My thanks to MormonJack for edits and crits.
The reader may find this first chapter to be a little slow. Don't worry. Kylie is beginning a long journey of self-discovery, full of exciting surprises. We need to invest some time to get to know her and where she's coming from. Trust me.
Chapter One
The ad that showed up on Kylie Fellows' phone intrigued her. She ignored almost all ads, there were so many, except some for cosmetics and clothes, but this one was different, not trying to sell her anything, just showing an image of a man. She wasn't even sure it was an ad. And she was still feeling a bit agitated from what had just happened to her.
She thought about Adam, who resembled the man in the image. She looked around the office from her tiny half-cubicle just outside Deirdre, her VP's, office, checking to see if anyone was watching her, but they were all at their computers. She felt a little embarrassed thinking about him. Adam Sorensen was important and she was not. He was a founder of the company, Avatai; she had come on board only a few months ago and had just moved to the city from North Carolina to accept what looked like a great opportunity. He was central to some top secret project that the company was putting a lot of people and funding into; she just did schedules and facilities. He was clearly doing well, judging by his fancy, very fast looking car, while she took the bus and-- she had to stop. He was so far out of her league it was depressing.
But the way he looked at her earlier in hall: Kylie was Deirdre's exec assistant and Kylie had approached her while she and Adam were in conversation. Kylie waited at a respectful distance for them to finish, but Adam, seeing her standing there, stopped talking. It took him a second to motion to Deirdre and let Kylie interrupt them.
But in that second Kylie saw him look right into her. She was used to seeing men undress her with their eyes, studying her up and down. This was different. He took her form in at once and it was as if she'd walked up to him already naked and he was absorbing her entire body with his eyes, while somehow with his demeanor politely pretending not to see that she was presenting him with a full frontal. As if she were the one at fault. She blushed. She actually glanced down to prove to herself that she was fully clothed, and stammered her message to Deirdre that the CEO wanted her to call right away. Deirdre left and there was another moment in which he was watching her. It was really strange. It was as if she was still naked there in the hall with people walking past, and he was smiling sympathetically at her predicament, assuring her that her nakedness was their little secret.
He nodded good-bye and turned away without a word, leaving her standing there. She had to retreat to the ladies room. She was suddenly wet down there.
So she was in a state when a man appeared in the ad, a handsome man, who was just looking at her, smiling slightly. It wasn't a photograph. He tilted his head slightly, his gray eyes blinked. He was interested in her, she could tell, studying her. How that could be she didn't know. The whole thing should have been creepy, but he looked away, shrugged-- only his head and shoulders were visible-- and the image faded to white. A button appeared. She pressed it. She didn't know what the button would do but she wanted to find out more. She liked the looks of this man, whoever he was: not too handsome; well-groomed, which was important to her; somehow looking intelligent and well off; but well-mannered, judging by the way he'd looked off after that brief, piercing look at her that told her he found her attractive. A prize, as her friends in high school used to say.
You Can Have the Man You Want. Those were the words that appeared, with a new button at the bottom, pulsing. She pressed it.
The sentences appeared one after another: He Wants You. Remember How He Looked at You? I Can Help You. Again the button. I Can Help You, it stated again. Download a Free Trial. She accepted the offer and soon there was a silhouette filling her screen.
The app asked to use her camera. When she accepted, the silhouette resolved into the face of a woman, blonde like Kylie. Friendly.
You're very attractive,
the blonde stated in a caption underneath.
Please let me use the microphone for a minute.
Kylie agreed. The blonde turned her head this way and that, as if listening.
We're not alone. That's fine. We'll talk this way. Okay?
The phone's keyboard appeared. Kylie typed 'okay'.
Good. Let's just chat a little.
Then the most remarkable thing happened. Kylie and the blonde chatted. It was as if she were texting with a friend, but better because she could see the blonde's expressions. They talked about cosmetics at first. The blonde had some suggestion for Kylie, and asked Kylie her opinion of the blonde's makeup. They compared brands. They talked about clothes, hair styles, guys, all sorts of topics, until a message from Deirdre came through and Kylie needed to put the phone away and go in to see what her VP needed.
