by Jade West
That’s what I didn’t tell Nick, when he asked why childcare. It’s because it’s the only time I’m really happy, when I can disappear into a magical imaginary world with children and live there with them for a little while. When I can forget I’m a big girl who has to clean up after her mother because her mother’s never been much of one for taking care of herself. When I can forget that I spent my evenings after school trying to cook myself dinner and do my homework and tidy the house up.
When I can forget about the noises coming through the wall from my mum’s room every night and how they made me feel.
I sigh and it sounds loud in the room.
That should have been my birthday wish. I wish I could live here forever.
I think about it. Living here. Being Jane. And the thought makes me smile.
I think about Nick being my daddy, and making my breakfast in the morning and ruffling my hair.
I think about Nick holding my hand and telling me I’m a good girl. Kissing me on the head.
Kissing me.
I think about Nick’s mouth.
His big hands.
I think about him touching me.
I think about him making the noises I heard through my bedroom wall.
I think about how it would feel. If it would hurt.
I rub my clit and it feels so naughty, touching myself in his daughter’s bed while he sleeps down the corridor. It feels naughty and wrong, and maybe it’s the combination of adrenaline and relief, but I can’t stop, not even when I hear footsteps on the landing and realise he’s not asleep. Not even when I reach that place where I breathe so quickly I make little gasps, and my heart races, and my toes curl.
My breath is so loud when it’s over.
I roll onto my side and pull my knees to my chest and realise that Jane’s bed creaks.
I convince myself that Nick definitely won’t have heard me. Definitely not, no way. Not one little chance. Not even one.
Until I hear his footsteps move away from the bedroom door.
Oh shit.
Chapter Three
Nick
I tell myself I always leave the bathroom door open when I take my morning shower, that’s one of the advantages of living alone. I tell myself I’ve always preferred the shower in the main bathroom — the one on the landing that opens directly across from Jane’s door. I tell myself that Laine is asleep, that she’s probably exhausted and I’ll be long finished and dressed by the time she surfaces.
I wish to God I hadn’t heard her last night. I wish I hadn’t lingered, hadn’t pressed my ear to her bedroom door to hear her exploring Jane’s toys with curious fingers. Only those toys aren’t Jane’s toys. I never got a chance to give most of those beautiful toys to my little girl.
I wanted to make sure Laine went to sleep ok, that’s what I tell myself. I wanted to be sure she wasn’t still scared, wouldn’t lie awake all night fretting over the piece of shit who tried to molest her in an alleyway.
My cock definitely wasn’t hard. It definitely didn’t take all of my restraint not to jack myself off like a cheap pervert outside her door.
I definitely didn’t want to hear her touching herself.
My shoulders feel tight until the hot water works its magic. The girl shouldn’t even be here. This is reckless. Ridiculous.
I don’t make stupid rash errors of judgement. That’s something I learned from my father.
Every decision has consequences, he’d say. Make sure you’re well aware what they are before you subject yourself to them.
He subjected me to enough consequences that I still bear the scars across my backside. Brutal, but fair, and he made me a better man for it. A smart man. A calculated man. A determined, responsible, powerful man.
Just like he was.
A man who doesn’t pick up vulnerable young women and put them to bed in his little girl’s room. If he wasn’t already long in his grave, my father would tan my backside afresh for my stupidity. I smile to myself at his memory and lather on some bodywash. I scrub hard, working the suds into my skin as though they stand a chance of cleansing my impure urges.
I’ve worked hard to keep my impulses under control. Worked hard to express my desires in an acceptable way. Now really isn’t the time to be thinking about them, not with temptation personified sleeping soundly across the landing. I shampoo my hair, working my fingers into my scalp, trying to get my head back in the game.
Breakfast. Laine will need breakfast. She’ll need her clothes. She’ll need taking back home, where she belongs.
Still, I can enjoy her just a little, just enough to get my blood pumping when I think back on her beautiful, innocent smile later this evening.
