Chapter 2

There wasn't that much traffic that night and by eight o'clock we were seated and ordering. The food was good, as usual, and we had a nice talk, about her job, her upbringing by a single mom and her brother who was serving his second tour in Afghanistan. And about her lousy love-life and choices of boy-friends.

"I keep meeting these guys who seem real nice, then once I start falling for them, they seem to lose interest in what I think and want and turn into shits!"

"Well, Charline, that's not the first time I've heard that story."

I leveled a kindly, fatherly type, gaze into her eyes, and I wasn't faking it.

"Why do you think that happens?"

"My mom says it's because I like sex too much."

I chuckled. She sure wasn't mincing words.

"She may be right."

"Mom says it wasn't like that in the old days, guys didn't get into the pants of any nice girl on the first date."

She looked at her beer glass then at me ... I nodded and ordered another round of Dos Equis.

"Well, I think your mom is probably wrong, on that part anyway. I'd bet I'm old enough to be her father ... and my wife and I had sex on OUR first date, and I didn't marry her because I was desperate, I married her because we had a lot in common. Besides having a helluva lot of fun in bed."

"Oh ... you're married?" She looked at my ring finger.

"No ... she died. She was only forty at the time, and they didn't catch the breast tumor quick enough."

"Oh, I'm sorry ... you must have loved her very much. I mean you didn't remarry, I take it?"

"No, my kids were almost to the point of leaving the house and I wanted to find just the right woman."

I took a big draught on the beer. "But let's get back to your problem."

"Well, if you had sex on your first date way back in the old days, I don't know why I'm having so much trouble with guys ... that shouldn't be a factor, I would think."

"Well, I see your point but I think it might have more to do with where you grew up and how the people, there, thought than attitudes toward sex, generally."

"Remember, that was back in the late sixties ... you've heard about the "Summer of Love"?"

"Yeah ... I guess ... wasn't that something to do with Woodstock, a bunch of rockers and hippies?"

Oh, how time flies, I remembered it like it was yesterday ... to this girl it was some prehistoric event.

"Well, yes and no, that phrase didn't just happen. And it didn't just happen in '67, It was building up for years."

I leaned back and smiled. "The pill appeared on the scene in the mid-sixties and that just pushed my little circle of friends over the brink. This was a small city, really a suburb of Springville, and had just one high school though it was pretty large."

"And another thing, we had several bars to hang out in, besides the drive-in restaurants were still operating so we had lots to do, social-wise, in the evenings."

"And we were really well-off compared to you kids today."

"Guys would graduate HS, get a job at GM and buy a new car within a year ... and have plenty of cash left to party ... and party, we did! But that wasn't the big thing that was the difference ... for some reason, the attitude toward sex wasn't quite as caustic ... oh there were the typical guys who screwed any girl that would let 'em ... and there were the girls that would let 'em. And those got talked about, probably like today"

"But in a circle of friends, male and female, the attitude was different ... if one of our girlfriends got smashed and had someone drive her around the restaurant parking lot, with her bare ass hanging out, mooning everyone in sight, it wasn't taken as if she was a slut, anymore than it would if it were a guy. And it wasn't unusual to go out on a double date and end up parked, or in someone's living room somewhere with both couples going at it a few feet apart."

She was still listening intently, I was amazed she wasn't nodding off.

"Hell, my girlfriend and I, that's one before I met my wife ... and her, too, used to go out in the car during band intermissions and knock off a quickie ... dancing to raunchy lyriced cover songs and pounding down the drinks will do that to ya'" I laughed.

"Wow!" She marveled. "Mom never told me stories like that. Wonder if my Grandma did that, too?"

I smiled at her again. "Sweetie, your generation didn't invent sex. I know you've heard that before but it's true, and mine didn't either. In fact I, myself, am a 'seven month miracle'."

Ah,, but enough of the repartee. To round out the evening, when I took her home to her apartment ... she found a little bell hanging on the outside doorknob. She returned to the car and told me that was a signal that her room mate had company for the night. She had expected to stay at her boy-friend's and now that the plans were changed, she had nowhere to go. I asked about her mother's...

"Well, I hate to ask you to drive me all the way to Marysville..."

"Look, Charline, I live just across the river in Arlington, and I have a guest room you can use. Or I'll drive you to your mom's, it's still pretty early..."

She considered this a while, a long while ... which made me feel better about it.

"Well, okay, if you don't mind. I guess I know you well, enough, and you're on record and all."

I nodded without seeming eager, which I wasn't anyway and we went to my place.

If this is coming across to you, the reader, as some sort of geezer fantasy ... well, just think about the spot I was putting myself in. The thought of her turning traits and crying 'rape' in the morning, because of the circumstance certainly occurred to me.

"Or ... there's a Red Roof nearby, I could put you up there."

She looked at me long and hard, whether she had some previous thoughts and was changing her view, who knows!

"If you prefer that, Brad, it's okay with me, but I think I can trust you"

"Okay, let's dial your mother and tell her the deal so she wont worry if she tries to get hold of you."

I handed her my phone, again.

"And I'd like to speak to her as well."

After she told her mom the story of her night, she handed it back to me."

"Yes, sure ... don't worry, it's no trouble ... no, ma'am ... I'm old enough to be YOUR father, there's no worries there."

Which was the truth. So far, anyway.

"Yes, this is my cell number, my home phone is 555-5643."

When we got to the house, Charline seemed impressed though it didn't differ much from the rest of the neighborhood.

Inside, I showed her the guest room and where towels were, etc, and we adjourned to the main room.

"Would you like a coke?"

"Err ... no, thanks ... in fact I need to use the powder room."

Heh, not "little girl's "! I liked that. I turned on the TV and picked ESPN News.

When she returned, she settled in nicely in a chair and asked "I took the wrong turn in the hall, I see you have a room with a lot of computer stuff ... you work with computers?

"Oh, well, sort of. I run a web site and those are servers"

"Oh, what kind of site?" She grinned. "Not a porn site, I hope..."

I turned to watch her reaction. "No, not exactly, it's more a video chat sort of site. I deal with people who want to meet up with other people on-line"