admin
16 Nisan 2024, 18:58
http://kizsalsorunlar.net/paylasim/sex_gif_2/133/ass_H7cp4OxWa0_gconEFwRURA.gif
Like a drug, reader's comments make me write more. Like a whip, constructive criticism makes me write better. Please vote and comment. Your feedback makes for better writing.
Of course, it's best to read the previous chapters.
A Little Side Business, Part Six
Driving Miss Crazy
In which our hero seizes the sword
*****************
I tried to remember if I'd ever awoken to a more beautiful woman's face, but my 20s were so long ago I couldn't trust my memory. I probably didn't appreciate it at the time, anyway. My own face in the morning looks like an old Brooks leather saddle.
Rita and I lay in my bed, morning sunlight slanting in through the hurricane shutters, birds singing. I watched her sleeping, her eyes twitching in a dream, dark hair fanned on the pillow, small hands curled in abandonment. If we hadn't had to be at VoltT by 9:45 I'm sure we would have stayed there nearly all day. I slipped quietly out of bed, took a piss and started a shower. While I was rinsing the night out of my eyes I heard Rita use the toilet, then the curtain parted and she slipped in, smiling. I let her under the spray silently.
She had her hands together between her breasts as in prayer in the warm water, her back to me, letting the water soak her hair, making a shiny black curtain over her face. I embraced her body, enfolding her in my arms, covering her hands with mine, squeezing her against my chest. I bent my head and whispered in her ear, "Good morning," my cock thickening as it hung between her little round ass cheeks.
"Good morning to you both," she laughed. "Get some soap, OK?"
I reached and plucked the bar from the recess and lathered up my hands. She took the soap from me and, beginning at her delicate collar bones, I spread the slippery lather down her body, slowly caressing her breasts, ribs, belly and finally the delta where I'd spent myself just hours before. She arched her back and purred, raising her arms above her head and stretching. Rita yawned as I carefully soaped her bush and worked some suds in her navel. Then she laughed, "Tickles!"
I moved on, retracing my path back up to cup her breasts, running my fingers over her stiff nipples like a washboard. Rita reached back and grasped me, squeezing, assessing my cock.
"You need to save this for filming tonight, darling man," she sighed. "Sorry."
I thought for a minute. "You're alright with that, my having sex with Tamika?"
She turned to me and lathered my chest, working the soap across my shoulders and moving down toward my cock, now pointing hard up at her face.
"Frank, we've only been intimate in the last twelve hours. I don't think I've earned a claim to you exclusively. Not yet, anyway. Filming tonight is part of our plan to help Charlotte. And Tamika is my friend. She and I have talked a lot about the dynamic between you, me and her. I think we just play the whole thing by ear." What a sensible woman, I thought. Women talk together about stuff I would never share with a buddy. If I had a buddy. I myself was torn with guilt about whether I was cheating on any of them. I realized suddenly that my sense of loyalty came from a fear of abandonment. My instinct was to do anything for any of them just to keep their love and attention. I'd always been that way. I had thought that loyalty was one of my better qualities. The crazy things that come to you in the shower.
She bathed me in a no-nonsense few moments, squeezed my cock affectionately one last time and we reluctantly shut off the water. It was so hard to leave that little cocoon of warmth and tenderness.
Rita retrieved her blouse and skirt, I threw on a VoltT uniform and we walked to her apartment, twenty minutes away, with a stop in between at The Bean for coffee and pastries, that we ate while we walked and talked. And it wasn't awkward at all. We both were high on the night before and still intimate, even under the spreading trees and fountains of sunny Forsyth Park, dotted with students and tourists. It was bliss.
"I want to tell you the moment I began to be attracted to you, Frank," Rita said, crumbs of muffin at the corner of her mouth. I wiped them away, raised an eyebrow.
"You're a very private person, don't talk much about yourself at work. Everybody else has an opinion about everything. How to diet, what to wear, best music, best team and on and on. You, Frank, one day in some conversation about dieting, I think, said, 'Everybody finds their own way.'"
I can't say I remembered that day, but, sure, I probably said that. One of the few things I've learned. She looked up at me and smiled.
"That was so mature an attitude and so affirming. I decided to try get to know you better."
"Can I say you make we want to be a better man?"
"Please don't start channeling Jack Nickolson. Not my kinda guy." She made a sour mouth.
"So you started riding as a way to get to me?" I asked.
"Well, I admit to having a strategic plan. I never expected to see you part of Chatterley, though. Things moved a lot faster than I thought they would." She looked concerned.
