Ericas Submission

We had been friends for years, good friends, and our relationship had evolved from co-workers to advisors to confidants. Any financial problem, any marital problem, anything—she had helped me through a particularly rough time with my department manager (I had been wrongly accused of falsifying a record), and I conciliated with her when she divorced her uncaring, disinterested lout of a husband.

Let me set one thing straight from the start: Erica Poulet and I had a purely platonic relationship. In fact, as I'm about 16 years older than she is, I think of myself as more of a father figure than anything else. When we met on the job three years ago when Erica was hired as my secretary, and I was as impressed with her as a worker as I was with her personality. We became fast friends, and it was primarily through my recommendations that Erica landed a job as an assistant manager within my department

In describing Erica, the key word would be petite: she's only about 5 feet tall, and thin. Not skinny, but thin in a very feminine way: slim, long legs and waist, but a nicely shaped bottom and kind of a big bust for her size. And she's got these tiny hands and feet—I used to kid her about them all the time. She's about 23 wears these circular glasses with thin bronze frames, and they really compliment her dark brown eyes and curly brown hair, which usually is kept long and is full of these fascinating little ringlets she constantly complains about when they fall into her eyes.

Sure, I couldn't help but notice how pretty she is, but as I said, our relationship was always purely professional and neighborly. That is, until Robert—but I'm getting ahead of myself.

I'm 39, and have been unmarried the last seven years…when I first met Erica, I had already separated from Arlene, my wife, a woman I deeply loved when I met her, but found over the course of our six-year marriage that I couldn't tolerate her nagging and her badgering. What I initially construed to be a passionate personality settled into an aggressive, tiresome annoyance. Nothing was ever right: no one was ever well motivated, no one was up to her caliber, nothing could ever be good enough. At first it was other things: her boss, a lady at the cash register, a particular news story, her car—whatever went slightly off kilter made her mad.

And then, as the years went on, she focused in on me: no matter what I did, I couldn't please her. I was either too lazy or working too hard at my job. I was either inattentive or smothering her. I found I was running in circles. Try as I might (and I did), I didn't take her out enough, or compliment her enough, or do anything that made her happy. My family and friends kept telling me I was nuts for putting up with her, but I wouldn't listen, and was sure I could make it work. But as the years wore on, I finally realized I was wasting my life, and an ugly divorce put an end to that.

In the years since, understandably, I was not eager to get tied down again. I enjoyed my freedom, and while I poured my energies into my job for a while, I soon settled down and found a happy balance between work and the life outside it, and had to admit I had never been happier. I dated, and had a good social life, an occasional but pleasant sex life, but avoided any romance…it had left such a bad taste in my life that I made that clear to anyone I met.

And so Erica, though beautiful, had no designs upon me, nor I upon her—and that seemed to suit her fine as well. I found her to be an avid and ardent worker, and though she kept to herself I found that as I got to know her better she actually had a great personality. She was just shy, and quiet, and took a little more time to get to know than a lot of others.

As the first couple of years sped by, I realized she had more potential than she thought, and it was under my prodding, praise and recommendations that she eventually landed a higher paying and more rewarding job as an assistant manager. Though nervous, she was extremely happy and came to realize that she was as capable as I said.

There were several repercussions to our new relationship. One was that we became a lot closer: in the process of my reassuring her to move forward in her career, we got to know each other better. She slowly became quite trusting of me, and I think I showed her a lot about herself she didn't yet know.

And so we began to talk. We often ate lunch together, and our conversations were wide ranging and seemed to have no boundaries. And, in time, I found that would turn out to be very, very true.

Our first really intimate conversations tended to be about her dating. She had come from a very strict, religious family, where discussions of such subjects as romance were viewed as vulgar and profane. Her father, a highly conservative man, had kept a strict eye watch over her, and though she was blessed with a lot of physical advantages the boys were too intimidated by him to ever try to get anywhere with her. As such, she led a very sheltered life until her parents' untimely death in a car accident, which precipitated her landing a job at our firm.

