Jennifer Unchained

I scanned the room. It was luxurious, spotless, and entirely devoid of any personal effects. It felt like an upmarket hotel room for all the lack of personality it contained. But it was comfortable and had a large ensuite bathroom to one side. Bespoke fitted wardrobes contained clothing on hangers under clear plastic covers. One wardrobe was for a man, two others had women's clothes. Several drawer units contained neatly folded clothes including shirts, vests, underwear and socks; bras, panties and tights. There were also shoes in two extensive shoe racks within further wardrobes. If these were the parent' clothes, the family had apparently wanted for little. I should have felt that selecting clothing to wear was like trying on a dead man's clothes, yet it all felt so impersonal. Then I realised: the clothes were uncreased as if brand new; they had never been worn.

The men's clothing fitted me well, but then I'm an average male size. I chose a slim track suit bottom and cotton sweater. The evening was mild so I remained barefoot. I rinsed my socks and underpants in the bathroom and hung them on a heated radiator to dry. I didn't feel like wearing dead man's underwear so went commando under the track suit pants.

The kitchen was empty when I returned to it, but somebody had opened another bottle of wine and left it on the island worktop with a single glass. Beside it was a bottle of gin and a glass tumbler, some sliced lemon and an ice bucket. I chose the wine, and took the half-filled glass with me on a tour of the ground floor. Back in the entrance hall, the first door to the left of the inner exit doors led to a downstairs toilet, with a neat pile of small cotton terry towels for drying hands, and a range of colognes for guests. The second door led to a deep L-shaped room, wrapped around the back of the guest toilet. It was a corner room study with a front window overlooking the front lawn and two side windows. One window overlooked an orchard. The other was curtained off. To the other side of the hallway was a large sitting room which had expansive windows on two sides with south and east aspects. I went in to explore it in more detail. The views from windows on two sides were spectacular. I guessed that they overlooked an unspoilt part of the North Downs. Next to the lounge door was a playroom and schoolroom, combined, filled with all manner of toys, a rocking horse, children's books and children's VHS videos. It was the first room I had seen with any personal feel to it. The third room, with windows to the front and side of the house, was a smaller room furnished comfortably as a library, with bookshelves between the windows and a couple of brown leather chesterfields.

I went back to the kitchen and opened double doors to the garden. The ground fell away quite steeply here, and a glass-roofed building nestled below in a dip, reached by stone steps. I felt impelled to investigate, and winced as I stepped with my bare feet onto small scattered stones on the paved pathway and steps. The discomfort of the journey was worth it, though, for it led down to an enclosed swimming pool in a structure which resembled a large hothouse. The ground in front of it had been levelled out to a medium-sized lawn backed by a patio against the pool house. Its doors could be opened all the way along its front to give a panoramic view for the swimmers across the wooded valley below to the south and the far hills beyond. The air inside was still hot from the Autumn sun earlier in the day, and a quick test of the pool water with my hand revealed that it was warm enough to swim in.

The location of the house and its setting above the valley were perfect. Yet despite its well-maintained condition, the property was mostly devoid of any sense of homeliness, much like an upmarket show home.

I made my way back up the steps to the kitchen. Tessa was there, leaning against the island unit with a gin and tonic with ice and lemon. "Cheers!"

I tried to smile and looked her up and down, I hoped appreciatively, but I was nervous about what she might be about to reveal. I felt she was building up to something.

She misinterpreted my expression, and her face clouded. She looked down at her clothing and patted her hips, then her bust, as if checking for anything amiss. "What?" Her expression was born of confusion.

She had also selected a tracksuit, but not any ordinary tracksuit. Hers was form fitting, in a light grey material edged at the seams with pink vertical bands, with a zipped top and collar. It hugged her bust and waist. This was not the same woman I had seen earlier today and six years before.

I stuttered, unsure just what to say. "I - I'm surprised. You wash up very well. That outfit suits you perfectly. It's as if you're a different person at home."

She beamed. "This is the real me. Not the work me. I haven't worn this for years. Actually, it doesn't really fit me anymore. I've put on a bit of weight."

