W.F. Stuart Teaching College is in the foothills, overlooked by the elite suburbs. It's the closest that ordinary folk can get to high living. Above the college are winding leafy roads with mansion after estate after villa. Deckings stilted above slopes, infinity pools cut into rock. Below the college was suburbia; rows of mostly untidy little boxes with simple grassed yards and low, meshed fences.
All of the students at Stuart were from Below. Above wouldn't deign to aspire to a career as a school teacher. It was beneath them, just as our school and our lives were.
In all honesty I hadn't aspired to be a school teacher either. A psychometric test recommended me to it. I fought the idea. I applied to art school, music school and even nursing. Teaching was my fallback's fallback. And yet here I was.
I'm not dumb, let's get that straight. I'm nervous. Tests terrify me. Presentations terrify me. I can't play piano at a concert. My paint brush shakes when people watch and judge me. The nursing practical I took was laughable. I literally killed the dummy. When I tipped the table over the head came off. But for some reason when I take control of a group of junior primary group kids, my anxiety melts away. I connect, and they adore me. Damn you, psychometric test!
My name is Wendy Wu. My dad is Chinese, but you wouldn't easily know it to look at me. Mom had stronger genes. The only obviously Asian part of me is my body. I'm 'petite'. My body is tight. I don't really need a bra, my breasts stand fine by themselves, though I use one to stop my nipples from showing out. My rear and thighs don't sag like my friends, but I'm not as tall as them. And they don't stumble like I do socially.
I had boyfriends over the years, I wasn't incapable. When they left it was never acrimonious, they simply drifted away. My friend Marge described it one day to me in Starbucks - I was good looking enough to attract the best guys, but too shy and introverted to keep them.
"And by that I mean sexually," she clarified. The memory of it makes me sigh. I never thought about sex. I didn't hate it; I had simply been indifferent to it. I didn't think of guys when I bought clothes. I didn't think of them when I dressed to go out. I didn't pick up the signals when I was being hit on. I didn't have sexual fantasies.
Don't get me wrong, I was not disgusted or put off by sexual people, I just didn't understand them.
"How did you ever lose your virginity?" a boyfriend snapped at me once. We were at his apartment, late, on the living room floor. It was mostly dark and he had pulled my jeans and panties down, poking his erection at me from behind. I wasn't stopping him, but I wasn't exactly helping either. I was watching TV. I get enthralled by some of the new series these days. The quality of the online streaming channels, it's amazing. It's like a whole movie was made for just one episode. GoT, Sherlock, Russian Doll, there are so many of them. I could watch them all night, completely absorbed... instead of paying the required amount of attention to the penis trying to force into my vagina from behind, for example.
One of my boyfriends tried to get me to come with him to a nude beach. That's just funny, right? I don't even wear bikinis. Guys get sick of it. They move on to more interesting girls.
"But your body is stunning," he would say in the shower, the only time and place I got nude with the lights on. "Guys would go nuts over you."
I looked at him like he was insane. Why on earth would either of us want that?
Shy. Good looking. Body to die for. Asexual. Poor. Career destined to remain so. I don't feel messed up, though. Each day I live my simple life happily.
———————
"We need money," my classmate Shirley said at lunch in the College cafeteria one day.
"What's new?" I shrugged.
"I can't even fix my car."
"You took the bus?" I raised my eyebrows. Shirley never took the bus.
"Of course not. Davy came to pick me up."
"You are cruel."
"He loves it."
"You broke it off. The poor guy is still in love. You need to let him move on."
"I tell you, he doesn't mind. A round trip and he gets a blow job. It's fair."
She was kidding of course.
"It's cruel. Let him go."
"You gonna pay to get my car fixed?"
"We need money," I agreed.
————————
Shirley came up with a plan. The employment office was there to help graduates find work, but occasionally had part-time roles. There was an ad for tutoring math after class for a middle-school kid.
"Where?" I asked, thinking it couldn't pay well.
"Up the hill."
"Up? Above? You're kidding. They advertised here?"
Shirley nodded. "Yep."
"How much?"
"50 an hour. 90 minutes. 75 each time."
"Holy shit!"
"I know, right?"
"How many people going for it?"
"They'll only interview three. You can put your name down, too," Shirley said generously.
I frowned.
"No, you do it," I said, not wanting to compete.
"Hey, if you go in we're a two-thirds chance of landing it."
There was some logic to that plan, but I was hesitant to go up the hill. It made me nervous. I didn't fit in up there.
"Middle school kid? That's not for me. If one comes up for elementary, I'll look at it."
"Pfft. No parent tutors elementary kids. Don't be ridiculous."
I knew that. It's why I said it.
"You go for it. Get it."
"I will."
"But how you gonna get there til you have enough money to fix your car?" I asked genuinely.
Shirley smiled. Oh no, I thought. Poor Davy.
———————-
I saw Shirley changing her clothes before going Above for her interview.
"You can't wear that!" I said, shocked.
"Hey, there are three of us going for it, I'm the last. Wilkins in the employment office reckons they like Mary Fluffy-Clothes. The one that looks like a hamster. Said there's no real point to go. So, I have one shot at it. Need to be different. Set myself apart."
"The kid's mother won't let you in the door."
"I'm banking on just the dad being home. According to Wilkins he has been for the others."
"Geez, Shirley, don't you think it's too much?"
Shirley is taller than me. Light brown wavy hair, flicks of blond highlights. Big bright smile. Great natural tits. Long shapely legs. All packaged in a flared yellow floral minidress and white-rimmed sunglasses.
"At least pull the front together, I can see your nipples. You'll get arrested teaching a minor with that much tit out."
"I'm not teaching today. It's just the interview."
"Tell me you left your panties on at least?"
Shirley looked mischievous.
"Freshly shaved," she grinned, cheekily flicking her front up.
"They'll call the police!"
"Well, then Davy won't have to give me a ride home, will he."
—————
The next time Shirley and I had lunch she told me she got the job.
"What? Why didn't you say something before now? I thought you must have blown it. Why didn't you tell me?"
Shirley twirled her vegetable pasta.
"This stuff is such crap."
"Shirley. Tell me how it went!"
Shirley looked up.
"It was all a bit weird."
"How...weird?"
"I think I'm in love."
That wasn't what I expected. I couldn't help it, I burst out laughing.
"Shut up you bitch!"
"With the dad??"