Her Neighbor's Pleasure

by Shosha Pearl

  Michelle cried out with pleasure. While Esther watched her cling to the curtains and battle against the assault of her husband, whose clothed back was now pressed against the window, she lay her own hand against the outside of her underwear, feeling the warmth that was emerging. Esther slid a finger underneath the wide elastic rim of her panties, and was startled at how much moisture was pouring from her.

  Esther's apartment was filled with wordless cries of intimacy. Worried the impassioned sounds would wake her family; she scanned the room for their entry point. She could see several open windows, but she was too scared to close any of them for fear of being spotted. Instead she sat there, glued to the sofa in a mix of anxiety and arousal, listening to the sounds grow to a crescendo.

  Their curtains were now completely parted so that Esther could see everything without interference. Esther watched Jason withdraw from between his wife's legs and position himself behind her, his trousers now sitting around his ankles. His hands were on her hips as Michelle leaned forward, head down, hands pressed against the glass and tilted her backside towards her husband. When he entered her, Michelle's body jolted forward; her breasts hung roundly below her, trembling slightly with each of her husband's thrusts.

  And still the noises came into Esther's apartment. "Oh yes, yes," Michelle called. "Fuck me. Fuck me hard," she continued. The language was shocking to Esther in its coarseness, but it seemed so right. And with each command, Jason increased his tempo; pushing harder and faster against her. His furious thrusts continued for minutes that seemed like hours to Esther, the woman who could not turn away.

  Eventually, the moment arrived when Esther heard Jason’s cries above those of his wife. An audible burst of primal male exhalation rolled across the evening air, and hit her like a blow to the gut. Esther sucked in her breath in terrified excitement. She was aroused beyond her understanding and afraid of the desire gripping her body.

  Long after Michelle and Jason had moved away from the window, their lights eventually fading, Esther sat in the darkness unable to move, her hand still inside the elastic of her underwear.

  When Esther opened her eyes the next morning her first thought was of her neighbors. Lying in bed only a few hours earlier, she had tossed and turned, unsettled and confused. She wanted to forget what she had seen, to shed the effect it was having on her body and her mind. But as much as she wished to erase these images from her memory, she knew she could not. They were now part of her and she could not talk about them with anyone.

  In the kitchen, as she poured milk into cereal bowls and fixed a coffee for her husband, the image of Michelle, her face pressed against the glass, her breasts pushed flat along the clear panel, stood before her. She heard them too. Michelle's cries of pleasure echoed in the water stream that poured from the tap into a sink filled with bowls and mugs. The rising suds bubbled out from the hot water, forming shapes that made her think of bodies turning together. Everything was out of step. She was slow as she dressed her children. When they got to the car, she looked towards her neighbors' empty parking bay, simultaneously dreading and hoping that she would see one or both of them.

  The scenes of the previous night continued to replay in her mind; she could think of little else all day. And, as her thoughts combined and collided, details became confused. Sometimes it was Sholem's face instead of Jason's; at other times it was her own face in the place of Michelle's.

  Throughout the day, her breaths were short, her mouth was dry, and her underwear singed with heat. At the park in the afternoon, she sat on a bench and watched her children play, the sun running its fingers down her back. Meir played with cars in the sandpit before her, while Aviva and Chaim climbed and swung and called to her to join them.

  "Imma's sleepy," she said from her seat. "I just need to rest."

  She was tired. Over and over, she saw Michelle's body swaying back and forth, the curve of her back, the tension in her arms as Jason ran his mouth between her thighs. Then she forced her mind to return to the present, to her children running back and forth to gather twigs and leaves, until her thoughts strayed to her husband.

  Sholem was a gentle lover; a good man and a loving husband. When they first married she had been shy to the point of obstruction. Her mind had been a mix of ideas, of fears and fantasies. She was raised to be a good and righteous woman. She was the daughter of a respected rabbi and now the wife of one. Women like her should be modest in all senses and at all times.

  From the moment that she and Sholem had first met, she had noticed the easiness about him and she’d taken pleasure in the comfortable connection that had developed immediately between them. Their first date had been in the lobby of a hotel, where they had sat and talked over glasses of coke. Their second meeting was in a kosher café, with coffee and chocolate cookies. She couldn't remember what they had discussed, but recalled the evenings were pleasant; not frightening or overwhelming as she had worried they would be.

  Sholem had smiled a lot – a sweet, shy smile that had played about his mouth, a clear circle of soft skin between his lips and honey-colored beard. She had watched those lips as he talked, but her eyes had often wandered along his broad shoulders, across his chest and arms. She had seen no sign of the expanding waistline already present in some of the yeshiva boys she knew. His body had been lean and strong.

  "Do you work out?" she had asked, without thinking.

  Sholem had seemed to think this was funny, which confused her. Perhaps it was not the kind of question to ask on a date. Perhaps it wasn't tznius, but she didn't see why - her instinct for modesty had been fine-tuned from a young age.

  "No," he had said. "But I like to run."

