Teacher's Pet

"I see. Was there anyone special?" Landrie asked, feigning nonchalance.

"A couple. There was a gal from Columbia Missouri that I dated my junior and part of my senior year. We talked about marriage, but it didn't work out" I responded.

"That's a shame. Would I be too nosy to ask why it didn't?" she asked.

"I suppose not" I replied. "She wanted to move to LA to work in the entertainment field. That made sense because she was a film and TV major, but I wasn't interested in LA. We're still friends and we talk sometimes, but that pretty much put a bullet in it."

Landrie continued ferreting out intimate details of my dating life under the guise of understanding what KU's social life was like. As in all things, she was smart in the way she did it, edging into very personal things, then back out into discussions of course selection, who the good professors were and other safe subjects to mask her interest. But soon the conversation had become so personal that I joined Landrie to make sure the guys were still asleep, because if any of them had been awake I would have had some explaining to do.

"So, if you want to make out, where do you do it? I mean, you've got a roommate, right?" she asked.

"Yeah, most people do" I responded. "Unless you can afford a single room, which I couldn't. You just set up some sort of signal with your roommate. You tell them, I need the room tonight, or you leave something on the door to show that they should stay out. Guys would tie their ties on the door to signal that they were entertaining someone, but I didn't much like that."

"Why?" Landrie asked.

"Well, there were lots of guys who'd remove it as a prank so that your roommate just walked in on you. Others would just start banging on the door when they saw it. Plus, I thought it was disrespectful. It was like you were advertising 'hey, we're having sex,' so when the girl walked out, she'd get the evil eye from everyone on the floor. Bad business."

"Where was the weirdest place you heard about kids doing it?" she asked nervously.

"Where did they not?" I laughed. "While I was there, we had kids get caught in the stadium, in Phogg, two of them managed to get into the Provost's office and were doing it on his couch when a security guard caught them. We had a professor and a student caught doing it in the back of her classroom where the projector equipment was stored..." I said, cringing at the parallelism of my last comment.

As time passed I nervously probed her right back, asking her what she was looking for in a social life, how important it was to the whole college selection calculus, and so-on before edging into more detailed information about her romantic tastes than I could possibly have needed to give her good college selection advice. She responded obliquely, telling me that she "already had a pretty good idea" what kind of boy she wanted and that while she thought it made sense to look for a committed relationship, that she also thought young people should be "open to new things." By the time we pulled into the parking lot of our high school to the tiny and very geeky ticker tape parade the team's parents put on, Landrie and I had long departed the standard teacher-student relationship and were exchanging far more intimate information. It was nothing anyone could have called entirely inappropriate, but it went well beyond safe boundaries and we both would have been uncomfortable had anyone been awake to hear us. Other than the risk of having had the conversation, the only down-side was that it left me yearning for more.

To my great delight, Landrie enrolled in two college credit courses with me during her senior year and rejoined the interscholastic competition team. The classes were held during normal hours, but at the end of each semester I met individually with each student in the class several times to work through their term papers, giving both guidance and expectations on what was necessary to make a college-worthy writing. Most of the meetings lasted about twenty minutes, but the meetings with Landrie lasted well longer than the norm. They always began on topic, but never ended there.

She and I always left the subject matter, which she was going to handle brilliantly anyway, and the conversation became entirely personal and increasingly intimate, so intimate, in fact, that I was constantly checking the door to make sure we had no incoming traffic. In May of her senior year we crossed the un-crossable line.

"So, what do you...like?" Landrie asked anxiously, her own eyes checking the door for intruders. We both paused to stare at the door for a moment, then laughed as we caught each other doing it.

"What I really like, when I can get it, is real intimacy. I like the feeling that comes when you are so close to your partner that it becomes way more than just sex. Much more than a physical act. When you get there, sex is like glue that seals the connection." I replied.

"How often does that happen?" Landrie asked shyly.

