New Beginnings Falter

'Who did Janie sleep with?' I asked. 'On your second night, I mean.'

'I can't honestly recall,' said Joyce. 'I remember her collecting all ten scalps in no time. I think it took her a fortnight. It took me more like a month.'

'So you slept with all of them? Even the men?'

'Yes. And yes.'

'And you weren't ever jealous? Not even a tiny bit?'

'No. We bought in to peace and love. Especially the love. I still class everyone I met there as a friend, and I love them all. That's the concept to grasp, you know? Love isn't a finite thing, fit only to give to one person. We're all capable of loving many others, emotionally and, most of all, physically.'

I considered that a while. I had had friends at school who I loved on a non-sexual level. And I loved my family members, of course. I even felt some affection for my two male lovers, Giles and Joe. At that moment I actually felt guilty for tagging them as "pathetic". They had been guys trying their damnedest with a gal who, subconsciously, didn't want anything they had to offer.

And so to Dave. Up until yesterday I had believed my love was finite, I had directed it all at her. How did I feel now? Had it all gone? Or had I just realized her share wasn't all I had?

Heavy thoughts, eh? Very heavy.

'I don't know how good I am at peace and love,' I told Joyce. 'I still love Dave, but I hate her too. Not as much as I hate Kat, but a fair bit.'

'Love and hate are interchangeable,' she said serenely. 'Opposite sides of the same coin. If you keep turning your coins love-side up, you can't go wrong.'

*****

Half a gallon of cider later we went to our rooms, having agreed to meet up again in the bar at six thirty. That gave us an hour to wash, change and pee for England.

Warty confession time. I was, for once, apprehensive about masturbating in the shower. I won't say diddling myself under jetting water is an everyday occurrence, but it does happen an awful lot. Usually I just get on with it, blanking my mind and enjoying the experience. That afternoon I was afraid I might start thinking about Dave.

No, no, no. Not her!

Partly I feared she would somehow know. That some dark telepathy would tip her off. Mostly, though, it was a matter of pride. She'd treated me badly and I'd quite rightly walked out. How could I hold my head up if I then used her as an erotic image?

I solved my dilemma by using Joyce as an erotic image. I mentioned before that she fancies me, no? Well she does. Not so very long ago she had two wardrobe malfunctions while leaning over my desk. For some reason bra-less and unbuttoned, she'd given me more than just an eyeful. In fact she'd "accidentally" popped 'em both out, right and left.

Joyce has nice tits, I thought as I frigged myself two-fingered. They're as big as mine, and as firm and round. Not at all wrinkly or saggy . . .

I orgasmed fiercely then transferred my attentions to my clit. Still thinking about Joyce's tits I came quickly then, almost immediately afterwards, I came again.

There, I thought, that's what I call a shower!

I'd set off that morning in a sensible black skirt and blindingly white blouse. I had similar items for the morrow but was going for more smart/casual that night. Figure-hugging blue jeans and a tight white T-shirt (I'm lucky, T-shirts always look tight on me), all topped off with my brown leather jacket. I have brown eyes and auburn hair; browns and whites work for me and don't I know it!

I checked the time. Ten past six. Scowling, I got out my mobile. It had been switched off since Friday, and that had to be a record. Reluctantly, I booted it up. Five missed calls (one from my mum, three from Dave and one that looked like spam). And twenty-seven texts, most of them from Dave.

Starting with the most recent, I opened them one by one.

I LOVE YOU MIKKI.

PLS B MY FRIEND.

Hardening my heart, I deleted it.

On to the next.

I LOVE YOU MIKKI.

PLS B MY FRIEND.

Now you might think I should have been swayed by this outpouring of devotion. Perhaps I should . . . but I definitely wasn't. As I went from identical text to identical text, I got madder and madder. Dave is IT, I told myself. She'll know ways to set up a text to resend itself, again and again, and at irregular intervals.

I kept on opening and deleting, working my way back in time. The non-Dave messages were few, far between and answerable with one line replies. The only one that gave me pause for thought was somewhere in the middle, when Dave changed her wording.

MIKKI I LOVE YOU. I

LOVE YOU LOVE YOU

LOVE YOU. PLS RING.

HEAR IT FROM MY

MOUTH.

I deleted that one as well but, when I'd cleared them all, I hesitated. Maybe my heart wasn't so hard after all.

'Shit, shit, shit,' I said, aloud and quite poetically.

Then I dialled the number I will never forget.

It rang and rang. I was about to hang up when a strange, breathless voice answered.

'Hello.'

'Who's that?' I snapped.

