Heart Ball
by Uther Pendragon
anon584c@nyx.net

If you are under the age of 18, or otherwise forbidden by law to read electronically transmitted erotic material, please go do something else.

This material is Copyright, 2001, 2003, Uther Pendragon. All rights reserved. I specifically grant the right of downloading and keeping ONE electronic copy for your personal reading so long as this notice is included. Reposting requires previous permission.

All persons here depicted, except public figures depicted as public figures in the background, are figments of my imagination and any resemblance to persons living or dead is strictly coincidental.

Heart Ball
by Uther Pendragon
anon584c@nyx.net

Part 10
Continued from Part 9

Steve skipped the committee meeting. His attendance had been well above average, and tonight was the night for shopping.

He should buy Shannon something small, something she could smuggle into her house. Still, another thought had been tickling the back of his mind. He would look, at least, at the nighties.

The store was warm after the street, and the women's section felt still hotter. He stood looking at a rack full of nighties without any idea what they would look like on Shannon.

A lot of adults these days looked like kids to Gert. Still, workers didn't wear backpacks; this one was still in high school. She took pity on the kid. "Looking for something particular?" she asked.

"A nightie," Steve said. Suddenly, he felt twice as warm.

"For your wife?"

"My girl. My girlfriend. It's her birthday."

She didn't think he'd meant his daughter. It was none of her business, anyway. Still, this looked like a nice kid; and her conscience would hurt her if she sold him what would break up his romance. "Look, it's none of my business. Still.... Think of your girlfriend opening the present. Her friends are looking on, and she gets this from you. She'll blush redder than you're doing now. Take it from me, it won't make her happy. Wait until you're married, and then give her a negligee in private."

"It's not like that." Shannon wouldn't open it in public. She wouldn't have a chance to.

"Okay." She'd tried. "What size is she?"

"About this tall." When he kissed her forehead, the top of her head would come about to his nose. Well, he'd have to bend down. "Maybe this tall."

Gert had seen some of the oddest size-differences in exchanges for women's clothes. Hell! Her husband used to give her size eight clothes before he switched over to kitchen appliances. Well, negligees didn't need to be close-fitting. "What color?"

"White!" Steve was sure about that.

That surprised Gert. She moved over to another rack. "Now, this one is nice and warm."

"Warm isn't precisely what I was looking for." This was starting to look like a bad idea.

The boy was blushing even brighter. White and sexy? White and sexy and sized to fit anybody. "Now, this one is rather sheer." Intended for a bride's trousseau, actually. And it was priced accordingly.

Steve put his hand inside the nightie. He could see it clearly through one layer of cloth. This is what he had wanted. Picturing Shannon in this started him hardening. They were at the cash register before he even asked the price. It was more than he'd planned on. By now, however, he was picturing Shannon wearing it.

"Can you fold it into a smaller box?" he asked. "Something which would fit in my backpack?" If she couldn't, he'd go buy something else. It really cost too much.

"It would wrinkle."

"Wouldn't the wrinkles come out?"

The customer is always right. Gert folded the present which would embarrass her customer's girlfriend into a package which would fit into his backpack. It was a nice sale with a nice markup, but Gert had eighteen years in the store. One of the teen girls who worked the cash registers on the weekends could have handled this one just as well.

Steve had it gift wrapped. It cost a buck more, but he didn't trust his own skills to compete with the packages that Shannon had wrapped for him. Even so, he had much less for his cash- stash than he had hoped. But, then, he told himself, he wasn't taking Shannon to a dance tomorrow.

Walking home didn't take all that much longer than the bus trip, since he went straight. He left the backpack with its secret contents in his room, then he joined his parents for dinner.

Shannon had dropped the martyr pose, and Allison enjoyed the easing of their relationship. The only question which her daughter asked about meal prep was intelligent, and she listened to the answer. Shannon even had a story to share during dinner about school. The kids were up in arms over a bad call during a basketball game.

"And how is the actual school going?" Wayne ventured. "You know, classwork?" Allison, who would never have pushed her luck on the eighth day of Shannon's grounding, waited for the explosion. It didn't come.

"Ask me Monday. The big thing right now is English, and the test's Friday. I mean, I'm working; but I won't see any results till then."

Shannon cleared the table without a single grumble. She was putting the clean dishes away, dressed for bed, when the sports came on. "Mom, do you want me to go to the store with you Saturday?" she asked when Allison came into the kitchen for her snack.

