Chapter 8: Eden
"Les parfums, les couleurs et les sons se respondent"
Charles Baudelaire
i.
Catskills, New York has been known as a perfect getaway for New Yorkers – people who are constantly surrounded by sky scrapers and concrete pavements; lines of hustle restaurants and lines of hustle strangers on the streets.
Catskills is beautiful, with the ordinary beauty of a mountainous area: printed onto the sky is the splendid line of brown mountains reflecting on a perfectly calm and sparkling lake beneath; there, a lonely boardwalk would stand, waiting for a far –away boat to come back from its little trip; and hidden behind the line of bulky trees are the lovely inns and cottages in the perfect tradition of a quiet and peaceful England country site.
He chooses a white cottage in Forestburgh with sinuous strings of ivies and blue – shuttered windows, along with a perfectly trimmed bush of pink lilacs at the front. A small garden with purplish flowers at the back of the house is the final touch.
"Come on, old man, I don't have all day!" – His girl says with a frown on her beautiful face and a huff before dragging her bag and walks with a brisk pace into the cottage.
He recalls the times they made love during the trip – that one time under the oak tree, and the times he made love to her in many different ways, with his kisses, his hand on her lively thighs, his fingers tangling in her hair. Humbert Humbert and little Lolita had their own little trip across the states, and God knows that man had had Lolita – time after time – with an aching heart and an utter adoration for the little girl with brown hair.
The noble and artistique Monsieur Hudson thinks about a long journey with his very own brunette darling, crossing the lines and dots on some old maps with folded corners and having a stack full of used tourist guides, with a box packed with souvenirs at the backseat of his 1956 Morris Minor 1000 while singing along with some old tunes on the radio, stopping every once in a while for food or making love under the stars.
Wishful thinking – the wing of poetry, mastered by Monsieur Hudson.
ii.
He thinks she knows men want her. He thinks she knows the way men look at her. She wears a tight sweater that shows the skin above her belly – button, and a skirt with its waist high enough to cover the rest. He doesn't miss the way she smiles at the guy at the other table, or the way she brushes her fingers lightly with the charming waiter with his hair combed back and slick with gel, or the way she rests her chin on her hand and pouts her lips in a child – like way as she looks up at him when she listens to him talk. Or the way she wraps her hair around her tapering finger and plays with it.
When they're back at their cottage, he presses her face on the door as soon as they're both inside. With one hand kneading her breast from behind, he lets the other seek its way inside her panties and plunges his fingers inside her without any warning. She lets out a scream – a combination between pain and pleasure, he guesses. "You're not wet enough" – he breaths into her ear and bites her neck, then sooths it with his tongue. She reaches back to tug at his hair, but he slaps her hands away and keeps them above her head with one hand, while fondling her breasts with the other.
"Finn… What…" – She's panting now, rubbing her knees together.
"Tell me that you're mine, baby. Tell me." – His fingers pushing in her with a quicker pace, while he rubs his loin in her lower back.
No words, just moans.
"Tell me." – He frees his cock and without any warning, pushes inside of her and starts thrusting with force.
"Ah…Don't stop…"
"Tell me! Tell me you're mine." – Thrust after thrust, he does it differently this time. No holding back. No restrains. Just unbridled lust and perhaps, rage.
He must be hurting her hands and her arms with the way he holds them, but he doesn't care. Neither does she.
He comes with a growl, and she follows moments later.
"Tu es à moi (You're mine)" – He whispers, more to himself than to her, while still thrusting into her before pulling out and letting her hands free.
She turns around and cups his face in her hands before kissing his sweaty forehead.
iii.
They decide to go for a walk after that.
She takes a blanket with her and he carries the vinyl record player he gave her for her birthday and their picnic basket before walking towards the spot she mentioned when they first arrived at Forestburgh, which according to her, is "étonnant (amazing)".
She was right.
The place that the innocent picnic date between Monsieur Hudson with little Rachie will happen is a high grove looking across the lake, hidden behind the dark line of pine and cypress – a clandestine getaway; perfect for any affectionate caresses that Monsieur will probably shower little Rachie with.
He lays the blanket down on the grass and listens to the grating noise when her lovely body lies on it. She sweeps her hair over her shoulder to let the breeze kiss on the magnificent skin at her neck, and turns to look at him with such tenderness that drives him mad.
In front of them, Claude Monet's "Sunset" is being painted with the subtle interplay of colors: red, yellow, white, pink – all shimmering and dancing together gracefully as the air is filled with nervous and warm scent of wet grass and August flowers.
She lets out sighs – the kind of sigh of young girls make when they think about something. She sings softly to the resonant music from the party at the cottage on the other side of the lake – a familiar tune of one of those cheesy songs which Monsieur Hudson can never tell apart.
He lies down on the blanket with her; she bends her legs slightly to make some room, while continuing her soft singing. Her hand creeps towards his, its slender fingers caressing his rough ones, before she intertwines them together.