I was, too. "Well, Chatterley, samsun escort (https://samsunrentcar.com) that was a surprise. That and Charlotte."
"Did you notice that text was sent to you, me, Tamika and Marcus?" Rita asked, juggling coffee and a blueberry-walnut muffin.
I was nervous. "What do you think she's got planned for this night shoot? Are we going to film the au-pair scene? What's Marcus got to do with that?" It's fair to say Charlotte's behavior was unpredictable even when she was 'normal'. We'd planned to confront her after work that night, but the call to come film meant we would all be in one place at the same time, so I'd texted Tamika, who agreed that we should wait until we were all out at Bateaux. Marcus was a wild card, so we didn't bring him in on our plans.
Rita admitted, despite her brave look, that she was afraid of seeing Charlotte at VoltT. "And I don't know if I can act as if I know nothing about what you went through with her. She assaulted you, orgasm or not."
"The blowjob felt wrong, but I'm not scarred or anything," I admitted.
"You were forced to have sex with her against your will. Whatever her motives were, you did not consent."
"I kinda didn't stop her, though. My body took over."
"Frank, you're describing the same experience a woman has when raped. The heart, mind and body aren't always on the same page. Imagine how bad it feels to have sex after an assault when the pleasure brings up all that emotional pain. A woman's own body betrays her. You probably know that rape is about power more than pleasure. You, being a man, probably didn't feel as vulnerable as a woman would." Rita spoke very passionately.
"Did this happen to you?" I asked, sympathetically.
"No, to a friend. And to too many women. Some heal better than others, at least to outward appearances. There are a lot of walking wounded out there." We walked in silence for the last couple of blocks. I kept finding myself looking at my life from farther and farther outside of it, gaining perspective despite myself, watching myself acting without thinking, making mistakes. When would I figure out what I was learning from them?
We stopped at Rita's place just to get her car and a uniform for her, then drove out to the store to open. Karl was the opening manager, Tamika had the day off, we knew. She said she'd be preparing herself for the scene and the ordeal ahead and pick us up at the store after our shift so we could ride together to Bateaux and make last minute adjustments to our plan.
Unexpectedly, Charlotte was not there. Karl said she'd called out sick. Uh, Oh, I thought. Is she taking the day to prepare for the shoot, or could she be just going completely off the rails with no one there to help? I checked the district scoreboard in the operations room. I could tell Marcus was at work at the 17th Street store because his sales were showing up on the board. What was Charlotte up to? What would we be stepping into tonight? I'm ashamed to say that I even wondered if she and Tamika might not be together ruining our plans. Rita was absolutely certain that Tamika would not betray us and was relieved not to be seeing the boss.
We had a minute or two during the busy day to talk, but as usual, a VoltT store is like a high speed assembly line where customers come in one end, go through the sales-grinder and leave with a device and several hundred dollars less cash. We assembly line workers were there to keep the flow as fast and snag-free as possible. No time to breathe. Or think.
So 8PM got there pretty fast. And Tamika was waiting outside in her MINI, wearing a thin blue plaid shirt and tight jeans. A coworker saw us get in the car and called, "Hi, 'Mika! Where y'all off too?" Shit, we don't need questions now, I thought. But Tamika apparently had thought of this possibility. She answered, waving as we drove away, "Frank's gonna help me buy a new bike!"
Rita laughed, "Good thinking, 'Mika. I can't wait to ride together!"
"I ain't had my ass on a bike seat since I was twelve and I won't any time soon." She said, smiling. "Here, I brought y'all a veggie burrito to split."
I passed half back to Rita and dove into mine, hungry from nerves, a short night and a long day at VoltT.
Tamika had thought of that, too. "You got to keep your strength up, Frank."
"Frunk OO!" I said around a bite.
"Exactly. And more than once, I hope." Tamika laughed. But her face clouded and she added, "I have a bad feeling about this shoot tonight."
Rita and I devoured the burrito, rolling down Skidaway Road, AC on high, as the sun set behind us, and we talked, reviewing the plan to simply form a solid wall of truth for Charlotte, to tell her we knew all about her and demand she seek help, for the sake of Chatterley if nothing else. We thought her creation might be even more important to her than her own health.
Rita, from the back seat said, "'Mika, is Charlotte really a danger to herself or others?"
"I hope not," Tamika said, "One thing I know from class is that you have to meet a patient where they are and develop a relationship before you can help them move to urfa escort (https://sanliurfan.com) a better place."
