10 comments/ 14843 views/ 0 favorites Nostalgia By: slyc_willie (Author's note: This story is an official entry into the 2009 Literotica Winter Holidays writing contest. I hope you enjoy this tale, and please read all the other entries. There's a lot of good talent on this site. Happy Holidays, and please don't forget to vote.) * * * * I find it funny that the same music which makes you cringe when you start hearing it in the department stores after Thanksgiving can conversely give you a warm, nostalgic smile in different circumstances. Christmas, since I became an adult and stopped thinking of the time of year as the ultimate in material wish fulfillment, was a time for reflection. Sure, New Year's Eve was traditionally about making resolutions in regards to the past indulgences of the year, but Christmas just seemed the perfect time for slowing down, taking your life in stock, and being grateful for what you have and who you are. This Christmas, I had agreed to help out my great uncle Jerry at his little hometown bar called The Whiskey Shallow. I had some experience as a bartender, having filled in at the restaurant where I worked throughout college in that capacity. To be honest, it was a pretty easy gig. Most of the patrons wanted nothing more complex than a cold bottled beer or a Jack and Coke. For those few times when some college coed or career barfly ordered a Sex On The Beach or a Long Island Iced Tea, I had a dog-eared copy of The Bartender's Bible to help me along. The onset of Christmas naturally meant a surge in business as men and women enjoyed an additional night off during the week, or otherwise sought refuge from irritatings and relatives who had come to visit. Being a bartender, I quickly realized, meant being a good listener and junior psychologist. People seem to think that standing behind a bar and slinging drinks for eight hours meant you were somehow in tune with the collective subconscious or something. At the least, I can attest to learning a few things about the human condition by being one of the only sober individuals in a room full of drinkers. Jerry gave me a piece of advice which he urged me to take to heart. "You have to wear a coat of 'I-know-what-the-fuck-I'm-doing' when you tend bar, kid," he told me in his gravelly voice. "Otherwise, they're gonna eat you alive and your tip jar's gonna have the bite marks to prove it." So I did my best to be as arrogant as a young pitcher just brought up from the minors, and what I didn't know, I faked. Being a weekend alcoholic during my undergrad years helped. So when the cute blonde in the breast-hugging top bounced to the bar with that slightly inebriated, wicked gleam in her penny-colored eyes, I was ready to play her game. "What you want this time?" I asked. "I want a blowjob," she retorted with a swipe of a firm pink tongue across pearly teeth. "Isn't that my line?" I quipped, immediately wondering how wonderful those lush pink lips would feel. She bit her lip seductively. "Maybe later, stud," she answered, giving me a quick once-over. "If my plans fall through." I rolled my eyes, but reached for the Bailey's behind me. "Nothing turns a guy on more than being second-best," I drawled, taking up a shot glass. The girl giggled. "Well, technically, you'd be my first choice for a guy, but I'm after pussy tonight," she revealed wickedly, tossing a glance over her shoulder toward a brunette at a table behind her. The sudden, intense image of those two coeds going at it resulted in immediate swelling beneath my jeans. I tried to focus on pouring the beige-colored liquid. "Nice," I managed to say. "It will be," the girl responded, slapping down a five-spot and taking up the shot after I had topped with whipped cream. She gave me a playful wink. "Would it help if I told you I'll be thinking about you when I've got all this thick, sweat cream in mouth?" she asked rhetorically before prancing back to the brunette. I couldn't come up with an answer. I could only shake my head and try to think of old naked nuns in order to cancel the surge in my libido. A low chuckle drifted toward me from halfway down the bar. Close to midnight on Christmas Eve, the Whiskey Shallow had started to empty out, leaving just the die-hard drinkers and those with nowhere left to go. I wasn't sure to which category the hoary old man with his barely-trimmed grey beard belonged as he nursed his third Glenlivet on the rocks. "What's so funny, Felix?" I asked him, scooting down the bar and taking up a towel to dry some glasses sitting on the drain rack. "Blowjobs," he commented, his crinkled old face showing his age as he smiled. "You remember your first one?" I laughed under my breath. "Yeah," I said. "High school." Felix sputtered, thick red lips flapping through his facial hair. "I was a quiet kid in high school," he revealed, then licked his lips and smiled with a fond memory. "Even after, too. Girls didn't do things like that back then. Well, not like they do now. It was a good girl/bad girl thing, you know?" I chuckled. "Good girls didn't, bad girls did?" Felix grinned, showing stained teeth. "No. Good girls just didn't brag about it." I smiled. "But they still did, huh?" He sighed wistfully. "At least one did," he mused aloud. He stared at nothing in particular while his mind clipped the cartwheel backward in time. "She was a real catch, but I didn't know it at first. The all-around good girl, Miss America wrapped up in soft brown hair, rosy cheeks, and a pleated blue skirt." "What was her name?" I asked, polishing glasses. The majority of the remaining patrons – including the gallivanting