BAR NAPKIN SONNET #22 Moira Egan

(I want to fall in love, but not forever. Is that the truth, or am I still confused where love's concerned" Or am I simply used to Solitary broken by Whoever looks interested or interesting" Never quite thought of it that way. What is the juice that drives the flower, forces green the fuse that sparks in me"what? Last night, with my lover, I almost dropped the L word. O confusion! He gathered up my hair the way they do when habit seems like love. On top of him I swear I found some new type of orgasm. I've swallowed almost anything, but do you think it's good to swallow I love you?)

I should go out. Staying here in this beautiful condo mesmerized by the oddity that is my life, I wonder, am I shallow" To be so impressed with the luxuries of my existence"

I should at least miss home. My sisters all named for some flower that had graced my mother's rounded abdomen at the moment my father dutifully thanked her for her generous ovaries. The father who indulged my every spoiled little whim and learned to gently sigh in exasperation at any squall that threatened his peaceful serenity. We never misbehaved, not out of any fear, but out of an assured understanding that to do so would threaten the Judge's peace of mind. And that just would not do. What of mother? The Domestic delight, so delicate and firm, unbreakably weak and determined to embody all the charm a Southern girl was meant to emote.

I don't.

I don't miss it with any real longing or sense of pain. Momentary fleeting whimsies but they all flee from the smoldering intensity of my needs, my desires, my secret longings that had brought me here.

I slide my skin across the perfection of 500 thread count sheets and resist the urge to moan aloud despite my singular aloneness. None would hear me should I give into the tickling in my throat. Yet, decorum remains and I simply stretch up to a sitting position, luxuriating in the whisker burn along my inner thighs. I know my sensitive skin will surely reveal the good doctor's attentions. Barefoot, I let my toes sink into the thick plush carpet of my bedroom, decorated to my southern tastes: all creamy colors and airy light.

My bathroom has become my sanctuary. The deep seated tub with its jets is my destination and I run the bath choosing an apricot blend and pouring the creamy milk into the steaming water. I settled into the liquid embrace and let my thoughts diffuse.

No one ever tells you how painfully awkward the morning after is going to be. To awaken draped over a man's chest with my legs tangled with another's was unnerving.

I adopted the same air that my mother would use when dealing with invading Yankees. As if this were something that simply must be endured and would only be made insurmountable if one let on that they were ruffled.

Showered, dressed for the day and breakfasting with them, I found their own discomfort charming. The Watch Boys were goodlooking and well-mannered. Unaware of how to act around each other after a night of shared intimacies with me.

The island counter in my kitchen became much more enjoyable once I discovered that the best solution to the tension was to revisit our activities from the night before.

As I moaned out the first of many climactic responses I felt a flush of something other than pleasure stain my soft skin. If the shame of realizing that I didn't know either of their names aroused me even more I'm sure He could analyze the source of my miscreant desires.

The thought spurred me to new heights. I gave them whatever they asked and even more than what they imagined. I eagerly participated in my own despoiling, driven to a wild state of abandon as I sought to exorcise Him.

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I got my wish. For pain. Laid up for two days in my darkened bedchamber I shunned all light and noise and refused most nourishment.

Migraines. Such a simple word for such a hideous betrayal by your very own body. Overstimulated nerve endings screamed in viciously jagged shrills. My body rebelled against the agony of my head and all I could do was coccoon myself away from all stimulants.

Overwrought, my Watchboy did the best that he could. This injured, weakened thing a drain upon his empathy and patience. As much as he adored my needing him, the need was wearing on him. A burden he did not desire. I was supposed to want, need, and desire him for all things, not actually become needy.

It's silly this game that men and women play. My psychology training allows me too much insight into the machinations of man and I find myself acting in the reality that is my life too often.

I had called into work and this nagged at me. I knew He would know that I did so only out of the sheerest urgency. Yet, I imagined Him lost without me there. Of course, my True Self hoped and prayed that this was indeed reality. That he was right now staring out of his floor to ceiling windows at the Plaza de Troyes pining for my safe return from this dark journey of pain. It was a sign of my infantile sexuality and my arrested development that this immature hope fueled my dreams.

