Excitement

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 Tipping the Velvet (1998)

  It was not a very saucy costume; but I thought it a terribly clever one, because it had a connection with the gift I had bought Diana, for her birthday. For that event the year before I had begged the money from her to buy her a present, and had got her a brooch: I think she liked it well enough. This year, however, I felt I had surpassed myself. I had bought her, all by post and in secret, a marble bust of the Roman page Antinous. I had taken his story out of a paper at the Cavendish, and had smiled to read it, because - apart of course from the detail of Antinous being so miserable, and finally throwing himself in the River Nile - it seemed to resemble my own. I had given the bust to Diana at breakfast, and she had adored it at once, and had it set up on a pedestal in the drawing-room. ‘Who would have thought the boy had so much cleverness in him!’ she had said a little later. ‘Maria, you must have chosen it for him - didn’t you?’ Now, while the ladies all assembled at the party below, I stood in my bedroom, trembling before the glass, garbing myself as Antinous himself. I had a skimpy little toga that reached to my knee, with a Roman belt around it - what they called a zone. I had put powder on my cheeks to make them languorous, and spit-black on my eyes to make them dark. My hair I had covered entirely in a sable wig that curled to my shoulders. About my neck there was a garland of lotus flowers — and I can tell you, the lotus flowers had been harder to organise, in London, in January, than anything. I had another garland to hand to Diana: this I also placed about my neck. Then I went to the door and listened and, since the moment seemed right, I ran to Diana’s closet and took out a cloak of hers and wrapped it tight about me, and raised the hood. And then I went downstairs. There, in the hall, I found Maria. ‘Nancy, dear boy!’ she cried. Her lips looked very red and damp where they showed through the slit of her pasha’s whiskers. ‘Diana has sent me out to find you.

• From Tipping the Velvet (1998)

  The Cavendish Ladies’ Club it was called; and it was situated in Sackville Street, just up from Piccadilly. I knew the road well, I knew all those roads; yet I had never noticed the building - the slender, grey-faced building - to which Diana now had Shilling drive us. Its step, I suppose, is rather shadowy, and its name-plate is small, and its door is narrow; having visited it once, however, I never missed it again.Go to Sackville Street today, if you like, and try to spot it: you shall walk the length of the pavement, quite three or four times. But when you find the grey-faced building, rest a moment looking up at it; and if you see a lady cross its shadowy threshold, mark her well.She will walk - as I walked with Diana that day - into a lobby: the lobby is smart-looking, and in it sits a neat, plain, ageless woman behind a desk. When I first went there, this woman was named Miss Hawkins. She was ticking entries in a ledger as we arrived, but looked up when she saw Diana, and gave a smile. When she saw me, the smile grew smaller.She said, ‘Mrs Lethaby, ma’am, how pleasant! Mrs Jex is expecting you in the day-room, I believe.’ Diana nodded, and reached to sign her name upon a sheet. Miss Hawkins glanced again at me. ‘Shall the gentleman be waiting for you, here?’ she said.Diana’s pen moved smoothly on, and she did not raise her eyes. She said: ‘Don’t be tiresome, Hawkins. This is Miss King, my companion.’ Miss Hawkins looked harder at me, then blushed.‘Well, I’m sure, Mrs Lethaby, I can’t speak for the ladies; but some might consider this a little - irregular.’‘We are here,’ answered Diana, screwing the pen together, ‘for the sake of the irregular.’ Then she turned and looked me over, raising a hand to twitch at my necktie, licking the tip of one glove-clad finger to smooth at my brow, and finally plucking the hat from my head and arranging my hair.The hat she left for Miss Hawkins to deal with. Then she put her arm securely through mine, and led me up a flight of stairs into the day-room.This room, like the lobby below it, is grand. I cannot say what colour they have it now; in those days it was panelled in golden damask, and its carpets were of cream, and its sofas blue ...

• From Best Erotica & Sexual Deviance Narratives Ever Written (2024)

  After tea, and taking a turn in the garden, my particular, who was the master of the house, and had in no sense schemed this party of pleasure for a dry one, proposed to us, with that frankness which his familiarity at Mrs. Cole’s entitled him to, as the weather was excessively hot, to bathe together, under a commodious shelter that he had prepared expressly for that purpose, in a creek of the river, with which a side-door of the pavilion immediately communicated, and where we might be sure of having our diversion out, safe from interruption, and with the utmost privacy. Emily, who never refused anything, and I, who ever delighted in bathing, and had no exception to the person who proposed it, or to those pleasure it was easy to guess it implied, took care, on this occasion, not to wrong our training at Mrs. Cole’s, and agreed to it with as good a grace as we could. Upon which, without loss of time, we returned instantly to the pavilion, one door of which opened into a tent, pitched before it, that with its marquise, formed a pleasing defense again the sun, or the weather, and was besides as private as we could wish. The lining of it, embossed cloth, represented a wild forest foliage, from the top, down to the sides, which, in the same stuff, were figured with fluted pilasters, with their spaces between filled with flower vases, the whole having a pay effect croon the eye, wherever you turned it. Then it reached sufficiently into the water, yet contained convenient benches round it, on the dry ground, either to keep our clothes, or..., or..., in short for more uses than resting upon. There was a side-table too, loaded with sweetmeats, jellies, and other eatables, and bottles of wine and cordials, by way of occasional relief from any rawness, or chill of the water, or from any faintness from whatever cause; and in fact, my gallant, who understood chère entiêre perfectly, and who, for taste (even if you would not approve this specimen of it) might have been comptroller of pleasures to a Roman emperor, had left no requisite towards convenience or luxury unprovided.

