The Erotic Mind-Control Story Archive

As it happened, we didn’t actually fuck when we got to Kristen’s house. Instead, we ended up playing gin in Kristen’s playroom.

Kristen’s playroom was actually an apartment that was over the garage at her parents’ house. It had a living room, kitchen, bathroom, and a bedroom and was probably big enough for a married couple to live in comfortably. Actually, the only part of the building that was being used by the Swifts was the actual garage, which housed two of Kristen’s father’s cars and Kristen’s Camaro, and Kristen’s playroom. There were other apartments unused in the building.

The walls and furniture of the playroom were beige and brown, and the motif followed with slight variations throughout the entire apartment. For example, the kitchen had more yellow accents, and the bathroom was brighter, like an ivory color.

Kristen’s playroom was a place where she could get away from it all. Before I came into Kristen’s life, she told me she mostly played board games and cards there with her older brother before he left for college. Alone in the playroom, she would play solitaire or curl up on one of the overstuffed chairs and read a book. Kristen also had a Pong game console for her television that she played with occasionally.

Since the two of us started going together, we found ourselves referring to the place as our own, as opposed to just being Kristen’s playroom. Each of us had long ago decided on our favorite chairs or pillows in the living room and the kitchen, and we even had our own sides of the bed when we would sleep together. I never for once actually considered this place as mine, actually, but Kristen took to calling it “our” playroom, and the idea stuck.

When we got into the playroom, we both saw a deck of cards on the cocktail table, and we instantly decided to play cards. From playing against Kristen, I was starting to learn more strategy in the card games we played. Due to the fact that card games still had an element of luck in them, I occasionally found myself winning, although pretty infrequently. Kristen was really an ace at every card game we’ve ever played.

We found out early on in our relationship that playing cards allowed us to talk, and we found out lots of things about each other during those games.

As we played gin, I asked Kristen about her parents. “Kris, can you tell me why your parents don’t seem to mind you dating me? After all, I’m younger than you, and they know that we’re sleeping together.”

Kristen started dealing a new hand and said, “Well, Mom is a bit older than Dad, so it’s not that strange to them.”

“Sherry said something about me only being interested in your money. Surely your folks might suspect the same thing.”

Kristen actually laughed. “Jim, with those tickets, you could probably get me to give you all the money I have and I’d probably be happy doing that for you, even without any tickets. You haven’t done anything like that.”

“But I let you pay when we go out,” I said.

“That’s only because I have money. Who pays isn’t really important.”

“But others...”

“Fuck the others,” Kristen said. “I have the money, so I pay. It’s simple as that. I don’t tell you how to run your jazz band rehearsals and you have never asked me to buy you jewelry or anything else that I can recall. You don’t have much money, and you should be saving up for college. You are lucky that you don’t have to work at Jack in the Box or at some pizza joint to earn spare cash.”

I wasn’t too convinced, but Kristen continued.

“Look, at the mall, when you got that bracelet for Merry, I didn’t insist on paying. You paid for it, and because you did so, it meant more as a gift to Merry. Right?”

“Well, of course!”

“It works the other way as well. Dinner isn’t a big fucking deal!”

“I was just worried that your parents might think I was after their money.”

That got a big laugh. “Their money? They have their will set up so that if anything happens to them, all their money goes to Will!”

“Will? Do you mean your brother?”

“Yeah. I don’t need their money. They know it.”

I looked at Kristen as if she had two heads.

Kristen looked confused for a few moments, and then said, softly. “Oh. I never told you.”

“Told me what?”

“Wait a second...” Kristen said, looking at the cards in her hand and picking up my last discard. “Gin!”

“Fuck! Stop changing the subject!”

I didn’t bother counting my points. I was way over the point total.

Kristen pushed the deck away and smiled. “Look, Jim. We’ve established that you aren’t after my parents’ money. Isn’t that correct?”

“Yeah.”

“How do you feel now that I’ve told you that I won’t be inheriting anything from my parents? Maybe the house—I think that Will and I will split that, but he’s not going to be moving back here. I get Mom’s jewelry. Most everything else goes to Will.”

“It doesn’t sound fair, but you don’t seem to want it. Is that what you’re saying?”

Kristen nodded. “Yes, honey. Does that upset you?”

“No. I guess not. I guess I better go to college and land a good job so I can support us.”

