Jake poured himself a glass of chardonnay and selected the light-jazz station, too tired to even choose a CD. After working twelve hours straight to meet a deadline, he didn’t even want to think anymore, let alone make decisions. He sipped from his wine glass, walked across the room and parted the draperies — and that was when he saw her. Later, he would wonder what might have happened if he had never looked.
She seemed so tiny and pale, poised at the edge of the roof next door, dressed only in a flowered bra and matching panties. The temperature was in the lower 70’s, but a brisk wind raced off the East River, so she couldn’t have been all that comfortable. At first she just sat on the low wall that went around the roof, but as Jake picked up the telephone to call 911, she brought her hands to her upper back, and with one deft movement, unhooked her bra and tossed it down to the street. He wondered where it would land, after traveling several stories, and what would happen once it got there.
Jake couldn’t stand by any longer. He slid open the glass door, stepped out to his own balcony, and called to her, cupping his hands so his voice would carry over the city noise.
“What are you doing?” he shouted.
She turned, fast enough that her straight brown hair fell into her face, and she brought up one hand to brush it away. Her newly uncovered breasts were lovely, not too big or too small, with pert, plump nipples the color of raspberries. Jake wondered again about the ultimate fate of her bra.
“What are you doing?” he called again.
She only shrugged and turned away.
He studied the distance from his own balcony to where she sat. A movie stunt man could cover the distance easily — but Jake, a writer of commercials and advertising copy, a man who drove a keyboard all day, would never be able to do it. He sighed. Maybe he would have to trust this to the trained professionals after all.
The woman’s shoulders began to shake. Even over the sound of traffic and approaching sirens, he could still hear her sobs. “Damn it,” he said to himself. “I can’t let her sit there like that.” Wasn’t there anything that would get him to the other roof? He leaned over the balcony and peeked along the side of the building — where he noticed a rusty pipe that crossed the gap about ten feet down. If he could wiggle along a narrow ledge, just a few feet to go, he could grab the pipe and shimmy next door in no time. He brushed his hands on his jeans, took a long, deep breath, and made his move.
The most important thing, Jake realized, was to avoid looking down into the narrow abyss between the two buildings. One false step, and he’d be hurtling to the ground. He averted his gaze to the sky, where he saw a helicopter hovering in the distance. A news chopper, perhaps? Would his foolish heroism be broadcast for all of New York to see? “Can’t think about that now,” he whispered as his fingers touched the pipe. He grabbed it, tightly, closed his eyes, and positioned himself so he could slide next door with very little effort. In seconds, his feet felt the blessedly hard asphalt. He straightened himself, swallowed hard, and opened his eyes.
The woman stared right at him. As Jake approached her, she held out her hand to wave him off. “I can’t believe you did that. Go away!” she shouted. “You’re not going to talk me out of this.”
“I’m not here to talk you out of anything,” Jake said, still amazed that he’d made it over to the other roof. “I just want to chat.”
“Well, there’s nothing to chat about.”
“Okay. Then we’ll just hang out for a bit.” He’d made it as far as the wall where she sat, and he foolishly dared to look over its side, down at the sidewalk. A small group of people had started to gather, and something was being passed from hand to hand. “Looks like they found your bra.”
“Good for them. I’ve got a pair of matching panties for them in just a minute.” She sat up a little straighter. “And then, me.”
“You?”
“You bet. Goodbye, cruel world!” Her laugh rang off the bricks. “And goodbye, Bennett Franklin! Hope you enjoy it when they call you down to identify my naked body, you bastard!”
Jake leaned against the wall, next to her with his back to the street, reminding himself not to look down again. “Who’s Bennett Franklin?”
“You don’t want to know.”
Up close, she was even lovelier than she’d looked from the other roof. He observed a sudden urge to lean over and caress her left breast. “Listen, I have to ask you…”
“What? Make it quick, I want to get this over with.”
“I — I don’t know why you’re up here, why you want to do this. All I want to know is this — why naked? Or — I should say — partly naked?”
She shrugged. “Why not?
“Is this to get back at your friend for something?”
“Very likely. Pardon me for a second.”
