4 comments/ 10233 views/ 3 favorites The Boarding By: Carole99 A short enactment of a common women's fantasy- taken by a stranger. ************************ Monica was bored. Her husband had taken the crew onshore for a well deserved break. She had no desire to join the all-male holiday, so here she sat, reading. Throwing the book down, she stood up and looked out the large window. Across Biscayne Bay, she could see Coral Gables, probably 3 or 4 miles away. The hotel jungle of Miami loomed in the haze to her right. Though she spent plenty of time on the yacht since her marriage, Monica much preferred solid land. Terra Firma. Home Firma. New York City Firma. She also preferred action and people, and sitting here anchored and alone on the 75 ft. yacht offered neither. "Why didn't I go?" she thought. "I could have found a spa or something. Oh well, time for some sun." Shedding her pajamas and quickly changing into her bikini and a light coverup, she headed out the glass door to the aft deck. She slid the door closed. Something was wrong. The boat was dipping in an odd way though there were no big waves to be seen. A blonde head appeared at the stern. The man stepped easily over the rail. Monica backed up, ready to retreat inside. He was quite tall, tanned and wore only a pair of cutoff shorts. His hair was sun-bleached and his body was lean and muscular. "What do you want?" she called. He casually walked toward her, stopping about ten feet away. He stared straight into her eyes. "My husband is on his way back. What do you need?" Her voice cracked a little. He remained silent. "I'm going to call him." Her hand touched the door handle. It was hard to take her eyes off of him. He gave a slight shake of his head, freezing her on the spot. He moved closer, looking directly down on her. His stare pierced her to the bone. He beckoned her away from the door, out into the sunlight. Monica found herself moving forward. "Please, what do you want?" He crossed his arms over his chest and tilted his head a bit, as though to say, "What do you think I want?" "He'll be back any minute!" Her voice had turned into a plea. He waited. Monica was melting. "Who are you?" she asked, weakly. He still had not spoken a word. Finally, he uncrossed his arms and pointed 2 index fingers at her shoulders. He moved his fingers outward in an arc. She knew what he wanted. Her eyes glanced downward and her bare feet shuffled on the deck. He waited. Monica's mouth opened, but no sound came out. Her resistance melting, her hand moved to the buttons on the front of her coverup. In a moment, it fluttered to the deck. She faced him in a skimpy blue bikini, her face reddening. She looked up again, expecting some indication of approval. A nod, a small smile. There was no change in his face. His eyes still burned into her. He rubbed his thumb and index finger together. Monica cringed. She knew. A tear formed as she reached back to release the clasp. The bikini top joined the coverup on the floor. She knew better than to cover her breasts with her hands. She just stood there, her mind reeling. He was in no hurry. His eyes grazed over her breasts before returning to her face. His power was overwhelming her. He pinched his thumb and finger together and made a pulling motion. Feeling small, she reached down and pulled the bows at her hips. She had to part her legs to get the fabric to fall. She stood before him naked and gasping for breath. Again, he waited. A random thought came up in her mind about her tan lines, which were quite obvious at this moment. As if to make that thought worse, he twirled his finger, indicating that she should turn. Awkwardly, she made a slow full circle. On the way, through tearful vision, she saw their reflections in the glass door. "Can I make it back through the door?" she thought. "No, he would be on me in a second." Again, his eyes raked over her exposed body, his face expressionless. Monica closed her eyes for a moment, trying to think. When they opened, he towered over her, pointing to the floor. With a long sigh, she sank to her knees, her heart pounding. She had to look almost straight up. The stranger extended 2 fingers. He moved them apart giving an unmistakable message. Blushing, Monica slowly moved her knees apart. When she looked up again, his fingers were farther apart. A small sobbing sound escaped her lips as she placed her hands on her knees and moved them wide. "Please! Don't hurt me!" she pleaded. Slowly, he stepped right up to her face. She could feel him through his shorts. Monica knew what he wanted without any hand signals. The sun was now behind him and she was in his shadow. She reached up to unfasten his shorts and pull them down. No tan lines. His hard organ flopped