How the Coronavirus Changed My Life Ch. 02

With that, we cleaned away the stickiness and slid under the covers. By unspoken agreement, Grace lay between us, and we cuddled together until we all fell asleep. I was completely out of steam after what had been a very long day. My last thought as I drifted off was of the Lou Gehrig farewell speech in Yankee Stadium where he pronounced himself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.

I awakened before the alarm as daylight crept into the room. I quietly brushed my teeth and went downstairs to make coffee. I brought a tray with three steaming mugs plus cream and sugar up to the bedroom. I had no idea how Cathy liked her coffee. The two of them were awake but naked under the covers. I opened the blinds to fully let in the daylight, and then ripped off the covers in a single quick motion.

I looked down at them and smiled. "Alexa. Play something by Bare Naked Ladies."

Cathy got out of bed first. She went looking for her panties. She found Grace's pair first. She picked them up and took a close look. You could almost see a light bulb turn on in her head. "Grace, you really need new panties. Yours are terrible. Alexa. Order two pairs of Cosabella Women's Never Say Never Hottie Lowrider Hotpant Panties. Size small. One color is Barbados. The other color is Shell Pink."

Alexa prompted for the authorization code. I gave it.

Cathy turned to Grace. "I like those panties. Sexy looking yet comfortable. I think Tom will enjoy them too. Especially the Barbados color." Cathy turned towards me and winked.

The next several weeks were in a word wonderful. Grace's new panties arrived. Grace wore the aquamarine Barbados ones on for me that night. They did not stay on her for long.

Cathy took Grace shopping for some clothes with a little more sex appeal. Expensive, but worth it. That night, Grace told me that they had made one another cum in the dressing room of the high-end store they were shopping in. Cathy also had one of her silk qipaos altered by a seamstress friend of hers to fit Grace like a glove.

I had returned Cathy's panties to her once we had become lovers, and one evening when Cathy's husband was on-call, my ladies put on a fashion show for me. Matching panties. Their silk qipaos, both falling to mid-thigh with Grace's in red, and Cathy's in black were the highlight of the show. I expressed my appreciation by prolonged worship of each of their pussies.

###

Cathy decided to host an afternoon early summer party. She invited six couples. Grace and I were involved in the menu planning, as Grace was the superior Chinese cook, and I was deft with the grill. It was a given that they were going to show off their sexy qipaos.

And show them off they did. One of the invited couples was a married pair of two women. Only half of that couple showed up, as her wife wasn't feeling well. There were six men and seven women present that day. None of the men wore anything memorable. Two of the women did. My two women.

When I wasn't in conversation or tending the grill, I paid attention to the men paying attention to my women. There were no strangers in the group. We all knew one another. Cathy had always dressed to impress, and so it wasn't unexpected that male eyes tracked her as she moved about. Grace on the other hand wasn't wearing her usual nondescript outfit. She looked much sexier than normal. They all noticed. They all watched her. Someone else had their eyes on Grace. Hungry looking eyes. It was Megan, the woman who had come without her wife.

The food and the conversations were good. Thirteen people had polished off five bottles of wine and a dozen cans of beer, and everyone was relaxed. As the sun went down, the bugs came out. The other couples took that as their cue to say their goodbyes. Megan lingered. Grace was feeling no pain on the couch. Megan sat down right next to her. Chris and I were assigned outside cleanup duty. Cathy was in the kitchen, putting things away and cleaning up. Chris was busy cleaning the grill while I brought the glassware and dishes in from outside.

I brought the last batch of glassware into the kitchen. Cathy was bent over loading the dishwasher. My hands were dirty, and I didn't want to ruin her beautiful dress, so I simply uttered a sotto voce "Hi, beautiful. Wanna fuck?" Cathy turned and smiled at me. "You have a dirty mind, sir. But you're not the only one." She pointed to the couch in the living room.

Megan had her hand on Grace's thigh, well up under the hem of her qipao. Grace seemed entranced as Megan was leaning in close and talking to her softly. I watched them as I was washing my hands.

Cathy and I were alone in the kitchen. I put my hand around her waist. "Seems as if Megan is putting the moves on her. Should I go rescue Grace from her clutches?"

