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"Ah! C-c'mon now, Elliott, I jus' got through th' door! Gotta fresh'n up..."
"Where's the need?" he asks with a hungry inhale by her ear. "You always smell so good after a hard day of work...it's your natural musk!"
Aina pries him off her with both dirt-speckled hands and a tight knot of reluctance catching in the space between her chest and belly. The left of her sweaty neck tingles from where his lips had dotted a line on it seconds ago. "Man, if ya wanted a roll in th' hay, you shoulda come after me sooner! When I'da been up for it. Now I need me a good long shower an' some peace-n-quiet. So there."
By the front door, her turtle Nori rests out of sight in her pen, tucked beneath her log-shaped shelter (lovingly hand-carved by Leah), having soaked up enough light from her lamp to sustain her.
Elliott backs off, glossing over his disappointment with an indulging smile that deepens the lines around his mouth and reaches the bottom rim of his emerald-green eyes. He's no good at hiding his feelings. It seldom occurs to him to do so, and when it does, he fails at it. It is one reason, of many, that she had chosen him as a mate. She never needs to guess his intentions. "Er...as you wish," he concedes, his cheeks pink as the peaches she'd picked off the trees today. "I'll go make dinner, then. What do you crave tonight?"
Aina peels off her overalls and blouse with a sigh of relief, the air condition lodged in the bedroom window blowing dozens of kisses across her flushed, bare brown skin. "Could go for some o' your crab cakes. An' fruit salad," she answers while packing her soiled clothes into her jute rope laundry hamper. "You should find ev'rythin' ya need for all that on th' counter. Or, ah, th' fridge." Upon peering over her shoulder to regard him, she catches Elliott leaning in the doorway, regarding the curves of her thighs and behind with a hand over his mouth.
Despite the ache in her bones and the lightness in her head, the intensity of his stare pulls a giggle from her. Heaven knows how many times he's seen her naked in the four years they've been together (come autumn and it will officially be five years!). And still, he looks at her like he's beholding her for the first time. How does he do it?
Perhaps by the same way she can peek at his cleavage darting in and out of the top of his half-buttoned shirt and still be stricken with the urge to nest her face in it?
Raising her arms over her head to let the cool air caress her beneath her arms and breasts, she exaggerates the sway in her hips as she heads for the bathroom. "Ha! Try me again in an hour an' some. Han'some!"
From behind her, she hears him clear his throat--no, the bottom of his chest. "I intend to!"
Aina leans against the door upon locking it, her next sigh from the bottom of her belly as her shoulders slacken. She rests her eyes for about a minute, then reopens them to regard her reflection in the mirror over the bathroom sink beside her. The Aina in the mirror combs back the dampened curls sticking to her brow and temples at the same time she does. Her eyes are heavy, her smile weary yet satisfied.
Her figure is thick and pear-shaped. Rolls along her waist, a soft hill of a belly, and defiant forests of hair under her arms and between her legs. Her breasts droop, stretch marks streaming up and down them like rivers along mountains. Her legs stretch like great plains of tall grass. That's how Elliott had described her body when he'd first seen it in its entirety. She had led them up to the bathhouse near the train platform for a date and forgone a swimsuit. According to him, she was...is the spirit of the valley personified.
To which Aina could only reply, "Sure, Elliott. Whatever ya say."
She is nothing at all like the sort of woman she'd assumed Elliott would like in the early days. But he had surprised her. What vanity he was guilty of never extended beyond himself, and he would never sing praises that hadn't come from the bottom of his heart.
Though it's only been two weeks into it, summer has so far yielded a promising harvest. Tart blueberries, hot peppers, tangy tomatoes, juicy melons and oranges and peaches. The first two weeks and last two weeks of each season are the busiest for her--have been ever since she'd first claimed this place but even more so since she'd began raising animals. Sowing, reaping, selling, more sowing, more reaping, more selling. Feeding, petting, milking, shearing, collecting, cleaning, selling on repeat.
