Muse

‘Well, if you’re going to be standing up there naked you might as well do something about it.’

‘That wasn’t my intention. Breaking out of my rut was my intention.’

Eyes twinkling like some fairy godmother with an evil plan, Cheryl said, ‘What better way to break out of your rut than with some hot, sweaty, string-free sex?’

‘I …’ Dani didn’t know what to say. She just shook her head.

‘I know you’re not really looking to date. And you’re definitely not looking for a relationship right now. But who said you have to have either in order to have some fun?’

‘I’m terrified,’ Dani admitted.

‘So,’ Cheryl pointed her fork at Dani’s discarded meal. ‘Is this why the rabbit food?’

‘Mostly because food is repugnant. I’m a ball of anxiety.’

Cheryl waved a hand. ‘Don’t be. Girl, you’re built like a brick shithouse. Sorry. That’s crude, but it’s what my grandmother would have said.’ She chuckled.

‘I’m not skinny,’ Dani said softly.

‘So? Have you ever seen art? I mean real art? Most of those women are not skinny. They’re lush. They’re curvy. They’re spectacular! And so are you.’

‘But magazines, TV, media—’ Dani said, not finishing the sentence.

‘Are all full of shit,’ Cheryl said, finishing where Dani had left off. ‘Look, this is art. That’s advertising. How else are they going to sell us their potions and products if they don’t tell us we’re not good enough? You’re not flawed, baby. You’re an amazing, gorgeous, real woman. I say, go for it. And if you get a chance at some eye-rolling, body-melting, mind-warping sex … go for that too.’

‘I hadn’t even thought of that.’

‘Of course not. That’s what I’m for,’ Cheryl said. She checked her watch. ‘Eat up. We’re back on the clock in ten. And you have a big night ahead of you as a muse. You need your strength.’ She pushed the chef salad back in front of Dani.

Dani did her best, eating as much as she could. She was fine. She was perfect. She was exactly what she was meant to be. New things often threw her off the rails. She’d just breathe and go with it.

* * *

She got a text at five that simply said: See you in an hour J from Christopher.

‘Yes,’ she muttered. ‘Yes, you will. All of me.’

Dani wasn’t dumb. She’d subconsciously chosen a very modest outfit to wear to go to the college. Leggings and a form-fitting white tunic overlaid with another flowing oatmeal-coloured tunic. A long necklace, ankle boots, her hair down free, which would probably be a mistake. When she got nervous she played with it. Obsessively.

She punched Cheryl’s number in and her friend answered on the third ring. ‘There’s the model!’

‘Ugh,’ Dani said. ‘What am I going to do? I think they’ll have me wear my hair down. How am I going to stand still? How am I going to not fidget? You know I’m a fidgeter!’

‘Yes, you are. When you’re stressed at work and in the zone, that leg of yours goes up and down like you’re spurring on some invisible horse.’

Dani moaned and Cheryl laughed. ‘What if I have to pee?’

‘Then tell your old friend you have to pee. Like the book says, everyone pees. OK, it’s everyone poops, but same concept.’

‘This was a stupid idea.’

‘Hush,’ Cheryl said, a bit roughly. Dani took a deep breath and stopped her melodramatics. ‘You just have to be Zen. Breathe. Deep breaths, long exhales. You’ll get into a zone. You will be fine. I have utter faith in you.’

‘That makes one of us.’

‘Did you at least eat something so you don’t pass out?’

‘I had a smoothie.’

‘Well, there, that’s plenty.’ The sarcasm in Cheryl’s voice was thick enough to cut with a knife.

‘It was a protein smoothie.’

‘Better but still …’

‘I cannot eat. I’ll vomit. I’ll die. I’ll …’

‘You’ll snap out of it and go do this thing. Look,’ Cheryl said on a sigh, ‘you wouldn’t have had the instinct to say yes if this wasn’t something you wanted. Now the trick is to own it. You’re talking yourself out of it. Instead of should-ing all over yourself you’re shouldn’t-ing all over yourself. Knock it off.’

‘Shouldn’t-ing?’

‘Yeah. You’re giving yourself every reason in the world not to do it. Flip it around. Give yourself every reason in the world to go through with it. Why’d you say yes in the first place?’

‘Because it’s something I’ve never done.’

‘And?’

