The Widow’s Gift
Part 01
Levi wiped his sweaty palms on his faded jeans then rang the doorbell.
He was nervous and hated that he felt that way. If there was a dictionary definition for a completely safe, non-threatening interaction with another human being—and Levi wasn’t entirely sold on the idea—this would be it.
He fervently wished that he had taken an Ativan before coming here but that was the problem. Levi was beginning to wish he had taken the little five-sided anti-anxiety pills whenever he left the house and building a physical dependence on Lorazepam was the last thing he wanted to do.
“I am coming. Who is there?”
The voice that came from within the large Laketown home was feminine, strongly accented and musical in quality. Ms Alina Makarova was audibly Eastern European. Often sounding like a coloratura soprano from a Hungarian operetta with the way her carefully articulated English rolled off her tongue, exotically laced with a lyrical lilt.
“I-It’s only me, Ms Makarova.” He answered timidly then felt a bit stupid, “I mean, it’s me. Levi Millard.”
He shuffled his feet and took a few deep breaths to center himself.
Levi knew on an intellectual level that the skittish tension he was experiencing was irrational. He understood that the twist in his guts were the result of an unfortunate cocktail of misfiring neurochemicals flooding the limbic system in his brain.
But no amount of book learning, online research and, let’s be honest, underwhelming College counseling sessions helped.
“Levi!” He flinched back as the huge double doors flew open, “I am pleasured to see you again, Darling”
Alina appeared genuinely excited to see him, as she always did. Levi was never sure why exactly, he knew that he was nothing impressive. Not like his gorgeous older neighbor with her thick, wavy blanket of golden hair touched up with hints of autumn and faultless, timeless allure…
The mature foreign beauty looked like she was barely pushing thirty rather than the forty some years she consistently claimed. Her face was regal, fine featured with soft plump lips, a perfectly pert nose and those magnetic gray-green eyes that Slavic women seemed to monopolize.
Alina’s dazzling visage was supremely smooth and expressive, her radiant smile could illuminate ten city blocks though not a single line marred her blemishless cheeks or brow. A person could be fooled into thinking she wore artfully applied makeup but Levi never spotted a sign of it as she swooped in close to embrace him… again.
“Ummm… Hi, Ms Makarova.” He mumbled awkwardly as she pressed his flushing face into her pillowy bosom.
“Levi, how many times?” She scolded gently, rubbing the back of his head as he tried to politely disengage from her overly familiar touch. “You must call me Alina… Al-ee-na.”
“Hnnnmph… Yes, Ms Makarova.” He said, finally pulling away. “What chores can I help you with today?”
Despite her gregarious disposition, one thing Levi genuinely appreciated about Alina Makarova was that she did not outwardly flaunt her feminine wiles…
Jeezus, did he really just use the term ‘feminine wiles?’ How old was he, nineteen going on Amish?
But it was true, Levi’s down-the-street neighbor was decidedly reserved in her manner of dress.
Alina heavily favored baggy figure obscuring clothing, like loose fitting sweatpants and over-sized wool knit sweaters. The most revealing outfit he had ever caught her wearing was some workman’s jeans and a fluffy pink hoodie which she had practically been swimming in.
While many Illinois residents were taking advantage of the warm spring sunshine to shuck off the shackles of winter fashion, Alina was dressed in an old fashioned house coat buttoned tightly at her slender neck and draping formlessly to her ankles.
She was certainly hiding something under the dense layers of cotton fabric, The generous swell of her breasts and other subtle hints Levi had caught left no doubt on that point. But given his nervous disposition around women, he was honestly grateful for her old-school sense of modesty.
“Levi, no…” She pouted and the puckering of those kissable strawberry lips threatened to make the young man break out in a fop sweat. “You Americans are far too busy. Always rushing with the ‘GoGoGo’. Come inside me, please and keep a lonely old lady company for a spell.”
That was another thing.
Sometimes Alina’s otherwise excellent grasp on the language… slipped in embarrassing ways. Levi knew he should probably correct her but that would probably be fatally mortifying for at least one party involved.
“Okay but… but just for a few minutes.” He stammered looking down at his sneakers. “Then we need to get to work. I have exams coming up and…”
“Круто!” Alisa lapsed back into her native tongue briefly as she clapped her hands excitedly. “I will make us coffee. You will like my coffee I think, Darling.”
The way Alina always said “Darling” came out sounding more like “darlink”.
She reached for his hand but Levi winced and sharply jerked away as she tried to pull him further into her extravagant suburban home. Extending his arm had made his freshly strained shoulder flare up painfully.
She looked back at him with worry burning bright in those large, mesmerizing gray-green eyes. “Levi, something is wrong. You are hurt. What is this thing?”
“It-It’s nothing.” Levi could feel the all-too-familiar heat of humiliation dust his cheeks. “Please, Ms Makarova… I don’t want to talk about it.”
Alina frowned and her expression soured suspiciously before relaxing into one of almost motherly concern. She stepped up to him, getting in close. Too close, really, and laying an elegant hand on his chest as she looked compassionately down at Levi. Alina was a tall, striking picture of noble consternation as she affectionately caressed his cheek.
“We will drink coffee and we will talk, Darling.” She said quietly, but there were hints of steel in her usually melodic voice. “You will tell your dear, dear friend Alisa what ails you and we will see what is to do.”
Levi didn’t know what his neighbor thought she could do to help. Moreover, he really didn’t want to go into any of it. Not with anyone but he could see the hardened resolve in her enchanting gaze and his defenses shattered.
Those eyes were suddenly cold and gunmetal gray. Alisa kept them locked onto his own, even as she calmly guided him towards the kitchen.
“Heya Mill-tard. You better have those class notes for me.”
Levi trembled but tried his best to hide it as he hurriedly spun towards his approaching tormentor.
