Julius and Me Ch. 09

Julius and I returned home about a week later, firm in our conviction that his parents' reunion was permanent. Julius had spent several nights alone with his mom, and I was happy to have Henry all to myself on those occasions. Mother, father, and son had definitely restored their bonds of affection.

But something strange happened almost immediately after Julius and I came back to my house. By this time I was resolved to quit my job and follow my lover to Chicago. Hopefully there would be wedding bells at some point in the future, but I didn't even care about that anymore. I just wanted to be with him--I needed to be with him.

But, two days later, as I was idling in my office (I was not teaching summer school, so I really didn't have much to do), I received an unexpected caller.

It was my husband, Mark Stephens.

I will be honest with you: he always looked good. As a trial lawyer, he was a natural performer; and he knew how to dress well and how to look fit and in control. From his shock of deliberately untidy straight black hair to his broad shoulders to his muscular chest to his slender waist to his powerful thighs and calves, he looked like a man who combined brain with brawn--and he did.

Of course, he wasn't quite in Julius's league where physique was concerned, but he was no slouch.

But what was different now was that his usual robust self-confidence--bordering on know-it-all arrogance--had given way to an utterly unexpected shyness and mortification, as he slid hesitantly into the chair next to my desk and muttered, "Hello, Sandra."

I wasn't at all interested in conversational pleasantries. "What the hell are you doing here?" I said sharply.

He winced as if I'd struck him. What a laugh! When, in years past, he'd plow into me with a vigor that came close on violence, I would in fact strike him--pounding his back as a way of demonstrating that I was no shrinking violet. It was all a game, and we'd had loads of fun in bed--but now he'd slunk off with that young floozie who'd tempted him away from me, and our whole married life had come to seem like an illusion, a fantasy.

"Gee, Sandra," he whined, "I just thought we could talk a little."

"Talk? We have nothing to talk about."

Well, of course that wasn't true. One urgent thing I wanted to talk about was: When are we going to get a divorce so I can marry Julius Welker? I inwardly guffawed as I thought of his stupefied reaction when he learned I was bedding down with a star athlete--one who was even younger than that silly airhead he'd shacked up with.

But my amusement vanished at once when he said, "Sandra, I met your man yesterday. You know, Julius."

I staggered into my own chair, feeling suddenly weak in the knees. "You--you met Julius?"

"I should say he met me. He came to my office."

I was almost dizzy with confusion. "But--why?"

He have a mirthless little laugh. "He thinks we should get back together."

I don't think I have ever been closer to passing out than at that moment. My vision blurred as I felt my whole world--or, rather, the world I had fondly been picturing for myself--seemed to crumble all around me.

"Why does he think that?" I manage to croak.

"I guess he thinks you still love me. I told him you didn't, but he's convinced of it. And he thinks I should leave my girlfriend and go back to you. I can still hear him in that deep baritone voice of his: 'She's your wife, guy.'

"One thing I can say," Mark went on, looking at his hands. "I still love you."

That got me riled up. "Oh, you do, do you? Well, it seems that sly little tart didn't have to wiggle her tits or her butt very much to get you to dump me. Or are you just passing that off as a midlife crisis?"

"I don't know what it was!" he cried plaintively. "All I know now is that I made a mistake--and I want to come back. Is there no hope for us?"

The expression he was giving me--like a little lost boy yearning for his mother--wrung my heart. I had to stand up and retreat to a corner of my tiny office, as a desperate way of putting some physical and emotional distance between us. My head was spinning and I was hardly aware of my surroundings. I felt utterly at sea.

"I--I just don't know, Mark," I said. All of a sudden the eight years of our marriage came flooding back into my mind. They were good years, by God! We were madly in love at the beginning, and even toward the end I felt we were in good shape. His desertion of me had come like a bolt from the blue, and I was still baffled by it.

"Please, Sandra," Mark said, "let's give it another shot."

"Mark, you must know I want to be with Julius." I had to cling to the hope that that extraordinary young man still wanted me.

"Yes, I sense that. That's okay--I won't mind if I have just a part of you."

"So what are you suggesting? Some kind of ménage à trois?"

