Chapter 3: Devin's Awkward Brushes...

“Let’s pick it up for one more lap.” That bouncy ponytailed runner’s breathy encouragement had that eternal Piper Positivity.

Devin was dragging ass, they both knew it, but Piper would never call her on it, she was just too nice. She’s been slow all morning. She hadn’t been up to meet Piper for their 9 AM run, so Piper jogged the 4 miles to her place and when she got their Devin wasn’t even up yet. It was already 10:30 by the time Piper got to her place and for some reason Devin insisted on taking a shower before she went for her run.

After all that Piper was still the one throttling her pace so they could jog together. Piper jogged with her head held high, arms high and close, hands loose, chest up and open, ready for air. Devin was just struggling, concealing the soreness between her legs that had been a strange source of hidden pride.

Devin was thankful Piper wasn’t bugging her about not training. She had been running plenty, she just was dehydrated from last night’s drinking, but that was something she would not be divulging. There was no way in hell she was going to tell Piper about the exhilarating and odd thrill of walking home with a juicy pussy that was leaking a man’s cum into her little panties. She didn’t want the judgments or especially the lectures - she even banished those from her own conscience.

As they came to the lest bend in the park’s trail, Devin, then Piper, broke down into a walk. She’d had enough, so she stretched her long arms over her head, which pulled her old “SuperReader!” baby-doll t-shirt just above her navel.

“So... phew I missed you, what happened to you last night?”

Devin’s mind flashed to the drinks, the touches, the orgasm, and Phil’s cock. She vaguely remembered staggering home, and being as quiet as she could getting up to her bed. She fell asleep in bed with her tank top and bra in her hands, where she’d been sniffing them because they smelled like him, like them. “Uhm, not much, you know. What do you mean?”

“I mean I texted you a bunch, we were supposed to get together after my cheer meeting.”

“Oh yeah, how’d that go,” Devin deflected.

“I ended up hanging out with Pennie, Demora, and Alicia afterwards. We kept on working on new cheers after the meeting was over.”

“You come up with any new ones?”

“I’ll show you one, if you can keep up with me all the way back to the house!” Piper gave a taunting wide open smile, side skip stepping and encouraging Devin to run. In that instant, she seemed like an over eager little puppy dog, bursting with boundless peppy energy. Energy like that is infectious, and Devin decided Piper had plenty to spare, so she fed off it without concern as they jogged home. ‘The JV squad really had a big win getting Piper. She was born for it.’

Devin collapsed down to one knee right next to the hose in her backyard and turned it on, so completely drained she couldn’t even look back up to Piper. Devin greedily sucked down water for breaths at a go. While Piper went on as she sometimes does. She took to the hose, too, since she’d run so much.

“Good run, that was good, and girl, you really picked it up in that last stretch, rock on!”

“I wanted ... to see ... your cheer.” Devin was clearly the more winded of the two.

As Devin flopped down, Piper popped up, “Well you earned it!”

Piper, in her running shorts, white sneakers, and midriff runner’s tank-top, bounced out to the grass. She spun to face Devin, head down, arms akimbo, feet at shoulder distance apart for a still moment. This was the crazy, mind melting, invasion of the body snatchers transformation that she, Sarah, and Micah (just a friend) sometimes joked about when they watched the cheer squad go. Micah would narrate, “One second, they are totally normal girls, the next second, they are...” Then all in unison, “CHEER-BOTS! (Dun, dun, duuuuuun)”

Mecha-Cheer-Piper raised her head in that perfect clear-eyed cheer smile, hands clapped together palm to palm.

“We’ll put you - back - in your place On the a - ttack - in your face Hurricane, Hurricane, Our shooters make a three point rain! Don’t step to this, don’t even try The Blue and Gold of Garland High!”

“Very good Piper,” her mom’s approving voice came from the sliding glass door. Devin looked back to see her mom with a carafe of water with fruit in it.

“Yeah, that’s a new one, Piper made up.”

“Wow, even more impressive, Devin you-,” her face suddenly turned to a scowl, “Turn off the spigot, oh my goodness were you drinking hose water?” To Piper, “My daughter, ugh.”

“Jeeze mom.”

“You know what that water is, it’s rain drainage and sewer water. It’s filthy and it turns things yellow, and you want to drink it? No, here, I have filtered water with mango and lemon. This, here ladies, this is a palatable drink after a run.”

