The Power of Photography

They were all of me in, what I suppose is the classic male fantasy of ladies underwear. All black, an almost diaphanous bra, a tiny thong, lacy top, hold up stockings and high-heeled stilettos. They were from a variety of angles each illustrating different aspects of the underwear and, of course of me. My legs in the stockings, the patch of bare skin above them and below the panty line, my bottom spilling out from the thong and my breasts, both the part of them covered by the bra, although my nipples were clearly seen through it, and that spilling out over the acutely cut tops of the cups.

"Bloody hell Mandy, these are great," he gushed.

Again, I had no idea what made me say I but I heard myself saying, probably a little huskily.

"Keep them if you want."

"Would you like desert?" A pretty, young, blonde-haired, presumably Polish waitress asked, smiling at me, maybe because she had seen what Matt was looking at.

"Not for me thanks?"

"Actually nor me, just the bill please, that is unless you want coffee or something else?"

We argued over the bill with Matt's macho maleness winning and him stumping up fifty-five quid.

Stumbling out into the still warm, early September evening, Matt said.

"What now?"

I giggled. "Is there a what now Matt?"

"I would very much hope so," he said as we walked into the grounds, which contain the Greenwich Observatory, which sets Greenwich Mean Time.

"Like to see the telescope?"

"What, in these heels, no thanks, the inside of a DLR train is the better option."

"I'll walk you to the station."

That he was interesting, there was no doubt. That he was an attractive man was equally certain. That we got on easily and well was clear and that I could quite fancy him, was becoming that way. That overall, he were a good package was beyond dispute.

"So why the fuck am I on my way home to watch TV by myself?" I thought, as I got off the DLR and made my way to the apartment.

I answered that by realising that he hadn't offered anything else. For all I knew he might have several bits on the side round London and/or a wife tucked away in Thameside Kent, Dartford was it?

I didn't think the former was likely, sure, it was possible, but improbable, but I had no idea on the latter; he had been rather unforthcoming when I had floated the boat on whether he was merely separated or getting divorced, always a ticklish topic. But then I hadn't said much about my divorced status and whether I had a partner or anything, had I?

I slightly tottered on my high heels from the DLR station to my apartment block and let myself in. I felt tired.

Sara, my daughter, was staying at a friends that night so I was alone. Alone, but not lonely. In the four years since I had kicked Kevin out and the three since we had divorced, I had got used to my own company. Got used to fending for myself, being by myself, and taking care of myself. I had also got quite used to making love to myself.

It was as well I had, for I had become more and more jaundiced about the whole dating scene. After the hurt and disappointment of Kevin I found it impossible, at least until Sara was more or less off my hands at university in three years time, to contemplate any close relationship with another man; I didn't want her having a series of "uncles" or "mummy's friends" to cope with. So I couldn't visualise me having any real attachment until then, for I was in terrible fear of becoming emotionally dependent on a man. But, I wanted sex, I needed it, I had been used to such a regular and generally very satisfying supply of it during my marriage that being without it was awful. Yes, I had played round a bit and now and then still took lovers, but less frequently and with less enthusiasm as time went on. The hassle just didn't seem worth the dubious pleasures so, more often than not nowadays, I made love to my hands and fingers not men.

Then Matt came into my life. But hey, I thought as I took off the black power suit, he hasn't come into my life, for Christ's sake, he just bought me a drink and meal and had sneaky look at my tits.

As I was rolling the suit up to put into a plastic bag for collection by the dry cleaning service, I remembered we had exchanged phone numbers as we had pecked each other on the cheeks at Greenwich DLR station. I rummaged through the pockets finding it, feeling relieved that I hadn't sent the suit with the number in it. I tapped the number into my PC planning to download it to my phone later. Accessing the PC I saw the folder Lejobe pitch and that reminded me about the photos. Opening up several password protected folders, which hopefully prevented my daughter getting into the folders by accident, I opened the folder. Suddenly there was that woman, me, in those sexy, black undies filling the large screen. I have to say that I looked pretty good, cocky bitch that I can be.

I had looked at these photos many times, too many really, but still every time I looked at myself in them, I became aroused. Why the hell is that pictures of myself dressed in sexy gear turns me on? Sheer bloody arrogance?

