The Mammoth Book of Threesomes and Moresomes

by Linda Alvarez

  Calla and Basil had not had such an initiation from her. They were still waiting.

  I should have realized when Saffron died that I might be in over my head. But I was so caught up in her, and in music, in finally devoting my life to someone and something that I enjoyed, that I felt I was born to do, that I didn’t worry about how the Spark worked. It was just the lifeblood that fed us, that kept each of us going, writing, composing, playing. Some nights, when we’d played to a fever pitch, it boiled over, and there were always wildlings around to party with, to soak up that energy and go home tired and exhilarated both in the morning. Groupies don’t know it, but it’s the Spark they are attracted to, addicted to. Maybe they figure it’s just the drugs, or the excitement, they feel it during the sex we have, that thrill singing in their veins. But unless they have music in their souls, it can’t hurt them. It passes through them just like the drugs. It’s only people like me that it takes hold of and doesn’t let go. And Saffron. And Nura and Rose, who were both gone now for years, replaced by a string of studio musicians of Glory’s choosing, until now Calla and Basil . . .

  I had started to shiver, there in the doorway, as if the coldness of her flesh was making me chilly. There was also the fact that I was wearing just an old show T-shirt and underwear. I felt cold and empty, and the shaking became worse.

  Calla was there, then, dressed in show clothes. Anticipating a press conference, I guess. She wrapped her arms around my shoulders. “Oh, Luna . . .” she started. “Be strong.”

  But I wasn’t shaking with sobs. Glory had told me once that the Spark runs its course like a fever – oh sure, it could be years and years, but the hotter it burns the more likely it is to burn you up. At some point it burns out and leaves you high and dry and unable to function.

  She had waited until after I’d accepted her offer to spell all that out for me. When she told me, it felt almost like it wasn’t anything that I didn’t already know. Some hacks can go on for ever because they never had it in the first place. But those who really had it . . . I didn’t have to hear her name out the others. The agonizing slow death of Elvis, who staggered on long after the Spark had abandoned him, trying to replace it with amphetamines and sycophants until both failed him. Janis Joplin, whose own insecurities about her talent strangled it and forced her into drugs also. Kurt Cobain. The murderous rampage of the octogenarian Paul McCartney outside Buckingham Palace.

  My body was wracked with spasms. And suddenly it made sense to me. The Spark was going to go out for me if I didn’t do something about it. The fl ame needed to be fed, stoked, with music and sex with other people who had it. Was that what killed Saffron, ultimately? Being cut off from her, and being unwilling to share it with others for his own survival? I wished I had known him better. Had he been losing it already, starting to burn out, when he left the Seekers? Had Glory and I been killing each other with the fighting and “creative differences”? The passion had turned to anger long ago, is that what made her burn up or gutter out?

  “What happens now?” I asked Calla, who was squeezing me harder now, as I clenched my jaw to keep my teeth from chattering.

  I hadn’t meant her to answer, but she did. “Luna, you’re sick. We have to get you to medical.”

  “No!” What would they find? The Spark was a secret not even Huiper knew about. Who could I turn to? I had met very few others who I knew beyond any doubt had it. Bowie, still going in his thirteenth decade, reinvented once again. But I didn’t know how to reach him and couldn’t imagine the conversation we would have.

  Looking at Glory there on the table, I considered the traditional ways out for a moment. But I couldn’t see myself drowning my “sorrows” in chemicals or crashing my fl yer while “under the infl uence”. I took a deep breath and got the shivering under control for a few moments.

  There was really only one choice. Pass the Spark on to Calla or Basil, or die. “Calla,” I said, trying to work up the nerve to say something.

  But then Basil was there. “Huiper’s not reachable. We can try him again at four, though.” I looked up to see Calla take her hand, and I suddenly knew the two of them had slept together last night.

  No, they were about to. They had each been waiting, hoping, to be the one that Glory took up with when she took up with someone again. Now she was gone, and they could see each other clearly for the first time. They looked into each other’s eyes, a kind of wordless connection strung between them.

