by Mimi Strong
To my disappointment, the only places that were of interest to me, a couple of cute clothing boutiques, were just closing up for the day.
Smith approached the gray-haired woman pulling in a rolling rack of clothes.
“Are you the owner?” he asked.
Her eyes narrow with suspicion, she said, “Maybe.”
He pulled his wallet from his pocket and plucked out some bills. “How'd you like to triple your day's sales?”
She laughed and told him to put the money away. “I can stay a bit longer. Just pay for whatever ya like, hun.”
“This is my niece,” he said, putting his arm around my shoulders as we followed the woman into the boutique.
I reached out to shake the woman's hand just as Smith said, “My niece doesn't speak English. Not a word.”
I smiled and nodded.
The woman spoke loudly, enunciating every word, “NICE TO MEET you sweetheart!”
“She takes naps in the woods,” Smith said, twirling one finger around his ear. “Cuckoo.”
I turned my back to them so she wouldn't see me smirking.
“She doesn't have any grown-up clothes,” he said. “I want to take her out for dinner, but she's a disaster, as you can see.”
“We'll fix her up,” the woman said.
I was already doing fine on my own, but she buzzed around the small shop, pulling out fabulous things I would never have noticed if she hadn't held them up.
I tried on an armload of outfits, each thing more appealing than the last. How long had it been since I bought new clothes? My most recent acquisitions had been from the Lost-n-Found box at the laundromat. Paying off student loan debt was a higher priority than pretty things… though pretty things certainly had their appeal. Had my legs always looked so curvy in a skirt?
Smith looked at each outfit and then he chose which pile to put the items in. He said he was paying, so who was I to argue? Besides, apparently, I didn't speak a word of English.
The woman took away the dirtied-up clothes I'd come in wearing, and I settled on a black denim mini-skirt and a cornflower-blue blouse with ruffles to wear out of there. The outfit was dressy, but just casual enough it didn't seem crazy paired with my sneakers.
Instead of us having to haul a big bag of clothes back up to the cabin, Smith made arrangements for my clothes to get delivered the next day, along with our groceries. Ah, so that explained how the food got there. Apparently, the delivery boy had a motorcycle—a dirt bike—that he rode the trails with.
Smith took me for dinner at a cozy place, an old house that had been converted into a restaurant that defined the word quaint. The building was still divided into several rooms, each containing hints of the room's former life. The hostess tried to seat us in the nursery, but Smith wrinkled his nose and said it wasn't to his liking. She steered us all the way to the back of the place, to a former mudroom with big multi-paned windows overlooking the back yard.
“Perfect,” he said, grinning broadly. “My cousin Sandy and I will dine in the mudroom.”
We sat at the antique-looking table, and he pointed up to the ceiling, which was covered in silk flowers and feathers.
“Now that's just ridiculous,” I said, giggling. “I love it.”
The mudroom was decorated with a variety of footwear running up and down the walls, but with the evening sun filtering in through the wisteria vines covering the window panes, the place was as golden and romantic as anywhere I'd ever been.
He reached for my hand across the table and grasped my fingertips gently. “You look so beautiful tonight. The shirt matches your eyes, and your creamy skin is positively glowing.”
“Thanks,” I said, feeling the flush of my cheeks turning red.
With my free hand, I rubbed the spot on my leg where he'd pinched me. It was up high enough that the skirt covered it, but I'd noticed a bruise forming when I was in the changing room.
Our waitress came in and rattled off a long list of things that sounded French. Smith nodded knowingly and asked a dozen questions about the wine list. It hit me: I was nervous because I was completely outclassed. He was a bestselling author, and if memory served me correctly, he'd already been wealthy from business endeavors even before he started writing.
And who was I? A barely-middle-class girl with freckles and a pile of student loan debt. I didn't know what all the various-sized forks laid out in front of me were for. I knew one was for salad, and one for the main course, but there were more than two.
