The Lingerie Shop

It was almost 2 PM when Julie came back into the lingerie shop. She was coming from her lunch break, and like always at that time of the day, the only person in there was Mrs. Warren, the shop's manager, like always standing behind the counter and looking outside with a bored face.

Well, there was someone else, really. Julie hadn't seen him, even standing as he was in front of Mrs. Warren. An exhibitor was casually hiding him from the shop's entrance, and seeing the old woman looking with the same placid face as always in the same direction as always, Julie had supposed she was alone.

"I'm here" she said, but Mrs. Warren did not make any signal of being aware of her presence. Julie, not wanting to interrupt the conversation, looked at the old woman's companion with the corner of the eye and went up to her place, almost on the other end and facing the front door.

They were talking; she could see the stranger talking in a low voice with her boss. Always a bit on the sly, she saw it was a man about forty years old, which for her meant "old". Julie was 25 years old, and had a delicious dark brown flow of hair which fell upon just below her shoulders, plus a pretty face with delicate features and a serene look. Her sales uniform -a white silk blouse, a blue lino skirt knee-high and low-heeled shoes- gave decency and respect to her curvacious but discreet figure. She knew she had been chosen for the job because of that: she was beautiful but didn't make it too evident, so the shop's clients would take her as a partner and not a competitor.

Most of the clients were women, though once in a while some nervous young man went in looking for an "interesting" set of lingerie to buy as an intimate present for his girlfriend. Julie toyed with the idea of take care of them, but she had precise instructions of take those to Mrs. Warren, and she did... seeing more than once a vestige of deception on their faces. Mrs. Warren attended them with mother-like efficiency and it was usual of her to sell them nice sets, although nothing so audacious like the pieces some female clients asked Julie for. Sometimes the girl wondered if those men wouldn't have asked for them, having been attended by her. But so were things at work.

Because of all this, she was surprised when the man stopped talking to Mrs. Warren and walked in her direction. As far as she could see, her boss had not shown him any piece... in fact, she had apparently just listened to him, because Julie did not saw her talk to him, in fact, or so she believed. Now the old lady was still looking ahead, a bit tilted over the counter, sitting like always on her chair.

The man was now in front of her and Julie had to face him. He was not too ugly, though he didn't have a face to remember; only his black and penetrating eyes called for attention on a face that needed a shave. For a second, Julie was astounded that Mrs. Warren had not lost her attire in front of that bold looking man, as he didn't look any better dressed than his face. The raincoat, a bit crumpled, didn't match with the quiet summer day outside. She would had gone on thinking on all this, but he was looking at her in the eye, and at that precise moment, he spoke.

"You're Julie, aren't you? The lady told me so" he said with a calm, low and melodic voice, which didn't match his look. "I'm looking for something for my wife, and given that she is more or less your age, I asked that lady to let you do the sell, if you don't have a problem with that". His way of expressing himself was that of a gentleman.

Julie hesitated for an instant, as she looked at his eyes, and then reacted without saying a word. She turned her head looking for her boss's approbation... but Mrs. Warren seemed to be very concentrated on an empty coat hanger standing a few feet away.

"Don't worry, she has given her permission. She even told me about your good taste in clothes... and from what I can see, I must agree with her". Julie turned to look at him and he smiled, a smile not out of the ordinary. After a few seconds, though, Julie found herself smiling too.

"Well... of course there's no problem" she said, rearranging herself and returning to her normal behavior for her clients. "What kind of article you're looking for?"

"A bra, just to begin" he said still looking in her eyes, and then he waited, as if wanting the word to do an effect on the girl. Then, Julie felt herself blushing right through her ears. "What am I doing?" she thought, but couldn't help it.

"Hey, there's nothing to be ashamed with" said the stranger with a calm voice, and Julie's face blushed even more, because he had noticed. "Julie, be quiet, there's nothing to shame. This is a lingerie shop. You work at a lingerie shop, and you sell bras, as you do with many other things. A bra is a most important article for a woman. It helps a woman to present herself, to underscore her charms, to make her pretty... And of course I, as a man, also fancy to look at a beautiful girl, to see her bra through her clothes, to guess her forms underneath... It's very nice to see a bra through a soft, thin blouse... And you know that, and you like it, and that's why you like to sell bras in this place. Don't you?" He had said all that on a single breath, always looking at her in the eye, forcing her to look in his.

