The Girl Across The Street Ch. 03

The economy started unravelling again slowly. People thought that vaccines meant the virus pandemic had ended a couple of years earlier. That fall, virus-induced illnesses began showing up again, primarily in the South. Although there was no government-ordered "shut down," fear caused a substantial slowing of the economy.

The next shoe dropped quietly at first. Several start-up companies on the West Coast filed for bankruptcy. There was no big deal until a large West Coast bank disclosed that it was writing off nine figures worth of loans it had made to those companies. The business press and then in general media began questioning whether the bank was solvent. That triggered a run on that bank and increased withdrawals across the industry. The economic slow-down meant more defaults on existing loans and fewer credit-worthy borrowers. The banking industry was taking a hit.

Banks nationwide saw profits, and stock prices, decrease. Most banks made the time-honored response to bad news: they laid off staff. Heartland's loan portfolio was better quality than most of our competitors. Consequently, our revenues, while down, compared favorably to the industry. Our CEO announced that Heartland would not have layoffs. All of us at the Bank were relieved.

The relief did not last long. In April, the board announced a one cent per share cut of the first quarter dividend. That infuriated a very wealthy "stockholder activist" who, along with two allies, had gotten board seats two years earlier. "The Bank exists for its stockholders," Gordon Sommers declared publicly. "It is intolerable that stockholder returns are cut but we pay huge salaries to people just dot 'I's and cross 'T's." The activist started a proxy contest for more board seats with a promise to fire the CEO at the May annual stockholders meeting.

Liz Rand summoned the entire Integrity Unit to the Bank for a meeting two weeks before annual meeting. "As you all know, Gordon Sommers launched a proxy campaign to ultimately unseat Geoffrey as CEO," Liz started. "I'm pleased to announce that Sommers has decided to be reasonable and withdraw the proxy solicitation." There was a restrained cheer. Liz held up her hand. "There was a price. Effective Friday, ninety percent of Bank employees deemed not to be 'direct revenue producers' are being laid off. That includes the entire Integrity Unit." A stunned silence descended. Liz continued, "you are not alone. The Bank's legal and accounting staffs are being reduced by 75%. Our facilities management department is being eliminated." Liz looked at her watch. "Those employees are being informed now. You will receive one month's severance pay and, of course, you have COBRA. I'm not happy about this but, well, that's all." Liz turned and walked out of the room quickly.

Neither Trish nor I had any inkling this was coming. Trish took my arm and said, "I need to get out of here for a bit." We went to the coffee shop on the first floor. I saw several people in there whom I knew from the Bank. No one looked happy. Seated by herself at a table was Alicia Woodruff, the beautiful African American deputy general counsel who worked with the Integrity Unit.

Trish and I got our coffees and walked over to Alicia's table. Alicia looked up at us and, after a moment, said, "you might as well sit down."

As we sat, Trish said to Alicia, "don't tell me you're out too?"

Alicia nodded her head. "Abolishing the Integrity Unit also abolished my job.'"

"I'm sorry," Trish said.

"I came to the Bank rather than a law firm because I thought the Bank would be more secure," Alicia said. "Got that one wrong. I'm not sure what I do next. I know firms are cutting, not hiring. What are you guys going to do?"

"I'm not sure," I said. "I don't see a lot of demand for our skills outside financial services, which is the hardest hit industry right now."

"At least we can still make a little modelling," Trish said.

"What do you mean 'modelling?'" Alicia asked.

I shot Trish a look. We had always agreed that we didn't mention modelling or our three-cornered personal life with co-workers. "Shit Will," Trish said, "we've been fired. What does it matter now?" To Alicia, Trish replied, "there's a photographer on the northeast side of town whom we model for a lot. We get a cut if he sells a picture we're in."

"You model together?" Alicia asked.

"Yeah," Trish replied. "Sometimes Will's girlfriend Danielle joins us."

Alicia was clearly unsure about what she was hearing. "Uh, what kinds of pictures do you pose for?"

Trish pulled out her phone. "I'll show you," she said. She fiddled with her phone before handing it to Alicia. I got up and walked behind Alicia to see which pictures Trish was showing her. Trish had up one of the pictures Fred had shot of us on the two-lane road about 18 months before. Trish had about 20 of them on her phone. Alicia scrolled through all of them. There was not a single picture in which Trish or I wore a stitch of clothing.

