This is a work of fiction. Any similarity to actual people or events is unintentional. If you are underage, or do not want to read about explicit sex between women, please leave. Constuctive comments are encouraged, and all reasonable emails will receive replies. Thanks.
To say it was all about her would be overstating just a bit. My life, that is. Even now.
Masha and I met in college my sophomore year. We were both acting students and had been cast as sisters in a play about a family trying to rebuild in the U.S. after the Holocaust. Though the drama department was fairly small, I had never met Masha until the audition. She'd been abroad my entire freshman year, fall semester in London and spring in Moscow. Josh, the graduate student director, had been impressed with her and asked her to stay through the evening. She was in the room when my time slot came up, and since Josh liked my audition, he asked us to read a scene together.
What impressed me initially was not (though it should have been) her astonishing grasp of dialect. In fact, until she introduced herself after our reading of the scene, I thought she was actually Polish. What struck me was her voice itself, without the Polish accent. Had I not already known that my sexuality at 19 was open to anyone, hearing her voice would have helped me out. I was instantly turned on when she told me her name. This surge of eroticism, the surprise of her not being Polish and the knowledge that she was now speaking to me after we had finished a fairly intimate scene together stupefied me. I stood there, not shaking her hand, until finally she smiled and said, "Kind of intense, yeah?"
I nodded.
"It's a rough scene for a cold read," she continued. "You did well, though." She touched my arm and asked if this was my first audition. Freshmen were not permitted to audition, so it was. She said that she would enjoy working with me if I got the part. She moved and spoke with a kind of sleepy, casual confidence. I looked at her for a moment before thanking Josh and his stage manager and leaving. She watched me look, grinning as my eyes slid down her face, across her shoulders and along the lines of her body. When I left, I almost ran home to call all my friends and ask about her.
Even though she'd been abroad, I had heard her name before. She was almost legendarily good, and her performance in The Seagull her sophomore year still had most of our professors salivating. Anytime Chekov came up in class, we were guaranteed a free period during which the instructor would ramble on about Masha. Now I kicked myself for not listening better.
My rampage of phone calls produced the potential for being cast alongside her allowed me to ask a lot of questions without seeming like a stalker. I quickly found out she was a senior, was suited to classical roles, and was, like most of us in the drama department, sexually ambiguous. It also became clear that everyone, not just me, thought she was hot.
That week I had several more auditions. All of the auditions took place at the beginning of the semester, since the directors wanted to get into rehearsals right away. I was offered the part in Josh's production and one other. I could not take them both because the rehearsal schedules overlapped, but since the part in Josh's play was the lead and the other was a much smaller role it was not a difficult decision. It is easy to think that Masha had nothing to do with it, but I know that she could have, if that's what it had taken.
I ran into her shortly after being offered the part, in the hallway outside my scene study class. She had seen my signature accepting the role on the cast list, which was posted on one of the hallway bulletin boards. She congratulated me and started to hug me, then stopped. "What?" I said.
"I just realized I don't know you at all," she said.
"Well, this is the drama department," I pointed out, laughing. "Virtual strangers hug me every day."
She looked at me, smiled slowly, and said, "But I don't want to be a stranger, Kelsey. Not to you." I tripped, though I was standing still, mumbled something about us surely becoming friends during rehearsals and walked away.
The next time I saw her she did hug me. I was at the bus stop outside the drama building late on a Friday night. I had just finished rehearsing a scene for one of my classes. At that hour the campus buses only came every 30 minutes. My scene partner was staying in the building to study, and no one else was around. It was raining and cold.
There was a shelter at the bus stop, but I had gotten wet running to it and was shivering.
Across the street, above a deli where we all bought coffee and bagels, were six apartments that some students rented. Masha came out the door while I was waiting there. She trudged across the street, then saw me and came to stand under the shelter.
"Hi, beautiful," she said, brightening. "What are you doing here so late?"
I told her and asked her the same. She told me that she had been at Peter Marrin's party. Peter lived across the street. He was a sophomore, and I knew him. He was a big time lady's man, great looking and smart, but never very clean. He also had a drinking problem, which is why I never went to his parties. He inevitably got maudlin at the end of them, and it depressed me.
I asked her why she had left the party so early. She told me Peter had hit on her.
"Oh, so you ran away?" I asked.
"No," she said. "We did it. But it was over very quickly." She laughed and then told me they'd had an intense conversation for the first two hours of the party.
"He's smart, you know," she told me.
I nodded. He was. Eventually he took her into somebody's bedroom, and they talked some more.
"He told me he just wanted to kiss me," she said. "And I don't know . . . we kissed, and of course I slept with him." She sighed.
"But where was Shelly?" I said. Shelly was Peter's girlfriend, though everyone knew he cheated on her.