"You think we have that kind of relationship with Charlotte?" Rita asked between bites.
"Not sure. I don't know if Charlotte, or the part of Charlotte that we know, thinks we're her friends. The whole world may be suspect to her. In which case she's gonna feel attacked rather than helped by this." Tamika beat her hands on the wheel, nervous too, not her usual bubbly self.
"I always thought sex was the ultimate intimacy," I said. "Maybe I was wrong. I mean, I used to be attached like velcro to the woman I was having sex with. Now I've had sex with three women in a week and I don't know which way to go. I want to pour my heart into all of you and at least two of you are either indifferent or dangerous."
"That's sweet, Frank," said Tamika, smiling. "I told you not to get too attached to me or Charlotte, didn't I?"
"Well, that leaves Rita." I'm known for stating the obvious.
"Yeah, you and Rita, now, that's another thing." She smiled. "I have a theory about how people make couples. Wanna hear it?"
"Shoot," I said.
"There's this psychologist named Maslow who worked back in the dark ages. About when you were born, Frank."
I poked her shoulder. "I'm about to be a danger to others."
"He developed what he called a 'hierarchy of needs'. Everyone starts at the bottom with a need for basics like shelter and food and has a drive to go higher, to needs like love, self fulfillment and community. He thought that only about five percent of people became what he called 'self-actualized', the most advanced place on the hierarchy."
"That sounds kind of simplistic and maybe Darwinian to me," said Rita, looking at her in the rear view mirror.
"Well, I have two minutes to explain it, so Google it. You want to know my theory or not?"
"What's this got to do with couples?" I asked.
"Well, I think two people who are at about the same place on the ladder are best suited to be happy together. It doesn't matter how high or low as long as they're about the same level, like you two."
Rita reached to the front seat, took my hand and squeezed it. We were turning in at the Bateaux gate.
We rode in silence down the long, dark green drive, headlights boring a tunnel into the wood. Tamika pulled the MINI around back where we found the Beamer. The Charger was there, too. When we opened the doors the Low Country air enveloped us, briny, thick and hot. I started sweating into my shirt. The lights were on in the pool house like that first night I'd been there, what seemed like a lifetime ago. I crossed the patio apprehensively and found the door locked and no one home.
"There's a light up at the big house," said Rita, standing by the pool. Yes, dimly a light glowed from several windows. So we retraced the steps I'd taken on my journey with Kathryn, up to the terrace, now cooling in the evening gloom. A light was on in the library. We filed in and Tamika went to the hall door and called for Charlotte. There was a reply, a muffled echo.
Before we left the room Rita gasped, "Frank, look at this!" She stood before a portrait on the wall facing the windows. "It looks just like you..." I came to her side and saw a painting of a man of middle age, graying, slim and bearded, with glasses. He wore a fine suit and stood leaning suavely on a mantelpiece in some baronial room. His look was pensive, intelligent, his eyes not quite focused on the viewer. I could see the resemblance, but it wasn't the man I saw in the mirror every day.
I tilted my head to read the brass name plate on the frame."Benjamin Franklin Grantwell. Who is this guy?" I asked.
"Grantwell. Charlotte's name. Must be a relative. This is spooky, Frank. It really looks like you. And his middle name is Frank?" Rita clutched my arm. I began to wonder if Charlotte's interest in me was rooted in something in her past and not in me at all. Sometimes desire is only a case of mistaken identity. Maybe it always is.
"Come on. They're upstairs," said Tamika, leaving into the hall and climbing the creaky stairs toward the light on the landing. We left Ben behind and followed.
Upstairs, across the hall from the room where Kathryn had seduced me were Charlotte and Marcus in a large bedroom full of filming gear, lights, reflectors, extension cords and all of the camera rigs we'd used on Thursday by the pool. The room was long enough to have a separate sitting area. The narrower wall that the old iron-framed bed was against also had a door at each end. One was open to an en-suite bathroom. Charlotte, in white polo and tennis skirt, ponytailed as usual, looking as much an in-control boss as ever, was directing Marcus to place a camera by the bed. She turned as we came in, serious.
"Before you say anything, listen to me. I'm not crazy. I am in full possession of my faculties and Kathryn will not be visiting us again. I'm sure Frank told you about what happened here yesterday morning. Frank, you're no doubt confused about that incident. I'm sorry I lost my temper. I didn't handle the situation well."
"There's sinop escort (https://sinophabergazetesi.com) still a mark on your..."
