Andy

Mick just put his glass to his lips when that little twerp of a wannabe reporter and half-assed photographer, Terry, just so happened to walk by. He popped his head into our office.

"You know, you can get fired for drinking on the job."

"Terry, fuck off," I said.

"You can't talk to me like that! Besides you know you not suppose to drink alcohol while at work."

"Come here," Mick said.

Terry took a few tentative steps into our office. "I don't see any one drinking in here. Do you see anyone drinking in here, Jake?"

"Of course not," I said. "That's against the rules."

Mick reached into the outbox on his desk. "Here, on your way down to report us, give these to Joyce in production."

Terry took the papers from his hand and walked out of the office in a huff. "You know, that guy must have photos of someone's wife," Mick said.

"Or photos of someone doing someone's wife."

Mick smiled and poured us a bit more booze into each of our glasses. "You've got a lot of potential inside you, Jake. Have you ever thought about settling down? You're a brilliant writer. I know if you follow your passion, your passion for words, there're great things inside you."

"Settle down as in getting married? I don't want a wife, let alone a kid or two. Passion? I don't know."

"Perhaps you just haven't let it bubble to the top, yet. Jake, one of these days, you're going to wake up and you're going to be fifty-seven years old. You'll look over your shoulder and lying beside you will be an old, worn-out whiskey whore. She'll have tits that look like a street map of St. Louis; riddled with blue and red veins. Then when you get up to take that first piss of the morning, you'll yell out in pain 'cause you picked up something from another woman a week earlier."

"Damn, Mick, you don't know that."

"Jake, I know you've bedded every single women that works for the paper. You've got a reputation. Let me ask you this. Have you put a notch on your belt with Ellie's name beside it?"

I sipped my drink. "No, I haven't."

"And why not?"

"For the life of me, I don't know, Mick."

"Perhaps, just perhaps, you know there's something more between you two than a casual rumble between the sheets. Jake, can't you feel it just a little bit?"

I handed Mick my glass and reached for my jacket.

"Where are you off to?"

"It's a nice day. I think I'll go for a walk."

Mick sat in his chair and then rolled another sheet of paper into his IBM Selectric as a puff of smoked escaped from his pipe. "Watch out for the wet cement in front of the Howard building." He smiled and then touched the side of his nose with two of his fingers.

********

Ellie and I made a date; one of several over the next few weeks. Mick was right. I did have feelings for her. And I hated to admit it, but I enjoyed her son Andy, too—snotty nose and all. But Ellie had a boyfriend. Or so it seemed. She never talked about him too much. I only knew he worked construction and his name was Matt. They shared an apartment together, but somehow I felt Ellie was the breadwinner. Matt never seemed to work much.

I have this unwritten rule I live by. I won't fuck a married woman or a woman that's in a relationship with someone. Ellie was hands off.

The weather was getting hotter as was the politics. City council members were up in arms about a shift in direction they felt the mayor shouldn't have done. It was feeding time in city politics and I was getting fat. Then there was the break-in of a hotel in DC that was flooding the AP wire services. Mick and I were busy as we pounded the keys on our typewriters churning out editorials about politics.

It was early morning. Just a few inches remained in the first pot of coffee. Neither one of us saw her coming but when she knocked on the doorjamb we both looked up. There in blue flared pants and short platform shoes, stood Ellie."

"I need to talk," she said. Her voice was ragged and sharp.

"Sure." I pulled out a chair. I could see something was wrong. Really wrong. I knew she wasn't allowed to wear pants in her office, so she hadn't been to work yet. Ellie kept favoring her left side of her face keeping her right side always turned away.

She sat in the chair. I saw her hands shake. I moved one of the empty chairs over and sat beside her.

"What's wrong?" She didn't answer me. I make my living by reading the faces of people. The way they stand and how they carry themselves. The words they use and the way their eyes move. I knew there was something terrible wrong. I just didn't know what.

"Ellie, you came here for something, what's wrong?"

"I don't know what to do." Her words came pouring out. She turned her right cheek away from me. By this time Mick stopped typing and came over.

I reached out and as gently as I could I turned her face toward me. "Oh Jesus." Ellie tried in vain to cover a bruise by her right eye with makeup. "Look, Mick."

"Ooh, that's going to be one hell of a shiner," Mick said as he touched her cheek. "Who hit you?"

