More Lessons with Kelli Ch. 05

Writers Note: Things just keep getting better and better and as always, life is a lot of fun. Thanks for all the reads and emails. We both appreciate them.

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After Ann left on Sunday, we washed the few man clothes that I had left and put them in a bag to be left in a clothing donation bin. The organization that puts the bins out has a store thirty miles away from us, and one evening a few weeks ago, we drove down there to drop off most of my old clothes and to do some shopping. This place is pretty price savvy on the more collectible items but we got a few things and going through their clothing area, I picked up a couple of stretch slacks and pullover tops. There were going to be a few days at the new store where I was doing some painting and cleaning after I moved in and I didn't want to mess up any of my good clothing in the process. Monday morning arrived and after our usual routine of a half-hour workout, breakfast and a shower, we got dressed to go to work.

Before going downstairs, I took a look in the full mirror in our bedroom and Kelli came up behind me, kissed me lightly on the neck and said, "Welcome to the rest of your life."

I laughed and replied, "I never imagined that there would be a day like this."

She pulled me around and after a kiss said, "But it feels good, doesn't it," and that it did.

All of the fixtures from the old store needed work, some needed minor repairs, but it mostly was cleaning and painting them to match the colors of the new store. The first order of business was to get the office and computers set up. My Internet service was getting turned on that afternoon and we decided to go with a cellular phone for the store. Kelli came over on her lunch hour and we ate together although I teased her that real reason that she was there was to make sure that I ate my salad, rather than being tempted into checking out the pizza shop that was two doors down from us. For most of my life, salads and I had never been on speaking terms, but one of the few things that Kelli had ever asked of me when I first moved in with her, was that I get and stay healthy and so a salad eater I now was.

By Tuesday evening things were starting to take shape, but there was still a lot to do. There is a flea market on Wednesday that is open year round that I gone to for a very long time as a man. That day I went down as a woman, although between the lightly tinted sunglasses, scarf and floppy hat, I probably wouldn't have recognized myself. The market isn't very full at that time of year but we had an unusually warm winter so there were more sellers there than normal for the beginning of March. I made a few purchases and afterwards headed down to a place that sold used retail displays and fixtures. We needed clothing racks along with a few other pieces for the store. The guy there was nice and the prices on the clothing racks I picked out were reasonable. There were a few other display fixtures that I decided that we could make use of and I looked through his stock of counters and display cases and decided on what I wanted there, although those were more expensive.

I asked him about hangers and he asked, "How many truckloads do you want lady?"

We walked to the rear of the warehouse and there was an area that had lots of very large boxes on pallets overflowing with hangers. I said that one of those boxes would be plenty but that the box wouldn't fit in the store. He said that they would repack them into smaller boxes and gave me such a low price that left a smile on my face. I couldn't haul any of this back, but one of his trucks was making deliveries in our area on Monday. The delivery change was fair and next Monday our displays arrived along with a lot more hangers than I was sure fit into just one of those boxes.

After the displays were in place, the store really looking good but it still needed a lot more merchandise. I went to auctions and checked out more thrift shops, spent a lot on gas, but I had a fair return on my investment. A lot of the stuff was not really what I eventually wanted to have in there, but then you can't sell off of an empty shelf either and I wanted it to look reasonably stocked when we opened for business.

One of the other things I did do that first week was to call a number of guys that did house clean-outs. When an older person who owned a home passed away, it was usually up to the family to get the house ready for sale. A lot of families would call in an auctioneer. but depending on what was in the house, the auctioneer might agree to do everything but more often that not, they would take the better items to sell and leave the rest for the family to deal with. The clean-out guys paid the family for the rights to take everything away with the price offered based on how much they thought they could make from what was in there.

