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Living Dolls: The Director's Cut

By: MarshAlien



This is the original ending to my story "Living Dolls." As I prepared to post it, I realized that the end of Chapter Seven, with Jason and Karen sitting on the steps awaiting the return of Jason's parents, was the best place to end the story. Nevertheless, there are more chapters. They have none of the humanity of the first story, but I wrote 'em, and I'll be damned if I'm not going to post 'em. If you haven't read Living Dolls yet, I'd suggest you do that first (although be prepared to be there a while). Just click on my name above, and then on the "Stories/Poems" tab. Otherwise, the unexplained appearance in this story of dolls who can be changed into women may be a bit of a surprise.

CHAPTER ONE

I don't think I'd ever seen Mom as happy as she was when she raced down the sidewalk only to halt, out of breath, nearly out of control, and hear the voice of her goddaughter again. Maybe it was because Karen had told Mom, in no uncertain terms, that she was going to marry me. 

More likely, though, it was because Karen had called her "Mom." We had talked about that before Mom and Dad got home, and Karen had insisted that this was her home, and that these were her parents. She knew that they'd never replace her real parents; in fact, I told her that, if anything, they'd help her 'find' her real parents. But the only "parent" she'd known for the last twelve years had been a sham, and she wanted something real in her life for once. 

So to her she was as good as adopted. It was her family, and her mom and dad. She'd asked me if I minded sharing them, and I told her I didn't. As long as she didn't mind a little incest in the family. That's why that spot on my arm was so susceptible to that second pinch on the front steps.

I also don't think I'd seen Mom or Dad any more impressed than when explained how I'd managed to produce their goddaughter only a few weeks after they'd revealed her existence to me. Karen and I had talked about that, too, before they got there, since there were only a few instances where I was willing to let my story correspond to the truth, and I was a notoriously bad liar. 

"It was all your doing," I told Mom once we'd all gone inside and I'd given them a bare outline of the facts.

"How's that?" She had trained herself not to react to sucking up like that, but I could tell she was eager to claim at least a tiny part of the credit. 

"Well, once I figured out who Kerry might really be," I explained, "I decided to gain her confidence before I came right out and asked her, to establish some rapport."

Mom nodded sagely. This was one of the lessons she'd taught me. Karen was still holding my arm, listening to me shovel this shit. 

"So that when I finally told her I knew who she was, she wouldn't panic and run away. 'Cause she was obviously hiding something, you know."

"Don't use 'you know,'" Mom said.

I stared at her for a few seconds – I found your goddaughter and you're correcting my English? – before continuing.

"And then we started talking, you kn – over a period of a few weeks, and we finally realized that her so-called aunt had been lying to her, too. 'Cause you guys told me that Karen's parents had died in a car accident. And her aunt – "

"Stop calling her my aunt," Karen said. "Please."

"The bitch?"

I got a nod.

"The bitch made up some really sick story to keep Karen under her thumb. So after that it was just some old-fashioned detective work. You know how much I liked all those Hardy Boys books you bought me."

Both parents just stared at me. Probably a little too much sarcasm.

"I did most of it on the Internet."

They both nodded at that. That made sense to them – the Internet. Neither one was really what you'd call computer literate. Both of them knew enough about the Internet to find sites they needed in their specialties, but if I'd told them that you could find out the location of the lost continent of Atlantis on the Internet, they'd have fallen for that, too, hook, line, and sinker.

I smiled at Karen and rubbed her arm. She smiled back at me.

I put the dolls back in my closet that morning and Karen never gave me any reason to take them out. Or frankly, any time. My parents furnished a very lovely bedroom for her, an upstairs room my mother had been using as a second study. On Saturday, they bought her a beautiful queen-sized bed, a chest of drawers, and a new desk, and had her pick out new colors for the walls and the trim. Of course, the painting meant that Karen had to spend the first few nights elsewhere, and the guest bed was too soft. The living room couch was too hard. My bed, oddly, turned out to be just right. After that, she never seemed to be able to find the time to move back to her own room. Not for sleeping, anyway. We liked to use her slightly springier mattress as a change of pace sometimes.

In the weeks that followed, Karen became a new person. From a shy, even sullen twelfth grader, she turned into an outgoing, gregarious . . . eleventh grader. During the investigation into Karen's travels with her "aunt," the police learned that Karen hadn't actually attended school one year. And what the police knew, the Hardwood High School administration soon knew. That prompted them to launch an "investigation" of their own, which meant that Karen was going to have to repeat twelfth grade.

To my surprise, Karen was overjoyed.

"You, um, won't miss me?" I asked. My inferiority complex was never far from the surface.

"Oh, honey, of course I'll miss you," she assured me. "But I've spent the last twelve years without parents. So the thought of another year at home..."

She was lost in her smile. I understood.

The other two students caught up in the "investigation" weren't quite as happy. Both Julie Pinsky and Andy Richardson had spent considerable amounts of time overseas as kids, and they, too, were deemed to be short a few essential classes. Andy's father threatened to sue, of course, but the school was adamant, and he didn't put up a very big fight. Rumor had it that Andy could use the chance to make some better grades, and maybe get into a better school. And after a while, Andy was rubbing his hands at the prospect of being elected student council president for an unprecedented fourth year in a row.

So in the end, we were fine. Right up until three weeks before the end of the school year, that is, when Karen sashayed into our bedroom with practiced nonchalance.

"Andy Richardson asked me to the prom today," she said matter-of-factly.

"Richie Rich?" I blurted. "But I thought that we – that is, I figured –"

I'd just assumed she was going to go with me. The junior-senior prom took place on the last weekend of the school year. I'd helped Karen pick out her dress, while she approved the tux Mom had bought me on New Year's Eve. But I'd never actually asked her to go with me.

And now I'd been upstaged by Andy Richardson. It was a sign of how much Karen had blossomed over the last couple of months that the guy who was universally agreed to be one of the best-looking guys in the school, not to mention the wealthiest guy, or at least the son of the town's wealthiest lawyer, had asked her to the prom. 

My horror at what I'd done, or more precisely what I'd left undone, was apparently obvious on my face, because after a few more seconds of her haughtiest expression, Karen burst into giggles.

"What a gulli-bull," she laughed. "What a nin-cow-poop. What a –"

"That's enough, Bugs," I cut her off.

"I didn't say I'd go with him," Karen said. "I just said he'd asked. You don't think I'd dump my fiancée just cause Richie Rich starts hittin' on me, do you?"

"Whew," I said, breathing again. "What about Julie anyway?"

Julie Pinsky had been dating Andy Richardson since, like, forever. When he was elected head of the student council at the end of the school year two years ago – as a rising sophomore, for crying out loud; when he'd run for reelection last spring nobody even bothered to run against him – Julie was on his slate as the nominee for secretary. She was very attractive, kind of a prerequisite to being a cheerleader, and a really nice girl. If she'd sat down at our table with a signed, witnessed, and notarized acceptance, Gordon Ackerman would have been all over her. 

"I don't know," Karen said. "I couldn't believe he asked me. But they were still sitting together at lunch. I wonder what's going on with them. Do you think she turned him down?"

"Julie? Rumor has it that she hasn't turned down Andy for anything. By which I mean, anything. More likely she's just like me, assuming they're going together."

"Until she finds out he asked me out," Karen said sympathetically. "The poor girl – she'll freak. I mean, don't you think?"

"It is possible to find out," I said slowly.

"How?" 

My eyes drifted over to the closet.

"The dolls!" Her eyes lit up. "I forgot all about the dolls. You've been a very good boy, not playing with your dolls, haven't you?"

I grinned at her.

"I have enough trouble with the real you."

She hurried to the closet and pulled out the brunette.

"I'm sorry, I forget how they work."

I explained the protocol. 

"Can you get men with them?" she asked, with a sly grin.

"No," I answered.

"When did you ever try to get a man?" she started laughing.

"I didn't," I said. "I'm just telling you that you, Karen McCarthy, can't use them to get men."

"So what you really mean is that I may not use them," she said, her eyes twinkling as they always did when she had a chance to correct my grammar. "I may not use my boyfriend's cute little Barbie doll to get George Clooney, hunky actor, life-size."

She hugged the doll's lips to hers, closing her eyes as she waited for the transformation.

"Stay right there," I said after nothing had happened. I touched the doll. "Let me try. So you're looking for a life-size version of George Clooney, hunky actor, who co-starred in that movie 'Oceans Twelve' with the actress Catherine Zeta-Jones."

I stepped back and watched Karen, her eyes closed, kissing Catherine Zeta-Jones, who appeared in a lovely pair of white shorts and a white top. Karen's eyes popped open. Still kissing, she looked over at me, narrowed her eyes to give me a glare, and then closed them once again and returned her attention to the kiss. Oh, God, was this hot!

"Very nice," she said after she finally broke the kiss. "Now turn her back. We have work to do."

I turned her back to a doll, and Karen turned her into Julie Pinsky. Julie was wearing her cheerleader outfit, her face flushed with the exertion of practice.

"Hello, mistress," she said sullenly.

"Ooh, that's weird." Karen turned to me.

"It's happened before," I said. "You should have seen Kerry Marshall the first time I summoned her."

"That's enough from you, Mister Thompson," she said, turning back to the doll. "I need you to answer some questions, Julie." 

"Yes, mistress."

"Did you know that Andy asked me to the prom today?"

"I – I figured he was going to."

"Why?"

"'Cause you're number one now," Julie explained.

"Number one?"

"Number one on the senior babe list."

"There's a senior babe list?" I burst in.

"There's a senior babe list?" Karen repeated.

"Yeah, the guys in Andy's group rate the girls in each class. You just made it up to first. I'm in second now. So I knew he'd ask you out."

"So why did I suddenly go up to first?"

"At the beginning of the year, you were tenth on looks alone. But they figured you were a real drip 'cause you never talked to anyone. Ever since, like, the middle of February, when you suddenly started being nice to everybody, you've been rising pretty steadily. And apparently you smiled at Bobby last week."

Bobby was one of Andy's assistant rich kids. Currently, he was the vice-president of the student council. 

"God damn assholes." Karen glared at me.

"I don't do it!" I held up my hands in surrender.

"So why the hell do you date him?" Karen turned back to Julie.

"Well, you know," she said slowly. "I'm not smart like you guys. I'm just a . . . a cheerleader. My mom's always told me that I was never gonna get a guy with my brains. But I got Andy. And my mom is . . ." 

"All proud that you landed a rich one," Karen prompted her.

Julie simply nodded.

"And your dad?"

"They're divorced. And I only see Dad on the weekends. He actually hates Andy, even though he works with Andy's dad all the time."

"Is your dad a lawyer, too?" I asked.

Karen shot me a look.

"If you feel you need to chime in," she said with quiet sarcasm, "could you at least say something intelligent?"

"Excuse me?" I raised my eyebrows at her.

"You do know there's a local paper, don't you?" she asked.

"Well, yes," I said, slowly, "the Journal. But –"

"And the big story splashed all over the front page last week?" she continued. "About the Eagles?"

"Yeah," I agreed. "That was cool. Some local bank financed a guy who bought, like, 25 percent of the team."

"See?" She turned to Julie. "Mention sports and they perk right up.

"And the picture that went with the article?" She turned back to me.

"Well, ya got me there," I said.

Karen sighed.

"Was of Gene Pinsky, president of Hardwood National Bank," she said. "Who arranged the financing. And who is Julie's?"

"Father," I finished.

"Good for you." Karen smiled at me like I'd just said something clever. And like I was four. She turned back to Julie. "So if Andy asks you if you'll go to the prom with him after I turned him down, would you go?"

"Well, yeah, sure," she said. "I mean, like, who else is going to ask me?"

Just about every unattached boy in the twelfth grade, I thought, would cut off his arm for the chance. Of course, not with Richie Rich in the picture. Karen and I traded looks.

"And I suppose you've fucked him, too, huh?" Karen continued.

"Well, yeah," she said. "How else would I, um, you know, keep him?"

"God damn asshole," Karen said. "Is he any good?"

Julie looked puzzled.

"In bed," Karen said. "Is he any good in bed?"

"I guess," Julie said. "How do you tell?"

"Well, you do orgasm, don't you?"

"I guess. I mean, it feels good while he's doing it."

"And how long does he usually do it?"

"Five minutes?" Julie wrinkled her brow.

"Five minutes?!" Karen was incredulous.

"Yeah," Julie acknowledged. "I usually have to blow him first so he can last that long."

"Yeah, they all tell you that," Karen said with another glare at me. "And then he does you?" 

"Does my what?" Julie asked.

"You know," Karen said, "returns the favor."

The expression on Julie's face was priceless, and I was holding my stomach trying not to laugh out loud. Karen gave me a hard stare.

"Is he at least big?" Karen asked.

"Well, he's bigger than the other –" Julie slammed her mouth shut.

"Wait a minute," I butted in. "You've been dating Richie, er, Andy, since the ninth grade. You didn't have sex before then, did you?"

Julie remained frozen in place.

"Answer him, Julie," Karen said gently. "Tell the truth."

"No," she whispered.

"So these other guys," I said, taking my cue from Karen and lowering my voice. "Andy knew about them, didn't he?"

She nodded.

"Did Andy make you have sex with them?" Karen asked. I could hear the edge in her voice. 

Julie nodded again.

"I'm gonna rip his balls off," Karen said. She turned to me. "Operation Bury Richie Rich begins today."

"You know," I said, "I like to think that the dolls should be used only for good and not for evil."

"Thank you, Mother Teresa," she said. "It's good for Julie, isn't it? And how was that little coed thing you pulled off good for Sue's boyfriend Stewie, anyway?

"I'll take your silence as assent," she concluded after a millisecond pause.

She turned back to Julie.

"Here, Julie," she said, patting the bed. "Sit here."

Julie obeyed in silence, and followed Karen's further orders to spread her legs apart.

"Now," Karen continued, "pull your panties to the side so we can see your pretty pussy."

"What are you doing?" I asked her.

Julie again obeyed her mistress; both ignored me.

"Ooh, completely bare," Karen smiled. "You like it that way?"

"Andy l–" Julie began before she stopped herself.

"Andy likes it that way, the little shit," Karen said. "You'd think he'd pay it more attention."

She turned to me.

"Why don't you show her what I mean about returning favors?"

"Are you kidding?" I laughed. "You don't know where that's been."

"Will you excuse us, Julie?" Karen said sweetly, before she turned back to glare at me.

"Outside."

I followed her out of the room and waited until she shut the door behind her. Then she turned and drew back her arm and slapped me across the cheek.

