Note to the reader: this short story is the first work I wrote under the pseudonym "Walt Militant." It also represents my first attempt at writing a piece of fiction from a female character's perspective in first person.

 

 

PERFECTION

by

Walt Militant

 

 

 

 

There she stood, garbed only in the mist. It was almost as if she were a goddess, so perfect was her skin and so knowledgeable were her eyes of deepest ebony. The blackest eyes I have ever seen. If there were ever a woman more perfect than she, I had yet to meet her—doubted if I would ever. She was perfection. She would be my downfall.

Never before have I felt this way about another woman. If I could stop long enough to think, I would have thought it wrong if not perverse. But whenever I beheld Ms. Orphelia Evermore, or, more pointedly, whenever I held her, all thoughts were lost in the moment. Only she mattered—she of the darkest, deepest eyes I have ever seen.

As soon as she touched me, I shivered, and could scarcely breathe. I allowed her to do with me as she pleased, for her pleasure was my pleasure and anything she commanded of me, was, indeed, my sincerest wish. If she was satisfied, I was.

It did not take her very long to arouse my every passionate desire. Her fingers were magic wands as they felt my every inch—inside and outside. I could not stand it. I could not resist it. I was hers.

¼

I awoke with a start. It was only a dream. Yet it had felt so real. Even my bed was awash with my perspiration. My heart aflutter. Ms. Orphelia Evermore was just a figment of my imagination. She was not real. Still, even as I showered and readied myself for yet another day at the office, I thought about her. It was almost as if this imaginary person were a part of my life. Indeed, she was. She was the perfect friend. She was the kind of person I've searched for all my life, only to find that she was living in me the whole while. I knew that my Orphelia would never do me wrong, would always be there for me and would always love me. A true friend indeed.

The bus ride into work was the usual fare, with people hustling to and fro, with men staring at the women's breasts, thighs and face, usually in that order. I always preferred to dress casually: modest pantsuits, just a touch of makeup, my short hair not styled in any particular way. All to avoid looking too sexual. I could not help looking sensual, because that was me, so I've been told much too often for it not to be true. But today, I let it all hang out. A short black mini, black stockings, black ankle boots, make-up galore. Men's eyes were ablaze in their quests for my essentials.

In the office, heads turned, eyes crawled and lingered. Comments and compliments flew. It wasn't exactly corporate attire, especially for someone in my position, but it felt strangely wonderful to have my physical attributes the center of attention as opposed to my usual mental focus. My early morning conferences proceeded more smoothly than they ever had. The usually stalwart male rivals and adversaries feared capturing my highlighted eyes or, worse yet, seeming overly drawn into the depths of my plunging neckline. I was never overly well-endowed, but that didn't matter to their darting eyes. I had them speechless in the end, as my valor soared in their floundering.

With my proposals accepted, I was introduced to our legal counsel’s paralegal. My mouth dropped; my heart was aflutter; my legs grew weak. She had the deepest, darkest, most consuming eyes I have ever seen. And when they saw my astonishment, they twinkled with what can only be described as recognition. It was my Orphelia—in the flesh.

She was introduced as Ajay Martin, but I knew it was the woman from my dreams—of my dreams. She had the same slight accent, the same mellow brown complexion, the same coarse black mane, albeit one that was now twisted into the most magnificent glowing queue. And as I spent lunch with her, I learned that she had most if not all the same interests as Orphelia, except that Ajay was a widow, her husband having been murdered in some undisclosed fashion that she did not feel comfortable discussing and was still coming to grips with.

I invited her to my apartment for dinner and she graciously accepted. I could scarcely contain my delight and the hours passed too slowly. I could hardly wait.

½

She arrived at seven thirty precisely and immediately made herself at home. I did not mind in the least. As a matter of fact, I was somewhat surprised by how well she knew my place. It was almost as if she had been there before. She adored the art nouveau styling of my furnishings, just as I knew she would, and was equally impressed by the seafood pates which I had prepared especially for her. She had chosen an excellent wine to accompany our meal and when we were at last finished with the formalities, we made ourselves comfortable on my sectional.

I immediately noticed that her eyes found my figure as appealing as I was finding hers. Her white, lace-trimmed blouse accentuated her larger breasts in a most outstanding manner and her white slacks were glued to her thighs.

I once again commented on how wonderful I thought her attire was. She could only smile and point out that my dress was identical to hers and that our tastes must be fairly similar.

Then it happened. Just as I knew it would. She leaned close to me with her full lips gleaming like red apples daring me to take a bite and I could not resist. My body trembled as I felt her power surge through me, urging me to my carpeted floor, my mind wild with imaginings of what she would soon do to me. It was just like my dreams, except now the emotions were real, the sensations were sensational, and the passion was stellar.