She ran her hands down her hips and slithered out of her bikini panties, with movements just daring enough that Jake feared she might slip off the roof by accident. The panties were so pretty, made of a translucent material with bits of lace along the seams. She dangled them at the ends of her fingers, then with a flick of the wrist, set them free, floating like a dandelion seed down to the street. The crowd cheered as they fluttered to the sidewalk. Her newly revealed pussy hair was trimmed in a narrow downward-pointing triangle.
“There,” she said. “Me next.”
“No, no, that won’t solve anything. Please, believe me — um, could I ask your name?”
“Sara.”
“I’m Jake. Pleased to know you, Sara.”
He held out his hand for her to shake, but she just glanced at it, then turned her gaze back to the street. The crowd had now grown to a couple dozen people, and a few of them started to cheer her on. “Jump! Come on, jump!”
“Shut up!” Jake yelled back. Then he turned to Sara. “You know, you don’t have to do this. I know life can get tough — man, I’ve been there, I’ve wanted to do just what you’re doing right now. Maybe not in the nude, but — but I always stop, I always change my mind. Takes a lot of courage to live, it’s true, but it can be done.”
“Easy for you to say.”
“You live in this building?”
“Maybe.”
“I live next door. Right over there.” He pointed at his window, where the draperies were still slightly apart from where he’d first observed her. “You know, you really are pretty. You want to come over for a glass of wine or something?”
“No thanks.” She waved at the people on the sidewalk; a police car had just arrived. “I got something to do here.”
“No, you don’t!” Jake cried. “That’s just it! Look, just come away from the wall for a minute at least. It — it’s making me dizzy.”
“All right. For a minute.” She smiled at him and touched his beard with her fingertips. “You know, I like a man with facial hair.”
Jake laughed. “Oh, really?”
“They’re fun to kiss.”
“That’s good to know.”
He touched her elbow and pointed to a bent-up garden lounger, over by the cable TV box. A tenant must have left it upstairs for some casual sunbathing. Sara hesitated, so Jake decided to enjoy it himself, stretching out and patting a place for her down by his knees. Much to his amazement, she finally climbed down from the wall and walked over to the end of the lounger, where she perched cautiously on its edge.
“There, that’s better, don’t you think?” Jake asked.
“Yeah, I guess.” For a naked woman, she’d certainly managed to sit modestly, with her arms hiding her breasts, her thighs held firmly together. The temptation of unseen beauty, so close by, was killing him.
“Gosh, I get up close to you, I see how pretty you really are. Has anyone ever told you that?”
“Yeah, once or twice.” She swept a bit of hair from her eyes, and Jake even thought he saw the beginnings of a blush. “Not too often.”
“That’s a shame. Would this include that Franklin character you were talking about?”
She nodded. “For sure. God forbid he should ever pay me a compliment.”
“Oh, yes, that’s such a shame.” Jake reached over and ran his knuckle along her outer thigh, which caused her legs to fall open slightly. He raised his head a little to catch a glimpse of the shadowed regions where those thighs met. “Yes, how lovely!”
“Would you like to see better?”
“If you would like to show me.”
So she let them fall open all the way, until Jake could see the clean-shaven folds of her outer labia, a hint of moisture barely hidden by the inner lips. She took her fingers and held them open even further, and Jake felt the saliva begin to gather on his tongue, just like it would in the presence of a nice plate of pasta or a ripe peach. “I’d really a little taste, if you’d be so inclined, Sara. Please?”
“Hmm, well — a little pleasure before I go on to the next world could fun, you know?”
“Don’t talk that way,” Jake said, getting up from the lounger and kneeling before her. He looked up into her eyes for a second, drinking in their deep blue, then moved forward and laid the tip of his tongue against the reddish point of her clitoris, which peeked so temptingly at him. It tasted slightly salty, but equally as sweet, and it did not take him long to press his whole face into her pussy, beard and all.
“Oooh, yes, that’s wonderful!” cooed Sara. “Please don’t stop.” Her legs straightened, tightened at the knees, and she threw back her head and moaned, a sound that almost drowned the sound of arriving sirens. Almost, but not quite. Nor did her sighs of passion cover the footsteps of the half-dozen policemen dashing through the door and stumbling onto the roof, startling both Jake and Sara and causing the latter to leap to her feet.
