“There I was: giving her both inches real good… wait, did I say both inches—I meant twelve, I was giving her all twelve inches, when…”


He sat in his motel armchair, and laughed to himself at the stupidity of it: the first line he wrote of a forum-style narrative he emailed to “win” the attention of a woman online he admired, a woman most men obsessed over. “Hell,” He thought, “I probably am too!”


He checked his watch for the dozenth time in the last hour. It was a new silver banded watch to go with the rest of his brand new outfit: dress blue shirt, khaki slacks, brown leather belt and shoes; one of them springing its heel into the carpet. He noticed his knee bumping up and down and tried to ignore it as he looked again to the door.


Everything about him was fresh and new as he sat and waited for his moment to arrive. A moment he had been thinking about for several months now: first at a humorous distance safely disallowing himself to believe in, but then unremorsefully during most working and slumbering hours. On the interminable flight from Kuwait he had time to plan out everything he would have to do when he arrived in Atlanta.


He had already thrown out most of his clothes and underwear, almost everything he had worn for a long lonely year while deployed overseas in the desert. He would have to go shopping, get a haircut, and even wax the Wookie off of his back because he remembered reading on her webpage—she didn’t go for that at all!


That’s where it all started, on her industry webpage. An absolutely coincidental conversation which lead up to their meeting here in person, in his motel room, for two whole days while he waited for his contractor paperwork with the Army to finish at Fort Benning, just outside of Columbus, Georgia.


He stood, crossed the room towards the vanity counter beside the bathroom and made himself a drink from the small assembly of wine and liquor before him. He wished he were more cultured, and actually knew something about wines. He had asked the liquor store clerk for help in picking out a couple bottles each of red and white and hoped she would like them. He felt nervous about his purchase because after all, she was French.


“If you have time before company arrives,” The clerk said, “What you want to do is put the Chardonnay on ice, and open the Merlot to let it breathe on its own for a little while.”


He had done so, but chose to drink his drink of Jim Beam and A&W Vanilla Cream Ale. “At least,” He thought. “If she doesn’t show I will be drunk on what I want to drink.” He stirred the soda into a tall glass of liquor and ice, with a condiment bag coffee straw. He took a long pull from the glass and sighed out loud. It had been an extensively dry year, without many things one should always have around.


He felt he had changed in the last year. Not just the new money, but all of it: the good and the bad, and all the sacrifices to go away and provide for his family, all of which he would probably now lose because of that deployment itself in a seems-to-be-heading-there divorce over the next few months. He drank it down on the second hit and quickly made another as he shook his head at the Catch-22 idiocy of it all.


He looked at himself in the vanity mirror and summed up his new groomed appearance. He seemed not to care about the oncoming grey hair, “Better than being bald.” He thought, but let himself feel happy about regaining the former military body he once had. He owed his focus in the gym over the long months to the attention his webpage girl had given him. He checked the knot in his complimentary-colored tie and reviewed anything he could possibly do and everything he had already done to make this meeting more effortless and seemingly natural.


Then he looked into the mirror and said to himself, “None of this matters, none of it! Not your stupid fucking watch, not your new shirt, or your God damn big nose, none of it… as long as you have confidence and believe in yourself, you’ll be alright. Now, Man-The-Fuck-Up!


“If she actually shows up: you’re gonna look her in the eyes and have the time of your life, and then you’re gonna go back to your wife and act like the man that you are. Or if she doesn’t show: you’ll get good and drunk and go back to being a welcome mat at home—maybe even take a fucking divorce in the ass now that you just made a shit ton of money for your wife to take from you.”


He took his wedding band off of his finger and dropped it into his shower kit then zipped it up.


Just then there was a faint knocking behind him. Taking a sip from his drink, he walked back across the room and left it with a napkin on the dresser before unlocking the door. He pulled it open and felt the cool breeze of air conditioning suck out past him into the scorching summertime heat of the south. “Hel-lo, John!” She said, with an under the tongue z-sound, as if his name was coming up a hill from far away.


And there she was.