She wouldn't trade it for all the iridium in the world. But oh, does it take a lot from her! Seven years strong and all that's changed is that she doesn't instantly pass out on the floor when night falls.
Least I ain't doin' it all alone, anymore.
She and her mirror twin peer at the Bellina moth orchid suspended by the upper left corner of the mirror, its center rich with the purple of dawn and the outer edges of its buttery petals bright and green as the grass in summer. It greets them both with a slight citrus scent. Perpendicular to it is the window above the shower curtain, the last of the day's sunlight trickling through the dusty, water-stained glass. Elliott had given her that orchid for her birthday back in spring. He'd said it reminded him of her.
Fussy? No. In his words: "Strong, noble, exquisite. And I prefer the word fastidious."
Had he said that way back when they'd first started dating, she might have charged him with deception. Those words didn't describe her at all, or so she'd believed then. But this year, she'd accepted the orchid with a smile and a kiss no less tender (and her eyes shut so he wouldn't see her rolling them). She may still struggle with receiving praises, but it's gotten so much easier since she'd began to teach herself not to argue against them. No matter how silly they sounded at first blush.
She turns the faucet on the wall towards her and water instantly cascades from the shower head. Power spray, her favorite setting. She steps into the stall and slides shut the curtain dotted with turtles, fish, and frogs croaking on lily pads. The shower starts out cold as melted ice, good for a quick cool-down after a long day under the sun. Shhhhh, the shower whispers in her ears, enveloping her in a weighted blanket of suds. Little by little, the pulses massaging her flesh grow warm, steam fogging her vision and misting every glass surface in the room.
The orchid loves when the bathroom gets like this. It is why Aina had chosen to hang it here. Many claim that orchids are difficult to care for. But maybe they say that because they lack the patience to meet the particular needs of these flowers? Indirect light from a window to the east (or west). A open bark-based compost that drains well, placed above a tray of gravel to maintain humidity. Water in the morning, with misting in the summer.
If orchids are worth the effort it takes to raise them...surely she is, too? This was what Elliott had meant to say when he'd picked it for her.
Shane's like an orchid, too. An' so's Abigail an' Leah an' Sebastian, she muses as she lathers her body with soap. Shea butter with honey and spice berry. A special concoction she'd made for herself, with Maru's chemical expertise. An' you, Elliott. You're like an orchid, too. Rare. Beautiful inside an' out. An' way tougher than you look!
Many say you should limit showers to five minutes to conserve water. Aina, for all her love and concern for the earth, has been guilty of taking at least twice that much time to bathe. That is, when she'd been living alone and sleeping in an empty bed. These days, she's managed to shave her showers down to six or seven minutes. Another goal to thank Elliott for helping with. And Abigail, when she and Sebastian come home from their latest expedition. She times herself by singing a folk song Grandpa taught her on the harp.
******
Donned in only her bathrobe and silk bonnet, Aina flops on the bed, spreading her arms and legs out like a sea star in the tide pools near Elliott's cabin. The departing sunlight seeps through the single window above the headboard and lingers along the wall before fading away. Around this time, Anzu saunters in, her thin orange striped tail standing erect over the rest of her body. Aina can tell it's Anzu before seeing her because of the jingle from the silver sleigh bell the cat wears on her collar. An alarm for the wild birds Anzu would sometimes stalk on the property.
"Anzu...hi, baby girl," coos Aina, rolling her head to the right just so to glance at Anzu's tail and the pointed tips of her twitching ears over the mattress. "Didja miss Momma?"
To Aina's half-relief and half-disappointment, Anzu doesn't jump up to join her on the pillows. She is making her evening rounds, ensuring everything and everyone is where they should be. If only in her own mind, she is a tigress, the guardian of this territory. She leaves as quietly as she comes.
Anzu, Nori, the coop, the barn, the bats, the fish, the bees, Hamakaze (her horse, currently traveling with Abigail)...they are all her children. She likes to think of her animals as her children, at least. They do depend a lot on her, and they love her without condition. (When her campaign for mayor had crashed and burned, they were the ones who had first kept her from jumping into the river when she could not bring herself to face her fellow human beings. She had even refused to see Elliott at the time, ashamed of having made him look like a fool for supporting her.