I left messages for a number of them, a few never got back to me and a couple after hearing what I was looking for, that being small antiques and clothing, told me they already had places to move the stuff. But one guy, who sounded old and gruff on the phone, said pretty much the same but that he thought that he was getting a job were there was a lot of women's clothing. I told him where the store was located and he said that he would get in touch. After the displays arrived on Monday, I was in the front of the store setting up a computer on the sales counter and I heard a knock on the door. Even though there was a closed sign, some people had knocked to see when we were opening. I walked up and there was this old guy standing there so I unlocked the door and asked if I could help him.

He asked, "Are you the lady that is buying clothes?"

I replied, "Yes," and he turned and walked out to small and very old dump truck that was double-parked out front.

I watched as he unloaded seven very large trash bags and carried them into the front of the store. I opened the first bag and it was crammed full of lingerie. Slips, nightgowns, panties, and a lot of it looked like it was from the 1960's and this was just the top of the bag. I checked out another one that had blouses, skirts and slacks that were all older looking as well.

I asked him, "How much?"

He thought for a few seconds and answered, "Thirty, no make it twenty-five."

"A bag?" I asked, which still would have been reasonable if everything in there was like this.

"No," he answered, "For all of it."

I went back to the office, got thirty dollars out of my purse, and as I handed it to him I said, "Keep the change."

He replied "Thanks," and told me that he had a couple of other places that he thought that he was going to be doing next week.

"Bring it all," was my answer and he left.

I thought about working on this stuff the next day but I knew that Kelli would enjoy going through it. So I dragged the bags back to the rear of the store and loaded them into my vehicle. I drove pickup trucks for a long time but since those aren't very lady like, especially for an older woman like me, I now have a large SUV. But even with the rear seat folded down it was pretty full by the time I was finished. Kelli was already home and had started supper when I walked in carrying the first bag.

She asked, "What is in the bag?"

I replied with a smile, "Bags, and I think it is a gold mine!"

I opened the one I brought in which had the lingerie, and Kelli's eyes got really wide as she said, "I think so."

I brought in the rest and after supper we started going through the stuff. The lingerie bag took over an hour to sort and there were items in there from back in the late 1940's until recently. This woman had never gotten rid of anything out that was still good and almost all of it was. There were a few older bras and panties that the elastic had deteriorated and those we threw away, but everything was clean and without a single stain. You could follow as she gained a little weight from the early years and then went up a size or two every decade after that. There were even a few maternity panties, slips and nursing bras from the 1950's based on the style and there were also girdles, garter belts, full and half slips, as well as nightgowns.

We had the dining room table and every chair covered with clothes, along with the breakfast bar in the kitchen. I had planned on having a one and two dollar table at the store. There is a seller at the one flea market brings a trailer load of kids and women's clothing, all at fifty cents a piece, and people buy stuff by the arm load. So I figured with a better selection I could get a little more money for the common items. I started a bag for each one and some of the lingerie went in those, but a lot of it I was going to sell at a better price. Kelli picked out a couple of the 1950's slips since they were her size and there were a few bras from that era that I would have loved to own but they were too small in the band size for me and too big in the cup for her. I did get a couple of half-slips from the later era in colors that I didn't have. The rest of the bags had skirts, slacks, shorts, blouses and dresses. The one had some real treasures, four 1950's maternity tops and matching skirts. These were in really nice shape and I knew they were worth some money. There were coats and jackets in the last full bag and the seventh bag was only half full with a mix of lingerie, socks, a few tops, and to our surprise a dozen pairs of seamed stockings still in the package. But those were sold by shoe sizes and her feet were smaller than ours. The only piece of children's clothing in all of this also came out of that bag. It was a very old looking christening gown and cap, that while the stitches were very fine, you could tell that it had been hand sewn.

We started at six o'clock and it was close to eleven by the time we were finished. But it had been a lot of fun and it was good start for us. I spent the next day getting it all priced and out on the racks and tables. I went to some more auctions and the Wednesday flea market, then on Saturday we headed to a house auction and got eight boxes of women's clothing for two dollars each. There was nothing great in there and a lot of it was destined for the bargain tables but it was worth what we paid for it. As we were heading back to the store, we got a call from a woman who said that they were cleaning out the house of her husband's mother and she asked if we be interested in taking a look. So after dropping off the first load at the store we drove over there and wound up buying some of the glassware and a few small furniture items along with another lot of clothes, including some more vintage lingerie from the 1950's and 60's.

