Chapter 1

Carol Walker sat at the dining room table, cupping her coffee in both hands and staring out the dining room window. How had she gotten to this point? she wondered. She wasn’t always this despondent ... in fact, there had been many happy times and wonderful memories in her past. But those happy days were only that now – just memories.

She thought back to when Jack had proposed to her. It was like a fairy tale for her. Jack was Mr. Popularity ... the guy every girl wants and the guy every other guy wants to be. She couldn’t believe the day he first asked her out and then as time went on they got closer. Finally, after a year or so of dating, he popped the question.

Carol became Mrs. Jack Walker and she was the epitome of the happy housewife. She did everything for her husband – whatever he asked of her she would do or die trying. At first, she stayed home happy to be his homemaker. But when the cost of living made single-family incomes too hard, she gladly went to work to help out.

Then she learned she was pregnant with their first child and she had to stop working halfway into the pregnancy. After Thomas was born and she was able to, she went back to work in the commercial loan department of the bank balancing motherhood and her wifely duties with her work.

Then the girls came along – first Diane, three years after Thomas, and then a couple years later, Jenny. Now with three rapidly growing kids, she definitely had her hands full. But she made it work, and as he grew Thomas helped out as best he could around the house.

Jack did his part too, working hard to get promoted in his job and pulling in whatever overtime he could to help pay for his growing family. At first, it wasn’t too terribly hard – they managed and got everything paid each month.

Jack did get a promotion which helped and once the kids were old enough, Carol went back to work again full-time at the bank. They were very happy to have her back and the extra income helped their financial situation. Carol thought they had finally made it.

But it’s just when things are going too well that life has a tendency to kick you in the ass and it did to Carol big time. Jack had started working long hours at the office and even spent some Saturdays working to get ahead. Or so he said. Carol would learn after a few months of this hard work and long hours that it wasn’t work at all.

Bobby Sue was a painfully clichéd bleached blonde cocktail waitress at a bar that Jack frequented. With her big tits and small mind, he found her a delightful playmate who didn’t know the meaning of “no”. They began hooking up and he spent many happy hours between her easily spread legs.

One day Carol caught them together thanks to a helpful tip from a friend who had seen them together often. A huge fight ensued and Jack stormed out of the house, presumably to the waiting arms of Miss Peroxide.

The divorce went pretty much uncontested – Jack just wanted to start over so he consented to full custody of Jenny (Thomas was twenty and Diane was seventeen by then so they could make up their own minds and they chose to stay with Carol). He also walked away from the house and all their belongings, such as they were.

They didn’t have a whole lot and Jack wanted a clean break without the memories burdening him. Once everything was settled, he made a beeline for the border and moved out of state, never to be heard from again. Not that any of them were looking – they all knew whose fault this was and said good riddance to him.

Carol tried to put on a strong show for the kids. Even though they were older now and understood what had happened, she wanted to show them that it wasn’t the end of the world; that life goes on and you have to go with it. But it was just a show.

Inside Carol knew that her fairy tale had come to an end and not the happily-ever-after kind. Now she was a middle-aged divorced woman with three almost-grown kids, two of which lived with her. Not exactly a recipe for successful dating!

That was nearly a year ago. She looked up at the calendar and sighed. A whole year since she had sat across from him in the courtroom watching her “Prince Charming” ride off with another woman.

Carol finished her coffee and tried to get on with her day. It was Saturday so she had the day off and she planned on taking advantage of that to get some much-needed housework done. There was laundry piling up in the laundry room and the morning dishes to get done. There were beds to be made with fresh sheets and vacuuming too. A full plate of housework to be sure.

She had just put another load of laundry in the washer and was tidying up her bedroom when it happened. She went to put away her sleep mask in the nightstand drawer. She opened it and there, staring at her, were her wedding rings and a purple vibrator that was her only sexual partner these days.

The contradiction was more than she could take. Here was her happy old life and her sad current one both together, yet worlds apart. She collapsed on her bed, sitting with her face in her hands, sobbing uncontrollably.

Thomas had the day off as well. His current project was waiting for the inspectors to give him the go-ahead on the next phase of the construction and they didn’t work on the weekends. So he was at a standstill until Monday morning.

He decided to stop by the house and see how Mom was doing. He planned on taking her to lunch, seeing as how Diane was working and Jenny was away at the lake for the weekend with her best friend and her family.

He pulled up to the house and got out. He was in a pretty good mood, too. It was a nice day and he was taking his mother to lunch at a nice restaurant. He walked into the house without knocking – his mother had told him when he got his place, he could come over anytime and didn’t need to knock. So walking into the house like this was normal for him. But what wasn’t normal was what he found when he got inside.

