Seducing the Neighbor

That afternoon, back on the bus, I was deep in thought. OK, so Krystal's plan was a lot better than what I had before as an idea (nothing). Yeah, why not -- I didn't have to choose -- both were possible. However, now I had to figure out how to broach the topic with Daniel. What do I do? Just casually drop it into the conversation -- 'oh, yeah, by the way, I want you to learn orgasms, come and see the girls'? Hmm.

At around 3:00pm, some refreshments came around. I had some orange juice in a mini-carton. Daniel, still sitting next to me, had been sleeping and had woken up to drink a bottle of water.

"Still awake?" he asked.

'I didn't sleep," I replied.

"I don't usually sleep in the daytime, but I might as well on this journey."

"Yeah, sure."

Daniel noticed my pensive manner. "What's up? You've been pretty quiet since lunch."

"Yeah, well," I mumbled. A pause. Then I turned to him. "Daniel, while you're studying, what do you plan to do about a private life? You can't just sit at home all day doing homework or working out."

Daniel smirked. "Especially not with you around."

Aha! An opening! I seized it. "That's kind of what I was thinking; but I'm so much older than you."

"So what?" he said, brightly. "Life is more than fun with you around. I don't care about age."

I smiled. "As long as my body looks good, right?"

"No, not just that," he replied. "You're only thirty-two. You're fun, exciting -- really amazing to hang out with. As for your body, you're a fashion model, aren't you? You look fantastic." He smiled warmly. "I love the way you look." He squeezed my hand.

I needed to feel that warmth. "So tell me," I continued. "You don't look too bad yourself, if truth be told."

"Thanks -- I work hard in the gym."

"I know you do. Surely some other girls must have taken a liking to you before."

"They did," he said, with a twinkle in his eye.

"Tell me about them."

So he did. It turned out that he had had some make-out sessions in high school with various girls, starting at around sixteen. Before that, he had been kind of skinny but he had begun exercising and had started looking pretty good. He had experienced a crush on a girl at seventeen, which had lasted around three months.

She had initially taken an interest in the hunky guy, but things had come to an abrupt end when he had said the wrong thing at a barbecue party at a friend's house. Nothing disastrous but, reading between the lines, it sounded as though Daniel's pick-up game wasn't as sharp as most women would think someone of his looks and body ought to have.

Admittedly, I had noticed this -- his conversation was pleasant but was never going to set the world on fire. He might be kind of an introvert.

"So what happened after high school?" I asked.

He told me he had moved away from home and had started his current degree course. Women at uni were older and more confident about what they wanted, and had made some definite approaches. He had taken them out, and one hot babe had given him oral sex down the alley beside the movie theater.

Another had sucked him off in the back of a car, and still another, who sounded like a total size queen, had been agog at the size of his cock and had jerked him off on three different occasions just to watch him unload his large balls in front of her.

She, in turn, had spread word around and, finally, one woman had taken the opportunity to seduce him at a party and, in a private room, sucked him off, then had spread her legs wide on the bed to feel him inside her. Since then, he had since had sex with one other woman he really liked, who had suddenly changed colleges when her family moved away.

"Anything else?" I asked.

"No, that's about it," he concluded.

"So I'm only the third woman you've ever had sex with," I remarked.

"Yeah, pretty much," he concurred. "I've had more sex with you in the past week than I've ever had before."

"The advantages of an older woman," I smiled at him.

He blushed, which looked cute. "It's not just the quantity -- it's the quality, too. You seem to know what you're doing. You don't do what the other two did."

"I'm better, right?" I grinned.

"Definitely." He looked at me. "Where did you learn all that stuff? I guess, if you don't mind me saying, that you've been with a bunch of guys in the past. I figure I've got some catching up to do if you learned that much from them."

This was going better than I had hoped. "What makes you think I've been with tons of guys?"

He looked a little awkward. "Well, it's just that -- you're a lot more confident and know quite a bit -- stuff I'd never thought of doing, or girls -- women, sorry -- doing either."

"So you think I was this innocent, young, eighteen-year-old who has been taught all she knows since then by a bunch of guys she shacked up with," I remonstrated.

