An Artist's Eye

Copyright © 2007 by Crystal Barela

First to come off was my knit hat, which I am sure put my hair on end, static and curls at odds with each other. But I was late for Brigette. I always was, and I didn’t want to lose one more second with her. I didn’t bother to remove my mittens, just folded back the knit fingers and buttoned them open so my fingers were free. I gave my fingers a loosening wiggle. My hands were always cold anyway.

The back of the room was good for my warm up sketch. I took an easel from the corner and drug it between two other artists so I could get a good view of the Brigette’s back. There was a shush from one of the students. I glared and apologized at the same time while somehow tossing my sketch pad onto the easel.

I opened my art bin and pulled out my charcoal. My Brigette was soft. I cursed under my breath and placed the charcoal against the newsprint. She wasn’t mine. I traced the curve of her hip, where it met the gentle fold at her waist. Shadows hid in the indents of the dimples above her ass. Beautiful skin. It looked smooth and soft. Golden, the color of caramel.

Brown hair. No, earth-colored hair, darker than brown, but not black. Softer than black. Straight, sleek. I wish she’d put it up so I could see the nape of her neck. Brigette had a lovely neck made for kisses.

Backs were my favorite, the elegance, the beauty of the spinal column. And hers…I sighed.

Brigette moved her head slightly and the shadow between her shoulder blades wavered. Time meant change, not necessarily good for capturing a pose. I could see nothing of her left arm, but her head rest on her right hand, her elbow supporting her.

“Fifteen minute break,” the teacher called out. Ms. Looann Reed. From Texas. She was a genius and the reason I started taking this class. But it was Brigette that had me coming back for the second semester.

Not enough time. I closed my eyes and expelled a long breath. Why did work always have to interfere with my art? Why were bits of charcoal so expensive? Why—

“You’re late, Carla,”

“I know,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest. You’d think Looann would be used to this by now. Just accept that I got here when I could.

“Third time this week.”

“Sorry. Work.” I said reaching into my backpack for a snack.

Looann sighed and patted me on the shoulder before moving on to the other students. I knew she liked me, if she didn’t I—

I froze, mid-rip of my bag of jerky, taking Brigette in. Her back was to me as she slipped her arms through the sleeves of the pale pink silk kimono. Next she lifted her hands to put up her hair. She wrapped the long strands around a chopstick and twisted the strands atop her head. I smiled. Hair off her neck, just as I wanted. Sometimes it was as if she could read my mind.

She stepped off the platform to walk the perimeter of the classroom and take in her likenesses. My belly flopped. Brigette had been the first pregnant woman I had ever seen without her clothes on. I mean live and in person. When I had started the class you would never have known there was a life growing inside her. A flat sleek belly had greeted my eyes the day I first saw her, but now she was round, her breasts at least a cup size fuller. Watching her bloom was—
She approached to the guy beside me and I quickly shut my sketchpad. Not good enough yet. Not for Brigette.

Brigette’s big brown eyes peeked over my easel at my closed sketchpad. Those lashes. Thick and long. When she blinked they moved in slow motion. You could drown in those eyes. The flecks of caramel surrounded by dark chocolate a tempting treat.

“Why do you never let me see?” she asked. Brigette had an accent. French? ‘See’ sounded more like ‘Zee’.

I shrugged my shoulders, but I knew why.

Brigette blinked rapidly and frowned. She leaned back and crossed her arms over top her belly. The curve looked hard and smooth. Beautiful. The charcoal pulled at my fingers. Draw. Capture.

“Why not?”

“I don’t want to show you.”

Brigette reached for my pad her dangly earrings swinging against her neck. “That’s silly, let me—”

“We are going to do an hour long pose, class, so get comfortable,” Looann said.

With a stomp, quite ineffective in her bare feet, Brigette returned to the risers in the center of the room. Because of the length of the pose, she chose a position lying down. Again she was on her side, but this time facing me.

Sketchpad under my arm I weaved in-between the other students, forcing them to move if they were to get a good view. I wanted that face, those eyes and I couldn’t see them from the frickin’ back row. I sat on the floor so that I was eye level with my subject and found that the eyes I admired were glaring at me.