"What was that for?" I whined.

"I don't ever want to hear you say anything like that about another woman." She was red hot. "Especially when she can hear you."

"But she can't!" I protested. I pointed into the room. "That's a doll."

"I don't care," she hissed. "She's a guest. That girl in there feels just as insulted by your stupid, idiotic comments as the real Julie would."

When you're wrong, you're wrong.

"Sorry."

"Besides," she said, as the anger dissipated just a little, "I can't imagine you were real good about protection and disease prevention with these dolls before, were you?"

"Sorry," I said.

"Okay," she said. "Now get back in there and treat that girl like the, like the –"

"Like the achingly beautiful future cheerleader captain that she is?" I grinned.

"Asshole," she grabbed my arm and pushed me through the open door. 

"Besides, Andy and his buddies always use rubbers," Karen said confidently as we approached Julie.

Julie just nodded.

"How do you know?" I asked.

"'Cause Andy's not about to risk getting Julie pregnant," Karen said to me grimly. "And he doesn't want his buddies coming inside his girl. Now get to work. You need to figure out just what turns Julie on."

"Because?" I prompted her.

"Because when you do it for real, I want you to have all the advantage you can get.

"Not that you seem to need it," she added ruefully. "Take a look, Julie."

Karen undid my belt and lowered my pants and shorts.

"Oh, golly," Julie said. "I couldn't possibly..."

"Julie, I just want you to relax," Karen said, "and let Jason make you feel good. And then I think you'll find that you possibly could."

Julie was still apprehensive, but she leaned back and left her legs apart as I knelt down between them. 

It actually wasn't hard to make Julie feel good. Over the past few years, her body had adapted to Andy's hastiness by giving her a hair-trigger of her own. Or a hairless trigger, I grinned to myself, as I was eating her through a second climax. 

And Karen was more than happy to help. After we'd stripped Julie of her clothes – I particularly enjoyed watching Karen pull Julie's sweater over her head – I lay down on the bed and Julie straddled me, facing Karen who was sitting at the end of the bed.


"How does it feel?" Karen asked.

"Fucking fantastic," I moaned. My cock had gotten sucked into Julie's pussy like a dust bunny in a vacuum cleaner.

"Not you, jerk," Karen said. "Julie. How does it feel?"

"Oh, God," she said. "It's so big. I'm so full. I'm –"

After that, Julie didn't have much else to say for a while. A couple of "Jason, Jason, Jaaaa-sons" where her pitch went higher and higher until it ended in a cute little squeaking noise. Other than that, though, nothing really coherent.

Fortunately, Karen was there to fill in the silence. When I sat up to put Julie on her hands and knees and fuck her from behind, Karen decided it was time to offer some advice.

"Reach around and wiggle your finger against her clit," Karen said.



Living Dolls: The Director's Cut



"Huh?" I said on one of my thrusts.

"Reach around her and diddle her clit," Karen said again. "To make this position as good for her as it is for you." 

"How – come – you – never – told – me – this – when – we – were – doing – it?" I asked in tempo.

"Well, you hope boys will learn things on their own," Karen giggled. "They never do, but hope springs eternal. I know you like it this way. So I like to do it this way for you. But a little remedial education never hurt."

Apparently not. Julie had gone from a reluctant partner to an active participant. Not that she could do much in her position, of course. But from the way she kept striking her hand on the bed and whimpering my name over and over again, I figured I'd learned something pretty good. I finally turned her over on her back, where she instantly wrapped her legs around me and pulled me back towards her. I held back at the entrance, looking down at the way the perspiration had matted the roots of her hair, smiling at a picture that was both erotically wild and incredibly soft.

"God, Jason," she whispered, "you're going to kill me with that thing."

"I'm sorry," I said.

"I'm going to kill you if you don't," she said, sending Karen into hysterical laughter next to us.

"All right," I said, "but you asked for it, Julie."

"I'll beg for it if you want me to." She smiled back at me. 

There was no need for that.

______________________

"It's all set," Karen announced a day later as we did the dinner dishes.

"What?" I asked.

"My date on Friday with Richie Rich. Your date with Julie Pinsky."

"Oh, God. How did you get Julie to agree to that?"

"I didn't have to. I told Andy I'd give him one chance, on Friday night, provided that he got you a date with the Julie Pinsky. I tell you, that girl has no self-esteem at all. She came up to me in the hall before eighth period with this kind of really dull look, and asked me what time you were picking her up and what I thought you'd want her to wear. And then she told me what Andy would want me to wear. Like I really give a flying –"

"And what time am I picking her up?" I interrupted. "And where are we going? I assume this is Operation – what did you call it?"

"Operation Bury Richie Rich."

"And you're going to bury him by dating him? While I take his girlfriend somewhere else on a date?" 

"You're staying here," Karen said. "Mom and Dad are going to a ball in Allentown, and won't be home until like two o'clock.  So you'll be here. Where I'll be expecting you to use some of that Gail Dodge magic on Julie."

"Well, I suppose I could do that," I said with a blush, "with your permission, of course. While you'll be doing what, exactly?"

"Not letting that asshole Richie Rich fuck me for his five minutes of fame, for one thing."

"Well, this looks like it's going to be a good evening all around." I grinned, earning a swat on the arm.

And so on Friday evening, about a half an hour after Karen had left in the car that we'd convinced Mom and Dad to buy us, albeit with Karen's money (she'd absolutely refused to even sit in the car her "Aunt Camilla" had bought), I answered the door of my otherwise empty house to find the lovely Julie Pinsky, nervously shifting her weight from foot to foot.

"Hi, Julie." I stepped back to let her in, and closed the door behind her. Karen had given her some very good advice on clothing: a white, short-sleeve blouse that was just low-cut enough to emphasize her chest, and a pair of black jeans.

"So, you want a joe blob?" she slurred.

That's when I suspected she might be a little tipsy.

"I'm sorry?" I grinned, leaning in.

"I said – UURRPP!"

And that's when I knew she was actually drunk. It landed on my clothes, her clothes, and the tiled floor of our foyer. 

It turned out, though, that she couldn't have been that drunk. By the time Karen arrived home, a little after ten-thirty, Julie was sitting on one end of the couch wearing Karen's terry-cloth bathrobe, while I sat on the other end in sweat pants and a T-shirt. I was reading to her from one of my favorite Woody Allen stories, and she was laughing uproariously. We looked up as Karen banged through the door and then slammed it behind her.

"That son of a bitch!"

"What happened?" I rose to my feet.

"That son of a bitch drugged me!" she said. "He put some kind of shit in the wine he gave me."

I sat back down. She looked fine. Julie and I looked at each other and then back at her.

"'e turned me into a newt," Julie said.

"I got better," I added reflexively before I started laughing. Wow! Who knew what a jewel this girl was? I'll bet Richie Rich didn't. If I didn't already have the Hope Diamond...

Karen waited us out.

"Not me, jerk," she finally said. "The – you know."

"The what?" I said. This was way too cryptic even for me.

She opened her purse and stuck it in front of me.

"Gross!" I said, jerking my head back at the smell and pushing the purse away.

"Fuck!" Karen said. Reaching into her purse, she pulled out a version of herself that was even smaller than the normal doll. I hadn't even known they could do that! The doll was clearly woozy, and had thrown up several times in Karen's purse on the way home.

"What – what is that?" Julie's eyes were wide as she watched the tiny girl writhing on the table top.

"Oh, shit!" Karen apparently just realized what she'd done. "Look, you have to promise that this will remain our secret, okay?"

Julie scooted back a little more.

"Julie?" Karen said, a little desperately. "Promise?"

Julie finally tore her eyes away long enough to look at Karen.

"Um, okay," Julie said. "What is it?"

Karen gave her the short version, and by the time she was finished, Julie – who had the evidence right in front of her – was perfectly willing to accept that I had a magical doll." 

"So I brought the doll in my purse and sent her inside. Meanwhile, I went to O'Brien's to give myself an alibi. I spent the night talking to every jock in the place. And then I swing back by Richie's at ten, and look in to see myself lying on the couch. Richie was in the kitchen, and I heard some other voices, too. Apparently his buddies had me, too." 

Julie turned beet red.

"He drugs you every time, doesn't he?"

"Well, he always gives me a glass of wine before we, you know, do it," Julie was starting to tear up. "He says it's to relax me."

"I'll bet," Karen said.

"You had one tonight, didn't you?" I said with sudden realization.

Julie was staring at me now. 

"She came over here and upchucked all over me," I told Karen. "I had to wash the clothes twice, and now they're in the dryer. Then I went out to her car and found these."

I held up two little airplane bottles of bourbon.

"So she decided she needed some relaxing on her own. Most of it apparently landed on our floor before it really got into her." 

"So you guys didn't . . .?" Karen asked.

I shook my head.

"But apparently you, or she . . .?" I asked tentatively.

"I don't want to talk about it," Karen said.

"So when did you shave, though?" 

"Shave what?" Karen answered.

"Your, um, you know," I said, pointing at the doll's bare mound.

Karen just stared, her breath getting deeper and deeper. She turned to me and spoke with an eerily calm voice.

"It's time to pay that son of a bitch back."

"And you want to do that by?" 

"By stealing his girlfriend."

"By what?" Julie whispered.

"By showing you, Julie, just how good sex can be," Karen said. "As opposed to five minutes with Mr. Littledick and his even smaller, slimier friends.

"Look at me, Julie," she said.

The brunette slowly raised her head, and finally looked Karen in the eye.

"It's nothing to be ashamed of," she said. "You were drugged every time. And the three of them together didn't have this, did they?"

She stepped over to me, dropped to her knees, and yanked my sweats and briefs down my thighs. 

I heard "Oh, golly," and looked over to see Julie with her hands over her mouth. I'd already seen this movie. Fortunately, I liked the way it ended.

CHAPTER TWO

Mom raised an eyebrow when she saw me eating breakfast with two lovely girls, but she also couldn't resist smiling.

"Mom, this is Julie Pinsky," Karen said. "Julie, this is Jason's real mom, and my second mom, Dana Thompson."

"Nice to meet you, Mrs. Thompson."

"We were just thinking about who Julie ought to go to the prom with," Karen said.

"How about Gordon?" Mom said as she poured herself a cup of coffee.

"Gordon Ackerman?" I asked, a little puzzled.

"Gordon Ackerman?" Julie repeated, a little alarmed.

"Gordon Ackerman," Karen echoed, as if she'd just had a revelation. "You know Gordon, right?"

"Well, yeah," Julie said. "But . . ."

"But what?" Karen pressed her. "He's a nice guy."

"Well, yeah, he's nice," Julie agreed.

"And cute," Karen prompted.

"Well, yeah, he is cute, but he's kind of . . . geeky," Julie finally said.

Karen just stared at her for a minute before speaking.

"Yeah, how's that geek, non-geek thing working for you, anyway?" she said, not giving Julie a chance to answer before turning to me. "I forgot to tell you, when I first talked to Julie about this, the first thing she said to me was, 'You go out with Jason Thompson, right? I mean, he's kind of cute, but isn't he a little . . . geeky?' So what did you think of geeky, Pinsky?" 

Her eyes wide, Julie looked over at my mom.

"Oh, I'll just take my coffee into the other room," Mom said with a smile, "and you guys can discuss all Gordon's and Jason's geekiness to your heart's content."

Julie blushed as my mother left, and then turned shyly back to Karen.

"So do you think that Gordon is as geeky as Jason?" she asked.

"I'm sure he has the potential," she said, "though I'd be surprised if he had as much practice. You might have to coach him up a little. But he's such an excellent student at everything else. . ."

Julie took a deep breath.

"Besides, I can make him even cuter," Karen added off-handedly.

"Excuse me?" I butted in. "You can go around making guys cuter?"

"Not all guys," Karen said. "You, for example, are just about cuted out. But Gordon, with a better haircut, and a nice tux – he's gonna be a real good-lookin' guy."

"I think I'm offended," I pouted.

"I think you're just full of crap," Karen said without any sympathy. "Well?"

"All right, God help me," Julie said after a deep breath. "I'll go to the prom with Gordon Ackerman. How do you know he hasn't asked anyone else? How do you know he'll ask me?"

"Gordon Ackerman, ask a girl out on his own?" Karen snorted. "Not likely.  However, I do know a way to prod him along. I don't suppose you'd be willing to sign a paper, which we will witness, stating that you'll go out with him?"

"Well, I guess," Julie began, "but –"

"And notarized," I pointed out. "It has to be notarized."

"My dad's secretary is a notary," Julie said eagerly. Wait a minute, this hottie actually wanted to go out with Gordon Ackerman now? Maybe Karen pulled a switch with the dolls. "And they always work at the bank on the first and third Saturdays of each month."

"Well, let's get a move on," Karen said.

After breakfast, we drafted what we thought sounded like an official acceptance and I drove the group to the bank. We walked through the lobby to the offices in the bank and Julie started singing out.

"Hi, Mrs. Ack – kerman." 

Julie had stopped dead in the middle of the door, so I had to slide around her to get into the office. Fortunately, as we were walking through the bank, I'd remembered that Gordon's mom worked there; otherwise I would have done the same stop-and-stare that Julie was now in the middle of. Not for the same reason, though. Julie, for example, had only just now realized that she was committing herself to date her father's secretary's son. 

For me, it was a little different. After I'd dropped Shelly Johnson at her door on New Year's morning, I'd gone home to watch the football games. Mom and Dad went out around one o'clock to a party, and as soon as they left I'd summoned Shelly.

"Master," she purred, her eyes lighting up. "You were wonderful last night."

"Thanks," I said. "You were pretty amazing, too."

Well, I couldn't very well turn down a blow job from Shelly, could I? A few minutes later, though, I broached the subject that I'd summoned her to discuss, the crush she'd mentioned the night before. She explained that in her freshman year of college, she and her roommate had both had a crush on some Steve guy from their Intro Psych class, and that I was, if not a dead ringer for Steve, the next closest thing. Right before Thanksgiving, they both had a little too much wine and the roommate, Andrea, had called him and invited him over. Before anything could happen, a fire alarm sent the entire dorm out into the street. 

Shelly also explained that after they got home for break the next day, Andrea had reunited with her high school sweetheart and, a month later, found herself pregnant. After that, she never came back to school. With Andrea spoken for, Shelly had dated Steve a few times after Thanksgiving, but, because of her exams and some problems he was having at home, they never seriously hooked up. And then he too hadn't shown up at school after Christmas break, and had never answered any of Shelly's letters to boot.


