Part 6

"About this budget idea," Shannon asked at dinner, "what did you have in mind?"

"Well, we're springing it on your mother, for which I apologize. My idea was to take your income -- including current surplus -- for the next eighteen months, subtract extraordinary expenses, and break the rest into seventy-eight equal amounts. Then your mother would dole out those amounts and the budgeted extraordinary expenses as well."

"Sounds awful complicated," Shannon said.

"Sounds a little complicated to me as well," her mom said. "The budget at college is the problem, and there is no sense deciding that now. Why don't we set up a budget to the end of school? We can figure out where that causes problems, and do another for over the summer. You'll really need less when you aren't buying school lunches, dear."

Her dad loaded the dishwasher while she and her mom figured things out. Some things, Mom pushed her to pare back; but others, like desserts at school and snacks elsewhere, she insisted would cost more than Shannon thought. They had everything down on the list when Dad got back. "And what for incidentals?" he asked. Shannon thought that there couldn't be incidentals -- they had covered everything. "Would five dollars a week be enough? And put the church pledge down, too."

"Shannon remembered that," her mom said. "Four-twenty-three will even the total out."

"Is four dollars and twenty-three cents enough for incidentals?" her dad asked.

"I don't understand you guys," she responded.

"Look, Shannon," her dad said, "you have to learn to live on your budget. Someday, you'll need a new pair of pantyhose."

"Pantyhose is on the budget."

"So it is, but you'll need one more pair than has been budgeted. So that week you won't have incidentals, or you won't join your friends for a soda after school. I don't care what, so long as you don't starve yourself at lunch time. The time is coming when you'll have to live on a tight budget, but that isn't today. Let's take one step at a time. Talking of which, what are the extraordinary expenses which you can foresee?"

"I'll get the expenses for the pictures and that sort of stuff tomorrow if I can. The yearbook's going up, but I forget how much. And then there are the dance dresses. Not the regular dances but the balls."

"The yearbook, cap and gown, that sort of stuff, we can put on the budget just under their names," her dad said. "We'll need more information later, but you'll go through the graduation formalities. It will cost, but we'll fill in that amount later. Do you really need a new dress for every ball?"

"She needs one for the prom," Mom said. "She has enough for the other dances."

She had worn a prom dress her junior year. Wayne didn't see why she couldn't wear it again, but he wasn't going to fight that battle.

"I need a new dress for this coming ball," Shannon said. She needed a front-clasp bra, too. "I might need one more."

"So," her dad said, "we're cutting out what? Two dresses?"

She counted the remaining balls in her head. "Yes, two. Anyway, can we put dollars on that another day? I want to get some things done before babysitting."

When she got to her room, the panty-liner was virtually clean. Still, she wiped herself, inserted a new tampon, and donned fresh panties. The last thing she wanted was to have Steve touch some of her blood. She dressed in a loose skirt and a worn flannel shirt which had been her dad's until the sleeves had to be cut short. A sweater over that was all the preparation she made until Mr. Jensen called that he was on his way.

"We'll get you home by eleven," he told Shannon when she got in his car. It was later than she had ever started an evening for them, but nothing extraordinary for most of her other customers. She had told him of her babysitting curfew. Telling him was her duty, since Mrs. Green had already used up her late night.

"Well, if you run late, call and warn me. You do have a phone machine?" Once she was there, she couldn't do anything until they did get home; and she didn't care.

"Well, Theresa -- and Peggy -- are going to be less permissive than you are. She's feeding her now, though."

"You don't mind about Steve?"

"Not when you're taking care of the girls. Just when she is."

Amy was already in bed, and Mrs. Jensen was at that end of the house. Mr. Jensen kept his coat on while he checked her out once again. "We'll be at my sister's house, Sandra Foster. Here's the phone number. It's her wedding anniversary, so ask for Bill or Theresa. The place will be crawling with Jensens."

They stood there awkwardly. Shannon didn't feel she could ask about Amy's future, and couldn't think of another subject. Suddenly Mr. Jensen spoke again. "You're willing to take a check aren't you? I should have asked that before."

