Eve's Boutique - Chapter 3

 

Chapter 3

Home Life

Abigail and Chloe spent the afternoon together in the living room of their shared apartment.  Chloe sat on the floor, notes and textbooks spread in front of her.  Abigail was draped across her easy chair, reading a fantasy novel and carefully maintaining her mimosa buzz.

The two spoke little.  At one point, Chloe mentioned that Abigail had a test coming up in French Phonetics, and hadn’t she better be studying?

“Mêle toi de tes oignons.  And don’t you owe me a back rub?”

Chloe dutifully went to work.  She came to stand behind Abigail, and had the shorter woman remove her sweatshirt and strip to her bra and lounge shorts.  She spent a good half hour, massaging soft oil into Abigail’s shoulders.

Abigail grinned owlishly.  The novel in her lap was reaching its romantic climax, and this story had some seriously great sex scenes.  Reading a book, sipping an adult beverage, while her sexy best friend gave her a massage?  This was turning out to be a pretty good Sunday.

Neither girl mentioned the neatly wrapped package on the coffee table, though both of them looked at it often.

Mackenzie arrived around four o’clock with a young gentleman in tow.  His arms were draped with shopping bags.  Abigail had put her shirt back on by then.  This wasn’t a guy she’d seen before.  He was cute, and tall even by Mackenzie’s standards.  She had often explained her rule against sleeping with anyone who didn’t have at least a three-inch height advantage.  Mackenzie was five-nine, which removed most women, and a decent number of guys from her dating pool.

Still, she never had trouble finding suitors.

Abigail and the young man began a friendly conversation, but it wasn’t long before Mackenzie interrupted, saying she had something in the back she needed help with, and wouldn’t he just be a dear and come along?

“I’m really glad we gave her the back bedroom,” Chloe said, as Mackenzie turned on her white noise machine and shut her door.  “At least we can’t hear them going at it, all the way down the hall.”

“Yeah,” Abigail said flatly.  “It would be awful to hear your friend having sex every night.”

Chloe looked at the floor.  “Oh yeah.  I’ll um.  Try to be quieter.”

“Sure.  I’ve met Kayla though, so like.  Taking bets on how that goes.”

The sun was setting when Kayla, their fourth roommate, finally arrived.

“Hey guys.  What a fucking day.  I’m exhausted.”

Chloe scurried over like an obedient puppy, stood on her tiptoes, and kissed her.  “Take a load off.  I’ll make dinner, then rub your poor aching feet.”

Kayla’s voice dropped too low for Abigail to hear – though from context clues, she thought it was probably, ‘I’ve got something for you to rub.’  Chloe gasped, looking scandalized.  And kissed her more seriously.

The two really did fit well together.  Chloe, her figure soft and generous, against Kayla’s hard-angled muscularity.  Chloe, dark-complexioned, a little shorter than average.  Kayla, her pale skin just beginning to develop a base tan for the summer, and the tallest woman Abigail knew personally at six-foot-one.

Well, she mused.  Second tallest.  After Eve.

Kayla started to take things further, as her lips pressed down against Chloe’s.  For a fleeting moment, Abigail wandered how she might fit in that arrangement, between her friends.  It was an intrusive thought, and thankfully it flitted away as Kayla made sidelong eye contact.

“Sorry about that Abby.  You know how it gets.”

“Sorry about what?  I’m reading.  Definitely not creepily watching you two make out.”

Kayla snorted.  “I getcha.  Man, today was garbage.  We had to haul about six tons of potting soil at my landscaping gig – uphill I might add – and Manny forgot the keys for the goddamn forklift.  Then I unloaded six pallets at the warehouse, by myself.  And all of this after I was up at five to hit the gym.  So Chloe, I’m going to bed early tonight.  Okay?  No tempting me.  With your… wiles.”

Chloe held up two fingers, grinning.  “Scout’s honor.”

“Good.  So what did the two of you get up to today?  How was Bestie Brunch?”

“It was good….” Abigail began.

Chloe cut her off.  “We met a witch!”

“You met a what-now?”

