"I've been a bad, bad girl," she thought, humming the tune as she slid into the shower, "I've been careless with a delicate man..."
He hadn't even seen her coming.
It was boring, toying with rednecks in dive bars while her husband watched, his hands in some girl's quivering crotch, the drinks flowing fast and the bad music faster, the fringes of friend-circles leaving latex in pools in her master bathroom toilet. Eight extracurricular men in a year, not counting the occasional odd blowjob. Three of them in the house.
Rhiannah felt jaded, and cynical. Birthdays often did that to her, and October was like that anyway - she often felt the need to go for long drives alone, to misbehave, to rebel against something she didn't name, even to herself. "I have to get out of here," she often said in the autumn. Harvest time.
Dr. Shrink hadn't known she would be there, watching him. They'd met before, talked sometimes, but he wasn't expecting an invitation to lunch.
"Sure," he smiled. She was a little surprised he agreed - she didn't think much of herself, sometimes, and it wasn't always taken for granted that her playthings would come along so easily, but come along they did, and he smiled again and asked her what he'd done to deserve such good fortune this day.
"Nothing," she replied. "You're buying me lunch, not the other way around."
He grinned as though women came up to him and demanded lunch on a daily basis.
"Okay."
They sat in the small Chinese restaurant, selected for ambience - she wasn't a big fan of the food - and sipped Volcanoes as she picked at her soup and he ate like there was no tomorrow. They chatted amiably for awhile, and he looked at her suddenly, reaching across the table to tilt her chin up to see her eyes.
"Are you very unhappy?" he asked.
She started. "Of course not, idiot. I'm fine. How rude." She tried to laugh it off, but as they ate he asked those leading shrink questions, as shrinks will. How was she, how were things going, how was the job, how was married life, oh, do tell about the lifestyle changes, hmmmm, oh? He nodded, she answered somewhat perfunctorily but with a certain edge of something - teasing, maybe, or anger, hard to say which.
"Tell me about this lover," he said, ordering more drinks. She blushed.
"Not much to tell, really. He lives far away, he's brilliant, he's handsome, he's busy a lot, he doesn't like me to be bored," she answered, smiling sideways and slurping her straw.
"Been seeing him long?" he prodded.
"Um, about a year since we met, I guess," she said. "he's really smart.. I like him lots," she added, an idea germinating in her mind. "When I tell him I saw you and made you buy me lunch, he'll ask me what else I made you do."
He laughed heartily. "Oh, really? Likes to hear about your misadventures and exploits, does he?"
She nodded, but didn't say anything, and talk turned to other subjects. Rhi deflected his suspicion, or thought she had, until he asked her very seriously if she was really all right, if she was safe, if she needed his help. She blinked once, and remembering that he knew more of her than many people, answered honestly (i'm fine, i'm okay, i just had a bad week), and he began to talk to her about her stress level. This really wouldn't do.
She'd seen the move in a bad movie once but really hadn't tried it much, so slipping off one shoe she trailed her stocking toe up his leg. That shut him up. So easy. From doctor to man in one simple step, she thought, and smiled at him innocently.
"Rhiannah, darling, I..." he trailed off as her toes found his fly and rubbed gently. He was half-hard before i got there, she smirked, and let him swell under her massaging foot until he was sweating across the table.
"Check please," she grinned at the Asian waiter, and slapped it down in front of him.
