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Chapter 4 - "What No One Else Can See"
The next morning, Logan was surprised to find Jayla dressed in a long-sleeved blouse with her jeans despite the sunny day and casual Saturday plans. He didn’t say anything until breakfast, when she reached for the milk to drench her cereal.
"What did you do to your arm?" he asked, then realized the answer to his own question.
"Oh, nothing," she replied, pulling her hand back.
Logan reached over and gently took her hand, pushing her sleeve up her arm. On it, and on the other when he checked, were bruises at the wrists.
"We are not using those things again," he declared flatly.
"It’s not that bad," Jayla said.
"Bad enough."
Jayla sat for a moment in silence, then said softly, "I, uh, I’m not sure I want to give it up."
Logan was not convinced. "It was an interesting experiment, and fun at the time - or so I thought - but nothing is worth injuring you. You only did it because of that silly movie and my reaction to it. I wish now we had never gone to see it."
"I don’t," declared Jayla, still quietly, but firmly as well. "I’m not going to try and resolve this right now. But I have to tell you, I found it a lot more interesting, more arousing, than I expected. I need some time to sort out my own feelings on this, but please keep an open mind about it, at least for now."
Her husband shrugged silently, clearly not convinced, but not willing to argue. That would have to do.
They finished their breakfast in silence, then Logan gathered up his gear for that week’s travel and work. While he was busy, he didn’t notice that Jayla disappeared for a few minutes. When she returned, she was wearing a short-sleeve shirt.
"It’s likely to be warm today," she explained, unasked except for a raised eyebrow from Logan.
He looked more closely and realized he could no longer see the bruises on her wrists. Stepping closer to his wife, he once again took her hand in his. "What did you do?"
"Just a little makeup. That is my specialty, you know," Jayla replied, smiling.
Logan frowned for a second, then shrugged once again and wrapped his arms around his slender wife. "I love you, and I never, ever want to hurt you."
"I know that," she murmured. "But sometimes you get too protective. I’m a big girl, and sometimes a bit of discomfort can be a very small price to pay for a lot of pleasure. Goodness, this is no worse than the ache after working out, and this ‘workout’ was a *lot* of fun."
She looked her husband directly in the eye, her own elegantly arched brow now asking a silent question. He finally grinned wryly and said, "Okay. It was certainly fun. But we shouldn’t have to hurt you in the process."
"Okay, that’s a valid point," she said, agreeing as much to make sure they parted on a positive note as because she was convinced.
Their parting might have been reasonably positive, but that was about the best that McDaniel could say for the day. While preflighting the 310, he walked into the tip tank and banged his eye. Then, he made a bad landing in Denver, after which his rental car was not ready. By the time he made it to Harrison’s company, he was far from the best of moods.
His tension flavored the discussions for the day, and in his room that evening McDaniel knew he needed to change his attitude for the next day. If he couldn’t convince his colleagues that he was pleasant to work with, his contract could be terminated even more quickly than it was signed.
That resolution, however, fell before the image he saw in the mirror the next morning. Overnight, perhaps because he was sleeping on his side and blood could pool in his cheek, he had developed a world-class shiner. His right eye, actually the cheek and eyelid, were showing a bright array of colors that were anything but subtle.
"Oh, great," McDaniel muttered to himself. "It looks like I got in a bar brawl last night. Real professional."
Things didn’t look any better while he shaved, nor when he dressed. Now that the contract had been won he wore business casual clothes just as the Harrison software experts did, so an impeccable suit offered no counterpoint to his inelegant appearance.
If he had been a cartoon character, a light bulb would have shown over his head as he packed away his shaving gear. In his kit were the cosmetics he had worn the week before to please Jayla. Moments later, well, actually about 15 very long minutes, the multiple colors of his black eye were hidden beneath a different set of colors, these carefully blended to appear as though there were no unusual colors at all.
It made him nervous. All day long McDaniel was afraid that something would show, either that he was wearing makeup or that the covering would fail and his black eye would show. That distraction might not have been much more valuable than irritation at convincing his clients that he was an effective aid to them, but it was at least different.
By the end of the day, however, he was back on stride and his help was beginning to be recognized. He did duck into the rest room a few extra times, checking and if necessary repairing his handiwork, but that wasn’t particularly noteworthy.
The next day was more of the same, minus the nervousness. He still used and renewed the covering over his facial bruises, and he still got away with it. By the end of the week he probably could have come in wearing the full glamour look Jayla had shown him without risk to his contract. His insights and suggestions were that effective. So he was flying high in more than airplane ways when he got back to his beautiful wife on Friday.
"Hi, gorgeous," McDaniel called cheerfully from the airport on his cell phone. "How about you let me take you out to dinner?"