Ellie didn't say anything at first, then blurted out, "He tried to hurt Andy. I went to stop him and he hit me. I grabbed Andy and I ran out. Jake, he hit Andy!"

"Matt?"

Ellie nodded. "You said you knew all sorts of people in the city. I can't go back. We can't go back. We need a place to stay. It'll be just for a few weeks, maybe a month 'till I get some money saved up for an apartment. I don't have a dime right now. Jake, he hit Andy! I can't go back."

"I don't know anyone off hand. I can make some calls." I looked over at Mick. He placed a finger to the side of his nose and tapped it a few times. I knew what he meant. I did know someone that had plenty of space for the both of them. Mick did do. It was me.

Ellie's hands were flying about. "If we have to sleep in my car..."

"I know someone, Ellie, that has room for the both of you."

"You do?"

"Yeah, I sure do."

"I won't be able to pay them anything for at least two weeks 'till I get paid again."

"That's not going to be a problem," I said as reassuring as I could. "You and Andy will be staying with me."

Her hands stopped. "I-I-I," Ellie stammered. "I'll sleep with you in exchange for room and board," she said without a thought.

"That won't be necessary." I almost caught myself laughing at her quick offer of sex. Her face turned bright fire engine red. Ellie knew what she said wasn't what she wanted to say.

"We won't be a bother. Just 'till I get things together."

"We'll talk about it later, okay? Now, first things first. I don't have much in the way of food at home, I'm a terrible cook."

I reached for my wallet. I gave Ellie four-twenty dollar bills. "Get some groceries for you and Andy."

Just as I handed Ellie the money, I looked up and there I saw Terry leaning on the door. "Oh, I see you're bringing your whores into the office now."

I exploded. I jumped over a chair, and I grabbed him by his collar and lifted him off the floor then smashed him into the wall. "If I ever hear you call her that again, I'll break every bone in your face. Do you understand me you little fuck head of a man?"

Terry nodded. He was too scared to talk. I felt Mick's hand on my shoulder. "Better put him down before you kill him, Jake. The paper work would be a bitch."

I let go and he fell to the ground. I looked over at Ellie still sitting at the desk. "You better apologize to her."

"I'm sorry, miss." Terry damn near ran out of the office.

I turned to Mick. "You know, I bet that little weasel was standing there all that time listening and when Ellie blurted out—"

"One of these days, that guy is going to get his ass handed to him on a platter," Mick said.

"Get me a platter, Mick," I said as I pushed my shirtsleeve up.

"Just cool your jets. He's not worth getting fired over."

I heard the sound of Mick's drawer open. He picked up a glass and wiped the rim with a paper towel. He sat in front of Ellie. "Here you go, Ellie, it will calm you down." Mick poured some Kessler's into her glass. "Go ahead, Ellie. We won't even turn you in for drinking on company time."

Ellie sipped at the liquor. "Did you call the cops?" Mick asked.

"No, it won't do any good; it's his word against mine. We can't stay there." Ellie turned around in the chair and looked at me. "I didn't really. I mean it just came out. But if you want me to, I guess I did say it."

"I've known this man for quite a few years, Ellie," Mick interrupted. "He's not the kind that would take advantage of you. Don't worry about what you said." Mick poured a bit more Kessler's in her glass.

"I've never had a guy stick up for me like that, Jake. I hope you don't get into trouble."

"It'll pass," I said. "It wasn't any problem. No one should call you that." Mick and I talked to Ellie for a while till she calmed down. I rooted around in my desk and found the spare house key I kept. I gave it to Ellie and I kissed her on the lips and told her I'd see her and Andy when I got home.

********

Ellie didn't have much and we got it all into one of the newspaper's delivery vans. I have to admit it took a while to adjust to having a small boy running around; especially one like Andy. I swear he managed to run into every table corner, he fell down the steps, he tried to fly by jumping off the porch railing, and the list went on and on. But, you know, after a while I kind of liked seeing the little guy. He'd meet me at the door every night. He'd hand me a drawing or something he made. One night, I came home and gave him a green plastic Godzilla. Oh, you should have seen his eyes light up when I handed it to him. It instantly became his most prized possession. When he'd wrap his tiny hands around my fingers it just filled my heart with light. Yeah, snotty nose and all, Andy quickly became my best buddy.

