For obvious reasons, Kent began paying somewhat closer attention to Doreen while she was over at the house. He found himself staying there a little longer when she came over to babysit before he left for his scheduled appointment and he also found himself coming home a little sooner as well.
Kent occasionally found himself mentally replaying Doreen and her boyfriend's sexual falling out that night, as it unfolded in his own bed. Re-living the nervous conversations he had shared with Doreen since that night, in the safety of his darkened bedroom, Kent wallowed in the memory of his voyeuristic interlude and told himself over and over that he would have known how to have treated the young girl right.
By the time the first light of dawn had crept through his bedroom window however, Kent quickly realized how silly those fantasies of having a chance with Doreen really were.
__________________________________
As happens many times when one breaks up from a stressful relationship, a person often goes out and does something wild and completely out of character to try and change things up and put the pain of a broken bond behind them.
Sitting on his sofa late one Tuesday afternoon, waiting for Doreen to show up to babysit Melanie, Kent got to see first hand the 18 year old's endeavor to 'change things" after breaking up with her boyfriend.
After answering Doreen's knock at the door and letting the young girl in, Kent quickly picked up on the excited look beaming across Doreen's pretty face.
"What's up, Doreen?" Kent asked curiously.
Before he had a chance to brace himself, Doreen lifted her shirt halfway up her chest and exposed her bare, slightly tanned midriff.
"UHHH" Kent gulped.
"I decided to get my bellybutton pierced," Doreen proudly gleamed as she held her shirt up for Melanie's Father to see. "I just felt like doing something crazy... me and my friend Deana decided to do it today at the mall."
"It's... it's nice... Doreen," Kent stuttered, as he tried to avoid making eye contact with the exposed young girl.
Unable to look Doreen in the eyes and not wanting to stare like paralysed hawk at her new piece of jewelry, Kent instinctively raised his hand to his face and alternated his view back and forth from Doreen's frame to the floor below when he felt his insides start to turn to mush.
"Do you wanna touch it?" Doreen asked as if she were a child beckoning a person to play with a new Christmas toy.
"I'd ... better... not," Kent wavered internally even though his shaky hand rose forward.
"OH... MY... GOD," the older man thought to himself as his fingertips gently collided with Doreen's bellybutton.
Holding his trembling hand in place, Kent plastered an unsteady smile across his face as he subtly eased his fingers back and forth against the teenage girl's soft stomach.
"I bet your Dad and Mom aren't gonna be crazy about this," Kent joked, trying to conceal his percolating nerves with a touch of sarcasm.
"Yeah... ," Doreen replied. "They said I had to wait till I was 18 and out of high school... I don't think they really care if I did it or not... they will just get on my case because they know how impressionable my little sisters are and they'll think both of them will want to get something pierced besides their ears too."
"I bet," Kent politely agreed as he grudgingly pulled his hand away from the babysitter's exposed flesh.
"Its... real nice... Doreen," Kent stammered, feeling a light glaze of sweat beginning to coat his brow. "Let me go... let me go upstairs and tell Melanie you're here... I should be home by 8 or so... Is that OK?"
"No problem," Doreen smiled as she dropped her half raised shirt back down.
With that, Kent quickly darted up the steps, first to tell his daughter that Doreen had arrived and then to sneak into the bathroom for a few seconds to collect himself before heading out for the meeting he was due at.
Standing alone in the upstairs bathroom, his feet spread apart and bracketing the toilet bowl below, Kent was sure he could still feel Doreen's soft, youthful skin on his fingertips as he wrapped his right hand around his now rigid hard-on.
"I can't believe your doing this," his inner conscience scolded.
"She's your daughter's babysitter... for Godsakes... she's almost young enough to be your own daughter... this just ain't right... Hell... She's down there right now playing with Melanie while your up here... up here... up here... jacking... off... " Kent continued to lambaste himself for nearly a minute until a bubbling hot string of semen burst like lava from his straining and reddened penis, landing in a series of messy and echoing plops in the water below.
"And you just came thinking about it... didn't you?" Kent guiltily sighed out loud as he continued to wallow in the alternating mental images of Doreen's pretty face and smooth white belly.
After splashing some cold water across his face and staring sheepishly in the mirror for several moments to collect his wits, Kent exited the bathroom and gingerly bounded down the steps, saying a quick goodbye to Melanie and Doreen before leaving for his appointment.
_____________________________________
Arriving home that night at a little after 10, Kent mashed his teeth, upset he had frittered another night away at work to the point that he was over an hour later getting home than he had promised Doreen.
"I'm sure she put Melanie to bed a few hours ago," Kent grimaced as he lugged his spent body up the walk towards the house, feeling an inner twinge of frustration that he had missed another night of tucking his young daughter into bed.
Seeing the light in the living room on through the window, Kent lost himself in the memory of earlier in the evening when he got a first hand view, and feel, of Doreen's new piercing.
"I wonder if her bellybutton is the only thing she has pierced?" Kent found himself pondering before his inner civility shut him up.
"Don't even think about that kind of stuff... getting involved in something like that is the last thing you need right now... besides... you don't need your hand shaking when your trying to write her check out tonight."
Taking a deep breath before letting himself in the house, Kent's insides inexplicably warmed when he saw Doreen sitting on the sofa, painting her toenails.
"Hey... Hey... How are ya Doreen... sorry I'm so late... kinda got stuck at my meeting," Kent apologized softly, trying not be wake Melanie upstairs as he greeted her babysitter.
"No big deal Mr. Sandridge... I just pulled a few movies off the shelf there and did some of my girl stuff after I put Melanie to bed about an hour and a half ago," Doreen smiled as she put the finishing touches on her toenails.
"Good," Kent replied unsteadily.
