The Abstract Tattoo

Chapter One “Breathe!” My back arched. “Rhythm.” My thighs straddled the man’s hips. I pushed down. My ache is insatiable. The desire is unquenchable. My eyes glanced at the erotic impressionist painting on the wall. “Breathe!” I whispered again. “‘I’ve never, I’ve never…” He gasped. “Jesus!” “Are you okay?” “Oh god, who are you?” he grimaced with pleasure. Smiling, I thought of Parvati, the goddess of relationships. Matriarchy was the answer to the divisive nature emanating from patriarchy. Me? I’m physically and spiritually an ambiguous nymph and goddess possessing an androgynous attitude. I have an exceptional c**t. It’s who I am. I don’t know how to explain it other than an awareness of my two spirits. I embrace the feminine divine. I’m also Egyptian. And I happen to be Illegitimate. My father? I once asked my mother who just smiled and said, “Reine Sharifa, you brighten my day.” I know my voice and my heart. Schooled in biology and philosophy I appreciate the protein of my heredity. How else can I explain the two spirits within my body? An abstract art object I received at the death of a friend and the abstract tattoo that arrived with me at birth. Both are symbolic of my traits. My body gyrated. The grip tightened. The man’s chest heaved. “Christ help me,” He gasped. “Relax. Relax.” Colleagues at the New York Goddess Circle grasped the tattoo’s meaning. A caring, dominant, ethical nurturing slut were phrases used to describe me. I would just grin. Measuring a person by a temperature reading is crude, amusing and familiar. I relished a throbbing c**k inside my p***y. Depending on the man I could be a c**k w***e for him. The eyelids of my one-night stand twitched. His breathing was quite heavy. He knew obedience. I want a man to feel his submission to me. Bliss. When I was younger I sought affirmation. Self-confidence. I reached a point when I woke up one morning realizing I no longer needed or desired affirmation. If it came, I was gracious, otherwise, f**k it. I had already accepted my worth. My mantra was from Egyptian and Hebrew theology - I am what I am. It’s a universal saying among the ancients and becomes hypnotic if repeated. Much like everything else in life. My empathy, lust and compassion are instinctual. I care in my own way. Beads of sweat dripped from my protruding brown n*****s, dripped down over my visible stomach pouch and disappeared into an entangled, luxurious covering of my divine wetness. My heart beat more from angst than the night of desire. My bare papaya shaped breasts still hungered for the attention of a truly ravenous tongue. While my body felt the heat of the moment, my mind drifted. I tilted my head back and gazed at the ceiling for a second. Straddling the man, his thick c**k wrapped in animal skin, the quiet of the hotel room was punctured by an abrupt spasm of heavy breathing. He shuttered. My suitor’s ecstasy bathed his fat, bowed shaft, now drained of its milky fluid. Sympathetically, I looked down at his distorted face. Eyes closed, he gasped for another breath in s****l agony. I lifted my dripping femininity from him. Soft and tired, he slid out from the trickling wetness. His balding head fell back on the soft oversized pillow, eyelids closed involuntarily over large brown eyes as his chest expanded then contracted. He was semi-conscious and experiencing a form of s****l exhaustion. His fatigue was temporary. My eyes felt the sting of a forming tear. Why? I quickly wiped the saltiness away with a finger. The sensuous pressure inside me, the rubbing against my petite c**k shaped c**t, the titillating feeling, satisfied the surface of my libidinous desires. It was a minute feeling. I enjoy the girth though I relish a man who knows how to use his tongue. The thicker the tongue the better. The sonorous tapestry of a cunnilingual orgasm can haunt my mind. Still, I find the arousal of the intellect imperishable. The taste buds of an orgasmic event remains a thought away. Still, I wanted something I didn’t have. Perhaps it existed only in my imagination. I wanted the emotional comfort of a partner waiting for me at home while enjoying the reality of my internal wiring and external behavior. I became a familiar woman with an insatiable s****l instinct. I like the taste of sweat. An ache seeped into my heart. The ache was for a man who was in another part of the city. Up to this point my s****l liaisons were pragmatic and negotiated. They were unsigned provisional aphrodisiacs where the partners agree to an erotic act. And increasingly they were like the rain clouds that dissipates after its release of moisture, a dampness ensued but never enough. I enjoy diverse partners. I missed a primary partner who would greet me in