Adventures of Me and Martha JaneChapter 10C
- 3 years ago
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Wednesday morning. My last Wednesday in New York.
While Martha showered that morning in the kitchen I finished making coffee and toast and I put on my running clothes. Then I remembered that I was supposed to take a day off from working-out.
Martha hurried into the living room to gulp down her coffee and toast. She saw me lounging at the table. "You didn't run yet?"
"Takin' a day off."
"Good!" She bent down to me, then she sat on my lap with an arm around my shoulder. "Good. You take a day off. I'm meeting Howard this afternoon, and I'll be back early for a change. And Ronnie will be around, and I want you two to have a good time together and do something. Don't just sit around getting depressed about... you know what. Hear me?"
"Yes ma'am."
"Oh, don't say yes ma'am like that. Please. Say okay, or say something besides that."
I smiled at her. "Your butt feels good."
She grinned. She gave me a kiss. She whispered, "That'll have me home very, very early tonight."
She kissed me again and rose and got her briefcase and left.
I sat at the dining table listening to her heels clatter down the stairs. I said to myself: Yes, ma'am, I'll take the day off. The whole day. Your little boy Steven will take a day off from all of it, from everything, from the questions and from Howard and from New York and from all the things I can't do anything about. You've all worn the hell out of me.
Instead of roaming the book stores looking for answers, I roamed some book stores and just looked, period. I spent hours completely wasting my time. The most serious book I browsed was 'Bartlet's Familiar Quotations', and an illustrated book on stress-relieving massage. After boring myself with that for a while I kicked around the East Side in Martha's neighborhood, getting horny going through nudist magazines at a newsstand until the proprietor shooed me away. I took a subway all the way to the Brooklyn Bridge and took another one back to where I started at 86th Street. Just before noon, I called Ronnie at work.
She answered the phone, sounding tired and cranky. "Hello, this is Veronica."
"Hello, this is Steven."
"Well, you sound in a decent mood. Very non-existential. What morbid secrets did you find in the book shops today?"
"Bartlet's Familiar Quotations, and a couple of nudist magazines."
She gave a half-hearted laugh. "Well, at least you could have raised your sights a bit and gone to the museum to look at the nekkid pictures."
"When do you want me to come over today?"
There was a pause. "Sure you wanna come over?"
"Of course! We having a change in plans?"
"Uh, no, it's... I'll be prepared to receive visitors at one. Okay?"
"Prepared?"
"Eh, I, uh, stayed up late. Very late. Drawing. Drawing, drawing, drawing. Didn't clean up my mess yet, but gimme time to take a quickie shower so I won't be all clammy. The air conditioner's on the fritz in the office today. So let's make it at one-fifteen."
"Okay, see you at one-fifteen."
"Good. Best tranquilizer I've had all day."
I hung up. I strolled up one street and down the other, waiting for one-fifteen. I remembered what one of the nuns used to say to the class: "An idle mind is the devil's workshop." I remembered the sight of Martha and Ronnie frolicking naked on the beach. I considered that Martha and Howard might be together later -- but I considered that only briefly, only for a split second, until I happened to look down Third Avenue and saw a church steeple rising above the smaller apartment buildings. I remembered reciting the Latin when I served at Mass; I remembered sitting up for many nights memorizing it. I remembered the sounds Martha made when she climaxed. I saw Ronnie's eyes glitter in the candlelight. I looked at the church steeple and muttered under my breath, "Fuck you."
Ronnie let me into her apartment. She wore the oversized shirt and the full, print skirt she often wore when she was drawing. She had a tired smile on her face, which looked tense and a little sweaty.
"You're here on time again. Uh... oh, come in. I'm cleaning up."
I entered. There was little room to walk. The floor was littered with charcoal and pencil drawings strewn everywhere. There were two ash trays filled with cigarettes on the floor.
She hurried to snatch drawings off the sofa. "I was hoping you'd be late. Here, lemme clear a place for you to sit.
I glanced around. "What'd you do? You did all this last night?"
She straightened up, a batch of drawings in her hand. She wiped wet hair from her face. "Yeah. Until two or something. A mess, huh?" She motioned toward the sofa. "Come on, sit. I'll get this up."
"Well... want me to help?"
She grabbed papers hurriedly, piling them face down on the coffee table, which was also covered with drawings. "No, it's okay. Have a seat."
I lifted my feet high and stepped carefully into whatever open patch I could find, making my way to the sofa. I said, "Sure you don't want some help?"
"No, no, I have them in order. Doesn't look like it, but they're in a certain order."
I made it to the sofa and sat in the middle of it. I watched her stooping and bending as fast as she could.
She said, "Want me to get you anything?"
"I'll wait."
"Okay. Good. Just a second."
At my right on the sofa were a couple of stray drawings. I picked them up and held them out to her. "Here, what about these?"
"No!" She rushed to me, her footsteps shaking the windows, and she swiped the drawings from me.
I said, "I'm sorry."
"No, it's okay." She brushed hair from her face, her eyes averted from mine. She smiled quickly. "It's just... unfinished. I don't like people to see them... unfinished." She got onto her knees and started shoving the drawings together into a spot on the floor.
"I'm sorry."
"No, I'm sorry. I'm the one who's sorry. I overreacted."
I watched her for a moment. "Hey, I feel stupid sitting here while you work yourself to death. You're getting overheated. Got your big window fan working?"
"No, it's... just the little one in the window, there. The big one hasn't worked for a couple of days. It's slow, it hardly moves."
"Let me take a look at it."