"Why?" It would take Shannon out of the house, but it was the only chore they hadn't assigned to her. This Shannon would speed shopping; the Shannon of the last week was something she hadn't cared to display in public.

"Well, I might not have a party this year, but I still need some birthday cake to share with my friends at school. I'll bake it, which means a simple mix; nothing like what you've fixed the last couple of years. I figure that you wouldn't let me shop by myself, but I could go through the line right behind you. And I'd help get stuff or push the cart the rest of the time."

"Shannon!"

"Mom, it isn't any extra time. It's at school. I'd talk with them, anyway, or talk with Steve. You can't object to my spending less time with Steve."

"Shannon, you're grounded. You have no social life. Period. We aren't celebrating your birthday this year. You are not celebrating your birthday this year. Not at home, not at school."

"But that was a party. That was presents. This is something we've done for years. Most of these girls, I've already eaten their cake." Shannon's face held a genuinely pleading look.

Allison slowly shook her head.

Shannon broke out in tears and ran to her room. Allison finished putting the dishes away. This hadn't been a ploy to escape chores -- Shannon was truly broken up.

"What happened?" Wayne asked when she got back in the living room.

"We are punishing our daughter. I just punished her."

"You spanked her?"

"I told her that she couldn't share birthday cake with her clique at school."

"I told her that last Wednesday," Wayne said.

Still, Allison thought, Shannon had cried harder at this ruling than at anything they had done previously. Maybe they were getting through to her at last.

If teachers had the brains they were supposed to, Steve thought, or even a little common sense, they would schedule tests on Monday and let people study for them over the weekend. Still, he reviewed the play that night. Maybe re-reviewed. He felt he knew this material -- either that or he was fooling himself completely.

This would be the disk that Shannon had over the weekend, but homework hadn't left much time to write. He started a story of Shannon in her nightie, but that would spoil the surprise. He saved it and read the letter before beginning another story.

She didn't want special positions. He would remember that when he wrote the fantasy. But first, he should answer her letter. And, if she wanted to play numbers games, he could start the letter on that.

He finished up with the story, again in a separate file:

The soft buzz woke Shannon in the night. Why the alarm and not the radio? Oh yes, she hadn't set anything. She was surprised that the alarm had gone off.

Oh no! Mom was trying to poison her relationship with her oldest friends. Awake now, she got out to answer Steve's letter, or -- at least -- write him one.

Steve hadn't taken the gift-wrapped box out of his backpack. Obviously it couldn't take the crushing he was used to giving the pack. He carried the pack in his lap on the bus.

He waited for Shannon by her locker with the backpack open and in his hand.

"Oh Steve!" she said. How had he known that she needed his comfort?

"Watch out!" She looked like she were heading for his arms. That was great; that was where she belonged. But not in school.

She stopped herself short of him. He moved aside, and she opened her locker. "Mom hates me!"

This wasn't news. But it sounded like something new. "What has she done now?"

"She won't let me have a birthday cake to take to school Monday. We've shared cakes on the days after our birthdays. Always. Now I'm the one who can't do it."

"That sucks." And it did, but it wasn't what he would call a surprise. "Look," it was already too late for him to get to home room on time. "We'll talk at lunch. And happy birthday from me, at least." He handed her the box and left her there.

Shannon was able to get her attention back on Shakespeare's tragedy from her own long enough to take the test. The essay question was "'Romeo and Juliet' was meant to entertain, but great authors do more. What single message do you believe Shakespeare intended to communicate in this play?"

She was tempted to write "Families suck." But the play was really about Juliet's first love, her one love. Shannon had thought about this long enough that her problem was keeping the answer short.

Steve's answer to the essay question focused on the feuding.

At lunch, Shannon told her friends that she couldn't bring a cake on Monday. This time, she was quite willing to sit with Steve, hut all her talk was on the injustice of her mom's ruling and how this had ruined her whole time in high school. "Junior high, too. Our group has been together since grade school."

Steve was, as he had told her, on her side on anything -- much less her parents' punishment for time she had spent with him. Still, this was much more venting than she had spent on being denied a party where Steve and these same girls would have been present. Also, he had expected some reaction to his gift.

"Can you fit the box I gave you into your backpack?" he asked.

"I think so."

"And they aren't going to poke inside to find it."

"They haven't done that yet," Shannon said. "I know where to hide it in my room."

"And no peeking until Sunday."

"I won't." She wasn't all that tempted. She had resigned herself to having no presents this year. It was the 'no parties' which hurt.

"Do you think you did all right on the exam?" Steve asked.

