When Krystyn returned with the coffee service on a large silver tray along with a large bath towel she put to the side of the couch, saying in explanation, “I brought the towel in here in case there’s a spill on the rug. There’s nothing wrong with being prepared for the unexpected!” They chatted amicably for a minute, exchanging pleasantries and she offered to take him on a tour of the house before they had their coffee. He accepted and she took him back to the hall and showed him her office in the front of house, off the main hall. Then they toured the bathroom, kitchen and family room on the first floor. After they had seen the first floor, she led him up the mahogany banistered stairway and showed him the second floor. A quick peek at her large sixteen-by-eighteen foot bedroom revealed a queen-sized bed with a wrought iron canopy with black metal ivy leaves that curled around the posters to disappear into blood red canopy hanging above. The walls were painted a rose color like the living room, but it was of a darker, more sensuous hue. Andrew had a hard time believing how detailed his memories of his dream were. It felt like he had actually experienced being in that house. Every detail was exact and crystal clear in his mind. He remembered seeing a glass-topped sitting table over by the window made of matching wrought iron with the same ivy motif with blood red cushions on the chairs. A matching candlestick was centered in the table with alternating twelve-inch black and red tapers.

 

The single glimpse of her bedroom had made Andrew’s heart pound in the dream. The strangeness of the wrought iron furniture had given him the spooky impression that the ivy was once a living thing that had bloomed in some person’s well-tended garden and had somehow magically transformed into dark-dun, dead metal by some evil spell. Nevertheless, the color scheme in Krystyn’s bedroom affected him strongly; the room reeked of sexuality and power. For Andrew’s deeply repressed sexual drive, a single glance was all that it took to give him a massive erection, even in his dream. This was a woman of self-confidence, of money, of power, someone who could fulfill dreams his subconscious had not yet formed.

 

His spine tingled at the very thought of laying naked with her and made him quiver in anticipation of an event that would breach his wildest imaginings. She would rule over him in perfection while he groveled at her feet below. Andrew had shaken his head in his dream to rid his mind of the fantastic scenes that filled his mind. Krystyn had intoxicated him by her very presence. She was the epitome of female power and sexuality to his immature psyche. She symbolized feminine power incarnate. He would have been glad to trail behind her silently to the ends of the Earth, eternally grateful if she would only turn from time to time and bless him with the radiance of her smile.