St. Valentine's Day Gift

Her name was Sparkling Mist, but everybody just called her Misty. By the time I met her in American History as a senior at Waverly High she had already been voted most popular everything there. In fact, it was that first day for me at Waverly, when after dropping my pencil, and reaching down to pick it up, I looked towards the back of the class right up her short dress. It was the triangular blond fleece instead of panties that caught my attention, and put her on my most popular list of goddesses. She caught me staring, but gave me this wink. The kind that says: "Don't you wish?"

I also met her boyfriend Duke later that afternoon, and the only notable thing about him, other than the fact that he was dumber than dog shit, turned out to be his yardage gained running an egg shaped pigskin through other notable mental midgets. Misty and I obviously ran in different circles, so I basically adored her from afar like everyone else that year as her slutty behavior bloomed, and became legendary among the athletes. I took out my own frustrations through the Zen of martial arts, how others handled it is beyond me.

Time whispered on like a smoking cigar left neglected in an ashtray. I graduated high school, and went off to college finishing two years before deciding to see what the rest of the world was like. And through a lot of luck, and diligent study habits I made my way up through the hawspipe, and by the age of 24 acquired my first class pilots license for ships on the Great Lakes. The next time I bumped into Misty, she was using the stage name; Ms T as she flung her body around a fire pole in half a thong bikini, and did lap dances for twenty bucks a pop at the Pussy Cat's Palace.

"Mind if I sit with you?" Her voice just as sultry, and girlish as it had ever been.

"Sure Misty, let me buy you a drink," I replied, saying her name the way I remembered, and not with the T emphasized.

She moved in right next to me, her perfume surrounding me even if she couldn't. A bikini clad waitress setting a drink down in front of her before she had her butt tied to the seat. I paid with a sawbuck getting no change back.

"You're the best dancer up there," and I pointed to the stage were a brunet with her hair braided into a rope down to her ass was dusting the stage floor, and with guys tucking ones into her thong.

"So you were watching."

"You could say I've been watching since the 12th grade."

"Ezekiel Walters? American History? Mr. Bedford's class, right?" I nodded, amazed that she remembered me at all. "You looked up my dress after dropping your pencil as I remember it. But you never gave me another look after that. How come?"

"You were very attached," I replied.

"Oh yeah, the Granite Wall," she sighed, "he died while out on National Guard field maneuvers. They say he tripped over his dick, and fell in front of a tank running away from some local girl's daddy. It was a closed casket funeral. But at least I got his GI insurance, even if he was too cheap to ever buy me an engagement ring. Our daughter will now have enough to go to college when she comes of age."

"Sorry," was all I could get out just then seeing the pain in her eyes shadow the smile she kept on her face.

"Hey, shit happens," and she downed her drink in two gulps. Just in time as the waitress took away her empty, and put down a fresh one.

"Five bucks," came out sounding like finger nails against a chalkboard.

"Here's twenty, leave us alone for awhile. If you have to bring the drinks, put some real booze in them, or I'll report this five dollars for a glass of tea crap to my brother. He's a cop."

"Make mine Diet Pepsi," Misty corrected, then pushed the tea away. "I don't drink on the job."

"Fair enough," I agreed.

"Thanks," she said when we were alone again. "I hate being phony, but it's part of the shtick here."

"And you make a percentage off of every drink," I added. "No sweat, everybody has to make a living."

"It pays better than K-mart, and far less hands paw at me than when I was a secretary."

"But I thought…" I blurted before I could take it back.

"That I was the class slut?" She actually laughed then, a deep-throated belly laugh. The kind that releases all of the bullshit we store up for one reason or another. And even so it wasn't loud enough for anyone but me to hear. Her laughter eventually dying out, she caught her breath before saying; "I was a virgin bride, Zeke."

I was, of course, speechless. I mean what could I say to such a revelation as that? We talked then, really talked. Mostly her, with me priming the pump with a question, or detail about myself whenever she became unfocused, or talked about her husband Duke. A brutal man, and insanely jealous he hadn't been all that different from the way her own abusive father was towards her mother. The slut reputation came about by accident from Duke's buddies on the football team. They conned him into thinking she was being raped in the locker room to surprise him on his birthday, and when he barreled into the party in progress yelling out:

"Where is that Slut!" the tag just sorta stuck on her, and grew as an inside joke after that. Duke never bothered to say differently when he saw how guys avoided her like the plague after that. Their daughter Grace entered the world twelve months, two days, and three hours after the wedding. Three days after Duke's accidental death four years ago.

"Tell me Grace takes after you," I chided.