Over the course of the next few years, Erica was surprise to find out just how many men were interested in her. I often got to hear about these men, and as she began to trust me more and more Erica began to tell me everything about them, and ask my advice about them. And, more often than not, the advice was about sex.

Erica told me she had very little experience in that area, and had few girl friends, and I was one of the only people she could truly trust. And, being a man, she said I had a lot of insight as to how the men she dated worked. And while some of our discussions were more factually oriented—what was a condom and how did they work, how effective was the pill, and so on—often, they got more philosophical.

"Just how much," she asked me once, "do men expect after a date? What am I expected to do in return?"

I told her that she didn't ever have to feel she owed anything to a man. Sex should never be an obligation, and she should free to engage in as little or as much of it as she felt comfortable with.

After a different outing, she asked me if it was normal or abnormal to talk during sex. She told me that the last man she was with wanted to talk a lot, and encouraged her to join in. I asked her if she did.

"Some," she said.

"Well, like what?" I asked.

"Well, mostly he wanted to know if I liked what was doing…you know, to me," she said, blushing.

"And what did you tell him?" I asked.

"I told him yes," she said.

"Did you really?"

"Tell him yes? I really did."

"No," I said. "Did you really like what he was doing?"

"Oh," she said, really going red now. "I guess so. It was okay."

"Hmm," I said. "Here's where people are going to disagree. I don't know…I can't say what's true for everyone, but I'd want you to be honest. I know a lot of men want to be told they're the best, but if I really wanted to get to know a woman, I'd want to know what I could do to really please her. Personally, I think women should just be honest, in the kindest way they can."

"Really?" Erica said. "I don't think men want to hear anything but how good they are."

"You're probably right," I said. "But not me. I hate dishonesty. Arlene was never honest."

"How do you mean?"

"I mean that she never brought anything to the bedroom that was truly her. She performed for me, and gave me what she thought I wanted, but she wasn't truly herself. I could never figure out what turned her on. As a result, I don't think I ever did. I hated that."

Erica thought about it for a moment, and then said, "But there's a risk in that, John. If a woman tells you what turns her on, and it's not what you want, then isn't there a chance that she might lose him?"

"But if she weren't honest," I countered, "she never really had him in the first place."

It was about two months ago, after she met a man named Robert, that things really began to change.

I became aware that Erica was avoiding me. I worried about her, but she was purposely vague in our conversations, and seemed to hiding something. I was too close to her to stand by if something bad were to happen to her, and so I stopped her late one afternoon when she was staying after to get things caught up. She had thought I was in a meeting, but hadn't seen that I had let my people go early.

The office was empty—our wing anyway—and I sat her down in my office with the door closed and asked her if I had upset her in any way. She said no, emphatically. I asked her if there were any problems—I wanted her to know I was there for her, and she could tell me anything.

She seemed to be wrestling with herself as she sat there, silent, her tiny little hands fidgeting in her lap, so I came around to the chair beside her and leaned over close to her. I put my hand upon hers—to be honest, it was the first time I think I had ever touched her other than in a passing sense, and I think that contact seemed to snap something within her.

"Erica," I said gently. "Tell me what it is."

She shook her head slowly. "I can't, John," she said. "I just can't."

"Erica, it's me," I said. "I'm your friend."

She sat still, then, after a long silence, spoke softly.

"Do you remember," she said, "you once told me how you hated dishonesty?"

I said yes, I remembered.

"And I told you that I worried that being honest could drive someone away?"

I remembered this, but I had to admit it concerned me. I was convinced that I must have done something to upset her, and she was too timid to tell me what it was. Braced for the worst, I told her I did remember.

"Well," she said, and bit her lip before answering, taking her time to respond, "I'm kind of confused about things, and I don't know who to talk to."

I felt so bad. I must have done something to bother her, but it was obviously tearing her apart to tell it to me. I knew she was close to no one in her immediate family, no one to talk to, so whatever I did had to be churning within her, with no outlet.

I said she needed to be honest, and just say what she had to say.

Erica swallowed and hesitated, then stammered, "I found a man who knows what I want, but I don't know if it's right to want what I want."