‘And that’s exactly what I wanted. Something I’d never do. I want to do something I’d never do. Get that rush. Take a chance.’

‘Then stop whining and do it.’

She could tell her friend was smiling and then Dani found herself smiling. ‘You’re right. I’m sorry. Thanks for talking me off the ledge. I’d better go soon. I’ll text you later. Let you know how it was.’

‘The hell you will! You’ll call me and let me know how it was.’

‘Deal,’ Dani said. Then she cut the call, grabbed her bag and headed out. Every time a stab of anxiety lanced through her, she shut it down. She breathed, she focused and she muttered over and over, ‘This will be fine … this will be good … you can do this.’

She threw in an ‘Om’ for good measure.

Chapter 6

Dani hovered there in the doorway. Christopher looked up and smiled. He said something to a student, patted the young man’s shoulder, and headed her way. ‘There you are.’

‘Here I am.’

‘Nervous?’ He gave her a quick hug. ‘Never mind. Don’t answer. You’re stiff as a board and practically vibrating. I’ll take that as a yes.’

‘Extremely,’ she said anyway.

‘You’ll be fine.’ He kissed her forehead and that small gesture calmed her raging nerves a little. ‘Be right back,’ he said.

He came back with a brightly patterned patchwork kimono. ‘Ladies’ room is down on the right. You can just slip into this and come back when you’re ready. We have a few things to go over before we start.’

‘Everything?’ she asked. Her breath came in little fits. Her heart banged like an angry creature caged in her chest.

He gave her a half smile. ‘Everything.’

She sighed. ‘Is this … clean?’

He chuckled. ‘It is. I take it home at the end of each semester and wash it thoroughly.’

‘Once a semester!’

He tried not to laugh and failed. ‘I take it home every week. Or I let the model take it home and launder it. It’s only going to be you wearing it, you can be in charge or I can. But I assure you, it’s clean.’

‘Sorry. I’m being a bit … obsessive. I’ll go change.’

He gave her a small squeeze and let her go. ‘Just breathe. This is going to be good. You’re going to do great.’

In the ladies’ room she stood inside a stall and manoeuvred out of her clothes. All that work choosing her sleek, modest outfit and she was stripping naked in a forest-green cubicle while trying not to drop her shoes in the toilet. She folded everything with shaking fingers and stuffed it into the empty canvas tote bag she’d brought. When she was naked, she took a big deep breath, shut her eyes and willed her body to calm down. An electric current seemed to be running beneath her skin. She was electric. Alive.

‘Alive,’ she muttered. ‘Remember that. This is the feeling before a big step. Before taking a chance. This is good.’

It dawned on her that, despite her near terror, she still wanted to do it. Something about baring herself fully in front of strangers was intoxicating.

‘Right,’ Dani muttered. She pulled on the oversized kimono, wrapped it tight around her and held it with one hand. She grabbed her bag and her tote with the other and left the stall. She spared herself one glance in the bathroom mirror as she left. Her cheeks blazing with blush, her hair down and full and slightly windblown. Her eyes startled and shiny with a mix of anxiety and what could only be described as arousal.

‘Here we go,’ she told the woman in the mirror and then she left the small room and padded down the hall to Chris’s classroom.

* * *

Christopher was just wrapping up his welcome speech when she entered. He smiled, waved a hand at her and said, ‘This, class, is your first assignment. This is my friend Dani. Dani will be your nude model tonight. I want to get her set up quickly because you’ll need the majority of class to get your sketch down and then you can fiddle with it.’

Someone in the class laughed and Dani felt the blush in her cheeks bleed down to her chest. She had the urge to laugh or maybe cry. She definitely had the instinct to run. Somehow she managed to tamp it down and tune back into what Chris was saying.

‘Obviously, it will depend on how many of you have complete or nearly complete works by the end of class. If we need to set her up in the same pose next time we will. If not, we’ll move forward. Dani,’ he said, addressing her. He wore that small calming smile she remembered from her youth. Somehow, no matter what they were about to do – diving into a swimming hole rumoured to be the home of water snakes, racing downhill on their bikes at Turner’s Twister, a particularly challenging twist of country road, or egging houses the last Halloween before he left for college – his smile had always acted as a soothing balm on her worry. ‘This is the class. If for any reason you need to take a break, you just say my name. Other than that, you just do your best to stay as I position you.’

