It’s a good thing my boss was out of town for the day. He is the only one at work that can tell when I am slacking off. I was really struggling with distracting thoughts and so nothing productive was going to get done. My mind kept racing through all that had happened in the last sixteen hours. Anne had not reacted well to Kathy’s heartfelt bombshell and hasty departure. She had been visibly shaken but she did not want to talk about it. She had tried to be nonchalant about it. She had tried to get us to continue with our sexual evening, but her eyes kept returning to the door Kathy had raced out. In her distracted state, the best I could salvage out of the evening was to get her back on the massage table where I relaxed her nearly to sleep. Anne had apologized as I packed up to leave. She implied that she would be more open about her anxiety after she had a chance to talk to Kathy. Brad and Sandra had enthusiastically thanked me for coming, and they said they were looking forward to the next time. They hinted at some possible plans that they had wanted Anne to tell me about. Anne smiled and told them we had been too distracted. We let them assume what they wished. Anne walked with me out to my car and although she kissed me good night, I could tell that her mind was miles away. I was not sure that I would hear from her again. My wife wanted to know how the second date had been. I gave her the stripped down version and I was surprised that she didn’t try to find a way to blame me for how it had ended. She did jump to telling me all about how her plans were coming together. She sounded truly happy and I could not help but smile at her enthusiasm. When I got to work the next morning, I had planned to reach out to Anne at lunch time. Between online chat and cell phones, I shouldn’t have had too much trouble finding her. I worried that if I tried too hard, she might feel like I was stalking her. Around 9:15, I noticed a chat pop-up from Anne. — Anne: John, are you there?Anne: 911 please answer! Me: Hey, I was away, what’s up? Anne: Thank you! Have you heard from Kathy?Anne: Can you check your email too? Me: no, 1 secMe: No email- what’s the matter? Anne: I fucked upAnne: I don’t know what to do Me: ok… can you tell me what happened? Anne: I was stupid Me: please? I want to help, but I need somewhere to start Anne: promise me you won’t be mad Me: OK, I promise Anne: okAnne: I called her last night after you leftAnne: I wanted her to explain why she said what she saidAnne: she wanted me to say it out loudAnne: I was frustrated and more and I said things I didn’t mean Me: and more? Anne: OK I was scaredAnne: everything is changing and I am getting lostAnne: something broke inside of my head when she kissed meAnne: I tasted you and me in her kiss and I nearly cameAnne: and then I wanted to kiss her againAnne: I wanted her… and then she said those words…Anne: it scared the crap out of meAnne: I called her to try to explain and to try to be less scaredAnne: but I ended up lost and angry and she hung upAnne: and then she called in sick this morning and she won’t answer her phoneAnne: I am scared sick that I will lose herAnne: I need to find her… I need to tell her that I love her too! Me: Wow, and hugs and breathe! Anne: how can I breathe?Anne: a week ago I wasn’t sure that I loved anyone, not even my husbandAnne: now my heart is breaking in too many waysAnne: I’ll screw it up and I will lose herAnne: I’ll end up losing both of youAnne: I don’t want to be in love any more if it hurts like thisAnne: OMG. Tell me I did not just type all of that. Me: Breathe, it will be ok! Let’s work on making sure Kathy is ok first Anne: How can it be ok? She isn’t home. I stopped by her apartment on the way to workMe: Hmmm… my advice is to just give her some time.Me: I know it will be hard, but I bet that if we wait, she will call Anne: I feel like I just made things worse.Anne: I will wait but I won’t like itAnne: one more thing, I am scared to ask… Me: the answer is Yes Anne: um… what do you think the question is?Anne: now I am more scared Me: I don’t know what the question is, but since you know the answer, you don’t have to be afraid to ask Anne: oh. since I don’t have to ask,Anne: I will be there to take you to lunch at 12:45 Me: OK 🙂 Anne: ok… have a good morning Me: you too, see you soon — It’s a good thing my boss was out of the office. With all of the thoughts whirling around in my head, I thought it might explode. Finally, I had convinced myself that brooding would not help, and I settled down to get something done. Of course, that is when my computer beeped to let me know that I had a new friend request in chat. I did not recognize the user name, but I had a hunch and so I accepted anyways. Two seconds later, a chat window popped up. — K: Hi John, its KathyK: do you have a minute to chat? Me: Hi Kathy, I have 10, unless you need more K: I think it was only 7 1/2 or 8, but that is more than enough 😉 Me: lol, so… what’s up? K: seriously? have you talked with Anne? Me: Yes- she is very worried about youMe: you two need to talk! K: worried? she sounded madK: I think she is istanbul travesti going to