Rowena Awakes

Rowena was tired. Rowena was always tired. She was tired when she went to bed, tired when she woke up, tired all day long.

She took a last look round the room she had just finished preparing, noting the main items. "Bed. Quite an adequate desk – it was the one dad gave me for my eighteenth birthday. Good swivel chair. Armchair, wardrobe, dressing table, bright curtains and a rug, gas fire. Yes, it should be all right." She sighed wearily.

"Wish I'd never volunteered," she muttered to herself. "Having to look after someone else, cook for them, and I suppose wash and clean for them. Why couldn't I keep my mouth shut?"

Two Sundays before the minister had announced in church that people with spare rooms in their house were being sought to take in university students. The students came from inland rural areas, and there was a shortage of accommodation for them. Most of these students had never been away from their families before, so it was thought desirable for them to be boarded with families in the city.

Rowena had sniggered to her self in a weary sort of way. She thought, "I should imagine one of the last things these young people wanted was another family breathing down their necks. What they'll be after will be the freedom to get into all sorts of trouble."

After the service, she noted that few people seemed to be rushing to take on these students. "They probably realise the difficulties they might be getting themselves into, taking on seventeen and eighteen year olds," she thought.

Despite her gloomy prognostications about what might be expected from youth, and on the spur of an altruistic moment, she volunteered.

"I've got that whole house to myself," she told the minister. "There are three bedrooms, and I could turn the big one into a bedroom and study." Now she regretted her impetuosity. She foresaw and foreheard, loud music, feet clumping, riotous behaviour, foul language and perhaps even drugs.

The minister had been doubtful. Not that he had said so, but you could tell by his attitude. He knew Rowena was a woman always in a state of depression, always brooding over her loss. She was a loyal church attendee and he did not wish to offend her, so he said, "I'll let you know Rowena when I've got all the names of those volunteering."

Rowena was only thirty-two but looked and behaved as if she was fifty. Those who had known her only since her beloved Ken had been killed five years before, would never have believed she had once been a scintillating and attractive young woman. Young men and not so young men had pursued her in those days, but in vain. It was not until her lovely Ken had taken her by storm, that she succumbed. Her wedding day had been the happiest day of her life. Both she and Ken had married as virgins. In the few years that followed their love had given rise to a great passion. Their marriage seemed to lack nothing, except the one thing they both longed for, a child. When Rowena announced to Ken that she was pregnant, it was a day of high celebration for both of them.

Three months later Rowena opened the door to find a policeman standing there. She knew before he even spoke. She simply said, "Ken!" He nodded. Ken had been killed in a car accident on his way to work. Rowena fainted, and the shock caused her to abort the child.

Since that awful day Rowena had wandered across an emotional wasteland. At first, nothing could console her for her double loss. She told her story to anyone who would listen, and wept endlessly. Later she ceased weeping and seemed to close off from life.

She carried on the daily routines, but with a weary resignation. She rarely spoke to anyone, and those who did try to converse with her found her remote, looking all the time as if she was in some distant place and not hearing them. Physically she seemed to age suddenly, walking with bowed shoulders and shuffling feet.

In the weeks after she had volunteered to take in a student she heard nothing further. In fact, the minister had hoped he would not have to take up her offer. Rowena was relieved. "I won't have to be bothered after all, " she thought.

Fortunately or unfortunately, depending on your point of view, the minister found he had one student he had been unable to place. Despite his doubts about the wisdom of it, he was forced to resort to Rowena.

"He's a young fellow from a cattle station up north," he told Rowena. "His name is Steven and he's nineteen years old, and being so isolated he's had a bit of a battle to make it to university. He's never been to the city before and his parents are concerned that he will be a bit lost."

"I had hoped it might be a girl," complained Rowena. "They're not so noisy and messy as boys." Having three teenage daughters the minister thought otherwise, but maintained a diplomatic silence on the subject.

"We really do need a place for Steven," said the minister. "If you won't take him I don't what we'll do."

So Rowena had reluctantly agreed, and awaited the arrival of her student boarder.

