by Smith, Skye
"No, oh no, that is bad," moaned Karl, "I don't want children with her. She is too... significant. She would always be using psychology on them instead of just letting them play and explore. My God, she would probably demand they go to private school. You've heard the yuppie mums in the playground. They over-intellectualize everything."
Erik scrunched his neck and mimicked a yuppie mum. "Now Johnny, I don't think you are quite grasping the consequences of not sharing. You play together nicely and stop this errant and discordant behavior. Look, now you've made me spill my double frothy soya milk crappacino."
"Yeah, right," chuckled Karl, "that to a two-year-old. I shouldn't laugh. This is serious. I knew she would have a crush on me after sex under my aura, but that was my weak little aura and manageable. Who knows what will happen after a night under Maya's?"
"Karl, that's just the tip of the iceberg. At the restaurant last night, Maya sort of agreed to have our children, sort of. Now she has spent the night with a woman who absolutely wants our children, or at least yours. And today you are taking that same woman to a wedding where you will meet all of her family."
"I feel sick," said Karl.
"No, that excuse won't fly. It would be cruel to force her to go to the wedding alone. I don't want to be cruel to Emma. She's a sister."
"No, really, I feel sick," and Karl ran to the powder room.
* * *
"The guys are up," whispered Maya, listening to someone upchucking while she stroked Emma's shiny brunette hair.
"Fwive mow minwuts," mumbled Emma from where she had her faced nestled between Maya's breasts.
"The wedding," Maya reminded her.
Emma slowly rocked her face back and forth between Maya's small soft mounds, and then slowly pulled her face away from heaven. She couldn't resist sucking on a nipple, and Maya supported her head as if she were an infant. Eventually she felt foolish and sat up. "That is a magic place."
"A billion babies can't be wrong."
"No, I mean for feeling your aura. My face was surrounded by it. My whole head was bathed in goodness. Oh, I feel so, so..."
"Sensitized"
"Exactly"
"That could be awkward at a wedding. They stream with emotion. Maybe you should ask Karl sweetly for a come, before you leave, just to get back to normal."
"Oh darling, not coming is what passes for normal for most women. Me included. Couldn't you just, sort of, zap me?"
"All right, this time, but there is probably something against it in your medical oath. Lie on your back and relax." Maya prayed over the womanly body beside her, and then moved one hand slowly and closely over the belly to the pubic area, and then she thought good thoughts about the nice lady and the whiteness took over her sight and it was done. She pulled her hand away quickly to prevent an overdose and then just let her general aura create a dome of pleasure over the woman.
* * *
"Hear that," said Karl with the spoonful of natural Balkan yoghurt held still. "I told you so. That is Emma moaning."
"Yup, I would know her moaning anywhere, after listening to it all night the other day."
They looked at each other accusingly.
"Bitch" whispered Karl.
"Skank" whispered Erik.
And then they smiled at each other, sweetly, and came together and hugged and felt each other's auras and kept hugging until the moaning upstairs stopped. "You know, we look on these things as problems, but most of the world would envy us. How blessed is a house that is filled with good loving?"
* * *
Arm in arm, Maya and Erik waved them out of the driveway. There had been a panic in the end because they had forgotten that the Mercedes was still downtown. Maya and Erik had fetched it while the other two were dressing. They made a handsome couple, although Maya wondered why Canadians dressed in dark colors for weddings, as if they were going to a funeral.
"Ah, that is something you should ask Gerry," he said as he walked her back into the house. She felt so good in his arms. "He says that the English world has lost the true meaning of tasteless when applied to the world of fashion."
"I don't get it. You'll have to give me more," she said not wanting to give up his arms despite being back in the house.
"In food there is good taste, bad taste, and tasteless. Water is tasteless. Neutral. Candy is sweet. It has a good taste. Vinegar is bitter. It has a bad taste, but at least it has taste. It is not tasteless. Now do you get it?"
"So are we talking about the wedding cake?" She got it. She just wanted to keep him talking and looking at her.
