Tuesday, August 24, 2010

The Bet - Chapter 28 (Friday – week 4 Part 2 of 10)

The Bet
by Karen Singer

Chapter 28 (Friday – week 4 Part 2 of 10)

Mel walked out to Andrea’s desk with a folder full of paperwork in her hands. She dropped the folder on Andrea’s desk as if she wasn’t happy with it, turned on her heel, and headed back to her office. Andrea watched her for a moment, then picked up the folder and looked through it. There wasn’t anything wrong there as far as she could see. “Mel?” she called, stopping her employer before she could get back into her office. “What’s wrong with it?”
Mel just shook her head. “Nothing,” She replied before heading straight back into her office.
Andrea was puzzled. Mel had been acting strangely all morning… as if something major was upsetting her. And now this! There were no clients in the office just then and none were expected for a little while. She got up and headed for Mel’s office. For once, she didn’t knock like she always did, she just barged in instead. Mel looked up at her from behind her desk, but her expression was almost blank. “Okay,” Andrea began, “you’ve been moping around here all morning like the world’s come to end! Out with it! What’s wrong?”
Mel rolled her eyes, but otherwise her expression changed little. “Not today, Andrea.”
“Bullshit!” With purposeful strides, Andrea walked all the way into her office and sat in one of the chairs in front of her desk. “You’ve been behaving terribly all morning! It’s got to stop! Now tell me what it is!”
Mel looked at her friend. Had she really been behaving that badly? “Have I been that bad today? Does it show that much?”
“You’re so out of it, you shouldn’t even be here!”
Mel took a big breath and let out just as big a sigh. Yeah, Andrea was probably right. She hadn’t been behaving properly at all. Not very professional for a lawyer. “Sorry,” she apologized contritely.
“So what gives?”
“Ugh!” Mel wanted to jump out of her chair and pace around the room, but she forced herself to remain calm. “Have you ever thought you were about to touch your dreams, only to have someone suddenly rip them completely away from you?”
“Huh? Over and over again! Let me guess, it’s got to be a man. Right?”
Mel was about to say yes, but then stopped herself. “Sort of.”
“So start at the top and tell me all about it, while we still have time.”
Mel stared at her friend. She knew Andrea was right. She had to get it all off her chest. She told her about the trip to Gloria’s last night and about how she found out that Chad had been fooling her.
“Wait a minute!” Andrea said at the end. “Are you telling me you’re giving up? You… the great Mel… giving up?”
Mel blushed a bit. “I… I… I hadn’t really thought about it,” she stammered. “Maybe.”
Andrea shook her head. “I never thought I’d hear you say that. You’re the one who always fights tooth and nail for every little thing – even when you shouldn’t be. You never give up!”
“I don’t know that I am giving up! Like I said, I haven’t really thought about it!”
“Yeah… Well as I see it, this bet was supposed to last for two months. Right? What’s it been, a month now?”
“Not quite.”
“So you’re not quite half-way through, and already you’re considering giving in?”
“I said I don’t know! I haven’t really thought about it! And I’m certainly not going to quit half way through something. You know me better than that!”
“So you’re not giving up then?” Andrea asked with a smile on her face. She could literally see her boss coming back to life.
“Not on your life!” Mel proclaimed. “I don’t lose! Especially not to some… some… some powder-puff of a man! If I could go so far as to even call him that!”
Andrea almost laughed. Yeah, her boss’s fighting spirit was back again. There would definitely be no more bad attitude around the office from her today. “So what are you going to do about it? It sounds like he’s got some pretty good reasons for fighting back.”
“Yeah, that’s the problem, he does. Self-respect. Who would have ever thought that someone like him would be worried about such a thing?”
“So what are you going to do?”
“I don’t know yet. I still have to figure it out.”
“But at the same time, from what you just told me, it sounds like you’ve made a lot of headway with him already.”
“Yeah, but not enough. I got so wrapped up in my own dreams and desires, that I completely forgot about the terms of the bet itself. It’s fine to keep him all dressed up and be my little frilly sissy maid toy, but that won’t win the bet for me. He, on the other hand, has obviously not lost track of what’s important. I have to make him completely incontinent by the end of next month, or I lose! And I don’t like to lose!”
“But you’ve already made some headway. You said a few minutes ago that all the suppositories you give him have robbed him of that control.”
Mel shook her head. “It’s not enough. Besides, how do I know he can’t still control himself after I stop the suppositories?”
“So like I asked before, what are you going to do?”
