by Olivia London
(04/23/08)

The ad was refreshing enough. Sure, I had been warned ad nauseum about the dangers of online dating, but how else does anyone get laid these days? I'm self-employed, so it's not like I'm running into cute guys at the water cooler. A man might smile at me in the grocery store, but that's as far as the love goes.

In our current dating culture, you just can't walk up to someone and say, 'Hey, what's shakin' bacon? You're kinda cute. Doing anything tonight?' You'd be marked as desperate before being quarantined to the Freak Zone. Or you might get stalked by a kooky, desperate sort who says your smile reminds him of his mother, ergo, he wants to kill you.

Not that I've had much luck with the ads. One week, I had three coffee dates lined up, feeling quite the vixen.

The first stood me up.

Bachelor #2 had hair a foot longer than mine, pulled back into a ponytail. When I asked him what happened to his bald pate, he stared back blankly. He couldn't even remember the photo he mailed. Then the nut asked if I expected to inherit anything because he lost his job and didn't think he could find another one.

The third contender was a talented artist, albeit heavily medicated. He spoke of so much tragic history that I dug out my wallet to find the business card of a friend of mine who likes to recommend therapists. That meeting ended with a wellness hug and me wishing my date a top-speed recovery. I was going to call it quits, settle for fogging my breath on the dildo counters, when I had a curious dream.

It was a dream about embarking on a sexcapade with an arrogant, chubby bloke who just happened to have an exquisite cock. He had me sit naked on a sofa while he vacillated between reading poetry and instructing me to masturbate. My bare bottom balked at the itchy sofa cushion material but the bard would have none of my quibbles. "Sit," he commanded. "And cross your legs so I can see your sacred passage."

While my pedagogue orated and mused aloud on the necessities of onanistic pleasure, I felt a panicky heat hit my stomach, which then rushed into each thigh as I wondered how many stanzas I'd have to sit through before getting properly fucked.

Dry as peanut brittle at the start, my sere self finally gave way to a delicious fondue as my fingers bobbed in and out of their sticky heat. The poetry book slammed shut. My legs opened. He was on me now, all over me, fucking me hard and harder yet. Fucking me with what could only have been a monument from some ancient priapic world, a standing stone of pleasure and wonder. Suddenly, my limbs were as clumsy and disjointed as a marionette's and I couldn't make a sound other than an insipid gurgling. I had no sensation other than this weight, this massive gravitas pushing deeper than a stake in the ground, pushing through and unloosing the tightly wound ribbons of my girlhood with thrust after thrust.

When I woke, it was with the same sad feelings that follow every sexual dénouement. I tried to hurl back into sleep so my subconscious could conjure more fantasies, but it was no good. I had to change my panties anyway, with the crotch so thoroughly juiced from a happily pumping nectary.

I searched my top dresser drawer for the comfy cotton underwear you'll find only in a celibate woman's home: Fruit of the Loom briefs, Valentine candy pink with an elastic band running over the hips and across the belly button. I can't put them on without thinking of how Fruit of the Loom was outsourced to some country or other and what can America be without these iconic butt huggers?

And of course I'd worked up an appetite with all that thrashing about so I slip into footies -- also an unabashed pink -- and pad into the kitchen to make a sandwich. Being a multi-tasking muncher, there's usually a notebook or two on the Formica tabletop along with a jar of pencils. I like drawing eatables juxtaposed over nudes and I'm not sure which I relate to more, the vulnerable torso or the fuzzy peaches and taut plums parading over nipples. I have to be careful though, as art can pull me into a sensual reverie, and before the night is through, I'm all out of undergarments.

Once, I was reading an article about a Japanese performance artist inspired by cats and that was enough to lift the libido, I had to stop and pleasure myself. After denuding a few pages of archival paper, I turned to the Sex Cadet Weekly, where the ads placed by horny people are like philters for the uninitiated. Seems ironic how this paper requires readers flip through (or peruse) ten pages of adult entertainment before they can reach the last two pages of "Looking for You and Only You" connections where couples can get together, have coffee and date like dinosaurs.

So, I see this ad: "The Five Lovers You Meet in the Elysian Fields. I can be one of them, or, keep changing clothes and be all five." Did I want a lover? My subconscious obviously wanted some action or I wouldn't keep having erotic dreams.