Still, he did not give up on her. He had waited until the end of winter for her return. For that, he'll always have a room in her heart.)
Long ago, Aina had released her desire for motherhood, determined to instead leave a legacy of community and stewardship. And love. Love, above all else. She had warned Elliott she was unlikely to ever change her mind about the matter. He had agreed; being five years older than she and having never sought children of his own, she would have to trust him not to change his mind about it, either.
The ticking clock on her right tells her it's 6:45, the mechanical rooster perched on it resting til morning. Except for it, the hum of the air conditioner, and the shuffle of dishes and utensils from the kitchen, the house is silent. Inhaling from her belly and exhaling from her nose, she dozes, adrift on a raft on the river of dreams. It doesn't matter to her if her dinner gets a little cold. Elliott is more than welcome to eat his fill without her.
"Aina...Turtledove..."
A rich baritone she knows well calls to her. It's 7:45 when she stirs to the scent of vanilla and pomegranate, and the sensation of lips peppering her face and neck. A warm, familiar weight rests on her. It's none other than her beloved Elliott, his elbows and knees propped on the sides of her body.
He purrs, "You smell sweet, my dear. Like a honeycomb drifting on a pool of spice tea."
Aina's arms instinctively wrap around him. "Mmm, that's th' soap you smellin'," she murmurs, discovering to her pleasant surprise that Elliott is naked except for the apron he has on. The pink one with a single red kiss mark and the words Kiss the Cook embroidered on it in cursive. It complements his tan complexion.
"Mmm, I waited an hour, as you asked. How are you feeling?"
"Heehee...much more r'laxed, thank you. Didja eat?"
He nuzzles her. "Yes. But I'm still hungry. For you." His emphasis on that last word awakens that geyser in her belly she prays never dries up.
"Is'at right? W-well...ha, that gives me an idea. There any more fruit salad left?"
"Plenty. And two crab cakes with two lemon wedges. As you like them. I've brought your meal to bed."
"An' water?"
"One pitcher of ice-cold water. Infused with our very own oranges! All seeds have been saved."
"Good man! Up, please."
Elliott rolls over to her left, giving her the space she needs to reach for the plate on the nightstand. Shrugging her bathrobe off her frame, Aina sits up and grabs the bowl to stir the salad: a toss of blueberry, melon and peach with a cup of white wine and vanilla bean. A recipe from straight out of the Queen of Sauce's cookbook. All the while, her chest bubbles with giggles, the rest of her simmering with anticipation.
"My, ah, my orchid needs waterin'. I mean this orchid." She points to the folds between her spread legs. The pepper-red flush radiating across Elliott's face is adorable. The way his breath hitches, how his teeth catch the left half of his lower lip, tempt her to take his face and press it into her then and there.
Instead, she hums the tune of "Pleasant Memory," the song that had played when they'd danced together for the first time at the Flower Dance. She stirs a few more circles into the salad before lifting the spoon to slide it from her collar all the way down to the dip between her belly and crotch. The spoon leaves a sticky path of syrup in its wake, its chill tickling her spine enough for her back to arch while the scent of wine and vanilla wafts over the two of them like a billowing veil. Once satisfied with her painting, Aina dips back into the bowl to scoop up a single blueberry. She tucks it into her navel.
All the while, she can feel Elliott's left hand squeezing her hip, having reached beneath her raised thighs for it. From the way his fingertips press into her flesh, it must be taking a lot for him to restrain himself. His right hand smooths the path between her neck and the bottom of her ribcage. This is a good part of what love is about. Trusting someone enough to let them touch you in places where they could kill you if they only wanted. And them trusting you in turn.
After a pause, she reaches back into the bowl to scoop out a nice chunk of melon, then two slices of peach. Easing back into the bed, she carefully places one slice of peach in the dip above her crotch and the melon in the valley between her breasts. "There." A straight path to her orchid with three enticing fruits of the summer. No need to over-complicate the game with detours.
