Neither of us asked questions about the other’s sexual history. As a bachelor earning good money, I’d had plenty of opportunities to enjoy sex in South America and I assumed that Penny had done something similar in New York. There was a tacit assumption that I wouldn’t ask how she was such an expert when she gave me a blowjob and she never asked where I’d learned about cunnilingus. I can’t say I wasn’t curious, but I decided to let that sleeping dog lie. Through the year that followed, we spent the better part of our times together, in both senses, in bed.
At that point I got an offer to go and work in Germany. I was keen, but the idea of being so far from Penny made me hesitate. I discussed it with her, but things had stalled until one very early morning she called me long-distance.
“Pete?”
I could hear anger in her voice, mixed with panic. “A problem?” I asked.
“They fired me. The bastards just fired me!”
“No!” It didn’t make sense. I knew Penny was a conscientious, hard-working employee, who put in what seemed to me to be ridiculously long hours at her desk. “What happened?”
She explained that the bosses at her firm had been sailing too close to the wind and had just been caught out. The upshot was that while the big guns were fined a pitiful amount, they “let go” all their staff. No compensation, and a black mark on Penny’s CV that would make it hard to find a new job. She got onto the next plane and once I had comforted her, I brought up the subject of our future.
“There’s nothing to stop you now. Please will you come with me?” I asked.
“I don’t speak German.”
“You’re an intelligent woman. You can learn,” I encouraged her. “Even the dumbest Germans can speak German. You talk Spanish with your grandmother, don’t you? So German shouldn’t be too difficult.”
“Easy for you to say that, Pete,” Penny said. She sat in silence for a while. “On the other hand, there’s nothing for me here until the scandal dies down.” She shrugged. “I could do with a rest, too. I’ve been shattered for months now. And I’m sick of having to dress up every day for work.”
“How would you like the chance to be a casually-dressed lady of leisure in Germany, at least for a time, while you get up to speed on the language?” I asked her. “Maybe you could teach some private English lessons? I can afford to keep us both for a while, so anything you earn will be yours to spend on riotous living…but if it’s sexy riotous, I hope you’ll let me join in. How does that sound?”
“I get to keep whatever I earn?” Penny sounded more enthusiastic. However much she had been earning, and it had been considerable, she’d always struggled to break even at the end of the month.
“You do.”
“That’s tempting. Oh well. I enjoyed being in England and I guess Germany can’t be too different,” she said after a little thought. ”Okay. Leap and the net will appear. Let’s do it. I’m in.”
I went first, to set up house and start work. Penny arrived a few weeks later, carrying a single bag.
“That’s all you have?” I asked. I was used to Penny turning up even for a weekend with at least two big cases.
“New country, new start,” she said. “I sold off all my work outfits and a load of other stuff as well. Everything I own in the way of clothes is in this case. Live light is my new motto.”
Which was fine for a while, until she asked me what it meant when she overheard one of our neighbors referring to her as “unsere Jeansdame”. That pissed Penny off and she asked me if I would take her shopping.
Having just moved country, we were not in a position to lash out for an expensive fashion makeover, so off we went to one of the major department stores in the city. The saleswoman was very helpful and made suggestions as to what would suit Penny. They disappeared into the changing room. When Penny emerged, she was different. I couldn’t recall ever having seen her in a skirt before. Even at tennis she usually wore track pants. I was very much aware that Penny’s ass was seriously cute in or out of her habitual jeans and that her boobs were pretty neat too. Now, it sank in for the first time, really, that her legs were well up to that same standard. The skirt she bought that day fell maybe a couple of inches above her knee and the way it swung as she walked made me wish it had been shorter…a lot shorter.
I demonstrated my enthusiasm that night and told Penny I’d love to see her in something less conservative. She didn’t fight my suggestion and her second skirt, my choice since I was paying, showed a lot more leg. It was made of a lighter material, too, which made it float a little as she walked.
Not long after that, we were walking through the middle of Saarbrücken when Penny stopped to look in a shop window. I was standing a few paces behind her when a gust of wind blasted down the street. Penny wasn’t the only woman who found herself with her skirt whipped up round her waist. A couple of guys who were passing got an eyeful of her skimpy pale-blue underwear and one of them gave me a big grin of appreciation. A light came on in that part of my brain devoted to sexy thoughts. Penny’s exposure was accidental and nothing to do with me, but I knew instantly that if I got a chance I would show her off. I’d have to be careful what I said to Penny about it, though. Although she’d gotten used to wearing a skirt, I couldn’t be sure she’d be comfortable knowing how much I, and others, had enjoyed that moment. For the following week or so, I spent an unreasonable amount of my day-dreaming time wondering how a repeat performance might come to pass.