"Would you pose for me in private?"
It was such a direct question, so boldly delivered that he couldn't respond for a moment. They had met by accident that afternoon in town, had almost passed each other in the street, then stopped with a flicker of recognition and a shared smile. She had pulled him to the side of the path to get out of the way of the other shoppers, and said, "I nearly didn't recognise you with your clothes on", to which he laughed and blushed faintly.
She was one of the artists, and he recognised her of course. The modelling had been his flatmate's idea, and he had overcome his initial reluctance to make a few extra dollars posing nude for the community art college.
She was one of a group of mature students learning to draw, and he had spent an hour a week for the last couple of months posing naked in the studio under the direction of the tutor; who told him he had just the right type of body for his classes — lean, but with good muscle tone, plus a relaxed attitude and the ability to stay still for long periods without apparent effort.
He subverted the erotic potential of the evenings by masturbating just prior to biking down to the college, and found this left him curiously indifferent to his own nudity, and to the stares of the group circled around him. But she had caught his attention anyway: she was older than him; a confidant well dressed woman who looked serious when concentrating on her drawings, but after the sessions the models and the art students had cups of the awful college tea and she showed herself as cheerful and quick-witted, with a gently teasing manner that made him feel even younger than he was.
"So? Would you? I have a small studio at home and some drawings I want to work on"
The question hung there as they stood in the street, and he stumbled his reply that, "Sure. I mean, I don't see why not". They haggled over the price as he didn't think it was fair to get paid the same as the group evenings, and she insisted, saying he would be just as nude for a single artist as he would be for the group. They settled on a fee and a time, and he arranged to come to her house the following afternoon.
2
She opened the door to him dressed simply in a blouse and skirt, and he realised again how effortlessly good looking she was as she guided him through to her studio — a standalone shed at the back of her garden. The studio was warm, lit through a large sunlight which bathed the room in a pleasant overhead light.
The room was lined with drawings and paintings, mostly nudes and as he looked closer, he saw that they were nearly all studies of one subject: Michelangelo's statue of a nude David, posed with his sling and stones, ready to face Goliath -- with his face tense, but his body curiously calm and still. She had drawn from a wide range of perspectives, as if she had come in from a great distance, and then moved closer and closer until she was drawing the texture of his marble skin.
She offered him a glass of wine, and they stood together sipping as she confessed her obsession. She told him of her time in Italy as a young woman, the frequent visits to Florence, where she had spent hours in the Academy sitting in the gallery with the statue, drawing and reading.
She told him about its history, about the surprise choice of the young Michelangelo to sculpt it; of the deranged man attacking his toes with a hammer; the continuing battles between Rome and Florence over its ownership.
She pointed at a small replica of the statue on a desk. "So, what do you think — can you maintain a pose like that?"
He looked closely at the miniature statue, the standing pose - relaxed but slightly awkward and shrugged his shoulders, "It doesn't look so difficult". He took off his shirt and noticed her turn away while he slid out his belt and removed his trousers and underwear. And then he was naked in her studio, their slight mutual embarrassment covered by her directing his pose. She gave him a handful of stones and a strip of leather as a sling, then helped to arrange the leather strap across his shoulder and down his back, where it curled around his buttock. His right hand curled around the stones and hung loose at his side, and finally she stepped back and was satisfied. "Perfect. Just hold it there."
3
In the art class it had never been a problem, but it was different here: the warmth of the studio, the wine, the proximity of her as she walked around him had all conspired to stir his sleeping penis from its slumber. And he realised too that he had forgotten to masturbate as he normally did before a posing session.
Thinking about masturbation didn't help. He tried his silent art class mantra: 'Margaret Thatcher, Margaret Thatcher, Margaret -' but it was too late. He was swelling and could feel the gravity tugging at his thickening cock. and knew that if he looked down he would see it beginning to arc out from his body.
She had noticed too of course, but rather than turning away she came closer, transfixed by the sight of his lengthening cock fattening and uncurling like an awakening creature.
Looking at her as she approached, he saw that she didn't appear at all shocked. Rather, there was a pink tinge to her cheeks and neck, and from this angle, he looked right down her substantial cleavage and to the outline of her nipples protruding through the fabric of her blouse. Instinctively, he reached out to her, longing to slide his hand down her neckline, to run his fingers along the curve of her breasts and cup them in his hands. He started to speak, but she quietened him with a finger to her lips, and then held her hand up to indicate he should stay just as he was, silent and unmoving.
She slid a hand down to caress and knead her breast, and then down over the folds of her skirt. She ran her hand firmly up between her legs with her eyes closed, savouring the feeling as the afternoon changed in that moment from awkward to sexually charged; where she knew there would be no stopping until they had taken each other, until they had cast aside their restraint and fucked each other until exhausted and satiated.
She unbuttoned and took her blouse off -- a move so unexpected and sudden that it was all he could do to stop himself pulling her to him. She was braless, and her beautiful pale breasts stood proudly out from her chest. The skirt quickly followed the blouse to the floor, and then they were naked together just inches apart but not touching.
4
For her, she was transported back to the Galleria dell'Accademia in Florence, with the warm light through the dome centred on the huge statue of David on its plinth. She was sitting on the bench she had always chosen to the left side, against the wall. The murmuring crowds had faded and she heard the main doors being shut. Lastly the radios and footsteps of the guards had come and gone, and the interior doors were closed and locked behind them.