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The Grass is Always Greener

By: dayle01



The mansion that I live in; its not mine I am just looking after it, is situated in an area that reeks of money, power and esteem, they would probably shudder if they realized a wannabe cad like I was residing there. They are all pillars of the community, the drivers of the country towards a better destination, they all smile beautifully, they have airs and graces, they are very important and they know better than us commoners.

I had sort of got friendly, nay not friendly, I had made my existence known to my immediate neighbour; Gordon was his name, he had a heavily coiffured wife called Emily and they had 2 boys who were the next generation of top class citizens, Gordon had made his money through selling consumerable goods, yet this still made him a leading figure and role model.

Gordon had learned a bit about my past and he took great delight in rubbing my nose in it, recently we were talking and he did a tut-tut, then shook his head and said, "Come on Yves old fellow, when will you learn the grass is never greener on the other side of the fence." I had countered that argument once before by explaining that although beautiful, life would be so much better with a variety of colours. 

"Look at me Yves, Emily and I have been together for 25 years we are comfortable with each other, we live a great life, we are not left wanting anything," he said as he applied another layer of polish to the Lexus, behind him I saw Emily in her bedroom applying another layer of make-up.

"How is Emily's back?" I asked and continued with, "It must still be sore, I see she is still in her own room!"

Gordon looked back at her room and replied, "It doesn't seem to be getting better, it has cost a small fortune and no-one seems to be able to pinpoint the problem. Bloody nuisance really always seems to get in the way of us being, hmm, intimate shall we say".

"Ooo Helloo Yves," it was Emily she was standing beside Gordon looking down her rather considerable nose at me, "I am just off to my Golf lesson now Gordon and then have an appointment for my hair to be done and then a spa, see you about 7.00 tonight." With that she gave him a peck on the cheek then she was gone in her Lexus, yes that's correct they have matching cars, how sweet!.

"I would have thought Golf lessons would be bad for the back Gordon?" I said as we watched Emily disappear down the road, Gordon just shrugged, his attention was diverted by the rather delightful Jenny from across the road coming down to check her mail, Jenny gave him the most suggestive looking smile, I was just about to comment when I heard my phone ringing and left Gordon to go and answer it.

Part of the contra deal that I have for living at the mansion is that I keep the lawns and gardens tidy, this suits me fine, being the poser that I am I like to get out and mow the lawns without a shirt on, hey if you have it flaunt it, that seems to be the general motto of the community anyway. It was a nice day so time to honour my commitments, I got the lawnmower out and I was primed and rearing to go and would you believe it the bloody thing wouldn't start, I am not in anyway mechanically inclined, I do pride myself on being a problem solver, this one was easy borrow Gordon's.

Last time I went to their house it was to deliver some errant mail on that occasion I remember that no one came to the door to answer the knocking, Gordon explained that they spend most of the time around the back, they have a great setup with swimming pool and an spa and he could normally be found there. Needless to say I made my way around the side of the house to find him.

Find him I did, just as he was entering and it wasn't the pool, she was facing away on all four but I knew it was the lovely Jenny, being the gentleman that I am I stayed and watched. The excitement levels became frenetic when we were all rudely interrupted by Emily, it transpired that she had forgotten her favourite driver for the lesson and had come home to get it. There didn't appear to be anything wrong with her back, she could swing that club like Tiger, unfortunately for Gordon his hand had taken on the appearance of a golf ball.

His hand was in a cast for about 4 weeks, Emily has gone and taken a considerable amount of the belongings including the lawnmower, Jenny had a dislike about the stigma of being a home breaker and vanished. You have to feel sorry for Gordon he had borrowed a handmower and was struggling away the other day when I pointed out it doesn't matter what side of the fence its on, it is still bloody hard to mow.

The Grass is Always Greener



When I was young my Grandfather used to read the paper to me. One of his favorite columnists was a woman named Erma Bombeck. I got the idea for this story from the title of one of her books. As usual thanks to Mikothebaby for editing this story. If you like it please let her know that her work is appreciated by someone besides me. 

* * * * * *

Refusing to let go of the past is the surest way of not having a future.

God damn it. I hated mornings like this one. It was a crisp, clean, spring morning with a sense of renewal in the air. The birds were singing, the sun was shining, the leaves and the grass were beginning to turn green, I was miserable. I wish that I was like Storm from the X-men and the weather could reflect my moods. It would be a completely different day. The sky would be gray and the air would be as cold as my mood.

As I jogged the last few steps down my block, one of my neighbors, who was outside trying to get her lawn mower started waved at me. I waved back in a far more cheerful gesture than I felt. That was good I told myself. Just keep pretending to be cheerful and no one will know how you really feel.

I had a satisfied little smile on my face. The smile was actually more due to the fact that I'd pulled off another day without breaking down than a reflection of my actual mood.

As I came up to my house, I noticed an unfamiliar vehicle in my driveway. It was parked right behind my Grabber Orange 2009 Mustang GT. As I slowed down to a walk, I recognized the truck. Sarah had driven it once or twice when she needed to bring loads of her things over to my house. She had so much shit here that a lot of people thought she lived with me.

Seeing the truck forced me to make my smile not bigger just happier, I had to keep up a good front for her. I was ready for her to either try and tug on my heartstrings and beg to go back to what we had or barring that, for her to stoically go about collecting her belongings and get the hell out of my life. Shit, if necessary I'd even help her move her stuff.

I was slightly disappointed when I got to the front of the truck and saw not Sarah but some guy. He wasn't big and imposing or small and wimpy, he was just a guy. He had on a baseball cap over his graying hair and he wore a red and white flannel shirt over jeans and tennis shoes. He couldn't have been more ordinary if he'd tried.

"Hey Bill," he said as I walked up.

"You must be, uhm Bobby, her brother," I said, making sure to keep up my smile.

"Uhm huh?" he said, looking at me.

"I'll give you a hand loading her stuff," I said. "Give me a couple of minutes to shower and change into some dry clothes while you go through and figure out what you can take in the first load."

He looked at me curiously and then smiled. "God damn you're good," he said. "Probably one of the best I've ever seen."

"The best what?" I asked.

"Liars," he said, looking me straight in the eye.

"I'm not lying," I snapped. "I really will help you move her stuff. I just need to take a shower. I just ran ten miles."

"You run ten miles every morning except Friday, Saturday and Sunday," he said. "Friday morning is your day off. Saturday you only run five so you'll have more energy for whatever you and Sarah do that day. Sundays are your long run day when you're getting ready for a marathon. I'm not talking about you not helping me get ready to move your wife's belongings out of your house. I'm sure you'd do that and more. What I'm talking about is your feelings. You're even lying to yourself. You're actually so good at lying that you almost believe it yourself."

"For future reference, it's the eyes that you really have to work on," he continued. "That's what gave you away. You have that fake ass little smile down pat. But as you got close to me, I could see all of the pain you're feeling written in your eyes. She hurt you pretty badly didn't she? Well this has been a pretty fucked up situation from the beginning. Maybe it was time this happened. Why don't we go out on that deck that she was always telling me about? You can bring me a beer and you have a Pepsi or some of that Apple juice that the two of you love so much."

I just looked at him strangely. "Come on Bill, we need to talk this out. Believe me, I know what it's like losing your wife. I lost mine to cancer, it was almost six years ago and I still hurt. I didn't come to get Sarah's things. She doesn't even know that I'm here. I came here to talk to you and figure out what the hell is wrong with the two of you."

I looked at him even more strangely. I couldn't get over him having the audacity to just come to my house to talk to me about something that wasn't his business. Especially since...Well his sister and I weren't married. "Why do you keep calling Sarah, my wife?" I asked him. "We're not married. We're not in a romantic relationship of any kind."

He looked at me then and just started laughing. It wasn't a quick snort or a derisive guffaw. It was a full bellied, knee slapping, outburst of genuine mirth.

"Yeah," he said, when he got control back. "She told me the same thing. You should also know that this isn't really her fault. She got some bad advice from someone who used to be her friend. But my sister is susceptible to that considering she's pretty fucked up in the head. That part is your fault. I just hope that you're man enough to admit to it after we talk. And this is going to take some time to solve. Years of abuse aren't going to just melt away in one day."

"Hold on a God damned minute," I said. "I have never abused your sister. I've never once hit her, screamed at her or cursed at her."

"Nope you didn't," he said. "In fact you damn near killed her with kindness. That makes it even worse don't you think?"

"Exactly what the fuck are you talking about?" I asked. I didn't understand any of what he was getting at.

"I think I've got it all figured out now," he said. "It's all about strength isn't it? Or maybe, it's a facade of strength, right? The only time that someone needs to be that strong is when they think they're weak. They project an aura of invincibility because they don't want to be hurt again." He tilted his head and looked at me as if he was psychic. "This didn't start with my sister, did it? Someone hurt you before you ever met her. And that's what stilted your whole marriage to my sister. And now recent events caused her to do something really stupid that's put your whole weird ass marriage on the line."

"Why do you keep calling it a marriage?" I asked.

"Because Bill, that's what it is," he said. "Now come on let's get out to that deck and start talking. We need to figure this out before the two of you do something even stupider. And I like my beer cold. You'd probably better bring two of them. This has all the makings of a two beer conversation."

As we walked through the house, he looked around and smiled as he noticed things. I noted that he seemed to know the story behind some of the things that Sarah and I'd picked up in our travels. My rack of swords and weapons of all kinds didn't seem to faze him in the least. It was as if he expected them. "No guns, huh?" he said with a smile.

"I'm going to grab a shower," I said. "The kitchen is that way and the door to the deck is in there. You can stop off and grab your own beers. All we have is..."

"I know," he said. "You only have Dos Equis. You don't always drink beer...Shit you don't drink period, but you just like the fucking commercials. Sarah told me. It's one of the things that she lo...likes most about you."

I knew what he was going to say but I let it slide. I had other things on my mind. Like why the hell I was going to talk to him anyway? Sure he was Sarah's brother, but things between Sarah and I were over. I wondered if he even knew what his sister had done. I wonder if he knew just how casually she'd thrown away everything we had. As the warm water of my shower cascaded over me, I had to put away a pang of longing as I remembered that only days ago Sarah and I had stood in this shower together, lovingly caressing each other under the same warm water. She'd turned around with her back towards me and bent over, looking at me over her shoulder. "Too bad you're so tired from your run..." she'd begun. "...Or else we could..."