I had to admit her reply threw me for a loop. I had no idea what she meant, but I felt relief that it wasn't something I had done. I spoke softly.

"I don't know what you mean, Erica," I said. "Explain it to me."

Erica turned a deep red, and breathed deeply before she responded. "Do you promise you won't hate me for what I am going to say to you?" she said.

I felt that old fear come back to me again, that I was somehow to blame. I told her I would never hate her, no matter what she told me. I assured her that I cared deeply for her, and she needed to talk to me honestly, to tell me what she was feeling.

"Robert has a…way…of being sexual with me," she said, her breath short as she spoke, "that I have never experienced, and I don't know if I am wrong to enjoy it."

I couldn't help myself, but I took a breath and sat back for a second, smiling slightly. I was so relieved to find I hadn't hurt her. I think Erica thought I was upset with her, and tried to withdraw her hands from mine.

"No, no," I said, holding her hands more firmly. "Don't worry. Everything's all right."

She relaxed a little, and I held her hands softly in mine. "Do you think you can tell me about it? Do you feel safe with me? You know I would never breathe a word to anyone about this. I only care about you."

Erica took several deep breaths, and began speaking, her eyes down, looking at her hands within mine.

"Robert is…different," she said. I had never met him, so I had no insight into him I could offer. I simply stayed silent, nodding or saying "Um hmm" or "I understand" whenever I thought it appropriate.

"He brings something out in me that I guess I never knew was there until I felt it. He does things to me that I want, that I crave," her chest heaved as she said this, "but I wasn't brought up this way…I don't know if I'm wrong to feel this way."

I stroked her hands as she spoke. "I need you to tell me," I said. "There's no way I can guide you unless I know."

Erica sat silent, her eyes never meeting mine. She took a while before she responded, and with a discernable effort, she said, "Robert has a way about him, a kind of manner," she said, gulping, "that makes me feel good. But I am not sure about whether it is proper to feel good this way."

I told her that nothing short of physical injury should worry her. If she felt good, it was probably good. But I needed to know what it was that she was talking about, and told her I couldn't advise her until she told me.

"Robert is very…strong," she said, "in a nice way. A man's way of being strong. But it's more than just that," she said, and I saw that her free hand, her right one, was tracing soft lines along her the skin of her left arm, and goosebumps rose along her skin. "It's that he's…forceful, and attentive, and…powerful."

She hesitated a moment, then looked at my face. Her eyes were moist and full. Until now, I had never fully appreciated just how large they were.

"I want to serve him," she said, her voice barely above a whisper, as she twisted her face from mine. "There's something about him that makes me want this, to want to care for him and give myself to him and lose myself in him, and I feel wonderful when I'm doing it, but I don't know if I'm wrong for enjoying it so much. When I'm with him I feel as if I'm losing myself, as if I'm surrendering the part of me that I am, and I enjoy it and love it. But afterward I don't know if I was right, if I did the right thing. But it's so right when I'm doing it."

I was taken aback. I had no idea how to deal with this—it was so dynamically different from what I thought was the problem. I hesitated, but only briefly, and held her childlike hand in mine as I spoke.

"A person is free to love whomever or whatever he or she loves," I said, freeing one of my hands to lift her chin so that her eyes again met mine. But she ducked her eyes whenever I tried it—she was not yet ready to look at me straight on. "Whatever two people do in the bedroom is all right as long as no one is being hurt."

Erica nodded her head, but I could see there was more to the story than she was letting on. "But what if the two people agreed that a little bit of hurting was all right?" she said.

I admit to being puzzled. "Well, I don't know," I said. "What do you mean?"

"What if being hurt was part of enjoying what you did?" Erica asked. "What if some pain was part of the pleasure?"

I started to understand, but I was still worried. Here was where I had to admit some of my own Midwestern upbringing made me pause a bit. I didn't want Erica exposing herself to anyone who would do harm to her.

"Do your remember," she said, "that you once told me that you thought women were too often dishonest, that they only did what men told them to do so they would keep them?"

I said yes.

