Pavlovian Reaction

So at least now I knew she was, in fact, a psychologist. Probably won't keep me from accidentally calling her a psychiatrist later on anyway.

"But since we have already agreed that you will get the 'premium package,' I would like to ask you to give me the benefit of the doubt. At least wait until we've had one private session before cementing your opinion of me. I won't try to defend my entire profession in your eyes, but I do have it in my power to defend myself, my competence and my common sense." She said all of this in the same manner in which she usually spoke, without any apparent spitefulness, and seemed to be in earnest.

I nodded, still feeling foolish but not ashamed, if she had reprimanded me or tried to patronize me I would have either felt very ashamed or even more annoyed. This way, I felt like my honesty, even though it was a bit rash, was welcomed and appreciated by her.

I nodded again, smiled a genuinely friendly smile and was glad when I received one in return. I lowered my head a little bit, so that now I had to look at her slightly over my eyelashes, playing the 'I'll be nice now' card and said, "Do you maybe know when I can expect you to start convincing me that you're not all as evil as I think?"

She was just a bit shorter than me, and she was standing close enough to me so that I could smell her. She smelled -- clean. As if she had showered just a few hours ago. There was maybe a hint of perfume but it was bland and unobtrusive. I felt a need to trace my nose along her neck and check whether it was more noticeable there. I stopped sexualizing her during her short speech, but now I was back at it again.

"Not exactly, but I can tell you at least approximately. The first of the sessions should take place during the weekend. While I do feel that it would be slightly unfair to the other members if you, as our most recent one, were to be the first to get a private session, I think that I can indulge myself that much, since I would like to continue this conversation in a more private setting. Perhaps then you can tell me what made you so unfriendly to us psychologists."

She smiled again, and this time I felt my heart throb instead of what was throbbing until then. Although my pussy might have throbbed at the same time as well, I wasn't sure. I wondered whether she could notice this, as well.

She noticed my earlier irritation and Vallory-distraction easily enough it seemed, and I had noticed that she noticed, but it was as if she was oblivious to the sexual turmoil in me. Or she was good at pretending she was oblivious, I wasn't nearly good enough at reading people to be able to tell. Concluding that she probably could tell that I was turned on by her, I decided to put a bit more effort in hiding it from her. If I wasn't able to read her as easily as she could read me, I would do my damn best to make it hard for her to do it. I knew it was childish for me to think and feel this way, but that didn't stop me.

"You left your information with us when you signed up for the program, right?" She asked and I nodded, thinking of adding a 'feel free to get informed,' but decided it was too cheesy even for my newly found low flirting standards and her playfulness. I still didn't know whether she was entirely straight, and if she was, maybe continuous, childish flirting might make her uncomfortable, so I kept it to myself.

"Alright, someone will contact you as soon as we can offer you a specific time. You can count on it being at some point this weekend, either early in the morning or later in the afternoon, since most of the offices here are taken up during the rest of the day."

I nodded, and started to say something regarding that when someone called, "Miss Bennett?" from the group by the table, and she excused herself to go and talk to whoever it was. I realized that I had taken up quite a bit of her time, but didn't feel overly guilty about that.

As she walked away, I had my first chance to look at her from behind. Her body made me wonder how old she was again, because the first impression of her remained unchanged, at least not for the worse. She had a small but tight ass as far as I could see, held her back straight, and I wondered whether she exercised and how much. I also wondered whether she had any children. I didn't linger on that thought, my mind was in the mood to think about things going in, not going out of her.

Pris came up to me with a glass of soda in one hand, a half-full bag of tortilla chips and a nearly empty jar of tortilla sauce in the other. She sat down on the chair next to where I was standing, and nudged me with the glass to sit down. I sat, took the glass from her, placed the jar on my thigh while she fumbled with the bag of chips. She looked over her shoulder to where Vallory was standing with the rest of the group. I also realized that Vallory's go-to posture was her hands crossed in front of her chest, not intertwined, but one arm under, and supporting, the other. It was probably the most non-threatening pose in the book, and I felt that earlier annoyance re-surface. Pris looked back at me, with a wide, self-satisfied grin on her face.