Or more accurately; tormentors… plural.
The University of Illinois Springfield was located six miles southeast of Springfield, occupying 740 acres of easily navigable higher learning, adjacent to Lake Springfield. Levi had been trying to cross the colonnade, simply another face in the faceless crowd of countless other students, and still they found him.
They always found him.
Britney, Carmen and Kimmy.
Three youthful specimens of ripening womanhood with visages of angels and the souls drawn directly from the seventh ring of hell as Dante described it.
“Please, Britney… I was going to finish listening to the recorded lecture over lunch.” Levi pleaded. “If you would just give me your email, I could send them directly—”
“Email? What a fucking nerd.” Britney sneered, flipping back her long golden curls in disgust.
She was the quintessential college cheerleader. Devastatingly attractive in that all-American homegrown hottie style. The teen beauty queen face, a frankly ridiculous combination of athletically lean and imminently busty figure, perfectly blonde, perfectly everything really.
And a raging bitch to boot.
Levi shrank back but soon realized the three coeds had corralled him against one of the towering white columns with no way to escape. Like they had been waiting for him and timed it that way.
They probably had. It fit well with their general modus operandi.
Levi didn’t know why history insisted on repeatedly beating him up by proxy through girls like these but it was the story of his life. From elementary school to the present, the mean girls seemed to hone in on him like a goddamn beacon and go out of their way to turn him into their punching bag in every possible sense of the word.
It was as though they took one glance at his small build, his soft hands and lanky hair and thought “Oh, there’s Levi Millard. He’s a cowardly scarecrow that practices piano instead of football and likes to read books about history. We should abuse the shit out of him and make his life hell. We’re hot, he’s not and who’s going to believe him anyway?”
…and so far, they had been right. Regrettably so.
“Nobody uses email anymore, Mill-tard.” Carmen mocked.
She was a stunning Latina scholarship athlete who had led the UIS girls soccer team to victory in the last three inter-college matches. With her long dark hair, smokey eyes and take-no-prisoners attitude to game fouls. She packed the stands at every game with drooling male fans, thanks to her aggressive play style and rock hard butt, toned hips and muscular thighs.
“I don’t think the loser knows what DMs are.” Kimmy sniffed, not deigning to look at him as she tapped away at the latest iteration of whatever fruit inspired smartphone was currently in vogue. “What would his profiles even look like?”
Weirdly, Kimmy rankled Levi the most out of the three of his beautiful, dreadful oppressors.
Like, what was she even doing with the other two? She was an academic overachiever hanging out with what were essentially two female jocks. Surely, out of the three of them, the delicately pretty Korean freshman should have some empathy towards his plight.
Bookworms 4 life… or something like that.
No such luck.
The petite Asian ice queen had zero compunctions about standing back in her calculatedly short, pleated miniskirts and perfectly pressed white blouses that hugged her shapely upturned breasts like a second skin. Looking like some undercover k-pop starlet touching up her makeup while her thuggish friends extracted their daily pound of flesh from Levi’s skinny ass.
He was certain she got her cut by some existentially pleasing means, though he had no idea what she could possibly want from the likes of him.
“I’m nobody.” Levi wanted to weep at the unfairness of his eternal dilemma. “I don’t know what you want from me.”
“I want my class notes, you little bitch.” Britney hissed, jabbing him painfully in his skinny chest with a long painted nail. “I’m not going to let my GPA score drop and get kicked off the cheer squad because you were busy trying on your mommy’s dresses all night instead of studying.”
“I’m not even in PSC 201, I’m a communications major…”
Carmen stepped up and in one fluid movement, grabbed his wrist and twisted Levi around until his nose was mashed against the cold cement of the column. His breath escaped him in a painful wheeze and she yanked his scrawny arm up behind his back until his shoulder joint nearly popped out of the socket.
“You’ll do as you are told, you dickless anglo puta.” She whispered hotly into his ear. She sounded excited. “Otherwise everything we have asked of you before now will feel like foreplay. Nod if you understand me.“
Levi nodded rapidly, silent tears running down his cheeks. He felt so powerless and unmanned in Carmen’s strong grip.
“So glad we sorted that out.” Britney drawled, inspecting her manicured nails. “I’ll expect to see you waiting with my notes in the cafeteria by noon. Don’t make me come find you.”
“Yes, Britney.” Levi sobbed.
His legs were about to give out under him and not one person seemed willing to look in their direction. It was as though nobody cared.
“Good. We’ll see you soon, Mill-tard. Byyyeee~”
All three girls laughed as they strolled away together, shoulder to shoulder, in conspiratorial cahoots like the tyrannical triumvirate of heartless shrews they truly were.
“That is horrible, Levi!” Alina gasped, covering her pretty mouth with her hands. “These… I do not know the English word… сука treat you this way often?“
Levi stared bleakly down into his coffee and nodded wordlessly. It was strong, dark and extremely bitter. He was at least one of those three things.
Somehow it was worse, more shameful because they were girls. If they had sicked their boyfriends or male admirers on him it might have been different. Better in some way but…
“This is not how young ladies should act towards a fine man such as you.” Alina declared, “It is a terrible thing they are doing.”
They were seated together on the dark leather chesterfield in her lavish parlor and she reached over to take one of his hands in both of hers. Her grip was firm though her fingers were warm as hugged his hand to her large chest.
“Do they not have eyes, these foolish girls? Can they not see what a good and sensitive young man you are?” She fussed with Levi’s digits, positioning them over her heart through the thick cotton gown. “I say that they do not have hearts but cold flint in their breasts.”
Speaking of breasts, Levi was becoming extremely aware of where Alina was pressing his palm and his racing pulse dropped into high gear at the feel of her pillowy softness.
“Aaah, I… ummm—” He began but she shushed him by placing a single long fingertip over his lips.
