Laura and Don Pt. 04

The arrival on Thursday of a Don letter prompted a smug smile from her. I have him trained, she thought, with considerable self-mockery. On the way up the stairs, she felt the lust undercurrent becoming less under.

Once she was in the apartment, she set the unopened letter on her laptop table and went to the alcove to make dinner.

It was almost eight, she was really hungry.

She couldn't let it go at that.

Am I scared?

Do I think this letter will take me down, somehow? I've felt so good since the last one.

She had already started making the salad. So she finished. And ate it. And put the bowl and fork in the sink.

She looked back at the table. The envelope leaned against her laptop.

Every second I spend like this is one that goes to waste.

Her first impulse in response to that thought was to start on the work she'd brought home.

NO! I'm happy, and this is me time.

Seated in her big chair, she opened the letter. Trembling, and not in a good way.

'Dear, completely totally Dear, Laura,

'Mock all you like, but my lips are targeting your forehead. My chest hair will have the same tint whether your clothes go to the floor or not. As for how much I have to spend to watch you eat...okay, there'd be a definite price ceiling on that one.

'Did you ever review me on SylviBase? Would you now post there my proposed 'activities,' which you categorized as 'heartfelt, if odd?' I should inform you that I think I could hack SylviBase, if I didn't care about the collateral damage to countless women, some of whom apparently enjoyed my company.

'You're a confident woman. I know this from many data. One of them is that you didn't have tissue wadded up in your panties when I got them off of you. Of course, you had just been freshening up, so maybe tissue had been there before. Hey, this just in, witty isn't necessarily funny, let alone nice. And did I get a grimace out of you by writing 'panties' instead of 'underwear?' Gosh, if you're still planning on a SylviBase review, I might be ruining my rep.

'Can't say as I get much satisfaction from being the smartest guy in an otherwise empty room. And, yes, I would very much want you to be in the room with me, and I would gladly become the second-smartest human in that room. A room in which you have never been. Gotta change that. I have about two weeks to make this place presentable to someone other than me. That might be enough time.

'You may have already decided, however, to extend our Month of Separation. By a month, or maybe by the rest of your life. Well, if it must be so, then at least when they find me crumpled in an alley clutching a bottle that once held rotgut, and it is quickly determined that there is nobody else in my life, I'll be able to say, "At least I was witty."

'I'll gladly keep you on your toes. An ideal way for you to do that would be to wear skyscraper stilettos. This would, of course, give you a substantial height advantage over me, and perhaps make you question consorting with such a shrimp. This is a realistic proposal, dear Laura, because as a woman of stature you have the tarsal appendages to uphold said stature, as I became well aware when you were, as you put, it, flat on your back, legs straight up. I would never propose such challenging footwear to someone with petite feet.

'It does me little good to think of your clothes on your floor. I want them on my floor. After you have been freed from them. And, yes, all the rest of it, with me being there also, and similarly freed, and you and I satisfying our carnal urges. With each other. If I left a loophole in this scenario whereby you and I do not copulate, I'm sure you'll find it.

'I'll close on a departure from pointlessness. Is there anything you actually want to know about me, beyond the internet-available stuff about my parents, upbringing, education, work, etc.? I think we intended to use this time to get to know each other, and I'm yammering about high heels.

'Yours in search of a bucket and mop that I know I have around here somewhere,

'Don'

Laura looked up from the letter with the calm smile that was on her face when she first got home. She was still happy in her me time. She wasn't even particularly aroused. Menstruation had something to do with that. There were parts of her that didn't want to be touched very much.

She decided to start on work before composing her next letter. The work went well, as it had for days. The smile pretty much stayed put. Slowly, a kind of sizzle began in the back of her mind. Don. Don's apartment. No desperation, no anxiety. True, witty isn't necessarily funny. Now, though, being on the receiving end of his wit was fun. She'd have to respond in kind.

***

Grumbling continued in Don's pub-crawling cohort, as both Don and Arnie sat out another weekend. Arnie chimed in something to the effect that at least he and Marcie were spending time together. Marcie, it appeared, had heard from another friend about what Laura and Don were doing, or (in the opinion of both groups) not doing. Don stayed out of the discussion, but he was getting antsy. If he and Laura were around the peak of the bell curve for each gender in the age-25 range, Laura might be able to get by without sex longer than he could. Chastibation, or whatever this was, could only do so much.