"Okay. It sure didn't help that I spent the night crying over Mom's new cruelty. I was tempted to answer the essay question with some comment on how families mistreat their daughters. You?"

"I think it was all about feuding. After all, the end of the play focused on that; it didn't bring the lovers back to life. And the same goes for the problems. Romeo would have been banished if he hadn't fallen in love, or hadn't fallen in love with Juliet. They died because the Montagues were feuding with the Capulets....

"And because they fell in love, and Shakespeare can't have meant that they shouldn't have fallen in love."

"Oh Steve!" She had told him all about Juliet's pure love, her only love. He hadn't listened at all. Well, it was done now. "I meant how did you do on the test? Aside from the essay question."

"Pretty well, I think. And, if I did, you deserve all the credit."

Then it was time to trade disks and leave for their next classes.

Snow was already falling outside. The number of kids who actually attended committee meetings had dwindled, anyway. Steve was able to get a table all by himself. "Don't want company?" Ken asked when he came by.

"Want yours. What's this about Shannon's parents letting her out of the house on Saturday?"

"We left it up in the air. I'm not going to ask for another week. You still on with Hauksbee?"

"Sure," Steve answered. "I traded this Sunday for next Saturday, I couldn't get out this late if I wanted."

"If Shannon can't get off, would you come help in the gym? I won't cheat you; I'll try my damndest to get permission from her mother."

"Why, Ken! You think she won't come decorate the gym."

"I," said Ken, "think she'll be too busy decorating the Steve."

When Steve got home, his mom had beaten him by only a few minutes. "Dinner's in three quarters of an hour," she said. "Don't bother to shovel; it's still coming down. TV says we'll get better than a foot."

"TV guy doesn't shovel. From where I stand, we'll get worse than a foot." Actually, he was glad for the snow for once. "I'll bet that you'll want me to shovel the walk after dinner."

"You'll have a good, long, time. I can't start the brownies until dinner's done."

"And there might be another snow storm later this year." It was the second of February. They were due three or four serious storms before spring. "And you might want the walk shoveled tonight, and tomorrow morning, and for the next storm as well."

"What do you want? I've already offered brownies."

"And that's what I want. But not when I want them. I want the entire tray of brownies, cut -- cut small for that matter -- but not one piece removed. I want them baked Sunday night for me to take to school Monday morning. For that you get the walk shoveled for this storm and for the next one, too."

Rachel Anderson was hardly the chockaholic that her son was. Still, the cook was entitled to her share; and she had planned to save a few pieces for Roger. Steve wouldn't really get much more than half the tray, usually. Also, shoveling the walk was Steve's responsibility; brownies were a reward, not a negotiable salary. But, if Steve wanted to negotiate, two could play that game.

"Next three storms? This and the two after it."

Steve hadn't thought of that possibility, but Shannon wanted something to share with her buddies. "Done." And he went up to his room to read Shannon's letter.

Which was all about her birthday. This ruling had knocked Shannon for a loop.

He just hoped that the brownies would be accepted. He loved them, but Shannon's friends were persnickety.

After dinner, the snow kept falling. He shoveled the entire width of the walk, then a path through the little bit which had fallen since. He set his alarm an hour earlier than usual.

Then he sat down for his letter to Shannon.

For his story, since he didn't have the answers to any of those questions, he dealt with their second night. She wouldn't see the fantasy before she'd seen the birthday nightie.

Between the crises at home and the major exam in English, Shannon had been neglecting her other subjects. Friday night, after the dishes, she corrected that.

She didn't read Steve's note until she woke up in the middle of the night. This schedule had its problems. Athletic socks and fuzzy slippers or no, her legs got cold sitting at the computer when the thermostat was set for night.

Steve's header, what she thought of as his 'poem,' was cute. He couldn't help much, but he had tried. She briefly wondered what he had got her for her birthday. Her friends said they were on her side, but Steve was the only one who had smuggled her a gift. And she was perfectly willing to believe him about "nonillions."

Did she want to go to Steve's house? So many things could go wrong. It was better than parking the Jeep somewhere. Damn! She wanted Steve's kisses; she knew from experience she would want more when she got those; but she also wanted to be in control. But she couldn't take a babysitting job, and Steve sure couldn't come here.

Would Steve want more? He'd always been such a good boy, despite her complaints about pushing. He did take 'no' for an answer. And did she still want to say 'no'? She'd been a good girl, too; and it had got her grounded forever. If she'd snuck around instead of telling the clients, she'd be having a party tomorrow and taking a cake to school Monday.

