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 The Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica Volume 10 (2011)

  new heat spreading along the crotch of the briefs. Could girls get morning boners? Touch me. This was getting even weirder. Could underwear talk? Go ahead, put your finger inside. Although she wasn’t usually in the habit of taking advice from Bobby’s underwear — or anyone else’s — Zoe decided it was too early for arguments. Obediently, she snaked her finger under the flap and burrowed through the second opening to greet her clit, already standing at attention. Suddenly she wasn’t so cold any more. Knees bent, pelvis tilted forward, she began to strum. The briefs strained against her buttocks, like hands gripping her there. It felt naughty, but exciting, too, to play with herself like some perverted voyeur while she watched Bobby sleep. He was avery appealing sight. His bare shoulder still had a coppery sheen even in the pewter light of dawn. She loved his skin. To her it tasted of cinnamon, cumin and cloves. Like his gorgeous black ringlets, it was the happy legacy of his adventuring grandfather, a Liberian chieftain’s son who stowed away on a steamer bound for New York. S' b oxi Just then Bobby moaned and shifted, one arm shooting out to embrace the emptiness where Zoe had been sleeping. She jerked her hand from his underpants. The cold pang of guilt in her stomach reminded her that she really did have to pee. More awake now, she could easily spot her own jeans, bra and blouse in the pile. But that was what she wore on ordinary days. Her pulse racing, she pulled on Bobby’s sweatshirt and wiggled into his jeans instead. Suddenly the smell of him was all around her, Mediterranean spices and sweat. She could feel the ghost of his body, too, in the looseness of the waistband, the tightness at the hips, the pooling of the denim at her ankles. It wasn’t a perfect fit, of course, but it was good enough for a trip to the john. Stepping into her own shoes — that little glitch in the outfit couldn’t be helped — Zoe moved quietly to the door. On the way out she lifted his baseball cap from the dresser and slipped it on her head, brim backwards, the way Bobby wore it. She shivered and blinked in the harsh light of the stairwell, but by the next floor, she’d found her rhythm, taking two stairs at time. Bobby’s clothes were warm now, melting into her skin. Even her flesh and bones felt different, lighter and infinitely at ease, as if the 54 Donna George Storey

• From My Life and Loves, Vol. 1 (of 4) (1922)

  “It’ll hurt you at first, Sophy, I’m afraid”; but she stilled all scruples with “Shucks, I don’t care: if I gives you pleasure, I’se satisfied” and she opened her legs, stretching herself as I got on her. The next moment my sex was caressing her clitoris and of herself she drew up her knees and suddenly with one movement brought my sex into hers and against the maiden barrier. Sophy had no hesitation: she moved her body lithely against me and the next moment I had forced the passage and was in her. I waited a little while and then began the love-game. At once Sophy followed my movements, lifting her sex up to me as I pushed in and depressing it to hold me as I withdrew. Even when I quickened, she kept time and so gave me the most intense pleasure, thrill on thrill, and as I came and my seed spirted into her, the muscle inside her vagina gripped my sex, heightening the sensation to an acute pang; she even kissed me more passionately than any other girl, licking the inside of my lips with her hot tongue. When I went on again with the slow in-and-out movements, she followed in perfect time and her trick of bending her sex down on mine as I withdrew and gripping it at the same time excited me madly: soon, of her own accord, she quickened while gripping and thrilling me till again we both spent together in an ecstasy. “You’re a perfect wonder!” I cried to her then, panting in my turn, “but how did you learn so quickly?” “I loves you”, she said, “so I do whatever I think you’d like and then I likes that too, see?” And her lovely face glowed against mine. I got up to show her the use of the syringe and found we were in a bath of blood. In a moment she had stripped the sheet off: “I’ll wash that in the morning” she said laughing while doubling it into a ball and throwing it in the corner. I turned the gas on full: never was there a more seductive figure. Her skin was darkish, it is true; but not darker than that of an ordinary Italian or Spanish girl, and her form had a curious attraction for me: her breasts, small and firm as elastic, stood out provocatively; her hips, however, were narrower than even Lily’s though the cheeks of her bottom were full; her legs too were well-rounded, not a trace of the sticks of the negro; her feet even were slender and high-arched. “You are the loveliest girl I’ve ever seen!” I cried as I helped to put in the syringe and wash her sex. “You’re mah man!” she said proudly, “an’ I want to show you that I can love better than any white trash; they only gives themselves airs!”

• From My Life and Loves, Vol. 1 (of 4) (1922)

