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From: Rachael Ross <rache696@yahoo.com>
Reply-To: rache696@yahoo.com
Subject: {ASSM} (RP) Little Birds by Rachael Ross (MF, Gothic Rom, Reluc, coerc, Ghost?)
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Date: Thu, 14 Aug 2008 01:10:03 -0400
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<1st attachment, "little birds.txt" begin>

Little Birds Copyright 2004-2008 Rachael Ross all right reserved.  Intended
for adults only.  This text may be archived/reposted to free public access
provided the author's name, email rache696@yahoo.com and this notice appear
in the message body.  This is the best story I've ever written.  I was 21
years old and the world was my oyster.  Thanks to Anais Nin who's style I
very much attempted to emulate here, but with only limited success.

   =1=2=3=4=5=6=7=8=9=0

   I borrowed a line from "Moby Dick" by H.  Melville and a line from
"Hamlet" by W.  Shakespeare.  I did not pay either of them a royalty fee,
since they are dead and did not answer my emails.

   The obligatory whaler's poem, lewd and crewed, in Ahab's honor: (To be
sung by 12 men in a longboat...Or standing in a circle, your choice)

   Sing Ho!  For the Dick, lass Sing out for Moby, please!  But should he
show his pale prow Sing out upon yer knees!  And should ye kiss that barny
brow Ye'll catch his sweet disease; Oh!  If ye taste the Dick, lass Ye'll
drown in his white seas!  -rr

   Okay, the funny BS is done, now put the kids to bed.  This is an adult
story:

   ---

   Little Birds fiction by Rachael Ross

   ===

   I'm a 22-year-old woman, college educated and intelligent.  I'm
reasonably attractive, outgoing, and well regarded.  I've known my husband
since I was in high school and he is ten years older than I am, but that
hasn't mattered to me in the least.  Nor to him, I would hope.  He's an
academic and well respected in his field.  We both come from good
middle-upper class families and we were never abused as children, or
suffered physical or emotional trauma.  We're very normal people.  We've
been married since June and had decided to wait until I've settled into my
career before starting a family, but plans change.

   We've always enjoyed a healthy sexual relationship, but it is what you
would term 'vanilla' I believe.  A few times when we dated my husband and I
would try very mild bondage games, being tied to the bed with silk scarves
or being spanked rather gently, but for the most part we enjoyed oral
foreplay and straight intercourse.  It wasn't great every time, but I
thought it wasn't bad.  Once we were married though, something changed.

   These changes began with my husband telling me not to move so much while
we were making love.  This was soon after our wedding; in fact it was just
about the last night or maybe second to last night of our honeymoon.  I'm
very active in bed.  I like to move and talk and let him know when I like
something or, much more rarely, when I don't.  He never complained about it
before and it surprised me a little.  You have to picture it I suppose, me
on top of my husband, bouncing around rather enjoyably, and then his strong
fingers digging into my hips.

   "Shhh...Don't move so much, okay?" he whispered, annoyed like I was
ruining a good movie or something.  I didn't say anything, but it did
bother me if only because I didn't understand it.

   Perhaps a week later we were making love again and he'd positioned
himself so that I was on my back and he was next to me on his left side. 
His right leg was between mine while his left leg was underneath us, so
that we were scissored with his penis inside me.  It was very comfortable
and I felt very good, but when I began moving, just rocking my hips a
little and moaning, he again asked me to stop.

   "What?" I asked a little breathlessly.

   He put his hand on my stomach, pushing down slightly, not very hard at
all.  "Please, just...Just don't move, okay?"

   "Ummm...okay," I said, but I was confused again.  What was I supposed to
do if I wasn't moving?  My body goes all by itself and even though I tried,
my hips were still rocking and my thighs wanted to press together.

   My husband was very still, just sliding his penis in and out of me and
all I could hear was his breathing.  He had his eyes closed and for some
reason this angered me a little.  But I didn't say anything and whatever I
felt that was good physically was lost.  I just wasn't into it anymore.  So
that made it much easier to lie there and be quiet like he'd asked.

   He ejaculated a few minutes later, pulling me hard onto him as he
emptied himself into me.  When he came it was one of the best orgasms he'd
had in a long time, he was actually groaning and really driving into my sex
that time.  Usually he stops moving and pulls out rather quickly, but not
this time.  He kept thrusting as though he hadn't cum at all and despite my
resentment it did start arousing me again.  As soon as I started moving
though, that was it, he stopped and finally pulled out, leaving me feeling
very neglected.

   I rolled over and pretended I was asleep when he tried to talk to me.

   A few days later I'd cooled down enough so that I could actually bear to
bring the subject up.  We were in bed and I knew he was horny because he
was rubbing my thigh as I lay with my back to him.  He'd slide his hand
down to where my panties covered my sex and ass and almost but not quite
touch me there.

   "Are you going to tell me to shut up again?" I asked him without turning
over.

   "I never told you to shut up," he replied defensively, taking his hand
off my leg with a sigh.

   "What did you say then?"

   "I just asked if you could not move so much, if you could be a little
more quiet, that's all."

   "And why is that?" I turned around finally, looking at him in the dim
light that came from our bathroom.  "You just want me to lie there,
like...I'm asleep or something?"

   I sounded angry because I was; unfortunately this usually gets him a
little mad also.  "Or something, yeah," he sat up and stared down at me. 
"I just...I wish you'd try it once.  It's not like I'm asking to fuck you
in the ass or something."

   "Oh yeah, right.  So it's either I 'shut up and lie still' or I get
buttfucked?" I sat up too.  "Fuck you!"

   "I didn't say that!"

   "But that's what you meant," I shook my head.  "Okay fine, I'll be
quiet. In fact, I'll be so quiet that you won't even know I'm here." I
grabbed my pillow and left, going to the spare bedroom to sleep on the
daybed.  "Happy?" I slammed the door behind me.

   He brought me flowers the next afternoon, but it was another three days
before we traded apologies.  I'd thought about it and maybe I was just
misunderstanding what he wanted.  We went out to a nice dinner and
everything seemed to be getting back to normal.  We had sex the usual way,
real dirty hard make-up sex, and it was great.  I made a lot of noise and
everything.

