for A.G.
The principal protagonist in the tale I have to tell you is a woman by the name of Myrtle Mary Townsend. She prefers to be known as Myr, because the elegant, mysterious and slightly aromatic image that this single syllable conjures up is far more accurate than what you might imagine on hearing her given name.
Her own story is long, complicated and for the most part obscene. It is enough, for now, to say that she is twenty-nine, tall, beautiful, raven-haired and pale and, thanks to an ever-waging war for affection between her wealthy father and even wealthier step-father, has ready access to an amount of money which, if written down, might easily be mistaken for a phone number.
She has three degrees, speaks six languages, plays two musical instruments to a near-professional standard and a third merely excellently.
I know, sickening isn't it? She's really
nice
too, which somehow makes it worse.
Unless you get on her bad side, that is.
You don't want to do that.
She has been my closest friend for many years - though our backgrounds could hardly be more different - and when we first met... ah, but I digress. Let's get started, shall we?
* * *
Myr sat alone at the bar in the smallest room of the conference-cum-party suite at the Meadway Hotel London, SW1. She wore a long, flowing black dress with a lacy crimson trim at the bust and long hanging red sleeves. Her body was encased and eye-poppingly uplifted by a tightly-bound leather corset. She had ditched the pointy hat with the trailing red ribbon, but was confident she was still pulling off the fairytale princess look. Maybe a fairytale princess whose formative years had featured a little too much Joy Division, but a fairytale princess nonetheless.
The occasion was an all-singles fancy dress Valentine's ball being thrown by... oh, somebody. Was it somebody famous, or just a friend of a friend? Could be both. She couldn't remember now. She hadn't wanted to come. It had all been Elena's idea, and
she'd
promptly disappeared off to a room somewhere upstairs with the first handsome man to pay her the slightest attention.
The main hall was full of rich, single idiots dressed as pirates and princes and historical figures and celebrities. The music was disgusting pop, as was the wine. All in all the event fell well short of even her lowest expectations.
She had escaped to this smaller, quieter part of the extensive suite, to wait until Elena returned from her giggly humping, or until Myr became too bored and left without her. There was a bar and there were relatively few people. There was no music.
Myr sat on a tall, leather-cushioned stool, one elbow on the bar, swiping text into her phone with the thumb of one hand and taking the occasional sip from a large gin and tonic held in the other. She was having an argument on twitter about sexism in the media, another on facebook about the ethics of taxation, a game of chess with a renowned Pakistani mathematician, and cybersex with someone whose gender she had yet to establish.
None of it was really going anywhere. Just passing time.
After a while she locked her phone - arguments won, game stalemated, sex abandoned - put it away in a tiny handbag and finished her drink. She looked up and saw that the extremely fit-looking barboy she had been flirting with earlier had been replaced by a short, generously and sensuously rounded barmaid with short brown hair. Myr gestured with her empty glass and smiled, and the barmaid came over.
"Yes madam?" she said.
"Please," said Myr with a grin, holding out a hand. "My name's Myr, what's yours?"
The barmaid took Myr's hand and shook it uncertainly.
"Ren," she said.
"Pleased to meet you, Ren," said Myr. "I'll have another G and T if you'd be so kind."
Myr leaned forward as she said this, folding her arms and using her elbows to push her breasts together. Her cleavage formed a deep, dark ravine barely separating two smoothly pale mountains of flesh, which drew in the eye and seductively beckoned the face to follow. Ren's gaze shifted involuntarily, falling into that inviting shadow as though at some subliminal command. She was held there for a second or two, before the spell lifted and her panicked expression flicked up to meet Myr's.
Myr met her gaze, smiled and winked, and Ren's face flushed pink. She turned away quickly and walked to the back of the bar area, where a wide counter held a bewildering array of bottles.
How cute,
thought Myr, staring at the woman's curvaceous rear as she bent to get a bottle of tonic water from a glass-fronted fridge.
Like all the bar staff, Ren wore nondescript black trousers and a black shirt. It was a professional, unobtrusive and pointedly demure look, which could easily have rendered even the most desirable figure a mere background detail. Not for Myr, though. She had an eye for such things. She could spot a nice bum through a taped-up bin bag.
As Ren crouched down her trousers - a little loose, perhaps - slipped down at the back to reveal a thin crescent of flesh and a sliver of pink cotton. Myr felt a hint of warmth stir between her legs, as she imagined teasing those pink knickers gently downward and sliding her tongue into what lay beneath.
Ren straightened, tucking in the back of her shirt, and their eyes met in the large mirror over the counter. Myr gave a mischievous grin. Ren smiled nervously back, then looked away.
Movement in the mirror caught her eye, and Myr saw a tall, thin man dressed as a prince approach her from behind, staring. He licked his lips, and his throat wobbled alarmingly as he swallowed.
Oh no...
"Oh my dear princess, my lady both sweet and fair," he began in a reedy voice. Myr rolled her eyes. "Oh! How thy countenance doth reflect the very light of heaven like a still silver mere in the moonlight!"
Myr turned very slowly and looked the man up and down. He was young - about twenty, she guessed - and gangly with it, possessing no chin to speak of. His face looked oily and desperate beneath a dreadfully-coiffured mop of lank brown hair, topped with an expensive-looking silver crown. The whole outfit was quite well done, actually, but it didn't make up for the contents.
"So," she said. "My face reminds you of a puddle at night?"
"What?" the prince exclaimed, reddening. "No, not at all, I... oh, my lady, please do excuse my lack of eloquence, so stunned was I by your radiant beauty..."
Oh please,
she thought,
pass me the bucket!
"...please accept my most humble apologies for any, assuredly unintended, offence," he wittered on. "Allow me to get you a d... oh."
At that moment Myr's drink arrived. She accepted it gratefully and rolled her eyes at Ren, who grinned sheepishly back. She took a long sip, finishing half the large measure in one mouthful.
He introduced himself as Chester, and gradually dropped the prince charming act as his faux-medieval vocabulary failed him. He went on and on and on about nothing of interest and little of sense. Myr tried to listen at first, out of politeness, but soon found herself fantasising about Ren. She imagined laying a trail of soft kisses around the luscious curves of the barmaid's bottom and upper thighs, gently parting her legs, spiralling inward with her kisses, closer and closer, feeling a moist heat press against her face as she extended her tongue and tasted...
She snapped out of it, coming back to the room with a small cough. She straightened herself up on the stool, uncrossed her legs - she felt a little wetness soak out into her underwear as her thighs parted, and briefly pictured Ren on her knees between them, lapping it up - and then recrossed them the other way.
