Serena, Part 1

Serena, Part 1
puffery@prodigy.com

The unassuming way that she descended the three shallow steps off the 
street; the uncontested victory of footwear comfort over show; the 
brushing back of her shoulder length natural blond hair as she shed 
today's mandatory raincoat; they all signaled American, fellow 
American.  And if, by the very fact that I trouble you with such 
detail, you were to presume her more than a little attractive, well, 
then you would be getting to know something of me in addition.  

This particular bistro thrived on its decorous, coveted, street-side 
seating with a stash of five indoor tables little more than a 
contingency.  Today, however, the great outdoors weren't so great.  
This young woman would have little choice but to settle into my snug 
little hollow.  Further, having already cornered the prime real 
estate adjacent to the establishment's sole functioning heater, good 
sense and damp clothing would necessitate her locating pleasantly 
near me.  And that's exactly what she did.

Lest in its re-telling my observations border upon ogling, let me 
assure you that they were all executed surreptitiously and with the 
inconspicuousness of a master.  I'm not without practice in such 
matters, what with something like twenty years of discreet female 
surveillance to my credit.  You might even be startled to know that 
my initial enthusiasm was actually somewhat tempered.  Certainly not 
with her appearance mind you but rather her all too familiar 
ethnicity.  Let me explain.  

Empirically, European women in general, and the French in particular, 
are several times more likely to smoke than their health obsessed 
American sisters and it was precisely the reliable presence of such 
an audience that brought me frequently to this particular table.  
Truthfully, this is no tame preoccupation.  It is an obsession; such 
an obsession that it is not an inconsiderable factor in my continuing 
Continental residence.  This too requires some clarification.  

For lack of a better word you could call me a tobacco-phile although 
I find the sound of that imprecise and a bit too coarse.  I've been 
afflicted (or blessed) with this particular fascination since I was a 
child.  From my earliest memories I can recall being captivated 
watching women smoke.  And to be more exact, the rapture specifically 
centers on attractive women - the younger the better; smoking 
cigarettes - the longer the better; and doing so in a sensual, 
provocative, and unequivocally feminine manner.  Let's be square here.
  Like it or hate it, turned on or turned off, conscious or otherwise,
 recognizing the sexual overtones to smoking requires no postgraduate 
degree.  

Now while attractive smokers draw my most fervent attention, my 
fetish is not so insidious that I'll edit out an attractive non-
practitioner altogether.  Let's be reasonable here.  So when, in a 
rather diffident manner, she slipped a softpack of Benson and Hedges 
Menthol Lights out of her parka pocket, I was not caught completely 
off-guard.  My attention did however immediately intensify.  Thanks 
to the superbly placed Heineken mirror I watched as she inadvertently 
nudged the pack up against that Parisian tabletop fixture - a Martini 
and Rossi, flame red, embossed ashtray - with the purse she 
aggressively continued to rifle through.  Maintaining my exterior 
aloofness as she dug frustratingly through her purse, then all of her 
jacket pockets as well, in a progressively fruitless search for any 
functioning combustible, presented me with a not inconsiderable 
struggle to preserve my anonymity.  

With a full two minutes consumed and a growing air of exasperation 
about her, she reluctantly resigned her search in lieu of an 
alternative course.  Approaching the counter to retrieved a book of 
matches, I was rewarded with my first full length profile.  Man was 
she hot!  Retreating, but not yet re-seating, she anxiously picked up 
the pack and expertly shook loose a single cigarette, my signal that 
the time was finally appropriate.  Innocently, I looked up as if I'd 
not even seen her come in, feigned surprise at her very presence, 
then proffered my most beguiling smile.  

I clearly caught her by surprise and her American smoker's guilt 
raced pavlovianly.  Cigarette, once dangling freely from her 
glistening lips, and match, in soon-to-be-lit pose, both froze.  "Par-
don" she sputtered out with an unmistakably Midwestern twang as she 
struggled vainly to recall the French for "Do you mind?" or some 
comparable apologetic.  I smiled silently as she resorted to a 
Chaplin-esque cigarette lighting mime punctuated by a passably 
communicative, palms up "May I?"