Don liked physical contact. He was quite happy to cuddle after, and before, and during. He wondered if this factored into his SylviBase reviews.

He really did want to feel on his skin the breath of sleeping Laura.

Her letter arrived in Saturday's mail. Somehow they had still never stated flatly to each other that it would be okay to have sex with someone else (although he had left her an opening to do so). He didn't want to ask. Despite the tone of her previous letter, he still worried some about hurting her.

As he opened the letter he had it clear in his mind, and not because he'd made a point of it, where Russ and George and Walt and maybe Hugh would be tonight.

'Hi Bats! Mwah!

'Oh no, my very dear Don, you can't duck out of cleaning your apartment by getting me to break up with you. I couldn't get you to break up with me when I thought I had a chance to stay free (a product I am currently using, as it happens; did that get a grimace out of you?). Terribly sorry, you blew your chance by admitting how you feel about luscious, desirable me. You'll have to resign yourself to having a naked lady strutting through your man cave. Skyscraper stilettos? Waxed nether parts? (Your most recent SylviBase judge mentioned this.) Let your fantasies run wild, the better to have them brought crashing down to reality.

'Unless you're covering up very dark secrets, like your family being in a cult or your degree being from Louie's Computer Fix-It Emporium, I don't need much more info than what you're providing through your actinic wit. (Are you tired of reading about wit yet?)

'By the time you get this, single people our age, in this very city, will be pursuing one another in various libation establishments. I didn't mind sitting out last weekend, and I think I'll be okay doing the same again (well duh, I'm currently accursed). My friends think what I'm doing is weird. I unburdened about us to the one who found you on SylviBase. That filtered through to some others, and maybe to some of your crowd. Sorry if this is tarnishing your masculinity amongst your bros.

'You know what's really odd about this? We're confiding in each other about...each other. In a rom-com, the lead female and the lead male must each treat the other as The Other, forever unknowable. You might have been on to something, Smartest Guy In Any Room. If I do review you on SylviBase, it'll be three words: He's Mine, Bitches.

'Wow. That's going more in the direction of the L-word than I've been planning. But, y'know, this drafting text looks so good, I don't want to waste what I've already written. Any chance you could send this letter back? I want at least to walk back the toxic possessive part. Only you can decide if you're mine. And yes, you have my blessing, this weekend, to go bang some lucky lady while I sit home alone, cramping and bleeding.

'Yours in need of an iron supplement,

'Laura'

Immediately Don got out his phone and placed an order. Then he sent Laura an e-mail:

'You're about to get a delivery. You think we know enough about each other? I still don't know what you eat, or won't eat. I hope this will help you build platelets, or whatever a lady in your condition needs.'

Then he went to the gym, and achieved the goal of getting too tired to go out that night.

***

The delivery was hot restaurant-made soup (a quart each of chicken noodle and vegetarian bean). Laura was surprised, delighted, and found herself misting up a little. As she enjoyed the chicken noodle, she e-mailed him back:

'I sure hope this isn't a parting gift. You're now also The Sweetest Guy In Any Room. Note: I'm an omnivore, who tries to be responsible about ingredients and sourcing and all that. Meanwhile, attached is a fulfillment of one of your activities.'

She included a selfie, with a spoonful of soup approaching her hugely grinning face. A Stay Free pads box was in the background. She didn't mind adding this moment of silliness to the electronic repository of Laura Canfield.

It wasn't until Monday morning that she wondered if he considered the e-mail and soup to be substitutes for a snail letter, and if he might think the ball was now in her court. Turned out that her snailage that day included more paper from Don.

By this time, her period was over and her work buzz wasn't enough to keep her upbeat. Tonight, reading this letter, she was ready to let her clothes go to the floor. Not that she had to admit that to Don.

Her clothes, in fact, went to the closet and hamper. She put on the camisole she had worn when they had hooked up, settled into the big chair, and opened the letter.

