Years ago, I registered for a weekend workshop called “Tantric Yoga for Women” at an Ashram in the Catskills. It’s the kind of silly thing a single academic sometimes does with her spare time.

Only it wasn’t so silly, after all.

There were about a dozen of us from across the bell-curve of feminine adulthood. Two or three, including myself, were in our twenties. Most had a touch of grey, a few gathering wrinkles, and the slightly saggy boobs typical of women in their thirties or forties. There were also a couple “mature” outliers who were clearly in their fifties and even sixties.

Our instructor, Chanda, was an unpleasantly thin young woman with one of those incredibly limber and carefully sculpted yoga bodies. She had a rather plain face, mousey hair, and an annoyingly serene attitude. By the end of the weekend I was in love with her. We all were.

The point of the workshop was to awaken dormant pleasure centers in order to concentrate and intensify “the orgasm.” And that we did. For two days we gave each other long, teasing massages and explored erogenous zones that, frankly, even the most sexually experienced of us never knew existed. Surprising, it wasn’t entirely about physical sensation. Chandra was emphatic that kindness and compassion, communicated by the empathy in our words and voices, our willingness to please, and especially the softness and selflessness of our touch, could also vastly amplify the power and pleasure of orgasm.

There was just one rule. We couldn't let ourselves cum until the end. There was actually a little candlelit graduation ceremony held in a dark and cavernous yoga studio. Instead of certificates or diplomas, we masturbated ourselves to climax. It was the most intense, explosive and soul-satisfying orgasm I’d ever experienced. You never forget something like that, and from that moment on, I did my best to live my life, or at least my love life, according to the principals of Tantric Yoga.

Which brings me to Brandy.

Brandy Jones was a Sugarbaby, although I didn’t know it yet. In the beginning, she was just the hot girl in the second row of the Neoclassical Brit Lit class I teach at a NYCU.

There’ve been a lot of hot girls in my lectures. But none like Brandy. With the sex-appeal of Mila Kunis, the charisma of Emma Stone, and the looks of a young Megan Fox, Brandy was in a class of own.

Look, I don’t know if it’s Tantric or not, but it’s always the sweetest honeypie that gets the bees. It may not be fair, but it is the way things work.

So, of course, I became hopelessly infatuated. That’s what oversexed, under-appreciated college teachers do.

Call it what you will. Obsessed. Addicted. Enchanted. Fixated. I simply couldn’t get Brandy out of my thoughts. Not during class. Not after class. Not when I got home, slipped off my clothes, and indulged in a little unrestrained Tantric fantasizing. Not even when I was honeydipping on a weekend getaway with my best-friend-with-benefits Sandra.

Clearly, I’m not talking about a platonic infatuation. Pure, rock-my-world lust is more like it. I’ve always been a wet girl when I’m playing with that special someone. But I wasn’t fucking Brandy. I was just looking. One peek of her little booty and I’d get so quaggy that I started keeping spare panties in my desk drawer.

Could it be some kind of super sex-pheromone? Doubtful, really. Brandy was seldom closer than twenty feet. And is there such a thing as a lezzie sex-pheromone anyway?

Tantric magic? I wouldn’t rule it out.

Sandy said I was crushing on Brandy because at thirty-two, my sex drive was peaking and subconsciously I was terrified that everything was going to be down hill. Not the most cheerful analysis, but I suppose there could be some truth to it.

As for myself, I was wondering about the old chestnut that “opposites attract.” I’m freckled, busty and curvaceous. So curvy that I haven’t been in public without a bra since I hit puberty. With a flawless complexion, full sensuous lips, emerald-green eyes and a petite size four figure, Brandy was the diametric opposite.

Normally I’m drawn to generously-endowed women like Sandy who are close to my own age, have expressive eyes, sympathetic smiles, clever minds, and are eager to please. All that went out the window when Brandy walked in the door.

I could spot Brandy’s little ass and coltish legs half-way across campus. Once she had taken her seat, my eyes roamed higher. Her tits were tiny, but had a delicate upthrust shape that never failed to make my mouth water. And Brandy’s nipples spoke a language all their own. Sometimes they lurked inconspicuously. Then, when I least expected it, they rose up and winked furiously in my direction. “Tweak us. Lick us. Suck us. Fuck us,” they’d plead.

I’d try not to stare when her nips got hard and pressed into the soft fabric of her Henley T-shirts. But Brandy’s erect nipples were the longest and most prominent I’d ever seen. I couldn’t look away. I really couldn’t.

Brandy didn’t help me out, either. When her nips stiffened, she’d twist her thick mane of auburn hair into a loose braid and let it cascade down the front of her T-shirt, partly but never completely obscuring those beckoning little suckle knuckles. “Peek-a-boo, we see you,” they’d whisper seductively. “But can you see us?”

All this, mind you, while I’m expounding on Milton’s contempt for political hypocrisy or explaining the social satire of Pope’s mock-epic poems. You have no idea how hard it is to teach about dead white males while fantasizing how a late-teen beauty’s hot tits would feel clamped between your lips. Either set of lips.