"No, it fits you perfectly, perhaps too well. Tessa, you are gorgeous. I hope I can be permitted to say that, I can blame the alcohol talking, and I might deny it in the morning."

"Why, thank you, gallant sir, I think."

She slunk towards me. Her movement spoke of genteel deportment, but her hips shouted 18-rated filth. The trouble with closely-fitting tracksuits is that they show any lumps and bumps and imperfections. Hers implied a sensuous body shape I could not have imagined. Mine just betrayed my guilty secret, which was anything but concealed. I had an instant boner which I could not hide.

She reached for me with both arms. "I know I'm being selfish, but hold me, please." Her tone sounded helpless, needy.

"Selfish? I'm the lucky one here, having your gorgeous body pressed up against me. Can't you tell? It's most distressing for me. Should we be doing this on a first date?"

She laughed hysterically at that, an over-the-top reaction that confounded me. It helped to release the tension which had been building between us.

"I'm touched that you find me attractive. In fact, I'm delighted. But there is a downside. You can admire the goods, but you can't sample them."

She tossed out the remark as if it was a witticism, but there was an edge in her voice that suggested something else. Was this a tease? If so, to what purpose?

"Now is maybe the time, finally, to tell you all. Shall we go into the lounge and talk?"

She led the way, and I ogled her bottom quite shamelessly as she walked. She gestured towards a long sofa with lots of cushions. We sat about an arms-length apart, facing each other. It had a high narrow table running all the way behind it, which served as a surface on which to place our glasses. She tucked one leg under the other and leaned against the backrest. It highlighted her bust and I was in seventh heaven. I felt an almost irresistible desire to reach out and touch it.

"I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I had a mental reaction to our parents' death as well. Short term; it was, perhaps not surprisingly, almost a complete mental shutdown. I recovered quite quickly, though, when I learnt that Jennifer was seriously ill. She became the focus of my attention after that. I will come back to that in a minute. As far as I'm concerned, the only long-term effect in me is that I can no longer tolerate sexual intercourse. Physically, my body is unresponsive. My mind is fine - in every other respect - but my body has flicked a switch to the 'off' position. The doctors cannot explain it, although other similar cases have been observed, following mental trauma.

"One consultant has advanced a theory - yes, there have been several - that it is Jennifer's condition which has caused my continuing problem. The fact is, my mind still wants me to be desired and loved, but my body does not want to co-operate."

She paused, expectantly. I held her gaze but said nothing for several moments. I was mulling over what she had said. Finally, I spoke.

"Yet you dressed this evening to display your body. Was that deliberate?"

"I suppose it was. I want to be desired. I just cannot reciprocate with lovemaking. I don't even want it, the business end of it, that is; and I wouldn't do it just to please a man. Does that repel you?"

The ball was firmly in my court.

"I've been alone for a long time. I've had several unsuccessful attempts at new relationships, but I, too, have a problem. Until now, I had no idea what it might be. Now, suddenly, like a flash of inspiration, I think I know what it is.

"I never enjoy sex at a first attempt with a woman, certainly never on a first date - not that I have tried that. The problem is that I'm a voyeur, a pervert, I suppose. I enjoy looking at women more than I get pleasure out of lovemaking. The one has to precede the other. If I'm not visually stimulated, I find it difficult to reach a climax. It isn't something one discusses on a first date. So I guess I'm flawed, and not through any known trauma."

She was smiling, pleased at my admission. "So, do you find me attractive? Do I turn you on?"

She had one leg tucked under the other. Her free leg was gently kicking out into thin air, perhaps a sign of nervousness.

I evaded the question. "What do you think?"

"I felt your erection. I know you like what you see. I've never dated a pervert before."

She giggled but she was still smiling, and I took that jest on the chin.

"Well, I hope my confession makes you feel easier?"

"It does, and it leaves scope for development. It also encourages me to proceed with my story."

"Did you have any doubt?"

"This evening could have ended at any point up to now with an early night and never to meet again. But now I'm encouraged to tell you all. I ask only that you don't rush to judgement. Hear me out and consider my case."

"I didn't realise I was being interviewed. Did I pass?"

