My face was buried in the field of black hairs on his warm chest, my leg was draped over his thighs, my arm wrapped around his waist. The night was dark but bright with white stars. The fireflies were gone. I wondered where they went. We were all alone. The only two people in the world it seemed. I was the happiest I'd ever been.

      Malcolm ran his fingers through my hair. "I wouldn't say all of my life. Maybe half."

      "I've never done anything like this before. So out in the open. Where anybody can see," I said.

      "Neither have I," he said.

      "I find that impossible to believe," I told him.

      "Really? Then tell me what you do believe," he said.

      I believe that you've brought every woman that you've ever slept with to this very spot and seduced them. That's what I thought, but I said, "Tell me about your first love."

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      Um. Um. Um. He had a king size bed with a pretty, solid oak headboard, a soft but firm mattress with a goose down topper, and two overstuffed, feather pillows that were drenched in his delicious scent.

      Malcolm was a poet in that bed, but not one committed to or satisfied with rhythmically releasing or listening to words that expressed sexual pleasure. For him words lacked the force and spontaneity needed to express seduction, sexual stimulation, and ecstasy because they were too easily manipulated, misunderstood, denied, or forgotten. For him, action was the only way to voice sexual excitement and pleasure. Action was unpredictable and harmonious. He believed that action spoke what words could not describe, and showed things ears refused to hear. It unmasked lies, and let you in on secrets. But most of all, sexual action gave Malcolm the power to set the record straight on any matter concerning his manhood. So that's why he was a poet devoted to sexual action. And that's also why he never let me get on top.

      But I, on the other hand, enjoyed nothing more than hearing and speaking words that conveyed sexual pleasure. It was the only time that I actually listened to the tongue because for me words were living proof that lovemaking was not only occurring but had meaning. Words gave voice to a wink, nod, frown, grimace, or smile that may have otherwise gone unnoticed. Words spoke of the reasons behind a sweet but kinky sexual act. Words spoke of things that sexual action could only hint at.

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...SATIN...

      I relaxed. Satin stopped squeezing my leg and she began taking slow strokes up and down my calf.

      "Better?" she asked.

      "Yeah," I sighed.

      Her strokes traveled longer in distance, etching their way along the outside of my thighs, circling to the inside, and back down to my toes. The third time that her hands moved up my thighs they went under the robe, over my hips, and across my stomach. She circled my navel with one of her long fingernails. Satin, seeing no signs of objection from me, untied the robe and pushed it away from my skin. I opened my eyes and thought, Oh shit, Tonya!

      How do I stop this? I asked myself. Should I be cruel and insensitively shove her to the floor, and run from the room screaming obscenities? Or should I embarrass her with a patronizing rejection such as I like you, but not that way.

      While thinking, I centered the rest of my attention on the ceiling fan. It had five black blades with two gold stripes painted on their edges. It rocked slightly and hummed a windy tune that mingled with Chaka's voice and grew louder as the whispers from her touch grew louder. I envisioned the fan rotating viciously on its axis, shaking loose from the bolts that fastened it to the ceiling, and then crashing down and slicing us in half. I know that that was a horrible thought, but I had hoped that it would help me to detach myself from "the difference" as I had a long time ago. But this time "the difference" was different. It was stronger and more direct, and I couldn't free myself from its hold.

      Again seeing no resistance, Satin's hands journeyed up toward my breasts. And when they arrived, brushing lightly over my hard, dark nipples, I had to take a deep breath in order to downgrade some of the pleasure that they wrapped my body in. Satin stood looking down at me lustfully, and held out her hand. I hesitated. Her persistent hand hung in the air, knowing that I would and patiently waited for me to reach out.

      The robe fell to the floor, gathering around my feet, and I was standing naked before her. How was she able to strip me naked without so much as a nod from me in protest? I wondered. I was further baffled by my diminishing need to cover myself.

      "You are gorgeous," she said, carefully sounding out each word.

      She touched me and I waded in the enticing waters of her foreplay, and then ran back to shore before the tide of surrender could sweep me out to her sea. I did that a few times. It was my way of proving to myself that I was in control. And since I was the one who was in control, I could stop this before it went too far, as if it hadn't already.

