At the urging of several TMF friends (particularly dig dug dog, elaah & desdemona), I'm posting this little story. I hope you like it....
Julie slid the key into the lock, twisted it clock-wise & turned the knob all with one hand, a sequence of actions she had done so many times that it had become almost robotic. She sighed as she opened the door, tossing the drenched umbrella into the basket in the foyer. Thunder rumbled in the distance as Julie reached for the light switch, only to find that the room remained in darkness. She flipped the switch up & down a few more times before concluding that the storm must have knocked out the power. "Wonderful," she thought.
Although there were no lights on in the house, there was just enough ambient light to allow her to find her way around, albeit with more than a few bumps & knocks. As Julie made her way into the kitchen, a curious thought entered her mind: where was the ambient light coming from? She looked out the kitchen window & saw the glow of the street light across the street. "How can the power be out if the street light is working," she muttered to herself. In her fatigued state, she hadn’t even noticed this obvious contradiction, which was further evidenced by the ceiling fan & light she could see in her neighbor’s kitchen next door. "Did I blow a fuse? How? I didn’t leave anything on," she muttered again. Then another, more disturbing, thought occurred to her: why hadn’t any of her cats greeted her at the door, like they always do? An almost palpable fear began to grip her. "Something’s wrong here," she thought as she started to back away from the window. At that moment, a brilliant lightning flash illuminated the kitchen & out of the corner of her eye Julie saw a shadow against one of the walls that was clearly not one of the kitchen furnishings. A rapidly mounting panic seized her. The thunder clap arrived at the exact moment that a gloved hand darted out of the shadows & over her mouth & nose. Julie began to feel dizzy & nauseous, & being a nurse, instantly recognized the smell of ether. She fought for only a moment as the room began to spin around her. As darkness enveloped her, she heard the distant, excessively reverberant sound of a cat’s meowing……
Light gradually entered Julie’s darkness. As the drowsiness began to give way to consciousness, Julie tried to rub her eyes & realized that she could not move her arms. Nor could she move her legs. With full awareness restored, she began to slowly discover the details of her restraint. She was spread-eagle on her bed, naked except for her underwear, with her arms tied to the corners of the headboard. Her ankles were held in some kind of device, somehow clamped to the bedframe, that she could only think to describe as some sort of bondage/stocks-type of thing. In addition, she couldn’t even move her feet. After a few seconds of trying to wiggle her feet, she concluded that her big toes were somehow tied to the stocks-thing, as were her little toes. This manner of restraint not only immobilized her feet & toes, but stretched her soles taut & spread her toes apart, exposing the undersides & the spaces in-between. "What the hell is going on here?," she thought.
As if in response to her telepathic question, a figure emerged from the shadows cast by the various candles around the room. For just a moment, Julie wondered why she hadn’t noticed the candles before, but her focus was instantly brought back to the immediate situation by the presence of the stranger. He was dressed totally in black, with black leather gloves & a black ski mask, the kind with two holes for the eyes & one for the mouth. He was clearly not a large man. Julie guessed he was about 5’8" or maybe 5’9" tall, & maybe about 180 to 185 pounds. She was a little surprised at her powers of observation, considering the situation.
The stranger approached the right side of the bed & leaned over her, looking intently at her face. She was immediately struck by his eyes: despite the dim light of the candles, they were the deepest, most resonant blue eyes she had ever seen, to the point that they almost seemed to glow. Julie started to indignantly protest her situation & immediately realized that she had been gagged. Once again, she wondered how she could possibly have missed such a thing before now. The stranger straightened up & moved toward the foot of the bed. Lifting her head up, she could just see him reaching down & picking up what looked like a black travel bag. He unzipped it, looked inside for a moment &, appearing satisfied with its contents, pulled over the stool Julie kept near the dresser & sat at the foot of the bed. The stool was only designed as a step-up tool &, consequently, was only about a foot high. Between the size of the stocks-thing & the shortness of the stool, Julie could only see the stranger’s head from the eyes up.