Before she'd even finished her statement, I was in her. Pulling her brutally against me and plunging my dick into her in one moment. I put one hand on her firm tummy and the other on one of her large breasts and pulled her against me over and over again as she hissed in pleasure. She tilted her head around and back and her tongue inserted itself into my mouth seeking mine. Her arms reached behind her and pulled me into her further. "Ohhh God, Bill, I..." she said as she started to shiver with the onset of her climax. I had to hold her up because, as usual, when she came, her legs got weak. She turned around still slippery from a mixture of sweat and soapy water and kissed me again. "God," she said again. Her smile was tinged with a sadness that only we understood. But it was only for a moment.

"So what are we going to do today?" she asked.

"It's your turn to pick," I replied.

I shook my head and threw away the memory. I'd never do that with her again and her brother was waiting for me downstairs. I turned off the shower and dressed in casual clothes. As I passed through the kitchen on my way to the deck, I grabbed a small bowl of the fruit salad that Sarah had made two days before. I smiled again thinking of days last summer when we had literally lived on fruit, cold cuts and soda.

I sat down at the table across from Bobby.

"You guys have a beautiful place here," he said. "Did you know that even though Sarah doesn't officially live here, she considered this her home?"

I just rolled my eyes.

"Her apartment is pretty much empty. She gave most of the furniture to my daughter when Emily moved into her own place two years ago. I don't even know why she ever bothered to go there when her heart was here. The two of you really need to work on your acting skills. Everything about this place has her touch all over it. There are at least as many pictures of her here as there are of you. All of her favorite stuff is in your refrigerator. And as her brother, I really didn't want to see her panties drying in your laundry room. Why can't the two of you just admit it?"

"Just admit what?" I asked. "We were friends nothing more. She worked for me and we hung out together. Okay we hung out a lot. But there was nothing going on between us." He just looked at me with that nearly psychic look again.

"Okay, Bobby, we're both adult men, right? Your sister and I were uhm, friends with benefits. But she decided to pursue other avenues. It happens. We got along great and we also took care of certain needs for each other. I mean everyone has those needs and since neither of us had anyone in our lives...well you know?"

"Yeah, I know," he said smiling. "I know you were both fooling yourselves. Well, you were mostly fooling yourself and she put up with it. That was really one of the worst ways that you abused her and in the end that was part of what just made her snap."

"I mean, Bill, you're a good looking guy. You have a successful business and more money than you need. You could have gotten yourself a woman without very much trouble. And you could have easily gotten someone better looking than my sister."

"See," he smiled, looking at me. "When I said you could have gotten someone better looking than my sister, you got pissed. Your mouth even moved a bit but your eyes told me that you wanted to kick my ass for even saying it." He started laughing again.

"You're going to get even more pissed at me, Bill, for what I'm about to say," he said. "You love Sarah. That's why this whole thing is fucked up."

"I do not," I said loudly.

"Do not," he echoed sarcastically. "What are you six?"

"Don't get me wrong, Bill. My sister isn't a troll. She's an attractive woman. She's especially hot, if you like your women a little thick. She has that big old butt and some really nice tits but she's got a slim waist too. If you're into that hour glass shape she's your girl. But it's more than that for you isn't it, Billy? Despite all of your protestations and your little friends with benefits bullshit, you love my sister, don't you?"

"Do not," we both said simultaneously, which caused him to erupt in laughter again.

"Alright Bill, let's get started," he said finally. "Tell me about what you went through before you met Sarah. Let's hear the story of why you put my sister through all of this hell for the past five years."

He was looking at me as if he really expected me to just spill my guts to him. I'd never told anyone how I'd fucked up my first marriage or why I decided not to ever do it again. But something in his eyes just made me want to let it all out. Maybe if I could talk about it just once, it would serve to clear out some of the bullshit in my head. Maybe it would give me a new perspective on what I was doing wrong to cause not one but two women to cheat on me.

* * * * * *

Sarah

I woke up and reached for Bill with a smile on my face. I'd had an awful dream. I'd dreamed that we'd broken up. Well we couldn't really break up because we weren't really together; at least not officially. But the truth was that I loved Bill Reed more than life itself and I wanted to have his babies. Suddenly I realized where I was and why and I started crying all over again. We HAD broken up. After the best five years of my entire life I had fucked up so badly that I was sure there was no way to fix it. I know how Bill looked at betrayal. I know how he'd handled it with his first wife and I knew that since we weren't even married, I couldn't even hope for what she got. What she got was evicted from his life with no hope of parole. My tears ran down my face and caused it to hurt. The salt in the tears from the day before had dried on my face irritating my skin and the new torrent of tears made it hurt all over again.

The banging on my door that had awakened me in the first place resumed and I went to the door hoping against hope that it was Bill.

When I opened the door and saw Theresa standing there, my mouth hardened and I started to slam the door in her face.

"Damn, you look awful," she said. "Anyway, I need your help."

Theresa had never been known for her tact. She pushed right past me and into the apartment. "You really need to just rent this place out," she said. "You barely even have any furniture here. How often do you actually come here?"

"What the fuck do you want Terri?" I asked her in as icy a tone as I could manage. "Haven't you done enough to me yet? Have you come to just shoot me in the head and put me out of my misery?"

She looked at me like I had fallen off of the stupid tree and hit every branch on the way down. "You didn't tell him yet?" she asked.

"How can I?" I sobbed. "He won't talk to me."

"Well you probably shouldn't have listened to me, then," she snapped. "Anyway, we have a bigger problem. You fucked up my little brother's life and he's depressed. You have to help me fix it."

I looked up at her like she was the crazy one. "How the hell is it my fault?" I asked.

"I didn't say it was your fault. I just said you had to help me. Well...indirectly this is your fault," she continued. "You were so miserable that I had to try to help you. So I came up with an idea that probably wasn't a good one. But it was your misery that caused it so even though it was my plan, you share the responsibility." Somewhere in all of that she lost me.

"My brother, Frankie's girlfriend got a visit from one of Billy's PI's," she said. "They told her that Frankie had ruined a relationship by having a one night stand or maybe more than a one night stand with another woman. That woman, being you, of course. She got so angry at Frankie that she called off their engagement. Since Frankie works or worked for her father, he got fired. So now he's lost his girl and his job for no reason. We have to help him."

"What do you want me to do?" I asked.

"Well, you could talk to her and tell her the whole story," said Terri.

"You could too," I said. "I'm sorry for your brother but I'm just not in the mood to leave here. Maybe I'll never leave here again."

"She doesn't believe it coming from me. she doesn't like me at all. Anyway Sarah, we'll find you another guy," she said. "We'll find you someone better; someone who doesn't have all of Bill's hang-ups."

"Terri, just get your meddling ass out of my apartment, now," I snapped at her.

"Damn it, I'm sorry," she said. "What is it about this guy that's got you wrapped this tight?"

"Just go, Terri," I told her. As she stormed out and slammed the door behind her, I thought back to the first time I'd met Bill Reed.

It was five years ago at the Woodward Dream Cruise. The Woodward Dream Cruise is a really amazing event. It's kind of like a rolling car show through the heart of Detroit. Well to be truthful, the Dream Cruise doesn't actually take place in Detroit. It's a totally suburban affair that starts embarrassingly less than fifty yards away from the Detroit city limits and goes all the through to Pontiac, Michigan.

You can see any and every type of vehicle driving by. There are all kinds of incredible cars, trucks, motorcycles and oddities. One guy even drove a motorized toilet that first year that I was there.

Anyway, I wasn't involved in the actual Dream Cruise event. Each small city and suburb along the route has their own events and displays. Ferndale, Michigan has one of the best. It's called Mustang Alley and it is a huge all Mustang display and contest. About three years before that show my dad had passed. His passing, coming closely on the heels of my brother, Bobby, losing his wife and my divorce had just devastated us. Dad had left Bobby the house, he'd left me a broken down 67' Mustang and a little bit of money. I'd decided to sell the car to see what I could get for it and just move away.

At least that had been the plan. I took one look at that car and remembered how much my dad loved it. A 67 Shelby GT 500 was a rarity. I wondered why Dad hadn't left Bobby the car and me the house. Instead of selling the car, I decided to restore it. Somewhere along the way, I started to love the car too. The guys who were restoring the car came up with the plan of converting the car into a GT500E. When I saw the designs they had I knew that it was perfect and my Eleanor was born.

The Dream Cruise that year was her coming out party and mine too. Over the previous twenty four months that it took to restore the car, with me helping with a lot of the work, I'd gotten over most of my personal tragedies. I saw my dad in the car every time I looked at it and I knew he'd have loved what I'd done with it.

I also saw that my ex-husband had moved onto another victim. Even as he possessively held onto to her hand in the market where I saw them, I noticed the tell-tale signs of his love in the bruises on her arms and the too thick makeup on her face. Better her than me, I thought. I'd dated a couple of guys but hadn't really felt anything special until that day at the Cruise.

From the first second that I pulled Eleanor into her assigned display spot, I had people, mostly guys staring at her. Since there weren't very many women at these kinds of shows except for the car show model types and sharks looking for men who can afford a toy car, I also attracted a lot of attention.

Most of the guys who came after me were either guys who wanted my car and figured if they got into my pants they'd get into her driver seat, or guys who already had a car of their own and figured it would be cool to have a woman with her own car as well.




The Grass is Always Greener



Neither type appealed to me. I wasn't a babe in the woods even then. At 32 years old, I'd been around the block a few times and I knew what I didn't want in a man. This time around the track, if I was going around the track again, it would be for someone who really loved me and made me feel good about myself.

My first husband had been all about himself. He often told me that I wasn't pretty enough and I should be glad to be with him no matter what he did. My ass was too big and since I was over thirty my tits would be on the floor soon. I was also too short and my legs were too thick. After hearing it for over ten years, I have to admit he got to me and I believed it.

I wish I could say that I was strong and I extracted myself from that situation immediately, but I can't. I put up with it for far longer than I should have. But once I decided to go, I moved quickly and decisively.

So there I was at the Cruise. I was sitting next to Eleanor, wearing a t-shirt that I'd bought at the Cruise that morning and my favorite, comfortable, old, too-tight jeans. I got up from my folding chair for a hot second to go and get something to eat. When I started back I saw this guy going up and down both sides of the display area. He was taking pictures of all of the cars. He also spoke to almost every one of the owners of the cars. I thought he was cute and I was kind of looking forward to him talking to me and taking pictures of Ellie.

