Turn of a Card

I picked a card off the top of the pack and turned it over. "Jack of diamonds," I said.

He hesitated for a moment then turned his card over. It was seven of clubs.

Amazingly he looked up at me and grinned. "You win, I'll be on my way then; see you in the morning."

Without another word he rose and left, not even a glancing at Tania.

I had the unpleasant feeling that the floor was moving up and own and the walls spinning round. I was going to pass out but before I did Tania was beside me.

"Ted, are you all right, you look terrible?"

Things gradually came to a standstill and I managed to say, "Yes, I'm okay...I think...it's just all so weird."

I looked up at her; she was smiling and said, "Am I such a frightening prospect, Ted."

"No...no...of course not, it's just the whole mad thing, and you're not to worry I won't try and touch you."

"Why not, you won, didn't you?"

"I don't buy women and I don't win them on the turn of a card," I said, perhaps a trifle self-righteously.

"Well my dear, it looks as if you've done both, like it or not."

"Nothing says we have to go through with it," I replied. "I can leave here right now. I can leave the money with you and no one will be any the wiser."

Tania knelt down I front of me and took my hands. "Ted, suppose I tell you I want you to stay; that I want to spend the night with you, and it has nothing to do with money, cards or winning?"

"You don't mean that," I gasped.

"We've said, and even Jarvis said, 'It's just one night', would it be so hard for you to give me that?"

"No...but Jarvis..."

"You don't imagine that he'd believe either of us if we told him nothing had happened, do you?

"No, I suppose he wouldn't believe us."

In my confused state I did not take in the full import of what Tania had been saying. It was not until later that I understood and even then she had to spell it out for me. What I did have the wit to perceive was that like the turn of the card, I had to lose one way or another. In other words, whether I had sex with Tania or not, Jarvis would always believe I did.

Tania rose and still holding my hands said, "Come to bed with me," and looking at her wristwatch, smiled and said, "It's after sun set."

Given the befuddled state I was in it's hardly surprising that I had no erection, but in the bedroom, and as Tania stripped herself, I knew I wanted her. How many men could have resisted her? Yet I, like so many others before me, quailed before the loveliness that was Tania.

Many beautiful women have complained that it was their very beauty that had turned men aside, afraid that they would be unworthy of them. Yet here was a woman of beauty who was saying, "I'm yours, take me."

I had known many women; the one night stands; the short term relationships; the women I had avoided long term relationships with; women whom I knew would be in bed with another man the next night, or the night after. But here was the woman I had idealised; one who would never cheapen herself. But then, I had idealised Jarvis as well; idealised their relationship as husband and wife.

Tania must have sensed the battle that was going on inside me because she came to me and pressing her body to mine, kissed me softly on the lips and said, "There's nothing to worry about Ted." With that she started to undress me.

Between us we managed to get my clothes off, and for a moment I stood looking at her. I thought she was the loveliest woman I had ever seen; her chestnut coloured hair flowing over her shoulders; breasts standing out proudly, their nipples long and firm; the swell of her hips and her sex organ without pubic hair. Starting just below her mons I could see the firmly cleft vulva and I wondered how, even given his dire straits, Jarvis could so readily let another man enjoy Tania's body.

Tania saw me looking at her genitals and said, "Jarvis doesn't like pubic hair so I had it permanently removed; you don't mind?"

I couldn't resist a weak smile and said, "No, it gives you a look of innocence."

She came close to me again. I could feel her firm warm body against mine; she kissed me and said, "I think we all lost our innocence tonight."

She took hold of my penis and drew it between her legs and started to work it along the lips of her vulva. I could feel her moist warmth, signifying her readiness for me. I eased her carefully onto the bed and she opened her legs wide to receive me. I came between them and she guided my shaft to the entrance of her vagina. I placed my hand on one of her breasts and kissed her.

It began with the tender pressure of our lips, and gradually our mouths opened and tongues explored each other's mouths. Tania made a slight movement with her hips and I slide into her. There was warm, moist softness, and as I pushed my full length into her she said, "I do want you Ted."

As I drew back and started to plunge into her again she began to make an upward thrusting rotating movement. This was the most beguiling movement I had ever experienced with a woman.

