Tight Women in Hard Places

by Alicia Night Orchid

  “Whatever you say.”

  The next week, Avery called on her day off. He told her to meet him at midnight at the Sunrise Motel, Room 212. Tammi said okay and thanked her lucky stars it was a different room than the one where she’d spent graduation night with Dan. Avery said there was $500 in it for her.

  After losing fifteen pounds and tightening her belly and thighs, she looked better than ever in her new pantsuit. She returned to the outlet mall and used more of Avery’s money to buy an expensive pair of five-inch heels and a new black thong to replace the one she’d given him. At a CVS pharmacy on the other side of town, she purchased a pack of condoms from a pimply teenage boy. His arousal was palpable when she told him she wouldn’t need a bag, and slipped the condoms into her purse.

  In the shower that evening, she held a mirror with one hand while shaving her pussy bald as a bowling ball with the other. After shaving, she rubbed lotion into the sensitive flesh. The muscles in her thighs, buttocks, and calves rippled. When she tightened her belly, her abs stood out like rungs on a ladder. Her bare pussy looked strangely vulnerable, a dark line etched on white skin. She’d heard that men liked it, that little-girl look.

  She was dressed and ready to go two hours before she needed to be. She sat on her porch stoop, smoking a cigarette and drinking a glass of box wine.

  Avery answered her knock through the door and told her to let herself in. He sat in a straight-backed chair, wearing that same gray suit, neat and prim as ever.

  His eyes traveled the length of her body. “You look like a whore.”

  Tammi felt like she’d been stabbed. “I thought . . .”

  He shook his head. “Show me your breasts.”

  She removed her top and bra. Her breasts were smaller than before she’d lost the weight. They stood out firm and proud, her nipples stiff as pencil erasers.

  “Can you suck them?” Avery asked.

  “I don’t know.”

  “Try.”

  For the first time, Tammi detected color in the little man’s face. She craned her neck and stuck out her tongue. The tip barely grazed the nipple’s end.

  “Now, I want to see your pussy,” he said. “Your pussy, your pussy, your pussy, Tammi.” A bulge showed in his trousers and his left hand squeezed it absent-mindedly.

  She wriggled out of the pantsuit and thong. She stood naked before him.

  “You shaved.”

  “You like that, Avery?”

  “I prefer it natural, actually. Turn around.”

  She spun in place, planted her feet wide apart, and thrust out her ass. She heard movement when Avery moved in for a closer look. She could feel his breath on her buttocks.

  “Open your pussy lips for me,” he whispered.

  She spread herself using two fingers of her right hand.

  “I can see your clitoris,” he said. “Tammi’s clit.”

  “It needs you, Avery.” She couldn’t believe she’d spoken the words.

  Then she heard a muffled sob as he collapsed into the chair. She turned and looked down at him. He was breathing hard and a large wet stain showed on his pant leg. She reached out to touch him, but he waved her off.

  He licked his lips, straining to regain his composure. “Your money’s on the dresser,” he said, nodding. “Next time, shop at Brooks Brothers and let your pussy hair grow back.”

  “That’s it?” Tammi asked.

  “I’ll call you,” he said. “You can get dressed now.”

  She threw on her clothes, took the five $100 bills, and fled to her car.

  She woke up in her lounge chair, an empty wine box on the floor. On the Discovery Channel, some guy by the name of Bear was eating raw goat testicles with nomadic desert tribesmen. It had been one of Dan’s favorite shows. She turned it off and made her way into the bedroom.

  Still dressed in her new clothes, she stood in front of the mirror and struck one pose, then another. She thought about Avery and the money he’d given her. He wasn’t there, but in a way, he was. The clothes belonged to him. Her new body belonged to him. Her soul even belonged to him. After all, she’d told him her hopes and dreams.

  She struck another pose, her butt jutting toward where an imaginary Avery and his hundred-dollar bills sat in the chair. “You like that, Avery?”

  Of course he did.

  She unbuttoned her top and leaned over the chair. “You want these, Avery?”

