Chapter 3

“Can I have one too, please?”

“Sure,” I shrugged, “I’ve never seen you drink before.”

“I don’t,” she replied, “my dad’s in a Twelve Step program and mum has never touched a drop, dad’s not against me drinking but I don’t like what it does to my head.”

“So, just one glass?”

She carried Garfield to the couch and looked at me. “Is it all right if he sits on the couch?”

“Well you’ve showed him all over the apartment, sure he can sit on the couch, he can even sleep on the damn couch.”

And that was an unusual thing for me to say because I did like that couch but then again I liked her as well, she was still in her uniform but as I carried the drinks over to the coffee table she took off her jacket and draped it over end of the couch. Garfield promptly claimed it as his new bed and we sat down next to each other. Her school books were in a neat pile on the other side of the table and more out of a desire to be a pleasant potential landlady I picked one up at random.

“The Canterbury Tales, in Middle English,” Tamara smiled.

Ultimately it was a combination of Chaucer and Garfield, with a glass of wine thrown in for good measure that kicked the whole thing off.

I’m thinking as I write this next bit and Tamara is sitting next to me with Benjamin, our West Highland terrier. Poor Garfield went to that great cat home in the sky two years ago, just before we moved to Britain but I’m getting ahead of myself yet again!

Now despite the fact I liked her, I had no intention of going any further with her that night. Somehow it just seemed wrong and that was just my maternal side coming out. I was tired from work, I’d driven five blocks and back again to move her things to my apartment and neither of us had to work the next day, so where I should have hit the sack I stayed up later than normal. I’ve been here before with other women, it starts with a joke or a touch, sometimes both then you get to talking and before you know it you get to a point where if you don’t part company and break the atmosphere it’s going to happen.

It started out like that. Tamara reading out one of Chaucer’s tales and stopping every few seconds to explain the meaning of a word. The particular tale was The Wife of Bath’s Tale and I was laughing over her translation of a word for vagina, which was literally my pretty thing. Garfield jumped onto her lap and put his front paws on my pretty thing. It got her laughing then.

“Garfield, get off her pretty thing,” she lifted the cat and nuzzled his face with her nose, he batted her face playfully and she put him down. I rubbed her back without thinking and she sat back suddenly, which forced me to drape my arm along the top of the couch. Tamara put her hand on my thigh. It was a smooth action now I think about it but at the time it was more instinctive and I was still trying to be a pleasant host. I had my right hand on the book when Tamara slipped her fingers behind the cuff and pulled it back and found my watch.

“Ambidextrous,” I replied, “but I like the watch on my right arm.”

“Huh,” she murmured, “you’re like me, I’m ambidextrous too.”

I looked down as she turned the cuff around to look at the cufflink. A moment later she undid it and took it out to examine it in greater detail. I might be a New Yorker but I’m also a Cubs supporter, which just makes me more unusual.

“And a Cubs supporter,” she nudged my side with her elbow, “one day we’ll win the World Series.”

“Yeah, my mother used to say I won the queer lottery twice,” I took off the cufflink, “I like women and the Cubs,” I handed it to her, “it’s an old family joke.”

Tamara chuckled as she looked at them.

“I bought these same ones for dad a few years ago with money from my first job.”

I put the cufflinks on the table but had my left hand resting on the back of the couch.

“And a tie to match,” she tweaked my tie.

“Huh?” I looked down at my black tie.

“I bought him a Cubs tie as well.”

“Oh,” I put the book beside the cufflinks, “I have one of those too, I haven’t worn it in months and never to work.”

“I’ve never seen you wear it,” she replied as I angled myself slightly towards her. Tamara slid her fingers up and down my tie and it was only then I switched from potential landlady/housemate to something else.

My left hand was just touching her head and I flicked my fingers though her soft silky hair. I thought I’d gone too far because she moved her head slightly, but then adjusted her position ever so slightly, angling towards me. I put my thumb and forefinger around her tie and slid my hand up and down it, mimicking her movements. Our heads moved closer together until our foreheads touched and we stayed like that for a minute or so, just playing with each other’s ties, I felt her warm breath against me, she was breathing slowly and I was just about to speak when Tamara pulled back slightly and letting go of my tie, stared up at me.

I had my fingers resting on the knot and she put her hands gently around my wrist. For a moment I thought this was it, the moment she’d tell me to stop but no words came out of her mouth, it was like she was frozen. I made as if to let go and she leaned forward and slid her hands down my arm, I felt her cheek against mine and then Tamara tried to kiss my ear but missed. She started rubbing her cheek against mine while I kept hold of the knot and drank in the scent of her perfume. I moved my other hand to her collar and slipped my fingers behind it, she moved her head sideways. Our lips skipped across each other and then she reached the other cheek, I managed to slide a finger into the knot and inched my other hand around her neck.

