Six

AND THEN IT WAS OVER. Our new friends flew back to Romania. Team USA headed to California and we caught a connecting flight to Seattle. Lissa, Melody, Bree, and Whitney got back from London on Sunday afternoon and we spent a week recovering.

For me, that meant painting. Kate and I went to the studio. I’d focused so much on racquetball in July that I felt I was months behind in producing the paintings for my show in December. I was finally happy with the sketch of Bacchanalia and was ready to start painting it. The suite of paintings that would go with it was a challenge, but my models all seemed to be happy to come in for a day and undress while I completed the sketches for the individual pieces. Especially since I was now paying everyone who modeled a modest fee. I wanted all the sketches finished before Labor Day so I could just paint once school started.

Kate was ahead of me and I liked what I was seeing in her work. She was painting pieces that were broader in scope, but her attention to detail was just as important in the bigger works as in the smaller. The closer you got to one of her paintings, the more you could see. You could almost imagine getting a magnifying glass and seeing even more detail. I mentioned that and Kate abruptly stopped painting as she got a far-away look in her eye.

“You know,” she said, “that might be just what I need. You have entire images super-imposed over other images, but the idea of different levels of reality appearing tinier and tinier hasn’t had a lot of play in the past century.”

“You’ll be painting miniatures next,” I laughed. “I can imagine entire scenes painted on pinheads.”

“How many angels can Kate paint on the head of a pin?” she laughed. “Still...”

“Hey. It’s almost our birthday. What would you like to do to celebrate this year?”

“It would be hard to top last year,” she sighed. “Tony, I’m so happy I came to you all that night.”

“I know that I can speak for Mel and Liss when I say we’re happy, too,” I said. “But even more, I’m happy. Now we’re going to celebrate our birthdays and our anniversary on the same day.”

“I love you, Tony.”

“I love you, Kate.”

We kissed and allowed ourselves to float together, not trying to go beyond the kiss, but putting everything we had into it. I looked into her eyes and saw that pure burst of sunshine that came from her smile.

She pushed me toward my chair and I fell into it. Kate was on top of me in an instant. The little recliner in the studio was adequate. Kate pulled my shirt over my head and my hands slid up inside the oversized white shirt she used as a painter’s smock. I wasn’t surprised to find nothing under it but Kate. The feel of her skin beneath my palms caused the expected response in both of us and she had to struggle a little to get my pants down over my hard-on.

“Kitten, didn’t we just have a week of frolicking naked?”

“Mmmhmm. Did you get your fill?”

“I don’t think I’ll ever get my fill. I want to spend my life trying. Will you spend your life with me, darling?”

“Tony! I’m spending all the time I can with you.”

“You know what I’m talking about.” Kate kissed me deeply—a kiss I wanted to never end. I wanted her desperately, in my life, my bed, and my partnership. The word “wife” even crossed my mind. While we kissed, I felt the dual sensation of her pussy settling over my cock and her tears on my cheeks.

“Please don’t pressure me, Tony. Please just fill me. Make my life so there isn’t room for anything else. Love me. Please, love me.”

I did love her. Lying back in that chair as she rode me, kissed me, and wept on me, I made love to her. I filled my hands with her butt, then with her breasts. I got the smock open so I could kiss and suck her lovely nipples. Each lick brought her higher. I could hear the whine of her breath as she reached her peak. Her muscles clamped down on me as she ground against my pubic bone, and life flowed from me. I was barely still breathing when she collapsed, her eyes rolled into the back of her head. I caught her and held her naked breasts against my chest as I drifted off, the tears now coming from my eyes rather than hers.

What was I going to do with Kate?

“So,” I said as we recovered our composure and turned again to our canvases, “what shall we do to commemorate our first time and our birthdays? It’s only a month away. We need to celebrate.”

“I just did. I can’t think of anything I’d rather do than crawl in bed with my lovers. I can’t believe that just eleven months ago I was a virgin and now I have a beautiful man and three insatiable women to share my bed with each night.”

“Not to mention the occasional playmate,” I laughed, remembering catching her with Allison. “How about if the five of us go to Las Vegas for a long weekend? That has all the trimmings of a typical way to celebrate our twenty-first.”

Silence. I turned to look at Kate. She was staring at me. Her eyes were brimming with tears again. I couldn’t fathom what had come over her. I thought we got past the awkward part. We’d just been so happy a moment before. Las Vegas? Did she think I wanted to elope?

“What is it, Kitten?” I asked. I put down my pencils and caught her as she nearly collapsed with a sob. “Darling. It’s okay. What is it, sweetheart?”

“I ... I ... lied to you,” she sobbed. “I’m sorry. Please don’t hate me, Tony. I’m so sorry.”

“Kate! Kitten! I’m not going to hate you, no matter what. What do you mean you lied to me? Isn’t your birthday the same day as mine?”

“Yes. But I didn’t tell you the whole truth and now I have to and you’ll know. Everyone will know and you won’t want me anymore.”

I led Kate back to the recliner in which we’d so recently made love and settled her on my lap, petting her hair and whispering softly to her. We weren’t going to get any painting done today, but I didn’t care.

“Unless you are an axe murderer or a child-rapist, I don’t think there is anything you’ve ever done that could possibly make us hate you, Kitten. I’m going to forgive you right now for the lie, whatever it was. I promise I will never hold it against you. You don’t even have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

That resulted in renewed sobs, and when she’d finally settled a little, she kept her head facing my chest.

“I can’t go to Las Vegas for our twenty-first birthday. It ... isn’t my twenty-first. It’s only my nineteenth,” she gasped. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want you to know I wasn’t as old as you.”

“What? Why would that make a difference? We’re not going to be upset about ... But you’re a junior in college. How old were you when you came to PCAD?”

“Sixteen. I was so scared someone would find out. I was so afraid when I fell in love with you that you’d think I was just a kid. I didn’t want Lissa to think she had taken a little girl to bed. What will she think, Tony? I waited for our birthday so I’d be eighteen when we made love. I’m still only eighteen.”

“Well, if you haven’t noticed, Lissa’s got another eighteen-year-old she’s been seeing lately, too.”

“Whitney turned nineteen in April. I’m even younger than her.”

“How did you manage to get into college when you were just sixteen?” I asked. “Oh, god, you were all alone here that Christmas and you were just seventeen? You poor kid.”

“I’m not a kid! Please don’t treat me like I’m just a kid now.” She pounded my chest with her fists, not hard, but emphatically.

“That’s not what I meant, Kitten. I think you are the most adult of all of us.” I said. “I’ll never use the term again.”

“I got here the same way Willow, Sunday, and Rainbow did. Rainbow will be seventeen in November and the twins in December. We’ve been emancipated. It’s part of why we all left the commune. We were adults and expected to pair up by the time we were eighteen,” Kate rattled. “When I went back at Christmas, there was a lot of pressure. That’s why I wanted you with me when I went back. The commune is a beautiful place to be a kid and great if you choose the lifestyle. But there’s pressure to conform to the standard if you choose not to leave.”