Naked

THE rustling of bedsheets faded into oblivion.

He craned his head up from bed, silently. The bed didn't creak. Luck was on his side, it seemed.

The lights went out in the adjacent room. Finally, his parents were asleep.

Darkness engulfed his room, only a dim ray of light from the lamp in the corridor shining its way into the room through the doorway.

He got up, lifted the mosquito net, and started to stealthily tiptoe to the table by the bed.

Immediately, winter reminded him of its presence - the cold marble of the floor sucked out the last iota of drowsiness from his head like a dementor. The excitement had laid waste to his sleep anyways.

He took a deep breath and took pulled his shirt off. The cool breeze rushing in through the tiny opening in the window brushed against his naked skin. It was a titillating sensation. The comforting darkness of the night only played Cupid.

So intimate, so sensual a thing he had never felt before. Never before had he felt so... free.

Fearing, rather dreading someone would have heard him, he made his way back to bed.

He knew there were mosquitoes around. Lifting the mosquito net to create only a tiny opening for himself to crawl in (and no mosquitos piggyback), the soft fabric brushed against his back as he made his way in, so sensually, so gently, that it sent shivers down his spine.

Wow, he thought to himself. This is already turning out great!

He slid in under the welcoming warmth of the quilt, his shirt under the pillow, ready to be worn stealthily and out of sight, with none the wiser.

If so far had been heaven, this was forbidden paradise. It took him only a moment to fall under the intoxicating spell of feeling the soft fabric brush across his naked skin. He surrendered to the forgiving comfort of the night all too quickly.

It took him only a moment to slip his shirt on the next morning, so that when mom arrived to wake up her innocent little boy, he was just that: an innocent little boy.

AND so it happened the next night too.

Literature was no longer a failure to him. He finally loved the night.

The sensation was indeed intoxicating. He craved it every night just like how a bee craves honey.

THEY say change is the only constant, and nothing, not even something as cold as winter, can stop it.

Spring approached. The quilts went in, and out came the bed sheets. The fan too found itself woken up from a long winter slumber.

Soon, it was too hot to engulf himself completely under the bed sheets. But ceasing to use them was easier said then done.

"Take the bed sheets off only to let mom find me sleeping without a shirt in the morning? Hell, no!" he thought to himself.

STRIPPING down isn't always merely a mechanical task, it's often an experience.

All this while, he had been hiding. He had been hiding his insecurities and vulnerabilities underneath a cloak of darkness.

When darkness failed, the quilt and bed sheets doubled up only too well as its allies.

But he no longer could. Summer was approaching. Darkness was only temporary. The quilt and the bed sheets would soon be gone.

HE was in love with being naked. "The sensation is heavenly, it's intoxicating". Soon, sans the darkness and its allies, he would really be naked.

The world would see his body exactly as it is. He had forever kept it intimately private.

WAS he really prepared to be naked in front of the world? To show the world what he really is, and be proud of it?

He didn't feel so sure.

To be continued...