Miss Taken
A Short Story
By Maryanne Peters

The girl behind the counter had taken pity on him and placed a glass of water on the counter near the corner. He came in drawn by the smell of freshly roasted coffee, but he could not afford one. He had just enough for the ticket home, or so he hoped. Or a ticket part way and then dodge the conductor. Either way it was a failure to go back there. He would be marked when he walked down the street.

“That’s Todd,” they would say. “He couldn’t make it in the city. Thought he was too special for hard work. Thought a skinny pretty boy could make a living in the city doing nothing. I guess he will be sponging off his parents from now on.”

He took a sip. It was like drinking his own tears.

Then there was a tap on his shoulder. He turned around in time to see the smile drop from the face of the tall man with the carefully clipped beard.

“I am sorry, I thought that you were somebody else,” said the man, with genuine disappointment. “It was the blonde hair and the colorful shirt. That was what she said she would be wearing.”

“Yeah, the shirt,” said Todd, running his fingers through his fair hair in a ruggedly masculine way to assert his manhood. I painted it myself.” It was the last good shirt he had, and it was clean because it had been special. Back home it would be a joke. This was his last time to wear it.

“Foolish of me to mistake you for a woman,” said the man. “No offence?”

“None taken,” said Todd. “She will turn up.”

“I don’t think so,” said the man. “The truth is that I have been waiting almost an hour. I started amusing myself on my phone and looked up to the bar and saw … well, I saw you. Do you mind if I take a seat? Perhaps I can get you a coffee, or a drink?”

The thought of a drink was enough. Todd had no shame anymore. That awaited him down the line.

“Sure. Take a seat. I’ll have whatever you’re having.”

“I’ll have one of those ready-mix cocktails,” said the man. “So can we make it two Cosmos? Alright then. My name is Matt by the way. Matt Stiles.”

Todd took the offered hand, which seemed to close about his like a cow eating a white moth. He felt even more insignificant if that was possible.

“I guess I am drowning my sorrows,” said Matt. “I don’t often get stood up.”

Todd looked at him in profile. He believed it. What kind of woman would not go out with this guy. He was tall and good-looking, patient to wait around, and generous, to a total stranger. He was a good person.

“I actually have a booking for two at a nice restaurant between here and my hotel,” said Matt. My job will pay for me and a guest, so would you like to join me?”

Todd felt his stomach rumble in reply. “That’s sounds great,” he said. “But I am not dressed for anything better than a diner.” He pointed to his worn jeans and flipflops.

“You’re right,” said Matt. “I was expecting to be taking a classy lady to dinner. But we can stop at the department store on the corner and get something.”

“I have no money,” Todd blurted out, as if it was a secret when it was so obvious. “Not a cent.”

“I have plenty,” said Matt. “Finish your drink. Let’s take you shopping.” He held up his credit card with a broad smile on his face. That smile seemed to affect Todd in a strange way. It was more than an appreciation of the clear generosity – it was something felt lower in the body – almost sexual.

Matt held the door open for him. It seemed like an odd gesture, but the afternoon was becoming very strange.

As they came to the department store Matt stopped and looked in the window. The display was of women’s fashion clothing, not something that would stop a man.

“I wonder if, as I am buying dinner and dressing you for it, you might indulge me a little?” he said. “I do like your shirt, and colors like that would look so good above that black skirt.” He was pointing to an asymmetrical wrap skirt, below and above the knee.”

Todd stared at it. He was thinking – ‘Are you joking? I am not a transvestite!’ But here he was, hungry, penniless and basically lost. He found himself saying – “If you’re paying, I suppose you’re choosing.”

It seemed ridiculous the moment it had been said, but it had been said, and within minutes that dress had been bought.

The lady insisted that Todd try it on.

“You will need shoes my Dear,” she said without batting an eyelid at a man in a skirt. “And we do have a spa upstairs to attend to those legs.” She turned to Matt as the man, or the man who would be paying.

“That is an excellent idea,” said Matt. “A half-done job is not really done, is it?”

Todd found himself nodding, as if he had acquired a tic that was bound to see him agree to anything.

The hair being torn from his legs seemed to bring him around to at least refuse to have his eyebrows plucked, but the ladies at the spa agreed that they could be shaped with brushes and that a little makeup could fix anything, but only after his hair was washed and shaped.

‘It is all temporary’, Todd assured himself. ‘I am filling in for his date. I am playing a part. It is a piece of fun. There is nothing deviant or depraved in it.’ The silent words bounced around his seemingly empty head. His stomach rumbled again.

“Well, you look fantastic,” said Matt. “You look better than the date I was expecting to meet tonight. I think we are going to enjoy ourselves. But do you know, I don’t even know your name. Now wait, before your answer, just let me hope that it is a name that fits the person in front of me.”

“Imogen.” It was a name that seemed to have fallen from the sky. Todd knew nobody of that name. It had no origin. It was just the name of the woman in the mirror behind Matt. The shaggy hair was now styled with a few well-placed curls; the makeup was perfect, the shirt had become a perfect feminine top gaping open to suggest the slightest bosom that only the people in that room knew was not there. Below that was the skirt, smooth legs and stylish shoes with a slight kitten heel.

“We have been all afternoon getting ready, and now we are in danger of being late at the restaurant,” said Matt, with the hint of a tease. “Would you care to take my arm, Imogen?”

It seemed so natural that Imogen slid her arm in without a thought. It should be a joke. She should be laughing, but she wasn’t. And yet the happiness inside was beyond description.

It was only a few paces around the corner to the restaurant – small and intimate and clearly expensive. There were smells which threatened to fill her mouth with drool, but she kept herself restrained. If she looked like a lady then she would behave like one, even if it meant slowly eating what she longed to devour. But the food was good, and eating it daintily made it even better. She could not resist ordering a little more of this and that.

