Impact 26: of the Vvife

For those who pay attention to such things: When Sarah is alone the story is in the past tense. When Claire and Sarah are together the story is in present tense.

Thanks to HaltWhoGoesThere for copy editing.

Impact of The VVife

"You in or out?"

Kip had pitched his voice as deep as he could go and spoke right next to my ear. And even though I was waiting on him, I had been wool-gathering. He had caught me totally unawares. His voice in my ear startled me enough to make me jump straight in the air and squeak loudly like a cartoon Sarah Beth.

I had been standing in our doorway, facing in, staring thoughtlessly past the hunched figures of Keith and Ben, their faces illuminated by their monitors. Nominally, I had been looking at what was left of our to-do list charted out on the whiteboard and our gouache studies pinned to the wall next to them... but actually I had been looking right through our lists and sketches.

Not a thought in my head.

Kip had caught me unawares, literally.

My cartoon squeal of very real fear startled both Ben and Keith, who both turned in alarm to see what all the commotion was. Until then they hadn't noticed I'd come back from the bathroom.

"Kippen!" I chirped. I tried to swat at him but he just wrapped me from behind in a bear hug.

"What's good, Nerds?" he called over my shoulder, while I struggled uselessly. Keith and Ben both mumbled greetings as they turned back to their monitors, returning to whatever tasks engrossed them. They were both as dead-eyed as I felt.

"You scared me," I whined as I went limp and Kip softened his hold on me.

"Just now, or with the Bobs?"

The image of the three naked men, Kip smiling and turning to wag his dripping erection, flashed in my mind's eye. I drew my chin into my neck as far as I could and waved my fingers in front of my face, trying to dispel the image.

"Yes," I sighed.

"Somethings can't be unseen..." he agreed with obvious pride. Switching gears, he asked, "You hungry? I'm FAMISHED - you boys want anything? I'm just taking her to the eighth-floor cafe...."

Ben raised his hands off his keyboard and pushed the question away. Keith just shook his head, no.

"Wow, you guys are really in it," Kip observed absently as he threaded his arm through the crook of my elbow and led me away.

"Yeah we are," I agree. "We bit off way more than we can chew, and it's all but caught in our throats, and now editorial is trying jam its fingers down our throats, tying to-"

"Stop! Oh my God! Seriously, I get it - do not torture that metaphor one

instant

longer!"

I hugged his arm to my side in a burst of affection unattached to any one thing. I felt like I should tell Kip how much I loved him.

"You big stupid," is what I said instead, putting all my love into the tease.

"Dummy," he teased back, his voice full of warmth and affection, squeezing my arm against his body.

"So I

really

like Claire," he announced seriously. "HUGE hit with the Bobs as well... you too, of course! Both of you were."

"Good save,

Kippen!"

I shot back, giving his name as much ironic disdain as I could. "For a moment there I was feeling a little like chopped liver."

"Have you been to Barney Greengrass, up on Amsterdam and Eighteee... something?

Great

chopped liver," he enthused. "Honestly, Sarah, the best in the city."

"Not my thing?" I reminded him.

On and on like that. I had seen Kip naked and fucking, he had seen me topless, coked up, and heard me have bathroom sex, but nothing had changed.

We were good.

"Perhaps coke isn't your drug?"

"What do you mean?" I asked, dabbing at my tears.

"This is a lot of angst, even for you."

I had broken down and told Kip about what a terrible week I was having. I didn't have the courage to tell him about the job interview but I spilled about Stephanie, well, not EVERYTHING about Stephanie, but about how she had been haunting me.

"Working at Pentagram sounds like it was super stressful but good, and I don't get why you're beating yourself up over an old roommate. Was she a crush?"

OK, so I hadn't told Kip

everything,

there was a lot I left out - like all the sex stuff. I just told him Stephenie had been really mean, but also the closest thing I had to a friend that summer.

"She wasn't a crush. She hated me!"

"We can be attracted to people who hate us," he replied matter-of-factly.

"She tortured me..."

I was leaning forward, whispering, trying my best to hide my tears from the rest of the room.

"Sarah," he sighed, and then in a conspiratorial tone he explained, "Drug highs are like climbing a roller coaster..."

Kip had made his voice overly serious, like a TV announcer, and was moving his hand, palm down across the table, but then, letting it climb steeply away from the surface, he made like his palm was scaling a bell curve.

