llust zero

There was something about that moment, when the taxi wallowed away from the kerb leaving Rachel standing alone, that would stay with her. The sun was setting behind hills glimpsed at the end of the street, and while the air would be warm all night, Rachel felt a shiver — as though she stood on a precipice.

She let the feeling explore her for a moment longer. How incongruous it was, to be standing here outside the house of a stranger, thousands of miles from her own home in the wolds of middle England. A laughing conversation at the end of a long flight, a moment of shared understanding, a finding of a kindred spirit: perhaps these were strange reasons for a half-hour taxi ride at dusk into the hills north of Los Angeles.

But no. She smiled. As she had told herself several times tonight, she was living up to her own standards of impulsiveness, for once. Besides, Susan was older than her, well spoken, educated: nothing about her had prompted the slightest misgiving about visiting her home. Besides, Rachel had nothing else to do. She had deliberately not planned her week off, not even decided where she was going, until the vagaries of airline cabin crew scheduling had placed her on a long-haul route to the West coast of the USA a few days ago.

So she took a breath and strode up the short drive of the low, tidy house. Its dark roof overhung a shallow porch, and stepping up onto the wooden decking she came to the screen door. Nervously, she swapped her beret to her left hand and leaned back to scan the door frame for a bell push.

With a jolt she realised that the door behind the mesh was already swinging open, a robed silhouette reaching for the outer latch. ‘Hi,’ said a voice cheerily, as Rachel took a stumbling step out of the way of the outward-opening screen.

‘Sorry,’ she mumbled. Then, pulling herself together: ‘Hello Susan.’

Susan smiled at her genially, then backed inside. ‘Come in. Want a smoothie? I’ve just made some up.’

‘Please,’ said Rachel automatically. She tucked herself inside the door, jumping slightly as the screen banged to behind her. It was odd for Susan to receive her in a bathrobe. She shrugged a little. This was almost the other side of the world, after all.

Susan’s house was elegantly sparse, with only a few scattered oddments to give it the look of a home. White furniture, wood floor, bright white spotlights. Her eyes were drawn to Susan’s feet as she padded away to the open-plan kitchen: athletic feet, she decided, then frowned to herself. No judging. ‘Don’t tolerate, just be,’ the Qi master had said.

Actually, she had nice feet too.

‘Have a seat,’ Susan called, busying herself. Rachel glanced around and settled on one side of a hessian sofa, before returning her eyes to her host. Susan’s dark, wavy hair was slipping over her shoulder to fall beside her strikingly handsome face as she poured: she tossed her head to return it, caught Rachel’s eye and smiled. Rachel glanced away on reflex, her mind’s eye dwelling on the glimpse of Susan’s outstretched neck.

Am I blushing? Oh god, thought Rachel. Not already. Can’t I find a new friend in a far-away place without getting caught being weird?

Their short conversation on the flight had ostensibly been triggered by Rachel’s many rings, the only remaining evidence of a brief Goth period in her youth. Her hair was now its natural blonde, her weight on the softer side of slim, her make-up uniform-friendly; but some silver and obsidian, and one tiny death’s head among her fingers had (mostly) been overlooked by the airline. None of it, she had confirmed, represented a bond to another human being. However she had not admitted to the impossibility of this, in the face of a total record of — no lovers at all.

But Rachel was sure Susan’s interest in the rings was a pretext for saying hello; their eyes had met several times already during the flight, and not just when Rachel was serving drinks. She had been fascinated by Susan’s tall, graceful frame, and the delicate laughter lines at the corners of her eyes. It wasn’t the first time a passenger had been the subject of her interest, but no-one had deliberately returned it before. And though embarrassed at being caught out, she was delighted to find Susan so genuinely affable and interested.

Susan was passing her a glass, three-quarters full of a faintly luminous green cocktail topped with brownish foam. ‘All natural,’ she said, ‘and all super-food. Pure energy.’

Rachel made what she hoped was an appreciative noise and lifted the glass to her lips, grateful for the extended chance to come up with something to say. Susan remained standing, taking a gulp and then lowering her glass onto the coffee table.

She then pulled apart the loose knot in her bathrobe’s cord, and let it fall open.

Rachel froze. Her first self-conscious sip was still in her mouth, the glass still at her lips, both forgotten. Somewhere in her mind, pieces fell into place. The returned interest. The warmth. The invitation. But overwhelming everything else was the sudden shocking awareness of beauty. Beauty so close at hand, so wondrously real.

Now Susan’s long elegant neck revealed its roots in her upper chest. Her skin showed the intricate interplay of tendon, muscle and bone; like draped, subtly textured silk over collarbone and sternum. To either side her breasts rose to still-hidden peaks, their lower slopes returning at right-angles onto her ribs, so smooth. Beneath, her abdomen showed harsher but oh so fascinating ridges of muscle, and then — Rachel swallowed at last.

‘Don’t be ashamed,’ said Susan softly as Rachel darted her wide-eyed gaze back upward. She was suddenly aware of the heat of her cheeks and the thumping of her heart. ‘Just look. I loved the way you looked at me before.’

A war was being fought in Rachel’s mind. A lifetime of conformity, made stronger by the failures of dreary teenage rebellions and vague adult resolutions, had found itself besieged by a deeper force, suddenly focused: oh my god, she thought. Oh my god. Was it true?

It had to be. Without fanfare, resistance died. Rachel let her eyes fall once more, drinking deep, while brown foam lapped onto the floor out of the glass in her limp grasp.