The Tail

Priya was lying next to Sumit on her side, as he lay on his back. She idly toyed with his chest hair with her hand, appreciating the manliness of his body even as her cunt was slowly oozing out their mingled fluids onto her thigh. He turned his head toward her and smiled a slow and lazy smile.

"In my medical judgement," he began, mock seriously, and Priya shoved him, snorting her own mock contempt. "No, seriously!" he continued, smiling.

"So then speak seriously, don't make a joke of it!" She was glad to feel no drawing back in him, but needed to know where they stood for real. "Sabu, do not toy with me. I need to know just how you feel."

"I'm sorry, Jaya, I did not mean to mock." He blew a long slow breath, then started up again, in a much more slow and almost reverent voice. "In my medical judgement, I have no medical explanation for your tail. No, nothing. In my view, it is nothing short of a miracle."

Priya was surprised by that. She arched an eyebrow at her husband, hoping that he would continue to explain. He did.

"Your tail, it is a mystery to me. I have never before heard of anything like this." He paused again, seeming to gather himself before he could continue. "I think it may be a holy mystery. In fact, I believe this is a blessing from Hanuman."

Now this was not a possibility that had crossed Priya's mind before. She didn't think that she believed in such a thing, but whether or not it might be true, she could see how the same conservative religious upbringing that she had feared might be a problem between her and Sumit could also lead him to this much more positive conclusion. But what would the implications be?

"And if it is?" she asked, "What then?"

He spoke slowly, clearly thinking things through as he was speaking. "Jaya, if indeed this is a blessing from Hanuman, then the question is whether this is a miracle to be shared or whether it is a private blessing that should not be. Considering the circumstances, I believe this is a private matter."

He reached around her and gently grasped her tail, stroking it gently and lovingly, "Consider the sensitivity and pleasurable sensations."

"Oh yes," she halfway whined, wonderfully stimulated by his touch.

His hand slid up and stroked the pubic hair around its root. "Consider the nature of the hair as well." This felt good too, but Priya wished that he would go back to his former stroking. Instead, however he shifted to holding her by the thigh. "Jaya, these things are private matters. I think that we should no more share the knowledge of your tail with others than we would discuss the shape and scent of your cunt or the details of how the two of us have sex. Hanuman has blessed our marriage, but the blessing is for you and me, not for the world."

"Sabu," she asked, both relieved and perturbed, "If Hanuman has blessed us both, then why has the tail grown only on me? Why did he not give you one as well?"

"I do not think to know the mind of gods," he said, but went on anyway, "Perhaps, however, it is because a man's clothing could not conceal a tail in the way a sari can."

"So, no more salwar kameez for me? No trousers, only saris. Thank you for the wardrobe guidance, Hanuman!" Priya's tone was a bit more acid than she intended it to be.

"Jaya, I am sorry. I did not mean it that way."

"Of course not. Of course not. But still, who gets to carry the burden of this blessing? Me, of course, the woman. Who has to live in fear every day of exposure by the neighbors, of what your mother will think, of having my thrice-blessed tail come slipping out in the toilet and touching who knows what contaminated filth!"

Sumit looked hurt, buy Priya couldn't help herself. She went on, "I love you, Sumit, but sometimes you are just such a fucking man." She turned away, onto her back, now abruptly feeling cold and exposed, and moved to cross her arms across her chest.

Silence stretched between the two of them, where just a few short moments before there had been ecstasy and closeness.

"I'm sorry," Sumit said to her, now sitting up.

"You're damned right that you had best be sorry."

"I love you. I want to make this up to you."

"Then listen to me and learn. You are a good man, Sumit, but you will never understand what it feels like to be a woman living in this city. You live happily with your parents here, I leave my home and make chapatis that aren't good enough for your mother. You work a hard late shift, but when I leave my job I have to make sure you have your dinner waiting for you. You go to work, you watch to keep your wallet close. I go to work, I have to deal with street harassment." She paused. "Fuck, now I have to protect my tail from gropers too, you know."

Sumit was still silent, clearly transfixed upon her words. Priya wished that she could take everything that she had said back, somehow smooth things over and retreat to her ordained domestic sphere, make everything simply safe again. But she also felt the truth of every word she said, and the Goddess was in her now, plunging forward into battle with no way back but victory or defeat. She sat up, and continued.

