The Look in Her Eyes
Don Julian Winslow
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"In the end, we are all voyeurs."
-- Hollis Compton in "Does it Really Matter?"
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Ten curious faces turned as one to watch the new girl enter room 303. They were all at their places, their easels forming a loose circle around an empty chair atop a small platform. They had been talking casually; just waiting for class to begin. Their conversations stopped when the door opened to admit the newcomer; an intruder into their little group; for Madeline it was an awkward moment. She was instantly relieved to find none of the students were in any of her classes. She had worried about that on the nervous ride over. Now, from somewhere in the back of the room, Professor Kenner bounded up to take her hand and welcome her to Drawing 201. He introduced her to the class as "Maddie Kosco" who had kindly consented to be one of our new models for this term.
The thin girl with the straight dark hair, gave a tentative smile and friendly nod. Several of the students, both girls and boys, smiled back. Professor Kenner, white haired and gracious, was in a hurry. He asked if she were ready to begin, and ushered her to the alcove in the far corner of the room. Like a changing booth in a dress store, it was tiny with just a low stool; on the wall a mirror, and a single hook holding a long white robe. Behind the curtain, Madeline quickly stripped, undoing her khaki shorts and shoving them down her long straight legs. Her t-shirt followed, ignoring the mirror which followed the progress of the slender small-breasted girl in her underwear.
She reached up in back to undo the bra and brushed it from her shoulders with a brisk business-like gesture. Then hooking her thumbs in her panties, she bent forward to ride them down to her ankles before stepping free of the fallen underpants.
On the stool, she quickly tugged off sneakers and socks, all the while aware of that tinging rise of the nervousness that she felt as she sat on the bus heading for her new job in the Fine Arts College. And it was a job, she reminded herself, good pay or only a few hours a week, and all she had to do was take her clothes off and sit there while these budding young artists practiced drawing. It was just plain silly to be nervous, she told herself.
She stood up and paused to take one final look in the mirror, critically examining the nude woman staring back at her. A pretty girl (she had been told that many times in growing up), with straight hair that she wore shoulder-length. Lanky shoulders and straight narrow limbs. "All arms and legs" her mother used to say with a smile, as the coltish girl was sent off to school. Later, she decided her legs were her best feature, tall and smooth and tapering with slight feminine contours.