The Making of a Gigolo (14) - Erica Bradford

by Lubrican

Chapters : 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26

Chapter Thirteen

December the 31st, 1975 was celebrated much like it was anywhere else in the country. There were parties and gatherings that weren't called parties, but which had a party atmosphere to them.

One such was at Tilly and Jake Johnson's house. There were only four people there, the other two being Erica and Will, but it was still a celebration. The kids were in bed, and the TV was on, but turned down. They hadn't so much eaten a meal as snacked all evening, having a sandwich here, or some chips there. Tilly was taking sips of white wine, which Will enjoyed too. Erica and Jake were drinking Dr. Pepper.

They were playing cards, which made it interesting, because it was spades and it was men against women. Both men only had one hand to play with, and a simple code had been developed so that the woman sitting next to each man could pluck a card from the man's hand and put it on the table. The women were losing, and as the night progressed, they started plucking the wrong cards more and more often.

"Ohhh, Jake, I'm so sorry," said Erica, as she pulled the ace of spades from his hand to play on a heart's trick. "I thought you said you had a heart."

"I DO have a heart, woman," he growled. "Is there something about being in the women's liberation movement that requires you to harass men?"

"Not that I'm aware of," said Erica sweetly, as she put the ace back in his hand and pulled another wrong card, showing them he had the jack of diamonds. "Oops."

"We may as well just let them have the game," sighed Jake. The men were a hundred and fifty points ahead with a score of three hundred sixty.

"Don't you let us win!" snapped Erica. She blushed as she realized what she'd said, and the tone of voice she'd said it in.

"Don't have to let you win," said Jake, unruffled. "You're going to cheat to win anyway."

"Jake!" said Tilly sharply. "These are our guests!"

"You're no better," he groused. "Both of you, preying on poor old crippled men. You should be ashamed of yourselves." He tried to look hurt.

"I'm not old," said Will. "And I think we can beat them even if they cheat."

It went on like that, until Will's prediction was proven.

Tilly packed up the cards as Erica tried to add the points incorrectly, so that the game wouldn't officially be over.

"And they let you teach school?" asked Jake, grinning.

It was only fifteen minutes until midnight, at that point, so they didn't start another game, sitting down in the living room to wait for the clock to strike, and for the new year to be official.

"So how is the play coming?" asked Tilly.

Erica smiled.

"It's mostly okay," she said. "Bobby and a cheerleader and I got all the sets finished, so that when the kids come back we can start doing full walkthroughs, with sets and props and all that. My real concern is that the kids will have forgotten their lines over Christmas, and that they won't grasp the idea of the right kind of delivery."

She went on to say that when the kids said their lines, it sounded like they were reading them, instead of speaking them.

"When they get in front of a real audience, I'm afraid they'll forget everything, because they're not thinking about what they're saying. If they have the least bit of stage fright, I'm sure it will all just vanish from their heads completely."

"Can't you get some people in there to watch rehearsals?" asked Jake. "That would give them an audience to practice in front of."

"I don't think that would work," said Erica. "It would have to be enough people to scare them ... you know, make them take notice?"

"Not if it was the right people," said Jake.

"Like who?"

"Like me and Will."

"What?" Erica goggled at him. Tilly leaned forward, interested.

"Most people are scared of men like me and Will in the first place," said Jake. "They don't know what to say. They forget common manners. If we were sitting there, say at the front of the stage, where they could see us, and we were watching them ... don't you think that would make them as nervous as a whole crowd?"

"That's insane," said Tilly, smiling benignly at her husband. He'd made other decisions in the past that were more outrageous than this one, such as allowing Bobby to impregnate her twice, the good old fashioned way, so she wasn't shocked. She just thought it was silly.

"No it's not," insisted Jake. "Us being there would throw them for a loop. At least you'd know whether they could concentrate or not."

"I don't know," said Erica, frowning. "That doesn't seem very fair."

"Is putting them in front of a crowd when they're not ready fair?" asked Jake.

"I wasn't talking about them," said Erica. "I don't think it's fair to you to put you in that situation. You have no idea what will happen, Jake."

"Of course I do," said Jake.

"He does," said Will, who had hit the wine a little harder than anyone else. "I do too."

"Okay," admitted Erica. "But what if they scream and run away?"

"It's not that bad," said Jake. "Mostly people just try to ignore us, once they've stared a bit."