Julie started to ask what he was doing down there but all that came out was a muffled "aawmmm mmmmnnnfff." The stranger responded by holding up his right hand &, with his left, removed the leather glove. He closed his hand until only his index finger pointed to the ceiling. He then lowered his hand & his head. Julie felt something fairly soft lightly stroke the bottom of her left foot from the base of her toes to her heel. She tried to turn her foot away but, of course, could not. Another light stroke, this time from the heel toward the toes, followed. A few seconds later, the light, feathery touch of what Julie believed was the stranger’s fingertip was replaced by what was obviously the point of his fingernail, again stroking from the base of the toes to the heel. Again, a stroke from the heel to the toes followed, this time with the fingernail. Julie’s left leg stiffened & she moaned briefly in protest. "My God, he wants to tickle me!," she thought. He looked up again & held up his left hand, removing the glove as before. Again, he closed his hand to make an upwardly pointing gesture. Again, he lowered his hand & his head & proceeded to stroke the sole of her right foot with the same pattern as he had with her left. Again, her leg stiffened in response to the stimulus. The stranger held up both hands but didn’t close them before lowering them again. This time Julie felt strokes on both soles at the same time. Once again, her legs stiffened & this time she wanted to pull her legs away, as the stranger’s once light strokes were giving way to harder & stiffer strokes. Her protests were starting to become more animated & were beginning to build in volume. Suddenly, the stranger stopped. Julie relaxed her legs & breathed a sigh of relief as best she could through the gag. But the stranger was hardly finished.
Just as Julie was starting to relax again, she felt what she thought were multi-fingered, feathery touches running up & down both of her soles. If she could have moved them, her feet would have been trembling & twitching as the dancing fingertips did their steps. Just as her feet were almost starting to become desensitized to the light touches, the stranger went from fingertip touches to fingernail touches. He quickly increased the pressure on her soles, concentrating on specific parts like the area just below the toes on one foot while scratching the area just below the ball on the other. Julie tried to curl her toes in response to the more intense tickling but all she could do with her outer toes tied the way they were was to slightly arch her middle three toes. The stranger switched locations frequently, so Julie would not become desensitized. The whole time this was occurring, Julie’s moaning protests were becoming louder & more frequent.
Even in this heavy stimulus situation, Julie knew that her feet were not her most sensitive spot, & that she stood a good chance of getting through the tickling relatively unscathed if the stranger did not continue very much longer. As if in telepathic response to her thoughts, the tickling suddenly stopped. The stranger then abruptly stood up & left the room. Julie was perplexed. "Is he going away? Is he going to leave me like this?," she wondered. Her confusion increased dramatically when she heard one of her cupboard doors opening & then closing, followed by the sound of her electric can opener cutting into some kind of can. "What the hell?," she thought. The can opener sound was immediately followed by the familiar sound of her cats meowing. "They’re OK! They must think it’s time to be fed," she thought. In a manner of speaking, she was absolutely right. They were going to be fed, but in a way that Julie couldn’t possibly have imagined.
The stranger returned holding what looked to be a can of tuna, followed by her cats, mewing constantly. He sat down once again on the stool & reached down for his travel case. From it he pulled a basting brush. He dipped the bristles into the can & proceeded to paint Julie’s soles from the base of her toes to her heels. The sensation of the brush on her feet only tickled slightly, to the point of almost being pleasant. However, when her cats jumped onto the edge of the bed & started to lick her soles with their raspy tongues, the pleasure gave way to a surprisingly intense tickle. Julie started her moaning protestations again. She lifted her head for a moment & saw the stranger looking at her & holding up a pair of toothbrushes, one in each hand. "Huh?," she thought.
The stranger lowered his hands & Julie’s puzzlement was instantly solved by the most intense foot-tickle sensations she had ever experienced as the stranger scrubbed the undersides of her captive toes. While her feet were indeed not her most ticklish spots, the sensory combination of her cats licking the soles & the stranger brushing the undersides of her toes was more than she had ever experienced before. What was even worse: the stranger would sometimes dart the toothbrushes IN BETWEEN her toes, an intense sensation she had never experienced before, & one which tickled considerably more than she could have imagined. The volume of her moaning protestations was slowly rising & her body was beginning to rock & twist in an effort to escape this previously unexperienced tickling. However, after what Julie believed was only a few minutes of toothbrush tickling, the stranger abruptly stopped & stood up. While the cats continued to lick her soles, the stranger walked toward her & sat on the bed by her knees. Without warning, he reached over her legs & started tickling behind her knees. This was a more sensitive spot than her feet, &, along with the cat-licking, had Julie moaning quite loudly despite her gag. Fortunately for Julie, the fact that she was lying on her back made it awkward for the stranger to effectively tickle her behind the knees, & he stopped rather quickly.
