Kate and Hal in an Empty Nest

(Note to Readers: The sex is vanilla, all of it by a married F-M couple, some of it outdoors. There are flashbacks, and in some of them the couple's son is under 18, but he has neither involvement in nor awareness of any sex acts. There is a scene with a reference to the father having had a birds-and-bees talk with the son, but it's a short narrative summary.)

***

They both hugged Kevin just before leaving his room. In the elevator down from the eleventh floor, they were alone, but still stood separately, mostly silent, except for a brief exchange about where they might eat on the way home.

The walk to the car was also uneventful. They noted that the campus was new, and so the trees hadn't grown enough to provide much shade. This August move-in had raised a light sweat on the couple, even with Kevin doing most of the work.

Hal drove. Kate finger-fanned herself, with the air conditioning yet to provide comfort.

"When?" he asked, as they progressed from the campus to the town.

"Not until we're between farms."

Soon, they reached a stretch of the two-lane state road that was nearly empty. There was tall corn on one side, and lush soybeans on the other.

"Just remember," she said, unzipping her jeans, "this is not our nest."

He chuckled, keeping his eyes on the road. A truck zoomed by in the other lane. After it was gone, Hal eased his right hand across the console, and into her lap. His fingers found her nether hair to be slick, with sweat, or her excitement, or both.

She murmured, "Ohhhhh yeeaahhhh."

It took an hour and a half to reach the restaurant. Several times, Hal needed to put both hands on the steering wheel. Now and then, the state road went through the centers of small towns, inhibiting driver and passenger. Yet the road was open for long stretches, and they felt free enough then. Kate enjoyed two orgasms.

***

Kate freshened up, as much as she could, in the ladies' room. This was a truck stop, but the diner was family-friendly, because it was where the state road met the interstate. There was a huge salad bar, and as much city-folks food on the menu as there were chicken-fried basics for truckers.

She wanted to be presentable, under the circumstances. Her forty-six-year-old self tried to respect the ambiance of a sit-down restaurant, in a way that her twenty-year-old self seldom did. She didn't have to be presentable for Hal, however. With a brief smile, she thought of him as her co-conspirator.

There were enough wipes and tissues in her belt pack for a thorough mopdown of face and arms. A fresh panty liner helped her stay comfortably dry. She emerged from the ladies' room feeling, and she believed looking, like the settled matron that was her preferred disguise in public.

From where Hal sat in the booth, he could see into the convenience store on the far side of the cashier's counter. There were shelves and spin racks of supposed trucker supplies, although many of them seemed like tchotchkes that a real trucker wouldn't spend on. Still, the area presented a culture where white-collar Hal wouldn't feel welcome. He saw this as a vague challenge to his masculinity, but one which he did not feel obligated to answer.

As Kate slid over to sit on the other side of the booth, she asked, "Interested in mud flaps with the silhouette of a hot chick?"

Embarrassment showed in his smile. "Not my style."

"Maybe we can rethink what our style is now. What kind of people we can be." She winked at him.

"Okay then," he said, his smile edging towards wicked. "What are you ordering?"

Her lips tightened. "Chicken cobb salad."

He stroked his chin. "I recall that from your current style."

"Shut up," she said, with a tiny smile that conceded his point.

***

Dusk was deepening as the car turned in to the driveway, and the garage door obediently lifted.

As Hal turned the engine off, Kate said, "Stay right there," loudly enough to be heard over the closing of the door.

Hal obeyed, giving her a puzzled look as she reached to the floor of the back seat.

She brought up the sunshade, which she unfolded and spread across the windshield. "Don't want the cam to catch this," she said.

Before he could point out that they could erase whatever the garage security camera recorded, she pulled off her t-shirt while saying, "Whip it out."

He was still fumbling with the zipper when she had removed her bra and, smirking, draped it on the rear-view mirror.

When he finally shoved slacks and drawers to mid-thigh, she knee-stood on her seat, leaned over the console, grabbed his head, and pressed her conical breasts onto his face. After a moment, she moved her hand down, slapped his hand away, and started yanking his prick. "Bastard," she hissed. "Think I'll let you be all smug, and poised, and superior, about diddling your wife across five counties? Nope! You'll be as frazzled as I was! And even messier!"