This time was no exception. I stood in my lounge in just the black bra, thong, holdups and high-heeled shoes, clicking the mouse so that shot after shot of 'that woman' in the sexy underwear filled the large screen as I became more and more sexually agitated.

In some ways, I wished I didn't have this terrible hang up about emotions and sex. As I unclipped my bra and stared at my full, soft, slightly saggy tits, (but hey, I'm 43 and have had a baby and discipline with diets and exercise was never my strong point), I thought how nice it might have been to have invited him back here with me.

To have been doing this sort of strip tease and running my own personalised film show as he looked on. To have been holding my breasts as I was now, or for him to be holding them, stroking them, caressing them and rubbing them. Yes, him doing all the things I was doing that would have been so nice, I thought regretting in some ways the bloody hang-ups and morals.

Squeezing their softness as I sank down onto the black leather, six-seater sofa. Pinching and pulling the hard, aching nipples as I laid back. Him working my breasts as I was, for my own pleasure. Imagining Matt was doing just that as, between us, we undressed him, as we stripped him naked and my hands found the hard, welcome warmth that soon would invade me. As, at the same time, we both watched the 'film show' of me in so many poses in the erotic underwear. Laying in his arms, me cradling his cock, he cupping my breasts, as we watch the still images of me, was it really me?

I was now laying full length on my sofa. On the sofa where so many times I had been fucked, where so often I had made love, where, more and more frequently recently, I had had sex, great sex with stupendous climaxes, but always alone. Nobody had ever shagged me in my own apartment, it just didn't seem right. One or two had come near in that first crazy year after the divorce was final, but I hadn't yet felt able to go "all the way" in here. After all it was my daughter's home as well and it sort felt as if I would desecrate it by fucking men here; the idea was slightly, but not totally abhorrent to me. Deep down, I knew that soon I would 'break my duck' in that area. With Matt, I found myself, rather illogically thinking.

My hands, as I imagined his would, left my breasts; not completely, though, for the sensations were so wonderful that, as if with a mind of their own, they kept flitting back to the full mounds and aching buds. Yes, they kept returning, but overall they travelled downwards towards where all my mind and body demanded them to be, where they had to be, to do what I needed, where I was now imagining his hands were. They were on my panties, on that black silk thong; they were in it, roughly pushing it down, my fingers rubbing me through its lustrous material. That brought me back to my senses. It was ludicrously expensive, forty pounds for nothing other than the best-looking pussy hugger and bum accentuator you could get. I lifted my bum up and slid it off, now was not the time for ripping my panties off, not at forty quid a pair, although of course I hadn't paid for them!

I could feel his fingers stroking me, touching my lips, unfolding me and finding the epicentre of my sexuality. Finding it and arousing it so easily and so expertly, rubbing me alongside it, not on it, showing the touch of a man that knows women.

It wasn't long, it never is, it just can't be when a woman is so aroused and so frustrated. My fingers, though in my mind his, were in me, up me, probing and thrusting as I lay on that sofa. I wanted to be fucked, I wanted him to fuck me, I wanted my mind to imagine him on top of me, my legs bent and parted widely with his body between them, Between them, both of us holding his hardness guiding it to my wetness. My mind, wasn't good enough, I couldn't do it, I couldn't imagine the feelings of him inside me, of his cock up me, of Matt fucking me.

But my fingers sliding into my soaked crevice helped me. Yes, the three then four, straightened fingers I shoved into my pussy assisted me in imagining that it was Matt's cock. I arched my back; I lifted my bum from the sofa, my skin momentarily stuck to the thin, luxuriant, black leather. I thrust myself against the rigid fingers. I plunged them in and out of myself. Yes, piston-like now I fucked my cunt with the surrogate cock made by my fingers.

"What the fuck was that all about?" I asked my self as, still clad in the hold-ups and heels; I brushed my teeth before going to bed.

As we were parting, Matt had said something being very busy for the next couple of days, yeah right, probably wifey won't let him to play, I thought rather wickedly.