"At least in my experience, not often enough" I replied. "There are just too many things in the way. Worry about whether or not you're making the right decision to do it, about whether or not he thinks you're a slut, about whether she really likes you or is just having fun. Since we're asking, how about you? What are you looking for in a sexual relationship?"

Landrie looked down and hesitated. I worried that I'd pushed too far and done it too fast. "If that's too personal don't worry about answering it" I said.

"Oh, no, not at all" she said putting her hand on my right arm. Her touch sent chills up my spine. I looked into her eyes and she looked away.

"It's just that, I don't know how much I should tell you" she said. "I guess I'm afraid that if I tell you what's really going through my head it might be off-putting."

I wanted desperately to hear what she had to say. She'd been occupying my thoughts for months and we'd been tip-toeing up to this discussion since the end of her junior year. I knew if we walked away from it that it would be difficult for us to work our way up to it all over again.

"How about I go first?" I heard myself saying.

Landrie smiled beatifically, the relief on her face evident. I wanted to kiss her, for a bunch of reasons.

"Well, it is a bit of a sad tale, I guess. While my preference would be to have a long-term intimate relationship, those aren't very easy to come by. You have to meet someone, then make the commitment to get to know them well, and it has to work, you have to really like them, perhaps even love them, and vice-versa. So, I haven't had that happen in a while. Maybe it's like that Eagles song, maybe I got tired or I just got lazy. Anyway, most of the sex I get these days is off my computer" I said, pausing.

"That's crazy" Landrie said.

"Well, it's true" I answered a little defensively.

"No...no, no, I didn't mean it that way" Landrie said, panicking. "I meant that its crazy that you don't have a girl. I...think you're...amazing! I don't understand why you don't have a bunch of girls coming after you."

"Wow...thank you" I said, pausing to regain my center after hearing that mind-blowing compliment. "Anyway, lots of what is on the web I just don't like. It's just people screwing and not people I'm particularly drawn to, all those tats and piercings, it's just not me. There are a couple of the sites that center on women pleasuring themselves and I...subscribe to one" I admitted reluctantly. "At least they're real. When I see a woman reacting to her own touch, it isn't fake. It could be, I suppose, but it isn't. Instead, they seem to be sharing an intimate moment, even though I'm not there with them and I won't ever be."

I sighed involuntarily, my mind weighing whether I should blow through another stop sign, before almost audibly thinking oh, what the hell? In for a penny, in for a pound. I began again. "There are some rougher sites that I probably shouldn't talk about."

"Rougher?" she asked.

"Rougher." I responded. "Are you sure you want to know about this?" I asked.

She visibly hesitated. "Yes...I do." She gulped anxiously and we both turned to look at the door at the exact same time, laughing as we realized how anxious the entire conversation was making us.

"I am drawn to situations where a woman...wants to be...wow...I can't believe I'm saying this. Okay, hell. Where she wants to abandon herself, to lose control, to think only about her pleasure and not worry about morality, or what the guy will think of her, or what someone else might think about what she's doing. One of the sites I subscribe to has all kinds of situations like that, where women get tied up and teased or...spanked...you know, hurt...even...by a guy or even groups of men, because it drives them to a higher peak. Even though it's very different from the other site, I like it for the same reason--it's genuine. They always interview the woman after she's been through the session. You'd be surprised how intelligent and well-spoken most of them are and how enthusiastic they are about what they've gone through."

I read Landrie's reaction as I offered my explanation, hoping for any sign about how she was reacting to it, but other than observing me and listening closely, she gave up no tells, other than perhaps a little accelerated breathing. "Does that offend you?" I asked.

"No" Landrie said. "I...well...I..." she stumbled as she tried to articulate her thoughts. She paused, gathering herself, and I put my hand on top of hers. "You don't have to say anything at all if you don't want to. We heard footsteps approaching and I drew back my hand as though I'd touched the burner on a stove. Our vice-principal poked his head into my classroom to remind me that the graduation committee was meeting in ten minutes. I thanked him, praying that I didn't look nearly as guilty as I felt. But, by the time I turned around, Landrie had gathered all of her books and was rapidly heading out the door.