“What the hell?” Jake was thrown backwards and landed on the roof, with his legs splayed out like a crab’s.
“Where’s the jumper?” One of the policemen held out Sara’s panties, now encased in a zipper-locked plastic bag. “These yours, ma’am?”
“Yes, but I won’t be needing them anymore.”
“Wait!” The policeman lunged after her, but she was too quick, jumping up on the perimeter wall with the grace of a faerie ballerina.
“Wait!” Jake screamed, trying to grab her bare ankle.
Sara looked back over her shoulder, right at him. “Thanks, Jake. That was really good. I did appreciate it.” Then she stood up, spreading her arms like bird’s wings. “But I have to go now. I’m sorry.”
And with that, she jumped from the roof. No hesitation, just a graceful leap into mid-air. Jake looked over the side, in time to see her naked body falling through the New York air, her long chestnut hair streaming out behind her. A cluster of firemen waited with some kind of huge inflatable mat, and she landed smack in the middle of it, bounced once, and was then grabbed by dozens of hands, who carried her away, wrapped in blankets to hide her lovely nakedness from the world.
* * * * *
At least she hadn’t died. Or so it seemed. Still, she’d hit that rescue mat awfully hard. Was she all right? Jake ran downstairs after the policemen, but by the time he made it to the street, the ambulance was pulling away, and the television news people hovering at the edges of the crowd made him nervous. Already he could hear them asking the policemen where “the man” was. “You know, the guy who was up on the roof with her,” one shrill-voiced fellow said. Jake took that as his cue to hide.
Even that took some doing, though. As he slipped back through the door, a tall gentleman flashed a police badge in his face. “Where are you going? You’ll need to answer some questions.”
“I — I can’t. Not right now.”
“Then we’ll call you. Put your number here, please.”
Jake took the policeman’s clipboard and scribbled his phone number in the margin of the report. “Thanks for being so understanding. I’m sure you see these things every day, but I –”
The man interrupted him, taking back the clipboard and slipping it into a battered leather briefcase. “Stay close to the phone tonight, sir. We’ll need to wrap this up.”
Back in his apartment, Jake was too rattled by the whole experience to finish his wine or fix any dinner — and besides, any food or drink would wash away the taste of Sara herself, which lingered on his lips. He ran his tongue over them as he flipped through the channels, never stopping long enough to catch the drift of any particular program. As the network programming segued into the evening news (with no report of the incident, thank heaven), and then the late night talk shows and on to the infomercials, Jake finally fell asleep, his head hanging over the edge of his sofa, the last of the wine growing warm in the glass on the windowsill, right where he’d left it.
He woke to the electronic bleating of his cordless telephone. It rang several times, and he appreciated his caller’s patience, since it took him a minute to find the phone where it had been dropped under some newspapers. “Hello?” he muttered, his throat so dry, he could barely speak.
“Jake?”
A female voice. One he’d heard before. “My god,” he whispered. “Sara! You’re alive.”
“Yes. Apparently.”
He wondered how she’d gotten his phone number, since he didn’t remember even telling her his last name. Probably the cops had given it to her. “Where are you?”
“They took me to the hospital, for ‘observation’, you know? They’re going to keep me for another twenty-four hours, then they have to let me go.” She sighed. “Look, I just wanted to call to say thank you.”
“For what?”
“Come on, Jake, you know.” Her laugh came from deep within her throat and was extraordinarily sexy. “For talking me out of it.”
“Well, I didn’t do that much talking, as it turns out.”
“Oh, but you did. You used your tongue to great advantage.”
“Hey, after you get out of the hospital, could you — do you — could we see each other sometime? You know, maybe catch a movie? Dinner?”
“I think I would like that a lot.” She paused, and Jake thought he could hear voices in the background, probably telling her that she’d talked long enough. “Yes, I know I would. I’ll call you when I’m home again, okay.”
“Thanks. I’d like that too.”
Jake hung up the phone and sighed. He wanted to say so much more tell Sara how beautiful she was, or at least how tasty. The memory of her lovely juices still lingered, however slightly, which gave him hope that he would have the chance, very soon.
© 1999 by J.Z. Sharpe. All rights reserved. Not to be reproduced, redistributed in any form whatsoever without express written consent. This means you.
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