Desire

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From Macho Sluts (1988)

  Then he had discovered, to his chagrin, that the true masochist is nearly as rare as the genuine sadist. He was often as alone and disappointed standing behind the whipping post as he had been when he hugged it to his breast and waited for the perfect blow that never came. But these blows were like balm. Physical pain was so much easier to bear than ennui and self-hatred. When the man behind him stopped, he could not turn around because he was ashamed of his own excitement and did not want anyone else to see it. His cock was up, flushed and eager, the head so sensitive he almost came from feeling it rub against the fly-seam of his jeans. The thought of how obvious his erection was only made it come back against his belly in a full brace, instead of merely standing at rigid attention. “Stop,” he said faintly, dishonestly, as if the whipping had not stopped already. “But we aren’t finished yet,” the spoiler said, taking control in his sweetest, softest, most reasonable voice. ‘And I never will be,’ he thought, as the master kept his broad shoulders level, flexed in front of him, both booted feet flat on the floor. There was no evasion in that body, only attentiveness, receptivity. ‘I love what you are, beautiful and frustrated, a stallion in a herd of geldings, a sexual athlete surrounded by men too spoiled and lazy to pull their own puds, the last Roman gladiator in a world of puling Christians. I will never break you down or damage you. How could I, when this is exactly what you want and need more than food or sleep or your next deep breath?’ He was there for hours. During the night, he changed hands, implements, the position of the subject. But by the time he was done, too tired to lift his hand to wipe the sweat from his face, they both knew that the master’s expertise at administering pain came from a very deep well of need for it. And the master knew he had to go back to that well as often as possible if he wanted to keep his expertise or just his sanity. We usually don’t know how much we need something until it’s possible to get it. The spoiler helped the master up to his bedroom and applied ice to his welted back. He wanted to stay but did not know if he could sleep there, show his face in the morning, and still be forgiven. He said off-handedly, “I wasn’t about to let that kid come in my mouth, rubber or no rubber. But I don’t feel that way about you.” No human being is ever too exhausted to feel curiosity. “Why?” “Because you deserve it,” he said simply. “Blow jobs bore me limp,” the crusty voice said bluntly.

• From Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928)

  Stretching with the curious yawn of desire, for he had been alone and apart from man or woman for four years, he rose and took his coat again, and his gun, lowered the lamp and went out into the starry night, with the dog. Driven by desire and by dread of the malevolent Thing outside, he made his round in the wood, slowly, softly. He loved the darkness and folded himself into it. It fitted the turgidity of his desire which, in spite of all, was like riches; the stirring restlessness of his penis, the stirring fire in his loins! Oh, if only there were other men to be with, to fight that sparkling electric Thing outside there, to preserve the tenderness of life, the tenderness of women, and the natural riches of desire. If only there were men to fight side by side with! But the men were all outside there, glorying in the Thing, triumphing or being trodden down in the rush of mechanised greed or of greedy mechanism. Constance, for her part, had hurried across the park, home, almost without thinking. As yet she had no after-thought. She would be in time for dinner. She was annoyed to find the doors fastened, however, so that she had to ring. Mrs. Bolton opened. "Why there you are, your Ladyship! I was beginning to wonder if you'd gone lost!" she said a little roguishly. "Sir Clifford hasn't asked for you, though; he's got Mr. Linley in with him, talking over something. It looks as if he'd stay to dinner, doesn't it my Lady?" "It does rather," said Connie. "Shall I put dinner back a quarter of an hour? That would give you time to dress in comfort." "Perhaps you'd better." Mr. Linley was the general manager of the collieries, an elderly man from the north, with not quite enough punch to suit Clifford; not up to post-war conditions, nor post-war colliers either, with their "ca' canny" creed. But Connie liked Mr. Linley, though she was glad to be spared the toadying of his wife. Linley stayed to dinner, and Connie was the hostess men liked so much, so modest, yet so attentive and aware, with big, wide blue eyes and a soft repose that sufficiently hid what she was really thinking. Connie had played this woman so much, it was almost second nature to her; but still, decidedly second. Yet it was curious how everything disappeared from her consciousness while she played it. She waited patiently till she could go upstairs and think her own thoughts. She was always waiting, it seemed to be her _forte_.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  As they went thus, the son asking and the father answering, they encountered by chance a company of pretty and well-dressed young women, coming from a wedding, whom as soon as the young man saw, he asked his father what manner of things these were. "My son," answered Filippo, "cast your eyes on the ground and look not at them, for that they are an ill thing." Quoth the son, "And how are they called?" The father, not to awaken in the lad's mind a carnal appetite less than useful, would not name them by the proper name, to wit, women, but said, "They are called green geese." Whereupon, marvellous to relate, he who have never seen a woman and who recked not of palaces nor oxen nor horses nor asses nor monies nor of aught else he had seen, said suddenly, "Father mine, I prithee get me one of these green geese." "Alack, my son," replied the father, "hold they peace; I tell thee they are an ill thing." "How!" asked the youth. "Are ill things then made after this fashion?" and Filippo answered, "Ay." Then said the son, "I know not what you would say nor why these are an ill thing; for my part, meseemeth I never yet saw aught goodly or pleasing as are these. They are fairer than the painted angels you have shown me whiles. For God's sake, an you reck of me, contrive that we may carry one of yonder green geese back with us up yonder, and I will give it to eat." "Nay," answered the father, "I will not: thou knowest not whereon they feed." And he understood incontinent that nature was stronger than his wit and repented him of having brought the youth to Florence. But I will have it suffice me to have told this much of the present story and return to those for whose behoof I have related it.

