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This work is copyrighted to the author © 2011.  Please
don't remove the author information or make any changes
to this story.  All rights reserved. Thank you for your 
consideration.
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Nina
by Oyster50 (oyster1950@gmail.com)

***

One day a single guy goes to the park and meets a 
pretty, bright teenage girl. She's different, and he's 
single, and things just workout for them. A friendship 
turns to love. (M/f-teen, underage, 1st, oral, rom)

***

Author's Note: This is a work of FICTION. That means 
that not only did none of it actually happen, but also 
there is no intentional depiction of any actual human 
beings.

Further, there are graphic depictions of sex acts 
between two people, even references to sex acts 
involving ONE person. Therefore, if you're under 
eighteen or have scruples about reading such things, now 
is the time to go somewhere else. It's a big internet. 
You should find something that interests you somewhere.

And speaking of interests, I do NOT write short, quick 
whack-off stories. This is about romance and love and 
human interactions. If that's your bag, then read on. If 
you're looking for nine-inch cocks and steaming love 
tunnels, again I remind you: BIG internet.

Have a good day!

***

One of those perfect spring days. We get so few of them 
down here on the Gulf Coast between our two seasons: 
cold and wet, or hot and wet. I couldn't resist. I 
grabbed my e-book and headed for the park. The book 
stayed in the car while I fast-walked a couple of miles 
on the walking path. A good brisk walk felt good. I 
passed up all but one woman who, dressed in spandex and 
an athletic tank-top, was obviously a regular.

After my half an hour was up, I retrieved the e-book and 
settled onto a partially shaded park bench to read and 
relax. I was near the playground equipment and a half-
dozen or so kids from toddler to about eight were 
climbing, swinging, sliding under the watchful eyes of a 
couple of adults, one an obvious mommy and the other 
with all the marks of a divorced dad doing his weekend 
with the kids. I opened my Kindle and punched up the 
middle of the book I was currently reading.

It was just about idyllic. The kids' voices were far 
enough away as to not be annoyingly loud, and they were 
all happy, and closer, I could hear squirrels and 
songbirds in the trees. I wished to myself that I'd 
brought the iPod with me, but oh, well... I read. And 
every now and then I'd look up, eye distracted by some 
movement in my peripheral vision, or some sound caused 
me to look up, or just to change my focus to keep my 
eyes from tiring.

But the voice startled me. Feminine. With a lilt. 
"Excuse me. Is that a Kindle?"

I looked up. Young lady. Five-six, maybe five-seven. Not 
fat. Not skinny, but it was hard to get too specific. 
Her jeans were loose-fitting and her torso was under an 
over-sized sweatshirt with the logo of the local 
university emblazoned across the front. The face was 
pale, a scattering of freckles across her nose and 
cheeks. Eyes were an astounding light blue. Eyebrows and 
hair were dark, her hair almost black, except about an 
inch of the tips was bleached blonde, stopping just at 
her chin, and across her forehead at eyebrow level, a 
set of heavy, straight-cut bangs.

I was thinking "Goth" but the hair was dark brown, and 
her nose, lips and ears were bereft of the hardware 
affectations of most Goth chicks. Okay, ears... A tiny 
silver round ear stud, conventionally placed in each 
ear.

All that thought took me about a second and a half 
before I answered her. "Yes, it is..."

She smiled. I thought to myself how well that fit her 
face. "I've been thinking about getting one. How's it 
working out for you?"

"Wonderfully," I said, and then we talked about how it 
worked and what it cost and what I liked and didn't 
like.

"Oh, by the way, I'm Nina. Nina Sayers." She offered her 
hand.

I shook it. "Dan. Daniel Gleason."

"Happy to meet you, Dan. I saw you walking earlier. You 
come here often?"

"No," I said. "Just in the spring when the days are 
pretty. This one's beautiful. And you?"

"Pretty often. I'm taking care of that little blonde 
girl and boy over there. Baby-sitting. If I bring 'em to 
the park, they'll be tired when I get them home and I 
can study."

"Study? High school? College?"

"High school senior." I mentally filed that. Seventeen, 
maybe eighteen. She looked at her charges clambering up 
the play equipment. "And you?"

I laughed. "Waaay past high school."

"Really... New SUV. So where do you work?"

I named a local industrial facility.

"I know that place," she said. "I know some people who 
work there. What do you do?"

"Engineer," I said. "Electrical. I deal with power 
generation."

"Really?" She didn't sound as if she were feigning 
interest. "That's what I'm gonna major in when I go to 
college."

Now I folded my book closed. "Now that's interesting," I 
said. "No arts major, or mass communications, or 
teaching?"

"Nuh-uh," she said. "What's wrong? I don't fit the 
stereotype?"

"Oh, no," I laughed. "It's just that female engineers 
aren't that common, and I've NEVER met a fledgling."

Giggle. "I've never heard anyone use the term 
"Fledgling" in conversation before. 'Specially about 
ME!"

"Get used to vocabulary, Nina. Engineers have some. 
You're going here to college?"

"Yes," she said. "Where'd you get your degree?"

"Here. Fifteen years ago."

"Really? D'you think they did a good job teaching you?"

"Sure," I said. "But what makes you an engineer is what 
you do AFTER college."

"That's what I've heard," she said. "That's why I wish I 
could do something other than babysitting this summer. I 
mean, the money's okay. Actually the people I do this 
for pay me very well, but still... "

I reached into my pocket for my wallet and pulled out a 
business card. Handing it to her, I said, "This is me. 
That cell number is good around the clock. If you're up 
for a field trip, let me know. I can give you the tour 
at the plant."

Her eyes twinkled. "Wow! Thanks!" Her eyes went to an 
eight-year-old blonde girl approaching. "Oh, that's one 
of mine," she said. "I guess playtime's over."

The little girl whined, "Mizz Nina, I'm HUNGRY..."

"Okay, Haley," said Nina. "Go get your brother and we'll 
go..." Nina turned to me. "Dan, it's been really nice 
talking to you. Really. Maybe I'll see you here again. 
"She paused for a second, then she patted her jeans 
pocket. "Oh, no! I'll call you. I want that tour!"

I watched her gather up the two children and walk to a 
little sub-compact car. They all piled in and she drove 
off. Pretty young thing, I thought. And I went back to 
reading. An hour later I was home, alone in my house, 
except for a big cat that didn't think I was alone as 
long as HIS needs got met.

Saturday evening, sitting alone playing on the laptop 
and watching TV at the same time. Sunday morning, get 
up, fix a light breakfast, then hop in the car and go 
for a drive through the springtime countryside. Sunday 
evening, finish up the week's laundry, fix a bowl of 
soup, do a couple of miles walking in the neighborhood, 
then shower, and go to sleep after petting the cat, 
showering, shaving, petting the cat some more...

Monday morning I was at work. Tuesday, same thing. It 
was a good job. I worked with a compatible bunch of 
people and we managed our facility well. Office politics 
was almost non-existent and the pay was acceptable.

About me. I'm divorced. Didn't WANT to be divorced, but 
wasn't exactly in a textbook "happy marriage" either. 
But I could've lived with it. Unfortunately, the former 
wife was one of those "the grass is greener" people and 
she hauled up and took my daughter with her, three 
states away, with an old high school flame that she re-
discovered on the internet after, just coincidentally, 
HE divorced HIS wife. And there I was, a house to myself 
(and the cat) and nothing but child support payments and 
occasional visits as a vestige of what I thought a 
"normal" life was supposed to be.

And a religious upbringing left me a mental wreck when I 
tried the modern dating/mating scene. Trouble was, every 
woman I'd met was either like the ex, looking for the 
greener pastures, or was the victim of a husband who'd 
pulled that stunt on her. And the baggage would've 
filled a freighter. I got far enough in a few 
relationships to meet the kids, and I could've gotten a 
major in abnormal child psychology. A few bouts of that, 
well, I gave up. I could see myself doing dinner and a 
movie, or a light social scene, but I wasn't bringing 
'em home for the night, nor was I spending the night 
with any of 'em. My conscience rode tight herd on me.

That's why it was a surprise when, Wednesday evening, my 
cellphone rang and I didn't recognize the number on the 
display.

"Uh, hello. This is Dan..."

Female voice. "Hi, Dan! This is Nina. From the park, 
remember?"

"Oh, hi, Nina." I ran the slideshow entitled "Nina – 
cute teen girl" from my memory bank. "How are you?"

"I'm fine, thank you." Proper little thing, she was. 
"Does that offer still stand for the plant tour?"

"Sure. We need to set a date so I can get it all 
cleared. Next week?"

"Uh, okay... How about Wednesday?"

"I'll do it. Afternoon?"

Tiny bit of a giggle. "That'll work. I'll make the 
arrangements on my end."

"We'll do it." I was thinking that this would be an 
interesting diversion.

"Oh, and Dan?"

"Yes, Nina?"

"I'll be at the park Saturday afternoon with the 
kids..."

This was a turn I hadn't expected. A ball had been 
lobbed my way. Interesting. Okay... "Okay, Nina. I was 
going to be there myself." I wasn't lying, at least not 
too much. The park was always an option, but I never 
planned a trip on a specific day.

Brightly, she said, "'Kay! See ya!"

"Okay, bye..." I punched the "end" button on my phone 
and laid it on the end table. I mulled over a couple of 
thoughts, none of them of any consequence, and I caught 
myself before any of them got too far.

Thursday was pretty much routine. Meetings. Walking 
around my little fiefdom, looking at big spinny things 
and checking to make sure that a million things were in 
the right places, doing the right things at the right 
times. I chatted with co-workers, drank an offered cup 
of horrible coffee, ate a donut that might have been 
better when it was bought early in the morning, and then 
I went back to my office. Last thing on the day's agenda 
was running down the list of last minute emails.

The normal ones were there, salesmen, other engineers, 
admin stuff, and... one I didn't recognize. One from a 
NinaS8421. Normally my spam filter caught this stuff, 
but I clicked...

"Dan:

 

I checked with my guidance counselor about our field 
trip. He thinks it's a good idea, but he's interested in 
what sort of things are on the tour. Here's his email. 
Could you send him something about that? Make it sound 
impressive.

Thanks, Nina"

And a smiley emoticon.

That was easy enough. I composed a list of interesting 
features and sent it to him. That was my last shot for 
the day. I was out the door, out the gate, and on the 
way home.

In the house, I changed to shorts and walking shoes and 
did a couple of brisk miles. I was showering when I 
heard the phone ring. I stepped out and dried enough to 
pick it up. Nina.

"I hope I'm not bothering you, Dan," she said. "Is it a 
good time?"

"Well, Mizz Nina, I was in the shower. If you can call 
me back in twenty minutes..."

"Ooops! Sorry. I'll call back!"

"'Kay! Gimme twenty minutes."

I finished showering and shaving and donned my "knocking 
around the house in the evening" shorts and t-shirt. I 
kicked back in my recliner and ministered to the cat. He 
determined that he needed petting today.

And the cell phone rang again. I looked at the display. 
Now I recognized the number.

"Hi, Nina," I said.

"Hi, Dan..." she paused. "You don't mind me calling you 
Dan, do you. I mean, you ARE a lot older..."

I felt the vestigial bubble of my ego deflate. Yes, I 
was "older". "No, just call me Dan, Nina. That's fine."

Lilt in her voice. "Mmm-Kay! Did you get my email?"

"Yep! Sent one to your counselor. I should've copied 
you. I'll forward it to you in the morning."

"Thanks! I'm sorry I got you out of the shower."

"That's okay. Thank you for understanding. Some people 
will keep talking and let me drip dry..."

Giggle. "Yeah! I know. But what I called you about..."

"Okay, what DID you call me about?" I laughed.

"Trig." Her sigh was audible. "Trig finals are coming, 
and I wanted to see if you'd help me study..."

"Wow. I've been out of school for a while, Nina. Are you 
sure I'm the guy to help you?"

"Well it's not any of the other students, Dan... I'm the 
top of the heap. But I'd like to get the most out of 
it."

"We could try, I guess. When?"

"Am I being rude if I ask if this evening would be okay? 
I mean, if you're not doing something..."

"I'm free."

"I'll drive over. Where do you live?"

I gave her a street address.

"I'll be there in fifteen minutes."

"Oooo-kay, Nina. I'll be waiting." And when the phone 
call ended, I got up and made a frantic pass through the 
house, making sure that it was a cut above its normal 
tidiness. I looked at the cat. "Sam," I said. "Best 
behavior, bud. We got company coming." I was excited 
enough to talk to the cat. Oh, never mind. He and I had 
many conversations. Mine were about everything. His were 
about food and litter box and why I insisted on sitting 
in his favorite spot, my recliner.

The doorbell rang. I opened it and there she was, a 
bookbag dangling off her shoulder, those blue eyes 
twinkling, a big smile on her face.

"Come in," I said. The cat was at the door to evaluate 
the intrusion.

She saw him. "Who's this?" she asked.

"This is Sam. He runs the place. I am his unworthy and 
incompetent staff."

"Oooooh, what a beautiful big ol' cat!" She bent over, 
reaching for him. This is where Sam usually headed for a 
hidey hole. He wasn't the cuddly kind of cat. But he sat 
back on his haunches and let her pet his head. And 
purred.

"Wow!" I said. "You're the first visitor that's ever got 
to touch him."

"I like cats," she smiled. She closed the door behind 
her. "Where's the best place to work?"

"My office. Right this way." I brought her up the short 
hall, past the bathroom. The end of the hall had two 
doors, both open. One led to the bedroom, my king-sized 
bed (a vestige of a dead marriage) visible, and yes, 
made up perfectly, that is, except for Sam's cat-shaped 
wrinkles in the center. I noticed Nina look in that 
door.

The other door opened into my home office. I had a desk; 
a drafting table (got it for free. Everything was done 
on computers now), a computer table with a HUGE monitor, 
a file cabinet, a print rack and a couple of chairs. 
"Here," I said. "Pull up next to the desk."

She sat. I sat facing her as she pulled a trig book and 
some notes out. "This is nice. You don't work here, do 
you? I thought you worked at the plant."

"I do some side stuff. Consulting. This is where that 
happens. I have an office out there, too. You'll see it 
next week."

"Neat!" she said. She opened up her trig book and 
shuffled through some papers. "Here's what I want to go 
over..."

The next thirty or forty minutes we spend going over 
things. I had to stretch a bit. Yes, I took this stuff 
in school. And passed, quite handily. There was a 
"professional engineer" license displayed in my office. 
But it was still a matter of exercising memories I'd not 
needed for years. I managed. We managed. Nina actually 
prodded ME a couple of times, to her glee. And my 
discomfiture.

"It's two weeks to finals," she said. "I've got a 
scholarship."

"Really? To the engineering department?"

"Yessss!" she smiled. "But I wanna end high school on 
the best note."

"You should be proud, babe... Nina!"

Her eyes cut toward me and at first I thought I'd done 
something wrong, but the smile stayed there. I'd just 
called her "babe". A slip of the tongue. But she was a 
babe. Hiding it in that baggy shirt, but from a range of 
three feet I saw a delightful face, soft, rounded, open, 
freckled. And smiling.

We finished up.

"You wanna coke, Nina?" I stood.

"Sure!" Brightly. She finished stuffing her book and 
papers back into her backpack. "This is nice."

"Nice?"

"Yeah. Your house. You keep it neat. I like how you 
turned this into an office. What's that other room?"

"Spare bedroom. It turns into a little girl's room for a 
month in the summer," I said.

"Little girl?"

"Yeah. My daughter's ten. She comes to stay with me for 
a month."

"So you're divorced."

"Uh-huh... four years. Sad story. Not the sort of thing 
I should discuss with a teen-aged girl."

"Oh, I'm sorry. I wasn't being nosy."

"Oh, that's not what I mean. I mean, it's a sad story, 
and I'm glad you're visiting and I don't want to ruin 
the moment with sad stories."

She poked her head into the kitchen as I retrieved a 
couple of cokes and poured them over ice and handed her 
one. With a straw.

"Thanks," she said.

"Sit." I pointed to the end of the sofa. She sat, and 
immediately Sam showed up and snuggled up against her 
thigh. For a brief flash I hated Sam for his ability to 
do that.

She put her face to him and stroked his head with both 
hands. "You're just a big ol' fluffy kitty, huh, baby!"

"I can't believe he lets you do that. He won't even let 
ME do that, and I feed his sorry carcass."

She was sipping her coke and dangling a shoe off her 
toe.

"So tell me. What's with the hair?"

She tossed her head, bouncing it and flipped her hand 
under the back of her neck, giggling. "Oh, I just wanted 
to be striking. Grandma freaked."

"It IS striking," I said. "And I can see where grandma 
might just take exception to it."

"She's really pretty good about me. Bought me my car. I 
shouldn't jerk her around like this."

"You live with your grandma?"

"Like your divorce story. Long. And sad. Grandma's the 
happy ending."

"Oh, really?"

"Yeah. Been at grandma's for two years now. Mom's, well, 
Mom's in prison."

"I'm sorry," I said.

"Oh, don't be sorry for Mom. She wasn't innocent."

"Well..." I stuttered.

