1 comments/ 8265 views/ 9 favorites The Wednesday Couple By: markelly My deepest thanks to SouthPacific for his editing skills, this story reads allot better with his help. I had some real trouble deciding on a category for this one. The first page or so will lead you to believe it should sit firmly in one category, but when you read it to the end you will think it could well sit in another. Just a shame that it can't go into multiple categories! I do hope you enjoy your read. ***** I thought I had it all - before I walked into the Paradise Hotel. A loving partner of thirteen years, if you include the three years we fucked like bunnies in college before we got married. The two children we had just seemed like the icing on the cake to me. I'm an electrician by trade. It's not a job that's going to make me rich but, as my Dad always said, everyone needs an electrician sometime in their life. I was covering for Marty today; his wife called the office and told our receptionist Carol that her waters had broken. The scream we heard from the reception area made us all think we were being held up. So Marty made tracks to the hospital, and I headed off to an emergency call from the Paradise Hotel, out on the very edge of town. I had only ever driven past it before, but just pulling up alongside the main entrance to the place made me realize that places like these had a tradesmen's entrance and I sure wouldn't be welcome up this drive. Security met me round back and I was escorted into the main security room. The place was wall to wall TV screens showing every aspect of the hotel and grounds. I paused as my eyes tried hard to take in all the pictures on the screens. "Wow! Now that's hard on the eyes." The security guy laughed and said that you get used to it. He told me what was wrong and I got to it; we chatted whilst I worked, and I genuinely liked him. He didn't fit the bill of the usual type of security I had to deal with in some of the buildings we had contracts with; this one did more than point and grunt, so it made the time go a little faster. Although I had to feed a new line through some tight spots he helped when he could, but I did find it odd that he kept looking at the time. "Don't worry, bud," I said. "It's only going to take another couple of minutes - the hard stuff's done." He just grinned and sat back in his chair. Once I plugged everything back together the last of the three screens came to life, and that's when my own blissful life turned to shit. As I looked at one of the screens, my wife of ten years came strolling down one of the corridors, hand in hand with someone I had never seen before. "Holy shit!" Security looked at me, and then the screen I was looking at, and smiled. "She sure is hot, isn't she? You can almost set a watch by them." At least I had the calmness of thought not to bounce out of there and go looking for them. I watched as she disappeared off one screen and re-appeared on another, still hand in hand with the guy and heading for the elevator. It was plain to see by their body language that they had known each other for sometime. My fear was: how long? "I thought a place like this didn't allow hookers; sorry, escorts?" The guy was still smiling as he watched the happy couple walk into the elevator. He didn't seem fazed by what I had just said. "Oh she's not a hooker; that's his wife. I've been with this hotel for the last seven years, and the guy I took over from said they had been coming here for three years before that. We have a nickname for them - they're the Wednesday couple." Desperate to stall for time so I could compose myself more, I started to put my stuff away, taking calming breaths and not feeling very calm at the end of them. I said. "Ok I'll bite. You call them that because they come here every Wednesday, I take it?" He laughed and shook his head, walked over to the coffee pot, poured us each a coffee, handed me mine, and sat back down again. The happy couple emerged from the elevator on one of the other screens, turned left down the corridor, passed two doors and used a swipe card on the third. She hurried in and the guy she was with laughed as he closed the door. "Nothing like that. The second Wednesday of every month and always the last Wednesday of the month." My math wasn't anywhere near that quick, so I sipped my coffee while the wheels in my head turned. It was then I choked into my cup, causing coffee to dribble down my chin. The bitch had stepped out on me over two hundred and forty times! Security looked at me, concerned. "You could have warned me it was that hot." He laughed and placed his coffee down on the table, then started testing the equipment before he would sign for the work done. I decided I needed to know just a little more; it was just how to get that information out of him without making it look like I wanted it, so I giggled and shook my head. He stopped reading my paperwork and looked over at me. "You know, if I had thought about it a little longer I would have said you called them the Wednesday couple because they go into their room and don't come out again until the next Wednesday." We both laughed as he shook his head and signed my paperwork, and I then handed him his copy. "No; nothing like that. I got talking to his wife once - they work on opposite sides of town, and to keep their marriage fresh they have a nooner here twice a month. Romantic, don't you think? They will be here for a few hours at best, although they have stayed for a week before, so we couldn't get away with calling them that." We walked back to the tradesmen's entrance and shook on it as I thanked him. I couldn't thank him for ending my marriage, but I thanked him anyway. Making it back to my truck was a little difficult as it was a bit tough, even on a nice sunny day, to see the damn thing through my tears. There seemed little point in leaving straight away, so I pulled further over to the edge of the car park and cried. As question after question tumbled from my thoughts, the emotions that followed stuck to them like glue, many wanting answers. But the one question that I needed answering was the one that was going to hurt the most. I wasn't interested in why, or who he was, or anything like that. This had been going on for ten years! When Sarah was born my wife had turned to me and said "Enough! We have one of each, and both are healthy," so these would be the last little feet to pitter-patter around the house. My own wife had betrayed me, and still to this day was betraying me, but had she committed the ultimate betrayal? Whose were the children? Even as I drove back to the office it must have been on auto-pilot. Carol told me with a smile that Marty made it to the hospital in time to see his daughter enter this world. All I could do was nod my head, and that alone saddened me. Usually right about now would have been the perfect excuse to pull out pictures of my own two children, but the image of my wife walking down that corridor hand in hand with that guy was burned into my memory. The branding iron used to do it also seared away any emotion connecting me to the two little people that lived with us as well. With that one thought in my head I made it to the bathroom just in time to lose my lunch. This morning I was in a happy place. I had a loving, very sexual wife, and two children any man would be proud to call his. Now, as I flushed away the evidence of my rebellious stomach, my mind told me I had nothing. My heart held onto a faint glimmer of hope, but that's only because my heart hid it from the rest of my emotions, occasionally calling for calm while my body went on its own rampage of self doubt, hatred and loathing over what my own eyes had seen. A man who didn't know me, and therefore had no reason to lie, had told me a story. The look my own wife gave the guy the second before she dashed into their hotel room for the afternoon could do nothing other than confirm it. A piece of me died just then. As the door to that hotel room closed, coldness surrounded my heart, refusing to hear the doubts over what I had seen. The only voice I had heard was that of the Reverend Douglas Baker as he uttered those words on our wedding day - to forsake all others. A thought occurred to me and I started to laugh. I actually laughed so much I was sick once again. Those dark thoughts took hold of a weakened mind. My heart had its own battles to fight and couldn't help as those dark thoughts took hold, and I just knew that this was my life now. This was the day trust had died, and the person who killed it was the woman I had loved so very much for the last thirteen years. Again that thought stabbed at me, and I wondered at how I could even think so badly of a person I once loved yet now loathed. How the smile on her face as she looked at him just before they both entered that hotel room had my mind screaming - a mind I thought so kind and gentle to others, yet it screamed over and over one question I could never ask, for fear of knowing that the answer would indeed crush what little I had left in the way of dignity. My stomach could not fuel its hatred anymore. It had nothing left inside it to offer. I actually wondered if he was at our wedding. ******* Thankfully for the rest of the afternoon my standby status was just that. I knew I only wanted the answer to one question, and that involved the two little people of the house. Thirty minutes on the computer in one of the side offices gave me the answers; well, the start of this one anyway. A trip to the drug store and a five minute conversation with the guy in charge got me what I wanted. The look in his eyes as he handed me the little white bag left me in no doubt that he wanted to say more than he could. Even as I drove home I knew that Mandy would know something was wrong. She wasn't the stupid one; it seemed I was. I was proved right within five seconds of opening the door. Mandy looked up from the kitchen counter, the knife half way to cutting the carrots, and stopped. "Honey, you look like shit. What's happened?" All I could do was shrug my shoulders and tell her I must have eaten something bad for lunch. Excusing myself, I headed for our room. The children interceded before I got there, both hugging me, and that's when I came oh so close to crying. The love I had for these two bundles of joy had simply gone. It felt like I was cuddling someone else's children, and that both saddened me and scared me at the same time. Mandy came in an hour later with some soup, placed it on the cabinet next to my side of the bed, sat next to me, kissed me on the forehead, and even whispered in my ear that it looked like she wouldn't be getting any loving tonight. That thought alone, after what I had seen and heard about the Wednesday couple that afternoon, sent my stomach into revolt once again and I had to run to the bathroom. It had nothing to offer other than a disgusting looking white mess, and my wife gently patted me on the back, telling me to get back to bed and try and eat something later. With the click of the bedroom door telling me she had left, all I could do was slump to the floor in front of the bathroom and cry once again. This time I really didn't want to do the math as my mind kept screaming "sloppy seconds." My heart remained silent, knowing it had no place in this mess anymore. None of this was of my choosing; I never asked Mandy to step out on me. When she finally had Sarah, said that two was enough and that she was going to get her tubes tied, all I could do was admit it was her body and go along with it. In a relationship where I actually thought I was an equal partner, all I had been reminded of all day was that I was only a passenger along for the ride. Had my love for this woman made me that fucking blind? ******* It was still dark when I woke. Mandy was curled up into me, the bowl of soup now gone and the lamp on low in case I had another run to the bathroom in mind. As I moved to sit up, Mandy woke and asked if I was OK. "I'm just going to check on the children and kiss them both goodnight. I know once they reach double figures and cop a load of attitude I'm not going to be able to do that any more, so I want to get as many days of them being children as I can." Mandy giggled, and said "I'm sure they will always love their dad, even when they're teenagers." That was the trouble with what I saw that afternoon. Everything this woman