Helping Jodi

I am seated across the breakfast table from my daughter on a Monday morning. She will leave in a few minutes for her job as a barista at a local coffee shop. I am not on the production schedule today, so I have the day off. As we chat amiably, I study her closely, looking for any sign of change. She will enjoy her eighteenth birthday next Sunday and I keep expecting something to be different. My life changed abruptly right after my eighteenth and I can't help but worry a little about her future.

Logically, I realize I have little to be concerned about. She has been a straight-A student all her life. She recently graduated as valedictorian of her high school class and will enter Stanford at the end of the summer. She is awash in scholarship money and I am financially well off. The remainder of her college expenses, including graduate school, if she chooses to go, will be easily covered. Scholarly excellence coupled with her good sense and thoughtful approach to life should stand her in good stead.

From a distance, we are often mistaken for twins. Our shared Celtic heritage is lathered all over our bodies. We both have flaming red hair and pale skin with a dusting of freckles across our noses. Mine have faded a little with age while hers are still cute and girlish. She is a beautiful young woman with a stunning figure. In ten years she will be truly gorgeous after she matures and her features soften slightly. It happened to me and it will happen to her. At the age of thirty-seven, I still turn heads wherever I go.

We both wear our hair long, hers reaching the middle of her back, mine a few inches shorter. Both of us have large green eyes and full, sensuous lips. Jodi is not yet fully aware of the power that her beauty will bestow upon her. She's learning, but she's not there yet.

"Your birthday is Sunday," I say after a sip of my coffee. "What would you like as a present?"

I have always made a big deal of her birthday, far more than any other occasion. Even Christmas. She has been the most important person in my life since her birth and I acknowledge that fact whenever I have the opportunity. Birthdays let me go all out for her.

"I've been giving that a lot of thought lately. Eighteen is a big deal so I want the day to be special," she responds with a hint of mischief in her smile.

"So what have you decided? If it's within my power to give it to you, it's yours."

"I want to relinquish my virginity," she says in a calm voice as she looks me directly in the eye.

I choke on my coffee, hacking and sputtering for a long time while Jodi watches dispassionately. She knows I won't choke to death because I'm able to cough.

Our relationship has been so close, so open, that she rarely says or does anything that startles me. This time she knocks me completely off balance and waits calmly while I recover. Eventually I can talk a little.

"You've been on the pill for a year," I croak, "I thought you'd have resolved that issue by now. What's wrong with Troy?"

"Troy and I aren't going anywhere," she replies with a sigh.

"Why not? I thought you guys were pretty serious."

"Not really. We've done some experimental groping, but I don't let it go beyond that with him. He's not the solution to my problem."

"Are you going to expand on this topic a little, or just leave me twisting in the wind?" I ask and get another sigh in return.

"When I wake up on my birthday, I'll probably be the only eighteen year old virgin in southern California. All my girlfriends, including Bonnie, have done it already and everyone says the same thing."

"And what might that be," I prompt. Bonnie has been her best friend since grade school and she will go on to Stanford with Jodi where they'll be roommates.

"They all told me that it hurts a little the first time, which I expect, so that doesn't bother me. What bothers me is that all of them said it was over before they had a chance to see if they liked it or not. Here's what's worse. They've all had sex a couple of times since and tell me they enjoy it, but it's always over too soon. Their boyfriends are only interested in their own gratification. Not a single one of my friends has had what she would call a satisfying experience. Every one of them gets more pleasure from masturbating."

Jodi and I are so candid with each other that talking about sex causes us no discomfort. I am now taking this conversation in stride.

"Unfortunately, it takes a while for a man and a woman to develop sexual rapport," I tell her. "Inexperience takes time to overcome."

"Well, I don't want some self-absorbed, hormone-stoked, pimply-faced guy to do the deed. And I don't know anyone else who would be suitable."

"I don't know how to help you," I respond, truly sorry that I'm going to disappoint her for the very first time on her birthday.

"Considering what you do for a living, I was thinking you might have an idea or two. Oops, sorry. Gotta run or I'll be late for work," she declares as she jumps up, kisses me on top of my head, and races out the door.

