Parts 34-36

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He asked, “Red, are you starting to trust me?”
I said, “Yes, Sir, I am.”
And then he just casually said, “Good. I need you to make yourself available tomorrow and meet me and Christina at the coffee shop where we had dessert at 5.”

Wait… what?????

I was in shock. I did not know what to think, let alone say.
Noticing my shock, Gabriel said “Red, it will be OK, I promise.
You don’t HAVE to do it and if you decide not to do it, it will also be OK, I’ll understand, and nothing will change.
But I think it will help ease your discomfort with Christina.”
He grabbed my hand and guided me to the little wooden bench right outside my door.

My mind kept spinning with thoughts:
Christina?
Tomorrow?
Can I handle this? I mean, I would be meeting Ms. Falling Panties?

Gabriel watched me and softly said “Beautiful, look at me, I know that this feels like a lot and I can tell how overwhelming it is for you.
It is normal and it is OK. Remember, you do not have to do it.”

I nodded, but the feeling kept creeping in, the tightness on my chest.
“Listen to me,” he continued, “part of what you’re feeling right now – this anxiety – is because of the unknown. Christina is a mystery to you, and it is easy to let that feed your fear.”

What he said hit close to home. I hadn’t thought about it like that, but he was right – I didn’t know her or anything about her, all I knew was the picture I had made up in my head, and it was not pretty… or perhaps, too pretty.

Gabriel squeezed my hand slightly and pulled me closer to him. “The unknown is scary. Our minds just create all these worse-case scenarios, but that doesn't mean they are true”.

I gasped for a little bit of air and trying very hard to keep my eyes from completely watering up, said “So, you think meeting her will make it better?”

He replied calmly “I do. Meeting her means you’ll see that she is just a person – no better or worse than anyone else.
This is only about facing what scares you, instead of just letting it control you.
If you decide that you’re not ready to do it, it is OK, we will do it another time.”

I simply looked down at our hands, unsure of everything and said “but… what if I don’t like her? What if she doesn’t like me?”

He grabbed my chin, so I had to meet his gaze and said “Red, this is not about whether you two become best friends, in fact this is not about her or about me, at all.
It is about you taking control of yourself and your emotions… I will be there, right next to you every single step of the way.”

I understood he was not asking me to be OK with everything, he was just asking me to take a step.
There was a voice inside that said “Remember, you promised you would give this your best shot.”
Sure, NOW my inner voices want to take his side. Traitors.

I sat there silently for a moment, just thinking about everything that could go wrong, the thought of it was daunting beyond anything else we had done.
Sure it was OK while they were just scenarios playing in my head, but he was asking for me to play them in real life!
Imagine that—he wasn’t just content with me talking the talk; now he wants me to walk the walk. What type of grown-up bullshit was this?

He did say that I didn’t HAVE to do it now and if I don’t, nothing will change… but I guess eventually I’d have to.
And then again, I did promise him I would give it my best shot… “Fuck it!” I said in my mind, may as well get it out of the way now.

“Okay,” I whispered, nodding. “I’ll meet her. But you ask for a whole lot of faith, Mr. Gabriel.”

He responded quickly “I have yet to let you down, right?” I sighed, then smiled at his confidence and said “Right.”
Gabriel smiled and said “That’s my girl. We’ll face this whole thing together. One step at a time, and with me right beside you.

I also want to take a second and thank you for letting me guide you, you’ve done great so far, and I am very proud of you for pushing past your discomfort.”

I looked at him brattily and said “With all due respect, Sir: you and your damn cake… Sir.” Hey, I had earned at least a bit of insolence!
He laughed a little bit too loudly for my taste, considering the time. The last thing I needed was for mother to come out while I was sitting there with my boyfriend, who is older than her, convincing me to meet his OTHER girlfriend and me saying “yes, Sir”.

Oh shit! Mother! I had to go in the house! Shit! Shit! Shit!
How do I let him know that I have to go without saying “I am a big kid that’s afraid of her mom?” I swear, when this is all over, I am going to write a manual on how to be a girl… HA! I’d have to learn first.

I figured that if I got up, he would too and that would expedite things. It is funny how when he said it was time to go home, I did not want to and now I am trying to figure out how to shoo him away.

I got up and he got the hint, yes!
He walked me to my door and said “Red, I can’t thank you enough for being brave and going through all this. I know it is not easy.

Come here so I can get my kiss and let you go to bed.”

I whispered “yes, Sir” and got closer for the kiss. He kissed me, wrapped his arms around me and pulled me closer.
When we kissed, it was very exciting, I guess I was a little on edge about mom coming to the door or seeing me through the window, but there was something exciting about it. On top of that, as the kiss lingered, I felt his excitement growing against my belly and HOLY SHIT, it was sooooo arousing.

