Love in the Loire Read online

  “Would you like a drink?” he said as he took off his shirt and headed for what turned out to be the bedroom. No idle sitting around chatting for Cass. He was sitting bare-chested on the edge of a very good-sized bed for France, taking off his shoes as we came into the room.

  “No, thank you,” I said. “I’m fine.”

  “Me either,” Steve said.

  “You can put your clothes anywhere,” Cass said. He was standing up dropping his pants. “I’ll get some towels.”

  He was wearing jockey shorts, the closest thing France has to Calvin Klein style. Sexy. Why was I surprised?

  Where did I read that it takes one-seventh the time to get undressed that it does to take to get dressed? We were all undressed in a matter of moments. I just threw my clothes in a heap on the floor. Steve hung his neatly on a chair. The German thing. He put the camera on the seat of the chair on top of his clothes. Cass didn’t seem to notice. He pulled off his underpants after throwing himself down on his back in the middle of the bed and said. “Where should we begin?” He was already getting hard.

  To my surprise Steve said, “We always like to start with massage. Why don’t you turn over and we’ll both massage you for a while?” Cass did.

  Steve straddled his waist and started massaging his shoulders. He had put his arms above his head and his face sideways on the pillow. His eyes were closed. I decided to sit with my back against Steve’s, straddling Cass’s buttocks and working on his thighs. I bent each leg up and massaged the bottom of his feet. He didn’t laugh. Most people are ticklish there. I rubbed his calves after I put his legs back down. I reached around to see if Steve was hard. He was. He moved back and forth a little in my hand. Then one of his hands came around to check me out. I was too. He wiggled his ass against mine. I wished very much that we were by ourselves, but there we were.

  I spread Cass’s legs and reached down between them to find his cock. It was hard, and he lifted himself up a little bit so it could come down between his legs. I put some spit on the tip of my finger and rubbed the head of it. It got harder. He was uncircumcised. I thought most Englishmen were. But that’s not an area of expertise for me. I’m not keen on the uncircumcised penis. It’s a bit like eating endive. Cass didn’t have to make apologies about the size of his winkie. I always think that many of those men who sleep around a lot just do so because they don’t want to go back for size criticism. That was not his case. There was something there for those married ladies to miss.

  “I want to turn over,” Cass said suddenly. I was just about to lean down and put him in my mouth, but hey. We both crawled off, and he flopped over. The winkie flopped around, too, as he turned. He pulled us down beside him on either side as we lay there. Then he put his hands on our cocks.

  “It’s sort of like skiing,” he said, swaying his body back and forth and holding us as though we were ski sticks. “I’ve always wanted to do this,” he said.

  “Well, here we are making your dreams come true,” Steve said. “How about a few photos to commemorate your wish fulfillment?” He reached over and grabbed the camera. “I’ve always wanted to be a photographer. I’ll set up some poses. Hugo, sit on Cass as though he’s in you.”

  “I could really be in him,” Cass said. Eagerly, I think you could say. “No. Not now. I’m sure it would hurt, and I don’t want to see that on Hugo’s face,” Steve said. He clicked away and looked at the little camera screen to see what he’d gotten. I didn’t move much, remembering that the camera was slow.

  “How about this?” Cass said, and putting his hands under my ass, pulled me up, and slipped me into his mouth. He wasn’t shy about it. “Great!” Steve said.

  Then he said, “How about this?” and moved in and put his own cock into Cass’s mouth beside mine.

  “Is this what you call a close-up?” I said.

  “Definitely,” Steve said. It was comforting to feel Steve’s cock in there beside my own. He was really running this little photo project. It had been my idea, but I was definitely feeling very ill at ease in its execution. I really wasn’t liking it.

  “Okay, now how about one of Hugo sucking my cock?” Cass said.

  “Let’s make that a long shot,” Steve said very professionally. I knelt on the far edge of the bed away from the camera and did the thing. And that’s when we called the whole thing off and started getting dressed.

