The Bet - Chapter 33 (Wednesday – week 5 Part 2 of 8)

The Bet
by Karen Singer

Chapter 33 (Wednesday – week 5 Part 2 of 8)

“Hi Sissy,” Robin’s voice called as she walked past the entrance to his cubicle. He turned to return her greeting because she had paused briefly at his cubicle, but by the time he turned around, she was moving away again. He turned back to watch his computer booting up.
“I’m back,” Robin said to his back a minute later.
Chad turned around, surprised to see her so soon again. “Morning,” he finally got to return.
“Pants today,” she noticed right away. He nodded happily. “And new ones,” she noted. He nodded again. “Well…”
Chad was confused. “Well what?”
“Well, stand up so I can see. That’s what!”
“Oh.” He felt like he was being inspected all over again. But as he got up out of his chair so Robin could see what he was wearing better, it struck him that her little “critiques” of his outfits every morning had also become the “usual.” Typical.
Robin’s face went from happy to frustrated… or was it angry. She rolled her eyes. “Humph!” A moment later, she stomped off to her own cubicle.
“What?” he called after her. But the entrance to his cubicle was empty. He glanced down at what he could see of his outfit. It all looked okay to him – as far as he could tell.
Earlier this morning, Mel hadn’t said that anything was wrong. Nothing! So what was eating Robin? He walked out of his cubicle and went into hers. Her back was to him as she sat, slumped over, watching her monitor as her computer booted up. “What’s wrong?” he asked. “I thought this looked fine.”
She didn’t turn toward him at all. She just waved a hand in the air. “Oh, it is fine. Perfectly fine! You look great!”
Chad was confused even more. “So what’s wrong then?”
“Nothing! There’s nothing wrong with you at all!” She half turned toward him. “With the way you look, anyway.” She turned away again and typed her password into the machine.
“So what did I do to piss you off?”
“You? You didn’t… Ugh! Just leave me alone!”
Shaking his head, Chad backed out and went back to his own desk. “What had gotten into her? She had seemed so happy one second then the next, she was upset. Women! He’d never understand them – even though he was dressing like one all the time now. He logged into his own computer and pulled up the things he was working on. Women!
“Sissy?” Robins voice called over the cubicle wall.
“Yes?”
“I’m sorry. Okay?”
That surprised him. “Sure. No problem.” He still didn’t understand what was going on.
“Look, it’s just that…” He heard her mutter a soft curse word. A moment later she was walking into his cubicle. He turned to look at her. She seemed a bit upset. “Look,” she said again. “I’m a woman, and you’re not. You’re only pretending to be… no offense!”
“None taken,” Chad replied, wondering where she was going with this.
“Well, you’ve only been dressing like a woman for a short while now but…” she stopped, trying to find the right words.
“But?” he prompted.
“But… Damn it! Did you have to wear a top like that?”
His top? He briefly looked down at it. It seemed okay to him. “What’s wrong with it?”
“What’s wrong?” She threw her arm up in the air, totally exasperated. “What’s wrong?” she repeated. “Shit! Look at you. You’re not a woman, and I am!”
“So?”
“So your shape looks a whole lot better in that top than mine ever does – in anything!”
His shape?
“I mean… Look at you! All nice and slender and well, curvy in all the right directions. While I’m just… dumpy!
“You’re not…”
“Oh shut up!”
Chad shut his mouth. He had been married before. He had been around women enough to know when to just let them rant.
“It’s not fair! I don’t eat that much. And I diet… whenever I can. A lot actually. I used to look like you, in fact, better! But since I got married… And then after the baby… And then you come along and suddenly change your whole… “outlook” on life. And within a month you go from looking like a guy to much more like a woman. And you’ve lost weight. A lot of weight! Do you know how hard that is for me to do?”
Chad knew when not to answer. He just let her rave on.
“Very hard! But you make it look so easy! And the results! Okay, I know a lot of what you’ve got there is fake, but still, it’s not fair that you should look better in a blouse like that than I do! Damn it!” She pointed her finger at him. “I’m going with you today to that gym, and this time, I’m going to sign up!”
Chad immediately realized the implications of that. “No!” But she was already stomping out. He got up and followed her. She was sitting at her desk with her head in her hands. “Robin, you don’t want to go to that gym.”
“I need it. Obviously, I need it,” she said into her hands.
“No you don’t. You look great!”
“Get lost!” she said, none too kindly, still not looking at him.
“But…”
“Just get out of here!”
Chad backed away and went back to his own desk. His shape? Would she really sign up to go to the gym? That gym? The very thought of it worried him tremendously. If she did… and even if she didn’t go at lunch time with him… then undoubtedly, she would still hear about what he had done there on Monday within a very short time. Everybody there was still talking about him. As Cassie had said, he was “all the buzz.”
He stopped his thinking short. And what if she went there today… at the same time he went? A sick feeling ran though him. The receptionist! The damn receptionist. She had tried yanking his chain a little bit yesterday. If Robin was there and she tried it… He stared at his computer, but he was unable to work for worry about what Robin might do.