Our clothes, strewn from one end of my apartment to the next, were forgotten as she led me to the shower and bathed me from head to toe. I could only scream in delight as her fingers smoothed soapy water over my every inch. She loosened her black mane and let it fly freely in some impossible breeze. In an instant we were back in my bedroom, the covers scattered on the floor and our bodies entwined. Her brown body and my tan body perfectly complementing the other, moving in unison as if made to do so. And as I finally drifted off to oblivion, my energies spent and the love of my life found, I knew that my damnation was worth every moment of it.

Â

The next day after work, we went by her place. It was on the southside of town in the poorer section, but no one bothered us as we made our way through drunks and druggies. Everyone seemed to know her and quickly let us go on to our destination in a very respecting manner. Her apartment bore a medieval motif, with ornate chairs, wrought iron decorations and hard wood floors. Some of the things looked all the world like torture devices.

She laughed at my observations and made something simple for dinner. Once we got that out of the way, we made love and made love again. I was totally thrilled. Ajay was the perfection I had always wanted in a lover but was never able to find. There was nothing that she could not do and nothing that she was not able to teach me to do. Even when the love making was over and we sat around talking about our pasts and possible futures, there was nothing that I could not learn from her. In fact, I learned that she was a believer in interconnections from times past to times to come. She explained her beliefs to me and I was not even able to question her. It was so obvious that it was true that there were no questions to ask, and as she spoke to me about what she called PFI or past-future interconnection, I did not need to ask questions, for she explained it all so perfectly.

PFI was the reason for the perfection of our love-making, she said. She said she knew what it took to please the essence of me and could do so with no hesitation or need for exploration. And she said that even though I did not consciously know how to please her, that I could never fail to. We had, it seemed, been lovers since the beginning of time. Our very essences had revolved around the other’s in the creation and were to always return to its complementary mate. I could not disbelieve her—nor the magic of her fingers against my flesh. I was hers. She proved it again and again that night.

I was hers.

º

I awoke with a start. There was nothing to cause such a waking that I could determine, but when I gained my senses and could at last focus my eyes on my surroundings, I was nothing less than perplexed. I was again in my own bed. The sheets were saturated with perspiration and the obnoxious smell of my unwashed body was heavy in the air. The room was still dark and the glaring red numbers on the digital alarm clock said that it was 3:47 AM. I had slept only half the night. I didn't recall getting into bed—at least not my own—but I did recall showering with Ajay during the course of one of our love-making sessions. It was the last of the love-making sessions in which we had lathered each other from head to toe and then had slithered, slipping and sliding, back to her bed, still dripping wet and slick with suds. It had been a particularly fun affair. I remember how she had taken a deep blue bottle of some exotic smelling oil into the shower with us and how she dashed the stuff all over me, then proceeded to lick it from me. I recall how intoxicated the stuff made me feel and how I could literally feel the stuff flow into my skin, ignite every nerve and send my desire for her through the roof. Her already potent caresses were like electric lances on and in me. My body was out of control, but ever mindful of how much joy and gaiety the entire situation was.

Now, though, hours later, it was as if we had never been together. How could we have been when my own scent choked me and days worth of body hair met my hands’ inspection of my body? I had never allowed it to get to the length and thickness that it was, and I nearly panicked at the impossible occurrence and the prospects that I had not lost hours in my mindless sleep but days. I groped for the light on the night table beside my bed, but managed only to knock it to the floor, shattering it into a thousand pieces. I staggered from my bed, stumbled into the bathroom, and hit the wall switch. The light burst with such ferocity that I shrieked, and though mostly blinded by it, I could see that the hair on my body was indeed several days worth of growth. And I looked like a hag when I could focus upon the image of myself in the mirror.

What had happened to me? I shrieked and dashed cold water onto my face to awake from this terror. I combed my fingers through the mass of tangled hair on my head, desperately trying to bring some semblance of order to myself. At last all I could do was slump to the floor in a heap, and bawl at what I found myself to be.

Just then, someone entered the apartment and came rushing directly into the bathroom. It was Ajay and she looked gravely concerned when she saw that I not only was not still in bed, but that I had seen myself in the mirror.

She scooped me up in her embrace and whispered: "Don’t worry, we’ll clean you up."

I could not even ask her what had happened to me. But she did as promised, washing me, shaving me, shampooing my hair, drying and dressing me like a mother would her child. And when it was done, she held the mirror before me, and I saw, much to my relief, that I was back to the way I was supposed to look. I was perfect again, just as she was.

Then I asked her.

Her dark eyes met mine. "I stole a week from your life. Just a week. The price of perfect love."

I did not understand, and she did not give me a minute to understand, nor did she take a minute to explain. She simply kissed my lips, smoothed down my hair to make certain that it remained perfect, and left the apartment. I never saw her again. Whatever she truly was.

I did dream of her, though. And the perfect love that we had shared. I never found another lover like her, though. Lord knows I tried. I guess what she said about PFI was true after all. For all the anguish, sorrow, heartache that that search caused me, I would gladly have given her as much of me as she wanted. A week. A month. A lifetime. There was no limit to what I would have given her for that perfect love. There is no price too high for perfection.

 

END

© 1992 by Walter R. Milton