• From Less (2017)

  “Well, I’m not even supposed to be here,” Less explains, caught up in the delight of this birthday parole, knowing his words make little sense. He has emerged from the Métro somewhere near the Marais and cannot get his bearings. “I was teaching in Germany, and I was in Italy before that; I volunteered for a later flight.” “What luck for me.” “I was thinking maybe we could get a bite to eat, or a drink.” “Has Carlos got hold of you?” “Who? Carlos? What?” Apparently, he cannot get his bearings in this conversation either. “Well, he will. He wanted to buy my old letters, notes, correspondence. I don’t know what he’s up to.” “Carlos?” “Mine are already sold to the Sorbonne. He’ll be coming for you.” Less imagines his own “papers” at the Sorbonne: The Collected Letters of Arthur Less. It would draw the same crowd as “An Evening…” Alexander is still talking: “… did tell me you’re going to India!” Less is amazed how quickly intelligence moves around the world. “Yes,” he says. “Yes, it was his suggestion. Listen—” “Happy birthday, by the way.” “No, no, my birthday isn’t until—” “Look, I’ve got to run, but I’m going to a dinner party tonight. It’s aristocrats; they love Americans, and they love artists, and they’d love for you to come. I’d love for you to come. Will you come?” “Dinner party? I don’t know if I…” And here comes the kind of word problem Less has always failed at: If a minor novelist has a plane at midnight but wants to go to a dinner in Paris at eight… “It’s bobo Paris—they love a little surprise. And we can chat about the wedding. Very pretty. And that little scandal! ” Less, at a loss, merely sputters: “Oh, that, ha ha—” “Then you’ve heard. So much to talk about. See you soon!” He gives Less a nonsensical address on the rue du Bac, with two kinds of door code, then bids him a hasty au revoir. Less is left breathless below an old house all covered in vines. A group of schoolgirls passes in two straight lines. He is certainly going to the party now, if only because he cannot help himself. A very pretty wedding. Bright promise of something—like the card a magician shows you before he makes it vanish; sooner or later, it will turn up behind your ear. So Less will mail his VAT, go to the party, hear the worst of it, make his midnight flight to Morocco. And in between—he will wander Paris.

• From Wild (2012)

  “Stay safe out there,” he said, and disappeared around the corner of the building. I ripped open the box and gasped when I saw what was inside: a dozen fancy chocolates in shiny twisted wrappers and a bottle of red wine. I ate some chocolate immediately while pondering the wine. Much as I wanted to open it that night on the trail, I wasn’t willing to lug the empty bottle all the way to Timberline Lodge. I packed up the last of my things, strapped on Monster, picked up the wine and the empty box, and began to walk to the ranger station. “Cheryl!” a voice boomed, and I turned. “There you are! There you are! I caught you! I caught you!” shouted a man as he came at me. I was so startled, I dropped the box on the grass as the man shook his fists in the air and let out a joyous hoot that I recognized but couldn’t place. He was young and bearded and golden, different and yet the same as the last time I’d seen him. “Cheryl!” he yelled again as he practically tackled me into an embrace. It was as if time moved in slow motion from the moment that I didn’t know who he was to the moment that I did know, but I couldn’t take it into my consciousness until he had me all the way in his arms and I yelled, “DOUG!” “Doug, Doug, Doug!” I kept saying. “Cheryl, Cheryl, Cheryl!” he said to me. Then we went silent and stepped back and looked at each other. “You’ve lost weight,” he said. “So have you,” I said. “You’re all broken in now,” he said. “I know! So are you.” “I have a beard,” he said, tugging on it. “I have so much to tell you.” “Me too! Where’s Tom?” “He’s a few miles back. He’ll catch up later.” “Did you make it through the snow?” I asked. “We did some, but it got to be too intense and we came down and ended up bypassing.” I shook my head, still shocked he was standing there. I told him about Greg getting off the trail and asked him about Albert and Matt. “I haven’t heard anything about them since we saw them last.” He looked at me and smiled, his eyes sparkling to life. “We read your notes in the register all summer long. They motivated us to crank. We wanted to catch up to you.” “I was just leaving now,” I said. I bent to retrieve the empty box I’d dropped in the excitement. “Another minute and I’d have been gone and who knows if you’d have caught me.”

• From Tipping the Velvet (1998)

  The Lord Mayor’s salary?’ There were titters at that: there had been a bit of a scandal, a couple of years before, about the Lord Mayor’s wages. Now I gratefully singled out the titterers and addressed myself to them. ‘No missis,’ I said, ‘I’m not talking of pounds, nor even of shillings. I am talking of persons. I am talking of the amount of men, women, and children who are living in the workhouses of London - of London! the richest city, in the richest country, in the richest empire, in all the world! - at this very moment, as I speak now ...’ I went on like this; and the titters grew less. I spoke of all the paupers in the nation; and of all the people who would die in Bethnal Green, that year, in a workhouse bed. ‘Shall it be you that dies in the poorhouse, sir?’ I cried — I found myself adding a few little rhetorical flourishes to the speech, as I went along. ‘Shall it be you, miss? Or your old mother? Or this little boy?’ The little boy began to cry. Then: ‘How old are we likely to be, when we die?’ I asked. I turned to Ralph - he was gazing at me in undisguised wonder - and called, loudly enough for the crowd to hear, ‘What is the average age of death, Mr Banner, amongst the men and women of Bethnal Green?’ He stared at me dumbfounded for a second, then, when I pinched the flesh of his arm, sang out: ‘Twenty-nine!’ I did not think it was loud enough. ‘How old?’ I cried - for all the world as if I were a pantomime dame, and Ralph my cross-chat partner - and he called the figure out again, louder than before: ‘Twenty-nine!’ ‘Nine-and-twenty’ I said to the audience. ‘What if I were a lady, Mr Banner? What if I lived in Hampstead or - or St John’s Wood; lived very comfortably, on my shares in Bryant and May? What is the average age of death amongst such ladies?’ ‘It is fifty-five,’ he said at once. ‘Fifty-five! Almost twice as long.’ He had remembered the speech and now, at my silent urging, kept on with it, in a voice that was soon almost as strong as my own. ‘Because for every one person that dies in the smart parts of the city, four will die in the East End. They will die, many of ’em, of diseases which their smart neighbours know perfectly well how to treat or prevent. Or they will be killed by machines, in their workshops. Or perhaps they will simply die of hunger.