"I love you, Sumit, but I am not my mother's generation, and if we're going to make this marriage work, you have got to do better." She paused again. "Especially now, especially with this tail that's complicating everything. Blessing or curse, or maybe both, it's going to make our lives more complicated, and either we're on the same team here, or else I'm going home tonight."

She hadn't meant to go so far, but it was out before her now, and Sumit would have to deal with it or not. As she sat and watched his face reacting, watched something complex going on behind his eyes, Priya considered the irony of the fact that she had walked home wondering if Sumit would throw her out tonight, but now she was the one who was threatening to walk out of their flat herself. She didn't want to, but she would if it came down to that. She had her pride and her integrity.

She wondered how long this upset had been building up inside her. She wondered how long Sumit would sit there thinking before he actually responded to her ultimatum. She wondered with surprise and hope, in fact, at the seriousness with which he seemed to be contemplating her assertions.

"I think," Sumit began quite slowly, "that this is actually about far more than your new tail." Priya looked at him, chin raised, waiting for him to continue. "I think, perhaps, that I have failed you in my duty as a husband. Men and women have their places in the world and in the home, but those places are not so simple as they once have been."

Priya was feeling rather dubious about this line of reasoning. "Please say less about my place and more about how you are failing me."

"What I mean," he waved his hand around vaguely, "You are right, this is not our parents generation. India has changed, the world has changed. But it is not for us to say if these changes are good or bad, but to find a way to follow our dharma appropriately in whatever circumstances we may find ourselves."

"The point?" Priya felt abrupt, impatient with this philosophizing. Her arms were crossed in anger now.

"The point, Jaya, is that I have been failing in my spiritual duties in our marriage. The duty of a husband is to show love, care, and affection to his wife. Just as serenity and calm are required of a wife, so hard work and strength are required of a husband. But clearly, no matter how hard I may be working physically, I have been too lazy emotionally and spiritually. I have overlooked your needs, have taken you for granted."

"Go on, Sabu." She wasn't sure how she felt about how he was getting there, but maybe his upbringing meant that such a roundabout path was the best way he could manage.

"Perhaps in ages past the household would have been your dharma, but this is now, and in your eyes I see reflected all the powers of creation. I hear the passion that you bring to your designs, the satisfaction when a building rises with your hand in its becoming, the frustration when a job is bungled by poor workmen. I hear the sound of your voice when you sing, see the power in your body when you run. Your dharma is a damned sight more than the fucking chapatis."

He paused, and she could see the tears in his eyes, clearly heartfelt even in this odd approach to empathy. But at least she now felt seen.

"And that's why I've been failing you, my love. I've been too lazy and blind, lost in the maya of worldly comforts and lack of conflict." He stopped, apparently suddenly struck by something. "Hanuman! A calling away to battle, though one of the spirit and the soul!"

Now Priya was feeling halfway lost. "Hanuman?"

"His blessing!" Sumit was up and pacing now, unconscious of his nakedness. "You are right that your tail is a burden on you and not on me. That can only mean that there is just as large a burden that I must take as well."

"Jaya," he said, turning and facing her, very still indeed, "If you will have me, I must share the household chores."

"I'm sorry, Sumit, but let me make sure that I have got this straight. You're saying that Hanuman gave me a tail in order to fix our marriage, so therefore you're going to help me with the cooking and cleaning?"

His face was alight with purpose now. "Yes, exactly! Just as you have been supporting me in my career, I need to support you in yours as well. If it would be OK with you? I know the kitchen is a woman's sanctuary, and I don't want to intrude if I am not wanted there."

"You're serious?" Priya could see he was indeed, with that same intensity of purpose that had caught her eye when her parents introduced him as a candidate for marriage, that she loved to see in him when he talked about the patients he had helped.

"Absolutely serious."

"Well, Sabu, I don't think I see this all the way that you do, but I would definitely appreciate having a husband who is a more equal partner in the household. But won't your parents throw a fit?"

"They may. But I am married to you, not them. I owe you, Priya. What sort of man would I be if I let me mother walk all over my wife?"

"A normal one. One who's been doing it for five damned months now, ever since I moved my ass into my wedded home."

