Specs Appeal, Inc.

By All4Eyes 

Brrrring! Brrrring! Went Paige’s telephone. "Hello? Oh, hi, Stacy! What’s up?"
"Well, I just got home and I’ve missed you so much I was wondering if I could come over and see you and, you know, have one last wild weekend before school starts?"
"Oh, Stace, I’ve missed you too! How was it, spending the summer in California with your Dad?"
"It was great, but really I’m glad to be home. Did I miss anything while I was gone?"
"Well, there’s this guy and we-"

Note: This story contains depictions of an explicit sexual nature, which may be offensive to some.
Reader discretion is advised (so, if you decide to read this anyway and get offended, don't blame me; you were warned!).
Note to men: Right after the explicit sex part, it gets kind of mushy and there’s some talking-about-feelings involved
(so if you decide to read this anyway and get offended, don’t blame me; you were warned (plus, I’m a girl, what do you expect?)!).

Specs Appeal, Inc.

By All4Eyes April 2007
Brrrring! Brrrring! Went Paige’s telephone. "Hello? Oh, hi, Stacy! What’s up?"
"Well, I just got home and I’ve missed you so much I was wondering if I could come over and see you and, you know, have one last wild weekend before school starts?"
"Oh, Stace, I’ve missed you too! How was it, spending the summer in California with your Dad?"
"It was great, but really I’m glad to be home. Did I miss anything while I was gone?"
"Well, there’s this guy and we-"
"Oh, oh, you’re in love, I can tell by the sound of your voice!" Stacy squealed. "So, tell me all about him."
"Well, he’s smart and funny and-and I lost my virginity with him!"
Stacy gasped "You didn’t!"
"I did!"
"I remember when that happened to me. Before I’d been all anxious, thinking it was either going to be really painful or really exciting and at first it was a little of both, but after I’d done it a few times, it got to where I didn’t really feel much either way anymore. A lot like wearing contacts, really."
"It wasn’t painful for me, but it was exciting. It still is and I think it’s going to stay that way, because we’ve done it more than "a few times" already. You know, maybe the contacts are the reason you don’t feel much anymore."
"What?"
"You may not believe this, but… Oh, this is really too complicated to explain over the phone. Just get over here and I’ll tell you all about it."

An hour later, Stacy was up in Paige’s room, unpacking her contact lens paraphernalia in the bathroom.
"Seriously, I’m thinking about having laser surgery, these contacts can be such an aggravation- lug the stuff around, pop ’em out, clean ’em, put ’em in their little case, stumble blindly to bed, get up in the morning, stumble blindly to the bathroom, clean ’em again, pop ’em in and then keep rewetting them through the day and don’t even get me started on windy days and allergy season! I can’t just not wear them, either, not with my vision-it’s something like 20/1000, I mean WAY off the chart!"

"You know, Stace, you could just wear glasses."
"Glasses?" Stacy said, as if it were a word from a foreign language she’d never heard before. "I haven’t worn glasses since I was 10! As soon as my Mom said I could get contacts, that was it-I don’t even own a pair of glasses!"
"Well, maybe you should." said Paige with such a sly smile that Stacy said "Ok, girl, out with it! What is it I’m missing here?"
"Well, the thing I forgot to tell you about my boyfriend Drake is, he wears glasses. Not just any glasses-really strong, thick ones. And his are plus lenses, not the minus kind like you and I need" Paige replied, pushing her own thick glasses up her nose. "But that’s really not so bad, in fact….."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Glasses?! What do you mean I need glasses?! I can see perfectly fine! Or at least I could until you put those stupid drops in my eyes!" Drake exploded.
"Yes, and I’ll wager you get a lot of headaches, too. Drake, all those drops did was temporarily relax the muscles you’ve been using to compensate for your farsightedness. I don’t think you realize what you’ve been putting your poor eyes through. To see things in the distance, you have to work to focus the way people with normal vision do to read, so it’s as if you’re doing close work constantly. And then when you try to read, it’s almost like a normally sighted person trying to focus on the tip of their nose! I’m only going to give you part of your full prescription right now, since you’ll probably find it hard to adjust to at first, especially for distance vision, but once you’ve gotten used to them I’m sure things will be not only clearer but a whole lot more comfortable for you." explained Dr. Jiff calmly.

"Hold on a minute, doc. You say my new glasses are going to be hard to adjust to, especially for distance-does that mean I’m supposed to wear the darned things all the time? I thought farsighted people only wore glasses to read."
"People who are only mildly farsighted just wear glasses to read. You, on the other hand, are very farsighted, so once your eyes learn to relax into the correction that you need and stop overcompensating, you probably won’t be able to see clearly up-close OR far away without correction."
"Oh, terrific, I’m sure the girls will just go crazy for me now!" said Drake sarcastically. His family had just moved here and it was hard enough being the new kid in town without being the new geek-with-glasses in town.

"Well, you never know, Drake" said the doctor slyly and Drake could almost swear he saw the doctor’s lips curl up in a most peculiar smile, but of course with the drops, it was hard to tell. "Look, high school is rough, especially if you feel you look different. I know, I’ve been there. I used to wear glasses myself until I got these contacts."
"That’s it!" Drake cried. "I can get contacts! Can’t I, doctor?"
"Well, now, just hold on a minute. Eventually we can try you with them, to see if you can tolerate them, but for now I think you’ll have enough trouble adjusting to your correction that you will need to put your glasses on-and-off a lot, at first."

"Exactly what kind of "trouble" I’m I gonna have, doc?"
"Well, your close vision should be clearer and more comfortable right away and your headaches should stop" he replied first, always one to accentuate the positive. "But your distance vision will probably be somewhat blurred for awhile. Your eyes are used to having to work the focusing muscles to see and at first they’re going to keep trying to do that, until they realize they don’t have to anymore. In effect, putting your glasses on is going to make you a little nearsighted in the beginning. But, it shouldn’t be an intolerable blur and the more you wear your glasses the sooner you’ll adjust. I’d advise you not to try driving with them or anything else that requires sharp distance vision, until you feel you can see clearly enough with them, which you most certainly will very soon. Just don’t be surprised if one day you take them off and everything goes blurry!"

"You said you aren’t giving me my full prescription yet, just what are you giving me?"
"Well, I’m starting you off with +3.50 in your better eye and +4.00 in the other. That should be enough to help with close work, but not be too bad in the distance. Right now you seem able to relax into +2 lenses with your accommodation intact, so this prescription will give you the vision of a -1.50 and -2.00 myope at first. Like I said, not great for distance, but not intolerable. You’re lucky you don’t have any astigmatism, that would have made things even harder. Well, shall we go have a look at some frames now?" Dr. Jiff was a full-service optometrist, testing, fitting and dispensing all in one place.
"Do I have much choice?" Drake muttered miserably.