   For three weeks everything was peaches and cream.  I'd pretty much
forgotten our argument and when I remembered it, I felt a little
embarrassed because it really had been nothing worth fighting over.  We had
to go to a funeral though, for one of my husband's students.  She was from
the area and had died in a boating accident on the sound.  We probably
didn't have to go, in fact I would have preferred not to, but my husband
felt that he should.  I'd only been to one funeral previously, for my
grandmother when I was very young.

   The student in question was a girl of 20 years and I didn't know her at
all except for what my husband had told me.  She was pretty and healthy and
just entering the prime of life, and now it had been stolen.  That hardly
seemed fair, but my reflections aren't really important here.  It's enough
to say that I was saddened and sympathetic with the family.  I thought
about my own family and tried to imagine what it will be like when someone
like my father dies, because it will happen someday.  That thought filled
me more than any other; the sheer certainty of it was like a great weight
around my neck.

   After the funeral, I was ready to leave as I'd been somewhat
uncomfortable with both my thoughts and my surroundings.  The cemetery was
nice enough, like a park with well manicured grounds and a great many large
and ancient trees, and you could almost imagine having a picnic there until
the countless headstones and monuments forced themselves into focus.  Then
you realized that hundreds, even thousands of people were interred just a
few feet down.  It was not a very comfortable sensation.  I didn't like it
and I wanted to go.  But my husband would not leave, he started walking
away from the car and I had to hurry to catch up.

   "What's wrong?  I want to go...Let's go," I said, but he shook his head.

   "Let's walk a little, okay?" He seemed alright, not depressed or
anything and I was trying to understand.

   "Okay, a little," I reluctantly agreed.

   So he took my hand and we walked down a road that soon changed from
asphalt to cobblestone towards the oldest part of the big cemetery.  It was
a very nice day in late August.  Still warm, but not oppressive the way it
had been recently, and birds sang and squirrels ran from tree to tree. 
There was nobody else in sight and it actually became quite enjoyable, just
holding my husband's hand and walking like that.

   We started looking at the gravestones as we walked, noting the dates as
they regressed through time, past the turn of the last century.  We smiled
at some of the names and shook our heads at the children.  My earlier
discomfort had faded, perhaps because we were so far removed now from the
immediacy of that girl my husband had known.  Far from her gleaming dark
coffin and the smell of uprooted earth, the sounds of her family quietly
weeping.  These were people long since gone, forgotten by their children's
grandchildren, and tended by anonymous men who were paid to care.

   We stopped by a beautiful moss covered angel, peering towards heaven
with palms pressed to her breast.  The marker beneath it was old and
chipped.

   Claire Marie Hessel October 7 1872 - December 19 1891

   Beloved Wife and Daughter

   "Claire Marie," I said.  "That's a pretty name."

   "Yeah," my husband's hand squeezed mine.  "Let's sit down."

   We sat next to the angel, in the shade on that cool lawn.  "She was just
nineteen," I sighed and traced the lettering, getting the tip of my finger
smudged dark with dust.

   "Barely even that old."

   "What do you think she looked like?"

   "She was pretty, with auburn hair like yours," he smiled at me and
touched my hair.  "But Claire's hair was longer, and curled just a little
as it lay across her shoulders.  She had green eyes that were bright and
quick and never still, as though she were afraid that she might miss
something."

   "She knew her time was short," I whispered.

   My husband looked into my soft brown eyes.  "Her skin was pale, like
milk, and her breasts small with rosy nipples that made her flush with
embarrassment the first time her husband-to-be had seen them." Then he was
kissing me.  "But on her wedding night she felt no shame, for she loved him
passionately and offered herself without regret to his sweet gaze."

   He does that to me, my husband, he tells me stories as foreplay.  I was
already growing wet and the dress I wore bunched easily around my hips.  I
let my husband make love to me while Claire Marie slept below us.  I dug my
heels into that soft grass and pulled him inside me, pretending I was this
girl, although I didn't know why.

   "Call me Claire...Say it...Say it for me..." I breathed urgently as his
warmth speared deeply into my womb.  And he did, repeating that name over
and over, staring at her gravestone and joining my orgasm with his.

   I felt guilty after that, after my lust had been assuaged and we were
walking back to our car.  My husband's seed burned inside me, and some I
imagined spilled onto the ground, seeping into the earth to find Claire
Marie.  It was a sacrilege, I thought afterwards, doing that there, in that
place.  I wouldn't speak with my husband, though I could tell he was in a
fine mood and willing to entertain me.  I just wanted to go home and take a
bath.

   That my feelings weren't clear to my husband became manifest a few days
later when he proposed we should go back to the cemetery sometime, perhaps
to bring some flowers for the girl.  He'd left it unclear if the girl in
question was his former student or our Claire Marie, and I didn't ask
further.  I understood him to mean he would like us to make love again in
that place and the thought of it repulsed me thoroughly.  Guilt rose like
bile in my throat and I shook my head, telling him that I couldn't, not
again.  He was disappointed and I tried to explain, but my words were
inadequate and we found ourselves separate once again.

   Soon thereafter came an episode that was to be repeated at odd intervals
over the next several months.  It had been our custom to drink wine with
our weekend suppers, both of us enjoying the exploration and growing
passion of the amateur connoisseur.  One night in mid September I'd
apparently had a little too much.  Soon after we'd finished our dinner I
felt dizzy and weak.  My body was languid and my mind unclear, as though a
great weariness had possessed me.  My husband carried me to bed and
undressed me, but beyond that I could remember nothing at all.

   The next morning I'd awoken to find myself somewhat tender and still
damp from what had obviously been a long night of lovemaking.  I felt very
anxious about this, not because I felt my husband had abused me in some
way, he was very emphatic about my willingness to couple with him and I had
no reason to disbelieve him, but because I simply couldn't remember it.  I
wondered if this 'blacking out' was a symptom of alcoholism, or some
physical problem I was unaware of.  It made me nervous and I considered
seeing a doctor, but my husband dissuaded me, saying it was probably just
my body chemistry that night.