So I put my sunglasses on and leaned back in one of my most seductive poses to wait. It didn't take long. He got to the car next to mine, a really nice 2010 V6 convertible in a custom shade of red with a contrasting interior. This guy was cool. Just from listening to the way he spoke to the car's owner I got the impression that he just loved Mustangs. He wasn't a snob about it, he loved them all. He liked V6's just as much as their more high powered cousins and he seemed to appreciate all eras of the pony car.

I loved his voice and the enthusiasm he got in it when he talked about the cars that we both loved. For the last five years of my marriage, I don't think I was ever actually turned on. I think it had gotten to the point where I just endured it. So it came as a shock to me that listening to this guy talking to the sixty year old guy who owned that red Mustang had my panties dripping.

I heard him thank the guy for talking to him and shake his hand and then I saw him head towards me and walk right by. To say that I was crushed was an understatement. It just made no fucking sense. I tried to figure out why he'd skipped me. I looked across from me and saw him talking to a guy with a sweet black and Red early 90's 5.0 GT. It was a nice car but not nearly as rare or as cool as my Eleanor. I decided that there was no reason for him not to take pictures of my car and I got pissed. I went back to the booth halfway down the block to get something to drink. Fuck him I thought. No sooner than I left though he must've made a beeline for my car. He was taking pictures of it from almost every angle. Several times I saw him just stop and shake his head.

Just from the way he was looking at my car, I got jealous. I headed back from the food stand and saw him jet away from her and start talking to the guy on the other side again. I had an idea. I grabbed the arm of a guy walking down the street.

"Which one is your car?" I asked him. He looked at me crazily.

"I don't have a car in this show," he said. "But boy I'd like to. As soon as I get a job, I'm getting a Mustang."

"Great," I said. "I'm sure that Ford will love you. How would you like a chance to pick up some women? Maybe you'll have a better chance of getting a car with a girlfriend."

He looked at me then and smiled. "Not me," I said quickly. "You need someone younger and prettier."

"What do I have to do?" he asked.

"See the car over there?" I pointed at my Eleanor. "I just need you to go over there and stand next to that car for a little while. I have a seat next to it. Sit down in the chair. If a guy comes over and asks you about it, tell him it's your car but your sister was watching it for you."

He nodded and went and sat next to Ellie. It took less than 20 seconds. As soon as he sat down, Billy was on him. I was sure that he had tons of questions for the guy. On one hand I felt better. It validated my theory that my car was indeed special and beautiful so I was happy. On the other hand I wondered what the hell was wrong with me, that a guy that I didn't even know disliked me so much that he'd skip my car to avoid me?

* * * * * *

Billy

I looked over at Bobby. He took a long pull on his beer and laughed at me. He burped loudly and looked at my bowl.

"Cantaloupe, honey dew melon, pineapple, green grapes and cherries, that's one of her favorite concoctions," he said. "She even has you trained in the way you eat. Okay, we don't have all day. Let's hear this story of why you don't love your wife...I mean my sister."

"Alright," I said.

"This all started back when I was twenty four. I met this girl at a party after work. Her name was Irene and we kind of fell for each other. We started dating and got married. We had a great life or so I thought. At first, we did everything together. We were almost never apart. She was everything to me. As time went on though, I guess like most couples we kind of settled in for the long haul. Things weren't new and fresh anymore, in fact they were kind of boring."

"I guess that our marriage was like most things in life. You spend all of your time and energy trying to get something. Then once you have it, you get used to it and pretty soon it isn't nearly as special or important as it once was. Over the years, Irene had settled in too. Don't get me wrong, we still loved each other but maybe we'd just gotten used to each other.

It wasn't my fault or her fault; it was just the way things go. I'm sure that I'd spent far too much time building up my business and making us financially secure. I often worked sixty plus hour weeks back in those days. So she probably resented the time I spent at work. She'd told me more than once that I was married more to my business than I was to her.

On the other hand, I was in love with success. After scraping and barely getting by for a number of years, I finally had enough cash flow to do whatever I wanted. I bought that first Mustang back then and was in love with it. Since I was a kid I'd always been into Muscle cars and Mustangs in particular. So that first Mustang, the Black one, that's out there in my garage even now, was important to me.

I'd also started running marathons, so I was in pretty good shape when I wasn't complaining about my injuries or how much my legs hurt.

I guess it was me that messed everything up, because I looked at my life and at my marriage and didn't think that I had everything I deserved. I was especially disappointed in the way Irene turned out.

Irene was really cute when we first met. She was short and petite. She was kind of pixyish. But over the years, she'd picked up a few pounds here and there. She wasn't built like Sarah, so the extra weight didn't look good on her. On the other hand, she also just didn't give a damn about her appearance. She didn't do anything with her hair so for convenience she just chopped it off short. Also, as she went past thirty, she started wearing these huge unflattering glasses. She wasn't really unattractive, she was just frumpy.

I guess she figured that we already had each other, so we had no one to impress. We were comfortable with each other. Maybe that was what made everything boring. In fact, when I think about it, our life wasn't really bad at all, it was just boring. And in retrospect, I am at least 50 percent to blame for it. Maybe if I'd taken more time away from work or taken more of an interest in Irene, things would have been different. But I didn't so they aren't.

You know that old saying the grass is always greener somewhere else? Well, it was that greener grass that is partially responsible for fucking up my marriage.

In those days, I worked really hard drumming up new clients for my business. Anywhere and everywhere that I went, if I saw or heard about someone who might be a potential customer, I was on them. At the same time, I was still the same old guy I used to be. I still hung out with a lot of my friends from both college and high-school.

One of my best friends at that time was James Kirk. Kirk and I had played little league and high-school baseball together. When we got older we'd chased girls together. Kirk had been married and divorce three times by the time he was 28. Kirk was a notorious pussy hound. Anyway, Kirk and I were having lunch and talking about old times in an outdoor cafeteria near my office when I first saw HER.

When she breezed into the café, every guy in the place followed her with their eyes. Like most of those guys, I was smitten. Rebecca was simply amazing in the weirdest way. She wasn't one of those twenty year old, blonde, Nordic, goddess, swimsuit models with an amazing rack and piercing blue eyes.

In fact, she was almost the opposite of that. She was kind of pretty in a girl next door sort of way. She had short, brown hair in one those flip under styles. Her breasts weren't huge or even large and she was a few years older than me. She was probably about 36 or 37, maybe even older, but that was how old she looked. But there was just something about the way she smiled and the way she walked that got everyone's attention.

She had this way of having her eyes kind of half open and half closed and just scanning the room and smiling at every man there. But each and every guy thought that she was smiling only at him. If I knew then what I know now things would be different. I'd have thrown some money on the table and walked away from there.

Anyway, that day she sat down to eat her lunch with one of her girlfriends and an obsession was born. I started eating lunch in that café every day just to catch a glimpse of her. Without ever once having spoken to her, I fell head over heels completely in love with what I thought she was like.

Rebecca was, in my mind, the woman that I should have married. She was perfect and pure, but in the bedroom, I was sure that once unlocked she'd behave like a perfect whore. I always stayed in the back of the café, hoping that she wouldn't notice me. I watched her for six months before I really went crazy. I made up all kinds of little fantasy scenarios about the way that we would meet. I imagined what she'd say and how she'd act. I was behaving kind of like a fifteen year old girl does with her first crush.

The only thing missing was me getting a notebook and writing our names and making little hearts around them. Part of the reason why I couldn't do that was because I didn't know her name yet.

So every day I was sitting there watching my perfect dream princess eat and imagining how perfect our life together would be. But every night I was going home to a woman that I was simply tired of and bored with. Irene never did anything wrong. In fact, her only crime was that she wasn't Rebecca.

Suddenly, she was too short for me and her legs weren't long enough. Her hair wasn't dark enough and it wasn't styled correctly. Anything she wanted to talk about didn't interest me. And, of course, none of it was really her fault. It was all me and my fantasy.

Kirk and I had lunch again and he noticed my interest. "She's a player," he said.

"What?" I asked.

"She's the kind of girl you could have for a while if you wanted her," he told me.

Then he told me to watch her very carefully. A guy walked past her table and dropped something. I couldn't tell whether it was a napkin, a rolled up piece of paper or a business card, but she looked at him and then picked it up and slipped it into her purse.

"Tell you what," he said. "Your birthday is coming up. I'll get you some info." Before I could say anything, Kirk got up and walked over to their table. Without any preamble or introduction, Kirk went into action. He walked right over to their table and sat down next to Rebecca. He pushed her away from him as if she was crowding him and stared directly into her friend's eyes.

Rebecca's friend, whose name I later found out was Bonnie, was an interesting woman. She was on paper far prettier than Rebecca and built better. She was also younger and nicer but around Rebecca, she was always the odd one out. It was like Rebecca just exuded sex appeal beyond her actual physical beauty and made most of the women in her vicinity just null.

Kirk had somehow sensed that and just went straight to the heart of the problem. He grabbed Bonnie's hand and stared into her beautiful blue eyes. She was so taken with Kirk ignoring Rebecca, which almost never happened, that she'd have done anything he wanted.

She gave Kirk her phone number on the spot and agreed to see him that evening. As Kirk returned to our table all smiles, I noticed Rebecca's laser like gaze on him and then me. She smiled at me from across the room and I was hooked even further though I didn't really understand what was going on.

The very next day, Kirk came into my office, though he didn't work for me and told me all about Rebecca. He told me her name and that believe it or not she was forty years old. She was also married and very unhappy in her marriage and yes she fucked around; a lot.

I couldn't believe that she was forty, but I didn't care. I couldn't believe that she was married, but in the end I didn't care. And I was sure that there were reasons for her fucking around. I was sure that once we got together she'd stop.

It's really funny that Kirk had the idea that I was just after a quick piece of Rebecca's ass and after I'd gotten it I'd go back to my marriage happier and fulfilled. And he was even more convinced that Rebecca was, as he'd first called, her a player. After he got his info on her, he always got this sneer in his tone when he talked about her. I guess in his mind he thought of her as just a sperm dump.

On the other hand, I still saw her as my fairy princess. Sure her halo had been dented a bit but I was sure that I could save her, make her happy and we'd have this perfect life together. I started imagining all of the scenarios around us meeting and getting together. I'd take her away from her husband who I imagined to be some brutish asshole that abused her and didn't deserve her.

