Summer was well begun, and on that Wednesday morning, I went off to the office, swinging along the shaded walks of western Pearl Street, past other buildings of condos like my own. I was wearing a new dress I´d just finished. It was a little shorter than usual, showed my legs, but tastefully I think. I was loving the feel of my breasts moving under the front, and now and then I´d look down to watch them sway. I thought about how I´m brown all over, though not many people know it.
I was humming to myself when I overtook another woman headed in the same direction. I recognized her. “Fran! How are you? Haven´t seen you in ages, where have you been?”
Fran started and turned to see who had called her. I was surprised to see her face changing strangely from recognition to pleasure to a semi-sour mien. “Oh. Hello, Toni. I´m fine.” She looked me over. “You´re certainly looking well. Quite a change, I´d say.” The change did not appear to please her.
“Thank you. I am well, Fran. I feel wonderful. How come we don´t see you at Wednesday any more? It´s been quite a while.”
Fran´s face turned genuinely sour. “You´re not going to see me again, either. I had quite enough of that bunch.”
I was taken aback. “Why Fran, I thought you enjoyed the group. What happened?”
She drew back, almost as though she was going to take a swing at me. “What happened? You couldn´t see? No, you don´t care, and I can see...” she waved her hand at me, “you´ve gone down the same track. You used to be the only one. The only one with any sense of... of decency. The rest of them, the rest of them...” she was gathering steam, “My God, they are so disgusting – sitting there in public, rubbing up against each other. They thought they wouldn´t be noticed, but I could see them, touching each other. Men and women!” Fran´s voice began to rise. “Women and women!” Fran´s face was red and the veins in her neck stood out. “You, you were the only one who...”
I was amazed. But, as she really began to warm up, I said, “Fran, I´m sorry you feel that way, but those people are my friends. And let me tell you something else. You said I´ve changed, and I have. I´m in there rubbing up against them, too. Men and woman, and I´m not sure which I like better. But I don´t like what you´re saying, and if you feel the way you do, you´d best stay a long way away from us.” By that time, I was fuming, too, and I walked away down the street, leaving her visibly steaming with self-righteous rage and nowhere to vent it.
On the mall, I hurried past the office and went down the block to Melanie´s shop. I called out “Hi, it´s Toni,” and, hearing a muffled answer from the back, helped myself to a mug of coffee and opened the office door where Melanie was sitting at her desk, entering accounting data in the computer.
“Hi, kid,” Melanie said, “plant yourself. What´s up?” She turned and picked up her coffee mug, settling her elbows on the desk.
“You won´t believe this...” I began, and told Mel about the encounter with Fran.
“Well, I´d say ‘good riddance,´” Melanie concluded. “I never felt she was one of us, anyway.”
“She sure isn´t, but how could you tell I was?”
“I didn´t know. Just had to wait to see how it turned out. You´re good-looking, dress well, smart. It was just a question of waiting ‘til you decided how you felt about how the rest of us are.”
I was a little unsettled by that. “I didn´t realize there was a plan.”
“Wasn´t. Isn´t.” Melanie sat back in her chair. “I just mean, we all sort of came together. The ones who wanted the same things found them, the rest left. Remember Tim? He only stayed a week or two.” She leaned forward, grinning. “Did you really tell Fran you rub up against women? Is this a change I should know about?”
I put my legs up on the chair near the desk, watching my dress fall away from my legs – just the way I´d planned. “Mainly, I wanted to shock her. I´m simply not sure about sex with women – one way or another – right now. And what is it we all want, after all? You´ve been thinking about this, I haven´t.”
“Not a lot, really. It´s just that Dana and Jenny and I all like to snuggle up together, you too, and don´t deny it. I´m pretty sure Dana and Jenny are lovers, though I´ve never gotten more than a few gropes at Wednesday from either of them.” Melanie smiled. “Gropes and a lot of loose talk about getting it on together. They certainly aren´t prudish about it, anyway.”
“Well, no. And I can tell you Dana´s not bashful. When we were fitting the clothes we showed you, she gave me a kiss and a genuine invitation.”
“You got to fuck her?”
“No, Mel. I wasn´t ready for that.”
Melanie smiled. “But that sure explains them coming out bare-ass and talking business with us. By the time we were through, I was ready to jump both of them.”
“I know. I could smell you.” I grinned at her. “But so what if some of us are bi? How´s that got anything to do with us as a group?”
