Chapter 19

“Sweetheart? Can I talk to you about something?”

“Gee, Mom. You asked that so nicely I almost feel like I could say no.”

“You don’t want to talk to me?” Megan sounded hurt.

“No, Mom. I was being sarcastic. What’s up?”

“Bob asked me to marry him and I don’t know what to do.”

“Did you fall and hit your head?” Erica stared. “Sorry. That was sarcasm, too. Are you asking me for my opinion, or are you asking me to help you decide?”

“Both.”

“Okay. I think you should marry him. And to help you decide what to do, I think you should just remember the last time he made love to you.”

“There’s more to a marital relationship than sex, Erica.”

“Okay. Do you like it when he’s around?”

“Yes.”

“And do you like talking to him about stuff?”

“What kind of stuff?”

“Stuff other than the mind-blowing sex you to like to have.”

“Yes,” said Megan, her voice tinged with anger.

“Has he ever hurt you or asked you to do something you didn’t want to do?”

There was a pause.

“Yes.”

There was another pause.

“What? Did he hit you?”

“No, Honey. He’s never been aggressive to me at all.”

“Then what did he want you to do that you didn’t want to do?”

“He wants me to pose nude.”

“We already talked about that,” said Erica. “What else has he wanted you to do that you didn’t like?”

Megan thought about the butt plug. She still couldn’t believe she’d done that. But all he’d asked her to do was trust him. He didn’t ask her if he could put the thing in her. And, after she got used to it, she actually liked it a little. So did that really count? And in any case, she couldn’t tell Erica about that.

“Mom?”

Megan blinked. She’d been remembering what it felt like to walk around with something in your ass. She felt warm.

“No. I’ve never told him I would not do what he asked me to.”

“The way you said that it sounds like he asked you to help him rob a bank and you did it.”

“Look. You know I have some self-image issues,” said Megan. “I’ve called myself a slut and you didn’t like that. But maybe you’re old enough to know more about me.”

Erica clamped down on an urge to say, “Oooo. Do I get to hear a deep, dark secret?” Her mother’s tone of voice sounded very serious.

“Okay. I’ll try to hear it like an adult.”

“The reason I have never wanted to talk to you about your father, is because I don’t know who your father is.”

“Why not?”

“Because I was letting ten or fifteen boys and two adult males fuck me pretty much whenever they wanted to. I really was a slut, Erica.”

“Wow! I can’t picture that,” said the girl.

“I don’t want you to picture it. I want you to understand that my relationships with men were always fucked up. Sorry, but that’s the only term that really fits.”

“So you don’t trust Bob?”

“No, I don’t trust men. All men ever wanted from me was my ... vagina.”

“And now Bob wants your vagina, too. Does it feel the same when you’re with him, as back when you were a slut?”

“No! It’s not the same at all. I won’t lie, the reason I was a slut was because I craved the feeling of a penis ... you know. I didn’t even care who it was. But what I feel with Bob makes me understand I was a stupid girl who tasted candy and demanded to have more, even though it wasn’t good for her.”

“So Bob treats you with respect.”

“Yes.”

“And love.”

“Yes.”

“And he cares about you.”

“I think so. Because of Covid we haven’t been able to go anywhere or do anything so it’s hard to say how he feels when I want to go shoe shopping and he wants to go fishing.”

“Bob fishes?”

“I don’t know. I was just using that as an example.”

“You can’t get mad when I ask you the next question.”

“Fine,” sighed Megan.

“When you make love, does he make sure you have an orgasm before he does?”

“I’m not mad, but I very much want to know what you’ve been doing to come up with that question.”

“I read it online in an article about how to choose the right lover. It said he should always make you cum before he does.”

Megan closed her eyes.

“Yes. He does that.”

“Then, according to that article, you should marry him because he’s rare.”

“I’m not going to marry a man based on what some internet blog says!” snapped Megan.

“Okay. Do you love him?”

“I do. Or at least I think I do. I’ve never been in love before. Not like this.”

“Do you think he loves you?”

“Yes.”

“Then you need to ask him to sit down and make plans for the future. Find out what his life goals are and tell him your life goals. Talk about everything, including how much you should go in debt and what kind of car to buy and how many kids you want to have. You do want to have kids, right? I mean we brushed up against that when we talked about going on the pill, but...”

“I’m ambivalent about that. I don’t want to have a baby until the pandemic is over.”

“That makes sense. Anyway, spend hours planning and talking about the future.”

“We don’t know what the future might offer. A year ago if you’d asked me if I might ever meet a black man who reminded me of my math teacher and then start having a physical relationship with him while I couldn’t leave my house, for all intents and purposes, I’d have said you needed to daydream something that could actually happen. But as crazy as that sounds, it did happen. Bob Chambers upset my whole life.”

“The pandemic upset your whole life, Mom. All Bob did was give you something else to do, since you couldn’t go to work.”

“I suppose so. So, why all this planning the future when the future is as misty as a cloud?”

“That article also said if he’ll spend time with you that way, he really loves you.”

“Wonderful.”

“Mom, I’ve seen you two together in all kinds of situations. I hope with all my heart that I get to feel what I see you feel every day. I hope with all my heart I meet a man who will treat me like Bob treats you. If I do, I’ll drag him to the altar, if I have to.”

Megan sat there, while a single tear rolled down her cheek.

