Cervenka nodded and left, speaking to Milan as he walked through the door, but Milan didn’t reply. He simply stood in silence while his mother spoke, faintly, with a laboured rasp. The words sounded reproachful.
When Milan’s turn to speak came, he was impassioned and full of wild gestures. Lydia took a step back, wanting to hide in the shadows. It didn’t seem right that she was here, but Milan seized her forearm unexpectedly and yanked her back into the foreground.
“English,” said Milan’s mother.
Not sure if it was meant to be a question, Lydia nodded.
“I no speak,” she said, apologetically. “My son—you love?”
She nodded.
The old woman smiled for the first time, rose from her rocking chair and busied herself at the range, pulling out a dusty bottle of something and pouring them each a small glass.
Milan didn’t speak, apparently waiting for his mother to set the mood.
She turned to Lydia. “He…” she said, then she pointed to her heart and made a violent movement, signifying its splitting in two.
“I’m sorry,” said Lydia automatically.
“You? No. Him.”
“She’s still angry with me,” translated Milan. “But I think I can work on her. I think she’s pleased to see me, in her heart.”
“I can go back to the hotel, if you want to be left alone together…”
“No, it’s fine. Really.”
They sat at the small table and drank something that tasted of apricots with a fiery kick, while Milan and his mother continued to pour out streams of rapid Czech. Lydia tried her best not to feel like a spare part but was nonetheless relieved when, after an hour of this, Milan’s mother got up and opened the front door.
She nodded at Lydia, then drew her son into a tight embrace. Lydia was so moved by this she almost burst into tears.
“Is everything okay, then?” she whispered, not sure if she should break Milan’s meditative state as they descended the stairs. “Are you forgiven?”
“Maybe,” said Milan. “I told her to come to the concert tomorrow—to come backstage. We can talk about her moving to London. She didn’t say no.”
“That’s wonderful. Really wonderful. I’m so happy for you.”
He stopped at the foot of the stairs and looked at her.
“Are you? You really care?”
“Of course I do.”
He slung an arm around her shoulder, walking back into the street with her.
“I’m glad I met you,” he said.
She wanted to burst with happiness, here in the middle of this grimy urban street.
“Now, I owe Cervenka a drink, then we can continue with our tour, yes?”
“Yes.”
As she watched the sunset over the River Vltava from the Charles Bridge, Lydia felt that she had found her ideal of perfect happiness, right here in Prague with Milan. He stood behind her, his chin resting on her shoulder, his hands clasped beneath her ribs, whispering magical tales of Czech folklore directly into her ear. On her right towered the castle and cathedral, and on her left the bridge disappeared into the seething cobbled streets of the Old Town. Ahead, pleasure boats cruised lazily up and down the river, lit up with strings of bulbs while the faint strains of jazz bands drifted up from under the bridge.
Since the meeting with his mother, Milan had seemed different—lighter, younger. It was as if he didn’t have to put on the mask of the charismatic virtuoso, and could just be. She thought perhaps he would be like this all the time if they stayed in Prague and let the orchestra go home. She daydreamed of a future for them, living in a beautiful town house with his mother, playing together in the Czech Symphony Orchestra. She would have to learn Czech, which wouldn’t be easy…but Milan would teach her.
“What if I stayed here?” he said, breaking into her thoughts with such prescience, Lydia wondered if he had read her mind.
“I think it would be good for you,” she said. “You seem so happy now. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you happy before.”
“I’m happy when I’m with you,” he said, with a jarring touch of false gallantry.
“Don’t. I’m serious.”
“So am I. What would you think, if I stayed?”
“If it was what you wanted, I would accept that. You have to do what’s best for you.”
“You are very special, Lydia. I don’t think anyone’s ever cared about me in that way before. It’s always been about what people can get from me. Fun, excitement, patronage, sex.”
“That’s not true. Everyone’s in love with you, and you know it.”
“Not the right kind of love. Not like you.”
