Chapter 3

Emily woke in the morning, mildly hungover and caked in filth. Still, she was grateful to be up before her date had. She scrubbed off with his hand towel in the bathroom, dressed in her clothes from the day before, and ran out bright and early. With enough hustle, she could make it to Kyle’s place, change, and maybe get to work on time-ish.

Kyle had been at home just finishing breakfast when she walked in. “Hey, whoa, just getting in?”

“Yeah, Kyle.”

“Some night out, then huh?”

“Yup,” she steamed over to her stuff and dropped the bag with the dress down by her suitcase.

“Shopping?”

“Kyle? You know what? I don’t have a lot of time right now, so, if you need something, make it quick.”

“Jeez, no, fine, nothing.”

She didn’t hear him say anything, but she assumed he’d probably throw a b-word in their to himself afterwards. He’d never say it out loud though, because he was such a good guy. She grabbed a robe and headed to take a fast shower.

Steaming in the water, she tried to think as she soaped herself up. ‘That was Preston, I know it. He did something to me, and my breasts are not that sensitive! The credit card was a setup too. But how did he know I was going to go - no there’s no way I just randomly ended up at that restaurant. He was there. I bet he was following me. Oh my god. Why did he have to make it feel so good? I just wanted to be touched more and more. I bet it would have felt even better if he could have been inside me while he licked my-’

She jerked her hands away from her soapy tingly breasts which were quite well clean enough already. She stepped out of the shower and dried herself off as quickly as possible so as not to indulge any longer. ‘Okay,’ she thought, ‘if he’s going to try to set me up like that, then I’m not going to be his high class call girl slut.’

With resolution, she put on some track pants, a sports bra, running tank top and the old NYU windbreaker she got when she was in High School and still thought maybe she might be able to go. At least she felt a little bit of self satisfaction from her defiant frumpiness before heading off to work.

At work she took another moment of respite while rehydrating from a water bottle. Strange as it was getting a good night of sleep two nights in a row plus a real full honest to goodness meal had her feeling clearer and her hangover was already gone. She picked up her phone and posted on Facebook to ask if anyone else had a place she could crash, since she didn’t want to be too much trouble to any one person. Afterwards, she bit her lip, took a deep breath, and made a call.

“Hello?”

“Hey ma.”

“Heeeeey, sweetie, it’s so good to hear from you, I hadn’t heard in a couple weeks, how’s Raymond?”

Of course, she hadn’t changed her relationship status on Facebook. She didn’t want to get into that though, “Oh he’s ... fine.”

“Good, great, and how are you? How is work, do you like it there? Are they treating you better?”

“I’m ... fine, here at work,” to herself she added, ‘and waiting to see if my magically powered super stalker is going to come rob me of my free will and dignity again.’

“Honey, are you okay? You don’t sound fine. Are you in one of your sad phases?”

She wasn’t fine. Actually, things were a complete mess, but she didn’t need to know that. Emily’s mother was the kind of woman who seemed more happy than she had any right to be. She was alone, a single mom whose husband left for another woman and, though she was definitely an active dater, none of her relationships lasted more than 6 months. Still, at this moment, Emily was just glad to hear her voice.

“I am just fine mom, no sad phase, I promise.” Sad phase was her mom’s term for her depressive episodes. Her mom tended to be a little on the manic side and bursting with energy and then sometimes she’d get down-cycles. But they were nothing like the kind Emily had. Emily would sink into dark pits of despair from time to time and sit unable to claw herself out. Even when she wasn’t there, there was always a part of her that was being pulled down into a blackness. It was her oldest companion. She closed her eyes and let the sadness wash over her. It was familiar, a feeling she’d grown accustomed to over the years. ‘I wish, I wish, I wish... ‘ “So ma, what’s going on with you?” It was easier to listen to her mom’s carefree take on life, as unrealistic as it could sometimes be. Her mom was more than happy enough to babble on.

Emily was lucky she spotted Shawnice walking down the aisle. She whispered to her mom, “Boss coming,” when Swanice spotted her and smiled. “Mm-hm, that’s interesting. Maybe I could stop by and we could chat more about it in person? Sometimes late next week? Okay, great, how about I pencil you in for Friday, ‘kay?”

