I remember the first time I saw Delwyn, that’s Del to his friends, I’d agreed to go this political seminar with my sister. My oldest sister’s name is Vonda. By the way my name is Sherry, as in Sherry Van Dyke.

All three of my siblings; I mean Vonda, Nancy and Chelsea are older than me, and like our mom and dad, they’re all right wing, conservatives. Yes, they’re Republican to the bone. I guess I’m the black sheep of the family. I’m a left wing liberal. In fact I’m about as left wing as they come.

Don’t get me wrong; this story isn’t about politics, but it was politics that got the ball rolling. Let me tell the story, and you’ll see what I mean.

We were all sitting around the table in my mom and dad’s dining room. Anyway this was three years after I saw Del at the seminar I just mentioned. My sisters, their husbands, and my parents were all riding me about the president. The president by the way is a Democrat, he’s black, and he’s a little on the liberal side.

My oldest sister, that’s Vonda, she was married to Del, and she was giving me this raft of poop about the president. She was telling me how he’s a liar, he’s corrupt, his birth certificate is a fake, he’s not really a Christian, and he well ... you know ... he’s just not like us.

Now I’d heard all this crap a hundred times before, but since I was the youngest of my dad’s ‘four misses’, I was expected to ‘tow the mark’, be a ‘good girl’, and not argue with ‘my elders’. Not this time! This time I decided to fight back. I fought back for my self-esteem, for the president, but also for another reason I’ll leave unmentioned.

My oldest sister, Vonda, was a woman I secretly hated with the kind of blind passion that would have made Osama Bin Laden proud, not that I liked him in any way shape or form She was waxing profound about how the president had committed all these ‘high crimes and misdemeanors’, and he should be impeached by the House, brought to trial in the Senate and removed from office.

I’d had enough. Vonda is the oldest and certainly the hottest of the four of us girls. She’s a cool 5’6”, weighs a taut 140 lbs.; she has light sandy colored hair, light blue eyes, and the kind of body men have gone to war over. I mean she has a classic set of hard nippled, pear shaped 36Cs that just make me want to puke. Add to that her classic wasp’s waist, a perfect heart shaped ass, and an absolutely gorgeous face and you’ve got everything I’m not.

Vonda’s a college graduate. I am too, as are my other sisters. She graduated from the local university, the names not important. Every city has a couple’ they’re the big colleges with a handful of token dormitories, but where almost everybody else commutes back and forth from home or from an apartment to school.

Vonda got her training in the medical profession, and emerged as a Physician’s Assistant. She got a pretty good job at the local hospital, and in a couple of years she was promoted to head PA. in the cardiac unit. Don’t ask me the details. I majored in English Literature and since then got a job teaching tenth grade English at one of the public schools. Among the four sisters I’m the least successful. They all say it’s because I’m the stupid one, and that’s why I’m a Democrat. Who knows? Maybe they’re right?

Well here we were sitting around mom and dad’s dining room table, and everybody was throwing dung on the wall about the president just to see what might stick. There’ve been these two senators, one from Arizona and another from South Carolina who’ve been doing it for years. Vonda was the loudest, and to me, the most obnoxious. I had heard just about enough.

I hope everyone’s still reading. This is where it starts to get good.

I gave Vonda one of my best hairy eyeballs, and asked her, “Vonda how many hours do you put in a week at the hospital?” Now this is an old song of hers; how she’s always on call, and how she has to put in all these long hours.

Vonda stiffened her back in pride, glanced at her loving husband, that’s Del, and answered, “I guess about seventy hours a week.”

I had her, “You’re that incompetent?”

She looked at me like I was really stupid. My dad started to say something, but I held up a hand and held him off. I looked back at my ever loving older sister, “This is America. In America most people put in around forty hours a week, actually thirty-seven and a half given a half hour off each day for lunch. You say you put in seventy hours so it means it takes you nearly twice as long to get done what everybody can get done in forty.”

Vonda flared back, “That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard. You...”

I cut her off. I wasn’t anywhere near finished, “Hold it,” I said, “There’s only four reasons I can think of why someone would be putting in that many hours. One I just mentioned; you’re incompetent. If it’s not that, then it must be you’re afraid of your ass.”