What Jodi said isn't precisely true, but it's close enough. I need to figure out a way to help my daughter. When I hear the door slam, I pick up my coffee cup and think back over everything that has brought us to this point.

****

I don't remember my father. He left when I was learning to walk. As I grew older, I pestered my mother for information about him but she steadfastly refused to respond other than to offer the opinion that marriage didn't suit him. Eventually I let the subject drop.

When I was twelve, she died of cancer and I went to live with my aunt Barbara who lived only a few blocks away. Neither of us had a choice. Ours was a contentious relationship from the beginning; she didn't particularly like kids and I was resistant to her authority.

We lived in a modest house on the eastern outskirts of Calabasas, California. I had my own room, so I was content to avoid my aunt whenever possible, which suited both of us just fine. She worked long hours as a paralegal for a large law firm nearby. On a good day, we saw little of each other.

At best, I was an average student with no interest in attending college. I worked summers at a local supermarket for spending money and spent the rest of my time with Rob. We had known each other since we were toddlers. By the end of my junior year I realized we were more than just friends and that marriage was probably in our future.

Rob was a year ahead of me in school and not much better at academics. Lacking both the resources and the inclination to attend college, he joined the Navy and went off to boot camp and then a long period of specialized training afterward. I saw him on rare occasions when he was home on leave but we stayed in touch the rest of the time by e-mail.

I missed him terribly until he was assigned to a unit at Point Mugu Naval Air Station which is only about thirty miles from Calabasas. Rob was a crewmember in some sort of helicopter. They worked hard and trained hard, but he had adequate time off and we spent every minute together when we had an opportunity.

As my eighteenth birthday came and went and I finally put high school behind me, three things happened that would alter my life forever.

For starters, my aunt informed me that I could remain in her house until the end of the summer. After that, I had to find my own way.

The second was that Rob's unit was tagged for a tour of duty in the Middle East and they began a pre-deployment training regimen that kept him busier than usual. We didn't know the exact date of his departure, but we knew it would be soon.

Those two things spawned the third. Rob asked me to marry him and I accepted.

Probably thinking marriage would ensure a quicker departure from her house, my aunt payed for a modest wedding and a three-day honeymoon at a nice hotel in Santa Monica. Like most newlyweds, we spent most of the time fucking our brains out. We weren't very good at it, but it felt good so we kept doing it. By the time Rob returned to Point Mugu, I had honeymoon cystitis and needed a trip to the doctor's office for a short course of antibiotics.

My Aunt welcomed me home with some enthusiasm, probably believing that I would depart sooner rather than later to be a Navy wife. What she didn't understand was that, with Rob deployed, I had few options as far as living arrangements were concerned. Affordable housing was nearly non-existent and Rob was not senior enough to qualify for housing on base. When I informed her that I would be forced to remain in her house until I could make other arrangements, she was clearly disappointed.

Five days later, Rob's unit left for the Middle East. We had two more nights together in a decent motel near Point Mugu, once again fucking ourselves senseless. After giving him a final hug and kiss at the naval base, I waved goodbye and returned to my Aunt's house with Rob's almost new Camaro. At least now I had my own transportation so I could begin looking for a job with more potential than sacking groceries.

Within a day, I had a job in the cosmetics department of an upscale department store in our local mall. Although I used little makeup, they liked having attractive women work behind their counters. My looks were just about all I had going for me, but they were enough for that job. It didn't pay much, but it served as a place holder until I could find something better.

A week after Rob's unit arrived in the Middle East, his helicopter crashed on a routine mission. Two men made it out injured but alive. Three did not. Rob was one of the fatalities.

Two days later his body was delivered to the military morgue at Dover Air Force Base. A week after that, at the Los Angeles National Cemetery, I sat crying as a ceremonial guard fired its salute, Taps was played, and a folded flag was placed into my hands. My aunt was by my side, uncharacteristically crying along with me. After the ceremony, we returned to her house where she held me in her arms while I sobbed uncontrollably. Her attitude toward me was different from that day forward. When I calmed a little, she told me that I was welcome in her home for as long as I wished to stay.