"Be my guest, ma'am" I both verbally responded and physically nodded, 
my distinctive Houstonian drawl completely throwing her for an 
evident loop.  

"You're an American?" she retorted, beginning interrogatively but, 
reality setting in, finishing rhetorically.

"That would be so, ma'am" I responded with forced stoicism as, 
without fully standing, I took a short step with my ever ready 
lighter already ignited, the dancing flame accentuating her 
magnificent luminance.  Her gentle little touch of my hand as I held 
the lighter was more familiar than two hours of conversation and the 
ensuing mellifluous "Thanks" maybe two more.  Speechless, I watched 
torrents of smoke disappear to unseen recesses of her being with a 
familiar warmth encompassing me as I awaited the inevitable tornado.  
None of these individual events however prepared me for the barrage 
that was to come.  

"I've only been over here a little over a week" she continued "but 
I've got to tell you what a gigantic relief it is not having a bunch 
of pissy ant fuckheads shooting me those knowing little disgusted 
smirks.  It just makes me want to walk up to them, stick my hand down 
their pants, pull out their puny cocks, and slice 'em up like a 
banana."  Then with a decidedly non Marina Bobbitt little giggle she 
concluded "I guess you can tell that I haven't exactly mastered my 
self-consciousness over smoking yet, can't you?  American are just so 
fucking cruel and self-righteous about it, don't you think?"

I didn't respond immediately.  It wasn't the kind of question that 
begged a thoughtful answer.  As it was, I was having a difficult time 
camouflaging my surprise over her forthrightness and that was more 
containable than the captivation of watching her smoke.  I was 
totally enraptured by this performance art she'd so clearly long ago 
perfected.  The animation initiated by my flame was now bringing 
warmth to all extremities.  Juxtapose Cameron Diaz with Jim Carrey 
and you've got the picture.  

Ethnically she might not have been French but stylistically her 
ravenous nostrils would never expose her.  "Not a problem for me 
ma'am" I crooned two or three magnificent puffs later, my body 
temperature still rising.  "It's entirely your business whether you 
smoke.  Not mine.  Not anybody else's."  Pausing, I added on  "And 
don't you ever let anybody tell you any different" then wondered 
belatedly if I'd laid it on a little too evangelically.  "I'm Simon 
by the way" I quickly appended just in case reconnaissance was in 
order.

Now it was her turn to pause.  This big smile just enveloped her 
entire, likely Nordic lineage face as she volunteered "With that 
attitude I think you could be Jeffrey Dahmer and I'd still have you 
over for dinner.  Not one guy in years has ever cut me a single 
minute's slack over my smoking.  All I ever hear from these assholes 
is what a weakling and degenerate I am.  Would you believe that I've 
actually lost two pretty serious boyfriends and one fiancee because 
when forced to choose between them and smoking ... and every one of 
the son-of-a-bitches made me choose ... no matter how dumb it seemed, 
the guys came in second."  

"In a way that kind of worries me" she rambled on.  "It just doesn't 
seem natural.  I never have figured out if I really love smoking that 
much or maybe they're right.  I'm weak and scared shitless that I 
could never quit no matter what.  Or maybe none of them have been 
worth quitting over.  I don't suppose it matters much what the 
motivators are.  The bottom line is that at this point in my life, 
and who knows, maybe it'll always be this way, it's 'love me, love my 
cigarettes'.  How stupid does that sound, I want to know?"

"Not one bit.  Au contraire, sounds like a totally irresistible offer 
to me"  I responded with a playful inflection and a knowing twinkle 
making certain to hold her gaze.  "Anyone not up to that offer isn't 
up to you."  Not seeming quite certain how to field that comment, she 
just laughed it off but there certainly wasn't anything to suggest 
that she was put off by the blatancy.  To the contrary, she hardly 
broke stride continuing to chat on blithely with her disarmingly 
refreshing charm amid periodic pauses of nicotine ecstasy.  

