So, that was what that little two-woman play was all about. "I plan to, beautiful. Let's spend some time doing some taste testing on that coconut oil Lou put on you. I am especially interested in the portion she rubbed so lovingly on your buttocks."
Suzanne's eyes got wide, and she smiled. "You and that one trophy wife. She was staring at me so that I gave her my best 'on your knees' dom look. She got all flustered and then took her husband and ran."
"What if she hadn't run away?"
"We'll never know, but let's speculate on what might have happened during your taste test." She took me by the hand and led me to our bedroom.
"That's a delicious idea, my love."
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There were only 2 class days left in the spring semester. I took a drive Monday morning, instead of going to the review session in Math. Big mistake, probably, but I needed to clear my head and think. My car worked like a tranquilizer, and the only decision I had to make was when to tap the (optional) paddle shifters. The car would do it for me, and probably pick the shift points better than I could.
I knew from my embedded systems class that the car monitored OAT, EGT, RPM, and LOOT (lots of other things) and kept moving averages on them as an input to its 'fuzzy logic' decision making system. I knew the theory about 'degrees of truth' but sometimes I thought of it like a big set of moving Venn diagrams, pulsing like the icons on my phone's screen when you move them around, bouncing off each other. I knew it was inexact, but sometimes made much better choices than a simpler and supposedly more exact program.
Asa Weltschmerz told me that the brain used lots of fuzzy logic too, implemented in 'neural networks' of 'dendritic trees' that somehow learned from experience, but not always in the same way. It worked a lot better than lots of hard wired electronic logic systems, and apparently used lots of multi-state logic instead of simple binary logic. He asked if I had studied 'fuzzy sets' in math yet. Nope. If I couldn't pass M408D this semester, I wouldn't have the prerequisites to take anything else, either. Then he told me that in fuzzy logic, the values of the variables are more like words in linguistics, rather than numbers in arithmetic. Like I needed another reminder of how bad I was doing in that class, too. Asa had markedly stepped up the pace and intensity of our weekly therapy sessions the last few weeks. I suppose he was trying to influence some of the choices I had to make before I took the summer off from school to gain some work experience.
Driving without a plan, I soon found myself well south of Austin on the road toward Three Rivers that I had previously traveled with Peggy. This would have been prime Bluebonnet viewing territory just a few weeks ago, in April. I had made one decision since then - to take the summer job in England working on the "Chunnel". One of the TA's in my embedded systems class was from Morocco, and he told me to stay away from Calais. I was hoping to spend my weekends either with Peggy and her new fashion model friends, or with one of the twins (or, but not and) their amazing mother, Belinda Hatch-Peters, Abelard's 'second and final wife'.
The native Americans that once lived in Central Texas considered Bluebonnets to be spiritual messengers, and made tea from them as love potions. The Spanish priests used to gather seeds and plant them around the missions, making many people think the flowers came from Spain. But they are native plants, and have been the official state flower since 1901. Maybe I should stop and make some tea. I could use a few spiritual messages right now, in the vein of relationship advice.
In a recent demonstration of the Frankenstein-ish potential of genetic engineering, the Aggies had created a "Maroonbonnet" in the Aggie's favorite color instead of their natural blue, and tried to spread them onto the ESU campus. Leave it to the Aggies to deliberately vandalize and pollute the genetic material of the great state of Texas. Loyal Longhorns kept literally rooting out this threat, which had now substantially receded, sort of like Aggie football. Perhaps the best thing about Bluebonnets was that Nora adored them, and if I could let myself believe it, she also adored me.
Nora had resolved one conflict for me. I didn't have to choose between Nora and Lara, or Nora and Suzanne. I could have all three. I suddenly heard Asa's voice in my ear. I really didn't have any problems, did I? 99% of the people in the world would trade places with me in two seconds. My mother's old advice came through again - what's the worst that could happen? I could have to take M408D again, and find another elective to take in another semester that I can do better at than linguistics. I could deal with that.
Suddenly the car turned itself north and I put my foot in it. Now I felt like planning and working instead of fretting. Just relax, do your best, and let things happen, Robbie. Right after finals, I want to have some wild college days with Saskia and Rene' and Rene'. It will be good for me. I can do my level best on my exams and then let it all hang out, plus I feel like I have a duty to Saskia to let some of her fantasies become reality. I can do that. I need a little help from Suzanne, but I think she will do that for me. I want to give Lynn Da Britain a few bachelorette party thrills too, but I haven't convinced her yet. Husky Varna is on board to help. A goal for my next semester in Austin? Isn't Country Chrissy on the schedule for next fall too? I should go for it!
Uh oh! Do I also have a duty to Suzanne to help some of her fantasies come true? I suppose I do. Fuzzy logic time. I assign a high degree of truth to the fuzzy idea that Suzanne just wants a big thrill, and is not looking to replace me. I also think she just wants to try it once, not develop a whole new lifestyle. So, if she does it to the fullest extent possible once, maybe she won't want to try it again. If she just tries it sort of half-way, and it isn't a big thrill, she might be driven to try it again. And again. Ergo, I should do my best to give her the best possible thrill, and hope that it is enough for her to let go of the idea in the future, and make it a "one time thrill".
My fuzzy ideas form into a concrete and very physical plan in just a few seconds. It will be like what we did for Millie, but more intense, more real, and much more personal for me. For Suzanne, too, I suppose. I have a few calls to make. Just airtight or airtight ski jump?