"Er -"

"So you must think I bed guys like other women eat chocolate bars, or else these dudes were super-experienced Casanovas who must have learned what they know from the two thousand girlfriends they've had."

"Hmm, see -"

"I get it. Well, guess what? Not including make-outs, random kisses with guys in bars, flirting and grinding to attract attention, and occasional mercy hand-jobs and BJ's, the total number of men I've had full-on intercourse with is SIX."

Daniel's eyes widened. "That's it?"

"That's it."

Daniel turned his head to look out at the countryside speeding by outside the window. Then he turned back to me. "You must be a natural."

I laughed. "A natural what?"

"You know, someone who can pick up sex really easily, just naturally knowing what to do at the right time."

"Haha, no way."

Suddenly Daniel got excited. "I'm impressed by this! I think women are amazing. I read a book somewhere once that said a woman is like a high priestess, and men are just acolytes."

My eyes widened. "Really! Well, huh. I think you'll find there's a much more down-to-earth reason."

"What's that?"

"You don't know?"

"Er, well -"

"Daniel! Take a look around this bus. What can you see?"

Daniel craned his neck to peer over the seats. "I just see a lot of women. Beautiful ones, too," he added, with a smile.

"YAY! We're getting somewhere. Who do you think taught me?"

The penny dropped. "WHAT! Them?"

"Ha, well, not these ones in particular, but women in general. We learn from each other."

"OH!" cried Daniel. "Are you lesbian? Bisexual or something?"

"No," I replied, honestly. "I'm totally straight."

Daniel was captivated now. "So how did you learn?"

I sighed. This would be a long story; but hey, what better time to tell it than on a long-distance journey with a gorgeous hunk? So I filled him in on the fashion industry, how models are constantly bombarded with creepy guys, abusive fashion designers, horny "fans" groping and clawing at our bodies at Fashion Week, pervert photographers trying to get sex in return for 'exposure', being invited by billionaires onto private yachts to end up getting raped, the silence from the industry, the #MeToo movement, the #TimesUp initiative.

I became quite heated, and my underlying feminism burst forth, angry, bitter and raging, adamant that such things should never, EVER happen to us! Then I went on to describe how my business was supposed to be a solution, but had always been small, with the safety I offered meaning bigger jobs were out of reach, how incredibly fantastic my models had been in spite of this downside, and how I hoped Daniel's idea of a cooperative would be a way out for us -- a way to play a bigger game without sacrificing personal safety.

Throughout all this, Daniel actively listened. At times when I was particularly emotional, he had rested his hand on my thigh, touched my shoulder or squeezed my hand. I had to admit, this felt amazing. I felt heard, understood, empathized with, and you know what? It felt great.

"I'm sorry," I said, feeling tearful. "I get so agitated by all this; but it's important, you know?" I squeezed his hand back. He hadn't said much, but I was starting to think that his being introverted was a definite asset, compared to the usual extroverted doofus idiots I had been with - and shared my bed with! - before.

"No problem, Cathy," he replied. "I'm fascinated. It's really inspiring to watch you talk about your dreams. The way you talk, you're so animated! It's just incredible to see." He smiled.

I smiled back, grateful. "Thanks, Daniel. You've been a great listener." Then I thought. "Oh, I've gone off on a complete tangent -- I was supposed to be talking about how I got experience."

"No problem, say what you want," Daniel said, encouragingly.

"Well, huh! I guess it's related -- in a way. So, like, basically it's dangerous for fashion models to get boyfriends or hang out with guys in the industry -- they're all a bunch of creeps." I paused, looking at him. "So, we hang out with each other, and, well, one thing leads to another and, if we spend a lot of time close together, it's inevitable that we'll end up in bed with each other -- sometimes out of boredom, sometimes for pleasure, sometimes for a little emotional intimacy, sometimes just to de-stress and relax."

"Hmm, I see," said Daniel.

"So we experiment on each other, learn how different bits work. All the working parts that make up the glory of femininity and the infinite coolness of womankind."

"Ha! I understand."

"However, there's a downside -- well, sort of. A lot of people would call it an upside."

"What's that?"

I lowered my voice to a comic, conspiratorial whisper. "We're just outrageously horny all the time -- like, almost out-of-control horny, like we're climbing the walls."

