Brittany's Do-Over

"Jesus fuck." My life flashed before my eyes, but not too dramatically. I was merely afraid of getting fired, or maybe divorced. "I can't believe that."

"You can't?" She arched a plucked eyebrow, still smiling. "A lot of my friends think you're attractive, Mr Kershaw. I might as well be the one to tell you."

"No, dumbass. I meant I can't believe you posted it on the Internet!" My coffee, forgotten, trembled as my knee twitched nervously under the table.

"Dumbass? Come on, Mr Kershaw." She shook her head, but she looked away again. She was trying to decide whether I was pissed or not; she was wondering whether she should have kept her mouth shut. When she looked back, at least there was a guilty look in those eyes. "It was just a kiss on New Year's. People do that. It doesn't mean anything; it's a folk custom."

I was staring hard at her; I could feel my face getting hotter. "What about the second kiss?"

This time, Brittany was starting to blush too. "Well. Yes. I didn't post about the second one." We both went quiet for a moment, remembering, staring vacantly across the gym at where the parents were thinning out, the kids getting rowdier by the DJ. She glanced over as I kept my mouth shut. "What? Come on, Mr Kershaw. You know me better than that."

"I thought I did." I reached for my coffee then, but I didn't really want it anymore. How many other kids knew? "You kids get yourself in trouble posting shit on the Internet all the time. Don't drag me into it."

"Well." She shrugged. "It's done, and trust me, it's no big deal. And my friends don't know about the second kiss. Nobody does." She gave me a sidelong glance. "Do they?"

"No," I replied firmly. "And nobody needs to, either."

"Right." She sighed and sipped at her tea. "It's like we said at the time. We just got carried away."

"Sure." I frowned, and then the silence got awkward, and I just couldn't let it stretch. My stupid mouth just had to fill the gap in the conversation. "It was a damn good kiss, though."

She didn't hesitate. "Hell yes," she nodded fervently, and when she looked back at me she was smiling again. Such a nice, warm smile; I felt, sometimes, that I was the only one she did that for. And that's when my coffee started to taste better. I'm not sure why I went to the subject, but it was surely the elephant in the room. I looked carefully down at my shoes. "So, is everything okay with your friend?"

She stared across at me, her eyes very wide behind her glasses. "What?"

"Your friend." I was trying to sound nonchalant. "The one you texted me about last month?" She was shaking her head, clueless. "The, uh, the one with the sex question?"

She went instantly and obviously red. "Oh!" Her hand flew to her mouth. "Oh. Sorry. Yeah. She... yeah. I'm sorry. I never should have asked you that. I feel like an idiot."

I flapped my hand dismissively. "Don't worry about it. To tell the truth, I was happy to help." I finally looked at her. "Everything okay?"

"Yeah, yeah." She was calming down slowly. "Everything's fine. You were, like, super-helpful. Thank you."

"It was nothing." I'm not sure why I kept going. "So, what did she decide? Was it sex?" I was keeping my voice down, but there was a perverse thrill in discussing this here, in public. I leaned in. "I have to know whether my research worked out."

She nodded and wiped at her lips with the little paper towel her tea had come with. "Right, right. Well... she's still not sure, I think. I don't talk to her much about it anymore, really." She met my eyes again, bolder. "She hasn't tried again, though, so it's still an open question."

I felt my eyebrows rise. "Why not? I mean, is she worried?"

Brittany shrugged, a quick twitch of her fine little collarbones through her low neckline. "I wouldn't say that. I think she just got a little... I don't know, sketched out? Like, she didn't want her first time to be some random hookup." She arched an eyebrow. "And then it was, and I think she kind of wants a do-over."

"Shit. Like a mulligan? Like in golf?"

"Sure." Brittany was no kind of athlete, so she had no clue what a mulligan was, but I guess the context was clear enough. "A second chance. Only, you don't really get to lose your virginity twice, do you?"

I looked down at my coffee. "I guess not." I remembered mine, and clearly... to my wife. She hadn't been my wife yet, and I'd been old at 24. "Does she... I suppose she feels pressure? Peer pressure? You know, to lose it?"

