Hey Nineteen

I could have happily done without them for the rest of my life.

Sarah's 'first' implied there was a second, at least. So she went on.

"I demand to be treated with respect. Not the kind of respect that says a woman cannot be a sex object -- I will very clearly a sex object this weekend -- but the kind of respect that says a woman can be a sex object and a real person at the same time."

"That's no problem at all," I said. "I wouldn't want it any other way. I tried it once... it was awful."

Sarah nodded. "April assured me that you were that kind of person. It's why I am here. My last condition is simple. I want conversation."

"We're so far apart in age," I said. "What can we have to talk about?"

Sarah smiled, her eyes studying me. "I won't pull out the old trope that 'I'm mature for my age' though I probably am. I have a 140 measured IQ - the obvious flaws in IQ measurement aside - so I'm probably smart for my age too. But that does not make up for a vast difference in real world experience. You're right.

"I'm probably a fan of some of the music and movies you grew up with, and some other things, but no, we don't have a lot in common.

"So we can talk about that. You can tell me about the olden days."

I groaned. "Oh sure, rub it in what an old man I am."

Sarah pierced me with her look. "There's no way around that. Have to face it. But whatever you call it, I am genuinely interested. They couldn't pay me enough to fake that. I want to learn about what I don't know. I want to share what I think I do know, and see how it holds up against a lifetime of experience and thought. I want to find out what we have in common, emotionally, intellectually, and maybe even in some small ways experientially.

"This is why I am doing this. The money tipped the balance, but after hearing about you, in fact, I would have considered doing it for free. For my own benefit. The difference is that I would have been less amenable to letting you call all the shots, and maybe not to concentrating the whole thing into one weekend."

"You're serious, aren't you?"

"Totally serious. April and Mickey will vouch for it, if you trust them. I don't lie about these kinds of things. I might fudge the truth a little, exaggerate some when it comes to sex, but not about the important things."

"Don't," I said, picking up on her caveat. I was still having trouble registering this, and jumped at the chance to add a condition of my own.

"Don't fudge or exaggerate on that. Don't fake it, ever, no matter what. In fact, that's one of my conditions. You say you'll do whatever I say. Fine, and I will take you up on that. But be honest. Tell me what you like, what you don't like. What you want, what you don't want. Don't ever pretend.

"Initiate things if you want to, suggest things. Push back on something if you aren't sure. I take it that this deal means that you'll do what I ask even if you don't really want to at the moment. I may take you up on that too. But never lie about it."

"Deal" she said eagerly. "If you ask something I'm not too keen on, or if something isn't working for me, you'll know it. If you get off on doing it anyway, fine, but remember my first condition."

"I'm still waiting for Allen Funt to jump out from behind the curtain," I said. Mickey and April laughed. Sarah just looked at me.

Oh lord, the cultural references were going to be a big obstacle here. I explained Candid Camera to her, and she finally got the joke. It lost a lot of its punch when it had to be explained.

"He won't. I'm all yours through Monday at 9 pm sharp. Then I have to go home. It's a school night."

"Jesus. A school night."

By the time dinner ended, I knew what my decision was going to be. But I could still not pull the trigger. I hadn't even thought about her panties, or lack thereof, but now that I did, it swept all my reservations away in a rush of blood to what April would clinically refer to as the erectile tissues in the shaft of my penis.

I was so impressed with Sarah's intelligence and blunt forthrightness that I almost forgot she had a body. Once I remembered, the combination made me shudder.

Sarah had been ruthlessly careful about not letting me find out about her panties all through dinner. I knew that no matter how short the dress, she had absolute control over every movement of her body and legs. She could show exactly as much or as little as she wanted, and she could make those decisions continually while holding a real conversation, an intellectual one that covered a range of topics.

That was what had sold me in the end. She was the kind of person where body and mind worked together. The conversation, once we had gotten past her bullet list of terms, was amazing, even with the big gaps that my olden days cultural references left.

But with that body and that mind working together... I wondered if I should make out my will. I might not make it through the weekend.

"I don't... I don't even know where to start," I said while we stood outside the restaurant waiting for the valet to bring the car around.