We moved very slowly, looking into each other's eyes until, closing her eyes she gasped, "Oh Ted...Ted...I'm going to come."

Her movements grew more forceful and starting very quietly but with increasing volume she cried out repeatedly, "Oh...hah...oh...hah..." Then suddenly her legs were wound round me; she wailed, "Oh my God, it's coming...its coming...ahaheeow."

Her movements had worked up into a wild frenzy and as she came to climax I shot my sperm into her. This seemed to make her even wilder and as she passed her climax I felt a sudden convulsive grip round my shaft as if she would hold me in her and suck the sperm from me.

Grasp and release...grasp and release; this went on with diminishing force until she emitted a long drawn out sigh and I felt her body relax under me.

She lay still for some time, then opening her eyes and looking at me she said, "I feel so good, Ted."

"It's beautiful with you, Tania," I responded.

She held on to me for a long time, keeping my penis in her vagina. After becoming flaccid my penis rose again and Tania whispered, "Can you do it to me again Ted?"

In reply I started to move in her again, feeling the sticky mixture of our fluid to which I was soon to add.

Tania was very relaxed, making only little gasping sounds as I drove into her. She seemed to have a series of minor orgasms when she would give an upward thrust with her hips and softly cry out, "Oohaa." As I unloaded into her she murmured, "Deep darling...put it in deep."

When it was over I pulled out of her and drew her to me, the top of her head just under my chin. I felt a deep sense of contentment, as if I had at last found what I wanted in a woman.

Sunrise was still along way off, but already it seemed to hang like a spectre over us. It would end our one night and in a perverse way I regretted that we had ever begun this time of love making. I've heard people say, "What you don't know you don't miss," but now I knew, and the pain of knowing that it would all end with the dawn was agonising.

Unknowingly Tania made it worse when she said, "It was always you Ted, even when we were at high school it was you."

"I didn't know," I replied, "you never gave the slightest sign."

She drew my hand to her breast and continued, "What was the use, I could see even then that you had your mind set on other things, not marriage, and as you know I would never have accepted anything less than that."

"Yes, I knew."

"You could never have known how much it hurt me when I knew about the other girls – those casual affairs you had – probably still have."

The desire I had suppressed for Tania had been let loose, but it was more than desire. At that moment I knew I had loved her for a long time, and that love added to the pain I felt.

I could have been the one climbing into her bed; I could have been making babies with her, and I had thrown away that opportunity for what? The business and the money that had bought her for one night? The turn of a card by which I had won this night? Tania was worth more than this, far more. I felt as if I'd betrayed her love and mine.

Tania stirred and said, "Darling, I'm in such a mess, I'm going to have shower, do you want to come with me?"

I shook off my mood and laughing said, "Well, since I'm partly responsible for the mess I suppose I'd better help clean it up."

By the time we got to the shower our mingled fluids were running down the inside of Tania's thighs. I washed her very gently and removed as much of my sperm from her vagina as I could. As I did this I thought ruefully about making babies with her; what an opportunity I had missed.

I wondered vaguely why Jarvis had never made babies with her. "Perhaps," I thought, "they've decided not to have children, or he's too eaten up with his gambling to want to have them."

Then I realised the incongruity of my own desire to make babies with Tania. Always with other women making babies was to be avoided. Was the desire to make babies with Tania another sign of my love for her?

Tania was washing my penis and in the process it started to rise again. Holding my penis firmly Tania said, "Is this telling me you want more?"

"If you can stand it," I replied.

She smiled and said, "I think I can give as much as you want." She paused, looking at me keenly, then asked shyly, "Is there anything you don't like doing...I mean, sexual things?"

Its strange how there are things you can happily do with one woman that you don't like doing with another. In Tania's case I felt that I could do to her whatever she want me to, so I said, "Whatever you want Tania, is fine by me."

Back in bed I soon found out what she wanted. I had started to suck on one of her nipples and fondle the other breast with my hand, when she suddenly moved to sit across my chest, and then starting to squirm her genitals over me she moved slowly up to my face leaving a trail of lubricant as she went.