“I know what to do now, Darling. You have been so kind and you helped this poor widow turn her house into a home. You will do so again today, yes?” She was staring at him so intently with her brilliant green eyes that Levi could only nod mutely. “This is good. Today you will organize the garage and I will bake you a special treat. Come, come…”
Rising, Alina led Levi towards the rear of her grandiose home.
It was a tall stately residence, far larger than any of the other brick and weatherboard single story homes in the neighborhood. It had been designed and built by an investment banker who wanted a luxury home on the water without paying the exorbitant property prices in the fancier suburbs like Lake Pointe.
That was the year the credit crisis had blown the markets all to hell and the owner, a man Levi had never met, defaulted on the mortgage and loans just as construction was completed.
So the wide-ranging waterfront home—with its wrap-around driveway, huge in-ground swimming pool and private dock—sat dead on the market until three months ago when the mysterious and reclusive Ms Makarova appeared out of nowhere with a small fleet of removalist trucks and moved into the neighborhood.
Alina often giggled and professed that she had stolen the house from the bank. Levi figured that meant she purchased the foreclosure for rock-bottom price. There was plenty of that going around.
“When I move to America, after my beloved husband passed, I say to myself, ‘Alina, this is a new start. Put aside your old life and lock it away.’” Alina said, leading Levi through the long, airy corridors and spacious rooms of her home. “This is for the best, yes.”
“You mentioned you moved here from Stalingrad?” Levi asked politely, drawing on his love of world history and geography. “On the Volga river in Russia?”
“That is Volgograd, Darling. The name was changed many years ago, even before the fall of the Soviet Union. Much changed in those years.” Alina mused, sounding a bit wistful. “But no, I was born far to the east in Vladivostok on the shores of the Sea of Japan. I lived there all my life until I was married.”
“You must have been very happy, Ms Makarova.” Levi said politely, feeling a bit out of his depth.
Alina was usually more interested in talking about any subject other than herself. Asking Levi about his studies, what his interests were and which books he was reading as he helped the young widow settle into her massive new home.
That part had been Levi’s mother’s idea. Helping their new mysterious neighbor a few times a week as a way to get his nose out of a book and into the real world where he would have to come to grips with his social anxiety. Like some kind of soft-core exposure therapy.
Whether it was working or not, Levi didn’t know. Nor did he mind as he soon discovered he actually enjoyed the company of the beautiful, if mildly eccentric Ms Makarova. Even if she still gave him nervous tummy butterflies from time to time.
“Happy? Yes and no. My husband was a great man. A brilliant scientist who achieved much in his research for the Russian Federation.” Alina stopped in front of a door and reached into her house coat to produce a key. “But great men are rarely good men. Without him, I would not be the woman I am today and I loved him desperately but I think many important people were frightened of him.”
Frightened? Levi’s skin prickled with unease as Alina paused with the key in the lock. Her usually bright, open expression was replaced with a pensive, thousand yard stare.
Then he blinked and Alina was blazing warm sunshine back at him again, as though she didn’t have a care in the world.
“You are a good man, Levi. I know this to be true.” She said, unlocking and opening the door before reaching in to flick on the interior light. “I tell myself ‘Alina, trust your Darling Levi, he only wishes to help. Such a handsome and worthy man’ and all my silly worries disappear. Poof… like smoke.”
She stepped aside and hung back as Levi wandered into the huge three car garage.
He had seen much of the house and grounds in the past weeks of doing odd jobs for Alina. The place had six bedrooms and four bathrooms which was a lot for a single person to furnish, decorate and maintain. The full sized pool needed cleaning and the long drive wanted regular blowering but the garage had remained shut up tight.
Despite her obvious means, Alina did not own a car, much less three. So the garage was principally a large empty space for the most part, lit by evenly spaced fluorescent tubes set into the high, angled ceiling.
A pile of cardboard moving boxes, old suitcases and some furniture under dust covers were stacked haphazardly in one corner. It looked as though the removalists had carelessly dumped it all in a heap and left it there. Otherwise the vast space was featureless, save for a long stretch of mounted steel shelving and workbenches that took up the back wall of the garage.
“Ummm… what do you want me to do here, Ms Makarova?” Levi asked and his voice almost echoed in the cavernous room.
Alina hadn’t moved from the adjoining doorway, as though reluctant to enter.
“There in the corner, Darling. Those boxes and bags contain memories of my life in the old country. Some are mine but many were my husbands. They can be… a painful reminder. I myself do not like pain so I think ‘Alina, Levi is such a pleasant and obliging young man. If you ask him nicely, he will do this thing for you.’”
She was staring at him again with an odd expression on her flawless face and somehow the top two buttons of her drab house coat had come unfastened revealing just the barest hint of bulging cleavage.
Levi gulped.
What was she asking him to do?
“But listen to me rambling like a dithering old lady. What must you think of me?” Alina squeaked, cupping both her blushing cheeks in her hands and shyly turning away. “Please, Darling… Simply unpack the boxes onto the shelves where they will be safe and out of the way.”
“Aaah… sure thing Ms Makarova. That sounds fairly straightforward.”
“Alina, Darling. You must call me Alina.” She insisted, patting at the air with her hands. “Now I shall go cook for my most helpful young man and Levi…”
“Yes?” He looked up from where he was reaching for the nearest box.
“Please be careful, Darling.”
Levi surveyed the contents of the first box as he unpacked it at one of the steel top workbenches.
As usual, he wanted to be methodical in his approach to the task laid out before him. Levi was a thoughtful soul by nature. Many mistook this as meaning he was slow or lazy but really Levi just liked things to be done right the first time rather than having to repeat a job because he’d rushed it.
There was a lot of stuff to get through and, if this first load was any indication, arranging it all in any discernible order was going to be a challenge. That was fine, Levi wasn’t trying to build Rome in a day and he wanted to do right by Ms Makarova. She had been nothing but kind to him.