Still, the white wedding had been her dream; it hadn't come from her mother the way the dream of Albion had.

Steve went on and on about kissing her down there. All the novels made that sound so exciting too. Well, at least that solved the problem of the white wedding. Sex was another step after that kiss. And she could still wear white. But the novels seemed to suggest that that step took seconds.

Still, the historical stories, at least, took only a few minutes between the first kiss on the mouth and the first sex. She knew that didn't apply to her case. She made a decision. If she had to give in, she would give in about the kiss. Although she didn't have to give in yet.

Still, it was cold. She would have to thank him for the birthday present, anyway; and she had two more days to write that letter. She took the history book back to bed. Curled up under the blankets, still wearing the socks if not the slippers, she finally got warm.

Steve shoveled the walk again before Saturday's breakfast. His mother drove him and the shovel to Hauksbee's. He had half the walk outside the drugstore shoveled when Hauksbee got there.

"Why Steve, thanks," he said.

"Do you want me to continue?" Steve could picture the old man letting him shovel the rest and then chewing him out for getting inside the store late.

The druggist wasn't sure that Steve had done him as much of a favor as he had intended. The law held him responsible for the state of a shoveled walk, but not for the state of an unshoveled one. On the other hand, the people in the town would like it better, and they were customers. Anyway, he was probably liable for the state of the walk now. And, of course, he was insured. "Please."

Steve finished shoveling but spent more time mopping the floor that morning than behind the cash register as customers tracked more snow in.

He left the shovel in his mother's car behind the dentist's office before walking home. He rewrote his story for Shannon, and then did his homework for the next week. When his mother got home, he shoveled the walk once again. They killed the evening watching TV.

When Shannon got up in the middle of the night, it was -- of course -- already her birthday. Since she only would get one birthday present this year, she should wait to open it until later. On the other hand, she was tired of being a good girl. She opened the box.

It was a negligee, a sexy negligee. Well, she could hardly expect Steve to buy her a sexless one. But should he be buying her nightwear at all? At least her parents wouldn't see it.

And it did make her feel sexy. It made her look sexy, too, when she modeled it for the mirror. The cloth was nearly transparent. She could clearly see the shape of her breasts. She could see the nipples stick out, too; it was cold in the room. After spinning once to see the negligee stand out far from her, she shivered and put the much warmer nightie back on before climbing into bed. Not only had the gift been sheer, but it had an opening down the front, closed by dozens of tiny buttons. She couldn't quite see why; it was large enough that she had donned it without even attempting to open them.

Then she could see why, and shivered again. The negligee was designed to be opened by a husband. A lover? No, she thought, a husband. Those buttons gave him access to all of his wife, but slow access -- teasing access.

The gift was much sexier than she had thought. She wondered whether Steve had seen all of that. Probably! Sexiness was one thing which Steve saw much more quickly than she did. Soon she crawled out of the warm bed to the cold computer. It was time to write Steve. First, she thanked him for his gift. Let him stew over whether she saw it as sexy as he did. Then she grinned. She hadn't felt like a good girl wearing it, and she didn't want to feel like a good girl ever again. She got out his last letter. Then she dug out his previous letter and story to answer. The story would make her feel like a bad girl fastest.

She wrote. What she liked about it, she couldn't quite express.

Anyway, it was better than being caught by Brosna. Where had he come up with that name?

No reason to admit that the word, nonillions, was new to her. And, if he had made it up -- the word wasn't in her dictionary, she'd checked that -- then she was just accepting a word he'd made up.

She still wasn't sure that she liked the idea of visiting his house, his room? Still, making out in the Jeep was a much worse choice. Where else could they go?

And he was still pushing on the kisses. But the novels kept making them seem nice. Nice? they made it sound delightful. And it wasn't -- despite the novels -- something a nice girl would do. Shannon wasn't a nice girl any more, and something which was both evil and felt delightful might be just what she needed. She would read his ideas; whether she would let him do them was another question. Anyway, he was talking about after marriage.

And, in the latest story, he didn't even mention them. Would they be like that as a couple? Would he still think that she was sexy after getting totally used to her?

She saved her stuff and hid the disk in her pack. Then she returned to the warmth of her bed. There, she didn't retell the story to herself. Instead she pictured -- again and again -- the negligee as it had looked in the mirror.

Shannon didn't set any alarm for the morning, but her parents were able to get her up for church anyway.

She was ready before her mom was, even if she had dragged her feet all morning. "Too bad you took so long," she whispered to her mom under the prelude -- but so several people could hear.