"Okay. In the kitchen."
I took a look at the window fan in her kitchen window. It was coated with dust, the leading edge of the blades were thick with fuzzy, greasy residue, and black lint and soot blocked the motor housing.
I had previously cleaned Martha's fan. Ronnie's was just like it. I searched through her kitchen drawers for some tools. I called out, "You got a screwdriver? Pliers? Anything in here?"
"I don't know. Somewhere."
I found some old pliers. I had to use a kitchen knife as a screwdriver. I removed the window guard and the fan's rear grill. It was a mess. I ran hot soapy water in the sink and dipped a rag in it to clean the blades and major parts. The water was dark brown by the time I was almost finished.
Ronnie walked into the kitchen and pressed her hands into her lower back. "Oh! I finally got most of it up. Almost broke my back."
"You okay in there?"
"Yeah. Finally. I'm sorry. I couldn't get a subway up here fast enough, I got here too late to clean up."
"That's all right." I swished the rag around the big fan blades to soak up the final, thin layer of black soot. "There's so much soot in the air in this town, with all the traffic and those oil-burning water heaters."
She said, "Steven, you're wonderful."
"That's all right. The blades were weighed down with garbage." I turned to her. "You have a vacuum cleaner?"
She looked at me. There was that same hint of nervousness in her eyes that was there when I showed up. "I borrow Martha's."
"Oh. Uh, got some tweezers?"
"Yeah. I'll get 'em." She hopped out of the kitchen. I rinsed the rag in the soapy water, and started to drain and clean the sink. The sooty stuff stuck to the old porcelain. I had to wash it off.
Ronnie came back with tweezers and handed them to me.
I took them and walked to the fan, looking at her. She seemed flustered and edgy. "You all right?"
She looked at me, hands on her hips. She gave me an almost-smile. "Yeah. Tired. Hot."
"Yeah, it's pretty warm in here." I worked with the tweezers to pick small gobs of sooty hair out of the motor housing, one at a time. I said, "You look worse than tired." She didn't reply. I turned my head to look at her.
She blushed and ran a hand over her eyes. "Well, I... subways don't run, air conditioners don't work, people at the office go nuts, the fan... too many things break down, and I break down. Sort of. I don't know about these things. Folks used to yell at me. You know, the whole thing."
I worked away at the hairy soot. "Well, I'm not yellin' at you."
Behind me, she went on, rambling. "I wasn't smart about this. My brothers were the smart ones. I was the dumb one."
"Yeah? Can your brothers draw?"
"My brothers can't even spell."
"Well, they're pretty useless in this town, then."
"And I wasn't pretty. You had to be pretty, you know? 'As seen on TV'."
"You're pretty now. You're very attractive. You sure fooled them, huh?"
For a moment she was silent behind me. Then she said, "It's hard to forget all that sometimes. Creeps up on me. Not easy sometimes."
I turned to her and joked gently, "Next time you start workin' on my inhibitions, you remember what you just said."
She nodded and grinned. "Yeah. Right."
I looked the fan over. There was not much left to do in the cleaning department. I asked her, "You have any lubricant? You know, oil? There's a little spout here for lubrication."
"Mm. Got some three-in-one."
"No, no. Not for a fan. Something like engine oil. Thick."
"The super left some up here one time. I think." She knelt down to look into one of the lower kitchen cabinet doors. "In here, maybe?" She got on her hands and knees to reach inside. She had such cute legs. I was horny. I wanted to fuck her. Every time I saw slender, feminine, dark-eyed Ronnie she made me horny and I wanted to hug her and then fuck her. But it wasn't like wanting Martha. Wanting Martha was maddening. Wanting Ronnie was friendly, affectionate.
She lifted out a small, dirty, discolored glass jar.
I took it from her and removed the top. Motor oil. "Great. You have an eye dropper, or something?"
"Medicine dropper?"
"That'll do."
She left the kitchen again. I replaced the metal grille over the rear of the fan. I was peering into the slots of the motor housing to see if there were more than one lubrication point, when Ronnie returned. At my shoulder her hand appeared, with a thick glass, rubberbulbed medicine dropper.
"Thanks."
She leaned against me, her head on my shoulder, and she watched what I was doing. I could feel her soft hair against mine.
I used the glass dropper to draw oil from the jar, then peered through the grill, twisted my hand through an opening, and squeezed oil into the spout of the illusive little pipe on the edge of the motor housing. The stuff drooled right in. I needed more. I got another draw of oil and worked my way through the grill opening.
Just as I was ready to squeeze the dropper, I felt Ronnie's lips on my neck, barely brushing. It took me by surprise. What also took me by surprise was the vividness of her lips on me, with only the slightest contact.
She said softly, girlishly, "Thank you for this."
I said with the utmost casualness as I aimed for the little spout again, "That's okay. You rubbed my back, I'm rubbin' yours."
She kidded me, "I didn't fix your fan, though."
"You can fix mine next time." I leaned back, and she moved away a little. I turned on the power switch. The old fan groaned a bit and the heavy blades circled slowly. I grit my teeth, waiting. I hoped it worked; it was hot in Ronnie's place.
The engine picked up speed and built to a muted roar. I turned the speed control all the way up.
Ronnie sighed, "Ooooh, wonderful! I feel it already."
I turned around to her. She was standing with her eyes closed. I wiped the sweat from my eyebrows, and right away I knew I'd made a mistake. I had oil and soot all over my hands and arms.
She opened her eyes and looked at me. "Oh, we're a mess."