He was able to assert himself a little, moving his hands to her boobs. But he started spewing while still in his third fondle.

It was then that his ecstasy spread past his groin, to the full awareness of the freedom he and his wife could now enjoy. He inhaled the rankness of her bosom sweat, and got another rush.

Yet he said, "You said this isn't our nest."

"The garage is attached to the nest," she said, wiping off her hand around his navel. "And this wasn't real sex."

Their fun mood continued through the evening, but when they bedded down for 'real sex,' the session was one of those when they weren't in synch. Kate needed a whole lot of clit rubbing to get off, and Hal wasn't as erect as usual. They wrote this off to fatigue, and the not-really-sex in the car, and confused excitement--even anxiety--about their new situation.

***

They met on New Year's Eve, when 1999 gave way to 2000. Like everyone else eager for the wildest party opportunity of their lives, they dismissed the nattering of calendar purists, who insisted that there wouldn't be a new century or millennium until 2000 yielded to 2001. Besides, entering 2000 carried the still-unknown danger of the world shutting down from 'Y2K,' because of two-digit year fields in the ancient software of automated systems. Hal and Kate were pretty sure that wouldn't happen, but why not add some excitement to the event, by thinking it might include the end of civilization? And maybe use the danger to justify reckless fun that might never be available again?

Harold Minton was in a roving pack of guys who bar-hopped. Katerina Sobieski was in a similar band of young women. The groups crossed paths early in the evening, when the search for fun had not yet been addled by alcohol. Hal enjoyed the company of a wisecracking cutie with pixie-cut hair streaked in purple and silver. Kate enjoyed having a willing foil for her humor, and was more than amused by the look of a big, mullet-haired guy, whose smile was open and friendly. They soon divulged that they were unattached, at least that night. Each soon cut the other out of their herds.

As hooligans, these two were light hitters, mostly just yelling and laughing as they wove through the crowds on city streets. They didn't damage property, and their names were not entered into police reports. They got slightly intoxicated, so they remained aware of their actions while behaving as though they weren't. This allowed them to watch what was going on, and remember it later. As midnight approached in the Western Hemisphere, reports of minor glitches in the Eastern had made it clear that 2000 would start without severe cybernetic drama. Thus, Hal and Kate paid more attention to each other.

They were among the lucky ones. Their stranger hookup did not result in a fertilized ovum (with Kate trusting where she was in her cycle), or an exchange of hostile microorganisms. When they undressed in his apartment, she was at first unmoved by his bland fleshiness, but in their close embrace, she found comfort in being surrounded by him, and was aroused by the gentle strength with which he responded to her. He was thoroughly smitten with the quick wit and spitfire energy in her compact curvy frame, to the point of worrying that she might ditch him the next day.

Yet they kept the contact information they exchanged, and used it in the ensuing days to affirm that they had, in fact, escaped life-changing consequences. Thus they entered 2000 with the ability to continue their 1999-based lives. And, as they spent time together while sober, they considered seriously whether to make their 2000 differ from their 1999.

This led them to dating in 2000, cohabitation in 2001, nuptials in 2003, and parenthood in 2005.

***

In their newly emptied nest, the middle-aged couple didn't transform into wild libertines. They still had paying work to do, as well as chores to keep up their house and property. Each tried to pick up unspoken cues from the other, whether to make an intimate move, or encourage one.

They defaulted to hanging back.

Finally, one night as they were finishing dinner, Hal said, "I think we should talk about the elephant in the nest."

Kate nodded, not meeting his eyes. "Yeah, okay," she said. She then bought some time by standing up, and clearing the table.

Hal went to the living room and took a seat at one end of the sofa. When Kate joined him, she sat on the other end. They angled enough to face each other, but didn't touch.

He began, "I wonder if we're scared of being disappointed. After the way we were off stride, that night."

"I'm still getting used to this," Kate told him. "I've been bottled up for so long...I might always be looking over my shoulder, wondering what Kevin is up to."

"All I expect us to do," said Hal, hoping he sounded patient, "is speak freely. The same kind of things we whispered in bed, only now we can prolong the discussions."