Mrs. Browning stopped her as she was going out after service. "Come stand by me for the coffee hour, twin," she asked. She and Shannon had the same birthday, although their birth years were seventy-two years apart. The church would celebrate all the February birthdays today, and Mrs. Browning's 90th would almost certainly get a special mention.

"I'm so sorry, Mrs. Browning," she said sweetly. "My parents aren't allowing me any birthday celebration this year." Then she hurried out.

She was cold by the time her parents found her by the car.

"Why didn't you come to coffee hour?" Dad asked. "We had to hurry out to look for you after the singing."

"I couldn't go to the singing," she said. "They would have sung to me, and you two won't allow me to celebrate my birthday."

"We didn't say anything about church," Dad said.

"My friends can't celebrate my birthday, but you'll make an exception for your friends?"

The drive home was remarkably quiet after that.

Steve managed to shovel the walk clean before breakfast. When he and his mother got home from church, there wasn't enough new snow to require another full shoveling. He did clean up the patches of blown snow while his mom fixed lunch.

"Well," she said when they had started in on that meal, "if it's not coming down any more, that means your father might get home tonight."

He went to his room after lunch. Before starting his homework, he began to rewrite his last letter to Shannon. The fantasy was all about taking that nightie off her on their second night of marriage.

Still, he worried more about the first night. Shannon was going to give him some help on the clothes, but he could use some help on the activities. He snuck into Mallory's room to get some of her bodice rippers. The books often fell open to the sexiest scenes. Somehow, that didn't surprise him.

The descriptions of the first times varied a good deal. But they seemed to have pain for the girl more often than not.

What if Shannon were sore, he suddenly thought, after their first time? The second wouldn't be as much fun as he was painting in the story he had written. What if she expected to be sore? She, after all, had had more sex ed than the heroines of Mallory's books. Maybe he should rewrite the story to ask her that question.

Still, it wasn't a topic he wanted to bring up. "This might hurt you, but I'll really enjoy it." That didn't sound quite like the tone he wanted to take right now. Inspired, he rewrote the story.

He would keep "It was the second night of their honeymoon. Steve waited in their bedroom as Shannon showered. When she came out in the sexy nightie, it took his breath away."

The details of their time in bed, he copied over to a file he could read any time. He still thought it was sexy, but he erased most of the fantasy. Then he changed "sexy" to "delicate" and "it" to "she."

He left it at that. Some of that reading was rubbing off. Would they have sex on their second night? He hoped so, but not if she was still in pain. What he needed to tell her, however, was that she was beautiful. He certainly should not mention the possibility of pain.

And, of course, Shannon was beautiful. He liked looking at her. He certainly liked touching her more, but he already knew that she preferred his mentioning the beauty.

Supper was a remarkably silent meal for Shannon and her parents. Shannon pictured the negligee again. That was one thing that they didn't know. "What are you thinking, dear?" her mom asked.

Shannon realized she had been smiling. "I was thinking how there are only seven months until September," She said. "After then, I'll never have to live in this house again." They didn't know about the negligee. They wanted to control her every action, but there were so many things they didn't know.

"We'll be sorry to see you go," her dad said, "but happy that you are growing up." Shannon couldn't believe her ears. He thought that they would be happy about her growing up. At least, he thought she would believe that they would. They treated her like a little child, and both of them clearly wanted her to stay that way forever.

Wayne thought that his statement was overly optimistic. He and Allison looked forward to Shannon's growing up. But she had been acting like a preschooler lately. Would going off to school suddenly provide her with maturity? Well, it was an opportunity, and an unavoidable one. What Shannon would make of it was another matter.

Steve's dad had called that he was on his way. Steve had the table all set, and his mom was waiting dinner when they heard the Cherokee in the driveway. Over dinner, they dealt with reports of what each had done in the past week.

Would the house be free for Shannon on Saturday? Steve couldn't ask it in quite those words; he didn't want his dad to feel unwanted, and he certainly didn't want to explain why he was unwanted. "How about next weekend?" he asked. "Do you think that you'll be able to get back then?

Roger didn't want to guarantee what he couldn't deliver. "Well, that depends on the weather and the state of the roads. Why?"

Steve had an answer ready for that question. "You know that we're decorating the gym for the big Valentine's dance. Ken is sure to need transport for people and material." Doing a favor for Ken would always get the approval of his parents. "I thought if you were going to be back I could borrow the Jeep." And if Dad were back, he would probably need to borrow the Jeep. "Well," Roger said, "I can't promise what the weather will be like. But I will promise that I'll make every effort to get back Friday night. I've spent more than enough time in motels this winter."

