The Mammoth Book of Women's Erotic Fantasies by Sonia Florens Page B

time, you still think my painting is some kind of game?”
    “Don’t get on that high horse again. Making a point, that’s all. Some of us have to be in certain places at certain times; some of us have to do certain things, though we
don’t want to do them. You don’t have to do anything.”
    “I see. I have nothing to do, I have nothing to think about?”
    Once upon a life this used to be my magic place; a place where nothing could hurt me.
    We walk on in angry silence until we reach the stream. He stops, clasps his hands behind his back, stoops as he says, “The great artist. Ha!”
    Will not react. Paint a picture of a unicorn hanging by its hooves, blood dripping from his mouth. In the cavity I will put Alan.
    Cress grows lush and appetizing. It is the first of the plants I harvest in the ravine. Salad tonight. Perhaps a cold cress soup. Pick an armful. There should be some nasturtiums at the fence
which separates this land from McLaren’s. A hoofprint.
    “Look, there’s been a horse here. Imagine! A horse drinking at our stream.” Trace the mark with my finger just as if I was drawing it in the form classes in art school.
    He doesn’t look at the print. “Probably one of McLaren’s horses broke through the fence.”
    “Never! This couldn’t be one of those ugly, scraggly, great mulching-bags of riding-school horses; it has to be the print of a gentle stallion, full-maned, flowing tail, nostrils
flared and breath billowing before it like a tunnel of steam. Yes, that’s how I see the horse which made this print.” Giggle in spite of my mood. Romantic idiot. He ignores this, or he
didn’t hear. Just as well.
    Bunch my cress with some dead grass. No, the nasturtiums are too small for picking. We walk back to the house in silence. The day is yellow and bitter. It has the taste of overcooked meat.
    Frame 4. Another week on this damned unicorn. It’s solid. Dead. No magic, a mundane glibness.
    So, take a walk, girl, go and find the magic in your special place. Look at the rocks, feel the humid damp, wallow in the rotting leaves and stick your nose into a damned trillium. Pink or
white.
    One colour, one movement, one shape, and it could make everything come alive. Sure it could.
    Find the spot where the cress grows. Funny, the cress has all gone. See a unicorn eating my cress and he’s welcome to it. Set up my easel, spread my blanket and line up the paints. The
ground is spotted with camomile flowers. I lean against an elm and meditate, clear my mind, become the forest. Float. Huron woman waits for her man to welcome him onto a bed of fine moss; early
settler picks ripe tomatoes from her vine as the bread rises; farmer disappears into the heavy corn to see if it’s ready for picking.
    Clear morning light changes to midday hazy softness as I paint. Colours swirl round me. Forms join and separate.
    Need a rest. Bend down to the stream for a drink. More prints in the soft mud. Touch them. They are fresh. What horse this?
    Frame 5: Deep inside the forest the unicorn blends into the dappled shadows and vibrating leaves and spotted rocks. He’s behind the elm where I work. His breath brushes
my bare shoulders, no more than a breeze. He strokes me with his nose. Yes, this shining black horse with the fine turned horn which explodes out of the bone of his skull. Reach out and stroke the
horn – dry, hard, rough. Fondle his hot, furry nose. Curl my fingers round the nostrils and with the other hand rub the tip of the horn.
    “I can see you’re friendly.”
    He nuzzles my cheek with his mouth.
    “You are a silly old horse. I think that you could be almost human.” Keep my hand on his neck and the touch of him is as comfortable as the touch of a child. His breath on my face.
Lean against the tree. He rubs my face with the side of his horn. Now his head is in the angle between my head and shoulder. I hold his head in my hands; his breath is fresh, like grass. This
gentle, huge animal. This silky, warm