A New Dawning

A fictitious story loosely based on some actual events

It had been raining on and off the whole day, and the covered parking had a full sign in front. So he headed for the open roof parking, cursing the further delay which would make him late for his meeting, as well as the fact that his umbrella was at home. He found a spot open among the late evening shoppers' cars and hoped they wouldn't scratch his paintwork with the full trolleys which always seemed to have a mind of their own.

The meeting was long and did not go well—the buyer, a cocky bastard, was determined to knock down Geoff's price well beyond where he had been prepared to go. So he eventually broke things off as it was getting real late and he realized that firstly he needed to get some food into him and secondly his car would be almost the last one there—and he knew the roof security was minimal. When he got to the roof, it was raining again, and there his car stood forlornly alone right next to the only other shopping-spree survivor. He sprinted through the rain and the puddles to get to his car, and as he was about to open the door, a vision of a woman stood up on the far side next to the other car and in such a timid voice said, "Please, can you help me; I have got myself into a spot of bother here!"

Although she was drenched to the skin and bedraggled with the rain streaming down her face, he could make out her pretty features in the light of distant floodlights—and he could also see that she was crying. Now Geoff could never resist helping anyone so pretty or so obviously upset, so he walked around the car saying: "Of course! For a lovely lady like yourself—anything!"

As he came face to face with her in the shadows that lay between the cars, he was struck by a few strange things—she held her right arm strangely bent against her, and her left arm seemed to dangle by her side also a bit unnaturally. At this point the rain was pelting down making it even more difficult for him to see her clearly through his now wet glasses. "Right," he said. "What's the problem?"

"Well, I have dropped my car key—actually it's a card-type key—into the grating down here and ..." At this point she turned away from him. "And I have also lost my hand through the grating trying to get it back."

Geoff felt the words sink in, and then the realization of what she meant hit him like a four-pound hammer—God! She has an artificial hand he thought! "No problem!" he stammered trying to keep his voice even and cool sounding (It sounded like a strangled yelp to him though). He looked straight at her and said, "Because you are so calm I assume that the hand is not your real hand and I don't need to call an ambulance?"

She smiled and swung the right arm away from her body and he saw the glint of light on the end where the wrist unit now completed the arm and he could see the hole where the hand usually plugged in. Keeping his voice level, he asked her where she had actually put her hand through the grating—thinking as he said it that he must keep talking about it as her "hand", and not letting his mind even begin to probe the possibility that it was a hook.

At this point she raised her left arm to point at a spot in the grating about three feet in front of her, and it was then that Geoff's mind went momentarily into tilt mode. This beautiful if somewhat wet woman was using a hook to point with—the left arm was also a prosthesis! Struggling to keep control over his voice (and other sundry bits of his anatomy as well) he said, "I assume the one you lost is a partner of the left one?"

She gave him a wan smile and nodded her head. Geoff was thankful he could bend down and hide the excitement he was feeling as he peered into the gloom under the grating. He could see something glinting down there, but the swirling water in the drain and the darkness made it impossible to make out the detail.

He stood up and said to her, "Look, I will need more light, and you need to get out of this rain before a beautiful woman like yourself gets pneumonia, so hop into my car and I will turn it and put on the lights to help me see." She did not argue but allowed him to help her into the car as she was somewhat awkward with the right arm held so strangely in front of her. He got in next to her and started the car, then turned it so that the lights shone on her car directly next to the spot where she had lost her "hand".

At this point she spoke again: "I am so sorry to put you to all this trouble and if you decide to push off now I will understand—I am a bit much to handle at first glance being as crippled as I am, but right now I am in such a fix. You see the right arm is my better one, and I am helpless without my hook. I would be so grateful if you could get it back for me? The damn thing also costs a bomb, and I don't have a spare at home anyway!"