• From Tipping the Velvet (1998)

  Fucking had come to seem to me like shaking hands - you might do it, as a kind of courtesy, with anyone. But would Zena have come and let me kiss her, if I had called her to the bed? I cannot say. I did not call her. I only said: ‘Thank you, Zena; there’s nothing else, just now.’ And she picked up the scuttle, and went. I had some squeamishness upon me about such matters, yet. And Diana, I knew, would have been furious. This, as I have said, was sometime in the autumn of that year. I remember that time, and the two or three months that followed it, very well, for they were busy ones: it was as if my stay with Diana were acquiring a kind of hectic intensity, as some sick people are said to do, as it hurtled towards its end. Maria, for example, gave a party at her house. Dickie threw a party on a boat - hired it to sail with us from Charing Cross to Richmond, and we danced, till four in the morning, to an all-girl band. Christmas we spent at Kettner’s, eating goose in a private room; New Year was celebrated at the Cavendish Club: our table grew so loud and ribald, Miss Bruce again approached us, to complain about our manners. And then, in January, came Diana’s fortieth birthday; and she was persuaded to celebrate it, at Felicity Place itself, with a fancy-dress ball. We called it a ball, but it was not really so grand as that. For music there was only a woman with a piano; and what dancing there was - in the dining-room with the carpet rolled back - was rather tame. No one, however, came for the sake of a waltz. They came for Diana’s reputation, and for mine. They came for the wine and the food and the rose-tipped cigarettes. They came for the scandal. They came, and marvelled. The house, for a start, we made wonderful. We hung velvet from the walls and, from the ceiling, spangles; and we shut off all the lamps, and lit the rooms entirely with candles. The drawing-room we cleared of furniture, leaving only the Turkey rug, on which we placed cushions. The marble floor of the hall we scattered with roses - we placed roses, too, to smoke upon the fires: by the end of the night you felt ill with it. There was champagne to drink, and brandies, and wine with spice in: Diana had this heated in a copper bowl above a spirit-lamp. All the food she had sent over from the Solferino. They did her a cold roast after the manner of the Romans, goose stuffed with turkey stuffed with chicken stuffed with quail - the quail, I think, having a truffle in it.

• From Tipping the Velvet (1998)

  You that makes the throats of the city shout, “Brava!”’ As he spoke he lifted his hat, and punched the air with it; one or two passers-by turned their faces towards us, then looked away quite unconcerned. His words, I thought, were marvellous ones - and I knew Kitty thought so, too, for she gripped my hand at the sound of them, and gave a little shudder of delight; and her cheeks were flushed, as mine were, and her eyes, like mine, were shining and wide. We didn’t linger very long in Leicester Square after that. Mr Bliss hailed a boy, and gave him a shilling to fetch us three foaming glasses from the sherbet-seller, and we sat for a minute in Shakespeare’s shadow, sipping our drinks and gazing at the people who passed us by, and at the notices outside the Empire, where Kitty’s name, we knew, would soon be pasted in letters three feet high. But when our glasses were empty, he slapped his hands together and said we must be off, for Brixton and Mrs Dendy - our new landlady - awaited; and he led us back to the brougham and handed us to our seats. I felt my eyes, that had been so wide and dazzled, grow small again in the gloom of the coach, and I began to feel, not thrilled, but rather nervous. I wondered what kind of lodgings he had found for us, and what kind of lady Mrs Dendy would be. I hoped that neither would be very grand. I need not have worried. Once we had left the West End and crossed the river, the streets grew greyer and quite dull. The houses and the people here were smart, but rather uniform, as if all crafted by the same unimaginative hand: there was none of that strange glamour, that lovely, queer variety of Leicester Square. Soon, too, the streets ceased even to be smart, and became a little shabby; each corner that we passed, each public house, each row of shops and houses, seemed dingier than the one before. Beside me, Kitty and Mr Bliss had fallen into conversation; their talk was all of theatres and contracts, costumes and songs. I kept my face pressed to the window, wondering when we should ever leave behind these dreary districts and reach Greasepaint Avenue, our home. At last, when we had turned into a street of tall, flat-roofed houses, each with a line of blistered railings before it and a set of sooty blinds and curtains at its windows, Mr Bliss broke off his talk to peer outside and say that we were almost there. I had to look away from his kind and smiling face, then, to hide my disappointment.