"I'll be okay." I walked to the kitchen sink and closed the jar and ran hot water to clean up.
She said, "But I got you all sweaty and everything. You were a nice, clean Catholic boy when you got here."
"Never you fear."
"Here, lemme get you some soda or something. Want a coke? Water? I can make coffee."
"Water's fine."
She opened the refrigerator. "Got some ice water here." She grabbed an orange juice container filled with water and then stepped to the kitchen counter beside me while I cleaned my arms with soap in the sink. She opened an overhead cabinet. She looked less tired, and cooler, but she still seemed tense and touchy. She took a glass from the overhead cabinet and poured water for me.
I said, "Thanks. I'll have my hands dry in a minute."
She gazed into the top cabinet. "Want a little wine?"
I tensed at that, remembering the last time. "No, thanks."
"Oh, c'mon." She brought down the wine bottle. There was about a cup of dark wine left in it.
"Ronnie, no."
"Not even enough for a full glass here." She got a small glass and uncorked the wine. She gave me a quick smile as she poured. "You sure?"
I eyed her sternly. "I'm sure. How about you?"
"Oh. Won't hurt anything."
"Ronnie."
"Well, I'm --" She put the bottle away and reached for the glass. She said, suddenly intense, "I had the creeps all night. All night."
I turned off the sink water and dried my hands with the dish towel, shaking my head slowly. I couldn't just grab the glass from her. I knew from family experience that the results could be volatile. I also knew to remain calm. "I wish you wouldn't. You don't really need that."
Her eyes darkened as she looked into the glass. For a brief, eerie moment, she seemed different, seemed hard like the women I'd seen in the streets. She muttered, "How do *you* know what I need?"
"Ronnie. Please."
"So join me if you want."
"You know I won't."
She looked down into the glass. She said dryly, "Here's to the great state of Michigan."
She stepped closer to the counter, lifting the glass a few inches. She looked deeper into the glass. Then she closed her eyes. Her hand lowered a few inches. She whispered plaintively, "Please stop me."
"How? You won't listen to me."
She moved the glass toward me. "Take this away from me. Take it."
I gently put my hand around the glass and took it from her. Her eyes still closed, she put a hand across her face.
She said, "Get rid of it."
I poured the glass of wine down the sink and put the glass on the counter.
She looked down at my hand and took it in hers and held it tightly. She relaxed a little. "I've embarrassed you. I'm so sorry, Steven. You didn't need this." She gave my cheek a kiss and backed away from me, nervously rubbing her arm at her side. "Look, you got messy fixing my fan. You can take a shower in here if you want to. I'll take one after you." She started toward the living room.
I said, "Ronnie. Don't go hiding out on me, now."
She paused in the kitchen doorway. "I'm just going to get some clean towels."
"Oh. Okay."
I stood by the shower stall, unbuttoning my shirt, making up my mind about leaving or staying. She returned quickly with two big bath towels, and she at least had the makings of a smile on her face. She handed me one of the towels, saying "Here's yours," and she hung the other on a hook outside the stall. She started out of the kitchen again. "I promise not to look, okay? I know how shy you are when you're alone with your Aunt Ronnie."
I said, "Hey. Where you goin'?"
She turned around and faced me, surprised. "Just in here. I can clean up a little more while you rinse off."
I beckoned her with a nod of my head, and I pulled off my glasses and put them on the kitchen counter and started unbuttoning my shirt again. "Come on, take a shower with me. Didn't you say you wanted to cool off with a shower?"
She stared at me.
I said, "Come on. You've been in a sweat all day." I pulled my shirt off and lifted a leg to start on my shoes.
She walked toward me slowly, frowning but pleased. "In there with you?"
"Sure! We've been nekkid together. We even showered together, three of us in one of these." I shrugged and added, "And we've shared a few other things."
She smiled at me, and her eyes smiled at me, and she hesitantly undid a button on her shirt.
I unbuckled my belt. "Want me to help?"
"You go in first."
I scoffed, "You're kidding!"
She went to the next button on her shirt. "There's something different about you today."
"Like what?"
"You're not even blushing."
I pulled down my pants and kicked them off. "Martha's been giving me classes in blush prevention."
"Martha blushes worse than you do. She even blushes so bad sometimes, she breaks into tears."
I reached for my jocks. "Come on, no fair. I'm almost nekkid and you haven't even started."
She watched my jocks go down and she watched me kick them away. I stepped toward her. She said, "I can do it."
"I can help." I undid the last button on her shirt, and she watched me open her shirt and take it off. I ran my hand around her waist looking for the zipper of her skirt. "This thing have a zipper?"
"It's just an elastic waistband."
I tucked my fingers under the skirt's waistband, but she stopped me, smiling.
She said, "You go ahead and start the water. I'll finish." She pushed her skirt down, and I stepped into the stall and started the water going, adjusting hot and cold, and she kept looking at me with mild disbelief as she took off her loafers and her bra and then her panties.
I held out a hand to her. "C'mon. Lemme know if the water's right for you."
She stepped to the stall, still looking somewhat taken aback, and I took her hand and she stood naked next to me and stuck her other hand inside. She said, "It's fine."
I held her hand and with my other hand I led the way into the stall. "Step right in. I'll show you something I learned at Fiore's."
She eyed me askance. "Will this hurt?"
"Nope. A little stress reliever I've tried myself, many times. Until the warm water ran out."
She muttered, getting inside, "Doesn't take long in this building, I guess you know."
She stepped inside and turned to face me, the spray bouncing off her back.
I stepped inside, and she moved inward a little, her eyes still watching my face. "What are you up to?"
