Chapter 19

“I found out today that he’s dating Denise’s sister,” said Rodney. “Denise told me. Cross your fingers.”

“Really! Thank God,” said Claire. “Oh and consider them crossed!”

“Yes, for damn sure,” he said.

“Serious?” she said.

“Who knows? Probably too soon. But, Denise says that they went our four days in a row last week, so...” he said, leaving his words hanging in the air.

“Oh man, maybe we caught a lucky break. She is pretty, very pretty. And, they do have you know what in common,” she said.

“Yeah, they’re both heroes who lost body parts becoming one,” he said.

“Yes, our hero got his legs cut off saving us. Kind of gives us bragging rights don’t yuh think!” she said.

“I guess. But all I can think of is how bad it would be if she eventually shines him on. I mean like Nadine did. It’s looking good right now, but as nervous as he doubtless is, I’m even more nervous!” said Rodney.

“Yes, I see what you mean,” she said. “I just crossed my toes too.”

“Good idea, I’ll join you,” he said, and he wasn’t smiling.

“On another score, Rebecca asked me about him yesterday,” she said. “I think she misses him at least on some level. He doesn’t call or ask to visit or email her or anything. He answers her calls when she makes them and that has happened twice since the barbecue last month. But he makes no such moves on his own. I think she is beginning to realize just how hurt he was that time he heard her talking to Jill.”

“I don’t know. He’s her daddy. He knows teenagers say and do dumb things. I can’t believe he’s holding on to those kinds of bad feelings this long,” he said.

She shook her head. “Maybe not, but I’m mildly concerned that he might be. His feelings are still, even after all this time, so delicate so raw. I mean you know,” she said. Just then there was a commotion at the front door.

“You mean since the divorce,” he said.

“Yes, since the divorce. Him losing his legs to save us just kind of compounded everything. But now with this Ann woman, maybe...”

“Yes, well that is the hope,” he said.

Date number nine was at the Crossroads. I’d set up camp at the Randall Arms, my old stomping grounds. I’d made the move back to the Valley because and only because of my new relationship with Ann.

Until this night, the only ones who knew about my new old address were the Traynors; they’d seen me at church and we’d talked. They were more than supportive of my relationship with my new woman.

At any rate the two of us awaited my buds, Sammy and Henry. I was feeling good. Nothing like a woman to make a guy’s day. I hadn’t even thought about Claire in any meaningful way in days; that had to be a positive for sure.

“Here they are,” I said, as Sam and Henry sidled up to us. “Have a seat guys.” They sat, and I slid an inch or two closer to Ann.

“Sam, Henry, this is Ann Rogers the prettiest girl in the place,” I said. The two men hey-hey’d me for the next couple of minutes.

Our conversation and drinking and laughing and nonsense went on for an hour plus.

“Anyway, you two met at the Pollard’s place?” said Sammy. “That is one heckuva coincidence for sure.”

“Yes it was,” I said. “I mean go figure.” He gave me a look that I could not figure out.

“Sam?” I said.

“Nothing,” he said. “Just a helluva a coincidence, like I said.” I nodded. But, now I was thinking and my thoughts weren’t good thoughts. I put them out of my head for the time being.

The four of us partied for some time. Colleen joined us near the end, around 11:00 P.M.: she’d had shift duty at the hospital or she would have been with us earlier.

The night ended and the van delivered us to her place first. We were in the back seat. As the vehicle came to a stop, I got the sweetest kiss I’d ever gotten or so it seemed to me.

“That was something,” I said. I leaned into her, and I gave her one back. It had a lot of passion in it too a lot of stored up passion.

“And so was that,” she said. I smiled a smile I hadn’t smiled in forever.

Back at my place, I mulled over what Sammy had sort of suggested while we were at the Crossroads. Could Ann have been a set up by Claire or more likely Rodney to get me a woman? And what if one or the other of them had set me up? It was a hell of a coincidence, but Ann had said, or at least implied, that Rodney did not know of her injuries prior to meeting her for the first time at the barbecue. And, how should I react if it had been a set up? I had no intention of breaking off whatever it was that I had with Ann. Oh no, I’d actually come to the realization that I needed her.

But what might be real bad: what if Ann had been influenced in doing this, being with me, to get me to feel human again but had every intention of dumping me down the line. I couldn’t believe that the two cheaters would stoop that low, but then again, they’d stooped way lower than that more than once. Oh yeah, they were capable of a stunt like that. But, with all that had happened in recent years the true fact was that I doubted that they would go that far this late in the game. I did, however, think it more than plausible that one or the other or both of them might have set it up for me to meet with her that was a very large possibility. I’d be finding out as soon as I could.

“I took a flyer yesterday and stopped by the Salvation Army office,” said Claire.

“Oh,” he said.

