"The Body Makes a Promise..."

"Let's meet up for a tea and a chat before too long," she had stated in her lilting Liverpudlian accent before stepping off the platform of my double-decker bus the week before. As I had driven off, she had turned and waved, the gaze of her arctic blue eyes locking enticingly onto mine...

I knew in that moment she was trouble. I knew that because I was as weak morally as my lusts were strong. Dangerous. Exciting. A moth to a flame.

A couple of weeks later I was in the changing rooms of the Heights Leisure Centre in Sandown having swum a mile followed by about forty-five minutes luxuriating in the sauna, Jacuzzi, and steam room. I was glowing and felt really relaxed.

Once I had got dressed, I took my mobile out of my backpack and switched it on. There was a pause before the message alert sounds. It was from Claire.

Pop round for a cuppa when you're ready x

I had told her I was off to the Leisure Centre earlier.

Claire was the ex-wife of one of my colleagues, Christopher. They had got divorced after she ran off with someone else. It had broken his heart at the time, but the truth was that he was a player himself. Her new relationship, however, didn't last and despite having had a couple of boyfriends since she was now single. She was physically attractive, easy going and in possession of a good sense of humour - temptation was never so tempting.

I'd replied informing her that I would be about ten minutes.

I picked up my bag, walked out of the changing rooms, dropped my health suite wrist band off at the reception and then exited the building. It was a cold, sunny winter's day but my body temperature was still warm from the heat of the sauna. I'd got into my car, a white Renault 19 and driven the short distance to her flat which was at the top of a two-storey converted house. I'd pressed the buzzer and after a minute or so she'd answered the door.

"Hi, come in Matt, I've done you some sandwiches as I thought you might be hungry after all that swimming."

"Thanks, I am a little peckish."

She was wearing a tight white T-Shirt and jeans which emphasised her shapely buttocks.

She then invited me to sit down in her plush and spacious sitting room while she went off to make the tea.

"Help yourself to the sandwiches - I take it you like cheese and tomato?"

"I do, thanks."

The act of her preparing food for me made me feel special, wanted even - it had been a long time since Sharon had cooked me a meal - and I was reminded of one of the few occasions when my mother had brought me in honey on buttered bread whilst I had been watching Robinson Crusoe on the old black and white television as a young boy all those years ago. I wondered if the root of all my emotional problems had not been feeling loved enough as a child, and maybe not feeling loved enough in the present.

I'd picked up a sandwich and taken a bite being careful not to drop any crumbs on her meticulously clean sofa and carpet.

Claire entered the room and had plonked down a cup of tea on the small table in front of me. She had settled herself comfortably into the armchair opposite me before saying: "You've been a bit up and down recently what with your father dying. How is it all going with Sharon? Still shaky?"

I'd looked at her and realised that she had put me in mind of Gaby Roslin, the TV presenter. I'd also caught a whiff of her fragrance, Chlöe.

"Yeah, it's not that good between us, we haven't had sex since the beginning of November, but she did come down to Torquay for my father's funeral. I think we will split up eventually."

"My dad is clear from cancer at the moment, but I do worry about him. We're very close."

"That's good and bad, it's good that you love him but bad that you may lose him. My relationship with my father was different, he split from my mother when I was about eighteen months old and then went off and married a German nurse working over at the Ventnor Chest Hospital whom he had got pregnant. I have a faint memory of a man holding me with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth but that's about it... "

"But you got in contact with them, didn't you?"

"Yes, about six years ago I traced them to Torquay and discovered that I also had twin half-brothers, fourteen years younger than me, and of course met my half-sister who is three years younger than me. His wife made me feel very welcome, but he couldn't face seeing me though he did write to me and speak on the phone. I always hoped that he would eventually relent and agree to meet, but we never did. He was an odd fellow but highly intelligent - he could rush through and solve the Times crossword in double quick time but was lazy and an alcoholic. He had also been in jail for a bit, when he was younger, after smashing windows which his wife reckoned was to do with inner anger towards his parents who had had a greengrocers in Ryde. Funny enough I pass by the old shop most days. Even though he wouldn't see me I used to pop down and visit the rest of the family who were very friendly and kind. Yet, on one occasion he hid in his room when I popped round... "

"He doesn't sound that nice, you were probably better off not knowing him. Would you like another cuppa, Matt?"