said to me from now on always seemed to have a double meaning for me. I'm sure I grunted some response before she turned over as I opened the door of our bedroom, glad that she couldn't see the new tears as my mind analyzed what she had said and screamed its own response. The white bag came out of my coat pocket, and so began that lowering of the flag in our marriage. Oh, I held out that faint glimmer of hope that I was wrong. But something that the security guy said to me had stuck and, as I slowly ticked off the days in my memories, I had figured it out. He said that "the Wednesday couple had stayed for a week once." When my Dad died, Mandy told me to take the children with me so that my Mom would have something emotional to keep her from thinking too much about my Dad as I organized the funeral, and she would come down on the day. It kind of made sense, and to be honest it worked as well. Mom lavished so much love on those two for the whole week while I got the funeral arrangements sorted that I even got an "I told you so grin" from Mandy when she turned up and I told her about it. Sadly Mom passed away six months later; it seemed she really couldn't live without him. So, while I was away for a week sorting through the funeral, Mandy was with him doing whatever floated their boat. My mind refused to let my imagination conjure up pictures of them naked together. Insanity was only half a step behind if that ever happened. I also now understood what people meant when they said "with a cold heart." I was brought up to believe that our hearts glowed with love; more so when we married because we then had someone to share it with and, when children came along, then your heart just grew with pride. Mine was cold that evening as I held one, then the other, kissed their foreheads, gently took a swab from the inside of their mouths and placed it back into the container. I followed all the rest of the instructions and placed it all into the envelope and back into my work coat. Surprisingly I even went through the routine of returning to bed, but the futile attempt at sleep still had me watching the sun come up as my mind kept replaying a loop of the happy couple walking hand in hand down that corridor. Mandy woke seconds before the alarm went off, but I feigned sleep for a moment before deciding to get up. There seemed little point in staying home since I had to send off the package anyway. Mandy simply shook her head and repeated that I should take the day off. I volunteered to take the children to school since it was Mandy's day at the insurance office. It didn't take that much to persuade her that I was best suited to get them there and on time, since her office was the other end of town. The boss kept me on stand-by as cover for Marty, so sweet-talking the receptionist was easier. I needed to get the results delivered, and it couldn't be at home since I couldn't guarantee I would be there for the post. Lying had been unfamiliar territory to me a day ago yet, as I stood in front of Carol and told her that the delivery were tickets for an anniversary, she just smiled and sucked it all up. The trouble was going to be my boss - he was the closest I had to a father now mine was dead. I genuinely liked the guy and, while my head was in a dark place all the time now, I just knew I needed his help and advice. The knocking on his door was the easiest part. Saying "Boss, have you got a minute?" was the hardest, because I knew I now needed to put into words the dark conclusions which my mind had already reached. ******* For two hours we sat and talked, only getting up for a coffee and to use the bathroom. He was smart and offered little in the way of advice. What I did get from him was a perspective on what was going on, and two scenarios to work with dependant on what the results of the tests were. Many times he shook his head as I detailed what I knew, what the guy at the security office told me, and where I suspected she was the week I took the children with me to Mom's. "Know this, son; I'm taking you off stand-by and putting you on special projects. Let's face it, your head isn't here and, if I were in your shoes, I can't say mine would be either. I have a few things you can do here for the next few days until the results come back, plus I will also sort out the details needed for both scenarios. But, and this is the biggie, you have to decide for yourself if this is what you want to do. OK?" Even as we shook on it we both knew. He hoped of course, but that elephant in the room was just too big to ignore. The last lingering doubt was the children. Could Mandy be so evil, so conniving and manipulative to do something as despicable as what I believed she had done? I suppose my boss had to see it with his own eyes; after all, how could someone play the loving wife and mother card for so long, and get away with being a cheating whore who had palmed off her lover's children onto her blind husband? It was easier now. A train-wreck relationship didn't seem like such a national disaster when I came out of my boss's office. Oh, I could still see the end coming but, either way, I knew I actually had someone in my corner. God, how I missed my folks. The next week was ... difficult. I could say that it was downright fucked up. Mandy decided I had got over the bug I had and she wanted some loving. Ever seen a woman who couldn't get her old man up with a blow job? Just seeing her in my mind, hand in hand with her lover and the way she skipped into that hotel room, worked better than drugs. Her passing shot as she finally gave up after her own ego had taken a kicking was that I needed to see a doctor, since something was clearly wrong with me. The urge to laugh was so hard to fend off I had to bite my own lip, the taste of blood telling me to let go before I did some real damage to myself. Something else I noticed about myself was that I looked at the calendar more often. Usually I looked up to the weekend and stopped right about then. My eyes watched the third and fourth days go by, while my mind seemed to want to work out how many days before the Wednesday couple met up again. I can sure tell you that this lifestyle was NOT conducive to a happy marriage. My boss caught me as I strolled into work, a week to the day after posting my hopes and dreams wrapped in three vials and a padded envelope. The look on his face told me everything I needed to know, and yet I still followed him into his office. He refused to say anything until I was sitting down, and only then did he slide the envelope across the table to me. It took an age to make my hand move from my lap and hold that envelope; my world teetered on the edge as it was, and now came the day of reckoning. The first page was a lot of legal words that meant shit to me, but exonerated the clinic for everything from snow in the managing director's office to the girl in the canteen catching a cold. It was the second page that dropped my life into hell and slammed the gate shut on the way through. Mandy was systematic about everything. The children's school had sent us a letter a couple of years back telling us to get our children DNA tested, so that if something "bad" happened we would have closure. It took me a New York minute to agree to this; I wanted my damn kids covered for every eventuality. It took Mandy a day or so to agree, and it's probably the one real argument we ever really had. She finally agreed, and told me she would take care of it. The Wednesday Couple Seems she did a real good job of doing that as well. I looked at those results last night. When Mandy was making dinner, I went into our home office and opened our fire safe to look at it. The samples all matched, the mother was indeed the mother, both children were brother and sister, and the dad really WAS the dad. So why was I now looking at a report that clearly stated that the sample I sent with the children's samples stated that both children were related, but that I was not the father of either of them? The urge to hurt her was real on so many levels. The paperwork disappeared from my view as I wept at seeing the results. Just who the fuck was I married to, and could love really make you that insanely blind? My boss remained silent as he just sat watching me, waiting. In situations like these time seems to want to dictate to others. I had read and re-read that report so many times I felt like I was wearing out the ink. I felt so very old and weary; when I looked up at my boss he winced. What he saw I will never know, but I recognized the sadness that followed. "It took ten years to build that marriage, and less than a week to kill it stone dead. If I go back to that place I once called home I will hurt her. She may have destroyed our marriage a thousand times over, but her children need their mother." "They are still YOUR children, Daniel! You were the one who cut the cords, who chased away the monsters under the bed. That report means nothing if you don't want it to." I knew what my boss was trying to do, and I wasn't angry with him. With each of our discussions he had tried so very hard to bring positives to the table. I took on board what he had tried to say, yet my own mind screamed "NO!" "I'm just the glorified babysitter they call dad, because their real dad won't do anything other than knock their mom up. I'm sure I feel something for them but, whatever it is, it's clouded by what I feel for their mom and dad." Even when I handed my boss the report he only took a casual glance at it. Watching me read it had said enough for him to know the outcome of the DNA test. I heard him say he was sorry. "How soon can we get this over with?" "I have everything in place; you can leave whenever it suits." I nodded my head and stood. "I'm going to pack some things and visit the bank. I'll see you in a couple of hours." My boss simply nodded his head. The report still sat on his desk when I left. An hour later saw me with my life in two suitcases. Ten years of working to build something that I could eventually retire with and call my own, and all it amounted to was two damn suitcases' worth of clothes. I knew what was in the bank with regards to savings, rainy days and holiday money, and I took most of it out. Two hours later the cab dropped me at the car park around the back of my company. My boss had bought a car in the company name, and told me he would make sure it was insured for two years. Even as I stood in front of him and shook his hand one last time I felt sad for him. I was leaving - it was he that would have to face the aftermath, and that saddened me. He thrust something into my hand and I looked at it. "It's a cheap cell; it only has my number on it. When you're settled call me to let me know. This is yours as well." He pulled an envelope out of his back pocket; the cashier's check was for all my wages. If I had been paid my worth I would have earned shit these last few days. I hugged him and told him what he already knew: that he was the nearest thing to a father that I had after my own had passed away. ******* Even as I pulled out of that car park I didn't know which way I was heading. All I wanted to make sure was that it was as far away from here as I could make it. For the first three days I drove until I was too tired to drive anymore, sleeping in my car and, once awake, driving off again. That worked up until I pulled into a gas station and the guy behind the counter kept his hand close to the panic button. I got my first look at myself in the glass of the fridge door I opened to grab a soda, and understood why he kept his hand there. The next three days I managed to find cheap motels along the way and kept the beard to a small goatee and a mustache. The drives were still ten or twelve hour ones, my need to keep the distance between me and my past as far apart as possible keeping urging me on. Hell I wasn't even sure which of the states I was in anymore either. What made me stop, OK, what made me swerve and almost crash, was the sign that said "Welcome to Clarksville." Only there was a guy up on the board scrubbing out the part that some spray painter had altered, it now reading "Welcome to Whereville." I sat on the side of the road and watched for a while, snickering to myself as I realized that this was the closest I had come to laughing for a while, so I figured it was time to investigate Clarksville and, if I found anyone