He inspected the flower again, then impulsively leaned forward and placed it onto the tatami in front of her. Next, with the same control in his powerful hands that had touched the glaze of the tea bowl, he gently gripped the shoulders of her loose yukata. She felt her body flush with warmth as slowly, gently, his strength once more held in check, he carefully slid back the cloth off her shoulders until her breasts were free. Then plucking a petal from the bud, he reverently brushed one nipple, then the other.
It was an erotic game she knew he loved, one of many. Games. Sometimes she had imagined them inhabiting an eighteenth-century shunga, those woodblock prints picturing lovers in what she had once thought impossible embraces.
He'd once declared that the kimono was actually the most sensual garment in the world. Take a look at some of the shunga, he said, and the possibilities become obvious. Though it seems cumbersome, entangling, yet it lifts away like a stage curtain to invite all sorts of dramatic possibilities. The human nude is only interesting when half concealed.
Games. She reached and took the petal from him, then ran it along the silk of his own kimono, over his muscular thighs as he sat, Japanese-style, feet back. Next she lifted away the silk from the flawless ivory skin she knew so well. She drew it along his thighs to tease him.
"Tam . . ." He reached to slip away her yukata, but she
caught his hand. Then she touched his lips with her fingers, silencing his protest. She pushed away his kimono and trailed the petal upward, lightly brushing his own nipples. Finally she pushed him gently backward and smoothed her cheek against his thigh, drawing back his kimono even more.
The glow of the coals was dying now. As the last shadows played against his face, she laid the petal on the tatami and moved across him. . . .
They lingered till the moon was up, then strolled back through the garden wearing their antique wooden clogs. The air was scented, musical with the sounds of night. Later that evening they downed an eight-course meal off antique stoneware plates, drank steaming sake on the veranda, then made love for hours on the futon.
Around midnight he ordered one more small bottle of sake, a go, and suggested they move out onto the veranda again, this time to watch the moon break over the trees. She slipped on her yukata and padded out. She'd just decided.
"Tamara, I want to tell you something." He poured her small porcelain cup to the brim. "You are everything Matsuo Noda is seeking. The way you held the tea bowl tonight, tasted the tea. The cha-no-yu doesn't lie. You have discipline, our discipline. That's very, very rare."