At first, his mother was nowhere to be found. He checked the living room, the kitchen, and the bathrooms, but found nothing. Then he went to the laundry room and to a couple of the bedrooms. Still, no mom to be found. The last place he looked was in his mother’s bedroom. When he approached the bedroom, the door was brought to but not completely closed. He was just about to knock and call out when he heard it – the sound of a woman crying!

“Mom! What’s wrong!” he said, opening the door fully and rushing to her side. Carol was crying too hard to talk so she just pointed to the half-open drawer. Thomas looked inside and saw the rings and the vibrator. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out the problem here!

He sat down next to his mother and put his arm around her shoulders, gently rubbing her back. “Mom, it will be okay,” he said, the only thing he could think of at the moment.

“When Tommy? When will it all be okay?” she looked up at him through tear-filled eyes. “All I have wanted since I was a little girl was to have a man to take care of. A husband that I could be a good wife to. And I was a good wife – wasn’t I a good wife and mother?” she asked.

“Of course, you were, Mom. You were the best wife and mother anyone could ask for!” he said.

“Then why am I sitting here looking at some discarded wedding rings and this, this damn vibrator? Hell, it’s all I have anymore, but at least it won’t cheat on me or run out on me!” she said, shaking the vibrator as she spoke.

Thomas turned her head and put his hands on both sides of her face. “Listen to me mother, you were the best wife and mother there is. The man you married was a lying, cheating, good-for-nothing asshole and the only thing he ever did right was to leave us so we could get on with what’s left of our lives. We are better off without the likes of him, trust me.

“Now maybe you don’t have a man to share your bed with, but you are still very much loved. You have three kids that think you are the living end. And maybe, for now, you have to get your sexual gratification in the form of this plastic boyfriend, but that won’t last forever. And the next time a man comes along, he will appreciate what it is he has and not use you as a handy rest stop until something better comes along.

“Mom, you are a beautiful, desirable woman and any man would be lucky to catch your eye. You have a lot to offer any man worthy of your attention and don’t you forget that. You are still a stone fox mom and you have it upstairs as well – something that bimbo Jack chased after doesn’t have,” he said.

Tommy refused to call the man his mother married Dad or father, even though biologically he was. Instead, Tommy referred to him by name only – Jack.

“Oh Tommy...” she said, giving him a small smile.

“That’s my girl!” he said with a smile. “Now dry those eyes and get ready, I’ve come to take you to lunch and we can’t have you blubbering all over your burger!”

“O-okay,” she said and she went to get herself fixed up. When she was ready, they went out to get lunch and forget about this whole incident. All except for Thomas. He couldn’t forget.

While they were waiting for their food to come, Carol looked at her son sitting across the table. She looked at him and studied him for a bit. He had certainly grown into a handsome and well-built young man. And she was proud of how he had stepped up to help the family when everything fell apart. Yep, he was the kind of man his father failed to be.

Thomas looked up and caught his mother looking at him. “What? Do I have something on my face?” he asked, looking at his reflection in the chrome napkin holder.

“No, hon, you’re fine. I was just thinking...” she said looking down.

“Thinking ‘bout what?” he asked.

“It’s nothing, don’t worry about it. I’m fine,” she said, trying to quickly get off this line of questioning.

“Now Mom, I don’t know a lot about the inner workings of a woman’s mind, but I do know that when a woman says she’s fine, she’s not! Now, what’s up?” he said.

Seeing that she wasn’t going to get away from this subject, she quit trying. “Tell me, Tommy, did you mean what you said at home ... in the bedroom ... about me being beautiful and desirable ... a stone fox, I believe you said. Did you mean all that or were you just trying to make me feel better?”

Thomas took both her hands and looked her straight in the eyes. “Mom, I meant every word of it. You are even more beautiful than ever. A real MILF if ever I saw one!” he said.

“MILF?” she asked, uncertain of the term.

“Mother I’d Like To Fuck. If you weren’t my mother, hell I’d make a play for you!” he said.

“Oh, Tommy! Now you’re just teasing me!” she laughed. “But thank you for the thought!”

But what Carol didn’t realize yet was that his “teasing” would get a lot more serious before long!

With lunch finished, Thomas and Carol headed back home, with Carol in a lot better spirits than she was when she left. She still would sleep alone that night and for the foreseeable future, but she knew she had her support system, her kids, to help her get through it. And whether it was meant as a joke or not, Tommy’s compliments did make her feel a lot better about herself. At least SOMEONE noticed!