out against her cheek. His male smell, though not too strong, drifted to her nose. Monica had done this many times though not under these circumstances. She took his cock in her mouth and started swirling her tongue. She moved her lips slowly over the head. Rinse and repeat. He remained still for a few moments, then started moving his hips in time with her. He put his hands behind his back. Monica realized that, in a way, she was volunteering for this. She put her hands on his thighs and kept bobbing. She felt a familiar tension in his body. She wrapped her fingers around the base of his cock and began pumping. Monica glanced upward. He was looking right into her eyes, his mouth tightening into a kind of grimace. Before long, he began a series of groans. "Uh, uhh, uh, uhh, umm, uh, ahh!" As he spurted into her, she thought, "That was the first sound he has made." Softening, he pulled away and bent down to pull up his shorts. He turned and padded away, stepped over the rail and disappeared. Monica, breathless, stayed in her spread position for long moments. She stood, leaving her garments on the floor, and headed indoors for the shower. Her hand was already rubbing her crotch. The End The Boarding-House A few quick notes about this one. This is a pre-existing chapter from my novel-in-progress, tentatively titled "Eternal." I'm curious as to whether fantasy stories do well here, and I have more erotic scenes of these two and others to share, if people like them. Since this was an interior chapter, the characters would be well-known to the reader by this time, but in excerpt form like this, not so much -- so let's fix that here. Anhelia is 43 years old, and is undead. She was and is a soldier, an officer; she died in battle, and was chosen to be revived as an "Eternal", her society's name for those so chosen, the "best of the best". She's not exactly sure how she fits in that definition. En route to a posting, Anhelia's ship was sunk and the hibernation chamber "coffin" she was being transported in -- so her psychic vampirism wouldn't harm the crew -- washed up on the shores of a small island, where she lay for eight long years. She was found by the crafted-person Soot, a humanoid creature built from metal and glass and stranger things by a long-dead sorcerer. Soot prevented her from harming the crew by feeding the starving undead woman from her own energies, and the two have developed something of a relationship in the weeks that have passed. Finally, they've reached shore, and the chance for greater privacy ... * Soot was good to her word; for a dockside boarding-house room, this was luxury indeed, if a little tasteless in decor. It probably was the case that captains entertained their women here, either regular friends or professional encounters, and the room did have kind of a harem, pleasure-palace feel to it. Lots of gilt. Rich jewel-tone colors, ruby reds and emerald greens and golds and purples. Tassels edging the bedspreads and pillows, that kind of thing. It threatened to give her a fit of the giggles, and her laughter-stifling expression set Soot off too. "I don't think ... I've ever ... seen anything ... like this!" Anhelia said around her hand and around held-in gusts of laughter. "Look at it! I'm not sure exactly what they intend this to be ..." "I just asked for their nicest room, I swear!" responded Soot. "Not ... someone's idea of a Tefenin whorehouse, or whatever this is!" If she had eyes to see, they would have been dancing with laughter, Anhelia was sure. Pretending to be shocked, Anhelia asked, "Is that what you take me for, woman? Just some dockside whore you can take to a room like this? Hah!" Soot playfully touched her index finger to Anhelia's pale lips. "I certainly do!" she exclaimed, putting on a pompous, entitled tone of voice. "And if you don't put out and do what I want, I'm going to put you back in your box and return you to the store I bought you at!" Anhelia pushed out her tongue and licked the fingertip on her lips. "Well, then, I better do what I'm told! So what do you want, great Captain?" The finger on her lips stroked them, and then traced the line of her jaw round to her ear, a softly brushing touch. Anhelia's breath caught a second before continuing, rather heavier, as her senses sang. Soot's finger was so warm that it felt like a line of fire drawn back across her face, circling her ear, and moving back along the hairline to the back of her neck, further traces of fiery fingertips joining it as she tilted her head back to the taller woman, and then the whole hot hand clasping the back of her neck, fingers dragging in her fine white hair, gently pulling her closer as Soot's lips descended on hers. She smelled of night-blooming jasmine