Shelly was blushing so furiously when she told the story, particularly the first part, that I decided to have a little fun. I summoned the two beautiful, horny eighteen-year-old coeds, Shelly Havelmeyer and Andrea Hanson, and "reenacted" the incident. While I was doing it, though – specifically, while Shelly was sitting on my cock and Andrea – "call me Andy, Steve" – was sitting on my face – I couldn't help but think that Andrea looked vaguely familiar. 

After we were finished, I used the dolls to find out why.

"Andrea Hanson," the current version, was my buddy Gordon's mom, Andrea Ackerman. Interesting, I remember thinking, that the dolls respond to either the maiden name or the married name. Huh. 

And while I was thinking about this interesting phenomenon, Andrea Ackerman, twenty pounds heavier, maybe, with much shorter hair and a much, much more conservative outfit, was dropping to the floor to give me a blow job.

"No, no, no," I said. Shelly was one thing. Gordon's mom was something else. She was still very attractive, but no, no, no. In fact, if I'd known it was her when I was, er, enjoying the teenaged version, it would have put a serious damper on the afternoon's activities. There were some things you just didn't do in Hardwood, Pennsylvania.

The adult version of Andrea confirmed Shelly's story, and told me that she'd married Gordon's dad after she'd dropped out of college. He had died when Gordon was ten years old. She hadn't been working at the time, but had found a nice job in the bank and, with a little insurance money, had made a nice life for herself and Gordon. It was a cute little story and I dismissed her.

I'd long since forgotten it. It was only while Karen, Julie, and I were trooping through the lobby of the bank today that I remembered that Andrea Ackerman worked there. Fortunately, Julie's surprise gave me time to cover up my own.

"Hi, Mrs. Ack - kerman," I mimicked Julie. "I had no idea you pronounced it that way."

"Hello, Jason," Andrea looked up and smiled. "Julie. Your dad's busy at the moment."

"That's all right," I said. "We wanted to see you. Mrs. A, this is Karen McCarthy. Karen, this is Gordon's mom."

"It's nice to meet you, Mrs. Ackerman," Karen said.

"And it's nice to finally meet the gorgeous redhead I've heard so much about," Mrs. Ackerman smiled as Karen blushed. "Gordon's been telling me that his friends are dating the hottest girls in school. And I saw Gunner and his girlfriend at the mall yesterday evening. You boys are certainly doing all right for yourselves, aren't you?"

Karen immediately picked up on the wistfulness in her voice.

"So Gordon hasn't asked anyone to the prom, huh?" she said.

"No," Mrs. Ackerman sighed. "I keep telling him that he's going to regret not going, even if it's just with a friend. But who listens to mothers?"

"I always listen to my mother, Mrs. A," I said. "And my mother would tell you not to give up hope quite that quickly. Speaking of which, could you notarize something for us?"

"Certainly," she said, happy for the change of subject. "All three of you?"

"Julie's going to sign it, and Karen and I will witness it," I explained. "Maybe you should read it first."

"Oh that's not necessary," Julie managed to speak for the first time since her initial greeting. I snatched the paper out of her hands and put it in on Andrea's desk. I watched Andrea read it and then stiffen.

"This is not very funny, Julie Pinsky," she said in a somewhat loud and trembling voice. She glared over at me, and I just grinned back at her.

"Jason Thompson," she began to scold me as well before stopping short. Apparently, it occurred to her that I was one of her son's best friends, and unlikely to be involved in a practical joke this hurtful. She turned back to Julie in confusion.

"But you're dating that assho—" she started before abruptly shutting her mouth. I couldn't help but start laughing, and Karen was about to join me when we heard another voice from the doorway on the opposite side of the room.

"That asshole Andy Richardson?" 

We looked up to see a good-looking guy in his early forties with a broad grin on his face leaning against the door frame. 

"Daddy!" Julie squeaked.

"Hi, punkin," he said. "Sorry, I just couldn't resist finishing one of Andrea's sentences. She's been doing that to me for years."

"Mister Pinsky, I am so sorry," Mrs. Ackerman said. 

"Oh, you are not," Mr. Pinsky said. "And I think my daughter knows by now that you call me Gene. Hi, I'm Gene Pinsky."

"Oh, excuse me," Mrs. Ackerman said, still flustered. "Mr. Pinsky, this is Jason Thompson, one of my son's friends, and Karen McCarthy."

"Very nice to meet you," he said jovially. "Although I have to tell you that what got me out of my seat was that voice. 'This is not very funny, Julie Pinsky.'" 

He added the last in a high falsetto that had Mrs. Ackerman squirming in her seat.

"Just last week," Mr. Pinsky pressed on, "she used the very same tone of voice on me when I gave her her bonus. 'This is not very funny, Gene Pinsky.' Apparently, she thought that I, a bank president, mind you, was giving her a fraudulent check."

He was clearly enjoying this, and walked over to the desk to pick up the paper we'd worked up. He read it over and cocked an eyebrow at his daughter. Without warning, he tore it in half.

I could see Karen about to explode next to me, and Julie looked like she'd just lost her best friend. Mrs. Ackerman, in the meantime, had gone from looking outraged to simply looking shocked.

Suddenly, Julie's father gave us a big smile.

"Let's do this right, shall we? Andrea, get some of the good paper. Hey, Frank, come on out here."

Another figure appeared in the doorway.

"Hi, Uncle Frank," Julie said.

"Hi, sweetie," he answered.

"Frank Tonelli, this is Karen McCarthy. Karen, Frank is the mayor of Hardwood and Julie's godfather."

"Nice to meet you, sir," Karen said, all but curtseying.

"And this is Jason Thompson." Mister Pinsky turned to me after Karen had shaken hands with the mayor. We shook hands as well.

Mr. Pinsky turned back to Julie. 

"So what happened to that – to Mr. Richardson, that is?"

"My, um, new friends have convinced me that I need to date, um, other guys," Julie said shyly.

"And that's what this is, you're going to be dating this – um – Gordon Ackerman?" he smiled. "Do we know anything about him?"

He handed the two pieces of paper back to Mrs. A, who was clearly mortified at this new development.




Living Dolls: The Director's Cut



"No, no, the nice bank stationery, Andrea," he said. "The mayor and I will witness it. Make sure you include all of our titles, particularly signatory's father and godfather. I'd hate to have this young man think my daughter wasn't serious."

Twenty minutes later, the trap was set, and two days after that, the bear walked right into it.

"Well, all right, how about Julie Pinsky?" Gordon asked. 

We were sitting at our usual cafeteria table on Monday. We had changed the arrangements again, of course; Gordon now sat in the middle on one side with Karen and Sue on either side of him, and Gunner and I occupied two of the three seats on the other side. Gunner now sat across from Sue on one end, and I sat across from Karen on the other, leaving the seat between us unoccupied. 

Karen had wasted no time.

"So who ya takin' to the prom?" she asked Gordon.

"Oh, for cryin' out loud," he moaned. "Last week that's all my mom talked about – the prom, the prom, the prom. Then this weekend, it was like she'd finally given up. I didn't hear a damn thing about the prom. And now you start. It's like frickin' tag team wrestling. I'm not takin' anyone. I'm not goin' to the prom."

"What about Alice Lincoln?" Karen asked.

"Too shy." Sue leaned over to talk across him. The two of them always had fun talking over Gordon. "That wouldn't work. How about Kathy Wilson?"

"Kathy Wilson would eat poor Gordon alive," Karen said.

"So now we need someone who's just right," Gordon teased them in his best Goldilocks voice.

"So you pick someone," Karen prompted him.

He picked Julie. I followed his eyes to see Julie enter the serving area.

"Julie Pinsky?" Sue said warily.

"Sure." Gordon laughed. "Look at this table. At the beginning of the year, three nerds. Now, three nerds, a gorgeous redhead, and a beautiful blonde. Why shouldn't I be entitled to a lovely brunette?"

"Exactly." Karen joined the laughter. "So ask her out."

"Karen," Sue started to warn her. Up until now, I'd suspected that Sue had been roped into this as well, but apparently she had no idea what Karen and I had done.

"No, no, no," she said, stifling Sue's protests. "He needs to ask her."

"Look," Gordon said with a sly grin. "Julie Pinsky may be the most beautiful girl in the senior class – sorry, ladies, I have a thing for brunettes – and she may finally be tired of dating Richie Rich for however many years and want to try her luck at the nerd table. But she's still gonna have to play by the rules."

"The rules being?" Karen asked.

"Signed, witnessed, and notarized," Gordon said. "I'm not askin' her out if there's even the slightest possibility of rejection."

"So if she manages to divine what it is that you want, and agrees in advance, you'll ask her out, right? Is that right, Gordon?"

"Absolutely."

"So explain to me, hypothetically, just how she's supposed to know that?" Karen asked. "Is there a sign somewhere? Something on your webpage, perhaps?"

"This is an awfully silly discussion," Gordon said, a little put out at the way he was being teased. "I told you I'm not going – "

"Hi, Julie," Sue said, looking over Gunner's shoulder. The most beautiful girl in the senior class had apparently snuck up on us while Gordon was arguing with Karen.

"Hi, Sue."

"Hi, Julie!"

"Hi, Karen."

"Julie," I grunted, followed by an equally monotonous grunt from Gunner. We knew that even turning around for another girl wasn't acceptable.

"Jason, Gunner," Julie said.

"OW!" Gordon said, giving Karen a dirty look. She returned his look in spades and nodded at the brunette standing across the table. 

"Hi, Julie," he mumbled.

"Hi, Gordon," Julie said brightly. "Is this seat taken?"

"No, not at all," Karen said. "Stand up for the lady, you two goons."

Gunner and I good-naturedly stood to let Julie take the seat between us.

"So are you and Andy going to the prom?" Sue asked.

"No," Julie said, staring directly at Gordon. "I'm hoping I get asked by someone else."

Clearly confused, Sue looked over at Gordon as well. He remained stone-faced, but he was sweating. Sue turned back to Julie and sighed.

"I can't believe I'm going to ask this," she said, "but would you be willing to sign a –"

"No!" Gordon yelped.

"No what?" Karen needled him. "You just said no more than two minutes ago that if Julie Pinsky here produces a signed, witnessed, and notarized statement that she would accept a date to the prom with you, then you would ask her to go. I heard you say it."

"Karen," Gordon was turning beet red.

"Didn't you hear it, Sue?" she asked.

By now, Sue knew that something was up.

"I certainly did. Gunner?"

"Oh, yeah. Jase?"

"You bet."

Now it was Julie's turn to sigh.

"The things I won't do to get a date."

She reached into her purse and pulled out the bank envelope.  Gordon simply stared at it as she held it out to him, so Sue reached out to take it instead. 

"May I?" she asked with a big smile on her face.

"Please," Julie said.

Sue gleefully tore open the envelope and began reading.

"I. Julie Pinsky, hereby swear and assert that I will accept an invitation from Gordon Ackerman to the Hardwood High School prom. Signed, Julie Pinsky. Witnessed by Gene Pinsky, President, Hardwood National Bank, Signatory's father, and Frank Tonelli, Mayor, Hardwood, Pennsylvania, Signatory's godfather. And notarized by Andrea Ackerman. Are you related to her, Gordon?"

"Oh, my God," Gordon groaned. "No wonder my mother was so frickin' happy this weekend."

"Gordon?" Karen said, stern and sweet at the same time. "Don't you have something you need to ask Julie?"

Despite the fact that he practically had a red carpet laid out in front of him, Gordon still swallowed hard before he looked up at Julie.

"Julie Pinsky, will you . . ." he stammered. "Will you, um . . ."

"I'd love to go to the prom with you, Gordon," Julie finished for him with a smile. "What time would you like to pick me up?"

"Eight o'clock," Karen hissed.

"Eight o'clock," Gordon dutifully repeated, as all three women broke out in smiles.

It was actually five after when we got there, because Gordon's mom thought us incapable of explaining how to use her camera to Julie's father once we got there. That was the second time in a week that I'd seen Mrs. A flustered. Come to think of it, I think it was the second time ever.  

Gordon disappeared inside while the rest of us – me, Karen, Sue, and Gunner – waited patiently in the limo. Sue and Gunner had been runner-up prom queen last year, and the prom queen was currently in seclusion, awaiting the imminent birth of her baby. So Sue would be crowning the new girl. After five minutes, Mr. Pinsky waved us all inside, and then sent me back out to the limo for Mrs. Ackerman's camera. 

"I'm under very strict orders," he explained, lining us up for the photo. "By the way, I'm sorry about the campus center."

"The what?" I asked.

"The campus center," he said, "at the college? Where you were supposed to have your post-prom party?"

"What about it?" I asked.

"There was a fire. They said it'll take at least thirty days before it's useable again."

"Well, sh – oot."

"Exactly," Mr. Pinsky said with a smile. "However, I'm going out tonight, and I don't expect to be back until quite late. Quite. Late. So if you guys – and I mean just the six of you – want to come back here after the prom, feel free. Is that alright, punkin?"

"Thank you, daddy. It's perfect."

"Thank you, sir," Gordon said nervously. Well, of course; he'd said everything nervously ever since we'd picked him up. He went on saying everything nervously throughout most of the prom. When Julie Pinsky was named queen, we nearly had to scrape him off the floor to get him to take his position beside her as king. Her election had clearly been engineered by Andy before he learned, on the Thursday before the prom, that she wasn't going with him. Now he was furious at her, but even more furious at Karen, whom he glared at all evening long. Karen ate it up. Every time she caught the full force of one of those stares, she'd blow him a kiss, and fall into my arms laughing.

We dismissed the limo when we got back to Julie's. She assured us that when her father got home, she could drive us all back to our respective homes.

"And if he never gets back home?" I asked. "He's going to be Quite. Late."

"You're complaining, Thompson?" Sue grinned.

"No, ma'am," I said with a grin of my own. "Just establishing the ground rules."

"Rules?" Gunner was grinning, too. "We don't need no stinkin' rules."

"No, guys, Thompson's right," Karen the wet blanket said. "We're guests here. If there are ground rules, we're going to obey each and every one of them."

"The ground rules are as follows," said Julie, who'd popped into the kitchen while we engaged in what passed for witty repartee in our little group, and who returned with a grin even bigger than the rest of ours. "Daddy left me a message. He won't be home at all. So Sue and Gunner, you get the guest room down the hall. Karen and Jase, you get my older brother's bedroom upstairs. And as for you, tiger" – she pulled Gordon's bow tie loose and kept hold of one end – "I have big plans for you."

We followed them upstairs, and as Karen and I undressed, we could hear Julie in her room next door. 

"Oh, golly," she said. "Looks like you have big plans for me, too."