  They looked up at the first sound of the guitar. I had crawled over to where Glory lay, and slid the Walker from her hands to cradle it in my lap. I had no pick and just used my fingernails to strike a chord, the first of a descending series starting up on the neck and working my way down until it felt right. From there, I fell naturally into a minor key riff, alternating the strum with finger-picking.

  I could almost hear the parts that would go along with it, a cello, with a deep, rich bowed voice, and hand drums, a doumbek maybe. I kept playing. There were no words. I didn’t know what to tell them, what I wanted to say about her or me or my life. I just kept playing.

  But eventually the song came to a close, as it cycled down and my energy fl agged. When I finished, I saw they were both crying. I laid the guitar aside and went to them, and hugged them.

  Exactly how that turned into me kissing Calla, I’m not sure. Her mouth was hot in mine, her cheeks wet and scarlet. Her breath came fast and hard. My hands travelled down her sides, over her hips. I felt her weight shift, as she reached out to Basil. Then she was kissing her, too, and in the back of my head I tried to pause. I had done many wild sexual things since leaving my quiet life on the moon. Some of them had been with Glory, some not. But I did not know what Basil had under her jeans and to some part of me that mattered.

  The Spark did not much care for my squeamishness. The pang of fear I felt transmuted into thrill, and then my attention went back to Calla and I felt desire fl are. I pulled her towards me, Basil trailing along like the caboose, on to the smooth, hospital-cornered bed. I began peeling off the clothes she had just put on. Basil took her other side, and very shortly Calla was naked there on the coverlet between us. Basil and I exchanged a look, then each of us took a nipple in our mouths and Calla gasped. In perfect harmony, we each slid a hand up the inside of her legs, teasing her. Then Basil’s fingers cupped over her mons, her labia, and then spread, opening her for me. I used the tip of my index finger to skim the cream from the edge of her vaginal opening, spreading it liberally around her clit. She moaned. I continued to move gently, my touch light, until she ground her hips upwards towards my hand. But she could not move much, as Basil and I kept sucking her nipples, and I lifted my hand away from her.

  She whimpered and Basil chuckled low in her throat in response. I played with her lightly until she bucked again and this time I let her impale herself on my fingers, my index and middle fingers curving into her, my thumb extended over Basil’s hand and then sliding between her fingers to where her clit swelled. One of her hands clutched at Basil’s jeans and I gave her a little nod. I had her cunt to myself then, and I took the opportunity to position myself there, my cheeks between her thighs. But as I licked her with long strokes, at first softly but then with urgent energy as her voice rose to a wail, I had one eye fi xed on Basil. Under the jeans she had plain white briefs, with a noticeable bulge. My stomach tightened. Then she slipped those off, too, and I almost laughed with my tongue plastered in Calla’s cunt. Basil’s protuberance was a technocock of some sort, form fitted and wired to her nervous system, rising rapidly in response to the arousal signals her brain was sending. The skin was imbedded not only with millions of nanosensors, but with accompanying lightglow effects. Right now the base was a deep red but the tip was glowing white like an iron left in the fire.

  Calla tugged at Basil’s brightly coloured cock then and silenced herself as she pulled the slender machine into her mouth.

  Baz gasped and steadied herself on the bed with one hand, as Calla’s tongue wo
rked. It felt to me like I was licking her, too, as if somehow, through Calla, Basil’s cock and my tongue were connecting. “Kee-rist . . .” she breathed, the only one of the three of us whose mouth was not busy, and yet she could barely speak. “Wow . . . it’s . . .”

  Calla paused to grin up at her. “Is it as good as they say?”

  Basil nodded, then must have read the questions in my eyes. “It’s new. She . . . paid for it . . .” and that was all she could say as Calla’s mouth went back to work. It made sense now, the way she kept expecting Glory to invite her to bed. I felt Calla’s clit spasm under my tongue and knew she was close to coming. I increased my pressure and she came while Basil thrust into her mouth, into the fleshy side of her cheek where I saw it bulge. Then I closed my eyes and concentrated on making her come once more, two fingers spiralling in and out of her while my mouth drew her clit in and I clicked my tongue on it. She rewarded me quickly, wailing again as Basil popped free.