  But even that meeting with Smith, wherein I reached the topmost height of golden hours, was set off, so to speak, by another happening of this wonder-week. At the next table to me in the dining-room I had already remarked once or twice a little, middle-aged, weary looking man who often began his breakfast with a glass of boiling water and followed it up with a baked apple drowned in rich cream. Brains, too, or sweetbreads he would eat for dinner and rice, not potatoes: when I looked surprise, he told me he had been up all night and had a weak digestion, Mayhew, he said, was his name and explained that if I ever wanted a game of faro or euchre or indeed anything else, he’d oblige me. I smiled; I could ride and shoot, I replied; but I was no good at cards. The day after my talk with Smith, Mayhew and I were both late for supper: I sat long over a good meal and as he rose, he asked me if I would come across the street and see his “lay-out!” I went willingly enough, having nothing to do. The gambling saloon was on the first floor of a building nearly opposite the Eldridge House: the place was well-kept and neat, thanks to a colored bar-tender and colored waiter and a nigger of all work. The long room too was comfortably furnished and very brightly lit—altogether an attractive place. As luck would have it, while he was showing me round, a lady came in; Mayhew after a word or two introduced me to her as his wife: Mrs. Mayhew was then a woman of perhaps twenty-eight or thirty, with tall, lissom slight figure and interesting rather than pretty face: her features were all good, her eyes even were large and blue-gray: she would have been lovely if her coloring had been more pronounced: give her golden hair or red or black and she would have been a beauty: she was always tastefully dressed and had appealing, ingratiating manners. I soon found that she loved books and reading and as Mayhew said he was going to be busy, I asked if I might see her home. She consented smiling and away we went. She lived in a pretty frame house standing alone in a street that ran parallel to Massachusetts Street, nearly opposite to a large and ugly church. As she went up the steps to the door, I noticed that she had fine, neat ankles and I divined shapely limbs. While she was taking off her light cloak and hat, the lifting of her arms stretched her bodice and showed small round breasts: already my blood was lava and my mouth parched with desire.

• From The Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica Volume 10 (2011)

  “Sure.” She smiled. “Good. You will want to undress completely. We want all the costumes to look authentic. Are you ready?” “What should I wear first?” she asked as she started toward the screen. Her head spun a little with the wine and the heat that had collected between her legs. “Any of the costumes you wish.” Behind the screen, she dropped the robe and her nipples stiffened instantly. She examined the costumes and picked one with a short red jacket and a pair of ballooning ebon pants. She grinned as her hands unfastened her skirt and dropped it beside the robe, unsnapped the garter as if she broke chains, and rolled the stockings down her shapely legs. She felt them on the other side of the screen, six men, all waiting for her. She slid her soaked white panties down her legs. All through the morning while the men had been shooting her she’d watched them and felt their desire, saw their erections — some more than others. She knew what men had between their legs — she had seen statues and paintings — but this was different. Statues and paintings were tastefully flaccid, not stiff enough to snap a photo. As she posed for these men, they had all grown hard watching her, wanting her, just as she needed them to see her and to want her. Never, even in her imagination, had anything felt so good, so purely ecstatic. She peeled away the wet panties and reveled for a moment in anticipation of their worship, and then she pulled on the harem pants and slipped on the halter that might as well have been made of spun glass. When she stepped in front of them, the wine’s heat spread all through her legs and up her spine. Pleasure she had known in dreams and a few times when she had touched herself, manifested magically before them, before the wide eyes of lenses. They posed her on the divan, chastely at first, but then more wanton, sprawled in opiate abandon, her jacket open and then gone altogether. “Change,” Mr Bentley commanded and she obeyed, wearing a bra made of golden chains and a belt and breechcloth that barely covered _her pleasure. When she took off the bra and only a scrap of silk covered her, Doug Spencer’s pants looked like they might split open. Charlie wore a costume too, a harem guard, they said, and he looked good in what there was of it. He posed with her, his stomach 484 Angela Caperton and chest bare and hard with muscles. Mostly he posed behind her, but sometimes he stood over her while she sat at his feet. Every time he touched her, she thought she might come.

• From The Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica Volume 10 (2011)

  Smell is the sense tied mostrclosely to human memory. So when I sense any use of potassium chlotate, a white, crystalline compound well-stocked in science laboratories and often used for combustion, I remember how it felt to have the fire of orgasm sizzle its way through my body and melt a liquid path down my legs. The chemical’s odor singes my nostrils and flashes me back to the feel of a chilly, marble countertop pressed against my back, to the press of fingers digging into my supple thighs, to the slick pressure of rounded glass slipping in and out. And it’s what I remember most about him. Most scientists that ve met fit the typical stereotypes. Most would rather analyse your genes than pry off your jeans. Yet I suspected that Michael Harrison was capable of much more than shedding me of my pants. With wavy black hair, broad shoulders and Clark Kent glasses, I believed that stripped of his unassuming attire, he would have something surprising and heroically powerful bulging underneath. I understood this the first time I shook his hand and caught the scent of chemicals trapped in his clothes and seared into his skin, a smell faint and tangy and far too interesting to be cologne. Like the smell of your body after a lengthy swim in a freshly chlorinated pool. I imagined that if I should run my tongue along his perky nipples, my tongue would sizzle as though touched to the tip of a battery. 120 Velvet Moore We needed a scientist to impress the hospital donors with a tour of the lab. I planned to find an excuse to use him. I spent the following week visiting the lab to get a sense of his work. His area of interest was biochemistry and I was certainly interested in his chemistry. I came to notice how his hands flexed tightly, fighting against the latex gloves each time he cupped a beaker full of liquid. I watched as he gradually pushed the tip of the lengthy pipette into the stickiness of the gel and ejected its contents. I'd secretly graze my hand across my chest as he pinched and lifted the bell jar by its perky, nipple-like top and used the glassware to create a vacuum. He stood beside me as an orator while his lab staff performed an experiment in front of eager donors. “Molten potassium chlorate is a strong oxidizing agent that reacts violently with sugar,” he explained. A lab student added a plump, red Gummi Bear to the white liquid bubbling in a test tube over an open flame. In an instant, the candy ignited, sparking and steaming with the power of an electrical fire and screaming like a train whistle. The sudden pop of energy startled me and I jumped in reaction as though I had been smacked sharply across the ass with a ruler.

