Lunch goes really well

When you’re about a block away from the mall with the food court, you text Penelope and arrange to meet her by the western entrance.

Once you’re inside, you spot her from a few hundred feet away: that combination of ‘long coppery red hair’ and ‘almost as tall as you’ is hard to miss. She’s looking in your general direction; after a few seconds, she spots you too, and waves.

“Jacob!” she calls out, excited, and by now you’re not surprised as you’re hugged by a seventh woman in as many hours. “It’s so good to see you!”

You hug her back. She smells nice, and her tits are pressing against you, and she’s warm, and enthusiastic, and you’ve always thought she was pretty, and after that conversation this morning you genuinely like her as a person (wait – was that only this morning?!), and it is only by rigid self-control – and the awareness that you are in a public place with a lot of other people around – that you manage to not get an erection.

Penelope steps back and gazes at you appraisingly. “Damn,” she says. “I wasted a year.”

You smile at that. Then she blinks. “Wait, are you wearing the same – the exact same clothes as yesterday?!”

“Well, yeah. All my other clothes were in my apartment.”

She winces. “Oh, right.”

“Don’t worry, I put them through the laundry this morning.”

“I have a related question, then,” she says. “But it can wait until after we get lunch. Because I was waiting for you, and I’m hungry.”

It’s almost 1pm, so the lines are a lot shorter, and it’s barely five minutes before you and Penelope are seated at one of the food court’s many tables. You have pad see ew with beef from Thai Game, and Penelope has chicken caesar with a side of fries from Republic of Salad, and you both pick at each other’s plates.

“The related question?” you prompt her.

“Oh, right. Since you put all your clothes in the laundry this morning… does that mean you were naked while we were talking?”

She waggles her eyebrows.

You snicker. “No, my sister lent me a bathrobe.”

Penelope shrugs. “More serious question: was everything okay with your insurance appointment? Since it took so much time?”

“Well, the appointment before me was running long, and then the guy basically went berserk.”

Penelope blinks. “He what?”

“Screaming, yelling, knocking furniture over –”

She pales. “Oh my god, are you okay?”

“Me? Yeah, I was in the waiting room. He was doing this when he was in Maggie’s office with her. Uh, Maggie’s my insurance person. Then he opened the door, screamed FUCK!, and stomped out.”

“Is she okay?”

“I mean… he didn’t actually hit her, she said he never even touched her, but… ugh.”

Now Penelope looks grim. “Eric never actually hit me either,” she says. Then she closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. “I do not want to fucking talk about Eric right now,” she mutters. “I want to have a nice lunch date with my friend Jacob.”

She opens her eyes; they’re a little wet.

You put your hand on hers, and she smiles faintly at you. Your phone buzzes. “Go on,” she says. “Maggie?”

“Right, yeah. She was a little dazed when we went in there – me and the receptionist – but she was okay after a while. Well, she seemed okay, at least. I heard her giggle when I was picking up the papers, so that was encouraging.”

“… papers?”

“The berserk guy tore up a lot of – I don’t know what they were, my best guess is they were other people’s insurance policies, but Maggie said they were confidential so I didn’t look.”

You explain about helping rescue the documents, and about crawling around with your eyes closed, and about how this was actually a little hazardous. You explain about bonking your head into Maggie’s desk a few times, with sound effects, and Penelope giggles too. You explain about your head going into the receptionist’s ass –

Penelope bursts out laughing, and you wince. “I mean,” you say. “I mean… you know what I mean!”

She’s still laughing. “Yes, yes, I know, I know…”

Nobody else seems to be paying attention to the two of you, but Penelope lowers her voice anyway. “I hope you got her name before you went into her ass!”

You mock-glare at her. “I did, actually. She’s Belinda.”

She looks at you very innocently. “Does Belinda have a nice ass?”

You take a fry from Penelope’s plate and eat it before answering. “Well, it’s bigger than yours.”

She smiles. “You’ve looked at my ass a lot?”

“Uh…”

You take another fry from her plate.

“… honestly, no.”

She blinks. “What?”