and cakes straight from the oven, of butter and honey, of fruit-pie and burning candles, a feast for Anhelia's starved senses. Her lips felt as rich and smooth as sun-warmed chocolate, and Anhelia felt herself drawn in closer, lips pressing and pulsing against each other, as if their pale coldness and dark heat were blending, mingling into some fabulous dessert. She clasped Soot's lips between her own and nipped them, and shivered as her own were likewise caught and teased. Soot's tongue teased her, tasted her, liked what it found and searched for more, impossibly, inhumanly deep. Anhelia's eyes closed with the sensation and opened herself to it, relaxing in Soot's strong arms, suckling on that wonderful tongue, lips pressing, body trembling in joyous release. Pulling languorously away, Soot whispered to her. "You taste of rich spices of the tropics, of sweet vinegar and crushed pepper, of toasted almonds and salt. I want to feast on you, Annie. Consume you." Anhelia reached up on tiptoe to whisper, right in Anhelia's ear, "I'll be your willing feast, if you'll be my lush dessert," and then spoiled the whole thing by giggling again. "I think we read too many bad romances, didn't we?" Soot said, her own stomach heaving in laughter against Anhelia as they hugged each other close. "Don't tell anyone," responded Anhelia. "I have a reputation, you know. Tough-as-nails Hel, not a romantic bone in her body, just driven. No sense of humor, neither." "Umm-hmm. None!" "Tell you what; I have an idea. I want you to turn the light off, and I'll close the curtains tight-closed. I know you can see me in the dark. I want you to watch me. Hear me. Stay by the door ..." As she turned to the curtains, she heard Soot step to the door, finding the chromed switch on the wall and throwing it with a metallic clack. The lanterns dimmed and died, and the curtains, heavy and multiple layers, designed to let exhausted guests sleep as long as they wished, cut out pretty much any light that remained from the setting sun outside. When they were properly closed, Anhelia turned to see near complete darkness. Only a little glow coming under the door remained, not enough to see anything by but the occlusion of the light by Soot's ankles as she stood there. She took a deep breath and let it sighing out, feeling like she was come full-circle in her strange life to a place she hadn't been in since she was very young; nervous, playful, passionate, and enjoying the company of someone so much older and taller than she. It put her in a place she'd avoided since then, that of the slightly more passive partner, enjoying being drawn along by the other. And it felt strange. Relaxing in some ways, a little touch well-suppressed of terrifying in others. She tossed her peaked officer's cap aside and ran her hands through her hair, suddenly self-conscious of being visible, being watched. Aware of the sounds her fingers made through those fine strands, things she'd never noticed before. Fingertips down her face, tracing the outline of herself for Soot's vision. Over her ears, down her neck, over her collarbones, so close to the surface these days through her thin, soft skin. Her hands became her lover's eyes, she thought, and moved them down over the low swell of her chest and down, feeling the ribs even through jacket and shirt. Those long years asleep had left her even more wasted-away than she had been before. Back up the closure of the jacket, flicking buttons open one by deliberate one, deliberately sharp movements, each almost a pop in the still darkness. All open, she pushed the sides slowly apart, letting rough twill jacket and silken lining slide against the cotton shirt. She shrugged the jacket off her shoulders, and let it slip smoothly down her arms on to the floor. She sat on the creaking bed and reached down to slip the buckles and untie the laces of her high cavalry boots, releasing the scent of leather from the linings as she pushed each in turn from her feet. Her fingers followed them down, over the lines of her calves, all sinew and wiry muscle, and over her slender feet, sliding the wool socks off them as she went. "... Beautiful ..." breathed Soot, hardly moving, captivated, fascinated. She stood again and unhooked the sword from the rings on the belt from which it hung, crouched to lie it carefully on the ground near the wall. Her fingers followed the shape of the sturdy leather belt around her waist, the black pouches with the half-moon ammunition clips, the holstered revolver. All the way back to the front again, tensing the belt to free the buckle as the metal clicked, clacked and rang like a bell. Next, the buttons of the tight breeches, one, two, three, four and five, and fingers dragging nails