Best Lesbian Erotica 2011

ICE Rachel Charman

She was going to leave town, the cold-hearted bitch.

It didn’t matter to her. My existence only crossed over with hers in the most superficial of ways. She regularly asserted that she had no responsibility for my interpretation of our affair. I was her dog, running, jumping and barking when she said so, nipping at her heels and whimpering as she drifted out of my life.

She had been there only five weeks. I had come upon her on her first day in the town center. It seems strange to me now that I had been walking around, going to work, buying vegetables and whatever else without knowing what was about to happen to me. I turned onto the High Street and there she was, sitting languidly under one of her sculptures in the middle of the busy pavement.

It was the sculpture that caught my eye first. As the hot bodies of shoppers, bundled in coats, never still, whining, shouting and wanting, swarmed around it, the sculpture remained demure, still, beautiful and freezing. It was the perfect antidote to life itself. It was made of ice, around nine feet tall and impossibly constructed; a lion, standing on its hind legs, front paws raised to the sky. Though from a distance the lion seemed to be about to pounce snarling onto the passersby below, the face was perfectly calm, with its eyes shut and its mouth closed and smiling a little. The overall effect was of a creature not about to kill, but about to dance. I laughed out loud as I drew closer.

Next to the lion, practically horizontal on a bench, she lay. She wore a thick, grubby men’s overcoat and a scowl. Her dark hair was unkempt and practically dreaded, and her hands were covered in scars. Piercings glinted dirtily from her nose, ears and lip, and I could see from where I stood her heel, poking proudly out through a hole in her shoe. Anyone passing might have thought she was homeless but for the way she gazed at the lion, jerking slightly when anyone touched it.

“It’s delicate,” she growled at a middle-aged couple laden with bags.

“Did you make it?” said the man.

“Yes,” she said, and with her tatty foot, she nudged the old hat positioned under the lion’s pedestal.

On the second day the sculpture was a mermaid: a glistening siren calling out to me silently from a melting rock. I tried to strike up a conversation about the sculpture with its creator. I thought art might make me interesting. She looked at me with a bored expression that seemed to say, You’ll do, and invited me gruffly to get coffee somewhere.

There, in a dingy midafternoon bar, she ordered two double whiskies for herself and another to go with my coffee. We spoke little. I was afraid. I asked her about her sculptures. She explained that she was a former rich brat and earned a fortune making ice sculptures for exclusive parties for ten months of the year. The rest of the time, she said, licking the rim of her glass like a savage, she moved from town to town displaying her work on the streets, got up like a beggar with a ragged cap for spare change. She was, apparently, doing it all to write a book on perceptions of art and poverty. I think she just liked to glower at people from a smug self-induced state of poorness. I didn’t say so. I smiled at her and said it was fascinating. At that, a flash of joy passed over her features, and she seemed to be about to thank me. Instead, she asked me to take her home with me.

Once we were through the door, she slammed me against a wall in the fading light. I was shocked to say the least, but delighted that I was suddenly part of this rock ’n’ roll artist lifestyle. She kissed me and I tasted booze and tobacco and a little desperation on her mouth. I kissed back eagerly as she made no attempt at ceremony. She reached down and began fucking me hard, glaring at me as if daring me to come. Losing myself in it all I began to feel the waves of tension wash over me and my knees weaken.

“So,” she said casually, as if she weren’t controlling my body from the inside out, “you like my work?”

“Yes,” I said breathlessly. She nodded to herself.

“And you’d like me to sculpt you someday, wouldn’t you?”

“Oh, yes,” I said, imagining standing naked under her gaze while she chiseled the shape of my hips and thighs into the ice.

“Say so then,” she spat, almost disdainfully.

“I’d like you to sculpt me.”

“You’d what?” she demanded, knowing I was losing the power of speech.

“I’d love you to sculpt me. I… want you… to…” I felt my hips buck and my head roll back involuntarily as the orgasm swept through me, and I abandoned my words to screams. She left almost as soon as I had got my breath back.

So now, she was moving on.