Her head leaned back on the sofa cushion. "Everything we say seems to be loaded now. Even the word 'prolong.'" She allowed herself a smile.

He eased closer, but didn't touch her. "It is my duty to prolong for you. In space and time."

"See?" she said while chuckling. "Anything can be a dirty joke."

He tried to read her expression. Despite the banter, she seemed dulled out.

"Any other problems?" he asked.

She said, "There shouldn't be. I had my gynie checkup a month ago. She said that I show no signs of perimenopause. But the fact that the subject has been raised, has me thinking that it could start any time."

"Would it be better, for you, if we didn't talk about it? Give ourselves permission to start some fun, any time, but stop immediately if the other person says no?"

She gave that some thought. "I think so," she said, and showed him her tiny smile of mischief. "I like the idea of acting on impulse."

He laughed. "In the garage, that's the most fun I've ever had in that car."

"Which only makes me wonder about the cars in your past."

He wagged a finger. "You said you didn't want talking."

"Right. But I want informed impulse. If you want to put a move on me, look up the schedule app first. How about no grabass within six hours of an appointment, or some other planned event. Eight hours if the event requires us to dress up."

He made a show of checking his phone. "I don't see anything, the rest of tonight."

"The usual chores," she said firmly. She was, however, getting a little frisky, despite her claimed dislike of overtalking.

"All right," he said. "After that, will you join me in the shower?"

She took a slow, deep breath, then smiled. "Sure. I just told myself that Kevin is nowhere near here, and my man and I can use this house however we like."

They soaped and groped and repeated. When there was tickling, the ticklee sought revenge by weaponizing the shower massage.

The groping advanced to more sensitive places. But when Hal got a finger to Kate's G Spot, she said, "No. Bed."

"We've done this before," he said, while trying to recall the details of their small sample of shower sex.

"And it didn't feel good," she said, already out of the shower and toweling. "Maybe you loved it, Darling, but water isn't lube."

He worked to make it up to her in bed, with slow, passionate foreplay. They connected fully for the first time since returning home, and enjoyed a marathon of copulation, carrying them together in waves of pleasure.

Much later, Kate hummed, eyes closed, lips in a savoring smile. But then she opened the eyes enough to focus on Hal, and said, "You about there?"

"I can be," he said, though he felt great and wanted to keep going. He had already spurted in her once, and his respite was spent pleasantly in slow kissing and fondling. Now his prick reveled again in her wet heat, and thrilled to her tunnel's squeezing. And he was a man, he had made his woman climax, more than once, and he was again a mighty, erect man! "Lube wearing off?"

"Oh no," she said, smile expanding. "It's doing very well. But lube isn't always my friend. Sometimes it's an enabler, making me happy in the short term. When you only enjoy the experience, you don't notice everything that's happening. You only catch on to all that later, and when you do, lube can no longer help you."

"Spoken like a mother warning her kid about drugs."

"Damn right. Give me one more blast."

He sped up, and granted her wish about five pumps later, and for another ten or fifteen after that. He howled. She sighed from the joy of his strongest stretching against her walls.

Much of his upper weight dropped to his left elbow, denting a star of folds on the sheets. He slid his right hand behind her back and lifted her torso, then hunched to slobber her bosom. He was still deep in her quim, and his sucking sent aftershocks through him, into her.

She floated on the bliss for several heartbeats. Then she said, "Now get out, and maybe we can do this again tomorrow."

He complied, to a sound of skfulch, bringing them both to laughter.

They cuddled again, to escort each other to sleep.

What this impulse missed, however, was that the following day was one when they both had to work, early in the morning, at their pre-pandemic offices, rather than at home. As they dragged their sleep-short bodies through the morning after, it was difficult to appreciate the memory of their lovemaking. They muttered agreement on the need for their impulses to be more thoroughly informed.

***

Early on a Saturday afternoon, Kate saw Hal slothed on the sofa, watching sports on television. She spurred herself to seize the rest of the day.

She stuffed a large tote bag with towels, blankets, and Certain Necessities. She doffed her t-shirt and jeans, changed what she wore under them, and dressed in the same outerwear. Then she strode up to Hal and said, "Get in the car."

