The Pen is Mightier

by J. A. Cipriano

  I couldn’t quite smell myself or anything, but I knew I had to be ripe. I smiled. I could make myself clean with a few simple words.

  “Jesus,” I mumbled, shaking my head. “If this keeps up, I’ll just be Jabba the Hutt sitting on a giant throne, using the pen to fulfill my whims.” It was weird because as revolting as the idea of being that giant space slug was, the rest of it was strangely appealing. I could have minions, an empire, people who could protect me from a plucky Luke Skywalker.

  That thought still in my brain, I turned the corner and headed toward the outside stairs that led up to my floor. My foot had barely touched the first step when I heard a car door slam only a few meters away followed by the sound of someone coming toward me.

  Panic surged through me, causing my heart to pound and adrenaline to surge through my veins. Was it for me? I wasn’t sure, but I gripped my pen tightly, ready to whip it out and write them to death as I whirled to find out who it was.

  “Amy?” I squawked, my breath catching in my throat as I saw my boss from the superstore coming toward me with a grocery bag in one hand. It was a bit strange because she’d clearly done her makeup and hair, but at the same time, she was wearing a Dick Tracy style brown trench coat that fell to her ankles, covering her entire body from view. That made it even stranger because she was wearing six-inch red heels that matched her lipstick.

  “I’ve been waiting for you all night,” she said, giving me a brittle smile that told me she was a bit upset, and as I stared at her, I remembered telling her we’d get together tonight, but then I’d erased the line about her appreciating me. After that, I’d completely forgotten about it. So why was she here now that the line was gone? What was going on?

  “I’m sorry, I um…” I stopped myself as her smile started to falter. “I just wanted to shower. I should have called.” I looked at my feet. “One of my friends was getting beaten up by her boyfriend, and I needed to give her a hand.” I offered her a hopeful smile. “Sorry.”

  She recovered, nodding at my explanation. “It’s my fault, maybe I should have called again?” She took a deep breath, stopping only a few feet away. “You didn’t return my last sixteen calls or my texts, but I’m sure you were just busy with your friend.” She gave me a searching look, like she didn’t entirely believe me, though I didn’t know why.

  “Did you really call that much?” I asked, dread exploding through my stomach as I reached into my pocket. I had over thirty missed calls, and as I stared at my phone, I remembered switching it to silent before we’d gone into the basketball game at the college. Damn.

  “It’s okay.” She looked at me, and I could see she wanted to cry but was being brave anyway which made me feel like a monster. “You still want to do something?”

  “I, um...” I swallowed, thinking back to what I’d written, and as my gut swam, she looked at her shoes.

  “I guess when you didn’t answer, I should have just backed off.” She looked up at me. “I just… I want you so badly.”

  As her words hit me, I found myself looking down at my feet. My stomach hurt from the idea that I’d hurt her so unintentionally. How could I have been so stupid?

  “Amy, it has nothing to do with that,” I said, and the words made her eyes start to water. The sight of it made me feel even worse. I hadn’t meant to hurt her, and now every word I said was hurting her. I was a jerk. A real asshole. Only, I didn’t want to be either of those things.

  “Then what does it have to do with?” She met my eyes, and I could see how dangerously close to breaking she was from the twitch of her lips, from the way her breathing had changed, from the way she looked at me, begging me not to crush her heart. I didn’t know how long she’d been waiting for me, but judging by the fact the first missed call was almost four hours ago, I was betting it was a while.

  “That I’m an idiot. Honestly, I had my phone on silent and didn’t hear it. I know that doesn’t make it better, but I am glad to see you.” I gave her a smile. “Maybe I can make it up to you? How about you come inside, and we talk about it, okay?”

  Amy brightened noticeably. “I would like that.”

  She came closer, and as she reached out to me, I realized she wanted to hold my hand. Not sure what else to do, I took her hand. As she squeezed my fingers, I led her up the stairs toward my apartment.

  Part of me was horrified by the prospect, and as we ascended the last step and approached the door, I realized I had no idea if it was even clean. Only, I could clean up.

