The three of us were sitting at the breakfast table when my wife Jenny’s phone rang. “Hello,” she answered. “Yes ... Oh ... I’m sorry to hear that ... Yes, I am ... Yes, of course. I’ll drive over right now. We’re in Kansas City. It’ll take me two or three hours.”

“Marjorie is dying,” Jenny announced to Kate and me. We were visiting Kate, a widow who lived alone in a large house in a suburb of Kansas City. She was one of Jenny’s oldest friends as was the dying Marjorie. Jenny’s face struggled with emotion, but she said decisively, “I need to leave ... to hopefully see her before she dies and to begin making arrangements for her funeral.” She said to Kate. “I’m sorry to ruin our visit, but I’m the executor of Marjorie’s will. I need to be there.”

I rose from my chair. “I’ll start packing up.”

Jenny thought for a moment. “No, Bob. I’ll be busy meeting with the lawyer and the funeral director and I’ll stay at Marjorie’s house and it will just be chaos. I’ll be back tomorrow afternoon. Stay here.” She turned to Kate. “Is that all right with you, Kate?”

“Of course, anything I can do to help.” Jenny and I were eighty years old and Kate was about the same age. She and Jenny had been friends for more than half a century and I had known Kate and her late husband during most of those years although, living in different cities, I had never been close to either her or her husband.

Jenny rose from the kitchen table and kissed me on the cheek. “I’ll pack and leave. Finish your coffee.” She stepped around the table and hugged Kate. “I’m so sorry to leave. We were having such a good time.” With that she left for the bedroom and five minutes later she waved goodbye to us as she went out the front door carrying an over-night bag.

“I admire Jenny,” said Kate. “In times of stress, she’s always so cool and efficient. I’d fall apart.”

“I doubt it,” I answered. Kate didn’t strike me as any less cool and efficient than my wife. She was a small, bird-like woman with a sophisticated presence and a well-kept exterior. Her thin, fragile skin was stretched tightly over the bones of her face, ringed by hair of the purest white. Her nose was long, thin and pointed which kept her from being beautiful in the conventional sense. Her face and hands were dotted with the liver spots of the aged. She didn’t have any extra weight on her small frame although her breasts were surprisingly large. From what I could see of their outline beneath the wrap-around robe she was wearing they had stood up well from the ravages of time.

Kate asked, “Do you want to continue with what we planned: a walk in the park this morning, a movie in the afternoon, and dinner this evening in that new restaurant I was telling you about?”

“Yes, let’s do that.”

She directed a warm smile at me. “I’m sorry Jenny isn’t here, but I haven’t had a man around the house for a long time. It’ll be fun.” She got up from the kitchen table. “I’ll wash the dishes and then get dressed.” She walked around the table and picked up my plate and silverware, her breasts beneath the furry cloth of her robe brushed my shoulder lightly as she bent over to collect the utensils. We exchanged a smile.

Kate and I spent a lovely day together. She had always been restrained around me, either from shyness or, perhaps, a disposition to keep me at an emotional arms-length. I felt closer to her than ever before as our day rolled along – and I liked her more. She was funny and playful.

I don’t claim much of a macho presence. I am – or rather was – as my wife often reminds me, a typical high school math teacher, complete with thick eye glasses and a nerdy personality – but, as she also tells me jokingly I have a gigantic cock and that makes up for a lot. I respond by saying that she must have a lot of experience with cocks to make that comparison. We both have a casual attitude toward sex and a fair amount of experience with members of the opposite sex, although that dates to the distant past.

We came back to Kate’s after dinner. She poured two glasses of wine and we sat together on the sofa. Kate sat on her legs. I was aware that her nicely shaped knees pointed toward me. We drank our wine and laughed together. Our glasses drained, Kate said, “Time for bed, I suppose. I’m sorry Jenny had to leave but I had a good time with you.” She sat her glass down on the coffee table and leaned forward to kiss my cheek.

I’m not sure how it happened but our good night kiss became a hug and a kiss on the lips and a full body embrace on the sofa with our bodies pressed against each other. our lips locked, and our hands ranging up and down each other’s backs, flanks, and buttocks. Each of us was panting when we broke off the kiss.

“Oh,” Kate whispered in my ear, “I haven’t been kissed like that for a while.”

“Nor me.” I still had my arms around her.

She pushed me away. “I can’t do this. I loved it, but that’s enough. I must go to bed.” She started to get up from the sofa, sat down again, kissed my cheek, then got up quickly and ran down a hallway, opened the door to her bedroom, and disappeared into the room.

I sat on the sofa for a minute, marveling at what just happened. I felt a stirring in my trousers. Finally, I got up and walked toward my own bedroom down the hall from hers. I shouted “Good night!” to her.