A Funny Thing Happened...

22.

"Ow! What the hell was that for?"

I glared at him, thought 'What the hell, in for a penny...' and hit him again.

"Damnit, Gin, what's the big idea?"

"Sim Brownstone, you're an idiot!"

"OK, OK, I'm an idiot. Now will you stop smacking me?"

I kissed him on his forehead. "Did that feel good?"

"Better than the smack, yeah."

I kissed his cheek. "Did that feel good?"

"Yeah, it..."

I kissed his lips, long and hard, slipped my tongue into his mouth and caressed his tongue with it. "Did that feel good?"

"Ginny..."

"Did it?"

He looked into my eyes: "Ginny, can I tell you something? It won't take long, but you have to promise not to hit me again."

"No promises." But I got off him, and lay down beside him, and rested my head on his chest, so that I could feel him speaking as well as hearing it.

"Maybe twelve, fifteen years ago, when I was just starting to work semi-regularly, I did a summer at a stock company in Utah. It's long gone now. Anyway, I was a bunch of little stuff in three shows: Music Man, Oliver!, and...something else; doesn't matter. The theatre was in this tiny town not far from Bryce Canyon: gorgeous National Park, red-rock formations everywhere. You ever been?" I shook my head. "Well, there wasn't much to do on the off-days, so a group of us decided to head out to Bryce for this two-day hike. It started at one of the trailheads and went—I don't know—up onto another part of the park where this guy was going to meet us with a van and take us back. Anyway, we hiked all day, and we camped for the night on this ridge, I guess you'd call it. One of the guys in the company who was with us—young guy, or younger than me at any rate—had just got engaged, and he was in LOVE with a capital "Luh." He quickly became just staggeringly boring on the subject: love is God's way of manifesting himself to man, a man and a woman perfectly in love don't have to eat or sleep to be perfectly happy, just on and on and on."

"So it just so happened that I woke up first that morning. I got up a little before sunrise—we'd slept in our clothes—stretched, and headed off to this little copse of trees to—you know—pee, explore a little, just get away from the group for a bit, particularly from our resident bore. So I'm wandering through the trees in this sort of blue-gray light, and all of a sudden, I'm through the copse and looking out over a cliff into a valley. I guess I was facing south, because as I stood there looking out, the sun peaked above the horizon and warmed the left side of my face, and the air was cool, the view was breathtaking, and there was almost no sound, maybe some wind, birds, but nothing...noticeable. And I stood there feeling young and strong and awake and alone and warm enough and cool enough and not hungry or thirsty, and all of a sudden I started thinking back to boring guy and his endless description of how great love feels, and I thought to myself: This wins. Hands down. There are all sorts of terrific feelings in the world: love's probably one of them, but so is nailing an O'Carolan tune on the violin, or sex, or booking a job, or singing "Who Will Buy", or eating corn fresh from the stalk, or I don't know what all else. But nothing will ever feel more perfect than this does.

He continued, and I could hear the smile in his voice. "I've had a good and a lucky life, you know? I've done a lot of things that I've enjoyed, taken pleasure in all kinds of stuff. But nothing ever beat that moment alone on that cliff in the sunrise. And then you kissed me...tonight when you came in to start that little rehearsal or whatever it was. I hadn't known what to expect, and I just stood there, holding you, kissing you. And all of a sudden...I was happier...more...alive, maybe, even than I had been on that day. Turns out boring guy was right: love won. Or anyway you won, Ginny. You beat the sunrise. And I kept kissing you, because I never wanted to let go of how happy I was with you, and how good you made me feel. So...does that answer your question?"

23.

I hadn't been crying for long when he stopped speaking, but the tears just kept coming, silent, gentle, no sobs, no heaves, no sniffs, forming a little puddle which ran down the side of Sim's chest onto the sheets. "It's OK, Ginny," he was so quiet it seemed like I felt rather than heard him. "You have to understand, I wasn't expecting what happened tonight—well obviously, so when you said 'next time', I didn't know...I don't know...what you want, or...I mean I know I'm too old for..."

"You're not, though." I'd intended to say it differently, to wait until...I couldn't even remember what I was supposed to be waiting for. "I mean, I don't think it matters. I think I love you. I know I'm not supposed to just come out and say that, and I'm not looking for anything from you...well, more sex would be nice, but..."

Sim started chuckling, and then he was laughing; his chest was heaving. I looked up at his face, prepared to be...I don't know what. I didn't want him laughing at me, but he wasn't. He was smiling, but he was also crying, and all of a sudden I just wanted to kiss him over and over again until he stopped. I never wanted to see him cry again, and then my lips were on his cheeks, his forehead, his eyelids, his lips, and I was murmuring: "Sim, Baby, don't, please don't...it's OK, it's not a huge thing, or it doesn't have to be, I mean..."

"I'm afraid it is kind of a huge thing, Gin. Because I think I love you too, and if that's true..."

I smiled. "At least we know there'll be a next time."

24.

We lay for a while, naked and silent, spooned, his front to my back, his arm across my chest, his cock snuggled up against my ass. It got later, and the green room got colder. We wrapped the sheets around us, and still we lay there, quiet and happy and maybe a little scared. I must have dozed a little, because I woke up to feel Sim's lips pressed to my forehead. "Come on, Gin," he whispered, and he was standing over me, still naked, "it's almost midnight."

"S'OK," I mumbled, "I told Jason I would lock up."

"And he agreed? How'd you manage that?"

I giggled sleepily: "Feminine wiles."

Sim gave my ass a light smack. "Minx," he said, "come on, let's get somewhere warm where we can fall asleep or talk or..."

"Or what?" I asked playfully. I was waking up. "You up for another round of...holy shit!"

"What?"

"You never came, did you?"

"Um...yes I did, after a world-class blowjob..."

"But not while we were fucking, right? I came...(God, that felt good), and then I kind of collapsed, and then you said you wished you could see my face...and then we started talking, and then...then you told me about the sunrise, and you said you love me." I looked up at him, suddenly afraid I'd gotten it all wrong, or dreamt it, or something. "Sim, would you say it again?"

He smiled down at me. "I love you, Ginny."

"Then can we finish? Will you finish making love to me, and can I be...can I watch you, when you cum?"

"I...now? Sure, I mean I'd love to...but why?"

"Because you're handsome," I said it as simply as I could, and I meant it, "and I love you, and I want to watch while you take pleasure in my body. And because a good slut hasn't done her job unless she's had her man's stuff in at least two of her holes."

Sim barked his laugh again: "Jesus, you really are insatiable, you know that?" He laid me back on the bed, and knelt between my legs. "It may take me a minute to get ready..."

"Let me help," I said, and as Valentine's Day ended, I put my arms around Sim's neck, brought his face down to mine, and gave my man a long, tender, passionate kiss.