She has convinced her husband to take the children for the afternoon, has told him she needs to rest, and to prepare for the evening. She will be alone for hours. Unhurriedly she makes the bed, stripping it down to the mattress, carrying the sheets and quilts and pillowcases to the laundry room, retrieving new sheets and quilts and pillowcases, stretching the fitted sheet, tucking in the flat sheet, smoothing the quilt, fluffing the pillows before and after covering them. The bed is clean, crisp, pristine, inviting.

Selecting a sheer white robe from her dresser she lays it on the bed, positioning it carefully in the center for later use.

The bedroom ready, she proceeds to the bathroom, places a towel on the floor, cleans the tub, kneeling on the towel, humming softly to herself, her strong back muscles rippling with each cleansing stroke, her breasts, confined only by a sweatshirt, rubbing nipple to cloth, cloth to nipple as she sways, a stray lock of dark hair falling annoyingly across her pale face.

The tub gleams at her.

Satisfied, but knowing her hair must be dealt with, she returns to the bedroom, lays out curlers on the mantle in front of the mirror in a neat row, arranging each curler with her fingertips. She barely glances at herself as she undresses, it is not yet time, she is too self-critical, but still she smiles slightly at her breasts, at the eagerness of her nipples in the cool still air. Carefully she folds her clothes, places them in the hamper, returns to the bathroom to run the shower, bare feet padding across wood and tile, breasts swaying, nipples hard. Idlely she strokes herself with her right hand as her left hand tests the water. Across her breasts, between her legs. Warm and wet. Warm and wet.

Anticipating the evening, the party, the beginning of a new year, she steps under the shower head, alone in the house, able to speak her mind, she repeats the names of every man she has ever fucked, has ever wanted to fuck, intends to fuck in the very near future. The names are accompanied by images, erotic, naked, too fragmented, brief, and incomplete to assert any control, to overtake her, to occupy her. She is very much in charge as she mutters, almost violently soaping her body, shampooing her hair, experiencing the pounding, the heat, of the water, reveling in the washing away of dirt and past and reality. The washing done she simply stands, letting the water flow over her, letting her mind soar, picking a man from the list, an older man, a bigger man, a stronger man, a muscular man, before turning off the water, stepping onto the towel, placed on the floor.

"Fuck me!" She demands of the steamy room, the empty house, the imagined lover. Vigorously she dries herself, moves before the mirror, wipes off the condensation, combs her hair, breasts swaying, nipples pointing, self-abandonded to delusion, her babbling almost incomprehensible even to herself. "Fuck me hard you bastard, stick your big cock inside me, suck my breasts"

Again she moves between the rooms, back to the bedroom, and the bedroom mirror. Pictures the man in the mirror as she curls her hair, pictures him sitting up in bed, his back against the headboard, his hair a distinguished grey, his eyes bright and piercing, his chest broad and bare, his delicious gigantic erection hard in his softly stroking hand. She teases him, puts on a show, licks her lips, sways her ass, flexes her back, moves her neck, her delicious neck, admiring herself as she knows he must be, would be, if he were really there.

One last check to see how gorgeous she really is, trailing her hands along her neck, across her breasts, and her stomach, again between her legs before walking to the bed, putting on the robe, sheer white over pale skin beneath dark piled hair and curlers. Kneels on the bed, facing the headboard, as though riding her husband's boss, her palm mimicing the slap of hip against clitoris, her fingers tweaking her nipples as she imagines him sucking them. Faster and faster she rubs and strokes, tweaks and bounces and curses out loud, leaning forward into the headboard on her left arm, grimacing, face red, right hand flying, she comes, grunting, screaming, shouting his name.

When her husband returns with the children some half hour later he finds her in bed, reading, glowing, incredibly attractive in curlers and sweats with her neck exposed. Giggling she fends off his advances, asks him to help cook dinner and help get the kids ready. Everyone fed, the kids ready to be dropped at his parents' house for the night, they dress, him in tuxedo, her in evening gown, the curlers removed, he too occupied by complexities of cufflinks to notice that the evening gown is all she has on besides earrings and necklace. She twirls gracefully in front of him, making him hard, knowing he anticipates a midnight kiss, a cab ride home, a night alone together.

They arrive at the party fashionably late, elegantly attired, are greeted warmly at the door by her husband's boss, their gracious host. Within minutes they are separated in the large house, by the large crowd. She socializes independently, flitting about the house, looking, looking. Minutes before the magic hour she finds herself in a guest room, far from the rest of the guests, finds her host seated on the guest bed, distinguished, gray, large, strong, muscular, smiling, eyes twinkling, his back propped against the headboard, his pants unzipped, stroking himself as he watches her close the door, lock the door, walk to the bed, raise her dress up over her waist, kneel over him, lower herself onto him, impaling herself, filling herself, gasping and moaning as her very soul is stretched by his cock, bending forward to kiss him deeply as the clock strikes twelve and the new year unfolds in all its glory before her.