...I don't know that I should really be telling anybody this story, but guilt has driven me to share it, guilt and obligation, although I do have a certain amount of anonymity in this format...
It was well before the back to school sales when the company had first acquired Rose, a fresh out of grad school student getting her first big break. I thought this was also possibly her first real job as well, not counting selling girl scout cookies or perhaps a lemonade stand in her parent's front yard. She was pretty, maybe even sexy to some, but my preference was not other girls, although I had made an exception or two in my younger, more crazy years.
Rose was even pretty enough that she probably hadn't heard the word "no" directed toward her a single time while growing up, or at least that's the way it seemed to me in my sometimes cynical frame of mind. I just know that's why she was hired, the upper office guys wanting the opportunity to perhaps get inside her panties, and it was always easy to be generous with other people's money anyway, and old man Bloomingdale had plenty of that. Hence the generous starting salary, office, and unearned responsibilities.
In contrast, I had been employed here for eight years, just an EOE hire fresh out of school myself, but a last ditch effort to get the shipping and receiving department back in order, and I had done so with smashing success. Those guys just needed a woman's touch, my unique outside the box motivations shaking them up, and to be honest such exploits were fun for me too back then, as well as building my own considerable ego. My exclusively male predecessors, to a man, had tried the stick and donkey approach, where I tried the carrot and stick method instead. These were big and strong men accustomed to physical labor, and not the least bit unintelligent either, intimidation just wasn't going to work with them, but that's a different story...
I have a dirty cluttered little desk, and a phone that always rings when there's a problem to be solved, but stuffed into the corner of the warehouse; it's hot in the summer, and cold in the winter, but my desk is where the work is. In stark contrast twenty something year old Rose has a nice comfortable desk and chair in an equally comfortable office several floors up, in management country, a place I try to avoid like the plague. She can dress quite nicely up there too, and she does, short skirts and heels, colorful dresses that fit her like a glove; she's a good looking girl, it's perhaps her best asset, and she doesn't let anyone forget it either.
Well anyway, on that particular day my phone rings and I catch it on maybe the tenth ring; jogging to get it as one of the warehouse guys catches my ample chest gyrating about under my sweatshirt, his playful catcalls to follow. In any other environment this is an automatic writeup and possible counseling, but I have encouraged this kind of banter, this but one of the many "carrots" I have been blessed with and use when necessary. It's Rose on the phone, she's frantic on the other end, and I almost, almost feel sorry for her. It's not her fault though, and while there is a bit of schadenfreude going on here for me, when Rose fails, or any of the other upper floor people do, it usually hurts my profit sharing.
"...IT WON'T WORK! IT DID WORK, BUT IT STOPPED! AND THEY'LL BE HERE IN HOURS, YOU'VE GOT TO HELP ME!"
Rose is nearly screaming and hysterical on the other end of the phone, and in short order I discover that "it" is the giant interactive toy bear that everybody is talking about this Christmas. This whole deal is her baby, soup to nuts, and I had to admit, begrudgingly, that she may have hit it out of the park with this one, except for this one little snag.
I knew what it looked like, I had personally unpacked it and charged the battery that first time, this huge toy would likely be very good for our company, not only for its sales, but for the collateral sales it would generate with "foot traffic" into the store. I had even played with it first, truth be told, until it overheated, which didn't take very long either. It was interactive, it could squeak answers to simple questions, walk awkwardly around, lift a paw, wag it's bushy tail, things like that. The big deal was that it could learn, there was a remote to turn it on and off, but other than that the commands were all verbal.
...The box it came in was equally huge, like almost human sized, and several of the guys had even dared me to stuff myself into the box on hands and knees, they then placed the plastic and cardboard lid on me, only to take some pictures of their "toy in the box." To fit I had to strip out of my signature sweatshirt, and this left me in my sports bra and blue jeans, sans work boots, but this made for some good pictures too. Once inside they had then placed me and my box on a pallet, strapping me in place before hoisting me three stories up to the roof of the warehouse, so everybody could then see the human toy in the box. I was their temporary prisoner for this little exhibition, but it was all in good fun...