'Dear One Who Threatens My Sanity,

'Do you have an idea what that pic did to me? I got home from the gym and I saw you looking happy (well, sort of) because of something I did. More to the point, I saw you. You were having fun. Not like all those well-here-I-am, workplace-appropriate, head shots you have online. Conventional stress reduction can only do so much, lady. So can obsessive apartment cleanup.

'I don't think we agreed on how long a 'month' is, and we didn't start the count at the beginning of a calendar month. Based on your count from a few letters ago, while I sit here writing this, we have nine days to go. Can we agree that when we each finish work on the Monday nine days hence, the friggin' Month Of Separation is over? And at that time, may I have the honor of taking you out on a date?

'As for what our friends think, in my case at least, the time has come for me to tell them to piss up a rope. I've been veering in the direction of the L-word myself, and it isn't even freaking me out. My main non-lizard-brain reluctance derives from whether absence is making the heart go bonkers, and I owe it to you to let us get back into direct contact and see if we've been idealizing too much.

'I will note, however, that my friend Walt is throwing a party on Saturday for paying off his student loan. It's at a bowling alley. This was originally going to be a sausage party, but Arnie has wheedled Walt into letting Arnie's squeeze and your friend, Marcie, tag along. I've heard second-hand that interest in this event is building among your friends. Walt seems to be going along with this. He's even shared that a woman he met on a certain recent Friday (yeah, that Friday) will be joining him. Arnie has said that he'll cover the cost at the event of everyone who doesn't have a Y chromosome, thus delaying his own debt freedom by maybe a few weeks. I don't want to upstage Walt, who is justly proud of being the first of us to get college completely behind him, but I raise the possibility that you and I, because of being in a public place, could still satisfy the criteria of 'separation.' I can't invite you, because this isn't my shindig (Arnie made his own rules), but I can tell you that I'll be there, and I would welcome your attendance as well.

'Note: None of the guys bowl particularly well. It's a low-pressure goof for us. A couple guys are getting deep into golf, and I'll never go there.

'Other note: No, I didn't grimace. Physiology is what it is. I drag around a prostate gland that might someday do unpleasant things to me.

'Yours with mop and bucket located,

'Don'

Writhing in the camisole stiffened her nipples as the shimmery material slid across them. She had seen some chatter about the bowling alley event. Still holding the letter in one hand, with the other she pulled up her left labia, creating faint tingles deeper in her groin. Her breath caught. She wanted to go slowly, despite the work she'd brought home.

She read again his reaction to the pic she'd sent, goofy grin and all. He hadn't shown many moments of passion when they had coupled, but she recalled one now, his witty, urbane persona buried beneath that of a rutting animal, as he drove his prick deep into her and gasped rhythmically. His wit turned her on and she, yes, she loved him for it, but as her thumb and forefinger closed on her clit, she wanted the animal, knowing that the wit would still be there later.

Fluid moistened her inner lips. She inserted a finger to keep the fluid inside, and also to make more of it.

I love him. Yes. Fear can't counteract that. Maybe not all that deeply, maybe not forever, but I love him now. And I want him now.

The hand still holding the letter hauled up the camisole. Somehow she managed to tease an exposed nipple while still holding the paper before her eyes. Her hips twitched, and her butt rose from the chair, feet on the floor going to tiptoes.

She stood, interrupting what she knew would continue. Setting the letter down, she threw the camisole to the floor, walked to the closet, and got out her high heels. She strutted nude to the bathroom, got a towel, and then sashayed back to the chair, feeling equally wanton and ridiculous. With the towel protecting a chair she'd rather not pay to steam-clean, she flopped down, lying flat, and spread her legs. She grabbed the copy stand from the table, affixed the letter to it, and set it on her ribs, just below her bosom. Three fingers of one hand entered her pussy, thumb and two of the other hand rubbed and pulled her clit.

She read again of his veering in the direction of the L-word. She saw beyond the letter her legs aloft, spread wide, silly shoes higher than the rest of her. She began to cum. The orgasm built steadily. Her spine bucked, and the copy stand flipped to the floor. Fluid escaped past her fingers. She had never squirted before, and wondered if it was happening now.

Somehow she managed not to yell. Or had she 'managed' anything? Her own rutting animal was in charge. Spasms and nerve thrills persisted after she stopped moving her hands.