"Me? About five-foot-eight."
"That's not what I --"
I held her gently by the shoulders. "Do you have an aversion to water running over your face?"
"What?"
"Does it drive you crazy if water runs over your face for a minute?"
"No."
"Okay. Turn around, now."
"Not much room to turn ar--"
I took a small step back, my butt sticking out of the stall. "I'll make room, now. Come on, turn around." I held her shoulders as she turned to face the shower. I said, "Now lower your head and step under the spray. Go ahead."
The water soaked her hair flat and ran over her shoulders and flooded off her face. I kept my hands on her soft little shoulders.
I said, "Now, just stand there. Relax. Let the water run down Just let water run down over your head and face. Okay? Feel okay?"
She spit water off her lips. "Okay."
"You want it colder? Warmer?"
"It's fine!"
"Okay, just relax a minute. We're gonna have you all calmed down in a minute, okay?"
"I hope so."
I got soap off the little metal bar on the side wall. "You still feel creepy?"
"Yes." She wiped the cascading water from her face.
"Are your eyes open?"
"Yes."
"Close your eyes. Close your eyes and relax."
"Okay."
"That better?"
"... Yeah."
"You just enjoy that for a minute. I'm gonna wash your back, okay?"
"You're gonna what?"
"Wash your back."
"Steven? What are you up to?"
I slid the bar of soap back and forth across her back. "Why do you think I'm up to something?"
"I'm not used to you like this."
"Like what?"
"Like THIS!"
I started swishing the lather over her shoulders. "Nobody ever washed your back before?"
"No!"
"Not hurting am I?"
"... No."
"Trust me?"
"... Trust you about what?"
I began to gently massage the back of her neck with my soapy thumbs. I said, "I'm not gonna hurt you, Ronnie."
She didn't say anything.
I massaged slowly. "Hm? Okay?"
"That feels so good."
"Good. You just let me know if anything makes you uncomfortable, or creepy, or anything. Okay?"
"Okay."
I massaged her shoulders and then her shoulder blades and then her back and the small of her back with lots of bubbly soap, gently, and spoke to her. "We're gonna do this just for a minute, now, until you're relaxed... and all soapy clean in back. And nice and warm and comfy, okay? Whatever you wanna do... whatever you want... that's what we'll do. We'll stop, we'll start again. Whatever you want." I finished with her tush and the tops of her thighs, and I placed my hands on her shoulders again and kneaded them gently but deeply. She moaned pleasantly. I crooned into her ear, "Okay, now, I'm gonna get a little closer to you, okay? Don't worry, now, I'll just lean my chest forward a little bit. Now let your head fall back against me, just lift your head, let it lean back. Let the water run onto your face. Okay? Is that okay?"
She nodded yes, her eyes squinting in the spray. The back of her head was against my chin. I swept the spray from her neck and shoulders across her back, rinsing soap away. Then I let her head rest on my shoulder while I put my chin on her shoulder and I soaped my hands again. "Now we'll soap the front, okay? Step back just a little, now, just a little, keep the water off your face and relax. Relax." I rubbed soap on her throat, her chest. "Nice and easy, Ronnie, just soap. Just warm and easy." I skimmed her breasts quickly. "Okay?"
Ronnie lay with her head resting on the pillow and cradled my head on her breast, cautioning me, "Careful. I'm a little sensitive, too, right now." She closed her eyes peacefully while I kept my mouth easy on her nipples. In the dark, quiet room I spent many long, long minutes fingerfucking her and then licking until she was wet and ready enough for my finger to slip effortlessly inside. Martha watched, lying on her tummy on Ronnie's other side and stroking my back and rump, kissing my...
During that same week, more complications ensued. As usual in New York, it was best to expect the unexpected, while expecting the expected to involve unexpected hassles. On Monday I got a little financial relief when Fiore announced that I was in good enough shape to get transferred to a less expensive class, out of the more costly, personalized sessions. The change lowered the overall price of Fiore's training to one-half the former cost -- a good move for me because I was beginning to see...
Ronnie set me up for my first modeling session on Wednesday afternoon. I was going to be paid seventy-five bucks for an afternoon of work with a photographer that Ronnie knew. That was a pretty hefty sum in those days for a nonprofessional my age, although a pro would have been paid more. The session went well and was similar to posing for an artist, but with many more pose changes and a constant stream of instructions from the photographer. He was a handsome, shipshape man in his late...
It was a little after eleven Friday night. Martha lay atop me, her hips over my face, her head over my cock. She ran her tongue around my glans, slowly, around and around, and I licked her tush and licked downward along the round muscles and onto the back of her thighs and then toward her pussy and along the rim of her slit, up and down, and she moaned, "Ahh. Steven." Her mouth enclosed my tip, and then slid down, down. I sighed hotly, "God. Martha." Her mouth moved up and then off me,...
Martha and I undressed in the bedroom while Ronnie went into the bathroom for a minute. Outside, the sun had descended just below the height of the West Side buildings. Martha watched me with a little smile while she stepped out of her panties and I pushed down my jocks. Naked, she walked to the window and drew the thin Woolworth's curtains closed, blocking out the pink glow of dusk, dimming the room. Martha moved to her dresser, and I watched her hazel eyes and her nipples and her auburn...
In the candlelight Martha's teeth and eyes glinted as she lay naked under me, knees drawn back, grinning up at me. She held my cock at the root with one hand and she watched my eyes while I entered her. I groaned as her creamy pussy closed around me. Her grin widened when I started screwing. She whispered, "Fuck. Fuck." Her cunt gripped, tight. I groaned again, my head arching back. Martha whispered, "Fuck." I looked at her eyes. They sparkled with lust. I knew by the look in them...
