CarnalDevices

by Helena Harker

  Burst after burst of carnal bliss jolts my nubbin. The intensity of it blinds me to everything around me. Soon, as my climax approaches, I close my eyes, shutting out Phineas. I focus only on the beads, the stimulator, the strong steady rhythms that rack me with pleasure so intense it is indescribable. Every nerve in my cunny and nubbin is alive. Climax is approaching. Nearer. Nearer. So rapid. So unexpected and effortless. Such incredibly overwhelming feelings. Swirling, massaging, rubbing, flicking. I am lightheaded, woozy with sensation.

  “Faster.” My breath escapes in a hiss. “Increase the speed of the stimulator! Slightly more pressure, ever so slight!”

  Phineas is skilled. No sooner do I utter the words than he compensates. My climax comes quickly and so powerfully it catches me by surprise. My fingers never produced this sensation, and for the clitoral stimulation to be coupled with the delicious sweeping motion of the beads is beyond description. Spasm after spasm racks my core. My hips rock forward as my pearl seeks additional stimulation.

  I throw back my head and call out, “Phineas! Phineas!” My orgasm consumes me.

  After the spasms calm, and the muscles in my thighs stop shaking, I realize my fingernails have tightened around Phineas’ shoulders, leaving vivid half-moons in his skin. I also realize every single person in attendance downstairs must have heard my lusty screams.

  “I believe the ladies at Carnal Pleasures are quite jealous of you at the moment,” he says with a grin.

  “Let them be jealous.” I grin back at him, lean over to kiss his cheek and caress the graying hairs at his temple. “I’m keeping you to myself.”

  Phineas removes the facilitator from my cunny. It is shiny and wet with my juices. While I am fully satisfied, his member is still swollen and erect. I lean over and grasp it. “What about you? Do you not wish to experience coitus?”

  “Of course I do, my sweet. But my primary goal is to initiate you to the pleasures of the flesh, and that has been accomplished. You must learn to please yourself in order to please others. You are progressing toward that goal. I refuse to hamper your progress by insisting that I bed down with you. Too many men have used you in the past. You are not ready to have me inside you, so I will wait. I can use the male facilitator on myself, if need be.”

  I am most interested in seeing the male version of the fornication facilitator, but I am even more curious to know how it feels to engage in carnal activity with Phineas. Skin to skin, without any mechanical intervention. “What if I do not wish to wait? What if I want you inside me?”

  “Are you certain?” Concern flashes over his features.

  He does not wish to push me too hard. While I appreciate his tenderness, I know what I want. The Kama Sutra’s reversal roles intrigue me. The book mentions the woman playing the part of the man, climbing on top while he lies supine. “Oh yes, Phineas, quite certain. Lie back.”

  The old me, accustomed to the swine that populate Silverton Square, must disappear forever. I must burn every last trace of the old India and ensure that India of Rajasthan rises from the ashes. The new me knows what she desires and ensures that she gets it.

  He chuckles as I press on his shoulders until he is fully reclined upon the bed. I place a pillow beneath his head. “I wish to mount you.”

  A smile plays on his lips, and his eyes light up with a smoldering fire. “It is refreshing to be with a woman who does not expect the man to make all the effort.”

  After straddling him, I take hold of his member, so large, so full of promise. Remembering the terms from the Kama Sutra, I whisper, “I will take your lingam into my yoni and pleasure you until you climax.”

  I lower myself, and his tumescent member slides into my nether regions. The sensation is delightful and my passions take flight. I have seldom been on top, where I can control my own pleasure. I feel free without the crushing weight of a man on me. In my experience, men only request this position when they are drunk or fatigued. Otherwise, they fear it compromises their masculinity. Phineas seems to have no such compunctions, and I am thankful for it.

  I ride him, briskly bobbing up and down on his shaft, reveling in the pleasing sensations coming alive inside my cunny. Phineas gazes adoringly at my breasts as they heave and bounce. His hands slide down my waist, to my hips and come to rest on my thighs. The mattress yields under our combined weight, and the bed creaks and groans.

