INTRODUCTION
Amy, a striking brunette, walks into the barn, wearing her full cowgirl outfit: cream-colored and blue-checked long-sleeved light cotton shirt; faded, worn Levi’s tucked into tall shiny fire-engine red leather cowgirl boots that nearly come up to her knees; a matching wide red leather belt with a square pewter belt buckle. Her tussled chestnut hair falls in a pony tail just below her shoulders, with her off-white cowgirl hat cocking slightly backwards. She wears a red patterned bandanna around her neck, keeping a spare blue and spare yellow one in each of her back pockets. In the inside breast pocket of her denim jacket she carries a revolver.
BACKSTORY
A svelte 5’4”, just having turned eighteen years old, with strong and perky breasts—Raised American Beauties, as the description goes—her athletic build fit quite nicely into her jeans. Having grown up in the suburbs, she isn’t sure whether her cowgirl garb is authentic, and she doesn’t care. She’d seen her high school’s productions of Oklahoma and Annie Get Your Gun and just really dug the cowgirl-garbed heroines. In the early ‘90s, first a ‘tween in the Girl Scouts and then teenager, she remembered the cowgirl boots that she saw in TV shows of that era and always wondered why most actresses wore their jeans over their boots. It didn’t make sense to her to hide so much of the boots, especially when the most of the stitching, design, shaft, and shininess would be going for naught when worn under the jeans. She much prefers the idea of showing the boots off, the way her older sister Stefania’s friends were wearing them with faded jean overall-shorts in the early ‘90s; back then, Amy had noticed how good the girls’ bare calves looked peeking out of the boot-tops, and had hoped, someday, she could pull off the same look.
Amy loved how she’d seen the full boot-view in movies, and most preferred the look of jeans tucked into boots. She really loved how the jeans would crumple up slightly where boot meets jeans, somewhere just above mid-calf ideally. By the time Amy had hit mid-teens in the mid-‘90s, that particular wave of cowgirl boot fashion was fading, but Amy never forgot how cool women wearing cowgirl boots looked to her—strong, independent, athletic, seductive—all attributes she sought to embody. She recalled watching old TV westerns, where the villains would sometimes capture the cowgirls, then bind and gag them as bait for the cowboy hero, but how the cowgirls would always give the villain a hell of a fight during their capture. Sometimes, even before the cowboy eventually rescued them, the cowgirls would even succeed in loosening the bonds and escaping by themselves. And sometimes the good cowgirl would turn the tables on the bad one, tying her up and leaving her for her henchmen to find.
Despite her beauty, Amy really had never thought of herself as classically pretty. In junior high school, five-foot-even, flat-chested, and with a slightly too-big hook nose, she still sported a fair amount of baby fat and a large number of zits. While never even remotely close to obese, she received her fair share of abuse from her classmates and her older sister’s friends. Her nickname, “BowPi,” came from the bitchiest of her sister’s friends, Penelope Van Dijk, who used to tell Amy she looked like a bowling pin and insisted how boys would never like her. Amy hated Penelope and detested that nickname. In return, Amy called her Penny—which always irritated the hell out of Penelope—and sometimes called her “worth-a-penny, worth-a-penny,” which Penelope loathed because her family came from major old money.
Amy’s sister Stefania knew Penelope was a complete bitch, but Stefania hung out with her because they co-captained the cheerleaders together. The third cog in that cheerleading wheel, Erica Anderson, acted nicer to Amy than Penelope did, but still had her moments of bitchiness. All three girls set striking profiles in high school Germano-Nordic beauty: all between 5’5” or 5’7”, all long-legged, fair-eyed, tannable blondes—their nickname was the “Blonde Squad”—any one of them could have graced the pages of a men’s magazine: the cover, or the centerfold.
Protective of Amy, Stef always did her best to shut Penelope up, but rarely could; while Penelope stood a shade shorter—5’ 5”—than Stef at 5’6” and Erica at 5’7”—she certainly kept her nose in the air the highest. Three grades older than Amy, the Blonde Squad was just hitting its stride of big time upperclassmen high school popularity at the same time Amy was hitting rock bottom in her awkward junior high stage.
Tired of Penelope’s calling her “zitty, short, flat, and fat,” once she got to high school Amy knew she didn’t want to deal with the shallow bitchiness of cheerleaderdom. Amy figured on getting in shape: decided to join the girls’ soccer team, and ran indoor and outdoor track. Penelope, of course, mocked Amy for not trying out for the cheerleading squad, telling her she wouldn’t have made it anyway. (Amy was also pretty sure that Penelope started the rumor that Amy’s newfound athleticism meant she fantasized about other girls, earning her the new nickname LezBowPi.)
Amy liked boys, however, but didn’t carry herself well around them, what with her massive insecurity as the misfit younger sister of an uber-popular cheerleader. Amy of course appreciated female beauty, envying the pretty popular girls the way that most teenage girls do. She longed to command the attraction that her sister and sister’s friends did; Amy had always been a bit envious that her sister got their Italian grandmother’s exotic first name, flawless skin and 36Cs, as well as their German-Scottish side’s blonde hair, button nose, big light-green eyes and height. Amy got their German-Scottish grandmother’s boring first name, 34Bs, but their Italian side’s brown hair, aquiline nose, almond-shaped hazel eyes, and shorter stature. Both sisters, of course, shared the German family name, Stiefelbach.
In what seemed an eternity, Amy’s plan began to work. During her freshman year, her soccer and track regimens shed most vestiges of plumpness. Her boobs were starting to grow and firm. She herself had grown an inch or so. During the second semester of Amy’s freshman year, Penelope and Stefania had a blowout fight—over a boy, of course—right after the Blonde Squad’s senior year’s basketball cheerleading season. They quit talking for good. Amy rejoiced, and celebrated again when she found out Erica chose Stef’s side. The now-former members of the Blonde Squad soon all graduated and ironically went away to the same college; Amy stayed close with her sister and with Erica that summer.
