Arthur Hailey - Overload

Should he? the ethical issues seemed a nightmare tangle of unanswered questions, a moral labyrinth.

He had unbuttoned Karen's blouse. Now be raised her shoulders while he eased it from her arms. She wore no brassiere. Her small breasts were superbly shaped, the tiny nipples slightly raised.

"Touch me, Nimrod." It was a soft command. Responding, be moved his hands lightly over her breasts, his fingertips caressing, then knelt and kissed them. At once he felt her nipples harden. Karen murmured, "Oh, that's wonderful!"

A moment later she told him, “The skirt unfastens on the left side."

Still gentle, he unbuttoned and removed it.

When Karen was naked, doubts and anxiety still plagued him. But be moved his bands, slowly and with skillful sensuality, as he knew by now she wanted. Soft murmurings made her pleasure clear. After a while she whispered, "I want to tell you something."

He whispered back, "I'm listening."

"I'm not a virgin. There was a boy it happened when I was fifteen, just before I . . ." She stopped, and he saw that tears were rolling down her cheeks."

"Karen, don't!"

She shook her bead. "I want to tell you. Because I want you to know there hasn't been anyone else in all those years; no one, between then -and you."

He waited, letting the purport of what she had said sink in before be asked, "Are you telling me . . . ?"

"I want you, Nimrod. All the way. Now!"

"Oh Christ!" Nim breathed the words, aware that his own desires never difficult to unleash-were making themselves known in urgent terms. Then he threw the complex equations overboard and started taking off his clothes.

Nim had wondered, like others he supposed, bow it would be for an unimpaired man to make sexual love to a quadriplegic woman. Would someone like Karen be totally passive? Would the man make all the effort, obtaining no response? And in the end would there be pleasure for one, or both, or neither?

He was discovering the answers, and all were unexpected.

Karen was demanding, responsive, exciting, satisfying.

Yes, in one sense she was passive. Her body, other than her head was unable to move. Yet Nim could feel the effect of their lovemaking transmitting itself through her skin, vagina, breasts, and most of all her passionate cries and kisses. It was not, he thought in a flash of whimsy, at all like having sex with a mannequin, as some might suppose. Nor was the pleasure brief. It was prolonged, as if neither wanted it to end. He had a sense, over and over, of glorious eroticism, of floating and soaring, of joy and loving, until at last, as always, the ending came: Attainment of a summit; climax of a symphony; the zenith of a dream. And for them both.

Could a quadriplegic woman have an orgasm? Emphatically, yes!

And afterward . . . once more . . . a return to tenderness and kindly loving.

Nim lay still, carefully considerate of Karen, blissful, spent. He wondered what she was thinking and if, in the aftermath, she had regrets.

As if telepathy had delivered both questions, Karen stirred. She said drowsily but happily, "Nimrod, a mighty hunter of the Lord." then: "This day has been the best in all my life."

Cynthia said, "I had a hard day and I could use a drink. There's usually scotch around here. How about Von? "

Nim told her, "Count me in.” It was an hour since he had made love to Karen, who was now sleeping. He felt the need for a drink too.

Karen's older sister had come to the apartment twenty minutes ago, using her own key. Nim had finished dressing sometime earlier.

She had introduced herself as Cynthia Woolworth. "Before you ask the question, no, my husband-unfortunately-is not connected with that wealthy family. I used to spend half my life answering that; now I get it out of the way at the beginning. Sloan was simpler."

"Thank you," he said. "I'll never mention it again."

Cynthia, he observed, was different from Karen, but also similar. Where Karen was blonde and slim, Cynthia was brunette, her figure full, though not excessively. Clearly, too, Cynthia's personality was more forceful and outgoing, though perhaps, Nim thought, the misfortune which life had dealt Karen early, and their differences in life styles since, could account for that. What both had in common was a rare natural beauty-the same delicate symmetry of features, full lips, wide blue eyes, a flawless skin and-more developed in Cynthia-elegant, slim bands. It occurred to Nim that both Sloan girls had inherited their charms from their mother, Henrietta, in whom traces of an earlier loveliness still lingered. Nim remembered that Cynthia was three years older than Karen, which made her forty-two, although she appeared younger.

Cynthia located the scotch, then ice and soda, and mixed two drinks efficiently. The quick economy of her movements showed she was used to managing for herself. She had demonstrated that from the time she arrived at the apartment, shook out her dripping raincoat and hung it in the bathroom, then following mutual introductions, instructed Nim, "All right, you sit down and relax-here, I brought the evening paper and I'll do what's needed for my sister."

She had walked into Karen's bedroom, closing the door so that Nim could hear a murmur of voices, but no more. When Cynthia came out fifteen minutes later, moving quietly, she announced that Karen was asleep.

Now, seated facing Nim, Cynthia swirled the liquor and ice in her glass and informed him, "I know what happened here tonight. Karen told me."

Startled by the directness, all he could think of in response was, "I see."

Cynthia threw back her head and laughed. She pointed an accusing finger.

"You're scared You're wondering if I'll be the avenging elder sister.

Or if I'll call the cops maybe, and holler 'rape!"'

He said stiffly, "I'm not sure I want, or need to discuss with you

"Oh, come on!" Cynthia had continued to laugh; now suddenly she stopped.

Her face became serious. "Look, Nimrod-if I can call you that-I'm sorry if I embarrassed you, and I can see I did. So now let me tell you something. Karen thinks you're a kind, sweet, gentle, loving man, and the best thing that's ever happened to her. And if you're interested in an outside opinion, I feel the same way."

Nim stared at her. As he did, he realized that for the second time tonight he was seeing a woman cry.

"Damn! I didn't mean to do that." With a tiny handkerchief Cynthia wiped her tears away. "But I guess I'm as happy and satisfied as Karen is herself." She regarded Nim in frank approval. "Well, almost."

Nim's tension of a moment earlier dissolved. Grinning, he acknowledged,

"I can only say one thing. I'll be damned!"

"I can say more than that, and will," Cynthia said. "How about another drink first?"

Without waiting for an answer she scooped up Nim's glass and replenished it, along with her own. Returning to her seat, she sipped the scotch before continuing, carefully choosing her words.

"For your sake, Nimrod, as much as Karen's, I want you to realize something. What happened between you and my sister tonight was wonderful and beautiful. You may not know this, or understand it, but some people treat quadriplegics the way they would a leper. I've seen it happen sometimes; Karen sees it more. That's why, in my book, you come out as Mr. Nice Guy. You've never thought of her, or treated her, as anything but a woman Ob, for God's sake! . . . Here I am crying again."

Cynthia's handkerchief was clearly inadequate. Nim handed her his own and she glanced at him gratefully. "It's the little things you do . . . Karen told me that . . ."

He said humbly, "It all started, you know-my coming to see Karen-accidentally."

"Most things do."

"And what went on between us tonight . . . well, I didn't plan it. I didn't even think . . ." Nim stopped. "It simply happened."