Chapter 3

That same Saturday night, just before dark, lightning started to become evident again, coming in from the west across the lake. These storms are quite seasonable and we get them more often than not about this time every November. Nimbo-Cumulus clouds turned the sky a pre-storm bilious eerie green colour. By ten o'clock the rain began with huge drops and within minutes you couldn't see through our lounge room window and water was pooling under the front door, blown in by the wind, which was also making the house shake. That was when the lightning began in almost complete sheets, the thunder an almost continuous clap. Now personally, having spent almost my complete life living and working outside in most all kinds of weather, I find being inside, dry, in a nice cosy bed, with a full stomach, a very large glass of dry white beside me and reading a good book (Robert Jordan's The Eye of the World Orbit Fantasy UK £6.99 RRP-for some reason it doesn't have a price for us, only a scan grid) during storms like this almost more satisfying than sex. Angel joined me within minutes, her head burrowing under my spare pillows, her bare body in the foetal position and shaking. I threw a blanket over her as the storm had caused the ambient temperature to drop almost ten degrees. In another five minutes Mel graced us with her presence by throwing herself onto the bed on the other side of me, throwing the blanket completely over herself, including her head, and wrapping her arms around my thighs, also shaking like a leaf.

At this point of time I'd better explain a little of my history. I have been married and divorced twice. I matured rather young and began having sexual relationships at about the age of twelve or thirteen often with ladies ten or more years older than myself. At one point in my early to mid twenties, without keeping score, I was concurrently sleeping with at least four women, all good friends of mine of whom two were married (not to me) and two single. They all knew each other; I believe they had coffee and compared notes once a week; there were no secrets except with the husbands and with the people I was working for and with (why them for another time). In my late twenties one of these married ladies got divorced and I ended up in my own first marriage with her. They had all decided behind my back that she was the best candidate to not rock the boat. It was about this time I discovered that I, and seemingly all women, had totally different expectations about their relationships with me. By then I needed marriage so I could settle down into a faithful monogamous relationship and stabilise my life, what had been up till then, a badly organised orgy. I'd spent all my younger years travelling the country by foot, road, rail and air, finding it very hard to settle, rarely remaining in one place more than two months. I had really been there and done that and didn't want to play that silly game any more. I explained this to the lady how I felt before I married her, it seems she didn't believe me. I even told the other three ladies who all basically looked at me as if I'd grown another head and said, "Oh yeah, sure." It was much later that I learnt they had been actively scouting to bring another lady into the fold to take up an available timeslot they'd wanted to fill. When my wife and they later discovered that I meant exactly what I had said and that I expected my wife to also remain in the same faithful monogamous relationship and she was to supply all the sex I needed instead of spreading the wealth over another three, she rebelled. She was the same person who explained to me what a woman meant by a good satisfying horse ride and why there are three times as many female riders as male; go figure.

Marriage two was on the rebound from marriage one, a good Italian girl who sometimes drank a little too much. I thought I loved her and leading up to the marriage she supplied all the sex I could (and did) ask for, with great enthusiasm. She had trouble walking on more than one occasion but it couldn't be said that I neglected her bodily needs before or after the wedding. Our Angel's conception and birth had been planned but difficult but we saw it through together. It all went downhill from that point on. She went from a good Italian girl who drank a little too much to an alcoholic who didn't believe in the sexual act after marriage. After she had left, taking my Angel with her is when I rebelled. No, no, no, no! I could live without my wife but I could not possibly live without my Angel. Due to my ex's instability and alcoholism, shock and horror, the court agreed with me. It also helped that my ex was abusive when she was drinking and Angel refused to live with her; it was either myself, or a foster home and Angel wanted her daddy.