by Rachael Yukey
Wakefulness came slowly, and I let it take its sweet time. Gradually I became aware that I was naked under the covers, and my comforter had somehow disappeared. I opened my eyes, allowing them a few seconds grace to come into focus on Terry’s bedroom. Oh yeah… I dropped by here and got fucked last night, didn’t I?
Plucking my phone off the bedside table, I checked the time. Nine-thirty already. Setting the phone aside, I noticed that Terry had laid a change of clothes on the nightstand. We’re not together anymore, so why do I still keep a toothbrush and extra clothing at his house?
Terry’s house sports a massive living room near the entrance, an equally large parlor at the opposite end of the ground floor, and a cozy little den upstairs. His original plan was that the kids would use the parlor and the living room would be for adults, but in practice it turned out that everyone just gravitated towards the living room. That’s where I found them, and it was the usual barely-controlled bedlam. Terry has four girls, and damned if I know what the story is with their mother. Terry will only speak of his ex-wife in the vaguest of terms, and if visitation ever takes place, I’ve never heard about it. I took it all in at a glance; in my line of work, you get good at that.
Dawn, the eight-year-old, had her best friend Allison over, but she’s just part of the scenery. Allison lives on the next block, also the daughter of a single father. That particular gentleman can never hold a job for more than a month or two, so there’s never any stability and his work hours are often pretty weird. Allison’s older brother is violent and mean-tempered, to the point where at age twelve he’s already been institutionalized a couple of times, and she can’t be left alone with him. So she more or less lives at Terry’s house during the day.
The two of them were in the middle of creating an elaborate Lego complex that was already eating half of the substantial living room. Six-year-old Maya was trying to help as best she could. Dawn and Allison were being as gracious as could be expected, but not to the point of letting her mess up their construction plans.
Ten-year-old Naomi was seated on the big wraparound couch with a script in hand, quietly mouthing lines, and I dimly recalled that she was in her elementary school’s spring theater production, which was opening in just a few days. Naomi’s a talkative, vivacious, social creature, and gets involved in as many activities as her father will allow. She’s also the changeling of the family, big-boned and a bit short for her age, whereas her sisters are slender and tall.
“The other girls look like me, God help the poor creatures,” Terry once said. “Naomi got all of her mom’s Norwegian genes.” It’s about as close as Terry ever gets to discussing his ex.
At the table in the adjacent dining nook sat a reflection of me, at least as I perceive myself at age twelve. Somber, quiet, reflective Halee. She had her laptop open and her headphones on, and I couldn’t make out what she was doing. Halee had recently dyed her hair jet-black and started favoring dark-colored clothing, her t-shirts adorned with the logos of punk bands nobody had ever heard of.
All four of Terry’s daughters were going to be beautiful. They already were, in a girlish sort of way, and in Halee and Naomi’s cases, it was a way that I found entirely too interesting. Halee was just starting to get breasts, and Naomi’s Scandinavian bone structure afforded her a delightfully shaped backside several years before most girls her age would start developing one.
Looking for all the world like the lord of the manor sitting aloof above it all, Terry reclined in his easy chair, thumbing through a magazine. Classical music from the stereo provided a backdrop for the scene. Terry’s audio system makes me drool a little; he’s the only person I know with a better system than mine. The damn speakers cost ten grand by themselves. But I can’t abide his taste in music.
I came down via the small staircase next to the dining nook, knowing that’s where I’d find Terry and his girls. Terry heard my footsteps on the stairs, looked up, and gave me that grin of his that’s been known to make men check up on what their wives are doing. I gave a little wave and retreated into the nearest bathroom.
As the hot shower cascaded over my body, I realized that I was heating up in more ways than one. Whirling through my mind was the image of Halee sitting at the table, intent on her laptop screen. The black dye left her hair color almost identical to mine, and I thought it suited her skin tone. And then there was the way her just blossoming tits pressed at the front of her punk band tee —
Oh, dear. My occasional lover was sitting right out in the living room, and there I stood with my body aching for his preteen daughter. Detaching the shower head with trembling hands, I aimed it at my eager pussy, using the other hand to spread my lips wide. As the torrent battered my clit, I almost doubled over in ecstasy. Holy fuck; I was even more turned on than I thought.
