Elizabeth's Roman Awakening Ch. 07

23.

Elizabeth sat back in the weathered green wooden side chair overlooking the lounge window and brought up her knees to her small chest so that her heels rested on the edge of the seat. When she and Michael returned home from lunch, she had slipped off her shoes and her skirt and top and now after donning her favorite faded college tee shirt and cotton panties, sat idly contemplating her toes. She decided that her nails needed to be repainted in the vibrant red Joseph favored, but in truth her thoughts were a million miles away.

The call from her sister Diane and her daughter Karen, telling her that they had arranged a surprise graduation trip to Italy had been a psychic shock of titanic proportions for her and probably Michael as well, forcing them to face up to their complete immersion in what had become an almost alternate reality. Since their return home, he had been sullen and withdrawn and busied himself with housework. She caught him sweeping the same area in their narrow kitchen over and over and knew he must be deep in thought as well.

At that instant, She wanted nothing more than to undo the last few weeks and pretend everything that had transpired -- all the pulse pounding excitement, the sexual awakening inside her -- had never happened. She wished it, but couldn't wish away an aching feeling of need inside her. Certainly she hadn't felt this kind of burning passion in her loins for years with Michael and running her fingers through her hair, she wondered whether it was simply the lustful feeling common with every new sexual relationship or something deeper. No, she decided, this was not simply a whimsical affair. She knew it and more importantly, felt it with every fiber of her being. If she closed her eyes, she could still smell, taste, and almost feel Joseph's presence. Thinking about him, brought a tingling between her tightly pressed thighs, and her nipples stood out hard from suddenly swollen little breasts.

She massaged her feet then hugged her knees tighter to her body to hide her arousal. Although she hardly ever wore or even needed, a bra in what she referred to as "tee shirt and panties mode", she suddenly wished that she had decided to dress in something less revealing. She didn't want Michael to become aroused right now, and she knew that appearing scantily clad in front of Michael was one of those little unspoken signals that couples develop to indicate their interest in sex.

Right now it was the last possible signal she wanted to transmit to Michael. Elizabeth looked over toward her husband who saw caught her eye and offered a shy, almost self-deprecating smile in return.

She had to admit to herself that the sexual awakening that blossomed inside because of Joseph was very seductive and compelling. She decided she must have a submissive streak she never knew about before him. Surrendering everything had been so easy for her to do, but in her own defence, she had to admit Joseph was pretty damned easy to surrender to. She smiled to herself as she considered how incredibly self assured and dominant he was, not just with her but with everyone. He really was born to rule.

She idly picked at a hangnail on her little finger as she thought about how dominant he was in bed as well. She regarded her fingers intently. It was a childhood habit almost forgotten, but which seemed to claim her when she was most worried. And she was a study in worry today. Why did she yield so readily to him, from the first night they slept together? She knew even before then that she would be putty in his hands, completely malleable and bending to his will, his desires. He was so incredibly dominant and it was so wonderful having a strong man make all the decisions, provide all the directions, command her in every aspect of her life. None of the men in her life, not even any of the men in their social circle back in Indiana, were even remotely like him.

She loved pleasing him and trying to fulfill his every wish. Her one concern was the possibility of an unwanted pregnancy, and she was reasonably certain that had not happened. It was the one wish she needed to deny him and would fight hard not to give into. She was feeling uncomfortable in the knowledge that her period was late but knew that any number of factors could be responsible for that, not the least of which was the emotional roller coaster she now found herself riding. The smallish chemist around the corner stocked neither home pregnancy kits nor contraceptive, and she was too embarrassed and frightened to go to the farmacia over on the via Corse.

In any event, she was determined that the whole relationship with Joseph needed to end, however painful that might be for her. The fact that her sister and daughter were now definitely coming to visit was like a tidal wave threatening to wipe out her comfortable notions of what was normal and acceptable. Squeezing her eyes shut to rid herself of the image of Joseph and his gorgeous body, she decided suddenly that it all had to end. She would have to return to the barren sexual and sensual wilderness she had known almost her whole life before the past month. Diane and Karen's visit would rebalance the whole equation, bringing her and she hoped, Michael, back to their senses.