Smith had let go of my hand when the waitress came in, and I was wringing a napkin nervously on my lap.
The waitress turned and asked me which wine I'd prefer.
“You decide,” I said, smiling at Smith. “I think sometimes you know what I want before even I do.”
The waitress grinned and said, “Have you two been dating long?” Apparently the hostess hadn't passed along Smith's fib that we were cousins.
“No,” I said. “We're not—”
“Less than a month,” he said, beaming. “We met scuba diving and she saved my life.”
The waitress tilted her head. “Aww!”
“Yes,” I said, kicking him under the table. “That was really… unbelievable. Like something out of a book.”
“Or a movie,” the waitress said. “I love the meet-cute.”
“He barfed,” I said.
“Sweetie!” He pretended to be shocked and embarrassed.
The waitress giggled, each little laugh making her look more stupid to me and more interesting to Smith.
Grinning, Smith took another look over the wine list and made his selection, then ordered food for both of us.
After the waitress left, I said, “Thank you for ordering for me. I had no idea what anything was.”
He laughed, tipping his head back and filling the mudroom with his booming laughter.
I kicked him again. “Don't laugh at me.”
He frowned. “You're being silly. Who cares what some waitress thinks? As long as she doesn't think you're rude, and stick her dirty thumb in your food, it doesn't matter.”
“I guess. Easy for you to say, with your big wallet full of cash and your… good looks.”
Looking smug, he turned to look out the window at the lush green garden. “My good looks, you say? Do go on.”
“You're not bad-looking, for an older guy.”
“Ouch.”
“Smith, can I ask you a question?”
“You can ask me two. Now go ahead with the second one.”
The waitress came by with our wine, so I waited until we were alone, and said, “Is this how you wrote all your novels?”
He swirled his wine and stared into his glass. “You mean did I have sex with my other typists? Come now, I didn't ask you for your sexual history.” He leaned across the table with his glass raised in a toast. “To fresh stories.”
“To fresh stories.”
Despite my toast, I wasn't satisfied with Smith's answer. In the olden days, pre-internet, a woman would have to wait for a man to divulge his secrets, but these were not the dark ages. I had my cell phone with me. After we ate dinner, I excused myself to the washroom, where I did some web searches on his name.
It took me ages to find anything that wasn't a book review or a fluffy interview. What little I did find was not exactly what I wanted, but still illuminating.
I discovered that he preferred to write first drafts in his cabin in Vermont, which meant the cabin wasn't a brand-new thing. One article said he spent months researching his stories ahead of time and outlining them. That part was news to me, as I hadn't seen any notes or outlines at the cabin. I read on, to a quote from him, where he said he put away all his research when it came time to write the first draft, and went on his memory alone. He said that if an element of the book didn't stick in his memory, then it wasn't important enough to have in the book.
I found scant information about his personal life, except for a brief mention of his divorce, two years ago. I
found no mention of a new wife, which was a relief. The thought had crossed my mind that he could be married. I doubted any sane woman would send her husband off for two weeks in a cabin with a young secretary, but that didn't guarantee he wasn't doing it in secret.
Wife or no wife, was I still his secret? Was that why he introduced me to that woman as his niece, and then asked to sit at the very back of the restaurant?
My mind flitted around all the possibilities as I went to the sink and tidied up my hair. I appraised myself in the mirror. The blue blouse was flattering, and the clothes had that crisp look only brand-new things have. My skin really was glowing, and except for my sneakers, I looked like someone who mattered.
I calmly told myself, “It's just two weeks. Have some fun, earn some money, and make a few great memories. That's it. Two weeks.”
I freshened my lipstick, gave myself a winning smile, and left the washroom.
When I got back to the table, Smith was frowning at his cell phone. He held out his empty palm and said, “Dead battery already. Let me use yours.”
I handed him my phone from my purse and sat down, looking around at the wild décor. The sun was getting low on the horizon, making all the shadows long.