Even aware of my own diagnosis I did nothing to change. Instead I dwelled in the erotic fantasies of my mind, pretending to myself that the romantic outcome I desired was not simply delusion.

Apple by Jay Leeming

"Sometimes when eating an apple I bite too far and open the little room the lovers have prepared, and the seeds fall out onto the kitchen floor and I see that they are tear-shaped."

Love hurts. And yet we always go back for more. I can't explain it. I don't know if I even want to try. The Watchboy and I fought. It was typical really. This falling out of our semblance of love.

I was not blessed with the ability to maintain a friendship with past lovers. This pained me. I'm not a judgmental soul and upon the conclusion of a relationship I would not be adverse to remaining aware of our connection. The problem is this never works past theory for me.

My relationships tend to end in a volatile explosion of hurt and anger. Designed to drive the most distance between us as quickly as possible. Sometimes I think it is because the idea of a failed relationship lingering about depresses me as if the spectre of that long dead love might rise up again and suffocate me.

The few men that I am able to stay friends with always find a new replacement for me and I am forever disliked by their newfound love. Perhaps it is because it is quite obvious that I enjoyed their mate in very intimate ways and I feel no desire to hide this connection. Perhaps it is out of a very real fear that I could at any point decide to rekindle an old flame on an impulse.

I'm not sure. And I don't really search for the answers to this quandary.

As the Watchboy and I disintegrated, our relationship faltering in the early stages of its life (coughing and sputtering up in jagged emotional outbursts), I couldn't hide the relief I felt at the ending.

Of course this hurt him. And he rode that hurt hard and wet, furious with me for causing pain.

Tears, like little apple seeds, spilled about my apartment as I weathered the beating of our injured hearts.

When he left me, as he was destined to do, he was finally tender as if the rage of our emotions had uncovered a glimmer of the love beneath the hurt.

We thanked each other for this journey with a fleshy communion. I didn't have to fake the orgasm that swept me at this physical farewell.

I felt for a moment grateful and certain that our relationship could continue past this, when as he dressed he stared at me for a long moment before bequeathing his condemnation: "You're Poison."

I wondered if that made him Snow White, eating of my poisonous flesh, and I had a sudden vision of him rising up from between my thighs my juices dribbling down his chin.

"You didn't seem to mind." Was all I could say as he gathered up the last of his things and departed.

I was regretful for the way the evening had turned out. I had never meant to hurt the sweet man who offered himself up for my discernment. I should never have agreed to the date, nor sought it out.

But the thing about regrets is that they are usually forgotten and when presented with an opportunity that might stir them awake we tend to overlook their insistence.

I wanted a distracted. And I got one.

The date was progressing quite nicely despite the empty interest of our words. He possessed no skill at flirtation and was quite literalminded. But we could discuss the upcoming cultural events around the city and I admit to a pleased thrill at our discourse.

It was the nitpicking that drove me to distraction. He was not happy with our table. We were moved. He was unhappy with the Soup and we were rewarded with a visit from the chef. Who gave us a special appetizer he'd been testing out. It was divine, the calamari prepared just so. Yet my date was not appeased.

I was on my third glass of wine when our entrees arrived and he scrunched up his forehead in what was becoming a familiar pose to me.

Sighing, I'd sat my fork down and asked before the tsking could begin, "What now?"

Perhaps it was my obvious irritation that had him squirming apologetically, or it could simply be that the only thing that he had not critiqued this evening had been me and now I was acting out; whatever it was, he attempted to pretend that there was nothing wrong with his salmon even as we both knew he lied.

I needed distance from him before I said the cutting words that danced along my tongue. Taking his plate, I told him I would handle it even as I envisioned throwing the salmon in his lap and departing.

And that is how I ended up in the kitchen. And that is how I ended up with the chef buried between my thighs.