Daniel laughed. "Why do you think that is?"

"Because we're not actually lesbians -- well, Bonnie's bisexual, but most of us aren't. So all these vibrators, dildos, fingering orgasms -- they work up a thirst in a girl, you know what I'm saying? A strap-on is just a stop-gap solution in that case."

"So this is where I come in."

"HAHAHA! Yeah, well -- haha! You got me on that one." Amused, I watched him sitting next to me. He was getting more and more attractive by the minute.

"I thought lesbians could be pretty thirsty."

"Oh, yeah! They definitely can. We were talking about that only last night."

"Who? Not with me you weren't."

OH NO! "Er, yeah -- well, actually, I was hanging out with those three on the other side of the aisle last night, and we were talking about that."

"Oh, right." Daniel looked out of the window again.

Phew! I nearly let the cat out of the bag!

"Where?" asked Daniel.

"Oh, I popped over to Bonnie's house," I said, truthfully. "Hey, so enough about me. What about you? What's your background?"

Daniel gave a small smile. "I told you already. I've only been with two women before you."

"No, I mean some family background -- and what are your plans for the future?"

So then he said his dad was in law enforcement, working in the Atlanta Sheriff's Department, while his mother ran a small, self-employed concern from home, tailoring clothes. Then he told me he would like to finish his degree, continue working for the company that gave him his house, then maybe try to get a promotion there to management. If that didn't happen, Plan B was to save money during the years working there to open a property management firm of his own and be his own boss.

"Cool," I said, approvingly. This sounded great. "What about your personal life? Any plans to eventually settle down? What kind of person do you see yourself with?" I worried whether this was becoming an interrogation -- or maybe a job interview. He seemed to be playing along happily enough, though.

"That's a long way off still," he replied. "I don't know -- maybe I'll think about it in my early thirties -- actually your age would be a good time. As for what type -- hmm, well." He paused for a while, thinking about it. "Actually, I want a woman who believes in herself -- someone I don't have to mollycoddle or have to take care of too much, someone independent, who knows her worth. I like a woman who has something to offer, something I can get behind, someone going places and achieving things. But..."

Oh, I thought. Things had been going so well for these last ten seconds. "But what?"

"Er, nothing."

"Go on."

He looked a little sheepish and downcast. "Well, you know -- that's what I would like; and I thought I could get it, until the last woman dumped me."

"I thought she left because she moved."

"She did, but there was something about the way she just upped and left. I was really interested in her, and thought if I had enough time, we could have ended up becoming serious, but the way she just moved away, never even thinking that I could have gone with her, or that I might have liked to keep her in my life -" He paused again. "I mean, her new university isn't that far away. They have a business degree program, too. I could have transferred."

"If you had done, you would have lost your house and job, and would have had student debt."

"Well, lots of other people have that. I would have done it for her -- it would have been worth it, if it had meant I could have been with her."

"No way. I think you made the right choice. College is overrated. I wouldn't take on mountains of student debt for the sake of a guy. I think you made the right choice."

"But Cathy -- I didn't choose. She just left."

"Stuff her. If she did that, she didn't care about you. You're better off finding someone else who does."

"But I cared about her."

"Forget her. She's not worth it. For goodness' sake, mature students who are already married would think twice before making that kind of decision. She's not even your wife, she made absolutely no commitment to you, save perhaps a couple of dates and a make-out session at the movies or something."

Daniel frowned. "Hmm, I didn't think of that. Maybe you're right."

"Of course I am. You've got parents who love you, a house, a job, you're making money, you've got zero student debt, and you're only twenty! That's amazing! If I had had that at your age, I would have gone to university myself, instead of doing this modeling jazz."

Daniel stared off into the distance for a moment. He looked like he wanted to say something. I decided to wait to see if he did. Sure enough, presently, he spoke. "Cathy," he began, squeezing my hand.

"What?" I asked, leaning towards him.

"I want all these things -- a great job, a career, a promotion, management, you name it. I also want the kind of woman I talked about. I've tried hard to work out. I've built up this body through my own sweat and toil. I was kind of skinny before. I'm focused on getting through college and making something of myself. My dad's pleased with me so far. I want him to stay that way. But the girl I was with before has taken something with her." He turned to look at me. "Some of my confidence. I was so sure I was doing everything right. I've made my body into something I'm proud of. I wanted to look really good; but it wasn't enough, though. She left anyway."