"Did you take the battery out and hit the reset?" I asked calmly, the poor girl sounding like her world was falling apart.
"DO YOU THINK I'M STUPID?" she barks back at me, and I think to myself, game on, bitch. You called me and I'm trying to help you, and the company obviously too. I think to myself that I don't deserve such attitude, from a girl that was probably back in junior high when I had first started working.
I also knew that doing that had fixed the damn thing when I had overheated it myself, but I'm just the dumbass in receiving, what do I know?
"I'm sorry," I hear on the other end of the phone, "I'm under some stress here," she tells me then, almost in tears. "The display is all set for a noon kick off, in the big window at ground level." As if I didn't know this myself. I had directed the set up personally, the old man not trusting THIS to anybody else. Everything was perfect on my end, and the customers had been deluged with advertisements for a week, they about to get a huge surprise when the curtain on the busiest street in America draws open to reveal... an inert and static large stuffed bear, completely devoid of any signs of life, or obvious interactivity.
We would be the laughing stock of the retail world, and while this might be fun from a certain point of view, it's not good for my bottom line, nor for the old man's, somebody who gave me a chance once myself.
"Can you get it on a cart and get it down here?" I ask, "maybe I can do something with it, I think."
"Down... there, in the warehouse?" she asks, as if this is the pit of hell itself. She has never been here herself a single time, I then realize, we and this place I work every day beneath her pretty high heeled shoes, quite literally.
"Yes, I have the box here already, just try to act nonchalant about it, take the freight elevator doooowwwwnnnnn," I tell her sadistically, drawing out the word "down." I know that the guys have pinned a pair of my panties up high on the safety grating, removed from my body by one of their calloused hands as a trophy of sorts. I had offered something special to the foreman if he could get the trucks unloaded in a specific time and order, he collecting his reward from me in that same freight elevator after hours as he stopped it between floors. He had stripped me naked that night, right there, and his creative use of several cargo straps had me quite secure to the metal grating of the safety cage wall, spread eagled and with not a secret worth keeping. I hadn't thought it would go that far when I had offered him "something," but I have a thing for big strong men, even married ones it seems. In his defense, I didn't say "no" a single time, being just as wound up that night as he had apparently been.
I struggled for all I was worth that night, and the orgasms he had given me were some of the most intense of my life, the struggling restraint doing something extraordinary for me. I never got my lacy panties back that night either, they were a well earned trophy for him, and something that also told the guys that I was serious about making, and keeping, my end of a deal with them. This also let the guys know that I could make this hard job fun, for all of us. Every time I saw those panties pinned in place I remembered that wild night, and I ride that thing almost every day.
Rose arrives with the broken giant bear on the cart. I ask if anybody saw her coming, to which she replies simply "no," the look in her eyes is as if she just saw Bigfoot, or something just as outlandish. "These guys are animals," she tells me, "there is a pair of women's underwear attached to the top of the elevator."
I laugh in response, although I don't necessarily like to hear her calling MY coworkers animals. An idea pops into my mind. But I couldn't, I tell myself reasonably, my conscience further argues, surely there would be consequences if I did? I then think about my own brief display in the toy bear's box, if I could fit into it...
"Let's get this thing apart and see what's inside," I offer. We take the fabric cover off first, working on top of some crates in the corner near my desk, and I left feeling like a poor imitation of a veterinarian, or perhaps more accurately a taxidermist, seeing how this thing was now little more than a dead display. There's a series of concealed heavy steel zippers that hold the outer "skin" overtop of the aluminum skeleton to give it shape. It looks much like the wire frame on an automated Christmas reindeer yard display - although much more sturdy - of which we have plenty in stock at this time of year. Inside of this was the actual mechanism part; servo motors to move the appendages, a small speaker and microphones, and of course the logic circuit board that controlled it all, plus the battery and far too many wires.