"Does that mean you've accepted?" she asked with a hopeful look on her face.

Oh god, that look. To see a girl that young looking so hopeful about sex. "Not officially." I nodded toward April and Mickey, who were off to one side in an intimate conversation of their own.

We had all agreed to go back to my house to hear my final verdict. I was kind of thinking that once I gave it, I would want to literally kick April and Mickey out the door so I could act on it, but I wasn't about to be so rude to my way too generous benefactors.

I watched the valet's face as he opened the door for Sarah. He did not help her into the car, but he got a big tip anyway. One that he would surely relive later tonight in the privacy of his own bedroom. I watched him do a double take then blush as she swung her legs into the car, parting them ever so briefly as she adjusted her position in the back seat.

My angle was all wrong. I still didn't have my answer. I was sure the valet's reaction would have been similar whether she was wearing panties or not.

The ride home was full of delicious tension. We sat close, I put my arm around her, just like a teenager in the backseat.

I was in awe of her. Of everything about her. Kids these days, am I right?

I wished I could find such a woman closer to my own age, if there was such a thing. But how many myths could come true in one lifetime?

I'd already had it all, the woman that was my own age, who was equally mythical. This was not the start of a relationship. It was an extended one night stand. But it was not coming from a bad place, and I was sure she would be more than a vessel. Claire would be happy for me, or at least, not the kind of unhappy she was with that other woman. Not that I was going to tell her about this.

Would I be ashamed to? The thought made me take a step back. If that was a possibility, then I shouldn't be doing this. That had been a rule for me, before. If I was contemplating doing something that I would be ashamed to tell Annie about, then just don't do it. It's a lot easier not having to apologize and beg for forgiveness.

Once Annie was gone, so was that avenue of self-restraint. I was trying to bring it back. No, I would not tell Claire, for the simple reason that you just don't tell your daughter details of your sex life. But I wouldn't be ashamed if she found out.

It felt like a start, like I could start to accept life after. Sarah was a hell of a lot of motivation for it, but I was sure... pretty sure that I would not regret it after.

I needed to live, with all the joys that could come with it. There would never be a day that Annie wasn't close to the surface of my memory, but I now imagined that not as a reminder of what we'd lost, but as a reminder of what life was all about.

For what felt like the first time in a very long time, when her face came suddenly, unbidden to my memory, she wasn't broken and dying in my arms. She was smiling. She was happy.

I choked up a little at it, tears not of loss, but of a melancholy joy at what we'd had. Sarah in my arm seemed to sense it. She sat still, letting me work through it.

---

"Guys," I finally said after managing to hold back the tears. I couldn't wait any more. "I accept."

April turned back to us and Mickey cocked his head to catch my eye in the rearview. "You're supposed to wait till we get to your place," April said.

"Fuck that," I said in an exaggerated frat boy voice. I turned and pulled Sarah toward me and gave her a kiss that promised to take the wind out of her.

It seemed to work.

She turned to me and we wrapped around each other with our lips mashed together. Her kiss was electric, and not because she was such a hottie. Because she was special. No, not the kind of special that makes her a candidate for "the one", but a special person.

She was so impressive at dinner and she ticked every box of 'respectable' that I could think of. Even her choice to prostitute herself this one time seemed like it was something of an entirely different nature than what that usually means.

And I found that I cared about her. A lot of that was carryover from how much I cared about April, but some of it was all about her. She was the kind of person that deserved to be cared about, to care about her feelings and to care about her future.

If I thought that this weekend would do anything to threaten that future, I would have called it off with zero regrets. But she had convinced me otherwise. The opposite, in fact. I resolved to try to make this weekend everything she wanted, even if it came at the expense of everything I wanted.

That felt important to me, like a little piece of the cure that April intended this weekend to be. Not a complete cure, but the first dose of it. The fact that this was not going to become a relationship took the pressure off my need to get over my guilt.

The weekend promised closeness and intimacy, but only for a limited time. I didn't need to abandon my ongoing attachment to Annie, to commit right now to moving on. I only had to put it aside for three days.