"I'm willing, especially from you; but I prefer cash." After all, she wasn't quite certain about this budget business. "Checks are fine, but if somebody asks about using me as a babysitter don't tell them that."

"Well, we probably have the cash between the two of us. You're right, though, my employer frowns on writing rubber checks more than other employers. And knows about it faster."

Shannon hadn't meant that at all. The Jensens had always treated her fairly. She trusted Amy's father, Mrs. Jensen's concerned husband, the guy who waited in the car until she was inside her door, not the bank teller.

Mrs. Jensen came out. "I was only able to express half a bottle this afternoon. She's going through a growth spurt. Even so, she should sleep a good long time, but you won't be so lucky after the next feeding. Call me when it's done. We're going to be at a family party, and they know I'll need to come home."

Theresa Jensen had bottle-fed her first child. More bottle- fed babies developed asthma, and she knew -- whatever Dr. Wyatt said -- that this was the cause of Amy's illness. That wasn't going to happen to Peggy, and she actually found the nursing restful sometimes.

On the other hand, having people see it, even talking about it, made her feel like a cow. Her sister-in-law, Sandra, had fed her baby in front of the whole world, or at least family of both sexes; Theresa hid from Shannon, and was bothered by having Shannon's boyfriend even in the house while she did it. Anyway, it was time. "I'm ready, Bill; let's go."

"I thought that you were going out tonight," Rachel Anderson said to Steve. It was not that she didn't enjoy the company of her son, not that she wasn't pleased to see him studying this early in the evening. It was just that she felt safer talking to Roger when she was certain that Steve wouldn't impulsively pick up the phone.

"Shannon is babysitting. The Jensens said they don't mind me coming over, but they don't want me to until after they leave. Honest!" Sounded kinda weird to him, but it was true.

Rachel didn't worry about that. Steve was perfectly capable of making up a plausible story; implausible ones were likely to be true. "Is she breast feeding?"

"Shannon said something about that, but she leaves bottles in the fridge."

"You make formula as you go. Must be her first child."

"No, the second. I told you about Amy. Peggy's the baby sister."

"Strange. I was rather shy about Mallory at first; but by the time you came along, I'd whip it out in front of anybody." She almost laughed aloud at Steve's evident discomfiture. At the time, he'd been quite in favor. "Anyway, you're a guest in their house. If it bothers her that you are there, you leave immediately. Is that clear?"

"Sure."

"I'm serious about that. We let you run about at all hours..."

"That's the deal. I keep my grades up. So long as the results are satisfactory, you don't decide the methods."

"But you have to do what we say. And I won't have a son of mine embarrassing some lady generous enough to let him visit her babysitter. I'll tell you this, I never let a babysitter have guests in my house." Although at least one had. Which, after all, might have persuaded this woman. She knew Steve's name, knew where he lived.

"It's Shannon. People trust her, and with good reason." At this testimonial, the phone rang.

Steve got the phone before the second ring. "Anderson residence. Steven Anderson at your service." Damn it! He'd forgotten the 'Esquire.'

"Steve?" It didn't sound like Shannon at all, but he had been so sure that it was. "This is Heather. What did you mean about asking for suggestions?"

It took him a minute to figure out the context. "Ken has some idea. What I meant was that you could ask him about it. He was really impressed with your art. Last time I saw him that excited, genuinely excited, was about Abelian groups."

"More exciting than a beel-whatever group. What every girl wants to hear."

"Well, I think you're more exciting than Abelian groups. I wouldn't even mind Shannon's hearing that. But Ken's thinking that you are more exciting than Abelian groups is a whole different story. It was really your Cupid. He kept saying that it was art. Anyway, your Cupid gave him an idea. Listen to it; Ken's ideas are always worth listening to.

"On the other hand," he continued, "what the motion said was that you could get suggestions from anyone you chose. It didn't say that you would follow Ken's suggestions." Ken's ideas were always worth hearing; they weren't always worth following. He'd been to the principal's office twice learning that -- to say nothing of the tee-shirt that they'd tried to make into guncotton.

"You guys go back a long ways, don't you?... I'll give him a call."

The phone rang again almost immediately. "Yo?"

"Steve? This is Shannon. You can come over now if you want."