Suddenly, the reality of what I was doing struck me like a ton of bricks. Turning off the water with a savage twist of my hand, I grabbed the towel and got the fuck out of there, unsatisfied.
My body was still raging as I stepped out of the bathroom, fully dressed with my hair in a towel. It occurred to me to drag Terry upstairs and rape him, but I didn’t think I could look him in the face right then. Suffer in silence, you disgusting pervert. I slunk down the hallway, hating myself.
As the hall opened out, the dining nook to my right and the living room ahead, I picked up the smell of frying pork. Turning my head to the left, I could see Halee through the imposing red-brick archway of the kitchen entrance, cracking eggs into a pan. At the opposite end of the kitchen an identical opening led to the seldom-used dining hall, sporting a table of suitable size to host a state dinner.
Halee glanced in my direction. “The rest of us ate,” she said without preamble, “so I’m making yours now. Better than reheated stuff, I guess.”
A young lady of contrasts, Halee is both the most rebellious and the most domesticated of Terry’s daughters. She’ll argue like hell over curfews and other restrictions, but she keeps her spaces meticulously clean and is among the best cooks I’ve ever encountered. She slammed a lid down on the pan, throwing a glance at the microwave clock.
“Thanks, Halee,” I said, offering her a small smile.
She tossed back a humorless grin. “Don’t mention it.” She held my gaze for a moment, her hazel eyes unwavering. I froze, wondering if I’d somehow given myself away. Did she know where my evil, twisted imagination had led me? All the same, being the subject of that intense scrutiny was unbelievably hot. If I didn’t get the hell away from this kitchen, my clean, dry panties were going to be neither in a minute or two.
The corners of her mouth twitched upwards, and she turned back to her cooking while I beat feet for the living room. The three younger girls had disappeared, most likely to Dawn’s bedroom. I plopped down on the sofa with an explosive sigh.
Terry looked up at me, his eyebrows raised. “Something eating you?”
Your daughter Halee would be an ideal candidate for the job, I thought, and had to fight back a burst of wild laughter.
“Just trying to wake up,” I tossed off, trying to sound nonchalant.
“Chelsey Milne is out of ICU,” he informed me.
My eyebrows shot up. “That’s great, but how the hell do you know?”
“Oh, I have a source down at Children’s. I just heard a few minutes ago.”
I rolled my eyes. With Terry, “source at Children’s” no doubt meant, “a nurse he’s had sex with.” But honestly, I didn’t care too much. I was overcome with a sense of profound relief.
“That’s great news, Dad!” piped up Naomi, from her position on the opposite end of the couch from me. The little minx was wearing a pair of leggings that looked as if they’d been spray-painted on. Her legs, revealing the ten-year-old’s Scandinavian ancestry, might not have been shapely in the classic sense, but they had a beauty all of their own, and I had to force myself not to stare. It occurred to me that Naomi and Chelsey were probably within a few months of the same age.
“It’s news you keep to yourself for the moment, I’m afraid,” Terry warned her. “Lest we compromise my source. I wouldn’t have said anything at all if the younger girls were still in the room. Don’t worry; it’ll be all over town within an hour or two.”
Naomi beamed, instantly recognizing that her father was placing his trust in her. When she smiled, that round, expressive face lit up in ways that pushed all my buttons at once.
“That being said,” Terry went on, turning back to face me, “I have to run the Midgets Three over to Stacy Wood’s house; she’s taking them to the pool in Melville along with her girls. I’m just going to drop them off, so I won’t be long. Now, I know– there’s an indefinable sense of loss associated with my departure. But do try to be strong.”
“I think I’ll manage,” I informed him, with a roll of my eyes.
He turned his attention to Naomi. “I know it’s mostly kids younger than you,” he told her, “but Stacy did say you’re welcome if you want to come. Halee too, but I know better than to ask.”
Naomi giggled a little at this. “You know what, Dad? I think I will after all.”
She peeled herself off the couch and disappeared down the hall towards the bathroom. I studiously avoided watching her go. My level of arousal hadn’t gone down even a little bit from the moment I’d aimed the shower head at my lady bits, and I could feel my panties growing damp.
Terry entered the hallway at the opposite end of the room and rapped on the first door he came to. “Fee, Fi, Fo, Fum,” he announced. “Hie thy backsides to the horseless carriage parked at the curb, or resign thyselves to being main courses at a convention of giants.”
