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Lady Behind The Wall

By: Sir Galahad



I sat in the back of the Galaxy Club, moodily communing with Jack Daniels. It had been a rough day, culminating with my girlfriend moving out. I replayed our final conversation in my head.

"What's going on?" I'd asked, coming home after a hard day's work running piping and installing the kitchen sinks and bathroom fixtures in a new restaurant going in on Clermont. I needed a shower and a change of clothes badly, but not so badly that I didn't notice Debbie, pretty as always, coming down the stairs with a suitcase in hand. Two more sat just inside the front door.

"I'm leaving, John. I won't be back."

"But why? I thought you – we – were happy, that we were progressing nicely!"

"Well, you thought wrong, pal. My agent has signed me up for a six month southwest and West Coast club tour. Oil tycoons, Internet millionaires, doctors, athletes and movie stars. If I can't latch onto something good on this tour, I'm not the girl I think I am. This time next year, I'll be sunning myself by the pool and admiring my diamonds while I decide which wine to have with the truffles and the trout almandine.

"Don't take it so hard, Johnny. All you and I ever were was a convenience. You got to fuck a gorgeous exotic dancer and have all your tiresome blue collar buddies envy you; and I got someone to take care of things while I worked my way up into the majors. It never was serious. I'll just leave the keys on the hall table. Later!"

Perhaps our liaison hadn't been more than a passing convenience to Debbie, but I had fallen for her. Fallen hard. We'd met right here in the Galaxy between sets. She was the only singing terpsichorean ecdysiast I had ever heard about. Not a bad voice, a lush body with a healthy sexual appetite... and all the morals of a diamondback rattlesnake, apparently. I took a sip of my drink, trying to decide if I wanted to get drunk or not. I felt a hand on my shoulder.

"I heard what happened. You want to talk about it?"

I nodded.

"C'mon back into my office." I obediently got up and followed Lacey Starr, owner of the Galaxy, into her office.

It's a remarkable room. It stretches the width of the club and is walled on three sides with one-way mirror glass, half-height in the front and apparently paneled with full height mirrors alternating with oak panels in the corridors. From inside you can see into the two corridors leading to the restrooms, the coatroom and the ATM machines, and out over the bar and the side tables toward the pit and the stage. Lacey could monitor everything with security cameras and does in fact maintain them for insurance and legal purposes, but she prefers to rely on her own eyes and the bouncers who sit by those front windows ready to put a stop to trouble before it starts. There has never to my knowledge been a serious brawl in the Galaxy Club.

Lacey's real name is Natasha Rambova, Tasha to her friends. She was a headlining stripper and soft-porn star in her day, but unlike most women in that line of work she saved her money and invested it well. She has a head for business, which was why she is now comfortably well off when most of her contemporaries have faded into obscure poverty. She still has a fine figure and her hair is the same crown of flame it was when she was onstage. She has never admitted to using henna.

We met shortly after Tasha opened the Galaxy, when one of her dancers dropped a diamond ring down a sink and got her hand hopelessly stuck trying to get it back. JM Plumbing & Heating (the company I own) advertises 24 hour a day, 7 days a week service, which we take in turns after business hours and on weekends. I was the on-call plumber the night Lacey called. The fact that I'd been able to extricate her dancer without injury and recover the ring without having to destroy the plumbing had impressed her sufficiently that she'd given me a retainer as the club's plumber. The Galaxy had become my regular hangout and I'd done more than a little business here over the years. We sat down on a leather couch and I placed my drink on the coffee table. She looked compassionately at me; at least I thought that was her expression.

"John, I know you have Asperger's Syndrome and have a very hard time reading people's physical and social cues. But I never thought you would take that scheming little bitch for serious. She's after a position in society. Meaning no offense, my friend, but you just don't measure up to her vision of the ideal mate. She has a whole checklist of standards her husband must meet. You aren't rich enough, famous enough, in a profession with cachet enough or of high enough social standing to fit into her scheme to become a Very Important Person. If I'd known you were sweet on her *"

"Well, Tasha, you didn't!" I snapped, taking a gulp of my drink. Her eyes crinkled but I couldn't tell if she was amused, frightened or angry at my outburst. "I was laboring under the delusion I had something going with her, with marriage not beyond the realm of possibility in a year or two. I feel like four kinds of idiot. Reevaluating, my analysis is that in Debbie's mind I was an expedient measure. I can see now all I ever was to her was a free hotel and automatic teller machine. Conceding the sex was marvelous, that doesn't ease the mental anguish at the moment. Difficult as it is for me as an adult male to admit this, she used her wiles to keep the mark gulled. Intercourse meant less to her than inserting a tampon, and likely not as much."

Tasha sat back and motioned to one of her bouncers, miming to pour her a drink and bring it over. She took a sip of it and looked at me over the rim of the glass.

"How old are you, John?"

"I passed the big four-oh last birthday," I said. Without a girlfriend in sight or prospect, I'd observed the day by completing a particularly difficult furnace repair for the elementary school necessitated by a winter power failure and subsequent freeze-up so the school could open on time on Monday.

"How many girls have you lived with?"

"Three, counting her, but never of long duration. Never longer than a few months."

"Why did your other girlfriends leave?"

"They alleged I wasn't sensitive to them, that I did not pay proper attention to obvious signals or look soulfully into their eyes. And they all got upset over incidents I thought were trivial. That sort of thing."

"And were you sensitive to them?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. I did not forget anniversaries, even silly ones like having first made their acquaintance three months ago, or that it was a month since they had first cohabited with me. I was always giving them little gifts, so they'd know I cared. I even remembered to put down the toilet seat every time." I tried to smile to show I was making a joke, the way the books say you should.

Tasha frowned and stared into her drink. At last she said, "Have you considered looking at some of the mail-order bride sites online? That was how I got to America. Back then it was a slow process compared to now. 

"You paid a fee to the agency and they would take pictures and put them in a book they would send to men in America. The Americans would look you over and read your biography and if they liked you, they would write to you. Eventually, maybe one or two would like you well enough from your letters that they would come and visit you over there. One of them asked me to marry him and I leaped at the chance to come to America. I took American citizenship when I married him. It was fine for a couple of months. Then he took to beating and raping me. Finally I fled to a woman's shelter and I hooked up with an agent and become a dancer far from the city he lived in. At that, I was lucky.

"Today, it is faster and there are more checks on the would-be grooms. Before these agencies will set up meetings, they run background checks on the men and on the women too, to weed out the bad apples. Maybe you should give that a try. There are lots of beauties from behind the old Iron Curtain who would go for a guy like you, John."

"Not so many as you might think, Tasha. I actually have looked at two or three of those websites. If the pictures and the short form biographical information looked good, I would buy their addresses and write to them, either email or airmail depending on their computer access. 

"The first thing the women wanted to know, each and every time, was what kind of car I drove. Next, how large a house I owned. Then, what kind of work I did. Then, how much money I make, a question I find greedy bordering on mercenary and would not answer except in the most general terms. Such exchanges always ended with them telling me they weren't interested in taking things further; forget about joining one of those headlong meet-and-greet tours and making actual contact. I just don't have the prestige they want in their dream Western husband, even though I own my own business, a piece of another successful company, and netted half a million dollars free and clear last year after taxes, salaries, bonuses, insurance payments, buying two new trucks, replenishing stock and whatnot."

I looked Tasha right in the eye, not without difficulty. "Maybe I should just hire hookers. At least there I won't have any illusions about their giving a single solitary damn about me– about anything but the money I am paying for their services."

Tasha patted my hand. "Don't give up, John. The poets say that for every man, there is a woman. You know how many boyfriends I have?"

"Three, last time I checked. Betting in the shop is 5 to 3 on Richard the lawyer, 4 to 1 on Donald the broker, and 9 to 1 on Emilio, that new doctor at the hospital; with me a 1000 to 1 longshot purely to round out the field. The smart money is on Richard, with the wedding taking place before the end of next year." The deadpan delivery of this information made her laugh, but my expression didn't change.

"Well, don't give up on yourself yet. Your social skills aren't the greatest even with all the coaching I've given you, but you are neither hopeless nor undesirable from a female point of view. The thing is, you need to do a few things. 

"First, you have to figure out exactly what you want in a partner – I don't think you're after just a roll in the hay, or you'd have asked me if Cleo was working tonight. Second, you have to figure out exactly what you have to offer a woman. Third, you need to determine what sort of woman would find you desirable even with your disability as part of the equation.

"Once you've done all this, you have to find a demographic that fits all the criteria. Then you figure out how best to present yourself to the females in that demographic. That's how you are going to find a worthy mate, John."

"I don't suppose you would consider telling me what you believe that demographic to be?"

"No. If I did, you wouldn't believe me even though we've never lied to each other. But if you do what I said, you will see the sense of what I'm telling you; and then you will know where to look and why I suggested you look there. I want you to be happy. You are my best male friend in the entire world, and I love you like a brother. It does not mean another woman can't see you in the light of a lover and maybe even a husband some day."

She finished her drink and stood up. She looked down at me and I looked up, over her shoulder but with my angle of vision taking her in perfectly. This discommodes most people and upsets some, but Tasha is used to my ways. I can see clearly much farther to the side without moving my eyes or my head than most people. It's a side effect of my Asperger's brought on by my need to be aware of what's going on around me.

"You're too good a man to lie moping in the dirt just because some conceited bitch dumped you. Pick yourself up and dust yourself off, and try again. Just back a better horse next time." She started for the concealed door and I took the hint, following her out. I left my drink behind and walked out to my old Jag. (Hey, just because I drive a van with my tools and supplies in it when I'm on the job doesn't mean I cannot drive something fancier when I'm not working!)

I drove home, poured myself a glass of Old No. 7 over one cube and sat down in my easy chair to think about what Tasha had said. Over the years she'd taken on the role of big sister to me and she hadn't steered me wrong yet, either in business or personal matters. If she said I wasn't a total waste of space in the relationship department, I had to believe her. 