with paint on their hands, I might just thank them for the laugh. The diner was my first port of call, my stomach reminding me that carry-outs only have a short life in a body, and I really did need a good cooked meal inside me. Even when I sat and looked around I never did see anyone with paint on their hands, and I smiled once again, my thoughts taking a sideways turn when the waitress snuck up on me. Between us we settled on something for me to eat, and the coffee was in continuous fill until the food arrived. I had just taken my first bite of real food when the lights went out, the waitress swearing once before she realized that she was in mixed company and apologized. Other than with the aid of a torch I figured I had zero choice but to help out or starve. Asking the waitress where the fuse box was only got me some homely woman to come out from the kitchen. She in turn took me to the back of the diner, and less than ten minutes later the lights were back on and my food was still warm. The woman from the kitchen told me my meal was free on account of the fact I got the lights back on. We settled on me paying for my dinner and dessert being free, since all I did only took ten minutes. The thing was I was now no longer just a face amongst many. The Sheriff was parked behind my car when I left the diner. He watched as I came out and had joined me by the time I got to the driver's door. "Evening." The key to my car went back into my pocket. "Evening, Sheriff. Is something wrong?" "Nope, everything's just fine. I would appreciate it, though, if you would come with me." "Front or back?" This time he smiled. "Front will be fine. Like I said, young man, you ain't done nothing wrong." Although my bullshit meter was on full alert, I didn't get the feeling he was playing with me, so I shrugged my shoulders and went along for the ride. Silence did seem to be the theme, so I went along with that as well. The ride itself didn't last more than a few minutes, since we ended up behind the courthouse. The Sheriff sat for a moment before he smiled and said, "Didn't I tell you, son, all we want to do is have a chat. After that I will take you back to your car, and you can decide what to do with your life after that." That bullshit meter still sat in neutral so I followed the Sheriff into the courthouse and along a corridor, stopping at a door with "Judge Carlton Whitmore" on it. The Sheriff knocked once and walked in. "Well, well. The light man." Still unsure of what he wanted, I just waited. "Son, you came to our attention because you stood up and did something, and in this town there ain't that many folks willing or able to do just that. If you hadn't got the diner's power back up, Marlene would have had to have phoned Walter over at Chester Grove, and that's clear across the state line. Hell, we would have been without the diner for close to two days." "I'm not interested, Judge." Both men looked at each other. "Well that's a crying shame, son, since I spoke to your old boss and he seemed to think you could well be interested." The judge watched my confusion and then realization. The car and insurance were still in the company name. This time I sat and listened; it seemed Hank Peters was the general electrician, plumber and just about anything else that required him getting his hands dirty. It was both his niche and the town's downfall. Hank liked to work alone and, when a heart attack caught up with him, it left the town without cover. I spent the night in jail thinking about it: I even smiled at the invite. Turns out Mrs. Calderwood's boarding house had termites and was in the process of being treated, so the only accommodation was the jailhouse. True to his word, the Sheriff did leave the door open, for which I was extremely grateful. As I lay on that bed looking up at the ceiling, I somehow didn't see my life looking like this. A cute little redhead came in the next morning and placed a breakfast tray on my bed. We met at the door of the cell as I was coming back from having a shave. She didn't say much other than the word "breakfast," and bolted for the stairs. I heard the door slam a couple of seconds later. Even the Sheriff came down to see what had happened. "Son, what the hell did you say to Katie?" "Thank you." "What?" "Sheriff, I swear, she said breakfast, I said thank you, and then she bolted for the stairs like I was going to chase after her." The grin on the Sheriff's face was infectious enough for me to copy him. "Oh I wouldn't do that, son, that's Katie." He made it sound like that was all the explanation needed as he walked back up the stairs and I tucked into breakfast. Even as I sat in my cell eating, my smile wouldn't leave me. It was stealth - I swear it was. I mean, who else would accept a job while eating breakfast in a jailhouse? I'm sure stranger things have happened in life, but at that moment I just couldn't remember reading about any. It still took a day of paperwork and my old boss faxing my qualifications and letter of recommendation over. We decided that for the sake of the town it would be best to break Hank's old business down. Plumbing wasn't something I was trained in, and the thought of flooding someone's house through my ignorance didn't sit right with me. When the Sheriff opened the door to Hank's shop I was having a bad case of second thoughts. With those thoughts in mind, a boy of maybe ten walked past me and through the door, grabbed a broom, and started on the mess that was Hank's shop. It was the Sheriff that got his question in first, but only because I didn't know the boy's name. "Jimmy, what the hell are you doing?" "It's Katie, Sheriff. She said I have to come help for the day to pay off busting the window on the judge's back door." Whoever this Katie was, she sure had a grip on a lot of things around here. The mere mention of her name always seemed to stop any argument. The Sheriff just shrugged his shoulders and told the boy not to touch anything but the broom, before walking back to his car and leaving me seemingly in charge of Jimmy. I will say this, that the boy must surely have been afraid of Katie. He never stopped cleaning in all the time he was in the shop, except when he stuck his hand up to ask to go to the bathroom. When the wall clock struck four the boy leaned the broom up against the wall and wiped his hands down his pants leg before looking at me. "You will tell Katie I stayed till four like she told me to, won't you, mister?" I nodded and pulled out a few dollars from my pants pocket, but the boy simply shook his head and left without even looking back. When I got here I figured the judge and the Sheriff ran this town; now it seemed the name Katie sure opened more doors than they could. With a shrug of my shoulders I went back to work stacking shelves and opening boxes that Hank never seemed to get around to opening. Holding a brand new fuse box in my hands I couldn't help myself. "Now that is going in the diner once I talk to whoever the owner is." "That will be Marlene. She does most stuff in the diner and covers for sick. Sundays is the only day Marlene closes the diner, but even then you may have to wait until after church before she will let you in." When I spun around I nearly dropped the fuse box. The redhead was leaning against the door, her arms folded as she looked around the shop. "Jimmy left at four." It was only then that she took a step or two inside. Looking at both the floor and the stacked shelves as she did, her lack of conversation only seemed to make me carry on talking. "Although he was a big help, I could have got the cleaning done. He wouldn't accept payment for his labor." Placing the fuse box down my hand went to my pocket. "Perhaps you could give him this since he wouldn't accept it from me." By the time I looked up with the money in my hand the redhead was gone. Even when I got to the door and looked outside she wasn't to be seen anywhere. I was starting to think Katie could make a Ninja scared with the way she just sneaked up on people. I was still stacking shelves when the phone rang on the counter; I looked at it for a moment before I realized I worked here now, so it might be best if I answered it. This Katie woman sure liked to oil the wheels around town. It was Marlene on the phone telling me that Sunday afternoon would be fine with her opening the diner for me to change the fuse box. That's when I smiled and shook my head, as Marlene went on to tell me that she attended church on Sundays and then proceeded to ask me why I didn't. It was also then I told her I was in the middle of a very important job and once I confirmed Sunday and the time I put the phone down. ******* I must have been down to my last unopened box and set to start making an inventory when another four women turned up, with an age range of about eighteen to late forties. The oldest introduced herself as Annabelle Fenton. Seeing the blank look on my face, she rolled her eyes and then tried another approach. "The Reverend Fenton's wife, my dear. Katie mentioned that you've taken over from Hank, so I rustled up some of the women from the church and, while you're sorting out this squalor, we will deal with whatever upstairs looks like, and try our best to make it at least habitable." The blank look didn't bother Annabelle in the least. I think to her she had said what she was there for, and simply got on with it. For the moment I was just the casual observer at this insight into small town life as all four women wandered up the stairs at the back. The pause was momentary before I heard, "Oh, my sweet Lord. Tessa dear, get on that cell thing of yours and call the rest of the girls, or we may be here all night." Even I wondered if it was wise to go up and have a look at Hank's lifestyle but, judging by the way he ran the shop, I might find it a good idea to stay out of the way. What followed over the next two hours was a procession of women, and a guy who was put to work dragging black bags down the stairs, out the door and into the back of a pick-up that, when full, disappeared for a while before returning to its place outside the shop. The odd order from Annabelle still made me smile before I went back to my inventory. "Charlotte dear, please open the windows to let the Lord's air in. Just wash your hands when you're done, dear; we haven't bleached that window yet." "Just put the bed linen directly into the black bag, Betty. I will get Jason to burn that one before whatever is living in it wakes up and bites someone." Even Marlene came by with a tray of covered Styrofoam cups, a letter written on the top of every cup to correlate with the soon-to-be owner, and went upstairs to some very welcome words from the twelve or so women and the odd guy who were now up there. Even with my head buried into shelves and paperwork, plus the running commentary from upstairs, I sensed something. When I looked around a covered cup and a sandwich in saran wrap sat on the counter. The cup had the letter D on the top. Marlene came down the stairs about that time, and smiled at me looking at what was on the counter. "That would be Katie. She said she would swing by and drop yours off." Being caught unawares and feeling just a little spooked, I asked the most obvious question. "Marlene, who the hell is Katie?" For a moment she looked totally confused, before she had to remind herself that I wasn't from around here. That was when she sat on the stool I had just vacated and told me about Katie. She was the judge's daughter and had gone off to college, then started doing some local radio work before she decided to return to Clarksville. To prove her point, Marlene pulled the tired looking radio that sat on the counter towards her and turned it on before tuning it, and then Katie's voice emanated from the box on the counter. "Yes folks, we have an electrician in our midst once again, following the sad death of Hank. I hear he's still finding his feet, so be gentle with him; and Jordon, Beryl called again to tell the whole word she loves you, so you know what's coming next." Katie's voice faded out and the sound of Lionel Richie's "Hello" came over the radio. I heard a soft sigh from Marlene. "Those two will be married before the year is out, you mark my words." Marlene got up and walked out of the shop with me looking at her and shaking my head. The church women upstairs started cleaning again, and my own thoughts