The door flew open and three small bodies launched from the room like a flock of oversized featherless birds. Terry watched them barrel through the living room and down the hallway towards the foyer with overt amusement.
“I won’t be long,” he said, caressing my cheek with a finger as he strode past the couch. Then he was gone.
It was only a moment later that Halee came in, carrying a plate laden with sausage patties, fried eggs, and toast, a cup of coffee in the other hand. To be honest, I’d forgotten I had breakfast coming. She set the whole works on the coffee table in front of me, her budding breasts clearly outlined through the snug t-shirt she wore. Those pert nipples were only inches from my face.
She straightened, giving me a good look at the fishnet leggings disappearing under a short black skirt. I wouldn’t have imagined that such an ensemble would work on a girl so young, but it did.
“Thanks,” I managed to get out.
Halee crossed the room, flouncing into her dad’s recliner. I took a bite of egg. I wasn’t sure what the combination of seasonings was, but it was delicious, and I realized that I really was hungry. I attacked the contents of the plate with gusto, glad to have something to put my mind to other than this horrible, forbidden lust.
“How’ve you been, Halee?” I inquired between bites.
The girl gave me an exaggerated shrug. “Same as always, I guess. What’s the story with you and my dad?”
I was taken a little aback by her directness, and it took me a moment to formulate a response.
“Nothing heavy this time,” I said. “Just hanging out, really.”
Her face went a little bit hard. “Don’t do that,” she said. “I know what goes on in there. Even if I was an idiot… and I’m not… Dad’s bedroom is right next to mine, and you’re both noisy.”
I should have been embarrassed, but I wasn’t. Knowing that this junior hottie had been listening kicked my already considerable arousal up about five notches.
After a moment’s contemplation of possible responses, I elected to go for disaffected nonchalance.
“Whatever,” I said with a shrug. “But that’s all there is to it. We’re not getting back together or anything like that.”
Halee said nothing, fixing me with a steady, unwavering gaze for so long, I could feel myself starting to squirm. I returned my attention to my half-eaten breakfast.
Finally she spoke. “Can I ask you something personal?”
I snorted laughter around my last bite of sausage. “I think we’re already way past personal.”
“I know what goes on between you and Dad,” Halee said. She spoke slowly, as if choosing her words with great care. “But there are rumors about you. Stuff about you and other girls.”
She had my full attention now. I took a sip of coffee, struggling to appear calm while feeling anything but. Is this the point at which I started to seriously contemplate seduction? I think it was. Not consciously, but I’d be lying if I didn’t acknowledge that my next words were carefully calculated to pique Halee’s interest.
“I’m bisexual,” I told her. “It’s not something I’m ashamed of, or trying to hide.” I met her eyes, held them. “Is that something you have questions about?”
The moment seemed to last forever. We just sat there, gazing across the living room into each other’s eyes. There was communication in that gaze, or at least I perceived there to be. It’s a good thing I was wearing nice thick denim jeans, because my panties were absolutely sodden.
Halee had just parted her lips to reply when we heard the front door open. Dammit. At that moment I was well past the point of no return. My breathing was ragged, and nobody was even touching me. I could think of only one thing to do.
I rose from the couch, leaving my empty plate and half-full coffee cup behind. I met Terry in the hallway, tugging him towards the stairs by his shirt sleeve.
“Whoa, what are you… ah, I see,” he said jovially, falling in behind me. “I think this turn of events bodes well for me. My lady, I shall follow, lo unto the pits of hell and back again, if I’ve correctly understood what it is you have in mind.” By the time he got all of this out, we had reached the top of the stairs.
“Shut up,” I said hoarsely, whirling around and shoving him against the wall. I threw my body against his, pushing my tongue into his mouth. Sixty seconds later we were in the bedroom, and thirty seconds after that my pants were on the floor, his face buried in my pussy.
“Goodness,” he said, coming up for air, “the dew is especially heavy this morning.” I grabbed his head with both hands and shoved him back in place. It’s a good thing my hands were covering his ears, because just then I heard a soft click as the door to the next bedroom was carefully closed. Halee was in her room.