His eyes widened.

She continued, "Unless you object."

"Uh, no. I sure don't."

He barely had time to put on shoes, and to stuff his wallet into a pocket.

She drove to a nearby forest preserve. It was a fine September day, with many people clustered at picnic tables and shelters. She found a parking place near the start of one of the hiking trails.

Saying nothing, she shouldered the tote bag straps and set off on the trail. It ascended a ridge thick with trees, just starting to color their leaves away from green. Hal followed, also saying nothing. His questions in the car drew no response, so he had given up on them.

They were familiar with the trail. When Kate veered left onto what wasn't even a path, Hal grinned.

A few dozen paces took them to a clump of four trees, so closely rooted and branched that the far side was out of sight from the trail. At the middle of the far side, Kate set down the tote bag against a root, pivoted, and extended her arms, just in time to halt Hal's arrival. She kissed him with her mouth open wide.

At their next breathing opportunity, he said, "Do with me what you will!"

This time she spoke. "Don't take any pictures."

She unzipped his cargo shorts with a rough yank. His right hand slid inside her t-shirt to find the sheer bra she had never worn outside their bedroom. As his fingers rubbed the mesh onto her nearest nipple, her whole torso tingled. She gasped in delight and relief. Until then she had felt nothing, and faked everything. Her impulsive action was merely a performance. Now she knew her transgression would at least be fun.

Kate had worried for years about how her body was changing. Her physique and looks had held up well, and for a while she shrugged off her libido lapses as results of the demands of parenthood. But the emptying of the nest had scared her as much as it thrilled her. So much of the joy in her youth had sprung from the energetic desire of her body. How much of that could she recover now? Any of it?

She raised both arms straight up. Hal took his cue, lifting her t-shirt up and away. He left the bra in place, its see-through naughtiness somehow more daring than a bared bosom.

"Beach towel," she commanded. As he bent over to dig through the tote bag, she dragged down his cargoes, and then his boxers, leaving them crumpled around his shoes. The lovers separated long enough to spread the towel. Then she knelt, lifted his cock, and began a slow, thorough licking of his scrotum.

He wheezed, "Bucket list, right?"

She took some moments from her tonguing to say what linked together as, "Yeah, ever since we saw the carved initials, and the spent condoms among the roots. They inspired both disgust and envy." Then she closed her lips around half of his shlong.

Unable to do much of anything for his lover, except stroke her hair, Hal shed his shirt, then quickly looked around to see if they had an audience. Finding none, he looked again at Kate, her skin and strapless bra touched here and there by sunlight through leaf shade. Her light brown hair, still short as a good complement to her head and face, responded to show reddish highlights that weren't quite auburn. He had another thrill like the one in the garage, glorying in the awareness of their freedom. But the prospect of getting caught was scarier than it was fun.

He reached to get his hands on her shoulders, and eased her away. Despite wanting her fellatio to last forever, he crouched to join her level on the towel. "I want you! What first?"

"Fingers," she said with a grin. He unbuttoned and unzipped her jeans. With thumbs in her unused belt loops, he pulled the denim past her hips.

His bugged eyes brought her a laugh, and a tingle throughout her lower half. She wore her only pair of split-crotch panties, the lavender lace and satin showing the direct route to her labia--where the breeze now teased her to moisture.

Hal flopped on his side and dutifully fingered past her underwear. She lay facing him, and gripped his putz.

They kissed, and she freed a hand to squeeze lube onto key locations. Soon they were banging in cowgirl. Moments after Hal spread his right hand onto her left breast, his shlong started spurting . Kate was getting very close, but she left nothing to chance. Rapid pelvis grinds, and a clit rub that she found later to be too rough, ensured that she emerged from this excursion with an orgasm.

"Now we escape!" she said, withdrawing her trunk from his spindle. Her plan all along had been to rush through everything to sustain the sense of defying and dodging authority, whether it was chasing them or not. Even if this made the sex itself imperfect.

Where needed, Hal toweled himself and Kate stuffed tissues. Even less necessary than their rapid dressing was their hurried descent of the trail and entry to the car. In the drive home they mainly enjoyed their rapid breathing, and exchanged some dirty talk and laughter.