Two weeks later, I found out I was pregnant.

****

Being a pregnant nineteen-year-old widow got my attention in a big way. Although my aunt's attitude toward me had changed dramatically, I had no intention of raising a child in her house. The only way to get a place of my own was to find work that payed a lot more than the minimum wage I was earning at the mall, so I began pouring over the help-wanted columns. Unfortunately I had few skills other than some working knowledge of the desktop computers and business software that were in use at the time.

I did have money, so I wasn't destitute. There were some military death benefits and Rob had the good sense to take out a group life insurance policy that was offered to everyone in uniform. It seemed like a fortune to me, but I knew it wouldn't last forever. I needed to protect as much of that money as possible to act as the principle for investment in my baby's future.

In Sunday's paper, an ad caught my eye.

'Help desperately needed. Computer skills a must. Will train for everything else.' A phone number was provided. I called first thing Monday morning and a young woman answered.

"If you're calling about the job," she said in a hurried voice. "Here's the address. Get here before lunchtime if you're serious."

"What does the job...?" I started to ask but she broke the connection just as I finished jotting down an address in Canoga Park. That seemed promising. Canoga Park is in the San Fernando Valley only a few miles from Calabasas. Grabbing my purse, I headed out the door.

Traffic was heavy so it took me more than thirty minutes to arrive at a small, seedy looking commercial building in a neighborhood of seedy looking commercial buildings. Nothing about it looked like a prosperous business. I sat for a moment, debating whether I should turn around and go home. I couldn't imagine what kind of work might await me. Maybe telemarketing, and I wasn't about to do that unless the money was phenomenal. I thought that unlikely, but finally decided to check it out just to be sure. I could always walk away.

There was nothing on the door to tell me what kind of business was inside, just a small sign that invited me to 'Come In.' So I did, finding myself in a large, messy office space with a desk and a bunch of filing cabinets. An extremely pretty blonde sitting behind the desk jumped to her feet.

"If you're here about the job, you're hired. Now I can get back to work. This is a desk, this is a computer, and this is a phone," she informed me with a grin as she pointed to each item. "Over there is a bathroom and over here is a waiting area for visitors. I'll tell Sly you're here, but from the looks of you, you'll be working out back within a week," she added as she jerked her thumb toward the back of the building and then departed through a door into a hallway that headed in that direction.

A little stunned, I moved around the desk, set my purse aside and took possession of the chair. A computer screen was frozen in the middle of a game of solitaire.

"Must be really demanding work," I said aloud just as the same door opened and a scruffy looking middle-aged guy stepped into the office.

"Are you the new girl?" he asked with a frown. As I got to my feet he looked me up and down. Suddenly I was glad I hadn't worn the miniskirt I had originally considered.

"Maybe," I replied.

"Goddammit!" He exclaimed. "I told Janna I wanted an ugly one. Fuckin' women. They never listen."

Raising both hands in the air, I backed away from him to the other side of the desk and grabbed my purse.

"Obviously, I've made a mistake," I told him and turned toward the door.

"Wait. Don't go. My apologies. It's just that getting steady help here in the office is nearly impossible. Good looking women like you quickly realize there's a lot more money to be made out back so turnover is high. I've had to threaten the girls to take their turn in the office when they're on the rag and can't work or not on that day's production schedule. They do nothing but bitch about it. I've damned near got a mutiny on my hands all the time. A fat, ugly secretary would solve all my problems."

I was appalled by his coarseness. Whatever they did in that place was of no interest to me. I reached for the knob and yanked the door open.

"Wait! Please!" he exclaimed. "I'll pay twice the minimum wage. Unless you'd like to work out back. With your looks, you'll be a star before the week is out," he added with a leer.

Twice the minimum wage got my attention.

"Just exactly what do you do here and what would be my duties?" I asked, glaring at him as he burst out laughing.

"Didn't Janna tell you anything?" he asked, now bent almost double as he tried to catch his breath.

"No."