over her lower belly, the slight swell of hips, and down her thighs. Back up, whispering fingertips, and then pushing the breeches down, practically peeling them from her body. One leg free, then the other, and fingers slipping back up over her cool bare skin, over the cotton knickers, to the rougher cotton shirt above. Again, buttons, more of them, stiff and loud, and her fingers caressing her bare skin as they went up, slipping between her slight breasts, always too insubstantial to require anything but a shirt over them. Pushing the shirt apart slowly like opening twin doors, inviting her lover in. Off the shoulders and down the arms and tossed, a touch of flamboyance, of building confidence, into the corner. She hugged her own skinny elbows and ran palms up over her own shoulders and down, just the lightest hiss of skin on skin. Over her nipples, down her belly, catching the band of the cotton knickers and dragging them teasingly down her thighs, fingers sliding down her mound in front, cupping herself as she pushed the thin fabric off, then back over her thighs and her buttocks and down, whispering all the way to the floor. Fingertips stroking slowly from ankles to knees to the points of her hips, and she felt aflame for Soot, unwrapped and presented, ready and greedy for her touch. "Come here," she whispered then, "Come here and find me." And Soot did. Her fingers found Anhelia's body, explored every part of it as she stood there, feet apart, arms spread wide, opened to her. Warm exploring fingers, inquisitive, touching everything as if to place every shape and curve and crease in her memory. The hands found Anhelia's small, gently hanging breasts and cupped them and squeezed their cool flesh, and Soot's fiery breath washed over them before her burning lips caught the icy nipples and captured them, sending waves of heat through Anhelia's body. She felt like a ice sculpture, melting in her lover's dark flame. Her hands caught and twisted in Soot's stiff, silvery hair, feeling its prehensile strands curling around her fingers, rippling under her touch. Soot's long tongue curled around her breasts, one then the other, tasting her, arousing her to shivers of delight. She gasped and tightened fingers on Soot's head. A warm hand worked its way in between her thighs, cupping, pressing, rubbing, pushing inward, laying its claim on her, taking her in hand and possessing her. Those burning kisses now descended her belly, the tongue swirling suggestively over and into her navel before dipping further, more kisses down the slight swell of her lower belly and over her pubic mound, which Soot nuzzled deeply, rubbing her face against, licking along the crease of her thighs on each side. Anhelia had to hold herself upright with her grasp on Soot's head and shoulders, for her knees were shaking, her head thrown back, eyes starting blankly upward. Soot's hair was tickling her sensitive thighs, rippling like the frills of ocean coral. Her lips mouthed at Anhelia's flesh, tugging gently, stroking. Slowly further down, inexorable pleasurable fate. Kisses, soft kisses, and she felt herself pushing forward with her hips, urging her lover onward and further. She required little prompting, and the kisses descending her outer lips became warmer, hungrier, wider, wetter. If she were still humanly alive, she would have been smearing Soot's smooth face with the liquid of her arousal, which was a flickering high note slowly building above the heavy bass of their slow movements against each other. Soot's long tongue parted her wetly and cleaved her apart, and she found herself voicing her delight in a sigh that became an uncontrollable moan as that wonderful tongue found the exact perfect spot, its tip lifting her clitoral hood to flutter and stroke its shaft and head. Strange sensations further down puzzled her pleasure-muddled mind until she realized Soot was wetting her own fingers in dribbled saliva before pushing them slowly between Anhelia's labia and into her, two long, supple fingers sliding inside and hooking around, possessing her, pulling her hips into Soot's adoring mouth and pressing and rubbing places on the inside that joined the sensation of her clit and sent her into pulsing, thigh-shuddering climaxes, hardly even aware of her screams of delight. Her eyes stared wide but her mind was filled with images quite different, with an unearthly glow of joy filling them, as if she watched the delight not only of herself but so, so many others, joined in this circle of pleasure. So captivating were they that she hardly noticed the weakening of her knees and her body sagging, was only dimly aware of Soot's strong hands clasping her and holding her and carrying her, of the soft bedding that