Brigette’s cheek was flush with her bicep; her arm was extended over her head and off the platform, her fingers relaxed in the air. Wisps of hair fell across her neck. One full hip was in the air, her other hand resting protectively over her round belly. Brigette’s nipples were hard and long, and I didn’t think from the cold, but with impending motherhood. Her skin had a golden translucence as if she were a piece of fruit ready to fall from the vine. Ripe. Sweet. She had one leg crossed over the other so that her knee rested on the floor, but I could still see the nest of hair between her legs. Darker than the hair on her head. I would say this was black.

There was a cough and my eyes shot to Brigette’s face. It was red.

Had I been staring? I cleared my throat and looked down at my pad. I mean at her mound?

“Very nice,” Maryloo said from behind me. It was. Simple lines. I believed less was more. Hour long poses always turned into two half hours for me. And there was nothing pornographic about it. Thank the maker.

What was wrong with me? What was my obsession with wanting straight girls? You couldn’t get straighter than carrying a man’s child.

I flipped the page on my pad and scooted along the floor, closer to Brigette’s feet. I was looking up her body, from an odd angle. The bottom of her foot was facing me, and the back of her knee. Her ass and the bit of hair that spread from between her legs thinning onto her thighs took up my line of vision. One of my favorite parts of the woman’s body. I liked taking a woman from behind. Sliding my fingers between their pussy lips. Tugging those hairs. Nipping—

I looked down at my sketchpad then shut it at once. My face burning. Christ.

***

Class was over and I was standing outside having a smoke. Went well today. Aside from the distraction of Brigette’s nether bits. I giggled and expelled a stream of smoke. She really was a beautiful woman. A sexy woman.

“You are rude you know.” Brigette said from behind me. I turned, dropped my cigarette and stamped it out. She should really avoid smokers. She wore a red turtleneck that was stretched taught over her stomach, a tan line of skin just below her belly button exposing the bottom half of her belly. I wasn’t sure how her jeans were staying up.

“Christ, aren’t you cold?” I pulled off my scarf and threw it around her shoulders. It was December and Manhattan was stuck in a permanent frost.

“How gallant,” she said, wrapping the scarf around her neck. “But I am always hot now,” she said with a gesture to her belly. Brigette wrapped her arms around the mound protectively, coving the bare skin.

“Would you like something hot to drink?” I picked up my portfolio and walked to the corner. “I know a good coffee shop.”

“I do not drink coffee,” she said following me.

“Well, tea then?”

“Only if you show me your sketches.”

I stopped at the corner and looked down at her. She looked determined.

“You live near here?” she asked. The light changed.

“Why?” I asked continuing my walk.

“Private pose for you,” she said, taking my elbow as we weaved in out of the crowd. “If you show me your sketches.”

“Brigette—”

“You say my name.” And she smiled up at me. Her teeth were white and her cheeks dimpled.
My mouth went dry.

***

I am not sure how we ended up in my studio apartment, or how Brigette could possibly be on my bed, naked. Nor, could I understand how my mind, always caught in light in shadow, even when faced with Brigette’s beauty, was now focused on lips and lashes; eyes and nipples.

Now my interest was in texture and smell. I wanted to be a part of my drawing. To touch her skin with my hands, not capture it on paper. Did she know how erotic she was? Kneeling on my bed like the goddess of fertility, her hands clasped atop her stomach. I felt wrong to want her like I did. She was eight months pregnant.

“Can I see?” she asked. But there was nothing to show her. I had spent the last twenty minutes doodling. My desire growing.

“No,” I said. Standing from where I sat cross-legged on the floor. There was no other furniture in my apartment. Just the bed.

Brigette pouted, her bottom lip a succulent—I cursed. Why did I let her talk me into this? My heart was beating too fast, too hard. My body was warm, my insides liquid. Goo. I turned and leaned against the kitchen counter than ran the length of the room. There was a sink, a hot plate, a half fridge, and the worn Formica supporting my weakened knees.

“Don’t be mad, Carla,” she said. I turned and Brigette extending her hand to me.

“I’m not mad. I’m…” I didn’t know how to finish. What was I?

