Author's Note: Emily, a bright, overly confident, North American white 18 year old, has decided to enlist the help of one of the contractors doing a remodel in her home. She's discovered a secret room, The Study, that has been walled up since forever. In exchange for his help, not only in fixing up the room, but in teaching her construction and training her in sex, she's agreed to have sex with her however he wants. But she's discovering it's
her
fantasies that worry her, leading her to believe that the room's fragrance may be hazardous.
It was a running day, back by 8:30, the crew already working. She could tell just by the smells coming from the basement they were working on something dangerous. Burning. Soldering. Rinsed and dressed, thinking maybe if she just kept her clothes on she'd be less horny.
Hasn't worked so far, but with Steph coming over, not much choice anyway.
She'd slept like a log, no weird dreams, and even though her body had been on fire, her exhaustion was like a blanket. When she arrived at practice, she felt energized and pushed herself. Coach wasn't pleased. Not because she was too slow; just the opposite. He didn't want her driving herself so hard.
9:00. Not enough time to put another coat on. She looked at The Study and wondered if she could figure out where Abby's fragrance might be coming from. They'd left the fan on all night to keep the stain from stinking up the house, blowing from the opening to the octagons away from the back stairs. She turned it off, the faint smell of the stained lumber wafting to her before the fragrance overwhelmed everything else.
She turned toward the cabinet, sniffing as she approached the doors. She was certain it was something from inside that must have broken open or spilled. The intensity didn't seem to change. The room was just steeped with it. Then she opened the doors and the fragrance enveloped her like it had every other time. She felt herself lighting up and quickly closed it. But even when that initial cloud dissipated, the aroma was ever-present in the room.
It must be coming from there. It must be.
She opened the left door again and looked at all of the drawers, remembering the bottom two that were stuck. Other than those, there hadn't been anything that would be a source of the fragrance.
It must be inside one of those drawers!
She went down on her hands and knees sniffing at the two drawers, wondering if the smell would intensify. And, while she was down there, she sniffed at the floor thinking it might have been something Abby had spilled. The aroma seemed to increase, but no one place seemed to smell more intensely than another. Except when she opened the cabinet and the perfume floated out on an invisible fog, nothing rose above background intensity. The smell lingered, everywhere. She felt her arousal intensifying, rising up, her clothes felt too tight, her nipples hardening.
Fucckkkk!
9:15. She remembered Cos had said something about lightly sanding the wood before the next coat. She grabbed the paper he'd set aside and rubbed it across the faces of the pieces still sitting on the sawhorses. Her phone buzzed. 10:05 and Steph was running a few minutes late. She'd finished all of the main pieces and the shelves, but couldn't face sanding the plywood by hand.
"Cos?" She shouted down the basement stairs from the kitchen. "Do you have the sander some place?"
He poked his head around the bottom of the stairs. "Yeah -- it's in the tool box on the bed of the truck. Why?"
"I'm done hand sanding all of the smaller pieces, but thought it would go faster on the plywood if I used the power sander."
He nodded. "Smart. Yeah. Here're the keys. But be careful -- just hold it lightly."
She caught his toss. It would be too late to finish before Steph arrived, but she'd get things ready at least.
"Hey! Perfect timing!" Steph had driven up while she was grabbing the tool from the truck. Em waited for her to come up the drive. "Thanks for coming over!"
"What's up?" Steph leaned in for a hug. "What can Super-scientist Steph help you with?"
"It's upstairs. I'll tell you about it when we get there." But Emily stopped before opening the back door, remembering what she and Caroline had talked about the day before. She didn't want to expose Steph to some weird chemical. "Ummm...before we go in...shit. Don't think I'm bat-shit crazy, but," in her head she ran through all of the ways she could tell Steph her concerns.
"What? What's the problem?"
Steph and Emily had known each other most of their lives, going to the same schools, been in the same classes. The past semester they'd been lab partners, which helped Emily a lot more than it did Steph, but Steph didn't seem to care.
"Okay. Here's the deal. I've found a secret room in the house. Yeah. Hold on. That's a thing, but not
the
thing. But when I opened it, I think I might have gotten exposed to a chemical, and it's...it's maybe an aphrodisiac?" Emily stopped there, staring at Steph, waiting for her to tell her she was commitable.
"Okay...ummm..."
"And I don't want you to get exposed to it without at least my having warned you."
Steph giggled. "You think it would spice things up with Robert?"
Emily dipped her head and eyes to the side.
Why doesn't anyone take this seriously?
"That's the thing. Maybe? I don't know. I don't know if it even exists." She realized too late that that sounded really nutso.
"Wait. What?"
"No. Sorry. I meant: I don't know if everyone can smell it. Caroline could, but, I mean, one of the construction workers couldn't, so I'm not sure what's going on."
"Caroline was here? How's she doing? We've been meaning to hook up. And you think it's an aphrodisiac because...?" Steph raised her eyebrows, waiting for something juicy.
"Because I'm having wild monkey sex with that construction worker," she whispered in her ear.
The two of them started giggling.
"Jesus, Mary and Joseph," Steph said. "It's about time."
"Wait. What?"
"We've been thinking of putting together a pool to see when you'd finally get laid."
"Wait. What? Who? Shut the fuck up!" Emily looked at Steph's face not believing it. "Seriously? Who? You have to tell me!"
"C'mon. You've got to know. We've only been poking at you for a year. Like, 'Is Em going to date Hank, or maybe Melanie?' Seriously, girl, we've been wondering what you're saving it for."