• From Macho Sluts (1988)

  This club had a different name then, and catered to vanilla swingers. But Kerry, a master of her craft, was not distracted. She knew you must practice this despised art where you can, and disregard what is tawdry or unclean—or learn to love the dirt, the sleaze, because it represents your membership in the elite. Now she had him remove his shirt and grab a rung far above his head. He was stretched on his tiptoes in front of her. She asked him a question only he could hear. “Ah don’t want no bondage,” he said loudly. Iduna and Teddy shared a brief, unpleasant laugh. Planarians can learn. Howard sat up and took notice when Kerry began to work on Bill’s naked back with a short, suede flail. Hanging from her belt, it looked homemade, innocuous. In her hand, it was a weapon. She whirled it so quickly that there was no apparent difference between the sound it made swinging through the air and the sound it made striking skin. It was one continuous, ominous tone, a single voice that became a duet when the man began to scream. However, he did not let go. Gil leaned toward Howard and whispered that he had seen some people cut and run at this stage. Howard was still skeptical, but now he was keeping an open mind. Everyone watched. It was what you did at the club when someone hung by their cold and sweating palms and took a beating. Granted, not all of them approved. By tomorrow night, rumor would have it that Kerry had half-killed someone. Heavy S/M is not popular with most of the adherents of light bondage and discipline. Unless you love pure pain for its own sake, it is difficult to see that deliberately administered, controlled agony retains its own severe sensuality. Iduna rocked on her bar stool, separating her legs enough to let the edge of it press across the middle of her cunt. Teddy spared a glance for her and smiled at her flushed cheeks, then ran a hand along his own erection. It had been a long time since he had played with Kerry. She hadn’t been in for a while. Maybe Iduna would take a quick stint behind the bar. The leatherwoman had switched to a longer flail. It was not suede, and the tails had knots in them. Bill’s broad back was now an evenly raised mass of bruises. Kerry danced behind him, side to side, quick as a cat, cruel and exact. He was crying out continuously, twisting from side to side. He seemed to have forgotten he could let go of the ladder. Iduna swallowed a mouthful of wine and thought, how delicious, it would take only one good stroke to split that wide open. And of course this is what Kerry (wielding the braided cat now) did. Nine narrow tails whistled through the air, and the skin divided, rent, bled.

• From Macho Sluts (1988)

  I want somebody I can perfect with hard, constant training. A living work of art I can take out and show off on Folsom Street as my counterpart. So pretty and so alive and responsive to me it will make all the other tops, boys and girls, gnaw on their arms. It’s makin’ me crazy, what I want. What do you think?” Tyre thoughtfully chewed her lower lip. “Well, the only problem is the classic one of determining consent. Since my negotiations are with you and not with Roxanne, I have no way to determine if this really is one of her fantasies.” “Well, what do you want me to do? Give her a safe word?” “Since the whole thing is being set up as a test, I don’t think that would ruin the ambiance. And I also need to check your credentials, and her background. You understand. If I’m going to find tops she doesn’t know, I’d have to do that anyway.” “I think my reputation will bear up under scrutiny. You plan to be equally careful when you select the other members of the party?” Tyre nodded. But she seemed distracted. “What else is bothering you?” Alex asked. “I was just wondering if that’s what they say about me—that I have no interest in dominance and submission.” Alex shook her head. “You wanna know everything they say about you, we can sit here all day and I still won’t be done.” Her eyes had gone cold, calculating. “What the fuck does it matter to you? You’re not exactly working for commission.” “I just get sick of being the object of so much gossip. It’s ostensibly a form of attention, but it actually makes me feel slighted and ignored. Because what people are really paying attention to are their own fantasies, their own needs, their own ideas about who or what I should be in relation to them. They have no idea what the Calyx means to me, why I do this, what keeps me going. And they don’t care.” “How could they ever get to know you? You’re a very private lady. You have a huge fan club of adoring little baby dykes, but you keep ’em away with the color of your money and your Snow Queen attitude. The ninjas and cat-ladies you got workin’ for you are a buncha hard-core bodyguards.” “I have to be very careful to protect my privacy. Because you know what happens when women find out something about me that doesn’t agree with their fantasies, their projections? They get angry. And there’s nothing more dangerous than a disappointed fan.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  LODOVICO DISCOVERETH TO MADAM BEATRICE THE LOVE HE BEARETH HER, WHEREUPON SHE SENDETH EGANO HER HUSBAND INTO THE GARDEN, IN HER OWN FAVOUR, AND LIETH MEANWHILE WITH LODOVICO, WHO, PRESENTLY ARISING, GOETH AND CUDGELLETH EGANO IN THE GARDEN Madam Isabella's presence of mind, as related by Pampinea, was held admirable by all the company; but, whilst they yet marvelled thereat, Filomena, whom the king had appointed to follow on, said, "Lovesome ladies, and I mistake not, methinketh I can tell you no less goodly a story on the same subject, and that forthright. You must know, then, that there was once in Paris a Florentine gentleman, who was for poverty turned merchant and had thriven so well in commerce that he was grown thereby very rich. He had by his lady one only son, whom he had named Lodovico, and for that he might concern himself with his father's nobility and not with trade, he had willed not to place him in any warehouse, but had sent him to be with other gentlemen in the service of the King of France, where he learned store of goodly manners and other fine things. During his sojourn there, it befell that certain gentlemen, who were returned from visiting the Holy Sepulchre, coming in upon a conversation between certain young men, of whom Lodovico was one, and hearing them discourse among themselves of the fair ladies of France and England and other parts of the world, one of them began to say that assuredly, in all the lands he had traversed and for all the ladies he had seen, he had never beheld the like for beauty of Madam Beatrice, the wife of Messer Egano de' Gulluzzi of Bologna; to which all his companions, who had with him seen her at Bologna, agreed.

