sadness, "sometime between then and my return, somewhere in that year she had grown and moved on, went on about her life as I never once forgot her face." "It is almost unbelievable," I muttered. "I hired a detective to search her out but never could find her," he continued, "so I will wander the same path on the same day, Earth Day, hoping to give away a car to a person with more faith than I apparently." "So you never found her?" "Only in my dreaming," he said sadly. "When I drink my third Absinthe she will appear again and speak to me." "I don't understand?" "She reminds me of the embarrassment of riches," he still sounded melancholy, "and she reminds me that everything is but a dream." My own mind tried to describe the confused state of my feeling, words flowed quickly to my inner voice but my lips seemed hard pressed to form and announce them. Christine guffawed aloud and threw her head back dramatically, causing her ample breasts to quiver in her blouse and her fiery red hair to dance at her shoulders. "I am reminded that I should care about the environment," he mused, "being rich does not mean I need to be wasteful." I nodded. "Another," he asked. Moving my head I agreed and once again he prepared for me another drink. As I sipped upon my second libation, he asked how I felt. He had wandered around in his mind telling me broken fragments of his story, made me another Absinthe and one for him too so we drank and I wondered what he wanted. "Your husband has told me that you are an architect," Michael broke from his sadness and returned to a more jovial host again. "Yes," I smiled, "well not yet an independent one, I still do mostly little projects, but I dream of designing something amazing one day." He nodded as I sipped generously from my glass. "I want you to design my house," he said more sober, "a truly green one." My mind wandered to my purely dream project as he spoke. "Your husband says you want to build a LEED Platinum mansion that shows luxury need not be wasteful." Again I nodded and the images of plans formed in my head. We talked of the multi-million dollar house that would be luxurious yet responsible, green and respectful of our environment but also a pleasure to live within. I know that we talked of his annual trip to Jazz Fest over the Earth Day weekend and then Michael asked how I felt in a whisper to my ear. Sitting there engrossed in my attempt to converse with him, I suddenly felt a hand on my knee beneath the table. It was Michael's hand. His touch took me by surprise; I mean if someone puts a hand on your knee, is it merely to indicate he wants to talk to you? Perhaps he intended to force my attention to something he wanted to say? Perhaps he wished to share a confidence through purely non-verbal communication? Or perhaps he simply mistook my knee for his own? I should have shot him a covert glance to see if he had, perhaps, some confidence he wished to impart. But I didn't do that either. Instead I just froze in place and watched as my husband fawned over Christine. My husband laughed at something she said. Something I didn't hear through my haze. And Michael added to their tête-à-tête some quiet joke that eluded me. It was that moment, on sober reflection later that I had the opportunity to put a stop to what followed. However of course I failed to just then. In fact I had decided to leave the hand where it was and ignore how it gently squeezed the bones under my bare flesh. Slowly I felt how his fingertips felt the cap at my knee, his thumb pressed at a sensitive hollow behind that and his pinky found its opposite while his palm pressed to the top of my leg there. I turned my head to look at him and he merely glanced sideways to my eyes with a gentle smile at his lips. Doing nothing about the hand on my knee, the conversation continued another few words before I felt his lower leg against my own. Again, and largely for the same sort of excuses, I did nothing. I left my high heeled foot where it was, my knee where it was, and the calf of my leg where it was, which now, was hard against his. Both of us stayed as we were. Both of our eyes were on my husband and his girlfriend as they flirted and a certain sensation of jealousy rose in my heart. She was so definitely beautiful, tall and ginger, creamy white and be-speckled, her chest filled out even more generously than the rest of her curvaceous body. Her deep red painted lips moved seductively as did her body. Green Fairy Dream My fingers were round the bowl of my glass before me on the table. Michael's right hand continued the seductive grope of my knee. The crisp stiff white cuff of his shirt opened as he reached for an apple slice and I saw the glint of light at his silver watch. My golden jewelry glittered too, a tennis bracelet at my wrist and rings at my fingers, the diamond on my ring finger sparkled for just a moment. More words were said by everyone including something passing from me as we all seemed to talk together. Yet I was in my very own private bubble, the only intrusion being Michael's hand at my leg. My husband and Christine now openly touched; the flirtatious thoughtless caresses of hands to hands, the brush of an arm and the mock pushing away as they sank deeper into their own intimate focus. It seemed to me that Michael and I were both pretending nothing was happening, but wondering what would come next. To be honest, that was certainly what I was doing. Then I heard the sharp crisp snap as he bit the slice of apple. But the only thing truly engrossing me right then was his hand now travelling higher up my left leg with the fingertips caressing the inside curve of my thigh. Something in me said that the hand would wander up my leg just a discrete bit, perhaps get the feel of the pattern in my stocking top but refrain from going further. To my relief his hand paused and indeed felt my stocking top, pressing back my dress I felt it hike a little higher yet knew no one could see what he did. Forgive me in that I simply didn't know how to properly stop him. I imagined reaching down and catching his hand, or wrist, or forearm, saying something in protest or insult, and pulling him away. I could picture us in a tasteless wrestling match as he insisted