Chapter 6

Veronica Luisa Juarez – “Ronni” to just about everybody besides her parents -- felt a giddy tingle in her tummy as she made her way to her friend’s house. She could still hardly believe the rapid and significant changes in her life. Three months ago, the quiet, somber seventh-grader, third of five children and daughter of hard-working, socially-conservative Mexican immigrants, had felt like a nobody.

Both of her parents had entered the country as children, illegally with their own parents in the mid-eighties. President Reagan’s amnesty program had normalized their status and they had since followed all the rules and were now proud to be citizens -- Republican voters, in fact. Her father owned a handful of dry-cleaning businesses throughout the city, and worked long hours, primarily keeping an eye on the business rather than working the plant anymore, but sometimes he couldn’t help himself -- and sometimes it couldn’t be helped. Her mother often pitched in at the locations, too, although of course they had plenty of non-family staff at this point. Mr. Juarez believed that he could really only trust family with keeping the chain’s reputation top-notch. As a result, and as a savings measure, Ronni and her siblings spent many a school night evening and weekend morning doing homework in one of the shops between handling the intermittent front counter traffic.

On this particular Friday afternoon and evening, however, Ronni was free of those responsibilities, although she was scheduled to help out in the west side location the following afternoon. Tonight, she had permission to sleep over at her new best friend’s house. A new best friend who had changed everything for Ronni.

This friend was amazing!

She was an eighth grader, just about the most popular girl in their middle school, and in Ronni’s eyes the prettiest, too. Ronni was of course probably correct in this latter assessment, for in cliquey adolescence those two characteristics – female social position and pulchritude -- are often highly correlated.

But frankly, there were lots of hot and popular girls in the school, especially among the eighth graders, who naturally “ruled the roost.” This particular hot and popular girl was “amazing” because of what she had done for Ronni, what she had done with Ronni, and what she had done to Ronni.

For Ronni, she had, out of the blue, befriended her, publicly, which had immediately skyrocketed the younger girl’s profile, popularity, and status. Ronni still had no idea why this had suddenly happened. Sure, the two girls had both been cheerleaders for the combined seventh- and eighth-grade boys’ basketball team, but that wasn’t particularly relationship-building; after all they had only practiced maybe six times after school, and then cheered for a grand total of five home games. So Ronni had been acquainted with her benefactor casually, but this didn’t really explain the older girl’s outreach. And besides, she herself hadn’t been popular at all, had no boyfriend, and most importantly of all, was merely a seventh grader.

Despite the tendency of girls Ronni’s age to harbor insecurities about their physical attributes, a tendency she shared in standard measure, she couldn’t ignore the reality that she herself seemed to be considered attractive by most of the boys. The small circle of girlfriends she had maintained prior to her “elevation” had always wistfully expressed envy of her pretty face, her sleek dark hair, her cinnamon skin tone, her eyes -- especially her eyes: large, dark, unbelievably long-lashed -- and even the way her butt looked in her favorite jeans. But despite the secret hope these compliments had occasionally evoked in her heart-of-hearts, her shyness, the limited opportunity her duties in the family business afforded for out-of-school social activities and, above all, the constraints imposed by her strict and loving parents, most importantly that of “absolutely no boyfriends,” had conspired to settle the thirteen year old cutie into a vague schoolyard anonymity. Until she stepped in.

That is what the popular, bright, and very pretty Bethany Michaels had done for Ronni.

With Ronni ... well. It still made her blush to think of how that started. Bethany had for whatever reason decided to befriend Ronni, but of course that didn’t go from zero to “best” friends overnight. But it did involve a growing frequency of text exchanges and threads, sharing tables at lunch, or sitting together on the bus, and then the basic hanging out after school. They didn’t live too far from each other, and so they had initially traded visits, under the general pretext of studying together, although since both girls were good students on their own and not even in the same grade or taking the same classes, these were really just occasions to play with electronics or watch some TV, and more often than not text other girls in the “clique” not present. Bethany’s looping her into those text circles, Ronni knew, was almost as important as sitting with her at lunch in solidifying her acceptance into the exclusive top social tier at Northside Middle School.

One day Bethany had asked Ronni if she would be willing to help one of her friends out. Ronni, of course, had sad “sure”; she would do anything for this older, now-idolized girl. The request was simple enough.