  And he did run. When they were first married he ran almost every day. He would come home, red-faced and dripping of sweat; small moist curls forming in his hair. Seeing him like this made her pause; she watched his bright eyes and panting chest and felt a strong urge to run her hands through that sweatiness, to pull his clothes from his body and reveal his vibrant, athletic nakedness. But she didn't. Women like her do not lose themselves in the smooth, sweet sweat of their learned husbands; they don’t long to roll naked with them on the floor in the daylight, to rub skin against skin until her sweat melded with his and they were both covered in a fine layer of liquid warmth. Such things were done by other people. Instead, she would smile and turn away.

  But everything was different now. The visions of her neighbors burned into her mind; it was difficult not to be overwhelmed by the possibilities of desire that had been revealed to her.

  That evening, as she looked across the table at her husband, her mind stripped him naked and she imagined him raw, hard and eager. Suddenly, the idea that she might spontaneously run her hands along his body seemed more acceptable. Esther might be the wife of a rabbi - a rebbetzin - but something about what she had seen the night before had shifted things within her. She had witnessed first-hand what uncontained passion looked like and she longed to know how it felt. Esther felt it was time for her to be a woman first and a rebbetzin second.

  "You're very quiet tonight," Sholem said.

  Esther blushed, looking down at her food. Her eyes felt bloodshot, her mind heavy, her body desperate. "Am I?" she asked, trying to sound sensible. "I'm sorry – I’m just a little tired."

  "I would help put the children to bed tonight but..." he said. He had students waiting, a shiur to give, she knew. It was the same most nights; he'd be out after dinner teaching, coming home after she had fallen asleep.

  "I'll be all right," she said, smiling at him, trying to erase the pictures in her mind.

  After another late night call, Esther had not been able to sleep, despite the weariness she felt. She lay awake in the near darkness, listening to Sholem's rhythmic breathing. He had the bedclothes tucked around his chest, his arms emerging like long lines of smoothness. He might have the mind and soul of a Torah scholar but right now she was more interested in his well-toned body. It thrilled her to examine him like this, un
guarded and unaware of her gaze. Sometimes, during these hours of Sholem's heavy sleep, even before these recent thoughts had beset her, she had been tempted to pull his sheets back and pour over every inch of his frame. Even in his sleep, the muscles on his arms were firm and tight, his biceps swollen. She imagined those arms grabbing her in the way that she had witnessed Jason do with Michelle. Esther wondered what it would feel like to be locked in a hold that felt dangerous and exciting, perhaps even a little frightening. She pictured Sholem and herself standing in their bedroom, watching one another, each waiting for the other to break the tension between them. He'd see the excited strain in her eyes, her rapid breathing and uncertain stance.

  In the quietness of her bedroom, beside her sleeping husband, Esther moved her hand under the covers to feel her nipples. In her mind she pretended that it was Sholem's hands fidgeting under her nightdress seeking her breasts. She circled and squeezed them, mimicking his make-believe roughness. When his imagined hands moved to find their way into her underwear, Esther slid her own hand between the elastic of her panties to find a warm, wet welcome.

  Esther pictured Sholem pressing her against the door, his lips firm against hers. He spun her around, marching her backwards towards the bed, pulling each item of clothing from her without a sound. He was not aggressive, nor was he gentle. In less than a minute she stood before him naked, self-conscious under his unrelenting gaze. She pictured herself wanting to raise her arms to cover herself, but she knew from the smile on his face that this would not be allowed.

  Instead, in her mind, he pushed her onto the bed. She felt the smooth sheets catch her, heard the hollow thud of her buttocks on the mattress. The ignominy of the fall was at odds with the thrill that ran through her. She breathed fast now, and hard. Her imagined self didn't know what to do with her legs. Should she cross them in modesty, or open them in welcome? Her pubic hair was in full view, staring at him, waiting to see what he would do with it.

  Esther did not have to wait long. The Sholem in her mind was on the bed, beside her, his hands along her bare skin until his fingers ran down her stomach, through her hair and between her hot, wet lips. He pulled her legs apart so that her knees were open and nothing was hidden. And while he did this, Esther entered her own real, burning wetness, amazed at the lubrication flowing from inside her. She sucked in breath after breath, as her hands moved under the covers in sync with those of her imaginary husband while the real one slumbered beside her. Together, they slid a finger around her clitoris until the pleasure became almost painful. As his movements grew more frenzied so did hers, until the moment arrived when the pleasure peaked, her climax pouring out around her, through trembling muscles and shuddering limbs, in gasps and low groans, partly stifled in the darkness, but loud enough to stir the sleeping man beside her.

  Esther froze, holding her breath, waiting to see if the explosion that had just ripped through her body had woken her husband. He sighed, and in the faintness of the light easing through from outside, she wondered if she saw him smile.

  Esther lay for a minute and watched his smooth face. Then her own eyes closed.

  Esther was teaching one of her classes on the weekly Torah reading in the girls’ junior school. This week the Torah reading was Parshat Shelach in which Moses sends twelve spies into Canaan on a reconnaissance trip. It was one of the best parshas to teach small children.