  “I’m gonna need my hand back for a second,” I said, and as I tried to pull it free of her grip, she held onto it with enough force for me to have to work at it.

  “I’m sorry,” she flushed when I finally wrenched my hand free. “I just like touching you so much.” She gave me a smile and leaned in close to me as I dug my pad and pen out of my pocket. “I like when you touch me too.”

  I swallowed hard and shut my eyes, trying to stop little me from doing the thinking. Everything in me wanted to forget about cleaning my place and take her in my arms. Only, I wasn’t going to do that. I was going to be a goddamned gentlemen. Besides, denying myself now would make it better later. Or at least that was the idea.

  “I like touching you too.” I offered her a grin as I made a quick note.

  My apartment is clean.

  “Good,” she said, leaning in to see what I was doing. Her face screwed up in confusion. “What are you writing?”

  “Nothing,” I said, shutting the book. Man, I was being a bit too blatant. I’d have to write something else about making people not realize what I was doing, but for now, I had other things to do. “Ready to come inside?”

  “You have no idea,” she said as I pocketed the pad and pen and pulled out my keys.

  “Again, I feel really bad about making you wait,” I said as I unlocked the door.

  “It’s okay. Now that I know it’s because you’re an idiot and not because you didn’t’ want me, I’ll be happy to let you make it up to me,” she replied as I stepped inside and switched on the lights.

  My heart did a little flip-flop of happiness when I saw the place was clean. No old pizza boxes and discarded Chinese food containers. No underwear was on the floor. Hell, the blanket by the couch was even folded. Score.

  “After you,” I said, swinging my arm out and gesturing for her to enter. “Welcome to my humble abode.”

  “It’s so clean,” she said, giving me a sly look. “Since you’d forgotten about our meetup, I expected you to run in and have to clean while I waited outside.” She gestured at the place. “This makes me think you did remember and cleaned for me.”

  “I did clean for you,” I said. Okay, it was sort of a lie, but at the same time, well, it kind of wasn’t, right?

  She nodded in approval and stepped inside. “You are such a good guy. I don’t know how I never saw it before.”

  “Oh, well, you know,” I said, feeling a bit guilty as I turned and locked the door. I probably would have said more, but as I turned around, I found her standing there dressed in lingerie with her trench coat lying on the ground behind her.

  She was wearing some kind of red satin bikini thing with two thin strips of fabric that spread out from her crotch in a v. Her nipples were barely hidden by the sheen of skin-tight fabric that struggled to hold her huge breasts in place, and as she smiled at me, I nearly forgot how to think.

  “What do you think?” she said, taking a step toward me, her whole body jiggling in exactly the right way. “Is it too much?”

  “Too much?” I swallowed. Hard. “I think my socks have more fabric than that thing.”

  She smirked. “Yeah, I think they charge for this stuff by the ounce.” She did a quick pirouette, showing off her fantastic ass. “But I think it’s worth it to see that look on your face.”

  “The look on my face?” I said as she faced me once more.

  I could see her nipples poking through the straining fabric, and it took a lot of effort to tear my eyes fro
m her spectacular tits and focus on her face. Only as I looked up in time to see her bite her lower lip and drag her teeth across it, I felt all the blood rush from my head.

  “The one that says the only thing you want to do is fuck me.” She nodded, leaning in close so I could feel the heat wafting off of her body. “That’s what makes the next part so fun.”

  “The next part?” I asked, swallowing hard. “What next part?”

  “The part where I go into the kitchen and pour us some wine, and you have to sit out here in anticipation.” She gave me a feral smile. “The longer you wait, the better it will be.” She licked her lips. “Trust me.”

  “Or we don’t do that—”

  “I’ll do that thing you like.”

  Then with that, she turned and walked into my kitchen. The grocery bag still clutched in one hand. And man, while I was sad to see her leave, the thong she wore made it almost worth it.

  As I stood there trying to figure out what to do about the girl in my kitchen, I heard a knock at the door behind me.

  Confused, I turned and looked at the door for a moment. Should I answer it? What if Amy came back and got seen? After all, she was wearing only lingerie. I wasn’t sure I’d be okay with someone else seeing her like that. No. I knew I wouldn’t be okay with that.

