by R. Rodriguez
Oh, Lucian’s sweet kiss… was like I remembered. Nothing that I’d experienced since. His firm lips melted perfectly into mine. Our heated breath mingling together. Our mouths conjuring a perfect rhythm that robbed me of my very breath. Our lips meshed as did our hands, and bodies. His large hands drew me in the room and I heard the door click loudly behind me. The sound didn’t deter me, though. I kept meeting Lucian’s kisses with fervor.
I felt his powerful arms lifting me again and laying me gently on his huge bed. I was in his domain now. The covers already smelled of his alluring essence. It also clung faintly to the crook of his neck. It was such a familiar scent, but it had a different edge to it now. It took my passion for Lucian to a higher level. I pulled at his head to intensify our kiss and arched up to his hard perfect body.
Lucian stopped to graze my face with his lips, all the while, transmitting his love and regard with a single gaze. I suddenly understood the treasure I had before me and I decided to let him know that his feelings for me were reciprocated and I didn’t have to wait to have another hypnosis session to know that or that in his arms was where I was meant to be.
“Lucian…” I started. He froze as I started speaking and began to separate from me.
“No. Wait. Lucian. I just wanted to let you know that …”
“You have to be sure, Grace. You have to be sure because after we consummate this, nothing will be the same for us,” he warned. “We’ll be truly linked forever. I’ll be here for good.”
“I love you, too, Lucian,” I said without a doubt.
Only when I actually said it did I notice that it came from the depths of my soul. Only then did I understand the implications of his warning. It was about this spiritual dimension that I wasn’t aware of before, but that was so real to me, now. His touch was now more real. A million jolts of pure pleasure struck me each time he kissed me and touched me.
“I accept this life with you. Only you,” I ascertained.
I surrendered to Lucian’s caresses. Our lovemaking wasn’t rough and harried. It was pure and unrushed. My impulsiveness and unbridled passion had brought me so much pain and grief in the past. I now experienced true passion and sensuality with the true love of my life.
Lucian and I kissed and caressed each other tirelessly up to the point of contentment. It was as if we had a waited a lifetime to do so. And in fact, it had been more than that. We fell asleep intertwined in a tight embrace amidst whispers of love and promises for the future. I saw hope again. I had a future. A future too magnificent to imagine before. A future that had been in front of me the whole time. A future with Lucian.
“What color am I now, Lucian?” I tempted before dozing off.
“I can truly say, finally… that I have no idea,” Lucian replied smiling.
“Welcome home, sweetheart,” I whispered in his ear.
About the Author
My mind wanders with curiosity. My loyalties lie with a better past when my life was “So Called”, I was full of “Teen Spirit”, and the world’s greatest lover was a “Champion”. I’m obsessed with the great minds of men and women who have made a difference for humanity. From Jesus to Jared Leto. Words are my playground. In them lies my passion.
Grace is the first novel I publish, although I’ve been writing since I was a teenager. My other works in progress are Chastity- The Second Eternal Beloved Novel and a children’s book, Renaissance Quest. I work full time as an English teacher in Puerto Rico where I live with my husband and two children. For more information about my books please go to my author page on facebook or visit my blog at http://rrodriguezeternalbeloved.blogspot.com.
Excerpt
Chastity
An Eternal Beloved Novel
By
R. Rodriguez
Preface
They say that in every relationship there is a lover and a beloved. I think I just figured out which of the two I am.
Of course, it took me so long to figure it out because I’ve been in denial despite the obvious displays to this effect. Lover I am. So now that I hold this enlightening piece of information, what will be my next move?
It would seem easy to any person on the outside to make a decision, but it isn’t. It isn’t easy to accept that I’ve perhaps wasted a good chunk of my youth pursuing dead ends. That the efforts I’ve employed into healing the wounds of my circumstance could turn eternally against me.
How was I supposed to know that he would remain the way he did? After all, his charms didn’t go uncounted, either. In fact, he was the pioneer of “spreading yourself around in astounding ways”. I just jumped on the van wagon…and the current rumor? The one that caused it all— was totally unfounded, to my disappointment.
Foreword
“Spreading my arms like a butterfly’s wings… I gathered love continuously… in all the wrong places. I held on to meager crumbs for so long, I never noticed precious love foregone… until it was … too late.”
-----Chastity
Chapter 1: Mother
Petals in the wind. Mother’s petals were in the wind. The petals that people had attempted to throw as a final farewell refused to reach her mahogany casket in its descent underground. A gust of icy November wind scattered them throughout the grounds of Seaport Harbor Cemetery.
I looked up, startled, to watch a single petal that had caught my eye. It was the only one that I’d seen actually make contact with the polished wood. As soon as it did, it jetted to join the others in their fluttery migration across the gray field. It swooped and flipped, making way for itself amongst the others. It almost landed on the ground and then reverted its course right back to where I stood. It finally landed—on me.