A golden shaft of late sunlight rippled on the river’s surface. Lydia watched it break up and reform, mesmerised, feeling that she would always remember the sights and the sounds of this moment.
“You don’t fawn all over me like the others,” he continued. “If you think I’m doing something wrong, you tell me. You don’t join in like everyone else does. You challenge me. Nobody else does that.”
“Somebody has to, or your rampant ego would run away with you.”
He laughed.
“You know me.”
“I love you.”
“I know. If I stayed, what would you do?”
She looked up at him. What did he want her to say? Did he want her to offer to stay with him? Or did he just want a declaration of mad love, to satisfy his aforementioned ego? He seemed to want honesty tonight. Should she take that risk?
“If you stayed here…I’d find it hard to go back to London.”
“What if you didn’t have to?”
Is this real?
“If I didn’t have to? If I could stay with you?”
He nodded. His irises skidded from right to left, as if he was terrified she would give the wrong answer.
“It would be a huge decision,” she said. He wanted honesty. He would get it. “But I think…I could live here.”
“Really?” He smiled boyishly and hugged her close.
“Really.”
He kissed her neck, then drew her away from the parapet, linking her arm in his while they passed the sketch artists and ukulele players, the bangle sellers and jugglers. It was a wrench to leave that low-lit river, but if anything could lure her away it was the thought of going back to the hotel with Milan.
The church bells were chiming eight o’clock as they entered the lobby and crossed to the lift. No tactical breaking of their embrace tonight—from now on, it seemed they were ‘officially’ a couple. A couple of flautists came out of the elevator, passing them as they went in, and scampered off, whispering. As soon as the doors shut, Lydia and Milan fell into a passionate kiss that lasted all the way to the top floor.
“Stay with me tonight,” he whispered, opening his door and whirling her round and round the room until she fell backwards, laughing, onto the bed.
She wanted to remember everything about this night, from the tiny cracks around the ceiling cornicing to the way Milan’s muscles moved in his face, his skin stretching and slackening over his jaw and cheekbones while he mock-pounced on her. She wanted to remember the placement of each strand of unruly hair, the exact blue shade of his eyes, the length of his neck and the V of his skin that was exposed when she undid the top button of his shirt. The bed creaked and some of the orange-brown, swirly wallpaper had peeled, but no room had ever held such promise and such joy—and such desire.
Milan dropped off the edge of the bed and removed each of Lydia’s shoes with a dramatic flourish, hurling them to the far corner of the room, then repeating the action with her socks. After diving back on the bed with a springing movement, ending in a low crouch over Lydia’s body, he unbuttoned her jeans and began to shimmy them slowly over her hips. Helping him out, Lydia arched her spine with an inviting smile. All of this was his—all of it could be his forever, if he wanted.
He uncovered her legs reverently, letting the denim slide slowly over inch afte
r inch of thigh, then down past her knees, speeding up to rip them off her ankles and toss them aside. She opened her legs like scissors and clamped his hips, yanking him down with her heels on his buttocks for a long, lascivious kiss. They lay like that, feeding on each other’s mouth, for a long time. Lydia felt him grow and harden at the apex of her thighs, his erection pushing down and begging to be let inside her pussy lips, although they were protected by her knickers. She rubbed her heels up and down his arse in delight, loving the feel of his clothes against her skin. His kiss, always voracious, was also tender, and Lydia sensed that he wanted her to understand and receive his passion as a promise, a solemn vow of togetherness. Once she had allowed herself to hope, it was easy to slip into the consciousness of love and of being loved. Yes, there was a future here, at last, and yes, she meant to seize it.
He curled his fingers under the hem of her hoodie, one he professed to hate with the orchestra logo across the front, and before she knew it he’d slid his hands up her ribcage and lifted the garment over her arms and head, leaving her in no more than her underwear. She writhed beneath him, plucking at his shirt buttons, wanting to equalise their footing, but he took her wrist and held it down above her head, lording it over her for one heady moment before unbuttoning the shirt himself with his other hand.