One luxurious shower, only to get dirty and sticky again so soon...ah, but such is life! Besides, she's the one paying the water bill.
She shifts a bit toward her right to place the bowl and spoon back on the nightstand. She pinches the second slice of peach in the fingers on her right hand like a cigarette while Elliott watches with pupils blown so wide that they nearly swallow the green of his irises. Her left hand reaches over to comb Elliott's rich auburn locks. "Reckoned we, ah, oughta get your mouth waterin' fore you start waterin' me, ahaha. Follow this path. Start at my lips. Kiss all th' way down to, um...my other lips. Heeheehee!"
"Oh, you temptress!"
"Nah. 'Temptress' makes it sound like I'm tryna trick you. No tricks here. Only treats."
"Might wanna, ah, tie back your hair 'fore you start. Unless you don' mind gettin' it messy..."
"On it!" Well! He must have been thinking about this all day, for sure enough she spots the scrunchie around his wrist. Sitting up, he slides it off to tie it into place around his locks behind his head. His hair makes a loose horsetail shimmering under the glow of the lamp, swishing back and forth over his defined shoulder and back muscles. "And here I'd come expecting to seduce you."
"Ah, but you have, Elliott! Got me food an' drink, didn' ya? Gave me my space. You take care o' me. Ahahaha...ain't nothin' sexier a man can do than show a woman she's safe with 'im. Show 'er he cares. I'm...mighty lucky to've got you," she coos before setting the second piece of peach between her teeth, wiggling it lightly in her jaws to entice him. As if she's ever needed to.
"Turtledove, the honor is mine!"
He swims up to her and plucks the fruit from her teeth with his own, splashing juice across her lips as he slices it in two with his incisors. The piece left in her mouth is small enough for her to crush between her tongue and palate before swallowing it. "Chew-n-swallow, darlin'," she murmurs with a lick of her lips. "No need to rush."
The last time they'd tried incorporating food into their sexual routine, Elliott had gotten too hasty in his passion and almost choked on a strawberry she'd tried feeding him with her mouth. Aina had managed to save Elliott with some abdominal thrusts, but the ordeal had left him with a bruised abdomen and a cracked rib, both caught by the good doctor Harvey when she took him to the clinic afterwards. Since then, they've made a vow to take food play, like everything else about their sex life, nice and slow.
Nodding, Elliott obeys. With her hand pressed on his sternum, over his fluttering heart, she won't let him proceed otherwise. (He'd also rather not crack another rib in his lifetime if it can be helped.) He swallows louder than usual, signaling his eagerness to continue. In the next heartbeat, he descends on her waiting mouth, traces of peach and crab lingering in his taste as their tongues trace each other in greeting. He's bound to get syrup on him as he narrows the gap between their bodies, sandwiching her between the mattress and his own body. Ah well, she thinks as she clings to his back.That's what the apron's for!
Her callused fingertips till short, crooked rows into his toned flesh. Not sharp or deep enough to cut. Her nails are too short and blunt to cut, her fingers too rounded. But her scratching encourages him all the same. The next thing she knows, he's gliding down the length of her body, swirling warm wet circles along her skin with his tongue as he licks away the trail of syrup. Each stroke sends a flurry of sparks along her spine, her back arching beneath her to catch them as her voice dissolves into coils of giggles and moans.
When he gets distracted and starts comparing her dusky, hardening nipples to fairy roses, she squeezes her breasts together, using the curves of her mounds to roll the chunk of melon up to him. "L-less talkin', more lickin', please!" Always a gentleman, he responds best to orders punctuated with a "please." Or a "thank you."
Not that she doesn't enjoy hearing him talk. Most of the time, she does! But there's a time to converse, and then there's a time to act. This is a time for action.
When he reaches her navel, he rolls the blueberry around with his tongue for a bit before scooping it in his jaws, taking his sweet time to caress the tender skin around her belly for how ticklish she is there. She almost hammers him with her heels for the effort. Not because she doesn't like what he's doing, but because she does, ahhhh, so very much! Her strong reflexes to his touch is a risk he's happy to take.