As annoying as her mom was, she was right. Her mango lemon water was good.

“This is wonderful, Mrs. Fawkes, thank you so much.”

“You’re welcome Piper, and tell your mother, we love your manners and she did a wonderful job raising you.”

“Thank you, mom,” Devin groan as an afterthought.

Piper giggled at their continued back and forth. For some reason Devin and her mom just didn’t seem to get along these days, and she couldn’t understand why. Or maybe their sniping was just how they got along. They were funny. Piper looked back at the house behind them where the girls had gotten drunk in the hot tub. That’d been a fun night.

“You know what would be great right now,” she whispered conspiratorially out of ear shot of Mrs. Fawkes, hoping Devin would get the hint, “a hot tub.”

The way Piper looked at her meaningfully for some reason stirred an angry green monster inside of her. “Uhm what? Where’d that come from?”

“You know, we just got done running, it’d be cool to relax in a hot tub, you know, wouldn’t it?”

Devin deflected, “Yeah, a pool would be awesome. Mom, can we get a pool?!”

Debra chuckled and called back to the from the patio table, “We don’t have room for one, unless you want to rip out Mr. Kushing’s bushes and buy his yard.”

Piper tried again, “Nah, a pool’s too much, just a hot tub would be nice.”

Devin replied, “Doesn’t your dad have a hot tub at your house?”

“Yeah, but not really. I mean we have one, but the heater is never on so it’s pretty much just a kiddie pool. Kinda no point, you know.”

Piper was really starting to irritate her now. That green eyed monster of jealousy was growling inside her. It just played a scene of Piper looking all hot and perfect, and Phil would see the two of them, and then everything would be over. Why would Phil want her when little miss perfect was right there too.

“Why the sudden interest in a pool?”

Her mother’s sudden proximity startled Devin, “Eek, mom!”

Piper replied, “Well I was just saying it’d be nice to cool off after a run.”

Debra suggested, “Well, I know Mr. Kushing has a hot tub, but I think it would be pretty rude to just go ask to use it ... But do you know what we should do? We should go over there and bring him dinner sometime. I haven’t seen him out in the neighborhood for a couple weeks. Maybe he might like some company?”

Her green eyed monster calmed, suddenly replaced by the thought of dinner with Phil. She couldn’t show too much excitement at the thought, though. Still, it would be really nice to just spend some time with him. She had to play this cool.

“Yeah, ok, whatevs,” she said off-handedly. Perhaps a little too dismissively, she realized.

“‘Whatevs’? Come on he used to be your favorite! Every day, can Mr. Kushing come out to play? Pick me up! Pick me up!”

“Okay okay. I’m not a baby anymore.”

Sensing her daughter’s embarrassment, her mom continued, “This child, God love her, she actually came to me and asked me one time, is ‘Mr Kushing really a grown-up’? She’d known him for a week, but all the kids loved him, and some of the mom’s did too but that’s another story.”

“Mom!! Oh my god, ew!”

“Wow, do you think he’s handsome?” Piper asked with a giggle at Devin’s obvious torment. There were few moments of schadenfreude that Piper enjoyed, but their banter was one that she just happened to like.

Devin offered to Piper, “He’s a little tubby.”

Debra corrected her daughter, “Well he’s not fat, sure he doesn’t have a six-pack like he did eight years ago, but he’s still a handsome man.”

“Oh em eff jee.”

“He was quite the looker back then, still mostly is.”

“Mom!! You are embarrassing the hell out of me, just stop talking. Go away.”

“Devin!” Piper was shocked, this was not the normal banter.

“Young lady, what’s gotten into you? You know what? You are going to go take a shower and get dressed, then we are going to go over there and YOU, young lady, are going to ask that very nice man that helped raise you if we can bring him some dinner. Did you know he’s been having a hard time, lately? He has always been there for us and now we are going to be there for him.”

Devin had to bury the snicker she felt inside. ‘Yeah, he was having a really hard time last night... ‘ She didn’t say a word.

Mrs. Fawkes continued her lecture, “The world doesn’t revolve around you, and it is time you started acting with some compassion and deference to the needs of others.”

‘Oh, I’ll take care of his needs, mom, and he’ll take care of mine,’ she thought.

