The Husband is Always the Last

“Mattie, I can promise you one thing,” I assured her. “I will never betray you. I have to show you by my actions, rather than my words, how I feel about you. I won’t try to push you into anything. When, and if, you feel the time is right, you can let me know.”

“Do you really understand?” she asked. When I nodded my head, she smiled and her whole face lit up. “I hoped that you would. Roy, you are my best friend, and I think I’d like you to be something more.”

“You’re more than a friend to me,” I brushed back her hair and smiled, “but that is something I’m going to have to prove to you. There is just one thing I need to know.”

“What’s that?”

“Is it okay if I still grab a feel every now and then,” I said giving her my best roguish smile and a wink, which broke the tension, and we both laughed. I ended up walking her to her room a couple of minutes later.

We continued to see each other regularly, but as the finals before the Christmas holidays approached, we found ourselves dating less and studying more. Sometimes we would study in my room, sometimes in her room, and sometimes at the library. By working as a team, we were able to give each other support, and we took the finals filled with confidence. Then came the holidays, Mattie went back to spend the time with her family and I went home to be with mine.

I found that being home wasn’t the same as it had been in the past. It was that Mom, Dad, or the house had changed; instead, I was the one who had changed. I found myself missing Mattie, and I wasn’t happy being away from her. Some of my old friends wanted me to go out with partying with them. They picked up some girls, grabbed some beer and began their celebration. I just couldn’t get in the mood to enjoy myself and ended up going home.

I spent most of my time at home just sitting and thinking. A couple of times, I roused myself from my thoughts long enough, to see my mother smiling and shaking her head, as she looked at me. When I wasn’t thinking about Mattie, I was writing love letters to her. I’d never written a love letter before, but the words just seemed to pour out of my heart. I suppose that if I read those letters today, they would probably embarrass me to no end, but at that time, they seemed to sum up everything I felt, or dared to dream about the girl I loved.

When I got back to school, I went immediately to Mattie’s room, but she wasn’t there. I asked a couple of her friends if they had heard from her, and they told me that they didn’t think that she had returned yet. Classes still weren’t set to start for a couple of days, so every few hours I kept dropping by her room, to see if she was there. On the second day, my checking paid off, and a very tired looking Mattie opened her door in response to my knock. She said that she had just gotten in, after having had a terrible trip back. I saw she had her suitcases open, and she was in the process of unpacking. I gave her a big hug and kiss, told her to get some rest, and as I headed out her door, handed her a packet containing the love letters I had written.

About one o’clock in the morning, I was awakened by someone pounding on my door. Wondering what jerk dared to show up at that hour, I flung open the door. Mattie pushed me out of the doorway and closed the door behind her.

“Just what do you think you are doing, handing me those wonderful letters and running away like that? I’ve been reading and rereading them for hours. Roy Wells, you are the dearest, sweetest man I have ever known, which is just as well, because I’m in love with you so much it hurts!” She unbuttoned her blouse and tossed it aside. The rest of her clothes followed in rapid order as I stood transfixed, my jaw hanging open like some idiot. “This is where you can make it stop hurting. Why are you standing there? Where is this bed you were always talking about?”

Never before, not even during my first sexual experience, had I been so nervous. As I joined Mattie on the bed, I hoped that she couldn’t feel me trembling. I felt clumsy and awkward. I hoped that I wouldn’t disappoint her, but soon all my thoughts vanished as she reached up and pulled me down to her to her waiting lips. Her mouth met mine in a fiery kiss, and our tongues met in a dance of passion. My hand cupped her bosom, and my lips broke the kiss, to move down to her other breast. I lightly sucked upon her stiffening nipple, allowing my tongue to move in circles over her areola. There was not much more foreplay. It as if we had restrained our love too long and we were now hastening toward the long awaited consummation of our passion. Her hand enclosed my manhood and pulled me between her legs. I moved my hips forward, as she her hand guided me to her opening. She was extremely tight. On my first thrust I barely entered her, and the next thrust advanced me only slightly. It took me several more shoves, before I was fully encased in her passage. I then paused for a few seconds and Mattie moaned beneath me.

