The Melody Beneath His Touch

The first time I walked into Marcus Chen's studio, I thought I'd entered a cathedral. Not the kind with stained glass and incense, but something more sacred still—walls lined with concert posters from Vienna and Milan, a grand piano gleaming like an altar beneath afternoon light that streamed through tall windows. Even the air felt different here: cedar and something citrus, maybe bergamot, as if the man himself had perfumed the space with his presence.

My mother had begged him to take me. “Please, Maestro. Just one lesson. She shows promise.” She’d dragged me to his masterclass at the conservatory like I was a lamb to slaughter, my fingers still bruised from practicing Liszt until dawn. While other students leaned forward in their seats, I’d sat with arms crossed, pretending I didn’t care that his recordings had been my lullabies since childhood. But when he’d played—Chopin’s Ballade No. 1—my throat closed. The notes didn’t just sound; they bled. I felt them in the hollow beneath my ribs, in the pulse between my legs, in places no teacher had ever reached.

Now he stood before me in rolled shirtsleeves, the top two buttons undone, revealing a triangle of golden skin and a faint scar above his collarbone. His dark hair was tousled, like he’d run his hands through it while composing. Those hands—God, those hands—were the reason I’d practiced until my fingertips split. I’d watched videos of them flying across keyboard oceans, but up close they were more beautiful than I’d imagined: long fingers, veins that traced blue rivers beneath the skin, a pianist’s calluses that caught the light when he gestured.

“You’re Emma,” he said, my name sounding foreign in his faint accent. “Your mother says you play like you’re angry at the keys.”

“I’m not angry,” I lied, clutching my sheet music. “I just... feel things.”

His mouth curved—not quite a smile, but close. “Good. Music without feeling is masturbation. Technical, empty.” He gestured to the bench. “Play something that scares you.”

My heart hammered as I sat. The Steinway’s keys were cool beneath my trembling fingers. I chose Rachmaninoff’s Prelude in G minor because it terrified me—its thundering chords, its demands for violence and tenderness in equal measure. I played like I was confessing sins, my body swaying, sweat pooling at the small of my back. When the final note vanished, silence rang louder than the music had.

Marcus didn’t speak at first. He stepped closer, close enough that I smelled his skin—something warm and metallic, like bronze heated by sun. “Again,” he murmured. “But this time, don’t think. Feel where the music wants to go. Let it fuck you.”

The word hit like a slap. I stared at the keys, blood roaring in my ears. When I began again, his hand settled on my shoulder. Not possessive—just there, grounding. But I felt it everywhere. His thumb traced the ridge of my collarbone as I played, a slow counter-melody to Rachmaninoff’s storm. My rhythm faltered when he leaned down, his breath stirring the hair at my nape.

“Here,” he said, covering my hand with his. “You’re holding back. Let it break you open.”

His fingers guided mine, pressing harder, demanding more. The contact was professional—technically. But my body didn’t know the difference. Heat unfurled low in my belly as he adjusted my wrist angle, his thumb brushing my pulse point. When the chord crashed, something inside me crashed too. I was wet, suddenly, achingly, the way I’d only ever been alone in my room with my own hand and fantasies that always ended with faceless men who had Marcus’s hands.

“Better,” he said, but didn’t move away. “You’ve been taught to fear your own hunger. Don’t.”

The lesson ended with me stumbling from the bench, cheeks flaming, unable to meet his eyes. He handed me a folder of exercises—his own compositions, ink still fresh. “Practice these. Next week, same time.” As I reached the door, he added, “And Emma? Bring your hunger. Leave the shame.”

I touched myself that night with the lights on, staring at my reflection in the mirror above my dresser. I wanted to see what he saw—this hunger I wasn’t supposed to fear. My hips lifted to meet my fingers as I imagined his hands, not mine, the calluses catching on delicate skin. I came biting my lip to stay silent, but what escaped was his name.

The second lesson, I wore a skirt. Not obvious—just a black A-line that swirled when I walked, hitting mid-thigh. I told myself it was coincidence, that I’d dressed without thinking. But I’d shaved in the shower that morning, taking care between my legs, the razor’s glide making me shiver. I’d chosen the silk underwear too, the ivory pair that felt like water against skin.