"Let me finish. I am under a doctor's care and I'm taking medication for my condition. I explained to Marcus what happened. I had a slip - I didn't take my meds for a month or so and relapsed. But I'm good now. A fully functioning member of society. Everything is under control." She chopped her hand.
Tamika asked, "How often do..."
"We can talk later. Right now we've got a scene to film. You'll find several more directions in the Drive file I sent you last week. Marcus is here because he has a part as the woman's driver. Read the scene again while he goes to change." Marcus gave me a hard, meaningful look as he left for the bathroom. He pointed and mouthed silently, "I will fuck you up". Jeez, I thought.
Since I'd come to believe that my attraction to Charlotte sprang from my own dysfunction her spell had been broken; I no longer heard her siren's song. I didn't want to be pulled into a love with her and lose myself as I had wanted to. I wasn't the threat Marcus thought I was. We weren't even going to risk Chatterley by confronting her. She'd outflanked us.
We were disarmed. Our plan had been pre-empted. Well, we wanted to keep Chatterley alive. It looked like we were back at work. Still, I had deep misgivings and Tamika, Rita and I shared skeptical looks over our phone screens as we read the revised script. The first part of the scene read as before, with the woman seducing the au-pair into a clinch on the bed. The husband is introduced and takes the girl from behind as we'd rehearsed it. While the au-pair goes down on the wife, the wife calls the driver in from her cell and a four-way begins. The director's notes at this point said 'improvise'. God. I was filled with adrenaline from my anticipation of our confrontation and now I was expected to have an orgy on camera. I had some serious energy to unleash, but I had to do some rapid mental gear shifting. This was like riding the Blue Ridge Parkway; long, heart-bursting uphill climbs, followed by terrifying downhill free-falls. But the view was terrific.
"Also, if anyone finds my phone, let me know. I've misplaced it. 'Mika, put yours here on the nightstand. We need it for a prop." Charlotte pointed at me. "Frank, there's a suit for you in the bathroom. Change there and wait at that end of the room for your part. We'll cut so you can enter from the hall, and again for Marcus. Say your lines when I prompt you. The lighting didn't work out in the sun when we tested it last week, so we're in here. I dropped the GoPro rig out, too. That was too complicated." She scratched her head while reading from her tablet, pointed at the equipment. "Rita, I want you to use the GoPro as a steadycam and move around us. We'll use the dolly pan like before and still keep the static camera on Tamika's face. Use your judgement on framing and focus. I trust you know what I'm looking for. I picked up some establishing exterior shots out in Ardsley Park this afternoon. 'Mika, you did a great job of describing your sensations in rehearsal. Do that again." She looked up at us. "Any questions?"
"What's this about improvising after Marcus comes in?" I asked.
"We haven't rehearsed that and I think we'll capture a more organic and natural scene if we just go with our instincts."
"I haven't had group sex with a guy before," I admitted, chuckling nervously, "I might feel a little awkward."
"You've performed beautifully every time I've been with you, including our rehearsal with Tamika, so don't sweat it. Follow our lead." She looked irritated. "You want a Viagra?"
"No, no... I can manage." I would not take penis pills. I'm not old, I thought. Of course, I'd been sleeping less and screwing more over the last week. My tank was a little low.
"Tamika, talk to him."
'Mika grabbed my wrists and looked up into my eyes. "Frank, you need to own this role, embody the character. You look the part, but you've abdicated your power. In this film you are the boss, you are the rich white man, you own your wife, you have all the privilege and power of your birth. It's a sad fact, but me and Marcus are your servants. Sadder still, these are the roles we were born to play."
"Just for the film, though? You know I'm not like that." Not the time to talk politics, either.
"Yes, for the film. And I admit, sometimes I like to be bossed around, tied up, dominated. But just for fun. Not in real life."
She dropped my hands. "Find the alpha male in yourself tonight, Frank." She grabbed my shirt, pulled herself up and kissed me hard, gave me a wicked smile.
Marcus came out of the bathroom in his driver's uniform, a dark suit and cap, looking like the hired muscle he would be playing. I took his place and found an expensive men's suit in light gray wool, classically cut, a blood-red tie and especially nice Italian shoes. The whole kit was a little musty from hanging who knows how long in this old house. The shoes didn't quite fit, but I figured I wouldn't have them on more than a few minutes. I'd never spent money on shoes myself, yet here were several hundred dollars worth that must just have been sitting in a closet unused for years, rimed with mildew. The rich are different from you and me, Fitzgerald wrote, but I guess they take their pants off one leg at a time like everybody else.
