Rerouted

"Ooh, yeah, I like her too."

"What the hell's not to like?? She's talented, charismatic, smoking hot, 's got a voice to bring down the house...she totally, rocks."

"Y'know, I believe she got a new girlfriend last year. Which means they're probably gonna move in together...sometime last year."

"Huh! Yup; U-Haul lesbians. Shack up fast, get over each other reeeeeeeeal slow."

"That should be our slogan. Oh, god! Guess what the hell happened to me last month. My friend set me up on a blind date. Whoever could it be?...OH, how 'bout none other than my ex from '98?!"

"HA! Been there."

"Tip: always ask for a name and description first. Blind lesbian dating: dangerous. Shortsighted dating? Possibly okay."

"Very wise."

"That's me: exes-wise! Queen of bad puns!"

"...

"That's worse than bad; that's pun-ishable. You go sit in the corner for five minutes and think about what you just said."

*****

94: Zoning Out, Zoning In

Saturday, March 8th, 2003, 4:52 p.m. Central / 5:52 p.m. Eastern

"...which, as it turns out, was one of the most amazing and memorable things that happened in my whole childhood!"

"No doubt. I can't believe you've stayed on the phone with me this long, Dawn."

"I'm having so much fun, Maur! And I can't believe how much I've gotten done today just carrying the phone around my apartment. Without the distraction of my computer and TV, I've put my loose groceries away, cleaned my kitchen counters and stove top, fed the bird and fish, dusted, Windexed my mirrors, taken out the trash, and done three loads of laundry. Washed, dried, folded, put away."

"Wow...phone chores. Who the hell knew. Oh hey, I'm about to enter Mountain Time."

"Oh, fascinating. I've never driven across a time zone before."

"Yeah...'s probably not necessary to change my clock, I'll just have to remember—"

Saturday, March 8th, 2003, 3:53 p.m. U.S. Mountain Time / 5:53 p.m. Eastern

"—what time it is now."

"Oh, hey!" Dawn repetitively observed. "So that means you just picked up an hour. 'S like a bonus Daylight Savings Time."

Maureen gasped. "Oh my gosh, Dawn, I wish you could see this. I'm heading straight due west, the sun's setting, and even through all the clouds...the entire sky looks like a giant rainbow! It's amazing!"

"Ohhh...I'm such a sucker for pretty things," said Dawn. "Flowers, stars, sunsets, Christmas lights, hot girls...I love jewelry too. Sometimes I like to hold the stones in my bracelets right up to my eyes close as possible, and just admire the sparkliness."

"Yeah...I'm actually partial specifically to blue Christmas lights. Maybe not the most customary color for the yuletide season, and yet...there's just something about it. Blue's probably my favorite color in general."

"My favorite color's burgundy," offered Dawn. "It's like maroon, just a little...sexier."

"'Cause it's close to the color of the human body component our hearts circulate to our naughty organs when we get excited?"

Dawn giggled. "That's an intriguing way to think of it. In addition, let's see...my favorite movie is Field Of Dreams, my...favorite song is every song there is entitled 'Forever Young'...my favorite beverages're fruit punch and root beer—soft—and white wine—hard. For the drink, I prefer white to burgundy. Oh yes, and my favorite canned soup cuisine is 'PasghettiOs.'"

It was Maureen's turn to chortle. "'PasghettiOs'?"

"Told you—I'm a grown-up five-year-old."

Maureen beamed and glowed, driving into the rainbow. She could hardly believe it, but her face was starting to ache from smiling so much. That one misdialed digit on her touch-screen phone had brought almost an entire day's worth of delight and camaraderie, the whole way on this otherwise humdrum drive. It astonished her. Yesterday, she didn't know this lady existed. Now, they'd shared a thousand facets of their lives. She remained too fascinated by the coincidence of meeting someone called Dawn first thing in the morning. Was it possible this whole encounter—this whole day—had been some surreal fantasy?

"...Hey Dawn?"

"Yeah?"

"Please do me a favor and take this the right way: you...are...real, right? This...whole day has really been happening, hasn't it?"

Dawn laughed. "Rest assured, my dear Maureen, Dawn Lori Kerringer is an entity of bona fide flesh and bone, blood and marrow. Who occasionally refers to herself in the third person."

"Hee hee...this is just...so damn cool. If only you lived in Minnesota. Or Montana. Or either Dakota."

"Well, I do take week-long vacations twice a year. Or a single one for two weeks. Travel's often involved."

"Suh-weet," Maureen assessed, shifting lanes. "We oughta get together sometime in the summer or fall."