Julie was beginning to notice that the tickling on her soles was slowly diminishing as the cats stopped licking one at a time, the oil from the can having been essentially cleaned off. Before she could relax & catch her breath, the stranger stood up again & reached for her neck. His fingers stroked & wiggled furiously, & Julie started squealing through her gag. Her neck was a very sensitive spot, even more so than the backs of her knees & certainly more than her feet (even with toothbrushes scrubbing her toes). Occasionally, he would move his fingers from her neck to her chin & sometimes, her ears. Julie’s squealing was slowly rising in volume AND pitch, as her resolve not to succumb to the sensations was gradually crumbling. She was also starting to find it hard to breathe. The gag was restricting her intake of much-needed air through her mouth. Just as Julie was beginning to feel a bit dizzy from the lack of oxygen, the stranger again abruptly stopped.
Gasping as best she could through the gag, Julie noticed the stranger gazing at her torso & a bolt of panic shot through her: "he knows my spots!," she screamed inside her head. "He knows my spots!!!" Indeed, the stranger had known to start with her least sensitive spot, her feet, move to her next most ticklish spot, the backs of her knees, & then to the next most ticklish spot, her neck. And now he was gazing at her ribs & tummy, areas that were at least as ticklish as her neck. "Oh my God! Does he know about my underarms?" Julie’s underarms were the absolute worst spot on her entire body. The thought of being tortured there (& it would be "torture") caused the rising panic to gain even more momentum & speed. Julie’s heart was pounding furiously in anticipation of the possible armpit tickling. However, the stranger responded, once again almost telepathically, by poking his index fingers spasmodically in various places on her ribcage. He began slowly, a poke here, a poke there, but rapidly increased the frequency of the poking. Julie started laughing & squealing at the same time, again rocking & twisting to escape the poking digits, but with much more animation than before.
Julie was starting to lose her sense of time. The tickling sensations were so intense that her mind was beginning to focus more & more on the tickling, & less on anything else. She had no idea how much time had passed, but she was starting to get dizzy again. Despite the rib tickling, her survival instincts were taking over. She began to forcefully attempt to suck in air through her gag, with the result that the stranger’s poking fingers were having less & less of an effect on her. Julie was on the verge of passing out when the stranger (yet again, almost telepathically) stopped.
With the room swirling around her, & struggling to breathe, Julie exploded into shrieking, squealing, howling hysterics when the stranger began wiggling his fingers in her armpits. She bucked & twisted in an attempt to once again escape his wiggling fingers. The sense of time she nearly lost during the rib tickling was now completely gone. It seemed like she had always been tickled & would always be tickled. The entire focus of her existence was on the sensations coming from her armpits. Without missing a beat, the stranger climbed on the bed & straddled her waist. She was now unable to even buck & twist her body. In addition, his weight on her abdomen, although not his full weight, was enough to further inhibit her ability to breathe. Julie was beginning to feel dizzy again, & was again struggling to breathe through her gag. Unfortunately, her armpits were so ticklish that even a substantial lack of oxygen was not able to substantially diminish the tickling sensations. Julie felt the slow onset of unconsciousness approaching, & was suffering the anxiety/panic attacks of someone who thinks that they are on the verge of death. Mentally pleading to God for relief from her torment & perceived impending death, Julie mercifully welcomed the blackness that enveloped her……
Julie awoke to the sound of birds chirping & opened her eyes to the brilliant rays of sunshine streaking through her bedroom window. She rolled back her covers & looked down her body to see that she was dressed in her usual nighttime attire. On each side of her hips was a cat. The other three were asleep at her feet. She saw no candles anywhere in the room.
Julie rolled out of bed & padded out to the kitchen. She smelled tuna. Opening the lid of her kitchen garbage can with her foot, she spotted an empty tuna can. The initial surge of anxiety gave way to rationale calmness as she reached for the refrigerator door. A sigh of relief emerged when she saw the sealed bowl of tuna salad she remembered making two days before. "Man, that was some dream!," she muttered to herself. Looking up at the obviously running electric clock on the wall confirmed that the electric power was certainly running, at least now. She picked up her watch from the kitchen counter & compared the time with the clock on the wall: they were the same. "It seemed so real. It just seemed so real," she thought. She looked over at the back door & saw that it was locked. "Hmmmm," was all she could say to herself.