I thought: I'm so busy, though. Finally. After years of schooling, bouts of unemployment and working menial jobs, I'm living -- not large, but bigger than the benighted forest I grew strong enough to flee.

I paused to think of the millions of women who, like me, can't muster enough energy for a relationship but have been terrified of one night stands ever since watching "Looking for Mr. Goodbar." I didn't want to see that movie as I thought it would be dated and cheesy, like "Saturday Night Fever." Coming to these flicks a generation after their sell date, I remember being struck by how Catholic they were. Say you have looks, personality, a modicum of charm and you just happen to be stuck in a repressed, spiritually bankrupt family: of course you're going to want to fuck everything in sight.

So. Did I want a lover? I called the ad, hung up, called again. This Elysian lad had such a warm, unfettered voice, like he was comfortable in his own skin and wouldn't mind seeing a bit of yours; he ended his message with 'Cheers!' which made me think of a hard day's work and golden microbrews. Risk taker that I am, I called and left my particulars, hoping that if this person did call, he'd want to meet at a café and not some dorky hot tub establishment. Lover did call and we met under the auspice of fall colors and mutual delight. He had a frugal name but a generous nature and was fond of cats.

Some people hit our lives like lightning; they're gone before you can take a decent picture. That's how it was with Chase, though I still remember his spiky hair, surprisingly soft it was, and the firm fruity feel of his deltoids. I don't go for body buffers, but a little muscle is definitely sexy. And Chase had sex drawn all over him, like a mural. The way he walked in a loping half strut that made him seem taller yet accessible, and the insouciant banter that spilled from his lips like the peanut shells hitting the floor. He wore loose pants but a T-shirt nailed his chest like a banns on a church door. Not that I was thinking long term. It's a good thing people can't hear our thoughts, or I would have been put away a long time ago.

"So, Chase. You said you make furniture? That's great." Fuck me. Now.

"Do I want another drink? Um, sure." To be perfectly honest Chase, sorry, I almost called you Chad. Chase, honestly, I'd rather go back to your He-man castle and climb the trail that leads to your cock.

"No, I don't mind you asking me that; I think it's sweet. I'm a Scorpio." And I could fill you like an ingot with my desire. We could fuck like maniacs who fuck so deep into the night they're astonished by the morrow.

"Hmm? No, I don't travel much. Do you?" There's an empty booth over there. You could drop your trousers and I could go down on you right now. Wouldn't that be fun?

It was Chase who astonished me by wanting to be "friends first." Oh, yeah. The dinosaur thing. We ended our meeting with some pretty petulant petting. Every time I reached for his baguette, he pushed me away, hungry and hurt. I asked him if he's one of these guys who's addicted to porn because real women scare him.

Chase stopped my doodling finger and raised it to his lips, sucking the tip. I lost all reserve.

"Be with me," I murmured.

He cupped the back of my head and readied me for a kiss -- on the cheek.

"Zoe," he breathed. "I'll call you tomorrow. Do you like Mexican food?"

"Will a margarita help you relax?"

"You bet." And with that, my semi-date took his French leave.

So we talked, taking life for an ambient stroll. We talked at cafés. Yammered at bistros. Kvetched while standing in line for grim, sad-ending films. Spoke in earnest on a visceral level regarding just about every issue at hand. His father was dead and he was estranged from his mother. No siblings. Nowhere to go for the holidays. He wasn't bored when I disclosed the darkest periods in my life.

I told him I had the working-class version of Girl, Interrupted, i.e., once my insurance ran out and the drugs wore off, the doctors said I was cured. He laughed and said he'd give anything to be as crazy as me, which I took as a compliment. Chase and I careened in and out of so many phone calls and e-mailed each other at such great length it seemed we were each of us competing to get the last bon mot.

Now, every girl knows, unless you're with that rare secure-in-his-identity man, it's not often likely that verbal sparring will lead to romance. Life isn't a Katharine Hepburn/Spencer Tracy movie. But was I willing to play dumb just to orgasm more than once a neap tide? Hell, no. I just had to find out what turned the man on. For me, it's art. I could float for days remembering the brash or subtle hues of a painting, but Chase wasn't interested. He liked movies okay, but was curiously more excited by the urns of popcorn which accompanied them, producing his own special salt and paprika concoction once we were safely tucked into our seats. He turned positively orgasmic when he discovered a diner that served blue-plate specials with hush puppies. "I haven't had a decent hush puppy since I left the South," he crooned, stuffing the fat fingers of dough into his mouth.