"You, my good woman, have a deal."

Maureen kept smiling, a twinkle in one eye, a sparkle occupying the other. She'd for several hours had the thermostat adjusted perfectly—not too warm, not too cold—and she was feeling a bit of a sniffle coming on. Which could only mean one thing.

"This...this is incredible, Dawn. Y'know, ten hours ago, I thought today was gonna be the second-worst day of my year. Next to tomorrow. But...all of a sudden, I..." She shook her head. "...I can't believe how happy I feel. If I may be so bold as to say so, I think you may have quite the most wonderful effect on me."

Dawn stopped in her tracks just a moment, retrieving a TV dinner from the freezer.

"Awww!...And you just melted my heart."

A charmed Maureen shrugged, shifting a bit in her seat.

"Know what, Dawn, if you'd said that to yesterday's Maureen, she'd have doubtlessly rolled her eyes and said something like, 'Well, I'm so touched, I could just barf.'"

"Heh!"

"But, regaled with the cellular companionship of mine truly, today's Maur just says, '...Serendipity.'"

Dawn popped her defrostable supper in the microwave and went to reline the parakeet Jibjab's cage.

"Could hardly have put it better myself."

The newly euphoric Maur trolleyed on toward the horizon under falling dusk, new scenery greeting her all the way. Trees in spring bloom flew by. Soundwalls ascended and descended the roadside. Horses and cows grazed in pastureland. In due course she'd made her way through Valley City, Jamestown, Steele, BISMARCK, New Salem, and now inched on to Dickinson. She also bypassed traffic cones surrounding road work, cop cars behind pulled-over motorists, boats and idle vehicles in tow, and interstate exit after exit after exit. And she and Dawn Kerringer shared more memories, anecdotes, favorite things and random facts of their lives than either could remember doing before. By nightfall, they began to feel like best friends who'd known one another for eons, rather than mere hours. Suddenly, the questions Maureen wanted to ask just built and built, till they began falling over themselves. One question, however, shoved its way to the fore (even though, technically, she already knew the answer. She just wanted to ask it).

"Dawn?"

"Yes, Maur?"

"...Where've you been all my life?"

*****

94: State Line Warmup

Saturday, March 8th, 2003, 10:20 p.m. Mountain / Sunday, March 9th, 2003, 12:20 a.m. Eastern

The sun was long since down. Maureen's rainbow had vanished beneath the horizon, waiting to regreet her the following day. She'd been slowed up by a substantial traffic jam. An accident congested the interstate, but fortunately no one was hurt. By the time 10:00 arrived, it'd begun to thin back out. But Maureen had sensibly afforded a surplus of time, for situations just like this. And the function at Helena and her husband Joseph's house didn't start until noon. And even were she tardy, no one would be cross with her. It was a birthday party, not a dentist appointment. Her family gatherings only tended to feel as painful as a trip to the tooth tinkerers. And for the stretch of this trip, she had Dawn's pleasant and soothing, yet provocative and sexy voice to keep her company.

"So how're you doing on the trip?"

"A'right," Maureen nodded. "Butt's feeling a little numb, but I'm still throwing back the Bull in moderation. No fatigue just yet."

"Me neither," said Dawn. "Just put on another pot o' Folgers. I've got a feeling I'm not gonna want our conversation to end. I know it'll have to eventually, but it'll make me sad. I feel really attached to you...even though I haven't seen your face once."

"I understand. What time've you got now?"

"Uh, lemme see...oh gosh, 12:21."

"Whoa! It's after midnight there?? I've...oh, that's right! I've got 11:22, which means here it's really 10:22, 'cause I didn't change my clock. That's...wow. So that means it's two different days for us right now! It's Saturday for me and Sunday for you!"

"Oh, just wait. I'm sure once technology goes far enough, the Internet'll let us talk to anyone in the world. Y'know, they started talking on the news about this thing called...social media, I think. Like...web sites that'll let you connect with new buddies."

"Huh. When're they due with that?"

"They're thinking maybe as soon as later this year. But you and I've managed to connect amazingly close on the phone in one day."

"Nonstop," Maureen added.

There was a pause. Maur did not know it, but Dawn was screwing up her moxie to ask her a very specific question.

"...Say, Maur?"

"Hee..." Maureen giggled under her breath. "Did...you just start that with the word 'Say'?"

"Um...yeah, I guess I did," Dawn giggled back. "Apparently I'm living in U.S. Eastern time in the year 1940."

A chuckle. "Swell. Well, golly gee, hot mama, I'm your dame; lay it on me."

