Chapter 1: The Essence of True Romance

My ad had been quite explicit:

“Saggy and wrinkly but still potent (well usually). Just turned 70 and determined to grow old disgracefully. Seeking hot young chick with grandfather fetish or older woman with sense of humour”

I had had a few responses, and now I was about to meet my first “date” and I was terrified! We had exchanged emails and some relatively modest and demure photos. She certainly wasn’t young, but had probably once been hot. A long time ago. Of course so had I. A very long time ago.

It had been a very very long time since I had had sex with anyone but myself. And that self relief had usually been accompanied by a sense of failure and regret. It was seventeen years since I had “given up” sexual relationships for what I had convinced myself was a spiritual quest. Seventeen years of trying to deny and sublimate my horniness. Seventeen years of trying to pretend that “Bramacharya” was a spiritual gift and that I wasn’t secretly lusting after every female I met.

Up until now. A fortnight earlier after a series of small epiphanies, I had severed my connection with my “guru”, renounced the vows I had made, and was once again a free agent. Free to start dating again anyway. No relationship. No ties. No expectations. Just back into dating.

Dating? Hell! – I just wanted to get laid. So I put the ad on an online site. And now here was Leslie, waiting in a booth in a café while I skulked anxiously by the counter in the next room, trying to pretend I was just an ordinary patron semi hiding behind a pillar and pot plant, checking her out, and telling myself all sorts of awful stories about how unattractive my 70 year old body had become, about how my dick no longer got as hard as it used to, and about how Leslie wouldn’t want a needy old man, no matter how good a lover I used to be.

Leslie looked about sixty. She was a small, trim woman who had clearly been quite striking when younger, and she still moved with the grace and poise that women seem to develop with lots of positive attention. She was dressed quite conservatively except for an oversized necklace/choker that looked as though it carried half a kilo of turquoise and silver.

I chuckled to myself about checking her out. Who was I kidding? I had been dreaming and fantasizing about sex with another person for seventeen years. Somebody? – Anybody! I would have happily offered my neck to Dracula’s grandma if I thought she was willing to have sex with me. And Leslie had answered my ad, and looked even better than her photo.

So I shook just a little and tried to ignore the butterflies in my gut as I headed towards her. She looked nervous too, but she smiled and motioned me to a seat opposite. Her voice was lower and deeper than I had imagined, and as we waited for some nibbles and coffees, we exchanged pleasantries and gradually relaxed with each other. A bit anyway.

By the time the coffee and nibbles were done I was having a good time. So was Leslie. We had checked out the preliminaries – neither available for a relationship – neither wanting exclusivity. But what did we each want? Years of stumbling and embarrassing experience as a young man had taught me that plain speaking was my best strategy so I came to the point pretty quickly.

“Ah ... Um ... Ah ... Um ... Ah I’m looking for a friend with benefits”. My words eventually tumbled out.

Leslie stiffened ever so slightly. I shrank a little inside. She grinned a bit - a real grin followed by a semi pout. She half tossed her head and her grey bob framed her neck “just so”. Nothing arch, nothing too coquettish, just the natural and almost unconscious flirting of the most popular girl in the class.

“What sort of benefits?” Her tone was teasing, but I suddenly knew I had her number. I was just the latest of the hundreds of boys and men she had flirted with. She had been an attractive baby, an attractive child, an attractive young teenager, and an attractive woman. Leslie had been dealing with men wanting her for at least half a century. She could flirt rings around me and stay completely in control of where the conversation went if I played that game. A direct approach was my best chance with this one.

“Start where we are, and move to some body contact, then to some skin, and then sex when we’re ready.”

That’s both ready?” Leslie’s half pout was back, so I thought I would up the ante in our little game.

“Yup – only when we’re both ready. Which are you?”

She frowned in some puzzlement for a second and I noticed the way her eyes crinkled at the corners. I decided to follow my advantage.

“The ad asked for a hot young chick with a grandfather fetish or an older woman with a sense of humour. So which are you?” I asked, being careful to keep my tone light and playful. It was a “come on” pure and simple. I wasn’t serious about the “grandfather fetish” bit. I had never been serious about the “grandfather fetish” bit.

That was just to get a laugh. I have been around long enough to believe that there are very few young women with a fetish for old men, and even fewer that don’t have “issues” that make any “friends with benefits” arrangement pretty risky.

Leslie got very still. Not frozen, more very calm and determined.

“Can I be both? - I used to be a hot young chick and I’ve always liked older men”.

I was a little taken aback, and wondered if this was still a flirty game. But this woman was certainly a player, so I pressed on.

“That’s not quite a grandfather fetish”. I smiled, glancing over, expecting to see Leslie’s half pout again, but her face was serious and her gaze was level and eye to eye. She was still very contained but now she looked at me with quite an intense focus.

“I’ve been masturbating to an image of my grandfather’s erect penis since I was thirteen!” Her gaze stayed level, watching me closely across the table.

Holy Shit! She was serious! I had worked as a therapist for long enough to know that incest and abuse are always big deals. I was well retired, but perhaps I still had professional responsibilities here.

She must have seen my reaction in my face, because she reddened and then pulled her body upright.

“No – nothing like that.” she mumbled, and suddenly she couldn’t quite meet my eye. “He never touched me – he never even looked at me that way ... I just...” Leslie blushed deeper under her tan and trailed off. Then she looked at me keenly, and after a couple of seconds seemed to come to some decision.

“I’m sorry ... I thought you wanted someone who turned on to old men...” she trailed off again and got up quite hurriedly. “I’d better go...”

Bugger! My first “date” was going sideways, I had no idea how to recover the situation, and years of experience with clients was no help at all. I had a well-practiced professional response that was safe, detached, attentive, and caring. But that had nothing to do with what was really happening inside me. I didn’t know or care what I ought to do. I was elated and fascinated and excited and very scared by what I had just heard, and I wanted to explore where Leslie’s revelation could lead. I was also turning on really strongly. I could feel my glans rubbing against the fabric of my briefs as my cock stirred. Perhaps my wrinkly veiny old body really could be an asset.