Finding Myself

She moved even nearer, checking theatrically that no one else was listening.

"It's naughty of me I know but sometimes I find myself checking out friends and colleagues and wondering what it might be like."

My eyes widened in surprise and the question was out before I could stop it.

"Who? Not the students?"

"No, of course not, credit me with some morals."

"Then who?"

Again, she looked around the obviously empty room before she replied.

"Gail Anders, for one. She's a real peach don't you think?"

"You think she's a lesbian?"

"If she is she's totally discrete about it, and I've never heard her talk about a boyfriend."

Her smile was almost a smirk and I felt like a teenager exchanging mischievous gossip. I asked.

"Anyone else?"

"You mean apart from you?"

My brain suddenly felt starved of oxygen. Had I not been sitting I would have fallen to the floor. She must have registered my shock as she playfully touched my face.

"Sorry, I was joking, I didn't mean to upset you. Look, I'll take a shower and then I'll open a bottle of wine."

She rose from the bed and extricated herself but my mind was still racing.

"Are you okay?"

She now stood over me and somehow the side of my face was pressed lightly to her skirt.

She stood still, waiting for me to move away, but then must have assumed that I was still in need of comfort. She began to gently stroke my hair once more but she only succeeded in increasing the tension that was slowly building within.

It had never occurred to me that another woman might find me attractive in a sexual manner and, joking or not, I guess I should have been flattered.

My thoughts tumbled over one another and I knew I should stir myself but the feel of her hand was soporific and, in a childish way, I felt that I was deserving of consolation.

After a few moments she must have decided that the situation was growing awkward and she turned her hip slightly as a prelude to leaving the room. In so doing her skirt rucked up a little and she gently attempted to straighten it.

I apologetically eased away but as she lifted her skirt I caught a glimpse of smooth ivory flesh framed between the welts of her black stay ups and a seductive pair of similarly coloured panties.

Time seemed to stand still. Mine was the merest glance, a barely perceptible flick of the eyes, but she was somehow aware. She held her skirt up a fraction longer as if to test the truth of her senses and then reason was strewn to the winds.

I let my head loll but this time my cheek came to rest against the naked warmth of her thigh. Everything seemed incredibly still with the exception of my heart which had quickened alarmingly.

No words were exchanged as she allowed her skirt to drape over me and then began to stroke my head through the light cotton fabric.

I was still capable of rational thought, enough to know that I was acting aberrantly, but I also knew that I had crossed the Rubicon.

For a moment I was transported back to childhood, seeking the sanctuary of my own private world beneath the bed sheets, but this new world was more closely confined.

In the darkness I could still discern the pale glow of her skin but this was a much warmer haven, her body heat adding to the humidity of my breathing.

Her skirt, fresh on that morning, held the waning fragrance of lavender but the trials of the day added a redolence of freshly baked cookies.

She continued her unhurried caress but, as she did so, her body began to turn; at first almost unnoticeably but then degree by slow degree.

My nose was brought round and pressed to the soft cushion of her panties releasing a heady and unmistakable scent. For a second or two I stopped breathing, as the air thickened around me, and then I opened my nostrils.

The sinful nature of the act only added to the rush and my head began to pound. Under normal circumstances it would have taken me a long time to recover from the wrenching orgasm that I had so recently enjoyed but I could feel the inner heat rekindling.

I was briefly assailed by an image of the pair of us enjoined as we each breathed in the others excitement but the abasement was mine alone. Her hand rested a little more heavily at the back of my head as she encouraged an even greater intimacy.

My face scrunched gently against a sculpted tuft of hair beneath which her labia assumed a surprising prominence. Without knowing why I pursed my lips and formed a kiss.

Even through the sheer barrier of her panties I felt them respond, swelling partially and opening a little. Their pliancy seemed suggestive of a proud maturity and, for a moment, I felt a little overawed.

She responded to my stasis with a fractional movement of her hips, teasing my mouth with an increasing wetness. For a second or two I sealed my lips but then, as if it had a mind of its own, my tongue stole forth.