That elicited a smile from Kristen. She opened up the cocktail table and deposited the cards inside. “Ever play Uno?”

“Uno? Is that French?”

“The word is Spanish, silly! It’s basically Crazy Eights with a special deck.”

“I’m game.”

“With two people, it’s a quick game. It’s killer with four. I should think of it when Patty and the others come over. I have about eight decks. I even have special rules when we have lots of people.”

“How about the normal game?” I asked, leery about Kristen’s “special rules.”

Kristen explained the basic concept of the game to me. I caught on quickly, and we started playing. Since strategy didn’t help much with only two players in this game, I figured that for once, I might even have a small chance of beating Kristen at cards.

“Jim?” Kristen asked after I won a round.

“Yes?”

“You’re really willing to support me?”

“I’d sail to the moon for you, my Goddess!”

Kristen swooned. “You are pretty romantic. You should write stories.”

“I have enough trouble writing music arrangements. Why would you ask if I’d really support you? Of course I would.”

“I have expensive tastes. I’ve grown up with all this,” Kristen added.

“I’d have to be a pretty serious composer. How much does Leonard Bernstein make, anyway?”

Kristen giggled. “Jim Crittenhouse, ace composer.”

“Yup. West Chicago Story, starring Kristen Swift as the Goddess. And Jim Crittenhouse as Tony.”

“Most musicians don’t earn much. You know that.”

I nodded my head. “Is that why you’re suggesting that I write stories?”

With a shake of her head, Kristen disagreed. “No. You are very sweet and romantic. What would you do?”

“I’d love you with all my heart, my fair lady. We’d live on love and happiness.”

“No idea, huh?”

“Nope. We’re young. We have our whole lives in front of us.”

“What if I told you money wouldn’t matter?”

I sighed. “I’ve been trying to tell you that.”

“No. You were trying to say that we’d learn to live and love without it. I’m saying we wouldn’t have to live without it.”

“We’d borrow it from your brother?”

“No. In fact, if anything, he might borrow money from us.”

“I’m totally confused.”

“In three months, my inheritance is officially mine.”

“You’ve been talking about inheritance. You said you aren’t inheriting anything. I’m getting confused. Are you just confusing me to get my goat?”

“No,” Kristen explained, her face serious. “And I’m definitely not kidding, either. Will inherits most of my parents’ money.”

“Even if your parents die in three months, then, you don’t inherit anything other than the house and some jewelry, you said.”

“Yes.”

I was now confused. Didn’t somebody have to die for someone to get an inheritance? Kristen seemed to be intentionally confusing me. I really didn’t give a damn about her money, really.

I started to play another hand. If Kristen was going to explain herself, that she could do it. I started concentrating on my hand, which had a couple of Draw-Four cards in it. It looked like I was going to win another round.

“Jim, I turn eighteen in three months.”

“So?”

“I’ve already received my inheritance, but it’s in a trust fund.”

“But your parents are alive, and you’re not inheriting anything from them.”

“Yeah,” Kristen said seriously. She put her cards face down on the table. “You see, my grandfather on my father’s side was the one that made the family fortune. My father and he had a bit of a falling out years before I was born, and they didn’t speak to one another for years.”

“Sounds like Mom and my real dad,” I said.

“Well, my grandfather died right after I was born. He had a heart attack, I think, or was it a stroke? Anyway, in his will he had left his money to his wife, who had died a few years before he died, and any living blood relatives with the specific exception of my father. I was, and still am, the only living relative, so the money is now in a trust fund. I get a stipend from the interest of the balance, about two hundred thousand dollars a year, but my mother has it mostly reinvested back into the principal. American Express and my “allowance” come from that, and it’s nowhere near that amount. I get control of the fund when I’m eighteen, although there are some stipulations that prevent major withdrawals until I’m twenty-one, and there are some investments that won’t mature until I’m twenty-five.”

“You mean...”

“Yeah. The money is in a trust account, looked over by a bank selected by the executor of my grandfather’s estate. My dad had money from before my grandfather died. Up until recently, we only used my trust fund for collateral on the loan on our house, but Dad paid that off many years ago. In addition, I bought the apartment where Will lives in Cambridge and promised to pay for his first four years in college. My money’s just sitting in a bank earning lots of interest right now. As I said, the bank pays me an ‘allowance’ of sorts on an annual basis, but I have never really needed much of it. Since my parents already have plenty of money, my mother arranges for the American Express card and some ready cash for me and we redeposit what I don’t need. If I really needed money, I could actually get about sixteen thousand dollars a month. Of course, the interest rates may have changed, and the principal is now larger, but you get the picture.”