How could she possibly look better in person than in all of her pictorials? “This is really going to happen.” He thought. “I can’t believe it!” Standing in the shadow of the walkway above was his FBBFF, whom he had never met. With her island-style wedges and long capri-covered legs, she stood just a couple of inches shorter than him. Her shockingly-white almost see through linen shirt more than hinted at a dark skin-toned bra.


A glimmer of jewelry from beneath the knot in her shirt caught his eye, as she passed her clutch from one hand to the other. John accepted her hand lightly and leaned in to kiss her cheeks. As he crossed over to kiss her on the right side, he noticed some random dude dressed in black, just standing there smiling. “Who the fuck…?” He thought, but kissed again and said, “Bonjour, Roxanne!”


Roxanne saw John notice the other man and stepped once towards him and leaned into his side to clasp her brown hand into his tan one. “John,” She said again in her pouty, playful accent, “This is my husband, Luke.” Then she pushed her Jackie-O sunglasses onto her tight pony-tailed hair and turned so that her husband could kiss her on the lips.


“I fucking knew this wouldn’t happen.” John immediately said to himself, but leaned forward offering his hand politely, “How are you?” He asked, smiling.


“Très bien,” Luke said, shaking his hand warmly, “Et vous?”


“Ok, I think.” John laughed.


Luke looked hardly surprised, “Vous ne parlez pas Français?”


“I know enough, to say no to that.” John said apologetically. Luke gave a silent look to his wife.


Roxanne quickly bridged the silence, “Luke, this is my long time cyber-friend, John. He’s the one I picked in the contest, but because he was overseas working, they made me choose another.”


“Yes,” Luke said sarcastically with immaculate English, “I remember how well that “date” went!”


“Do not even start me.” She said curtly. “How was your flight, John?”


“Very long.” He said. “Something like 20 hours, including the first leg. Upgrading to the business sleeper seat is the only thing keeping me awake right now.”


“Yes, first class is the only way we can deal with the trans-Atlantic flights.” Luke offered without much condescension.


Just then Roxanne’s clutch began ringing. She opened it to retrieve her Blackberry. When she saw who the caller was she said, “I am sorry, John, I have this to take, excuse me please.” Then she stepped a few feet away, into the sun, but not far enough to be bothered by the motel guests’ children splashing at the pool in the courtyard. She lowered her sunglasses and spoke down to the caller in what sounded like mishandled scheduling and marketing details.


The two men stood awkwardly for a moment neither one able to think of an ice breaker to smooth over that they were both standing there together in the middle of what was obviously a planned affair between John and Roxanne.


“Am I about to get my ass kicked here?” John thought, completely confused by Luke’s calm demeanor.


“Oh,” Luke finally said, remembering the black bag slung over his far shoulder. “I almost forgot this. Here, my friend, this is for Roxanne, she will need this when you are with her.”


Luke slipped the strap from his shoulder and passed from his outstretched hand to John’s, one medium-sized black leather bag. As it hung down between them, John felt an opportunity to push for clarity, “What’s in the bag?”


“In that bag?” Luke asked obstinately after letting go of it. “In that bag, my friend, is something wonderful… Inside of it is “Pandora’s Box”, but I would be careful about opening it if I were you.”


John only had time to return a semi-dismissive look, because Roxanne had just then finished her phone call and walked to where the two men were standing. She hung up her blackberry, and then pressing on it again firmly, turned it off and returned it to her clutch purse. John slung the strap over his shoulder and did not ask anything further about it.


“I am sorry for the interruption, John. My assistant has double booked my schedule next week.” Then to Luke, she added. “I have two calendar shoots in Las Vegas next week, instead of one.”


“Imbécile!” Luke said, with a disgusted wave of his hand. “Elle est un “Merde-Midas” et doit être renvoyé immédiatement!”


“Yes, she made a mistake,” Roxanne said. “But she does not need to be fired immediately.”


Luke waved his hand again in a flippant manner, “Are you still on at The Cheetah Club tonight?”


“Yes!” She said definitively. “You are coming too, John!” She told him taking a hold of his hand. John felt awkward but did not let go.