Rose presses the single button on the generic looking remote in her hands, and I see that there was a red light that illuminated on the board when she did so, but nothing else actually happens. The remote reminded me of something both familiar, and presently in my locker, a dark plan forming in my vindictive mind, but I WAS the company problem solver, and this was a for-real serious problem that I would gladly donate some personal things to in order to solve.
Rose was actually a few inches shorter that I, without her ever present heels, and certainly less well endowed too. She was a tiny thing really, but she dressed well for her body type, looking good in her pencil skirt, blouse, and in-fashion jacket, layers always a thin woman's best friend. Without them though she was small enough that this could just work, if she was willing. And, if she wasn't, she might just be doing this anyway, I thought to myself with an evil grin.
"I know a way this can still work," I tell her hopefully, dangling success in front of her panicked desperate eyes. It's cruel of me, but I also remember her earlier cheeky tone with me, and her reference to my coworkers and friends as ‘animals’; she was about to get a first hand taste of what that really feels like. "I just need to get some things first," I tell her, not telling her exactly what, so as not to scare her away.
She's still there when I get back with my bag of stuff, which is a good sign, but she has little other choice if she wants to save face with the upper floor people, and avoid getting canned so close to Christmas for a major F-up too. "It's not necessarily your fault, but life isn't always fair like that," I tell her cynically. I'm dragging this out now, but we're well past the point of calling off the display's grand opening anyway, and I do this merely for sadistic payback. Call MY friends animals? I think to myself with a smile.
I then open the metal framework with my tools, taking out the old defective animated guts of the toy, in preparation for some new animated guts, ones that should hopefully be slightly more dependable, if not more motivated. I then tell Rose to hop up on the crate next to the frame - patting it with my hand as if offering the spot to a beloved pet dog - she has to mount up on her hands and knees, after hiking her nice skirt so it doesn't get ruined.
The light finally goes on in her pretty little head, she's no dummy, and instead asks why I'm not doing it.
"These aren't going in there," I tell her candidly, hefting my considerable chest and letting it drop again for dramatic effect, "and besides, it's your project, and your F-up," I tell her coldly. There were practical reasons for this as well, I would be needed to properly secure her into the framework, and deliver her to the store window in time too... if we actually wanted to keep this just between "us girls."
She reluctantly gets into position and then tucks her hands to her shoulders, and her now bare tiny feet to her ass when I tell her to, Rose impressively flexible, and also seeing for herself that this could actually work, with her "standing" like this on her knees and elbows. There's a technical problem, but I've already come up with a solution for that one too, and why spoil the surprise?
"Go to the bathroom and have a good sit down," I tell her as if speaking to a child about to take a long car ride with her parents. It's degrading, but this is only a prelude of things to come.
"I can't do this," she tells me, but I don't verbally reply, I only smile, my smile telling her quite clearly, oh yes you will! She walks toward our tiny warehouse bathrooms anyway, at least in luck in that she can use mine, being the lone female in this section. I know it's clean in there, because I keep it that way, there's even a small shower stall in there, and a metal locker with some personal things and a change of clothes, in case I get really dirty while working. In comparison the guys have a gang shower in theirs, ask me how I know?
I collect some more things I'll need while Rose is indisposed; some of the guys wander by to see what's up, and I ask them to avoid the area for a bit, but that I would have a big surprise to share with them before noon if they behaved. They knew my surprises were always good ones, and usually sexual in nature, so it was easy to get them to cooperate.
I knock on the door when I think she has been in there long enough, we had a time schedule to keep, and I didn't know exactly how long this would actually take, as this is a first for me too.
"Strip," I tell her through the door, "you can put your pocketbook and clothes in my locker."
"WHAT?" I hear from the other side of the door.
"You heard me! Unless you want me to come in there and strip you down myself?" I ask threateningly and with about zero empathy.