Something didn’t add up. “You said that you were the only relative, Kris,” I pointed out. “What about your brother Will?”

“Will’s not a blood relative,” Kristen explained. “My parents didn’t think that they could have children, so they adopted Will. Then, a year or so later, I was born.” Kristen shrugged. “I guess they were able to have children after all. As it stood, I was, and still am, the only living blood relative. I have an Aunt Honey, but she’s a friend of my parents, and not really a relative. I don’t even have any cousins. It’s just me.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“Will has been more than a brother to me. He was also my best and only friend for the longest time. I know I told you that he was my first... the first guy I had sex with. We actually did it more than a few times. Last time was a couple of months ago when I visited him in Boston.”

“Oh,” I said, not sure what to say. I had, of course, known about Kristen’s first time with her brother, although I had never asked (nor really wanted to know) about the gory details. Hearing Kristen describe her relationship with her brother, especially the part where it seemed to be ongoing, however, made me feel a bit uneasy for some reason. Why this was, though, I couldn’t put a finger on it.

“Shit,” Kristen said, looking at me.

“What?” I asked.

“I hadn’t told you about all this,” Kristen said, “mostly because you didn’t ask.”

“I told you, the money isn’t that important.”

“But you’re jealous. There is really more that you need to know about me. Yeah, I’m rich. And I’ll take care of Will and my family, if necessary, and still have enough money to live very comfortably just on the interest alone. Will is special—very special to me. Please don’t be jealous. You don’t need to be.”

Jealousy? Was that what I was feeling? I was stunned.

“I’m not jealous,” I protested.

Kristen said, “You haven’t met Will. Maybe I’ll arrange a trip for the two of us to see him in Boston. We have a nice apartment there. I promise you that you’ll like him.”

I didn’t know how to answer this, especially the “we have an apartment” part. I didn’t say anything.

Kristen tried to find the right words. “Will isn’t you, Jim. He was, and still is, a very good friend to me. He is also my brother. I’ve talked to him quite a bit about you. I once thought of him as a lover, but we always knew that we wouldn’t be able to live together as husband and wife, and we both understand that.”

Kristen smiled at me. “Anyway, Will has this mystical way about him. I’ve told him about you and he really likes you, and has told me that he thinks that you’re a ‘keeper.’”

“He called me a ‘keeper?’” I repeated, now smiling. “That’s how Mom described you when I first brought you over for dinner.”

Kristen giggled. “Wow. Talk about coincidences! Anyway, you remember the day you made me a junkie?”

I lowered my eyes. Yes, I remembered that. Kristen didn’t talk about it that often, thank goodness. “Yeah,” I said, dejected.

Kristen knew I still harbored a lot of guilt over that. “I called Will collect that day,” she continued, “but I never got through to him. He was out, I guess. You don’t know how strange that was to me, Jim. It’s as if he always answers my calls on the first ring, as if he is expecting me to call that very second. This was one of the first times in my life that I turned to him and he wasn’t there. I didn’t really know who you were, or how you made me do the things I did. To tell you the truth, even now I don’t know what to make of your damned tickets. Anyway, I was thinking about moving out to Boston to be with him and to get away from you, but the reality was that you had made me addicted to you. There was no way for me to leave. The cravings were horrible! I was stuck here with you. Luckily, things have worked out since, and I’m still here.” Kristen gave me one of her killer smiles. “See! Happy ending!”

I looked at Kristen. She was smiling at me, having forgiven me a while ago. Now, of course, we were lovers.

Kristen picked up her cards, and then played a perfect sequence of Reverse, Skip, Draw-Two cards, then played a Draw-Four, called “Red” and played a red nine. Her hand was empty, and I looked at my hand... the two Draw Fours were one hundred points right there, and I had six more cards from the draw pile on top of that.

“Fuck!” I said, looking at the cards in my hand with disgust. “Some fuckin’ happy ending! My hand looks like a basketball score!”

“Oh, you!” Kristen smiled.