• From My Life and Loves, Vol. 1 (of 4) (1922)

  For the first time in my life I notice here that the writer’s art is not only inferior to reality in keenness of sensation and emotion; but also more same, monotonous even, because incapable of showing the tiny, yet ineffable differences of the same feeling which difference of personality brings with it. I seem to be repeating myself in describing Kate’s love after Mrs. Mayhew’s, making the girl’s feelings a fainter replica of the woman’s. In reality the two were completely different. Mrs. Mayhew’s feelings long repressed flamed with the heat of an afternoon in July or August; while in Kate’s one felt the freshness and cool of a summer morning, shot through with the suggestion of heat to come. And this comparison even is inept because it leaves out of the account, the effect of Kate’s beauty, the great hazel eyes, the rosied skin, the superb figure. Besides there was a glamour of the spirit about Kate: Lorna Mayhew would never give me a new note that didn’t spring from passion; in Kate I felt a spiritual personality and the thrill of undeveloped possibilities. And still using my utmost skill, I haven’t shown my reader the enormous superiority of the girl and her more unselfish love. But I haven’t finished yet. Smith had given me “The Mill on the Floss” to read; I had never tried George Eliot before and I found that this book almost deserved Smith’s praise. I had read till about one o’clock when my heart heard her; or was it some thrill of expectance? The next moment my door opened and she came in with the mane of hair about her shoulders and a long dressing gown reaching to her stockinged feet. I got up like a flash; but she had already closed the door and bolted it; I drew her to the bed and stopped her from throwing off the dressing-gown: “let me take off your stockings first”, I whispered, “I want you all imprinted on me!” The next moment, she stood there naked, the flickering flame of the candle throwing quaint arabesques of light and shade on her beautiful ivory body: I gazed and gazed: from the navel down she was perfect; I turned her round and the back too, the bottom even was faultless though large; but alas! the breasts were far too big for beauty, too soft to excite! I must think only of the bold curve of her hips, I reflected, the splendor of the firm thighs, the flesh of which had the hard outline of marble and her—sex? I put her on the bed and opened her thighs: her pussy was ideally perfect. At once I wanted to get into her; but she pleaded: “please, dear, come into bed: I’m cold and want you.” So in I got and began kissing her.

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  That night he drove her to his tiny apartment in Cleo, which turned out to be a ramshackle 1931 Model-A roadster. The convertible top was down in the middle of March and the heater didn’t work. Not wanting to seem old and fussy, she didn’t say a thing. Nor did it matter to her that his room was that of a messy boy. He played the guitar for her and then his viola. Full of assurance, he leapt up and pushed her down on the lumpy mattress, his kisses strong and skillful, the caresses of a musician, electric; his hands on her backside kneading in a frenzy that awakened her nerves. Fire and nerves and rhythm building to an assured crescendo. There was, she realized with joy, nothing passive about Rupert’s desire for her. After he drove her home in Cleo, she slipped undetected into bed with Hugo and lay awake, drunk from her passion with Rupert. Until dawn, she auditioned possible stories to tell Hugo so that she could run away in three weeks with her exuberant, young lover. At breakfast she said casually to Hugo, “You know my friend Thurema Sokol?” “The harpist.” “She’s giving a concert in Los Angeles but she’s afraid of flying. She asked me to keep her company on her drive across the country to California.” Hugo objected about the money the trip would cost, as she knew he would, but in the end he handed her a stack of bills, insisting that she pay her share of gas and lodging. She threw her arms around his neck and thanked him as a jagged stab of guilt pierced her. With her guilt came worries: What if Hugo ran into Thurema? What if Rupert didn’t show up on their set departure date? What if she got sick from exhaustion on the long drive? Her age would show and scare Rupert away. She handled her anxiety by keeping busy. She packed and re-packed her suitcase, hiding it with her diaries in the secret closet she’d had a carpenter install in the apartment without Hugo’s knowledge. The morning Rupert was to pick her up at 8:30 a.m., Hugo dawdled over breakfast. “I can be a little late to the office this morning.” He gave her a reptilian smile. “I’ll wait for Thurema and see you both off.” “Oh, you’d better not. Thurema said she might be late.” Anaïs jumped up and dialed the phone. Turning her back, unseen by Hugo, she disconnected the call. “Oh Thurema, how are you coming?” she said into the dead receiver. “No, that’s okay. Eleven would be fine. Hugo wanted to see you, but I’ll explain.” Putting down the receiver, she put her arms around Hugo. “I’m sorry, darling. You better get going.” She fussed over him, buttoning his coat, repeating how much she would miss him. It was 8:25. If he were coming, Rupert would be there in five minutes. What if Hugo were still in the apartment?