  I sat up and Calla looked at me, pleadingly, both of them did, and it was easy to see she wanted more of the technocock. Basil and she giggled a bit as we swapped positions, and I shifted around until Calla was sitting up, her back against my chest like two kids on a gravity toboggan. I reached around with my hands to brush her nipples and she arched just as Basil thrust in. Soon she had established a rhythm, and I let the waves of sensation come through her body and into my own cunt. I had tucked my head next to hers and she could turn her head to kiss me on the lips. I closed my eyes and kissed her and rode the wave of Basil’s backbeat for a while. Then she broke away and kissed her, too.

  I was startled out of my reverie then by Baz’s lips on mine, her tongue searching urgently for something in my mouth. The Spark fl ared up to meet her hungrily. And then somehow she was climbing past Calla, and the two of them together climbed on to me. Calla lay along one side, kissing my neck and stroking me from breast to the top of my bush, while Basil crushed the erect technocock into the crook of my hip with her body.

  “Luna,” she whispered, her throat tightened by desire. “Luna.”

  I quivered under her, the echo of the shivering fit I’d had before starting again. I knew if I paused too long . . . I knew I didn’t want to pause too long. Glory and I had played with dildos, the low-tech kind, from time to time – she liked sticking things into my cunt as a way to prove she was in charge – but never anything like this and not in a long time. I crooked one knee up and there was the tool, now glowing blue and green and casting an undersea look on Basil’s face, bumping up against the flesh between my legs. It had looked so slim before as she had pumped Calla’s mouth, but now I wondered if it would hurt when she put it in. I clutched at her sweaty back with one arm, the one that wasn’t trapped by Calla, craving it and fearing it all at the same time, which only stoked the Spark hotter. Calla’s free hand then, it had to be, reached between my legs and opened me wide, and Basil thrust upwards through the slippery juices, then she adjusted her angle and sank into me.

  I cried out, not from physical pain but from the sudden memory of the shape of Glory’s hand stuffed into me. Basil’s technocock was nothing like that, conveniently shaped for pleasure but not the rock heart that her fi st had been.

  Calla moved then, letting Basil push my knees up, and straddled my face. I licked at her between gasps as she dug her fingers between our bodies to get at my clit. She soon had the loose skin of my labia and bush stretched up taut towards my belly with one hand while the other jabbed in double time over the hard nub. Basil’s thrusts mashed her hand even harder into me and I thrashed my head from side to side. “Harder,” I said through clenched teeth. My body wanted violence, needed it to break through the tense wall of pain that separated me from them. The wall that Glory’s death had erected.

  No, I realized. The wall that Glory and I had built bit by bit over the last few years. Basil and Calla obliged, fucking me and frigging me as hard as they could, until I felt the edge of Calla’s finger claw over my clit. “Yes!” She crooked her finger more and I bucked hard against her, Basil now the one along for the ride. The orgasm seemed to radiate along my skin as well as through my insides, doubling back and cresting for a second time as they continued their motions until I went limp.

  I was amazed that Basil had not come, but what did I know about how the technology worked? Maybe she had a way to turn it down. She pulled out of me, the tool glistening wet and now throbbing a deep purple, and Calla nearly leaped upon it. Baz obliged, falling on to her back and letting Calla seat herself with the cock deep inside. She moaned and fell forwards for a moment, then sat up erect. Now I could again circle her with my arms and get my fingers on to her clit and nipples.

  I don’t know how long it was before she succeeded in making Basil come. All sense of time had long since fl ed. The three of us were just in a groove, where Calla would peak, then I would, using my own fingers when I had to, until eventually she arched and cried out and gripped her by the hips for two last thrusts that set Basil finally into a spasm, while I thrust my own fingers into my empty vagina, trying to remember what Glory’s callouses had felt like.

  The two of them were then on me again quickly, Calla burying her face in my muff while Basil hugged me from behind. Then, as Calla drew another orgasm out of me, as I beat my palms on the coverlet, I shouted, “Enough, enough!”