Like a drug, reader's comments make me write more. Like a whip, constructive criticism makes me write better. Please vote and comment. Your feedback makes for better writing.
Of course, it's best to read the previous chapters.
A Little Side Business, Part Six
Driving Miss Crazy
In which our hero seizes the sword
*****************
I tried to remember if I'd ever awoken to a more beautiful woman's face, but my 20s were so long ago I couldn't trust my memory. I probably didn't appreciate it at the time, anyway. My own face in the morning looks like an old Brooks leather saddle.
Rita and I lay in my bed, morning sunlight slanting in through the hurricane shutters, birds singing. I watched her sleeping, her eyes twitching in a dream, dark hair fanned on the pillow, small hands curled in abandonment. If we hadn't had to be at VoltT by 9:45 I'm sure we would have stayed there nearly all day. I slipped quietly out of bed, took a piss and started a shower. While I was rinsing the night out of my eyes I heard Rita use the toilet, then the curtain parted and she slipped in, smiling. I let her under the spray silently.
She had her hands together between her breasts as in prayer in the warm water, her back to me, letting the water soak her hair, making a shiny black curtain over her face. I embraced her body, enfolding her in my arms, covering her hands with mine, squeezing her against my chest. I bent my head and whispered in her ear, "Good morning," my cock thickening as it hung between her little round ass cheeks.
"Good morning to you both," she laughed. "Get some soap, OK?"
I reached and plucked the bar from the recess and lathered up my hands. She took the soap from me and, beginning at her delicate collar bones, I spread the slippery lather down her body, slowly caressing her breasts, ribs, belly and finally the delta where I'd spent myself just hours before. She arched her back and purred, raising her arms above her head and stretching. Rita yawned as I carefully soaped her bush and worked some suds in her navel. Then she laughed, "Tickles!"
I moved on, retracing my path back up to cup her breasts, running my fingers over her stiff nipples like a washboard. Rita reached back and grasped me, squeezing, assessing my cock.
"You need to save this for filming tonight, darling man," she sighed. "Sorry."
I thought for a minute. "You're alright with that, my having sex with Tamika?"
She turned to me and lathered my chest, working the soap across my shoulders and moving down toward my cock, now pointing hard up at her face.
"Frank, we've only been intimate in the last twelve hours. I don't think I've earned a claim to you exclusively. Not yet, anyway. Filming tonight is part of our plan to help Charlotte. And Tamika is my friend. She and I have talked a lot about the dynamic between you, me and her. I think we just play the whole thing by ear." What a sensible woman, I thought. Women talk together about stuff I would never share with a buddy. If I had a buddy. I myself was torn with guilt about whether I was cheating on any of them. I realized suddenly that my sense of loyalty came from a fear of abandonment. My instinct was to do anything for any of them just to keep their love and attention. I'd always been that way. I had thought that loyalty was one of my better qualities. The crazy things that come to you in the shower.
She bathed me in a no-nonsense few moments, squeezed my cock affectionately one last time and we reluctantly shut off the water. It was so hard to leave that little cocoon of warmth and tenderness.
Rita retrieved her blouse and skirt, I threw on a VoltT uniform and we walked to her apartment, twenty minutes away, with a stop in between at The Bean for coffee and pastries, that we ate while we walked and talked. And it wasn't awkward at all. We both were high on the night before and still intimate, even under the spreading trees and fountains of sunny Forsyth Park, dotted with students and tourists. It was bliss.
"I want to tell you the moment I began to be attracted to you, Frank," Rita said, crumbs of muffin at the corner of her mouth. I wiped them away, raised an eyebrow.
"You're a very private person, don't talk much about yourself at work. Everybody else has an opinion about everything. How to diet, what to wear, best music, best team and on and on. You, Frank, one day in some conversation about dieting, I think, said, 'Everybody finds their own way.'"
I can't say I remembered that day, but, sure, I probably said that. One of the few things I've learned. She looked up at me and smiled.
"That was so mature an attitude and so affirming. I decided to try get to know you better."
"Can I say you make we want to be a better man?"
"Please don't start channeling Jack Nickolson. Not my kinda guy." She made a sour mouth.
"So you started riding as a way to get to me?" I asked.
"Well, I admit to having a strategic plan. I never expected to see you part of Chatterley, though. Things moved a lot faster than I thought they would." She looked concerned.