There was only one fly in the ointment of my perfect fantasy life with Rebecca. I had to find a way to get Irene out of the picture.

* * * * * *

Sarah

So, as I saw Bill go over to the jobless wonder that I had sitting next to my car, I was pissed. The closer I got the more I found the situation funny. Bill was asking the guy all kinds of questions that he simply couldn't answer.

"Is this car a reproduction or a restored original?" he asked the guy.

"It's a Mustang," said the guy, smiling proudly.

"What kind of engine does it have?" asked Bill.

"Chrome," said the guy.

I stepped behind Bill and tapped him on the shoulder. "The car is a 67 Shelby GT500, but it originally wasn't an Eleanor. All of the parts for the conversion and the body kit were made by Shelby so in that regard it could be considered and original, but since there were actually only two Eleanor models made by Shelby this can't be considered an original."

"The engine is a Ford Racing performance modular V8. It puts out four hundred and twenty eight horse power."

He just looked at me with those green gray eyes of his and nodded his head and then he turned away.

"Hey, wait a minute," I said. "I answered your question, now you answer mine." He just nodded his head.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"Every year that I bring my car to the show, mine is the Grabber Orange 09 GT over there. Anyway, I always take pictures of all of the cars in the show. I ask questions to give me an idea about mods that I might want to do to my car and for cars I might like to buy."

"Are you gay?" I asked him. "Or is it just that you don't like ugly, chunky girls."

"I'm not gay," he said. "But I can't really say that I like ugly, chunky girls either. Do you know any so I could figure out what an ugly, chunky girl looks like?"

"You know, like me," I said. He just laughed at me then.

"You're nowhere near ugly," he said. "And your tummy is too small to be chunky. You just have a lot of goodies. Most of the guys coming here today will be staring at your jeans."

"Then why..." I began.

"I just don't have any room in my life any more for women," he said. "I mean they're okay, but there are just too many problems with them. They're kind of like Lamborghini's. They're beautiful to look at but they're just not practical. Who wants a car that you have to pay more for a brake job than the down payment for another car?" He shrugged his shoulders.

"Maybe it's not even the case of practicality," he continued. "I appreciate them but I just don't want to own one."

When he'd said, "beautiful," he'd been looking right at me.

"Thanks for telling me about your car," he said softly. "It's probably the nicest car here." As he turned to walk away, something told me that he was the man I was destined to spend the rest of my life with. Just from looking at him and listening to the way he spoke, I was smitten.

"Hey babe, can we go get something to eat now?" asked my stand in, the jobless wonder.

"You go right ahead," I said.

"But I thought that we had something?" he said. "Maybe we could go for a ride later?"

"I wouldn't get your hopes up," I said.

"Is it because I don't have a camera?" he asked. I just shrugged my shoulders. "Man it's like those rap stars always say. Bitches be crazy." He walked away looking back at me and then he turned away and kept walking.

For the rest of the day I watched Billy as he walked up and down the entire display. He must've taken at least one picture and probably more of every one of the more than 600 Mustangs on display. His own car was a honey. It was a 2009 GT that had been heavily modified. It had black racing stripes and gloss black bar billet details everywhere. The upper and lower grills were black billet. He had a splitter in black that matched his stripes and contrasted nicely with the orange paint. He had a black rear diffuser. Even the rims on the car were a very glossy black in a split five spoke design.

His engine was all chromed with black details as well. His shaker hood system was the first time I'd seen one of those. The functional scoop amazed me. The black scoop rose through and above an opening in his hood. His spark plug wires were the same orange as the body of the car. His car also put out more horsepower than Ellie did. I had no doubt that it was probably faster as well. One of the things that amazed me the most was that even looking under his car everything I saw was black, orange or chrome. I was sure that I was in love.

I watched him through the early morning hours and he wasn't bullshitting or playing hard to get. He avoided women for the most part. He even avoided those mouth-watering little car show girls in the Ford booth and all of the other vendor's booths as well.

I did notice that though he froze out every woman I saw between 18 and 60, he was an angel personified to little girls and very old women. It took me a while to figure it out but someone must've hurt him really badly to make him this way.

Throughout the day, I made an ass out of myself with him. I'd ask him to go and get something to eat with me and he'd turn me down. But then I learned something. If I told him something that was totally car related and non-social he'd go for it. Like when I told him that the Ford mechanics were doing dyno testing on some of the cars they'd modified, his eyes got bigger. He even let me grab him by the hand and lead him over to the parking lot they were working in.




The Grass is Always Greener



Later on that day, I told him that the raffle was starting for the door prizes and again I grabbed his hand, he didn't object. I actually won one of the prizes in the raffle. I didn't win anything cool like custom wheels or engine mods. I won a dinner for two at one of the upscale restaurants in Pontiac.

"Oh, this is perfect," I said. "I may as well throw these away."

"I thought you'd enjoy something like that," he said.

"Why?" I snapped looking away from him and smiling. "I'm divorced. It's just me and Ellie. I don't want to have anything to do with any of these guys around here and I don't date. My ex was enough of a bastard that I'll never do that again."

"I know the feeling," he said. I'd played it just right.

"I'd look retarded cruising all the way out there to that restaurant to eat alone. I'd seem like the biggest loser in the world. Oh look at her. She couldn't even get a friend to come with her."

"I'm sure that there are lots of guys here who'd go with you," he said.

"Yes dummy, I know that," I said. "But they all have the wrong idea already. Most of these guys don't realize that I love my car just as much as they do. They think I'm here because I'm desperate to hook up with a guy. If I also offer to take one of them to dinner he's going to think that he automatically gets to fuck me. The four biggest questions you got today were #1 how much horsepower does your engine make? What kind of rims are those? Is that a supercharger? And is that a factory color? Am I close?"

He smiled and nodded. "There were a couple of others thrown in but that's pretty close," he said.

"You know what mine was?" He shook his head.

"Is that an original Eleanor? What size bra do you wear? Is that your boyfriend's car? Do you have a boyfriend?"

He laughed when I said that. "Why is it that you get all the questions about your car and I get all of the dating questions that have nothing to do with mine?"

"I just wish I could meet a nice guy to have as just a friend with no romantic or sexual overtones. Maybe just someone I could do stuff with some times who doesn't want or need to try to get into my panties. Damn, it would be so cool to just take our cars, cruise to this restaurant, eat a nice dinner with good company and then maybe a little bit of a nighttime cruise to cap the evening off and then go our separate ways."

I thought at first that I'd laid it on a bit thick. My heart was beating in my chest hard enough to make my breasts vibrate. It seemed like eternity passed before he spoke again.

"What's your name?" he asked.

"Sarah Jensen," I said.

"Bill Reed," he stuck out his hand. "If all you want is a friend with absolutely no romantic overtones or pressure, I could be your friend."

We hung out together until the early evening and then we left to go out and cruise to the restaurant. The dinner there was truly magical and the conversation was wonderful. But then I already knew that it would be. Bill paid for all of the extras that the tickets I won didn't provide. Towards the end of the evening he was looking down and I sensed that he wanted to ask me something.

"Go ahead," I said. "I can tell you want to ask me something." I was hoping he'd tell me that he'd had a good time and ask if we could do this again sometime. If HE didn't, I was going to. I'd rather make a fool out of myself than risk losing him before I actually got him.

"What size bra DO you wear?" he asked.

"What you really want to know is how big my tits are right?" I snapped. Then I noticed that he was smiling. "Okay you liar what do you really want to ask me?" I was smiling by then too.

"Okay," he said, "But it's kind of personal." I just nodded.

"For the trip back could we trade cars?" he asked, looking down at the table. I started laughing my ass off. There I was thinking that he wanted to take me somewhere more private and all he wanted was to get into my car's driver seat, not mine.

By the end of the night, we had exchanged phone numbers and we were friends of a sort. In the early days, I ended up calling him a lot more than he called me but we were off to a good start."

* * * * * * 

Bill

The answer came to me suddenly. Kirk, he could do it. Kirk was, as I have mentioned, an out and out pussy hound. He liked nothing better than to go after some woman that there was no way he could ever get. He got the shit slapped out of him a lot of times, but he also got a lot of pussy.

I called him, invited him to lunch again and hit him with my idea.

"Are you out of your fucking mind?" he asked me. "Why would I want to do that?"

"It would be like you were doing me a favor," I told him.

"You're not going weird on me are you Bill?" he asked. He tilted his head and looked at me. "You're not turning into one of those weird ass guys from the internet that gets off on having someone screw their wife are you. Some of those guys...hell all of those guys are seriously mentally challenged. You know the ones who claim that seeing their woman with another guy just proves how much they love them and all of that?"

"Uh no Kirk," I said. "Those guys are simply genetic dead ends. They have no viable traits to provide the species and they inherently know it, so they help the gene pool out by allowing a better specimen to attempt to impregnate their mate. In short, they're losers and they'd rather not pollute society, so they don't reproduce but accidents happen, unfortunately. It'll probably take a few generations to weed them all out, but they're doomed."

"So, what's the point then?" he asked.

"Kirk, I'm tired of being married to her," I said. "And there's someone else I want, but I couldn't cheat on Irene to save my ass. But maybe if she cheated first, in that case I'd only be getting even. And if she cheats on me with you, I don't have to worry about losing her, because shit, you don't stay with anyone long enough for the cum stains to dry up anyway. I don't think you've ever fucked any woman more than once or twice in your entire life."

Suddenly, Kirk ducked down in his chair. He sank so low that he was almost under the table. I looked around and noticed that Rebecca and Bonnie had just come into the restaurant.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" I asked him.

"Uhm, Bill, I did fuck Bonnie three or four times," he whispered. "Now the bitch thinks she owns me. She keeps calling me and trying to get me to meet her fucking family."

I just laughed. As I looked across the room to see if Bonnie was looking our way, I did notice that Rebecca's eyes were turned towards me and she smiled.

"So who is this woman that has you so turned on?" he asked, still ducking under the table.

"I'd rather not say," I said. "Hey, they got seated in the other room, you can get up."

"Please tell me it's not that brown haired whore," he smirked. "Please tell me that you're not risking your marriage for her."

"She's not like you think she is, Kirk," I said.

"And you know this how?" he asked. The look he gave me was the same one that mothers give their kids when their kids have said something so stupid that it defies classification."

"I've been doing my research," I said.

"Alright, I'll do it," he said. "But only so I can save your ass."