"You have to admit that she's hot as hell." She leaned in closer, and lowered her voice just a bit, as a precaution against us being overheard by the group. "Just look at her. She seems like the perfect woman to handle all your mommy-issues. How she's dressed, how she talks to you full of that unforced confidence. God. I bet she knows just what to do with bad little girls."

She was teasing, and dramatizing of course. She didn't actually call herself a 'bad little girl' in her spare time. It was obvious that she was more than happy to call and consider herself one as far as Vallory was concerned, or call and consider herself whatever Vallory wanted. I got a brief image of the two of them together, and I had to admit that it was something I'd pay to watch. I wondered what Pris thought about when she imagined her and Vallory. I thought of actually asking her that, but thought of a much better question.

"Is she gay?" I asked, not sounding eager, but disappointed. I didn't know whether she was more unachievable straight or gay. It was a weird thought, one that made no sense at first but gradually started to. If she was gay, she had a whole lifetime of experience with women. I wasn't sure I had anything new and exciting to offer her, other than my youth; but she would still be gay, I would at least be the sex that she preferred and had a chance because of that. If she was straight, I was the wrong sex to begin with, and if she hadn't decided in 40-something years that women were something that she liked, I didn't stand much of a chance to change her mind; but in that case I had something new, and definitively exciting, to offer. Having thought this, I decided that it didn't matter. I had already resolved to get to know her better, and all this strategizing of how to approach her wasn't all that necessary.

I wondered what Pris found most interesting in Vallory, whether her personality and education were just an added bonus to her age and appearance, or if they were as important as they were to me. Vallory was damn attractive (I will drop the "for her age" part, since in all honesty she was attractive for all ages, I could bet that a lot of much younger women would kill to look like her), but her physical appearance wasn't enough to get me this interested in her.

I had almost forgotten what I had asked Pris when she replied, "Honestly, no idea. She isn't wearing a wedding ring, but not all middle aged women have to be married to some asshole. She's dressed way too neatly. That's the only concrete gay vibe I'm getting from her. She doesn't look at women any differently than she looks at men, and honestly, I don't believe she's bi -- I'm certain that whatever she is, she's just that, all the way. I haven't noticed anything sexual about her though, at all. She has that same confident, playful and teasing manner, but it somehow comes off as professional and respectful either way, and she doesn't stray far from it. She's relaxed in all that somehow, too; she can joke about everything, talks about whatever drug as if she's actually tried it, and maybe she actually has, I don't know. But God damn is she hot." Pris, very conspicuously turned toward the group again, looked Vallory over with a grin on her face. Vallory turned to her at that moment, her countenance remained the same as when she was talking to whoever she was talking to before. She looked at Pris for a short while, before turning back to her interlocutor.

It was impossible to tell whether she was internally rolling her eyes at two teenagers or not. Pris didn't behave as if I was competition or something, or at least not resented competition, which was good, because we would definitely be competition. Whether Vallory was straight or gay, Pris and I fell into the same category of women, we were pretty much direct opponents, the things we offered were almost identical. If I had any specific intentions regarding Vallory I would have felt discouraged upon finding out that I had Pris to contend with. However, I had already decided that I was going to at least try to get closer to Vallory in a friendly way and convinced myself that I wouldn't be disappointed if it turned out to be "just that." Then again, describing furthering my acquaintance with her as "just that" might give away that I wouldn't be entirely satisfied with it, especially if Pris happened to get more than that. I wasn't sure who I was jealous of, but I was jealous. Whether of Vallory for getting so much of Pris's attention, and being able to interest her so effortlessly, or of the fact that Pris was much more attractive than me to the average woman, and would actually know what to say when she wanted to get more of Vallory's attention.

