A Tale of Two Paramours Ch. 03

I was walking in my front door after my evening with Jessi when my phone pinged. I expected it to be a text from the sexy little blonde, even though she had barely spoken to me before I left her apartment. Moments after our kiss, and her expression of concern about my impact on her life, Jessi had quickly withdrawn, both physical and emotionally. She had rolled from on top of me and out of the bed. With her arms folded across her breasts, she had informed me that she was going to take a shower.

Then, with her intense blue eyes locked on me in one of her characteristically disconcerting stares, Jessi said, "Don't wait for me. I'll text you later."

Following these words, the petite blonde had gone into her small bathroom and locked the door. I slowly gathered up my clothes, dressed, washed my face and hands in her kitchen sink, and grabbed a bottle of water from her refrigerator. However, all too soon I ran out of reasons to linger in her apartment. It was clear she had meant what she said.

Finding a small scrap of paper, I left her a short note: "You are an incredible woman, Jessi. I had a fantastic evening. Mark." I placed the note on her small table. When I left her apartment, I made sure the door locked behind me.

As I drove home, Jessi words continued to reverberate in my mind: "I have a horrible feeling that you might be very bad for me."

My former student had confessed this after our first kiss, a kiss that followed the twenty-year-old blonde giving me fantastic head and swallowing every drop. She had been surprised by the kiss, which is likely why I was able to deliver it at all. Jessi had been avoiding kissing me on the lips the entire evening, but in that moment, I had caught her unawares. I had not felt guilty when I did it, as her proscription on kissing was in seeming contradiction to her willing participation in various sexually intimate activities.

But what I should have realized then, and what I was coming to grips with now, is that there really was not a contradiction. I now understood that in Jessi's world view, kissing equated to intimacy beyond just mere physicality. This fit with both what I had observed about her over the course of the last semester and what she had told me while we had been eating pizza in an interlude between sexual activities.

Jessi existed in a world in which her social awkwardness created a buffer between her and other people. It was through sex, she had told me, that she had been able to connect to someone else. What I suspected she meant by this was that physical/sexual intimacy was the only type of intimacy with which she was comfortable, or perhaps the only type of which she thought she was capable. Thus, I concluded that Jessi's reluctance to kiss me was rooted in a fear of what was for her the unknown - connecting emotionally with another person.

"Maybe," a voice in my head chided me, "She is just afraid of being emotionally intimate with you."

"Maybe," I said aloud, my voice startling to my own ears. I had not meant to speak aloud.

"Or perhaps they are one and the same," I continued in my mind. "She feared kissing me, and told me she was afraid I was going to be bad for her, because she knows on some level that she wants our relationship be more than just sexual."

"Yes," the scolding voice spoke up, "but do you want more than mere sex from her?"

I pondered Jessi: her quirky personality; her intense blue eyes; her disconcerting stare that often lingered too long; her soft, slightly wavy blonde hair; her slender yet femininely shaped body, with perfectly shaped bosom and nicely curved hips; her delicate, almost elfin features; and her sexual openness. I thought that I felt something more than just lust for the young woman, but I was not sure exactly what it was I felt. What did I want from her?

"And if I you are not sure how you feel, why, knowing her social awkwardness and her apparent fear of emotional intimacy, did you kiss her, against her express wishes, in such an incredibly intimate moment?" my conscious charged me. Unfortunately, I did not have a good answer for myself.

***

The text was not from Jessi - it was from Jessika.

"Just got home from evening with friends celebrating grades. Saw Karen from class. She was very happy with grade )"

I smiled as I read Jessika's message. I should have been annoyed she might have let something slip about us, but I was not worried about her doing so to Karen.

Karen, the student Jessika had mentioned, was a returning student in her late thirties, and in addition to becoming fast friends with Jessika, she was quite a success story for me as an instructor. When the semester had started, her writing had been unfocused and timid. Through the course of the semester, she had blossomed as a writer, gaining both technique and confidence. Despite the problems with her earlier work, I had given her an 'A-' for the semester due to her rapid improvement. I did not think she would be quick to reveal anything tuzla bayan escort that might embarrass either Jessika or me.

I texted back, "Not worried about Karen. Glad you had fun, though I hope you were safe getting home."

Even as I hit the send button, I realized how parental the last clause sounded. I was about to apologize when her reply popped up: "Yep - always safe. Took a taxi. "

"I should have known you would be," I replied. "Any plans for the holidays?"

"Work, I guess. I might go see my folks, but I am not sure."

For the next forty minutes, as we both prepared for bed, Jessika and I texted back and forth about the holiday break, family, work, etc. Like most of my interactions with the curvy brunette had been since the start of the semester four months ago, our back and forth texting was relaxed and easy. It was as if we had been friends for years. I did not even feel awkward when I stood naked, drying off, and answered a text that had come in while I was in the shower.

I had just turned out the lights and settled into bed when a new text arrived. But this one was from Jessi, not Jessika. As with the naked photo of herself from earlier, the text contained only a link to media content. I hesitated before following the link. Our evening had ended so awkwardly, and my banter back and forth with Jessika had been so easy, that I debated whether it was wise to even look at whatever the blonde had sent. However, I had to see, so I tapped on the link.

Again the picture was of Jessi in her full length mirror. This time, however, the photo did not cut off her head. Her vivid blue eyes, surrounded by the black fur of a cat mask, burned from my phone's screen. The petite twenty-year-old was wearing her Halloween cat costume, but the bra cups from the corset had been removed. The confining black garment pushed up her perfect breasts, emphasizing them in a way not even the nude picture she had sent earlier had accomplished. With some difficulty, I made myself look away from her obviously erect nipples to take in the rest of her. The black miniskirt of costume was just as I remembered, but black fishnet stocking and a pair of black high-heeled boot were new. I vividly recalled her legs had been bare on Halloween, because I had been enthralled by the creamy witness of her skin (and also curious whether she was cold in the outfit).

As I had felt several times that evening, not to mention over the course of the past semester, I again was off balance with respect to Jessi. I was surprised she had taken and sent that picture to me now, considering what had happened before I left, and I was uncertain as to how to proceed.

"Maybe it is an old picture that she decide to send," I mused.

In the picture, her loose blonde hair was curlier than when I had been there earlier that evening, so maybe that lent some credence to the idea it was an older picture. On the other hand, I could see enough of her bed in the reflection that I could tell it looked just as it had when I had left.

"She could just be a messy housekeeper," my mind suggested, but that did not fit with how tidy her apartment had been when I arrived, including the bed being made.

On closer inspection, I saw what looked to be a piece of scrap paper in her left hand, which she had on her hip. I thought it quite likely it was the note I had left for her.

I was saved from continuing to try to figure out what Jessi wanted when another message from her appeared on my phone screen: "Sorry I was weird. It was 2 much."

"Let me make it up. Pls," read the text that immediately followed.

"There is nothing for which you need to make up," I replied.

"Was a bitch. Just scared. I had a gr8t time too."

I felt bad for the young woman and what were obviously some difficult emotions for her- I genuinely liked her - but I was starting to truly appreciate the ramifications of her social awkwardness on any relationship we might have. And if it was already problematic now, so early in, how bad might it be later? Furthermore, everything so far had been much easier with Jessika.

"I should probably just concentrate on having fun with Jessika," I thought just before Jessi's last text message of the night arrived.

"Will wear the cat costume next time. Lick you all over