Chapter 1

"Yale Law Review - they all go to the Current Journals section." Carol reeled off an identifying number from the new coding system, and soon I was able to find the correct shelf. I heaved the stack of musty tomes up from off the trolley. ""Come and work for a big glamorous law firm", they said. "Do important cases and be famous" they said..." I tailed off sardonically.

"The cases we have to do are these ones..." Carol swept out her arm to indicate the rows of tall grey metal bookcases in the archive room. "... in accordance with this new system". She tapped emphatically on the manual we'd been given by Brad, our immediate boss, when he told us we'd be working together on this "vital reorganisation" of the firm's case-law collections. Carol had been here almost twenty years, but I was a new kid on the block. A lot of the people here I still only knew by sight. Including Carol, until just lately. "If you don't like it" she continued, "why don't you quit this job and finish your law studies full-time? That way, you'd start at the top. Well, the middle, anyway." "I don't have the dough. And it will look good on my resume. Always looks better for a law student to be doing the shitwork of a law firm than some grocery store..."

She flinched at this.

"Excuse me, I've been doing this... this "shitwork" since almost the time you were born..."

Oh-oh! Looks like I was in for an inter-generational telling-off! But, impetuous youth that I was, the flames got fanned with:

"Yes, how'd you put up with it for so long? I'd have been driven insane by now!"

She went quiet, then: "Sometimes it does drive me insane. But it's a job... and better than some things I could be doing..."

That made me bite my tongue. I'm no bleeding-heart liberal but you didn't have to be an Einstein to get her drift, about being a girl, and Hispanic, and growing up in the place that she did.

"So I always take this kind of thing seriously " she continued. "It's Brad's way, or the highway."

"To hell with Brad! Soon this stuff will all be on-line anyway! I'd rather be working-out, or mountain-biking... anything but this for three straight weeks!"

"Then go ride your mountain bike, so I can go ask Brad for a new assistant. One who can knuckle down, and not just be only thinking about "looking good"... if kids like that can even be found these days..."

My turn to get tetchy, about being called a "kid". At twenty-one, hadn't I just been given the keys to life, and everything? Anyway, what's wrong with looking good? Far from a sign of laziness, it'd been a career in itself developing an upper body like mine.

But the conversation here was really not that heated. Banter like this helped to pass the time, and after this exchange we lapsed into silence for a while.

Then we got on to spouses.

"So... when did she move in with you?" Carol wanted to know, having just learned about the existence of Fay.

"About three months ago. It's getting serious, I guess"

"I guess. Are you engaged?"

"Shit, no! I'm not ready for anything like that!"

"I'll bet you're not. But what about her?" Carol's probing hinted at a deeply ingrained Catholicism.

"I dunno. She hasn't said. We mostly just have a good time together."

"And what makes a "good time"?"

"You mean, lifestyle in general? Or intimate secrets?"

"You can save the intimate secrets. I meant lifestyle in general."

"Okay, I guess we have a lot in common. She's sporty. I'm sporty. We met when competing in a triathlon. I like to spend a lot of time in the gym. She does too, fortunately for me. It'd cause a problem for us if she didn't."

"What else?"

"I like girls with athletic bodies. She has a very athletic body. Very taut, very..."

"Hey, that's intimate!"

"No it's not. I'm just describing her figure."

"To us women, having our figure described is intimate."

"Why?"

"It's like being looked-at all over, but in words... oh, never mind!"

"I thought women like being looked at!"

Carol didn't dignify that with an answer. Another period of silence, punctuated only by book-moving talk.

"Anyway" I said after a while, "Enough of me, what about you? What do you think about me?"

I'd heard this line in a Bette Midler movie, but if Carol thought it witty she didn't show it.

"I got married when I finished high school, and have two sons. Miguel is smart, handsome, but shy. Anton is lazy and already a charmer with the ladies."

"Anton... that doesn't sound like a Spanish name."

"It isn't. I just happened to like it."

"And your husband?"

She was slower to answer that one.

"Anton takes after him" was all she'd say.

