In the car, while Mario is driving her home, she thinks about his manly gentleness, impassioned tenderness, and fervid caresses. She does not have any regret for what they have done, but she has a disgusted anger for what has been deprived from her all her life. In her country, women are told that the intimacy are only for men and women must obey their husband no matter what they do to them. The word pleasure does not exist for women. Hana can say for certainty that at her age, she has had a pleasure of intimacy with a man for the first time. As she thinks, while Mario is driving, she remembers that she particularly enjoyed the massage, when he skillfully kneaded her body with his strong hands to soften all her tight muscles. She thinks how could he know of her aching and overworking body that gave her such a treatment, when all the tension of her shyness and everlasting pain gradually eased away? And how could he by any means recognized when to stop the stroking of her body's sore feeling and began those passionate and endearing caresses?
In the silence of the car, where the only sound is their heavy breathing and the sound of engine, Mario conjures up the genuine bliss he has felt that no one has ever given him after his wife's death. He thinks of this honest and serious woman, who is in such need of love in her reserved way; nevertheless, he has one regret that frightens him tremendously. He knows this kind of personalities well enough as has learned by his extensive traveling overseas, whether for business or pleasure, to identify their paranoid characters. If Hana begins feeling guilty for their intimacy, she will never want to see him again. He is certain of that. His only chance, he thinks, is Hana's unbelievable and unusual intelligence. That natural brilliance she possesses, may enable her to overcome the obsolete belief of a culture and custom that woven a web around her which does not work in America.
When the twenty minutes drive from Mario's home to Hana's ends in one hour, since Mario unconsciously was driving the opposite direction to her home, it is time to end this night by saying good bye, or see you again, or a kiss.
"Well, this is it." Mario says despondently.
Hana, as though is awaken up by a harsh sound of an alarm clock, trembles.
"I must go in now."
"We see each other again, right?" Mario murmurs.
"I don't know."
This is what Mario was afraid of.
"Do you have any regret?" He asks.
"No, I'm not sure."
"Did you enjoy yourself?" Mario tries to make her admit of the pleasure he is certain of.
"Yes, I did!"
Now he is hopeful.
"So we see each other again."
"Sam is coming home on Tuesday. I don't know how he is going to feel about us. Let me call you when I see our situation is okay with him."
Mario not only understands that remark, he thinks it is a wise one.
"I agree with you. I don't call you. You call me and let me know."
"All right."
Hana feels once again his manly and passionate kiss and smells the aroma of his cigar before getting out of the car.
As she eases into her bedroom in the dark apartment, she thinks that for one night she has been earth and Mario has been universe; as in her belief women are Earth and men are Universe, and neither earth nor universe can exist without each other. Sitting on her bed, as old days, in the pale light of her room, she writes:
"In the obscure room, the ecstasy numbs.
My every existing cell shivers and becomes
Overflown with a special thrill and desire.
A passage of sunlight sets me in fire.
~
It is his touch that makes me glow.
His passionate kisses caresses me like rainbow.
Should I have only one second to live,
It must be in his bosom, so I can give."
To Be Continued
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