blonde and her imminent lesbian lover – seemed content to keep themselves entertained for the time being. "Rose," Felix answered, a faint twinkle lighting up the corner of his eye. "Went to high school with her, but didn't really know her. She was quiet, like me. Anyway, I shipped out to Korea in '51. Spent two tours over there as a supply clerk with a MASH unit. Guess I came out lucky, not being on the front lines and all. Least I didn't have any nightmares or horror stories when I came home." "Good thing," I said, for lack of anything more profound to say. I watched Felix tilt the glass back, as the lights in the bar refracted like golden sunshine through the facets of the tumbler and the ice within. He set the empty glass on the bar top and pushed it slightly toward me. "Got back home just in time for the first snowfall in '53." He shook his head with a sad smile. "Christ. How long ago was that? More than a half a century, now." I refilled the old man's glass and slid it back before him, waiting for him to go on. His little story had me intrigued. "Anyway," he continued, cradling the glass in gnarled hands. "I saw her one day at the library. I was going to school, then, just like you, furthering my education. Wanted to be a businessman." He gave me a wink. "You know, do something respectable." I smiled, waiting. He inhaled through thick nostrils, regarding his drink with a distanced eye. "She was like an angel," he said. "Putting away the books in the Civics section. I offered to help with some of the higher shelves, and she just smiled, thanking me with those deep blue eyes. Now, I was never a ladies' man, but something about her just compelled me. We got to talking, and before I knew it, I was inviting her out to the soda stand after work for a milkshake." Felix touched his lips to the scotch. "She said she had a beau she was waiting for, a soldier in Korea who was due home after Christmas. I respected that, I really did. I was a gentleman. Honestly, I never figured anything more than sharing a chocolate shake would happen between us." "I'm guessing that's not the end of the story," I said, prodding him when he took another sip. Felix chuckled knowingly. "Be pretty boring if it was, wouldn't it?" I nodded. He sauntered on with his tale. "Well, we agreed to catch a flick at the drive-in that weekend. I tell you, I had the most Christian motives in mind when I picked her up. I had this '48 Mercury I bought cheap. It wasn't much, but it was a set of wheels, and that was all that mattered. Rose was wearing a blue country skirt and a blouse, a shawl over her shoulders . . . not the kind of get-up you'd expect from a girl with anything other than pristine motives in mind." "Appearances can be deceiving," I commented, stepping away to pop open a trio of beers for the cocktail waitress. "You ain't kidding," Felix said when I returned, picking up as if only a second had passed between us. "I don't know what did it, but soon as I cut off the car and we started watching the movie, Rose was cuddled up against me, tucking herself under my arm like we were going steady. She said I was a 'nice guy,' that she could 'trust' me. Always figured that was a code, you know." I laughed. "Yeah, I know. Nice guys always finish last." "If they finish at all," Felix added with a dark glimmer. His face softened. "But it turned out I was wrong." He sipped again from his drink, then took up the pack of cigarettes before him and lit up. Thick grey smoke billowed out from his lips, preceding the words that followed. "I just about jumped through the roof of the car when she put her hand in my lap. And it wasn't on my leg, either." I chuckled. "Didn't think she'd be that forward, huh?" "Christ, no!" he exclaimed, then sucked on the filter of the cigarette. "But I wasn't no dummy. Hey, a girl as sweet and cute and virginal as Mary wants to pet my johnson, I ain't gonna stop her." "Hell, I wouldn't, either." Felix grinned, sipped his scotch, smoked his cigarette. "Next thing I knew, she was getting my belt undone and popping the buttons. I couldn't do anything but let her go on with what she wanted. Didn't even look around at the other cars, to see if anybody could see what was going on. Part of me figured I might scare her off if I said or did anything, and the other part of me knew I didn't have any experience in such matters, so I'd best play it cool and see what would happen." "I guess that worked out for you." "In the best way," Felix muttered, almost to himself. "I don't mind saying I was harder than the Rocks of Gibraltar when she pulled it out. Damn did her warm little hand feel good. It could've been fifty below outside the car for all I cared. For the first time, my pecker got to know a hand other than mine." He chuckled and puffed on his cigarette, flicked it over the ashtray on the bar before him. "But I wasn't prepared for what she did next." Felix sipped from his glass and licked his lips. "The way she was huddled against me, I could only see the top of her head, the way the part zig-zagged back and forth. But then she sort of moved, sliding down in the seat and lowering her head. I didn't even know what she was doing, that's how green I was. But, I tell you . . ." he sighed heavily, tilting his head back, aged cloudy eyes fluttering toward the ceiling. He lowered them and gave me a look. ". . . It was heaven." I nodded. "Always is." Felix let out a sharp laugh. "Bet you do," he remarked. "Good-looking kid like you, bet you've had your pecker sucked more than a few times. Casual as a handshake these days, ain't it?" I shrugged. "Maybe." "Well, it