“This friend of mine ... well, he’s really a friend of my stepdad’s, he’s an adult ... well he has this app he is trying to test out. It’s super-secret ‘cause he doesn’t want the idea getting out before he can publish it. You know, so no one steals it.

“Anyway, this is like a video app, but he thinks it will be bigger than YouTube. Since teens rule with this kind of stuff, I’m helping him out, he wants me to help him make it better. It’s called beta-testing. I have his app on my phone, and whenever I watch a video or anything, I watch it on his app, to test it out. Would you help, too?”

Of course Ronni had immediately agreed, and so under the older girl’s direction she had downloaded the app -- something called TrackQ -- onto her phone and henceforth did all her video surfing through it. She dutifully reported certain buggy experiences to Bethany: sometimes the video would flash with seemingly random (and sometimes embarrassing) images, as though a different video from somewhere on the Internet, maybe like sitting next to the one she was trying to watch, accidentally bled over or something.

The eight-grader laughed and said she got those sometimes, too. She confided that her friend -- or rather her stepfather’s friend -- wasn’t so much of a coder, because in his real job he was a doctor. “He’s actually older than Don -- my stepdad -- so I’m not surprised his app isn’t perfect yet. He’s a good doctor, though, really nice, so I keep using the app, to help him out. I’ll let him know what’s happening with yours. Keep watching with it though, okay?”

Over time, Ronni really did start to prefer watching her video clips with TrackQ, despite the occasional weird “flash”. Somehow, watching videos with this app made her feel more excited, or maybe energized was the right word. Tingly.

Anyway, this shared project became an excuse to spend more time with her mentor, as the girls would often meet up after school at Bethany’s house, lay on the older girl’s bed, and surf videos, sharing good ones with each other.

Things changed in a big way one day when somehow they ended up looking at porn. Ronni wasn’t as naive as to never have seen it, nor to have failed to explore it a bit on her own, surreptitiously and a little guiltily, from time to time. And that crazy TrackQ app sometimes flashed with inappropriate imagery, so the girls had already seen bits of it in each other’s presence. But to look at it intentionally, like an actual porn video, together with another girl -- that was something different, and scary. To laugh and brush it off at first, but then to realize they were both more than just amused by it, but also fascinated, intrigued, aroused even -- flushed faces and more rapid breathing – that was a very different experience from furtive iPhone-surfing on a slow evening behind the front counter of one of her dad’s shops.

It wasn’t long before pornographic material made up the vast majority of the video surfing the girls did in each other’s company -- and in Ronni’s case, at least, one-hundred percent of the video surfing she did on her own.

That crazy TrackQ! Weird thing was, when she watched regular, “nice” videos on it, the interrupting flash images that sometimes occurred were almost always sexual. But when she watched porn, it seemed like just the opposite kind of material would occasionally flash -- cute babies, the American flag, the Virgin Mary. When she pointed this out to Bethany, the older girl had said something about conditioner, but when Ronni had corrected her, saying she hadn’t been seeing any hair-care images in the flashes, Bethany had sort of laughed and said “never mind”.

These mutual, shared afternoon explorations took a peculiar turn when somehow they ended up looking more and more at porn featuring women together, completely without men. Ronni was embarrassed that she found this just as arousing as the other kind, and was afraid that this would somehow “show” to her older friend. How humiliating if it did!

But almost as if she were a mind reader, Bethany not only broke that tension but addressed Ronni’s very confusion and concern!

“I used to think there was something wrong with me, liking the girl-girl stuff. But then I looked up some science on it. You know what? All women like it. Turns out scientifically that just about every woman likes other women that way ... it’s not lesbianism unless you only like women, and don’t want anything to do with guys. And that’s not me!”

“Me neither, I can’t give up guys!” Ronni had quickly replied, giggling nervously. Not that she could have pointed to any experience with boys, but she sure liked them a lot. But it had made her feel much better to hear the older girl both confess an interest in the girl-to-girl material, and to learn about the science. Bethany was pretty smart, so if she said that’s what the science said, it probably was.

“Let’s try it!”

What? Had Bethany really just...

Next thing she knew, Ronni felt the older girl’s mouth on her own. She was being kissed, and she kissed back. It was fun. It felt good. It felt good everywhere.

At first, Bethany gave her the impression that this was all pretty new to her, too, but as their make-out and petting session continued, it became clear that she had done this sort of thing with girls before. That might have put Ronni off had she known it up front, but now that she was “guilty” herself, it actually reassured her; Bethany’s experience seemed to normalize the behavior. Creating her first sexual experience is what this amazing new friend had done with Ronni.

