Eat Me (2 page)

‘All right,' he whispered inside her. ‘All right then. I will eat you. I will. You will be my paté, my calamari, my pumpkin risotto, my roast and three veg.' He ate now, ate like a man who was starving. He devoured her with his tongue, his lips, his teeth and his hands. He ate every last trace of fig and strawberry and grape and kiwi, transformed by her love blender into a warm and salty tropical fruit yoghurt.

Ava dropped the whip. Her hand closed on a bunch of bananas as she slid down to the floor. Adam was kneeling between her legs now, still feeding at her goluptious trough. He reached out, grabbed her hands and pinned them to the floor with his own, forcing her to release the bananas. She raised her head and glared at him. Struggled, but to no avail. He was smirking now. At his own, torturously slow pace, he returned his attention to her cunt. Moaning, she came in his mouth, kicking hard with one foot and sending a high-heeled shoe skimming down the aisle in the direction of the breakfast cereals. Still lapping, he released her hands, which lay limp by her side. He fumbled for the bananas and peeled one. She drew in her breath as he pushed it inside her. He scrambled to his feet, and watched out of the corner of his eye as, with welltimed thrusts, she brought herself to orgasm again. She didn't stop until the banana disintegrated into pap.

‘You disgusting bitch,' Adam spat, walking towards the vegetables. He returned with a Lebanese cucumber. She'd stood up and picked up her whip again.

‘What did you say?' Her tone was imperious, if a little shaky. ‘You little piece of rat-trap salami,' she spat huskily.

‘You disgusting bitch,' he repeated, with slightly less conviction, his eyes on her whip hand. ‘I despise you more than tinned minestrone, more than, than…more than angel cake mix, more than sliced cheese.'

‘Take off your trousers, Chiko-face,' she said, fondling the leather.

‘No way, cod-feet.'

‘Take off your trousers, I said, full-fat.'

‘Bitch. Cunt. Soupbones.'

Ava snapped the whip with a sudden movement. The end licked Adam's thigh.

His nostrils flared. He pulled down his trousers, revealing that he wasn't wearing any underwear either. He had a massive erection. Ava gently flicked at it with the whip. She sneered. ‘So curd-cheeks. You've been enjoying this all along.'

Adam refused to meet her gaze.

‘Bend down.'

‘No.'

‘Don't make me angry.'

He scowled as he bent down, arse to her, balancing with his hands against the shelf with the fruit.

‘Give me that cucumber.'

Turning his head, he watched as Ava lubricated it in her vagina. Slowly, she insinuated it up his arse. He groaned and twisted with pain and pleasure.

Suddenly, there was a silence. Someone had turned off the muzak. Ava and Adam froze as, with a slight electronic crackle and a clearing of throat, Sarah's voice came over the p.a. system. ‘Attention, shoppers. The store is about to close. Please make your final selections and pay for them at the counter. Thank you for your cooperation. Please shop with us again.'

Ava removed the cucumber from Adam's anus and tossed it back over into the vegetable section. It landed right next to all the other cucumbers.

‘Good toss, cupcake.'

‘Thanks.' They laughed, a little harshly, and quickly straightened their clothing. Ava retrieved her shoe, folded up her whip and put it back in her purse. ‘I'd better buy something,' she whispered, thinking randomly of coconut milk and small packets of tarragon.

‘See you next week, honey pot?' asked Adam. ‘Usual time, usual place?'

‘You bet, sweet pea.'

‘Bye for now.'

‘Bye.' Adam watched as Ava sauntered down the aisle to the cashier. Sarah looked up at her, wondering how one of Ava's stockings had fallen to her ankle. Hadn't she noticed?

‘Good book?' Ava asked Sarah as she handed over her purchases.

‘Yes, very,' sighed Sarah, her eyes on Ava's bare thigh. ‘I love romances. Do you?'

‘Of course,' Ava answered, winking. ‘Have them all the time.'

VEAL

‘Delicious,'
purred Chantal, narrowing her dramatic green eyes and running her tongue suggestively over beesting lips. A man striding past their cafe table came to such a sudden halt at the sight that he nearly fell over his own feet. Even in the smorgasbord of Darlinghurst, Chantal stood out like a designer entree: elegant, colour coordinated, piquant. She looked every inch the fashion editor she was. If she noticed the man, she gave no sign, and he quickly moved on in embarrassment.

