Living Dolls: The Director's Cut

"Yes," she whispered. "No. Oh, I don't know."

"Do you think you're less attractive than Shelly because she went out with that Steve guy?" I said.

"It's just . . ." she continued.

"You worry that you're more boring, plainer, don't you?" I said.

"Yes," she hissed.

"And now you're worried that even your new stepdaughter's more adventurous than you, don't you?"

She just stared at me.

I smiled at her.

"Far from it," I said. "You are one of the hottest, sexiest babes that I know. Shall I prove it to you?"

She looked around nervously.

"Jason," she swallowed, continuing softly. "If you'd approached me last year . . . "

Oh yeah, right. Like that would have happened.

"No, no. I know you're getting married next week. I know your new stepdaughter's here. Trust me, okay? Andy?"

She swallowed again, before whispering, "Okay."

I stood up and backed up so that everyone could see me.

"All right, ladies," I announced. "Now it's time for tonight's entertainment. First, though, I need an assistant. And I believe I will select . . ."

I made a pretense of scanning the room, noting in particular Karen's suspicious look.

". . . Julie!"

I took the brunette by the hand and led her upstairs, where I sat her down on my bed and sat down next to her.

"How could you have seen Andy when she doesn't remember it?" she asked.

I cocked my head at her.

"The doll!" she finally exclaimed.

I stood up and walked to the closet.

"You have two!" she said as I pulled them out. "Do they both work the same way?"

I nodded.

"So here's what I want you to do," I said.

Ten minutes later, I walked downstairs and immediately had the ladies' attention.

"First of all, I want to tell you a story," I said. "About a boy who one day found two dolls in his attic."

Karen gasped.

"Jason, are you sure?" she said.

"You already know," I said. "Julie already knows. It's my understanding that Sue already knows."

Now it was Karen's turn to blush. Sue had a big smile.

"I'm sure that we can count on our three other best friends here to keep our secret."

Actually, I wasn't sure of any such thing. Not for that reason, at least. They were women, right? But, seriously, what could they do with the knowledge? Tell somebody else? Hah! Try it, girls. It's hard enough when you actually have the dolls.

Karen just smiled back at me as I scanned the puzzled looks on Gail's, Andrea's, and Shelly's faces.

"They were magical dolls," I continued. "And he could turn them into any woman he wanted to."

All three women had crossed their arms over their chests. I had crossed the line into incredulity.

"For example," I said, "he could turn a doll into his mom's friend, Mrs. Johnson, and learn that stockings make her feel incredibly sexy."

"Oh my God," Shelly exclaimed, her hand over her mouth.

"Or he could turn a doll into his teacher, Ms. Dodge, and learn that she might need to be invited over for Thanksgiving dinner."

"Oh my God."

Now it was Gail's turn to put her hand over her mouth.

"Or he could just have a little fun," I grinned. "Julie?"

Julie came downstairs followed by my two eighteen-year-old college girls, Shelly Havelmeyer and Andrea Hanson, dressed exactly as they had been the night before Thanksgiving during their first semester of college.

"Oh my God," Andrea said, as the last of the skeptics fell. Shelly got up from the table and sat at Andrea's feet.

"Shit, that's really us," she whispered.

"If you girls wouldn't mind giving us the couch," Julie suggested to Sue and Gail, who quickly scrambled to find seats on the floor. "All right? Showtime!"

I'd had Julie summon the dolls to avoid the whole "master" business, which might interfere with my plan of giving Andrea and Shelly a sneak peek at what might have happened that night seventeen years ago. 'Showtime' was her code word for action, and the two girls started in immediately. As Julie had instructed, the two girls were oblivious to anyone else in the room.

"So?" Andrea said.

"I can't believe he gave an exam the day before break," Shelly said. "When we come back the final's only three weeks away. How'd you do on the paper anyway?"

"A-minus," Andrea said. "You?"

"B-plus," Shelly said. "Smart ass."

The real women grinned at each other.

"So we have a whole night here until we head home tomorrow," Andrea said. "What shall we do?"

"Let's start with that bottle of champagne we've been saving," Shelly said eagerly.

Fortunately, I checked; we did have a bottle of champagne in the refrigerator. Shelly returned with two glasses and filled them. Literally. And then they started gossiping about the other girls in their classes.

"So," Karen turned to the real women, "how much did you two have to drink 'til you got up enough courage to make the call?"

Andrea laughed.

"This was my first champagne," she said. "I'd say about one more sip."

The younger version suddenly put down her glass and leaned in to her roommate.

"Guess what I've got," she asked.