Finally, he slurps up the slice of peach tumbling around the edges of the bush covering her "orchid." As he always does, he pauses to inhale her aroma like he'll suffocate without it. Though the sweetest man she's ever met, Elliott is far freakier than he looks during the day!
Then Aina reaches down to gently tug on his ponytail.
"Mmm, what is it, Honeycomb?" he mumbles into her groin. "Something wrong?"
"N-nah! Jus' need us t' drink some water. Make sure ya swish it 'round your mouth real good!"
"O-oh, right!"
They always have water on hand when oral sex is on the menu. Really, when sex in bed is on the menu. It rinses the palate, replaces precious fluid, cues one up to pee afterwards to flush out the pelvis. It's one of those small yet vital things few people think about in the pursuit of good sex. For few things say "I love you" better than helping a lover prevent bladder infections.
Aina slides up the bed enough to pour two servings of water. The first, she gulps down, the hints of orange soothing one of her thirsts. The second, she hands to him in the same glass she'd drank from. As she watches him swish and gargle and swallow, she considers taking out an ice cube from the pitcher and sliding it down his back--even tucking it into the crack between his glutes. A harmless prank. But she quickly sets the idea aside. Her orchid really needs his attention, now. It flares for it. Plus, the weatherman has said it's likely to rain all day tomorrow. There will be plenty of time to tease him with ice cubes, then.
Elliott hands the glass back to her. "Thank you, Honeycomb," he purrs with a thorough lick of his lips that sets her hairs on end. "Now, to tend to you..."
He hooks her hands around her thighs, guides her toward his head and ohhhh yes, that's th' spot!
No matter how many times he's kissed her clit--or, if she should keep comparing her vulva to an orchid, her "column"--she reacts the same, without fail: by humping his face as hard as he'll let her, just like she'd caught two of her rabbits (both girls) doing that afternoon. Already, she's towering over him, one hand burying fingers through his luscious auburn hair and the other tugging on his makeshift ponytail. Her vision blurs as those familiar waves of pleasure she will never, ever tire of lap at her core in rhythm with Elliott's lips and tongue.
"Ah, ah, now, now, darling!" he chuckles against her petals. "I adore your enthusiasm, but I-I'm not sure I can please you properly if you keep that up. How about this~?" His hands, warm and full and partly leather from all his writing and help around the farm, glide about her thighs until they find the undersides of her knees. Once they do, they hook there and fold her legs back until her kneecaps dab at her breasts. At this angle, she's more pinned down. She's exposed to him in every sense of the word.
But she is not frightened, for she is safe with him. He won't let anything happen to her that she wouldn't enjoy. In this position, her ruts become slow and shallow. With the rest of her feverish body undulating against the mattress, she clings to his head like he's her anchor in this sea of ecstasy he's lulled her into. "Ah, E-Elliott...oh, Ellie, yes! Yes, please, yes~!"
Sometimes, he compares her to the Sun itself, showering light and warmth on all who are lucky enough to share her world, himself included. She's still not sure about all that, maybe she never will be...but if they're going to compare each other to celestial things, then Elliott is like the Moon. Constant. Gentle. Unassuming when the world is bright, but whose true beauty shines forth in the darkness. And as the Moon draws the tides, so too does he draw her waters. And her breath.
Elliott leaves not one fold untouched, pausing only to pant for air or to spit out any hair that catches in his mouth. For as much sweet time as he takes with this, he switches his technique just when Aina starts to fall comfortable with the sensations. He swipes his tongue inside her while nuzzling her clit. Then he takes to tracing letters across her petals and clit. She could swear he's spelling Forever yours, in all capitals, on her flesh. She answers back with a cry, tears of joy beading her cheeks and beneath her ears.
Her heart flutters and swells with enough warmth to raise her toward her first climax of the night.
The next few climaxes she hits are small but no less delightful, like sailing over the chops of the tide on a breezy summer's day. At some point, her legs melt into jelly. "Oh, m-my legs," she whimpers, all shame vanished with the day. "I can't..."