"You could choose not to wear glasses. But I think if you’re really honest about it, you’ll admit you’ve been having a good bit of trouble. And, you may not always have a choice-you’re working your accommodation pretty hard now and it’s likely to give out sooner rather than later. By the time you’re 25 or 26 there is a very good chance you simply won’t be able to read anything without glasses, even if you decide not to get them now. It would really just be delaying the inevitable."
"Well, then, I suppose I might as well get used to it now."
Drake still wasn’t ready to admit this out loud, but as he thought about it he realized he had been having a lot of trouble. He’d had daily headaches for so long now, he hardly remembered what it was like not to have one and often when he was reading the print would seem to "slide around" on him, but he could always bring it back in order by holding it out a little farther (lucky for him, he was a tall fellow with rather long arms).

Drake came to this appointment by himself (after being bullied into it by his sister, who was hyperopic and saw similar symptoms in her brother) because he didn’t want to be humiliated from anyone knowing he had bad eyes, but as he sat there trying on frames, he really wished he’d brought someone along to help him choose. He was still almost blind from the eye drops but even with what little he could see, each frame he tried looked worse than the last. This doctor is crazy Drake thought. I’m really not cut out for glasses. Every time I’ve tried on my friends’ glasses at school, not only have I looked terrible in them, but I couldn’t see a darn thing! How are the glasses this guy gives me going to be any better? Drake didn’t realize that his friends who’s glasses he tried had all been myopic, so naturally, he didn’t see well with them, and the minification of the minus lenses was exactly what his face didn’t need-his eyes, in addition to being rather small ("little beady eyes" is how he always glumly thought of them) were also set-back deep in his head, making them look even tinier. Finally, the drops were starting to wear off and he managed to choose a squareish silver frame, not because it looked the best, but because it looked the least awful.

"Alright, now that you’ve chosen your frames, there’s just one more matter we need to address" began Dr. Jiff. "I’ve been thinking about your situation and I think I’m going to let you in on a little secret. Naturally, I can’t tell you exactly how it’s done, but I can tell you the basics of it and see if you might like to give it a go."
Drake was intrigued. "A secret, doc?"
"Yes, a most wonderful secret that was discovered about 10 years ago. Would you believe me if I told you that I could make you a pair of glasses that would not only not drive the girls away, but also make the right one absolutely wild about you? No? Well, I didn’t believe it either when my eye doctor said that to me a few years back. But, always one to try new things, I had a pair of these "magic glasses" made and within a month my future wife ASKED ME to go out with her!"
"Really?" Drake asked, his normally tiny eyes wide as saucers.
"Yes, indeed. And let me tell you, the flame of passion in our marriage hasn’t flickered once. Lately, it’s even gotten stronger, because my wife was recently prescribed her first reading glasses, but we got them made in this special way and she wears them during our intimate times together, as well as to read."

Drake, a born skeptic, replied "But, if this works so good, why are you wearing contacts now?"
"Ah, well, you see, it worked TOO well. I started getting hit on right and left, by women and sometimes men, too. And that was WITH the special "love-match only" coating!"
The doctor saw Drake’s head cock sideways in confusion, so continued "Very soon after the invention of this technology, the inventors realized that being overwhelmingly attractive to everyone was really more a curse than a blessing, so they came up with this special coating for the lenses that makes it so the "magic" only works on a person who would be attracted to you anyway. Then it merely serves to intensify what’s already there. Now I wear contacts when I go out, to avoid the excess attention, but as soon as I get home, I pop them out and put on my special "specs appeal" glasses, much to Paula’s delight."

"How do they do that?" Drake asked.
"Well, the basic premise of it is this-people have a gland, called the pineal gland, that is some way or another connected with their eyes and responsive to light. This is the gland that produces the hormones that make us tired at night, after dark when it’s time to sleep, and refreshed in the morning, when it’s light and time to work or play, and that cause Seasonal Affective Disorder or SAD, an illness that causes people to get very depressed during the winter when the days are shorter and there’s less sunlight. Anyway, this gland is also involved in a number of other hormonal processes, including sexual arousal and attraction. So, what the makers of these special lenses have done, is invented a way to make a lens in such a way that light goes into it and some is bounced back out, but altered in such a manner that when someone looks at you while you’re wearing these glasses, this altered light bounces into their eyes and affects their pineal gland, making them feel an intense sexual rush."

"Well, alright then, why isn’t everyone wearing these special glasses?"
"For a couple of reasons, Drake. One is that, if everyone was running around feeling intensely attracted to everybody else, it would be an absolute nightmare! We have enough trouble in this world with STD’s and unplanned pregnancies and whatnot as it is. And besides, this wouldn’t work, anyway. You see, the way these lenses work is that as the strength of correction in the lens increases, so does the strength of the lenses’ "magic powers". Actually, in double-blind trials, we have found that there is no statistically significant effect until the lens strength reaches -6 for concave lenses or +3 for convex ones. Some of the researchers who worked on the project had their own glasses made up with these special lenses and some of them with lower prescriptions did report an effect, but we think this was largely due to placebo effect, meaning the glasses worked because the researchers expected them to work, all in the mind, you know. But an interesting thing to report, particularly interesting for you, is that they discovered that plus lenses, given their magnifying properties, increase the power of the "magic" even more than lenses with an equal number of minus diopters, by a ratio of about 2:1. Hence, the need for lenses of -6 to reach the same effect produced by +3 lenses."

"So my lenses will be just barely strong enough for this to work?" asked Drake.
"For now, yes, but as I said before, you’ll be getting stronger lenses as soon as your eyes adjust to these."
"About how long will that take?"
"It varies from person to person. You may be ready in a few weeks or it may take a few months, but as soon as you can put your glasses on and immediately see clearly at all distances, call and make another appointment."  

Man, Drake thought, now I’M going crazy! A few minutes ago I didn’t even want glasses, now I’m anxious to know when I can get stronger lenses! This stuff is all probably just a bunch of nonsense he tells everyone to get them to wear their glasses. Still, if it works… Man, I hope it works, I haven’t been laid in so long I’ve almost forgotten what it feels like! And so far I haven’t been able to get so much as a second look from any of the girls around here.

"So, do you want to do it?" asked Dr. Jiff.
This startled Drake; for a split-second he thought the doctor was referring to "doing it", since this was what he (Drake) was thinking of at the moment.
But he quickly realized that this wasn’t the case and recovered enough to say "Sure, let’s do it" in a calm, cool voice.
"Excellent! Now, do you want the special coating on your lenses? I would highly recommend it, you never know what might happen if everyone gets turned on by you. Why, I’d be liable to try to jump you right here in the office, and I love my wife very much and don’t normally have any homosexual leanings whatsoever-that’s how powerful these lenses are!"
"Wow, I guess you’d better use the special coating, then." Drake said, trying hard to keep his breathing even and not too rapid.
He didn’t normally have homosexual leanings, either, but just then the poor boy was so horny, even the thought of getting jumped by the doctor was turning him on! He’d been something of a big-time player back home (though, of course, it wasn’t his home anymore), so he was used to getting a lot and the sudden deprivation since the move was hard on him (in more ways than one!). He was glad to be sitting at a table, which obscured the doctor’s view of the evidence of this.