At first there was an unwelcome tartness, an echo of my experience just a short while earlier, but then her full taste began to be osmotically transferred. I flattened my tongue and savoured it with a series of long slow sweeps.

A voice in my head, which could only be my own, told me that I was little more than a slut but I could not make myself stop. Lost in my own netherworld I was suffused by a frightening sense of contentment.

How long it continued I could not say. The passing of time was measured by an increasing, but almost pleasant, soreness as my tongue worked at the barrier between us. I thought that if I laboured long enough it could be dissolved but Ruth was more in tune with reality.

She held me still as she reached beneath her skirt and eased her panties a little so that slid down her legs. For an instant the spell was broken and I had a chance to redeem myself but I did not take it.

She held me firm as she stepped free of the lacy encumbrance but, either by desire or design, I found myself slipping to my knees.

She used both hands to press her skirt against my ears, closing me off once more, and making clear that there was to be just one point of focus. So fixed, I could hear nothing but the rush of my own blood and all my other senses became heightened.

I reapplied my tongue to the raw wetness and her pouting lips melded themselves in a gentle embrace. The temptation to delve deeper was strong but, for now, I stayed as I was letting the tip of my tongue explore the shallows.

My nostrils distended and each ensuing breath was more heavily impregnated with the scent of ever growing arousal. It was, in its way, another unwanted reminder but it had its own unique signature that made me breathe deeper still.

She was attuned in some way and she let her hands slip to take hold of her skirt and pull it tightly about me. I was immediately sealed into the muggy atmosphere of her heated femininity and I could no longer resist the urge to take more.

She thrust her hips fractionally to meet the pressure of my tongue and I slid inside with unseemly ease. Almost at once I felt an excited pulsation and some instinct had me seal my mouth to her opening.

Her hands found my head once more, holding me tightly in place, as I felt her begin to melt. Moisture ran over my tongue and I swallowed as best I could but I almost choked on the inundation as she started to come.

It was a brief, intense, orgasm and my mind was a whirlpool of conflicting emotions. I felt a surge of remorse for having acted as I did but this was counter posed by an odd sense that I had let her down in some way, that I had made her come too quickly.

She seemed in no hurry to release me and I wondered if she was as embarrassed as I was but, as her breathing settled, she finally lifted her skirt.

I had to make an effort to meet her eyes but her face glowed with an open smile.

"That was nice. Wait for me while I take a shower."

I was not sure what she had in mind but it soon became clear. I struggled to find my voice.

"I need to clean up...to wash my face."

"No you don't sweetie...just wait quietly and think of me."

It was almost an instruction and I was unclear how to react to it. In the event she left me to my own decision as she walked from the room.

For a minute or two I remained on my haunches listening to the spattering of the shower next door. I felt so wanton as I knelt there reeking of her but, each time I tried to snap out of it, I found myself conjuring an image of her luxuriating beneath the cleansing water.

What was it I wanted? Was I expecting her to return the favour, in spite of all that she had said, or was I simply hoping to do it again, to prove myself the equal of her former devotee?

The latter thought was unconscionable but the very fact that it had entered my thoughts spoke volumes about my disordered state of mind.

She returned to the room to find me exactly as she had left me and she favoured me with a knowing smile.

She was completely naked and stood as if to be admired.

She carried a little weight on the hips but this only helped to emphasis her hourglass figure crowned by her enviable breasts. She was also blessed with long legs and years of cycling around the campus had kept them well honed.

If I was in as good a shape when I reached her age I would be more than happy. It was easy to understand why she found men easy prey.

Having paused she moved towards my bed which was still in disarray following my earlier exertions. Her dark eyes looked a little disdainful as she drew up the coverlet over the rumpled sheet but her smile returned as she lay down and settled herself.

She was half raised on my twin pillows and her central position left no room for me to join her on an equal footing. It was the final confirmation of what she wanted and her assumption that my own pleasure was to be found in the giving.