"Anyway, I live with Grandma, and life is pretty good. 
Could be better, but a lot of kids have it worse, too."

"Yeah, I guess so. Life can be messy."

She giggled. "That's a good word for it. Messy."

"So you're an honor student?"

For the last two years. Grandma pushes me. I did "C's" 
before I moved in with her. Didn't have to study or do 
homework to do C's. Grandma pushes, and I do A's."

"That's good. A's, especially if you're doing trig."

"Last year was geometry. I did two extra maths and two 
extra sciences. Chemistry and physics."

"You didn't take the easy road. I'd be proud..."

"Thank you. I am. I mean, I don't flaunt it, but I am." 
She glanced at her watch. "I guess I gotta go, Dan. Is 
it too much to ask about tomorrow?"

"No, but come over early and we'll go get something to 
eat. I'll buy."

Squeal! "Like a date?"

"Like eat and do homework."

She smiled a quirky grin. "Call it what you want. Five?"

"Perfect!"

I had trouble concentrating at work all day Friday. Like 
a kid going on a date to the movies with his young 
girlfriend. I slid out of the office right at the 
whistle and was home and bathed, shaved and ready when I 
heard the doorbell.

I opened the door to a surprise. The only views I had of 
Nina were somewhat frumpy, baggy jeans, loose-fitting 
shirt, hair not exactly disheveled, but not noticeably 
attend to. The girl standing at my door was dressed in a 
dark green dress that fitted her well, not tight, but 
formed, length stopping midpoint between hip and knee, a 
pair of matching pumps on her feet, and her hair, 
including the improbable blonde tips, was shining 
perfection.

It took my breath away. And in retrieving that breath, I 
caught a subtle hint of perfume.

She had the backpack clasped in her hands.

"Hi, Dan!"

"Good lord, Nina! You clean up very well..."

"UHHH!" she said, feigning irritation, "I didn't think I 
was doing THAT bad before..."

I laughed, "No you weren't. But it's like you just waxed 
a Maserati..."

She smiled. "I just thought you might be less scared to 
take me out in public if I wore something nice. Is this 
okay?"

"Uh, yeah! You choose wisely, fledgling."

"You called me that before, you know."

"Yes, little one, I DO know." I rattled my keys. "Where 
would you like to eat?"

"Oh, I don't know."

"Is there something you DON'T like?"

"Nope. I'll eat anything."

"Okay," I said. "Italian? As in NOT pizza?"

"Yeah, but where?"

We had two Italian places in easy distance. One was a 
national chain. The other was a local place with a good 
reputation. I named the second.

"Isn't that kinda expensive?"

"I'm buying. And you're dressed for it. Is it okay?"

"Oh, yes. I've eaten there once. I loved it."

Twenty minutes later my SUV pulled into the parking lot 
and I escorted Nina into the place like the princess she 
was. We sat at a table in a private corner, not by 
design, just by good fortune. And we talked.

"What's your grandma say about you coming over?" I 
asked.

"I told her, Dan. That you were an engineer and you were 
thirty-something and I met you at the park and you could 
help me with my school work. Why?"

"Because I don't want an angry grandma after me."

"She won't get mad, Dan. I don't date. I have a few 
friends at school, and sometimes I go out with a group, 
but I DON'T date guys."

I guess I raised my eyebrow a little too noticeably.

"Not like THAT! I'm... I'm, well, DIFFERENT."

"Okay," I said, "do you want to tell me why you're 
different? I mean, you don't look like your name is 
really Bradley or something like that..."

She giggled. Did I tell you that her giggle was like 
tinkling little silver bells? It is. "Thank you for 
making me laugh. No. I'm a girl. For almost eighteen 
years. But I get called "dyke" at school because I've 
never been on a date, not a "date" date, you know, with 
holding hands and kissing and making out and stuff..."

"Oooohhhh!" Like I was getting it. But I wasn't getting 
it. Salads arrived. We ate. I noticed that she knew her 
way around silverware and etiquette.

"It's part of that sad story." She ate a bite of salad. 
"You might be interested to know that YOU'RE the first 
guy I've ever gone someplace with, alone."

"Uh, I'm flattered, Nina, but we're at a restaurant."

"I know," she said. "I know." She sighed. Then her nose 
wrinkled. "I love these peppers!" she chewed a 
pepperoncini. "What's gonna happen when they retire the 
space shuttle?"

And we talked about space missions and aviation and 
space exploration, on through her lasagna and my 
linguini with clams in white sauce.

She noticed a couple at the table across the room. "In 
another month I'll be able to have a glass of wine with 
my meal," she announced. Won't be able to buy it, but if 
YOU buy me one..."

"If YOUR grandmother says it's okay..."

"Yeah. You need to meet Grandma."

Why did I get the feeling that this was more important 
than it should have been?

We ended up back at the house, in the office, doing a 
little bit of studying. She showed me her English paper 
with an A on it. We looked at her science lessons, such 
that they were, two weeks before the end of school.

"I can't believe that they're starting reviews already," 
she said.

"Reviews?"

"Yeah," she snorted. "Two weeks of reviews so kids can 
pass the finals."

"Oh. Well, Nina," I chided, "everybody's NOT you. Not as 
smart. Don't catch on, don't retain like you do."

Nina looked at me. "I know... but sometimes I just want 
to LEARN!" She was putting her books in the bag.

"Got time for another coke?"

"Yeah. I gotta use your bathroom, though."

I went to the kitchen to fix our drinks and heard the 
toilet flush. She was leaning over the bar smiling at me 
a minute later.

"I noticed something," she laughed.

"What? You've got a mischievous look on your face."

"Only ONE toothbrush."

"Meaning exactly what?"

"Just that you don't have somebody else staying her with 
you. At least not often enough to leave a toothbrush."

"Either that or I date women with poor dental hygiene."

She laughed. "Yeah, that is a distinct possibility."

While I was handing her a glass of coke and ice, I was 
mulling over a couple of things, first, that she had a 
quick and inquisitive mind, and second, that she was 
checking on my single status.

This time we sat at opposite ends of the sofa.

"Lots of books," she said.

"Not as bad since I got the Kindle," I said.

"Uh-huh. And CD's." She got up and scanned the labels, 
reading some off. "Mendelsohn. Bach. Mozart. Beethoven. 
Boccherini... Wow! You've got taste, mister!"

"Try telling that to my ex," I said. "Now I can listen 
to it any time I want. Alone."

She fixed her eyes on mine. "I love this stuff."

"You got an iPod? I can fill you up!"

"I'll bring it next time," she smiled.

"I thought kids were all into hip-hop and stuff."

She shook her head. "Or here, country and western is 
big. And I can't do either of them. Noise. Production. 
Do you ever wonder what went on in Bach's head when he 
was doing the Brandenburg Concerti?"

"Concerti?" She KNEW the difference.

"Yes. Plural of concerto... Can you imagine getting into 
the mind of Mozart or Beethoven? And I'm supposed to get 
all overheated over four guys who use volume to cover 
lack of innovation and skill? Puh-leazzzze!"

"My thoughts exactly, babe," I said. I knew she caught 
"babe" this time. Her eyes ...

She sat back down. "It's stuff like that, you know, that 
makes me NOT fit in. I mean, I can't sit with a bunch of 
girls my age and get all excited about boy bands and 
fingernail polish and who's going with who and who's 
doing what... It's just not ME. I want to be ME."

"Took me thirty years to figure that out, Nina. Do you 
know who YOU are?"

"I think so, Dan." Her face was serious. "I have plans 
for school. I know more about how people are than most 
people."

"What makes you think that?"

"Living with Mom... when she wasn't dumping me at 
Grandma's. I mean, I think sometimes she tried to be a 
mom, but it wasn't her. And I learned about 
relationships, because she COULDN'T get it right. Kept 
experimenting. I learned about women and men and how 
they are and can be and how things can be so wrong and 
people just keep doing the same things over and over 
hoping that something different will happen."

"Wow..."

"Mom's in prison for prostitution and being involved in 
a meth lab..." Her head hung. She raised it. There was a 
tear on her cheek.

"I'm sorry, Nina. I wasn't trying to make you sad..."

"Oh, I know, Dan. You've just been nice to me. I don't 
know why I'm telling you this. I'm just harshing our 
mellow."

"Nina, you're my friend. Friends talk. Even when it 
hurts. And sometimes talking makes things feel better."

"Thank you, Dan. For listening."

"And your mom, whatever she did, that's nothing to do 
with YOU. You're smart and cute and you have your head 
on straight."

"It's not THAT straight, Dan. Sometimes I'm scared... I 
mean, Mom didn't start that way. I don't want to end up 
like that."

"Your grandma is taking care of you, babe, and you'll do 
just fine."

She picked up her backpack. Standing there in that green 
dress, NOT smiling, she was still beautiful.

I stood to escort her to the door. We eased toward it 
and I opened it for her. She turned to me and looked 
into my eyes. And kissed me. Light, almost like the 
touch of a butterfly. On the lips. For a brief second. 
"You're a good friend, Dan."

"You're a beautiful, bright, delightful girl, Nina." I 
sighed. Inside I wished I was twenty years younger.

As she walked the short distance to her car, she looked 
over her shoulder. "Tomorrow. One o'clock. At the park."
Chapter Two

I finished my laundry before lunch. At one, I was 
pulling up into the park near the kiddie playground. I 
got out. No Nina. I started walking. Fifteen minutes 
later I had a mile under my belt and had completed a 
circuit. And Nina's car WAS there. And Nina was walking 
her charges to the swing set. She released them to go 
play and then she came to sit beside me. I was sipping 
on a fountain drink.

"Did I bum you out last night? Dan?"

"No, Nina. You needed to talk. I listened. 'S what 
friends do."

She eyed my drink. "Can I have a sip?"

"Sure," I said, "if you don't mind drinking after me."

"I'm too thirsty to worry about boy cooties," she 
giggled, and she sucked on the straw. And before she 
finished, she looked at me and sucked it one more time, 
then released it and licked her lips. And handed it back 
to me. And grinned.

"It's not nice to tease old men, Nina," I said.

"Was that teasing? I didn't think it was teasing." She 
giggled. "You know," she continued, "I really enjoyed 
last night. It was a perfect first date. Well, almost 
perfect. I got all sad there, but it was a good first 
date." She looked at me a little more intently than I 
expected. "Can I call it a date?"

"You can. If you want. I had a good time, too, Nina. 
It's been a long time since I had a day with somebody as 
pretty as you. You were stunning."

"Uh," she feigned hurt. "I'm not stunning now?"

"Of course you are. You're enough to melt hearts."

She changed the subject. "So where's your Kindle?"

"I left it at home," I said. "Thought that since you 
were here, I'd have somebody to talk to."

"You do," she smiled. "I like talking to you. So what do 
you like about being an engineer?"

And off we went on career discussions: what my day was 
like, what I used from school, how I learned, who I 
worked with, and all sorts of things about engineering.

"So what made YOU decide to take up engineering?"

"I like learning stuff and doing things. Our guidance 
counselor gave me one of those aptitude tests, and it 
said that I had the personality traits to be an 
engineer. And he said that with my grades, I was smart 
enough."

"No,"I said. "You're gonna be a lot smarter than a lot 
of other engineers."

"You think?"

"Yeah, I think..." And looking over her shoulder I saw 
two little blonde kids approaching. I knew our time was 
up.

Little Haley whined, "Miss Nina! We're hungry. And 
thirsty."

"Okay, you two," Nina said. "We'll go home and feed 
you." She turned to me. "Bye, Dan. Can I call you 
later?"

"Sure," I said.

And as she walked the kids to her car, I heard little 
Haley singing, "Nina's got a boyfriend" in a teasing 
song.

I thought that silly. Flattering. I'd known Nina for a 
week. Seen her four times, counting today. And there was 
that twenty years disparity in ages. But what red-
blooded guy wouldn't look at her and entertain a thought 
or two... I pushed those thoughts away. Since that 
pretty teen with the striking hair was gone, I headed to 
my own car and drove home.

Kicking myself. I had a pretty good world going for me 
up until a few days ago, and now all of a sudden I was 
feeling alone again. I walked in the house, headed 
straight to the shower, and performed my evening 
ablutions. I popped open a can of chili for supper and 
put some dried beans to soaking for tomorrow.

Dinner behind me, I retired to my recliner and flipped 
on the TV. I flipped through the channels and found 
nothing interesting enough to occupy my attention, so I 
left it on the most interesting of the rejects and put 
my laptop on my lap and started surfing the net. 
Remembering that I'd left work abruptly, I remoted into 
my company email server and checked the email. Nothing 
new there, but I saw that email from NinaS8421. I copied 
the address to my personal email program and did a new 
message.

"Nina- Here's my personal email address. It goes to my 
cellphone, too. Just in case you need to get hold of me 
when I'm not at work. – Dan."

And I hit "send". And immediately asked myself "why". I 
went back to surfing the web, looking at curiousities 
and funny videos and things. No. No porn.

It was a few minutes after eight when my cell clanged. I 
looked at the display, hoping that it wasn't work. I 
have some horrible stories about "Uh, Dan, we need you 
out here right away. Half the plant's dark..." The 
display had four letters on it: N-I-N-A.

"Hi, Nina," I said.

"Hi, Dan!" In my mind's eye I could see the smile that 
accompanied that tone. "I just got in the car. I'm on 
the way home. Just wanted to call you."

"Be careful while you're driving, Nina..."

"I am, Dan. Uh..."

I beat her to it. "What's your day look like tomorrow?"

"Nothing," she said. "Well, Grandma and I go to church. 
But we're home at noon. Why don't you come over and meet 
her?"

"Meet your Grandma? You sure? I mean, HOW are you going 
to introduce me?"

"My friend. My mentor. She knows about mentoring. Why? 
Should I tell her something different?"

"Oh, no, Nina. That sounds good."

"And then if you want, we can go for a ride or 
something..."

"That works," I said. She dutifully gave me her 
grandma's street address and I wrote it down.

"12:30, okay?"

"Okay, punkin," I said.

"Uh, Dan..."

"Yes, Nina?"

"Is "Punkin" a good thing?"

"Yes it is. EVERYBODY loves punkins..."

"Okay... I'm pulling up at Grandma's. I'll see you 
tomorrow, okay?"

"I wouldn't miss it for the world."

Thirty minutes, maybe forty-five, and the sound popped 
up on my computer's speakers indicating incoming email. 
I clicked the email program to the top of the stack and 
there was, indeed, an email from NinaS8421. With an 
attachment. A picture.

Nervously I clicked the message open.

"Dan—

Thank you for giving me your personal address. Maybe 
there are things you shouldn't get at work. Like jokes 
and links. I know Grandma can't get some of those 
things.

So now I can send you stuff. Like this picture. Grandma 
took it. Says it's one of her favorites.

I hope you like it.

Nina"

I clicked on the picture. Nina. Pre-blonde banded hair. 
Not quite a profile, she was caught turning toward the 
camera, her eyes and mouth formed into a smile, her hair 
swinging, the motion caught, trapped, the freckles a 
whimsical punctuation to a bit of photographic 
perfection. I opened the picture in my photo editor and 
printed it on 5x7 photo paper. When the picture came out 
of the printer, I stuck it in my briefcase.

And the email dinged again.

"Dan—

I thought you might like these too...

Nina"

And three more, one of them a longer shot, giving her 
whole body, another delightful face picture, a third of 
her sitting, wearing a dark sweater, her face like the 
sun...

"Okay," I said to myself. "I can do this." I opened up 
my picture folder and selected a few for her: Me at 
work, crawling out of a transformer, a smudge of oily 
brown on my cheek. Me behind my desk at the office. Me 
kayaking with my friends last summer. And I sent them.

Ding.

"Dan—

Thanks. The one with you in the kayak, that's going on 
my desktop...

Nina
x"

And I caught the "x". But surely, I thought, that was 
just reflex to a teenaged girl... But desktop?

Phone clanged. Nina.

"Hi, punkin," I said. Okay, "punkin" was as innocent a 
pet name as I could come up with. Like a little sister 
or something... I was trying, wasn't I?

"Hi, babe," she said. I was "babe" now. But that was 
just friendly, right? Right! "I just wanted to talk to 
you one more time before I go to sleep."

"I like hearing your voice, Nina..." True, I would have 
probably liked hearing ANYBODY'S voice on some Saturday 
evenings. Sometimes loneliness was tougher than other 
times. But this was MORE true.

"I'm listenin' to Beethoven," she said. "But I want 
more. From you... uh, your collection. You said you'd 
let me load some on my iPod."

"Oh, sure! We can do that. Tomorrow, if you want."

"Maybe," she said. "Either that or we do that riding 
around you talked about."

"Whatever YOU want to do. Tomorrow's your day, okay?"

Sigh. "Okay, Dan. I better go to sleep," she said. 
"G'nite, babe."

"G'nite, sweetie." I hung up. "Sweetie". Like in little 
nieces and such, right?

I closed... started to close the laptop, but I went back 
to that directory that said "Nina". And I looked at the 
pictures. I closed my eyes. Okay. Shut the stupid 
computer down, Dan.

I went to sleep after the nightly round of cat-petting.