Fortunately for me, what Sarah wanted for this weekend had considerable overlap with what I wanted. Not just what I needed, but what I wanted. What I wanted as a man who had been celibate for two and a half years, except for one encounter that was, by all measures, worse than no encounter at all.

I put my hand on Sarah's thigh. Her legs were long and thin, but this was no frail twig of a limb. She wasn't a gym rat, but she clearly kept in shape. She probably didn't have to try very hard, she probably had the natural ability to stay that way that only nineteen year olds can have, but she at least didn't do anything to undo it.

I broke our kiss when my touch to her bare skin sent a small flinch through her. Her eyes told me that the touch was not at all unwelcome, the flinch was pleasure, not a warning.

"I'm going to have my answer," I told her.

She looked into my eyes from four inches away and started to speak. I was ready, and before she could get a breath out, my finger was across her lips. I shook my head. "No, no. Don't tell me. Don't show me."

I slid my hand further up her thigh. The corners of her mouth turned up and her eyes glowed. Her lips separated just enough to accept the kiss I immediately planted on them.

I gave her her first lesson in having sex with an old man. Patience. That her partner could have it. It took all my strength to show it.

I moved my hand away from her thigh. It was my near hand, the one attached to the shoulder that was pressed against Sarah's as we sat side by side. It wasn't the ideal position for the extensive investigation I meant to carry out.

I put that arm around her instead, allowing her to turn more toward me.

Her shoulders and, just a short time later, her lower back, had that same combination of delicacy in their proportions and a taut, reserved strength.

It took only a small nudge on her lower back to get her to slide up sideways onto my lap. We never broke the kiss, mostly because I did not want her movements to give the game away visually. Though I certainly gave some of my side of the game away when she had to squirm a little to find a spot on my lap to put her ass that was not overly lumpy.

With the dexterity that, again, only a nineteen year old girl could have, she managed to turn her upper body almost square to me while her hips and legs were still sideways on my lap. The kiss, and my investigation, could now begin in earnest.

Now that my far hand could reach her easily, naturally, I moved it to the outside of her far thigh, finding it further away than I expected. I pulled it toward me, closing her legs. Patience, my dear, you'll get the opportunity to separate them again soon.

I slid my hand to her hip, not letting the hem of her dress stop me. But only so far, enough to squeeze the tight but yielding flesh of her ass without letting the waistband of any possible panties provide a spoiler. If she was wearing any, I knew they would not be granny panties. They'd be much flimsier than that, if not an outright thong.

I kneaded her skin, then slid my hand back down to her knee, letting my fingers drag lightly and my thumb drift toward the inside. Just a little bit, just enough to get her thinking about where my hand would go when I decided to let it.

I trailed my fingers down on the outside, to the crook of her knee. Some women are very sensitive there, but she just found it ticklish. I didn't linger, instead, I moved further down her leg, prompting her to raise her foot so I could move my hand along her calf and shin.

She seemed to enjoy that, and I added it to my mental notes about what she liked and didn't. I moved to her foot and gently released the medium high-heel shoe there, letting it fall with a thunk to the floor of the car. I massaged her foot lightly, then prompted her to lift the other.

With both her shoes off, I ran my hand back upward, now on the inside of her near leg. There was only one place that exploration would end, and we both knew it. But as they say, the journey is half the fun.

When I got to her knee, I noticed that the other was nowhere to be found. It made me even more determined not to look down to get my answer directly. I didn't want that.

I wanted that. More than anything in the world. But the car was dark, aside from random lights flashing across us as the car moved through the evening. It would likely take more than a glance.

We hadn't exactly gotten bored with wrestling our tongues, but it was time to move on. While I inched my hand up her thigh, tickling and caressing along the way, but going much slower than either of us wanted, I moved my lips to her chin and started down.

Her dress had a zipper in the back. I lowered it enough to loosen her collar and give me more access to her wonderfully delicate neck and throat. Her head tilted to the side, inviting me to explore it fully. I found several more spots to add to my notes. One where her jaw met her ear, one just behind her earlobe, and another where her neck met her collarbone. Each brought a small shudder and a purr, though both reactions were overwhelmed by anticipation of the travels of my hand below.

