As my wife opened my underwear drawer, I panicked.
She was lost in talk about a bathroom remodeling and hadn't yet noticed women's panties right on top of my things. They were so blatantly not hers because it was a red thong and she never wore anything that exciting. She was looking at me but blindly reaching for them. In that moment I had to do something so I casually pushed her out of the way.
"Hun, actually I just remembered, my running shorts are in the wash."
Still preoccupied with talking about the kind of tiles she wanted, she didn't consider my intervention as suspicious. She looked so very distracted. Somewhat excitable, come to think of it. Picking an alternate running set from my gym bag, we went out and somewhere between tile colors and talk of clawfoot tubs she didn't notice me sweating before we even hit the trail. After the run I offered for her to take the first shower so I could examine my drawer. She declined but I firmly insisted, being the consummate gentleman I was.
How the hell did this thong get here, I thought as I held it and listened for the gentle shower splashing.
"Well, I don't remember you," I whispered.
It smelled faintly of unfamiliar perfume and skin, maybe sweat. Not unpleasant, just ladylike, like it had been recently worn. Combination of vanilla and sweat, somewhat confusing. Couldn't remember it. My occasional fuck buddy didn't know where I lived, we always hooked up at her house over wine. The older coworker I had an affair with - and got bored of - never came to my house either and it had been awhile anyway. Was that a year ago by now, I wondered?
Product of a habitually guilty mind or not, it was bizarre to feel like a cheater without cheating. Burying the thong under a pile of my skivvies I took my turn to shower and wondered if I was losing my mind. No one had access to our house. So how did that thong show up here? After the shower I thought I should dump them far away from home, but the clingy wife made that opportunity difficult so I moved them to a different armoire when I could.
Days went by and I still hadn't dealt with the thong. Maybe I just didn't want to throw the evidence away before solving the mystery, but it was far more stupid to leave it around. It was asking for trouble.
Was this a test administered by my wife? In that case, I already failed it. But nothing blew up so that meant that this thong belonged to a new woman, one I hadn't conquered yet and that was exciting. The sexual excitement over the discovery was very latent, but it was there. The long period of time it took from discovery to that realization slowly translated into a commensurate horniness. A slow burn.
Reminding myself with her old texted nudes, I concluded that the older coworker didn't know where I lived. She was a good fuck but she was also too willing for my taste so I got bored of her quickly. Even so, I took the opportunity to look at her yoga outfit pics. They were prefaced with "my tits are grossly huge," way too obvious attempt at fishing for compliments. Of course, she really did have nice tits. I rubbed one out looking at them and remembered how delightfully squishy they felt. Maybe later I should try for one last fuck with her?
The thong had to belong to a stranger. Because of the potential for a nasty fuck, I didn't even feel creeped out over someone going through my things.
Next day as I went through our weekly mail pile and read a buried note on the kitchen counter, it hit me. In retrospect, I felt really dumb for not thinking it earlier, but someone did in fact have a key to our house. The cleaning company! The note was an apology for accidentally breaking one of our colored decorative glasses my wife collected. It was signed with a heart, "Cleaning team four, Crystal and Donna."
One of the maids? Really? Which one?
That was just so weird but it was also the only plausible thing I could think of. One of the maids must have slipped a thong into my drawer. But why? And ... why? Crystal? Donna? Both had trashy names, which was kind of hot.
My wife was a horrible housewife. She was beautiful, she worked a meaningful job, she exercised and she dragged me into social functions I hated. But she was terrible at cooking and cleaning. When she brought up wanting a cleaning service again I grumbled and went along with it, even though I thought they sucked at their job for the money when we first tried it. We alternated paying for the service every other week, taking turns writing a check. After a time we reduced that to once a month.
Since she spent more time at home than I did, I could tell that their cleaning was perfunctory at best. She was just too used to the mediocrity to notice`. You could smell a clean floor, and we never got that from this company. Only private maids did a good job cleaning, I thought, because they were paid better and got to take all their earnings home with them. This company paid their employees low hourly wages and I honestly sympathized with them dragging their feet.
The only time that they cleaned the house well was the day before I found the thong. My car broke down, dead battery after a long winter, so I worked from home that day. That time their work was remarkable. The two women were so obviously startled that I was unexpectedly home and I guess because I was watching they did a thorough job for once.
In fact, they brought in a third person to help them finish. She looked even more surprised than the other two, borderline alarmed, and ended up spending all her time on her phone talking quietly. But they split their tasks and they all took their time scrubbing. Even so, their work was amateur quality and I assumed the maids had checkered pasts and this was the only low-paying job they could land. Once they were done, yes, the floor smelled clean. Still sloppy, but noticeably cleaner than usual.
In retrospect, that was eye-opening. Bad maids, dragging their feet, leaving their worn underwear in my drawer? I didn't make the connection because ordinarily the maids were invisible to me. They came and went, but it must have been one of them. Oh god. Why?
My hardon, well, hardened and my mind went into dark places. She was a horny slut. Right? Or an honest to god part time hooker sending out feelers? Young mommy with swollen dark nipples just trying to supplement her income? Just so she can buy a seasonal toy for her kid? How humiliating for her! I adjusted myself through my pants as I worked through the possibilities.
Which woman was it, I wondered? There was a black chubby one, a disturbingly skinny blonde, or the third one who showed up later? That last one looked like poor white trash, the kind you see working as a grocery store cashier. Decent body, pretty face but not excessively so. It was the kind of easy girl you fantasized about seducing by lazily flashing money and power. My hardon grew restless, mind of its own guiding my thoughts. The thong was small so maybe one of the white girls? Longer I thought about the new girl, I realized I couldn't recall her face. She was pretty, but I couldn't remember what she looked like.
Few days later I panicked again, watching my wife walk around the house with my laundry. Oh Jesus, this was a disaster. She never did my laundry so I didn't expect this might be how I got busted. Luckily, she was putting it far away from where I stashed the thong. In case she felt charitable again, I again moved the troublesome thong.