I hope they didn't hear us laughing. Of course, a little while later they wouldn't have heard us if we'd started playing trumpets. Karen and I made love four times that night. We had to! Gordon and Julie made enough noise to wake us up three times after we finished the first session. And while Julie was instructing Gordon on some of the finer points of geekiness, Karen did the same in our room.  

The next morning, we were all gathered in the kitchen. Gunner and Sue and Karen and I were sitting sedately at the table eating Mr. Pinsky's croissants and drinking his premium coffee. Julie was sitting on Gordon's lap, feeding him little bits of pastry. At least when she wasn't kissing him. Ah, young love.

"I really ought to call home, though," Gordon said with a sigh as he reached across the beautiful girl on his lap for his cell phone

"Oh, I'm sorry, sir," he said when someone picked up. "I must have the wrong number."

He disconnected and grinned at us. 

"Boy, that's weird," he said. "How do you get a wrong number on a speed dial?" 

He tried again. Meanwhile, Julie had stood up and grabbed the receiver on the wall phone. 

"I'm just going to try Dad's cell," she told us.

"Hi, mom," Gordon was saying. "I just wanted to let you know I was at Julie's . . . Yeah, everything was really nice. . . . Yeah, all right, you were right, I was wrong. Happy now? . . . Is that a cell phone? 

"Hi, Daddy!" Julie started her own conversation.

"Who's there, Mom? I hear another voice."

"I hear a woman, Daddy! Anybody I know?"

"Have you got a guy there, mom? Mom?"

"Who is this?" Julie asked.

"This is Gordon Ackerman, who is this?" Gordon demanded.

"This is Julie," she looked up at him.

By the time Gordon and Julie stopped staring at each other and realized that theirs wasn't the only Ackerman-Pinsky party the previous night, the rest of us were rolling on the floor.

CHAPTER THREE

The wrath of Richie Rich was neither long in making itself felt nor particularly subtle. On Monday morning, Gunner pulled me aside in the hallway.

"Have you seen the picture?" he asked.

"No," I said. "What picture?"

"Here," he thrust it into my hand. "There are copies all over the locker room."

I looked down at a photograph of a naked girl with her head buried in Richie Rich's lap as the little scumbag gave the camera a thumbs up. The photograph was taken from directly in back of the girl, so that her only recognizable characteristic was her long, red hair.

"Holy shit!" I looked back up at him.

"Yeah," he said. "And, of course, the word is that Richie just smirks when you ask him who it is, and just smirks more if you ask him whether it's Karen."

"That little son of a bitch," I said. "I'm gonna kick his ass."

"Then everyone will think it's Karen," Gunner said. "I mean, it's not, is it?"

"Shit," I said. "The fucking little son of a bitch."

I was stumped. Somebody smarter than me was going to have to figure out how to deal with this. And that somebody was going to find out about it soon enough anyway, so she might as well hear about it from me.

I caught Karen before lunch, and dragged her out to the football stands with me. I don't know what I expected. Crying, wailing, gnashing of teeth, rending of garments. What I got was white hot fury.

"I'll teach that little son of a bitch not to mess with me," she growled.

I repeated Gunner's advice.

"Hell," I said. "He could have even worse pictures than this."

She looked back at me with an odd little grin.

"He could," she said. "I wasn't there. Shall we find out?"

I just started at her as she picked up her books and walked back with her toward school. She was back in the building before I found my legs and headed after her. I didn't meet up with her again, in fact, until we got ready to walk home after school. 

"We have to wait up," she said.

"Why?" I asked her.

"We have to wait for Julie and Gordon," she explained.

"Okay," I said. "Because?"

"Because Julie's my running mate and Gordon's my campaign manager," she said.

"Uh-huh?" I cocked my head.

She flashed me a particularly bright smile.

"I'm running for student council president," she said.

I just stared at her.

"We turned in the papers not more than fifteen minutes ago," she went on. "The election's Friday. Did you know that today was the deadline for signing up?"

"No," I said. "I don't think anyone in school knows it other than –. This is how you're gonna teach him a lesson? By letting him beat you in a student council election?"

"See?" she laughed. "That's why you're not my campaign manager. You have absolutely no faith in the electoral process."

"In high school, no," I said. "In Hardwood, no. By Friday, no. Do you know how Andy got to be president in the first place?"

She shook her head. I started to explain.

"There's this rule, see, that says you can't have any written campaign material before the election. The penalty is supposed to be that you lose ten percent of the vote you get for the first violation, twenty-five percent if there are two violations, and one-third if there are more than two. So Andy decides, when we're all still just ninth graders, that he's gonna run and plasters the high school with posters."

Karen nodded.

"So the principal hauls him in – remember, he's not even in high school at this point – and explains the rule. And the next thing that happens is the principal gets a call from Andy's father, arguing that the rule violates Andy's right to free speech and the penalty violates students' rights to cast votes for the candidate of their choice, blah, blah, blah. And so the principal backs down. And then all the other candidates back down. And Andy wins, like, by default."

"What a little shit." Karen smiled. Stop smiling!

"Last year and the year before," I continued, "nobody else even signed up to run, but all the posters went up just the same. I assume it was supposed to happen again today but now they have to fix the posters to take Julie's name off. I don't understand any of this. How is this going to teach him anything?"

"O, ye of little faith," she laughed. "Hey, Gordon. Hey, Julie. You guys ready to go?"

"Sure," Gordon said. "This guy's not on the ticket, is he? That'll make things much harder."

"Asshole," I muttered as he laughed.

"No," Karen joined him. "Julie's the veep, Kathy Wilson's the treasurer, and Scott Kamen is the secretary."

"Gordon's going to be your treasurer?" I asked. "And who's Scott Kamen?"

"He's this hunky ninth-grader who has a crush on me," she said. "Should be a good ticket, huh?"

"Oh, sure," I said, "you're appealing to all the groups. Cheerleaders, math nerds, and hunky guys with poor taste."

She slugged me in the arm. But she was laughing when she did it.

The posters were going up Tuesday when we got to school. All kinds of posters, some with pictures, some without. They'd been printed the week before, obviously, requiring a rush job to cover up the name Pinsky with a new sign for Ann Stoller, the sophomore girl whom Richie Rich had taken to the prom and had anointed to take Julie's place as his – excuse me, as the council's secretary.

Another publication came out on Tuesday, too. This one was a close-up of the same girl from the side, with a dick obviously inside her mouth. It was only a little bit more recognizable as Karen, but the warning was clear. Andy had no intention of letting a contested election take place.

"Did you see this?" I asked Karen at lunch.

"Yup," she said between bites of her sandwich.

"And?"

"I don't think he got my good side, do you?"

Julie and Gordon burst out laughing. Sue and Gunner joined me in staring at them.

As it became clear that Karen had no intention of withdrawing, the pictures became progressively more graphic. Until on Friday, the day of the election, the four of us arrived at school together to find a full frontal picture of someone who was very obviously Karen, facing the camera as she straddled someone who was very obviously Andy Richardson.

"Oh, my God," I said.

"Perfect," Karen said. "Here."

She took the picture and handed it to Julie, who immediately took off at a dead run with Gordon behind her.  Karen turned to look at me.

"You're embarrassed," she said.

"Well, yeah," I said. "It's you."

"I need angry," she told me.

"Huh?"

"I need you to be angry at this," she said. "You know I wasn't there, right?"

"Well, yeah," I said. "I mean, sort of."

"So I'm angry about these pictures, aren't I?" she asked.

"Yes," I agreed slowly.

"And as my brother, and my boyfriend, you're angry, too, aren't you?"

Okay.

"Damn straight I am," I agreed, with considerably more enthusiasm than I actually felt.

"Good boy," she punched me on the arm. "Just hold on to that through fifth period."

"What's fifth period?" I asked.

"The debate," she said. "And the election."

We all piled into the auditorium for fifth period: the seniors, the juniors, the sophomores, and the freshman, for their first official visit to the high school. Hardwood tradition dictated that the candidates for student council president engage in a debate for the hearts and minds of the electorate. Without prior advertising – the supposed ban on written materials – kids were supposed to cast their votes based solely on the extent to which they were persuaded during the debate.  It was an excellent theory.

The stage had three chairs. Karen sat on one end and Andy on the other. In between sat the faculty moderator. Usually that was the faculty member with the least seniority, the one least able to decline the principal's "request" to supervise the election. This year, it was Gail Dodge. All three of them sat there waiting, little portable microphones pinned to their clothing. To the left of the stage there was a podium, and as soon as everyone was seated, Gail stepped up to it.

"Boys and girls, welcome to this year's election for student council. There are two slates of candidates this year, and I'd like those running for office to stand when I call your name. Running for president on the first slate is Andy Richardson. His vice-presidential candidate is Bobby Parker, his candidate for treasurer is Fred Mars, and his candidate for secretary is Ann Stoller."

They had each stood up, Andy on stage and the others from the audience, as their names were called. As I looked around to find Ann Stoller, sitting in the back with the rest of the freshman, I saw a hand waving at me. My eyes widened. Mom and Dad. Sitting in the back. Sitting right next to Andy's father, in fact. Mom caught my eye and waved harder. I couldn't believe that Karen had invited them here to watch this slaughter. Oh, my God, what if somebody showed her the pictures? I slowly turned back as Gail began speaking again.




Living Dolls: The Director's Cut



"Running for president on the second slate is Karen McCarthy. Her vice-presidential candidate is Julie Pinsky, her candidate for treasurer is Kathy Wilson, and her candidate for secretary is Scott Kamen."

Karen won the coin flip to determine the order of speakers, and choose to go second.  So Andy got up, and gave the same smug little speech he'd given last year, about what a great thing it was to have a democratic process, and how he and his little assistants would continue giving us the same excellent quality government that they had for the past two years. It was well-written (yeah, like he wrote it) and well-rehearsed. The kind of smooth performance we'd all come to expect from Richie Rich.

And then Karen got up. And totally bombed. I was stunned. She'd always seemed to be so self-assured when she was giving presentations in the classes we had together. Of course, that was before a crowd of twenty. This was a crowd of six hundred. Every third word was "um." She licked her lips. She sweated. Not just perspired, but sweated. I wanted to rush up there and hug her to me and tell her that I loved her and that by the time school started again next year, nobody would remember it. Instead, I just started sinking lower and lower in my seat. 

Everything she said was fine, brilliant even. She spoke about how it was time for a change, about how a close examination of the record of the current administration would reveal that they had done very little to benefit the average student, and about how the changes they had managed to effect had been cosmetic, or had only affected a small group of students, like those who drove fancy sports cars to school.

But it sucked. I mean, my God, she'd been practicing – along with Gordon and Julie – for three hours in her room last night. And three hours the night before. At least, I'd assumed they'd been practicing. I looked over at the two of them. They both had little half-smiles on their face. Yeah, I should probably be doing that supportive crap, too. If Karen looked over here and saw what her boyfriend/brother/fiancée thought of her performance, she'd probably start crying. Of course, you didn't want to look like you actually enjoyed sitting on the deck chairs of the Titanic. Nice night, huh? A little chilly, maybe. Doesn't the ship seem a little less horizontal than usual?

When Karen sat down, it was clear from her expression that she knew that the election was over, and that the final tally of votes would simply be the final humiliation.

Ms. Dodge stood up, and with a worried glance at Karen, walked back to the podium.

"And now the question portion of the debate," she said. "Mr. Richardson, it's your turn first."

"I'm sorry, the what?" Andy looked over at her, with the shit-eating grin he'd been wearing ever since Karen started speaking.

"The ten-minute question portion," Gail told him. "To be followed by a five-minute summation. It's all spelled out in the rules, Mr. Richardson."

"Oh, yeah, yeah, sure," he said. He'd never had an opponent before, so the "debates" the last three years had ended after Andy's opening speech. He obviously hadn't remembered about this part, but he clearly didn't care. He looked over at Karen, and decided that this was the time for him, the king, to show mercy.

"I'll pass." He waved Gail off.

"Very well," she said. "Ms. McCarthy, do you have any questions for Mr. Richardson?"

"I do," she said, in a surprisingly strong voice.

Gail gestured Karen to the podium, and my girlfriend/sister/fiancée practically leaped out of her chair.

"Mister Richardson." Her voice rang out across the auditorium, "do you have a personal computer?"

"Well, yeah," he said. "I mean, everybody has one."

Well, not everybody. Hardwood wasn't exactly Westchester County, New York.

"A good one?" Karen asked.

"Yeah," he agreed.

"With all the fancy programs on it?"

"I guess," he said.

"Word?" she asked.

"Uh-huh," he agreed, clearly taken aback by this whole thing, and now a little puzzled by Karen's questions.

"Excel?"

"Uh-huh."

"Photoshop?"

"Uh-huh."

"PowerPoint?"

"Yeah," he shook his head. "It's a nice computer. What's your problem –"

"Mr. Richardson," she talked right over him, "have you seen this picture?"

She pulled a picture out from the podium and held it up so he could see it.

"What the fuck?" Andy said.

"Mister Richardson," Gail cautioned him.

Karen was already in motion. Walking over to Andy, she threw it in his lap. Meanwhile, Gordon and Julie were in motion as well, jumping out of their seats and striding toward the front of the auditorium, passing papers down each row as they came towards the back.

"Well?" Karen asked as she returned to the podium.

"I object to this," Mr. Richardson – the lawyer – jumped up from his seat next to my parents in the back of the room.

"Sir," Gail said, "I'll have to ask you to take your seat. This is a student debate, between your son and Ms. McCarthy. If you speak up again, I will call security."

"Then I object," Andy said.

"To what?" Ms. Dodge asked.

"To this written material," he said. "It's against the rules."

The whole auditorium started laughing at that. Except me, of course. By this time, not only had I received my copy of the picture, the same picture I'd seen this morning, but my parents had received their copies as well. I twisted back to see the horrified expression on my mother's face.

"Ms. Dodge," Karen said. "I agree that this violates Rule Thirteen point Four of the Hardwood Student Regulations. And I hereby accept my penalty, a loss of ten percent of any votes I receive in this election."

"Very well, Ms. McCarthy," Gail blinked, making a note on the clipboard she had put beside her chair. "Please continue."

"So you recognize the picture." Karen turned to Andy again.

"Yeah," he said slowly.

"And have you been passing out this picture, and other pictures like it, to your fellow students this week?"

"Well, I guess my buddies have," he admitted.

Yeah, like he hadn't been involved. A low chuckle ran through the audience. Everyone in the school knew Andy's buddies didn't go to the john without getting permission.

