Thanks as always to my husband, to my literary agents (Philip Spitzer, Lukas Ortiz, and Jane Judd), and to the wonderful editors at Avon/HarperCollins in London: Keshini Naidoo and Sammia Rafique. And thanks especially to Peach: this book is both for and about you, and all the fragile and lovely spirits we’ve known together.
This is a second-hand memoir, written about a person other than myself. Because of that, and because of the necessity of protecting people’s identities, particularly Peach, it can be viewed as true but not completely factual.
Most people in this book are composites. Most places have been changed. While I spent countless hours with Peach talking about this book, listening to her stories and thoughts and her feelings, I cannot guarantee the accuracy of anything that is written here that does not include me directly.
Readers are urged to take it as it is meant – as an example of living a life that many people could otherwise not imagine, and yet one that is familiar in enough ways to perhaps help people see that we are not so different from each other, after all.
For Peach, of course
The couple had been sipping wine for almost half an hour when he made his first move.
They had already exhausted talk of his work (he was an accountant, so that part didn’t take too long) and hers (she was a graduate student, she told him, though when you purchase companionship through an escort service you never know whether you’re being told the truth), and he had been watching the ample cleavage defined by the black lace camisole long enough to be feeling excited. Very excited.
Still, he liked the sound of her voice, and he listened to it longer than he had planned.
He took the wineglass from her hand, gently, courteously, and placed it on the glass top of the coffee table in front of them. She was smiling. When he kissed her, her lips were as warm and yielding as he had thought they would be.
She put her arms around him and drew him in closer, her mouth, her lips against his, her tongue exploring inside his mouth, feeling hot, feeling impatient. He sensed a surge, a response inside himself, as though his groin were suddenly on fire.
She leaned back on the bed and pulled him on top of her, still fully dressed, and her legs came up and encircled him, pulling him down harder on top of her. She was kissing him back, his face, his neck, pulling at his clothes even as she held him pinned on top of her; it was as though a fire had been ignited inside of her when he made his first move. She must like me, he thought, as he returned her kisses, reaching between their two bodies to fondle her breasts. She must reallybe hot for me.
She gasped and pulled away from him, scrambling up further on the bed, still with that smile. Slowly, watching him, she started to undress. The black lace top that barely concealed the camisole, the skirt … she was wearing a garter belt and stockings – he caught his breath and felt that pulsing in his cock again. Sheknows what I want, he thought, and locking eyes with her, he stood up, unbuckled his belt, and unzipped his khakis.
She was just wearing the camisole and stockings now, no underpants – God, I love it when they don’twear anything underneath – and she leaned back against the headboard, still watching him, her legs falling apart naturally. Slowly, she put a finger in her mouth, then withdrew it; slowly, she moved her hand down and slid the same finger into her pussy.
She’s so hot, he thought. He pulled off his shirt. He couldn’t take his eyes off her pussy. She didn’t shave it, like some girls did, and he was fascinated with the curly dark hair and the slender hand on it, moving, pulsing …
He crawled up to be with her, but she put one elegant, black-stockinged leg up, her foot against his chest, to hold him away from her. Her eyes were still holding his. She wet her finger once more and started really caressing herself, rocking her hips rhythmically, moving against her hand, her breathing coming faster, even moaning, and all the while her eyes were still on him.