Like a Long Road Home
Erotic Stories of Perilous Travel
edited by the Circlet Press Editorial Staff
Circlet Press, Inc.
Cambridge, MA
Like a Long Road Home
Copyright © 2010 by Circlet Press, Inc.
Published by
Circlet Press, Inc.
39 Hurlbut Street
Cambridge, MA 02138
www.circlet.com
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Table of Contents
Touching Hemingway by L.A. Mistral
Ota Discovers Fire by Vinnie Tesla
Neither Bird Nor Tree by Sunny Moraine
On the Rocks by Elizabeth Coldwell
Traveling always brings with it the chance to meet new and exciting people, people you would otherwise never have met. Think of all the people you have the chance to encounter in travel and those who help you along the way. The more dangerous the paths you take, the more interesting the people you tend to meet. Whether the journey is in a foreign country, through rarely-traveled forests, across new lands, or even in your own area of the globe, there's always that chance for chance encounters.
For some, a chance encounter is all that their suppressed passion has been waiting for to burst forth. For others, the journey itself becomes the chance to find what burns under the surface. In "Touching Hemingway" by L.A. Mistral, rekindling passion can become a dangerous journey. Yet when a trip first becomes treacherous, perhaps the best bet is to keep company as untamed as the trip itself, as realized in "Ota Discovers Fire" by Vinnie Tesla. "Neither Bird Nor Tree" by Sunny Moraine shows that the company we keep can lead to risky encounters all on its own. In "On the Rocks" by Elizabeth Coldwell, it all culminates to finding the positives in the potential negatives a dangerous location can hold.
In these four short stories, the perils come from both the world around and from within and prove that sometimes, the most memorable parts of the trip are the impromptu detours we take along the way.
The Editors
May 2010
L. A. Mistral
(1)
"Here, climb on top," Shawn called to Yurina.
He bent low into the surf so Yurina could climb on top of his shoulders. The surf was a little rough and Yurina was a Wisconsin lake girl, not accustomed to waves that could churn and twirl her like a square dance on steroids. But she was beginning to like it. Yurina liked the danger of it.
She climbed on top of Shawn and the waves lapped at her legs. It was early September now, and the ocean water was just getting mild. Canadians and Germans were taking their last holidays. Even hurricane season did not deter them. The beach and the September sunset were surreal and seductive. Yurina and Shawn stayed two nights in Veradero, a spit of land on Cuba's north coast lined with expensive resorts, crimson sunsets, and tanned skin. Then they'd moving on to Havana. Veradero's coast was creamy, with white beaches, bars, shops, and hotels. Yurina and Shawn booked two nights in the Hotel Internacionale. The elegant pool there was like swimming in a liquid art deco with its ornate tiles and trim. But Yurina and Shawn both liked the secrecy of the beach. They could try out things in private.
As she sat open-legged on Shawn's shoulders, the back of his neck pressed into her clit. When he lifted up to ride a wave, a force field of low-current electricity radiated from her cunt into the center of her body. Sometimes she pressed back into his neck, but she hoped he didn't notice. She was embarrassed to be so open now. Her body wasn't used to Shawn's physical closeness. Shawn's skin seemed alien to her now. His voice seemed like a stranger. She had a hard time looking into his eyes.
But her pussy had a mind of its own. It loved the press of flesh, the push of another's skin near it, and it wanted to push back. Her pussy was spongy and wet, and not because of the waves. Internal waves splashed her and leaked out, staining her bottoms.
He turned his head up and it hit Yurina's clit just right again. Another wave broke across her cunt, rolled up into her belly and splashed across her breasts. Her nipples tightened and scraped across the tight cloth of her bikini.
The rolling surf swarmed and undulated beneath her. It rocked her and put her into an erotic, experimental mood. She hoped he'd say something witty or sexy or at least interesting.
But all he said was, "Let's go back to shore."
Yurina and Shawn had a difficult fifth year of marriage. They had been best friends all through college and it had been a foregone conclusion that they would get married. They dug into their careers, Yurina as a social worker at a local homeless shelter and Shawn as an associate minister. Of course, they had evening meetings; and, of course, they came home exhausted every night. Each wanted to save the world. But slowly the world ate them up. The world nibbled at their energy and the world bit at their time. It chewed up their idealism and their expectations. Before Yurina and Shawn knew it, subtle sex became no sex at all. The desire for intimacy became the desire for isolation. First, sex was reduced to an afterthought and busyness replaced the long talks they used to have. Then, sex became an embarrassment.