she collapsed into. When Soot got in next to her, her long body naked now against Anhelia's, her warm glow filling Anhelia's senses, her senses had returned enough to murmur, "Now you got me ... into your whore's bed ... just where you wanted me. Damn your ... tricksy tongue, woman ..." Soot's response was a soft kiss on the forehead as she wrapped the smaller, colder woman in those long arms. Anhelia snuggled into her, pressing her face into Soot's firm, warm breasts, closing her eyes with a sigh of delight. She nuzzled them, finding a nipple and slowly wrapping her lips around it as she drifted into a slow, dream-filled sleep, full of echoes of pleasure. The Boarding House The sounds from the radio lilted through the lace curtains of the open window, across the alley to Mrs. Scott's boarding house. Her boarders were seated for dinner. Mr. Grist, the day laborer and lay preacher, had just finished another monumental blessing of the meal, a rambling supplication that left the other boarders shifting in their seats. Harvey had managed to stifle his inner cursing at its length. This was only his second night in the house. He wasn't about to make a comment. Mrs. Scott looked up from the folded hands in her lap and said, "Well, that was a fine blessing, Mr. Grist." Spoons clanked with dishes, and dishes changed hands across the table. Cordelia, Mrs. Scott's kitchen girl, stood at attention at the dining room door. "Why don't we get us a radio?" asked George, the itinerant salesman, as he was spooning black-eyed peas onto his plate. "The programs that would come over that thing would lead to impure thoughts," Mrs. Scott said knowingly. "And that would then lead to...." She closed her eyes and nodded her head slightly to the side. "Fornication." Her tone implied the correlation between the two would be obvious to anyone. "Oh, I don't know," he persisted. "There's a lot of good entertainment, too. What about that preachin' show, the one on Sunday mornin's?" Mrs.Scott didn't give him a chance to fish up its name. "Perhaps so, but if we can't separate the good from the bad, then we shouldn't listen to any of it," she said. Clarence, the slow-witted boy from Hancock County, asked, "What's fornication?" The wheezing and snorting of stifled red-faced laughter filled the room, and Harvey had to struggle to hold on to a mouthful of cornbread. Jimbo, a young man with sweet smelling hair parted down the middle, whispered the answer into Clarence's ear. Clarence's jaw slackened in amazement. The answer was whispered because of the presence of Mrs. Scott's twelve year old son, Bobby Lee, Jr. He always took meals with his mother and her boarders. She had taken it upon herself to shield her son from any potential wickedness since her husband, Bobby Lee Scott, Sr., had not come home. A shell had buried him alive in a trench and he had been left behind in France. Mr. Reynolds, the veteran who had only left an arm in France, concentrated on a leg of fried chicken. He was the only boarder not to laugh at Clarence's ignorance. The shelling had taken his hearing as well. "Maybe Sunday services would prove a pleasant diversion for you men," Mrs. Scott offered cheerfully. A silence ensued so profound the men could hear themselves chewing. Mr. Grist spoke up. "I say 'hear, hear' to that." The silence continued, punctuated by the clank of utensil against plate. George steered the conversation to more neutral ground. Cotton prices. The weather. And the radio from across the alley taunted them softly. After dinner, the men gathered on the front porch to smoke and talk politics. "Hoover's gonna ruin this country," George said as he exhaled and examined his cigarette. "Who's Hoover?" asked Clarence. "The president, Clarence. Hoover's the president." They watched a model A sputter down the street and fishtail in and out of a muddy rut in the street. A girl in a round hat that covered her ears clutched the wheel tightly with gloved hands. She whooped and laughed, and a man sitting next to her steadied the wheel with his hand and laughed. George changed the subject. "Say, Harvey, you got you a girl?" Harvey studied his shoes for a moment. His brown hair fell in a wave across his forehead near his dark eyes and over the last drying pimple of puberty. "Not presently," he stammered. "I gotta think about college now." "College! What you studyin' on?" "Accounting," Harvey replied meekly. "Accounting! Don't say!" There was another pause. On the neighbors' radio, an announcer spoke. "Friends, do you like a good biscuit like I do? Well...." "Mrs. Scott said she could use a man good with figures," George continued. "Help her with the books, I guess. You know for her age, she's quite a looker." He was right. Her jet