Winner of Third Place in Satin Slippers (USA) inaugural short story contest, 2002

Fine Art

by Barbara Welton

"Obscure", the auctioneer called it. "Unknown artist." "Of unclear origin." "Of no School known to art experts." "Crudely rendered and in need of reframing."

'Oh, yuck!' Sondra grimaced as the auctioneer's assistants placed the large painting on the easel beside the podium. She squinted down into the catalogue and looked up again at the artwork, trying to work out why such a revered art collector as the late, great Dame Markberry would have retained this sorry picture amongst her treasure trove of fine art. The catalogue gave its title as "The Lover", noting that this name appeared on the tiny copper plaque on the bottom edging of the old frame. 'It's horrible!' she continued, turning to face her companion. 'Bette? Don't you think it's horrible? Just look at that thing!'

Bette looked up sedately from studying her catalogue and let her intense green eyes focus on the derided work for the first time. It was a portrait of a young man of the 1920s, standing in front of an art deco leadlight window, holding what appeared to be a love letter, the feminine name Marguerite the only legible word on the painted missive. He had dark, wavy hair and a pallid complexion, a black jacket with silk lapels, crisp white shirt and black silk tie. His mouth had a slight pout, his lips were quite a luscious red, and his nose was unremarkable. One large, slender-fingered hand was posed on his right thigh, suggesting he was trying to draw attention to his pelvis, like a wannabe cowboy hooking his thumbs into his belt. His black eyebrows were finely arched and meticulous - perhaps a little too meticulous, causing several whispered comments of "fop" and "pansy" around the room. The eyes beneath these brows were blue as a peacock's breast, giggling cheekily out at Bette from beneath the paint and decades of time.

True, the painting was below the respected Dame Markberry's usual standard. The rendering and execution were indeed crude and of no discernable style or "School". It smacked of having been painted by a hopeful novice, one whose dreams of being an artist would have been cruelly dashed by the realisation they lacked any real talent. But, the catalogue declared, Dame Markberry had kept this painting in her personal bedroom suite for more than seventy years. No other artwork had ever passed the door of her boudoir - not the Turners or the Dobells, never the Matisses nor the Warhols, not even the Renoirs or the tiny, intricate sketches by Leonardo himself. Only this painting, this rather obnoxious young man with his foppish air and obvious love of his own sexual prowess, had ever looked down on the esteemed Dame as she slept, watched her as she dressed, idly observed her with her notorious string of society lovers.

The auctioneer was doing his best to rouse interest in the picture. The morning's long-anticipated auction of the Markberry collection (or at least, those pieces the Dame hadn't bequeathed to the National Gallery) had been going so well until now. Slowly, and with a great battle, he managed to get the bids up around the 500 dollar mark. God, he hated this painting.

Bette straightened her wire framed glasses, pushed her long, dark red hair back off her shoulders and looked directly into the twinkling eyes of the young man in the portrait. A burning, fiery sensation erupted between her thighs, causing her to clench her inner muscles in reflex and flush from the neck upwards. Beneath her faux Chanel jacket, she felt her nipples become taut and hypersensitive, grazing against her clothing maddeningly. She could sense herself becoming wet and aroused, making her cross her legs in agitation.

'Five hundred and seventy-five dollars going once!'

Bette was shaken by the sudden booming of the auctioneer. Without thinking, she shot her hand into the air and heard herself shout.

'Seven hundred dollars!'

Every head in the hall turned to peer at her. The auctioneer barely kept his jaw from dropping.

'Are you mad?!' hissed Sondra beside her.

* * *

'You are mad.' Sondra stood in Bette's bedroom with her arms crossed haughtily across her palatial chest. 'I still can't believe you bought this piece of crap.'

Bette ignored her friend as she busied herself with plaster hooks and hammer, balancing atop a ladder opposite her kingsized bed.

'Just because some senile old cow kept this thing for sixty years doesn't mean you have to follow suit, y’know. You're not even thirty, Bette, I don't think you're a candidate for dementia just yet.'

'Seventy,' grunted Bette as she whacked the hooks into the wall, 'Dame Markberry kept this portrait in her bedroom for over seventy years. Surely there must have been something remarkable about it for an art connoisseur like her to choose it over everything else in her collection.'

'Yeah, well, maybe she painted it herself. Ever consider that? It'd make sense, really. Those who know about art and are talented at it become artists. Those who know about art but can't do it themselves become collectors. She was probably hiding it in her bedroom, not treasuring it!'