When Brandy wore yoga pants, well, those were the days I either changed panties after class, or resigned myself to an afternoon in soggy knickers. Long after class, I’d still be visualizing all the things my tongue would do in the pretty little V-shaped gap between her pussy and her thighs. A couple of students told me how much they enjoyed my passionate lectures this year. They have no idea that the reason my voice quivers with emotion these days is that I’m thinking of all the depraved things I want to do to Brandy’s sweet little honeypie.

Would I actually indulge in those perverse fantasies?

Hell, yes!

NYCU doesn’t have a formal prohibition against faculty-student relationships. But it’s understood that if a student goes public with a credible accusation of favoritism, coercion or harassment, it’s going to be a career-ending event. A full professor might weather the storm, but I’m an untenured instructor who can be replaced, as they say, in a New-York Minute.

Which did nothing to quell my hunger to savor Brandy’s flavor.

“So, Mari,” I asked myself a hundred times, “how do you even know if this girl is a lezzie?” I mean, she doesn’t have a rainbow flag tattooed on her forehead, wear a messy bob cut, carry a penny board in her back pack, or even hunker down under a hoodie.

Call me a dreamer, but I picked up on a couple bi-curious signals, like the black VEER shadow crewneck she wore on cold mornings, her snap-back Mets cap, and the Tegan and Sarah sticker on her laptop. Nothing conclusive, but enough to feed my fantasies. Winner, winner, chicken dinner!

Even Brandy’s innocent gestures stoked my crazy lovepanky. Like when she twirled a pencil between her fingertips. For the longest time, I couldn’t understand why this caused an almost painful yearning between my legs. Then one night when I was touching myself down there, I realized that all this time I’ve been thinking about Brandy’s fingertips massaging my labia with that same easy twirling motion.

Sometimes she’d put a pink pencil eraser between her orthodontically perfect white teeth and bite down. I hardly need to describe how my own nipples felt.

Brandy would also arch her back in a slow feline stretch. That would press her love buds against the tight cotton t-shirt until the material was so distended, their outline was visible from two blocks away. Then she’d lean back and splay her legs, leaving the contours of her pretty little butterfly-shaped pussy lips fully exposed. That never failed to send pangs of raw lust coursing through my erogenous zones, including some of the ones I only learned about in the Tantric Yoga workshop. If my panties hadn’t already flooded, they did now.

I know exactly what you’re thinking: “Mari M. Marlow, PhD! You, of all people, a humanist and female academic, should know better. You’re objectifying an innocent young woman. You’re a lesbian slut and a traitor to Feminism.”

To which I reply: “Just hold your horses. Objectification is what horny people do. We can’t help it.”

Besides, I haven’t finished my story.

My last three lectures of each semester are a sort of Cliff’s Notes summary of everything you really need to know for the final exam. For students who spent the first fourteen weeks texting and sexting or, bless their little hearts, fantasizing about fucking their instructor’s brains out, this is their eleventh hour reprieve. Pay close attention during the final week, and you’ll get at least a “C+.”

When Brandy missed the first review session, I felt a vague sense of relief. At last, I could stay dry while explaining Dryden. When she didn’t turn up for the second session, relief turned to mild concern. After session three, I was genuinely worried.

Not about her grade. Brandy was high-honors material. She’d received an “A” for first semester, her essays were detailed and insightful and whenever she’d answer questions in class, she was thoughtful and well-informed. During the last nine months, she’d only missed a handful of lectures. It just wasn’t like Brandy to skip three classes in a row.

After the last lecture of the year, I walked back to the former storage closet that is my office, and found an e-mail from Brandy: “Can I see you this afternoon about something personal?”

Something personal?

Had Brandy finally picked up on my infatuation? Did she want to talk about “us?” Was she distressed, confused, aroused? Was my transparent lust the reason she’d skipped those last three lectures?

“I’m free at 3. Meet me at my office,” I wrote, my body shivering like a badly tuned violin string.

A few minutes later Brandy answered. “Thanks so much. I’ll be there.”

And she was.

When I opened the door, Brandy had on what looked like an original Antonio Berardi sheath dress with red Jimmy Chou ankle boots and a Jacquard wool and silk trigon scarf wrapped tightly around her neck. I confess I felt a pang of jealousy. Not so much because I could never afford an outfit like that, which I can’t, but because you have to be as skinny as a runway model to pull off a Berardi sheath dress.

She looked so naturally elegant that it took a moment to realize that something didn’t compute. Brandy was on an academic scholarship. I knew that much. So, how did she afford a three-thousand dollar outfit, no matter how casually sophisticated it made her look? And why was she wearing it on campus in the middle of the afternoon a couple of days before final exams?

Then I saw the tears welling up in her big green eyes and an anguished expression spreading across her delicate features. Something had clearly gone terribly wrong for Brandy Jones.

She started to speak, but her voice caught in a sob and in that instant my long sexual obsession broke like a fever, transforming itself into an almost primal urge to provide comfort. Without thinking, I pulled Brandy into my arms and hugged her.

The English Department secretary watched this with an expression of alarm while down the hall, one of my colleagues leaned out of his office to see what the commotion was about. Disconsolate students aren’t exactly unknown near the end of a semester. But a sobbing undergrad dressed like a Park Avenue socialite on the way to a black-tie dance at the Metropolitan Club was a definite cause for curiosity.

