Moondust Hollow Ch. 04: Paid

With her seeds all planted from yesterday, Elsie wasn't certain what to do with herself the next morning. She checked on the little mounds in the earth and watered them well, but that didn't take more than an hour of her time. Looking around at the chaos which was the rest of her farmland, she decided she might as well spend time clearing more land; eventually, if everything went to plan, she would have enough money to buy more seeds for planting and would need room to grow a larger crop.

The work which followed was brutal and left her limbs shaking like a leaf in a gale: she hauled away rocks, breaking open the biggest ones with a pick axe. She cut down trees and threw the wood on the pile heaped next to her rickety shack. She tilled land until her hands threatened to bleed from the blisters left by the hoe.

Elsie was punishing herself, she knew, as well as trying to keep her mind off the last two nights. She didn't like what was happening, what she was becoming; it didn't feel like her. When had she become so passive and docile? Was it life in the cubicle farm which had wrought this change in her? Why had she dropped to her knees and opened her body the instant someone ordered her to? First she submitted to Darryl, then to Charlotte, her entire being flushed and crying out for more as these strangers-her neighbors!-used her like a toy.

Alongside the anger she held for herself, she found room to nurture a seed of frustration at the couples who had slept with her. Yes, she had obeyed. Yes, she had made a choice. But Darryl and Rachel, as well as Charlotte and Paul, were older and wiser and more experienced. They held emotional power over her, as well as the physical power of the debt leveraged against her farm. They knew what they were doing, and didn't care if it was wrong; they were too busy enjoying themselves to dwell on the morality of the situation.

It frustrated Elsie that she could see that they were wrong and yet still want them. Her dreams last night had been torturous affairs of pleasure: Darryl's warm voice praising her as he stroked her hair and took her mouth; Charlotte's soft hands on her body as she brutalized the girl's every hole. Rachel and Paul lurked on the edges of her dream touching themselves and telling her soft praises that faded with the dawn: how lovely she was, how aroused she made them. She woke covered in sweat and panting, masturbating furiously as she chased the orgasm which had seemed so close in her dreams. When she came, it was a quick and unsatisfying, nothing like the roiling sensations her recent partners had coaxed from her.

What the hell was she going to do?

She wouldn't go back to them on one of her off-days, she knew that much. It was one thing to visit when she was scheduled and to work off her debt, but it was another entirely to crawl back to them on her own free time and beg for more. She wasn't a dog to whimper at their doors for scraps. But when would she be scheduled to see them again? Elsie hated herself for wanting more, but her hate couldn't stop the hunger. Her body burned as she worked and no amount of labor could drive away the coiled heat in her stomach.

When it was time to shower and report to her next assignment, Elsie was so exhausted she thought she might have to crawl there. She checked the envelop in her mailbox and breathed a sigh of relief; Jessie and Kevin's house was at least close to hers. Even so, the walk felt like an eternity and she wondered what the evening held in store for her. She'd not met this couple at all, even in passing, and she could only pray that they hadn't received a briefing about her straight from Rachel's tattling lips.

The house, when she entered after knocking, was a country kitsch affair: too many knick knacks covered in dust, with too much gingham trying to force homeliness and cheer into the room. A housewife with a cute face and auburn hair tied in a long braid over her shoulder studied Elsie with listless eyes. Elsie shifted on her feet, feeling uncomfortable. "I'm here to work?" she offered. "I'm Elsie. The farmer. I'm new here."

"Jessie," the woman said, extending a hand to shake without much enthusiasm. "I'm sorry about the mess. I did try to clean up before you got here, but there's just so much to do and anyway that's why you're here, right? Doesn't make much sense to clean house before a maid comes, does it? Not that I'm saying you're a maid, but that's what you're here to do, right? Clean? Or did I get that all wrong?"

Elsie swallowed hard, feeling relief unknot the tightness in her shoulders; as cute as this woman was, she had absolutely no desire to do anything with her in the bedroom. "Yes, ma'am. I'm supposed to be doing, um, odd jobs around the village to pay back the debt on my farm. Taxes. I'm happy to clean."

