Carousel Ch. 3

It was purely an accident. I had not meant to spy on her.

I was running errands on a weekday off, late afternoon. I had been all the easy places, and now was on the harder ones. I parked in the huge lot, and hit the mall. This is one of those huge places with 200 stores, 3 levels, umpteen escalators… and a carousel. This was of interest since I work for an amusement park, usually running a carousel. The nip in the air reminded me we would be shutting down soon, and I would have to find other work that would let me write most of the day and keep body and soul together the rest of the time.

Lately, the carousel had been on my mind for another reason. For the last month I had been involved in a torrid affair with a lady I met there. We had spent as much time together as her other life would allow. I had carefully kept my questions to myself, but her hints had led me to believe her marriage was happy, her two kids were normal teen-agers, and she was at least fond of me. She kept coming back, anyway.

As far as I knew, she didn't even have my phone number. She just showed up, expecting I would be alone. Since meeting her, I had been alone. No one else interested me.

I stood on the upper level, looking down at the top of the carousel as it spun lazily into the indoor air, the noise from the hurdy-gurdy that accompanied it drifting up to me, some schmalzy show tune.

It was her figure that caught my eye. She stepped off the main deck as the big machine slowed to a stop. It was her. I had no doubt. I stayed calm, thoughts rushing a mile a minute: can I talk to her? Is she here alone? Would she think I followed her?

The last thought - at least she didn't feign her interest in carousels.

Any plans I might have had ended a second later. A tallish gentleman of about her age rose and met her. She reached up to kiss him, and they hugged. I had to wonder, but in a moment two tall red-head gangly teens joined them, and they moved off toward the exits. I found a bench and sat for a minute, watching the earnest faces of shoppers, mothers, lovers, moving back and forth, bound on earnest missions.

Okay, dummy, you knew she had a family already.

Yeah, but seeing them made it a bit more … tangible.

So, when she shows up next time, you gonna say, begone?

That one was easier to answer. I wanted to keep breathing, to keep finding out about these new feelings she was giving me. I could no more tell her to take a hike than I could fly. I got up and finished my shopping. By the time I got back to my truck, I had worn out my radar trying to make sure I would not run into anyone unaware.

I never knew if it would be 3 days or 3 years before I saw her again. It was that kind of thing. She knew she had me, that I would be available whenever she wanted. If I had felt differently, if I had resented being so obvious, I guess I would have done something about it. But I neither resented it, nor cared. She had opened up worlds in my head, and my heart, and I wanted to explore them, with her. In the meantime, there was plenty of work, and lots of chores, and always the writing. The unsettling feeling she left me with turned out to be good for business. I sold a few short stories at bargain basement prices. The sad thing about it was not only letting the story go, but not being able to call her immediately, and tell her the good news. After school started in all the area districts, our crowds began to thin out. We stayed open weekends until the weather got too cool, but the crowds were barely worth it. The carousel remained a busy ride, and there were nights I would go 30 or 40 minutes at a time without thinking about her. There had been no contact since she left after spending the night with me at my place. I had been unsure of her frame of mind when she left. I had asked her to stay, breaking one of the unspoken rules. I didn't know what arrangements she made to get away. The only reason I would have cared would be to make sure they were secure, and if there was anything I could do to help them along. For the first second after I saw her on the main deck of the carousel, I thought I was just focussing on her too much, that I was hallucinating. She had not bought a ticket. I moved toward her, nodding to the few kids and their parents as I passed. She saw me coming, and fixed me with her eyes. I paused by her ride, the seated chariot, usually reserved for very old, very young, or lovers who did not want to be separated for a moment. Her gaze was level, untroubled, waiting for me to speak first. "Hi." Finally. She was here, and all I could manage was 'hi?' "Hi," she said, softly. The calliope was playing a badly arranged version of Smoke on the Mountain. "I was hoping to see you." "I knew the park would close soon, and I wanted to ride again." I nodded, and moved on through the rest of the deck, making sure no one was doing anything dangerous. Teenagers had been known to risk death to impress a date, and there were places on this machine to get hurt. As I examined my motives for leaving her alone at that second, I found I had to leave her alone, because if I didn't all the ideas she probably had about me, and me and her, would be right, and I was not sure I could stand that. She knew how to come and go like a puff of smoke. I had to wonder if she would still be there when I came around again. She was. I approached her again. This time she spoke first. "Closing at the usual time tonight?" I nodded, almost allowing my hopes to rise. "You gotta be somewhere," I asked. She gave me that enigmatic look I had come to know and love, and said, soundlessly, "Yeah."