"When Gerry wants to be noticed, he either dresses in very good taste, or in very bad taste. He is good at both, for effect. When he doesn't want to be noticed he dresses tastelessly. You know. Drab, black, dark colors, or worse, beige. Nothing to catch the eye of the beholder and make them react positively or negatively."
"So business suits are tasteless. They are the water." she said.
"You've got part of it."
"Sweatpants with bum written across a saggy backside are bad taste. The vinegar."
"Well ..."
"My yellow sundress is good taste. The sugar. Wouldn't they love it at a funeral?"
"Enough. Any good theory will leak if you poke enough holes in it. Of course, taste in outfits depends on the occasion. That wasn't the point."
"I was just yanking your leash. I heard all this from Gerry first hand." Maya pressed her head sideways into his chest and looked out at the view. "Look, the fog is sweeping in again. Let's go back to bed. I'll show you what I did with Emma. You'll enjoy it."
He was so tired he couldn't say no.
* * *
Afterwards, when he was lying with his face nestled between her breasts, and occasionally wandering his lips across her nipples, he whispered, "We have been putting it off too long. Considering the circumstances, we shouldn't put it off any more."
"So you're not too tired," she whispered back, her heart soaring. "not too played out for a first time."
"No, and not only is it overdue, but it is Saturday night. Go, go and put on your dancing dress. Let's have an official first date."
Her heart crashed. "But I thought you meant, you know. A first time."
"Bah, morning sex is the best. Why waste a Saturday night when you could be out dancing? That disco number will be perfect. The queens will want to scratch your eyes out."
She pulled his head back between her breasts, "But darling. We are finally alone." She held him there, but then relented. Emma and Karl would definitely spend the night together, so she would have Erik all to herself again for the whole night, but this time with no aura to force him keep his distance.
* * *
* * *
MAYA'S AURA - the Refining by Skye Smith
Chapter 4 - Three years earlier in downtown Vancouver
There was trouble at the door of the night club. They wouldn't let them in. No amount of fast talking seemed to soften the resolve of the doormen. They had their orders. This was a special night at this club. The Queen's Ball. No straights allowed.
Erik saw someone he knew go in and he waved and yelled out ,"Bring Gerry!" They waited like outcasts, while she grew colder by the minute as the temperature dropped with the mist. She had stupidly left her new trench coat in the minivan because she didn't know if they would have a coat check. He put his punk leather jacket around her shoulders.
It was so unfair. They made a stunning couple. They had come dressed like extras from the movie Saturday Night Fever. Maya had gone consignment shopping again, with some of the money Emma had paid her for her task force assistance. She had been thrilled to find a disco dress in a silver fabric that draped beautifully and swirled perfectly when she danced in it. She had been even more thrilled to be able to afford it, and some silver Capezio sandals that were comfortable to dance in and some elbow-length black gloves. Erik was in skin tight black pants with no pockets, and no room to get horny. He was laughing.
"Any oth
er day these pants would mark me as a flaming faggot, which is why I rarely wear them, but with you on my arm, no one believes I'm gay." He looked down at her. She was not amused.
"Karl, Karl," came Gerry's falsetto voice above the chatter around the door. He was winking obviously at Maya to play along. "Oh, it worked. Better than I'd hoped." Gerry, as Queen Victoria, at over six feet, was quite an impressive sight. The big woman bumped the arm of the doorman. "It took me four hours to wax every delicious morsel of him, but it worked. I have turned Karl into Olivia Nuetron Bomb, queen of the disco." She winked at Maya again and then lifted the doorman's arm off the retaining chord and opened it up.
"Oh, give me a break," shrilled the falsetto voice. "You don't recognize Karl and Erik. Are you new here or something? Oh Karl, how did you squeeze your feet into those pumps? Come in out of the cold."
The doorman relented. No one in the society business ever messed with Gerry. She could use her radio report to savage your scene.
