Please vote for my entry into the 2017 Nude Day contest.
When I started reading on Lit, this was the contest that held the most interest for me. Its stories from the many authors capture my imagination. I guess that you could say it was the reason that I found Lit to be my favorite erotic story site on the Internet!
So if any of the other authors are reading this, I want to thank you!
Most of all, thank you readers for your continued interest in my works! I hope you enjoy this one-shot!
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"I've called you all in here because I wanted you to know..." Pierson took a deep breath. "We have problems. The big guys and the town are beating us out of business."
Negative shouts rang out throughout the room. Six delivery people and seven cooks and clerks were present. He hadn't hired anyone new in three years since there were no jobs to be had anywhere else. His youngest employee was 19, his oldest 40, and everyone knew each other fairly well, or so he thought.
"How long do we have?" Aaron asked.
Pierson raised his arms to quiet the crowd. "The books aren't good. If things stay as bad as they are, I'll have to close in a month at most."
"I can't lose this job!" Aaron yelled out. This started a round of similar comments from the others.
One voice offered hope. "Is there anything we can do?" Mary asked.
Everyone quieted and looked at Pierson eagerly.
"Well that's part of why I called everyone in here. I need you all to come up with ideas. All the promotions I've tried haven't helped," Pierson said.
"Lower the prices," Rachael said quickly.
"We could do that but it doesn't solve anything. Unlike the big guys I can't get ingredients so cheaply that I can make a profit with lower prices."
"Advertising?" Aaron asked.
"I already do on all the local radio stations and newspaper. TV's too expensive and the stations are 75 miles away. The return on investment is far too low."
"How about offering things like wings or poppers?" Miguel asked.
Pierson nodded his head. "That's good, but it'll take too long to get going. If we can pull out of this I'm going to keep that one in mind."
Miguel smiled broadly and a few patted him on the back.
Unfortunately that seemed to signal the end of the ideas. "Come on people. We need something real and fast, for all our sakes."
Pierson watched his crew and waited for anything at all! He wasn't telling them the truth. If they didn't turn it around in a week he'd be going out of business in two. He was desperate, but didn't want them to panic and abandon ship right away. That's why he lied about the month; dirty but necessary.
But as the murmurs went on and nothing else came forth, Pierson started to become more and more depressed and anxious. He started his pizza place with lofty ideals, but soon realized his home town was probably the worst place to do it. Three thousand people in town with two large chain pizza restaurants gave too much competition for a small specialty pizza company.
Pierson's shoulders slowly drooped. He knew that it was a long shot to involve the whole staff in this, but he had to try something. With a sigh he started saying, "Well if any of you can think of something soon..."
"Nude deliveries," a quiet voice said. All eyes turned to the source, Jenna.
People were mostly upset by the suggestion, but Pierson was desperate enough to be interested. "Quiet down, quiet down," he said waiving his hands in the air. "What was that?"
All eyes were on her, the shy delivery girl who just suggested the outrageous. Her eyes darted around while her head remained still and she shrunk from the attention.
"Go ahead, dear. Please explain your suggestion," Pierson said. All eyes turned to him this time.
"Are you crazy?" Aaron asked Pierson.
"Crazy enough to explore anything before the ship sinks, yes. Please Jenna..."
Jenna felt a little more confident with all eyes off of her. "We deliver the pizza in the buff." All eyes shot back to her and she cowered away more.
Pierson's mind was on overdrive, wondering if he could make it work... if he could get the delivery people to give it a try...
"Why would you ever suggest that?" Mary asked Jenna. Jenna mumbled something. "What?"
"Nude Day's in three days," she said quietly. Most in the room didn't hear, but those closest did.
"What's Nude Day?" Rachel asked.
Jenna looked like she was going to implode from all the attention. The cat didn't have her tongue; it more looked like she swallowed it herself.
"It's a day to celebrate being naked," Peter said looking at his phone. "Naked in public."
Jenna looked up at Peter and smiled into his eyes.
The din in the room was high, making it difficult to even think. But Pierson stood there staring at a random point in the room with his mind working faster than ever. Could he possibly make this happen?
"I'm going to ask a ridiculous question here," Pierson said hushing the room and turning all heads toward him. "Who'd do it?"
