_____________________________________________________________________________________

After spending the amount of time in a pool that I had, most men would come out with their penis  shrunken into their pubis. However, now walking closely alongside the beautiful and beautifully statuesque Lita, oh, no! Although no longer sticking straight forward, there was no doubt that ‘I’ was still there and, rather than the embarrassment one would think I would be feeling, walking through a field of people with a partial erection, whom, by the way, due to the fact that Lita was Negro and I Caucasian, having no doubt that we were being watched, maybe even being gawked at, embarrassment was not what I felt... rather pride.

 ___________________________________________________________________________________

Elysium Fields Part 9

Topanga Canyon, California

Sunday, May 11, 1986

12:33 PM

Having retrieved my pannier along with the beach towel and brown bagged lunch, Lita on her back, me on my side, our bodies pleasantly drying in the early afternoon sun, Lita’s hair, cut to just above her shoulder’s – though at the time I had no idea this was done – had been straightened and softened so her hair now lay softly to either side of her face. Answering my two questions of lo, those many years ago, now out of the water, the areola of Lita’s quarter sized nipples were perfectly smooth and did have the intense darkness of her hair... Answering my second question, looking downward, the tightly curled hair there appearing to be course to the touch, “Lita.”

Turning her head, opening her eyes...

My head cupped in my hands, looking now at the darkness of her eyes, actually becoming lost in the darkness of Lita’s eyes...

“Mitch?”

…“Oh, yeah, sorry. Your eyes, your eyes are so beautiful.”

“Thanks’. So are yours. I don’t get to see many green eyes and yours are, too… beautiful, that is.”

“Thank you,” Blushing, I’m sure I was blushing beneath my tan. “Can I do something?”

Smiling, “If it doesn’t hurt, but in front of all of these people?”

Laughing, “It won’t hurt, I promise, but, uh...”

“What?”

“Can I touch you?”

Becoming serious, “I wouldn’t mind, but where?”

“Here,” motioning to her crotch, “I’d like to feel your hair there.”

Glancing about, seeing no one presently looking in our direction, “sure, I can understand why.”

Taking my hand, Lita placed it onto her pubic hair, and held it there longer than needed for my little investigation, as, closing my eyes at the thought of where my hand was, my heart again thumping, my penis again jumping, leaning forward, my lips touching her lips, the point of her tongue parting my lips...

Oh, God! Not wanting to! But here in the open? Here, among possibly better than a hundred people Here, now...

Knowing I’d...we’d better stop... now! Forcing my lips from her lips, my breathing harsh, my words difficult, “So... uh,” needing something to say, something to take my mind from where my mind had been, from where my hand still was.  “So, uh,” moving my hand, “what do you do for a living?”

 Quiet for a number of seconds, “Real Estate.”

Trying to return to calm, “Really? Me, too!”

Turning now, on her side now, facing me, “Broker?” she asked.

“No, just an associate... You?”

“Yeah, me, too.” Lita said. “How long you’ve been doing it?”

Thinking a moment, “since seventy-four... You?”

“I got into it in eighty-two.”

“Rough times, huh?”

“Yeah. Well,” Lita said. “with seventeen percent interest, we sure learned what ‘creative financing’ means.”

The recession of the late seventies, into the early eighties nearly a thing of the past.

Quiet again…

Lying on our sides, close enough to feel the other’s breath…

Neither of us speaking until…

 Taking my hand again, “Mitch...” placing it flat onto her chest, beneath her hanging right breast,

Not answering.  Lita’s breast, heating the top of my hand, her chest heating the bottom of my hand. Closing my eyes at the thought of where my hand was, again. My heart thumping, again. My penis jumping, again. Leaning forward, my lips touching her lips, this time my tongue parting Lita’s lips...

Oh, God! Not wanting to! But here in the open? Here, among possibly better than a hundred people Here, now...

Knowing I’d...we’d better stop... now! Forcing my lips from her lips, my breathing harsh...

Holding my hand, Lita moved it downward, onto the hard, yet butter soft flesh of her stomach...

Small talk. Got to cool down, make small talk... 

“Mitch...”

“Yeah, Lita?”

 “Let’s go to a room.”

Not exactly the ‘small talk' I had in mind.

                                                                  ****

‘Let’s go to a room’.  Oh, God, how I was hoping, how I wanted this. Yet...

Knowing myself!

Knowing if I did this thing – because it had happened in the past – if I did take this one step further, Oh, God, but I wanted to!  If I went into a room with Lita and made love to Lita, feeling as I was feeling for this lady that I’d met little more than an hour ago...

Sexual intercourse, for me, was never ‘casual’. Actually, I’ve never made love to a woman that I didn’t truly feel ‘something’ for. Sexual intercourse, for me, was always deeply emotional, and, in the past, was always with, if not exactly at that time, sexual intercourse would be with someone that I would then became extremely emotionally fond of.

If I did go with Lita, and my, already deep feelings for the lady were to escalate but hers did not, where do I go from there? How do I, an older white guy living in the suburbs “see”  a – I figured Lita to be in her mid-thirties – How do I “see” a much younger black woman living someplace in Los Angeles? How would I do it? I couldn’t!

Vacillating: If I do this thing, if I did go with Lita, knowing myself, Lita would be a longing part of my memory forever.

Vacillating:  If I do this thing, if I did go with Lita, I would be “cheating” on my wife again. I would be “cheating” on my marriage again, and I do not want to go through the agony of a separation, again.

Okay, yeah, Marsha and I do have arguments, as, I am sure most long-married couples do but I blame her shitty temperament on diabetes and her see-sawing blood sugar levels; that and her immeasurable stubborness. But yet, in our times of peace, we love as newlyweds... At least until I say something to'set her off again',

Vacillating: If I did not do this thing, if I do not go with Lita, knowing myself, I’ll be, figuratively, kicking myself in the ass forever.