Gloria unlocked her office building and went inside. She went directly into her office where she set her purse on her desk and sat wearily down in her chair. Her mind was on Mel though. Actually, Mel and Chad. She had no doubt that Mel would call her again to set up another lunch date and try to persuade her yet again to hypnotize Chad and help her to win their crazy bet. But that was the one thing she would never do.
Yes, she did still want to hypnotize him again, but only to get answers. How badly had she screwed up by setting those instructions in his mind in the first place? It had all seemed like such fun. She had honestly believed that he really did want everything she had done to him. And that was her problem! Almost everything had worked – brilliantly. Better than she ever hoped they would. So somewhere in there, he had to really want what she had done to him. So she felt totally good with everything she had done.
But then she had found out how hard he was fighting the most important part of it all – for Mel anyway. His incontinence! The suggestions seemed to have stuck, but only for a short while. That was common for hypnosis suggestions. If you didn’t maintain them then they eventually wore off. But there were other things… he had reasons why he was fighting it so hard. Darn good reasons too, as she saw it. Although what was really important was that they were good reasons to Chad. They were strong enough reasons that they allowed him to quickly break the hypnotic conditioning.
So he did want what she had done to him… but now he didn’t want it. Which left her confused and feeling guilty. If he didn’t really want it, it wasn’t ethical. Of course since they had done it all without his knowledge, it wasn’t ethical anyway… but she could look past that on the pretense that he really had wanted it in the first place. Wasn’t that the reason behind their bet anyway? That he did want it?
Ugh! She was going around in mental knots! How could she get Chad alone for a while to hypnotize him and really talk to him? There had to be a way!

Mel stared at the back wall of her office, not really seeing it. Her thoughts weren’t on work, they were on Gloria, and how could she get Gloria’s help with Chad again. She only knew a little bit about hypnotism, but she was very certain that it would be easy for Gloria to hypnotize him again and reconvince him that he really did want to be incontinent – and she knew for a fact that he did. Why was he fighting against it so hard now? Okay, so he had some reasons. But in the beginning, he had no reasons at all. The result was that she and Chad were firmly locked into a battle of wills. And time was growing shorter!
She wasn’t even sure if she had made any progress with him anymore. She had thought she had. But after hearing how long he was capable of holding back, she wasn’t sure of anything anymore. Gloria could get the answers out of him. Truthful answers. She could do so much to help, but she wouldn’t. There had to be a way!
And the first step in getting Gloria’s help again was to keep talking to her. Their lunch yesterday had been better, but strained. She had to keep talking, keep trying! And to do that, meant more lunches. Every day for the rest of this bet if that’s what it would take.
She picked up her phone and punched in Gloria’s number. “Hi Gloria. It’s me.”
“Hey Mel. How are you?”
“Fine. Lunch again?”
Gloria sighed. She had known Mel would ask. “You know I’m not going to change my mind.”
“I know. But we’ve still got to talk.”
Gloria paused for a moment, thinking about it. If only she could convince Mel to let her have him alone for a while! “Okay Mel. The usual?”
“Yeah, that’s fine. See you later?”
“Later.”

