Power
by Writer345
1. Schwerpunkt
Frankly, I was bored...
Bored with my job...
Bored with my friends...
Bored with my family...
Bored with the people around me...
Bored with life in general...
Bored...
Bored...
Bored...
So bored in fact that things just had to change—a lot of things!
Perhaps I should have just accepted my life as it was and drifted along in the same mindlessly dull way as those around me. Maybe I should have just accepted the status quo and lived for the present like the good little well-domesticated citizens that the Government (every government) wanted us to be.
Sure! Life was good: I had a nice home, plenty to eat and drink (too much in fact), and a television to relax in front of while my mind trickled out of both ears. Docile domesticity has a lot to recommend it, or so my friends and family seemed to believe most fervently. Well I assume that they believed it for they were constantly regaling me with the pleasures of normal family life.
Trouble was that I had ambition... I wasn’t ‘normal’ either... I needed to change things... I needed to change my life! I needed to change me!
Thinking about it, it wasn’t boredom, not really, it was dissatisfaction which is even worse. Material possessions weren’t satisfying and nothing that I ever accomplished was ever good enough. Everyone around me said that I was fantastic at my job, but I knew better! I knew what my shortcomings were and I knew that I could have made a better job of things. In fact I was a perfectionist and as such I was my own worst critic.
I am a surgeon and everyone around me keeps telling me how good I am at what I do: but I don’t believe them; not really for I know what I could have done better. Everything from the simplest procedure to the most complex operation could have been improved upon!
It had started long before I had trained as a doctor... I was bright child... I did well at school and after that, at sixth form college. As a little girl I had always wanted to know how things worked and had loved repairing mechanisms. But not just repairing them—I had to improve them. As I grew older I got interested in living things and wanted to know how they worked too. When they broke I naturally wanted to fix them only I couldn’t because I didn’t know how. This was tremendously frustrating for not only couldn’t I repair them, I couldn’t improve them either.
It was this that led me to read medicine at university.
How did I find the training? Well there was a lot of hard work but it was more of a challenge than an obstacle and I was able to throw myself into it: in fact I had the time of my life. Hooray! I was learning how to mend people.
I’m not going to go into boring details... Instead I’ll jump forward fifteen years... The fifteen years that saw me become established in my profession... The fifteen years that led to me getting where I am now... The fifteen years that are largely irrelevant to rest of my story even though they were the foundation upon which everything else was built. However it was fifteen years of slowly increasing dissatisfaction.
It all came to a head at one of those regular friends’ nights out.
Here I was sitting in a pub with a few friends: all of us were in our late thirties, give or take and I’d known most of them for years. Tonight started off the same way as every previous session but this one turned out to be different. It was the night that my life really began. I had a secret and this was the night when it was revealed.
There are seven of us around that table in the lounge bar of The Dog and Duck: we’d been going once or twice a week for longer than I cared to although I haven’t been in that particular local since. It began as a normal night out with the old gang... There was red-headed Wendy Anderson who I’d known since we were kids in Wolverhampton when we had run the streets and got into mischief together. We were still together as Wendy is a theatre sister and works at the same hospital as I do. Then there was Andy, Wendy’s husband: he’s a teacher : a rather bland and two dimensional git. What she saw in him I’ll never know. He’s just not my type—but then he couldn’t be.
Next there were Rachael and Simon—the Goldbergs—I’ve known them both since Medical School, they’re both doctors: GP’s and of the the same practice. Now that’s a real recipe for disaster because they’ll automatically unload their stress onto each other, they just won’t be able to help it. I’ve noticed that they’d been arguing a lot lately and it won’t be long before they’re arguing over custody of their appalling brat-of-a-kiddy!
Then there was Tristram: I didn’t know him and what’s more: I didn’t want too, either. So what was he doing on our friend’s night out? Simple! He was the latest in a string of eligible bachelors that Wendy has attempted to fix me up with. She meant well but I knew that she’d fail with this one, too.
Finally there was Lakshmi Gupta, another surgeon and a... Well I won’t call her a friend because I don’t think that she has any... But Lakshmi’s a character and we get on well together even though I don’t trust her and have the distinct suspicion that she’d whip out one of my kidneys and sell it on the black market, given half a chance! Officially she’s a GP who does plastic surgery on the side. Unofficially? Well that’s what much of this story is all about.
So how did that friends’ night out go? Actually it didn’t last very long and I was only part-way through my first drink when everything went pear-shaped. Wendy had introduced Tristram and made sure that he was sitting across the table from me so that we could ‘get to know each other’. Wendy and her husband were sitting at one end while the Goldbergs were at the other. Lakshmi was sitting next to me and glaring at ‘lover-boy’: she really couldn’t stand him and when she takes a dislike to people, well, interesting things are likely to happen.