to molest my sex and I defended my honor. In my little fantasy I spill his drink. My husband is angered that I spilt the drink. He is not particularly concerned about how Michael's hand still reaches between my thighs. We fight. How is this simple caressing a matter of such importance that it prompts me to ruin the evening? But I did nothing of the sort. As the momentary daydream of that faded from my imagination, the guilty notion that I didn't want it to be pulled away crept into my thoughts. Perhaps it was my fault after all? Displaying as much leg as displayed tonight, my decision on such a short dress and my choice of sheer hosiery to make my legs appear more desirable. Why shouldn't he be tempted to feel my stocking? So I did nothing to stop his fingers between my legs, toying with the silk and the softness beneath. Sipping my absinthe I continued the charade that nothing was happening. As I feared his hand pressed higher to feel how soft the skin was above the top of my stocking. Again I deluded myself with the illusion that he would accept this naughty discovery was satisfaction of my willingness to be indiscrete for the sake of my husband's business. He spoke to me, only me, in a low voice directed at my ear nearest him, a gentleman's compliment of my beauty and how fortunate my husband was to have such a beautiful spouse. And I watched as my husband and Christine audibly clink their glasses in a private toast. Michael's hand felt my bare skin there, his fingers exploring my inner thigh, reaching to the lower curve where the seat met my leg. I prayed he would soon return his hand to himself mission accomplished. But then I felt the fingers on the sensitive skin near the inside of the top of my leg and realized that my already imprudently high hem must be at least another inch or more towards my waist. Looking down I saw his hand over the almost mocha toned skin of my bare thigh between the glowing white pattern of my stocking and the ruffled bright white hem of my hiked dress. He was slightly darker like a genuine Latin man, not as dark as my own sun-bronzed color, and his hands looked so big and powerful on my lithe limb. He had a masculine hint of hairiness to the back of his hand with a tuft above each knuckle. I confess how I adore a strong pair of masculine hands, even hairier than these, so very frightening in how they seem to look so ready to defile a woman. It was then that my illusion of his discretion began to evaporate. The caress at my bared thigh became too engaging. His fingers dipped further down my leg until I felt the tips of his fingers pressing into the softness of my inner thigh as if he were confirming if the lower curve of my leg was as round and smooth as the curve at the top. The muscle tensed on its own and he would feel how toned my thigh was yet still supple and very smooth. I had freshly shaved my legs just this morning in anticipation of the big night out. It was so very important my husband kept telling me. Michael is too important of a client not to impress he had said over and over. And now I thought of his desire for offer me my first real commission too. I had modeled my dress with and without panties, with and without bra, with and without garters to see what turned him on most of all. The thinking being, as he explained, cupping my aroused sex and causing me squirm in the mirror of our bedroom after we had settled on my dress as we were getting ready for this evening in our bedroom, that if it turned him on, then it would please Michael too. The words filtered into my oddly lucid mind. "Michael loves hot Spanish women," he had whispered in my ear as his grope of my sex wetted me. How would my husband know such a thing? Simultaneously I wondered what thought formed in Michael's mind as he fondled my thigh just then. His seductively gentle squeeze confirmed that I remained shamefully acquiescent. His hand drew deeper back up my thigh until the side of his little finger now touched my panties. I blushed knowing he could feel the heat in my crotch. Would he feel the dampness too? Perhaps my very conservative upbringing or lingering commitment to my faith held me hostage just then. That contradictory compulsion to acquiesce to a fatherly figure and the deep revulsion at being obviously touched sexually by a man; part of me wanted to pull that hand off my thigh in revulsion, and part of me yearned to part my thighs and welcome his violation further. Of course I should have stopped him right there. Even as an important client he had taken more than the perhaps acceptable leeway he might feel entitled to. No other man would be permitted such a lingering and intimate grope. Just how long should I permit his hand to remain on my leg without objection? The side of his hand pressed to my crotch and pushed the sheer fabric of my panties to my sex more closely. I knew that my trimmed and shaped bush was still visible through the sheer top of my panties, and I imagined those shortened barely curled hairs now roughly formed a certain obvious texture too. As he rubbed to that furry sensation my own body felt the tickle of every hair communicating into my sex and arousing further the already stiff point that stirred Michael spoke and my husband and Christine laughed. They all spoke now, my husband and Christine almost in an embrace. They sipped at their drinks and Michael made me another. "No," I meekly refused. My thoughts floated as I knew I had to refuse another of those milky white concoctions. My legs moved to close and trap his hand. A foolish impulse as the back of his hand now was felt by my other thigh. He gripped my flesh lightly and pulled my thigh back towards him. I knew he desired me to acquiesce once again. The pull at my thigh was light and delicate. I had hoped he would have been a brute. I felt his hand on my bare skin and understood that he wanted my active acquiescence. As the muscles in my belly relaxed I felt my thighs go limp and my knees parted for him. Why did I let my legs slip open? The question became rather moot as I felt his hand easing my leg over his own. My leg cooperated and I consented to having one leg apart from its pair, angled up and over his knee, my right leg still