"Yes, of course... I like to sell a bra" Julie said the first thing that came from her head, which was what the man had just said. God, I'm looking like a fool. But it was true, wasn't it? She liked her job. "Yeah, I like to sell bras" she repeated, this time more assuringly.

"Of course you do" he affirmed, with a delicate smile. "I could see that the moment you walked in. I said to myself: this is a girl that can sell a bra, because of her trust in herself and her figure". Julie thought she was to blush again, but somehow she could repress herself. "I couldn't help but note you're wearing a bra below that nice blouse... a soft piece, but firm enough to put itself on display. It's true, isn't it? You're wearing a nice bra, don't you?"

Julie was still looking at the stranger's eyes, she could not change position to look at him better; he was imposing his eyes on her. What he had just said sounded a bit bold for someone we just met, or did it? And yet his stare was so clear, with a pureness he had not seen earlier...

"Yes, it's true" she answered.

"Of course it is. You're wearing a very nice bra. It's from here? I imagine you like to wear the clothes you sell, don't you?"

"Yes... it's one of ours" she said starting to smile, but she repressed right away. What kind of conversation is this? Her brow started to frown.

"I hope I'm not making you uncomfortable with this things I'm saying. It's just my wife is about your age, as I said before, in fact she has a figure very well like yours. So when I saw you, I thought: what could be better than this woman to understand me, she seems to have just the size I'm looking for, who better than her to sell me a bra for my wife... which is what I'm looking for and what I'm here for, talking to you on this beautiful spring day... Did you notice the fragance in the air?"

"Huh?" Julie somehow startled with this sudden change of subject. She was staring into his eyes, trying to think of all the things the man had said.

"Of course, spring has a special smell, the odor of just-opened flowers in the air" he said smiling. "It's very light, but it's there, and it does its influence on us without doubt, like the brilliant sun you must have noted yourself when you went out. I hope you're not finding this conversation a bore..."

"No..." she started to say as a courtesy, but he was talking again.

"I imagine you were coming from lunch, usually nobody's shopping at this time... And I know it could be disturbing to work again right after you come back here. After lunch, the body relaxes a little and, even if you have to stand behind a counter, you really would want to sit and rest for a while, wouldn't you? Letting yourself go by that dizziness that comes on the early afternoon, with warm food on your stomach, making your tummy and your body warm, covering them like a warm and light blanket... like the sun..."

Julie was now motionless, in a pose very like the one she had seen in Mrs. Warren a few moments before. She was not aware of this: she was keeping the train of thoughts that this man was making with his melodic, soft voice, this man looking at her with deep black eyes that seemed to cover all her field of vision. Julie sighed.

"That warm, brilliant spring sun.. Now you can see it over you, bathing you with its sleepy warming light... It makes you blink a little, it's the quiet hour of the afternoon, the sun's above you and the air's full of little points of dust floating in the air... the sun is floating... and your mind feels lighter and float away..."

Julie sighed again and kept looking into the deep black eyes of the stranger. Her mouth was a bit open now, and she was too busy to be aware. She had just kind of seen the sun's rays in the stranger's eyes... She blinked a couple of times, and they were still there, illuminating the dust floating in the afternoon air, ahead of the blackness of his eyes, which emphasized it.

The man's face got closer to Julie's. Now they were so close he could feel the small breathing of the girl going into his own mouth. He started to talk lower and faster. Now Julie had to really concentrate on what she was seeing to understand what he was saying...

"Your mind floats freely on the empty afternoon... there's no trouble now... nobody to make you work, that doesn't matter at all. The only thing that matters is the sun and the dust floating around, and that warm blanket to nourish and protect you, and my voice bringing all that to you. You're gonna take a deep breath and see all that now". The man took a deep breath and Julie did the same. "Letting the air go you feel how your body relaxes as the mind is floating away, the heaviness of your tired body that had just been fed and wants to rest, to break free, to hang like a dead weight, a very heavy weight... Your mind's floating away, your body is hanging heavy, it doesn't matter, my voice brings you the sun and you can see the sun in my eyes. You can see it in my voice and in my eyes. Nothing else matters now, other than my voice and my eyes. Aren't they beautiful?"