      Satin brought her face to mine. That's when I attempted to assert my control. But I couldn't halt what was happening. I tried but I couldn't. Satin pressed her luscious lips against mine, coating them with a sweetness so addicting that I couldn't resist kissing her back. My lips had never felt a warmer, more arousing kiss, and her tongue broke down any resistance I had.

      What am I doing? I asked myself. But I didn't have an answer. My mind was simultaneously cloudy and delighted. I couldn't understand why I was letting it happen. I'd always been told that this was sinful behavior. That it was freakish and disgusting. By all rights, I should have been angered and repulsed by Satin's touch, but I was neither. I was highly excited.

      Everything seemed to be moving in slow motion, but at the same time, too fast for me to stop it. How far are you willing to let this go? I asked myself. I didn't have an answer for that either because it wasn't up to me. What I should have asked was how far was Satin going to take me.

      I watched in amazement as Satin released her medium, firm breasts from the confines of her red sports bra, and then removed her red panties, revealing something too erotic for words. Her stomach was flat. Her long and shapely legs were absent any markings of childhood. They were smooth and tender looking. Tattooed on the lower right side of her pelvis was a weeping willow with long, drooping branches draped in dark green leaves that kissed her thick, curly, black pubic hairs, which could have easily been mistaken for the willow's shadow. Oh, yes! I thought. Black is very Beautiful!

      She motioned for me to come nearer, but my feet wouldn't budge. Confusion and fear rooted me to that spot. Her light footsteps circled my body. I expected her to round me a second time, but she stopped behind me, placing her hands on my hips. I jumped and she pressed her hands firmly against my skin as if to assure me that I had nothing to be afraid of. Satin cupped my breasts and sent heat hurtling down to my crotch, setting my clitoris ablaze. I became light-headed as she repeated the act several times. I tried to dip in and out of the fiery water to reaffirm that I still had control, but even the warmth at the shallow end of her sea was too abysmal for me to resurface.

      Somehow she managed to lay me down on her satin covered bed. Feeling my petrified body shaking under hers, she whispered, "I'll stop if you want me to."

      I stared at her afraid and perplexed, wanting to say stop but unable to make my mouth function. Her soft hands were stirring up a vortex of emotions. I twirled inside the twister thinking that maybe if she kept her hands still, just for a moment, I'd be able to think clearly. But she wouldn't do that. Her tranquilizing hands traced my body, unleashing stronger desires that only added to my confusion. Receiving no answer from me - one way or the other - she continued.

      Satin rinsed my body with kisses, leaving puddles of passion everywhere as she leisurely wafted her way down my frightened frame until she reached my thighs, and then she kissed deep inside them. She ran her tongue along the inside of my thighs and that made me weak, so weak that I couldn't remember how to resist even if I wanted to. Suddenly, a sensation stronger than any I'd ever felt before unmercifully clutched my clitoris. It was so intense that my eyes slammed shut and I stopped breathing for a second. I wiggled in its grasp, half trying to escape and half trying to make sure the feeling didn't stop. And then I lost control, something that I never truly had in the first place.

      Warm, wet, and tender. Those were the three things that were sending my body into convulsions. My head turned from side to side on the pillow, and I was drenched in sweat as I neared my climax, a climax that I was almost too frightened to have. The sensations that were bolting through me bordered between pleasure and pain. And the stronger the feelings got, the less distinguishable their characteristics were. They joined together as one feeling, having one purpose: to give me as much pleasure as I could stand. Only thing was, I didn't know how much more of it I could handle.

      My hands choked the sheets, my head pressed hard against the damp pillow, and my facial muscles tightened as a surge of untamed, ineffable pleasure settled on the very tip of my clitoris. Sultry and weakened by whatever it was she was doing, I exploded. And before I could grab it by its collar and yank it back, an uninterrupted, earsplitting moan rushed up my throat and leaped from my mouth. It was loud enough for her neighbors to hear, loud enough for my voice to crack as it escaped, loud enough for me to feel embarrassed for having screamed at the top of my lungs like that.

      I know that I only had one orgasm, but it resounded through me with a booming force that made it seem as though I had three or four. It felt so wonderful that it brought tears to my eyes, and left me limp, tired, shaky, and wanting more as I lay in a puddle of sweat.

      My breath was coming out in short puffs now. My heart had stopped. I opened my eyes, licked my chapped lips, and turned my sweaty face toward the mirror, and what I saw nearly blinded me. I saw her. Saw us.