I was, too. "Well, Chatterley, samsun escort (https://samsunrentcar.com) that was a surprise. That and Charlotte."
"Did you notice that text was sent to you, me, Tamika and Marcus?" Rita asked, juggling coffee and a blueberry-walnut muffin.
I was nervous. "What do you think she's got planned for this night shoot? Are we going to film the au-pair scene? What's Marcus got to do with that?" It's fair to say Charlotte's behavior was unpredictable even when she was 'normal'. We'd planned to confront her after work that night, but the call to come film meant we would all be in one place at the same time, so I'd texted Tamika, who agreed that we should wait until we were all out at Bateaux. Marcus was a wild card, so we didn't bring him in on our plans.
Rita admitted, despite her brave look, that she was afraid of seeing Charlotte at VoltT. "And I don't know if I can act as if I know nothing about what you went through with her. She assaulted you, orgasm or not."
"The blowjob felt wrong, but I'm not scarred or anything," I admitted.
"You were forced to have sex with her against your will. Whatever her motives were, you did not consent."
"I kinda didn't stop her, though. My body took over."
"Frank, you're describing the same experience a woman has when raped. The heart, mind and body aren't always on the same page. Imagine how bad it feels to have sex after an assault when the pleasure brings up all that emotional pain. A woman's own body betrays her. You probably know that rape is about power more than pleasure. You, being a man, probably didn't feel as vulnerable as a woman would." Rita spoke very passionately.
"Did this happen to you?" I asked, sympathetically.
"No, to a friend. And to too many women. Some heal better than others, at least to outward appearances. There are a lot of walking wounded out there." We walked in silence for the last couple of blocks. I kept finding myself looking at my life from farther and farther outside of it, gaining perspective despite myself, watching myself acting without thinking, making mistakes. When would I figure out what I was learning from them?
We stopped at Rita's place just to get her car and a uniform for her, then drove out to the store to open. Karl was the opening manager, Tamika had the day off, we knew. She said she'd be preparing herself for the scene and the ordeal ahead and pick us up at the store after our shift so we could ride together to Bateaux and make last minute adjustments to our plan.
Unexpectedly, Charlotte was not there. Karl said she'd called out sick. Uh, Oh, I thought. Is she taking the day to prepare for the shoot, or could she be just going completely off the rails with no one there to help? I checked the district scoreboard in the operations room. I could tell Marcus was at work at the 17th Street store because his sales were showing up on the board. What was Charlotte up to? What would we be stepping into tonight? I'm ashamed to say that I even wondered if she and Tamika might not be together ruining our plans. Rita was absolutely certain that Tamika would not betray us and was relieved not to be seeing the boss.
We had a minute or two during the busy day to talk, but as usual, a VoltT store is like a high speed assembly line where customers come in one end, go through the sales-grinder and leave with a device and several hundred dollars less cash. We assembly line workers were there to keep the flow as fast and snag-free as possible. No time to breathe. Or think.
So 8PM got there pretty fast. And Tamika was waiting outside in her MINI, wearing a thin blue plaid shirt and tight jeans. A coworker saw us get in the car and called, "Hi, 'Mika! Where y'all off too?" Shit, we don't need questions now, I thought. But Tamika apparently had thought of this possibility. She answered, waving as we drove away, "Frank's gonna help me buy a new bike!"
Rita laughed, "Good thinking, 'Mika. I can't wait to ride together!"
"I ain't had my ass on a bike seat since I was twelve and I won't any time soon." She said, smiling. "Here, I brought y'all a veggie burrito to split."
I passed half back to Rita and dove into mine, hungry from nerves, a short night and a long day at VoltT.
Tamika had thought of that, too. "You got to keep your strength up, Frank."
"Frunk OO!" I said around a bite.
"Exactly. And more than once, I hope." Tamika laughed. But her face clouded and she added, "I have a bad feeling about this shoot tonight."
Rita and I devoured the burrito, rolling down Skidaway Road, AC on high, as the sun set behind us, and we talked, reviewing the plan to simply form a solid wall of truth for Charlotte, to tell her we knew all about her and demand she seek help, for the sake of Chatterley if nothing else. We thought her creation might be even more important to her than her own health.
Rita, from the back seat said, "'Mika, is Charlotte really a danger to herself or others?"
"I hope not," Tamika said, "One thing I know from class is that you have to meet a patient where they are and develop a relationship before you can help them move to urfa escort (https://sanliurfan.com) a better place."
"You think we have that kind of relationship with Charlotte?" Rita asked between bites.
