"I kind of understand, Mr. Aycock, but not really." Cres smiled hesitantly at Wart, her boss. He was a great guy.
Cressida Palmer, christened for the vehicle in which she was conceived, struggled to understand her employer.
"Please, Cres, call me Wart." He smiled, and offered her some Earl Grey. They were an awkward pair sitting in his big parlor.
"That's right, it's what people call you."
"Well, my given name is Worthington, and my brother's is Wickert, but we always went by Wick and Wart. It's cute, I suppose."
"I love your house, Wart. You really want me as a roommate? Sometimes I keep late hours."
"You can keep whatever hours you like. And I'll take care of cooking and cleaning. My mother showed me how to do this. well.
Cres was unsure of what to say. You'd think he could afford a housekeeper. "I like your bowtie, too. It goes well with your gray vest."
"This is a waistcoat."
"You're always so formal. This is Saturday, by the way."
Cres of course was all over the place, fashion wise.
Her spiky blue hair and leather miniskirt over Spandex might have been too much for Wart, but he never seemed to criticize anyone.
Still, next to her boss, Cres felt that she resembled a domestic terrorist.
But Wart was so nice. He'd hired her despite her lack of experience. She was a friend of his niece. Cres and Bernadine had failed out of beauty school together...
For Berni, who had only gone as a lark, since she was rolling in dollars, it was no big deal, but Cres had really been depressed that she couldn't get a marketable skill.
Cres had, after turning 18 and "aging out" of the Buttermilk Pentecostal Children's Home, had been bouncing around on friends couches...
And now she had a job and a place to live!
It was clear, of course that Wart was attracted to Cres, most men were.
But he'd never gotten handsy with her, and when she'd sat on his lap at a Christmas party, Wart had looked thrilled, but also like he was going to have a stroke.
"We get on well, Cres, and I would like it if you'd stay for at least a year. You'd have a big room, and use of my other car, and you could help me with certain issues."
"What's that?"
"There are habits I need curbing, and I also need to be galvanized into completing projects.
"Galvanized?" What the fuck did that mean?
"Motivated. I've always admired y our--" He was staring into her cleavage-
"Energy. And I think you can help me get a jump start on unfinished things around the house."
Cres casually crossed her long legs, and Wart began sweating a little bit.
"When Wick and I were growing up, Mother was able to get so much done by getting us going, but since she passed, I've been terrible."
"I'll have to learn more about that."
Later that night, while enjoying the tones of Richard Scalpel and the Abortions at the Satan's Rectum nightclub, Bernie looked doubtful about her uncle's plans for Cres.
"See, Uncle Wart and my dad-"
"Wick, right?" asked Cres.
"Yeah. They're a little weird. It might be Grandma's fault. I mean, my folks split 'cos Dad asked my mom to spank him, and now Dad is involved with a drag queen or something."
"Still, they're like that?"
"Oh yeah, I just came back last year-remember when you met me?-I've been living over in Kuomi Rao with my mother and my stepfather, going to the college there, and moved back to live with Dad, and I've seen him and Uncle Wart running around with bitchy leather types, and whatever."
"But Wart's not a bad guy, is he?"
"Of course not. I asked him to give you a job. He's great, but it might get a little weird."
After a moment, Jazlynn and Vianne asked the girls to join them in slam dancing and throwing panties on the stage, and Cres forgot almost completely about Wart's possible peculiarities.
**********
One morning, Cres was doing her aerobics, leaning side-to-side and sweating up a storm.
She had been living in Wart's house for about five days or so, and, in kindness, he'd told her he would keep her on salary at work while she took a month off to settle down.
Now she was leaning over and her cleavage was almost falling out of her top.
Wart was peeking around the corner of the living room, staring at her. He was naked except for his bathrobe, and his hand was busy in the robe, up and down, again and again.
Suddenly, Cres looked up.
"What...what the fuck are you looking at, Wart? Peeking around at me? Staring at my tits?"
Wart, unfortunately had now let go of the opening to his robe and it was all hanging out.
Cres bent over to look at Wart's privates and her sweaty cleavage was exposed, which made Wart a bit more tumescent.