was a novelty then," he said bitingly, jabbing a twisted, dried finger onto the stained bar. "The kind of thing that rates highly on the scale of unexpected pleasures. And trust me, it was ten times that novel, that pleasurable, when Rose first took my rod in her mouth." He fell quiet, considering his drink and smoking his cigarette. I felt a little chastened. The intimation of his words was that my generation didn't revere certain pleasures the way his did. And we didn't. Felix was right; a blowjob these days was as casual as a handshake. I had dated girls who had set the rules up front: "I'll suck you off, but no fucking, okay?" Hot in one sense, but not so much in another. The mystery, the challenge, had been removed. There was no sense of wonder, hope, or possibility. The impression I'd always had was that a movie and a bucket of popcorn rated a standard cocksucking. Expensive dinner turned that into a topless blowjob. Maybe fingering, or cunnilingus in trade. For my generation, sexual favors were all about making a deal. "Christ, what an incredible feeling," Felix said, remembering. "Warm, wet, sucking and pulling like a waterspout over a lake in tornado season. And she was making little noises, too, whimpering and moaning, like she was doing something she needed to do. I was in awe, let me tell you, completely in awe, watching her head bob up and down, that soft brown hair bouncing." He paused, draining the rest of his scotch. He slapped the glass down and wiped his mouth, before a smile stretched his lips. "I remember thinking I wasn't sure if I should warn her when I was going to . . . you know." I nodded. His story had elicited memories of my own, making me realize the comparisons. "I shouldn't have worried," he continued, pushing from the bar and slipping his legs to the floor beneath the bar stool. "She took it all. Every damn drop, and kept going at it to make sure she got every damn last little bit. That was a special thing, kid." I gave him an amused look. "Did you fall in love?" He nodded, accompanying it with another wink. "Yeah, but it wasn't because of a blowjob." He stepped back. "I gotta drain the lizard. Tell you more when I get back." * * * * Jerry was going over the inventory in the back when I stepped through the door from the bar. He gave me a curious smile as I took up a bottle of water from the little cooler. "How's it going out there?" I shrugged, speaking flippantly. "People having fun, girls flirting, old man telling me about the good old days. The usual." My great-uncle's features darkened somewhat. "Old man?" I nodded. "Felix. I got the feeling he comes in a lot." Jerry pursed his lips. He was best described as a toad of a man, his back arched and limbs somewhat twisted by arthritis. Still, I had seen pictures of him as a man my age, and had to admit he had been more than a little good-looking in his youth. "He's been here a while," he said sourly. I could read the cloudy expression he wore. "Is he trouble?" Jerry made an effort to smile, though it was obviously fake. "No. Not really. There's just some history, is all. But it's been a long time." I drained the rest of the water, thinking there was more my grandfather's brother wanted to tell me. But I refrained from pushing the issue. I knew Jerry well enough to understand he would tell me something if he felt I needed to know it. The fact that he remained silent told me his association with Felix was casual at best. But I wasn't sure I believed that. * * * * A short list of drinks awaited me when I returned to the bar. Two cosmopolitans, a line of Patron shots, and several bottles of beer. As I finished popping the tops of the latter, sending the cocktail waitress on her way, my attention returned to lonely old Felix. "Saw her again the next night," he continued, picking up his tale where he had left off. "It was strange, watching that angelic, pretty young thing come to the door after what she had done for me. I met her father, shared a beer with him. He liked me, I could tell, mainly because I was a soldier and was going to college. Guess he figured I'd make good husband material." He chuckled under his breath, looking lost for a moment as if he had forgotten where he was. But clarity returned quickly enough. "Told me to take good care of his little girl. 'Only one I got, son,' he said." Felix dipped his eyes. "He called me 'son.' Only my old man ever called me that." I watched him from the corner of my eye while pouring a couple pints of Blue Moon. Felix' temporary look of self-admonishment vanished under a forced smile. "Anyways, I took Rose out to dinner. We talked a little bit about ourselves. She mentioned the guy she was waiting for again, but . . . didn't seem to me like she was waiting all that seriously. In fact, we never spoke about him again. Not that night, and not once over all those weeks leading up to Christmas." By the way he paused, I could tell he was leading up to something. I watched the scant few others in the bar, most of them clustered around one of the two dart boards. They weren't paying either me or Felix any heed. "Christmas Eve," the old man breathed, speaking the words with reverence that seemed uncommon coming from him. "It hadn't even been two months, but it figured me and Rose were as good as engaged. Her family liked me, mine liked her. All that was missing was the ring." "I took her out to the Big Ben," he said, intoning the name of a venerable steakhouse on the edge of town which had seen better days. "We took a little walk out in the park after dinner. Rose liked the lake, you see, which was right on the edge