Dr. Jiff went around the corner into another little room, his lab. "Now, you can’t watch what I’m doing here, it’s a trade secret, but it won’t take me long to get your glasses ready-"Dr. Jiff" isn’t just my name, it’s my motto."

After less then half an hour (by which time Drake had cooled down a bit) the doctor returned, bringing with him Drake’s new glasses.
"Now, close your eyes and don’t open them till I tell you to" Dr. Jiff said.
He put the glasses on Drake, took them off and slightly readjusted them, then put them back on him.
"Now, open your eyes."
When Drake opened his eyes he saw a card with small letters printed on it, much like the one the doctor had used to test his near vision. Only this time, he could read all the letters, right down to the bottom of the page.
"Wow, I can see all the letters, even the teeny-tiny ones! Maybe this won’t be so bad after all!"

"Alright, then, let’s see what your distance vision is like."
Dr. Jiff brought down the card he had been holding up in front of Drake and as he looked up across the room, Drake was shocked to see how fuzzy things were. The doctor saw the horrified look on his face and rushed to reassure him.
"I know things aren’t in focus right now, but I PROMISE it will get better. Can you read what that sign on the storefront across from here says?"
Drake squinted his eyes into narrow slits, just like he’d seen many of his classmates do to read the blackboard, shortly before they showed up wearing glasses. Only he HAD glasses and had to do this. It wasn’t quite making sense to him.
"Just barely" he replied.
"You can remove them if you need to to get a good look at something in the distance, but I’d advise you to keep them on as much as you can-remember, the more you wear your glasses, the quicker you’ll get used to them."

"And, I must say, they really don’t look half bad on you."
Drake looked in the mirror that was sitting on the table in front of him, close enough that he could see it quite clearly with these oddly vision-impairing vision aides. He was pleasantly surprised by what he saw-he had a more mature, serious look about him, a welcome change since he’d always had something of a "baby face" with a fair, delicately pink complexion and longish, straight dark-ash blond hair, which was thoroughly in harmony with the cool silver frames. His eyes, which had formerly been visible only as two small, dark hollows in his otherwise disquietingly pretty face, could now be seen as large, beautiful pools of deep blue, set-off with long, dark lashes that fluttered alluringly as he opened and closed his eyes.

"But, level with me here, doc-are these things REALLY going to get girls interested in me?"
"Well, they won’t ALL be interested, but that’s a blessing, believe me. But, I’m sure that there have been a few girls who’ve looked at you before and liked what they saw, now they’re going to LOVE what they see when they look at you!"
"Do I get my money back if I don’t have a girlfriend by the end of the month?"
"Did I SAY anything about a money back guarantee?"
"No" Drake answered, rolling his now big, beautiful blue eyes.
"But trust me, you’ll not be wanting your money back. Now go out there and show ’em all what a fantastic farsighted fellow you are!"

After leaving the optometrist’s office, Drake decided he was hungry, so he headed for the food court a few stores down. It was a little disconcerting to walk through the mall with everything more than a few feet away looking blurry, when he’d been used to having perfect distance vision all his life, but he thought if getting used to his glasses had to be done, he’d just as soon do it now as later. And who knew, maybe there was something to Dr. Jiff’s story. Drake figured if he never wore his specs, he’d never find out. Drake found his way to the food court and over to the Mexican cuisine stand. It was a beautiful, summer Saturday afternoon, so there were a lot of people in the mall and a rather long line at the food stand.

As Drake took his place at the end of the line, he noticed the girl in front of him was about his age, on the tall side for a girl (as he was for a guy), with long, straight, shiny black hair, like an Asian, but her skin was as freckled as a redhead’s. Her back was turned to him, so he couldn’t see her face, but he found himself thinking "Hmm, this is an interesting girl to look at." The line moved at a snail’s pace and all the while Drake was looking (perhaps staring would be more fitting) at the girl in front of him, nearly going crazy with curiosity to know what her face looked like. He thought it must feel wonderful to run one’s hands over such beautiful, silky hair and he admired the cut of her jeans, which did much the same thing for her hips as his glasses did for his eyes.

Then when her turn finally came to order, she suddenly turned around, looked right at Drake and said "Excuse me, but could you read the price for a small serving of nachos, please? I can make out most of the menu, but the prices are in such tiny print that my glasses are a little too weak for me to see them. They’re my old ones that are about -2D behind my current prescription, but after I broke my newer glasses, this was the closest I had."
"Well, I’m in kind of the opposite predicament, my glasses are a little too new, but I’ll see here…"
He found squinting wasn’t quite enough this time, so he had to pull his glasses down his nose and peek over top of them.

"Ah, they’re $1.99."
"Thanks. By the way, my name’s Paige. You look about my age, but I don’t think we ever met, do you go to Lincoln High?" "Not yet, but I will this fall. My folks just moved here. Oh, and I’m Drake."
"Pleased to meet you, Drake" she said, her tone of voice and her smile equally warm, as she offered her hand to Drake to shake.
Then when her food was ready, Paige said "Hey Drake, if you don’t have anyone else you’re planning on sitting with, I’ve got an empty table over here. You want to have lunch together?"
"Sure!" he said, beaming.
As he waited for his order to be prepared he continued discretely checking Paige out, this time from the frontal angle as well.

Her front curves where just as full as her back ones, but her stomach was nice and flat. She had a most intriguing face, some might call it "severe", others "chiseled", but to Drake, it was simply gorgeous. It was made up of clean lines, high cheekbones, a straight nose and firm jaw with pointed chin. It made a nice contrast to the lush, soft roundedness of her body and added an air of sophistication to her look. Her lips, however, were again a soft feature, full but not to the point of looking bee stung, with a bit of shimmery pink lip gloss. Her eyes appeared to be dark and somewhat small behind a pair of large, aviator-style glasses, with some definite cut-in and power rings and a light blue tint (she was the sort of girl who looked really cool in the kind of quirky, off-beat accessories that most girls couldn’t carry off). Her face was as freckled as her body, but somehow it all seemed to "work".

Almost before Drake even sat down, Paige began asking questions (guess they’re won’t be any awkward silence with this girl! he thought).
"So, where did you guys move from?"
"From Cleveland" he replied.
"Oh, this little town must seem like the middle-of-nowhere to you, then?"
"Well, it’s always tough to be in a new area until you meet some people and in a big city there’s more people out on the streets and stuff, so you meet people sooner, but now that I’ve come to the mall and seen this is where everybody hangs out, it’s not too bad. I don’t know, I like what I’ve seen of this place so far."
"Speaking of seeing, you say those glasses are new?"
"Yeah, in fact I just got them this afternoon, at Dr. Jiff’s here in the mall. I’m still getting used to them. I’m, farsighted, you know."
"Oh, really, I did think it strange that you looked over top of your glasses to read the menu. I’m nearsighted, so I guess that means we’re opposites. Like, for me, when I take off my glasses, I can see OK if the thing I’m looking at is only a few inches from my eyes, but for the most part everything is a blur to me and the farther something is the blurrier it gets. How do you see with and without your glasses?"
"At the moment, it’s kind of a toss-up as to whether I see better with or without them. Without them, I CAN see, OK, but I’ve been getting headaches and reading’s kind of hard. Now with them, everything close-up looks really sharp and bigger and much easier to read, but if I look at something far, it’s fuzzy. Hey, I wonder who has the worst distance vision, you without glasses or me with them?"