Luke saw them hold hands and nodded as if it were something he was allowing her to do. He turned to his wife and softly pointed his finger at her, “Rappelez-vous, pas de sexe à moins qu'il ne rend-delà de la troisième phase!” As he finished he stretched out his thumb and the first two fingers of his hand.


“Oui, ok.” She said.


John knew what Luke had said was important but would have to wait until after he Left them alone to ask Roxanne to translate. Then he thought, “He is leaving us alone, isn’t he?”


“I have made dinner reservations for us, before we leave for the club tonight.” Luke said and then turning to John with an outstretched hand. “Mon ami,” He said, encompassing their handshake with his other hand, “Please be a gentleman today.”


In utter disbelief, but trying to be nonchalant, John said, “I shall not steal away with your wife.”


Still holding his hand, Luke said matter-of-factly, “How can you steal, what I offer in friendship?”


Then he let go of John’s hand said, “Au revoir.” to them both, kissed his wife goodbye and said he might possibly go swimming later before dinner. He walked away whistling towards where their room must have been.


John watched him leave, blinking once or twice as he thought to himself, “Who the fuck whistles while wearing black in this God damn heat!?” and then with a wakeful shake of the head, turned and led Roxanne into his room.


John shut the door to his room as Roxanne took a seat on the bed near the armchair where he had been sitting earlier. He set her black bag that Luke had given him onto the middle of the long, almost empty dresser in front of the mirror. He continued walking towards the vanity nook in the corner of the room, and while facing away from her asked if she would like something to drink.


“What have you?” She asked.


“Chardonnay and Merlot.” He said.


“…Why not make yourself another of these?” She said sarcastically, sitting back down on the bed with what had been his drink. “Ceci est très bon. Does it have a name?”


A proud smirk crept across John’s lips as he made himself another drink. “I have called it by a couple of different names over the years.” He said returning to his former chair beside her. “But I never came up with one that stuck.”


“So, is yours invention, then?” She asked while taking another sip. “What from is it made?”


“Jim Beam and vanilla cream soda.”


“It is a whis-key?”


“No, a bourbon.”


“That is why so smooth, no?”


“Yes.” John said.


“You do not like whis-key, then?”


“No.” He said. “Whiskey is like drinking straight razors. I prefer to drink butter knives.”


“Ah, oui, I understand. So what are these names you have spoken of for this, yours invention?”


John laughed at her accented words and his pathetically named drink. “Well the last one I came up with is, “Beam Dream” but I think it’s because I know I am dreaming when I think I will be able to walk into a bar and order that someday before I die.”


“But why?” She asked, holding the drink with one hand and sipping from the straw with the other. “I think it to be just as good as a “Screwdriver” or how is it called, “Sex-on-a-Beach” even”.


He was happy for the small talk. They had been speaking closely for almost nine months now, but he was unsure were there friendship was about to go, even though they had made plans together: to have this moment, this affair. Having sex on a beach is exactly where he wanted them to be right then.


He was halfway lost in thought watching her full lips sip from the straw when she said excitedly, “Why not call it, “Cream-on-a-Beam!”


He laughed out loud in agreement, “That’s a great name.” He said, “That’s awesome.” and then trying to continue the joke, added, “Leave it to a pornstar to come up with that one!”


But it wasn’t received at all the way he had intended it to be. Her head dropped down ashamedly, and he saw her swallow the bad taste in her mouth. He leaned forward to recover himself and place his hand on hers but she withdrew it from him. “I’m sorry, Roxanne.” He said. “I didn’t mean anything by that!” He implored, but she remained silent.


He sat back and tried to think of what to say or what to do to erase the last 30 seconds and get back on track. He looked to the side out through the thin white curtain to the children running around and splashing in the pool.


“Are you nervous, John?” He heard her ask. He turned to her and asked with his eyes, what she meant and then saw her look to his knee. He stopped tapping and brushed the top of his leg as if turning off a switch not to do it again.


“Only that I have upset you.” He said, and then, “I have never treated you like a pornstar.”


“But you just did, John.”


He felt cornered, “I have never called you any of the names I have seen written on your webpage that you responded to with laughter.”