A bit of harmless fun never hurt anyone.
Laine
Jane’s bed is really comfortable. Her room looks so warm and cosy as the light breaks through the gauzy curtains. I stretch out, kick back the sheets, relaxing quite happily until I remember with a thud that Nick heard me playing with myself last night.
Shit.
My heart races at the thought of facing him. How ungrateful can I possibly be? Taking advantage of his kind hospitality by playing with myself in his daughter’s bedroom? In his daughter’s pink bedsheets? Cringe doesn’t even come close.
I bite my lip, think things through, and there’s nothing else for it. I just need to get it over with. Smile and face him and hope he isn’t too mad with me. I can’t bear the thought of a man like Nick being mad with me. Disappointed in me.
I grab Jane’s robe from the back of the door and trace my finger over the DaDDy writing on her picture. She’s so lucky.
I make sure I’m wrapped up tight before I open the door, check myself in the dressing table mirror and smooth my wispy hair into some kind of order. I look so young in the morning light, in this room, as though I’ve regressed to being a little girl again.
The thought feels like warm marshmallows in my brain.
I hold my breath as I press down the door handle. Here we go. Now or never.
Maybe he isn’t even up yet. Maybe he’s already up and gone, leaving my clothes in a pile with nothing but a get out of my house, you dirty little bitch message waiting for me.
I hope not.
I hear the water as soon as the door is ajar. The sound is much stronger than it is at my house, our shower is barely more than a trickle at best. I step out onto the landing and my tummy lurches as I see that the bathroom is opposite. The door is open, just a little bit. I can see a mirrored bathroom cabinet on the wall, all steamed up. A black towelling robe is in a heap on the floor. My breath hitches at the thought of him in there, the thought of him naked under the water.
For the first time in my life I don’t want to be a virgin anymore. I want to be confident, like a sex vixen. One of those girls like Kelly Anne who can go after what she wants. If Kelly Anne were here she’d ditch the fluffy pink dressing gown and stalk in there naked. Flash him a smile and a hello there and climb straight in after him.
Hell, I’m nothing like Kelly Anne, and even if I were, a man like Nick isn’t going to want a silly little girl like me. I wouldn’t even know what I was doing.
He probably dates businesswomen types, older ladies with hot glasses and tight buns, and a wicked smile. Women who can talk politics with him over coffee and talk dirty with him between the sheets. The thought of Nick talking dirty makes my skin prickle.
I wonder again if he makes the kind of noises I’ve heard coming from Mum’s bedroom.
I try to pull myself together, decide that it’s probably better to go and wait in Jane’s room until he’s finished, but I don’t. I’m in that strange place again, where everything feels surreal, and my feet are moving on their own, tiptoe steps so careful as I inch my way across the landing. Just a little further. I just want to see a little bit more…
I shouldn’t. I really shouldn’t. But I can’t stop myself.
I don’t want to stop myself.
I keep my eyes on th
e tiles as I edge closer. They are those expensive kind, like those spa hotels have. I went to one once for Kelly Anne’s birthday, just for a swim, but I couldn’t stop staring at everything. It was so beautiful, so grand. Nick’s house is like that. He has one of those modern basins, one of the big ceramic bowls that sits on top of tiles, not like the tired old sink we have at mine. He has golden-brown towels over one of those fancy metal radiators. They match the colour of the bathroom perfectly. He’s so stylish.
I think of those towels touching his skin, think of him rubbing himself down when he’s finished, and my eyes creep further in, my toes edging closer to the doorway. I can feel the steam on my face.
It feels nice.
I shouldn’t be doing this. I can’t even believe I’m doing this.
I take a breath as my toes touch the tiles, eyes wide as I lean forward enough to peep around the door.
Insane. I’m insane.