Back on shore, they lay on a large beach towel. They had put their beach towels and food in a small cove surrounded by a low hedge of rocks. They were invisible to all but the most curious of eyes. Secrecy felt naughty to them. Their jobs were so proper and so public. After years of marriage, naughtiness was arousing.
Yurina could feel how slippery she was on the inside. She stretched out, and her muscles released months of tension. The towel was warm now by the ambient heat of the sand. She liked to tease him. Her nipples strained against the patterns of her bikini top. The more her nipples rubbed against the cloth, the more she got wet. It was a cycle of desire and she had no desire to stop it. She turned toward him on her side and lightly rubbed her breasts against his shoulders. Shawn had his eyes closed, but she could tell his cock had one eye open. Its eye was on her.
He cracked his eye open. "I see you," Shawn said. "At least part of me does."
Shawn slipped his hand into the waistband of her bikini. Then he waited. He waited for some sign. Still not looking at him, Yurina smiled and he slid her panties down the length of her thighs. Yurina had delicious skin. It had a dusky kind of glow, like a sun had just set there. Shawn felt like he could just sink into her skin. He wanted her skin to swallow him up. But, still, he said nothing.
"Anything can happen in an exotic country, even miracles," Yurina thought. "Romance is easier in an exotic country, even an embargoed country."
The sunset bathed the shore in a pink glow. The slanting rays of the sunlight highlighted the clouds above the horizon in streaks of magenta. It was a miraculous setting, and she wanted something marvelous to happen.
Yurina started the miracles by stripping off her swimsuit. She kicked her bottoms off with a flick of her foot. Shawn eased his hand between her thighs and rubbed it between her pussy lips. Her lips there felt full and her warm juice felt good on his hand. Yurina loosed her legs and his hand went deeper. The edge of his hand split her pussy and he pressed the edge of his palm into it. Her whole vulva was open now, exposed to the rip tides of his hands.
Yurina had closed her eyes and let her legs come apart. Shawn's hands felt like fleshy sunrays inside her. She liked how full and how taken she felt. She equated the force of Shawn's fucking to the urgency of his need for her. Yurina's pussy was as pink and puffy as the clouds in the red sunset. Now her cunt was more slippery than the surf. She liked when he used to take her; now he asked permission too much, way too much. Yurina wanted some sign from him, some spark of initiative, some assurance that he could be directive and demanding.
She got it. Anything is possible in a land of broad-hipped women and literate men.
Shawn pulled down her top, and Yurina's breasts shuddered in the dusky air. Her nipples opened like mouths sucking in the evening.
First Shawn nuzzled them. Then he nibbled them. Then he bit them. They tasted like salt and salmon. Yurina arched her back. They didn't speak. Words would've only gotten in the way of their mouths. The waves rolled from her breasts to her pussy. He nibbled at them again.
Yurina couldn't tell if he wanted to be tender or if he was just timid.
"Do it harder," she whispered into her ear. "I won't break."
He bit harder. Still no good. "Like this," Yurina said.
She bit down on his ear. Shawn gasped and immediately got hard. Yurina could see his cock rise and pointed to his suit.
"Are you gonna keep that thing on?" she said. It was half a question and half a dare. He was annoyed that Yurina was treating him like an adolescent, and anger made his cock head swell. It was as red as his face. Shawn was breathing hard now, too. He knelt between her legs and balanced his cock between the outer lips of her pussy. He ran it up and down the length of her vulva, lightly touching her ass. Her thick juice greased his cock and he dipped the head inside. Then he gently slid all the way inside. He rocked her lightly, like he was rocking a baby asleep.
He was fucking her like saying a rosary, and Yurina wanted to be fucked by the devil himself.
She stared back at him, smiling. She wanted to see his face angry. She wanted to see another face besides his complacent face, his compassionate face, or his empathetic face. She was glad to see his angry, aroused face.
