Chapter 20: PersephonePersephone—I never knew her st name. The only woman I ever loved. I say that, though I’m not vihat what we had was love at all. I mean, really, who the hell knows what love is anyway? What we had, was six months together. Only six months. And what we had was twisted and wonderful and difficult. I guess you could say that our retionship was . . . plex.

  But then, I guess every een-year old thinks their first serious retionship is the most intense and plicated thing in the world. It’s so hard to keep perspective ohings. That was twenty years and a literal lifetime ago. It’s funny, when I think back about it, though not ha-ha funny.

  Not that I do very often. Think about the past, that is. She’s not something I like to think about. I think that’s what makes me sad and angry most of all: that the only person I’ve ever loved is also the only person I’ve ever truly hated. No wonder I went ihere for a bit once our retionship—ended.

  That’s not true. What makes me really mad, is this: that when I think bad try to picture Sephy. . . I ’t. Even in my dreams—my nightmares—she’s increasingly faceless, featureless, the details filled in by fragments of the day’s recolle. It’s beey years; God, twenty years! And that’s all it takes, I guess: twenty years she’s fading from memory, like neer c a closed-down shop’s windows, yellowed and bleached by the sun. She was taller than me. Slender and inflexible, strong ahy, like bamboo. That’s what I remember. Her and me and a bamboo forest.

  The wind tore through that tall, rigid bamboo forest and surrounded us with this otherworldly rustling, creaking sound--an old wooden ship caught in a storm. We were hiding. Hiding in the bamboo, panting with exertion, our mutual hatred momentarily forced aside by a mutual enemy. hing, we were hungrily kissing, tearing at each others’ clothes, cursing and biting at each other, suddenly turned feral with lust and released tension. We had sex in that vibrant, verdant field of swaying stalks that cwed the greying sky overhead. She cried out in passion and fury as I entered her and she tore my bad her voice was ripped away by the growing storm.

  I loved her from that moment on, deeply and with all my soul.

  But that’s all I remember: bits and pieces, ss of the whole. Her angry smile fshing; narrowed eyes; slim, nearly boyish hips cocked to one side and her balled up fists. “I’m no good for you, David,” she always used to tell me. “And you’re no good for me. We’re enemies. And this ’t st.”

  She was right. Goddamn her, but she was right.

  But man, was the sex ever fantastibsp; The best: passionate, intense, our entire being poured into that short, ecstatient spent together. I’m not sure I really knew Persephone, outside of sex. Not the real Persephone anyway. Then agaih spent a lot of our time together lying. We had to. But not durihat was always ho. And angry. I’d fotten how good angry sex be.

  I’m not sure why Sephy was running through my head as I returo bed. I’ll be ho: I didn’t bother ing off the makeup. I didn’t strip out of that damned lingerie or any of the other shit. Hell, I didn’t even unwind those goddamned heels from my calves. I was simply too tired. All I wanted was some sleep, a few good hours of solid, regeive sleep. Vaguely aware of K puttering around the room, setting everything straight for our departure tomorrow, I colpsed face-down on the bed and closed my eyes.

  I couldn’t sleep. Exhausted as I was, I begun to feel . . . odd. Hot, even though I y half-naked over the sheets. At first I thought I was growing a massive hard on, but I khat wasn’t possible. Not the way everything was sealed away and ahetized down there. The sensation hantom response, what I imagine an amputee feels for an arm . Only it didn’t go away. Growing warmth settled between my legs and began to tingle. I squeezed my thighs together to cmp down on the feeling but it didn’t help; it made it worse; I began to feel strangely slick down there. I squirmed over the sheets, wanting to thrust into the bed but knowing it wouldn’t provide any relief.

  It was because of Sephy. It had to be because of her. The enter in the bamboo forest all those years ago kept running through my mind. I vividly remembered pushing into her, her strong legs ed around my back; but those memories didn’t match up with the sensations my body was sending bae; I had nothing to thrust with.

  “Is everything okay, dy?”

  K’s voice cut through my fevered fusion. I flipped over on the bed and stared up at her with wide eyes. “What the hell is happening?”

  “What do you mean?” A shadow of a smile danced across her face.

  “Dammit, K! I feel all . . . weird.”

  “Weird? How, weird?”

  “You know damn well what I’m talking about!” My ski flushed and hot. I fluttered one hand down around my crotbsp; “This . . . thing. It’s making me feel all . . . tingly.”

  “Has dy been having naughty thought?”

  “No! Well, a little. So what? My bits are all locked away, right? So what the hell’s going on?”

  K shook her head, eyes sparkling with amusement. “I think you misuood me. Yes, yans are incapable of responding in the normal way. After all, aion could severely promise the prosthetibsp; However, nothing was doo dampen normal sexual response.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” There anicked edge to my voice I wasn’t proud of. I wiggled my hips a bit and squeezed tighter and was shocked to feel actual wetness down there. How the fuck was that possible? God, how I wao reach down there with one hand and grab hold of . . . something. The o thrust was immehe frustration at being uo do so was driving me insane.

