But away from him, that night, a warning; no it can’t be this, surely not.
An article in a fashion magazine abandoned by your stepmother, about the dangerous allure of first love. That first passion that can whisper through your blood your entire life and become the standard of intensity by which all other partnerships are measured. You sense, that night, a shiver of a truth: that the man in reality will always fall slightly short of the man in your head, the concept of him – that the known will never quite arouse the way the mystery will later, alone. The shock of reality – sour breath, wrinkles, flaccid stomach, dulled teeth – all is forgotten with that precious little bauble of wonder and chuff that you carry to bed with you, every night, into your sleep.
That you love, and are beloved.
There is nothing else in the world that you want.
You have found a love that will be the foundation for your entire sex life to come, you sense this, even now. And God knows if you will ever be able to replicate it – if you are being spoilt for life. Is this Tol’s way of expressing his love? Stamping you with these memories so that forever onward you will be dissatisfied, disappointed, until you give up; bound by worship and longing for an experience long ago, ruined by it.
You pick up your notebook.
There will never be anyone else.
Lesson 129
Year by year the fierce experience of life, through death, circumstance or change, narrows the circle of those who own friendship
By the dam bank, naked in the softness of the mud, he tells you he wants to marry you out here, that it’s like the two of you are welded by the elements, by the land and the water and the air. Yes, you breathe, yes. The sweat and the semen gluing your skin and he suddenly presses in, so fierce, as if he’s trying to extract the life-force from you, thudding his torso against yours and murmuring, it’s like we were made for each other, we fit, as you curve into each other, you keep me alive; and his cheek is soft against yours as you stare up at the cloud-dotted blue and feel a peace blooming within you, because this is right, you fit. Yes, married out here – by the sky, and the dust, and the air. Anointed by ochre, and light.
‘I’m ready,’ you tell him.
‘Really?’
You nod. Ready for the next step.
Lesson 130
We take pleasure in tracing the large workings of all things
That night, in preparation for God knows what, you order your notes. Because you have no idea what you’ll be writing in the notebook next. So, now, a collation of all you have learnt from this summer about what works. For whatever is next.
It is a gift to experience sex with someone you love: For then the pleasure is multiplied thousands of times over, becomes sex full of emotion, the best.
A gift to experience sex with a man who treats lovemaking with reverence: Because with that comes a generosity of spirit – he won’t get you to do anything you don’t like.
A gift to be with a man who is not intimidated by you: Who is not afraid of women.
A gift to be with someone who knows what they’re doing: Whose touch hums; who is assured, gentle, confident. Who cherishes women so that his love for them – and their bodies – illuminates the experience.
A gift to be with a man who will hold a woman, just that, as she comes: Wrap her in his arms, still her shuddering but not intrude upon it, share the experience but not snatch the pleasure from her in that deeply private moment.
A gift to be with a man who is kind: When a man is attentive and considerate, when he listens to what a woman wants, then she’s gone, like a dog rolling over for its tummy to be tickled.
A gift to be with a man who tells you that you’re beautiful: Who instils in you a sense of confidence. Who empowers, not chips away or wears you down.
A gift to be with a man who respects the mind: For some, the best sex they’ve ever had may well be the sex they’ve never had. You can be much better at it by yourself, in your imagination.
A gift to be with a man who coaxes you to break down barriers and enter places you’d never usually explore: But gently, so gently, with tenderness.
You shut your notebook and enfold it across your chest, lying on your back.
Poised.
On the brink of God knows what.
Lesson 131
The known face of your girlhood will altogether vanish – nay, is vanished
‘There’s something incredibly erotic about a woman –’ his voice drops into breath, he can barely say it – ‘bound.’
A sharp intake of your breath.
‘Hidden,’ he continues. ‘Wrapped. Think of Heloise and Abelard. Unwrapping themselves, all their clothes, their known lives – for each other, no one else. The cheongsam will be waiting in that ditch where you leave your bike. Will you wear it? For me?’
You nod your obeyance.
‘What we’re about to embark upon is a form of bondage … but not as you know it. The best type of bondage can be very life-affirming, relationship-affirming; it requires a heightened level of trust between two people, a willingness.’ He whispers, cheek to cheek. ‘A closeness that doesn’t exist in normal life. Absolute surrender, trust; a communion of equals. Are you ready?’
You nod, your eyes dancing.
He picks up a heavy art book. Flicks through it. You weren’t expecting this. He runs his hands over a picture of the Mona Lisa.
‘Look at her. What is this woman’s story? She’s a mass of erotic contradictions. There’s the sober clothes, the demurely folded hands, but this, this –’ his fingers trace her lips – ‘the extraordinary smile. This painting is all about sex. Don’t you think?’
‘Yes,’ you laugh, seeing it. ‘She’s just done it. Or is thinking of it.’
‘Absolutely. And it’s a big reason, I suspect, why this picture is still so alluring five hundred years on.’