"You know," mused Erica. "I was reading a book on drama, and one of the things it said was that actors should behave as if the audience isn't there. The hard part is getting them to do that, because they know the audience is there."

"Don't tell me you're actually thinking of letting them do this," said Tilly, blinking.

"Maybe he's got something," said Erica. She turned to her brother. "What about you?"

"I'd be scared shitless," he said, peering at her with owlish eyes. "I mean spitless," he said, looking at Tilly.

"Not with me there with you," said Jake. "We're brothers, you and me."

"I know," said Will, concentrating hard to speak clearly. "That doesn't mean they won't puke all over the place when they see me, though."

"I didn't puke," said Tilly. She flushed, as she realized she was actually supporting this really ridiculous idea. "I wanted to, but I didn't," she said, trying to turn it around.

"Tilly!" barked Jake.

"Okay, I lied. But this is crazy. You know it is. Neither of you needs to go parading around in public, having people stare at you. Jake, it took me years just to get you to go to a town celebration!"

"I was stupid," said Jake. "I've been stupid about a lot of things over the years. But about eight years ago, my little filly, I started getting smart again."

Tilly blushed, because she knew he was referring to him letting another man make a baby in her belly.

"And I think this is a good idea," he added.

"At least talk to Bobby about it first," Tilly pleaded.

"Bobby? Why would he need to talk to Bobby?" asked Erica.

Tilly blushed even more. "We respect his judgment on things," she said. "That's all."

"Ha-ppy new year!" said Will suddenly. He tossed off the rest of the wine in his glass.

They all turned to the TV, where confetti was falling and people were laughing and smiling in the cold air.

She thought she'd be tired when they got home. It was almost one in the morning. But the thought that they could sleep in, and an underlying excitement had Erica wide awake. Will had a comfortable buzz on and was humming to himself when she opened the door, with his wheelchair ready to take him inside.

"I wish we could sleep together," he said as he hopped to one foot, grabbing the arm of the chair expertly, despite the alcohol in his system.

As she pushed him up the ramp, it occurred to Erica that ... they could sleep together. Her bed was plenty big enough for two people. The idea of having someone else in the bed with her was foreign, but if it was Will ... well that didn't seem so far out.

"Do you want to sleep with me tonight?" she asked, once they were in the house. "I never thought about that before, but my bed is big enough."

He had a different look on his face when he lifted his head. There was something in his eyes that looked almost dangerous, somehow, as if he were angry.

"I've dreamed of sleeping with you almost since I can remember," he said softly.

It may be understood, with a little reflection, that because Erica had pushed sexual thoughts and urges away from her all those years, it was only natural for her to think of "sleep with you" in a slightly different way than her brother did. To Erica, "sleep" meant exactly that ... slumber ... unconscious repose ... shuteye. Of course to Will, it meant the same thing as it means to the majority of people, most likely including you, the reader.

What saved Erica from losing her virginity that night was an almost bizarre combination of circumstances.

Once they were in her bed together, naked and breathing hard, had Will been whole, he would have rolled over and simply impaled her. He was not whole, however, and while the alcohol had reduced his inhibitions to the point he was willing to fuck his sister, it had done nothing to restore his physical capabilities. When he tried to roll on top of Erica, he just couldn't make it work.

From Erica's perspective, she didn't quite understand what he was trying to do. Always before, he lay on his back, comfortable, while she stroked him. She had learned, by this time, how to bring him to completion without his help. In an ironic kind of way, she was proud of herself, in terms of her capability to sexually satisfy a man. She didn't think of it as debasing herself. She did this out of love. And so, when he obviously tried to roll on top of her, she perceived it as an attempt to embrace, while lying down. That was something she could understand.

So, she rolled to embrace him, from the top position. She only went three quarters of the way, because that was all that was needed. In that position, she could press her breasts against his chest, and reach the good side of his face for kisses, while still being able to reach his stiff prick to do what she had always done. Since learning to masturbate in the shower, Erica no longer felt the overpowering urge to masturbate while she took care of her brother. She could do that any time now.

The bizarre part of this otherwise tender scene, was that her body covered his in almost the identical pattern that Josh Turner's body had covered him, a few years earlier, as he lay mangled on a battlefield, waiting for napalm to turn his body to ash.

As his sister's naked ... hot ... body pressed against his ... Will Bradford had a flashback.