This was too much to fit into my vehicle but the husband had a pickup truck and so we loaded the breakable items into my vehicle, packed up his truck, and it was back to the store to get unloaded. We ate a late lunch there, dived into the small mountain of clothing and at six, Kelli said that we should call it a day. After a trip home to get changed, we went out for an evening of supper and dancing. Sunday morning we slept in late but went back in the afternoon for a few more hours. By then we had decided to have our grand opening the following Saturday and on Monday Kelli got some paint and poster board and made a sign for the window. I placed an advertisement in the local newspaper and hit all the online places that I knew of as well.

The bag man as we called him, came back twice that week, first on Monday with a few bags of average stuff, then again on Wednesday with just one bag. He told me that the owners had cleaned out all the clothing before he got there but there was a cabinet in the attic that they didn't get to. I paid him without even looking at it and later in day decided to check it out. There were a number of older dresses in there that were my size, but there wasn't anything that I was really interested in. Plus the lady had smaller boobs than me and had the dresses tailored to fit. But the last one to come out was this dark red velvet dress. The front was open all the way down to the waist with two gathered pieces that went over the breasts and shoulders. There were panels that came off of the sides of those and met in the back where the zipper was and the dress was lined with dark red satin. The waist had a band around it similar to the front pieces, after holding up to me, it looked like it would fall just below my knees. The bottom, while it was going to be tight, looked like there was enough room for my ass, so I decided to take it home and try it on.

Kelli called and said that she was running a little late so when I got there, I went upstairs and undressed down to my panties. I put the dress on, then I looked in the mirror and wow, it looked great, although there was a lot of boob showing. The front covered about half of my breasts and while the edges were close to my nipples, it was tight enough that even with a few shakes, they didn't pop out. It was snug around my ass but not too tight and it tapered down my legs to just above my knees where it flared out enough to be able to walk. I had worn my hair up that day and on a whim let it down, then worked it out with my fingers, and as I turned around to see what the dress looked like in the mirror from the back, I jumped when I saw Kelli standing there off to the one side.

She said with a very serious look on her face, "You had better take that off right now."

I asked, "Why, does it look that bad?"

Kelli answered, "No, but I am afraid that I am going to rip it to shreds when I attack you," then she smiled and asked, "Where did you get that? That is so hot!"

I replied, "The bag man!" and told her about the rest of the stuff that he had brought.

She looked at me and said, "Saturday night!"

Jenna and Beth both had Saturday evening and most of Sunday off, so they were driving up and we were going to check out a club about an hour to the northeast of where we live. Kelli decided that she needed something a little hotter in a dress as well, so after I got my clothes back on, we went down to a big mall, had supper there and went dress shopping. She finally decided on one that was a shiny gray in color, similar to what is called sharkskin in a man's suit. The back was open other than a few thin strips that went across but there was no way that she could wear a bra under it. The lower section hugged her ass very tightly and went straight down her legs to her knees where there was a large ruffle of the same material along the hemline. Where it went around her ass, it was sewed in such a way that I told her that she really should wear a thong with it. Kelli never wore thongs, but at Ann's urging a few months after getting the last operation, she had gotten one, wore it to work one day, and swore that she would never do it again. But she agreed and I picked out a black lace one that had small red bows on it. We had talked about her just going with the thigh high stockings that stayed up by themselves but one store had crotchless pantyhose and after getting a black pair, we were ready for our big night out.

I drove us home and Kelli called Jenna and told her to plan on dressing, "Extra spicy," for Saturday.