He sits up on his elbows, kisses her parted lips softly before nudging her mouth open with his tongue. One hand is feeling the splendid curves of her body, while the other's kneading her breast. He takes his time, licking at her neck and she twitches when he bites on her hot ear lobe. He pulls the loose spaghetti – straps of her blue playsuit off her brown shoulder, his fingers slowly make their way to her areola; he draws circles on her skin and plays with her nipple carefully and tenderly, before pinching and twisting it slightly. His darling lets out a whimper; she rubs her knees together impatiently, squirming under his weight. He pulls the upper half of the playsuit and gathers it around her waist – there, he feels her ribs moving – then tugs her nipple before sucking it until her impatience wears thin and she pounds her fist on his back to get him to where she wants him most.
His hand travels south and when it finds what it seeks, he plunges his fingers into her immediately – he shivers as her juice coaxes his fingers, he feels the clenching of her walls. He studies the look on her face – with her eyes shut, her lips parting slightly, her nostrils flaring as she breathes in.
He replaces his fingers with his tongue – he probes and licks, he plunges it inside her, almost violently as she keeps squirming and moaning.
When puts his cock inside her, she's still sensitive from her first orgasm; but almost immediately, she wraps her legs around his waist and urges him to go faster, go harder with her biting his ear lobe. His thrusts are stronger this time; his pace is quicker this time. He listens to her body, he listens to the sound of their skin slapping against each other; he's kissing her when they come.
Under the shade of pine and cypress trees, they lie together, spent. He wraps his arms around her naked torso to pull her closer, and he can see the arabesque of dancing lights coming from the windows of other cottages behind the slender – leaved trees.
He whispers into her warm hair:
"Je n'ai pas oubli é, voisine de la ville (I have not forgotten our white cottage),
Notre blanche maison, petite mais tranquille (Small but peaceful, near the city);
Sa Pomone de plâtre et sa veille Vénus (Its plaster Ponoma, its old Venus)
Dans un bosquet ché tif cachant leurs members nus (Hiding their bare limbs in a stunted grove)…"(*)
He strokes her hair as he always does whenever they lay together, his fingers caressing her back, now smooth and wet with sweat, feeling the femininity of the outline of her shoulders. Her breath tickles his bare skin, a moan escapes her lips as his hands move to love her lower back. In the very placid moment of this affair – the first and the last of his – he knows that he will love her, this Rachel, his Rachel, standing 5 foot 3 in the morning*(1), Rachel – an insolent brat, Rachel – a skilled lover, Rachel – the little child with a heart made from fire. Oh, there is no Rachel that he would not love.
She sits up to pull her playsuit back on – he sees the perfect outline of her upper body under the dimming light. The sight is too much for him. He wishes he could bottle up the moment and brings it to his grave – this Rachel, his Rachel*(2).
He takes her hand and walks with her to the lake. She dips one foot into the water and jumps when she realizes it's too cold. One, two, three times – she does it again until her body gets used to the temperature. Then she sits down, putting both of her lively legs into the water before pulling him down with her. She leans her head on his bare shoulder, swinging her legs and watches in amazement as the movements of her legs creating waves on the surface.
She keeps humming when he plants kisses all over her body and makes love to her again with his mouth at her clit. She doesn't have a chance to finish the song though.
iv.
"Why are you looking at me like that?"
"I'm waiting for you."
"Waiting for me to do what?"
"Leave me."
She rolls her eyes and sticks her tongue out at him, "Why do you always speak like that?"
"Rachel."
"Hmm?"
"I love you."
"I know, you've told me that, about a hundred times when we fuck."
He's afraid to ask her if she loves him or not, because he doesn't think he can handle the truth.
"Finn?"
"Qui, mon cheri?"
"Sing for me."
"Here we are, out of cigarettes
Holding hands and yawning,
Look how late it gets.
Two sleepy people by dawn's early light,
And too much in love to say goodnight…"
She falls asleep in his arms, quietly, calmingly.
He wraps the blanket around them and looks at her face, at her soot – black long lashes and her high cheekbones, her swollen lips and the dew drop on her nose.
v.
It's raining when they leave Forest burgh.
He drives and drives, until Forest burgh becomes nothing but a blurry image of pine trees, of purplish little flowers, of a blue – shuttered white cottage and a beautiful dancing Nymph.
Her fathers are standing there – they must have been waiting for them for quite some time – when Finn and Rachel arrive at his building.
tbc
…::::…..
A/N:
Thank you every one who has read and left lovely reviews for "Creep". I know I say it all the time, but I DO appreciate every single one of them! (^x^). Thank you CJ and Danielle (^v^)
I just created a Tumblr account, , so please go check it out guys!
(*): "Je n'ai pas oubli é, voisine de la ville" by Charles Baudelaire, English translation by William Aggeler, The Flowers of Evil (Fresno, CA: Academy Library Guild, 1954)
*(1): "standing four feet ten in one sock" (Lolita, Vladimir Nabokov)
*(2) : Humbert Humbert repeated this phrase multiple times in "Lolita", (this Lolita, my Lolita) – Finn was making reference to the novel and drew the parallel between him and Humbert Humbert.
Song: "Two Sleepy People" – Seth MacFarlane (yep, Family Guy) and Norah Jones.
Til next time my lovelies! Kisses and hugs!