I put my cards down. “So, the interest on your inheritance is sixteen hundred bucks a month?”

“Sixteen thousand dollars, actually, but it may be earning more interest than that, now. A financial manager actually runs the fund, and he has it invested in stocks, bonds, and a few other things. Occasionally I can request specific stocks and investments, sometimes because of suggestions my father makes, but mostly for sentimental value. For example, I have a thousand shares in Disney because I liked Mickey Mouse when I was younger. Or was it ten thousand? I forget.” Kristen smiled. “Anyway, there’s a CPA that does the income taxes and other things, and my mother and I cosign the papers once a year after the accountants tell me what they have done with my money. When the money is officially mine, I’ll set things up so that I have a bit more control of what happens with my money.”

The numbers were simply astronomical for me. “I’d rather just not have to worry about money.”

“Well, it’s not much to worry about. In three months, as I said, I’m entitled to it. The fund manager renegotiates his salary based on the performance of the fund over the past year. That, the annual briefing about my finances, and signing tax forms each year is about as much as we will have to worry about if we don’t want to worry about it.”

I had gotten used to Kristen’s way of thinking that marriage between us was just a matter of formality. I loved her; she loved me. Now we wouldn’t have to worry about money. What more could a guy ask for?

I had an answer to that question. I wanted to be the person that provided for Kristen if we got married. The fact that she had boatloads of money didn’t seem to faze her, but it worried me. How could I provide for her if she was already a millionaire?

Kristen looked at the time and said, “Time for dress-up. Come on, Ken!”

The name “Ken” came from a little game of “Barbie and Ken” the two of us had started playing with each other where we would dress each other up, usually with Kristen wearing risqué lingerie. Actually, I called her “Beautiful Krissie” because of her actual name, as well as the fact that I was madly infatuated with Kristen’s luxuriously soft and wonderful hair. I remember there was a doll named something like “Beautiful Chrissie” back in the sixties or early seventies with hair that got longer... it was a perfect match for my lovable Goddess.

This evening, Krissie was wearing a shocking pink bustier and pantie set that matched an identically colored mini-dress with slits on the sides that ran nearly high enough that it almost revealed the top of the leg of her panties.

For my part, Kristen had started stocking a closet with outfits that she picked out for me, as well as some briefs that looked almost like girls’ panties. As she was pulling the briefs on me, she gave me a pleasant suck that had me shooting into her mouth after about five minutes of her oral attention.

The outfit that I was wearing that night was black pants with a dark gray—almost black—dress up shirt that had a tiny collar. Kristen surveyed the effect of me in the outfit, looking at me from many angles and admiring how it looked on me.

She added a pair of pink granny glasses, which were what she called “window panes” (clear glass; not for corrective lenses), that she said completed the outfit.

I was a bit uncomfortable wearing the glasses, but had gotten used to them by the time we hit Emilio’s. Kristen had made reservations, and the two of us had a great lasagna dinner together.

Later that evening, Kristen and I slept together in “our” bed in the playroom. We made love, which wasn’t something we did very often.

The first time I ever made love was on my sixteenth birthday. Kristen drove me into the city and she lavished me with the sexiest and busiest birthday night that I ever had. Since that time, the two of us slept together every weekend, but didn’t actually have intercourse that often. Kristen was still a bit orally fixated on my penis, and I was very happy to return the favor, usually in a sixty-nine position with her on top.

Sometimes, I would wake up in the middle of the night with my body spooned against hers. I’d carefully wiggle my erect penis between her legs, and I’d start a slow, steady rhythm. Kristen would sigh contentedly, and when we were done, she would shift her body to lick my penis clean. Usually when we did this, neither one of us would achieve orgasm, but just delight in the sensations that we would be feeling and giving to one another.

This night, we made love face to face. The two of us were intent on smothering the other’s face with kisses. This was very intimate, me being face to face with my lovely Goddess.

“Yeah, Oogie. Do it!”

“Oogie?” I said in mock horror that Kristen would use that name during an intimate moment. “I’ll show you an Oogie!”

I lifted my hips so my dick actually came out of Kristen’s warm hole, and without warning, I plunged it forcefully back into her. “Oogie!” I said.

I did this a few times, forcing the word “Oogie” as I pummeled her, and then I heard her saying it with me.