I jumped upon its impact on the carefully tended waves that fell down my chest. How could something so light carry so much deadly weight? I looked down on it like it was a cockroach climbing up my tresses and attempted to swat it away, but it was stubborn. It adhered to my long strands of hair.
As the few people that came to bid goodbye to mother retreated, I was left to stand alone in my battle with the single rose petal. At last I was able to remove it. I watched it retake its uncertain path until it hovered above the open grave for a moment and then dove into its original destination.
I took a step back, shaken as I remembered mother’s last words.
“You should have never been born. I curse the day you were.”
Tears streamed down my face as I recalled a distant story that seemed innocent enough when it was told to me. If only I had known the true nature of the grandmother that told it.
“There wasn’t even a day for your birthday, Chastity. You could’ve been born on any regular day, like everybody else, but you chose to come into this world on Leap Year.”
“So that means I’m special right?” I remember opening my eyes wide in expectation of Amelia’s answer.
She responded with a harrumph and a, “You’re special all right!” and continued dusting her infinite figurine collection in the study.
And my wretched birth date defined the rest of my days. There wasn’t a day in my seventeen years when I didn’t have to listen to a recount of my many attributes by either mother or Amelia. I was unlucky to be born a wild and impulsive spirit. Convention had me yawning. Routines, which were so important to children, made me restless. Propriety was an unlearned word in my vocabulary.
When other little girls were appropriately playing dress up with their Barbie dolls and playing house, I was running around the boardwalk at the risk of drowning or getting hit by a sailboat. Or worse, at risk of being stolen by one of the many tourist that visited Seaport Harbor on a yearly basis.
I was a nuisance to my only neighbors whose paths were filled with my Hansel and Gretel style markings. Their Cypress tree was haggard from my constant climbs to get a new view of the seaport. And I was not to trespass on their property even though I had overheard mother say that the property was as much mine as it was theirs.
That was the only t
ime I heard mother defend me against Amelia’s scorn —when Amelia mentioned Mayor Stevens or one of his perfect twins. She would retort in a fiery manner I didn’t think she had in her, at any complementary comment my grandmother awarded the exemplary family we were lucky to live next to.
The rest of the time mother kept to herself. She spent a lot of her time in her room with a headache or some other unseen ailment. On the offhand days that she got up and washed and primped herself until the luster of her truly beautiful skin and hair emerged, it was to leave.
She would leave on holiday with Channing so and so. She would leave to the new restaurant that was all the rage in New York with Peter who was so nice enough to invite her. They’d be taking the train of course, which meant she wouldn’t be back in a few days. She would leave with Cameron, her best friend, and so and so to the Hamptons. Leave with Emil, the new chairman to the town council. And soon after the chairman trips, came the trip that always brought her back to her darkened room and her migraine bandana.
The trips with Mayor Stevenson that lasted well over a week, to aid in his campaign efforts or other charitable deeds. She always returned from those with bags and bags of new stuff mostly for herself, but there would always be a little something for me in the mix that made me quite happy. A bottle of sticky sweet little girl perfume that I emptied on my body by the week’s end. A rare hair band that I tied around my head like Pocahontas wore hers. A music CD of a popular songs remade by cool kids from New York.
Soon after all the joy, though came the gloom. My mother cloistered herself up in her room for days on end. The mayor himself, who was my very exclusive neighbor, would come knocking on the door. Thank God he was so close to help, recanted Amelia. She would offer him all kinds of sweets and aperitifs she always seemed to have ready in the refrigerator. The mayor would politely ignore her Hors d’oeuvres, as she called them before climbing the stairs and landing right in my mother’s room which I always thought was so rude.
After countless hours, he descended refusing grandmother’s four course dinner that she prepared in a flash and ignoring me just as vehemently. Amelia always dolled me up when the mayor was around, to no avail. She rushed me into the bathroom for a bath, squeezed me into an ill fitting pageant girl dress that I hated, bobby socks and all, and smoothed down my messy long curls with baby oil.
After the mayor’s visits I always got mother’s attention but in the way no child would want.
“Chastity! Get your behind over here!”
“Chastity! Come pick up the mess you left in your room!”
“Chastity! Are you deaf?! Can’t you do anything right? Are you stupid?!”
“Chastity! Have you been touching my things?!!!”
“Go on child. Listen to your mother.” Amelia would concur.
My mother, so beautiful in my eyes, so charming to the many visitors that she entertained, was so, so… wretched to me and it was all due to my unfortunate birth date.
Things got particularly worse on the day Mayor Stevenson finally noticed me. I was about nine years old. We were invited to his house for his daughter Susie’s ninth birthday party. I took pride in the fact that I had become nine a whole three months prior to her.
It was actually the only Stevenson event we were ever invited to and it had been Mrs. Stevenson herself who had taken the liberty of ringing our doorbell nine years after being our neighbor, to do so. Everyone knew the Stevenson family. I had seen Susie countless times parading around on floats in her perfect Mary Jane’s and her fluffy short curls.