• From Wild (2012)

  It occurred to me that now would be the perfect time to take a photograph, but to unpack the camera would entail such a series of gear and bungee cord removals that I didn’t even want to attempt it. Plus, in order to get myself in the picture, I’d have to find something to prop the camera on so I could set its timer and get into place before it took the shot, and nothing around me looked too promising. Even the fence post that the PCT blaze was attached to seemed too desiccated and frail. Instead, I sat down in the dirt in front of my pack, the same way I’d done in the motel room, wrested it onto my shoulders, and then hurled myself onto my hands and knees and did my dead lift to stand. Elated, nervous, hunching in a remotely upright position, I buckled and cinched my pack and staggered the first steps down the trail to a brown metal box that was tacked to another fence post. When I lifted the lid, I saw a notebook and pen inside. It was the trail register, which I’d read about in my guidebook. I wrote my name and the date and read the names and notes from the hikers who’d passed through in the weeks ahead of me, most of them men traveling in pairs, not one of them a woman alone. I lingered a bit longer, feeling a swell of emotion over the occasion, and then I realized there was nothing to do but go, so I did. The trail headed east, paralleling the highway for a while, dipping down into rocky washes and back up again. I’m hiking! I thought. And then, I am hiking on the Pacific Crest Trail. It was this very act, of hiking, that had been at the heart of my belief that such a trip was a reasonable endeavor. What is hiking but walking, after all? I can walk! I’d argued when Paul had expressed his concern about my never actually having gone backpacking. I walked all the time. I walked for hours on end in my work as a waitress. I walked around the cities I lived in and visited. I walked for pleasure and purpose. All of these things were true. But after about fifteen minutes of walking on the PCT, it was clear that I had never walked into desert mountains in early June with a pack that weighed significantly more than half of what I did strapped onto my back. Which, it turns out, is not very much like walking at all. Which, in fact, resembles walking less than it does hell.

• From Tipping the Velvet (1998)

  They thought it more than strange, I knew, that I should be returning to the Palace yet again; Rhoda, in particular, seemed greatly tickled by the story of my ‘mash’. ‘Don’t you mind her going, Mrs Astley?’ she asked. ‘My mother would never let me go so far alone; and I am two years older. But then, Nancy is such a steady sort of girl, I suppose.’ I had been a steady girl; it was over Alice - saucy Alice - that my parents usually worried. But at Rhoda’s words I saw Mother look me over and grow thoughtful. I had on my Sunday dress, and my new hat trimmed with lavender; and I had a lavender bow at the end of my plait of hair, and a bow of the same ribbon sewn on each of my white linen gloves. My boots were black with a wonderful shine. I had put a spot of Alice’s perfume - eau de rose - behind each ear; and I had darkened my lashes with castor oil from the kitchen.Mother said, ‘Nancy, do you really think -?’ But as she spoke the clock on the mantel gave a ting! It was a quarter-past seven, I should miss my train.I said, ‘Good-bye! Good-bye!’ - and fled, before she could delay me.I missed my train anyway, and had to wait at the station till the later one came. When I reached the Palace the show had begun: I took my seat to find the acrobats already on the stage forming their loop, their spangles gleaming, their white suits dusty at the knees. There was clapping; Tricky rose to say - what he said every night, so that half the audience smiled and said it with him - that You couldn’t get many of those to the pound! Then - as if it were part of the overture to her routine and she could not work without it - I gripped my seat and held my breath, while he raised his gavel to beat out Kitty Butler’s name.She sang that night like - I cannot say like an angel, for her songs were all of champagne suppers and strolling in the Burlington Arcade; perhaps, then, like a fallen angel - or yet again like a falling one: she sang like a falling angel might sing with the bounds of heaven fresh burst behind him, and hell still distant and unguessed. And as she did so, I sang with her - not loudly and carelessly like the rest of the crowd, but softly, almost secretly, as if she might hear me the better if I whispered rather than bawled.And perhaps, after all, she did. I had thought that, when she walked on to the stage, she had glanced my way - as much as to say, the box is filled again. Now, as she wheeled before the footlights, I thought I saw her look at me again.

• From Tipping the Velvet (1998)

  The Sappho with the cigar shook her head. ‘I have never heard of such a thing,’ she said. ‘Well,’ answered Dickie impressively, ‘you will hear more of it, believe me.’ ‘Let us hear more of it now!’ cried Maria; and someone else called: ‘Yes, Diana, read it to us, do!’ And so more candles were brought, and placed at Diana’s shoulder. The ladies settled themselves into comfortable poses, and the reading began. I cannot remember the words of it now. I know that, as Dickie had promised, they were not at all filthy; indeed, they were rather dry. And yet, her story was lent a kind of lewdness, too, by the very dullness of the prose in which it was told. All the time Diana read, the ladies called out ribald comments. When Dickie’s history was complete, they read another, which was rather lewder. Then they read a very saucy one from the gentlemen’s section. At last the air was thicker and warmer than ever; even I, in my sulkiness, began to feel myself stirred by the doctor’s prim descriptions. The book was passed from lady to lady, while Diana lit herself another cigarette. Then one lady said, ‘You must ask Bo about that: she was seven years amongst the Hindoos’; and Diana called, ‘What? What must she ask?’ ‘We are reading the story,’ cried the woman in reply, ‘of a lady with a clitoris as big as a little boy’s prick! She claims she caught the malady from an Indian maid. I said, if only Bo Holliday were here, she might confirm it for us, for she was thick with the Hindoos in her years in Hindoostan.’ ‘It is not true of Indian girls,’ said another lady then. ‘But it is of the Turks. They are bred like it, that they might pleasure themselves in the seraglio.’ ‘Is that so?’ said Maria, stroking her beard. ‘Yes, it is certainly so.’ ‘But it is true also of our own poor girls!’ said someone else. ‘They are brought up twenty to a bed. The continual frotting makes their clitorises grow. I know that for a fact.’ ‘What rubbish!’ said the Sappho with the cigar. ‘I can assure you it is not rubbish,’ answered the first lady hotly. ‘And if we only had a girl from the slums amongst us now, I would pull her drawers down and show you the proof!’ There was laughter at her words, and then the room grew rather quiet. I looked at Diana; and as I did so, she slowly turned her head to gaze at me. ‘I wonder...’ she said thoughtfully, and one or two other ladies began to study me, as she did. My stomach gave a subtle kind of lurch. I thought, She wouldn‘t! And as I thought it, a quite different lady said: ‘But Diana, you have just the creature we need! Your maid was a slum-girl, wasn’t she?