  Still, the knocking seemed pretty urgent, and I was pretty sure if it was someone after me, they’d have just kicked it in by now. Pausing long enough to make sure the words about doing me harm were still written, I approached the door.

  “Someone’s at the door. Give me a sec, okay?” I called over my shoulder, and when I heard her acknowledgment, I turned to the door right as there was yet another knock. Only this one was way more insistent than before.

  Taking a deep breath, I opened the door ready to get rid of whoever it was so I could deal with the nearly naked chick in my kitchen.

  “Roger!” Miss Montgomery exclaimed, throwing herself through the threshold and wrapping her arms around me. “You’re here! When you didn’t answer your phone all those times, I got worried and decided to come by. I hope that’s okay.”

  21

  As panic unlike anything I’d ever expected exploded through every inch of my being, Miss Montgomery turned and shut the door behind her. Then she locked it.

  “What do you think?” she asked, gesturing down at herself as she turned back to me. She was dressed like one of those Japanese school girls, complete with white button up and blue pleated skirt. “I figured this time, maybe you could be the teacher, and I could be the student.”

  “I just…” I said, racking my brain for a solution. Only none would come. I was fucked, screwed, totally hosed. Worse, I didn’t know how to salvage this. Not at fucking all.

  “Is something wrong?” she asked, concern etching across her face. “Is it the uniform? Is it too much?” She shrugged. “We don’t have to roleplay. If you wanna be vanilla, we can do that too.” She nodded once, her eyes drifting to my crotch. “I’m up for anything as long as it involves us both being naked.” She began unbuttoning her shirt, and I realized she wasn’t wearing a bra.

  “Roger, is everything okay?” Amy asked, peeking into the room from the kitchen, and I turned toward her in time to see the wine glasses in her hands slip from her grip and hit the cheap laminate tile in the kitchen. The sound of breaking glass filled my ears as she took a deep breath and stared at the two of us. “Who the fuck is that?!” She pointed one angry finger at Miss Montgomery.

  “She’s my guidance counselor at the college,” I said because I really didn’t have any better explanation. Worse, as I stood there, the only thing I could think of was that I was about to get murdered.

  “If she’s your counselor, why is she standing there with her tits out?” Amy replied, her whole body practically flushed red with rage.

  “We had a date tonight,” Miss Montgomery added unhelpfully from behind me. “Who are you exactly?”

  “I’m his boss,” Amy said, her eyes flicking from me to the woman behind me. “And we had a date tonight.”

  “Look, I can explain,” I said, wishing I could, in fact, do that because I absolutely didn’t want them to fight, especially since this was my fault, but it was as though I hadn’t spoken because the two women had locked sights on one another.

  “Seems like you’re a pretty great boss.” Miss Montgomery took a step forward, pressing her bare chest against my back. “This whole setup is really hot. I bet he’s a great employee.” She kissed my neck, one hand traveling around to cup my crotch.

  “What are you doing?” I hissed as Amy looked like she was about to go ballistic, and truthfully, I had no ground to stand on. I had fucked up. No. I had done more than fuck up. I had done something a billion times worse than fuck up.

  “I said I was up for anything, Roger, and I meant it.” Her breath was hot on my neck as she spoke. Then her lips touched my ear, and she whispered, “You should have told me you were bringing another playmate though.” She smacked me on the ass. “I’ve got this, but you owe me.”

  “Wait, what?” I said as Miss Montgomery disentangled herself from me stepped past me, heading toward Amy.

  “Let me guess, he didn’t tell you about wanting a threesome either.” My counselor shook her head. “It’s pretty fucking rude, but I’m willing to let it slide.” She licked her lips as she hungrily looked my boss up and down. “Because you’re fucking hot.” She did a little wiggle, her already hard nipples cutting through the air. “I can’t wait to go down on you while he plows me from behind.”

  Amy froze so completely that for a second I thought she’d turned into a statue. “What?” she said slowly.