fire me 🙁 Me: she was not mad, she was unsettledMe: please call her! Me: ok?Me: ok? (Don’t make me ask again!) K: I might Me: you might call? or make me ask again? lol K: both? :)K: *please* I need something first Me: ok… I will do what I can… just ask 🙂 K: can we meet tonite at your office? Me: yes?Me: what do you have in mind? K: I need a lot of things :(K: I need to let you punish me for not answering :)K: I need to let you seduce me ;)K: whatever will get you on my side to convince Anne that she doesn’t need to make me leave 🙁 Me: you do need a lot of spankings! :)Me: first for not answering, second for being naughty and third for thinking there are sidesMe: it will be interesting to see how many I can give you when you get here tonite 😉 K: so you will let me come? Me: yes! K: ok Me: Hugs to you, I will see you at 5 😉 K: thank you — It’s a really good thing my boss was out of the office! For all of the advice I had been spewing out, I wasn’t surprised to realize that I couldn’t breathe. With both women on edge, I might have been safer throwing rocks into a mine field than getting in the middle of their mess. I had a lot to think about, and there was no chance that anything productive was going to get done. I did take a moment to text Anne. She was not online, so I sent a message to her cell phone. It said, “Chatted with Kathy. She is ok but worried. It can wait until we talk at lunch.” A while later she answered back, “Thanks”. All I had to do was try to look busy until 12:45. Eventually, she sent another short text to let me know she was on her way, and another when she arrived at my work. Anne had parked right in front of the sidewalk, so I had no choice but to get in the passenger side. She immediately asked about local restaurants, and she avoided eye contact. I tried not to think about land mines as I directed her to a local cafe. As soon as she had parked, I hopped out of the car and hurried around to her side. She had already opened the door, and I waited for her to step out. “This is where I have to ask if everything is okay,” I prompted. When you play Minesweeper, you never know what will happen when you click the first square. Sometimes you get a mine, and the game ends before it starts. “How can anything be okay?” she asked. She still wouldn’t make eye contact. I had her trapped in the open car door, and I waited for her. I saw her realize that I had trapped her, and I saw her ball up her fist. I was pretty sure that she wouldn’t hit me. Her eyes were glassy with the tears she was fighting when she looked up at me. “How can it be okay?” she asked again. “We wanted no strings and suddenly I am saying stupid things and having feelings I don’t understand and I seem to be going out of my way to mess up everything and…” As she stopped to breathe, I mentally clicked another square and I said, “Stop.” My eyes held hers, and tears formed in hers and she had to blink them away. “First,” I continued, “we gave up on no strings the minute we agreed to meet a second time. We lost the rights to go back the moment we told our spouses, and definitely lost it when I met your husband and liked him.” She continued to blink away tears, but she tentatively stepped closer to me, and put her hands on my arms to steady herself. “Second,” I said, “feeling awkward about new feelings, and not being sure of how to talk about them does not mean that your words are stupid or destructive.” I gently reached out and brushed her tears from her face. “Having negative thoughts and projecting them as a shield against the uncertainty will make your fears come true. Will you talk with me? Will you let us work through this together?” She nodded and quietly said, “Yes.” “Good,” I answered. “I don’t know if we will make every last thing okay, but we can try to make them better.” She nodded again, and then threw her arms around me and just held me close. I held her just as tightly until we both gently released. She still had tears at the corners of her eyes, but the happiness beaming from her smile was infectious. “Can you teach Brad how to hug like that?” she asked. I laughed and said, “Of course.” After a moment I added, “Although he is nearly as tall as I am, so he and I will have to work out where to put our arms.” Her eyes flared with laughter and she punched my arm. “Goof!” she declared, and then she kissed me. The kiss lingered for several moments, and she and I both knew that things were getting better. I finally let her out of the trap, and we walked arm in arm into the cafe. We sat in a corner booth and quickly ordered soft drinks and sandwiches. I could tell that she had let go of the tension she had been holding since the night before. She was smiling and much more relaxed as we waited for our food. I thought of the game and I prepared to click on a square. “So talk to me about Kathy,” I started. Her smile faded a bit, and she briefly looked away. Her eyes were clear as she looked back at me. “I think I could love her,” she said. “I don’t think I realized that when istanbul travesti I called her last night. I was trying to understand myself, but I was demanding answers from her. I think I scared