Surprisingly, the kinder actually has a decent adult bathroom. The building isn't new, so it probably wasn't always a kindergarten and the two-stall ladies bathroom is a legacy of a previous age. I did my thing and then stood washing my hands in front of the long mirror, looking at my reflection and checking for lines and grey hairs, making sure nothing was sagging that should be firm. I was washed and dry and everything else was five-by. I still looked great.
I was looking at my breasts -- hey, I had to keep up with the guys who had been staring all afternoon -- and realised they weren't tender. I'd never had pre-menstrual breast-pain until recently, but probably from the beginning of this summer I'd noticed it, the last day or two before my period. It had returned right on cue the day before the barbecue, but it was gone again and that was weird. I felt them to make sure; gingerly at first, but there was no pain.
"Don't mind me, I just need to pee."
Holy fuck, where did you come from?
Stealth-Mom! I didn't even hear the door. She was early thirties like me, about my height or an inch taller, and a similar compact shape without the muscle-tone. But that's where the similarity ended. She had styled blonde hair that she wore down, just past the shoulder, and she was dressed in a white, sleeveless blouse and soft-pink skirt with pantyhose and a pair of white, wedge sandals.
She looked at me holding my breasts and I saw a slight change in her eyes, a mix of curiosity and maybe concern. "Do you want a hand with that?" she asked without inflection.
What the fuck? Do I want a hand feeling my tits? Jesus!
"Do you want to go fuck yourself?" I shot back deadpan. It was out of my mouth before I could take it back; it was the sort of thing I'd say at work if a crack-whore made the same offer, but this middle-class Mom had surprised it out of me.
That same look of curiosity and concern stayed on her face for a two-count while she processed what I'd said, then her blue eyes bulged comically for a second and her face dropped in horror. Poor thing had probably never heard language like that. And then she surprised me; she burst out laughing. It just exploded from her -- this sudden burst of hilarity -- and her face transformed from horror to outright glee. God only knows what my face looked like; I'd just been lesbo-propositioned in a kindergarten bathroom, told a soccer-Mom to fuck herself, and now I was getting laughed at.
"Oh shit! Whoops!" she clutched her groin, still giggling uncontrollably. "I almost peed myself. Give me a moment." And then she ran into the stall and slammed the door.
I heard the sounds of cotton and nylon and she did battle with her skirt and pantyhose while she talked in broken half-sentences.
"I'm so sorry," she began. "I don't know how that must have ... I mean, I'm not ... I didn't ... Oh flip, now I can't pee. Shut up a minute ..."
I don't know why she was telling me to shut up; I hadn't said anything since I told her to fuck herself. A moment later, she got started and I heard a soft sigh of relief.
"I'm Susan," she said through the door. "Zack's Mom. I think I introduced myself earlier." (She hadn't) "I'm so sorry, I can't imagine what you must have thought. It's just ... I saw you doing a breast exam and it looked ... well it looked like you hadn't done one before."
That was actually true. Nick examined them regularly and in minute detail, though possibly not for lumps or anomalies. Since Jimmy was weaned, I've pretty much left them to their own devices. I was deeply regretting what I'd said at this point; how could I have thought she was propositioning me?
"Um ... no, I'm ... um sorry," I stumbled through an apology. If it was my son doing it, I would have made him start over.
"What do you have to be sorry for?" she laughed. I heard the sound of tearing toilet paper and then she paused again before resuming over the flushing toilet. "The look on your face was priceless, and I completely deserved it." She paused while I listened to her fight again with the pantyhose and getting her skirt back down over her hips.
She came out smiling with roses in her cheeks and looked at me in the mirror. I felt a little pang of jealousy at her blonde good-looks; petite and feminine, she was the quintessential yummy-Mommy.
"I'm a doctor," she explained. "I have women parading around in my exam-room with their boobs hanging out all day, so showing them how to examine themselves is the most natural thing in the world for me." She shrugged as she dried her hands with a 'what-can-you-do?' gesture. "I just spend so much of my life with patients, sometimes I forget how to relate to real people." Then she smiled again, "So when I ask to feel your boobs, it's just how doctors say hello."
