#15: Take My Picture

Having gone to bed early the previous night, Whitley woke up around 6:30 and managed to leave the house before Alicia could intercept her for a jog. She walked down Empire St. to John Hardy's, where she enjoyed a double-order eggs benedict, a fruit bowl, and coffee. She spoke with the server Reggie as she left, who directed her to a prep cook who sold her an eighth of weed for $45. She'd have been happier about the deal if the product were not of such mediocre quality. She stuffed the plastic bag into her backpack and jogged back down the street, taking a few side streets to extend her trip.

Arriving back home, she found Krysta on the porch, drinking tea and reading a New Yorker. She considered joining her but then waved as she headed into the house and up to her room. She shut her door behind her and opened the window, letting in the autumn sun as she packed a bowl and took four long hits. Laying back on her bed, she relaxed and checked her email. She put off reading Coach Richter's Monday practice agenda until later. She had a more intriguing message to investigate.

Google Alert - "Whitley Valentine"

The Google Alerts had generally tapered off since she'd left college and managed to stay out of the news. There were occasional rumblings about her on message boards here or there, but nothing substantial. There was a time when she read them daily. These days, she preferred the weekly digest. There were three alerts today. The first was from earlier in the week where the NU athletics page made a minor announcement of her hiring and listed her on the website. The second was yet another spambot post message from the "Whitley Valentine Sexy Feet" Yahoo! group. The third, however, gave her pause. She followed the link to a message board, read the message, and sighed.

Whitley Valentine is a volleyball coach at my school!!! She is absolutely STUNNING in-person.

I'm back on the radar.

The fact she was a discussion topic on a giant women message board did not concern her. She'd been a fixture in the tall admirer community for years. Her thread extended back seven years to when she was a junior in high school. If anything, it was due for an update. What she wasn't in the mood for was some creep on campus snapping pictures of her without her permission or knowledge. Whoever it was had apparently already seen her, which narrowed the likely suspects down to college staff, student-athletes, and the few others on campus in the early autumn...basically a few thousand people.

She pushed the worry aside for now. She'd save her concern for when a candid picture of her actually appeared. With two more hits she cashed her bowl, then emptied the ash out the window. She changed into flip flops, pajama pants, and a comfortable mini-tee, and stepped into the hallway where she found a squatted Krysta in a tank top and shorts gathering cleaning supplies from the hall closet. Whitley was amused with the way Krysta's breasts packed the space between her knees, arms, and neck. Krysta unexpectedly looked up, and Whitley blurted the first thing that came to mind.

"Wow...your tits."

Krysta grinned. "I will simply say 'thank you.' Besides, I took a curious look at the inseam of your pants in the laundry yesterday so I cannot throw stones."

"Impressed?"

"Flabbergasted."

"Thank you. So, I assume the first Saturday is cleaning day, eh?"

"It is part of the routine, yes. As normal, I will take the bathroom. My parents paid for the renovation, so the room is my baby, of sorts. Alicia will get the kitchen since it is her second home after the basement. Are you okay with tackling the living room?"

Whitley shrugged. "Can I blast Songs in the Key of Life while I do it?"

"Whatever you need," Krysta said, tossing her a tub of Swiffer sheets. "And please, be thorough. I film myself topless in there, and I have standards. I am not making some thrown-together girl-next-door smut."

Whitley was formulating how she might ask for a trial membership to watch Krysta's shows when Alicia emerged from her room wearing a pastel-pink maid costume complete with tiara, gloves, stockings, apron, frills, and cat ears. Krysta picked up her bucket of supplies and slipped past Alicia into the bathroom, not giving her a second look. Whitley's semi-baked mind struggled to process the extent of the spectacle in front of her. The outfit was expertly crafted and flattered Alicia's powerful frame. It still didn't look any less absurd. Whitley stared as Alicia pawed her face like a cat.

"Okaerinasaimase, Ojou-sama!"

Whitley shook her head. "What in the holy fuck are you wearing?" 

"It's cleaning day, silly!"

Whitley wasn't sure what answer she had expected. Alicia presented her phone to Whitley, daintily holding the device at its bottom edges with both hands.