During her sophomore and junior years, Amy grew three more inches and thanks to some industrial-strength doses of tetracycline and the summer sunlight, her complexion cleared up entirely. The size of her nose still bugged her, however.
During the summer before her senior year, now long free of Penelope’s taunting and firmly out of her ugly duckling stage—Amy had also managed to change hairstyle from a board-straight long oily chestnut hair to a loose-curled slightly-below-the-shoulder length—she concentrated on her athletics: soccer and track.
Late that summer, in August of 1998, at preseason soccer practice, a kicked ball hit her square in the nose, breaking it and causing a deviated septum; the operation to correct it produced a gorgeous but natural-looking movie-star nose. With her three-plus years of running miles and miles per week as a soccer midfielder and then for track, her now-longer legs looked great even in bare feet. She certainly didn’t need stiletto heels to accentuate her calves and in fact didn’t even own a pair. This new nose, however, instantly launched Amy from a 7 at best to a 9 on bad days. She now stands 5’ 4”.
THE FIND
When recuperating at home from her nose operation, Amy gets bored and goes rummaging through Stef’s closet. Now back at college—Stef and Erica had joined the same top sorority, while Penelope pledged an arch-rival house—Stef had taken only what she could fit into her cramped college closet so had left her all of her cowgirl boots at home, along with a cream-colored cowgirl hat, and several bandannas.
The dominant boot of the early ‘90s came in black leather with black or white stitching and mid-height, maybe 2” or 2-1/2”, heel; the blonde Stefania would sometimes pair her black boots with a black sweater, a combination that accentuated the blonde-on-black color contrast. In her early high school days, when Stef hadn’t yet hit her statuesque 5’6”, she’d wear a wide black leather belt with stonewashed jeans over her boots to complete the look, which Amy remembered thinking worked very well for her sister. Stef didn’t wear the outfit all that much, however; once she’d grown to 5’ 6”, the boots brought her to 5’8”, an intimidating height to a lot of high school boys. At that point, she seemed only to wear them around the house, or when Penelope and Erica slept over, also wearing their pairs.
Amy remembers the girlfriends all wearing their boots and dancing in front of the TV to the videos of that era. Stef’s black boots look worn-in but not worn-out, with a fair amount of wear on the soles. Fortunately for Amy, she knows she and her sister wear the same size boot, so Amy tries them on.
Amy likes the idea of the mid-height boot heels to increase her own height to what she considers an ideal 5’6”. She tries them on and loves how her own well-toned calves seem to peek out of the tops of the plunging v-shaped cowgirl boot-tops, which reminds her of showing cleavage: just enough to allure, but not too much to make a woman look slutty or desperate. Amy instantly thinks about putting on a pair of jeans and tucking the jeans into the boots, but instead keeps on rummaging.
Stef’s closet also soon yields a black-heeled fire engine red pair that Amy immediately takes to. She loves their deep red color and thinks they’d bring out the slight red highlights in her chestnut hair. She also finds a chocolate brown pair with black heels, which she also really adores, since they too match some of her own natural coloring; she instantly feels this pair will work best for her. (Amy once heard that tan-colored boots dominated cowgirl boots in late ‘70s—early ‘80s fashions and knows right away that she wants a pair with some tan on them someday soon.)
She calls Stef at college to see whether Stef minds her borrowing them; Stef says she doesn’t mind a bit, but cautions that cowgirl boots have been out of style for a good couple of years, that maybe Amy should wear them inside the house first, to see whether she likes the look enough to go up against prevailing fashion trends. (Stef had always concerned herself a lot more about the fashion police than Amy.)
Amy likes the look all right, of all three pairs. Amy tries the boots on inside her house and loves the way they sound when walking on hardwood floors, reminiscent of horseshoes’ clopping on cobblestones, she thinks, and just loud enough to attract attention. She really likes how the shiny leather catches the light; she thinks it almost sparkles. Amy decides she needs matching belts for all three boots, so as soon as she can, she goes out belt-shopping. Amy notices she loves the way the leather makes that slight scratching sound when the wider belts have to strain to fit between the belt loops, so she buys the widest belts she could find that can still fit her jeans—with plain square pewter, silver, or gold buckles—no big rednecky western rodeo buckles. She lives in the suburbs, not the Sierras.
.
Amy cinches the belts as tight as she could to accentuate her figure, and intriguingly finds she enjoys that slight constraining sensation that a tight belt would cause. Amy also remembers how much she likes the look of black leather cowgirl boots over leggings (or with jeans) plus a wide black leather belt. Amy likes how women wearing this outfit seem to possess the confidence to boss men around, at least on TV; she’s pretty damn sure the cowgirl boots have something to do with it. She herself feels more confident when wearing them, a lot like the plucky cowgirl heroines she remembers from old TV westerns, or the strong women on the ‘90s sitcoms that always seem to get their way with men.
Amy also notices that only Stef’s black pair shows any real wear at all on the soles; the red and brown pairs look brand new, with one odd exception: all the boots’ leather appeared a bit dented and slightly scratched around the ankles and just below the boot-tops. Amy remembers that her folks had bought Stef the red pair for Christmas 1994 and the brown pair for Stef’s birthday in February 1995, both after Stef had reached 5’6”, and—when that era of cowgirl boots was going out of style—explaining why it looks like Stef had never worn them. Amy, however, doesn’t care much about why Stef didn’t wear them: Amy thinks they rock, and less of a follower of style than her sister, thinks about making them her own trademark fashion statement. So what if a few years had passed; Amy thinks. She can extend the fashion trend, for herself anyway. She knows the look works for her, as she had hoped it would, way back in her BowPi days.