• From The Decameron (1353)

  ‘Sir,’ replied the lady, ‘as you know, I have two younger brothers, who bring their friends to the house at all hours of the day and night, and since my house is not very big, it would be quite impossible for us to meet there unless we were to remain completely silent, like deaf-mutes, without saying a word, and move about in the dark, as though we were blind. In this case, it would be feasible, for my brothers never invade my bedroom; but their own is immediately next to mine, and one can’t even whisper without being heard.’ ‘That’s no great problem,’ said the Provost. ‘Let’s do as you suggest for a night or two, until I can think of a place where we can meet more freely.’ ‘I leave that to you, sir,’ said the lady, ‘but on one thing I must insist: that the affair remains a secret, and you never breathe a word of it to anyone.’ ‘Of that you may rest assured, madam,’ replied the Provost. ‘But when are we to meet? Can you arrange it for tonight?’ ‘Why, of course,’ said the lady. And having explained to him how and when he was to come, she took her leave of him and returned home. Now, this lady had a maidservant, who was none too young and had the ugliest and most misshapen face you ever saw. She had a huge, flat nose, a wry mouth, thick lips, big teeth, which were unevenly set, and a pronounced squint; moreover she was always having trouble with her eyes, and her complexion was a sort of yellowy green, so that she looked as though she had spent the summer, not in Fiesole, but in Senigallia.3 Apart from this, she was hipshot on the right side, and walked with a slight limp. Her name was Ciuta, but because she was so ugly to look at, everyone called her Ciutazza.4 And although her body was so misshapen, she was always prepared for a spot of mischief. So the lady sent for her and said: ‘Ciutazza, if you will do something for me tonight, I shall give you a fine new smock.’ At the mention of a smock, Ciutazza pricked up her ears and said: ‘If you give me a smock, ma’am, I’ll go through fire for you.’ ‘That’s good,’ said the lady. ‘Now, what I want you to do is to sleep with a man tonight in my bed, and ply him with caresses. But you must take care not to utter a single word in case my brothers should hear you, for as you know, they sleep in the room next to mine. And tomorrow you shall have the new smock.’ ‘If need be,’ said Ciutazza, ‘I would sleep with half-a-dozen men, let alone one.’

• From The Decameron (1353)

  From time to time, by recounting other tales of a similar kind, Bruno added further fuel to the flames of the physician’s longings, until, very late one evening, when Bruno was busy painting the battle between the cats and the mice by the light of a lantern being held aloft by Master Simone, the physician decided that Bruno was by now sufficiently in his debt for him to bring his feelings into the open. And since they were alone in the house, he said: ‘As God is my witness, Bruno, there isn’t anyone on earth for whom I would do all the things I would do for you. Why, even if you were to ask me to go all the way from here to Peretola,11 I almost believe I would do it. So I trust you will not take it amiss if I speak to you now as an intimate friend, and ask you a favour in strict confidence. As you know, you spoke to me not long ago about the doings of your merry company, and ever since that day, I’ve been positively dying to attend your meetings. I have good reason for wanting to come, as you’ll see for yourself if I should happen to be invited, for I assure you here and now that if I don’t get those magicians of yours to fetch the comeliest serving wench you’ve seen for many a long day, I deserve to be taken for an idiot. I fell passionately in love with the girl from the moment I clapped eyes on her, last year in Cacavincigli,12 and I swear to God that I offered her ten Bolognese groats, but she turned them down. So I implore you, from the bottom of my heart, to tell me what I have to do to become a member, and I beg you to use all your power and influence to bring it about, for I can assure you that you could never have a better or more loyal comrade, nor one who would bring you greater credit. I don’t suppose, for instance, that any of your members is a doctor of medicine, and you can see for yourself what a handsome fellow I am, with a fine pair of shanks and a face like a rose. Besides, I know lots of good stories and some excellent songs. Would you like to hear one?’ And without waiting for an answer, he burst into song. Bruno was so amused by all this that he had a job to keep a straight face; and when the song was finished, the Master said: ‘Well, Bruno, what do you think of that?’ ‘It’s fantastic,’ said Bruno. ‘With a cacophonous voice like that, you could charm the vultures out of the trees.’ ‘If you hadn’t heard it with your own ears,’ said the Master, ‘you wouldn’t have believed it possible, would you?’ ‘I certainly wouldn’t,’ said Bruno.

• From The Decameron (1353)