I got on with life the next day working away on my freelance copywriting trying to ignore thinking about him. I put the time with him out of my mind and tried to forget the fact we had had such stupendous sex on my sofa. Sara arriving home that evening helped push him further away, although alone in my bed that night my hands felt drawn toward my breasts as I thought of that glint in his eyes as he had teased me about the photos.

I had taken Sara to school and was on my way home in the car when my mobile rang. I didn't for one moment think it would be him but it was; luckily I have full, hands-free Bluetooth otherwise he might have arrested me over the phone, I smiled to myself. I felt unusually nervous. We sort of bumbled round a conversation eventually agreeing to meet the next evening for a drink in bar then dinner in Docklands.

I ploughed into my work during the rest of the morning feeling quite excited at the prospect of seeing Matt again the next day.

Around noon, my mobile rang. I picked up thinking it might be him. It wasn't

"We got it Mandy, we only fuckingwell got it?"

James, the MD and owner of one of the ad agencies that employed me on a freelance basis as a copywriter, was referring to the account we had pitched for the day I had taken Starbucks in Greenwich by storm.

"Great, that's fantastic," I gushed.

"So babe, you can have all the stockings, tights and sexy underwear you like now, can't you?"

The account was Lejobe a hosiery and ladies' intimate apparel provider as they termed themselves. A naughty knickershop as Fred, the Art Director on the pitch, who was also on the phone, called them.

"Only if you model them for us Mands, all in the spirit of promoting creative juices of course," he shouted.

I guessed that the team were in James' glass, walled office and that there was probably eight or nine of them listening to this exchange. Political correctness is a late arrival in the ad industry.

"Fuck off you dirty old pervert," I said back smiling, as I heard the rest of the guys and the two younger women laughing. I didn't mind, for in the main I think PC has gone far too far.

"We pay good modelling fees," Fred retorted.

"Even you lot couldn't pay me enough to persuade me to parade myself like that within a half mile radius of you Fred, you know that."

Kelly, one the young, female, media research girls called out.

"In any case he'd run a mile, he's a big tart really."

I rang off shortly after that, for they were all getting pissed and raucous. I did though agree to join them in a Soho restaurant for a drink or two after lunch; I knew that lunch would go on well into the afternoon and would become dinner as well; typical ad industry excess.

Why it happened later that afternoon, I'm not sure. It had happened before. Several times in fact. Probably half a dozen or so, I think; in the past few years that is. If you add in the fling we had before I got married and the one just after the divorce, oh and the one a couple of weeks ago, but that was excusable, I had probably had sex with Carl fifty or so times. But not for some time. We had reached a sort of unsaid agreement to stop. Nothing heavy, but we both knew it would never go anywhere, so we had almost until a couple of weeks ago, stopped, well put it on hold at least.

So really, it shouldn't have been that big a surprise that I ended up after the boozy, fun filled, nice lunch with my work colleagues and mates, in Carl's bed in his small flat in that narrow road opposite the station and hospital in Blackheath Village. I wondered, as he undressed me, whether, somehow, meeting Matt had made me more receptive to Carl's cool and casual. "Shall we," as he ran his hand over my bum in the narrow, deserted apart from him and me, hallway outside the loos.

Carl and I went back a long way. He was my first boss when I started out in advertising and it was to him that I turned after my divorce when I wanted freelance work, more as a therapy than as an income. I was financially ok after the devastation of splitting from Kevin; it was emotionally and mentally that I was fucked up.

It was nice sex, but then it always was with him. He was the only man I had met since Kevin that could satisfy me physically and emotionally.

"So did the photos help?" He asked.

"Yes I think so," I replied.

"Well James was pleased, he thought your copy was, as he put it, inspired and spoke from your cunt and tits."

The client had sent over loads of samples for the creative team to look at and use for inspiration for the ads we would have to put together for the presentation. The room that was assigned to the presentation prep was a ladies underwear fetishist's Aladdins Cave. Panties of all descriptions, colours and styles, loads of bras, waspies, camisoles, basques and teddies. Stockings and tights and nightwear. All was sexy, but none were tacky; it was high quality 'intimate apparel.'

The creative, research, media and account handling guys had a field day.