“I mean, the first few days after you started work, sure, I looked at you and I thought, she’s pretty, she’s smart, she seems interesting – and, I mean, yes, sure, I guess I’ve also looked at your tits and ass, I’m a heterosexual male – but you made it very obvious that you didn’t want anything to do with me, so I figured it wasn’t… wasn’t a good idea to keep looking.”

She sighs. “That makes sense, I guess.” She takes a chunk of beef from your plate and eats it. “I’m glad you think I’m smart and interesting.”

“Well, you are.”

“Thank you. … So, I only mentioned my ass, but you said you’ve looked at my tits too.”

You blink. “Uh…”

“Do you like them?”

You blink again. “…yes? But, again, I mean… don’t creep on the new analyst, especially if she clearly doesn’t like you.”

She nods, conceding the point.

From there, the conversation drifts into workplace issues – what you’ve missed in the office today, what you’ll be missing over the next several days, how much PTO you’ll be using while you search for a new place to live…

“I’ll try to be in by Thursday,” you tell Penelope.

“I really, really appreciate it, but if you need more time off, I promise it’s okay,” she says. “First thing I did with my new access level was spend an hour going through your project files for the past two years, and you’re more productive than I realized… are you looking at my tits?”

It’s a very liberating feeling to be able to say “Yes.” She smirks.

“But also,” you continue, “you’ve got a piece of lettuce on your shirt.” You touch the equivalent spot on your own shirt; she glances at it, swears, and gets up.

“Be right back,” she says. “Napkins.”

While she’s away, your phone buzzes – with a text, not the Multiplier. You pull it out to check.

The text is from Eleanor, and it has a picture of Graham hugging Banana in front of your building – your old building, dammit. Graham is clearly crying but… not happy, he’s lost his apartment too, but relieved.

“Who’s that?” Penelope says, looking over your shoulder.

“That’s Graham, he was in the apartment next to mine. And that’s Banana.”

You recap the story of how you and your neighbor Eleanor technically committed breaking-and-entering to rescue a pet bunny.

“He’s adorable. And huge! I didn’t know bunnies got that size!”

“He’s a Flemish Giant. Almost twenty pounds.”

“Mm. This was the fire down by Preston Street?”

You nod. “Just off Preston, yeah. Oh, that reminds me – this morning, you asked if there was anything you could do to help me?”

Penelope stops with her fork halfway to her mouth. “Yes? What do you need?”

“You have a car, right?”

She finishes her forkful, then nods. “Where do you need to go?”

“Can you help me empty the salvageable stuff from my apartment, carry it over to my sister’s place?”

She looks thoughtful. “I can absolutely do that. Hold on a moment,” and she pulls out her phone and taps on the screen. “Rain forecast for the weekend, so we’ll need to do it before then… I have meetings this afternoon and tomorrow morning… how about tomorrow afternoon?”

You finish the last of the pad see ew, and offer Penelope the last chunk of beef. She takes it, and offers you the last of her fries, which you likewise take. “Yeah, tomorrow afternoon sounds good, I’ll text you and we’ll figure out the logistics.”

She smiles. “I’m glad I can help make things better for you, Jacob,” she says, and she takes your hand in hers. “What are you doing this afternoon?”

“Uh… first, my sister gave me her apartment key, so I’m going to get it duplicated and then stop by her work to give back the original. Then… I guess I need to go shopping for new clothes. I don’t want to wear these three days in a row. Maggie said they’ll reimburse me if I keep my receipts.”

She nods. “Good luck.”

“Would it help if I avoided a particular color?”

She blinks. “What?”

“Blue gray green white black,” you say. “Can’t repeat Eric’s pattern if I don’t have all five colors, right?”

Penelope’s eyes widen. “You remember that?”

“Uh, yeah? It bothered you enough that you went a full year not liking me, so…”

Penelope blinks several times. Her eyes are wet, and she sniffles. Your phone buzzes.

“Thank you for offering,” she says after a moment, “but it’s fine. Get whatever color shirts you want, and if I ever notice that you wore Eric’s pattern three days in a row, I’ll tell you so you can break it.”

“Deal,” you say, and you both get up from the table and head for the food court exit.

