Seeds of Fear

'Get used to it,' she mumbled, shivering in her underwear at the kitchen table. She took another sip from the heavy ceramic mug that said 'Don't Ask Me, I Just Work Here,' a memento of her recently ex-job.

Cynthia was going on forty. Her long brown hair was worn pulled back, showing off a handsome, if somewhat heavy, face. She wore the best clothes she could afford, but they were old and too tight in some places, too loose in others.

All told, Cynthia was not the type of person one would normally choose for an office romance. She wasn't the self-assured, tight young college graduate, the naive, even younger secretary, or the older, but still sexy, vice president with the failing marriage.

She may not have had the body, the age, or the power to attract lovers, but Cynthia had the voice.

And she had learned long ago that her voice was as sexual as any breast or butt or leg.

It was deep, but not too much so. Raspy, but not grating or harsh on the ear. It was a tingling, vibrating, resonant, breathy voice, reminiscent of Lauren Bacall or Kathleen Turner.

Without a doubt, it turned men on in ways her body alone never could.

It had been what had attracted her boss, what had kept him in her bed for eight months.

It couldn't, however, save her from being fired by him.

That had thrown her for a loop. Cynthia was so accustomed to maintaining the upper hand in her relationships that this single act by her boss left her feeling powerless and bereft, not knowing quite what to do with herself.

So with a couple weeks' severance, a last lunch with the girls, and a parting, bad-dog-eyed good-bye from her ex, she left, with no prospects and fewer ideas of what to do next.

Another punishing draft of hot coffee, and she flipped the newspaper open, scanned the want ads. Down the columns, through administrative assistants, receptionists, secretaries. She circled those that appealed to her; there weren't many.

Her eyes drifted down to 'Topless Dancers Wanted,' and she snorted, almost gagging on her coffee. She remembered fondly what Ralph in Accounting had told her on her last date.

'Well, Cynthia,' he'd laughed, his voice dropping. 'With your talent, I think you'd be able to find a great job in the phone sex business. You'd make a fortune. Hell, I'd call and let you talk dirty to me for two dollars a minute!'

'Ralph!' she'd protested, half-gamely, half-flattered.

Suddenly, cold and depressed and in her underwear on a Monday morning, Ralph's idea didn't seem so ridiculous. With the phone company contacts she had gained through being a receptionist with a large company, a little research, and a little money borrowed from her retirement fund, she might be able to swing this.

Then something at the back of her mind whispered to her what she was really thinking of doing.

Talking dirty to men on the phone. And not just dirty, but explicit and definitely X- rated.

Are you really going to be able to do this? the voice asked.

There was only one way to tell.

It amazed Cynthia how quickly it all came together.

She secured a business license, got a tax number, made the necessary arrangements with the phone company. Her liaisons there were more than eager to help her in getting a «900» line installed in her apartment.

While she waited, she visited the newsstand outside her building. There, under the silently amazed eyes of the old newsman, she self-consciously bought a few of the seedier men's magazines.

Back in her apartment, she sat in the little space she'd cleared for her office and flipped through the magazines, intending to go straight for the classified ads. Her curiosity, though, demanded that she scrutinize the first several carefully, until the photos all took on a surreal look, with their tangled limbs and close- ups of genitalia so tightly focused, she was sure even a gynecologist would have trouble identifying what he was seeing.

She was able to cobble together pieces of the ads she liked into a small ad for her new service. Several phone calls and overnight packages later, her little ad was scheduled to run in several of the men's magazines she'd reviewed, as well as a couple of local alternative newspapers.

Before she could sit back and wait for the phone calls, though, she needed practice.

'Hello?'

'Ralph? Hi, this is Cynthia.'

'Cynthia?' he said, lowering his voice. 'Cynthia Johnson?'

'Yes, Ralph,' she purred into the receiver. 'And do you know what? I'm sitting here totally nude.»

Here she paused, hitched in a deep breath as her stomach fluttered.

'. and I'm really wet.'

There was a stunned silence on the other end. Cynthia heard the tinny sound of a television somewhere on Ralph's end. She almost laughed then, imagining him standing in his living room listening to her. Here she sat in a T-shirt and jeans with no makeup.

Not nude and decidedly not wet.

'My wife is here, for chrissakes!' he whispered.

'Ralph,' she moaned so low that her own phone vibrated in her ear. 'Oh, Ralph. I've been thinking about you, imagining you. Touching myself. I've been very naughty.'

'Dear Lord,' came a hoarse voice.

'I took your advice to start a phone sex business. You're my first customer. But don't worry,' she said with a throaty giggle. 'This one's on the house.'

'Can I call you back?' he whined.

'No, Ralph. We've got to finish. right here, right now.'

He did.

After that, Ralph became her first paying customer, too.

The phone rang at 3 A.M.

Cynthia didn't bother to turn the lights on as she picked her way to the chair by the phone. In the three months she'd operated the service, she'd walked the path many times in the dark, often more asleep than not.

The men who called at this hour were more lonely than horny, a bit more sincere, sweeter, and a little more desperate for simple human contact. Cynthia found that she could talk to these men about things other than sex — their jobs, hobbies, problems. Sometimes these callers even became so engrossed in their conversations that they never made it to the sex part.

Cynthia plopped into the chair near the phone, answered it without clearing her throat, knowing that these men wanted to rouse her from bed, wanted to hear her raspy, sleep-filled voice. It lent an air of intimacy to what they did, as if they had merely rolled over and awakened a lover curled in bed next to them.

'Hello, honey. This better be good.'

'Hello,' came the man's voice, rough and hoarse and whisper-quick.

Cynthia knew from experience that he would say nothing more, only respond to questions or ask short, wheezing queries. In this situation, very few men wanted to take the lead.

She preferred it that way.

'Does your mommy know you're waking me up? 'Cause if she doesn't, you go tell her it's two ninety-nine per minute.'

'My mommy's not here,' he growled.

'Good thing. Mine's not here either.'

'What are you wearing?'

'Nothing, honey.' Actually, she was wearing a pair of panties, but otherwise this was accurate.

'I always sleep naked,' she continued. 'You never know when the opportunity may. arise. What are you wearing?'

'I'm not wearing anything either.'

'And I bet you've got quite a handful.'

'You could say that,' he laughed, and it raised goose bumps on her arms, for it was a disturbing laugh, confidential and low, like a rusty engine slowly turning over. She heard a sound, distant, maybe the squeaking of bedsprings, the rustle of covers.