We were cradling yet another table no bigger than a pothole cover, enjoying cappuccinos, when Chase had the nerve to say, "Zoe, I could converse with you forever."

"Meaning what? I'll see you naked in the afterlife?"

Chase laughed a nervous little chuckle.

"Chase, listen to me. I have plenty of friends. If you're looking for something platonic..."

"I just need more time."

"You've got nine and a half weeks."

A slow smile crossed his lips, like tracks in a desert, or in his case, a dessert. "I've seen the movie more times than I care to admit," he said.

"Well, good. You just got the ultimate cultural reference for heterosexuals. I bet your favorite part was the kitchen scene when they were rolling on the floor, stuffing each other's faces."

Chase looked horrified. "That just shows how little you know me, still. I had to close my eyes during that scene! All those prosaic provisions holed up in the fridge for who knows how long. Food should be savored, not pummeled. Food is the most sensual thing on the planet. Nothing makes me shudder like scallops wrapped in bacon. All is right with the world when I sit down to a freshly poured mimosa paired with quince-glazed ricotta pancakes."

I made a quick note to self: Zoe, pick up champagne, orange juice and a pushup bra. The rest can be delivered by The Gorgeous Gourmet. I just bagged a foodie.

I invited Chase to dinner, informing him he had lost the battle of the sexless and he best bring plenty of casques for a certain honorary soldier.

I greeted my hungry man wearing a diaphanous negligee over lick-my-plate clean lingerie. He peered over my head to ogle the dainty array of appetizers, but I unzipped his jeans and buttered one side of his bread which shifted his attention right away. My hands were softened with an apricot-based lotion, and once I was sure he had a whiff, I led him to a tray of scallops grilled with an apricot glaze.

"Sorry, I don't do bacon," I purred, giving him my tongue as a palate cleanser.

"That's okay." He pushed up his sleeves for action.

"Why don't you take your shirt off?"

Chase obeyed, revealing an undershirt which also hit the floor.

"You better peel off those jeans as well."

His body was beautiful. I didn't ask where he got his tan at the start of winter or why his chest hair was shaved. Wasn't about to have him feel self-conscious now. We moved on to the potato pancakes topped with sour cream and caviar. "Now, don't come yet," I admonished, as he swirled in ecstasy over the amalgam of flavors.

"Wow," he said, grabbing my hips and pulling me toward him.

His hair had grown and I pushed the blonde stalks back and forth, grabbing fistfuls as if I was plowing the great fields of Iowa, plowing to reach the ultimate healthy, hungry Midwestern hunk of cheese.

He had deftly handled the protection situation and I'd been wet the moment he walked through the door. I was going to give him a blow job but then thought better of it. He had made me wait too long.

Time it was for Chase to get fucked. I maneuvered myself on top, my knees squeegeeing the sofa cushions and hands braced against the back of the couch. I had to ease myself gradually, down, down into the abyss that makes this life worth living. It was like sitting on a volcano, he was so hot and huge inside me. My breasts were trembling in his face and he sucked one into his mouth like he was guzzling wine, taking gentle sips all over before stoppering the nipple and moving on to the next. When I finally inched my way down to the base of his cock, he groaned and said, "Aargh, that's incredible."

"I need your help, sweetness." He got the message and clenched my buttocks together, then twisted my wetness back and forth like a cork, his coal-hot hands burning my bottom as they raised me up to the roof of his cock.

I said, "I like the view from here but I'm getting dizzy."

With that, he plunged me by the hips back down to the couch and I nearly screamed from the pleasure of it all. Gingerly, he picked me up and took a few long strides until he was bracing me against the wall and I held his lower back muscles with one hand while gripping a plastered edge with my other.

Oh, this had been worth the wait. He pumped with everything he could bring to the table and I yowled for more, not about to settle for table scraps. When he finally pulled away and we replenished ourselves with water and wine, he guided me to the bedroom for a postprandial missionary position.

We were comfortably wedged into a slice of the morning when Chase said, "Zoe, hon. You really know how to feed a man."

It was true. And it was time to feed that man again.

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