Over the next few weeks, things happened very slowly. Kirk tried to bump into Irene a couple of times in places like the supermarket and even at our home, pretending that he had something to drop off for me. For a master of seduction, his success rate was alarmingly low. After several of these encounters all he'd succeeded in doing was to get Irene to tell me that there was something wrong with him and she didn't want him hanging around our house.

"God damn it Kirk," I said. "I thought you were the man. I can't believe you struck out."

"I didn't exactly strike out dude," he said. "This one is just harder to crack than most women are."

"Well get cracking," I snapped. The thought of his failure preventing me from having the life I dreamed of with Rebecca was really frustrating me.

Meanwhile, I was working on other things. I needed to find out as much as I could about Rebecca so our life together would be better.

I also knew that there was simply no way that I could settle for just seeing her on the side. Despite what Kirk thought, that I only wanted to fuck her and then go back to Irene, I had other plans. In my mind Rebecca and I were star crossed lovers along the lines of Romeo and Juliet. I wanted us to be together forever. That meant that I needed to be able to gain her freedom from that asshole husband of hers who made her unhappy.

To that end I hired a very discreet PI to follow hubby around and get me some dirt on him that I could probably use to help her out in a divorce. I met him in his office the day after my talk with Kirk.

The PI looked exactly like you'd expect him to. He had bags under his eyes and hadn't shaved in a few days. He had a slight paunch and was wearing rumpled clothes. The funny thing about it was that the guy was only about twenty years old. The bags under his eyes came from staying up all night playing his X-box. The paunch came because like a lot of kids these days he didn't get any kind of exercise and he was just too damned lazy to shave.

"I put a couple of my best guys on him," he said. "By rotating them, there's less chance that he'd notice or remember them."

I nodded my head. "That's why you charge me so much for the surveillance, right?" I asked. He gave me a yellow toothed, shit eating grin. The more I looked at this guy, the more I was sure that if Rebecca and I ever had kids, I wouldn't buy them a gaming system. Or at least I'd severely limit the time they spent on it.

His teeth were so yellow that they looked like he ate butter sandwiches for a living.

"I don't know why you wanted us to tail this guy," he said. "He's boring. He doesn't do anything. He works as a mechanic in an auto-repair shop. He has a certificate from a very good program. He does great work. His boss and all of his customers love him. I have hours of video on him. Actually, we did find him doing one thing that could have gotten him into trouble."

I was salivating when I heard that. I put on my wolf like grin because I just knew that he was going to tell me something that could use and this would have all been worth it.

"Let me guess," I snapped. "He drinks on the job?"

"Nope," said the PI.

"He does drugs?" I said.

"Nope," said the guy.

"He's stealing from his boss?" I asked.

"Well, kind of," he said. "There was a woman who came in to get her car fixed and didn't have all of the money she needed. He just took what she had and paid for the rest of it out of his own pocket. So in a way he undercharged her but he didn't really actually steal. When he told his boss about it, his boss actually gave him part of the money back. But that's the closest he came to doing something bad."

"What about at home?" I asked. "How does he treat his wife?"

"He worships the ground that bitch walks on," hissed the PI. "She's the one you ought to be paying us to follow."

"Okay, charge me for another couple of weeks and follow her," I said. I figured that maybe they could at least get me some info on her likes and dislikes to bring us closer together.

* * * * * *

Sarah

My first year with Bill was really interesting. It was like being back in the third grade. In the third grade, little girls kind of knew that some boys were nice, but all of the boys thought that girls were icky. I often called Bill to go to different car shows and Mustang events. He was usually glad that I called and we had a great time together. But he was very quick to point out to people that we were only friends. I often got really pissed when other women would try to make a run at him after learning that we were only friends. But he often used me as a shield when the women were overly aggressive. He'd come over near me and sit down and take my hand as if we were more than friends to get them off his tail. I lived for those moments.

Another thing he did that pissed me off was if a guy was following me around, he never got jealous in the least. I wasn't even sure that anything was going to ever happen with us until the end of the summer. I'd really dreaded the end of the summer because I had this idea that I'd lose Bill then. In Michigan, very few of the serious car people drive their cars during the winter. The snow, the ice, the dew, the moisture are all terrible on cars.

I guess I'd been planning on driving Ellie until it snowed, but Bill just looked at me like I was crazy. He reminded me that Ellie's frame and undercarriage weren't powder coated, so temperature changes and dew could give me a coating of rust under there. To be truthful, I loved Ellie but I really hadn't thought it through that far.

Bill had been to my apartment several times and I'd been to his house as well by then. I often dropped by Bill's house to wash Ellie because Bill had everything in terms of car care products. I also just wanted to see him. So, after our conversation about what to do with Ellie for the winter, I decided to drop by and see him. I could always tell him that it was about the car. When I got to his house, he was cleaning out the other side of his garage.

Bill had a three car garage and he had two Mustangs. He had a jeep that he drove in the winter and his Mustangs. He used the third part of his garage for keeping tools and his lawnmower and storing things. I couldn't figure out why he was going through all of the trouble of cleaning out the third part. He was moving all of the stuff from the third area into a shed he'd just put up. In fact the shed wasn't complete yet. He still had to put the roof and the doors on it.

When I showed up, he stopped cleaning the garage out.

"I'm glad you're here," he told me. "I could really use some help." I was really happy to hear that from him.

"They said that putting this stupid thing up was a two man job and they weren't kidding. I've been able to do most of it by myself. I took a couple of days off work." He smiled at me. "You can do that when you're the boss."

"What do you need me to do?" I asked.

"I need you to go into the house and change into some of my sweats and help me put the rest of this thing up," he said.

"Hm that sounds kind of fishy to me," I said. In my head I was seeing all kinds of scenarios where he came into the room while I was changing and I dropped whatever I was putting on in mock shock and he got to see me naked. "What do I get out of this?" I asked.

"How about I take you out to dinner at the restaurant of your choice when we're done? Purely as friends, of course," he said. He would have to throw that in to dash my hopes. But still it was progress and it opened up interesting avenues for the winter.

"Done," I said. I went into his house and into his bedroom. His house was very neat for a guy who lived alone. That is until I got past the living room and the kitchen. He obviously kept those areas very neat for when people dropped by unexpectedly. His den and his bedroom were nowhere near as neat which only made me like him more.

Bill had again been diplomatic when he suggested the sweats. I had to roll the pant legs up several times to make them fit. But if the material hadn't been stretchy there is no way I'd have gotten my ass in his pants. Those pants fit Bill loosely. They fit me loosely too until I got past the knees from there on up they looked like they were painted on. Bill's sweat shirt fit me like a small dress. Even though it was fresh from the washing machine, it still had small traces of his scent on it. It was one of those Mustang sweat shirts from the Ford catalog. I had no intention of giving that shirt back. I still sleep in it now. He thinks it's because of the Mustang on it, but it's really because it's his.

Bill and I spent the rest of that late summer day baking in the weakening sun, putting the finishing touches on the shed and then we moved the rest of his stuff into it. I got two big shocks that day. The first one was when I came out in my outfit. 

Bill took one look at me and his eyes got bigger. It wasn't one of those, "Shit I didn't know she was that big," looks either. He tried really hard not to react but the swelling in the front of his pants gave him away. I knew then that Bill, despite his fucked up thought patterns really did find me attractive. The second shock came later.

After we'd showered, separately of course, and dressed, we were eating at Texas Roadhouse, which turned out to be both of our favorite steak place and Bill's favorite restaurant period, we talked.

"I'm going to order the most expensive thing on the menu," I said. "You worked me like a slave. Since all I'm getting out of it is this frigging dinner, it's going to be a good one."

"You deserve it," he said.

"Seriously Bill," I said. "We're friends. I'd have helped you for nothing. I just don't understand though why we cleaned up and swept out your garage if we weren't going to put the stuff back in it. Now one side of your garage is just a big empty space." He looked at me really strangely then.

"What?" I said.

"Do you trust me?" he asked. I was thinking, of course, I do you moron. I trust you more than anyone in the world except for maybe my brother. Why would I be putting up with your bullshit if I didn't? But I didn't say that of course. I made a big pretense of thinking about it.

"I know what I'm going to ask is weird since we don't know each other that well," he said. I couldn't help it, I started smiling. I was sure where this was going. He wanted to take me away somewhere for the weekend and I was sure that we were going to end up in bed.

I made another big pretense about it. I didn't want him to think I was a whore, but I really liked him. Plus there was the fact that we weren't teenagers. We were both over thirty and had both been married before. There was simply no need for all of the games and bullshit. If we wanted each other I didn't see a problem. If he wanted a no strings relationship, I was sure that it would eventually become more. Then he shocked the shit out of me.

"Think about this before you say no," he said. I nodded.

"Your garage sucks," he said. "It's not heated, so you can't control the temperature. It's dusty, it's not insulated, there are cracks in the walls and I'm sure the roof leaks. I don't want her there all winter."

"You don't want who, where?" I asked. I was still confused and wondering when he'd get to the part about us.

"Your Eleanor would be better off in my garage for the winter," he said. "My garage is heated and has its own thermostat. It's totally sealed and since it's an attached garage, we wouldn't have to ever open the outside door for the entire winter. It's relatively dust free and we could even wash her during the winter sometimes. Don't get mad, but I noticed that you don't have a cover for her so I kind of got one of those too."

My head was spinning and I was kind of pissed. I understood now why all of those guys get really pissed at women who tease them and lead them on and then just give them a quick goodnight kiss at the door. We'd been together all day. I'd heard of guys getting what they called "Blue balls" from that. My nipples were so hard that they hurt. I think I had "blue tits." He'd been sneaking looks at my ass and my tits the whole time. I knew he wanted me or at least his body did. I don't know how I kept control of myself.

I guess the only thing I could do was to laugh. I was only able to do that because I guess it took me that entire summer to realize it but I really didn't like Bill. I knew then that despite his fucked up attitude, I loved him. And maybe this was just his way of telling me that he loved me too. So, pretending that I was thinking about his offer, which I already knew I was going to accept, I thought about whether or not I should continue to pursue Bill.




The Grass is Always Greener



He'd treated me better over the summer than my husband had the entire time we were together. I also wanted him badly. Even if we stayed just friends, he was definitely worth pursuing. Even my brother often remarked that he'd never seen me as happy as I'd been this entire summer.

There was also the fact that if Bill hadn't come up with the idea of keeping Eleanor, I'd have had to come up with something on my own. I needed a reason for us to continue seeing each other throughout the fall and winter. What better reason than I just wanted to check on my car?

