The Imprisoned Spirit

"Very diplomatic, that response - okay one - I "eat" Yoghurt and it's in the fridge, two definitely drink coffee and it's filter and the pods are in the grocery cupboard and the machine on the kitchen counter, three I can skip the bath as I haven't been playing outside yesterday or today, so what else should I add? You didn't add number four - will you make love to me again before my sister gets here, provided the viewing of my naked self doesn't send you screaming down the road?"

"You can't be serious! I would have thought, given what you said, that you would be satiated after last night for at least the next week! Are you a nymphomaniac?? If so, then your life up to now must have been even worse than I had imagined!"

She laughed openly at that, "No, in all honesty I am not sure I could deal with another orgasm for a while, so I was just testing you!" This was a relief, because I was still very concerned at what her physical reaction had been last night, given her obviously massively buggered body condition. However her request was fair, so I stripped off the bedding, and undressed her, and took a long hard look at her. I then bent down and kissed her while playing a little with her clit. "Hey! Not fair! You can't just do that and then walk away!"

"Who said I was going to walk away? Is that not an answer to your earlier question?"

The time had come to dress her and feed her, so I went to her dresser, got the clothes out she asked for, and dressed her without a diaper this time. Then I went to fetch the electric wheelchair and discovered how to disengage the drive motors, and wheeled it to her bedroom. I picked her up and put her in the chair, which had a semi reclining backrest as well. I carefully fastened the 3 belts, which ensured her positioning and she took over driving it with her right fist to the kitchen. There she directed me to get her the yoghurt she had as breakfast, get the coffee machine going, and then went to the lounge where she had her first smoke of the day.

We now sat in the lounge, and had an awkward moment as we each tried to work out what to say to each other, as actually, we had really never really "talked" to each other! I decided to break the ice first, "Okay, so I am 26 years old, and work as an engineer for a firm of consultants designing buildings of various sizes and shapes. I am actually quite senior and have a team reporting to me. I also have a fanatic hobby called rallying and spend a lot of weekends, screaming around technically closed roads and routes for usually a period of 30 hours. In fact that was my rally car that brought you home last night as my more pedestrian town car was in for service. So I work long hours for most of the week, and then spend Friday preparing old Matilda and then Saturday and sometimes Sunday morning rallying, and then either drive home, or if I have pranged it, get Matilda towed back home, have a thrash at the Motor Club Sunday night, and then back to the grindstone Monday morning. The reason I was at the party, it was a free weekend with no competitions, which happens about 2 in every 5. So now your turn!"

"Well you know I am 22 and slightly disabled, had polio at 7 became financially independent at 16, am actually a qualified accountant and do a bit of consulting to pass the time, as I really have no financial need to work. Not much else to tell you, as nothing much ever happens in my life! So how successful are you at this rallying?"

"Hmm - good question! I rally in the class B, not the open class, where anything goes. We are limited to modifications to a certain extent, but I am a privateer, and there are works supported cars in my class who have very deep pockets, and huge resources to provide backup during every event. Despite that I am lying 3^rd overall in class and top of the privateer's lists, ahead of quite a few of the works cars. So I guess I could say it's going well!"

"Okay, now some background, my sister is one really nice person, so don't piss her off or you will be dealing with me! She has always looked out for me and although I have full control over my finances, I tend to regard her advice very strongly. Her husband is a dick, and is quick to pretend he has input into the financial decisions, and tries to come over as some sort of an expert. Apart from not offending my sister, you don't have to give him any slack at all."

Her timing could not have been any better, because just then the front doorbell rang and I went and opened the door for the sister and brother-in-law. Her sister could have been a twin - she was just as pretty although her upper body was really developed as one would expect from someone who had used crutches most of their lives. I glanced down and the trousers hid her legs completely except her shoes which appeared to be fairly high heeled with a shiny bar on each side possibly attached in the heel section, but I could not be sure. Her hubby was a paunchy, ferret faced individual, some 4 inches shorter than me, who gave me a very disapproving look (I was still wearing yesterday's clothes which were probably showing some signs of wear!) which probably did not help my initial impression, which fully validated Marlene's description of being a "Dick". He sort of looked vaguely familiar, but I could not place him, and I shrugged it off, thinking he looked just like so many other flabby ferret faced individuals one regularly sees.

