He’s doing it AGAIN, feeling or dare I say caressing my elbows. Gently, softly, slowly. Sometimes speaking, sometimes not – just silently caressing. Backwards and forwards, backwards and forwards. To and fro, always in rhythm, never rushing, never hurrying. Gently, softly, slowly. Very hypnotic. Leading to where? I tell him to stop, but I don’t want him to stop. His gentle, sensuous touch barely marking my skin. His fingers, his hands, so soft. It puts me into a dream, a trance, takes me back, but to where? My mind and my body want to float away. I feel I’m moving, returning home, back to childhood. I feel safe, warm, wanted, and needed.
I have to stop him. This can’t go on. He is capable of making me feel too vulnerable, too soft, loving, and young. All the things I don’t show to the world. He is managing to break down the defense walls. What is it about him? OK he is young, he is good looking, and he is blonde with skin that tans without effort or burning…like a young Viking warrior, a Nordic God. He is so healthy looking. Must drink a lot of milk! Strange he has such an effect on me. I usually go for dark haired, well built men who look like they could play a good game of Rugby and be happy with their hands round a pint of beer…though these days it is more likely to be silvery grey haired men who prefer a good programme on the telly! Certainly not slim, blue-eyed, blonde young men with looks more suited to tennis. Plus they have to be older than me. Never fell for toy boy material. God, one could be arrested. I bet he will soon charm the birds off the trees. And when he speaks his sounds rather like Hugh Grant at his most charming. I tell you, if a woman wasn’t careful, she could let herself be hypnotized by that voice…and where would that end up? I ask you!
Must stop this. Say something. Do something.
“Stop it, stop it. Let’s put the kettle on and make a drink” When this is done, I sit back down but it starts again, just a soft butterfly touch. “Why?” I ask. “Why? What is it with my elbows?”. “Nothings up with your elbows, I just like them. They are so soft”. I reply that they are no different than anyone else’s, nothing special. “Yes, they are” and the stroking begins again.
If I was to be really honest, I do like it. I like the sensuousness, the closeness, the cosiness. I like the hypnotic drowsiness, the calmness…the loving. But there is danger, I can sense it. I have to keep control. How easy it would be just to allow it to continue, to allow myself to sink deeper into the warmth, deeper into a trance. I feel as if I am in a secret place, my secret place, a place known only to me, where all is still and peaceful. It is my cavern, surrounded by the warmth and stillness of the water which is close by. The space is late by a soft warm glow, holding the sense of peacefulness. I am safe.
It is all reminding me of something, someone. What is it? Who does it remind me off? The memory is more than a touch, more than a sound, it’s a voice…who is it? My mind and thoughts are rushing back many years, must be nearly forty years ago since I last felt like this…yes, that’s it, that’s who it is. Well, I never. Of course it is. I ended up marrying that voice. Now he was a real Rugby playing man, played for the Army and captained a local team. Gorgeous dark brown eyes and dark hair he had…and his voice! One afternoon he read The Pied Piper of Hamlin to me…and I would have followed him anywhere and I DID! All over England and most parts of the Far East. A right charmer that one! Now he could charm the birds from the trees…in fact they were more like falling out of the trees on the day of his funeral. It all ended in tears.
But I am not safe and it’s not quiet and there is no stillness. We have been out and are just finishing our meal, sitting drinking coffee, people all around us. He has returned from washing his hands but instead of sitting down again, he is standing behind my chair, putting his hands on my elbows. “Will you stop it?” I say, trying hard to be angry. “No, I like doing it” is his reply. Thank goodness we don’t see one another very often – maybe two or three times a year. I couldn’t cope if we lived closer- the danger of slipping out of control would be too great.
“Will you stop it?” I ask again. “OK, but only if you will tell me something, then I will stop: “What” I say. “I’ll tell you anything, just stop it”. “Right then, what team did Granddad captain when he played rugby? And Dad says he went to war in Borneo. Is that right? Where is Borneo”.
All that was 12 years ago, 12 years since he has been to visit me and one year since we last met. He is now a young man, lovely, kind, gentle, with a mischievous sense of humour, very polite and now almost 6’ tall. Still blonde and tanned – and he now has a girlfriend. He now towers over me, he has a job and looks after himself.
And what of my elbows? Oh, yes, they still get stroked; the feeling still takes me back in time. But there is an added dimension now as he says he has the urge to pick his Nan up! Thank goodness he is courting!