Resigned, I went back to my chair next to Trish. When Alicia finished looking at the pictures, she handed the phone back to Trish. She looked at Trish and me for a moment. "Those are beautiful pictures," Alicia finally said, "I admire you for doing that."

"I was afraid you'd be offended or put off," I said.

"No," Alicia said. "I admire your courage." Alicia paused before saying, "You know I was a gymnast in undergrad?" I didn't and shook my head. "I was," Alicia said. "You've seen gymnast's leotards, right? Bare legs, nothing much covering your ass, showing your camel toe on every apparatus? I and a couple of my teammates always talked about doing our routines in the nude. Of course, you couldn't do that at a meet, but it sounded exciting. We kept talking about how we could do it and have people there to see us. We never did it though."

"Maybe," Trish said, "you should try posing with us some time."

Alicia gave a rueful grin. "I would say my boyfriend wouldn't permit it, but I'm not sure that matters now."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"You know Don was an associate at Smithson, Knowles & Prather?" Alicia asked. I nodded. SKP were the Bank's outside lawyers. "They laid off about 30 associates ten days ago, including Don. He's found a low-paying job with BLNL. It's in southern Arkansas and northern Louisiana. He wants me to go with him. I can't. I grew up here, went to college in this state, and went to law school in Michigan. Things aren't perfect here but places like Arkansas scare hell out of me, especially these days. Anyway, Don and I split up over it. He called me a parasite; said I was happy to enjoy the benefits of people before me who fought for equal rights but wouldn't step up myself."

"What is BLNL?" I asked.

"Black Lives Need Lawyers," Alicia answered. "They provide free or very reduced rate legal services, things like evictions and foreclosures, child custody, filing for benefits. It's noble. It's necessary. I just can't go to Arkansas." While recognizing that I was probably just going off stereotypes, I couldn't blame Alicia. She was so physically beautiful, obviously educated, articulate, and upper middle class. I couldn't see her going over well in the rural South.

Danielle was facing an analogous problem. She would receive her degree in less than a month but had no job lined up. Arts groups around the country were either closed entirely or, as in our area, performing for restricted audiences. The donations that kept every arts group afloat had been reduced by half or more. No one in Danielle's field was hiring.

Fortunately, I had been relatively frugal and had no mortgage. That meant I had some money saved. Bruce's business had also taken a hit, but Bruce shared with me once that he had re-positioned his personal portfolio at the start of the pandemic almost four years ago. Bruce was savvy and I was confident he was in ok shape now. Between her parents and me, Danielle could survive for a while.

Although she had been working several years longer than me, Trish was in the weakest financial condition. She had borrowed a lot from Heartland to buy her townhouse. She had spent on a car, clothes, shoes, and the other badges of an upcoming professional. She wouldn't be able to pay her mortgage and property taxes for long. As property values tanked over the summer, she was also upside down on her townhouse. Someone made an offer on the townhouse in August, at a price below what Trish paid. Contacts got Heartland to deem Trish's mortgage was satisfied in return for 100% of the sale proceeds. Trish had little choice as she couldn't afford to stay in the townhouse, but she walked away with nothing.

Trish needed a place to live at little or no cost. The solution was obvious. Trish moved in with Danielle and me at my place on Poplar Creek. Officially, Trish lived in my guest bedroom. In truth, the bed Danielle and I shared was big enough to include a close friend.

Danielle, Trish, and I had dinner with Alicia Woodruff a couple of times over the six weeks or so after she, Trish, and I were fired. However, we had not heard from her for almost three months. I assumed that she had found a job and moved on. Alicia called Trish one evening that September.

Alicia said that she had gone to work in her father's electrical contracting business. The slowdown in his business put her dad's company in bankruptcy. What were we doing? Did we know of any way to make some money?

Fred the photographer was surviving, although the poses he asked of us were now overtly sexual: threesomes, anal, girl-on-girl. Also, we had agreed to let Fred show our faces in return for $ 17/hour for posing. When we finished a session in which Danielle, Trish, and I had all masturbated for Fred's camera, Trish told him that we knew a woman who had been a gymnast, who needed money, and who might pose. Fred called back a couple of days later. If our friend would pose on gymnastic apparatus fully nude and show her face, he'd pay her $ 25/hour.

