Gary Fowler sees opportunity in the household of a new customer. Will he keep his focus on his employment? Or will he be distracted by her?
Gary Fowler looked across the swimming pool and nodded proudly. He was the master of his own domain. True, his domain was the new tiling around the ladders, but for now, he could bask in its ownership, at least until Mrs. Barton paid for it.
He had known about Mrs. Barton for years, mostly from whispers and jokes from his former squaddies, but the first real account he had heard was from Bob the plumber. He had gesticulated about her at length in the Plough a few months before. Bob was middle aged and fat, but he told good tales and his account of trying to hide his hard-on while simultaneously trying to fix her guttering had raised the whole bar to a chaos of laughter. This incident, Gary had contemplated, was in the wintertime, when it was raining, and she was wearing a coat; exactly what kind of sexual influence did this woman possess? He had learned there was a pool up in the Grange and he had wondered when the business might get a call.
His father had deliberated over whether to send his son on this job, as the client had subtly suggested. Gary had only started in his job twelve months before, after leaving the army, but, having worked hard and apart from some talk he had heard in the pub, which he had immediately silenced, came to the conclusion that the young man could do the relatively simple job of replacing some cracked tiles, even though the request for Gary in particular was irregular, Mr. Fowler senior just assumed a partiality to fit, athletic young men on the part of the customer and, in any case, this one was important and the first real “nob” on his books. In any case, Gary was one of the “Sons” in the “Fowler & Sons” on the side of the van, and the “quality” loved that.
So it was, on a warm spring day, that Gary looked up at the high, misty sun and slowly removed his shirt. He had formulated a plan with regard to this new client, in bed with Tracey the night before. It had been part of their foreplay fantasy, after which, thus excited, he had aggressively shafted her for a quarter of an hour to put a stamp of the idea. Tracey had loved the long minutes of that stamp, and now, with Mrs. Barton appearing from the French windows onto the patio, that blithely thought-out plan was being initiated.
The sudden sight of a muscular torso in her garden stopped the upmarket little mother in her tracks; for a short moment. But after pretending to look at the roses, she continued her path toward him with that jaunty, bouncy walk that he had noticed earlier. Mrs. Barton’s large breasts seemed every bit as dramatic as Bob’s imagination had assumed and though constrained by underwear and tight jumper, mirrored her step and jumped about in a delayed and syncopated reaction.
‘It is a warm day, Mr. Fowler' she said as her approach brought her within arm’s reach. Mrs. Barton, it transpired, didn’t appear to be a great respecter of personal space.
‘Aye, it’s definitely warm' Gary replied. He wasn’t perturbed by his customer’s relative closeness. It was a situation he had experienced all of his life. Even as a teenager, he had garnered trust with his handsome baby-face and had taken full advantage of that. Nine years in the army had taken that edge away however, but it had been supplanted by physical confidence and a physique that more than made up for the loss. It was an important feature of his plan that Mrs. Barton be interested in that physique.
She looked down at the new tiling and pursed her lips thoughtfully. ‘It is lovely work Mr. Fowler.'
‘Aye, me Dad ‘ad me working when I were a little lad Mrs. Barton,' Gary replied. ‘He always needed an 'and.' His explanation was a partial truth. The partial mistruth was that the work was tiling.
Mrs. Barton smiled condescendingly at his dialect and seemed thoughtful in her reply. ‘It must be so comforting to have a child who shows such diligence.'
Gary laughed. ‘Aye, but he’d give us a right bloody belt if he found us slacking.'
Mrs. Barton ruminated on the work he had done, tactfully ignoring his joke. ‘These new tiles though,' her eyes switched quickly between the newly laid ceramic and Gary’s newly exposed torso. ‘don’t you think they rather overwhelm the old ones?’
Gary nodded, the plan may have diverted a little here, but he sensed an opportunity. ‘I guess, aye,' he replied, ‘tough to distress tiles it is. Have to wait till they all weather in, wit’ the sun and frost and that.'
‘Oh no. We can’t have that. I have important guests at the beginning of the month. I think we have to replace all of them.'
Gary scratched his chin and looked around the pool. A thirty by eighteen-foot pool, with twelve-inch tiles. He, his mate and two apprentices could have the work done in the matter of a day. That wouldn’t do. He had to think quickly. ‘Aye, problem is we ain’t got the blokes right now, they’re all off on a big job in town. I’d have to get it done round that. By me sen’ like.'
Mrs. Barton seemed far from disappointed by this. ‘I see, mmm. Well, when you’ve tidied up, pop over to the house and we’ll talk business.' At this, Mrs. Barton span around and flounced her way back toward the French windows. Gary gazed intently at her backside as she walked. It pivoted in a lithe and sumptuous dance, like a small beam engine.
‘Aye' he thought, ‘A right cracker, a bit too much make-up for me likin’’ but she could be just the ticket.'
These deep musings were distracted by a shuffle in the curtains in one of the upstairs bedrooms. He stared intently hoping for more information, but the curtain remained still. ‘Well now. Who is that then?’ he whispered to himself.
