Stripped

by Mia Archer

  And then it hit me.

  I didn't know it could feel like this. It had been so long. Sex had become mechanical for me. Something I did because I needed a release. Not something that I did because it was an experience to share with another person.

  Only this was an experience I was sharing with Taylor. This was our bodies coming together. This was the ultimate pleasure washing over me and through me as I squeezed my eyes shut and stars danced in the blackness waiting on the other side of my eyelids.

  Her heavy breathing joined mine. Our quiet cries filled the room. I wondered if her neighbors might hear, and I didn't give a fuck. No, all I cared about was this moment. This shared experience with Taylor. This perfect moment of bliss.

  When I came down sparks still danced all over my body. Little moments of pleasure captured in time. Frozen in a memory that I knew it was going to stay with me for the rest of my life.

  Things could change, this could end up not working out between us, but I had that memory. That moment.

  I wrapped my arms around her. Pulled her in for a kiss. My tongue pressed into her mouth, and then I wanted to press my tongue into other parts of her.

  I needed her. Needed to feel her.

  Needed to taste her.

  "Are you ready Taylor?" I asked, my voice husky. Full of longing and need. I needed this more than I'd needed any sexual experience ever.

  She seemed to realize exactly what I was talking about. Her own body was shivering and shuddering and shaking. She took in a breath and let it out in a soft moan. A quiet gasp.

  Yeah, she knew what was about to happen.

  And so I kissed down. Pulled up her tank top until she was exposed, but I didn't stop there. Her body, her breasts, were every bit as perfect as I knew from our experience in the private dance room at work, but I wanted more. I wanted something that I didn't get that night.

  I wanted her.

  And so I kissed down, down, and I found beauty, perfection, waiting for me.

  I paused. Looked up at her. My hands were hooked in her underwear and I could see her chest rising and falling and above it all were those gorgeous eyes staring down at me and the desire was clear. The need was clear. It was obvious this was everything she'd been hoping for when she invited me over tonight and then some.

  "Do you want me to?" I asked.

  "Yes," she breathed.

  "I want to hear you beg for it," I said, a mischievous smile coming to my lips.

  She blinked and fixed me with a smile of her own. "I want you Jasmine. So bad. More than I've wanted anyone…"

  Well then. How could I argue with an invitation as heartfelt as all that?

  I couldn't, and so I moved down, down…

  13

  Taylor

  "Thank you for calling technical support. I hope you have a wonderful day!"

  “And I hope you’ll go fuck your…"

  I reached out and tapped the button that put an end to the call before they could tell me exactly what they hoped I’d go fuck. Even that nasty attitude wasn't enough to bring me down. Not after everything that had happened recently.

  I sat there smiling for a moment, a warm glow all over me, before I realized there were more calls in the queue.

  Even the normally frustrating sight of a bunch of calls waiting for me wasn't enough to steal my sunshine. Not today. Not after what I’d enjoyed the night before.

  No, I was on a high that I'd been enjoying for a week now. I couldn't wait until I got to see Jasmine again.

  "How are things going?" I heard a familiar voice ask. I turned around and there were both Stephen and Dan looking down at me with grins of their own.

  I didn't even care that they were supposed to be in their own cubicles answering calls. The customers could wait. It's not like we were going to get fired or anything for ignoring them for a little while.

  "Things are going pretty great!" I said.

  Dan winked. "And is there any reason in particular why things are going so great for you?"

  I couldn't help it. I still had a stupid grin on my face. It would be pretty fucking obvious to anyone who looked at me exactly what was going on here, and I didn't care.

  "Maybe things are going well," I said. "What's it to you?”

  Then someone else appeared over my cubicle wall and I felt my good mood falter for the first time. Jason stared down at me with a grin that wasn't pleasant. Then again his grins never were pleasant.

  My smile went down. Not quite into a frown, but I wasn't exactly happy to see him either. Not that I was ever exactly happy to see him.

  "What do you want Jason?" I asked.

  "I always see you guys having powwows over here," he said. "I figured I’d see what all the fuss is about for a change."

  "Don't bother," I said.

  The only problem? Right before I could give him the same advice that client had just given me Dan was grinning and spilling his guts. Damn it. Dan never could pick up on anything. So annoying!

  "We were just having a conversation here about Taylor's love life," he said.

  Jason's eyebrows shot up. "Your love life? Really? I was under the impression there wasn't much of anything going on there."

  "What's going on in my love life is none of your damn business," I spat at him.

  Jason held his hands up in a clearly defensive move if I'd ever seen one. And I’d seen it plenty of times from him. He was one of those special brands of asshole who loved pushing people to the edge and then tried to dial it back and act like it was just a big joke or something.

  "Whoa there," he said. "I was just making friendly conversation. Isn't that what we were doing here?"

  Stephen and Dan at least had the good grace to look a little embarrassed. Dan also seemed to realize, too late, that maybe he’d said too much. Then again Dan was always realizing too late that maybe he'd said too much.

  "It's okay," I said, not wanting him to get to the point of accusing me of being an asshole for pointing out that he was being an asshole.

