San Francisco reared its head up at them through a wall of cotton tailed clouds, iridescent in the early afternoon sunlight.
"That's my city!" Toni said craning her neck at the city they called the Paris of the Pacific. "I love going away because I always love coming back." It was a sentiment Lisa had heard expressed many times before about many different places. She felt the same way about her own patch of land in the Nevada desert. They fastened their seat belts as the plane bucked into a heavy air pocket and began its descent.
Their ears were still popping open and shut as they stepped into the taxi and Toni could barely hear her own voice giving the driver the address of her apartment on Geary Street.
"It's been years since I've been here," Lisa said as she watched the outlying suburban sprawl flash by bringing them closer to their destination.
"I'd say this place has weathered the march of time pretty well," Toni observed like a guidebook. "If you've got to live in California, this is the place to live as far as I'm concerned."
Toni paid the driver and tipped him four dollars. Her apartment was situated at the top of one of those notoriously steep San Francisco hills that looked majestically down towards the bay and the span of the Golden Gate bridge.
"Hey I like it already," Lisa said looking at the elegant dark brown two tone exterior of the building with its window boxes glutted with colorful flowers.
"Wait 'til you see it inside."
Toni had four palatial rooms with high ceilings, all in wood and dappled with sunlight. "And two full bathrooms too," she added as Lisa looked the place over with an approving eye, "and that's what I call luxury."
"Beautiful, just beautiful. Where did you get that rug?" Lisa asked admiring a brilliant Persian in the middle of the living room.
"Oh I'll take you there before you go back. Wait til you see all the stuff they've got."
"I feel like a shot of something. Where do you keep the booze?"
"Right over there," Toni said pointing to a cabinet in the corner, "Help yourself. I'm just going to call the office to see what's been going on while I've been away."
They spent the afternoon browsing through the North Beach book stores, the antique shops in the Marina and by seven were back at the apartment; shoes off, drinks in hand, pleasantly foot sore gazing out at the city sprawled beneath them through the enormous plate glass window of what Toni caller her 'Observation Room'. Two business women at the tail end of the day with the night yet to come.
"I think," said Toni taking a long, cooling sip of her drink, "that we should have a bath and then go down to the wharf for dinner. I could do with some good old San Francisco sour dough bread and a nice big lobster. How about you?"
"Start running the bath water," Lisa said unbuttoning her blouse.
Toni opted for a quick shower instead. Walking into the guest bathroom with a towel laced around her and a second drink in hand she looked at Lisa in the tub, bubbles up to her neck, hair piled high and tight in a casual bun running a yellow washcloth up and down her long, smooth right leg.
"Admiring yourself darling?" she said sitting herself down on the edge of the tub.
"Always," Lisa said toying with a clot of bubbles.
"Whatcha" thinking?" Lisa asked trying to read her thoughts.
"Oh about flesh and things," she said dreamily.
"Flesh? You mean my boobs?"
"Yeah your boobs."
"Holding up pretty good aren't they?"
Toni reached down through the fleecy wall of bubbles and let Lisa's tits fill her hand. She squeezed on the left one lightly and appraisingly. Lisa stopped stroking her leg with the washcloth and settled back into the warm water.
"Like them?" she asked looking at Toni's half open mouth, at the even white lines of her teeth.
"Always have, you know that. What's not to like? Lisa… "
"What is it?"
"Do you think that… " she stopped, her hands manipulating the rising swell of the frosty nipple, her thoughts forming slowly, edging outwards. "Do you think that we could ever get back together again? I mean like the old days-live together, share some kind of a life? Do you think something like that would work out or is it too late?"
"No, I don't think it's too late, but is that what you want?"
"It's a thought. In fact it's more than a thought. It's something I've been thinking a lot about in the last few days. We're good together in a lot of ways. This bachelor life is OK, it has its advantages but it's not really where it's at-not by a long shot."
"Is this an official proposal I'm getting?"
"Just say tentative. Food for thought."
"It's appetizing but what about our work? We've pretty well established ourselves-you here-me there. It would take a lot of rearranging, major change and I don't know if either one of us is ready to do it. We're not as foot loose and fancy free as the old days. We just can't pick up and say see you later,' like we used to."
"I know."
"We actually have responsibilities. I hate that word, but there it is hanging over us."
"You're right, but what if all that could be worked out somehow. I mean if we really wanted to be together, be with one another all that would be secondary."
"We'd have to give it a lot more thought."
"Yeah, sure. Say why don't you finish dabbling with yourself and let's get a move on-I'm getting very hungry." She got up from the edge of the tub and gave Lisa a pout that resembled a smile and walked out of the bathroom.