"Will you please tell your fellow students who is in this picture?" Karen asked, having made her point.

"Seriously?" he asked her.

Gail spoke up.

"Ms. McCarthy is entitled to ask any questions she wants," she reminded him. "You are required to answer them, Mr. Richardson."

"All right," he shrugged. "It's you and me."

"And when was this photo taken, Mr. Richardson?"

"Two weeks ago," he said. "On Friday night, when you came over to my house."

"That would be Friday, the second of June?"

"Yeah," he said.

"At what time?" she asked.

"I dunno," he said. "Like, nine-thirty?"

"So I was at your house, having sexual intercourse with you, at nine-thirty on June second?"

"Yeah." He smiled at her. "You were."

Karen looked out in the audience toward us and nodded. Julie and Gordon bounced up again.

"Ms. Dodge," Karen said. "This is my second violation. I understand and accept that the penalty will be the loss of twenty-five percent of the votes I receive in this election."

"Very well," Gail said, making another note.

"And I hereby demand that Mr. Richardson forfeit one-third of the votes that he receives, based on multiple violations of Rule Thirteen point Four."

"NO!" Andy shouted. Apparently, he had concerns of his own now about where this was all headed.

"Mister Richardson," Gail said. "You were the one who objected to Ms. McCarthy's use of written materials. Based on that objection, I have already noted a penalty of ten percent."

"I withdraw the objection!" he screamed as he stood up.

"I'm afraid it's too late for that," Gail said. "Do you contest Ms. McCarthy's allegation of multiple violations of Rule Thirteen point Four?"

"Fuck," he said, slamming himself back down in his seat.

"Please continue, Ms. McCarthy," Gail said.

"Mr. Richardson," Karen said, "if I told our fellow students here that I was in O'Brien's having a hot dog and soda with John Fuller on Friday evening from nine o'clock to quarter of ten, you'd say I was lying, wouldn't you?"

"Fuck, yeah," Andy growled.

"And if I produced an affidavit from John Fuller saying the same thing, you'd say he was lying, wouldn't you?"

"Yeah," he challenged her.

She walked over and handed him the second piece of paper that Gordon and Julie had passed out to the rest of us.

"Will you read the part I've highlighted please?" she asked him.

"No," he whispered.

"Very well, I will," Karen said. "'I got to O'Brien's about quarter of nine, and about nine o'clock Karen McCarthy came over to sit with me. She spent the next 45 minutes telling me her life story, including how wonderful her boyfriend is. She's a beautiful chick, but if I have to sit through something like that again, I'm going to slit my wrists.' So Mr. Fuller is lying, isn't he?"

"He, uh," Andy began.

"John Fuller, the senior captain of the Hardwood soccer team, who turned down full athletic scholarships to Stanford and the University of Virginia in order to attend Columbia next fall, is lying in this affidavit, is that what you're saying?"

Mr. Richardson wasn't saying anything, just staring at the affidavit.

"Mr. Richardson," Karen was flying now, "you said earlier that you had Photoshop on your computer, didn't you?"

"Huh?" Andy looked up.

"It's a nice program, isn't it?" Karen said. "You can do a lot with pictures on it, can't you? But you still assert that this is me, right?"

By this point, Andy probably wasn't sure that he was at his house on that Friday night. He was looking wildly around for support, at his buddies, at his dad, at any friendly face he could find.

"I guess I'm pretty good looking, aren't I?" Karen said. "Nice and smooth, too?"

She raised an eyebrow at Andy as she paused. Everyone else in the audience was looking at the picture again, too.

"But not that smooth, you fucking asshole," she said.

Stepping out in front of the podium, Karen unzipped her pants, hooked her thumbs in her panties, and jerked them both down five inches. Now all of Hardwood High School knew that my beautiful Karen was a natural redhead. She slowly pivoted, giving everyone a good look. Then she zipped herself back up.

"I have no further questions, Ms. Dodge," she said sweetly into the microphone before she returned to her seat.

"Um, very well," Gail said. "And I'll have to caution you to watch your language as well, Ms. McCarthy."

"I'm sorry, ma'am," Karen smiled.

"Mr. Richardson," Gail stood up at the podium. "You have five minutes for a final summation."

"What?" he said, trying to focus on the moderator.

"Five minutes," Gail said.

Andy was rooted to his seat.

"Starting now," Gail finally muttered.

Andy got up after a minute or so and mumbled through the same speech he'd given earlier, until Gail finally cut him off.

"Ms. McCarthy?"

Karen sprang up again and launched into the speech I'd been expecting all along. So evidently she'd been practicing this speech. Although now that I heard her speaking, I realized that it had probably been much harder for her to give the bad speech than it was to give this one. Maybe she'd spent most of her time practicing how to suck. I allowed myself a small smile as I returned my attention to what she was saying.

"And I told Julie Pinsky that she deserved a new boyfriend, that she didn't have to settle, that she was too good for that. And she said, 'oh, golly –"

Julie started laughing hysterically next to me.

"— you know, Karen, I think maybe you're right.' And I'm here to say the same thing to you know, my fellow students. I've been here for a year now, and I've spoken to Julie about the government you've had for the past two years. And I want to tell you that you deserve a new government, that you don't have to settle, that you're too good for that. You deserve a government that takes does more than just satisfy itself. A government that thinks about you before it adjourns. A government that takes longer than five minutes to come to a conclusion. A big government, not a small government. A vote for me, for Julie, for Kathy, and for Scott is a vote for that government. Or you could, you know . . ."

She shrugged her head toward Andy and raised her eyebrows, and the audience collapsed with laughter. The laughter turned into applause as Karen took her seat, and she was forced to stand up to ask them to stop so the voting could take place.

"So what was the hardest part?" I asked her, when the four of us and Mom and Dad were sitting around the dinner table with a celebratory cake.

"Sweating," she grinned at me.

"Sweating?" I asked her.

"Sure," she agreed. "Any idiot can pull down her pants. The hardest part was working up a sweat through something that I had no doubt would turn out exactly the way I had planned it."

I mentioned before that she was smart, didn't I? The girl was a fucking chess player. I hope she never gets mad at me.

"The only thing I don't understand," Mom said, "was the final vote count. How could Andy get only two votes?"

"They penalized him thirty-three percent of his votes for the campaign violations," Karen explained. "They penalized me twenty-five percent; that's how I ended up with 447 votes."

"But that's only one vote," I protested.

"Sorry?" Karen raised an eyebrow.

"If you lost thirty-three percent of your votes, and you ended up with two," I explained, "that means you only started with three."

"That's true, math boy," Karen had a sly grin on her face.

"But he had four people on his slate," I said. "That means he didn't even get all of their votes."

"That's true, too," Karen said. "By the way, you guys, I hope you don't mind. I think I'm going to ask the student council to approve a fifth officer next year. Corresponding secretary."

"You've got someone in mind already, haven't you?" Julie asked.

"Ann Stoller," Karen said. "She came up after the assembly. So I introduced her to Scott. I don't think he'll have a problem with it at all. They were getting along real good when I left."

"By the way," I asked her after Julie and Gordon stopped laughing, "what's that card you threw on your dresser when we got home?"

"Oh, that was Mr. Richardson's business card," she said. "He told me to give him a call after I got out of law school. He also told me he thinks that Andy might do pretty well in military school next year."

CHAPTER FOUR

We spent part of the following summer deciding on which colleges Karen was going to apply to the following year. Or, to be more precise, which college. Mom was pushing Karen to look at her alma mater, Chatham College in Pittsburgh, where Mom was one of the members of the Board of Trustees. Karen agreed that it was an excellent college; her only problem with it was that, at least at the undergrad level, it was women-only.

"Mom," she asked, "do you really think I ought to leave my husband loose among some other bunch of coeds when I'm not there to beat them back? I mean, it'll be bad enough to have him at Penn this year." 

"Beat them back?" I asked.

"Husband?" Mom asked.

Oh, yeah, that too.

"Husband?" I asked. We'd always referred to each other as our fiancées, but we'd never gone out and bought a ring. At least, I hadn't. And we certainly hadn't set a date. At least, I hadn't. Of course, I was often left out of the loop in a lot of the decision-making around our house.

Karen looked at both of us and gave us a surprisingly shy smile.

"I really do love him, Mom," she said. "Apart from the whole gratitude thing. He's my other half. He always will be. And I don't want to wait one minute longer than I have to to marry him. There'll be only one college. I'll be going to Penn."

I smiled back at her.

"All right, dear," Mom said. "We'll take a look at the calendar and pick out a date next summer."

"June 23rd," Karen said. "The day after I graduate."

"All right," Mom said slowly.

"I already reserved the Moose Lodge," she said.

"The Moose Lodge?" I asked. "We're getting married in the Moose Lodge?"

Mom was also a bit skeptical.

"Trust me," Karen took my hand. "It'll be the best day of your life. Of course, it better be the only wedding of your life."

"We're getting married in the Moose Lodge, Mom," I said. "June 23rd."

I started at Penn in the fall. Back in Hardwood, Karen took complete charge of the reins of student government, although she did manage to accidentally miss a meeting or two so that Julie had to run the show. And I came home pretty much every weekend.

Thanksgiving weekend was particularly special, though. Gail and Chris had asked us to meet them for dinner in August in order to wish Gunner and Susan good luck before they went off to freshman orientation at Free Union. The real purpose, though, was to announce that they'd selected the Saturday after Thanksgiving for their wedding date. Gail had Sue bawling when she asked her to be her maid of honor, and Karen began sniffling when Gail asked her to be her lone bridesmaid. Then Gail turned to me.

"Chris's two brothers are going to be his best man and usher," she said, as I felt a pang of disappointment. "But I'd like you to give me away."

"Give you away?" I asked. "Give you away to who?"

"Whom!" Karen and Gail said at the same time.

"Math guy!" I protested, throwing up my hands. 

"I'm not asking my family," Gail explained to Karen before turning back to me. "Usually a woman's father 'gives' her to her groom. Since I don't have a dad, I'd like my hero to do it instead."

I sat there with an open mouth until finally Karen said, "He'd be honored."

Originally they were planning on a relatively simple civil ceremony in the park, but then Julie had excitedly announced to us at during one of my weekend's home in early September that her dad and Gordon's mom were also going to be getting married the Saturday after Thanksgiving.

"And of course they want the two people responsible for them getting together to be there," she looked at us expectantly as Gordon, also home from school, gazed at her on with a particularly sappy grin. He was doing a lot of that this year. I don't know, there was just something annoying about it.

"And who is that?" I smiled back.

I was apparently equally clueless with respect to all marriages. 

"You two!" Julie gushed.

"Us?" I protested. "They worked together for ten years!"

"Actually only six," Gordon pointed out. "But if you hadn't gotten Julie to spend prom night with me, then her dad would have never asked my mom out."

"Well, that's sweet," Karen said gently. "And I'm really sorry to have to tell you that we already have a wedding to go to that day. You remember Ms. Dodge? Well, yeah, you were in Creative Writing last year. And she was the one at the debate. Well, I'm her bridesmaid and Jase here is giving the bride away."

"Really?" Julie said. "That's so cool. I'll tell Daddy and Andy. They can change the date."

"Oh, don't be silly," Karen said. "They can't just – "

"Don't you be silly," Julie answered, reaching in her purse for her cell phone. "It's already done."

In fact, Mr. Pinsky and Mrs. Ackerman did a lot more than change the date of their wedding, to the next weekend. Once they found out about Chris and Gail, they also insisted, in one of those won't-take-no-for-an-answer ways that you can get away with when you're the town's banker, on Gail and Chris getting married in their house (the Pinsky mansion). And even on paying for the caterer as well, since they'd already engaged her for that weekend. Gail and Chris never had a chance. Gail found herself agreeing to everything that Julie and Andrea proposed.

So Thanksgiving promised to be a full holiday. Gail's bachelorette party was going to be held at our house on Thanksgiving night. By then, Karen had Mom and Dad wrapped around her little finger, and had no trouble convincing them to extend their usual Thanksgiving holiday until Friday. Her plan was that Gail would come over for Thanksgiving dinner – Chris would be on his way back from Ohio with his parents – and then after dinner Julie, Andrea, and Sue would come over to our place for the party while I joined Gordon and Mr. Pinsky to watch the Eagles and the Cowboys on Gene Pinsky's projection TV. I put up a half-hearted and completely ineffectual protest at being driven out of the house on Thanksgiving night, but even Mom backed Karen up on that one.




Living Dolls: The Director's Cut



Still, my whining worked. On Wednesday night, with Mom and Dad already gone, I got my reward for my coming exile. I'd been looking forward to the evening ever since I got home late Tuesday night, and my anticipation only increased when Karen ordered me to do the supper dishes and then wait downstairs until she called. Finally, I heard her and took the stairs two at a time.

"Ooh, somebody's a little excited," she said, as she stood with her back to the closed door to our bedroom watching me gasp for breath. I was a little disappointed, to be honest; I'd been expecting a sexy nightie or something similar, and here she was dressed in a big old bathrobe and gray sweat pants, carrying a book she was reading.

"I'm sleeping in the guest room," she smiled. "Tomorrow's for me and the girls, so tonight's for you. And one more thing, the girls in there don't know the word 'no.'"

I was getting a big grin on my face.

"In fact," she said, "all they know is 'Yes, Master.' Now, wait until I'm back downstairs before you knock on the door."

Ten seconds later, I heard two oddly familiar voices cry out "Yes, Master" in response to my knock.

I opened the door and found myself unable to go any further. A pair of naked women was lying on the bed in front of me. I could only see the legs of one of them, because she was lying on her back with her head away from the door and because the other woman was lying on top of her. The second woman's head, in fact, was between the first woman's legs, her long, blonde hair blocking my view of anything else. I could tell the blonde had a great ass. Otherwise, though, I was going to have to wait. The blonde hair suddenly lifted, and Sue Waggoner smiled at me.

"Thank God you're here, Master," she said, pulling a carrot out of the other girl's pussy as it opened to my view. She took a quick bite off the glistening end. "This isn't big enough any more to satisfy this hot little bitch."

"Don't believe her, Master," came Karen's voice as she lifted her red hair off the other end of the bed. "She's the one who's always been hot for your – oh fuck!"

Sue had slid the carrot back inside Karen.

"Do you need any help undressing, Master?" The blonde grinned at me. "Or should I continue getting your little bitch ready for you."

"You just carry on," I finally found my voice. I couldn't believe that Karen had used the dolls to arrange this for me. Was I a lucky guy or what?

"Ooooh, you are big," Sue said as I pulled my briefs down over my hips. "I just figured you'd managed to fool a couple of innocents."