With that, she had to say her goodbye’s to Piper and headed to take a shower while Debra gave Piper a ride home.

Ding dong dang dung ... Dung dong dang ding.

Phil groaned. His head ached, his face was scratchy and he reeked of ... oh yeah. Last night’s miracle. He was a wreck after he’d gotten her out the door and heading home. They hadn’t used protection, they hadn’t worked out any stories, she’d gone home drunk. But most of all, he’d had sex with an under-aged girl ... that he knew ... in his home.

There was another knock on the door. Phil groaned and slung his arm into a robe, pushing up from the couch where he’d passed out after putting a hurting on that bottle of rum after she left. But when he got to the door, he just about shit a brick. Devin and her mom were at his door.

‘Oh shit, oh shit, did she tell? Did Debbie find her drunk? Oh no, I am so fucked. Oh God I am going to jail, everyone is going to know what happened ... I am going to get pounded in the ass by a bug Black man nicknamed ‘Treetrunk’. I’m dead!’ He wiped the schmutz out of his eyes and opened the door with a squint.

“Hello, yeah?”

Debbie was taken aback by his appearance. He was clearly either hung over or possibly still drunk, and in a robe at almost noon! “Hel-oh my goodness, Phil.” Her face quickly shifted from friendly hello to concern and on to nagger. She turned back to Devin, “Honey, could you give us a moment?”

Devin, who had been waiting in faux frustration with her arms crossed threw them up in the air in faux disgust and faux wandered off, staying within earshot.

“Phil, talk to me. What happened last night?”

‘Oh shit, oh shit,’ kept running through his mind, and he started tearing up, his lower lip trembling. He felt like the earth was falling out from beneath him. “I- a- a- I got- I was really drunk last night I was out of control, it won’t happen again.” He could see Devin’s look turn sour at his last words. He tried to catch her eye as he repeated, “I’m sorry.”

Debra missed that look to her daughter, she was busy spying a mostly empty bottle of rum on the floor by his couch. “Phil, that’s okay, I understand, just ... just go get cleaned up, I don’t want Devin seeing you like this and she has something to ask you.”

Ass pounding terror suddenly gave way to intense confusion. He nodded and scurried off to get cleaned off with a quick pits-and-bits shower.

Devin’s mom continued her teachable moment lecture, “See, honey, I know you heard all that, Phil is having a really hard time with his break up and we should really help him out now. You are going to ask him to come to dinner at our house tonight, I want to get him out of that house.”

Dutifully she did, in that most stilted odd conversation. All the while biting back the hurt of his meaningful “never happen again” words.

“My mom wanted - we want to invite you dinner tonight.”

“Okay.”

“Okay, come over at seven.”

“Okay.”

Phil stood confused by the facts, but still let his eyes be drawn to Devin’s flowing sundress and her smooth pretty bare shoulders, much more tan than her bare bottom had been. Devin seemed apathetic but inside was confused by churning emotions, jealousy, love, hurt, and Debra was simply beaming with pride as they left the entryway. Ignorance is bliss.

The same newness that Devin had experienced all last week was now running through Phil’s mind when he arrived for dinner. Pleasantries with Debra passed for normal, but in his head he kept hearing a mantra, “I fucked your daughter, I tasted your daughter’s pussy juices, I came inside your daughter.” It was distracting and nerve wracking. Debra took his out of sorts demeanor as a symptom of his depression. Devin, on the other hand was petulant, hardly even looking at Phil.

Mr. Kushing was present physically, but absent in all other meaningful regards.

Devin shoved his plate in front of him as she was setting them before Debra sat down, Phil tried to give her a helpless questioning look, but she shot him back a tight lipped sneer. ‘Yeah, I’m beautiful, but only when you’re drunk,’ she thought. With every mention of Clarissa, Devin seemed to get a little colder.

About halfway through dinner Phil asked, “So, there’s an upside to all this craziness.”

“Oh?” Debra prompted with prim politeness.

“Well, after our break-up, Clarissa left several canvasses, lots of paints, a stand, basically a bunch of her art materials at my place. She’s not coming back for them, cause she’s more of a sculptor than a painter.”

“Oh, are you going to try out painting? Maybe take some lessons?”

“Me? Oh no, I have no artistic talent, but I know you were always artistic, Devin. It’s yours if you want it.”