"It does sound like a good idea," I said hesitantly. "But..." I began to say. Bill shook his head and placed a key on the table and slid it over to me.

"Here's the key to my house," he said. "This way you can check on her any time of the day or night, whenever you want."

I made a valiant attempt to keep my face neutral as I slowly nodded. I intended to go through his house with a fine tooth comb. Call me nosey or whatever, but all women do it. We just need to know everything possible about our men and whether he wanted to admit it or not, Bill was mine. Just friends my ass; you simply don't give someone who is just a friend their own key to your place.

Following that evening, I called Bill often and just dropped by mostly on the pretense of seeing my car. Bill always told me that there was no need to call first.

"What if you're with a date or something?" I said.

"Sarah, you know I don't date," he said. "I have no interest in dating."

"Well what if you have friends over?" I asked. He shrugged his shoulder and looked at the floor.

"You're my only friend," he said. His admission was so sad and from the tone of his voice, I could tell he was telling me the absolute truth. It just broke my heart.

"I mean you know like your guy friends," I said. "You know guys that you have over to watch the game, or go to a bar or the movies with."

"I don't drink so I don't go to bars," he said. "And if I go to the movies, I just go alone. There are no guy friends either, Sarah. Guys betray you just as easily as women do and it hurts just as bad."

That told me all I needed to know. Bill had mentioned that he was divorced and I figured that was why he was so down on women. Now I know that there was more to it than just a run of the mill divorce and that someone he'd considered a friend was involved. Maybe one of his friends had given testimony against Bill during divorce or had been supposed to help him hide some of his assets and kept or sold them. Maybe there was a car involved because Bill was really serious about his cars.

"Bill, I'll never betray you," I said in a small voice. "And you never have to do anything alone."

That night set the tone for the way that things would become for us. That night we crossed the first of a series of lines. Over the next few weeks things began to happen and they sped up quickly.

It was only about ten days from then that I lost my job. I worked as the secretary to one of the accountants in a mid-sized accounting firm. There was no drama. My boss had a heart attack. His doctor suggested that he needed to take some time off from work or move into a less pressure filled position. He decided to retire. He'd passed retirement age several years previous but simply kept working because he loved his job. The firm decided not to replace him. They'd simply spread his work out among the other ten guys they had in his position. That left me out in the cold.

I was really upset and I turned to the two men who were closer to me than anyone else. My brother sympathized with me and told me that if the bills got too tight I could always move in with him. I thought about it. I knew that since his wife had passed he was alone in his house.

When I told Bill about it he just smiled and said, "Texas Roadhouse."

I thought that he was trying to take me out to cheer me up and I loved him for it but he had something else in mind. He kept looking at his watch, while we ate. At about eight-thirty he made a call.

"Elise, how are your classes going?" he asked. "That's good."

I could hear someone talking on the other end of the phone and Bill continued to eat as he listened. He even looked at his watch as he listened to her as if he had a certain period of time allowed for listening to her side of the conversation.

"Well Elise," he said. "I've been thinking about you a lot lately." That immediately pissed me off. I didn't want him thinking about some other woman.

"I've decided to change my policy, at least for you," he said. "I'm going to promote you to sales even without your degree. Of course, I can't pay you what the other sales guys get for their base salary until you graduate in June, but you'll be getting the same thing they get for commissions and it will probably be more than what you're getting now." I could hear excited screams coming from the phone. This Elise sounded like she was very young and she was in college too. I was getting more upset as time went on.

The he looked at me with a little smile. "My secretary just got promoted into sales," he smirked. "Do you know anywhere that I could find a good personal assistant?" I just stared at him with my mouth open.

That was how I started working for Bill. The next shock came in the middle of winter it was about a week before Christmas. Bill came out into my part of the office. He handed me a box and smiled. "Merry Christmas, Sarah," he told me.

"Thanks Bill," I said. "But why are you giving it to me so early, Christmas is a week away. I haven't even had time to get your gift yet."

"You can give it to me when I get back," he said.

"Bill, where are you going?" I asked.

"Sarah, the whole Christmas thing just depresses me. I'm cold, I'm alone and it's just not any fun. So rather than drag everyone else down with me, I'm going on a cruise," he said.

"Who are you going with?" I asked immediately.

"No one," he said quietly. For the rest of the day he made plans and lists of everything he'd need. As his personal assistant I got to make some of his arrangements. Bill didn't have a cabin mate. He'd had to book a normal sized cabin that two people could sleep in comfortably. I decided to lay all of my cards on the table.

"Bill, how are we getting to the airport?" I asked.

"Well I'm going to drive the jeep and park it in long term parking," he said.

"Should I drive there too or are you going to pick me up?" I asked.

"What are you talking about?" he smiled. "I'm a big boy. I don't need anyone to drive me to the airport."

"Bill, I'm cold too. I've never been on a cruise and I don't want to spend Christmas alone either. You and I always have a good time when we're together. There's no pressure, it just means that we don't have to be alone. I'll pay you back the money for the cruise. You can keep my Christmas bonus as a start."

"But Sarah, there aren't any cabins available," he said.

"I'll share yours," I said. "It won't be anything big, there's plenty of room."

He pulled a quarter out of his pocket and threw it up. "Heads or tails," he said.

"Heads," I yelled. George Washington looked up at us from the floor. He shrugged.

"You get the bed the first night," he said.

Two days later we were aboard the ship. Everything was wonderful. With the package that Bill had paid for, everything was included. I was worried because on some ships, they nickel and dime you over everything after you're aboard. You have to pay for drinks and everything costs an arm and a leg. But Bill had made sure that everything was included. There were some things that were supposed to be charged for but we just showed our room cards and they were billed to the room.

The second day out we decided to go up on deck and get some sun. My brother had decided to spend the holidays with some of our relatives out of state and when I called him and told him I was working on my tan he was jealous.

Jealousy was the theme that day apparently. Before we left the cabin, I got a glimpse of Bill in his long shorts and sandals. I knew that he was in shape but I had no idea that he was that well-muscled. I mean I knew he ran, I'd watched him run in a couple of races over the summer and fall but I had no idea that he was built like that. I found myself sucking in my stomach all the time when I was around him.

Every time one of the women on the cruise started the routine I got angry. The routine went like this. Some female porter or server would say, "Your husband is really cute/attractive/hot." And I'd say, "He's not my husband," or, "We're not married." Bill would get a lot of attention and I'd get pissed. I even think they were telling other women, because Bill started to get hit on a lot.

Of course, once we got on deck, I got a lot of guys looking at me too. A couple of the bolder ones even came over to talk to us. They spoke to Bill too, not to be rude. But when they found out that we weren't married, they gave me a lot of attention and Bill didn't bat an eyelash.

I remember telling him how much they got on my nerves. "You're an attractive woman," he said. "You should expect it."

The problem was that Bill just couldn't see things the right way. Okay, for a lot of guys maybe I was attractive. Not every guy of course, but for the ones who like a big butt and a chest, I'm their girl. There were two problems with this. The first was that most of these guys didn't want a relationship with me. They didn't want to get to know me. It was that whole cruise ship experience coloring the way they saw things. On the ship, everything you need or want is provided for you. All you have to do is ask for it and you can have it.

So they saw big tits and a nice butt and they thought that those were provided for them too. In short, all they wanted was to fuck me. A week from now they wouldn't even remember my name or my face. The second thing was that I was already somebody else's girl whether he wanted to claim me or not.

The nights were even worse. We took strolls along the deck that were so romantic I wanted to scream. The funniest thing was that neither one of us could dance. So when we got up to dance one night to one of the slow songs in one of the clubs, it just fucked my mind up. I was watching all of the couples dancing and maybe Bill caught a glimpse of the longing in my eyes.

"Why don't you dance with one of those guys," he said.

"Why don't you dance with me," I snapped. "Then I wouldn't have to worry about some lounge lizard grabbing my fat ass or trying to rub himself on my chest."

"If your ass is so fat why would they want to grab it?" he asked. "And it you're worried about your chest just step back from them."

"You're supposed to be my friend," I said. "Why can't you protect me from that kind of thing?"

"I can't dance a step," he said. "I just wanted you to have a good time."

"I am having a good time," I said. "And I can't dance either."

"You know not everyone fits into the same box," he said.

"Are we talking about caskets?" I asked.

"No, we're talking about you," he said. "I'm getting tired of the fat girl comments. You're really pretty. Not every guy likes the skinny girl type and you're not fat. You should see guys watch you in your swim suit even with all of the skinny girls there."

I didn't say anything. I tried to keep my face frowned up, even though I was so happy inside that I was about to burst.

"Okay, let's dance," he said. "We'll just fake it and do what everyone else is doing. We'll just make little circles and not crash into anyone. You don't have to worry about me grabbing your butt or your chest."

"Please grab my butt," I thought as I nodded.

I know that he did it for me. We've talked about it since then, a lot. But it was the worst idea ever. It almost ruined the good time we were having. Hell, it almost ended us. We walked out onto the dance floor and Bill put his arms around me. I got dizzy before we even started to move. When we got closer and our bodies touched the reaction which had been building for months just erupted, we couldn't help it. I almost blacked out it was so strong.

Forget about dancing, I was ready to fuck him right there on the dance floor in front of everyone. And as much as he tried to hide it, Bill was as hard as a rock. He wanted me badly too. He kept trying to pull away from me, but I was out of it. Every time he'd step back, I pushed myself more into him. I wanted to feel that thing against me even if it was only for a dance. And shit, we had all of our clothes on, what could it hurt. I don't think anyone noticed anything. But Bill abruptly just took my hand and led me back to our table.

"Sorry," he said. "You probably should have tried to dance with someone who knows how."

"Yeah," I snapped. My anger was out of control because I wanted him so God damned badly and he just couldn't see it.

"Or at least I should have danced with someone who doesn't mind having the fat girl touching them." I walked away from him and headed back to our cabin.

* * * * * *

Bill

It took a lot less time than I expected. Barely three days after hearing that Rebecca's husband is a good guy, the PI called me back. He told me he had something for me. I went to his office and he had a DVD and several audio CD's for me. I locked myself in my office and watched the DVD.

I saw Rebecca leaving the building she worked at. She got into her car and drove to a bar. She didn't get out right away but when she did her skirt was a lot higher than when she first got into the car.