"Whitley, will you please take my picture?"

"What on Earth for?"

"Internet!" Alicia exclaimed with a touch of impatience. Whitley took the phone, and by the time she had opened the app and held it up to her face, Alicia was fully posed with her hands folded, head cocked to the side, and body tilted forward in a slight bow.

"You look like the Terminator version of Rosie from The Jetsons," Whitley said, snapping several pictures.

Alicia snorted with amusement while assessing Whitley's undersized outfit, complete with side-ponytail. "You look like a Titan disguised as a college coed."

Whitley handed the phone back to Alicia. "You look like the housemaid for an eccentric submissive."

"You look like you ate a pot brownie with 'Eat Me' written on it."

"You look like Mrs. Doubtfire, starring Sylvester Stallone."

"You look like She-Hulk cosplaying as a normal person."

"As much as I sincerely hate to cut in," Krysta shouted from the bathroom. "I am going to insist you two get cleaning. If we're on this now, we can be done in time for lunch." Alicia smiled a bright, beaming grin and proceeded down the stairs to the kitchen, her Maryjane clogs clicking loudly on the wooden floors. Whitley stepped into her room to raid her record collection for Stevie Wonder's Greatest Hits and snagged the broom and Swiffer on her way to the living room.

"So, look what I found behind the couch." Whitley held up the wrinkled jeans she'd extracted while cleaning the living room floors. As Krysta had forseen, the three girls had blasted through the morning cleaning and were finished in time for lunch.

"I was wondering when those would turn up." Alicia served a tray of mini-sandwiches, sugar cookies, and tea, her maid outfit still impeccably clean despite having scrubbed, mopped, and dusted the kitchen to sparkling perfection. "I figured they were still here somewhere."

"Yeah, but it doesn't explain how I lost them in the first place."

Krysta scratched her head, struggling to piece together her recollection of Whitley's inaugural visit. "I am fairly certain you had them on when we were on the balcony. You would have been cold otherwise."

"You guys were only out there for, like, a half-hour tops," Alicia said, refilling the tea. "You came in around midnight."

Whitley tried her best to recall the events of the evening, but both her current and past impairment worked against her. "I...think I remember."

"Was that after midnight?" Krysta said, puzzled.

"Well, the first time you guys came back for more wine, and Whitley said she wanted to—" A chime sounded from the kitchen. "Time to wipe the oven!" Alicia cried out, pointing a finger in the air. She set down the teapot, placed her hands together, bowed, and promptly left the room. Krysta continued pondering over the events of their hazy night, but Whitley had already moved on to more recent matters.

"Hey, Krys. Do you do Google Alerts?"

"No. I have a good idea of what I have put out onto the internet. Outside the context of my live chats and feedback in the comments on my videos, I am not particularly interested in what people have to say about me. Why?"

Whitley held up her phone. "Google Alert. Apparently, someone on campus was real excited to see me in person. Posted on a message board for giant women admirers."

"You must have seen that coming."

"Guess I took the quiet for granted. Turns out, I wasn't as off the radar as I thought. I'd stepped away from it for a while."

"Does it worry you?"

"I dunno. I guess I'm not in the mood for this same, tired...routine." Whitley hung on the last word and stared into space. After a minute of silence, she stood up and dropped her pajama pants to the floor, baring her legs. Krysta watched with both surprise and fascination as the near-bottomless Whitley gave her jeans a few rigorous shakes, slid them on and fastened the buttons. She tossed her pajama pants onto the couch and gave her legs a pat-down.

"Just had that denim urge?" Krysta asked. She was feeling a vague sense of deja vu.

"Not exactly." Whitley slipped her feet into her sandals, which laid next to the shoe rack near the door. She looked at herself and gave a satisfied nod, sat back in the chair, and tossed her phone to Krysta. It landed on the couch next to her with a dull thud.

"What are you up to?" Krysta asked.

Whitley pulled the tie out of her hair and shook out her thick curls. She took a final hit and set the bong aside, then turned to Krysta.

“Can you take my picture?"

"What on Earth for?"

"Don’t worry about it."