When Martha saw I'd stopped she rose upright and put a hand on Ronnie's shoulder, and Ronnie let her head fall back and closed her eyes and sighed. I watched her rest for a moment, and then I withdrew my wet finger and put my palm on Ronnie's tummy. She opened her eyes and looked at me, her eyes intense and edgy. I smiled and asked, "Okay with you if we stop?" She didn't say anything, didn't blink her eyes. She smirked, but her eyes didn't change. She laid one hand on the back of my...
Sunday night after dinner we went to Ronnie's apartment again. The previous Friday's coupling had left the three of us less needful. Sunday night began as a languid body massage session, without lotion. We caressed and teased, and lay for some time doing little more than running a finger along an arm or leg while we talked. A long time after we lit a candle and undressed, I was lying on my back with Ronnie sitting up on my right and Martha lying alongside me on the left, and while Ronnie...
Some events are like dreams. Their cause, their meaning, their place in one's history remain forever unexplained. They occur once in time, surprising us sometimes, but always making a mockery of our expectations. In memory they are recurring, timeless, with vague borders and an always jumbled, inexact sequence. In the aftermath all one can say is that they occurred, and defiant memory recalls only the pieces, never their source or their reason. In the yellow-white sun Martha and Ronnie...
Our Friday night dinner with Ronnie had a late start because Martha had to stay at Columbia late for a staff lecture. By nine o'clock the three of us were in a diner, with Martha tiredly picking at her food. Ronnie announced, "Martha, Steven has consented to letting me draw his perfectly proportioned body. So don't make plans for late Sunday afternoon. He's mine for the day." Martha said dully, "Oh. That's nice, Steven. Wait until you see her work. She's good." Ronnie said,...
Everything I did in New York had me thinking of Memphis. My Saturday night date with Becky was a lot of fun. Innocent fun, despite the fact that Becky was such a lively, sweet tempered turn-on. I took her to see 'Bridge Over the River Kwai', which I'd seen before but wanted to see again. It was an exercise in socializing. Merely sitting next to cute Becky in a movie house was sexually arousing. I couldn't help but feel affection for her, she was so likeable and bright. But my emotions...
The small, candlelit room seemed untouched by time. The earth stopped turning. As if in a dense, humid fog of sexuality, I let Ronnie relax onto her back and gave each of her nipples a gentle suck for a moment while she lay with her eyes closed, her breath easing. Then I rose and enfolded Martha in my arms, my sweet, beautiful, sexy Martha, and we held each other longingly and she lay back on the floor and opened her legs and smiled, her eyes simmering, and she whispered, "Lick me, hon....
On Friday night Ronnie had a date that precluded our usual threeway dinner and "extended dessert," as Ronnie called it. Martha met me for a quick dinner at a diner in the West 70's and prepped me for my meeting with yet another of her teenage girlfriends, Jessica. She said while we ate, "The man in charge of the summer drama program at Jessica's high school is a friend of mine. His name is Howard. I told him about you several times, and he's looking forward to meeting you. I haven't...
Wednesday. The nude beach at Fire Island, again. A breezy, slightly cloudy day. Martha grumbled, "Out here in broad daylight." She glanced quickly up and down the beach. "So who's around?", Ronnie said. "There's nobody for miles." She sat Indian style on our big towel in front of me. I sat upright, my knees under me, while Ronnie's left hand cradled my balls. Her right hand, lathered with suntan lotion, rhythmically squeezed my cock in a well controlled milking motion. Martha...
Each day in New York introduced me to a different and fascinating experience that I hadn't imagined in Memphis. Wednesday was no exception. The Long Island Railroad was a world of its own. We rose at five thirty and Martha and Ronnie and I had a quick, greasy breakfast in Pennsylvania Station before boarding a commuter train bound for eastern Long Island. We shuttled through Jamaica Station just as the westbound rush hour mounted; for miles and miles as we headed east toward Bay Shore, we...
I massaged lotion into Martha's arms and shoulders, my strokes growing slower and more sensuous to test Martha's state of mind -whatever the hell that might be at this point -- and moved tentatively to the swell of her breasts and then between them for a while, and then to her tummy, and down the tops of her thighs. Martha closed her eyes and I asked, "Okay?" and she said, "Hm. Take your time, hon." I got more lotion and massaged along the tops of her thighs and calves, and then lightly...
Thursday I was on my own all day. After Martha left for work I went back to sleep. I woke up so late that I knew I could never make it to Fiore's on time, so I called the health club and cancelled for the day, playing sick. I managed to meet Ronnie for lunch, but I sat feeling like a truant. My guilt piled up as I listened to Ronnie talk about how hard she had worked to get through college. I could hardly speak, and soon I was almost too ashamed to look her in the eye. For the rest of the...
Thursday morning her alarm beeped away and she shut it off roughly and flopped onto me naked, her arms sleepy and hot and her lips on my neck. After a couple of minutes I said, "You have to go to work." She groaned. She hugged me. She lay still. I kissed her shoulder. "Hey." She sighed and raised her head and looked at me, her eyes thinking, thinking, and she swept her hair back on both sides. Then her eyes looked at mine and she whispered, "All right." I started the coffee. I had...