Brigette rose off her calves and took my finger-tips in her hand. With a soft tug I swayed against her body. The firm ball of her unborn child between us.

“Feel,” she said.

She set my palm flat against the side of her belly, the warm taught skin solid and real under my fingers. Brigette slid my hand down the gentle slope and my eyes flew to her brown ones. She stopped just above her mound, the hairs touching the tips of my fingers.

“Do you want me, Carla?”

My throat felt tight, but I nodded, my fingers making tentative circles on her skin.

She leaned forward, her lips touching mine in the softest of kisses. My eyes were open and hers were shut, those great long lashes casting soft shadows beneath her lids.

“Why are you afraid?” she whispered.

Is that what I was? Was it fear that made me hesitate?

A trail of nibbling kisses dotted my jaw line from mouth to ear. “I will not brake,” she breathed in my ear.

Brigette took hold of my wrist and pressed my fingers between her thighs. Her nether lips were damp, the hair long and curling around my knuckles, her stomach unmovable on my forearm.

She didn’t feel fragile. She felt hard and soft all at the same time.

I slipped a finger inside her and she moaned. I moved a second into place and she bit her lip, moving against me. Gently I pushed her back onto my bed. This was real. Not a dream, not a fantasy. I took a step back and brought my wet fingers to my lips tasting Brigette. I closed my eyes savoring the—

“Do you know how hot that is?”

I pulled my t-shirt over my head. “Do you know how beautiful you are?” I unzipped my jeans and let them fall to the floor.

She smiled and said, “I feel beautiful when you look at me.”

I climbed up onto the foot of the bed and used my shoulders to spread her knees apart.

“Sexy when you look at me.”

I knelt between her legs. “Do you know if the baby is a boy or a girl?” I asked. Life was in front of me and I let my hands circle the mound.

“I will call her Zoe,” Brigette said as I spread my fingers and trailed them over her stomach.

“Zoe,” I whispered and leaned forward to kiss her belly. One kiss led to two, then three, then four, and my mouth traveled over the taught skin to be caressed by the hairs covering Brigette’s desire. Her clit was hard and extended, the pearl a wet pink candy that I drew into my mouth.
Brigette’s heels dug into bed, her painted toenails curled. Her hips lifted and her clit kissed me back; over and over, until her sweet juices painted my chin. The hair guarding her womb tickled my nose and I sneezed.

She giggled, a hand lifting to my head, and sifting through my hair. Had she known I wanted this? Had she seen it in my eyes as I drew her every week? I had been careful not to show her my drawings, to keep my secret desire.

I sat back. The length of her body was like a painting by a master. Golden skin, gently rounded limbs. My hands traced her skin from knee to inner thigh. I left a trail of goose bumps. With a finger I traced the rim of Brigette’s wet hole in a slow circle, my eyes on her face. Her skin held a sheen of perspiration and the color was rising like the sun in the morning. A passionate pink, except where she bit her lip, the skin there golden, her teeth white. Her lashes bent against her cheeks, eyes shut tight.

She moaned my name and I smiled. For eight months I’d watched Brigette blossom. I’d seen her grow more and more beautiful. Watched her body change, her skin brake and stretch.

I shut my eyes, her grace in my mind. My mouth slurped and fingers dipped. Her skin was hot and wet beneath me.

And Brigette came, crying out my name. The muscles in her legs tightened, her knees gripped my shoulders. My nose was clogged with earthy desire.

I rest my cheek against her thigh and breathed deep. That smell. That was Brigette. That was her scent. Dark, rich, like the scent of my oils. Like paint. I lifted sticky finger to Brigette’s belly.

“What do you draw?” She said, unable to see the underside of her stomach.

I had spelt, “love,” but I did not tell her that.

“Come here,” she said and I crawled up the bed to lie beside my love. Brigette took my face in her hands and licked her wetness from my lips and cheeks. She sucked my tongue deep into her mouth and kissed me in slow motion. Soft warmth grew until my body was nothing but heat. Silky strands of her hair caressed my face and neck, brushed my breasts. Her hand pressed between us and tweaked my clit through my panties, moving my nubbin, pushing, tugging through the fabric.