“Yes, I asked if they’d heard from Jim in the last few weeks. I mean, apart from hearing that Jim and the new girl, Ann, were dating we haven’t heard anything from or about him per se,” she said.

“Okay?” he said.

“He’s moved back into town for sure. I know you thought that he might because it would be closer for him to be with his new woman if that’s what she is,” she said. “And, well, he has.”

The man smiled. “I’ve avoided calling him knowing how little he wants to be around us, but I will now. Maybe we can even go out with them or something. You know kind of support him, them.”

“Yes,” she said, “that’s a good idea.”

“I like your place,” I said. “I see you’ve made some effort to make it more easily accessible to folks like us.”

“Well yeah,” said Ann, “kind of a logical thing to do dontcha think.”

“Yeah for sure. I’ve done it too, but not as much as you. I mean I’m renting at the Randall Arms. Not allowed to do all that much there, the rules you know,” I said. He’d toured the three bedroom ranch style and now they were seated together on the couch in the front room. There was a large screen TV across from them but it wasn’t on. Television was not the order of the day, evening.

I had my afghan across my lap. Yeah I was still self-conscious about my missing legs. Well, my stumps didn’t look good and that was the long and the short of it, no pun intended.

She’d dimmed the lights, had one of those dimmer switches that some people have in their homes. If I ever got my own place I made a mental note to have one of those installed too.

I was nervous and she must’ve realized it: she took the lead. By lead, I mean she leaned in and kissed me.

“Wow! Man-oh-man!” I said, really more like whispered.

“Been a little while since I’ve kissed a man in a darkened room, actually a long while,” she said.

“Trust me as far as that’s concerned, I figure I’ve got the bragging rights,” I said. “I’m quite sure it’s been a lot longer for me since I’ve tasted a woman’s lips. Oh, and if you had any doubts about it, yours are flat wonderful!” She smirked.

“Well, thank you for that,” she said. “Dare I ask, how long has it been for you?”

“About eight years,” I said. And, until tonight I had no hope of ever getting another romantic kiss again. My legs...”

“Hmm, yes they are a draw back. I do know something about that. It’s been almost a year since my husband dumped me,” she said. I nodded.

“Do you miss the guy, what’s his name?” I said. She gave me a curious look.

“Hmm, his name is Carl, Carl rogers. And no, not since I realized what a bum he was. When a man treats his woman the way he treated me, well, he loses a lot of his allure if you know what I mean,” she said. I nodded.

“I know exactly what you mean. But for me the hurt has never really faded. Too many elements to the betrayals to forgive and forget,” I said.

“I understand,” she says. “In my case I just made the decision to never speak to the asshole again and get on with my life.”

“I’ve tried to do that, but the bunch of them keep bringing me back to heel. And, there is the fact of my daughter, as you’ve pointed out,” I said.

“Yes, your situation is different for sure,” she said.

“Yes, yes it is,” I said.

“Anyway, maybe we should get down to business, whaddya think?” she said. I smiled what I was sure was a truly a winsome smile at her words.

“I think you’ve got a seriously good idea there,” I said. “Oh yeah!”

I leaned in once again and kissed her. It was such an animalistic thing to do. And, I felt like an animal, a tiger in search of a tigress, and she was it!

She was wearing a long sleeved lavender dress that fell below her knee. My hand was resting on that knee and she didn’t object. It, my hand, began to slowly inch its way up her thigh. I was almost fainting from the intoxication of the smell of her. She tasted like juicy-fruit when I kissed her and smelled like jasmine in spring time when I nuzzled her neck.

The two of us were sure as heck missing a lot of flesh and bone, but at that moment it didn’t make a darn bit of difference. My hand paused not two inches from her pussy and massaged, gently massaged, the flesh near it. She was actually panting and dribbling spit from the side of her mouth which I mopped up with my tongue. Our faces smelled acidic from all of our kissing and sucking and licking.

I pressed my luck, I pushed her panties to the side and cupped her labia, and the feeling I got was so personal so wonderful so almost a new thing that I could have died at that moment and had no regrets. But, I didn’t die and I pushed a finger as deep as I could inside of her. She shivered a little but her eyes were closed and her arm dangled motionless at her right side. I pulled my finger out and sucked her woman juice from it.

Her eyes opened and she leaned in and kissed me. Her hand wandered down to the front of my pants and squeezed my steel hard manhood.

“I see your little man is ready for me,” she whispered.

“Oh my yes,” I said. She unbuckled my pants and pulled my zipper down. The one thing I didn’t want was to take my abbreviated pants completely off. I wanted her to pull them down but not off. She seemed to get it and did exactly as I hoped she would: down but only almost off. She played with my sex for a few moments and then leaning down she took me in her mouth. My God the woman was a true expert at driving a man totally over the top!