Not like a few other mean-spirited young women he had the displeasure of knowing.
He shook off unpleasant thoughts and focused back on the job at hand. The contents appeared to be a random assortment of miscellaneous knick knacks. As though whoever had packed it couldn’t decide where in the house they should go and simply lumped them all together into a cardboard box labeled ‘Garage’.
“What on earth is this supposed to be?” He asked the air, pulling out a boxy looking gaming console that belonged in the previous century. It took cartridges for goodness sake. “SINtendo, is that some kind of cheap Super NES knockoff?”
He placed it neatly beside a clunky plastic toy gun with J-power BG450 written in faded lettering on the side.
It wasn’t all toys though… no, that would have been a simple matter. There was a stack of ancient strongman workout programs tied up in twine, countless self help cassette tapes, an unlabeled bottle of milk that seemed oddly fresh when it should have turned to cheese by now and a bunch of rattling pill bottles from a curiously named company called ‘BimboTech’.
Levi racked his mind for some way to catalog or order the chaos slowly collecting on the bench top in front of him as he next pulled out a pink perfume bottle with a silver label.
Nope, just… nope. It even looked noxious. What kind of moron would use the foul stuff?
He placed it carefully next to a round tub of citrus smelling orange goo in a section he mentally designated as cosmetics and stood back to consider his options.
“Levi, Darling,” Alina’s musical voice sang out to him from inside the house. “Come on me in the parlor, I have prepared a treat for you.”
Levi could feel his ears turning red. There were times he was convinced she was intentionally misspeaking to get a rise out of him, Then he would look into those guileless, innocent eyes and know that she wouldn’t—couldn’t—be doing anything of the sort.
Alina was too pure and lovely to tease him. She was a perfect angel struggling with an unfortunate language barrier. Thank goodness she didn’t speak to many folks, some of her phrasing would certainly be cause for some awkward misunderstandings.
“I’m coming!” He called back, then silently cursed his own poor choice of words. “I—I mean, I’ll be there shortly.”
Stopping by one of the lavishly appointed bathrooms to wash the grime off his hands, Levi made his way back to the parlor and blinked at what he found waiting for him.
“Join me, Darling.” Alina cooed softly, patting the empty spot on the leather lounge beside her. “Please sit and see what I have made for you.”
Ms Makarova had changed out of her frumpy house coat and into a light floral summer dress more suited for the warm spring weather. It was still a modest number, falling well past her knees with short frilly sleeves that covered her slim shoulders and toned upper arms but it was showing more of her than Levi had ever been privy to before.
A spotless gingham smock apron conservatively concealed most of Alina’s front and chest but the heavy swell of her cleavage visibly taxed the fabric and the ties at her sides cinched in tight around an impossibly narrow waist before her skirts fanned out over wide hips but stopped short of her shapely calves.
Her outfit revealed next to nothing but Levi’s overactive imagination filled in everything.
His stomach performed back flips as his mouth went dry. His feet felt like blocks of cement and he was rooted in place by an existential dread of the gorgeous dream brought to life in front of him.
“I—I can’t… I should go.” He managed to squeeze out, his tongue felt dry as old boot leather. “I d-don’t think…”
“Darling, pleeeease~ don’t leave me.” Alina begged, shooting to her feet in alarm as Levi began to tremble uncontrollably. “I am sorry. Tell stupid old Alina what she has done wrong. Why do you shake so?”
Levi wanted to tear out his hair. He wanted to curse to high heavens and rage against the injustice of a world that had conditioned his poor tortured psyche to react so viscerally to the presence of a beautiful woman. It wasn’t fucking fair.
“It—It’s not your f—fault.” He groaned from between chattering teeth. “I’m so—sorry, Alina.”
Then she was there, wrapping her slender arms around him and drawing his sweating skull against her prominent bosom. Levi half expected to fly into a full blown panic attack but something about Alina’s warm touch and soothing softness calmed his hammering heart and Levi found himself finally able to breathe again.
God but she smelled like fresh summer rain. Clean and sweet and full of the promise of greener pastures.
“Shhhh~... all is well, Darling.” Alina crooned, slowly guiding them both back to the chesterfield as she held him close. “Sit and let poor Alina take care of you.”
Levi’s trembling subsided under her tender touch as her burnished mass of white gold locks settled over him like a comforting blanket. She rubbed small circles over his spine and ran her manicured nails through his scruffy hair until his breathing settled back into a steady rhythm.
“All is well, Darling Levi. You see?” She murmured down at him, placing a fond kiss on his head. “Alina will make you feel better.”
“It’s so humiliating.” Levi rasped into her ample chest, his cheeks on fire. “I—I’m sorry—”
“No more sorry, Darling, I will not hear it.” Alina chided in a sympathetic voice. “I have seen this thing before. Back in Russia, some men returned from war with that same look in their eyes. You have been misused like they were, yes? Unmanned and broken.”
Levi couldn’t help but the cringe at her words.
Kindly though her intentions were, they still hit too close to the mark. It seemed pitiful to compare his childhood experiences with that of traumatized war veterans. Alina must have felt it too, because she drew him back to arms length and looked him in the face with an oddly stern expression.
“I hate these girls who have made my Darling Levi feel this way.” Her voice was swelling full of passion but took on a hard edge as she gripped his narrow shoulders tighter. “You; who have played this lonely old woman sweet music on the piano. You; who selflessly bring joy to this big empty home and my heart. Do you know what your name means in my homeland?”
“N—No…” Levi shook his head but couldn’t look away from her. Alina’s eyes had turned gunmetal gray again but were no less mesmerizing for it.
“If you were a boy from Vladivostok, your name would be Lev; it means ‘Lion’. Doubtless, many pretty young women would have chased after you there.” She sighed wistfully. “They would bake you Ptichye Moloko, a famous Vladivostok dessert and try to win your lion’s heart.”