“I trust you found what you were looking for,” Smith said, and then he read out a few lines from the newspaper article I'd been reading about him.
“How dare you!”
I grabbed for my phone, but he pulled it out of reach. “Naughty girl. I'm confiscating this.”
“It's my damn phone, I'll look up whatever I want.”
He dropped my phone into a full glass of drinking water, spilling water over the edges of the glass.
I swore and grabbed it from the water.
“I'll buy you a new one,” he said. “I'll add the equivalent to your check. No, I'll double the replacement value, so you can't complain.”
I practically growled at him. “That was my phone. How dare you?”
Nonchalantly, he said, “It's in the contract. No accessing the internet for the duration of the contract. For my privacy and protection. It's a standard typist thing.”
“More like a power trip thing.” I shook the excess water out of the phone, wrapped it in my cloth napkin, and stuck the bundle in my purse. The poor thing seemed to be fried, but perhaps it would turn on once it dried out, or so I hoped.
“You agreed to the contract,” he said.
“You're an asshole.”
He shrugged. “That's like calling a woman a bitch. It's meaningless. Yes, I'm a man. I do man things. Does that make me an asshole, just because I'm not a woman?”
“Unbelievable.” I pushed back my chair. What could I do? Storm out? And then what? Sleep in the bus station that night until I could find a way out of town? No. Sleeping on a bench would only be punishing myself.
I'd return to the cabin that night and leave first thing in the morning.
Smith stood and walked out, not even waiting for me. I had to scurry to catch up with him.
Smith Fucking Wittingham, Asshole Novelist, kept up the brisk pace all the way back to the cabin. The sun was setting, and the last half mile was difficult to traverse in the dark. I kept stumbling, but refused to take his hand when offered.
“Fine, be that way,” he said with a chuckle.
Those were the only words exchanged the whole walk.
Back in the cabin, he put on water for tea and made himself comfortable on one of the three ample sofas in front of the large television. He started watching a new James Bond movie, and I was interested in watching the film, but couldn't bear sitting in the same room as Smith.
I went to my room, turned on my small television, and watched the cooking channel as I fumed.
In the morning, my rage had dissipated to a dull ache, like the lingering emotional hangover of a bad dream.
I accepted what I'd known subconsciously the night before: I would not forfeit my pay for the work I'd already done, not by leaving now.
I would stay the full two weeks and collect my pay. I would type the words, I would kill him with kindness, and I would not allow any further access to my body.
The day was gorgeous and sunny, just like the previous day. The air was moist, as though it had rained overnight. It was a fresh, new day, just waiting to be ruined.
Smith sat outside on the veranda, at a table set up with a generous breakfast for two, including the thick slices of ham I'd smelled as I was taking my shower.
I sat on the Adirondack chair adjacent to Smith and gave him my most sugary smile. “This is lovely,” I said through clenched teeth. “With all this wonderful food, we'll have a very productive day.”
He raised one eyebrow. “Decided the money was too good to pass up, did you?”
I poured a cup of tea from the teapot. “Whatever do you mean?”
“Just surprised you're still around.”
“Someone has to type your novel. Apparently, you're deficient in some way and cannot type it yourself.”
He laughed. “Deficient! That's a good one, Sheri.”
“Tori. My name is Tori.”
“Whatever.” He scratched his neck and gazed out at the small, tidy lawn and the trees beyond. He hadn't shaved since the first day, and the blond stubble gave him a disheveled, surly look.
He said, “You know what I'd really like? A Border Collie. They're smart and tenacious.”
“Do you have any pets back home?”
“I have no home.” He scratched his neck again. “I'd like a nice little bitch who comes when I call her.”
I nearly choked on the tea I was sipping. I set down the cup and filled my plate with scrambled eggs and toast, not commenting.
He continued, “A nice, submissive bitch. She'd roll on her back and show me her tummy like a good girl.”