“Oogie!”

“Oogie!”

“Oogie!”

I didn’t have any more willpower, and with one final “OOGIE!” I started blasting my seed within her.

The two of us lay there, still conjoined, my dick wilting within her.

“God, Jim!” Kristen said. “That was fantastic!”

“Want another ‘Oogie?’” I asked, smiling.

“Not now. I don’t think I’d... No. Let’s save those for special occasions.”

“Sure thing. But you’ll get one every time you call me that in bed.”

“Promise?”

I grinned. “I’m serious.”

I resumed kissing Kristen’s face, and then moved off her to start lavishing my attention on her breasts.

Kristen’s breasts were different from most breasts that I had seen. For one thing, she had no tan lines whatever. For another, her aureoles were very dark—so dark, in fact, that it was sometimes difficult to discern where her nipple was except by feel.

Of course, that was my favorite way of exploring Kristen’s breasts. Using my fingers to caress and my lips and tongue to suck, I continued teasing her breasts for a while until I noticed that her breathing was regular and steady.

I looked at her face, and Kristen was asleep.

I was amused, since this was the first time that the two of us had ever fucked when Kristen didn’t suck me off afterward. I wasn’t disappointed, but the strangeness of it intrigued me at the time. My eyes watched the hypnotic rhythm of Kristen’s breasts rising and falling. It didn’t take me long to also fall fast asleep. A few hours later, I felt Kristen’s warm lips encircle the shaft of my cock. Better late than never, I thought to myself, feeling myself grow within her mouth.

Kristen noticed my erection and stopped. “Jim?” she whispered.

“Yes, Goddess?”

“You know what I would really like?”

“What?”

“I’d like you to fuck another girl, and let me eat your sperm from her cunt.”

I didn’t answer. Kristen’s remark stunned me. She usually didn’t get this graphic with me, and I knew that such a situation would probably never happen with us. After all, Kristen had shown signs of jealousy, and she had a fragile ego. Kristen would never allow me to fuck another girl, especially if she were there in the same room.

Actually, that might not be true. Patty was our friend; maybe Kristen was close to Patty, but I also knew for sure that Patty and I had no desires for intercourse with each other. Patty was looking for her own Prince Charming, and even though I was close to Patty, I doubted that the two of us would ever go all the way together.

“My kinky Goddess,” I smiled, humoring Kristen.

“I guess I am kinky,” Kristen answered, and she resumed sucking on my penis. Her action was slow and steady; she could just suckle on my cock for hours, enjoying the taste without making me reach orgasm.

I must have fallen asleep, because I woke up and noticed Kristen was spooned against me. It was our favorite sleeping position. Kristen’s rhythmic breathing told me that she was asleep.

I closed my eyes, and considered how much of a lucky stiff I was to have such a lovely and beautiful person in love with me.

I felt my erection grow, and Kristen instinctively wiggled her ass against it in her sleep.

I sighed, enjoying the feel of Kristen. I was about to move my arm over her body so my hand rested on her delicate breast, and Kristen whispered. “You awake?”

“Yes,” I answered, moving my hand to its intended spot.

Kristen murmured happily as my fingers started to tease her nipple.

“I was serious before.”

“About what?”

“I’d like you to fuck another girl, and then I’ll eat your sperm from her cunt.”

The first time Kristen said that to me, she sounded wistful. This time, however, she sounded adamant. “Whatever,” I said, humoring her some more.

“I mean it. I want it before I turn eighteen. You have three months.”

“Whatever,” I said, hoping that Kristen would forget her delusion in the morning.

“I want you to fuck somebody else while I’m watching you take her, and afterward, I want to eat her out, tasting your sperm inside her.”

Something told me that Kristen wasn’t going to forget this the next morning.

The next morning, Kristen did remember. She repeated her request to me.

“Is this your fantasy?” I asked her.

Kristen looked thoughtful. “Well... a little.”

“Do you realize how unfair that would be if I were to actually take it seriously?”

Kristen looked incredulous. “Unfair?”

I had stayed up an hour or so that night figuring out what to say. I didn’t rehearse anything, but I knew the gist of what I needed to say. “Yes, it’s unfair. You want me to have sex—no, make love—with somebody that I don’t love! You don’t seem to consider my feelings about whether or not I’d want to sleep with somebody else, whether you were there or not. You know we waited for the perfect time to make love together; I always consider it special. You are suggesting that I cheapen it by screwing somebody I don’t care about, just so you can have this kinky fantasy. You also don’t seem to be considering the feelings of the other girl, as well.”