Tamara kissed my cheek with soft, light kisses, my other hand reached the tie and I started inching the material out, she started stroking my arm and finally found my lips. It was a quick kiss and she pulled back briefly and exhaled, and then kissed me again and this time I parted my mouth and exerted a little more pressure. The second and third kisses were a little longer and then something seemed to change.

Tamara moved back and stared at me earnestly. I had managed to slide the tie a couple of inches out of the knot. Her eyes shifted to take in this new development and I kept sliding the tie out of the knot, a slight smile nudged her lips as the tie came free. I now had both ends of the tie in my hands and started sliding the tie back and forth. Tamara looked down in mild amusement for a few moments and then stared into my eyes.

A few moments later her soft hands slid up my front to my face and began a slow and very methodical exploration of my face and hair as I kept up my see-sawing motion, but it slowed a bit when she started stroking my cheeks. She finally reached my neck and then the collar, I wanted to kiss her again but didn’t want to disturb the moment. Tamara found the knot and her eyes narrowed as she started inching the knot free and then she tilted her head and kissed me.

As kisses go, it wouldn’t break the world record but it was a long kiss, she parted her mouth and worked mine methodically, slowly and passionately. Now and then she’d pause to work more of the tie loose and by the time it was undone and we stopped kissing we were both panting. Her cheeks were flushed and she had this light in her eyes. I knew then this would go all the way and that meant our little arrangement would need to be changed.

It was definitely something I contemplated as I ran two fingers up and down her placket, six buttons and almost as many reasons to stop doing this because it was beginning to arouse her.

The primary reason was obvious. I was her supervisor and that broke my cardinal rule about getting into intimate arrangements with coworkers. It causes problems, despite the fringe benefits. Another was my offer to let her stay for as long as you need, I hadn’t thought it would come to this a couple of hours ago. She could be playing up to me, maybe this was part of some game, I’ve been bitten in that place too and it leaves marks. I fingered the top button as I thought of another reason. She was so obviously straight and I’m wary of the curious types who might go one or two nights, even a few weeks but eventually the ardor cools and they return to men, despite identifying as bisexual. But as I rested thumb and forefinger on her top button, another reason rose unexpectedly.

She was innocent and that stirred up long buried memories of a woman I’d long forgotten, a woman who could have been charged because she was so much older and I was only sixteen. I’d never opened my mouth about it because to be frank I liked it. She realized her mistake after the fact and managed to extricate herself but I merely found other girls closer to my age. Tamara looked down and placed her hands around my wrist lightly and then she looked up with a look of serious intent as she started sliding her fingers up and down my wrist It was a steady rhythm and I saw a flicker of doubt in her eyes.

I slid my other hand through her hair and found her earlobe, her eyes shifted as I tickled it slowly but she didn’t speak a word and I let my hand fall to her collar. She looked down as my finger slid behind the collar and started see-sawing back and forth while I kept hold of the button and then looked up at me.

“Do you want to go further?” I asked her.

Tamara swallowed and nodded but just as I was about to undo the top button she grabbed my hand firmly.

“Please don’t tell me you love me if you don’t mean it and please don’t hurt me.”

I felt my insides retreating as I nodded.

“Hurting you has never ever entered my mind, I want you to be happy even if it means not being with me like this. I’m a big girl, I can roll with the punches.”

The pressure on my hand relaxed.

“I trust you, don’t betray my trust.”

“I won’t,” I undid the button and opened the collar. My fingers slid around under the collar as I stroked her neck and throat. Tamara exhaled slowly and went back to stroking my wrist. I moved my left hand down to her placket and let my fingers slid up and down her front. She watched me the first few times and it did go on longer than I intended, but I was getting off on the gentle stroking and the look in her eyes. She was really enjoying it. Eventually I slid my fingers between each button to touch her skin and bra, and soon she stopped stroking my wrist and began moving her hands up and down my front.

I finally undid the second button to open up the shallow vee and with my right hand keeping up the gentle stroking of her skin, I returned to sliding my left up and down her placket. I could sense her heightened arousal by the shallow breathing and her subtle movements, she shifted ever so slightly every time I slipped a hand between her buttons.

Tamara finally undid my top button and her hands slid under my collar and then she leaned forward and kissed me slowly and passionately. I felt her hands sliding through my hair as she worked my mouth, her tongue slid along my lips and I responded in kind. When we broke free she moved to my right cheek and kissed it softly as she undid my second button and placed her hands onto my shoulders.

When she moved back slightly, she arched her back and let me move my hands to her shoulders, we kissed again and again, soft lingering kisses that sent me soaring. I slid my hands further along her shoulders, pulling the silk material against the third button and a crooked smile nudged her lips as she looked down at it. I slid my fingers up and down the hem, exerting more pressure on the button but then moved my hands under her shirt and outwards as I brushed my way up to her shoulders. I briefly touched a bra strap and then moved to her neck.