  That particular bit of logic had always drove me wild, but I wasn't going to give him an opening.

  "There's really nothing to talk about," I said.

  "No seriously," Jason said. "Are we talking about that girl you met at the club?"

  I opened my mouth again to tell him it was none of his damn business, but that would only give him another opening. So I figured I'd tell him as little as I could get away with.

  "Maybe," I said.

  "Congrats!" he said, looking almost sincere for a moment.

  I was immediately on guard. Sincerity from Jason was something to watch out for. Sincerity for him was another tool in his arsenal of causing trouble for people.

  "What are you going to say?" I asked.

  "What are you talking about?" he asked.

  "We both know how this works," I said. "You act like you're actually interested in whatever someone is saying and then you come out with some little smartass remark that turns it all around. So why don't we skip the small talk and you can get right down to it?”

  The smile faltered on Jason's face. Then it disappeared entirely. His eyes narrowed and he shook his head.

  "Fine. If you want to be like that. Have you ever stopped to think about what that might look like for your career?" he asked.

  "I surely don't know what you're talking about," I said.

  He looked at Dan and Stephen who were both making a big production of looking anywhere but at me. Obviously I wasn't going to get any help from that direction.

  "I mean dating a stripper," he said. "Sure maybe she's working her way through college or something. It seems like they always are. But you can't trust them, and that wouldn’t look good for a professional such as yourself to be seen with that kind of person."

  I bristled at what he was insinuating. Not only was he insulting Jasmine, but he was also insulting me by extension. Yeah, suddenly telling him to do what the customer had just advised me to do didn't seem harsh enough.


  No, insulting him wasn't good enough. What I really wanted to do was launch myself across the cubicle and claw his eyes out. I didn't know what it was about this guy that always got under my skin, but he was doing it now and I wanted to hurt him.

  "I think you need to leave. Now," I said.

  "I'm just trying to give you some things to think about," he said. "What if news about something like that got back to the owner?"

  "Is that supposed to be a threat or something?"

  Again he did the whole routine holding up his hands and looking like he was completely innocent, but the implied threat was more than enough.

  Not that I gave a damn about any threat he might want to make. After all, I was falling head over heels for Jasmine. There was never any question that I would abandon her because of some asshole at work threatening me.

  No, it was one of those superpowers of being gay. Not giving a fuck what anyone thought about your love life. At least that's how I’d learned to adapt to growing up in an environment where people looked down on me for who I decided to date.

  Next to that the idea of someone looking down on me and for dating a stripper was nothing.

  "You can go and do what you want," I said, my voice suddenly quiet. "But if I ever hear of you breathing a word of this to anyone at this office like it's a bad thing I can promise you I'm going to personally make sure you're never able to have children. I'll be doing the world a favor."

  "Hey you…"

  I talked right over him. I wasn't interested in hearing anything the asshole had to say.

  "Then again as long as we’re talking about love lives maybe I shouldn’t worry about you reproducing. You’d have to convince a girl to go on a second date for that to happen, right?"

  His frown deepened. “Fuck you too!"

  He turned and stomped off. I was sure he was probably going to start spreading rumors as soon as he could. The guy was more of a yenta than most of the women in this place.

  "Well that went well," Dan said.

  "Yeah," I replied. "No thanks to you knights in shining armor coming to my defense."

  "Hey. When it comes to you and Jason getting into it with each other it's a good idea to stay the fuck away."

  I rolled my eyes. "You guys really need to grow a pair. He's going to get promoted someday if you don't stand up to him and then what are you going to do?"

  "He's never getting promoted," Dan said.

  “Says you," I replied.

  "Did you ever think there was something to what he said?" Stephen asked.

  "I'm going to go ahead and pretend I didn't hear that," I said.

  "Right," Stephen said. "Forget I said it."

  "Besides," I continued. "Can you imagine Mr. Anderson ever saying something to me? He doesn't give a fuck what anyone does in their personal life, and Jason sure shouldn't give a fuck about what anyone does in their personal life."

  "She's got a point Stephen," Dan said. "We really should complain about him. Heck you should complain to HR about this Taylor.”

  "I don't want to cause any trouble," I said. "I just want him to leave me alone."

  "And getting on him for harassing you about who you date sounds like just the way to do that," Dan said. "Anyways, we have to get back to work. Think about it though."

  I did think about it. I thought about it as I went through our ticketing system. I was so frustrated after the argument with Jason that I didn't feel up to getting on the phones and talking with our often frustrating clients. My good mood was torpedoed, and I knew if I started talking to a difficult client I’d probably say something that really could end up causing trouble and maybe getting me fired.

  I managed to not pay attention to about four different tickets before I realized I actually did need to do something about Jason this time around. It had been awhile since I'd gone to HR, but she’d always been pretty good about having my back.

  Even if Gwen didn’t do something this time around, at least I’d have it on the record that he was up to his shenanigans. That was something.

  So I logged out of the system. Sighed and looked across the way to the HR office. It wasn't even much of an HR office. Just Gwen who mostly took care of the paychecks, but I'd seen her come down on people causing trouble in the office like a ton of bricks.

