X is for Xanthopia or Xylophone or X-ray

X is such a tricky letter. Probably the trickiest of the entire alphabet. You want to avoid being an arrogant show-off. Besides, who would believe that I didn’t just Google it, words starting with X, huh? And the word must connect with the story, unless I embark on a new one. Will it be a new adventure or a plausible diversion from the previous story?

X-ray is one of the obvious choices. How can anyone find an X-ray story that is even remotely titillating? And that’s where I will gladly prove you wrong with the help of the brilliant lyrics of The Girl with X-Ray Eyes, one of my most favorite songs written by Noel Gallagher, during his post-Oasis era. From one smut writer to another, an odd confession: it’s extremely hard to write a decent description of a blowjob, to make it tasteful, erotic, and poetic simultaneously. And Mr. Gallagher just nailed it, pardon my unintentional pun. Because it is the most poetic description of a BJ in the history of BJs, bar none.

As she swallowed space and time

We gathered pearls and swine

She shot me to the sun

Like a bullet from the gun

Indeed, words to live by: She swallowed space and time. Good girl!

Xylophone, on the other hand, would be another simple option, given Nick’s choice of the implement, a stingy ruler. He did play me like a xylophone, alternating between both cheeks and upper thighs, crisscrossing the marks for extra ouchiness. Low moans and high-pitched shrieks, prolonged owwws and shorter yikes, repetitive no-no-no’s and sharp ah’s—all the sounds of a very particular pain repertoire, spanned over three octaves or so—all skillfully extracted by his firm hand.

But it’s Xanthopia that has my heart. For Google-deprived and lazy ones, it’s an eye condition that makes you see the world with a yellow tint. Metaphorically, it would be a person who sees the world through yellow sunglasses: sunlit by a warm yellow light, feet drowning in a hot yellow sand, with a cold yellow umbrella drink in hand. When life gives you lemons, you put on a lemon-yellow lingerie set, grab the world by its balls, and squeeze them like lemons.

I had a lemon-yellow set ages ago; it’s still at the bottom of my lingerie drawer: a lace bralette and a thong, two sizes two small now. Who even cares, lingerie isn’t meant to stay on for long enough for anyone to notice if it’s too small. Hell, they won’t even remember the color, unless it’s red or black. And thongs cannot be too small, as they cover nothing, even if they are the right size. There!

I lie across Nick’s lap, laced by a whippy ruler, adjusting my yellow-tinted sunglasses. Life is the way you see it. I open my eyes to take in his face, so close. Oh, I missed him so much for so long, and now he’s here, next to me. Thank you, my wheel of fortune landed on yellow. I open them for long enough for Nick to drop the ruler and, with his magic fingers, to take me a bit further down the yellow brick road of redemption. As I close my eyes again, the whippy ruler flogs me along the same yellow road.