"...the highs are super fun, but they gobble up dopamine or endorphins or... whatever."

"Science," I sniffed.

"Just so," he agreed. "Anyway, those artificial highs are inevitably followed by a crash," he said, swooping his hand down past the table's edge as if it were going to crash to the floor. "You are crashing. You were already fragile, this is a stressful week,

obviously,

and let's face it, kiddo, you tilt a

little

dark."

"I don't tilt dark!" I said gesturing at myself with a tear-soaked tissue.

"Sarah..." he said patiently.

"A little," I conceded, pouting and thinking about the cruel way my mind works at times. "But just a tilt!"

"Just a tilt," Kip agreed.

After lunch, I slipped into the women's room at the south end of the bullpen. It was always empty. I checked my eyes, they weren't bad. I'd wept, but I hadn't cried-cried. I was flush and my cheeks were rosy. I couldn't go back to work like this. I stared at myself for a long time, knowing what I was going to do, but trying to deny myself. I failed.

I slipped into the last stall and unzipped my skirt. Hanging it on the back of the door, I pushed my panties down to my knees and examined the stretched crotch. The silky gusset was soaked, smeared, and glossy with cum. Talking about Stephanie - even in abstraction - had upset me, but it had also worked me up.

I thought of Claire keeping a stash of fresh panties at work. I might need to take a page from her book.

I didn't want to think about Stephanie, so I pictured Claire instead. She was dressed the way she had been the other night, in her tight jeans and ratty t-shirt. But that night she had been all warmth and comfort, maternal and loving. I wanted to imagine her in a very different mood.

I pictured her unsmiling and haughty, the way she had made herself for me the morning she dressed me in office s/m drag. I imagined her scolding and berating me and finally lunging at me. Me in my little nightie, spinning around to avoid her, trying to get away but getting caught by the hair, Claire jerking me back and down.

I was standing in the stall, bare-assed, legs shaking, one hand against the stainless steel door for support, my other hand working between my legs, fingers making wet smearing sounds. My back was arched and my hips rolled back, making my ass stick out.

Wanton.

I imagined Claire throwing me to the floor, fighting her off as hard as I could but in my imagination, she was too fast and strong, easily pinning me.

That image was enough. The orgasm prematurely swamped my fantasy, ending it.

But it was Stephanie's mouth I saw poised over mine as I came, saliva hanging from her lips. God almighty, how many times had I cum to that image over the years?

I was left weak kneed and panting and disgusted with myself.

'Fuck, why?' I wondered, remembering Kip's hand swooshing down off the table. My post-orgasm thoughts crashed into darkness.

I had been dizzy after Stephanie pinned me. The cloying sweet licorice taste of her spit filled my mouth. It's hard for me to think about that mix of shock and humiliation, without recalling all the other feelings that went along with it. At that moment on the floor, it was all too much. I remember feeling frozen by it, unable to think, too afraid of my own thoughts.

Stephanie, meanwhile, had just left me on the floor, discarded, like her shirt and jeans which she had stripped off and dropped carelessly on her way to the bathroom as she walked away from me. One more discarded thing. I might have stayed that way all night, catatonic, but she had left the bathroom door ajar, and the slash of her piss in the pot roused me. She was almost done. I didn't want her to come out and find me still on the floor.

With weak arms I lifted myself off the carpet and on unsteady legs I crossed to my bedroom; not bothering to shut my door. It was hot and Stephanie had come home alone, but that wasn't why. I was simply beyond care. I stumbled into my bedroom and dropped into the shadows, landing on my bed hard enough to bounce. I didn't get under my covers or arrange myself. I lay still, wishing I could be more still, that I didn't have to move my lungs, that I could stop myself from breathing.

I was overheated and had no hope of sleeping. That particular oblivion felt

very

far away.

I had left the living room and kitchen lights on. I looked away from the glare, staring instead into the darkest of my room, seeking comfort in the inky nothingness and listening to Stephanie finish up in the bathroom. I didn't look up or even shift as her shadow crossed over me on her way to the kitchen. Her movements sounded... angry. Her bare feet pounded the floor and cabinets banged. She was mumbling to herself in German. Lights went out and she walked past my door again. I listened to her swearing under her breath. Her bedroom door was still locked and she had trouble getting it open.