"Out of town," said Masha. "That's the thing. I knew that he had a girlfriend, and I was just so into him I did it anyway. I've never done that before."
We talked for a while about Shelly and Peter's relationship. I thought they were currently broken up so Masha shouldn't worry. Masha thought this did not matter because they were always breaking up, but everyone knew Peter was with Shelly for the long haul. I reminded her that Shelly had a small role in our play. She groaned and said that she was wearing Peter's shirt since hers had gotten something spilled on it. She needed to get it back to him right away. She seemed quite sober, though I am sure that she'd had one or two drinks. She denied alcohol as a contributing factor.
"Though maybe it was for him," she said, sounding further disgusted. I attempted to reassure her by saying I knew at least two other women who'd slept with Peter while he was with Shelly and that Shelly, very appropriately, blamed him alone.
"She knows who these people are, and she says hello to them as if nothing happened," I said. "She's forgiven them almost entirely. She understands it's Peter's problem. He can't be faithful."
"Well, it takes two to tango," said Masha. "Thanks for trying, though. Sweet."
That was when she hugged me. It wasn't the most intimate thing. We were both dressed in many layers, and I was soggy. It was nice, though, to get some measure of her size. Even with all of the clothes I could tell she was bony. She was maybe three inches taller than me, thin and angular feeling, like a young boy, but more delicate. She let go when the bus came, a few minutes later. "You made me all wet," she said as we got on, gesturing to Peter's water-splotched shirt.
That Sunday morning Masha called me. My roommate Lindsay, who'd heard all about her, answered the phone. She asked who was calling, then shot me a smile.
"Just a sec," she told Masha, "she's getting out of the shower."
I was fully dressed and dry as a bone. "What are you doing?" I mouthed, grabbing for the phone.
"Helping her imagination a little bit," Lindsay whispered, holding the phone out of reach.
After what she determined was an acceptable waiting period, Lindsay gave me the phone. I was out of breath from repeatedly lunging for it.
"Hello," I said.
"Hi, you," said Masha. Her voice was liquid. "I wanted to thank you for listening. The other night, I mean."
"Anytime," I told her.
"Maybe I'll call you back later? You need to dry off or something, I'm sure."
"No, no. I wasn't in the shower. Lindsay was just trying to spur your imagination." I glared at Lindsay, who smirked in the corner.
"Oh," said Masha. I could hear her smile. "She's very convincing. Maybe she should be a drama major."
"Maybe," I said.
"Well you tell Lindsay for me," Masha said huskily, "that I've been imagining you quite well on my own."
I tried not to sputter into the phone. Masha made small talk to let me recover before getting to the point.
"Peter is having a cookout at the park," she said. "It'll be a great time to give him back his shirt. He'll be surrounded by people, so he won't try to talk to me, and Shelly is still away. I want you to come with me, Kelsey. You're the only person I've told, and I don't want to see him alone."
"Yeah, better not," I agreed. Knowing Peter, he'd jump her, cookout or no cookout. But with me there, he wouldn't. We knew each other, and he cared what I thought of him.
Masha and I met for lunch and then headed over to the park. It was warm enough during the day, but I knew that the cookout would break up when the sun started to go down. Peter would probably be drunk by then, and he would be begging people to stay and end up depressed and alone. I started to feel badly for him. When I saw the way he dealt with Masha, however, I realized he'd be fine. It was early, and there were only about 20 people there when we arrived. Peter was grilling steaks and still sober. He saw us and waved cautiously. Masha had washed his shirt and carried it in a paper bag. As we approached him, Peter looked at the bag and then at me. He figured out quickly that Masha would not want to see him again. A flash of disappointment passed over his face, and I knew he would have dumped Shelly for good this time, to have a chance with Masha. He recovered quickly, smiled at us and shook my hand.
"It's good to see you, Kels," he said. "Will you guys stay for some food?" He knew the answer, but was graceful enough to ask.
Masha spoke before I could say anything. "No, but thanks. I've got a monster paper to write. Just thought I'd bring you your shirt," she said, handing it to him. She smiled weakly. "Thanks for letting me borrow it." She could not look him in the eye.
"No problem," he said bravely. He smiled at us both and touched Masha's shoulder. "Give me a call," he said quietly to her, "if you ever . . . want to."
Masha nodded briefly, thanked him again and started to walk away.
"What about you, Kelsey?" Peter asked before I turned to follow her. "Want to stick around? We'd love to have you, and there's plenty of food." I thanked him but said I could not stay.
"Okay," he said, "I'll see you around, then." Walking backwards and waving, I studied him. He looked upset but not surprised, and he had been able to remember his manners. I turned around and ran to catch up with Masha. When I reached her, she seemed relieved.
"Mission accomplished," she said. "Shirt returned without further incident." She grinned at me. "Thanks for coming. He looked good, didn't he?"