• From The Surrender: An Erotic Memoir (2004)

  On one occasion, shortly after #169, I felt the need and called an old Hound friend. He announced, to my surprise, that he really wanted to fuck me—which was out of the question. But he let it be known that for a price he would eat my pussy: amazing how demanding Hounds can get when left alone too long. The money would give him detachment—he would be a tongue for hire. I loved the idea of turning a man into a whore—though it did feel a little too politically correct. But before even negotiating a price, he proposed that he would give me a freebie under the condition that I be entirely dominant, dictating every turn, every move, fulfilling my every desire. Okay, okay, I said—but just this once. I can, on occasion, be compliant with a Hound; I could be a dominatrix for a night. It would, however, have been easier to pay him. We were now both “topping from the bottom”—and I wasn’t sure who was actually in charge anymore. He came over and I was ready for him, reclining on my bed in my boudoir in black lingerie. First I asked for admiration while he sat in a chair. Why was I the hottest chick at the party? He explained. In his life? He explained further. I found this game to be quite fun. In the whole world? He explained still further, but this time I was not convinced. Next game. We examined my ass in the mirror from all angles, and he pointed out every curve and line to explain why it was the best ass—best in the boudoir, anyway. Then we looked at how my shaved pussy lips peeked through my thighs below my ass when I bent over. This was really fun—right out there with it all, shamelessly. So far he hadn’t been allowed to touch me. Lying on my bed, I then asked for a back massage, then a breast and stomach massage, then a butt massage, then a hip and thigh massage. Then I told him to go back to the chair, sit down, take out his cock, and stroke himself while I displayed my pussy to him like a stripper girl on the runway, spread lips, swollen red clit, long lean legs, killer shoes. He got pretty fucking hard. Then I asked that he lick my pussy for a while, taking long strokes from my ass to my pussy to my clit and back again, the whole wet package. That was great. Really just great. Next I asked him to concentrate on rimming my asshole with slowly increasing pressure until his tongue started forcing its way inside: “Like you want it.” “Like?” He did want it. Then he served me four or five inches of a red chili pepper vibrator up my ass. I hadn’t asked for that part, so to speak, but it was hot so I didn’t object.

• From Delta of Venus (1977)

  The hard tassel that she felt just at the sensitive place between her legs affected her like her fingers’ caresses of the nights before. She tried to move closer to it. She wanted to hear the voice of the priest, warm and suggestive, asking about the impure dreams. He said, “Do you ever have dreams of being kissed, or of kissing someone?” “No, father.” Now she felt that the tassel was infinitely more affecting than her fingers because, in some mysterious way or other, it was part of the priest’s warm voice and his words, like “kisses.” She pressed against him harder and looked at him. He felt that she had something to confess, and asked, “Do you ever caress yourself?” “Caress myself how?” The priest was about to dismiss the question, thinking his intuition had been an error, but the expression of her face confirmed his doubts. “Do you ever touch yourself with your hands?” It was at this moment that Linda wanted so much to be able to make one movement of friction and once again reach that extreme, overwhelming pleasure she had discovered a few nights ago. But she was afraid the priest would become aware and repulse her and she would lose the sensation completely. She was determined to hold his attention, and began, “Father, it is true, I have something very terrible to confess. I scratched myself one night and then I caressed myself, and—” “My child, my child,” said the priest, “you must stop this immediately. It is impure. It will ruin your life.” “Why is it impure?” asked Linda, pressing against the tassel. Her excitement was rising. The priest leaned over so close that his lips almost touched her forehead. She was dizzy. He said, “Those are the caresses that only your husband can give you. If you do it and abuse them, you will grow weak, and no one will love you. How often have you done it?” “For three nights, father. I have had dreams too.” “What sort of dreams?” “I have had dreams of someone touching me there.” Every word she said increased her excitement, and with a pretense of guilt and shame she threw herself against the priest’s knees and bowed her head as if she would cry, but it was because the touch of the tassel had brought on the orgasm and she was shaking. The priest, thinking it was guilt and shame, took her in his arms, raised her from her kneeling position and comforted her. [image file=image_rsrc1RD.jpg] MarcelMarcel came to the houseboat, his blue eyes full of surprise and wonder, full of reflections like the river. Hungry eyes, avid, naked. Over the innocent, absorbing glance fell savage eyebrows, wild like a bushman’s. The wildness was attenuated by the luminous brow and the silkiness of the hair. The skin was fragile too, the nose and mouth vulnerable, transparent, but again the peasant hands, like the eyebrows, asserted his strength.

