“Boy, you better quit it,” I say. “Don't start nothing you can't finish.”
I can't believe it when he comes over to the sink and starts touching my hair. I mean, shit, the only thing between us and the rest of the party, besides our marriages, is a slising glass door. I am torn between feelings of shock and the tingles of anticipation spreading over my body like ripples in a lake, slow and steady, one after another. Then he grabs a handful of hair at the nape of my neck. I try tko move, but I am in a trance. It is as if he is effortlessly taking me to the edge regardless of the consequences.
When Sam walks into the kitchen, I think Hampton will let go, but he just keeps his hold on me and asks Sam, “Man, doesn't she have some pretty-ass hair?”
Sam walks right over and grabs a handful for himself. “Pretty ass. Pretty hair. Pretty everything.”
Sam is mature and reliable, and I admire that in him. He reminds me so much of my Rodney in that way. I really expect
him to bring the whole situation back to home base, but he is open in a way I hadn't noticed before this moment. Suddenly he seems intensely sexual and mischievous. I blame it on the champagne. It makes everybody so lusciously edible and suckable to me, so I'm thinking it probably has him a little twisted, too.
“Uhâ¦fellas. What's going on?”
“If you have to ask,” Sam says.
“Well, I mean, did I miss a meeting?” I ask.
“We took a vote,” Hampton says.
“Yes, and we decided it was time to take the game to another level,” Sam says.
“I see. And when was somebody going to ask me if I was down with this?”
“You saying you're not?” Hampton asks.
I laugh a little and turn to look at Hampton. He is so lovely. His eyes are so certain. I can't understand how we have come to this, but I am open to the experience. I only worry that our marriages and our friendships will suffer if we take the game too far.
“Who came up with the game?” I ask. “Chloe?”
“Actually, it was Rosanna's idea,” Hampton answers.
“Rosanna, huh?” I say. “What's the object of the game?”
“To see who the best lover is without fucking,” Hampton says.
“Oh? I like the sound of that,” I say. “What's considered fucking?”
“If you have to ask,” Sam says again, and we all laugh.
I look out on the deck to see if we have become the cause for a pause, but to my surprise my husband is standing on the deck between Chloe and Rosanna, holding each around her waist and taking turns giving and receiving what looks like very sensuous kisses. For a moment, I am filled with instant fury because I know how delicious his kisses can be, but I let
it go. I have my back to two irresistibly unavailable men, and they have me by the hair, standing against a kitchen sink full of sudsy water and slippery champagne flutes. All I can think of is floating in the ocean under the stars, surrendering myself to the rhythm of her waves and tasting the salty sweetness of her waters as she rocks me backward and forward into ecstasy.
Hampton takes his free hand and lifts my skirt over my ass and suggests we take things out on the deck to join the rest of the party. I push his hand away and smooth my skirt back down. The three of us file out the door. Once we are out there I lean back against the wooden rail. Rosanna comes closer and says, “It's about time we got this party started. I didn't think we were ever going to cross this godforsaken sexual divide.”
Sam starts toward me, maybe for a kiss. I can't tell.
“Slow your roll, Sam. Damn,” Rosanna says. “You're too tied up in all those layers.” She is looking at me.
“I'm not taking my clothes off, Rosanna. This shit has gotten wild as hell.”
“And why not?”
“Everybody else on this deck is fully clothed. Y'all are not gonna have me out here buck naked to be eaten alive by mosquitoes.”
“Somebody get the citronella torches going,” Rosanna says.
Etta James is singing “Don't Explain.” We are face to face in the flattetring light of floating candles, stars, and a misty moon. Rosanna is seducing me with her ability to make things happen, with her knack of getting people to do thingsâher way. Rodney, Sam, and Hampton are lighting torches when Rosanna asks me to take off my blouse.
“Rosannaâreally now!”
“Just take it off. You can keep your bra on. It's just like a bikini top.”
“I'll still be the only one taking anything off.”
“Chloe, take off your shirt,” Rosanna says.
“OK, but you know me: Once the bra is off, the party is on,” Chloe says.
“That's the idea,” Rosanna says.