  “Here, sit up.” She helped me up and smoothed my hair back over my shoulder. I swear her touch just made me feel worse, hot fres trag ay skin. “In a way, I suppose this is my fault.”

  “This is all your fault!”

  K smiled. “What I mean is that in our haste to attach the prosthetic, there was not enough time to calibrate it properly. I suspect that it is operating at a slightly higher sensitivity than normal.”

  “Slightly?” I fought to squirm at the edge of the bed. “What is this thing doing to me?”

  “As far as I uand the device, it is . . . hijag, I suppose, the signal beio your male ans aing them to the prosthetibsp; The artificial vagina seems desigo react as naturally as possible, aurns the appropriate sensations. It may seem a little . . . touchy, at the moment, but should adjust itself to an appropriate sensitivity with time.” She hesitated for a moment. “Do you trust me?”

  I gave a dry, slightly manic ugh. “Yeah, sure, why not?”

  She reached down and with a few touches coaxed my thighs apart. I couldn’t watch as she reached between my legs. I couldn’t see . . . but I could damn well feel as one finger gently traced a path through those short curly hairs . . . her fingernail sent a shiver through my spine . . . and then the impossible feeling of actually beirated, the tip of her finger quickly dipping into something I couldn’t have. I swear I actually whimpered and had to forcefully keep my legs from g down on her hand.

  When she pulled her finger back the tip glistened in the dim light. “Amazing,” she said.

  “Yeah,” I added weakly. “No shit.”

  “Back at the b, they are irely sure how the prosthetierates the lubrit, though they believe it draws and stores moisture from the body. It is not the real thing, of course, but the approximation is truly remarkable. It seems to secrete in respoo sexual stimuli.” She looked at me curiously. “What does it feel like, David?”

  I wao reach down there myself so bad, to scratch at that pce that K had touched . . . but couldn’t bring myself to do it. Not with her there. Not even if she wasn’t. That just wasn’t a line I was ied in crossing. But the sense of arousal wasn’t fading away. “It feels . . . it feels really weird, K. Like I’ve got a hard on, but I ’t touch it . . . it’s like some kind of wide-on, and it’s not going away.”

  “I see.” She reached into one of those cy cups aly held one of my breasts. Her thumb brushed against the nipple and I jumped. What the hell? “The breasts seem to be responding as well.” I hadn’t noticed but it was true--an almost painful stiffening of the breasts, like screws being tightened and fog the warmth swelling through my chest on that one point. They hadn’t done anything for me before, but suddenly felt awfully sensitive. “The nipples are respoo sexual arousal as well as to ges in temperature.”

  “Yeah, that’s just great.” Bloody hell. It seemed an impossible, surreal se to me, poised on the knife’s edge of that bed, in these clothes, with this sexy woman fondling my breast. “Do you, ah, mind?”

  “I was curious as to what the response would be,” she said, without removing her hand. In fact, her thumb tio absently flick across the nipple as her eyes curiously wandered ay body. “Your brain is sending very mase signals down to the prosthetid the device returns feminine impulses. How is the information processed by the male brain? it properly interpret the sensations? How should your body react?”

  “K, I . . . please. . . .”

  Her other hand found its way between my legs again. This time my thighs did cmp down, trying to keep her out, but too te. Her palm cupped that feminine mound and seemed to capture and intensify the warmth down there. With her middle finger she slipped into that--dammit, into my--vagina, and my hips jerked involuntarily again. God, I was so fug wet! “Of course, these devices are merely very ving replicas. Hardly the real thing. The vagina, for instahough capable of limited peion does end as deeply as that of a real woman’s.”

  She pushed her finger all the way in. Jesus fug Christ! I nearly colpsed against her, releasing a short, high-pitched squeal, and uhe influence of that spray on my throat I sounded like a stuck pig, like some bit heat. But what else could I do? The sensation of something inside of me, it was . . . I don’t know what it was! Uanding of what was happening to me kept sliding away as overwhelming and fusing feelings bombarded my brain.

  “Iing,” she said. “Just deep enough for a finger.”

  “K, you gotta-- you hafta. . . ,” I panted.

  “Yes, dy?” she asked.

  “Stop,” I barely mao say.

  She paused in her ministrations with one finger inside of me and her haly holding my left breast. “Really? You are a very strong girl, dy. I am not restraining you in any way.”

  Damn that woman. Yeah, I could’ve thrown her off me easy. K’s clearly a strong girl, but like I’ve said--I’m in good freakin’ shape. I might not look it but I’ve got some serious strength behind me when I . Somehow, she seemed to have robbed me of it. That finger in my t was like goddamn kryptonite. I was so geared up, so horny from whatever that thiween my legs was doing to me that I didn’t wao stop toug me. But I did wao stop, because this felt s. It also felt really, really ni a very, very strange way.

