Wicked Wednesday #156 — Roses

Eliza collapsed besides the vase filled with roses in the backseat of the taxi. The gorgeous blooms reeked of sage to her, their natural scent eclipsed by her memory of Marcus’s. Her hand dropped lazily between her thighs. He had told her that she would burn for him, that he would make her want him that much. 

She did.

Eliza wanted him so much it weighed her down. She moved and thought like molasses, at work she was prone to distraction and caressing the parts of herself that she could in an office. Stroking her collarbone was like rubbing her clitoris, she needed to be touched so bad that even that absent stroking eased some of her desire.

At home, she was not sure if Rafe noticed. Something was going on with him–with them. She wondered if he was seeing Severine again, because he was distracted. But she was distracted, so she was as not upset with him about it. Sleeping at night in his arms, he held her tight and she felt safe and loved. But she could feel he had a secret, he did not have to tell her.

Eliza rubbed the inside of her knee, wondering if Rafe could feel her desire. Sitting in the back of the taxi and saturated with lust, she looked out of the window at New York flashing by her. She was infatuated with Marcus and New York at the same time. The city looked different, was lit up with her excitement as she headed to a bar near where Marcus was filming. He had not told her, but she felt that she was not going to really be with him until he was finished filming this season of his show. The taste of her blood was sweet, after she bit her lip thinking to herself when would her cliffhanger cease? When would her need be quenched? 

Her lips were parted, and she licked them as they stopped at a corner. Eliza giggled as she saw a billboard that revealed several layers, one of them was an older ad for Marcus’s show. 

He was everywhere, and not just ads or billboards. She saw him every time she saw a man’s fedora. Fedoras were suddenly ubiquitous in the same vein as bowler hats were for Magritte, or as in The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera. Fedoras triggered her as much as Marcus’s kisses had, made her quiver on the brink of imploding.

She got out of the taxi on shaky legs. When she regained her balance, she realized that she had left her roses in the backseat. Tears came, even though she did not want them to. All she had left of the beautiful roses Marcus gave her, were the ones she had adorned herself with in her hair, in the waist of her skirt and the petals she had stuffed in her bra.

   
Marcus sat at the bar, when she walked over to him he studied her face. There was nothing she could hide from him, and she knew that he knew that she was weak with desire for him. She did not blame him for lingering since she had acted like she did not know what she wanted, when he asked her if she wanted him to seduce her. Now she wanted him so much, she did not need his seduction or roses. Maybe leaving the roses in the taxi was symbolic for her not wanting to wait anymore for him. That she wanted him to take her without finesse. She wanted raw emotion, raw physicality between them.

“You were crying,” he said, caressing her cheekbone with his thumb. “Do you want me that bad?”

She nodded.

“I left the roses in the backseat of the car.”

“They were not that important to you then. Or maybe you wanted them on your body, and not in a vase.”

“I want you.”

He stared at her.

“Why because Sandrine is sleeping with Rafe?

Eliza caressed her collarbone with anxiety.

“What?”

Marcus swallowed, and she salivated with the movement of his Adam’s apple.

“Rafe did not tell you?”

Eliza shook her head, shock chilling her desire.

“No, he can sleep with who he wants to and I would not sleep with you for revenge.”

“So you want me?”

Eliza nodded, the scent of roses on her body like fire ignited her desire again.

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roses photo by f dot leonora