my home. A deeper connection. And yet I wanted my lovers on the side. As I mature I probably have become more selfish and yet, still I love to nurture. I moved my body down next to him for several minutes, I listened to him breathe. Eyes shut, the man’s body was still, until suddenly he turned toward me, and his mushroom head fell on the edge of my thigh. He would survive. And my extrusive phallus c**t hungered for a man not in the room. In the brevity of a breath an emptiness enveloped my heart and then receded into a mist of hesitation and memory. My eyes gazed at the off-white ceiling. I was born backstage during a rehearsal of a saucy and amorous off-Broadway play. It was at the Cherry Lane Theater on Commerce Street in Manhattan. I grew up near Washington Square. My mother was an impassioned actress married to a man other than my father. Sharifa was my mother’s surname. Our family was live theater. And I came to know Manhattan as an unchaste offspring of exotic dancers who my mother told me were inspired by Terpsichore, the Greek Muse of dance and song. She also said to me, “Reine Sharifa, to be a credible actor in life you must learn to play the gender roles of both a woman or a man.” And then would add, oral performance is a life skill for both genders. “You’re a s****l being. And you are a natural leader. To know what and who you are may take what seems as a lifetime.” I matured young. My theatrical career didn’t last. I became acquainted with the city like a soothsayer examining the curved and splintered lines on the palm of my hand. There was no deeper meaning to the elusive reality of the theater in which I was exposed. I learned in the process there are no straight lines to a peculiar desire. I didn’t need to be physically inside a theater to be on stage. It was during my ever-evolving educational curve the previous night, on an unusually warm, rainy evening, when my desire began sketching the detailed character lines on my brain. I had ridden in a taxi that weaved in and out of the late hour traffic. The driver stopped at a corner for pedestrians crossing the street near St. Patrick’s Cathedral. A striking young woman held onto an umbrella as the wind and rain swirled around her body and the short skirt she was wearing rose above her waist. I noticed she wore a lavender colored crotch-less pantie, her trim p***y accentuated by a car’s headlights as if she was a nude dancer performing on a live stage. I half-smiled as the young woman didn’t appear embarrassed as much as flustered while managing her dilemma. She shrugged her shoulders and looked over at me and laughed. She reminded me of my youth. The wetness clung to her like a sweaty lover after hours of passion. I wondered if she was someone’s inamorata. And now here I am with a suitor I agreed to meet in the Café Carlyle on East 76th street down a block from Central Park. I thought of the sensuous woman crossing the street as vehicle lights from the street outside danced in bursts across the ceiling through the parted curtains of the hotel room. The tranquil was pierced with a grunt like snore of the man lying next to me. Minutes passed silently as I adjusted my body against the pillow without disturbing my suitor. His flaccidity weary from battle, partially retreated inside the condom which served as its transparent suit of armor. I shrugged trying to recall the person’s name my suitor uttered when his body shuddered and after he closed his eyes. Was it Rae or Ray, had he gasped? Was he referring to a man or woman? It didn’t matter. I breathed an anxious breath. The shiver of regret was altered by an unmet desire. I pinched my n*****s between my thumbs and forefingers. My thought was redirected to the other man, an associate professor at Columbia University. A confidant and friend at the university intimated to me, “You need to meet this man.” She texted me: “Here’s a recent photo of the man I spoke about to you. His name is Micah Zunge. He’s Jewish.” A sheet lightning lit up the room. My mind uttered “Micah!” My heart pounded as I recalled him in the flesh browsing among the books at a local bookstore. “Breathe!” I whispered to myself at the time. I watched him walk over to the adjoining coffee shop with a book in hand. My hand grazed the divide between my legs. I was wet. How could this happen with a man I had yet to meet? He turned his head in my direction. My heart raced. “Did he see me?” I stepped back. Catching sight of him was intense. It was more intense than I imagined. It wasn’t that he was handsome. He wasn’t. Rather he possessed a charisma – he appeared humble, with a searching presence as he leafed through a couple of books. He glanced up. He was professorial. I smiled. How can you tell if a man