“Sounds about your speed,” I said. “It would make you feel like such a big man to be around someone you're smarter than.”
“Maybe I'll get two, in that case.”
You're an asshole was what I wanted to say but didn't. I crossed my legs, surprised by the feeling that was happening between my legs. I was actually getting turned on by arguing with Smith, imagining the tickle of his stubbly chin on my body, his face between my legs. Why did he have to be so infuriating and also so sexy?
He continued, “If I had a Border Collie, I'd treat her like a princess. I'd brush her long hair and stroke her all over. I'd kiss her on the nose and get her to sit on my lap, even though she'd be much too big for a lap dog.”
I recrossed my legs and crunched on my cold toast.
He kept talking about his imaginary Border Collie, and how much he'd love looking down at her on the ground as she gazed up at him with absolute adoration in her eyes.
After breakfast, we went upstairs to the office. The levers on the chair no longer amused me, and I couldn't get the settings quite right. The story was meandering, and I kept typing the word “um” every time he said it, much to his annoyance.
“The editor can take it out,” I said.
After an hour of this, and two dozen occurrences of the word um, he leaned over my shoulder and did a quick search-and-replace to remove them.
“There,” he said proudly.
After that, I had to get more creative with the vocal ticks, making each one different, such as errr, guhhh, and hrmm.
Eventually, though, I stopped typing the vocal ticks, as it was no longer annoying him, and I'd started to feel petty.
At the end of the morning's session, he put his hand on my shoulder and said, “Good work. Thank you, Tori.”
His touch and utterance of my name sent shivers down between my legs, and I felt my nipples tightening up within my bra. He squeezed my shoulder and said it again. “Thank you.”
I turned and looked at his hand on my shoulder. The fingernails were tidy and buffed to a shine—likely a manicure. The upper knuckles had tiny blond hairs, and I wanted to rub my cheek on them. I wanted to suck on his fingers.
He p
ulled his hand away and moved to the doorway.
“I'm going to have a shower and possibly a nap,” he said. “Our afternoon session might be delayed. Feel free to take a few hours for yourself, do whatever it is you like to do.”
And then he left.
I went downstairs and poked around in the fridge for lunch.
The shower went on upstairs, and I imagined him naked, under the water. I didn't want to be alone for a few hours; I wanted to be with him.
I went to my room and clicked on the television. I kept thinking about Smith Wittingham, up there, naked. My hands wandered down, inside my shorts. I locked my door and took off all my clothes, all the better to touch myself.
I stood before the mirror over the bureau, noting my hair was messy. I grabbed my hairbrush, and a wicked thought surged through me.
Once the idea entered my mind, there was no shutting it out. The idea howled at me, a fantasy desperate to happen.
And so, absolutely naked, I left my room and walked up the stairs with my hairbrush in hand.
Smith's bedroom door was unlocked, as was his bathroom door.
His bathroom was much more sumptuous than mine, with a large soaker tub as well as a stand-up shower with a glass door. He was in the shower, and he saw me as soon as I came in, but he didn't say anything. He grabbed a plastic bottle of shampoo and kept going, washing his hair.
I got down on my hands and knees and put the hairbrush between my teeth.
“Woof,” I said around the hairbrush.
Grinning, he rinsed the suds out of his hair and turned off the water. He stepped out, magnificent and naked within a cloud of steam.
“What have we got here?” he said.
I wiggled my whole body, simulating a wagging tail.
“You look like a stray. Did you run away from home?”
I didn't answer, but gazed up at him, trying my best to put adoration in my expression, though it was a new one for me.
He grabbed a towel and quickly dried off, rubbing the towel under his balls and around his cock, which was already poking straight out like a towel hanger.
“I should adopt you,” he said. He patted me on the head and walked along me, running his fingertips down my bare spine. He grabbed my buttocks and pulled them apart, leaning down to inspect me. “Yup, you're a female,” he said.
