O N E
Rachel and Tess relaxed on a sofa, nursing hot chocolate, lazily conversing while they kept their eyes fixed on the fireplace, where logs snapped and burned merrily. It was a Sunday night in December, the last of their three nights in Vail at The Lodge. They had spent their days skiing and their nights eating as much as they wanted and talking for hours. For this weekend anyway they were blessedly husband-free. Jim, Rachel's husband, was not a skier, while Tess' husband, Mark, had recently suffered a back injury, minor but enough to keep him off the slopes. Both marriages were happy ones, but it was fun for these best friends to sometimes find time alone together. Rachel had additional motivation to spend some time apart from Jim. For as long as she could remember she had also been attracted to women. But apart from the occasional lingering glance on a street or across a room and brief, awkward clutches and kisses with a couple of girls from her school days, she had never acted on her feelings. She had determined that this must change.
Rachel looked at her friend. She had never felt the need to confide in her about her lesbian impulses. Petite and curly-haired, Tess was not her type, though she loved her as a friend. Rachel was submissive and needed a physically and emotionally imposing woman to control her. Tess had her left leg up on the coffee table in front of them. She had sprained her ankle skiing earlier in the day, had taken a painkiller, and now her eyelids were at half-mast.
"Tess ..."
Tess' eyes popped open. "Oh, I'm falling asleep."
"Why don't you go to bed. I'll stay down here for an hour so you can fall asleep, then I'll come up. I'm ready too. I'm tired from all the skiing."
"Yeah. Yeah, I'm ready." She lowered her leg to the floor and pushed herself slowly to her feet. "See you later, Rach," and she limped toward the elevators.
"Okay, Tess, I'll be up soon." She watched till the elevator doors closed on her friend, then headed for the bar. Once seated, the bartender approached. He was handsome, young and well built, but right now he wasn't making an impression on her.
"What'll you have?"
"I don't know. Something warm."
"We've got mulled cider and rum. It's really good. I've been selling a lot of it tonight."
"Okay, I'll try that." The truth was, Rachel rarely drank and had never had anything stronger than wine before. While the bartender made her drink, she looked down the bar and out to the many surrounding tables. She immediately sensed a lot of guys were looking at her. Rachel was a beautiful young woman, 28, with long blonde hair, long legs and perfect facial features. Plus she was alone. She concentrated on what she was looking for: an older, larger attractive woman.
The bartender set her drink in front of her. "Enjoy," he said and gave her a big smile.
"Thanks." She sipped her drink through the swizzle stick. It was strong. Her throat burned and her eyes teared up. She was instantly tipsy. She took another sip. This time the liquid went down better, and a sense of well being flooded her. She looked around the room again. It was peopled mostly with guys, young guys. Any women she saw were young as well and seemed to be attached to the guys. She shuddered, realizing she didn't belong here, in a bar, drinking. She drank again, then once more. She would finish her drink and leave.
Suddenly, from behind, a hand clasped her shoulder hard. Oh no, she thought, a guy. She spun in her chair. To her surprise she was looking up at a tall, strapping young woman, her own age or perhaps a bit older. The woman said, "You don't recognize me, do you? You should see the expression on your face."
Rachel shook her head. The woman had shoulder-length auburn hair, which was parted in the middle and partly tucked behind her ears, a large face and a toothy smile. She was attractive without being beautiful. "No, I don't recognize you."
"I'm the girl who flew by you this afternoon and kicked up all that powder in your face while you were down. I wanted to stop and apologize, but I was just going too fast. But when I came into the bar just now I recognized all that blonde hair. Let me make it up to you and buy you a beer." She didn't wait for a response, but whistled and waved at the bartender. "Hey, Andy, a couple of Heinekens." He waved back to acknowledge her. She turned back to Rachel and put a foot on a rung of Rachel's chair. "So I'm Picabo."
Rachel looked at her dazedly. The alcohol was really having an effect. Andy set two beers in front of them. Picabo reached into a pocket of her jeans, pulled out a twenty and tossed it on the bar. "Wait a minute. Picabo ... are you Picabo Street?"
"That's right. That's me. What's your name?"