Oh great! Dad didn't have to make the effort for Steve's sake. But, the comment about motels gave him another idea. Steve wondered how much a motel would cost, and whether he could get Shannon to go to a motel with him. It sounded a lot worse than visiting his house, even than visiting his room. On the other hand, they would have privacy there. Now how could he convince Shannon that he wasn't asking her to go all the way?

Mostly, he worked on his homework after dinner. He did reopen the disk holding his letter, though.

Roger and Rachel were both aware that Steve could come out of his room at any time. Still, they had been apart a long time. Rachel sat beside Roger on the sofa in front of the TV set. Every once in a while she pushed his hand off her leg. "We'll hear him if he walks down the hall," he whispered. She went into the kitchen to make two batches of brownies.

She brought in one for Roger as soon as the pans were done. At least, juggling the hot brownie kept both of his hands busy. "Mmmm," he said when it was finally cool enough to swallow, "but this is going to bring a chaperone out of his room."

"Nope," she said. "I made two pans, one for him. And he wants that pan untouched for the morning." Soon, they took their pan into the bedroom with them.

Conscious of the thin walls, neither dared speak a word, much less reach for the wand.

Roger teased and teased. He sucked Rachel's nipples while stroking his nails over any skin which caught his fancy.

At the edge of an explosive orgasm, Rachel pulled a pillow over her face.

At that point, Roger abandoned her breasts. After putting a brownie between his lips, he drew his fingertips over her thighs lightly. When one bite had been savored, he withdrew a hand to push the brownie deeper in his mouth. Then he stroked her lower lips with his thumb.

Rachel could stand it no longer. "Roger, please!" she said.

"Oh! You want a brownie, too." He put another in his mouth and leaned his face over hers. When she tried to correct him, the brownie entered her mouth.

She shoved his shoulder hard. He tumbled over in the bed. Sweeping the covers off his groin, she straddled him. "Damn you," she mumbled around the brownie. Then she fitted herself to him.

"Oh! That's what I want." He filled her with his hardness.

One of his hands played across her nipples. The other one stroked her where he knew she needed it.

"Just there!" she said. She rubbed the most sensitive part of her against him. "Just ...." Then the fire took her away.

Roger could feel her convulse around him. He couldn't have prevented his own explosion from matching hers. He didn't try. He raised his hips off the sheet despite her weight. He pulsed. Then he collapsed. He heard the bed groan, and almost matched it with one of his own. Then she lay on him.

Some time afterwards, she moved off to lie beside him. She adjusted the sheet and blanket. Roger was still lying flat on his back, breathing like a steam locomotive. "You okay?" she asked.

He nodded weakly. She tucked herself against his side and began to drop off. Getting to sleep was so much easier when he was home. Still, she hoped Steve hadn't heard any of that.

"She's still fighting," Wayne said to Allison while he stripped. Shannon had been in her room for hours, now.

"You sound like you admire her."

"Well ... in a way. What she did was sneaky and childish. Some of her recent tactics are equally childish. 'If Shannon's friends can't celebrate her birthday, neither can her parents' friends.' On the other hand, she hasn't given up yet."

"And she gets that stubbornness from you."

"You're not exactly a string of cooked spaghetti yourself. And, really, we've raised her to stick to her own standards. What we really meant, of course, is that she should stick to our standards. Well, she didn't and isn't, but she seems to be sticking to her own. And she is about to go away next year."

"Where she won't have any influence from us. She really made that clear this evening."

"Where she will have no standards to reject but her fellow students'. If she remains as stubborn as she is now, she's safer in college than we might fear." He got into her bed beside her.

"You look at the bright side of everything. Do you want to end her punishment?"

"No. She still isn't giving us any chance to accept her remorse. Well, enough of her for one night."

"You only say that because it's Sunday night."

"I only say that because I think we've exhausted the subject. Do you have anything else to add?"

Allison reached over to caress his face. "Not really."

He leaned to kiss her. Remembering that she was still in parent mode, he spent a long time on the facial kisses. Slowly, she relaxed. He licked her lips, and then slipped his tongue between them. He wasn't sure she was ready when she sat up, but that was one hell of a subject for a fight -- this was one hell of a time for one, for that matter. He helped her remove the nightgown.