I was assigned to write the body copy of the ads, the Head Copywriter and Art Director came up with the overall theme and the headlines, one of which was. "Lingerie to be undressed in," another being. "A lover's gift to you and your gift to him." They got to me. I liked both the terms and the underlying sentiments, restrained sexiness. As both a copywriter and, more importantly, a woman I associated with them, what they were saying about the product, the wearer and what she would experience from wearing the beautifully made garments. After all, the prime factor when buying undies, for many of us is, 'What will I look like, if he sees me in it' and 'How will I feel in it?'

I needed more than just looking at it and feeling it.

I smuggled some out and at home put it on and walked round the flat looking at myself in the mirrors. It worked; it did what it was supposed to do. It was lingerie to be undressed in and it had the effect on me that it was supposed to produce. It was a good job they had provided loads of pairs of panties and thongs, for I soaked at least three pairs in my research!

I discussed the part of the presentation for which I was responsible with Carl. I admitted to him that I had worn some of it.

"How did it make you feel?"

"Good?"

"Good as in virtuous?"

"No," I smiled, "Good as in sexy."

We talked more about it and, as they do, one thing led to another. He photographed me in them and then, inevitably we fucked.

We weren't fuckbuddies; well at least I didn't think we were. We were able, though, to have sex, cuddle up, be very tender, caring and loving towards each other then get out of bed and go home, him to his wife In Wiltshire, at weekends, me to my daughter.

I was quite amazed at myself. Having sex with an old flame one afternoon and a date with new one the next; what a busy social butterfly I am, I smiled, as I was getting ready to meet Matt.

I was trying to persuade myself that this would be nothing more than just a few drinks and dinner. After all that is what grown ups do. I was telling myself, it was no big deal, I wasn't that interested in him or men come to that, as he probably wasn't that interested in me.

So if that was true about my feelings, why am I pampering my body and face so carefully? Why am standing naked before the mirror looking at myself? Why am wondering, 'is he tit man"' or, turning and looking over my shoulder, 'a bum guy?' Why, as I looked at the slight droop of my full breasts, did I wonder whether he was used to large, sagging tits? Did his wife or ex wife have big ones, was she a little overweight, had she got the testimony to having had children of a slightly bulging tum, did she carry a few extra pounds on her hips? Or maybe he dated a lot and was more used to the stick-insect figures of younger women, the kind for which Kevin betrayed me so many times. If that was the case, he was going to be bloody unlucky when he saw what I was carrying. 'What?' I may well have said aloud. 'Saw, what do you mean saw, what's he gonna see, it's only a first fucking date, for Christ's sake?' I argued, remembering what I was about to put on and recalling one of the strap lines I had written for the pitch. "Lejobe, it's undewear to be undressed in."

So why was I slipping into the most risqué matching bra and thong set from their catalogue? Why was I wearing a deep, plunging lace and net bra that did nothing to hide my tits or nipples, but gave the support my DD cup goodies needed nowadays, I asked myself? I got no sensible answers.

I decided on black, leather trousers and high heeled strappy shoes with my toes poking out. Nice and smart, but casual with an elegant tartiness about them.

I slipped into a little, black, loose weave, cashmere cardy that was cut low at the top and high at the waist revealing a fashionable band of bare flesh when I stretched or reached out. It had tiny buttons that ended half way up my cleavage, which, with the tight, uplifting, supportive bra, looked deeper than usual. Mmmm the product is quite good, I thought putting my copywriting hat back on as I heard the intercom buzz four times, realising that was the concierge telling me the cab was there. I slipped into the long, black linen coat that billowed down past my knees and set off for the restaurant and my date with Matt.

I was late, purposefully so. Although I was now four years on from the split with my ex, I still was not comfortable going into bars and restaurants by myself, I still didn't like it. I still felt vulnerable and on show. I still wondered what the, usually mainly, couples and even more the single men thought. The more of a bar the place was, the more I conjectured if they were wondering if I was a hooker; a high class one of course! So, I tended to arrive a discrete, but not too impolite, fifteen minutes or so after the agreed time. Not long enough to annoy, but sufficient to make sure my partner was there and that he might be wondering, is she going to turn up? No harm in starting off teasing and using my womanly wiles is there?