To Hire a Cheerleader Pt. 01

Jake sounded confused when he said, "Did you say men's underwear? Try running that one by me again?"

It was Tori's turn to laugh. She figured it wouldn't take Jake long to piece together that she was about as worldly as a turnip fed porcupine. So, with that in mind, she decided to tell him of her second attempt at securing employment for herself.

"After my first morning fiasco, I stopped by this nice clothing store to get a job and the manager on duty hired me on the spot. Then he showed me the 'clothes' that I was supposed to custom fit to male clients. I swear that I have seen several of those things in Radio Shack, and they weren't selling them to wear. At least I don't think they were. But this store was trying to. I couldn't even figure out how to attach some of the pieces to any bodily parts that I'm aware of men having. Then the manager offered to help me out and dropped his pants for me to practice custom fitting. I just gave up and ran away at that point. I figured if I stuck some of those things in the only holes I saw that he'd have me charged with some sort of bodily misconduct. And I wouldn't even know how to defend myself! I could just see me in court, trying to explain what the contraption was that I had abused the man with. The judge would never believe me."

Jake was laughing so hard that Tori had to wait for him to catch his breath. Finally, he gasped out, "Oh, Tori, the judge would probably have had one on, himself! This isn't Kansas, anymore, Toto!" With that, Tori chuckled as well. Maybe this was going to work out alright.

After Jake managed to quit laughing, he turned to the business at hand. "Tori, let's go over what I need from you. What I want you to do for me is to be my hands and feet on a couple of cases. We'll start kind of slow so you get acquainted with the ropes and then we will move on to some tougher stuff. When you go into your office, you will find some files on your desk. Look over them, surf the net to gather up the information that I marked, then we will go over the results."

Although it was completely dark in the room, Tori found herself looking around. "Jake? How are we going to work in the dark? I can't tell you what I found if I can't see what I wrote."

Jake sighed, "Well, I guess we will have to communicate over the intercom. That's not my preference, but you do have a point. Perhaps I can rig up some sort of 'mask' to cover my eyes so we can go over the information in your office. I'll work on that."

With that question settled, Tori realized that she had a far more pressing concern. "Jake, I don't think I can do this."

"Do what, Tori?"

Tori tried to explain, "This work you want me to do. I've never done anything like this before and you seem to be under the impression that I will know what I am doing once I get into my office. I've never even had an office. You told me what Daddy told you about my life, but did he tell you that I just finished high school? I didn't go to college, Jake. One time, I thought I wanted to be a nurse, so I took this advanced class in high school. I even got so far that I was assigned a shift at the hospital as a 'nurse in training'. One night was all that it took, though. When my first patient died on me, I was out of there. Well, I was out of there after I finished dealing with the corpse. After that I was finished with that prospect for a future career. But that's all I've ever done with regards to anything beyond your normal high school courses. I'm not really qualified to do this."

Jake didn't seem taken aback, but rather said, "Tori, you have surfed the net haven't you?" At the sound of affirmation that Tori made, Jake continued, "Well, that's about all it takes to start sleuthing for the information that I need. You can use the search engines, discussion groups, chat rooms, whatever you need to locate the stuff. Just get busy. I need it soon." And with that, Jake dismissed Tori's concerns.

Tori was pretty sure that Jake was dismissing her, as well. But she was in a bad situation. When she had entered the room earlier, she had managed to find the chair that she was sitting in, but she had no idea what else was in the room. She also wasn't exactly sure where the door was in relation to the location of her chair. After a few moments of silence, Tori whispered, "Jake? I don't know how to get out of here."

Jake's laugh was genuine as he said, "Silly girl! Let me help you." Tori first heard Jake moving about, then she felt his hand on her arm. Tori hadn't expected him to get to her so quickly or to touch her. Without thinking about it, Tori tensed the muscles in her arm and jerked away. Jake said, "Whoa, Tori! I'm not going to hurt you. Let me help you find the door."

Tori could feel the flush of embarrassment course through her body. "I'm sorry, Jake. You just surprised me. I wasn't expecting you to touch me. I'm really sorry."

"It's ok, Tori. I should have warned you that I was going to touch you. It's all right to be jumpy. You don't know me and you have been sitting in the dark for the last half hour. I doubt that this is a normal experience for you. Let me help you to the door."

This time, when Jake touched her arm, Tori didn't pull away. She followed Jake to the door and stepped through as he opened it for her. He was careful to stay in the shadows, so Tori still didn't know anything about how he looked. From the angle that he had touched her, though, she could tell that he was taller than her by several inches. From the strength in his hand and the power in his arm, she knew that he was strong. But beyond that, she was clueless. Almost as though he was reading her thoughts and wanted to shut them out, Jake helped her through the door, then quickly closed it behind her. With a sigh, Tori found her way down the hall, back into the foyer.

Chapter Three

Once Tori reached the front entrance foyer, she recognized the butler, who had first greeted her, standing in the doorway across the small room. As he turned to look at her with his cool expression, Tori decided to take the bull by the horns. She said, "Hi. I guess I'll be working here. My name is Tori."

