The last frames faded out and the bouncy-happy end credit music began to play. Mary and Jess snuffled happily and nestled in even harder for a moment.
“Thanks dad,” Mary kissed me on the cheek. “That’s a great way to end a day. I think I want to watch a movie every night this week.”
“There is a good selection,” Jess took the liberty of mimicking Mary and kissed me on the other cheek. “It’s funny because really we just sit here for a couple hours, but this is some of my favorite time all year. I’d love to watch a movie every night too, Mr. Schmidt.”
I hugged them back, trying to maintain that it was fatherly. “Well, we’ll see,” I said, avoiding commitment. I wasn’t sure I could stand the torture. If I could go upstairs and vent some sexual tension with my wife, that might have been different, but I’m not sure what state I’d be in if I had to sit between two young goddesses for two hours every night. I thought my dick might actually explode out of revenge. It had been years since my last regular lover. “Off to bed with you, and we’ll hit up the mall tomorrow, like I promised.”
“How about you,” Mary asked, extricating herself from the blanket. She took her body heat with her and I nearly shivered. Her ‘nightgown’ was askew, accenting her figure even more. “Are you going to sleep now too?”
“No,” I said, unwinding from an almost-purring Jess. “I have a few things to work on in the den. I rarely get to bed before midnight.”
“Okay,” Mary yawned, stretching in an unconsciously unfair way. “Goodnight dad.” She kissed me again and started for the stairs.
“Goodnight, Mr. Schmidt,” Jess kissed me again too, and turned to follow Mary. Her lingerie had caught in her panties as she sat curled on the couch, leaving most of her beautiful butt exposed. I didn’t bother embarrassing her by pointing it out, I simply stared, helpless, and pretended to go about shutting down the movie. Without even trying, the way she climbed the stairs in her semi-sleepy, barefoot way was as seductive as if she were a professional runway model or glamour star. — At eleven-thirty, unable to concentrate, I’d abandoned my den and computer and made my way upstairs. I passed Mary’s room quietly, pajama collar awry, slippers whispering against the carpet. The dim light from the hallway showed the door to be ajar, and quiet blackness within. “That’s a mercy,” I grumbled. In past years it might be two or three in the morning before they wore each other out talking.
I made my way into my room, got ready for bed, clicked out the lights, and stripped down. The bed was cold, but smooth, and I could feel my own body heat, egged on by my fast-beating heart, already warming the covers.
It took what seemed a long time to finally fall asleep. Images and impressions of my past sexual relationship with Cathrine flooded my mind, and my blood refused to cool. There was no doubt I missed her in many ways. I’d learned to live with the gigantic hole over the last six years, but it didn’t seem like the kind of thing that would ever actually fill.
Tossing and twisting with restless mind and unnerved body, I kept replaying the full, satisfying sex life I’d had, and how empty it was now. It wasn’t like that’s all our relationship had been, but when my heat was up, it was only natural that I couldn’t get it out of my mind. Eventually, inactivity and the inability to maintain an erection for eternity conspired to dim my consciousness and I drifted off. — “Mr. Schmidt?” I awoke not quite with a startle, nor with the slow climb upward from deep sleep, but with a regular awareness blooming in the darkness. I shifted. The clock read one-thirty in the morning. I looked towards the door.
“Mr. Schmidt?” Jess whispered again. Her outline was silhouetted in the dim light from the hallway. From this perspective her nightgown seemed much more appropriate – a more blocky shape that still showed she was a pretty girl, but not so seductive.
‘Now where did that thought come from?’ I asked myself, still groggy but with some realization that I’d been very horny lately.
“Yes? Jess?” I said fuzzily, almost fully awake.
“Can I come in?” she whispered back. There was a catch in her voice as though her heart beat too fast for her to speak normally. There was a pause while the idea stole through me with some sort of icy nervousness.
“Are you okay?” I asked, shifting again to sit up on one elbow. I realized I was completely naked under the covers, but in the darkness and with all this bedding around me, she shouldn’t be able to tell.
“I think so,” she whispered, taking a tentative step into the room. “I had a bad dream, and I’m a little shaky. I…” she faltered.
“Come in,” I said as gently as I could. I clicked on my bedside light, the first setting dim enough to allow reading without glaring off the walls.