“You could care for her! You like Patty!”

“Patty is completely out of the question, Kris. We love each other... yes. However, that’s where it ends. It’s not a physical love. Patty wants a romantic love, and we don’t share that kind of love together. It wouldn’t be fair to Patty, and it could destroy whatever it is that we already have together. I won’t do it! Friends are too important to lose.”

Kristen looked at me confused.

“Listen, Kris. Patty was raped—RAPED!—by some ignorant asshole who fucked her and laughingly called her a good piece of ass. It has traumatized her for years. Do you really want me to treat her like a piece of ass myself? Where are your fucking feelings?”

“I didn’t know...”

“No, you didn’t,” I said, a bit softer. “And I might be violating Patty’s trust by telling you. I just want you to understand that it’s not just a simple thing of liking somebody and then hopping into the sack with that person. I’m not like that! She wants romance. She fucking deserves it. She’s one of the nicest people I know, and deserves to be treated like a princess.”

“I’m sorry.”

There was no way that I could continue to be mad at Kristen. “I know, and I’m sorry for dumping Patty’s problem on you.”

I kissed Kristen, and tasted salt.

“I’m sorry if I made you get mad...”

“Ssh,” I said to Kristen, soothingly.

After a few moments, I said, “Who else? Camille? She’ll go to bed with me. You know that she made offers to me in the past. She hasn’t done so recently, I think because Patty advised her to tone it down. Nevertheless, it wouldn’t really be special to her. For that reason, it wouldn’t be special to me. That would cheapen the entire act. And I’m not sure how Camille would react to having another girl lick her down there.”

“Camille does girls,” Kristen said, softly.

“How do you know?” I asked.

Kristen didn’t answer me.

“There’s one other person that would do it. Sherry. She’d probably drop her pants in a heartbeat. She’s in love with me, and has had some sort of puppy love for me since seventh grade. If I told her to let me fuck her and have you eat her out, she’d probably do it, even if she fucking hates you something fierce. Would that be fair to her? I can’t give her what she wants if what she really wants is me. She’ll resent it, and she’ll resent you even more for making her do it.”

“I hadn’t thought about her.”

“We could go into the city and find a prostitute. But then again, it wouldn’t be special, and it would cheapen the act for me.”

“No. I don’t want that.”

I had nothing more to add.

There was a few minutes of silence before Kristen asked me, “How do you do that?”

“You are mostly right about Camille. And you’re probably right about Sherry, too, although I don’t know her that well.”

I shrugged. “Anyway, it’s my turn to cook breakfast, my dear. How would you like your eggs?”

“The usual.”

“Two Cammy eggs coming up.”

This was a private joke between us, although I told Camille about it. ‘Cammy eggs’ meant ‘over easy,’ the way that Camille usually described herself. Camille loved having a style of eggs named after her.

Kristen didn’t laugh at my joke, but looked thoughtful as I prepared breakfast. She continued looking thoughtful while the two of us ate. I could see that she was considering my response to her request. I certainly hope I explained my feelings to her properly.

Unfortunately, I saw more frowns than smiles on Kristen’s face, and the smiles seemed to me to be a bit forced.

We met my family at the flea market. Kristen’s dark mood seemed to lighted up as enjoyed the novelty of the place, finding one-of-a-kind things. Once she got the hang of the place, Kristen found that she enjoyed talking with the many vendors, some of whom would remember her from her previous visit. Conversations would continue from the last time she visited.

One thing I noticed about Kristen was the way that she interacted with people. She always treated people with the utmost respect. Despite the fact that she was very well to do, she didn’t assume such affectation of being better than other people are.

I wondered how I had misjudged this wonderful creature all these years. I had originally thought that Kristen was a spoiled brat who looked down her nose at most of the people at school. It turned out that this wasn’t what Kristen was like at all. So how could I have so grievously erred in my original evaluation of her?

Part of the answer was that I had perceived Kristen to be the person that was responsible for turning Patrice against me back when she entered junior high. I recently found out, from both Patrice and Kristen, that this was definitely not the case. If there were one person to fault for this, that person would probably be Dale Hardy. Dale was a person that I admit that I didn’t really know, but I had already formed a nasty opinion of her.