I nodded. He had, I realized. Good for him.
She sighed, and we stood on the sidewalk for a moment. She reached up to touch my arm.
"Wanna take a walk?" she said.
We strolled for a while, not saying anything. It was not a comfortable silence for me. Walking beside her, wanting to kiss her, but knowing I wouldn't was frustrating. A phone call and a bus stop conversation did not allow us to pretend it was anything more than physical. I was ashamed just then to want her only for that. Plus, I vaguely recalled that I was not single.
When we parted, I stood watching Masha walk away, still dizzy with the scent of her from when she'd hugged me goodbye. I took stock of her once more, trying to assess what it was about her beauty that so moved me. In my quest for information, I had learned her father was Russian, and she was Slavic featured with a wide forehead and great cheekbones. Her hair was shoulder length, neither straight nor curly, a darkish blonde. Her eyes were blue, large and almost circular. She was spectacular looking, and I had never met anyone who looked at all like her. Her appeal was, I decided, unquantifiable, and I gave up.
Later that day, I met Tim, my boyfriend, for dinner. I needed to talk to him about Masha. We were in a monogamous relationship, and he deserved to know that I was having some very non-monogamous thoughts. When I told him who she was, he said he knew her.
"Nice choice, Kels!" he exclaimed, clapping me on the back so hard I nearly ate my straw. "She is entirely hot."
"Ahem!" I said. "We are supposed to be talking about my unfaithful, lecherous thoughts here. Not yours."
"Oh, right. Absolutely. Sorry." He grinned. "Hey, did you see her in The Seagull a couple years ago? She was fantastic. Made me go home and read Chekov all night."
"Peter, I was in high school," I reminded him. Peter was a junior.
"Oh, uh-huh. Always forgetting that," he said. "So that's why I was lost my freshman year. I was waiting for you to enter my life."
"Gag me," I said. "Anyway, what do you think?"
"Well, I'm okay with you thinking whatever you want. As long as you think of me in that way sometimes, too. But as far as you doing anything about it . . . well, I don't know. Do you know how she feels about you?"
"To be honest, yeah. I mean, we haven't talked about it. But there is definitely a lot of looking going on."
"Stop it, you're turning me on. I'm trying to be a supportive, unthreatened boyfriend here. It would help if you tried not to talk about my fantasies."
"Okay. But I don't know how to talk about her without being sexual."
"I said stop it."
"Yeah, yeah," I said, poking him. "So, what do you want me to do? I love you, Tim, and I don't love her, but if she kisses me, I don't want to stop her."
He was thinking, and I waited. He was a smart guy, but a slow thinker. I ate my salad. Ten minutes later he said, "Don't you think that love and lust are the same thing?"
"No," I said.
"Well why not?" he said. "You want Masha, but you will not admit to being in love with her because you are afraid."
"I'm not afraid!" I said, offended.
"Then why aren't you in love with her?" he said. "Obviously, the feelings are there."
"What I feel for her is not a feeling," I said, not noticing the contradiction. "It is a bodily condition."
We sat for a moment.
"Feeling!" I said, scoffing. "It's nothing as wussy as that."
He mulled it over. "But I think that when people talk about lust, they mean love and vice versa. It's just that love is so grandiose and lust is so demonized that we cannot equate them, even though they are the same thing."
"I'll have to get back to you on that," I said, humoring him. "Meanwhile, what am I going to do when she kisses me? Tim, do you want me to stop her?"
"Would you?" he said. "For me, I mean?"
I thought about it. I nodded.
"In that case," he said, grinning evilly, "I think that you should kiss her first."
Gratitude washed over me. "Tim, you are a god."
We had a great time that night. After dinner Tim took me to a scary movie. I crawled around in his lap, content with the choice I had made in him. I was enthralled by his every cell: his wit, his flat stomach, his gracious charm. We went back to his dorm room for sex. I am ashamed to admit that the evening, and my admiration for Tim were brought on in large part by the freedom he had given me with Masha. Tim really was a god, and I had known it before, but I never gave him what he deserved. I never, with the exception of that night, fucked him like he should have been fucked.
The next day he called me while I was packing up to study in the library. "You know," he said, "if you're going to do to Masha what you did to me last night, I might have to reconsider."
"Reconsider what?" I asked, honestly forgetting.
"Reconsider letting you at her," he said. "I might never see you again."
"Last night was for you, Tim. Besides," I laughed, "she doesn't have the same equipment. I'll have to use my other bag of tricks."
"Thought I told you to stop it," he said.
Tim had cheated on me once. Recently, in fact. The previous summer, we were apart, and he had sex with a woman named Dawn. He told me about it a few weeks afterwards. I was initially devastated, but not at all threatened. Now, I wondered if his infidelity was what made him so generous about Masha. If that was the case, I reasoned, he was ending up with the short end of the stick. The luxury of even thinking about Masha had to be better than his night with Dawn.