It wasn't intentional.

Sonnet 21 By Moira Egan

I keep a file of pick-up lines. Your smile is bright enough to launch a thousand ships. Hey, Cleo, you're my lily of the Nile. Where do you keep the winder for those hips" Your ankles are so slender I could cry or kiss your feet, or fall at them for life. The literary one: When small birds sigh... THe honest one: Distract me from my wife. And weighing in at worst, I think, Your tits are dynamite... Take note, my dears, who are so very clever: I want to fall in love, but not for ever.

The men in RhyDin came in varying packages and wrappings. I was impressed by the variety. I never had a problem finding a date and went through a whirlwind of choices, bouncing from the differing types like a schizophrenic in an ice cream store.

The tactics were fascinatingly diverse and the pick up lines I found myself collecting for my amusement much later. I had but one girlfriend to share them with and we laughed wildly over a bottle of wine at the most insane ones. And then we wound down into a dejected sadness at the implications it unraveled.

Why was it so difficult for men to understand" I wasn't interested in an intense love affair that would overshadow Helen of Troy's legacy or make Tristan and Isolde appear as teenage crushes. No, nothing so weighty or grand.

I wanted to feel important. I needed to feel like I mattered. I desired to know that I was not just another pretty face that the tired worn line was aimed at.

My would-be cupids kept using bows and arrows whose suction cupped missiles stunk of the other women they had been recovered from.

But through it all I persevered waiting for a call from Him.

Sonnet #15 by Moira Egan

It's not my place or his to want to fuck. He's married and I'm tired of that old dance, The Men's Room journey to annulment, quick as mercury (he thinks), but on his hand there lingers still that ring of skin, untanned. Yet it's that virgin stripe I bend to kiss because I know this evening wasn't planned and he's gone to the trouble to evisc- erate his marriage vows for me. Tonight I'll let him have all seven deadly sins. Tomorrow he will waken to the light of fear and loathing, something in-between, their breakfast butter dripping from the knife. I can't imagine being someone's wife.

Week two of my affair with the married business man from Temple District was doing incredibly unique things to my psyche.

I wanted to be maudlin, to linger over the pain that we were inflicting but I found myself oddly sharing more with him than I had with any previous lover and this confessionary postcoitus partnership was fast outpacing the incredibly passionate sex. Or maybe it was because I knew what was coming that I was able to come so damn hard.

And so quickly.

Breathless we panted, wrapped around one another, clinging like two people tossed inside a storm. I cried.

He cried.

It was beautiful really as we both recognized that we were crying from a release of it all.

"She never lets me do that to her."

I knew what he spoke of and I smiled the pleasant soreness in my body testament to our topic. "I love you." I said and I didn't mean him and he knew it. "He never lets me say that to him."

He choked a laugh through the tears and tangled a fist in my hair pulling me up to meet his lips, "I love you." He responded in a voice wracked with shared pain, "I love you the way he should."

Our kiss mingled tears, sweat, blood, and pain. And as I trailed my way down his body I shuddered convulsively at the thought of Him saying those words to me. As I lavished this man's body with my hot hungry mouth he cried his wife's name and I came in an explosion of bliss at our aberrant connection.

Bar Napkin Sonnets #24 Moira Egan

It's wicked to admit I love these bruises, the set of fingerprints along my hip that an FBI agent could dust and use to track him down. I love the boy-stung lips from hours kissing, lips soft, but his whiskers grown rougher with the hours into night, and rougher still, we move together, quicker, as if our muscles' work brought on the light. Mornings like this, I'm torn between two notions: Are love's inscriptions like a form of art, or injuries incurred from constant motion: tennis elbow, carpal tunnel, arrythmic heart" And you should see my scars I sit alone, a glass of wine, a napkin, and my pen.

I loved and hated with equal parts fervor. Barely able to contain my ecstasy at Euriya's sudden renewed vigor of interest. I poured myself in the wickedly sinful scarlet dress and made sure to make the ride to the Gala as interesting as I was able.