“Are you alright?” I asked. “I didn’t hurt you, did I?”

“No, silly,” she replied her eyes filled with fire, “it feels wonderful. Don’t stop now, keep going.”

I pulled myself halfway out of her body and quickly pushed all the way forward. I held myself above her, as I worked my hips back and forth. She reached around my neck and pulled me down to her, holding me tightly against her body, as if she feared I might suddenly try to escape. My excitement, at having her at last, made me fear that I might erupt her too soon and deprive her of the pleasure, which I wanted her to feel. Somehow, I was able to hold myself in check, and I plunged time and again into her tight channel. After five or six minutes, she began to softly moan and began to wildly shove her sex up to meet my down strokes. Soon her moans became full vocal cries of lust. Her whole body shook with the force of her climax. Then she lay still for a moment, breathing deeply and tightening her grip upon me, until she again started moving. The sounds of her pleasure were soon filling the room, as we wildly melded our bodies together. For twenty minutes or so, I fought the inevitable release of my seed, which threatened to burst forth against my will, spurred on by the intense delight of our lovemaking. However, all too soon, I felt the familiar warm, tingling feeling that heralded my impending orgasm.

“I’m going to cum, I better pull out.” I gasped, I realizing that in our passion, I had not thought about birth control. I tried to pull free from Mattie, but she encircled me with her legs.

“No!” she said managed to moan sweetly. “I want to feel you shoot into me. Fill me with your love!”

The world seemed to vanish, and for a short while only Mattie and I existed, in the entire universe. I could hear her sobs of passion rising again, and my body went rigid, as the dam holding back the torrent of my seminal reserves burst. I sent stream after stream of my essence, shooting into her womb. As my seed poured from me, I felt as if a part of my being was going with it into the woman I loved. I lay there hoping the feeling would never end, until realizing my full weight was resting on her, I fell over to the side. For a moment, neither of us could do more than gasp for air. Still panting I pulled Mattie to me and covered her lips with mine.

“That was incredible,” I told her. “I felt as if I gave you a part of my soul.”

“I will take very good care of it. Now, I have given you my body as well as my heart,” she smiled at me. “I don’t know what happened to me. I was totally out of control. I could hear myself making noises, and I couldn’t stop them. I think you must have brought out the animal in me.”

“You know,” I told her, “if I had known those letters were going to have that effect, I would have written them a long time ago.”

“The letters were sweet, but I had already made up my mind about us, before we left for our homes. I started on birth control pills a month ago, because I was fairly certain we were going to end up like this. I missed you so much during the holidays. I was going to wait until tomorrow to seduce you, but after I read your letters I had to be with you tonight.”

We continued to make love most of the rest of the night, until sometime around dawn we fell asleep in each other’s arms. Late the next morning, after we showered together and went out for breakfast, we returned to my room to continue our amorous bouts. I found out, that in many respects Mattie was a sexual novice. Her former boyfriend had confined their relations, to little in the way of foreplay and only missionary position intercourse. I decided that it was my duty to give her a crash course in sexual technique. I found her to be a very adept student, who never balked at trying something new. In time, she began to take the initiative in our love making and surprised me with her ingenuity.

As that final year of college moved on toward its conclusion, we continued to help each other with our studies, even as our love affair continued to bloom. I suggested that we move in together, but she refused, saying that her parents would never understand.

When spring break came, Mattie didn’t have enough money to go home. I called my folks and told them that I had decided not to come home. I apologized to them, and explained that something important had come up, and I couldn’t leave.

“What could be more important that coming home, boy?” my father sounded angry. “Your mother was looking forward to seeing you!”

“Now, Henry,” I heard my mother say in the background, “if he says it is important for him to stay there, then that’s that. I know exactly what is going on, and you would too, if you gave it some thought.”

Mattie and I had a great spring break. Somewhere along the line, she was able to talk me into going to church with her on Easter Sunday. I hadn’t been in a church in ten years and was amazed, when I discovered that the experience wasn’t as bad as I had expected it to be. I knew that my going with her had made her happy.