of the park. Told me that water was her element. She wrapped herself around my arm like a ribbon, silky smooth and cool at first, but then warmer and warmer. There wasn't much snow falling and the wind was gone. Just pure Yuletide scenery. Kind'a magical, really, like God wanted to make everything right, just for us. Wasn't another soul around, either, which suited me just fine." "Don't tell me you two got frisky in the park," I commented dryly. Felix tossed out his rakish, "gotcha" grin. "Would'a been a hell of a scandal if anyone caught us. Good girl like Rose, soldier boy like me . . . but like I said, there wasn't another soul around. Just me and Rose and the snow and stars. And back then, the stars looked a lot brighter at night." He took another sip and puffed on the cigarette, regarding it for a moment as if he expected to have been smoking something else. "Anyway, we got to this little picnic table, out past Old Man Tree. Boughs were so thick with snow some of them touched the ground. Cold as it was, though, it didn't feel like it. Maybe that's because of the way Rose and me were holding each other, kissing like bandits afraid of the posse coming down on us. Then, just for a second, she pushed me back, those round cherubic cheeks glowing like an elf about to offer up a present. Which, I suppose, she was. "Now, I don't know how many perfect pairs of breasts you've seen in your life," he continued. "And I'm talking real ones, not that fake silicone crap. Real, honest-to-God perfect breasts. The kind that float on a girl's chest as if she was treading water. That kind. Round and firm, with just a few freckles right in the middle like dots if cinnamon sprinkled on a cappuccino. And creamy white, too, like fresh milk, with bright little cherries on top. Puts any birthday sundae to shame, let me tell you." I smiled at Felix' descriptions. The man should have been a writer, I figured. Hell, maybe he was. "I'd been raised to treat a woman with respect, you know," he went on after another puff of his smoke. "Not to dive in like a starving man who's never seen a feast. Not that I had; well, a feast like that, anyway. Still, I kept my military decorum and took my time, admiring the gifts before me. And boy, did I admire them. Eyes, hands, fingers, lips, tongue . . . I admired the hell outta them." A snicker escaped my lips. I took the bottle of scotch from the shelf and gave Felix another shot on the house. He tipped his hand as if touching the brim of a hat. "That really got the little firecracker going," he said with a fond sigh. "She had this dreamy look in her eye, and told me she had something to give me. I had something I wanted to give her, too, but I don't think we meant the same thing. Anyways, I let her give it up first." He winked knowingly, making me roll my eyes. But I was enthralled by his story. Nostalgia He started to speak, then paused. "A difficult thing, trying to put words to something so perfect and new. I mean, how do you describe snow the first time you feel it hit your cheek? How do you describe rain when all you've known is the dessert?" I started to answer in some flippant way, but Felix cut me off. "The answer is, 'not well,'" he said, then smiled. "What Rose and I shared that night is special. I think I ought to leave it at that." I nodded. "Maybe you should." With a heavy, groaning sigh, the old man straightened in his stool, then pushed back and slid heavy, aged feet to the floor. He took the down-filled parka hanging off the back of his chair and slipped it on, in the process giving me a glimpse of a single red rose in the inside breast pocket. But it disappeared quickly enough as the thick lapels slapped to his chest. "I feel like I need to round it out," Felix said, as if in afterthought. He hesitated by the bar, weathered old fingers tapping the rim of his glass in contemplation. "Maybe you can tell me the rest Saturday night," I offered. He shook his head beneath a cloud of dry, silvery hair. "We went for a drive around the lake in my car," he said, voice hollow and distant. "But that's a story for a different life, I think." Leaving me with that last, cryptic phrase, Felix stepped from the bar and headed toward the door. The burst of algid air that accompanied his departure swept through the bar like the obnoxious breath of Old Man Winter. Even the inebriated, salacious blonde and her brunette girlfriend shivered through the shield of inebriation. I caught their eye as I glanced away from the door. "Closing time," I announced. * * * * Half an hour later, the bar was empty as I went through it, switching off the lights. The speakers still played a medley of classic Christmas tunes intermingled with more contemporary ones. Bing Crosby bled into Elvis, Brian Adams into U2 and then more recent fare. The only lights that remained on where the green, gold and crimson orbs glowing in the front windows. Leaving behind the strong aroma of cigarettes and cheap perfume, I stepped through the small kitchen, bidding Juan, the dishwasher, a good night before opening the door to the office. My great-uncle Jerry sat slumped in his chair before a glowing computer screen awash with multicolored ribbons of light. I gently nudged him awake with my hand on his shoulder. "Wh-what? I wasn't gambling! It was just cards!" I chuckled, stepping back. "Relax, Uncle Jerry," I said. He blinked, coming awake. Passing a parchment-like hand over his face, he groaned and shook himself back to consciousness. "What time is it?" "Two-thirty. Time to go home." He nodded, smacking dry lips and grimacing. "We got any fresh coffee?" I glanced