"The fuck? I don't mean to criticize, man, but you are some kind of perv."
Wart tried to close his robe, but Cres stepped over daintily and opened it, and his penis bounced around like an irreverent joystick.
"Look, I've been here almost a week, not quite. This is the second time I've caught you being weird, not to mention there are no panties in my laundry bag anymore. Yes, the second time. Tuesday you were in my room, trying on my bra. I was nice about it, but it's getting too familial."
Wart began to babble.
Cres tried to smile. "I want to live here, you're fun to watch TV with, all of that, but I can't be feeling creepy. Sunday night when my boyfriend and I went to Johnny Rockets, you followed us in your car."
The trouble was, the closer Cres stood to Wart the hornier and more erect he got. Those pouty lips of hers (she glossed them to do aerobics in) and the tiny upturned nose, and that look of petulant annoyance...
"I mean, how would you like it if you felt exposed and humiliated all the time? We were so thrilled when you put a gym in the office, but Sierra and Rochelle have both complained that when they're using the shower, you come in and peek at them."
Wart looked abashed.
"They're not going to say anything to you-they both have kids to support, and Rochelle's husband has been sick...
They don't want to lose their jobs. But me, I'd move out of here, quit the job and hitch to Los Angeles tomorrow if I wanted to. I'm nineteen and fancy free."
"Please don't do that, Cres. I need you, so much."
While Cres was lecturing Wart, she was shaking her little finger at him, and her tits were jiggling. Wouldn't it be neat if she decided to whip him? He had to stop thinking that way.
"Wart, how would you feel being exposed? Naked in front of someone of the opposite sex?"
Cres got annoyed. She forgot herself and grabbed Wart's robe in her pretty little hand. She gave Wart a stern look.
Cres was about five four and Wart was nearly six feet tall (He had been a point guard on the Princeton University basketball team) but he didn't resist, he dropped his arms, and Cres pulled the robe off him, and threw it behind her.
Cres was of course snugly outfitted in her workout leotard, and her tits were almost spilling out. Wart was standing right in front of her, stark naked, and feeling very silly.
"Not so nice now, is it?" Cres said. She leaned over and flicked a long, sharp, magenta nail on the tip of Wart's straining penis, and he yelped.
" I want you to understand what women feel like, when you're leering at them!"
Cres said this severely. "What are you ashamed of that little penis? Stop trying to cover it with your hand."
Wart blushed and put his hands behind his back. He looked down at his dick, which was in fact fairly tiny. Wart heard a noise, and Cres was going to the bathroom, and she returned with her pink "Lady Gillette " razor and some shaving cream.
"Stand with your legs apart. I'm going to clean this mess down here up."
Cres dropped to one knee and began shaving Wart's crotch until it was a teeny bit stubbly, and then she went back and got a can of Nair, and sprayed down there with it.
"Now I want you to keep it this way for as long as I live with you. You behave like a child and now you can look like one. I'll pull out any hair that you don't keep shaved down here with tweezers."
"Let's shave your chest, while we're at it. Only men, normal, masculine types, not Peeping Toms-or Thomasine's" Cres giggled "get to have lots of body hair."
"Can I dress now, Cressida?"
"I'm afraid not." Cres took the shaving stuff back to the lavatory and returned with a pink ribbon, which she tied onto Wart's penis, just under the glans.
"I don't know what your plans were today, Wart, but call in sick. They must not need you, since you were hanging around here, perving on me in that ugly bathrobe."
Wart coughed.
"What kind of guy wears a flowered robe? It belonged to your mother, I bet."
"Y-yes."
"So disgusting. I'm glad I was an orphan, and even gladder that I'm a woman."
It wasn't a very lively day, really. Cres changed into a halter-top and shorts and sat in the living room, smoking a joint and reading a fashion magazine. Wart stood around awkwardly, wearing only this ridiculous ribbon.
Cres looked up casually. "Why don't you make us something to eat?"
After lunch, Cres returned to her chair while Wart cleaned up the kitchen. Cres whistled, and Wart came back in, the ribbon jouncing.