   I abstained from alcohol for several weeks, and thereafter limited
myself to a single glass with my meal.  I'd almost forgotten it entirely
when the experience was repeated.  Again I felt disoriented and tired and
my husband had to help me to bed.  I woke up the next morning very early
and found myself still dressed, although it was obvious that we'd made love
again.  Several times, judging from the condition of my vagina and the
copious amount of semen and other fluids both inside and outside my body.
I'd also awoken with a headache, which was very unusual for me, and while I
was in my bath I decided I would see a doctor.

   I told my husband this and he again tried to talk me out of it, telling
me that it was probably just the wine.  He'd also woken up with a headache,
as though he'd drunk an entire bottle, rather than just two glasses.  He
retrieved the bottle from the refrigerator and examined the label before
pouring what remained of the wine down the sink.

   "We won't be drinking from this vineyard again," he said, putting the
bottle in the recycling can.  "But I don't think we need to see any doctors
either, okay?"

   I nodded and let him make my decision for me, hoping that it was just
tainted wine and not me at all.  But I was thinking about blackouts and now
denial.  I told myself if I started hiding airline bottles of cheap
chardonnay around the house I was going to check into a clinic.

   One day shortly after that, this would have been early October, my
husband and I were walking downtown, through the old University District.
We were visiting a small gallery where a friend of mine was having a show
and I was looking forward to it.  My husband was somewhat less
enthusiastic, but not terribly.  We were both enjoying the day and being
together.  Even so I had made a vague promise a few days before about
making it up to him.  We walked down the street close together with his arm
around me, the other holding an umbrella above us to ward off the autumn
rain.  It was fun and I was surprised when he stopped suddenly, turning us
to look through a store window.

   "I know how you can make it up to me," he said.

   "Oh...How?" I smiled, wondering what he was thinking.

   "That," my husband pointed at a mannequin.  "Let me buy you that dress."

   I looked at it through the window.  The store was a vintage clothier and
the dress in question had to be from the thirties, or maybe even the
twenties.  It looked like a wedding dress, formed of satin and lace and
richly layered.  The gown was wonderfully intricate and woven through with
small dark beads, like tiny black pearls.  In fact, the whole dress was
black as night.  On the mannequin's head sat a black velvet hat with a
narrow brim and a black veil finely netted to cover the face.  It was
beautiful, but...

   "It's black," I said.  Shaking my head and laughing.  "Who would wear
that?  It's too Goth, even for this town."

   "It's perfect," my husband breathed.  He looked at me.  "Please?  Just
try it on, okay?"

   I thought we were just playing a game; really it was kind of funny.  So
in we went and found the girl who was clerking.  She seemed surprised to
find that we were interested in that dress.  It's very expensive, she
warned us, but my husband shrugged that off despite my sideways glance.  I
was still worried about my student loans and the dress had a tag with 4
numbers on it, all on the wrong side of the decimal point.

   My husband asked about the dress' history, but the girl didn't know
anything really.  It had been bought at auction when an old woman had died.
Her estate was to be divided amongst her children and they apparently
decided to cash in.  My husband shook his head at that.  He's a social
anthropologist and cashing in, as the girl so eloquently put it, is almost
criminal to him.  The dress had been in a chest, along with a number of
other, lesser garments, and had been purchased quite by accident.  It is
doubtful any of the children had even known of its existence.

   I needed the clerk to help me with it, which she did only after my
husband had assured the girl of our immediate and genuine interest.  I'm a
size 4 and the dress actually fit me very well, it was perhaps just a
little long and a little tight around my tummy.  It was supposed to be worn
with a corset, the clerk told me, but I could get away without wearing one
she thought.  I was almost certainly a size or two smaller than the woman
for whom the dress had originally been made.  But our breasts were about
right I supposed, though a corset would probably help to fill the bodice
more properly.

   It had herringbone hooks hidden along the spine and a wide satin sash
with a fixed bow that wrapped around my waist and then pinned to the small
of my back.  There were actually three layers to the dress itself, with a
slip-like interior of crinoline that had lost much of it's original
stiffness, surrounded by the fine satin material of the dress proper, and a
layer of lace over that, stitched at the waist and neck, and diaphanous in
effect; like wearing a shadow.  It was beautiful and I stepped out of the
dressing room, letting my husband see me while I turned for the mirrors.

   My husband bought the hat for me as well and I felt both spoiled and a
little nervous as our purchase was carefully wrapped and boxed.  It seemed
like an awful lot of money to spend on a dress I would never wear in
public. It was an extravagance; a decadent luxury and I worried over it all
afternoon.  My husband, however, was quite the opposite, animated and
charming with my friends at the gallery.  He lavished attention on me so
that I was quite pleased when someone commented on it, paying us the
compliment of being truly lovers amongst so many who had the mere
appearance.

   In a somewhat secluded corner, beneath a pleasant watercolor of potted
flowers in an old and cracked windowsill, my husband pulled me close and
kissed me deeply.  He surprised me with his urgency, clutching me to him as
his hands moved down my back to my hips and further to my ass, pulling me
to feel his erection pressing between us.

   "What's gotten into you?" I whispered, smiling and licking my lips.

   "I want you," he replied simply and I looked around wondering if his
voice hadn't carried away from our little hiding place.

   "What?  Here?" I giggled and then he was kissing me again, exploring my
mouth with his tongue and making me moan as my breasts were crushed to his
chest.

   "Turn around," he whispered, moving me with his hands so that I faced
the painting.  He was lifting my skirt and I had to lean forward, pressing
my palms against the cool red brick of the wall.

   "Please, no!  Someone will...Oh!"

   My husband had freed his penis and he pulled my panty to the side,
actually ripping the fabric with his fingers.  He rubbed the crown of his
erection across my sex and I felt the excitement rushing through me.  This
unexpected encounter with so many friends and strangers nearby was
intoxicating suddenly.  Any moment one of them could come around the corner
and...

   "Ahhh...Yessss..." I hissed when his hardness penetrated me, stretching
easily the humid folds of my sex.  I pushed back as desire coursed through
my veins and the anxiety I felt was only making it better somehow.