Being kissed and held by him, suddenly reminded how good this all is and why I am going through all this madness.
I felt him pull away and it was bittersweet, I didn’t want him to go, but I definitely needed to go in the house. As we finished kissing, he helped himself to a handful of my butt. His grip was gentle yet firm all while saying “mmm I can’t wait”, and he finished it off with a light tap. I was shocked and embarrassed, but I also felt… desired.
I would say it was a perfect way to end the night.

Then he walked away, and I just stood there, admiring and thinking “if this man keeps this up, I am in big trouble”.
I took a deep breath and stepped into the house, bracing myself for whatever surprises might be waiting inside.

I remember walking in casually, but in my mind, I was playing SWAT team, screaming “living room, CLEAR!” and on to the next room, “kitchen, CLEAR!”, “hallway, CLEAR!” and so on.
Finally made it to my room unseen, mom must’ve been asleep. Time to get out of these clothes, remove my make up and throw my hair in a ponytail… we must rid ourselves of any evidence.

As I took off my clothes, I got a look at my dress and honestly by that time, it was not that bad… but if you inspect it closely, you definitely can tell.
I thought that I should spill something on it on purpose so when I take it to the dry cleaner, it is not that obvious and embarrassing… genius plan, wasn’t it?

Time to inspect my panties… well, it is safe to say that these were going to have to be washed, twice… OR saved as a memento!
I crack myself up, I should be a comedian or something.

Did you notice that I was doing everything to keep myself from thinking about what was coming the day after? I noticed.

By the time I made it to bed, I was spent but was spellbound again. When I thought about it, even the parts that were “bad” were good, and the parts that were good, were amazing!

Honestly, the whole “Ms. Sliding Panties” thing, really was not on my mind. I even tried to put myself into that space again, but there were no negative feelings other than some discomfort that I could deal with. I figured that if I slept on it and the feelings were back, then I would work through it, if not then I am in a much better place than I was yesterday.

Meeting her… now that’s an entirely different thing. I was nervous about it, but If I am honest, it is nowhere near as bad as it was the first time I went out with Gabriel. I remember thinking to myself “maybe I am growing up… NAH! He grabbed my booty, and I liked it!”
I was more concerned about Thursday and the “thing” with his friend. What was it? Did I need to dress up again? Because, my good sir, I am fresh out of dresses. I will ask tomorrow on our triple date… WTF? I guess this is one of those things I do now.

Having said all that, I could now reflect on dinner, dessert and the afterparty at the park.
The thought about having a “Gabriel use me” session did cross my mind, but I was so relaxed and I was spent.

I was surprised at how relaxed I was. Usually going to bed was a process of masturbating, playing on my phone for a while, masturbating and then tossing and turning for a long time, but this time I hit the pillow and I was gone. You would think that with Ms. Perfect Panties looming in my near future I would be a nervous wreck… but nope, peaceful sleep.

The next morning, I woke up feeling relaxed and refreshed, I had not slept that well in ages. Woke up before my alarm went off and that’s usually a good sign for me.

I was still spellbound; Obviously, I had time to get my “Gabriel use me” session, I mean last night I was done, but apparently I recharge overnight.
Honestly, I thought I was going to be feeling down about the whole thing with Christina, but I wasn’t, same old discomfort, but nothing to die over.

I got up, did my usual morning things and headed to the kitchen for some coffee.
Mom was sitting in the kitchen having breakfast and playing on her phone, the usual.
When I walked in the kitchen, she just looked at me, weird, but I was feeling too good to let it bother me, so I said, “Good morning mom”, grabbed myself some coffee and sat across from her. She kept giving me that weird look and eventually it got to me, so I said, “what mom?” and she said, “looks like someone had a good time last night.” I said, “what do you mean?” Her response caught me off guard, she said “Sooo, he has a beard huh.”
At that point I was, worried or shocked, I wasn’t sure, but I did not like it!
I thought she might’ve seen me through the window, or something; but then it hit me, what if she heard the whole conversation? Shit!
I thought to myself “ok, calm down, Red, calm down.” I said “how do you know? Are you spying on me?” She just started laughing and said, “beard burn, honey, beard burn!” I didn’t know what that was, so I asked her. She explained that when you make out with someone who has a beard for too long, the skin around your mouth gets irritated and red.
Well, I’ll be damned… Nothing gets by her! But hey, at least I was more relaxed knowing that she didn’t see or hear anything.
While feeling my face with my hand she kept talking, I jokingly said, “nothing gets by you, does it mom?” and she laughed. She even said that it was OK and that she had her share of bearded boyfriends when she was younger, and it was always annoying to deal with the irritation.