She watched the sun disappear behind the tall block of pink and buff colored flats across the street and the room took on a subtler, softer hue. She looked over at Michael and he seemed disappear into the shadow of the pantry. She held out her hands to decide whether to reach for a nail file and with a sudden start noticed the lack of a wedding band. She unbent her form, stretched and shuffled lazily to the flowerpot where she remembered Joseph tossing them. Looking down, she could see nothing and looked again at Michael.

Suddenly, she looked at him as if for the first time, as if in a new light, and perhaps it was just a trick of the light, but was it possible, she wondered -- did he seem to be physically smaller, to have shrunk somehow? Perhaps, or perhaps not, she thought. In any case he came across as a ghost rendered in sepia tones. He seemed to lack the charm and appeal she once saw, or perhaps only thought she saw, in him. Even so, she told herself, he was her husband and they were inexorably linked as life partners. This is the life we have chosen for ourselves after all. She managed a brave smile when he looked over at her, and he smiled back brightly, showing the first signs of happiness she had seen in him all day.

"Michael, honey. Where did our wedding bands disappear? Have you seen them?"

Michael responded, "No Lizzie, I have no idea. The last time I saw them, they were right there in the flowerpot. And you know fucking well how they got there."

She frowned angrily and remarked, "Well damn it, we need to find them pretty damn quick wouldn't you say?"

Michael looked back at her with a blank stare and shrugged, both palms upward.

"Honey, come over here and sit with me on the sofa," she said in a soft conciliatory voice. She slid onto the sofa and folded her legs under her lotus position, and patted the cushion next to her. Michael propped the broom against a cabinet, and plopped heavily down next to her. He was noticing that of late, she had a much more commanding style when she spoke to him. He decided, that was perhaps a result of her fucking Joseph, and her changed regard for him. He wasn't sure he liked it, but oddly felt a tingle in the pit of his stomach and perhaps a bit lower even.

"Michael darling, you know that I only agreed to be with Joseph because you demanded it, right? You pushed the idea -- and pushed me -- hard. You were like a dog in heat over it -- you know you were, and you are even at this moment. You put us in a place where I found myself unable to refuse. Everything I have done has been to please you. Admit that, honey. You agree this is true, right?"

He clenched his jaw tightly. A dull headache was beginning to nag at his temples as he nodded in agreement with what he believed to be the truth. Although he didn't actually set Elizabeth up with Joseph until after they had already coupled, he believed that he did and for him, that was all that counted. Elizabeth saw his eyes take on a far away look; he suddenly seemed deep in reflection.

Michael's eyes did indeed have that 'thousand yard stare,' as though he was oblivious to his wife or anything else in the world. He was wracked by a queasy feeling in his gut that Elizabeth's feelings for Joseph had transcended simple sexual lust; that perhaps she was in love with him. At the very least she was responding to Joseph in a way that had been giving off subtle clues detectable to someone who had been in a long-term relationship with her and could 'read' subtle unspoken cues. He thought to himself that the clues were all there -- the way her eyes widened in her black lover's presence; the musk of nervous perspiration when he was near; the way she brushed her hair back behind her ear and smiled shyly at him with downcast eyes. He had seen all these and more and knew them because once upon a distant past, they were signals she gave off only for him.

He was suddenly afraid that Elizabeth would no longer have any need for him in the traditional marriage they had both bought into so many years ago. Weighed against these very real fears was the uncontained sexual high he got from having watched them the one time he was granted the privilege of watching his wife open her legs for Joseph. Seeing a powerful black man fucking his wife, watching her hips buck wildly in response to his thrusts had caused his heart to pound wildly, and his cock to ache with painful need of release. His need to go further with this incredibly erotic experience both sickened him and excited him like nothing else in his life ever had. It was a palpable feeling of erotic pleasure at seeing what a slut Elizabeth was in the hands of another man and the pain of losing out his place of primacy with his wife.