I raised my eyebrows as I dropped my clothes on the floor.

"You know," she smiled. "Gail and the virgin redhead here. But you're bigger than any hardwood I ever had at good ol' Hardwood High. OOFF!"

Karen had taken advantage of Sue's lapse in concentration and squirmed out from underneath her. Quickly gaining leverage, Karen ended up on the edge of the bed with the blonde stretched across her lap.

"You little bitch – OW!" Sue yelped as Karen smacked her on the ass.

"You don't want to pay attention to my pussy, slut? Fine. We'll see how well you pay attention to yours," Karen smiled down at the helpless blonde. "Fuck the little slut, master. Right now."

"No foreplay?" I grinned.

"This slut's been playing with her self fore and aft for the last twenty minutes," Karen smiled. "You should have seen her hairless little pussy lips twitching while she was staring at your big dick."

I stepped behind Sue to take a look. Last time I'd seen her naked – well, alright, the last time I'd seen her naked in doll form – she'd kept her sparse blonde bush well trimmed, but it had still been there. Now there was nothing. Well, nothing except – 

"Look at how swollen and wet she is," Karen said.

I was, I was.

"This slut doesn't need any foreplay," Karen continued. "Watch."

Karen straightened the middle and ring fingers of the hand that wasn't holding Sue on her lap, and put the tips against Sue's slit. Sue moaned as Karen smoothly slid them in, resting her palm on Sue's squirming ass.

"Oh, God, yes, master," Sue cried. "Fuck your little slut!"

I was more than happy to oblige. With Karen seated on the bed and Sue across Karen's lap, I was in perfect position. Karen obligingly held Sue's lips apart with her fingers, and I plunged ahead.

"Oh, you fucking bastard," Sue screamed.

"Master," Karen reminded her with a swat on her ass.

"Oh, you fucking bastard master," Sue moaned. 

"Unnh. Unnh. Unnh." 

Sue grunted each time I filled her after that. It turned out not to be the easiest position to fuck in after all, and after a while I decided to make it a little easier on myself. Grabbing the blonde around the waist, I buried my cock in her one last time and then lifted her off of Karen's lap. 

"Master?!" she squeaked.

Sue was a healthy girl, and I wasn't one of those Schwarzeneggers who can keep a woman in the air and fuck her at the same time. But I did manage to swing her out and gently let her find the floor with her hands and knees. Pulling out slightly, I pushed forward again to remind her why we were there, and she dropped her head to the ground, resting it on her forearms with her ass still raised high in the air.

"That's right, master," Karen said as I bottomed out inside Sue on each stroke. "Fuck the little slut into the floor."

She jumped off the bed and sat with her legs on either side of Sue's head. 

"She just loves the way you make her nice big boobs brush against the carpet each time you fuck her." Karen laughed with delight, reaching her hands around Sue's torso and grabbing the tits that were swaying beneath the blonde. "These little nips are so fat and hard they're gonna burst any second."

"Oh, fuck," Sue groaned as she let my next stroke push her forward even further, so that her blonde mane bumped against Karen's red mound and her boobs pressed into Karen's eager fingers. 

"Yeah, give her a nice case of rug burn," Karen said, giving Sue's tits a final squeeze before letting her chest drop to the carped floor.

"You – fucking – bitch," Sue grunted.

"My turn's next," Karen teased her, at the same time stroking her back with her loving fingertips. "Right now you're the bitch he's fucking. Tell her to shut up and lick me, Master."

I swallowed.

"Um, uh," I began.

"Master," Karen whined, yanking Sue's hair up with one hand and playing with herself with the other.

"Um, shut up and lick her, Sue," I said.

"Yes, master," Sue agreed.

What Karen had said about them not knowing the word 'no' turned out to be absolutely true. Although I was seldom the one to test it out. These girls both had much better imaginations than I did, and with them egging each other on, my line was usually, "Really, is that true?"

As in, "Master, why don't you take your cock out of that blonde slut's mouth now and fuck her in the ass. She's been wanting that ever since she met you."

"Really, is that true?" 

Or, "Master, Karen dreams about having you lay her over her desk and fucking the shit out of her from behind." 

"Really, is that true?"

Or, "Master, Sue wants to clean us both up off after we're done fucking." 

"Really, is that true?"

Or, my favorite, "Master, Karen wants you to fuck her while I sit on her face and hold her legs open for you." 

"Really, is that true?"

To my delight, they answer to each one was a ringing, "Yes, master!" I think I might have gotten a little sleep between one and two o'clock. And I woke up to find two beautiful women challenging each other to see who could get my erect cock – apparently it was perfectly willing to do a solo act without the rest of me – deeper in her throat. 

Finally, I fell asleep again around five, and when I finally dragged myself out of bed the next morning, the "girls" were already gone. I sighed – nothing that good lasts forever – and looked at the clock. It was already 9:30, and that meant that we had to start cooking soon. I opened the bedroom door to find a grinning Karen standing in the hallway with a load of laundry.

"Phew!" she wrinkled her nose. "Shower first for you. There should be enough hot water even to get you clean. I'll hold off on starting these. Maybe I should do your sheets, too, huh?"

I just looked back at her with a stupid grin on my face.

"Thank you, honey," I said sincerely, leaning forward for a kiss.

"Shower first."

She had her hand against my chest.

"And you're welcome," she added softly.

After my shower, I went downstairs to find not two, but three girls in the living room, chatting away. Gail looked wonderful, having added about 15 pounds since the end of the school year. She was now teaching two school districts away, although she still lived in Hardwood because Chris wasn't finished with school yet. I hadn't seen her since the beginning of the school year, so she jumped to her feet when I got to the bottom of the stairs and launched herself into my arms.

"Oh, God, it's good to see you," she whispered into my ear.

"Oh, sure," I said, "and you almost a married lady."

"Hey, this is just part of my bachelorette party," she said with a twinkle in her eye as she pulled back. She looked over her shoulder at Karen. "You probably didn't hire a stripper, so we may have to use your brother."

"Excuse me, my fiancée," Karen said by way of correction.

"Fiancée tomorrow," Gail smiled. "Brother tonight."

"Well then, no, no stripper. Guess it's up to you, little brother."

"I'll give you 'little' brother," I growled back.

"Oooh, he's so tough now," said our other guest, the beautiful Sue Waggoner. "What happened to our little math nerd?"

I looked over at the blonde, doing my best to separate the real deal in front of me from my fantasy visitor of the night before.

"I thought you were having dinner at the Gunns," I said.

"The team got a last-minute invite to a tournament in Hawaii," she explained. "They couldn't pass that up, so he jilted me. I like his folks well enough, but the thought of the three of us having Thanksgiving without Joshua was a little much."

"And your folks?" I asked.

"Oh, when I told them before that I was going to go to the Gunns, they hightailed it out to Debbie and Eric's to see the new grandkid," she said. "So I'm the only one home. Now, am I going to get my hug and kiss or not?"

I greeted her with only slightly less enthusiasm than I'd shown Gail, doing my best not to get aroused.

"So when do you ladies start cooking?" I demanded, picking up a magazine and taking a seat. I winked at Gail. "Seems to me this turkey stuff takes a while. Not to mention all the other courses that Gail and I are used to."

"Actually, we just got a call from Julie," Karen said. "They lost power, and don't expect it back for another five hours. So I invited them over here for dinner. They're having it catered, so they're bringing their caterer with them."

"Cool," I said. "Although that means that Mr. Pinsky and Gordon and I are going to be watching the football game in the middle of your bachelorette party."

"Actually," Karen said. "only you are. Julie said her dad and Gordon got invited to the game in Dallas by one of the minority owners of the Eagles – the guy he helped buy into the team – and flew out on his plane late last night."

"Those bastards." I smiled. "So I'm going to be stuck here at a bachelorette party with five lonely women, eh? Five women looking for a stripper, eh?"

"Don't even think about it, football boy," Karen warned me. "After dinner, you're taking the little TV upstairs and watching football."

"The black and white?" I protested. "You can't be serious."

But the look on her face told me that she was.

Twenty minutes later, we heard the honk of a car horn, and Karen and I went to the door to see what they needed.

"Could you get your studly fiancée to help us with this stuff?" Julie yelled up to Karen as she got out of one of the back doors.

"Sure," Karen smiled as I stepped back inside for my sneakers. "But today he's apparently just my little brother."

"Cool." Julie's eyes were still dancing as I approached the car.

The caterer's car was one of those big SUVs, and I never bothered reading the sign on it, so it wasn't until I went around to the back to help unload that I was introduced to the caterer.

"Jason, this is my best friend, and matron of honor, Shelly Johnson," Andrea Ackerman said. "She's catering Gail's wedding on Saturday and mine next week."

"Hi, Mrs. Johnson," I said with a big grin on my face. Shelly looked around to see if anyone could see her blushing. She and my mom were still good friends, but Mom liked to meet her now for lunch at a restaurant rather than bringing her over to our place – odd, huh? – so I didn't think Karen had actually met her yet.

"Oh, please, Jason," Andrea said. "Just for today, we're Shelly and Andy, okay?"

"Certainly, Andy," I said. "Shelly, this is my sister, Karen."

"And your fiancée, if I'm not mistaken," Shelly offered her hand.

"Not today," Karen said. "Today he's just my brother. Just between us, I think some of the women here have been having naughty thoughts about him."

Shelly blushed again, this time in obvious view of Karen, and I wondered if my red-headed bombshell had learned anything about Shelly from Mom. She certainly hadn't learned it from me. She knew about Gail, from summoning Sue for fellatio lessons, but she hadn't asked, and I hadn't told her, about any of my other pre-Karen sex, with or without the dolls.

Dinner was wonderful – Shelly was really good at this catering business that she'd set up after her divorce became final. 

"Well, this is certainly better than we could have done," I said with a smile.

"Yeah, all the courses came at the same time," Gail said with a giggle.

I shot her a quick look. Karen and Sue knew that I'd spent last Thanksgiving with Gail, but I wasn't sure that the other three women needed to know it. 

I tried to cover it up quickly.

"See, Shelly, I told you that you should become a chef," I said.

"No, you didn't," she answered.

"Yeah, I –"

Oh, right. I hadn't done that. I'd thought about it. And of course that was the doll that night. I started gnawing on a turkey leg so that I couldn't get my foot any further into my mouth.

Dinner finally ended and I was dismissed. As instructed, I took the black and white television to my room. The game was in the second quarter when I heard a light knock at the door.

"'Sopen," I said. It wasn't hard to tear myself away from the game. The fricking Cowboys always played out of their minds on Thanksgiving, and the game was quickly getting out of hand. I watched as Sue opened the door, looked back down the hallway behind her, and then quietly closed it behind her. 

"What's up?" I asked.

"You have to come downstairs," she whispered. "The party's going downhill fast. Andrea's pissed at Shelly, Julie's pissed at Andrea for being pissed at Shelly, and Gail and Karen are just upset because it's Gail's party."

"Well, what do you want me to do?" I whispered back.

"I want you to come downstairs and fix it. It's your fault."

"My fault? How could it be my fault? I've been sitting here watching the game. When I left you, everybody was smiling and laughing."

"Yeah. And then Andrea got the bright idea to ask us where our most intense sexual experience took place. She started off, and hers was on a train with her late husband."

"Yeah?" I prompted her.

"And then Karen said that hers was right here, in this house, on this bed."

"Well, that's sweet," I said. "But she doesn't have a lot to choose from, you know."

"Unlike some people?" Sue whacked me on the arm.

"I just meant we hadn't done it that many other places!" I protested.

"Anyway, then it was Gail's turn, and she said it was right here, in this house, on this bed."

I just nodded this time.

"Julie's was different, though," Sue said.

"Thank God," I smiled.

"Hers was on the couch."

"Fuck! Well, at least you were – "

Sue nodded.

"Back here on the bed."

"Wait a minute," I held up my hand. "Hold on. What do you mean yours was on the bed? You mean you and Karen . . .?"

My eyes were wide now. Karen and Sue? It must have been last spring, or over the summer, maybe. I knew that Karen and Sue and Gail had become good friends over the summer, but I didn't know it had included this. Apparently, that kiss Karen had shared with Catherine Zeta-Jones last year was hotter than I knew. Where the hell had I been?

"Yeah, me and Karen," she began, before batting her eyelashes at me and adding, "and you, Master."

She reached over and pushed my mouth shut before continuing.

"What about – what about –" I began. What about a lot of things?

"I'm still a little sore," she said, rubbing her butt and giggling.

"What about Gunner?" I finally said.

"He's known ever since we've been going out that if I had a chance to thank you I would jump at it," she grinned. "We're strong enough for that."

"But what about when Karen said last night," I went on, "that the girls in the room didn't know the word 'no?'"

"That's exactly what the real Karen told her to say," Sue grinned. "There was only one doll last night. And I don't think we ever said 'no,' did we? Except maybe when your girlfriend was screaming, 'No more, master, please, no more' when you were holding your climax back that one time."

I was very glad I was sitting down.

"Anyway," Sue continued, "the topper was Shelly's."

"I'm sorry?" I came back down to earth.

"Shelly's most intense sexual experience?" Sue reminded me.

"The guest room?" I sighed. 

"The guest room," she agreed. "When Andrea gave her one of those looks, Shelly said you reminded her of some guy named Steve. And that didn't help. Apparently, there's been some resentment buried there for a long time, and that's when Andrea started getting pissy." 

"So what do you want me to do?" I repeated.

"Fix it. Like I said, studly, it's your fault. I gotta go. They think I just came up here to pee. Wait a few minutes, and then come down. And fix it."

CHAPTER FIVE

The situation had apparently degenerated even further by the time I finished thinking and came downstairs. Andrea was sitting in an easy chair pretending to read a magazine, while Sue had her arm around a teary-eyed Gail on the couch. Julie and Shelly were clearing the table, and Karen looked like she was about to cry.

"So who ordered a stripper?" I said loudly.

"I think everybody's already seen the show," Andrea huffed, shooting a dirty look at Shelly.

"Well, everybody else," I said. I glanced over and saw that Sue was horrified. I knew what she was thinking: this was helping? "And I've seen all of you. All of all of you."

I'd gotten their attention with that. They were all looking at Andrea.

"I think I'd remember that," she said, flipping a page.

"Probably not," I said. "But I certainly remember it. I remember the cute little tattoo you have on your butt."

Andrea's jaw dropped open.

"How do you know –" she began.

"And I remember that at least when you were younger, you had to wear a special piece of cotton in your bra to keep your nipples from constantly popping up, particularly your left breast which is oddly more sensitive than your right."