People were starting to leave slowly, and Vallory repeated louder that we can all expect to be contacted before the next group session in order to set a date for the private ones, that at least two or three sessions would have to be scheduled after the next group one, and she apologized for that. I had already mentally resigned to fall into those "two or three sessions" but then remembered that she herself told me that I'd be the first one. We gathered our things, shamelessly took a half-empty soda bottle to carry back with us, waved and said goodbye to Vallory, and exited.

There was honestly no way that we wouldn't spend some time talking about Vallory. We laughed at the slightly insane, made-up scenarios in which Vallory would come to us and start teaching us about the birds and the bees and then explaining that it doesn't always have to be like that, that it can be just birds sometimes... We were perfectly aware that that wasn't how the metaphor went, but hey. We spent a significant amount of time walking to our respective bus stations talking about Vallory's sexuality. It wasn't often that neither of us had a clue about a woman's sexuality -- usually at least one of us noticed something definitive, and told the other.

My "gaydar" was a particularly vague thing. All that it could do was tell me "hey, pay attention to this girl," and not tell me anything more specific than that. The subtle hint that it does give me was, for example, the reason why I introduced myself to Pris in the first place, so it wasn't all that useless. Pris didn't have so much of a "gaydar" as she was simply more familiar with the gay culture, and could notice certain patterns of behavior that gay women exhibit, that I couldn't notice myself. So we could sometimes even guess what type of girl whatever girl was in question preferred.

Usually, they preferred Pris, hence my earlier jealousy. It wasn't something that I minded in normal circumstances. I had a healthy sex life, so I didn't mind her healthier one ("healthy" is a confusing term when applied to the amount of different people someone slept with). It did annoy me sometimes when I noticed women pick her over me, when choosing who to flirt with. This happened only in sexual circumstances however, and where regular human interaction was concerned, we were equally popular. We hugged and parted at an intersection and went our separate ways.

I didn't think about Pris or Vallory on my way home, or for the rest of the day. They seemed to be part of a TV drama that I had nothing to do with when I wasn't watching it (meaning: when I wasn't with them), but as soon as I went to bed I couldn't help thinking about them both. I had nothing else to distract me, reading didn't help, nor did playing games on my phone. I thought about how I liked Pris, how easy and fun to talk to she was, how she could avoid pissing me off expertly, and just as expertly piss me off when she wanted to, and how good the sex was. I also thought about Vallory, and our conversation that day, the way she looked, talked, smelled, her posture, body language, countenance, everything. Inevitably, I thought about that same fun, hot, and easy-to-talk-to Pris losing interest in me and at the same time becoming interested in, and gaining the attention of, the other woman that occupied my thoughts. It seemed unfair that I should be upset with Pris about that when literally, there I was, thinking about Vallory myself, and losing some of my interest in Pris in the process. The realization of my hypocrisy didn't help me stop being hypocritical, and I went on thinking that Pris was being an ass.

***

Wednesday and Saturday never seemed so far apart in my life. However, Wednesday, along with its group session, was over and all I had to do was wait until I received an email, or maybe text, politely inquiring whether I was free at some specific time during the weekend. So yes -- all I had to do was wait. I managed to successfully wait for two hours after waking in the morning before becoming restless, so I found ways to occupy myself and forget about what I was waiting for.

I even studied a little bit, voluntarily for God's sake. That's how desperate I was. Despite me thinking that I would die waiting for the email, I soon forgot about it and went about my day as usual. I didn't even notice the notification when it arrived. I noticed it over an hour later, when my phone's blinking LED grabbed my attention from the game I was playing. I read the email in a polite, female reception worker voice, and the voice asked me whether Saturday at nine in the morning was alright for my appointment with Miss Vallory Bennett. I then realized that neither Pris nor I noticed that she was a "Miss", and that the whole thing where we noticed that she wasn't wearing a wedding ring and internally patted ourselves on the back for being so insightful, was unnecessary.