• From Macho Sluts (1988)

  But Chris was already ahead of her. “I know you’ve taken more than this, but not a hell of a lot more, was it?” Chris asked. Roxanne groaned assent. “I wish you could see all of this. You’re so soft and ripe that all I’ve got to do is flick you and you turn black and blue. I want to be able to hit you until my arm is tired, until I can’t lift it to hit you any more. Can you do that for me? Can you stay here with me? You’ve gotten me this far. Don’t give up on me now. The rest won’t be easy, but I’m so close, so close, so fucking close.” She continued to administer the snapping strokes, but now they had been redefined as something Chris needed that Roxanne could provide. She did not want to deny Chris her climax, and went looking for a second wind. A drowning woman must, she thought, when she knows she is dying, attempt to dive yet deeper into the water, to hide herself, to take in more and more of the alien water that surrounds her. Perhaps she hopes to be able to draw oxygen from the water, if only she takes in enough of it, or become a fish and swim without harm in it. The force that surrounds me is pain, and it is alien to me, and yet I begin to crave more and more of it. I will take more and more of it in until it is part of me and loses its power over me and I cease to exist. But God, it is hard hard so very very hard. Joy was behind the cross, her hands hooked over its arms, her feet braced on the shelf. “Roxie, you are wastin’ time, trying to make it fly away. But you only got this one good life, and it’d be much better if you slowed yourself down. I’m gonna help you now, if you let me, you gonna be able to see that whip come at you like it takes ten minutes to land. And the tip of it is gonna hook you, take you outta your self again, draw you out on the shining path. God walkin’ out of your body, Roxie, I mind the silver cord for you. I know who you need right now. That Alex, she is watchin’ you with narrow eyes, you circle ’round behind her, girl, and kiss her neck.” Joy saw Alex jump and look over her shoulder. With a puzzled look on her face, she rubbed the nape of her neck. Normally, a crowd would make this dangerous. But the pack was fascinated by the flogging.

• From Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928)

  "I'll tell you," he said. "The first girl I had, I began with when I was sixteen. She was a schoolmaster's daughter over at Ollerton, pretty, beautiful really. I was supposed to be a clever sort of young fellow from Sheffield Grammar School, with a bit of French and German, very much up aloft. She was the romantic sort that hated commonness. She egged me on to poetry and reading: in a way, she made a man of me. I read and I thought like a house on fire, for her. And I was a clerk in Butterley Offices, a thin, white-faced fellow fuming with all the things I read. And about _everything_ I talked to her: but everything. We talked ourselves into Persepolis and Timbuctoo. We were the most literary-cultured couple in ten counties. I held forth with rapture to her, positively with rapture. I simply went up in smoke. And she adored me. The serpent in the grass was sex. She somehow didn't have any; at least, not where it's supposed to be. I got thinner and crazier. Then I said we'd got to be lovers. I talked her into it, as usual. So she let me. I was excited, and she never wanted it. She just didn't want it. She adored me, she loved me to talk to her and kiss her: in that way she had a passion for me. But the other, she just didn't want. And there are lots of women like her. And it was just the other that I _did_ want. So there we split. I was cruel, and left her. Then I took on with another girl, a teacher, who had made a scandal by carrying on with a married man and driving him nearly out of his mind. She was a soft, white-skinned, soft sort of a woman, older than me, and played the fiddle. And she was a demon. She loved everything about love, except the sex. Clinging, caressing, creeping into you in every way: but if you forced her to the sex itself, she just ground her teeth and sent out hate. I forced her to it, and she could simply numb me with hate because of it. So I was balked again. I loathed all that. I wanted a woman who wanted me, and wanted _it_.