He noticed. Of course he noticed. His gaze swept down my legs as I entered, then back to my face, something unreadable flickering there. “Today we work on touch,” he said, as if discussing scales. “The way your fingers meet the keys. It’s like sex—too soft, and there’s no friction. Too hard, and you bruise.”

My breath caught. He moved behind me as I sat, his hands covering mine again. But this time, he didn’t guide me through notes. Instead, he lifted my hands to his face. “Close your eyes,” he said. “Learn my skin the way you learn ivory.”

I was shaking as he pressed my palms to his cheeks, the faint scratch of stubble, the sharp angle of cheekbone. His eyelids fluttered shut as he guided my fingertips across his lips—full, soft, that bottom lip I’d stared at during masterclasses. When my index finger brushed the seam, his mouth opened slightly, breath hot against my skin.

“Now,” he whispered, “play me.”

He lowered our hands to the keys, but didn’t let go. I played a simple Bach invention, but every note felt obscene. His chest pressed to my back, the buttons of his shirt imprinting on my shoulder blades. When I reached for a high F, his hand slipped beneath my skirt—not touching, just resting on my thigh, the heat of his palm burning through silk.

“You’re trembling,” he observed, voice rough. “Good. Trembling is honest.”

The lesson became a blur of sensation. His fingers correcting my posture, tracing the line of my spine. His voice in my ear, describing phrasing in language that made me clench: “Let it swell here, like breath before release. Hold the tension. Make them wait for it.” By the time I left, my thighs were slick, my hands unsteady as I clutched my music.

That night, I didn’t imagine. I remembered. The weight of his hand on my leg. The way he’d smelled when he leaned close—cedar and something darker, like the inside of a violin. I touched myself with the precision I brought to Chopin, teasing, building, my hips rolling to a rhythm I’d learned from his heartbeat against my back. When I came, it was with his name a prayer on my lips.

The third lesson, he was different. Restless. He paced as I played, not touching, not speaking. When I finished, he stood at the window, hands shoved in pockets. “You’re improving,” he said, not turning. “But you’re still thinking. Still somewhere else.”

I set my hands in my lap, fingers curled to hide their trembling. “Where do you want me to be?”

He turned then, and I saw it—the thing we’d been circling. Hunger, yes, but something hungrier than hunger. Like he wanted to consume me and be consumed, to crawl inside my skin and make me sing from within.

“Here,” he said, crossing to the piano. “Just here.”

But when he reached for me, it wasn’t professional. His hands framed my face, thumbs brushing my cheekbones. “Tell me to stop,” he said, voice barely sound. “Say it, and we go back to scales and theory.”

I couldn’t speak. My hands found his wrists, not to push away but to anchor, to feel the race of his pulse. He lowered his head slowly, giving me every chance to turn. Instead, I rose to meet him.

The kiss was nothing like I’d imagined. I’d expected finesse, control—the way he played. Instead, it was clumsy, desperate. His teeth caught my lip, my hands fisting in his shirt as he angled my head, drinking me in like I was water and he’d crossed deserts. When we broke apart, we were both breathing like we’d run miles.

“Fuck,” he muttered, pressing his forehead to mine. “Fuck, this is—”

“Don’t stop,” I whispered, surprising us both. “Please.”

He made a sound—half-laugh, half-groan—and then his mouth was on my neck, my shoulder, pushing aside the collar of my shirt to taste skin. “You taste like—Christ, like pressure. Like the moment before a chord resolves.”

I was liquid, melting. His hands slid beneath my thighs, lifting me onto the piano’s closed lid. Sheet music scattered like startled birds. The wood was cool against my heated skin as he stepped between my legs, his hands mapping my body through clothes.

“Tell me what you want,” he demanded, voice raw. “Not what you think you should. What you want.”

I looked at him—really looked. At the wildness in his dark eyes, the way his hands shook as they hovered over my skin. At the man who’d played for queens and presidents, now on his knees before me.

