“Because.”
This time it only took Joe fifteen minutes“ to restore the intimacy. Alice’s body seemed to welcome each new caress—-just as long as he didn’t try to remove her dress. Indeed, although Joe half-expected another rebuff when his hand slipped under the silken panties she was wearing, not only did it fail to materialize, but on the contrary Alice clenched her thighs to draw the questing hand closer to the eagerly moist flesh awaiting it. As the hand pressed the trembling heart of her passion, her body was thrown into a frenzy and she threw all caution to the winds.
With one motion, she tossed her skirt up and under her, tugged down her panties, and pulled Joe over on top of her. It happened so fast that he had only the barest glance at her milk-white thighs and the little triangle of red curls above them. Then her nails were digging into his buttocks in her hurry to get his pants and underwear out of the way.
“Now!” she cried out, and her body thrust upward to meet the stab of his plunging lust. And they thrashed about until the stars whirled in the sky and their mutual desire exploded, leaving them drained.
As soon as it was over, Alice demurely pulled her skirt down to cover her legs. While Joe lit cigarettes for them, she reached behind her to hook her bra and zip up her dress. By the time the match was out, she was as completely dressed as when he’d picked her up for their date earlier that evening.
Despite the fact that he’d scored, despite the fact that it had been very enjoyable, Joe was left with a vague feeling of frustration. He told himself it was silly, but the fact that Alice had denied him a look at her body bugged him. It continued to bug him during the months of courtship which followed.
Gradually, she succeeded in convincing him of his responsibility in deflowering her. The fact that she encouraged him to continue deflowering her helped convince him. And the fact that she never allowed him to look on any pertinent portion of her bared anatomy added tantalization to the convincing and provided just the extra goad needed to get him to propose marriage to her.
This teasing refusal to let him see what he was getting -- indeed, what he had already gotten!—bugged Joe more and more. Even during the three-month period between their engagement and the wedding, it continued to frustrate him to the point of taking in two and three burlesque shows a week. Joe had never thought of himself as a voyeur, but now he admitted the tendency to himself. Just because he was denied it, the sight of the charms he was fondling became the most important thing to him sexually. And, in an odd way, he sometimes found the sight of the near-nude strippers even more exciting than the act of sex itself with Alice.
Also, as the date of the wedding neared, Alice seemed to grow more loathe to grant him the love-making which had come so relatively easily that first night. Womanlike, it was as if her “virtue” became more precious to her as the legal sanction to dispose of it came within grasp. The culmination of this attitude took place the night before the wedding.
Joe and Alice were alone together in the apartment which Alice’s parents had fixed up for them. They’d brought down some wedding gifts which had just arrived and unpacked them and stored them away. Then they’d relaxed on the couch in front of the TV set.
“Tomorrow this time will be our wedding night,” Alice sighed.
“Yeah. By this time we’ll be in the hotel,” Joe answered.
“. . . keep your breath kissing sweet,” the TV set advised.
“And the next day, we’ll be on our way to the Caribbean for our honeymoon.” Alice smiled.
“But before that-—” Joe’s voice was husky. “Before that comes our wedding night.”
“. . . a show the whole family can enjoy," enthused the TV set.
“Umm, ye-e-es,” Alice purred.
“I’m really looking forward to that.” Joe licked his lips.
“. . . This Telethon, to be seen coast-to-coast, will go on all night until ten 0’clock in the morning . . .”
“But why wait?” Joe kissed her.
“It’s only one more day.” She pushed him away. “Doing it the night before our wedding is just . . .”
“. . . one of the causes of muscular distrophy . . .”
“Aw, come on! Why not?”
“. . . stay tuned for a preview of coming attractions on the Late Show . . .”
“Because it gives me a headache.”
“. . . when aspirin won’t help and aspirin with buffering won’t help, then . . .”
“Let’s make love, Alice. Come on. You’re just feeling a little shy tonight. There’s no reason why it should give you a headache.”
“It always gives me a headache,” she confessed. “Ever since I was sixteen years old sex—”
“. . . will never let you down. It cures not only the headache, but relieves the nervous tension that causes the headache.”
“Since you were sixteen years old? But I thought I was the first man who—-”
“You were. You were. I’m talking about necking. Petting, things like that.”
“Oh. Gee, Alice, I’m so aroused. This is our last chance to make illicit love. What do you say? Don’t you enjoy making love with me?”
“Sure I do. I want you as much as you do me, Joe. I want to—”
"Let Hertz put you in the driver's seat!”
“Then come on. Let’s!”
“Oh, all right!”
Joe switched off the TV set and took her in his arms. Her reluctance quickly dissipated as his hands traveled over the blouse and skirt covering her body. Very quickly, she was reacting with an eagerness matching his own. As her hand slid inside the waistband of his pants and down his naked belly, Joe became so excited that he forgot the pattern of their love-making and unbuttoned her blouse and began pulling her breast free of her bra.
“Stop that!” Alice pushed him away.
“Sorry. I forgot.” At that moment Joe was too eager to make an issue of the point.
But later, after he’d finished making love to her in the dark with most of her clothes still on, Joe commented on the incident. “Why do you always insist on keeping yourself covered when we make love?” he asked, his frustration giving an edge to the words.
“I just don’t like to be looked at. You know that.”
“Yes. I know that. What I don’t know is why.”
“It just doesn’t seem right.”
“But why doesn’t it seem right?” Joe wanted to know.
“I don’t know. It just seems bad to let a man look at my naked body. Any man.”
“Even the man you’re going to marry?”
“Yes.”
“Even the man who’s making love to you?”
“Well-— Yes. I guess so.”
“How about your husband? When we’re married“ I mean. Then do I get a little look-see?”
“I never stopped to think about it,” Alice said primly.
“Then stop and think about it now. Are you still going to be so damn modest after we’re married?”
“I don’t know,” Alice said honestly. “I just don’t know.”
“Well, we’ll see,” Joe had answered grimly. “And damn soon! Tomorrow night we’ll just see!”
Now it was tomorrow night, and Mr. and Mrs. Joe Barker were following the bellhop into Room 401 of the Marlowe Hotel. Joe had been mentally undressing Alice for the past three hours and forty-seven minutes, or ever since they’d said their final “I do’s”. By now he was all primed to strip her for real. He fidgeted and his eyes danced from her small derriere to her ladylike bosom as the bellhop brought in their bags, opened the windows and drew the blinds. The room looked spic and span, but still the bellhop delayed, patting the covers on the bed, blowing an imaginary speck of dust off the night table, checking the water glasses in the bathroom. The purpose of the delay was twofold. Firstly it was intended, to intimidate Joe into overtipping him. And secondly, he’d noticed the rice grains still clinging to Alice’s hair and he was getting a small sadistic kick out of prolonging their impatience. At last it seemed there was nothing else for him to do, but just as he was turning to leave, he noticed that the door to the closet was slightly ajar and he changed direction to investigate.