  “He told me earlier he had a big surprise for me later,” Miss Montgomery said, gesturing at me. “I never thought it’d be you.” She smiled brightly and took a step forward. “I’m not sure how he knew to get someone so… well…” She gestured at Amy. “Beautiful.”

  “You planned this?” Amy’s eyes swiveled to me, and there was a tiny flicker of hope in them, though I wasn’t sure why.

  “I… um…” I said, but before I could appropriately stick my foot in my mouth, Miss Montgomery shot me a warning glance. That one look told me to shut the fuck up before I made things worse.

  “It’s my fault.” Miss Montgomery glanced at her watch and sighed. “I’m an hour early.” She gestured at Amy. “I’m guessing he was going to tell you about it before I got here. He did mention he had to make sure everything was okay.” She shrugged. “He was supposed to call me, but you know how he is.” She rolled her eyes. “Never remembers to call.”

  “Yeah…” Amy said, her voice softening. “He doesn’t, but he means well.” She sighed. “I’m sorry, I’m so embarrassed.” As she said the words, she must have realized she was basically naked in front of my school counselor because she crossed her arms over her chest like she was trying to hide her huge tits.

  “Oh, don’t be shy,” Miss Montgomery said, taking my boss by the hand and pulling her into the living room. “I’d love to get to know you a bit better, and if it doesn’t seem like something you’re okay with, I’ll go. Okay?”

  “But what about the mess?” Amy said, her voice full of both defeat and confusion.

  The sound of it made me feel like a complete asshole, which I totally was. This was entirely my fault, and now Miss Montgomery was covering for me because she was, well, I didn’t even know. I was just glad I wasn’t being castrated right now.

  “Roger, would you be a doll and clean up the wine while I talk to your lovely boss?” Miss Montgomery said, winking as she turned to look at me. “I think she’ll be more amenable if we have a chance to get to know each other.”

  “Yeah, sure,” I said, glad to be getting out of there. I rushed by them and moved into the kitchen itself. I stood there next to the sink for a long moment, my chest heaving. I had no idea what Miss Montgomery would say, but at this point, I’d be glad if I didn’t get dead.

  It was weird too because wh
ile I knew I could pen my way out of this, I didn’t want to do that if I didn’t have to. Still, the idea of both of them together was interesting, to say the least. My boss was curvy in all the right places while Miss Montgomery was pretty much the opposite, like one of those swimsuit models who seemed like she’d snap like a twig.

  Swallowing back the sudden rush of desire and the urge to write myself a great little story, I grabbed the sponge and roll of paper towels from beside the sink and headed back to clean up the mess. Only as I got there, I remembered there was broken glass. Setting down the sponge and towels, I moved back to grab the broom and dustpan from behind my black trashcan.

  Sure, I could use my pen to fix the spill. Only, I was pretty sure Miss Montgomery wanted me out of the way for a few minutes…

  I spent the next few minutes cleaning up the broken glass and spilled wine the old-fashioned way and trying to calm myself down. I had no idea what was happening in the other room, but I was still mostly panicked about it. Either way, I was going to be a man about it. Still, that didn’t mean I couldn’t swing things in my favor. I did have a magic pen after all.

  While I could just write them to get over it, I wasn’t sure I wanted to do that. Not yet, anyway. I had a whole bunch of things I could try before I went that route.

  After tossing the dirty towels into the trash and replacing the broom and sponge, I moved to my cupboard and pulled down three glasses. It wasn’t even a set. Just mismatched ones I’d gotten winetasting (i.e., getting really wasted) a year or so ago.

  Then I grabbed the bottle of strawberry Boone’s Farm out of the fridge that one of Marty’s dates had left behind. I smiled as I wrote a few words on the label, transforming the contents into that same Alexander Valley cabernet Amy and I had drank in her office.

  After I filled the three glasses, I gathered them up and made my way into the living room.

  “You’re back,” Miss Montgomery said, looking up from her position between my boss's legs, her face slick. “Put those wine glasses down and come over here.” When I didn’t move because I was too shocked at the sight, she continued. “And lose the pants.” She nodded at Amy. “She tells me she’s great at sucking cock, and I wanna see it firsthand.”