But he left the door open… it was his mistake… maybe I didn’t realise… maybe I wanted the toilet…
The sight of him makes my tummy flutter and lurch. He’s got his back to me, his big fingers lathering shampoo into his hair. His shoulders are broad, and his back tapers into a slim waist. He’s muscular… toned… I can see the definition in his back even through the steam.
Oh Lord, please don’t let him see me…
He tips his head back to let the water rinse his hair, and his hands move over his body. I wish I could see the front of him. I wish I could see all of him.
He leans back, and his hands move lower. His perfect ass tightens, his thighs so tense, and I can see his arms, moving… and it feels so…
Dirty.
He’s touching himself.
The wave of shock ripples through me, and it makes my brain pop … like the time I turned on the TV in the living room and it was on a channel it shouldn’t be, playing one of Mum’s boyfriend’s dirty DVDs…
I’d closed my eyes instinctively, then watched it through splayed fingers knowing perfectly well I shouldn’t. Knowing I shouldn’t be tingling in private places, shouldn’t want to touch myself at the sight of those big veiny dicks on screen.
They’d looked so big. Much bigger than I’d imagined.
Those men made the same noises I heard through my bedroom wall.
And Nick’s making noises, too.
Quiet ones. Nothing but breath and grunts. I can barely hear him over the sound of the water but it’s the most amazing thing I’ve ever heard.
My thighs clench tight, and it flutters there. I want to race back to Jane’s bed and touch myself, but I can’t, I can’t stop watching. It seems to take forever, standing statue still as Nick’s arm jerks and the water washes over him, but I don’t care. I want it to take forever.
He braces a hand against the tiles and lowers his head, and his grunts are a bit louder now, his hips thrusting forward. He swears under his breath, and I know this is it, know he’s about to come. I’ve seen it on the internet, I know how cocks look when men come. I wonder if Nick’s looks just like that. My breath is so fast, but so shallow.
I watch it all. Watch him tense and thrust, soaking up the way his body looks, all the noises he makes.
When he’s done, he relaxes, washes himself off like nothing’s happened, and reality crashes in, the horror of knowing I’ve been spying on someone’s most private moments. He turns off the water quicker than I expect, and I’m sprung right out of my dazed state. I back away, clumsy this time, dash back across the landing to Jane’s room and close the door behind me.
It closes too loud and I feel horrendous.
Embarrassment burns so hot.
I dive under the covers and pull them high over my head. Screw my eyes tight shut and try and calm my racing heart.
Shit.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
What the hell have I done?
I flinch as I hear a rap at the door, waiting for Nick to order me out of here, waiting for him to demand an explanation that I don’t stand a hope in hell of giving.
The handle turns.
Slowly.
So slowly.
Chapter Four
Nick
I only caught a glimpse of her. A flash of pink as she darted from the bathroom, her presence confirmed by the sound of Jane’s bedroom door closing across the landing. I don’t know how long she’d been watching, but the thought of her blue eyes staring at my nakedness through steamy glass makes my balls tingle all over again.
I remind myself that this is unacceptable. I also remind myself that this is also going to be short-lived. A dirty flash in a very dangerous pan, but one I’ll relive over and over in my fantasies when little Laine is long gone.
I rap at her door and give her a few seconds before turning the handle.
Her eyes are wide as I swing the door open and step inside, the bedcovers up to her chin, her pretty cheeks flushed pink. She looks guilty. Embarrassed. Gorgeous.
It suits her, and does nothing whatsoever to ease the temptation.
“Rise and shine, sleepyhead,” I say, as though I haven’t got any inkling she’s just watched me whack one off in the shower. I cross the room with her eyes following me all the way, and her eyelashes flutter as I pull the curtains wide. Bright morning sunlight falls perfectly on her blonde hair. She looks so innocent, a little angel in a little girl’s room. “I hope you slept well?”
She smiles a relieved smile, and she’s so beautiful here, in this room. Her presence brings the place to life again.
She nods her pretty head. “I did. I slept really well. Thank you. Thank you so much for everything.”