"HA! Gosh, uh...this's gonna sound bizarre right after that, but...a'right. Maur, may I please ask you a personal question?"

"Yeah, ask me whatever you feel like."

"It's...pretty personal."

"Oooh...like, juicy?"

"...Very much so."

She could hear the blush come through in Dawn's voice. Maureen suddenly felt intrigued.

"Go ahead. I promise I won't get put off."

"'Kay...how often do you...erm...shall we say...

"...Make...love, to yourself?"

Maureen almost choked in the middle of her current Red Bull sip.

"Oh, my. Mmmkay. Well, I promised you could ask, and I'm sincerely not offended. So, my honest answer is...semi-frequently."

"Hee hee...uh, too soon to ask?"

"Well, not necessarily. It would depend on the person. For the most prudish of the prudes, forever'd be too soon to ask. But to the crudest of the crude, there'd be no such concept as too soon."

"I see...and where do you fall on that spectrum?"

"To be bracingly frank...a little more on the crude side. But I prefer to call it 'sexually adventurous.'"

"Well, good for you! Every good woman should feel as free as she wants to be in, eh...touch with her sexuality. I give myself a nice frigging at least once every day," Dawn giggled, turning red. "Unless the day's particularly busy."

"...A nice frigging what?"

"Oh, no, no, sweetheart. An actual frigging. As in to frig yourself. It's a word for female masturbation."

Seat warmer on, Maureen's pussy awoke and began listening.

"Really?...And I thought 'friggin'' was just adjectival cousins with 'frickin'' and 'freakin'.'"

"Au freakin' contraire. I, love, masturbation. Of course, what's not to love? It costs nothing, it's good for you, it feels inCREDible, it makes me see stars, puts me in an awesome mood, calms me down and clears my mind. The only part I could do without is that aggressively nagging urge to go to sleep afterwards. Sometimes I'm still in the mood to do stuff post-frig, even if...'Little Dawn' isn't."

"Well, hopefully 'Big Dawn' makes the final call. 'Little Maur' bosses me around too. Sometimes I can't decide whether or not I wanna listen to what she wants to do. Or should I say, eh...who she wants to do..."

"HA! Priceless," Dawn guffawed. "So may I then inquire as to your, um...methods?"

Maureen blushed, snickering under her breath.

"I, uh...just use my fingers. Why, what do you use?"

"Any number of things!" Dawn abruptly exclaimed, suddenly feeling much freer to discuss. "My digies, a strap-on without the strap, a vibrator with or without the vibe, this beautiful little dazzler called a clickler..."

"S—...sorry, did you just say 'click-ler'?"

"It looks and works like one of those little fan blades. It tickles your clit. Clit-tickler: 'clickler.' Friggin' unbelievable. Pun intended."

Maureen's clit woke up with the rest of "Little Maur," and twitched under its hood.

"...Sounds like fun," she commented, feeling a skosh warmer than before. Unbeknownst to her, this portion of the conversation was turning her Pennsylvanian galpal on as well. Dawn perched on her sofa and began to caress her thighs. She responded.

"Sometimes I use those on my titties and nips too. And then from time to time, I get a little...let's say...creative."

Amusing... "Oh? Do tell?"

"It's...a-a little embarrassing."

"Definitely tell."

"All right, well...some time ago, I decided to take an old, but still functional electric toothbrush..."

Maureen thanked goodness she didn't happen to be drinking anything at the moment, for her nose's sake.

"You can laugh if you want, but it became one of my favorite ways to get off."

Maur placed the blade of her right hand between her legs. "How, um..."

The pitch of her voice jumped. She cleared her throat.

"H-how else do you get creative?"

"Hmm...okay, here's another one. Once or twice I turned my, uh..."

Maureen heard a snort, indicating Dawn was trying not to laugh.

"I turned my phone on vibrate..."

"AAAH! You didn't!"

Dawn stifled her giggles. "...Slipped it in a condom, and let the battery take care of the rest."

"What's your, um...all-time favorite?"

"Oooooh...hm. That'd have to be the Sybian."

"Hoo-hoo-hoo...you're making me wish I had some of these things."

"No kiddin', right? I'm actually, uh...hee hee! I can't believe I'm saying this, but I'm getting a little...happy, just talking about it."

Maureen bit the fingers of her mitten, pulled it off, exhaled on her fingers, and eased them beneath the fly of her trousers.

"Let's talk about it more."

"Oh?" Dawn grinned. "Enjoying it yourself, are ya?"

"Little further, and we can make 'enjoy' a cute euphemism. Details, please."

Dawn obtained the same idea. Her hands both slid under her jammies, which she'd kept on all day.