back to the little white Coffee-Mate in the nook behind the office door. "Define 'fresh.'" He grumbled, grey mustache twitching. "Just give it to me." I poured him a cup, tossed in two creamers and a spoonful of sugar, then stirred the mixture before giving it to him. "That Felix is a hell of a story teller," I commented as I handed Jerry the cup. His eyes looked tired and dark beneath a wiry brow. "Told you stories about the good old days, huh?" he quipped. "I guess," I answered. "More like an old man basking in the glory of his youth." "Is that what he called it." My great-uncle's deadpan and grave reply made me rethink my earlier assessment of his relationship with Felix. I took a chance. "You know him, don't you?" Jerry soured, saying nothing as he sipped his bitter, lukewarm coffee. In a flash, I went through all I knew about my grandfather's brother. He was the youngest of three, and being in his mid-seventies, was of the right age to have served in Korea . . . . Christ, I thought as a revelation occurred to me. "There's two ways you can know anyone," Jerry said before I had a chance to voice my suspicion. "By association, and by reputation. I never knew Felix personally." "But you knew him by reputation," I said, prodding. Jerry nodded. "Only once I came back home after the war," he confirmed tiredly. "Two days after the new year. I had a lot to look forward to. A clean life away from war, my family, a job . . . ." "Rose?" I offered carefully. His eyes flashed with suppressed anger mixed with regret. But like Felix, Jerry's eyes faded into reticence quickly. He nodded. "Yeah. Rose. My Rose." I fell silent, not sure what to say. I felt like an unwitting mediator between a pair of crotchety old men too wrapped up in their own narrow views of the world to risk clashing them together. "I guess he gave you a real nice story," Jerry went on. "All about true love and first times and all that bullshit." I frowned. "'Bullshit?'" Jerry showed crooked yellow teeth as he laughed mirthlessly. "I'm betting the way he painted things, it didn't come across that he raped my fiance." I recoiled, feeling a distinct tightness in my chest. "What?" "You're a bright kid, but you're still naive about some things," my great-uncle said blandly. "Did he tell you what happened when they went for a drive around the lake?" I blinked, feeling numb. "No." "The car went off the road, ended up in the lake," Jerry informed with a hard edge to his voice. "I figure they'd been fighting. Maybe she tried to jump out. Nobody knows for certain . . . except that Felix swam out, and she didn't. They found her the next day, still in the car." I swallowed thickly, shivering as a chill ran down my spine. Uncle Jerry suddenly turned away, alertness compelling him to finish the day's books. "Ah, who the fuck knows anymore? After fifty-six years--" "Was there an investigation?" I managed to ask. He paused, half looking over his shoulder at me. "Yeah. No fault. That's what they found." "So . . . maybe it was just an accident." "Depends what you call an accident," Jerry said in an acidic voice. "Was it an accident that I got assigned to a patrol that kept me in Korea three months longer than my tour? Was it an accident that some goddamn supply clerk comes home in time to seduce my Rose away from me? Or was it just a fucking accident that I fell in love with her in the first place? You tell me, because you got about as much insight into the works of God as I do." To say that I felt Jerry's pain – vicariously at best, I admit – would be an understatement. "I wish I could," I said at last. "Yeah," he scratched out through a dry throat. "Me, too." * * * * Only three hours into Christmas day, and I felt like I was carrying the weight of two different worlds upon my shoulders. On one side was balanced that of the strange old man, Felix, and on the other, the supposed betrothed of his lover, my great-uncle Jerry. Two men, two worlds, and not a satisfactory conclusion for either. I made an effort to push those worlds behind me as I exited the service door of the bar. A new blanket of snow had filtered down from the heavens, riding the slightest of breezes so as to land like a gentle blanket upon the land. I managed to shed a smile at the simple pleasure of catching a few flakes of snow on my tongue, and told myself that the heaviness of the evening would be gone by the time I awoke in the morning. I suppose it will ever be a question of chance or providence that I happened to glance to the front door through which the patrons came and went. Perhaps I'll never know. But there, just to the side of the doorway, away from traffic, lay a single red rose, partially covered with the fresh, pure flakes of Christmas snow, petals glowing gently with an innate crimson radiance. My immediate thought was that it had somehow fallen from Felix' coat, but how could that be, unless he had taken it out upon exiting. My eyes searched the myriad tracks leading to the parking lot, where they degenerated into greasy sludge. If the old man's feet had gone that way, I had no chance of following. So I bent and took up the rose and carried it to my car. I set it upon the passenger seat and drove home, whereupon fatigue bade me forget about it as I stumbled into my parents' house on the edge of town. Once inside, I delved carefully through darkness so as to avoid awakening the others, and made my way quietly to bed. That night, I dreamed of snow and iced-over lakes, of passionate gasps and cries, of forlorn groans and painful wails. * * * * The little television in my room at my parents' house flickered