"Quarter hour." But he made it to the Jensens' doorstep in just about ten minutes.

"Your phone was busy" was Shannon's greeting.

He kissed her briefly. His coat was in his way. "I was talking to another woman," he said as he stripped off his outerwear, including his shoes. "Talking to her about Eros, telling her that she was hotter than an Abelian group."

"Am I supposed to be jealous?"

"It wouldn't hurt."

"All right," she said. "I'm too jealous to kiss you. And I won't give you my news."

"It was Heather whatsername, the junior. Eros is another name for Cupid, and we mostly talked about Ken. Your news can wait."

She held up her hand. "What about saying she was so hot?"

"I told Heather that Ken got as excited about her Cupid as he'd gotten over anything since Abelian groups. Those are math thingies which Ken explained to me several times. It didn't take. She didn't think it was much of a compliment. We joked about that. I'm sorry I mentioned it. Now can I have my kiss?"

She figured that his face would have warmed up a little bit, and he might have learned that making her jealous didn't pay. Anyway, it was time that she got a kiss.

This kiss was for real. Her mouth opened for his tongue, and her breasts were soft against his chest. Her butt was firm under his hands, and then softened as she leaned against him. He turned her in his arms. He kissed the backs of her ears while lifting her soft breasts.

"My news is that Ken says he really owes you one," he said. "What's your news?" He brushed his fingers over her nipples, hardening below in response to their hardening.

"I talked to Dad about budgets. It's too complicated for words, but they don't seem to want to cut out all my pleasures. They put in everything, and then money for 'incidentals.' I thought that they would cut me way back." This was an odd way of talking, but rather pleasant. Steve talked into the back of her head -- she could feel his breath blow her hair -- and then kissed her ear while she spoke. "I can't think of anything which hadn't been already counted in the budget."

"How about buying coffee and pie to share a table with your boyfriend?"

It wasn't the best position for thinking, but she went through the budget categories. "You might be right! Anyway, Dad said something about your being welcome for another study date. He said that on Sunday."

"Not instead of dancing, I hope." He pulled her back against him. They really should do dances this way, with him holding her front instead of her back. "Speaking of which, might I have the pleasure of your company at the dance this coming Friday?"

"Well, you can have my company. The pleasure is your own decision."

"Having you in my arms is always a pleasure." He touched his finger to her face. "Still too cold?"

"Yes. Why don't you wash your hands?"

They kissed good bye to compensate for the two-minute separation. Her hands went to the buttons on her shirt. "Don't unbutton it," he said.

He came out with his own shirt unbuttoned, though, and with his undershirt in his hands. He opened his backpack on the table, stashed the undershirt in a plastic bag in the pack, and took the opportunity to spread out the evidence of his studying.

He took her hand in his warm one and kissed the inside of her wrist. From there, he trailed kisses up to the inside of her elbow. She shivered. It was ticklish and a bit sexy, not like when he teased her breasts, but a little bit sexy nevertheless. "Why do you do that?" she asked.

"You are sexy, sexy all over. I just decided that I was missing out on parts of you." He kissed her mouth, then the bridge of her nose. "Do you mind? Does it bother you?"

"It bothers me, but not in a bad way." She felt his tug on her shoulder like a dance signal; she followed as she would a dance signal until her back was snuggled against him. He cupped her breasts again, then began to unbutton the shirt. He kissed her right ear. "Isn't that why you kiss me?" she asked. "Like that especially? To bother me?"

"Only half the reason. I enjoy kissing you. I've seen you kiss the kids. Are you trying to turn Amy on? Peggy?"

"She's just so cute," she said. It was different, but she couldn't say how. Steve was holding her breasts in his hands, now. It wasn't a time for deep thinking.

"And so are you."

He spun her to his front again. Carefully spreading each shirt, he pulled her against him for a long kiss with her breasts pressed into his hairy chest. She was conscious of that touch, of his tongue exploring her mouth, of his hands squeezing her hips. Last, but quite strongly, she was conscious of his hardness pressing into her stomach. Finally, he broke the kiss to grab her head with both hands; he kissed her on her forehead.