Levi didn’t feel like a lion and tried to say as much when Alina reached down to the glass coffee table and raised a fine china plate to his chin.
Was that some kind of cheesecake?
On the dish was a fluffy white square topped in dribbling chocolate sauce. It smelled sugary sweet and had a slight gelatinous wobble to it. Alina scooped off a small corner with a small spoon and held it to his mouth.
“This is Ptichye Moloko, Darling.” She purred as Levi obediently opened his mouth and tasted it. Smooth, creamy deliciousness tangoed across his taste buds. “Russian girl’s make it for their, how do you say… Sweethearts. Alas, I am but an old widow but I tell myself ‘Alina, Levi is a good and handsome young man. Bake him your special Ptichye Moloko so he might find his lion and grow to be strong and brave.’ Do you like it, Darling?”
“Mmmhmmm~!”
Levi found that he did like it. Alina handed him the spoon but held the plate for him. It balanced atop the shelf of her bountiful bosom as she beamed her gigawatt smile directly into Levi as he ate.
He wasn’t typically a big eater, his spare frame attested to that, it just wasn’t something he took a lot of pleasure from. Food was fuel and Levi was lean at best, though ‘stick thin’ was the label most would saddle him with.
But this—what was it called again?—pudding cake confection was the epitome of more-ish. It coated his mouth in a delectable saccharin flavor and slipped down his throat with the ease of jello. It was cold but soothing and even the small portion landed like lead in his belly and made Levi feel full, almost drowsily so.
“I am so pleased to enjoy it, Darling.” Alina moaned. Her wording sounded off again and her exotic accent dripped off every husky word with deep gratification.
Her luxurious lashes fluttered sensually as Levi sucked the spoon clean and only then noticed with some embarrassment that he had shoveled down the entire portion in under a minute. Such base gluttony was not like him at all…
He gave the few last smudges on the little plate a wary side-eye before finally handing the spoon back with a satisfied groan. His unexpectedly ravenous appetite was sated and his eyelids suddenly felt as though ships anchors were hanging from them.
“M—Ms Makarova?” Levi slurred. His tongue felt thick and sticky from the creamy treat and his thoughts dragged like heavy chains as he tried to pull them together.
“Shhhh~... Darling.” Soft hands cupped his cheeks and drew his head down in place of cushiony comfort and warmth. Alina’s lap. “Rest easy, trust in Alina. You are safe now and all will be well.”
Alina’s calming words and gentle caresses coaxed Levi down into a deep restful slumber.
Levi’s dreams were filled with a sweeping orchestral score and a resounding chorus of harmoniously singing voices.
He was in a darkened theater, sitting alone in the stalls before a large illuminated stage. The domed ceiling was lost in shadows, the balcony boxes stacked high atop each other until they disappeared from sight above him.
The set design was one of an old royal court with a grand wooden throne set center-stage surrounded by small stools and colorful cushions, presumably for the actors to rest upon throughout the performance.
But where were the actors, the players to walk those deserted boards?
Levi could hear the singers—a whole myriad of warbling musical ranges rendered together in a rousing, melodic concert that filled the large vacant auditorium—but could not see them nor pinpoint the origin of their beauteous voices.
Then a breathtaking young woman stepped out onto stage and Levi squinted against the bright theater lighting.
Alina?
His neighbor was wrapped in a sumptuous opera gown made of rich scarlet velvet that hugged tight around her voluptuous figure. Split sleeves draped nearly to the wooden boards beneath her and a deep V-shaped neckline plunged down towards her navel, revealing a silken swath of creamy skin and the inner slopes of her tremendous cleavage. A split ran up each side of the slim skirts to her wide hips and smooth shapely legs flashed daringly as she glided about the platform.
She was gorgeous, shining like a crown jewel upon the stage, her brilliant voice flowed with adoration and yearning as she serenaded a figure hidden in the wings and reached for them with graceful, coaxing gestures in time with the lilting music from an invisible orchestra.
Levi could not understand Alina’s words—he guessed the language was most likely her mother tongue by the way she so confidently sang—but her soaring trilling tones and exquisitely expressive face told the story for him.
She was in love and she craved attention from the object of her affection. Her tenor was pure and crystal clear as she turned and dramatically grasped at the distant throne. Alina’s song grew impassioned as she pressed a slender forearm across her flawless brow and swayed as though to swoon.
The string section squealed instrumental alarm and the percussion crashed a panicked crescendo as she began to topple. Then a man was there, dashing nimbly across the stage and catching Alina by the waist in a low dancer’s dip. They held the pose as the music calmed and the beautiful Prima Donna ran her hands over her rescuer’s wide shoulders as her long bare leg slid up the outside of his own.
Levi’s breath caught.
He couldn’t make out much of the male performer from the way he stood with his back to the audience but the man was tall, ruggedly built and clearly strong by the way he held Alina’s lush body with ease. But Levi’s complete attention was on his neighbor’s big gray-green eyes.
Those brilliant emerald orbs were locked onto her co-stars face shone blazing with desire and devotion.
The male performer sang out a question in a deep baritone that rumbled like thunder through the vast acoustic space and pulled her back to her feet. Alina leaned heavily against him, her substantial heaving breasts threatening to spill out of their crimson confines as she hummed out a pleased response and nuzzled her head into the man’s broad chest.
The tempo slowed as they rocked in each other’s arms. Alina had never looked more beautiful, the deep blood red hue of the slinky gown contrasting and enhancing her spotless milky complexion and radiant sandy hair. She looked blissfully happy as waves of contentment practically washed out from her.
Levi shifted in his seat as something unexpected stirred within him. The first embers of longing for the lonely widow and maybe more.