will submit to you? I sensed it. Call it a mixture of intuition and vision with the attitude displayed by his posture. I watched him for several minutes then departed as another man approached the table. The two men quickly became actively engaged in a conversation. As I walked away, I thought he looked over in my direction out of the corner of his eye. “I’m going to have you,” I murmured, as I exited the bookstore. My mind returned to the hotel bed. I stared at his face. His pudgy cheeks, and bulbous nose reminded me of squirrels in Central Park in the fall, stuffing their faces with acorns. My gaze traveled lower to his shaved body, pouched stomach and muscled calves, long arms and broad firm fingers were in stark contrast to his face. I took note of the solid gold bracelet on his wrist. It spoke of wealth, a wealth I was indifferent to. He was with me to satisfy his hunger. I also wanted to soothe my physical appetite. I’m oversexed. He was an alternate choice. There are some days I can’t get enough and other days it feels perfunctory, formulaic and meaningless like a plot-less porn film. I guess it’s the nature of life. What do I expect? I surmised the s*x was ultimately neither good nor bad for him. It was inadequate for me. My want and desire are more provocative. Breathing quietly, my inner voice meditated with mixed emotions. My reverie was interrupted by the distinct audible sound of another taxi’s horn seeping through the window from the street outside. I slipped out of bed and walked over to the window with its parted curtains and stretched my body as I looked out at the buildings across 76th Street. My bedmate stopped snoring, then started again. The experience with him was part of an informal business arrangement and was quickly vanishing into an alcove of my memory. I wanted to be loved and f****d emotionally as I fantasized about the man in the bookstore. I reached down and slipped my fingers into my warm divide and slowly pressed them against my engorged c**t that stood erect measured in inches. I like playing with it like a man who m*********s, prolonging the foreplay before reaching an orgasm. My n*****s hardened as I thought of the man I saw in the bookstore. With each thrust I pushed my long fingers in harder, vigorously massaging my c**t, moving deeper inside. My breathing became heavy. I could feel the man in the bookstore inside me. My eyes photographed him. He possessed a seeker’s look, like a curious minded foreign correspondent in some remote place digesting events around him, with longish hair and a provocative sexuality on display through his sensual, deep blue eyes and an unreadable smile. He was a banquet for which I sought to satisfy my insatiable hunger. I imagined him sucking my c**t. I thrust my fingers deeper, drenching them with my juices. I lusted for the distinguished humble stranger. I f****d him in my mind. The city outside paid no attention to my inner lust. My fingers gently played with my erect c**t as if I was m**********g a man. My body jerked. I took a deep breath. I moaned. Shuddering, the fluid dripped down my inner thighs. Exhaling, I raised my sticky fingers to my mouth and tasted my juices. I savored the flavor of the mild tasting, sweet climax. The man rolled over on the bed, his breathing punctuated again with a gasp. He was even more out of shape than I originally estimated. His body masked the lack of stamina. I tiptoed to the bathroom and looked in a mirror. I gazed at my statuesque figure and wiped the wetness from my p***y and thighs with tissue. The deep brown ringlets surrounding my mound were an expression of my natural self. I briefly gazed at my Mediterranean visage. On my lower left leg above my ankle was an abstract tattoo that hinted more about my heritage than what I confided with any particular lover. I was considered an exotic work of art from the men and women I slept with. I walked over to the closet and removed my charcoal pinstripe skirt, matching jacket, lavender blouse, and black lacey bra from a hanger next to his dark blue suit and dressed in the sound of snoring in the background. I applied a touch of Brazilian tan lipstick on my thick, soft lips then slid my feet into four-inch black ankle strapped heels. It was then I noticed a nametag on the nearby dresser. Leonard. I paused briefly and exited the room without looking back, carrying my leather satchel slung over my shoulder in the early morning hours down the hallway to the elevator, pressing the lobby button. Already crafting my next steps, I walked out of the boutique hotel on the Upper East Side of Manhattan and feeling the morning rain turned mist pour over my body. “Taxi!” I waved at a nearby vehicle. Getting in, “Tarrytown, please,” I said to