Moonlighting: A Thanksgiving Story

Moonlighting:

A Thanksgiving Story

By

Vicki Blue

© 2011 by Blushing Books and Vicki Blue

All rights reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced or
transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including
photocopying, recording, or by any information storage or retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publisher.

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Blue, Vicki

Moonlighting: A Thanksgiving Story

eBook ISBN: 978-1-60968-566-9

Cover Design by ABCD Graphics

Table of Contents

Chapter One:

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Ebook Offer

Vicki Blue

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About Blushing Books

“Again, please.”

Charlotte Tetter
called on the last reserve of her patience as she guided six-year-old Nick
Kramer back to the middle of the stage.

“Again?” The
child’s tone was sullen, not that she could blame him. Like the rest of his
classmates, Nick had the attention span of a gnat, and Charlotte wondered why
the school chose the last day of school before fall break to have its
Thanksgiving pageant. It was impossible to get kids to focus on anything so
close to a holiday, especially lines for a play.

“I promise this
is the last time,” she said, forcing a smile as she adjusted the feather in his
headdress.  “Just try to remember to hand the basket of corn to Lydia, not drop
it on her foot.”

Nick picked up
the basket and walked over to a little girl dressed as a pilgrim. “I bring you
corn for the feast,” he said. “Later we will teach you to grow your own.”

“Thank you,”
Lydia said, taking it. “We are pleased to have found friends among your
people.”

Charlotte
clapped. “Good job!” she said, relieved. “Remember to remind your parents that
we have rehearsal again on Wednesday.”

The chorus of
“ok’s” erupted from the kids as they began to remove the costumes and hang them
on the hooks by the stage. Charlotte gathered up her books and papers, eager to
be off. She loved her students and enjoyed her job as a teacher at the
exclusive private school. She felt lucky to have it; when she’d graduated from
college there were few jobs to be had due to hiring freezes. Her dream of
teaching foreign language to high school students seemed to evaporate, at least
until economic conditions improved. The position as first grade teacher for
Falmont Academy had just been posted when she applied, and for three
nail-biting weeks she’d waited to hear back from them as they interviewed
applicants. Getting hired had taken a load of worries off her mind. She just
wished the pay were better. When she’d moved to Falmont, she’d not realized
that it would be so expensive. It was a beautiful community, but rent was
higher here. For months she’d clipped coupons and scrimped on things she
wanted. But soon she realized that she had no choice. If she were to make ends
meet she’d have to find a second source of income.

The school
frowned on teachers taking second jobs, and in her contract it stipulated that
staff was forbidden from waiting tables on weekends or taking other positions
that might have them serving parents or students in some menial service job
deemed below the task of teaching Falmont students. Knowing how the school
prized image made Charlotte even more mindful of keeping a secret she feared
would cause problems. She had found a second source of income - a good source.
She had begun writing fetish erotica.

It had come
naturally for her. Charlotte could not remember when her fascinated with
spanking had started, but it had followed her doggedly through adolescence. In
college she’d written fan fiction featuring spanking as a theme. It was just for
fun and she wrote anonymously on a number of boards. But one of her stories got
so much praise that she tweaked it a bit by changing the characters and
expanding the plot before sending it to a publisher of erotica. She didn’t hear
anything for three weeks and had nearly forgotten it when she’d gotten a letter
and a check for the story. The money had arrived at a good time for her.
Charlotte’s car was in the shop and the money helped make the needed repairs.
The publisher’s letter expressed interest in other stories so she continued to
write under the same pen name - Brita Sinclair.

It had been with
some reluctance that she’d approached Moonlight Books about resuming her
sideline writing career. She spoke directly with the owner of the small
company, who assured her that controls were in place to protect identity of the
writers. For the last few months, Charlotte had come home from helping first
graders with phonics and addition to write stories of dominant men spanking
saucy wenches into line.

Charlotte tried
not to live vicariously through her characters, but it was hard sometimes.
Falmont was a small community, and the only men she ever saw were fathers of
her students. Falmont Academy forbade students from having Facebook pages and
the ambiguously worded morals clause of her contract made her fearful of being
seen in town with a drink in hand or on the arm of some man who she may later
find had questionable character.