'That’s one theory, yes.' Bette climbed down from the ladder, short skirt pushed high up her thighs to allow safer movement. 'Though it's a theory with a bit of a hole in it when you ask yourself why she would've written her own Christian name on the love letter.' She pointed to the name "Marguerite" on the sheet of paper the young man held. ‘Can you give me a hand, please?'

Sondra brought herself to touch the painting long enough to help her friend get it onto the wall. 'But maybe her name there is her artist's signature,' Sondra pondered. 'Whoever it was who painted this thing didn't put their name to it anywhere else, afterall. One could presume, then, that the name that appears is the signature name. Anyway,' she shuddered, 'The whole thing gives me the creeps. Never did like portraits with eyes that follow you around the room.'

'Oh, that's one of the things I like about it!' Bette smiled wide and playful.

'But in your bedroom?! Yeww! It'll watch you getting undressed! It'll watch you rolling around your bed with that vibrator I bought you for your birthday! You do use that vibrator I bought you, don't you? Haven't just shoved it in a drawer somewhere to gather dust?'

'Yes, Sondra, I use your thoughtful present. Now, shoo!'

'You know, you really should get yourself a boyfriend. I think you're going weird...'

* * *

'I guess you heard that exchange today, eh?' Bette was talking absentmindedly to the portrait as she prepared for bed. 'My best friend thinks I'm weird because I like you.' She took her bathrobe off and stood naked in front of her dresser for a moment while searching for a fresh nightgown. The room was bathed in soft yellow light from the bedside lamp, causing Bette's reflection in the dresser mirror to appear as if in sepia. Her full breasts swung gently as she delved into the wooden drawers, her slender fingers scooping repeatedly into handful after handful of soft, floaty fabric. Eventually settling on a lovely mauve night dress, she lifted it over her head, letting the garment’s soft folds fall over her shapely curves. Shaking her long red hair loose and looking down to close the drawer, she noticed the vibrator Sondra had been talking about earlier lying there, forgotten and half-obscured under the pile of gossamer gowns. She'd actually lied to her friend this afternoon, when she'd told Sondra she used the cheeky gift. In the months since it had been presented to her it had languished in the middle drawer of her dresser, Bette feeling too self-conscious to do anything other than occasionally hold it gingerly and then return it to its lonely slumber.

'Well, I had to lie about it,' she said to the painting, glancing up at him as she sought to justify her fib. 'I couldn't very well tell her I've never used it. That would sound so ungracious.' She turned her head more and looked fully into his eyes. The peacock blue of his pupils shone brightly, even in the weak light and, just as it had happened in the auctioneer's hall, Bette was suddenly overcome with an intense sensation of arousal. Her breasts appeared to swell noticeably under the transparent gauze she wore. Her thighs shivered. She was certain she could actually feel the blood surge that engorged her.

Decisively, she took the vibrator and sat down on the foot of her kingsized bed. She looked up again at the portrait and felt her own hand creep up to her right breast, kneading her own flesh, pinching harshly at the growing bud that grazed against the flimsy material. His eyes smirked down at her cheekily.

She moved back onto the bed more, grabbing two pillows to support her head, and let herself fall back into an almost-supine position. Bringing her feet up onto the edge of the bed, she rested there a moment, her head propped up enough to allow her to continue staring into his eyes, her gown falling back to her waist from her raised and spread knees to give the painting a stunning view of her wetness and engorgement.

'So, this is why the great Dame loved you so,' she whispered up at him, positioning the vibrator between her thighs and running its head slickly back and forth between swollen lips. 'No wonder I never saw a picture of her without a smile on her face.'

A low humming sound broke the stillness of the room as Bette turned the switch at the base of the implement, and the entire inanimate shaft jerked to life in her hand. The head shivered against her flesh, sending a thousand tiny trembles racing along her nerve-endings and bubbling through her blood. She smiled cautiously. Hm. It really didn't feel bad at all.

The blue eyes of the portrait followed her actions as she moved the buzzing toy down slightly, pressing the vibrating head tenderly into her moist opening. Her body was so aroused that it swallowed inch after inch of the vibrator hungrily, with barely any pressure from her hand. The toy filled her and inflamed her, the sensation making her feel all the more greedy and free.