black hair was still full, though gray streaked. She insisted in wearing it in the pent-up style of the previous decade, rather than cut it short with permanent waves like the younger girls, flappers, they called them. A small dark mole dotted one side of her upper lip, and her eyes were crystal blue. In her younger days, she had had her pick of swimmy-headed suitors, but had chosen Bobby Lee, a handsome young cotton agent with a straw hat, a seersucker suit, and a Packard automobile. Within a year Bobby Lee, Jr. was born. Then Bobby Sr. had gone to France to fight the German Hun and had not come back. "Watch our fer that warsp there," Jimbo warned Harvey as he waved a plume of cigarette smoke at it. The wasp retreated into the yard. Mr. Reynolds blankly watched it go, and took a pull on his cigar. Jimbo continued. "She comes across as cold as an icicle with them blue eyes and all, but I bet if you could get her to warm up," he glanced inside the screen door, looked back and lowered his voice. "I bet it'd be like a-humpin' a tiger." "Hot damn! I bet you right, boy," George exclaimed. The men all chuckled, except Mr. Reynolds. "Well, I'm turnin' in. Gotta run down to Hattiesburg tomorrow," George said as he squashed his cigarette under his heal. He stood up, snapped his suspenders and rubbed his gut. "See you boys in the mornin'." The men took turns holding the screen door for each other and filtered up to their rooms. In the weeks that followed, Harvey would catch Mrs. Scott looking at him. Whenever George finished a story and had everyone laughing, Harvey would scan the table to enjoy the laughter in everyone's face. More than once he caught her looking back at him and absently playing with her earring. When their eyes met, she would quickly release her earlobe and transfer her gaze to the speaker. And it seemed as if the seat at the head of the table nearest her was always open and waiting for him. Once or twice, he thought he felt the toe of her shoe brush his leg. He always dismissed it as Bobby Lee Jr. teasing him from across the table. One night, there was a knock at Harvey's door. "Yes?" He looked up from his books. "Mr. Prentiss," the door said. "Can you have a look at something for me?" He got up and opened the door. There was Mrs. Scott with a rectangular leather-bound ledger under her arm. The high collar of her blouse was opened, revealing a wide wedge of creamy skin. Her gray streaked black hair was down out of its bun, and her blue eyes seemed glassy. "George tells me you're good with numbers. Can you help me balance the house ledger?" Harvey thought he heard her slur 'ledger' into 'lesher.' "Yes ma'am. Be happy." Harvey pushed away the open book he'd been studying. Mrs. Scott placed the ledger on his desk and he sat to look at it. She leaned over and her fingers, elegantly slender and pale, traced an entry in the lamplight. From across the alley and through the window, the dreamy sounds of Annette Hanshaw crooning "I Can't Give You Anything but Love" dribbled out. He felt the weight of her breast on his shoulder blade, her breath near his ear, not quite a pant, but quickened and a little labored. Harvey thought he could smell the sour-sweetness of liquor. Her hand brushed his back, slipped around to his chest to assess its muscularity, then slipped between his suspenders and onto his shirt. The pen in his hand went slack and he closed his eyes. A dog barked out in the night somewhere. Her hand smoothed the white cotton of his shirt, down over his youthful front and reached his crotch, just as her lips planted a kiss on the back of his neck, tasting the September evening perspiration. "Mrs. Scott," he said in a weak protest. "Mrs. Scott," he repeated in a whisper before she drew a finger across his lips and over his chin to silence him. Their eyes met in the desk mirror. Without breaking their gaze, she undid the remaining buttons on her high necked blouse and opened it. The wide circles of her nipples darkened the white linen of the lace trimmed camisole. She unbuttoned the sash at the waist of her black skirt and let it fall in a puddle over her shoes. She stepped out of the skirt, her button-up-the-side ankle-high shoes carefully freeing themselves. She stood there in the mirror in beige silk stockings held up by a garter. The hint of scattered spider veins was under them, like dark blue flashes of lightning frozen in time. "Do you know how long it's been? Since I've felt the weight of a man on top of me? Do you?" she complained in a purr. She didn't wait for a reply, not that Harvey had one. He hadn't looked away from the desktop mirror, afraid that if he broke their gaze for a split-second and looked around, no one would be there. Her fingers gathered