In the Warm and Cozy Pt. 01

Snooky reaches over Irma and gently holds Janie's hand, "I didn't mean to embarrass you. You can be anything you want, as long as you're my friend." Snooky says, "Sorry..."

Janie hugs her and says, "It's fine. Like your Irma says we're all here for you." Then she kisses her on the cheek and then Irma kisses her other cheek.

Snooky blushes, then laughs: "Lesbians are soo affectionate."

Nellie borrows under the covers until she is laying across Janie so that she can look at her niece, "Are you okay, Snooky? We are just being nice to Janie."

Janie rests her arm across Nellie's back and smiles, "It was a little intense for the first day on the job, Snooky, but I love meeting everyone--even the wicked Irmy-the-Wormy--and especially you."

"Irmy-the-Wormy, huh!" Irma laughs and begins to seriously tickle Janie and Snooky until the whole bed erupts in giggles as a rolling mass of legs and arms and feet scramble to avoid Irma's vicious tickles.

Janie slides out of bed, just in time to avoid another grab for her underarm, and says, "Quit, before I wet the bed!"

"Your gonna wash the sheets, Rosie!" Nellie says, and kisses Irma's nose as she tells Snooky, "See what you started, girl!" Then Nellie is on her feet and streaking to the bathroom, "I'm next, Janie!"

Irma and Snooky stop moving and look at each other. Irma says, "You know your Mom and I love each other no matter what."

"I hope so," Snooky says. "What about Dad?"

"We love him, too."

"You do?"

"He's my best male friend."

"You won't take Mom from him?"

"God no, girl!" Irma laughs, "What are you thinking under those pretty curls? It's not possible for anyone to take your Dad from your Mom--no one loves Desdemona more than your Dad!"

Snooky, her eyes shiny with tears, hugs Irma. "Thank you, Irmy! I love you, too!"

Janie and Nellie have returned just in time to hear the last part of their conversation; they look at the two of them embracing. Nellie whispers to Janie, "Aren't they beautiful? We're so happy you're here."

"Cookies! Cookies!" Janie says, wiping a tear from her eye. "Let's go, Snook!"

She pulls Snooky's offered hand and helps her up. Another hug and then Janie scampers around the room to find her clothes. The girls watch her until she looks at them pointedly, "Doesn't a girl get a chance to dress!"

They turn away and busy themselves, Irma smirks, "Virgin..." to which Snooky smacks her yet again on the butt. "Ow!" Irma says, "Quit, don't be a baby bitch!"

"Baby what!" Snooky says and grabs a pillow to beat Irma with.

"Ready?" Janie says, "I hate to breakup this fight, but..." and takes another pillow to gang up on Irma.

"Bullies!" Nellie says, "Leave my love alone." And flings herself on top of Irma.

"True love is her shield!" Janie says, smiling.

The weeks pass, the cookies sell. Clients come to know the names of the bakers by their specials: Janie's Choice, Snookie's Favorites, Nellie's Delights, and Roscoe's Picks arranged on their favorite plates. The coffee business grows and the bakery's tables fill. The spell of expresso mingles with the sounds of customers noshing and talking and laughing. Many believe they discovered this little bakery that before seemed undistinguished, somehow out of the way. Now it is blooming under the deft hands of the women, their warmth growing outward, inveigling like Christmas music in comfortable platitudes of peace and goodwill. The customers like the easy recall of their names, their favorite coffees, and the cookies they like, reinforced by the platters of samples offered by those fabulous baker ballerinas in their white aprons and inviting smiles, smudges of flour dabbed artfully on their rosy cheeks. The girls charm their customers as the samples grow into orders to go, boxed brightly, tied in gay ribbons to match the season.

Upstairs in the cozy attic Janie is still a virgin, content to be warmed but not overheated. To often--but not too often!--she lays her tired happy body next to her sweet Nellie or her tart but tasty Irma, their snuggling forms a blanket of secret delight. Sometimes she is lucky and gets to be in the middle, where the surrounding warmth and murmured conversations whisk her away to dreamland. Other times, lying in her bed, not that many feet away from their big bed at the end of the room, she listens amazed at their gasps of pleasure.

'Making love again like wild women, how do they have the energy, Irmy helped out all day in the kitchen so I know she must be as beat as I am, but she is making my beautiful noisy Nellie so happy. God, I love them both!' thinks Janie. 'Irma hasn't touched me since that last time weeks ago when she was teasing me. (Oh the memory of her lips pressed against the wet center of my panty, dah! Quit!) They don't tease me intensely like they did at first. Maybe, like me, they're afraid of screwing up our friendship.'

