Salvaging Life on a Back Road

"Hey, listen, if you want sometime, why don't you bring your little girl over to our place to meet little Emily. She's David's girl from his first marriage plus we've got little Evangeline now. She's at that stage where she's into everything. We'd love to have you over so anyways, Connor, you know what I'm trying to say. Next time if there is one, let me know and we'll do pizzas and beer and the two of you come play with us and the kids. OK?"

I liked the idea. David knew Ellen and I were an item a while back and I liked the kid so I agreed. If I was going to get stuck babysitting while the Ex went out and partied her ass off, got laid or whatever, I'd do it around other human beings.

Martha picked her Jeep up and I followed her and Sarah back to the house. The rest of the day was an exercise in oddity. Martha moped about for most of the afternoon and on a few occasions seemed as if she wanted to ask me something but she couldn't spit the first word out. It wasn't an obvious attempt at inquiry; it was more subtle than that but with my awareness being heightened by what I had to admit was a simple case of jealousy, I could read her attempts.

Later that afternoon, I preempted her.

"Martha, just to give you a heads up, I'm going out later this evening so I won't be able to keep Sarah tonight." I said to her.

She gave me the most quizzical expression and just said 'Oh'. It was actually one of disappointment but I couldn't read it any more than that. Was she disappointed that she was stuck at home or because I was going out? It didn't matter; my mind was suffering from the burdens of confusion and I needed to get out of the house.

10PM found me sitting in the 'Den with a pint of Lunch IPA in front of me along with the drunken stuttering of Sally P and Suzie Q on either side of me telling me how much they loved my house and wanted to come take a look at it. I had fucked both of them at one time or another and enjoyed every minute of it while they were there and every minute of it when they left. As much fun as a repeat would have been, I really just wanted to enjoy the IPA. But, they were fun chatterers and I allowed myself to enjoy their company.

I couldn't help but listen in on the conversation off to the table beside me. A couple of flannel shirts were talking about women and one of them was discussing his lack of conquest the previous evening.

"Yeah, I thought for sure I was going to hammer that chick last night that you guys came in with." The one fellow stated.

"You mean Martha, the MILF that came in with Claire and Denise?" The other fellow asked.

"That's her name, right. She was getting seriously loaded and was really busting moves on the dance floor. I mean I could smell sex on that chick but, hell; she was in some other zone. She kept talking about Conroy, Cotter or some such, I don't know. All I know was if I could have had that little fucking hottie for another 15 minutes, I'd have had her little hot butter." The first fellow said.

"Hell, you didn't stand a chance. Claire said she wasn't interested in hooking up with anybody. She's stuck on her old man or I guess her Ex, I don't know." The other fellow replied.

That was interesting. The only person they could have been talking about was Martha, my Ex, and it would have made sense if she came in with the same Claire that worked the retail store at the nursery. I looked at Sally and Suzie and just smiled not understanding anything they were trying to say. I had a decision to make. I could grab both of these two drunken, horny and VERY good fucks and enjoy myself for the next couple hours or so or I could finish my IPA and go home.

It was little after 11PM when I arrived home and the living room lights were still on with Martha watching television. I came in through the kitchen door and hung up my jacket after kicking off my boots. Grabbing a beer from the fridge I walked into the room and joined her on the couch.

She had been here 5 months now and seemed like part of the household. She was sitting there in a tee shirt and panties with her legs tucked under sipping a glass of white wine. Sarah was sound asleep upstairs. I didn't know what to say.

"Connor, can I ask you something, something personal?" She said after we had sat there a few moments.

"I suppose so. If it's too personal, I'll let you know I guess. I mean I don't want to share anything about warts on my ass or anything, you know." I grinned when I replied.

She got a serious look on her face. Neither of us was drunk or anything like that.

"Connor, you once said you would always love me. Is that still true today?"

When I said it, I meant it and still did.

"Martha, I have always loved you from the time we first went out years ago. I still do. I hate what you did to me, to us, but I never stopped loving you. I just learned to live and move on and allow myself to enjoy life." I replied in all seriousness.

"Will you forgive me for the horrible things I did, really forgive me?"

"Martha, look at me. I forgave you for all of that before I pulled you and little Sarah out of that snowbank. It didn't mean I forgot about it. But it did mean that it didn't control my life. I've enjoyed life up here immensely. Coming up here was the best thing I've ever done.