My eyes were open and so were hers, each lick of her tongue against mine like a touch of my clit.
Each blink of her eyes stroking my desire. She tongued my teeth, gaining entrance again.

Brigette’s knee came between my thighs under her hand, and pressed my hole, digging my panties into me while her fingers massaged my clit. I came, hard and wet, her mouth swallowing my cries.

Brigette rest her head against mine and I caught my breath, my arms encircling her. I kissed her cheek and she rest her had on my shoulder.

“Feel,” she said, resting my hand against her stomach.

The baby moved. “Zoe,” I gasped and she kicked my palm. “Wow. Does that hurt?”

“More uncomfortable than painful,” Brigette said with a grimace.

“Thank you,” I said, meeting her eyes.

“For?”

“For sharing you.”

She laughed and I stretched out my arm for my sketchpad.

Brigette took hold of my arm. “You do not have to show me.”

“Yes I do.”

Brigette opened the pad of paper to the first sketch. It was from last semester and at the time there was no sign of Zoe. She flipped through page after page and each careful rendering showed the progression of her pregnancy. Each stroke of chalk the growth of my love. My feelings were obvious and I wished for the first time since I joined her on my bed that I were somewhere else. I wanted a cigarette, I wanted space.

“Carla,” Brigette said and I closed my eyes. Her hand took hold of my chin. “Don’t be afraid.”

Was that what I was?

“You are safe with us.”

I opened my eyes and saw the truth in her eyes.

The Buzz

Copyright © 2006 by Crystal Barela

The tickle and burn of the pigment-filled needle scratched my lower back.

“Don’t move," the tattooist said. Her dark eyes in the mirror reflected back at me in warning. She laid a steady hand on my spine and bent to her work.

Buzz, pause, wipe. Buzz.

Six months had been put into the applying ink to my skin. The design covered three quarters of my back. My only request had been stilettos.

The likeness of a Goth hellcat astride a Harley lounged across my shoulder blades. The stiletto heel of one thigh-high boot grew from the crack of my ass, the other propped on the handlebars. Knees spread wide, the hellcat’s lace covered pussy a shadow between her legs.

The tattoo artist’s cinnamon breath burned my skin as she leaned closer to add the finishing touches.

Buzz, pause, wipe. Buzz.

In the mirror, I could see the dark sheen of her hair piled on top of her head, and the glint of the silver bar in her eyebrow. The tattoos on her shoulders and biceps danced while she worked.
My pussy twitched.

Buzz, pause, wipe. Buzz.

An hour crept by, my heart racing with every swipe of the needle. Six months of work. Me lying ass in the air, panties barely covering my dripping pussy and my nipples hard beneath my tee. Pain and pleasure became one.

She squeezed my hip - a warning to be still - but my hips were connected to my pussy, and with every nick of ink my excited flesh pulsed. The casual touch of her talented fingers were driving me mad.

A long sigh, like a woman satisfied, blew from between her lips. My thighs pressed tight as my imagination ignited. The wet sound of lotion between her palms added fuel to my fire.

“Done.”

"How's it look?" I asked, twisting round.

Over my shoulder, her black painted fingernails were dark against my pale skin.

"I had a beautiful canvas." Her plump lips lowered and I watched, transfixed, as they connected with my sensitive flesh.

Our eyes caught.

My pussy buzzed.

"Go ahead," she said, standing.

I slid my hand beneath me.

With a quick move my fingers were in, tangled in my short curls.

My eyes closed and I pressed my cheek into the table, biting my lip.

Her heels clicked as she walked past me.

“Open your eyes.”

Skirt lifted, her thigh high stilettos drew my eyes to her clean-shaven pussy. Flowered tattoos framed the gleaming skin in a riot of color. A ring pierced her labia.

Wetness soaked my palm.

Bracing one hand against the wall she lifted her leg so that the six inch heel was beside my cheek.

I nuzzled against the patent leather.

“Lick it!”

The heel was hard beneath my tongue.

My breath caught, thighs stiffened, clit on end.

Pussy buzzzzzz.

Pause.

Wipe.