24) Gail Friday

Gail came to my apartment. I had not asked her to. It was late. I was in my hammock, not asleep, but my muscles were slipping past feeling, when a tapping so light as to be merely a brush sounded three times without pattern on my door. I wasn't at first sure I had heard it, hoping I had not; but harder tapping pulled me from my sleep and the hammock. I can not see through the peephole; I just opened the door.

Gail stood there, but not for long, stepping past me with stiff, deliberate steps as soon as the door was open far enough. I closed it and lost her in the dark until she giggled.

"Mood lighting!" she exclaimed, her voice rising and falling. "How did you know?"

"What?" I turned on the light by the switch beside the door.

Gail blinked, squinted at the ceiling. "That's an ugly light," she said. "We need to get you a floor lamp."

"I do not use the light very often."

"Book Monkey!" She seemed surprised I was there. She dropped heavily to her knees in front of me, wrapped her arms around me, and pulled me hard against her, my back bending the wrong way, my face pressed to the side of her neck. There was that scent again. "You're so small!" That scent, and another. But for a sudden feeling--and the discomfort of her tight clutch--I would have allowed her to hold me there, her hair falling over my head; and but for her clutch I woluld have pushed away from her right then. "Oh!" she giggled. "I didn't mean that!" She let go of me, and I spun my back to her, snatched my pants--she uncurled my tail through her fist--and put them on over my embarrassment--I was glad, at least, that she was not appalled. Gail fastened the button over my tail, then reached to hug me again but fell against me, pinning me to the carpet. Her laughter convulsed against my back. "You're so cute. I love you."

"I can not breathe."

She rolled off of me, one arm still underneath me, across my belly. I was slow rising off it, and she curled her fingers and tickled my ribs. A laugh of pain and surprise escaped me. Gail shrieked and laughed anew and curled the arm and rolled me to her chest. Her grip softened but I no longer felt like escaping. Her breasts pressed against my back, whence I could see her bare knees pointed up. My legs were between them, my tail wrapped around one of her thighs. Her chest heaved with a long breath as her other hand slid like a snake across my belly. The smell of her releasing breath was dry and sweet. Its wind tickled my cheek hair. I was losing my thought to her touch; her hands swept over my torso as if searching--yet barely touching, hovering, triggering sensation from each hair. By the time a hand slid into my pants I had no mind at all. Gail rubbed her face against my head, kissed it. I went somewhere, into her touch, a touch no longer searching but examining, testing--cultivating a fire that spread across my loins and regathered into an excruciating, exquisite molten ball--it shot from me and me from it, a cry with my arching back. The crease of Gail's smile brushed my temple. She murmured, "I love you, Book Monkey. Don't leave me."

I awoke this morning in my hammock, under a blanket.