"If that's what it takes to get you back--or get me into your life somehow. I don't care if I'm just second fiddle to him. He seems like an incredible guy, and I don't wonder that you"--he had to swallow hard before he could say the words--"love him."

"I do love him," I said grimly. "And he wants me."

"He does want you. But I'm still married to you. If you really want a divorce, I'll give you one. But I want you just as much as he does--and we have a lot more history in our relationship than you and he do."

I covered my face with my hands. I just couldn't deal with this anymore. The stuff that had happened these last few weeks--from meeting Julius after being fucked by two dozen guys in that gangbang, to that foursome with Tricia and Dontae, to bedding down with my own parents, to bedding down with Julius's parents, and now to this imbroglio--was getting to be too much for me.

"Look, Mark," I said desperately, "I'll have to think about this. Maybe we can make this work somehow--but maybe not. I can't promise anything. The first thing I have to do is talk to Julius."

"Okay, fair enough," he said, getting up slowly. "You know how to reach me."

And he strode disconsolately out of my office.

I felt as if there was some huge wad of paper in my throat. Choking, I snatched up my purse and headed home.

It was early afternoon, and Julius had gone to the gym to exercise. It was well over an hour before he finally came back, looking about as heart-rendingly beautiful as I'd ever seen him. Sitting on the sofa, I gagged before I could say, "Do you know who came to my office?"

"Who, ma'am?" he muttered, although I'm sure he knew.

"My husband."

He nodded briefly. "Good for him."

"You went to see him?" I said, trying not to sound betrayed.

"Yes, ma'am."

"Why, Julius, why?"

He sat down beside me and looked right into my face. "You two are man and wife. You should be together."

There were plenty of things I could have said to that, but I was struggling to find the words. I couldn't say, What business is it of yours? But it was his business, since he was a part of my life just as much as Mark was (or had been). And I had no right to criticize him for interfering, since I'd boldly interfered in the life of his family by bringing his parents back together.

"Julius, I love you!" I whispered. "I was hoping we'd--" I couldn't finish: I was hoping we'd get married. But even articulating those words in my mind made me realize that it wasn't going to happen, and would never have happened. There were too many things standing in the way.

"I love you too, ma'am," he said gently, "more than you could possibly know. That's why I want to get you two back together. You belong to him."

"I'm not his personal property!" I spat.

"I didn't mean it that way, ma'am. You love him too--"

"No, I don't! Not after he left me for that young harlot!"

"Ma'am, you wouldn't be so upset about that if you didn't have feelings for him. This is not just injured pride, you know."

I lapsed into silence. In addition to his prowess on the football field, was this guy also an infallible psychologist?

"But--I want to be with you!" I cried.

"And I want to be with you."

Well, that was something. "I just don't see how--"

"We can work something out. I'm sure there's a way."

He bent forward and gave me a strangely chaste kiss. Then, patting my cheek tenderly, he got up and went about his business.

It took me a couple of days to work out my feelings, but I finally caved to the united pressure of my "two men" (Mark and Julius). I invited Mark go come over on Saturday afternoon so that all three of us could talk things out further. But a little while before our appointment, someone else came into my life.

Julius had gone off to work out in the gym again, leaving me alone in the house. When the doorbell rang, I couldn't imagine who it could be. Mark still had keys to the house, so he'd probably have walked right in--unless he felt that would be too presumptuous. But it was at least half an hour before his expected arrival, so it couldn't be him. Could it?

What I found on my doorstep was a young woman--quite attractive, I have to admit--but in a state of extreme emotional distress. She had already been crying, and when she lifted her face up to me (she was standing a step or two below the front door) she looked the very picture of inconsolable misery.

"Are you . . . Sandra Osborne?" she said in a high, girlish voice.

"I am. And who may you be?"

Her face writhed before she could say, "I'm Nancy Bennett."

The name meant nothing to me--and that seemed to surprise her.

"I--I'm . . . well, I'm your husband's . . . friend."

A surge of anger rushed through me. Friend, eh? So this was the little seductress who had lured Mark away from me!

But before I could express my outrage, Nancy collapsed on the steps, covering her face in her hands and sobbing pitiably.

"Oh, for heaven's sake!" I cried, embarrassed at the spectacle she was making. What if my neighbors caught sight of this? "Just get inside, will you?" I went on, almost dragging her into the house and shutting the door.

