The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife

Warning: This story contains adult themes and language.

"And you're certain this is an accurate translation?"

"Word for word," Sebastian replied.

"You're sure?"

"One hundred per cent. Trust me - it's a literal interpretation of the original Japanese."

"But... But..."

"What?" Sebastian asked, irritated.

"It's so goddamned awful," Amanda said, staring at Sebastian's email. "I mean - talking octopuses fondling a woman. Really?"

"It's high art, Amanda."

"It's bestiality, is what it is."

"It's not to be taken literally," Sebastian said sighing. "It's representative."

"Of what? Sexual deviance?"

"Well, tentacle porn is a genuine thing but this isn't some shoddy, Anime rip-off designed to titillate a pervert with a mollusc fetish. It's..."

"Hang on - tentacle porn is a genuine thing? An actual thing?"

"Yes, Amanda - it's a thing. If people can get aroused by cow's udders, it's not too much of a stretch to imagine how eight legs covered in suckers might tickle someone's libido."

"That's just wrong," Amanda said.

"If I had more time, I'd make a comment about how divorce has turned you into a prude," Sebastian said, archly.

"I wouldn't call it..."

"How long has it been?"

Amanda fell silent.

No. She didn't want to think about... him. Today of all days.

"Just because I'm taking a break from men, it doesn't mean I've suddenly turned into a prude," Amanda said, trying to change the subject. "Granted, sexually, I'm going through a fallow period, but that doesn't mean I'm vanilla. I'm as adventurous and as open-minded as the next woman."

"Only if the woman next to you was Mother Theressa."

"Bugger off."

"If I didn't know better, Ms Cork, I'd say that your sexual imagination has grown blunt."

"Far from it," Amanda said, lying. "I simply don't understand how being given oral sex from an octopus is arousing."

"As I said, before, it's not literal," Sebastian said. "The picture is supposed to be representative. Metaphorical."

"Representative of what?"

"Isn't that your job to figure that out?" Sebastian said. "Look - I'm just the translator - you're the writer. I provide the bare bones - not the flesh. It's your..."

"I know," Amanda said, trying hard to suppress a sigh. "I know."

"Was there anything else you needed?"

"A new job?"

"Goodbye, Amanda."

"Goodbye, Sebastian. And thank you."

"No problems. And remember - Douglas has specifically asked to see the copy by the close of play."

"It'll be done. Take..."

The line went dead as Sebastian ended the call.

"...care," Amanda said to no one.

She laid her phone on the desk and slumped back in her chair. Once again, she looked at Sebastian's email.

Octopuses and cunnilingus...

What had she agreed to? Of all the assignments given to her by the gallery, this was by far the most strange. And easily the most perverted.

In the first weeks after accepting the job, she'd been overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of smut that masqueraded as fine art. For someone whose previous experience of the art world had amounted to a snatched glimpse of the Mona Lisa in a crowded Louvre on a sweltering summer's day as a teenager, the number of penises and vaginas she had encountered on a daily basis as a copywriter for the Tavistock Gallery had pummelled her.

Michelangelo, Picasso, Titian, Dali - whoever -

They were ALL obsessed with sex. Every other piece contained a dick or a pussy. She felt as if she was working for a socially acceptable version of Pornhub.

It was certainly a change from writing copy about laundry detergent and toilet bleach. That might have been boring but it was a damn sight less triggering. At least back then she didn't have to find a dozen synonyms for the male genitalia every day.

But this -

Well, this was a new low.

She didn't care if this was considered a masterpiece. It was perverted. And weird.

Octopuses. Really?

Amanda sighed. Maybe if she asked very nicely the detergent people would take her back -

No, young lady. Put on your big girl pants and do this. You're a bloody writer - so write! Plus, you're on a deadline, Missy. And if you want to eat next month, you better make that deadline.

Besides, this job was a chance to begin again. To jump outside your comfort zone. To rebuild after...

Him.

And she was damned if she was going to be beaten by...

Amanda took a fortifying gulp of her - cold - coffee and leaned back over her laptop.

Using her right hand, she moved her mouse, hovering over the tab that contained the jpeg of the picture she now had to write copy for. She clicked and Hokusai's 'The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife' filled her screen.

Her job was simple.

In two months' time, the Gallery was mounting an exhibition of Hokusai's work - the first of its kind outside of Japan. On each of his prints, surrounding the main image, the artist had written text detailing what the participants in the picture were thinking or feeling.

Sebastian, the Gallery's language expert, who - in addition to Japanese - spoke eight other languages, had provided a word-for-word translation of the text in all thirty-two pictures. It was Amanda's task to add some 'colour' to these.

Or, at the very least, make them sound less ridiculous than they did when they were printed in the official brochure that accompanied the exhibition.

And, in the case of 'The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife', ridiculous was the operative word. If the picture was weird, then the text was downright surreal.

Amanda clicked her mouse again, maximising Sebastian's email. Slowly, she read it again.

LARGE OCTOPUS: My wish comes true at last, this day of days; finally I have you in my grasp! Your bobo is ripe and full, how wonderful! Superior to all others! To suck and suck and suck some more. After we do it masterfully, I'll guide you to the Dragon Palace of the Sea God and envelop you.

"Bobo?", Amanda asked, aloud. Who calls a vagina a "bobo"? This was stupid. It didn't even make sense.

"And, before you say anything, dear Sebastian, I'm not being a prude but a snob," she said, addressing her absent colleague. "It's shit language - "bobo" sounds like something my six-year-old nephew would say. It's crap."