“Who was that?” Shawnice asked.

“Oh, just an idea I wanted to develop.”

“Interesting, do tell.” Shawnice sat down on the the desk and listened intently.

“Oh, it’s, uhm, it’s nothing yet, but I just thought, you know,” she looked around desperately, then settled on her own attire, “well, you see I’ve got a friend who works retail at Joe’s Sports, I figured, I could pitch to them. Maybe they’re looking for a new ad agency.”

“That explains the intramural get-up.”

She smiled and nodded, “Yeah, I figured maybe I would head down and do some research.”

“Hmm, well it’s not really our usual market ... But it’s young, high energy, could work ... I like the way you’re thinking. Run with it, let me know if you can get something going and I’ll pitch it to higher ups.”

“Great!” she replied with a smile. Normally, Emily would be mentally shooting daggers at her boss. Pitch it to the higher ups meant pitching it as her idea, Shawnice wasn’t above taking (or rather stealing) credit. But for the moment, she was distracted trying not to show outwardly her hyper awareness of her still sensitive breasts. If nothing else, at least the sports bra would hide the fact that her nipples kept hardening up. The problem wasn’t that it was annoying, the problem was that the little sparks of pleasure she got were a bit too enjoyable. Right now she needed to focus and make a plan. She definitely did not want to stick around the office. Preston could get to her here. In fact, she needed to get out before he came around again. Maybe a walk would clear her head?

“Hey, Shawny? I’m going to head out and do some research for that thing.”

Shawnice gave her a thumbs up, a wave, and Emily was gone.

She stuck her earbuds in, locked in her resting bitch face and started walking with eyes cast down. There were going to be no unwanted interruptions today. Getting out of the office was a good start. ‘Okay, the puzzle. How do I keep my life, and escape from that asshole? Well, that assumes that I want to keep my life. Okay, what if I don’t care about my life? Run. Go anywhere. Leave my credit cards behind, maybe end up in some podunk town. What do I care? Debt? Okay, yeah, that’d suck. Maybe he could find me that way. No, I’d have to give up my entire identity. Could I do that? Never see my mom again?’ She stopped when she realized her hands were clenched and her heart was racing. As much as she sometimes looked down on her mom, she knew more than anything she didn’t want to leave her alone.

Another thing she was sure of was that she didn’t want to feel His presence pressing against her mind again. The few blocks she’d walked didn’t feel nearly far enough, so she hopped on the N-train and made her way uptown to the Park.

Central Park in New York City was the green oasis of every sitcom imagination. Emily was hoping she’d be safest hiding amid the mass of joggers that would inevitably be there. Unfortunately, all of those joggers tended to run early in the morning before going to work. Still, it was green and the air felt a little cleaner than downtown. She took a deep breath and began stretching. Even if his first gift had felt and continued to feel quite nice, she didn’t need anything else from Him. In the open air, and freely moving and twisting, feeling the warm arousing buzz from her body, she started to relax.

“I was worried I was going to be too late to give you a gift...” That voice. She bolted upright and spun to see him standing in front of her with a flower.

Without a word, she tore off in the opposite direction sprinting at full speed. Maybe it was stupid for trying, maybe she was stupid for thinking she could get away, but she clung to the hope that she could move fast enough to get away from him before he did his magic.

A tingling pricked up on the back of her head, she felt his presence pushing again, she picked up her breathing and pumped her legs faster, her mind chanting, ‘I wish, I wish, I wish, I wish.’ She could feel him poking and prodding at her, softening her mind up and pushing in. She shut her eyes tight, trying to squeeze everything away, still running even as she could feel him connect to her once again. It was even deeper this time, his soul, his essence filled her. For a moment she felt out of body and she heard his voice, ‘There we are. Now it’s time for you to enjoy your new gift.’

She hadn’t realized she was still running, until she collided bowling over someone and felt herself knocked back onto the ground. Dazed, she looked around taking stock of what was happening. She was out of breath, panting heavily flopped on the grass, and someone was yelling at her.

“Fuckin’ mother fucking shitting fuck! You stupid bitch, my balloons!”