So after spending most of August 1998 indoors due to her nose injury and recovering from her operation, Amy started her senior year ready for action. Immediately, she realizes that high school was getting better fast: her chestnut hair, hazel/brown eyes, and tannable but slightly freckle-able skin was getting her compared to TV stars: genuinely drop-dead beautiful TV stars!
Amy enjoys her newfound popularity, which, she feels she’s worked hard for and has earned on her own terms. Boys take notice and start flirting with her; she begins to learn how to flirt back. She even thinks she’d notices her soccer teammates—she was doing physical therapy with the team till her nose fully healed—occasionally checking her out in the shower. Amy doesn’t mind one bit, considering it flattering, especially compared to her former BowPi image of early high school when she couldn’t buy attention. She now feels empowered, stronger, more confident.
Knowing how black had been the dominant boot color for the past couple of years, Amy sets the black pair of Stef’s aside, concentrating instead on the red and the brown pairs. Despite Amy’s strong desire to show off the entire boot, she still wants to play it safe. When she starts wearing them to school for her senior year, she wears them under her jeans. She really loves the sound the boots make when walking down the hallways and classrooms: not as deep a sound as when walking on her hardwood floors at home, but still loud and distinctive enough to announce her presence. With the leaves just starting to fall, the boots make a great sound crunching them on the sidewalk, Amy thinks.
When sitting in class, she sometimes rubs the boots together to make a squeaking sound, and during tests, she notices it distracts some of the guys—and girls— improving her chances of a good curve-grading test score by messing with her classmates a bit. She likes wearing the red pair with jeans and a cream-colored blouse; her brown pair with jeans and red sweaters. She wears whatever belt works with the outfit, always cinching it tightly: she felt her 34Cs—now a tad larger due to her several weeks semi-off from soccer following the nose injury—perfectly firm and natural as they were, needed the little boost they got from the belt making her shirt tighter.
A few weeks into her fall semester, Stef calls and invites her down to visit her at college. Amy had visited a few times before, but only to pick up and drop her off, with their parents. Now that Amy had hit her senior year, she wants to visit some schools and is thinking of applying to Stef’s college. Their folks like the idea. It would make it easier on transportation, as a state college, much less expensive. Plus, Stef could watch out for Amy who, despite her newfound beauty, still does not have much experience with boys.
Stef talks to Amy about the fraternity’s party held every year in the early fall: the Boot-Scoot Barn Dance, where everyone takes shuttle busses from campus to a real barn a few miles from school for a blow-out dance party, and hopefully finds a little action in a hayloft, behind a tree, or on a hayride. As the name implies, wearing boots is mandatory, and any kind will do: combat, waders, KISS-type platforms, you name it. Amy loves the idea of finally wearing her, i.e. Stef’s, cowgirl boots tucked into her jeans, and mentions the idea. Stef loves it, knowing that the dance would make the perfect venue. Stef tells Amy to bring all three pairs to the dance, as Erica wears the same size boot as well.
COLLEGE WEEKEND
When Amy takes the train and arrives at Stef’s college, no one there had yet seen the new-and-improved Amy. Stef can’t believe what she sees. Amy had suddenly turned exceptionally beautiful, and Stef tells her so, announcing, “You look like a movie star!” Erica agrees.
Excited for the party, the three go back to the sorority house, open Amy’s suitcase and think about what each one would wear. Upon opening it and seeing the three pairs of boots, Erica looks at Stef, chuckled, and uttered, “Wow. Haven’t seen these in a while.” Amy starts to smile and looks over at Stef, who is exchanging a knowing glance with Erica. When Stef sees Amy looking at her, Stef laughs a bit nervously, with a “Yeah, been a while,” and replies quickly “Lucky we all wear the same size boot, eh?”
This late September day feels still like late summer: temperatures in the low 70s with fairly high humidity, making it difficult to choose between jeans or shorts, long sleeve or short sleeve shirts, or whether to bring a light jacket. The trio decides on their outfits: Stef would dress as her early-90s self, wearing her black kickers, denim mini skirt, a black top, and a red bandanna kerchief around her neck. Erica would dress as Bobbi Brown in the “Cherry Pie” video: red kickers, tight jean shorts, red tank top and wide black leather belt, adding a blue bandanna kerchief for effect. Amy, dying to tuck the brown pair into faded and well-worn jeans, does so, pairing it with a yellow bandanna around her neck, and a short-sleeved red-checked country shirt, which, at Stef’s and Erica’s suggestion, she ties in a bow at the waist, which artfully—and playfully—shows her wide brown belt’s square antiqued-brass buckle and a hint of her belly button.
Stef had earlier spoken to her boyfriend Jim, whose younger cousin Brett was also coming up for the event, and thinks that Brett would make a good set-up date for Amy. Brett is also a high school senior, and supposedly a bit of a ladies’ man, but an overall decent guy. Jim, like the girls, comes from the suburbs, but Brett lives in a small town not far from the college. Brett actually works with cattle, rides horses, and hopes to go on to college for veterinary medicine.
Stef introduces Amy to Brett at the pre-party at Jim’s fraternity house. Amy likes Brett, a sandy-haired rock-solid athlete, a swimmer and a soccer player, like Amy; Brett finds Amy innocently gorgeous and likes everything about her. Amy, of course is very much still a virgin, having had precious few high school romances, certainly never having passed second base. (She had, however, long since mastered the art of touching herself, back in her BowPi days when no boy would.)
Brett goes as a cowboy, sporting chaps, a lasso on his left side, a revolver in a holster on his right side. When Amy asks, Brett confirms he owns them all and yes, knows how to use them. The idea of leather and rope intrigues Amy, knowing how much she enjoyed the feeling of wearing her belts tight. She asks whether the gun is real, and Brett confirms it is. She then asks whether it is loaded, and Brett assures her it definitely is NOT. He says he has had to use it to put a few near-stillborn calves out of their misery, which at first makes Amy wince a bit. She immediately realizes that Brett was choosing the more humane path for the suffering animals.