Since the second day I had seen her, we had fucked every day. In that time we had barely spoken. Or at least, I hadn’t. My chattering in her silences made me nervous, and she rarely spoke apart from sudden rants about Prejudice, Capitalism and the Right Wing, and I was afraid to interrupt. Aside from in bed, she barely looked at me, and even there she seemed not to really see me. She enjoyed toying with me, holding me on the edge of orgasm for what felt like hours and making me tell her whatever she wanted to hear, about her sculptures, about her, about us. It was that power that kept me coming back. I craved her hold over me, almost as much as I longed to exert the same hold over her.

After five weeks of this, she called me, as she often did, to summon me. I licked my lips as I answered the phone.

“I’m going tomorrow,” she said.

“Going where?”

“On. Out. Next place,” she said. She rarely spoke in full sentences.

“What the fuck?” Panic rose in my voice, surprising me. I composed myself. “Well, thanks for the notice.”

“Whatever,” she replied. “Come over.”

“There’s no point really is there?” I said, attempting to sound bored but only sounding indignant.

“Just come. The workshop. I’ll be there all night, so whatever.” She rang off. I seethed for a moment. Then I cried a little and then drummed my fists on my knees.

“Bitch!” I shouted at the telephone.

I shouldn’t have cared, but I did. I should have just gone over there for quick sex and left, because that was what we both should have wanted, but it wasn’t. She had ignored and used me for just over a month and now she was leaving. It shouldn’t have been such a big problem, but I was stuck. I wanted so badly to crack that veneer and make her see through all her miserable judgments and her big philosophies. I convinced myself that it wasn’t for my sake but to simply prove a point.

If there is one thing I can’t resist, it’s proving a point, even if I have to fight for it long after the argument is relevant. Convincing myself that this stubbornness drove me, not my longing for her, I stamped into the bathroom. I was a mess, I conceded, as I looked at my blotchy face in the mirror. Rising to the challenge I slipped into the shower and began to prepare. I lathered, shampooed, shaved and scrubbed until I was pink, glowing and soap scented all over. After drying off in my room, I applied rich moisturizers and a perfume I knew had caught her attention before. I chose my clothes carefully, deciding on a short pencil skirt that had made her eyes linger longer than usual and a crisp white shirt that made me feel stern. I knew, despite all her feminist rants about sexualized clothing, that nothing turned her on faster than a pair of heels worn with confidence, so I selected my favorite black patent kitten heels to complete the outfit. Next, I dried and combed out my hair until it shone and applied light makeup. Once I was sure I was looking the best I could, I drove across town to meet her.

The workshop she squatted in was a former shop with a basement below it. The basement led to a bay where delivery vans had unloaded stock, and this was where she loaded her sculptures into her clapped-out transit each day. The windows at the front had been boarded up and the shop itself gutted. There was an old sofa against one wall that she slept on, and toward the back in an alcove behind a ragged curtain was a sink. Aside from that, it was empty. I found the door to the shop open and walked through to the back, where the stairs led down to the basement.

The basement was freezing, appropriately, and lit with institutional strip lighting. Leaning against the nearest wall was a chainsaw and a canvas strip full of hammers and chisels freshly cleaned and dried after the latest creation. She stood in the center of the room, smoking and leaning against what I presumed was a sculpture hidden under a dust sheet. She rarely let me see the sculptures before they went out on display. In fact, she rarely sculpted at night, preferring to create something early in the morning and then display it from midday in public. I anticipated another of her games and remained silent as I reached the bottom of the stairs. Once there I stood still, hoping she would feel awkward.

She acknowledged me with a slight twitch of the eyelids and went on smoking and staring about. I cracked first.

“Well?” I snapped, too loudly.

“What?”

“What do you want?”

She shrugged.

“You invited me over. You must want something.”

She sidled over, gripped my hair and with her cigarette smoldering close to my ear she kissed me hard. I tried not to give in to it, and as soon as I did, she moved off, wiping my lipstick from her mouth with the back of her hand and smirking. She sauntered away again, back toward her hidden sculpture.

