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By Galadrial Date: 2002 Mar 01 Comment on this Work [[2002.03.01.16.14.25567]] |
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Indian summer wistful warm, balmy days, cooler nights chasing the green from the trees and leaving an autumnal prism in the small park in the town center. He comes as always, the chair laden with easel, a battered thermos a paint stained wooden box--- and maybe an apple or two. He pushes smoothly at the wheels with arms grown strong and wiry--- the waist tapering in contrast you could see those arms execute a perfect iron cross and he's learned to forgive the ain't-it-a-damned-shame smiles people turn his way. His life is simpler now---- and he could get the motorized chair, but that is being a slave to technology. The kind you self propel cuts sharper turns and just don't command pity--- something he learned not to need. He goes to the Park in the Fall for the band of stately elms that remind him of the park of his youth where the trick was to rise early on parade day hit the corner bakery as it opened snag some doughnuts still warm enough to make the jelly runny then climb one of the trees to wait for the music, the old guys, the fire company the ladies auxiliary and the school band with the pretty majorettes in white calf boots. He paints more than the trees and the locals will nose past, comment and scurry off smiling sort of--- like he's got something they might catch. And the unwritten rule is that no one looks at his legs. No looking down on the unemployed, he quips---half to himself------- and is stunned by a laugh. She's back.... Half a dozen times now--- at first she hung back like the rest, but each time she drew closer, drawn by a profile--- and something that happens to his face when the painting thing catches him. Once or twice, she's actually spoken to him, but he's never heard her laugh and the sound felt like the Indian summer sun gently baking into his shoulders. He turns slightly, and drops a smile with the easy grace of a big tipper, murmurs a welcome, and returns to his work--- she's skittish and this time he will honor her silence rather than chase her off but in that glance he took in the messy pile of hair spilling softly around her face, burnt auburn, calm light eyes blue-----sometimes green when the light hit them right and an absurd wide brimmed hat worn for shade for that milk pale skin--- and maybe for camouflage as well. She tries not to be embarrassed-- it seemed like prying somehow but the comment was funny--- not bitter, not harsh just an observation from a clever heart. She glances at him again, he seems absorbed--- and yet she feels his regard sweep her like radar. He speaks softly and calls himself a cripple none of that warm and fuzzy "challenged" PC **** for him. It's verbal shock troops to make her see him beyond the chair, not some noble, suffering creature but simply as a man living his life. He hears her breath catch--- but a glance reveals a smile, no, the pity bomb is defused and her eyes sweep the canvas and him taking in the arms, the shoulders and neck and resting a moment on his chest. He catches her looking and instead of darting her eyes away she fixes her regard on his mouth. It is like she kissed him--- and his lips tingle and pulse softly. He never lost the need for touch--- for contact, and while some crips play the pity game to get their chips, he never has. Dead below the waist suggested only half alive--- and he was fully living, if not fully functional. He turned to face her fixing his eyes on her mouth--- a pouty lower lip like a Victorian cherub begging to be tasted, perhaps nipped-- but certainly savored. He watched her flush--- half with embarrassment half with pleasure and felt something swell inside of him. For ten seconds she had been a lovely woman being kissed by a man in the Indian summer sun. And now she would leave-- they always did. Only she stood firm, her brain turning over the recent event and considering him carefully. Then she walked softly to the front of the chair, and smiling leaned forward leaned in and made the kiss into something real. He dropped the brush and felt the life in her--- warm, pulsing, and hummingbird agile. her mouth was gentle and he knew what it had taken for her to make such a gesture, the fear she had pushed away to see him simply as a man she wanted to kiss. He drew her lip into his, tasting it inhaling a perfume that rose from between her breasts gone from sweet and spicy to drugging as rare as the creature before him. And in a simple motion his arms enfolded her, drew her to his lap and the biddies would have a field day he was sure, if they noticed this scene-- but that didn't matter. She sighed, and rested her forehead against his, murmured her name--Cassandra, and asked his with her eyes. Vincent, he murmured before touching his mouth to hers again--- this time with an urgency---and purpose. There was no rushing this--- the kissing was no mere appetizer to be hurriedly consumed in order to get to the next course. The kiss was what there was... and her hands went up into his hair, caressing the scalp trailing his face brushing the stubble with her hand making her skin what his was. He savored the touch drinking it in--- feeling it hit him like 18-year-old scotch smooth and warming. And then her hands began to explore the cords of his neck; the muscles in his shoulders trailing to his back like an electric path. Well, I never! a biddy passing sniffs--- failing to notice who was caught in flagrant delecto. They look into to each other's eyes and burst into shared laughter and it is ecstasy to be nailed for normal. He suggests a visit to his home-- and she considers for a moment. Later......she says her face aglow with a smile with naughty written all over it. The make out spot by the stream is thick with bushes she says casually. The path had been paved recently. They pack up quickly and he grins--- "Race you!" he says taking off her indignant gasp of "Cheater!" Ringing in his ears. The spot is perfect--- fall has done her Vegas show girl act and the foliage is glowing gold and red. The stream bubbles clear and the air is sweet with mosses. She arrives after him, winded, and falls to the grass gasping. He puts on the brakes, swings the chair carefully and lifts himself smoothly--- she watches intently--- this is how the body was sculpt then... and he is on the grass with her, waiting. She considers him for a moment, then reaches for the t-shirt, peeling it slowly off and gasping in appreciation at the elegant torso beneath. She reaches for him but he moves away, and looks at her in expectation. She flushes. Turn about is fair play. But when her fingers go to the shirtfront, he stops her. He kisses her, his fingers lightly undoing one button. And it becomes a sweet ritual. A button--- a kiss. A button--- a caress. And when the last button is loosed he lowers his mouth to a creamy shoulder and lightly tastes her skin with a soft sigh, slowly pushing back the fabric like silk swathing something precious and porcelain. There is a wispy covering over her breasts and when his eyes rest there warm and then hot she feels the visual touch and swallows hard and the nipples surge against the garment puffy, full, swollen, erect. He watches this miracle and his fingers trail down, touch the sweet swell and savor the tiny sigh that escapes with her breath. She reaches for him brushes his nipples with the edge of her nail and he swallows hard. She kisses his skin taking her time dallying when it seems he enjoys one spot more than the last. It is an eternity----- luscious, encompassing lips to skin skin to heart heart to pulse and his passion at being consumed is matched but her satisfaction with his response. He is awash with it, but even so--- a new desire is born a desire to fill her hunger and when he touches her reveling in all that is real to her he hungers for sweetness, for the very well spring of her being and so with shaking hands he searches beneath the skirt for the cotton cloth sees her eyes go wide with consternation--- she is reluctant to accept what he cannot share--- but his eyes draw her in, and down and she understands that this giving will fill him as well. The skirt bunches beneath her buttocks and she leans back her thighs open to his eye, his touch, his taste. His hands travel her expertly turning sigh to gasp and when he gazes at the subtle core of her with something like reverence her breath is stolen utterly. Sweet man------ complex sensual and in the moment that his mouth touches her she is seared to the skin, he is her lover and there is no compromise is this--- no settling--------- She releases herself to every touch, opens herself utterly and is consumed by the moment, taken by the man fingers lips tongue everywhere at once and as the moment builds inside her she knows that she will go home with him to sleep nestled against his chest and listen to his heart and share one night--- or if the gods are kind, many because he is a man and she is the woman who dared to kiss him in broad daylight one perfect Indian summer day in Mc Connell Park. |