I broke the embrace long enough to steer Brandy into my office, where she threw her arms around my waist and continued weeping. Under different circumstances, with her scent in my nostrils, her tiny breasts heaving into me, and my palms against her warm skin, I would have become unspeakably aroused.

But not now. Brandy’s despondent tears awakened some dormant maternal instinct. Instead of tingling sexual excitement, I found myself empathizing with her despair. As her heart beat against my breast, a barrage of powerful emotions rose up inside me. Prurient desire wasn’t one of them.

One thing was certain, this was not about my petty infatuation. Somewhere Brandy’s life had taken a seriously wrong turn, and I would do just about anything to help make it right.

“I’m so sorry…” she gasped, breaking our embrace and stepping toward the door. “I’ll come back… another time… when I’m not so hopeless.”

“It’s O.K.,” I said, squeezing her hand and pulling her gently back. “Don’t go. We can talk now. Everything’s going to work out.”

“I wish I could believe that, Dr. Marlow,” she whimpered. “My life’s such a mess.”

It took some time, but when Brandy’s desperate sobs eventually subsided. I helped her into a chair. She kept her head down and hugged herself by pulling her knees to her chest. Of course, the sheath dress rode high up her thighs and I caught a glimpse of pussy lips pressing against black silk panties. But this time I resisted the urge to take a closer look.

“Start at the beginning,” I urged, reaching out and stroking her cheek with my fingertips. “And, please, call me Mari.”

“Thanks… Mari” she sniffed, still looking forlorn and helpless. “I’ve never messed up like this before. I didn’t even know where to turn. Who to talk to.”

“I’m flattered you came to me. Take your time. Tell me what’s happened. Finding silver linings in black clouds is something of a specialty for me,” I said, passing her a box of tissues.

Brandy took a deep gulp, dabbed away the mascara that was running down her cheeks, then started at the beginning, just like I’d asked.

“I’m from Upstate. My parents own a small grocery. They’re very religious and hardworking. But for some reason they can never make ends meet. There’re four of us kids and growing up we all worked at the store to help out.”

“It was a good childhood, really. But I wanted more. I took AP courses, studied nights, weekends, every moment I had. Graduated Summa Cum Laude, Honors Society, the whole package. Dad urged me to go to a state college in Oswego or Plattsburgh where I’d be close to home and could get a full scholarship and work part time to pay for incidentals.”

“But you knew where that would lead?”

“Oh, yes. I’d worked too hard to spend the rest of my life packing broccoli florets in Nowheresville. So I applied to NYCU. Got an academic scholarship and thought that between a small student loan and a part time job, I could swing the room and board.”

“You underestimated how much it costs to live in the Big Apple?”

“I was clueless. I landed what I though was an amazing job hostessing four nights a week at a fancy restaurant in Chelsea. But it was only minimum wage with no tips, and didn’t even cover my dorm, let alone meals, books, subway pass, and an occasional concert or movie.”

“But the outfit you have on? Antonio Berardi? Jimmy Chou? Jacquard silk scarf. It must cost thousands.” I could see a new outpouring of tears welling up, but Brandy fought it back.

“That’s where I screwed up. Big time,” she sniffled and dug out more tissues. “There was a Senior girl on my floor. She’s from a little Upstate cowtown like me, so I doubt she was a debutante either. It seemed like every night she went out wearing a different outfit, and they weren’t from Old Navy or Collette Consignment either. Then I saw her parked near the door making out with this really old guy.”

“Oh, no!” I gasped before I could catch myself.

“A total ‘Oh, no!’ But when she told me, it seemed so harmless. She’d found this website where college girls hook up with older guys. ‘Everything’s negotiable,’ she told me. ‘No Sexual Activity, that’s called NSA. Heavy petting only. Penetration but no kinky stuff like bondage or S/M. Spell it out in your profile, or come to an agreement on the first date, or even before on the phone. You won’t believe how many generous old guys are out there who just want to hang out with girls our age.’”

“What happened?” Brandy had me hanging on every word now. I’d seen tabloid stories about college Sugarbaby. But I’d never talked to anyone who’d done it.

“I was feeling desperate. I didn’t want to end up as another student-loan horror story. Anyway, just to see what might happen, I set up an account with some selfies and a profile saying I was looking for a sensitive guy between 21 and 80 willing to help with college expenses. I didn’t mention sex one way or the other.”

“I’m sure you had plenty of offers,” I smiled.

“Dozens. Most were just guys trolling for escorts. Lot’s of e-mails like, ‘How about $300 an hour for some serious alone time with you?’ Gina, that’s the girl from my dorm, said to ignore them. That eventually I’d find a guy who was serious about helping out financially in return for companionship.”

“Did you?”

“I thought so. His name was Carl and his family has a big real estate company. He’s almost as old as my Grandfather, which was pretty freaky. But it turned out he keeps himself in shape, has beautiful silver hair, and isn’t all that bad looking.”

“Anyway, we spoke for hours before I actually agreed to meet him. He’d fallen in love with my photos. I was the most beautiful woman he’d ever laid eyes on. It was all very flattering.”