  And one day, around noon, having emerged from the bedroom in a flimsy white shift, her hair tied up in a bun, she happened to be washing her hands and face at a well in the courtyard when Calandrino came to the well for some water. He gave her a friendly greeting, which she acknowledged, then she began to stare at him, not because she found him the least bit attractive, but because she was fascinated by his odd appearance. Calandrino returned her gaze, and on seeing how beautiful she was, began to think of various excuses for not returning with the water to his companions. However, not knowing who she was, he was afraid to address her, and the girl, perceiving that he was still staring at her, mischievously rolled her eyes at him a couple of times and fetched a few little sighs, so that Calandrino instantly fell in love with her and stood rooted to the spot till she was called inside by Filippo. On returning to his work, Calandrino did nothing but heave one huge sigh after another; and Bruno, who always kept an eye on him because he found him so entertaining, noticed this and said: ‘What the devil’s the matter, comrade Calandrino? You do nothing but sigh the whole time.’ ‘Comrade,’ said Calandrino, ‘if only I had someone to help me, I could be the happiest man alive.’ ‘What do you mean?’ said Bruno. ‘Don’t tell a soul,’ said Calandrino, ‘but there’s a girl down there who’s lovelier than a nymph, and she’s so much in love with me that you’d be astonished. I came across her just now when I went to fetch the water.’ ‘Good heavens!’ said Bruno. ‘You’d better be careful, in case it’s Filippo’s wife.’ ‘That’s exactly who I think she is,’ said Calandrino, ‘for he called to her from the bedroom, and she went in to him. But anyway, what does it matter? For a girl like that, I’d slip one over on Jesus Christ, let alone Filippo. The truth is, comrade, that I’m so wild about her that I can’t begin to tell you how I feel.’ Then Bruno said: ‘I’ll make one or two inquiries for you, comrade, and find out who she is. If she turns out to be Filippo’s wife, I’ll fix things up for you in a trice, because she happens to be a very close friend of mine. But how are we to prevent Buffalmacco from finding out? I never get a chance to speak to her except when he is with me.’ ‘I’m not worried about Buffalmacco,’ said Calandrino, ‘but we must keep it a secret from Nello, because Tessa 4 is a kinswoman of his and he would ruin everything.’ ‘That’s true,’ said Bruno. Now, Bruno knew perfectly well who she was, for he had seen her arriving at the house, and Filippo had told him in any case.

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  The totem gods hanging above us swayed, nodding in approval as he pushed his pelvis against mine. I had never experienced a man moving his body on mine like that before, and it seemed so natural, so right. He raised himself with one arm and ran his fingertips from my nipples down my abdomen, sending shivers of pleasure through me. Then he lowered his frame over mine again on the cot. I could feel the satin of his shorts protruding against the nylon of my crotch. I looked down and caught sight of his penis coming through the opening in his shorts. I had the impulse to touch it, because a girlfriend had told me that touching a penis felt like petting a horse’s nose, and I loved the soft nose of a horse. I slipped one hand between us as he rose up and let my fingers brush against it. I was surprised by its heat and pulled my hand away. The great totems were watching from above, saying yes, touch it, feel it, do it; it is right, it is nature. I closed my hand over it. He stopped moving then. “What do you want?” “I don’t know,” I said and pulled my hand away again. What I wanted was to stay unknowing, just moving. I thrust my pelvis upward and he pushed against me, his rhythm my rhythm, the rhythm of the totems, again and again, as I looked up at the swaying gods, watching us, pulling us through a spinning siphon of pleasure into their world.

• From Apprenticed to Venus: My Secret Life with Anaïs Nin (2017)

  He confirmed her thoughts. “I’ve given you the freedom to explore whatever and whomever you wish in the name of your creativity. I understood. The artist needs to be able to play, to experiment, to try out ideas, and a writer, especially, needs to know lots of different kinds of people.” He parroted her words sarcastically, but then smiled. “Now we’ll have a chance to play together.” Play? With Hugo? It was hard to imagine. “It’s too late,” she said. “No it isn’t. You have to give this a chance.” She needed time to think. “What’s your third surprise?” He told her to open a leather satchel in the corner and in it she found a sixteen-millimeter movie camera. He explained that with his new freedom he was going to make experimental films and he wanted her to be his star. Actually, that idea delighted her. Being in Hollywood, overhearing actors, directors, and producers talk shop, she’d found herself wishing she were younger so that she could be involved in moviemaking. “Let’s just play and see what we come up with.” Hugo grinned boyishly. “We can experiment with your idea that film is the best medium for replicating our dream life.” Suddenly, she could see the twenty-three-year-old she had fallen madly in love with and married, the young idealist who wrote poetry and to whom every night she’d read her diary or her untutored attempts at short stories. He had always believed in her talent when she had no faith in herself. How could she deny him the same encouragement now? [image file=image_rsrc3R3.jpg] Lovemaking with Hugo was not as athletic and physically fulfilling as with Rupert, but it was emotionally fulfilling. All their years of marriage resounded like a 120-string orchestra: all the times they had touched, told each other their dreams at breakfast, decorated new dwellings, packed and unpacked, argued and made up, shared disappointments, consoled each other, helped each other dress to go out, slept side by side, melded as one vibrant harmony. With Rupert, making love was like the Liebestod, orchestrated to achieve a huge climax. With Hugo, it was the vibration of an infinite, encompassing resonance. While Hugo went to straighten out the realtor who had sold Anaïs the romantic shack she no longer wanted, she luxuriated at the hotel spa. Over a lobster dinner at the spotless restaurant of the American Hotel, Hugo told her proudly, “I got the realtor to return half your down payment and tear up the contract.” “He should return the whole down payment! It’s all that was left of my advance.” “Don’t worry about the money. We’ll have plenty of investment income.” “But my book advance was different. It was my own money that I made from my writing. And look what I did, I wasted half of it.”

