Chapter Twelve
“Your turn.” Arabella steps out of the water and into her silk robe. She then perches on the edge of the tub while I slide into the hot water. We’re both wearing a hair mask and a face mask. She lights a cigarette; the steam and smoke swirl together and loud French pop music is coming out of the speaker. I sink into the big tub and feel utterly relaxed.
“Okay, lift your leg. I’m going to shave you,” she says.
Look, I know. This bitch is crazy. But I kind of fucking love it. Her chaotic energy is exactly what I need right now. I’ve never had a girls’ night like this; it feels like it’s from the movies.
She’s using a terrifying-looking straight razor to shave my legs, one that she says is the same used on the men of the royal family.
“Nothing gets closer,” she says, when I ask her. “Okay, now stand up, it’s time to do the rest.”
“The rest?”
She gestures, and I realize what she means. “You’re fucking kidding me.”
“Oh, please. Have you ever gotten a wax?”
“Of course, but—”
“It’s the same thing, only better! You’re welcome, by the way!”
I shake my head but start to stand, hesitating still, because I can’t believe she means it. “Seriously?” I ask.
She shifts the cigarette to the corner of her mouth and sits with legs spread wide, like she’s offering a shoe polish. “Go on.”
I stand up. “This is so weird.”
“It’s a bit sensual, isn’t it?” she says. “A nice intimacy to have with friends. Leg on the edge, please.”
I breathe in deeply. “Why do women do this?” I ask. “Why do we feel we have to be completely hairless?”
“No, no,” she says. “It’s nothing like that. It’s just that we need to do what makes us feel as sexy and confident as possible. Head to toe. It may be just your secret, but people can tell when you’re at your best even beneath your clothes. Even if no one ever sees. Although they’d be so lucky.”
I bite my lip and look down. I agree. I love the feeling of just-shaved legs, and I do feel sexier. But this is so weird. But also, kind of…hot in a weird way. Which makes me feel crazier. Like suddenly I’m the one who’s being weird.
“Nearly through,” she says. “You have such a nice pussy.”
She says it so matter-of-factly that I’m taken aback. I laugh. “Thank you?”
She looks up at me. “Do you ever have sex with women?”
The tone of everything suddenly changes a little, and the blood begins rushing hot to my thighs. “Sometimes,” I say.
She smiles at me from her position by my knees. “Maybe it would help you to forget about that man.”
I raise an eyebrow and smile. “Maybe it would.”
She sets down the razor with painfully slow caution as I find myself suddenly wanting her, wishing she wouldn’t take her time.
But she does. She stands up and puts the cigarette out, stepping back against the door, her big, messy bun falling out in tendrils around her ears.
“Turn on the shower,” she says.
I do as she instructs.
Her robe falls to the floor. She’s still damp from her bath. This whole time, her nude body was just hiding away, only barely out of sight.
I see that she has a landing strip, identical to the one she’s given me. She also has perfect, round breasts that are bigger than I thought they were. She hides them well in her leotards. Some girls are just blessed with the kind that can hide away or be shown off like this.
She steps into the clawfoot tub, which has a showerhead on the wall above, and turns me around so my hair stays out of the water. “Let me rinse the mask off your face. Keep your hair out of it. Let the conditioner sit a little longer.”
I smile. “Only a girl would say something like that.”
She bites her lip and I let the water run over my face. She uses her fingers to get off the rest of the cream and then says, “Okay,” when it’s gone.
She reaches out of the shower and grabs her glass of champagne and hands me mine. We drink them, and then she takes the glasses, puts them down, and puts her mouth on mine.
Her mouth is cold at first, from the drink, but as our tongues meet, soft and delicate but urgent, we create a heat between us.
It’s been a while since I’ve done something like this. With Jordan, it was love. It was different. It was deep. It was meaningful.
But there’s something about sex just for the sake of sex that is its own kind of special.
My hands run over her body as it grows warmer and wetter from the steam. We’re about the same height, so when she moves even closer, our breasts press against each other’s, her hard nipples matching up with mine.
I let out a moan as her lips travel down the side of my neck. One hand is on my jaw, the other on my waist.
The water dampens her hair and I undo her hair tie.
She says, “Only a girl could do that without tying it all in knots.”
She kisses me and I can’t believe how good she tastes. The champagne and cigarettes and the lip stain from earlier have all somehow combined into something so delicious that I find myself desperately wanting more, more , more .
Her hand travels between my legs. She groans. “It feels even better than it looks,” she says. “You’re so warm and wet. Oh…yes, baby. I just felt you get tighter. You’re so sexy, fuck .”
She says this last part into my mouth as her tongue licks my lips and mine finds hers.
Her fingers feel so good. I start to breathe more heavily and she says, “I wonder if you taste as good as you feel.”
She drops to her knees while I stay standing, sinking into the still-full tub beneath us. It’s draining through the hole in the side, but staying filled almost to the brim.
Her mouth on my clit has me immediately let out a cry of desperate, greedy desire. The heat of it, the accuracy of her aim. The softness of her lips.
I get close, put my hand on the back of her neck as I grind her closer, closer into me, and then…
The wave of pleasure washes over me.
“Now, come here,” she says, pulling me down into the water with her.
I kiss her and she tastes like me, which is strangely intoxicating. I touch her and she lets out a deep, carnal sound of pleasure. We cannot get enough of each other, and we’re both drenched in water and each other. The sound of Film Noir’s “Prends la pierre” plays out of the speaker, seeming to set the tempo and tone of our connections. She climbs on top of me in the water and slides her leg beneath mine, so that our landing strips are right up against each other.
It feels amazing, and I’m still tingling from finishing as hard as I did. This time I slide my fingers into her. She cries out for more. I thrust harder, then she looks me in the eye and says, “More than two, more than two, give me your fist.”
I don’t hesitate, though I’ve never done it before. My hand is small, but it’s enough. After only a moment of me fisting her, she lets out a deep scream and calls out something in Spanish that I don’t understand. I don’t need to in order to know what it means.
We both catch our breath, her leaning back against the side of the tub.
When we can both breathe, she looks at me and then laughs and splashes me. “What a fucking mess!”
Both of us shampoo and condition, then rinse off and get out. “Don’t worry about the water,” she says, as I step through the one inch of pooled water on the tile. “I’ll clean it up.”
“I’ll get some towels for it,” I say, opening the door, both of us walking out of the steam and into the hallway in fluffy white towels around our heads and bodies.
“I think the steam was really good for that hair mask,” she’s saying, when her face falls. I look where her gaze has landed. It’s Cynthia.
“Oh, fuck,” says Arabella. “Thia, what are you doing here?”
Cynthia starts spewing out angry Spanish, and I feel suddenly very guilty and very weird. I thought it was just a little fun. Just a little distraction from Jordan. But now I have a sinking feeling that I don’t think Jordan would think of it like that, just as I don’t think Cynthia is either. I slip into my bare room and curl up on the air mattress.
What the hell am I doing?