For several weeks I saw Martha Jane only now and then as she walked across the grounds on her way in or out of the project. She caught sight of me once from a couple of blocks away and smiled and waved and yelled Hi. Meanwhile, it seems my Mom and future step-dad had gone through a brief spat. They started dating again a few weeks later. But my sitter was not Martha Jane. In fact, I had two different sitters at first. The first must not have been very interesting, as I have absolutely no...
Wednesday, Ronnie's half-day off, Ronnie met me at her apartment. I gave her Anita's birthday for a chart. Ronnie told me that she couldn't borrow the calculator from the office, so I'd have to help her work out the numbers using manual tables that came with her books. It was a pain in the neck. I spent more than half an hour calculating the figures, and another half hour checking them. Ronnie lounged on her sofa, watching me as I bent forward over her coffee table, working. She said,...
Monday. Monday of my last week in New York. I awoke with Martha and her alarm. While she was in the bathroom I was in the kitchen with a big towel wrapped around my waist, getting the coffee started and filling a sink with soapy water to clean up last night's coffee and cake dishes. While I stood waiting for the sink to fill, I thought: What the hell should I do today, find something interesting or just go crazy waiting for the week to pass? While I had my forearms sunk into the soapsuds,...
We strolled down East 86th Street. It was getting late, yet I was amazed that the traffic and the people on Lexington Avenue were as frenzied as they were during the day. Martha led me to a newsstand so besieged with customers that we had to push our way through to get a copy of the Sunday Times. "This is not the way you get it in Memphis," she said, offering me the hefty newspaper with both hands as if it were a precious gift. She saw my eyes bulge: the complete New York Times, including...
We dropped by Martha's place, changed clothes, and then spent the rest of the afternoon on the Staten Island Ferry. Martha showed me what she called the "expected tourist attractions" -- the Statue of Liberty, Wall Street, City Hall. As dusk was underway we walked uptown toward Greenwich Village, where she took me to a hairdresser for a very expensive haircut. Gradually, Martha cheered up. Gradually, I became more sullen. The city was dark. We strolled through New York University and...
Saturday. Rain. Saturday morning Martha and I took a shower together. When she shut off the water I put my arms around her and we stood hugging in the shower stall. She said, "We can't start anything right now. I have to see my gynecologist at ten." "I'm not starting anything. Just hugging." She snuggled closer. "What are you going to do today?" "Pack some. I guess." "Sounds depressing. Why don't you wait, and let me help you?" "I have to get used to the idea." She...
I lay on my side with Martha spooned behind me. Gazing out the small window that overlooked East 87th Street, I gradually returned to earth. I was startled at how quickly and completely I had fucked and climaxed. In trying to recall each detail of the past few moments, I felt I'd lost all control and all awareness; the whole event seemed blurred. Martha slid a hand down my arm and up again, as if learning anew the textures her fingers found there. She said softly, "I missed cumming like...
That was a sensuous summer. Mom's relationship apparently ran smoothly for a while and my stepdad-to-be took her out infrequently but regularly. Often it was on weekends when I was with my grandparents or godparents. But now and then they went out on a Friday, and I could be with Martha Jane. Each time, Martha Jane would show up on time and we'd fix dinner for each other, clean up, do a little homework, and then undress each other in the tiny bedroom. Soon the room echoed with our sighs and...
Perhaps, when I awoke groggily at my Mama Rose's house that Saturday morning, July 2, 1955, I had been dreaming of my father while asleep in that room. I had little else to hold before me as a model of what I might do and how I might behave when I went to Union Station later that day to say goodbye to Martha. I wondered how Steven Senior might handle it: he was a hero, a winner of the Air Medal, two Purple Hearts and the Silver Star. He had faced the terror of war with the Nazis twenty-two...
In December 1953 my Mom married and my stepfather moved into the apartment temporarily while they searched for a new house. The ceremony was little more than a small tea party in a room in the reception house at St. Mary's Church. This being my mother's second marriage, she didn't think a large wedding would be appropriate, and my conservative step-dad agreed. They took over the old bedroom, and I slept on the pullout sofa in the living room. Business problems at my stepdad's supermarket...
Candy met Martha at a friend's party. She had noticed Martha moving around the room. Everyone else seemed to notice Martha too. It was, she mused, not only because of Martha's generous proportions -- but also because of her easy laugh, booming voice and the animated way she flung her arms and head when chatting. You could see Martha was accustomed to being noticed and she did nothing to make herself any less the centre of attention by her style of dress, which was a loud floral clingy number...
Sunday. I woke at seven. I left Martha sleeping and donned my new-made cutoff shorts and my new running shoes and I jogged to the newsstand on 86th Street. But I was too rested and energized to stop for the Times. Something got into me; I kept jogging, picking up the pace and heading for Central Park. I zoomed into the park and across the small meadow beside the Metropolitan Museum. The few people who were about ignored me, and I chided myself for worrying in the first place that people in...
It was very early Thursday morning and a woman on the airplane who sat next to me and looked like my mother was smiling at me and asking, "You're going back?" I smiled at her politely and said "Yes." She said, "Oh, you'll love it in Memphis," and I smiled politely and shook my head and said, "No, New York." She said "But we're going to Memphis." I said "No. New York." I rested my head against the padded headrest. I closed my eyes, and it was just as it was when I was on the...
I had a bad cold. It was just before Thanksgiving. Wearing a heavy brown flannel robe, I sat up against the headboard as Martha Jane settled near me on the bed and sat Indian-style. In her hand she had a bottle of green cough syrup, a bottle of cod liver oil, and a bottle of ear drops. "Okay, hon, time for dessert." "That's not dessert," I complained. "This is dessert for sick folks." She shimmied her hips into the mattress to get comfy. "Now, let's see, what does this say... ?"...