Her hands dropped down to cover up her breasts, as if I was staring at them. I wasn't, though. I was staring directly into her eyes as I approached her and knelt at her feet. I lowered my voice so that she alone could hear me.

"And I remember how you liked to have somebody take that left nipple in their mouth when you have them inside you."

"How are you doing this?" she whispered.

"Because I have seen you," I said, caressing her face. "I do know you. Are you really upset with Shelly?"




Living Dolls: The Director's Cut



"Yes," she whispered. "No. Oh, I don't know."

"Do you think you're less attractive than Shelly because she went out with that Steve guy?" I said.

"It's just . . ." she continued.

"You worry that you're more boring, plainer, don't you?" I said.

"Yes," she hissed.

"And now you're worried that even your new stepdaughter's more adventurous than you, don't you?"

She just stared at me.

I smiled at her.

"Far from it," I said. "You are one of the hottest, sexiest babes that I know. Shall I prove it to you?"

She looked around nervously. 

"Jason," she swallowed, continuing softly. "If you'd approached me last year . . . "

Oh yeah, right. Like that would have happened.

"No, no. I know you're getting married next week. I know your new stepdaughter's here. Trust me, okay? Andy?"

She swallowed again, before whispering, "Okay."

I stood up and backed up so that everyone could see me.

"All right, ladies," I announced. "Now it's time for tonight's entertainment. First, though, I need an assistant. And I believe I will select . . ."

I made a pretense of scanning the room, noting in particular Karen's suspicious look.

". . . Julie!"

I took the brunette by the hand and led her upstairs, where I sat her down on my bed and sat down next to her.

"How could you have seen Andy when she doesn't remember it?" she asked.

I cocked my head at her.

"The doll!" she finally exclaimed.

I stood up and walked to the closet.

"You have two!" she said as I pulled them out. "Do they both work the same way?"

I nodded.

"So here's what I want you to do," I said.

Ten minutes later, I walked downstairs and immediately had the ladies' attention. 

"First of all, I want to tell you a story," I said. "About a boy who one day found two dolls in his attic."

Karen gasped.

"Jason, are you sure?" she said.

"You already know," I said. "Julie already knows. It's my understanding that Sue already knows."

Now it was Karen's turn to blush. Sue had a big smile.

"I'm sure that we can count on our three other best friends here to keep our secret." 

Actually, I wasn't sure of any such thing. Not for that reason, at least. They were women, right? But, seriously, what could they do with the knowledge? Tell somebody else? Hah! Try it, girls. It's hard enough when you actually have the dolls.

Karen just smiled back at me as I scanned the puzzled looks on Gail's, Andrea's, and Shelly's faces.

"They were magical dolls," I continued. "And he could turn them into any woman he wanted to."

All three women had crossed their arms over their chests. I had crossed the line into incredulity.

"For example," I said, "he could turn a doll into his mom's friend, Mrs. Johnson, and learn that stockings make her feel incredibly sexy."

"Oh my God," Shelly exclaimed, her hand over her mouth.

"Or he could turn a doll into his teacher, Ms. Dodge, and learn that she might need to be invited over for Thanksgiving dinner."

"Oh my God."

Now it was Gail's turn to put her hand over her mouth.

"Or he could just have a little fun," I grinned. "Julie?"

Julie came downstairs followed by my two eighteen-year-old college girls, Shelly Havelmeyer and Andrea Hanson, dressed exactly as they had been the night before Thanksgiving during their first semester of college.

"Oh my God," Andrea said, as the last of the skeptics fell. Shelly got up from the table and sat at Andrea's feet.

"Shit, that's really us," she whispered.

"If you girls wouldn't mind giving us the couch," Julie suggested to Sue and Gail, who quickly scrambled to find seats on the floor. "All right? Showtime!"

I'd had Julie summon the dolls to avoid the whole "master" business, which might interfere with my plan of giving Andrea and Shelly a sneak peek at what might have happened that night seventeen years ago. 'Showtime' was her code word for action, and the two girls started in immediately. As Julie had instructed, the two girls were oblivious to anyone else in the room.

"So?" Andrea said.

"I can't believe he gave an exam the day before break," Shelly said. "When we come back the final's only three weeks away. How'd you do on the paper anyway?"

"A-minus," Andrea said. "You?"

"B-plus," Shelly said. "Smart ass."

The real women grinned at each other.

"So we have a whole night here until we head home tomorrow," Andrea said. "What shall we do?"

"Let's start with that bottle of champagne we've been saving," Shelly said eagerly. 

Fortunately, I checked; we did have a bottle of champagne in the refrigerator.  Shelly returned with two glasses and filled them. Literally. And then they started gossiping about the other girls in their classes.

"So," Karen turned to the real women, "how much did you two have to drink 'til you got up enough courage to make the call?"

Andrea laughed.

"This was my first champagne," she said. "I'd say about one more sip."

The younger version suddenly put down her glass and leaned in to her roommate.

"Guess what I've got," she asked.

"A vibrator?" Shelly offered as we howled in laughter.

"Guess what else."

We laughed again.

"Steve Riley's telephone number," Andy announced, pulling a slip of paper out of her back pocket.

Shelly smiled.

"He's probably already gone home," she said, taking another sip.

"Nope," Andy said. "I know the girl who's giving him a ride. They don't leave until tomorrow morning at seven o'clock."

"Shit," Shelly hiccupped. "Are you gonna call him?"

"Yup," Andrea said. "Think he can handle both of us?"

We all looked at the real Shelly and Andrea, who were both looking at the floor. 

I suddenly felt my cell phone vibrating. Shit, that was my cue. Standing, I headed in through the kitchen and out the back door before I answered.

"Hello?"

"Is Steve Riley there, please?" came the tipsy voice of Andrea.

"This is he," I said pleasantly.

"This is Andrea Hanson," she said. "My roommate, Shelly Havelmeyer, and I wanted to know if you'd like to come over and help us finish off a bottle of champagne."

"Um, sure," I said. "You guys are in my psych class, right?"

"That's right," Andrea said. "Psych class. So, you coming?"

"Sure," I said. "Where are you?"

They gave me the name of their dorm, which I instantly forgot, and five minutes later I knocked on the front door of my own house.

"Come in!" yelled the two girls.

I pushed open the door and looked at the two girls sitting on the couch, both of whom had suddenly turned shy.

That didn't last very long. As it turned out, in fact, I was the shy one. As far as young Shelly and young Andy were concerned, there were only three of us in the room. And it quickly became clear that two of us didn't have any secrets from each other.


I, on the other hand, knew that there were actually eight women in the room. One of them was my fiancée, another was a woman I'd be "giving" to her groom on Saturday. And one was my best friend's mom. It was true that I had screwed five of them. But not with anybody watching me. Not with an audience. Well hell, I thought, they were an audience. Maybe it was time to go into stripper mode. If they wanted a performance, damn it, that's what they'd get. 

"You know what's funny, ladies?" I grinned at the two eighteen year olds, "I've actually been asking all over campus for your numbers."

They blushed. It was the first of many times, for both the young women and their older counterparts. _______________

"So you found these dolls when?" Andrea asked after the performance had ended and I had rinsed off in the shower and returned. By then it was around eleven o'clock. 

"Last fall," I answered.

"And you were a virgin then?" she continued.

"Yes," I admitted slowly. She already knew about my lack of success up to that point from Gordon.

"So who'd you lose your virginity to?" she prodded me.

"I'm not telling," I said.

"I think Gail was the first real woman he did," Karen chimed in. I shot her a look and she just laughed at me.

"Well, he wasn't a virgin when I had him," Gail said. "No way. He was too good."

"So who was it?" Andrea asked.

"I'm not telling," I repeated. "Why do you care?"

"I'm just interested," Andrea said.  "You're the only person in the whole history of the world who could have had anyone for your first. So who did you pick?"

"If I tell you, it'll be all over Hardwood," I parried. 

"Oh, come on," Julie said. "You trusted us with the dolls. I've kept that a secret for six months."

"How about this?" Karen said. "We each get one guess. If we get it right, you have to tell us. If we don't, no more questions."

I agreed, although I still didn't like the way this was going. Karen fetched six pieces of paper and pencils, and everyone spent the next five minutes studying me, as if I had the name imprinted on my forehead. The papers went into a bowl, and I drew them out and read them one at a time.

"Jessica Simpson. Gross, no. Who wrote this one? Pinsky, was this you? Yecchh."

I pulled out the next one.

"Catherine Bell. Good guess. Too tall, though.

"Anna Kournikova."

I smiled at that memory. I realized everyone was staring at me.

"No," I said truthfully. "It actually never even crossed my mind.

"Laura Prepon. This one is from Sue, who said to herself, 'I'm gonna pick redhead, I'm gonna pick smart.' Another good guess. But no.

"Angelina Jolie. Not for all the tea in China."

That left one more piece of paper in the bowl, and I knew whose handwriting I hadn't seen yet. I pulled it out very slowly, looking her in the eye the whole time.

"I know what this one says, don't I?" I asked her, rubbing the paper against my teeth. 

Her eyes sparkled. I had no choice. I opened it and looked down.

"This is so unfair," I said. "She hasn't even lived here a year yet and I'm like an open book."

I threw the paper down on the table and Andrea picked it up. Her eyes went wide and then she turned to look at Shelly with a big smile.

"What?" Shelly asked.

Andrea handed her the paper.

"Me?" Shelly whispered. "You lost your virginity to me?"

She started to cry, and I pulled her onto my lap and hugged her. Watching me hug my first girl was just the price that Karen was going to have to pay for her little triumph. I looked over. She wasn't bothered by it at all. She had as big a smile as the rest of the girls.

Gail finally broke the mood by excusing herself to "powder her nose."

I raised my eyebrows as she stood. I remembered last Thanksgiving. So did she.

"Oh, you," she said, chucking a napkin at me. "I'll bring back the powder."

Sue watched her go down the hall and then turned back to the table.

"Speaking of virginity," she said to Karen, "could I borrow your brother a minute to ask a favor?"

Karen and Julie burst into laughter.

"Oh, shut up, you bitches," Sue snapped at them, a smile across her face. "You are so filthy. Come on, Jason."

We trooped back up to my bedroom and I waited for Sue to go first.

"Do you know how Gail lost her virginity?" she asked.

"Actually, I do," I said. "She told me twice. Once as a doll, once as Gail. On her eighteenth birthday, right? I feel really bad for her."

"Yeah, me, too," Sue said. "Mine wasn't great, but it wasn't that bad. I mean, at least it was consensual, you know?"

I nodded.

"So I was thinking maybe after you've rested up, you could, uh, fix it?"

"Fix her virginity?" I asked. That would be a neat trick. "What is it with you and fixing things, Waggoner?"

"Well, okay, not fix it," Sue said. "But, you know, you just gave those two ladies a whole new memory to replace one that they obviously didn't like all that much. So I was thinking that maybe, oh, just forget it, it was just a stupid idea. It's just that all of high school for her was like one giant shithole. I'm surprised she made it this far."

"Actually, no," I said, suddenly transfixed. "It's not stupid at all."

And that turned out to be quite a performance, too. The other five women were watching when we started, with the eighteen–year-old Gail dressed in one of Sue's cheerleader outfits and Sue, the real girl, in another one. The two had walked into "Sue's house," where Sue had introduced her fellow cheerleader to her "stupid older brother," who happened to be home from college. Things ran their course, and Sue's stupid older brother had in turn introduced the virgin Gail to something entirely different, something very new and, it turned out, quite wonderful. By that point, Andy and Shelly had retired to the guest room – "your favorite place, right?" Andy cracked – and Julie and Karen had left as well to give Gail some privacy. Only Sue remained. She had left the scene in character, cleverly telling the young Gail (it was Sue who had done the summoning this time) that she wouldn't see Sue again that evening. The "invisible" Sue had returned to sit with and whisper to and hug and love the real Gail in one of our wing chairs.

CHAPTER SIX

I awoke the next morning to the smells of breakfast and the sounds of the washer and the dryer. The sun was streaming into the living room and warming up the couch I was sleeping on. Excuse me, the couch on which I was sleeping. See, I'm getting better. 

I looked at my watch: 9:30. It had probably been 3:30 when I'd finally managed to get to sleep, and I sure felt like I only had six hours of sleep. I staggered to my feet, annoyed at the giggling I was hearing from the kitchen. Pulling on my T-shirt – I'd stolen a T-shirt and sweats before Sue and Gail took over my room – I staggered to the door to the kitchen. All six women were fully dressed and looked disgustingly cheerful and wide-awake as they crowded around the breakfast table.

"Well, it's Mister Sleepy." Shelly laughed as she saw me in the doorway.

"Aww, little stud have a hard night?" Andrea snickered.

"Yeah," I muttered, "he heard too many women screaming out 'oh, yeah, that's it, lick me right there.' That made him hard."

I actually hadn't heard anyone last night. But it was a very well-placed arrow; I looked around to see six women with very sheepish expressions. I smiled at them.

"Shower time, girls. I'll be back."

"Keep an eye out for Chris, Jase?" Gail yelled after me. "He's supposed to drop his folks at a hotel and then swing by."

I grunted and left the room. After a quick shower, I pulled on my jeans and a plaid shirt, and on the way back to the food, er, the ladies, I opened the door to get the paper and came face to face with Gordon and Mr. Pinsky as they walked up the steps. A third guy, a couple of steps behind them, looked like somebody I ought to know. Oh, yeah, probably the guy with the Eagles. I must have seen his picture in the paper.

"Jason!" Mr. Pinsky grinned as offered me his hand. "I assume you have our women here?"

"Yes, sir," I grinned back. "Chained down in the dungeon with the others." 

"Good job," he laughed. "Steve, this is Jason Thompson. Jason, this is my good friend Steve Riley from outside of Philly. He owns part of the Eagles. I thought I'd bring him up to Hardwood and show him the town, introduce my new bride."

I automatically stuck out my hand to meet his as he stepped around Mr. Pinsky. It wasn't until then that I processed the name. No wonder he looked familiar; he looked like me.

"Fuck me with a spoon!" I yelped. My hand refused to shake his any more, but it also refused to let it go.

"Heh, heh." Mr. Pinsky chuckled nervously as all three guys stared at me. "See, Steve, you buy a part of the Eagles and all of a sudden you're famous."

Nope, still unable to let go.

The three of them were looking at me now like I'd become dangerous.

"Jason," Mr. Pinsky said calmly. "Maybe we should just go in and get the ladies and be on our way."

I came back to the world.