I admit it – while Terry ate me, I wasn’t thinking of him at all. Was Halee getting excited at the sound of my moans? Was she touching herself? I enjoyed those images for a moment, then began to fantasize that it was her head down there in place of her father’s, her tongue driving me to, then over, the brink. When he fucked me, I closed my eyes and imagined Halee’s fingers deep inside of me instead of his dick.
For the first time, I gave these fantasies full reign instead of trying to push them away. I can’t remember the last time I came so hard. After it was over I rolled off the bed, got my pants back on, and mumbled some feeble excuse to Terry. Retreating to my apartment, I locked the door, turned up the music as loud as I dared, and poured myself a drink. A big one.
***
There’s a saying in EMS that there are two kinds of calls: holy shit and bullshit. I think there’s even a t-shirt to that effect. Of the two, bullshit far outweighs the holy shit, especially out here in the middle of nowhere. I have medic friends in metro areas who are dealing with gunshot wounds and overdoses on a daily basis, whereas most of my patients are old people with, well, old people problems. A depressing percentage of these issues– most of them, really– could just as well have waited till morning and been taken to the clinic by car, instead of going to the emergency department by ambulance.
The bottom line is, I can go weeks without treating a patient in serious trouble, and a really nasty trauma code is something I literally might see once a year or so. I’ve been in EMS since I was eighteen, and have never seen a body as badly damaged as that of the Bixley kid. It might turn out to be the worst of my career.
The whole thing went down early on a Thursday, five days after my Saturday morning retreat from Terry’s house. In the interim, I’d seen Terry once or twice, just around town, and we chatted pleasantly, with no mention made of how I’d pulled a runner on him. That’s the cool thing about Terry: he knows I’m damaged goods, and takes my fucked-up quirky behavior in stride. If only he knew the full extent of it…
News kept filtering in about the Milne girl. She was still down at Children’s in Minneapolis, where she’d been transferred after stabilization at the smaller hospital I’d taken her to. But her condition was improving steadily, and she’d be coming home the following week. There’d be a long run of physical therapy ahead, but Chelsey was going to be okay.
It was six AM when the call came down, and I was commuting to my job at Thormleton Ambulance in Johnstown. The accident took place in the Bronning volunteer ambulance service area, so therefore not my problem since I wasn’t on call for Bronning. But I’d just pulled out of town, I was less than three miles from the scene, and there was no way I could reasonably leave a head-on collision between a car and a dump truck at highway speeds to the volunteer EMTs.
I diverted to the scene, and joined the crew of the A rig in transporting Jason Bixley, the sixteen-year-old boy who’d been driving the car, to the hospital. Terry and another EMT came out a few minutes behind us with the B rig and transported the dump truck driver, who’d sustained only minor injuries.
I’ll spare you any further suspense: Jason Bixley died. We were doing CPR within seconds of getting him into the ambulance, and worked him for the entire thirty-mile ride to the hospital. Truth is, we never had a chance. I’m pretty sure he bled out in the car. He had enormous, gaping holes in his body, and at the end of the trip there was almost no blood pooled on the cot. To make matters even less pleasant, he was pretty badly burned; the car had caught fire.
The hospital where we deposited his lifeless body is only a few blocks from my workplace, so I just had the crew drop me off there. I phoned my dad, asking him to get my car off the highway where I’d left it back at the scene, and pick me up after work.
Funny thing with really bad ambulance calls: afterwards, I always end up in somebody’s bed. Some coincidence, huh? The setup this time was oddly similar to Chelsey Milne’s call the previous Friday: I was lying on my couch, listening to music and drinking, idly thinking that I should get a house so I could crank my insanely expensive audio system up to the levels it deserved. An hour later, I was snuggling up with Terry Wilder in a post-orgasmic haze, slowly drifting to sleep.
Same damn dream. I’m vaguely aware that this is PTSD or something like it, and I should really go see a shrink or something. And once again, I jerked awake, slowly becoming aware of Terry regarding me calmly from the opposite side of the bed.
“You okay?” he inquired.
“Of course I’m okay,” I snapped, a little more harshly than intended.
Terry regarded me sidelong, then shrugged it off. “Shit’s been crazy here today,” he said. “Even worse than after the Milne accident last week.”
“I heard,” I said, doing my best to avoid sounding pissy. “Dad picked me up from work, and I had to listen to him talk about it for the entire forty-minute drive home.”