My musings were interrupted by the doorbell. I put down my glass and answered the door. Cleo, the Lebanese-American stripper Tasha had mentioned, was standing there in a full length raincoat, although the weather was nice.

"Mind if I come in?" she asked, brushing past me without waiting for a reply. I closed the door and followed her into the living room.

"What are you doing here?"

She turned around, unbuttoning her coat. She tossed it onto my chair. She was wearing one of the harem girl outfits she uses onstage, a spangled brassiere with a short vest over it and a pair of transparent harem pants held in place by three Velcro tabs. She knelt and took off the curly-tipped slippers that completed the costume and I heard two rips that meant she'd undone the straps that bloused the pants at her ankles and allowed her to easily shed them.

"Tasha told me Debbie dumped you today and took off. She thought you might be feeling lonely. I thought you could use some company."

She put her arms around me and locked her mouth to mine, her tongue pressing insistently into my lips, demanding entry. She ground into my groin and my cock automatically responded, going from soft and quiescent to rampant and ready in seconds. I pulled her to me, our mouths opening and my tongue touching hers. She grabbed my butt and pulled me to her as I squeezed her ass cheeks.

"Take me upstairs and fuck me, Johnny. I'm hot, and I need your cock! I want to feel you in me! C'mon. let's go!"

I didn't say anything, but grabbed her hand and pulled her up the stairs to my bedroom. I didn't need to read body language to know this horny slut wanted to be fucked like a ragdoll. 

In the bedroom, she turned to me and started to remove her vest. I put my hands over hers and lifted them away, doing the little chore of stripping her myself, unsnapping the vest and unhooking the brassiere and tossing them aside before I grabbed her around the waist, pulling her in and dropping my head to her boobs. I licked her nipples, moving between then, grabbing them in my teeth and biting. I felt her nails on me as she worked at my waistband, struggling to loosen my belt, undo my pants and shove them down out of the way. I let go of her and stepped out of them as she undid the last strap and expertly swirled her harem pants out of the way before flopping backwards onto the bed, spreading her legs for me and pulling her pussy lips apart.

"C'mon, Johnny. Happiness lies in the middle – in what waits between my thighs. Fuck me!"

Her shaved pussy was wet and inflamed, ready for me to fuck. Not wasting any more time on foreplay, I climbed on top of her and gave her what she so obviously wanted. My cock slid into her and I started to thrust. She sighed happily and began to buck under me as she ran her fingers through my hair, smiling.

"Oh, that's good! Just what I need and just what you need too, lover! Don't stop. I don't have to be back at the club for awhile and I want to enjoy this. Give me that nice, hard cock! Fuck me good, baby! Fuck me good!"

We moved smoothly together in a comfortable rhythm, Cleo moaning under me as I drove her towards orgasm, her nails scratching my back, urging me on. Her eyes were hot with lust, eager to reach her peak and cum under me.

"Don't stop! Give it to me! I want it! Fuck me, Johnny! Give me your cock! Almost there! Almost! Oh, oh, oh ... Y-E-E-S-S-S!!"

Cleo's pussy locked around my rod, clamping down like a hot velvet glove as she came. I stopped for a few moments, savoring the feel of her twat caressing my cock as she went first rigid, then limp as her climax spent itself against me. I began to move in and out of her again with long, full strokes, penetrating deep into her unresisting body. As she came back to this world, she pulled my head to hers, french-kissing me with a rising urgency as her cunt responded to my invading cock.

"You sure know how to give it to a woman," she whispered between kisses. "I'm soft as butter inside. Give me more of that beautiful prick of yours, baby. Make me cum again! I want to! I love your prick inside me! Don't stop! I want it! I want it bad! Give it to me!"

Our pace accelerated as she opened her legs wider and dug her heels into the mattress, actively fucking me back as I rammed in and out of her. We screwed like that for awhile, her cunt juice soaking me and running out of her box to drip onto the bed, her gasps and cries spurring me on. Suddenly she pushed me away, scrambling around and presenting herself on all fours, legs apart, sex-slime dripping down her thighs. Hair shaggy and sweat-soaked, she looked back over her shoulder.

"Take me like an animal, stud! I'm burning for your cock! Fuck me doggy-style! Use me good!"

Breathing hard, my eyes glazed by coitus interruptus, I grabbed her by the hips and remounted her, shoving my rampant erection back into her cunt where it belonged and where she so obviously wanted it. She whinnied like a mare in heat and pressed back against me, taking my cock into her, her pussy muscles rippling like fingers as I used her like a whore, giving her deep, rapid thrusts as fast as I could drive my hips. She screamed and pussy juice spurted out around the rock-hard dick filling her, but I didn't stop. I found her nipples and pulled them roughly. Cleo screamed again and dropped her head and shoulders to the bed as her body betrayed her into another orgasm. I heard her beg.

"Oh yes! Oh yes! Hurt me! Hurt me like that! It's so good! Don't stop! Don't ever stop! Take me! Ravish me! Fuck me!"

I grabbed at her breasts, squeezing them like grapefruit, yanking on them, listening to her plead as I hammered her the way she wanted it. I felt her cum twice more before I couldn't hold my own climax back any longer. Letting go of her boobs, I took her by the hips and rammed all the way into her.

"Yaaahhh!"

The cum came boiling out of my balls like hornets out of a nest that's been whacked with a baseball bat. My cock shot deep into her pussy once, twice, three times, four, and a last, weak fifth time. My strength drained by the intensity of my climax, I collapsed on top of Cleo, who was shuddering with the force of her own mind-blowing orgasm. We lay there limp for awhile, marinating in our own sex juices and sweat, and for the moment, satiated. She turned under me so we could put our arms around each other, savoring the afterglow. When our pulse rates were back to normal, she got out of bed and padded into the bathroom, closing the door behind her. I heard the shower come on as I dozed off.

A gentle hand on my shoulder woke me. Cleo was dressed again, sitting on the edge of the bed. I reached a hand up to her. She held it against her cheek but made no move to rejoin me.

"Have you ... have you ever thought about what it would be like to ... you know, go steady with me?" I stammered. She smiled at me, but I couldn't read what she meant by it.

"Oh, Johnny. You're sweet, and a helluva good fuck, but we'd never work together over the long run. You're old enough to be – well, not my father, but anyway my big brother – and you're established. You have a business and you're settled; and more to the point, you're ready to settle down with one woman.

"Me, I'm nowhere near ready to settle down. I still have a lot of wild oats to sow. I'm only 24 and a semester away from my Bachelors. I want to see a lot more of the world and do a lot more wild and crazy things before I commit to something long term. 


Lady Behind The Wall



"You need to find yourself a gal who wants to be with you and only you, I think. You should be looking for her; she's gotta be out there somewhere. But until you find her –" she stopped to kiss the palm of my hand, "– any time you feel the urge, give me a call. And now I'm off, glowing like a neon light." She put my hand down and walked out. A minute later I heard the front door click shut and she was gone.

I lay there for a minute, considering what Cleo had said. Then I climbed out of the bed still redolent with her scent and headed for the shower. The time to start my quest had arrived.

In my bathrobe with Uncle Jack lubricating my synapses, I took the clipboard that lives next to the business phone that relays from JM's main number for nights when I'm on-call and settled back into my easy chair. I decided to start by setting out the things that would answer questions in the categories Tasha had defined for me.

What was I looking for in a woman? 

First off, she would have to be near my own age, call it three years plus or minus. One of the problems Debbie and I had had was different perceptions of things, and that had been due to our differing degrees of experience with the world. Not only the degree, but the variety of experience as well. There is truth in the sayings that you learn the most from your mistakes, and that you see things most clearly after falling flat on your face. If my Zen 'perfect female' approximated my own age, even if she were from a different social stratum we would still have a number of shared experiences in common on a societal level. The books say shared experiences are an important building block in any relationship. 

She'd have to be attractive and have a brain in her head. I may not be some famous celebrity but I do have my pride, and I am a firm believer in Harshaw's Law. It is all very well to have a pretty woman on one's arm and in one's bed. However, if the lights are on but nobody's home, even a goddess will become tedious in very short order.

Personality counts for much, even in a beauty. Termagants or shrews are instant non-starters, likewise whiners. Partly because of my limited social skills I tend to be a solitary sort and I don't go to large parties. It's too easy to offend without intending to, or to commit major faux pas. Therefore, my Zen ideal would have to be something of a homebody outside of business hours, and preferably somewhat submissive in the home. I have been a bachelor for a long time and my outlook will not change overnight. Someone who, when we were en famille, would devote herself to me. A gentle and appreciative sweetheart, in so many words, not a superficial bitch whose looks and manners conceal an icy heart and the soul of a tax collector.

That brought me to sex. I chewed on the pencil for a minute, but decided that if this was to work at all, I owed myself total honesty. Write it straight and blunt. 

I didn't want a nymphomaniac. A clinical nymphomaniac is incapable of attaining sexual satisfaction no matter how many men she beds or how frequent and intense her orgasms may be. What I did want was an experienced partner well versed in the arts of pleasing her lover, one open to anything sexual from plain vanilla to totally kinky, and who would be completely available and willing at all times. By preference, a woman who aroused easily, orgasmed quickly, easily and multiply, and who was vocal during the act. Even after years of training by Tasha and practicing by watching movies, my ability to read body language is, to put it diplomatically, inadequate. I miss facial and subtle body cues even when I am purposely looking for them. Therefore, I rely much more on audible cues than most people. Women who do more than gasp and moan softly during intercourse, the illusions of pornographic movies notwithstanding, are uncommon. The women who appear in movies, even porno flicks, are called actresses for a reason.

I wryly reflected that what I was really looking for was a younger version of Tasha, one who would not regard me as her gently bewildered kid brother or perhaps the reincarnation of Augustus Fink-Nottle from the Wodehouse universe. Ah well, that's what dreams are for. If you are going to dream, it does not hurt to dream BIG. Continue.

What did I have to offer a would-be partner?