I had spotted her playing in her custom made, freshly painted playhouse, complete with real miniature sized furniture and dolls galore from my bedroom window. And… I must say that I was glad I wasn’t allowed to disturb her, or even speak to her while she was playing because everything she did bored the living daylights out of me.
She was even in my school, but THANK my lucky stars I was not to be in classes with her because she was in all the AP classes. She had a high and mighty southern drawl, off all things, that patronized and ordered as soon as it was out. As I stood next to Amelia when Mrs. Stevenson handed her the invitation, I realized where the southern drawl had stemmed from.
I don’t know why but the day of Susie’s birthday, my mother did the impossible to make both of us look our best. She actually got up before noon which was a miracle in my view, and declared that we were both visiting the beauty parlor. After getting our hair done, she shopped for a new outfit for me, which I complained about because I wanted to wear my stirrups (I had recently taken to mimicking Eighties fashion) and bought herself a simple aquamarine sheath dress that matched her sparkly eyes perfectly.
I wasn’t too happy about the get up. I felt like I looked like a cupcake. But, it felt good to do something with my mother. I loved her dainty figure. The way her eyes shone when she viewed us both in a mirror. The way she smelled as she dabbed a bit of her own lip gloss on my lips. I pursed my lips just so as she instructed me and smacked them together when she was finished.
“Don’t do that Chas, you’ll smear it under your lip.” She warned.
I wiped the underside of my bottom lip and followed her to the Stevenson’s house. Amelia was already waiting for us with a huge glittery silver wrapped gift with an equally large colorful bow the likes of which I had never seen for my own birthday. I secretly hoped it was one of those prank gifts in which there was a tiny little gift inside a huge array of packaging.
I didn’t detect the undercurrent that lay between mother’s and Amelia’s exchange before we left as I was so enthralled wondering what Susie’s present was.
“Now remember Catherine, just be your natural charming self.” Amelia warned.
Mother just breathed shallowly as she nodded her head taking in the instructions much as I did when I was being instructed by Amelia.
We stepped out into the spring night and headed for Susie’s birthday night. The party was at night because there was to be a special magic presentation by artists from the most famous circus show in the country and they needed lights and the like. I had truly never seen such a fantastical birthday. There were twinkly pink lights adorning the whole backyard. Even my favorite Cypress tree was adorned with large lighted crystal apples. It was a magical set up and now I knew why mother had dressed me so.
Unfortunately all the primping in the world didn’t make the birthday girl acknowledge me anyhow. She was already at the fantasy makeup section they had in a corner of the yard with her snooty friends. I lingered near the few adults at the party that were admiring the contortionist that hung from custom made steel supports in yet another corner of the backyard. Their lithe and graceful movements mesmerized me into place—and that’s when it happened.
“My, my, what a beautiful young lady you have here Gary!” A chubby man with impossibly red cheeks and booming laughter put his arms around my shoulder and pulled me into the circle of adults that were standing near me with the mayor.
“No wonder your dad has lavished you with such a special event. You’d be the jewel in my eye if you were my daughter, too. She’s the spittin’ image of you mate.” The man pinched my cheek and I saw how everyone in the circle just stood frozen in place.
Some gave each other knowing glances, but Mrs. Stevenson looked like she was seeing me for the very first time. She frowned and shifted her weight on her right heel as in further consideration, but Mr. Stevenson just took another swig at his drink as he too searched my face.
He didn’t say a word to acknowledge the man’s remark. It was my mother who came to the rescue. She had been standing in the background with her back to the group seemingly occupied with fixing an unseen hair thread from her dress. She turned and came barging in to grab me by the arm.
“I’m so sorry Gary. Chas’ didn’t mean to disturb your guests.” She quietly apologized, her voice sounding obnoxiously sweet as she looked demurely into the mayor’s eyes.
“This is my daughter,” she explained to the chubby man
smiling apologetically at the rest of the guests.
“Oh, my word. That girl just has your striking good looks, Stevenson.” The chubby man amended.
Everyone squirmed when the real Stevenson daughter came up to show her parents her makeup. It was obvious that she had not inherited her father’s dashing looks. Mayor Stevenson was the handsomest man Seaport had ever born. He had a full head of smooth blonde hair and captivating blue eyes that melted any woman on the spot.
Mrs. Stevenson’s attention turned to my mother’s aquamarine dress and full mane of silver blonde hair as mother resumed her position glaring at the festivities around her while pretending to nurse a drink.
The party continued and I remained planted right beside her as she’d ordered.
When the circus show was in full gear, Mr. Stevenson found a way to slip away from his wife’s condemning glare. He quickly approached mother. He pulled her aside behind a darkened side of the house. When they emerged mother grabbed my hand and dragged me unwillingly across the yard towards our house.
Who would’ve thought anyone had to be forced to wear a satin fuchsia costume to later get it ripped off from their body and smeared all over a hysterical woman’s makeup smeared face? After my day of bliss as mother’s astonishing daughter, this is the memory I held from that night. At least I regained my ample time to roam and explore the wonders of Seaport once mother secluded herself to her room for a whole month.