The minister brought him to the house, introduced them, and left. Rowena and Steven weighed each other up whilst trying not to look as if they were.

Steven's first impression was "Probably a spinster disappointed in love. Might look all right if she wasn't so slovenly."

Rowena was a little more favourably impressed in a grouchy sort of way. "Hmm, a big chap," she thought, "Looks as if he's got a lot of muscle. Not bad looking, and I suppose he's got a few brains or he wouldn't be going to university."

She showed Steven the room she had prepared, and he thanked her and said it was "very nice." She invited him to come and have a cup of coffee in the kitchen thinking, "And I won't make a habit of that."

Over coffee, they continued the surreptitious examination of each other in a little more detail. Steven was very quiet and not the rumbustious country bumpkin Rowena had anticipated. He seemed very shy and reticent, giving only brief answers to her hesitant questions.

Having a male in the house after so many years of living alone, Rowena was finding it more difficult than usual to make conversation, yet deep inside her self a little spark seemed to ignite. Could it be an ember of unruly interest? Rowena stamped upon it firmly.

Steven, whose life on the cattle station had not brought him into much contact with women, apart from his mother and two sisters, was still aware of the basic difference between men and women. In the manner of most males meeting a female, young or old, he surveyed Rowena with a touch of libidinous interest.

"Pity about her hair," he thought. "Could do with a comb through it. Nice face, if she didn't look so sour. Good Lord, she's got great breasts. She should show those off a bit more. Can't see her legs. I wonder what they're like? Must have a look when they come out from under the table.

These assessments went on under cover of hesitant and polite conversation, and when the coffee was finished and Rowena had instructed Steven as to meal times, washing days, bed sheet changes and so on, a silence fell upon them.

From Steven's point of view, it was a question of how one was supposed to behave in a strange house with someone you had never met before. Should he continue to sit in the kitchen or go to his room? If he sat in the kitchen, would he be unwelcome? If he went to his room, would he appear impolite?

Rowena saved the situation by suggesting that Steven go and unpack. Both parted with some relief.

In the following weeks the pair got to know each other a little more. Steven spoke of his life on the cattle station, his parents and sisters. He also occasionally talked about the agricultural science course he was doing, but he spent a great deal of time either at the library or working in his room. He seemed to have no social life at all.

Rowena's worst fears were not realised. Steven continued very quiet and she saw no sign of the drugs she had been sure would be in evidence. She revealed very little of her own life, her conversation being mostly limited to domestic matters and church activities. The little ember that had glowed the first day was still not quite extinguished, but she wrote it off as a "motherly interest." Steven on the other hand, had taken the earliest opportunity to inspect Rowena's legs, and concluded, "Not bad, not bad at all."

Rowena, having now lived alone for some years had, like many people who find themselves in this situation, become neglectful of her personal appearance. Such people have no one to please, no one to remark how nice they look, it does not seem to matter how they are, who cares? Add to this Rowena's usual state of depression, and you have someone who might be called, "A bit of a mess."

The advent of Steven into her life having, as it were, got rid of one side of the equation, namely, being alone, the other side of the equation, her depressed state, also began to disappear. Rowena actually smiled occasionally.

I do not suggest that Rowena suddenly became her old radiant self, rather I would like you to understand that a gradual improvement in her appearance and demeanor seemed to occur.

It is possible that it was simply the passing of time and the diminishing of her bereavement for Ken at the dictates of nature that brought about this slow, evolutionary change, and not the presence of Steven. Certainly, the people at the church took this view. But you see, they did not dare to take any other view, or they might have to admit that the arrival of a young man in the life of "Poor old Rowena," might have been the agent of change. That would be naughty.

Whatever the agent was, the practical outcome was, that Rowena actually went to a good hairdresser and had her hair cut and styled. She dug out from the recesses of her wardrobe garments she had not worn since Ken was killed. They were perhaps a little behind the times, but were a considerable improvement on the tatty skirt, blouses and cardigans she had normally been seen in.