• From My Life and Loves, Vol. 1 (of 4) (1922)

  “Not at once, eh?” she pouted, “talk to me first. I want to know how you are?” and I drew her to the big armchair and sat down with her in my arms. “What am I to tell you?” I asked, while my hand went up her dress to her warm thighs and sex. She frowned but I kissed her lips and with a movement or two stretched her out on me so that I could use my finger easily. At once her lips grew hot and I went on kissing and caressing till her eyes closed and she gave herself to the pleasure. Suddenly she wound herself upon me and gave me a big kiss. “You don’t talk”, she said. “I can’t”, I exclaimed, making up my mind. “Come”, and I lifted her to her feet and took her into the bedroom. “I’m crazy for you”, I said, “take off your clothes, please.” She resisted a little but when I began loosening her dress, she helped me and took it off. Her knickers, I noticed, were new. They soon fell off and she stood in her chemise and black stockings. “That’s enough, isn’t it?” she said, “Mr. Curious”, and she drew the chemise tight about her. “No”, I cried, “beauty must unveil, please!” The next moment the chemise slipping down caught for a moment on her hips and then slid circling round her feet. Her nakedness stopped my heart; desire blinded me: my arms went round her, straining her soft form to me: in a moment I had lifted her on to the bed, pulling the bed clothes back at the same time. The foolish phrase of being in bed together deluded me: I had no idea that she was more in my power just lying on the edge of the bed; in a moment I had torn off my clothes and boots and got in beside her. Our warm bodies lay together: a thousand hot pulses beating in us: soon I separated her legs and lying on her tried to put my sex into hers, but she drew away almost at once. “O—O, it hurts” she murmured and each time I tried to push my sex in, her “O’s” of pain stopped me.

• From My Life and Loves, Vol. 1 (of 4) (1922)

  “Indeed I do,” I cried; but I confessed to myself that she was right; her bottom was adorably dimpled; but it was a little too fat, and the line underneath it was not perfect. One of her breasts, too, was prettier than the other, though both were small and stuck out boldly; my critical sense could find no fault with her triangle or her sex; the lips of it were perfect, very small and rose-red and her clitoris was like a tiny, tiny button. I often wished it were half an inch long like Mrs. Mayhew’s. Only once in our intercourse did I try to bring her to ecstasy and only half succeeded; consequently I used simply to have her, just to enjoy myself and only now and then went on to a second orgasm so as really to warm her to the love-play; Rose was anything but sensual, though invariably sweet and an excellent companion. How she could be so affectionate though sexually cold was always a puzzle to me. Lily, as I have said, was totally different: a merry little grig and born child of Venus: now and then she gave me a really poignant sensation. She was always deriding Mrs. Mayhew; but curiously enough, she was very like her in many intimate ways—a sort of understudy of the older and more passionate woman, with a child’s mischievous gaiety to boot and a childish joy in living. But a great and new sensation was now to come into my life. One evening a girl without a hat on and without knocking came into my office. Sommerfeld had gone home for the night and I was just putting my things straight before going out; she took my breath; she was astoundingly good-looking, very dark with great, black eyes and slight, girlish figure: “I’m Topsy”, she announced and stood there smiling, as if the mere name told enough. “Come in”, I said, “and take a seat: I’ve heard of you!” and I had. She was a privileged character in the town: she rode on the street-cars and railroads too without paying; those who challenged her were all “pore white trash”, she said, and some man was always eager to pay for her: she never hesitated to go up to any man and ask him for a dollar or even five dollars—and invariably got what she wanted: her beauty was as compelling to men as her scornful aloofness. I had often heard of her as “that d—d pretty nigger girl!” but I could see no trace of any negro characteristic in her pure loveliness. She took the seat and said with a faint Southern accent I found pleasing, “You’ name Harris?” “That’s my name”, I replied smiling: “You here instead Barker?” she went on: “he sure deserved to die hiccuppin’: pore white trash!” “What’s your real name?” I asked.

• From My Life and Loves, Vol. 1 (of 4) (1922)

  The very next day he was in still greater haste: “I must get down-town”, he said, “I’m late already; just give me a rub or two”, he cried impatiently, “I must catch that train” and he fumbled with some bills in his hand. “It’s all right”, I said, and smiling added; “Hurry! I’ll be here tomorrow.” He smiled and went off without paying, taking me at my word. The next day I strolled down-town early; for Allison had found that a stand and lean-to were to be sold on the corner of 13th Street and Seventh Avenue, and as he was known, he wanted me to go and have a look at the business done from seven to nine. The Dago who wished to sell out and go back to Dalmatia, wanted three hundred dollars for the outfit, asserting that the business brought in four dollars a day. He had not exaggerated unduly, I found, and Allison was hot that we should buy it together and go fifty-fifty. “You’ll make five or six dollars a day at it”, he said, “if the Dago makes four. It’s one of the good pitches and with three dollars a day coming in, you’ll soon have a stand of your own.” While we were discussing it, Kendrick came up and took his accustomed seat. “What were you so hot about?” he asked, and as Allison smiled, I told him. “Three dollars a day seems good”, he said, “but boot-blacking’s not your game. How would you like to come to Chicago and have a place as night-clerk in my hotel? I’ve got one with my uncle”, he added, “and I think you’d make good.” “I’d do my best”, I replied, the very thought of Chicago and the Great West drawing me, “Will you let me think it over?” “Sure, sure!”, he replied, “I don’t go back till Friday; that gives you three days to decide.” Allison stuck to his opinion, that a good stand would make more money; but when I talked it over with the Mulligans, they were both in favor of the hotel. I saw Jessie that same evening and told her of the “stand” and begged for another evening, but she stuck to it that her sister was suspicious and cross with me and would not leave us alone again. Accordingly, I said nothing to her of Chicago. I had already noticed that sexual pleasure is in its nature profoundly selfish. So long as Jessie yielded to me and gave me delight, I was attracted by her; but as soon as she denied me, I became annoyed and dreamed of more pliant beauties. I was rather pleased to leave her without even a word; “that’ll teach her!” my wounded vanity whispered, “she deserves to suffer a little for disappointing me.”