  Of course he did. His eyes widened. He licked his gray lips with his pale gray tongue.

  Tammi stepped out of the pantsuit and swayed before Avery’s chair. She unhooked her bra, and grasped the chair arms. She shook her breasts at the imaginary Avery.

  “Oh yeah, you want ‘em. Look at the big old boner in your pants, Avery.”

  She could almost see and smell him. She reached out and squeezed his pretend hard-on. For a little guy, he had a long, thick cock, more than enough to satisfy.

  She held her left breast in her hand and milked it. She offered a nipple to Avery. “I’ll let you suck it for $50.”

  The imaginary Avery licked and sucked her like a babe. “Fifty bucks for the other one,” she said.

  Old Avery obliged, just like she knew he would.

  That’s when she remembered the vibrating dildo Dan had bought not long before their divorce. He’d gotten off on fucking her with it. She hadn’t enjoyed it all that much, but neither had she thrown it out. The dildo lay undisturbed in the drawer of her nightstand.

  She placed it on the chair so it stood straight up.

  “That’s it, Avery, show me that big dick. I’ll stroke it for $100.”

  Of course, he paid.

  Tammi sank to her knees, wearing only the black thong. She held the dildo in her hand and stroked it up and down. It had been a while since she’d held a man’s cock, but she hadn’t forgotten how good it felt. And this felt like the real thing. It was veined and wrinkly. It had a dark ring and a thick ridge where the knife’s blade had taken the extra flesh.

  She spit into her hand, then spit again. “You like it, baby?” she asked, her voice husky, breathy.

  She jacked him and pretended to watch his face. His eyes closed, his tongue flicked across those gray lips. “I’ll suck it, if you want,” she whispered, before taking the dildo in her mouth.

  She’d never been all that excited about blow jobs. She’d never appreciated the way Dan placed his hand on top of her head and fucked her mouth like he was fucking the knothole of a tree. But this was different. She was giving Avery a blow job, not getting a mouth-fuck from Dan.

  With her free hand, she rolled her nipples between her fingers. She reached lower and touched her pussy, pussy, pussy through the fabric of her thong. My God, she was soaked through. She pushed the thong aside and worked a finger inside. She smeared her clit with girl-cum and rubbed.

  “Shit,” she heard herself say.

  Tammi stood and stepped out of the thong. She rubbed the crotch in Avery’s face. “Yeah, you like the way my pussy smells. You like the way it tastes, don’t you? I’ll fuck you for $500,” she told the chair with the dildo on it.

  Avery produced five Ben Franklins, pretty as you please.

  Tammi turned around, facing away from the chair. She lowered herself onto the dildo. She used her thumb to rotate the on-off switch and felt the vibrations begin.

  “Holy fuck.”

  She watched herself in the mirror. The sight of her swaying breasts, her thrusting hips, excited her even more.

  “Goddamn sonofabitch.”

  She bounced in earnest.

  “Fuck me, Avery,” she said. “Come on, you paid for it, now fuck me good.”

  It was good. It was better than good. It was as hot and nasty as fucking the whole football team in the backseat of your daddy’s Oldsmobile, which, of course, she never had.

  She bounced harder and faster. She bounced until she felt it white-hot at her core. She wailed long and low, taking every inch of that dildo inside, grinding it out. Pulsing, pulsing, pu
lsing, she lavished in the aftershocks.

  Then, she fell forward across the bed, breathing hard, her heart racing. “Jesus Christ,” she said. “Jesus Fucking Christ.”

  She didn’t even bother to wash her face, brush her teeth, or pee. She turned off the bedside light, slipped under the covers, and snuggled up with a pillow.

  In the darkness, she imagined Avery hitching and zipping his pants. She imagined him opening his wallet and leaving a $100 tip on the nightstand.

  The following week she drove to Springfield and shopped at the Brooks Brothers there. She bought a navy-blue business suit, a sharp-looking button-down cotton blouse, and black square-toed flats with a clunky brass buckle on them. She bought no-nonsense white cotton panties and a matching bra. She paired the bra and panties with flesh-colored pantyhose. By the weekend, her pubic hair reappeared as bristly whiskers that itched like crazy. By midweek, the whiskers transformed into a soft, dark fuzz, and the itch subsided.