Even more dramatic changes emerged. She found some old make-up and occasionally applied it. She showered more carefully, and noticing that there was a considerable bush of under arm hair, attacked it with a razor. She stopped short of assaulting her pubic hair with the cold steel, but decided that her legs were long overdue for a shave.

I should like to point out that, like all evolutionary changes, Rowena's were incremental and slow. Steven hardly noticed any changes in Rowena until a critical moment arrived, but this was largely because he was so immersed in his study he hardly took time to notice anything else.

Th end of the academic year arrived. Steven was due to go home for the coming weeks. Rowena found herself regretting his departure. From being sorry she had ever volunteered to take a student, she had come to enjoy the presence of this quiet young man. The thought of being alone in the house did not appeal at all. She wondered if she should volunteer again if the chance came. Steven settled the matter for her.

A few days before he was due to leave Steven approached Rowena as she worked in the kitchen. "I've got a favour to ask," he began. Rowena wondered what was coming. "I shall be returning for my second year," he went on, "and I wondered if you wouldn't mind if I came to live here again? I mean, if I've been too much for you, I could probably find somewhere else now I've got used to the city, but I have liked it here."

Rowena's heart gave a little lurch, and for some reason she could not quite diagnose, her hands started to shake slightly. Her mind seemed to go into a sort of spin, making it difficult to answer the request.

Pulling herself together, Rowena managed to say, "You'd be very welcome to come back, Steven, and you haven't been 'too much' for me."

"Oh, thanks," said a relieved Steven, "but there is one other thing. I'd like to come back before the new academic year starts. I haven't really got around much all this year, so I'd like to do a bit of sight seeing and go to one or two shows. Would that be all right?" Rowena felt another lurch of her heart.

Dates were arranged for Steven's return, and a few days later, he was on his way to the inland and the cattle station.

As she expected, Rowena found his absence and the emptiness of the house oppressive. This did not, however, have the effect of returning her to a state of depression or the careless condition of her personal appearance she had previously suffered from. "He's coming back, and I won't be alone again."

Rowena started counting the days until Steven's return almost as soon as he left. For no particular reason, she found herself going to the room occupied by Steven and adding little touches to make it more comfortable and cheerful. He had left some of his belongings behind, and Rowena just happened to pick up one or two items sometimes, and they would be hugged to her breasts.

During the year of his stay with her, there had been nothing overtly sexual in the behaviour of Steven and Rowena. After the death of Ken, Rowena had almost completely shut her self off sexually. When on rare occasions sexual tension had overtaken her, she resorted to a dildo, fantasising that it was Ken still with her. Now she found that sexual tension was making itself more evident, and her fantasy was no longer Ken, but…She would not admit who it was to herself.

Rowena had seen no signs of girls in Steven's life, "Not," she thought, "that he had much time for that sort of thing with all his studies." But she did wonder about his sex life. "I suppose he masturbates," she thought, " poor boy."

As the time for Steven's return drew near, Rowena decided that a change in her wardrobe might be in order. Armed with the means of financial transaction: cash, credit card and chequebook, Rowena set forth.

She started from the skin outward, and began by purchasing some rather sexy underwear not normally considered fitting for a widow, even if young. Slack suits, which she had never worn before, dresses that displayed more of her than was formally on show followed and, most audacious of all, a bikini swimsuit, "Just in case I go swimming," she persuaded herself. (She had in fact not gone swimming since Ken's death).

When she got her purchases home and unpacked them, she began to feign having regrets. "I don't think I'd dare wear some of these," she muttered, but at the same time smiled a secret little smile, and went out again to have her hair attended to.

The day of Steven's return found Rowena quivering with anticipation and a knot in her stomach. When he arrived looking brown and fit Rowena did something she had never done before, and hugged him, giving him a kiss on the cheek.

Steven was somewhat surprised by this affectionate welcome, and recovering sufficiently to return the kiss said, "That's a very nice welcome. It's great to be home."

This statement seemed to cause a pause in conversation. It was the realisation that for Steven, "home" was no longer the cattle station, but here, with Rowena.

