This is a story about a sexually inexperienced young man, a virgin, being initiated sexually by an older experienced woman as an 18th birthday gift from his father. All characters are over 18.
Part 1
:
So my 18
th
birthday came. Then it went.
I still had no clue what my dad meant when he told me on the day itself that he had a gift planned for me. A big present, he said. But one he had to work to put together. And one I'd like a lot when he gave it to me, he said, grinning and winking.
What the heck was that about, Pops winking at me? He'd never done that in his life.
I was curious. I won't deny that. Was Dad going to give me a car? I was headed off to college in the fall. I'd need transportation.
Maybe a pre-college trip somewhere exciting? Was the delay in giving me the gift because he had to make travel arrangements?
I'm Brad, by the way, Bradley Hechinger. Dad's Bob Hechinger. My mom's Marsha. She didn't seem to be in on this birthday gift any more than I was. It was all Pops' doing. It was all his idea.
Because I was so sure Dad would be driving up one day with a new car for me or would walk in after work one day and hand me tickets for a flight to someplace like Paris, I was surprised—and I'll admit, puzzled—when he finally told me what the gift was.
He told me about the gift at a dinner he'd taken me out to, a steak dinner. A guys' night out, he said. Wanted to talk to me, he said. Man to man. About that birthday gift....
Pops loves to go to a little old school-type steakhouse across town, Blackie's. One of those dimly lit, polished wood and brass sort of places you don't find much anymore. Scotch, big man-sized t-bone steaks, baked potatoes slathered with butter and sour cream: the earmarks of a top-notch steakhouse as far as Dad's concerned.
Oh, and an obligatory tiny side salad—gotta have those veggies to be healthy, don't you know. What's not to like?
Because I had turned 18, Dad ordered a Scotch for me, my first time to taste the stuff. He downed his obligatory preprandial Scotch followed by one he knocked back while demolishing his big slab of meat. I've decided smoky Scotches are going to be one of those acquired tastes I'll have to work at when I get a few more years on me.
As we dug into our rare beef and potato, Dad started talking about the gift he'd put together for me:
"I know you're great at drawing, Son, and you're planning to study art in college. I also know your high school art classes didn't do everything they could to prepare you for college. So I've arranged a birthday gift for you that will help you fill in a big gap in your education."
"What I've done is arrange a session for you with an outstanding nude model who will walk you through the steps of drawing nude females. Name's Renate. I've known Renate for some time and she's the best in the field for this kind of thing."
What Dad
didn't
tell me as he chewed his steak and guzzled his Scotch and what Mom definitely didn't know was that Pops and Renate had a thing going. I'd find out down the road that Renate was Dad's bit on the side, as the Brits like to say, a side bit kept carefully hidden from Mom.
I never found out if Mom knew about Renate. If so, maybe she had someone, too. I hope so.
"Renate's got a cute little top-story apartment right in the middle of the city, old building, skylights in the top-level apartments," Pops said. "She's got everything set up in her apartment to use it as a studio when she models for art students. Several guys I know have sent their sons there as a birthday gift when they turned 18. Guys with sons like you who like to draw and want to study art."
"Renate's the best. She knows how to show the ropes to you artists-in-training guys. She likes doing that for young artists. I'll tell you right now, she's not hard on the eyes, either. She knows just how to pose to teach young guys like you some good artistic tricks."
As Dad said that to me, he winked. Again. What the hell was this all about? I wondered as I sat finishing my baked potato and trying to take this mysterious birthday gift in. Something just didn't pass the smell test. Pops had friends, other guys, who sent their sons to Renate to learn how to draw nude women when those sons turned 18? What in the heck?
Dad and I had had talks, more than one, about how studying art was totally fine for red-blooded men. Well, that was a point I had to make repeatedly with Dad, who was not convinced. As far as he was concerned, guys who liked to paint might as well hang a sign around their necks saying, "Gay guy here." I tried to tell him how absurd that idea was, to assure him that I'm not gay—not that there's anything at all wrong with being gay—because I like to draw and paint.
I'd given Dad the rundown of famous male artists widely known to be, well, some might use the expression "pussy hounds," macho men who went through women like crazy during their artistic career: Picasso, Diego Rivera, Gustav Klimt, Egon Schiele. Those names were just for starters. Van Gogh had a thing for prostitutes and was in love with a working girl when he ended his life too soon.
Still, I knew that Dad had reservations about my decision to study art. He had hinted more than once that he hoped after I turned 18, I could come of age in every way possible, get to know more about women and what makes them tick. I could read the signals as Dad told me about the gift he had put together for me—a guys' night out, a steak and Scotch dinner, a woman doing nude modeling for blossoming male art students. They made me suspect that this "gift" had a lot to do with Dad's reservations about art as a manly field of study.
But though I had my suspicious, I won't say that I wasn't also very curious. This was a gift I might very well like, even if it wasn't the car or trip I had hoped for.
So I thanked Dad and told him I appreciated his late birthday gift to me and looked forward to studying with Renate and learning more about drawing the female form. The
nude
female form....
"You won't be sorry, Son," Pops said, winking again as he downed the last of his Scotch. "Renate has a lot to teach you. And I mean
a lot
. What she teaches you is going to stand you in good stead when you get off to college in the fall."
Then Dad gave me the address of Renate's apartment, told me the day and time he'd arranged for my session, and said I wouldn't need art supplies, a sketch pad, an easel, anything. Renate had all that arranged.
Curioser and curioser.
I went. And I came. But I'm getting ahead of my storyline as I say that.
Here's the thing. I had never been with a woman before when Dad arranged this nude modeling session with Renate. Still carrying my V-card and wanting to get rid of it. Fast.
I'm pretty sure Dad knew this. I'm also pretty sure he wanted me to get some experience in that arena under my belt. So to speak.
I'm pretty sure he wanted to assure that, if I was going to study art, I'd be one of those manly men artist types, and not the type he mistakenly assumed all male artists were.
Here's what happened.
Part 2:
I arrived at Renate's place on the appointed day at the appointed time. When I rang her apartment, she buzzed me up right away. She'd obviously been waiting for me.
Renate met me at her apartment door, and I saw right away what Dad meant when he said she was easy on the eyes. Curvy in all the right places, pretty, thick lustrous dark hair clipped up so it cascaded in a ponytail down her neck, warm brown eyes. Definitely eye-catching.
"Come in, come in," she said as she gave me a big hug (just meeting and already on hugging terms?). "Brad, right? You look a lot like your Dad. Handsome. Strong. You're both men's men, for sure."
When I walked into Renate's place, I saw that it was a typical one-room loft apartment with a big skylight over it. But a spacious room, with a big double bed in the middle and an easel and drawing supplies arranged at the foot of the bed.
First thing Renate did is tell me she wanted me to put on a smock she had ready for me. She said the European thing for painters to do was to strip off and then put on a smock before they started working at their easels. Taking your clothes off and putting on an artist's smock is a symbolic way to leave the everyday world behind as you access your artistic side, Renate told me.