  While waiting for Avery’s call, Tammi practiced opening and unrolling condoms onto her dildo. When she was able to do it expertly with one hand, she practiced applying the condoms using only her teeth and mouth. While she was at it, she worked on her deep-throat technique.

  The call from Avery reached her at straight-up noon, the exact time of his first call. They arranged again to meet at the Sunrise, Room 212.

  He was the same gray man he’d always been, but tonight he liked what he saw. She could tell by that dull flicker in his eyes.

  He asked her to remove her pantyhose and open her legs, so he could look up her dress.

  Then he asked her to jack him off onto her breasts. He lasted two minutes counting the time it took him to remove his suit. She used one hand to cup his balls while jacking him with the other. Her eyes never left his. When he was close, she pressed him between her breasts and held herself tight about him. He thrust and grunted and dribbled out a few drops. He paid her $500 and gave her a $100 tip, just like in her fantasy.

  She was home in time to catch the 10:00 News.

  Over the next few months, Tammi increased her fee to $1,000 plus tip, per session.

  The third time they were together, he wanted her to masturbate for him. He propped pillows against the headboard and tweaked her nipples while she lay back against his chest and fingered herself so he could watch in the mirror opposite the bed. After she finished—a thrashing, gut-wrenching orgasm that surprised her as much as him—he asked for “oral.”

  She knelt on her knees while he sat on the edge of the bed and leaned back on his hands. She slipped on the condom without a hitch and sucked him slow and deep.

  The following week, he asked to eat her pussy. Dan had never been into that, but Avery had the patience and persistence of a pro. His fingers and tongue took her from one orgasm to another, each one more powerful than the last. In the end, he sat across her chest and came on her face.

  The week after that, he finally fucked her. She sat astride him, bouncing them both to a hard, quick come.

  The next week, he took her from behind. He pulled her hair and slapped her ass. After he shot and rolled off, she lay beside him and humped his thigh until she got off. He stared at the ceiling, unmoving.

  As summer turned to autumn, he wanted anal. She’d been ready for it and had practiced with her dildo. She accepted his tongue, his finger, his cock. When it was over, in a show of gratitude, he offered to eat her pussy again. She forced him onto his back, squatted over him, her bush now thick and redolent with her need. She ground against his face until she screamed it out.

  The weeks acquired a rhythm. Sometimes, between their weekly sessions, he stopped into The Dixie Highway for coffee, toast, and eggs. Other times, he called after she got off work. With the muted TV flickering across the room, she talked him through it. She could be nasty or sweet, reluctant or demanding, whatever he wanted.

  Sometimes when they were together, he just asked to hold her. She never stayed the night. He never acted like it was anything other than a business transaction.

  Then, the week after Thanksgiving, as abruptly as he’d appeared in her life, he stopped calling. He stopped coming to The Dixie Highway for late-night breakfasts.

  By then, their routine had begun to feel normal—as normal as coffee grounds in the sink at the end of her shift, as normal as piss on the men’s room floor. By then, Tammi had already paid her first semester’s tuition at the community college, signing up for classes in graphic art.

  Along about Memorial Day, the last of Avery’s money ran out. She’d used what was left over after paying tuition for a membership at the local health club and a closet full of Brooks Brothers’ clothes. Her tips from The Dixie Highway wouldn’t come close to paying her second semester’s tuition.

  One morning, just before sunrise, she and Shana stood smoking, looking out across the parking lot, Route 66, and onto the corn and soy beans pushing through the deep, black soil. The breakfast rush was only minutes off, but for now, it was quiet.

  “That little man ain’t ever coming back, is he?” Shana said.

  “Probably not.” Tammi had written him off with onset of the hot days.

  “Well, hon, they come and go. He might’ve had a wife at home. He might’ve had other women on the road.”

  Tammi ground out her cigarette with the toe of her shoe. She’d considered both possibilities, but didn’t want to believe either. “That’s a mean-ass thing to say, Shana.”