Great! I thought, I've gone too far. I've screwed the pooch completely. "Landrie" I said before she left "are you okay?" She turned my way and I could swear there were tears in her eyes.

"I'm good Mr. Stevens. I'm very good. I'm sorry this makes me so nervous. I can't seem to open up to you the way you did for me. I would like to, but I just can't do it. Not yet at least. Thank you for trusting me enough to talk to me about...everything."

I nodded and left leaving me feeling exposed and vulnerable. That was three weeks ago and, in the meantime, I had not talked to Landrie alone. She was friendly, but not overly so. Things seem to have returned to normal. We had no other sessions planned relating to her paper and the few times that we were together were in the presence of other people. Two weeks before the end of year we scheduled to travel together to the interscholastic competition. I was hopeful that there would be some chance to speak during the day, but none came up.

We won again, but this time by the highest score accumulated in the history of the competition. Landrie took top honors with the #1 overall test score in the competition. It earned her a $2,500 scholarship. I knew Stanford would promptly offset the biggest part of it by reducing their own prodigious scholarship to her, but I figured she would learn that in its own time and that there was no point in raining on her parade. Landrie demanded shotgun again on the ride back, then began checking on her fellow passengers as soon as we'd finished supper and were underway. Satisfied that everyone else was asleep, she began in an earnest quiet voice.

"I'm really sorry about the other day. I..." Landrie began, then ground to a halt seeing my panicked expression. I looked at her again and briefly shook my head "no" and pointing my eyes to the rear-view mirror. Danny Stephens, who, along with 50 or 60 other boys in high school had the serious hots for Landrie, had not gone to sleep and he was all over Landrie's tone, understanding that some seriously intimate shit was about to be exchanged. Landrie nodded understanding at my unnerved signals and went silent.

"I think I'll get some sleep" she said loudly enough to be picked up in the back, "are you going to be okay to drive Coach?" she asked.

"I'll be fine Landrie" I responded, frustrated that one of our few opportunities to speak was going by the board.

Landrie grabbed her coat and stuffed it up against the window, shifting to lean against the window. These moves shifted her skirt up and spread her legs slightly, placing just part of her lovely little red lace panties squarely in my view. I looked around. No one else but me could see it. My cock took notice immediately. I could feel it swell, but I focused on keeping my eyes on the road. As the wheat fields rolled past, Landrie adjusted again, and again, each time showing a bit more of her lovely thighs and the siren red thong.

There was a one-in-twenty chance that this display of lovely young flesh was accidental. That meager probability disappeared a few minutes later when Landrie extended her index finger straight across my viewing area between her legs; I caught you the first time. Landrie was actually stifling a suppressed giggle when I looked up at her. I lowered my hand to my own crotch as if I were about to grab it, then extended my middle finger. Landrie tittered loudly in response.

The next hour and a half were a delicious torture. Landrie played with me like a cat does a mouse. She casually laid her right hand on her thigh, then moved her fingers up and down between her knee and her quim, then in circles over the soft white flesh, her body scooting forward at the waist ever so slightly to signal that the sensations from her finger nails were transmitting directly to her pussy. Occasionally she arched her back slightly in response to her own stroking. When I looked at her face, her grin was gone, replaced by an unmistakable look of lust. Occasionally ran her tongue slowly and seductively around her lip. No one from the back could see it, but I could not miss it.

She would also remove her hand from her inner thigh to bring her fingers to her lips and sucked them. My cock felt like rebar and I wandered out of my lane so many times I thought I'd be pulled over for a field sobriety test. Finally, to both my relief and ultimate frustration, Landrie threw a shawl over her lap and went to sleep.

I gave up trying to figure out where all of this was leading. A beautiful young woman, bright, brilliant, incredibly hard-working, playful and sexually provocative was testing the waters. Not all at once, just dipping a toe in at a time to see what it was like. I was along for the ride, unsure whether I wanted to advance the situation, or run from it.