I let Denise come in, and quite forcefully swung in behind her in front of "Dick", and followed her graceful crutching into the lounge. She was incredibly smooth on her crutches, and it was apparent that both legs were rigidly locked into a straight position, and I could see now and again where the upper cuffs dug into the back of her thighs, and so now knew the extent of her paralysis.

Once inside, she stood in front of Marlene, and thinking that I was not watching pointed with the thumb of one hand holding a crutch in my direction and simply raised an eyebrow at Marlene, They obviously had a secret comms system going, because Marlene surreptiously nodded her head, and blushed slightly, upon which Denise gave a deep laugh, and shook her head, obviously meaning that that cat was thoroughly out of the bag!

The sister then headed for a chair next to Marlene, and carefully holding on the armrest deposited both crutches onto the floor, and then leaned down and release the bar behind the right knee, upon which that leg folded, and she sort of sat down rapidly on the chair, with the left leg sticking out straight still. She then reached behind the left knee and released that bar and the leg then bent at the knee and dropped to the floor. Both ankles remained fixed at the angle they were at when standing, and as I had gone and sat down opposite her, was able to observe her without appearing to stare.

Her trousers had lifted up a bit, and I was quite surprised to see heels of almost 3 inches on a very expensive looking shoe on the one foot, and an even higher heel, coupled to a small platform under the ball on the other foot - obviously she had an inch difference in the length of her legs. The trousers had draped over the legs and quite clearly outlined the leg braces enclosing two very atrophied legs, which extended all the way up her hips.

I introduced myself to the two and in response Denise spoke, "I am Denise, Marlene's sister as I am sure she told you, and this is my husband Barry." I shook both hands, and found hers to be warm and firm and his to be akin to holding a wet fish. She had a lovely voice, much like her sister, but not as breathless. "Listen, first we must really thank you for helping us out last night! You really went way beyond normal expectations in the circumstances, and there is no amount of thanks we can offer to cover that!"

"It was really my pleasure!" I responded and glanced at Marlene who promptly blushed most revealingly," I would do it again in a heartbeat!"

At this point Barry intervened, by addressing Marlene directly, "Shadow (She bristled visibly), what the hell did you do to chase Greg away? I (he emphasized the "I") went to a helluva lot of trouble finding him after the last one proved unsatisfactory, and now I have to go through that again!" At this point he had stood up and was standing in front of Marlene wagging a finger at her.

I could see Denise was struggling to get up so I got up, moved next to "Dick", placed a very firm hand on his shoulder strategically placing 2 fingers on either side of an extremely sensitive spot and applying sufficient pressure to cause a spasm of pain, and quietly said into his ear, "let's take this in the kitchen," with enough menace to get his immediate agreement. Once there, there was another conversation out of direct earshot of the visibly upset Marlene, and I suspected, an angry Denise.

"Listen arsehole, before you pick a fight with someone there are 4 things you should do. Number 1, make sure you have all the full and correct facts, number 2 always presume the other party is innocent until proven guilty, number 3 don't ever pick on someone who is in a vastly inferior space be it size, or ability, or position, and number 4 always make sure you are surrounded by more friends than enemies. Now you have got the situation pretty much wrong, so you owe Marlene a truly groveling apology, as you have really hurt her feelings!"

His response was quite amusing and loud enough for the girls to hear! "Who the hell are you to tell me what the fuck I should do!" "Um - a 6'1" extremely fit 220lb welterweight champion with 9 years karate training who put the last guy who insulted a woman I cared about in hospital for 3 weeks, and caused him to eat through a straw for another 4 weeks - does that answer your question?"