"There's more to come. As I said before, I was also involved in that car crash. We had an estate car. Jenny and I were sitting in the back. I was thrown into the rear space, which was lucky for me. Jenny suffered life-changing head injuries, and our Mumma and Papa died. I recovered within days with very superficial injuries. Jenny had major injuries, some life-threatening, which took months for her to recover from. Her physical scars healed to be almost imperceptible now. But just when I thought that she had recovered, she began to exhibit strange behaviours on release from hospital. In my line of work we understand such things, but we cannot always explain the physiological or mental causes, nor know how to treat them.

"Jenny and I had always been close, although she was several years younger than I. I felt her change more than the loss of our parents. They had gone, and with them died our family life. But Jenny has survived and she remains an essential part of me, in a way that our remote and aloof parents had never been.

"I felt guilty for surviving with so little harm whilst my beautiful sister was seriously if not irreparably damaged. I'm going to do something with you now I wouldn't ordinarily do with a visitor. I'm going to show you Jennifer."

She leapt up and held out her hand. I took it, even more intrigued, and she dragged me off to the study. She sat me down on the chesterfield and picked up a remote control from the desk.

"This is one of the many modifications I made to the house before Jenny came home."

She pressed a button and what I had assumed to be a curtain-off window opened to reveal a bank of digital screens. I assume that they had been installed before the days of widespread, split screen technology. There were six screens. They sprang into life, one after the other. At first there was no sound, only pictures. The screens showed a bedroom, kitchen, bathroom, hallway, and two vantage points in a lounge. Movement in the lounge caught my attention. There was a low definition image of two ladies sitting on a sofa, playing cards. Tessa manipulated the remote to zoom in on one of them.

"That is one of the carers, Louise. She is sitting in for me this evening. We arranged it so that I could go to the training today. She will be relieved by another lady tomorrow, Susie. There is always someone keeping watch on Jenny when she is awake, often two. When she sleeps or is resting, assistive technology takes over. It even works on the sofa and chair. There are contact pads under the seat cushions and under the carpet. When she leaves her bed at night an alarm sounds and her carer must respond. Wherever she is in her apartment, sensors embedded in the floor and in the furniture are able to monitor her movements, except when we have them turned off, which is much of the time nowadays. We give her as much time to herself as she wants. This was state of the art technology when it was installed. It's linked to concealed cameras and microphones, which can track her every movement. She knows it. We don't always activate it these days, usually only when she is in a fractious mood or needs to be left on her own."

Tessa looked at me for a reaction. I knew all about assistive technology, as she well knew. She trusted that I would not react with a trite accusation of 'big brother' surveillance. I wasn't thinking of that. The question bouncing around about in my head was why?

"The cost of this installation must have been colossal. Why is it necessary?"

"Good. Full marks. It's there because we can afford it. It's needed because Jennifer is a threat to herself and to others."

"Can I see her?"

Tessa fingered the remote again. The camera moved to the other figure in the room and zoomed in. The resolution wasn't great, but good enough to show a young, light-haired woman sitting with her legs up on the sofa, under a wrap. I had not noticed from the initial wide-angle shot but could now see that she appeared to be naked under the wrap. Tessa tapped the remote to zoom in closer on her face, then down to a partially exposed breast. When the camera reached her thighs, which were barely covered by the wrap and exposed a completely unclothed hip, I gasped and looked away. This was voyeuristic in a way that I couldn't countenance. I enjoy watching women who wanted to be watched, but not to spy on someone who is unaware that I might be watching.

"Oh god!"

"Right reaction! It's spying. Something I hate. But it's necessary. Jenny must be monitored for her own protection."

"Why?"

"She had a serious injury to her frontal lobe which caused apparently lasting mental impairment. She is physically fine, in fact she is beautiful in every way, except that she has behavioural problems, occasionally severe, and a mania, a fixation, about sex. Her brain injury has caused her mental filters of what is acceptable behaviour to fail. She has complete sexual disinhibition. At first it was accompanied with manic laughing or crying and a random destructiveness, but now it has quietened down mainly to sexual inhibition.