Neither high schooler has ever been much of a drinker, but since they are now visiting college, they have a few beers at the pre-party and on the bus to the barn dance. Stef, Erica, and their respective dates, long accustomed to college-style drinking, are having much more to drink but know how to handle it.
THE DANCE
They arrive at the party and spill out of the bus in various stages of intoxication. Brett and Amy are holding hands as they walk behind the others to the barn entrance. They hear the music blaring from the inside; they see the lights and some people already there, mingling. A few drinks later, Stef and Erica are dancing with their dates, while Brett and Amy are sitting on a bale of hay in a relatively quiet corner, getting better acquainted. Amy asks Brett to show her some lasso tricks, so he does: he takes the lasso off his left side and twirls it, first low, then above his head. Amy is impressed; she’s only seen such rope tricks in westerns.
Brett tells her to run, that he can show her a “real trick,” so she hesitates at first to fake him out, then takes off. The fake fails, as a second later, Amy feels a rope around her chest, and Brett is pulling on it slightly, to keep her from running. It tightens, just under her boobs: she immediately notices how she likes the feel the tug of the rope pulling them upwards. He pulls her toward him and runs up to meet her, forgetting that he’s had a few beers; Amy’s back bumps into Brett’s front bit hard, and, tipsy, they both fall to the hay-strewn floor, laughing. Amy’s arms are still a bit pinned to her sides, and when she falls on him, her right hand lands right on his rock-hard package. Noting the hardness through his jeans but not 100% sure whether it’s him or his gun, she turns to Brett, rubbing his crotch slightly, excited by his excitement.
“If I were a calf in a rodeo, what would you do now?”
“Well, that’s easy, I’d hogtie you—uh, if I were competing, of course,” Brett says a bit nervously.
“Hmmm,” Amy counters playfully, “do you really know how, or are you just teasing me? What IS hog-tying anyway?”
“It’s what the rodeo riders do to calves, you know, tie all four legs together. And yeah, I sure know how. I don’t rodeo, but I know how to hogtie, from working at the ranch. I know plenty of knots too. Of course, for people it works a bit a bit different: you tie the ankles together and the wrists together, and then run a rope between them and pull it tight. You ever see Kim Cattrall in Big Trouble in Little China? Just like that.”
Amy remembers the movie and the part with Kim Cattrall hogtied and gagged with a thick black cloth. Amy remembers seeing the lovely Ms Cattrall struggle against her bonds but thinking now that the sultry actress must have really enjoyed that sensation. Feeling a sense of adventure and the dual tightness of her belt and the rope around the bottom of her boobs, Amy winks at Brett and utters a devilish “Show me.”
Brett demurred, knowing that even though they were playing in a quiet corner of the large barn behind some bales of hay, and the party had just really gotten started, a hogtied cowgirl would attract too much attention. Instead, he turns to her and whispers, “Why don’t I show you a knot or two instead—for now.” Amy thinks it sounds fun, and replies, “OK, for now, that’ll do.”
Brett proceeds to loop the rope around the top of Amy’s 34Cs, then takes her arms and brings her wrists together in front of her. With her boobs flanked on top and bottom with rope, Brett brings the rope forward and ties Amy’s wrists together, palm-to-palm. Amy realizes instantly that she likes this feeling of semi-helplessness, with her booted legs still free, of course: her perky boobs now compressed and pointed, she enjoys that sensation too. She thinks for a second about those captured cowgirls and how they always fought as hard as they could. A moment later, Brett turns her around, grabs the top of her belt buckle and pulls her close to him.
“It’s almost unfair, cowgirl, given your current condition,” Brett teasingly utters, before planting one on Amy’s full lips. Amy kisses him back, softly at first, then with a little tongue, playfully but awkwardly, given her relative inexperience. She tries to loosen her wrists from the ropes, and soon realizes she can’t. Amy feels a pulsating in her crotch and likes how it feels. With her hands tied in front, Amy looks down at the several widths of rope around them, the rope between her wrists and the square knot finishing off the tie. She also notices the place is getting more crowded and thinks they should probably re-join the party.
“Very nice, cowboy; let’s grab another beer. Question: is that knot as easy as it looks to tie? I remember how to make some knots from my camping trips with the Girl Scouts.”
“Sure is, Annie Oakley—easy as pie,” Brett replies. “Throwing a lasso, however, takes a little practice. I’ll show you.” Brett unties Amy’s wrists but lets her take the rope off her own boobs, so as not to appear too forward. He shows her where on the lasso to grip it, how to spin it, and how to throw it. After a couple of times, Amy does all right.
Jim turns to Amy and tells her, “Good job, Dale Evans. You’re a natural,” then, looking towards the other end of the barn, he notices Jim and Stef motioning for them to come over. He attaches the lasso back on his left side.
They walk over the keg area where Jim and Stef are grabbing more beers.
Jim jokes, “Notice you two kids were enjoying yourselves over there!”
“Just showing her the ropes,” Brett shoots back, to everyone’s laughter.
“Amy, are you blushing?” Stef asks, pulling her aside.
“A little. Brett’s adorable, and his rope tricks, it made…” Amy hesitates.
“Made you get worked up inside?” Stef completes her thought.
“Yeah,” Amy admits, as her eyes widen. “How did—?”
Stef cuts her off, smiles at her younger sister and winks, saying, “Good for you.”
Amy, a bit embarrassed, changes the subject. “Hey, what is this place, anyway? Is it a real barn or just made to look like one?”
Stef replies, “Oh, it’s a real barn all right. It’s actually a stable for horses here most of the time. The college holds equestrian classes out of here. A number of my sorority sisters have taken the class. Kind of a big thing among the sorority crowd, actually.”
Interesting, Amy thinks. She likes the idea of horseback riding, which she hasn’t done since Girl Scouts.
