I went to the bedroom and opened up the package under the bed. Inside, neatly folded was a red silky wrap dress with a pair of matching slides on top. In its way it was quite stylish but it represented something considerably more exciting to me. When the box arrived a few days ago, a wide tape, diagonally like a sash emblazoned with the Air St. Colette logo I couldn't wait to unwrap it. This was my travelling outfit. I pictured myself in the departure lounge at Charles De Gaulle, me and all the other women preparing to board the flight, all wrapped in red. It would be the last item of clothing I would wear for at least three months, and who knows, maybe much longer than that.
I put the package away. Better to leave it until I board my flight from Paris. I had a bit of time until then. Not much but it gave me a thrill when I estimated that by this time tomorrow, I would be in the air, well on the way to Les Trois Soeurs. In the meantime I would be catching the 7pm train from St. Pancras to Paris from where I would be chauffeured to the Hilton at Charles De Gaulle airport. From there I would catch the early morning flight to St. Colette. Roni had organised all of this from a café table by the main surfing beach on St. Jeanne. I made my way slowly through the apartment with purpose, was there anything I needed to bring, was there anything I wanted to have kept safe for me. It would not be unlike me to forget something. I caught myself in the bedroom, the full length mirror framed my nude figure. I tied my hair up, Les Soeurs style. Was I ready to display all of this to the world, or at least that part of the world that resided on Les Trois Soeurs. Was I up to scratch? I was happy to admit to myself that I was.
I was never comfortable with compliments but, despite my possibly passive nature, I didn't lack for self-esteem. I was good-looking, I had no problem admitting this, if only to myself. If anything, my looks perhaps held me back a little and I tended to downplay them. My light dusting of freckles gave me a youthful appearance that sometimes hindered my professional development. It's hard to be taken seriously in a male-dominated industry, doubly so if you are frequently assumed to be some air-headed naif. I imagined that shouldn't be a problem at Jeann-Tech where everyone seemed to be very pretty and to a woman appeared years younger than they were. I was proud of my dark blonde hair which complemented my green eyes. I had never dyed it but was looking forward to it lightening in the tropical sunshine. Though I would certainly lather on the SPF 50, 30 at a stretch, on my skin. I don't mind a little tan and expected to develop a sun kissed look but I was proud of my pale porcelain skin. It pleased me to reflect that I would not have any tan line. My breasts were small but I was proud of them. I admired girls with big breasts and certainly on occasion found them enticing, but unlike many of my small-boobed friends, never desired them for myself. My breasts with their pouting pink nipples still had that pert, fertile look of my teenage years and I didn't mind admitting, complemented my mostly slender figure. My waist was narrow, my hips wider but when I turned around I was pleased to note that my bum had a nice firm plumpness to it. I found myself smirking, maybe I had Terry to thank for that with his relentless focus on anal sex.
I looked at the small double bed I had shared with Terry. My mind conjured up a showreel of repetitive sexual encounters I had participated in with him. Varying from genuinely pleasurable trysts with a sense of personal connection and intimacy, through myriad mediocre sessions to sheer downright drudgery with an increasing emphasis on the latter half of that spectrum in recent times. I was happy to leave those memories here in this basement. I didn't feel a pang. Tonight I would sleep in a luxurious hotel bed, by myself, no probing fingers in my anus, no thick purple-veined cocks presented to my mouth spurting spurious gifts of bodily fluids. I couldn't recall the last night I had slept alone. What an enticing prospect, to stretch out my limbs and revel in the delightful solitude.
I swept through the apartment, found a few items to bring to my Aunt's and settled on what would be my last outfit for some time. It was a simple ribbed jersey dress, easy to put on and take off but comfortable and ideal for the trip to Paris. I had a pair of sneakers that had given me good wear over the years but had earned their rest. And the was basically it. All my underwear was gone so I went from naked to dressed in one swoop. I had an cheap puffa coat that would serve me for the trip to Paris and I was sure the hotel would arrange to donate it to charity for me when I checked out. I packed everything I needed to travel. Passport, Purse, toothbrush, phone, charger, some makeup. It all fitted into a small handbag. How cool was that. My work laptop I had to leave behind and the one at the apartment was technically Terry's but it didn't matter, all of the stuff that mattered to me was uploaded and accessible anywhere. And in any case, Jeann-Tech were going to sort me out with a brand new setup when I got there and even more excitingly including wearables that would mean I wouldn't even have to carry my phone and stuff around while I was on Les Soeurs.