Still, when the last gasp of panting orgasm becomes a delighted giggle or a soft moan, she often slips out of her bed and snuggles against the sweaty back of one the girls. They know this and take turns offering their backs and a little, but not too much space, for Janie to slip in beside them and press herself gratefully against them. Sometimes they encourage her to roll over into the valley between their still overheated bodies, where the lush smells of sex and sweat and orgasm mingle with their delighted giggles as they lightly tease her: 'Caught you! Does Irmy-the-Wormy's pussy smell good?' Then a big kiss... 'Taste it! ' Nellie once shockingly said. She thinks about this, delicious with anticipation but not yet ready to leave her warm bed, drowsy as she is with her own sexy dreams, 'Afterglow kisses are like the taste of love...I hope my sweetheart will enjoy them. I'm going to get her to stay overnight, but I need to think of what to do with Snooky. Surely her mother would be inhibited by...'

Chapter 4: The Love of Your Life, Among Many

Janie met Desdemona a few weeks after settling in with Nellie. On a rainy, gray Sunday when the bakery was closed and the apartment quiet, empty of her pretty tormentors, Janie is enjoying the solitude, absorbed in a book. Desdemona comes tiptoeing up the stairs, secretly hoping to catch Nellie and Irma inflagrante--the better to tease and, if she's lucky, join them. Desdemona peaks around the corner separating the stairs from the attic. In the light of the reading lamp, sits an innocent, angelic girl who in the stillness of her concentration is a study in beauty glimpsed: Cascading red hair frame an intent face inclined in light, a glowing girl, beautiful with delicate yet oddly forceful features of alabaster, a young sensual face sculpted with mystery, content and character. Desdemona almost gasps, later likening her reaction to the first time she saw Michelangelo's Pieta during a tour of the Vatican. Janie looks up to see a dark-haired voluptuous woman with parted lips and wonder widening her twinkling eyes.

"Hi, I'm Desdemona," her mouth dry, heart hammering, she searches for words, any words, "You must be Janie?"

"Oh, hi, you must be Snooky's mom! It's nice to finally meet you!" Janie says, putting her book aside and getting up to hug Desdemona.

"Oh! That's nice, a hug!" Desdemona says, awkwardly. She pats Janie's back like a baby being comforted, a stroke here, a pat there, continuing long past convention, unwilling to release her from the hug.

"Snooky is always talking about you and the fantastic cookies you're teaching her to make. I hope she isn't overwhelming you; she can be very enthusiastic."

Desdemona, still holding onto Janie, is really voicing a longstanding worry that her daughter will become a lesbian because of what she thinks is her own less than sterling influence. Now that she is presented with the evidence of Janie's beauty, she's also hoping that Janie will not be a temptation to Snooky like she is this very moment to herself.

"Oh! I'm sorry! I didn't mean to cling!" Desdemona says, astonished to find her arms still around Janie. (Janie watches the arms falling away and is surprised to feel regret; it was so comforting being patted and stroked like a child.)

Indeed, Janie impulsively reaches out and hugs Desdemona again, holding her close, wanting to take away her embarrassment. She whispers in her ear, "Snooky is a sweet girl who is lucky to have you for a Mom."

"You think?" Desdemona says, a tear welling up. Janie feels the dampness on her cheek, and squeezes Desdemona closer, "Yes! Yes!" She loves you like the dickens (I don't know what that means, exactly, but that's what she says). She worries whenever you and Roscoe fight or when you're sad because you miss Irma!"

"She told you about Irma?"

"Of course! And Irma told me about Irma who loves you like the dickens, too. Even your sweet sister-in-law, your ex-lover, loves you like the dickens."

Desdemona has settled into Janie's hug like a slow-dancer's embrace of a tipsy lover. She whispers, "Thank you."

Then Janie surprises herself and says, "I can see why!"

Janie, entranced by the moment they are sharing, takes Dedemona's hand and leads her to the couch, adding with more intensity than she expects is customary, "Let's have some wine to celebrate our meeting in Nellie's attic."

Her mind swirls, 'Is this lie at first sight?' as she warms the wine, adds cheese and crackers for an appealing little platter which she sets on the footstool in front of Desdemona. She returns to her seat by the lamp where Desdemona is sitting, self-consciously dabbing her eyes.

"Sometimes it's so hectic, I don't get a moment to think. Work, work and play, play--but I love it." Janie says, "Just like I love your daughter, who is my confidant and my best friend. We are all so impressed with her. Even when she's being moody like any teenage girl, she has the presence of mind to laugh at herself and to go along with our constant teasing."