She held my eyes as she drew up her knees and opened her legs safe in the knowledge that I would not be able to resist the temptation to let my gaze fall.

For some seconds I battled with myself. What had gone before could have been construed as accidental, something in the heat of the moment, but this would be totally premeditated. There would be no hiding from myself and no way back.

She could see the conflict raging but she was sublimely patient. She ran her fingertip lazily through the petite triangle of black hair that pointed the way down and my eyes finally dropped.

"Don't fight it..."

Her voice was seductively husky as she used the same single finger to beckon me forward and, as a moth to the flame, I approached the bed.

To reach my goal required a further act of obeisance as I laid myself down between her parted legs but now that I no longer had to meet her eyes I felt less vulnerable.

Instead, I stared at her elongated labia which were a beautiful shade of dusky pink. It was impossible to resist and I drew nearer to place a gentle kiss.

Her skin smelt sweetly of coconut oil, a product of the shower gel she preferred, but, as I continued to kiss it was slowly overwhelmed by a now familiar pungency.

She relaxed more deeply onto the bed and following my natural instincts I took a single fold between my lips and caressed it with my tongue.

I was surprised both by its suppleness, its wonderful smoothness, and the way that it yielded up the taste of her. I began to alternate between them encouraging her sex to open up to me until the moist inner core was revealed.

She gave a quiet purr of approval and, encouraged by this success, I licked along the whole length of her sex with the flat of my tongue.

I tapped a well of moisture and, for some minutes, I continued to lap at her. As I swallowed from to time I wondered, obliquely, if it was possible to become addicted to the taste.

The simple fact was that the greater the measure of my success the more aroused I became.

The urge to touch myself was getting harder to resist but my hands were now trapped beneath the fullness of her buttocks and I did not want to do anything to spoil the moment.

Her body had begun to quiver with pleasure and she gave a contented sigh as I now moved slowly upwards.

I thought that she might use her fingers to open herself up to me but she made no move to do so. I was left to seek out her clitoris with the tip of my tongue and, initially, it was a clumsy attempt.

I suppose I was expecting something more prominent and not this delicate, deep set, bud. It took a moment to realize that I had found my goal but confirmation came in the form of her fingers entwined in my hair holding me just so.

She began to gasp as she pushed herself at me and I felt a sense of elation. It was only in looking back that I decided that her arousal was stoked not by any ingénue skills of mine but more by the fact of another conquest.

Her second orgasm was more frenzied than the first. Her body bucked and she closed her thighs about my head in an almost painful embrace. At some point she cried out but, imprisoned as I was, I barely heard it.

After what seemed an age she finally relaxed a little and I felt her body being subjected to a series of gentle aftershocks.

By the time she deigned to open her legs again I must have looked a complete mess. I could feel perspiration beading at my temples and my face felt hot and clammy.

"I won't be long..."

I got up quickly and crossed to my en-suite shower room. For the second time that afternoon I stood beneath the soothing jets trying to make sense of events but, more particularly, what I would say to Ruth.

When I came out she was gone. I stopped to listen and heard her moving around in her own room. Within seconds I had thrown on some clothes and I shouted as I went out of the front door.

"I have to get some air!"

Chapter 4

As soon as I was outside I knew it was a mistake. I was simply postponing the inevitable. At some point we were going to have to talk.

As I walked I tried to examine my feelings.

Had I enjoyed it? Yes I had but I found it hard to explain why.

Was I attracted to her? Physically, there could be no doubt, but there was no emotional connection other than that to be found between good friends. The problem I had was in coming to terms with the fact that she had, in some way, used me but to what extent had I brought it upon myself?

I resolved to tell her that it would not happen again and to volunteer to find somewhere else to lodge although that was likely to be a real pain.

It was some hours later when I got back to the apartment and, having steeled myself, I was disappointed to find she had gone out.

At some point I dozed and slept straight through. Ruth was still not home but that was not altogether unusual. I got myself ready and rehearsed what I was going to say to Meg Dowland.