• From The Incendiaries (2018)

  I danced with her for the length of the song, and then she unfastened my pants. She stripped me down to my boxers. I haven’t done this before, I thought of saying; I didn’t. It wasn’t until I was naked that she let me pull off her shirt, its striped, delicate fabric bunching in my palms. I unzipped Phoebe’s skirt. I’d fantasized about this for weeks, in detail. Even as I slid a nail up the ridged line of the real Phoebe’s spine, those previous versions, ghostly but alive, crowded around us. They flexed thin backs, exhaling phantom sighs while I tried to focus on this girl, Phoebe, with these specific ribs. Fingers with this exact tang of lime juice. We fell in bed. I put Phoebe’s thumb in my mouth; I lapped at taut nipples. She lowered a breast to brush my lips, then raised it again, playful. But when I tried to roll on top, she resisted. What’s wrong? I asked. Let’s stay like this, she said. She straddled me, then shifted onto hands and knees. She looked back, shoulders arched, and instructed me to keep going. Small hipbones jutted out like half-formed handles; I reached for them. She rocked back and forth, but I still couldn’t tell if she was having a good time. I heard a branch scratch the windowpane, insistent. The sound emphasized Phoebe’s silence. It was too soon to stop. I tried to think. The other night, while it rained, a gingko had fallen. In the morning, a passerby noticed a white gleam in its root ball. It turned out to be a skull. The Edwards quadrangle had been built on top of an old burial site. Beneath the lawn, the earth would be latticed with bones. I bent low, kissing the knotted spine. I wanted to slow down. Phoebe thrust back against my thighs. It was too fast, too—she tensed at the waist. Letting go, I collapsed. 8.JOHN LEALThe fall he returned to Noxhurst, John Leal established a habit of paying morning visits to the graves on Hilcox Street. The churchyard gates opened at dawn. He went in to keep his vigil. Tall lindens stood bare, stripped by the cold, but still they raised their limbs in hallelujah. He walked about; he examined memorial inscriptions, the etched, once-loved names fading. Frost burned his feet. Winter softened into spring, and mossed obelisks pointed on high. In the estival heat, he set his back against the cold stone of a tomb. He plucked a honeysuckle stalk sprouting from what had once been men; he sipped its bit of juice. In time, lying in the dirt, he, too, might nourish future pilgrims. If he had one petition for himself, it was this: that he be made useful.

• From The Incendiaries (2018)

  4.WILLI first met Phoebe in a house full of strangers, five weeks into the Edwards fall term. I was new to the Noxhurst school, but a sophomore, a late arrival. I’d transferred in from the Bible college I’d had to leave, and I was often on my own. Then, one night, while I was taking a walk alone, I noticed a loud throng of students turning into a gate. It was left propped open; I followed them in. Hip-hop pulsed, rolled. Pale limbs shone. I’d learned that the alcohol table was the one place where I could stand without looking too isolated, and I was idling at my usual station, finishing a third drink, when a girl in a striped dress tripped. She spilled cold liquid down my leg. She shouted apologies, then a name: Phoebe Lin. Will Kendall, I said, also in a shout. We tried talking, but I kept mishearing what she said. Phoebe started tilting her pelvis from side to side. Life as a juvenile born-again hadn’t put me on a lot of dance floors; uncertain, I followed the girl’s lead. She swayed left, right, bare shoulders sliding. Others writhed to the frenzied tempo, but Phoebe’s hips beat out a slowed-down song. Punch-stained red cups split underfoot, opening into plastic petals. Palms open, she levitated both hands. The room clattered into motion, rising to spin. She dipped, glided along its tilt, and still she moved to the calm rhythm she’d found, dragging the beat until my pulse joined hers. She kept dancing, so I did, too. By the time she stopped, she looked flushed, out of breath. She lifted black, long hair into a makeshift ponytail. We shouted again, and I watched a drop of sweat trickle from Phoebe’s hairline toward the clavicle niche, where it might pool, I thought, to be lapped up. Thick bangs, damp at the tips, parted to expose her forehead. I wanted to kiss that spot, its sudden openness: I leaned down. She pulled close. Since then, three weeks ago, we talked; we kissed, but that was all. I didn’t know what I had the right to ask. I waited, while the rest of Edwards played musical beds. Late at night, if I walked to the bathroom, I crossed paths with still more girls listing tipsily down the hall in oversized, borrowed polo shirts. They flashed smiles, then swerved back into my suitemates’ rooms. I returned to mine, but I could still hear the squeals, the high-pitched cries. In no time, a pretty girl might zigzag into my bed, and if it hadn’t happened yet, it was excitingly attainable—if I said the right words, reached for the right girl—

• From Macho Sluts (1988)