He came; she did not. Shawn pulled out just before he came. He was not used to being inside her, and come piled up on her stomach like white petals.
"Look," Yurina said smiling, "springtime in September."
Shawn laughed and felt like doing something unexpected. His cock still glistened with Yurina's juices, and an early evening ocean breeze blew across his damp cock. It made him shiver. Shawn pushed Yurina to her knees and stood behind her. He folded his hand into her hair like a flesh barrette. His motion was so subtle, so liquid that she hardly noticed at first. Then he twisted his fingers into a fist and yanked her head back. He dried the head of his cock on a handful of her red hair.
Yurina didn't cry out, even though the swiftness of his yank on her hair startled and hurt her. She was delighted with how desperate he seemed for her. After all, they had come to Cuba for desperate reasons. It smelled like hot iron and raw silk and she hated to wash it. She was disappointed when he later said he was sorry.
"I'm not," she said. "That last part was good."
(2)
Their marriage was foundering, like so many makeshift Cuban rafts bound for the United States. Yurina and Shawn flew to Cuba on a dare, a wager. It might be the most important bet in their married lives. Would Shawn commit a felony to save his relationship with Yurina?
The evidence of their sexual indifference was everywhere before they left for Cuba: the unused condoms, still hermetically sealed in their orange and red packages; tubes of lubrication, without any frenzied dents in them, their tops still screwed on tightly. Then there were the immaculate bed sheets, lying flat as a New England pond; no wet spots. They walked a desert of desire, each looking for an oasis.
"The sanitary life is killing us," Yurina thought to herself as she lay on the beach. The sun was almost gone now, but the sand still radiated a full day's worth of heat.
She looked at Shawn half-dozing in the sand and remembered how firm and spontaneous he used to be. "He'd take me in the most unexpected ways," she remembered. Yurina wanted--maybe needed--some act of outrage and intuition to break through.
"But break through into what?" Yurina asked herself. What did she really want?
The plan came to her again as quiet as a breath. But it made her inhale. She thought of theft, of fingertips and raw-skinned, teeth-grinding ecstasies.
But what she said was, "It would break us out of our doldrums--our own Horse Latitudes." Yurina reminded Shawn what they planned to do.
Shawn paused skeptically, and then said, "You still mean steal the thing right from under the noses of the Cuban government?"
"You know," Shawn told her, "the Cubans consider Hemingway a national hero. Stealing that is like stealing Che's beret or his pistols from the Che Guevara Museum."
"We can do it," she emphasized. "It'll be the glue that binds us together."
"We'll be bound together alright," Shawn said. "We'd be bound together during the arrest, bound together at the trial, bound together until they throw you in the women's jail and me in... oh Jesus...." His voice was getting high and whiney.
But Yurina knew she would be right. She would make it right. She had to make it right--for both their sakes.
"Do you want to feel how much I want it?" she asked. "Come here; I'll show you."
She pulled his hand to her and slid it down her front. It was a once-familiar ride and his hand remembered the way. It was like a downhill run. His fingers tracked her tiny hairs below her navel and felt the tuft of shaved hair. Shawn was quieter now and saw the detail of her body. He hadn't realized that she had shaved herself. He wished he had done it. He liked the slick, smooth feel of her sex. Shawn inhaled.
Wetness and prophesy rose from her pussy. It was a rumor of scent--an ocean spray found its way into her panties. Her hairs down there became a humid, Caribbean country. Her pussy felt like palm trees and sunsets. In a flash of insight, she could tell the future. The deeper Shawn went into her, the clearer the prophesy seemed.
Yurina still held his fingers in her left hand. Shawn combed her sculpted hairs between his thumb and forefinger. They felt luxuriant with oil and he dipped two fingers inside her. His fingers felt like bodies, well massaged with suntan lotion, catching the last rays from a hot day at the beach.
"That's how much I want it," she said, slowly grinding her breath into his ear.
"I want this," she said and guided his hand around her pussy. She was shaved into a design that he recognized but couldn't quite identify.
"I want this," she said and pulled his hand to the end of her pussy and pressed it around the rim of her ass. He could feel it tighten slightly then relax. She raised his finger a little to collect more juicy lube and--