The Only Time is Forever

When she felt she had, again, reached her limits with this delightful agony, her body held out for even more, until his tongue made every nerve ending in her burst into fire . She started to see stars before her eyes were returned to her mind's control, and then she was able to focus on him, and his Cheshire cat smile.

Nothing had prepared her for these feelings. She had known what it was like after her own hand had made her crest. But, to be here, in his arms, HIS arms, not just someone's arms, as she rode the remaining waves within her. It was something she could only absorb; not something that could be explained or remembered in words.

She sensed him looking at her, and she returned his look.

"See what happens when you flirt?" he chuckled.

She laughed, tiredly. Then she paused...and started to cry.

"Are those good or bad tears?" Bill asked, gently.

Melissa looked at him, and whispered through her tears, "I don't think my mother has ever felt this or known this much happiness."

"That is a terrible thing, and I hope she can find it someday," he responded, as he slowly stroked her skin.

"Me, too...me, too," she sniffed.

Despite the moment of sorrow that had intruded, it could not take root, as his hands found new nerve endings of hers to trigger. She stopped him, and sat up, studying his questioning look. She moved over Bill, so as to straddle him, feeling him under her wetness.

She smiled, and said, "I assume I cannot give you all that you have given me, but it is my turn to learn what I CAN do to you!"

Melissa watched his eyes close, as her hands moved up and around him. She added kisses, and her tongue, all over him. She delighted when she made him twitch or groan. She moved to tantalize his legs and feet, toe by toe. She had him roll onto his stomach, which she followed by using her finger to write "I Love You" on his back, although he did not recognize the pattern.

When she had exhausted the search for any missed skin she had not caressed, she had him turn back over. She extended her full body on top of him, and kissed him with all the passion she could muster.

Then she rolled off of him, lay herself next to him, and spread her legs wide.

"I want to feel you on me, between me, against me," she pleaded.

"But, you know I can't..."

"You still will enjoy me, won't you?" she answered to his hesitance.

He nodded and moved between her legs. She felt him rest against her wetness, and she started moving her hips, rubbing his skin against her most sensitive spot. She drew him down to a kiss, the rate of her breathing rising.

She kept moving, faster and with bigger movements, with his weight on her. They kissed, on and on, as she started to moan into his kisses. She knew it was approaching, and she finally broke the kiss, and looked into his eyes.

He looked into her hazel eyes, wide and anxious. Then she closed them, wrapped her legs around him, and let out a short scream, as she shook beneath him.

His tears came again, dampening her face. She started to cry, too, unsure if it was for him, or herself, or even her mother. As she calmed from the storm, he rolled off of her, and wiped at his own tears. She rolled, and wrapped herself around his side, her head on his shoulder, her tears ebbing.

-----------

The phone alarm sounded, startling them both awake.

She looked at his face and saw his eyes had a sorrowful look.

"Never again?"...She had to ask that question.

"No, my wonderful, beautiful woman. Your future is not with me."

She nodded, and whispered, "You know I will never forget this, don't you?"

"I told you it was complicated. But it will become a pale memory, if you are wise and choose the right young man to share your life with, for the two of you can create hundreds of such memories."

"I better get dressed and get home. I doubt mom slept, even though she let me do this." Melissa gave him her last kiss.

They got dressed, and went to his car, and he drove her home. She got out of the car slowly, then leaned back in the car's door opening, and smiled. "I only turn 18 once. Thank you for the rest of my life."

He nodded

"TV soon?" Melissa asked, hopefully.

Bill smiled and nodded.

----------

Over the rest of her senior year, she visited often, asking more questions of life and watching TV, while she curled into him. Sometimes she even fell asleep on his thigh, and when she did, he often whispered, "Behave, my lovely."

He helped her find a partial scholarship, for a college about a 3-hour drive across the state. He would pay for the balance of her education. He bought her a used Mazda 3 sedan for her high school graduation present.

She had some dates during her senior year, though she remained a virgin. She discussed with Bill all the good & bad points of each date. Among those dates that she let touch her, none of them had the caring she sought. What she said she had learned from him and dating, was the ability to distinguish physical pleasure from an emotional connection.