Security, for one thing. I'd been brought home from the hospital to this house. I have lived here all my life and it has long since been paid for. It was part of my inheritance. No mortgage worries. Any partner of mine would not have to fear coming home to find an eviction notice nailed to the front door. So long as I kept the taxes paid, there would always be a roof over my head.

I own my own company, and it turns a profit. Because of my position in the company and the fact that I am in a line of work that cannot be outsourced overseas, I have job security. I have a respectable stock portfolio thanks to Tasha's advice and occasional hunches of my own (buying Apple stock at its lowest ebb just before it rebounded with the release of the iPod, for instance), and I own pieces of land here and there. I would present to any potential girlfriend a reasonable amount of financial independence, if not outstanding social position. Then again, I wasn't looking for a female who has had breaking into the Junior League as a lifelong ambition.

In terms of looks, I am not Schwartzenegger in his prime but I don't have any flab on me, thanks to the personal trainer who stops by two evenings a week and daily use of the home gym in the basement. The thing she would probably notice first was the handlebar mustache, compensation for my slowly receding hairline.

My doctor reports that I am in disgustingly good health for my age, with no serious issues to worry about. Eating the proper foods in reasonable quantities and daily workouts does miracles.

I have no bad habits as most people think of such. No drinking to excess, never any drugs, no gambling problems, nothing like that. My biggest vices are reading, fishing, hunting and target-shooting. I try never to miss opening day of fishing season or deer season, and I do a little varminting for the local farmers. Oh yes; and every three or four years I go on a safari, though only once to Africa so far, and never after endangered or at-risk species. If you aren't going to eat what you shoot and use as much of your kill as possible, you have no business hunting. 'Sportsmen' are despicable.

I have never struck a woman in my life or spoken to one with the intent of deliberately inflicting emotional harm. I wondered if that counted for anything, but wrote it down anyway. 

On reflection, I wondered if my never having had a long term relationship counted as an asset or a liability. I added it to the list just to be on the safe side. Let the women in the search group, whatever that was, decide. 

This brought me hard up against the next item. What sort of woman fit the first two categories?

I needed to find a woman who might not be looking for a companion in the usual ways. Someone who was loath to deal with the traditional bar scene, or who wanted the safety of not meeting in person before communications established some degree of compatibility. But why would she want to delay such a meeting? 

Possibly because she feared rejection. I thought back to the two attempts I had made at speed-dating, egged into it by a client who ran a dating service. I flushed as I recalled the reactions of the ones that had piqued my interest but had not returned it, and of my own negative reaction to a couple of obviously predatory women. Nobody likes to be rejected. I have experienced enough of it from females in the amatory arena that I find it hard to open up and give even a gal I am interested in a chance to get to know me. Perhaps it was the same on the opposite side of the sexual divide.

I had read here and there that many beauties found it hard to date because their looks scared potential suitors off. If such a one was also smart, she might seem so intimidating that only the bravest and most confident men would have the nerve to approach her. Or perhaps such women figured that most men were trophy hunters after only one thing and wanted nothing to do with them, erecting their castle walls so high as to make them impenetrable. 

Hmm. What if those walls were there because she saw herself as damaged in some way? Not to keep Lotharios out, but rather to keep her locked away so society and its rules could not hurt her again? What kind of women fit that picture?

I took another sip of my drink as my mind shifted into a higher gear. A woman who looked good and was smart but was damaged goods in the eyes of society. What constitutes 'damaged goods' in this day and age? Not divorce; that was long accepted – was almost expected, given the current statistics on marriage failure rates and some social commentators referring to a first marriage as 'the trial marriage.' Single motherhood could do it, especially in the lower strata. In strait-laced sections of society, biracialism still missed the socially-acceptable cut. Sexual abuse like rape qualified females for this set, because even now there is the tendency of society to say that the victim was really asking for it, that she was really a slut or a cock-tease who led the rapist on, even though anyone with an above room temperature IQ knows that's utter horseshit. And except in the very highest circles, possession of a criminal record was worse than the scarlet letter had been in Puritan New England four centuries ago.

Could that have been what Tasha meant? That I needed to look among the females rejected by mainstream America because they had been convicted of something? There are crimes and then there are crimes. Some are more crimes against societal mores than crimes against the common good. Not all criminals are equal. There are lots of cases of people turning their lives around after doing time, although today such a turnaround requires determination, education and more than a little luck. Well, at least it was someplace to start looking.

As with many questions, perhaps I could find my answer online. I finished off the bourbon and went to my computer. Heaven knew there were enough mail order bride sites out there listing women from around the world who wanted to link up with someone. Could it be there was something similar for female convicts?

A quick search told me that indeed there was, and not just one or two websites. I raised my eyebrows and dove in.

Refining my search by specifying American female inmates as part of the search string got the number of sites to investigate down to six. A quick look at them cut that number in half. Three websites was a universe small enough to check manually if necessary. I looked the sites over. Although I fully intended to check all the entries that seemed close to my Zen perfect woman's specs on all three websites, I expected one of the three might be easier to use than the others.

ladiesbehindthewalls.com seemed to be the easiest of the three to navigate, so I decided to start there. I began with the frequently-asked-questions page.

The site operators were up front about what they did and how it was done. Prison inmates do not have access to computers, so communication with the outside is by snail mail. The site acted as an honest broker. A woman sending her bio, ad listing and photos to the website had to swear that the information was accurate and the pictures were actual pictures of her. Current snapshots with something to prove the date they were taken were preferred, although there were plenty of candids, topless and even professional pics posted with the listings. The site stressed that when a listing arrived, before it was added to the online catalog the operator accessed national or state prisoner registries to verify that the information – date of birth, age, state where incarcerated, date of expected release, physical stats, etc. – was true. 

They also checked the provided photos against the record shots in the inmate's file. If there was some question that the photos really were of the inmate, the ad would be held until the woman satisfied ladiesbehindthewalls.com that they were photographs of her. All photos had to provide the month and year they were taken, to enable lonely men and women cruising the site to extrapolate current appearance based on that date.

If someone attracted you, you could purchase their mailing address for $15 or four addresses for $50. If an address turned out to be unusable, the site would give you three addresses of your choice for free. 

ladiesbehindthewalls.com also offered assistance in getting gifts to prisoners. Sending something to someone convicted of a crime isn't like sending a prisoner of war a Red Cross parcel. American prisons are far more restrictive in what inmates are permitted to receive. However, each listing included information on what kinds of things were acceptable, the procedures for sending them, and when certain things could be mailed. These varied from state to state and institution to institution quite a lot.

The other sites I checked were more or less the same. Prices for the addresses and the amount of information each offered changed but that was the only real difference. I concluded I'd lucked onto the best of the lot first crack out of the box. I closed out the others and returned to ladiesbehindthewalls.com to begin my search for a woman who might accept me.

It would have helped if the site had included a decent search engine. The only sorts that it could do were by ages within a range you set or by distance from your zip code. As distance would not be a consideration until a gal was released, I simply set the age ranges and hit the start button. Fifteen pages with 24 listings per page popped up. I started looking at the hits.

The team that had set up the site had been considerate enough to include a clipboard to which you could transfer the listing of any lady that caught your eye. I took my time studying the photos, trying to see into a woman's soul from photographs. By the time I'd finished my initial run-through I had seventeen files on the clipboard. I selected Clipboard, and the seventeen selected ladies displayed on a single page similar to the main page. I took a deep breath and opened the first file. I spent the next hour examining them, reading what they had to say and looking at the ladies' pictures. More than a few went into the trashcan. 

A couple were dumped because the listings made it plain that they were avaricious predatory types like Debbie. I'd learned my lesson concerning that variety of woman.

Three didn't make it because of their constant reference to the Lord Jesus Christ. I'm not a churchgoer, much less an evangelical. Having met people with that kind of mindset professionally, I felt too many of them were narrow-minded bigots who regarded anyone who didn't share their worldview and religious creed as half-human at best. That kind of aggravation is easy to live without.

Two more went into the trash because something simply didn't ring true about what they were saying. I may not be able to read body language very well, but my ability to detect bullshit in written and spoken words is sharper than most. Asperger's takes away, but it also gives.

Five more were weeded out by Harshaw's Law because they seemed to have been written by subliterates who'd never finished grade school. I'd long since concluded that while bimbos are wonderful to look at and often fun in the sack, you don't spend your whole life in bed plugged into a female. For a relationship to work there has to be more than attraction based on beauty and sexual skill.

This winnowing left me with five possibles. That's a reasonable number to check by following the suggestion made on one of the other sites, of subscribing to an online access service that could pull up the record of any currently incarcerated convict in the country.

A quick trip to a new window made me a subscriber. Switching back and forth between screens, I compared what each remaining inmate had said in her listing with the data in her records. Two more ladies were weeded out this way. Now I was down to three. It was decision time. Although all three websites had suggested ordering more than one name at a time, I knew I couldn't handle more than one woman at a time, at least not in a romantic sense. Which address should I order? 

I kept returning to one photo. A professionally shot still, she was looking at the camera in three-quarter front view. The woman was lying on her stomach, shoulders up to show off her cleavage, long legs together, bent at the knee and crossed at the ankle, toes pointed in black stiletto heels, the calves long and shapely, the thighs firm. A bandeau top barely restrained a pair of boobs, definitely and defiantly tits, not titties; and a tiny bikini bottom below her waist showed a nice ass to good advantage. Unusual reddish skin; natural, not makeup, given how little she was wearing in the way of clothing. Long black hair in two braids, secured by rawhide thongs. She had an oval face with an aquiline nose between fashion model cheekbones. One manicured finger brushing her full, slightly parted lips, her expression was wistful; but it was her eyes that called to me. Irises so dark they appeared to have no pupils, they were expressive even to somebody like me. While I can't interpret body language very well face to face, I do better at reading emotions in photographs. I had never seen a more perfect definition of loneliness trying to disguise itself as allure. I clicked on the picture to open her file.