“I’ve got a meeting in fourteen minutes,” Penelope says, “so I need to get back to the office, but… I had a really good time with you today, Jacob.” She’s smiling.

“Thanks!” you say, and smile back. “I had a really good time too.”

She bites her lip, and for a second you think she’s going to hug you again, but then she leans forward and kisses you on the cheek. Mostly on the cheek – the corner of her mouth brushes against yours, and it could have been unintentional?

“Bye!” she says, and walks away. Since she pretty much gave you explicit permission, you watch her ass move as she goes.

It’s a really, really nice ass, but you’re still in public so you don’t let yourself fantasize about her just now.

You pull out your phone and find a locksmith shop located between here and Tammy’s boutique, then use the route planner to figure out how to get there, then head for the bus stop.

Once you’re there, you sit down to wait, and pull out your phone. First, you text Eleanor back with a “yay! Tell Graham I said hi!”

Then you open the Multiplier and look at Penelope’s full profile, since you only glanced at it last time.

Name: Penelope Kayla Jones

Personal Information -

• Age: 23
• Gender: Female
• Marriage Status: Divorced
• Children: 0

Physical Information -

• Height: 6’ 1/2”

• Weight: 182

• Eyes: Green

• Hair: Red

• Bust: 38D

• Waist: 28

• Hips: 38

• Sexual experience +

  ---

  You consider looking at what the app says about Penelope’s sexual history, but decide that doing so might give you an erection, and you are in public. Instead, you check the status updates.

• Penelope Jones: Oh my god, that hug! +4/+4/+9 (77/56/25)

• Penelope Jones: Has realized you’re honestly not that bad-looking, now that she’s giving you a proper chance. 0/0/+7 (77/56/32)

• Penelope Jones: Likes how it feels to be picking food off each other’s plates. 0/+3/0 (77/59/32)

• Penelope Jones: Got to make a joke about you being naked! 0/0/+1 (77/59/33)

• Penelope Jones: You understand that “he didn’t hit her” isn’t enough. +1/+1/0 (78/60/33)

• Penelope Jones: You offered emotional support when she was thinking about Eric. +1/+2/0 (79/61/33)

• Penelope Jones: Likes that you’re funny. +4/+1/0 (83/62/33)

• Penelope Jones: Likes that you volunteered to help Maggie and whoever those policies belonged to. +1/+3/0 (84/65/33)

• Penelope Jones: Got to make a joke about you fucking Maggie’s receptionist! 0/0/+1 (84/65/34)

• Penelope Jones: Realized she likes the idea of you looking at her ass. 0/0/+5 (84/65/39)

• Penelope Jones: You think she’s pretty. +1/+4/+3 (85/69/42)

• Penelope Jones: “Well, you are.” +4/+5/+1 (89/75/43)

• Penelope Jones: You said you like her tits. 0/0/+5 (89/79/48)

• Penelope Jones: Caught you looking at her tits, and you admitted it. +1/0/+1 (90/79/49)

• Penelope Jones: You rescued a bunny! +1/+3/0 (91/82/49)

• Penelope Jones: You remembered about Eric’s pattern, and you offered to accommodate her. +3/+9/0 (94/91/49)

• Penelope Jones: Kissed you. A tiny bit. It felt special. 0/+1/+1 (94/92/50)

• Peaches and Eggplants: Got someone to +50 Lust. Mmm. (100 points awarded)

• Penelope Jones: Is confident that you’re watching her ass. 0/0/+5 (94/92/55)

  ---

These are very, very impressive numbers, but you’re not sure what they mean you should actually do. Is Penelope in love with you now? Should you have kissed her? Her Lust score is past 50 – is she going to be really horny for the rest of the day? Tammy’s Lust score is in the nineties, and she masturbated in the shower twice this morning. You’re totally confident Sigrid would eagerly say yes if you asked her to be your girlfriend, and so would Eleanor, and they’d both be great to spend more time with. But what about Molly? For that matter, what about Sonia? Her Affection score was really low. Should you do anything about that? Or Maggie and Belinda? Or –

Then the bus pulls up, so you put the phone away and get on.