I then hear the distinctive metallic sounds of my locker opening, knowing now that I had read this girl properly. I can't take credit for this myself though, I credit our store Santa, who for the other eleven months a year was our loss prevention specialist, or better known as our store's undercover cop. He had this odd but strangely accurate way of giving the people he interacted with a one word handle, or nickname, to categorize them. Mine was ‘opportunistic’, and I didn't necessarily like that one either, but the lecherous old man was at least honest about it.
Rose was ‘naughty’, and the way he had said it to me left little to the imagination as to what kind of naughty he thought she really was, deep down. I had thought he was mistaken about her, she seemed like a total innocent prude to me, although one with one hell of a body. Who calls panties ‘underwear’ anyway, except maybe an eighty year old?
Well anyway, naughty Rose opens the door a crack to look around for the crew, and only once she's certain that we're as alone as we two can be, in this portion of the warehouse, she exits wearing her matching lace bra and panty set, and her very tall heels. I can't blame her for the heels, they're likely there to keep her from having to walk barefoot on the cold and sometimes dirty concrete floor. She was covering her assets with her arms and hands as if the first time at the beach in a bikini, but she had the kind of compact and firm body that made this unnecessary.
As she walks past me I discover her ‘underwear’ is in fact a thong, and the naughty little thing even has some tasteful ink on her tiny little ass, talk about surprises! It's a fairly detailed silver dollar, tails up, and I wonder at this, this no common off the shelf tattoo parlor butterfly, nor a namesake red rose with some lucky guy's initials inside. This is serious body art, and I fight the urge to ask about it, there'll be time later if all goes well. The thong is in the way for what I have planned, but the bra can maybe stay, but without the one, why bother with the other? I reason in practical fashion.
She looks around one last time, just to be sure we're alone, before she hops up on the crates once again, kicking off her shoes once she mounts up. She looks good like this, very good, and if I hadn't chased the guys away they would be all over her, making her run for her clothes before I had her properly bound up. There's an obvious order to all this though, lest Rose lose her nerve before I have her irreversibly committed.
I have some special beige packing tape, boxes of it in fact, it's cloth backed and strong as hell. It blends in nicely with my complexion - and likely with Rose's too. The guys and I have played with it before, so I can personally attest to both its strength and adhesion. Rose's getting her own chance this time though, and to keep her here with me I first tape her ankles to her upper thighs with several wraps, moving on to her wrists and shoulders next. She's my captive now, whether she realizes it or not.
I then place some packing foam under her right elbow, and then some more, jacking the front of her tiny body until her back is level, due to her arms being shorter than her thigh bones like everybody else on planet earth. Her ass high positioning actually looked better from a certain point of view, it's a very nice ass, but it wouldn't fit properly within the framework with which I had to work.
I tape the entire foam mass firmly in place so she doesn't bruise herself inside her temporary metal and cloth prison, thinking the gesture magnanimous, bearing in mind her earlier sassy tone with me. I then run the tape from there all the way up to her shoulder, going around repeatedly and pulling her tiny forearm tightly to her bicep in the process. I repeat the process with her left next, symmetry is always important to me, for some strange reason that I can't explain.
My captive's already getting antsy, but I have a nearly inexhaustible supply of tape, and we've really just started. I have her make fists, and then tape them firmly to her shoulders next, not that I necessarily have to for this little adventure of hers to be a total success, but from personal experience I find that the less I can move while bound up, the more my frustration, both sexually, and otherwise, and I so want Rose to have the whole experience! This is a once in a lifetime opportunity for me, or maybe not, if things go as they could.
"I can't do this," she tells me again, but this time both breathlessly, and foolishly. I was reading between the lines though and realizing that this is getting ‘naughty’ all wound up, but if I were in her helpless struggling place, I would be too. I could have actually had the guys stuff me into this contraption in her place, with my ample and naked chest pushed up against the aluminum framework, and maybe even pushing out on the fabric cover obscenely between the bars. It would only have been for the few hours the demonstration was expected to last anyway, but where's the lesson in that for her?