After I'd digested this, my mind went back to what she'd said about describing a woman's body. I'd just tried to describe Fay to Carol - so how would I describe Carol to Fay? Not that I made a point of letting on to Fay that I noticed other women's figures - quite the opposite. But I did notice. I noticed lots and lots and lots. Especially Brad's personal secretary with the legs that went on forever, and the junior clerk in Accounts who sometimes wore a tight stretchy miniskirt, and...

... so why hadn't I particularly noticed Carol before?

She's not from an age group I was attuned to noticing, perhaps.

I regarded her surreptitiously, or so I thought.

Her face was pretty, with smooth olive skin, though some lines here and there. A strong face, with heavy eyebrows if left unplucked. Nice full lips. Dark hair that fell in heavy curls about her shoulders. Dark eyes, usually with a warmth in them but sometimes guarded and sometimes with a trace of sadness.

Figure... a lot more rounded than his own past dates or preferences to date. Her frame was petite, and a little padded now with the passage of time. A narrow waist that flared out to her hips, a blouse front that swelled promisingly, and a gorgeous backside under that tailored skirt. She could look good - could put to shame some girls half her age. But the packaging... she always dressed conservatively. Demurely. Dressed down, you could say. In a way that always lessened rather than increased attention toward her... ahem... "assets".

She looked up sharply and caught me "regarding".

"What are you looking at?"

"Nice outfit!" I volunteered.

"Thanks" she said, but gave me a funny look.

A few more days passed, in the same old boring tasks. I couldn't wait to get back to my usual desk, doing my usual paperwork while surreptitiously surfing the net. The only upside of my present task was working with Carol, who was loosening up a bit and becoming easier company. Though I got the impression that at times I irritated the hell out of her.

"Have there been many other girlfriends before Fay?" Carol wanted to know one day.

"A few. In fact, several. I lost my virginity when I was fifteen."

I was being deliberately provocative here, and expected censure for it, but there was none so I followed with "How 'bout you?"

"Eighteen. On my wedding night" she said primly. One point to her, in the morality stakes. But a milestone had just been passed. We were now talking about intimacies.

"To have had so many girlfriends already, you must change them like library books. How do you do it?" she wanted to know.

"Same way you'd change a boyfriend, I guess".

"Which is... ?"

"You mean, you don't know?"

"I've only ever had the one. I married him."

"Weird! Try before you buy, I always say! It pays to shop around."

She allowed a silence which obviously did not indicate assent, then "Well... ?"

"Well, it's usually obvious if we're, like, drifting apart. We'll see each other less and less, phone each other less and less, then one of us finds someone else that we want to see more, and then... we say "It's over. Bye-bye!""

"As easy as that?"

"As easy as that. Unless, you've just met someone really hot, and you want to be free of complications real quick, then it can get heavy."

"So, what do you do?"

"Just tell her."

"Tell her what?"

"That I don't want to see her anymore."

"How does she take it?"

"Not well. Lots of waterworks, maybe things thrown. A stuffed toy once got disemboweled with a bread knife. Very symbolic. But hey, to make an omelette you gotta break some eggs!"

She didn't approve, I could tell. But then, she'd asked a straight question and I'd given a straight answer!

She got back to asking about Fay.

"What's the main thing that first attracted you?"

"Her body. In a two-piece Lycra triathlon suit, she looked so hot. I had to ask her out, the minute I saw her."

"What was so great about the triathlon suit?"

"The way it clung. And what it was clinging to. And the fact that she was dressed like that in front of 300 other entrants, mostly male."

"Is she big... y'know, in front?"

"Nah! Fried-eggs! And just as well, if you're an athlete."

"Do you still allow her to dress like that in front of other men?"

"Sure. I get a kick out of it. She does too."

CRASH! Carol's grip on a pile of folders momentarily faltered, and most of them ended up on the floor. We scooped them back up. While we were bent down on the floor, I took the opportunity to glance down her blouse. Only a brief glimpse of a deep cleft, but enough to confirm the presence of certain attributes that would render her seriously triathlon-challenged.