I had already started to reply to the email when I remembered that I had a test Saturday morning. I went online to check when it was, and the appointment was almost right in the middle of it. I sighed and replied asking when the next open possibility was, explaining that I was unable to come then because of college-related obligations. I waited a very long time for a reply, well, the hour that passed felt like a very long time. I got a new email that said that the next opening was also on Saturday, but at 6 p.m. I felt my heart stop for a moment, I was way too nervous and excited about this, and it wasn't pleasant. I replied that that was perfect and received instructions in the next email regarding how to get to the office where the session would be held. I put the phone down, my heart beating hard by that time, as if I was going to the dentist. Well, I was, a sort of a mental dentist.

That day, and the next, passed agonizingly slowly. I hadn't seen much of Pris. I was internally glad that she had to go to the same test as me, and that she wouldn't have the chance to see Vallory before I did. I went to all of my classes for a change, and was even glad to have that distraction. I was glad to do anything that occupied my attention. I think I met with more people in those two days than I had in the past month. I spent the rest of my free time with one or all of The Blondes, who criticized me for spending less and less time with them since I met Pris. I apologized, and said something about how hanging out with Pris had some extra benefits. They seemed to roll their eyes simultaneously when I said that. We talked about their respective boyfriends and lack thereof and discussed whether it was easier to find a decent girlfriend or a decent boyfriend. Being the group of women that we were, we concluded that it was easier to find a decent girlfriend.

Saturday came, along with the test, after which I went to a beer with The Blondes and some other friends. I felt that time stood still. Every time I looked at my phone to check the time, it seemed like 9 minutes had passed at best. I was increasingly nervous, and I couldn't tell whether it was just because it was Vallory I was about to see. I was an open person -- I didn't mind talking about anything, even painful and private things, especially not to someone as affable and inviting as she was; but that lingering resentment of psychologists appeared to bring with it a certain amount of fear. I decided that I would simply toughen up and go. I still had several hours of anxiety between me and 'toughening up', but they somehow passed nonetheless.

When I arrived at the office block I was still agitated. I arrived a full 20 minutes earlier, too. I walked around the block, and with time to spare decided that I couldn't wait any longer and went into the building. It took me only a few minutes to orient myself and find the office that I needed. It was already dark outside, the building felt almost deserted, so much so that I wasn't even sure anyone would open the door when I knocked. I did knock anyway, even though I couldn't feel my hands at this point. There was a long moment where all I could hear was the echo of the knocks in my head, and I was unsure whether I had actually knocked or just thought I did.

Vallory opened the door. She was smiling, her hair looked the same as it did a few days earlier, but now she was wearing a pale, knitted sweater, tight around her arms, and pulled up almost to her elbows, but much wider around her torso than the t-shirt she wore earlier in the week. The sweater fell nicely onto her breasts, even though it didn't hug her waist, and I could judge their size better now. I didn't come to a much better conclusion though -- they were smaller than mine, and perhaps slightly bigger than Pris's, but their size was unimportant, I just couldn't help noticing it, force of habit I suppose. The sweater was also long, it covered her hips almost completely, and underneath it she wore, again, tight, black pants. I felt less anxious, the light coming from inside the room behind her was warm, and her posture, expression and general air was also warm and inviting.

She smiled and said, "Hi." Then she gracefully moved to the side with an inviting gesture of her hand so that I could come in. I nodded to her, walked into the room and she closed the door behind me.

I was standing in a relatively large room, which I would eventually learn was some sort of lounge. There were three tables with plastic chairs on one side of the room, a few vending machines on the same side, a sink with several cupboards, and a fridge. That entire side of the room was very dimly lit, since the only light sources were two dimmed lamps, and the light in the vending machines, which illuminated little else than the things in the machines themselves. The lamps gave off a yellow light that illuminated the sitting space consisting of a couch and two sofas, between which was a table with a notebook on it.

Vallory motioned to the couch, accompanied by a "Please, sit." I sat on the couch, leaned back, changed my mind and leaned forward, with my hands clasped and my elbows on my knees. An attempt to seem casual I suppose, I thought that if I leaned back and crossed my arms like I intended, I would have seemed reluctant to be there. I was reluctant to be there, but only theoretically, it was hard to remain that way, now that I actually was there.