"Let them be. I've heard that Megan is pretty good in bed," replied Cathy as she rested her head on my shoulder.

"Not as good as you are, I suspect. Whether you're with a man or a woman," I said with a smile. I turned to face her, slid my hands into the slits of her qipao, and took hold of Cathy's tight little ass.

That's when Chris slid open the patio door and walked into the kitchen.

"The grill's clean," he said before what he was seeing registered with him. My adrenaline started to flow. I had no idea what to expect. To my surprise, Chris simply put the roll of paper towels and spray cleaner he was carrying on the counter, lowered his eyes, and left the room.

I still had my hands on Cathy's ass. I was further surprised when she gave me a soft kiss on the lips. "Don't worry," she said. "He won't do a thing."

Chris was a trouper, that's for certain. Grace and Megan broke up their little tete-a-tete when Cathy and I entered the living room and I suggested it was time for us to go. Cathy had Grace's food containers ready in a bag. I chatted with Megan while Grace and Cathy giggled in the kitchen. Chris materialized just in time to stand at Cathy's side as we said our goodnights.

###

Eighteen days later, Grace was dead.

The cause of death was septic shock as a consequence of COVID-19. Grace began having COVID symptoms four days after the party. Megan had come down with it the day after the party, so it's almost certain she was how Grace got it. Grace's symptoms seemed mild enough at first, and I wasn't that concerned. But she went downhill quickly six days after onset. She was hospitalized and needed more and more oxygen each day. I told our kids of course, and we were each able to chat with her via FaceTime for a few minutes a day. She began to struggle to breathe. She was placed onto a ventilator three days before she died. A day later some kind of blood infection took a firm hold. The doctors tried this, that, and the other thing, but to no avail.

I was with her in the ICU bay for the last two hours of her life. Technically, I wasn't allowed to be there. But the head ICU nurse had been one of the guests at the party, and once it was clear that it was only a matter of time, she let me stay with Grace. When I joined her in the ICU bay, Grace's heart was pounding away at 160 BPM. As I talked to her and stroked her skin, her heart rate began to slow.

I thought it was me helping. It wasn't. Over the course of the next two hours, her heart rate ramped down slowly. It reached 63 BPM. And then there was a long pause. An alarm went off. A single beat and another pause. One last beat. And then she was gone. It was 4:43 PM.

They let me sit and collect myself in a small conference room. I didn't cry there, even though many of her friends and colleagues did. They asked about an autopsy, and I agreed. COVID-19 meant that organ donation was not allowed. I signed a couple of forms. I called our children. I called Cathy. She offered to tell Grace's parents. I got up and drove home.

Grace always wanted to be cremated - she didn't want to be in a box in the ground waiting to be consumed by bugs as she put it. I bought the cardboard coffin. The outfit I chose for her to wear was that red silk qipao and the aquamarine panties.

We held a memorial service for her via Zoom. Our three kids were at home with me. Many people said many kind words about Grace. She was a good person, and had a lot of friends. Grace's parents participated from back in China. Cathy asked her China-resident daughter to provide running English-to-Chinese commentary for them. I had never met her daughter, and when I thanked her later learned that she was the spitting image of her mother.

It was a sad time. I wish I could report that I bore up stoically. While I did keep it all together for the memorial service, it was very hard for me once everyone else had returned home and I was alone in our house. I was never much of a drinker anyway, and I didn't seek comfort in alcohol. But I could not shake the emptiness I felt in the pit of my stomach. I didn't sleep well. I didn't eat well. I stopped taking my daily hikes.

Cathy tried her best to comfort me. She even came over to spend the night with me once when her husband was on call. She was as beautiful as ever, but my sexual desire was completely gone.

It was deeply humiliating to have no reaction at all to a woman who was my fantasy come true just a short time before.

I turned over the handling of Grace's estate to my lawyer son. Her estate was simplicity itself. I inherited everything. Between her work and personal insurance policies, my assets, and the assets in her 401K, it was pretty clear that I didn't need to work anymore. I had more than enough to support me into my nineties, with plenty left over for the three kids, two grandkids, and any additional grandkids who might come along. My son drafted a new will for my new circumstances.

