Chapter 5

The vicar grilled us, but seemed satisfied neither of us were jumping into matrimony lightly. I paid assorted fees, and we arranged that Betty and my mother would make any necessary arrangements. Emma insisted that she didn't care about the details. We spent a few days packing up my personal stuff in the house, arranging for a letting agent and for a gardener – one I trusted – to look after the garden and keep the bird-feeders clean and stocked.

Initially I stayed with Emma. The other girls seemed to accept that with equanimity, which was fair enough inasmuch as usually at least two or three of them had live-in boyfriends. We found a two bedroom flat, though we'd continue Emma's contribution to the shared house up to the end of the academic year and didn't move anyway until after the wedding.

The month before and the month after we were married, we were making love usually two, sometimes three, times a day. Often, Emma would come in and insist on dragging me off to bed before tea/dinner/supper – I still hadn't made up my mind what to call the meal – then again after we got to bed, and it wasn't too unusual for us to have a quickie ... sometimes a not so quickie ... before breakfast.

To my surprise, I began getting work locally. Some previous companies in the Sheffield area, or elsewhere, had passed the word around. That was good. I had no objection to being a house-husband and I enjoyed cooking, but it was income and occupation. Then, a few weeks after the wedding, almost imperceptibly, Emma began to be much more wrapped up in her work. Sometimes, she was coming in after midnight too tired to do anything but crash, and was reluctant to wake when I got up which I needed to do.

Don't get the wrong idea. I never even suspected another man was involved – there wasn't – and there was never any indication of such anyway. But I did recall what my father, a hard scientist himself, had said. I'm sure there are guys out there who will be thinking I'm a pussy for the way I dealt with the situation, but I am who ... and how ... I am, and I loved – I love – Emma. I knew who I was marrying, though I probably should have thought more about my father's warning.

Anyway, after a couple of weeks where sex – I could hardly call it 'making love' – was sporadic and perfunctory, a Saturday came round where I decided I had to lay the law down. She'd come in again after midnight – I stirred enough to check the time – and in the morning I waited in the kitchen to turn on the coffee maker when I heard her moving around. It must have been nearly ten when she walked into the kitchen and I handed her a mug of coffee.

"Thanks, Love," she said, taking it, and sipping at it without sitting. She went to the toaster and put a couple of slices in.

When she stood there, sipping at the coffee, waiting for the toast, I said, "Sit down, Emma. I'll bring your toast."

"No time," she said, "I need to eat and run."

"No. You don't."

"What?"

"Emma, sit down."

"Gerry!"

"Sweetheart, I thought you wanted to be married to me."

She looked shocked. "I do!"

"Well, you're not acting like it."

She opened her mouth and I thought she was about to say something ... intemperate. But then I could see comprehension spreading across her face. She went pale. The mug crashed down on the counter; a little liquid slopped over the rim, and she hurled herself at me, clung to me, and sobbed. "My God, Gerry! I'm so sorry! I've got so wrapped up in ... I'll take the day off. We'll go for a walk. Have lunch..."

"No! Sit!"

She looked so devastated I was about to sit down and pull her into my lap to hug her, but the toaster popped. I pushed her to a chair and passed the coffee over, got the toast out and put it on a plate, got out Flora and marmalade. "I don't think I'm hungry," she said, plaintively.

"You need to eat," I told her. "I think once you start, you find you are hungry."

"Are you very angry?"

"Very angry? No. Angry? Yes, a little. Emma, I love you. I didn't marry you and move here to live like a bachelor. When did you last speak to Sarah, or one of the other girls?"

She shook her head.

"What about your father?"

Her face, already pale, went white. After a longish pause, she said, "Um ... nearly three weeks." She made to stand. "I must..."

"Sit! Eat!"

She sank back into the chair and took another mouthful. "Emma," I went on, "I don't want you to change who you are. I admire ... and love ... your intelligence, your intensity, your focus. I don't want you to give up on your dream. But I do want a share of my wife."

She was about to speak, but seeing my expression, finished her second slice of toast. "Gerry, I'm really sorry ... I..."

"I know, Sweetheart. Go into the lab ... can you get away at lunch time?"

"Sure! I mean..."

"Then meet me at Tony's ... one o'clock?"

She nodded.

"Tony's, one o'clock, for pizza. He'll do it to be ready at one. I want half an hour of your time. Then, I want you to knock off at six. We'll have dinner, and you can start to make it up to me, okay?"

Her mortified expression dissolved and a smile blossomed on her face. "Oh, Gerry ... I love you. I really do..." she was speaking as she stood and came to me, then she was in my arms and trying to crush my chest.

"Now then, Sweetie ... off you go and I'll see you at one."

She was actually reluctant to let me go...

She was actually a few minutes early at Tony's. She greeted me with another hug and a heartfelt, "Oh, Gerry, I'm so sorry..."

"Dad warned me," I responded, "that hard science is a demanding mistress. I really don't mind sharing you, Emma, but I'm going to demand my share of your attention."

She looked a bit worried at that, but I went on, "Love, I know you're going to get immersed in whatever train of thought you're following and most of the time that'll be fine. Just try to remember you don't just belong to yourself any more."

She nodded at that and we sated our hunger with perfect pizza.

I spent a little while, after she left to return to her work, with Tony – Antonio, the proprietor of the best small Italian restaurant in the area. If we hadn't been on such good terms, I doubt he could have fitted us in, but I was happy to agree to an early time for our meal, and a menu with him, mainly following his recommendations both for food and wine.