The play would be up for only two weeks. It opened in early December, which meant we had all semester to rehearse. The first read-through was scheduled for a Friday night, the week after Masha and I had given Peter's shirt back. I had not seen her since then. It was a small cast, so Josh had the read-through at his apartment a few blocks north of campus. On the walk over I thought of Masha, trying to decide if I had blown my attraction to her out of proportion. I walked in, saw her sitting cross-legged on the couch, and knew that I had not.
It was a decent enough read-through, but the entire time I was distracted. I'd been attracted to women before, but it had always been sort of optional. I could either chose to realize it or not, depending on the convenience of the situation. Being aware of Masha and the visceral pull of her was required.
She wore an old drama department sweatshirt with a frayed neck. It tended to slide towards one shoulder or the other, exposing her collarbone. She was wearing jeans with one hole in the knee and another an inch below the back pocket. Between her exposed collarbone and the square inch of upper thigh that was exposed by the hole, I was fixated on her body. Had she been headless, I might not have noticed.
I sat as far from her as was possible in Josh's small living room. I wanted to read the script without drooling. I had decided beforehand that this was a goal Josh would appreciate.
When we took a break and were all milling around the kitchen, she took my hand and pulled me to sit next to her. Her thigh rested sloppily on top of mine for over an hour. She never sat on anything the way you were supposed to. At the end of the read- through, she leaned in and asked if I would let her buy me a drink. If I had been inclined to say no, her finger gliding down the side of my neck would have convinced me. As it was, I could only smile and nod.
At the door when Masha and I were discussing where to go, Rick, one of the other cast members, overheard us. He immediately announced that we were going to Phoebe's for a drink and everyone else should come. Masha caught my eye and shrugged.
Phoebe's was across the street from the drama department, on the opposite corner from Peter's apartment. It was a nice restaurant, actually, which turned into a bar for the theater-going crowd after plays. It had a dress code-no jeans or sneakers-but students and actors were pretty much exempt. We all rode over in Josh's truck, though it was only a couple blocks from his place. There were eight of us, including Josh's stage manager, so we were sitting in the back freezing.
When we got there, Rick immediately sat between Masha and I and began talking about having a threesome. We joked about it for a while until Rick said, "Oh, but Tim might not like that."
"Who is Tim?" asked Masha. Shit. I had wanted to tell her about him myself.
"Tim is Kelsey's boyfriend."
Masha suddenly seemed very upset. She saw Rick and I noticing and played it off. "Damn," she said, forcing a laugh, "so much for the threesome idea."
"Tim might not mind a threesome," I said, trying to keep it light, "but I think it'd have to include him and not Rick."
"But we can't have a threesome with Tim," Masha exclaimed. "I don't even know him!"
"Oh, sure, you know Tim," said Rick. "He's that film major. Made the movie about trash."
"Tim Wakey?" said Masha.
Rick nodded.
"Oh," said Masha, looking crestfallen. "He's a really nice guy."
"You don't have to look so upset about it," said Rick, laughing. "Did you think he was single? 'Fess up! Were you tryin' to steal Kelsey's man?"
"Something like that," said Masha, getting up and heading for the bar.
"Geez, I didn't think he was that cute," Rick said to me. "No need for her to get all worked up about it. There are plenty of better looking guys around."
"Hey!" I shouted. After all, he was my boyfriend. "He's cute enough."
"Evidently," said Rick.
We were quiet waiting for Masha to come back with our drinks. Rick and I were only 19, so we couldn't get them ourselves. In fact, all but two of the six cast members were sophomores. Most of the college bars had strict rules about buying drinks for others, but Phoebe's was not a college bar, so they were pretty easygoing.
Masha returned and handed me a glass of wine without looking at me. Rick drank Coors Light or some such atrocity. Really, it was hard to believe he was trying to be an actor. He had frat boy written all over him, but he was likeable in spite of it. He was very down to earth, which I liked a lot after spending so much time with people who thought they could actually become characters in a play.
"Anyway," Rick said, "who wants to host the cast party?"
"Rick, we haven't even started rehearsals yet!" I said.
"Yeah, are parties all you think about?" said Masha.
"Well, yeah," he said, "what else is there?"
In spite of her mood earlier, Masha seemed to enjoy the evening. After a while, we all ordered chocolate mousse and some other desserts to share. The kitchen closed at ten, but they served dessert until midnight. Masha and I were at a table with Rick, and the others were at two tables on either side of ours, so we all passed the plates back and forth.
I wanted Rick to leave so that I could talk to Masha about Tim. I knew, however, that Rick, being a party boy, would likely outlast both of us. I took matters into my own hands.