"Not sure. I don't know if Charlotte, or the part of Charlotte that we know, thinks we're her friends. The whole world may be suspect to her. In which case she's gonna feel attacked rather than helped by this." Tamika beat her hands on the wheel, nervous too, not her usual bubbly self.
"I always thought sex was the ultimate intimacy," I said. "Maybe I was wrong. I mean, I used to be attached like velcro to the woman I was having sex with. Now I've had sex with three women in a week and I don't know which way to go. I want to pour my heart into all of you and at least two of you are either indifferent or dangerous."
"That's sweet, Frank," said Tamika, smiling. "I told you not to get too attached to me or Charlotte, didn't I?"
"Well, that leaves Rita." I'm known for stating the obvious.
"Yeah, you and Rita, now, that's another thing." She smiled. "I have a theory about how people make couples. Wanna hear it?"
"Shoot," I said.
"There's this psychologist named Maslow who worked back in the dark ages. About when you were born, Frank."
I poked her shoulder. "I'm about to be a danger to others."
"He developed what he called a 'hierarchy of needs'. Everyone starts at the bottom with a need for basics like shelter and food and has a drive to go higher, to needs like love, self fulfillment and community. He thought that only about five percent of people became what he called 'self-actualized', the most advanced place on the hierarchy."
"That sounds kind of simplistic and maybe Darwinian to me," said Rita, looking at her in the rear view mirror.
"Well, I have two minutes to explain it, so Google it. You want to know my theory or not?"
"What's this got to do with couples?" I asked.
"Well, I think two people who are at about the same place on the ladder are best suited to be happy together. It doesn't matter how high or low as long as they're about the same level, like you two."
Rita reached to the front seat, took my hand and squeezed it. We were turning in at the Bateaux gate.
We rode in silence down the long, dark green drive, headlights boring a tunnel into the wood. Tamika pulled the MINI around back where we found the Beamer. The Charger was there, too. When we opened the doors the Low Country air enveloped us, briny, thick and hot. I started sweating into my shirt. The lights were on in the pool house like that first night I'd been there, what seemed like a lifetime ago. I crossed the patio apprehensively and found the door locked and no one home.
"There's a light up at the big house," said Rita, standing by the pool. Yes, dimly a light glowed from several windows. So we retraced the steps I'd taken on my journey with Kathryn, up to the terrace, now cooling in the evening gloom. A light was on in the library. We filed in and Tamika went to the hall door and called for Charlotte. There was a reply, a muffled echo.
Before we left the room Rita gasped, "Frank, look at this!" She stood before a portrait on the wall facing the windows. "It looks just like you..." I came to her side and saw a painting of a man of middle age, graying, slim and bearded, with glasses. He wore a fine suit and stood leaning suavely on a mantelpiece in some baronial room. His look was pensive, intelligent, his eyes not quite focused on the viewer. I could see the resemblance, but it wasn't the man I saw in the mirror every day.
I tilted my head to read the brass name plate on the frame."Benjamin Franklin Grantwell. Who is this guy?" I asked.
"Grantwell. Charlotte's name. Must be a relative. This is spooky, Frank. It really looks like you. And his middle name is Frank?" Rita clutched my arm. I began to wonder if Charlotte's interest in me was rooted in something in her past and not in me at all. Sometimes desire is only a case of mistaken identity. Maybe it always is.
"Come on. They're upstairs," said Tamika, leaving into the hall and climbing the creaky stairs toward the light on the landing. We left Ben behind and followed.
Upstairs, across the hall from the room where Kathryn had seduced me were Charlotte and Marcus in a large bedroom full of filming gear, lights, reflectors, extension cords and all of the camera rigs we'd used on Thursday by the pool. The room was long enough to have a separate sitting area. The narrower wall that the old iron-framed bed was against also had a door at each end. One was open to an en-suite bathroom. Charlotte, in white polo and tennis skirt, ponytailed as usual, looking as much an in-control boss as ever, was directing Marcus to place a camera by the bed. She turned as we came in, serious.
"Before you say anything, listen to me. I'm not crazy. I am in full possession of my faculties and Kathryn will not be visiting us again. I'm sure Frank told you about what happened here yesterday morning. Frank, you're no doubt confused about that incident. I'm sorry I lost my temper. I didn't handle the situation well."
"There's sinop escort (https://sinophabergazetesi.com) still a mark on your..."