It was a good conversation; we had not had a moment like that in a long time. I think we had been so caught up in our daily lives and I suppose that me locking myself up in my room so much didn’t help. I had forgotten how animated she could get.
I was enjoying myself, so I started prying a bit, asking her how many boyfriends and how she dealt with the rash. She said that the best thing to do was to moisturize, and as far as the boyfriends she said, “you don’t need to worry about my boyfriends, little girl.” I felt cheeky and said, “not so little anymore mom” while pointing at my beard rash and we laughed.
She then said, “I keep forgetting you’re not little anymore, you’re a grown woman” and I said, “yes I am, all grown up, boobs and all” and we just continued laughing.

We stayed there just talking and having coffee. It occurred to me that my life these days revolved around hot drinks a lot.

I kept prying about her boyfriends and love life, and she eventually started talking more about it, but it wasn’t easy to get her to talk about these things.
Apparently, mom had a lot of boyfriends!
I was shocked, I did not think she had a life before me. The more comfortable we got, the more she talked, and her face lit up telling me about her youth, we kept laughing while drinking coffee.
She kept telling me about different guys she had dated and maybe after the third name, I got ballsy and asked “mom, were you a little floozie?” She got serious and said “watch your mouth, REDiance! I was just a curious girl; but I can see how to a casual observer, I might’ve seemed a little… available.” We both cracked up, loudly.
Then I said, “but you’ve always told me ‘men are only after one thing’” and she said “and they are! I just didn’t resist a lot” and our laughter got even louder.

When the laughter ended, she said “so honey, how are things with this guy of yours? Does he have a name?”
uh oh, now she is comfortable enough to start asking me questions. Doesn’t she know that I am great at asking personal questions, but not so great at answering them?

Anyway, I decided to continue the moment we were having and told her his name and that we were just getting to know one another and stuff like that. Hopefully that would put an end to her nosiness for now. When I said that, she said “That’s good honey and whatever is going on, seems to be good for you.
You’re not couped up in your room all the time and we have not had a conversation like this in ages, so whatever he is doing, tell him to keep doing it.

And tell him if he wants to make out with my daughter, have some decency and use the back seat like civilized people, not at my front door.”
Ho-ly shit, she saw us! How much did she see? Did she hear anything? SHIT!!!! I was embarrassed! I am sure I blushed and just stammered an “ok,” – and with air quotes, said – “curious girl” and we both cracked up again.
I decided that if I started asking questions about what she saw or heard, she would come back with questions of her own aaaand we’re not ready for that.

I knew that if I lingered any longer it could only lead to more questioning and I just was not ready to talk more about this, so it was time to make my smooth transition and get out of there.

Before I left, there was a thought that had been lingering in the back of my mind since I heard Gabriel say “I love you” to his guy friend. I wanted to say “I love you” to mom, but I did not know how. I felt it bottling up and trying to come out of my mouth, but I was nervous. I don’t think I have ever said that to her, in fact, I don’t think I had said it to anyone.
I figured that I would pull a “Gabriel” move and hug her while I said it to her. Hugging always seemed to make things easier to say when Gabriel did it to me, so I decided to just go in for a hug, fuck it!
I went around the table and hugged mom and said “I love you mom” and I just heard her voice break as she said “I love you too, baby”. We just stayed there, holding each other with tears in our eyes. I felt a release of “something” I don’t know what it was, but it felt really good.
Maybe Gabriel is on to something with this hugging and loving thing.

Eventually I said, “I have to get ready for school, mom. I love you”, gave her a kiss on her forehead and I walked to my room. As I was walking away, mom said “you tell Gabriel to keep doing what he is doing”.

When I got to my room, I had to sit down. What the fuck was all that?
I mean, I know I started it, and it felt incredibly good to connect with mom, but it was… strange.

So, I hopped in the shower still feeling GREAT, got dressed and headed to school, but not before stopping to tell my mom that I loved her as I walked out the door.

I kept going through the events of the morning in my head. Something had changed inside of me, I did not know what it was, but it had.
The thought of “Ms. Slippery Panties” was not even something that bothered me… well, maybe a little but not even in the vicinity of where it had in the past.

While I was in class, I kept thinking about how things had changed for me since I started seeing Gabriel. Mom was right, I was not in my room that much anymore. My computer had not been touched in a few days, I was not on my phone as much apart from a few games of words with friends, some reading, some videos and I slept like a baby the night before, without masturbating!
If I didn’t give credit to Gabriel’s influence, I’d be the biggest hypocrite in the world. He certainly was changing my life, and I believed it was for the better, I just could not deny that.