She gazed around the living room as if it was Buckingham Palace. Clearly she'd never been here before. Well, that was something of a relief: at least she hadn't polluted my marriage bed with her pussy juices.

She stumbled to the sofa and sat down heavily on it, still covering her face. What the hell was I supposed to do? Was I really expected to have sympathy for this wretched creature who had led my husband astray?

Then I began to wonder. Who had led whom astray? I of course knew nothing about Nancy--but even now I sensed that maybe she wasn't quite as responsible for the destruction of my marriage as Mark was.

"What is it, dear?" I said. "Tell me."

Even this modicum of sympathy seemed to buck her up, and she took her hands away from her face and said, "Mark's coming back to you, isn't he?"

"Whoa!" I said. "Not so fast. I haven't agreed to that yet."

"He seems to think you have. He told me we were finished."

"Well, I'm sorry to hear that, but he is my husband you know." And, my anger increasing, I added pointedly: "Maybe you should think twice about seducing a married man."

"I didn't!" she cried bitterly. She tossed her head around as if trying to dispel some hideous nightmare. "He--he kept after me! I was just a paralegal in his office, but he seemed to get fixated on me. Was always talking to me, then asking me to work late. I was actually sort of afraid of him--I knew I'd get into huge trouble if I did anything like that with him, so I resisted him as best I could. But I'm not the strongest person in the world, and so after weeks and months I just gave in."

"You mean you went to bed with him," I said, not unkindly.

"Yes--and I never felt so ashamed in all my life! God knows I never wanted to be a homewrecker! But I just couldn't say no to him. And I guess you must know, Sandra, that the more a woman sleeps with a man, even if at first unwillingly, the more she starts to develop feelings for him. For women, there's no such thing as 'just sex'--your emotions always get involved. And so"--she choked up--"I fell in love with him!"

I thought she was going to have another burst of hysterical sobbing, but she managed to get a grip on herself and go on.

"I haven't had a lot of boyfriends--most guys seem to think I'm sort of shy and mousy and not very interesting--so I guess I was 'easy pickings' for an experienced man like Mark. At first I tried to convince myself that we could just have an affair and that would be it. I know that's bad enough, but not so bad as actually breaking up a marriage. I swear to you, I never wanted that! But after a few months, he astounded me by saying that he wanted us to live together! He actually got a nice apartment for us and arranged for all my stuff to be moved there. I basically felt like a kept woman--but I loved him!

"And then . . . and then a few days ago he suddenly came home with this solemn look on his face and said, 'I'm sorry, Nancy, it's all over. I'm going back to my wife.' I thought I'd faint dead away. But what could I do? I had no hold over him. He seemed sad about it, but he was determined to dump me. It was all a mistake, he said. So now our whole relationship had been reduced to a 'mistake.'

"Oh, Sandra," she wailed, "I have no business coming here to your house! I have no business trying to win Mark back--and I won't! I guess I deserve to be treated this way, to be thrown out like an old shoe. I brought it on myself by letting myself be seduced by him. But I--"

"No," I interrupted, "you don't deserved to be treated like this. No one does."

You see, I believed every word she said. This girl (yes, she was chronologically a woman--but in terms of sexual and romantic experience she was definitely a girl) was too open and honest to be capable of anything like deceit. She was a victim as much as I was--and my husband was to blame. And yet, I couldn't work up a lot of anger at him either: I suppose that over the last several years I wasn't the most loving or even the most agreeable person to be around. Too caught up in my career, too impatient with Mark for real or imagined deficiencies . . . and perhaps both of us were just in a sort of rut.

And so, as Nancy again covered her hands and wept, a surge of pity and female solidarity flooded over me. It didn't matter anymore that this woman had spread her legs for my husband and turned him into an adulterer. I just saw a young creature racked with pain and remorse for something she was not at all to be blamed for.

And I also have to say that, with my recent lesbian experiences, I had gained some inkling of the way men look at women. I was well aware that men can't stand to see women cry--it evokes a deep, primal sense of protectiveness. And, looking over her luscious body, I could easily understand why a man would have trouble resisting this soft, pliable, weak-willed female whom he could lead to his bed but also engulf in his arms as if she were his daughter.

