“And this time,” Gwen said over the phone, “try to be on time.” This was my weekend for Tim. She was bringing him to his soccer game, and I was taking him from there and to camp on Sunday. It had been weeks since I’d been late, but she wasn’t about to let me forget it. Once, Gwen had reminded me of all my faults regularly. The divorce had put a crimp in her schedule, but she did her best to keep up.

Since soccer was important to Tim, it was important to me. I got to the field before the game started. I went over to Gwen. Even bundled up, she was the sexiest woman I had ever seen. If she would have kept her lips zipped, I would have kept my pants zipped, and Tim would be spending every weekend in the same house.

“I’m here,” I told her. “You can stop worrying.”

“Hal’s here. Why don’t I find that statement reassuring?”

“Well, I’ll take it back. You never stop worrying.” The kids ran out on the field, then, and we turned to watch the play. Tim got the ball, and I watched more closely. He seemed surrounded by the other team. Suddenly, he took advantage of an opening I hadn’t seen. He kicked the ball straight across the field to a teammate.

“Good shot!” I called. I’m not one of those soccer parents who think they can coach. I do, however, cheer. Sometimes I even cheer his teammates.

“It was a pass,” said Gwen, “not a shot.” I ignored her.

The teammate, Rick, had a clear shot -- Gwen would have said a clear pass -- at the goal. He took it, and the opposition goalie was just a second too late.

“Goal!” I cheered. Gwen was cheering, too, not correcting me. The game went on. Soccer is like chess; the game is as much about what one side threatens and the other side prevents as it is about what either side does. Tim’s coach tells them to use their heads as much as their legs. At the end, Tim’s team won 3 to 2. They gathered around his coach for a few final words. Gwen turned to go.

“Well,” I said. “Have a nice time -- a nice time with Pete, isn’t it?”

“I’ll have a great time, but alone, not with Pete. I learned better than to stick with irresponsible men. He had nearly as many faults as you, without your advantages in bed.” She walked away quickly as Tim was coming towards us. Soccer is not like football where you have to change afterwards. We try to act friendly when he’s with both of us, and we both find that an effort.

“Great assist,” I told Tim in the car.

“Did you see me steal the ball from that big guy?” He was more interested in his defensive play. That one hadn’t resulted in a goal. The other guys had got the ball back before his team could score.

“I saw that you had. From where I was standing, I could see your body and the ball. I really couldn’t see any feet.”

“You were standing with Mom.” He was supposed to have been keeping his attention on the game.

“Yeah.”

“You don’t think you could... ? That Pete guy’s gone.”

“That Dad guy’s gone, too, and he’s been gone a lot longer.”

“I thought you were here.”

“I’ll always be here for you. I’m no longer there for her. Look, lots of times we tell you that you’ll understand something when you get older. Well, this you won’t. Nobody but the people involved understand why they get together; nobody but them understand why they split apart.” That might have been a little white lie. I would bet anything that Pete knew what had attracted me to Gwen.

The rest of Saturday was fun and pizza. Sunday was fun, too, though the apartment where I presently live is so small that I couldn’t quite ignore Tim’s cartoon shows. I drove him to camp that afternoon, and started back about sunset. I normally give Gwen the support checks when I return Tim, so I called her up after dinner.

“Hope I’m not interrupting anything,” I started out. She still gets jealous, and I don’t want her to think that I do, too.

“No. I was just enjoying the quiet. Everything okay?”

“He got there on time, in good health, and without an accident.”

“And, apparently, you got back okay, too.”

“Want me to bring the check over?”

“That wasn’t what I meant. I still worry about you, too.” I’ll believe it. She worries about everyone. When she drives by strange kids playing on the sidewalk, she’s afraid that they’ll suddenly run into traffic.

“I didn’t claim that it was. I just called to see if the way was clear for me to bring over the check.”

“Sure. I’m not dressed for company, though.”

“I’ve seen worse.” I had, after all, seen her through several bouts of flu and a pregnancy. She was dressed in a quite pretty, and sexy-without-being-revealing, robe when I got there. She had taken off her makeup because the day was over. Then she had put on fresh lipstick because I was coming over. I know how she does things; she probably knows my habits, too.

“He was not only healthy but happy when I left him,” I reported. That was no guarantee that he was still happy, a ten year old at camp at the end of the day. Actually, he was probably asleep by now. “Tim’s a good kid.” The only thing I could say that was guaranteed to get her agreement.

“That he is.”

“We did one thing right.”

“We did plenty of things right, Hal, just not enough of them. Want a beer? I bought a six-pack, and I want to finish them before Tim gets back.” She had 2 weeks, well 13 days. Only Gwen would think that having one can for every two days meant that she needed help.

“Why, thank you. There’s no rule, you know, that you can’t have beer in the house when he’s here. I have hard stuff.”

“But you don’t drink it when he’s around.” Tim must have told her, which means that she had to have asked. Not drinking is something that kids don’t notice. Hell! When was the last time that you noticed someone not doing something?

“Well, no. I prefer to drink with somebody. Somehow, sharing a drink with a kid who has a Coke goes better if I have a Coke, too.”

“So share a beer.” She went into the kitchen and returned with two open cans. I gave her the check, and she put it in the handbag which was sitting on the living-room end table. We sat at the dining room table sipping and saying nothing. Really, everything had been said years ago. Well, almost everything.

“He was really not as good in bed as I was?” I asked.

“Hal, you were always great in bed. I have a little helper in my dresser drawer, but you were much better. If I could have kept you in the dresser drawer, I would never have asked for a divorce.” Great! Now I knew where I rated, a little higher than her vibrator. Then, too, I could remember that vibrator, and I felt a little stirring in my pants from that memory.