As she reached my face I looked up to see her cleft poised over me. She reached down with her fingers to part her outer lips to reveal the rose petal-like lips beneath and a hint of the dark canal of her vagina beyond. She lowered herself until the warm wetness of her sex organ covered my mouth.

I could smell her female aroma, and as I began to lick, taste her.

Tania kept control of the places she wanted to have stimulated, and as her lubricant began to flow freely she moved so that I was working my tongue over her clitoris. I could hear her cries of ecstasy that rose to a long drawn out cry of, "Ooooohaa...Ted," and then I had to hold on to her thighs firmly as she thrashed about on me.

For a moment she slumped over me as if exhausted by her orgasm, and then seeming to come suddenly to life she moved quickly down my body, said, "Come darling," and took my shaft into her mouth.

She sucked so avidly I thought she was trying to swallow me and in seconds I was shooting into her mouth, each lurch of semen from my urethra dragging a groan from me, and as she seemed to suck the last drops from me I felt as if I'd been transported to heaven.

There were sticky droplets of my sperm glistening on her lips as she withdrew away from me. She moved to lie beside me and said, "Hold me Ted." I put my arms round her, drawing her close.

"It's been hell, Ted," she whispered.

I knew what she meant and asked, "How long have you known?"

"I've know for a long time that he gambled, but you knew that as well, but he was always talking about how much he won. I trusted him, and then one day, about two months ago, I found out he'd milked out bank balance dry. When I confronted him there was a terrible row and we had to keep it hidden from everybody, even you."

"You managed it very well," I said, "I hadn't the least idea until last Saturday."

"Yes, but by then the full truth had come out; he'd not only milked our bank balance dry, he'd borrowed all over the place and worst of all, he'd somehow been taking money from his workplace. He finally panicked and poured it all out. Ted, its thousands and thousands of dollars; exactly how much I don't know, and apart from what he's stolen from work I don't think even Jarvis knows."

I understood the disease well enough, and in some respects it infects most of us. We make a decision and act on it, only to find it was the wrong decision and find ourselves in a mess and then try to cover it up by making another lousy decision. For Jarvis always the next bet would get him out of trouble, but it hadn't.

"He knows how much he's stolen from work?"

"Yes, around forty two thousand dollars and if that came out everything would come crashing down."

I could see that Jarvis had not only put all his usual worldly goods at risk, but his professional future and his relationship with Tania as well.

Tania seemed to pick up on my thoughts and said, "I don't know how we can go on together; I won't ever be able to trust him, and even if he swore off gambling I'd always be suspicious, always waiting for it to happen again."

She stopped speaking for a couple on minutes and although I could not see her face I could feel she was crying. Then recovering a little she said, "You know Ted, he didn't even seem to care what happened to me; he even wanted me to...tried to talk me into...well, what we've been doing. If he really loved me, do you think he could have done that, sell me off at the turn of a card?"

Trying to find some justification for Jarvis I replied, "He was desperate, Tania," and then went on somewhat unwisely, "And you did insist that..."

"Yes Ted and I know how it must look...probably how it is in the end."

She clung to me more tightly and went on, "Oh Ted, why couldn't you have loved me when I wanted you to so badly?"

I knew her question was purely rhetorical since she already knew the answer, nevertheless I said, "I put other things, other ambitions before love and a permanent relationship. That was always going to come later."

There was another pause, neither of us knowing what to say next, then with a sigh Tania said, "Its weird isn't it, I was so set on no sex before marriage, and here I am committing adultery. They used to put people to death for that once."

"Would you have committed adultery if it hadn't been for circumstances as they are?"

"No, I don't think I would have, but that's the terrible thing; when you chose the card I was willing you to turn up the highest one just so I could do with you what I've always wanted to do. That's evil, isn't it?"

"As you said Tania, we've all lost our innocence, such as it was, tonight. Any one of us could have stopped the situation. If we try to count our sins now we'll go on endlessly. What's done is done and we can't call it back now."

"No."

She drifted off into sleep. I lay awake for some time after thinking about her and the bizarre circumstances that had led to our being together like this. I felt a tremendous wave of love and pity for her sweep through me. "All because I tuned up the jack of diamonds," I thought.