"Oh, sure, that's a great idea," I said.

I opened the door for them. Steve headed in first, and I waited until he was past me to speak up again.

"I know I'm looking forward to hearing you explain yourself to Andrea Hanson and Shelly Havelmeyer, Mister Steve Riley."

Steve stopped short, and Curly and Larry almost knocked him down. We assembled back on the porch.

"What's Mom got to do with this?" Gordon asked.

"What do you mean?" Mr. Pinsky asked him.

"Hanson was her maiden name," Gordon explained. "Andrea Hanson. Shelly Havelmeyer is her best friend, Shelly Johnson. You know my mom, Mr. Riley?"

By now, Steve was backed up against the railing with three pairs of eyes boring into him. Better him than me, I thought.

"Oh, my God," he said. 

He told us the story of how he'd met Shelly and Andrea. It was similar to the story I'd heard, although of course he'd just gone to their room the night before Thanksgiving to hang out. If I was friends with a guy about to marry Andrea, I'd have probably sanitized the story a little bit, too. And then he explained how, after Thanksgiving, after Andrea had reunited with her boyfriend, he'd asked Shelly out on a few dates.

"And then after Christmas," I prompted, "you never came back."

"Because my father was ill," he sighed. "He died two months later."

"So why didn't you answer any of Shelly's letters?" I asked gently. 

"How do you know all this?" he asked me.

Tsk, tsk, I thought; I asked first. I waited him out.

"Embarrassment, I guess," he finally said. "I had to stay on to help my mom with the farm. She died a year later and I spent the next five years paying off their debt before I could finally sell the place."

I raised my eyebrows. 

"What would she want with a farmer?" he asked. "By the time I got everything paid off and got my own business started, I tried to find her again. She was already married. 

"I've never found another girl like her," he added wistfully.

"Really?" I brightened up. "So you're single?"

"Still single," he smiled. "Waiting for the next Shelly Havelmeyer."

"Not any more," I said. "Today we're having a special on the old –"

"Thompson!"

I looked up to see the much-awaited Chris and the very unexpected Gunner walking up the driveway together.

"Hey!" I greeted them.

"Susan get to say thanks to you yet?" Gunner grinned.

"What happened to your tournament?" I cut him off.

"Blown out in the first round. Michigan State."

"Whoa."

"Exactly. So Coach gave us a choice of a weekend in Hawaii or a flight home on the redeye."

"And you said, 'oh, yes, sir, I'd much rather spend the holiday weekend in Hardwood, Pennsylvania,'" I shook my head. "'No beach babes for me, sir.' Well, you'll just have to make do with something from our menu. In fact, I think we have a girl inside for everyone today. I assume you all want the usual, right?"

Chris, Gunner, Gordon, and Mr. Pinsky all nodded in agreement and then I looked at Steve.

"The usual okay with you, too?"

He looked a little flummoxed. 

I appeared at the entrance to the kitchen with a clipboard in my hand.

"All right, ladies, quiet down," I said. "Your dates for the evening are here to collect you. I'll call your name, I'll give you a brief description of the gentleman who's interested in escorting you tonight, and, assuming you're interested, you can meet him in the parlor."

"Who are you, madam for a day?" Andrea cackled.

I ignored her.

"First up, a gentleman has requested Gail Dodge. He's a local graduate student, appears to be in good health, sounds intelligent, and is interested in a long-term relationship."

"I accept," Gail said. Standing up, she leaned in to whisper in my ear as she passed me.

"But if he wasn't here, you know, I'd steal you away from Karen in a heartbeat. Thank you so much for last night."

She gave me a kiss on the cheek, I kissed her hand, and she brushed by me.

"Next, a request for Andrea Ackerman, from a gentleman who appears to be reasonably intelligent except that he's requested Andrea Ackerman."




Living Dolls: The Director's Cut



Everyone had a good laugh as Andrea stood up. She leaned in just as Gail had, and with her back to the other girls, I gave her left breast, her particularly sensitive left breast, a gentle squeeze.

"Mmmmm," she closed her eyes and moaned against me.

"See you at the rehearsal, Andy," I said, kissing her cheek.

"Next," I said loudly, to cover the sounds from the living room, "a request for Julie Pinsky. The gentleman is immature, insecure, and –"

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Julie got up. "I enjoyed your sister last night, Thompson."

Sitting at the table, Karen blushed, and I got my cheek kissed again before Julie exited. That left Sue, Shelly, and Karen at the table.

"Well," Sue grinned ferally, "shall we—" 

"Ah, ah, ah." I held up my hand to stop her from saying something that she might not want overheard in the living room. "I'm not done yet. I have a request for Sue Waggoner, from a tall, geeky-looking, barely coordinated—"

"Joshua!" Sue shrieked. I never got that kiss. She was through the door before I could even tell her I'd see her tonight.

I looked back at the table. Shelly looked a little sad, aware that she alone would be without a date tonight. Karen looked a little angry, aware that I'd put Shelly in a position where this had become painfully obvious.

"Excuse me a minute," I said, ducking back out of the room. I took a quick look at everyone in the living room: Andrea holding Mr. Pinsky's hand, a big smile on her face; Julie and Gordon; Gail and Chris; Sue and Gunner. I handed the clipboard to Steve – after we'd coordinated our attack, I'd changed into clothing that resembled what Steve was wearing – and he went through the door with his head down.

"Sorry," he said, following the script. "Next up is a request for Shelly Johnson, from an idiot who can't believe he didn't have more faith in her back in college and is here to beg her forgiveness." 

Karen told me afterward that she knew it wasn't me from the word "sorry," but that Shelly didn't know something was amiss until the word "college." At that point, she simply stared at "me."

"Steve?" we all finally heard her whisper.

"Shelly Havelmeyer, I love you," he said. "If you can forgive me, I'd like to—"

At that point, all we heard was the scrape of a chair on the floor, someone running, and a body hitting the wall between the kitchen and the dining room. Peering in nervously, I saw Steve and Shelly locked in a kiss as Shelly pressed him against the wall. I smiled at Karen, and beckoned her out with my finger. 

By the time Steve and Shelly finished "talking" in the dining room, Karen and I were the only ones left. 

"Gail said to tell you that she'll set two extra places tonight at the rehearsal dinner for you two," I told the new couple when they finally emerged. "She and Chris had a few last-minute things to do with the Pinskys, well, the Pinskys-to-be, and Sue and Gunner – let's just say that Sue's parents are gone for the weekend. But Sue assured me that they'll be at the rehearsal dinner, too. Meantime, though, they have been apart for two entire days."

Everyone laughed.

"And where are you two headed?" I asked. "I mean, you've been apart for what, almost two entire decades?"

"Almost," Steve said with a smile at his reclaimed love. "But I think we want to take it a little more slowly. So, if you don't mind, Shelly offered me a cup of your coffee."

"Sure," I said. "Have a seat. I'll be happy to get you one. I notice nobody offered me a cup of coffee."

"It's your house, moron," Karen said.

When I returned, Karen and Shelly were nowhere around. Probably doing the laundry. Probably a good idea. Steve was reading the paper I'd brought in before.

"Here you go," I said, handing Steve one of the cups. I went back to the kitchen and fetched myself a bowl of cereal and sat down in the other wing chair. "Are you looking at the sports?"

He handed me that section with a grin, and I began reading about the game. Apparently, not much had changed after I turned it off and began playing with Shelly and Andy.

I heard a giggle from across the room and looked up to see both women staring at me intently. Well, staring at me and Steve. 

"What?" I asked.

"You both do that little thing where you bite your lip and arch one eyebrow when you're concentrating," Karen said.

"Yeah, we're actually twins," I said. "But Steve has premature aging disease. He'll be sixty in an hour and a half, so maybe you better take him home now, Shelly. Do you have any Viagra? You got about fifteen minutes before you need that." 

"Seriously," Shelly laughed. "You could be brothers."

"Well, I was adopted," Steve said. "But his parents would have to be pretty old by now."

"They are in their early fifties," Karen pointed out. "What is it?"

After a few more seconds, I became aware that I was staring off into space, and that three people were staring at me. 

"You know," I explained slowly, "on Karen McCarthy Day last winter – that's the day we celebrate Karen McCarthy's birthday, whether she's here or not – I asked Dad why they never had any more kids. And he said that until I came along they thought they couldn't have any more."

"So you mean Mom and Dad had a kid before you?" Karen asked breathlessly.

"I don't know," I shrugged my shoulders. "I guess they could have. I never followed up on it."

Encyclopedia Brown strikes again.

"Say," I said with a smile, "why don't we just ask them when they get home. 'Hi, Mom, did you give your first son up for adoption? When you were, like, seventeen? Oh, and by the way, is this him?' That'll be fun."

"Hang on a minute," Karen said, just before dashing upstairs. 

I did hang on, two or three minutes, in fact, until it occurred to me, and my stomach, that I still hadn't eaten any breakfast.

"If you guys don't mind, I'm just going to get a bowl of cereal while we're waiting for Red to come back," I said. "Some of us were inside pigging out on bacon and eggs while others of us were outside trying to reunite people with their college sweethearts."

I didn't have the chance, though, because we heard Karen thundering down the stairs.

"Oh my God, you guys, you have to hear this," she said. She looked back up the stairs.

"Come on, come on," she gestured impatiently.

"Yes, mistress," my mother said as she came down the last few steps.

Whatever it was we were supposed to hear was going to have wait, though, because Mom took one look at Steve sitting in his chair and her face glazed over.

"Stevie," she whispered, her eyes fluttering. She fell backward, her head slamming into the railing.

Steve jumped to his feet and ran over, pulling her head into his lap. Shelly and I, who knew better, simply glared at Karen.

"Turn her back," I said.

Karen looked down at Steve and leaned down to touch Mom.

"Sorry," she said. "Living doll."

Steven found himself with a plastic doll in his lap.

"What the hell is this?" he looked around wildly at the three of us. That ate up another fifteen minutes before we were able put the doll on the couch, where Karen again turned her into Mom.

"Mom," she started immediately. "You can't see anybody else in this room. Only me, okay?"

"Yes, mistress," Mom said.

"I want you to tell me, without crying," she glanced over at us, "about your first son."

"Stevie?" Mom said.

"Stevie."

You know, it was no wonder she hated my grandparents. God damn fuckers. Grandpa Thompson had been the only one who'd taken her side, and the combined wrath of Mom's dad and the two harridans that Mom and Dad had for mothers had been enough to overcome his resistance to the idea of spiriting his young, unmarried son's new baby away for an illegal adoption.

At this point, we realized that Mom and Dad would be home within the hour, so we carefully scripted the way that they would find out about Steve. He and Shelly would be upstairs waiting; Karen and I would sit Mom and Dad down and explain, very calmly, that we had found out about their earlier child. When they'd digested that, we'd explain that we'd actually found the child. And finally, we'd bring him out.

It was a great plan, with no chance for success. When I took the cereal bowl that I'd finally scored back into the kitchen to put it in the dishwasher, I heard the front door open and Mom yell out "We're home!"

"Shit," I muttered, rinsing the soap off my hands and drying them off before I headed for the living room. When I got there, completely unnoticed, I found my mom standing directly behind the chair that Steve occupied, facing the couch where Karen and Shelly were sitting. Dad stood a few steps behind her. I was behind both of them.

"Shelly," Mom said calmly. "What are you doing here?"

A fleeting smile played across Shelly's face.

"I'm in love with your son," she said to Mom.

Mom's head came back a little.

"Shelly, do you think that's wise?" she said.

"In fact, I think I'm gonna marry him," Shelly added, making a kiss at Steve. Evidently they hadn't fully agreed on that bit about taking it slowly.

Mom's head pivoted to the left.

"And what do you think of this, Karen?" she asked, in her best judgment-free psychologist voice.

"I'm in love with your son, too," Karen grinned. "We're already planning on getting married. June 23rd. The Moose Lodge."

"And Jason," she put her hand on Steven's shoulders and looked down at his head, "what do you think about all of this?"

See, this is what cheesed me off. Brother or not, this guy's losing his hair faster than, well, faster than the Eagles can lose to the Cowboys. My hair is very thick, very full, very not 34 years old. And Mom's standing there staring at the top of his head, asking him a Jason question. 

"I think it's great," I said from directly behind her.

Mom whipped around and stared at me.

"As long as little Stevie understands that I get the redhead."

Steve had stood up and Mom now turned back to look at him. She stared, looked back at me, back at him, and then she reached out to touch his face with her hand.

"Stevie," she murmured.

I caught her easily, even as I heard the sound of Dad hitting the floor next to me.

"Well, we hadn't figured on that one," Karen sighed.

Gail and Chris's wedding was beautiful. Andy and Gene's wedding was beautiful. Shelly and Steve's wedding, which we somehow slipped in the following spring, was beautiful.

_________________ 

Today is June 23rd.  Time for Karen and Jason's wedding. I hope it'll be beautiful, too. It's just a hope, of course, because, as usual, I have been kept completely in the dark.

Yesterday, the whole gang had assembled to watch Karen and Julie graduate from high school. Karen – surprise, surprise - had ended up the valedictorian of the class. 

And now the whole gang is waiting for another ceremony. Gordon is adjusting my bow tie in the house we've rented next door to the Moose Lodge.

"So you really haven't seen what she's done to it?" he asks, again.

"No," I say, again. "Apparently everyone else has. I take it you have."

"Well, of course," he smiles. "I was there yesterday with the maid of honor."

"Oh, for Chrissakes," I say, "tell me you didn't boink her in the Moose Lodge where I'm getting married."

"I didn't," he admits. "It was hard, though. All right, my friend. We are ready to go. One more trip to the john and I'm your man."

"My best man." I give him a big smile.

He leaves just as Sue sticks her head in the door. She looks ravishing in her bridesmaid dress, just as her boyfriend Joshua looks handsome in his tux.

"Hey, studly." Her eyes travel up and down. "Lookin' good. Have you seen the flower girls?"

"Sue and Julie?" I ask. "They're right out there."

She joins me at the window and we watch the two eight-year-old girls, their blonde and brunette heads bent together while they look at something in the grass, trying desperately but unsuccessfully to follow the instructions they were given not to get their beautiful white dresses dirty.

"I always wanted to be a flower girl," Sue sighs.

"And a bridesmaid," I point out. "At the same wedding."

We stand there and watch them a little longer.

"I'll go round 'em up," she says.

"So just put them back in the closet after we've left, okay?" I finally tell her. 

"You bet," Sue says. "I just love that you invited them."

"Invited who?" Gordon asks as he returns.

"Those two little dolls out on the lawn."