Arriving far later than he'd intended, after all, we'd promised Fiora to assist with the setup, I was not remorseful. Indeed, as he hurried off to find the hostess of the hour I texted Jack with lightning fast fingers. He couldn't wait to hear the details.

Details I was quick to share: Like Euriya's new date who had outbid me easily enough. I had wanted to engage in the bidding war, but I didn't wish to frustrate the target of my interest. As he talked up the woman with the tail I downed the first of several glasses of champagne and related my woes to Jack. He encouraged me to unleash my own considerable attention getting talents.

When Euriya returned to the table I had delved beneath it with eager limbs and excited us both easily enough. I was seconds from slipping beneath the cover of the cloth to take my coy activites to the next level when he had requested my presence in the restroom.

Far be it from me to ruin well-laid plans.

Of course, after our heated coupling, he had slipped out to leave me to clean up and it was only later that I learned the woman that occupied his attention upon my exit was a date he had successfully bid on.

Ate up with jealousy I pleaded a headache and a concerned and considerate Euriya tucked me inside the limo and sent me on my way. I texted Jack.

And Jack had dropped everything to come to my condo and hold me as I cried bittersweet tears.

He'd just peeled me from my dress when the call came. Euriya wanted me at his place.

I should've denied. I should've demurred. I should've done any number of intelligent things.

But what I did was have Jack slide the coat back over my naked shoulders and kissed him farewell, quivering in excitement.

The night was spent in scarlet lit intensity and I left his bed shortly after dawn.

A text from Knmblnkwik said only: Details" And mine was simply, "Lunch?"

Both of our answers were a sincere yes.

What kind of friend am I that a part of me feels like Fiora got what she deserved"

Horrid isn't it' But the bubbly kittenish woman had set herself up as my competition somewhere along the way and I had run the gamut of emotions with her.

We were friends. But I hated her.

We were enemies. But I loved her.

The first couple of times she'd dated Him I had said nothing. Given nothing away about my feelings on the subject. Euriya dated many women and once he bedded them he moved on. I could wait. At the time I was seeing my Watchboy.

But then the dates had continued. And with it had grown Euriya's fascination. I had to find out why. I had to decipher what it was he saw in the petite, uncouth creature that owned the building we worked in.

I invited her over.

And I fell for her.

She was adorable. She was fun. She was vibrant. She was funny. She was a riot. And I laughed until I cried.

She told me dating wasn't for her and I relaxed any and all guard. I shared things with her I'd never shared with another woman.

We became tight friends. And Euriya kept coming around. And they started dating again and I let slip my emotions.

Was it intentional" I don't think so. In fact, I was quite horrified by my loose lips. After all, what if she told Euriya of my confession' Would he be angry with my interference"

So I foolishly encouraged her interest. Yes, I asked her to hurt me without revealing the pain she caused me in the acting on it. I told myself that He would grow bored with her soon enough.

But they kept seeing each other and I discovered in a girlish moment of confession that Fiora was not sleeping with him. She danced before him, unattainable.

I was a wretched thing then. For I pushed her to sleep with him. Surely after he had indulged in her he'd move on...he'd come back to me"

And then she'd met the new man. The investigator. And I cheered her on in her efforts. I practically demanded she date both. I pushed and encouraged. Surely this would be the breaking point"

But it had only fueled Euriya more.

The night of the Gala...I'd wished her harm.

All of this and more I confessed into Jack's strong arms, my tarnished soul his to soothe. He never judged me. Not even in this confession so horrid and wretched.

But as I sit beside her hospital bed I have to ask: What kind of friend am I"

Jack appeared to be genuinely horrified by my actions. For the first time I thought I received a hint of censor from my confidant. I felt the chrysalis forming to protect my heart. The hardening was always so cold and lifeless and yet necessary to keep me from the pain of judgment.

You'd think after years of such accusations that the slurs would become meaningless but there was something about the knife edge of such words that resisted the dulling of age.