Amy then turns to Brett, who is just coming back with two draft beers. With his hands full, she turns to him and motions toward his gun. “Hey Hopalong, I thought you said you were going to show me how to handle your gun. You sure it’s not loaded, right?”
“Did I say that? Well sure, why not? Let’s head back to our spot in the back so we don’t scare anyone, though. Cool?” Handing a beer to Amy with his right hand, Brett checks the gun, still in the holster on his right side.
“Definitely not loaded. I made sure of it. I’ve handled guns since I was a boy and my dad taught me gun safety from day one.”
When they get back to their spot, he again checks the chamber and cylinders: definitely no bullets. He then hands it to Amy and shows her how to aim using the sights, how to hold it properly, how to cock the hammer, and how to put on the safety. Amy likes the way it feels in her hand, and how Brett is reaching around her torso to hold it with her. As Amy is aiming at various items in the barn—windows, poles, bales of hay—and making pretend shooting sounds, she suddenly stops dead.
In the sights, she sees her. Yes, her. Walking into the barn, in full equestrienne garb, Penelope Van Dijk sashays in. Amy recognizes her immediately: the gorgeous long blond hair falling below the shoulders, the perfect 36Cs, wearing a form-fitting silky red blouse, white jodhpurs, and tall black equestrienne boots. At her side, a strikingly handsome young man is dressed as a polo player. Amy knew right away these two haven’t borrowed those outfits.
Memories of Penelope’s taunting immediately came flooding back. Amy’s lips purse. She thinks for a second she wishes Brett’s revolver is loaded. Knowing it isn’t, of course, she cools her booted heels while she thinks of a way to get back at Penelope. With those few beers in her and the thoughts of how Brett, her cowgirl boots, her tight belt, and the ropes are all getting her hot and bothered, she isn’t exactly thinking clearly enough to hatch any kind of scheme. Plus, she has to go use the bathroom, and since Brett hasn’t noticed her rising anger, she quietly excuses herself and heads toward the set of eight or so Port-a-Potties, outside the barn, where it has gotten pretty dark.
She waits her turn in front of one, and a few minutes later, she notices Penelope standing in line next to her. Amy tries not to look, but catches Penelope giving her the sidelong glance. Amy bites her lower lip and waits to use the Port-a-John. The door finally opens and Amy goes right in. Moments later she hears the next door over open and shut twice, knowing that someone had left and Penelope had entered.
A few minutes later, Amy’s and Penelope’s Port-a-Potty doors open at the same time. Penelope immediately turns to Amy and says,
“Wait. NOW I know where I know you from.”
Amy pauses nervously.
“You came through sorority rush, first stage! I looked for you during second stage, but I couldn’t find you. I KNOW we asked you back but I didn’t see you; how could I have missed a darling like you?” (In Penelope’s affected upper class accent, the “darling” sounded more like “dahhling.”)
Amy realizes that Penelope has no idea who she really was, so she decides to play that angle.
Penelope continues, “You’re Harriet, right? Harriet Knox? I just know you would LOVE our house. You’d fit in soooo well.”
Amy decides to correct Penelope with some quick thinking and replies, “No, I’m sorry, I’m not Harriet. I’m Elizabeth.” (Amy uses her middle name, knowing it would pass muster with an uber-WASP like Penelope.)
“Elizabeth?! Elizabeth…?” Penelope queries.
Amy is about to use her mother’s maiden name, Morelli, but as she started saying it, she realizes that Penelope would recognize it as Stef’s mother’s maiden name, and it might give her identity away. Also, Amy knows that an Italian surname would instantly cause the uber-WASP Penelope to lose interest, so Amy clears her throat after the “Mor—“ and finishs with a quick-thought-up “—rison, pardon me. Elizabeth Morrison.”
“’Elizabeth Morrison’, that’s a fiiiine name. Now please accept my apologies for confusing you with someone else.”
Penelope, when she needs something, can act extremely polite.
She continues, “You DID come through sorority rush last weekend, did you not? Please tell me we wouldn’t somehow let a fine young woman like you NOT pledge our house.”
Amy doesn’t know enough about the college or the Greek system to BS her way through it, so she starts telling half-truths, ones she thinks she could get away with.
“Well, I’m still a high school senior, staying with my, uh, friends in the dorms this weekend. But I’ve already applied early admission and fully intend on going here next fall. I’m dying to join the right sorority.”
“Well, we’re the best—absolutely. All the best fraternities think so, and all the other sororities know it,” Penelope announces, smugly. Suddenly, Penelope’s eyes widen. “Since we’d love to have you rush us next fall, I’d love to get to know you better and introduce you to some of my sisters. How would you like to go riding with me, here, tomorrow?” By the way Penelope pronounces “riding”—a lot like “riiiiding”— Amy knows she is referring to horses, not bicycles. Amy had seen the Will Smith movie Six Degrees of Separation, and knew what snobs meant by “riding.”
Amy responds immediately, “I would love to--absolutely.” Amy purposely copies Penelope’s use and snappy pronunciation of that word; quite sure that Penelope wouldn’t catch the mockery.
“Wonderful,” Penelope purred. ”It’s settled then: 10 AM sharp. We’ll ride my horses.” Penelope then turned and saw two figures—her polo-clad boyfriend, and another equestrienne—approach. She introduces her boyfriend as Charles Kent, and the pretty raven-haired equestrienne as her sorority sister roommate, Heather Montgomery, who of course gives Amy the once-over. Charles turns to Penelope and tells her they need to leave very soon because he has “an early tee time with faaather in the morning.” Penelope agrees, shakes Amy’s hand gently, with a quick, “It was a pleasure to meet you. See you at 10 tomorrow.” The three then walk to Charles’ convertible BMW, parked just a few steps away, and they take off.
Amy seethes. Not only did Penelope assume Amy had her own transportation to the stable, she knows the thought never even crossed Penelope’s mind. Luckily, Amy had ridden horses many times; back in the Girl Scout days and later in her ‘tween years, with another friend whose family kept horses in the country. She knew she could keep up “riiiiding” with Penelope tomorrow.
