Being a Girl (2 page)

Below a row of tensor lights at the centre of the room was a square glass table that for some reason made me think of Alice when she found the golden key that would take her to Wonderland.

‘This is where we lay out the goods for the directors,' he said, and turned to the banks of filing cabinets. ‘Most people are on file, but more are going straight to computer now.'

The room was stifling. The computers hummed and Jean-Luc Cartier's voice with its faintly accented English made me feel drowsy. I had worked so hard on the exams I was exhausted. My stomach was squeezed against the waistband of my skirt, my blouse was sticking to my back, and my breasts were rising and falling immodestly with each breath I took. Everything was tight, constricted. I was bursting from my clothes, as matron had said, but it was so close to the end of term it would have been a waste to buy a new uniform.

Mr Cartier didn't say anything but he must have known I was hot and filled a big glass of water from one of those plastic fountains, the bubbles making vulgar noises as they exploded on the surface. I guzzled the water down so quickly, it splashed on my blouse, and I felt like a complete idiot as I handed back the glass. He wedged it under the tap.

‘Take off your jacket,' he said.

It was like an order and I obeyed without thinking, hanging it on the back of the chair where the actor was still staring from the computer screen with a faintly mocking expression.

Mr Cartier approached with the glass refilled, but instead of giving it to me, he held it to my mouth and
I was so thirsty I opened my lips. He stared at me and I watched his eyes as he tilted the glass, the water gushing out, drenching my school blouse and running down my front. He kept tipping the glass until all the water had gone and it seemed like a game but he wasn't smiling. This was a new sort of game and I didn't know the rules. I was panting for breath, hot still, and he was standing so close, a wave of panic coloured my neck and cheeks.

Now he spoke in the same soft hypnotic way, kindly, with force, pointing with a sort of impatience at the wet blouse.

‘You should take it off,' he said.

We were silent. I swallowed. I couldn't understand what he meant. Had I misheard?

‘What . . .'

‘It's wet, Camilla,' he added. ‘Slip it off.'

‘But Mr Cartier . . .'

But what? I didn't know. I didn't have the right words. I could smell sweat under my arms, a feeling of fear, even excitement, like I was in a horror film.

‘I can't do that,' I finally managed.

‘You can't?'

I shook my head.

‘If things are going to run properly it's important to follow instructions. Do you understand that?'

‘Yes, of course I do.'

‘I thought you had a sense of discipline . . .' he said, pausing, and I wondered if he was trying to remember my name.

‘Milly,' I said.

‘Then don't let me have to tell you again, Milly.'

Now he waited, staring at me, at my breasts rising and falling, and I don't know if it had been the tone of his voice or some furtive yearning inside me but I
wanted to prove that I would do as I was told if I got the job, that even if Binky had long gymnast legs my breasts in their white cotton bra were as pretty as two little flowers. Actually, quite big flowers.

He sighed as he glanced at his watch and, while I was daydreaming about Binky's legs skipping along the drive at Saint Sebastian's, my fingers were nervously doing my thinking for me, releasing the last few buttons on my blouse until it was completely open down the front. The blouse was soaking wet, so it did make sense. Sort of. That's what I was telling myself, anyway.

‘Come along,' he said.

I shuffled the sleeves down my arms and clutched the material to my chest. He turned his watch around his wrist and then held out his hand, motioning with his fingers. The actor with no name was staring across the room, daring me, and I gave Mr Cartier the ball of damp material.

He shook out the creases, straightened the sleeves and placed it neatly over another chair. He hadn't looked at me at all, but glanced back with an irritated expression.

‘Come along, Milly, and that please.'

He was pointing at my bra. I sort of shrugged and tried a smile. It was ridiculous.

‘Oh, but I can't.'

‘There is no such thing as can't. Not in my language.'

He held out his hand but I remained defiant. ‘Mr Cartier, I'm not going to.'

‘But why?'

‘Well, I'm just not.'

‘Milly, what did I tell you about obeying? Are you going to obey?'

‘Yes . . .'

He pointed at my blouse. ‘You have done very well. Now, off please.'