Dani nodded, not trusting her voice.

He moved towards her and an interesting thing happened. Maybe not interesting, she thought wildly, more like unanticipated. Between her thighs she went damp. So fast and so much she worried that the students would see. So much that she felt an urgent need to be touched. Or touch herself.

Great …

Because that was the moment Christopher reached her and said, ‘Can you drop your robe, please?’

For a split second it was only them in the room. Time stood still and he was asking her to disrobe for him. And him alone.

She shook her head and his forehead crinkled. He didn’t know she was shaking her head at her own internal ramblings. So, to clear things up, she took an enormous breath, blew it out and opened the kimono. Then she let it fall free of her body.

Cool air kissed her skin. Her nipples pebbled instantly. She saw Christopher register it. His expression changing, his pupils dilating. But then he retrained his gaze to her face and smiled. He arranged her to his liking. A not too difficult pose to hold. One hip cocked just so, her right hand at her side, her left on her hip. Her head slightly tilted.

The wetness at the apex of her thighs had turned to a steady thumping pulse that matched her pounding heart. She bit her lip, trying not to focus on the fact that her body apparently thought there was sex to be had.

Then she tried Cheryl’s advice. She went Zen. She thought of one of her favourite things. Falling leaves. The weather outside had turned. The leaves had changed to golden honey tones, vibrant reds and spectacular shades of orange. She pictured a single leaf in her mind and studied it. The different shades, the sombre hues, the veins …

She was vaguely aware of Christopher walking back to his desk. Of him urging the class on and making a joke that he was now going to tackle a mountain of paperwork. And that at the one-hour mark they’d allow a fifteen-minute break for Dani to stretch and walk around.

Her anxiety morphed into calm. Her instinct to flee changed to a heavy kind of patience. She stood there, focused inward, aware that they were all looking at her body. Studying it. Putting it down on paper.

It’s sort of like being immortalised. The thought flickered through her mind and then she let it go.

She could do this. She was doing this.

* * *

Dani felt eyes on her. Of course she did. Many, many eyes. But when she’d come back from her fifteen-minute break a bit calmer, not so incredibly freaked out by the exposure of the whole situation, she felt a particular set of eyes.

Chris had asked her not to make eye contact. To try and act as if the class wasn’t there at all. ‘Look off into the distance like the maidens in the classic works of art,’ he’d said with a small smile.

She’d snorted with amusement. To even try and put herself in that category, even to get into a mindset, was laughable.

Chris tugged a piece of her hair and she heard herself gasp like a scandalised maiden. ‘You can do it,’ he said, ‘You know what I mean.’

He’d gone back to the classroom then, leaving her in the hall to walk and stretch her muscles. She touched the end of that lock of hair, feeling the surge of heat and pain and then the little blip of pleasure all over again. He hadn’t tugged her hair in … too many years to count.

Back in the classroom she’d kept her eyes pinned to that land of far off. She occasionally glanced at Chris but he was studiously not looking at her. Was that for her comfort or because he didn’t want to see? She had no idea.

When she became aware of what felt like a steady, intense gaze boring into her, the fine hairs along her arms stirred. She used all her self-control not to look, until finally she did. All the crazy stuff Cheryl had said to her about affairs and no strings and all that madness had come back to her. She looked. She couldn’t stand it.

Man bun was staring.

She blinked slowly and then tried to pull her gaze back from his. It was almost impossible. Dark-brown eyes, so dark they seemed like they could swallow her up. His equally dark hair was tied up at the back in a modern day hipster samurai bun. She should have found it amusing. He was probably five or six years her junior. But the whole package – the broad shoulders, the bun, the liquid ink eyes, and then he tossed in a half-smile – was pretty spectacular.

He cocked an eyebrow at her and she was severely aware of that wetness between her thighs returning. With a vengeance.

Chapter 7

She was almost out the door, on her way to her car. Dani had a hankering for a big-ass glass of wine, hell, maybe a bottle. The adrenalin rush had reemerged when she’d been told to put her clothes back on. She’d done it. She had actually fucking done it. She found herself clutching her tote bag and her purse with trembling fingers and her legs felt made of wet spaghetti.

‘Hello?’

She turned, one hand rising to her chest to cover her thumping heart, because this hall had no other classes this evening and he’d scared the hell out of her.