Abigail laughed.  “Do you want to tell her, or should I?”

They told her together.  Chloe began with a lurid portrayal of the shop, its rare and impossible plants.  Abigail picked up the story with a just-as-detailed description of Eve.

“She wasn’t that much taller than me,” Kayla asked.  “Was she?”

“She totally was.”

“She was flirting with Abby.”

Abigail slapped Chloe’s knee.  “She was not.  We were verbally sparring.  She’s a good conversationalist.”

“Uh-huh.  Anyway, what I don’t understand is why you believed she was a witch so quickly.  That’s a pretty astounding claim.”

“Sure.  But look at the context!”  Abigail held up the fantasy novel in her lap, and gave it a little shake.  “A mysterious shop, that wasn’t there before.  Strange and exotic artifacts – or weird plants, same difference.  It’s a cliché.  But it’s one of my favorites.”

“It isn’t like we actually saw her do magic.”

“She knew about Elijah.”

“And didn’t you say most of those plants were impossible to grow in this climate?” Kayla said.  “That seems a little ‘magical’ to me.”

Chloe let out a long, drawn-out sigh.  “Fine.  She’s a witch.  Therefore, we have, in our possession, two magic potions.  And we also have precisely no idea what they do.  Did you hear how vague she was about that?”

“Yeah.”  Abigail toyed with the corner of her book, picking at the cover with her fingernail.  “Witches speak in riddles.  It’s like, part of their code.  The one thing they don’t do is straight-up lie.  So we can piece together some likely outcomes here.  We know my potion is going to make me taller….”

Chloe’s eyes widened.  “What?  How do you know that?”

“I’m not certain-certain.  But I’d give you ten to one odds.  She suggested it right after I pointed out how short I was.  And she also mentioned it was one she used on herself.  You saw how tall she was.  But her build didn’t look like it was meant to support being that big.  Her shoulders were too narrow for one thing.  Compare her to Kayla – how broad her chest is, the shape of her calves.  She’s supposed to be tall.”

Kayla nodded, and relaxed.

“So it’s going to make me grow,” Abigail went on.  “I don’t know if it’s going to be a quarter inch, or if we’re talking ‘Attack of the Fifty Foot Woman.’  Either way, she promised to undo it, and for a witch to say something that specific?  I’d take it to the bank.”

“So what’s mine going to do?” Chloe asked.  “She said it would help with how big my chest is….”

“No she didn’t.  And it’s a good thing, because if she said that, then this potion would probably make your tits grow.  She also didn’t say people would stop staring at you – she said it would stop people you didn’t want from staring.  So maybe it’ll let you turn invisible at will.  Or it could be a confidence potion, so you can find the courage to tell them to fuck off.”

“I wouldn’t mind that,” Kayla said.  She grinned, and slipped her hand into Chloe’s pocket.  “A little more confidence would be sexy on you.”

They made dinner together, and afterward Chloe made good on her promise to rub Kayla’s feet.  Her display of attention and devotion made Abigail’s back rub pale in comparison.  From the sounds the taller woman was making, she was clearly enjoying it.

Abigail was half surprised the windows weren’t fogging up.  And she found herself re-reading the same sentences in her book over and over, constantly getting distracted and losing her place.

The foot rub was still going when Mackenzie emerged from her bedroom.  The boy from earlier followed behind, looking faintly dazed.  The two of them kept grinning at each other like idiots.  They’d managed to dress in a way that didn’t scream, ‘we just had sex,’ though his hair was messy, and Mackenzie’s lipstick was the tiniest bit smudged.

The two made an awkward attempt at conversation with the group, but it was clear the guy was having trouble stringing words together.

“Will I ever see you again?” he asked, as she kissed him goodnight at the door.  “You’re… amazing!”

Mackenzie’s smile lit up the room.  “I’ll check my calendar.  I think I’m free Tuesdays between four and six.”

She closed the door, and let out a contented sigh.  “My, what a nice Sunday.  What did the three of you get up to?”

“Read a fantasy novel,” Abby said quickly.

“Went to a plant shop,” Chloe added.