"A vibrator?" Shelly offered as we howled in laughter.

"Guess what else."

We laughed again.

"Steve Riley's telephone number," Andy announced, pulling a slip of paper out of her back pocket.

Shelly smiled.

"He's probably already gone home," she said, taking another sip.

"Nope," Andy said. "I know the girl who's giving him a ride. They don't leave until tomorrow morning at seven o'clock."

"Shit," Shelly hiccupped. "Are you gonna call him?"

"Yup," Andrea said. "Think he can handle both of us?"

We all looked at the real Shelly and Andrea, who were both looking at the floor.

I suddenly felt my cell phone vibrating. Shit, that was my cue. Standing, I headed in through the kitchen and out the back door before I answered.

"Hello?"

"Is Steve Riley there, please?" came the tipsy voice of Andrea.

"This is he," I said pleasantly.

"This is Andrea Hanson," she said. "My roommate, Shelly Havelmeyer, and I wanted to know if you'd like to come over and help us finish off a bottle of champagne."

"Um, sure," I said. "You guys are in my psych class, right?"

"That's right," Andrea said. "Psych class. So, you coming?"

"Sure," I said. "Where are you?"

They gave me the name of their dorm, which I instantly forgot, and five minutes later I knocked on the front door of my own house.

"Come in!" yelled the two girls.

I pushed open the door and looked at the two girls sitting on the couch, both of whom had suddenly turned shy.

That didn't last very long. As it turned out, in fact, I was the shy one. As far as young Shelly and young Andy were concerned, there were only three of us in the room. And it quickly became clear that two of us didn't have any secrets from each other.

I, on the other hand, knew that there were actually eight women in the room. One of them was my fiancée, another was a woman I'd be "giving" to her groom on Saturday. And one was my best friend's mom. It was true that I had screwed five of them. But not with anybody watching me. Not with an audience. Well hell, I thought, they were an audience. Maybe it was time to go into stripper mode. If they wanted a performance, damn it, that's what they'd get.

"You know what's funny, ladies?" I grinned at the two eighteen year olds, "I've actually been asking all over campus for your numbers."

They blushed. It was the first of many times, for both the young women and their older counterparts. _______________

"So you found these dolls when?" Andrea asked after the performance had ended and I had rinsed off in the shower and returned. By then it was around eleven o'clock.

"Last fall," I answered.

"And you were a virgin then?" she continued.

"Yes," I admitted slowly. She already knew about my lack of success up to that point from Gordon.

"So who'd you lose your virginity to?" she prodded me.

"I'm not telling," I said.

"I think Gail was the first real woman he did," Karen chimed in. I shot her a look and she just laughed at me.

"Well, he wasn't a virgin when I had him," Gail said. "No way. He was too good."

"So who was it?" Andrea asked.

"I'm not telling," I repeated. "Why do you care?"

"I'm just interested," Andrea said. "You're the only person in the whole history of the world who could have had anyone for your first. So who did you pick?"

"If I tell you, it'll be all over Hardwood," I parried.

"Oh, come on," Julie said. "You trusted us with the dolls. I've kept that a secret for six months."

"How about this?" Karen said. "We each get one guess. If we get it right, you have to tell us. If we don't, no more questions."

I agreed, although I still didn't like the way this was going. Karen fetched six pieces of paper and pencils, and everyone spent the next five minutes studying me, as if I had the name imprinted on my forehead. The papers went into a bowl, and I drew them out and read them one at a time.

"Jessica Simpson. Gross, no. Who wrote this one? Pinsky, was this you? Yecchh."

I pulled out the next one.

"Catherine Bell. Good guess. Too tall, though.

"Anna Kournikova."

I smiled at that memory. I realized everyone was staring at me.

"No," I said truthfully. "It actually never even crossed my mind.

"Laura Prepon. This one is from Sue, who said to herself, 'I'm gonna pick redhead, I'm gonna pick smart.' Another good guess. But no.

"Angelina Jolie. Not for all the tea in China."

That left one more piece of paper in the bowl, and I knew whose handwriting I hadn't seen yet. I pulled it out very slowly, looking her in the eye the whole time.

"I know what this one says, don't I?" I asked her, rubbing the paper against my teeth.

Her eyes sparkled. I had no choice. I opened it and looked down.

"This is so unfair," I said. "She hasn't even lived here a year yet and I'm like an open book."

I threw the paper down on the table and Andrea picked it up. Her eyes went wide and then she turned to look at Shelly with a big smile.

"What?" Shelly asked.

Andrea handed her the paper.