"Why does she get eight dollars more than we do?" Danielle asked Fred.

"Because I have a client who's kinky for gymnasts," Fred replied.

"Does it matter that the woman is black?" Danielle asked. "I promise you she is stunning."

"I don't think so, but I'll ask," Fred replied.

Fred called back to say that he would pay $ 30/hour for a black woman nude on apparatus if she would show her face, pussy, and asshole. I decided that Danielle or Trish could relay that proposal to Alicia.

Alicia agreed to meet Fred and asked that Danielle, Trish, and I go along. We drove her to Fred's house late one afternoon. Fred, I think, was completely charmed by Alicia. Alicia was, I think, more comfortable with Fred than she expected. She finally agreed to pose if Danielle, Trish, and I were there. Alicia explained to us that, while she didn't feel comfortable about doing this, she would be less uncomfortable if people she knew, who also knew Fred, were present. I suspect that Alicia needed the money and wanted us there as moral support and peer pressure so she wouldn't back out.

Fred was fine with Alicia's conditions. He left the room and made a call. Returning to the room, he said, "We can use the gym tonight. Alicia, you might as well get it done before you get cold feet." Fred gave us directions to the gym and told us to be there at 9:30 p.m. We took Alicia home to get ready. We picked her up again about 8:45 that night. To say she was nervous is an understatement.

I never knew how Fred did it, but he got access to a fully equipped gymnastics gym. We arrived just as the manager was leaving. She handed Fred the keys, gave us an odd look, and drove off. Fred spent some time turning on and off the rows of lights in the ceiling until he had what he wanted. Alicia, wearing a warm-up suit, spent that time stretching and warming up. Finally, Fred looked at Alicia. "Ready?" he asked.

"I guess so," Alicia replied hesitantly.

"Ok," Fred said, "take your clothes off."

Alicia turned her back to us. She unzipped her top and tossed it away. Her back had noticeable muscles underneath her dark skin. She pushed down her pants and stepped out of them. As you might expect of a gymnast, Alicia's ass and thighs were somewhat muscular, but very alluring. After a moment, she turned to face us. Alicia had a flat stomach below two perfectly shaped breasts that were perfectly proportioned to her body. Below her stomach, a narrow line of trimmed hair ran down her mound between her firm thighs. Her hips were feminine but not large. Simply stated, Alicia Woodruff had a stunning body.

Unintentionally, I think, Fred followed the program of a meet with Alicia vaulting first. As she stood at the end of the runway, Alicia said, "I'd never try this if I didn't still workout some." She did a few simple vaults, basically planting her hands on the horse and flipping over it. Walking back from the third of those, Alicia told Fred, "get your camera ready."

Alicia went back to the end of the runway. She took a deep breath and sprinted down the runway, her dark nipples bouncing slightly. She hit the horse and went much higher in the air than she had before. I didn't see it all clearly, but Alicia did at least one flip and some twists in the air. She landed facing back towards the horse, with her knees bent, and did not take a step. Danielle, Trish, and I applauded.

On her way back to the end of the runway, Alicia stopped in front of us. "I've been vaulting since I was a child," she said. "I never knew how much better it feels to vault with nothing on." I sensed that Alicia was starting to enjoy herself. We enjoyed watching her.

Alicia did a couple more vaults, although nothing as spectacular as her first serious one. Fred suggested moving to another apparatus. Alicia vetoed uneven bars. "I haven't been on the bars in a few years," she said, "the risk of getting hurt is too great."

That left balance beam and floor. Balance beam was a place where Alicia could hold poses so they spent a lot of time there. Alicia did several gorgeous profile shoots and quite a few with her legs spread out exposing her lovely pussy. She even volunteered a pose in which she was bent over the beam so Fred could get shots of her asshole from behind. As Alicia finished her beam poses, I saw that her eyes were gleaming and, I think, she was trying to suppress a smile.

Not that I know much about gymnastics, but floor exercise seemed to be Alicia's strong suit. Fred liked it too. He could get shots of Alicia's nude body tumbling and could pose her lying on the floor as exposed, or not, as he preferred.

After more than forty minutes tumbling and posing on the mat, Alicia stopped for water. I could see a little sweat on her brow, above her breasts, and, I thought between her legs. As Alicia took a breather, Fred looked like he was thinking. When Alicia walked back onto the mat, Fred asked, "Alicia, would you pose with Will for a few shots?"