"Well," she hesitated, "more like my mother did at four than me," and then she winked that same wink from so long ago, in that time of innocence. However I now knew it for what it was. The impish side of Misty that she only let out when she felt safe. "I've got another set to do right now, then I'm off work after that. Stick around, Zeke, and we'll go get some coffee afterwards."

"You make a great cup of Yuppie coffee," I said across her kitchen table.

Her two-bedroom, three level apartment house a spotless refuge for the few toys otherwise scattered around in Grace's playroom spoke volumes about the woman Misty had become. And it was also easier to see why she had taken the job she now had too. There she only had to work a few hours, and at that prime time right after Grace went to bed, and the rest of the world watched sit coms on their TV's. And with her assets, she was bound to have accumulated her own fan club of groupies, gropies, or whatever. I couldn't have been more proud of her if she'd of been my wife instead of Duke's widow.

"I love French Vanilla," she smiled back over her coffee cup. All the glitz, and glitter gone, left behind at her make-up table at work. She took on that glow of just showered with a hint of autumn in some far off distant rain forest. Her blue jeans whitening at the knees along with her over sized wool sweater barely hid the wondrously racy curves the creator had granted her. And there wasn't a hint of self-indulgence in her as is too often normal for many woman of such rare beauty these days. Just a look of assured neglect that comes to those who know that they are on their own in this world.

"Why me?" I had to ask. "It's more than evident that you don't bring men that you just met home from work."

"We didn't just meet, Zeke," She replied. "And, well, I've sorta admired you from afar too. I saw you win that Karate Championship, and cheered you on from the stands with everybody else. And when you took the honors in that Chess Match against Brighton, I was there too."

"With Duke," I chuckled, "I noticed. I just didn't understand why he was there."

"I dared him to go," she giggled, "for school support? I told him that as head cheerleader I had to go, so naturally he took me."

"So why me?"

"You were the only guy in high school that I knew who dared to be different. You got straight A's, but never bragged about it, and the extracurricular activities that you engaged in were hardly team oriented. Which meant that you followed your own lead, and not any group's rules of conduct. Even now, you work in a profession that requires one to think on their feet, and do the right thing."

"Being a professional seaman, even as an officer, is hardly the romantic life portrayed by Herman Melville," I interrupted.

"See what I mean?" And again her face glowed over that coffee cup. "You've even read Moby Dick."

"I've read Autobiography of a Flea too, but that doesn't make me a voyeur, does it?"

"Well you did say that you've been watching me since the 12th grade in high school. I went without panties for a whole week, but you never tried to scope me out after that first time."

"No, I just sweated tarantulas every time I entered Mr. Bedford's class after that."

The conversation became a give, and take of mutual admiration after that. A time of getting to know each other, to become comfortable with one another in a neutral setting, a time to breath in the same air without preconceived assumptions. And a couple of hours before sunrise I departed her apartment with nothing more, nor less than a firm handshake, a smile, her telephone number, and a great deal of respect for this single mother. My mind filled with possibilities gave my feet wings to walk amongst the clouds, and my dreams later were filled with erotic mental snap-shots of my personal goddess gyrating, sweat soaked, with nipples pointed at me in a hell frozen over orgy for two.

I called her the next day, and asked her out for breakfast at Denny's after she was finished with work. She had a bowl of fresh strawberries, and I had flapjacks with maple syrup, but we got the chance to talk some more, and were fast becoming good friends. By a more or less unconscious agreement between the two of us, from then on, whenever I was home, I would pick her up from work every night, but from that point on I would wait for her outside of the club.

Winter arrived, and my ship lays up tied to a dock when the water freezes up out on the Great Lakes. I'd missed Christmas, and the New Year with Misty, and Grace, but I wasn't about to let Valentine's Day get by without sending her a real message. There were only two problems, what to do that wasn't cliché, and how to find out the proper size for the gift I wanted to get her.

"I was thinking of getting a matching dresses with hearts on it for you, and Grace," I said over coffee in her kitchen. "And I was wondering if we could go to the Mall in Lakewood this Friday when you're off from work. I'd treat you both to dinner at Mackey D's."

"As tempting as that idea is Zeke," Misty replied hesitantly, "I'm afraid Duke's parents have asked to have Grace for the whole weekend. I could hardly refuse since my parents will have her the following weekend. So I told my boss that I was available for that night if he could give me the whole Valentine's Day weekend off like you asked. If you want I can give you our sizes, that is if you're still going to the mall."

"Yeah, I have to take my mom's wedding ring, and my old school ring to the jeweler's there to get them resized, and cleaned anyway."

"They do cleaning too?"

"Oh sure, and it's pretty cheap. If you want, I can take your class ring with me, and have it cleaned as well."

She was gone for only a minute, but when she returned she gave me two rings, one high school ring wrapped in angora, obviously a man's ring, the other a simple gold wedding band.