Then cymbals crashed and the wind section took flight as Alina spun out of her paramour’s arms and tried to pull him towards the throne. She beseeched him with her sweet melody as he sang back his objections in ringing basso tones. But she persisted and eventually he relented, turning and sitting upon the padded seat.
Then Levi finally saw his face.
It was his face. Levi’s own visage stared sternly out into the audience as Alina lilted her praises for him in a joyous soprano. It was Levi’s face and at the same time it wasn’t.
His dopple’s chin and jawline were rock solid with a clear line of rough stubble, where Levi’s were soft and hairless. The other man’s steely eyes burned with determination and defiance that Levi had never seen in his own reflection. His back was ramrod straight, his shoulders squared and his head held high in a manner that Levi couldn’t dream of emulating.
He looked so regal, so… commanding.
It was confusing to look up and envy his other self. This other him.
Levi couldn’t imagine this version being pushed around or stepped up. This… king would brush nuisances like Britney, Carmen and Kimmy aside as though they were insignificant. He wouldn’t tolerate their cutting banter or abuse. This man would punish them for it.
Alina’s soaring aria ended with a upsurge of raw emotion in Levi’s chest as she spun with happy tears glistening upon her rosy cheeks and fell into her beloved’s arms.
Her large, succulent breasts almost busted out of the straining velvet gown as she slipped elegantly into the other Levi’s lap and pressed her panting, parted lips to his.
“Vivat! Vivat!” The unseen chorus roared in jubilation.
Then it struck Levi like a lightning bolt.
He wanted to be that better version of himself, up on the stage and kissing Alina passionately. Levi wanted to be that man who would shake off the barbs of his tormentors and rain righteous retribution upon them.
Levi wanted it so badly that it hurt. Seated high upon the throne his double ran a rough hand up Alina’s satiny thigh into the slit of her dress to latch on to her luscious rump. Their kiss had deepened, growing almost frantic with their desperate thirst for each other’s taste and touch.
”Vivat! Vivat!”
With a groan of discomfort Levi suddenly realized he was hard.
His cock was stiff as an iron rod and his simple slacks weren’t tented so much as they were on the verge of a critical failure. He ached painfully, both with throbbing lust for the sensuous angel in front of him and covetous envy of the masculine vision of who he might have been in another life, another reality.
Horns blared and beating bass drums set a frenetic pace for the performing duo’s amorous excitement. Alina had shifted over, straddling her lover’s thighs as she ground against him and smothered his head in her overflowing cleavage. Both the other Levi’s hands were up her slinky scarlet dress, hiking it the glossy fabric obscenely as he mauled her ripe, globular ass with clawing fingers.
“Vivat! Vivat!”
Levi watched on, filled with a horny desire that was beginning to border on jealous rage. He should have been that man. It should be him, on the stage with the slim, busty woman of his dreams riding his lap and showering him adoration. For the first time in a long time, his perpetual anxiety and fears took a back seat to another powerful emotion.
Righteous fucking determination.
Alina flung her gorgeous head back—her tumble of autumn-kissed golden tresses spilling down her slender back with a cascading waterfall mirroring the sunset—and piped out a single high, pure note of ecstatic bliss as the ascending orchestral score crested one final time and abruptly ceased.
With jarring suddenness the curtains dropped and the stage lights cut out, and Levi was rudely plunged back into utter darkness.
Eyelids fluttering open, Levi found himself stretched out on the leather chesterfield with his head couched in Alina’s soft lap. She was dreamily humming a hauntingly familiar tune as she gently played her clever fingers through his long, lanky hair.
“What was that?” He murmured sluggishly.
“Hmmmm, Darling?” Alina looked down at him with a relieved smile, “Sorry, I think maybe your blood sugar—”
“No, No. The tune…” Levi waved her concerns away but didn’t sit up. He hadn’t felt so comfortable or relaxed in forever and around a beautiful woman, no less. “What was that tune you were just humming?”
“Oh? It is from an old Russian Opera.” She replied and her radiant smile turned wistful again. “It is called ‘Boris Godunov.’ I attended a performance at the Mariinsky Theatre in St Petersburg many years ago.”
“Is it a love song?”
“You know it?” She asked but Levi shook his head. “It is Marina’s aria. She was the daughter of an important Polish Senator who fell in love with a young Muscovite prince. I found it to be very moving.”
Alina looked off into the distance and hummed a few more bars in her sweet, melodic voice. All Levi could do was stare entranced at her arresting face, when it wasn’t being eclipsed by the heavy swell of her generous bosom. It tickled at the back of his sleep-addled mind and stirred up unexpected emotions.
“Oh, Darling. It seems that you also found it… rousing.” Alina giggled, looking down at Levi’s body with flushing cheeks.
He shifted a fraction, uncertain of her meaning then Levi felt it. His dick was erect, very erect, and pressed hard against the thin cotton of his trousers.
“Oh gawd! I—I… ummm, I’m so sorry, Ms Makarova!”
He tried to sit up in panic but Alina pressed a firm hand to his skinny chest and cupped his cheek in a warm palm. Levi’s heart was racing again and all the blood drained from his face in horror but Alina merely shushed and cooed at him as though she were trying to calm a spooked horse.
“Shhh~ Darling, there is no need for your sorry.” She breathed, her hand caressing his chest through his shirt. “You are a young man, energetic and virile. Poor Alina knows this is true.”
“N—no, It’s just that I—” Levi’s words were cut off when she placed a single long finger over his babbling lips.
“Such kind and handsome men like you have needs, Darling. All good Russian women are taught this thing too.” She crooned, bending down to place a soft peck upon his brow. It pushed her incredible cushiony breasts against the sides of Levi’s skull and his aching cock lurched in his pants.
“Look how it twitches. So big, long and hard.” She continued, her tongue darting out to moisten her plump, ruby lips. Only inches away from his own. “Does not your girlfriend bring you enough relief? Such a strong, fine man like you requires regular release to stay healthy and fit.”