   We made love quickly, with my husband's arms wrapped around my breasts
and his chin over my shoulder.  His breath was hot in my ear as he thrust
into my womb with short quick strokes.  I was panting and biting my lips,
telling myself to remain quiet despite the almost primal need to release
the energy that overwhelmed my senses.  I had one orgasm after another
until I could barely stand and my husband was forced to hold me up.

   It was our best sex in a long time, since our afternoon with Claire
Marie, and I was grinding myself back against him until finally even that
desperate motion gave way to stuporous ecstasy.  I was limp and powerless
in my husband's strong arms and soon after my complete surrender he too
began to orgasm, loosing his seed deeply inside my womb.  He kissed my neck
and cheek, holding himself within my quivering flesh until the moment
slowly passed and we were able to arouse our sensibilities.

   My husband straightened himself and fixed his appearance, smiling
happily at me while I tried to do the same.  I giggled and felt myself
blushing furiously.  I looked around with the realization, or at least the
hope, that I would never know if anyone had witnessed our immodest passion.
I had to remove my panties, they were ruined and I used them to clean the
wetness spilling down my thighs.  It was barely adequate and I felt him
still inside me, a warmth that would betray itself the rest of the day as
it sought escape.  I looked around, holding my damp panties, which now
smelled strongly of our union.  I did not really want to put them in my
small purse.  My husband took them from me with a chuckle and laid them
unceremoniously on a piece of rather mundane statuary.

   "You're so bad!" I laughed at him, and he merely smiled and took me by
the hand.

   We left the area slowly, but deliberately, and I avoided looking at the
other people as they circulated for fear of seeing recognition in their
eyes.  I held my husband's arm tightly and questioned him again.

   "What was that all about?" I whispered, looking quickly away as a waiter
approached to offer us champagne.

   My husband took two glasses, thanking the young man, and handed one to
me.  I drank half of it quickly.  "Didn't you like it?" He sipped his own
drink and we wandered into another section of the gallery.

   "I...Yeah, I loved it...But..." I shook my head.  "It's that dress,
isn't it?" I felt like something important had suddenly become clear.

   My husband nodded, tilting his head as we walked so that his mouth was
close to my ear.  "I've been wanting you ever since I saw you wearing it,"
he gave me a small hug with his arm around my waist.  "I kept seeing you in
it and I couldn't wait."

   I felt his sperm still inside me and the wetness cooling on my thighs as
we walked.  I lifted my face and looked around brazenly, suddenly hoping
that someone would give me a knowing smile.  I was flushing hot all over
and I felt a little confused at being so...horny.  I wanted him again,
right then, but not right there.  I asked him to take me home.  I wanted to
wear my new dress.  I did not have to ask twice and if our apologetic
goodbyes were clumsy and hastily given, neither of us cared.  We retrieved
our coats and our packages and our umbrella from the cloakroom and waited
breathlessly in the rain for a taxi.

   That night I wore the dress for my husband and I felt somewhat
self-conscious at first.  This was someone's wedding dress, I reminded
myself.  It was a dream come true as only a woman would understand it.  My
own wedding dress was wrapped in plastic.  Once in awhile I would look at
it and smile, even open the bag and take a small breath of it on occasion.
I wondered if the owner of this dress had ever done that, and what would
she think of our little scene?

   My husband made love to me, the both of us fully clothed.  I might have
protested that the dress could get stained, but he'd allowed us no other
choice.  He wanted me in that black dress, lying on my back with my legs
together and my hands clasped over my breast.  He positioned me like I was
modeling for a painting and it was clear that this pose was exactly as one
would expect from someone dead.  I did as he asked but I wanted to question
him.  What was the purpose of this?  What did it satisfy in his nature to
see me that way?  I thought I was finally gaining some understanding of why
he'd asked me previously to lie still and be quiet.  It was frightening to
me, despite my love and trust for him, to be treated in this manner.

   "Do you think about me being...Dead?" I asked him finally.  He was
sitting on the bed, touching me, touching the dress and looking at me.

   "Wha...What?"

   "The dress, the way you want me to lie here, not moving, not
talking...I'm dead, right?"

   "No...No, you're not.  I...I...just want to look at you first," he
replied haltingly, looking for the words.

   "Making love in the cemetery."

   "That was...Different."

   "I am dead." I closed my eyes and said nothing more.

   I could not tell you why I did it then, though I have my suspicions now.
My husband couldn't hide his secrets from me, they poured out of his eyes,
begging to be known.  He wanted a dead woman to love; I would be that woman
for him.  Perhaps only that once, or perhaps as many times as he wished, I
didn't know.

   He shook me gently, calling my name and I ignored him.  He tried talking
to me, explaining that I'd misunderstood his intentions.  He paced the room
slowly and sat back down.  I ignored that too.  He told me that he loved
me, but he was speaking to a dead woman.

   My husband made love to me then, as I said before.  He was slow and
deliberate and his kisses through the fine lace of my veil nearly beguiled
away my resolve to be lifeless.  His touches were sensitive and only with
difficulty did I make no sound of pleasure or protest; allow no movement to
betray my intentions.  I let him mold me to the shape he desired, spreading
my legs and lifting my dress, exposing my bare sex to his kisses first and
later his turgid penis.  He made love to me for hours it seemed, holding
himself back when he came close and shifting his attentions to prolong our
adventure.

   I was not immune, though I found perverse pleasure in denying my
emotions the release I craved.  I would tremble with impending orgasm, and
wrestle great battles to control it.  I was at war with myself while my
husband flooded me with sweet pangs of pleasure.  His attention was my
enemy and I was rigid with the effort to resist him.  The wetness between
my legs, the hardness of my nipples, and my breathing, the speeding and
slowing of my lungs lifting my breasts, all gave me away.  But those were
all as nothing compared to the wonders of being dead.