"Don't fret," he said, "I'll get it back, but not sure about the card though—with that amount of rain, it may have been washed into the sewers by now." She got a haunted look on her face and said she had a spare at home. Geoff got out into the rain and peered into the depths which were now quite illuminated by the reflected light. There, in the water, he could see a dull glint which must be the hook. He tried to get his hand through the squares in the grating but his hand was too big. "Hmm—this is going to be tricky!" he thought. Next he bent down and, taking a firm grasp on the edges of the grating, strained at it for a moment and then felt it giving under the powerful lift he had applied. He lifted it up on its edge, and then, trying to balance it with one hand, he wanted to reach down with the other to grab the hook. He realised there was a 50/50 chance that the grate would topple over onto either him or his car, so he called out, "Excuse me—could you come and lend a hand here for a minute?"

He heard a muffled answer coming back, "I can't open the door!" He smiled to himself and lowered the grate again, went around to her door, and opened it for her. "Sorry, I don't have that much function with the left arm, and I couldn't angle it to get to the door handle."

He could see the tears in her eyes again, she being so frustrated by her helplessness. Without thinking he took her in his arms and held her wet body close to his. "Hey! It's OK. I wasn't thinking—by the way, I'm Geoff. Who might you be?"

As he asked her this, he could feel her trying to hold him to her with the left arm, but the right arm was hard in between them. "I am Diane, and I can't shake your hand for reasons you already know!" They both laughed.

He explained that he needed her to balance the grate while he fished out her hook. He then asked her how she had lost it there in the first place, and she told him how she had dropped the card and then tried to fish it out with the hook. The hook had fitted though the grating quite easily on the diagonal and she had just gripped the card when someone hooted close to her and she had jerked upright. This caused the cable lever to catch the grating, and at the same time, the release button on the side had hit the other side of the open square, and out popped the hook. She had then tried to pull the hook out while it dangled from the cable still, but she couldn't get it through the opening. Eventually, she had tried to give a big yank and the cable had parted and that was that. "Well," he said, "first things first, let's get your hook back."

In a timid voice she asked him to also recover the cable if it wasn't still attached and the card key if he could see it. As he lifted the grating, he heard her mutter to herself "God he's strong" and again he felt the same gut reaction. She told him to lean the grate against her leg as she did not feel secure holding it with her left arm. He did so and then fished out the hook and seeing no cable, felt around and found a length of about two feet, ending in a stainless-steel ferrule and ball. But there was no card to be found. He lowered the grate again and without thinking offered her the hook. She carefully extended the left arm and he watched fascinated as the hook opened and then gently took the armless hook from him. She awkwardly tried to put it back into the amputated prosthesis but could not get the angle right.

"Please could you put it in for me? I feel incomplete without it," she asked.

"With or without it, you are a complete woman," he answered her as he slipped the hook right against her breast into its socket. He may have imagined it, but he was sure she had held it closer to her than was necessary, making him virtually stroke her breast as he fitted the hook.

She looked at him and said, "That was one of the nicest things anyone has ever said to me!" She swung the hook away from her body and with a small shrug, the forearm lowered to a horizontal position.

He blushed and felt the pressure in his groin again. "OK, now what? Can I give you a lift home to get the spare card-key?"

"Well, with the broken cable I am a bit helpless, otherwise I could phone a friend from a payphone—could you operate one for me?"

"I can do better—I have a cell phone, and if you give me the number, I will dial it for you and hold it to your ear."

They returned to the car and he sat next to her, dialled the number she gave, and then holding the phone to her ear, he clearly heard the message, "This is Anne, we are away for the week of the 5

th

, but leave a message and I will call when I get back." Today was the 6

th

.

Diane swore under her breath and asked him to dial another number, and got a similar message. "Damn!" said Diane. "It's bloody school holidays—I don't really know anyone else who is here at the moment, and my sister is also away! What am I going to do?" At this point she started crying with huge sobs wracking her body. "God, I need a cigarette!" she exclaimed and apologised for her behaviour.

He remarked that she could now move her right arm and he asked her how come she didn't before. "Well without the hook, its too light to counteract the spring in the elbow so it won't go down of its own accord!" He thought he was going to burst out of his pants as he now had confirmation that the right was also above the elbow!