Then Dave was there, equally breathless. 'Mikki,' she gushed. 'Thank God, I . . .'

'That was her, wasn't it?' I said glacially. 'You're fucking her, aren't you? Fucking her in your bed, with my favourite toy . . .'

'Mikki,' she wailed, 'you don't understand . . .'

'I understand you're a two-faced, two-timing cunt,' I snarled. 'Get back to it, why don't you? You deserve each other.'

'Mikki . . .'

I cut her off without further ado. And I switched off my phone. Then, not satisfied with that, I took it apart, tossing the component parts into my travel bag.

'There,' I said, 'contact me now!'

The temptation to assault the minibar was tremendous. Overcoming it, I left my room and went down in the lift. Being alone in there, I looked at myself in the mirror wall, expecting to see red-rimmed eyes. Instead, all modesty aside, I looked pretty good. Okay, Helen of Troy still had nothing to worry about, but I'd been out looking much worse.

(At this point I must yet again apologize for my deteriorating command of English. I know I'm becoming a serial offender in that particular respect . . . using foul and abusive language, that is . . . but you must admit I'd been under pressure. No? Oh well, I apologize anyway. In an incarnation to come I'll be full or peace and love and have no hatred at all.

Or maybe not.)

I was two minutes early in the bar but Joyce had still beaten me to it. She was sitting on a bar stool, elegant in a fresh black skirt, becoming yellow blouse and black cotton blazer. Her outfit went well with her blonde hair and feline eyes.

'Here she is,' she said to the barman, oblivious to the drooling table of businessmen watching her every move. 'Red wine?'

'Wine not,' I said automatically.

'I love cider,' Joyce said to me, sotto voce. 'But I've spent most of the last hour peeing.'

'Me too,' I confessed. 'Well, I prefer Yorkshire beer, but that makes me pee even more.'

Joyce laughed, attracting the businessmen's attention further still. 'Have you decided?' she went on. 'What we're doing afterwards, I mean. After dining.'

'I want to experience some lesbian nightlife,' I said, surprising myself with my directness. 'As an academic exercise, of course.'

'Okay,' she said. 'Dinner then a walk down to St James's Street.'

'Is that where it all happens?'

'It certainly is.' Joyce smiled, slyly, if you ask me. 'Or so I've been told . . .'

The hotel restaurant was moderately busy, perhaps because of its prices. I would, I decided, need to drink a heck of a lot of wine to get my tab up in line with Joyce's.

'This academic exercise,' she said after we'd ordered. 'You're cool with holding hands and a bit of smooching?'

'Smooching?' I pretended to be outraged. 'You'll be groping me next.'

'Hmmm,' went Joyce. 'That could be arranged.'

Being inherently nosy, I asked my line-manager why she'd left her commune. 'It sounds so idyllic,' I said. 'Living with people you love . . .'

'It was idyllic,' she told me. 'But not everybody liked us. And our lease ran out.'

'I thought Cornish folk were tolerant.'

'They didn't seem to mind us in Perranporth, but the locals from the nearby village despised us. We couldn't get served in any of the shops. In fact they accused us of shoplifting if we even tried to step inside.'

'That must have been awful,' I said.

'It was, but you get used to it. And as I said, they didn't mind us in Perranporth. We made our money there, during the season, selling trinkets and things we'd made ourselves. We very rarely got moved on in Perranporth, and never arrested.' Joyce smiled sadly. 'It was lack of money that did for us. We were self-sufficient for food . . . we had hens and goats, and grew our own potatoes . . . but that lease ran out on us. We tried to renew but the villagers were up in arms. We couldn't have stayed even if we had been able to come up with the cash.'

'So what happened?'

'It was no big surprise. Janie and I knew it was coming to an end when we joined. We knew we had three years and no more. So did everyone else. Folk drifted off all the time, most of them going back to a conventional life. Others came to replace them, but that eventually dried up. For the last month there was just me, Janie and Nan.'

'And?'

'Janie came to the rescue again. Her dad had a pub in Newquay. We went and worked there for two years, entertaining ourselves as well as the tourists.'

'And Nan?'

'Last I heard she's living in the Shetlands, carrying on much as before.'

'What about Janie? You were with her a long time, weren't you?'

'I was with her for seven years,' said Joyce. 'Nowadays she's married with four teenagers. But she hasn't completely opted out. We had a tumble or two when I went down to see her last summer. And we'd have had a few more if it hadn't been for all those flipping kids.'

I joined in her laughter. Then, heart in my mouth, I asked, 'What about you nowadays? Have you got a significant other?'