• From My Life and Loves, Vol. 1 (of 4) (1922)

  “I’m sure Mother would be delighted”, she exclaimed. “You see”, I went on, “I’m trying to serve you all I can, yet you don’t even kiss me of your own accord”: she smiled and so I drew her to the bed and lifted her up on it: I saw her glance and answered it: “The door is shut, dear”, and half lying on her I began kissing her passionately while my hand went up her clothes to her sex. To my delight she wore no drawers, but at first she kept her legs tight together, frowning: “love denies nothing, Kate”, I said gravely; slowly she drew her legs apart, half pouting, half smiling, and let me caress her sex. When her love-juice came I kissed her and stopped: “It’s dangerous here”, I said, “that door you came in by is open; but I must see your lovely limbs” and I turned up her dress. I hadn’t exaggerated; she had limbs like a Greek statue and her triangle of brown hair lay in little silky curls on her belly and then—the sweetest cunny in the world: I bent down and kissed it. In a moment Kate was on her feet, smoothing her dress down: “What a boy you are”, she exclaimed, “but that’s partly why I love you; oh, I hope you’ll love me half as much. Say you will, Sir, and I’ll do anything you wish!” “I will”, I replied, “but oh, I’m glad you want love: can you come to me to night? I want a couple of hours with you uninterrupted.” “This afternoon”, she said, “I’ll say I’m going for a walk and I’ll come to you, dear! They are all resting then or out and I shan’t be missed.” I could only wait and think. One thing was fixed in me, I must have her, make her mine before Smith came: he was altogether too fascinating, I thought, to be trusted with such a pretty girl; but I was afraid she would bleed and I did not want to hurt her this first time, so I went out and bought a syringe and a pot of cold cream which I put beside my bed.

• From The Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica Volume 10 (2011)

  “Tt’s a fairly common compound, yet incredibly powerful. What’s so amazing about it is that it looks unassuming, but when combined with something sweet, it releases a surprising amount of energy.” With that, he closed the remaining distance between our bodies and, reaching with one hand, slowly grazed the pad of his thumb across my smooth lower lip. The touch tingled lips above and below my waist. I watched as he lifted his hand to his mouth and tasted his thumb . I think where my mouth had just been. “I found something sweet . -we should experiment.” . His hot mouth crushed against mine and I swiftly slid my tongue between his slick lips to pry them open. When his tongue pressed back with equal force, my breath caught and my folds swelled. Eager for pressure, I shoved my hips forward and ground my pelvis against the strong plane of his body. He grabbed my hands, now tangled in his hair, loosened my grip and lowered them to rest against the 122 Velvet Moore lab bench ledge. Like a fallen angel, I stood with arms spread wide awaiting his command. His nimble fingers made quick work of my shirt’s buttons and my bra and he encircled my right breast with his slick mouth. As he feasted to the right, he pinched my left nipple, pausing only to roll it between his fingers like a fine cigar. The groans that escaped his muffled mouth made me raw with want. Then he suddenly pulled back. I reached out to draw him back in but he again pressed my hands down. I was eager to see the lengthy muscle that had so eagerly been pushed against my aching middle, but he lowered to his knees without disrobing. He gripped the fronts of my thighs beneath my skirt and spread my legs further. He pushed the skirt up around my waist, tucking the bottom into the waistband to keep it put. Down slipped my soaked panties as he pried them down my legs and tossed them aside. A hand cupped possessively at my swollen sex, his palm spreading my lips, pressing against my throbbing clit, fingers toying along the crease of my rear. He met my eyes and showed a sly smile. Removing his hand from my body, he reached into the deep pocket of his white lab coat, and then pulled out a glass test tube. I gripped the lab bench a little tighter. The slender cylinder slipped easily on to his middle finger. His sly expression disappeared and a look of intense concentration took its place as he leaned forward and leisurely ran the weighty tip of his tongue from the bottom of my soaked sex to the tip of my throbbing clit, making sure to increase pressure during his ascent.

• From The Mammoth Book of Best New Erotica Volume 10 (2011)