You gaze at the sexual contradiction on the glossy page before you. The hints of a private, supremely confident eroticism behind the sternest of public masks; the sombre clothes, the knowing lips.
‘Reserve and sexuality.’ He looks at you. ‘An explosive combination. My favourite. Never forget that.’ He buttons up your flannelette shirt, right to the collar, and steps back. Nodding.
‘Explosive. ’Til next time, my love.’
You want to crumple to the ground with torment, anticipation, wetness, want; you do not. It is only then you notice the thick rope Tol has taken from the couch, is wrapping around his wrist, pulling taut, jerking it.
Lesson 132
To domineer and to rule are two distinct arts, proceeding often from totally opposite characters
Two jagged days.
You change your clothes just beyond sight of Woondala. The cheongsam, of course, nothing underneath. The buttons firm across your breast. Restraint, and flesh.
Uncontrollably wet.
He is waiting. He throws up his hands in triumph at the sight.
He takes you by the hand. He leads you inside to the drawing room. He picks up the blindfold that is lying, in readiness, along the mantelpiece.
He wraps it around your eyes and knots it firmly.
‘I want you to read Foucault, I will give you a book. He says we exercise control over sexuality by our knowledge of another person – but also, crucially, by a knowledge of ourselves. What our body can do, the amazing things it’s capable of. That’s the secret. The mind is truly extraordinary. And now, an introduction to it. I want you to surprise yourself. Imagine you are unlocking a door to a hidden room deep inside you, and you have no idea what’s in there – yet. Are you ready?’
‘Yes.’ So much.
He is breathing deep. He undresses you, slowly; lingering his tongue and his lips, pausing for a wisp of a kiss, here, there. Until you are quite naked except for the blindfold whose long silk ribbon trails down your back with the deftness and coldness of a lizard. Now a suitcase is being opened – you can hear it – things are being removed carefully, and placed upon the
floor. It is taking time. Your legs are almost buckling now with want as you strain for sounds, clues. It is taking too long.
His tools.
A heavy leather collar of some type. Wound around your neck, buckled firm. You gasp. A chain is attached to it, its leather handle is whispered across your pubis. Its coldness is then looped down your back and threaded through your legs and pulled, firmly, once. Again, a gasp. You squeeze your groin on it, into it. Bend, instinctively working the metal deep into your fold. With a steady hand, with firm and gentle fingers, you are led through the listening, waiting house; every so often the chain between your legs is pulled taut – a reminder, a taunt. You are taken to an upstairs room, a room ringing with air and light, you can read it, read the sky in the dark. You are laid down, gently, upon your back on an empty mattress. Your legs are parted. You go to shut them, automatically, they are parted again; firmer. Your hands are taken, they are bound with a thick scratchy rope and secured to the iron bedstead. You are trapped, you cannot move them, you twist on your back. ‘Uh uh,’ he whispers, ‘you wanted this.’ Your legs are pulled apart and tied wide. ‘That’s better, that’s what we need.’
You arch your back, groan. We?
‘Now,’ Tol says, from above, looking down, ‘we can do whatever we want.’
The metal chain lying along your spine is jerked up, once, savagely, through your legs. You buck, exposing yourself more. You cry out. Tol pauses, you strain to hear anything beyond him …
‘Or should I say, whatever you want.’
A shardy silence. Shuffling in the room, breath, you can’t make it out.
‘Fuck me, quick.’
Tripping with wetness, coming, too quick.
Now he is unbuckling you, hauling you up on your haunches, exposing you – for what? Who? Opening you wide, dipping in a tongue. Fingers, many. Rim you, probe you. You pulsate, want it. All. All. Everything.
‘Well done. Perfect.’ At the end of it, the delight in his voice. ‘This is only the beginning, my beautiful, beautiful love. The very start.’
The tin roof above you talks in the heat, it cracks and stretches and creaks – or is it something else? In the room, watching. A feminine gasp, no, surely not, is your mind playing tricks? You are still blindfolded, you can feel it, you think, perhaps, you don’t know.
‘Again,’ you whisper to him in the dark, widening your legs further. ‘Now.’
You have tumbled out of yourself.
Lesson 133
What a future you open for her!
Your love has lost its innocence.
He is greedy. After the librarian, the demureness, the restraint – the whore.
‘Let’s play, come on.’ Gleeful, as if a fabulous world of riches awaits.
He has gone shopping, there are many new clothes, toys. Tassels at the nipples now of a beautiful satin bra, a slit in silken panties he jerks his finger up.
‘Be my stripper,’ he’s breathing softly into the back of your neck, a hand looped around your belly with a finger through the slash in your panties that are soaking wet.
‘Why?’
‘Because she’s such a fabulously glorious mass of erotic contradictions. The girl who promises everything but actually, gives very little.’ His voice drops, his fingertip swirls, inside you, you groan and clamp him tight. ‘It’s all look and fantasise and project – but don’t touch. Don’t possess. The potency in resistance, remember. She’s the girl who’s completely in control but she’s never quite going all the way and she’s revelling in it, that supreme moment of power where she’s got the attention of an entire room and is calling all the shots but is always withholding that final moment.’