Alicia looked at me, smiled, and said, "is Will willing to pose with me."

"He will," Danielle answered for me.

"Will," Fred said, "please take your clothes off and get on the mat with Alicia."

I undressed and walked onto the slightly sprung platform used for floor exercise. An interesting thing I noticed about Alicia was that she became more attractive the closer you got to her, at least when she was nude. There were little details that were not visible from a distance which made her more attractive. As I stood before her, Alicia looked down at my dick. She looked back up at my face, smiled, and said, "not bad, for a white guy."

Fred put us through several poses, starting with one in which Alicia hung in front of me, parallel to the floor, facing the camera, while I held her by an arm and a leg. This pose had my dick brushing Alicia's glorious ass. That was followed by several poses in which I held Alicia in the air, including one rather difficult one in which she basically sat in my right hand.

Fred's final idea was that I would stand in one corner of the mat. Alicia would stand in the diagonally opposite corner. Fred wanted her to do a tumbling run towards me that would end with her jumping into my arms and me lifting her up with my hands on the sides of her hips. I was dubious about this since we'd never practiced, or done anything together, until a few minutes before. Alicia was game to try it, however, so I went along.

The first time we tried it, Alicia miscalculated the distance to me. Instead of jumping into my arms, she was just coming out of a tumble when she plowed into me. I could have gotten out of her way. Had I, Alicia probably would have gone off the mat onto the concrete floor. As it was, she knocked me down and fell on top of me.

Alicia did it perfectly the second time. She leaped at me. I put my hands on her hips and used her momentum to push her up into the air. Holding her there, as Fred wanted, was not too difficult with two hands. Fred kept us in that position longer than I had expected. Alicia's close-cropped mound was in my face. Feeling a bit naughty, I finally reached my tongue out, felt what I took to be a bit of labia, and licked. Alicia spread her legs very slightly, so I probed deeper; although I could not see what I was licking.

Fred finally called out, "ok, Alicia, I want you to slide down Will's arms and body until your feet are on the ground. Can you do that?" Alicia wrapped her legs loosely around me. I loosened my grip, letting my hands slide up her ribs and onto her back as her legs slid down me. Alicia's belly and then her tits slid past my face. I felt her mound sliding over my dick. Finally, her feet were on the floor. She was looking up into my face smiling.

We hugged as Fred finished snapping pictures. When Fred announced that he was done, Alicia leaned up to my ear, whispered "naughty boy," then gave me a quick kiss on the lips.

The day after posing with Alicia was unseasonably warm. Carol and Bruce had not yet closed their pool. Not working, Danielle, Trish, and I had nothing to do, so we went across the street and sat by the pool nude with Carol. Although he was working shorter hours, Bruce still went into the office most days. I knew that Danielle told her parents almost everything. I was not surprised when Danielle told Carol, in detail, about me posing with Alicia the night before.

When Danielle finished, Carol said, "If your friend Alicia is out of work, why not see if she wants to come sit by the pool. We won't have that many more days like today for a while." Trish called Alicia. Alicia was happy to sit by the pool that afternoon. Trish gave Alicia directions. Trish neglected to tell Alicia that nudity was mandatory at the Webbs' pool.

We heard Alicia's car pull up in front about forty minutes later. Alicia called out "hello" and Danielle answered, "out here." Alicia came around the front of the Webbs' house and entered the pool area through an opaque gate in the brick wall just where it met the sidewall of the house.

Alicia was wearing a tight, white one-piece. The color contrasted with her dark skin and the suit emphasized her wonderful compact figure. Alicia took, maybe, three steps into the pool area. We all stood to greet her. Alicia stopped, looked at us, smiled, and said "damn, I overdressed." She pulled the shoulder straps of her suit off her shoulders and down her arms, wiggled out of the suit, and tossed it on a patio chair. She looked just as good nude as she had the night before. "You know," Alicia said, "before yesterday, I don't think I could have done what I just did."

We introduced Alicia to Carol and the five of us had a pleasant day by the pool. Carol was, of course, aware of the relationship between Danielle, Trish, and me. Consequently, the three of us felt no constraints about touching, kissing, and teasing each other. Alicia seemed amused.