   I imagined the walls closing in around me, changing to virgin white
satin, plush and perfumed.  I was in a room just big enough for my body to
lie eternal.  I felt the pillow under my head, and the roses wrapped in
baby's breath clutched to my breast.  My eyes were closed and my skin was
pale and wax-like, and soft as the petals of a lily.  I could no longer
feel my husband on top of me.  My nipples stopped burning and my clitoris
ached no more.  My lungs held their last breath jealously and my heart
slowed and finally stopped.  Everything was quiet now, finally and forever.
I was alone.

   My orgasm exploded and I let out the breath I was holding, coughing and
panting.  I wrapped my arms and legs around my husband, pulling him to me
as I wept.  I was cumming so hard I thought I should never be sane again.
All reason deserted me.  Clarity was gone and a riot of the senses stole
through me.  I was alive again, and wanting and needing more than I ever
had before.  I'd died for my love and he'd brought me back, waking me from
the eternal dream.  My husband responded immediately, not asking me to be
still or quiet, but tearing the veil from my face and kissing my lips, my
cheeks, and my eyes.  We twisted and rolled and made savage love to
celebrate our life.  I understood.

   "I thought you were dead," my husband breathed, smiling and cuddling me
the way I like.

   "I was," I whispered, "and then you brought me back."

   "I don't know why I like..." he searched for a word, "...that.  I just
do."

   "I know," I hugged him.  "I felt so lonely for a moment.  I was trying
to convince myself that I was dead and for just a second it felt like I
was." I didn't know if I could explain this, but I was so excited that I
had to try.  "I felt nothing at all and my heart...It stopped, I think."

   My husband looked at me.

   "What?" I asked, giggling and feeling foolish.

   "I don't want you to die."

   "I know that, we're just...Pretending, right?" I kissed him.

   Whatever epiphany I'd experienced that night hadn't totally convinced me
of what we were doing however.  I'd found excitement first in the
discipline of 'dying' and then again when I was able to abandon that effort
and be 'saved' in a manner of speaking.  It was tempting to use the word
resurrected, but I feared such language.  My husband's experience was
different, I thought.  I wasn't sure his idea was so dissimilar, but for
him there could be no salvation for his lover.  I suspected that he would
love death itself, if he could; that he had loved me during our role-play
seemed incidental.

   My husband and I performed this role-play several times over the long
month, adding little things like candles and flowers in a seeming effort to
turn our bedroom into a funeral parlor.  Our scenes became ritualized and
at times I found the effort tedious or humorous or even uncomfortable, like
soaking in a bathtub full of ice water for twenty minutes so that my
husband could experience the lifeless chill of my form.  Or painting my
body and face with a thinned solution of some theatrical skin whitener,
only to find it did not wash away as easily as promised.

   By this time it was nearly the end of October and I joked with my
husband that I at least had my costume already.  We were going to attend
two Halloween parties; my husband's department head was hosting the earlier
and for me, less attractive one.  My old sorority was giving the second.  I
was still close to many of the girls, since I'd only gotten my degree the
previous June, and very much looking forward to seeing them.  But it would
be at the first affair that I met someone far more interesting.

   She was older, a humanities professor from Bonn, with a rich German
accent.  She'd introduced herself to me with a remembrance of the girl's
funeral several months prior.  She'd seen me there, but I was somewhat
embarrassed to confess that I did not recall very many of the faces in
attendance that day.  My husband had taken the opportunity to play
university politics and I found myself alone with her on an antique settee,
sipping my drink as we spoke.

   "I was there today, at that cemetery," she told me.  "No, not to visit
anyone.  I was doing rubbings of some of the markers there."

   I had to ask her what rubbings were, being unfamiliar with the term.

   "It's using charcoal to capture the marker, like using a pencil to copy
a penny into your notebook when you were a child," she smiled at me as if I
were still a child.  "I use onionskin instead of a notebook, of course."

   I nodded.  Of course, I thought.  "Why would you do that?"

   "Because they are beautiful.  Would you care to see some?"

   "I...I don't know." I wasn't sure what she was asking me.

   "Of course you do," she touched my knee lightly with a wrinkled hand. 
"I have them here, the ones I did today.  I'll be right back."

   I sat there watching the people around me, waiting and wishing my
husband would come rescue me.  I had no opinion then on the substance of
this woman's enthusiasm, although it struck me as slightly odd.  I
understood a little of what she was saying; there had indeed been several
markers that I'd found pleasing both aesthetically and emotionally, but I
didn't think I wanted to take them home with me.

   The professor returned with an artist's portfolio, an old worn leather
case of generous proportion.  She sat beside me and opened it slowly. 
She'd put her rubbings in plastic sleeves, after treating them with an
aerosol of some sort that artists use to prevent smudging.  She explained
the process briefly as the first of her rubbings was removed.  She handed
it to me and I was surprised by my own reaction.  The slanting shades of
gray, lighter here and darker there, rendering with perfect imperfection
the headstone of a man some 42 years old and dead a hundred years.  The
cracks and bumps, the very texture of passing time was revealed to me.

   "There is a serenity there, captured in the art, wouldn't you say?" she
was looking at me as I studied her rubbing.  "Not the calm of a still life
painting, which is artificial and boring, but the very essence of the thing
itself.  Do you see it?"

   I nodded, "Yes, I do see it."

   There was motion in that art; the rapid movement of the charcoal across
the paper was plainly captured as clearly as anything else.  But the eye
was drawn beyond that, to the object, and then beyond that as well to
something more.  There was something else moving, underneath, and I tried
to fix it with my eyes.

   "Melville wrote, 'It is the thing behind the thing, I chiefly hate.' And
so Ahab was damned."

   I looked up to see the woman staring into my eyes.

   "But we do not hate, you and I, we embrace it and so we are saved," she
continued patiently, playing the teacher for me.

   "I...I don't understand.  Saved from...What?" I tried to remember that
story.  Ahab hated God, didn't he?

   "Saved from our fears."

   "I do not embrace...Death," I challenged her.  "If that's what you
mean."

   She smiled at me.  "You saw something a moment ago, in here," she patted
the rubbing I held in my lap.  "Did you see death?"

   "No.  I saw...I don't know...Life," I decided.

