Paul Theroux - Blinding Light

“I think you’re a sneak,” she said.

“No sah.”

“Yes sah. So why are you sneaking over here to sit on my front porch and drink lemonade?” she said. She had hitched forward and was kicking the porch floor, propelling the swing back and forth with each kick and accusation. “You know my parents are out.”

He felt guiltily that because this was so, he was a conspirator. His silence made her sharper.

“Or else you wouldn’t be here,” she said. She kicked again, a skid-squeak of her rubber sole. “And you were sneaking around the clothesline.”

This was also true, and so accurate in its blame he said, “No I wasn’t. What do I care about all that old washing? I was just taking a shortcut.”

Instead of replying, she leaned so that he could see her smiling. She kicked the floor again, hard, and sent the porch swing backward, and he felt all her insistence in the movement.

“Please don’t tell them.”

“I’m going to,” she said, and it sounded like gunnah. “I’m going to blab everything.”

Now he wanted to go, but he could not rise from the moving swing, and when he finally got a grip on the arm of it and tried to hoist himself, she was talking again in that same teasing tone.

“I bet you want to come right into my house.”

“No,” he said, his voice breaking, and turned the small word into a squawk. He just wanted to leave. The day had gone dark, though he hadn’t noticed it until now.

“Then why did you come all the way over here?” And seeing that he was flustered and at a loss for a reply, she laughed softly.

The lights had gone on in the park, illuminating the treetops, and he still heard the sounds of the softball game, the cries of the spectators, the shouts of the players — easy to tell apart. He was thinking of all that passion and noise, just a game being played, so innocent, so blameless, an honest ball game under the lights. And he knew that he was doing something wrong, enacting a secret in the shadows he could never explain or justify.

“So why didn’t you bring me anything?”

He was silent. Another ball was smacked, another cheer: the players were harmless and happy and he was wicked.

“Because I got something for you. Want to see it?” She did not wait for a reply. “Stay here.”

She went inside and closed the doors — the screen door, the solid inner door, and he heard the thunk of the bolt. He remained sitting, wondering whether anyone could see him. He felt conspicuous and impatient and sensed he should go home. After a few minutes he rang the doorbell to tell Carol he was leaving. The bell was loud, but even so, there was no answer, not even footsteps. He waited, feeling trapped by the silence. Like a gasp, an expelled breath, a light inside went off.

And then came the metallic swallowing of the door bolt and a movement of the inner door. He could not see past the screen — only the outline of the doorframe, the darkness within. He plucked open the screen door and saw nothing but the dim hallway.

“Go in there,” she spoke from behind the door. He could see only her bare arm pointing to the living room. “Wait a little while. Then you have to find me.”

As soon as his back was turned she hurried away. He did as he was told, continued into the living room, his heart pounding, excited by the suspense. The living room was shadowy, lit by the street. He sat, and fumbled, then stood and listened, tremulous, his hands damp.

Her muffled voice came from somewhere upstairs in the house. “I’m ready.”

He went to the stairway and listened, and hearing nothing more, he climbed the stairs, looked into one room and then another, all in darkness, but he could make out the shapes of chairs, the lumps of beds, the glint of mirrors.

He entered a room at the front of the house, and though there was more light here from the street lamps, he did not see Carol at first because she was motionless, standing upright, almost posing. But he could see what she was wearing: short blue baby-doll pajamas and a pair of fluffy slippers. Her hair was fixed in two high bobbing brush-like ponytails, her shoulders were bare, her skin so pale as to be almost ghostly. The diaphanous blue cloth shimmered in the scanty, slanted light.

“Do you like it?” she said. “I dressed up just for you. I bet you don’t even care.”

She twirled before him and set the baby doll in motion, and then approached him and took his hand and brought him close to her, so close he could feel her but hardly see her, as if she were embarrassed to be stared at. And liking the darkness he clutched her, the silken cloth in his fingers, the warmth of her body, the odd warm saltiness of her damp flesh in the room that was like the promise of sex, the burnt perfume on her skin. She began to kiss him in a way that was new to him, sucking on his lips.

She moved from his mouth and said, “You better not tell anybody.”

Then, before he could say anything, she kissed him again, her kisses like promises. And as he returned her kisses, answering back, he opened his eyes and saw the room beyond her more clearly — the chair, the small bed, the neat row of costumed dolls on the dresser. He led her a few steps to the bed and pushed a cloth doll out of the way and sat down, hugging her, still kissing her, tasting the saltiness of her moist neck, the lemonade in her saliva.

“Lie down.”

“No,” she said, in a tone of caution that was almost fear.

But she did not stop kissing him, and a moment later, when he took her free hand and pressed it against his lap, she let him guide her fingers. Then all the initiative was hers, as she touched him, rubbed him with her small hand and finally unzipped him and took hold of him, pumping, her whole hand enclosing him. The thought came to him that she knew a great deal and was unafraid.

She certainly knew more than he did — he could tell that from her grip, her confident fingers wrapped around his stiffened cock. And her other hand, too. Her boldness startled him, for he had hardly touched her body. He knew with a kind of dread that he was trespassing. He had entered a new country that was strange and dark and sinful and pleasurable, full of shadows and delights, and he was here for good, was possessed, was changed, would never return. Being here with Carol, kissing the lemony taste of her lips, her skinny hands bewitching him, was not a choice — there was no alternative. He loved it and knew he was damned.

She sighed when he touched her, slipping his hand onto her thigh, and fondled the lace of her baby doll, which was like part of her nakedness. She sighed again, and he knew her sigh meant yes. She parted her legs and allowed his hand to rise. Groping there, fumbling in the dark, was for him like uncovering a secret being, another person, a hidden woman, her scalp and cheeks, her lips, her mouth — everything but eyes — and when his fingers traced and hesitated at the tiny mouth of this damp-faced creature, she opened her legs wider.

“Put it inside,” she said, as she kissed him. He slipped one fingertip in, and she said, “More.”

Even unseen he could feel the lip-like folds glisten as his finger dipped into the slick pocket mouth of flesh. Sliding closer to him, crushing her nightgown against him, she kissed him harder, put her tongue into his mouth, showing him how, until he did the same to her.

She was leading him, teaching him. He used his tongue as he stroked her with his hand, in the same motion as she was stroking him. She was rocking, helping his hand, and in this fierce syncopation of desire he could feel her small damp body squirming beneath the satin, like a captive animal, a mewing cat trapped and twisted in silk. The lights from the street made the cloth glow. The bedroom, not so dark now, was fragrant with her perfume and her dolls.