Her name was Deirdre. She was 39 years old, confined in Texas with a release date next year in late summer or early fall. Her height was given as 5'10", her weight as 180 pounds, and her measurements as 38-28-34. She was heterosexual, had two adult children, didn't do drugs but did drink; and was willing to relocate. The thumbnail photo, which expanded to snapshot size on the file page, was two years old. So much for the short form data. I read what she had written about herself.

"A nice girl like me ended up in a place like this. Beautiful enchantress seeks divorced or single male to share an intimate correspondence relationship with the goal of finding a 'happily ever after' in each other.

"I'm 39 years of age, a Pisces, with beautiful looks and a beautiful mind. Although I'm 39, people tell me I look ten years younger. I can still turn a few heads. I have silky hair that falls all the way to my waist. I take pride in my captivating smile and sincere eyes. I am open-minded with a great sense of humor. I am incarcerated for getting my second DUI. I don't do drugs, but I do love my alcohol.

"I'm trying to change my life and I'm tired of being alone. I am looking for a generous man who wants a real woman in his life. Yes, I need a man to help me change my life. I consider myself to be passionate, attractive, sexy and in good physical shape. As you can see from my pictures, I am well endowed.

"I am seeking a kind, passionate man who is not verbally or physically abusive. A man who knows what he wants in life, who is in good physical shape and doesn't have a lot of emotional baggage or trust issues. The man I'm looking for must be self-supporting. I've always worked and look forward to holding a real job again, but I won't get involved with someone who expects me to support him. I don't want a player or a bullshit artist. He must be my age or a little older so we'll have things in common and be able to relate.

"Basically, I'm looking for friendship first. After that, we'll see what comes. I need someone who is willing to love me unconditionally and be there for me, now and later. 

"I like to be spoiled and I'm happy to do the same for my mate. Although I have never been married, I dream of finding the right man someday so I can love and cherish him. I want us to share our lives and our selves in and out of the bedroom, in public and in private. 




Lady Behind The Wall



"If we click, you should be prepared to deal with public displays of affection because I'm very direct about what I need. There's a wild, spontaneous, sexual side of me I'm anxious to share with you. I also have a pair of 38Ds that are eager for a man's touch. Tell me what you'd do with them if you had them to play with! I know what sensuality is and I revel in it. Do you think you can handle me?

"I have a lot of love to give. My letters will be open and honest. If you are interested in me, please tell me about yourself. Not just the usual things like height, weight and looks. I want to know the things that are important to you. What are you looking for in a friend, a woman and a lover? What do you do for fun? What is your favorite food? Do you like sports? If you could go anywhere in the world, where would you go and why? What about your family? Anything you'd like to share with me.

"There is nothing left for me in Texas. I 'm open to relocating. I'm very unattached.

"If you would be so kind, please enclose a photo so I can see what you look like (you can send up to ten at a time), but not Polaroids; they aren't allowed. A book of stamps would speed my reply to you.

"If you are serious about having a lifetime of devotion and love through the good times and the bad, of unconditional acceptance and support, don't waste any more time. Take a deep breath, put pen to paper or put your fingers on the keyboard and tell me about you. Don't worry about that first letter; it's only an icebreaker. We can start there and see what the future holds for us. Hope to hear from you soon."

Her ad carried an 'additional photos' icon, which I clicked. There were five additional pictures. One showed her standing on the porch of a rustic cabin in a pair of daisy dukes and a man's shirt tied under those spectacular boobs, leaning on the rail with her hair in a ponytail, laughing. The next one showed her nude in a swimming pool, hair floating loose in the water, a nymph out of folklore. Another had obviously been snapped at a party. She was seated at a table, a little drunk, leaning back in her chair with a drink in hand and her dress open almost to the navel, exposing a half cup brassiere with her tits spilling out of it down to the nipples. In another, obviously a publicity shot, she was done up as a showgirl, high cut, tight fitting sequined bodysuit covering her just enough to avoid a morals charge, with a transparent silk cloak flowing off her shoulders and ruffling in the breeze as she stood hipshot on impossibly high heels wearing a feather and pearl headdress that made her look eight feet tall. The last photo was a nude study, one knee figleafing her as she toyed with a kitten lying on her breasts while reclining on a pile of pillows. Apparently innocent, it was one of the most erotic pictures I had ever seen.

I reluctantly backed out of Deirdre's listing and went on to my other two finalists. 

Lulu was a plush blonde with a body built for sin and according to her listing, a high sex drive that amounted to perpetual horniness. The three pictures she included made it clear she was an honors student in the School of Sexual Pleasure. However, none of the pictures was less than four years old. Rechecking her records raised questions about the disparity between the weight and height she claimed and what the official record stated, and not just a matter of an inch or a few pounds either. Her listing was silent on what she had done to earn her sentence, but the inmate records site told me this was her third trip through the system, and she wouldn't even be up for parole for another three years on the assault charge that had landed her behind bars. Not a good candidate despite her looks and frank sexuality, assuming the photos were actually of her and not of someone else. 

Maria was a cute little thing, five foot two, petite and well proportioned, with big boobs, bedroom eyes, a stated preference for high heels, leather and spankings, and a come-closer-you-interesting-man look on her face. Only a state away, she said she would be out in less than six months. But on rereading her listing carefully I noticed that she was evasive, providing no information on how many children, if any, she had. I reflected that this lack of honesty might extend to other things as well. Back to the prisoner records website I went in search of further information. Sure enough, there it was. Maria had three kids by three different fathers, all living with their grandmothers. She had been divorced twice. The information on her activities in prison was not reassuring. It was all sports and social activities, with no sign of self-improvement classes, correspondence courses or anything that might help her turn her life around once she got out. Bottom line was that she didn't seem all that stable and looked to be husband-hunting with an eye toward sitting at home all day and partying all night, preferably without kids in the picture. She lacked the kind of integrity and loyalty I was looking for. Scratch her off the list.

Very well, then; Deirdre it would be. I returned to her page and clicked the Order button, then went to Checkout to complete the transaction.

The checkout page stated that Deirdre's information had been ordered once before. Did I wish to proceed?

I thought about it. On the other sites, when I had looked at the general catalog pages I had noticed boxes where the thumbnails should have been, with either "Sorry, She's Taken" or "Removed on [date]." I didn't know if ladiesbehindthewalls.com followed the same practice, given that I'd gone straight to the search engine, but it seemed likely. I used the mouse to complete the transaction, noting with approval that the site accepted PayPal and used it to send the payment.

The next screen stated the information I had purchased would be sent to me within 48 hours. I was suddenly eager to see what might come of this. Illogical; but as Mr. Spock once observed, sometimes wanting is actually better than having. 

I checked my email before I went to work next morning. Nothing. I got the same result when I came home that night and again in the morning. As I worked that day, I wondered at odd moments if maybe the whole thing was a scam. Back home, I showered and changed, made dinner and cleaned up, and dealt with the monthly bills before I faced my fear and switched on the computer to check my emails again.

There was an email from ladiesbehindthewalls.com in the in-box. There it was: all the information I needed to contact Deirdre. I opened the word processor, thought for a minute and started to write.

"Dear Deirdre:

"I got your name and address through the ladiesbehindthewalls.com website. Your entry intrigued me, as did your pictures, so I am writing to you. It feels as though I already know you a little bit, so I'll start by telling you something about myself. As you said, the first letter is only an icebreaker. So let's break some ice.

"My name is John Middleton. I'm 40 years old, a college graduate and a licensed master plumber. I own and operate a small plumbing company a couple of states away, which ought to suit you if you really want to get out of the Lone Star State. JM Plumbing & Heating isn't the biggest dog on our block, but I'm not a one man show, either. We do both commercial and residential plumbing and HVAC, split about 60 – 40 at the moment if you count the subcontract from Marion & Pickens LLC for a new estatelet housing project they're building as commercial. 

"Plumbing isn't a glamour job. It's not being a lawyer in a three piece suit arguing cases before a judge, nor a doctor saving lives in the emergency room, nor being a stockbroker and making big wads of money by shuffling paper from hither to yon. But its honest work and my men and I are good at it. There is one good thing about it: we don't need to worry about our jobs getting outsourced to India or China or some other place where the capitalists don't pay the workers a living wage. As a matter of fact, the biggest thing we have to worry about is the home handyman with delusions of adequacy who tackles his own remodeling job. The way that works out, about seven times out of ten we get a frantic call from his wife pleading for us to send someone right away because darling hubby is flooding out the house, so we make more money from the job than we would have if they'd just come to us in the first place! 

"As far as hobbies and such go, I like to hunt and fish. I keep a bass boat on a trailer at the shop and during the season I'll camp out in some remote spot where they're biting, or at least I hope they are. I'm not one of those trophy addicts but I do enjoy the tussle with a fighting largemouth on light to medium gear, and they taste real good pan-fried in lemon butter with mushrooms. Some of the folks I grew up with own farms, and if they have a varmint problem they call me because I hit what I point at, not their livestock. In return for keeping the varmint population down, they let me hunt over the fields and the borderlands in season. It's a rare year I don't manage to take enough game to keep the freezers fully stocked with venison, pheasant, quail and goose; wild turkey, too. If I can't use what I shoot, I give it (cleaned and dressed, of course) to the local food pantry. Hunting must not be done solely for pleasure, in my opinion. If you aren't going to eat it or wear it, don't shoot it, is my motto.

"That tells you a little about me. But you asked what I was looking for in a woman. Let me give you an idea, and then you can decide if you want to initiate a correspondence with me.

"I'm looking for a woman who is willing to devote herself to me, to make our happiness her top priority. I'm not looking for Suzy Homemaker, who deals with the house and entertaining and nothing else. She has to have a brain in her head and not be afraid to use it, and mustn't be afraid to work outside the home. Like you, I don't need any players or hustle artists in my life. I want a woman who can pull her own weight.

"She will have to be prepared to put up with a somewhat limited social life because of my personality. I'm something of a solitary sort. You'll have to get to know me better before we get into that, however. She also must either like the outdoors, learn to like the outdoors, or be willing to be a hunting and fishing widow during the seasons. We could talk about that.