Vonda was getting mad, and as I looked around the table I knew no one was on my side. I was used to that so I went on, “I mean you work all these hours and you don’t complain? Come on. Seventy hours? You must be dead on your feet. You know how that works Vonda dear. Seventy hours! Hours like that must wear you down. You must be exhausted. Damn it sis, tired and fatigued people make mistakes. In your line of work a mistake could mean death! You haven’t murdered anybody lately have you?”

Now everybody was up in arms. I wasn’t finished, “OK, you haven’t killed anybody. You’re not incompetent, and you have asked for help. But I said there are four reasons why someone would work that many hours.”

My mom said, “Can’t we change the subject?”

Vonda wasn’t hearing it, “No let my little sister finish her rant.”

God did I have her now. I went on, “Reason number three. You work seventy hours a week because you don’t want to go home.”

It got real quiet. I pushed in the knife, “You stay at work because it’s less stressful at the hospital than at home. Maybe you don’t want to go home and face Del. Maybe Del puts you on edge. Maybe Del makes you unhappy,” I didn’t want to do this. Del was special, everyone will find out how special later, but I had to go on. I added, “Maybe Del upsets you? We all know he wants kids, and you want your career. Do you hate to go home because he reminds you how you let him down?

God was Vonda burning up. I think I hit some of the truth, but I still wasn’t done, “Vonda what’s reason number four?”

Vonda had always been jealous of me. I was the youngest. I was daddy’s baby. She was the oldest; dad always held her to a higher standard. Vonda glared at me and snarled, “OK smart ass; what’s reason number four?”

I had her! Gosh I really had her! I pulled out my hammer and my stake and drove it in her bitchy heart, “Vonda the fourth reason’s the worst. You work seventy hours because maybe you’re not actually working seventy hours. Damn it Vonda you work at a hospital! There are beds everywhere. You’re young! You’re hot! There are all these sexy doctors, and they’re all over the place! Doctors Vonda! What does Del do? Del is a damn camera man.”

I have to back up here. Del got his degree in some kind a communication electronics thing. He works at one of the local television stations in the news department. Whenever we watch something on TV, and we get the images and stuff; it’s somebody like Del behind some kind of camera taking the shots. No one knows he’s there; it’s the kind of job that’s important but he’s the technician, the expert who always remains anonymous; anonymous, that’s a word that is easy to grow to dislike.

I hated myself, but at that moment, that was exactly where I needed to be. I looked at Del, “Del maybe you ought to get some of those tiny voice activated recorders. Slip one in Vonda’s cell phone. She’ll never know. Slide one under her car seat. Next time you visit her at her office in the hospital hide one behind a chair. Maybe you should install a GPS unit in her car somewhere.”

I had Vonda in the corner of my eye. I knew I was being a bitch, but at that moment, at that precise instant I knew the truth. Vonda, my oldest sister, the family role model, was a lying cheating whore. I glanced briefly at Del. I felt like I’d just strangled a puppy. He knew it too!

I had to go on. I was driven. I was mad. I was insane, “Yeah Del hook up a GPS. Check on her car. Sure she’s always at the hospital, but maybe, just maybe, sometimes her little Honda might be parked in front of the Holiday Inn down on Crowell Bridge Road.”

Vonda went ballistic, “I don’t have to listen to any more of this. Sherry you make me sick!”

I knew it was time to back off. I’d done what I wanted to do, now I could go back and play the politics game. “I’m sorry Vonda. Everybody knows I made it all up. We all know you’re a dedicated worker. You do work a real seventy hours each week. You love your home life. You do love Del. You’d never cheat on him. God everyone knows you and he are the perfect couple. I only said the stuff I did to show everyone how easy it is make someone look bad. Sure I guess the president’s made some mistakes. Don’t we all? I mean look how easy it is to tear up someone as honest and as dedicated as you Vonda. Crap, think of the job the president has. I bet he puts in seventy hours each week too.”

My dad finished the discussion and me off, “I’m glad that’s over. Sherry I’ve told you before to keep your views off the table. What you’ve said today was way over the line. I think it’s time to move on.”

I looked at Vonda, “I’m sorry sis. I didn’t mean it.” Honestly, I meant every word.

Gary, that’s Nancy’s husband piped up, “How about the NFL draft. Which team do you think made out the best?”

From there the conversation went off on a new tangent.