"How do you know she gets a kick out of it?" Carol finally brought herself to ask.

"She told me. We were confessing turn-on's to each other. She says it's like a revenge on all the big-breasted women in the world, when she dresses to make her nipples really obvious. Guys can't take their eyes off them!"

Funny, Carol didn't seem to be placing so many news-blackouts on "intimacy" these days.

But she had her limits.

When she asked "And what's the main thing that keeps your relationship going?" I replied simply "The sex. Her blowjobs are fantastic!"

Carol was offended by my crudity, and ended the conversation to go into a huff for a while. But hey, it was the truth!

Well, not totally. I was about as in-love with Fay as I was capable of being in those days. But if I'd been forced to choose between love or blowjobs, it'd be a close call. I guess you could say I had a short attention span.

Speaking of which, Carol was starting to catch my attention more and more.

Why, I don't know.

Maybe it was a combination of things.

First, she was different.

Different to what I was used to. Soft and rounded, not lean and taut. Dark, not fair. Quiet and considerate, not showy or egocentric. Mature, but on some things quite naïve.

Or was it just the close familiarity we now had at work, being on the same project for over two weeks with mostly just each other's company - a sort-of "hot-house" atmosphere where things might happen that in other circumstances wouldn't?

Or maybe it was just the fascination of somebody who is off-limits, a case of wanting to obtain the unobtainable. I mean, I'd have no intention of forming a relationship with her. She was at least fifteen years my senior, and married with kids.

At least that's what I'd remind myself each time I found myself fantasizing about her, or glancing at her legs while she was up the stepladder with a stack of files. Good legs, too... now stop it, will ya!

"Nice outfit! It suits your figure."

I was taking to making little comments to show I noticed what she looked like. Yeah, obvious, I know. Subtlety was not my strong point. She was suspicious at first.

"What figure? I'm a mom, remember?"

But after a couple of days she'd take my occasional compliments in good grace.

She'd even return them, in an indirect way.

Like, instead of just saying "Lift that carton of files up for me", she'd instead go "Get those ab's and pec's working for me, will ya?" and give my upper arm a squeeze. I enjoyed her touch.

I began wondering how I could take this further, how I could find some way of winding up in bed with her.

Then fortune smiled upon me. Or so I thought.

"Hand me up those Harvard publications?"

She was balanced on the ladder, high enough that I could see a little thigh under the hem of her knee-length skirt. Nothing to get too excited about; still, she had to place one foot on the bookshelf itself to reach across to the "H" section, almost out of her reach. Would I get to see more? One foot was still on the ladder. Not an ideal situation in terms of the laws of physics.

And sure enough, the ladder toppled sideways. She had one foot on a shelf, but immediately lost this precarious toehold. It happened so fast that my reaction was purely instinctive, but I managed to catch her as she literally fell into my arms. I was able to break her fall, but got pushed off-balance hard up against the opposite shelving, with Carol wrapped up in my arms.

We remained frozen like that for a couple of seconds.

Then I kissed her.

Just lightly, on the lips. Fairly chastely, I thought.

I kissed her again, a little more forcefully, seeking out each full lip.

But now her eyes had gone round like saucers, her hands came up between us, and she tried to fend me off with a hard shove. Except I was still jammed against the bookshelves, and had my arms around her.

Her arms relaxed for a bit, and I felt her lips soften too. The tip of my tongue flickered along the tiny gap that was opening up, but then her lips hardened again and she pulled her face away.

"Please stop! This isn't right..."

"It feels very right to me" I replied, bending and covering one of her soft cheeks with light kisses that ended at her earlobe.

She tried another push.

"I'm married! I can't do this!"

My lips tried to move back to her mouth again.

"Stop! This is harassment!"

That brought me to my senses. I released her at once, and she spun away. She stood against the shelves a few feet from me, looking straight at the floor, and breathing heavily but otherwise silent.

"Carol, I'm sorry! I... I don't know what came over me! I acted on impulse, I guess..."