"Why don’t we find out?" Paige said, removing her own specs.
"Oh, wow, it always takes me a little by surprise how bad my eyes are, at first. OK, looking at you now, I can see that you’re a human, but I don’t know for sure if I’d be able to recognize you if I didn’t already know who you were. I see your shirt is blue, but it just looks all blue to me, the thin white stripes I could see before have totally disappeared. I can see you have blond hair, but your face is just a big, flesh-colored blur to me. I can’t tell what color your eyes are, I can’t even tell if you have eyes! Your turn."
Drake looked at Paige. "Well, I can see better then that, I think. You’re actually pretty clear to me, you’re just starting to get too fuzzy for me to see your freckles. But I can see you have very nice eyes, when they’re not hiding behind those blue lenses. Don’t get me wrong, I mean, your glasses are cool, but it is nice to be able to see those pretty eyes."
Yep, big-time player extraordinaire, that was Drake. But in all seriousness, he really did think her eyes were just beautiful, as beautiful as the rest of her. They were glossy black, like her hair, and slightly narrow or "cat’s-eye" like, another puzzlingly Asianic feature, though it was possible they just seemed that way because of her slight but constant squinting.
"Sorry, Drake, I know how you just said you like to see my eyes, but perhaps unfortunately for you, I happen to like being able to see yours, too, so I’m afraid I’m going to have to put my glasses back on now."
"Ahhhhhh!" she sighed with relief as the cool, clarifying combo of metal and glass settled on her face once more. "Now I can see those big, baby blues again! Actually, I’m not seeing so hot right now even with them. As I said before, they’re old and a bit too weak. I have an appointment with my eye doctor Monday, since, to be honest, even my "new" glasses that I broke were starting to get a little weak, anyway. I wasn’t planning to go for an eye test until just before school started, like I always do, but I just don’t think I can walk around in a blur like this for two more months."

"Hey, didn’t you say that those glasses are about -2D too weak?" asked Drake.
"Yes, they’re -2D weaker than the newer ones I had, but they’re probably a little farther short of what I actually need than that, even, since my newer glasses were starting to get too weak, too. They may be closer to -3D too weak. Why do you ask?"
"The doctor told me that with my glasses I’m going to have the vision of about a -2D myope until I get used to them, so I guess you and I are actually seeing about the same with our glasses right now. But if those are really -3D short, then I guess you’re seeing a little worse than me. What is the prescription of those lenses, by the way? Mine are +4.00 in my right eye (the bad one) and +3.50 in my left."
"These are -6.50 in my right eye (also my worse one) and -5.75 in my left. My newer ones were -8.25 and -8.00, it seems my good eye is trying to catch up with my bad one, they may both be the same next time, I don’t know."

For the first time since they met, there was finally a moment of silence between Drake and Paige, but it wasn’t awkward, it was peaceful and contemplative, as they both sat and thought pleasant thoughts about each other. Drake wasn’t sure what to think of this girl. She was pretty, certainly and he could feel the lure of physical desire for her, but more than that, there was something intriguing and captivating about her. Yes, captivating was the word, he felt captured by her, but he didn’t feel frightened or want to run away. It was almost as if she had hypnotized him, he slowly found himself falling deeper and deeper into fascination with her, like sinking into an intensely interesting and erotic quicksand. Yet she appeared so open, straight-forward and natural, that she seemed like the last person to artfully craft an hypnotic seduction.

I’ve GOT to learn more about this girl. He thought. As he watched her eat, he realized she was almost done and was suddenly seized with panic. Don’t just sit there staring, you idiot! Get her number! Quick, before she finishes her nachos! 
 "You know, Paige, I’ve really enjoyed talking to you. Do you suppose I could have your phone number, in case I don’t make any other friends for a while and get lonely and need to talk?" He asked, looking at her with an exaggerated pouty lips and sad puppy-dog eyes face.
"Oh, I’m sure you’ll make tons of friends before you know it" she assured him, not knowing him well enough to know if the lonely-puppy act was real or put-on. "But, here’s my number, just in case" and she wrote it down on one of the paper napkins.
"Thank you" he said but as he went to pick up the napkin he caught sight of his watch. "Wow, this afternoon really flew by! I hate to rush off like this, but my sister’s gonna be here to pick me up any minute now. Not that I don’t have a license of my own and everything, I do, but she just thought since I just had my eyes examined with drops and all, I better not drive right now. Anyway, it’ll give me more time to get used to my glasses, since I’d have to take them off to drive right now. But I’ll call you."
"OK, have fun exploring your new home!" Paige called as he walked away, turning his head around to look at her until he had to turn the corner.

On Monday night Drake called Paige and asked how her eye doctor appointment went. "It turns out I was right about my left eye catching up to my right. My new rx is -9.00, both eyes. They said they won’t have my glasses ready till Wednesday, though."

"What kind of frames did you get?" asked Drake. "Well, actually I got two pairs this time. I don’t want to be in the same position I’m in now if I should break my new glasses. I got one pair that’s kind of a squareish, clear plastic frame. Then I got this other pair that’s a small, metal oval shape, but they have a finish that looks like tortoiseshell and the lenses in this frame have a slight yellow tint."

"Oh, you got tinted lenses again? But, baby, I hate to see those pretty eyes covered up like that."
As soon as he finished speaking, he realized he’d just called Paige "baby" and wondered if she picked up on it. If she did, it didn’t faze her, for she went right on.
"I know, Drake, but I like seeing the world through different colors and I’ve heard that yellow lenses are supposed to give you sharper distance vision. I don’t think these lenses hide my eyes as much as my old blue ones, though. But, really, my prescription is getting so strong and making my eyes look so small, that you almost can’t see them anyway because of that, tint or no tint. You’re really lucky that your glasses make your eyes look bigger instead."
Paige felt a warm, tingling sensation come over her as she remembered those big, blue eyes, with long-lashed lids blinking up and down like fringed curtains.

"Well, I can’t wait to see your new glasses. I’m sure they look really nice, even if they do hide your eyes a bit. You do have great taste. I just choose my frames cause they looked less terrible than some of the others. Do you think we could meet some place after you get them, like maybe the mall again? I’d invite you over here, but I think we’ll still be unpacking and trying to get the house together."