her away and I’m afraid that she will leave me. I’ve tried to think of what I can say to her to bring her back, and I think anything that I say will make her hate me more.” “Did you think to start with ‘I’m sorry I spoke to you that way’?” She stared at me for so long that I was sure I had clicked on a bad square. Our food arrived, and I was granted a reprieve until the waitress walked away. Hopefully it gave Anne more time to think. “That might work,” she finally said with a half smile. “Unless I made her so mad that she hates me,” she added. “She is worried that you hate her,” I pointed out. “She is afraid that she pushed too hard last night and that you want her out of your life.” “That’s the last thing I want,” she exclaimed. “Heh. That makes things easy for me,” I said without thinking. “What do you mean?” she asked with a frown. I realized I was still clicking dangerous squares. “I agreed to meet her tonight. She wants to see if she can recruit me to help her win you over.” The truth is usually a good place to go. It could easily be a trap as well. “She wants to convince you that you don’t have to send her away.” “I want her to stay, now more than ever. Did she say how she was going to get your help?” I know a loaded question when I hear it, but I had no choice but to click the next square. “She offered to let me seduce her, or to let me punish her for being bad.” “So she wants a lover or a father, or both.” “I don’t know. She never asked in that way, and she was most concerned about repairing her bond with you.” I waited. Finally she said, “So, I don’t know if I am ready to talk about bonds, but I think I want to try something for her. I will need your help. Tell me what you think about this idea.” She slowly outlined a plan where she could apologize to Kathy, and then move their relationship forward. I had to remind her that she knew Kathy way better than I did, but I agreed that helping her was a good plan. I agreed to discuss the plan with Kathy when she and I talked later in the day. We shared a lingering kiss when Anne dropped me off at work. I know I didn’t get any work done, but the afternoon flew by. Soon enough people were leaving for the night. I did a walk-through and made sure the building was empty of people. I ended at the front door just as Kathy walked up. I opened the door for her and she greeted me with a casual hug. I had propped the inside security door open, so I led her right inside. I don’t know what I was expecting, but somehow I was relieved to see that she was casually dressed in jeans and a t-shirt. Kathy is just a little bit shorter than Anne, but with a slighter build. Her dark shoulder length hair was up in a pony tail. She barely had any makeup on, but her youthfulness made her all the more appealing. I pushed that thought aside. We needed to fix things between her and Anne without me getting in the way. “Let me show you where my desk is,” I said. “That will be a good place to sit and talk.” “No way,” she answered. “I want the same tour you gave Anne, and I want to see the boob prints on the glass in the classroom!” I smiled and shook my head. “If you keep saying ‘I want, I want’, I may have to give you the spankings we talked about.” She smiled and stepped close enough to put her hand on my chest. “Please?” she begged aloud. I heard more, but it may have been my imagination. I heard, “Spank me? Guide me? Please me?” “Please give you the tour, or please give you spankings?” I asked with a leer. “Both,” she answered. Then her smile faded, and she added, “But I need to ask a small favor.” “Sure,” I said. “Ask away.” “Show me around while I explain,” she asked. I smiled and led her through the same route that Anne and I had taken. “This is hard for me to talk about,” she explained. “Anne knows that I have been seeing a counselor to deal with some of my past. The counselor wants to help me, but I just don’t trust her. She knows there are things I won’t open up about to her.” We had reached the second floor conference room, and Kathy stopped and turned to face me. “I want to trust you, John. I probably shouldn’t, but I see how you treat Anne, and how she trusts you. I shouldn’t trust you yet, but I do.” I took her hands in mine. “You are right,” I said. “You probably should not trust me, and you have no reason to. I promise to try to respect you and your trust.” She smiled and said, “Thank you.” We turned and continued up toward the classroom. “I have had only one boyfriend,” she continued. “We dated for a couple of weeks. I felt that it was time to let things get physical, and although it started out fine, it ended horribly. Is this the window?” I smiled at the sudden change of subjects, and said, “Yes. You can see our cars and the bus stop, and if you look close, you can see the hand and breast prints are still on the glass.” She took a deep breath and traced the prints without actually touching the glass. “I can’t imagine istanbul travesti how hot that was. I wish I could have been here.” She smiled and stepped up close to me. Her smile faded, and she focused her attention on my chest. She slowly started to unbutton my shirt. “We were making out