"Me?" Shelly whispered. "You lost your virginity to me?"

She started to cry, and I pulled her onto my lap and hugged her. Watching me hug my first girl was just the price that Karen was going to have to pay for her little triumph. I looked over. She wasn't bothered by it at all. She had as big a smile as the rest of the girls.

Gail finally broke the mood by excusing herself to "powder her nose."

I raised my eyebrows as she stood. I remembered last Thanksgiving. So did she.

"Oh, you," she said, chucking a napkin at me. "I'll bring back the powder."

Sue watched her go down the hall and then turned back to the table.

"Speaking of virginity," she said to Karen, "could I borrow your brother a minute to ask a favor?"

Karen and Julie burst into laughter.

"Oh, shut up, you bitches," Sue snapped at them, a smile across her face. "You are so filthy. Come on, Jason."

We trooped back up to my bedroom and I waited for Sue to go first.

"Do you know how Gail lost her virginity?" she asked.

"Actually, I do," I said. "She told me twice. Once as a doll, once as Gail. On her eighteenth birthday, right? I feel really bad for her."

"Yeah, me, too," Sue said. "Mine wasn't great, but it wasn't that bad. I mean, at least it was consensual, you know?"

I nodded.

"So I was thinking maybe after you've rested up, you could, uh, fix it?"

"Fix her virginity?" I asked. That would be a neat trick. "What is it with you and fixing things, Waggoner?"

"Well, okay, not fix it," Sue said. "But, you know, you just gave those two ladies a whole new memory to replace one that they obviously didn't like all that much. So I was thinking that maybe, oh, just forget it, it was just a stupid idea. It's just that all of high school for her was like one giant shithole. I'm surprised she made it this far."

"Actually, no," I said, suddenly transfixed. "It's not stupid at all."

And that turned out to be quite a performance, too. The other five women were watching when we started, with the eighteen–year-old Gail dressed in one of Sue's cheerleader outfits and Sue, the real girl, in another one. The two had walked into "Sue's house," where Sue had introduced her fellow cheerleader to her "stupid older brother," who happened to be home from college. Things ran their course, and Sue's stupid older brother had in turn introduced the virgin Gail to something entirely different, something very new and, it turned out, quite wonderful. By that point, Andy and Shelly had retired to the guest room – "your favorite place, right?" Andy cracked – and Julie and Karen had left as well to give Gail some privacy. Only Sue remained. She had left the scene in character, cleverly telling the young Gail (it was Sue who had done the summoning this time) that she wouldn't see Sue again that evening. The "invisible" Sue had returned to sit with and whisper to and hug and love the real Gail in one of our wing chairs.

CHAPTER SIX

I awoke the next morning to the smells of breakfast and the sounds of the washer and the dryer. The sun was streaming into the living room and warming up the couch I was sleeping on. Excuse me, the couch on which I was sleeping. See, I'm getting better.

I looked at my watch: 9:30. It had probably been 3:30 when I'd finally managed to get to sleep, and I sure felt like I only had six hours of sleep. I staggered to my feet, annoyed at the giggling I was hearing from the kitchen. Pulling on my T-shirt – I'd stolen a T-shirt and sweats before Sue and Gail took over my room – I staggered to the door to the kitchen. All six women were fully dressed and looked disgustingly cheerful and wide-awake as they crowded around the breakfast table.

"Well, it's Mister Sleepy." Shelly laughed as she saw me in the doorway.

"Aww, little stud have a hard night?" Andrea snickered.

"Yeah," I muttered, "he heard too many women screaming out 'oh, yeah, that's it, lick me right there.' That made him hard."

I actually hadn't heard anyone last night. But it was a very well-placed arrow; I looked around to see six women with very sheepish expressions. I smiled at them.

"Shower time, girls. I'll be back."

"Keep an eye out for Chris, Jase?" Gail yelled after me. "He's supposed to drop his folks at a hotel and then swing by."

I grunted and left the room. After a quick shower, I pulled on my jeans and a plaid shirt, and on the way back to the food, er, the ladies, I opened the door to get the paper and came face to face with Gordon and Mr. Pinsky as they walked up the steps. A third guy, a couple of steps behind them, looked like somebody I ought to know. Oh, yeah, probably the guy with the Eagles. I must have seen his picture in the paper.

"Jason!" Mr. Pinsky grinned as offered me his hand. "I assume you have our women here?"

"Yes, sir," I grinned back. "Chained down in the dungeon with the others."