"Well, you could come over here."
"That’d be great!"
"OK, I’ll call you as soon as I have my new glasses. But, I warn you, when you come over here, you have to be on your best behavior. My parents are very strict and they always seem to know EVERYTHING that goes on in the house, even when they’re not there (not that they let me have people over when they’re gone), I think my siblings might have something to do with that-no honor among snitches, and I’m the youngest out of six, so I’ve got five people, besides my parents, who think they need to look out for me."

"Wow, you have FIVE brothers and sisters? And they all still live at home?"
"Yep, Carrie’s next youngest after me, she’s 17, the twins Kevin and Brandon are 19, they’re both in college and so is Riley (he’s 22) and Sandy is 24, but she’ll be leaving soon, since she’s engaged."
"She’s engaged and she still lives with her parents. Wow." That seemed really odd to Drake, most couples he knew lived together for a long time before they got engaged. Well, his parents hadn’t, of course, they were old, but nowadays it seemed a funny thing to stay with your parents until you were married.
"Yep, like I said, our folks are strict and they’d have probably disowned her if she’d gone off to "live in sin" with some guy." She heard Drake’s little gasp of shock and giggled "Well, maybe not really literally disowned, but they’d have been very disappointed in her, which to her would be the same thing. She’s a very loyal, responsible sort of person, goes with being the first-born, I guess. But me, I just want to live my own life and be true to myself. But I’m sure we can still manage to have some fun, even with all those relatives around. They said it’d probably be late Wednesday before I can pick up my new glasses, so I’ll probably call you on Thursday, OK?"
"Great!" said Drake.

Sure enough, on Thursday afternoon Paige called and said she had her new glasses and gave Drake her address and directions to her house. He was adjusting quickly to his glasses, even though his long distance vision still wasn’t crystal-clear, he now felt it was safe for him to wear them to drive, or at least as safe as not wearing them, because now not only was his close vision a total blur without them, but his intermediate vision was starting to go as well, so he couldn’t read the dashboard instruments.

When he arrived, Paige greeted him at the front door, wearing her new, clear-plastic glasses. She was also wearing a pretty, little yellow dress, nothing too revealing (she dressed a little more provocatively when going out alone or with her friends than she did around her parents) but revealing enough for someone in Drake’s condition, sexually deprived and madly infatuated. "Wow, Paige, you look great! I love those new glasses!"
"Thanks, come on in." She led him into the living room, where her father was sitting in a chair.
"Well, now, you must be the famous Drake!" he said. "Paige has told us so much about you."
"Yes, sir, I’m Drake" Yes SIR? Drake thought Now where did THAT come from?
He could see where Paige got her exotic, Asianic appearing features-her father was of Native American descent, with copper-toned skin, sleek, straight black hair and black, almond-shaped eyes like Paige but Paige’s skin was different and on her his features took on a different quality. She had also inherited her tall, chiseled bone structure from him.

"Martha!" Paige’s father called "Come meet Paige’s new friend!"
When Paige’s mother entered the room, Drake could see where the rest of Paige’s inheritance came from. Her mother was rather short, but with the same voluptuous curves her daughter possessed and her coloring was that of a stereotypical Irish redhead; flaming ginger locks, emerald green eyes and pale, freckled skin, just like Paige’s. But neither of Paige’s parents wore glasses, so it appeared that either one or both of them was wearing contacts or had had surgery or else Paige’s nearsightedness was something of her own invention.

Drake soon found out, for just as he and Paige’s parents had finished exchanging pleasantries, her brother Riley popped in, wearing glasses that appeared to be only slightly less than twice as strong as Paige’s. He walked in, grabbed a can of soda from the fridge and was off again with little more than a "hello" to Drake or anyone else. "You know, that’s really funny Paige, that you and your brother both wear glasses (he’d started to say "such thick glasses" but thought better of it in time to stop himself), but neither of your parents do."

"Well, our Dad used to wear glasses, really strong ones in fact, but now he wears contacts 90% of the time. Mom used to wear glasses, too, but she mostly only needed them for driving and TV, but then she had laser surgery, so she has perfect vision now (our Dad would have had surgery, but they said his eyes are so bad they wouldn’t have been able to correct him all the way and it wouldn’t be worth the risk of retina damage). All of us kids are nearsighted, Sandy’s the worst at -21, but she wears contacts all the time. Lucky for her, she’s the only one of us who really tolerates them well. They won’t work for Riley (who’s -16) because he has irregular astigmatism plus he needs prism correction to keep from seeing double (overall, he’s probably got the worst eyes out of all us kids) and Carrie (who’s -12) and I can’t stand to wear them because our eyes are so sensitive. The twins (Kevin’s -15 and Brandon’s -19, funny they’re identical, except for their prescriptions) never even bothered to try contacts, I think they like that having different glasses frames helps people tell them apart. None of us is eligible for surgery yet, since our eyes are still changing, and will probably all end up too nearsighted for it to be worth the risk, like Dad. Would you like to see my other pair of glasses?"

"Sure, Paige."
"OK, I’ll go up to my room and get them."
As she got up and started over towards the stairs, Drake got up and started to follow, but she said "Sorry, one of the rules here is "No boys allowed in the girls’ room (and vice versa)" ".
She came back wearing the yellow tinted tortoiseshell pair.
"Wow, those look nice! You were right, the yellow lenses don’t hide your eyes as much as your blue ones did and they really are a great match for that dress you have on today. I still think I like your clear ones best, though. You really do have such gorgeous eyes."
Paige then took off her tortoiseshell specs, with the intention of putting the clear ones on again, but Drake grasped her hand and held it down on the couch between them. He leaned his face in close to hers, so close their noses were almost touching.
"And they’re even prettier close-up" he said and in the next second his mouth was on hers and he was pleasantly surprised to discover that, despite her highly protective upbringing, she must have had some practice kissing-no girl was just naturally this good at it.

They had quite a nice make-out session, deep French kissing and much kissing and stroking of cheek, chins, noses and necks, as well. Ahhhhhh, Drake was right, it did feel wonderful running his hands through Paige’s sleek, glossy mane! He had worked his way down her neck and had just managed to get his tongue far enough down her dress to get a taste of her bra, when Paige suddenly remembered where they were.
"Oh, Drake, we have to stop. We can’t do this here." She said softly, partly from impassioned breathlessness and partly from trying to keep her voice down so no one would hear.
"Well then, I guess I’ll just have to invite you over to my place" he whispered in her ear, then began to nibble on it. "Your parents don’t care if you do this?"
"My parents don’t pay any attention to me. Nobody does" his tone suggested he had mixed feelings about that.
He stole one more kiss from her before resigning himself to the fact that any further activity would have to wait until he got her over to his house.