Continuing to effervesce, she exuded "It sounds so fifties-ish, so 
play-it-again-Sam-ish to say this but may I offer you a cigarette, 
monsieur?" she teased, as she flipped the pack in my general 
direction, a single cigarette not coincidentally emerging in the 
maneuver.  

"I can think of little more considerate and I thank you for what is 
uncommon thoughtfulness in today's world, but unfortunately I'm 
afraid I'll have to decline.  You see, actually personally I don't 
smoke.  Haven't, for that matter, in a number of years."  Holding 
fast to her gaze, a detectable tension infiltrated the conversation 
at that moment.  But barely hesitating, I alleviated.  "Even though I 
don't smoke like I've already indicated, I just don't happen to mind 
others smoking.  In a way I even kind of like it."  And rapid fire 
her expression transformed from mild disappointment to major 
disbelief.

"You what?  You kind of like it?  You kind of like people smoking 
around you?" she reiterated in every possible permutation while 
stubbing out her cigarette.  Perhaps inadvertently exhaling directly 
at me, "You kind of like it?" she muttered one more time as if the 
words themselves would somehow breed understanding.  "For God's sake 
where have you been all my fuckin' life?" she cooed.  "All these well 
scrubbed boyfriends I've had haven't been able to dish out 
disapproval fast enough and here's a hunk who actually likes smoking. 
 For Christ's sake, I'm the one who smokes and I don't always even 
like it myself.  How the hell can a nonsmoker like you say such a 
preposterous thing?" she questioned.  "Oh, and by the way I'm Serena.
"  

Again I was in no particular rush to respond.  The reference to me 
being a hunk grounds enough for pleasant reflection.  Her jiggling 
out a second cigarette on the heels of stubbing out her first, gave 
me further opportunity as I lit it for her and then sat back to watch 
her inhale.  Once assured that the cigarette was properly lit, she 
took an extremely hard pull parting her lips just enough for me to 
see the lucky smoke be helplessly sucked behind those luscious 
breasts.  In no rush to exhale, she stared back at me for several 
seconds with her tongue teasing her upper lip.  In good time she did 
exhale, not once, not twice, but three times before her lungs were 
apparently evacuated.  And given that at this point she was again 
drawing firmly, who's to say they'd even been fully evacuated then.

Never taking my eyes off her, I finally commented with unabrogated 
suggestiveness "I don't know how that was for you but I know how it 
was for me.  Watching a beautiful woman like you enjoy a cigarette, 
crave it, master it, envelop it, consume it; you could say that I 
find that act exceptionally arousing.  That's what I mean when I say 
I kind of like it.  I more than kind of like it."  Revealing just the 
slyest hint of a smile ... okay, a licentious one at that ... I 
awaited her reaction.  I didn't have to wait long.

She met my glance head on with a mixture of dumbfoundedness and 
wonder.  "Arousing?  You aren't talking about physically arousing, 
are you?" she posed as a question with skepticism clamoring out of 
every pore.  "You're putting me on aren’t you?  This is a game you 
play to somehow set us smokers up to eventually feel even more 
wretched and depraved than usual, right?" she continued, but I noted 
just the most fleeting glance at my crotch as she spoke.  

Fleeting however did nothing more than mandate a return visual visit 
to my undeniably bulging Levi's.  And doing so, no further 
corroboration would be called for.  "Well I'll be God damned to hell" 
she said.  "Something's revved your motor.  I guess maybe you do find 
smoking sexy, don't you, you apparently well endowed little rascal?  
One part of me says 'God must have sent you' yet the other cries out 
'What a fuckin' pervert.'  I honest to God don't know whether to be 
honored or repulsed by your peculiar form of recognition." 