His scream of agony was both completely unexpected and terrifying to Erica, who suddenly found herself on the floor. Will's body had arched so violently that it had literally thrown her across the bed. She scrambled up, confused and flabbergasted, to see Will's good hand slapping at the left side of his ruined body as he screamed over and over again. His heartrending screams turned her blood to ice, but her brain recognized his actions and she somehow knew what was happening.

Screaming back at him didn't work. He was mindless as his brain overpowered reality. She did the only thing she could think of, which was to dash to the bathroom and wet a towel with cold water. She dashed back and pressed the cold, wet cloth against his left side, trying to spread it out and avoid being hit by his hand, which was still trying to beat out the imaginary flames.

That cold towel did the trick, and his mind jerked back to reality in an instant, mid gasp. His screams cut off as if his vocal chords had been severed, and no longer worked at all.

Then he sobbed.

It took her an hour to calm him down to the point that he fell into an exhausted sleep. She was afraid something else might happen, so she stayed there, eventually falling asleep herself.

The preservation of Erica's virginity continued, the next morning, because alcohol and terror had robbed Will's mind of the ability to recall all the events of the previous evening.

She woke him gently, worried that he might be frightened still. His eyes opened, clear and unconcerned.

"Hi," he said.

"How do you feel?" she asked, carefully, putting one hand on his chest.

It was then he realized he was in bed ... his sister's bed ... and that they were both naked, and that it was morning. His mind tried to supply information about what had happened the night before, but was only partially successful. He remembered wanting to fuck his sister, but that was it.

"What happened? Did we do it?" he asked, his voice almost dreamy.

"Do what?" asked Erica, confused.

"Did I put it in you?"

Understanding hit her like a medicine ball in the stomach. It was understanding of more than just his question. As she realized what he meant, other things made sense to her too, that had been troubling and frustrating feelings in the past. Erica had intentionally repressed the thought of having sex with any man, much less her brother. But she knew what it looked like, from that movie way back when, and from the descriptions of her friends.

Now, as the image of her, lying on the bed, legs apart, came into her mind, and the image of Will's penis hanging over her sex, was added, the tingles she felt all over her body made much more sense. Her body had felt those tingles ... the urges she was feeling now ... and she just hadn't understood what they meant.

Now she did.

"No!" she blurted. "We can't do that, Will!"

"I thought we did," he said, his voice still dreamy.

"You ... you ... wanted to?" She felt helpless. This man she loved and trusted ... he wanted to take her like that? The tingles intensified. They felt like bugs crawling on her body, that she couldn't brush off.

The fear in her voice broke through Will's dream-filled thoughts, and he looked at her. He realized she was rigid.

"I would never do anything to hurt you," he said, his eyes alert.

"But you want to ... to ... to have sex with me?" Her voice went even higher.

"I'm confused," he said. "What happened last night?"

That was something she could talk about, and in doing that, she calmed down. Eventually she was able to piece together what had gone on in his mind ... or at least part of it. The bottom line was that he had entertained the thought of pushing his penis into her vagina. But it was also clear to her that it had been a misty urge to him, rather than an intentional desire to extend what they already did.

"We can't do that, Will," she said, no longer afraid. "I love you, and I like doing what we do. I still think you deserve that ... but we can't have intercourse."

"I know," he said. "I'm sorry I thought about it. I won't do that anymore."

"You can't just stop thinking about something," she said. "You're going to think about it. You just have to do something to push those thoughts away."

Erica thought she was giving him good advice. She would help him, she said. She would help him by making sure that any time he was horny, she made his horniness go away. It all made sense to her.

What she didn't plan on were her own continuing thoughts.

Technically, Bobby was done with supervising set construction. That was made clear to Erica when he didn't show up at the auditorium on the first day of practice after the Christmas vacation. She had time to notice she was disappointed, but then pushed that away without thinking about it, because she had her hands very full with rehearsal.

After rehearsal, which went dismally, because the kids had forgotten their lines, she was in a funk when she got home.

"So what did Bobby say about Jake's idea?" asked her brother. After sobering up he had decided that he hoped Bobby would say it was a bad one.

"He wasn't there," she said. "The sets are all done, so I guess he decided he wasn't needed any more."

"Is he?" asked Will, curious that it sounded like she was mad at Bobby for not being there.

"No," sighed Erica. "I suppose not. What do you want for supper?"

"Anything will do," said Will. "Why don't you just call him?"

