21. Maria #2
“Leave it, if you still want it on,” I say. “Trust me, after over fifty years living in flimsy apartments in Brooklyn, with only paper-thin walls between us and the neighbors, Papa can sleep through almost anything you can throw at him.
Abe nods and turns away from the radio, but Regan reaches across and switches it off anyway.
“Hey, I was listening to that?—”
“Yeah? Well, I’ve got a better idea.” Regan stands in front of us, grinning mischievously.
“I hope you don’t mind me saying so,” he says. “But you lot stink of barbecue sauce, spare ribs and charcoal fumes. It’s quite disgusting, to someone with delicate sensibilities like me.”
He makes a comically exaggerated gesture of holding his nose.
“Well…” growls Grant, bunching his fists warningly. “Perhaps a swollen nose will sort that problem out for you.”
“Perhaps,” laughs Regan, dodging easily out of Grant’s reach. “But my idea’s much better.”
“What’s your idea, Regan?” asks Abe, quizzically.
“My idea… is that we all go for a midnight swim. It’s a hot night, and I’ve been sweating all day in these clothes. I don’t know about you lot, but a nice swim in the lake is exactly what will set me right. Who’s in?”
“Damn right!” Abe’s all for it. Grant hesitates.
“What about Maria?”
“Maria’ll manage. She ain’t made of glass or something. She’ll survive.”
“No. I mean, she’s… you know… a woman.”
“Ding dong—and the prize goes to Grant Naylor for his scientific advances in human anatomy. Well done, Boss. What of it?”
“Well, she can’t just take off her clothes in front of us, she’ll?—”
“Oh, stop being such a wuss. We’ll look the other way. When she’s in the water it won’t matter.”
“Maria?”
The three men look at me. Like Regan, I have been traipsing up and down the mountainside in these jeans all day, then cooking and eating the barbecue. And the night is glorious. Still, warm—hot almost. Not a breeze stirs. A dip in the lake sounds… delicious.
“Alright, let’s do it.”
“Woohoo! Last one in’s a dumb-ass called Abe.” And as he says the last part, he trips the big man neatly over his leg, sending Abe crashing to the ground.
With that, he and Grant are scampering, whooping loudly, towards the far end of the yard, where they turn onto the short track that runs directly to the small lake that sits there, hidden to visitors because it’s on the other side of the house.
Abe sits up, shaking his head, brushing off dirt from his shirt and trousers. I offer him my hand which—after a moment’s hesitation—he takes, but which he puts none of his weight behind as lifts himself up from the floor.
We remain hand in hand as we head across the yard and turn onto the track, following the two laughing, yelling boys, the moment feeling tender, and warm.
“Remind me to get that asshole back.” He mutters to me darkly, and I glance up at him, worried. But thankfully he’s smiling, and just winks back at me. “Don’t worry, Maria, I’ll let him live…” I breathe out, not having realized I’d been holding it.
“Phew!” I say.
“…probably.” He concludes.
I decide the best way to handle the nudity is simply not to make a scene about it, and just get undressed normally, though I’ll admit I don’t linger.
As soon as my clothes are off and in a tidy heap a safe distance up the sandy shore, I make a dash for the water, running until the water comes up to my knees, then diving forwards with a scream of shock as the coolness of the water hits me.
I rise to the surface, huffing and panting, my legs desperately circling until I remember how shallow it is, and that I can stand on the bottom.
Feeling slightly foolish for almost losing control, I push off with my feet and dipping my head down below the waterline again, I swim several paces underwater, coming up blowing and puffing like a herd of hippos.
Well, I never promised I was graceful in the water.
We didn’t have a swimming pool at my state school, so Papa had paid to take me to a few private swimming lessons when I was twelve.
He’d said that it was an important skill to learn, and that all Italians were naturally good swimmers, but I was hopeless.
It didn’t matter, though. By the end of it I could swim, even if badly, and Papa was satisfied that I wouldn’t drown if I ever went in accidentally.
No doubt he’d gone without a few dinners for me on that occasion, though of course I hadn’t realized it at the time.
The water tingles against my skin, and I wade out towards the center until it’s over my waist. The ground underneath is pleasant and sandy. The water is cool, but after the first shock, my body soon adapts, and it feels wonderful, lapping against my skin.
The last of the sunlight starts to fade away in golden oranges, peaches, pinks and reds.
Over to the east, the moon has risen, casting its faint, silver aura over everything it touches, and leaving darker shadows amongst the rocks and trees.
A startled water fowl of some kind lets loose with a loud quacking and frantic-sounding splashing over on the far shore.
Again I push off from the bottom with my feet, this time doing the breast stroke, and making my way towards a little island—no more than a rock really—that one of them appears to be vigorously, noisily and pointlessly defending from the other.
I stop a few feet away from the two men, gripping a low hanging tree branch, content to watch rather than desirous of joining in and no doubt getting upended for my troubles. Abe comes up alongside me.
“You warm enough?” he asks.
“Yeah,” I say. “You?”
“Yeah. We used to come here all the time, in the summer months, anyway. The year we built the place, we were hardly out of it. Funny isn’t it, how you just fall into and then out of some habits?”
