I looked down and saw his feet. His long toes were curled in arthritic pleasure. It was the pleasure of being encompassed by my insides. He was my captive animal, trapped beneath my long, strong legs he loved so much, his chaleco de salvavidas, as he liked to call them.
Wanting to somehow participate, he lifted his upper torso to my left breast and sucked me, the saliva popping loudly in his mouth. He’d look up at me occasionally with one of my reddened nipples in between his teeth. I liked it when he did that, with that look of complete submission. At that moment I was Mother Mary giving milk to her baby Jesus. I was omnipotent and feverish, on a sort of low-grade heroine haze. And then suddenly I tired and alighted off him, lying down and spreading myself out for him. I felt shaky, anaemic.
He tried to eat me again but my body couldn’t take any more, and I captured his eager head in between my hands like the saviour and lifted it to give him my breath. We kissed furiously, mouths stretched open to their full capacity, teeth knocking, unfurling our tongues like safety ropes.
Then his cell phone rang. I hated that thing. He stiffened for a bit, as if feeling a change in the air. He looked over at it, contemplated getting it, then thought again. He looked at me instead. Then he let himself inside me elegantly, as his eyes peered into mine. It was like he was looking right through me, intuiting my life’s accumulation of sadness. I tried holding my eyes right back to his like I usually did, my lioness instinct. But this time I wanted to hide. I didn’t know why, but I felt shaken by the way he looked at that phone. I lowered my lashes instead.
The urge to cry was rising in me fast. I thought of my mother, her pain in love, her long-time fear of ageing, of dying alone. I thought of how she finally decided to face this fear by violently making it come true. I felt myself shrinking in his sentient gaze. As he pumped me, his eyes were welling up with tears along with mine. I held back and fought the demon. I didn’t want him to know how much I loved him yet or how happy I really was despite my current state. How I wanted to become part of his world and abandon mine!
Deep within me, David twisted and coiled himself, sensually taking in the texture of my inner walls. Then he stopped and said, “Let’s get on our sides. But keep me inside of you.”
I went with him, face to face, as he grabbed my left buttock, and carried me into a half-turn on to our sides. Never disconnecting our selves, David had somehow managed to go even deeper in that new position. We rocked back and forth tensely; his cock massaged my clit, our bodies aching in perfect symmetry. There was so much moisture. He pulled out, buried his head at my breasts again, allowing for us to dry off a bit.
When he re-entered me, he pulsed three times and whimpered at the sensation. That was all he could stand and I was ready too. We came in muted silence, and I allowed myself one stray tear to travel down my face as David shut his eyes and rolled over on his back. I quickly wiped it off.
“You OK?” he asked, catching his breath. He stared up at the white glare of my high antique tin ceilings. I had always thought they looked like dozens of tiny breasts lined up in quadrants. He placed a hand on my leg for reassurance. He wasn’t one to touch after sex, too busy recoiling into himself.
“I thought about my mom and got emotional,” I mumbled.
“You want to talk about it?”
I tried to decipher his tone before answering. Then I thought about the phone call he received during sex. Who could it have been? Why did he even consider stopping to answer?
“No, it’s OK. It’s passed now,” I lied.
“Some water?” he asked.
“Oh yeah, parched is an understatement,” I answered.
I forced myself up with him and went for a cigarette while he took his phone with him into the bathroom. It was probably Sergi. I had heard David whispering on the phone with him late at night. When he came out of the bathroom, I asked him who had called.
“It was Sergi. He likes to reminisce when he’s drunk.”
It was 3 a.m. Spain time, 9 p.m. ours.
“Doesn’t he have anyone else to call?”
It wasn’t just the question, but the way my voice shot it out. It had a tone of desperation. I felt threatened. It was the tone that my mother had used a million times on my father when he told her he wouldn’t be coming home for dinner or that he had another important business trip.
I was envious of a something I couldn’t even put into words or quite understand about him and Sergi. It was just a gut feeling I had. There was nothing I wanted more than to be proven wrong.
He was calm. “A mutual friend of ours is arriving into town tomorrow, Anna. That’s what he was really calling about. Miguel Velasquez. He’s an old friend of the family who’s here on business. He’s an art dealer.”
“Great,” I said, trying to keep my sanity. “Where shall we take him?”
We arranged to meet Miguel the next night at a high-end, big-chef restaurant on the newly reformed Clinton Street. We went through three bottles of South Africa’s finest wines, since this was thankfully on Miguel.
It was my first time seeing David with a close friend, riding down the green, comforting path of memory lane. Miguel was jet-set handsome with perfectly styled salt-and-pepper hair. He was married to a rich Catalana who stayed at home and raised their two boys while he frolicked around the globe. He was cordial to me but didn’t go beyond the niceties to make me feel like part of the old clan.
His attention was all on David. He had a fountain of questions about David’s work and about his mother and her health. Miguel asked if she had remarried since David’s father passed away. Like a pair of old women, they unearthed fresh and hardened dirt about themselves and their mutual friends.
Sergi’s name was splattered over practically every adventurous tale there was to tell. Remember when you and Sergi had that party for. . or when Sergi and you and those girls. . You and Sergi disappeared with those Swiss dudes. . Whatever happened to them!
It was obvious the Canettis were the life of the party.
“Yeah, whatever happened to them?” I interjected, giving him a shove and raising an eyebrow.
“Nothing!” David said and laughed. “Nice purple mouth you got there, Anna. Why don’t you have some more wine?”
My teeth and lips tend to suck up the tannins. I must have looked like a fool. And he was trying to change the subject.
“Aw come on, man,” Miguel egged on. “Those guys were like in love with you and Sergi. You guys were such the cock-teasers!” said Miguel. He glanced over at me to try to detect a reaction.
My blood was boiling, but my face muscles were contained.
Their banter was so drenched in homoeroticisms, they might have as well been fencing with their dicks.
I changed the subject to something neutral. I asked about the art Miguel was viewing in New York. Mentally, I prepared myself to confront David when we were alone.
I knew that I was quieter than usual on our walk home.
After we saw Miguel into a cab uptown, David tried a million times to jump-start conversations about Miguel’s shallow art world. But all his attempts fell flat. I was trying to breathe and shoo away the black birds of paranoia circling me. We tired from our walk and hailed a short cab ride home.
We slid into the back seat, and I gave the driver directions. I turned to David.
“Tell me more about your experimentation with Sergi.”
He was instantly defensive. “Why are you making such a big deal about him? Do you think I’m gay or something?”
“I don’t know. What the hell did happen with those Swiss guys then?”
“I told you, nothing, we just did lines together. What’s wrong with you, Anna?”
“I just want you to tell me more about how you and Sergi first fooled around with each other.”