as I came awake. Apparently, I had left the device on a local station, which was broadcasting the noon news as I awoke. ". . . city workers this morning discovered the frozen body of an elderly man, tentatively identified as Felix Lautner, 77 on the southern shore of Lake Shannon, in Old Tree Park. Cause of death is as yet unconfirmed, but suicide is not being ruled out since the body was found sitting up and there was no evidence of foul play. Results of a toxicology screen are pending." I blinked my foggy eyes awake, the reality of the news anchor's words slicing through the miasma like a woodsman's saw. The camera angle changed, showing a black and white photograph obviously taken a good half century before floating on the screen beside the anchor's head. It depicted uniformed men from the era standing amid snow-laden banks, looking toward a car being dragged out from the waters of the lake. "The discovery of the body, and the apparent name of the deceased, comes on the fifty-sixth anniversary of the death of Rosemarie Anne Carter, who, along with a then twenty-one-year-old Felix Lautner, drove into Shannon Lake on Christmas Eve. Miss Carter drowned, but Lautner survived, giving rise to a flurry of rumors surrounding the tragedy. Despite being absolved of any wrongdoing in the death of Miss Carter, Felix Lautner's innocence was never completely accepted by the community--" I jumped out of bed, needing not to hear anymore. I rushed to pull on my clothes and dashed to the bathroom down the hall, ignoring the intoxicating scents of gingerbread and roasting turkey, the excited laughter and squeals of my sister's and cousins' kids. I didn't bother shaving, just brushed my teeth and fixed my clothes. I rambled down the stairs, pausing briefly as I caught my mother's eye as she stood in the kitchen along with my grandfather and great uncle Jerry. Beyond them, the small television on the kitchen counter flickered quietly, showing the same newscast I had been watching. "Honey?" my mother asked tentatively, smiling crookedly. "Are you all right? I'm sorry if the kids woke you, but it is Christmas--" "It's fine," I said, trying to appear calm. I shot Jerry a brief look. His features were like the face of David, as always. Stoic and unreadable. But I could see a quiet storm swirling behind his eyes, a tumult of conflicted thoughts. "Well, you want some breakfast? You're a little late for pancakes, and too early for turkey, but I could make you an omelet, I guess." "I can feed myself, mom," I said, touching her arm. I leaned in to give her a kiss on the cheek. "Thanks for letting me sleep in." She smiled, the way only a mother can, conveying a sort of chastising forgiveness. Then she looked past me toward her uncle. "I have a feeling you two have something to do," she said sagely, then touched my cheek. "Dinner's at three." I nodded. "Thanks, mom." * * * * I had expected yellow crime scene tape stretched across stakes hammered into the ground, perhaps surrounding some kind of tape outline in the snow. But the only things that marked where Felix' body had been discovered were trampled snow and a vague depression wherein, I figured, had been found the old man's body. The scene was eerily tranquil. A few boats bobbed lazily on the surface of the lake; joggers in their best winter workout garb circumnavigated the edge of the lake. Less than a hundred feet away, a happy young couple held hands as they stared out over the still winter waters, faces rosy and noses red, eyes aglow with love. I looked down at where Felix had been found, imagining him seated as he slowly froze to death, staring out at the lake in which, more than half a century before, Rose Carter had drowned. What had he felt as he died? Remorse? Regret? Or maybe just the simple pain of survivor's guilt mingled with the sense of acceptance? I'll never know, I thought, holding the single red rose in my hands. In my periphery, Uncle Jerry appeared, stone-faced as always, narrow eyes staring out across the lake. "You think Felix would appreciate a gesture like that?" A weary sigh escaped me. "Yeah, I do," I answered, then looked sidelong to my great uncle. "You still think he raped her?" Jerry didn't speak, but I could see his jaw muscles working beneath leathery old skin. "You ever think, all this time, he was telling the truth?" "I considered it. But, like I said, what does it matter anymore? It's been fifty-six years, now." "Then maybe it's time two old men finally came to terms with their grief," I said in a tone I had never used with my grandfather's brother before. He gave me a look that would normally have been a prelude to some condescending diatribe about age and experience and "knowing the ways of the world." But it didn't come. Instead, it seemed, an old man who had always lived his life alone, who had always been the dour old curmudgeon throughout my entire life . . . for a moment, he appeared to become human. "I hated the man," he said in a strangled voice, forcing the words out. His eyes reddened, then watered. "I thought I always would." "I know." He sniffled once, making a supreme effort to hold back tears which had been welling inside for more than five decades. "Jesus, what the hell am I supposed to do? I'm too old to change my mind now." I fidgeted. This was new territory between my stony old great uncle and I. "I don't know what to tell you," I said. "I don't have another fifty years of experience and life wisdom under my belt to even qualify to tell you what to do. But, maybe it's just me being young and stupid and not knowing squat about anything . . . it just seems