I didn't sleep too late. I was up, breakfast out of the 
way, a cup of coffee, and catching up on current events, 
that kind of Sunday morning routine. And the clock 
crawled. Finally, about a quarter to noon, I did a quick 
shower and then dressed up. Not too dressy. A good pair 
of jeans. A polo shirt. Sneakers. With socks. I 
holstered my cellphone and got in the car. At 12:28 I 
pulled into the drive behind Nina's little Honda. "Okay, 
"I told myself, "Here goes."

I got out of the car, walked up and knocked on the door. 
Nina opened it. "Hi!" she grinned. She turned and said 
loudly, Grandma, he's here!" And she escorted me into 
the house with her hand on my bicep.

"Dan," Nina said, "This is my grandmother, Helen Sayers. 
Grandma, this is my friend, Dan Gleason."

"I'm pleased to meet you, Dan," Helen said. "Nina has 
been going on about you for a week."

"Nina is a bit of work," I said. "I'm pleased to meet 
you, too, Mizz Helen."

Helen smiled. "Don't do "Mizz Helen" with me. I'm not 
THAT old..."

"Okay," I said, but my poor ol' momma would beat me if I 
hadn't started out that way."

Helen laughed. "So Nina tells me you're an engineer?" 
She motioned toward an overstuffed chair. "Sit!"

"Yes ma'am. I am an engineer."

"There you go again. And you're helping her with her 
school work?"

"Uh, she doesn't need much help. We're just reviewing. 
And I'm showing her what she's in for next year."

"That's what she tells me." She fixed her gaze on Nina. 
"Nina, could I have a couple of minutes with Dan, 
please, dear?"

I was nervous now. Hadn't done a darned thing but send 
her grand-daughter a few pictures of me, fully clothed, 
but I was nervous.

"Don't be mean to Dan, Grandma. He's a nice guy." And 
Nina left the room.

Helen fixed me in a serious stare. "She thinks you're a 
nice guy, Dan. She's known a whole lot of guys who 
weren't nice. Her mom's uh, friends."

"I AM a nice guy, Helen. I have helped Nina with 
schoolwork, and taken her to dinner once, and we've 
talked about everything under the sun," I paused, 
"including the Sun. She's a terribly bright girl who's 
given me only the tiniest idea of what's gone on in her 
life. And she says that the past two years, living with 
you, are the best she's had."

Helen sighed. "Lord knows I've tried, Dan. I'm surprised 
she made fifteen without being on drugs and pregnant. 
Did she tell you about her mom?"

"Was she not supposed to?"

"No," Helen said. "I didn't know if she'd open up to 
anybody about that. What'd she tell you?"

"Prison. Drugs and prostitution."

"That's the truth. And some more truth is that she's 
lived with me on and off all her life. Her mom would get 
a home, bring Nina there, some guy would move in, and 
Nina would end up back here. Last one before her mom 
went to jail, I had HIM picked up for tryin' to molest 
Nina. He tried. Spent a week in the hospital with a stab 
wound in a very uncomfortable place."

"Really? Nina?"

"Slept with a knife under her pillow. He crawled into 
her bed naked, figuring she was her mother's daughter, 
and she took a couple of whacks at his, uh, his 
manhood."

"Wow." And I cringed a little bit, as any man might. 
"But Helen, she's sweet and bright, and funny. It seems, 
just from what little I've seen that she's good with 
kids. And she's very well-mannered, from what I saw at 
the restaurant Friday evening."

Helen sighed. "I've tried to teach her right from wrong. 
Church. How to get along with others. "She's a good 
girl, Dan."

"That's the side I see, Helen. Are there bad sides?"

"Dan," she said, "the only bad side is that she is very 
hard-headed and she will stand up for herself. That's 
the only trouble she's had at school. Two years ago when 
she started at this school, some girl made some comment 
about how her mom was in jail and Nina was the same 
thing. Nina put a fist in the girl's face. Fortunately a 
teacher saw it and knew that the girl had been goading 
Nina for a week. Nina got 'counseled'. But they don't 
mess with Nina, either. Boys neither. One of the 
football players decided that she needed his special 
attention. He got HERS. Missed two games with bruises 
to, you know..."

"Remind me not to get Nina mad at me," I said.

"Yeah," Helen said. "I can laugh now... But Dan, she's 
ten days shy of her eighteenth birthday, and two weeks 
from now she's going to graduate from high school, and 
she wants an education. I've done my best with her so 
far."

"It appears to me that you've done darned good."

"I like to think so. But here's the deal. You came 
along."

"Me? What'd I do?"

"If I believe her, you've done absolutely nothing but be 
a friend. Frankly, I'm more than a little surprised. She 
hated men. Until YOU came along."

"B-but... I didn't do anything."

"That's what she said. Said the first day she met you, 
she was watching you walk and you walked past a bunch of 
women and didn't turn and stare at them. Then you were 
sitting there reading and the same thing: women would 
walk by and you just looked up and then went back to 
reading."

"Okay. I don't do that leering thing that some guys do."

"Impressed our Nina, it did. So you're her friend now. 
She said Friday was her first date, ever."

"She told me that, too."

Dan," Helen said, "Do you have a girlfriend, a 
significant other, a whatever they call them these days? 
A woman in your life?"

"No, I don't."

"You're not gay, are you?"

"Uh, NO! Just celibate. Single in a big way."

"Nina. She's almost eighteen. I can't stop her from 
doing what she wants any more. I mean, I'm not going to 
let her do anything in these four walls. It's MY house. 
But it's HER life. And since you seem to be her friend, 
I'm asking you to be careful with my, with OUR Nina."

"Wow... sounds like Miss Nina's... I don't know, Helen. 
I've been single for a bunch of years."

"Well, son," Helen said. "Looks like you just might have 
collected a girlfriend."

"B-but... I'm thirty-eight..."

Helen smiled, "Boy, I know guys who'd die to have an 
eighteen year old girl falling for him. And stranger 
things have worked." She sighed. "But, Dan, if you're... 
be careful. Let her down easy..."

"Helen," I said, "I didn't even pick her up. But I would 
NEVER hurt her. A week. That's all I've known her. 
And..."

"Okay, Dan. I believe you. But if you hurt my 
granddaughter, I will personally hunt you down..." Her 
gaze was stern, resolute.

"I believe you. And I won't hurt her. But she's 
eighteen. What if I'm the one that gets hurt?"

"You will learn about my granddaughter. She's not the 
hurting kind..."

"You just told me three people who would differ with 
you..."

"Keep that in mind, Dan." She raised her voice. "Nina, 
you need to come in here."

Nina was back in the room, and this time she perched on 
the arm of my chair. Her hand sat on my shoulder, like 
she was marking me as her possession. "Were you hard on 
'im, Grandma?"

"No, I wasn't, Nina. I told him a little background 
stuff. And how much I loved you and wanted good things 
for you. That's all. I think you said you two were going 
out driving this afternoon?"

"Yes, ma'am," Nina said. "I guess. Since he didn't run 
screaming out the door." She stood up and tugged at my 
bicep. "Come on, babe. Let's go."

I stood up. "Helen, I guess that Nina and I are going to 
go for a ride. I will have her back home... what time?"

"Eight. She's got school tomorrow."

"And I have work. Okay. We'll see you then." And we, 
yes, "WE" walked out. Buckled in the SUV, I backed out 
of the drive and headed up the residential street. Once 
on the road, I rested my right arm on the console, as 
was my habit. I felt a soft, warm, feminine hand take 
mine.

"D'you mind this, Dan?" she asked in a soft voice.

"No, Nina, I don't. Are you telling me something?"

"I heard what Grandma told you. All of it."

"And what I said, too?"

"All of that, too..."

"This is scary to me, Nina... I've known you for a week. 
It's..."

"Special?!?"

"How did you know that's what I was thinking?"

"I just sort of know..." Her hand left mine and touched 
my cheek. "How about we just be friends... And we'll 
see..."

"I'd ... Just friends... Okay..."

And the afternoon was just that, holding hands, the 
occasional caress of face or arm the seemed to be 
transmitting so much more. We ate dinner at a country 
barbecue joint, laughing at the mess we made, walked a 
nature trail at a park, and finally headed back into 
town. I walked her to the front door. Before she opened 
it, she turned.

"Thank you for a wonderful day, Dan." And she kissed me. 
Chastely. Lips closed, but soft, so desirable. "I'll 
call you tomorrow. Homework. Okay?"

"Okay," I said. This time I got a little bold. I touched 
my hand to her waist and gently pulled her toward me and 
kissed her back. "I'll see you tomorrow, baby." And I 
left.

I don't remember Monday. I did remember a photo in my 
briefcase. I put it in a frame, camouflaged by being in 
with a bunch of other pictures of me, co-workers, 
friends. But a thousand times during the day, I looked 
up at those eyes.

I was out the gate at four. Home by four-thirty. Bathed 
and shaved and thinking about supper when the cell 
buzzed. I was hoping... Nina!

"Hi, sweetness," I said.

"Hi, boyfriend," she answered. "You busy?"

"Not in the least. Waiting."

"Me too. I'm on the way."

"Come on."

Fifteen minutes later she walked in. "I didn't even 
knock."

"So I noticed." I reached onto the counter. "Here's 
something, just in case."

"A key?"

"Yeah. In case I'm not here and you need anything."

"But you're ALWAYS here," and then she smiled. "I guess 
you're not worried about me walking in on you and some 
other woman."

"There ARE no other women, babe. And there will BE no 
other women."

"Serious friends, then, huh?"

"Serious," I affirmed. "Uh, got any homework?"

"Nope. Just reviews."

"Do you need any help? I mean, I'm supposed to help you, 
you know..."

The grin was enormous. "You DO help, babe," she said. 
She produced her iPod. "Can we do this?"

"Oh, yeah. Here! Let's get it started. I have most of 
them on a hard drive. I got the transfer started. It's 
gonna take a while."

She smiled. "Then put this on." She handed me a CD, 
Beethoven. Pastorale. I put it in the player and then 
accepted her tug onto the sofa. This time we were NOT at 
opposite ends.

"Turn the lights down," she said. I turned down the 
lights. And she nestled back into my arms and that's 
where we stayed. No groping. No heavy breathing.

"Mmmmm. You smell good, babe," she said. She nestled her 
face into my chest.

That presented me with her hair, brushed to perfection, 
smelling clean, soft to the touch of my lips. I kissed 
the top of her perfect head and she responded by pulling 
my arms tight around her. On top of a pair of small but 
wonderfully firm breasts. But she had my hands captured 
in hers, and there was no way I was going to make a move 
to touch things that needed touching, caressing, 
fondling... No way.

Her breathing was even, regular... asleep in my arms. 
Oh, well. If she wanted to sleep, I'd let her sleep. 
Finally, a cramp in my leg required, insisted, demanded 
movement. I tried not to disturb her, but was 
unsuccessful.

"Mmmmm" escaped her lips. "I thought I was dreaming, 
babe." I adjusted my crampy leg and she rearranged 
herself in my arms again. "This is better."

"You were asleep, Nina."

"I know. I didn't sleep good last night. Just tossed and 
turned for hours it seemed. I don't know how I made it 
through school today. But the music... You holding me... 
It's perfect. Uh... I'm sorry I'm not much company, 
babe."

"Oh, it's horrible, it is... Lounging on the sofa with a 
pretty girl in my arms. I am perfectly happy, little 
one."

"I am, too, Dan. Uh, what time is it?"

"'Bout time for you to head home, babe... as much as I 
enjoy this..."

"I know," she said.

We untangled and she stood. I stood with her and then 
went and retrieved her iPod. "Here," I said. "You'll 
have good music." I escorted her to the door and got 
another chaste, tender, lips closed kiss. And a hug. And 
I kissed the top of her head and breathed the sweetness 
in, and I let her go.

Tuesday was different. Nina was excited. "Don't forget 
tomorrow's the day you're supposed to give me my tour," 
she reminded me.

"Like I could forget. How's that gonna work? Am I 
supposed to pick you up at school?"

"Can you get off to do that? I can ride the bus, and 
then you can come get me at school and bring me home at 
the end of the day..."

"I can do that," I said. "Do they know what we're 
doing?"

She smiled. "Just ask for Mr. Simpson. He's my 
counselor. I talked with him and I got a permission slip 
signed by Grandma and everything's cool."

"I'll be there at twelve-thirty," I said. "Wear 
something comfortable."

"I can do that," Nina smiled. "I'm looking forward to 
seeing your world."

"Not just my world, babe," I said. "You're wanting to be 
an engineer too, you know."

"I know."

"I want to help you." I picked up my car keys. "Let's go 
for a ride..."

"Where?"

"I don't know," I said. "Just ride around..."

"No," she said. "I liked last night. We just sat and 
listened to music. It was nice, just to not worry about 
tests and lessons and school for a while. And be 
held..."

"Okay," I said. "Just didn't want you bored. What do you 
want to start with?"

She reached in her purse and picked out her iPod and 
punched at the touchwheel. "Moonlight Sonata. For 
starters."

I took the suggestion and lined up her first choice and 
several others of similar vein on the playback queue of 
the computer I used to manage my sound system and 
started the music.

"Dim the lights, babe," Nina said. "And come sit in your 
chair."

"My chair" was a big recliner. Many a night I'd fallen 
asleep in its comfy confines. But last night Nina and I 
had snuggled on the sofa. The recliner wasn't wide 
enough for both of us. But I followed her instruction 
and sat. And she slid onto my lap.

"Am I too big to sit on your lap?" she purred.

I answered by encircling her in my arms and kicking the 
recliner back to deposit her on top of me. "Is this 
okay?"

And she kissed me. Not the safe, chaste kiss from the 
evening before. No, her lips, while closed, were hot, 
soft and searching and I responded in kind.

"Mmmmm," she said.

"Oh, Nina," was all I could do. I sucked in a breath, 
trying to clear my head, thinking, "Dan, what did you 
expect? You have her in your arms."

Another kiss. Her lips parted, her tongue tentative, 
almost frightened, touched my lips and I parted my lips 
and lightly touched my own tongue's tip to hers. Feeling 
that, her tongue became emboldened and she probed my 
mouth as I tasted her for the first time. She broke the 
kiss after long moments, sighing.

"Mmmm, Dannnnnn..."

"My Nina." My words drew another kiss, her body twisting 
to put us face to face, her arms between us, her hands 
grasping my shirt.

"Dan..."

"Nina... baby. Oh, god..." I breathed in, the scent of a 
hint of her perfume in my nostrils. "another, baby." And 
she turned her face to me. This one was hotter than the 
last. My hands stroked her hair, sleek, soft to my 
touch, my fingers brushing the bare skin of her neck. 
When she raised her lips away from me, I touched her 
face, enraptured.

"Dan... you..."

Me? Me, what..."

"No, never mind. You'll think I'm a silly young girl."

"I haven't thought you were silly from the first time we 
talked, little one. What are you thinking..."

"Stuff that I probably shouldn't..."

That intrigued me. There was a single part of my anatomy 
that was a long way past any intrigue. My dick was hard, 
almost painful, because it had gone hard while pointed 
in the wrong direction. But I didn't think with that. I 
wasn't going to LET myself think with that. I knew in my 
head and in my heart that I could not be the kind of man 
who'd take advantage of Nina. "Babe, I'm your friend..."

She put her fingertip to my lips, shutting me up. 
"That's just it! You ARE my friend. But..."

"But, what..."

"No, I'm being silly..."

"Try me. I can evaluate silly. I'm an engineer." She 
kissed me again, almost like she was slaking a thirst.

"Okay... Dan, is it silly to believe in love at first 
sight?"

"It's not silly to believe in love," I said. "And I 
guess it can happen fast, and it can happen ... I don't 
know, why not? With who?"

"you." she said, simply. "Who am I kissing? YOU!" She 
sighed, "Dan, you're the first guy I ever kissed because 
I wanted to KISS him. I mean, I was a little girl and I 
kissed little boys, like little kids do. But since I was 
old enough to get over the little girl, little boy 
thing, I have never kissed a guy. Like since I was ten." 
She brushed her lips across mine like she was testing, 
then they melted into mine, her tongue brushing my lips 
as I opened my mouth to her.

A thousand heartbeats later, it seemed, I was gazing at 
her perfect face in the dim light of the room, the music 
of the masters adding to the perfection. It was my turn. 
"Nina, baby, dearest..."

A brief kiss before she answered. "Yes, Dan..."

"How can I... I've fallen in love with a dream..."

Giggle. Sigh. "You too?"

"Yeah. And your grandma said..."

"I heard what Grandma said. You hear what Nina says." 
She sat up a little straighter, out of kissing range. "I 
am a week short of my eighteenth birthday. I have NOT 
had a good life except for the time I spent with my 
grandmother. And at school, even though I have been an 
outsider. Kids at school know about my mother and they 
know me, and I don't put up with getting the two of us 
confused. I am NOT my mother in any way, shape or form. 
And I am different from other eighteen year old girls. I 
don't have any illusions about knights and shining armor 
and castles and princesses and pretty ponies. None of 
that crap. I am logical and mature and intelligent. And 
at THIS point, Dan Gleason, I think I have found myself 
to be in love. With you."