  After a while I need to catch my breath, so I lean forward, brushing my breasts against his chest, letting my hair fall in a silky cascade over his skin. Fingers massage my scalp, and I utter a soft moan. His palms travel down my back all the way to my buttocks, clasping them tightly.

  Sitting up, I squeeze his torso between my legs. What about his member? Even if I am still, I can stimulate him. “Will you last for hours if I do this?” As I speak, I squeeze the muscles of my cunny around his cock. He gasps and his hips buck. “I plan to put your assertion to the test.” Again, I squeeze him tight.

  “Ahhhhhhhh!” Phineas’ eyes roll back in his head. “Few women can do what you are doing, India!”

  “Is that so?” My muscles clench and this time I squeeze so hard my face contorts into a grimace.

  “If you continue, I will not last.”

  “You said you would,” I tease.

  “You have unexpected talent.”

  So do you. But I do not wish to say it aloud. This time I combine the squeezing with an up-and-down movement, bouncing gently like an equestrian astride a fine stallion. As I rise, I release the pressure on his cock.

  “Tighter!” he wails, fingers digging into my thighs.

  I give him what he craves, the ever-tighter clench of my cunny. His features tell me he is almost there, almost at the point of climax. His back arches, his hips buck and he holds on tight to my hips, preventing me from rising. The spiraling ecstasy of his climax is etched on his face.

  I watch his face as he ejaculates, his entire body shuddering with his release. His eyes close. His lips press together and then part widely as he groans. In the end he relaxes, turning his head to the side, his fingers still pressed into my thighs. Instead of dismounting, I lower my upper body against his and we remain joined, his lingam growing flaccid in my yoni.

  He whispers, “Thank you, India of Rajasthan.”

  I shake my head. “Thank you, Phineas, for making me see what I could not see before. There is pleasure to be had in sexual relations.”

  He kisses the top of my head. For the longest time we lie in each other’s arms and I listen to the comforting beat of his heart. I do not wish this to end. Although I am not in love with Phineas, I am developing feelings for him. He understands how my past influenced and molded me. Now he is helping to sculpt me into a completely different woman.

  “Since you and I had never met before today, how did you know how to please me?” I ask.

  “Rowena made it easy to anticipate your difficulties and desires.” He strokes my hair. “She gave me your card.”

  Madam Rowena keeps cards for the ladies as well! How shocking and inappropriate. On second thought, I understand why she does so. “Whatever does it say?”

  “Read it.” Phineas reaches into the leather case beside the bed and pulls out a small card.

  INDIA

  Strong-willed, opinionated, full of potential. Sometimes stubborn, brooding and withdrawn. Months spent on Silverton Square caused much damage to her sense of self. Shows no interest in pleasing her patrons. Would rather be anywhere but here, but the prospects for her elsewhere are grim. Spends so much time reading novels, I fear she has a distorted perception of reality. Reminds me of myself in my earlier days, when I dreamed of becoming a thespian. Perhaps this explains my keen interest in helping her kindle a passion for her profession.

  She wanted to be an actress on the stage? Interesting and unexpected. “An accurate assessment of my character,” I admit.

  “Rowena believes you are terribly frightened of her—”

  “Indeed I am!”

  “But s
he has your best interest at heart. She cares for all her ladies.”

  “Phineas, she threatened to throw me back into the street!”

  “Her threat is designed to motivate you. She will not act on it unless she feels it is absolutely necessary. Trust me.” He raises my hand to his lips and kisses it.

  “I enjoy lying here with you. Affection is not generally forthcoming in this profession.”

  “It can be. You need to cultivate a list of clients who see you regularly. You will learn that many men, particularly married ones, seek affection in addition to sexual relations.”

  Surprised, I raise my head. “Truly? I did not realize this. It is important to be touched and spoken to.”

  “I agree. In my experience, the women who seek my company desire conversation as much as congress.”

  “Since you have studied sexology for so many years and have published so many papers, do you find there any areas you have not yet explored?”