"I thought at first that she had recovered well enough, until I was contacted by the police. She had left the house and been behaving indiscreetly in a night club, and caused a ruckus, to put it mildly. Rioters caused major damage, and all to get control of her body. She had stripped and provoked several men to try to fuck her 'if they were man enough'. You probably can't see from that camera definition, but Jenny is an absolute stunner. She drove those men crazy."

There was enough definition in the monitor to suggest that Jenny was indeed physically attractive.

"We knew then that she had a problem. It is one thing for a plain woman to show inhibition, but quite another when they are beautiful and sexy. That puts the whole world of men at risk, of reckless criminal behaviour, stupidity, you name it.

"Apart from her behaviour, she is mentally astute, totally aware of her surroundings and her situation."

"So how does she react to it?"

"It varies from day to day. Sometimes she accepts it and acts normally. Other times she rails against it and can be violent. She escaped from the residential hospital several times and caused commotions in the town. She would often be brought back, invariably naked, under a borrowed coat or wrap. The local police knew her well, and how to react to the situation. However, one constable took her to his home and raped her. He had taken too long to bring her in. He had his career terminated, along with a prison sentence, not because she did not consent, but because she was deemed incapable of consent. You see the trouble she can cause?"

As if to emphasise the situation, Tessa zoomed in on Jenny's face. Even with the poor definition of the cameras I could see that she was probably beautiful. It seemed a cruel twist of fate that someone so physically gifted should be cursed with such an affliction, although some men might not think it so.

Jenny picked up her phone. The carer visible on screen picked up another one. Tessa spoke into it, "We're watching. Let her free."

The carer reached over and pulled the wrap from Jenny's body. It was like a trigger. She leapt up and began to gyrate uninhibitedly, her naked body moving sinuously to an imagined hypno-beat. She suddenly changed tack and threw herself onto the other woman and started kissing her and tearing at her clothes. The woman allowed Jenny to strip her and indulge herself.

I watched with grim fascination at the sight of Jenny's naked body, unashamedly displayed. In any other context I might have become aroused, despite the poor quality image, but here I was appalled. I felt unclean at observing it. I was not a clinician or a mental health professional and I had no justification for watching. Tessa noticed my reaction and my evident distaste.

"Louise knew you were here, and that you once worked with me. She copes well with Jenny. I think she might even enjoy Jenny's inhibitions. She knows we are watching. She will not mind. She trusts me. Jenny knows, too, and is probably playing up to the cameras.

"The wrap is something Jenny has got used to regarding as a constraint, when she has got out of control. Normally, we would take her to her bedroom wrapped in it and help her to get dressed. When it fell off and we didn't react, she took that as a cue to indulge herself. It's use has been part of our strategy to monitor her progress. It feels sometimes like a game of cat and mouse, although I'm never sure which is which."

In my astonishment and confusion I had leapt up and moved further away from the screens. There was nothing remotely erotic about what I was witnessing. This was a damaged woman, imprisoned for her own welfare, and for the safety of all heterosexual men. I did not just feel like a voyeur at that moment, I just felt dirty.

Tessa got up and came to me. She hugged me. "Thank you for that reaction. I feel safe with you. You are a good man. I knew you could help us, but that is a topic for another day. I have to leave you for a while, then I'll come and find you. Before you leave the study, please shut off those screens."

"No, I don't want to stay here. Please close it down."

She smiled again and obliged me. She led me back to the lounge I had found earlier.

"Now, sit down, relax."

She found another remote and pointed it somewhere. A light came on to highlight the location of a hi-fi system. Several clicks found a channel to her satisfaction.

"Just relax and enjoy the music. I won't be long. Here's the remote for the TV if you'd prefer."

Then she left the room. I sat there in stupefied inactivity, mulling over what I had seen and the awful connotations. Even without any further discussion with Tessa I could foresee the immense ethical issues which this situation raised. The situation felt unreal in one way yet, somewhere close by was a beautiful, naked, and apparently totally uninhibited young woman. Every virile man's dream. I suddenly realised that I yearned to see her in the flesh, preferably naked. It felt dirty but arousing.