+++++++++++++++++++
Lara returned from all her legal excursions, and the Friday night before finals began found Nora leading a review session for the class she TA'd for, and Suzanne in Waco for a soccer game. So, it was Lara and I alone together, for the first time in a while. She wanted to go back to the Mexican place up on Burnet Road for dinner, which we did. We were early enough to get a good booth on the patio, and I enjoyed the incredulous looks from the other patrons as we were seated. Lara was feeling expansive, and in the warm weather she chose a scoop neckline sleeveless dress that looked a bit like a pastel colored curtain across the Grand Canyon between her very ample breasts. Her blonde hair was up in a big bouffant kind of thing, and she looked seven feet tall, perfectly made up, and hot as a nuclear reactor core with all the rods pulled out.
The waiter remembered Lara, not at all surprising, and even recalled that I was the "Habanero Gringo" with the hot woman, and got the hot sauce just right. Some chips with this perfect salsa, plus cabrito liberally doused with same should get me in the perfect state for high fidelity Suzie signal reception and fully prepared for treating Lara right later tonight. Right for Lara was a little rougher and required more effort than most girls, but I was happy to work hard for her. Duty calls.
I just smiled and took in the sights as she updated me on her travels. She had enjoyed the seminar, and the law school interview visits, and had already received acceptance letters from all her backup schools. She could now relax and just hope that a late acceptance to one of her 'big three' would turn up. I was willing to help her relax.
+++++++++++++++++++
Maybe it was just relaxing and not worrying so much, or the last-minute review with Esmeralda Estigoy, but my Math 408D final went pretty well. I was on the border line between high C and low B. I could live with that. Husky Varna got a middle C and he was ecstatic. Linguistics was a bigger surprise.
The 'normal' portion of the test was pretty much like the previous exams that Husky had given me, so I did okay on that part. But there also was a high value essay question on how linguistics was relevant in modern scientific thought, and thanks to Asa and Dr. Augie's lecture, I could go on and on about fuzzy logic, neural communications, and the potential symbolic manipulation of quantum entanglement, and the professor ate it up! He had not attended Dr. Augie's lecture, plus I had a little insight of my own to add. He made a personal note on my exam, and gave me an A in the class. Hoo Hah! There was now no need to find another elective, or worry about my overall GPA.
Saskia gave me an A in conditioning, albeit for only one credit hour, and I got a B in Engineering Physics, and an A in embedded systems, plus several major improvements to the Arduino programs on my car. All in all, I was fucking ecstatic about this semester. And I was now determined to do some ecstatic fucking to celebrate.
A message popped up from Cisco. He had somehow learned to manipulate the SMS servers such that in any group message, he got his copy first before anyone else, and often his reply would come through BEFORE I got the original message. I suppose that was a great way to demonstrate his hacker cred, but it was irritating to have to re-read the 'stream' below his reply to figure out which message in the sequence that Cisco was replying to, since the order they were displayed in was no longer strictly chronological, thanks to Cisco's meddling.
I suppose I had to take the good with the bad since his skills (with some social engineering help from Suzanne, Mei Ling, and Millie) had helped take Lara's window humiliation video off the AG website, and his continued vigilance assured me that whatever escapades Kevin and I planned for the condo out a Horseshoe Bay would remain private. Which reminds me - it's time to talk to Suzanne about Saskia's little end of semester party, which also may include her admirer from the med school and the trainee 'twins' Rene' and Rene'.
+++++++++++++++++++
Lara and Nora were enthusiastic about my party plan, but Suzanne smiled at me in an almost predatory way. I could feel a negotiation about to commence. Lara and Nora headed out to for an end of semester ritual to return some textbooks at the coop, while Suzanne and I stayed in Lara's apartment.
"So, let me get this straight, My Animal." She paused and put her tongue on her upper lip, and waited for me to notice.
"This will make how many times I have helped you make some other woman's fantasy come true?"
She ticked them off on her fingers. "First Lara, then Millie, Strelsa, Nora, Candy, Veronica Tappert, and now potentially Saskia, the postdoc M.D. who is hot for her, and the two hot personal trainers, with Little Marilyn and Big Liz waiting in the wings I am only a published PhD candidate economist, not an engineer, but I can do sums, and I count at least a dozen women who have had, or are about to have you arrange and help act out their sexual fantasies for them."
Even I knew not to say a word about my plans for Lynn Da Britain and Doctor Doolittle, Country Chrissy, and the Tennis Twins.
Suzanne continued. "I am not at all bitter, as I thoroughly enjoyed myself, and them. But, I can also think of one very noble and deserving woman, whom you claim to love, who has not had the benefit of such an effort on your part, even though she has been totally open and honest with you about everything!" She batted her eyelashes dramatically.
I knew I could not avoid the subject anymore. "Perhaps I should arrange a little prank for you, too?"
She feigned a shocked look. "Six guys would be excessive, Robbie. My fantasies center around three, maybe four for good measure, or in case someone doesn't" she paused dramatically, "... last." I took it as a given that she would have no problem with - lasting. The look in her eyes was scary and her Suzie signals suddenly sizzled like frying bacon - like white noise on all frequencies at once. In her case, it was more properly called pink noise, concentrated in certain yet unsatisfied frequency bands, I supposed.
She suddenly sounded a bit challenging, like Red Rock Tappert. "Surprise me, My Animal, if you can." She rested her tongue on her upper lip and sneered. She was a lot prettier than Rock Tappert, but it still made me mad. I decided to rock her world a bit, to see if she could stand it. To see if I could stand it, too, I supposed.
+++++++++++++++++++
ESU's Canvas 'electronic blackboard' class management system 'people' page from Saskia's conditioning class got me email addresses for both Rene' and Rene', and I invited them to a 'private training session' at Lara's, making it clear there would be several instructors, both male and female, and that they would have to perform exactly as those instructors specified, or be punished. They would in fact be punished in either case. Both responded quickly and enthusiastically.