"Well, it, uh..."

Three paws began to rove.

"...It all starts with the idea and urge in your mind, prompting the initial stimulation of your pleasure cells."

"Oooh yeah, talk dirty to me."

Chortle. "You think about it a little more...the girls start to wake up..."

"Yeeeeeesss...?"

"You devise the scenario in your mind: setting, mood, ambience...how many participants, should you be involved as one of them, or're you just a voyeur, enjoying the show..."

"...Wow," breathed Maureen, "You're good at this."

"Damn right. Next step: come up with a brief storyline for the fantasy, and choose your players. Now, for purposes of demonstration and imagination, I'll share one of mine with you."

Yes.

Dawn reached for her bra hooks, and unclasped it. Her other hand's fingers rode the edge of her panties. Maureen looked ahead of her, and in the rear-view mirror. No one around. She discreetly slowed, sidled to the shoulder of the interstate, and settled to a halt. She narrated for Dawn what she was about to do next.

"I'm stopping the car."

"Oh. I see."

"And so as not to draw attention, I'm turning everything off. Well. Not everything..."

"Hee hee...I like you. You're naughty."

"That's me, one bad girl. Now lay that tasty fantasy on me, dirty birdie."

"Very well...this scene takes place in the office where I work."

"I like that already."

"I know, right? Little kinky right off the bat. Now. Alone inside is a co-receptionist who I have a crush on. Even though I doubt she's gay. Her name's April. She's a strawberry blonde with dark blue eyes. Medium-built, rich-textured voice, nice rack."

Maur dampened. "I love this, Dawn."

"Get ready to love it more. Next thing you need to know is, there doesn't have to be a reason she's there alone. 'S the great thing about fantasies: no logic necessary. Next thing she knows, who—in my fantasy—should pop in the door but...drumroll, please...

"...Jennifer, Joanna, Aniston."

Maureen wolf-whistled. "Y'don't say...Rachel Green herself, huh?"

"Yep; Mrs. Brad Pitt. Now obviously, she's a hundred percent straight. But again: your fantasy, your rules. So if it makes it realer for you, you can blindfold her, you can have her be drunk, whatever you need. Personally, such measures aren't necessary for me. So now Maur. Lemme ask you, dear, which celeb do you have the biggest crush on?"

"Ohhh...gotta go with Penélope Cruz."

"Oooh, nice choice. I like her too. Okay, we'll use her. So picture then, if you will, an ordinary psychiatrist office waiting room. Behind the desk is a late-20s strawberry blonde. With dark blue eyes. And a sweet rack."

Dawn squeezed her right tit with her left hand. Her pussy leaked a tiny bit.

"No patients, no doctors, no one else in the office. Just her."

Maureen was liking where this was headed. She breathed on her other hand and eased it under her own shirt.
"The door opens, and in struts one Penélope Cruz."

Maur smiled, bringing the Spanish beauty to her mind's eye.

"April looks up to address her, but, uh-oh..."

Maureen arched her brows.

"...Where did she put her glasses?"

"Well, why wouldn't she be wearing her gl—"

"Ah, ah ah, remember what I said about logic. Don't question it. Just enjoy it."

The way she purred these lovely words beckoned Maureen's pussy to further activity. She went moist, and stroked herself.

"So April feels around for her glasses, but she can't find them. So she looks up to the blurry impatient Miss Cruz.

"Penélo—...let's call her Penny, if that's cool. It's easier to say and it'll save a little time."

"Sure, g'ahead."

"Great." Dawn alternatingly squeezed her "melons" from underneath, granting her nipples the needed time to stiffen.

"Penny taps her foot, hand on her hip. April can't see it, but Penny's shooting an accusatory dagger at her. April looks blindly at her and says, '...I'm sorry, do you have an appointment?'

"Penny tilts her face upwards, still gazing right at her, and says..."

Dawn paused, affected her best attempt at a Spanish accent, and tried to imitate the tone of Penélope's voice.

"...'I do not.'"

OOOooh, thought Maureen. The impersonation was less than dead-on accurate, but the effort carried a great deal of charm.

"April says, 'Then may I help you?'

"Penny doesn't answer her this time. Instead, she saunters around the corner of the desk, finds the recep entrance, and slips inside."

"Oooh."

Dawn began feeling the passion sizzle through her. Her pussy generated a thin layer of arousal. Her narrating voice became more throaty and breathy. She paused again, this time to inhale.

"So, April starts looking for her glasses again, a little more panicked. In the meantime, she says—

"'I'm very sorry, Miss, but I'm afraid you can't be back here.'"