  “K, I . . . I don’t know if I . . . .”

  “Shh, dy.” Her left hand crawled from my breast aly stroked my neck before softly pressing a finger against my painted lips. “You have wahis since you first id eyes on me.”

  I think that’s when it finally occurred to me that I was sitting on a bed with a very attractive woman wearing nothing but her bra and panties. Yeah, yeah, fet the fact that my lingerie was cier and sexier than hers and that I had tits and the other thing as well. K pushed forward and her mouth crushed up against mine. The sweetness of lipgloss danced on our tongue and I realized the taste came from me. Still with that finger inside of me, she pushed firmly against my chest and I fell bato the bed. She followed me down, expl the inside of my mouth. The thought that I was actually getting it on with K carried me to a new level of arousal . . . I felt my hardness grow . . . no, I felt a fusing swelling . . . I moaned into her kiss and her finger slipped in and out of my redoubled wetness.

  “My, dy, you are ahusiastic girl, aren’t you?”

  I was already flushed from the experie found myself growing even hotter with embarrassment, whi turn made me squirm with even more sexual hunger. God, I just . . . I wanted some kind of relief so badly! Our breasts crushed together as she bore down on me. My mouth hungrily sought hers and I began to push against her weight, my hands reag for her ass, running through her hair, grabbing, aggressive.

  “No!” she anded. Her finger slopped free of my pussy aher hand released my tit and she grabbed at my wrists. “Be a good girl, now,” she said, f my arms back over my head. She straddled me at the waist. I looked up at her, half-blind with passion. Her eyes glittered in the half-light. Her small, tight breasts, still in their bra, loomed over me. Her smile was hard and cold. “Be dy.”

  What the hell did that mean? Her cotton-covered crotch hovered an inch over mine. I wao buck my hips, thrust up arate her; my thighs and ass tensed up and my tits felt even hotter and tighter than before. She stole another kiss from my open, panting mouth. She pnted a trail of kisses along my neck down to my breast. Both massive things had already popped free of the merrywidow. Her tongue found a nipple and drew it into her mouth. Her hand stroked my leg, drawing sensuously up the silky length of the stog before toying with the cy edge; she she garter and the sting and sound of it against my thigh made me even hotter.

  Her face pulled away from my chest. Her hair tickled my skin through the nylon as she nguidly traced a path towards my groin. Both hands stroked my breasts and then my sides before slidih my ass and roughly squeezing. I watched, stunned, overwhelmed by the flig sensations, as this beautiful, sexy woman worked her way down to my crotbsp; My breathing intensified in anticipation of her sug me off . . . but I couldn’t . . . she wasn’t going to. . . ?

  Her tongue darted out and pped against a little button down there I’d pletely fotten about.

  “Fu--!” I cried out, my whole body jerking at the overwhelmiion. I think somethied in my head. There was no mistaking my voice for anything other than a girl’s at that moment. My fists coiled in the sheets and I went momentarily rigid as a board. “Oh . . . God, K . . . .” I felt poised at the edge of some thrilling, dangerous precipice; every nerve infmed and g out for relief. I was terrified ahralled by where she was leading me.

  “Did you enjoy that?” she asked, lifting her head from between my legs. Her glistened and her grin was animalistibsp; “Shall I tinue?”

  I stared at her with open eyes. My whole body quivered with anticipation and what worried me most was that I didn’t even feel ashamed, spread out and desperate before her. I’m sure I’d been this physically turned on before, but at the moment I sure as hell couldn’t think of when.

  “Say it!” she demanded.

  “Holy shit . . . yes?” I barely mao whisper it.

  “Say please.”

  “Please?” I begged.

  “What’s you name?”

  I knew what she wanted. I sidered resisting—for a sed—but with her face down near my pussy, dark eyes glinting just visible over my heaving tits—and her breath, hot against my mound—I crumbled: “dy!” I cried out.

  Her wicked smile grew and I was chilled by how cruel she suddenly seemed. “Too bad,” she said, and she pulled away and slid off the bed.

  What the fubsp; No! “K, you ’t . . . !”

  Her face suddenly loomed over me, eyes fshing angrily. “If you ever point a gun at me again, David,” she said, “I will break your arm.” Then she lunged down and stole a final, savage kiss before breaking away.

  She returo her bed. “I advise that you get some sleep,” she said, her voice barely heard through the fused anticipatory haze in which she left me. “We have a long day ahead of us tomorrow.”

  I just y there in stunned, eroticized silence.

  “And dy? I strongly suggest you learn to trol yes. Good-night.”

  She turned off the lights ao bed.

  By seven o’clock we were on the road again, heading for the Asklepios ic.