• From Delta of Venus (1977)

  All naked, in the high black boots, I began to order him to do humiliating things. I said, “Go out and bring me a handsome man. I want him to take me in front of you.” “That I won’t do,” said Marcel. “I order you to. You said you would do anything I asked you.” Marcel got up and went downstairs. He came back about half an hour later with a neighbor of his, a very handsome Russian. Marcel was pale; he could see that I liked the Russian. He had told him what we were doing. The Russian looked at me and smiled. I did not need to arouse him. When he walked towards me, he was already roused by the black boots and the nakedness. I not only gave myself to the Russian but I whispered to him, “Make it last, please make it last.” Marcel was suffering. I was enjoying the Russian, who was big and powerful and who could hold out for a long time. As Marcel watched us, he took his penis out of his pants, and it was erect. When I felt the orgasm coming in unison with the Russian’s, Marcel wanted to put his penis in my mouth but I would not let him. I said, “You must keep it for later. I have other things to ask you. I won’t let you come!” The Russian was taking his pleasure. After the orgasm he stayed inside and wanted more, but I moved away. He said, “I wish you would let me watch.” Marcel objected. We let him go. He thanked me, very ironically and feverishly. He would have liked to stay with us. Marcel fell at my feet. “That was cruel. You know that I love you. That was very cruel.” “But it made you passionate, didn’t it, it made you passionate.” “Yes, but it hurt me too, I would not have done that to you.” “I did not ask you to be cruel to me, did I? When people are cruel to me it makes me cold, but you wanted it, it excited you.” “What do you want now?” “I like to be made love to while looking out of the window,” I said, “while people are looking at me. I want you to take me from behind, and I want nobody to be able to see what we are doing. I like the secrecy of it.” I stood by the window. People could look into the room from other houses, and Marcel took me as I stood there. I did not show one sign of excitement, but I was enjoying him. He was panting and could scarcely control himself, as I kept saying, “Quietly, Marcel, do it quietly so that nobody will know.” People saw us, but they thought we were just standing there looking at the street. But we were enjoying an orgasm, as couples do in doorways and under bridges at night all over Paris.

• From Delta of Venus (1977)

  Then Mathilde wanted to know how she looked when Martinez told her to turn over. She lay on her left side and exposed her ass to the mirror. She could see her sex now from another side. She moved as she moved for Martinez. She saw her own hand appear over the little hill formed by the ass, which she began to stroke. Her other hand went between her legs and showed in the mirror from behind. This hand stroked her sex back and forth. Then a forefinger was inserted and she began to rub against it. Now she was taken with the desire to be taken from both sides, and she inserted her other forefinger into the ass hole. Now when she moved forwards she felt her finger in the front, and when she lurched back she felt the other finger, as she sometimes felt Martinez and a friend when they both caressed her at once. The approach of the orgasm excited her, she went into convulsive gestures, as if to pull away the ultimate fruit from a branch, pulling, pulling at the branch to bring down everything into a wild orgasm, which came while she watched herself in the mirror, seeing the hands move, the honey shining, the whole sex and ass shining wet between the legs. After seeing her movements in the mirror she understood the story told to her by a sailor—how the sailors on his ship had made a rubber woman for themselves to while away the time and satisfy the desires they felt during their six or seven months at sea. The woman had been beautifully made and gave them a perfect illusion. The sailors loved her. They took her to bed with them. She was made so that each aperture could satisfy them. She had the quality that an old Indian had once attributed to his young wife: Soon after their marriage, his wife was the mistress of every young man in the hacienda. The master called the old Indian to inform him of the scandalous conduct of his young wife and advised him to watch over her better. The Indian shook his head skeptically and answered: “Well, I don’t see why I should worry my head so much. My wife is not made of soap, she will not wear out.” So it was with the woman made of rubber. The sailors found her untiring and yielding—truly a marvelous companion. There were no jealousies, no fights between them, no possessiveness. The rubber woman was very much loved. But in spite of her innocence, her pliant good nature, her generosity, her silence, in spite of her faithfulness to her sailors, she gave them all syphilis.

• From Delta of Venus (1977)

  Then Bijou turned and struck Leila hard, angry that she was so aroused and yet unsatisfied, burning and unable to put an end to the sensation. Each time she struck she felt herself palpitating between the legs, as if she were taking Leila, penetrating her. After they were both whipped to redness and fury they fell on each other with hands and tongues until they reached the full effulgence of their pleasure. IT WAS PLANNED that they would all go together for a picnic: Elena, her lover Pierre, Bijou and the Basque, Leila, and the African. They set out for a spot outside of Paris. They ate at a restaurant on the Seine. Then, leaving the car in the shade, they set out on foot into the forest. At first they walked in a group, then Elena fell behind with the African. She suddenly decided to climb a tree. The African laughed at her, thinking she could not do it. But Elena knew how. Very deftly, she put one foot on the first low branch and climbed. The African stood at the foot of the tree and watched her. As he looked up he could see under her skirt. She wore shell-pink underwear, tight-fitting and short, so that most of her legs and thighs showed as she climbed. The African stood there laughing and teasing her, as he began to get an erection. Elena was sitting quite far up. The African could not reach her, because he was too heavy and big to step on the first branch. All he could do was to sit there and watch her and feel his erection becoming stronger. He asked, “What gift will you make me today?” “This,” said Elena, and threw down some chestnuts. She sat on a branch swinging her legs. Then Bijou and the Basque returned to look for her. Bijou, a little jealous when she saw the two men looking up at Elena, threw herself on the grass and said, “Something has crawled into my clothes. I’m frightened.” The two men approached her. She pointed first to her back, and the Basque slipped his hand down her dress. Then she said she felt it along the front, and the African slipped his hand inside of her dress and began to search below the breasts. All at once Bijou felt that something really was crawling along her belly, and this time she began to shake herself and roll herself over the grass. The two men tried to help her. They lifted her skirt and began to search. She wore satin underclothing that covered her completely. She unhooked one side of her panties for the Basque, who, in everyone’s eyes, had more right to search her secret places. This excited the African. He turned Bijou over rather roughly and began slapping her body, saying “This will kill it, whatever it is.” The Basque was also feeling Bijou all over.