the driver. He gazed in the rearview mirror. “Ok, lady,” Making his way into sparse traffic, I saw the knowing smile and bob of his head, counting the high dollar fare. “The shudder of an orgasm is simply measured by the instant of a memory like an exclamation mark. Memory?” I whispered looking out the taxi window. “Did you say something?” The taxi driver asked. “Talking to myself.” He shrugged, “So what’s new?” Glancing at the passing cityscape, it seemed of late I second-guessed the men I slept with - a glass of fine wine, soft words and a moan and offering my oral expertise after fifteen minutes of dancing. “Some days I’d rather be alone than be a participant in a liaison or rendezvous.” I whispered to myself. “If I want the universe to change I have to change.” Vera, my assistant, once counseled me, “You need a humble, compassionate intellectual who’s searching but not sure of what he is seeking. He has a grasp of his internal wiring, is a man of intense curiosity and willingly monogamous to your poly nature. Ask yourself, how many years did you spend in a disjointed marital union to the philandering narcissist you called a husband? He was a charismatic Manhattan lobbyist and financial wizard while you were a head nurse in an emergency room. Where did it get you? Your parents died during your honeymoon to the Bahamas. That was the first sign. And then years later a nervous breakdown, weight loss followed by weight gain. You were on pills for depression and vitamins for energy. Where did all the tears get you?” She answered her own question, “A divorce. A settlement.” I didn’t make out so bad. Yet, I pondered Vera’s frank words as the taxi jostled through traffic. A conversation with Dr. Sheila Chasteté, my friend at Columbia, came to mind. We belonged to the Goddess Circle. She went on occasion by the name of Dr. Sheila and suggested I needed to meet Micah Zunge, an associate professor of Medieval History at Columbia University, and close friend that might fancy my deeper passion and intellectual interests. “You both appear to me to be on the same field of inquiry, exploring the quirky terrain of relationships but have yet to find each other. Micah is a humble and lusty intellectual who has arrived at an emotional impasse. He seeks a special woman to guide him…a dominant feminine woman,” Dr. Sheila told me over a Manhattan during a late-night rendezvous at the Hamilton Bar on Amsterdam Avenue. Dr. Sheila looked at me, “Both Micah and my husband have similar levels of curiosity. Except my husband’s parents named him, Jean-Paul, after the French existentialist, Sartre. My husband hates the name Jean-Paul and what he represents. He prefers Albert Camus’ writings. I told him people could give a s**t. And in my husband’s case, he doesn’t know how to manage his instrument of pleasure in light of his exotic desires. The musical notes of his biological rhythm are flat. The result inevitably provoked a s****l void in my opinion. Whereas Micah, in my opinion, is from a different time – the Knight–errant from the Medieval Ages seeking a goddess who would offer a path to a satori or awakening. Micah is an unfinished canvas in that regard.” “I appreciate,” I said with a partial grin. The more I looked into Micah’s background, the more I wanted to know him. I thought of Dr. Sheila’s arrangement with her husband. I knew she experimented with chastity devices for men as she and others talked about the use of c**k cages at our meetings of the Goddess Circle. As I sat in the taxi watching buildings recede in the distance, I reflected on the intimate scenarios with the men and women I experienced - the hunger, thirst and avidity for the little details the enhanced the relationship even if it was one-night stand. “Micah,” I repeated his name when a billboard with a butterfly landing on a flower petal came into view. I smiled and reached for my cell phone checking the time, 6:00 a.m. I decided to make a call and then paused. I remembered Dr. Sheila telling me she was also an early riser. In my Columbia University contacts, several names were filed. Among them: Dr. Sheila Chasteté and Assoc. Prof. Micah Zunge that I had recently added to my contacts. I smiled at his name’s meaning. If my understanding of Hebrew was correct, then Micah translates into he who is like God, and Zunge…mm…perhaps a conspicuous tongue. “So, my dear Micah…” I mused to myself. “Micah, you’re an intriguing and humble man with a voice of your own.” Drops of rain speckled the window of the taxi as I glanced at the passing scenery. “Looks like we’re in for more rain, “ The taxi driver interrupted my thoughts. “It does look that way.” I said, wondering whether Micah was still asleep. I pressed the keys on my cellular phone.