Amy goes back into the barn and tells Stef the whole story. Stef could barely believe that Penelope didn’t recognize Amy, but it makes sense given how much time had passed, and the transformation Amy had undergone in the interim.
The whole group soon gets on the shuttle bus and quickly couple up. Now close to midnight, it has gotten colder and Brett loans Amy his denim jacket. They kiss on the bus but Brett doesn’t try to touch Amy’s boobs, despite the darkness and drunkenness of every other occupant. Amy respects Brett for not trying, but at the same time really wants him to. She likes what she felt when he’d thrown his lasso over her, and especially like the firmness of his crotch when her hand had fallen onto it. Her fresh, eighteen-year-old body needs some real sexual awakening.
The bus soon drops everyone off in front of the sorority house. Brett walks her to the door where they kiss some more, then say good night. They both know that boys are not allowed in sororities after 9pm, and time certainly had reached the witching hour. Brett says he’ll call her tomorrow and gets her cell number. He then begins to walk the few blocks back to Jim’s fraternity house.
Amy meets Stef and Erica in the front hallway, where the two older girls had gone in beforehand, to give the high schoolers some privacy outside. They quickly go upstairs to ask Amy what she has to say about the evening: Brett, Penelope, the dance, everything. Roommates, Stef and Erica lead Amy to their room, where they all take off their boots, change into the standard college t-shirt pajamas and talk just for a few minutes before passing out from beer and exhaustion.
MORNING RIDE
They all wake up the next morning around 9:00am. Stef and Erica are pretty hung over, but Amy feels fine, only having had a few beers the night before. Realizing she doesn’t have that much time before her half-hour drive to the barn, she quickly showers, towel-dries her hair, and throws it back in a pony tail. She opens the room’s window and it feels chilly outside, typical of fall mornings. She asks Stef for directions to the barn—luckily it’s a straight shot a few miles down the road. Noticing her brown boots had gotten a bit muddy from the night before; Amy asks Stef whether she can wear the red cowgirl boots that Erica wore last night, thinking that Penelope would be impressed with such an extensive boot collection for a visiting high school senior, helping her with her rich-sorority-girl ruse. (Erica was still sleeping, and besides, they were Stef’s boots, after all.) Stef says of course, and adds a serious: “Be careful with Penelope.”
Amy, barely noticing Stef’s warning due to her hurriedness, quickly puts on a sports bra, a ribbed white tank-top t-shirt, and fresh pair of faded and well-worn Levi’s, including some near-rips at one knee and at the crotch. Hurried, she puts on the red boots and tucks the jeans into them, remarking how well the jeans crumple at the boot-tops. She then puts a cream and blue-checked long-sleeved cotton shirt over her ribbed tee, tucking it into her jeans and then put on the red belt and cinches it tight.
A sunny but somewhat chilly fall morning, Amy looks for a jacket and sees draped over a chair, the denim one that she realizes she had forgotten to give back to Brett. She looks too for her cream-colored cowgirl hat, finding it on Stef’s desk, along with the all the bandannas the girls had worn to the dance, still rolled up. She knots the red bandanna loosely around her neck, and, knowing the morning fall temperature would probably rise considerably, puts the yellow and blue ones in back pockets, knowing she might need them to wipe her forehead and face if it gets hotter. She puts on her cowgirl hat, and places her cell phone in one of the jean jacket’s inner pockets.
Picking up the keys to Stef’s car, she grabs Brett’s jean jacket and carries it into the hallway and down the stairs, noticing that it feels heavy on one side, much more than just from her cell phone. When she gets outside, she moves quickly to the car, donning the jacket as she walks. Instantly she notices where the extra weight was coming from: Brett evidently had transferred his gun from the holster to the inside left breast pocket of the jean jacket, probably to keep it from falling out of the holster, Amy surmises, but unsure. Pressed for time, she keeps going for the car, knowing she doesn’t have time to let Brett know she has his revolver. Besides, she reasons, it is only Saturday and he’d be seeing him later in the day.
On the drive, Amy thinks about what plausible stories she can tell Penelope; she figures she’ll lie about the name of her actual high school—considering Penelope went there too—so she would tell her she went to the nearby Catholic girls’ high school. Amy knows girls who went there, and so does Penelope, so if she asks Amy knows real names and would not be clueing her in to the lies about her true identity.
Amy also thinks about how to get back at Penelope for all her taunts over the years. Realizing she hadn’t thought of any scheme last night due to her tipsiness, she quickly remembers the phrase “The Best Revenge is Living Well,” and decides what she’ll do is reveal her true identity at the very end of the meeting with Penelope, when Penelope pulls a fake air-kiss or however snobs say good-bye, Amy will pull back and say, “Oh, by the way? My name’s NOT Elizabeth Morrison. It’s Amy Stiefelbach. Yeah. And you’re still a grade-A bitch, Penny.”
Amy makes it to the barn in about 20 minutes, and since no shuttle busses were taking barn-dancers there, she can park up close. Not seeing any other cars, not even Penelope’s, she parks just past two tractors, then walks into the stable, in her full cowgirl regalia, feeling confident and pretty, her brand new Amy self.
On the walk from the car to the barn, she notices that even during the short drive, the fall morning has gotten warmer. The bright sunlight contrasts with the interior of the dimly lit barn. On the way in, she decides to take off Brett’s denim jacket. Remembering a coat rack next to entrance on the right, she thinks it perfect that the right side of the barn door is swinging out while the left side is swinging in. She begins taking off her jacket, enters the barn, and hangs it up on the coat rack.