I’ve got to go back to the beginning again. Remember I said Vonda and I both met Del for the first time a political seminar. Let me explain how that happened.

Me, I’m twenty-three now, but back then I was only twenty and still in college. Vonda is five years older than me, so back then she was twenty-five. I walked into the seminar first, and right away I spotted this tall handsome man seated about half way between the dais and the back door. There looked to be seating for maybe fifty or sixty people.

I tell you he was stunning. He looked to be about six feet tall, and around a hundred eighty pounds. He was built like a brick shit house. I’m sorry I cussed, but he was really something. I don’t mean he was all muscle bound, far from it, he was just so well put together. He was lean and muscular, firm looking biceps and forearms; even seated I could tell he had a great ass. He was wearing this loose fitting Tee shirt, but by loose I mean it was loose in all the right places while still tight in all the other right places, that means like loose around the waist but tight across the shoulders. He was no muscle man, but the shape of his body from his waist to his shoulders made this perfect V. He had the slimmest hips; my God, if I was a man, I’d have had a hard on! I don’t mean I’m gay or a lesbian or anything, I mean, well ... you know what I mean.

He was dreamy. He had medium dark brown hair with red highlights. It was kind of mussed up like he needed to run a comb through. That wasn’t true, what he needed was for me to run my fingers through it. He had brown eyes; they were pretty brown eyes. By that I mean they weren’t the typical dark shit brown; they were a lighter shade of brown. They looked really cool; he had this sensitive vulnerable look. He needed a hug. God, he was a force of nature. I wanted to just run up there, wrap my arms around him, kiss him, and ask him to marry me!

He was sort of glancing around in that quasi-self-conscious way people who are alone someplace and don’t know anyone sometimes get. I didn’t want to go up and introduce myself; I wanted to go up, sit on his lap and kiss him. Just then my sister showed up. I looked at her then back at gorgeous and asked, “You know him?”

Vonda looked him over then shook her head, “No.”

I asked her, “Isn’t he just beautiful?” I was already having these fantasies where I’d kidnapped him, taken him to some hidden cabin, and raped him till he agreed to marry me.

She gave me one of her condescending older sister grimaces, “Him? You’re kidding.”

I shrugged it off. She’s my older sister, she knows. I gave him a second look. I guess he wasn’t that hot after all.

Just as soon as I polished off my fantasies about Prince Charming Vonda took off straight for him. She walked straight up and perched herself on the chair right beside my Mr. Right. I watched in stunned disbelief as my oldest sister, my heroine, swept right by me and proceeded to steal my vision quest right away. By the time I got to where they were Vonda had introduced herself, found out he didn’t have a girlfriend, and arranged an after seminar coffee clutch at the nearby Starbucks.

I got there. Del, I found out his name was Del, was camped out on an aisle seat, and Vonda had usurped the spot right next to him so I couldn’t get anywhere near him. Vonda introduced me as her ‘little sis still in school’.

Off and on I listened miserably to my sister as she whispered in my dream man’s ear all the things I wished I knew to how say. The seminar droned on for ninety minutes followed by a brief question and answer session, but it didn’t matter. I was so sick in love, but my sister had stolen the man of my fantasies right out from under me. I hated her.

After the seminar Vonda dismissed me like I was some child, “Honey you should run along home now.” Damn, she told me to go home! She said she and Del were going out for coffee and maybe some sandwiches later. I’ll admit it I wanted to cry. I saw him first! I even pointed him out to her, so what did she do? She derided him to me, and then went right off and stole him!

To make a long story short Vonda found out what he did for a living, thought it was interesting and decided Del was the guy she’d marry. I think she did it just to spite me. Hell, she already had a boyfriend.

She dropped boyfriend number one like a hot potato, circled Del like a shark, and in three months she landed him. Then she had the temerity to ask me to be one of her bridesmaids. I, of course, agreed.

My heart was broken. I walked down that aisle that day in some ugly green dress, while my sister was waiting in the rear all in white. I walked down toward Del, my Del, and was I ever crying. I wasn’t crying because Vonda was happy and getting married. I was crying because she was stealing my one true love right away from me. God I remembered his every visit to our house. I recalled every time he showed up to take Vonda out. He and I would talk. We were so much alike it wasn’t funny. I knew, and I think he knew too, I was sister right, while Vonda was sister wrong. Did I say I hated my sister?

