David Russell writes

An Ecstatic Rendezvous 
(Part2)

There was an uncomfortable week, suffused conjointly by aftermath and anticipation. Then, one sleepless night, after days of indecision, my mind racked by weighing up -- probably imaginary -- pros and cons, I was propelled by a dream in which my room was smothered in incense. The mirror melted and gelled into my beckoning lover, in her bathrobe, which floated off to proclaim her bathing-girl glory, celebrated by ethereal accolades from an invisible choir -- a heavenly body come to perfect flesh! 

She wafted upwards as she sank downwards, cancellation of contraries in perfect fusion. I was galvanised into action for the next day, feeling every bit as energetic as if I’d had a great night’s sleep. Now I must find a lady. Gradually, and with painful trepidation, I plucked up the courage. There were years of reticence, of moaning, about my ability to chat up and charm and some disappointment about subscribing to respectable dating agencies, which led to so many blank, negative meetings -- at a ridiculous cost. 

I finally got over my quite heavy inhibitions about shady back pages of newspapers, and those upper shelves, so long strictly beyond the pale of the civilised, cultured, and proper. The censorious voices of the past continued to reverberate in my memory -- surely you could never think of descending to those depths… That would be quite unthinkable. These frowns and tut-tuts faded off to let in a flood of memories of past rebuffs, with subdued shakes and turnings of the head, curls of the lips and movements away. Now, the wheel had come full circle. My new tide would overcome that old one, and confound all those old bêtes noires who had said I was ugly, probably groaning with their beer bellies by now! 

At last, the voluminous curtain rose on the beginning of my great drama. I let my desires out of their near-subterranean fully through steeling my nerves to buy a contact magazine. I felt quite hesitant at the retail counter, but the Indian woman there gave me a knowing nod. I looked through the London contacts, and in the midst of a mass of others, many of whom repelled me, my eyes lit on Sandra’s photo, which radiated allure and classy refinement, crying take the plunge. Here was someone whom I would formerly have considered out of reach, but now that the intrepid spirit reared up, I was going to reach out for her, and our astral spirits would fuse. 

Through the monochrome photo -- retouched by my yearning if by nobody else’s action -- her radiant aura of a super-Hollywood morale booster beckoned alluringly to be unbuttoned, unzipped, and caressed. So, I nervously wrote my letter to the box number, did several circuits of the mailbox before posting it, and remained quivering on tenterhooks for those few days until my reply came through my letterbox. In some ways, I wished I’d had a copy of one of the sketches of me to enclose with the letter. 

She wrote a response along with her phone number. I rang, and after four rings, her voice on the answer-phone was as electric as her photograph: velvety smooth, with the slightest trace of a husk and perfect breath control. Emboldened, I left my message in the deepest, silkiest tone I could imagine. My instruction to her was that she must ring me back on the dot of midnight. I managed to sound firm with that instruction. 

My bonus-prize digital watch bleeped away with its glinting green flashes in my tense hand. Then Sandra showed perfect synchronicity in following the instructions -- twenty-four hours to the very second, the very cusp of night and day! 

“We’ve synchronised watches,” Sandra whispered. 

She sounded refined, if with a slight suspicion of quivering shyness, tentative with each word, but beneath that surface there was eagerness, intense, burning with passion and experience. Here was an authentic connoisseur. Through breezing, blowing breaths, and coded tappings of our receivers, we tongue-kissed, petted, caressed, petted some more, and disrobed, holding some fibres close to the receivers for authenticity. Then, slowly, surgingly, we worked up to a two-way telephonic orgasm, panting through the thunderstorm of our making -- true fire-raisers in the flesh. 

“I’ve never before encountered such telephonic aplomb. Are you that good in other areas?” 

“I am confident of that. I’m all agog till we meet face to face, darling,” I said between pants. 

“Reciprocal assurance -- for the visual-tactile re-enactment. You won’t be disappointed,” she replied. 

This level of communication felt truly telepathic. Every sound, every verbal hint felt absolutely delicious. Now, it was just a matter of a telescoped stretch of time. The flood of destiny swelled and surged. It was now confirmed that we were to meet for the real, now the non-virtual, get into the tactile dimension. We fixed the rendezvous at her place.