Fine. Yes, it's the right thing to do.

"My girlfriend's gonna be so pissed when she finds out about these power outages," I hurriedly blurted out. The words sounded more **** and **** than they probably should have. "She and I already signed a year lease."

Tami kept smiling, but I saw a bit of the wind go out of her sails. She quietly let herself drift a few feet further from me in the pool, for propriety's sake.

Claire, on the other hand, suddenly looked like a completely different person. She hadn't shown me a genuine smile even once, all day—but as soon as she heard me say the words "my girlfriend," she instantly relaxed. She started acting friendly—even silly. It made me wonder if her whole icy persona wasn't just some sort of subconscious defense mechanism she'd evolved to defend against constantly getting hit on at work.

The girls insisted I tell them about Sonya—she was going to be their neighbor too, after all—and so I laid out the facts of our whole frustrating, long-distance situation.

"Eight weeks without seeing each other? That's awful!" Tami said.

"Tell me about it."

"Do you even know anybody else out here?" Claire asked, frowning. "Or are you all by yourself until then?"

"Well, I don't exactly plan to spend the summer holed-up in my apartment with the curtains drawn—but no, I don't really know anybody out here. Not yet, anyway. Haven't quite figured out what I'm gonna do for a social life now that I'm officially a Californian."

My eyes travelled back and forth between the two women in the pool with me: Tami—short, curvy, and cute. Claire—tall, slender, and striking. Each of them ridiculously, impossibly beautiful in her own way.

I laughed, "Although, I suppose I could have had a worse first night here than meeting the two of you."

"Aww!" Tami giggled. "Don't worry, we'll be your friends. We might as well get to know each other, if we're all gonna be working together, right?"

And with that, she surprised me with another of her big-breasted hugs. The soft curve of her hip rubbed up against my still-raging erection, and Tami's eyes widened at the sensation. Then, with her back to Claire, Tami gave me a brief, secretive wink.

"Anyway, it's getting late, we've gotta make dinner soon," Claire sighed, pointing up at the now inky black sky above us.

They both headed off and I stayed behind in the pool for a few minutes, waiting for my penis to calm down before I hopped back on dry land with a boner in full view of my neighbors. When I finally did emerge from the water, I realized that the 80-year-old woman was still sitting at the side of the pool, serenely poking at the water with her toes.

She looked a bit lost, so I walked over to her and asked, "How are you doing? Everything okay?"

"Oh, I'm just thinking," she said.

"Thinking about what?"

She turned to me, her eyes glinting with knowing mischief: "Thinking about how nice it would be if I could still fill out a bathing suit as well as those two friends of yours. Once upon a time, you know."

I just nodded, having no idea how in hell I was gonna respond to that. She saw my discomfort and chuckled genially. "Well, well, well. Mister big handsome man spends all evening flirting with two beautiful girls, but he gets all tongue-tied trying to talk to an old woman."

"Seems to be the case," I smirked.

"Did I overhear you say you're girlfriend is out of town for a few weeks?"

"Yeah."

"Well then, son, I suggest you hurry home and rub one out before you do something incredibly stupid. I know how a young man's mind works, believe me."

Blushing all the way down to my most vestigial internal organs, I nodded my thanks and, still naked except for my wet boxer briefs, I hurried back to my apartment, fully intending to do just as she suggested. Thank god for jacking off; the world's single greatest vaccination against infidelity—

I'd locked myself out.

In my hurry to get downstairs to the pool, I had left my keys inside, with the doorknob bolt locked out of habit. Now I was stuck out here, in the dark, with no phone, no keys, no wallet, and no clothes.

With a sigh, I realized there was only one thing to do...