"Wow. That's quite a speech," I said. "Now, do you want 
to hear mine?"

"You've got one?"

"I didn't PLAN one, but since YOU started it, I am 
thirty-eight years old, I have been badly hurt by 
several women in my life whom I've, in each case, 
committed to spend the rest of my life with. One has my 
daughter, and the way things are going now, I will never 
get to be a father to her. I do not easily fall in love, 
and I do not sleep around or do one night stands. I find 
that my tastes are different than most people's 
especially most women's and I had decided that unless 
some bolt of lightning out of the blue dropped a 
lifemate into my lap, I would just as happily spend the 
rest of my life with a cat as a companion." I paused. 
"And YOU'RE in my lap. Thirty-eight year old guys are 
NOT supposed to be in love with eighteen year old girls. 
Especially after knowing them for a week and a half. But 
I am in love. And I like it."

"Shut up," she said, "and kiss me. Lots."

I ignored the discomfort in my crotch. I wasn't about to 
break this mood. I complied with her order and provided 
her with kisses. Lots.
Chapter Three

At eight PM I let Nina go. My hands had wandered over 
her back and shoulders and arms and her hands had done 
the same to me. Neither of us had teased or attempted to 
touch skin that was covered by clothing. Chaste. It was 
little wonder that after seeing her out the front door, 
I was in the shower easing the pressures that had built 
all evening.

I wasn't a constant masturbator. I wasn't asexual, it's 
just that I didn't do fantasies very well. I didn't have 
a fantasy in mind on this night. I saw blue eyes and 
almost ebony brown hair and that outrageous blonde 
fringe and laughter and I squirted for relief, not lust.

At twenty minutes after noon the next day I was at the 
local high school, in the office, asking for Miss Nina 
Sayers. The middle-aged lady at the office counter sent 
a student assistant away to get the guidance counselor. 
I met him in a couple of minutes, a balding, fifty-ish 
man of husky build.

"Hi! I'm Jim Simpson. Guidance counselor. You're getting 
one of my prize students."

"I'm Dan Gleason. Electrical Engineer. I promised her a 
plant tour."

"Ah," he grinned. "Electrical engineer. So THAT'S the 
connection."

"Yessir," I said. "She indicated an interest, and I let 
her talk me into an afternoon of wandering around a 
smelly old chemical plant."

He laughed. "She's a joy. A student who wants to get it. 
Who works to get it. Gosh, I wish I saw more of 'em."

"Hi, Mister Dan," came a chirpy voice.

I looked to the door and saw Nina, jeans and a long-
sleeved cotton shirt, sensible leather shoes, her 
backpack slung over her left shoulder.

"You ready to go?" I asked her.

"Yessir. Sign me out!"

"Mister Jim, here's my card. Maybe we can get together a 
program for other interested students."

"Thanks," he said. "I'll call you."

"Okay, do that. We'll see you later." I signed the 
proper forms and walked out with Nina at my side. We got 
in my SUV.

She poked me. "Just remember, mister, that this 
"interested student" LOVES you."

"I will not forget that, baby. This old engineer loves 
you too."

The ride to the plant was twenty minutes, followed by 
signing her in the security gate, giving her a visitor's 
hard hat and safety glasses, and then hopping in the 
golf cart that was my personal in-plant transport. 
Somehow, the idea that I had a golf-cart to run around 
in all day was impressive.

"My time's a bit too important to waste walking back and 
forth," I said. We did the grand circle around the place 
as I showed her the production units and the shops and 
my pet, the powerhouse where two big generators 
converted steam to electricity. "Wanna see my office?"

"Sure," she beamed.

I pulled up and parked.

"You have your own parking spot."

"Yep. And my own office." We walked in the door and I 
started introducing her to my co-workers.

Old guy, Harvey. "So this is the one you've been telling 
us about? Nina, is it?"

"Yessir," Nina said.

"And you're wanting to be an electrical engineer?"

"Yessir."

He laughed. "I wish my daughter'd want to be an 
engineer. I'm paying out the nose so she can go into 
marketing. Hah! Miss Nina, you're too pretty to be an 
ELECTRICAL engineer. You ought to do mechanical."

Nina laughed. "Oh, no sir! Mister Dan says they're all 
knuckle-draggers!"

Harvey guffawed. "That's what I expected him to say."

I showed Nina my office, the piles of books and prints, 
the big monitor for the computer, and the unit clerk, 
thirtyish, plump, smiling Jannie.

"Jannie," I said, "This is Nina Sayers. Soon to be an 
engineering student."

"Hi, Mizz Jannie," said Nina.

"Hi, Nina," said Jannie. "Don't let him fill your head 
with ideas. **I** run this place."

"She's right, you know," I laughed. I guided her to my 
office.

"Hmph! The one at your house is neater," she observed.

I showed her some artifacts of some notorious equipment 
failures, a few pictures, a few examples of our 
drawings, and then we went back out into the loud, 
smelly world I worked in. The tour took us in the noise 
and heat and humidity of steam powerhouses and clean, 
cool, high-tech of modern control facilities. We peeked 
at the maze of wires that did the control, and at the 
arm-thick cables that moved huge amounts of electrical 
power, and the odd-looking apparatus of high voltage 
substations, and she drank it in.

We caught a crew of electricians at work pulling in a 
new set of cables and she pretty much shut the job down 
by showing up. Pretty young girls with striking hair 
showing underneath their hard hats can do that. And I 
really flustered the crew leader by asking HIM to 
explain a bit about what they were doing. And she smiled 
and thanked him.

We toured a couple of production units and I took her to 
the quality control lab so she could see chemists 
testing the final products. And I introduced her to the 
plant's engineering manager and told him that Nina would 
be lining up for a summer internship a year hence.

Four o'clock saw us pulling my golf cart into its slot 
so we could walk together to the parking lot. I signed 
my fledgling out of the plant and then scanned my own 
badge to end my day, and we got in my car to head home. 
As soon as we cleared the boundary fence she grabbed my 
free hand, hauled it to her lips and kissed it.

"'Cuz I can't crawl over the console and kiss YOU!" she 
cooed. "That's all so wonderful, Dan!"

I shook my head, almost disbelieving. "It's WORK, doll!"

"I know, but EVERYBODY'S got to work at something, and 
that's INTERESTING!"

"It is," I admitted. "It's what I like to do. Well, 
maybe not the paperwork, but the technology, the 
constant mental challenges of making things work better, 
helping people learn to do things, that's what I like."

"I saw that, baby," she said. "Those guys we talked to, 
you could see it in their faces, that they thought a lot 
of you."

"I don't know about all that," I said. "I've pissed 'em 
all off at one time or another."

"That happens between people," she said. "If you're put 
together, there's always going to be times when you 
don't necessarily want the same thing at the same time. 
But there's always somebody who's right, and somebody 
who's boss. You have to hope those two belong to the 
same person at the end of the day, and that everybody is 
mature enough to get past getting told "no" and go on."

"You're a wise young lady." I took my eyes off traffic 
long enough to regard her pretty face.

"You don't live with my mom without getting crash 
courses in human relations, Dan."

"I suppose. And you seem to apply them yourself. The 
right way."

"I try. But you know, I know other people who try 
sometimes, and things just go wrong. Like I said, one 
person's right, and one person's going to win, and you 
hope those are bath the same person. Because if the one 
who's right, loses, well..."

"But sometimes that's the way life is, babe," I said. 
"sometimes being right is a matter of life or death. 
Sometimes being right is choosing the entertainment for 
the evening. One battle is worth pulling out all the 
stops. The other is worth a shrug and eating spaghetti 
because that's what your partner wanted instead of 
schnitzel."

"Don't sweat the small stuff, huh?" She giggled. "And 
most of it IS small stuff."

"Yeah, like dinner tonight. I drop you off at your 
house, you clean up and get a little bit dressed up 
while I go to MY house and do the same, and then I pick 
you up for dinner and I'm thinking rib-eyes and you're 
thinking enchiladas..."

"Actually, I was thinking of calling Grandma and seeing 
if she wants to go out to eat with us. She's got this 
friend..."

"Boyfriend?"

Giggle. "If you want to call a sixty-something guy 
"boy", I guess so. But we could ALL go out and eat."

"That would be nice. Makes us look respectable."

"Hah! Babe, we ARE respectable." She smiled.

"Yeah, once you get past the part where a seventeen year 
old girl is running the roads with a thirty-eight year 
old guy."

"Where the guy is an engineer who just took a high 
school student on a field trip. And helps her with 
calculus and trig and physics." She sighed, sounding a 
bit exasperated. "Besides, I'm a week shy of being 
eighteen, and at eighteen if I want to go out and get 
MARRIED, I can, with nobody's permission..."

"Except maybe the guy you're marrying..."

She laughed, "Yeah, there is THAT. But what I'm saying 
is that there's nothing illegal."

These conversations were what I liked about Nina. She 
let her mind roll around a subject, as much to see what 
SHE thought as what I thought. "Nina, punkin, " I said. 
"There's a huge difference between what's legal and 
what's considered proper."

"Believe me, babe, I know that," she continued. "And 
sometimes," she continued, "that's good. And sometimes 
it makes NO sense at all. Like, I'm seventeen. D'you 
KNOW how many seventeen year old girls I know of who are 
still VIRGINS?"

"Uh..." I had no idea.

"I'll tell you. One. ME! But I don't know everybody. But 
the girls I hear, they've ALL done it. Some of 'em do it 
a LOT. With a lot of different guys. I'm sorry. I had a 
mom like that. I don't EVEN want to be like Mom."

"But just because a lot of people do something doesn't 
make it right. Stupidity can flourish in large groups."

Giggle. "I saw that on a sign in your office!" I had a 
poster that said "Never underestimate the stupidity of 
people in large groups."

She kept on. "But what irks me, Dan Gleason, is getting 
lumped into the group. Like my hair. Until I did this 
blonde tipping thing, I looked pretty conservative. I 
don't do fashion trends. But do something striking to my 
hair, and then I was lumped in with a group. Just 
because of how I look." She sighed. "That was a 
revelation. Even some of my teachers..."

"You learned a lesson."

"Yeah. I should've gotten it trimmed off for my 
birthday."

"You do what you want. I have to admit, though, the 
first day I met you, I saw the hair and the first 
thought was "Goth chick". Until I looked closer and saw 
dark brown, not black, and the only piercings were one 
in each ear. And then you started talking, and that 
erased any preconceptions I might have entertained."

"See," she said. We turned on the street of her 
grandma's house. "Anyway, what I'm saying is that in 
some cases it's okay to go counter to the accepted 
norms. Sometimes the norms are good. Sometimes they're 
stereotypes. And eighteen and thirty-eight..."

We pulled into her driveway. This time she did climb 
halfway over the console and deliver a chaste kiss. 
"I'll call you after I talk to Grandma... See ya, babe!"

I smiled. "See you in a bit, angel." I wanted, almost 
blurted, "I love you..." but how stupid could I be, 
three weeks into knowing her. But then I remembered 
already crossing THAT line. I drove home, silently 
thinking. At the house, I met the cat at the door, gave 
him a perfunctory scratching behind his ears, then 
stripped, showered, shaved, and the phone rang. Nina.

"Hello, little girl."

"Hello, old man," she giggled. "Can you come get me in 
forty-five minutes? Grandma's gonna ride with Ed. That's 
her guy. And I wanted to ride with you."

"Where are we going?"

"I hope you're up for that Italian place again..."

"Good memories there. Most wonderful first date in my 
whole life took place there. With a girl you'd think was 
a Goth until you found out different..."

Her voice was lower, almost a whisper... "Dan, you say 
sweet things to me..."

"You mean sweet things to me."

Her sigh was audible over the phone. "See you in forty-
five minutes, okay..."

"I'll be there, babe!"

Dinner was an enjoyable time. Nina's grandmother, Helen, 
was an interesting person in her own right, and her 
"friend" Ed was a business man, semi-retired, and a 
funny guy, smart, acerbic wit, and Nina, was, well, in 
conversation, capable beyond her years. Salads came and 
went. Entrees. Desserts. Coffee.

In the parking lot, we split up into two couples again. 
I promised to have Nina home by nine, it being a school 
night. That gave us an hour alone together and Nina's 
comment: "let's go to your house."

Twenty minutes later we were there. In my recliner. With 
Nina in my lap, and we were kissing and caressing one 
another, each keeping hands strictly limited to no 
private areas. The only feel of her perky, smallish (now 
that I'd seen her in something other than over-sized 
shirts) breasts was the feel of them pressed against my 
chest or arm. The only feel of her softly curved, 
shapely butt was it pressed against my lap.

Her lips melted me, though. Except for one particular 
part, and I knew she HAD to feel it pressing against her 
from inside my trousers, but she never acted as though 
it was of concern to her.

"I know we don't have a lot of time, tonight, Dan, but I 
just needed you to kiss me and hold me." We kissed. I 
lead the way at first, but her own mouth was ranging 
around my neck and face now, and I said NOTHING about 
her use of her teeth but she had a habit of attaching 
herself to my neck and sucking and biting.

I loved it, although I cautioned her about visible 
marks. We kissed and caressed. "Dan," she said, "I... 
Uh... You make me feel... Uh..." Her voice fell to a 
whisper. "I love you. You make me love you."

"I love you too, Nina..."

She turned her head. The clock was clearly visible. And 
our evening was almost at its end.

"Dan," she said, preparatory to dropping a bomb, "I wish 
I didn't have to go home..."

I took a deep breath, knowing that the response to this 
simple statement was of monumental importance to the 
future of Dan and Nina. "I think that would be 
wonderful. I love having you near me."

Kiss. She said, "I mean, like "together", Dan... I've 
thought about it."

"I have, too, Nina..."

She burrowed into my chest. You have? Really? Me?"

"Who else? You're my everything... If you want to be."

"I do, you know. I've thought about it."

"And..."

And then my Nina shifted from hormonal teen to Little 
Miss Logical. "And I think we might... It just could 
be..." She sighed. "Dan, I love you. Very much. You're 
the first guy I ever loved..."

"I feel quite privileged to have that distinction 
bestowed on me, sweetness," I said.

Kiss. "Mmmmm..." sigh. "You've been... Uh... Is this the 
way it is?"

"No," I said truthfully. "It isn't."

That answer caused her to raise herself to look into my 
face. "No?" Her eyes looked concerned.

"No. Never has been. This," I said, "is the way I WANTED 
it to be."

"Really? Because it's important to me..."

"Babe," I said, "I look at how we are, three weeks 
together, and I'm amazed. You walk in here, pull a CD 
from my collection, and it's Boccherini. We talk, and 
it's about science and news and philosophy. We kiss, 
and..."

"I know," she said," finishing my sentence for me. "I 
know... You've always let me be myself." Another sigh. 
"I guess I need to go... home."

We untangled, my body aching for her continued presence, 
and then entwined ourselves together, standing, kissing, 
and I felt her hand slide downward past my belt and over 
my butt. And then pull away. Her eyes surveyed mine but 
she said nothing.

A short while later we were at her house and I walked 
her to the door. Ah, the "door kiss". Chastely, she 
tiptoed and planted and kiss on my lips, short, oh so 
sweet. "Dan, this has been a wonderful day. We'll have 
more. And better."

And I went home.

Thursday. Friday. Less than a week to her birthday. A 
week until her high school graduation. Despite her 
grades, she wasn't valedictorian. She'd only maintained 
the high average for the past two years. The kid who got 
the honors had been pumping out straight A's for four. 
And wasn't doing four maths and four sciences and was 
likely headed into liberal arts instead of engineering. 
Nina's commentary on this fact was wry and laconic. "He 
played the game for points. I'm after knowledge."

Saturday was her babysitting job. We did meet at the 
park and sat together while her charges worked 
themselves to exhaustion, and I retired to spend 
Saturday night accompanied by my cat. And the cat missed 
Nina.

Sunday I got Nina after church and we did the classic 
drive in the country. Monday was the last of her final 
exams. Grades were Wednesday, and Friday night I was in 
the stadium watching my love receive her diploma, along 
with five hundred other kids. I knew that many of them 
were headed off to parties afterward. Nina'd told me 
that she'd been invited.

"Babe, go if you want to. This is your only high school 
graduation."

"Yes it is, Dan," she'd said while holding onto me with 
her arms around my neck. "Let's see. What should I do? 
Choices... I could go to a social event with the same 
kids who used to give me pure hell, and where there will 
be drinking and drugs and loud music that I fail to 
appreciate, or I can come here, have a quiet dinner with 
a man whom I adore, and listen to the masters... Oh, 
such a difficult choice..."

"Did I mention that you have a sarcastic streak?"

"Me?!??!" she squealed in mock indignation.

"Yes, you." I kissed her on her nose. "And I find it 
delightful."

And that's why, after her graduation ceremony, we ended 
up at my house.

But her birthday was two days before. And we celebrated 
with a quiet party for four, me, her, her grandmother, 
and her grandmother's beau, at a nice restaurant. And I 
presented her with a ring. No, not an engagement ring. 
Just a, as I said at the dinner table, "friendship" 
ring. With a sapphire, because I remembered her telling 
me that she liked the blue color.