  He hesitates. His mouth opens and closes again. “Yes…”

  Why doesn’t he wish to speak of it? He hasn’t held back at all this evening. Every step of the way, he was open and communicative. “Pray tell.”

  “Some consider this act…a perversion.”

  Frowning, I consider deeply. “Animals?” I whisper in revulsion.

  He bursts into hearty laughter. “No! Men who indulge in…the sin of the Greeks.”

  “You wish to study men who copulate with other men!” Shocking!

  “It is always best to experience these relations for yourself before analyzing them, hypothesizing about them and subsequently publishing a paper.”

  He is entertaining the idea of bedding down with a man as some sort of experiment? Phineas has thoughts of being a—I can barely think the word, much less say it aloud—Uranian!

  Then I remember my reaction to Madam Rowena’s probing fingers. My Sapphist reactions stunned me, yet I quite enjoyed her touch. Perhaps some men find it pleasing as well, although I have difficulty imagining it. After all, what orifice would they enter?

  Oh, oh, that orifice! Oh my. Even the Kama Sutra does not contain images of this type of congress. It speaks of multiple partners, but never between individuals of the same sex. This is undoubtedly another subject that is covered by the confidentiality clause and I must refrain from speaking of it to anyone.

  “Are you not worried about the legal ramifications of your actions?” I question. “Men who are caught committing this pernicious vice face a year of hard labor.”

  “It is merely a thought, India,” he says. “I have never engaged in this type of activity and it is highly unlikely that I ever will.”

  “I have another question, Phineas.” Part of me is reluctant to ask. “Please do not think me perverse.”

  “Feel free to broach any subject.”

  “Since I enjoyed sitting on top, and the Kama Sutra calls this the man’s position, does this mean I have…Sapphist tendencies?”

  “Not necessarily. You are a woman who enjoys taking charge and that is unusual in our society. It is in no way perverse.” He kisses my forehead. “You are much like Rowena when I first met her.”

  I am?

  “The more I consider the idea of members of the same sex engaging in relations, the more I believe it is simply a difference, or perhaps a form of experimentation. It is not an aberration, although the Creationists would not agree. The church deems all sodomites to be deviants, since the only purpose of copulation is procreation.”

  “Are relations between women viewed in the same light?”

  “King Augustus ruled that such behavior did not take place between females, so the penal code contains no sanctions against women who bed other women.”

  The king is obviously shortsighted, since we have a Sapphist wing here at Carnal Pleasures.

  Phineas yawns. “Tomorrow evening, I will return for you. India of Rajasthan has a meeting with the Steam Society. Dress appropriately.” His breathing deepens and soon he falls asleep, his arms still wrapped around me.

  Chapter Three

  Late in the afternoon, Madam Rowena sends me her tailor, who enters with yards and yards of diaphanous cottons, gauzy muslins, and textured silks. He carries so many bolts of material that I barely see his bald head shining over the top of a sheet of gold-embroidered cloth.

  “A sari is at once a simple garment,” the short, pudgy man states, unrolling bolts of fabric on my bed, “and a highly complex one. It consists of one length of cloth, between six to nine yards, wrapped around the body. There are many ways to wrap the cloth, depending on the effect one wishes to have. Traditional. Gown-like. The possibilities are numerous.”

  Soon, my room is a textile merchant’s dream, draped in billowing fabric of every imaginable texture and color. When Madam Rowena enters, she appears stunned by the array of choice.

  “You are using your creativity, India. In only one day, you have made remarkable progress.” She seems genuinely pleased, calmer and more relaxed than usual.

  It makes me happy to see her this way. For once, I do not feel my usual sense of apprehension when she is near. Even her clothing is understated, a somber burgundy skirt and a black bustier girdled with supportive wire.

  Madam Rowena handles a particularly stunning emerald silk, the one I prefer over all the others, and fingers its edges, which are gilded with a glittering pattern. She holds it against my skin. The tailor makes eye contact with her and nods.

  “I would suggest this shade,” says Madam Rowena, holding it against my bodice. “It complements your complexion.”