She stared at me and shook her head slowly. "God, Mr Kershaw, you're as bad as my father. You guys have no clue what it's like to be young these days." She chuckled. "Peer pressure. Look, I went through most of my high school years trying to lose it. Everyone does. And then it doesn't happen and, well..." She paused, rewinding her words and realizing what she'd said, and when she rebuilt her eye contact with me it was a slow, lidded rise of her eyes, now a little troubled. "I mean, she went through those high school years."

I smiled, gently I hoped. "Your friend."

"Exactly." She knew I knew, though, so there it was. We both sipped at our drinks, and when she changed the subject, she didn't change it enough. "So apparently, you've been worrying about New Year's?" She asked it with fake carelessness. "Was that a little weird?"

"What, the kiss?" She colored again.

"No..." she said slowly, and then her eyes were straight on mine. "The other kiss. You seemed scandalized when I told you about Missy."

I shrugged. "Like you said. Like we said, at the time. We got carried away."

"Right." The tea was just about done. I felt like I needed to say more.

"I shouldn't have done that with you, Brittany. It put you in an awkward position, and I'm sorry." But I fucking loved it, I didn't say.

She put the cup decisively back onto the table. "It didn't feel awkward, though."

"It sure didn't," I nodded. It hadn't, either; it had felt totally natural. Like, disturbingly natural. "It felt right." I said it so quietly I wondered whether she'd heard it, but I needn't have. She was listening closely.

"We shouldn't discuss this here," she said simply. She nodded sideways, to where Melissa Southern was watching from across the room as she pretended to help her mother sell seashell art. "Will you get fired if you take a little break?"

"You mean take off? Have a chat?" I felt my heartbeat quicken, but I didn't want to misinterpret anything. "I'd love to."

"Just not in the science office." She was staring straight at me now, very serious.

I shrugged, feeling reckless. "I don't know. I don't think anyone will bother us there."

"Someone did last time," she pointed out at once, and then she shuddered slightly; true. In the days since New Year's, I'd wondered many many times what might have happened in that cluttered little office if Connie Ferrick hadn't come barging in to use the copier.

"True. So maybe not there," I suggested tentatively. She was watching me now, hanging back, but her face showed growing eagerness. Or was I just imagining it? I cleared my throat and leaned back. The decision, whatever it meant, was made automatically. "Well, hell. I'll just go to my classroom to fetch a few things, some grading I forgot." I raised both eyebrows. "There's nothing going on down here."

"You know," she put in, her voice low and gravelly, "I was thinking I'd take a little stroll around the halls, maybe visit my locker, check out my old classrooms through the doors." She smiled quickly. "Nostalgia-type stuff."

"Good idea," I replied vaguely. "You never know what you might find in your old classrooms."

She sat back and toyed with her teabag. "Maybe I'll see you later, Mr Kershaw."

"Only if you're lucky." It was my stock response to almost everyone I knew, but in these circumstances it probably wasn't the wisest thing to say. Both of us smiled at the same time, hers a clever little smirk; mine felt normal, but it was hard to know how she took it. Whatever. I stood up and turned toward the trash can. "Thanks for coming by to visit, Brittany." I said it in a normal tone of voice, but it didn't look like anyone was paying us the slightest attention. I shrugged self-consciously. "It's always nice to see you."

"You too, Mr Kershaw!" She sounded like her usual self, but I had to stop myself from glancing back several times as I made my way out of the gym, then up the stairs to where the bio labs were. Everything was dark, the custodians already done with this whole floor and now waiting around in their fart-stinking little office, impatient for the Faire to end so they could mop up and go home. I slipped my key into the lock and went into my room, feeling a little foolish, wondering what I was doing. And whether I should leave the door unlocked.

Eventually she found me by the fish tanks I kept in the corner behind my desk, all the tanks lit fluorescently during the night; other than that, instinct told me to leave off the classroom lights. Her face showed up first, peering furtively through the long window on the classroom door before she opened it and came flitting in like some spy-movie informant sliding through a gap in the Berlin Wall. The door closed behind her. "Should I pull the shade?" was the first thing she said, and I shrugged. I was in my chair with my feet on the desk, a position she often saw me in.

"Might as well," I allowed, trying for a dry voice, and then she was walking across the linoleum toward me, her sandals slapping dustily in the quiet room. "So, how's that nostalgia-type stuff coming along?"

