The Mammoth Book of International Erotica

THE OPERA by Sonia Rykiel

translated by Maxim Jakubowski

Goose bumps.

Skin bumps

moving

singing

and moving again.

Legs held up high.

Embroidered material slashed open,

Opened skirt,

unhooked, wanton.

Above him.

Brilliant gems.

Exquisite surroundings

Beautiful

Start again, and again.

On the ground for a long time,

Terrific.

Invention, insolence

Touched front and rear, everywhere

Moving again

touched behind.

At the Opera, two salons bordered with mirrors, a thousand mirrors. Warm mirrors, mirrors like the sun, cold mirrors, mirrors like the moon.

Endlessly watching myself listening to the music from Tosca, La Traviata, or La Bohème.

Was I right?

Making love to Mimi’s tune, pulling her skirt up, holding on to her legs, her arms, her heart, her cunt.

Straightening her back, holding her tight.

She is held aloft, he is under her.

Crying, screaming.

Your sex is inside me.

Unveiled.

Even filled, I will not cry.

I am hollow, flat.

But still I keep on lying.

Don’t put the phone down.

Where is chance, where is beauty? I slide, I leave, I move on.

You turn round. Look at me. I feel a need to see you in those thousand mirrors.

“Raise your face, raise your cunt. Where are your eyes?”

I can no longer see you.

The most exquisite pain takes hold of me, a moist exquisite languor. Where is my dress, where are my stockings, my shoes, my hands? Where is he, him?

I seek ecstasy.

“Get up, come here.”

Waiting to be picked up, labelled, manipulated, passed around like a bottle.

I sigh, almost drunk.

The liquid is melting me inside.

Have I fallen, am I obscene, deranged?

Like a newspaper from hell.

Made up, painted, my lips so red, my eyes so dark my skin so white, my hips so curvy, my arse so voluptuous.

No, not voluptuous, exciting, lustful, on offer.

And my pear-shaped breasts, and my thin waist.

I gifted him with all of me that evening at the Opera, in the “Moon” boudoir, in the “Sun” room.

Whose existence no one else is aware.

Beauty.

Lost.

Enigma.

There is no more beautiful sight than those two rooms connected by a long, ornate walkway.

The atmosphere is electric. In five minutes, it will be Pelleas et Melisande.

I was dressed in pink, with orange seams.

But stark naked in the golden salon.

Spread like a saint, arms laid out like a cross, legs wide open, scarlet toed feet.

Outrageously on offer.

All that is missing is a cushion under my head.

“Here, take this scarf.”

“To cover myself?”

“No, for your head.”

The man is standing, shameless, his cock at attention, handing me the scarf.

His eyes are sharp, moving from my face to the upper area of my thighs. He bends over, moves closer to me, takes my head into his hands, squeezes me, approaches, bites my lips, caresses my face, pulls my hair back, holds me still, observing me.

The curtain rises. Debussy?

Mortal passion.

He holds my body high, makes me swirl, pulls me back beneath him, enters me, slips my shoe back on.

He’s killing me.

Despite it all, I feel relaxed, my face now obscured by the scarf I have replaced over me.

Then he picks me up again, pulling at my arm, drags me across the floor, ploughs me, hammers me, ties me with the scarf. He shouts.

“What about Debussy?”

I am dizzy.

He nails me to the ground.

I had earlier noticed the patterns on the floor, wooden squares mottled with red, black and brown washes.

I’m crushed by the weight of his body, I sway from one side to the other.

Have I been drinking, smoking?

Complicit.

I swivel over, find my own rhythm again, lose my soul, close my eyes.

He holds me tight.

Assault, tenderness, scandal.

To be doing “this” at the opera.

Like Melisande, I am lost.

Do not touch me or I will throw myself into the water.

He looks at me.

“Who hurt you?”

Does he think he is Golaud?

“I can’t say.”

And do I believe I’m Melisande?

I let myself go, I want to listen to the orchestra serenading me; I want to abandon myself to the seductive voices, the sound of the violins. I want to implode.

Obsessed, he turns my lips to fire, discards the scarf concealing my face, dislocates me, pulls me to his right and then his left, rises and places his foot on my breast.

His eyes are blue, ever so blue.

Half naked on the cold floor, I slip and he catches me.

There are shadows on the walls,

Maybe I could float if only I could hear him clearly, if I could gift myself to him fully, my hair falling wildly across my face.

I pull my knees together in an attempt to get my breath back.

“I like the way you move, I like your breasts.”

I am confused, I am on display.

He draws back.

“Get up on your feet.”

“Naked in front of the mirrors?”

Naked a thousand times, reflected, reshaped, wrong.

He approaches, touches me, feels me, takes my hand, lowers it to his cock.

It’s a part, I’m an actress, the camera is rolling, I am obeying the film director.

“Caress me.”

I stroke him.

Scandal.

I love “this”.

Bodies in lust.

Pleasure at its peak, sharp and true.

I am without reason, torn, asunder.

My pearl is dripping onto the wooden floor, I am gasping.

A gust of wind.

“Don’t fret.”

I’m trying not to rush, not to interrupt the flow.

“Stop.”

Like flowers…