"For a long time I was angry about it when I let myself think about what you did but after I bought this place and focused on letting life be about me for a change, everything else just faded away into a collection of life experiences."

Martha glanced down at her wine and taking another sip, looked back up at me.

"Do you love the woman you are seeing up in Island Falls?"

I didn't know she knew about Nancy as I had never talked about her and she had not been back down to Sangerville since Martha and Sarah arrived. I looked at her and answered as honestly as I could.

"Her name is Nancy and I like her a lot. We've been seeing each other for about a year now off and on as a FWB thing but in answer to your question, no, I don't love her in that way."

"It's more like what you had going on with Ellen?" She replied.

Hell, I'd never talked to her about Ellen either but since they worked together I suppose somethings just come out. I looked at her with a bit of a raised brow.

"Yeah, pretty much like with Ellen." I said.

Martha just laughed and grinned.

"Ellen told me everything and I mean everything you guys did. I was taken back by it at first but she said if we were going to work together I needed to know, no secrets."

Since we were being so familiar I tossed out the next inquiry.

"Did you get laid last night?"

She didn't skip a beat.

"No, but I was close to wanting it. It was just the wrong man." She replied with a tinge of forlorn angst in her voice.

"Connor, I want to ask something else personal, OK?"

I just nodded.

"Without reading too much into anything and no hidden expectations or such, would you take me out somewhere next week?"

"You mean, on a date?"

"Well, yes, I guess. What I mean is I need to get out of the house but I don't want it to be like last night with some lumberjack doofus trying to put my panties in his pocket."

"You mean you need a chaperone?" I asked.

"No, Connor, that's not what I mean. I'm asking you if you will take me out next week so we can have an evening as two adults. Ellen offered to watch Sarah if I needed her so that would be covered."

I thought she was going to cry but she didn't. I agreed and we picked up our few dishes and cleaned up a bit before we retired to our separate rooms. It was hard getting to sleep. I kept having an old image of her lover's cock buried in what used to be my pussy but unlike the troubled soul I suffered as when the injury was fresh, I saw a different Martha this evening and she was a different woman than the one I was married to then.

I suppose that is true of most relationships over time whether broken or bonded. We all change and grow according to the kinds of nourishment and experiences we accumulate over the years. If I looked back at who I was ten years ago compared to today, I would be almost unrecognizable. When I look at Martha today I don't see a woman I was married to for ten years, not emotionally or physically. For me, relationships had become distilled down to the challenges of an adolescent; can I have the opportunity to fuck that beautiful piece of ass before the night is over.

Hell, even that wasn't really true. I left Sally and Suzie sitting at the 'Den when I had a sure thing with not just one but both of them. The question I couldn't answer was 'why'.

I took Martha out the following Saturday night while Ellen watched Sarah as she promised. We had a good time, no, make that a great time. We didn't fall into each other's arms and strip off into bed. We simply had a good time and enjoyed the evening with friends that showed up. I danced with her and with a couple other women that were interested and Martha did the same. It was what one might have expected on a '1st date'.

That set the stage for life over the next couple of months. I still had to run up to Island Falls occasionally and I was still fucking Nancy once in a while. Martha and I hadn't done anything but dance and have a good time and spend time together with Sarah. She wasn't going out with anybody unless she went with me, her choice, not mine.

Early one evening as I was working in the backyard and around the foundation wall to my barn, I could hear a woman weeping, crying mournfully. It was one of the most sorrowful, pitiful cries I had ever heard. I quietly and quickly peered in through one of the dusty windows and I saw Martha sitting on a wooden chopping block with a hand to her brow and her whole body shaking with her sobs. Whatever was troubling her was right to the very core of her being.

It looked like she had been going through some of her belongings that we had stored in the barn and she had a collection of papers in one hand, clutched together. I honestly didn't know what to say or do but I had to do something. I set down my tools and softly walked around to the barn door and entered behind her. I grabbed a folding chair I had next to the wall and opened it up across from her as I took a seat.

She looked up a bit startled, still shaking from her cries, and turned her eyes downward. I reached out and placed my hand on her shoulder.

"Martha, look at me. What has happened?" I asked her.

I glanced down to look at what was in her hand and saw the final divorce decree, a copy of which I still had upstairs in my attic. She looked up, suppressing her sobs and wiped her nose and eyes.

"It was the enormity of it." She said.