Not that it
mattered, really. Charlotte doubted she’d ever find a man like the ones she
wrote about - chivalrous, dominant, caring but stern enough to give her the
guidance she craved since she could remember. Charlotte’s desires sometimes
made her feel apart from other women, and she never discussed them beyond
weighing in anonymously on the occasional forum. But she’d even stopped doing
that since she started her job and now she felt more alone than ever.

“A group of us
are going out for dinner. Wanna come?”

Charlotte turned
to face the speaker. Sue Ellen Forrester was smiling toothily at her. In her
rush to evade the offer, Charlotte nearly blurted out that she had to go home
and work, but caught herself in time.

“No, thanks,”
she said, picking up her bag of papers and purse. “I’ve got a bunch of errands
to do.”

“Shame,” Sue
Ellen said. “You never seem to want to go out with us.”

That was the
truth, but not one Charlotte could admit. Her fellow teachers, mostly older,
were wretched busybodies who had lived in Falmont almost all their lives. They
went to the same church, attended the same book clubs and seemed intent on
recruiting her.

“We hardly know
anything about you,” Sue Ellen whined. “Keep turning us down and you’ll make us
suspicious!” The last line was delivered with the same singsong tone Charlotte
sometimes heard Sue Ellen use with her students.

“I assure you,
your suspicions would be wasted. Excuse me.”  She turned away, irritated.

“It was just a
joke, dear,” Sue Ellen said, her tone piqued.

But Charlotte
was too tired to care. Being roped into handling the Thanksgiving play was bad
enough;  to have to answer about how she spent her free time did nothing to
improve her mood.  She turned the corner and started down the hallway, relieved
when she finally came to the door. But as she opened it, the strap on her bag
broke, spilling her papers all over the floor.  “Great,” she said, sighing in
exasperation. She leaned down and then startled when a large pair of hands
began to assist her in the pickup.

“Mr.
Longbridge,” she said. “I didn’t even see you!”

“I was in the
janitor’s closet putting up the janitor’s bucket left in my office. Timmy Reid
decided to not just get himself sent to me today, but he also decided to come
down with a case of severe nausea as I was explaining why we don’t call our
fellow students names.”

Charlotte found
herself smiling. Nigel Longbridge had always struck her as a bit officious and
she realized that this was the first time he’d ever made small talk with her.
She had always thought he was attractive, and attributed part of it to his
speaking voice. He’d been born in England and came to the U.S. twenty years
earlier, according to the other teachers.  He’d not lost a trace of his accent.

“There now,” he
said, handing her the stack of papers. She opened the bag, which she was
holding from the bottom, and he slid the bundle in. “At least you’ll have an
excuse to go shopping for a proper bag now.”

“I’ll probably
just sew the strap back on,” Charlotte said, looking at the damage.

“Hmm.
Thriftiness. That’s a good trait. Quite uncommon in this day in age.”

Charlotte
laughed. “We do seem to be too busy to preserve things, don’t we? It’s easier
just to replace them, more convenient.”

“That’s just one
of the things wrong with society today, Ms. Tetter,” he said. “The traditional
values were far better…”

His words
intrigued her, but Nigel Longbridge suddenly grew quiet, as if embarrassed at
having gotten too caught up in the conversation. He took a step back and
adjusted his tie. He was tall and slim, his brunette hair thick and wavy. He
struck the perfect balance between masculinity and Geek. Charlotte felt herself
blush and look away.  “Thanks again,” she said. “Goodnight.”

She turned
before he could reply and walked hurriedly to her car. Her face felt flushed
and her heart was hammering. What in the world was happening to her? She did
not have to turn to know that he was still in the doorway, watching her. As she
pulled away in her car, she could still see him standing by the door. He was
appearing to adjust a poster on the window by the door, but she could see him
watching her from above the top.