There was something about her body chemistry that suggested to me 
that the question had already been answered for her but she'd have to 
make that discovery herself.  On the other hand, perhaps I could help 
her along just a little bit.  The journey looked short and all down 
hill.  "Let me tell you what I see when I watch a breathtaking woman 
like you smoke Serena.  From the moment that you put your pack of 
Benson & Hedges on the table there was this sense of mystery about 
you.  The determined yet delicate way that you removed the cigarette 
from the pack.  The way your lips gently but firmly clasped the 
cigarette as you took my light.  The charm and sensuousness of the 
gentle little caress of your fingertips as I cradled the flame.  The 
elegant, upright way that you hold a cigarette, the interminable 
pauses between your inhales and exhales, and then the measured 
precision of your exhales.  Your confluence of confidence and control 
with simplicity and nonchalance.  Your portfolio of styles and 
perfection of each.  And maybe most of all, that look of sheer 
contentment you radiate as the nicotine works its magic sublime."

I paused only long enough to take a quick reading and the sensors 
said she was fully engaged.  It might even be a little wet under the 
table.  "So you see, the way you smoke a cigarette is pure sensuality 
to me.  There's other elements as well that get a little more 
psychologically convoluted.  Should I continue?"  I already knew her 
answer but none-the-less awaited the affirmative nod and the endless 
bobbing exhale that majestically accompanied it.  

"Well, you certainly can't overlook the Madonna-whore aspects either. 
 There is something totally erotic about a woman who clearly places 
pleasure high on her list.  Smoking, particularly today, makes you a 
kind of wanton woman and to more of us than you can possibly imagine, 
that's a total turn-on - a woman who first seeks creature comforts."  
Then taking a final gamble I finished, "And as a climax, I suppose I 
needn't even broach the weakly camouflaged symbolism of watching a 
woman lick and suck a firm cylindrical object."

That last comment again caught her totally unprepared but 
surprisingly both unfazed and unfettered.  With nothing more than a 
momentary pause, she took a substantial drag, exposed an 
intentionally impressive sphere of smoke allowing it to languish 
tauntingly between her cherry lips, then took it Mark McGuire hard 
and deep.  If her coy little smile left any question as to her 
receptivity to my explanation, it was dismissed by the alluring roll 
of her tongue along her glistening upper lip as we both awaited the 
delightfully expectant exhale now within her command.  It came 
concurrent with her right hand settling well up my left thigh, 
perhaps in scientific confirmation of the sorcery she'd performed.

Before I continue, I guess I should point out how slow a day it was.  
We remained the only two customers in the bistro and through a set of 
small movements we now shared a single table.  I couldn't however 
explain those movements if my life depended upon it.  Just some 
strange preternatural mating choreography I suppose.  It is then 
neither an accident nor an acrobatic phenomenon that her hand should 
have meandered to its new and welcome location nor I suppose the 
corresponding and near simultaneous placement of mine.  The pot at 
the end of the rainbow she was now exploring should come as no 
surprise to her but my explorations were a bit more unpredictable.  I 
must say however I was more than pleasantly rewarded by encountering 
distinctly damp undies before the formal transgression of her 
welcomingly lubricated pussy, another testimonial to the erotic power 
of my personal fantasies.

The good sense to relocate to a more intimate venue gave way to the 
passion of the moment.  We didn't even retire to the privacy of the 
WC.  We just got it on there.  Gently we rocked each other back and 
forth with dexterous digits until finally her warmth and wetness 
explosively released, her free hand tightly over her mouth to stifle 
the vocalization of ecstasy.  Her bliss unmistakable, I offered and 
lit a fresh cigarette - for her now a post-coital treat.  Cigarette 
heavily lipsticked and hanging slut style from her lips - what with 
both her hands otherwise occupied - and smoke billowing out around it,
 her first few lusty puffs in conjunction with her skilled handicraft 
brought me quickly into a rather sticky situation of my own.

I'd just engaged in a public sexual encounter and before my third 
morning cup of coffee.  Neither of us had the foggiest notion where 
this might lead to next but clearly neither of us were rushing for 
the door, at least not alone.  After a little freshening up we agreed 
to an early lunch and left the bistro together now arm-in-arm.  While 
our intentions were to head for an 'in' little spot I'd taken 
intimate acquaintances to before, the walk necessarily took us past 
my flat in the process.  Grabbing a half dozen items, the minimal 
number of necessary supplies at the corner store, we chose my place 
as an alternative rendezvous.