You gasp.
‘Imagine you, here, with a room full of men. Imagine the power of it. All of them. Rapt.’ His voice right at your ear. ‘But you don’t have to withhold at the very end … if you don’t want.’
You touch yourself over his finger, you curl him into you, tumble to the ground. He pulls away your panties but before he gives you the release of his own touch he is parting your legs and staring, appraising, teasing.
‘You want others, don’t you? Watching, touching, wanting; hands, everywhere, all over you. Dipping in.’
His breath brushes your arsehole, he doesn’t touch.
‘I know you do,’ as he spreads your legs wide, wider, ‘you’re ready, aren’t you? Just tell me what you want.’
You arch your back, your nipples erect, you feel all-powerful, tripping with it; you would give him anything in this moment, anything.
He touches you.
You explode.
Lesson 134
Order is heaven’s first law
‘I must know. Everything. What’s in that head of yours? Don’t be afraid. I need to know. So I can help. With absolute, utter trust. Always that.’
All his words, words, words, over the next few days of apart. Spinning in your head as you help your father with the engine of his ute, handing across spanners and wrenches and bolts. You’re in retreat, here, now – you can’t go back, everything is galloping too fast – you don’t know what’s next, where it’s meant to stop, who he’s bringing in to this; you’re a good girl really, you can’t.
You will not go back.
What happens if you’ve fallen in love with a person who will ultimately destroy you?
It is not the first time you’ve thought this.
Woondala has woven a spell around you; you are different there. You don’t recognise yourself.
Your father needs to fix the chook house. It’s falling apart, a big job, you want to do it with him; need his silence, the solidness of hard work, the reassurance. Need the known, everything that is comfortable and secure and known in your life. In the heat that is so thick it is a presence in this place.
You do not go back.
Lesson 135
It often takes years to comprehend the peculiarities of one’s own constitution
A letter. Your name and address on the envelope, typed. Businesslike, anonymous. Your stepmother turns it over curiously, goes to hold it up to the light.
You snatch it from her. It is typed with his old typewriter, you just know.
‘It’s from my drama teacher at school. She said she’d write.’ Nonchalantly, already ripping it open. ‘It’s about the school play, next term, my lines. She promised.’
Rushing it to your room, as bored-looking as you can.
There’s a joy and trust and innocence brimming within you, and a depth which caught me unawares. I’d never want to hurt any of that in you or see you lose it. I feel old and cynical. Don’t inherit that from me, racked with all my doubts and worries. I feel I could poison you. Bring you down. Leave you bereft … but to capture that acuteness of being alive! That razor-edge quality, yes, that’s what being with you is like. I feel like you help me to live. You are so much stronger, freer, braver, than me; I must learn from that. I was feeling so crusted over, so weary of life – and then you came along. I want to make love with you madly, maddeningly. However you want.
Longing for you.
Now you must hide this, burn it. And then come. I need you.
You run out the door with a slap of the flyscreen and leap off the verandah – clearing, cleanly, six steps.
Lesson 136
Be scrupulously honest and truthful, in the smallest as in the greatest things
Sobbing as you’re pushing him away then pulling him to you, animal fucking, eating his flesh, biting, branding him, feeling his seed dribble from your stomach as you lay back on a huge slab of rock and it scrapes your back and you want it to, need it, to be marked forever, scraped by this grit; need it to hurt, to always remember this; want this day’s rawness and hunger tattooed upon the flesh of your back.
‘Deeper,’ you command, craving. ‘Fill me up.’
‘You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me,’ he says in the thick of it.
Holding you tight, thudding you into the rock, scrunchi
ng into your body as if he is clinging onto a lifebuoy in a wide ocean of fear, not wanting to let go, not wanting this to stop. He smells good, he always smells good and you nestle your face into his armpit, its animal smell, and drink him up – intoxicated, with all of it.
Soaring with happiness. That he could be so open, honest.
‘You’re the best thing that has ever happened to me.’
You love the vulnerability, the anchoring power of it.
A dome of secrecy over you both. As you lie there, limbs strewn, inside the raucous, ringing, bang-smash bell of heat and noise, cockatoos screeching above and the wheeling blue, the bubbling creek.
You look straight into his eyes which laugh back.
So, now you have it. That bloom of certainty that women who are anchored by a relationship have, that you have envied and craved your entire teenage life. A love that scorches self-hatred and insecurity and doubt. You are the love eaters in this place. Love gorgers.
Life eaters.
Yes. You feel so alive with all this.
You tell him, at last.
What he wants.
Lesson 137
It matters little when, or how, or by how many, truth is spoken, if only it be truth
You are thinking of someone else. Other men. He is the trigger; he is only the start. It is all in your head, the movie running concurrently with the physical action, it needs momentum, it does not need his talk crashing into it.
Nikki Gemmell’s Threesome: The Bride Stripped Bare, With the Body, I Take You Page 38