Jenna wanted to know what was up but Kelli told her that she had to wait and see. Friday night we went to bed early without making love since Saturday was going to be a long day. We got to the store early, took care of a few last minute details, opened the door at ten and nobody came in. The first forty-five minutes were the same and the only person that did come in was the delivery guy from the local florist shop. Ann had ordered a beautiful arrangement for us and sent a card congratulating us on the new store. But after that, people started coming in and soon it was fairly busy. The bargain clothes table got a lot of action and I heard people calling other people on their cell phones to come check it out.

Places like our store tend to attract some characters and there was one younger guy who was acting very gay that picked out a lot of lingerie, both from the bargain tables and off of the rack. When it came time to check out, he tried every trick in the book to get me to give him a lower price but I held my ground and finally the deal was closed. Kelli was busy out on the floor and there was another woman waiting to pay for some stuff while the young guy was doing his dance.

After he left, she came up to the counter and said with a smile, "I have to tell you dear, you handled that asshole sweetie-pie a whole lot better than I would have!" and we laughed.

I replied, "With people like him, you have to get things off on the right foot otherwise every time he would be expecting me to give the stuff away."

"Isn't that the truth," she answered.

There was no one behind her and we chatted for a while. Her name is Marge and she is a short and kind of chubby woman in her late forties. She told me that she used to have a store that sold country primitive items but that was just for something to do. She had picked out a couple of slips and a nightgown and commented how she really didn't need any more clothes but that these were too nice to pass up. I waited on a couple of other customers and she hung around for a while. She said that she had never gotten rid of any of her clothes going back to before she was married and that she should probably clean some of it out.

With a laugh she said, "There is stuff there that even if I went on a starvation diet for five years I still would never get back into."

I replied, "Bring it over, we will be more than happy to pay a fair price for it, especially lingerie."

Marge rolled her eyes and answered, "I'm not so sure that I would be comfortable thinking about Tinkerbelle there running around in a pair of my panties," and we both laughed again as she added, "But let me see. I really don't need the money and it looks like you girls having fun here."

With that she left and business was steady for the rest of the day. Towards the end, a middle-aged woman came in and said that a friend of hers had said that we had some old maternity outfits. I showed her where they were and she asked if she could take a good look at them. I helped her carry them over to the display case and she went over each and every piece.

She said "I will take them," which got a look of surprise from Kelli because of the price that I put on them and the lady asked, "Do you have any more?"

I answered, "No but there were a couple of slips and panties that came from the same batch," and we went back over to the rack.

The lady took those and grabbed a few other things as well. She paid cash for everything and told us that she had a store in New York City that sold items like this. She introduced herself as Rachel, gave me one of her business cards and took a couple of ours.

Rachel said, "I specialize in clothing from the 1950's and if you ever get anything else like this, please make me your first call. I visit a friend here at least once a month."

I replied, "That is fine with me," and after a handshake, she left.

We closed up at four-thirty and I totaled up the sales for the day and we had done very well. Kelli had never worked in this kind of environment before and she had a great time. Jenna and Beth, who was still in Tim mode, got to the house a few minutes after we arrived. After a round of kisses and hugs, we all headed up to shower and get ready for the evening's activities. I put on a pair of dark sheer stockings that had seams up the back along with my black garter belt and topped that off by a pair of tight and sheer black panties. Kelli got into the crotchless pantyhose then slid the black thong where it was supposed to be on top of them and she looked so hot as she wiggled her ass. We did our hair in similar styles, parted on the left side with curls on the front and curled under around the rest of it. Then after a trip to get our makeup on, we put on dresses. I went with pearls for my jewelry. I had a couple of small pearl berets in my hair, along with pearl cluster earrings, a three strand pearl necklace and a matching bracelet on my right wrist. Kelli had on gold jewelry and against the color of the dress, it really shined. The last piece of clothing for me was an off white knotted shawl over my shoulders and the final touch for both of us, was a very musky perfume that we knew from experience would have the right effect on anyone that got close. Beth and Jenna were already dressed and waiting downstairs waiting for us. We walked hand in hand with our arms lifted a little as we made the grand entrance and the look on their faces was wild.