Touch

by Vick Kiff

Copyright 2000, All Rights Reserved.

The picture she would have presented was all wrong.

Connie closed her eyes, sighed heavily, and then opened them once
more. If anyone could have seen her at that moment, then they might have thought
that she could have been the model for what would be the classic pose of
fearful hope and waiting.

They would see her, a solitary woman standing bravely on the shore
beneath an old lighthouse, staring out to sea. A figurine frozen in time,
watching the waves tumbling toward the rocks and beach, waves pressed
landward by some unseen storm. They would see the woman who waited,
braving the rising tide of wind as it blew heavily landward. Endured the
sea spray as it stung her with its force and with the winds help, molded
the thin, shapeless summer dress to her body so that it seemed she wore
nothing. The material itself would play its part in this imagined picture,
outlining every nuance and curve of her breasts, the slender line of her
body, the shaped delta formed by her legs, hinting at the reality beneath.
It would be as if her clothes echoed her thoughts, for she was the offering
that the God's of chance demanded for hope and escape from the blue water
mysteries of the sea.

She glanced upwards to the lighthouse on the cliff above her. Its tower
was darkened for the moment as the sun began its descent. It seemed as
distant as the man who tonight tended the light. A distant lover, one who
had become like forgotten time itself. As she turned back to the waters,
she knew it was the uncertainty of what she would do that she feared and
what brought the picture and her imagining to her thoughts. She was
aware that the wanting could seem more terrible than the needing that could
make the wait unbearable. Wondering if hope and longing could continue
to replace the remembered touch of his hand upon her skin or the look in
his eyes and the promise they would hold.

Wanting could be enough, sometimes. But not always. There would
always be the hunger to have his hands sculpt and tease her body to
arousal, rather than by the wind. It would always need to be his hands
and lips finding all those places that only her fingers had caressed since
her absence. She was unashamed to say she could crave his touch and
the feel of his breath upon her even though as lovers they had been
separated for more than twenty years. As if in lonely anticipation, her
nipples swelled beneath the dress as her breath deepened and
quickened. But it was no more than that. Though the intenseness of the
feeling remained as her imagining faded, the vision did not.

She sighed. Yes, the picture she imagined was all wrong. The ocean she
saw in her mind was in reality Lake Michigan. And it was not he who was
returning, but she, if but for a little while. An unexpected chance, a
reunion, a last coming together and she wondered, had he longed for the
feel of her body against his own as she had since she had left him?

The sun was almost down. It would be another hour before it set and then
darkness would surround her. She looked behind her again, up to where
the lighthouse tower emerged from behind the trees of the bluff. The old
place had been closed long ago, it was no longer needed to warn of
danger. They said there was no need for this kind of history what with
modern navigation aids and radio to fix a ship's location along the
treacherous shores of the lake. The place would have been destroyed,
but something had persuaded Kale to buy and restore the lighthouse to
its former glory. Now it was his home for part of the year as the sky light
further faded into the coming azure blackness of night.

Memories. Nearly forgotten memories.

She glanced upwards again and thought she saw something. Possibly, it
was the beam of a torch in the tower. She turned fully to the lighthouse
as a small circle of light slid against the windows. A slow smile spread
across her face as another light in the lantern room flickered. As the
number of her breaths increased, the light gradually grew stronger and
stronger until finally the white sliver of light swept out and across the far
horizon as of old. And there, she remarked to herself as she watched the
light turn. There was the peculiar double flashes that had been the lights
distinguishing trademark of old.

It was nearly time.

In the past, they had come to this part of the beach, just below the light,
to escape prying eyes. The land and lighthouse belonged to the Coast
Guard and they were trespassing. What remained of a river, in those times, had
flowed softly through the gully beneath the light before it emptied into the
lake. The shores of that slender river had become a place where a married woman
with a son could meet with a young man whom she had considered a dalliance when
they first met. Someone to play with even as her husband played house with
others. Kale would be her angry rebuke to a husband and marriage that existed
only on paper.

It was so easy to wrap him around her finger. He was always there, a
quiet if distant presence. When she walked, she knew his eyes followed
her every move and so she was deliberately provocative. His undivided
attention was a thing to be desired then. Dalliance he might have been in
the beginning, but it changed in ways she had come to treasure one year
before their moment together ended.

It was neither warm nor cold that night. The heat and humidity of the day
had spawned a thickening haze. The traveling finger of the lighthouse had
seemed like an extraordinary presence as they huddled together before a
small campfire beside the river. The tower light was a warning neither of
them had heeded. Everything was still. The jokes and laughter had fallen
by the wayside. And it was then that their hands touched accidentally, as
firelight glittered in eyes intent on something else.

Was it him or was it her who began? Did it matter who it was who
reached across the chasm of oneness to include the other? No, she
remembered. All that mattered was that there was a moment when they
were one thing and in the next, they had become something wholly new.
Something wondefully new that was born from a touch.

A touch became a kiss. A kiss that became a wish. A wish that released
both the intensity and laughter, and the sudden need.