“Oh, I don´t know, Toni,” Melanie said, swinging back and forth in her chair. “I just have this feeling that, all of us, we sort of look after each other. Nothing too big, after all, but we sort of care for each other without a lot of strings attached. Sort of like a family – a strange one, maybe.” She turned and looked sharply at Toni. “I mean, look at you and Ned. I think he saw you were hurting, somehow understood, and was able to help you. Isn´t that so?”
“You can say that again. Ned saved my life. Someday I´ll tell you about it.” I swept my hand down my front. “But, look at me. I dress like a woman again, I´m tanned all over, even the crack of my ass. And, I get laid whenever I feel like it.” I set the empty coffee mug on the desk. “I guess I see what you mean. Dana did something like that for Jenny, right?”
Melanie considered. “Yeah, I think so. Jenny used to be so frumpy. Now, she´s tall and strong. And then, she moved in with them – I´m pretty sure they all sleep together, even though Jenny still dates.”
“They don´t make much effort to conceal it – at least from us.”
“No. Well, I think Dana had something to do with Jenny´s changes. They sure are three happy people, where Jenny used to be just barely hanging on.”
Toni looked thoughtful. “You know, Sylvia was at Ned´s with us the other day. She was curious about – well – about how come we´re not jealous of each other, the way we mix around.”
“What did you tell her?”
“We told her how we each feel about jealousy. Mainly, if you´re sure of your own worth and don´t pretend to own someone else, it´s not a problem.” Toni watched Melanie´s reaction.
Melanie thought it over. “Not a bad way to put it. I do know that with Rudy and me, we´ve dealt with jealousy pretty well. I´m not concerned about it, and neither is Rudy, because we make sure we each know where we stand with each other. It´s got to be something like that with Ed and Dana and Jenny. Ask them.”
Toni nodded, “Maybe I will,” she said then went on, “That leaves Sheldon, doesn´t it? What about him?”
Melanie looked at her watch, “Hold on a sec,” she said and went out into the store. In a moment, she came back, carrying one of the sexy outfits I designed. “Getting late,” Melanie observed. “I ought to be dressed for the noon trade.” She grinned. “Some of them are just voyeurs; they come in to see what I´m wearing. But sooner or later they´ll be back to buy.” She began undressing, pulling off her shirt and jeans, standing in tiny panties.
“Are you avoiding telling me about Sheldon?” I asked, looking over her lush body. Surprisingly, it made me hungry, and I´m sure it showed.
“Not really; there´s just not much to tell,” she said, resting her butt on the edge of the desk, her legs close to mine. I ran my hand up the inside of her thigh. Warm. Smooth. “Rudy and I had him over for dinner a couple of Friday nights. But he does turn me on. So, one Friday he stayed for Sunday brunch. He´s lonely. And horny.” Melanie looked thoughtful, then looked at me with a grin. She pulled my hand up into her crotch. “And hung like a horse.”
“About time you told me.” I stood up and ran my hands over her body, paying special attention to her breasts and thighs. “He been back for more?” Melanie pulled my zipper down, and I shrugged out of the dress leaving us both only in panties. I hugged her and kissed her. It felt good. I was only a little surprised.
Melanie murmured, “I think Jenny got him next, then she brought him home and I think he spent the weekend with them. I´m definitely interested in a re-match.”
“Sounds like I´m the last to know.” My leg was between Melanie´s thighs; I rubbed myself on her, she rubbed back. “I´ll have to do something about that.”
“Won´t Ned mind?” Melanie´s hands were inside my panties.
“No. I told him I need experience. Like this.” We kissed again, just getting really into it when the door chime rang.
We separated, and Melanie looked at the TV monitor. “Damn,” she said, then called out, “Just a minute, be right with you.” She pulled off her panties. “Sorry, love. Maybe later,” then pulled on the dark blue cotton bib overalls she had brought in earlier. I pulled up the zipper that cinched the material around Melanie´s waist as she hooked the neck strap to the button on the bib. Obviously naked except for the overalls, Melanie walked out into the store and began talking with the customer who had come in.
I slipped back into my dress, smoothed it over my hips, and left Melanie´s office. As I headed for the front door, I winked at her. “Come by the office at lunch, Mel. We can finish then.”
That evening, after the Wednesday group had met and talked, drunk beer and eaten hamburgers, Sheldon and I walked arm and arm in the late evening dusk down Pearl Street toward my apartment.