But back to that post-graduation thing. She was eighteen 
years and three days old now. And our post-graduation 
dinner was the standard foursome, late in the evening, 
courtesy of reservations. And after a surreptitious 
conversation with her grandmother beforehand to make 
sure I wasn't violating HER wishes, I asked Nina if 
she'd like to try a glass of wine with the meal.

And Ed proposed a toast: "To Nina, who's like a grand-
daughter (he cocked an eye towards Helen and winked) to 
me. Young lady, may this page in your life turn and find 
you in a new and wonderful chapter!"

And we clinked glasses and enjoyed our meal.

And in the car after the meal, we headed back to my 
house, because, she said, "Every place we go will be 
full of graduating kids. It'll be a madhouse." So we 
turned towards the house and in twenty minutes I was in 
the driveway. We walked inside.

After the door closed behind us, I faced a very pretty 
eighteen year old girl who wanted a kiss. And when she 
wrapped her arms around my neck to get that kiss, her 
body formed against me and I felt myself getting hard. 
I'm sure she did, too, but she made no notice except to 
merge into my arms. After the first kiss broke, she 
said, "I told Grandma I'd be home at midnight. She said 
that was reasonable, considering that it was my 
graduation."

"That is reasonable, babe." I kissed her again. And when 
this one broke, she took me by the hand into the living 
room.

"Sit," she commanded. I sat while she picked music for 
the evening and loaded the CD player. When she got the 
music started, she came to sit on my lap. Together we 
rocked the recliner back and she eased into her snuggle 
mode, semi-sideways, the soft roundness of her hip 
pressing into my crotch, her torso twisted to let us 
kiss and cuddle, and my hands, one cradled her head, the 
other softly stroked her shoulder and back, never 
straying lower than her waist, never to the soft, 
waiting breasts. Her lips, her neck, her ears, those 
were a playground for my mouth, and she took equal 
liberties with me, although she did give herself free 
reign over my chest.

Her hundred and thirty pounds was never the problem. 
There was a problem. My dick. I learned early in these 
exercises that I needed to make sure it was pointed in 
the right direction before we began our marathon 
cuddling, because the smell, the feel, the taste of her 
lips, the feel of her skin, I got hard and stayed hard. 
Was it torture? Yes. And no. I told myself that here was 
this delightful creature who wanted to be held and 
caressed and kissed, and I decided that I would do just 
that until doomsday because of the riches of her smile, 
her laugh, the joy I got from seeing twinkling eyes and 
that lop-sided smirk when she dropped a horrible pun 
into conversations or laughed at our jokes together.

And she said she loved me. In my mind that put me in a 
different position. Love. Not lust. At least not the 
lust that put us in bed together. I figured that if she 
wished that at some time in the future, I would accede 
to her desires. But that would be at her pace.

We listened to the music for a while then flipped on the 
TV and watched a bit, talking about what we saw in the 
middle of some fairly recent chick flick.

"Dan, baby," she said, "is it wrong to want the fairy 
tale?"

"Fairy tale? Like in "happily ever after?"

"Yes," she sighed.

"I dunno, sweetness. I guess. But I think you have to 
define your own happiness, and know that pieces of it 
come up after some tough things. Some people never learn 
that."

"Do YOU know how to do that, Dan?"

"I was doing pretty good, babe," I said. "You know I 
love my profession. I enjoy the people I work with. 
Yeah, I was being pretty happy until about a month ago."

"And then I came along and made you unhappy?" Her face 
took a sad look.

"No, babe, not a bit unhappy, every day that I have you. 
I'm just fitting you into my new definition of happy. 
It's dangerous."

"How's it dangerous?"

"Because I've been hurt before by women I thought I was 
happy with. And they were happy with me. Until they 
weren't. Hurts..."

"Oh, baby, I didn't mean to make you sad." Her eyes were 
moist, on the verge of tears.

"Oh, please, Nina, don't even think that you make me 
sad. You're the thing in my life that makes me 
happiest." I kissed her, brushing her bangs aside with 
my lips so I could reach her forehead. "But you brought 
the subject up. What's on YOUR mind, babe? Hmmm?"

And a first happened. She rolled her hips to place her 
body full length on mine. And she propped her face in 
her hands, looking at me.

"Me. And you."

"Us?"

"D'ya think of it as "us"?"

"Yes, pretty much. Let's see. Since I met you a month 
ago, the only place I go by myself is to work and to the 
grocery store. And the park. But when I get there, 
you're there."

The cat jumped up on the arm of the recliner. Nina 
stroked him, starting his loudest purrs.

"So, yes," I continued, "it's "us". At least in my mind. 
But what do you think?"

"Us. But I thought I was being presumptuous."

"Presuming what?"

She had an incredible shyness at times. This was one of 
those times. "That you could love me. Like, love, not 
sex."

"You, dearest, are smart, funny, and in my eyes, 
incredibly pretty. You have a quick wit and you 
apparently read books without pictures. Your vocabulary 
includes words like "presumptuous" and others with more 
than two syllables. If I was a quadriplegic and could 
never hope to do any more than just see you and listen 
to you and talk with you, I'd love you."

She smiled.

"But here you are in my arms and I breathe deep when 
you're around, just to add the happy scent of you to the 
happiness I get from seeing you and hearing you, and 
you're in my arms, and I just as well have had my first 
kiss a month ago when your lips first touched mine, for 
the way I feel when we kiss. Yeah. Love. Not sex."

"Dan," she said, "Love is... Is... forever. I think."

"I thought so, too, babe. But some people don't. I've 
fallen in love, forever, before. Had it shoved up my 
nose."

"I'm sorry," she said softly. "I kinda know..."

"How, babe? You've..."

She put her index finger against my lips. "Shhhh! I paid 
attention. Mom. And had long talks with Grandma about 
what I saw. I don't want that done to me, like Mom did, 
guy after guy, getting dumped on because she didn't know 
the difference between sex and love at first, then later 
when she just didn't care, and she dished out as good as 
she got. But you know, somewhere deep inside, I think 
she was still hoping..."

"It's my turn to say I'm sorry, babe." I kissed her 
gently. Her lips melded into mine.

"But some people get it, huh, babe?"

"Yeah, sweetie, some do. That old guy who told you to be 
a mechanical engineer, he's been married forty years. 
Has pictures of his wife and kids and grandkids. Some 
do."

Another sigh. "'It's what I want, Dan."

I sighed. We'd had parts of this conversation before.. 
Gently I said, "Sweetie, we've talked about this. I'm 
afraid. You're eighteen. Pretty. Getting ready to start 
college. And every class you go to is going to be filled 
with kids your age, some of them guys, and you're taking 
engineering courses, so that screens out a lot of the 
run of the mill jocks and dumbasses. You'll meet some 
guy and the two of you will click and then you'll decide 
to start off your careers together."

This time there WERE tears. "Dan, do you still TRUST 
people? Me?"

"I want to, baby..."

There was a new insistence in her next kiss. "You'll 
see." She pushed up from my chest. "Babe, it's time to 
go. Almost midnight. 'Kay?"

"Okay..." came from my lips. "One of these days... uh, 
make that "nights"," was in my head, running around, 
screaming.

We kissed long and hard, standing. In the car she said, 
"Babysitting tomorrow, sugar. Meet me at the park?"

"I'll be there. To see my dream in the sunlight, taking 
care of kids..."

"Brats..." she laughed. "Well, they ARE getting better."

"Yeah," I said. "You said you won't be babysitting all 
summer?"

"Nope!" she giggled. "This is the last weekend. They're 
going somewhere for the summer. I won't know WHAT to do 
with myself on Saturdays after this weekend..."

"I can think of a million things..."

"Me too, love," and she giggled. And I was glad. I loved 
her when she was giggly. We pulled into the drive at her 
house and I walked her to her door and kissed her.

By seven AM Saturday morning I was running a fever. I 
don't know... some kind of virus, I thought. I took my 
own temperature and it was 101. I couldn't see straight. 
Every muscle in my body ached. I tried eating breakfast 
and it came back up faster than it went down. I 
staggered back to bed and lay down and passed out.

In the dim spaces of my head, I heard ringing. Insistent 
ringing. It went away. Came back. Finally, in my fever I 
deciphered that it was my phone. I picked up.

Nina's voice. "Dan, I'm at the park. Where are you?"

I croaked, "Home. Sick. Fever. Can't move. Throwing up."

"Baby..." she gasped. "I'm coming..."

"No, not with the kids. Don't come here. I don't want to 
expose you..."

"Grandma will watch the kids. I'm coming over!"

The exertion drained what little energy I had and I 
flopped back down and in a second I was back out of it.

The next time I awoke, a cool, moist cloth was 
soothingly wiping my face. "Nina..." I croaked. My 
throat felt like nails were driven into the back of it.

"Babe, you're SICK! I've been wiping your face for an 
hour. You've been out of it."

"Uhhh" was all I could get out.

She picked up the electronic thermometer from bedside 
and stuck it in my mouth for a minute, then read it.

"102," she said. She flipped open her cellphone. 
"Grandma. He's 102. NO. Semi-conscious. No. I can take 
him if I can get him to the car." She looked at me. 
"Babe. Can you walk? We're going to the emergency room."

I tried several times to turn and rise to a sitting 
position; oblivious to the fact that I was wearing only 
a t-shirt and tightie-whities. As I was gathering 
strength, she rummaged through my dresser to find a pair 
of shorts and knelt in front of my legs as they dangled 
off the side of the bed. She picked up one foot at a 
time and put my feet into the pants legs, then pulled 
them up as high as she could with me sitting. As I tried 
to stand, she helped steady me and knelt down again, 
pulling my shorts up, reaching around the back to pull 
them up to my waist, then tugging up the front. 
Disastrously, there was a bulge that just didn't fit 
easily. She looked up at me and saw me dazed and shaking 
from the effort of standing, and she shrugged and her 
fingers pushed on the bulge in my drawers and pulled my 
shorts up. She snapped them then pulled the zipper up, 
her fingers pushing gently to keep that pesky bulge out 
of the way. She stuffed my wallet into my back pocket.

She supported me to the front door.

"My car," I said hoarsely, my throat a mass of pain.

"You sure, babe?"

""Sure..."

She picked the keys off the board by the front door and 
we left the house. She opened the passenger door and 
pushed me to get me inside and then buckled my seatbelt. 
"I do this for my kids all the time, she said, trying to 
make me feel better. She returned to the front door and 
locked it, then got in my SUV and cranked it up. Fifteen 
minutes later I was a dazed mess under the awning at the 
emergency room and Nina was haranguing the staff to get 
a gurney out to unload me. As the orderlies rolled me 
inside, Nina recovered my wallet from my pocket and 
attended to the registration.

Twenty minutes later I was being poked and prodded and 
stuck and Nina was at my side, fretting, holding my hand 
in hers. The doctor came in, left, came back.

"Miss Gleason," he said, "He's got bad strep throat. 
We're going to keep him overnight and put some 
antibiotics in him."

"It's serious?" Nina asked in a small voice.

"It could've gotten worse and we'd have been in trouble, 
but he's gonna be okay. This nurse is going to give him 
a couple of shots. One for the pain, the other is a 
quick-acting antibiotic. And he's going upstairs."

I was in and out. Swallowing was like having a red-hot 
poker driven into the back of my throat. The pain-killer 
was blessed relief, and as I drifted off, Nina patted my 
arm. "Babe," she said, "I'm gonna go home and get you 
some things. I'll be back." And she kissed my cheek and 
left.

Some hours alter I woke up in a hospital room, dimly 
lit, and there at my bedside was Nina.

"Babe," I said.

"Hi, baby. I'm worried."

I looked at the IV dripping into my arm, big bag of 
fluid, little piggyback of IV antibiotics which were 
apparently kicking streptococcus ass in my body. I could 
almost swallow without wincing.

"I'm gonna be okay. I can swallow now."

"Good." She rubbed my arm gently.

There was a knock at the door and the voice of a staff 
nurse.

"Come in," said Nina. "He's awake now."

The hefty nurse came in with her instrument cart. "Well 
hello," Mister Gleason," she said. "Good to see you 
awake." She stuck an infrared thermometer in my ear. 
"Fever's coming way down. You were over a hundred and 
two when you came in. Have you tried drinking."

"No, not yet."

"Can you give it a try for me," she smiled. Nina handed 
me a waterglass with a straw. I sucked at the straw, 
wincing first from the movement of my throat as I tried 
to suck then again as the ice water hit it. But that 
felt GOOD. I drank a bit.

"Very good!" chirped the nurse. "I've got another round 
of Demerol on the chart for you."

"Uh..." I said.

The nurse said, "You ought to take it. You're still 
running on the last dose and you're gonna hurt when it 
wears off."

"Do it, then," I said.

The nurse injected the painkiller into my IV line and I 
started drifting off.

"He's going to sleep some more," she told Nina. "If you 
need to go home and rest.."

"I'm not leaving his side," Nina said, determinedly.
Chapter Four

I woke again after midnight when the nurse made her 
rounds. When the nurse walked in, Nina woke up and stood 
by me. My fever was drastically down and I was feeling 
much better.

Morning came, and so did my regular doctor. "Well, 
Mister Dan, you had one raging case of strep throat. 
Could've been really bad if you hadn't gotten to the 
emergency room."

Nina interjected, "I found him almost unconscious... He 
missed our date..."

Doctor Regan laughed. "He'd HAVE to be unconscious to 
miss a date with YOU." He turned to me. "Keep 'er, Dan."

"I have to," I said. "She saved my life." Nina sidled up 
to me and put her hand on my cheek.

"He's MINE," she announced.

The doctor smiled wryly at that pronouncement. "Well, 
he's gonna go home today. He's gonna be weak for a few 
days. You see that he's taken care of, okay?"

I looked at Nina. Nina looked at me. She smiled. "Sure 
will!"

Doctor Regan said, "I'll go sign your charts and get you 
checking out. You'll have some prescriptions for a week 
or so. And if you start hurting again, call me and come 
back in. Don't wait until you're hallucinating this 
time."

"Okay," I said.

"Is he contagious?" Nina asked.

"Have you shared a drinking glass or something in the 
last week?" he asked.

"Yes, something like that..." Nina smiled. Me too. I 
remember having her tongue searching the inside of my 
mouth two nights ago.

"Then he's not contagious to you."

"Good. Thank you, doctor!" She watched him leave and 
then came to me and kissed me lightly on the lips. "I'll 
take care of you," she said.

An hour later I was walking, still shaky, out of the 
hospital, Nina carrying a bag in one hand, her other arm 
wrapped around mine like she was supporting me. She sat 
me in the foyer and went for my car, parked it, and came 
in to retrieve me. "I'm NOT helpless," I complained.

"Doctor's orders. Said to take care of you." She held 
the door as I got in the passenger seat, closed the 
door, then climbed in the driver seat. "Let's go home," 
she looked at me, smiling. On the way home she drove 
through the pharmacy drive-thru and dropped off my 
prescriptions. "I'll come back and get these for you 
after I get you home, babe," she said.

We got home. I wasn't used to being a passenger in MY 
car, but Nina did a perfectly good job of driving. And I 
was still riding down off a Demerol haze, and that 
helped. She got out first, unlocked the front door, then 
helped me into the house. "Go get in bed," she ordered.

I went in the bedroom and undressed myself, then crawled 
under the covers. I was immediately joined by Sam the 
cat. He formed a cat loaf beside me, waiting to be 
petted. I obliged. Even old yellow tomcats need love.

I heard Nina on the phone talking. "Yes, Grandma," she 
was saying, "I brought him home from the hospital. No, 
he's gonna be okay. The doctor told me to take care of 
him. Said he's gonna be shaky for a few days. No, ma'am. 
I'm gonna stay here. My guy's sick. I need to be here. 
Okay. I love you, Grandma. Thanks for worrying about me. 
Bye."

It sounded like I had around the clock care. She 
appeared in the bedroom door. "Are you okay, babe?" she 
asked.

"Better. Sweetie, I'll be alright by myself. Really. 
Don't get crosswise with your grandma."

She giggled. "She ASKED me if I wanted to stay here and 
take care of you. Didn't sound surprised when I said I 
was." She approached. "D'you mind if I sit on your bed?"

"Uh, no," I answered.

She picked up the pants I'd discarded on the floor and 
hung them on a hanger, depositing my wallet on the 
dresser. "We can't be messy now," she grinned. And she 
sat on the edge of the bed and stroked my face. 
"Yesterday you were burning up, babe. And turning 
colors. I was SO worried."

"You handled things very well," I said. "I don't know 
what would have happened without you."

"You're my guy, babe. It's what I'm supposed to do." She 
leaned over and kissed my cheek, pulled back, then 
returned, kissing me lightly on the lips. "Mmmmm," she 
said. She sat back up. "Can I get you anything? Coke? 
Juice? Soup?"

"Maybe later, babe. I'm tired." I was. I let my head 
sink into the pillow. Almost a surprise was Nina kicking 
off her shoes and laying down in the bed beside me, 
although she remained on top of the covers, I underneath 
them.