“He was also lonely and searching for someone to share dinners, concerts, sports events, maybe a little clubbing now a then in return for helping with college expenses. I was upfront about sex. Explained I was virgin and didn’t know if I was ready for sex. He said, ‘No problem. We’ll play that one by ear. I won’t pressure you into anything, I promise.’”

“And?”

“I fell for it. At first it was so glamorous and carefree. I think he was re-living his youth and just being with me really was enough. Well, almost enough. Before going anywhere, he’d take me to Saks or Bloomingdales or Creatures of Comfort, and pick out a couple of designer outfits. Dresses, shoes, accessories. He was really into it. Then we’d go into a dressing room and I’d try them on while he watched. I knew he was getting off on seeing me undress, but the things he bought me were so beautiful, and expensive.”

“Did he give you money?”

“No. Maybe he avoided that to make things seem more… legitimate. Like we really were dating. But it didn’t take long to figure out that I could sell stuff on E-Bay. Even if I only got half of what he paid, it was a fortune to me.”

“What about your hostessing job?”

“Carl asked me to quit so I’d have more time for him.”

“Did he honor his promise about not pressuring you?”

“Yeah, he actually did. He’d pick me up in this black Range Rover and after each ‘date,’ we’d park for a while on the edge of campus. He wanted to make out. I was uptight at first, but went along. Once we began deep kissing, he’d get really worked up, and it was a little frightening. I mean, he was so old. When he tried to feel me up, I gently pushed his hands away.”

“How’d he take that?”

“Not bad. He was never angry. Gradually I got more comfortable being with him. One night he said I was making him so horny it was physically painful and would I mind if he just jerked himself off? I didn’t have to help or anything.”

“I mean, like, he’d already given me so much. How could I say no? It was actually a first for me, so I watched pretty intently. He liked that. While he was doing it, I complimented him on his size, he really was bigger than any of the guys I’d seen, and I encouraged him by saying how hot it was to watch. In a strange way, it really was hot.”

“What happened?”

“It became a regular routine. We’d go out and afterward we’d park and make out and once he was hard, he’d take it out and jerk off while I watched and urged him on. He especially like it when I talked dirty. Sometimes he’d asked to see my tits, which he saw all the time anyway, or to look between my legs, even though I always wore panties.”

“At first it was a little creepy. Pretty soon, though, I actually enjoyed the feeling power that came with knowing how much I aroused him. Eventually he wanted me to help, of course. So that started the hand job era. Pretty soon I relented and let him touch me at the same time. Once or twice, I almost orgasmed, but I couldn’t completely let go with Carl.”

“All in all, it sounds pretty innocent,” I said. “By New-York-City standards, anyway.”

“That’s what I thought. Like I said, he seemed to be reliving his youth. With the end of Fall Term coming up, I dropped some hints about how hard it was for me to afford the dorm. I thought maybe he’d give me some money instead of the extravagant shopping trips. A couple days later, when he picked me up, there were two Latin guys with him.”

“I don’t get it?”

“Neither did I, until Carl explained he had the solution to my rent problem and the guys would help move my stuff. If I didn’t love it, they’d move everything back. An hour later I’m standing in this amazing studio apartment with a view down Broadway to Times Square. That night we went to a Billy Joel concert at the Garden and returned to the apartment instead of parking.

“We started making out like usual and soon I was pumping his cock and he was fingering me with one hand and then I felt his other hand on the back of my head gently guiding my mouth onto him. It didn’t really seem like such a big deal. I mean I did it for my high-school boyfriend and all he ever gave me was mono.

I laughed at that. “When did you start having sex?”

“A week ago. But it was just once. Then he dumped me.”

“Oh, Brandy. I’m so sorry!” I could only imagine how rejected, distraught and adrift she felt. “What happened?”

“I can’t say he actually pressured me, but he talked a lot about ‘consummating’ our relationship. By now we’d get naked in bed and if I didn’t blow him, he’d get off by humping between my pussy lips without actually penetrating me.

“A week ago, he took me to Saks and picked out this incredible Fleur de Mal lace bridal kimono. Afterward, we had dinner at the Rainbow Room and stopped to get two bottles of Dom Perignon on the way to the apartment. I knew what he was expecting and made a big deal of taking a long bath and putting on the bridal kimono before getting into bed.”

“I thought he’d be tender and appreciative, but for the first time Carl got rough.

There was no foreplay, he had me suck him off for a few minutes and when he was close, he put me on the edge of the bed with my ass in the air and jammed his dick inside. I yelped in pain, and he put his hand over my mouth to keep me quiet and humped hard and fast for a couple of minutes until he came. Then he wiped the blood off with a towel, pulled up his pants and left without saying goodbye.”

“A fuck-and-run artist!”

“Fuck-and-run for sure. Not much of an artist, though. He didn’t return my texts or phone calls for almost a week. I was terrified to go to classes because I kept breaking down and sobbing at random times.