The cotton flapped over her stomach and ribs, caressing the slopes of her breasts, until he released her so he could shrug it off completely, exposing broad shoulders, muscular arms and the precise definition of his chest. Lydia worshipped him with her eyes, mouth watering at the way his belt sat on his hips below a tight stomach, drawing her eye lower. He smirked down at her, revealing his awareness of the power he held over her, and held her breasts, using his thumbs to peel away the bra cups. Her nipples popped up, red and ready for him, and he circled them with languorous fingers, licking them now and again, building the sensation within her up and up while she shut her eyes and let it take her over.
She abandoned her thought processes and gave herself up to pure sensation. Soon all the barriers between them were gone and they lay, skin against skin, heart beating against heart, transferring warmth between them until it was no longer clear whose warmth and scent belonged to whom. An endless vortex of heat and wetness, need and tension, span Lydia around. She knew that she moved, she knew that she reached and touched. It was all she needed to know. She and Milan, joined, were the beginning and end of the universe.
After the kissing and feeling, the exploring and teasing, they plunged into the serious business of coupling. Lydia spread her thighs to welcome her lover, her one beloved, to hold him inside her and keep him for as long as she could. Filled with his cock, she was whole.
“I love you,” she whispered, over and over again.
“Miluji tĕ,” he said.
Her orgasm ripped her apart and remade her, and his, when it came shortly afterwards, completed the ceremony, which she thought of as a bonding ritual.
Now they were one. Now their life could begin.
She lay in a fog of satisfaction and unspeakable emotion for a long while, waiting for her mind to come back to her. Milan lay on top of her, so heavy and limp that she almost thought he might have lost consciousness. But eventually he stirred into life and rolled to the side, allowing her to breathe freely again.
“Are you okay?” he asked eventually, sounding worried.
“Of course.” She propped herself up on her elbows, squinting down at him. He looked scared. “Are you?”
“I really felt that,” he said. “I haven’t felt it like that…not for years.”
“Felt it like what?”
“I don’t know. I felt free, I guess. I wasn’t performing. I was just…letting my body… I don’t know. This all sounds stupid.”
“No, no, it doesn’t. It’s pretty amazing. I almost felt like I was having, like…” Lydia laughed self-consciously. “A spiritual experience.”
“Yes.” Milan nodded. “It was more than sex. An extra dimension.”
“What was so different?”
“I think… I was thinking about you. About how you were experiencing everything. It was all for you.”
“That’s it,” said Lydia. “I would call it love.”
“Would you?”
“Yes.”
He held her until the room grew dark.
“One thing about love,” he said at last.
“What?”
“It makes you hungry. I’m going to call room service.”
She giggled and snuggled closer into the crook of his elbow.
Chapter Twelve
Kisses woke Lydia—kisses leading to caresses, gentle at first then firmer until her breath was heavy and she radiated heat.
She lay beneath Milan, her arms around his neck, watching his chest rise and fall as he eased back and forth inside her. Her eyes were still gluey from sleep, her limbs lazy. The perfect conditions for slow, easy morning sex.
The hammering on the door, however, somewhat ruined the mood.
Milan uttered a Czech oath and tried to ignore it, speeding up his stroke.
“Milan,” whispered Lydia urgently.
“They can go away,” he growled.
But the hammering continued, followed by the rattling of a doorknob.
Milan held himself still, poised halfway through a push-up, waiting for the noise to cease or for the noisemaker to reveal his or her identity.
“Milan!” The voice was male, the accent Russian.
“Fuck off, Evgeny,” shouted Milan. “I’m sleeping.”
“No, you aren’t. Let me in, or I’ll wake everyone in this damn hotel.”
Milan sighed and crumpled on to Lydia’s spread-eagled body.
“I’m sorry,” he muttered, pulling out of her and throwing on a bathrobe before striding to the door, erection poking against the satin.