She kissed my cheek. "Rest, baby. I need to go get your 
medicine at four. I set my cellphone. I'm tired, too." 
She snuggled against me and against all odds I was too 
tired to react. We went to sleep for the first time 
together.

Two hours later we both awoke to the sound of the alarm 
of her cellphone. I told her to take my wallet with her 
to pick up my prescription.

Heading out, I heard her holler, "Root beer float?"

"Yes!" I hollered back. She remembered a treat we'd 
shared together on a previous Sunday outing.

I sank back down into the pillow and drifted on the edge 
of sleep for a while longer. I must have drifted a bit 
deeper because I was gently stirred by a soft hand on my 
shoulder and a gentle "Babe?" in my ear. I opened my 
eyes.

"Can you sit up? I brought you a root beer float."

"Uh, lemme get to the table, babe."

"You feel strong enough?"

"yeah. I'm getting better." I stood up. And realized 
that I was clad only in my skivvies. "Oops!" I 
exclaimed, turning my back to her.

"Here's you some shorts, babe. And don't get all 
embarrassed. I dressed you yesterday. I saw you closer 
then..."

"How close?"

Giggle. "I couldn't get your shorts up until I pushed 
things in place."

I turned red.

"Oh, don't be embarrassed. It was all very clinical." 
She smirked as I pulled on my shorts and buttoned and 
zipped up.

We headed into the living room. "Sit in your chair and 
sip this, babe," she smiled. "I'll get your pills."

I sat down and kicked the recliner back and let ice 
cream and root beer sooth the soreness out of my 
tortured throat. Nina handed me three multi-colored 
pills and I chased them down with more for the drink

"So," she said, "since I'm spending the night, where do 
I sleep?" She had a sweet expression and a look I was 
trying to decipher.

"Uh, that's a problem, babe," I said. I only have the 
one bed. One of us gets the sofa. Or this chair. Or..."

"Or I could just quit being silly and we BOTH sleep in 
our... uh, YOUR bed."

"Sweetie, You know I love you, but I'm a bit sick, not 
dead. Both of us in bed..."

She touched my lips with her fingers. "Shush! I think I 
know what I'm doing..."

"B-but..."

"But nothing! I just spent twenty-four hours with you. I 
looked at you in a hospital room with IV's in you and 
worried about you. And I got to thinking. I asked myself 
some questions. And I answered them. You only have to 
answer one..."

"Question?"

"Yes. One question."

"What, baby?" I looked at those improbably blue eyes. 
She could ask me to slit my wrists and I'd do it for 
her.

"Are we..."

I jumped ahead. "Nina. Will you marry me?"

"That answers my question."

"Answer mine."

"Yes," she said. "I told Grandma last night that if you 
were okay, I'd ask YOU."

"You planned to ask ME?" I, well she DID tell me she 
loved me. But marriage?

"Yes. I planned. I mean, it's been a month... some 
people wait years. And some people get married after 
meeting overnight in Vegas. And we're not even drunk."

I took a long sip of my drink. She sucked on her own 
straw and looked at me, eyes twinkling.

"You've talked to your grandma? About me?"

"Yes. About you. She and I talk about stuff, Dan. 
Everything. My mom. Her life. Her mistakes. Men. Grandpa 
died seven, no eight years ago. He was quite bit older 
than Grandma. She said she never regretted marrying an 
older man, that they'd had the greatest life together."

"Really?

"Yeah. But she told me like she tried to tell Mom. Not 
just ANY man. I told Grandma that in all the time we 
spent together, all you ever did was kiss me and hold 
me, and she said that meant that you weren't after sex 
with an eighteen year old girl. That you must love me."

"I do love you."

She smiled sweetly. "Not lust?"

"Babe, it is easy to lust after you. You're pretty. But 
love first... If I never laid a hand on you, never 
kissed you, I'd adore you anyway."

I heard her straw sucking dry. She got up. Took my own 
empty cup from me and went to the kitchen to dispose of 
them.

She returned. "Is your lap okay?"

"Yes, my love," I said.

She scooted into my lap and kissed me lightly. Her nose 
wrinkled.

"What?!?!?" I asked.

"Babe, I forgot. You were doing chills and fever 
yesterday. You sweated. A lot. My baby's pretty rank. 
You need a bath. I'm sorry..."

"Oh, I'm sorry, too, babe. I should've known."

"It's okay, babe," she said. "I've smelled you sweaty 
before. That's okay... kinda musky... I dunno, almost, 
uh, sexy. But this is different."

"Because I was sick, babe."

She looked thoughtful. "Yeah. Makes sense. "D'you think 
you're up to a shower?"

"I think I can do a shower." She got up out of my lap 
and I lowered the recliner and stood. I was feeling 
better. MUCH better.

"I'll go take a shower, baby," I said.

"Call me if you get woozy," she said.

I grabbed a change of clothes and went into the master 
bathroom and started the shower. I undressed and got in. 
For minutes I stood there, breathing the steamy air in, 
letting hot water push some of the achiness out of my 
body.

And the door slid open. And a naked Nina stepped in. 
Completely nude. Deliciously, wildly unclothed. Her arms 
folded across her breasts.

"Nina!" I exclaimed. "You..."

"I thought you might need help."

"Oh, god, Nina!" I wrapped her naked body in my arms.

"This is a big step, Dan, my love... You gotta know..."

"I know..."

She grabbed a washcloth and soap. "I really AM going to 
help you." She slathered up the cloth and started. 
Giggle. "A lot more to you than Jimmy..." Jimmy was her 
babysitting charge, now maybe five years old. She sat on 
my shower bench. It was BIG shower. I'd bought the house 
from an older couple who'd put in amenities for old age, 
and old people don't do tight showers. And for the first 
time, I thanked my lucky stars for the goofy seat in the 
shower.

Water spray slicked Nina's hair against her head. "Leg," 
she said, slapping my left leg. I lifted it. She soaped 
and washed my left leg. My dick was about two-thirds 
hard by now, inches from her face, and she was 
studiously ignoring it. "Right leg." She repeated the 
ablutions. She washed my back, my arms, my stinky pits, 
reached up and shampooed my hair, and I was beginning to 
wonder exactly what manner of girl I'd gotten.

Then she sat back down and hooked a hand behind my 
thigh. And lathered... "I'm thinking that I don't want 
to use a washcloth here." And she gently lathered my 
balls and my dick. "Turn around." I didn't want to turn 
around. I wanted her to touch me forever. But I turned 
around. And she lathered my butt, running fingers inside 
the crack. "Gotta get you clean," she smiled, turning me 
around. She took the telephone showerhead and rinsed me.

"Can you wash me?"

Oh, man, could I. But I replicated her careful 
indifference, no more lingering over those "B" cup 
titties, I lathered over quarter-sized areoles and noted 
that the ministrations of the washcloth and soap perked 
her pink nipples up like little strawberries. I noted, 
too, the soft dark hair sparsely sprinkled on her mons, 
and as I lathered washed her pussy, I heard her draw a 
sharp breath when my fingers first touched those puffy, 
pink lips. After shampooing her hair, I carefully rinsed 
her off.

"Time to get out," she said. "I hope I helped okay."

I got out behind her, fully erect. I opened the linen 
cabinet and pulled out towels, handing her two, one for 
her hair, one for the rest of her. And another for me. I 
didn't make a move to get out of the bathroom, and 
neither did she. As I dried off, I was overrun with 
mixed feelings. This was truly unique. We were both 
absolutely nude, seeing each other for the very first 
time.

"Let me get your back, Dan." I let her.

"Your turn," I said, and I dried hers. She'd done her 
best on her hair. It was still wet, but she reached into 
her purse and pulled out a brush.

"I'm gonna need a hair dryer if I do this again," she 
smiled. She brushed her hair to clear the tangles, but 
short hair doesn't tangle badly.

"Just a sec," I said. I rummaged in the back of a 
cabinet. "Here's one. Hasn't been used for hair, though.

She looked at me questioningly.

"Seriously. I dry wet boots with it."

She laughed. "Okay. I don't want a second-hand hair 
dryer." And she plugged it in, and I said, "Sit!" She 
perched on the bathroom's stool and I dried and brushed 
her hair.

"That's good," she said, turning around. And when she 
turned around, my semi-hard dick was just a bit below 
her eye level. And her eyes looked down. And she looked 
up. And stood and draped her long arms lovingly around 
my neck. "You're feeling better, huh..." and kissed me. 
And her body formed against mine and the semi-hard dick 
disappeared, replaced by one that could possibly cut 
diamond.

"Uh, babe," I said, "I am fast running out of self-
restraint."

"Me, too," she purred into my ear. "But I'm a little 
scared, Dan..."

I didn't let her out of my arms. "Babe, you're 
beautiful, the most beautiful creature I've ever held in 
my arms, more beautiful to me than I ever imagined. But 
if... We don't have to do anything. Not until our 
wedding night."

She whispered in my ear, "Dan, this IS our wedding 
night. I love you."

"I love you, Nina. D'you really mean this?"

One word escaped her lips. "Forever."

"Forever it is, Nina... Mrs. Gleason." I followed as she 
walked back into the bedroom.

"Are you feeling okay, Dan? I mean, you were really 
sick."

"And I feel really okay, Nina."

"I don't want you to die on our wedding night, babe."

"I promise I won't die."

She pulled back the covers and slid to the middle of the 
bed. "I don't think I could've kept my hands to myself 
tonight if I slept with you, babe."

"Me neither. And I was afraid that I'd scare you or 
something." I crawled into the bed beside her. She took 
my face between her hands and stared into my eyes.

"Babe," she said. "I just said I was going to spend the 
night in your bed. Don't you just think that I might 
expect things to happen from that?"

"I see you as so innocent, Nina."

She smiled. "I love that, Dan. And in a lot of ways, I 
am. But I... I know about sex. And love. And the 
difference. And I know that you and me, we're putting 
them together. There is no "sex" for me. And you. Only 
love." And her hand touched my hardness. She kissed me 
and I kissed back, our tongues weaving intricately 
together. "Mmmmmm, Dan...."

I stroked her shiny, sweet-smelling hair. My Nina. 
Really my Nina." My hand slid down her back and over the 
smooth, succulent curve of her butt. I couldn't help but 
squeeze.

"Mmmm... I've wanted you to OWN me, Dan. I want to be 
YOUR woman." Her hand, her fingers explored the shaft 
she held.

I groaned. "Oh, god, Nina. I've wanted you. How I've 
wanted you. This way, too..."

She pushed me gently onto my back. "Dan," she said, "I 
don't know what I'm doing, babe. I'm serious. You're the 
very first. When I touched you in the shower, that's the 
first time I've touched one over four years old. I don't 
know anything except what I've heard."

"Oh, god, Nina... You just turned me into a virgin 
myself. Your hand... it's perfect. Let's learn each 
other together." I looked at her face, seeing her glow, 
and I kissed her. Then her neck. I knew her neck. I felt 
shivers run down her body from my lips touching, sucking 
gently. She returned the favor, except she knew that I 
liked to feel her teeth biting into me.

"It's throbbing," she whispered. "Did it do that 
before?"

"Every time you kissed my neck, little one."

"Oh, Dan... I didn't know..."

"Baby... It's a GOOD thing..."

Her fingers left my dick and explored my balls. Gently. 
Curving, cupping, tugging lightly. "Like that?"

"Yes, like that. Don't squeeze hard. They're sensitive."

"I've heard that. I'll be careful."

"I know you will." I cupped one delicious breast, 
letting my thumb gently circle the nipple. She moaned. 
"Oh, Mmmmm... Dan..."

My lips moved from her throat, softly down her chest to 
nuzzle the soft mounds. Her hand went to the back of my 
head and gently urged me. My lips found a nipple. 
Waiting. I kissed. "Mmmmmm...suck..." I sucked. My 
tongue circled and teased. I felt her shivering. I 
gently moved a hand down the softness of her belly, my 
fingertips lingering in the soft hair on her mons. I 
kept working on her titties, first one, then the other, 
then my lips moved downwards to feast on her navel. Then 
a kiss lower...

"Oh, godddddd, Dan... You'd... I... I've... dreamed 
about..."

I planted a kiss on her mons, just a fraction of an inch 
above the beginning of her slit. "This?" I asked. "Or 
this?" I kissed the beginning of her slit. "or..." and I 
let my tongue seek out the moisture that was glistening 
the length of her womanhood.

"Oh, god, yesssss..."

I moved in the bed, lying between her legs as she 
quivered in expectation, and I savored her wetness. 
Every sense of mine was tuned to the joys of Nina's 
body. I looked at her beauty. Felt the quivers of 
expectation running through her. Heard her whimpers and 
sighs. Smelled her musk, and then I tasted. Nectar.

She threw her thighs apart, opening herself wide, her 
fingers clawing at the back of my head, pulling me into 
her. I licked and sucked, laving her labia with my 
tongue and lips, and then I gently prodded her little 
erect clitoris with the tip of my tongue. She bucked up 
against me.

"Yessss," she hissed through clenched teeth. "There." I 
stopped for a second. "Oh please, Dan. There. Please do 
me."

And I did her. Virgin pussy. Delicious. And responsive. 
And she came. Hard. I let her surges stop, then flicked 
her button again. And she clapped her hands on the back 
of my head, "uh-huh! Yes. Again!" And I complied. This 
time her shudders were accompanied by "Nnnnnggghhhhhh! 
Ahhhhh!" and a collapse.

I moved up beside her and cuddled her to my chest.

"Mmmmmmm. Oh, Dan..." Her fingers found my dick and she 
stroked its length. I let her breath for a minute. 
Longer. "Dan. I want you... us." She gave my dick a 
little tug.

"Babe. Nina, my love, if we... you only get to give this 
away once..."

"It's yours, Dan." She kissed me. "I'm yours. It's been 
yours all my life. I'm..it's time..."

"It could hurt."

"I don't think it will. I want you."

"Then you get on top of me. That way YOU get to go as 
fast as you want."

She gave it no thought. She pushed m onto my back and 
straddled me. I looked up at feminine perfection. That 
outrageous hair. Those bangs above blue eyes, freckles 
sprinkled whimsically across her nose. I wanted to sink 
myself into her. Now. But I wanted HER to be in control. 
This was her time to make us one.

She worked her wet pussy back and forth over the 
underside of my shaft, smearing delicious juice over me, 
mixing hers with mine. Her hips took an insistent motion 
and she was biting her bottom lip.

"Dan! This is GOOD!" She slid back and forth happily, 
then stopped and raised up. Her hand went between us, 
guiding my dick towards her waiting hole. And she eased 
down. I felt the head squeeze into nirvana. Her eyes 
closed in concentration, still biting her bottom lip, 
wiggling hose hips, forcing downward. I felt the head 
inside of her. She rose, withdrawing, then easing back 
down. Two inches. Up. Back down. She breathed. And 
further down. And up. And further down. I felt the kiss 
of her pubic arch against mine.

Her eyes opened. "Gahhhh, Dannnn. You're in me..." She 
rocked. I realized that there was no definitive sherry-
popping moment. I was just in her. All the way. Her face 
changed to smiles. She sat right there, not moving.

"I love you, babe," I said. "You okay? No hurt?"

"Nuh-uh," she said, then just a little hip movement. And 
she slid up and down my shaft, then back and forth, 
looking for HER motion. And found it. And I joined in, 
seeking MY orgasm inside her. Her motions complemented 
my own and I felt the building fires.

Her hips pounded me as I plunged upward into her. 
"Gahhh, Dannnnn.... I.... I... Nnnngghhhh!" and I 
spurted. Hard. Deep. She kept her motions and I felt 
deep muscular contractions in her pussy. My own surges 
dwindled to a glow in my groin and she fell into my 
arms, her cheek on my chest. I kissed her head.

"My Nina," I said.

"I am," she sighed. "You own me. I'm yours. You've got 
every bit of me."

I sighed. "And you have all of me, too, little one."

We basked in our mutual rapture for a while. Finally she 
slid off to my side and I rolled to face her. Our lips 
met. Long minutes, our lips locked, out tongues lazily 
teasing each other. Finally, with a sigh, we pulled 
apart.

"Nina," I said. "I was serious. Married."

"Dan," she said. "This... this is what used to seal a 
marriage. We chose each other, and consummated our 
bond." She looked at me with love in her eyes. "But yes, 
let's make it right for the world to see. Soon. Like 
before the end of June. Okay?"

"Yes, Mizz Gleason."

She giggled and kissed me. "I like that," she said. 
"Just a second." She got up and went to the bathroom. I 
heard water running for a minute, then she came back in 
with a wet washcloth. "We made a mess, babe. Lemme clean 
you up."

She gently wiped the stickiness of our lovemaking up. "I 
had a little blood. I guess I didn't try hard enough."

"Try what?" I asked.

"I knew about that hymen thing and how it was supposed 
to hurt, so I've been trying to stretch it all out. 
You're bigger than my finger."

"You've been planning this?"

"Dan," she said matter of factly, "I knew we'd 
eventually make love. I wanted it to be good, not 
painful. I read some stuff, and I tried to make sure 
that our first time was good."

"You're a smart one," I said. I kissed her. I felt a 
hand stroking me back to hardness.