Somehow, they talked throughout and yet learned nothing about one another. It was the food and the décor and the man staring at Imogen from the table across the room.

“He sees nothing but the most beautiful woman in the room,” Matt reassured her. “The same as what I am seeing.”

Imogen looked back at Matt and saw something in his eyes. That feeling was back – the one that was almost sexual. Perhaps it was sexual?

“My hotel is very close,” said Matt. “I am alone tonight. I would rather not be alone. Would you consider spending the night with me? I am not expecting anything more than you would be willing to give.”

Todd would have snapped back – “I’m a guy for fuck’s sake! What kind of weirdo are you?” But he also would have remembered that he had not bought a train ticket, and he was to have slept on the train because there is nowhere else.

It was Imogen who answered – “I don’t want to be alone tonight either.”

Matt paid the bill and they walked to the hotel with her hanging off his arm. They walked past reception to the elevator and then from there to his room on a higher level. It was large and luxurious. It had a bed that a person such as Todd could only dream of.”

“I want to tell you that I am not a whore,” she said.

“I know that,” said Matt. “But I can see that you are in difficult circumstances. So what I propose is to give you some money. I think that I have $1,000 in cash, maybe a little more. It is yours. It is a gift. A charitable donation to the poor. You can take it and leave if you like. No quid pro quo. As I said in the restaurant - I am not expecting anything more than you would be willing to give. If it is not your gift to me, then I don’t want it.”

“What can I give you?” Imogen found herself looking into his eyes dreamily as she asked it, so his reply sent her crashing back to earth.

“A blow job would be nice,” said Matt with a grin

Imogen bit her bottom lip and tasted the lipstick. That prompted her to look across at the mirror. She saw a woman, or Todd saw a woman wearing his painted shirt. How far had he gone to be this? It seemed that another step was almost nothing beside this. And anyway, it would not be Todd sucking his cock, it would be Imogen.

“Okay,” she said. “But I have never done this before.”

“Something tells me that you are going to be a natural,” said Matt. He threw off his jacket and his tie, unbuckled his belt and let his pants fall. His penis was already tenting his boxers. It was the right thing to free it from the restraining fabric.

Imogen found it surprising easy to handle the penis of another man, and as she looked up and smiled at Matt it was somehow thrilling to feel it suddenly swell.

‘I am having this effect on him,’ she thought. ‘He thinks that I am beautiful. He thinks that I am sexy’. She licked the tip and felt it shudder. It gave her a sense of power unlike anything she had felt before. She looked up again. His eyes were closed and he was smiling.

She wrapped her lips around it and slowly pushed forward until her nose hit his pubes. It seemed odd that all of him could enter her so easily, as if she was born to take a man in her mouth. Perhaps she was. She seemed to be salivating so as to lubricate it as she moved away and back, sucking and slurping and spilling drool.

“You have such pretty hair,” said Matt. His fingers played with it as he softly held her to him, as if fearing she might disengage before time. But he did not have to wait long. He gasped.

She felt that last spasm, and then his semen mixed with her saliva. He grunted in his ecstasy. He pulled out and she found herself swallowing, and spluttering a little. She looked up and he was grinning down at her, his eyes warm.

“Let me get you a drink from the minibar,” he said. “Perhaps you don’t like the taste of me?”

“No,” she said, truthfully. “It was nice.” He was nice. Pleasing him was nice.

“Lie with me for a little,” he suggested. She was fully clothed. He was now naked. His body was strong and hairy. It was the very opposite of hers. His body was that of a man, and it made her realize that hers was not. It was not the body of a woman either, but as long as she was clothed, it might be.

They lay together. Close to his naked body she felt warm and safe, and happy.

“I feel that I need to make you come as I just did,” said Matt. “But I won’t touch any penis except my own. I am not gay or anything like that.”

“I would hope not,” she said. It seemed like an odd thing to say once she had said it. If he was not gay, then what was she? But she did not feel gay either. “So, what do you suggest?”

“Why don’t you take a bath,” he said. “Clean yourself inside and out, and then, when I am ready, I will massage your prostate with my cock.”

She looked across at him. He stroked her hair. His eyes seemed to plead with her, and yet she felt that he genuinely wanted to pleasure her. She smiled at him because she understood.

“You will have to be gentle with me,” she said. “This is all new to me.”

She ran a bath, and he went over to the large candelabra on a side table and selected the large central candle.

“A little stretching will improve your pleasure,” he said. “This time, that is what I want.”

She took it from him as if it was a gift of great value. She toileted and then stepped into the bath. She used the hotel razor to shave her thighs and some of her pubic hair, shaping what was left into a heart. Then she shaved her armpits. She covered her hair with a shower cap and left her made up face untouched.

With the assistance of the warm bath water and extra shower gel the candle went in quite easily. She worked it in and out. She found that her small penis was swelling. Somehow this was giving her pleasure, even though it seemed that it should not.

She dried herself and put her shirt and skirt back on, but not her underpants. She pulled off the shower cap and primped her hair. The hairdresser at the department store had done a great job. It was a feminine style. That was not the reflection of a man. That was just as well, those lips had sucked cock. She wished that she had lipstick to touch things up. She needed lipstick.

But for now, he could take her as she was. What she realized was that she needed him.

“Should I bend over?” she asked.

“Lie down so that I can see your face and we can kiss,” he said. “I want to drink in your beauty. I just don’t want to break the spell by seeing anything that does not belong on a woman as beautiful as you.”

She knew what it was in that moment. It was love. Feeling his penis inside her and his tongue in her mouth only confirmed it. Imogen was a woman being made love to by a man. Everything was perfect or soon would be.

She had been taken. She was happy at last.

The End.

© Maryanne Peters 2022