Lola's Lurching Life

Chapter 1

Moonlight beaming through the open window informed Lola Hunt (33) that she was in her bed on a fine night, but what had interrupted her sleep?

A gunshot nearby sounded.

Lola sighed, thinking it would be some poor sod, with or without pals, attempting to steal one of retired farmer Fred Brown's goats tethered on his lawns in suburbia to keep the grass down.

Fred probably was firing warning shots and next he might shoot to maim. But firing even in bright moonlight coupled with rising anger, meant anything could happen, including shooting one of his inbred goats.

Lola stretched and padded off to the loo, remembering stories her mother told her from her experiences in growing up in post-World War 2 widespread poverty, when people stole food and nicked clothing off neighbourhood washing drying lines in order to survive more comfortably.

It was now a case of history repeating itself, thankfully in a much less severe version, as many people practically world-wide were coping with change in post COVID-19 years including the poor, while even former reasonably well-heeled financially folk were having to 'tighten their belts' in a growing age of job losses and falling incomes

In some cases, the period of financial and social readjustment could result in a growing number of people stealing what they wanted from other people.

Nude, she urinated, scratching under her left breast.

Lola was okay financially, as a result of down-sizing, having sold the marital house she received as part of her divorce settlement from Harry four years ago. And it had been good riddance after deciding he preferred fucking his female office assistant more than his wife whom he'd alleged had become 'sexually incompetent'.

That's what the jerk wrote when filing for uncontested divorce on the grounds of irretrievable breakdown of the marriage.

Well, thought Lola, in the bathroom, any right-thinking woman would choose to lay there in bed like she had in similar circumstances, when their once lean and romantic husband, having earlier consumed two straight whiskies after wine with dinner and beer starters, dropped on to her holding his erection and squashing her with his increasingly fat belly, the inheritance of even more weight from over-eating. Already half-sleep, he'd pound away and perhaps two out of every three occasions the session would end with him rolling off complaining how could a guy achieve ejaculation when his wife lay imitating a basket of wet washing?

Earlier, on the eve of commencing their failed trial separation, Harry had drenched her as heavily as he did on the first occasion that she'd allowed him to bang her.

What a pig!

"See," he'd cried. "All that cum is the result of you at last deciding to move your arse, and more."

"Yes Harry, it was quite incredible," she recalled saying to him, when reaching for a towel. "For once I was rather excited about having sex with you because it will be the last time forever."

He cried, actually shedding tears, and pathetically shouted 'Bitch,' watching her escape to the spare bedroom.

That had been the last time Lola engaged in sex with a male. Fortunately, three of her married girlfriends possessed strap-on devices.

Lola was about to roll back into bed, wondering about reaching for her vibrator, when there was knocking on the front door.

Nervously wondering who'd be making a social call at 3.20 am, she went downstairs, opened the door a little, and saw a guy pushing back the hood of his soft jacket.

"Yes?"

"Hi, I'm your nearest neighbour Cooper Roper. My housekeeper, Mrs Bishop, told me yesterday that you lived alone and upon hearing the seven gunshots..."

"Wow, were there seven shots?" Lola interrupted. "Something awakened me, but then I heard only one rifle shot. Look, I would ask you in Cooper but I'm um without nightwear."

"I'll try not to stare," grinned the fair-haired guy aged about 30.

That triggered the long-buried flirtatious side to Lola's behaviour and she smiled, "That's tempting, but give me a minute to disappear up the stairs and then come in and make coffee - everything is beside the coffee maker. I'll return wearing some clothing."

"That's very civilised of you Miss Hunt."

"Lola."

"Ah, a name of Greek origin, Lola."

Climbing the steep stairway, Lola wondered was Cooper named after the past film star Garry Cooper and heard her unexpected visitor call, "Great arse."

The attractive brunette divorcee turned, ready to vent the Auckland neighbourhood with a scream, "How dare you!" but caught herself and smiled, noting the doorway was exactly how she'd left it, almost closed. He was still outside.

"What an oaf," she giggled, moving into her bedroom to pull on jeans, a sweater and slippers, deciding not to waste time digging out a bra. She rarely wore one at home.