  “I’m not even going to get to fuck one of you?” Cass said. “I was going to let one of you fuck me.”

  “Sorry,” Steve said. “We’ve got a very important appointment, and we have to get out of here. And we have to be up early for rehearsals.”

  “Look at this. You’re going to turn this down?” He reached down and shook himself at us. I need to explain that Cass was not at all disgusting. His body was big and strong and not hairy, except for his chest. From all the physical labor he did, his muscles were bulging from his arms and thighs and abdomen. And as I said, there was nothing wrong in the crotch department. I just was not enjoying myself at all with Steve involved. What was I feeling? It wasn’t jealousy. It wasn’t possessiveness. Maybe something like partnership? I just felt we shouldn’t be sharing ourselves with somebody else. Strange.

  “We have to go, Cass,” I said. “We got what we came for. The pictures. Just so your lady friends have a little evidence to defend themselves with.”

  “As if you’re going to show them to them. You’re sucking cock in those pictures.”

  “Don’t you think that’s what people expect me to be doing?” I said.

  “We must run,” Steve said from the doorway.

  “Well, I’m going to have to flog myself off here. Don’t expect me to get up and let you out,” Cass said.

  “We’ll let ourselves out. Actually, you’ve gotten us so worked up we have to run home and fuck each other’s brains out,” Steve said. He was getting a nice grasp on American English vernacular it occurred to me. Which we did. Let ourselves out. And fucked each other’s brains out.

  Afterward, Steve said, “I didn’t like seeing you with that guy’s cock in your mouth. I didn’t like it at all. Do you think I’m falling in love with you?”

  “I’m thinking the same thing,” I said.

  “Is this what it feels like?” he said.

  “I guess so,” I said. But I knew that it did.

  Nina Goes into Production

  “Well, first of all, you have to understand that The Red Mill is a perfectly dreadful show,” Kitty Carlisle Hart said. “And Victor Herbert isn’t much better as a composer.”

  The assembled students and professional cast members did not seem much discomfited at this news. I was the married lady from across the street who was going to be one of the chorus. The students wanted to call me Mrs. de Rochemont, but I insisted on Nina.

  We were actually in production for a musical comedy with a true star at the helm. We would have sung “Three Blind Mice” for Kitty Carlisle Hart. Anything.

  She was seated on a chair at the front edge of the stage in the old riding arena of the Abbey that was now the theater. She had on a dark brown cashmere sweater and a brown wraparound skirt that was falling open to show her legs. She had great legs. She undoubtedly had great legs back in 1933 in the original production of The Red Mill. Isn’t it curious how reams can be written about someone famous and no one mentions something quite obvious? Kitty probably got that first job because she had a nice face and a passable singing voice and great legs. Some producer saw her, and there she was. Off on a career. The 1930s were good for girls with legs. Tits were out at that time and didn’t come back until the war and Rita Hayworth.

  And they really came back with Marilyn Monroe, who didn’t have exceptional legs. You probably think I’m awfully young to be knowing all these things but primero, I’m in the fashion and beauty business. Had been long before I met Graham and married him. And I’ve studied the stuff. Segundo, I’m not all that young. I’m a number of years older than my husband. A number I’d just as soon n
ot discuss.

  I was at The Red Mill rehearsals because I’m blonde. Someone must have said, “Get Nina de Rochemont for the chorus. The Red Mill takes place in Holland. Dutch. Blonde.” Get it? I can’t sing, but they probably won’t notice. Graham isn’t in this one. He said, “You’re a little preggers, but it doesn’t show much, and you should go have fun. I’ll keep an eye on Theo during rehearsals.”

  I think they have a part for him in Tea and Sympathy, so I can take over the babysitting. And I’ll probably be showing by then.

  Yes. Kitty was exactly the right type for her period, slender and willowy. You know fashion tends to follow the shape of a woman’s body as she matures. You didn’t know that? First “The Little Girl.” That was the 1920s. The no-bosom, no-waist, little straight legs look.