Having showered & dressed, Julie was tying the laces on her sneakers when the doorbell rang. Opening the front door, she was confronted by a rather smallish man in a postal carrier uniform. He was wearing a white pith helmet with the postal service emblem on the front which partially covered his face. "Hi! I’m your new carrier. I just wanted to introduce myself," he said. He then tipped the helmet back & Julie got her first look at the face of her new postal carrier. She was immediately struck by his deep, resonant blue eyes……
Julie slid the key into the lock, twisted it clock-wise & turned the knob all with one hand, a sequence of actions she had done so many times that it had become almost robotic. She sighed as she opened the door, tossing the drenched umbrella into the basket in the foyer. Thunder rumbled in the distance as Julie reached for the light switch, only to find that the room remained in darkness. She flipped the switch up & down a few more times before concluding that the storm must have knocked out the power. "Wonderful," she thought.
Although there were no lights on in the house, there was just enough ambient light to allow her to find her way around, albeit with more than a few bumps & knocks. As Julie made her way into the kitchen, a curious thought entered her mind: where was the ambient light coming from? She looked out the kitchen window & saw the glow of the street light across the street. "How can the power be out if the street light is working," she muttered to herself. In her fatigued state, she hadn’t even noticed this obvious contradiction, which was further evidenced by the ceiling fan & light she could see in her neighbor’s kitchen next door. "Did I blow a fuse? How? I didn’t leave anything on," she muttered again. Then another, more disturbing, thought occurred to her: why hadn’t any of her cats greeted her at the door, like they always do? An almost palpable fear began to grip her. "Something’s wrong here," she thought as she started to back away from the window. At that moment, a brilliant lightning flash illuminated the kitchen & out of the corner of her eye Julie saw a shadow against one of the walls that was clearly not one of the kitchen furnishings. A rapidly mounting panic seized her. The thunder clap arrived at the exact moment that a gloved hand darted out of the shadows & over her mouth & nose. Julie began to feel dizzy & nauseous, & being a nurse, instantly recognized the smell of ether. She fought for only a moment as the room began to spin around her. As darkness enveloped her, she heard the distant, excessively reverberant sound of a cat’s meowing……
Light gradually entered Julie’s darkness. As the drowsiness began to give way to consciousness, Julie tried to rub her eyes & realized that she could not move her arms. Nor could she move her legs. With full awareness restored, she began to slowly discover the details of her restraint. She was spread-eagle on her bed, naked except for her underwear, with her arms tied to the corners of the headboard. Her ankles were held in some kind of device, somehow clamped to the bedframe, that she could only think to describe as some sort of bondage/stocks-type of thing. In addition, she couldn’t even move her feet. After a few seconds of trying to wiggle her feet, she concluded that her big toes were somehow tied to the stocks-thing, as were her little toes. This manner of restraint not only immobilized her feet & toes, but stretched her soles taut & spread her toes apart, exposing the undersides & the spaces in-between. "What the hell is going on here?," she thought.
As if in response to her telepathic question, a figure emerged from the shadows cast by the various candles around the room. For just a moment, Julie wondered why she hadn’t noticed the candles before, but her focus was instantly brought back to the immediate situation by the presence of the stranger. He was dressed totally in black, with black leather gloves & a black ski mask, the kind with two holes for the eyes & one for the mouth. He was clearly not a large man. Julie guessed he was about 5’8" or maybe 5’9" tall, & maybe about 180 to 185 pounds. She was a little surprised at her powers of observation, considering the situation.
The stranger approached the right side of the bed & leaned over her, looking intently at her face. She was immediately struck by his eyes: despite the dim light of the candles, they were the deepest, most resonant blue eyes she had ever seen, to the point that they almost seemed to glow. Julie started to indignantly protest her situation & immediately realized that she had been gagged. Once again, she wondered how she could possibly have missed such a thing before now. The stranger straightened up & moved toward the foot of the bed. Lifting her head up, she could just see him reaching down & picking up what looked like a black travel bag. He unzipped it, looked inside for a moment &, appearing satisfied with its contents, pulled over the stool Julie kept near the dresser & sat at the foot of the bed. The stool was only designed as a step-up tool &, consequently, was only about a foot high. Between the size of the stocks-thing & the shortness of the stool, Julie could only see the stranger’s head from the eyes up.