“Well, if I had tits like yours, Chloe, I wouldn't need much convincing my damn self,” I say.
“Tits aren't the only thing a woman has under her shirt, Meena,” Rosanna says.
She had a point. Was she going to pull her own shirt off tonight? Had she come to terms with the loss of her own breasts to that extent? On film is one thing. In person is another. Thinking of our circumstances in comparison made me feel vain and silly. I was worried about nipples that didn't exactly point to the clouds anymore, and she was as flat as the day she was born and had no nipples at all.
“Why is it that every time I'm anywhere near you, I end up naked, one way or another?” I ask.
“Because you're so fucking beautiful and you don't know it,” Rosanna says. “I would leave you alone if you would see yourself as you truly are. My work here would be done.”
“Fucking drama queen. Rosanna's missionâto make all of her friends feel beautiful,” I say.
“Well,” she replies, “it ain't bad work if you can get it.”
“Just the shirt, Rosanna. I'm not playing,” I say as I begin to unbutton.
“Good girl,” she says.
“Yeah, good girl,” Hampton says. “I've learned to just do as I'm told. I don't know why you try so hard to resist.”
When my shirt is off, I feel silly but daring. My husband, Rosanna, Hampton, Chloe, and Sam are forming a semicircle around the place where I am standing against the banister. Chloe has loosed her floating breasts. We have all seen those things so many times, they are almost an uneventful unveiling, but still quite amazing.
“Now you,” I say to Rosanna.
“Me?”
“Unless you don't want to,” I say, giving her some room to choose.
“I don't care. I just don't want anyone to get freaked out, and shit,” Rosanna says.
“I can't speak for anybody else, but I think you're right when you say there's more under a woman's shirt than just tits,” I say.
“Meena, you got me on that one,” Rosanna says and lifts her yellow, sleeveless sweater over her head, revealing a completely flat chest and an equally flat and amazingly sculpted six-pack.
We are in our circle, a circle of friends and lovers, husbands and wives, three bare-chested women. In the light of the fire, stars, and moon, the scars where once there were breasts are like faded magnolias. There is nothing traumatic about the map of her journey. In reality, what her struggle with cancer has left behind is a kind of proof of couraged. True beauty. The shots in the exhibit had seemed stark, barren. Here, in the flesh, there was warmth and abundant life.
“Well, damn,” I say. “You weren't lying when you said you had been working out.”
“Word,” Hampton says. “She gets up at the crack of dawn every day and hits the road for a five-mile run and then hits the floor for at least a half hour of crunches.”
“Well, what about you, Hampton?” Chloe asks.
“What
about
me?” he replies.
“Don't the fellas have anything to show?”
“What you looking for?” Sam asks.
“They want to see some strong backs and big arms,” Rodney answers.
“You got that right,” I say, “and plenty more, so take it off.”
When everyonfe has taken off at least one article of clothing, we are standing still, just staring at one another. “What now?” I ask.
“Well, that depends,” Rosanna says. “Do you want to give or receive first?”
“Shit. I think we all know the answer to that one,” I say.
Rodney approaches me, and Rosanna quickly pulls him back to his place in the circle.
“Not you,” Rosanna says. “You're her husband. You'd know exactly what to do to make her come right away. It has to be someone else.”
Sam and Hampton both approach, and I am nervous. I don't want to appear uptight or inexperienced. I want to relax and just enjoy whatever is about to happen. Sam turns me around to face the railing, pulls my panties to the side, and smacks my fleshy behind a little to make it shake just before he puts two fingers between my thighs. Try as I might to hold onto my composure, my thighs are trembling. I am already slippery wet.
Then Hampton squats down, opens my legs, and licks my panties with his stiff tongue. When he finds my clitoris, he flicks at it until I squirm. Sam takes my chin and turns my head so that he can kiss me. He parts my lips with his tongue, and Hampton removes my panties, moves back in to devour me from the back, and we are caught up in the undercurrent of the slowest, deepest three-way kiss I could ever have imagined.