At first, Tori thought that the butler was going to ignore her. But then a brilliant smile broke across the man's face. It made him look years younger. His voice was warm and vibrant as he said, "And you have no idea how happy that makes us! We are so pleased to have you here. I'm George and this delightful woman," he gestured to the cook in the kitchen beyond him, "That beauty is my wife, Beatrice. I can't tell you how glad we are that you have agreed to help Mr. Rhodes. He has been alone far too long."

Tori was taken aback by the sudden change in the butler's attitude. She was thankful for it, but she was still surprised by it. She also wasn't sure what he was talking about. She didn't know anything about her employer's past. Unsure of how to respond to George's statement, she decided to focus on what she did know. She said, "I'm really glad to have the chance. I have never done anything like this before. I'm a little frightened that I'll screw up."

Beatrice spoke up then, first clucking her tongue from the kitchen, "Nothing to screw up, my girl. Come have a bite to eat before you go do all that logging on stuff that I hear them talking about." And with that, Tori was ushered into the kitchen and adopted into Beatrice and George's attentive care.

During lunch, Beatrice and George told Tori a little about themselves. They were in their early sixties and had worked for Jake for twenty years. George and Beatrice told her about their four children, all of whom lived in the area and who were rapidly producing much longed for grandchildren. It was a pleasant meal and ended far too soon to suit Tori.

When Beatrice shooed them out of the kitchen, George showed Tori to her office. It was a beautiful room, filled with volume after volume of legal texts. Tori was staggered by the overwhelming effect, but George patted her on the shoulder and assured her that she was the best thing that had entered that office in a long time. Feeling buoyed by his confidence, Tori started in on the work at hand.

When the buzzer on her intercom sounded, Tori almost jumped out of her skin. She looked over the box and finally found the 'talk' button. She pressed it and answered, "Yes?"

Jake's voice came back over, "How are you doing? Do you have any questions?"

Tori pressed the button down and said, "Well, after I figured out how to decipher my new boss' atrocious handwriting, I'm doing all right. Did you know that the man can make the word 'legal' look like something akin to a drawing of a mountain range in the Rockies?"

Jake's growl made Tori giggle. She liked this man. He was easy to kid with and didn't seem to mind that she wasn't as worldly as others her age. She was kind of glad that he couldn't see her. She had often heard that the best thing about the new age of internet flirting was that the other person couldn't see you. That meant that you could be anybody that you wanted to be when you were talking on line. Tori felt like that with Jake. Since he couldn't see her, she could pretend to be all the things she had ever wanted to be - at least physically.

And Tori had spent her life wanting to be a lot different from who she really was - physically and mentally. Because she had been responsible for taking care of her family for so many years, Tori had never really blossomed socially. She knew the technical term was introvert, but she just felt like a wall flower. It didn't help her self confidence that her body was about as much like the women she saw in fashion magazines as it was like a fire truck. Well, actually, maybe that was pushing it a little. Because the truth was, she really did have more in common with the fire truck - at least it matched the color of her hair.

The women who graced the magazine pages were thin and straight. But, Tori had curves that were lush and full. She had always been told that her body was too big and overly abundant. And, no matter how many diets her family had managed to obtain to 'cure' her, she had always found herself still soft and dimpled. Over the years, Tori had accepted that her body wasn't going to change. She was simply a large woman.

While Tori may have accepted her body and appearance, she certainly hadn't rejoiced over it. In fact, she blamed it on her continued social inadequacies. And her social inadequacies caused her to dislike her looks even more. Like the typical catch 22, Tori didn't know how to break out of the vicious cycle that was her life.

Tori's family - first her mother, then her mother's parents - were always pointing out that Tori should take better care of herself. Of course, they never seemed to notice that taking care of them required not only all of her time, but also all of her energy. Tori hadn't had an opportunity to do anything for herself. Until now. And now it seemed too late to figure it all out. How was she supposed to look? What was she supposed to wear? How was she supposed to style her flaming red hair? Tori had decided not to obsess over it all and simply clothed her body in oversized shirts and leggings, wearing her hair in a long ponytail and not bothering with make-up, figuring it was too late to change.

But now, life had dealt her a new hand. Here she was, in a new city, around complete strangers, working for a man who couldn't see her. In a world where Tori felt like she would never be attractive or desirable, here was her chance to pretend to be both, at least for a little while.

Jake's voice snapped Tori out of her revere as he asked for some of the information she had been assigned to look up for him. She pulled out her notes and told him what she had found so far. At one point, she heard him say, "Yes!" rather triumphantly and realized that she had helped him prove some point or other that he had been working on. That made her feel useful and built up her confidence.

When Tori finished passing on her last bit of data to Jake, she was surprised when he told her that she had done well and that he would see her the next day. Glancing at the clock, she couldn't believe that the entire afternoon has passed her by. She had been so engrossed in her work that she hadn't noticed the time. Now she would have to hurry to make the early dinner date she had with her dad. She sent a quick good-bye over the intercom and hurried out to catch a cab.