It was the longest 44 hours, 18 minutes and 27 seconds of his entire life, but on Saturday afternoon (one whole week after they first met in the mall) Paige finally arrived at Drake’s house. She was wearing her clear plastic glasses again; otherwise, she was dressed all in black, in one of her not-around-my-family outfits-a tight top with plunging neckline, a short, black denim skirt and (she always had to have something quirky) black cowboy boots. She had her hair in a French braid clasped at the end with a black, heart-shaped barrette, her pink lipstick had been replaced with brick red and her fingernails were painted a deep reddish black. To Drake she looked like a dark-and-dangerous combination of Lady Dracula and a cute, nearsighted, female Johnny Cash. It was a very different look from the sweet, simple girl he’d met before, but somehow the two sides didn’t seem to clash; he understood that she had not suddenly become a different person, she was just showing a different side of herself. She had that amazing ability, that Drake had never before seen a girl possess, to be both a "good girl" and a "bad girl" without seeming constrained in the first role or guilty in the latter. She was totally comfortable with all parts of her personality, and there were many; she reminded him of a well-cut diamond, so many facets and so many different brilliant rainbow colors. He felt a little underdressed or wrongly dressed or something, having met her at the door in only a plain, button-down white shirt and basic blue jeans, in bare feet and with his hair in it’s usual state of sexy (to Paige, though he didn’t realize this) disarray. But he was freshly showered, cologne-sprayed and mint-mouthed, and he figured that counted for something. He offered to show her his room and she readily took him up on it, though her family would have found it quite scandalous and it was something she herself would never have done before she met Drake.

Once they were there, Paige asked "Are you sure no one is going to find out what we’re doing here?"
"Sure" he said easily. "My mother’s never home on Saturdays, Dad’s always working and even if he found out, he’s cool, he’d be like "Right on, that’s my boy!" My sis comes in here sometimes to borrow stuff, but she knows a closed door means "Stay out" and even if she knew she wouldn’t care, I don’t care what she does with her boyfriends."
Then for awhile Paige just stood in the middle of the room and looked around, while Drake stood there looking at Paige looking around. It was like they’d been hit with the "nervous bridegroom syndrome", now that all the external inhibitions were gone, their own internal ones had paradoxically increased.

Drake began to wonder just how clear Paige was on what was about to occur; she’d obviously had some make-out experience, but he had a sense that she’d never gone all the way before, though she never told him so. In all his experience, he’d only been with two girls who claimed to be virgins; one had been just as he’d expected a virgin to be, shy and scared and in need of a lot of coaxing to get to that final step. He’d heard about how girls always remembered their first and he had some romantic dream of being forever stamped on some girl’s memory as some sort of hero or ideal that all who followed would have to live up to. But in reality it was more like a nightmare-it had been messy and painful (for her and frankly for him, too, because she was so tight) and she cried a lot after and called him things you wouldn’t expect to hear coming out of a virgin’s mouth. Great he’d thought So much for being a hero, she probably thinks I’m a jerk! She called him a few days later and apologized, saying he hadn’t done anything wrong, it was her problem, that sometimes it was hard for girls their first time. He forgave her, but he didn’t suggest they get back together, either, and neither did she. OK, so I’m not a jerk. She’ll probably just look back and think of me as some dumb kid who didn’t know any better, maybe she’ll laugh about it someday.

The other "virgin" was a girl he rather suspected wasn’t-if she was a virgin, I must have been one heck of a teacher; as soon as we broke up, she promptly went and did half the guys in school! But Paige was different, she may have had her wild side, but she wasn’t the type to pretend to be something she wasn’t.
Eventually, he realized that one of them had to make the first move and break the ice, so he sat down on his bed and patted a spot on the bed beside him, saying "Why don’t you kick off your boots and come sit a spell?"
Speechlessly, Paige walked over to the bed, sat down and started tugging at her boots. She moved slowly, not with hesitance but in a dreamy, languid sort of way, almost as though she were hypnotized. Then suddenly she leaned toward Drake and kissed him. Hard. The suddenness and intensity of it nearly sucked his breath from him. She continued kissing him with a mad passion, his lips, his forehead, even his glasses. Then she started working her way down; seeming to steady herself just a bit, she slowly began unfastening his shirt buttons, her moist tongue and hot breath following in the wake of her busy hands. Such a strange contrast of sensations on his skin, her hot skin and breath and the cool plastic and lenses of her glasses.

Once she’d finished unbuttoning his shirt, he drew back momentarily to shrug out of it and she took the opportunity to pull her own shirt over her head, knocking her glasses off in the process. A blind, panicked look came over her as she began feeling along the bed for them. Drake saw them lying on the floor, but had a naughty impulse to continue watching her desperate search.
"Oh, Drake!" she cried. "I dropped my glasses, could you please help me find them? I’m practically blind without them, especially in a place I’ve never been!"
He bent down and picked them up, then gently placed them back on Paige’s nose, then started kissing her and her glasses with the same fervor with which she’d kissed him. He put his hands behind her and rubbed her back and felt that her silky, black bra had a clasp in back, so it wouldn’t have to be pulled over her head (fortunately for her, but unfortunately for Drake, who much enjoyed the blind-without-my-glasses "spectacle").

Drake undid the clasp and pulled the bra down and off her arms, then cupped one of her breasts in his hands (it quite filled them) and teased the nipple with his mouth until it stood up, pointy and hard. Now it was Paige’s turn to feel the strangely erotic mix of warm flesh and cool glass against her skin. She began to give him little love-bites on his shoulders, the tiny points of sharp pricking giving him more pleasure than pain. After a few minutes, she suddenly began to moan and writhe beneath his touch.
"Oh, Drake, I feel so strange! I’ve never felt anything like this!" she gasped and Drake was sure she’d never been this far before.
He was beginning to feel pretty strange himself; he’d laid awake half the night the night before, thinking about today, and had finally been forced to relieve his own tension, and now he was glad he had, because in spite of having had that release, he was finding it increasingly difficult to keep his libido in check, though he knew it wasn’t good to try to rush a girl along before she was ready, especially her first time.

He at least had to get rid of the uncomfortable restraint of his jeans, so he quickly unzipped them and pulled them down, trying to pull away from her as little as possible.
She suddenly looked at him with surprise and said "Drake, do you realize you’re almost naked?"
"Is that a good thing or a bad thing?" he asked, not sure from her tone which way she was thinking.
"An interesting thing" she replied "I’ve always wondered what a naked man looks like."
Her voice sounded more genuinely curious than flirtatious.
"Well, wonder no more, baby" he said, removing his undershorts.
"Wow" she breathed, staring awe-struck at him.
There wasn’t one part of him that didn’t look all together gorgeous to her.
"Can I ask you something?" "
Sure, sweetheart."
"Well, what I want to know is, how does it feel to you, when your, you know, is…up, like that?"
It was the first bit of bashfulness she’d ever displayed and Drake was blushing with embarrassment himself-after all, it was one thing to do it, but he’d never had a girl ask him to talk about how he felt doing it! But then, he’d never met a girl like Paige before, either.