Finally, I was left alone in the dark. I still didn't move. And I couldn't help listening with special interest through the thin wall separating us - my mind, as always, trying to picture her. She was moving around restlessly, probably stripping out of her underwear, or maybe putting things away, or maybe just pacing? Was she upset? Did she regret what she had done? Would she apologize?

No part of me believed she ever would.

Whatever it was that kept her moving around, she finished it. I heard her climb into bed and settle down.

Although separated by a wall, we lay just inches apart. I could still taste the Jägermeister she had been drinking. My whole body felt too full of blood. My nerves buzzed and pulsed. I was radiating a sticky heat. There was no relief in sweating. My pores felt clogged and dirty. My core was on fire. I could feel myself getting hotter rather than cooling down. My thoughts were a wine-addled confusion.

What had happened? What was going on?

I hated myself. Hated my body. Hated how soft and needy I was. Hated how much I wanted Stephanie to make some noise, some sort of sign... of what? I didn't know. I just wanted her... to do, or regret, or want, or act... I hated myself for wanting. I wanted so much. My whole body ached and vibrated with need.

My sleep clothes were still in disarray, twisted around me and binding uncomfortably. My left boob was pulled up and bound tightly by my little cami, my right boob was entirely exposed. My boy shorts were hiked over my hips, one ass cheek hanging out. The crotch was wedged like a rope in the crease of my pussy and ass.

Without really deciding to, I started pulling at my sleep clothes. I had chosen them because they were revealing. I wanted Stephanie and her boyfriend... or date... or fuck... whatever, to see me that way. I had been showing off for her and she had spit in my mouth.

She hated me.

And I knew why, my cowardice and habits of easy submission. She was right. Timid, anxious, doubting - I was pathetic and weak.

'And vain!' I thought, tugging at my sleepwear. I had wanted her to be excited, knowing I was listening. I had imagined she was conspiring with me, like Rebekah, that we were experimenting...

The thin stretchy fabric clung to me. I was filmed with sweat, radiating a moist viscid heat. Raising my hips off the mattress, I struggled to peel the little shorts down off my ass. I had soaked the crotch through. I had been so scared when Stephanie attacked me I thought I might piss myself, but this wasn't pee. Silvery threads of thin mucus trailed and smeared the insides of my thighs as I squirmed and rolled the damp little trunks down my legs. They were twisted and unrecognizable by the time I kicked them off, sending them arching into the darkness. Holding my knees apart, I dropped back down to the bed and bounced off the mattress again. In one smooth movement, I sat up. Twisting to get my top off as fast as I could. I felt my breasts swing and bounce as I fought to free my hair. I threw the damp top into the unknown to join my shorts.

All of these movements were immoderate and forceful enough to make the little bed's frame creak and knock against the wall. I was drunk and angry and carelessly telegraphing my every move, my need.

Keeping my legs apart I stretched back out. I ran my hands over the fronts of my thighs, the bowl of my belly, and the cage of my ribs, until I was cupping the undersides of my breasts. They felt big and firm, more than filling my hands. My palms slid easily over my sweat-slicked skin. I was so sweaty my hands were pushing the moisture into drops that trickled down my sides. It felt good to touch my breast. I was proud of them. I knew they were beautiful, that other women coveted them. I wanted to believe Stephanie coveted them, that she wished she had big boobs like me. I was fingering my nipples, they were swollen and ached in a way that felt wonderful.

I didn't want to feel wonderful. I wanted to feel the opposite of wonderful.

"HMN!" I cried as my fingers surprised me. They pinched the fragile skin as hard as they could. I wasn't thinking clearly. I wasn't thinking at all. I was all wretched feelings, loathing, shame, and anger. My hands and fingers were moving and acting on their own accord. My hands were punishing me, taking everything out on my nipples.

Naked and uncovered, my door wide open, I twisted and stretched my nipples, which were stiff swollen cones.

"MMNNH!" I mewled, baring my teeth as my clamped fingertips pulled my nipples away from my breasts, stretching them until my eyes began to water and tears ran into my ears

"AH!" I finally cried, my jaw unlocking, but my hands continued to pull. I would not stop.

"AHHh-" I cried again, biting back on the sound. My hands were forcing me to be loud,

more

than loud enough to be heard.

