Simon was warming up to his mission as a purveyor of oral satisfaction for the neglected women of his community. Melissa and Janine, his buddies from his favorite bar, The Rusty Scupper, had been very talented at helping their friends find the groove they were missing. Some, like Alice, the shy wife of the assistant pastor required a little convincing. Reluctance, too has it charms, but the rewards can be remarkable.
They brought Alice in the back door because she insisted on it; and there was a lot of giggling in the kitchen before she dared come out and meet Simon. For once, both Melissa and Janine were wearing dresses, with stockings and simple makeup. This time nothing too wild or sloppy with the hair, either. Simon himself had dressed a grey suit. With a tie!
Alice was wearing a shapeless yellow print dress that could have been purchased from Sears, covered modestly by a pink cardigan. Her dirty blonde hair rippled softly on either side of an oval face, but it looked like it had never seen the inside of a beauty salon. Hardly any makeup. Huge, soft, sad, brown eyes.
Janine had set up the end of the living room with a folding table covered by a pretty blue cloth. Tea! And sugar cookies!
They all politely sat down and sipped their tea and nibbled their cookies. Alice, the assistant pastor's wife, stared at the table. But from time to time a tiny smile curved her lips and she peeked up at the rest of them, especially Simon, with those big mournful eyes. She perched on her chair as though about to skitter away at any second, and she probably was mentally half-way out the door. They had to keep reassuring her.
She peeked up at Simon. "Does, does
he
have to be here?"
Melissa's voice was gentle. "Not if you really don't want, Alice, But you can also think of him as a very wise and caring counselor; who might help you understand men... your husband better. Okay?"
"I just... I just feel so...
bad
. I shouldn't even
be
here. Stephen would be so, so
shocked.
But... but I so have no one to talk to and I kind of feel I am disappearing. I used to be a
fun
girl. Oh, don't get me wrong, I was a
good
girl. I didn't fool around or anything. Well, I did kiss Jimmy Smith that one afternoon at the lake, but that was because Andrea and Alexa dared me to. And I was... I was...
curious.
So... not
bad."
Melissa pushed a little. "Alice, no one here is calling you
bad
. We kind of wanted to help you feel... just normal. Because we felt something was making you sad. And you hinted that Stephen thinks something is wrong with you. We don't yet know what that might be. You look like a nice, pretty young woman to us. Isn't that right Simon?"
Simon just nodded.
"So Alice, does this feeling you have come from a disappointing sex life? We know that many men can be pretty clumsy or inadequate in the bedroom. Is that the trouble?"
Alice shook her head.
"So Stephen is disappointed in
you."
"That's sort of it... but not."
"Does he need you to be more of a tigress in the bedroom? If that's the trouble we can help with that. Is that it? Does he think you're a cold fish? Sorry."
Alice bit her lip.
"
No and yes. Oh, I'm so confused.
He
wanted good girl, a virgin even. And I never even touched
myself
even though sometimes I sort of
needed to
. Only that one time when mother got so mad. I was good. I always helped out, I was doing the laundry. I kind of liked doing the laundry. I could go to that warm little room and take my book and lean on the washing machine as it churned, and churned, and churned. It was nice. Only that one time I put a big load of towels in the dryer, and it was kind of whumping around like it does when the load is uneven; and so I shifted the stuff, but nothing helped, so I kind of pushed my...
front
against the thing to hold it more still, and, and some
parts
of me were kind of pressed tight against it, and I started to get this
feeling
like I was kind of lifted up and coming out of myself. I think I was sort of singing or crying or something, it was so intense. Oh, why am I talking so much?"
Alice paused, pressing her arms tighter to herself and crossing her legs restlessly.
Janine patted her hand. "So, Alice, that was good, wasn't it? We all have done something like that."
"No, no that was
bad because, because
my mother must of heard me, cause she came in the laundry room, and...her face. And she called me a little Jezebel, and made me scrub every floor in the house, on my hands and knees... with a brush. She watched me after that. So I was good almost all the time until I met Stephen, and after. Because he said we should wait until after we got married. So we did. Though once he touched my...." She patted her chest. "So I knew he
wanted
me. And I wanted him."
Janine touched Alice's cheek. "So that was
good,
right? What happened?"
"Well... I, I got
married.
And I thought that would take care of it... because, because... sometimes I got... I get these
feelings,
and Stephen... I thought he got them too, because his eyes would get funny, and I could see his.... But starting that
first night
when I took my clothes off and he just looked at me a long time, his eyes wide. And he was looking at my... you know,
that.
And I asked him if anything was the matter. Because he wasn't looking like 'wow, this my own beautiful wife'. He was looking like, 'what the heck is
that?'
And he turned off the lights real quick and we did it in the dark.
"I thought it was going to hurt some. But it didn't at all. It was all nice and loose and slippery. Oh, TMI, sorry. But that's what we always do now. Quick. In the dark. And he asked me a mean question that first time. He asked me if I had been with a bunch of other guys. And I was so hurt, because he
knew
I was saving myself for
him;
and we had
talked
about it and waited.... So later I asked him why he said that and he said that a first time girl, woman like me should be like
tight
and I wasn't. And I didn't even ask him how