I found out that Ellie is quite a cook, so my days of luke-warm Chinese takeout dinners came to an abrupt halt. And Ellie wasn't bad on the eyes, either. One morning, she was in the kitchen wearing a suede miniskirt with fringes along the bottom with matching boots. Ellie fixed Andy and me breakfast and I let my eyes roam over her body like an invisible hand.

One morning, just before we both headed to work, Ellie was busy packing my lunch when I reached over her head for something in the top cabinet. My hand came down onto her shoulder and moved down the curve of her back. I cupped her butt in my hand and I could feel her panties under her skirt. My fingers slowly traced along their outline. Ellie stopped wrapping sandwiches and stood there with her eyes closed. She swayed slightly in her heels. Ellie's perfume filled my head with the earthy fragrance of jasmine mingled with a spring rain. The back of my other hand brushed back and forth across her right breast. I lowered my lips and she rose on tiptoes to meet me. We kissed. Our lips burned with desire. I squeezed her butt and palmed her breast. Suddenly Andy bounced into the kitchen and we stood apart. Andy crawled into his chair and ate his breakfast.

"I'm sorry," I said. But Ellie didn't say a word.

Ellie never spoke to me about that morning in the kitchen. We weren't lovers. We never slept together. We didn't mess around with each other. I found her sexually attractive, I mean what red-blooded guy wouldn't, but I respected her immensely, too. I didn't want Ellie to be nothing but a casual fuck. She deserves more than that. Ellie simply wasn't going to end up as another notch on my belt. That was the part of our relationship that I couldn't quite put my finger on.

Ellie called me one late afternoon, she'd been asked to work over, and the money was enough to sway her to stay. I picked up Andy at daycare and fixed him his usual dinner. It was going on eight and Andy was in bed when I heard the door slowly creak open. In walked Ellie and I could tell by the way she moved that it was long hard day.

I know I'm not much of a cook, but I managed to put together something that I knew wasn't about to kill either one of us. She kicked her heels off. "Hi."

I grinned back. I was proud of myself and I had everything laid out. Two candles, wine glasses, a white tablecloth and my best silver wear. It wasn't Rolando's, but it was damn nice. Ellie was beat as I could see it in her eyes. We ate quietly and halfway through I noticed she had her fingers moving back and forth across mine. I know it's a cliché to say it, but there was some kind of electricity when we touched. Her fingers moved along the back of my hand while her stockinged toes wiggled underneath my pant leg. I leaned over and with the lightest of touches, I kissed her lips. Ellie's eyes sparked in the candlelight but it was a lackluster sparkle. She so was tired and it showed.

"Hey, why don't you go upstairs and get ready for bed? I'll clean up here and then when I'm done, I'll give you a nice smoothing back rub. What do you say?"

"That would be nice." Ellie pushed herself away from the table and drugged herself up the stairs.

I finished up in the kitchen and by the time I walked into her room, she was already under the sheets, almost half asleep. I sat beside her with a bottle of wintergreen rubbing alcohol in my hand. "Roll over," I said.

Ellie had on just the tops of her PJs and I pushed them up to her shoulders. "Would it be better if I took this off?" Ellie asked.

"It would be." I turned my head while Ellie pulled her top over her head. When I turned back she was on her belly, Ellie's bare back exposed to my fingers. I poured a bit of the green liquid into my hands and started working it into her skin. Ellie jumped when the cold liquid hit her skin.

"Ooh, Jake, ooh, that's so nice."

"Rough day?"

"Ooh, was it ever...down a little bit to the left. Ooh, yeah, right there..."

I massaged her back, then up her shoulders and down her arms. I guess it wasn't ten minutes later than Ellie was out. I mean she was dead to the world. I grew bold. I wiggled her panties down and softly massaged her tight derrière then my fingers moved up her lower back to her shoulders. I stopped for a minute and just admired her figure. Oh god, it was so tempting to roll her over on her back and explore her treasures. Had this been any other woman lying on my bed asleep, that's exactly what I'd have done, but I didn't with Ellie. I reached down and kissed the back of her ears, then down her neck and across her shoulder. I pulled a sheet across her body and walked to the doorway. Looking back, I pondered why Ellie held me at bay the way she did.

Was Mick right? There was a knot burning in my gut. I felt my head move side-to-side. Is this the way love begins?

The next morning it was back to work. I let Ellie sleep in a bit longer while I packed lunches and got Andy ready for day care. I had a few minutes free so I was enjoying a cup of coffee. Soon, I heard the familiar tap-tap of Ellie's heels as she walked down the steps. "I have everyone's lunch packed," I called out.