Being alone in the house was very oppressive. One of our kids gave me an idea. I had always wanted to drive across the USA, avoiding the interstates and taking the backroads. Grace was prone to carsickness, so that idea had always been a non-starter. But I was alone now, and there was no longer a reason not to.

I told my boss that I was taking a leave of absence. I arranged a two month rental on a Class B RV. I bought an annual pass for the National Parks. I talked with Cathy and told her I needed to get away. She understood. Her only request was that I stay in touch with her. I buttoned up the house, arranged to get someone to mow the lawn, told the bank to expect debit card activity from anywhere in America, and hit the road at 0500 on a muggy August morning.

Normally I plan my road trips in detail. Not this trip. I was starting from eastern Pennsylvania and headed west. I chose a generally-counterclockwise route so that I would cross the northern states before fall weather set in.

Before Grace died, I always had either music or podcasts playing when I was on the road. For now, however, it was almost painful to have music or talking. So the only sounds were the sounds of the engine, the wind, and the pavement.

I avoided big cities for the most part. I started hiking again, especially on weekdays when the trails were less crowded. Solitude was what I wanted. I parked the RV at campgrounds or Walmarts. I didn't bother shaving. Sometimes I'd stop at an LA Fitness at off-hours to exercise and shower, but mostly I used the phone-booth-sized shower in the RV. I wasn't troubled by erections or the need to jerk off. I'd see pretty girls here and there, but they had no effect on me.

I spent one afternoon at a laundromat in Rapid City, SD. As I was washing clothes, I texted Cathy to let her know I was still alive. She replied a few hours later with a thumbs up and a smiley. Two days later, after seeing Mt. Rushmore and the Devil's Tower, I was in Montana.

I spent ten days in Montana, hiking in state and national forests. I stayed at campgrounds most nights, but sometimes just parked my RV off of the side of the road. I made sure to spend the nights in dark places with minimal light pollution. I sat in a folding chair with a beer in the cupholder looking up at the stars with a pair of powerful binoculars and a star map phone app. I often awoke very early and sat outside with hot coffee watching the stars fade away in the dawn.

I was not brought up to be a religious man. I didn't believe that Grace was up in heaven smiling down on me. But the stars were a reminder that it's a big universe out there, and that I wasn't a special someone who was immune to tragedy. Almost imperceptibly at first, the weight of sadness began to lessen. The knot in my stomach began to loosen. I began to sleep through the night.

I was at a lakeside campground one early morning, sitting in my chair with steaming coffee in hand awaiting the sunrise. A woman with long hair came out of her camper along with her dog. She was wearing an ankle-length dress. She might have been twenty or forty - it was too dark to tell. She and her dog went down to the lake. The dog took a long swim as she stood there watching with her back to me.

The sun came up. As it did, the woman was silhouetted by its glowing light. She was fully clothed yet fully naked. It was pure and sacred and immensely erotic. The image of her sparked the first flash of sexual desire I had felt since Grace had died.

Her dog emerged from the lake when she called to it, and they went back towards their camper. I lifted my coffee cup to her as she walked by. She nodded to me. I never saw her again. But I will never forget her.

I began a tour of the string of national parks along US Route 89, starting at Glacier and slowly making my way through Yellowstone, Grand Teton, Bryce Canyon, Zion, and the north rim of the Grand Canyon. The weather was mostly good. The scenery was inspiring. Grand vistas by day, shining stars by night. I was starting to feel fully alive again. I put my memories of Grace's last hours into a little mental box. If I opened the box, I was apt to cry. But I was mostly able to keep the box on the shelf.

After the Grand Canyon, I kept going south. I had spent way too much time in Scottsdale on business during my work career, so I knew it well. I headed for the local Hilton. Pricey, but the outdoor pools were good. I took a close look at myself in the mirror. My beard was scruffy, and much more salt than pepper. And I really needed a haircut. So I asked the concierge to recommend a good barbershop, and let them hack off my beard and cut my hair. I looked civilized again.

I texted Cathy with before and after selfies, told her where I was, and asked her how she was doing. She didn't answer until the next day. All she texted was a rather terse "I'm good." I was hoping for a warmer response, but knew I hadn't exactly been showering her with attention during my travels. I replied with "I'm glad to hear that. Text me any time if you'd like to chat." She didn't reply.