"She loves you, too! It's always Janie this and Janie that." Desdemona sighs, deciding to be frank--something in Janie seems to call out for it: "I'm worried that she'll be a lesbian like me and that you'll be her first lover."

Janie giggles, "She would be my first lover, too!" Then she reaches out and holds Desdemona's hand, "Don't worry, we are really just best friends. Besides even though Nellie and Irmy try to seduce me, I'm still a lesbian virgin, as they like to say."

Desdemona blushes, "I'm sorry, sometimes I can't keep from saying exactly what I'm worried about."

"Snooky is the same way," Janie says, "I don't think you have much to worry about, her girl friend, Cassie, is a little curious and they have kissed--she told me she told you about Cassie--but I think boys are starting to hover, like bees to a beautiful flower."

"Another problem..." Desdemona says. "So you're not interested in women?" And sighs.

"Is that a sigh!" giggles Janie, "You want my body, too!" and tickles Desdemona who starts to giggle, too. They squirm and playfully fight, until Desdemona lays herself on Janie's lap, snuggles in, and looks up at her, grinning, "Yes! Yes! I saw you sitting here and I almost stopped breathing. What a slut I am, wanting my daughter's best friend!"

"You are a slut, but I love it! This is the magical horny couch. When I first met Irma, Nellie was playing with my fingers on this couch, moving in for more I think. Then in comes Irma who plops right down between us and teases us mercilessly. They both end up in my lap--like you are now. Even though nothing much happened, I just loved being here, like being welcomed home after being lost in the dark.--I like to think of my girlfriends (but not your Snooky) as love disguised as seduction. I fell asleep between them. The most sexy thing that happened other than seeing them naked down there (Irma has that sexy fountain design for her pubes!) is when Irma kissed the outside of my wet panty--wow!"

"I love it when she does that." Desdemona says wistfully. "So the girls have been nice and not too naughty?"

"Yep, Snooky sometimes sleeps with me, too. It's like a slumber party until we get bombarded with flying pillows by Nellie and Irma because they can't sleep because of our giggles." Then Janie strokes Desdemona's cheek, "You are such a good mother. So what if she's exposed to some differences...the love you and Roscoe shower on her is a joy nothing negative can dilute."

"Oh," Desdemona says, turning her head and pressing herself against Janie until she hears Janie's gurgling stomach and looks up, "Are you hungry, I hear you gurgling."

She starts to move, but Janie strokes her head, "Don't move, please, I like holding you."

"You do?"

"Yes, you are more tempting than my roomies. Sometimes I want them, too, but I don't want there to be jealousy so I don't give in. I'm also trying to set a good example for your daughter. I want her to know a little restraint is not too bad a thing for a young girl to have."

"Do you think she understands? I hope so. She's eighteen; old enough to make her own choice, I guess, but a late starter--she was sick and didn't start grade school on time, but now she's caught up and will soon graduate from high school. But I still I worry, she absolutely loves Irma and her Aunt Nellie."

"She does, but she has a mind of her own and they both respect her for it."

"I do, too." Desdemona sighs, burying her face comfortably into Janie's abdomen, hands sliding along her hips. "But a Mom--especially someone like me--worries."

"I'll tell you a secret, not something Snooky told me, but something Nellie and I overheard." Janie says, "Snooky was talking to Irma after a big tickle fight--kind of like you're doing to me, but without the sexiness." Janie says, and playfully pinches Desdemona's nipple--"I know what you're doing! Anyway, let me finish before you distract me."

Desdemona groans, "Sorry, I can't seem to keep my hands off you!"

"So Snooky asks Irma if Irma is going to take you away from her father. Irma reassures her that Roscoe loves you more than anything, that no one can take Roscoe from her Mom--no one loves her Mom more than her Dad!"

"That's why I love Irma--she understands us and she's made a place for Roscoe. As buddies they can tease each other and not feel the kind of jealousy I know would happen if another man were a part of our little neglected love triangle."

"Neglected?"

"I came tiptoeing up here hoping I could find Irma and Nellie making love. I wanted to join them."

"What about Roscoe? He looks very manly to me--wouldn't he object?"

"No. Roscoe and I have a good sex life. I like him all over me, I like him inside me, I like--"

"Enough, Jeez! He's my boss, you know!"

Desdemona giggles, "I could share..."

"Don't even think that. It's bad enough I'm snuggling with my sexy best friend's mother. This is a soap opera, but I do somehow really like being close to you, just keep your clothes on, OK? What would I say to Snooky if I--miss virgin lesbian--had to confess I slept with her mother?"