As I walked into the outer office Gail asked how I was feeling but, with thoughts of what Ruth had suggested about her, I could not meet her eye. I muttered a peremptory reply and carried on into the Principal's office.

Meg rose to greet me and then offered me a seat. She looked at me silently for a second or two before speaking.

"I've given that matter some thought and I will speak to all the girls involved. I will have them know that they cannot get away with such behaviour and I will withdraw all privileges.

If there were proof I would exclude one or more of them from school altogether but you see my difficulty.

Now, you may disagree with me, and you may be minded to pursue a stronger course of action, but I would caution you against it.

I have no doubt that everything happened as you said it did, and you were hurt in more ways than one, but it would be your word against theirs.

Clearly, we cannot have you teaching them as a group anymore and I would like to make a suggestion whilst I shuffle the timetable.

You are a good teacher, and your reputation with difficult children is undoubted, otherwise you would not have been recommended for the exchange programme in the first place.

For the next few days I wonder if you would consider tutoring Rachel Cummins at her home? I know your initial acquaintance with her was brief but she mentioned you by name."

So it was that I set off across town. I still felt aggrieved but I could see the sense in what Dowland had said even if I did not entirely agree with it.

Rachel had been part of Chloe's clique but she was tolerated almost in the manner of a mascot; compared to her 'friends' she appeared physically underdeveloped and lacked their streetwise dress sense. Now eighteen she could pass for fourteen with ease but, more recently, the continued jibes that she had been forced to endure had pushed her too far.

She had hit out at another girl resulting in a mass brawl. All of Chloe's group had been involved but Rachel had been singled out for exclusion.

I had only had her in school for two days but shared Dowland's opinion that she was actually a very bright young woman who would flourish if she were sufficiently removed from Chloe's malign influence.

Rachel's home came as a surprise. A neat, detached, three bedroomed house with freshly painted white facings.

I rang the bell and Rachel herself answered the door. In school she came across as a dowdy dresser with little pride in her appearance but today she could have been a different person.

She wore her long blonde hair loose and it had a lustrous shine which was not apparent when she sported her usual tight chignon.

It was also the first time I had seen her in makeup. It was very tastefully applied and brought out a previously hidden beauty in her blue eyes and a pleasant emphasis to her full lips. She still looked younger than her years but this was an ugly duckling transformation.

Instead of her chain store jeans she wore a neat cotton skirt which gave the lie to the 'sparrow legs' nickname I had heard her called. In fact, her legs were coltish and nicely proportioned.

The final surprise was her bust. She was wearing a simple, but expensive looking, white blouse loose over her skirt. Far from being flat chested, as her usual sloppy sweatshirts would suggest, she was possessed of a pair of pert, shapely breasts, which some of her peers might rightfully envy.

She smiled and invited me in and I found that even her accent had changed. She did not use the street argot that always made her sound so awkward but a more natural suburban vernacular.

Over the course of the morning I had to resist the urge to ask her why she so obviously hid her true personality and instead tried to assess her true academic potential.

By the time lunchtime arrived I was really beginning to warm to her and offered to take her to Denny's but she insisted on making coffee and sandwiches.

We resumed after lunch but I started to feel uncomfortably warm. It was another hot day but the house was air conditioned and I wondered if I had the makings of a cold.

Rachel looked cool enough and when I began to feel dizzy she insisted that I lie down for a spell. I refused, saying that I would get a taxi home, but I was really feeling quite rough. She showed me up to her mother's room and I told myself I would just take a quarter of an hour to recover and then leave.

When I opened my eyes again I felt disorientated, at first wondering where I was and then for how long. It took a moment to gather my thoughts but only to realize that something was badly wrong.

I was completely naked and completely immobile.

Trying not to panic I assessed my predicament. I was still on Rachel's mother's bed but my arms and legs were bound to the four corner posts with stockings.

I tugged angrily at my bindings but there was little play in the material and was forced to give up the struggle.

No sooner had I done so than Rachel entered the room.

"You're awake."

"What the hell have you done to me...My God...you drugged me!"