Page 7 of Forbidden Desires

I smiled and shrugged. “Yes, myself and others who have entirely too much money to keep for ourselves and would rather put it to decent use before we’re not able to use it anymore,” I said, directing her toward an abstract painting. “I learned the value of artists and those who create from my mother, and thevalue of applying myself methodically and effectively from my father. Lessons that have served me well here.”

She looked impressed, and I didn’t think too long and hard as to why that mattered to me. Or how easy and comfortable she was to be around. Her red, glossy lips parted as if she were about to say something, but before she could comment, I heard someone call my name.

“Eric! You’re finally here.”

I grinned, turning us toward the source of the lilting, female voice. A beautiful Desi woman in a scarlet sari with gold accents approached, her brown eyes warm and her smile mischievous as she looked between me and Jasmine, still tucked close to my side.

“I was beginning to wonder if you were intending on standing us up tonight, but I see you have the company of a beautiful woman, so I won’t fault you too much on that.”

“Hello, Aanya,” I greeted her. “You know I would never stand up an occasion like this.”

A smirk kicked up one corner of her mouth. “One could only hope that you’d finally chosen to give yourself a vacation, or maybe take an evening off and treat yourself to something delightful.”

I raised my brows. “Art isn’t delightful?”

“Oh, it is, but we both know that even the most dedicated need a palate cleanser every now and then, and you’re hardly, if ever, in the mood to indulge yourself.” She looked to Jasmine, her smile widening. “And you haven’t even introduced me to this lovely flower on your arm tonight. How unexpectedly rude of you, Eric. I expected better,” she teased, then held her hand out to Jasmine. “Aanya. And you are?”

The poised woman at my side shook Aanya’s hand. “Jasmine,” she answered with a friendly smile. “Are you a backer for the gallery?”

Aanya laughed. “Oh, hardly. No, I’m one of the artists. Eric saw my work online a few years back, put in a word for a few workshops and grants, and here I am now, living the dream.”

“That sculpture over there is one of Aanya’s pieces,” I said.

I pointed not too far from where the three of us stood, toward an exhibit that featured a massive marble lotus blossom, and what looked to be gold work details around the edges and seeped into what was likely intentional cracks laid into the marble’s surface. It was a piece that I knew Aanya had been working on for a long time now, something that would end up being one of her best works of hand-sculpted marble to date. It was hard to find work like Aanya’s even in elite spheres. The difference was in the fact that Aanya had an uncommon respect and reverence for the craft and less interest in the commercialization of it.

“Ah, yes, my beautiful little lotus,” she said with a fond sigh. “It’s one of what will hopefully be several marble flowers. If we’re going to be all—” she waved her hand in front of her, a slight roll to her eyes “—philosophical, I wanted to take the concept of how men always love to reference flowers as a vagina metaphor and turn it into something that is utterly lifeless and completely devoid of any sexualism. It is merely a thing to observe. Maybe even to comment on its beauty. But never particularly valued beyond either its utilityorbeauty.” She grinned and leaned closer to Jasmine. “Eric has told me that despite my convictions of appearing to loathe the pretentious, that I do manage to allow myself some nice philosophizing at times.”

Jasmine laughed lightly, then pulled from my arm to approach the sculpture. Aanya and I exchanged a look and followed.

“To be fair,” Jasmine said, studying the piece intently. “It’s something easy to feel when most of those flowers as vaginas metaphors are really only there for one purpose.” Jasminelooked to Aanya, amusement sparkling in her eyes. “To get the man creating those symbolisms laid.”

“Exactly!” Aanya said delightfully. “It almost makes the whole thing devoid of all meaning. Shame, really. I do enjoy the occasional orchid vagina art piece. There’s something about the way the petals fall that is actually quite delicate and feminine. Almost makes you want to reach out and touch them just to see if they’ll react, but it’s incredibly hard to capture that kind of whimsy and feeling in art, painting, sculpture, or otherwise. Are you an artist as well, Jasmine?”

“Once upon a time,” Jasmine answered enigmatically. “Now I’m more so a distant appreciator of the effort.” She nodded toward the lotus blossom sculpture. “You said you were sculpting more to go with this one?”

“Oh, yes. I’ve got a few designs sketched for the series, and I hope to start sculpting the second piece soon. I…”

Grateful to see the two of them hitting it off, which wasn’t always the case with mydatesand other women, I decided to locate something to drink for all of us. It was the first time I felt like I could leave my guest with someone that I knew and not have to worry about what would be said—or done.

Surprisingly, I trusted that Jasmine wouldn’t attempt to pull personal information about myself from Aanya, or pry disrespectfully to see if Aanya and I had ever slept together, which we hadn’t. I didn’t mix friendships with the bedroom, and I was certainly not Aanya’s type. Jasmine seemed far more interested in the art and Aanya’s approach than attempting to scheme something out of me as so many before her had tried.

I smirked to myself. If I were a lesser man, I may have felt a little put out about the situation.

As it was, when I returned with glasses of red wine for each of us, I couldn’t be put out by the way Jasmine’s eyes seemed to sparkle and her laugh tinkled in the air while she and Aanyawere still speaking with each other. They looked like a pair of old friends with the way they stood close to each other, seemingly so comfortable that it was me who was the outsider here, not Jasmine who’d I’d invited into all of this.

It brought an unfamiliar warmth to my face that I quickly schooled before I handed the women their glasses of wine. “I hope that I’m not interrupting too much,” I said, only half-joking. “You two seem to have hit it off. Perhaps Jasmine should be going home with you tonight?”

“Don’t tempt me!” Aanya said, a naughty gleam in her eyes as she glanced back at Jasmine. “Be sure to tell me if he becomes an overbearing no fun zone bore though, will you? And I can whip him into shape for you no problem. I’m not afraid of this silver fox.”

Jasmine chuckled. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

Aanya turned to me. “You have a good evening, Eric. Treat the lady nicely,” she said with a saucy wink before heading off to talk to another patron.

“I like her,” Jasmine mused as she took a small sip of her wine. “Very open. Very funny. I’m impressed she hand sculpts out of solid marble. It’s such a difficult medium to work with, but the result under her hand is just…” She sighed wistfully, looking to the marble lotus blossom once more. “So beautiful.”

It certainly wasn’t the only thing that was beautiful. As she looked at Aanya’s sculpture, I witnessed that same longing in her eyes that I had seen when we had our meeting here. Like there were thousands of tiny gears whirling and twirling in her mind. Like she could see all the reasons why Aanya had made this sculpture and had a hundred reasons of her own as to why it was such a striking piece to begin with.

“I see you’ve found yourself taken with Aanya’s work,” I said, admiring the lotus right along with Jasmine. “She’s one of the most prolific artists that shows in this gallery, along with a fewothers that I help subsidize and fund. If you end up coming back to this gallery, you’ll likely see more of her work.”

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