  The next period is “The Teenage Body” shape. The 1930s. All that slope-shouldered slenderness. Everyone slumped forward so their tits wouldn’t show.

  Then “The Mature Woman.” World War II was one of those periods. There was Rita and the rest of them: Betty Grable, Ann Sheridan, Hedy Lamarr, Lana Turner. I once asked my instructor at the Kounousky gym, who had come from Hollywood, if he’d ever seen a perfect body, and he said, “Yes. Lana Turner. For about two weeks in 1947.”

  And then there was “The Very Mature Woman.” Marilyn and her copycats. Sophia Loren in Italy. The Italians are great at doing the very mature woman. Anna Magnani. There’s enough fashion education for you.

  Kitty was one of the great exemplars of the 1930s, and she has sailed right on through, slim and supple and full of charm.

  She went on, speaking of charm, actually, “This is an interesting show to perform, despite its weaknesses, because it depends greatly on the charm of the performers.

  “You know, before the great old warhorse musicals like Oklahoma, Carousel, Guys and Dolls, no one expected a Broadway show to run any length of time. Six months was a lot. I believe Oklahoma was the first Broadway musical to run more than a year, and went on to run for many years. It was during the war, of course, and New York was packed with servicemen coming and going, so it was a great time for the theater. But even so, these were new kinds of shows. Oklahoma you can produce out in Keokuk, and it will be fine. Good story, good characters, great songs, fun costumes. A show like that is always a good show.

  “But before shows like this, performers were expected to project a lot of personality. Remember, no microphones. A tinny pit band. Very simple lighting. When you came out of the wings, the glamour had to be you. And I guess if I’m here to teach you anything at all, it’s to figure out what your stage glamour is. Many successful artists have made it based on who they were, not what they could do.

  “None of you will ever have heard of Gaby Delys. She was a French actress at the beginning of the last century. If I could go back in time, my only reason to go would be to see her perform. I can only imagine it.

  “She was performing in Paris when J. M. Barrie saw her. He had written Peter Pan, which had a great success on the stage in London. He was enchanted with Gaby, and he wrote a musical for her just so she could come across the channel and work her magic on London audiences.

  “She came to London and was in rehearsals when J. M. Barrie decided he would drop in at the theater and see how rehearsals were going. He slipped into the empty theater, took a seat, and he was appalled. Gaby was terrible. She saw him sitting in the theater and must have been able to see the expression on his face. She came downstage and leaned over the footlights and said, ‘Baree, Baree, Baree, I know, I know, I know. I can’t sing. I can’t dance. I can’t act. But it will be all right.’ And it was. The audience loved her. She must have just oozed with charm. And I think it has to do with loving the audience. If you love performing for them, I think they want to love you back.

  “I always preferred musical theater to making motion pictures. I admire motion picture actors very much because they work without an audience and repeat short scenes out of sequence. There’s an added tension when you’re in front of an audience.

  “Motion picture actors never have to deal with this scary world. There’s always another take. I always felt that I was better on stage because something kicks in. I have more adrenalin. Or perhaps I was just more flirtatious. Certainly I never had any great success in motion pictures.

  “But I did in television. I think the television producers were smart to always have some sort of audience present in the studio. They really didn’t have to. But early television was live, and someone realized the performers would be more on edge and give more energetic performances with an audience present. But enough about me. Let’s talk about my show.”

  Everyone laughed. Kitty certainly did have that fabled charm. She could have gone on talking all afternoon.

  “Some of you have prepared songs and scenes already. Let’s start with ‘Every Day Is Ladies Day with Me.’ E. L . . . Mr. Losada . . . pardon me for being so informal, would you come up? I’ll play Gretchen, the love interest. You’re the Burgomaster who wants to marry me but finally isn’t going to.”

  The new young actor who had just arrived from the United States with Cranston Muller, who created the festival, came up on the stage. He was of a good height. Handsome? Something beyond that. Very young, but definitely a leading man.

  Kitty called out to the pianist, “Lester, take it from the very top. Intro music and all. E. L., you can sing off the score, of course.”