"I'm tired," I said, yawning and stretching. I tried to make sure, during the stretch, that Masha would see a little skin, but she was not even looking. "I'm going home." There was a chorus of boos.
"C'mon," said Rick, "It's Friday!" I told him I had to meet my scene partner at nine the next morning, and then I began to gather my things. I glanced at Masha to see if she would get up. I could not force her to be alone with me if she didn't want to talk.
After a second, to my great relief, she announced that she would walk with me.
"Who's gonna buy my next drink?" said Rick, a little too loudly.
"Keith or Josh will get it for you," she said. Keith was the other senior in the cast.
Masha sidled up to me. "Ready to go?" she asked. I looked at her empty hands.
"Don't you have any stuff?" I said.
"No," she replied. "I'm in an anti-stuff phase. Don't you think," she said as we walked out the door, "that there is just too much stuff?"
"Well, sure, but where do you put your money and your ID and your Chapstick?"
"I put it in my pocket," she said. "If it doesn't fit, then I have too much."
I thought about that as we walked.
"You know," I said, "This bag is really heavy. Maybe you're right. But what about books?"
"Surely you've noticed, Kelsey, that all the books we need for class are plays, and they are very small."
This was true.
"In fact," she said, "they can fit inside a coat pocket or an overall pocket, or you can just carry them. But why put them in a bag? A bag is just a hider of stuff. You have bags so that you can deceive yourself about what you have and what you need. Every year these freshmen come in with bigger and bigger bags. They put more and more stuff in them. Eventually they don't even know what is in the bag. How could you need something you didn't even know was there?"
"I don't know," I said.
"Trust me," she said. "Eliminate your stuff. You'll be amazed at how free you feel."
"Okay," I said. "Maybe tomorrow." I was not just going to leave my bag on the street, after all. We walked in silence for a while. I looked at her profile in the streetlights and felt myself grow wet.
"Why did it bother you?" I asked her. "About Tim, I mean."
No answer. She walked faster. I kept up.
"Look," I said, "I wouldn't be asking if I didn't want."
"Kelsey," she stopped, turning to face me. "I think you know why it bothered me.
I don't think I've ever been more clear. It was stupid of me to assume you were single. I am a grown woman and can deal with not always getting what I want. Let's leave it at that."
Before I could say anything, she started talking about Tim. She said she knew him fairly well. She'd been in a class with him her sophomore year, and one of her housemates was an actor in his trash film.
"I didn't really like his trash film," I told her, surprising myself. I'd never admitted this to Tim.
"Why didn't you like it?" she asked.
"Well, no good reason, I guess. But, trash. You know. Pretentious to make a film about it, don't you think?"
"Yes, I think," she said, grinning.
We had reached our parting point. Masha lived in a house east of campus. My dorm was on the western edge. I wanted to tell her that Tim and I had talked about her, but I knew that it wouldn't matter. Pursuing me now would feel to her too much like what she had done with Peter. So what she said next surprised me.
"Kelsey," she said, "you and Tim-how serious are you?"
We'd talked about marriage.
"Not at all," I said.
We both knew I was lying.
For the next few weeks, I could think of nothing but Masha. I did not see her, but saw her desirability unfolding before me like a new understanding of the sun-brighter and larger than any fathomable quantity, distant and untouchable, yet all that I could see.
I exercised frantically. I put my image of her at the end of the treadmill and ran. This was the only activity that allowed me to feel as if I were doing anything at all.
Eventually, I understood marathon runners. It was not masochism that drove them. It was desire.
Three weeks after our drink at Phoebe's, Rick was having a party. I knew I would see Masha there. The night before the party I had class until 6, then dinner with Tim, so I did not get to the gym until 9. I ran a long time, searching within my image of Masha for a clue as to what was happening to me. I tried to reconcile Tim's views on love with my own. I knew that I was not in love with her. I was just beginning to like her. And I loved Tim, but had denied him sex more times than I could count. I could not imagine ever refusing Masha. In the throes of appendicitis I would want her.
When I could not run any more, I stumbled out of the gym and fell backwards onto the grass. I closed my eyes and rested there, gasping desperately for breath. I pushed my hand across my stomach and felt my sweat, wishing it were hers. I opened my eyes and, seeing the stars it struck me. Tim was onto something, but he was wrong.
The entire world was wrong. Love and lust were not the same thing. Lust was better.
The Hallmark hierarchy was all screwed up. We were a world full of fools, talking and thinking and being moral about love when our bodies provide us with a variety of liquid proof that we are alive. To feel the sweat rise from nothing, to have my blood flow more quickly, to be miraculously slick between my legs at the thought of another person was new and implicitly urgent. Lust, not love, was the ultimate human condition. And I would likely forget about this, and go around eventually saying I was in love with Masha.
But right then I knew what I was: a liquid-filled vessel in homage to her sex appeal.