“Like what?”


“Like, “Dirty Slut!”” He said.


“…Do you want to fuck me, John?” She asked him bluntly.


He was looking straight into her eyes and answered her honestly, “Yes… Yes, I do.”


“I do not think you do, John.” She said, her eyes hinting at tears. “I think you are just like all the other perverts. I think you are on top of a giant mountain of them: you are the paramount pervert, and you only talked me into coming here so you could sleep with your fantasy-fuck and tell all of your pal-friends how très-cool you are!”


He decided to let her run out of steam and let her get it all out. “…And until you admit to me what you want—nothing is going to happen between us!”


He was hunched forward with his elbows on his knees and his hands together touching at the fingertips. He opened them up and held them in an offering gesture, “I want to fuck you, Roxanne.”


“No.” She said, wagging her finger. “Roxanne is not who you want to fuck… Say who you came for here!?”


He sighed. “I want to fuck…”


She cut him off again, “No!” She fingered. “No! You go stand over there and you say it loudly, like you are not ashamed of who is in this room, like you do not care about those swimming children or their mommies near to them at the pool. You tell everyone who can hear you who is in here and what you want to do to her!”


And so he did.


He walked over to vanity nook, set his feet comfortably, drew in a deep breath, and shouted at the top of his lungs…


“I WANT TO FUCK YOU, CHOCOLATE SUNSET!!”


Roxanne sighed at the thunderous wave of words going past her out through the glass window, out into the pool area courtyard. A boy hung momentarily, mid flight, in a tucked cannon ball. Poolside mother’s heads snapped in unison to the direction of the outburst and immediately accounted for their personal items and children.


Roxanne stood quickly while laughing and blinked away her tears. She extended her arms outward and waited for him to come to her so she could hug and kiss him.


She tipped up onto her toes and passed her drink hand around the side of his broad shoulders and brought her free hand up to his face, while he too embraced her and they kissed their long awaited first kiss.

They held each other for a long moment with John’s arms encircled around her. Finally Roxanne slapped her hand into his chest, “Please be to me, the online friend you have always been.” She said. “Do not become some stalker pervert; I am not ready to become my work yet. We are going to be as friends with each other, no?”


John raised her chin lightly with the knuckle of his forefinger. “We are friends.” He said to her and kissed her mouth fully with his tongue and sucked on her lip with a gentle tugging bite.


“Why not call yours invention, “Vanilla Beam” She said softly. “Like the vanilla bean, no?”


He smiled brightly, “That’s the best name I’ve ever heard for it, “Vanilla Beam” it is!”


“Teach me to make it.” She insisted, and then took his hand and led him towards the vanity. She centered herself on the vanity in front of the liquor; he centered himself on her ass. He leaned in close behind her and pressed his hips forward into her and leaned down to place his hands on the counter top edge, surrounding her body. He turned his face to her side and kissed her on the neck.


“Add some fresh ice to your glass.” He whispered into her ear. “Now pour in how much booze you want.”


“I want it a little less than before; I have yet to dance tonight.”


“Ok, I’ll say when.” He said moving his hands inward towards her stomach. He slid his fingers across the tightness of her twenty-something skin. “When.” He said as he kissed around her ponytail near the back of her neck. “Now pour in the soda, and stir vigorously.”


“It is done? So simple.” She said turning inside of his arms to face him. She had her hands up to her face with the drink and the straw, then she sighed and leaned back into the counter to place her drink and her other hand down at her sides so he could have her.


He pushed forward against her body, scooped her up and lifted her onto the counter. She wrapped her arms and legs around him. She kissed and tongued his mouth deeply and then returned a tugging bite of her own on his lip. “For today, there are rules.” She said.


“For today, there are rules?” He questioned out loud. “…You have rules, about how we are going to be together, today?” He asked for clarity.


“Oui.” She said, and then leaned up one more time and kissed him lightly on the lips.


He inched back defensively, “Get the fuck outta here!” He thought to himself, but kissed her back and said. “You have rules, baby?”


