South of the Boudoir, by ARthur

Chapter 5
South of the Boudoir, Part 5

Chapter Description: By ARthur

During the next few days, Valene lived in acute fear of Uxia. Seeking refuge under her bed, Valene made no attempts to escape. While under the mattress and wood slats, she contemplated how she had descended from a self-confident woman of wealth to a frightened and dependent little girl.

She realized that as the days progressed, she was increasingly reacting more like a small child than a rational adult to the now out-of-control events that were ripping her world to shreds. But she was emotionally unable to fight back these creeping changes in her psyche. The child in her feared the punishments she’d receive for crossing the woman who inserted herself as Valene’s ’mommy.’ And what remained of her adult side didn’t want to leave either. To do so would abandon her wealth to Uxia, who was spending it at an alarming rate.

The stays under the bed grew longer as Valene began to hate walking around the apartment. That usually resulted in her viewing Uxia making a big deal out of enjoying Valene’s property, while taunting her. "What’s a matter, baby? Somebody steal your dolly," Uxia would ask while trying on some of Valene’s adult clothing or jewelry. These excursions from her fortress of solitude only left her feeling browbeaten.

Late one morning, Uxia reached under the bed and yanked Valene from her spring and foam roofed redoubt. "We’re going to the beach," Uxia said as she forcibly stripped Valene and stuffed her into the tankini bathing suit.

Uxia pulled Valene down Ocean Avenue so hurriedly that Valene had trouble keeping up, almost losing one of her sandals at one point. All the while, Uxia threatened Valene not to ’try anything funny’ like trying to escape or ’telling false stories about your mommy’ to strangers. She especially warned her unwilling ward of the penalty for not addressing her as ’mommy.’

To Valene’s distress, Uxia exiled her to the kiddie pool area, which was surrounded by a chain link fence and had a park employee stationed at the gate to keep the children from leaving without permission. It was like Stalag 17 with a water slide, Valene thought.

Standing by the fence, her face pressed against the crisscrossed links, Valene watched Uxia as she spread out a blanket on the sand and removed her robe to reveal herself wearing a lime green bikini - the same one Valene had bought for herself after her first dose of Izumiwakai water. Rob soon joined her.

Valene sadly contemplated how she provided everything that Uxia was now enjoying. Even Uxia’s toned and sexy body had resulted from the Izumiwakai water Valene had purchased, and she was using that body to snare the man she so desperately wanted.

Valene’s efforts to listen to Uxia and Rob’s conversation was interrupted as a boy her age crept up behind her, pulled back the elastic band on the bikini bottom of her suit, and let it snap back onto her keister. "Yow!" Valene screamed before she turned around to push the boy away.

His twin brother soon joined him. Each grabbing either Valene’s arms or legs, they carried her screaming to the pool and tossed her in.

Thrashing in the water, Valene soon regained her bearings, allowing her to bob to the surface. Gasping for breath, she saw the boys seized by the lady lifeguard. "It’s not their fault. The girl started it," the boys’ mother screamed from the far end of the fence.

Valene returned to the fence, only to see that Rob was gone, and Uxia was carrying on an acrimonious conversation with another woman. Valene knew the other woman. It was Jeneane Lozano, whom she remembered seeing infrequently at the McCauley Health Club, but also at Uxia’s parties in the apartment. Jeneane and Uxia always seemed happy to be in each other’s company at the parties. Jeneane even once gave Uxia an envelope with a ’commission.’ But now they appeared intensely angry with each other. And Valene could vaguely hear Jeneane claim Rob as her boyfriend, warning Uxia to lay off. But Uxia only laughed, claiming that she was ’stealing Rob fair and square.’

That night, Uxia put on Valene’s most expensive party dress.

"See how this diaphanous gown compliments my every curve? You should be glad I’m making it look so good," the sexy woman told the involuntary 8-year-old, who sat looking cross on the sofa.

"Oh, mommy’s little girl is jealous," Uxia retorted, dripping with sarcasm.

Valene continued to glare.

"So you think you’d look better in these clothes?" Uxia sneered.

She pulled Valene off the sofa and into the boudoir. She unceremoniously yanked off Valene’s play dress. Valene squirmed mightily as Uxia pulled over her legs a pair of woman’s pantyhose, which she knotted in the back to adhere to Valene’s girl-size waist. The stockings drooped baggily on Valene’s legs. Uxia then dropped over Valene’s head a woman-size silk blouse. It hung down to Valene’s knees, with the plunging neckline exposing her navel.

"Still think you look better in mommy’s clothes?" Uxia snickered as Valene looked up helplessly. "Oh, maybe if you wore some of mommy’s makeup," Uxia added as she dragged Valene to the vanity. Uxia ground ample quantities of face powder and rouge on the girl’s face, topping it with a broad swatch of lipstick around her mouth. Viewing her image in the mirror, Valene thought she looked ready for Ringling Brothers.

The sound of the doorbell brought Mrs. Garcia, ready for guard duty. She brought Valene’s dinner, a nearly cold Happy Meal.

The next bell brought Rob in an ill-fitting polyester suit. He viewed the curiously dressed and made-up Valene in the living room, the heels of her stockings following at least eight inches behind her feet.

"Isn’t my daughter silly, trying to look like mommy?" Uxia told her broad-shouldered beau. Rob chuckled, "She’s nothing like her mother." Totally humiliated, Valene retreated tearfully into the kitchen.

Valene listened intently as she heard Uxia instruct Mrs. Garcia to keep a close watch on her while she and Rob dined at Chateau Oncle Marcel, the most expensive French restaurant in town. Valene found her Happy Meal hamburger especially dry that evening.

Late that night, Uxia returned walking on air. She danced from the front door into Valene’s tiny bedroom and interrupted her sleep.

"Wonderful news," she told the girl who was still wiping her eyes, trying to get her bearings. "Rob proposed to me tonight. Won’t it be wonderful to have him as your daddy?" Uxia added as Valene, suddenly jarred fully awake, sat petrified.

After Uxia danced from the room, Valene pinched herself. "Ouch!" she said, proving to herself that she had not died and gone to hell. She was living in a worldly hell, one in which an ordinary woman could be condemned to be the young daughter of a grinning monster and the man of her dreams.

Clouds of doom hung over Valene the next day as she merely went through the motions of living. She picked at her breakfast and just stared at her lunch. Much time was spent glaring out at the ocean from a chair on the balcony. Her life had become one gigantic nightmare that even Wes Craven wouldn’t touch.

But by evening, she noticed that Uxia was no longer happy. She had become nervous, pacing the apartment while repeatedly placing phone calls that weren’t answered. Viewing this, Valene decided that maybe life was still worth living - at least for a few more days.