• From Birthday Girl (2018)

  Le lanzo una sonrisa burlona, ni un poco molesto porque haya vuelto al revés todo mi aburrido y cuidadosamente construido mundo. Estoy haciendo cosas que normalmente no haría solo para complacerla, pero también me hace sentir cosas que no había sentido en mucho tiempo. Algunas de ellas, nunca. De hecho, hoy me encontré considerando una lista mental de todas las cosas que quiero hacer con ella. Llevarla a juegos de béisbol, viajes por carretera, y hoy investigué en el jodido eBay cintas de casete de los 80 con las que pensé que podría sorprenderla, como si fuera a estar cerca en las festividades importantes y su próximo cumpleaños, por todos los cielos. Hace que me emocione por todo lo que vendrá. Sea lo que sea. Me vuelvo hacia ella, tratando de mantener un ojo en el camino y besarla al mismo tiempo, pero acabo riendo. —Cinturón de seguridad. Me vas a meter en problemas. Retrocede y se aparta un poco, poniéndose el cinturón de seguridad. —Oh —le digo, mirándola—, y sé que Mick quiere contratarte. No vas a trabajar allí. ¿Entendido? Descansa su cabeza en el asiento, mirando por el parabrisas. —Oh, ¿estás poniendo las reglas ahora? —No me gusta preocuparme. Esto se soluciona ahora. Realmente no creo que hable en serio, pero me gustan las cosas talladas en piedra. Solo se encoge de hombros. —Mi hermana gana mucho dinero. No está lastimando a nadie, y no voy a dejar que nadie me mantenga. —Hace una pausa y luego continúa—. Creo que haré lo que tenga que hacer. Realmente no necesito tu permiso, ¿sabes? Frunzo el ceño, la irritación de esta situación arrastrándose por mi espalda. Pero luego recuerdo lo duro que tiraron de ella al escenario esta noche, obviamente, decidiendo que un concurso de camisetas mojadas no era para ella, sin importar si se había vestido para eso o no. Suelto un bufido, recordando la forma en que protestó. —Ni siquiera sé lo que me preocupa —digo, mi voz llena de humor—. Eres una buena chica. No tienes lo que se necesita para trabajar allí. —No soy una niña. Presiono mis labios para dejar de sonreír, pero es difícil. Lo sé, lo sé, es una mujer. —¿Y si entran Dutch o ese pequeño idiota Jay o cualquiera de los tipos que trabajan para mí? —presiono—. ¿Podrías usar un bikini detrás de la barra y servirles bebidas, o peor aún, quitarte la ropa y bailar para ellos? ¿Dejar que te usen para correrse? ¿Sentarte en sus regazos y frotarte contra ellos por cuarenta dólares? No puedo evitar reír entre dientes ante la ridícula idea. Si realmente lo piensa y se pone mentalmente en esa situación, sabrá que es absurdo. Gira su cabeza hacia mí. —¿Te estás riendo de mí? —Estoy diciendo que te conozco —le digo, nivelando mi tono—. Tú y yo sabemos que no tienes más agallas de las que yo tendría, así que vamos a dejar de perder el tiempo discutiendo sobre algo que nunca sucederá.

• From Birthday Girl (2018)

  Mueve la mirada entre nosotras y finalmente la deja sobre mí. Su cabello corto está un poco desordenado, y puedo ver el sudor de su día de trabajo todavía humedeciendo los lados, y la sombra de barba en su mandíbula. Marcas negras manchan sus antebrazos, y los tendones de sus manos bronceadas se flexionan cuando agarra su cinturón de herramientas y el contenedor del almuerzo. Inhala profundamente y avanza, colocando sus cosas sobre la isla. —¿Ya mudaron todo? —me pregunta, pasándose una mano por el cabello. Asiento. —Ajá —dejo escapar—. Quiero decir, sí. Mi corazón está haciendo esa cosa de nuevo, donde se siente como si estuviera navegando en olas del océano dentro de mi pecho, y no puedo recordar lo que se supone que debo hacer. Así que solo asiento de nuevo, parpadeando hasta que mi hermana aparece a mi lado y finalmente recuerdo lo que estaba pasando. —Pike. Señor Lawson —me corrijo—, lo siento. Esta es mi hermana, Cam. — Apunto hacia ella—. Y ya se iba. La mira. —Hola. Y después, para mi sorpresa, su mirada regresa a mí por un momento antes de mirar el correo sobre el mostrador y comienza a hojearlo como si no estuviéramos aquí. Parpadeo, un poco confundida. Cam es una atracción de feria. Puede que sea más joven que él, pero sin duda es una mujer, y la mayoría de los hombres dejan que sus ojos se detengan sobre ella, sus largas piernas y los pechos turgentes y grandes que tiene debajo de esa camiseta sin mangas. Él no. —Sí, encantada de conocerte —dice—. Gracias por recibirla. Nos lanza una mirada rápida y una media sonrisa antes de tomar todos los sobres y meterlos en un cajón del correo. Cam comienza a salir de la cocina, y la sigo mientras entra al cuarto de lavado. Una vez que está fuera de su línea de visión, gira, diciéndome con un brillo travieso en sus ojos abiertos: —Oh, Dios mío. Aprieto la mandíbula, sacudiendo mi barbilla para que siga caminando. Ahora va a estar aquí todos los días coqueteando con él. Escucho a Pike detrás de mí, abriendo uno de los hornos, y me doy vuelta. —Estaba preparando la cena —le digo—. Para nosotros tres. ¿Está bien? Cierra el horno, y veo un atisbo de alivio en su rostro. —Sí, eso es genial, en realidad. —Suspira—. Gracias. Estoy hambriento. —Estará lista en quince minutos. Alcanza el refrigerador y saca una Corona, mete la tapa debajo de un abridor clavado debajo de la isla y la quita, dejando caer la tapa en la basura. —Suficiente tiempo para ducharme —responde, mirándonos—. Disculpen. Y luego sale de la cocina, con la botella colgando de sus dedos mientras sale con solo medio paso. Me detengo, y de nuevo caigo en cuenta de lo alto que es. Esta es una casa de buen tamaño, también, pero sería imposible no notarlo en una habitación.