Man bun.

‘Um … oh, hi. Sorry, you scared me.’

‘Sorry.’ He shoved his hands into the pockets of his faded skinny jeans. No doubt very expensive jeans that were manipulated and abused to look as if they’d received years of steady use to make them soft and distressed. ‘Wasn’t my intention.’

She nodded, waiting, heart now pounding like some wild tribal drum. What was this?

‘I don’t usually do this …’ He trailed off. She saw, despite his confident personal fashion and roguish straying eyebrow, he was rather shy.

‘Do what?’ she prompted.

He chuckled. It was a lovely self-deprecating, deep sound. ‘Confuse women in the hallway.’ He sighed, leaning against a locker and regarded her. ‘What I meant to say is I don’t usually see women out of their clothes until after I’ve asked them out. This time I’m reversing it. Asking out a woman I’ve already seen out of her clothes.’

‘You don’t know my name,’ she said, stupidly.

‘You could fix that. You could tell me.’

‘Dani,’ she said. ‘Dani Young.’

‘Kevin Buck,’ he said, holding out a hand. ‘But I did know your name, remember? The prof told us.’

She took it but a small laugh escaped her. She had forgotten. Entirely. ‘Buck?’

He nodded, eyes shining with amusement. ‘Yep. Buck. I’ve gotten them all. Young Buck, Don’t give a Buck, Quick Buck …’

‘I’m sorry.’ She shook and released, uncomfortable with how much she liked the feel of his hand on hers. ‘I’ve just never heard that name before. I wasn’t making judgement. Sorry about the names too …’

He shook his head, took a step back as if to show her how harmless and charming he was. ‘No big deal. It could have been worse. A lot worse. So about that proposal of mine …’

‘Going out?’

‘A drink maybe?’

‘When?’ Had she just asked when? She’d meant to say no.

‘Wednesday after class?’

Dani swallowed hard. Cheryl’s voice was echoing in her head. Her encouragement to explore. When she opened her mouth again she heard herself say, ‘Yes. Sure. That’s great.’

He nodded – it was nearly a bow – and the samurai bun bobbed. She smiled. A few small tendrils had escaped, and she imagined he liked it like that, but she had the urge to tuck them back into the artfully messy mass he’d created. And to see if his hair was as soft as it looked.

Instead, she pushed her hands into her jacket pocket and said, ‘I’ll see you at class, then.’

‘Absolutely,’ he said. ‘Maybe when I’m done I can show you my sketch of you.’

‘Oh, I don’t think I want to see that.’

There went that errant eyebrow again.

She cleared her throat. ‘What I mean is, I don’t want to see myself. It makes me … twitchy. There’s a better chance I’ll stick with this if I don’t see myself. If I see myself on paper from someone else’s perspective … I’d probably not like it. It would probably upset me.’

Why was she telling him this? Nerves. It was the only answer she had.

He moved a little closer and brushed her shoulder with his palm. ‘It makes me sad to hear that. Maybe one day you’ll change your mind,’ he said. ‘You’re spectacular.’

The next thing she knew she was pushing out into the chilly night. It felt like they’d get their first frost. Dani watched her breath make ghosts in the darkness as she exhaled. She’d survived her first class and man bun, aka Kevin, had asked her out.

‘Not too shabby,’ she whispered.

* * *

He was painting her. Kevin Buck. With his dark, mussed man bun and his bottomless gaze. But not on paper. Not on canvas. He was painting her. He had his tongue tucked between his teeth as he worked. Every time the slick cool smear of paint touched her skin, followed by the kiss of a red sable brush, she had to suppress a shiver. But worse than that, every stroke he laid down on her skin as he worked acted as a bellows to the heat that was growing between her legs. Dani shifted just a little and he said softly, ‘Stay still, Dani.’

The paint whirled around her nipple. Which instantly stiffened and went insane. The flesh wanting to tingle and ache all at the same time. She squeezed her thighs together and that only made it worse. Vibrant cobalt blue began to cover that small halo of flesh. He dipped, he swirled, he dipped, he swirled, and she found she couldn’t catch her breath.

‘I told you that you were spectacular,’ Kevin said, grinning. Now a small paintbrush was clamped between his white teeth. Teeth, she noticed, that were just crooked enough to be adorable and charming.