When I arrived at Rick's party, she was sitting on the couch, surrounded by admirers. Tim had not come, since he and Rick did not get along. Tim hated frat boys.
Rick hated pretentious film majors. Rick greeted me and offered me a shot of something blue.
"Nice outfit, Kels," he said, leering at me. I was wearing tight black leather pants and a tiny t-shirt that said "Born to be used." It was an ad for some new operating system. My engineering pals had given it to me. None of them had the nerve to wear it.
"Thanks," I said. I downed the shot, and Rick noticed me looking at Masha.
"She should have an autograph signing or something, huh?" he said.
I nodded. I was trying to figure out if my competition was mostly men or women and if they all wanted to get down her pants or just get acting tips, not that it mattered.
"Although now that you're here, in those pants, maybe she'll get a break," said Rick.
I flashed him a smile as I headed for Masha. "I don't think so," I said.
I sauntered over and caught her eye over the throng of suitors. That was all it took. She excused herself and came over to me.
"Hi," she said, trying to find an appropriate place to look. She was wearing a grayish, v-neck sweater and the holey jeans. I smiled, but said nothing. It was too noisy to talk anyway.
I started towards the kitchen, and gestured for her to follow. When we got there, I turned to her, put my hands on her hips and pushed her, hard, into the pantry door. She was leaning against it now, looking at me, her eyes glinting, her breathing irregular.
"I am in love," she said as I leaned in to kiss her, "with your pants."
When I touched her lips with mine she yielded immediately. I opened slightly, and my tongue met hers once, quickly. I heard her moan and gave her my tongue again.
She tasted like wine. Soon we were making out like adolescents, sloppily and in a rush.
Her hands were drawing a line across my stomach, beneath my shirt. I kept my hands on her hips, cupped around the front of them, pressing her harder against the door to hold myself up. When we finally came up for air I was dimly aware of her troubled expression, the applause and catcalls of several onlookers and my own incoherent rebirth.
"Kels," she said softly, "one of us is practically engaged."
I nodded, still unable to speak. I leaned forward, resting my body on hers. I lowered my forehead and allowed it to rest on her shoulder. She was still panting and had one hand in my hair. The other was trapped between us, still on my stomach. We stood there for a moment.
"God help me," she said, turning her head and tracing my ear with her tongue, "I want you, and if you continue like this I am not going to make it. I will implode from lust."
"I talked to Tim about you," I told her.
"I'm flattered," she said, dragging her lips along my neck. "After his name came up at Phoebe's, I was certain I'd misread you."
"No," I said, gasping as her fingers trailed downward on my stomach.
"I am fully intending to push you away," she told me matter of factly. Her hand reached the edge of my pants, and her fingers curled inside the waistband. "In just a sec .
. . "
"You couldn't," I said. "I have leverage on my side."
She laughed. "It has nothing to do with leverage," she said, pulling me into her and kissing me. This time she was slowly sensual, pulling her tongue through me, groaning and pressing up into me. Finally, she let me go, and we both rested for a moment. I was sure that by now a crowd had gathered to watch us, but I didn't want to look.
"So, what did Tim say?" she asked me. "Can I have you, or are you just trying to kill me, hitting on me like this?"
"You can have me," I told her. "In fact I am going to follow you home."
"That is very sweet, but I can't--" she said, tugging me toward her by my pants and licking me, "wait. Now let me up, and I'll be right back."
I tried to stand but had leaned so far into her I had to use the pantry door to push myself up. She escaped by ducking under my arm. She went off somewhere. I turned around, rested up against the door and tried to catch my breath. I hoped she wouldn't be gone long.
After a minute, Josh came by, looking for ice. "Hi, Kelsey," he said.
"Hi, Josh." I tried to guess if he had seen Masha and I.
"From the looks of things earlier, I guess she's gone to get you two a room."
I blushed and tried to look innocent.
"You know rehearsals start Monday night, and I want you bright-eyed and bushy- tailed, so don't get carried away," he continued.
"I don't see how . . ." I started angrily.
"I'm kidding," he said, grinning. "Do what you want. It's none of my business."
He patted me on the shoulder and left. I was just beginning to wonder about him and his thinly veiled jealousy when Masha returned. She had a bag of stuff with her.
"What's up with the stuff?" I asked, grinning.
"Well, sometimes you have to make exceptions," she said. I hoped the stuff was not sex toys. With her, I wanted to use my hands.
She took my arm and led me through the kitchen into a back hallway to a door.
"The thing about quality frat houses," she said as she jingled a set of keys, "is that they have wine cellars that lock."
She unlocked the door, opened it and pushed me unceremoniously inside. I walked down the stairs slowly in the darkness. She locked the door behind us, came down, and walked over to me. She pulled out some fat candles and a lighter and placed them on some crates around us. She started lighting them at top speed.