She shrugged; even in the shadows of the fishtank light, I could see her teeth flash as she understood this wasn't going to be heavy. It was going to be just like almost every other interaction she and I had ever had: clever, respectful, easy. She had nearly reached me before she answered. "Aw, you know." She hitched her narrow butt up onto the corner of my desk, as she had countless times during dozens of light lunch conversations. "They say you can't really turn back time. It's different, being back here."

"Different seeing you here," I replied evenly. I often had a hard time remembering when different kids graduated; sometimes, the years all ran together. In Brittany's case, it sometimes seemed she'd never left. "Nice, though."

"I always like visiting you." It was an admission made non-cheesy by her solemn delivery, and by her basic honesty. Still, she took a deep breath before she went on, her eyes narrowing strangely. "Even if you spend a lot of the time looking at my legs."

"What?" I opened my eyes wide. "How dare you, Brittany? I've always been a perfect gentleman." Still, I smiled back at her; she had a point, after all, and those very legs were now dangling just a foot away from me, supple in her yoga pants. I did, though, give those legs a long glance, and let her see me do it. I whistled low, and she tried to keep from grinning. "Can you blame me?" I admitted at last.

She shrugged. "I'm never sure how I look," she confessed. "I mean, I never have problems getting dates, and guys spend plenty of time looking at me. But then, guys look at every girl."

"Right," I nodded emphatically.

"So, yeah. But I never mind when you look," she added solemnly. She was swinging them now, her heels bumping softly against the desk drawers. "It's cold in here."

"It's after hours, after sundown, in February," I pointed out evenly. "You need to lower your expectations, Brittany."

"I guess." Bump, bump, bump went her feet, and she was looking soberly down at me now. She looked even more luminous than usual in the bluish light from the aquarium. "So," she said at last. "Where were we? The kiss, right?"

"The second kiss," I nodded. It would have been an exciting experience anyway, kissing a girl so fetching; the thrill had been magnified beyond all reason by the fact that she was a former student, that we were in the science office in the middle of the day, that the whole thing had been so spontaneous. "The first one was good enough," I mused, "but that second?" I leaned back and laced my hands behind my head. "I mean, what can we say?"

"I know, right?" Bump, bump, bump. She shrugged. "Who'd have thought you'd be, you know, such a good kisser?"

"You weren't bad, either," I observed, and then both of us were grinning openly. "I always have liked you, Brittany."

"Same here," she replied at once. She laughed softly. "I meant what I said, too. I think there were a lot of jealous alumni checking out my Pixboox account."

"Think so?"

"Know so." She winked. "I'd show you some of the comments, but I'm not sure I want you seeing them."

"No?" Bump, bump, bump.

"No," she said firmly. "It sounds kind of weird probably, but I don't like to think about other girls visiting you." The admission sounded like it had taken a lot of nerve to say, but I was nodding. So far, nothing she was saying was surprising me, and suddenly the near future, alone with her in a quiet, darkened room, loomed exciting and dangerous before us. I sighed.

"I'd rather have a visit from you than from any other former student," I told her quietly, and she could tell it was the truth. So she nodded too, just as I had a second ago, and suddenly both of us were wondering who'd make the next move. I cleared my throat. "That was bad luck, Ms Ferrick busting in on us," I said, just barely getting the words out before my throat seized again. Bump, bump, bump. Her thigh was just inches away from my perched feet. She was leaning forward, slouching with her hands on the edge of the desk and her her shoulders up by her ears, still with that clever little hooded look to her eyes.

"If she hadn't..." She left it unsaid, and of course both of us were visualizing... what? A torrid makeout session, frantic sex under the science office table, a wild affair that sizzled and bubbled until it burned out? Or just those two kisses, firm and confident, needy and yet possessive? There was no way to know, and that was the point.

I thought long and hard before my next statement, but I think I'd already made up my mind about all this without really realizing it. I swallowed. "Well," I sighed, forcing myself to sound casual, "I doubt Ms Ferrick is even in the building right now."

Her eyes lit up behind the glasses, and all at once a slow and somewhat devious smile grew beneath her sharp nose, the shadows making her look like a bird of prey as she perched there with her head low. All at once, as if paying attention to it for the first time, I felt my dick hardening down my leg. And this time, she was the one who needed to clear her throat. "That's good," she managed, and then I took my feet off the desk and planted them on the floor, and she sighed as she slid down off the desk, stepped sideways, and stood over me. She was breathing hard, her firm little breasts quavering under the thin shirt. "So, like, how do we do this? Do you remember what we were doing when she came in?"