"Because I don't need Bobby Dalton to tell me what to do!" she barked. She calmed immediately. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't take it out on you."

"Take what out on me," asked Will.

"Oh, everything!" she moaned. "The kids forgot their lines, and I got the blocking all wrong when I planned it out. The sets look great, but that's about all there is to be happy about. Then Bobby wasn't there and ..." She stopped, looking confused.

"I think you're sweet on him," said Will, grinning.

"I am not, William Bradford!" she snapped.

"Okay, okay," he said, still grinning. "All I know is that when he was there, you usually came home only grumpy, instead of outright pissed off."

"I'm not grumpy to you!" Erica sounded wounded.

"I know," he said. "I was just teasing you ... kind of paying you back for how you tease me sometimes."

"I thought you liked it when I did that," she said, sounding even more hurt.

"I love it when you do that," said Will. "Do you feel like teasing me now?"

"No," she said, sounding like she was pouting.

"There you go," said Will, tossing up his right hand. "When you get to see Bobby you're only grumpy, but you tease me really good."

"If you want any loving tonight, you'd better decide to stop talking, mister!" she warned.

"Chili!" he said. "I'd love a bowl of chili tonight."

Then he turned around and dragged his chair to the living room, where he could watch TV.

Erica wondered how she could still be miffed at her little brother after she'd had two orgasms masturbating him the night before. She decided it was his ridiculous assertion that she had some kind of interest in Bobby Dalton.

For that reason, she decided not to talk to Bobby about Jake's idea. She had to do something, but she had a bad feeling about just bringing two severely handicapped men into the school and sitting them on the stage in front of rehearsal. If some kid did run screaming home to mamma, things could get ugly. It wouldn't be fair, but that wouldn't matter if it happened. Instead she went to her principal.

Julia Staffordshire was the principal of Granger High because the school board couldn't draw a man to the school for the salary they offered. She didn't much care about that. She got by, and she thought of herself as being an agent of change in the community.

For that reason she was quite tolerant of Erica Bradford, a firebrand women's libber, no doubt, and who was disliked by many of the other teachers. She was doing fine, though, and seemed to be holding up well, so Julia didn't worry too much about her.

Or hadn't. Now she wondered. The woman had come to her with the craziest idea Julia had ever heard of. What was even crazier was that she sold Julia on it, using logic and common sense, to justify something that purely defied common sense.

Now, as she sat in her office, Julia wondered if she hadn't just handed some folks in town the ammunition to blow her off the stump, so to speak. If this went badly, and word of it got out, she would take the heat ... not Erica.

Because Erica had to go home and get her brother, Julia had said she would get things organized. It was time to do that, so she left her office. As the last of the students trickled out of the building, Julia walked into the hallway, where she immediately saw a woman pushing a man in a wheelchair through the double doors at the front of the building. She detoured.

"You must be Jake and Tilly Johnson," she said, pasting a professional smile on her face. She tried not to look at Jake's body. "I'm Julia Staffordshire. I'm the head cheese here."

"Pleased to meet you," said Tilly. She didn't sound like she meant it. She looked slightly ill, in fact.

"I understand this was your idea," said Julia, having to look at Jake.

"It's worth a try," said Jake. "Got nothing to lose."

"I'd like to talk to the children before you go in," said Julia.

"You sound like a wise woman," said Jake. He smiled.

He had spunk, this one-armed man with the crooked leg. Julia could see that immediately. She felt a little better. He had to be strong to offer to do this. Now all she had to do was make sure the kids didn't completely blow it.

"I'll let you know when to come in," she said. "The stage entrance is down that way to the left."

"We both went to school here," said Tilly.

"Well then!" said Julia. "Welcome back to your alma mater. I hope this all works out."

The first thing she noticed when she walked into the auditorium was that rehearsal was already going on. There were some twenty students on the stage, standing in what looked like a quite lifelike town square with an ancient ambiance to it. Melody Watkins was loudly proclaiming herself to be someone named Meg. It sounded like she was arguing with someone. There was a man standing at the front of the stage, with his back to the orchestra pit.