“Finally, this morning I got a text message telling me to meet him at Smith & Woolensky’s for lunch. He wanted me to wear the Barardi dress, which was the first thing he bought me, so that seemed like a good sign. But he didn’t show up and when I finally returned to the apartment, the locks had been changed and there was a pile of cardboard boxes by the door. Someone had packed up my text books, notebooks, makeup, backpack, computer, headphones and stuff like that. But no clothes. Not the outfits he bought me. Not even my old things from home.”

“Bastard!”

“I can live with getting booted by Carl. In a way, I’m kind of glad. Maybe someday I’ll get my self-respect back. But last week, something else happened. Something much worse.”

“Worse?”

“Yeah, some guy at Nowheresville High School saw my photo on that fucking Sugarbaby website. It was all over town within an hour. My little Bro found out and showed my Dad, who went ballistic. He phoned and screamed at me for an hour. Called me a whore and a slut and said he never wanted to see me again,” Brandy was sobbing again.

It was a little awkward, but I wrapped my arms around her shoulders and pulled her close. “I know this sounds crazy right now. But before long, he will be pleading for you to come home,” I assured her.

“But he was so cold… so furious. He’d never been like that before.”

“Trust me on this. I’ve had some experience with Catholic guilt. It may take a few weeks, but he will come around, I guarantee it,” I told her with conviction. What I didn’t mention, was that if her Dad failed to forgive Brandy out of his own sense unconditional love, I would make damn sure he did it for less altruistic reasons.

She nodded, but clearly wasn’t convinced. It was also dawning on me that somehow Brandy was going to have to put all this emotional turmoil behind her to concentrate on finals. As a scholarship student, a couple bad grades could derail her entire college career.

And I realized something else. Brandy probably didn’t have a place to stay, or even a safe place to leave her laptop and books.

“What about your stuff?” I asked. “Is it safe?”

“I guess so,” she said. “I took an Uber to my old dorm. I have a couple of friends there and am still on good terms with the RA. I thought maybe she’d let me stay in an empty room until exams were finished. But everything’s full. She’s keeping my stuff and said that as long as no one complains I can sleep in the lounge tonight.”

I groaned. “When’s your first exam?”

“Monday,” she frowned. Just three days away.

“You need a quiet place where you can focus,” I told her.

“I know. I know,” there was a hint of desperation in her voice. “I’m going see what I can find on AirBnB.”

“I’ve got a better idea,” I told her. “There’s an extra bedroom in my apartment. It’s set up as an office, but there’s a futon with clean sheets and a half-empty closet. It’s the perfect place to cram for finals. After your last exam, you can hit AirBnB, Roomster, Couchsurfing or whatever.”

Brandy was speechless. Then she started crying again. “I can’t… I can’t impose on you like that,” she said through a new storm of tears.

“It’s a non-negotiable offer. Come on, I’ll show you the place and get you a key. I think there’s some abandoned sweat shirts and jeans in the closet that should fit well enough until you can get over to H&M or Forever 21.”

I know what you’re thinking. But you’re wrong. At that moment, the only thing on my mind was making sure Brandy didn’t tank her GPA and end at some remote Upstate community college.

I borrowed Sandy’s Prius to pick up Brandy’s stuff, and helped her settle into my apartment. Normally, spare bedrooms in New York City are scarcer than an empty yellow cab in a downpour. But there’s nothing normal about faculty housing. They say it takes an annual income of $98,000 to afford your own place in Manhattan. Not needing to share your rent-subsidized faculty apartment with random roommates is one the biggest perks of teaching at NYCU.

For the next five days, Brandy worked on term papers and studied relentlessly for exams. We settled into a predictable routine. Brandy would be on her second cup of coffee by the time I woke up. In the evenings, I’d cook a light dinner and we’d work side-by-side cleaning the kitchen. At night, Brandy’s lights went out about midnight while I stayed up for another hour or two reading or watching TV.

It didn’t take long for Brandy to work her way back into my sexual fantasies. It started the first afternoon when I noticed her studying in the nude with her slender back and perfect butt on full display through the open door.

There’s no way she could be unaware of my own sexual proclivities. My apartment’s practically a celebration of bi-sexuality, starting with the refrigerator photos of Sandy and me making out in Halloween costumes and my Georgie O’Keefe prints. There’s also a carefully-curated DVD collection with titles such as “Blue Is the Warmest Color,” “Laurel Canyon,” “Pretty Persuasion,” “Water Lilies,” “Imagine Me & You,” “Saving Face,” “Loving Annabel,” “Mulholland Drive,” “Fingersmith,” “The Incredible True Adventures of 2 Girls In Love,” “Room in Rome,” and my all time favorite, “Codependent Lesbian Space Aliens Seeks Same!”

I won’t even get started on my lesbian-themed book collection.

If my sexual orientation caused Brandy any uneasiness, she never showed it. On the contrary, although she would slip into a sweater and jeans for dinner, the rest of the day she seldom wore more than a long Henley T-shirt and white cotton panties. Not exactly what you’d expect from girl who’s uncomfortable with a bi-sexual roommate.

Yes, the old ache returned. But in a kinder, gentler way. For some reason, I could at least admire her charms without becoming consumed with concupiscence.