I wanted to use that hand to feel her breast, but she would kill me if I did. Not for taking liberties, but for abandoning the voyage up her thigh that was already accelerating her breathing and bringing a palpable tension to her neck and shoulders.

She held her leg unnaturally still, as if afraid that any movement would spook the hand that was about to reward us both for our patience. I slid my fingers up until that thigh quivered and her breath hitched. I knew she'd break before I got to the final destination, when she finally believed it was imminent.

I looked into her eyes and moved my hand the wrong way. Back down. Just a little, but enough to tell her that I was no fumbling bumbling college boy. Her eyes were a mixture of abandon, frustration, and wide-eyed wonder. My eyes smiled at her, letting her know she was at my mercy. Her eyes begged.

She wasn't wearing any panties at all. I learned this by dragging one finger steadily up her thigh to brush against the outer edge of her lip, then over her bare mound, a second finger trailing directly across her sex so lightly that it only served to emphasize what I was not going to do just yet.

Her eyes flared and her frustration turned to anger, to a demand.

Down the other side and I found her other thigh almost at a right angle to the first. I opened my hand and dragged all four fingers down that thigh and back up. She tried to press it even further out as if the only thing stopping my hand was that her legs were not spread widely enough yet.

I let her stew, smiling into her eyes to tell her she would have to wait just a little bit longer. As soon as I saw resignation in them, I moved instantly to wet my finger in her copious dampness. Her eyes shot wide in shock and she shuddered.

No more teasing. I dragged that wet finger up, gathering more as I went, and straight to the hard nub at the top of her slit. Rubbing little damp circles around it and over it made her chin fly up into the air and her eyes clamp shut. She sucked in a deep breath that stuck in her chest while her mouth twitched helplessly. I dragged my tongue across her throat and nibbled there, accepting her surrender.

I felt her whole body tense, and I supported her while my other hand pressed further to give her more reason to need support. My thumb replaced the little circles my finger was making with a firmer and more directed rubbing, while that finger and its companion slid along her slit, pressing inward at the bottom of each stroke.

She began to shake, and her back pressed harder against my arm. Her hands clawed wildly at her belly, yanking the dress up above her waist where it was stopped by her ass holding the back of it against my lap.

I let her fall back slowly, my arm holding her from flopping back too fast and cracking her head against the door. As her upper body unfolded, the hand that was now relentlessly flogging her pussy got more and more access.

She finally came with her back against the seat and her head cocked at an unnatural angle against the door. Her hips bucked up, desperate for more pressure. I pumped two fingers in and out of her, with only my thumb remaining to provide external stimulation.

I curled my fingers forward, finding the hard egg behind her clit after a couple of tries, and she just lost it.

She wailed and keened and thrashed, half on my lap and half on the seat. Her contortions finally released her dress and the hem rode up to her waist. She put on the most obscene display I've ever seen while my fingers squelched in and out of her.

April had been turned in her seat by the time I remembered there were other people in the car and looked toward the front. Now she was just staring with an open jaw and a knowing look in her eyes.

By the time Sarah pushed my hand away, she was a mess. Not the kind of mess I really wanted to make on her, but, you know, patience.

Her hair was a wild, sweaty tangle. Her makeup was smeared over her face like a Halloween mask. Her clothes... the one piece of clothing she wore, was a rumpled rag bunched up at her waist with the collar I had loosened cocked to one side and twisted almost 45 degrees around her neck.

She lay there, limbs akimbo, with a thousand-yard stare blocked by the roof of the car. Her chest heaved. She panted. An occasional shudder went through her, running from her neck down to where her far leg flopped to the side.

"April?" I asked, my tone sarcastically questioning. "I can't tell. Is she wearing panties?"

April laughed. Sarah was too far gone into her own world to react. Mickey cocked his head to look into the mirror, then futilely craned his neck to try to get an angle that would allow him to see. When he realized he couldn't, his hand started to move to adjust the mirror. But it stopped and he slumped in his seat.