to me that there's no use being angry anymore. Felix is dead, Uncle Jerry." He nodded sagely. "Yeah, he's gone, and so is my Rose, and I still don't know what the hell happened between them. For the longest time, I just wanted to believe he took advantage of her, abused her, even killed her. It was a hell of a lot easier than to think the woman I wanted to be my wife had fallen in love with someone else. Easier to use that as an excuse to stay miserable for the rest of my life." I was quiet for a moment, looking down at the rose in my hands, when an epiphany fell upon me. A smile pulled at the edges of my mouth as I held up the rose before Jerry. "Tell me if I'm wrong, but you're life isn't over yet." Jerry frowned, looking first to the rose, then to me. I didn't know what was going behind his eyes at that moment, but I could have sworn I saw at least a flicker of life in there somewhere. Hesitantly, he accepted the rose, holding it like Arthur when presented with the Holy Grail. "What the hell am I supposed to do with this?" he asked as I stepped away. "I don't know," I called back as I made my way up the bank. "It's your rose, not mine." ~finis~ (Thank you for reading. Please, don't forget to vote, and feel free to leave a comment below. If you like my writing, and would like to see more of my work in the future, please add me to your list of favorites. I have more stories coming soon.) Nostalgia for White Ex-Boyfriend So my ex-boyfriend, the man I dated when I first moved to Canada, got in touch with me again. It had been a bad break-up, quite sudden but in other ways not unexpected. i knew that I had been treating him rather poorly for the last few months before, but it was still a surprise to me that one day, before we went for dinner, he abruptly said things weren't working out and it was over. I have to admit that I hadn't valued him very much, even though he had generously introduced me to the city and been my almost constant companion since I arrived. We would meet after I finished work each day, going out to eat at a new restaurant or otherwise exploring some part of the city that I hadn't seen yet. He was like a travel companion actually, even though he had lived in the city for many years. Perhaps I was with him mostly because he was like a live-in tour guide, able to keep me company and to provide a safe place to feel at home every night. He had his own apartment, but because he had returned to school and I was working full time, my place was much nicer and so we spent almost every night in my bed. He was very good looking, the first white man I had ever dated (although not the first I had slept with), and I had been shocked the first time we went to bed. White cocks are so different than Asian penises--not only was this man's cock larger and thicker than any Japanese man I had known, it was soft, almost spongy to my touch. Asian cocks are rigid when erect and much smaller and compact than his almost monstrous member, but his cock was squishy and never became quite as hard as my previous Asian boyfriends. But it was probably a good thing that his cock was a little soft to the touch and not too hard because it was huge, and so I think it might have been too painful for me to take him inside if he had been absolutely rock hard. As big and thick as he was, I could still fit him all the way in because his cock conformed into every nook and cranny inside me--it also felt incredible full, like no other feeling. I remember the first time I had slept with a white man, an American ex-pat I met one night at a dance club in tokyo. He was a friend of a co-worker, and obviously loved Japanese women. He had slept with a string of japanese girls who themselves were curious about what it was like to sleep with a gaijin, and I had told myself I would never suffer the humiliation of being just one in a line of such stupid girls. Gut after a few bottles of shochu the end of the evening brought me to a love hotel, staggering into the room with him. A voice inside my head said that this was better than taking a taxi home, and whatever happened I would just wait for the first trains to run again in the morning and go straight to work. I always had a change of clothes in my desk, and if I arrived early enough I would be refreshed and ready for the day rather than having to take a taxi for an hour and then only sleeping for an hour before waking up again right away to catch the morning commute. Having sex with him didn't seem to have entered into my decision-making, and so it was almost surreal when he stripped my dress off and began licking me. His tongue felt warm and long inside me, and by the time I had unzipped his pants to reciprocate i was crazy horny. That man's cock had been a normal size, no bigger than my Japanese boyfriend's at the time, but it had also had that slightly spongy quality. I had thought it was because he was so drunk that he couldn't get fully erect, and he wasn't very good in bed. But that first white penis had done nothing to prepare me for the man I began dating in Vancouver! So last night, almost three years after we broke up, this ex-boyfriend sent me an email. He said he had come across my profile on plentyoffish.com. I blushed immediately when I realized he thought I was still single. I had created the profile almost two years ago, when i had been single and lonely, but had never bothered to take it down even after I had begun dating the man who I eventually married. Knowing that my ex had seen my profile made me feel humiliated, and so i was about to delete his email and not even answer when I saw that he