To Chantal's left sat Julia, her small pointed chin balanced on folded hands. Her dark eyes were closed and a dreamy smile curved her soft mouth. Her warm olive skin glowed in the sunlight and her long raven hair cascaded in a frozen flow down her back. So still was she sitting that not a single item of her abundant silver jewellery jangled.

To Chantal's right perched Helen, a wholegrain loaf of a woman in beige and brown, seeded with freckles. Behind tortoise-shell spectacles, her eyes were a dark mustard. Helen glanced down at the manuscript, the pages of which lay scattered on the table in front of them. She shook her head appreciatively. ‘Chantal's right, Phippa,' she enthused to the fourth member of their little group, who was seated opposite Chantal. ‘Delicious is the word.'

‘Yeah, they're, uh, supposed to be pretty good for you too,' Philippa replied, deadpan, holding up half an apple-and-walnut muffin and pretending to study it. ‘No sugar, no animal fats, no artificial ingredients.'

‘No shit, Phippa,' Helen cut in, rolling her eyes. ‘We're not talking about the muffins. We're talking about your story. And you know it. It was wonderful finally hearing you read some of your work to us.'

‘Did you really like it?' Philippa grinned shyly, looking down, sweeping the pages into a pile. She shook them out for crumbs, and then fed them into the mouth of her cavernous shoulder bag, which she replaced on the back of the chair.

The four were having breakfast at Cafe Da Vida on Victoria Street, their favourite hangout. It was a gorgeous Sydney spring morning, all the more perfect for being a late Saturday morning at that. The native fauna of Darlinghurst, dressed to thrill, were sloping through the urban jungle towards their favourite coffee holes. Actors, artists, sex workers, junkies, nurses, actors who were also junkies, artists who were also sex workers, sex workers who pretended to be nurses, gays, straights, bis, straight-acting gays, gay-acting straights, immigrants with Hungarian accents, young English and German and French backpackers. In pairs and packs they came. There were loners, too. Though some carried just the big black bags underneath their eyes, others toted much-thumbed journals, the weekend papers, or slim books by fashionable authors.

Philippa wanted, more than anything else, to be one of those fashionable authors. There were two things about the publishing industry that she knew favoured her chances. One, sex sells; two, she'd look great in the photograph on the dust jacket. In real life, she was afflicted by a kind of physical awkwardness born of shyness about her tall, big-boned frame. But in photographs she looked a sultry vamp, the quintessential femme fatale. She had thick black hair, which fell to her shoulders, grey eyes and creamy skin. She tended towards black turtlenecks worn with dark jeans. She secured the jeans with wide black belts and anchored them with heavy black boots. It was a look that drew inviting glances from dykes in the leather scene as well as a certain kind of neurotic male artist. Glances she returned. But rarely—so far as her friends could tell, anyway—did anything about. Philippa appeared to be single-mindedly devoted to her writing. She worked part-time as a journalist in a government department and full-time on her erotic fiction. I am, she would declare, mistress of the v-words: vicariousness and voyeurism. I have, she would insist, an excellent and satisfying sex life, but it's in my head, not my bed.

‘Helen.' Philippa suddenly looked anxious. ‘You're up on these things. What's the latest line on pornography among feminists? I'm a bit worried. Think they'll take a dim view of the story?'

‘Oh, look, it's not that clear, really,' Helen answered. ‘Some feminists still maintain that all pornography is representational violence against women. But I think that kind of line can hardly apply to women's erotica. Particularly when it involves a woman stuffing a Lebanese cucumber up a man's arse. No, I thought the story was fabulous,' she affirmed. ‘Really. I found it, uh'—she raised her eyes to heaven and paused, as though interrogating God as to how She would have put it—‘both erotic and empowering.' Helen liked words like ‘empowering'. She was a feminist academic and film critic, and terms like that came with the turf. She paused, primly smoothing her longish skirt over her knees, and added, ‘I think you could've done more with the whip, though.'

Chantal pursed her lips and lashed at the pavement with an imaginary whip, startling a rollerblader. An older European at the next table stared, utterly rapt, over the rim of his espresso.

Philippa nudged Helen, and pointed at Julia with her chin. Chantal looked over at her too. ‘Wonder what she's thinking about?' Philippa mouthed to the others.