"You're crazy!" Aaron said and Rachel agreed.
"Yes. Yes I am. I'm crazy enough to do anything to keep this place open. Since the factory closed there aren't many jobs in town or opportunities. If I close the doors I'll have to move out of town like everyone else seems to be doing. How many of you have had the same thoughts?"
Everyone looked around at each other and started nodding.
"So who'd do it?"
No one was forthcoming, although everyone fell silent. Moments passed and Pierson started to realize it was a stupid idea.
Jenna slowly raised her hand; her eyes closed and face cast down.
Rachel gasped. All eyes turned to her and then followed her gaze to Jenna.
"Y-you'd be willing Jenna?" Pierson asked.
Jenna nodded.
"Why?"
Jenna took her time to answer, but no one in the room moved a muscle or breathed a molecule until she did. "I participate every year. I-I go to the city."
More gasps could be heard throughout the room. Little, shy Jenna was a closet exhibitionist... Everyone was dumbstruck, unable to speak.
Until one did. "Hell, if she's in..." Aaron said drawing all eyes to him. "What? There's no way I'm letting her be the only one brave enough to do this crazy thing!"
Mary and Rachel were in awe of the former local high school football star and stared at him dreamy eyed.
"Ok, that's two. Anyone else? Kitchen staff has to be excluded for obvious reasons, sorry people," Pierson said looking at that group.
"What about the clerks?" Mary asked.
"And what about the police?" Rachel asked.
More noise broke out hearing this and Pearson had to quiet the room again. "The bigger question is how do we get the word out?" Jenna slowly raised her hand again. "Go ahead, Jenna."
"I'll make a flyer. I c-can get it done in an hour or so," she said.
"Good! As for the law..."
"I'm calling my dad right now," Aaron said standing and walking out of the room. His dad was the sheriff.
"Right. Well if that gives us a big fat no, all this is moot," Pierson said.
"Moot? What's that?" Rachel asked.
Pierson smiled. "It means pointless. Are you in if it pans out?"
Rachel looked at Mary, two peas in a pod if there ever were. They both nodded at each other slightly. "Only if Mary can do it too..."
Pierson sighed. "As long as she doesn't go into the kitchen and some other things line up... Hell, why not?!"
Mary and Rachel smiled. Miguel fell off his chair.
"You all right?" Pierson asked.
He was a little embarrassed with all eyes on him. "Yes sir! I just... I..." he said looking away with the biggest red-faced grin.
"Ok, so that's two delivery girls and Aaron, with Mary in the store maybe. Anyone else?" Pierson asked.
Peter, who was another delivery person, looked at Jenna again and volunteered.
"If we pull this off you might have the biggest tips you've ever seen!" Pierson said hoping that would be the most encouraging thing he could say. But no one else, even with the promise of more money, came forward.
"Well if you change your minds, let me know. We'll need to hand out Jenna's handy work today to drum up buzz. I hope the copy place can make enough in short demand."
Jenna nodded and walked out. There was a lot of conversation in her absence and Aaron's. How to pull it off, what to do to guard against children being involved... it was so crazy to think that everyone was into the idea whether they planned to be nude or not!
Jenna was back a few minutes after she left with her laptop. She was very busy working on the flyer, completely drowning out everything else.
Twenty minutes later Aaron came back. When he walked into the room all eyes turned to him and the silence became deafening. He was zombie walking, staring at his phone and stood a few feet inside the door.
"Well?" Pierson asked.
"I can't believe it, but Dad's getting permits for us..."
"Permits?" Pierson asked.
"Yeah. The city has an event every year... who knew? When the factory was on the verge of closing, the town council toyed with the idea of doing it here to keep the factory owners interested in staying. They were gonna do anything to keep it here and passed a law for Nude Day..."
"You're shitting me?" Rachel asked.
"I wish I was. I thought there'd be no way this crazy idea would happen. Now I hafta do it..." Aaron said dejectedly.
"Well then..." Pierson said. Even he didn't believe it would happen. He was just hoping that the staff's creative juices would be boiling enough to come up with something else if not...
Several minutes passed.
"Oh. He said that prostitution laws are still there," Aaron added.
"Right. So no sex while on the job people!" Pierson said.