Elliott, ever considerate, lowers them along the bed while keeping them spread wide enough for him to continue. All the while, he slurps her up like how he does an especially tasty bowl of Tom Kha soup. And all the while, her moaning laughter cheer him on. Her eyes squeeze shut as she lets herself float on the tides, the darkness behind her eyelids as warm and cozy and orange as he is.
Suddenly, he slows down. His tongue and nose disappear. "A-Aina...look at me?" he gasps against her skin.
Her watering eyes fly open. She lifts up just enough to lock eyes with him. What a sight to behold! Between her legs, he looks intoxicated. His eyes glazed over and heavy, his whole face glossy and pink, his hair partly escaping its bind from where she's been clutching it. He's as hot to the touch as she's become.
There are exactly two circumstances in which she's seen him wear this face. One, when he's indulged in too much ale. The other...
"M-my tongue's beginnin' to cramp," he slurs. The way his tongue pokes out haphazardly from his mouth confirms his complaint. "May I use my fingers?"
Aina nods frantically. "Ah yes, yes please! Jus' one more, please! One more...!"
It's Elliott's turn to nod against her, his strong chin rolling deep in her folds to and fro and over her clit while he curls two fingers inside her. The foaming chops rippling through her swell into tidal waves, washing her mind clean of coherent thought.
(Once, during her first winter in the valley, Aina dug up a note while spelunking in the mines. About Elliott. And about Shane and Harvey, too. Perhaps a scrapped dating ad written by a concerned friend hoping to see the three find love despite their age and imperfections? The writer had described Harvey as "anxious and weak," yet had also promised he'd make "a loyal and devoted husband." Shane had been described as "messy and antisocial," whose "gruff exterior" shielded "his softness from the world."
Aina would find she could not return Harvey's feelings for her, and her romance with Shane would not work out for reasons neither could fix in the end. Nevertheless, she'd learned in her own time the writer had been truthful about both of them. As far as male friends go, she could not ask for better than them.
As for Elliott...the anonymous writer had called him "foppish and melodramatic" but in possession of "a nice chin." Not an incorrect statement, but it had struck her at the time as awfully shallow compared to the summaries of the other two men. If Elliott's chin had been the most important redeeming quality the writer could make out, then they must not have spent enough time with him to see the rest of what he has to offer!
Indeed, it was this detail that had made Aina suspect the note had been written by Marnie, a pining romantic in her own right. Shane is her nephew; Harvey, her doctor. Of course Marnie would know their personalities far better than she'd know Elliott's, having had no business with him before he and Aina had gotten together.
Regardless of all that, the writer's comments about Elliott's marvelous chin had been an understatement!)
He strokes her from the inside in tandem with his nodding. The raspberry he blows on her mound is her undoing, his soaking vibrations magnified by her clit before they rattle the rest of her. Her final orgasm for the night lifts her up like a tsunami before crashing over her, her insides tumbling over and over as Elliott keeps her fastened to the bed by her left hip. Dizzy with tears and hoarse with laughter, she presses his head to her orchid as tightly as she can, just faintly aware of the muffled groan pouring out from him.
"I love you!" she sobs. "I love you I love you I love you...oh, I love you...my Elliott...!"
Then, except for their collective gasping and the crickets beyond the window, the room hums with a tranquil quiet. The tides that had rocked Aina's body in all directions start to recede. They are back on shore. Elliott's breath on her petals, his dampened hands smoothing her mound and thighs and hips, ground her. Loosening her grip on him, she clumsily combs his hair.
With a sniff, Aina reopens her eyes, shrugging each shoulder against a cheek to dry her tears. "Ah...that was wonderful!" she sighs, her face stretching from ear to her with a smile. "You...you're so good t' me...so right..."
"Mm-hm..."
"Haaaah...ahahaha! Awright, come on back up here. Now I-I'll water your orchid!"
"Oh. My turn, now? Um...thank you, love! But that won't be necessary..."