"Oh, good." Jessie looked relieved, a smile brightening her tired face. "Okay, excellent. I have laundry to do so I'll be in the back room with that, but you can stay out here and dust. You don't need supervision, do you? Oh, good. Please don't mind Kevin, just be quiet and don't get in the way of his television watching."

She gestured at something behind her and Elsie looked around her to see a tall man with rugged features sprawled on the sofa in the middle of the living room. He nodded in their direction but his eyes didn't leave his show. Elsie returned the nod, smiling nervously. "Do you have a dust rag...?"

--

Two hours later, Elsie was exhausted to the point of tears. She'd made a decent dent in the living room, starting on one end and dusting her way to the other side, but there was so much to clean. In addition to the dust on each knick knack, the baseboards needed a thorough dust and wash, and the walls themselves were in need of polishing. Elsie switched from dry dust rag to wet rag to polish rag again and again, heady from the fumes and dust in the air. Kevin watched television while she worked, largely ignoring her.

Jessi checked on her from time to time but mostly kept to her own work in other rooms. In addition to the laundry, there was cooking to be done for tomorrow and dishes left over from tonight. She had her own daily chores to do, she'd explained in a tired voice, and Elsie was here for deep cleaning work that never got done because there was so much else to do. Did she know how to paint? she'd asked in an airy way before heading back into the kitchen with shoulders hunched. Elsie's emotions wavered between relief and a sort of secondhand exhaustion for the poor woman.

When the village bell chimed nine, Jessie wandered back into the living room and watched Elsie rub out a particularly bad spot of grease from the wall. "Liam explained we have you until midnight?" the woman said, voicing a little sad uptick on the end of her sentence to turn it into a question. "I'd like to use you for the full six hours, but I promised Kevin to split your time fifty-fifty. His shed is in the backyard and needs cleaning; I'm not allowed back there. Can you see your way out? I need to start ironing and folding."

Kevin had left through the back door after his show ended. Elsie nodded her agreement, too tired to speak, and let herself out into the dark night. The cool spring air was bracing but she was exhausted. None of her previous work nights had gone until midnight and though neither of them were easy to endure, she'd at least not been scrubbing walls with rubbery arms still tired from a morning spent hefting axes and hoes.

The 'shed' was a little building in the backyard, almost just the size of the little shack she called home and looking twice as sturdy to add insult to injury. She pushed the door open and stepped into a haze of cigarette smoke. "Kevin?" She coughed once, her lungs irritated already from the dust. "Jessie sent me?"

"I'm here." The light cast by a single travel lantern was dim but with his voice she was able to locate him; he was lounging in an army cot crammed into the far side of the shed. He took a long drag on his cigarette, unreadable eyes watching her as she stood by the door, unsure where to start. "Thanks for coming. I told Jessie I needed help cleaning but, well." He cleared his throat and shrugged. "I know what you are."

She blinked at him. "Excuse me?"

He shrugged again, looking almost faintly embarrassed to be having the conversation. "I saw you walking home last night, and the night before. After visiting with the other couples in town."

Elsie's cheeks burned at the memory and her imagination supplied what she must have looked like: tousled hair, clothes askew, cheeks flushed. The scent of sex in the air like a perfume, a sheen of telltale sweat. She took a step back into the shed wall. "Whatever you think you know, you don't. It's not like that."

"I'm not judging," he said, taking another long drag on his cigarette. "God knows I've got no place to. I've visited enough hookers in my time. Or is it whores?" His expression turned concerned, like he'd just taken a dump in her bed and wasn't sure if he'd committed a faux pas. "I forget the proper terms. Sorry."

"Pretty sure it's 'sex worker'," Elsie said through gritted teeth. "And I'm not one. Like I said, it's not like that."

"Sex worker," he echoed obediently. "Sorry. In the army, we didn't fuss much over using the right words."

Elsie took a deep breath and decided to guide the conversation elsewhere. "You were in the army?" Pulling out a rag she began dusting the nearest shelf full of tools, determined to make herself occupied with something other than him. She was here to do a job, dammit, and that job wasn't him.

"Just got back from a four-year tour," he said, leaning back and watching the ceiling while she worked. "Wasn't sure my wife would even recognize me when I got back. Don't get me wrong, I love Jessie and I know she's happy to have me home, but everything's different now. It's not just the sex, but that's a big part of it."