He didn't call me names. But the look in his eye castigated me for reckless behavior, screamed SLUT, WHORE, and TRAMP.

I asked him to leave as soon as we got back to my condo. But he did the unthinkable. He refused. He said I needed him. I was surprised to discover that I think I did. Need him.

Cuttingly I denied him, hoping to wound him the way in which I felt the slice of his gaze upon my soul. Dicing me up into ribbons of ruin. I was unfit. Unnatural. I was a disgrace.

Later as I sat in the luxurious tub I tried to stem the flow of tears. If someone as damaged as Jack couldn't comprehend me how could I ever expect to stand naked before another" Especially Him. He'd see my flaws, dissect my cracks, he'd offer understanding and compassion from a clinical standpoint.

But would he love me"

Could anybody love me?

I didn't hear Jack enter the bathroom. I'd forgotten I'd given him my key. Angrily he yanked me from the tub, my body slick and glistening from the water. He yelled at me, cursed me, raged against me and I welcomed it. I'm not sure which of us was the first to turn out touch to something hotter than the rage.

All I know is that as my body rocked, bent over the tub, I felt purified, cleansed in a way the waters of the bath could not have. The wet slapping sounds of him invading me, abrading me, ladling me with his love and forgiveness drew from me welcoming moisture. My body wept as I did.

Pretty little lines of snow How do you like your blow?

The snorting of cocaine off your ass is a surprisingly ticklish sensation and one that makes it difficult to hold still. Of course if you're being held down and high as the person doing the line, well it helps.

Like all good girls from good moneyed Southern homes I had dabbled in drugs before. A bender here or there was only just to blow off steam after all.

The tangle of bodies had become one creature and I could no longer separate myself from them. We moved together in a weird fluctuation of body parts. Sometimes I'd find myself astride the soft curves of a female and at other times I was penetrated by what could only be the rigid lengths of a male. I was passed about and I did my own passing.

I'd lost track of the days. Lost track of everything but the hazy reality of pleasure. And pain. My protests were as listened to as much as my encouragements. It didn't matter. None of it did. I was rolled this way and that.

At some point I disengaged from myself and just let it all simply flow. A drug-induced coma of forgetfulness. There were parties, and new faces. Club nights dancing and fucking. There were drugs and alcohol, and through it all Kurt and Chloe were my escorts. I was their new favorite toy. Always willing, never turning anything down. We ran the length of Sin City in the heart of Rhy'Din's Casino District. Money exchanged hands as easily as did the drugs and the bodies. I embraced it all with barely any recognition of what I was doing. But through it all the faces of Euriya and Jack kept re-emerging.

"It's Kurt baby. It's Kurt." He grunted as he took me yet again and I rolled my eyes up to the other man who was approaching with eager anticipation. "Euriya..." I moaned and clenched my eyes against the faces of my lovers. As my mouth became engaged I let my mind drift in a lurid fantasy. But as I pictured Euriya and Jack replacing the men thrusting furiously at me I panicked.

And I gagged.

Wretchedly.

I jerked and struggled. Disengaged and pulled free.

Violently I choked, my body convulsing as I scrambled free from the grasping hands, puking up the contents of my stomach.

No! No, they couldn't share me. Euriya needed to Love me. He needed to want only me and for me to be only His.

I locked myself in the bathroom and ignored the pleas on the other side of the door as I bathed away the foolishness that was my recent escapades.

I felt dirty.

Tarnished.

Ruined.

And it was to him that I would go. I was damaged goods and he was an expert at fixing the damaged. But I would never let him see the tattered parts of my psyche. For him I would be perfect.

I left a few hours later. Wrapped in a bathrobe from the expensive casino, a handful of cash paid my way back to my condo no questions asked. In the hazed state of my mind I realized that Kurt and Chloe had begged me to stay at the party but I had been oblivious. They were shades to me now. An almost forgotten dream.

The first order of business upon arriving home was to set up a spa appointment.

