Nils only found out about it at the last minute. A chance to work with Anais was too important to pass up, so he did a few hasty sketches, watercolors and pastels, packed them in a shopping bag, and hurried to the local art center, letting the watercolors drip, hoping the bag would hold.

Two young women sat Indian fashion on the auditorium stage. Nils presumed they were models; they were too cute to be artists, but you never know. A minute later a young man in a suit came in, carrying a monogrammed attaché case. LF, the infamous Louis the Fish. The buttons snapped—that loud soft sound of brass slapping soft leather. Nils could see inside. Yachts caught in quiet waters. Seabirds hurrying home before the storm. At a glance he could see that this Louis had a way with water, with waves. Nils feared his own clumsy efforts wouldn’t have a chance.

A moment later Anais arrived. She wore a camel-colored coat and some scuffed but attractive moccasins. Maybe that’s all she wore. She smiled at Nils and he wanted to paint her eyes. He wanted to paint her throat and her shoulders and her breasts and her bellybutton. Yes, the light would find her eyes, her breasts, her belly button, and maybe the apex of her clit. He’d paint her in oils—no timid pastels or watery watercolor.

And then he’d fuck her. Or maybe he’d fuck her first. Well, can’t blame a guy for ... But maybe she would. She looked through his work, knuckle of her forefinger nudging her chin, but made no comment. Nils wanted to suck that finger. What if she insisted on pastel...? He could comply. He had a sudden vision: how her breasts would appear, the camel-colored coat eased aside: the pale flesh, the soothing mounds and between them an excited cock. The art would show the instant before the initial spurt. “Oh, my little cum-puppy,” she would say. Nils laughed to himself, but that didn’t stop his penis from growing hard in his pants.

“Some of these are a little wet,” she said to Nils, handing him his sketches. “I thought you wanted water,” Nils thought to say, but he held his tongue, returned her simple smile. She moved on to the open attaché case. Nils chatted amiably with the pair of pretty girls, who, it turned out, were here a week early for a flower show. “You are prettier than any flowers,” Nils told them, and he asked if they’d be interested in having their portraits painted. “Would we be naked?” one of them asked. “Would we be sucking your cock?” the other inquired. “Bathing it in juicy bliss?” said the first, looking pointedly at the bulge in his pants.