Our hunger once again raged and it wasn't for lunch.  In a movie-like 
scene we undressed each other one luscious article at a time taking 
substantial time to sample each new cuisine.  Nothing disappointed.  
Her blondness was pleasantly universal, her skin silky to the touch 
with a complexion of pure ivory, and her distinctively unexpected 
navel ring - a remarkable turn-on.  Everything was low calorie, 
nourishing, and delightfully insatiable.  

Just as I was about to direct her through the door and onto my 
awaiting bed which I had fortuitously made that morning, she paused 
to reach into her purse.  Expecting her to produce some form of 
protection, I was pleased to see that it was instead her cigarettes 
that she'd again retrieved.  Pushing me back down into the chair, she 
draped herself salaciously over its nearby garage sale companion.  
Mechanically she rapped against her wrist the new pack of full 
strength Benson and Hedges that she'd just purchased.  

"Fuck those god damned Lights I've been smoking.  Just another 
apologetic concession to politically correct behavior" she'd said at 
the time.  "If you're looking for a naughty little girl then this 
naughty little girl might as well get all the pleasure she can too, 
don't you agree?"  And so this self-proclaimed naughty little girl 
proceeded to put on a show.  Legs distractingly spread, she opened 
the pack meticulously and deliberately, then audaciously tapped out a 
couple of white filter tips substituting my recovering rod for her 
wrist.  First brushing the partially exposed cigarettes from stem to 
tip, she next drew the pack back up to her lips.  Capturing a 
cigarette, she then teased it out as she slowly withdrew the pack 
momentarily laying it to rest upon my pronouncedly pulsating crotch.  


My reaction certainly didn't go unnoticed.  She watched me rise to 
rigid attention with far more than my eyes.  Throbbingly, I saluted 
as she conducted a classroom demonstration on how to seductively 
light, draw on, inhale, and exhale a cigarette.  Cigarette dangling 
provocatively from what were now obviously moist lips and ashtray in 
hand, she floated about me landing butterfly lightly on her knees 
square between my anticipatively parted legs.  

For perhaps a minute she kept both hands gainfully employed to my 
incredible delight and just when I thought it could get no better, 
she made a single comment "What was that you said about licking and 
sucking cylindrical objects?"  Then swallowing a colossal drag, she 
sent me in after it.  In awe I watched as exhaling smoke made literal 
my figuratively burning loins.  Two more similar iterations and the 
smoke summoned a well deserved and welcomely received chaser.

Two horny Yanks in Paris had found each other.  I hadn't the foggiest 
notion of whether the attraction ran deeper.  Hadn't given it any 
thought.  For the moment I didn't care.  Here was an incredibly hot 
and uninhibited young woman who would live out my smoking fetishes 
with lust no less than my own.  Whether we were long-term destined 
for each other wasn't even a thought.  I couldn't think beyond the 
next orgasm and on that account our brief history indicated more of a 
need for a stopwatch than a calendar.

We did do the Brie and baguette thing with a little vino and 
admittedly I was in need of this kind of sustenance too.  It just 
hadn't been a priority.  We talked a little about what got us to 
Paris and what might lie ahead.  It didn't sound like there were any 
priorities for either of us any more pressing than this grope fest.  
She might be looking for a job over here but she really hadn't 
thought things out that far yet.  Her last relationship had just come 
unglued and she just plain had to get away.  We both agreed that 
she'd made a great choice of where to come.

Halfheartedly I suggested that we go back out and maybe walk the 
Seine and she agreed that we could probably use a little variety in 
this exercise program that we'd just embarked upon.  In the meantime 
however the conversation just took over again thwarting the best of 
intentions.  Finding the story behind a woman smoking nearly as 
erotic as the act itself, I'd casually introduced the topic and she 
took it from there.  The outdoors would just have to wait.