He kissed her breasts and stroked between her thighs. When he reached her center, she wasn't quite dry. He had found her much wetter on other occasions, though. He stroked there, hoping to increase her excitement. Very soon, however, she reached over and grasped his erection. As it firmed in her hand, she tickled the shaft. He couldn't take more of this.

He rolled away to put on the condom. "Are you sure?" he asked.

"Unless you want to go back to your own bed. It's Sunday night, after all."

He climbed between her legs. The lubrication that had come with the condom was enough to get him in. Soon, he was stroking faster and faster. He could tell that she was nowhere near her climax when he reached his. He gasped and lay on her for a moment.

Then he rolled off towards the side. He thought of saying something, but then thought better of it.

After a few minutes, he said, "I do love you." He got out and went to his own bed. There he removed the condom and put it in the wastebasket.

Without saying a word, Allison rolled over in her bed so she was turned away from him.

A little later, they both went to sleep.

Shannon awoke easily to the radio. She was eighteen years and one day old. The next day, she wouldn't have any cake to share with her friends. She'd gotten a little revenge today, but that hardly compensated. She reread the history assignment, since she'd done all her homework. Now that her parents had destroyed her business and social life, there was much more time for school assignments.

Then she got out of bed to reread Steve's letter. Her answer seemed okay. What if she could visit him at home? How far would she let him go? She got back in to the warmth of her bed to ponder these questions. Steve had really been her only ally. And look where being a good girl and fending him off had gotten her.

On the other hand, it was her body. She had a right to say when. To be fair to Steve, on the other hand, he seemed to accept those rules. And he had gotten her the only birthday gift she had received this year. Well, he deserved a smooch for that; he didn't deserve a fuck for that. Fending him off had two sides to it. Her parents had come down on her like a ton of bricks despite the fending off, and Steve had supported her despite the fending off.

She wouldn't pretend that Steve was happy with the present situation -- the situation before she got caught. But he had seemed, still seemed, satisfied with it. For that matter, Steve was being entirely supportive when all their making out was cut off.

Were these really his fantasies? Did he really dream of being married to her? Well, he might dream of fucking her. To be a little more honest, he dreamed of making love to her. Still, he dreamed of making love to her after they were married. At least he told her only those dreams.

She turned off her lamp and stretched out under the covers. Where could they go? She certainly didn't want to work on the gym. It was still far from certain that she could even get out that morning. Where could they go to get a little privacy if she could?

His house, maybe. That would put him in control of things as he had never been on their dates. Her mom couldn't see how much control she had kept. Still, would his being in control be so bad? Maybe she wanted him in control. Maybe he would push farther, and she wouldn't have to give any permission at all. Still, on dates you could walk home. She had. If you had told your mom that you were decorating the gym, you couldn't walk home. And walking from his house was a lot of walking.

Still, she thought as she drifted off, either they went all the way or they didn't spend Saturday together.

Shannon turned in beside Steve on their way to English. "Brosna?" she asked. "Where did you get the name Brosna?"

"In the atlas," he said. Or was it in the gazetteer? He could never tell those two books apart, and the one in his house was bound with the other. Anyway, that was old news. "Would your friends consider brownies instead of birthday cake?"

"Huh?"

They turned in the classroom as he was thinking of another way to ask the question. He put his pack on his desk and unzipped the top. "Here," he said. He handed her the tray of brownies.

The bell rang before they could say anything else. They both looked guiltily towards Mrs. Foster, but she didn't direct any attention towards them.

When she passed back the tests, however, neither Steve's nor Shannon's was among them. "Steve," Mrs. Foster asked, "did you study the play with Shannon?"

"Not for the test," he answered. Mrs. Foster hadn't said that they shouldn't.

"But before?"

"Yes ma'm. You didn't say we weren't allowed." Really, Shannon had helped him a lot more than he had helped Shannon, but he couldn't tell who was in the wrong on that one.

"And what was the theme of the play? What did you write about for your essay question?"

"The feud. The Montagues and the Capulets feuded, and it was a tragedy because of that."

"Shannon," Mrs. Foster continued, "what did you say was the theme of the play?"

"Juliet's love. She had never been in love before; she had never even thought that she was in love. Then she fell for Romeo, and everything was different. Her whole world changed."

"All right!" Mrs. Foster said. "I keep despairing about what is going to happen to my students when you get into college courses. You ask about studying together, and I dodge the question. Well, Steve and Shannon studied together, but each of them thought for himself about the play. That's all I wanted to see on the essay question, whether you had thought about the play. Those two had. They both got excellent grades on the test. Each of them made mistakes on the essay question, but their marks for content were perfect."

