“You got it. But where?”
She leads me into the den, a cozy, carpeted room with bookshelves lining the walls, a sofa, rocking chair and a stereo that looks like it had been purchased by her dad. Not to be sexist, but few women are into high-end stereo gear. Her dad bought it but it was actually Sam who advised him on what components to buy, she tells me. “Sam was heavily into this stuff,” she says.
I had heard B&W speakers in various listening rooms, so I know this is good “stuff.” In my stocking feet, I relax on the sofa while Rhiana pops a Rachmaninov piano concerto into the Denon CD player and then joins me. I’m lukewarm when it comes to classical music, but I like what I’m hearing. Lush and romantic, it sounds like the right kind of music for our present state
of mind.
To cuddle, kiss and comfort. We begin doing all of the above, not in a heavy,
passionate way, but slow and cautious, even tentative. It’s akin to wading into the ocean, one step at a time, testing the water. But that’s okay. We’re still strangers who met in a strange kind of way. I’m grooving on her warmth and caring. Not to mention her long, sexy legs wrapped in those sexy tight spandex pants. “And to think, before meeting you, I wasn’t ready for this,” I say.
She reaches up and runs her fingers through my hair, grown long, like my beard. “Me neither. I had almost become a recluse. I’d go to work, teach, then come home and cry. It was tough facing those kids each day but somehow, I made it through. Once in a while, nagged by girlfriends, I’d go out and have a drink with them. Some of them even tried to set me up with guys they knew, or guys that knew other guys. I politely declined.”
She has such nice skin, baby-soft, satin-smooth, I think, sliding my fingers across her face. “Then I came along.”
She nods. “Yes you did, Aaron Kravitz. On a most unlikely day. I think this is a clear case of serendipity.”
We get back into it, necking while this sublime music fills the room, music that just might entice me to give classical music more of a chance. At the very least, I’ll always associate the name Rachmaninov with another name, Rhiana Schuster, and a certain frigid day in January. Frigid outside, that is. Inside, on this plushy sofa, things are heating up. No longer so tentative, Rhiana leans forward and kisses me while straddled on my lap. Her kisses warm and comfort me, and the intoxicating, lanolin-scented smell of her wool sweater and some kind of floral scent that I surmise is part her, part whatever she’s wearing, add fuel to the fire. “You’re perspiring,” I say, with my hands tucked under her sweater, feeling the beads of sweat along her stomach.
She sits up and says, “Yeah, well, it’s getting warm in here.” She lifts the ends of her garment and fans it in front of her. “I’m tempted to take this off. But then my bra would come off too and that could lead to something we lack the privacy for and emotionally I’m not sure I’m ready for.”
“I understand because emotionally we seem to be in the same place,” I tell her. “Physically, well, that’s a different story.”
She chuckles and cops a feel between my legs. “Yes, I can tell. And you should know that I feel my panties getting wet.”
“Which means, I think, that you’re attracted to me.”
“That is the case, yes. Very much so. I just need more time. Sorry, don’t mean to be a tease.”
Ordinarily, in a situation like this, I’d be frustrated. But this is no ordinary situation, Rhiana is no ordinary woman and there’s no way I’m going to push the envelope. “I don’t see you as a tease,” I say when she climbs off my lap. “We both need more time to heal and before today, I didn’t have anyone who could help me heal in the way that I sense you can, Rhiana.”
She snuggles closer to me, resting her head against my chest. “Thanks. That’s so sweet of you to say. You’re a true gentleman. Yes, we both need more time to heal, and I’m counting on you as well to help me do that. And part of the process is kissing and snuggling, which I hope you’d like to continue, because I sure as hell would.”
My actions speak for themselves, holding her and kissing her and enjoying every wonderful second of it, while the music plays on, now into the slow part, slow and beautiful. “The adagio,” Rhiana explains to me. “Most concertos have an adagio movement, just like the start of some relationships. Although, I wouldn’t exactly call this a slow start. I mean, I didn’t even neck with
Sam on our first date.”
“You’re doing me one better because I wouldn’t call this a date. At least it didn’t start out that way. A prologue perhaps. Or, if we’re talking music, an overture.”
“Ooo, I just love your metaphors. That turns me on, you know. A guy who can think in metaphor.”
“I’ll give you more of them if it induces you to take your bra off. Really, I’ve got a whole bag of metaphors. Loads and loads of them. Kidding, just kidding,” I say, watching her laugh. “Well, sort of,” I add. “I mean, I respect what you told me about not being ready for going further. On the other hand…”
She laughs harder, a belly-holding, face-reddening laugh that warms me to the bone. Then she says, “Aaron, I haven’t had a decent laugh since, well, you can imagine since when. And I have a feeling that it won’t be long before I am emotionally ready to take my bra off–and everything else that goes with it. Speaking of metaphors, I mean that metaphorically as well as literally, by the way. She throws her arms around me once again and says, “Meanwhile, I’d love to do this some more. If that’s okay with you.”
“Like you’d think I’d object. More than okay. Let’s proceed.”
Once again, we plunge back in, “pulse nigh to pulse, and breath to breath, where hushed awakenings are dear,” wrote another poet whose name escapes me. We kiss and cuddle while the music plays on and my emotions run wild and my libido simmers in the heat of the moment in this precious space of time on this cold winter afternoon, keeping intimate company with this amazing woman.
*****
Herman Schuster, her dad, comes home while I’m at the door, coat and boots back on, preparing to leave. He’s a big six-footer, with a full head of gray hair, slicked straight back. We shake hands when Rhiana introduces us. My contact with him is brief–I suspect that she and Roslyn will fill him in later.
I walk to my car with a very different mindset than when I began my little hike today. Somehow, this cold, blustery January day doesn’t seem so cold and blustery. I’m tempted to pinch myself to make sure I didn’t dream it all up. A case of serendipity, Rhiana had said. I agree, amazed at what a heavy dose of serendipity will do to soothe an aching heart.