As roommates go, Brandy was much more considerate than I would have been at her age. She never ate my probiotic yogurt, used my mascara, borrowed my tampons, left dirty dishes in the sink, blasted music, shouted into her cell phone, or sang in the shower. Her respect for my privacy was almost unnerving. At times, I almost forgot she was sharing my apartment.

The two big threats to Brandy’s GPA were a Chemistry Final on Thursday afternoon and a Chinese Mandarin term paper due on Friday. I was friendly with Lin Chen, the Mandarin and Cantonese instructor, and when I ran into her in the faculty dinning hall I explained there’d been a recent tragedy in Brandy’s family. Chen was quick to e-mail Brandy a sympathy note and extend her term-paper deadline by a week. As for Chemistry, Brandy was on her own with that.

“How’d it go?” I asked when she returned after the Chemistry final.

Brandy just groaned, but from her smile I could tell it wasn’t a complete disaster. “Do you happen to know what alkaline earth metal is located in period 3?” she asked.

“Hmmm… let me think. Vulcan Glimmerglass?”

We had a good laugh, then Brandy caught me off guard with full-frontal hug that ended with her face pressed firmly against my breasts.

“What’s that for?” I asked.

“I got an e-mail from Dr. Chen about my Mandarin paper. That had to be you.”

“Guilty,” I grinned, gently breaking the hug before I did something rash like putting my fingers under Brandy’s chin and pulling her lips to mine.

That evening she was still in a celebratory mood and we finished off a bottle of Chardonnay along with two plates of my best veal scallopini. We joked around a lot and a couple of times I notice Brandy looking at me with a bemused smile. After we cleaned up, she gave me another hug, then went back to her room to study.

I was reading in bed around 10pm when Brandy tapped lightly on my door. She had a mischievous grin I’d never seen before. “Umm, Mari,” she stammered. “Can I ask you something?”

“Of course, Sweetie. What is it?” Sometime during the week, I’d begun calling her “Sweetie” without even realizing it.

“I’m kind of burned out. Want to do something together? Watch a movie, maybe?”

My libido screamed, ‘Oh, my god, yes!’ Fortunately, my brain interceded. “I’d love that,” I told her. “I could use a break too.”

“Great! You’ve got so many cool DVDs. I’ll go pick something.”

“Do that. I’ll move the DVD player to the living room.” I have TVs in my bedroom and living room, but just one DVD player.

“Oh, don’t bother. Let’s watch in here. It’s so much cozier.”

Did Brandy just say she wanted to watch a movie in bed with me? It sure sounded that way. There were only four pieces of furniture in my bedroom. Two night stands, a dresser with the TV on top, and a queen-sized bed. For a place to sit, my bed was the only option.

“Oh, wow!” she shouted from the living room. “‘Room in Rome,’ I’ve always wanted to see it.”

“You’ve heard about it?” I asked, heart pounding.

“Oh, sure. A night of passion that will change their lives. Directed by Julio Medem. Unrated.”

“You’re reading from the cover,” I giggled.

“I am.” She was now standing in the door, holding the DVD case so I could see the photo of the two beautiful and naked actresses, Elena Anyna and Natasha Yarovenko, embracing against a fanciful background of flower blossoms and butterflies. “I heard it’s an erotic lesbian romance. Is it explicit?”

“It’s not exactly porn. But there isn’t much left to the imagination, either,” I told her.

“Sounds yummy,” she said with an expression that was simultaneously innocent and flirtatious. “Some girls like girls like boys do, you know,” she added with a wink. “That’s nothing new.”

With hands trembling, I switched on the TV and dropped the DVD into its tray. It had been a couple of years since I’d seen ‘Room in Rome.’ While the plot couldn’t be simpler, Spanish dyke seduces straight young Russian beauty, it took a few beats to recall some of the specific scenes. When I did, my heartbeat kicked it up another notch.

For a girl who likes other girls, and it was becoming increasingly obvious that Brandy was one of us, ‘Room in Rome’ was not a film that can be seen without becoming sexually stimulated. And not just a little excited, but a full-on ‘let’s go into the ladies room and fuck’ kind of aroused.

“You’re sure about this?” I asked as the main menu appeared on screen.

Brandy nodded vigorously as she made a little nest in my pillows. Looking both stunningly beautiful and surprisingly relaxed, she leaned back against my old wrought-iron headboard. Then hugged she her knees to her chest, and this time I didn’t even try to disguise my admiration of her naked thighs, the drum-tight panty panel between them, and the obvious outline of her pussy lips. Brandy glanced at me briefly with a shy smile, then returned her attention to the screen.

I settled onto the bed next to her, our bodies not touching, but close enough I could feel the heat from her bare arms. As Alba began her on-screen seduction of Natacha, Brandy let out a soft sigh and her head fell gently on my shoulder, as if it was the most natural thing in the world. Which for Brandy, perhaps it was.

About 20 minutes into the film, Alba overcomes Natacha’s last resistance and the now nude women tumble into bed. Around three minutes later, Natacha experiences her first lesbian orgasm.

“That’s so hot,” Brandy whispered, even though in the aftermath, Natacha seems to be having second thoughts. “I can’t believe how wet I am. It’s been so long. Would you mind if I… um… masturbate?”