And then, there were the feelings that had been cooking up inside me towards him. Hold it there, buckaroo! Too real. We won’t be dealing with that for now.

I was not even concerned about Christina, honestly. I just wasn’t. Of course, there’s that little competitive side of me that wants no competition, but let’s be honest, I am the main girlfriend.
So, all things considered, I was feeling good. I was not apprehensive about meeting her or anything like that.
Having said that, I knew that actually meeting her was going to be different and probably difficult.

In the end, I was feeling better than I had ever felt and I guess that does earn Gabriel a little perk… like an extra girlfriend.
WOW! Now, there’s a sentence I never thought I’d say, and yet, here we are… Sigh… I guess this is one of the things Red does now.

After school, it was time to go get ready to meet Gabriel and Ms Perfect Panties.
Ok, so perhaps I was suppressing the nervousness, cause it hit me hard! It was nothing bad, I was just nervous, anxious and all sort of other things, but I was not hesitant. I also did not feel the punch in the gut I was accustomed to when it came to dealing with her.

Anyway, I went home, took another shower, got dressed and off I went.
I didn’t know what to wear, so I did my best with some jeans, a light blue sweater and semi-casual boots. The sweater accentuated “the girls” and they were THERE, ready to defend against any attacks… and perhaps welcome Gabriel!
It was not a dressy outfit, but nobody could say I didn’t look good!

I was supposed to be there at 5, so I planned to be there at 4:45, at the latest. Gabriel really did have a good system going; plan to be there early and you don’t have to worry about, or apologize for, being late.

It was 4:35 and I was parking my car, I had time to spare! Which is good, cause parallel parking has never been my strong suit.
I parked and started walking towards the café, and there he was again, early and looking at everything and nothing at the same time.

As I walked towards him, my nervousness kept increasing and my thoughts of meeting Ms. Slippery Thong made me tremble. How the hell did I get myself into this mess?
Was it too late to run back to my car and pretend I had car trouble? He wouldn’t buy it.
C’mon Red, you said you would give this your best shot!

When he saw me, he gave me that big smile I was getting so used to seeing. As he walked towards me, I won’t deny the fact that I wanted to run towards him. I just couldn’t wait any longer to be in his presence. I did not do it, but I did have the urge. I had seen the whole running thing in movies, but I always thought it was just done for dramatic effect, but the urge was THERE.

When we were finally close enough, I just sunk into him and there it was, that connection I had been craving since the last time I had it, I just nestled in it. I heard him say “Red, you can stay there as long as you want, but eventually I am going to want my kiss” and I just said “yes sir” and kissed him.
I was amazed of how one simple kiss from Gabriel could make every single solitary problem in my mind become a blur of nothingness and at that point all I knew was that stuck on his lips is where I belonged. That was home.
The nervousness I had been feeling all afternoon faded and I was ready to take on the world again… That was the effect he and his kisses had on me. I know it sounds corny, but I felt like my whole life I was incomplete, and I was finally where I needed to be.

The kiss broke and he looked in my eyes and said, “Thank you so much for being so brave and strong”. I just smiled and said “you and your cake, I swear” … We laughed and he pulled me in closer to him.
After a minute of that, I figured I would address the enormous elephant in the room by saying “I thought Christina was going to be with you today” and he responded, “she’ll be here soon”.
Damn it! I was hoping she had cancelled! So much for my hope that she would not show up, but hey she still could get hit by a bus or something.

Eventually, I said “should we get a table and wait inside?” and he said that it was OK, we’d just wait outside and enjoy the moment.
With each passing moment I felt the anxiety of meeting her grow, but Gabriel kept me busy talking and kissing me, and that was a good way to distract me from all the crazy things that were going through my mind.
Every single girl that walked by made my nervousness increase, and of course, that day it seemed like that specific street was a model runway because every girl that walked by was prettier than the last.
Blondes, brunets, redheads, every single variety of girl that exists walked by us that day. I remember thinking “wtf is this, a model reality show? This is ridiculous!”
Girls with gorgeous faces, perfect boobs and butts just walking by. Every time I would see a beautiful girl coming in our direction, I thought “that must be her, she is beautiful” but then I was relieved when they kept walking by.
And then I saw her, a beautiful girl with wavy brown hair and a beautiful face. She was wearing a short, fitted dress with high heels and she appeared to be walking in slow motion. I knew she was much better looking than me. Fuck! I should’ve bought a dress, at least I could pretend to be in her league… fuck!
As she got closer, I brazed myself, this was going to be an uncomfortable moment… Fuck! I just want to run to my room!
How was I supposed to greet her? There was a feeling of losing my breath, I just did not know what I was going to do.
Eventually, her slow ass made it to a few feet from Gabriel and me and I got small, I hated the feeling. Once she was within a few inches, she just kept walking past us… false alarm! I can breathe again.