Graduation was the same joyful, tearful, hot, ponderous, pontificating thing that it always was. The hard part as a teacher was remembering that although it was my 10th graduation, it was the only one most these kids or their families would ever see. Landrie was valedictorian, with one of the highest GPAs ever recorded in our school history. Her speech revealed her as the same person I'd come to know for the last three years, sweet, sensitive, smart, innately optimistic, and with a wonderful head on her shoulders.

When she'd completed the address, it was time her to designate a teacher to put the award around her neck. She selected me. I ignored Jordy's Groucho Marx eyebrows and gathered her medal from our Principal as I made my way to the podium. I lowered the award over her neck, but when I went to shake her hand, Landrie pulled something from the pocket of her graduation gown and palmed it to me. It was an envelope with something small and hard in it. I pocketed it as discretely as possible, applauded her, then returned to my seat, praying that I had escaped detection. Since Landrie was receiving a standing ovation few paid any attention to me.

The post-graduation sprawl was a competition between the desire to get away quickly and the need to pass on good wishes to the kids who had invested so much in my programs. The crowd was so massive that I could see Landrie only from a distance. She was surrounded by an impenetrable throng of family and friends. Perhaps it was better that way, I thought. There was an even-money chance that I would make a blubbering fool of myself if I came into her direct presence. I gave her an enthusiastic wave and a shrug of my shoulders to say "I can't reach you" when I caught her eye. She returned it just as fervently. I headed out the back of the coliseum.

The letter was burning a hole in my pocket. When I got home, I immediately grabbed a beer and tore it open. A small note and a thumb drive fell out. The note merely said "Call me when you're done watching it!" with a small smiley face. It listed a number, presumably Landrie's cellphone.

I opened my lap top and plugged it in. The thumb drive contained a movie file, a little over twelve minutes long, and simply labeled "Landrie." It was probably a greeting, maybe some heartfelt thanks and a doff of the cap to our more intimate conversations with few tears to punctuate the point. I appreciated the fact that Landrie felt our relationship was important enough to put this effort into it. Most of my students wouldn't. But then again, I'd never had a relationship with a student like the one I had with Landrie. I opened it up and plugged it in. The image that popped up on my screen was of Landrie sitting on the side of a bed, undoubtedly her bed, wearing a dark blue dress. The camera was perched somewhere well above her, like on a bookshelf or the top of a dresser drawer, and looked down on her at an angle. Fine I thought, wondering momentarily why not just sit down at the desk and look at your camera on your computer? Nothing in the image indicated that Landrie would do more than an extended "thanks!" Still, as I punched play, I was nervous. Why would she give me this on a thumb drive? Why not just make it a point to look me up after the ceremony, or give me a call? Why not drop me an email?

"Hi" said Landrie "First things first, I'm really anxious so if I flub this up, I'm sorry. This is actually my third take on this film, at least the intro part of the film, but I wanted to get it right.

I think it goes without saying, but thanks for everything you've done for me the last two years. You were the first person who made me feel welcome here and you were the best teacher I've ever had. You're the best teacher in our school. Everyone knows that. But, I...hope you know you've become much more to me than just a teacher and I hope that I've become more than just a student to you. I sorry for being such a coward and never being able to talk to you face-to-face about...things. Jeez, see there, I did it again. I can't even say it to a camera, much less to you personally. Wow. Okay, here goes.

She visibly gathered herself. "I know you got embarrassed when I caught you looking between my legs. You shouldn't have...I love it when you look at me there, anywhere really. But when you looked at me down there, I knew you were looking at me as a woman, not a student, a woman. It made me feel warm and...wet. There! See! I can say it! But it was a little embarrassing for me to be sitting right there in the middle of your class oozing. You looked so...hungry...that I wanted to do something, anything, to let you know that I felt the same way. I thought about going up to the desk and bending over next to you or putting my hands on you, anything to let you know how it made me feel. But I froze up. Our 'one, two, three strikes you're out game was the best I could do. I never meant to embarrass you, I just wanted to have some fun. It looked like you had fun too.