Emma walked in to the flat well before six and into my arms. "Gerry, I'm sorry ... again ... I didn't think. I was assuming you would sort something out for dinner..."

"Don't apologise any more, love. We've got a table at Tony's for seven. You just need to get ready." She moved her hands to the sides of my head and kissed me. It was a passionate and inflammatory kiss. I had to break it. "Steady on, love, or we won't make it to Tony's at all."

"I don't think I care."

"Well, I do. Go on, run along and be ready to be the pretty young wife I am so proud of."

She smiled, shaking her head, and kissed me again, but it was just a light brush of the lips. "Alright, love. I probably need a shower anyway. How long have I got?"

"The table is for seven. Tony's pretty busy, but he fitted us in as long as we're early."

Perhaps because Emma had never really been in the dating and mating scene, she was showered, dressed, and sashaying back into the room in little more than forty minutes. Of course, her short, dark, curly hair needed little attention to be, well, natural, and Emma knew I didn't care much for cosmetics. She was slim, lithe and beautiful just as she was. She was wearing a dark red dress that I thought suited her very well; it certainly held promise that raised ideas in my head ... and other places.

As we set out, I took Emma's hand, but she wrapped it round herself and tucked in against me, so we walked tucked in close to each other the half-mile or so to the restaurant. Tony himself greeted us and sat us in a discreet corner. He did the 'pour a little wine in a glass for the customer's approval' bit; I grinned at him – he knows perfectly well I know next to nothing about wine – sipped and ... he must have seen the shock on my face because he smiled widely. "Will it do, Gerry?"

"Do? Tony, you know perfectly well that is an exquisite wine!" And it was; as I say, I know nothing about wine. That one was smooth and fruity, with no hint of the slightly bitter after-taste characteristic of some red wines. Tony filled our glasses.

Emma sipped. "Oh, Gerry, that's gorgeous!"

"It is," I agreed. "But let's try to limit ourselves to one bottle, okay?"

She giggled. "No problem..."

Over the meal, I got her to tell me what she was doing at the lab. "Not the technicalities," I said, "just the general idea."

"Well, mostly, I'm just at the computer, running models. The sort of lab work I'd like to do would be horribly, prohibitively expensive ... like, CERN expensive. You see, atomic physics has advanced so far ... well, to say it's difficult to investigate a hypothesis would be an understatement. But I'm hoping..." she trailed off.

"What, love?"

"Well, I think there's a hint in the maths that there may be a key to unlocking Albert's limit. Not next week, of course, but some day."

"Could we get a computer capable of doing what you need so you could work at home?"

She shook her head. "No, the one at College is..." she trailed off, frowning. "Could we get a fast broadband connection? Cable, perhaps?"

I shrugged. "I don't see why not."

She brightened. "I can access the lab computer from home with a decent connection and work from home. And you can ... ride herd? ... on my work patterns. I'm well ahead of time, I think, but we'll see." She paused, then, "Gerry, I ... you're important to me. Perhaps, more important than science, but certainly as important. I forgot that."

I reached out and took her hand. "It's okay, Emma. Honestly. I count myself very lucky to have you in my life. Part of loving you is wanting you to fulfil your potential. I wouldn't mind being the husband of a Nobel prize winner, you know."

She shook her head, giggling a little. "Not much chance of that, I think."

We finished our meal – truly excellent – and made our way home. In our bedroom, she undressed me – slowly – and when I was naked pushed me back onto the bed, still wearing that dress. She reached back and I heard the whisper of the zip before the dress puddled on the floor around her feet. She stood before me, nude, slim and lovely. I was erect, almost painfully so, when her lips closed around my penis as she looked up at me under her eyebrows. But she didn't spend much time doing that. Instead, she straddled me, lowered herself on me. She was very wet, and I slipped in easily despite her tightness. I reached down to tease her clit, but she caught my hand and placed it on her breast. I noticed that her breasts had firmed a little since we first made love and happily reached out with my other hand to give the other breast equal attention.

"This is for you," she said, "tonight is for you. I'll probably come anyway, but I know you like to feel that so it's okay. But I'm yours. Any way, any how you like." She was rocking as she spoke, and then added a circular motion. I caressed her breasts and played with her nipples, in a weird sort of state where I felt I could continue in what I could only call 'bliss', yet without coming. My hands wandered, tracing the shape of her waist, her hips, cupping the globes of her bum. "Yes..." she said, "even there, if you want."

I didn't respond immediately. Anal has never appealed to me, somehow, though I know some people like it. "I don't think so, darling. This is perfect, anyway."

She kept up her gyrations and, eventually, my climax crept up on me. During the process of getting there I'm fairly sure Emma came three or four times. But as my spasms subsided, she stayed on me and I could feel her pussy squeezing me until my erection, which never really subsided, returned full force. Then, she lay down on top of me and pulled me over so we lay facing each other on our sides. That way we continued to make love slowly, more enjoying the journey than looking to its end, kissing softly and caressing each other.

"I've been such a fool," she murmured. "Don't let me get away like that again, will you?"

The next day, Sunday, Emma called her parents and, after a latish breakfast, we went to see them and share their Sunday roast. Though little was said, I thought Frank looked thinner, tired and drawn, but he kept up a light conversation.