Look I’m not hot like Vonda, but I’m no wallflower either. I can hold my own. I just don’t go after every guy I see. Vonda and Nancy were the ones who always had to have boyfriends. I’m not like that. When I was in high school I had my own car. All we girls had our own cars. As soon as we turned sixteen our dad made sure we knew how to drive a standard transmission, and we each had our own set of wheels. Ok it might have been big and slow, and it might have been a gas hog, but it was mine.

Dad wanted to make sure we’d never have to be dependent on some guy. He even made sure we got Karate lessons! There’s a story about that, and I’ll tell it in a minute. Look when I went out on a date I’d meet the guy at the place. I drive myself there so if I decided I didn’t like the layout I could just go back home. I did that a couple times too. Honestly I never dated much, never had a steady boyfriend in high school or in college. That’s what made Vonda’s trick so mean. As soon as I saw Del I knew. I mean I just knew. And then she grabbed him right away from me.

So I’m not hot like Vonda, and I’m not so sexy as Chelsea or Nancy, but I’m all right. I’m 5’4”. I weigh in at 120 lbs. I have brown hair I keep a little long but usually no one can tell because it’s in either a bun, pig tails, or braided. I have green eyes, a pale complexion, and I’m the only sister with freckles. I think the other three are jealous of my freckles. Look I’m not big; I think to say I’m a 34B is a stretch, but I have a good shape, and I’m not bragging when I say that of the four of us I have the nicest personality. Guess what else? I’m twenty-three and I’m still a virgin! How about that! I mean if I were a man like Del I think I’d want to be with me first.

Like I said I’m small. Dad made sure we all got Karate lessons. Well there was this boy in high school, a bigger boy, a football player. He started hounding me for a date. I was never going to go out with him. He had a reputation; not that all football players had reps, but he sure did. He wouldn’t leave me alone. One day in school while classes were changing he tried to corner me so he could feel me up. I ran into the girl’s lavatory. He followed me! He tried to grab me so I flipped him and put him on his back. He got really hurt, not his feelings, his back! He missed like three games. Guess who got suspended for three days! They suspended me! The vice-principal said I was guilty of aggravated assault. He said I shouldn’t have done what I did. Hey, did I follow muscle head in the boys’ lavatory? That’s my Karate story. No one believes me today, but that really is a true story.

Between me and my sisters I’m the last one still living at home. Vonda and Del are married. Nancy’s married to Gary, and just a while back Chelsea moved in with her boyfriend Hank. So when everyone left later that afternoon after the big discussion at the dining room table I was left at home alone to face the music.

Mom eyeballed me first, “I’m ashamed of you Sherry. Vonda loves Del. She’d never cheat on him.”

What could I say? I answered, “You’re right mom. I was only trying to make a point about how easy it is to make things up about people.”

Dad hit me then, “You should keep your politics to yourself. Your crazy liberal ideas will only get you in trouble.”

I wasn’t going to take that, not even from dad. I gave it back to him, “Yeah I know dad. Remember I studied Nineteenth Century American Literature. Someone should paint a scarlet ‘L’ on my blouse.”

Dad laughed, “You’re hopeless.”

I laughed then too, “I’m your daughter daddy.”

That ended our little post family gathering melee, but it still didn’t change what I knew. My sister was getting her ashes hauled at the hospital, and the man I loved was being made to look a fool. Face it I knew Vonda was a cheating bitch, and I’d decided I was going to be the one who rescues Del. As far as the Van Dyke girls were concerned Del was about to go from the frying right into the fire, because I was simply burning up for him!

I’d been keeping an eye on Vonda for nearly six months, but how I came to realize what she was up to came about completely by chance. Del worked at the news station. He put in long hours, but thanks to the way things worked at the station most of his time was put in during the day. Vonda’s workload seemed to be erratic; she’d get called back in at all kinds of odd hours.

Since Vonda couldn’t seem to keep up with her professional work and her home responsibilities she occasionally called me in to help out. I was always glad to do it since I wanted to be around Del as much as possible. Me helping out led to some disquieting discoveries. Vonda was too sure of my naiveté or she was just careless; either way I started to pick up the signs that something just wasn’t right.