Sex. That was what she was thinking about.

Julia had recently had one heaven of a night. As much as she'd tried to concentrate on Philippa's story, her own steamy little narrative insisted on replaying itself in her head and she was having trouble finding the off button. She was up to the scene where she was watching Jake spoon up the final morsels of beef chilli khadi with the last of the naan. She smiled to herself. She was glad she'd taken a punt and called him.

Jake was on the dole, a struggling musician with a clapped-out car that was about to be repossessed and a troublesome band so beset with internal strife that he referred to it as ‘Bosnia'. He lived in a grungy share-house in New-town and called his dreadlocks his only accomplishment in life. Julia had met him at a party she and Philippa had attended last weekend in Glebe.

At the party, she and Jake had danced. Afterwards, he'd gone into the kitchen to fetch some beer. He'd pressed the cool can against her neck before handing it to her, and suggested they find somewhere to talk. Snuggling into a sofa in one of the less populated rooms, they'd asked each other most of the usual questions and a few unusual ones as well. He told her about his band, she told him about her photography. She mentioned her fascination for China, he said he'd once thought of learning Mandarin. Their legs just touched. His seemed to go on forever under his grey Levi 501s; he was improbably long-limbed. Jake had smooth, honey-coloured skin, warm brown eyes, a small neat nose, a wide mouth, and a dry, laconic wit. He seemed sincere when he said he'd like to see her photography. When Julia had laughed loudly at something and rocked forward in her mirth, causing her long black hair to cascade in front of her face, Jake had reached out and flipped it back over her shoulder in a surprisingly intimate gesture. He sent her Latin blood racing.

In the style of his generation, which, depending on how you counted, was one or two behind hers, he was so laid back that she wasn't sure what his intentions were, or if he had any intentions at all. When an old acquaintance of hers approached with an endless list of have-you-seen-so-and-so-latelys, Jake excused himself and slipped off into another room. Julia hid her disappointment but felt consoled by the fact that—at her instigation—they'd already exchanged phone numbers. She caught sight of him later, but he was deep in a conversational scrum in the kitchen.

Eventually Philippa approached to ask if Julia wanted to share a taxi home. Philippa lived in the Cross; she could drop Julia off at her warehouse in Surry Hills on the way. In the cab, they talked about the party. Julia neglected to mention her meeting with Jake. It wasn't that she didn't want Philippa to know. But she was superstitious about such things and believed that telling tales too early on might put a jinx on the whole enterprise.

Anyway, there they were, five days later, in a discreet Indian restaurant on a side street in Glebe. After a brief stocktake of the dishes to check that nothing edible remained, Jake suppressed a burp and extended his hand across the table to cover hers. She let her middle finger curl lightly into his palm.

‘Glad you're not a vegetarian, Julia,' he said after a silence.

‘Why's that?' Julia asked.

‘Oh, I dunno. It's not really vegetarians I'm afraid of so much as vegans. But maybe I shouldn't tell you. Not now, anyway.'

‘But you've got me all curious.'

‘Later.'

Oh well. She liked the sound of that word, ‘later'. ‘Promise?'

‘Promise.'

She looked down at his hand now. She often marvelled at hands—all nerve endings and capillaries, sensation and blood. And those of younger men could be so beautiful, so tender and supple. With her fingertip, she explored and tickled. He shivered, almost imperceptibly, and leaned forward. She kissed him over the table and, under the table, caressed his leg with her foot. After a minute, he whispered, a little hoarsely, ‘I have a raging erection.' She smiled and caught the attention of a passing waiter. ‘Could I've the bill please?' she said.

Chantal smirked. ‘Lights are on. Anyone at home? Oh, Joo-li-ya!' She sang out Julia's name, syllable by syllable, re-re-do.

Julia's eyelids flew open and panic shone briefly in her eyes.

‘Well,' asked Philippa after a significant pause, ‘Did you like my story?' Suddenly self-conscious, she mumbled, ‘Of course, you don't have to, you know, say you did if you didn't.'

Julia caught a quick shuttle back to Planet Earth. She blinked. ‘Uh, yes, of course I did,' she stuttered. ‘Put it this way,' she continued, slowly, recovering her poise. ‘I've got the cream. All I need now is another cup of coffee. It was orgasmic.'