...If you need one, order two, especially when we're talking about something that comes from China, as most toys seem to these days...
The guys would have almost certainly taken liberties with me once bound up and helpless too, and I wouldn't have blamed them either, and I don't necessarily want Rose to miss out on the humility of such either, but that's a little far without her specific permission. Up to now, it could be argued that everything we had done was consensual, and I wished to keep it this way, for my own conscience, if nothing else.
I pretend that I don't hear her, the toy bear having a squeaky human-speech mimicking noise that it made back when it was briefly working, and my captive will therefore need one as well to properly emulate it. Our pet-toys section has the answer here as well, a rubber squeak toy ball; when your dog - or bear I suppose - bites down on it, it squeaks. Perfect, and I stuff this into naughty's little mouth from behind, buckling my own ball gag harness loosely overtop of it and preventing her from spitting it out. She bites down on it indignantly several times, and it squeaks, but at least I won't have to hear any more human language complaints from her.
...There's just something about a ball gag that turns me on, so much so that I keep one here, in my locker, just in case the guys need to silence me. I can be quite the screamer, and sometimes the guys even collect their "winnings" when people are around during working hours. Maybe naughty Rose is even a screamer too? I think in my mind, but not now, now she's been reduced to, at best, a squeaker...
I then band up her long hair so that it doesn't overheat her, nor become entangled in the moving part of the mechanism that she'll be encased in shortly. I move onto her legs, she is already resigned that she's doing this in her mind; her surrender to me is almost delicious to see.
A smaller foam pad goes under each knee, but I tape her folded legs together just as securely as her arms, this little bear is not going anywhere until released. I've yet to place her into the open and waiting frame, but she clearly knows she's going in there, and that she's soon going to be performing simple tricks for thousands of people on the other side of the glass. It's the kind of thing that would make me a juicy hot mess, and a small part of me is envious of her.
We're almost ready now, and I start to wiggle her thong off of - and the string out of - her shapely ass, but she squeals indignantly and tries to crawl off of the crates I have her perched upon, heedless of the painful face plant she crawling toward. I pull her back towards me easily, she no match for my physical strength, even without her bindings. I then smack her little exposed ass firmly, the crack heard clearly in the suddenly silent warehouse, as is her gagged indignant scream. It's then that I realize that the guys have stopped working, and that they've been spying on me, on us, but doing so covertly. This is a show then, and I aim to please, this haughty little bitch I'm sure thinking these guys beneath her. I smack her again on the other butt cheek, the red imprint from each swat maybe giving evidence that I had swatted her just a little more firmly than necessary to make my point.
I hear that scream echo off of the walls, followed by a series of angry squeaks, but we've come too far to turn back now. I wiggle her thong off with little more resistance, she has no fight left in her now. Too bad, we have some time, and I just know that the guys are getting off on watching all this... It's a little work getting the small and fragile garment off of her with her legs bound up as they are, but I try not to destroy it on her as it looks quite pricey. It's also quite damp too, telling me our store Santa had things spot on with his naughty nickname for her. She's waxed smooth down there as well, the overall look adding to her perceived innocence, that I soon discover to be an elaborate hoax.
I move to unhook her little bra next, and she simply glares at me, but she doesn't fight me either this time. I tell her softly that I had intended to leave it on her, but that she's misbehaved for me, and now I've changed my mind because of this. I work the straps down her bound arms easily, seeing her pierced nipples with welded rings in each, this girl a walking, or is that crawling, contradiction. I look at them, and then to her eyes, and then back to her rings again, between that and her tattoo, and the pictures I intend to take with my smartphone, I set with a lifetime worth of blackmail material. Rose might even turn into my guys quarterly performance bonus, tossing HER into their gang shower, imagine the irony?
I then pick her up like a large pet dog and place her gently into the metal frame, I've had it standing next to her the whole time so I don't expect any size issues, and I fortunately don't have any either. I put the top frame part on and screw it down tight with almost two dozen screws, even if she weren't bound up like she was she still couldn't get out of this thing on her own. I have her walk back and forth a little on the crates, and her look speaks volumes to me. She's on one side of the bars and very trapped, and I'm on the other and free as a bird!