Julia knew a little about that man. No one had officially told her that Bobby Dalton was taking part in the preparations for this production, but Julia made it her business to know what was going on in her school. Knowing that man was in the building after hours had made her a little nervous. She'd heard some startling rumors about him, but they were the kind of rumors that couldn't be verified. Some number of his sisters had been students in the four years she'd been at Granger High. One, named Suzie, had stood out as one of the best students, though she was a shy thing. She'd seen the brother, of course, at the 4th of July celebrations, and the ice cream socials. Julia was one of the women who sat apart from that crowd. She did that not because she looked down on the women who were ostracized, but because if she didn't, she'd be ostracized herself. She'd never felt very good about that, but that was politics. She climbed the steps to the stage and walked to stand beside him.

"Mister Dalton," she said quietly, nodding her head.

"Mrs. Staffordshire," he acknowledged, also in an almost whisper.

"I thought your considerable talents had been consumed," said Julia. "I'm surprised to see you here."

"Tilly Johnson called me and said Erica was going to go get Will and meet them here," said Bobby. "She asked me to come over. She's a little nervous about Jake's idea. I have to admit I'm a little nervous about it too." He glanced at her. "I'm also a little surprised you approved this."

"No more than me," said Julia. This was the first time she'd ever spoken to this man. She found him to be polite and a somewhat imposing presence up close. "Did you get them going?"

"Yes ma'am," he said. "They were milling around, so I thought a little practice ... before practice ... might keep them busy."

"And they listened to you?" Julia was surprised.

"I think they're terrified that I'll give Erica a bad report on them," said Bobby smiling.

"You mind if I talk to them?" asked the principal.

"They're your students," said Bobby.

"The Johnsons are out in the hallway, through that door," said Julia, pointing to a set of double doors at stage left. "Mrs. Johnson could probably use a friendly face."

Bobby walked off without a word. Everything on stage stopped, as the actors tried to figure out what was going on.

"Go on," she said, waving her hand.

After a few comments like, "Where are we?" and, "Whose line is it?" they got going again. About half of them were trying to read from scripts that it was obvious to Julia they weren't supposed to have. She could tell that by the way they tried to hide them.

She let it go on for ten more minutes and then called "Cut!" She wasn't sure that was the right word, but everything got quiet.

"EVERYBODY ON STAGE!" roared the principal, in a voice any drill sergeant would be proud of.

She turned around to another gaggle of kids who were sitting in the seats, but apparently weren't needed for this scene.

"You too," she barked. The kids popped up and started for the stage.

Julia Staffordshire was not known as a woman who minced words. Not by the student body anyway. If anyone wanted a role model for how a woman could do just as well as a man, Julia would have been a good one. Several male teachers had found that out the hard way.

"Here's the deal," she said to the quiet group.

Then she explained that this was Ms. Bradford's first production, and that, in the ten minutes that she had just heard, it was obvious the actors weren't taking things seriously. In fact, they were abysmal, but she didn't say that. She explained that she wanted Ms. Bradford to have a successful experience at this so that she would be willing to do this again sometime. She upbraided them for not knowing their lines, and for standing around like lumps of clay when they spoke.

"How many of you here want me to stay and watch the rest of this rehearsal?" she asked.

One hand went up in the back. She could hear the slap of another hand on that one, and a hushed, "Ow!"

"Okay, then, here's what we're going to do," she said. "I have some friends. They're going to watch you rehearse. Some of you may have seen one of them, but the other one you probably haven't. As soon as you see them you're going to go, 'Ewwwww.' Get over it. They're here for a reason, and I don't want you people making them feel bad. Any questions?"

"Who are they?" came a voice from the back.

"One is Jake Johnson, and the other is Ms. Bradford's brother. He was injured in the war and is disabled, like Mr. Johnson."

She heard a buzz of conversation. The word "cripple" came through, but she couldn't tell from where.

"Why are they going to be here?" asked Linda Zwickey.

"That doesn't matter. You are to ignore them. They're going to watch. They may have some ideas about how you're doing ... how you might be able to do better. I don't know about that. What I want you to know is that they are guests ... our guests ... and I expect you to treat them with respect. Is that understood?"

There was a chorus of, "Yes, ma'am" that didn't sound very sincere.

"I will not be embarrassed by your poor behavior!" Her voice rang loud, filling the auditorium. "Now, is that understood?" she asked, almost quietly.

The chorus was much more enthusiastic this time.

"Now, let's start this thing over again," said the principal. "You will run through the play while these men watch. You will ignore them completely. See if you can make me want to come see it when the show goes on."

<< Previous Chapter | Next Chapter >>