  Then she took it over to Clarissa, for her inspection. “My grandmother brought these back from the Orient,” she said. “She used them to fasten her opera cape. Aren’t they pretty?” She showed Clarissa a pair of silver clasps, each in the form of a dragon whose jaw moved to grip the edge of a cloak … or whatever was placed in its rapacious mouth. The clasps were connected by a few inches of chain. The beam was so narrow that Clarissa’s breasts peeked out of either side of it. Berenice petted them, making the little girl so lascivious that she thought she must go mad if she were not granted some reprieve. A pinch on each nipple only increased her need. “You are so cruel,” she wept. Berenice twisted the nearest nipple. “Mind your tongue,” she said, and pressed the cold, grinning dragon against her soft skin. “Do you know what I’m going to do with this?” she asked. “Have you already guessed?” “No,” Clarissa lied. Berenice opened one of the clamps, pulled slightly on Clarissa’s nipple, and left the mythical beast hanging from her breast. In another moment, its twin was swinging from the other breast. The chain was so short that it almost made her nipples touch. Clarissa sounded as if she were crying, but no tears were coming from her eyes, and she was attempting to rub her female parts against the beam. The stiffness of her corset prevented her from achieving full freedom of movement, and the slight contact she was able to achieve with the leather only titillated her further. Berenice went to the foot of the beam and petted her again, spreading her love dew from the clitoris up to the perineum, anointing each side of the inner lips, even rubbing it on her tightest, smallest hole. Then she bent down and blew on the moisture, and Clarissa groaned. “I feel as if I’m nothing but wetness, nothing but the thing between my legs. What are you going to do with me?” “What does it matter to you?” “It doesn’t—only don’t leave me—please take me, use me—oh!” she cried as Berenice once again spread the thick juices, smeared them onto her thighs and between the cheeks of her behind, and expelled her hot breath on the inflamed, liquid parts. When Clarissa was quite incoherent, Berenice selected her third and final weapon: a long, flexible, yellow cane. Before beginning, she administered more brandy and a few sharp tugs on the grinning dragons. Thus far, she had inflicted moderate pain and reddened the skin until it was warm and slightly swollen to the touch, but she had not bruised it. She was not in the habit of marking Clarissa, preferring her skin smooth and unblemished.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  The Rhodians, seeing this, cast down their arms and all as with one voice confessed themselves prisoners; whereupon quoth Cimon to them, 'Young men, it was neither lust of rapine nor hate that I had against you made me depart Cyprus to assail you, arms in hand, in mid sea. That which moved me thereunto was the desire of a thing which to have gotten is a very grave matter to me and to you a very light one to yield me in peace; it is, to wit, Iphigenia, whom I loved over all else and whom, availing not to have of her father on friendly and peaceful wise, Love hath constrained me to win from you as an enemy and by force of arms. Wherefor I mean to be to her that which your friend Pasimondas should have been. Give her to me, then, and begone and God's grace go with you.' The Rhodians, more by force constrained than of freewill, surrendered Iphigenia, weeping, to Cimon, who, seeing her in tears, said to her, 'Noble Lady, be not disconsolate; I am thy Cimon, who by long love have far better deserved to have thee than Pasimondas by plighted faith.' Thereupon he caused carry her aboard his own ship and returning to his companions, let the Rhodians go, without touching aught else of theirs. Then, glad beyond any man alive to have gotten so dear a prey, after devoting some time to comforting the weeping lady, he took counsel with his comrades not to return to Cyprus at that present; wherefore, of one accord, they turned the ship's head towards Crete, where well nigh every one, and especially Cimon, had kinsfolk, old and new, and friends in plenty and where they doubted not to be in safety with Iphigenia. But fortune the unstable, which had cheerfully enough vouchsafed unto Cimon the acquisition of the lady, suddenly changed the inexpressible joyance of the enamoured youth into sad and bitter mourning; for it was not four full told hours since he had left the Rhodians when the night (which Cimon looked to be more delightsome than any he had ever known) came on and with it a very troublous and tempestuous shift of weather, which filled all the sky with clouds and the sea with ravening winds, by reason whereof none could see what to do or whither to steer, nor could any even keep the deck to do any office.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  Accordingly, that he might see on what wise and in what habit the king went, whenas he visited her, he hid himself several times by night in a great saloon of the palace, which lay between the king's bedchamber and that of the queen, and one night, amongst others, he saw the king come forth of his chamber, wrapped in a great mantle, with a lighted taper in one hand and a little wand in the other, and making for the queen's chamber, strike once or twice upon the door with the wand, without saying aught, whereupon it was incontinent opened to him and the taper taken from his hand. Noting this and having seen the king return after the same fashion, he bethought himself to do likewise. Accordingly, finding means to have a cloak like that which he had seen the king wear, together with a taper and a wand, and having first well washed himself in a bagnio, lest haply the smell of the muck should offend the queen or cause her smoke the cheat, he hid himself in the great saloon, as of wont. Whenas he knew that all were asleep and it seemed to him time either to give effect to his desire or to make his way by high emprise[157] to the wished-for death, he struck a light with a flint and steel he had brought with him and kindling the taper, wrapped himself fast in the mantle, then, going up to the chamber-door, smote twice upon it with the wand. The door was opened by a bedchamber-woman, all sleepy-eyed, who took the light and covered it; whereupon, without saying aught, he passed within the curtain, put off his mantle and entered the bed where the queen slept. Then, taking her desirefully in his arms and feigning himself troubled (for that he knew the king's wont to be that, whenas he was troubled, he cared not to hear aught), without speaking or being spoken to, he several times carnally knew the queen; after which, grievous as it seemed to him to depart, yet, fearing lest his too long stay should be the occasion of turning the gotten delight into dolour, he arose and taking up the mantle and the light, withdrew, without word said, and returned, as quickliest he might, to his own bed. He could scarce yet have been therein when the king arose and repaired to the queen's chamber, whereat she marvelled exceedingly; and as he entered the bed and greeted her blithely, she took courage by his cheerfulness and said, 'O my lord, what new fashion is this of to-night? You left me but now, after having taken pleasure of me beyond your wont, and do you return so soon?

