Chapter 11G

Sunday.

I woke at seven. I left Martha sleeping and donned my new-made cutoff shorts and my new running shoes and I jogged to the newsstand on 86th Street. But I was too rested and energized to stop for the Times. Something got into me; I kept jogging, picking up the pace and heading for Central Park. I zoomed into the park and across the small meadow beside the Metropolitan Museum. The few people who were about ignored me, and I chided myself for worrying in the first place that people in New York would notice me, remembering Memphis and how I used to shy away from seeking a seat in front of a church at Mass because I was afraid that the eyes of the congregation would be upon me, analyzing every fault.

Soon I was winded. I slowed to a walk, angry with myself. When I got my wind again I did some chin-ups from a tree limb, only to have leaves and debris bombard me. I dropped to the ground and lay down, resting but getting angrier.

Then I got up and broke into another jog. I heeded Fiore's warning and kept the pace moderate, determined to make it all the way to Martha's. I stopped at the newsstand for a Sunday paper. It was too cumbersome to jog with, and I was getting out of breath again. I waited on the corner of 86th Street and 2nd Avenue for the traffic light. I looked around: not yet eight in the morning, and traffic and people were everywhere. I thought: What a life, what a city! Surely there must be something I could take back with me to Memphis to see me through, to see me out of that one horse town and back to...

Back to what? I realized that I was just a breathless kid on the street, with no firm goals and little with which to attain them.

On my way to Martha's a shadow floated down the street. I looked up; heavy overcast was moving over the city. Sunshine disappeared from the block as I entered Martha's building.

On my way upstairs I heard Ronnie's door open as I passed.

She called quietly behind me, "Hey, you." I stopped and turned. She stood in her apartment doorway, eyes narrowed and lips pursed, mildly accusing.

She said, one hand on her hip, "Full of surprises, aren't you?"

I frowned questioningly, and she said, "That rose."

I grinned. "You don't have to say anything."

She winked at me. "Listen, I owe you one."

I winked back. "No you don't."

As she drew her door closed, she peered out and winked at me again.

Upstairs, Martha still slept. In the kitchen I took off my sweaty clothes and had a quick, rinsing shower while the coffee brewed. While I dried myself in the kitchen I said grumpily to myself: Right, you're already supercharged and pissed off, so have some coffee and make it worse! Still drying with the towel, I went to the bedroom.

Martha was on her tummy in bed. She glanced at me as I crossed to the small chest near my side of the bed by bedroom window. She rolled over, propped on one elbow, and sleepily watched me.

With my back to her I dried my crotch and legs, glum and wordless. Then I reached into one of the drawers and pulled out fresh jocks.

Behind me, Martha asked with a slurry whisper, "Done your running for the day?"

"Yep." I pitched the towel onto the top of the chest.

"You're a good boy."

I gave a small, dry laugh and said ruefully, "Yeah I'm a good boy who still has a long, long way to go!"

"Looks like your getting there."

I didn't reply. I turned toward her and slipped my feet into my jocks and pulled them up. I stepped to the side of the bed, one arm rubbing the back of my neck, and I asked, "You want some breakfast?"

"Yes," she said. She leaned toward me and grabbed my arm and pulled me into bed on top of her and put her arms around me. She said with huskily seductive exaggeration, "Yes, I want some breakfast. Some slow, filling breakfast." She slid a hand down my back and under my jocks and raked her nails down my butt, and then under my jocks her hand swept around to my front and cradled my balls. "Mmmm," she groaned pleasantly. "Steak and eggs."

She may have been kidding, but I got serious. I opened her pajama top. While I sucked her nipples I moved a palm to the inside of a thigh, and her flesh was hot, soft with sleep. My hand moved upward and her thighs parted and my fingers found simmering cream.

For several minutes she lay drowsily enjoying my cock in her and then she had a lazy, sultry climax. I considered making her cum again and getting her worn out, but she felt too good under me; after another minute of slow screwing I shot off, and we lay together silently for a while before she went into the bathroom. I rested in bed, listening to the drone of steeple bells from the Catholic church two blocks behind Martha's street.

After we took a soapy shower together, the drizzle started outside.

That was the kickoff for my second workweek in New York. It rained all day Sunday and into Monday, and the sun remained hidden most of the week. But Martha kept up the pace. We went to an offBroadway play Monday and Wednesday, to a lecture by Ray Bradbury on Tuesday. She scheduled something to do every night and kept us up late until, by Thursday, Martha could hardly wake in the mornings. And neither could I.

Thursday morning at breakfast I mentioned that I was getting into heavier workouts at Fiore's and I would be needing a little more sleep.

Martha said, buttering her toast, "I hope you didn't come to New York to put so much effort into just working out."

"No," I said casually, chewing, "but I only have about six weeks left. I want to learn all I can from Fiore."

"Well, don't spend six weeks wearing yourself out. I am glad that you picked up on Fiore, Steven. You need more men in your life. Strong men, like him. But let's compromise. Let's don't get to sleep *too* early."

"So what's a good hour to set for beddy-bye?"

She looked at me, her eyes playing with mine, her smile a sly little curl, and she sipped from her coffee and said, "Not only am I naturally wicked, hon, I'm now even more decadent because having you here has spoiled me. Spoiled me rotten. I do want you to build yourself into what you want to be. It would be very good for your self esteem." She propped her arms on her elbows and brought her cup to her lips, her eyes on me. "But now I'm spoiled and I'm getting selfish about it. So I'm all for getting into bed as early as we can."