Sumit looked crushed and guilty. "Fuck," he said, "you're right." And now he was crying, and Priya felt annoyed that she was the one with the problem and now he was the one who was crying.

She gave him no damned sympathy. "Fuck yes. And I've not brought it up because I've been trying to be a good Hindu wife, fitting into your household and not upsetting the way that things are expected to be. But I think I'm done with that."

He looked at her, wiping his eyes, and simply said, "I'm sorry."

"Thank you," Priya said, and then went on, "I'm glad you understand at least. That helps."

He reached down a hand to her. She took it and stood, then shook his hand, the two of them looking very seriously and straight into each others eyes, naked and near-naked though they were together. Priya, as she stood there, became aware again of the stickiness still in between her thighs, the lost delight of sex buried beneath this argument of theirs. She noticed Sumit's flaccid cock, and thought how funny they must look, standing there together, as her tail began to move again, a slow and restless motion as her emotions once again began to stabilize. She wanted to move on, to get back to something more like the night they might have had.

"Sabu," she said, "Would like to help me make our dinner?"

His face broke wide into a boyish grin and he embraced her where she stood. And so it was, that soon enough, Priya found herself before their stove, teaching Sumit how to make luchi and both of them still entirely naked but for her supportive bra. She showed him how to mound the flour up, making the pocket for the water in the middle and dribbling the oil all around. Then they were kneading and rolling the dough together, her precise architect's hands guiding his strong sure doctor's movements, their breathing slow and quiet and together.

As they moved to frying, Priya thought just how foolish their unprotected skin most surely was, but didn't want to break the moment. Her tail was reaching over to wrap around his leg, just holding on a bit, caressing him as they worked together. Sumit had no hand to spare as he worked the dough, but nudged her hip back with his thigh. Priya nudged the luchi as it fried, smiling as she watching the golden bread puff up into bubbly circles.

No other food came out that night, just the luchi they had made together and a plenitude of condiments, pickles and chutneys and spicy sauce, which they dipped the bread into and fed bits into each other's mouths. Afterward, with the sky now fully dark outside, Priya led Sumit back into the bedroom.

"Lie down," she said, "I want to be on top."

He smiled at her and did as she had bid. His cock was already standing at attention. At now Priya finally undid her bra, letting her breasts hang free and wobble as she climbed on top of her man. Lowering her cunt, she swallowed up his cock inside, into a wetness that had been building up inside her in anticipation. Slowly, gently, she settled deeply down, pressing their pubic hair together, feeling Sumit rocking his hips to push back up as well.

Once there, she sat still, feeling his cock tense up inside her, smiling down at Sumit smiling up at her. "Maya," she said, "or something more?"

"Fuck me, please," he breathed, writhing inside her warm and wet embrace. Priya simply squeezed her cunt, feeling the fullness and resistance as she worked her kegel muscles. Then slowly she started to rock back and forth, just her hips, closing her eyes as she moved in a building cycle. Sumit's hands were on her hips, holding her tightly down against him, writhing in her loving grip. Priya's tail stretched out behind her, waving slowly in the air. Her breathing was slow and rhythmic, moving with her hips, savoring every pleasurable movement as she went.

Up and up and up she built, milking his cock slowly with her cunt, eyes closed and focusing on the fine sensations in her and along her hips and thighs. She could feel Sumit breathing with her now, following her lead as they fucked deeply and thoroughly. As Priya continued to rotate her hips, she pushed her clitoris down deeper and harder against her lover's cock. The rhythm built and built and built, faster and harder now, then harder and harder and harder still, until finally she was crying out, releasing her exploding orgasm in a clenching shuddering mass of uncontrollable sensation. Sumit once again went off as well, somewhere during the endless rolls of shuddering as Priya came, then came again.

And then their moves were slowing down, still moving, but slower and slower now, cooling down and Sumit softening inside her, but Priya not yet ready to release his cock, not until it finally slopped out on its own, falling beneath her and she shifted off her man, lying down and pulling him on top of her to kiss together fiercely and deeply in their sticky nakedness. His hands were in her long black hair, tangling in its roots as he held tightly to her head, and she was holding to his back, appreciating this complex man. "We'll make it through, I think," she said, and Sumit answered back, "Together, I am sure we can."