They walked in the wake of Queen Vicky's hooped skirts past Elizabeth Two, Beatrix of Holland, Elizabeth one, another Elizabeth two. Gerry kept turning around to talk. Talking was something she liked to do better than anything. "We used to have a true beauty contest, but then the Malays came to town with their cute little boy-girls and it became no contest. Now we just come dressed as queens and party."
The hallway opened up into a dance floor, a sprung wood dance floor, and half the crowd were dancing. The other half were drinking and cruising. Gerry was talking to her again. "Now sweetie, you mustn't stand too close to the other women. They look fabulous alone or with each other, but if you stand beside them they will look tawdry. Like clowns in comparison. That's why they weren't letting you in. Promise me."
"But those girls are hanging out with them," she said pointing to two of the most exquisitely beautiful women she had ever seen. Some mix of oriental blood, and wearing sleek silk gowns of the Hong Kong cuts that hid nothing of their curves.
"Those are the Malays. Yes, you may go over and stand with them. Please go over and stand with them. It will serve them right."
Maya was overwhelmed by the colors and commotion. Most of the people were taller than her and though she wasn't a short woman, she felt like a little child amongst adults. She held her elbows and withdrew her aura so that it wouldn't be bashed about.
"This was a mistake," Erik spoke into her ear. He jumped when someone pinched his bum.
"Oh Erika dear," said a woman in a sparkling flapper dress with feathers and a cigarette holder with a candy cigarette, "have you gone to the dark side, or are you just sampling the fag hags for a change?"
"Um, this is Karl's daughter, Maya. Be polite, or else you will never be invited for supper again."
"Daughter, you kidder. Karl is younger than me." She turned to Maya. "Get in line, honey. If Karl ever dies, this one is mine, complete with house." She strutted away with her basic black come-fuck-me-pumps making her tight bum wriggle invitingly.
Erik tried again. "This was a mistake. You don't know anyone here. We can leave if you want."
"Maya," came a call, "it's Maya." Two devastatingly handsome men with coat hanger shoulders, vee chests, six packs and arms like oaks strolled towards them. They were costumed as Egyptian palace guards and the men in the crowd who had come dressed as men, melted out of their way.
Maya screeched with delight and threw herself into the arms of the closest, who effortlessly lifted her high above the dancers and then set her down like a feather. They were two of the stunt men from the movie set. Two of the manliest men in town.
"What are you doing here?" she asked.
"We were going to ask you the same thing. We came as Nubian guards for Queen Cleopatra over there."
She did her cutest pose. "I am the queen of the disco, Olivia"
"Nuetron Bomb," they finished together and low-fived.
"I have to get dancing," she said. The music was fabulous, and she was sure Gerry had just told the disk jockey to put on some disco music. "See you later." She spun around and found Miss Flapper pressing Erik against a post, or with one. She grabbed his elbow and swung him into the middle of the dancers and away from Miss Flapper.
Erik took stock of the spaces and non-spaces on the dance floor and spun her slowly over to a space beside the Malay princesses. The princesses accepted the challenge and chose dance partners and the disco dance fight began.
The Malays out-danced her in every number, but Erik knew some moves that had the men standing along the bar whistling and cheering. She decided to out-graceful them, but that didn't work either. The Malays were devastatingly graceful, and began doing a fusion of disco and Balinese dance.
The disco set ended and she took a break, and it was then that she noticed that the bartender would allow no one to touch her drink but him, and that when she left it to dance, he would cover it with a coffee lid and put it behind him on the bottle shelf.
The next set was modern stuff. Techno-dreck. Boring, mechanical, single dimensional crap. The men along the bar who had been enjoying the disco fight, began yelling cat calls and booing.
Miss Flapper came up to them, but instead of cornering Erik against the bar, she singled out Maya. "You are losing to those Malay bitches, darling. Stop trying to outstep them and start out-swirling them." She didn't understand, and so Flapper reached down and grabbed her hem and pulled it one way and then the other.
"This dress is cut on the bias. It is designed to swirl. Forget fancy footwork. Just swirl your dress and twirl your titties off."