“Did he mention all the rumors that are flying around like fucking mosquitoes in July?”
I pulled the blanket up to my chin. “Not really. He mostly just went on about half the stores closing, and the kids not having to do anything at school. At length. You know how he is.”
“No, I don’t. I don’t think I’ve exchanged three words with your dad in four years, except when I’ve bought lumber from his yard. Besides, didn’t a wise man once say that no man can truly befriend the one who’s banging his daughter? I think it was in the Bible or something.”
“You’re impossible.”
Terry’s expression was one of wry amusement. “Just improbable. Never mind. The question of the day is why the Bixley kid was out on that highway two hours before the school day started, and why he was heading towards home instead of school.”
“That’s two questions, dummy.”
Terry chuckled and laced his hands behind his head. “Maybe, but don’t try telling me he was making a pre-dawn run to pick up milk. Nothing in this town opens that early, and you know it. ”
Of course it had occurred to me. Jason Bixley had lived on a farm six miles from town on County Highway 70, and that’s the direction he’d been headed when he met his fate.
“Yeah,” I said, “I thought of it. So what?”
“Well, to add seasoning to an already caustic brew, the rumor mill would have us believe his parents had no idea he was out of the house.”
I rolled on my side to face him. “So he snuck out. Kids do it all the time. It’s just shitty that his folks had to find out about it like this.”
“That’s what I figured, too. He probably slipped out to meet up with a very nice girl– you know, for tea and crumpets or something. He then lost track of time, and was hauling ass to get back home before his mom and dad found out he was gone. But you know how it is; people talk. The kid was out when he shouldn’t have been, coming from nobody knows where, and he swerved into the wrong lane so sharply it left marks on the pavement. Right into the path of a friggin’ dump truck, I might add.”
I rubbed my eyes. “He was probably playing with his phone or something.”
“That’s what I think, too.” We lay in silence for awhile.
“I’ll drop it if you want,” Terry said, “but…” He hesitated.
“It’s all right.”
“Was it as bad as the firefighters made it out to be?”
“We never had a chance,” I said flatly. I wriggled in close, pressing my body tightly against his. “If I’d withheld resuscitation and just called the doctor on the spot, I doubt anyone would have questioned me on it. It’s what I would have done, if it hadn’t been a kid. He bled out in his car. I’ve been in EMS for seven years now, Terry… I’ve never seen a body that wrecked. The only good news is that he was probably dead before the fire got to him.”
Terry slipped an arm under my head and around my shoulders. “You may need to make sure Jessie Kramer understands that,” he said. At nineteen Jessie is the youngest and least experienced EMT on the Bronning squad, and she’d been in the back of the ambulance with me that morning.
“She’s a train wreck,” Terry was saying. “I was at the station when the A rig got back to town, and she couldn’t stop crying. I took over the rest of her on-call time for the day, and I’m covering her twenty-four tomorrow, too. I hope we don’t lose her over this; it’s really fucking her up.”
I sighed. “I’ll talk to her,” I said. Not that I have a single fucking clue what I’m going to say. I turned over on my side and draped an arm across him. He pulled me close.
“How was the dump truck driver?” I asked.
“I think he was all right,” he said. “Naturally I have no idea what they found in CT, but he was completely oriented for the whole ride in, and his vitals were good. He felt really bad about the accident, no matter how many times I assured him it wasn’t his fault.”
I nodded, feeling glum. That driver was minding his own business, staying in his lane, and would probably suffer from post-traumatic guilt for the rest of his life because a teenager crossed the center line and ended up dead. Then something else occurred to me.
“So if you’re covering for Jessie tomorrow, we’re on call together, then,” I pointed out.
“True story,” he said. “You got plans for the weekend?”
“Nope.”
“Wanna hang out?”
My hand slipped between his legs. I stroked what I found there, thrilling at the sensation of it hardening beneath my fingers. For a fleeting moment, underage pussy was the furthest thing from my mind.
“Sure, why not?” I rolled on top of him.
***
What followed was one of those rare transcendental sexual experiences that writers wax poetical about. Our bodies and minds melded, the rest of the world fading into a dim, unimportant backdrop. We came together, hanging on to each other for dear life. It was the last time Terry and I ever made love, but it wasn’t such a bad way to go out.
On to Chapter Three!