Hmmm! That was interesting, I just assumed that was her and worked myself up to a froth. Maybe Gabriel was right, I created this whole thing in my head before anything happened.
I just got closer to Gabriel so I could get his smell and I decided to confide in him instead of making these ridiculous scenarios in my head; I said “Gabriel, I am really nervous… I don’t know what to do.”
Gabriel pulled me close, looked into my eyes and said “It is ok beautiful; I am here with you. There’s nothing to worry about.” Then he kissed me again… well, that seemed to work.

After that kiss, he pressed his forehead against mine to the point that our eyes were damn near touching one another and he said “Red, I see YOU. I am here with you and for you. We will work through this.”
The forehead touching thing was… intense? Calming? Intimate? I don’t know, but it just grounded me, for some reason. Even though he had been telling me that he was there with me, and for me, it did not REALLY sink in until that moment.

Then he kissed me again. His lips kissing mine silenced every crazy thought, each worry dissolving into nothing. It was like my entire world refocused, and right there, in his arms, everything felt manageable.

After the kiss, he said “Red, tell me about your day, how has it been?” and then I remembered the whole interaction with mom that morning.
It really had been one crazy day. My interaction with mom, school and now I am meeting my boyfriend’s girlfriend… Talk about an emotional roller coaster!

I told him that I had a thing with mom that morning that felt good but was curious about. He said “oh. What kind of thing?”
Now, normally this should be no big deal to answer, but considering that Gabriel did not know just how emotionally inept I was, it would be yet another vulnerable conversation. I guess he would have a clue of how inept I was emotionally, but he really did not have an accurate gauge of my ineptitude.

AH FUCK! Why did I open my mouth, this would be such a much better conversation at a different time, and also it would give me a chance to prepare.
It would be a great conversation to have somewhere else… like at a park, on a bench, where he can, you know… do finger naily things and whisper things in my ear… yeah, let’s make THAT happen. Sigh.

I decided to take the cowards way out, again. I said “Mom and I were talking this morning and she saw my beard burn, Thank you for that, Sir, and she told me how she had a few boyfriends who had beards.

Anyway, in not so many words, she said that he was a floozy when she was younger.”
As I finished telling him that, I cracked up and he chuckled about it.
Then I continued telling him that she had always given me the speech of “men are all the same, all they want is sex”, but did not follow her own advice.
He just calmly said “I understand, she is repeating what was said to her when she was younger. It’s understandable.
We humans tend to do that; it is like going on autopilot, we just repeat what has been told to us over and over.”
I asked what he meant, and he explained “Some of the things we tend to say a lot, are just repetition of what our parents told us when we were kids.
Unfortunately, it is not always the most positive things.
But it is not our parent’s fault, that’s what our grandparents told our parents, and what our great grandparents told our grandparents, and so on… we continue teaching the same things to our kids.

The worst thing is that it is not limited to the things we say, it is also things we do and how we conduct ourselves.
Some of these things are so deeply engrained in us to the point that we convince ourselves by saying ‘that’s how I am’ or ‘that’s how my family is’.

If you ever meet a person that when you ask them how they are, their response is invariably something along the lines ‘same shit, different day’; it is a safe bet that if you meet their family, they will have a very similar response, or identical.
And it is not just the words, per se. They, as a family, have adopted hopelessness, resignation, cynicism or even frustration as part of who they are.

I have found that one of the first things we need to do to be happy is shed a lot of the things that have been engrained in us for generations.”

Hmm… Come to think of it, one of the first things that come to mind when it comes to guys is “they just want sex”, maybe Gabriel had a point.
I was so engrossed in the conversation that I had forgotten that we were standing on the street waiting for Christina… wait a damn minute, Mister! Did he do this on purpose? Cause it worked!
Should I call him out on it? I think I should. I said “Grabriel, this conversation did make me feel better and the distraction worked, very sneaky, but it worked.
Thank you, Sir.”
He responded, “you’re welcome beautiful, as I said, I am here with you and for you.” And then we both smiled and kissed.

In the middle of the kiss, I heard a sweet, feminine voice say, “Hey lovely couple, am I interrupting something?”

 to be continued...