She held my gaze. 'I have a few others, but none of them significant.'

'A few,' I said, echoing again.

'Three girlfriends and half a boyfriend,' said Joyce. 'They don't know about each other, but they all know they haven't exclusive access. In other words, I'm still jealousy free.'

'How can you have "half a boyfriend"?'

'He's working in Dubai. And he's the first bloke I've had in donkey's years. We had a hectic week over Christmas and he's expecting more, next time he's back.'

'Is he going to get more?'

'The jury's out, but I suspect he will.'

'Okay,' said I, chuckling along with her. 'Are we finding a gay bar or what?'

*****

It was still early when we arrived at the first bar. I found the atmosphere inside . . . well, it was liberated but subdued. We held hands as we went in and, as Joyce had predicted, nobody hit on us. Come to that, nobody seemed to be hitting on anyone. The place was mostly all-girl couples, with hardly any singletons to be seen.

The second bar was livelier and our hand-holding didn't stop a number of approaches. Scared and flattered, I let Joyce kiss me, and that seemed to do the trick. The longer we kissed, the longer we were left alone.

It was nice, too. As far as females went, I'd only ever properly kissed Dave. And don't worry, I'm not going to make comparisons. Not yet . . .

We kissed again in the taxi returning us to our hotel. Sitting in the back, really going for it. The cabbie didn't seem to mind. There again, he probably had ten fares like us every night.

We were still holding hands on the forecourt as the tail lights of our transport dwindled and then disappeared. 'It's not ten yet,' said Joyce. 'Why don't we go damage 327's tab?'

'Why don't we go to 327 and make love?' I replied.

'Because you're on the rebound,' she said, surprising me. 'And I'd die if you couldn't look at me in the morning.'

'I could look at you any time of day,' I assured her. 'Morning, noon and night.'

'Let's go drink.' She smiled. 'I need more alcohol even if you don't.'

'327,' the barman said in greeting. 'What is it this time, ladies?'

'Shiraz,' I said, overlapping Joyce's, 'Brandy and port.'

'Make that two large glasses of Shiraz and two double brandy and ports.'

The barman seemed to be as impressed by my line-manager's self-assurance as I was. He never questioned the extravagant amount of units and served us with a smile.

Finding a free table wasn't as easy as it had been that afternoon. In the end we settled on a vacant bit of bar top and gazed into each other's eyes.

'I do want to make love,' I whispered. (Whispered? Well, I probably blurted.) 'And no way will I regret it.'

'Drink your drinks,' said Joyce, her expression fathomless.

I tried again in the lift. Joyce rejected me again. Oh, she was nice with it, but a rejection is a rejection, no?

The lift stopped on the third floor. On my floor. Joyce was on the fourth. I pecked her cheek and, using my hand to stay the sliding door, looked back at her.

'Thank you for a wonderful evening,' I said. 'If only . . .'

'If only,' she said as I removed my hand and the door slid shut.

*****

Miraculously, my keycard worked on my first attempt. Give me a proper metal key every time. I usually can't get a keycard to work for love nor money. Perhaps I have some sort of force-field about me; one that wipes their magnetic strips and stops the blooming things from doing their job.

Dejected, I closed the door and draped my jacket over a chair. Then I looked at the minibar. Knowing I shouldn't, knowing they were ridiculously expensive, I checked out its contents.

Omigod, they had Shiraz!

Before I could grab the bottle I heard a soft rap on my door. Puzzled, I answered it.

It was Joyce. 'Can I come in?' she asked.

I stepped aside and pushed the door shut behind her, letting it lock itself.

'I was worried,' Joyce said. 'You looked so down. I thought you might get laced into the minibar.'

'I was about to go for the Shiraz,' I admitted. 'Care to join me?'

'No,' she said. 'I want to be your friend. And we've had enough to drink now. A friend would talk you out of having more.'

Fair point, I mentally conceded. Then, chancing my arm: 'Does a friend get a hug?'

She nodded so I stepped into her embrace. And it was nice. I'm quite tall but Joyce edges me by half an inch or so. We are well matched for hugging, though. Back then, there in room 327, I enjoyed the feel of our bodies together. Of our bits pressing together and our arms around each other . . .

My hands were high up on her back, on her shoulder blades. Hers were lower, on the small of my back, just above my bum. Unable to resist, I pulled her closer, not just pressing but almost crushing our tits together. She didn't object at all so I pressed harder into her with my groin. That made her gasp and, after a brief hesitation, grab my buttocks and do some pulling of her own.