"Well, it’s kinda hard to explain" he began. "Please try, though. I really want to know."
"Um, well, it’s sort of like, on the surface there’s this tingling, but on the inside it’s more of a throbbing feeling. But really, I don’t just feel stuff…down there, it’s like my whole body feels different somehow. Oh, I told you it’s hard to explain!"
"No, really I get it. Actually, that pretty much describes how I feel right now, I mean I know I haven’t got the same parts, but what you said, that’s just how I feel. Only I have, like, this feeling of pressure, too. Like when you haven’t peed in a really long time and you just feel like you’re going to burst? Only it’s not my bladder, it’s something else, do you know what I mean?"
"Yeah, I feel that, too. And I know how to make it feel better."
With that, he quickly removed her skirt and panties and put his fingers into her, surprised at how hot and slickly wet her flesh was. Now she was not just moaning but actually yelling, a person who didn’t know what was happening would think she was being tortured, just judging from her vocalizing and facial expressions.

Drake felt they were both as ready as they’d ever be, so he moved on top of Paige and prepared to enter her.
As soon as he took his hand away, she gasped and begged him in a high, strained voice "Oh, please don’t stop!" as a desperate look came into her dark, minified eyes.
"Oh, I don’t intend to" he said as he began to fuse his flesh with hers.
Paige lay beneath him, too stunned to speak; his coming into her brought a mildly uncomfortable stretching sensation, but over and above that was a mounting excitement and tension that so filled her being that she could think of nothing but this beautiful young man and the feelings he was giving her. She looked up into his heat-flushed face, with long, blond strands of hair plastered to his forehead with sweat, his big, blue eyes darting all about to look at different parts of her, sometimes closing for a moment as he concentrated on feeling, behind those shining spectacles with their lenses catching the light in the most fascinating way, seeming almost to glow as if the lenses themselves were the source of the light. Then he brought his face down to hers and kissed her deeply, their glasses hitting with a raucous series of "CLINKS", until suddenly she was overcome by a sensation unlike any she’d ever known, as if she had been standing in a sea of bliss and then the high tide came in and she was knocked down by wild, powerful waves of pleasure!

For several moments after he withdrew, they simply laid side-by-side and tried to catch their breath.
Finally, Paige whispered "You know, I’d never made love before".
"Neither have I." replied Drake. "I mean, I’ve had sex before, but that’s all it was, just sex. This was…deep. I know I must sound stupid, but this was just…beyond anything I’ve ever known before. I mean like it means something. Like it means…we’re in love."
By this last part his voice had almost dropped to a whisper, both with emotion and just a bit of embarrassment. I sound like such a girl! he thought. But there was no denying this was love.
"Of course it means we’re in love" Paige said sweetly, smiling and brushing a few stray hairs off Drake’s forehead.
"See, this is what I’ve been looking for! All the other times, all the other people, I just wanted to feel this. Feel love. That’s why I kept going from girl to girl, I’d see a girl a couple times and then I’d realize that what I really wanted wasn’t there, so it was on to the next one."
He’d been thinking out loud and, suddenly remembering who he was talking to, he was horrified at what he’d said. He’d never told a girl about any of the others before her. But when he looked at Paige, she was just sitting there looking attentive and empathetic, so he went on.
"I think maybe I never really felt loved. Not just by girls, I mean, but even at home. You know, in a way I almost envy you, having parents that care enough to stick their noses in your business. I do like the freedom that I have here, but sometimes I wish I had parents that cared when I didn’t come home till the wee hours of the morning, I mean, the thought never even crosses their minds, when it’s 3 in the morning and I’m out somewhere (they have no idea where, because they never ask me where I’m going) that I could have had an accident or been mugged or something. I could go missing for a week and probably nobody would notice! Mom’s always either at some bar or when she’s home she’s drunk out of her mind and I think Dad doesn’t want to come down on me cause he feels guilty about all the stuff he does. I know he’s got a girlfriend, I’ve known it for years, the way Mom is I can hardly blame the guy, but still…"

"Wow, Drake, I’ve never looked at it like that. I mean, I’ve always been grateful that my family loves me, but I’d never thought that maybe the kids who’s folks let them do anything might not have it so good, after all. Has it always been this way, didn’t you ever feel like your parents loved you?"
"No, I don’t guess my parents were always this way, I’ve seen old home movies and photographs and stuff and actually it looks like they were pretty happy at one time. But then my Mom had my sister right after they were married, and me right after her, and she really didn’t want a kid, let alone two of them! Me and my sister were accidents, our parents have always reminded us. Apparently Mom couldn’t take the stress and started drinking a lot, which drove Dad away and caused him to look outside of our family for what he wasn’t getting at home (kinda like me). They used to fight a lot when we were little, but now mostly they’ve both just given up, I think. On fighting, on loving, on life really, or anything good in life, anyway. I never want to be like them, Paige. I want to love my wife and my children and being who I am. I don’t want to just numb myself and turn off all my feelings because I can’t handle some pressure. I want to be strong enough to take whatever comes and still be able to feel."

"Oh, Drake, you are strong! It takes a lot of strength to admit what you just told me."
She sat for awhile, thinking, looking very serious or at least, as serious as a girl can look when she has nothing on except a thick pair of glasses.
Suddenly she started giggling and for a moment Drake was afraid he’d said something he really shouldn’t have, but then she said, laughing "Do you realize we both forgot to take our glasses off? We were wearing them the whole time!"
"When yours came off I thought about just telling you to never mind them, but you seemed so panicky I knew you really needed them to see anything, even for this. And, you know, I never even thought about mine. That must be a sign I’m getting used to them, since at first I could think of nothing BUT my glasses and how blurry things were with them on."
Then he took them off and was startled to discover that the world around him was a blur. By straining his eyes painfully, he could bring the far end of the room somewhat into focus, but when he looked over at Paige beside him, her face was nothing more than a fuzzy, flesh-colored blob and that it remained, no matter how hard he tried to focus.

"Wow, now I can hardly see WITHOUT my glasses! I guess it’s about time to go back to Dr. Jiff for an increase in my prescription."
"But you just got the prescription you have now, right? I’ve never gone less than a year between increases, though the last couple years I have started getting the squinties about 8 or 9 months in. But none of us kids ever had to have new glasses in less than 6 months."
"Actually, the doctor only gave me part of my prescription to start with. See, when you’re farsighted you have to get used to your glasses, it’s not like you nearsighted people who get glasses for the first time and suddenly everything’s clear. Anyway, he told me that once I adjusted to this rx, I’d need to come back in so he could give me some more."
"Can I come along when you go to see the doctor?"
"Sure."