"Right," I said flatly. "Well I'm a cop. I spend my days with crack-whores and dealers, so when I tell you to go fuck yourself, that's just how cops say hello." I couldn't help a smirk at the end of that. We'd just both done what comes most naturally, and in retrospect, it was kind of funny.
"I'm sorry, I don't remember your name," she said. I hadn't told her yet, but doctors probably weren't as good with names as cops; they dealt with one person at a time and had all their details on a clipboard. Or so I believed from watching TV dramas.
"Anna Volakas," I said, still looking at her in the mirror. "Sergeant."
"Susan Richards," she replied, smiling. "M.D." There was a little flicker of ironic acknowledgement in her eyes, suggesting we both knew it was absurd to be using titles at a kindergarten barbecue, but still we couldn't help ourselves. Curse of the career woman. Obviously I had mis-characterized her as a soccer-Mom.
"So did you ...," she searched for the words, "... um, want to?"
"Want to what?" I asked, genuinely confused.
"Learn how to do a self-examination," she smiled, and then holding up her hands, "I won't touch. Promise. Learned my lesson the first time."
I didn't really want to talk about breasts with this unusual woman at all, but she had completely disarmed me with her wit and that almost hysterical outburst of laughter. Part of me was curious; I knew it was something I had been ignoring for a long time that I really should learn, but it wasn't like I was ever going to have an idle moment when I would decide to look it up for myself.
"Fuck it," I breathed. "Okay. What do I have to do?"
"What? Oh, okay," she smiled. "I didn't think you were going to. You just had that look."
"I wasn't going to," I said.
"Right, well. First thing: you don't just feel," she began in a brisk tone, unbuttoning her blouse and pulling it untucked from her skirt. "You need to look as well, and you can't do either properly wearing a bra."
Shit, I didn't see this coming. I just met the woman, I wasn't really planning on having a titty tea-party with her. I felt a moment of reluctance when an icy shiver went down my back, but then I had to smile inwardly; how many times had I had them out when Jimmy was breast-feeding? That was a few years ago now, but it seems some of the dignity that fled my life the day I lay on a bed with a doctor, Nick, and two midwives staring up my twat was finally growing back. What the hell, I said to myself; I could get the girls out for another public performance. Just this once, by popular demand.
"I teach a three-step exam, rather than the five-step," she explained. "A lot of women promise they'll do weekly exams to your face, but then life takes over and they forget, so simpler is better."
Susan was pulling off her blouse already as she talked to me in the mirror, revealing an expensive, lacy white bra. Such a typical suburban yummy-Mommy. The pink skirt hugging her slim hips contrasted with the creamy, white flesh of stomach; perfectly flat and not a hint of muscle -- how did she get it that flat without crunches? Everywhere else was soft curves. Her waist wasn't angled like mine; it was just a continuation of the gentle curve of her hips that flowed smoothly out again at her breasts: round and full B-cups, snugly tucked into a pretty girlie bra that she picked out precisely for the reason that it could be shown off through the blouse.
"I'll just show you number one and two," she went on. "One is in the shower and two is in the mirror. Three is in bed, so we can leave that one until we get to know each other a bit better," she joked. At least it sounded like a joke.
Throwing modesty to the wind, I pulled my t-shirt over my head to reveal my highly practical and comfortable black lycra bra, just as she was reaching behind to unclasp that Victoria's Secret page three special.
Susan shrugged off her shoulder straps, and cupping it in both hands she lowered it to reveal her breasts, round and full at the bottom with a ski-jump curve on top. With my fingers working at the clasp on my own bra, I froze, an unfamiliar shiver pricking goose-bumps on my arms and making the little hairs stand on end.
Oh my God. They match!
The thought was so clear and real, I wondered for moment if it had come out of my mouth. Her areolae were tiny, about the size of pennies, with small, slightly upturned nipples at the center of each -- so small and perfect, it was hard to believe they'd ever seen the inside of a baby's mouth. But the thing that stopped me was the color; it was the exact shade of pink as her skirt.
My own skin is a Mediterranean olive brown -- almost dark enough for skinhead Nazi punks to call me 'colored', but really no more than the deep tan that an Anglo can go if they see a lot of sun. I guess I've seen white girls' tits before -- mostly at night busting street walkers who won't get a fucking room -- but I haven't ever been affected like that. It was actually scary; I could feel my jugular throbbing in my neck.