She backed her face away. "Let's love again, babe..." 
Her mouth fastened to my neck and her teeth bit into me. 
I shuddered. I knew I was hard again. Her fingers 
wrapped me, stroking, then she cupped my sack again.

I eased a hand down to her cleft and explored with a 
fingertip. "You're not sore?"

"Mmmm. A little. But I want..." Her fingers left my sack 
and tugged my dick. "this..." She tugged me as she 
rolled onto her back, spreading her legs. The hand that 
had been fondling me guided my hardness into her. She 
exhaled a sigh. "Ahhhhhh..."

"Nina, you feel so good..."

"Do I, babe? Are you happy with me?"

"God, yes, little love. And the fact that I'm in the 
most wonderful place I've ever been has nothing to do 
with it. But I am perfectly happy with you, Nina."

I felt her wiggle beneath me, her pelvis pushing her 
pussy up to plunge me further inside her. Our pubic 
bones met. Long, muscular legs wrapped wound me.

I started slow strokes in time with her hips and looked 
into her eyes. I found lust and adoration and her face 
was smiling for me. I melted. Well, at least my heart 
did. Another part was quite hard. And it was stroking 
into nirvana. She hauled my face to hers and our lips 
merged. I caressed her head and face as we kissed. Her 
hands were on my hips, urging me into her as she bucked 
against me seeking her release, her clit rubbing against 
the shaft of my plunging dick. Our lips broke apart.

"Hnnnnnghhhhhh... ohgodohgodohgod... Dannn.... 
Nnnnghhhhhh!"

I kept stroking. I was close. Very close. I felt her 
fingers dig into me and I went over the edge, squirting 
hard, deep inside her. After that first surge from my 
body, all I could manage were a few feeble thrusts as my 
orgasm turned from squirt to dribble. I wrapped her in 
my arms and rolled us over, putting her on top of me.

"Baby... MY baby..." I said.

"I am," she whispered. "I really am."

My hands glided over her smooth curves from her 
shoulders, down along her waist, over the sweet curves 
of her butt, to her thighs. She brought her own hands up 
and cupped then on the sides of my face. She kissed me, 
grinning, and then nodded, pressing our foreheads 
together.

"I love you, babe," I said.

"I love you too," she smiled. "Is it always this good?"

"No, babe."

Her pretty brow wrinkled. "No?"

"Babe, it was NEVER this good. It's better than it ever 
was."

"Dan, you're just saying that. It's okay, baby. I know 
you've been with other women."

I ran my fingers up her neck and tangled them in that 
distressingly brown hair. "You didn't listen, babe. It's 
like YOU are my first. Like I really experienced love-
making for the first time."

"It IS my first time." She giggled. "Well, counting an 
hour ago, my second."

"Little one, it erased every memory I ever had of 
another woman. My life begins with you."

"Good!" came her reply. "Makes it easier that way." Her 
lopsided grin was infectious. I was smiling so hard my 
face hurt. She pushed her hands against my chest and sat 
back astraddle me. I ran my hands up her thighs, upward 
across her belly and cupped her titties.

A little cloud crept across that perfect face. "Uh, 
babe, I'm not very big there." She covered my hands with 
hers as I played with the firm flesh. "Guys like big 
ones, don't they?"

"Nope. Not necessarily. I don't. And yours are perfect."

"Your hands feel good on them. And the first time your 
mouth... gahhhh, Dan... You acted like you were 
enjoying... "

"I wasn't acting, Nina. It's like you're made for me. I 
hope YOU liked it..."

She didn't answer with her words. She bent forward and 
pushed a perfect pink nipple into my mouth. Her hand 
cradled my head as I sucked and nibbled. She purred, 
"mmmmmmm" I shifted to the other and gathered another 
purr for me efforts.

Finally she rolled off me and cuddled up to my side. 
"Tonight we sleep together, Dan."

"I know, princess," I said. I moaned as her hand found 
my soft dick.

Giggle. "It's mine. I get to play with it, huh?"

"Yes, it is, babe," I said.

"I'll be back," she said, bounding out of the bed and 
grabbing the washcloth we'd used after our previous 
coupling. I heard the water running, then she returned 
to the bed and began to wash my dick and balls clean. "I 
did me, too," she laughed. "Will it always be messy like 
this?"

"I'm afraid so, babe. You get juicy when you get 
excited, and so do I. And when I come... you make me do 
a lot."

"Coming. I've heard that term being used before. Mom and 
her "friends" weren't very quiet. But now I know why... 
I don't think I could be very quiet either, love. Not 
when YOU make me do it."

I looked at her with the obvious question on my lips.

"Yeah, I know... I do that sometimes. Not much... until 
lately..."

"Lately?" I asked.

"Yeah. Remember that first time we really kissed?"

"The day I took you to work?"

Uh-huh. Dan, I went home... and I... I felt kinda nasty 
doing it because I was thinking of kissing you. And..."

"I did the same thing, babe. And felt just as guilty."

"We don't have to feel guilty now, do we?"

"Not any more, babe," I said. "You have exceeded the 
fantasies..."

"You have too, babe. I mean, I imagined how it would be, 
and I knew what uh... coming felt like when I played 
with myself, but I wasn't prepared for how it just takes 
over my whole body..." She hooked a leg over mine and 
hauled herself halfway back on top of me and attacked me 
with a passionate, hungry kiss. "I didn't miss it 
because I didn't know it. Now I know."

"I know... I had fantasies in my head, Nina, and I tried 
so hard NOT to. But now I realize that I can't dream as 
good as reality with you..."

Her hand was now back on my dick and it was stirring. 
She giggled. "It's coming back alive." She shifted lower 
on my torso, propped up on one elbow, her free hand 
fondling me. "I can look at it now. I never looked at 
one before." She looked at me with a little girl twinkle 
in her eyes. She grinned, showing her even teeth.

Her soft strokes and the proximity of her face to the 
head of my dick combined to get me hard again. "I love 
the way the skin is so soft, and it's so hard 
underneath. And it slides."

"That feels real good, babe."

"Does it?" She examined me further at close range. "This 
is so neat. The tip is soft..." Her fingertips brushed 
over the rounded head and traced the coronal ridge, 
following it to the underside, to the most sensitive 
spot. I moaned. "Is that a good spot?" she asked, 
grinning.

"Oh, yeah," I gasped.

"Can I squeeze?"

"Yes," I said. "Squeeze. Start at the bottom and squeeze 
and slide the skin up to the tip."

Squeal! She did that. And a big drop of clear pre-cum 
escaped the tip.

"Wow!" she squealed. "I MADE stuff come out. That's not 
your, uh... semen?"

"No, babe. That's just lubricant. Makes it slide inside 
you easier. The semen doesn't come out until orgasm. 
When I come." Then it occurred to me that I hadn't old 
her everything... "Babe, there's one thing I haven't 
told you... About my ex-wife."

She sat straight up, releasing my dick. Turning her 
attention to me, losing the wonderful adoring, excited 
look, and I hated myself because now I was scared. I 
wanted to spend my life with this kittenish young woman 
in my bed, and there was one thing that I was going to 
tell her that could be the deal-breaker.

"What, Dan?" Her eyes looked at me with a combination of 
love and fear.

"Babe," I said, "When I got married the first time, I 
thought it was forever. And when she got pregnant and 
had our daughter, she had bad issues and they said she 
should never try to have another baby. So I got fixed. 
Vasectomy."

Squeal! Giggle. "Is THAT all?" She dumped herself on top 
of me and showered me with kisses. "You scared me, Dan. 
I didn't know WHAT you were gonna say."

"Babe," I said, "I can't give you a baby."

"Dan Gleason! Get this! I don't WANT a baby! I want 
YOU!"

I breathed a sigh of relief. "Babe, it's just like you 
thinking that all guys want girls with big titties. I 
thought all girls want babies."

Her hair flared out to the sides as she shook her pretty 
head. "No, Dan. I thought about it. I mean, if YOU would 
have said you wanted one, I would have gone along with 
it if you insisted, but I know where babies come from, 
and how they get out, and I just can't imagine..." She 
looked down and I followed her eyes to that pink, 
recently virgin pussy, the lips open as she spread her 
legs. "I ... That scared the hell out of me."

"I wouldn't want to wreck that either, babe, but..."

A soft kiss landed on my lips. "Shush! I love you. Me 
and you, okay? And tomorrow I'm telling Grandma..."

Another set of dark thoughts. I liked her grandma, and I 
could see all sorts of scenes that ended up with me 
being called names and a crying Nina and... "Babe, how's 
your grandma going to take this?"

"You don't worry," Nina said. "We talked about the 
possibility already. You seem to be an acceptable 
choice, remember?"

"Yeah, but I thought, like after a few months of 
courtship... It's been three weeks..."

"Just days on a calendar, love." Her eyes twinkled and 
her face was confident. "Now, where was I before we 
averted disaster?" Her grin was lascivious. "Oh, yeah." 
Her fingers encircled my soft shaft. Giggle. "I like it 
when it's soft. It's so CUTE!"

It didn't stay soft for long. She remembered the 
instruction I've given her about a milking motion and 
there was another big drop of pre-cum glistening on the 
head. She looked at me. "So, if I was like, sucking on 
you, this stuff would be in my mouth?"

My mind raced through a whole set of possibilities and 
the best of them were very pleasant. "Yes, it would."

"Have you ever tasted it?" she asked, grinning.

"Yes, I have to admit that. Salty. Not too awfully 
different from YOU. After all, our bodies are getting 
ready for the same thing."

Bigger grin. "I know what I taste like." Her fingertip 
scooped the droplet off my dick and she stuck it in her 
mouth. Then her eyes twinkled and she grinned. "Just 
checking. You know I have to suck this." More grins as 
she shifted around.

"You don't HAVE to, babe," I said, all the time inside 
going "please, please PLEASE suck me" in my head.

"D'ya want me to?" Eyes questioned me.

"Uh-huh. I'd love for you to try. If you want to."

I watched that dark brown hair bounce as her head bobbed 
downward and an indescribable warmth enveloped my dick. 
I felt a tongue exploring inside her mouth. And she 
sucked and pulled back, releasing me with an audible 
pop. And looked at me, smiling, those blue eyes 
twinkling. "Well?"

"Well, yourself. Yes? No?"

Giggle. "Dan, this thing's MADE to suck on. And I tasted 
it. Mmmmmm."

I smiled. She crawled up and kissed me.

"We're going to learn everything about each other, huh, 
babe?"

"You betcha..."
Chapter Five

Waking to find a soft, naked female form in bed after 
all these years as a special joy. When I gently explored 
the form with my fingers and her eyelids fluttered and 
then opened and her first words were "I love you, babe," 
the experience got richer. We both had full bladders and 
made the trip to the bathroom.

Back in the bedroom, she turned into my arms and kissed 
me. "Dan," she said quietly, "I don't regret last night. 
I do love you."

"I don't regret it either, Nina. And I was serious. 
Marry me."

Giggle. "You ask me to marry you and we're both naked?"

"Put your clothes on. I'll ask you again after we go get 
breakfast."

"Nuh-uh. This comes first." And she pushed me backward 
onto the bed. She was all over me, sucking me to 
immediate hardness and then straddling me and demanding 
that I serve her to orgasm, a task I joyously performed. 
Her own orgasm left her collapsed in my arms, my emptied 
dick slowly squeezed out of a perfectly tight pussy.

She rolled off me and twisted, surveying the mess we'd 
made of each other. Two of her fingers dipped into the 
white slop oozing out of her happy hole and she held 
them up and surveyed the results. She looked at me. "I 
suppose we need to find out, huh?" she smiled. And she 
stuck her fingers, laden with her juices and mine, into 
her mouth. And smiled. "Not bad. Now I know how to clean 
up our mess." She looked at me. "Does it gross you out 
to think of licking YOUR own juice?"

I shook my head.

"Can we, like, I do you and you do me? At the same 
time?"

"That's called sixty-nine."

"I heard that before. Now I think it's a pretty good 
idea."

"You get on top of me, then." I was rewarded by the 
immediate presence of a sopping, musky, freshly fucked 
pussy in my face. Yes, that while ooze was mine, along 
with some of the clear stuff mixed in with it, but a lot 
of that juice was the woman I loved, and it was US, and 
I lapped happily, my tongue causing shivers in her body. 
And I felt her tongue and lips performing the same 
functions on me.

Finished, we were in each other's arms. Her dark hair 
was splayed out on my chest as we breathed in unison.

"Babe?"

"Yes, my love?" I responded.

"Breakfast would be nice now."

"Uh, babe, we need to shower. We smell like an orgy."

"Yah think?!?!? Shower? Isn't that how this all got 
started?"

I laughed. "I don't know. I haven't had a blood supply 
to my brain since you opened the shower door last 
night."

She started to get out of bed, pausing to give me two 
kisses. One of them was on my lips.

The shower this morning was wonderfully sensual. Nina 
wasn't the least bit bashful now and we soaped and 
rinsed and soaked and kissed and hugged under the warm 
spray. Afterward we dried each other and while I shaved 
she dried her hair. We got in another couple of hot, 
nude kisses before we got dressed.

In the car, I was definitely well enough to drive, and 
we headed out towards a breakfast of pancakes at a 
nearby eatery. Nina flipped open her cellphone.

"Hi, Grandma. Yeah, he's MUCH better. No, we're going 
out for breakfast. Yes, I got a good night's sleep. So 
did he. No, when we get finished, we're coming by there. 
We need to talk with you. Uh-huh. Yeah. That talk. I 
love you, Grandma. You're the best. Okay. Bye."

She turned to me. I had the questioning look on my face 
again. "She knows what we're going to talk about."

"What are we going to talk about? Me and you getting 
married?"

"Yeah," she said. "But, Dan, I wanna know..."

"What, babe?"

"Do you have a problem with me moving in? Before we're 
married? I mean, some people have... objections..."

"Babe," I said. "You said it yourself last night. In 
another day and time, we'd have walked out of the house 
this morning, gone to meet our friends and family and 
just said, "We're married" and wrote it down in the 
family Bible and waited for the travelling preacher or 
judge to make it official."

"So you think we're married?"

"Do you intend for us to be together forever?"

She said simply, "Yes."

"So do I. We're married. Let's go eat pancakes."

She laughed at the incongruity.

We were seated in a booth in the rear of the restaurant, 
per my request, and I ordered coffee for starters.

"Me, too," Nina said.

"I didn't know you drank coffee, baby."

"Every now and then." We sipped steaming mugs of the 
best commercial coffee in town, but I was missing my 
home-roasted stuff. I told Nina so. "You'll have to show 
me how to make, it, babe."

"You got it."

"Uh, just in case you're wondering, Mr. Gleason," she 
said, "I can cook. Grandma showed me how."

"Really?"

"Really," she said. "I'm thinking that when you're at 
work, I will cook and take care of your house this 
summer. And start college in the fall."

I looked at her. I shouldn't have been amazed, but every 
hour I spent with Nina I found more and more depth of 
thinking. "You sound like you've got it planned."

"I changed my plans. The part about taking care of YOU." 
She sighed. "And I wish I had a bigger scholarship. I 
can get through the first two semesters with my 
scholarship and what I've saved. But I was going to get 
another job or do student loans."

I smiled. Here was going to be my first chance to share 
our lives. "You just became eligible for another 
scholarship."

She looked at me quizzically. "How so?"

"You, Mrs. Gleason, are the first, and only, recipient 
of the Dan Gleason Scholarship for Fledgling Engineers."

Her smile was sweet. "Dan, I didn't... it's not about 
money."

"I believe you, Nina. But you're my wife, and what 
husband wouldn't do this for his wife? It's settled. 
Money isn't going to be your problem, Nina."

"Thank you, husband."

The waitress that brought us our food and refills for 
the coffee overheard that comment. I was one of her 
regulars. She looked at us both. "Married?"

Nina smiled. "Mmm-hmmm... this is where he takes girls 
on a honeymoon..."

The waitress laughed. "Well, Mister Dan, I'd've never 
figured you to remarry. But she's a doll."

"Thank you," Nina chirped. "Uh, Dan... extra tip..."

The waitress walked away chuckling. "Good one there, 
Dan!"

We finished breakfast and paid the bill. With an 
unusually generous tip.

I wasn't anything less than anxious about seeing Helen, 
but that was next on the agenda, after Helen got back 
from church. So we were sitting in her living room when 
we heard the sound of her car in the drive. I stood up 
when she walked in.

"Dan, you don't have to get up," she said.

"I wanted to be in position to run," I said, smiling.

"Oh, sit down. You act like this is a surprise to me." 
She looked at Nina. "You didn't tell him?"

"I told him some of it, Grandma. I don't think he 
believes me."

"Okay," said Helen. "Dan, Three weeks ago I told you 
that you'd collected a girlfriend. Change that to wife. 
I guess... You ARE serious, aren't you?"

"Confused. But serious. I owe her my life after 
Saturday. And she acts like she wants me."

"I want him, Grandma."

Helen looked at the two of us as Nina scooted against me 
on the sofa. "How soon?"

Nina's turn. "We get a marriage license tomorrow. Then 
it's seventy-two hours."