Tristram was a stock broker: absolutely loaded, according to Wendy, not that that made any difference. I’ll give him his due: he was good looking and had that annoying oily self-confidence that goes with his job. If you don’t know what I mean, imagine a cross between a slick estate agent and an equally smarmy used car sales man and you’ll realise that he was as smooth as a bucket of sick.
He’d tried to chat me up and receiving no positive response he must have decided that I was shy. Well I must have been for I didn’t throw myself at him. Naturally this led him to try humour in an attempt to break the ice and ingratiate himself but his first and only joke backfired big-time.
Looking straight into my eyes and tittering, he came out with: “What’s the difference between God and a Surgeon?”
Getting no response, other than a blank look, from the gorgeous brunette opposite (that’s me, by the way), he launched chuckling, into the punchline. “God doesn’t thing he’s a surgeon!”
Wendy and Andy laughed politely, as did the Goldbergs... I think that I glared—I’d heard that particular gem when at Medical School and hadn’t found it funny even than.
Lakshmi, however, jumped to her feet, shouted: “How dare you?” And promptly slapped his face good and hard, hissing: “I’m a surgeon and I resent that insult!”
Suddenly there was total silence and not just around our table but around the ones nearby as everyone turned to stare at the idiot who’d just insulted the nice Indian lady doctor.
If Lakshmi had left it at that then my life would have returned to its hum-drum normality, but she didn’t—she outed me. She grabbed my arm, hauled me to my feet and in a loud said. “Come on, darling, we’re leaving!” Then she kissed me—right there in front of everyone—it was a real kiss, too, and not just a peck on the cheek.
Lover-boy: his ego bruised, glowered up at us and muttered. “Pair of fucking dykes.”
Lakshmi’s brown skin seemed to darken and her eye’s blazed as she snatched up her drink and threw it in his face before grabbing me and marching me out of the bar and away from the arguments that were erupting behind us.
Twenty minutes later the two of us were up in my flat commiserating with each other over a mug of coffee and she was fussing over me like a mother-hen. Like I said, she wasn’t a friend—not exactly—but Lakshmi is easy to talk too and we’d also known each other since Medical School. Suddenly my phone played its annoying little jingle so I snatched it up and pressed the ‘connect’ button.
It was Wendy. “Is everything alright, Steph?” That’s my name, by the way, I’m ‘Stephanie Cox’.
I didn’t answer straight away which perplexed Wendy even more. “Stephanie? You there, Stephanie?” Her voice sounded both concerned and troubled.
“Yes, I’m here...” I itted rather stiffly.
She didn’t give me chance to continue but instead launched right into her concerned best friend routine. “Only we are really worried about you, Tristram included: he’s very upset, you know.“
“Good,” I snapped, “serves him right.”
“The landlord threw him out so we’re all round at my place. We are very concerned about you so why don’t you come round?” She suggested, completely oblivious to my distress, which was Wendy all over. “Tristram’s dying to apologise—he really likes you, you know.”
I bristled a little at another Wendy-ism—that of ending sentences with “you know”. Well I did know! I knew that I didn’t want anything to do with Tristram—or any other man, for that matter. Still, she was my oldest friend so I softened... “I’m just a bit upset and Lakshmi’s here looking after me. I just want to put it all behind me.”
“Lakshmi?” Wendy sounded aghast.
“Well at least she doesn’t want to get into my panties!” I snapped.
Lakshmi was leaning over to listen in on the conversation and by her smile I suddenly realised that my statement probably wasn’t accurate.
There was a pause at the other end of the phone during which I heard the ghosts of several whispered conversations.
“Steph?” Wendy came back after a good few seconds. I didn’t answer straight away as Lakshmi had slipped a protective arm around my shoulders—well I thought that it was protective.
“Steph? You still there Stephie?”
“I’m still here... Is Tristram still there?” I purred as Lakshmi’s hand had inadvertently strayed onto my breast.
“Yes, he’s still here.” Wendy gushed.
“Well in that case I’m staying right where I am and having an early night.” I snapped and ended the call by turning the phone off and flinging it onto the coffee table as I did so. “She’s going to be all questions at work tomorrow... She’s my theatre sister and we’re operating.”
“Yes, I am too.” Lakshmi purred sexily into my ear but I was so wound up that I missed her double entendre.
She kept her arm around me while we finished our coffee—I didn’t push her away as I need the comfort that the brought. Eventually she spoke, her voice little more than a whisper. “You like her, don’t you?”
