Stella walked to the window of her hotel room and threw it open. She had asked for a ground-floor room with a view over the beautiful gardens, filled with lush tropical vegetation and showy flowers.
She had arrived in Jaipur, in northern India, earlier in the day by train from Delhi. She had wanted to visit India ever since she was a child, and heard the stories her father used to recount of his military service with the British army in India during WWII. She had grown up eating curry prepared by her father, and had developed a taste for it, though in light of the real Indian food she had been eating since her arrival in India, she realized that his curries were not really authentic, but they were delicious and prepared with love. Tomorrow she was going on a tour of the famed ‘Pink City’, as Jaipur was known, for the pink stone used for so many of its buildings.
But now the sun had set, and she was tired and ready to go to bed. The warm evening air was charged with mystery, and heavy with exotic fragrances that were so different from what she was used to in England. She stood quietly by the open window for a few minutes, breathing in the intoxicating perfumes of the garden and of India. She was treating herself to a couple of nights in one of the hotels that used to be a maharajah’s palace, so her room was large and rich with gilt and mirrors. She felt quite at home in this new environment, and although she was a pale, blue eyed blonde young woman from northern climes, and didn’t speak the language, she felt a connection with this land of dark-skinned people, powerful aromas, strong flavors, and overwhelming sensuality. She wondered if perhaps she had had a previous incarnation here. India was like a land viewed in technicolor, so powerful after a life growing up on an island of pale watercolors and sepia tints. A classic case of the attraction of opposites.
She turned from the open window, stripped off her clothes and slid naked between the sheets. She extinguished the light by her bed and lay listening to the night sounds, allowing herself to drift off to sleep enfolded in the unfamiliar eastern night, moonlight gently bathing the room.
No one had told her to be sure to close her window at night, and it was with deep shock and fear that she awoke sometime after midnight, when the air had turned chilly, to find something in bed beside her. She wondered if she was dreaming, moved slightly, and felt a corresponding move from whatever was in her bed. She was a small, slight young woman, about five foot five inches, and she realized that whatever was in her bed was stretched out along her entire length. She opened her eyes slowly, and found herself staring into the hypnotic eyes of a cobra. His eyes were unfathomable pools, black as onyx, unblinking and inscrutable, and she felt mesmerized by their power. His head lay on the pillow next to hers, and he emitted a low hiss, almost like a growl, when he saw that she had opened her eyes. He moved his head slightly so he could caress her face gently with his flickering forked tongue, picking up her personal odor, evaluating her. He cuddled up to her for warmth and held her in his coils. She knew snakes like to keep warm, so understood its motives, but still, this was taking her love of animals beyond her limit. It didn’t seem to be threatening her in any way though, so she moved carefully, and the snake gently, almost lovingly, coiled its body around and over her just a little more tightly. She felt cradled by his body and was able to close her eyes and relax again, drifting off into a strange sleep. She started having erotic fantasies, and she couldn’t tell if she was awake or dreaming. It was an eventful night for Stella, but hazy. Was she making love, or dreaming that she was? Whatever it was, it was extremely enjoyable, and she felt waves of pleasure wash over her body, which by now was highly aroused.
She woke with a start, to find sunlight streaming into her room, and her bed empty of the enormous cobra that had visited her during the night. The light chatter of the garden sweepers and chai wallahs drifted in through the window, along with distant strains of sitar music. She lay in bed, unclear about whether she had actually been visited by a cobra, or whether it had all been a figment of her imagination. Whatever it was, she felt different upon waking, more of a woman, her body perplexingly fuller, at one with India, and to her surprise, she found herself hoping that perhaps, on the following night, her visitor might return.
Susan P. Blevins, an ex-pat Brit, lived in Italy for twenty-six years, traveled the world extensively, and has now settled in Houston, Texas, where she is enjoying writing stories and poems based on her travels and adventures. She had a weekly column on food in a European newspaper while living in Rome, and has published various articles on gardens and gardening while living in northern New Mexico, before moving to Houston. Since living in Houston she has been published in various literary magazines, both in hard copy and online. her passions are classical music, gardening, nature, animals (cats in particular), reading and of course, writing. She has written a journal since she was about nine. She is a true bibliophile and has books in every room of her house.