on his bed, and most of our clothes were off,” she said. I was desperately trying to come up with a reason to stop her hands. There was a lot of pain in her voice, and I knew we needed to let her keep going. “We heard a noise, and we realized that his mom had come home early.” Her warm hands slid up my bared chest, and there was fire in her eyes when as she looked up at me. “Don’t even think to tease me for dating a guy that lived with his mom!” “Okay,” I answered in a shaky voice. Her eyes flared in wonder and she flexed her fingers against my skin. “You like this?” she asked. “Yes, very much,” I answered. “I may have to tease you the same way when our other talk is done,” I warned. “I don’t want to talk about that until you promise to help me.” “I promise you won’t need my help.” “If that’s true, then I don’t need to seduce you,” she purred. Somehow, she eased away while pressing her body closer to mine. “If I don’t need to seduce you, then there’s no reason for me to do this,” she added as she pulled her shirt off. She had the cutest breasts. They were perfectly suited to her slender build. They were lifted up taut as she pulled her shirt off, and then settled as her hands came back to my chest. They were perfectly suited to fill my hands, and I couldn’t wait to hold them and lift her perky nipples to my mouth. She pressed them firmly into the hair of my chest and hugged me close. She turned her head onto my shoulder and stayed in my arms. “Anne was so right,” she murmured. After a moment, she said, “I think he was scared more than I was.” I really struggled to get my mind back to her story. “He put his hand over my mouth, and he said those words.” She was trembling as she held me, and I felt her tears on my chest. “He couldn’t have known,” she whispered. “But why would he say them? Of all the things he could have said, why those words?” As I held her, I could feel her pain. I could sense her fear. Certainly she was warm and desirable in my arms, but sex could never have been further from my mind than it was at that moment. She wiped her tears and looked up at me. “I need you,” she said. She wiped her eyes again, and said, “I need you so bad.” I brushed some of the tears off her cheek. “I’m not sure I understand what you want.” “Remember the favor? “Yes, you were explaining. I don’t think you have asked yet.” A shy smile played across her face. “It starts like this, but this is not the favor.” Her lips parted expectantly, and she pulled me down. I lifted her and kissed her gently. When she eased away, I was reluctant to let her go. “I need you to use your imagination,” she said with a smile. “I need you to spank me and tease me like your naughty little girl. I need you to take me as your lover, or use me like your own little slut. I will do anything you ask, any way you want.” She saw the skeptical look in my eye. I was not sure that the things she was asking for would do anything to help her deal with the pain in her past. “I wanted this to win you over to my side, but you said I wouldn’t need your help with Anne. I need this for me. Do you know why?” I shook my head, and said, “Tell me.” “Because of Anne.” She saw that I was confused, so she continued. “She and I have talked about sex and love a lot. She always felt safe with her husband. She knew that sex with someone else would be outside of her comfort zone. She was lucky enough to have found you, and you keep taking her so far out of her comfort zone that it scares the daylights out of her. Do you know why she lets you take her there? She knows deep down that she is still safe when you are there.” “I have never felt safe like that. Sex was fear and hurt and I had to run away to get away. And the first time I tried to get past my fears, he said those words and it all came back, and I screamed like a banshee and split his lip and I had to run again.” “I trust you, and I want you to take me and show me pleasure without fear. Please? And you probably know the favor I want. Promise me you won’t ever say those words. Promise me you won’t say ‘Hold still and don’t make a sound.'” “Of course! I promise I will never say that. I give you permission to kick me in the shin if I say something even close to that. But I’m not sure that racing headlong into sex is the best way to move forward in the healing process.” “That shows how little you know about a determined woman,” Anne said from the doorway. I had given her my access card to get in the building. The original plan had been for her to meet us at my desk. Nothing in the plan allowed for me to be half naked with Kathy when Anne confronted her to apologize. “Anne!” Kathy exclaimed as she pushed away from me. Anne’s eyes were boring into me as she asked, “Do you want our little girl to suffer the pain of rejection just at the moment when she most needs love and affection?” Turning her attention to Kathy, she said, “Baby girl, I am so sorry I spoke to you so badly last night. I hope you will forgive me. I was afraid of the feelings I have for you, and I shouldn’t have needed John to make me feel safe in saying that I love you.” Without a word, Kathy ran to Anne and hugged her tight.