Any predictions, premonitions or expectations I might have had about New York were quickly and unexpectedly undone and/or displaced at every turn. Life in Memphis, like its population, was fairly uniform and predictable. Not so in New York. Martha turned out to be a pretty decent companion during the week, despite an occasionally cranky outburst. If Ronnie was in the throes of her period, she showed little sign of it; she was as eventempered as ever at our two lunch dates during the week....
Sunday. I had been in New York six weeks and two days. Sunday morning Martha and I went to an Appalachian Arts exhibit at the Metropolitan, and late Sunday afternoon we went with Ronnie to see an old Greta Garbo movie at the Museum of Modern Art. Then we went to a diner. For the first time, as we ate, Martha asked me about the party. She said, "It must have been great. He was out until two o'clock." Ronnie said, "Two o'clock? Hey, hey. And how did Anita hold up?" I said flatly,...
The week preceding Martha Jane's last weekend of packing before she left her charming apartment near Memphis State was a long, numbing one. As far as I knew, it would be my last chance to spend time with her before she moved to East Memphis under her new stepdad's watchful eye. Although we spoke by telephone briefly during the week and set the schedule for my Saturday visit, there was no mention of what might or might not happen after that weekend. I was too fearful of bringing it up. When...
Her eyes and her words left me speechless. I cleared my throat and concealed my state of shock, nodding firmly to signal my acceptance of what she had said. I shuffled nervously. She waited, staring at me almost apprehensively. She seemed at once both resolute and vulnerable. She said softly, "I hope... I didn't blow your fuses." I said with a brittle smile, "They're not fuses. They're circuit breakers. They reset after a few minutes." She smiled sweetly. "Have I... burst all your...
Neither my parents nor Martha Jane's mother were home that week. For the first time, Martha Jane slept overnight with me. When I woke, earlier than usual, the morning sun was just peeking over the rooftops of the project buildings beyond mine. Two radiant shafts of sunlight poured through the bedroom's double window and across the middle of the bed. Martha Jane was not with me, but I knew where she was by the muffled sound of running water behind the closed bathroom door. I could not have...
I sat dumbfounded while viewing my first foreign language film, so amazed, that at first I didn't feel Martha nudge me with her elbow in the dark theater until she did so insistently. I turned to her. She wiggled her fingers near my face. Understanding, I took her hand in mine. She smiled contentedly and hugged our clasped hands against her thigh over her skirt. She rubbed my arm cozily, and turned back to the movie. I had never seen such a film. The movie was "Bicycle Thief," which had...
I blinked. The room was black. The candle was out. Vaguely, I heard distant sparrows. Vaguely, I felt a warm, small, still hand resting on my cheek, barely touching my skin. I saw lips near my face, and a face so close to mine that my sleepy eyes couldn't focus on it. Before I saw any features or sensed any other signals, I knew the face and hand were Martha's. I was on my back but leaning slightly to my right, my right arm slung across the bed toward the night table at the right of the...
Ronnie said to me as I sat nude on a three-legged stool and she started drawing, "Martha won't let me draw her, you know." I asked "Why not?" "She sat for me about the time we first met. When we were roommates. And she had such a classic, gorgeous figure, I told her she just had to pose nude for me, just *had* to. Or in a swim suit or something." "She wouldn't?" Ronnie sighed, erasing something. "No." I said, trying to balance myself with one foot on the floor and my other...
Monday morning, Martha went back to the same old grind. After she left for work I went back to my same old grind, jogging to Central Park and hanging a few chin-ups from a tree limb. I was closer to Memphis, no closer to staying in New York or finding ways to get back more often, no nearer to a conclusion about my feelings for Martha or Ronnie. I did have cash in my pocket and a bundle of traveler's checks I'd earned from posing. While I was cleaning up at Martha's, Ronnie called on the...
Saturday, August 24, 1957. I woke up at six. Martha slept like a log beside me. Even after a good night's sleep, I was grumpy; I was ready for life to ease up. Nothing was turning out the way I wanted it to. Two weeks left in New York. I had a hard run through Central Park, trying to run past unease and frustration but feeling it keeping pace with me. When I arrived at Martha's I was covered with sweat. Martha was in the kitchen shower. She swept aside the shower curtain and peered out...
One day in early October when I came home very late from school, Mom said as I entered the kitchen, "Oh, there you are. You missed Martha Jane's call. I told her I didn't know where you were. I said tonelessly, "Okay." I opened the refrigerator, looking for something to eat. Mom stood with her hands in the dishwater. "That reminds me, she called a couple of weeks ago, and you weren't here then, either. I guess I forgot all about it." I took a milk carton out of the refrigerator....
Saturday. In my mind, it was Anita Day. Anita didn't attend the Saturday class. I called her on the telephone the day before. She said she had a busy schedule and wouldn't be at Fiore's, but I was to meet her for the party with her friends at her godparents' home. My exhausting Friday night with Martha and Ronnie had me in a calm mood for handling myself in a sexually civilized manner with Anita. In fact, I found myself hiding out again when I met Anita and we strolled to the expensive...
I had a few disastrous flirtations. The Brothers held a sophomore class prom. Those who couldn't find a date could get one through Brother Lawrence's contacts with the Catholic girls' schools in town. At first, my sister was going to fix me up with a blind date. After meeting several of her girlfriends I decided I'd be better off with pot luck through Brother Lawrence. How bad could it be, I told myself, after some of my dates in New York? But trying it was. Being driven to and from the...