"OK, let's solve the cigarette issue—how do I do this?"

"OK, in my bag you will find a packet in a case—take it out and slip the holder out that is in the little side pocket." He did this, took a cigarette out and put it in the holder, and turning to her, said, "Now what?"

"Open the right hook by pulling back on that lever and put the holder at the end of the hooks. Then rotate the wrist—it's quite stiff—so that the holder is horizontal." He did as she directed then saw the case had a lighter at the other end—he took out one of his own and then lit hers watching fascinated as she craned her neck forward to get her lips to the cigarette. Lighting his, the two of them inhaled deeply and sat there in the car like two drowned rats creating puddles on the leather seats. "What do you want me to do now?" he asked. "I am quite prepared to take you home and if necessary take you to wherever you want tomorrow, too, so that you can be fully "handy" again—but on one condition."

She looked downcast. "OK—I guess I don't have any choice in this?"

He laughed and said: "I would never coerce you to do anything you didn't want to! No, I am famished, so at some stage during this, I need to get some food into me!"

There was a fleeting look of regret and then she put on a relieved expression. "That's easy. I have some great instant meals at home if that will do?"

At this point he thought that if he touched her, there would be an explosion in his loins!!! "Fantastic," he said. "Let's get to your place!"

Geoff put on her seatbelt when he saw her look at him pleadingly while trying to get a hold on it with her left hook. She asked him to take the cigarette from her as she was "a bit clumsy in a car with it!" Following her directions, they were soon at her home in a cluster scheme and parked in her open garage. She asked him to fish out the access card from her bag and open the door for her as "I can't do that with only one working hand!"

He followed her inside, and she asked him if he wanted to dry off first, to which he replied, "Yes, got spare clothes for me?" To his joy she said she had some jeans and a top that would fit him but no socks or shoes!" Geoff looked around and saw a gas heater. "That's ok, I'll dry the socks and shoes there, and take your offer of the clothes. Now—can I shower quickly first?"

"Sure you can. I'll get dried while you are in the shower, just light me another cigarette before you do though."

He showered and marvelled at how hard he was just thinking of her—she was a really lovely woman with an incredible personality to boot as well! Shit, he suddenly thought—what if she is married!! He didn't even think to ask her! But then surely she would've phoned her hubbie. Also, there would be lots of male clothes around. Whew! He needed to relax!

As he got out of the shower, he heard her moving around in the bedroom next door. Drying off and putting the towel around him, he asked her through the door if she could pass him the jeans. Her answer made the towel jump to attention, "Please I have again got myself into a bit of a tangle, could you give me a hand?" He realised that she could not miss his erection if he stood in front of her, but, what the hell! Stepping out he found her sitting on the bed, her top halfway off, over her head and the sleeves stuck on the outstretched prosthetic arms. "It didn't slide off as it's supposed to because it's wet! God, I am so embarrassed! And this must be awful for you—helping a woman who is as helpless as a baby!"

It was a good thing she couldn't see through the blouse or Geoff would have been the embarrassed one! "Hey, let me tell you something, you are a very sexy woman and this is unfair with me having to be so close to a beautiful woman who is only wearing a bra and panties!" Carefully he helped the sleeves past the hooks and examined the harness holding the limbs on with some quick glances as he worked. She had the standard figure 8 with a lower bottom strap at the back, from which a control strap looped over the right shoulder—his guess was the elbow was controlled by this. The broken right cable was dangling loosely over the same shoulder. The whole upper body was scarred all over, and he could not resist running his fingers gently over these shoulders which had witnessed so much pain.

She instinctively recoiled from his touch and in a hoarse whisper said: "Please don't touch me there. I am too ugly and I cannot bear to have you feeling sorry for me!"

He answered, "No, I am not doing this because I feel sorry for you, but because I think you are attractive." At that point he got the top off her, and as he turned to put it on an adjacent little stool, her eyes dropped down his body to settle on the obvious erection, and then the bloody towel decided to slip off! He heard her suck in her breath and then she said, "Christ, you are big!"