"I'd prefer her to be experienced in the bedroom and open to anything we agree to try. As you said, those are indeed a nice pair of 38Ds and there are many things I can imagine doing with them, but I'm not going to be more specific until I know A) to what extent the institution you're in censors your mail and B) whether you like explicit mail or not, and C) how explicit you'd care for me to be. Answer those questions and I'll respond appropriately.

"In short, I'm looking for someone who can walk side by side with me into the sunset with our fingers intertwined, not two steps behind me with her head lowered at the end of a leash – unless she gets off on that sort of thing. Anything more detailed than that depends on what you say.

"I'm ready to try and make a new start in the personal relationship department. Are you? Meanwhile, knowing that there's a lag in communications between here and there, I will write a couple of times a week until and unless you tell me to cease and desist. I look forward to your reply.

"John."

I went back to the beginning and reread it. I added a postscript.

"PS: Enclosed please find a couple of pictures and a book of stamps."

I went and rummaged in the desk I used for paying the bills and found the book of stamps I keep as backup to the 100 stamp rolls I buy at the post office. It was still sealed. In the right hand drawer I dug out a box of photos and looked through it. They were mostly digital prints taken either at company parties and cookouts or leftover shots from promotional literature I'd had made up for homeowners thinking about remodeling. I selected one that showed me standing by the (then) latest addition to the company fleet and a candid my office manager had snapped of me futzing around at the grille that showed a bit of the formal garden Mother had put in and a corner of the swimming pool. I reasoned Deirdre might like to see the flowers. On reflection, I tossed in one of those record shots they take when you land a big ocean fish and then sell you as a memento of the occasion. I'd spent a week last summer at Boothbay Harbor chasing tuna, billfish and sharks. This tuna had been big enough to pay for the day's charter after I sold it to a local restaurant. It also was the closest thing to a Charles Atlas-type shot I had, being that I was wearing just a tan, swim trunks and a pair of boat shoes. Deirdre might as well get some idea of the kind of physical shape I was in.

On my way to the shop next morning, I pulled into the post office. I got out and walked over to the mailbox. The envelope was still unsealed and I thumbed through it again, peeking to make sure the photos and the book of stamps were all in there. I licked the envelope and sealed it, but I still couldn't bring myself to mail it. I just stood there, tapping the letter indecisively against my palm. Did I really want to do this? Was it the right thing? Was I being an idiot? What would happen if she told me to fuck off? Then I heard an ad on the radio over the idling motor:

"You can't win it if you aren't in it!"

"What's the worst thing that can happen? She says, 'No thanks.' So what if she does? Give it a try, you gutless wonder!" I said to myself. Suiting deed to word, I tipped the envelope into the slot and watched it disappear.

"And so the game begins," I said aloud.

True to my word, I sent off a short note or a postcard every other day, writing of inconsequentialities mostly. What I wrote were the sort of things that a dedicated diarist might scribble in the daily record of his or her passage through life, of no possible interest to anybody except perhaps a biographer; yet according to the FAQ pages of all three of the women inmate websites I'd found, this sort of trivia was exactly what these women missed the most. When I wrote a postcard, I always made sure it was a colorful one with flowers or brightly colored birds, both North American and tropical. Research told me that Deirdre's lockup was up in the Panhandle, home of the blue norther and the summer scorcher, not what you'd call the most colorful place in the world. The tones tended to sand, brown and at best dark green. Institutions as a group tend toward drab, boring shades. They may cost the least and be easiest to keep clean, but lord! do they suck the spirit out of those forced to be there.

*****

Deirdre swung down from the Department of Corrections bus, wiping sweat from her forehead with a manicured hand. She and her seven student beauticians had spent the day in a nursing home washing and setting, doing perms and dye jobs, and styling the hair of sixty-plus elderly ladies. It was good for morale on both sides and good practice for the cons that were looking to start new lives with a saleable skill when they were released. Neatly folding the white coats that they wore over the civvies they were permitted, the group ambled from the front of the Administration Building toward their barracks. Camp Jackson had been an Army Air Force gunnery training school and she reflected that the place hadn't been changed much by its reincarnation as an honor camp. The inmates still wore khaki, things still ran to bugle calls, and you still couldn't wear civilian clothes except under special conditions. Get right down to it, she thought, the biggest difference is that back then it was a stag camp and today it's a hen house.

She had just finished changing back into khakis when Assembly sounded over the PA. Hastily tying her shoes, she took her place in line in front of the barracks for roll call. It was a technical point, but the camp administration took pride in its 'humanization of the prison experience.' They didn't have 'head counts' here, they had roll calls, and then only three a day; and at that the lights-out count was on the honor system.

Roll call was pro forma. Sergeant Jo Carter, known behind her back as Jarhead because of her name, one hitch as a Marine and her rank's coincidence with Frank Sutton's character from Gomer Pyle, USMC, had already swept the ranks with her eyes and found everyone present. After the verbal count and the military-style report to the watch commander standing at the end of the company street, she about-faced and dug into the mailbag hanging from her shoulder.

"Mail Call! Pass 'em along if they're not for you! Moorhead ... Kelly ... Martin ... Smith ... O'Connor ... Little Fox ... Talliferro..."

To her great surprise, Deirdre found herself holding a letter with a return address she didn't recognize. Her heart sped up. Mechanically she passed two more letters back to the last rank.

"Barracks Chief, take the formation," ordered Carter when the last letter had been distributed. "Dinner in five minutes. Carry on!"

Ronelle Talliferro, a lanky black woman who like Deirdre was doing a misdemeanor deuce for DUI and who was grimly determined to go straight, right-faced the platoon and calling cadence, marched them to the dining hall. She fell into line behind Deirdre as they moved down the steam tables to collect their food and sat next to her at the table.

"So who's writing you, Dee-Dee? A fan from the old days?"

Deirdre grinned at her. Talliferro was one of the few women in the barracks who got mail regularly and shared the good parts with the others, and she was the next bunk to Deirdre's. The two had made friends because of their common military-brat background despite their racial difference, something that was not as usual as the authorities wanted the public to believe.

"Let me open it and see." She tore the envelope open with a finger and was surprised to see three photographs and a book of stamps fall out. She hastily scanned the letter.

"It's a guy who got my address from that website you had me send my name to. He's a plumber with his own business. He likes the outdoors. Seems a little formal. Maybe he's shy."

"Well, he's not bad-looking," Ronnie said, picking up a photo of a man in better than decent shape standing next to a huge fish. "Nice pecs. Strong arms and legs. You know, Dee, if you decide not to keep him, throw him my way. He looks like he knows what it's about."

"Don't be greedy," chided Deirdre. "I'll write him back tonight and we'll see what happens." She retrieved the picture, tucked pictures, stamps and letter neatly back into their envelope, and resumed eating.

*****

Ten days after mailing my letter to Deirdre, I arrived home to find a plain white envelope with a TDCJ Camp Jackson return address in the mailbox. I was surprised at the shiver that ran down my spine at the sight of it. Tossing the rest of the mail onto my bill-paying desk, I set the letter on the table beside my easy chair before I went to wash up. Showered and in clean casual clothes, I poured myself a drink before I took out my pocketknife and slit the envelope open.

"Dear John:

("No, I'm not blowing you off! But that's the traditional way the letter from the girl who is ending the relationship is always referred to in the Army. Do you have a nickname? Maybe I should give you one. Let me think on it.)

"I was thrilled when your letter arrived today. It's been weeks since I last received mail, and that one was from my lawyer. Not the same at all. Mail means so much to gals in my situation. Even though this is a minimum security camp for trusties, we don't have internet access or cell phones or any of the things I used to take for granted. Even telephone calls are restricted to just 30 minutes a week, and that is subject to being in good standing and if we are able to schedule a call. We have to get approvals for them.




Lady Behind The Wall



"Let me tell you a little more about myself. As you saw from the return address, my full name is Deirdre Little Fox. I'm the result of a marriage between a full blooded Cherokee father and a Eurasian mother. Maman was half French and half Vietnamese. They met when Papa was serving with an A Team in Vietnam. 

"The first twelve years of my life, I was what they call a Nomad, an Army brat. Papa was stationed all over. You learn to get along with almost anyone and you get to see a lot of the world, but the price is never having anywhere you can really call home. Then Papa was killed. We never found out where or how he died; theArmy wouldn't tell us. But he was awarded the Distinguished Service Cross posthumously, so whatever he was doing was important and involved combat against an armed enemy. That's all I know about it.

"After Papa's memorial service, Grandmother took us into her home on the Cherokee Reservation in Oklahoma. That was like going to another planet. Maman and Grandmother hated each other. Grandmother is the family matriarch and I think she blamed Maman for Papa's death. Maman just left one day. She sent me a letter telling me she'd come and get me as soon as she was settled, but I never saw or heard from her again. When I was a senior in high school I got a letter and a check from the insurance company. That was how I learned Maman had died.

"I went to college in Texas, mainly to get away from Grandmother. I stretched the insurance money as far as I could, but it wasn't enough to pay 100% of my school bills. A girl in one of my classes was paying her way through by working as a stripper and she introduced me to the manager at the club where she worked. He liked what he saw, helped me work up an act, and took me on.

"When Grandmother found out what I was doing, she was so upset she tried to get the tribal council to declare I was not a Cherokee. The elders refused to do that, but ever since then anything I send her is returned, marked 'Refused.' She threw me out of her life and according to my aunt walks out of the room if someone as much as mentions my name. I'm all alone. Aunt Cloud is the only one who writes to me, but her farm keeps her busy and she doesn't have a whole lot of free time to write.

"After I was cut off by Grandmother, I dropped out of college. Nothing seemed to matter. I drank more and drifted out to Vegas. I worked the clubs and took formal dance training so I could become a showgirl. The pay isn't as good, but it's a respectable job. By day I studied and got my cosmetologist's license. By night I danced, either chorus or exotic as finances moved me.