Encouraged, I kissed her. She let me, keeping cool. That was pleasantly surprising. In the bar and the taxi we'd gone at it quite hotly. Not vindaloo but definitely madras. Now here she was, being korma while I was heading towards phall. Playing my part, I thrust my tongue into her mouth. Playing her part, Joyce met me with her tongue, jousting without making any effort to repel me.

Even more encouraged, I slid my right hand around and squeezed her tit. She made an odd, gagged, half-strangled sound that might have been a groan. So I squeezed again, harder.

Joyce broke for air. 'Mikki,' she cautioned. 'If you do that once more, I really will lose control.'

Grinning at her I stopped hugging and, taking a tit in each hand, squeezed them as one. 'Get on that bed,' I said.

To my amazement, she obliged. Then I was pulling off her cotton blazer and scrabbling at the buttons on her blouse.

'Mikki,' she warned me. 'I'm on the edge . . .'

'Don't care,' I replied, unfastening the last obstacles in my way. 'I want you to be on the edge.'

'Mikki,' she complained . . .

But she still let me undo the last of her buttons.

Hmmm. As if I was likely to stop now!

Her tits were contained in a sexy white bra. I quickly unhooked it and let her spill out. And I sighed at the sight. As I said earlier, Joyce's boobs are as big as mine, and as firm and round. She's not at all wrinkly or saggy.

I'd never chewed big tits before. Hungrily, I made up for my lack of ambition. Joyce moaned and groaned and generally let me know I wasn't doing too badly.

'I love it,' she murmured, 'I love you. Yes, yes, yes!'

I didn't take much notice of the word "love" at the time. Joyce "loved" everyone, remember? And I was . . . well, lost in love. You-know-who never featured in my thoughts. I was engaged in "open" sex and fuck me, was it good.

Sorry! For yet another eff word, I mean!!

But it was good. Good? It was very, very good. Then I tried to put my hand in Joyce's knickers and she said to me nay.

'Joyce . . .' I began.

'Me first.' She grinned, dispelling my fears.

So I let her strip me. Blouse first. Then, although her skirt should have been next, I permitted my figure-hugging jeans to be tugged off. And my sexy pink knickers.

'My, my, just how soggy are these!' she crowed. 'Fuck me, Mikki, you're as bad as me!'

'Fuck me,' I countered. 'Please Joyce. Please, please, please!'

So she did. Slowly and surely. Carefully and thoroughly. I have honestly never known anyone who possesses even half of her skills. There quite possibly isn't anyone who possesses even half of her skills. If there is someone out there . . .

Well, here's my email address and mobile number. Tomorrow's fine by me. Tonight is even finer.

Joyce's lovemaking is always out of this world (as I now know!). Even so, that first time she excelled herself. I won't bore you with details, but she licked and nibbled my clit while she used two fingers on my G-spot. As I just said, she excelled herself. In fact she made me cum and cum and cum.

Then she stripped, relishing me watching her as she did so.

'I'm wetter than ever before,' she declared.

'Me too,' I cried eagerly. 'Me too!'

'Stockings on or off?' she persisted.

'On,' I said, more eager than ever.'

'Knickers off, then,' she said, announcing, not asking.

Then, when I was completely breathless and very close to flaking out on her, she told me she was going to sit on my face.

'Worry not,' she added, perhaps concerned by my expression. 'I won't really sit. I'll support my fat arse and let you lick.'

That was half a lie. Joyce's arse isn't fat at all. Physically, she's very much like me. She can eat and drink until the cows come home, without ever putting on an ounce.

I stayed motionless, watching her straddle me. Thinking she was balletic. Thinking that age only added to her attraction. Thinking that she was the most beautiful person I'd ever seen.

And I'm getting ahead of myself. She stripped for me quite a while before she actually climbed on board. And her sex is, to say the least, alluring. She has a long, rectangular landing strip, running north to south. Otherwise she is shaved as bald as a badger.

And wet. Every time I've seen her she's been wet. Very, very wet.

On first sight I didn't half fancy that landing strip. I wanted to run the tip of my nose through it. So I did, clapping my grubby mitts on her ass and pulling her close.

'Jesus,' she moaned. 'The things you do!'

'Cum for me,' I replied, abandoning all subtlety

She did. Then she straddled me and, as promised, sat on my face. Also as promised, she supported her slender arse and let me lick up at her.

It was so good. So, so good.

And the taste of her! She leaks nectar and that night there was a lot of it leaking. A big drop landed on my tongue before I even began. Trickle-tracks ran down the insides of her thighs. I had plenty to lap up and, the more I lapped, the more she seemed to trickle. It was ages and ages until I could move on.