"Hmm." Was this an opening for what I needed to ask?

"There's another thing, too. There's this bodybuilder guy in class. He doesn't look like me -- he used to be this fat kid in his high school, but now he's got -- well, big muscles, but kind of over-big - puffy, with no angles or vascularity. He's got a ginger beard and wears a baseball cap. Anyway, he's kind of always dragging himself down and really negative with himself. He's never had a girlfriend. He also subscribes to a lot of this red-pill stuff online and spends hours at home playing online games, surfing forums with these incel groups and all this junk. He's become kinda unpleasant with me lately, calling me a chad and stuff."

"Woah, he sounds like bad news. Keep away from him. He could be the next active shooter -- you never know." College kids these days - what on earth?

"Hmm, well -- I never really paid too much attention to him before, but since this girl left me, some of the stuff he says has started to make sense -- and that scares me."

Huh? "Like what?" I asked.

"Well, he says he's been working out for years, longer than me, but he still hasn't got a girlfriend. He's jealous of me because of what I look like, but the fact is, even with a body that looks like mine, girls will still leave him, because that happened to me -- and I haven't the heart to tell him."

I felt a sudden frisson of annoyance. Turning to Daniel, I pointed my finger at him. "Now hear this, Daniel! You don't listen to that stupid incel garbage. Keep away from him, you hear? Plug your ears up with cotton wool in class if you have to, but don't listen to any of that junk! Let me give it to you straight! The fact is, you're just bummed because you did all that work in the gym and that girl left you, anyway -- it's got nothing to do with what you look like! Up until now, I've been impressed with you -- you've got everything you need to make a success of your life, and everything to play for -- but now you tell me you've lost some confidence because some stupid girl barely out of her teens who has probably had sex with two useless dweebs herself dumps you to go to a different college and you act like your life's completely over!"

Daniel was astonished. He looked at me, mouth agape.

"It doesn't matter how long or how hard you work out in the gym -- no girl is just gonna eff you because of that -- unless she's stone drunk out of her mind, she's desperate and she's in a bar at 3am or something -- and is that what you want? Just a bunch of bar floozies and drunk wasters? What happened to 'I want a woman who believes in herself'? Oh, you do, huh? Well, how about you start believing in yourself first? Don't believe all that 'opposites attract' garbage. Actually, women never do that. Women only have sex with guys equal to or greater than them, OK? Like attracts like. We're all models here. Do you think we would ever go out with guys like your incel 'friend'? We want guys at least the same as us. That's why we don't want to have sex with sleazy photographers and abusive agency execs. You, with the body you've got, at least look the part -- someone a model could see herself with. I'm a model. I'm with you. I brought you along. Wanna know why?" I stopped.

Daniel looked shocked and a little dazed. "I'm sorry," he said, presently.

"It's OK. I'm sorry, too. It's just that -- I care about you, Daniel. Everything you said up until the incel stuff was perfect. You're doing GREAT. Far better than most people your age. Don't throw it all away because some girl you actually cared about dumped you. Did you tell her everything about yourself that you've told me?"

"No," he replied.

"Well, if you had done, she would have stayed."

"What? Really?"

"Yeah, sure. If she knew about you, even half the stuff we've been talking about this afternoon, she would have stayed with you. In fact, you wouldn't even have had to transfer. She would have forgotten the other university and stayed in your class."

Daniel was dumbfounded. "Seriously?"

"Absolutely. It's a dead cert. Why did you think I screwed you on Monday night the way I did? I didn't do it because of your body. ER, WELL -- actually, I did; but not only for that."

Daniel smirked.

"It was because I was impressed by your potential. I was first attracted to you when you were standing on my doorstep on Sunday, talking about what you had achieved, what you were doing with your life. Not later, when I showed up to see your workout equipment and you took your shirt off. If you had acted like an incel on my doorstep, there's no way I would have effed you -- even with a body like yours."

Daniel leaned back in his seat, trying to take it all in. "Well, hmm!" he remarked.