Mel shook her head. “I just don’t know. I do have a plan for the suppositories. And from everything I can see, that part at least is working. And I do still have another month to go with it. It’s the other side of him, the front side that has me troubled. How do I fix him so he can’t control his peeing at all?”
“I don’t know. I have no answer for you. Besides, this is your fight. I’m just here to keep the office running and type up your paperwork.”
Mel smiled at her. “You do a lot more than that! Thanks for keeping me straight. I’m sorry I was such a bitch earlier.”
Andrea smiled as she got to her feet. “That’s what I’m here for.”
Mel stared at the back of her office door after Andrea had closed it behind her. Andrea had been right. There was still a month to go, a bit more actually. There was still time, just not as much of it. Frustrated, she picked up a pencil off of her desk and threw it down again. She felt like she had wasted an entire month. How could she have been so blind? But obviously Sissy hadn’t been wasting his time. Twenty-eight minutes. He said he could hold his pee for twenty-eight minutes. Almost half an hour. Mel didn’t think she could hold hers that long – no, she knew she couldn’t. How did he do it?
One thing was for sure, the nice gloves had to come off! It was no more little-miss-nice-girl as far as he was concerned. She had to get tough! And with only a month left, she had to pull out all the stops and use every trick in the book! The only problem was, that there was no book. How the hell was she supposed to go about it? And with only a month left? Darn the man, anyway!
A thought occurred to her. She reached for her phone and dialed Gloria’s number. “Hi Gloria, it’s Mel,” she said as soon as her friend had picked up.”
“Mel! I’m so glad you called! I’ve been fretting over last night since it happened. I was so afraid you wouldn’t talk to me anymore.”
“No. Don’t worry about it. Listen. I can bring him in for a special session. I’ll work out some kind of excuse so he won’t expect anything’s going on. Then you can hypnotize him again and convince him that he doesn’t want those ideas of his after all.”
“Mel, I can’t! I’m not going to do that! I feel bad enough about what I’ve done to him already. And I’m really torn over whether what I did was right or not. I mean, on the one hand, what I did wouldn’t have worked at all if he didn’t really want it, so because of that I feel justified. But on the other hand, he’s obviously fighting so hard against it that he’s able to completely throw off some of the suggestions. Which means I was wrong and he doesn’t really want it.”
Mel listened to her friend’s arguments. She tried to understand. But she was a lawyer. Much of her training was in forcing her opponents to see things the way she wanted them to look. “Listen, Gloria. Obviously he’s very divided over this thing. It has to be really bothering him. Trying to choose between two different things that he wants can’t be easy on him. In fact, I’m sure I’ve seen signs that these things are bothering him.” A lie if she ever told one, but if it suits her purpose… “Why not help him out with his dilemma. A little ‘therapy’ from you could go a long way toward easing his mind and making him a lot happier. And… since we both know how much happier he would be if he really were incontinent, then… Besides, he did say that when this bet was over that he wanted to try making himself that way again.”
Gloria thought about Mel’s words for a moment. “That’s true,” she agreed – hesitantly.
“I can have him there right after work today. Sooner if you’ve got the time!”
But Gloria wasn’t ready to be pushed that far yet. “No Mel. Not today. I still need to think about this.”
Mel’s frustration returned. She hated stubborn people. “Ok, Gloria. How about lunch today? I’m buying.” She could always convince her over lunch.
Gloria was tempted, but she knew that Mel would only spend the entire meal trying to talk her into doing exactly what she didn’t want to do. And she really wasn’t ready to make that decision yet… with or without Mel. “Not today, Mel. I… I can’t do lunch today.”
Mel was disappointed. She was sure she could have convinced Gloria to help her over lunch. “Ok, Gloria. Maybe next week?”
“Yeah, next week for sure Mel… And Mel… I really am glad you called. I was so afraid I was going to lose you as my friend. You were so mad last night when you left!”
“Yeah, I was mad Gloria. But I’m over it now. Sorry about that. Next week then, Gloria.”
“Yeah, next week Mel.”
Mel put her phone down and sat back in her chair. Gloria wasn’t going to help… at least not yet. But the next time they had lunch together, she’d convince her to help again. She needed that help. There was only a month left!
Thank God Andrea had helped her get her head on straight. Speaking of Andrea… Mel picked up the phone on her desk and dialed a number she had memorized from frequent use over the years. “Hi, it’s Mel. I need something special, and I need it right away. And I’ll pick it up myself.”

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