The illusion of the appropriate nightgown disappeared, dispelled by the light. Crumpled a little by sleep, it clung to her body, and perhaps without so much light to reflect off the material, her breasts were clearly visible beneath. She flitted the few steps from the door to the bed and sat down on the edge. Whether from her sudden movement or urged by her arm I couldn’t tell, but the bedroom door swung so that the latch clicked gently against the stop – though it didn’t close.
I was too aware of her proximity to pay enough attention to, or react to, the door. She’d sat down so that one leg curled up on the bed, the other hung over the side, her right hip almost touching my thigh. The covers rippled against me and in an absurd panic I thought they might slide off – despite the several feet of fabric spread out in every direction. I covered the motion by trying to sit up a little more, pluffing my pillows against the headboard, and leaning against them.
“What’s up, Jess?” I asked, trying to mask the thudding of my own heart.
“I just…” she began, but trailed off and looked down at her hands in her lap. “I just need to talk to you a little, is that okay?”
“You’re always welcome to talk to me, Jess,” I assured her.
I couldn’t help myself. I could tell anyone she was my daughter’s friend and it was a fatherly gesture, but I reached out and brushed her hair off her shoulder, then gave it an affectionate squeeze.
She looked up at me with enormously wide eyes, as though afraid, but didn’t say anything, and seemed to have frozen herself in place so as not to disturb her shoulder.
“It does seem unusual to speak to me at one in the morning,” I tried to sound casual about it.
“It’s the only time,” she looked over her shoulder suddenly, at the door, and the movement pulled her body just far enough that my hand fell away. “That I thought we could talk alone.”
“Oh,” I said, trying to sound like the family doctor. “You wanted to talk about Mary?”
“No,” she sounded breathless. “More – without her.”
“Very well,” I said, trying to figure out if I could rest my hand on her leg without giving myself away. I decided against it, but kept the thought clearly in mind as my penis stirred, thickening.
“It’s so nice,” she started, stammering down into her lap again, the words starting to come out in a whispered rush. “I mean, my dad isn’t around a lot. Well, okay, he’s not around at all, and I don’t really like how grumpy he is whenever I do see him, and it was so nice to just sit with you on the couch, snuggled under a blanket. It’s like what I guess I dream it should be like to have a real family. I’ve obviously heard all about the father-figure concept, and I don’t want to put any extra pressure on you and all, but … it’s just so nice to have a man to cling to once in a while.”
She took a quick breath, and plowed on, her eyes now on her bare knee. “I mean, I’ve obviously been around boys at school, and it’s exciting and fun to be near them and touching too – you know like holding hands or holding on to their arm when they’re talking and laughing with each other – but it’s so different with a… I don’t know, a real man?”
Jess looked up a little more, her eyes on my exposed nipples. “I mean, they’re real, but they’re so unstable, so unsure themselves – I can feel how insecure they are and how volatile, how likely they are to do something stupid just as easily, or more easily, than something good. They’re all trying to be cool because they don’t know their place yet, and they just make all these blunders. Boys try to touch me back, of course, and it’s very exciting, but it’s also alarming and they don’t always seem to know what they’re doing. It often hurts or doesn’t feel good other than the fact that it’s just fun to be touched – like someone thinks I’m beautiful, or even can’t help themselves.”
Now her eyes came up to my face, but she seemed unable to look directly into my eyes. Her own eyes were dilated, and I could see her trembling. “But when you hug me, or hold me, or just let me sit against you, it feels so comfortable, so warm, so soothing…” she broke off, licked her quivering lips, and looked into my eyes. I was incapable of looking away, saying anything, even moving.
“I’m so confused,” she said quickly. “I don’t have a dad to talk to about all this. I’ve tried to talk to mom about it, but she gets all flustered and goes off on all the wrong tangents. Things were so bad between her and dad, and I never really saw them comfort each other, but I have these powerful urges…”
She took a shallow breath as if it were a long one, and when she spoke again it sounded as if she were already out of breath again. “Half of it is the fantasy – sometimes overpowering – of being held, just held by big, strong arms. Knowing they’re there for me, to protect me, to keep me warm, and… and…” She seemed unable to continue, and tears filled her eyes.
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