Steve was hot. Not just because the lab was stuffy and warm in the extreme July weather. No, it wasn`t that. It was the fact that Ingrid, the Norwegian exchange student that he shared the lab with was wearing next to nothing due to the heat. Ingrid was the Goddess in Steve`s dreams, that usually ended with his sheets wet and sticky. They had shared this lab at the university for nearly 6 months now, but they had barely said three words to each other that were not work related apart from the cordial morning greetings or goodbyes at the end of the day.
The lab where Steve had worked for over seven years now, since his graduation, was part of the Biology department, and Steve`s speciality was Arachnida, or spiders for the common man. Every year there was a student assigned to assist him. This year it was Ingrid that had been sent to his small lab that was nearly in the basement. She hadn`t seemed so happy with the assignment, but Steve had to admit she was very proficient in everything he detailed her to do. His big problem was that she was absolutely gorgeous and her trim athletic body was on show spring, summer, autumn and Winter due to the heat caused by the heating lamps on the many tanks containing a multitude of specimens from around the world.
Steve was not a bad looking man. At twenty nine, his six foot frame was trim and his legs were muscled from cycling to and from the university. It was over six miles to his one room flat over an Indian restaurant in the city. He made the trip on his bike through rain, shine or even snow. His mop of brown hair was a bit unkempt as he tried to keep up the crazy professor image. His nose was slightly bent from falling down the stairs at home, when he was ten. Behind stylish silver rimmed glasses his brown eyes sparkled with a mischief that was never fulfilled.
Looking as he did, Steve should have had his fair share of girlfriends. However, he was painfully shy. He had had a long term relationship with Mary that lasted two years. Mary and he had had sex. Not often, but enough to satisfy his carnal needs. Then came the hammer blow. She walked out one day and went to live with some rugby player in Cardiff. That wasn`t the problem for Steve though. It was her parting words as she walked out the door, "Steve. You are so fucking boring. Sometimes when we fucked I nearly fell asleep. There is more to sex than just pumping in and out a few times and then shooting your load. No woman will want to have sex with you like that!"
Those words had stuck in his mind for the past two years fuelling his possible shame and embarrassment about what might happen should he ever once more get close enough to a woman, or if he dated someone and sex would be the next step.
Whenever he was around women, and especially good looking women like Ingrid he became so introverted that it was painful for him to even talk, and unless the conversation was work related he was left tongue-tied.
Steve glanced surreptitiously at Ingrid once more. Her blonde hair was cut in a bob style that framed a round face with full lips and bright blue eyes. Her thin neck led downwards to pert, smallish breasts that were today encased in a small green halter top with no bra. Her flat stomach rested just above the waist of a short denim skirt that hardly covered her lady parts and she had tanned legs that seemed to go on for ever. Her feet sported stylish white sneakers.
Steve was startled out of his voyeurism as the door to the lab swung open. There was no knock before, as was detailed on a paper that Steve had written and taped to the door. Jerry the mail boy basically bounced into the room. Jerry had a personality that was the exact opposite to Steve. Always laughing and flirting with the girls and women throughout the facility as he made his rounds.
Jerry was about twenty three, so the same age as Ingrid. Steve watched with frustration as her eyes lit up at Jerry`s arrival and his greeting of, "Hello Darling. How`s my beautiful Ingrid this wonderful sunny day?" was met with a smile that Steve could only dream of eliciting from the Norwegian girl.
She replied in her soft accented voice that Steve had masturbated about on many an occasion, "I am very wonderful thank you Jerry. How are you? What do you have for us?"
"Just one box today lovely," Jerry said handing her a small box about ten centimetres square. "It's from Brazil judging by the stamps. Very exotic!" he continued.
Steve let all of his frustrations out as he said sharply, "Thank you Jerry. Please pass it over here. And Jerry. How many times must I tell you to bloody knock in case we are doing something sensitive?"
Still looking at Ingrid, and giving her a knowing wink he said, "Sorry Steve. I forgot. I wouldn`t mind doing something sensitive with Ingrid here!"
Now Steve actually shouted, "Get out Jerry! Before we have a sexual harassment case pending!"
Both Ingrid and Jerry laughed at his outburst, and with a loud, "See you later gorgeous!" Jerry was gone and the door clicked shut behind him.
They never got many visitors in the lab as nobody was really that interested in "Spiderman", as Steve was not very inventively nicknamed. So Steve and Ingrid were left to continue working alone. Their main area of research was in preparing antidotes for the venom of breeds of spiders that could administer poisonous bites.
Ingrid walked over to Steve and he couldn`t help but stare as her braless breasts swayed free in the small halter top. He was sure that she had noticed, as she had swung her hips more than was necessary and she smiled at his discomfort and pink cheeks. She handed Steve the box and returned to her own work station.
Steve knew what was in the box as he had been waiting for it. The university had sent a research team to the Amazon this year and the students had found a species of spider that was until now unknown. This box should contain a specimen for Steve to classify and to run some tests on the venom to see if it was dangerous or not.
Carefully opening the box with a Stanley knife he pulled open the box and removed the clear plastic container. Steve was amazed when he saw not one spider, as he had expected, but about twenty or twenty five. The spiders were small and the specimen had obviously given birth en-route from Brazil. Studying the "mother" he saw she was about one centimetre long with a brown hairy body with a yellow V pointing towards her head. The eight legs were also around one centimetre long and the fangs were very pronounced for such a small spider. Laying the box down Steve took up a book from the desk and flipped through the pages trying to find a similar species amongst the hundreds catalogued on its pages.
Steve had no fear of spiders, and in fact he had been fascinated with them for years. He had quite a large private collection in his small flat. This fact would also not help him with any prospective bed mates he thought to himself with sadness.