"If you don't take your time with those, we're gonna start a fire," I warned.
"I am" she said through gritted teeth "in a hurry," but she slowed down anyway.
When all of the candles were lit, the place was beautiful and haunting. It was sprawling and must have contained hundreds of wine racks, most of them about half- filled. The racks were wooden, the floor bare. Masha took out a blanket and laid it on the floor.
"I don't suppose," she said almost shyly, "that you want any wine?"
I shook my head. She knew what I wanted. The realization of what was about to happen hit me, and I found myself shaking and almost sick with it. I looked away from her to collect myself, but before long she came up behind me. I knew she was there, but still gasped when I felt her arms surround me. She nuzzled the back of my neck, and I moaned. Her hands crawled under my shirt and she rested them there.
"I have been thinking about your stomach since the day we met," she told me.
She turned me around, pushed my shirt up, and knelt to drag her lips slowly past my navel.
"I haven't been able to stop thinking about it. Among other things," she said as she moved one hand up over my breast. I shuddered and pulled her up next to me.
I kissed her and pulled my fingers along her neck. Her tongue entered my mouth and played there. I could not think of her arousal any more but gave in to my own, drawing my hands quickly along her body. I traced the shape of her collarbone with my fingers. When I reached her rib cage, I ripped her shirt to feel her. She moaned into my mouth as I touched her. I flattened my palm against her side, then moved my hand slowly around to graze her breast. She gasped and took her mouth away from mine. She pushed me down onto the blanket and straddled me, looked down at me and smiled, then kissed me again. This time my tongue moved more slowly with hers, lingering there while she unbuttoned my pants. She left them on me and brought her mouth to my neck.
Together we struggled to get me shirtless, and then spent some quality time making out in our bras. I could tell she was ready for more, but she was a phenomenal kisser, and I was reluctant to let her lips go anywhere else. After about half an hour of this, she started to whine.
"You lied," she said between kisses, "you are trying to kill me."
"No," I panted, "but I don't want to stop kissing you. You're just going to have to figure something else out." She could always go down on me tomorrow, I reasoned.
That was the last amount of reasoning I did.
She continued kissing me, but her hands roamed my body much more recklessly than they had been. She removed my bra and traced her fingers across my nipple. It hardened instantly and I whispered her name. As she took my other breast in her hand I had to pull away to breathe. Still hovering over me, she drew her tongue down my chest and circled it around my nipple. She sucked it as she put her hand on my knee and slowly moved it upward. I was trembling and panting, afraid I would come before she touched me. She, however, had no worries, and continued flicking my nipple with her tongue. I groaned and pushed myself forward into her mouth, almost embarrassed at how hot I was.
Her hand reached my crotch and touched me through my pants. "Oh, God," I gasped. She squeezed hard, and I could feel my wetness seeping under the leather. I felt my entire body enslaved by her hand. I wanted her to take off my pants so she could touch me more directly, but I did not want her to take her hand away from my cunt.
"Masha," I breathed, "please."
She needed no further encouragement, and got me naked in a flash. She came back up and kissed me again while her fingers trailed down over my mons. She reached around and touched my lips, moaned and gave me more of her tongue, then opened me slowly and entered. She fucked me gently for a while, using two of her fingers while I pushed my hips forward to meet her, my body rushing into orgasm. She withdrew her hand as I caught my breath. I kissed her then, using my tongue to express how enthralled I was. I had never come that quickly. She played languidly with my pussy as I kissed her, then began to trace my clit with her fingers. I almost came again in that instant, but was glad I hadn't when her fingers began a slow circling. She stroked me gently and finally stopped kissing me. She rested her head next to mine and panted as she touched me. My clit felt gigantic, straining to meet her fingers as she stroked. She suddenly slowed her strokes and brought her finger to the tip of my clit. She rubbed it gently. I was on the verge of orgasm and knew that in an instant, I'd be coming for her. Then she began to stroke me faster, and I was trembling.
"Oh," I moaned, "fuck, yes." My hips again pushed forward into her hand, and she rubbed me harder until I came. The party above us was still going on, and I could hear the music pounding as I cried out her name. Afterwards, she went inside and fucked me, much harder than she had before, until I was turned on all over again.
I rolled her over and kissed her, pulling off the rest of her clothes as she struggled to keep her hand inside me. She was pressing her middle finger into my g-spot, her thumb was back on my clit, and it was difficult for me to do anything, but I wanted her.
"This is not," I panted stubbornly, just before I came again, "going to be a one- way thing." Then my body hurled me into oblivion, and I creamed all over her hand for the third time.
She smiled, her hand still inside me, her thumb still on my clit, as I caught my breath.
"I never thought it would be," she told me gently. "But you come so beautifully, and I'm not finished with you yet."