"Yes please, two sugars."

A few minutes later she returned with more tea.

I carry on with the tale. "Anyway, back in December, Thursday the 20th to be precise, I got a phone call from his wife telling me that he had died suddenly in the local post office - he was just seventy. She didn't seem upset at all, in fact that morning he had got into an argument from a chap from the council who had been round to arrange the fitting of free double glazing. The agent had left telling him that he would return when my father was in a better mood. As soon as his wife, I suppose she's technically my stepmother, heard that he had died she phoned the fellow up to get him to come round telling him: 'That you won't have any further problems with my husband as he has now died'.

Claire chuckled.

"Between Christmas and the New Year Sharon and I drove down to Torquay for his funeral. There were only eight of us attending: his four children, his wife, his sister and her husband, and Sharon. He had no friends. There was no music or service as his wife couldn't see the point in spending a lot of money on him now that he was gone, and he wouldn't have done on her she said. Strangely my auntie's husband told me that the last time he had seen me was when I was a baby and he had held me in his arms - he had never expected to see me again. The funny thing, Claire, is that I have six cousins across the water in Portsmouth and I have probably passed them in the street at some point without knowing it. After the funeral Sharon and I had a meal with the rest of the family before my half-brother and I scattered his ashes in the garden of remembrance. It was the closest I ever got to him."

"Do you feel sad?"

"That's another odd thing, I thought I would, I was curious about him, and disappointed that I didn't meet him, but I actually feel nothing for him. Nothing at all."

"Do you know what Matt, you're an orphan now."

She picked up the plate and her cup and walked into the kitchen and I had followed with my empty cup. She'd turned her back to me as she had placed the crockery in the sink. As she did so, I kissed her on the back of her neck, whilst drawing in the heady fragrance of her perfume before whispering: "Let's go to bed."

It was a moment of recklessness, madness, and I feared rejection and humiliation but all she said was: "Okay, but we will have to be quick as my daughter is home in half an hour."

We had gone to her bedroom, and both stripped off though I was only half hard at this point. She clambered naked onto the bed where I took in her sexy slim body with small but nicely shaped tits. Claire was probably about five-three and her pubic hair was light brown and closely trimmed. Her skin was quite fair with light freckles on her shoulders and her hair was, straight, shoulder length and dyed blonde.

Blemishes wise she had a small mole on her wrist and a couple of cuties on her midriff. She also had a slightly larger mole on her strong left thigh.

I had taken her in my arms and commenced to kiss her.

"You're trembling slightly," she had stated softly.

"It's a reaction to the swimming," I had replied. But it wasn't, rather it was due to feeling a little apprehensive and guilty. But obviously not guilty enough.

I ran my fingers gently over her upper arms whilst I kissed the exquisite curves of her neck. As I did so her chest and face began to flush with sexual arousal, so I gently rubbed her nipples. She began to moan so I slipped my now fully erect member into her damp cunt. I thrust rhythmically and as I did, she brought her hand down to her clit and started to massage it which aroused me even more. I ask her to rub my nipples which she complied with despite appearing to be lost in her own rapture. A few seconds later I climaxed.

I pulled out my penis laced with spunk and juice prior to kissing Claire's cunt as she looked anxiously at the bedside clock. "You'd better go as my daughter will be back in the next five minutes," she said.

I wiped myself as quickly as I could with a tissue then swiftly got dressed. I gave her a quick kiss then left.

As I started the car, I couldn't believe what I had done. I had also broken the vow I made silently in Cherbourg to be faithful to Sharon.