Was this really happening? The object of my unrequited sexual obsession in my bed, watching an insanely arousing lesbian film, and asking politely if she could butter her biscuit with me only inches away. Talk about getting lucky.

“Not as long as I can join you.”

“I was hoping you’d feel that way,” she grinned as her fingers reached inside her shirt and cupped her breast. “Do you remember the first time you came?”

“Like it was yesterday. But mine wasn’t the typical ‘girl discovers what her fingers are really for’ story.”

“Really? What happened?”

“I was jumping around on an old Victorian couch and accidentally found that when I pressed my honey pot against the soft leather, it made me tingle all over. Especially between my legs.”

“You humped your sofa?” Brandy asked, putting it rather indelicately.

“That’s about it,” I giggled as I unbuttoned my jeans and wiggled them off my hips. “What about you?”

“I shared a room with my older sister and sometimes late at night I’d hear all this rustling and squishing and moaning from her side of the room. I asked my best friend what she thought was happening and she just told me, ‘Google masturbation, Dummy.’

“So, that’s what I did and, man, did I get an eyeful.” Brandy had both hands under her shirt, while on-screen, alba was fingering Natacha to another girl-on-girl orgasm. “I found all this solo girl porn. It was sure educational, and sexy.”

“Ahhh. I was an only child. I had to work it all out for myself,” I said, kicking my jeans onto the floor. “After the sofa, I discovered my fingers. But it was too late, I was head-over-heels in love the Chesterfield.” I paused briefly, watching her fingers massage her nipples under the thin cotton T-shirt. “You must have found plenty of solo boy porn as well?”

“Of course, but it was always girls that got my horny on,” Brandy laughed quietly, then pulled one hand out from under her shirt long enough to reach up and draw my lips to hers.

Our first kiss started slowly, almost hesitantly. Lips barely touching lips. Gently I pushed my tongue into Brandy’s mouth, searching for hers. For the briefest of moments she seemed reluctant. Then, her lips relaxed and she offered it to me. I sucked her tongue and wondered if she would do the same to me.

She did. For a long time our tongues played together. Sometimes stiff, sometimes soft. Sucking, swirling, and probing in what I hoped would be the prelude to a far more extensive oral exploration of our most secret places.

When we finally broke off, Brandy exhaled with a long and vocal sigh, as if this kiss were something that she, too, had hungered for.

That’s when I lost control. I pulled her hard against my breasts, and forced myself into her mouth. She opened to receive me and once again our tongues danced, embracing and recoiling, making moist, slippery contact again and again. This time there was no reluctance, no hesitation. Just unbridled lust. My nipples tingled, butterflies fluttered in the pit of my stomach, and my pussy ached for Brandy’s warm fingers.

Another deep sigh, then Brandy confessed, “I’ve wanted this so badly, Mari. All those months in class. I knew…”

“You knew what, Sweetie?”

“That we were the same. That we both like girls. But you were my teacher. So confident and sophisticated… an unapproachable goddess.”

I sighed, “Do you have any idea how desperately I lusted after you?”

“A little. I mean, I couldn’t help but notice the way you sometimes looked at me. It made me feel important. And excited. That’s why I did those things…”

“Those things?”

“To tease you. I’m sorry, Mari. I couldn’t help it. When you were watching, I’d pretend my pencil eraser was your nipple. Or I’d spread my legs to see if I could catch you peeking.”

“Did you?”

“All the time,” she said as our lips converged in another wet, squirming kiss. An electric shock surged up and down my spine as Brandy’s fingers crossed the space between us and came to rest on my breast.

“Do you want to see them?” I asked, looking down at the tiny fingers cupping my tit through blouse and bra.

“I’d like that very much.”

Without bothering with the buttons, I pulled my blouse over my head, then reached behind my back and undid the bra clasp. Before removing it, however, I took Brandy’s fingers and guided them to my nipple. My breasts felt full and glandular, like they do whenever my peach gets really juicy.

“Mmm, they’re excited,” she said dreamily.

“What about you, Sweetie? Do you know how many hours I spent playing peek-a-boo in class with your nippies? You do realize that you have the most provocative love bumps I’ve ever seen?”

Brandy didn’t answer with words. Instead, she grabbed the hem of her T-shirt and gently lifted it over her head. Her tits were milky white with pale pink areola no larger than a nickel. At the center of each was turgid pink nipple at least three-quarters-of-an-inch long.

Simultaneously, we moved to suck each other’s nipples. The result was a dull and painful thud as our foreheads collided.

“Age before beauty,” I muttered, pushing Brandy back against the pillows while my mouth latched onto her breast with the force of an angry limpet. Brandy squirmed and moaned in unison with Alba and Natacha, who were rapidly approaching the crescendo of a mutual orgasm.

You might think that after all the endless hours of fantasizing about Brandy’s nips, that the real thing would be anticlimactic. I even flashed for moment on Carl, who toyed with Brandy for months, yet when she finally surrendered her virginity, he responded with revulsion. There was nothing about Brandy that could ever repulse me. But I was both troubled and exhilarated by the very real possibility that we just might be falling in love.