Joseph had said that some men were born to be cuckolds and now Michael knew he must be one of them. In a flash of clarity he recalled that even as a teenager he would fanaticize about his girlfriend of the moment cheating on him. He also knew that Joseph must be right about Western social norms being against the natural order, and indeed he had witnessed things on his last trip to Joseph's tribal lands that confirmed that women were happier with the kind of arrangement Joseph had proposed for them.

Except for the fluke of his wife meeting the African, who was ironically a member of the family with whom he was negotiating to rip the mineral wealth of their homelands in the forested wilds of Nigeria and Cameroon, he would never have had his eyes opened and his understanding of the world expanded in this way.

He swallowed hard and slapped his knees with his open palms. His mind was made up. He decided that he needed to recapture the role of the dominant male in her life. He brushed his hands through his hair, stalling before saying what they both knew needed to be said. Finally, he took a deep breath, and looking directly into Elizabeth's dark green eyes, he began to speak to her in the authoritative voice he used in professional negotiations. "Elizabeth," he began, "We can't let this . . ." He fumbled for a word, "This 'fling' erase everything we mean to one another; everything we owe our daughter and our family. I was tricked into wanting this arrangement by my own lust, and my own spineless acceptance of Joseph's dominant personality. This is a hard thing to admit, but I think I was getting pretty convinced by his alternative views on marriage and the world. But really, Elizabeth, that's a world that 's so foreign to us, to anyone civilized really. "

He paused for a moment for effect, then continued, ". . . Can you imagine being in his bed, servicing him -- or worse each one of his brothers -- every night, perhaps even being forced to bear their children!" He paused again and silence filled the space between them. Involuntarily, his neck and face began to redden. Although his conscious brain was thinking one thing, his body was reacting quite differently. A sudden mental image of Elizabeth, her belly swollen with a black baby, bred to her by Joseph or one of the other alpha males in his tribal family caused Michael's modest little member to stiffen. His groin felt suddenly sweaty. As if to banish the thought, he swallowed hard and squeezed his eyes shut for a few seconds.

His words had an impact on Elizabeth, who had been having trouble thinking beyond how the raw, animal sexual passion she shared with Joseph. In truth, they had only been together perhaps a dozen times, but it already felt so natural to her. Joseph had awakened something inside her that she only barely knew existed. She had heard of other women being consumed by passion for a man in this way, but scarcely would have believed only a few months ago that she could be one of those lucky women. As she thought back to the events of the morning, her crotch ached both from the pounding Joseph had given her and from a sudden desire to feel him there again. She thought back to when she was a little girl and her dad would take the brood to the beach on the Mississippi Gulf shores. She would stay in the water playing all day; playing longer than her siblings; playing so long that even after her parents put her to bed, she could still feel the power of the waves rocking her legs and her little body as though she was still trying to stand up against the surf

Michael wanted so much for them to be a part of this lifestyle but it would mean the end of everything -- the entire basis of their life together and the social status they had achieved over the course of their time together. That would be impossible to give up, he told himself. He shook his head and closed his eyes tightly to bring himself back into the here and now.

Abruptly he spoke out again in a strong voice saying, "No, no, we can't do this! I mean, consider the logical conclusion of this if we were to allow ourselves to take the next step. We would never -- could never -- allow that to happen. It would mean the end of our social life as we know it. Our social circle, our family, everyone would reject us. We would be outcast. I am stepping in to take command of this situation. I forbid you to have any contact whatever with this, this . . . I don't have the words for him, but this 'savage'. He's really an animal, you know, Elizabeth. I have seen the way his brothers live and rule in Africa and you haven't. They really are savages at their core. . No, I absolutely forbid you from seeing him, or . . . well, you know. I don't think I have to say it."

Elizabeth was devastated by the sudden show of strength by Michael. Where had this sudden assertiveness come from? She felt conflicted about her ebony lover, but was hard put to argue against Michael's assertions. Their life was back in Indiana, not in Africa, not even here in Rome. What was she thinking? Even though her conscious brain was telling her one thing, the rest of her being was sending entirely different messages. They fought the better part of the afternoon and evening and slept apart for the next two weeks. When she left Michael at the airport for his month long trip to Nigeria and Cameroon, their embrace was perfunctory and devoid of any passion. In truth she didn't feel she would miss him, but driving the hire car back to their flat she felt a pang of regret and sadness at his being gone. Seeing the vivid neon green cross of the farmacia on via Corse reminded her that she needed to purchase a home pregnancy test, but she couldn't bring herself find out for certain. She argued herself out of stopping on the grounds that finding a place to park would be impossible this time of day. A rude horn blaring from one of the ever-present Fiat 500s behind her made her forget the chore altogether.