I would return to Him only once I was restored fully.

He lifted his dark head and the needle that carried across the record of my soul skipped and skidded as the world lurched beneath my feet.

The manila folder found its place upon his desk and I envied it that simple existence as his fingers steepled above it, his firm voice offering little in the way of a hint of his emotions, "Miss Beaumont."

The glint of his glasses concealed his eyes but I felt them glide across my body as surely as I did the assured state of ownership as his grip slipped around me, the leash settling about my throat as if it had never left.

"Doctor." I trembled but gave no hint of it as I took a leggy step into that inner sanctuary.

"The Door." He instructed as his gaze drank me in, "Please close it."

As I turned toward that ornate oaken structure I cupped one hand around the knob as if it were a lover I was taking to a private haven, the other I slid up its frame adoringly as I pushed it into place and closed us inside, together. My breath hitched, my head fell forward and sunstreaked strands whispered along my neck as I held my repose.

His voice, when it came again, made me quiver, "To what do I owe the pleasure, Miss Beaumont' Have you returned from your vacation so soon?"

My nipples tautened against the silk camisole I had carefully chosen for its vivid raspberry hue. His displeasure was kept muted but I felt it, recognized it for what it was. Hope soared alongside the slick hot surge of vicious need.

Just his voice was enough..

Slowly I turned to face him again and began my long legged graceful way toward him, "My vacation was ill-advised and far lengthier than I would've liked." The drawl dripped southern charm and kept up the petal soft sweetness of our odd relationship that apparently skimmed along the surface of reality except in those moments of hot slick conjoinings where truth could be discovered.

"It is good to be back." I couldn't keep the hesitant whisper of fear from my voice. What if he didn't take me back"

"I agree. And I must admit that I don't like being on the receiving end of those sorts of surprises. As you can see, I had to go and find a replacement." His words came as poisoned darts piercing my soul. I fought to breathe through the constriction of my chest.

Fear tangled and scrambled with sickly sweet agony and I detoured from my intended destination of his arms to stop by his filing drawers. The blatant disregard for his careful organization was acid in pulsating wounds of betrayal. A glance was sent to the closed door and the woman who had attempted to replace me and the venomous hatred was thankfully hidden by the angle of my body toward him, what a psychological treasure trove these emotions would prove to be.

Carefully I restacked and shuffled his papers with competent skill that spoke of the subconscious desire to please him. A paper clip was moved to the perfect inch of the corner, a tsk of censor escaping my lips at finding it out of alignment with the others. "I see."

"I don't think you do." He said flatly, a slight swivel in his chair keeping me at the same angle as I moved across his room. "You see, Miss Beaumont, I place a lot of stock in your assistance. To be frank, you are as important as one of my hands, if not the mind that controls them. You see my world in a way others can't, and because of that my success has been easily obtained. With your departure I've had to sacrifice this pleasure for the aid of one who is not nearly as adept in things that are...in a word....me."

I felt his gaze linger upon the presentation of my body as his words sung inside me, "I've been very unhappy." He added.

The sweet vicious rush of pleasure at his words was hidden from him though I could not contain the smile that curved my lips. A smile aimed carefully down at his files, back still toward him to hide the surge of my elation. Having re-organized the files I placed them in their military correct location and turned toward him with my southern belle expression clearly in place.

Warm, sticky, liquid desire pulsated through me at the sight of him behind his desk and I moved toward him with the hip swinging gait of a woman who was fully aroused, "It was selfish of me, Doctor Shilo." I agreed though the fierce pleasure that surrounded me, "I am most assuredly deserving of punishment."

I demurely presented myself at his side and slowly faced his desk, my movements gentle and innocent, right up to the point where I assumed a position bent over the area left barren for such purposes. The tight skirt rose upward, cupping my rounded ass and revealing the tops of my stockings, the line of the garter belt appearing as I lowered my cheek to the surface of his desk with a whimper at the rightness of it all.



When my punishment came I felt the rapture of the saved.