"Um, sure," she said, surprised. Usually after a long week he just wanted to get home and rest. Then another thought came to her. "You’re not wearing makeup again, are you? I don’t need for you to show me yet again that you love me enough to put up with the embarrassment."
"Oh, um, heh. You wouldn’t believe the story I have to tell you.
Meet me at Artful Dodger’s in half an hour, okay?"
"Okay, sure," replied Jayla, forgetting until she was off the phone that he hadn’t really answered her question.
When she got to the restaurant, she looked quickly at her beaming husband to see if he had indeed decorated his face. Despite her interest in the way he looked when wearing cosmetics, she was relieved to see that he looked fine. That is, he looked like any other ordinary guy, trim and neat but dressed well within the styles of contemporary men.
"Hi, beautiful," Logan called to her. Well, that was proof he was feeling pretty good. She was pretty enough to attract plenty of attention on her own without adding to it with calls across the room. They usually stayed pretty low-key in public in order to preserve any privacy at all. On the other hand, she was certainly not dressed to fade into the crowd, either. A snug black leather skirt, shorter than she usually wore, with a matching bolero jacket practically shouted elegant sophistication at the room. She was wearing heels, too, a fact Logan noticed immediately. He had always been fascinated by her model’s legs, and they were really on display in that outfit.
"Hi handsome," she said quietly as she reached his table. That triggered a strange sort of flush to his cheeks and it took Jayla a minute to realize why.
"You *are* wearing makeup," she said. "At least, ah, just what did you do?"
"I owe you a bunch, beautiful," Logan started, then laughed at himself. "Well, I always owe you a bunch, but this is special."
"I’m not, uh, following you."
He grinned and said, "My contact with Harrison has been renewed, and it’s all because of you."
"Indeed?"
"Sure thing," affirmed Logan. He explained about his black eye, and the way he had covered it up using her cosmetics. "So, after seeing what you did with your wrist bruises, I gave it a try. No one noticed a thing."
"I wouldn’t be too sure of that," she said, smiling.
"Why not?"
"Well, I noticed right away."
He shrugged, undaunted. "You’re an expert."
"Thank you, dear, but there is another thing. That makeup has a slight perfume scent. Didn’t you notice?"
"No! Really?"
"Yes. It’s not very strong, after all subtle is our trademark, but it’s there."
"So, maybe someone was wondering why I smelled so . . . what? What sort of smell is it? I really didn’t notice."
"It’s probably no big deal. It’s just a light combination of powder and musk. Not quite gender-neutral, maybe, but not flagrant."
"Oh, okay. Whatever. No one seemed to notice, anyway. And thanks to not looking like a hoodlum, I got that contract extension."
They made their orders, then Logan changed the subject to his wife’s week. "Anything special with you?"
"Well, I missed you," Jayla said, grinning.
"Good thing," he said, matching her grin.
"But I got my own good news," she declared. "My design for redheads, meaning my selection of colors and applications, got accepted by the company for their new brochures. I’ll get a nice bit of royalties from that."
"Good for you! Maybe I should make you pay for dinner."
"Maybe," she said, but there was a bit of distraction in her tone.
"What else?" Logan asked, picking up on it.
Now it was Jayla’s turn to blush. At least hers was becomingly symmetric. She didn’t answer right away. Instead, she shifted, not quite uncomfortably, more like self-consciously in her seat and blushed again.
"What’s the matter?" he asked again.
"I owe you," she said.
Logan shook his head, a confused look on his face, "No. I just told you. I owe you for showing me how to cover up my black eye."
"That was nothing," Jayla asserted. "I owe you for being a guinea pig for my makeup experiments."
"No big deal."
She squared her shoulders, a motion that did surprisingly active things to the shapes within her jacket, and said, "No. It *is* a big deal. And I feel that I owe you . . . "
Logan tried to interrupt, but she held up her hand and plowed on, "I know what you’re going to say, and you’re right. People in love don’t keep score, or do things for each other only because they feel obligated. I know that. But you’re wrong, too. Maybe that’s the biggest thing I owe you, for showing me that. I owe you paying enough attention to you that I can tell what would please you without you asking. I owe you my attention and my willingness to please - not merely acceptance of what you want, but active willingness."
Her husband settled back into his seat as she talked, recognizing that this was something she had been thinking about quite a bit. He nodded, not so much in agreement as in confirmation of his attention.
She smiled at his nod, relaxing a little now that the words were flowing. "I don’t owe you anything because of any one thing you’ve done or any list of things you’ve done. I owe you *everything* because you love me and are willing to do your best - a very considerable best - to make me happy."