“Is that it?” I barked, but my voice cracked. Was this really it? She had been grinning smugly, but now her lip curled in irritation.

“Why do you have to get so cut up?” she spat and then jammed the heel of her hand against her forehead as if to reproach herself for this outburst.

“Look, whatever it is you asked me here for…” I swallowed, “just get it over with, will you?”

She glowered at me for a moment, then threw her cigarette to the floor and ground it out on the cold gray concrete. Muttering to herself, she whipped the dust sheet from her sculpture.

“Fine. I wanted to show you this,” she snapped. I gazed at the figure before me, still amazed by her ability to coax such intricate figures from the harsh ice.

It was breathtaking. I took in the details in the translucent ice with awe. I gazed at the tapered fingers, odd-shaped feet with splayed toes and the teardrop-shaped eyes. The figure was seated, naked, with voluminous hair clouding around the face like a painting of a Greek goddess. Its lips were slightly parted, and the eyes were closed. She had even, with some tiny sharp object and a great deal of skill, carved the exact curl of her eyelashes into the sculpture’s cheek. One hand was raised and tangled in the hair, and the other rested in the lap.

It was her I realized as I stepped closer to the sculpture. She had created a sculpture of herself.

“It’s you!” I said stupidly, peering closer. I darted a glance at her. She looked miserable again.

“Almost,” she replied.

Almost was right, for as I looked I noticed the difference. She had managed to conjure a serenity in the figure’s face and a lack of tension in its limbs that was missing in herself. The figure’s skin was smoother, lacking scars and imperfections. I couldn’t help but feel that this was a sculpture of what used to be, not what was now. I composed myself.

“So, you dragged me all this way to show me a sculpture you made of yourself. I can’t say I’m surprised; it’s a subject you’re obviously obsessed with,” I said, taking a last desperate swipe at her. She appeared to shrug it off.

“If you want to spoil everything for yourself, go ahead,” she said.

“Me spoil everything?” I shouted as I whirled around to face her, tearing my eyes from her glistening alter ego. “You’re the one that’s riding off into the sunset without so much as a by-your-leave!”

“Fine!” she roared in response. She grabbed my shoulders and kissed me again, and though I hated her I felt my own tongue tangle ecstatically with hers and my hands creep to her hair. She pushed me away.

“Fine. If you care so much, show me what you would have done if I were staying.” She spun me around to face the sculpture.

Now it dawned on me what the sculpture was for. Now I could see what the game would have been. She hadn’t counted on us fighting, but she was determined despite or perhaps because of our argument to put us both through it. Something inside me snapped. I decided that if she was going to cast me aside, I would punish her with the only thing I knew she wanted.

With my back still to her I unbuttoned my shirt and slid it from my shoulders. I kicked off my shoes and stepped out of my skirt. I turned back to her. She was looking at me uncertainly and inside I crowed. For once I had surprised her. I kissed her roughly with her chin in my hand. I felt her mouth search for mine as I broke from the kiss and then turned her face away.

I turned back to the sculpture and considered it for a moment. Given her attitude it was much more attractive to me than she was at that point. Its body was open to me, its arms clear of the torso and the legs outstretched. The face was calm and smiling. I realized as I slipped out of my underclothes that this was an ecstatic figure, enraptured by something that was secret, and for a moment was stunned by its creator’s cleverness. Then I shook the thought away. The sculpture was mine now, not hers.

I stepped toward the sculpture and sat astride its lap. A moment’s self-consciousness swept over me as the sudden cold between my thighs shocked me. I straightened my back, where I felt her eyes, resisted the urge to turn and gauge her reaction, and laid my hands on the sculpture’s exquisite, pointed breasts. The smoothness excited me. I drew my hands across, marveling at the detail of the sculpture that had captured the exact folds of skin I remembered from her body. My hands came away wet and I tentatively laid them against my throat and shoulders. Behind me I heard her shift where she stood.