She looked up to see a vendor beside himself yelling and pointing at a bunch of balloons that were flying away, rapidly disappearing into the New York sky. “Ow.”

“Ow? You’re gonna really say ow if you don’t fix this right now, you’re paying for those. Jesus Christ lady, don’t you watch where you’re going?”

The cursing and commotion was starting to attract attention of a few passers by. Down the way a police officer’s ears perked up.

“Uh, I’m sorry.”

“Sorry don’t pay the bills, holy smokes!” the vendor was grabbing his head and looking over his cart. Apparently, in running into him, she’d knocked him over and his helium canister as well, and the helium canister had fallen and cracked the top bar of his ‘BALLOONS’ sign. The balloons that had been tied to the bar were there no longer.

“Are you okay?” a female voice came from behind her. Emily looked up to see a young woman wearing a zip up hoodie and an NYU tee shirt.

“Yeah, ow, I think so,” Emily got up dusting off.

The vendor continued laying into her, “Yeah yeah, you’re okay, she’s okay, everyone’s okay, and now you’re going to pay me for every last balloon, crazy bitch!”

The young woman helped her up and put herself between the vender and Emily protectively, “Hey, you go to NYU too, are you in law?”

She shook her head and was about to correct her about not being an NYU student when another voice called out. “Annalise!! Annalise, is he bothering you?” A shorter man rushed up to the woman’s side.

“Bothering? Look at this putz over here, that crazy bitch ran me over!”

The new man was shorter than both of the women, but he was thick. Barrel chested with large strong forearms, he had testosterone to spare and it showed on his thinning scalp. “Ay Ay Ay, watch your mouth, there’s ladies present.” He pointed a thick finger accusing at the vendor. Annalise was busy fussing over Emily while the two men continued.

“Don’t come over here and get all knight in shining armor, you friend here just steamrolled me and broke everything, now that bitch is going to pay.”

“I warned you once, and that woman you’re talking about is my sister, pal, so I’ll say again, watch your language.”

Annalise spoke up, “Ay, I didn’t do anything.”

Emily chimed in, “It was me, I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry gonna pay for the damage?”

The second man asked, “Anni, this girl a friend of yours?”

“Classmate,” she tossed over her shoulder.

“Alright, alright, look buddy, here, two hundred bucks for your balloons, ay?” He reached into his wallet and counted out two bills.

“Sign’s broke too.”

A policeman walked up, “Afternoon folks, is there a problem here?”

The second man spoke up, “No problem, no problem officer, we’re just fixing everything up right now. Look pal, here’s eight hundred bucks, for the balloons the sign, you never had it so good in one day. Are we good?” He held up the wad of cash in front of the vendor’s eyes.

The vendor looked to the thick fast talking man in front of him then back to the cop then over to the petite woman looking disheveled on in distress. “Yeah, no problem officer,” he took the money, “I just sold a bunch of balloons.”

The officer walked off, “Alright, then let’s just break it up and move on.”

The man called back to him, “Sure thing officer.”

Emily was still trying to take stock to see what effect Preston had placed on her while he was inside her head.

She went along with Annalise and the man and they headed back to a little picnic they had set up. They sat, while Anni continued to fuss.

“I’m Anni, and this is my brother Nelson.”

“Nelson Broly, pleased to meetcha, and sorry about that back there, that guy, though, no manners.”

Emily offer up a smile and then her name.

“What happened back there? You looked like you took a big spill.”

Emily looked down, “Well he wasn’t lying I did run straight into him,” she paused thinking about how much she wanted to say. Annalise was prompting her to continue. Gradually, she realized that she was becoming hyper aware of the feeling of her mons pushing against her panties. “Ohhh god, this is really bad.”

Nelson frowned and became a bit more interested, “What is it?”

Emily took a breath to steady herself and try to tamp down the feeling of arousal that was bubbling up from below, “There’s this guy. He- he’s been following me, and I skipped out of work to get away, but he came up behind me, so I ran.”

Annalise put a hand on her shoulder, “Oh my god that’s terrible!”

Nelson looked around, “Show me the bastard, where is he.”

She forced a weak smile up to them, “I don’t know where he is, I, I guess I looked back to see if he was chasing me when I ran into the balloon guy.”