The night gown annoyed her suddenly and she wanted to be relieved of it. She let go of the phallus that plugged her and ran her hands back up her body, along the hard, gentle camber of her waist and over the swollen mounds of her breasts. Her gaze never left that of the man in the painting as she gathered up huge handfuls of gossamer silk at her shoulder and chest. Imagining her hands were those that appeared in the portrait, she tore the garment as hard as she could, rending the fabric into shreds. Her huge, aching nipples poked through the silk lacerations to greet the night air.

'Did you used to do this to her, too?' she whispered up at him. 'Did you make her perform for you? Did she please herself like this and imagine her hands were yours, that you were on top of her, that the thing moving inside her was you? Just like I'm doing now?

'I wonder who you really were. What sort of lover you were. What your body looked like and felt like under that dinner jacket. How strong your hands were when you were holding someone to you. What did your voice sound like? What did you taste like? What did your hair smell like? How many times could you make love in one night? I bet you had a voracious hunger. I bet you attended Bohemian orgies. I bet you gave yourself to men as well as women. I bet you loved having your cock sucked. I can imagine you in the midst of a great tangle of limbs, welcoming hands and mouths and breasts and cocks from all directions, all at once. Am I right?'

She worked the rubber phallus in and out of herself rhythmically as she spoke to him, working herself up to the verge of orgasm but not quite getting there. She tried turning over onto all fours, always having liked this position when she was making love to someone, but as soon as her head was turned away from the painting and she could no longer see those stunning eyes, she began to feel silly and self-conscious. Eventually, she sighed and gave up, discarding the now thoroughly warmed toy and crawled into bed naked. Gazing up at her new possession with utter longing, she sighed, turned the lamp out and snuggled down among the covers.

She dreamt a jumble of images and sensations gleaned mainly from Hollywood; no stories or linear narratives, just a mishmash of Roaring fun. People in sumptuous clothes danced the Charlston on table tops while black musicians in tuxedoes smoked marijuana cigarettes, and Flapper girls with rolled stockings and feathered head-dresses puffed on mighty Cuban cigars. A chorus of Ziegfried Follies can-canned by as a Bohemian mock-funeral for Rudi Valentino degenerated into a tangle of bare limbs, strings of jet beads and plumes of opium smoke. Louise Brooks kissed Theda Bara full on the lips then laughed gaily and exited on the arm of Marlene Dietrich. Gangsters with violin cases sprayed a roomful of people with illegally distilled liquor instead of machine gun fire. Bette touched her head and realised her long hair had been cropped into a tight, helmet-like bob. The young man from the painting took her hand and fox-trotted her across a mosaic floor as the bulb of a photographer's flash illuminated her dreamscape. She could see flecks of stray paint on his silk lapels, and his fingernails were dirty with dried bright colours. "So, you're the artist?" Bette's dream-self had an American West Coast accent. "I'm The Lover," the young man purred back at her.

Bette awoke drowsily next morning, wrapped around a satin pillow in foetal fashion. Still half asleep, she hadn't yet formed memories of her lonesome abandon of the night before, or of her Hollywood cliché-ridden dreams. She was so drowsy that, for several seconds, she didn't even register the feeling of a man curled behind her in the bed. Sensing she was waking, a large hand moved to her breasts and caressed them steadily, with just enough force to be exciting. Involuntarily, she moaned softly and pushed her bottom back against the hardness she could feel behind her. Fingers now moved from her nipples up to her mouth and two digits entered her there, exploring her tongue and teeth. She closed her lips around them and sucked greedily, discerning a vague taste of turpentine on the skin. The fingers were suddenly removed with a popping sound that seemed inordinately loud in the morning hush of the room, and both the man's hands now travelled over her body, cupping her breasts, stroking her hair, pushing apart her thighs, kneading her buttocks. A mouth opened on the back of her neck, awakening every fibre of sensation in her skin, from the crown of her head down to the tips of her pointing, flexing toes. She shifted her weight slightly and opened her legs invitingly, flinging one leg backwards over the legs of the man behind her. His legs felt strong and muscular but slim, a young man's legs.

He moved his pelvis closer to her buttocks and she felt the first touch of his penis to her lips. She wanted to reach down and guide him, but elected to allow him to find his own way into her which she had no doubt he would do, and do soon. But he took his time instead. Languidly, he moved himself slowly back and forth along her lustrous valley, the domed head of his cock becoming quickly slick with her anticipation. The motion teased her perfectly, her nipples and her clitoris tightening all at once, the three petite erections seemingly connected by an intangible force. His long fingers splayed over her hips, fingertips pressing over the indentations of her pelvic bone, and with one fluid gesture he was suddenly inside her, moving immediately, thrusting himself high up into her body. She tensed and twisted her body - pelvis back, breasts out, head back, legs anchoring her weight. She stretched one arm out behind her and grabbed the back of his hard thighs, helping to pull his body into hers with every plunge.