Pretending to ignore her, I turned my attention to the sculpture’s face. The piercings and the frown were gone, but otherwise, it was a replica of her face. I traced my fingers across the upturned, open mouth, and then my tongue. The coolness was deliciously refreshing on my mouth, where I felt my pulse pounding in my starved lips. I leaned close and pressed my mouth to the sculpture’s. Freezing water filled my mouth, and my lips slid over the icy tongue and teeth. I felt the nerve endings in my lips inflame with the shocking cold and drew closer.

My body came into contact with the slick torso and I gasped. My body seemed to freeze against the sculpture for a moment, and then as the heat of my skin melted the surface, I slid and shuddered. Involuntarily I wrapped my arms around the sculpture and held it closer to me, running my lips and tongue over its face and welcoming the almost painful chill.

Now I permitted myself to turn my head, and I saw her. Her expression was impossible to read. She may have been furious, or saddened or enchanted, but whichever it was, she couldn’t look away. Her hands were stuffed tightly into the pockets of her filthy jeans and her shoulders hunched, as if she were willing herself to stand still. Pleased with myself I looked away.

With one arm still around the sculpture and my body pressed to its chest, I reached down. My fingers were turning blue and I was trembling, but my head felt thick and my face was flushed. I touched myself tentatively and groaned. I longed for her warm kiss but wouldn’t give in and go to her. Instead I consoled myself with the sculpture’s tortuous, freezing caress.

My breathing grew heavier, and I broke from my icy kiss and rested my hot forehead against the sculpture’s neck. As I glanced down at my hand, working slowly at my cunt, I noticed it. She had thought of everything, and with a breathy laugh I turned to her. She gave me the ghost of a smile.

The hand in the sculpture’s lap had appeared at first to be of no significance, trailing carelessly over its thighs as if forgotten. From where I sat, however, I could see that the hand’s knuckles rested on the thighs, with the fingers curled upward. She nodded at me, and I turned back to the sculpture. With excruciating slowness, I glided over the sculpture’s slick lap. The hand, already melting and wet from my heat, pressed into me as though into a glove. She had crafted it to fit me perfectly.

I cried out at the shocking, stunning sensation. My body convulsed but I forced myself to be still until I could bear the cold. Shaking now from the cold and the intensity I drew myself up, down, back and forth on the hand, moaning as the icy fingers found new spaces inside me. The hand was as unyielding and unforgiving as its creator, and my insides rejoiced at the pressure it exerted. My breasts pressed to the wet body of the sculpture and my hands slipped and slid as I tried to grip its hair and face. I rolled my hips harder, relishing the bizarre sensation of the flush of red on my skin spreading under the purple goose bumps. I dared myself to kiss the sculpture’s lips again, drinking the condensation hungrily and then flinching from the cold. The chill became so intense that I longed to come and then move somewhere warmer, but at the same time, I hoped that I never would. I wanted to freeze into the sculpture and become part of it, immortalized as the figure’s ecstatic lover, fucking euphorically until the heat melted us both away. I could hear my own moans as if they were someone else’s, and their ragged, frenzied tone drove me on faster and wilder.

Despite my pleasure I couldn’t help bittersweet thoughts of her creeping into my mind. I thought of her lying on the bench in her dirty coat, looking up at me. I saw her slumped in the bar, growling into her whiskey and suddenly flashing me that smile of pride. I saw her in bed, over and over, spitting commands and rebukes at me and remembered searching for a glint of warmth in her as her body covered mine. The anger and sadness spurred me to fuck harder, and I drove my hips convulsively until the orgasm gripped me fiercely. I screamed unashamedly until the last ebb died away, and then I sat, breathless and defeated, my head against the sculpture’s shoulder. I began to shiver miserably.

No sooner had I sat still I felt her hands on my shoulders. She probably wanted more, and I was just too tired of the whole thing to care. I noticed then a tenderness in her touch and I turned.

She was weeping. She gathered me in her arms, and my body rejoiced at the warmth and dryness of her clothes. She drew me away from the sculpture and cried. She had seen me, finally; she had seen more than my outlines and glimpsed a little of what I saw in her sculpture. She wept almost inconsolably into my neck as I shushed her quietly.