The Dick paled slightly and squirmed in the firm grip on his shoulder. "Okay, so let's be a good boy Arsehole, and you need to do the right thing!' I frog marched the now somewhat terrified chap back into the lounge and told the two ladies, one of whom, Denise, had now struggled to her feet after recovering her crutches and had started to swing herself toward the kitchen. But the entire exchange had taken but a few seconds so I looked at her and shook my head, not sure on whose side she was going to go to war. "Barry has something to say," I declared and offered to help Denise return to a seating position, which she accepted surprisingly willingly.

"Look Marlene, I am sorry for going off half-cocked like that - I should have really found out everything that led to you firing Greg." Marlene took my cue, and told him that it was alright, but what had happened was personal, and she really did not want to discuss it any further. Denise took forever to actually let go my arm, which got me acutely embarrassed, as Marlene was glancing at how this played out. Then Denise and Barry got onto the phone, and got hold of the agency that provided both temporary and permanent carers, and got a short list possibles to discuss.

At this point I felt a bit like a spare wheel and said to Marlene, that I really would like to at least get home and have a shower and change into some fresh clothes. In front of her sister, she asked, "Will you be coming back?" I answered that I would, at least until the new carer had been settled in, unless Denise couldn't stay until then? Denise asked to please have a chat with me in private, which was a bit strange, but I said sure.

"Could you help me up please?" she asked, and once again I loaned her my arm, and first she straightened her left leg and pushed down on the knee, and there was an audible 'click' as it locked, then hanging on to my arm, she pushed and pulled herself upright, and still holding onto me, pushed back her right knee to hear the same 'click,' and then took the crutches from me and her bag and said, "Let's go onto the balcony where I can have a smoke and we can chat in private."

I looked at Marlene with a quizzical look, but she shrugged and with a rather floppy movement of her arms, indicated that she had no idea what this was about. I walked behind Denise out to the balcony and had to admire her bum - it was not emaciated like Marlene's at all. When we got out on the balcony, she propped herself against the railing and freeing one hand, rummaged in her bag pulling out a cigarette and lighter, while I had recovered one from my pocket at the same time, She offered me a light, and at the same time shot me the following, "Was my arse as pretty as your looks were making it out to be?" I nearly choked, and tried to deny that I had been ogling her bum. She laughed, "Christ! Stop sweating! It is a wonderful feeling for a crip like myself to have an admiring look at my bum! My husband no longer does that, so I need to get it wherever I can! You did not notice the mirror in the hallway that let me see what your eyes were doing, and I won't lie, I liked what your looks did!"

I did not quite like where this was going! "Okay, so you do wiggle it sexily while you are walking, or was that especially for me??"

She nearly choked she laughed so much! "No shit, firstly I do not walk, I am a cripple with 2 pretty fucked up legs, what I do, at best can be described as bird hopping!"

What was going on here, I wondered? "Okay let's get down to the point of you schlepping me out here - it was not to have a quiet smoke on the balcony was it?"

"No, you got me there! Marlene has kind of let me know what transpired between you 2 last night - no relax! I am perfectly happy for her, and judging by the radiance today, it was more than a little pleasurable for her, and I am a touch jealous judging by some of the things she said!"

"Holy shit! She didn't blab about what we did in that detail! That was really naughty of her, and I am more than a bit mortified, as I did not expect her to share that!"

CHAPTER 4

Denise laughed - it was a very pleasant laugh, I had to admit! "I have to look out for her, even though she is an adult woman. She is frightfully vulnerable, because she is so horribly crippled, and I promised my folks back then when I was hardly grown up myself, that I would always look after her no matter what. Getting fucking pregnant with Barry, sort of screwed up part of that planning some 3 years ago, and I was really in two minds whether to have an abortion, go it alone as a single Mom, or marry Barry. For better or worse, I decided on the last option, after a long discussion with Marlene as to exactly what this would mean, because Barry was not at all keen to have her stay with us. Also Marlene really did not like him at all, but then, us crips cannot be too picky anyway!"

I interjected - "You are also one attractive woman so don't sell yourself short!"

"You making a pass at me??" was her immediate rejoinder!

"No, I have enough on my plate as things stand!"