I wondered how long I should wait before I reached out to touch her legs, so sleek in the shadows. "We were kissing, Brittany."

She laughed again, but it was a far smokier laugh than she usually used. "That's an understatement, Mr Kershaw." Her eyes were huge above me.

I shrugged impatiently. "We were really kissing, then."

She rolled her eyes. "We were both standing up, for one thing." Her teeth glittered, the smile now playful, and everything felt easy again. Gamely, I shot to my feet. I was at least a head taller than she was, and just as I had been on New Year's, I was immediately aware of how easy it was to see down her shirt, the lacy dark red of her bra peeking out from the bottom of her cleavage. I took a breath.

"You had your hands on my back," I suggested, furrowing my brow in mock concentration. She put them there at once, and suddenly her whole body was right up against mine, and she was obviously aware of my hard-on. Shit. I should have planned this out better; I was way, way out of practice for this sort of thing. A sparkling smugness showed in her eyes and in the tightening of her smile, but then she tamed herself and resumed her air of offhand innocence. "And I think I was, like hugging you about the same way."

"No," she said flatly. "Your left hand was on my hip."

"No way." I'd forgotten how much fun flirting could be, even with stakes as high as these. "I'd never have been such a jerk."

"Who said you were being a jerk?" she replied softly, arching her eyebrow, and I chuckled as my fingers found her hipbone, the forefinger settling on her warm skin between the shirt and the pants. "Yeah." Her voice was suddenly very, very hoarse. "Like that."

"Cool." We stood there clasped, for a moment, staring cheesily into each other's eyes, until I smiled again. "Well, I think you were the one who kissed me."

"You sure?" Her voice was a throaty murmur. "I think I remember it differently. You were the one who made the move."

"I think you may be right," I admitted, my impatience at last getting the better of me, and then I had her lips quivering against mine, temptingly, her breath foul with anxiety, and I waited until she grew comfortable enough to join in.

It took her very little time. Like, none. She opened her mouth with cool confidence, the same way she had at New Year's at the start of that second kiss, the one that wasn't innocent at all, and not for the last time I wondered just how much experience this girl had.

Kissing her was intoxicating, addictive, and before long she had my lower lip trapped between her greedy teeth, and this time when her hand began its lazy descent along my Cuban shirt, over my belt, it didn't stop for the arrival of a colleague seeking a copier. I heard myself groan into her mouth when I felt her fingers resting right on my ass, and somehow that forefinger of mine was inside the waistband of her yoga pants, actually inside it, and we were clutching each other as though January and half of February had never happened.

"Mmm," she hummed happily as slowly, with gentle reluctance, we pulled apart. Her eyes devoured my face, and no doubt mine did hers. "If Missy Southern could see me now, huh?"

"No shit," I croaked. She was shaking, her face radiant, her chin gleaming with my spit. "So, okay. Here we are. Ms Ferrick doesn't come in. Now what?"

"Now what?" She licked her lips, lizardlike, and squeezed experimentally at my ass. "Now we keep going, right?"

"I guess?" Our smiles met then, and the flirting was over; my mouth opened wide, then hers opened wide, and then we were all over each other, tongues clashing and teeth dueling, our hands everywhere all of a sudden. At long last, with a feeling of satisfaction long delayed, I had Brittany Taylor's ass filling my palms, the yoga pants molding themselves against my fingers as if she wasn't even wearing them, and she squealed hotly into my mouth with her foot sliding up my leg like you see in 40s movies. When I looked down at her now she had her eyes closed tightly, her face ecstatic, and both of us were making those little grunting noises like you hear in high school backseats the world over.

But her foot kept climbing, her inner thigh hard against my hip, and I was losing my balance. I pulled her close and we hopped, still smearing our tongues slickly together, toward my waiting office chair, wedged blessedly against the aquarium where the casters hopefully wouldn't budge when we landed.

As, of course, we had to now; the momentum was unstoppable, and if I was worried about collapsing into an undignified heap on my classroom floor, Brittany was not. I tried to figure out a way to glance behind me for a safe landing, but that would have meant not kissing her, and I wasn't willing to do that. So, quickly, I put myself in God's hands, stuck out my ass, and aimed with the blind, lucky haste of a bad guy in an Arnold Schwarzenegger movie.