• From Macho Sluts (1988)

  Clarissa coveted the welts on Elise’s body and often reproached Berenice for withholding them. Tonight, she informed her young charge, she would leave her with visible tokens of the whipping. “I have to give you enough to last six months. Remember that, if you think you’ve had enough. Six long, lonely months.” Though she seriously doubted Clarissa would go without comfort, company, or chastisement at this particular school. Sternly, she repressed a pang of jealousy. She had kept Clarissa all to herself for years. The love between them was genuine, but might not survive her adolescence. Even this sweet submission might fade and something hostile, domineering, or indifferent grow up in its place. Clarissa was waiting patiently for her to resume talking or begin the caning. Berenice collected herself, and returned to the task at hand. She must think of nothing else. No scattered concentration could be allowed to make her hand waver. “The marks will move up your legs from the back of the knee to the top of your hips. They will be evenly space and parallel to each other. You will not move.” Berenice’s voice was calm and deadly. Clarissa froze. Training exercises performed in previous sessions had convinced her that, when explicitly ordered not to move, she had best not stir even one-eighth of an inch. A few seconds to allow tension to build, to gather and slow her breathing, to take the most careful aim—then—swick! swick! swick! Each stripe was awful. Berenice alternated sides so that each thigh would match. She paused before marking Clarissa’s behind, to give them both a chance to take courage. Then she struck out like a tigress and left her with a perfect row of weals from the tender roll of baby fat just beneath the buttock to the thin, tightly stretched skin at the tip of her tailbone. Clarissa babbled pleas for forgiveness and release. Berenice fingered her lightly, evoking a painful moan. She repeated her caress, more insistently, and Clarissa’s whole body begged for more. “Please go into me,” Clarissa cried. “Take my maidenhead. I don’t want to give it to anyone else but you, Mother. Elise says she loves having you inside her, more than anything. I can’t stand it when you won’t give me what you give her. Please! Please!” Berenice frowned. “You’re jealous,” she said. “I find that very unattractive. Do you think you can coerce me into anything? Hmm?” She tickled her pudenda, applied light pressure over her hymen, but would not enter. Then she returned to Clarissa’s pink pearl and took her to the brink of orgasm. “Apologize,” she said through gritted teeth. “And you’d better make me believe it, or I’ll deny you satisfaction and send you to school in a chastity belt!”

• From The Incendiaries (2018)

  Guests blew in from the street, wind-spun, gasping for alcohol. They ate, paid, and left, fast, letting the tables go. It worked to my benefit, but I didn’t understand people who finished, then rushed out. If I’d paid to eat at a restaurant like Michelangelo’s, I’d dawdle. I’d sip a tall limoncello, let waiters refill the glass. I was about to drop a five-top’s check when the pinstriped man in my section’s last open table stopped me. His wife had questions about the veal chop. Of course, I said. The kitchen had run low on the dish, a point I emphasized. If he wished to have it, I should put in the order as soon as possible. Instead, he elicited details about the preparation while his wife flipped through the wine list, silk dress pleats glinting. I’d have liked to watch how light played on the gas-blue of the dress. The left dress strap pulled taut across the dip of the woman’s collarbone like a bridge traversing a ravine, and one could imagine following its arched, liquid line, sliding a hand back, down until the first swell of buttocks—but I had a job to do. I kept my attention on the man as I answered his questions. If I say I want it rare, is that something your chef will give me? he asked. Yes, sir, he— I can’t eat veal that isn’t rare. You’ll hear it bleat. With that, he smiled. I took down his orders, but once I made a trip to the kitchen, I had to return to apologize. Someone else had claimed the last available chop. Is that right? he said. Extending a lightly muscled arm across the table, in a gesture more languid than alarmed, his wife moved a painted fingertip along the top of his hand, from the wrist to his third knuckle joint. He inhaled. I want to talk to Paul, he said, lowering his voice. He’s a friend of mine. Go tell Paul that Miles Harris says hello. He’ll recognize the name. I’m sorry, sir, but Mr. Conti isn’t here. I thought I saw him. Is he gone for the night? You should tell him that putting an item on his menu, then not having it—it’s false advertising, which isn’t legal. I nodded. I let him talk. Paul was downstairs, in his office. If this man had been his friend, I’d have known it by now. When I could, I apologized again. I offered cocktails, gratis; I mentioned the suckling-pig ravioli, the Michelin critic who’d extolled Michelangelo’s poached quail. I convinced him to substitute the quail for veal, but when I brought him the martinis he sent them back. I fetched a second round; he told me to wait. His round lips parted for the rill of clear liquid. He took more sips. The drink’s fine, he said, but I’ll switch waiters.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  The damsel, being thus fully informed both of his name and parentage, thereby with subtle craft laid her plans for giving effect to her desire and returning home, set the old woman awork for the rest of the day, so she might not avail to return to Andreuccio. Then, calling a maid of hers, whom she had right well lessoned unto such offices, she despatched her, towards evensong, to the inn where Andreuccio lodged. As chance would have it, she found him alone at the door and enquired at him of himself. He answered that he was the man she sought, whereupon she drew him aside and said to him, 'Sir, an it please you, a gentlewoman of this city would fain speak with you.' Andreuccio, hearing this, considered himself from head to foot and himseeming he was a handsome varlet of his person, he concluded (as if there were no other well-looking young fellow to be found in Naples,) that the lady in question must have fallen in love with him. Accordingly, he answered without further deliberation that he was ready and asked the girl when and where the lady would speak with him; whereto she answered, 'Sir, whenas it pleaseth you to come, she awaiteth you in her house'; and Andreuccio forthwith rejoined, without saying aught to the people of the inn, 'Go thou on before; I will come after thee.' Thereupon the girl carried him to the house of her mistress, who dwelt in a street called Malpertugio,[96] the very name whereof denoteth how reputable a quarter it is. But he, unknowing neither suspecting aught thereof and thinking to go to most honourable place and to a lady of quality, entered the house without hesitation,--preceded by the serving-maid, who called her mistress and said, 'Here is Andreuccio,'--and mounting the stair, saw the damsel come to the stairhead to receive him. Now she was yet in the prime of youth, tall of person, with a very fair face and very handsomely dressed and adorned. As he drew near her, she came down three steps to meet him with open arms and clasping him round the neck, abode awhile without speaking, as if hindered by excess of tenderness; then kissed him on the forehead, weeping, and said, in a somewhat broken voice, 'O my Andreuccio, thou art indeed welcome.' [Footnote 96: _i.e._ ill hole.]