had attached a video file. Curious, I didn't even bother reading the rest of his rather long message, going straight to the attachment and downloading the attached file, which mysteriously was named "nostalgia.wmv." I clicked on the file after it downloaded and saw that it was a video him masturbating! I watched the clip mesmerized. I had forgotten how big his cock was! His body seemed a bit softer than it had been, a little bit older, but otherwise he seemed the same. He had been over 190cm, and quite well built although not muscular like a body builder. Since i am tiny, less than 45kg, we struggled at first finding a sexual position that worked. When he was on top of me, I felt almost a visceral fear that he would smother me, but I had to admit that somehow there was a thrill as he pounded into me from above, my legs spread wide or wrapped around his wide hips. When his huge cock drilled into me, it felt like i was being split open, and I had never felt so filled before in my life. He was at least 25cm long, and thick and meaty like a sausage. I always had to suck on him before we fucked, both to get him hard as possible, but also to lubricate him enough so that i could take him inside. My favourite position was to ride on top of him so that I could control the pace and the depth of his plowing inside me. But when I think back on our nightly and sometimes two or three times a night fucking sessions, I almost always had the best orgasms when he was on top of me pounding into my open legs and almost crushing me with his huge body. When he really began to exert himself, he began to sweat and smell like an animal, a strong musky odour that I had never experienced with a Japanese or Chinese man. It was a sharp scent, almost stinging my nose, and although I would have normally found such a body odour repellent, when I was horny it somehow entered straight into some part of my brain and drove me even crazier with lust. I wanted to cover myself with his sweat, lick the hairy crotch skin that surrounded his majestic cock. He also had gigantic balls that hung down almost 10 cm down in large fleshy sacs, and when he came he would shoot spurt after long spurt of sticky white cum. I had never seen so much sperm emerge from a cock, and coming out of such a large thick penis, it seemed like a machine pumping white goo all over my breasts and stomach. I didn't like when he came inside me because I would be leaking and sloppy wet the next day at work, and even when he wore a condom sometimes the rubber would slip off when he was fucking me really hard because his cock was so large and we had a hard time finding a condom that was large enough to stay on him. I became used to the tingly soreness after a long session of fucking him. He took a long time to cum, sometimes over an hour of constant sex, and as long as I sucked his cock back to semi-hardness when it would become too soft, he could go on and on for the longest time. Maybe it was because he was never quite fully erect that he could avoid having an orgasm too quickly. It was very difficult for me to suck him to an orgasm, and he only ever came by fucking me. He said he was surprised that he could last so long because he would often marvel at how "tight" I felt. of course I was tight when you consider how big and thick he was! To me I wasn't tight, I was being stretched wide! I have tasted many men's sperm, and the flavour ranges far and wide. Even the same man's sperm changes depending upon what he has eaten or drunk and whether he is dehydrated. But his cum was consistently sweet, with a slight alkaline flavour. It was probably a good thing I loved to drink his sperm because he produced so much! Enough to fill a small shot glass, and if I wasn't careful and tried to swallow it all at once, it would stick in my throat and choke me! Better that I savoured each chunk as it cooled on my breasts or my face after he had jerked out stream after stream of sperm. My protein snack each night, lying in bed catching my breath between finger scooped globs of cum fed onto my waiting tongue, my legs still open and my pussy lips sore from the pounding they had received. I have to admit that I loved being fucked by him, and that seeing the video immediately reminded me of our hundreds of nightly fucking sessions. So it was a bit nostalgic indeed to watch the video clip he made of his beautiful cock. Watching his cock harden reminded me that his thick meaty sausage was my first real experience with a big white cock. How many incredible orgasms it had given me. So many nights I had come three or four times during the hour or so of being torn open by his monstrous tool. After he had broken up with me, i genuinely missed his company, and I spent almost a year after that without having sex with a man other than an occasional one night stand. I didn't realize how much I had enjoyed being with him. The sex had an animal passion, even though I couldn't say in honesty that i was in love with him. Attracted to him, yes, but over time i had begun to treat him badly because somehow deep inside I didn't respect him, and eventually I could no longer hide the disdain I felt for him. I felt so sorry for him--after he broke up with me I realized how cruel I had been to him and was not surprised at all that he had become fed up and had enough. But what a cock! and when I think about the musky smell of his sweat and the sweet taste of his sperm, it brings back fond memories. Maybe I should email him back and send a little video of myself masturbating too, thinking back nostalgically of what it felt like being fucked by him...