MAIDEN: You hateful octopus! Your sucking at the mouth of my womb makes me gasp for breath! Aah! Yes... it's... there!!! With the sucker, the sucker!! Inside, squiggle, squiggle, oooh! Oooh, good, oooh good!

Oh, great, Amanda thought - the woman's actually enjoying this. So, I've not only got to find a way of making this appear less batshit crazy than it is, but I've also got to convey her pleasure at being accosted by two sea creatures.

MAIDEN: There, there! Theeeeere! Goood! Whew! Aah! Good, good, aaaaaaaaaah! Not yet! Until now it was I that men called an octopus! An octopus! Ooh! Whew! How are you able...!? Ooh!

"Not yet"? God - she's enjoying this much she wants to delay her orgasm. The freak. She's being molested by sixteen, squishy arms - have some pride woman, Amanda thought. I mean, that can't be pleasant... Can it?

Can it?

Suddenly, against her better judgement, Amanda wasn't entirely sure.

LARGE OCTOPUS: All eight limbs to interwine with!! How do you like it this way? Ah, look! The inside has swollen, moistened by the warm waters of lust.

"Waters of lust?" Actually, that not's awful. Clumsy but not complete garbage. It had a certain poetic panache, Amanda thought.

MAIDEN: Yes, it tingles now; soon there will be no sensation at all left in my hips. Ooooooh! Boundaries and borders gone! I've vanished...!!!!!!

"Vanished..." That's...

That's an interesting word, Amanda thought.

"Vanished."

Amanda minimised Sebastian's email, letting the picture fill her screen once more.

"Vanished"...

The word echoed in her head. An image, unbidden, arose in her mind.

Something was touching her. Stroking her hair. Then moving downwards - slowly, gently - to her neck.

But -

No.

NO.

Amanda slammed the screen of her laptop shut.

This is crazy. Unhinged

"Get a grip, Amanda," she said aloud.

She reached for her cup and gulped down another cold mouthful of coffee.

"This one can bloody wait," she said aloud. "I mean, no point in dicking around on this one when I've still got another thirty-one of these to get through, is there? Nope. I'll just move on to the next one."

She slowly raised the screen of her laptop. However, she didn't close the tab displaying 'The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife.'

She knew she couldn't. That she mustn't.

No - she couldn't just give up. Couldn't.

She had to know why. Why was this picture evoking this reaction? Was Sebastian right - had she become a prude? Had the divorce...?

It had been that word - "vanished."

That's what started it. "Boundaries and borders gone! Vanished."

But what boundaries? What borders? This wasn't just about being fingered by an aquatic beast. It wasn't that crude, that simplistic. Something else was going on. What was being represented?

And why was "vanished" the trigger?

Amanda stared at the picture, looking at the woman, looking for clues. A hint.

The wife of a fisherman. She would have been left alone for large stretches of time whilst her husband worked...

Or...

Or perhaps he was dead. Taken by the sea that had once provided his livelihood. Was she a widow? Had she been alone for a long time? Was she...

Lonely.

Full of longing.

What would it feel like to be touched again after such a long time?

Amanda's eyes flicked towards the large octopus dominating the right-hand side of the picture, its tentacles enveloping the maiden's legs and groin. Once more that sensation of being touched engulfed her -

Amanda closed her eyes, imagining swapping places with the widow in the picture. She could see the tentacles wrapped around her thighs, squeezing tightly.

But, in Amanda's mind, the legs encasing her felt human.

They looked like tentacles but they were warm and soft - fleshy. They had the dexterity and texture and touch of a man's hands.

Meanwhile, when the creature's alien head kissed her, she felt lips - human lips closing around her clitoris.

The smaller creature by her face was the same kind of chimaera. As he leaned in, kissing her, it was human lips she could feel against her mouth. Not a sea creature but a man.

A man.

But -

It's not him.

It wasn't his hands touching her.

For the past year, every time she'd felt horny, her brain had perversely summoned the image of her ex-husband. It would rise out of the murky depths of her subconscious like the Kraken emerging from the depths of the ocean, intent on destruction. In this case, the annihilation of her sexual arousal.

But...

Whoever was touching her now, wasn't him.

Even in her heightened state, Amanda was surprised by his absence. He had...

"Vanished."

Who was it? Who was she fantasising about?

Who?

Amanda could feel her breathing catch in her throat.

The sixteen arms encased her, squeezing tight...

Not the octopus' appendages. Not their wet, scaly tentacles. Human arms. Traversing her flesh.

Her heart was beating quickly now. Thudding against her chest like a hammer...

She was... "vanishing." Losing herself in the whirlpool of pleasure swirling around her...

And that's when she knew: The man - the octopus - the whatever-the-fuck-they-are...

They were representative.

Of anyone.

Of someone.

Of human contact.

Of human touch.

Of human connection.

Amanda had been alone for too long. She needed this in reality.

To be touched. To belong. To be desired. To make that connection once again.

At that moment Amanda knew what 'The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife' represented. For her, at least.

And, as she rode the waves of her orgasm, Amanda knew exactly what she'd write.

'The Dream of the Fisherman's Wife' is a woodblock-printed design first published in 1814. Although the artist's intention is almost impossible to discern, it can be argued that the picture represents physcial, emotional and sexual longing - followed by rebirth.

Taken from the brochure of exhbition 'Hokusai: Japan's Erotic Master staged at the Tavisotck Gallery, London - 2023.

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