Lydia sat up and let her shoulders slump. Reality time. Perhaps it really had all been too good to be true.
Within seconds, Evgeny had cannoned into the room, rumpled and scowling, dark hair mussed across his brow.
“I hope you slept well,” said Milan mildly. “Slept off all that vodka.”
“I’ve been awake all night,” he snarled. “Waiting for you. But I see that you’ve been busy with your little woman. What’s going on, Milan? When in Prague, do as the straight guys do? Is that it?”
“Don’t be stupid, Evgeny. Prague is one of the most tolerant cities in Eastern Europe. If I want to take a man out here, I can. I just prefer my lovers to be conscious.”
“I prefer mine to treat me like a human being, not a toy.”
“Touché. I’m sorry you feel that way. Now can you go back to your room, please?”
“We need to talk.”
Milan sighed.
“You’re right. We do need to talk. Okay, we have rehearsals from ten, breaking at one for lunch. Let’s have lunch together. We can talk then. Yes?”
“Okay,” said Evgeny sulkily.
“So we can get up and showered in peace now, yes?”
Evgeny said nothing, but flounced out of the room, slamming the door behind him.
Milan sat back down on the bed, reaching out a hand for Lydia before lying down beside her, seemingly intent on resuming their early morning activities. But she batted away the hand that delved down between her thighs and sat up, tossing hair out of her eyes.
“You’re going to break his heart,” she said.
Milan lay flat on his back, exhaling heavily at the ceiling.
“Am I?”
“Unless…what? Are you going to invite him to stay here too?”
“Do you think I should?”
Lydia held her tongue. She had never felt close to Evgeny. If she was honest, she had always seen him as a threat—not because he was Milan’s other lover, but because he had never got over his hostility and jealousy towards her. A permanent ménage dynamic between them didn’t seem viable.
“You don’t,” Milan deduced. “It’s okay.
I agree with you. Evgeny is too angry and too difficult. He exhausts me. He needs an exclusive lover, and I can’t be that person.”
“That’s hard on him,” said Lydia quietly.
“In the short term, yes. In the long term, he will come to see that it’s for the best.”
“And you’re going to break it to him at lunchtime? He won’t be in a very good frame of mind for the concert.”
Milan frowned.
“That’s true. Maybe my timing could be better. You think I should wait until tonight, after the concert?”
“It might make more sense.”
“But my mother is coming. I don’t want her arriving backstage to some almighty drama.”
“Would she understand, about your having a male lover?”
“I don’t know. I think she’d be okay. I like to think she would. But I don’t know.”
“Hmm, difficult. Well, you’ve told him lunchtime now. I guess you’ll have to talk about something.”
“We’ll talk about you.” Milan kissed her extravagantly.
“Please don’t. You’ll drive him even wilder.” Lydia shivered, sensing impending doom, even though everything in her garden should be rosier than ever. She reminded herself that the future was bright. It was true that the Evgeny situation was unsustainable. She felt for him, but it couldn’t carry on.
Nonetheless, she felt too unsettled to eat much breakfast, and barely heard Vanessa’s chatter about her night out in Prague with the other percussionists.
Once inside the majestic concert hall on the banks of the river, she tried to focus hard on the music and nothing more, but every chord made her think of making her life here and being an adoptive Bohemian. Evgeny’s perma-glower across the floor from the cello section didn’t help either. The surging lyricism of the Vltava movement from Má Vlast made her so emotional, and so happy, that tears welled in her eyes. Could she really mean that much to Milan? Or would her precious dream be snatched away?
When they took a mid-morning break for coffee and pastries, Evgeny made a beeline for Lydia, dragging her away from Mary-Ann by the elbow.
“It’s not just me and Milan who need to talk,” he muttered, while Lydia made apologetic grimaces to a nonplussed Mary-Ann. “We should talk too.”
Highly Strung Page 14