   "Exactly," she was quietly triumphant.  "I have a gift for you then, to
celebrate embracing life." She thumbed through the dozen rubbings in her
satchel and removed one, laying it on top of the one I already held.  It
was Claire Marie's marker.

   I looked at her.  "You saw us?"

   "Quite by accident, I assure you," she was smiling again.

   "You have the wrong impression of me, madam," I pushed the rubbings back
at her.

   The old woman ignored them.  "You did not think so a moment ago." Then
more softly she said, "I envy you so many things, do not wait until you are
my age before you find the courage to accept who you are."

   "And who am I?" my voice was a whisper.

   "A very special person," she tapped the rubbings with a crooked bony
finger.  I looked down and saw a key sliding across the plastic into my
lap.

   I opened my mouth to ask her what it was for, but my husband appeared
just then, smiling and looking curiously at the rubbings I held.

   "Professor, how nice to see you again," he offered, watching as she
closed her portfolio and I tried to give her the rubbings once more, but
she assured me that they were both mine now.

   "And you professor," she finally acknowledged my husband.  "Your wife is
truly a marvel; take care of her, ja?" She did not wait for an answer, but
walked away leaving my husband shaking his head.

   "She was on my doctoral review board," he made a face.  "Merciless."

   I handed him the rubbing of Claire Marie without a word, but kept the
key for myself.

   "She gave you this?" he asked and I nodded "Uhhh-huh..." he looked at it
closely.  "I like it."

   I smiled, "So do I."

   In the weeks that followed I replayed my conversation with the old woman
many times over in my head.  I did not have a fascination with death.  I
was not a fetishist of some sort.  There were no secrets to which I was
privy, no hidden world or serene divination to which I could aspire.  The
professor's words seemed contrived and angered me, although I did not
understand why this should be so.  And at the same time I had taken the
rubbings to have them matted and framed.  My intention was to hang them in
our bedroom, but instead I prominently displayed them in our living room. I
felt like a criminal who leaves clues at the scene of her crime, begging to
be stopped before she can act again.

   I had declined my husband's earnest desires to reprise our sexual games.
I took my dress to a cleaner who specialized in such garments, caring for
each individually by hand.  It was a slow process and required several
weeks, and even after it was ready I continually made excuses not to claim
it.  When my husband would ask me about it I would grow angry, asking him
in turn if it were the dress or myself with which he was enamored.

   We engaged in sex the normal way, when we did it all, and I was vexed by
inability to achieve orgasm.  I would practically force my husband to go
down on me before I would allow him penetration, but I was frustrated
despite his best efforts to bring me release.  Even masturbation, which I
engaged in regularly during my bath, was unsatisfactory.  I could conjure
no thought process or fantasy, or emotional connection with anything
internal.  I felt alone and isolated and my mood suffered terribly from it.

   This all happened very quickly and my husband and I were not happy. 
When it became time to renew my prescription for my birth control pills, I
put it off and used the excuse to avoid having sex with him.  I was seeking
something, but I didn't know what and I sought every rationale I could
imagine.  This was selfish, I knew, and I chided myself for not discussing
it with him, but I was certain that my problems were personal and I'd
become reclusive with guilt.

   My husband and I shared Thanksgiving alone, declining invitations and
resisting the wishes of our respective families.  I did not feel festive
and my husband was restless as well, both from the spiritual malaise I
suffered and his own frustrations.  He seemed convinced that my depression
had not come from my suspected interest in death, but from my denial of it.
His arguments were passionate, but they did not persuade, and I would not
listen.

   Thanksgiving evening I blacked out for the third time in as many months,
although it had been very nearly two months since the previous episode.  I
remember sitting down to read a manuscript after our dinner, sipping my
second glass of sherry, and finding myself unable to focus with my mind as
well as my eyes.  The words swam in front of me and my thoughts drifted.  I
had peculiar dreams, vulgar dreams in which I was ravished by strange men
in animalistic fashion.  I awoke very early the next morning, my back to my
husband's chest.  We were both naked and he had an erection pressing
between my thighs.  I felt damp and I reached between my legs to feel my
labia distended and puffy.  It had apparently been another good night of
coitus for us, though once again I had no memory of it.

   I called my doctor the following Monday, determined not to inform my
husband lest he change my mind.  She is an Ob-Gyn, not a general
practitioner, but I trust her and I needed that more than anything else. 
She was able to get me in that very afternoon for a consultation.  Her
first suggestion upon hearing my story was to get a physical, which I
resisted at first, but finally agreed to and I let her give me a referral
to UMC.  It was, as she told me, the best she could do given the
limitations of her clinic and staff.  In the meantime though she would draw
some blood and take a urine specimen and forward the lab work along with my
patient history to her colleagues at the University Medical Center.

   You can imagine my surprise a week later when my doctor called, asking
me what drugs I had been taking in the days prior to my appointment.  I
told her what she already knew.  The only medication I'd been on were the
birth control pills she'd prescribed for me, which I'd already stopped
taking more than a week before Thanksgiving, and some vitamin supplements,
also recommended by her.  I sat down as she told me there were traces of a
sedative in my blood, a type of tranquilizer most commonly used in
veterinary medicine.  Mixed with alcohol even a small amount could have the
effects I'd described.

   She gently probed to find out if I'd been with someone other than my
husband on any of the nights in question, intimating that this had
appearances of a kind of date rape.  I assured her that I hadn't, but I'm
not sure she believed me.  She told me her lab had found no indications of
STD's in any case, although I should call her office if I had unusual
discharge or noticed anything out of the ordinary.  I found the entire
conversation humiliating.

   It took me a long while to reflect on what had happened, on what I felt.
I'd wanted to confront my husband immediately, but I hadn't.  Perhaps it
was my fear that in my anger I would say or do something out of proportion
to events, but it was hard to imagine such a thing.  My period had come and
gone and I'd felt nothing but anger in my husband's presence, and the
burden of silence weighed heavily upon my soul.  The days passed slow and
gray and I couldn't bear winter's cold descent.

