Men are Like Red Wine

I pulled the cover over us and let her sleep. After a while, I tried carefully letting her slide down next to me, holding her while she slept so sweetly with her head on my chest. She was obviously in a good place. I decided against waking her and thought it a good idea to let her stay in her own dreamland. It took some careful movements to disentangle myself, step out of the bed and dress. On the night table I found a notebook and a pen, and wrote, "Dear Anna, we had a wonderful time together and I hope you now know what you can expect from a lover. Don't settle for anything less! Love, Bill."

Two weeks later.

I was watching myself in the mirror, just after drying off from my shower, Just as I had done two weeks earlier. It was quite an adventure I had that day, not bad for an eigthy-four-year-old guy, I said to myself. Now I knew the "appendage" between my legs was still functioning. I expected it had most likely been a one-off adventure. Or had it? With a sigh, I dressed.

After breakfast while reading the newspaper, I did some chores around the house. Like two weeks earlier, the weather was warm and sunny. I just wondered, would Anna and friends have a picknick lunch today? I wanted badly to see her again, but she had asked for me to make love to her once—only once. For two weeks I had avoided the park at lunchtime, I didn't want to be a stalker. I finally made up my mind and told my wife, "I'm going to my workshop through the park; see you later, dear."

When I entered the park, I could see that there was no group having a picnic at the pond. Walking on, I soon saw somebody sitting on The Bench. As I got closer, my heart started beating faster; it was her.

"Hi, Anna, may I sit?"

"Yes, of course, I had hoped to see you. What took you so long to come by at lunch time?"

"I was scared. You said only once and I wanted so badly to see you again, I didn't want to be a stalker."

"Bill, I can't forget that day, I want more. I may be greedy, but I want more. I've been sitting on this bench every sunny workday for the last week. I was so frightened that you didn't want to see me again. I didn't have your telephone number or address, only your Christian name. You knew where I lived; why didn't you contact me? She threw her arms around me, hugged me and cried.

"I want more, too. I might be old, but you make me feel young. You are such a joy to be with. But what about the practicalities? We can't be a couple, as you said before, it has to be discreet, more for your sake than mine, though."

"I can't take the day off like I did last time we were together. My job won't allow it. Can you spend an evening once every or every other week with me?" she asked.

"Yes, once every second Thursday might be possible for me, but where?"

"Thursday is fine, but why Thursday?"

"Every Thursday I go to a Builders Club I'm member of. We are meeting at a bar not far from your flat where we play cards, darts, drink beer or just talk. There are a bunch of us, twenty to thirty each evening, split up in several rooms and I circulate. I can come in late and stay there for an hour before going home without anybody being the wiser or suspecting I have not been there the whole evening."

"Tomorrow is Thursday, can you come to my flat after six?"

"Can we stay at your flat?"

"Of course, I live alone. It's a large apartment building with several flats. Nobody will notice you going in or leaving. Please come tomorrow, Bill."

Our adventure started with wonderful loving meetings, biweekly at her flat. We had many wonderful love sessions and, of course, many good conversations. This went on for about six months until I came home from the workshop, went in through our back door into the kitchen and was about to shout "I'm home" to my wife. I heard something through the partly open door to the living-room, something that made me stop. I heard my wife in there entertaining some of her friends, and what she said stopped me dead. "I'm worried about Bill!"

One of her friends replied, "Why are you worried, Johanna? He seems to be in such great shape. He helps us, all the widows, fix things we can't do ourselves. He's also so sweet and considerate. He's not ill, is he?"

"Not physically, I think," she said, "but I'm afraid he has beginning dementia."

"No, that's not possible," they all said simultaneously. "He never seems to forget anything and is so good about keeping the times he set for visits when we need something done," one continued.

I think it was Linda who asked the crucial question. "Why do you believe he has a beginning dementia, Johanna?"

"It started in June, about six months ago," she said. "He came home in such a good mood, so I asked him what made him so happy. He kissed me and said he had been sitting on the bench near the pond in the park. A girl, or young woman, twenty-five years old sat down next to him. After a while, she took him home and asked him to make love to her, which he did. He told me her name was Anna."

"That is hardly a sign of dementia, Johanna," one of her friends said. "On the contrary, I would say."

"You don't understand. That is the precise same bench we sat on 60 years ago, when I, after some petting, took him home for the first time. We stayed in my bed rest of the day. And remember, he calls me Anna, not Johanna. He might have had a sunstroke and then re-lived what happened with us such a long time ago. That's what I thought that day."

"What did you say to him then?"

"I gave him a kiss and told him I was happy for him. Then I told him dinner would be ready in half an hour."

I heard some laughter and then one of her friends asked: "Since then, something more must have happened to make you change your belief of a sunstroke to fear a beginning dementia, if not the plain truth."

"Get real. Who would believe a woman in her twenties would seduce a nearly eighty-five-year-old man? Simply not believable, being the truth, so I ruled it out. What happened later was that this Anna came up again. Two weeks later he came home after being to the Builders Club he's a member of. They meet every Thursday evening at a bar in Broad Street. They eat some bar-food, burgers or something, then they play darts or cards or simply socialize. This Thursday when I asked him if it had been a good evening, he smiled and told me "Oh, yes!" he had met Anna again and made love to her."

"Maybe it is the truth, Johanna. He is still a handsome man."

"Yes, he is, for a time I started to believe it could be the truth. He repeated his meetings with this Anna once or twice a month, always on Thursdays. Then I met Mary's husband, Frank, at the mall, and I asked him if he saw my husband at the club gatherings Thursday evenings. He assured me he had. 'Bill is always there, he never fails to meet, first to arrive last to leave,' he said. You see, it is all in his mind and it worries me."

"What are you going to do then?"

"My sister is a nurse. Retired now. In her last few years, she was working in a special care facility. She tells me that I should not challenge what he says or correct him. I am supposed to let him be happy with his memories. I don't do anything; I just say I'm happy for him."

I thought I had heard enough. I put the grocery bag with the eggs I had bought on the kitchen table, walked over to the door, opened it and closed it with a slight slam and called; "Anna, I'm home." I stood in the door opening into the living-room and greeted the ladies. "Hi, ladies, entertaining my wife?"

"Good to see you, Bill," Anna (Johanna) said. "Did you remember to buy the eggs I need for my cake baking later today?"

I cast a quick glance towards the grocery bag on the table, then said, "I'm so sorry, Anna, I forgot, I will rush down to the shop immediately and pick them up."

I closed the door took the bag and walked out, down the street to the Starbuck round the corner. I bought a coffee and found a table.

I smiled at myself, I had twenty minutes to spend and think about what to do now. Honestly, I didn't think too long, I folded my hands, looked towards heaven and prayed; "Please God, let me have my Anna (Susanna) until it ends by itself, and I thank you taking care of Frank for me, making him so forgetful that he doesn't remember what he did yesterday. Amen."

The End.