"The enormity of what, Martha?"

"Everything I did, all that I destroyed and threw away for nothing and to the best gift God could have given me. I let myself be used and destroyed us."

She couldn't continue at that point and I just stood there with my hand on her shoulder.

"Connor, I am so sorry for everything I did. I can't express how sorry and shameful I feel for what I put you through."

As I sat there I stared at the fixtures and things I had out in the barn. I gazed upon the documents in her hand.

"Martha, will you be OK right here for just a bit? I want to go get something. I promise I'll be right back."

She wiped her nose again and nodded yes.

It was easy to find. It was a small leather satchel I had owned since I was in school years ago but right now it was important. After I gathered it I returned to the barn and sat down across from Martha again. I knew what I wanted to do and at that point in my life I knew what I wanted.

"Martha, I'm going to do something I should have done a long time ago. I should have broken that damn restraining order and knocked the teeth out of anybody that tried to stop me but it's too late for that. Instead I'm going to put my mind at peace and I'd like to do the same thing for you. Something told me to do this over three years ago and I didn't but now I'm going to."

I walked over to the shop heater I had on the other side of the barn's workshop and started a small kindling fire in the firebox. The sound of the pine faggots crackled through the air and as the fire grew I returned to my seat.

Opening the satchel I took out what I wanted for that moment and looked up at her. She was watching what I was doing with puzzlement on her face.

"Martha, this paper, this copy, and this decree have all the signatures that affected the end of a life I lived what seems like a long time ago. There are only two signatures on there that matter really, yours and mine. The others were just bit parts in our drama. Sitting here, right now, Martha, I can tell you I'm glad we did it."

She looked like she would lose it if I continued so I was quick.

"If we hadn't done it I wouldn't be able to do what I'm going to do right now."

I rose up and walked over to the wood stove and with my copy of the divorce decree in hand, raised the stove lid and dropped it to the flames inside.

"Martha, if you want the peace of mind you are crying for, come over here and do what I just did."

She hesitated for a moment then rose and walked over to the stove and threw her copy on top of mine. We watched them burn for a bit and then I looked at the other thing in my hand. It was the unopened letter she had sent to me when I was on my way out of Portland those years ago.

"Is there anything in here that you can't tell me if I needed to know?"

She shook her head no and I dropped the unopened letter into the flames. I took her into my arms and looked at her in her eyes seriously.

"Martha, I'm going to be plain speaking here. When I burned that decree I was burning whatever, whoever it was, wherever it was, I don't care. It doesn't exist. The same has to be for you too. Neither one of us can allow us to grieve over what was done and buried or burned in this case anymore. I can't cry for what no longer exists and neither can you.

"For the last 6 years or so I have measured everything in my life by that day in that attorney's office and I want a new yardstick. For me it is going to be this evening right here. You need to do the same. Neither of us can pine for what we once had. It doesn't exist. So what I want you, both of us to do, is to walk back out the door knowing that we are both free to enjoy life, taste it, partake of it and not be hindered by whatever we used to be."

"What happens to us, Connor?" She asked.

I paused for a moment before replying.

"We raise a daughter.

Epilog

I fucked Nancy 2.6 more times. I say .6 because she completely wore me out on the 2nd time and pushed me beyond my limit on the last evening we spent together. With a woman living in my house full time I felt it was probably appropriate to end the FWB arrangement and leave off as just friends. I know Martha was very appreciative of that decision.

I continued taking Martha out on the weekends and she never gave any indication of wanting to broaden her horizons even though we had not yet been intimate. I asked her about that, not broadening her horizons or dating. She told me she had not been with a man intimately since before she sold the house now nearly four years earlier.

Eventually I put an end to that dry spell if only because I was tired of whacking myself off at the age of 39, at least that's what I told myself. Martha continues to have her own room but it's a place of contemplation rather than sleep. She started sleeping in my bed again the first night I fucked her.

Sarah is scheduled to have surgery on her ears to help her hearing and the life of raising our daughter continues. Martha and I have not remarried and to be honest I don't see us going down that path again. The old Connor and Martha may have done that. The new couple of parents are two free individuals that now have a comfortable living agreement between them that is the best a 'friends with benefits' arrangement can provide short of lawyers and a license.

Oh, I did knock Ps & Qs one more time, together just for old time sake, and they loved what I had done to the house.

MFH