Helen sighed. "That fast, huh?" She looked at me. Sighed 
again. "Well, I talked to Reverend Roberts after church 
this morning. He said he'd do it. In his office if you 
want. I'll make an appointment for Thursday morning." 
She smiled at us. "If that's not too soon."

We responded almost in chorus, "Great!"

"Uh, Dan," Helen said, fixing her eyes on me, "since 
you're not on death's door this morning, am I to 
assume..."

I hung my head. Nina said, "Grandmaaaaa!"

Helen snorted. "That answers that, I guess."

"Helen," I said, "I know this is a lot, but I want to 
move Nina in with me. We don't want to be apart 
anymore."

"I kinda figured that from Miss Nina's conversation this 
morning. Dan... Nina... You two be good for one another. 
Such as it is, you have my blessing. Nina, go pack some 
clothes and stuff. I need to talk to Dan again."

Nina left. Helen fixed me in her sights. "Dan, I hope 
you're serious about that little girl. I told you 
before. I will hunt you down. For real."

"Helen," I said, "I wasn't looking for women before, and 
with Nina as my wife, I damned sure don't have to look 
any further. She's cute, and smart, and self-confident, 
and lord only knows why she chose me, but I am truly 
thankful. But, how's this going to work for you? You're 
losing your grand-daughter..."

"I'm not losing my grand-daughter, Dan. She's eighteen. 
I couldn't keep her forever. And big secret... Ed's been 
wanting us to go get married, too... but I wasn't going 
to do that and move in with him until I was sure Nina's 
okay."

Nina was walking back in with a suitcase and a couple of 
shopping bags. "And I'm okay. So Ed's finally gonna be 
my new Grandpa?"

Helen smiled. "Yeah, little girl, you're not the only 
one who can net a guy..." She looked at Nina's load. 
"You don't have to move it all today, child."

"'Kay, Grandma," Nina said. "We'll be back. I'll call."

"You've got your key, too, honey," Helen said. "If I'm 
not here."

"Bye, Helen. And thank you," I said as I took some of 
Nina's bags out the door. We loaded up into the SUV and 
drove home. OUR home. Inside I started moving my things 
around, giving her the dresser, taking a chest of 
drawers for myself. I moved my clothes to one side of 
the walk-in closet, and carried my winter cloths into 
the closet in the spare bedroom that was my office.

And Nina went into the bathroom and unloaded a dozen 
mysterious bottles and vials of the substances women 
need and men can't identify. And when I stuck my head in 
the door to check on her, she laughed and pointed. 
"Look! TWO toothbrushes!"

I remembered her glee at discovering ONE toothbrush, and 
I laughed.

She faked a frown. "SO you think that's funny?"

"Yes, I do. A month ago, I was having a good but boring 
life, and then one day at the park and angel showed 
up..."

She moved up to me and tiptoed to kiss me on my lips. 
"Dan," she said, "I know it's... this is not just 
supposed to be about sex... I mean, we LOVE each 
other..."

"Buuut..." I laughed.

"But," she laughed back, "D'ya think we could get naked 
and..."

I was already unbuttoning my shirt.

"I take that as a "yes"," she said. She looked over her 
shoulder heading into the bedroom. As she bent over to 
shove her pants down her long legs, I grabbed her hips 
and pulled her against my hard dick, netting me a peal 
of squeals and giggles. She struggled loose and turned 
to me, delightfully naked from the waist down. Her arms 
looped around my neck and tugged my face to hers and she 
purred "Mmmmmm" as we kissed.

I turned us around and I sat on the bed and helped her 
unbutton her blouse. She pirouetted to present me her 
bra's strap for me to unhook. I unhooked her strap and 
twirled her back around as she shed her bra. That gave 
me access to a perfect pair of firm, rounded breasts. I 
feasted, her hands pulling my face into her chest.

After I nursed on her for a couple of minutes, she knelt 
and gently pushed my knees apart. I shuddered in in 
anticipation of her next move as she bent forward. I 
wasn't disappointed. I was transported to another 
dimension as Nina sucked and licked and stroked me. 
"Gahhhh, baby, I...I'm... uhhhhhhh..." Breathe "I'm 
gonna come."

She halted her assault on my dick to look up at me and 
grin. "Then you just need to go ahead and do that," she 
giggled. "I wanna see how it is to do that to the man I 
love." And her head went back down. My hands were on the 
back of her head, not to force her or to even guide her. 
Her enthusiasm was working wonders, and all I wanted was 
to touch her as she purred and moaned and sucked and 
stroked.

I felt teeth gently tugging the skin of my dick up and 
down. "Am I biting too hard? I wanna bite it a little 
bit, babe."

"It's wonderful, doll," I said. "I'm so close."

"I can tell," she said, then her mouth took me again. I 
felt my scrotum draw up in her hand and the first surge 
shot out. "Mmmmmm," escaped her throat. Her hand milked 
me in time with the second, third, fourth... Each time 
she sucked as I squirted. It dwindled to a flow and she 
kept sucking until I was emptied, and then she pushed me 
backward on the bed and kissed me. I tasted traces of my 
orgasm in her mouth. She straddled me then lay down on 
top of me.

"Mmmmm, babe," she smiled. "D'ya know how great it is 
that I can do that to you?"

"Oh, baby," I answered. "You're the greatest." We 
kissed, our hands roaming freely over each other. She 
moved from my lips to my neck and worked me over, and I 
responded by pushing her over on her back and then 
kissing my way down her body to her pubes. She spread 
her legs and pulled her knees up, opening herself to my 
mouth. I feasted my way through three orgasms before her 
hands topped pulling me into her and gently denied me 
further access.

We lay in each other's arms.

"Mid-afternoon," she sighed. "Can we just stay in bed?"

"Or we could go to the jewelry store and get something. 
I never asked you what kind of rings you wanted."

Squeal. And a sexy teen pressed herself into me. 
"Rings?"

"Yes, my dear... It is customary for a girl to get an 
engagement ring and a wedding ring. And her husband gets 
a wedding band."

"That's all I want, Dan. A simple wedding band. No 
diamond. No engagement ring. Just a plain little simple 
band that says that I have given myself to somebody. 
You."

"Are you sure, babe? I mean, anything you want..."

"A band, Dan. A gold band."

"Okay, dearest," I conceded, "Besides, a diamond who 
only be a pale beauty next to you." That got me another 
kiss. "So, d'you wanna go?"

She grinned wickedly. "Nope. I wanna come!"

"Then get up here and turn around." She squealed with 
delight as we fit ourselves together in a sweet sixty-
nine. Gamely she tried to keep sucking on me as I 
tongued her juicy slit and started ministering to her 
clitty, hidden as it was, just inside her sweet fold. 
She pulled me out of her mouth and held my dick against 
her cheek as she gasped through first one orgasm, then 
another.

After she came back to this planet, she swung around 
between my legs, her face hovering over my crotch. 
Asking questions about things before her.

She gently bounced my balls in her hand. "Don't squeeze 
hard?" she queried.

"Very gentle. But you're making them feel really good, 
tugging and rolling them around like that."

"Can I suck 'em?"

"Gently. More like just get one in your mouth and play 
with it using your tongue."

She tried. "Good?"

"Wonderful. And you can grab the skin of the sack with 
your teeth and gently bite and tug. Bite about as hard 
as when you were sucking me while ago."

Giggles. And delightful experimentation. "SO I take it 
that you liked the biting part?"

"Oh, god, yes. Just perfect."

"Then you won't be too mad about the teeth marks and 
bruises on your neck, huh?"

"It's worth it to me, babe. You make me feel so good."

She kept exploring, experimenting, turned my dick 
sideways and chewed and sucked her way up and down the 
underside like it was an ear of corn. Worked her way 
around the corona with little nibbles. Every time a 
droplet of pre-cum appeared, she sucked it off, I was 
solidly, completely erect and she decided it was time 
for a ride.

"No, babe, let's try it this way. Get on your hands and 
knees."

"Uh, babe, I don't want it in my butt. I mean, I've 
heard of that..."

"Ain't exactly my thing, babe. Just wait." I knelt 
behind her and rubbed the head of my dick up and down 
her wet slit, causing her to purr.

"Now THAT feels good," she said, then she gasped as I 
eased into her from behind. "Ahhhhh, Dan! That's GOOD!" 
She was rocking on her knees, pushing into my groin then 
pulling away as I guided her hips with my hands. I 
worked my own thrusts into the party. "I can feel your 
balls bouncing against me, baby... Is it good?"

"Oh, god, yes, angel." I felt the juices rising after 
her little play session.

"Come in me. Dan. Please! I'm close again!

I pounded her, matching her motions with my own, until I 
plunged forward and felt the fire exiting me to find its 
place deep inside my darling Nina.

"Auuughhhhh! I feelitDan! Nnnnnghhhh!" Her pelvis surged 
backward and up, pushing her clitty against the base of 
my rapidly emptying dick, and she came. I froze for a 
minute, then fell backward onto the bed. And Nina just 
slithered backward to put her juicy pussy in my face. I 
felt her lips close on my dick as she sucked and licked 
our overflow and for the second time today I emptied her 
full pussy with my mouth.

Finishing that exercise, Nina turned back around into my 
arms. Cuddling close, she turned her eyes toward me. 
"Dan, that butt thing? Did you ever?"

"No," I said. "I never had the desire. And you... why 
would I? It's either a dominance thing for a guy, or a 
submission thing for a woman, or maybe a woman is just 
too loose from having babies. But it's not made for 
that. And you've got pleasant places that are..."

She made a show of licking her lips. "Mmmmm, yes," She 
paused. "And we'll probably need to think about that 
this week. I'm due for a period mid-week."

"Oh, really?"

"Yeah. Probably Wednesday. I'm regular, you know. And 
the Pill."

"You're on the Pill?"

"Yeah. Didn't need the birth control, but it regulates 
my periods. I was kind of erratic. They make book-
keeping easier. And keep me from scaring Grandma to 
death."

"Ohhhh," I said.

"Uh-huh. When I first moved in with her, I went two 
weeks late. Grandma thought for sure I was pregnant, 
even though I told her that I was a virgin. Now she 
believes me, but back then, even SHE thought some of Mom 
had rubbed off on me."

I kissed her and held her. "Babe," I said, "Life is just 
gonna get better and better for us. And a period... 
Nothing. Just life."

She kissed me on the nose. "Let's go to the jewelry 
store, babe."

"Got it, angel." And we got up and dashed through the 
shower yet again. In the hot water she said, "Man, you 
make me feel sooooo good."

And hour later we were sitting in the food court of the 
local mall, in possession of a couple of little black 
velvet-covered boxes, smiling, drinking fountain drinks 
and observing the wildlife, her term for the mall 
denizens

Since it was the only mall in a fifty-mile radius, and 
Nina was eighteen and a recent high school graduate AND 
many of the "wildlife" were her classmates, several of 
them waved and a few stopped by to chat. Two of those 
were dressed in carefully planned dishevelment., hair 
colored in variegated bands of blonde and brunette, and 
a little more makeup than teen complexions need.

"Hi, Pammy, Hi, Cenda," chirped my Nina.

The taller of the two answered first. "Hey, Nina! Ain't 
it cool? We're out of school!

The short one added "Pammy's getting' a job at The Gap. 
Starts next week. I'm still looking. What about you?"

Nina grinned. "I dunno. I'm starting college in the 
fall."

Pammy looked at me in a measuring manner. "And 
you're...?"

"Dan Gleason," I said. "You're Pammy," and I nodded to 
Cenda, "and you're Cenda?"

"Nina, he catches on fast!"

"He should," Nina laughed. "He's an engineer."

Cenda giggled. "Your big brother? Cousin? Uncle?"

Nina pulled one of those little velvet boxes out and 
popped the lid back. "Nuh-uh. Husband. Thursday."

"Uhhhhh..." Cenda was rendered speechless.

Pammy stepped in. "Wow! An' we wondered why you weren't 
dating guys in school."

Nina smiled sublimely. "I find that Dan is a much better 
deal. Smart. Mature. Real job."

The pair pulled up chairs. Pammy asked, "So how'd you 
meet?"

Nina giggled. "I logged on to www.findanengineer.com."

"No, really," Cenda recovered her speech.

Nina gave the condensed version, carefully omitting 
dates so as to not make it look quite as crazy.

"That's just craaazy!" Pammy sighed. "Can you imagine?" 
She looked at me.

"Oh, don't ask me. My imagination stopped working when I 
started helping her with homework."

"So are ya'll having a big wedding?" asked Cenda.

"Nope," Nina answered. "Just going to Grandma's church 
and letting the preacher marry us. The wedding's not the 
big deal, the two people are."

"Oh, I want a BIG wedding," Pammy said. "The works! 
Dad's dying. He's hoping I'll turn out lezz or elope or 
something."

"Brad doesn't think you're a lezz, Pammy," said Cenda.

"Hah!" Pammy snorted. "Brad doesn't want to get 
married."

Cenda relieved the conversation with all the 
concentration of an ADD kid. "Oh, look! There's Jarvis 
'n' Brandi!" The two visitors got up and scampered off.

"You know, I think my IQ dropped ten points, Nina."

"Yeah," Laughed Nina. "And those were two of the smart 
girls." She sighed. "And in twenty minutes news will be 
all over town that Nina's getting married" She 
snickered. "And the next question asked will be "is she 
pregnant?" and the third will be "Who's she marrying?". 
Just so you know."

"Just people doing what people do. They like to talk, 
and other people make a good conversational topic." I 
smiled. "You thought enough of us to tell 'em that we 
were getting married."

She giggled. "I kinda wish that we'd have put the rings 
on, babe! That would've dropped their jaws."

"Uh, I suppose it would."

"Well, anyway," she opined, "the news is out."

Like I said. The only mall. And Nina's contemporaries 
weren't the only ones in a mall on a Sunday afternoon. 
It was my turn. In the form of my unit admin clerk, 
Jannie and her husband and a couple of pre-teens.

"Hi, Dan," she said. "You remember my husband, Robert, 
don't you?"

I stood and took Robert's offered hand and shook it. 
"Yeah I do. Hi, Robert. How're you guys doing?"

"I'm in the mall on Sunday afternoon instead of 
fishing," he chuckled. "I'm not doing too good, am I?"

The ten-year-old boy standing with them piped in, "Yeah, 
Dad! We could be fishing."

Robert patted him on the head. "We have all summer, 
son."

Jannie turned her attention to Nina. "Aren't you the one 
he brought in a week or so ago? Uh, Nina, wasn't it?"

"Mizz Jannie, you remembered!" Nina smiled.

"Hard NOT to remember a pretty young girl after seeing 
dumpy old engineers all day, Nina."

This is where Nina let the cat out of the bag with as 
much sublety as a hand grenade in a flour barrel. She 
stood up and encircled my waist with her arm. "I picked 
the one that wasn't dumpy, Mizz Jannie."

Jannie's eyebrow arched. "Picked?"

"Yes, ma'am, We're getting married on Thursday. I'm 
keeping 'im."

"Wow, Dan. You do have a way of surprising people."

"Nobody's more surprised than me," I said.

Robert was pumping my hand again. "Well, 
congratulations, Dan. Nina. I... we wish you the best!"

Jannie frowned for a second and then slowly let her 
smile come back. "After all those times I tried to set 
you up. I was wondering about... oh, never mind. She's a 
doll. Congratulations, Nina. And don't worry about him. 
I'll watch him for you every day."

Responding to the tugs of the eight year old daughter at 
her side, Jannie said, "Well, we' have to go get 
vacation stuff. I'll see you tomorrow, Dan."

We waved as they left and Nina said, "She tried to set 
you up with women, Dan?"

I knew that I needed to explain. As we walked toward the 
exit, I said, "Babe, you have to understand that every 
married woman in the world has a bunch of unmarried 
friends, and her goal in life is to match them up."

"Uh-huh," Nina responded. "So? Go on."

"Jannie's my age. So are most of her female friends, and 
every one of 'em is a divorcee or a single mom who never 
bothered to get married in the first place. And 
underneath each of those somewhat acceptable exteriors 
is enough baggage to fill a semi-trailer, and claws just 
looking for two things."

She cut her eyes to me, half-smiling. "Uh, what two 
things?"

I snorted. "A dong and a paycheck."

"Dan! Nice talk!"

"It's true. I don't do one-night stands. I won't go to 
bed for sex. And I won't get married for it."

She curled her arm around mine. "So you're not marrying 
me for the great sex?"

I laughed. "Uh... After a night with you, I think I 
could change my standard. But no, I'm marrying YOU 
because you're WONDERFUL."

She said, "Why, yes! I am!" with a wry smirk. She 
paused. "So! I took care of informing the whole school."

"And we told Jannie, which takes care of everybody at 
work. All we need is a few spots on the radio and the TV 
station, and everybody will know."

In the parking lot, she spun me around and kissed me. 
"And that's just fine with me!"

I smiled. "Me too, babe. Me too!"

END

Want more? Email me: oyster1950@gmail.com 

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This story was written as an adult fantasy. The author
does not condone the described behavior in real life.

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Kristen's collection - Directory 69