Lola returned to find Cooper standing beside the coffee-maker in the kitchen, that was part of the of her cute stone cottage with side window views across unkept grounds of the neighbouring huge property to the large heart-shape Lake Pupuke, the so-called inland jewel of inner Auckland Metro seaside area of Milford/Takapuna. They were located less than 20 minutes' drive into Auckland's Central Business District, err, apart from during morning and evening peak traffic times.

She spoke to sound neighbourly.

"I've heard the only child of the late wealthy Ropers was something of a recluse. Um, my guess is with you appearing on my doorstep, you are that person."

"Yes, I've spent a few years living in virtual isolation in rural Queensland, Australia, recovering my physical and mental health resulting from involvement in a horrendous road accident when a logging truck jack-knifed on a highway. Its load of logs tumbled free with some of them flattening my parents and our car. Miraculously, I was not wearing a seat belt and the initial impact of the collusion threw me on to the floor in the gap between the front and rear seats."

"But on to something else You've got this cottage looking lovely, from what I've seen, Lola."

She exclaimed, "Omigod, does that mean that you would have spent time in this near-derelict place that originally was occupied by the gatekeeper to your parents' estate?"

"Indeed, when growing up in the so-called Roper Mansion, I used to camp in this very room with some of my friends and eventually lost my innocence in here to the older sister of one of my friends who obviously wished to gain sexual experience to work in a brothel, or so I speculated. Incidentally, she's now a professor of English Romantic Literature at a university in the South Island and I know from experience that living on a university campus is quite similar to the reputed environment of a brothel."

"Sexual experience, what's that?"

"Ah, Lola. I now live as a recluse and you make it sound as you do, too."

"Something like that."

"Well, if you don't wear lipstick and let them hang down without a bra as they are now, you'll not be pestered by most blokes."

"Thanks for nothing. I'd appreciate being left to make my own choices."

"I apologise. I, err, find the novelty of this rather strange meeting with you is almost beyond comprehension."

"Yeah, my visitors are usually trespassers hoping the derelict outside appearance of the cottage could be a place for them to squat. I don't have TV or radio but do have a mobile phone with an unlisted number."

"Oh, excellent. Let's exchange phone numbers."

"Why?"

"Um, in case you wish to update on our first meeting."

"No thanks, I prefer being alone."

Cooper sighed and said spoken like a true recluse.

"Um, Lola, not all men are jerks."

"Please finish your coffee and leave. And thanks for checking on me in the aftermath of those gunshots. You probably have concluded I'm no pussy."

"Ah, an interesting choice of language."

"Fuck off, Cooper, but I shall speak if I pass you on the street."

He smiled and said smoothly, "For goodness sake, wear a bit of makeup and bring a half-decent bottle of wine when you come over at 6.00 tomorrow evening for dinner. First, we'll tour the decaying mansion for you to advise how I should go about restoration, even partial restoration. My mother would expect me do something about the neglect they allowed to occur to the home for all of her married life and my father's entire life, as his parents who had the monumental home built in their early thirties. appeared oblivious to creeping decay for the first 40 years after its construction."

"Will I be paid for my consultancy?"

"Yes, 200 bucks an hour."

"Thanks, but no payment. I was just testing to find if you were a skinflint. I accept the invitation to dinner because of genuine reasoning behind it. I'll wear lipstick as I do when I leave the cottage. Just don't bother asking me to stay the night."

"I possibly wouldn't think of it. Good very early morning, Miss Hunt. Um, what was your nickname at high school and university if you went to one."

"Sometimes it was cunt."

"I guessed that."

Cooper left, missing her huge smile as he walked to a red Audi TT. Lola figured it probably was his late mother's car. She had read the family had been in his late father's 4WD Mercedes SUV at the time of the fatal accident near the inland town of Taupo south of Auckland.

"He thinks too much to be a total recluse," she mused, climbing the stairs to her bed. She lifted her pillow and pulled out her favourite vibrator, leaving the cannister of pepper spray where it lay.

"Omigod, I intend thinking about Cooper Roper while masturbating," she said, rather thrilled, wondering if her somewhat twisted mindset about adult males might be overdue for updating.

Chapter 2

The hairdresser said, "How often do you get your hair cut, Miss Hunt?"

"Carla, please call me Lola. Usually I go to a hairdresser just prior to Christmas."