"Well, I'll have to think about that for a minute" she began.  "How 
exactly did I start smoking?  Well it was probably a good ten years 
ago now.  I was maybe twelve or thirteen, twelve I think, at the time.
  No one smoked around our place.  My folks hated smoking.  Actually 
my folks weren't fond of many things other than ladder climbing.  
They were so busy with their lives that they barely knew that my 
sister or I existed.  

I can remember that I tried smoking with a couple of my friends but 
I'm pretty sure we didn't inhale.  The kids I hung with were like A-
list and smoking wasn't really on the seventh grade agenda.  It was 
more like a ninth grade thing for them.  No, you couldn't say that it 
was really my friends that got me started.  Maybe more like the other 
way around would be more accurate" she chuckled.    

"It was actually my aunt, my dad's brother's wife where it all 
started.  This aunt's kind of a crazy woman.  Actually she's more 
than just crazy, she's got more than a little problem with the bottle 
as well.  I don't really know the whole story but Aunty Neve was 
always on the outs with the rest of the family one way or another.  
Nothing she did was ever good enough for them.  I felt kind of sorry 
for her 'cause she'd always been okay to me.  

It was the summer after sixth grade when she started asking me to 
baby-sit for her and I didn't really have much better to do.  I 
didn't really need the money 'cause the way my folks justified their 
inattention was by buying me and my younger sister most anything we 
wanted.  We were kind of rich then but unfortunately it came apart 
later.  I'll tell you about that some other time.  At least baby 
sitting would get me out of the mausoleum we called a home.

So anyhow I started baby sitting for Aunty Neve that summer and 
hanging out there quite a bit.  Most days she didn't actually go 
anywhere.  Only Thursday afternoons, which was her shopping day, was 
she sure to go out.  For some reason shopping would always seem to 
take her at least four hours.  But that's another story too.  Most of 
the time she'd just pay me for helping out or just being there.  We'd 
spend a lot of the time at her kitchen table and she'd chain smoke 
Salems and sip enthusiastically away at her jug of Chianti.  
Eventually she'd either get silly and giggly or morose and start 
crying.  I'd listen either way.  The silly was more entertaining but 
the morose more educational.  

One day when I was particularly pissed about something, I was taking 
my turn bitching about my parents.  This was an action always certain 
to draw her wholehearted support.  I said something about how lucky 
they were that I was such a model kid, near straight A's and all, and 
I wondered just how they would feel if I started causing trouble.  I 
rambled on extolling my own virtues saying something about not 
drinking or smoking and blahdy, blahdy, blah.  It was just one of 
those pity pot days.  

Before I quite knew what hit me, Aunty Neve had my empty water glass 
half full with wine and was handing me her freshly lit cigarette 
across the table.  For a moment I just froze thinking that since I'd 
kind of just described how she was that maybe she was offended.  I 
should have known better.  With unusual animation she said something 
like "Well, so there's your answer.  You can be just like me and 
that'll sure get their attention, won't it?" flashing a big grin.  
The irony suddenly struck me and I began to laugh too as she 
concluded "Go ahead.  Take my cigarette." 

So put to the test I said "You're really serious about this, aren't 
you?  You'd honest-to-God let me do this stuff here if I wanted, 
wouldn't you?  I bet you'd even let me bring some guy over to sleep 
with if I was in to that, wouldn't you?"  

"Fuckin' right!" was her patented response.  "Just let me know when 
your ready.  Nobody likes to get walked in on.  I should know" she 
concluded cryptically.  Continuing, "I don't need a niece near as bad 
as I need a friend.  It's about time for you grow up anyway, Kathy.  
And I'll tell you this, when they find out that you're another Neve, 
I want to be there to rub their faces in it."  That day began the 
transformation from Kathy to Serena.

"So for the first time, certainly the first time in front of an adult,
 I said 'What the fuck', raised up the wine glass up awkwardly and 
took a little sip, and then lifted the cigarette gingerly from the 
ashtray acclimating to the feathery feel of this contraband object.  
My history of cussing, drinking, and smoking were all launched in a 
matter of seconds.  All soon to become comfortable friends.  

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