Chad was working, getting things accomplished. What he was doing at the moment was repetitive and simple, but necessary. The redundancy of the job was beginning to wear at him, but he was almost done with it. He was surprised though when his concentration was broken by Robin walking into his cubicle and leaning up against his desk. He turned in his seat to look at her. She didn’t exactly look happy, but at least she didn’t seem to be mad at him anymore. He just raised his eyebrow quizzically.
“Sorry,” she apologized sheepishly.
He shrugged. “For what?” and then he grinned, letting her know that everything was alright. He was pleased to see her smile.
“Ready to go to break?” she asked.
Chad remembered the doughnut from yesterday. He suddenly wanted to go very much, but he was almost done with what he was working on. “I just need a minute,” he said as he turned back to his keyboard.
Robin stayed where she was and watched him working. She noticed something as he worked, something she had noticed before. Something about his hands. “You know, ever since you got those long nails last week, you’ve been moving your hands much more like a woman.”
He turned his head and looked up at her, then went back to his task.
“Not that that’s a bad thing. I mean, I think it’s really good in fact… seeing as how you dress all the time now.” She watched him for a few more moments. “And now that your nails are shorter, but still pretty long, I think you move them even more femininely.”
Chad stopped what he was doing and stared at one of his hands. He stretched the fingers out then curled them up, then stretched them out again. He still thought his fingers looked much more feminine with these nails… and it still pleased him. “Thanks,” he said… “I think.” She laughed a bit. Chad quickly finished up and with a flourish, minimized the project on his desktop. He got out of his seat. “Do you think they’ll have anymore of those doughnuts?” he asked as they both headed out into the hall.
“I sure hope so,” she replied. “You know. Your outfit really does look nice today. I’m sorry I got all huffy earlier. I just couldn’t help it.”
“Thanks,” Chad replied. “And for the record, I don’t think you need to be worried about going to the gym. Not at all.” The last thing he wanted was for Robin to be going to the gym with him. She would find out way too much!
“No, I think I do need it. Desperately! It’s about time I got off my bottom and made more of an effort to lose some weight.”
“But the gym? That gym?” How could he convince her not to go?
“What’s wrong with that gym? It’s a ladies gym and it’s supposed to be a good one. Besides, you go there!”
Chad had no answer for her. The last thing he wanted was for Robin to go to the gym where he got changed every day. The worry was still foremost on his mind as he entered the break room. He spotted the doughnuts again right away, but this time he followed Robin through the coffee line first before they each grabbed one of the pastries. Then together they made their way back toward the table the women usually favored. There were still some empty seats, but the table was filling up rapidly. Chad devoured his doughnut quickly. Yum! Solid food! Nothing like it! He began thinking about lunch. What would be good? Maybe a steak?
“Hey Sissy,” one of the women interrupted his thoughts of food. He looked up as he took a tiny sip from his coffee. “Love your top today. It really shows off your necklace nicely.”
“Thanks,” Chad replied. “I thought the same thing when I put it on this morning.”
“That reminds me,” another one interrupted. “Why do you always wear the same old necklace every day? You’ve always got new clothes on. In fact, I don’t think I’ve seen you wearing the same thing twice.”
“You haven’t!” Robin agreed. “He never wears the same thing twice, not that I’ve noticed either. And I get a good look at what he wears every day.”
“So how come you never wear any other jewelry?” the first woman asked.
“And how come no earrings yet?” Still another woman added. “I’ve been suggesting them to you for weeks now.”
Chad had no answers for them – that he could tell them. He always bought just what Mel ordered him to and that was it. In fact, that was enough! “Uh…” he searched for a decent answer. “Uh… I guess I’ve just spent so much time looking at clothes that I haven’t really gotten around to the jewelry yet.”
“But you are planning on getting some new jewelry then?” the first woman asked.
“Uh… Probably,” Chad replied.
“Good,” another woman said. “I can’t wait to see what you get. Your clothes are all really nice. I’m betting you have the same taste in jewelry.” There seemed to be a complete agreement among all the woman about that.
Chad inwardly gulped. Had he just agreed to shop for a bunch of new jewelry – nice stuff? Nice meaning probably expensive? He didn’t think he had promised to buy any, but maybe he did.
“So are you trying to be another one of those women who never wears the same thing twice?” someone else asked.
Chad was taken by surprise by the question. “No. Of course not.”
“Then how come you never wear the same thing again?”
He shrugged while he tried to think up a decent answer for that. “I guess just because I’ve been buying a lot of new clothes and I just wanted to try them out.”
“A lot of new clothes. That’s for sure!” someone added. “I wish I could afford it.”
“You and me both!” Robin replied. Again, there was a lot of agreement among them all. “You know,” Robin added, “if I join that gym, then maybe I’ll have an excuse to get a bunch of new cloths too.”
“You thinking about it?” someone asked her.
“Yes. Seriously! I mean, have you seen the way he looks? It’s starting to get embarrassing for us real women! At least as far as his shape goes.”
Chad didn’t know whether to be embarrassed or proud.