“Yeah, I guess it is funny.”
“Felt good, after a hard day’s work. I don’t know why we stopped.”
“Well, you could always start again.”
“I guess we could at that.”
“Abe…”
“What?”
“Nothing.” We stand together in relaxed silence for a moment. Then I hesitantly feel for his hand. “No, it’s not nothing,” I say. “I wanted to say how sorry I am, I wanted you to hear it properly, just the two of us.”
“You don’t have to?—”
“Oh, I know. You’re a good guy, and you’re not expecting anything from me.
I know that, Abe. But you see, it’s not just about you.
It’s about me too. And I like to think I’m a ‘good guy’ too, even if I happen to be a girl, not a boy.
” I turn in the cool water to face him, my other hand reaching for his other hand.
“It’s about making it right… for me, as well as for you. Do you understand?”
In the dusk, I see his silhouetted head nodding.
“I… I think so,” he says, hesitantly. “I think if I was in your position… well, I think I’d want to make it right, too. Not because of the other person, or because they demanded anything or even expected anything. No. Because that’s what I needed to do. For myself.”
“Yes,” I exclaim. “That’s exactly it. I need to make things right. Because if I don’t it will never be right, not properly. Not inside.”
“But… what can make it right?”
“Well…” I blush to my roots. “I don’t want to presume. I mean… no pressure, Abe. But seems to me that the best way—for all of us—is if we were all one family, sort of thing. Papa, of course, and then me, Grant, Regan… and you.”
“Yes, but I don’t understand?—”
I lean forwards and kiss him. Then I step back again. Giving him space.
“Oh,” he says, as if slightly surprised by something. “You mean… that.”
“Yes.”
“I… see.”
“So… will you?” I mean… if you want to, of course.”
“I…” it’s his turn to step forwards this time. Perhaps not trusting to words, he instead picks me up and enfolds me in his huge arms. So strong, so powerful, and yet so gentle at the same time. It’s like I weigh nothing.
Abe simply holds me close, tracing the outline of my back, down across my buttocks, cupping me, holding me.
We kiss. A long, sensual kiss, the wetness of our lips and our faces adding to the sensuality of the kiss itself.
He traces the outline of my teeth with his tongue.
Gentle, probing, exploring. I close my eyes, relax my body entirely, leaving gravity for him to sort out for the two of us.
Letting his strength and assuredness be enough for us both.
He scoots down in the water and lifts me, carrying me a short distance away from the two laughing, playing men, and laying me down, half in the water, half out.
He looks down on my body and for once, for some reason, I don’t feel exposed, or judged.
I just feel… admired, appreciated, cared for.
Like a precious musical instrument of some kind in the hands of its player.
His fingers trace my breasts, his lips moving down to suck at my nipple.
I arch my back at the exquisite feeling, the electrical surge through my body.
My insides are melting away, and there’s nothing I can do.
He goes lower with his hands, to the delicate folds between my legs, so hot and moist, even in the coolness of the lake.
My little nub is stiff and swollen, longing for his touch, and I take his hand and guide it there.
Now he really is playing me. A wonderful song.
A song of love, desire, and need. My heart beats faster, my breathing more ragged.
I roll on top of him, reaching down and behind to find his manhood, stiff, expectant, waiting.
I lift my hips and position myself above him, then with an “Oh!” of pleasure I slide onto him, letting him fill me.
I can feel him twitching inside me.
I raise myself, letting his shaft come half out, before sliding back down to fully envelop him in my warm, silky insides.
This time I stay there, feeling him inside me, wanting him to be there forever.
But then I feel that same feeling—a building, a swelling, a welling up.
A wall of pleasure, so strong it’s almost painful.
I slide up and down, slowly at first, and he holds me tight, kissing my breast, my neck, my nose, my lips.
I close my eyes tight shut, and move faster, rocking backwards and forwards, his shaft buried inside me, and I don’t want this moment to go, but at the same time I can feel it building, building, deep, glowing red hot, pulsating…
demanding. It will not be ignored. It cannot be denied.
Time stands still. We rock backwards and forwards in a gentle rhythm, the water lapping against us as we move.
My eyes are still shut tight. For some reason I feel no inclination to open them.
I feel strong hands on my buttocks, soft lips on my breasts, a tongue at my lips.
Fingers trace my back. I am held and turned, yet still somehow, I am astride Abe.
At least… I think it’s Abe. Abe’s here, I can smell the scent of him.
I can feel his muscles. I know he is beside me, keeping me safe.
But there are other muscles too. Other limbs, other faces.
I am confused, but I am comfortable, so very comfortable.
Whatever is happening, I just let it happen.
I give in to the will of whoever now has me in his arms.
As I ride my unseen partner I cry out, my back arching, my heels digging into the soft sand on either side of him. The orgasm hits me. I throw back my neck, I strain my thighs, squeezing, as the waves of pleasure break over and around me.
And all around me are hands. Lifting me. Holding me, gently massaging and caressing me. Have I died and gone to heaven? No… that’s too cheesy. Heaven won’t be like this… but whatever or wherever this is, it will do just fine for me.
For now, whilst I lie here, warm, protected, nurtured… I am safe.