Julie started to ask what he was doing down there but all that came out was a muffled "aawmmm mmmmnnnfff." The stranger responded by holding up his right hand &, with his left, removed the leather glove. He closed his hand until only his index finger pointed to the ceiling. He then lowered his hand & his head. Julie felt something fairly soft lightly stroke the bottom of her left foot from the base of her toes to her heel. She tried to turn her foot away but, of course, could not. Another light stroke, this time from the heel toward the toes, followed. A few seconds later, the light, feathery touch of what Julie believed was the stranger’s fingertip was replaced by what was obviously the point of his fingernail, again stroking from the base of the toes to the heel. Again, a stroke from the heel to the toes followed, this time with the fingernail. Julie’s left leg stiffened & she moaned briefly in protest. "My God, he wants to tickle me!," she thought. He looked up again & held up his left hand, removing the glove as before. Again, he closed his hand to make an upwardly pointing gesture. Again, he lowered his hand & his head & proceeded to stroke the sole of her right foot with the same pattern as he had with her left. Again, her leg stiffened in response to the stimulus. The stranger held up both hands but didn’t close them before lowering them again. This time Julie felt strokes on both soles at the same time. Once again, her legs stiffened & this time she wanted to pull her legs away, as the stranger’s once light strokes were giving way to harder & stiffer strokes. Her protests were starting to become more animated & were beginning to build in volume. Suddenly, the stranger stopped. Julie relaxed her legs & breathed a sigh of relief as best she could through the gag. But the stranger was hardly finished.
Just as Julie was starting to relax again, she felt what she thought were multi-fingered, feathery touches running up & down both of her soles. If she could have moved them, her feet would have been trembling & twitching as the dancing fingertips did their steps. Just as her feet were almost starting to become desensitized to the light touches, the stranger went from fingertip touches to fingernail touches. He quickly increased the pressure on her soles, concentrating on specific parts like the area just below the toes on one foot while scratching the area just below the ball on the other. Julie tried to curl her toes in response to the more intense tickling but all she could do with her outer toes tied the way they were was to slightly arch her middle three toes. The stranger switched locations frequently, so Julie would not become desensitized. The whole time this was occurring, Julie’s moaning protests were becoming louder & more frequent.
Even in this heavy stimulus situation, Julie knew that her feet were not her most sensitive spot, & that she stood a good chance of getting through the tickling relatively unscathed if the stranger did not continue very much longer. As if in telepathic response to her thoughts, the tickling suddenly stopped. The stranger then abruptly stood up & left the room. Julie was perplexed. "Is he going away? Is he going to leave me like this?," she wondered. Her confusion increased dramatically when she heard one of her cupboard doors opening & then closing, followed by the sound of her electric can opener cutting into some kind of can. "What the hell?," she thought. The can opener sound was immediately followed by the familiar sound of her cats meowing. "They’re OK! They must think it’s time to be fed," she thought. In a manner of speaking, she was absolutely right. They were going to be fed, but in a way that Julie couldn’t possibly have imagined.
The stranger returned holding what looked to be a can of tuna, followed by her cats, mewing constantly. He sat down once again on the stool & reached down for his travel case. From it he pulled a basting brush. He dipped the bristles into the can & proceeded to paint Julie’s soles from the base of her toes to her heels. The sensation of the brush on her feet only tickled slightly, to the point of almost being pleasant. However, when her cats jumped onto the edge of the bed & started to lick her soles with their raspy tongues, the pleasure gave way to a surprisingly intense tickle. Julie started her moaning protestations again. She lifted her head for a moment & saw the stranger looking at her & holding up a pair of toothbrushes, one in each hand. "Huh?," she thought.
The stranger lowered his hands & Julie’s puzzlement was instantly solved by the most intense foot-tickle sensations she had ever experienced as the stranger scrubbed the undersides of her captive toes. While her feet were indeed not her most ticklish spots, the sensory combination of her cats licking the soles & the stranger brushing the undersides of her toes was more than she had ever experienced before. What was even worse: the stranger would sometimes dart the toothbrushes IN BETWEEN her toes, an intense sensation she had never experienced before, & one which tickled considerably more than she could have imagined. The volume of her moaning protestations was slowly rising & her body was beginning to rock & twist in an effort to escape this previously unexperienced tickling. However, after what Julie believed was only a few minutes of toothbrush tickling, the stranger abruptly stopped & stood up. While the cats continued to lick her soles, the stranger walked toward her & sat on the bed by her knees. Without warning, he reached over her legs & started tickling behind her knees. This was a more sensitive spot than her feet, &, along with the cat-licking, had Julie moaning quite loudly despite her gag. Fortunately for Julie, the fact that she was lying on her back made it awkward for the stranger to effectively tickle her behind the knees, & he stopped rather quickly.