I’m a virgin. I know at twenty-three that sounds like I’m not very modern. But being a virgin doesn’t make me a simpleton. I know the difference between a woman’s natural excretions and semen.

OK, I’m not exactly a virgin in the purest sense of the word. A couple boys in college tried the old dry pump, or is it hump, outside my clothes. I let them get away with it a little bit, and oh yeah, there’ve been some fingers up there, but they’ve only been my fingers. Yes, I play with myself, and before this is over everyone will know who I fantasize about when I do.

When I first started helping out I’d change Del’s and Vonda’s sheets every now and then. It was OK by me, and if once in a while there were some damp spots from a little loving I wasn’t bothered, a lot jealous maybe, but never bothered.

Over time it became pretty obvious Del and Vonda’s intimate moments, at least in bed, were becoming less frequent. All right, no problem, people come home tired, they don’t have the energy, but I was helping with the laundry too. Look it was no problem for me to throw a load of sheets in the washing machine, and occasionally I might have tossed in a few of Del and Vonda’s under clothes.

Del wears boxers. I prefer a man in boxers. I think those tighty-whities are more for kids than men. Sometimes I’d hold his boxers to my nose just to get smell his pee. I know that sounds crazy, but I loved everything there was about the man. Most of Vonda’s panties are like mine; maybe soft cotton, some derivative of polyester, and an infrequent pair of silks.

Like I said, I know a woman’s natural excretions from a man’s spunk. I found spunk in Vonda’s panties! What was spunk doing in Vonda’s undies? Aha, that sounds like a quickie! But a quickie at home; wouldn’t that mean she’d have time to change panties? Yes, of course! But what if the quickie was someplace else; say at the hospital or in some motel room, then there might not be an opportunity to change. She’d have to slip back on the panties she was wearing. Geez, what if the quickie was when she was leaning against her desk at work? Heck, the panties would go down, the fun would occur, and the panties would be pulled right back up without any chance for a clean-up.

I wasn’t a math major, but I knew how to add. I put two and two together, and the two together certainly weren’t Del and Vonda. That really got my goat. Del and my sister had only been married for like three years, and now two and a half years into the deal and Vonda was already fucking around. Was she just a promiscuous bitch, or was this something more?

Vonda’s my oldest sister, and until lately my greatest role model. What she did always meant everything to me, but I had to face what I’d already known about her. Vonda had been a busy girl in both high school and in college. I heard her private talks with Nancy. They used to compare notes about their boyfriends; both of my older sisters were little whores. Vonda’s premarital indiscretions were continuing right on after marriage. I guess that wouldn’t have mattered; except this time she was hurting Del, and I loved Del.

Of course I could be completely wrong, but in times like these I knew I had to trust my womanly intuition; for a man that would be his gut instincts. Vonda was cheating on her husband. Sooner or later she’d get caught. I knew Del; he wouldn’t stand for it, he’d blow her off. That’s where it got scary for me; if he caught Vonda he’d surely be suspicious about me. He might suspect I knew something. Even if he didn’t suspect that I knew something I was sure he’d never go for another Van Dyke girl. If he caught Vonda on his own, my chances with him after the break up would be nil.

My world, my future came into focus. I had to see to it that Del found out about Vonda, but I had to be in on the discovery with him. I had to appear to be on his side. Heck, I was on his side! That was even scarier; if Del and I worked together he still might not want to have anything to do with me. I was Vonda’s sister. If he dumped Vonda and went for me, which is what I prayed for every night, he might not want to be around Vonda ever again, but her being my sister sort of guaranteed that he would be around her at least some of the time.

I was excited about the prospect of exposing Vonda, but I was terrified that Del wouldn’t let me be the one to pick up the pieces of his broken heart when it was over. What if he left her, and then decided to skip town. He had a great job. Good cameramen are always in demand, and I knew in my heart he was the best cameraman in the state, probably in the country, maybe even the whole world! He could go anywhere and probably name his own price, but what about me?

Heck, I was a measly high school English teacher. I only got my job because my dad knew somebody on the school board. English teachers are a dime a dozen. If Del moved on I’d have to follow him, but I’d never get a job teaching school again. What if I ended up working someplace as a waitress? Would Del still be interested in me? I mean even with Vonda’s memory tied around my neck I think he would, but waitresses and store clerks and stuff work long hours for low pay, they never have the time when they’re not too tired to play. Oh awful, I might end up in another place, doing a terrible job for no money only to get to watch the man of my dreams fall in love with somebody else again.