“Well, whatever is going on, you’re having a nice picnic with us now, alright? I got you, and no man is gonna bug you, okay?” Nelson smiled.

Emily nodded, closing her eyes. She didn’t want to look at him too much, because right now there was a rising slickness in her that was wondering what he’d be like thrusting inside her. ‘I know this is your doing Preston. Can you hear me? I know what you’re doing!’ She thought it as loud as possible.

“Here, have some water, hun,” Annalise offered.

They had a fun spread of kid’s food to snack on. Nelson explained it was a tradition for him and his sister. They were 10 years apart so they didn’t have a lot in common, but when she was little, she wanted to go on picnics so, every once in awhile, Nelson would make a picnic basket of PBJ, baby carrots, and other goodies and they’d go to the park. They decided to keep up the tradition even when she got older.

Emily smiled at them, finally relaxing a little bit. She’d never had siblings. Her dad left her mom soon after she’d gotten pregnant, so she never had much of any family. And her mom wasn’t close to her own family for whatever reason she couldn’t say. Sitting with them was actually really nice, even if she had to keep trying to push down the warm delicious feeling pulsing up from below.

Of course dividing her attention was a little taxing. A couple times she caught herself staring off in the general direction of Nelson’s crotch. She looked away hoping he hadn’t noticed.

“Alright,” Annalise announced getting back up after they’d eaten, “I gotta get back downtown. Got one more lecture tonight.”

“Alright, love you.”

“You too, you takin’ Emily home?”

“Yeah, I got her, don’t worry.”

Annalise looked to Emily, “Hey Em, keep an eye out for me on campus and add me on facebook. Not a lot of Broly’s.”

Emily looked back to Nelson and pulled her knees up to her chest. “Hey, I’m sorry about screwing up your tradition.”

“Forget about it,” he replied and reached to touch her arm, “look, for me, anytime I can chew out some guy for cursing in front of a woman, that’d bonus for me.”

His fingers touching her felt electric. She knew he was just being comforting, but right now, the way her body was throbbing, she felt this arching ache to throw her body against him. It felt like a sweet tickle that nearly made her giggle. She suppressed that into a smile, “Chivalrous man, huh?”

He grinned, “I guess. Or maybe I don’t like vendors.” His hand was still on her arm that was resting on her knees. She laid her head down on his hand to hide her face and squeezed her thighs together giving her a pleasurable squirm. Try as she might she couldn’t completely suppress her moan and it came out as a little whimper.

He whispered reassuringly, “Hey, hey, it’ll be alright.” He sat down next to her and put his arm around her, “No worries, kid, I’ll take care of you.”

She jerked her head up to tell him not to touch her, but stopped, her face an inch away from his. Her brain stalled a moment as a wave of heat pulsed through her body rocking her senses.

He could see her flushed skin, and the way her lips parted and breathed. She had a look of longing, of sexual desire. He must have seen something there.

“I am curious,” Preston said, “What were you thinking on Thursday, Nelson?”

Nelson chuckled, “Man, you’re crazy, I already told you this story on Friday I was thinkin’ I hit the jackpot. But what is this like a tall tale? Or are you really saying that the mystery rich girl Adriel banged is the same as the little college chick that I picked up in the Park?”

Preston tapped his thumbs together, peering at his guess from under his brow. “I’m just telling a story, think of it as a setup for tonight’s entertainment, but I want to know what you were really thinking.”

Nelson was thinking one thought, ‘easy pickens.’ Whoever that stalker was Nelson would owe that guy a beer, this girl was practically begging to have a little someone-to-watch-over-me bang. He leaned in and kissed her and she melted.

It wasn’t that the kiss was any good or that Nelson was particularly attractive,

“Hey!”

it was that she’d been trying to control herself all this time and that tickling itching craving to touch was too much to resist after he’d broken the seal with that kiss. Their lips smacked together, wet and hot. As much as she thought she should stop and excuse herself, she couldn’t help but keep kissing him. Maybe this was Preston’s plan all along, make her sleep with random guys just to break her down. Even if it was, she couldn’t bring herself to resist it, instead she just leaned into it and Nelson.