“Oh, really that’s so sweet, isn’t that sweet honey?”

Devin turned an icy raised brow at her mom. She’d never taken any painting lessons in her life.

“Oh, but we really don’t have any room for that here.”

“No problem, she can come over whenever she wants to paint in the mini-studio downstairs. Just so long as you don’t throw parties or anything crazy like that.”

Devin’s chilly countenance thawed as the warmth of realization dawned on her. Maybe that whole ‘Out of control, it won’t happen again’ thing wasn’t for real. This whole time, she’d been freaking out because he didn’t love her, but now here he was trying to set up a way for her to visit!

She looked up to see Phil unclipping a key from his key chain and presenting it to her. “What’dya say, paint whenever you want on the condition of you get your mom’s permission and no parties, deal?”

For the first time that night, Devin smiled, and the family’s dinner warmed up. She eventually warmed up and started chatting about running, Piper and Sarah, the Cheer squad (including queen Demora: captain of the Varsity squads), and Alicia (captain of JV football cheer squad). Though she wasn’t a part of it, she listened well enough to tell Piper’s stories as though they were her own.

That night as she drifted off to sleep, she couldn’t wait to start painting. She smiled, thinking about the genuine warmth in his eyes when he looked at her. And he listened to her tonight at dinner. He really was special because he was the kind of man that made her feel special. She patted her lower tummy and thought, for the first time ever, how nice it would be to have his child. ‘This is love.’

Phil smiled to himself. He couldn’t help but relish the idea having that eager young high school girl all to himself.

The very next morning, Devin made sure to text Piper and Sarah and tell them all about dinner. Piper was curious, but Sarah was more eager to talk about their own plans. They were planning on meeting up with Jake and his friend Bobby for a double date. They were going to a butterfly park, Piper’s idea of course. She’d manage to get that as a concession from Jake for some as yet unrevealed foul-up, and Bobby just wanted to see that “chick with the tig ole bitties!” Sarah didn’t mind cause she’d heard that Bobby was packing.

Piper was worried Devin might get offended having not been invited to the park, but Devin didn’t seem to mind. She was more interested in bragging about the new art thing she was going to be trying out.

“You sure you’re not mad?”

“Piper, I’m fine, look, I’m going to be trying something new, and I have basically my own personal studio, I can go over whenever I want.”

Later while sitting outside Piper was chatting with Sarah about all Devin’s plans, assuring Sarah that they were totally fine. Sarah barely paid her any mind, until she suddenly turned to Piper, “Wait, back up there, he gave her a key?”

“Apparently, yeah, she’s going over there today.”

“Ask her if he has booze!”

Piper quirked a brow at Sarah, but slipped her phone out and thumbed out a text.

“She didn’t say if he has any, but she says, ‘No parties’.”

“Oh score, man, what’s this guy like?”

“I don’t know, Devin said he’s a fatty, but her mom said he had a six pack a few years ago and she seemed to dig on him.”

“Oh my god you think her mom hooked up with him?”

Piper just stared at Sarah with a bemused look of silent surprise.

“Oh yeah, I bet she did it. That’s awesome. Does she have a pic?”

“I dunno, lemme check Facebook ... Huh ... There he is, he’s on her friend’s list.”

“Well shit, he’s kinda cute for an old dude. Go mama Fawkes!”

It was about time to do some house cleaning. Phil yanked the comforter off his bed and saw it. The red stain, the evidence. The proof that he deflowered a beautiful young girl in that very bed. Just thinking about it, he could almost smell the sweetness of her hair. She was an ideal, a paragon, a vision of perfect loveliness and innocence that he had turned into a rutting, cumming sexual puppet two nights ago.

“Wow. I’m so going to hell.”

He was shoving his sheets into the laundry when he heard the chimes of his doorbell. The door opened up to reveal a smiling Devin Fawkes. She was leaning on the door jam with one arm, hip cocked out to the side, wearing oversized sunglasses, a loose orange floral surf top that sat off her shoulders, a faded blue denim skirt and Keds with white socks. “Hello, lover,” she announced.

“Shh, watch it girl. Get in here.”

“What are you ashamed of me?”

“No, not at all, I just don’t want to go to jail.”

She grinned as he closed the door behind her, “I guess that makes me your jailbait.”