I called to my Aunt's for lunch, left the last of my stuff there and took the tube to the West End. I had a little stroll around. I felt unburdened, like a huge weight was off my shoulders. I was carefree. I felt like a tourist visiting this great grey city. Maybe even a tourist from Les Soeurs, the odd blast of cold air here and there to my unprotected pussy reminded me I was naked under my dress. I walked past myriad clothes shops and couldn't resist a little self-satisfied smirk to myself. I wouldn't need anything from them. I sat and had a coffee, watched the city commuters rush from tube to work to lunch to work, takeaway coffees clutched to their bosoms. I had been participating in this rat race for the last few years right up until the last few days. Was I really about to escape it? When I resumed my new job on St Jeanne, it would be vastly different. Roni had found me a lovely airy loft apartment in the Old Town a short pleasant walk to Jeann-Tech's amazing looking campus on the edge of town. Sleek modern architectural pavilions, fully glazed but with large overhanging roofs for shade, were dotted around an idyllic parkland and there was a literal amphitheater by the lake for presentations and for cultural activities outside of working hours.
I did a circuit of my favourite museums and galleries, I wasn't sure how long it would be until I was back in this city I had made my home. Despite vague non-committal suggestions to Terry I was definitely not planning on returning during my three month trial period. After that, who knows. At the National Gallery, I found myself lingering at the female nudes. Somehow they were comforting. Each portrait, each girl, though different in her own way, beckoned me to somehow join her. I felt that I was being drawn to a place of beauty and art. Living art. It was a barely formed thought at the periphery of my consciousness but it gave me a background thrum of bonhomie. I could list out the logical reasons why accepting the offer to come to St. Jeanne was the right thing for me, professionally, personally and even romantically, the opportunity to pause my relationship with Terry was priceless, but it also came down to feelings and instincts. There were some things in life you can't quite pin down and explain and this was one of them. Everything about my mood and emotions anticipating this adventure, even taking into account the feeling of trepidation that lingered, told me I was on the right path.
Time was getting on and I promised I would meet up with Terry before my departure. The site he was working on was near St Pancras Station so it was convenient for us to meet there as he finished work and he could walk me to the station. I somehow didn't expect a romantic train platform send off right out of the movies but we had been through so much together and he was such an important part of my life, it wouldn't feel right if I didn't say goodbye to him before leaving. An added bonus of doing this at the train station was the limited opportunity for him to sodomise me or urinate in my mouth which I'm sure, if he had the choice, would be his preferred way to send me packing.
I waited at the corner and watched him bumble his way endearingly from the site, yellow hard hat rakishly askew on his head, hi-viz vest scruffily caught on his jacket. I smiled to myself. There was a little part of him that came out sometimes that reminded me that he must have been an adorable little boy once upon a time. I could imagine his Mom ruffling his hair as he came home from climbing a tree, loose branches still caught in his jumper. He noticed me and smiled and I have to admit, I did feel a little pang. Not enough to shift me off course, nor even to introduce the slightest doubt but enough to make me aware that there were some nice things I was leaving behind. But this was the nature of change and renewal. Sacrifices had to be made and, cute and all as I found Terry on occasion, this was the easiest one for me.
We walked along side by side to the station. I can't remember the last time we held hands. Maybe in those first heady months of our relationship when I craved him and couldn't bear to be apart from him. Those days were long gone and he had one hand on his satchel and another in his pocket. It didn't bother me though. It made everything so much easier. I might really have struggled if Terry had been more affectionate to me, if I felt that we were on the same page about our relationship. If we had dreams and plans together instead of a kind of amiable shared drudgery. Thankfully he wasn't and we didn't. I was genuinely grateful for his obliviousness and inertia. They empowered me to push past my own instinctive passiveness. This comfort zone I had resided in did not offer me comfort or much else, it merely required some effort to escape. And a prompt, represented by this amazing opportunity.
The facade of St Pancras, a great red brick and sandstone confection, hove into view. How many times had I passed this lovely building and wished myself to be whisked away to Paris or beyond. Was the Orient Express still running? I often daydreamed about stepping onto a train in dreary, rainy London and travelling all the way east and back in time, arriving on the shores of the Bosphorus, some time in the Ottoman Empire. It struck me that I had often fantasised about being sequestered in the seraglio, one of the sultans's many concubines. The environment appealed to me at some primal level and my fantasies solely revolved around this languorous atmosphere, the baths, the pampering, the massages, the company, the sights. I don't think the sultan himself ever made an appearance. In a way St Jeanne represented a kind of seraglio within the archipelago. And just as in my dreams, this seraglio had no sultan. Was this another clue about my fate? Back then as I idly mused, did I even consider that some version of this story might, after a fashion, come true? My heart pounded with this epiphany and the lightness in my heart was renewed, I strode closer with a spring in my step.
"Steady on there Jen! Some of us have been working hard all day."
Yeah, working hard stuffing your face and scrolling through pornhub in a prefab site office is what I wanted to say but I resisted the urge and allowed him catch up.
"Come on, you old geezer!"