“Stop it,” she
chided herself on the way home. But already, the wheels in her sex-starved
brain were already churning. Charlotte tried to think of anything but the
professorial Nigel Longbridge, and how large his hands were. She always paid
attention to man’s hands, imagining what they would feel like spanking her
bottom…

By the time she
pulled into her driveway, she was furious with herself. Charlotte’s unwritten,
personal rule excluded men she personally knew from her fantasies. Men from
television and movies were fair game. James Bond, Dr. Who, Indiana Jones - no
problem. But Nigel Longbridge, her boss? Problem.

Charlotte forced
herself to think of anything else as she walked into her house. With a sigh,
she removed the contents of her bag onto her writing desk and examined the
strap. It could be fixed easily and since her sewing machine was set up in the
corner she quickly stitched the handle and put the bag to the side. She felt
tense and decided the best remedy was to write. She needed to get a new story
to the publishers at Moonlight, anyway. Christmas was coming on and she wanted
to makes sure she had enough put aside to get gifts for her parents and little
brother.

Sometimes the
best way to diffuse a fantasy was to play it out on her computer screen, so
Charlotte began to write a novella loosely based on a girls' school teacher who
looked much like her and a headmaster loosely based on Nigel Longbridge. The
setting was turn of the century England, where the female lead, Penelope Hill,
was seeking to protect a student from what she suspected are false accusations
from a group of Victorian Mean Girls. The student was slated for punishment at
the hands of the headmaster, and to buy time, Miss Hill had lied to keep that
from happening. But the headmaster, Basil Edge, found out about the lie.

He confronted
me the next morning in his private office, just before classes. It was tidy but
smelled of musty books, just as I always imagined it would. I’d spent a lot of
time imagining Mr. Edge’s office, more than I should have perhaps. The
headmaster was taciturn with both students and staff, offering little more than
a daily greeting or curt instructions as he managed the school. His presence
had always seemed to me the embodiment of authority. We would stand straighter
and get on our best behavior just by glimpsing him in the hallway. His
authority both mesmerized and terrified me. I’d dreamt and feared of being
called into his office and here I was, standing before the man himself.

“The matrons
have come to me with a disturbing report,” he said.

“Sir?” I
asked careful to inject innocence into my voice, even though I knew what was
coming.

They say that
for three days now Lydia has been absent from school, and therefore unable to
answer allegations of scrawling naughty words on the property of another
student. She is your student and one of the matrons said she saw you visiting
Lydia at home and the girl is not sick at all. She believes that you, Miss
Hill, have instructed the lass to remain truant until you can clear her name.
Is this true?

My heart was
pounding. The matrons were all prudish gossips. They’d not liked me from the
start.

“I do not
know what you mean,” I lied. I could not look at him as I spoke. I am a
terrible liar. My eyes always give me away. I looked at the floor.

“Really?” Mr.
Edge stood and walked around the desk. He moved in front of me and put a finger
under my chin, tilting it up until I was forced to look into his eyes.

“You deny
it?” he asked.

“I do,” I confirmed,
praying my eyes would not betray me as they always did. But one look into his
told me that they were doing just that. 

“So if I told
you that I went around and spoke to Lydia’s parents and they confirmed the
matron’s story, then what would you say?”

I said
nothing, afraid now to say anything.

“Miss Hill,”
he said. “I am a patient man until I am met with willful defiance. I will have
an answer from you.”

I swallowed.
I had no way to know if Mr. Edge were bluffing. But he did not strike me as the
type of man to bluff. I began to speak, choosing my words carefully.

“I work with
these girls every day,” I began. “I see their interaction, their spitefulness,
the way they prey on the weakest among them. I see what goes on between them,
the hierarchy, the meanness..”

“You’re not
answering my question.” He cut me off, his authoritative tone effectively
dashing the beginnings of what I’d hoped would be an adequate excuse for
misleading him. “I’m looking for a yes or no answer, Miss Hill, not a
dissertation. Surely as an a teacher you know the difference.”

“It’s true,”
I said quietly. “But my motives were good, I assure you.”

“Motives…” He
said the word as if pondering it, turning as he spoke to walk back round to the
other side of his desk. Once there he put his hands on the surface, leaned
over, and looked at me.  “Miss Hill,” he said. “This is grounds for dismissal.
You understand that, do you not?”