his face and turned it to hers, mashing his astonished expression up into his wide eyes. They kissed, then broke the kiss to get a breath, a long inspiration with eyes closed, and then kissed again. She slipped his suspenders off his shoulders, pushed him onto the bed and murmured, "I need to feel a man inside me, a hard man inside me." She pulled handfuls of his shirttail out of his trousers and kissed his stomach. He felt her exhale in pleasure at the taste of salty skin, her breath moving the soft hairs on his stomach. She kissed down to where his hair thickened as she unbuttoned his trousers, freed him and took him into her mouth. Her tongue traced him, her hand pulling down his foreskin. She felt him begin to tense, and took him out of her mouth. Her hand roughly cradled his jaw with her thumb and forefinger. "I need you to fuck me, boy. Give it to me." She unclipped her stockings so that she could pull down her loose fitting linen panties. And then she was above him and his face was swimming in her pubic hair, black curls with random gray. Her salty wetness emerged from the thick hair, and his tongue felt her harden. She shuddered suddenly, and her hands seemed like they would crush his head. She kissed his wet face and then backed down to place him inside her. As he gained entry, she moaned but moved herself slowly, trying to conserve her young lover. After a few strokes she let him slip out. He reached for her momentarily, but she rolled onto her back and beckoned him to mount her. He paused and peeled his shirt over his head. His hair was rumpled and wet with perspiration, but he didn't pause to smooth it down. He mounted her and slid back inside of her. Her hands were quickly on his cheeks, her fingernails digging into the soft, white flesh of his ass. "That's it, fill me up, boy. Give it to me. It's been so long," she whispered in a hiss. The pain of her fingernails in his ass kept him from coming. That, and his fears that one of the other boarders would hear her moaning and whimpering and think it was an attack, and come running to her aid. Only after she had come and relaxed her grasp did he finally release. He collapsed on her, breathing in the smell of the sweet Woolworth's perfume at her neck. She stroked the back of his neck lightly in the aftermath, and Harvey marveled how nails that could be so vicious could now be so tender. They lay a while like that, until the sweat on their bodies had dried in the night breeze. As she dressed, she said in a low voice, "Get something on, I'll have Cordelia come up and change your sheets. They're soaked." It was twice a week after that. A glance across the dinner table, and later a quiet knock on the door. Undressing in the moonlight. Hands roaming, searching skin for something, everything. Lips pulling lips, pulling skin, pulling nipples. Her heels on his back as her shaggy triangle caressed his face and his tongue probed her wetness. Her full breasts hanging tubular as she rode him. His hands in her graying black hair, all gray in the moonlight, studying her face, her eyes still blue, the only true color in the monochrome light. The pain-mask of her pleasure as she came, the way her sex squeezed him rhythmically. Harvey began to fear that the other boarders were suspicious. To him, glances exchanged between the other men became silent indictments. They seemed to linger in their doorways to see if she would return to his room. They never discussed it, but Mrs. Scott must have felt their suspicions as well. But neither of them could stop it or wanted to. One morning Harvey found a note, slipped under his door during the night. "Dixie Theater," it read, "Two o'clock showing, Very back row. Meet me there. Wear a hat." He recognized the handwriting from the ledger. Neat, orderly, controlled. He entered the darkness of the theater and saw her there under a wide brimmed bonnet. Her hair was down onto her shoulders and partially obscuring her face. He had removed his hat on entering the building, but as he sat down next to her, she whispered, "Keep your hat on." He replaced it, and she reached over to tilt the brim down over his face. The picture show, "West of Zanzibar," starring Lon Chaney, was already in progress. A piano at the front of the theater plunked out music to accompany the action as big fans hummed to circulate the thick air. They slumped in their seats in the back row under the rectangular mat of light that pierced the dusty air. The rattle and snap and tick-tick-tick of the projector was just behind their heads. She leaned over and palmed him through his trousers, feeling him swell. He exhaled forcefully. With her other hand she drew a finger over his lips to silence him, and then drew his hand to her lap. She