When school resumed, the time seemed to fly by, and the next thing I knew finals were at hand. Suddenly, a terrible realization hit me—it was all ending, and Mattie and I would be going our separate ways. I began to panic.

“Mattie, I want to ask you something,” I said as we lay together one evening. “I don’t want to lose you. You know I love you, and I will always love you. Please, Mattie marry me.”

“I can give you a very definite maybe,” she looked at me with a serious expression.

“You told me that the first time that I asked you out,” I answered, “what kind of answer is that?”

“Roy, settle down. I love you too, and I want to be your wife, but marriage is not something to be entered into lightly. When I marry it is going to be for life, and I expect the man I marry to feel the same way. We need to decide if our relationship is based on more than lust. Lust is temporary, but love lasts for a life time. I know, both of us are sure we love each other, but how can we really tell.”

“I can tell! Mattie, you were my friend before you were my lover. Hell, you are my best friend. You’re also the woman I love, and the only I will every love.

“I’ve never told you about my grandpa. He lives alone out in the desert. My grandma was the only woman he loved, and when she died, he knew there could never be a replacement for her. So, he left the city and now lives in a shack in the middle of nowhere. I used to spend a good part of my summers visiting him. He and my parents gave me some pretty good values. When I marry you Mattie Banks, it is going to be forever.”

“I feel the same way,” she said as tears began to form in her eyes, “but, we don’t have any money, and we don’t have jobs. If we jump into things too soon, all the odds will be against us right from the start. I want us to take four months to think things over and to build up some money. If at the end of four months you still want me to marry you, I will. I hate to wait, but I really think it is in our best interests.”

“Well, I don’t! I want to run off with you right after graduation, but I have to admit you have a point, we don’t have much money. However, four months is way too long. Let’s make it three months. In three months I’m going to marry you, even if we have to live in a tent and beg for food.”

“Okay, three months, but no tent and no begging. That would be a waste of a good education,” she laughed.

Mattie graduated with honors, and (I still don’t know how I pulled it off) so did I. Both her parents and mine attended the graduation ceremony. Mattie introduced me to her folks, and I introduced her to mine; but, we didn’t mention a word about our plans for the future. As we left, with our diplomas in our hands to go our separate ways, it seemed to me like the next three months were going to take a lifetime to pass.

At home I began to look for work, but while I had the education, most employers wanted someone with experience. I couldn’t figure out, how in the world anyone could get experience, when no one seemed to want to hire a person without it. My frustration at not finding work, coupled with being separated from Mattie, caused me to lapse into depression.

“Perk up, boy!” my father told me about month after I had been home. “Jobs don’t grow on trees. You’ll find one in time. If you don’t stop with all the sighs, I’m going to have to dose you.”

“Henry!” said my mother, when she overheard my father talking to me. “Can’t you see it is not work that he is worried about? It is the same thing that had him upset during Christmas, and the same reason that he didn’t come home for Easter. It’s a girl, Henry—our boy is in love.”

“A girl?”

“Yes, and unless I miss by guess, it is that nice Mattie Banks he introduced us to at graduation.”

“Is she right, son?” my father looked at me sternly.

“I’m afraid so,” I nodded.

“There will be other girls. You’re too young to be thinking about love. You need to get out and sow some wild oats, before you settle into anything.”

“Henry Adams Wells!” my mother said in a shocked voice. “You were only a couple of months older than Roy when we were married. Tell me—how did that turn out?”

“It turned out fine Tina, but we had an awful hard time, struggling to get by while we went to law school,” the sternness fell from my father’s face. “If it hadn’t been for my father, I don’t think we would have made it.”

“And what does that tell you? What goes around comes around, you’re the father now.”

“Humph!” he growled and walked away.

“You know him almost as well as I do,” my mother spoke to me as my father walked into another room. “He is a good man and has only your welfare at heart. You just be patient, he’ll come around in time. After all, he has only found out what I’ve known all these months.”

As if things weren’t bad enough, my grandfather suddenly passed away. How, I missed that old desert rat; his wit, wisdom, and teachings about life. I could hear Mattie start to cry when I called her with the news. She kept saying how sorry she was, and how much she that wanted to be with me. Somehow, her tears and sympathy made things a little easier to take.