seemed to divide: the inventory was going well and Lionel Richie was coming to the end of his lament while my own thoughts escaped my lips. "I wonder how long it will be before she's stabbing him in the back as well." "Won't ever happen. Beryl waited twenty-two years for Jordon. Even followed him into the service to do it. She was a combat medic, and a hundred yards behind him when both their worlds exploded in Afghanistan. The two guys next to Jordon died immediately, and he had leg and chest wounds." The shock of hearing another voice caused me to stand too quickly, and I cracked my head on the shelf on the way up. Katie continued her statement as she sat on the stool by the counter. "She killed six people that day to protect her man. She even told Jordon that he better not die or she would kill him herself." Katie smiled at that. "Jordon was near on half a year in hospital with his injuries, and Beryl got a job as a nurse at the same hospital to be near him. That's where their first child was conceived, and Beryl tells me she's aiming for a second just after the wedding." It was odd seeing Katie sitting in front of me, yet reading the local weather on the radio at the same time. Her face seemed to harden ever so slightly and a chill held me. "You're from the city; what you folks get up to I neither care nor appreciate, especially when you paint folks that live in this town with the same brush." She moved her gaze to the radio and then stood and headed for the door. I'm sure she heard me apologize; at least I hoped she did. The radio stayed on for the rest of the afternoon and into the evening. Annabelle and her work crew came downstairs about an hour after Katie left to announce that the area upstairs was finally habitable. I thanked each and every one of them, although it was still around midnight before I was happy enough with the shop to see what upstairs was like. The smell of fresh air was added to by polish or bleach depending on what part of the room you were in. Both my suitcases sat by the wardrobe, ready for me to put my clothes away. As I sat on the chair and once again looked at my surroundings, I started to wonder if I really was home. ******* For the next few days I had phone calls and walk-ins for work needing doing, or repairs on work that Hank had plugged together until he could get the parts. It was an unusual insight into a man who I never met. He may have lived the life of seclusion, but he never turned work away, was always ready to help when he could, and never left people without power. The Wednesday Couple Some of his wiring would never pass inspection, but it was safe and only there until the right parts could be ordered. Most of the townsfolk seemed to start their first conversation with me with the words "Katie said," and it became an echo in my life. If she wasn't on the radio, the people who came in kept her name in my head. In one of my more flamboyant moods I casually mentioned to the last person I talked to in my shop that I may need a part-time assistant. The next morning a woman walked into the shop and stood directly at the desk. Her deep blue eyes held a seriousness about them that her smile couldn't soften. Her hair hung loose, but couldn't hide the burn mark on her left cheek and down her neck. For a moment I did wonder how far the burn went down her body, but just until I figured out that it was none of my business. "I've come for the job. I will work four hours a day during school times and two hours a day when school is out, and get cover when it's needed. Once I'm married we may have to negotiate a different hour scale, depending on how long it takes me to get pregnant." If you have ever tried to play catch up on a conversation you have never been part of, you are where I was right about then. The lights still didn't come on until she followed with "Katie said you're looking for an assistant to handle the stock and keep the books in order." It was then she saw the understanding on my face; what she didn't see was more than understanding about the job. When Beryl protected her man and brought him home she left a part of herself in Afghanistan as well. "Did she tell you how much I pay?" Even her eyes softened a little; more so when she nodded her head. "I know it's minimum wage, but it's all going to the wedding anyway." This woman was proud; she wanted to earn her way, even though I knew Jordon worked. I leaned on the counter and looked real hard at her. Beryl's features hardened once again, expecting bad news. "OK, these are my terms and conditions, and are non-negotiable. The hours are fine; you do the stock orders when I'm down to one, and of course if I let you know I need more then get it. You only get to phone the radio station once a day on the shop phone." She bit back her smile and her neck got ever so slightly red about then. The eyes softened even more as well. "Between us we will muddle for awhile until we get to the point that we understand one another, so don't go all crying-girl on me since I don't stock tissues. Plus, and this could well be the deal breaker here, the day of your wedding I get to hand you two a check for a thousand dollars to go to whatever fund you want, be it baby fund or honeymoon." You could almost feel the wheels going round in her head, right up until her eyes narrowed and the hardness returned to them. "Why?" I sensed she was ready to walk, the only reason she was still here being to find out the answer to her question. Katie's remark about tarring people with the same brush still echoed in my thoughts even after the few days it had been since she said it. "You and Jordon love one another. I don't think I've said more than ten words to Jordon and not that many more to you, but I know your history, and every day on the radio I'm reminded about what true love is supposed to be. So the thousand dollars is my way of thanking you both for reminding this old man that true love does exist with the right woman by your side." Her eyes moistened before she nodded her head, turned and walked out of the shop. It wasn't until an hour later when Katie came by that I knew whether or not Beryl had accepted the job. She came with a coffee in one hand and another sandwich in the other. "We don't do pin the money on the wedding dress in this town." The smile reached her eyes and for that I was eternally grateful. Katie watched as I pulled the saran wrap away from the sandwich and handed her half, and for the first time since I had met this woman she seemed confused about something. Hell, it was half a sandwich, nothing more, and yet she still seemed reluctant to take it. It finally dawned on me that perhaps she was more used to giving than receiving. For the first time since I came here I started to get pissed. "It's called sharing bread. Where I come from, decent folks do it all the time and without the need for anything in return. I'm asking if you're hungry; I'm not asking you for a date." At least she had she decency to blush before she declined the offer of half my sandwich. "Beryl said to tell you that they don't have time for a honeymoon, so it will go to family projects. She's already looking up days out at theme parks with their boy." I just had time to nod my head before her attention went back to the radio. Katie must have figured out she had spent too long talking to me and dashed out of the shop. She must have made it back to the radio station in time, since the news and weather finished and the sound of Katie seamlessly continued as though the dash out of the shop hadn't even happened. ******* Beryl turned up the next Monday morning and basically took over the shop. She re-did the stock take I had already done, and tutted her way through it as she pulled parts off shelves and placed them on other shelves. When I went to make us coffee she had already put a note above the kettle with her preference. Reading from the note I was supposed to put the milk in last, even after the sugar. The devil in me wanted to see if she would notice if I put the milk in first, but even a quick look at the way she was moving stuff around on the shelves told me that she most probably would. The muddling through bit took two weeks, or maybe you could say one week since Beryl was part-time. She would bitch at me on a Monday since I worked on the Saturday, and she quickly noticed things missing and no notes or reason why, so had to go hunting through the job sheets to figure it out. It caused about the only argument I ever had with her. She ranted about the work I was making for her, and in retaliation I asked who paid her. Beryl stopped dead in her tracks and looked real hard at me. It was then I knew how she kept herself and Jordon alive as she systematically killed those men. "I'm not here to breast-feed you. Look after the stock and keep a clean shop I will do; run around after you I won't. You're a grown man and I'm told have qualifications to prove you're a good electrician, but that doesn't make you a slob. So write down what you take off the shelves and I will do the rest. Mess with me again and I may just piss in your coffee. Get me?" I got. To say I may have overstepped my boundaries would have come as a gross understatement. What could I say? She was right. We muddled on for a couple of days, and I made sure I smelt my coffee when she handed me one. ******* The town had a collective buzz about it over the coming months. Jordon and Beryl's wedding seemed to be the hot topic, and the procession of people just popping into the shop to talk details of wedding arrangements meant I kept out of the way or clamped my mouth shut when passing through. On occasions Beryl struggled to get a sitter so brought her son into the shop: he would sit in the corner with pencils and paper and amuse himself. I felt a pang of sadness as my own memories came flooding back: of the two little people I had spent ten years thinking were the fruit of my loins, only to stare at the paperwork stating that they were someone else's. Leaving her was the easy part, but walking away from those two children drove a stake through me. If anyone was innocent in this whole mess, it was them. They were the real victims in that charade of a marriage. Katie gradually wore me down. At first she was just the judge's daughter, but she had gone from being the "cute little redhead" who had delivered that first breakfast to someone who I realized just about ran the town, despite her relative youth. Not only that, but she had done such a good job of sneaking under my skin that I was hard-pressed to imagine life without her. She would still turn up and scare the pants off me, though I'm sure she did it to see if I would crack my head again. On occasions I would have lunch or dinner at the diner; it didn't take Katie long to sit down next to me when that happened. "Can you tell me why you're bugging me?" The question didn't even faze her. "Oh, that's easy. I want to see if you really are an asshole who has women issues, or if it's just the one woman that fucked with you." The staring competition took even longer. She even rested her arms on the table to make herself comfortable while we did. I actually found what she said quite funny, although I may not have a few weeks earlier. Looking back on that conversation, I should have quit while I was behind. "Well, the mouth on you makes me wonder if you are a woman." This time she moved her hands and started to unbutton her blouse. "What are you doing?" By now Katie had a hand on both parts of her blouse and pulled it apart. Her breasts sat snugly in her bra, the freckles adding to her charms. "I'm showing you my tits, dumb ass, so you can see I'm a woman." I leant across the table and pulled her blouse closed. Marlene came over and poured more coffee into our cups. "Not in here, please, sweetie." Katie looked up at her friend and said, "I'm sorry, Marlene, but this shit-for-brains had it coming." "That may be so, honey, but Emmett just spat his coffee over the floor when you got your tits out and I'm stuck with cleaning it all up. You have a gripe with him, then take it elsewhere." Marlene moved away from us and headed to the kitchen, coming back out with a bucket and mop just seconds later. My head turned to once again look at Katie; she seemed to be waiting for me to do just that. "Well?" "Well what?" Her eyes narrowed ever so slightly, but just enough to let me know a