Now another aspect of our relationship came into play: She had made time stop. Moments earlier it had been 8.30pm, an hour and a half from closing, about 2 hours from me being home. Now, it was 8.32pm, and I was what felt like a month and a half from getting where I wanted to be. "What would you think about meeting me there? About you going on now, waiting for me?" I had no qualms at all about her being there without me. I had earned a raised eyebrow, a questioning look. I fished my keys from my pocket, and separated the door-key. "You know where the place is, and how to get there." She looked around to see if we were unobserved, and reached and took the key. Being her, she could not do it without significant pressure on my hand, just being sure I knew. I heard the subtle tell-tale noises of the machine, letting me know the timer was about to run down. I moved away from her, finding that breaking her gaze was harder than cleaning this ride after a day of teen-glop. By the time I wound my way back around, and started to move the gate to let the next riders in, she was gone. Time slowed even more. By 9.30 there was practically no one in the park. I caught up with the paper work that went with the ride, inspections, tickets, receipts. At 10pm sharp, I deposited the sheaf of papers at the front office/shack, and hightailed it to my truck. I slid out of the parking lot, hustling, careful not to run over any recent patrons. In my younger days, I rode motorcycles. I always felt instead of riding, I was being pulled along, toward something I had little control of. It's why I stopped riding them. Tonight, that feeling returned. The engine beneath the hood, my conscious thoughts controlling the direction of the vehicle, meant nothing. I was being whisked along, unbidden. The ride would stop where it stopped. Her car was stashed around a corner. I saw it as I went by. I parked on the street in my usual spot, locked and secured the truck, and dashed to the old house subdivided into apartments. Then I remembered: I had no key! I swerved at the last second toward the side of the house, and moved quickly behind it to the rear door, hoping that I would not wake a neighbor, or a neighbor's dog. I must have moved too fast. Nothing stirred, nothing noted my passage. I retrieved the spare key from it's hiding place, and slipped open the back door. I put the key back, knowing I would not be thinking about it in the near future. The cold metal of the key made think about having her one made. I shrugged off my jacket, stepped quickly to the front door, feeling like a burglar in my own house. I checked to make sure it was locked. The scant light from the small entry lamp showed an oversized duffle on the floor. 'Hmm,' I thought. 'If that has clothes in it…' But right now I only wanted to find Debbi, and kiss her. I had made no effort to hide my presence. I had only hurried in a completely familiar place, even in the dark. So I was not sure if this show was for my benefit, or if I was just lucky. She lay on her right side on my bed, wearing only a sea-green t-shirt. One of mine, I hoped. The bedside lamp was on, but most of the scene was lit by the streetlight outside the window. Her long good legs were visible, as was her ass. I stopped, and moved toward the bed. Her eyes were closed. Her right hand disappeared between her legs, and the rest of the story was told in sound and light, both focussed on her face. I moved back. Her face, bathed in the light from the small bedside lamp, was contorted in that special way she had of looking. I might have wanted to see what she was doing with those fingers, but I was transfixed by her face. Her mouth slightly open, her brows low, concentrating on her task. I moved back to the chair I used to sit in to change shoes, and sat quietly. If this was a performance, it was for me, and I wasn't going to mess it up. If it was not, it was too private to intrude on. Either way, I watched. She adjusted her legs from time to time, to give herself more access, change angles. Her left hand lay on the bed, except for the brief times she placed her hand on her chest, tweaking her nipples through the cotton of the t-shirt. Her breath rattled in and out of her throat. It was a symphony. She sighed, wheezed, and rasped, eyes firmly shut. Her legs flexed from time to time, ranging from steely hard to lovingly soft. I could even see her stomach muscles flex beneath the shirt. But it was her face that fascinated me. It reminded me of the embers of a perfect campfire, heat darting across in ephemeral packets gone quickly as they are perceived. A look would come on her face, and be gone as quickly. Her open mouth and flared nostrils gave a hint to her struggle to breathe, but her pleased smile from time to time left no question that she knew what she was doing. The sounds she made revealed more of the flight taking place inside her head. She would start a sound deep in her throat, and end it with little modulation, only breath, hissing from her like air from a tire. On the intake her mouth would open to gulp in gouts of air to fuel her struggle. I saw her squeeze her nipples again. I could imagine her fingers pressing painfully on either side of her clit. She was doing this, but this lady was built for being with someone, not for being alone. Her whole body was crying out for contact, not just between her legs. If I had been with her at this moment, she would have been kissing me, her arms wrapped tightly around me, touching me everywhere she could press her flesh against me. It was how we became one.

The hand between her legs began moving rapidly back and forth, then top to bottom. Her hum stopped. Her legs clenched, and her eyes snapped open, but not to see, only to believe. I knew what it was like from the outside. If my head was between her legs at this instant, I would be able to feel every ounce of her muscle as she made her thighs rigid and tense with orgasm. Her body stiffened, and one last sound escaped her throat. As she relaxed she acknowledged me with a smile that dwarfed the light in the room. But her eyes closed, her arm slipped from between her legs onto the bed, her head slumped toward the pillow, and she slipped into sleep, quickly.

I rose with a smile on my face. She had known just what she was doing. It had been a gift, from her to me. I covered her with a light blanket, and moved to undress, shower, and do some of the daily chores that kept this place neat enough I could just hand her a key without having to warn her about monsters in the fridge. If I skipped a couple, put off a couple more, and rushed to bed, it is surely understandable.

I slipped under the cover with her, and spread it out over us. I moved to our position, and even in her dream-state, she moved against me. I hoped it was me she was moving against, and not the father of her children. Her ass against my front, me tucked comfortably between them. My arm beneath her head, gently, not wanting to disturb her, my other arm over her, gently tugging her toward me.

Just before I slept, I took a chance on moving my hand up, over her breasts, toward her neck, checking. Yes, the pendant with the single horse was there. This was my girl, and perhaps, before the day was out tomorrow, I would be able to show it.

Just before I winked out, I remembered: What was that duffle all about?