"Golly, well it appears to be in good condition. Um, could I attend to your face after I finish your hair as your facial skin appears in need of some elevated care. I'm guessing you've met someone unexpectedly. It is rare for anyone to offer any of us triple the usual fees to stay on after 5.30 for a private session."

"I live alone and detest the natter-natter conversations common in hair salons."

"Join the club," Carla laughed. "It drives some of us older hands into near despair, being amid it all day and, yes, admittedly adding our expected contributions."

The skin treatment, with the benefit of Lola recalling from the past what her skin type was, consisted of brief cleansing, followed by physical exfoliation and then application of a hydrating cream.

Carla said reassuringly, "I see an immediate small improvement that will, of course, continue over several days. If I may say so, your new hair shaping has launched you into appearing a real knockout to anyone familiar with hair styling."

"Well, I see a noticeable improvement and thank you for that. I should consider becoming a regular client of yours if you'll have me."

"Of course, I've lost three regulars who called to cancel their regular appointments due to money at home becoming tighter due to the after-effects of our national lockdown over the COVID-19 virus."

Walking to her ageing Mazda MX-5 Special Edition manual Coupe 2, Lola noticed that Milly's Fashions store was still open and entered to rummage. She ended up purchasing an expensive tight-fitting and short-length cornflower blue dress with a designer's label, a choice was rather odd for her; being a former 'tom boy' she tended to dress 'down'.

Lola sat behind the wheel of her sportscar, feeling exhilarated and then chided herself aloud, "Omigod girl, what's wrong with you? Let the poor guy continue life of a near-hermit."

At 5.00 next afternoon she had a rare bath, and had scented it. Usually she just whipped over her breasts, under-her armpits and around the exterior of her crotch and behind her knees in the shower with a dripping soaped flannel. Well, in her view, as a recluse female, she had the freedom of that choice.

She waited around nervously, with the thought she shouldn't be doing this because it was bound to make one of them or perhaps, even worse, both of them, become inflamed with the thought of shagging their new acquaintance.

God, what rubbish people load their minds with, she berated herself, twice in near succession, actually before stupefying herself upon realizing she was edging to becoming in favour of returning to a sexually active life.

"What on earth?" she moaned, feeling stupid.

Losing confidence, she changed out of the new blue dress and into a comfortable sweater and well-worn jeans and set forth.

Cooper came to the door answering the booming chimes that must have reached the rats in the cellars and mice in the numerous attics under the mini spires of what kids might believe was as castle. During the 200 hundred metre dawdle (females generally are not all that precise about estimating distances or compass directions) along the rough pathway across an overgrown field, Lola was unable to determine whether she would allow the host to kiss her in greeting.

Failing to decide didn't matter, anyway.

Cooper's jaw dropped and he used her favourite phrase of expressing surprise.

"What the fuck?"

She stared at him in accelerating hostility.

"I was expecting you would be dolled-up to celebrate with me my finest hour in making a significant break-through in creeping out of my mental lockdown."

She hunched, winding up to send what she imaged to be an iron-fist, into his solar plexus but was confused about his next reaction.

Quite emotionally, he said, "Please oh please return to the cottage and dress appropriately to celebrate with me the return of I believe of a portion of my former stable mind in respect of speaking fulsomely with a stranger. I'll walk back with you."

"Will dinner be worth it?" she goaded.

"Yes, I only cook from cans or frozen packed offerings. For this momentous occasion, I've persuaded Mrs Redpath, my mother's beloved cook, to come out of retirement from her nearby retirement village, to return into temporary service to prepare and serve our meal. She actually had been here for three days recently getting the kitchen back into shape that she used to maintain until the death of my mother, Iona Roper. For the duration of Mrs Redpath's 37 years' service, she always referred to my mother as 'Madam'."

"Omigod, Cooper. That's the distinctive stuff what makes books become big-sellers. You should write the story of your lurid life."

Cooper said sheepishly, "I've a completed manuscript written while I was receiving holistic treatment for my brainbox out in the wops of rural Queensland, but it shall never see the light of day. I was sent to Australia to that special facility to be far away from that fatal location."

Cooper pulled out his phone and made a call. Lola could only hear what he said.