"You are a sexy woman," he said. "You look like a woman; you feel like a woman; but, somehow, you are just the way those babies are." Needing protection, he meant, something like that.

Bridge had been Theresa's life once, she and Bill had been cut-throat partners for the bank's bridge team before they had any real dates. There were two bridge tables at the party, and a couple of Jensens yielded their seats gladly to Bill and Theresa. They were playing Jerry and Michelle (Mike) Foster who had taken a little too much pleasure in their edge in skill, or -- perhaps -- been just a little too open about that pleasure.

"I may have to leave early," Theresa said. "If the babysitter calls, I'll just go."

"You don't have to do that for us," Jerry said. "When you've lost your limit, just tell us. We'll let you go."

Bill looked at Theresa. She nodded. They weren't going to say anything; their entire response would involve the play.

"Lie facedown," Steve said when they reached he sofa. First, he scratched her back. Then he moved down. With one arm across her hips and the other across her lower calves, he kissed the inside of her knees -- first a little suction on the right, then a tickling lick on the left. She kicked a little against his grip. The feeling was somehow sexy, and she didn't fight hard. When he started kissing up the inside of her thigh, though, it felt much too sexy suddenly. The arousal was all wrong, and she turned over. He didn't resist much.

He brushed her hair off her forehead and kissed her there. He kissed the bridge of her nose. Then he settled into a nice long kiss, tongues playing with tongues while he cuddled her breasts with his hand, first one then the other.

"What's with this business of kissing everywhere, anyway?" she asked. Now this, her left breast in his hand, his thumb brushing the nipple occasionally, turned her on. But that was a comfortable feeling. She could hardly remember when it had been almost as disturbing as the kiss on her knee was now.

He shifted so that he could hold one breast in each hand, then kissed her nipple in promise. "Well, really, you started it. I used to imagine making love to you; but it was sort of the highlights, if you know what I mean. I wanted you; you wanted me; I would go inside you. And then all I imagined was moving back and forth until I came -- which was usually damn soon." Was he really discussing masturbation details with Shannon? Well, after all, she had -- in a fashion -- been there.

He glanced at her face. She looked interested, rather than disgusted. "Anyway," he continued, "you got off on this kick of being virgin on your wedding night."

"Wedding day," she corrected. All this emphasis on the wedding night was Steve's. Not that his version wasn't sexier. Really, that decision, while she was still determined to keep it, had seemed the opposite of sexy. Steve, however, had turned it into an erotic dream.

"Were you really planning to have a quickie before the reception?" he asked. She hissed and moved his hands away from her breasts. "If not, you were planning to be a virgin on your wedding night." He put his hands back where they belonged. She didn't resist. He kissed each nipple until it hardened.

"Anyway, you started me thinking about the wedding night -- and our first time. Starting at the sex doesn't really work. 'Shannon wants me, too, ' isn't really enough. So I started picturing taking that white stuff off you, and kissing what I uncovered, and other stuff. You have rules, and I follow them. Well, I want our first time to be slow, and private; and I want to hold you to me and kiss you again afterwards."

He went back to kissing her breasts. His hand brushed her skirt down, and then up. "And I want to see all of you," he said.

Wayne Bryant shook the last of the can of diet ginger ale over his glass. It wasn't enough mixer for another drink.

"Do you really need another drink, Wayne?" Allison said. He mixed them weak, but the whiskey bottle had dropped more than an inch that night.

"Well, if I had someone in my lap, I wouldn't be able to get to the kitchen? Now, would I?"

She came over to sit on his lap. She was an old married woman, for heaven's sake. "You are an insatiable letch."

"You, on the other hand, are a sexy blonde." He shifted her weight and cuddled her by her arm, not even touching her breast. They watched the next segment of the show like that.

She muted the sound for the commercial. "I'm sorry that I screwed up your plan for Shannon's budget, it's just..."

"It's just that it was totally over-complicated," he said. "I should have run it by you, I would have run it by you. But I mentioned it to Shannon first, and she asked for some time to think about it. I was going to run it by you when she first babysat next week. Who could have dreamed that she was actually thinking about it?" Sitting like this, he could feel her laugh all through his body.