She didn't know what to say to this. He seemed to take her silence as permission to keep going. "She was never super big on sex before I got deployed, but once she found out about the whor- sex workers, sorry, she was done. I think she was relieved to have an excuse, really. Now we have an arrangement and I take discretionary, uh, 'entertainment' money with me when I can get away to town. Which isn't often enough for my tastes." He took a long drag and gave her a lengthy sidelong glance. "I was pretty excited about you coming here for tonight," he admitted, still calm as a cucumber. "To be clear, I did expect to pay you."

Elsie looked up sharply, glaring in fresh confusion. "What?"

Kevin met her eyes. "Which part? Paying you? Well, I mean, I know you're here as a maid for Jessie. Stands to reason that extra shit like taking care of me would cost more. Is one hundred okay?"

It took her a long moment to breathe again as the number dangled before her. One hundred! She was hoping to make that much off her current meager crop, with intention to re-invest the money in more seeds for a higher profit. If she could acquire that much now for an hour's work, what a blessing that would be! She could race to the general store in the morning and buy more seeds without having to wait for her first crop to come in. She'd even cleared the land for it today, which meant she could get right to planting.

Except one problem. She didn't have sex for money.

'No, you just have sex with people you owe money, in lieu of paying them back.' The biting sarcasm in her head was her own voice dipped in vinegar, sour and mean. Was there any difference, really, between sex for cash and sex for credit? At least cash she could use; and if she used her cash wisely, she wouldn't need to have sex for credit. If she turned a high profit on her fields, she could pay back her debts with money.

Elsie studied Kevin, biting her lower lip. His arms and legs were thick and muscular, and he was handsome enough in a soldier-y kind of way; she wasn't attracted to him, but she'd trust him to carry her out of a burning building or catch her if she fell from a rooftop. He was polite, too, talking to her like a person and making offers where others had demanded. She was being given a choice-and cash!-rather than being ordered to strip and obey.

She hedged, nervous; Charlotte's toy box and threats of mysterious punishments had made her wary of accepting the money too quickly. "Depends. What would you want me to do?"

Kevin's eyebrows rose in mild surprise. "Uh, the usual? Cock here, mouth there? Suction happens?" He chuckled and she thought his nervousness matched her own. "It's filthy in here, I know, so I don't expect you to get naked. But if you could open your blouse, I'd like to see your tits."

Elsie closed her eyes, calculating. One hundred for a blowjob. She'd never get a higher rate for a single hour of her life. "Jessie can't know," she said, her voice hoarse. "No one can. You can't tell anyone." She didn't want Kevin learning from Charlotte or Darryl that they hadn't paid for what they'd taken from her.

"I can keep a secret," he said, turning serious. "No one will ever know I'm one of your clients."

Clients. Fuck. She had 'clients' now. Elsie stepped forward before she could lose her nerve, fingers at the buttons on her blouse. Kevin thumbed at his trousers, extracting his cock and holding it out for her. Semi-hard already and alarmingly thick, Elsie worried she might be biting off more than she could chew. Still, she knelt and bent her head, enveloping him in her warm mouth and running her tongue down the length.

He hissed soft pleasure when her mouth touched him and the sound seemed to kick her in the gut. Why had she been so afraid of this? She was an adult with another adult-one who seemed nice and polite and genuinely concerned for her-and together they were doing an adult thing which made him feel good.

"Just like that, baby," he murmured as her head bobbed the length of him. "Just like that. Oh fuck, the way you're using your tongue, yes. Yes, please." His hands reached to unhook her bra and let it fall open, her breasts exposed as she sucked him. Each hand took a breast, cupping the curve of her skin and rubbing a rough thumb over each nipple. The sensation sent shivers through her and a pooling warmth to her core.

"A little lower," he whispered, urging her on. Letting go of her breasts for the moment, he guided her head off him and she looked up in confusion. "Lower. Tongue. Balls." The little orders were given with a smile, but they were orders all the same and Elsie shivered. Obediently, she licked her way down the long shaft, paying special attention to a thick vein which throbbed for her, then darted out her tongue to lick and suck his balls. The action drew a thick moan from his throat and he leaned his head back in pleasure. "God, yes."