A split-second later, a strong gloved hand reaches under her left arm, grabs her right arm at the elbow, and pulls her close, pinning her arms behind her. She gasps, startled. At that very instant, the gloved hand smothers a damp cloth over her mouth and nose. Her cowgirl hat falls off. She gets woozy and begins to lose consciousness, doing her best to try and break free, but in vain. Just before blacking out, she hears an all-too-familiar snotty voice burst out through clenched teeth:
“I’ve got you now, you lying little bitch.”
AWAKENING
Amy wakes up in a haze. Her eyes begin to focus. She starts to opens her mouth when she realizes she’s gagged.
“Mmmph! Mmmph!!” her “Help! Help!!” comes out, muffled through her gag.
She tries to lean forward but realizes she’s tied to a pole, her arms behind her back. She can barely move; her wrists are tied together behind the pole, hands crossed, and she’s got a mass of white rope tied on the top and bottom of her boobs, which must be going around the pole, she figures, since she can’t move forward at all. She feels, but can’t see, of course, another set of ropes running just under her boobs and encircling her elbows around the pole, tying her tightly to it.
She looks at her legs: she’s sitting flat on her butt and has several widths of ropes wrapped tightly just above the knee, ropes just under the red cowgirl boot-tops, then, for good measure, ropes around her ankles, each tied off in crisp knots in front. The ankle ropes have another, long rope tied tight around them that in turn reaches to the next pole, maybe 10 feet away; with it so taut, she can’t move her legs toward herself—at all.
She tries to spit out her gag, but realizes she’s got her mouth stuffed with one, with the other wrapped tight around her face and neck, blocking the one in her mouth from coming out. The outside one is covering her teeth, but she feels her full red lips protrude on the outer gag’s top and bottom. As the wriggles and struggles, she feels no bandannas in her back pockets anymore and guesses that whoever tied her up must have used them to gag her. She feels another bandanna loose around her neck, however, presumably her red one. “Penelope!” she thinks. She struggles some more, hoping to loosen her bonds, but completely in vain. If Penelope tied her up, she sure knows how to, Amy immediately realizes.
As her eyes soon adjust to the barn’s darkness, she notices she’s tied up to a pole near the back, right where she and Brett played their little tie-up games the night before. She listens for a sound and looks around frantically: nothing. Thoughts race through her mind: “DID Penelope tie me up? DID I hear her say ‘I’ve got you now, you lying little bitch’ as I passed out?”
Perhaps a minute passes, but it feels much longer. As she strains against her bonds again, she hears a door creak open behind her and the light from outside shines behind her and onto her back. A moment later, a shadow follows and begins a saucy catwalk towards her.
“Why, hello, cowgirl! Comfortable enough? Amy hears the voice ask, snottily, in a mock Southern accent. She knows instantly who is taunting her.
“Mm-m-m-mmph, u mmmph!” Amy gag-talks what she wanted to come out, “Penelope, you bitch!”
“Now, now, don’t get so worked up. No telling how long you’ll be here, after all. Though, considering what it took to drag your fat ass from the front, it might BE a while: you know, to get my money’s worth,” the shadow tells her, as it walks from behind her and stands tall in front of her. “I do appreciate those extra bandannas in your back pockets. Made gagging your trap a whole lot easier and I didn’t have to waste any of my own.”
Penelope looks great, of course, in all her bitchy glory. She steps forward and straddles Amy’s legs, with each of her equestrienne-booted leg on each side of Amy’s legs, almost touching Amy’s red boots.
Penelope is wearing a different set of equestrienne gear from the night before. Amy knows Penelope wasn’t wearing an white shirt under a reddish brown suede vest the sultry night before; today her jodhpurs are tan, not white like last night, and her boots, chocolate brown, not black. Around her waist she’s wearing a wide, shiny chocolate brown-colored leather belt, with a 3/4 –circle weathered bronze buckle, tight, that peeks out of the bottom her saddle brown suede vest. Her hands sport some shiny matching chocolate leather gloves. She also wears a salmon-colored silk scarf around her neck, and additional ones around each wrist.
As if reading Amy’s mind, Penelope blurts, “Don’t you just adore my NEW outfit? I just couldn’t BEAR your seeing me in the same clothes as last night.” She pauses. “Yeah, as if I care! Still, I just love wearing my OTHER equestrienne gear, particularly when I’ve got a stupid cowgirl to teach a lesson to. Pretty easy to make you think I hadn’t gotten here yet, eh? All I had to do was park around back.”
Penelope continues, “Oh, ‘Elizabeth Morrison?’ Nice try. I knew who you were as soon as I’d asked someone at the party who the tarty brunette was talking to that slutbag Stefania, No way you could pass your Kraut-Guinea ass off as a WASP…Amy Stiefelbach! Or do you prefer simply ‘BowPi?! Good thing I parked behind the garage so you didn’t even know I was here, eh?”
At hearing that nickname from so many years ago, Amy yells. “Mmmph mmph yu mmmphing mmph!” (“Fuck you, you fucking bitch!!”)
“Yep, that’s me. And there’s not a damn thing you can do about it…BowPi! However, there IS a lot that I can do about it.” Penelope drops down and kneels, with one equestrienne booted leg on each side of Amy’s bound legs. Penelope inches forward on her knees, so that her knees line up with the tight ropes around Amy’s lower thigh. Penelope reaches down to check that rope and while doing so, touches her own tight jodhpur-covered crotch, lingering there for a moment. “Let’s have a little fun.”
“Mmph!?” Mmph ammph yu mmphko mmmph!” (“Fun!? Get away, you psycho bitch!!”)
“Temper, temper, Bowpi. I’m just admiring your store-bought nose, boob job, and zit-cream face. Looks like your folks found the dough to send you to some Beverly Hills doctors—impressive. Nice red boots too, by the way. Who do you think you are anyway, that Ariel slut in Footloose? Oh, and by the way? Cowgirl boots have been OUT for few years now. Not that YOU would know.”