  “I agree.” For the first time since setting foot in Carnal Pleasures, I smile at Madam Rowena, and she smiles back.

  “Do you know the story of the sari?” The tailor walks stiffly across the room, lays the selected fabric on my bed and cuts a great swath of fabric.

  “No,” I say.

  “A weaver wished to capture the essence of a woman. He dreamed of the colors of her varied moods, the sweep of her hair over her shoulders, the shimmer of tears on her cheeks, and the satin touch of her skin. All of these he wove into a cloth, and thus the sari was born.”

  “A beautiful folktale,” acknowledges Madam Rowena.

  For a second time, Madam Rowena and I agree. As the tailor sews the edge of the cloth, my mind draws me into the past, during my childhood when I lived in a rundown tenement by the Thames. Indian house servants were all the rage, since they were a sign of colonial power and wealth. They replaced poor white servants in many homes, including my mother, whose skills as a charwoman were not needed elsewhere. As a result, she resorted to begging and thievery.

  Sometimes I woke up in the middle of the night, shivering, because the fire in our tiny room had gone out. She was not there and I did not know how to rekindle the embers into flames. All alone I waited until she returned when the light of dawn appeared in the filthy windowpane. She always held a small handful of coins, and I wonder now if she committed acts more shameful than theft.

  Many Indians lived nearby, squatting in abandoned homes, doing their laundry in the Thames, beating brilliant lengths of fabric against rocks, and hanging them to dry in the sun. The sheets wafted and billowed, furled and unfurled. Never had I seen such a flamboyant sight, like a vision or a dream. When the women beat their clothing on hot summer days, they wore the traditional sari, albeit draping their bodies more modestly than they would in India. No bare bellies or shoulders, and the skirt revealed only the tips of their toes. Rows of men stood on the shore and gawked, lusting over the exotic yet impure women.

  Indians earned little respect, and in many ways were treated like the Gypsies who swooped into Lower London during autumn, appearing overnight out of the aether. The population of Upper London despised and feared the Gypsies, who were known for their cunning and treachery. They stole, cheated, told false fortunes, and when their pockets overflowed, they vanished into the aether from which they came.

  I remember one particularly beautiful India
n woman, the wife of a rich merchant, one of the few Indians to attain a status of respectability in English society. Her clothing was a stunning blend of the unfettered subcontinent and the conservative West. She was respectable yet alluring, sensuous yet sensible.

  “I would like a mixture of Indian and British fashion,” I tell the tailor.

  It goes without saying that I cannot dress like a true Indian woman with bare shoulders, midriff and ankles. There is a way to make subtle alterations to preserve my exoticism and show that I have ingrained in me the values and sensibilities of British society. While I do not want to cause a scandal in the streets, I want to turn men’s heads.

  “It is common to wear a form-fitting blouse beneath the sari,” says the tailor. “Perhaps you already have one that will enhance the emerald hues of this silk?”

  “Hmm. Let me see.” In my wardrobe I find a blouse that fits close to the skin, a shimmering gold shade that matches the gilded patterns on the silk.

  “Perfect,” says the tailor. “Put it on. And a petticoat. But no corset. Then I will begin.”

  While I change, the tailor turns his back. Madam Rowena, on the other hand, regards my figure with great interest and helps me button my blouse even though I do not require her aid. Her fingers press against my breasts and she does every single button with slow, careful movements. Yes indeed, Madam Rowena’s fingers are skilled. Heat flushes my cheeks.

  When I am ready, the tailor drapes the cloth sensuously around the curve of my waist, pleating it with care. Then he winds it around my middle, over my ample breasts, and the last yards of fabric drape over my shoulder, cascading to the floor in a glimmer of green and gold.

  “You have heightened your status, India,” says Madam Rowena in admiration. “In this manner, you will be deemed a courtesan, not a prostitute.”

  “Precisely.” Standing before the mirror, I evaluate the effect of my sari. I exude the mystery of the land of spices and monsoons. I possess the grace and sophistication of a fine English lady. Most importantly I am an enigma.