"Anyway," he continued, "the reason she needs a budget is next year, and I was right. But the time to learn to budget is this year, and you were right. Shannon got to see her father make a blunder, but it's not as if that was a shock to her. She thinks it happens even more often than it does." That earned him a kiss on the forehead. She got up after that kiss, but still the cuddle was well worth the lost drink. He shouldn't drink when Shannon was babysitting, anyway, any more than he should when she was on a date.

Steve prolonged the milder making out as long as he could stand, but the thighs he stroked were drawing his hand towards their juncture. The breasts he kissed were drawing his lips toward their peaks. He kissed her on the mouth and drew his hand down her thigh as slowly as possible. When he reached her panties this time, he stayed there. His hand cupped her mound while his tongue licked the underside of hers again. When he abandoned her mouth for her nipple, his fingers began stroking her.

Shannon had been feeling trembly for some time. Already warm under the sheer cloth of the panties, her groin heated when clasped in Steve's hand. The strokes there heated her whole body; the suction on her nipple pulled that heat upwards until her face was on fire. Her knees raised and spread, her belly tensed for what she knew was to come. Suddenly, the motions stopped.

Shannon's position was too suggestive. Steve climbed between those spread legs. He kissed the other breast. "Hug my waist," he said. "Hug it with your legs." When she did put those lovely thighs around him, he moved forwards tentatively. With her legs pushed back by his body, he moved his groin back and forth across hers. He kissed her chin on the top of those strokes. The friction, even through the layers of denim, drove him closer and closer.

She felt the position was totally awkward, then as she shifted her body and tightened her legs, totally natural. He was rubbing across her almost as excitingly as his hand had. But the idea was more exciting. They were, but for a few pieces of cloth, doing it.

Close to coming in his pants, he had to stop. He climbed back, kissing thighs to right and left. Back in the kneeling position, he kissed her breast yet again. He sucked the nipple while his hand returned to her pantied mystery. Her responses made him think that his gymnastics had ruined her edge, which was understandable. A minute later, however, she was moving as sexily as ever.

She felt herself burning and freezing. Feeling her belly tense against his arm, he began stroking her panties with the backs of his nails. The sensation made her gasp. He sucked harder and licked the top of her nipple. He inhaled half her breast, then let it pull out of his mouth, tightening on the nipple as it left. Fire burned her belly, the pain in the nipple only one spark of it. The fire pulsed, lifting and twisting her torso each time. He claimed her other nipple, sucking each time she gasped. His hand tried to ride her mound, abandoning regular strokes to respond to its motions.

Her gasps became moans; her twists became shudders. She felt herself burn, convulse, and then collapse. When she lay still, he moved to cuddle her. Letting go of her panties, freeing her nipples, he curled over her with his head on her stomach a little below her breasts. From there he could hear her heart slow and her breathing even, She pushed his hand down below her waist, but there she held it.

They lay like that for a timeless moment, until Peggy cried.

She pushed him away. "Warm the bottle, won't you?" She'd had to teach him how to do that, but he was a help sometimes.

By now, Peggy was telling the world that she hadn't simply turned over in her sleep. She was awake, hungry, almost certainly wet, and demanding to know what Shannon was going to do about it. Shannon fumbled with her shirt buttons -- they went the wrong way -- as she walked down the hall. All the strategic ones were buttoned by the time she reached the girls' room with its distinct coolness from the humidifier.

Shannon found a pacifier clipped to Peggy's sleeper. Slipping it in, she laid her on the changing table. Working in the weird shadows cast by the night light, she opened the bottom snaps. Peggy was dirty as well as wet. She got most of it with the Pamper, most of the rest with a wipe. A second wipe cleaned Peggy right up, and then Shannon applied the lotion.

"All I can find is an infant bottle," Steve said from the doorway.

Mrs. Jensen had said something about expressing only half a bottle. "That's right. Use it."

Dressed in the fresh Pamper, with her snaps all closed again, Peggy still had to wait for her meal. She wasn't used to that, and started to fuss immediately. Shannon got that response every time. She reinserted the pacifier and cuddled Peggy in her arms. Here, having Steve handle the warming was a real help. She left the room in a sort of dance, turning around as she went. Amy's breathing showed that she had slept through her sister's noise, though Shannon didn't like the sound of it otherwise.

