This story was originally published as "Can I Rub It For You".
But because I didn't imagine this story as the first of a series and so I didn't organize it as one, I am correcting that error now. The original text also had a number of very distracting typos, spelling, and grammar errors, as well as some weaknesses in the way it was told. (I also HATED the title.) I have therefore renamed, revised, and copy-edited it (with the generous help of HaltWhoGoesThere and ButteredCrumpet - who I am very grateful to for their time and input). I have tried to keep it as close to the original as possible.
My intent is not to offend, but this is a d/s romance with strong themes of nonconsent and reluctance. If that's not your bag, I understand and hope you will find another story to enjoy.
As always I hope you will enjoy the story, and that if you do you will leave a comment.
XOSNS
Entrance
Annie was at her desk, her book and notepad open in front of her, holding her pen, but staring out the window. She was daydreaming; had been for some time. Her dreams were relatively modest. She was imagining being the kind of girl who other girls liked and asked for advice; who made boys nervous, but they still asked on dates; who had friends who looked up to and admired her- that's when her roommate Michele had come hobbling through the door, tears running down her cheeks.
Michele, who was so strong and serene, who moved with an easy power and confidence, was weeping.
Annie watched in shock and confusion, arms hanging uselessly at her sides, not completely understanding what was happening; unable to imagine what could possibly make the stronger girl cry.
Michele had her hair pulled back in a thick ponytail and was in running gear - a tight white tank top over a sports bra, little red short-shorts, and clunky beige trail-runners. Her legs were spattered and smeared with mud.
"Did you fall?" Annie asked.
"NO!" Michele bellowed, startling Annie, making her jump back a foot.
Michele drew in a sharp breath, tears streaming down her face. "I did, but it's not-", she sucked in another breath. "My legs are cramping!" she hissed through gritted teeth as she stumbled forward.
"Lie down?" Annie blurted.
'Stupid girl,' she thought, feeling herself blush as Michele toppled face down onto her bed, her feet hanging off the end of the mattress, her legs twisting and flexing with the cramps. Annie stepped forward, started grabbing Michele's shoelaces, preparing to pull off her shoes, but stopped, suddenly unsure of herself.
Her hands were shaking.
In Annie's daydreams she and Michele were good friends, the two of them walking through campus being greeted by other students, eating meals together with a big group of smiling girls, laughing at jokes with handsome boys.
'You're such a ninny,' she thought, her heart racing. Michele scared her even when she wasn't barging through the door and yelling. Annie was a bit in awe of her roommate, and she knew it. Beyond Michele's serene confident manner, she was tall with a womanly frame Annie coveted.
Michele was over a head taller than Annie, had a thick mane of long brown hair. She was athletic, stylish, and was, Annie thought, the most beautiful girl on campus.
'She's glamorous' Annie thought, looking at Michele twisting and kicking in pain. 'Even like this.'
Michele was everything Annie wasn't. Annie was shy and small and skinny with fine blonde hair cut disastrously short. She wasn't even boyish compared to her roommate's womanly frame.
'I'm not even little-boyish,' she thought, looking down at her roommate's powerful long legs. Even though frighteningly stiff and warped by pain they looked beautiful.
Looking down from Michele's muscular tan shoulders, heaving with sobs, to her shaking fingers - so pale and thin - Annie thought of how very much she'd hoped that they would become friends, very much afraid it might not happen.
Annie felt paralyzed - frozen by embarrassment and fear - afraid to make a mistake, afraid to presume, afraid to overstep. But mostly she was embarrassed by how badly she wanted to make herself of use. It felt like desperation. She felt desperate. She took a long deep breath.
"May I rub it?" Annie asked quietly. Her voice sounded reedy and weak to her own ear. She waited, cheeks burning with shame.
Michele, her face buried in her pillow, was sobbing now. Not sure she'd even heard her, Annie squeezed her ankle. Michele nodded her head in the affirmative.
Annie's only experience with massage was rubbing her mother's neck after a long workday, or rubbing her feet while they watched TV together on the couch. This crisis was something entirely beyond Annie's ken.
She knelt at the end of Michele's bed, carefully undid her shoelaces, pulled her shoes and then socks off. Annie grabbed her feet and began to squeeze and rub them both with all the force she could muster. She pressed much harder than she would ever have dared to use on her mother, but Michele was much taller and more powerfully built than Annie's mother - taller and more powerfully built than any woman Annie had ever met for that matter.
She could feel corded tendons through the soles of Michele's arches and used her thumbs to grind into them. Michele, her face still buried in her pillow, cried out, but didn't protest, so Annie pressed on. Still kneeling at the end of the bed, she began working even harder into the arches of the stronger girl's feet with all her might, then using the heel of her hand to stretch Michele's curled toes, and using both hands to hinge her frozen ankles as best she could.
Rising onto her knees, Annie began to work her hands up Michele's calves. She brushed away dry mud; jealously admiring the other girl's firm muscular legs. Her skin was perfectly smooth and still tan from summer. Annie burned easily, she described herself as "skinny fat", feeling her own skin was pasty, that her 'muscles' were doughy. Her hands looked suddenly tiny and pale; her arms felt bird-like and inadequate against Michele's spasming bucking calves.
Shaking off her harsh self-deprecating thoughts, Annie focused on squeezing as hard as she could. Even though her forearms ached with the strain, she felt like she was hardly having any effect on the stronger girl. She wished she were stronger, wished she was bigger, more capable. But she worked the cramping muscles as best she could, sweating and grunting with the effort, not giving up. Like her feet, the tendons in Michele's calves felt rigid, her muscles spasming, fighting Annie.
With Michele's feet still hanging off the end of her bed on either side of her, Annie did her best to work both legs at the same time. But more often than not she needed both hands for one leg, or to abandon the calves altogether, in order to return to the work of pulling open Michele's cramping feet. But slowly Annie worked her way upward, pressing her hips into the edge of the mattress, reaching forward as far as she could.
Annie wiped sweat from her lip and climbed onto the foot of the bed, kneeling again, but now on the mattress between Michele's legs. Annie wasn't sure, but as she worked back and forth, from one leg to the other, she thought she could feel the other girl beginning to relax. If nothing else she had finally stopped sobbing.
Now, rather than kneading and grinding with all her force, Annie began to rub and massage more gently, working from Michele's toes upward; straddling one leg and then the other. She allowed her hands to climb a bit higher now, less and less worried with each pass that her feet would begin to spasm again.
Annie's mind drifted. She imagined how Michele would be grateful, that they would become friends; inseparable. Annie, who felt very much alone at her new school, imagined her roommate easing the way for her socially. Having transferred in as sophomores, Michele from a big school down South and Annie with credits from an accelerated program. Both started out the year on the back foot, Annie even more so, not just because of her age as she had transferred in a year younger than their classmates, but because she was painfully shy. Michele meanwhile seemed to be in demand socially, having already made lots of friends. And while she and Michele were friendly, Annie knew that they weren't friends.
After a long while of working up and down Michele's legs, it became clear that the crisis had passed. Michele was breathing deeply, almost as if asleep. Michele made no move to try and get up or otherwise end the massage whatsoever; so Annie, enjoying this work now, continued. The stronger girl had grown still. The only time she would move, even slightly, was when Annie shifted from straddling one leg to the other.
Allowing herself for the first time to reflect on what she had done, Annie felt curiously proud of herself, like a hero - something she was very unaccustomed to feeling. But she also realized, now that it was no longer an emergency, despite how much she was enjoying massaging Michele.