I felt overfull, like my nerves were overtaxed with sensations, like there was too much blood in my veins, too much heat in my body, and my blood was moving too fast, pumping too hard.

Unable or unwilling to let go of my nipples, I rubbed my thighs together for relief, scissoring them in order to compress my clitoris, smearing my wet lips against each other... I couldn't help myself, couldn't stop making the little bed churn and squeak.

My nipples burned, I was really hurting myself, I was going to leave bruises, but as bad as it was, it only brought me closer. And it was

almost

enough. I could almost cum this way.

"AYHhhaa..." I wailed, my hands tormenting my breasts, twisting and pulling them as hard as I could. Nails biting into the fragile skin. I badly wanted my hands between my legs, but they refused to let go, kept pinching and stretching, tormenting me, pulling the sounds from my throat.

"ah! AH! ahH!!"

My thighs were mincing against each other in some parody of dance, like a little girl desperate to pee, but my need was

very

different.

"AHH"

Thighs slick with sweat and cum, I was bouncing the little bed, mashing and stretching my swollen clit. Pulling and scratching at my nipples like they were at fault. My ass was soaked, my pussy was dripping, desperate for touch, even as my nipples screamed from self-abuse.

My hips began to roll and hump the air uselessly. That's when I saw Stephanie silhouetted in my open door. I couldn't make out her face, only that she was watching me. I opened my thighs for her, pumped my hips at her.

"AH, PLEA-" I choked.

It was enough.

My back arched as I came.

I woke up to the sound of Stephanie in the shower. I lay in bed, remembering what had happened.

"Jesus..." I groaned aloud.

My face burned. I touched my breasts and winced. I was

too

ashamed to move. How could I ever face her after what she'd done, after what I'd done? After she had watched me do it. I was wide awake. I wanted to be asleep. I never wanted to get up.

Her shower ended.

I was still uncovered and pulled the sheet over me. The bathroom door opened and she walked into the living room, standing in front of my bedroom door, carelessly naked, pretending to dry herself with her towel; displaying herself. I kept my eyes closed to slits, pretended to be asleep, but she didn't even glance in on me.

What were we doing? What was this?

I thought of Rebekah touching my hand while we studied, stroking the fingers I'd masturbated with in her bed, all smiles and affection.

I thought of Stephanie watching me jerk and shiver, legs spread, exposing myself entirely. She had been just a silhouette in the darkness but she didn't hide. I had called out to her - after what she had done to me - I called and pleaded, and she just turned away, gone back to her room without a word. But now she was displaying herself...

She moved away and I listened to the sounds of her morning routine. She got dressed and began moving around the kitchen, making herself breakfast. It was clear she wasn't rushing to leave. If I waited for her to leave I would be late. She might not leave at all. Paula had told me to be at her loft by ten.

And I needed to pee.

I got up.

I found my cami top on the floor at the end of my bed. I left them, pulled a jersey over my head. It was Danny's. It fit me like a tent and covered my bare ass. My little sleep shorts wadded up just outside my door on the living room floor. I kicked them back into my room as I went to take my turn in the bathroom.

She had left her clothes on the floor of the living room from the night before and the bathroom was a mess as well. I didn't think anything of it, just assumed she wasn't done, that she would pick up before she left.

I peed, brushed my teeth, and washed my face. Looking at myself in the mirror, I told myself I could do this. I had faced Rebekah. Stephanie was... different, but I could do it. I had to say

something

. I had to clear the air. I spent what felt like a long time trying to convince myself of this.

When I came out of the bathroom Stephanie was still at the kitchen table, the remains of her breakfast in front of her.

I wasn't at all convinced I could face her.

She had made herself a workman's feast of eggs and potatoes and sausage. Like the bathroom, she had left the kitchen uncharacteristically messy. She usually cleaned as she cooked, but her greasy pan was still on the stove, bread, and butter were still out, crumbs on the counter, a bowl with raw egg, and shells in the sink. She was in her underwear, her body deceptively thin.

I knew exactly how strong she was.

Before I could bring myself to say anything, she looked up at me, lifted the edge of her plate, and dropped it with a bang.

I flinched.

She didn't flinch. She just looked at me with dead-eyed contempt.

"Loser cleans for the winner," she told me, pushing away from the table.