24.

June was passing quickly and Diane and Karen were due at the beginning of July. Although summer weather in Rome features stifling heat and bright cloudless days, from June right through to early September, today was almost cool by comparison, so Elizabeth rubbed the sleep from her eyes and decided to finally leave the confinement of the flat. She felt uncharacteristically light and carefree. She had been depressed for the better part of a month, since Michael laid down his edict. She had ignored every attempt at communication from Joseph. She didn't respond to him in any way -- no phone calls, no tweets, no email. The first week, when she tearfully told him over Skype that she needed to make a clean break from him, he refused to believe her. At first, he came by for several days in a row, pounding his fists loudly on her door. For a month now, she barely emerged from the flat, and then only after scanning the street to make sure Joseph or any of his retinue were keeping tabs on her.

When it finally seemed that she had gotten through to Joseph, she thought she had managed the breakup; badly to be sure, but she had managed. Michael was stuck in Nigeria, his stay extended by trouble securing the mines and two of the largest oil refineries against scattered but frequent attacks by militant groups.

To lighten her mood, Elizabeth decided a shopping trip would help. She showered and couldn't help noticing that her waist and hips seemed a little more filled out than usual but attributed that to eating too much comfort food, and to be sure, comfort food was the name of the game almost everywhere in southern Italy. She thought she might settle on a salad for lunch, dismissed the idea, thinking she would have plenty of opportunity to walk off the extra calories today.

Dropping her towel, she inspected her body and decided she looked pretty good for a 40 year old. Sitting on the bed in the nude, she painted her toenails bright lavender. While they were drying, a sudden wave of remembrance and regret washed over her. She had finished painting her right toes, and her right leg was still bent and up on the bed. Impulsively she banged her head against her knee to force out the memory of Joseph. What they had done just wasn't right and breaking things off before they could go to the next stage was the right thing to do. At least that's what the voice in her head kept silently repeating. Screwing the top back on the nail varnish and tossing it aside on the duvet, she hugged her knee with both her arms. The silent voice kept saying, "What the hell. Why am I feeling like this?"

Nails finally dried, she decided that she needed to get going. She looked through the armoire for something dressy but not too lavish; maybe a little sexy even. In flipping through the dresses, she spied an outfit Joseph had bought for her. She suddenly flashed back to modeling it for him, and how he instantly said she must have it. She smiled and tingled slightly at the memory of the afternoon that followed. Walking resolutely across the Piazza Navona, she arrived on the via Corse in ten minutes to look for a taxi. The bright green cross of the farmacia caught her eye. She stopped in her tracks and muttered under her breath, "Oh what the fuck. It's better to know for sure isn't it?"

She stepped into the mostly empty premise and mimed a request for a home pregnancy test making the sign of a swollen belly for the chemist. He leered at her for a moment, waggling his eyebrows, then disappeared for a few seconds. After shoving 20 euros at him, she asked where the toilettes were. He winked at her and smiled wickedly then gave her a key and pointed toward the back of the store. She walked shakily toward it and after fumbling with the key opened the door, its squeaky hinges grating on her nerves.

The lavatory was filthy and she resolved not to sit on the seat and touch as little as possible. She ripped the package open, hiked her dress up, pulled her panties down to her ankles and squatted to piss on one of the sticks. She missed badly the first time peeing on her fingers and her cursing echoed in the empty room. The second time she hit it squarely and immersed the stick. Holding it away from her as if it was a dangerous weapon, she waddled over to the sink and rinsed her fingers thoroughly. She cursed to herself, "Fuck it Lizzie; fucking pull yourself together!" her words again echoed off the high walls