SUNDAY COFFEE WITH AN OLD BOSS
With football season over, Steffy usually spent her Sundays snuggled up with Stevie on her living room futon as they binge-watch episodes of '90s TV Shows on Hulu, Paramount Plus, or Peacock. However, this week, Stevie was too busy grading papers for her class to come up and hang out. Steffy thought about calling up Gabby to do something but remembered Gabby mentioning on Friday that she would be stuck entertaining her Abuela who was in town for the weekend.
So with nothing else to do, Steffy decided to kill some time at Perc Avenue, the new coffeehouse that opened up on the corner of Avenue C and Curry Street. She kept passing it on the way to work during the week, but was simply too busy or tired to stop in and check it out. It was an unseasonably cool, gray, and drizzly late May morning, so Steffy threw on a distressed dark indigo denim mini skirt and a man's gray oxford shirt (one of many shirts she "borrowed from and conveniently forgot to return to" her brother Trent) over the white sleeveless leotard and light gray tights she was already wearing. After sliding her gray stocking feet into her gray DC skate shoes, and then grabbing her keys, lanyard with her vaccine card to prove she had gotten both shots and didn't have to wear a mask, her trusty black New York Giants mask just in case the restaurant insisted she wears one anyway, her cell phone and her wallet, Steffy headed out the door.
Aside from some nuisance sprinkles, the rain had pretty much let up by the time Steffy made it outside and embarked on the two-block walk to Perc Avenue. As she always did when standing in line for something, Steffy dipped in and out of her shoes; she pulled back one foot behind her until the heel of her stocking foot popped out of the shoe and then pushed the shoe around the floor, and then after a while, but the shoe back on ad did the same with her other foot. While waiting her turn and thinking about what to order, she happened to catch another woman a couple of spots ahead of her in the queue doing some primo dipping of her own. She was an older woman, early to mid-30s, with long straight light brown hair wearing a belted seafoam green shirt dress that fell just short of the knee, nude hose, a pair of wedges the same color as the dress that on first glance appeared to be mules, but turned out to be slingbacks with the heel straps squashed down when the woman slipped her foot out of a shoe and rubbed the side of her leg with it.
"Mmmhm, my kind of a girl." Steffy thought to herself while watching the woman dip and leg-rub.
It wasn't until the woman placed her order that Steffy recognized her voice. "Myra Golick? Is that you?" She called.
Quickly turning back, the woman recognized Steffy as well. "Steffy Morgan!" She exclaimed, before handing the barista her debit card. "What are you doing here?"
"I was just about to ask you the same thing," Steffy said. "I live around here now, in the apartment complex on Avenue A. Wait, let me get my cappuccino and a muffin, so we can catch up."
"No problem, I'm going to sit by the window," Myra said as she picked up her order, a venti caramel macchiato, and two chocolate chip cookies, and then pointed to the table she intended to sit at.
As Steffy watched the slingbacks slap against Myra's nude-stockinged feet as she walked away from the register, she was dumbfounded. Myra owned and operated the jewelry store that Steffy worked at when she first came up from Jersey and was a stickler for professional appearance; she not only wanted her employees properly groomed and dressed, but she wanted them to keep their shoes on at all times when on the sales floor, which meant any kind of shoeplay while on the clock was forbidden (no matter how tired or uncomfortable your feet were.) Myra had to get on Steffy more than once a day about her dipping or kicking her pumps off behind the counter, so it was a surprise all these later for Steffy to bump into Myra and see her dipping and walking on the backs of her shoes, and in public yet. Come to think of it, Steffy never saw Myra take off or play with her shoes--not even in the break room or her office--which was a shame because she did have some nice-looking pantyhose legs and feet. Now here she was, just shoeplaying like an old master. After paying for her order, Steffy headed to Myra's table and was in further awe to see that her old boss sitting at the table with both shoes off and her right leg crossed over her left knee.
"Steffy, over here!" Myra called, waving Steffy over while casually wiggling her stocking toes. "So what are you up to these days?" She asked as Steffy sat down and promptly popped the heels out of both of her sneakers.
"Well, after I graduated a couple of years ago, I worked as a file clerk at The Wisteria Group downtown, hoping it would get me into the accounting department, but after a few months there it was clear that wasn't going to happen so I got a job as a teller at the South Ridge Savings Bank a little up the road here," Steffy replied as she spun her shoes around under her chair.
"You mean, the one on..."
"That's the one," Steffy answered as pointed in the direction of the bank.
"How about that!" Myra remarked, "I've been banking at that branch for years. You'd think I would have run into you there by now, at least once."
"I don't know what to tell you," Steffy said, and then paused briefly when she realized that she had kicked her left shoe too far forward to slip it back on. "I have been working there almost a year now."
As they continued to nurse their coffees, and trade stories about when they each had been up to since they last saw one another two years ago, Myra remained shoeless and Steffy played with her still reachable right shoe. As the conversation drew on, Steffy began to notice a faint, yet ticklish sensation against her right calf that would fade away as soon as it appeared.