“I want you to play me,” I said, the words torn from somewhere deep. “Like I’m your instrument. I want to feel what you feel when the music takes you.”

His answer was a kiss that claimed. He lifted me, carrying me to the leather sofa against the wall. Laying me down like I was something precious and dangerous. When he pulled off my shirt, his gaze devoured—my breasts in plain cotton, the curve of my stomach, the skirt bunched around my waist.

“Beautiful,” he breathed, tracing the line of my sternum. “Like a sonata. Every note perfect, but waiting to be—” He lowered his mouth to my breast through fabric, sucking until the cotton grew damp. “—played.”

I arched, fingers tangling in his hair. He peeled away my underwear slowly, reverently, spreading my thighs with hands that had performed at Carnegie Hall. When his mouth found me, I cried out—not a note but a chord, discordant and true. He tasted like he played—fierce, intuitive, finding rhythms I didn’t know my body could hold.

“Marcus—” I gasped, hips rolling to meet his tongue. “I can’t—”

“You can,” he growled against my skin. “And you will. Again. Until you understand that this—” He thrust two fingers inside me, curling them with the precision he brought to arpeggios. “—this is music too. Your body singing for me.”

I came apart, crying out as pleasure crashed through me in waves. But he didn’t stop. He played my body like he played Rachmaninoff—building, teasing, driving me to the edge and pulling back until I was begging, nails scoring his shoulders.

When he finally entered me, it was with the same focus he brought to performance. Every movement deliberate, watching my face for the smallest reaction. “Like this?” he asked, adjusting his angle until I gasped. “Or this?” A slow drag that hit something deep and perfect.

“Don’t think,” I whispered, echoing his early lesson. “Feel.”

He lost rhythm then, driving into me with abandon. I wrapped my legs around his waist, meeting him thrust for thrust, the piano’s faint vibrations beneath us like a bass line to our duet. When we came, it was together—a simultaneous crescendo that left us trembling, his face buried in my neck as I clenched around him.

We lay there, hearts racing in counterpoint. He traced lazy patterns on my sweat-slick skin, occasionally pressing his lips to my shoulder. “I’ve wanted,” he said quietly, “since the first time I saw you play. The way you bit your lip when you missed a note. The way your whole body moved like the music was—”

“Fucking me?” I supplied, making him laugh.

“Making love to you,” he corrected, tender. “Even then.”

The lessons continued, but they were different now. We still worked—he was relentless, pushing me until my fingers cramped. But now, when I played well, his reward was kisses along my spine. When I struggled, he’d lift me onto the piano, working out tension with his mouth until I sang for him.

I performed my first recital six months later. As I walked onstage, I caught his eye in the wings. He raised his hand—not waving, but showing me his fingers, callused and steady. I sat at the piano and began, my body remembering every touch, every lesson. The music poured through me—not just notes but memory, sensation, the way he’d taught me that hunger was holy.

When the final chord faded, the audience erupted. But I only had eyes for him, standing backstage, pride and something deeper written across his face. Later, in his studio, he laid me across the piano and made love to me slowly, worshipfully, each touch a thank-you.

“I love you,” I said, the words rising like a melody I hadn’t known I was composing.

He stilled above me, eyes dark and infinite. “I’ve loved you since you played that Rachmaninoff like you were ripping out your own heart. I just had to teach you to hear it.”

Now, when I play, I feel him in every note. Not just his hands or his mouth or the way he moves inside me—but the way he taught me that music and love are the same: hunger given voice, tension seeking release, the courage to be broken open and remade in the key of joy.

Sometimes, during performances, he sits in the front row. When I reach the climax of whatever piece I’m playing, I’ll catch his eye and remember that first lesson: Don’t think. Feel. My body sings the memory of his touch, and the music becomes more than sound—it becomes the story of us, written in flesh and ivory and the spaces between notes where love lives.

The critics call me a prodigy. They speak of technical brilliance, of emotional depth beyond my years. They don’t know that every performance is a love letter, that when my fingers fly across the keys, I’m not just playing—I’m being played, still, by the man who taught me that the most beautiful music is made when two bodies find their rhythm and never let it end.