"Would you tell her?"

"I'd have to--best friend's don't keep secrets. I wonder what she'd say?"

"You could just play with me couldn't you--please!"

Janie looks down at Desdemona, her beautiful silky black hair rumpled against Janie's belly, the pale skin of her classically beautiful Italian face snuggled in, almost like she wanted to burrow between her legs. "We can play a little bit, but I want to be able to look Snooky in the eye without blushing."

"Play? How do innocent virgin lesbians, play?" Desdemona asks, looking up a Janie, smiling. "Do they tweak the nipples of their women visitors, like you just did? Do they?" Desdemona pauses expectantly and raises her hand until her fingers can caress the slope of Janie's breast.

"Oh," Janie moans, scooting up to better cradle Desdemona's head in her warm lap. "Oh! Oh! You are so naughty--I should tell your many lovers about your advances on their innocent room mate."

"Will you tell them about these fingers?" Desdemona says, her eyes intent, as she slides her forefinger over Janie's pronounced nipple. "Will you tell them about these fingers?" she repeats and moves her finger to caress Janie's lips.

"Should I?" says Janie, holding the hand with the finger that is pressed against her lips. "Should I?" she asks again, her mouth opening--a will of its own--her tongue licking Desdemona's finger, first along the length, then taking it inside--an erect tasty treat--between moist lips.

"Bad, bad, girl!" Desdemona intones, her other arm now pressed around Janie's bottom, fingers caressing warm flesh. Exasperatingly, she removes her fingers so that she can take Janie's right hand to move it. "Would you like to meet, Miss Pussy, Janie? She is so wet and so needy and so ready to be touched by her Janie."

"That's funny, I don't remember being introduced!" Janie says and shudders.

"Is Miss Virgin shy?" asks Desdemona.

"It's Miss Virgin Lesbian to you, please try to get my title right!"

"Yes, your majesty!" Desdemona giggles and takes Janie's hand ceremoniously to her lips, bestowing on her palm with the swirl of her tongue, a wet, lingering kiss.

"This is so complicated," Janie mumbles, as Desdemona sits up and places Janie's hand on her warm naval. "We should stop..."

"You think?" Desdemona says dreamily, moving her hips unconsciously, pressing the hot hand flat against her abdomen. "Janie, Janie, come in and play, Dessie's little pussy is lonely and wet, waiting in the rain to play all day."

"Dessie?"

"Yours truly."

"Pleased to meet you."

"Dessie is sad. You haven't even kissed me."

"May I kiss you? I'm such a bad girl!" She adds, "I have no will power! You're Snookie's mom and Roscoe's wife, but all I can think of is my hand and your lips and..."

Dessie pulls Janie down along the couch until they are snuggled together.

"Blame it on the horny couch." She says and kisses Janie. Their kiss is a key clicked in a heart-shaped locket, picture perfect, plump curves fitting succulent openings, wet tongue upon hesitant wonder.

"That damned couch!" Janie says, taking a breath, awestruck by what it means to kiss the one you know you love. "Will they hate me?"

"They'll tease you to make sure you understand the rules."

"The rules?"

"Yes, the one that says love is not exclusive among friends--you have to share the one you love. And share and share and share. For Roscoe, you'll have to be one of the boys. You and Irma will have to be like his special beer drinking buddies, buddies he can trust with something precious."

"He's kind of like that now--sort of joking, but serious, making sure that Snooky's OK, that he can trust me. I never thought of men as being that trustworthy, but he is--like its some kind of code."

"Lady's knight errant, defender of the heart: The women in my life are his ideal chivalrous buddies, people he can trust to take care of his family."

"Hmm...the women in your life. I like being part of the family, are there more?"

"A few, you'll meet them if they visit. Can you share me?"

"I'll get pointers from Roscoe--he must be a saint!"

(Roscoe remembers that first time. How he finds them. Angels playing. Heavenly bodies writhing: taunt flanks, silky strong sleek, wanton and dangerous--an aura of lust so dense it made him dizzy. He thinks he should hate his friend Irma, but he knows that's just a lie his bruised ego tells. He knew all along, an intuitive little nudge here and there, how his lovely Dessie loved her girlfriends, even if he didn't put it into so many words. Now standing at the open door to their bedroom, he watches the angels playing in the lamplight revealing, their hot gasps of unbound pleasure growing, their lovely curves moving, twisting, pumping, shiny with the vigor of their wonderful woman heat. It is beauty, he realizes: their nature, strong and true, a force unto themselves. Musing, an involuntary smile forming: all is well--how often does a man get a glimpse of heaven.)