"You," I said to her in frustration, "are naked, and in none of my fantasies about you naked did I just lie here coming like this."
"Hmm," she said slyly, "that's funny. Because you did in all of mine."
She gave me just enough of herself to get me excited again. Then she flipped me back over and kissed me, having learned by now that this made me forget what I was doing. She had me again, half without my realizing it, her fingers long and subtle, touching me so skillfully I came without wanting to, and exploring my mouth with her tongue the entire time. Then finally, she let me touch her for the first time.
I pushed her down again and held her there. I kissed her, held her wrists tight against the floor, then brushed her nipple with my nose. When she shivered, I took it roughly in my mouth and beat it back and forth with my tongue. I could hear her responding, her legs opened up, and she stopped struggling to touch me. Now that we had established whose turn it was, I brought my knee up between her legs slowly. I kissed her again, trying to dominate her tongue as I felt the smear of wetness from her pussy on my knee. I felt her push her hips forward onto me and praised her with a groan.
Finally, I let her hands free and took her nipple between my fingertips. I kept kissing her and brought my other hand down to her inner thigh. I began a slow, hard rubbing and moved upward while I continued to twist her nipple gently between my finger and thumb. I stopped kissing her and ran my tongue down her neck and along her collarbone. I kept going past her navel. Right above her bush I stopped and placed kisses all the way across to her hips.
When I got there, my hand had reached her lips, and I paused before touching her.
As my fingers opened her and found her clitoris, she whispered my name above me, and I bit into the bone of her hip, a little harder than I had intended. I rubbed her clit and ran my teeth and tongue over her torso as I felt her body rise. I stroked her hot vulva and looked greedily at the expanse of her body before me. I could not believe my luck. She was moaning and gasping now, and I could not help but slide my fingers into her. I brought my head down to look at her as I fucked her, and she arched forward into my face. I kept my fingers in her, my other hand still working her nipple, as I lowered my mouth onto her pussy.
She had come already by now, I thought, but that did not deter me. I pushed my face into her, let my tongue loose on her clit, and started to push into her g-spot with short, hard thrusts. By this time she had grabbed onto my head and was starting to shake.
Her ass was six inches off the floor, and her pelvis was grinding into me. I had only been there a few minutes when she came again, this time more noticeably, crying out my name and shuddering.
She pulled me back up along her body and threw her arms around me, then kissed me slowly, savoring the taste of herself. We lay there kissing for a while, and I pulled my fingers gently down her back. Before long, my hand had come to her thigh, and I took the opportunity to find her again with my fingers. This surprised her, and she gasped, quickly reaching down for me as well. I played with her outer lips gently, then slowly began to meander towards her clit. Her wetness allowed me to feel every nook and cranny of her, and I kissed her again as I did so. She began to tease me as I reached her clit and stroked her, running her fingers through my bush and making quick strokes along my upper thigh. Finally, as she groaned in her own excitement, she separated my labia and zeroed in on my clit, squeezing it gently and shoving her tongue into my mouth.
We stroked each other like this, and it was not long before we came, together and moaning into each other's mouths. We stopped touching each other, somewhat reluctantly, and lay clinging together on the floor.
Neither of us spoke. I looked over at her and was astounded to find that lying there I began to want her again. I was too ashamed to admit that after all of this I could still be horny, so I sat up, pretending I wanted to get dressed. Before I could stand, she was on me again with renewed ardor.
"Where," she asked as she laid me flat and spread my legs, "do you think you are going?"
I could not answer her as by then her tongue had reached my again swollen clit, and she was lapping at it while she reached up to pull my nipple with her fingers. It was not long before her tongue had me squirming and thrusting and coming all over her face.
She climbed back up on top of me and looked me in the eye. "You," she said importantly, putting her finger on my nose, "taste wonderful."
I giggled and blushed.
"I don't think blushing is necessary between us," she said. "We've grown quite close, don't you think?"
I agreed that we had. We decided we were hungry and began to plan our escape from the wine cellar. The party had ended, so it was easy. When we had successfully arrived on the sidewalk outside the frat house, she turned to me.
"Do you still want to follow me home?" she asked. "I'll feed you, and we could take a shower."
"I'd love to, but I'm exhausted. I can't thank you enough for what you've done to my body. Going home with you now, however."
"Okay, I get it. You want to sleep," she said. "No problem." She took my face in her hands and kissed me, pushing her tongue into my mouth and lingering slowly there. I could taste myself on her, and began to regret going back to my room alone.
"Rain check?" she said.
I nodded. I turned and began to head home. Running 14 miles a day on the treadmill had not left me sore, but one night of sex with Masha and I could barely walk. I had pulled a hamstring or maybe both, I realized as I took another step. By the time I reached my dorm, the sun was rising, I was a lesbian, and I had discovered that taking smaller steps was key.