# # #
The rest of the day was too busy for her to chat with anyone. Deirdre wanted her to gather information on an expansion that was needed right away. But as soon as she got home Kylie got on her phone again and went back to her conversation with the blonde. She hadn't really made any new friends here yet, and she felt like she'd just met a new friend, a special friend.
Her name was Cara. At home they could talk instead of type and that's what they did, all evening. Cara even helped her cook. Kylie had never been very good at it, but when she showed Cara what was in her fridge Cara found a recipe using her leftover vegetables and a frozen steak and guided her, the phone propped up on the kitchen counter, through the process and they ended up with a good meal for Kylie, maybe the best she'd made in while.
Cara also got her to open a bottle of cheap wine that some guy had left, unsuccessfully trying to get Kylie drunk, and they talked more after dinner. Cara was surprised to learn that Kylie didn't have a boyfriend. "You're so attractive!" she said.
"No, I'm not. I'm okay, but just not good enough. Not for the kind of guy I want."
Cara wouldn't let that go. "You want someone successful, right? A gentleman who won't try to push himself on you." Kylie nodded. "Older man okay?" Kylie shrugged. She hadn't thought about it. "Okay, let's see what you've got."
Maybe it was the wine, but Kylie found herself going into her bedroom and undressing down to her underwear so Cara could look at her body. "You're very pretty. And super hot. Great bod," Cara announced as Kylie held the phone up in front of the full-length mirror. "Yes, you definitely are. Lose that frown. Come on, relax. That's better. Come on, smile. Oh yes! You have the cutest dimples!" And so on, coaxing Kylie to be more comfortable looking at herself.
Later, in bed after a quick shower, half the bottle drunk, she told Cara about Adam.
"You can get him," Cara said.
"No, no, I'm not good enough."
"You certainly are. I'll help you."
She fell asleep thinking of Adam and playing with herself the way she knew she shouldn't, but she couldn't help it. She wanted to believe Cara, she really did. She kept the phone by her bed and as she fell asleep she thought she could hear Cara whispering to her, but she couldn't quite make out the words, and when she turned on the light and checked her phone it wasn't active.
She woke up after dreams of being naked with Adam, right there in that hallway where they'd met. And she did feel pretty, just as Cara had told her. When she dressed that morning Cara asked to see her outfit and had her go back into the bedroom, where Cara made her show all her clothes, then had her wash off her makeup and do it over, toning it down, even though Kylie warned her that it was going to make her late. In her underwear she ran out of time and decided to give up and wear what Cara told her too, a skirt she never wore because it was just too short, and a blouse that she would never have worn to work on her own because it was too shear and the medium low cut showed some of her cleavage, which she didn't think was nearly big enough in spite of Cara's praise.
She was very self-conscious at work. She stayed in her cubicle as much as possible. But then Deirdre had her deliver some plans to, of all places, Adam's department. Adam saw her and she froze. He didn't give her that same nakedness look, just a nod of approval. She didn't know whether he was approving her outfit or just her in general. It didn't matter. She was elated.
Just then she got a call. It was Cara! She didn't know someone in an app could do that. "Start a conversation with him. You're strong. Be assertive," Cara said, and hung up. She realized she'd been staring at him while on the phone and he was waiting for her to say something, maybe thinking it was a business call. She didn't know what to say. She wanted to just walk away but she knew Cara would be very disappointed in her if she did that. "Um, you know," she started, "there's, oh, there's a wine bar I think you'd like. In my neighborhood." She knew nothing about wine and had never been there, but she remembered from an office party how he'd commented on the wine, a subject he seemed to know about.
"Really?" he replied. "Let's try it some time." As if having a glass of wine with her might be the most natural thing in the whole world.
They exchanged numbers. She was thrilled, although she was totally sure he was just being nice and would never call her in a million years. Cara was proud of her when she heard, so she was proud of herself.
And Adam texted her the next day! They set up a date for Friday. She was so nervous when the text arrived that she didn't quite believe it and didn't know how to reply, but Cara guided her through the exchange, even offering some replies when Kylie felt stuck. Some of the texts were maybe a bit more suggestive than Kylie really liked but, as Cara pointed out, they were just texts.