“If I marry him, will you still want him to pop your cherry?”

“Is that bothering you? Okay, since we’re talking seriously. Yes. I’ll still want that.” She waited three heartbeats. “Unless I change my mind and want Josh to do that. I’m pretty bowled over by him.” She waited again. “And the pandemic might end next week and I’ll be able to date again and I can get sex wherever I want to.”

“No!” Megan shouted. “Don’t be like I was!”

Erica came to hug her mother.

“I wouldn’t do that, Mom. I was just using that as an example of how my own future could change, so what I want right now might change. If you marry Bob, I’ll leave him alone. I can still have daydreams and I really do think things are going to happen between Josh and me. So don’t worry. I won’t try to mess up your happy ever after.”

She squeezed Megan tightly.

“Mom, we’ve talked about this before. I thought you had your mind made up.”

“I keep changing my mind,” groaned Megan. “Or thinking I should change my mind.”

“Well, if Bob marries you he wouldn’t ever do anything with me. I’m just a kid, to him.”

“What if I went insane and said he could take your virginity?”

“What? Why would you do that?”

“Because I want your first time to be beautiful and pain-free, and guilt-free. That’s not the way these things usually happen. But I know Bob would be gentle and care about you and love you. I want the memory of your first time to be something you treasure for the rest of your life.”

“Boy. Now I really want him to do it.”

Erica let her mother go, but held one of her hands.

“Part of me really wants him to do it, too,” said Megan. “The mom in me wants the best for you. The woman in me keeps whining about how he’s my man and other women should keep their hands off of him.”

“If we did that, it would be the only time we did anything,” said Erica.

“Oh, Sweetheart. You have no idea how the world can change. I’ll just say this. The first time Bob made love to me I knew then that I had to have that for the rest of my life. I had never felt that with a man, or any boy or set of boys. It blew my mind. I was hooked. And if you let him do to you what he did to me, you’ll be hooked, too.”

“Okay. Now I really, really want him to do it,” said Erica. She waited a few heartbeats. “Kidding, Mom. I don’t want to ever hurt you. I’ll tell you one thing, though.”

“What’s that?”

“You should definitely, absolutely, positively marry him. And you should do it as soon as possible.”

“Why?”

“Because you want that forever and marriage is forever.”

“Oh.”

“And after you’re married, you should let him do some nude shots of you. I’m pretty sure you’d like it.”

“Why?”

“I didn’t want to tell you this, but things have changed. Some lingerie I modeled was the slinky kind and I might as well have been naked. He was professional about it, but I knew he thought I was beautiful and it made me kind of shiver, you know? I definitely got horny. If he asked me to pose nude I’d do it in a heartbeat, just so he could see me that way and I could see the look in his eyes. He never did anything objectionable to me, but I kind of wished he would, you know? And if you were married, you could get as fired up as you wanted to and he’d be right there to take care of business.”

“That’s awful,” said Megan. “Parade around naked so a bunch of Japanese men can jerk off while my husband actually has sex with me?”

“Win – win,” said Erica, with a shrug. “I’ll be honest with you. I want to see if he’ll let me pose that way. I’m kind of chicken to do it but I know how much that pays.”

“How do you know?” Megan’s voice was firm.

“Models talk,” said Erica. “When you’re in a dressing room with four or five adult women you hear things. Like how adult modeling pays three times scale for normal fashion modeling.”

“And you want men to see you naked?”

“It’s not that, exactly. I don’t really care about them. I’ll never meet them so they’re just like any other Japanese person. But I loved how it made me horny to be almost naked in front of Bob. I’m going to get a couple of those sex toys, so if I do get horny I’ll have a Bob.”

“What?”

“Bob. You know, Battery Operated Boyfriend? Bee – oh – bee?”

“I do not want you calling something like that Bob.”

“Okay, I get it. I’ll just call it Frank, or George, or Beauregard.”

“Why those names?”

“Why not?”

“So you think I should marry him.”

“Yes, and I’ll be very cross with you if you don’t.”

“And you won’t have sex with him unless I say you can.”

“Well, that’s weird, but okay.”

“Okay.”

Megan looked around, as if she didn’t know how she got there.

“Whew! I feel a lot better! Thank you, Sweetheart.”

“Maybe you should tell him?”

“Oh, not now. If I told him now he’d drag me into bed and I couldn’t get out for hours. I need to make supper and vacuum the carpet in the living room.”

“Be sure to arrange your shoes, while you’re at it,” said Erica. “I think I’ll just go see Bob and find out when we’re working again while you do all that.”

“Don’t you dare tell him!” Megan blurted.

“I won’t. All I’ll do is find out if we can keep any of those Franks or Georges and if we can I’ll choose one and then I’ll tell him I want to do nude modeling next month.”

“Mom is going to marry you but you have to act surprised when she tells you,” said Erica.

“Why would you tell me that?” Bob asked.

“She said she might let you pop my cherry. If she says it’s okay, will you?”

“I’d have to think about that. Losing one’s virginity is a big deal. You can only do it once. It needs to be done just right.”

“That’s what Mom said, too. But I know you’d do it perfectly. Just think about it, okay? I might let Josh do it, though.”

“If you do decide to let Josh do it, wait until you’re ready and we’ll make a video of two teens losing their virginity. That kind of thing drives them crazy in the far east, especially if there is blood on the penis when it pulls out.”