During the week, Ronnie set me up with two posing assignments. They went well, although I found myself very restless while trying to hold a single pose for more than fifteen minutes. I posed twice for the same artist, a middle-aged woman in Greenwich Village whose apartment walls were literally flooded with drawings, paintings, and photographs by herself and others. She seemed quite pleased with me, and she gave me some pointers on how to promote myself and register with various services. I...
When I opened my eyes Saturday morning the sun was shining with a brightness that told me it had been daylight for hours. The little fan on the window whirred steadily, streaming air toward the bed. I glanced at the clock. Eight twenty. Martha was half on me, using my chest for a pillow. I stroked her hair. She didn't stir. I kissed her hair and caressed her shoulder. On my other side, Ronnie had turned away and slept curled on her side, her tush against my hip, my arm still cradling her...
Martha Jane and my mother helped me walk into our apartment, where they settled me face up on the sofa and placed a wet rag over my face. Mom called the relative who lived closest to us in town, my Grandma Rose Ricci, to hurry over in their car and get me to nearby St. Joseph's Hospital. But Grandma Rose was too distraught to drive and she called my Aunt Frances, who in turn was so distraught she called my Aunt Josephine, who in turn was also so distraught she called her niece, my cousin...
Friday. Martha woke with a start at a quarter to seven. "Damn! The alarm didn't go off!" She ran into the bathroom. I shook my head and rubbed my eyes. It occurred to me that I had not changed Martha's alarm back to its regular wake-up time after setting the alarm for Fiore's appointment the day before. Crap! As if I hadn't already disrupted Martha's existence! I ran into the kitchen and got the coffee started and made toast. In the bathroom, Martha was on the rampage, dropping...
Mom convulsed into a tight ball on her side and retched feebly, making a small sticky red stain in the kleenex she held to her mouth. Then she relaxed with a pitiful moan. "What's wrong?" I asked, going swiftly to her side of the bed. She licked her lips clean and tried to catch her breath. Not getting an answer, I raised my voice fearfully. "What's wrong? What happened?" "I'm sick, Speedy. It came on... all of a sudden." "What's wrong? When did it start?" "Called your...
At the time, most of this went right past my very young level of awareness--but I clearly understood that she was troubled. I knew that I somehow had to stay with her and believe in her and help her in some way. I wanted to bring indescribable pleasure and comfort to her. She was making me feel loved and tickly now, and I wanted desperately to do the same for her. I found the folds of her skirt and tried to gather them up, but had a hard time; my hands were too small. She stepped back, not...
She led me to the bedroom and I jumped onto the mattress, as I usually did, and waited for her to turn out the light and fluff up the pillows, as she usually did. But this time she stood very quietly in the dark near the edge of the bed. She took off her bra and panties. I had seen her bra-less often enough, but now she was totally nude. I remember how she looked, her smoky green eyes and frizzy auburn hair reflecting the moonlight. She was slim but not skinny, slightly curvy in the upper...
CHAPTER 19B: STARTING A NEW LIFE AGAIN, PART 2At the end of the meal Tim whispers in my ear and I nod. “Of course, Sir.” I excuse myself and suggest that Mom join me at the ladies room. While washing our hands, I look into the mirror at Mom. She smiles back to me. I say, “Have you enjoyed the evening?”“You are so fortunate to have a friend like him, Michele. He is so charming. And handsome.”“We have him as a friend, Mom. Now that you are a part of us he will consider you part of the...
Twenty teens gathered in the small theater in Anita's building. They were a very mixed group from all over the metropolitan area, some of them rich kids that had attended Anita's earlier party, others were apparently not so rich. A very democratic crowd. I was surprised to see a couple of black couples, an unlikely presence in Memphis. Both couples appeared to be from overseas. Maury sat down front with his coterie of seven or eight admirers, all of them in suits. Chris sat in the farthest...
I whispered, "Let's do this for a while. Just this. Okay?" She swallowed again. "Yes." For a while we silently enjoyed touching and stroking each other with no particular goal in mind other than pleasing ourselves and discovering all the things about us that had changed. As we touched and played we talked. I told her about the plays I'd done, how movies and photography and history had captured so much of my life. She told of her classes, her work, what she had learned. I didn't...
We reached the top of the stairs. She stood in the middle of the living room and looked about. She sighed downheartedly, "I'm so tired of this." Suddenly she started crying; she frowned and then squinted hard, and her eyes closed and squeezed out small pearly tears that tumbled quickly down her cheeks. "I'm so tired of this," she wept, and covered her face quickly with her hands. I went to her and held her shoulders, letting her lean against me with her face in my chest. For a minute...
During the night I awoke twice, finding it dark and still outside. Each time, I felt creepy and giddy and unable to define the vexing nervousness in my legs and chest. When I awoke the third time, it was daylight. Martha was walking into the bedroom in her heels. Dressed and ready for work, she came to my side of the bed. She asked, "What on earth were you dreaming about all night?" I turned onto my back, rubbing my bleary eyes. "I was dreaming?" She sat on the bed and rested a hand on...
The birthday party went on and on, with no surprises disturbing the world of my dead father's family, nothing changing, nothing learned, nothing decided. Soon everyone was hugging and kissing and saying goodbye. During the party I longed to be anywhere but there. I spent the whole time waiting for next Saturday to arrive. This world was a far cry from the world of Martha Jane, an eternity away from our secrets in the dark, of naked flesh reveling in affection and pleasure, of whispered...