  “I’m just calling it like I see it.”

  Tammi untied her apron, wadded it up, and fired it across the room. “Shana, you don’t know shit,” she said, striding out the door and across the parking lot.

  Shana called out as Tammi was unlocking her car door. “Where you going? You can’t leave me like this with the rush coming on.”

  “You’ll be all right.”

  “You leave here now, you’ll never be able to come back. I’ll tell Sam. He’ll never have you back.”

  “Tell him. I don’t give a fuck.”

  Shana ran across the parking lot. Tammi settled behind the wheel and lowered the window. She figured she owed Shana that. After all, they’d worked together for ten years.

  “What’s going to happen to you, girl?” Shana asked.

  “I don’t know what’s going to happen, but I know this—things aren’t ever going to be the same.”

  It took her a few days to get her bearings. When she did, she set her sights on the Holiday Inn.

  She strode into the lounge dressed in a gray pinstripe business suit and black silk blouse. Underneath, she wore black thigh-high stockings, black panties, and a tasteful black bra. Diamond earrings and a stylish gold necklace completed the sophisticated look. She settled on a barstool, lit a cigarette, and ordered a glass of red wine.

  Smoke hung on the leaves of the fake ferns. A local DJ played music to the left of a deserted dance floor. The patrons, mostly single men, sat and drank alone. A few tired couples clung together in darkened corners, playing out secret trysts and the tiresome end of spent relationships.

  It took only fifteen minutes for the first man to sit down beside her.

  He was about her age, traveling alone in rumpled gray slacks, a navy sport coat, and a striped tie that hung loose about his neck. He’d had a little too much to drink and the ghost of his wedding ring, pale and white, showed where he’d removed it to his pocket before approaching her. He introduced himself as Joe Smith.

  He offered to buy her a glass of wine. He told her he owned a successful business in St. Louis. He told her he was single and had never married, too committed to his work. He said he came this way often, on old Route 66, because he appreciated the “historical aspects of the journey.” He said it was a rare and real pleasure to meet a woman like her—someone obviously smart, someone obviously able to take care of herself. Yeah, he liked strong, independent women.

  She read it all for lies, like the lie of the missing wedding ring.

  Finally, he asked her name and where
she was from. He asked about her business and how much she traveled. He asked what she liked to do in her spare time, but stopped short of asking about her hopes and dreams. It was the typical salesman’s ploy—get the prospect talking. Flatter her. Eventually, close her.

  She told him her name was Shana, that she was a local, and self-employed. She told him she liked to work out, then she leaned in and whispered in his ear, “But what I really like to do is fuck.”

  He gave her a drunk and crooked smile. “Really?”

  She placed her hand on his knee, the hand with the freshly manicured and painted nails. “Really.”

  “You like me that much?”

  “I like you well enough.”

  His eyes narrowed to slits. “You’re not a nut job, are you?”

  She shook her head. “I’m not a nut job.”

  Then a wave of recognition washed over him. “You’re a hooker.”

  She leaned in close again, whispering in his ear, “I’m just a woman who knows how to treat a man. My pussy’s aching for you.”

  “You don’t look like . . .”

  She moved her hand a little higher. “For a thousand dollars, I’m anything you want me to be.”

  He mashed out his cigarette and took a deep breath. “A thousand bucks.”

  “There’s an ATM in the lobby.”

  She slid off her stool and started for the door, putting a little extra into her walk for his benefit. Halfway there, she glanced over her shoulder.

  Of course, he trailed behind as if he were on a leash.

  RAY’S OPENING

  My boyfriend Ray recently traveled to China for business. I drove him to LAX and kissed him good-bye at the security checkpoint. Afterwards, I cruised back to my place in Hermosa. The blue Pacific that would separate us for ten days broke in soft, warm waves along the beach. Surfers and volleyball players, lean, strong, and tan, exulted in their skills. I pouted and resigned myself to dining in front of the TV, reading alone on my deck, and satisfying my carnal urges with my own hand until he returned.