• From The Decameron (1353)

  Accordingly, she came ofttimes to Rustico and said to him, 'Father mine, I came here to serve God and not to abide idle; let us go put the devil in hell.' Which doing, she said whiles, 'Rustico, I know not why the devil fleeth away from hell; for, an he abode there as willingly as hell receiveth him and holdeth him, he would never come forth therefrom.' The girl, then, on this wise often inviting Rustico and exhorting him to the service of God, so took the bombast out of his doublet that he felt cold what time another had sweated; wherefore he fell to telling her that the devil was not to be chastised nor put into hell, save whenas he should lift up his head for pride; 'and we,' added he, 'by God's grace, have so baffled him that he prayeth our Lord to suffer him abide in peace;' and on this wise he for awhile imposed silence on her. However, when she saw that he required her not of putting the devil in hell, she said to him one day, 'Rustico, an thy devil be chastened and give thee no more annoy, my hell letteth me not be; wherefore thou wilt do well to aid me with thy devil in abating the raging of my hell, even as with my hell I have helped thee take the conceit out of thy devil.' Rustico, who lived on roots and water, could ill avail to answer her calls and told her that it would need overmany devils to appease hell, but he would do what he might thereof. Accordingly he satisfied her bytimes, but so seldom it was but casting a bean into the lion's mouth; whereas the girl, herseeming she served not God as diligently as she would fain have done, murmured somewhat. But, whilst this debate was toward between Rustico his devil and Alibech her hell, for overmuch desire on the one part and lack of power on the other, it befell that a fire broke out in Capsa and burnt Alibech's father in his own house, with as many children and other family as he had; by reason whereof she abode heir to all his good. Thereupon, a young man called Neerbale, who had spent all his substance in gallantry, hearing that she was alive, set out in search of her and finding her, before the court[204] had laid hands upon her father's estate, as that of a man dying without heir, to Rustico's great satisfaction, but against her own will, brought her back to Capsa, where he took her to wife and succeeded, in her right, to the ample inheritance of her father. [Footnote 204: _i.e._ the government (_corte_).]

• From The Decameron (1353)

  Now he knew very well who the wench was, for that he had seen her come and moreover Filippo had told him. Accordingly, Calandrino having left work awhile and gone to get a sight of her, Bruno told Nello and Buffalmacco everything and they took order together in secret what they should do with him in the matter of this his enamourment. When he came back, Bruno said to him softly, 'Hast seen her?' 'Alack, yes,' replied Calandrino; 'she hath slain me.' Quoth Bruno, 'I must go see an it be she I suppose; and if it be so, leave me do.' Accordingly, he went down into the courtyard and finding Filippo and Niccolosa there, told them precisely what manner of man Calandrino was and took order with them of that which each of them should do and say, so they might divert themselves with the lovesick gull and make merry over his passion. Then, returning to Calandrino, he said, 'It is indeed she; wherefore needs must the thing be very discreetly managed, for, should Filippo get wind of it, all the water in the Arno would not wash us. But what wouldst thou have me say to her on thy part, if I should chance to get speech of her?' 'Faith,' answered Calandrino, 'thou shalt tell her, to begin with, that I will her a thousand measures of that good stuff that getteth with child, and after, that I am her servant and if she would have aught.... Thou takest me?' 'Ay,' said Bruno, 'leave me do.'