   The University Medical Center couldn't get me in until the twelfth of
December and it would take five working days to get the results of my
physical.  I found some relief in deciding to wait until I heard from the
doctors before confronting my husband.  It gave me an artificial sense of
security, as if something else would happen in the meantime, some event to
rearrange my thought process and alter my emotions.  But nothing did and
when the hospital called, I learned only what I'd already known.

   "I went to see my doctor," I was eating salad and looking at my husband.

   "Oh?  Why?" he looked genuinely puzzled.

   "I had another one of those spells, last Thanksgiving.  I blacked out,"
I talked with my mouth full.  "You put me to bed, remember?"

   "Uh-huh, you didn't tell me you didn't remember anything.  I
thought...uh, I thought everything was fine."

   "I didn't want you to worry."

   "Oh."

   "Don't you want to know what the doctor found?"

   "Yeah, of course I do."

   "She found some animal tranquilizer in my blood," I laughed and shook my
head.  "Can you imagine that?"

   "But how...how would that...get there?" he wouldn't look at me.

   "Mmmm..." I swallowed and stabbed the fork in his direction.  "She has a
theory on that.  She asked me if I'd been with any strange men.  Someone
who would drug me and then do all kinds of very bad things to my body while
I was out of it."

   "Oh, uh..."

   "She even ran a test to see if I'd gotten a social disease or two," I
laughed again.  "Can you imagine, getting a phone call like that?  I told
her though, nope, no strange men in my life, just my husband and I trust
him.  I told her that and I hung up the phone."

   "Well, um..."

   "So now you tell me.  You tell me just what the fuck you did to me!" my
voice wavered on the edge of a scream.

   "I wanted to play, that's all.  I didn't want to hurt you, or
anything...It was just playing.  The first couple times you didn't
understand and then...then this past month you've been on some 'oh, this is
so evil' kick, which I don't get at all, by the way..."

   "Oh!  Don't you blame me!"

   "I'm not blaming you, okay?  It's nobody's fault.  It's..."

   "What?  Nobody's fault?  It's your fault!  You drugged me!  You...Raped
me!  You don't think that's your fault?"

   "I didn't mean it like that, yes.  That's my fault and I'm sorry.  I
just needed some...Something from you and you wouldn't give it to me."

   "So you took it.  You drugged me, raped me, and stole whatever it is you
need.  What, I wasn't dead enough for you?  I wasn't quiet enough for you
to get off on, is that it?"

   "No, please, it's not like that, I love you okay.  I'm sorry," he was
looking at me now, begging me to believe him.

   "Stop saying that.  You don't love me.  You're not sorry.  You're just
sorry you got caught.  Don't you ever say that again."

   "No, that's not true.  I love you so much; please just give me a chance,
okay?  Let me...Let me show you."

   "Show me what?"

   "I, uh...I taped us.  On the camcorder."

   "You did what?"

   "I thought maybe...someday...you'd like to see it.  Please.  I love you,
just...Just wait and give me one chance, okay?  Please?"

   In my defense I will say that I had spent much of that afternoon looking
through our wedding album.  I was trying to see if there was a discernable
difference between the man I married and the man who was coming home that
evening.  I was angry, confused, and hurt, to be certain.  But then there
is love.  Where does that end?  I did still love him, although I am certain
for many people that would be irrelevant even if true.  Those people would
not understand my story.

   "You are trying to kill me.  Inside...I'm dying.  Is this what you
want?" I was crying, despite my determination not to.

   "No, no.  I want you to...understand.  That's all.  Let me show you."

   I watched the television in silence.  Alone.  The way my husband had
been alone.  My body was not me and I felt angry that he couldn't
understand that.  He'd used me as a masturbatory tool, that's all.  This
talk of love and sharing, I shook my head; it just didn't exist without
consent.  That's what it was, I realized, an issue of giving versus taking.
If he'd asked me to let him drug me and make love to me as he desired.  To
record it so we could share the experience together later, would I have
said yes?  Or no?  I had no answer to that and it bothered me greatly
because now I never would.

   There were three tapes, one for each night that I'd been drugged, and
they were all very similar in content.  Only the props had changed.  In the
first I was completely undressed, the second clothed as I'd found myself in
the morning, and the third time my husband had dressed me in the black
wedding gown, removing it when he'd finished.  In every instance he was
gentle and tender, and I couldn't help but compare what I was seeing to
what I'd experienced with him during our years of lovemaking.  Was he more
or less passionate when I'd been drugged?  Did his love for me gain
expression, or was something lost with my ability to respond?  I found
myself worrying this over in my mind, as though I were watching him with
someone else, a different woman.  I was becoming jealous of myself and that
seeming contradiction drove me to the edge of tears.  I could see myself on
the screen, but it wasn't me.  It wasn't me.

   A range of thoughts filled me then, from the insane desire just to give
him his wish and kill myself, to the irrational dream of 'winning' him back
to me.  I could leave him, I thought, and that was surely what he most
feared.  But so too did I fear it and such was the reason I'd waited so
long to confront him.  I'd built my life around this man, around the love I
felt for him.  The thought of waking up alone filled me with dread, even if
alone really meant with someone else; I couldn't bear the idea.  I was in a
room with no doors or windows, no way out...

   I sat there with that metaphor.  The television turned off.  Crying in
the darkness.  I sat there feeling sorry for myself.  Pity is the absence
of hope, hope is the refuge of failure, failure is the lack of reason...A
place with no doors.  No windows.  No escape.  Imagine it.  Where would you
find such a place?  If you cannot escape it is because...You are already
outside.  If you have no word for slavery, you will never know you're a
slave.  If you have no concept of freedom, you will never know you are
free. My mind was running circles, trying to find an answer that lurked
just beyond the veil of reason...It was there, like a name on the tip of
your tongue.  Woman thy name is vanity.  Pride goeth before the fall. 
Think of something else and the answer will come unbidden.  It is the thing
behind the thing, I chiefly hate.

   "Come with me, now," I said.

   I walked into the den where my husband was sitting.  He looked up,
surprised to see me dressed in the black wedding gown.  I wore the hat with
the veil down, my hair pulled back severely and knotted.  I'd painted my
face white and my eyes black, my crimson lips were thin and my jaw set.  I
didn't wait, but moved to the car, sitting in the backseat erect and
patient as a statue.  It was mid-December and cold, painfully so as
midnight approached.