He found a larger brush, examined it and nodded as if it pleased him. She managed a small sip of air, enough to steady her buzzy head a little.

The large brush made bright streaks of cool orange paint down from just below her blushing-blue breast and towards her navel. Her stomach muscles trembled and he didn’t say a word. It was obvious she had no control over something as instinctive and primitive as that tremble.

He painted past the shallow divot of her belly button and the thick streak landed right above her mound.

Is he going to paint my pussy? … is he going to stroke that over my clit? … is he going to? … is he going to?

The words were a runaway freight train running through her mind. She bit her tongue and tried to keep her focus.

‘Your colour balance is off,’ said a voice.

They both looked up to find Chris there. She nearly died. The heat between her thighs became liquid and uncontrollable. Now he was here. Watching. Watching Kevin paint her … literally.

Kevin stopped and stared at his instructor. ‘I disagree.’

‘She should be in reds and golds, maybe a touch of copper. It matches who she is.’

‘I think this matches who she is.’

‘She looks like a clown fish.’

Kevin frowned. She said nothing. Her head whipped back and forth as if watching a tennis match. When Chris stepped forward and selected his own brush, all the air she had managed to keep in her lungs fled.

Chris took his brush and it came up crimson and spread the paint, slick and cool, around her other nipple. The lick of the brush was a trailing comet of pleasure. He took his time, face serious, brow furrowed as he painted out in ever widening circles. When her breast was nearly rimmed in red, he changed brushes and painted a trim of gold whirls. He too went and chose a larger brush, as her chest rose and fell in fits and starts from trying to breathe.

Copper gleamed thick and shimmering on the paintbrush. He started at the top of her thigh, bringing his lines up to kiss the V of her thighs. Dani’s body jerked of its own accord and for a moment their eyes met. Those blue eyes of his seemed to see right down into the flaming centre of her. The part of her that wanted, one of them, either of them, hell, both of them, to dip that brush between her thighs. To paint the part of her that screamed the most for contact.

Instead he curled his painted feathering line up her belly to meet the crimson and gold at her breast.

Dani thought they’d pushed her as far as she could go until Chris dropped his brush and squatted down in front of her. His torso facing her bare sex, his face close to her naked breasts, cloaked in nothing but thin cold layers of drying paint.

‘Your brush strokes are messy,’ he said to Kevin.

Kevin cocked his head, frowned, his samurai bun momentarily disturbed by the movement. Chris traced a large fingertip around the brush strokes that dotted Dani’s nipple. That already tight knot of flesh grew tighter still. Surely it would crack the paint, she thought wildly.

His fingertips ran along the seams of the blue that adorned her left breast. When he started to travel the trail of the screaming orange she saw white spots dance in her eyes. Inside her, everything clenched. Everything grew wetter. Everything screamed for that finger to travel all the way to its ultimate – most coveted – destination.

His fingertips licked the top of her thigh, stopping where the paint ended. His bright-blue gaze was on her again and he smiled. ‘You should paint her the way she deserves to be painted. Like the art she is.’ Then he dragged his finger down between her legs and slipped it over that swollen, hard part of her that needed his touch more than she needed air to breathe.

Dani woke tangled in her sheets, panting, her hand shoved firmly between her thighs. Her arousal, while she slept, had reached a feverish level. As the sun came up slowly, turning the light in her room from purple to periwinkle to smoky grey, she slid her trembling fingers over her clit. Abandoning that when it didn’t feel big enough, bold enough. She pushed two fingers inside herself, grinding her clit against her palm as she hooked and curled her fingers. Finally, on the brink of dying or coming, she found her clit with her other hand and with just a few gentle strokes (like the kiss of a paintbrush), she came.

‘Jesus,’ she said to the ceiling. ‘Fuck.’

* * *

‘What happened to you?’ Cheryl was leaning in her doorway, arms crossed, smirk on her face.

‘What?’ Dani finished her coffee, studying the liquid intently so as to avoid looking at her friend.

‘You look like you got slapped. Twice.’ She laughed and touched a fingertip to each of her cheeks to indicate where she meant.

Dani instantly pressed her palms to her cheeks. They were warm. Of course they were warm! She’d been sitting here trying to place a paper fucking towel order for the restrooms and instead reliving her vivid, lascivious sex dream that involved not one but two men. One of them her old friend who’d been more like a brother to her.