I was wakened before dawn by Tania stroking my penis. "Once more before he comes back," she said.

My penis had risen and she sat astride me and inserted my shaft into her. We moved hardly at all for a long time, just looking at each other in the half light. Then with very slight movements she came, gasping, "Oh my love." As I ejaculated I groaned, "I love you Tania."

We showered, washing away the odour of sex, and dressed.

Jarvis came in some time after sunrise. He asked nothing and said nothing; he simply took the case of money from me, opened it, and without actually counting it began to riffle through it.

There seemed to be nothing more for me to say and do. Tania came to the front door and putting her arms round me and said, "Goodbye, my love."

I knew it was goodbye because nothing could ever make us forget that night; it would always be there between the three of us.

In other days, in other circumstances, I would have left Tania rejoicing over our love making, knowing that I would return to her; but those other circumstances had never been, and now we all had to live with the guilt of those that had been.

As I knew it would be, there were no more invitations to dinner. I saw and heard nothing from Jarvis and Tania. More out of bravado than anything else I went to the pub a few times where Jarvis and I used to meet for Tuesday lunches. He was never there.

Perhaps I should have gone further and written or telephoned or even called at their house, but I didn't. Why not? A strange mixture of desire to see Tania again and knowing the pain I would feel if I did; a love for her now acknowledged and guilt that I had not walked away that night after "winning" her.

Tania had said "goodbye" at the door that morning in a tone of voice that had indicated finality.

I buried myself in my business and relieved my sexual needs with casual relationships, yet these relationships seemed to have soured. I had known what it was to have sex with someone whom I loved and who loved me, and anything else was now second class.

It was about six months later and after work one night when I was trundling a trolley round the supermarket doing my weekly shopping that I saw her. She was coming towards me pushing her trolley and scanning the shelves. I stood motionless.

She didn't see me until we were very close. She went to move past me, and then she too stood stock still, both of us staring at each other.

"Ted," she gasped.

Recovering slightly I gulped, "Hello Tania, how are you?"

"I'm...as you see."

What I saw was that she was pregnant.

"How's Jarvis?"

"We don't see anything of each other now."

"Separated?"

"Yes, for four months now."

"Will you two get out of the bloody way," an ancient snarled, "blocking the bloody aisle."

We moved to let her pass and as she did she muttered, "Bloody people standing in the aisle talking."

Tania's face was pale and I could see she was trembling; I was quivering a bit myself.

"Would you come and have a cup of coffee with me?" I asked.

"Yes but...the shopping, I haven't..."

"We can do that some other time, I must talk with you."

"All right."

We took what goods we had through the checkout and made our way to a nearby café. There were few people in there and we found a corner table and sat. We said nothing until after the girl had taken our order. When she had gone I said, "That night I suppose?"

"Yes, but not straight away. He didn't seem to care about that. All he wanted was the money to get him self out of trouble."

She gave a bitter laugh and went on, "You know Ted he didn't even thank me for saving him."

"What was it then if it wasn't that night?" "Oh, it wasn't the night itself that offended him, it was the outcome." She touched her abdomen.

The girl came with the coffee and we stopped speaking for a moment. When she had gone I asked the obvious question, "It was me, then?"

"Yes my dear, it was you."

"Are you sure, it could be Jarvis."

She smiled wanly; "No. because he can't, that how it all came out in the first place."

"I don't understand."

"You see, we found out that Jarvis couldn't fertilise me. We were going to go on one of the programmes and you know how expensive they are. I knew – or thought I knew – we had the money in the bank. That's when I discovered he'd taken it all to gamble with. So you see, since I'd been with no one else, it had to be you, and Jarvis knew it."

"God, I'm so sorry Tania."

"Don't be, Ted, because I'm not. I'm glad it was you and...oh God this is going to sound terrible. After that night I couldn't bear Jarvis to touch me."

"I could have walked away from you, not touched you."

"Please Ted, try to understand, I'm not sorry, but if you're sorry...if you regret it, then it's somehow spoilt. I...we got Jarvis out of the worst of his troubles; we had a beautiful night...or at least I did, so don't be unhappy because I'm pregnant. In any case, I'm certain that Jarvis and I would have split up eventually."