And so I pulled her hands away from her face, leaned forward, and kissed her long but gently on the mouth.

She made a little moan of surprise and tried to pull away, but I had my hand on the back of her head and kept her in place. When, after nearly half a minute, I finally released her lips from my own, she gazed at me with a wide-eyed surprise that made her look like a porcelain doll. Then, with another cry, this time of delight and relief, she jumped into my lap, grabbed my head, and nestled it against her breasts while yet another flood of tears--happy ones this time--poured out of her eyes.

I assure you this was not a sexual gesture in any sense. She was just overwhelmed by the empathy I was extending to her. And so, as I got a heady dose of her cleavage, lightly dampened by her sweat, I felt her hug me and kiss the top of my head in an ecstasy of emotion. She was so preoccupied with her own actions that she didn't notice my hand slipping under the hem of her skirt. Unconsciously she opened her legs and let my hand reach all the way to her crotch, where I felt her underwear thoroughly moist with her own juices. I pulled her panties away from her sex and fastened my fingers to it.

Only now did she become fully aware of what was happening, and she let out a confused little "Oh!" as she momentarily thought of stopping me. She actually put a hand on my wrist, but she had a weak grip and really made no effort to pull my fingers away from her pussy. Anyway, it was obvious she was enjoying the sensation, as she spread her legs even wider and allowed me full access to herself. As my fingers tickled her labia and clitoris, sometimes forging deep within her vagina, she began almost bouncing on my lap as her feelings got the better of her.

And then, sooner than she or I expected, a high-pitched squeal announced that an orgasm was racing through her, and she pressed my head even tighter to her chest as she gasped and choked and groaned with pleasure, her thighs quivering uncontrollably. I prolonged her climax as much as I could, out of a purely altruistic sense that this sad creature deserved as much happiness as she could get.

When she finally settled down, she slipped off of me and fell awkwardly onto the sofa next to me. She looked up shyly at me, her face red from both exertion and from embarrassment. Our sudden verging into intimacy had caught her completely off-guard, and she didn't know how to react to it.

"I--I've never had that done to me before," she whispered.

"You mean . . . by a woman," I said.

"Yes."

"Well, you obviously enjoyed yourself. Would you like some more?"

She was too mortified to speak. All she did was nod.

And so, just like a man, I stood up, picked her up from the sofa (she was quite a bit lighter than me), and carried her upstairs.

I placed her gently on the bed, deciding that I would undress first. As I began stripping, her gaze was fixed on my figure as if she'd never seen anything like it. Well, I suppose she hadn't seen a naked woman in a long time. When I was fully unclothed, I went over to her and peeled off her blouse, skirt, bra, and panties.

I will admit that she was a knockout. Slender, almost waiflike, she had a robust pair of breasts that were so full and so close together that they made a natural cleavage that would haunt any man's dreams. And her narrow hips and delicately round bottom were as gorgeous as could be. When I got into bed with her, I didn't know what to do first--I just wanted to eat her up!

But I think Nancy felt that she needed to recompense me for what I had done to her, and so she sidled up to me as I lay on my back and, after some tentative kisses on my mouth, she slid her hand down my body, pausing briefly to get an initial feel of my breasts, then proceeding down to my delta, where she (strangely) twirled some of my pubic hair with her fingers before actually touching my pussy, already flowing with its own juices. Her touch was hesitant at first; but, since she of course knew how the apparatus worked, she quickly got into the swing of things and in a matter of minutes had me moaning and shuddering with my own intense orgasm.

After a little rest, we decided to try sixty-nine. I was on top, and I plunged my head into her sex, absorbing the powerful musky aroma before letting my lips and tongue get a full taste of that succulent area. I did give brief thought to the fact that my husband had plowed his cock into this very spot and deposited his seed inside, but that didn't concern me at the moment. Nancy was quite a bit more reluctant to place her lips on my spot, but at last she overcame her shyness and became an enthusiastic pussy-licker.

And it was while we were in this position that Mark came into the house.

Remember, he still had the keys to the place. I imagine he almost immediately detected curious sounds coming from the master bedroom, and I heard his footsteps marching up the stairs. When he got to the threshold of the room, he stopped short and then flung himself backward in a melodramatic gesture of astonishment.