She sat at a booth with a couple of other women, one of whom was Bonnie. Rebecca got up and danced with several men. All of them had their hands all over her ass and were clearly grinding her. She didn't seem to mind. After dancing a couple of dances, Rebecca went out to the parking lot with one of the guys. He pulled his car away from the building and they got into the backseat.

When they were done, Rebecca repeated the performance a few more time before she went home. The other two women from her table stayed at the table and talked to each other. Both went home before Rebecca did.

There were several days of that same kind of thing. There were also worse things. There was an incident where Rebecca left her house while her husband was doing some work in their yard. He went over and kissed her as she left. She smiled but pulled away after giving him barely a peck. She drove to a shopping mall and before she went into the mall started talking to two big guys. After a while they left together and went to a motel. Rebecca went into the room with both men and didn't come out for a long time. During that period of time at least three other men went in. My heart clutched in my chest as I watched the DVD.

This was the woman I'd become obsessed with? Still some little part of me wanted to believe that this wasn't happening. I turned off the DVD in disgust.

The CD's were recordings of some of her phone calls. In one call to Bonnie, the two women almost ended their friendship over the phone. Bonnie was upset because some man wouldn't call her. Rebecca told her that it was her own fault for allowing herself to be treated like that.

"What do you want me to do Beck?" asked Bonnie. "Become a whore like..."

"Were you about to call me a whore?" asked Rebecca.

"No," said Bonnie. "Whores at least do it for money. The thing I don't understand is why you treat Johnny the way you do. He deserves better. If you don't love him, why not just tell him. You go out every night and fuck as many guys as you can stuff into your gash. Most of the time, you don't even give him a sniff. And Becky, he loves you so much."

"That's not your business Bonnie," snapped Rebecca. "Maybe I will let him go some day. He's a good security blanket, but he just doesn't make enough money to support me the way I need. I might be moving on soon though. I've got a line on someone who has his own business who might be just as obsessed with me as Johnny is."

"You have tons of guys who are obsessed with you and I can't even get Kirk to call me back," said Bonnie. "I'll talk to you later Beck. I'm going to call him again."

Hearing poor Bonnie talking about the way that my best friend was treating her made me feel worse. I blamed myself because Kirk had never been interested in her. He'd fucked her and pumped her for information to help me get to Rebecca. I was also disgusted because Rebecca was nothing like the way I'd built her up in my mind. Kirk had been right about her all the time.

I felt like a fool. Then things got worse. The CD continued. Rebecca called another woman. She told the other woman how upset Bonnie had gotten. She told her that Bonnie was stupid and naive. She told the woman that the only reason that she hadn't cursed Bonnie off for practically calling her a whore was because Rebecca was fucking Bonnie's man too. That was why Kirk wasn't calling Bonnie. He was too busy fucking Rebecca himself.

I got angry then. I wasn't angry at Kirk. He'd told me from the beginning what a whore he thought Rebecca was and that going after her would be a mistake. I was angry at myself. I was a fool. I had a woman at home who loved me enough that none of Kirk's bullshit could make a dent in her. She had frustrated him and totally frozen him out. I'd been ready to throw away years of history and a jewel of a woman for a whore. Nature always did make the deadliest plants the prettiest.

I'd looked for grass that was greener than my own and found it. The problem was that the grass was always greener over the septic tank. The grass was the prettiest shade of green in the places where the ground was full of shit.

Before I threw them away, I looked at the next scene on the DVD. The investigator had finally managed to get a camera on the inside of a motel room that Rebecca used. It was like a really badly shot porno movie. Rebecca, who really didn't look as good naked as she looked clothed was like a pincushion. She just sucked and fucked everything that was aimed at her, while moaning and begging for more. I felt my stomach churning even as I watched.

I called Kirk and told him to stop trying to get Irene to sleep with him. I told him I owed him one but I'd decided to take his advice about Rebecca.

"I'm glad you finally listened to me," he said. "She's just another whore. She's not worth you messing up your marriage over. Now what the two of you need to do is just settle down and have some little fat babies. Name the first one after me and we're even."

"Will do Buddy," I said as I hung up. I never mentioned to him that I knew about him and Rebecca. I figured the two of them deserved each other.

* * * * * *

Sarah

Everything had been going so well. It had all been too perfect. And now I'd just ruined it all by trying to push too fast. Part of the problem was that I'd been lying to Bill for so long. I loved him more every God damned day. I wouldn't ever betray him. Shit, after the way my ex had treated me there was simply no way I could do that to anyone else. And besides, my ex cheating on me, he'd done a number on my head. He'd been the one who convinced me that I just wasn't pretty enough. But Bill thought so and that was enough.

Bill was always telling me that. Both in words and the way he stole little glances at me all the time when he thought I wasn't looking. And certainly in the way his dick had turned into a rock when I pressed myself against him.

Then suddenly I knew what I had to do. I had gotten this far by lying, but I was on the verge of losing him. Maybe another lie could keep us together. I showered and instead of putting on my usual thick pajamas, I put on the tiniest panties I had and a bra that I knew wouldn't keep the girls in. Then I got into the bed, even though it was Bill's night to sleep in it.




The Grass is Always Greener



A short time later he came into the room. He avoided the area around the sofa. He probably thought that I was sleeping there as I should have been.

He stripped down to just his boxers and hesitated. In the darkness I could see him staring at the blankets piled on the sofa and shaking his head. He started to walk over there and then just came back and got into bed.

"Sarah what are you doing here?" he sputtered.

"Trying to sleep and getting more pissed at you," I snapped.

"Look, I know I was out of line but I couldn't help it," he said. "Did you know that it's my turn in the bed?"

"Bill, why are you such a moron?" I asked. "I thought you were my friend."

"I am your friend," he said. "That's why I was out there trying to dance with you even though I hate dancing. And you know what? I knew that what happened was going to happen."

"Then why bother?" I asked.

"Because you wanted to dance," he said. "And I wanted you to be happy because I'm your friend."

"Bill, do you know why that happened?" I asked him. "It happened because you're not a liar."

"Huh?" he said.

"It happened because you and I are grown-ups. We're adults Bill. We're healthy adults and in order for us to be happy both physically and mentally, we need to have sex."

His mouth shot open. "I don't int..." he began.

"Before you start talking, can I finish?" I asked him. He nodded his head and sat down on the edge of the bed.

"Bill, I'm never going to get married again," I said. "Once was enough. Never again will I go through that. But I have a problem. Like I told you, I'm a full grown woman and I have needs. Being married, you get used to a regular schedule of activity. It's not like when you're single and you go out and get shot down a lot. When you're single and you go out looking for sex, you call it getting lucky because a lot of the time it just doesn't happen. You get all dolled up and come home with empty pockets, wet panties and a bad attitude because the guy was a loser. Once you're married, you can get all the sex you can handle at least at first. And even after things slow down, you're going to get it regularly. That's why a lot of assholes figure divorced women are easy."

"I don't know about you Bill, it's December, we've known each other since July. So it's been about six months. Unless you've been seeing hookers, I don't think you've been with anyone for at least six months."

"Uhm it's been over a year, since before my divorce," he said.

"And it's been longer than that for me," I said. "Except for getting myself off, no one has touched me since my divorce either. I don't know how much longer I can go. That's why I know that you're really not my friend."

"What are you talking about?" he asked. "I encouraged you to go dance with one of those guys. Who knows what would have happened for you."

"See what I mean," I said. I pulled the blanket over my head as if the conversation was over.

"I don't understand Sarah," he said quietly.

"Bill, those guys don't care about me," I said. "Instead of seeing this as just a healthy physical release, they'd look at me like I was some whore. They'd just want to use me and throw me away and then talk about me badly." He nodded.

"What I need, is someone to take care of my needs who wouldn't judge me and who would try to get all emotional about it. Someone who knows that I'm not looking for a boyfriend or another husband, but at the same time cares enough about me not to hurt me. It would be just no strings attached sex, but without being evil or nasty about it."

"You know," I said, looking at him. "Friends with benefits."

"I don't know, Sarah," he said. "It just doesn't sound right. What if we mess up what we have? I don't think I'd like that."

From looking at his face, I could see even in the darkness that he was taking this talk seriously. I was important to him and that filled me with hope. At the same time, I felt really badly because I was still running a con game on him. I was hoping with all of my heart and soul, that if we started having sex, we'd move on to the next logical step.

"We can't mess up what we have," I lied. "Because we're friends so we can always go back to that. If you meet someone that you want to start a relationship with, I'll just back off. Will you do the same?"

"I'm not sure I could," he said. Once again, hearing his words only made me want him more. I knew that he'd never have to back off because I'd never want to be with anyone more than I wanted him.

"You're my only friend," he said. "You're the only person I trust." That almost made me decide to just forget it. He was telling me his innermost thoughts and feelings and I was just desperate to get in his pants.

"So Bill, if that's true then do you really want to see me go out there and fuck some loser because I'm so desperate to be held that I don't have a choice?" He slowly shook his head.

"I would really hate to see you hurt, Sarah," he said. I lifted the covers and he slowly climbed into bed with me.

My body started to almost vibrate with desire as I told him another lie. "Bill, I want you to think about this. I don't want you to do something that you really don't want to, but I think it would be good for both of us. It won't mean anything and nothing will change between us. We're still only going to be friends. It's just sex. It's only a physical release. No kissing, none of that stuff. If you want, we can think it over for a couple of days. If nothing has happened before then, we won't talk about it. I'll just find someone else. But for tonight, could you just hold me. We don't have to do anything, but I'd just like to be in someone's arms."

Bill reached out very slowly and wrapped his arms around me. The contact was exquisite. I tucked my head under his chin and my boobs flattened against his stomach. His flag pole was in full flight and it nestled against me. I felt him trying to subtly pull away and I grabbed him and pulled him back. He was so warm and I wanted him then more than anyone has ever wanted anything. I lifted one of my legs over his and the heat of my mound had to be driving him crazy.

The only thing separating us was two very thin layers of cloth. My nipples were as hard as diamonds and they were pressing into him. His hand started to rub my sides very slowly.

"Sarah," he gulped. It sounded like he was in pain. I knew then that I wasn't alone. The head of his penis was already sticking through the opening of his boxers. It was already nestled against me. I just pulled my panties aside and pushed. I was already so wet that he slipped right inside me. It was an awkward position and it wasn't nearly enough. I rolled over on top of him pushed myself down onto him. I was so ready that I almost came on entry. It was like falling down a long tunnel as I slowly slid down the length of his dick. More and more of it pushed its way up into me until I was sitting with my ass on his balls. It felt so good I wanted to scream.

