Free The Young Wife by Stephanie Calvin Page A

agreement. I felt the pressure of her silence building on me, forcing me to change the subject, so I asked her the first thing that sprang to mind.
    â€˜What’s this place like?’ I said. Then, seeing her look of confusion, continued, ‘You know, the one you said we are going to?’
    She grinned, and came towards me, then put her hands on my shoulders. ‘It’s a fetish club, for lesbians and their friends. You’ll love it!’ she said, and gave me a quick peck on the lips.
    â€˜It’s not some awful place full of women being right on and banging on about the sisterhood, is it?’ I asked in mock horror.
    She laughed again, and said, in between giggles, ‘No, it’s pure entertainment. No politics at all. Though I suppose that the phrase that springs to mind is “lipstick lesbians”, as most of the women there are young, and almost all are fairly attractive. It’s hard to describe to anyone who is used to normal clubs. It’s more like an eighteenth-century men’s entertainment than anything else. Although it has elements of fancy dress, and theatre as well.’
    She struggled to find the right description, then gave up, with a shrug of her wide brown shoulders. ‘You have to see it for yourself,’ she said.
    â€˜What is it called?’ I asked, as she turned away from me and headed upstairs.
    â€˜Plastika,’ came the shouted reply, bouncing hollowly off the stairs.
    I was going to make a cup of tea, and ask her more when she came back down, as I was nervous about following her around the place, in case she found it annoying. Strange that I could be so intimate in some things, and so separate in others, isn’t it? Then she called me upstairs, and I walked up, listening to the sound of running water. It took me a moment to realise that she was running a bath, and the scent of the oils she was using, mixed with the steam of the hot, running water from the tap, hit me when I reached the upstairs landing. I pushed open the bathroom door to see her bent, stark naked, over the big cast-iron bath. Her bathroom had no blind, or curtains, so the afternoon sunlight streamed in on to the bright, white tiles that ran around the bathroom walls. The rich brown of her back and bottom made a startling contrast to the background’s lightness, and she seemed to stand out, like a piece of brown marble sculpture, in the centre of the room. I noticed the pearly perfection of her toenails, and the clean strength of her sinewy ankles. The muscles at the back of her calves bunched like little rocks of hard sand, and the cleft between her buttocks was as deep and well-defined as the dimple in a plum. I wanted to put my hand in, to see how deep it was. How far in I could go.
    She looked over her shoulder, and I saw the bulge of one sweet breast under the ripple of her ribcage. The nipple was hard, and stood out like a raisin.
    â€˜Do you mind sharing a bath?’ she asked, as I studied the little knobs of her spine. ‘It’s just that my boiler takes ages to heat up again, and we don’t have much time to get ready.’
    â€˜No,’ I said, as I hovered uncertainly in the doorway. ‘I don’t mind at all, if you don’t.’
    I wanted her to stay bent over like that, but she turned around to stand facing me, and my eyes darted down to her nest. I was surprised again by how sparse the hair around her cunt was, and decided to mention it, saying, ‘Do you shave it into that shape, or is it natural?
    She knew exactly what I meant, and replied, with a shy smile, ‘No, I wax the edges. I like it small and neat. Do you like it?’
    I smiled, and nodded, then asked, ‘What about your bottom? That has no hair at all. Surely you don’t wax that as well?’
    She giggled, and nodded, saying, ‘As a matter of fact, I do. Why? Do you think it’s strange?’
    â€˜Doesn’t it sting?’ I enquired, in a