Julie felt herself sinking into a fog, but at the same time being bathed by the crystal-clear afternoon sun that made her want to take a nap. His eyes were very beautiful, but when she tried to answer, she found she had not enough strength to do it. Her lips make small movements, but the only thing that came from them was thin, warm air.

"Of course they are. They're beautiful and they're the only thing that matters now, for you to rest. It's the quiet hour and you have to rest. Your body feels very heavy and tired, let it rest... Your mind is also tired... the spring's sun is bathing it... and now your face is also tired, and your eyelids are tired too". Julie started blinking fast; she wanted to keep seeing the sun and the flowers and the spring dust in the stranger's eyes, but suddenly her eyelids were heavy like a log. "It's time for sleep, sleeping a light and nice nap".

Suddenly there was something standing between Julie's half closed eyes and the eyes that reflected all she wanted to look as she felt the same heaviness that came to her at night, in her bed, when she was looking at some stupid boring TV show but felt herself not having enough strength to catch the remote and turn it off. She blinked again and focused on the thing that was getting closer and closer to her: it was a finger, an index finger pointing at her and her tired eyes. By reflex, she moved her head a bit backwards, focusing her vision on the fleshy tip of that rude finger that kept getting closer, now going up and leaving just enough space to move her head a bit more backwards at the same time she was tilting it back, so she found herself staring at the finger from below, that finger still pointing into her eyes. Far away she could hear the man talking to her, like through a comfortable mattress, but she could make just some words now: "finger... just my finger... that brings sleep... focus on my finger... sleep..."

The stranger paused for a moment and drank in her image: Julie was still standing, her head tilted back, looking up, into the finger he was moving just inches from her blinking and tired stare. The girl stood still, the mouth mid-open, the breathing light and short. Only her eyes were moving now.

"When my finger touches your forehead, you're going to sleeeep" he intoned again, and a moment later he did. Julie's eyes closed instantly like two heavy blindfolds, and the girl made a deep sigh. Now the man had his whole hand over her face, moving it in a circle, and then another, as Julie's head rotated freer and flexier each time, her body starting to oscilate now.

"You keep yourself standing, sleeping deeper, more deeper now... deeper and deeper now" he said with a more strong and commanding tone, taking her by the shoulder and bowing her figure forwards. Julie's sleepy head, now free, fell slowly down and down. When it reached her chest he pushed back on the shoulder, and Julie's limp but straight body went with the flow. As soon as she appeared to keep her balance, her head hanging at shoulder's high, the man turned around fast, and in a couple of seconds closed the front door, putting the "closed" sign. Then he put an exhibitor in front of the door, blocking the vision from the outside.

On her own end of the counter, Mrs. Warren didn't see anything. She had been a long time floating on her own world by now, looking at nothing, seeing nothing more than the beautiful flow of images the man had implanted into her brain a few minutes after Julie went out for lunch.

The girl was feeling like she was inside a warm, heavy fog, so dense she could float by herself on the air. Someone was talking to her, maybe she was even talking too, but all that was like a dream she wished to leave behind, to stay all alone in front of that black sun that was putting her into some kind of ecstasy, making her lose all contact with reality. She was feeling so good... Floating on her own nap dream... getting a good rest after a heavy meal, knowing that later she would wake feeling comfortable, fresh, and rested.

Some time passed. Then, in a given moment, she opened her eyes and had to repress herself to not make a yawn. That man was still there, looking at her; he seemed not aware of how much and good she had slept. She was not going to tell, of course. She was a smart saleswoman. She felt comfortable, even a bit sexy.

"Now we can talk business, then" he said, lowering his gaze to her bosom for the first time, "we were talking about how beneath that blouse you're wearing a beautiful bra from the house, isn't it?"

"Yes" she said smiling. She even made a deep sigh, like she was trying to show better the piece through her clothes. He surely was a very smart man, to have noted that in just one look, she thought.