“Your clothes will be dry,” I tell her, wishing I didn’t have to. “Let’s go down, get some breakfast. Are you hungry? You must be hungry, Laine.”
She nods again, then throws back the covers, swinging her tiny feet out onto the floor. “Breakfast sounds really, really good.”
She looks so warm and cosy wrapped in Jane’s pink dressing gown. The urge to hug her is strong, to feel her tight against me. To hold someone again.
I take a breath. “Let’s see what we can rustle up.”
She follows me downstairs with bouncy steps, and her feet barely make a sound on the wooden floor as I lead her through to the kitchen. I pat one of the stools at the breakfast bar and she hitches herself up, adjusting her pink robe with a delightful little hint of self-consciousness that makes my mouth water.
I know I should show restraint and offer her a regular breakfast. Muesli or yoghurt, like I’ll be having, maybe some toast with marmalade, but that perverse little thrill is tickling through me, and I veer away from sensibility enough to pull out the box of frosted puffs I picked up from the petrol station last night. I shake the box and hold it up for her to see, a grinning cartoon leprechaun gracing the packet.
“Do you like cereal, Laine? I thought you might like these.”
How my dick twitches as her eyes light up. “I love frosted puffs! How did you know?!” she says.
I shrug. “A lucky guess.”
“They’re the ones with the marshmallow stars, aren’t they? I begged my mum for those when I was little!”
Little. She looks so little. Perched on the stool.
I pour them into a bowl and pick her out one of my smallest spoons. A little spoon for a sweet little mouth.
She beams up at me as I place the bowl in front of her, as though I’ve just bought her a show pony, not a cheap box of cereal. I pour the milk, ask her to say when.
“When!” she giggles, and stirs the bowl with her spoon, watching the marshmallow stars drift around. They turn the milk pink.
I get us both an orange juice and sit myself down opposite her to eat my muesli. I watch everything. The way she scoops out just the right amount of frosted puffs with her stars. The way she closes her eyes as she crunches them. The innocent enjoyment in her smile.
I would happily watch little Laine Seabourne eat frosted puffs forever, and I feel a jab of resentment at the k
nowledge that I won’t. It pains me that such a sweet, gracious girl has nobody waiting back at home to look after her. Nobody there to keep her safe.
But that’s not my business, nor my problem.
“Tell me about Jane,” she says, and it catches me off guard.
My breath catches in my throat. “About Jane? What do you want to know?”
She smiles. “Where is she? I guess she doesn’t live here anymore?”
“No,” I say. “Jane’s long gone from here.”
“All grown up,” she grins, and it’s the perfect opportunity for a subject change.
“So, how does it feel to be an official adult?” I ask. “Eighteen is a big milestone.”
She shrugs. “I don’t feel any different. I’ve kinda had to be an adult for a long time. Well, as much of an adult as I can be.” Her smile doesn’t mask her sadness, not quite. “I mean, it’s my mum. She’s just… she worked, when I was little. It was hard for her to take care of me. She tried.”
Somehow I doubt that.
“So you had to take care of yourself?”
She nods, “Yeah. Nothing wrong with that though, right? It’s good to be able to take care of yourself. I cook a mean toasted sandwich. Microwave meals? No problem.” She giggles, but it sounds false. I don’t answer and she sighs. “Jane is really lucky to have a dad like you. I’d have loved to have a dad like you.”
“Thank you,” I say, and the words almost stick in my throat.
“I mean it,” she says. “Her room is amazing. The writing on her wall… her fairytale castle… all the toys she had…”
“Toys don’t mean anything,” I tell her. “It’s love that matters.”
Her spoon stops mid-air, and her eyes stare into mine. “I wouldn’t know.” She shakes her head, checks herself. “Sorry. Way too much information.” She pulls a stupid face, tips her head to the side. “Stop talking now, Laine.” She dips her spoon back into the bowl and stirs the cereal.
“No,” I say. “Don’t stop talking. Not unless you want to, of course.”