  They fell away from me as the sensation ebbed. There weren’t many cases, but there were a few, where people were fucked to death. The Spark can burn out a host, too. It was time to get it back under control.

  I think it was some time later that I began to speak. I’m not sure if I blacked out or not, but when I came to, they were still there. The three of us were lying on top of the bed and I had no way of knowing if we’d been there for a minute or an hour. “We’re going to play tonight,” I said.

  “What?” Basil sat up at the sound of my voice and rubbed her eyes.

  “We’re going to play tonight. A tribute concert for her. Just like we did here. Improvisational, cooperative.” Not like anything we’d done before. As I described it to them, I could see the idea catching fire, the memory of the song I had played stirring faintly. “And there’s something else I have to tell you.” And I told them, about the Spark, about Saffron, about Glory, Rose and Nura, and all I knew. “I’m sorry,” I said as I finished. “I should have told you before. For some it becomes a curse . . .” I looked at Glory, still lying in state on the low table. “But it is a gift, too.”

  In response, they came and kissed me, both together. I already had the sound in my head of the music we could make together.

  Celtic Tongues

  Jacqueline Applebee

  They said a creature lived here. I breathed in deeply, inhaled a thousand shades of green into my lungs. I breathed out, opened my arms. I welcomed the new world. I was in Scotland, in the Highlands that surrounded the legendary Loch Ness. The lure of a monster in the deep waters had piqued my interest, but what had finally drawn me hundreds of miles from my home in Bristol was the thought of quiet, peace and tranquility.

  Nine glorious hours on a train had left me in the city of Inverness, the capital of the Highlands. A short bus journey had brought me to my destination: a collection of chalets in the tiny village of Invermoriston, where I would be staying for seven days.

  I made my way to the reception area, but nobody was there. I went back outside, my feet crunching on the decorative gravel that formed a border to the building. I was in no hurry to check in. I could have a leisurely walk around the sprawling grounds first; acclimatize myself before I settled in.

  A figure approached me from the pathway, a young man who was tall, lean and tanned. The sun broke the clouds, and shards of light glinted across his bare chest. I saw his toothy smile from some distance. I found myself grinning as he moved closer.

  “You OK there, hen?” he asked. In my journey from the West of England to the North of Scotland, I’d been called “mate”, “love”, “hen”, “pet” and “wee lass”.
I was starting to become accustomed to the variety of endearments used by complete strangers; it was quite sweet when I thought about it.

  “I was supposed to be checking in, but I guess I’m early.” I tried not to look at the young man’s nipples, but he was quite a bit taller than me, so his chest was literally in my face.

  “Well, my ma’s just on her way over.” He picked up my heavy suitcase with one hand.

  I inhaled clean sweat as he moved, but was riveted by the sight of lean muscles that fl exed beneath his skin. He looked hard and solid. I licked my lips without meaning to.

  I tore my eyes away from his delicious body, as a woman of my age came trotting up to us.

  “Hello there!” she called in an accented voice. “You must be Molly.”

  We shook hands. I glanced discreetly between the mother and her son. “I see you’ve met Adam.” She nodded to the object of my desire and sudden dread. “He’s helping me out today. Would you believe he’s just graduated from university, but the lazy boy won’t go out and find a proper job?”

  “I consider this a proper job!” Adam called out over his shoulder as he walked to the nearest chalet.

  “Ach, young people,” his mother said with a melodramatic sigh. “Do you have any children yourself?”

  I shook my head. I’d never been able to conceive. After a few years, I’d stopped trying, got on with the rest of my life.

  “He’s a good laddie really.” She ushered me to the chalet. Adam leaned against a wall near the door. He didn’t move as I squeezed by. All those good looks were obviously a veneer for a cocky attitude. He knew the effect he was having on me.

  Adam’s mother explained which keys opened what doors, where the recycling bins were, when the launderette was open. But I heard little of what she said, as my eyes and my attention kept being drawn to her son as he moved around the small chalet. At one stage, he reached up to unscrew a light bulb from a ceiling lamp. I watched his jeans slide low over his hips; I glimpsed the tan line over the swell of his buttocks. He glanced down at me, shook the bulb gently.