We dump the flowers onto the bed, and having armed myself with masking tape, I start covering the facade of lace over my nude bra. The expanse of my leopard print panties now seems daunting, the boyshort cut wide enough to cover my cello-curved hips.

My body becomes a canvas, and for the first time we are in our bodies, face to face. It is too intimate a scene, despite my covering with the flimsy daisies. I twist my body to cover the frontier of a sloping breast pushing against a cup. He watches me, his eyes following my fingers. There is no mirror in the room–I cannot see what he sees, but I can imagine that this costuming is far more erotic than any disrobing. Despite the unfamiliar eyes on me, despite the goosebumps dotting my limbs, the physical distance between us, I am comfortable in my own skin. It is an intimacy shared, from fingers to eyes.

I cannot meet his eyes. I pick up a dark cut-out, petals surrounding the boyish face of Leonardo DiCaprio. I push into my nipple, opposite one of Dick Cheney. “Can you help me?” I ask.

“What?” He’s brought into the moment with me.

I stick another flower on my hipbone, avoid his gaze. “I can’t see what it all looks like. Can you cover up any holes?”

“OK.” He jabs his short fingernails into a pile of paper, folds the tape on one side. Hovering with the flower, he scans my body, from top to bottom, settling on an area farthest away from trouble.

Lying down, I continue planting the hills of my chest: the sides of my breasts, underneath, the triangular peak into brastraps. Every so often another flower is patted down on my panties. Then he stops.

“Is it all done?” I ask.

He  steps back, like an artist examining a work in progress. “There’s … uhh … one spot left.”

“Can you cover it then?”

He pinches a petal of a flower, his fingers leaving it damp when he thrusts it into my palm. “I think you should do it.”

He motions my hand down, between my thighs. “Where?” I ask.

“To the left, a little bit. No, now up. Yeah. Wait, back to the right–”

“You just do it!” I stick the flower on my right thigh.

He peels it off, tentatively.

“It’s … uhh … it’s in a weird space.”

“Well, I can’t see anything.” The flowers bunch around in hills, petals obscuring sight into the valley below.

He moves forward, and hangnails brush against inner thighs, babyflesh. His hands forces my legs apart. Goosebumps rising on limbs, I wait for his touch. He pokes the flower on my bundle of nerves.

A giggle bubbles from my throat, petals rustle against each other as my chest shakes.

“I’m sorry!” He’s cautious, ashamed.

“Tickles,” I explain.