"Great, Mrs Redpath. You have recovered from your decision never to use the phone, and I quote, 'I'll never use such a new-fangled piece of dried out tripe, as it's beneath me'."

"Ah, you used it Mrs Redpath because it was in your apron pocket and I suspect if the sound it was making had been anything other than some bars of the tune of 'Lilli Marlene', you would have tossed it out of the kitchen window. I selected that ring tone because I recalled often hearing you singing it in the kitchen when I was there doing my school homework from when I was aged about 10."

"Yes, I do remember coming in about that time and finding the plumbing guy squashing over you under him on the kitchen table. Yes, some old memories refuse to die and I'm still bewildered why the plumber chap would be teaching you wrestling holds. Kindly hold dinner for an hour. I have convinced Miss Hunt to return and dress up. Wait till you see her, Mrs Redpath. It will be a sight to knock your socks off. Bye," said Cooper, grinning.

God, the fatal crash survivor was doing well in his social debut, Lola thought, as they were about to set forth and she decided to kiss him. But the fellow-recluse was half a jump ahead of her and crooked arms.

She was happy enough. That sign of friendship would do for the moment, or perhaps for ever if he stuffed up that evening.

As she climbed the stairs in the cottage, Lola called, "Social debut boy, I have put some cans of beer in the fridge for you for whenever you call."

"I don't make social calls."

"Fucking well make me the exception!"

"All right, all right. Don't get your knickers in a twist. You are THE exception."

Lola flopped on to her bed to ease out of her tight jeans, grinning. She had just successfully tested something she had recalled from childhood, her paternal grandmother telling her and cackling, "Most men are easily trainable providing you speak to them firmly."

She came down the stairs with her Pale Pink lipstick replaced with Ruby Red, her combed-out hair restored until it looked more or less like the hairdresser had achieved with its shape. She wore the blue dress and carried a pair of Ruby Red high heels to replace the flatties she was wearing to the portico of the castle, err of the grand old massive house.

Cooper dropped his second can of beer and his jaw simultaneously and then amid the gasp, Lola was certain he'd muttered 'Holy fuck'. Cripes, he must be impressed. She hadn't heard anyone used that term, or a more wholesome term, on her since she was in her late teens, early twenties. Well, the poor sod would have distorted impressions, being a semi-recluse.

"May I kiss you?" he asked, as she walked across the slate floor to him.

"Yes,' she said, bending to pick up his beer can and realised she'd given him a great view of a lot of tit flesh not able to fit into the skimpy in-built bra of her dress.

His face was highly coloured.

She held up her lips.

Instead he lightly kissed the tip of her cute nose (she believed it was cute, in comparison with the noses of women she'd observed closely, including her friends when making love to them).

Her extended eye lids fluttered in surprise at the nose-end kiss.

He croaked, "Lola, you're giving me an erection."

She snapped, "Behave, I don't want you to be an easy pushover."

He looked shocked and she handed him the drained can of beer and ordered him to get a cloth from under the sink and wipe up his mess.

She smiled as he dutifully said, "Yes, Lola" and hurried off to the bench.

He came back, having chosen the obvious floor cloth, and began cleaning and said, "If you think you be having sex with me, you'll be mistaken."

She cleverly turned away from him and said nothing, being confused herself about having sex with him and to leave him more confused about her than ever. That wasn't being kind but then she was focused more on the big picture, the theory might be they could be great for one another. But first, they'd need to use each other as stepping-stones to adjust one another to more acceptable levels of socialization.

She had already done the groundwork by letting him know he was welcome to drop in for a beer and, being male, that would give him the opportunity to eye her breasts. She was aware that most women had no idea that, no pun intended, men were suckers for the enticement of breast, or tits which was her preferred name for then. She had become aware when in her teens of the quandary men had in deciding which way to look when a top-looking car and then a decent pair of covered breasts came into view simultaneously.

That might sound stupid to many women, but it was the reality. Some women were unable to comprehend just how basic males could be. Lola had unfortunately chosen the wrong man to marry who had waited until after marriage to display his indifference to her. Yet at the same time, right up to the end, he never lost his interest in grabbing at her tits and even jerking out one to suck. She'd be a liar if she claimed she'd abhorred that attention most of the time,