"Anyway ...." She handed them their papers before going over every question.

Shannon sat down with her friends for lunch. "Who would like a little dessert?" she asked.

The brownies were a big hit. After all, nobody, least of all Shannon, expected that she would be able to provide anything.

Steve was sitting with his friends when the girls passed by. "Steve," Diane said, "if you ever set up to give boyfriend lessons, Jeff will take them. Won't you, Jeff?"

"What did I do?" asked Jeff.

"Who gives a ...?" asked another boy at the table. "The question is 'what did Steve do?'" Shannon gave the tray -- now sadly depleted -- back to Steve. He took one of the remaining pieces. If he'd shared the tray among that many boys, he thought, there wouldn't have been a crumb left.

"What Steve did," Shannon said, "was think about making things better for me."

Steve explained the situation a little more thoroughly.

Shannon got a library pass from study hall later. She looked up "Brosna" in an atlas. The map was a map of Ireland, and Brosna was a river. She was confused at first until she saw that it ran into the Shannon River. "Cute," she thought. "Not real smart, but cute."

She had a whole period in the library, and nothing to do except homework. She finally looked over the fiction section. She checked out one book which looked like it would be hot.

"I looked up 'Brosna' in the atlas," she told Steve after school let out. "Cute."

"Well, I couldn't choose a real name without consulting you, now could I?"

Then the Jeep honked for him, and he had to leave.

Steve had a little shoveling to do when he got home from work. Then he read Shannon's letter.

She liked his gift, and his story. She was puzzled by the girl's name, but he had known that already.

He got through his homework, and then started on another letter. This long pause between asking the questions and getting the answers could be a drag. Still, the story was more important.

He took them through the sex to a mutual orgasm.

House? Would they be able to afford a house? Maybe it would be a stuffy apartment. He decided to keep it a house. These were fantasies, after all.

Shannon thought that Steve's story was hotter than the book. Still, she had weeks to read the book and not much else she could do.

She didn't even try to reply to his letter until she had the house to herself.

He thought her beautiful. Well, he wrote about her being beautiful. Anyway, it was a nice fantasy. And he was a nice guy.

That didn't mean that she should go to a motel with him.

A motel was worse than his house. In his house, she could stick to the living room or the kitchen. A motel room was a bedroom. In his house, you had to worry about his parents coming home or somebody knocking at the door. A motel room was a locked bedroom. She could just imagine making out on some rented bed. Real danger. On the other hand, she could imagine making out on a rented bed. She could remember how nice he had made her feel.

The present was pretty. It was also sexy and expensive. Mom had been wrong; Steve wasn't limited by what she had bought him. That's what came of listening to Mom. Still she couldn't believe herself. For the brownies, much less the present, she owed Steve a smacking kiss. She didn't owe Steve her body. Yet she was thinking about meeting him in his house for hours with nobody else around; she was thinking about going to a motel room with him.

On the other hand, she'd been a good girl for years and years; she'd been Steve's girlfriend for one of those years. When push came to shove, being a good girl hadn't done her any good; being Steve's girlfriend had paid off. So she'd go to the motel where good girls would never go. Because that was the only place where she could be his girlfriend in the privacy they needed. (Assuming, of course, that his father would be home; if it was available, Steve's house looked better and better).

Not that she was going to tell Steve that she wasn't going to wear white on her wedding day. Still, she would go to the motel room with him. They would kiss and make out on the rented bed. If he didn't push, that would be that. If he did push, she'd decide then. Steve wasn't pushy, wasn't demanding. Still he had been pushy in the past, had been pushy about the kisses just recently.

And, of course, saying she would set the limits when he had her all excited was a mistake. Not really a mistake, she decided. It meant that her feelings mattered. Good girls didn't act like that, but Shannon was finished being a good girl.

And, since she was finished being a good girl, and there was so little opportunity to be bad in the middle of the night in the middle of the winter, she went back to bed and imagined the motel room. Since she didn't know what it would look like, she imagined Steve in this bed. She stroked herself as Steve would stroke her, as she wanted Steve to stroke her. It had jumped so in Mrs. Green's bathroom. Would it jump inside her?

And on that question, she came. Some time afterwards, she turned off the lamp and turned over on her side. This time, waking up in the middle of the night had been worthwhile.

Continued in Part 11
Heart Ball
Uther Pendragon
anon584c@nyx.net
2001/01/18
2003/02/09

This is one of a series of pages holding the novel Heart Ball.

The next page in the series is:
Part 11

The first page in the series is:
Part 1

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