With that, she seemed to have run down a little. Logan reached out to take her hand in his and said, "Quite a speech, beautiful. And I won’t argue with the basic logic as long as you realize that I owe you at least as much."
Jayla nodded, smiling again, then said, "So, I’ve decided I’m going to dream up things to do that interest you. Hopefully you’ll find them pleasing. If not, well, some experiments work better than others."
"Hmmm," Logan murmured. "An interesting idea, at least. I like it.
Okay, I’ll dream up things to do for you, too. It should be fun."
"You don’t have to . . ." Jayla began, to stop in a blush at her husband’s huge grin. "Touche. Okay, we’ll both invest a little creative energy in each other. And it should indeed be fun."
She squirmed on her seat again for a moment, then looked Logan in the eye and grinned a very mischievous grin. Not saying a word, she undid the buttons that held her bolero jacket tight to her trim waist and pulled it open a bit.
Through her white, sheer blouse, Logan could see her darkly-shaded, tautly-erect nipples, especially when she took a not-very-subtle, but quite impressive breath.
"No bra?" he gasped, conscious of a very definite sign of interest on his part.
"More than that," she smirked.
At his perplexed look, she giggled and whispered, "No panties, either. From now on, I just may not ever wear underwear when we’re together."
The grunt of something very like pain was probably not the response she expected from her husband, though his own squirm gave a pretty good insight into the cause.
"Score one for you," he finally managed to say. "I honestly had never even thought to suggest that to you, but you certainly found something that is, um, interesting."
"Good," Jayla said. "Gotcha."
"Indeed," Logan replied, a thoughtful look in his eyes.
Jayla reached out to lightly slap his shoulder and said, "No you don’t."
"Don’t what?" he asked innocently, or at least with an attempt at innocence.
"You’re trying to think up some way to, um, ‘get back at me’ for this; some sort of counter. This is not going to be a contest where we each try to one-up each other."
"Good," Logan said, laughing. "That way we won’t have to take turns.
I can think of half a dozen things to do immediately."
"Well, so can I," she said, trying to project a threatening tone.
Somehow it came out more like a promise instead.
"Like what?"
"I’m not telling," she said.
"Me, neither," her husband countered. Then his expression changed as an idea came to him. "Um, maybe I will. At least one thing."
He paused to gather his thoughts, but before Jayla’s curiosity got the best of her, he continued with a question. "Do you still want to, um, experiment with the way I look, trying out styles for redheads?"
She nodded and he said, "Well, that’s already been covered, so that’s nothing new. But how about this? You can also do my hair up however you want."
He was surprised that Jayla frowned instead of agreeing. "I can’t do that," she said.
"Why not? It won’t bother me. Or . . . just what do you want to do?"
"Hmm? Oh, nothing really," she said. "But I’m not very good with hair. I know cosmetics of course, and I can judge styles and shapes and colors very well. But turning an idea for a hairstyle into reality, knowing how to do the cut it and set it, I’ve just never been very good at that. Other than a few simple things I’ve learned to do on myself, I wouldn’t know how to begin."
"Oh," Logan said, face falling in disappointment. He tried to work up a smile as he said, "Well, I’ll just have to think of something else, then."
"Is this really something you’d like to do?"
"I suppose that depends on what you’d like my hair to look like," he said. "But I have to admit I’ve been thinking about it ever since you showed me how different Connie Spencer’s hair was from mine."
"Who?"
"Connie, that is, Constance Spencer. You know, the woman VP at Harrison."
After Jayla nodded, Logan said, "Anyway, I was thinking you might want to try something like that."
Jayla looked at him for a long moment, assessing both the potential and his own apparent interest in it. After that moment she asked, "Are you beginning to like this idea? Wearing makeup and, well, things?"
"I don’t really know," he admitted, then confessed. "I spent a little time this week at night in the hotel, surfing for some websites that talk about men dressing like women. I don’t think I feel the, um, arousal that they talk about, but I do know I like to look good. Maybe after reading about all those people who want so bad to be able to dress like women, it doesn’t feel as, um, strange as it did. Like it’s a shame guys can’t do that more than it’s a shame to want to do it. Does that make any sense?"
"Lots," Jayla said, nodding thoughtfully. "At first it was sort of naughty, and fun because of that. But now, it’s more like, um, why not? Who is it that said you can’t? And who gave them the authority to say so?"
"Yeah. That’s right."
"Well, *I* say you can, and *you* gave me the authority to say so, Jayla declared. She paused to gather her thoughts, then said, "Suppose I could find someone to do your hair? Would you be willing?"
Logan nodded.
"Okay, I’ll look into it," she promised.
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