"One thing about being a licensed beautician and a trained dancer: you can travel around the country as the spirit moves you. There's always someplace to work. I worked the club circuit for awhile, then got bored with that and drifted back into chorus work. Even though the pay wasn't great, by working the day shift in a beauty salon and as a dancer in a casino at night I was making good money, good enough to buy a little place in Vegas back before the prices skyrocketed and another place in Fort Worth. Eventually I settled into a routine: in football season Fort Worth, with my old alma mater and shopping in Dallas; winter and spring in Las Vegas; and summers traveling on the strip circuit, living in style because it paid for itself in tips and side trips.

"Drinking was my downfall. Even though a gal who looks like me can talk her way out of getting a ticket or even an arrest by quivering her chin, batting her eyelashes and flashing her tits – no, let me be honest, by using sex to get out of a jam – sooner or later she's going to do something the cops can't overlook. In my case, it was meeting a guy who came to Dangerous Curves who took a fancy to me after my last set, having a few with him in his motel room and then skidding across the Chief of Police's front lawn through a picket fence and fetching up in his wife's prize rose garden. He busted me, wouldn't let the D.A. offer me a plea, and here I am. 

"I used to think his wife was behind that since he had me a couple of times when he was younger and maybe she knew it, but I know now it was my own damn fault. I deserve what I got. I'm just lucky I didn't kill somebody or maybe myself.

"But let's change the subject. What's life like in here? It's not as bad as you may think if you've seen a lot of prison movies. This isn't a pen like Alcatraz or Joliet. It's an honor camp, a satellite of the TDCJ's Dumas Prison. That's a low-security prison for women. If you keep your nose clean in there for a few months, they offer to make you a trusty and send you here. Dumas has a 12 foot cyclone fence with razor wire, guard towers and locked doors at night. Here, there's no towers, no locks and the fence is a plank and post type like you'd find on a farm. It's just a symbol, the guards say, more to keep the public out than to keep us in.

"It's kind of like being in the Army. We have reveille and roll call, then morning jerks and breakfast. After that you report to your assignment, whatever it may be. We send out work teams to the farm – we raise a lot of our own food and supply Dumas too – and road cleanup gangs, and land restoration teams like the CCC had in the Depression. A few of us with special skills like me as a cosmetologist teach training courses. I get to take my students to the nursing homes and work on the old folks a couple of times a week. They don't get charged for it and my girls get to practice on real people instead of working on each other or other inmates.

"But one thing we all have to do is qualify as forest firefighters. It's the wrong time of year for it now, but in season they'll send us out if a brushfire or a forest fire gets out of control. They call us the Camp Jackson Fire Foxes since of course we're an all-girl outfit. Two years ago, before I got here, they sent the team all the way to Colorado to help with the big fire they had and they were gone for five weeks. 

"Odd as it sounds, some of the gals here hope for a fire because you get two-for-one good time when you're on the fire line and there's always the chance of meeting a nice guy you can get together with after you get out. After the Colorado fire, three of the gals who went married men they met out there. Others hope for a fire because discipline is relaxed and if you get lucky you can slip off to a quiet spot in base camp for a boinkfest. One thing about smoke-eaters, they're all in great physical shape!

"John, you asked how explicit I like my mail (or my male). You are right that all our mail gets opened, unless it's legal mail pertaining to an appeal or something like that. But the Warden's okay, as people who run prisons go. She doesn't care how steamy your mail gets as long as you aren't plotting an escape or getting religious tracts or propaganda that might cause a problem in the camp. They'll chop your good time for that, or even send you back to Dumas to complete your sentence, which would be dire.

"So tell me what you would do to me if you had me. Do you like me shaved or natural? Would you like to shave me yourself while I was tied down to a four-poster bed and tease me with the shaving brush? Would you like to spank me until my ass glowed and then give it to me anally? It's dirty, but it hurts so good and I can cum so fast that way. Or what would you do if you came home from work and found me waiting for you with an ice cold martini in blood red lipstick and nails and five inch stiletto heels and nothing else? Would you be aggressive or would you want me to be the aggressive one? I can be anything you want me to be. Just tell me what you like and I'll be that for you. Write me something sexy and imagine me lying in bed reading it and getting wet, with my fingers working down there until I explode with pleasure. I'll write back. I can't wait for your next letter, to start being your long distance mistress.

"Imagine my lips on yours, caressing you. But until we can get together, this will have to do.

"Deirdre."

She had kissed the bottom of the last page with red lipstick and carefully folded it so it wouldn't smear. I held the imprint up to my face, somehow pleased that our mouths seemed a match in size. I sipped my bourbon and thought. After a bit, I carried the letter upstairs to the computer.

A couple of terms Deirdre had used were new to me. It took a little digging on the Web, but I found out what she meant. 'Good time' had nothing to do with privileges as I'd thought, but instead was shorthand for 'reduction of sentence for good behavior.' I wasn't able to locate a set of guidelines specific to Camp Jackson, but the ones I found for other prisons were consistent. In essence, a prisoner is awarded good time for positive activities that show his or her intention of reforming and going straight when released. You get it for performing certain kinds of jobs, for teaching, and for passing authorized correspondence courses, GED studies or college extension courses à la Web-based educational institutions, though all of course by mail. I reflected that being rewarded for risking your neck fighting a forest fire with two days credited against time left to serve for each day you were on the fire line wasn't nearly enough, but it apparently was sufficient incentive to motivate these ladies. All things are relative.

"Dear Deirdre:

"Your letter made my day too. It's hard for me to talk to women, much less a beauty like you. I'm always afraid of saying or doing the wrong thing because I just don't understand the unwritten social rules that everybody else takes for granted. I find it much safer, if not always easier, to express myself in writing. That also has advantages. You can't recall an angry or hurtful word if you're talking. When you are writing, you can always edit what you say to make your point without offending or hurting the other person. That is, unless you're emailing or instant-messaging. I find I have to be very careful not to sit down at the computer when I'm angry and to THINK before I type. I suppose the discipline is good for me if sometimes hard on the ego.

"You see, I have Asperger's Syndrome. It's a mental defect, you might say. Asperger's is distantly related to autism; but let me make this clear. I'm not Rain Man or some disconnected kid rocking in the corner and beating his head against the wall. I look and act normally. I'm not a weirdo who walks down the street talking to himself and drooling as he looks at the pretty girls (although I will happily make an exception in your case; do you have any more pictures?). What it means is I don't pick up on facial cues or body language very well. Except to people I know, I seem a little 'flat' at first because I'm so afraid of saying the wrong thing or laughing at something that isn't funny because I can't read them, that I've learned to keep a mask in place and to not visibly react to what is said. It's why I prefer to write and use words carefully; their meanings do not shift nearly as far on paper as they do depending on facial expressions and tones of voice when used in face to face dialogue. It's why I get on well with most pets. They don't talk, but their body language and growls, purrs, yips, barks and hisses, etc. are always very clear to me. I can tell what they are about. It's a common enough presentation of the syndrome. Animals don't hold it against me that I'm not normal.

"I'm fortunate that I'm good at something that does not require interpersonal diplomacy and can deal with people over the phone for a lot of it, and that my customers understand that when I ask to be left to get on with the job I'm not being rude, simply practical. My reputation around town is that of somebody who is blunt-spoken and won't sweet-talk the customer, and who can explain the problem that brings me to their home simply so they'll understand what was done when they get the bill. That actually works for me!

"Something I'd like you to do for me, Deirdre, is tell me if there is anything you need. I know the State takes care of your clothing and personal needs, but I also know there are little things they may allow you to have that you might not be able to get from the camp canteen or the PX or whatever it's called. If you need something, maybe I can get it to you through ladiesbehindthewalls.com; they have a gift shipping service. Just send me the guidelines as to what the Warden will and won't let you have and I'll see what I can do for you. I'm not sure why or how, but you've already touched me even though we have never met in person.

"As to what I'd like to do with you if I could have you: oh, you've no idea of the things I'd like to do to bring you and me pleasure! Your boobs arouse the beast in me, and I fantasize about your wrapping your lovely long legs around me as I bury myself in you.

"If I had you spread-eagled on that mythical four poster bed, firmly tied down with silken cords (let's get into the fantasy world by all means), yes, I would shave you clean. I'd prop your oh so luscious ass up on a down pillow and shave you with a straight razor that I'd strop right before your eyes, whose sharpness I'd prove by plucking a hair from your head and dropping across the blade so you could watch the two halves fall away, severed by their own weight. I'd rub spice and sandalwood scented oil into your pubes to slicken the skin, and then I would use just the lightest coating of unscented shaving cream on the hair to soften it for the razor, applied with a badger bristle shaving brush. 

"I'd take my time with the shaving, working carefully to get every last hair off your mound of Venus, leaving it bare and clearing the way for later. After rinsing you off, I'd rub in more oil, with particular attention to your labia and the clitoral shaft, gently working on them until your own pussy oils seeped out to mingle with the scented oil on your skin. I'd be guided by your moans and whispers and whimpers as I worked on you. My goal would be to make you willing and compliant, eager for my touch.

"Next, because you're tied down like a slave girl and have surrendered your will to mine, I'd put nipple clamps on you, adjusted to constrict blood flow rather than cause pain. While I waited for your nipples to swell and empurple, I'd begin to finger you and gently lick your clitoral shaft, persuading your clit to emerge from hiding so I could nibble it. I'd be aware of your reactions; watching for the sexual flush and hopefully listening to you tell me what you're feeling as I drove you toward orgasm. 

"You see, darling, I want to make you cum while you're absolutely helpless to resist my attentions. It pleases me to pleasure my partner; I find it incredibly exciting and erotic. The sense of power and satisfaction I get by making you willingly climax is ultimate intoxication.

"When I sensed you were almost there, I'd take a Wartenburg Wheel and run it over your turgid nipples, then down your belly and along your clitoral shaft while I probed for your G-spot with my fingers. I want to set you off like a firecracker and drive you clear out of your mind into a place where only the pleasure you are feeling matters.