“That’s the story of our marriage. We were great until we got out of bed.” She smiled at my evaluation. “Well, back then I said you were the hottest woman I’d ever seen, and you still hold the record.”

“Not Candy?” Some people forgive and forget. Gwen never did either.

“Trying to have her, too, was a blunder. I never wanted to have her instead of you.” Actually, Candy had been a blunder all the way around, but that incident had been like the period at the end of this sentence. It marked that the marriage was over, but it wasn’t what made it over.

“Well, you’d been warned.” I had been warned -- about cheating and about lots of other things. Gwen never saw that the warnings hadn’t been preserving our marriage; they’d been eroding it.

“Yeah. Once I wondered whether the sex was worth the mouth. Well now, I still get the mouth. I just don’t get the sex.” The worst of both worlds.

“You’re between women?” That was one way to put it. I had struck out with the last two. I wasn’t going to tell her that. I’d struck out with her, too.

“Yeah. Tim tell you?”

“He didn’t like ‘that Marge woman.’” Tim had made that very clear. I’d have tried to stop his annoying her if I hadn’t known that he was doing it quite deliberately. Even so, I wasn’t crazy about Marge’s going on and on about how annoying my son was. She had drawn parallels between Tim and his father.

“He didn’t like ‘that Jerry guy,’ either.”

“Good taste. He may have better taste than his parents.” Gwen paused and drew a breath. “Well, you’re between women, and I’m between men...”

“Should we cry on each others’ shoulders?”

“That’s one possibility. I could get consolation out of my dresser drawer.” I hardened at my picture of her using that vibrator. She was watching me, so I couldn’t reach down to adjust my pants, even though the table would have hidden my hand. Damn! I’d used the vibrator on her. She’d put on more than one show with the vibrator in front of me after she had used me up. The vibrator she had now was probably different from the one I pictured, but we had been good together.

“You’re saying that to torture me,” I said. My tone showed that the torture had worked. She got up. Erection or no, I got up. This had once been my home, but she had since made it very clear to me that my welcome here was limited and conditional. When she opened the door, I wanted it to be the gesture of a hostess seeing me off rather than an order to leave. But she didn’t go to the door.

“Well, if you can’t see another possibility, then you deserve the torture,” she said from the stairs. I followed her up. If Gwen looked hot even standing bundled in a coat, she looked hot as hell with the robe swaying over her flexing butt. I followed that wagging tail as I had followed it so many times. I stamped on the stairs so she couldn’t claim to be surprised, but she didn’t look around. She went directly to our room -- well, her room now -- and turned on the light. When I was inside, she shut the door. The decor said that it was her room -- mostly pink and yellow rather than the royal blue and white that she had chosen for us. There were two chairs, both dinky. Well, Pete might have been in her room and in her bed, but it clearly hadn’t been their room.

I put my finger under her chin, and she raised her mouth for the kiss. I ran my hands though her hair while our lips met. Then I pulled her tight into my kiss as my tongue plundered her mouth. Her tongue was sweet, and her breasts were soft against me. She had so much sweetness in her mouth, and so much bitterness came out of it. I eased off the kiss so we could breathe.

“When you kiss me like that,” she said, “I feel as though I’d been raped.”

“Not yet.” I started on my clothes. She watched for a minute before starting on her own. “I was wrong. Going up the stairs with your butt twitching isn’t when you look sexiest,” I said when she was bare. There was more to Gwen now than there had been when we’d married -- her breasts rode lower now -- but all of it was sexy as hell. One place where there was a little less was her pubic hair. “You trimmed it again?”

“I go swimming Saturdays when you have Tim.” While she was saying that, I finished undressing.

“Well, like this, I’m not missing seeing you in your bikini.” She is damn sexy in a swim suit, but not as sexy as she is out of it.

“I’m a mother of a ten year old, Hal. I wear a one-piece now. You had the years when I looked sexy.”

“I wish! You still look hotter than hell.” And, while she did look hot, I knew that she had more heat than her looks. I crossed the space between us and kissed her again. While my tongue was exploring her mouth, my hands reclaimed the body I had lost so long ago. When we broke the kiss, I bent down and lifted her in my arms.

“Hal!” she said, but her arms were around my neck. I lifted her so I could kiss a breast while I carried her to the bed. “The spread,” she said. When I set her on the bed, she rolled over to the other side and got up. She pulled the bedspread off to the side and folded it before putting it on a chair. She folded the top sheet at the foot of the bed. This tidiness now frustrated me. At the same time, her movements showed her nakedness off in even sexier ways. She got into bed and lifted her arms to me. I climbed into bed and into that hug.

While we kissed, I glided the backs of my nails down her belly. When I parted her lips and stroked a finger up her groove, I found her moisture.

“Yes,” she said. Then she pulled me back into the kiss. This time her tongue was the aggressor. I did my exploring further down. I stroked her moisture upward, but stopped short of her clit. When she let go of my head to reach her other hand towards my cock, I broke the kiss. I went directly to her nipple. It had been a while for me, and I didn’t know how long I could last. I licked the nipple and stroked the clit while she tensed.

“Oh!” she said. Gwen has never been a screamer. I sucked on her nipple while she writhed.

When she fell back, I abandoned her nipple. Getting between her legs, I started on a thigh and kissed a path upwards. As I approached her cunt, I could smell her arousal. She had always smelled sexier than other women did. My cock twitched at every sniff. Then I buried my nose in her bush while I licked up those juices. They tasted bitter, but sexy as hell.