She gave me an angry look, though her anger was already fading - from white-hot to about red-hot.

"Look, you're basically a nice guy, and I don't want to get you into trouble, but if I say "stop" can you please stop?"

"Yeah, sure. I... I really apologize for upsetting you."

Her dark eyes flashed hard looks at me for another few moments.

"Accepted. Now lets get back to work. Your turn to go up the ladder."

We spoke only a little for the remainder of that day, just sticking to the business at hand. She was really pissed off with me. And fair enough, too. I must have been nuts to think she'd respond to an overture like that. I was feeling pretty embarrassed about it.

Every so often, though, I'd catch her glancing at me briefly. She was working on auto-pilot, and seemed often lost in thought.

"Good morning! We're not far from finishing... in just another few days time!" was Carol's greeting to me next day.

Everything seemed cool again. She could even joke about the day before.

"Can you spread a safety net around this ladder before I do my next high-wire act?" she kidded me upon going up its steps.

"I'll get a mattress and lay it ready, so you can have a real soft landing this time..."

"As long as its not a double mattress..." she shot back.

All in all, she seemed to be taking my indiscretion in good humour.

Another day later, and Carol did something out of the ordinary.

Ordinarily, she'd be dressed in formal skirts of conservative length, and loose, heavy blouses that didn't give too much indication of what she had up on top. Today she still had the regular skirt and tailoured jacket, but she'd also chosen a thin knitted sweater instead of the usual blouse. To put in bluntly, it accentuated her breasts. And she was a lot breastier than I'd previously given her credit for.

I wasn't the only one to notice. I'd gone out for some more boxfiles and other stationary supplies, and heard somebody say to another "Did you see Carol today! Is she changing her image, or something?"

There were no more ladder jokes between us today, but she was up the ladder a lot as we moved a stash of stuff that had to be archived. I could hardly take my eyes off her breasts. She'd removed her jacket before long and, as she held her arms up high and concentrated on getting the files in the correct order, I could take in her profile from a range of two or three feet away has I held each file up to her from below. Her bra was outlined in the stretchy wool, and strained to contain such heavy globes.

Nothing slutty here, you understand. On a woman of lesser dimensions I wouldn't have thought twice about the particular way she was dressed. It's just that, with someone of her chest size, it wasn't hard to choose clothes that brightened up my day considerably.

She must have known I was captivated, but gave no sign of noticing my glazed expression. Sometimes she bent down to put something on a lower shelf, and showed a deep, deep cleavage down the v-neck of that top. I was entranced.

Should I make any mention of this new state of affairs, or should I not? I decided it was a trend that ought to be encouraged.

"That sweater looks good on you."

"What, this old thing?" she answered nonchalantly.

Then there was another accident. Or "accident"? If it was faked, then it wasn't faked by me. Stepping down off the ladder with her back to me, she missed her footing and stumbled backwards on a collision course. I could have jumped out of the way, but then she'd have slammed into the shelving, so I stood and caught her - again.

In so doing, I managed some faking of my own. I managed to have one hand land across her chest, and the other on her hip.

My hand was pressed against the under-hang of one breast, with my thumb close to its nipple. This feels pretty good, I thought, and down in my groin, pressed hard up against her buttocks, something started twitching.

Though expecting a telling-off at any moment, I decided to get bold. My thumb found her nipple and started teasing it through her bra. There was no sign of panic. Carol remained leaning into me, her eyes closed and breathing evenly.

Give me an inch, and I'll take a mile. I cupped her breasts with both hands, testing their weight and brushing my thumbs over her nipples. I slumped down so that my lips could find an earlobe and start nibbling it, and so the tip of the tent-pole in my trousers could nestle at the tops of her thighs. She remained in a trance-like state.

Carol felt good, so soft and pliant, and the situation was getting better by the minute. I yanked up her top, pulled down the cups of her lacy bra, and her heavy boobs just popped out. Now that they were hanging over her bra, I could get my hands onto an abundance of soft warm flesh and easily find turgid nipples to tug upon.