  E. L. strode to the front, put his arm around the surprised Kitty’s waist, and looking occasionally at the sheet music in his other hand, started singing. Suddenly, he seemed to be at least 28. Much more mature. It was surprising. A sappy song but you felt he was actually interested in the woman he was holding. And that the words meant something to him. There was talent here.

  Kitty worked, too. She responded to him, put her arms around him, but I noticed never turned completely in profile. E. L. worked in profile a lot, and he got a very good hand when he finished.

  “Comments?” Kitty said.

  A very young girl down front said, “It’s sort of like a boastful song, but he didn’t do it that way. It was more like you made him sing it.”

  “That’s good,” Kitty said.

  “You never really looked at him,” someone else said.

  “I hate to work in profile on stage. I don’t think the audience ever really notices. Do they?” Kitty asked.

  “Yes, yes, yes,” chorused back.

  “Usually I make my partner look at me,” E. L. said. “I just didn’t want to manhandle you too much.”

  “Because of my age or because I’m the coach?” Kitty said.

  “Because you’re so beautiful,” E. L. said, bowing.

  “You’re going to go far,” Kitty called after him as he left the stage.

  Nina Talks to Toca

  “How could I ever be in love with someone who takes long walks in the countryside with some kind of plugs in their ears listening to popular music?” I said.

  Toca Sacar said, “And the music is ‘Ta-ra, ta-ra, sipouda, sipada, bing and bing and bing.’ Total senseless noise. But that’s easy for you to say, Nina, when you have that gorgeous husband running around the village wearing practically nothing, driving the French housewives mad with passion.”

  “That is not totally untrue. Graham is a very sensible man, but getting a little reward for his efforts to preserve his body isn’t beyond him. And he was all muffled up in clothes all winter in Paris. You don’t get out of your clothes very much in France in the wintertime. It may be romantic in all that fog, but it’s chilly. Last winter the sun shone once between Christmas and March 1st.”

  I had mentioned the young man walking with music playing in his ears because Toca and I were sitting in my living room having a chat when one of the cuter male students ventured forth from the Abbey gates. He was evidently set on a long walk, wearing shorts and stout shoes. Ignoring the fact that it was a wonderful day and he was in one of the most beautiful parts of France, h
e was pushing ear plugs into his ears, which was made more difficult by the large sunglasses he was already wearing.

  “That’s Danny Fandom,” Toca said. “I think he’s rather unclear as to what a theatrical career involves. He’s from Boston, but he should be from some place like Costa Rica. He wants to dance, dance, dance. And sing hot Latin songs. His idol is Luis Miguel. His father is an ophthalmologist. His mother is a Biddle.”

  “And you know what that means,” I said.

  “I certainly do know what that means. Danny is going to wind up at Harvard, and then on to medical school. Or law school. Or perhaps with luck the Harvard Business School. So at least he’ll have a good education before he opens that bar in the Caribbean islands somewhere,” Toca said.

  “He is rather cute. Don’t break your heart over him, Toca,” I said.

  “It’s really strange. I have to make a real effort to guide my interests away from much younger men because it’s so embarrassing. It’s one thing I can’t understand about homosexuals. They see their friends falling into some deeply humiliating relationship with a delivery boy, and then they turn right around and develop an adolescent crush on some local high school athlete. They completely close their eyes to how embarrassing that must be for their friends. Particularly if it goes so far as to arriving at parties with your much junior love-crush in tow.”

  “Do you think it’s an effort to hang on to your youth?” I said.

  “I think it’s because you didn’t have any satisfactory sexual activities when you were young. Make that any sexual activities in your teens. I wasn’t sleeping with those little cuties when I was their age, so it took me longer to know what it’s like. A lot of gay men come out much later, and I think they want to explore those teen feelings. Or perhaps have to explore it before they can move on,” Toca said.

  “I hear thunder,” I said.

  “Perhaps God doesn’t want us to be talking about this,” Toca said.

  “Surely God has better things to do,” I said.