I felt a tremor run through me. Nothing like this had happened before. It was embarrassing, humiliating, but sort of exciting. He was testing me and I suppose I was testing myself. I was Alice falling, falling, falling down the rabbit hole.

He glanced at his watch and shook his head. I'd blown it. My little sister was going to get the job. She'd be strutting around with the soap stars showing off her long legs. I sniffed back a tear. I didn't mind taking off my blouse. It was hot, and I was rather proud of my breasts if the truth be told. It seemed sort of logical, natural. My blouse was wet and, anyway, breasts are
everywhere
, in every magazine, in the daily newspapers, on every ad in the tube; starlets and weather girls. Breasts were in – or, out rather. They were public property, but no one except the girls at school had ever seen my breasts completely uncovered. Another bead of perspiration slipped down my back, the horror and the shame and the thrill of standing there hot and breathless was just too much to bear.

‘Mr Cartier . . .'

‘Yes.'

‘I just can't.'

But my voice had weakened with my resolve.

‘Milly, I think you can. And I think you want to.'

What did he mean by that?

‘I don't. Honestly.'

And it was true. Almost true. I didn't want to, yet while I felt nervous and self-conscious, my body was tingling with new sensations. After the months of study and stress I wanted to cast off everything, be
naked, run naked through the streets, exhibit myself to the world. I liked being on stage. On show.

Mr Cartier had moved back to the chair. He picked up my blouse and held it towards me.

We were silent. The computers were blinking. The lights were bright and I thought about Binky in her pink suit. My breath was beating so fast it was as if I was running a relay race. Mr Cartier held the blouse pegged in his fingers, waiting for me to move towards him and put it back on.

I tried to move but I was rooted to the spot. My knees trembled and the slope of my tummy was knotted against the roll of material at my waist. I opened my throat to suck air into my constricted lungs and his eyes remained on mine as I angled my arms awkwardly up my back to unfasten the metal clasp. I heard the snap. It was loud in the silence.

He nodded and I felt ashamed as I lowered the thin white straps from my shoulders, first one, then the other, being provocative without meaning to, sliding the straps over my elbows, and cupping my breasts with my palms. I continued clutching the bra, but Mr Cartier put the blouse back where it had been hanging and came towards me, his eyes never leaving mine. I dropped the white tangle of cotton in his outstretched hand and he tossed it over the chair.

As he approached me again, I moved back instinctively, my legs knocking against the glass coffee table.

‘There, that wasn't so terrible, was it?'

I shook my head.

‘Well, come along then, let's have a proper look, shall we,' he said and he sounded like the biology teacher before we peered in turn down the microscope.

It wasn't really a question or a suggestion. Now that I was exposed so fully it was as if my will had
left me. I dropped my hands, arched my back, and the most incredible thing happened. As I looked down, the soft plains around my nipples darkened from pink to cherry red, the little buds had sprung out rigid and were prickling. The beat of my breath hastened. I lifted my hands to cover my shame but mechanically took those erect nipples between my thumb and fingers and rolled them hard. I had thrown back my head and although I tried to control it, I realised I was panting.

‘
Très bien
. There, you didn't need that little bra at all. They stand up so nicely on their own.'

He placed his hand flat on my ribs, below the undercurve of my breasts, and it was true, they were round and full, the little teats on fire beneath my fingers. His touch was firm, and the awful thought flickered through my mind that I wanted him to cup my breasts in his hands, take them into his mouth and bite me hard. The vision sent shivers up my spine.

The bend of my legs was level with the edge of the table. As Mr Cartier put his free hand against my shoulder, I folded as if the bones of my body were soft rubber and lay back, propping myself up on the glass surface. He drew back the hem of my skirt and we both gazed spellbound at the rising mount pushing up from my white knickers. He looked into my eyes. I think I smiled. Everything was happening so fast it was hard to catch my breath.

When he placed his hand on my knee, I locked my legs together and it was like seeing a car drive uncontrollably towards a cliff edge, his hand moving up my thigh, across the plump muscle at the top. I had stopped squeezing my nipples. My breasts were bobbing about. The heel of his hand brushed against
my sex and he slipped his fingers over the band of my knickers.