   My husband peered inside before settling behind the steering wheel.

   "I want to see Claire Marie."

   "Wha..."

   "Don't talk.  Just drive." I stared straight ahead for the 40-minute
ride.

   The heavy wrought iron gates at the entrance were closed, but there were
two smaller pedestrian gates on either side of the great red brick façade
that arched across the road.

   "Park here, we'll walk."

   I got out and walked to the small gate on the left side, feeling the
cold wind through the dress and resisting the need to shiver.  There were
lights of antique gas lamp design and it was enough to use the key the old
woman had given me so many long weeks previously.  I did not know before
that moment what the key was for, but what else could it have been?  The
big brass padlock opened easily and heavy gate creaked open beneath my
ghostly hand.

   If my husband was surprised, I could not tell for I refused to look at
him.  "Lock it behind you."

   I waited while he did as he was told and fell into place a half step
behind me.  It was a dark, dark night and it felt as though it might rain
or even snow at any moment.  The leafless trees creaked and groaned and I
felt...Different.  In the car I had been cold, but here, now following a
path I could barely see towards a goal I didn't understand, I felt a warmth
spreading inside me.  My blood was on fire and I flushed as the asphalt
turned to cobblestone.  The moon suddenly appeared and disappeared behind
fleeting clouds and for a brief moment I was bathed in that pale light.

   "Are you cold?  You must be freezing..." my husband had decided to
speak. "Here..." he tried to put his jacket around my shoulders, but I
shrugged it off.

   "You don't feel it, do you?"

   "What?  Feel what, honey?" He was worried; he never called me honey
except when I was sick.

   "That's why you do it.  Why you need it."

   "I don't...Understand," he was putting his jacket back on and hurrying
to catch up.

   "I thought I was trapped...Inside.  Trying to get out." I saw the angel
waiting for me.  "But all the time it was you." I stepped off the road and
onto the stiff grass, pausing to kick off my shoes and walk barefoot on
that frozen earth.

   "Wait, don't...You'll freeze to death," he was picking up my shoes, his
voice concerned, as it should be.

   "No, my love." I sat below the angel in a fleeting halo of moonlight. 
"I won't die.  Not tonight," I smiled up at him.  "Join us here, lie with
me and we will comfort you.  I understand now.  I forgive you."

   "What do you mean?  I don't...." He looked so lost standing there, I
reached up to take his hand and pull him down to me.  "You're freezing! 
Please, let's go...It's too cold for this."

   I felt hot all over, as though the sun itself were trying to burst
through me.  "I thought you were trying to save me.  That your tenderness
was meant to comfort me.  But that isn't it at all, is it?  Claire Marie
knows what's on the other side, so does that old woman who gave me the
rubbings, who gave me the key to this..." I gestured, looking around with
wonder, "...Place without windows or doors.  The thing behind the thing, my
love, I have seen it.  I have embraced it and tonight I embody it.  Join
with us and be freed."

   I lifted my veil, exposing my lifeless face and dead eyes.  I'd stopped
breathing long before and my words left no clouds hanging in the air the
way my husband's did.  The moisture from his lungs crystallizing in the
cold moonlight, giving proof to his life.

   "I love you.  We need to go home now...You...You're scaring me," he
whispered, resisting my hand as it slipped behind his warm neck, pulling
his mouth to mine.  "N-No...No!  Who are you?" he leaned backward,
narrowing his eyes as if trying to see past this simple guise, but he was
incapable.  That was why he needed me.

   "I am your beloved wife."

   I kissed him then, forcing my tongue past his lips and into his mouth. I
had my arms around him, pulling him down with me, so that his body was
against me.  His chest pressed against my breasts, his heart beating
against me even as his hands tried to push us apart.  But his need would
overcome his fear.  I felt it; I sensed his desire to be freed of it.  I
spread my legs on that cold winter night and he entered me slowly, with a
tenderness that made me weep frozen tears.  I was burning through and
through, but my husband felt only the empty chill of death.

   "Oh, God!...You're so...Cold!" he gasped, trying to pull back as his
stiff member rebelled its intrusion.  "It's like ice inside you...Please,
darling, we need to..."

   I kissed him again.

   "Shhhhh...Make love to me," I sighed, kissing him again and wrapping
myself around him, pulling his member back inside me with my legs and
hands. "Ohhh...Yessss..." I hissed.  "Inside me...There...Push my
love...Fill me..." I urged him with my lips and eyes, thrusting my body up
to bring him deeper.

   My husband began moving with me then, his fear and trepidation giving
way to love and the physical expression of it.  I gave him my passion and
he offered me his warmth, until the two were mixed and inseparable.  He
filled me and brought me to wonderful orgasm so that I gasped and drew a
long breath, exhaling finally a minute later with a wintry cloud.  My heart
beat once more and blood flowed through my veins, carrying warmth and life
through my limbs.

   "Oh, my love...My love...You've done it..." I sighed, kissing and
pulling him tight.  My sex clasped around him, desperate to pull him ever
deeper.  "I live again..."

   "I love you...I love you so much..." he replied, over and over in time
with his thrusts until I felt him cumming, his seed flooding hotly into my
womb.  He held himself there, kissing me with his hands on my face,
touching me.  "I'm so...so sorry," he was frantic with his urgency to be
forgiven in that splendid moment.  "Never...I swear...Never again..."

   I shushed him and smiled.  I wanted to hold him and enjoy the feeling of
his sperm settling into my fertile womb.  I'd been off the pill over a
month by then and my period had come and gone.  I was ovulating and I knew
as we lay there wrapped in the warmth of our love that I'd conceived.  I
could feel it, a new life sparked deep in my body.  The thing behind the
thing waiting to be born again.  I fervently wished it would be a girl;
midnight had passed and it was December 19th and I had a name already
picked out.



   End
rache696@yahoo.com http://www.asstr-mirror.org/files/Authors/rache/www/index.htm
   

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