We woke that first morning in Mexico City to all the sounds I’d thought we’d left behind in New York. A couple of sirens screamed at each other, taxis disputed with horns blaring, and somebody was having a very loud argument in Spanish right outside our hotel window. When I pulled back the curtain, I saw urban sprawl blanketed with smog. This was our vacation?

Our jobs in the financial district kept us so busy that Diane and I virtually lived by our appointment books. I noticed that this was Wednesday, and we always penciled in time to have sex on Wednesday evening and Saturday afternoon, unless some unscheduled business commitment came up. I glanced over at Di’s sleeping form, hoping that maybe she’d forget to check her book this morning. After our escape from New York and the flight and a night in a strange bed, I wasn’t really in the mood for sex.

And that was the disturbing truth about our relationship. Neither of us was really in the mood very often, certainly not as in the passionate early years of our marriage. Sex had become almost like flossing — you remembered to do it because it contributed to overall good health.

Over breakfast I showed Di the list of things I thought we could cram into the week. “Well,” I said, “there’s the pyramid at Teotihuacen this morning, and the floating gardens at Xochirnilco this afternoon, and tonight maybe we can catch the Ballet Folklorico, and —”

Di sighed. I knew that sigh. “What?” I said peering over my reading glasses.

“How about the butterflies?” she said… Oh, you remember. I told you about that valley in the mountains of Michoacan where billions of monarch butterflies spend the winter. They migrate down from Canada every year. I read an article about it.”

“You really have your heart set on seeing those butterflies?” I asked. I couldn’t imagine what would be so special about a flock of butterflies.

Diane said that not only were the butterflies a sight to see, but the land up in the mountains was beautiful. We decided to leave the hotel in Mexico City and stay in a small bed-and-breakfast in the mountain town. As soon as we were free of the traffic and the sprawl, Di reached over and gave my shoulders a little massage.

“You can relax now,” she said, laughing. “Just us and the donkeys.”

She was right — there were actually donkeys walking alongside the road carrying big loads, with either old men or small boys leading them. Along with the donkeys were green fields and farms in the foreground, hills rolling off into the distance, and looming volcanic mountains as far as the eye could see.

We passed through Toluca, then Zitacuaro, each town smaller than the last and less like anything I’d ever seen. Finally the road ended in the tiny village of Angangueo. We were over ten thousand feet high here, and surrounded by pine trees and mountains.

Using her high-school Spanish, Di hired a guy with a battered pickup truck to take us the last six miles-up a winding, rutted, rocky road — to the edge of the butterfly reserve. He let us out and drove off after agreeing to come back for us in a few hours.

Then, just like that, there we were with the butterflies. Suddenly they were everywhere, millions of them, filling the air with fluttering orange-gold like autumn leaves falling, hanging onto the huge pine trees in clumps the size of small cars. Every few minutes, as we walked through the silent forest, came the sound of a branch cracking under their weight.

We were miles from the village, miles from any other humans, with hours stretching ahead of us before the truck picked us up. The warm air all around us was alive with golden-and-black wings. We knelt by a damp patch of ground near a spring and gazed down at hundreds of butterflies that were lapping up water with tiny black tongues the size of pins and maybe an eighth of an inch long. As they drank, their wings slowly opened and closed.

We wandered like children in Eden. moving in awe under a sea of glittering, molten gold. The blue sky overhead looked like the surface of this magic sea, far away, far above. The only sounds were the gentle crunch of pine needles underfoot and the whirr of wings — silent when one or two fly by on a summer afternoon. but now surrounding us with gentle music.

In an open grass-covered spot between the trees, Di stopped and slowly undressed. l quickly glanced around, but we were alone in the world, alone on this mountain under a sea of butterflies. Lingeringly she scattered her clothes on the emerald grass.

Around Di’s body, slowly moving in undulating waves, came thousands upon thousands of the creatures, their velvety wings catching the sunlight as they swirled around her, flying between and through her legs, waves of them around her torso, fluttering against her breasts.

I joined Di and dropped my inhibitions, along with my shirt and jeans, on the grass. I slipped out of my shorts. Then I stood only a few inches from her, gazing into her eyes, as waves of gold enveloped us. I was being caressed by thousands of butterfly wings, velvety soft, like tiny silken fingers touching me everywhere.

At the sight of Di’s luscious naked body and the touch of a million wings, my cock began to rise, throbbing, hot and eager. Di’s arms were at her sides, her palms open to the sky, her legs parted slightly, as wings beat softly against her breasts — gold across her pink, swollen nipples, gold across her fluffy black bush. A large monarch settled there, slowly opening and closing its wings, like a jewel set in her glistening black hair.

As I moved to reach out for her, the butterflies swirled in new patterns around my body, like sun — burnished water flowing in a warm river.

I leaned forward and our lips met in a kiss of probing tongues and hungry lips.

Slowly, gently, I caressed Di’s breasts with both hands, feeling her nipples plump and swollen beneath my palms, touching each nipple, squeezing them between my fingers and thumbs. Her cry of pleasure sent waves of startled gold flying up and away and then slowly swirling around us as we sank to the grass at our feet.

Di’s long, slender legs opened to me, and her smooth white hands reached down to guide my swollen shaft into the pink heart of her pussy. She was wet and hot and ready, and my cock felt bigger than it had in a long time as it plunged in, all the way in. We found an unhurried rhythm in our movements, so different from the rushed coupling we’d become used to back in New York.