"Is it nice? I guess it is, you would use only bras you like".

"Of course... I only use bras I like" she smiled. But other than the smile, she was giving him the same look as before, when he started to talk to her.

"I think you have the same size as my wife... which's yours?"

"38C" she answered inmediately, and blinked. Was it OK to tell a stranger her bra size? She didn't even knew his name...

"Then what can be better than look at yours directly. If I am looking for a nice bra for my wife" he said staring at her eyes again; Julie seemed now fascinated... "...and you're wearing a very nice piece, and you're the same size as my wife, who better to try it on, then?"

"It's true" she said after one or two seconds, as she was trying to follow his train of speech.

"In fact you won't eve need to try it on, because you have it on already. Now let's see how it fits. Will you show me how it fits?"

Julie looked at him without blinking for a few moments. Now she seemed more focused.

"Of course, I'm gonna show you..."

"So I can see how it fits..."

"So you can see how it fits" she said and always with her eyes focused on his, she began to raise her hands (why her arms felt so heavy?) and then open the buttons of her blouse, like in slow-motion. She kept on that til she found she had opened it to her very navel. It was obvious that there was no necessity to open more buttons. So her heavy hands went up again and opened coquettishly the cloth from her neck. showing a slightly pointed-up white bra below, with thin white straps running over her shoulders and back, and some silk applications on the half-cups.

"It's very nice" he said with a small voice, looking down on her body. The bra was raising Julie's breasts slightly, enough to trace a dark, easily noticeable valley between them. The half-cups covered the lower half. "You were very right in showing me, Julie, very right". She smiled, a bit absently, looking at the wall over his head. "I'm glad you did, I'm very glad". Then Julie moved back the blouse sides, so they were not blocking the man's vision of her bosom. "Very beautiful... now I'd like to feel it, because it seems so very smooth. But I'm sure you're a smart woman and would not let a stranger to put a hand over your tits, huh?" He smiled, and after a moment she smiled too, even with a smirk.

"Of course I would not" she said coquettishly, playing the offended. The man now seemed to seize the problem for a moment.

"OK, I'll tell you what we'll do" he concluded. "You can take it off and give it to me, so I can feel it without touching your skin. How's that?"

She tried to think and then to hide from the man that she couldn't; he had said Julie was smart and she didn't want to dissapoint him now that the sale was close. "OK, I'll give it to you" she said. Her hands went at her back and clumsily opened the bra. Then she took the straps with her hands crossed over her chest, and lowered them, taking off the piece and putting it on his open hand. As she was doing this, she was thinking: now this is a very comfortable way to sell a bra; you just show it on your body and then take it off, so the client can touch it, and then buy it.

"Yes, it's very light and soft" he said looking in his hand, and her eyes followed. He was feeling it first on the outside, then inside the cups. "It's tepid, warm, from her owner's warminess" he was talking very softly, and Julie's eyes followed the hand as it went, slowly, around the cups' inside. "It's so nice to feel a woman's warminess on her clothes. To touch it and imagine that warminess through her body one moment before. That warminess going through the skin and reaching the bra. The skin's warminess on every spot I'm touching with my hand..."

As he was talking, Julie sighed and felt on the inside all he was saying, as he was saying it. The warminess of her skin, the skin of her breasts, making them hot on every spot he touched in the fabric. It was as if from touching the cups, the man's hand were touching her brasts, awakening her skin.

Julie sighed two or three times more with eyes locked on the movements of the man's hand. He, silently, was looking at her figure, with her arms hanging on her sides and the blouse completely open, showing off her turgent, round breasts. As he looked, the nipples were hardening until they pointed forward, giving each breast the form of a mature fresh fruit, waiting for the hand that would rip it from the branch.

"So nice to feel the hand awakening the skin, making it hot, making you feel the warminess more and more. Making you feel hot" he was intoning, as Julie's sighs went stronger and deeper. "Very hot... you know your body can resist heat to a certain point, after that it needs to act... to free himself... The heat makes you free and at the same time, it makes you a slave of your own horniness... Don't you feel slave to your own horniness?"