That first day it had been limited to what a previous generation might have called “necking.” But Ronni didn’t hesitate to return the next afternoon, and that went a little further. By the end of that week, the two middle-schoolers were making love in the fullest sense, and the first time the older girl used her mouth on Ronni’s previously untouched vulva, she thought she would die from the pleasure of it. Earnestly, she had immediately tried to return the favor.

Tried, but maybe not fully succeeded. At first, Bethany was appreciative enough, patient enough. But after a few sessions, it became clear to the younger girl that she had a lot to learn, that she wasn’t doing things quite well enough. Which is what led to what Bethany did to Ronni.

To Ronni. Truth be told, Ronni very much liked this third development, as frightening and embarrassing as it was at first. One day, up in Bethany’s room, as Ronni was dutifully trying to properly please the eighth grader’s freshly waxed pussy, something had clicked, and from that moment Bethany more or less switched from making love with Ronni to a sterner, take-charge mode, directing her, ordering her, molding her, it seemed, into what she, Bethany, wanted Ronni to be.

Outside of the bedroom -- at school, in front of parents, even in the privacy of non-sex-related text chats, Bethany continued to treat the younger girl like a peer, a friend, just as much of an “equal” as she did any of the other popular girls. But in the bedroom, in private, and during their more sexualized text exchanges, things were now completely different. Bethany was domineering, imperious, bitchy, while Ronni found herself being submissive, obedient, and fawning. And, to what she was sure would be her eternal humiliation, Ronni Juarez absolutely loved it!

Thinking of what Bethany had done to her as she walked the final block to the older girl’s house on this Friday afternoon had the petite Latina’s underaged vagina positively molten.

This physical state was occasioned not only by thoughts of their now asymmetric sexual relationship, but also by the practical reality of one of Bethany’s demands -- orgasm control.

Prior to her eye-opening affair with Bethany Michaels, the youngster had, like anyone else, explored masturbation and self-love. She had even managed to teach herself about orgasms, or at least what she had thought was an orgasm before Bethany had taught her how great they could really feel. But in those days, masturbation had been an occasional matter, and climaxing an even less frequent one.

After becoming lovers with the older girl, Ronni was soon masturbating and climaxing – and climaxing much more “successfully” -- all the time. She played with herself continually, almost continuously, if the thirteen-year-old were honest with herself. And Bethany had, at first, encouraged this excess.

Ronni was touching herself at every opportunity, masturbating and cumming, sometimes several times a day. Upon waking, and upon going to bed. Behind a slow dry cleaning store front counter. During a bathroom excuse in the middle of fifth period!

In fact, in looking back, it seemed to Ronni that her obsessive masturbation was the trigger that led to the change in the dynamic between the two girls. Bethany had encouraged her masturbation from the first, but at some point she actually started directing it. She’d instruct -- and later order -- Ronni to masturbate and report back, by text or in person. It got so Bethany would make her play with herself right in front of her, whenever they had even the most nominal or momentary privacy.

The eighth grader would insist on smelling Ronni’s fingers when she returned from the restroom, to verify that her orders had been carried out. And though all of this, Ronni had obeyed – and had loved the obeying.

Eventually, the most common instruction was simply the word “candy”, in text or by voice, and Ronni would take that as a command to immediately find an opportunity to privately bring herself off. Whenever she got this instruction, she was not done until she had cum.

Following this came the introduction of the code word “touch”, which meant she was to play with her pussy wherever she was, damn any privacy concerns beyond what she could pull off on the spot through stealth or cover. This, of course, seldom resulted in orgasm, but it was enticing and sexy and oh so yummy. After four or five intermittent “touch” commands, Ronni would be yearning for a “candy” to find some privacy and finish the job fully.

And most recently had come the code word “almost.” This is the one that drove her mad, that she hated, that she lived for. Upon this command, Ronni was to play with herself, publically or privately as conditions allowed, right up to the edge of a self-induced orgasm -- and stop. Bethany called this “edging”, and Ronni found it deliciously excruciating, particularly because it wasn’t long after this command’s introduction that Bethany declared Ronni was no longer allowed to bring herself to orgasm, regardless of whether she were alone or in Bethany’s treasured presence, without the older girl’s specific permission, which could be given in plain English or by the “candy” command.