  I walked over and Gwen smiled as she saw me at the door.

  "Taylor!" she said in her sweet old lady voice. "How can I help you today? Is something wrong?"

  "Maybe," I said. "Then again maybe not. You see it's about Jason…"

  Her eyes narrowed at the mention of Jason. She sighed and rolled her eyes in a look that was decidedly at odds with the sweet old grandma vibe she gave off. She went from sweet old lady to HR hawk in an instant, and that made me think this wasn't the first time she'd had this sort of trouble recently.

  "What did that asshole do this time?" she asked, then put a hand over her mouth as she realized, too late, exactly what she'd said.

  I couldn't help but smile. Both because of how ridiculous it was to see this sweet old lady swearing and because now I knew she’d probably be on my side if they'd been having trouble.

  Ten minutes later I emerged from Gwen’s office feeling a heck of a lot better than I did before I went in there. Dan had been absolutely right, as much as it galled me to admit when he was right. I needed to talk to HR.

  She hadn't offered anything dramatic like an immediate move to discipline him or fire him or anything, but she did let me know she'd been getting complaints about his behavior and this latest incident would be added to his file to be addressed if it continued to be an issue.

  Basically he needed to be on his best behavior moving forward if he wanted to avoid any kind of trouble. I could live with that.

  By the time I got back to my desk everything was sunshine and rainbows again. I pulled up a picture of me and Jasmine I'd taken on my phone over the weekend. And I blushed as I thought of some of the things we'd done just an hour before we took that picture.

  I hadn’t known it could feel like that with someone else, but now that it had happened with her I wanted more of it.

  Yeah, I was falling for this girl and I was willing to do a lot to make sure everything continued to go well. And if that meant getting into someone's face at work because he was being an asshole? Well that was part of the price of admission.

  I forced myself to lock my phone. Put it on my desk.

  I could spend the entire workday staring at that picture of the two of us smiling into my phone, and I needed to avoid that. There actually was work to be done, after all.

  So reluctantly I hopped back into the queue and got ready for the remainder of a fun day dealing with people who should know better by now, but all of that was made better by the knowledge that soon enough the night would come, and with that came the possibility that Jasmine would give me a call and see if I wanted to hang out.

  14

  Jasmine

  "Well hello there," Tiffany said as I sat down in front of the mirror.

  I shot her a warning glance. "Now's not the time Tiffany."

  "What are you talking about?" she asked. "Why should I be making a big deal out of anything?"

  "Tiffany…"

  "You've just been out late almost every night this week, and a couple of days ago you didn't come home at all…"

  A couple of girls looked up and grinned. By now the rumor of how I’d gone off with a girl for a private dance all by my lonesome had gotten around.

  I guess that was news around these here parts. Especially since the only time I ever went back for a private dance was usually when one of those previously mentioned couples wasn't coming through looking for their walk on the wild side.

  Going back with a girl all alone was new. Out of the ordinary. Completely out of character for me.

  I blushed thinking about some of the things we'd done back there. I blushed thinking about some of the things we'd done at Taylor's apartment.

  I wasn't ashamed of any
of those things, mind you, but they still brought a blush to my face. It also sent a shiver running through me.

  "I don't see what the big deal is," I whispered.

  "No big deal," Tiffany said. "I was just wondering where my best friend disappeared to."

  I rolled my eyes and put down the makeup I was having absolutely no luck putting on because she kept distracting me.

  "Come on Tiffany," I said. "What about that time you disappeared for a week with no contact and it turned out you were busy banging a client?"

  Tiffany sniffed. "That's different. He offered to take me to Hawaii. I'd like to see you pass that up. Besides, he was cute."

  “I’d go off to Hawaii with a cute client," Carrie said.

  "Me too!" another piped up.

  "Well this is different," I said. "This is…"

  "This is what?" a voice said from the entrance.

  I closed my eyes and forced a couple of deep breaths. My pulse was racing and it wasn't racing in the good way that it did whenever I saw Taylor. No, this was the kind of racing that was caused purely by stress. The stress of hearing that voice.

  "Fuck off Tara," I said.

  "Oh," she said, sounding injured.

  I didn't turn around, but I could picture the look on her face. As though I'd done her grievous harm by telling her to fuck off even when most girls in the room were probably thinking the same damn thing.

  "You hurt my feelings!" she said.

  "You don't have feelings to hurt," I said. “No, scratch that. I guess anger and jealousy are feelings."

  "Last I checked they were," Tara said. "Though I don't know why you think I’d be jealous of you. God it must suck going through life knowing you're a freak."

  That was it. That did it. I knew she was trying to bait me, but I didn't care. I stood and whirled around to face her. A fire flashed in my eyes.

  "You take that back now you bitch," I hissed.

  Tara's eyes went wide. She was doing that thing that I hated. That thing where she pushed someone over the edge then acted like the person she pushed over the edge was the jerk even though she was the one who provoked it. I knew what she was doing but I didn't care.