“Capitalism is a scam.”  Kayla closed her eyes as she enjoyed Chloe’s attention.

“Well.  I hereby declare the day a success, then.  Did you happen to leave me any dinner?  I burned a lot of calories today.”

Mackenzie regaled the three of them with stories about her new guy – Peter, it turned out his name was – while she ate reheated macaroni and cheese.  Nothing she said was explicit, though there was enough innuendo that by the end of it, Abigail was sure she could list every position the two had tried.  Chloe and Kayla didn’t seem to mind, though perhaps they were too caught up in each other to notice.  The sounds Kayla made were getting louder, and the rubbing had progressed too far up the taller woman’s thighs for it to be considered strictly a ‘foot rub.’

Abruptly, Abigail threw her book aside, and stood up.

“Hey Chloe.  Want to try that tea we found?  The herbal blend?  Like now?”

In the kitchen, the two of them stood over steaming cups, each holding a bottle of potion.

“Are we really going to do this?” Chloe whispered.  She sounded scared.

“You don’t have to.”  Abigail set her jaw.  “But I definitely am.”

Together, they poured.

The tea itself was store-bought chamomile.  Nothing special.  The potion made it taste exquisite.  Abigail said hers had savory notes, like a well-mixed Manhattan in one of those flapper-era throwback bars.  Chloe’s was sweeter.  Like a variety of honey she’d tried on vacation in South America.  They both downed them quickly, afraid that if they hesitated they’d lose their nerve.

Afterward, they stood, staring at each other.

“I don’t… feel any different,” Chloe said.

“Me neither.  I guess it takes a little while to work?”

“Babe!” Kayla yelled from the living room.  “My legs are still really sore.  My butt, too!  Do you mind if I take off my pants for the next part?”

“I’m okay with it, for the record,” Mackenzie called.  “Did I mention Peter had an amazing tush?  God, I could spend all night squeezing him.”

“Yeah,” Abigail said.  “I think I’m going to call it a night.”

Abigail shut the door to the bathroom, and got ready for bed.  She was brushing her teeth, standing on tiptoe to see herself in the mirror, when she caught herself staring at her reflection.

Nothing was different.  Not yet.  But she was suddenly struck how… really not-half-bad she looked.  Kind of cute even, if anybody bothered to notice.  She’d just got a fresh pixie cut, and her bangs looked amazing.  She fluffed them a little, then spit out her toothpaste so she could examine herself more closely.

Yeah.  More than kind of cute actually.  Soft round cheeks, tiny upturned nose.  Her parents had been extremely attractive back in the day, judging by old photos, and it was obvious she’d inherited their looks.  Mom sure hadn’t done her any favors, though.  That whole branch of the family was short, even by Japanese standards, and the white guy her mother chose to marry was almost as tiny as she was.

She stepped back, getting a wider angle.  Nothing wrong with her chest either.  Her breasts were on the small side, but the word ‘perky’ suited better than ‘flat.’  She had no ass whatsoever, but she could deal.  If only she wasn’t so damn short.

Abigail’s reflection gave her a toothy grin.  Well.  She’d just see what tomorrow brought.

She lay in bed, thinking for a while, about what it might be like to be taller.  The potion was going to work.  She was sure of it.  What if she managed to grow, say, two inches?  That seemed reasonable.  She could let herself hope for that.  Plus it’d be subtle.  Maybe no one would even ask questions.  People would start noticing her, and not even know why.

Or.  Or!  What if she got really big?  Like Kayla?  Or Eve.  God, Eve was hot.  Tall, she meant.  If she was tall like Eve, she’d be impossible to ignore. 

In the dark, her lips curled up in a smirk.

She was just beginning to slip her hand into her panties, imagining the heights she might reach.  When Chloe moaned from the bedroom next door.

Kayla shushed her.  Then a moment later, moaned herself.

Abigail stared at the ceiling.  God.  Those two had made her abort every attempt at getting herself off for weeks now.  It was somehow even worse when they were trying to be quiet.

She put out the light.

And in the dream that came, someone told her that desires could be dangerous.  But she should desire anyway.