Once Ronni had yielded control of her own orgasms, or lack thereof, there was no turning back. They weren’t co-equal lovers, they weren’t mutually experimenting. Bethany had become Ronni’s mistress, in the dominant sense, and Ronni was had become Bethany’s plaything and sex toy, a doll to divert herself with. And, in either girl’s bedroom, behind closed doors, her complete and devoted slave.

So perhaps it was the combination of these musings over her erotic submission with the fact that Bethany had forced her to edge seventeen times over the last three days without once allowing her to climax that had the seventh grader a-boil as she turned onto the walk and up the steps to the front door of 479 North Pleasant Street. She had her backpack slung over her shoulder, and within it were her toothbrush and her PJs – PJs that Bethany of course would not allow her to wear once they were alone and sequestered in the bedroom for the night. This was, after all, a “sleepover.” Not that Ronni expected she’d get much sleep with such an insatiable pussy -- and critical mistress -- to serve.

She reached for the bell and for the umpteenth time noticed that the nameplate said “Weathers” and again reminded herself that Bethany lived with her mother and stepfather. She had never heard her mention her real father, so Ronni wasn’t even sure if he was in the older girl’s life, or if he were even still alive for that matter. But occasionally she did have to re-remember that the tall, fit, and handsome man of this house wasn’t actually Bethany’s dad. After all, he did seem to act like a devoted parent; for instance, even though at the time she hadn’t known Bethany very well at all, she had even then noticed that Mr. Weathers hadn’t missed a single one of the boys basketball games that Bethany – and of course, Ronni – had cheered at this year. And unlike some spectators, he had seemed truly fascinated by their routines. Most people were more interested in the game, and her own parents hadn’t even attended once, but Bethany’s stepfather had watched their every move, attentively, which was nice of him.

Lost in this thought stream, she was startled when the door opened before she could push the bell. And who should it be coming out, but the man in question himself?

“Oh, Veronica, sorry to startle you, I was just heading out. Bethany’s upstairs, in her room. Staying over tonight, huh?” The man boldly scanned her up and down as he said this, as though he were appraising her body as a potential purchase. He did that every time they ran into each other, lately, whenever Mrs. Weather and Bethany were out of sight. He wasn’t the slightest bit shy about this act, he never was, and Ronni secretly enjoyed it. Of course, she never mentioned a peep of it to Bethany – she was sure that that would creep her out, knowing her own stepdad was checking out her younger friend -- but in her current highly-edged, orgasm-denied condition, Ronni had to consciously resist responding to this bold eyeballing with an instinctual reach for her own overwrought pussy!

But she did resist the crazy urge – as if! -- and Mr. Weathers smiled and held the door wide for her. “Yes, Mr. Weathers. Don’t have to work at a store tonight, not until tomorrow afternoon.” Mr. Weathers knew her dad, had been a customer for years, and he was also about the only person other than her parents to consistently called her “Veronica,” although he did so with a short “o”, in the English, rather than Spanish, fashion. And she always called him “Mr. Weathers”. Some of her friends’ parents insisted that the girls call them by their first names. But not Mr. Weathers, and this seemed totally right to Ronni. He was no equal; he was no peer to teenaged girls. He was a mature, adult man. She felt that mature adult man’s mature adult eyes on her thirteen-year old ass as she climbed the stairs and she told herself that she’d better get her face into Bethany’s immature pussy in a hurry before she found herself disobediently jilling-off in the upstairs hallway!

As she turned to make her way to her friend’s bedroom, she heard the front door close behind the departing – and distracting – male. Ronni was forming the distinct opinion that the more she was forced to edge without the release of orgasm, the less she could trust her own self-control!

She knocked on Bethany’s bedroom door, heard a “C’min”, and swiftly entered and shut the door behind her. She watched Bethany rise from the bed and cross to the cushioned white ladder back chair by the window. The pretty brunette casually tossed a flattish square pillow on the floor before it, and opened her white terry cloth robe revealing her sleek, nude form, as she took the seat. In a practiced fashion, Ronni pulled her own top off and removed her bra as she knelt between he older girl’s spread thighs and, without a word, opened her mouth to engulf Bethany’s glistening vulva. Her taste was tangy, and she was already quite wet, a fact that pleased Ronni. This suggested that Bethany had been playing with herself, anticipating their time together, looking forward to her plaything’s arrival. Ronni felt a twinge of pride in her shame.