“I don’t have a girlfrie—mmmnph~!” Levi’s muzzled words were completely cut off when Alina slid her forefinger into his mouth and he automatically closed his lips around it.
Her invading digit tasted like a freshly plucked pear, mellow but delicious.
“Darling, I cannot believe it when you speak such far-fetched words.” Her exotic accent coated each purring syllable like honey as the delicate hand on his chest was drifting lower, migrating south across his belly seeking decidedly warming climes. “You are, how do they say? A catch. A hunk. A generous, sensitive soul who has been so kind to this old widow.”
Levi wanted to tell Alina that she didn’t look old at all. That she could have any man she wanted if she didn’t cloister herself away in her large, lakeside mansion. She was brilliantly beautiful and completely beguiling and Levi was anything but. Despite the, admittedly flattering, things she said to him.
Instead he sucked on her flavorsome finger and trembled slightly under her tantalizing touch.
No woman had ever touched Levi this way before.
One time in middle school an older girl named Tamara Hatcher had dragged him behind the school gymnasium and demanded to see his pecker then laughed at him until he cried after her friends had jumped out of the bushes to taunt him mercilessly.
Those boner wilting memories were immediately vanquished when Alina’s questing hand reached and skillfully stroked his rigid length through his increasingly tight slacks.
“Please forgive poor Alina, Darling.” She moaned huskily, unzipping his fly and freeing his throbbing tumescence. “She has been alone for so long and you are such a… a Stud. Yes, a Stud. So much that she cannot control herself any longer.”
With that she leaned over, covering Levi with her voluptuous figure and kissed the crown of his hard, pulsating cock with her plush, cherry lips.
“Hnnnmph~!” He grunted as Alina’s immense tits flattened against his stomach, pancaking within the summer dress and apron, ballooning outwards until a scandalous amount of bare, evidently braless, side-boob was pushed out on display.
She kept one dainty hand over his mouth as her other gripped and pumped his base, jacking him with languid upward squeezing strokes towards her enchanting face. Then her hot tongue lashed out and circled around his tip, lathering the sensitive underside with lingual affection until Levi’s head spun and his toes curled in his sneakers.
“Mmmhmmm… I have not tasted a man in many years, Darling.” Alina purred, looking back up the length of his prone body as she continued to stroke and tease his stiffness. “Please… just relax and let me do this for you. Your poor Alina only wants you to feel good, yes?”
His Alina?
Levi didn’t know what to say. He didn’t know what to do with his hands which were clenched into nervous fists down at his sides. He wanted to warn her that he was a virgin. To ask her to slow down and talk to him about this…
“M—Ms Makarova. A—Alina, I…ummm, I don’t think—Gah!”
He gasped in sensual shock as Alina stuck out her pink tongue and licked a wet trail of thrilling ecstasy from his balls to his tip then slurped his entire engorged manhood into her pretty mouth and down her hot, wet throat in a smooth, sinful motion.
“Mmmmwah~!” Alina popped her mouth off his turgid cock with a lip-smacking sound of relish, her hand jerking his slickened flesh at a hungry pace. “You taste amazing, Darling. I cannot help myself, it has been too long. Alina needs to taste your hunky manseed!“
Her gliding hand felt so small around his adamantine girth. It made Levi feel huge in her teasing, coaxing grasp. He wanted to wail and buck his hips as Alina vacuumed his bulging cockhead all the way back to the entrance to her tight milf throat again.
She began bobbing her beautiful blonde head. Seductively taking inch, after added inch of his iron-clad length back into her gagging esophagus with each new tonsil battering plunge.
Alina’s glorious mass of long glossy, golden hair pooled in Levi’s lap. Framing his jutting hardness in a lake of liquid sunshine and tickling his throbbing balls. The sight was dazzling and her hair felt impossibly soft against his sensitive skin.
Alina stopped her rhythmic sucking when she saw his awestruck expression and smirked wickedly, gathering up her voluminous locks and wrapping them around the trunk of his rigidity.
“Does this feel good, Darling? Your Alina worshiping you with her beauty? Offering every paltry part of herself to you?” She asked, pumping great fistfuls of her silky hair up and down Levi’s spasming member. “Make me your woman, Levi and you can possess every part of me, Levi. You only need to ask.”
“I—I couldn’t…” Levi struggled to speak. “You don’t want…”
“I don’t want what? Should I not want this strong Lion I see before me?” Alina murmured and stooped to lick up the bead of white forming on his quivering tip. “I am not so old that my eyesight is dim, Darling.”
She was so gorgeous and willing and all but begging him to take her. Levi warred with himself, with the awful feeling that he didn’t deserve such a bright diamond of womanhood.
But Alina’s warm attentive touch, the nearly frictionless sensation of her brilliant hair encompassing his raging erection, the pleading adoration in her captivating emerald eyes all sapped him of any strength to fight back.
“It makes me so happy when you look at me like that.” Alina moaned, her thick lashes fluttering. “No man makes me feel the way you do, darling Levi. No man has treated me so well. Please let this poor widow attend to your virile manly urges.”
Her free hand caressed his cheek lovingly as the other picked up its pumping pace. Jeezus… Levi had never been so hard in his life and the way she gracefully rolled her wrist and twisted her grip had him ready to launch like a Saturn V rocket.
His blood was boiling in his veins and his swollen balls ached viciously for release. The inside of his mouth still tasted like the creamy treat she had fed him as he gulped in audible arousal. Levi wanted to cum, he needed cum, if only because this earthbound angel was imploring him for his hot, sticky load.
…but something was restraining him from reaching that climactic release.