When I bit down and gently rolled Brandy’s nipple between my teeth, her green eyes flashed open in surprise, then fluttered closed again as she murmured a soft, “Oh, yes!” In the brief instant that our eyes locked, I saw something rare and wonderful in Brandy’s expression. Not love perhaps, but one of love’s most essential ingredients: unconditional trust.

I pummeled her nipples with my lips, teeth and tongue, then sucked each tit deep into back of my mouth. At the same time Brandy’s warm fingers returned to my breasts. At first she cupped each one, as if taking measure of its size and shape. Then her thumb and forefinger encircled my nips and began rhythmically squeezing and tugging. I have large areola and shallow, thick nipples that seldom seem to get truly hard. But under Brandy’s relentless teasing, they were soon standing tall and erect.

“My turn!” she exclaimed, lowering her head to my breast. There was no way Brandy could take more than a fraction of either hooter into her mouth. But while sucking as deeply as she could, she unexpectedly fluttered my distended nip with her tongue, sending a powerful jolt straight to my clit. “Oh, fuck! Yes,” I blurted.

Soon, my pleasure centers were all but overwhelmed as Brandy’s mouth and fingers expertly manipulated my nipples and mammary glands. I was drifting in a liquid sea of lust with my entire consciousness focused on the exquisite sensations within me. Brandy was taking me so deep into the erotic rabbit hole, I wondered if I could ever find my way back even if I wanted to, which I didn’t. Only a fool would swim against Brandy’s warm, wet whirlpool of velvet bliss.

It’s not so much that I lost track of all time and space. It was more like time and space ceased to exist altogether. Brandy’s tongue and lips and fingertips were transporting me into some alternate universe where the only dimension was the sensation of pleasure pulsing through me very essence. ‘So this is what the tantric awakening feels like,’ I thought to myself.

Brandy’s voice was whispering to me from some distant corner of my new universe. “The wave is gathering, Mari. The mysteries of your body are unfolding inside you. Embrace the white electric heat of the first blinding pulse.

“Let the second wave consume the first, compounding it’s own fiery energy,” she continued in a soft but confident tone of voice. “When the third wave arrives, it will touch every nerve in a climax so profound it can never be surpassed.”

All I could do was moan. I was no longer merely floating in a sea of rapture, I was tumbling through some cosmic rip in the very structure of matter. A rainbow-colored explosion of photons, protons, gluons, quarks and bosons danced and spun around me as all that ever was and all that ever will be became untethered from its foundations.

When my orgasm hit, it caught us both by surprise. My body tensed, my hips rose off the bed, my toes curled and I convulsed in ecstasy. When I finally stopped shuddering and opened my eyes, Brandy was looking down at me in wonder with thick ropes of saliva dripping off her chin. My chest was flushed and heaving and wet with sweat and spittle.

I wanted to pull Brandy to me and kiss her until the rapture consumed us both. But I was panting too hard to kiss and in the afterglow that was gathering inside me, I was far too relaxed to move. Brandy’s fingertips ran though my hair and stroked my cheeks with loving touch.

“Nipplegasm,” I gasped. “It isn’t a myth after all.”

“That was so intense,” Brandy said, her face still beaming. Somewhere in the background, I could hear Alba and Natacha speaking softly to each other as Brandy’s body stretched out next to mine, her arms around my neck and her lips nestled against my ear.

Slowly, my consciousness was returning to the real world. But Brandy had other ideas.

“Close your eyes, Darling,” she whispered. “Feel my arms around you and the warm glow that is enveloping us…”

Her voice was peaceful, perfectly modulated and every word punctured my consciousness with the power of an enchanted rune.

“Drift with me into the golden cloud… Our bodies lighter than air… Rising together… Wrapped in the protection of each other’s arms… Drifting higher… Through the ceiling and the roof… Above the trees… The lights of the City spilling out below in all directions…”

I was feeling it, every magic word. In my mind’s eye it was all happening, just the way Brandy described.

“Higher still, Mari… Our bodies enfolded in a glowing cloud… Leaving the earth behind… Flying free across a universe of fiery stars… Together…”

Somewhere inside, a dam burst and my tears erupted. Tears of joy. Tears of gratitude. I clung to Brandy as we fell off the astral plane and tumbled toward the inky black earthbound night.

When I finally opened my eyes, we were curled up side-by-side, naked save for our panties. The room was darker than I remembered, the only light coming from the flickering television screen and the pale green glow of Brandy’s eyes.

We stayed like that, motionless, looking into each other’s souls until the closing credits of “Room in Rome” interrupted my reverie.

“I’ll cherish the memory of tonight until my dying breath,” I told her.

“Let’s hope that isn’t for a long, long time.”

“Even if I had all the time in the universe, Brandy there’s only one thing I’d want to do with it.”

“What’s that?” she asked, propping her head a quizzical angle.

“This,” I answered as my fingers gently tugged Brandy’s panties down her legs and my lips began a feverish descent between her breasts, along her flat tummy and abs, and into the beckoning gap between her thighs.

Brandy sucked in a deep breath and arched her hips to meet my tongue as it parted her sweet pussy lips.

“Oh, my! Sweet as honeypie,” I said to myself. This was going to be a night that neither of us would ever going to forget.

To be continued...