• From Delta of Venus (1977)

  He was trembling from head to foot. His eyes were dilated. Linda realized that he was in a state of great excitement. When he took the handkerchief away he looked at it as if it were a woman, a precious jewel. He was too absorbed to talk. He walked over to the bed, laid the handkerchief on the bedspread and then threw himself on it unbuttoning his trousers as he fell. He pushed and rubbed. After a moment he sat up on the bed, wrapped his penis with the handkerchief and then continued jerking, finally reaching an orgasm which made him cry out with joy. He had completely forgotten Linda. He was in a state of ecstasy. The handkerchief was wet from his ejaculation. He lay back panting. Linda left him. As she walked through the hallways of the house she met the woman who had received her. The woman was amazed that she should want to leave so soon. “I gave you one of our most refined clients,” she said, “a harmless creature.” It was after this episode that Linda sat in the Bois one day watching the parade of spring costumes on a Sunday morning. She was drinking in the colors and elegance and perfumes when she became conscious of a particular perfume near her. She turned her head. To her right sat a handsome man of about forty, elegantly dressed, with his glossy black hair carefully combed back. Was it from his hair that this perfume came? It reminded Linda of her voyage to Fez, of the great beauty of the Arab men there. It had a potent effect on her. She looked at the man. He turned and smiled at her, a brilliant white smile of big strong teeth with two smaller milk teeth, slightly crooked, which gave him a roguish air. Linda said, “You use a perfume which I smelled in Fez.” “That’s right,” said the man, “I was in Fez. I bought this at the market there. I have a passion for perfumes. But since I found this one I have never used any other.” “It smells like some precious wood,” said Linda. “Men should smell like precious wood. I have always dreamed of finally reaching a country in South America where there are whole forests of precious woods which exude marvelous odors. Once I was in love with patchouli, a very ancient perfume. People no longer use it. It came from India. The Indian shawls of our grandmothers were always saturated with patchouli. I like to walk along the docks, too, and smell spices in the warehouses. Do you do that?” “I do. I follow women sometimes, just because of their perfume, their smell.” “I wanted to stay in Fez and marry an Arab.” “Why didn’t you?”

• From The Surrender: An Erotic Memoir (2004)

  A long silk or velvet gown, elegant but easily raised, is the most frequent choice. If I’m feeling like more exposure, I’ll choose high, tight shorts and a skimpy top. Lady or slut, I wear high-heeled mules and keep them on throughout—or, at least, I try to. The sound of those shoes hitting the floor, pounded off me, one by one, is his sign that things are going well, that now we’re rocking, that now she’s lost control of her facade, her fears, even her shoes. It’s usually when he’s deep in my ass that I can’t cling any longer to those heels. I lay out my outfit on the bed and fill a couple of water bottles and place them around the room and open him a cold beer. I draw the curtains and light candles—at least ten of them. Frankincense adds to the smoke, the chapel is prepared for his confession—and my baptism. I turn off the phone machine and turn on the music. I gravitate to New Age spiritual and chanting monks—to which he comments with a grin, “Oh, we’re having a holy fuck today?”—or Leonard Cohen or Tom Waits groaning as only they can: with inimitable angst. But Ella singing Gershwin is best. Ella is sexy but not slight, happy but not saccharine, serious yet funny—and completely subversive. Ella lilts, she taught me how. She is all about floozies, trollops, Delilah, and “boy-and-girl enjoyment.” But in the end it’s the rhythms. They are blow-job rhythms. Ella inspired me to suck cock like she sings—smooth, easy, deep, surprising, naughty, indulgent, clear. Then the final cue. The phone rings and he whispers into my ear, “It’s Time.” This gives me ten minutes for the final ritual. Pussy shaving. I do this last, out of habit. In the beginning I was so distrustful that he would really show up, so unwilling to believe that I could have this pleasure yet again, that until I got that final call I was too fearful to shave. I wouldn’t want to coif my mound for nothing. A freshly prepped pussy without a party to attend is a sad site indeed. It would be more disappointment than I could bare. So I shave last. I am naked now, but in high heels. Can’t shave my pussy without the heels on, never have, ever. They elongate my legs, turning my body into an easel displaying the canvas, my crotch, for the upcoming design. It makes me think of Jackson Pollock for some reason—though I am more precise than he in my execution. Taking two new pink Daisy razors out of the drawer, I remove the plastic protective tip from the first one. I line up the tools: mirror, baby powder, aloe gel. At this defining moment, ready to commit, but before the first cut, I always read the William Blake poem I keep on the bathroom windowsill in a tiny green-and-gold frame. It is called “Eternity.” He who binds to himself a joy