“Mmmph!!” Amy seethes at Penelope’s taunts, particularly of her mocking of the cowgirl look, since Amy has been busy making it her trademark these first few weeks of her senior year.
“Now, cowgirl, let’s go for that ride I promised. Since the Mexican stable hands don’t bring back my horses till tomorrow, we’ll just have to improvise.”
Penelope gets up, walks behind Amy, and starts playing with the ropes. She starts untying the rope that ties Amy’s wrists behind the pole, but pauses, realizing Amy’s hands would then be set free. Penelope instead picks up a length of rope from next to the pole and switches to tying Amy’s elbows together, in front of the pole. The elbow-tie strains Amy’s arms, but she refuses to give Penelope the satisfaction of crying out (or yelling into her gags, as it would have turned out).
With Amy’s elbows tied together in front of the pole, Penelope unties the ropes that go just under Amy’s boobs and wrap around the pole; Amy can now lean forward a bit. With Amy’s boots still tied with the long rope to the pole ten feet away, Penelope walks toward the far pole, and unties the ankle-rope from it, then walks back and unties it from Amy’s ankle-ropes, knowing full well that Amy can’t go anywhere, still seated, and with ropes around her legs in three different places: lower thigh, upper boot, and ankles.
“Get up, BowPi,” Penelope orders Amy. “Stand up!”
Amy shoots a glare back and, yells “Mmmphk mmph!” (“Fuck you!”), since they both knew Amy couldn’t move from sitting flat on her ass to standing, not with her legs tied so tightly.
“Awww, what’s the matter, Little Miss Run Along’s legs too weak? Maybe you need some assistance.”
Amy notices over near the far pole a duffel bag next to it, which she guesses must contain the chloroform—or whatever Penelope used to knock her out—plus extra ropes and whatever else Penelope brought.
Penelope then unties the ropes that encircle Amy’s ankles, knowing she’s tied tight the ropes around her boot-tops and lower thighs. She drops it to the ground where she stands.
“Can’t make a filly ride if she can’t walk,” Penelope teases.
She then stands back up and kicks pretty hard the toes of Amy’s bound boots to Amy’s left, jackknifing Amy’s legs. “Mmph!” Amy protests into her gag.
“There. You’ll be able to stand up in a minute, unless you’re really as weak as I think you are.”
“Mmmphk mmkyu!”
Penelope takes the long rope she’d just dropped, and walks over to Amy, and starts moving toward the set of ropes that run on top and bottom of Amy’s boobs. Penelope kneels down and straddles Amy, pausing to admire Amy’s newfound bounty, then doubles up the rope and ties it in a double knot. By creating a figure-eight around Amy’s boobs, the top- and bottom-ropes scrunch Amy’s boobs just enough to where Amy starts feeling her nipples pulsating. Penelope leaves the other end of that long rope hanging, for now, crumpled on Amy’s crotch.
Penelope pauses to look at Amy up close. “Nice new store-bought rack, BowPi. Mind if I cop a feel?”
Amy’s eyes widen and she shoots back, “Mmph mmpy, yu mmphko!” (“Get away, you psycho!”)
Paying her no mind, Penelope starts rubbing Amy’s shirt-covered nipples with her thumbs, cupping the side and bottom of her rope-flanked boobs with the edge of each hand.
“Mmmph! Mmmph!!” Amy yells and squirms, attempting in vain to move away from Penelope’s fondling.
“You’re right, BowPi. We’ll save the best for last. Meanwhile, I’ve got to get you standing up.”
Penelope takes the end of the rope making the figure-eight around Amy’s boobs and tosses it up to a rafter up, and a few feet in front of Amy, toward the far pole.
“A little tug or two ought to help.”
Penelope moves to the opposite side of the rafter and starts tugging, firmly but not too hard. Amy feels her body moving slightly up the smooth metal pole, and with her bound, booted legs jackknifed to her left, she pushes off the inside of her right boot, first off the heel, then the edge of the sole. She pushes backwards and moves further up the pole; Penelope tugs some more.
“Good BowPi. Good!”
“Mmmphk yu!
After a few tugs, and with Amy pushing off her boots, Penelope gets Amy fully upright. Penelope approaches Amy and stands right in front of her; Amy’s two-inch heels put her exactly eye-to-eye with Penelope, whose equestrienne boots sport a one-inch heel.
“So what do you think, BowPi? Shall I leave you here tied to the stake until someone rescues you?”
“Mmmph!”
“Shut up. Just be glad I don’t BURN you at the stake, you little bitch.”
With Amy now standing, Penelope takes the rope down from the rafter, and still tied to Amy’s boobs, runs it under Amy’s crotch, doubled up. She then moves behind Amy, holding the rope, loops it over back of the boob ropes, and pulls it tight, like a harness.
“There! How does that feel?”
Amy feels the rope tighten, right against a well worn part of her faded jeans that just happened to fall right over her sex. She instantly felt the tug—and her sex engorging.
Penelope takes the rope she’d been using to tie Amy’s ankles to the far-pole, and then wraps it several times around Amy’s waist, just above the thick red belt. She then takes that long rope she’d just run under Amy’s crotch, then runs it back under Amy’s crotch, back-to-front, pulls it tight, and brings it under and through the waist rope, right in front of Amy’s belt buckle. Penelope takes the end of this long rope, walks a few feet, extends it, ties the very end into a knot, and drops it, so that it looks like a leash lying on the ground.
Knowing she’s got to untie Amy from the pole to take her for a ride, Penelope unties Amy’s wrists and immediately pushes them in front of the pole. Penelope quickly reties them, this time palm-to-palm, the way Brett had tied them the night before behind Amy’s back, but in front of the pole, and very tightly. Amy grimaces into her gag. Penelope then unties the rope that runs just under Amy’s boobs from the pole. While fumbling for that rope, Penelope’s tugs on and inadvertently loosens the knot on the elbow-tie rope, too little for Amy to notice at the moment.