"Well," she said, "what if that was exactly what she wanted to do—if that was exactly what made her happy, to do whatever the man wanted? To be his, to exist for him, to be clay in his hands to mold as he wanted? Is that wrong?"

"But you should never lose track of who you are," I said. "What are your wants, your desires?"

She smiled, and shrugged her shoulders. "These are my wants and my desires. He fills me."

"Erica," I said, "Does he ever hurt you?"

"A little," she said. "But in a nice way. It's what I like—and he never goes further than what I want. He's very…controlled."

"I don't know, Erica," I said, "I worry about you. This sounds like a thing that could go too far. It sounds dangerous."

"But I've never felt better," she said.

"But you've been avoiding me like the plague," I said. "I thought I had done something wrong."

Erica looked up suddenly. "No!" she said. "No, you've never done anything wrong. You've always cared about me, and helped me." She put her hands on mine, and patted my hands as she spoke. Her fingers were so small, like the hands of a child.

"It's just I didn't know how to tell you," she said, "and I hated keeping a secret from you. But I didn't want you to turn away from me, John, or dislike me."

I smiled at her. "That would never happen."

I got up and walked around my office. The streets were dark outside, and I could see by the vacant spots in the parking lot that most of the staff had gone home. "I just want you to be safe," I said. "Maybe I should meet Robert. Would you ask him if that would be okay?"

I looked back at Erica, and she smiled. "I will," she said. "And thank you."

"What for?" I asked.

"For caring about me," she said. "I've never had anyone care so much for me before. I wish I had had a father like you."

***

The next morning Erica came in early—I could hear her in the office outside of mine, and just seconds later she knocked on my door and peeked in. She was smiling from ear to ear.

"Robert wants to meet you," she said. "He said he knows how important you are to me, and he wants to get to know you, too. Would tomorrow night be all right?"

That's one of the perks of being a bachelor. I didn't have to check my calendar. Tomorrow was Friday, and I had thought of going out at night with a couple of male friends, but not now. This was definitely more important.

"I'd be delighted." I said. "Where should we meet? A restaurant?"

"Robert said he would like you to get to know him," Erica said. "He'd like to meet you at his house."

"It's a deal," I said. "Give me the directions, and we'll meet about, say, 6:30?"

"Perfect!" she said, and ran in to give me a peck on the cheek. "I can't wait. And John, I think you're really going to like him."

***

Well, I had to admit I liked him. From the very beginning, from driving up to his house in what the locals call Pill Hill—a wealthy community occupied not only by doctors but lawyers, business owners, and corporate bigwigs—to his gracious greeting at the door, to what turned out to be a spirited, intelligent and humorous conversation touching on subjects as varied as politics, literature, and popular culture, I found I liked this man. Robert was courteous, intellectual, and friendly. Within thirty minutes I found I enjoyed his company every bit as much as Erica said I would.

Erica was a perfect hostess. I had to admit she had outdone herself: she served us our glasses quickly, brought appetizers as soon as we could think of them, and made every effort to make sure our pre-dinner appetites were met.

But it wasn't just her ready attention. No, Erica also dressed the part to the hilt: she wore a white top that hugged her waist but was cut low enough that very little was left to the imagination, a tight black miniskirt, and black vinyl boots on high heels that forced her to walk in a way that emphasized her beautiful bottom. I had to admit I felt a bit uncomfortable at first—there was almost no way that she could move that didn't make her physical charms apparent to both of us—but I soon began to love the kind attention she paid us so much that I found myself looking forward to her every visit to Robert's den.

"Would you like some more wine?" he asked me, tilting his glass. Robert was a couple of inches taller than I—I estimated him to be about 6'1—with a thick head of jet black hair and dark, piercing eyes. But he had a very genuine face, with an easy smile and a good, deep voice. I estimated him to be about my age, or perhaps a year or two younger.

As for the wine, I had to admit I had probably had enough…I felt the room was getting a bit cockeyed, and I put my hand up unsteadily.

"I hate to admit it, Robert," I said, "as delicious as this wine is, but I think I should wait until dinner. I don't usually feel the effects of it so quickly, but I'll assume it's the fact I haven't eaten yet."