Ellie slowly walked over and pulled out a chair. When she sat her knees touched mine.

"How'd you sleep?" I asked.

"I was pooped."

"I could tell, you were gone in just a few minutes into your back rub," I said.

"I need to ask," Ellie began, "did you feel me up while I was sleeping?"

"What?"

"Did you?"

I'm no George Washington, as I've been known to tell a lie now and then. But I wasn't going to lie to Ellie. I looked down away from her eyes. "I may have given your rear a few rubs, but nothing else."

Ellie took my hands and placed them on her knees then pushed them under her dress till the hem of it was across my wrists. We sat there like that for a while. Neither one of us said a word. My hands were only inches away from her treasures.

"Why didn't you?" Ellie asked. Her voice was soft and low.

I sat there for the longest time. I didn't have an answer. I watched her eyes as they watched mine. I went to pull my hands out from under her dress when she stopped me.

"Why didn't you?"

"It wouldn't have been the right thing to do."

A smile filled her face and Ellie put her hand onto my cheek. "Jake, I need to tell you something. Jake, I—"

"Mommie!" Andy called as he ran into the kitchen.

**********

Ellie only asked to stay a few weeks. However those few weeks turned into several months. I didn't want to be the chauvinist pig Gloria Steinem preached about, but damn it was great having Ellie as a live in guest. We talked about the arrangement we had and agreed that as long as things were going so smoothly, we'd continue as was.

Ellie was throwing me mixed signals. At times I just wanted to sweep her off her feet and carry her upstairs ripping her clothing off as I went.

But I had other plans for a special girl I knew this coming weekend—Sue Ling.

I met her long before Ellie. A reporter from a local television station, I became instantly smitten by her. She was an absolute beauty; a stunning oriental that just oozed sex. Only about five foot three tall, her long black hair, parted in the middle, flowed down her back to stop just at her waist. Sue Ling had perfect breasts that seemed to deify gravity and legs...oh did she have legs.

She'd walk into a room and those dark black irises of her eyes would catch the light reflecting it back into your own eyes. With a toss of her head, her hair would billow about her face. Her gait, long and slow, she'd move across the room like a sleek black Siamese cat looking for trouble—and I suspect usually finding it.

I made her my personal project. 'Cause if there was one thing in my life I wanted, it was to slide her pantyhose down those luscious legs of hers and off her delicate toes. Then I'd lift her bra up over those perky tits I knew she had to have, and then watch her wriggle and squirm as I slipped her panties down to her thighs. Oh yeah. Sue Ling was going to be mine. She just didn't know it yet. I've been after her for over six months, and at last she agreed to a date with me. It was my opportunity to score big. I wasn't going to toss it away.

******

Friday had arrived and my date with Sue Ling was only hours away. I was as nervous as a small kid at a spelling bee. I came down stairs, it was going on seven, and my date with Sue Ling was at nine. I looped the tie around my neck and fidgeted with it as I stood in front of the hallway mirror. I noticed Ellie as she slowly walked up from behind.

"I wish you wouldn't go," she said rather softly.

"I've been planning on this for a long time now, Ellie."

I watched as Ellie wet her lips. "Why her?"

There was no answer that I thought Ellie would understand. How could I tell her that I hoped to have Sue Ling naked with my manhood inside her?

"Is it just sex you're after?" Ellie asked.

"It's just a date."

I turned and placed my hands on her shoulders. She worked on my tie. "If I tell you something, you won't laugh?"

She nodded.

"I like women in dresses. Sue Ling told me she brought one special just for our date. I like the soft silky things that are hidden under a dress."

"I wear dresses."

"I know you do."

"And with silky things underneath, too." She worked in my tie, pulling it tighter around my neck. Her fingers stopped. "Please don't go."

"Why?"

She didn't answer me but instead pulled my tie out. "This one is wrinkled. I'll get you a better one."

Ellie abruptly turned and left. I walked into the kitchen when I felt a tug on my pant leg. It was Andy. I lifted him up and sat him on the edge of the countertop. "What's up, little man?"

"I'm hungry."

"Okay, bet you want more some apple slices?" For some strange reason, Andy just loved apples, bananas and lima beans; not all at the same time of course.

"Yup!" He nodded his head. "Where's mommie?"

"Upstairs, getting me a tie. I'm going out for while."