The ground was wet. Pebbles felt like huge rocks against her back. But
his skin was hot against hers and It seemed so natural, so lovely to have
him between her legs.

"Let me see to you, " he said. "Let me give you this moment. "

"But the moment is ours, " she protested as she reached for him. But he
caught her fingers and wrapped his lips around them. Kissing them as he
sometimes did in gay laughter. She tried once more to stop him, but there
was a determination in him she had not seen before. And then all thought
and fears evaporated as his head slipped down her body, stopping briefly
to shower her breasts and stomach with kisses.

And then he kissed her.

Such soft and light touches he gave her in the beginning. His tongue
moving upon the skin of her upper thigh. Then dipping into the valley
between her legs, before climbing from the abyss to move across her
other thigh. As he caressed her with his mouth, she became aware that
he was also speaking to her in words as well as in touches. And the
words flowed like the honey of his tongue upon her.

He moved further down her leg to her lower thigh and once again his
tongue followed the contour of her legs. Then he repeated the movement,
but coming higher and higher until once again his lips hovered above hers
as her breath came in gasps.

He touched her clit with the tip of his tongue and it was like an electric
shock arcing through her. She could only gasp as her hips rose to his
mouth. Then with the same light touch, his tongue circled the skin of her
clit, twice, three, it could have been a hundred times she thought. She
was dimly aware that her hips, her whole body, had become entranced by
his mouth and tongue and did not care. Moving as he did until he
captured the little pearl in his mouth and his tongue slid up and down its
length.

He kissed her vaginal lips, caught them between his own, then entered
her with his tongue, stroking her, kissing her, touching her to a
shuddering climax. It was, she remembered, the first time she had ever
cried after making love with someone.

He held her close. His arms wrapped around her and it was in those
fateful moments that he said, "I love you."

As the light turned above them, issuing its warning, she caressed his face
with her hands and said against the clear warning of the light, "I love you,
my love."

It was Fate and fateful. There would be a year of such moments before it
would end. Connie sighed once again and looked out to the turbulent, but
silent waters of the lake. Watched as the dark mass of water glittered as
the light passed and reached out far beyond what she could see to the
fog beginning to form over the warm waters. She felt the whisper and tug
of a new wind and knew she must do what she had come to do.

There were stone stairs beneath the tangled underbrush and these lead
up the cliff to the lighthouse. The passing light helped her to find them.
And then she was ascending the stairs noiselessly, seemingly gliding
upward.

Then she was before the door of the dwelling. As she thought, no light
other than that in the tower showed. He would be asleep, resting
for a few hours before he would perform some necessary duty.

The doors opened at her touch, aided by the warming wind. As she
passed each bit of furniture, she touched the fabric and left a bit of herself
and her scent to linger. Then she mounted the stairs, looked into the
room that was his study, then left to the room that was his.

Every twenty five seconds, the tower light would reflect into the room and
she could see his face clearly. But she did not need the light to know his
visage. He was more a part of her than she realized as she came to his
bed.

She knelt down and drew the sheet from his legs. But this was not
enough. When he did not stir, she pulled the linen from his body and
gazed upon his naked form. She captured her breast in her hands, found
its point, and twisted her nipple, feeling it harden, the skin puckering. Her
breasts felt heavier, warmer as she trailed a finger lightly up his leg to his
upper thigh.

He moved then and she froze. She had promised the God s that she
would not wake him for this was to be his moment. He had turned more
fully on his back, one arm stretched out upon the bed toward her, the
other across his chest. He seemed to be dreaming, for his expression
was pensive.

When he was quiet once more, she allowed her fingers to rise up his leg
and then she touched him. He groaned then, the expression on his face
changing. And the wind that had pursued her up the cliff, into the house,
and to this room, brushed coolly against her skin. She must hurry if she
were to complete her task.

She held his rising and hardening erection in her hand while the other
continued to caress her breast, her nipple, before descending down her
body. There she found a dampness and wetness that she brought to her
lips. Then she leaned forward and began to lick the living hardness she
held.

The wind was colder, but Kale s body was warming as her tongue
moved over his cock. and body His groans had become moans and his hips had
begun to thrust upwards. She opened her mouth wide and received his
thrusts as she tugged on his skin, coating it with her own juices, urging
him to come.

At the first faint tickles of the icy wind on her back, she felt his hardness
seem to expand and then his warm heat was in her mouth and on her
hands and breast. She watched as tears formed at the corners of his
eyelids, still closed in sleep. Then heard him whisper her name in a voice
filled with longing and desolate desperation.

Her essence was beginning to fade as the tower light stopped, lighting the
way for her return. She reached out and touched his brow as tears came
to her eyes. Then she spoke:

"Another year my love. Wait for me for another year and our reunion as
lovers in life and death will be again."

The wind faded to a whisper and she was no more. But her scent
remained, to remind the sleeper that she had been there and would come
again.

Other ENE Reunion 2000 Submissions