• From Macho Sluts (1988)

  Alex gave her a look. “I know you have to be brave for the both of us,” she said humbly. “I tell you I can take anything before it actually happens. I’m afraid of pain, so I struggle and call you bad names, and I lie. But I gave tonight everything I had, and I really do want to be your best girl. You’re always asking me to trust you, Alex. When I wear your rings, will you finally trust me?” Alex caressed her head, and took her gently by the hair. “You’re wonderful. And it’s been beautiful to watch you. I thought my heart would be ripped in two when I heard you scream, and knew it was somebody else who was making you suffer. But I’ve watched these women discover abilities that I didn’t know you had.” Roxanne shivered. “I wonder if I could really love any woman who held my leash and threatened to whip me.” “Well, at least we know you honestly do love to be abused,” Alex said. “You’re lucky you have somebody who will dish it out with a careful hand. Why do you think I want you pierced? I can’t run the risk of you forgetting me or trying to replace me. I want you wearing something that will prevent that. I meant it when I said I’m never going to let you go, Roxanne. But ownership enforced with a collar and a crop can be broken or mislaid. Even the marks you have now will heal and disappear. But these piercings are permanent.” “Oh … ” It was a whimper of sexual excitement. Roxanne’s hand strayed between her legs, and Alex laughed at her. She began to move spasmodically, crying again, begging subvocally for help and reassurance. “Rings,” Alex teased. “I am going to put my rings in your flesh. To see every time you dress and undress, to feel every time I put my hand on you. My rings.” Roxanne shuddered as if in the throes of orgasm, then ceased caressing herself. Alex held up a long, thick needle. “The points I’ll actually use are in the sterilizer,” she said. “But this is what they look like.” She gave it to her to play with. Roxanne examined it carefully, trying to find some acceptance or desire for it in her heart. She wanted the rings, lusted after them, but the needle appalled her. “Where will you pierce me?” she asked, trying to be calm. “Wherever I like.” Roxanne gave the needle back and folded up at Alex’s feet again, trying to hide within her own arms. She had a perverse desire to fall asleep. Alex stood up and stepped behind the bar. She and Tyre scrubbed together in the sink there, lathering themselves up past the elbow with antiseptic soap. “Think we’re sterile?” Alex asked Tyre. “We’re all girls. I don’t think anybody’s going to get pregnant,” she replied.

• From Macho Sluts (1988)

  She felt a willful desire to crack that mask, to warm that face and bring it to life, to make Kay respond and react to her. Instead, she found herself responding, moving frantically, shamelessly, crying out. “Stop it,” EZ scolded her. “Quit showing off.” Stunned, she complied. Her shame was intensified by the fact that Kay never noted the rebuke or her response. What looked like indifference was actually concentration. Every bit of Kay’s attention was in her fingertips, which combed the sides, the floor and ceiling of Roxanne’s ass, looking for the nerves, the joyspots, the loose thread she could pull to unravel Roxanne down to her core. Little messages ran constantly up those busy, delicately searching fingers, through forearm and bicep, to the shoulder, jogging it, keeping up a minute series of rhythmic movements designed to coax the asshole, the mouth of the great snake, to unlock its jaws and swallow its meal, Kay’s folded-over, pointed, pared-down and slicked up hand. Two fingers, then three, sank into Roxanne’s ass. She barely noticed. She was humming along a smooth road. This was so easy, there was so little friction that it barley qualified as fucking. Nevertheless, there was pleasure, enough to turn her into a squirmy little girl, so bad and dirty that she wanted people to bend her over, pull down her panties, put things up her ass, move them in and out, make her tell them how much she liked it and squeal for more. Then EZ made the mistake of interrupting all the stories she was telling herself about what a naughty, provocative, kinky slut she was and told her how many fingers Kay had in her. She jerked involuntarily. The squirmy feeling went away. Immediately, she tried to correct it—took slow, deep breaths; gathered her resources; willed herself to accept, open, opening, getting back on that seamless streamlined highway to lust. “She’s tightening up,” Kay said dispassionately. It might have been a weather report. EZ’s hand—gloved in thin black kid—gripped Roxanne’s face, covered her mouth and nose. She drew in a startled breath, and realized from the potent smell that EZ held an inhaler of poppers in her palm. The amyl came on slowly, then exploded. She was flying, falling, rushing—rushing! Her mouth fell open, her limbs went slack, and she felt four of Kay’s fingers spread and claim her. Penetration was exquisite pleasure. Under the magical assault of the poppers, she felt no need to lift her littlest finger. Since she could not act, she could yield herself totally, pinned to the sling by her internal sensations. She need not cooperate with or assist the implacable beings manipulating her flesh. EZ was laughing at her. “Wild, isn’t it?” she said. “What d’you think we could do if we were all too fucking stoned to worry?” The idea seemed to be a profound insight, and she let the anxious part of her mind play with it like a difficult knot.