For several minutes they were locked together, moving together as one, his cock full and satisfying within her, one hand ever on her hip as he moved in and out of her body with increasing ferocity. He applied his full weight against her back then, causing her to fall onto her front solidly and he followed her over, helping to man-handle her into her favourite position, pushing her knees up under her body until she was crouched on all fours. His movements became ever more frenzied now, his strength and his power matched only by the reserves of her own which she dredged up from the depths of her being as she rode the waves of wantonness with him. The large hands were secure over her hips, shoving her away then hauling her back repeatedly.

Bette could feel her body edging its way perilously close to the precipice of orgasm; a violent, shuddering impetuosity threatening to engulf her. But, just as she was about to open herself up to it and welcome it, the man behind her abruptly removed himself from inside her.

'No!', her cry was hoarse with exasperation.

'Shh...' She heard his voice for the first time as he soothed her heated anger.

There was movement, and then his face pushed into her sopping pussy from behind. Her back arched appreciatively as his mouth opened on her, as his tongue thrust into her hunger. Boldly, and feeling deliciously free of even the slightest notion of self-consciousness, Bette pushed herself thankfully back against his face, grinding herself against his mouth, chin and nose. The appreciative grunts and moans he made encouraged her and she responded. Her eyes were screwed shut as she imagined what they must look like - she on her hands and knees, he tongue fucking her from behind, his cock still rock hard and glistening with her juices, desperate to be back inside her once more. The orgasm that wracked her body soaked his face completely as he rode out the violence with her, his mouth sucking at her ferociously.

He didn't give her any time to recover. There was no denouement allowed just yet. He knelt up behind her once more and re-entered her roughly, his strong arms encircling her sweat-dampened body to stop her from collapsing, exhausted, onto her front. He repositioned his legs to outside of hers, so that he could squeeze her legs together. This action not only thrust her engorged lips outwards toward him, but also further tightened the cunt he was fucking so expertly. He was a practiced lover - there was no doubt of that.

"I'm The Lover." The words from her dream presented themselves in her mind again as she heard the man behind her groan gutturally. He kept thrusting, even as he was coming, as though he were travelling too fast for the brakes to work just yet.

Exhausted and spent, Bette and her lover sank forward onto the bed, limbs still tangled around one another, breathing harsh and feline. She was barely conscious of his tired penis slipping gently from her before she found herself drifting off again into deep, deep, restful sleep.

The late morning sunshine was merging into a sunny weekend afternoon when Bette re-awoke. The shrill of the telephone had disturbed her, but the answering machine had already engaged, so she luxuriated amongst her soft sheets and pillows for a few lazy moments. Sondra's disembodied voice floated through the house as she left her message on the machine's tiny tape.

'If you can bear to drag yourself away from that monstrosity you call an artwork for five minutes, how'd you fancy meeting me for coffee at the Luxor later today?' Sondra chirped. 'I'm going shopping but I've got the mobile on, so give me a call... Bye!'

Bette smiled as she uncurled herself from the bed and slipped into her bathrobe. Afternoon coffee with Sondra would be a perfect way to finish off an already frightfully enjoyable day, before deciding how best to spend the evening and beyond. She stopped in front of the portrait, her bare toes scrunching languorously at the pure wool carpet, and grinned up at The Lover.

'Did you hear that?' she asked him. 'My best friend just called you a monstrosity. Can you believe that?'

She stared happily into his perfect blue eyes for a moment then granted herself an indulgent scan of the entire work, taking in every detail of him. She studied the soft wave of his dark hair, the shine of his silk lapels, the red of his luscious lips, the sensuousness of his long, pale fingers.

Something about the love letter he held seemed different, however, and she couldn't quite put her finger on what it was. She fumbled on her dresser top for a moment to find her glasses and, balancing them on her nose, stepped in closer to the portrait for a better look.

Among the illegible amorous words of the painted letter, only one word remained readable, the name of the lucky woman he had addressed it to. Bette cursed softly under her breath, blinked, and read the name again. Her eyes darted up to his and the two souls smiled at each other through the decades of time.

The letter was now addressed to "Bette".

the end.