“Oui, Luke has rules. So you must be the gentleman an obey them.”


“Is that what he said earlier?”


“Oui.”


“What does the third phase mean?”


“You were understanding of him?” She asked surprised.


“No.” He said. “A little, I know ‘phase’ is a bilingual word, and he held up his three fingers when he said it.” John likewise held up his thumb and first two fingers.


“Très bien!” She acknowledged with a kiss.


“So why are there rules?” He asked coolly.


“I cannot tell.”


“What?”


“That is number first rule: “No explanation of rules!”” She said with her pointing impersonation of Luke, and then giggled.


“Why don’t we play our way, and you can tell him I was a gentleman?” He said trying to untie the knot in her shirt.


“No.” She said seriously. “You do not understand. These rules I like!” She said while stopping one of his hands from their task, bringing it to her mouth to draw out his fingertip with her sucking mouth, and then biting down. “Now go to the desk, bring the chair and place it in front of the dresser and mirror.”


He played along.


“Sit on your hands, if you please?” She said when he had placed the chair where she wanted.


He walked around to the front of the chair, and while looking at her; hitched up his pant legs slightly for comfort, then slid his hands beneath his ass as he sat. He watched her saunter over to the dresser and quietly wondered where this game would go. Like a cat absentmindedly strolling in close to the mouse she made her way to the dresser glancing here and there at the room’s décor and his personal additions to it.


She stepped before him at the center of the dresser and mirror. She reached out and moved her black leather bag closer to her. She unzipped the flip back top, but just as she was about to open it, her eye caught something out of place that she had not seen before. There behind the bag was a scented candle. She picked it up and smelled, “Mmmmm, Lilacs.”


She looked in the mirror to see if he was staring at her ass, but he was watching her smell the candle. She put it back where it was and then gently shook the small box of matches next to it and then put them down as well after hearing their soft rain-like sound. She returned her attention to her bag, and flipped open the lid. From where John was sitting he could not see into the bag.


“Is that Pandora’s Box?” He teased.


She turned and asked him, “Why do you say such?”


“That’s what Luke called it.”


“Did he?” She sounded surprised, and then turning back to the bag for a moment added, “Ah oui, it is true.”


“What’s in it?”


She was sitting with one cheek and thigh on the dresser, facing in between John and the bag. “Mostly it is my clothes I will wear tonight at the club.” She said matter-of-factly. “Would you like to see some of them?” She proceeded to remove small skimpy items of clothing: bikinis, halter tops, a neon orange feather boa, and of course a pair of clear-plastic platform stiletto heels. She momentarily held each item and then put it in a small pile away from the bag.


Finally she removed a small cylindrical wooden sand timer and set it before John, near the edge of the dresser. “What?” He laughed, “Are you going to cook some eggs for us later?”


“No silly.” She said. “It is an hour-glass.”


“Those would be some hard-boiled eggs for sure.” He said. “What’s it for?”


“It is to mark the passing of the phases, John.” She said, turning it over to the empty side, so its sands could trickle down below. “This is the first phase!” She announced slinking off the dresser and stepping towards him, then while holding back his head; kissed him on the mouth as she reached down his front to grab his cock and balls over his pants. “And maybe they will be hard-boiled, John.”


“What do I have to sit on my hands for an hour, and then we get to sleep together?”


“You will be sitting and whatever I think for you to do, John. Rule #2: Make up rules as you go!”


“What kinda crap is that?” He said, and then she jerked down on his earlobe till he acknowledged a pain threshold.


“Rule #1: No explanation of rules!”


“What,” He said, more serious now, already getting annoyed. “Are you going to interrogate me now, for an hour?”


“Interrogate you, John? For an hour?” She said with a laugh. “But I already know everything there is to know about you, and from not what you have told me online, but from personally meeting you here today.”


“Get the fuck outta here!” He scoffed, this time out loud.


“Would you like me to begin, John? Would you like me to become, Madame “Hercuile Poirot” for you?” She laughed, standing now behind him, her hands on his shoulders as she whispered into his ear, “Shall I read you like a book?”


“Go for it!”