So a few days later, Drake and Paige were sitting in Dr. Jiff’s office. The doctor repeated the whole procedure of dilating Drake’s eyes and clicking through the different lenses, even though Drake asked if he couldn’t just give him the next step towards the rx he’d found he needed last time. After this was over, he announced that Drake’s new prescription was +6.50 and +7.00.
"There now, you see, it was a good idea to retest your eyes! I was only going to increase you by 1.50 diopters, but your exam shows you can manage another 3 diopters and still see 20/40. Now that will give you the tiniest bit of blur at long distances, but not as bad as you had getting used to your first rx. Or, I could even go ahead and give you your entire prescription now, but then you’d have a blur a little worse than the one you had at first to contend with."

"Well, I suppose if Paige can live in a blur for a little while, like she’s had to sometimes, I can, too. So, what the heck, let’s go for the whole thing! By the way, how much is this whole thing that we’re going for?"
"You’re full rx is +7.75 and +8.25, which I warn you is going to mean pretty thick and strong-looking lenses, although we could always consider contacts." Dr. Jiff said with a funny look on his face.
"Oh no, doc, glasses are fine for me." Drake assured him.
"I thought so" said the doctor with what looked to be a self-satisfied smile. "Now, you could save money by having new lenses put into your current frames, but I’d recommend that you get a new frame and keep the glasses you’ve got now intact as-is, since the blur from your new rx might be too much to handle at times at first, but your eyes have relaxed too much for you to be able to see well simply by looking over your glasses, like you could before. You can wear your "old" glasses for driving and other things where you need good distance vision and use the new ones for reading and general walking around until you get fully accustomed to them."

Drake found the frame selection process much more enjoyable with Paige along to help, even though now his near vision was nearly non-existent as he tried to look at himself through the plano-lenses of the various frames. As Paige looked at Drake trying on the frames and bare-eyed in between them, she felt that he somehow looked very different without his usual glasses, and she felt different about him, too, a little less crazy-passionate, more cool and rational, not that she cared about him any less, though. She pondered why this might be until they finally settled on a frame, a smallish (at the doctor’s suggestion) horn-rim type that at first glance appeared black but was in fact deep midnight blue, just a shade darker than Drake’s eyes. Dr. Jiff asked Drake if he wanted the same "special treatment" as before on his lenses and he replied that he did.
As the doctor was busy in his lab making them, Paige asked "What special treatment are you getting on your lenses?"
"Oh, I’m not sure exactly what it is, it’s more cosmetic than anything else really, it doesn’t effect how I see, just how people see me."

Before long Drake’s new glasses were ready and when he put them on, both he and Paige were shocked-he at how blurred his vision had become, and she at how hot her boyfriend had become! It took all her self-restraint not to grab him and start making out right there in the optometrist’s office!
Then suddenly, it occurred to her and she said with a smile "Why, Dr. Jiff! You gave this boy Specs Appeal lenses in his glasses, didn’t you?"
Drake gasped "How do you know about those?"
"Oh, I’ve had them in my glasses for the last couple years. It all started when Sandy and her fiancé started getting serious. Carrie and I were jealous and since Sandy had contacts and a boyfriend, and we had glasses and no boyfriends, it wasn’t that great a leap for us to conclude that contacts = boyfriend. So we embarked on the great lens experiment. We were so determined to wear contacts that we refused to get glasses made as well, "just in case", as had been suggested. But sure enough, one week into the "experiment" we both had to give in and acknowledge that, rather than contacts=boyfriend our equation was more like contacts + our eyes=cats + dogs, in other words, our eyes didn’t get along well with the lenses AT ALL! So we had to sheepishly march back to the optician’s to get glasses made to our new rxs, since both of our old ones were way too weak. The optician heard how bummed we were and offered the Specs Appeal lenses to Carrie. She readily agreed to them and I asked couldn’t I have them too? And the optician explained that my rx wasn’t really high enough for them to work, but I said never mind I want them, anyway. That was the blue-tinted pair that you first saw me in, Drake. I had gotten some attention with those glasses, and also with the next pair that I’d just broken when we met, but not as much as I’d hoped for. And certainly I’ve never met anybody like you before."

Paige gave Drake a look that made Dr. Jiff feel a strangely voyeuristic blend of embarrassment and titillation.

"So much for the secret recipe" the doctor muttered, then smiled "See, I told you that you wouldn’t be wanting your money back, Drake! And I think it’s safe to say that Paige is satisfied, as well?"
"Oh, yes" she said "I’m VERY satisfied" and she proceeded to smother Drake with kisses.
"Uh, Drake" Dr. Jiff suggested "Why don’t you take those new glasses off now and put on your old ones for the drive home? Until, er, everyone gets used to them."
"If this girl would get her face off my face for a second I would" Drake laughed.
"Sorry" Paige said, blushing with embarrassment and desire and drawing back to allow Drake to switch spectacles.
There now, not so very hard to control things as long as he keeps those old, weaker ones on.

That afternoon when they arrived back at his house, they ran up to his room, shut the door and Drake put his new glasses back on.
"Are you sure you want me to wear these now? I really can’t see very well, you know."
"I know" she answered breathlessly between kisses. "The weird thing is, watching you squint those BIG, blue eyes, and knowing you’re seeing a blur, just gets me that much hotter! And it gives me an idea" she removed her glasses and laid them aside "Why don’t we both make love in the blur this time?"
What followed was warm and intimate, in a way that their previous love-making hadn’t been, because the soft blur that enveloped them kept them secluded together in their own little world, concentrating more on touch and sound and getting nose-to-nose to look into each other’s eyes.

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"And so, Stace, there it is. Now Drake’s gotten fully adjusted to his glasses and can see perfectly with them (but you should see how blind he is without them!). And, Dr. Jiff thinks we’re such a great "success story" that he’s offered us work in his optical lab, on weekends and after school, and he says he’s even thinking of turning his office over to us when he retires in a few years! And…Drake has asked me to marry him and I said yes! Now, we aren’t formally engaged yet, we both know my parents would think we were rushing things, but we’ve decided between ourselves that we’ll announce our formal engagement sometime this year and then get married this summer when we’re done with high school and Sandy will be having her wedding, so we can have a double-wedding, if Sandy agrees, of course, but I’m pretty sure she will. So now I’ve got a guy, a job, my whole life is coming together and it’s all because of these wonderful things called glasses! There’s just one problem, though…"

"What’s that?" Stacy asked.
"Well, way back Carrie and I decided that whichever of us got married first, the other one would be her maid of honor. But if we have a double-wedding Carrie will be so busy being Sandy’s maid of honor that I wonder if…you’d consider being my maid of honor?"
"Oh, Paige, I’d be, well, honored to be your maid of honor!"
"OK, but you’ll have to promise me that you’ll get yourself a nice pair of glasses and ditch those ridiculous contact lenses! I’ve never had the heart to tell you this before, but that blank, unaccessorized face of yours is kinda dorky-looking, reminds me of my parents!"
"Hey" Stacy said "Speaking of parents, when you two have kids, do you suppose your nearsighted genes and his farsighted genes will cancel each other out and your kids will have normal vision?" "I certainly hope not!" Paige replied "After all, we do want grandchildren someday!"

The End
April 2007