  It was good to be out of the house, among the busy, comforting energies of children. “Baruch Hashem," she said to herself when she entered the classroom. It was relief to have this distraction. At seven and eight years old, these girls were already well versed in Chumash, the five books of Moses. Each parsha class was a revision from the past year and the years before. Esther liked to let the children tell the stories. She enjoyed having them feel they were teaching her.

  The afternoon flew by. The respite she had received from her time in the classroom had been a blessing, but from the moment she returned home an array of lurid and confronting thoughts returned to assail her. The images in her mind were loud; they blocked the sounds her children made as they raced along the corridor yelling to one another. Repeatedly, Michelle's demands for her husband to "fuck her" ran through Esther's mind, as clear as on the night it had happened. Esther found herself turning towards their apartment regularly. It was hard to focus, her mind often wandering to a different place than the one that held her body. She wondered if this would ever stop.

  There was a slow shift in the mood in their apartment. Esther noticed it from the moment it began, because Esther's mind and body were the engine that drove the change. Sholem could be observant, sometimes surprising Esther with the details he noticed, but often his head was preoccupied and he failed to notice the things going on around him. Slowly, however, she saw that he began to sense that something had happened between them.

  The defining moment was dinner one evening a few days later. The summer still felt young and the heat from the evening moved through their apartment, skipping from one window to another. Sholem loved summer breezes and detested air-conditioning. Every night when the temperatures remained high, Esther knew he craved to open a window in their bedroom – not a lot, just enough to allow the air to flow freely. They had tried at first, but Esther was such a light sleeper that she had found herself frequently woken by the noises from the neighborhood. She had wanted to accommodate Sholem, but in the end her need for sleep had prevailed.

  They were having soup for dinner the night that Sholem seemed to notice something had changed. Standing to serve, Esther could see her slim reflection in the wall mirror opposite; her head covered by a soft black and grey house-hat. Her eyes seemed greener, her lips red with the warmth of the evening, and her cheeks flushed a near feverish pink. Esther caught her husband looking at her admiringly. She could feel arousal rising inside her underwear with each of his glances.

  Esther wanted him to really see her. She held his gaze, knowing that her eyes were broadcasting her desire. He could not turn away from her, even though he did not know what to make of her. Esther smiled a smile that spread across her face with a cryptic combination of messages - like she held a secret that she was not yet ready to share. When she passed Sholem his bowl, her fingers deliberately touched his. She knew he was out of his depth; that he was confused about how to respond to her – especially with their children seated beside them at the table. But the children were oblivious to the silent dialogue transpiring between their parents and she knew it.

  Later that night, when he returned home from teaching, Esther was in bed. Generally at that hour she was already asleep, but tonight she was propped up in bed, flicking through magazines, smiling an indefinable welcome to him.

  Esther wore a pink nightgown that was buttoned high at the neck. She knew it was his favorite, its fabric sheer and alluring in the lamplight. Esther positioned herself deliberately to give Sholem the opportunity to trace the lines of her body. She knew that sitting this way, propped up against pillows, her breasts sat slightly upturned, the shape of her nipples visible through the material.

  Sholem undressed for bed in the corner of the room, partly shielded from the golden glow emerging from Esther's bedside lamp. His wife's warmth radiated towards him as he slid under the covers. She smiled as he settled himself beside her, noting the desire in his eyes and the outline of his hardness against his pajamas.

  "How are you feeling?" he asked, placing a hand under the sheet on her thigh; the thin pink fabric between them. "Are you tired?"

  Esther placed the magazine on her bedside table and slid down under the covers to face him. "I'm always tired, but I'm also OK."

  Sholem slid his hand underneath the pink fabric; the feel of his touch on her skin was electric. Esther closed her eyes and undid the buttons at her throat, slipping the nightgown over her head. She turned her breasts towards him, daring him to touch them. Esther could not remember a time where she had been so forward in their intimacy, but the more daring she was tonight, the more she was dri
ven to go further.

  When Esther pushed the tip of her tongue inside Sholem's mouth she knew she'd startled him. Moving her fingers down to circle - then grab - his hardness, she heard his surprised intake of breath. It was not something that she had ever done before, at least not with such confident deliberateness, but the urge to keep testing boundaries was great. Her lips moved as if to devour him, while her fingers gripped him firmly. Sholem groaned, which fired Esther further with need. When he placed his hands between her thighs and found her moistness, she released a sound from her throat unlike anything she had made before.

  Esther knew she was doing something right when Sholem pushed his wife firmly on her back, rearing over her. Reaching across to switch off her lamp he stopped again at the sight of her breasts, lowering his mouth to them. As he sucked on her flesh she moaned again. After seven years of marriage she knew he was never fully certain that what he did gave her pleasure, but tonight she moaned enough that he surely must know that she liked what he was doing.

  In the darkness Sholem rubbed his erection against Esther's soft skin. She moved her hips towards him, causing him to tense with increased arousal. Hurriedly, a little clumsily, he began to rub against her mound, sliding along her wet canal until he found her opening. He pressed forward, inward, while she, once again surprising herself with her brazenness, not only spread her knees further apart, opening herself up to him completely, but also wrapped her legs around him, pulling him closer to her. He slid into her warmth with ease.