"Rachel." Her voice was small. She found herself staring at Picabo's breasts. They were large and shaped her sweater like two moguls on a downhill course. She wanted to ski those moguls with her mouth and hands. She heard herself say, "Oh wow."
Picabo handed her her beer and clinked bottlenecks. "That's what they all say, honey," and she tilted her head back and barked her laughter to the ceiling. Then she looked directly into her eyes. Rachel met her gaze unsteadily. "Take a drink, honey." Rachel lifted the bottle to her lips and drank. Picabo did the same. To Rachel the beer was bitter, hard to swallow. Picabo said, "Drink again," and this time they drank more deeply. She continued, "Let's take a walk, honey," and extended her hand toward Rachel.
Rachel shrank back in her chair and held up her left hand with its wedding ring protectively in front of her chest. Picabo laughed uproariously and said, "Honey, if I had a nickel for every married girl ..." But now her hand was in Rachel's, and they were walking toward the elevators. Rachel thought she heard a guy say, "Man, Picabo gets more pussy than I do."
The next thing Rachel was aware of was Picabo swiping her card key, opening the door to her room and saying, "You ever been with a woman before?" Rachel shook her head and said, "I think about it all the time." With that Picabo put an arm around Rachel's back, an arm behind her knees, lifted her up and carried her across the threshold, like a groom would a bride. Just inside the room she let her down to a standing position, kicked the door close and without a word kissed her fiercely. Rachel instinctively opened to her, a vessel waiting to be filled. She widened her mouth as Picabo's urgent tongue explored it and did not resist when she felt her wrists pinned behind her. She needed to be used. Picabo broke off the kiss to say hoarsely, "Let's take our clothes off." In a moment they were naked, and Picabo flipped on an overhead light. They stood before each other. Picabo extended her arms to pull Rachel close to her. "God, you're beautiful," she said. "I wanted you the minute I saw you." She saw that Rachel was staring at her 36D breasts. "Yeah, honey, I want you to suck "em," and with that she cupped Rachel's neck and forced her face onto her breast. The light went out.
Rachel opened her mouth to accept as much of the large breast as she could. Her tongue swirled the nipple, causing it to stiffen. She closed her eyes and nursed on it greedily, aware only of Picabo's unintelligible moans. She felt herself lifted again and carried to the bed, where she was gently lain.
Picabo knelt over Rachel. She kissed her mouth, throat and breasts. Rachel responded passionately, holding her new lover close, murmuring, "yes, yes, yes," and thrusting her hips, needing to be fucked. Picabo slowly ran her tongue down Rachel's belly and stopped between her legs. She concentrated on her clit and inserted a finger, then a second into the aching slit below. Rachel climaxed almost at once, shrieking, "O, O, O," in an ever escalating series of cries.
They lay in each other's arms for a bit, till Picabo reached to open the drawer of the night table and pull out a vibrator. She shifted her position so that she was squatting over Rachel's face. She began to use the vibrator on herself and instructed Rachel to lick her asshole. Rachel did so eagerly, periodically attempting to penetrate the sphincter with her tongue. Picabo shifted again as she came, seizing Rachel's hair and placing her cunt directly over her mouth, lightly suffocating her.
A little later Rachel awoke in pitch blackness. She looked around and saw a clock that read 2:03. Suddenly she remembered where she was. She tapped Picabo timidly on the shoulder, then harder when she didn't respond. That roused her. "What's up?" she said sleepily.
"I've got to go. I'm staying here with a friend. We're leaving in the morning, and she'll be worried if I'm not there when she wakes up. I don't want to have explain where I've been."
"Oh wow, I wish you didn't have to go. Hey, why don't you leave me your e-mail address. Let's definitely stay in touch."
"Okay, I'll do that." She got out of bed, fumbled for her clothes in the dark and went into the bathroom. She turned on the light and dressed. There was a tube of lipstick by the sink. She took it and wrote her AOL address on the mirror. She went back to the bed, sat and gave Picabo a long, loving kiss.
Walking to the elevator she thought about how bad she was, about the growing number of secrets she kept from her husband, how she deserved to be punished. The elevator doors opened. As she entered she was powerless to curb the muscles of her lower face from shaping her lips into a smile.