"As you reached that peak, I'd remove the nipple clamps and suck on your nipples hard and pull them mercilessly until you were thrashing on the bed ... and then I'd mount you, forcing my cock lubricated with your own pussy juice between your nether lips, thrusting deep inside until our pubic bones met. Perhaps you'd scream, perhaps you'd beg me to take you, perhaps both at once. We'd fuck each other for a long time, with I hope many orgasms on your part, until I couldn't hold back any more and grabbed hold of your tits and shot my cum deep into you, with us climaxing together if we were lucky and merging in that magic moment so our souls touched as deeply as our bodies.

"After we came down off that high, I'd untie you and hold you in my arms as we fell asleep together. And when we awoke again, if you liked what I did to you I hope you would start something so I could pleasure you again ... and again ... and again, until you were worn out and satiated. I suspect a woman who looks as sensuous as you do would be difficult to bring to that point, but it would sure be fun for me to try to do that to you and for you.

"To change the subject, you may have noticed I did not mention condoms or The Pill or contraception in our little fantasy. I am presuming you have no sexually transmitted diseases of any kind, including HIV and AIDS. I have none, but you also need not fear my knocking you up. When I was 21 I came down with a bad case of the mumps that left me sterile. Having had the disease as a child does not confer lifetime immunity as the doctors used to think. It wears off after 15 years or so, they say today.

"I shoot blanks in the bedroom. I can't sire children. If this is a problem for you, we need to talk about it. We probably should talk about it even if it's not a problem for you.

"So let me know what you need, and if you think I can give it to you. Write back soon.

"John."

I printed out the letter and put it in an envelope. I went through the pictures again, found two that showed the house and added them in before I stamped and sealed it. This time I didn't hesitate. I walked down to the foot of the driveway and put the letter into my mailbox for the mailman to pick up tomorrow. As I headed for what I thought was a well-earned drink, I wondered how Deirdre would react to it.

*****

Deirdre was still getting used to receiving letters and postcards after months of never hearing her name at mail call. Following the custom of her barracks, she read the postcards and then stuck them up on her locker or the bulletin board to brighten the bland colors of the place. Today she got a letter, several pages by the size of it. She tucked it inside her shirt to read later.

After dinner, while the other inmates gathered in the social space at the far end of the barracks with its TV and card tables to watch the tube, play cards or just talk, she walked outside and stood under the streetlight that illuminated the company street and read the letter from John. She went back and reread the part dealing with her being tied down on a bed, shaved, teased and then thoroughly fucked, feeling her nipples tighten and her pussy loosen and swell. Without a doubt, he had a vivid imagination! She hoped he would be ready to act on it, that he was not all talk. Looking at the rising moon, she returned to the barracks, stretched out on her bed and started to write a reply.

When lights out came, she crawled under the covers. Deirdre waited until the settling-in noises had turned to the deep breathing and snores of sleep before she shucked out of her panties and pulled her bra cups under her boobs. Replaying the scene from John's letter in her mind, her fingers went to her breasts and between her legs. She pinched her nipples hard with her nails and slid two fingers into her cunny while her thumb rubbed her clit and her hips bucked gently against her hand, imagining that it was her lover using her. As she masturbated, she lifted one heavy breast to her mouth and sucked on the nipple, pulling it with her teeth, loving that it hurt so good. Before long, her body's demands would no longer be denied and she climaxed, smothering her squeals against her own tit.

Getting up, she quietly opened her locker and removed a clean pair of cotton panties, taking the ones she'd worn to bed with her as she padded softly to the bathroom. She cleaned herself up, wiping the juices from her legs and her vulva with the old pair, careful to get every drop. As she went back to bed, she thought that John was going to receive a real surprise with her next letter.

*****

I'd taken to checking the mailbox on my way into the house after work, instead of on my way to the shop every morning. A thrill ran through me as I spotted a bulky envelope in Deirdre's handwriting. Once I was inside, I sat down and tore it open. A pair of panties fell out. I held them in one hand and her letter in the other.




Lady Behind The Wall



"John, darling:

"Just to show you how exciting I find your letters, I've enclosed a souvenir for you. This is what your last letter did for me."

I took a moment to sniff the slightly stiff panties. They smelled of female musk, the odor of arousal in a woman that she can't disguise when she starts lubricating in preparation for intercourse. Apparently Deirdre found my erotic efforts acceptable. If this is how turned on she got from reading, I wondered how much more excited she'd be if and when we got together?

"I think we're on similar pages, so I thought I'd see what I can do for you with words until we can meet up close and personal.

"You said you like to go fishing in remote areas. Imagine if we were going to a fishing spot up in the mountains so remote that it's accessible only on horseback. (You do ride, right?) We'd work our way upslope to an Alpine meadow, totally deserted, with a lake in it.

"I'd gallop across the meadow to the lakeshore. I ride hard and I like to be rode hard, too. We'd set up camp as the sun was setting and turn the horses out to graze, hobbled so they can't run away. You'd start a fire and put the coffee on, and I'd go bathe in the lake. When the coffee was done, you'd come to get me, stripped for a quick dip of your own. 

"I'd come up out of the water totally naked, walk up to you and tell you to close your eyes. I'd slip behind you and press my body against you, and when your cock leapt to attention I'd take it and stroke it slowly, feeling it get harder in my hand. Then I'd whisper in your ear, 'Darling, close your eyes, count to 100, then turn around three times. If you can catch me, you can have me!' and then I'd run away out into the moonlight, zigzagging to make it hard for you to track me, crouching down in the tall grass so I'm hard to see and finding me will be a challenge.

"You'd turn around and look for me, but Papa taught me how to hide in plain sight. I won't be easy to see. Like the hunter you are, you'd cast about and find my trail. Then you'd track me down. I'm a trophy worth having!

"When you got close, I'd break cover and run, my hair streaming out behind me, silvered by the moonlight. You'd be in hot pursuit. I'd lead you a good chase, but sooner or later you'd get close enough to tackle me and bring me down.

"When you had me on the ground I'd struggle a little, but not too much. You'd pin my hands over my head and get my legs up over your shoulders and roll me back, raising my hips. And then, with us looking deep in each other's eyes, I'd whisper, 'Take me.'

"You wouldn't say anything. You'd just push your hips forward and that big, beautiful cock would slide right into my wet pussy. I'd moan as you filled me all the way up, helpless to stop you and not wanting to, just wanting you to fuck me with your huge cock, wanting to please you as you took me.

"We'd start moving together and the light would turn red as I lose myself in the pleasure your rod would give me. I'd be trying to tell you what felt good, how good it was, never wanting you to stop, begging you to fuck me like an animal. I'd beg you to hurt me so good, to fuck me so hard it was like raping me, rejoicing in my helplessness and your male dominance as you used my pussy to please yourself and me. And then I'd climax for the first time, rockets exploding in my brain and my whole body having a seizure as I came. I'd wrench my hands loose and pull your head down so I could suck your tongue, wanting every hole to be full of you. As I started to come down, I'd beg you to suck my tits and without missing a stroke you'd grab a nipple in your teeth and pull it hard, growling between your teeth and setting me off again as you bit it and lashed it with your tongue. I'd scream my pleasure to the sky like the vixen in heat I am and rake your back with my nails, begging you for more cock, always more cock. 

"As I squirmed and shook on your prick, you'd roll onto your back and end up with me riding you, so you could get your hands and mouth on my boobs. Don't be gentle with me, baby. Twist 'em, bite 'em, squeeze them hard! I love a man's hands on my body when I want him, but especially when he's pleasing me the way you are. Your working my breasts, teasing my nipples and even spanking my ass as we fuck would set me off into a string of cums merging into one roiling rapid stream of climaxes so I didn't know or care where we were. I'd be bouncing on you, too caught up in the moment for words, but never stopping as you tortured me so sweetly on your prick. You'd call me names and I'd say "Yes!" to every one. Anything, just to make our pleasure last and last and last.

"Finally, you wouldn't be able to hold it any longer and you'd pin me on my back again, my legs wrapping around you as you exploded in my womb, your seed filling me to overflowing as you spent yourself into me and collapsed onto my body. And then I'd hold you, kissing you tenderly as we fell back to earth together.

"When we could, we'd stand and you'd pick me up and carry me back to camp in your arms. You'd walk into the warm lake and let me go when the water was up to your chest. I'd wrap my arms around you and kiss you deeply as our hands roamed up and down each other's bodies, reawakening desire. We'd leave the water and lie on the grass, still kissing and fondling, and then I'd swing around into a 69, taking your beautiful prick into my mouth and deep-throating you as you parted my pussy lips and ate me, your fingers in my box and your mouth on my clit, my juices flowing like a river over your face.

"After I came a couple of times but before you could, I jump off you. You'd sit up and find me on all fours, my hands pulling my asscheeks apart to expose my rosebud as I begged you to fuck me in the ass, the final conquering of your slut-vixen. 

"My begging and sucking would leave you with a larger cock than you'd ever known. You'd come up behind me and gather my cunt juice on your finger and lubricate my asshole, taking your time, easing first one finger and then two inside to ready me for your big dick. I'd feel the head of your prick slide into my box a couple of times and I'd shiver with anticipation. And then you'd use your thumbs to pull my browneye wide and I'd feel you enter my ass. It hurts so good! I don't want the pain but oh, I need it! I want you to fill my ass right up! Oh god, it hurts so good!

"Finally I'd feel your balls slap my pussy and I'd know you were all the way in. You'd slowly pull out of me and as you started back forward again I'd thrust my ass back against you and before long we'd be moving against each other and I'd be reduced to moaning and cries of pleasure as you ravaged me and I came again and again, you pillaging my ass, ramming my G-Spot, your balls hitting my love button, treating me like your plaything– and I'd love it, every single second of it!

"And when I thought I was as high as I could get, you'd reach around and find my clit and stroke it. I'd go off like a rocket, screaming into the heavens as I exploded into a million stars, lost to everything but the ecstasy of being your sex toy until you came explosively, shooting your cum into my bowels and we fell to the ground utterly done.