storm was coming. "Don't fucking play with me shit-for-brains, are you man enough? So far I've done all the dancing: it's your turn." It wasn't a single light-bulb that clicked in my brain at that moment; it was like a whole stadium lighting up as I realized that, for some strange reason, Katie fancied me as much as I fancied her. ******* She laughed when I switched the sign to "Closed." She even resisted heading up the stairs. Something about her virtue, and what would the folks in town think? The bitching stopped when she decided that I wasn't getting my pants down fast enough. Hell, how could I, since she was already naked and all I could do was stare at her. "My God, you're beautiful." "Flattery ain't going to stop me sticking your dick in my mouth, shit-for-brains." And, to prove her point, she did just that. Her hands went behind me and held onto my ass, the magic that had been her dirty mouth for the last half an hour doing more than drain me. Her eyes locked onto mine, challenging me to either give in or make her fight for it. Katie may have been all of a hundred and twenty pounds in the birthday suit she was showing me right now, but all of those pounds carried determination inside them. We both knew I wasn't going to last all that long: the woman attached to me made sure of that. Even more so when I went to tell her, my cock telegraphing that information to Katie before my own voice got to her. With the speed I had come to associate with this woman she detached herself from my cock, stood up, and jacked me off with her hand. We both watched as rope after rope splashed across her stomach, its own momentum already starting its slide towards her navel. "I've known you since you arrived here, Daniel, and that's been in you since then. I do swallow," she chuckled, "but I have no intention of drowning in the stuff." For the first time in awhile I smiled. The scene before me was just plain weird, and perhaps one of the reasons my next questions left my lips. "Shit-for-brains?" Katie blushed; her motions with her hand also stopped me going soft. "When a man's got his back against a wall he has no choice but to come out fighting, Daniel. It's easy enough to see that you like me ... a lot... just like I like you, but it looked like you would never do anything about it. I had to goad you into this; the alternative was just to continue watching you die a little more inside each day." My finger traced the length of cum that ran down her stomach. Katie shuddered when I got to her navel, a moan escaping her lips before she had a chance to hide it. "Make love to me, Daniel. I don't do weird sex. Just love me, and you will get it back in spades." Her hand stopped, and then tightened around my cock just firmly enough for me to know that she planned on making a point. "I'm not the bitch you left, Daniel. When this goes into me then you're my man, and my man gets the respect he deserves. Make love to me, Daniel, and I will do my best to make your pain go away, but if you ever look on me like you do her, and treat me bad for something I didn't do all because I have tits and a pussy like her, then this comes off with a blunt knife." An extra little squeeze just emphasized the "this" that she was talking about. So there stood Katie, her eyes showing so many emotions that I had trouble keeping up. So far she had been right on so many subjects. I did wonder how she did it, but just remembered the phrase I had heard from so many people in this town: "that's Katie." To emphasize her point even further, she leant down and placed her mouth around my finger. Her tongue swirled around it, taking possession of all the cum it had collected. Her hand also eased its pressure on my cock, for which I was ever so grateful. "This is your last chance, Daniel. We have a bed behind me, so do we make use of it or are you going to let the bitch continue to eat the life out of you?" In a moment of blinding clarity, it dawned on me that something had to give before I self-destructed, and that realization meant that, at last, my mind could finally be at peace with itself. I was looking at a woman who, at that moment, was not only a mind-reader but the most beautiful woman in the world. She was also naked, and holding onto a fairly important part of me. "Condoms?" She tried ever so hard to hide a smile, "No need; on the pill." "You clean?" Katie sensed where this conversation was headed, and didn't kick off at my question. "As clean as you." "You do anal?" This time the smile got in ahead of her attempt to hide it. "Only when you have worn out the other two holes." "You sleep on the left or right side?" The glance at the bed bought her a second before she answered, "As long as I have room to rest my head on your chest, and to throw a leg over you so I know when you try to sneak out, I don't give a shit what side." "OK, I'm done; the interview is over." Katie finally let go of my cock and jumped onto me, her hands around my neck and her legs clamped around my waist. Even as light a weight as Katie was, the unexpected act of climbing all over me took me by surprise, and we both landed on the bed. Katie looked directly at me. "My turn, buster. I like morning sex, so don't be surprised if you wake up and I've already got a head start on you." I waited for her to continue but, when she said no more, I replied with "OK." "What? You want more? Let me say this slowly so you can understand. Both of us haven't had sex for so long that neither of us will last. Before we hammer the shit out of each other the first time of asking, you had better be prepared to make it up to me the second time round." The Katie I knew with clothes on was just the same one I saw in front of me now without. She was that breath of fresh air I needed and, when I looked at her one last time, her eyes held that "what are you waiting for?" look about them. Her kiss was real and held nothing back, and her neck signaled her excitement by its warmth as I nuzzled her in return. Her pelvis lifted to try and trap my cock. As my body slid down hers and back onto the floor, my cock dragged across her pubic bone and traced the entire length of her slit. Katie's hands quickly grabbed my head and pulled our eyes close together. Words weren't needed: she was pissed off, and if I carried on teasing she would take matters into her own hands. With my knees now on the floor and her own legs draped over the edge of the bed, I held a leg in each hand on the way back up and placed them tight to my chest. The smile that radiated from that woman melted my heart. She seemed to sense my mind drifting away, and quickly brought me back to reality. Her hand once again found my cock as I stood up, and was already in the process of rubbing it up and down her slit. More of me entered her on her downward motion until even Katie's own impatience took over. "I need to cheat, Daniel; this dry spell of mine has made me tight, and I don't want to damage this." The "this" got a gentle squeeze with one hand while the other frantically rubbed her clit, and within seconds her eyes became unfocused as the sensual assault on her body continued. I watched and waited; perhaps mesmerized would be a better word. Katie was so comfortable with her own body that she didn't even feel uncomfortable with me staring at her actions. Finally the hand around my cock pulled me towards her and, as the bulbous head of my cock entered her, the rubbing of her clit increased. Katie's head arched back, her neck totally exposed as a slow moan escaped her lips. Her body was doing a fine job lubricating the walls of her pussy, yet she still felt the need to remove her hand from my cock and place it on my body to stop me entering her any deeper. "Fuck, Daniel, two years has been too long. Thank God you're not going to find a hymen down there or you may think I'm still a virgin." Even this guy thought it best to keep his mouth shut, and not answer what was clearly a rhetorical statement. Over the next few minutes a pattern emerged. Katie would frantically rub her clit and nod her head at the same time for me to ease slightly further inside her. Her hand would again stop me as the resistance became too much and her muscles had to take time to adjust. I always thought myself Joe Average in the penis department and, looking down at this sweating, panting and clit-rubbing angel, I'm sure she was grateful I was too. The sigh as pubic hair met with bald pussy drew my attention away from the snug fit of my cock in its new home. The expression on Katie's face made it look like she had just won the New York Marathon: sweating, drained, and glad that it was over. As that thought snuck into my mind, I had to clamp my lips together to stop the only answer I had in return leaking out: was she ready for her prize now? When her last moan ended her eyes opened. Her whole body was bathed in sweat, yet all that lay in front of me was a glow with a smile on top. Katie's lips moved, and after licking her lips she tried again. "Well, that was fun! Judging by the way you're looking at me, Daniel, I think it best if I have my legs back." As my hands released her legs, Katie slowly removed them from my chest and placed them around my waist in anticipation. My thoughts, although borderline carnal, still held concern for the woman in front of me. "Are you OK?" She smiled and nodded her head. I'm almost sure she wanted to leave it at that, but I refused to move. "Who do you see in front of you, honey?" she asked. At first I thought it was an odd question but, thinking back on certain conversations, I realized why she asked. "Katie. As naked and as beautiful as I have ever seen her." She grinned at my flattery but, just as I would have expected, it didn't fool her. "You're in me, Daniel, not her. You get this one chance to kick the dust covers off both of us; after that you're mine and I'm yours. She is a distant memory, Daniel. Hell, she shouldn't even be part of this conversation since your cock is so deep in me, but I'm not letting you do what your eyes are telling me." The Wednesday Couple Just like always, she was right. I nodded my head ever so slightly and held out my hand, fingers open. Her hand came across, her fingers interlocked with mine, and together we closed them, locking our hands together. It was a strange gesture, and yet one that held so much truth about it. Yes, I may be cock deep in this woman, but at this one moment in time we were together: truly together. The smile that spread across her face warmed my heart and, for the first time since I left that place I thought was my home, I really did feel at home now. The smile turned into a cheeky grin. "You're ready now, honey. Make your woman happy, and probably walking with a limp for a day or two." Our fingers unlocked and her hand went back to rubbing her clit. As I began to withdraw her head arched, exposing once again that long elegant neck of hers. The carnal part of me eased itself back into those dark shadows of our inner thoughts as I came about halfway out of this woman, only to thrust myself back gently into her. The moan as I slid back in turned to a grunt as our bodies touched. Her eyes flew open and she glared at me. I thought it best to say something before Katie lost it. "The aim is to kick the dust covers off, not damage you as we do." She refused to say anything, just watching as I picked up the pace. Within minutes I was slamming into Katie, who had long since given up rubbing her clit. Her hands now grabbed and pulled on the sheets as the force of our coming together pushed her up the bed. As we both sweated and fucked our own dust covers off, Katie groaned and grunted, interspersing the odd "fuck." Her eyes snapped open angrily and her hands left the sheets to grab my head, holding on tightly while the top half of her eased itself off the bed. I may have been looking at Katie, but I wasn't all that sure of the person glaring back at me. "Is that the best you've got, you wimp-assed motherfucker? Give it to me, all of it, or get the fuck off me." Something inside both of us snapped right about then. I grabbed her hips and pulled her back down the bed as she let go of my head and once again came to rest. This fucking bitch had busted my balls just once too often - she was going to limp for a week if I had anything to do with it. Every time I slammed my cock into her cunt her tits would do their own dance. Her grunts