guided his hand through an opened button on the side of her long skirt. Opening her legs, she settled his hand into her nest. There was no linen, no fabric at all, over her sex. There was just the tangle and, within it, the trough of her slickness. He worked her. Now he knew how, stroking her erect bud like he would stroke himself, up and down its length. She leaned her head back, and he saw her eyes closed in ecstasy. He quickened his pace and her hand stopped caressing him through his trousers. He pressed firmer. Her hips quivered and she gasped, then a few seconds later, a series of staccato jerks of her hips and another gasp. He began to withdraw his hand, and she stopped him. She slumped further down in her seat and held his hand in place, her hand pressing on his through the fabric of her skirt. He stroked her again, and then another quiver and a jerk and a gasp. A man toward the front of the theater turned his head and shushed over his shoulder into the darkness. She languidly began rubbing him again, tracing him with her fingertips through the flannel of his trousers. Her palm formed around him, and their eyes met in the penumbra of the projector. Her eyes implored him to cum, so she could see his face contort in the dim light and feel him spasm under her hand. He felt himself jet into his cotton drawers. He didn't hear his own quiet exclamation, only the man shush the darkness again. She put a finger in Harvey's mouth to quiet him. When he was spent, she stroked his inner thigh and put her head on his shoulder. They left as they had entered, from different aisles, and at different times. One and then a moment later the other. In October, a letter arrived for Harvey. "Please come home for picking," and then a citation of a bible verse, "The harvest is great but the workers are few." And a promise to return him to school in town as soon as possible after the work was done. Harvey could not say no. He came down the stairs with his worn brown valise at his side. It was dinner time. Mrs. Scott was concentrating on the platters that randomly orbited the table between hands. "Mr. Prentiss, we started without you," she said. "I hope you don't..." She stopped in mid-sentence when she saw him dressed to go. Her eyes never left Harvey as Jimbo took the platter of pork chops from her and stabbed one with his fork. "Daddy and them need me for a while," Harvey explained. "Be back in one week, two weeks, tops. Keep my room for me, will you, ma'am?" Mrs. Scott mouthed a word that did not come out. Her facade fought hard to conceal her disappointment and her shock. "Surely," she finally drawled. "We'll await your return." She placed her napkin on the table and rose to see him to the door. He passed across the threshold to a chorus of "See ya, Harvey," "See ya boy," and "Take care, now." At the door, her blue eyes fixed on him and she whispered, "Do be careful, you hear?" Her finger tips caressed his cheek. "Yes ma'am." He turned and his shoes sounded hollowly on the wooden steps. When he got to the street, he looked back. The ferns hanging in planters on the porch twirled slowly in what could almost pass as an evening breeze. She was still at the door, leaning against the door frame, her elegant hands holding the edge. If the county paper had been a daily and not a weekly, he would have known. He would have known of the great excitement, almost as big as the arrival of the circus. He would have known that both teams of the city fire department were called. He would have seen the boldfaced headlines, "Great Loss of Life." "Boarding House Goes Up, One Survivor." And he would have been spared arriving on the scene unprepared. He stood there by the street, his valise on the ground by his feet. He stood there for a while, waiting to wake up. He stood there and then stooped down to snare the handle of his valise. Looking down, he saw a pair of white patent leather shoes, ankle socks and brown legs. It was Cordelia beside him. Her white gloved hands cradled a Bible at her side. Her hair was slicked in waves under a white bonnet with a pink ribbon around the crown. "Did anyone," he began, "Did anyone?" was all he could manage. "Jes' one, Mr. Harvey. Mr. Clarence. Mr. Clarence, he be behind a tree, jes' a pullin' on hisself." Harvey surveyed the charred frame left in the gap in the row of houses. Only a small section of porch remained, the section where the men would gather to smoke. Glass from the blown out front windows covered the blackened steps. One fern remained, a spray of brown leafless stems in a planter still hanging from the one remaining eave. From behind the lace curtains of an upstairs window next door, the radio delivered an obscure harangue. The Sunday morning preaching.