Then Rosanna grabs Rodny's crotch and undoes his pants. Within seconds she is sucking his already bulging penis. When I check on Rodney again, he and Chloe are fully engaged in a 69. I'm a little jealous, but I don't want to seem like a hypocrite, so instead of protesting, I suggest that our threesome move closer to join the twosome.
When Rodney turns his face from Chloe's bush long enough to notice our arrival, I am relieved to see that he has a
smile on his wet face that tells me he's been doing just fine, but he's happy to see me.
I take one of Chloe's nipples between my index finger and thumb and begin to roll it back and forth with a little pressure.
“What happened to Rosanna?” I ask.
“Here I am,” Rosanna answers. She is coming back on deck with her camera.
“Oh, hell no,” I say. “Not the camera.”
“Relax,” Rosanna says and puts the camera on the side table near the door. “We're all friends here. I won't take any pictures below the neck. I promise. Plus, I'm not ready to start shooting yet, anyway.”
“What the fuck,” Chloe says. “I want to see my whole body.” She laughs and gets us all relaxed again.
“Well, not me,” I say. “I hope you don't think you're putting this shit up in some gallery.”
“I don't care either way,” Hampton says. “I think that would be funky. Pornographic maybe, but funky as hell.”
“Me too,” Rodney says.
“Oh, yeah?” I ask.
“Word. I don't have anything to hide,” he answers.
“Oh, word? Let's see if you still talking shit opening night,” I say. “Well, I guess it's just me and Sam from the neck up.”
“That's all good for you, Meena,” Sam says, “but Rosanna can take whatever shots she wants. I wanna see this freaky shit on film. Shit, somebody get the video camera. I want to take a few copies of the photos to work.”
“You
would
want that shit, Sam,” Rosanna says. “But I'm taking face shots only, and it's only for our private viewing, so everybody just get back to work.”
Rosanna takes Chloe's other nipple, and we twist and pull at her firm breasts and watch them snap back with a bounce. We delight in the silky, salty softness of our bodies.
“I sure do miss my breasts,” Rosanna says.
“I miss mine, too,” I say. We sigh and move on.
“Y'all can have mine anytime you want them,” Chloe says.
Hampton starts rubbing my clit from the back while he massages his penis, and Sam follows his lead and gets in position behind Rosanna. When we swich up, I take Hampton's long, brown, throbbing penis into my mouth and begin to suck deeply.
Rosanna gets to work on me with her wild tongue while I work on her husband, and I am thrilled to be sandwiched between two of the sexiest people I know. Rodney and Sam double-team Chloe, and she looks like she is in heaven.
Before long, Rosanna is teaching Chloe and me some new tricks as she focuses in on our faces with her digital camera. We are riding shins and grinding sidesplits. The boys are like misguided, frustrated missiles by now. I feel hands and tongues and fingers all over my body, and I am touching, rubbing, tweaking, sucking, grinding, licking, and kissing all at once. It is an exquisite overload of all my sexual senses.
One orgasm after another, we are climaxing, coming, getting our shit off, exploding, imploding, trembling, moaning, groaning, sighing, and singing ourselves into exhaustion. One-by-one, we each start to trail off for a little space, a smoke, or a drink. I am spent. When all the sucking and licking and kissing and hand jobs are finished, Rosanna gets her tripod, attaches the camera, and sets the timer.
Everyone is buttoning buttons and tucking in shirts and pulling down hiked skirts. Then I close my eyes and say to the group, “He's sexier than I ever imagined.”
Then Hampton closes his eyes and says, “Every sound she utters, every gesture she makes embodies a sexual and spiritual revolution.”
“My sentiments exactly,” Rosanna says. “Now get into a group.”
We get in a group, and Rosanna runs over to get in the picture.
After the photo is taken, Rosanna suggests we go in and see what she's got on disc. We all gather around the computer screen, and she pops in the disc. Rosanna had kept her promise. Our faces, one by one, appear, spreading themselves across the screen, unrecognizably distorted into otherworldly beings of pure expression like the faces of infants. We have become physically manifested emotions ranging from intense fury and agonizing sadness to drunken elation and soulful satisfaction. We watch in silence.