Thirty minutes later and he was in the large and impressive kitchen.
‘Aye, well by mesen’ it’ll be two foot an ‘our. So, I reckon if I get, like, three hour done a day it’ll take a couple of weeks to get round it, like.'
Mrs. Barton looked pleased with this arrangement. ‘You will have to work so hard; I am so grateful to you.'
In truth, it was a lot of hard work, but Gary Fowler had his own objectives. He had obtained these objectives at many other of his father’s clients. Private swimming pools were numerous in this area of the country and with pools came rich diverted husbands and bored distracted wives. Several local, uppity, middle-class women had thrown themselves at him, and the best thing, the best thing of all, was that exposure, in the close, snobbish circle in which they lived, would be social death. This lever had been used and had been rewarding.
Gary had remained shirtless and the lines of sweat on his muscular shoulders obviously proved distracting to Mrs. Barton. ‘My guests arrive on the fourth, will you be able to finish by then?’ she asked, letting her gaze lower slightly.
‘Three weeks? Aye, can do.' The extra time was an obvious signal, and a welcome one. He breathed in and slung his shirt over his shoulder, tensing his stomach muscles as he did. He closely observed Mrs. Barton’s face as he performed his well-rehearsed manoeuvre. It broke out into a barely perceptible smoulder, then converted to a smile.
‘We will be seeing a lot of each other then I guess. Maybe you can call me Samantha. That should make things... more relaxed, don’t you think?'
Gary liked this idea. Familiarity did not necessarily make a good business arrangement, but then his ideas were not altogether business-like. ‘Well, in that case, you can call me Gary. If you want, like.'
‘Well, I hope we can get this job done efficiently... Gary,' The plebeian name stuck in her mouth as he had expected. ’I must show my appreciation somehow.'
‘Aye, well…' his reply was interrupted by a bounding set of footsteps that started on the stair carpet and transformed into barefoot slaps on the parquet floor on which Samantha and Gary stood. The owner of those footsteps froze as a statue, open mouthed and wide eyed, staring straight at Gary.
‘Rachel, you silly elephant! You know you shouldn’t run in the house when we have guests.' Mrs. Barton’s words had absolutely no effect on what Gary presumed to be the source of the earlier curtain twitch. Rachel continued to stare, transfixed at the newcomer in the kitchen.
In return, Gary quickly assessed the surprise visitor that had congealed in front of him. It was a girl, slightly shorter than her mother, young, yet sharing all of the same physical characteristics. But it was her clothing that struck him most acutely. The little kitty t-shirt, way too small, had been stuffed, without a bra, with the largest pair of breasts Gary had ever seen on a girl that age. So much so, that a wide, downward facing tunnel existed beneath where the fabric refused to be tucked. Gary automatically began thinking of the instantly available access to the exposed underside of that mammary flesh. But it was what she wore below that began to unfurl his penis. An old pair of jeans had obviously been repurposed into a pair of shorts in a highly thoughtless manner, with the frayed hemline extending sideward across the very top of her thigh from the level of her crotch. Gary’s eyes swiftly reverted to the girl’s mother who must surely, though she did not show it, have noted his interest. He only hoped that the interest had seemed brief, though time had suspended itself and it was quite difficult for him to tell.
‘Rachel! Where are your manners? Say hello to Mr. Fowler.' The young girl continued to stare, open mouthed, at Gary. ‘I declare, you are the strangest little mouse.' Mrs. Barton turned to Gary. ‘She’s home because she didn’t settle into her new school, did you, poppet?' Rachel slowly shook her head. Gary again looked at Rachel, whose two big, dilated eyes fixed blankly on him. The girl obviously must have been in her mid to late teens, but oddly, her mouth pouted in a far more womanly way. He found the contrast between the sweet bashful innocence of the eyes and robust sexuality of the mouth rather disconcerting. Most noticeable of all, however, was the sudden projection and emergence of her nipples which began protruding out of the fabric of her minuscule top.
’I’m here to fix the tiles around the pool, Miss Barton.' Gary’s words seemed to startle Rachel who flinched and gulped, then turned and sprinted back to the foot of the stairs. Here she stopped, looked back directly at Gary, and then bolted back up the steps with a soft patter.
Mrs. Barton displayed absolutely no motherly concern with regard to her daughter’s state of dress but was more apologetic with regards to her perceived lack of manners. ‘Oh, that silly sausage! Why doesn’t she behave like she has been taught? Oh, she is such a worry, such a worry.'
Gary tried to be supportive. ‘Aye, well the lass has got plenty of time. I reckon she’ll grow out of it.'
‘I do hope you are right Mr. Fowler, I mean Gary,' replied Mrs. Barton with a coquettish giggle. ‘I do hope so.'
Gary Fowler concluded his business, agreed a price with Samantha and reluctantly drove away from the house in his van back to the village no more that a mile away. As he sat behind the wheel he mused lightheadedly and definitely had the expectation that this job was going to be far, far more interesting than he had previously thought.