and groans seemed to have changed in pitch as well. She was smiling - the fucking bitch was smiling! That alone renewed the tempo, and I now started pounding her pussy, using her hips to hold her down. Her legs clamped tighter to me like a vise, and it wasn't until her pussy flooded my cock on its return journey that I realized that she had cum. The fucking bitch couldn't even wait for me, and with energy that I didn't realize I had I just slammed into her pussy harder and faster. Katie's thighs dug deeper into my sides and she came again. I was incredulous and, if anything, I was fucking her even harder and faster. Within another minute she came so hard that she screamed and passed out, with my ears still wondering what jet aircraft had just buzzed the building. Her scream woke me from my zombie state of mind and, as I looked down at the sweat ravaged, glistening body out cold on the bed, I felt such a pig. I had done this to her, and I was ever so afraid - not of any retaliation, but that I had hurt her. Katie had snuck into my heart and had dragged me out of myself. This woman had given herself to me on the understanding that I see her, not Mandy, and this was what I did to her. As I pulled out of her Katie's cum flooded the bed. I pulled her to me and held her tight, almost afraid to breathe as my mind recalled the last few minutes and what I had done to this woman. It still took me minutes to realize two things - I was rocking back and forth with this woman tight to my chest while murmuring the word "sorry" over and over again, and that Katie was also awake. Her hand wrapped itself around my erection and stayed there. "Dammit, Daniel, the whole point of this was to kick the dust covers off, and mine came off after my first orgasm! I just went along for the ride after that, but you're still hard and I bet if I feel what's gushing out of my pussy none of it is you." "I hurt you; I'm sorry." "I hurt you too, honey. You're no wimp ass, but I needed you to stop treating me like a porcelain doll." That made me smile. "It's OK - I can take care of that later." Her breathing stopped. It actually stopped, and caused me to stop rocking us. The grip on my cock was slight, but it was there. It took her a moment, but when she moved I let her go so she could look at me, and even to this day I regret ever saying the words that had just passed my lips. "The fuck you will! That's my job." Katie told me to lie down in the middle of the bed. The look I got when I went to tell her that was where the damp patch was meant that she knew. It was fascinating to watch as she climbed up the bed and straddled me, drops of cum still dripping from her pussy, even more as her pussy lips opened wider. She held my erection with her hand and watched herself slide down on me, the whimper she tried to hide letting me know I shouldn't let her do this. The man in me knew that to try to stop her would mean the end of us. Katie had pride by the bucket load and, even though her pussy looked like a beat up piece of meat, that pride meant that she needed what I had in me inside her or in her mind this wasn't a relationship. "You can play with these if you want, honey, while I take care of this." A little squeeze from down below simply confirmed the obvious. Her voice snapped me back to reality, seeing her tits dangling in front of my face, her nipples still erect and pointing down. Just inches from me, her breasts jiggled back and forth as Katie set her own tempo on my cock, and the little gasps and sharp intakes of breath told me just how rough I had been with her. My tongue came in contact with the underside of one nipple, and her body moving back and forth repeatedly dragged my tongue over it, hardening it even further in the process. The slow moan from above me made me think that perhaps pleasure was already in the process of dealing with the pain. Her skin tone changed once again, and from my angle it was interesting to see it rise up her body, surrounding her neck and turning her ears an interesting shade of dark pink. My head moved a few inches, and when her other breast came within reach I repeated the process. I moved my hands to hold all of her offered flesh, and forced her breasts together so that I could play with both at the same time. Her slow steady pace never increased, but the damp patch between us sure did. My hips tried to join in, but Katie quickly shook her head. "No, honey. You need to stay still. Let me do all the work this time around, please, Daniel." I nodded in understanding and even tried to kiss her on the way down, but she just smiled and lifted herself out of reach, placing a nipple in my mouth instead. This guy got the message and went back to work. It took less than a minute to feel myself getting ready. Katie was only a second behind and, as I came, she sat up straight and finished impaling herself onto me. That triumphant smile sat on her lips and had no reason to leave anytime soon. She stayed sitting on me and refused to move, the smile getting bigger as she felt my cock pulse inside her. Her cheeks got a little pink about them when she saw me watching her. "That's one sensation no girl will ever get tired of feeling, Daniel." Her hands rested on my chest, mine coming to rest on hers. "I know now isn't really the time, Daniel, but it's in my head so I have to say it. The dust covers are off now, honey, so from now on you make love to me and don't hold anything back when you do." The feeling of her clamping herself tighter around my cock, even as it admitted defeat and started to shrink, caused our cum to ooze from her and make the area around both our groins even damper. Katie tried to hide the pain, but she winced as her own body betrayed her, reminding me of what I had done to her and the effort it must have taken from this woman just to do what she had only just finished doing. I sat up and kissed her, my now normal size cock slipping from her pussy and a groan passing her lips as we kissed. I sent Katie to shower, and reminded her that I needed to change the sheets or one of us was sleeping on the damp spot. It saddened my heart when I watched her walk into the bathroom. As a man I should have simply been watching that magnificent ass of hers, yet all I could see was the way she walked with a limp towards the shower. With my mind made up, I changed the bed in double quick time and decided to help Katie wash her back and anything else that was going to be within reach in my shower. As I got to the door of the bathroom I could see her head resting against the glass and the shadow of her hand gently moving between her open legs. The only thing I heard above the gentle spray of the shower was the sob that escaped her lips when her hand touched such tender flesh. It was as though we each mirrored the other at that moment. As Katie crumpled to the floor of the shower my own legs gave way and I slumped to the floor. She tried to be quiet in case I heard her from the bedroom, without realizing I was but feet away. It was becoming harder to see her as my own eyes welled up, my arms instinctively coming around me to seek some form of comfort, yet the sight in front of me gave me no comfort at all. I had hurt Katie that afternoon and, as I sat watching the one person who had managed to breathe life back into me, I made a solemn promise to myself never to hurt her again. It was at her insistence that we did something about the dry spell we had both gone through. I would have argued that there are easier ways on the body to get over them, yet to her there was only one way. She knew the pain that drove me over two thousand miles from the family I thought I had, and was proving herself very determined to do something about easing it. ******* I held Katie tight to me that afternoon and evening. She made noises about making love before we slept, and for just a second my cock thought about rising to the occasion. The memory of her crying as she washed herself made me soft all too quickly. I had hurt Katie, and I felt like a pig. My refusal, and asking for a rain check, got me a smile and nod of her head. We did get up, and she even rummaged through my clothes looking for something. The grin made me realize she found what she was looking for, and her putting on one of my shirts and buttoning it up before we had something to eat did give me a smile for the rest of the evening. There is just something about a woman in one of our shirts, or even T-shirts, that makes them look as sexy as hell. The sight of Katie in the shower that day never left me, and served as a reminder that Katie wasn't indestructible. She insisted we sleep nude, and who was I to complain when she undid the buttons of that shirt and I watched it slide off her body? We cuddled and even fooled around in the morning, but the image of her in that shower was a reminder to me. Neither of us left my room over the shop that weekend. I was thankful that the phone never went off and sent me away from Katie. We made love late Saturday morning, and it was fun to see this woman truly bloom under a gentle touch. Oh, she could still make my ears ring when she came, but I always wanted to hear those little noises she makes again and again. Invariably we would end up in each other's arms, totally exhausted. However hard I tried to make her happy in bed, I also made sure she would never know that I made it my life's work to never see a repeat of that sight of her in the shower ever again. ******* It didn't take long for us to become common knowledge. In the end Katie put it out on the radio and the station's phone line simply jammed. That didn't bother the folks in this town; they simply walked into the radio station and said what they had to say to Katie in person. Beryl, sensing what was going to happen when she heard the announcement, sent me to Chester Grove to give Walter a helping hand for the day. The judge kept Katie busy that evening so, although I heard about the announcement via Walter and his own network of gossips that seemed to be able to pick up the radio station, I never got to hear about the fallout until I opened the shop and Beryl strolled in and promptly handed me all thirty-seven messages from well-wishers. Katie all but lived with me for the next couple of months, until we ended up having one of those conversations. It seemed Katie was happy with the way things were between us, but the sticking point was the living arrangements. The love of my life was a social girl, and it sure is impractical trying to have an open air barbeque in a room over a shop. Subtle hints were never this woman's forte. It was also one of those smart move moments on my behalf as well. I left it to Katie and Beryl to sort out, and between them they had us moved into a two bedroom and God alone knows how many square feet worth of house, just two hundred yards from Beryl and Jordon's place, within six weeks. The house-warming party alone took up the front and back lawn; I did my best to ignore the smug "I told you so" look coming from Katie for the rest of the day. ******* "Katie, it's Marlene. There's some woman looking for your man; she's been showing his picture around the place. So far she's being treated like an outsider, but I figure someone's going to give her something that may lead her to where she wants to go." "Talk to her, Marlene. Send her over to the Kinkaids' place - John and Patti are off visiting their son in the city and won't be back until the end of the week." "You've got it, Katie. Do you want me to call the Sheriff?" "No. It's fine Marlene, I can handle it. We'll see you and Danny at uncle Toby's barbeque on Sunday, OK?" "You betcha, honey. I'll just go over and talk to this woman now. You best be quick and hop on over to John and Patti's." Even as the phone dropped back onto the cradle Katie rushed to her car. The mid-afternoon traffic was light, and she just managed to park her car behind John's garage and make herself comfortable on one of the porch rockers before the car came around the corner and stopped at the gate. Although she had never seen a picture of Mandy, she knew her instantly from Daniel's description of her. Katie's first instinct was to get up off the swing and meet her at the steps. Even as she placed her hand on the swing to lift herself off Mandy smiled and waved her back again. "The woman at the diner said you may know where my husband is?" "Out of your reach