I tape some more foam here and there so her head is a tighter fit in the bear's head frame part, but other than that we're almost ready to put the cover on. I take my razor knife and cut the bear's costume tail from the fabric though, the tail has to move, it's one of the features, although Rose doesn't know what I'm doing, nor why. I do something out of her sight with the tail, she'll know soon enough and I don't want to spoil this surprise for her.
I cut some air holes in the fabric near the mouth too so that Rose can breath, but I know it'll be hot in there if she has to crawl around a lot; I remind myself to turn down the heat in the display window.
I then show Rose the first of a few surprises, holding it up in front of her eyes while dramatically installing the new batteries to insure it works for hours. It's not the largest toy I own, but it's the one I have here at work and it'll just have to do. I press the wireless one button remote, and the thing violently comes to life for a few seconds, inches from Rose's shocked face, the duration variable, but she doesn't know that yet.
"Bear had a remote, you need one too," I offer in simple explanation; tormenting her like this is unnaturally fun for me.
I slip it into her easily, she's a juicy mess though, despite her pleas to the contrary. She's going to get off on all this exposure, and I think she knows it. I tape my toy in place so she can't push it out, I doubt it would get all the way out anyway once the cover is in place as tight as it is in there, but why take chances? I press the button once to test the bear's new remote while out of sight behind her, and she flinches and rattles the bars of her tiny cage violently, almost launching herself from the crates.
"Oh," I think to myself, "this is going to be fun!"
I need something, the rings in her nipples present an opportunity I hadn't anticipated, and I pick up my walkie and call one of the guys to bring me the ‘something’. Rose looked terrified that I had just asked for company, squeaking “no, no, no," and shaking her bear head side to side.
"Don't worry my little animal, they don't bite... often," I tell her mockingly. Rose glares at me in response, "so much for sisterly female compassion," her look finally acknowledges.
Rick hands me a box of paperclips from across the warehouse, looking my mute captive in the eyes but stoically not saying a word. He can keep a secret, but they all can, their loyalty to me unquestionable. He has to have been watching all this though, there is no way he could just stand there like a statue with no obvious emotion otherwise.
"Overheated again?" he asks.
"Yup!" I answer.
"Did you hit the reset?" he asks, and I smile at him in response.
"So I've been told," I respond just as deadpan, looking briefly toward a very naked and embarrassed Rose encased in her metal prison. Rick has a rather dry sense of humor to rival my own; he was the resident prankster, even catching me once or twice.
Without being asked he walks over to the bundle of servos and wires laying in a heap on the concrete floor exactly where I had tossed them, pressing the reset button next to the large battery as a very helpless and exposed Rose just watches, as if to say "what was that he just did?"
Rick then catches the remote I had tossed to him, pressing the single button and Rose going bug eyed as the heap of parts on the floor tried to crawl away, squeaking in it's odd voice as if in agony. He hits the button again and the thing mercifully dies right there, there something pathetic about watching it try to move without its framework attached.
While Rick was inadvertently helping me torment Rose with the first remote, I had been linking the paperclips together, forming a chain of sorts with them. Rose's champagne glass B cups are hanging without her bra, as much as B cups can hang, and the rings in them are hanging too, and my improvised paper clip chains are going to tether them to some of the lower bars as Rick watches, just because I can. I don't want to really hurt her obviously, but a little tug on her nipples might give her something extra to think about.
I get her hooked up with some only minor squeaking backtalk from her, but she's smart enough to know the score now, and she should be embarrassed for being so stupid as to not do as I had told her initially. Her little boobs are tugged into a slight funnel shape, but these particular rings are set deep into her flesh, and well below her actual nipples, which are quite erect with all this "handling" I have been providing.