When she calmed down, she chuckled at her situation, nude and heeled, with paper and copy stand scattered and her too-long torso revealed. Exactly the image she would never want online, not even for Don.

Getting up, she found the towel to have a damp patch, but it wasn't drenched. The chair was unscathed. Guess I'm not a squirter, or not much of one.

At full height, she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror on the closet door. Nude, and in heels.

I haven't done my ten minutes today.

Grateful that she hadn't raised any window shades since getting home, she strolled to the kitchen and made dinner. She tried to be ho-hum about it, but walking in heels with no clothes brought into frequent contact the parts of herself she had just enjoyed. It also seemed like her ass was out blocking traffic. This felt really, really good. She ate quickly and then went to shower, the clopping of the heels on the hardwood becoming familiar, and offering a rhythm for her heart and lungs.

She stepped free of the heels and turned on the tap. Even a light contact from soapy water got her going, and she felt shameless as her hands traveled her crotch and both breasts, bringing forth what may have been two orgasms or just a long one with two peaks. Heedless of future water and gas bills, she plugged the tub and reclined in a full bath, relishing long, slow loofa strokes anywhere and everywhere. Relaxed and unstressed, she nonetheless came yet again, face flushed in the heat rising from the water.

Robed and toweled, in a dreamy buzz, she began writing back to Don.

She didn't get far on the work she'd brought home. She didn't care.

***

Don had hoped that she'd e-mail about Walt's party, or his offer of a date, but nothing came from her through that medium by the end of Tuesday. He RSVP'd vaguely to Walt's e-vite, not making a point of anyone else's presence.

The snail gave him something on Wednesday, however. This got the usual smile from him, but mainly he was hoping to hear from her how things would shake out on Saturday and Monday.

Soon after he settled in to read, however, he had to recalibrate. Part of him had wanted this, but since the other letters didn't have it, he stopped expecting it.

He stripped. He started reading again, working the fingers of one hand around his balls.

'To Don: Yes.

'Yes, I will join you and the gents and ladies on Saturday. I will even attempt to bowl. I hope to exchange pleasantries with you.

'Yes, I will 'date' you on Monday, but this will be at your apartment. I will bring dinner, ending my food debt to you.

'Yes, that night I will give you my body and take yours. I will bring my overnight necessities, and you will make breakfast for us before we go to work, starting a new food debt.

'Yes, I now consider myself to be in a relationship with you. We can work out the specifics after we satisfy our carnal urges. Or during. I might need a whole lot of satisfying. I had three or four orgasms tonight, re-reading your letter and enjoying its effect on me. (I am now unbound by propriety. Please burn this letter while you read it.)

'Yes, the F-word has pushed in front of the L-word, but the L-word isn't going away.

'Yes, this is what you've done to me, without a pic. You got me naked and made me pleasure myself. Chastely, of course. And now that's going to end. I want your sausage to party way up in my happy place.

'Yes, I really want you thinking about that on Saturday. Because I will be. Like I'm thinking about it right now.

'Yes, I'll probably have some absorbent material inside my, ahem, underwear.

'Yours in a remarkably agreeable frame of mind,

'Laura'

Don couldn't match her orgasm count, and didn't try. Twice was enough to drain his nuts, and nowhere near enough to satisfy him. It was only after the second jerk subsided that he perceived how ridiculous he was, halfway slid out of the chair, with semen welling in his navel and dotting his abs.

He tried to relax, showering and eating dinner. He was almost at the point where he could do some work. He made time, however, to give the snail its final assignment.

***

On Saturday, Laura considered various grooming tasks. She tweezed her eyebrows, just enough to get rid of strays and outliers. She intended to wear jeans to the bowling alley, so she put off leg shaving until Monday. Her hair was in rollers when she trotted down to check the mailbox. Where she found that Don had gotten in the last word.

She had been convinced that everything was already set. Letter-writing had served its purpose, and now it was over. Back in the apartment, she stood just inside the closed door and slid a thumb inside the envelope (while deciding not to polish nails that would enter a bowling ball). She was about to take the letter to her chair, but at a glance saw it was short. So she stayed put and read.