It was Rowena who broke the momentary silence saying, "Its lovely to have you home, Steven." There was another pause as they stood, arms still about each other, and then Rowena led him into the kitchen for the meal she had ready for him.

The old routine of Steven spending the majority of his time in his room studying would not start until the beginning of the academic year. That was three weeks off. Instead, Steven began the sightseeing he had promised himself.

One night he went off to see a play, and on his return, Rowena was still up. "How was it?" she asked. "Oh, great," he replied, "but…" "But what?" asked Rowena.

He paused for a moment, then said, "Its not much fun on your own."

Rowena, who had hardly been out to see plays or films, or anything much at all for some years, agreed. "Yes, its not so good going on your own."

Steven spoke quickly with an edge of nervousness. "Would you come with me sometimes?"

Rowena, whatever her daydreams might have been, was not prepared for this. She hesitated and Steven taking this to mean he had stepped out of place, started to say, "Perhaps it's not the sort of thing you like, but I…

"Oh, no, no," cut in Rowena, "It's just that I think you'd have much more fun with someone your own age."

Now his time away from Rowena had given Steven the chance to see her in a new light on his return. While staying with her, he had noted some changes in her, but it was seeing her after the break that gave him a new vision of his "landlady." What he had perceived as a woman with potentially good looks, shall we say a caterpillar, had now emerged as a rather attractive butterfly.

Steven, not having had wide experience in the world of male/female relations, was not sure how to proceed. Like many shy people whom, when they do speak out in awkward circumstances, often put the matter directly, he blundered on.

"I don't know any girls to take," he blurted out, then realising that this was not very flattering to Rowena, resorted to rather old-fashioned style and went on, "But of course I'd be proud to be seen out with you."

Rowena wanted to laugh at this rather inept attempt to date her, but feeling a great tenderness for him in his plight, she responded, "And I'd love to go with you."

"That's great," said Steven. "How about tomorrow night? We could go and see a film."

Rowena, having been startled by Steven wanting to take her out at all, decided that she might as well go with the flow, and agreed.

They pored over the newspaper to find out what was showing, and made their selection.

Once started, the going out together did not stop. There were more films, plays and of all things, ice skating, which Steven had never experienced. He departed the ice rink with a few bruises and a slight limp.

All was going very happily and one evening Steven suggested they should go swimming in the sea next day if the weather was fine. Living deep in the inland he had never swum in the sea, in fact he had hardly seen the sea at all. Rowena had now got used to accepting his ideas about where they should go and what they should do, so she agreed without much thought. It was only when she retired to go to bed that a thought struck her. Having disposed of her old one-piece bathing suit, she would have to wear the bikini she had bought.

She had never been sure about the wisdom of the purchase, and the thought of wearing it in public and in front of Steven made her feel rather apprehensive.

She took out the garment and tried it on. "My God," she thought, "Its even briefer than I thought it was." The top was more an uplift for her breasts than a cover, this meant she was exposed almost to the nipples. The bottom half seemed to her little more than pieces of string just hanging together. This was a slight exaggeration of the facts brought on by her nervousness at the thought of wearing the thing on the morrow.

For all her reticence about wearing the bikini, she did note that her pubic hair extended outside the little sliver of cloth that ran over her genital area. She retired to the bathroom were she wielded the razor very effectively because thereafter no pubic hair displayed.

She retired to bed with mixed emotions about the coming visit to the sea and the wearing of the miniscule pieces of cloth. The thoughts of appearing so revealed before Steven brought upon her disturbing feelings, and to relieve them she had to resort to the dildo.

The day dawned fine and warm. Rowena put on her bikini in place of underwear, and slipped into a loose dress. Steven had also put on his swimming shorts, so there was no need to change at the beach. Rowena got out her now aging car, and off they drove.

It was still early in the day when they arrived at the beach, and there were few other people about. They divested themselves of their outer garments, Rowena simply letting her dress slip off her shoulders to fall onto the sand.