Warmth spread through her limbs every time he moaned another 'yes' at her. Elsie leaned into her work, concentrating on what she was doing. Part of her-the part that became riled the night before when Paul dared to suggest she didn't take her promises seriously-wanted to do a good job for the sake of her work ethic, to be the best damn blowjob Kevin could buy in this town. Another part of her just wanted the soft gasps he was making to continue, the little compliments washing over her with each flick of her tongue.

His questing hands found her breasts again as she worked, handling her more roughly than before. His caresses turned into a hard massage of her curves which sent coiling shots of warmth through her laced with a trace of pain. Calloused thumbs rubbed over her nipples until they hardened as much out of outrage as any kind of arousal, only for the hard little nubs to be seized upon for sharp pinches. She yelped after the third such assault, only to be shushed. "I don't. Want Jessie. To hear," Kevin gasped in admonishment.

She opened her mouth to reply-the words 'then stop twisting my tits!' forming on her lips-but he grasped his shaft and guided his cock into her open mouth, effectively stopping her protests. Elsie took a deep breath through her nose and tried to regain focus. The important thing was getting him off and taking his money home with her. Everything else was a distraction from her goal. She just needed to relax her throat, funnel her cheeks, and ride him out. She could last longer than he could, she was sure.

Kevin, however, seemed determined to make himself very distracting. Eyes glued to her face, he pressed an insistent palm to the back of her head, urging her down the length of him until her lips pressed to the very muscles of his belly. When she tried to pull back, he set a rhythm with his hand, guiding her at the speed he wanted and just about gagging her with his repeated demands that she take him all the way.

Elsie reached up, hoping to create a sheath around him with her hands and preventing the thrusts into her throat. But he caught her hands in a quick hold, shoving her hands under his legs and returning his own hands to the back of her head before she could react. She blinked, startled at the fresh onslaught to her throat; she was pinned in place, her hands stuck under his legs and her head entirely under his control.

Panic tightened her throat around him and Kevin groaned, his eyes fluttering closed. Elsie felt thick warmth pool in her stomach, an excitement that shouldn't exist and yet inarguably did. She was on her knees in a filthy shed, fully clothed save for her abused breasts, trapped with her mouth on the penis of a man she'd not known four hours ago. How could she be aroused now? She hadn't done this for pleasure, but rather for money, and yet she could not deny the hunger tearing at her from the inside.

Being used aroused her. The knowledge struck her like a slap in the face as Kevin tightened his hands around her head and moved her up and down his length like his own masturbation sleeve. She had no idea what to do with the information, but she could no longer pretend she didn't know. She swallowed hard, her throat convulsing around his shaft, and Kevin groaned like a man dying; with no more warning than that, thick warmth pulsed down her throat and she swallowed as rapidly as she could, desperate not to gag.

"Thank you," he said as he let her up, his voice hoarse. Standing on shaky legs, he walked to a little chest of drawers on his work table, the kind that holds screws and nails, and pulled a wad of bills out for her. "You've earned it. That was amazing, really. Come back any time you want a repeat?"

Elsie nodded at him, unable to meet his eye as she pocketed the cash and buttoned her blouse. Her groin was still on fire with need, but a glance at him told her he was done-and besides, she wasn't sure he was what she wanted. Charlotte or Darryl would understand, but she wouldn't go to them either. Not now.

He reached out to her and she ducked in confusion before realizing he was straightening her hair. "So Jessie doesn't notice anything," he explained with a sheepish smile. "Drink?" He offered her a sip of warm soda to swish out her mouth, and had her turn in a circle so he could be sure her shirt was tucked in. "Looks good. Can't tell a thing, really. Um, just tell her that cleaning ended and I sent you home early? Otherwise, she'll use you right up to midnight."

"Can do," Elsie said, the thought of home nearly sending her into a faint. She was exhausted and ready for the day to be over. She cast a glance back at Kevin as she left, but he was reclined on his cot again, eyes closed as he lit another cigarette. He looked strangely peaceful, less tense than before.

--

Back at the house, Jessie studied her with those listless eyes as Elsie explained that Kevin was sending her home to rest. She fiddled with her braid for a moment, then nodded. "Okay. If he thinks that's best. Um. Thank you," she added, seeming at a loss for what else to say.