  “T think I understand,” I said. And so the next few days went on. In a whirlpool of madness, flesh rubbing against flesh, mouths drowning in the thin air from which we’d sucked all the oxygen in our frenzy of desire, body parts inflamed, stretched obscenely. We drew the worst out of each other, as if never before had we even skirted those dark borders of absolute need. We had no shame, no limits. I fisted her, hurt her even, but she begged me to push harder, further. She squatted over my spent body and urinated over me as I rubbed the cool ambrosia that stemmed from her innards all over my skin. Had she asked, I would have drunk from her cunt lips. I don’t know when we crossed the frontier from which there is no going back. Possibly the day I was scheduled to fly back to Europe and blithely missed my flight. The more we stayed together, tested the very limits of our bodies, the more we knew we could never part. We now inhabited another world. She scratched me badly one morning. Not deliberately. It was in fact surprising that the inherent violence in our movements, our coupling, had not caused more damage before. Sprains, bruises, cuts. The blood welled over my shoulder blade. Her sad features turned somehow even paler than usual as she watched the solitary drops of blood she had summoned lazily slide down over my chest like dark pearls. “T feel like licking you,” she said quietly. “T wouldn’t mind,” I remarked. “Maybe the right way to celebrate our unholy union...” “No,” she said. “I would want you even more if I did.” She despatched me to the bathroom to clean up. But her eyes said something else. Another morning, I cut myself shaving and again the look that spread across her features was an unsteady blend of hunger and utter despair. She walked towards me with all the burdens of world weighing down her steps. Stopped just an inch away from me. Watching the minute flecks of blood on my chin. Her mouth opened. Her eyes clouded. The Communion of Blood and Semen 445 It’s right then it all finally came together. Her unnatural pallor. ‘The ambiguous clues she had unwittingly provided me with. The ever present dark glasses and nocturnal life. The origins of her name. Why I never saw her eating food. I asked her. And she told me her story. The tale of a beautiful vampire adrift in the confused life of a world in which she could never belong truly. How she survived. How sex could sometimes act as a substitute for the blood lust that kept her alive. But was never enough. I'd read the innumerable books; heard of the countless legends. “And if I allowed you to taste my blood, bite me ... what would happen?” I asked her.

• From My Life and Loves, Vol. 1 (of 4) (1922)

  I had had the best part of her wisdom, so I stripped off a five dollar bill and gave it to her. “Thanks,” she said, “you’re a dear and if you want to come an’ see me any time, just come an’ I’ll try to give you a good time.”—Away I went. I had had my first talk with a prostitute and in her room! The idea that a girl could want a baby was altogether new to me: her temptations very different from a boy’s, very! For the greater part of my first year in Chicago I had no taste of love: I was often tempted by this chambermaid or that; but I knew I should lose prestige if I yielded and I simply put it all out of my head resolvedly as I had abjured drink. But towards the beginning of the summer temptation came to me in a new guise. A Spanish family, named Vidal, stopped at the Fremont House. Señor Vidal was like a French officer, middle height, trim figure, very dark with grey moustache waving up at the ends. His wife, motherly but stout, with large dark eyes and small features; a cousin, a man of about thirty, rather tall with a small black moustache, like a tooth brush, I thought, and sharp imperious ways. At first I did not notice the girl who was talking to her Indian maid. I understood at once that the Vidals were rich and gave them the best rooms: “all communicating—except yours,” I added, turning to the young man: “it is on the other side of the corridor, but large and quiet.” A shrug and contemptuous nod was all I got for my pains from Señor Arriga. As I handed the keys to the bellboy, the girl threw back her black mantilla. “Any letters for us?” she asked quietly. For a minute I stood dumbfounded, enthralled, then “I’ll see,” I muttered and went to the rack, but only to give myself a countenance—I knew there were none. “None, I’m sorry to say,” I smiled watching the girl as she moved away. “What’s the matter with me?” I said to myself angrily. “She’s nothing wonderful, this Miss Vidal; pretty, yes, and dark with fine dark eyes, but nothing extraordinary.” But it would not do; I was shaken in a new way and would not admit it even to myself. In fact the shock was so great that my head took sides against heart and temperament at once as if alarmed. “All Spaniards are dank,” I said to myself, trying to depreciate the girl and so regain self-control; “besides her nose is beaked a little.” But there was no conviction in my criticism. As soon as I recalled the proud grace of carriage and the magic of her glance, the fever-fit shook me again: for the first time my heart had been touched.

• From My Life and Loves, Vol. 1 (of 4) (1922)

  “I want you so, Kate,” I said, trying to kiss her: she drew her head aside: “That’s why you’ve kept away all afternoon” I suppose; and she looked at me with sidelong glance. An inspiration came to me: “Kate”, I exclaimed, “I had to be fitted for my new clothes!” “Forgive me”, she cried at once, that excuse being valid: “I thought, I feared—oh I’m suspicious without reason, I know, am jealous without cause, there! I confess!” and the great hazel eyes turned on me full of love. I played with her breasts, whispering “When am I to see you naked, Kate? I want to; when?” “You’ve seen most of me!” and she laughed joyously! “All right,” I said, turning away, “if you are resolved to make fun of me and be mean to me—” “Mean to you!” she cried, catching me and swinging me round, “I could easier be mean to myself. I’m glad you want to see me, glad and proud, and tonight, if you’ll leave your door open, I’ll come to you: mean, oh—’and she gave her soul in a kiss. “Isn’t it risky?” I asked. “I tried the stairs this afternoon,” she glowed, “they don’t creak: no one will hear, so don’t sleep or I’ll surprise you”—By way of sealing the compact, I put my hand up her clothes and caressed her sex; it was hot and soon opened to me. “There now, Sir, go!” she smiled, “or you’ll make me very naughty and I have a lot to do!” “How do you mean ‘naughty’,” I said, “tell me what you feel? please!” “I feel my heart beating”, she said, “and, and—oh! wait till tonight and I’ll try to tell you, dear!” and she pushed me out of the door.