demurely on carpet. Legs parted, my intimate place proffered, my sex willing and wanting, his right hand move to my crotch itself. His palm at my mound, his fingers curling against my labia, the middle one pressing at the moist slit between them. A well brought-up lady, married, should not have to refuse such a touch. Why should I draw that obvious line? But the sensation was simply amazing. A virtual stranger's touch, the most intimate caress from another man, a man other than my husband, such a touch had not been felt since before my marriage. It was that touch that I wanted. My body proved what my mind still struggled to pretend was not so. "Please," I said softly. III. Things as They Are Did my mind intend to draw the line? Did it want another? "Do you enjoy your absinthe," Michael said softly to me. Suddenly I remembered my now empty glass and my hand toyed with it. My freshly manicured nails scratched at the bowl of the glass seductively. "Did you really just win the lottery," I said absent-mindedly. Michael had already begun my third Absinthe. The deep verdant green liquid filled the bowl and then the cube of sugar on the spoon resting over the glass as a steady pour of ice water mixed into the absinthe as the sugar cube dissolved. Once more the cloudy white filled my glass. "Yes," he grinned deviously. And then I took the glass for a sip. The bitter opalescent mix soothed my tongue and filled my mouth. It seemed to burn as it cleared my throat and my belly warmed suddenly as if on fire. Slowly I felt a surprisingly clear-headed feeling of inebriation, a lucid drunkenness, my mind awake as my body felt languid. Yet my mind also seemed to swim slowly through a sort of fog where my thoughts crowded in and my body felt alive. Everything felt like a waking dream. As I took my sips, his fingers made a light pass over my panties at the concealing web over the most private of part of my sex. He felt the soft flesh of my sex beneath the thin fabric, pressing at the warm damp fabric and exploring my obvious arousal. Michael's middle finger made another deep press into my slit. My breath drew in as his finger pulled up from my opening to the sensitive flesh at the very top. My muted inhale paused as I waited to exhale. The soft exhale sounded like a quiet moan of delight as the caress awakened me to just how much I adore a man's hand there. His fingertips now danced over the sheer fabric at the top of my panties, he purposefully felt my groomed bush, pressing the tender flesh and feeling my soft mons. My husband had suggested I go without underwear at all tonight. "No," I had said flatly. My husband did not argue with me but he gave me a disappointed look as I told him I would never go "commando," such a crass thing for a lady to do. Yet all that was between Michael and my naked sex was a thin sheath of fabric, more a cloud than a wall, it transmitted his every touch and every detail of my feminine geography. And without even a single protest from my good conscience I can confess I wanted his hand beneath my panties and to touch my naked sex. Another longer sip of my drink and his hand moved to my belly, his fingertips at the elastic, and with a very delicate motion he slipped his fingertips beneath it. Now I moaned in delight. His fingertips brushed through my short curled hairs and felt the softness, the center fingertip grazed the sensitive tip and moved that fleshy cover; his other fingers touched my shaven lips and parted them slightly as the middle finger dipped into my open folds until it touched the soaking entrance that wanted him to fondle everything. Absent-mindedly I sipped at my drink until I tasted that it was empty. His fingers had travelled the length and breadth of my labia in those many minutes that had slowed to a pause between the tick and the tock of the clock. Another moan and instinctively my teeth took the corner of my lip and started to gnaw it in sympathy to his every touch. He pressed my panties aside and uncovered my sex. Confidently his fingers reached to the opening between my lips and played around with the flesh that no longer concealed the entrance that freely rained with my slick lust. He dipped a finger into that open hole and drew out the wet nectar, pressing back and touching the edges where it is more sensitive. He moistened my flesh until his fingers had wetted it clear up to the delicate hood protecting my clitoris. I would no longer object at all. My lips kissed and my tongue wetted them as I moaned quietly. Feeling my panties stretch against his hand and into the crease between my buttocks, his fingers slipped over and into the dripping wet flesh, toying with my added bits that hung from within and between my outer lips he settled in to touch me just as I might masturbate myself. His fingers had found my clitoris and uncovered it, the sensitive tip wet with my own juices taken from my own vagina. The moans of my acceptance and pleasure became audible. Alarmingly, I felt the sensation in my core of a pulsing, a tightness that wound like a spring into a very tense coil poised for release. Outwardly I still imagined my expression betrayed nothing of the storm rising inside of me. My eyes had shut. When? I cannot recall. I slipped into my twilight of pleasure enjoyed and welcomed the vibrations in my muscles as I wanted my orgasm to finally come. Why deny it? Why conceal the beautiful emphatic cry that I always emitted just as that final straw fell to break free the convulsion of my orgasm raced up my spine and out to my limbs. Quivering and basking in the release I felt how Michael had moved a hand to my breast, small and sensitive, I felt his grasp through my dress and the brassiere too. He held me in place as a loose-limbed shudder swept through me. Opening my eyes I saw how my husband and Christine had seemingly not witnessed my willing mauling under Michael's hand. Could my cry just then been masked by their polite laughter? "Another," Michael whispered to me. "Another," my mind asked. "Absinthe or orgasm," my mind groped for clarity. Perhaps I was that inebriated. Perhaps that mystical drug in the absinthe had dulled every inhibition. Perhaps it had unlocked some deep dark fantasy I myself was unaware of?