I spent most of the day poolside, reading a book and thinking about Cathy. I needed a distraction. Being in Scottsdale had refreshed my memories of evenings spent in the quality strip clubs of Phoenix. I went online to do some research. It seemed as if Bourbon Street Circus was still the place to go. I took a drive over after an early dinner.

It had been a decade or more since I had been there, but I remembered the place. There was free popcorn and very low wattage lighting. It took my eyes a while to adjust.

The first rule of strip clubs is to check out the talent before letting a girl drag you off for a private dance. Let the dancers go through a complete rotation so you can see them in action. You can tell a lot about what to expect in the back from how they dance and interact with the customers on stage and in the main room. Does the girl look as if she wants to be there? Does she make real eye contact and smile when you walk up and put a dollar in her garter belt? Does she looked stoned or drunk?

There were eight girls in the early evening rotation. None of them caught my eye. One of them leaned up against my leg for a few minutes of small talk before trying to close the private dance sale. Her bolt-on boobs were as fake as her hair color, and I was more amused than aroused. Once she gave up on me, I hit the road and headed back to my hotel. It was about 9:20 PM when I got there. I heard a live piano playing in the ground floor lounge and decided to stop in and have a beer.

The place was quiet. A young couple in the corner. One guy at a table typing away on his laptop. Two golfers sitting at the other end of the bar. Three 40-something-looking women at a table speaking what sounded like Korean. Two of them were being a little too loud. The third was much quieter. Maybe she was the designated driver or something. I took a seat at the bar and ordered a local craft brew which turned out not to be very good.

I kept my eye on the quiet woman. There was something appealing about her. She eventually sensed that I was watching her. She looked straight at me. I lifted my glass and silently toasted her. She smiled in response.

After a while, her two friends went off to powder their noses or drain their bladders or something. On an impulse I asked the bartender what the quiet lady was drinking. She told me Diet Coke, and I ordered one for her, and a known-good beer for me. I picked up her drink and went over to her table. I left my beer at the bar.

"Don't worry. I'm not trying to hit on you. I just figured you deserved a drink for putting up with your noisy friends. Too bad it's only a Diet Coke. Not that you need to diet, " I said with a smile.

"Thanks," she said with a smile. I nodded and turned to go back to my barstool. I had only taken two steps when she spoke.

"Wait," she said. "Do you mind if I join you?"

I turned back towards her. "I don't mind at all."

I fetched my beer and led her to a nearby table, close enough for her friends to see her when they returned, but not so close that their chatter would be distracting. We introduced ourselves. Her name was Michelle. She was pleasant looking but not beautiful. Her best attribute was her smile.

We started with standard small talk. Where are you from? What do you do? Her friends came back and saw her talking with me. There was some giggling and pointing. Michelle studiously ignored them, and they quickly lost interest.

Michelle was one of those women who are incredibly easy to talk to. And I hadn't been talking to pretty much anyone besides store clerks and park rangers for more than a month. Before I knew it and without intending to, I was telling poor Michelle about the death of my wife and my drive across America. My eyes welled up as I relived Grace's death. Not exactly your normal casual getting-to-know you chat topics.

When the torrent of my brain dump finally slowed, Michelle shared her story. She was ten years younger than I was. She had lost her husband and her son two years ago to a drunk driver. Her parents came to America when she was six, and she had lived in the Valley of the Sun ever since. Her husband's life insurance plus the drunk driver's liability insurance had given her enough to live on for the rest of her life. Her two daughters were married and out on their own. She was a photographer specializing in desert landscapes. She wasn't making any money at it, and probably never would. But she didn't care.

One of her friends started waving and pointing at her watch. It was obvious they were ready to leave.

"I'm guessing you're their ride home," I said.

"That I am," Michelle said with a small sigh.

"If I ordered them an Uber, would you stay a while longer?" I asked hopefully.

Michelle smiled. "They won't like that."

"How about you? What would you like?"

"I'd like you to order them an Uber."

Ten minutes later, Michelle had ushered her friends to the lobby, put them into the Uber, and made her way back to our table. I had ordered another round of drinks.