She might not even have thought it was Myra's foot if she hadn't paused in mid-sentence and asked, "I'm sorry, am I kicking you?"
"Huh?" Steffy asked, and looked down to notice Myra's dainty nude-nyloned toes touching her gray tights-covered leg. "Oh yeah, a little but it's no big deal." Realizing this was her opening, Steffy decided to note Myra's unshod state. "Look at you with your shoes off. What brought on this change of heart? I remember you use to never take off your shoes and how you would blow me up if you caught me just slipping in and out of mine."
"You know, I think it started a year and a half ago," Myra said as she looked down at the nude stocking toes of her left foot. "Do you remember last November when we got a whole bunch of snow before Thanksgiving?"
"Ugh, how can I forget?"
"Well, as you know, I always wear my tall boots to work and then change into my heels. But, this particular day, I had forgotten them, and I didn't realize it until I had already taken my boots off."
"Uh oh."
"Exactly. Now, I didn't want to put the boots back on and track water all over the store, and I couldn't just hide in my office all day, so I bit the bullet and ran around all day in my stocking feet," Myra continued as she wiggled her toes and shook her foot, brushing Steffy's stocking right calf with every stroke. "It was a little mortifying at first, but the more time I spent without shoes on, the more I liked it. After that day, I always remembered my heels, but I felt this growing urge to take them back off almost as soon as I put them on. Initially, I would just slip them off when I sat down at my desk, but before I knew it, I would feel this fidgety twinge on the soles of my feet whenever I came out to work behind the counter. I tried to ignore it, but one day I gave in and started slipping one foot out of the shoe, quickly putting the shoe back on, and then doing the same with the other foot. Each time I did it, I kept the shoe off longer than the last time, hoping the tinge would go away and stay away. That was when I started getting the twinge between my toes too, so when I slipped my shoe off, I started rubbing the toes on the back of my other leg. I would get the twinges when I sat down and cross my legs like I'm doing now, so I started wiggling my toes," Myra explicated as the strokes against Steffy's leg grew more intense and pleasurable to both women, "but when I wiggled my toes, my shoe would start to slip off and just dangle from my toes until I reached down to put it back on of it dropped onto the floor. I can't explain why, but after a while, I started to like it. Before I knew it, I'd say by the time the Holidays were over, I was playing with my shoes almost as much as you do. And, not just at work. I do it almost everywhere I go."
By now, Steffy had realized what Myra was up to and was loving every minute of it. Hiding her arousal, Steffy coolly remarked, "It looks like you've discovered something that I've known for years. There's no greater comfort than taking your foot out of a pump, especially when you're wearing stockings."
"Tell me about it," Myra said. "I always wore stockings to work, but ever since I started playing with my shoes, I'm wearing them more and more on my own time." She declared as her left foot searched for and found Steffy's left foot. "It's like symbiosis. The more I play with my shoes, the more I want to wear stockings, and the more I wear stockings, the more I want to play with my shoes." She told her while rubbing her left stocking foot over the top of Steffy's.
"Myra, what are you doing?"Steffy asked, feigning naivety.
"Steffy, there's something else I've discovered since I started playing with my shoes. I have a thing for other girls' feet. Sometimes, when I do it, I think about other girls doing it. Okay, not girls, plural. Just you."
"Took you long enough," Steffy thought to herself.
"You were that twinge I was feeling, Steffy. All the times I jumped on you about keeping your shoes on just keep coming back to me. I remember how comfortable and happy you'd always look when you would slip your feet in and out of your shoes. You looked like a beautiful flamingo when you would lift your foot and shake it mid-air until your shoe dropped. I've been waiting for this moment when I could see you again and tell you to your face that I am so sorry for being so hard on you. I completely get now why play with your shoes so much. And, I was wondering if we could get to know each other better. You know, now that I'm not your boss anymore."
"Myra, there's something I forgot to tell you," Steffy said, reaching across the table to take her hand. "I'm seeing someone. She's a college professor who lives in my building." Steffy thought it prudent not to tell her about Gabby(even if they were just friends.)
"Oh," Myra said, pulling back her left foot. "This is not awkward at all. I mean, I just came out to you in a public place, Lord knows how many people eavesdropping on us..."
"Myra, I didn't say no," Steffy interrupted as she rubbed her left foot over the top of Myra's left foot. "I just said I'm seeing somebody. There's nothing wrong with us getting together once in a while to hang out, drink some coffee, play footsies, hold hands..."
"Maybe go back to my place for lunch?" Myra suggested as her right foot brushed Steffy's calf more slowly and seductively.
"I have nowhere to be," Steffy replied with a mischievous smile.
The two women quickly put on their shoes and hopped into Myra's 2017 blue Lincoln MKV, headed to Myra's townhouse.