Femme Fatale and other stories Read Free

say.”
    “What did you wear, Mona, when you were driving those boys crazy? None of those obvious outfits for you, right? You were one of those subtle ones, like Grace Kelly. Pretty dresses, custom fit.”
    “Right.” She brightened. Clothing was one of the few things that interested her. “That’s what these girls today don’t get. I had a bathing suit, a one-piece, strapless. As modest as it could be. But it was beige, just a shade darker than my own skin, and when it got wet …” She laughed, the memory alive to her, the effect of that bathing suit on the young men around the pool at the country club in Atlanta.
    “I wish you still had that bathing suit, Mona.”
    “I’d still fit into it,” she said. It would have been true two months ago, before she discovered Starbucks.
    “I bet you would. I bet you would.” Bryon’s voice seemed thicker, lower, slower.
    “I never let myself go, the way some women do. They say it’s metabolism and menopause”—oh, she wished she could take that word back, one should never even allude to such unpleasant facts of life—“but it’s just a matter of discipline.”
    “I sure wish I could see you in that suit, Mona.”
    She laughed. She hadn’t had this much fun in ages. He was flirting with her, she was sure of it. Gay or not, he liked her.
    “I wish I could see you in your
birthday
suit.”
    “Bryon!” She was on a laughing jag now, out of control.
    “Why can’t I, Mona? Why can’t I see you in your birthday suit?”
    Suddenly, the only sound in the room was Bryon’s breath, ragged and harsh. It was hard to see anything clearly, with the lights shining in her eyes, but Mona could see that he was steadying the camera with just one hand.
    “You want to see me naked?” she asked.
    Bryon nodded.
    “Just … see?”
    “That’s how we start, usually. Slow like. Everyone has his or her own comfort zone.”
    “And the video—is that for your eyes only?”
    “I told you, I’m an independent filmmaker. Direct to video. A growing market.”
    “People pay?”
    Another shy nod. “It’s sort of a … niche within the industry.”
    “Niche.”
    “It’s my niche,” he said. “It’s what I like. I make other films about, um, things I don’t like so much. But I love watching truly seasoned women teach young men about life.”
    “And you’d pay for this?”
    “Of course.”
    “How much?”
    “Some. Enough.”
    “Just to look? Just to see me, as I am?”
    “A little for that. More for … more.”
    “How much?” Mona repeated. She was keen to know her worth.
    He came around from behind the camera, retrieved a laminated card from the drawer in the vanity table, then sat on the bed and patted the space next to him. Why laminated? Mona decided not to think about that. She moved to the bed and studied the card, not unlike the menu of services and prices at a spa. She could do that. And that. Not that, but definitely that and that. The fact was, she had done most of these things, quite happily.
    “Let me make you a star, Mona.”
    “Are you my leading man?”
    “Our target demographic prefers to see younger men with the women. I just need to get some film of you to take to my partner so he’ll underwrite it. I have a very well-connected financial backer.”
    “Who?”
    “Oh, I’ll never say. He’s very discreet. Anyway, he likes to know that the actresses are … up to the challenges of their roles. Usually a striptease will do, a little, um, self-stimulation. But it’s always good to have extra footage. I make a lot of films, but these are the ones I like best. The ones I watch.”
    “Well, then,” Mona said, unbuttoning her blouse. “Let’s get busy.”
    F ETISH ,
M ONA SAID TO HERSELF as she shopped in the Giant.
Fetish,
she thought as she retrieved her mail from the communal boxes in the lobby.
I am a fetish.
This was the word that Bryon used to describe her “work,” which, two months after their first meeting, comprised four short films.