Why not, she thought, so she did what any real woman knew how to do, and very few faux women. She took her tiny bra off through her sleeve. She really needed to buy a larger size. She was sure her breasts were growing. She held her diminutive bra up and asked the bar keep for a plastic bag, and she dropped it in, and asked him to hold it for her. He opened a drawer underneath the bottle shelf and dropped it on top of a pile of other bras.
The disco came on again, and she eagerly pulled Erik onto the floor. She looked back at Miss Flapper but she was busy feeling up a tight bum and whispering into the guy's ear. Then Miss Flapper turned to her and winked and gave her the nod. Maya began to twirl, first doing old-fashioned jive to the disco beat, and then modified tangos and sambas, all the time keeping the skirt swirling and her breasts jiggling.
She looked over at the princesses. Their tight fitting silk outfits showed off their tight bodies to perfection but they did not move when they danced. They were all footwork and arm-work, but no swirl.
After three numbers, the Malay princesses surrendered and bowed to her and a mighty roar filled the dance hall. She looked around. All the queens had stopped mid-floor to watch her last dance, and now they were cheering. Not cheering her, so much, as not booing the princesses.
Erik bowed low to the queens and pulled Maya down into a curtsey, and then they escaped to the bar for a rest and their drinks. "Yes, she is," said the man two men down from her. "Ask her."
"I can't talk to real women," said the man next to her, and blushed, "what would I say?"
"Just ask her," said another man.
"Are you Marique's friend from Wreck Beach?" he asked shyly, dying a thousand deaths and hoping no one was watching him.
"Why yes, I am," she said holding out her hand to shake his. She had to lift his off the bar, because he looked like he was about to run away. "I'm Maya."
Four men further down were suddenly all speaking at once. The news spread down the long bar and the talking became louder and was punctuated by raucous laughter.
The bartender passed her drink to her and said, "You have a lot of friends at this bar, ma'am ..." but he was interrupted by Miss Flapper who said, "Oooh, so you are that girl. I love it when you walk along the rows of logs on the beach. I can instantly tell the men from the little boys."
Maya watched the shy young man retreat further and further away from the buoyant flapper, so she excused herself and pulled the shy one off his stool and
dragged him out to the dance floor. For a few minutes she thought he was going into a hypnotic trance from watching her breasts, but then he found the rhythm and started to enjoy the dancing.
Eventually Erik cut in, and danced with her but with a long pout. Once Mick Jagger had stopped crooning he yelled into her ear, "This is our first date, remember? Don't you be picking other guys up."
Since the Disco contest had been conceded, other dancers began crowding them out. Each time there was a break in the music, whatever dancer was next to her would ask her the same questions. "Are you really the girl from Wreck Beach who turns all the gay men on?" Men were continuously offering to buy her drinks, but the bartender refused to pour them.
It got so hot on the dance floor because of the press of bodies, that they darted outside to cool off and take some deep breaths of fresh air. The bonus was that their ears stopped ringing and they could speak in normal voices. They found their voices already quite hoarse and strained.
"Oh thank you for asking me out on a date," she crooned, and stood on her tiptoes to kiss him. There were a few catcalls from those that were outside having a smoke.
"I should be thanking you," he said. "Karl doesn't like this place, so if I come, I am one of the lonely ones leaning against the long bar."
"But you are so cute. Why not have Gerry doll you up and dress you up?"
Erik cast his eyes down and shrugged. "Because I don't want to have to explain shaved legs to my boss. Gay is becoming normal at U.B.C., cross-dressing is not."
"I'll bet you would be divine in a little halter top number with a short skirt." She pantomimed the outfit on him.
"Stop it. You're nasty. You know of course that everyone in that place is jealous of you."
"Because I get to go home with you?" she teased.
"No. Don't I wish."
"Because I have real breasts?"
"Well, that is true for the queens. I was going to say because you know those two hunks, the stunt men."
"So the men leaning against the long bar," she asked, "what's their story? Are they the cruisers?"