"They belonged to Duke," she pointed to the hand with the rings in it as she sat in my lap, "I was going to return them both to his parents for their wedding anniversary anyway, but if you get them cleaned for me they'd make a much better present. The one belonged to his grandmother. I figure his younger brother might like to have it when he finds the right girl."

I could hardly turn her down even if they did belong to her former husband. After all, I had made the offer already. But at least I would have her dress size now for the sales lady at Victoria's Secret.

"No, no problem, I'll get them back to you by Saturday."

I confirmed my reservation for the Glass Garden, and a little bed and breakfast place the next day. The only gourmet restaurant in the Cleveland area I'd had to make a tentative reservation at the Glass Garden from my ship two months in advance just to get us a table there for St. Valentine's Day. Friday I did the ring thing, and while they were doing the cleaning, and resizing my mother's wedding ring, I went to Victoria's Secret to shop for Misty's other present. I'm sure I blushed more than once when the sale's lady asked me to feel the fine silk, or nylon fabric of several thong panty accessories when I couldn't decide which negligee to purchase. So I purchased three different sets, and had her put the red see thru set in a box, and wrap it up special for me.

I stopped off at the florist shop on the way back to the jeweler's. Where I made arrangements to have one single white rose delivered to her work place every day from the seventh until Valentine's day, and on that day, a dozen red roses would be delivered to her apartment around two in the afternoon. It actually took more time to fill out the cards that went with each delivery than it did to buy her the three negligees. A candy store across from the jewelry shop had quite a huge display of heart shaped boxes of various sizes filled with different chocolate delights separately spaced in pleated paper cups. So I purchased two about four or five inches in diameter, opened one, and took out the center candy, and ate it before closing the box back up. The rich caramel coated chocolate was better than advertised, and would make a great addition to my other gifts without being overly nauseous to little Grace. Once I had all the rings in hand I headed for Daltons, and bought the matching dresses, then shoes, and purses to go with them.

When I picked Misty up from work on Friday I got a peck on the right cheek for the 1st rose. I gave the dresses to Misty when I returned Duke's rings Saturday before she went to work. Misty loved the matching white dresses with all of the little poker deck sized hearts poke-a-doted all over them. Both were sleeveless, they had straps, and zipped up in back, the top on both molding to the torso, the skirt for Grace flared, and for Misty's continued to mold, but both hems came up modestly to about three inches above the knees. I received a full body hug, and a kiss on the lips that night when I picked her up. On Wednesday I gave them the shoes, and handbag style purses just in case the shoes didn't fit, or they didn't like the purses that I picked out to go with their outfits. And by then I was getting a full body press, and a tongue filled mouth along with inviting eyes.

I arrived on Valentine's Day dressed in my best suit just before Grace left with her grandparents, and gave her the small box of chocolates along with a card. The card simply said: Be My Valentine. And I got a big hug, and kiss as well as a thank you for everything else from Grace, and a dirty look from her grandparents for the chocolate candy. (I heard later that they only let her eat the candy at bath time, or after breakfast.)

Entering the apartment house I caught sight of the dozen roses showcased on the coffee table in clear glass vase. My heart started to beat faster the moment I caught sight of Misty coming down the stairs for our first real date. Her feet in the red leather high-heeled shoes, and smoky black nylons gave her legs a grace that accentuated the natural swing of her flared hips when they came into view. Her dress like a second skin not quite ready to be shed, but hugged her every curve making me jealous with envy for touching her where I as yet, had not. Her pirouette at the bottom of the steps had me sweating the way her dress tucked in under her buttocks in back, or made a shadow hollow at her Y in front defining what I had seen underneath that first day inside of the Pussy Cat Palace. The bodice above, while snug wasn't overly stuffed, and didn't draw more than its fair share of attention to the overall woman inside of it. In all the dress defined sexy without shouting it obscenely, and allowed the elegant grace of her swan like neck to stand out now with Misty's hair up in a braided bun.

"What do you think?"

"I think," I started, "that I've already told you that you are the most beautiful woman ever born on this planet even when you were wearing baggy clothes. Oh, these are for you too. Misty, would you please quit your job, and be my Valentine..." And I handed her the gift-wrapped box from Victoria's Secret, the other box of chocolates, and the same card I'd given her daughter. She opened the card first, and smiled. Then she opened the box of chocolates next, and gasped when she saw the 2-karat inlaid diamond engagement ring sitting in the center laid on a bed of cotton where the chocolate that I had eaten was supposed to be. That's when I added; "... for the rest of our lives?"

I knew the answer before she move into my arms, and snuggled up to me for the longest, softest, tear stained tongue dueling kiss this side of eternity.