“Well Wendy is my oldest friend.” I mused.
“No I mean that you really like her,” she said overemphasising the word, and adding. “Like as in fancy.“
I gasped. Do I fancy Wendy? The thought rather took me by surprise but not half as much as the answer did.
“No.” I said very quietly, lying through my teeth as I did so.
Lakshmi didn’t answer, or at least not in words but her smile told me how much she believed me. She reached across and placed her empty mug on the table, ‘accidentally’ brushing the back of her hand across my breast as she straightened up.
The smile broadened when I shuddered. “C’me on.” She said in a quite voice as she stood, grasped my hand and led me into my bedroom. It wasn’t the first time that we’d had sex—I won’t say we made love for love is not a major component of her highly personal universe. But either way gentle, drawn out sex was exactly what I needed and as partners go she was ideal as she was female, considerate and available. We were both too much alike—too dominant—for this to be the start of a beautiful relationship... But as a one-off it was just fine as I needed the company and she, as always, was happy to oblige.
After an extended period of kissing, fondling, rubbing and intimate groping we sort of lay together in each others arms and basked in a mutual post-coital glow. The scent of our arousal bathed us and we must have stank of each other’s pussies, not that this bothered us. We were warm and we had each other so for the moment, what more could we need?
We relaxed and I heard myself sigh in response to her playing distractedly with one of my nipples... The world and all its troubles seemed so very far away as I began to doze.
“Why don’t you just take her?” She asked gently with just a hint of a put-on Indian accent.
I surfaced, returning to consciousness from that strange state of mind that is mid-way between thinking and dreaming. “Take who?” I mumbled.
“Wendy, you daft bimbo,” she chuckled musically, “why not just take her?”
My resistance must have been dulled by our recent intimacy as I couldn’t stop myself from answering. “Because she’s happily married... Because she belongs to someone else.”
“Married? Yes! But happily? I hardly think so: not judging by the way that she was re-acting to her husband.” Lakshmi mused. “So I’ll ask you again. You really fancy her, don’t you?”
“Yes.” I said in a little-girl voice. Yes, I really do fancy Wendy. I itted to myself.
“You would be happy if she was in a relationship with you.” This was not a question, it was a statement of fact.
“Yes.” I agreed.
“Would she be happy with you?” She asked.
I thought. “She’s not a lesbian.” I said iterating what I saw as a major obstacle to my happiness.
“Details! Details!” Lakshmi hissed dismissively. “I can turn her for you. Believe me. If you want her, she’s yours! She’s trying to fix you up... Why not let me give her a hand?”
Suddenly I was wide awake and hopeful. “Turn her? How?”
“Hypnosis... Conditioning... I won’t go into details, but it’s quite easy.” She chuckled and hugged me to her, kissing me on the end of my nose. “You’d both be happy together and that’s all that counts.”
“But her husband...? Her marriage...? I don’t have the right to come between them.” I protested... My innate sense of decency rearing its ugly and prudish head.
She ignored me. “She clearly likes you so do you have the right to prevent her from entering into a romantic relationship with you?”
I frowned... Her words were fast becoming cords that tangled me in silken bindings. “But her husband?” I persisted.
“You can safely leave him to her.” Lakshmi said slowly. “She’ll ditch him when the time is right—I’ll see to that.”
“He’s a nice person, I wouldn’t like anything bad to happen to him—I’d feel guilty if it did.” I said fighting against a rising feeling of dread: I didn’t know just what Lakshmi was capable of, not then I didn’t, but I suspected that she could be pretty ruthless. And if this caused anything untoward to befall him... I just knew that I wouldn’t be able to live with myself afterwards.
“Anything that happens to him will be of his own making. You have my word on that.” She said sounding rather mysterious. She gave me a squeeze. “Over the next few days let me know what changes you want made. You know: bigger or smaller tits... Plumper or slimmer arse... More or less submissive... Dumbed down.. Any quirks, foibles or perversions to be added or removed. That sort of thing and once I know what you want I’ll make a start turning her into the perfect companion.”
“What will all this cost me?” I asked as reality intervened.
Lakshmi kissed me once more leaving me quite light headed. “In monetary ? Nothing. I like helping the people who I like and I like the pair of you—you’re both nice people so I’m going to help you to get together.
“As for other things, I might call on you for the odd favour occasionally—you’re a top-notch trauma surgeon, after all and some of the stuff I get asked to do is pretty radicle. So do we have a deal?”
“Deal!” I murmured happily, not realising that I had just sold my soul.
I must have drifted off to sleep shortly afterwards for when I woke up in the morning, Lakshmi had gone but her scent lingered on the rumpled bedclothes.