“You are a very clean, neat and organized person. From what I know of your masculine humor, I imagine you can also be slovenly, but today you are very handsome. I know that you are married because we have talked many times about the ups and downs of your marriage with your wife: I know you love her because no one who did not love like you would go through with that in their lives.


“And even though we made plans to meet today: and you have told everyone in the hotel what you want to do to me,” She laughed with a kiss. “I know you do not want to insult your marriage and have taken off your ring; probably just before we met, judging by the redness on your finger.”


John was looking straight into the mirror at her nail him on the head.


“I know that you are a considerate person,” She continued. “And that you worry about appeasing others. I know this because you purchased four bottles of wine for me, two different reds and two different whites. But what is funny John, is that after being considerate, you don’t give a damn and will do what you want and drink what you want…”


She walked to her drink, took a long sip from her straw and then offered it to John as well. When he was done she placed it back onto the dresser next to her black leather bag. He was staring straight ahead as she placed the drink down, but as she walked past and behind him to close the thicker curtains; she was able to turn to her right and see in the vanity mirror: his face turn and glance downward at her backside. “From how you held me today, I know you are strong and physical yet I can tell you are a caring lover in bed, and if I am not wrong, John, I would say that you are for experimentation.” She said now rubbing her fingers through his hair while looking straight ahead into his eyes’ reflection in the dresser mirror. “Would you like to know how I know?”


“Yes.”


“The unlit candle.” She said. “My room smells of stale air as well but there are no candles in it for us: so I think you bought this for me so the room will smell pretty. Yet you were unsure if I liked Lilacs, so you did not light it.” She said looking at him. “But if you bought two choices of wine: I believe you bought a second candle too.”


John sat staring at her.


She looked once around the room and then her eyes settled back at the dresser. She moved around him and stood before it. She held out her finger and pointed to the top drawer on the right and then crossed it to the left. “Eenie, meenie, miney, moe…” She said and then pulled open the drawer to find another candle. John sat dumbfounded. “I do like cherries better!” She squealed with a giddy laugh and then lit the candle and left it on the dresser.


She turned to him with a crooked smile. “Thank you.” She said with a kiss to his forehead. “Oh, and John…” She said leaning down to put her hand on top of his bouncing knee, her full breasts sagging deeply into their bra and her linen shirt, her Chanel perfume enveloping him in an inviting haze of euphoria. “I know that you are nervous about today.”


“It’s not nerves!” He said staring at her cleavage.


She looked at him for a moment. “How long has it been for you, John?”


“…A year.”


“It has been a year since you slept with your wife before you left for overseas? And you met no one?”


“When?” He said. “When I was working twelve hour shifts everyday and talking with you online practically the rest?”


“When is the last time you masturbated?”


“…It was thirteen weeks on Wednesday.”


Then she said wickedly, “Oh, you should not have told me that, John.” She leaned onto his knees and looked straight into his eyes. “That, John, that was my interrogation!” And then she stepped back towards her bag as if she was going to retrieve something from it. “Into what hole of mine were you planning on putting that big load of cum, John?”


She looked in the mirror and saw him watch her put her hand into the bag. He didn’t answer her. She reached in then pulled it out as if distracted, John was still watching the bag waiting for whatever was in there to come out. “No John, I would describe this as going to be more like torture for you. Rule #3: When you cum, this session with me is over!” The cuteness was gone from her voice. She seemed now, worldly beyond her age.


John looked at her and arrogantly said. “I’ve been trained to resist torture. I’m gonna take this big load of cum and I’m gonna shoot it right in the back of your throat!”


Her eyes widened and she slid her hands down her thighs so that she was level with his eyes. “Good John, keep thinking like that and maybe you will.” And then she slapped him across the face. He turned back slowly with a steely gaze at her. “That first one was for shock, now I am going to slap you as hard as I can, and you will know whether or not you can withstand the rest of this phase.” John clenched his teeth and glared up into her eyes as she flexed her muscles back stretching her arm into the air, in preparation of smashing it across his face.


“Are you ready, John?” She said with her hand held high and firmly flat.


“Bring it!”