A short while after my grandfather’s funeral, I came home from the store and saw that we had company. Whoever it was drove a new car. I went inside and found set luggage sitting next to the door. It appeared that we had a guest that was coming to stay for awhile. I went into the living room and found my mother and father talking, they stopped when I came into they room. Both of them stood and came over to me.

“Roy,” my dad said coming over to me and putting his hand upon my shoulder, “I’ve just found out that my father was a very, very wealth man.”

“But, he lived in a shack!” I blurted out.

“It was a self imposed exile from the world, boy. I knew he had some money, after all he helped your mother and I when we were trying to make ends meet, but I never imagined he was rich. Your mother and I thought that he was going broke, and we had asked him many times, to come and live with us.

“He left your mom and I an ungodly amount of money. He also left you enough to set yourself up in that consulting business like you’ve talked about, with some money left over for frivolous stuff—like buying a house, getting married, and maybe starting a family. All those wild oat things you’ve got your heart set upon doing. Here are the keys to that car outside; it is a present from your mother and I. It has a full tank of gas. Your bags are packed by the door. There is a wallet on the table with a little seed money to get you to where you’re going. You won’t get your inheritance for a couple of months, but I imagine that your mother and I can subsidize you for awhile. I figure that if you take out of here right now, you should be able to make it back to Mattie in three days. There is only one thing you have to promise.”

“What?” I said with my head spinning from the turn of events.

“If you get her to marry you (heaven help the poor girl), you’ll wait until we can get there for the ceremony. We’ll fly back, when you tell us.”

“And there is something that I want you to promise, too!” my mother was smiling and crying at the same time. “You, make sure to call us every night and tell us where you are and what is happening.”

“Well, boy!” my father said as I stood there, for a couple of moments like a fool, still uncertain that I understood the situation. “What do you think?”

“I think I have the best folks in the world,” I said throwing my arms around the two of them, “and the best grandfather, too! I’ve got to call Mattie. Oh, my! What if she doesn’t want me to come?”

“You won’t know until you call.” Dad said. “So, you had better do it and the sooner the better.”

With more than a little apprehension, I dialed Mattie’s phone number. Her father answered and didn’t seem too pleased about my calling his daughter, but he put her on the line. When she came to the phone, I froze, and my mind went blank. My throat tightened up and I couldn’t say anything.

“Roy?” she said. “Why are you doing all the heavy breathing? Is this your idea of an obscene phone call?”

“Uh, no,” I managed to croak before my words began to flow more freely. “Mattie, do you love me?”

“Silly, of course I do. What is it? You sound so strange.”

“Mattie, if you really love me, you’ll get ready to marry me in a couple of days. Things have all changed. I’ve got enough money so that we can start our own business, and get us a decent place to live, and get married and do just about everything that we’ve talked about, and…”

“Slow down, Roy,” she cautioned, “you are blabbering. Have you been drinking?”

“Not a drop. I’m intoxicated by you! Listen, my grandfather left me a large amount of money. Dad says, I have enough money coming to do almost everything we dreamed about doing. I’m not going to wait any longer. I’m driving back there and will be there in three days. If you won’t marry me at that time, I’ll camp out on your front lawn until you will. Do you understand Mattie Banks, I’m coming for you. I love you. I’m not waiting anymore!”

“Oh, my gosh!” she gasped. “You’re serious aren’t you?”

“I’ve never been more serious. What do you say? Will you be my wife?”

“Yes, yes of course I’ll marry you, my love. Together we can beat the world, but without you, I’m just a hollow shell. Roy, I’ll get things started on this end. I can’t believe this! Are you sure this isn’t too good to be true?”

“Sure as sure can be! I’ve got to get going, I’ll see you in three days. I’ve got your address and I’ll hunt you down as soon as I get there. I’ll call you every night until then.”

“You, better not. My dad has been saying that he thinks you call way too often. He thinks we are getting too serious about each other.”

“Okay, I’ll wait until I get there, but then your father is going to be in for a big surprise. I love you with all my heart—goodbye for now.”