He was bright red and spun around while retrieving the towel. "Look", she said, "I cannot do much more without help—if you can face it, I need you do help me a bit more?" Mumbling something about being only too willing to help, he struggled to get his member into the jeans and under control. "There is one thing you have to promise me though and it's very important! You must promise not to leave until you have fully reassembled my arm and let me test it—please?"

"Of course" I said, "I promise, but please realise that I am not made of stone so you must understand that I will have a reaction to being so near to a beautiful and attractive woman like yourself who is basically half naked!" At this, Diane blushed and turned away from him saying "Well, we all have to suffer a bit sometimes!"

Then she showed him how to take off the arms and take the old cable off the loop on the left shoulder blade of the harness. As he did this, this beautiful woman sat there, armless, using her mouth to take off the stump socks leaving a short, reasonably scarred right arm about four inches long and a very badly scarred and an extremely short left stump. He could see why the function of the left prosthesis was substantially less than the right one. He took a robe from the bathroom and put it around seeing that she was cold. "May I at least dry you off? I will be gentle and as proper as possible—I promise."

She hesitated and then said "OK".

He got a towel and carefully dried her legs and her back off and then gently dried her hair as much as he could. "Look, I think I need to remove your bra; it is soaked. I will get a dry one, and then I promise to keep my eyes closed while I dry you there and put the dry bra on." He saw a near panic look appear in her eyes. "No, not that, please!" He didn't understand and said so. Suddenly she started crying again, and his heart went out to this defenceless woman sitting in front of him, armless and vulnerable. He kneeled down and held her close to him and she responded by holding him with her little stumps and crying on his shoulder.

Finally she stopped and pushed him away a little bit with her right stump and looking him in the eye she said, "It's not only my arms and chest that are scarred. My breasts are not ones that would ever appear on Vogue's front cover!" He understood and told her it didn't matter—where were her bras? She told him quietly, almost in a resigned tone where to look. As he approached her, she said: "Now remember you made a promise no matter how you feel! Maybe you had better keep your eyes open and see the whole horrible me." He kneeled in front of her and released the front clip of her bra, wondering how she put it on in the first place, and removed it.

Her breasts were badly scarred, the left far worse than the right, to the extent that the left was just a nippleless mound of scarred tissue. He took the towel and dried her breasts and saw she was sitting with her stumps tight against her side and her eyes shut tight. He gently lifted each stump and dried it and under it. She opened her eyes and looked at him in open amazement. "You haven't gone to throw up!"

"Why should I?" he answered. "I said you were a beautiful woman and nothing has changed that so far."

"But they are really ugly—especially this one!" With that, the little short left stump pushed against the destroyed left breast pushing it towards him. He carefully stood up so she could see his massive erection fighting to get out of the jeans. "Well, it doesn't seem to have affected him!" he laughed! He bent down and took each of her breasts in his hands and leaning right down kissed each of them in turn. He felt a massive shudder running through her body, and in a hoarse whisper she said, "Don't do that please—you are making me feel things I had hoped to have forgotten by now!" Even as she said this and he straightened up, she leant forward and stroked his manhood with the tip of her right stump. "I have wanted to do this to a man ever since the accident!"

"Not fair!" he cried.

She gave a giggle and asked him now to dress her as she was getting cold, but he noted a distinct glow on her cheeks and in her eyes.

Geoff realised that things could now head in a direction that he dictated. Diane had clearly indicated her willingness to pursue a far more intimate situation than he had initially envisaged, but he was hesitant to jump into bed with her after only knowing her for less than two hours!

"Slow down!" he pleaded. "Let's at least get to know each other a bit before we wind up ravishing each other—not that I think that is a bad idea mind you!"

She looked somewhat crestfallen and became shy again, trying to cover her breasts with her tiny arms. He suggested that he get the arm fixed and get her at least warmly dressed before she wound up picking up the flu or something. He went over to the dresser she indicated and opened the bottom drawer. There he found a collection of arms, hands, harnesses and—in a packet—a new cable.