"Let me finish. I am under a doctor's care and I'm taking medication for my condition. I explained to Marcus what happened. I had a slip - I didn't take my meds for a month or so and relapsed. But I'm good now. A fully functioning member of society. Everything is under control." She chopped her hand.
Tamika asked, "How often do..."
"We can talk later. Right now we've got a scene to film. You'll find several more directions in the Drive file I sent you last week. Marcus is here because he has a part as the woman's driver. Read the scene again while he goes to change." Marcus gave me a hard, meaningful look as he left for the bathroom. He pointed and mouthed silently, "I will fuck you up". Jeez, I thought.
Since I'd come to believe that my attraction to Charlotte sprang from my own dysfunction her spell had been broken; I no longer heard her siren's song. I didn't want to be pulled into a love with her and lose myself as I had wanted to. I wasn't the threat Marcus thought I was. We weren't even going to risk Chatterley by confronting her. She'd outflanked us.
We were disarmed. Our plan had been pre-empted. Well, we wanted to keep Chatterley alive. It looked like we were back at work. Still, I had deep misgivings and Tamika, Rita and I shared skeptical looks over our phone screens as we read the revised script. The first part of the scene read as before, with the woman seducing the au-pair into a clinch on the bed. The husband is introduced and takes the girl from behind as we'd rehearsed it. While the au-pair goes down on the wife, the wife calls the driver in from her cell and a four-way begins. The director's notes at this point said 'improvise'. God. I was filled with adrenaline from my anticipation of our confrontation and now I was expected to have an orgy on camera. I had some serious energy to unleash, but I had to do some rapid mental gear shifting. This was like riding the Blue Ridge Parkway; long, heart-bursting uphill climbs, followed by terrifying downhill free-falls. But the view was terrific.
"Also, if anyone finds my phone, let me know. I've misplaced it. 'Mika, put yours here on the nightstand. We need it for a prop." Charlotte pointed at me. "Frank, there's a suit for you in the bathroom. Change there and wait at that end of the room for your part. We'll cut so you can enter from the hall, and again for Marcus. Say your lines when I prompt you. The lighting didn't work out in the sun when we tested it last week, so we're in here. I dropped the GoPro rig out, too. That was too complicated." She scratched her head while reading from her tablet, pointed at the equipment. "Rita, I want you to use the GoPro as a steadycam and move around us. We'll use the dolly pan like before and still keep the static camera on Tamika's face. Use your judgement on framing and focus. I trust you know what I'm looking for. I picked up some establishing exterior shots out in Ardsley Park this afternoon. 'Mika, you did a great job of describing your sensations in rehearsal. Do that again." She looked up at us. "Any questions?"
"What's this about improvising after Marcus comes in?" I asked.
"We haven't rehearsed that and I think we'll capture a more organic and natural scene if we just go with our instincts."
"I haven't had group sex with a guy before," I admitted, chuckling nervously, "I might feel a little awkward."
"You've performed beautifully every time I've been with you, including our rehearsal with Tamika, so don't sweat it. Follow our lead." She looked irritated. "You want a Viagra?"
"No, no... I can manage." I would not take penis pills. I'm not old, I thought. Of course, I'd been sleeping less and screwing more over the last week. My tank was a little low.
"Tamika, talk to him."
'Mika grabbed my wrists and looked up into my eyes. "Frank, you need to own this role, embody the character. You look the part, but you've abdicated your power. In this film you are the boss, you are the rich white man, you own your wife, you have all the privilege and power of your birth. It's a sad fact, but me and Marcus are your servants. Sadder still, these are the roles we were born to play."
"Just for the film, though? You know I'm not like that." Not the time to talk politics, either.
"Yes, for the film. And I admit, sometimes I like to be bossed around, tied up, dominated. But just for fun. Not in real life."
She dropped my hands. "Find the alpha male in yourself tonight, Frank." She grabbed my shirt, pulled herself up and kissed me hard, gave me a wicked smile.
Marcus came out of the bathroom in his driver's uniform, a dark suit and cap, looking like the hired muscle he would be playing. I took his place and found an expensive men's suit in light gray wool, classically cut, a blood-red tie and especially nice Italian shoes. The whole kit was a little musty from hanging who knows how long in this old house. The shoes didn't quite fit, but I figured I wouldn't have them on more than a few minutes. I'd never spent money on shoes myself, yet here were several hundred dollars worth that must just have been sitting in a closet unused for years, rimed with mildew. The rich are different from you and me, Fitzgerald wrote, but I guess they take their pants off one leg at a time like everybody else.