Regaining control of her muscles, she starts to sit up to regard her man. "Huh? Wha'cha mean you don' need me t' treat you? S'only fair, ain't it? Gotta be hard as a rock by n--oh."
Elliott sluggishly rubs the sides of his face against her trembling thighs. Aina gropes the curves of his head until they find his bottom jaw, flushed and wet from all his hard work. A closer look into his eyes reveals that dazed, dopey smile he gets whenever he--
"Ah! Well, I'll be! You came, too? But--but you done had your hands only on me this whole time! I thought that was just a myth!"
He clears his throat, his eyes watering as much as hers. "Well...I have heard in certain circles that one's mind is the most sexually charged part of the body. And, can you blame me? When you are so beautiful, and I love you so very much...and your voice and your taste are so exquisite...!"
"Oh, Elliott! I love you, too!" The future may never be guaranteed, but she's certain of this much: she will never, ever grow tired of saying those words. "C'mere, you~!"
She helps him back into bed and out of the apron, where sure enough she spots the wet spots on the inside of it where Elliott had spilled his seed. The pit in her belly glows with a new gush of heat at the sight of the mess he's splashed across his soft, hairy one. To think he can get off just from thinking about her, from pleasuring her...is nothing less than a wonder!
With all the tenderness she can summon, she lays him down beside her, shaking the scrunchie out of his hair. With the soiled apron, she wipes him clean, trading languid kisses with him as she does. She can taste vanilla and orange and her own salt on his lips.
Stroking his left side, she traces a finger down the length of his now flaccid cock when he crosses her legs, blocking her.
"Er, not now, love. It's sensitive," he explains with a wince. "And not in a good way."
"Awww. But I like playin' with your orchid," she replies, reaching for him again when his legs lower back onto the bed, this time to fondle his balls. It's difficult for her to restrain herself, when they look so soft and squishy...
He crosses his legs again, tighter. "I-I'm sorry, darling! But you really mustn't! You can, uh, try me again in the morning."
"Heehee! What a coincidence! Weatherman said it was gonna rain all day t'morrow. I don' got much to do, then, an' Abigail an' Sebastian ain't due back for another two days...I was thinkin' we oughta spend th' whole day makin' love! What d'ya say?"
Elliott's gaze would probably look a lot more smoldering as he'd meant it to be if it wasn't for that grin he puts on when he gets excited. The one that lights up his eyes, lengthens the lines etched by the corners of them and along his mouth. But, if only at this moment, she is prudent enough not to point them out, because he hates any and all suggestion of looking older. Last fall, he'd lamented having spotted a single gray hair while brushing his locks.
To which Aina had said, "Ah well, lotsa things get better with age, don't they? Like wine an' cheese an' teas an' trees, an' people. An' anyway, I'm gettin' older, too! Do I look any worse for it? ... Ha! Didn' think so."
"A most delightful proposal!" he cheers, snuggling her into his full, fuzzy chest. In his embrace, she peppers his blushing face and neck with kisses. Her fingers wander to trace his nipples. His natural musk is every bit as delicious as he says hers is.
She only pulls away from him three times more that night: to share with him another glass of water, to gobble up the crab cakes (lemon wedges and all, to his continued astonishment!), and to take her turn using the toilet before him (he'd insisted she go first, ever a gentleman). The rest of the fruit salad, she decides, can stay on the bedside for tomorrow. A few hours in the open air won't hurt it. Deeming the sheets too warm, she kicks them off the bed, content with the velvety skin-on-skin contact only her lover can provide. Hips to hips, belly to belly, heart to heart, their imperfect fit is closest enough to perfect for them.
They fall asleep while combing one another's hair, Aina humming by his ear the tune of "Pleasant Memory". The song follows her into her dreams, wherein she spots two sand dunes on a pristine beach, at the end of a trail of grasses whose edges are laced with salt. Elliott waits for her in between the dunes with his adoring smile and both hands stretched to her in beckoning. The instant she grabs him, they intertwine, morphing into two orchids bathed in the sunset. Two orchids who now have everything they could want from life, including each other.