would be my best guess." Mandy paused for a moment, looking closer at the woman on the rocker. "No one is going to let me talk to him, are they?" "He's not yours anymore, Mandy, so go back home and pick up where you left off. Leave him alone; he's come a long way since the day he came to town. Seeing you again will hurt him too much, and I just can't let you do that." "I'm his wife; I have rights." Katie watched the anger in her eyes and brushed it off. "He had rights too. One of them was that you gave your body to him and him alone; we both know how that one worked out, don't we?" It was plain to see that this woman wasn't going away. Katie watched as she sighed and seemed to deflate a little, then looked at the steps and moved once again towards them. Katie tensed until Mandy eased herself down and sat on the top step, her back resting against one of the supports. "You look at me like I'm a whore. I'm not, you know." The temptation to answer in the affirmative was close to overwhelming as both women sat and stared at each other. Yet something undefined crossed Mandy's face, a tear welled up in her eyes, and she barely managed to pull a tissue from her pants pocket in time to stem its journey down her cheek. "I knew he was my soul-mate the second we met in college. He didn't get my virginity, but I made sure he got everything else I could give him. I never refused him, even when it was my time of the month. He may never have got my pussy, but I made sure he got the use of my ass and mouth. That's how much I loved that man." Katie didn't want to know any of this. All she had seen when he came to town was a broken man, whose trust of anything with tits and a pussy was minimal at best. She damn near wet herself the time she was doing Marlene a favor and took breakfast to some guy the Sheriff had in lock-up. When he came out of the bathroom bare-chested and running a towel over his hair, all she could think to say was "breakfast," and then he talked back. She had never been stumped for words before, yet her own tongue betrayed her to the point where she felt she was embarrassing herself, so she ran out of the jailhouse. She knew she had found her man, and he was it. No one, not even he, was going to stop her, and the campaign started almost immediately. "He doesn't know; at least, I've never told him, and since he never mentioned it to me I doubt he has figured it out." She tried to ignore Mandy's comment, yet the riddle within it became all consuming. Both women watched each other: who was going to blink first? Finally Mandy broke eye contact and continued. "I had decided that I wanted his children a year into our relationship at college. He was my world and I was his, but without telling him I came off the pill. I planned to tell him that it was one of those things when he got me pregnant, yet for the next two years I practically raped him whenever he came within arms' distance of me and nothing happened." Even though she tried not to, Katie could feel herself being drawn into listening to this woman. "After two years, and still no baby, I played detective. I told him we were using condoms for the evening because I wanted to see if he could last longer with one on. Once he spat into it and tied it off he tossed it into the bin. When he went to the bathroom I pulled it out and hid it." None of what Mandy was saying made any sense, yet something made her sit and continue to listen. "The next morning I went and got myself and his sperm checked out." Katie's mind screamed. She was also fighting the urge to get up and punch this vile woman. "He's sterile; my soul-mate can't father children. I was sneakier when I spoke to his mom. It seems he had mumps as a child; a bad case apparently. But I didn't care, he was mine now, and I would do whatever it took to make sure he stayed mine, and perhaps that was my downfall. I knew in my heart that whatever he wanted I would make sure he got. He had already had every hole in my body, a thing I believed no man would ever have, yet one look at him and I knew this body belonged to him." "It's just a shame it belonged to someone else as well for the length of your marriage." Mandy didn't even flinch. Her ability to define what was her husband's and her lover's became real clear. "Not all of it; he never got my ass. I told him that was a deal breaker. If he stuck it in there it meant we were done." The silence was longer this time, the gaping chasm between them clear to both. "I want him back. His children miss him and I need my soul-mate in my bed again." "Why? So you can continue to hang horns on him?" The flush around her cheeks was the only indication Mandy had even heard her. "We had an ideal world for ten years. He has the children he always wanted, and a wife who stood by him and made it happen for him. Knowing that he was sterile wouldn't have done us any good, so I did what I had to do to keep my soul-mate happy. Charlie and I had defined rules: they were never his children, they were my husband's. He was the sperm donor and that was it." The Wednesday Couple Katie could feel the muscles in her back tense. Her own anger was close to exploding all over this... this thing sitting in front of her. "Yet you kept seeing him all through your marriage." It was Mandy's turn to shrug and a hint of a smile escaped her lips. "My husband had the children he always wanted, so I decided to have something I always wanted: Charlie's cock. It really is amazing and fits so well. But I allowed myself that pleasure only twice a month; after all, any more than that and I would be cheating on my soul-mate, and that would never happen." Katie realized that as soon as this woman left she would have to bleach the whole porch. She couldn't allow John and Patti to become infected with whatever this loathsome creature had. She realized that Mandy had said something: her ears may have picked it up but her brain refused to listen. Mandy noticed that look of confusion and spoke again. "He will want children from you. I can see in your eyes that you love him as much as I do, and you will do just what I did to make that man of ours happy. You may fight it longer than I did because it's your nature, but you know now that he's sterile. Even with the love you have for him you will give that man what he wants, and that is a happy home life and children." Mandy stood and moved towards the porch steps. Katie knew by the look on her face that she had one more parting shot. "Men like him glow in that environment. Believe me, I watched him puff his chest every chance he got. He's a natural father, and he will love the children you give him with all his heart. It is a big heart, so pick your sperm donor with great care and make sure they look like him. Just make sure that you don't get too involved with the sperm donor. Remember more than twice a month is cheating on him." Even as she watched Mandy walk towards her car she just knew she couldn't move. No wonder he left her; no wonder he had hated anything that had tits attached to it. No wonder it took her so long to get him to ask her on a date. Ten years with that sociopath of a wife. ******* "Katie, honey, KATIE! Are you OK, sweetie?" Marlene nudged her friend once more, worried that this wasn't the Katie she knew. She hadn't even acknowledged her when she walked up the path and sat next to her. Katie's eyes seemed locked on the gate and the vacant parking space beyond. A solitary tear trickled down her cheek. Marlene dabbed at the tear on her friend, and she was scared. All through high school this girl had more cojones than most of the men, and here she was staring off into space crying to herself. "I saw the devil today, Marlene. It had a pussy and tits, and for ten years it was married to my man. No wonder he was a basket case the day he came here. That bitch played with his mind, his hopes and his mental well-being." She took a deep breath and finally broke her stare, looking instead at the porch and the spot where that woman had sat. "I need to bleach the porch, Marlene. I can't let that woman infect us all." Marlene both helped and watched over her friend through the coming days. As each succeeding day came and went, Katie's spirits seemed to return, and eventually the whole incident became nothing more than a blip in history. ******* "It's another sunny day out there! Yes, folks, that's the weather forecast for this Tuesday morning, courtesy of Clarksville Radio! And Daniel, honey, this is for you." As Katie dropped the power to the microphone and upped the power to the record, the phone next to her flashed in silent ringing. Katie picked it up, her attention now divided between the music and the voice of her friend. "Hey Katie." Even those two words put her on alert. Marlene was totally see-through where she was concerned; something was up. It still took a moment for her friend to proceed. "Katie, honey, I have a man here that says he has to talk to you." "Marlene, why is some man standing in front of you and hasn't come over here to talk to me?" The pause was longer this time and Katie was even more intrigued. "I'm sorry, sweetie. I asked him the same question, and all he says is that Mandy sent him and he was only to contact you through me." Her stomach felt like it was going to lose its breakfast. "Stick him in the corner, Marlene, and can you make sure you give us some room." "Will do honey. And Katie? He's wearing a suit." As the song wound down Katie placed another disc into the machine, and her voice went out over the airwaves as though the drama in her life at the moment wasn't even happening. It took her a minute for her eyes to adjust to the room's lighting, as Marlene pointed to a man sitting in the furthest corner of the diner. Katie's own voice came over the radio as she walked towards the table. The suit stood as Katie got to him, his hand already outstretched. Katie held onto the chair, not even caring if she was being rude. The suit could clearly see the woman was thinking the worst: perhaps she had every right to. "Miss Whitmore, I'm here at the request..." "I know who you represent, and I ain't buying what she's selling." The man sat down and waved at the seat Katie was hanging onto. "Please, Miss Whitmore, hear me out before you..." This time Katie leaned over the chair, her eyes giving away the pure anger she felt right at that moment. "No. You tell her to go to hell." "She's already there, Miss Whitmore, or pretty close to it; maximum security, in fact. Doing twenty to life: it's why I'm here." The anger quickly evaporated, to the point she felt her own legs grow weak at the revelation that Mandy was in jail, and she had to sit down. This time the suit introduced himself, and for the next hour he talked and occasionally placed his hand into his case to pull out a file to show her. Marlene would notice her friend's facial expressions, and made it her mission in life to keep them both topped up with coffee and keep everyone out of earshot. Katie finally stood up. The suit held out his hand and she shook it before he left. The urge was there to ask, but Marlene had known Katie all her life. Katie would tell her when she was ready, and not before. ******* I was out back when I heard Beryl talking to someone, then the familiar voice that was attached to the love of my life was leaning against the door to my workshop. "Hey, lover! I'm going to be heading home soon, so I just thought I would pop in to see you before I left. I have to go out of town for a couple of days; something came up that I have to attend to." The sound of Katie's voice in the middle of introducing another song came over the radio as I watched the owner of the voice look at me. My first instinct was to wrap my arms around her: she looked sad, and yet tried her best not to show it. "Are you OK?" Katie seemed to think about the answer before saying. "It's been a real long day, and I just can't see it getting any better for awhile. I have to go see Daddy before I pack." "Then go see the judge. I will let Beryl go early, and she can swing by our place and make us dinner." The voice that floated in from the front of the shop made even Katie smile. "I'm not your God damn slave! If you're letting me go early then I'm going home to cook for my own, not for you." As Katie moved away from the door, the smile still on her lips, she came over and kissed me. As our lips parted the smile was still