"This is a pornographic film studio in the San Fernando Valley, the porn capital of the world. We make videos in the back of the building where we have a half dozen movie sets," he answered with a wide grin. "About seventy-five percent of all porno flicks are made within ten or fifteen miles of where you're standing. This is a multi-billion dollar industry and you are right in the thick of it. I need someone to run this office for me while I worry about other stuff; someone I can depend on who isn't bitching the whole time she's here. If you want the job, it's yours and you can start today."

I was speechless. A porn studio? Nothing like that had ever occurred to me. Although I had heard of them, I had never seen a pornographic movie. I hesitated.

"Well?" he asked, clearly growing impatient.

"I'll take it for a week. If I don't like it by quitting time on Friday, you'll never see me again."

He stared at me for a long moment and then nodded his head.

"Fair enough. What's your name?"

"Linda Michaels," I replied.

"You can call me Sly. Now get to work," he ordered as he headed back through the door into the hallway.

I sat back down at the desk, cleared the game off the screen, and began to examine programs and files. The computer had good quality business software but file contents were largely a mess. I knew in an instant that it would be a long week. I also knew I would never be a performer on one of the movie sets so I vowed that, if I decided to stay, I would learn everything there was to know about the job and make myself indispensable to the boss.

A pizza delivery service showed up at noon and dropped off ten pizzas. Sly came into the office accompanied by a really good looking guy who grabbed nine of them and took them back out to the studios. Sitting on the corner of my desk, he opened the remaining box.

"Dig in," he ordered and then handed me a key. "This will open the office. There will be times when you'll get here before the rest of us."

When I got home at the end of the day, I told my aunt that I had found a good paying job as a secretary at an import-export firm. It wasn't exactly a lie; I was pretty sure that some of the porn found its way overseas.

"That's wonderful dear," she responded with a smile.

****

I was able to work out a deal with the department store. I would work for Sly from eight to four and then take an evening shift at the store from six to nine. Saturdays, I would work a full shift at the store. The days would be long, but I would be making a lot more money and the extra hours would help keep my mind off the loss of Rob. Sundays belonged to me and I hated them. I had too little to keep me busy and too much time to think.

On Tuesday, I needed to ask Sly an administrative question so I ventured through the door that led back to the rest of the building. There was a short hallway with a door at the far end, probably the entrance to the studio area. There was a restroom to the right and another door farther down that was shut. Sly's office was to the left. It was very spacious but looked like the Santa Anna winds had just blown through. He looked up, apparently pleased to see me standing in his doorway.

"Want a tour?" he asked with a grin.

"I...I guess so," I stammered, wondering what I was going to encounter in the back of the building.

What I encountered blew my mind. I wasn't very experienced where sex was concerned. I had learned to masturbate when I was fifteen, but Rob was my first, and only, sex partner. Basically I was pretty naïve about sex and completely unprepared for what I saw.

When we stopped at the first movie set, a very pretty ash blonde was kneeling on a bed with her ass in the air and her hands clawing at the sheets while a good looking guy with several tattoos was doing her doggy style. There were lights, cameras, and microphones all over the place. Two or three other people were in the room, operating equipment and giving hand directions to the actors. No one seemed to notice our presence.

"Cool, huh?" Sly remarked. I was speechless, blushing immediately.

The second set was being rearranged for the next video shoot. A gorgeous brunette and a nice looking guy, both wearing short robes, chatted away amiably while preparations for their performance were underway. Both smiled at me and gave a little wave.

The third set featured another beautiful brunette who was giving a blowjob to a guy with a very large cock. She couldn't get much more than the head in her mouth. I had given Rob a few blow jobs and, after watching this woman work for a few seconds, I was grateful that he had been normally endowed.

"Whaddaya think?" Sly asked.

"I...I don't know what to say," I stammered. Sly just laughed.

The fourth set really knocked me for a loop. A stunning blonde was blowing a guy reclining on a bed while another guy was hammering himself into her from behind. As I watched, she took the guy's cock out of her mouth, turned her face toward us, and let out a loud moan in response to what was happening to her. Janna was obviously back at work.