*

On the way back home, I called in at McDonalds on the outskirts of Ryde for a Big Mac and fries. Whilst there I texted Claire to tell her how good it had been and how much I fancied her.

When I got back to the bungalow, I ran a bath and put my clothes, which were steeped in Claire's perfume, into the washing machine.

*

It was about seven in the evening, and I was watching television distractedly in the lounge-cum-dining room of our bungalow. I was also still replaying in my head the events of earlier when I heard Sharon walk along the path prior to slipping her key into the front door.

I'd wondered what kind of mood she was in and had expected the worst if the past few days where anything to go by.

However, she had put her head round the lounge door and had cheerily greeted me: "Hi, you look very relaxed with your feet up, your little break from work seems to be doing you good. You've got some colour back in your cheeks, and I can tell you're less tense. What did you get up to today?"

Odd, I thought.

"Not a great deal but had a few hours at the leisure centre followed by a healthy McDonald's."

I was back in deceit mode.

"I'm going to get changed out of my work clothes and then perhaps we could go off to the cinema? Do you know what's on?"

"Vanilla Sky. It's supposed to be good," I replied.

*

The evening was great. The film was great. But when Julie (Cameron Diaz) turns to David (Tom Cruise) in the car and confronts him saying: "The body makes a promise even if you don't," I had inwardly cringed recalling my actions of a few hours previous.

The car of course had sped up before crashing through the parapet of the bridge with David paying the price, a very high price, for his philandering, with his life never being the same.

Yeah, that kind of made me feel a little bit uncomfortable. But not for long.

*

Back in the bungalow I had asked Sharon if she'd wanted a cup of tea.

"I'm okay thanks. Shall we just go to bed?"

What has got into her? She even held my hand in the cinema, I'd thought.

We both strolled into the double bedroom and removed all our clothes and though I had seen her naked a thousand times I still couldn't resist looking at her body -- and comparing it to Claire's. She had full and rich curly chestnut hair that tumbled halfway down her pale back and was also slim weighing no more than nine stone. She was about five-four in height with toned and shapely limbs with breasts that were large and firm with prominent nipples, her pubes being reddish-brown. Her complexion was pale though her arms were spotted with small moles.

I turned the light off and slipped bed next to Sharon. The room was still dimly illuminated by the lights around and in particular the floodlit Parish Church which was just a couple of hundred yards away on the corner of Queens Road and Upper West Street.

There was plenty of time for foreplay, unlike earlier, as I caressed her arms and kissed her neck. I teased her as much as possible, licking as close to her nipples without actually making contact with them. I rubbed gently between her upper thighs without touching her 'lips' then kissed her mouth whilst telling her I loved her whilst dimly discerning her swollen nipples in the half light. She moaned and I knew she was slowly beginning to reach heat. I reached down with my right hand and begin to massage her engorged clitoris. Her left hand tried to stop me, but it was a game she played for she really sought to be forced to orgasm.

I pulled her left arm behind her head and increased the frequency of my circling movements to her clitoris. I chewed upon her nipples as her breathing deepened. She was close now to release.

Suddenly she arched her back and gasped loudly before slumping back exhausted onto the bed.

"That was so good. It's been a while hasn't it," she said after a minute or so.

"Three months, but who's counting," I kind of joked.

"I'd better let you have your pleasure now. Do you want me on top or on bottom?"

"Bottom please."

I penetrated her and whilst I wrapped my legs around hers. She then caressed and squeezed my nipples without me having to request it. Within about half a minute of thrusting I reached the point of no return and as I did, I visualised Claire's naked body.

"You were quick then," she said.

"Men normally are quicker than women," I retort.

"Are they?" she responded cryptically.

We wished each other good night, embraced, and kissed.

Prior to dropping off I reflected upon the events of the day, and the fact that having had no sex for three months I ended up shagging two attractive women in the same day. I couldn't work out whether to feel guilty or smugly self-satisfied...