Julie was beginning to notice that the tickling on her soles was slowly diminishing as the cats stopped licking one at a time, the oil from the can having been essentially cleaned off. Before she could relax & catch her breath, the stranger stood up again & reached for her neck. His fingers stroked & wiggled furiously, & Julie started squealing through her gag. Her neck was a very sensitive spot, even more so than the backs of her knees & certainly more than her feet (even with toothbrushes scrubbing her toes). Occasionally, he would move his fingers from her neck to her chin & sometimes, her ears. Julie’s squealing was slowly rising in volume AND pitch, as her resolve not to succumb to the sensations was gradually crumbling. She was also starting to find it hard to breathe. The gag was restricting her intake of much-needed air through her mouth. Just as Julie was beginning to feel a bit dizzy from the lack of oxygen, the stranger again abruptly stopped.
Gasping as best she could through the gag, Julie noticed the stranger gazing at her torso & a bolt of panic shot through her: "he knows my spots!," she screamed inside her head. "He knows my spots!!!" Indeed, the stranger had known to start with her least sensitive spot, her feet, move to her next most ticklish spot, the backs of her knees, & then to the next most ticklish spot, her neck. And now he was gazing at her ribs & tummy, areas that were at least as ticklish as her neck. "Oh my God! Does he know about my underarms?" Julie’s underarms were the absolute worst spot on her entire body. The thought of being tortured there (& it would be "torture") caused the rising panic to gain even more momentum & speed. Julie’s heart was pounding furiously in anticipation of the possible armpit tickling. However, the stranger responded, once again almost telepathically, by poking his index fingers spasmodically in various places on her ribcage. He began slowly, a poke here, a poke there, but rapidly increased the frequency of the poking. Julie started laughing & squealing at the same time, again rocking & twisting to escape the poking digits, but with much more animation than before.
Julie was starting to lose her sense of time. The tickling sensations were so intense that her mind was beginning to focus more & more on the tickling, & less on anything else. She had no idea how much time had passed, but she was starting to get dizzy again. Despite the rib tickling, her survival instincts were taking over. She began to forcefully attempt to suck in air through her gag, with the result that the stranger’s poking fingers were having less & less of an effect on her. Julie was on the verge of passing out when the stranger (yet again, almost telepathically) stopped.
With the room swirling around her, & struggling to breathe, Julie exploded into shrieking, squealing, howling hysterics when the stranger began wiggling his fingers in her armpits. She bucked & twisted in an attempt to once again escape his wiggling fingers. The sense of time she nearly lost during the rib tickling was now completely gone. It seemed like she had always been tickled & would always be tickled. The entire focus of her existence was on the sensations coming from her armpits. Without missing a beat, the stranger climbed on the bed & straddled her waist. She was now unable to even buck & twist her body. In addition, his weight on her abdomen, although not his full weight, was enough to further inhibit her ability to breathe. Julie was beginning to feel dizzy again, & was again struggling to breathe through her gag. Unfortunately, her armpits were so ticklish that even a substantial lack of oxygen was not able to substantially diminish the tickling sensations. Julie felt the slow onset of unconsciousness approaching, & was suffering the anxiety/panic attacks of someone who thinks that they are on the verge of death. Mentally pleading to God for relief from her torment & perceived impending death, Julie mercifully welcomed the blackness that enveloped her……
Julie awoke to the sound of birds chirping & opened her eyes to the brilliant rays of sunshine streaking through her bedroom window. She rolled back her covers & looked down her body to see that she was dressed in her usual nighttime attire. On each side of her hips was a cat. The other three were asleep at her feet. She saw no candles anywhere in the room.
Julie rolled out of bed & padded out to the kitchen. She smelled tuna. Opening the lid of her kitchen garbage can with her foot, she spotted an empty tuna can. The initial surge of anxiety gave way to rationale calmness as she reached for the refrigerator door. A sigh of relief emerged when she saw the sealed bowl of tuna salad she remembered making two days before. "Man, that was some dream!," she muttered to herself. Looking up at the obviously running electric clock on the wall confirmed that the electric power was certainly running, at least now. She picked up her watch from the kitchen counter & compared the time with the clock on the wall: they were the same. "It seemed so real. It just seemed so real," she thought. She looked over at the back door & saw that it was locked. "Hmmmm," was all she could say to herself.
Having showered & dressed, Julie was tying the laces on her sneakers when the doorbell rang. Opening the front door, she was confronted by a rather smallish man in a postal carrier uniform. He was wearing a white pith helmet with the postal service emblem on the front which partially covered his face. "Hi! I’m your new carrier. I just wanted to introduce myself," he said. He then tipped the helmet back & Julie got her first look at the face of her new postal carrier. She was immediately struck by his deep, resonant blue eyes……