I couldn’t do this! I couldn’t start wallowing in self-pity about things that might never happen. I had to get Del to leave Vonda. If I could do that, I knew I’d get him. I just knew it.

Well there it is; that’s why I grabbed the chance at the dinner table to go after Vonda. I’d laid my cards on the table. Now it was up to Del. He had his choices. He could continue to play the fool. He could go after Vonda alone, or maybe, just maybe he’d say something to me. I’m at his house three, four days a week. He has my cell phone number! I thought of that really old ABBA song from way back in the olden days, way back in the 1970’s. What was it called; ‘Ring, Ring, Ring.” Yeah I remembered, ‘Ring, ring, why don’t you give me a call? Oh, oh, oh ring, ring, don’t you love me at all?’ Come on Del! Call me up!

Del called me two days after my dining room debacle. I picked up my cell, saw who it was and pretended to innocently ask, “Hello, is this Del?”

He replied, “Yeah it’s me. We have a lot of laundry, and I was...”

“I’ll be right over,” was my reply.

Del and Vonda had just bought a house, a small bungalow. It was about a quarter mile from my dad and mom’s. I took a quick shower, pulled my hair back, used rubber bands to tie it off in two pig tails, and capped them off with small red ribbons at the ends. I grabbed a simple, thin, white brassiere, and matching cotton panties. Then I found a cheerful little pink cotton blouse; it buttoned up the front and had a simple pointed collar. I left the top two buttons undone. To abet the cheerful innocent look I was aiming at I slipped on a pair of light brown loosely fitting culottes. I added some light brown knee high stockings that matched the culottes, and finished the outfit off with a pair of penny loafers. I skipped the makeup except for a tad of soft pink lip gloss and hint of pink eyeliner, and oh yeah a little pink blush for my cheeks.

I looked myself over in the mirror. Yes, I’d captured the sweet innocent look I wanted. Del was going to just cream over me. I could almost see in my mind’s eye his man thing as it grew and filled out the front of his pants. I have a story about Del’s thing too.

I dashed out to my car, my little Nissan, and took off. When I got there Del was waiting for me in the kitchen. I went in the back door. He was drinking a cup of coffee, “Hi Sherry, can I get you a cup of coffee?”

I loved coffee, but I’d just brushed my teeth and didn’t want anything to spoil my breath, “No thanks. Have you got any juice?”

He grinned mischievously, “Pineapple juice?”

I pretended I didn’t know the secret to pineapple, “Sure,” I answered. He poured me a big glass.

I pulled a chair around so he could see me. I took a sip of the juice. I folded my hands in my lap, and I leaned forward slightly so he could get a better view of my breasts as they pressed against my blouse. Then I started, “Before I say another thing I want to apologize for the things I said about Vonda. I just made it up to make her mad.”

Del’s smile faded briefly but returned, “You sure pissed her off. When we got home, once she finished cussing you, she lit into me. She made it clear nothing was going on at her work.”

God he was hot! He was wearing a pair of snugly fitting jeans that showed off his thin hips and muscular legs. He’d tucked a dark blue Tee shirt inside his pants, he wasn’t using a belt, the metal button holding the top of his jeans together was crying out at me. Unsnap me, unsnap me, it kept saying. His tight abs, his broad shoulders and his magnificent pectorals were unbelievable. Del was clean shaven, no beard or scraggly mustache was allowed to hide that beautiful face. His hair was crumpled. It wasn’t crumpled like that Kentucky senator’s hair; that man’s hair always looked dirty. No Del’s crumpled up hair looked sexy. He had grass in it.

I had to do it. I leaned forward, “You have something in your hair,” I picked at it till I got it all out, “there,” I said. Geez, I wanted to kiss him so bad. I think he could tell. His hair was so soft, nearly as soft as his big beautiful brown eyes.

“You look really pretty this morning Sherry. Did you get dressed up for me?”

I knew I was blushing, but why hide it, “I always get dressed up special when I know I’m going to see you,” I clasped my hands around my knees and leaned further forward. I knew the unbuttoned top of my blouse left a small cleft; I knew he could see a little bit of my chest. He looked too!