"Good job," he laughed. "Steve, this is Jason Thompson. Jason, this is my good friend Steve Riley from outside of Philly. He owns part of the Eagles. I thought I'd bring him up to Hardwood and show him the town, introduce my new bride."

I automatically stuck out my hand to meet his as he stepped around Mr. Pinsky. It wasn't until then that I processed the name. No wonder he looked familiar; he looked like me.

"Fuck me with a spoon!" I yelped. My hand refused to shake his any more, but it also refused to let it go.

"Heh, heh." Mr. Pinsky chuckled nervously as all three guys stared at me. "See, Steve, you buy a part of the Eagles and all of a sudden you're famous."

Nope, still unable to let go.

The three of them were looking at me now like I'd become dangerous.

"Jason," Mr. Pinsky said calmly. "Maybe we should just go in and get the ladies and be on our way."

I came back to the world.

"Oh, sure, that's a great idea," I said.

I opened the door for them. Steve headed in first, and I waited until he was past me to speak up again.

"I know I'm looking forward to hearing you explain yourself to Andrea Hanson and Shelly Havelmeyer, Mister Steve Riley."

Steve stopped short, and Curly and Larry almost knocked him down. We assembled back on the porch.

"What's Mom got to do with this?" Gordon asked.

"What do you mean?" Mr. Pinsky asked him.

"Hanson was her maiden name," Gordon explained. "Andrea Hanson. Shelly Havelmeyer is her best friend, Shelly Johnson. You know my mom, Mr. Riley?"

By now, Steve was backed up against the railing with three pairs of eyes boring into him. Better him than me, I thought.

"Oh, my God," he said.

He told us the story of how he'd met Shelly and Andrea. It was similar to the story I'd heard, although of course he'd just gone to their room the night before Thanksgiving to hang out. If I was friends with a guy about to marry Andrea, I'd have probably sanitized the story a little bit, too. And then he explained how, after Thanksgiving, after Andrea had reunited with her boyfriend, he'd asked Shelly out on a few dates.

"And then after Christmas," I prompted, "you never came back."

"Because my father was ill," he sighed. "He died two months later."

"So why didn't you answer any of Shelly's letters?" I asked gently.

"How do you know all this?" he asked me.

Tsk, tsk, I thought; I asked first. I waited him out.

"Embarrassment, I guess," he finally said. "I had to stay on to help my mom with the farm. She died a year later and I spent the next five years paying off their debt before I could finally sell the place."

I raised my eyebrows.

"What would she want with a farmer?" he asked. "By the time I got everything paid off and got my own business started, I tried to find her again. She was already married.

"I've never found another girl like her," he added wistfully.

"Really?" I brightened up. "So you're single?"

"Still single," he smiled. "Waiting for the next Shelly Havelmeyer."

"Not any more," I said. "Today we're having a special on the old –"

"Thompson!"

I looked up to see the much-awaited Chris and the very unexpected Gunner walking up the driveway together.

"Hey!" I greeted them.

"Susan get to say thanks to you yet?" Gunner grinned.

"What happened to your tournament?" I cut him off.

"Blown out in the first round. Michigan State."

"Whoa."

"Exactly. So Coach gave us a choice of a weekend in Hawaii or a flight home on the redeye."

"And you said, 'oh, yes, sir, I'd much rather spend the holiday weekend in Hardwood, Pennsylvania,'" I shook my head. "'No beach babes for me, sir.' Well, you'll just have to make do with something from our menu. In fact, I think we have a girl inside for everyone today. I assume you all want the usual, right?"

Chris, Gunner, Gordon, and Mr. Pinsky all nodded in agreement and then I looked at Steve.

"The usual okay with you, too?"

He looked a little flummoxed.

I appeared at the entrance to the kitchen with a clipboard in my hand.

"All right, ladies, quiet down," I said. "Your dates for the evening are here to collect you. I'll call your name, I'll give you a brief description of the gentleman who's interested in escorting you tonight, and, assuming you're interested, you can meet him in the parlor."

"Who are you, madam for a day?" Andrea cackled.

I ignored her.

"First up, a gentleman has requested Gail Dodge. He's a local graduate student, appears to be in good health, sounds intelligent, and is interested in a long-term relationship."

"I accept," Gail said. Standing up, she leaned in to whisper in my ear as she passed me.

"But if he wasn't here, you know, I'd steal you away from Karen in a heartbeat. Thank you so much for last night."

She gave me a kiss on the cheek, I kissed her hand, and she brushed by me.

"Next, a request for Andrea Ackerman, from a gentleman who appears to be reasonably intelligent except that he's requested Andrea Ackerman."