I hand Rick the new remote, asking him if he wants to try this one too, Rose emphatically shaking her head side to side. He hits the button anyway, looking into her eyes as he does so; she is snorting past her squeaky ball gag and shaking from the effects of my little vibrator. The paper clip chains I have fabricated rattle now too, Rick seeing for himself the cause of the vibrations, or should I say the source.
"Need help getting the cover on?" he asks, to which I say yes, as this toy is significantly heavier than the original. We wrestle it in place overtop the frame that now contains a much more human element, Rose's expression is one of a woman who's being buried alive. She can still see somewhat out of the toy's mechanical eyes, but not well, more just shapes and light. She can't get in too much trouble in the store's window like this anyway, but we had intended to chain the toy bear to the floor by a collar and leash arrangement anyway, allowing slack to interact, but not to get stolen away either. This is a valuable prototype toy, doubly so now for obvious reasons.
With the cover in place and all the zippers closed and hidden there is only one thing remaining, Rick noticing the gaping hole at the back of the costume that rather obscenely displays Rose's pale ass, at least in comparison to the crimson bear's natural fur.
"Uh-oh," Rick observes, looking at the obvious gap in coverage.
I put my fingers to my lips to silence him, but it's too late, but Rose can probably already feel the draft in her costume back there too now. I have glued the bushy bear's tail to a favorite plug of mine, also a donation to the cause, it could be said. I decide to do the honors as Rick moves forward to stand by Rose's toy bear head and keep her looking forward, but the restricted motions of the costume make it impossible for her to see what's going on behind her anyway. Her expression is hidden behind the bear's expressionless cloth covered face, but her squeals were ferocious nonetheless when I started to work the well lubricated toy towards it's new home. It was a series of ever larger balls, ending in a slightly smaller shaft, the handle and glued-on bushy tail keeping it from getting lost inside.
I didn't know if Rose was an anal virgin or not, but her unique "tails up" tattoo hinted at the latter; I had no real trouble working it inside her compact and trapped body to full depth. I had her wiggle her new tail as a test, but she has better success moving it in and out, but this is still motion of some kind. With the clock ticking, but still time to spare, we place Rose the bear on the cart, along with the box she's to come in when officially purchased for Christmas. Rick is now my accomplice, my co-conspirator, whether he realizes this or not.
We place her in the window, there's other toys in there too, but she's the prime draw, or will be when the curtains open in ten minutes. I chain her to the ring in the floor, with the other end going around her bear neck; not going anywhere until I personally unlock her. The very last thing to do is to tape the remote to the display window, my remote. There is a hole in the glass so that anybody who wants to can press the button to start the bear up, assuming it's sitting inert when they approach, which will be unlikely. There's instructions printed on the glass that might not exactly match this new bear, but they are close enough at this late hour. Verbal commands will be tough too, through the glass, even with our speaker and microphone setup.
The curtain opens right on time, and Rick and I watch the crowd from the shadows, there must be a thousand people out there, with a hundred of them with their noses pressed to the glass, the most prominent of such is Mr. Robert Magnum III, a somewhat well known unique toy aficionado in his own right, and ever so slightly eccentric. Mr. Robert Magnum III is very good friends with our store's founder and owner though, with standing orders to treat him as if family by the old man himself.
He's the first to press the button, our human toy squeaking to life and jumping forward as if just kicked in the ass, rattling it's chain. Game on, I think. We hear the shouted and incoherent orders next, "wiggle your tail, dance, roll over, say my name..." Rick and I leave the display in the window shortly after, our work done, for now. Rose's display appears a stunning success, just not in exactly the way she may have anticipated, but at least this way she'll get to see it first hand...
...I go up to collect our toy hours later, but maybe five minutes late, just after the curtain closes. I'm as certain as I could be that it would want out, just as soon as it could, and even a hot shower too. Rose deserved that much, at the bare minimum. But at the end of the chain in the display window, I find nothing. A cold pit forms in my stomach, and this elaborate prank suddenly seems not so funny...