He grabbed my hips and started to gently push me back up and then pull me back down onto him with increasing frequency and ferocity. My pussy was making tiny squishing sounds. He let go of my hips and grabbed my dangling breasts and pulled their tips one after another into his hungry mouth.

"Oh yeah Bill, suck my titties," I screamed. I was ramming myself onto him faster and faster.

"Do you like this?" I asked.

"Mmm Hm," he answered. Then he rolled me over and pinned me against the bed. I spread my legs further apart than I thought I could as he started ramming me harder and harder. I couldn't think any more. All I could do was try to rise to meet him. My insides began squeezing him involuntarily. My pussy was trying to milk every drop of his semen when he came. Bill let go of my breasts and started licking me behind my ear and I just lost control and started humping him. We lost our rhythm and slammed uselessly against each other for a few thrusts.

There were so many things I wanted to say to him. I wanted to tell him that I loved him so much I couldn't stand it but I knew that if I did, we'd be over and he'd never speak to me again. So I held my feelings inside. Then I felt him start to slam me even harder. I was very close to coming. Holding it back was like trying to prevent a tidal wave with a Dixie cup but I fought. I didn't want to let go until I felt him spurting inside of me. The first drops were as hot as molten lava and then I just spun out of control and screamed so loudly I thought they could hear me back at home.

We just lay there, spent, with him on top of me as our bodies spasmed trying to regain control. Then he did the dumbest thing he could have done. He plastered his mouth to mine. I opened my mouth and started sucking his tongue and then he was hard again and we started fucking all over again.

"I'm sorry about the kiss," he said.

"Bill just fuck me," I replied. "Fuck me, fuck me, fuck me."

* * * * * *

Bill

After telling Kirk to stay away from Irene, things just flip flopped. I stayed away from the cafe where Rebecca ate lunch. I tried as hard as I could to purge her from my mind. Much in the same way that sinners and drunks completely reverse themselves when they get religion or start a twelve step program; I started working on my marriage. When I went home each night, I helped Irene with the cooking or the dishes and I spent time talking to her or watching TV with her each night. She wasn't the young pretty girl that I'd married but I decided that at least part of that was my fault.

I started making suggestions that maybe she should start to run with me or maybe we could join a gym together. It was a huge mistake.

I looked at it in two ways. The first was that in my renewed love and appreciation for my wife, I wanted her to be the best that she could be. I wanted her to be healthier so she could live longer and we could enjoy our lives together both longer and better. It was also a way for us to spend more time together, because this way when I went out to run or do a workout, she could come with me and walk or run or do her own workout.

The second reason was purely selfish, but I wanted her to look a little better too. Irene had been really attractive when we first met but we'd been so young then. For over eight years she'd simply let herself go. I guess she thought that since we already had each other there was no need for her to go around putting on makeup or working out. But I really wanted the world to see how pretty she could be and why I'd been attracted to her in the first place.

Of course, Irene took it completely the wrong way. I didn't find out until later that she thought that it meant that I thought that she was fat and ugly so I was urging her to drop some weight because I found her unattractive. She started to distance herself from me at exactly the time that I was trying to pull us closer together.

Life is really funny that way. For weeks I'd tried to pull away or get away from Irene. Now I was trying to get closer to her and she was pulling away. At the same time, I'd been doing everything I could to find out as much as possible about Rebecca and how she was living her life. Now I was disgusted by Rebecca, so naturally you know what happened. I should point out, of course, that at this point Rebecca and I had never actually ever spoken to each other. Our entire relationship or fantasy relationship had been played out in my head. I'd seen her, fallen in love with her, then I'd built a whole relationship and future around the person I thought she was. When the reality of what she really was didn't live up to my fantasy, I'd broken up with her in my head and fallen back in love with my wife.

No one knew about it except for me and maybe Kirk, so no one got hurt, right? We can all have as many fantasies as we want.

The problem was that Rebecca had noticed me. Perhaps it was because of things Kirk might have mentioned, or maybe she'd just seen me around the café, but things changed. My fantasy began to intrude on my real life and at the worst possible moment.

Kirk and I had met at the café to discuss the possibility of him working for me. He'd lost his job recently and was looking for a new position. I was hesitant at first because the idea of having friends work for you doesn't always pan out. Sometimes friends expect the friendship to override the business aspects of the situation. They start violating rules or slacking off because they're sure their old buddy won't fire them.

Kirk had asked for the meeting at the café and to be truthful I'd forgotten about Rebecca. I agreed to the meeting because I wanted to lay down the ground rules before Kirk formally applied for the job. I had to let him know that I wouldn't give him any slack during working hours. Doing that wouldn't be fair to my other employees. I actually did think that hiring Kirk might work out because as the situation with Rebecca had proven, Kirk did have a way of getting things done. Those skills might actually benefit my company. Little did I know that Kirk had pretty much assumed he had the job and this meeting served an entirely different purpose.

Kirk and I had been talking about the parameters of what he'd do for my company and salary and bonuses and benefits. We talked about all of the things you'd expect to cover at an interview. The difference is we did it in a relaxed setting so we also had time for jokes and reminiscing about old times.

We were talking about something that had happened years ago at my bachelor party when Rebecca walked over to our table and said hello to Kirk. He started talking to her and she sat down. Luckily for me, my watch chimed and I pretended that it had been set to remind me of a meeting.

"Sorry Kirk," I said. "I have a meeting to hit. It was nice meeting you, ma'am." I got the hell out of dodge quickly and efficiently. That was the closest I'd actually come to her and my polite exit was the first time I'd ever spoken to her. The only thing I noticed that was different was that she smelled really good. But I found myself wondering what she smelled like after screwing five or six guys in a motel room.

I also realized how lucky I was. All of my plans and machinations could have led to me being in the same position that her husband was in. A few months of her giving me all...probably most of her attention to set the hook; then years of indifference while she screwed half of the guys in the phone book. Finally there'd be a divorce with her getting more of my assets than she deserved. I'd end up paying for her to fuck as many guys as she wanted until she found another sucker. God I was lucky. I'd dodged a real high caliber bullet. I kept thinking, "Be careful what you wish for. You might just get it."

Meanwhile, I had a very caring and faithful little woman at home, who, while not a raving beauty, was all mine and wouldn't cheat on me. She'd even resisted the master horn dog. Sure we had a few issues but most couples did.

A few days later I was on top of my game. Things had begun to thaw at home with Irene and we were in a good place. She'd given me a chance to explain the whole workout thing. She had actually kissed me like we used to when we were younger once I'd explained to her why I wanted her to start running with me.

At the same time, I'd just completed a negotiation with a company that would eventually become my biggest customer and raise the value of my business immensely. It had been a tough couple of days and both companies had considered walking away from the table at least once, but we'd finally hammered out a contract that would benefit both companies. I was on the verge of becoming rich. My timing was perfect too. If this had happened a little earlier it would have cost me a lot more money.

Anyway, I decided to grab a quick bite for lunch. I went to the café out of habit. Almost as soon as I sat down, I smelled flowers and Rebecca slid smoothly into the seat across from me. She smiled at me broadly. A few weeks before, I'd have been thrilled to have her sitting with me, but now I had a completely different reaction.

It's really funny the way our minds affect our senses. We are far more tolerant of a person's physical flaws when we like them. When I first looked at Rebecca, I thought she was the most beautiful woman in the world. She really isn't, she's actually kind of ordinary, but she just has, like I mentioned before, an air of sensuality that just makes you think of sex.

When I used to look at her, it was like the sunshine followed her around. I swear to God I thought she sparkled like a diamond. But now sitting directly across from her, separated only by the table, it was like I could see cooties crawling on her. Up close, you could make out the lines in the corners of her eyes and her skin wasn't as smooth and blemish free as I'd imagined. Up close I could see the forty year old woman.

"Can I help you with something?" I asked.

"Bill, are you playing hard to get?" she asked. "Is that your game? Because if it is, it's working really well."

"What are you talking about," I asked.

"Bill, I know you like me," she smiled. "And I know how much. Kirk told me all about it. I did have to dig some of it out of him, but I think it's kind of cute."

"I think Kirk got the wrong idea," I said. "I did find you attractive, but you know how that goes. We often see people that we think are nice looking, but the fact is that I'm married."

"Me too," she smiled. "See we already have something in common. But it doesn't have to stop us from having any fun. And who knows, maybe we'd be better off being married to each other than to the losers we picked. Kirk says your wife is a frumpy little housewife. You deserve better than that. I think you deserve me. And my husband is such a fucking loser, let me tell you. Wouldn't it be good if I could somehow just blink and the two of them ended up together? It would be just like on I dream of Jeannie. I could just blink my troubles away."

"I've got an even better one," I said smiling. "What if you just blink yourself the fuck away from me? Irene may be frumpy, but at least she's not a whore. And the person that deserves better isn't you; it's your husband." I got up and walked away leaving her sitting there with her mouth flapping like a fish out of water. As I left the café I saw Bonnie clapping her hands and giving me the thumbs up sign.

I called Kirk back at the office. Marsha Brady, our office secretary, told me that Kirk had left for lunch soon after I did. I called his cell phone because my old buddy and I needed to have a talk. I don't know why he'd told Rebecca about me, but he shouldn't have. He shouldn't have shot his mouth off about Irene either. Knowing Kirk, I was sure that he was belittling Irene because she hadn't fallen for his bullshit. I realized that Irene had been right all along. Maybe Kirk wasn't the kind of person I should be hanging out with.

That thought made me do something I hadn't done in years. Instead of going back to work, I stopped off at a flower shop and bought two dozen roses. I decided to surprise Irene at home and maybe take her out to a nice dinner.

I pulled into my driveway next to Irene's Taurus. Seeing it made me realize that I needed to get her a better car. Maybe she'd like one of those Lincoln MKZs.

I used my key and walked into the house. I looked in the kitchen and didn't see her. I heard her moving around upstairs. I heard a thumping sound. I slowly and quietly walked up the stairs. I wondered what she was doing. Maybe she'd started her own workout program without letting me know it. The thumping was kind of rhythmic.

The door to my bedroom was half open. I could see them before I got close. Somehow my brain refused to process what was going on.

"Kirk, stop it. I told you I don't like that," said Irene. "I don't even know why I let you come back. I told you last time was supposed to be the end of this."