"And when we woke in the moonlight, I'd lead you back to our tent and we'd sleep in each other's arms, knowing we were cherished and part of each other.

"My family name suits me in looks and appetite, darling. When I get started, I can't get enough sex. If we click, you'll never need to go looking for any other woman, I promise, John. I'll give you anything you want, any way you want it, whenever you want it. I can be your Barbie, your whore, your slave. Any way you want me, I can be. I feel close to you already too, which I find curious.

"Why curious? I was a stripper off and on for 15 years. I'm no blushing virgin. I know what men are really looking for, not what they think they need. Usually they are totally wrong, after only sex or eye candy, a trophy to show how studly they are, thinking women only want a sugar daddy or a protector. That's not what you want. Oh, an appetite for sex is certainly part of what you want in your partner, but that's not even half of it. You want someone who will be there for you, no matter what; not like the gal who when asked by the preacher if she'd have her husband for richer or poorer, in good times and bad, replied, 'Yes; no; yes; no.' You want a woman who'll share the triumphs with you and comfort you and buck you up in the bad times that happen to everyone. You want a woman who will accept you as you are and not try to make you into something you're not that might suit her better.

"Well, darling, maybe I'm that woman. You read my profile and chose to write me and you've been up front with me from the start. You understand the situation I'm stuck in and are doing your best to get to know me based on a few pictures and a lot of words on paper. I want us to get to know each other better still.

"So I've asked that you be put on my contact and visitor list. Right now, you're probably wondering what that means. Well, John, while the prison authorities can't stop us from sending each other letters they can and do restrict outside voice and personal contact. As I said before, phone calls are a privilege and a limited one at that. Generally, only family members and your lawyer are allowed to speak and meet with you here. I've put in the request and I think it may have a chance of approval. I wrote my lawyer about it. He has a limited power of attorney so he can pay the taxes on my two properties and my car, among other things. I asked him to send you a set of pictures I had made up in case I met someone while I was in here, and to see if there was anything he could do to speed up approval, since the Warden must finally okay any non-family additions.

"From what I understand, what happens is that the Warden sends a form to your chief of police or local sheriff and asks him to interview you and fill it out. I think they check the NCIC too. As you might guess, the TDCJ isn't real big on having ex-cons visit inmates. So when the cops call you, don't be surprised or afraid. It's just SOP.

"But if they approve you, we'll be able to talk on the phone and if you can arrange it, maybe we can even meet! That would be wonderful!

"As far as your sending me anything, I've enclosed a list of gifts we can accept. We aren't allowed to have much and they actually keep inventories on us and will confiscate anything we have that isn't listed. Generally, we have to buy from the camp commissary using our inmate account. We aren't allowed cash money for the obvious reason. It's why cigarettes used to be currency in prison. Today, it's barter.

"But one problem I have is with brassieres. My big tits need support and these prison bras just don't cut it. I end up with an aching back by the end of the day. If you could come up with a couple of bras that don't have steel underwires but do provide good support, I'd be so grateful! They don't need to be sexy, we can worry about sexy after I'm out. But they need to be sturdy and able to stand up to washing machines. If you can get me some, I'll make it worth your while (wink, wink). 

"And you wouldn't have to worry about knocking me up even if you weren't shooting blanks. I had a bad case of PID about 10 years back. The gynecologist says the scarring is so severe that I'm barren now. Does that bother you?

"Oh, I hope the approval doesn't take too long. I'd really like to hear your voice! We have a lot to talk about, I think. 

"Sweet dreams, darling.

"Your Deirdre."

I looked at the list she'd sent. It was a sixth or tenth generation photocopy and not easy to read. The things prisoners could have sent to them from the outside did not have much wiggle room. It was intended to keep anything that might make escaping easier out of their hands. 

They could receive paper and envelopes, but only plain white. Notepads or pads of lined paper had to be glued, not stapled. No ballpoint pens. No fountain pens or rollerball pens, either; only felt tip markers. Stamps were okay, but no more than 40 at a time. Photographs were allowed provided they weren't provocative, whatever that meant, but no more than ten in one letter.

Subscriptions to magazines and newspapers were allowed and so were non-controversial books, but they had to be sent direct from the publisher or a bookstore. I decided to talk to Antony, the barber who owns the unisex hair salon where I have my hair cut, and find out what professional magazines I should send her. I could arrange for subscriptions to newspapers from Fort Worth and Las Vegas myself. On reflection, I decided to include one to our local weekly and to Smithsonian and the National Geographic too. Those would give her and the women in her barracks some color, and the weekly would acquaint her with my town.

No razors of any kind. No homemade baked goods. I wondered if the Warden was thinking some idiot who'd seen too many B-movies might actually try to bake a file or a disassembled gun or drugs into a cake or something. Didn't they think the public knows jails have X-ray machines, metal detectors and sniffer dogs? No electronic games. No board games unless shipped direct from a store or website. I reflected that whoever put this list together had spent entirely too much time reading Stanley Lovell, Paul Brickhill, P.R. Reid and Lloyd Shoemaker.

Tobacco products were forbidden. The TDCJ was determined to run smoke-free prisons, which when I thought about it made sense for a number of reasons. Therefore, no matches or lighters were required.

Cosmetics were limited to lipstick and non-alcohol-based hair gel, purchased at the commissary. Unscented stick deodorants could be sent, but nothing else.

On clothing, the okay-to-send list was a bit more liberal. Underthings were allowed, again provided they were not provocative. I took this to mean plain, white and not cut sexy. If a prisoner had a job that required personal interaction with the outside world, tasteful civilian clothes were authorized subject to approval by the corrections officer in charge. Jewelry other than a cheap watch or a wedding band was not permitted. Footwear was limited to sneakers and slippers. If an inmate worked in the real world as Deirdre sometimes did, shoes were okay to send; but only flats, no high heels. 

However, thirty days before an inmate's release date, she could be sent anything in the way of clothing and it would be held for her until release day arrived, so she didn't have to walk out of prison in hopelessly out of date clothes or a prison dress that proclaimed her an ex-convict. I made a note to ask Deirdre for her dress size, shoe size and preferences in cosmetics.

That decision brought me up against two different presumptions on my part. First, I was operating on the assumption that Deirdre would want to come and be with me, which based on past experience was not as yet warranted. Second, that she had asked me if I could do anything in the way of providing her with a couple of sturdy bras that she really needed, from which I inferred she expected me to get them for her. 

Well, table the first presumption for now. I headed for the shower so I could do something about the second.

An hour later I was standing in front of Victoria's Secret in the mall. The displays were of opaque plastic mannequins with impossibly long legs and arms, tiny waists, flat butts and teeny tits. I looked dubiously at them, but finally plucked up my courage and went inside.

The sales associate in the brassiere department flashed me back to high school. She was the spitting image of a cheerleader who had graduated a year ahead of me, a classic example of the species bitchius populare Americanus. The cheerleader I remembered was of the Heathers variety, the kind who used her position in the school to make people's lives miserable just because she could. I had been a regular target of her cruelty until she made the mistake of running for student body president. 

She didn't realize that my 'flat affect' and ability to move silently with no one noticing me unless I wished to be seen made me the next thing to invisible to many people in that stalag, students and faculty alike. As a result, I heard and learned many interesting things. The principal, who kept a watchful eye on students he thought might be at risk, once remarked to the vice principal who handled discipline that I probably knew more about what was really going on at the school than he did. 

When election week rolled around, during the Candidates Q&A Forum in the auditorium I'd stood up and asked the cheerleader if she'd gotten over the case of clap she'd caught from her best friend's boyfriend yet. Her response was lost in the uproar as her best friend (and campaign manager) charged out of the wings and treated the delighted student body to a Jerry Springer moment resulting in torn clothing, two pairs of bare tits, hunks of hair ripped out and a serious clawing before teachers could separate them. The result was two broken relationships among the Beautiful People, one friendship destroyed, two trashed reputations, a week's suspension for the campaign manager, and a humiliating loss at the polls for Angelique the cheerleader. It was one of my favorite high school memories.

This one seemed cut from the same cloth. Her brows rose when she finally noticed me. When she spoke, her voice was just short of a sneer.

"Is there something I can help you with ... sir," delivered in a tone that implied there wasn't anything I could possibly help her with in any part of her life. However, I wasn't the same person who had been tormented by Angelique Corbeil back in the day.

"If you want to keep on working here, Jennifer, you could put some respect in your tone, for starters," I riposted. "I'm sure your manager would be very interested if I were to call her over and file a complaint."

She backed up a step as it dawned on her she had seriously misjudged the old fart. "I –"

"Never mind. What I am looking for is a plain white bra in 38D that offers firm support without underwires. What do you have that might fit the specifications?"

Jennifer frowned and twirled a strand of hair around her fingers, perhaps trying to wind her brain up so it would think. She walked over to a set of shelves, looked, and then tossed a "Let me check in the back," over her shoulder as she headed into the stockroom. Three minutes later she returned.

"I'm sorry, but we haven't anything that fills your bill. All the support bras either are lace, with underwires or both, or they don't go up to that cup size. We don't stock much in D-cups; we don't have much call for them."

"Where would you suggest I look?"

"Fredericks of Hollywood has bras in that size. If you strike out there, try the ladies floor in Macy's. They have a wide selection and go up to size D. I got my mother a good D-cupper there before a party last month."

"Would your mother's name be Angelique, by any chance?"

Jennifer's jaw dropped. "How did you know?"

"You look just the way she did at your age. It's a shame you act like her too, but you learn from your mistakes faster than she did. When you next see her, tell her that John Middleton sends his regards. Thanks for your help." I could feel her eyes on me as I walked out. With any luck, Angelique might have an unpleasant time explaining how it was she knew me.

Fredericks was on the next level up at the opposite end of the mall. I looked at the window displays. A sun and fun setup showed off bikinis and patterned underwear on substantially bustier dummies. I looked at one in particular, posed hipshot, one leg bent up, looking over her shoulder with a pair of sunglasses perched on the end of her nose. That decided me.