With gentle movements, Di urged me to roll over so she could be on top. The grass was soft and tingly under my naked body as Di straddled me, her slick pussy sinking down on my cock, deep and warm. She moved slowly back and forth, her large, firm breasts swaying only inches before my face. Behind her, as far as I could see, was the golden eternity of fluttering wings, a kaleidoscope of shifting splendor against the faraway azure of the sky.

Di’s exploring fingers trailed across my chest, her nails raking softly across all the sensitive spots as I moaned with pleasure. They found my nipples and flicked and teased as waves of ecstasy rushed through my whole body, flooding my cock with new passion as it thrust upward into Di’s hot core.

“Harder, harder,” she panted as she squeezed my nipples had with her lingers. “Give me every bit of it,” she cried as I arched my back. driving my cock up, and she opened her legs wider, thrusting her pussy down to take everything I could give her.

My hands were on her breasts now, squeezing her nipples; cupping her squirming tits as she moved, smooth and slick with perspiration; caressing their firm contours as she swayed back and forth. She leaned forward, giving me both breasts, moving them down to my mouth.

“Suck them, sweetheart,” she murmured.

First one swollen nipple, then the other — I sucked them into my mouth. tongued each, sucked it, nibbled, biting it a little. as she cried and moaned. She held them together with her hands and begged me to suck them both together, and I did. flicking my tongue back and forth from one ripe plum to the other. nipping one and then giving the other a little bite.

She was riding my cock now like a jockey coming up on the finish line. and I rose to meet her. harder and faster, up and into her as deep as I could. as though I could reach her very soul with one mammoth thrust of my shaft.

As we came. we both cried out in ecstasy, and as we did. thousands of caressing butterflies fluttered away from us in a shattering explosion of gold, with Di and me at the very center. We lay. spent, on the warm grass, breathing as though we’d run a mile. perspiration running off our bodies. We hadn’t made love like this in years — maybe never.

We drifted off into golden sleep then, lying like tired children on the sun-strewn grass. When I awoke. it was to the strangest, most sensual sensation I’d ever felt. At first I thought I was dreaming. Slowly I opened my eyes and saw that hundreds of the monarchs had come to rest everywhere on my body. I was startled by their boldness. Even when I moved to look over at Di, many of them still clung to me. Di, too, was covered with slowly undulating gold-and-black wings.

Barely moving my head, I could see them all around us. The sensation was incredible, like a gentle caress, but tingling at the same time. They were on my legs, too, and on my stomach.

Di’s own body was covered with as many butterflies as mine, and they were slowly opening and closing their wings. Di sat up, and it caused a frenzy of movement. She looked over at me and moved to embrace me. The butterflies dipped and fluttered around us. Then she lowered her head over my cock.

1 could feel my passion growing, and it felt natural to make love among these golden creatures. This was a day for sexual adventures. for breaking out of old molds.

The butterflies moved slowly around my throbbing cock while my wife sucked deeply on my shaft. This was truly an amazing journey to a sensuous spot we’d never been before.

I let my mind roam. and I felt as though I were truly flying, with hundreds of gold-and-black wings lifting me higher and higher. My passion grew, my cock throbbed. The sensation of having it licked by Di’s warm, soft tongue, along with dozens of tiny tingles of pleasure caused by small wings. was wonderful.

I touched Di’s pussy and realized that she, too, was moving quickly toward the most unusual orgasm she’d ever experienced. She couldn’t resist moving just a little, arching her back to make her pussy even more open to my caresses. while dozens of butterflies moved around her body. She moved her breasts. too. and between moving wings I could see that her nipples were swollen and puffed with passion.

The butterflies came and went in gently fluttering waves. like golden silk blowing softly in the breeze. Suddenly the sound of one little gasp of pleasure from Di brought me almost to the edge of orgasm. She had lifted her head off my cock and stroked me with her hand. I knew she was ready to come. I was almost there too.

Our cries of release were almost perfectly synchronized, and as my hot juices spurted up into the sunshine, the kaleidoscope of butterflies surrounding us exploded. As we rolled into each other’s arms, they rose and swirled away, two clouds of shushing wings becoming one as they fluttered higher into the sky.

Arm in arm, our bodies molded each other, we wandered in the mountains through the long, lazy afternoon. Below us in a valley was a tiny village, and the smell of cooking floated up to us along with the sounds of laughter and someone strumming a guitar. Two little children, a boy and a girl, chased swarms of butterflies along a path, waving their arms, as though they were flinging handfuls of gold coins into the sunshine. We felt like those two children, somehow liberated by the grandeur of the natural beauty around us.

Later the truck picked us up and took us back to the tiny village, where we spent the next few days at a small hotel. Mornings were relaxed and leisurely, and sometimes we made love before breakfast. Afternoons were for walks among the glory of the butterflies and quiet picnic lunches in secluded, pine-scented meadows in the mountains above the town.

At the end of the week, we drove out of the village in our rental car. A couple of miles down the road, we noticed that a single monarch butterfly had somehow gotten into the car with us. We pulled over to the side of the road and opened all four windows to let it fly away. As we watched, it fluttered slowly on the warm breezes back toward the mountain, high into the azure sky, and we kept our eyes on it until it disappeared.

Then we looked at each other with emotions we hadn’t felt in a long time. That butterfly was back on the mountain, but we would take it back to the hurry and bustle of the city in our hearts.