"That is what I am getting to - what exactly are your intentions? I know you have now known her for probably around 8 waking hours, and that is really way too short a time to actually make any decision at all normally, but this is not a normal situation, is it? She is not normal - neither am I, but she is much, much less normal than I am, and so a relationship with her will be anything but normal also. Do you want to sort of be a full time one on one boyfriend, or just someone who every now and then pops in to have hot sex, or do you want to leave now with a thank you and I wish you well?"

"My God, you certainly will never pass the diplomatic corps test! Look right now, I am not sure of any of the above. Since you are being so blunt, so will I. Right now of the 3 cognitive input functions, My brain, my Heart and my cock, my cock is ruling the decision making, and that is not any recipe for a longer term thing!"

"Hmm from all accounts that is something to behold I am told!"

"Christ is nothing private between you two??"

Denise thought for a while and then said, "No, there is nothing private between us that I can think of. We grew up in such a horrible physical circumstance, that no one else could really understand, we only had each other. When our folks got killed, this only reinforced that bond. Our motto became the same as the 3 musketeers, one for all and all for one! One day she may tell you a bit about our relationship in more detail, but I leave that to her, if you hang around."

"I am glad you were so honest and straight with me, and that confirms what she told me as well. But you have awakened something in her, which is potentially a problem. If you don't stick around, I may need to come up with some sort of a solution for that, but then that won't be your problem anymore, not that I fault you for that in anyway - she really deserved to have that pleasure as well, and from all accounts she got it in spades!"

"Look, I need to get a shower, shave and change. Then I need to also come down to earth, and like she made me do - examine everything in the cold light of day, before I make any sort of decision. I am sorry that I put a little bit of pressure on your hubby, but I really felt he was way out of line, and that is one of the things high on my "you-don't-do-that" list. So let me also apologize to him, and you folk get on with arranging a new carer, and I will get back here, and at least for the rest of today, I can stay with Marlene and act as a temp."

"Anyway, I suspect you need to sit down, because I can see that basically you are holding yourself upright with one crutch, as the braces support yours legs but not your hips which I think are also a bit weakened." A surprised look crossed her face, "My, but you are certainly full of surprises! Marlene said you were an engineer, so I guess it didn't take much to work that out! Have you finished mentally taking me apart and working out the rest of my hardware?"

I laughed out loud, "No, guilty of many things, but not that! Let's go inside and then let me do those things I need to do." So I went inside, and apologized to Barry who grudgingly accepted the apology, and went and explained to Marlene what I was going to do, and then left for my flat.

As I drove home, I ran through the whole scenario again, and had many diverging inputs to the events going forward. On the one hand, I had a clearly delineated life as a senior engineer in the consultancy business, which required an input of not less than 60 hours a week. Then the rallying, which basically needed anything between 5 and 15 hours preparation before an event, some 30 hours on the event and then at least 8 hours after the event to wind down, recover the car etc. In between this, I had to sleep, eat and just enjoy the odd cup of coffee, - that's it! I thought - I had seen the Dick somewhere else! It was at the coffee house over the road from the consultancy. And he was not with Denise, but some other big boobed, bottle blond, and not once but a few times. I had only dropped in there to pick up a take away cup of coffee, so he had probably never noticed me, being so busy looking down her cleavage.

Getting back to the hours, I reasoned that they added up to between 144 and 154 hours a week, allowing 7 hours for sleep, showers and eating a day. Which left between 14 and 24 hours in a rally week, and admittedly a lot more on a non-rally weekend, all of which sort made any kind of regular "togetherness" time highly impractical. The most obvious area to rationalize, was the work hours. The hours had been getting pretty intolerable anyway, and I was not being super productive anymore, grinding out 15 hours a day on a regular basis. Irrespective of what I decided about Marlene, this situation had to be clarified.

My boss held me to ransom, saying that if I wanted Friday's off on a rally weekend, then I had to simply pull the hours somewhere else, which was not too unreasonable. But a normal work week was 40/50 hours and he was getting 60+ so, there need to be an adjustment - or else! I had already had a not too subtle approach from a competitor consultancy, but not with a partnership sweetener.