I idly wondered if I was also misjudging Dale the way that I had once misjudged Kristen. All evidence seemed to point to the contrary, but I was now very leery of making uninformed judgments about other people.

It was amazing to see Kristen work the flea market. She wouldn’t purchase much, but she always talked to the vendors. Kristen always seemed to know what topics would interest another person. She would point to some odd doll and recall how she had a similar one when she was younger, and the woman behind the table would explain how she came about it.

I never managed to learn how to talk with other people as easily as Kristen seemed to be able to do. It was obvious from watching Kristen what her secret was: she genuinely cared.

About twenty minutes after we got to the flea market, we ran into my family. Merry noticed us first. She ran and gave Kristen a hug, and she headed for me next. She proudly showed Kristen her “Belly Buster” coupon that she received the night before, and showed me that she was wearing her “Shortcake” bracelet.

My parents weren’t too far behind my step-sister, and they both approached us and thanked Kristen for the meal at Vaughn’s. Kristen shrugged off the thanks, pointing out that it was Merry’s present, after all.

Kristen dragged Merry off to a table we had visited a few minutes before that had something that Kristen thought would appeal to Merry.

My step-father took the opportunity while I was away from Kristen to tell me that I was looking good. He noticed the outfit that I was wearing, which was from Kristen’s growing wardrobe of men’s fashions for me. “Looking sharp, Jim!”

I nodded, a bit embarrassed. “Kristen likes picking out things for me to wear,” I explained.

My step-father nodded.

I started feeling a bit ill at ease; it was as if my parents were starting to think of me as a kept man. Later on in life, I would learn meaning of the term “gigolo.” The concept was foreign to me at the time, although I knew a song that had that word in the title. To this day, I wonder what my parents thought of me at that point in my life.

Changing the subject, I asked, “See anything interesting here?”

“Not today, Jim,” my step-father answered, frowning. “There was this tackle box a few weeks ago that I should have gotten. It was a good price, but...” His voice died off. Apparently, the seller wasn’t there today.

“Well, it really isn’t fishing season anymore,” I pointed out. “Unless you want to go ice fishing in a month or so.”

This earned me a chuckle. “I’m not that hard core, Jim. You know that!”

My mother added, “Did the two of you see anything you liked? Christmas is just a couple of months away.”

“You want me to do Christmas shopping in September? Are you kidding?” I asked in mock protest. For my mother, July wasn’t too early to start Christmas shopping.

“Better to be prepared than to be out at the last minute,” my mother pointed out.

“Well, if I see any tackle boxes or ice fishing gear...”

“No ice fishing gear,” my step-father protested, laughing.

I suddenly remembered why Kristen had left me alone with my parents. “Oh, by the way, Kristen’s parents have invited you over next Saturday for dinner.”

“Dinner?” my mother asked. I could see gears turning in her head.

“Nothing formal, Mom,” I said. “No evening gowns or anything.”

My mother shot me a look, but then smiled. “I’ll trust you on that.”

“I’ll let the two of you discuss it. If you accept, just let me know. If not, I can explain to the Swifts that you have other plans...”

“Oh, no need to discuss it, Jim,” my mother said, looking at her husband, who nodded. “We’d be glad to come.”

Kristen was arriving back where we were with Merry in tow.

“Wow, Mom! They have these OLD dolls over there!” Merry squealed. “Like Pebbles and Bam-Bam, like the Flintstones? They are almost life sized!”

“Not so old,” Kristen protested. “I used to play with them when I was a little girl.”

“Really?” asked Merry.

“Actually, those were my dolls. I donated mine to a charity a few years ago, and one of them at the table had a tiny ‘W’ on the bottom of the foot where my brother had written his initial!”

“Kristen, dear,” my mother said. “Jim has told me that we’re invited for supper with your parents next Saturday.”

“Yes, Mrs. Cummings. Do you need directions to my house?”

I think Kristen asked that as a matter of formality. I think everybody in town knew where the Swift residence was.

“That won’t be necessary, my dear. What time should we arrive?”

“My parents have cocktails at five. And dinner will be served at six-thirty.”

“That’s nice. Please thank your parents and assure them that we’ll be there.”