He pulled at the elastic as if to peek into a closed box, lowering the front and revealing a wisp of dark hair. My mouth was open. I was observing what was happening as if it had nothing to do with me. I wriggled but his hand was firm. The white cotton material was bunched up. He pulled again, just softly, staring into my eyes and, I don't know why, but for the briefest moment I lifted my bottom from the glass table and watched him lower my knickers slowly down to my knees.

We both gazed in quiet astonishment at the dark curly patch of pubic hair. It was lush and silky, an unspoiled lawn. I knew I was to blame for allowing this to happen. I had lifted my bottom from the glass surface of the table. I was wicked and shameless and felt oddly vibrant, totally alive, as if school had been stifling me, drowning me, and I was breathing freely for the first time. I squeezed my nipples and the pressure pushed out a dewy dribble from the lips of my vagina. Nothing like that had ever happened before. It was humiliating with the scent of arousal in the room, and I couldn't understand why I was all wet between my legs.

Mr Cartier placed the palm of his hand on my stomach, warning me not to move, and ran my knickers down my legs and over my shoes. I felt so ashamed as he studied the yellow stains in the gusset, and my mouth literally dropped open when he held the cotton to his nose. I had no idea why anyone would want to do such a thing and I watched in a trance, this strange man with my damp knickers pressed to his face while he inhaled.

‘Mmm,' he said.

He nodded with approval and it was a relief when he put the knickers to one side. He looked back at the wayward patch of my pubic hair. I could feel myself leaking. After drinking all that water I wanted to go to the lavatory but didn't dare say anything. I was sweating. The lights were hot. My underarms were wet and my breasts seemed to have grown huge, billowing out like sails in the wind. I cupped my breasts to still them.

Gently but firmly, like the nurse checking for sprains after hockey, he wedged his hand between my knees and eased my legs apart, just a little, and it was as if my will had gone as I watched. I had no idea how this had happened, how it had gone so far, and I couldn't help wondering if Mr Cartier had tested Binky in this way and, if he did, just how far he had gone. How far she had let him go. She had already gone further than me with her boyfriend. Much further.

He now took my hand and slid it from my breast, over my ribs, my tummy and down to the sticky bush of my pussy. He folded my fingers into the moist pink opening, and I couldn't have stopped myself slipping them inside even if I had wanted to. I peeled back the inner lips of my vagina and the warm pad of my fingertip caressed what the girls call the magic button, the little hot pulsing point that no one but me had ever touched.

I was moaning, swirling my hips, unsure how I had come to be masturbating like this with Mr Cartier watching, and pushed back, raising my legs from the floor and resting the soles of my feet on the surface of the table.

‘Are you a virgin, Milly?' His voice was a whisper, almost breaking the spell.

‘No,' I gasped.

Even this was shameful, humiliating.

‘You are, aren't you? You must tell the truth.'

I sniffed back another tear.

‘Yes,' I admitted.

‘That's lovely. That's why you're so wet.'

He ran his hand under my pussy and showed me his fingers slicked with juice. Below me there was a puddle of drool and Mr Cartier did something so weird I would remember it always. He scooped up the creamy liquid on a fingertip and rubbed it over his teeth. I was truly mortified and flushed a shade of crimson.

I had brought myself to a state of terrible excitement but it ebbed away when Mr Cartier sat on the edge of the table and pulled at my hand. I thought it was over. I had shown I could obey. I had got the job and felt pleased that for once I'd got one over Binky. I scrambled to my feet, my skin squelching on the glass. He swung me round in front of him, his hands running under my skirt to the globes of my bottom. He smiled and I felt – I don't know – safe, confident in being me.

‘We don't need this, do we?' he said, and fanned the air under my skirt.

I shrugged and shook my head. Was this the last test? I unrolled the fabric at my waist, lowered the zip and he removed his hands from my body to allow the kilt to fall to the floor. I stepped away from it. I was naked, completely exposed, my breasts warm and full, my pussy wet and smelly. A few hours ago I'd been a schoolgirl taking an exam and I couldn't even remember what it had been about. I looked around the room, at the old TV star staring from the computer, the water fountain, the skirt on the floor, my knickers on the table.