Anyway, Peggy was distracted by the movement. Maybe she was just entertained. Shannon's breast was a bit tender where Peggy's head was pressed against it, though. Steve must have been rougher than she had noticed at the time. She missed a step, which was probably just a more complicated dance to Peggy.

She handed the baby off to Steve, who held her against his shoulder and danced the same three-step he danced with Shannon. The milk in the bottle was neither too hot nor too cold against her arm. She took Peggy back, settled her down, took out the pacifier, and replaced it with the bottle.

Now that things were being done right, Peggy settled down to her meal. The speed of her feeding, however, threatened trouble when the bottle was done before she was. "Well, gal," Shannon said, "you can be a demanding kid. Still and all, I'm glad you waited as long as you did."

"Speak for yourself," said Steve. Poor guy, he'd been cuddling her when the siren went off. Probably expecting something for himself.

"I was. Anyway, if you want to take a break in the bathroom, you may. We can keep ourselves entertained out here." She walked over to the chair which was most comfortable for this process. She eased herself down. Peggy kicked at the disturbance, but didn't let go of the bottle. The kick hurt Shannon's breast and reminded her.

"By the way," she said, then paused to arrange her thoughts. "I think that you got too enthusiastic in your sucking back then. I'm a little sore."

Steve winced. "I'm really sorry. I know better. I think I got carried away."

"I'll forgive you. I was too excited at the time to notice."

"Still I need to learn. I can hardly expect to be less excited when we do it for real."

"You know," she said, "you talked about 'our wedding night' once." And she still remembered that. "Ever since, it's been 'when we do it for real.' Sometimes, it's 'our first time.' You don't take my desire for a white wedding seriously, do you?"

"Quite seriously. And doing it for real is different from doing it for the first time. Remember I talked about doing it standing up -- maybe you kneeling. That's not for the first time, not by my plans anyway. Things are just more complicated. I don't want you getting mad at me."

"Well," she said, "I have a feeding baby in my arms. You probably won't get me more content than this." Then, too, he'd done a lot for her contentment himself.

"Well, I'm a boy and you're a girl." Which, she thought, was convenient, but hardly to the point. "We think about this sort of thing a little differently. I've talked about my dreams for our first time, and they are very real. But if you said, 'I'm ready. Let's do it on Mrs. Green's floor the next time I sit there, ' I probably would agree."

"Not going to happen," she said.

"Good. Not that I thought that it would. Anyway, my dreams are negotiable. I really have only one requirement."

"Birth control."

"Well," he admitted, "I probably have several requirements: not without birth control, not on the auditorium stage during a pep rally, not lying naked on a snowbank in the middle of a blizzard. But those aren't real requirements; you want them too. My real requirement is that I have to have your... Permission is the wrong word."

"Permission is a fine word."

"I want more. I want your enthusiasm. It's not enough that you let me. I want you to want me." She wasn't sure about this. He didn't have her permission ten minutes -- no it was closer to a half hour -- ago. She had really wanted him, though. "So," he continued, "as long as a white wedding is still your rule, we won't do anything until then.

"And, much as I want you -- want you right now -- the marriage rule does have one positive from my side. Lots of girls don't enjoy their first time. If we sneak an air mattress up to the meadow this summer before dawn, if we undress each other and I kiss you all over in the dark, if you open yourself to me just as the sun is rising, if -- as I finally enter you and fill you..."

"You've thought about this, haven't you?"

"Of course, I've thought about this. I've dreamed about this. And, may I mention, several other versions including the wedding night. I love you, which definitely includes desiring you. Anyway, what happens if -- after all that -- you hurt horribly and get no joy whatever? Would you give me a second chance?"

"I think so," she said. "After all, you don't sound like you're trying to hurt me." He'd sounded, indeed, like he was trying to be as romantic as possible.

"Well," he said. "You would be a lot more likely to give me a second chance, and third and tenth chances, if we were married. You wouldn't really have anywhere else to sleep, really."