It drizzled on and off all week, making me drowsy all the time and making it sloppy for me to get around in the city during the day. Yet I was amazed that, unlike Memphis, weather made the city more irritating and slow but couldn't stop it. There seemed to be no end of things to see and do; there were more than sixty museums and no way to see them all in a lifetime, much less a few weeks. And the more I saw, the more I wanted to see and absorb. Lunch with Ronnie on Tuesday and Thursday was but a prelude to a full day of looking and finding and wanting more.

At first I was less shy with Ronnie. But her easy mannered ways at lunch had me thinking of her frequently, to the point of my fantasizing about her at times. Yet this was Martha's bosom buddy, and I began to feel guilty about my feelings.

Thursday at lunch, Ronnie and I ate a quick, light snack and she walked around with me for a short while, leading me a few blocks from her office to Willoughby's giant camera store near Macy's. When we walked inside, my mouth fell open; here was all the gear, the heavy professional stuff I'd read about but had never seen.

Ronnie laughed at me. "What's the matter? You look as if you got struck by lightning."

"I did," I breathed. "Look at it. Look at all his stuff!"

She said, "Really? I didn't know you were interested in this, too. My, my, is there no end?"

I walked to a counter that was stacked with displays of several new Japanese cameras. I touched the sleek machines, actually touched them and found what they really felt like. And then I went to another counter.

I said, gulping in awe, "Look. These are Exakta's. Just like the camera and lenses Jimmy Stewart used in 'Rear Window'."

Ronnie said, "You mean you know all about this?"

"Yes. that's the problem. I do know about it." I looked at the price tags on the equipment and said downheartedly, "And I know how much it costs, too. Beyond my means. Way beyond.

She said, "Oh, I don't know. You can have this one of these days."

"One of these days," I mused aloud, unconvinced.

Ronnie reminded me, as we left the store so she could get back to work, "One of these days doesn't mean never."

I hung around that street. It was an entire block of camera shops, many of them famous advertisers in major magazines. I stayed for hours that afternoon, picking up so many photographic brochures and catalogs that I needed a hefty shopping bag to carry them. The literature listed thousands of bargains and demonstrated endless creative and technical possibilities. I toured the camera stores several times over the following weeks, compiling a pocket size spiral book of notes.

This was only the beginning of weeks of touring stores and shopping districts in Manhattan. I collected catalogs for cameras, book stores, audio shops, colleges, drama and film schools. It was all terrifically energizing. Yet I soon began to feel like Tantalus tormented in the garden, feeling more and more inadequate. I knew that when I returned home this environment of creativity and accomplishment and opportunity would no longer exit. The exact opposite was what I would find at home.

And in Memphis, Martha would be missing as well. In a way I tried not getting too used to her, knowing she would disappear in a few weeks. But Martha was far too sensual and overpowering for me to begin thinking of myself as independent of her. Martha's effect on me was far from limited to sex, but that was the area of greatest immediacy.

Compared with my first week in New York, Martha and I had sex only three times during the second week, our schedules being so hectic and demanding in their own way. Being in bed with her was becoming a contest within myself, with me trying to convince myself that I could do without when the time came, and me doing such a good job on her that she'd have second thoughts about not having me. On our first night early in the week I learned to orally give her multiple orgasms before having intercourse. Later in the week I had her suck me first, and then stayed hard inside her long enough to learn to give her multiple, consecutive orgasms again. But by the end of the week we were both so sexually exhausted that on Friday evening we fell asleep shortly after dinner, without touching one another. Saturday morning we had to wake up early to catch a train to upstate New York so that she could take me to West Point. All we had time for was a wrenching morning blowjob that had me napping on the train all the way to Poughkeepsie.

By the start of the third week certain activities became standard fare during my vacation. Tuesday and Thursday were lunch buddy days with Ronnie. Friday night was dinner with the three of us. Sunday night was a triple date at the movies, with Martha sitting on one side and Ronnie on my other, all three of us holding hands. I did get a stare or two about the hand holding from a guy seated in front of us one night; I just grinned back at him.

During the movie I sat absorbing the different feel of each woman's hand. Martha's held me snugly, now and then flirting with a nail on my palm. Her hand was warm, rather strong, her fingers shorter than Ronnie's. The hand of Ronnie was longer, slender, more casual, physically warmer but less provocative than Martha's.

And as we walked from a dinner or a movie, we become more of a close knit trio. I grew more comfy with Ronnie and more attached to our harmless banter, but I was careful to maintain that harmlessness. Through Ronnie I began to realize something about myself sexually and emotionally; I was fond of very, very few girls or women, but when I did develop sincere affection, I found myself wanting to protect and nurture, to touch and hug. The impulse was often physical, but not always sexual. But the more I liked Ronnie, the more I began drawing away. And the more I became involved on a daily basis with Martha, the more I did the same with her.

Sunday it rained so hard it wasn't worth traveling around town. Martha and I got soaked on our trip to the Guggenheim, prompting her to suggest that we stay in for the day to see if the weather settled later. We got into bed for an afternoon nap. When I woke up a couple of hours later it was still pouring outside. We ended up snuggling and, of course, that led to the expected.

I licked her and she came once, but when I started to mount her she stopped me. She said with uncharacteristic nervousness, "Really, I'm... I'm a little scared right now."