“I—I want to… I want to c—cum but….” Levi almost sobbed as his hip began thrusting up into her gloriously firm, quickening strokes and gliding golden tresses. “But I—”
“Take my hand, Levi.” Alina crooned, tracing her nails down his arm. “Be my brave Lion and guide your silly Alina for your pleasure. Show me how best to please my man.”
Then she took his shaking hand and placed squarely atop her pretty skull before diving down and shlorping half of his rocky shaft back into her scalding throat again.
“Oh gaaawd~! Holy shit… hrrnnngh! A—Alina!”
Levi stared slack jawed as his gorgeous Russian neighbor pressed her palm down over his and forced him to push her plump suckling lips down his rapturous erection.
Then Alina began to hum…
He wasn’t sure how she managed with so much of his meaty member obscuring her windpipe and it took Levi a few wide-eyed moments to recognize the tune through the waves of reverberating pleasure it sent crashing through his core.
It was Marina’s aria.
That poignant, evocative melody that had sounded so familiar when Levi awoke from his unexpected nap a few minutes ago.
It plucked at the strings of his soul and opened a wellspring of heated longing in his faltering heart. It stirred the chicken soup of his timid soul and dredged up a mess of tangled emotions but one fact outshone everything else.
Levi needed Alina as much as he needed his next lungful of air.
“Oh f—fuck, Alina that’s feels fucking incredible!” He grunted, bringing his other hand around to join the first in gripping her rapidly bobbing head. “Don’t stop… aaahha~! I’m so fucking close.”
The curvy blonde knockout’s tongue was a warm damp landing strip for his plunging manmeat to barrel down into the slick, rippling confines of her gulping throat. Her fist still stroked and squeezed his base in a thick, lustrous coil of her preposterously silken hair.
Spittle and pearly precum drooled from her pillowy, cock-sucking lips and leaked down into his lap. There, the golden lake of Alina’s curling locks seemed to absorb it, growing shiny wet and glossier rather than clumping or matting. As though every tiny part of the incredible, exotic lady—down to the individual strands of her hair—was created to drink Levi’s spouting lust and be further enhanced by it.
“Mmmmmhmmm~!” Alina hummed a few more musical bars as though Levi’s wildly thrusting member were a kazoo.
By all the gods in heaven, Levi wanted this wonderful, compassionate woman. His heart burned for her as another emotion unwound itself from the knotted ball laying heavy in his belly.
Levi wanted to protect her. He wanted to guard this precious, cum-gargling flower from a wicked world that ground him down a little more every day with its endless supply of vicious, entitled monsters.
A lance of molten anger pierced Levi as he pistoned his flexing hips faster into that perfect, exquisite face with those transfixing emerald eyes gazing worshipfully back at him. He would be her Lion, for a woman such as this Levi knew he could banish his crippling insecurities and be the righteous enforcer who would put all the Britneys, Carmens and Kimmys of the world in their proper places.
The dam within Levi that had been holding him back crumbled then burst just as Alina’s rolling tongue, magical humming and greedily swallowing throat all reached their carnal crescendo.
“Jeezus, fuck! I’m cumming, Alina!” Levi wailed, cramming his rampaging length as deep into her ravishing maw as he could then erupted. “I’m cuuumming~!”
His balls bucked like broncos as Levi unleashed a cannonade of blistering baby batter directly into the moaning milfs hungry belly. His vision blurred as he held her there—impaled upon his geysering magnitude with her ecstatically moaning lips kissing his pelvis—and poured a river of his liquid love into her gorgeous writhing body.
The glorious moment stretched out in a timeless infinity and when Levi finally came back to himself enough to release his death grip on Alina’s luxurious hair, he left utterly, gratifyingly empty.
“Oooh… Alina.” He groaned, words failing him as he labored for breath. “Alina, Alina Alina…”
Levi had expected his new lover to come up gasping for air but she didn’t.
The ravenous Russian minx took her time gulping and milking at his hypersensitive manhood until she was certain she had coaxed every last spurt out of him before finally slurping her back up his tingling shaft with a naughty giggle.
“What’s so funny?” He asked, admiring her joyful smile as she daintily dabbed at the sticky mess of juices glistening on her elegant chin.
“It is nothing, my Darling Levi. I am just so happy.” She replied, blushing girlishly as she used the hem of the apron to clean her face. “You finally called me by my first name.”
Oh, he had done that. He couldn’t rightly remember why he had been such a stickler about it before.
“It is a beautiful name.” He said as she leaned back up into her seated position and nestled his head firmly back into her lap. “If Levi means ‘Lion’, what does Alina stand for?”
“It means ‘Bright and Beautiful’, Darling.” She purred, beginning to run her long nails through his hair again. “It is silly—”
“No, it’s perfect.” He rumbled approvingly, her massaging touch felt very good on his scalp. “It suits you down to a tee.”
“Thank you, my Lion.”
Levi closed his eyes and enjoyed her gentle petting. He would be her lion and protect her because Alina was all of those things.
Bright and beautiful and all his now.
…and Levi would make sure that nobody could hurt Alina or himself ever again.
Gosh but he was feeling thoroughly drained. As though he had dropped twelve fluid ounces of water weight into his new woman’s sexy body. It nearly seemed unnatural to cum so hard and long.
It had been amazing but…
“Alina…”
“Yes, Darling?”
“I’m feeling pretty spent,” Levi stretched out a little more, enjoying her soothing touch. “Can you get me something to drink?”
“Of course, my Lion. I have iced tea chilling in the refrigerator. I will fetch you a glass.” She looked pleased and bent down to kiss on the brow again. “Is there anything else I can do for my strong, handsome Man?”
“Maybe something to eat. Got any more of the pudding cake? That was really good.” He added and cracked an eye open when Alina let out an almost sexual moan of satisfaction.
“My Ptichye Moloko? I’m so pleasured to hear that, Darling. Lay down and relax, your Alina will take good care of you.”