there, but seemed forced. "You two are going to go too far one of these days. Just remember she can kill you with her bare hands." Beryl's hearing was as sharp as ever. "Won't be worth it. I would be out of a job and his life insurance expired last week." Katie giggled on the way out the door, the two girls talking, or I should say whispering, for a minute before she left. It took about five minutes before I got up and walked over to the door. Beryl was still moving stuff around on the shelves. "If I asked, would you tell me what's troubling Katie?" Beryl paused, but refused to turn around. Eventually she went back to shifting things on the shelf. The voice that left her lips was the softest I had heard from her since we had known each other. "Nope, that's down to her to do. But that girl loves you as much as I love my man." Once Beryl had finally put what she had in her hands on another shelf. She turned and looked at me, then her hand went to her hair and she pulled it away from the side of her face, exposing the burn all down one side of her face and neck. "My scars are all on the outside. At the moment Katie's are on the inside. But when they come out you better love her all the more for what's she's doing." I never did see Katie when I got home. She left a note saying she couldn't wait, and that time was against her. I read that damn note several times over the evening, but it still made no sense. Over the next couple of days she would phone, but the conversation between us seemed a little forced, even though we always ended the conversation with an "I love you," both knowing that we did. The judge disappeared three days later. That was the talk of the town for a day or so; Judge Whitmore hadn't left town in over ten years. He told everyone that he had everything he needed here, so why would he leave? Beryl's time at the shop increased by a couple of hours, even though the work hadn't increased, so I got the feeling that she was keeping an eye on me while Katie was gone. When I asked Katie on one of our phone calls she laughed and called me paranoid. The next talk of the town was the judge coming back two weeks later. For the first week of his return I didn't see him. He told everyone that he had a backlog of work to do, and locked himself in his office. This was Clarksville, and crime for us consisted of one town drunk that the Sheriff let sleep it off in the cell on Friday and Saturday nights, and a bunch of college kids that took a wrong turn on the freeway and stopped at the diner for something to eat before moving on. One was brave enough to slap Marlene's ass on the way past, and the townsfolk in the diner at the time got upset about it and decided to help Marlene out. That day was the first time the Sheriff had to pull his gun out of its holster. I thought that was going to make front page news in our town. Clarksville radio station was still broadcasting; young Emmett Bowden took over from Katie. For the first hour the power went to his head and he played all sorts of stuff; he called it Garage and Rap. We all thought he was talking about where we put the car at night, but he calmed down when Beryl said she needed to go out for a minute on an errand. She came back with a smile on her face and Emmett started playing stuff we all knew. Beryl still phoned him once a day, and within ten minutes her song to Jordon would go out over the airwaves. When Emmett calmed down he was actually really good, but he wasn't Katie, and everyone in town was missing her. Me more than anyone, of course, but I'm selfish - after all, she loved me and I loved her right back, so in my mind I missed her the most. The evenings were the hardest. I trusted Katie, but that still left me wondering what was keeping her away from us for so long. She did eventually put me out of my misery when she told me that things were finally going her way and she would be back home in a day or so. She lied: it was actually three days. Beryl brought her boy in with her that day, though she got a call about mid-day and told me she was taking the rest of the day off. Things were on the slow side, so I didn't complain. Katie came into the shop two hours later, stood in the doorway, and said the words that I believe should be made illegal. "Honey, we need to talk." She emphasized those words by turning around and moving the sign across the shop door so it read "Closed." For someone who wanted to talk she kept her mouth shut until she was out back and had me sitting down. Even then she kept pacing and wringing her hands until I told her to stop walking around and spit it out. She smiled and eventually agreed with me, since she grabbed a chair on her last turn and placed it in front of me. Once she sat she glanced at me, her pain easy to see. That worried me; I had been where she seemed to be at the moment. Finally she grabbed my hands and held on. "A lot has happened over the last month to six weeks. I just hope you can hang in there and not come unglued." Instinct made me want to pull my hands away. Katie clamped her hands tighter. "Oh no you don't; this we have to get out in the open. I'm right in front of you, honey, and I'm not going anywhere. But things have to be said and settled right now." It was only when Katie felt me relax a little that she did the same. She forced a smile to her lips, and I eventually nodded my head for her to continue. "Your wife came to see you about six months ago. How she found you I don't know, but Marlene intercepted her and sent her to me. You were over in Chester Grove helping Walter out for a couple of days while his son was at the hospital. In her heart she knew you weren't going back to her. I think all she was doing was letting you know she knew where you were." Katie once again gripped my hands when she felt me start to shake, but she just kept on talking. She told me the conversation she had had with my wife, and then she looked really hard at me. "Daniel, it was a childhood illness and, now you know that, you'll have to live with the consequences for the rest of your life. You may be sterile, but that takes nothing from you as a man." The anger left me when I saw how much pain Katie was in. Every word that left her lips caused her to hang onto my hands even harder. Someone like Katie hated this conversation, yet she felt it had to come out. Her eyes and facial features seemed to be working overtime as she recounted the visit of my wife and the events that lead her to leave in such a hurry. Katie had debated telling me about my wife's visit, but decided it was best not to. Then came the visit from the lawyer. "Mandy is in jail, Daniel. She killed her lover." While I sat in shock at this piece of news, Katie talked. It seems that when Charlie found out I had left he tried to take up the space left by me. Mandy wasn't having it, and told him their deal still stood and that the children were still mine. When Mandy returned empty handed from wanting to bring me back, Charlie went full on. When he realized that Mandy was not going for a divorce he sent his own lawyers in to take his children away or, at least, his son. Mandy put up a fight with her own lawyer, and for a while things went her way, but money talks and Charlie had a lot of it. When she knew she would lose them she walked up to Charlie in the foyer of the Paradise Hotel, called him a bastard, and emptied a fully loaded gun into his chest. ******* It was just too much to take in at once. Katie just held onto me, waiting for everything to sink in. Neither one of us could clearly see the other through our tears. "Where are Sarah and Mark?" Katie was waiting for my question; her answer explained why she was away from me for so long. Mandy's lawyer came to see Katie, and told her everything at Mandy's insistence. Katie went to see Mandy in jail, and Mandy told her that she needed the children to be kept safe. Charlie was a self made man and had no family. Mandy knew that the only reason he wanted the children was for them to take over from him and continue his bloodline. To Mandy that was unacceptable; in her eyes they were, and always would be, mine. So between Judge Whitmore, Mandy and her lawyer, and a judge in my old home town, the paperwork was pushed through. "They are safe. Beryl is with them, and her boy has new friends to play with." This time the pressure on my hands left me and Katie stood. She held out her hand, but I couldn't move with so many questions still pounding in my head. Finally she sat on my lap, wrapped her arms around me, and buried her head into my neck. Her voice was muffled slightly, but I could still hear and understand her. "You can run, but you can't hide for long, honey. You have years of your life invested in those children. You're also sterile, so we can't have any of our own. I won't ever betray you like Mandy did, but Mandy has also given you three gifts on the condition that you never try to visit her in jail." I pulled my head away from hers so that I could see her more clearly. "She has to deal with her life in jail now, and said that she will refuse any visitors from now on. The three gifts she gives you are Mark, Sarah and an uncontested divorce, so that we can marry and get the children back into a stable family life as soon as possible." Katie still sat holding me. I'm not sure what sort of reaction she expected; I didn't know myself. With all the inevitable thoughts and fears jumbling around in my mind, the only thing stopping me from bolting home to see the kids, or losing my lunch in the bathroom, was that the love of my life still sat on my lap, constantly talking. It seems that Mandy became suspicious of Charlie and decided to keep an eye on him herself. She followed him to Mark's school, where he sat outside and watched her neighbor collect him and her own son. Charlie even followed them on to Chuck E. Cheese. Mandy believed then that she had no choice, more so since Charlie had made a point of telling Mandy a few days earlier in their last confrontation that he wanted his son, but she could keep the whiney girl for all he cared. So, under the guise of reconciliation, she asked to meet him at the hotel. I could see the irony of the meeting-place; the Paradise Hotel was the one place Charlie's guard would be down. Once she had killed him she even threw the gun at him before sitting down and waiting for the police. "She made me emphasize this point, Daniel: they are your children. In your haste to hate her you simply forgot that you are all they know as a father. They don't carry your genes, agreed, but you snuggled up to each of them when they were ill. You were the first to clap when they did something well." This time Katie did get up and hold her hand out. "Come home, Daniel, we both have work to do. Those two children need us both from now on, and living in Clarksville is going to help them. They are insulated now. Other than Daddy and Beryl, we are the only ones that know their past. When you get around to asking me to marry you, I will of course ponder on what I'm giving up." She grinned. "But I've been with those two children for the last three weeks, and lived with you for the last year, so I know what I have to gain." ******* Walking through the door at home brought a mixed bunch of emotions. Both the children were hesitant to begin with, and who could blame them? I hugged Beryl and thanked her before she left. Sarah dived at me, and clung to me like glue. It took Mark a while longer, but we all had over two years of life missing from each other. We talked and talked to catch up, and finally even Mark came around. Mandy's lawyer came by two days later with the paperwork; the judge looked it over and told me to sign. We left everything as it was for a month while the divorce went through and the children settled in, but both Katie and I knew we had to go back and sell the house and close everything down when we got there. Beryl and Jordon offered to look after the children, and Emmett leapt at the chance to look after the radio station. Goodwill became real busy for a few days as the house emptied after the "For Sale" sign went up, reducing Katie and me to inhabiting sleeping bags in Sarah's old room. I popped in to see my old boss to thank him, as well as introducing Katie to him. Within two weeks of walking into my old house we were driving away with ten boxes of clothes, photos and paperwork all stacked neatly in a U-Haul.