“But to those who see you…,” I said, “If you don’t mind me saying, you have an amazing body, and you wear sexy red shoes, bright red lipstick and dark eye make-up and, for most men, the only time they see a naked – sorry, nude – woman who looks like you do is only in pornography.”

Mia waved a finger at me as if she were about to contradict me. “Yes! Exactly! But you are wearing lipstick, are you not? And eye make-up? And dainty high heels too?”

“Well, yes, but I’m… I’m not naked.”

Mia smiled the smile that I was beginning to learn meant that the discussion was going exactly the way she planned it. “And what do you think clothes are for, eh? To keep warm, yes. Maybe in Finland. And in the UK too, no? But in Spain? Spain is so often too hot. No, clothes are not for warmth. We wear clothes to make ourselves look more attractive. I look at you in your trousers and your blouse and I can imagine the curve of your hips and your narrow waist and your soft yet pert breasts with their small pink nipples. Or maybe brown. I have no idea whether you have those things or not, but what my mind does not do is fill in these missing details with sagging and folds of fat. No, it paints a very pretty picture, imagining what you might look like naked.”

She waved her finger at me again before continuing.

“No. Clothes are not for concealing what we are because it’s shameful, but to force the imagination to fill in the gaps, to imagine perfection beneath them. I could put my coat back on, but then it’s just as easy to imagine me naked underneath, isn’t it? And is that not more titillating?”

Read the rest of Interview With An Artist, and 11 other ENF stories, in Naked Women in Shorts