Ilona sighed, blowing moist air through olive lips that were perched in the pout she had sat for hours in front of the mirror perfecting. The slender index finger of her right hand stroked the soft plane of her cheek, her pink nail polish lurid against her pale skin. When the finger reached her jaw-line, she curled it elegantly back into the arch of her hand and pushed a thick weight of brown hair back from her face and over her shoulder. All her gestures, one suspected, were like this – exquisite, effortless and utterly artificial.
She watched the man sprawled in one of the armchairs in her waiting room. He was handsome, she supposed, but not her type. His suit was rumpled, and poorly cut. His trousers were too short and rode high on his legs, revealing socks that featured crudely stitched images of Santa and Mrs. Claus. The cartoons were on the inside, so that when he jiggled his ankles it looked to Ilona as if the characters were dancing together. Each time he did this, he glanced up at Ilona, his muddy eyes looking to see, she thought, some sign of approval. When she sensed him about to look at her, she would always look away, busy herself with paper on her heavy wooden desk or tap away at the computer.
The suit jacket was too narrow for the man's shoulders, and the pockets were distended from the thick bulge of his wallet in the right and the book in the left.
Catch-22
, she noted. They had read a translation in school; she had though it a stupid and empty book, utterly frivolous. Not a patch on John Grisham, she had smugly told her teacher, who had just sighed, then nodded slowly. The pages were yellowed, and even from her perch she could see they were worn – not carelessly, but from frequent use.
The man's face was well constructed, but here too, he exhibited a lack of care. His short black hair was unkempt, his strong cheeks and jaw were dusted with stubble, and his blue eyes swam in dark pools. He looked like he hadn't slept in a week. Ilona sniffed. Maybe some women were attracted to scruffy guys, but not her.
The phone rang. She waited two rings, then picked it up and said the name of the office, her name, and then asked if she could help.
"Perhaps you could," said the familiar voice at the far end of the line. "I have this strange sensation and my penis has gone all hard. I've tried rubbing it, but that just seems to make things worse. Do you think I should speak to the doctor?"
Ilona laughed, but underneath the laughter, she felt a potent twitch of desire. Her boyfriend had been away for two weeks now and had only been able to call her during her office hours, due to the time difference. She hadn't had to use her fingers so much since she was 18, and her friend Caterina had shown her how to masturbate. Now she could feel the blood swelling her labia, feel her vagina moisten, feel her face and breasts flush.
"Can you speak?" her boyfriend asked.
Before when he had called, the office reception had been filled with waiting people, now there was just this one guy. He was from England, she recalled. Hungarian, they call us, she thought.
"I think I can," she said. "Let me find out."
"Do you speak Hungarian?" she said, in Magyar. He looked up, a quizzical expression on his face. "Hey scruffy," she tried again quickly, "would you like to see my breasts?"
He raised one eyebrow and smiled politely. Clearly he didn't understand. In English, she said, "Sorry – do you want coffee, or tea?"
He smiled, widely. "No thanks," he replied. Very cultured voice, she thought, for a man who can't buy clothes that fit. He went back to reading his book, and she told her boyfriend that they could, finally, talk.
"Oh, god I miss your pussy," he said. "I miss the way it holds my cock so firmly. I miss its heat and wetness."
"I miss your big dick," Ilona said, keeping her voice as casual as she could. "Its taste. Its soft, soft skin."
His dick was so soft, she recalled. On their first date she had jerked him off, marvelling all the while at the baby soft skin under her hands. He later told her that he never needed to use lubricant when he masturbated. He had fingered her that same night, stroking his thick middle finger in and out of her cunt, curling it to try and hit her g, diddling her clit with the tip of his index finger. "I like your bush," he had whispered, many nights later, when touching had led to actual sex.
Ilona had never shaved her pussy, as so many of her friends did. In part, this was because she did not particularly enjoy receiving oral sex; mainly, it was that she had long loved the natural lines of her pubic hair. She had spent, cumulatively, hours at the mirror, gazing and touching, tracing the neat, sparse curls from just below her taut little stomach, around and down between her legs and past her lips until the black hair met her anus, where, she had decided with jejune certainty, no-one would
ever
touch her. Shaving would only spoil its perfect lines, and her boyfriend loved it too, calling it the pelt he had won. His trophy.
"It's been so long since I came," Ilona said.
"Really," Tomas said. "That guy, in your office, is he... handsome?"
She laughed, affecting her deep, sexy laugh. This was a game they had played before, in bed.
Ilona purred, but quietly. Still, the guy looked over, then shrugged and went back to his book. "Very," she said.
"Big bulge at his crotch?"
"Very big," said Ilona. "Much bigger than yours."
"Take off your panties," Tomas said.
Ilona tilted her head to the side and wedged the phone between her ear and her shoulder. She slipped her hands inside her short skirt, then lifted herself off her chair and tugged her panties down, making it look like she was just adjusting her skirt. She wiggled her long legs and felt a shiver along her spine as her thin, silk panties slipped down to her shoes. The man coughed, then laughed once at something in his book.
Thank goodness for the modesty panel