When it came time to leave for college in the fall, she had her car loaded to leave, when she stopped at Bill's, after calling first to make sure he would be there. When she came to the door, he let her in. She stood there looking at him, choking back some tears, as she said, "We get a week's break in a few months. I will see you then. Maybe I will even drive home for a weekend or two, and we can get in some TV time."

"It would be my pleasure to have you here, anytime. And call anytime you need to...Or just want to," he added.

"I will," she said. She gave him a big hug, and then walked to the door and started to go out, when she stopped and turned towards him. "You know I would have married you, don't you, if you had asked me?...I do love you."

"I love you, too...but, I could not have lived with myself if I had been that selfish ...AND, I will be ecstatic, some day, when you tell me that you are engaged. Of course, he had better be a great young man."

"Oh, any man who is to be in my life, has to get my dad's approval. And, my dad had better give me away!" she laughed.

"Yes, he will," Bill replied, "Come back soon. I will delight in seeing your face coming up the walk. Behave yourself."

She turned and left, waving as she got into her car.

--------

It was ten days later, on a Saturday, when Bill came out of the kitchen, and was delighted to see Melissa walking towards his front steps. He went to the door to greet her, but as he did, he realized it was not his Melissa.

This was Melissa in 20 years or so. She wore a familiar sundress, and was of the same height and build. She had the same eyes, with a few lines added at the edges. Her hair was a little shorter and the honey shading was a bit darker. She had a similar walk, but with a slightly unsteady stride.

"Hello," he said, "I am William Haerth.

"Hello," she said, "As I think you have guessed; I am Melissa's mother. My name is Sylvia Traynor.

"Please come in," he said.

"Thank you," she said, nervously.

"Please have a seat. Can I get you something to drink, possibly something to calm your nerves?"

"It is that obvious, is it? I could use something in a hard liquor to help me." She sighed heavily, as she sat on one end of the couch.

"I don't keep that much on hand. I have vodka, tequila, and Fireball whiskey?"

"Oh, the Fireball would be perfect. It is one of my favorites...NOT that I drink that much!" she said, hurriedly, "Just when I do have something, I like the Fireb...,".

"Don't worry," he replied, gently, "I thought nothing bad."

He brought her glass over, as well as a glass for him, and the Fireball bottle.

He poured a couple fingers worth for each of them, and she thanked him.

He sat on the couch, about an arm's length away from her, and asked, "May I ask why you are so nervous? I hope it is nothing I have done?"

"I think it will become apparent. If I may start?" she said, "And, well, it is something you have done, but not at this moment. You are very kind to see me, unannounced."

"You are welcome, anytime. You do have my curiosity, though, so please proceed at your own comfort."

She paused, and he took the time to note how much of Melissa he saw in her; just a quieter, cautious Melissa.

Sylvia started, "First of all, I have to thank you, beyond my abilities, for all the financial help you have given Melissa. It helped her so much, and relieved me of a number of concerns. But, I have to ask you, as it worried Melissa too, whether you have done too much, in that she has never heard you speak of a job?"

"Do not worry yourself, at all," he replied, "I was fortunate enough to retire at 55, when my father left me a nice amount of money in his will. I am not wealthy, but safe and comfortable."

"And your mother?" she asked, cautiously.

"Ah...she passed many years ago, dying in childbirth of what would have been my younger brother. I am an only child. My father did remarry, to a strange woman, whom he divorced.

"I am sorry for your losses," she said, quietly.

"If I am not intruding; Melissa often referred to your 'tight budget'. Didn't your husband have life insurance, and are you secure?"

She took a deep breath, and said, "As to the latter, we are secure in a minimal way, as I was fortunate that the house was an inheritance of my late husband's, and was paid for. So my modest wages have gone for the usual necessities and such, what with a teenage daughter."

"Well, I am glad you are stable, anyway," he responded.

"But, as to the first part of your question; it is one of the reasons I came here today. My husband did have an insurance policy..." She paused to raise her head and look directly at his eyes. "The policy, of which I was the sole beneficiary, does not payout when the husband is killed by the beneficiary."

The short pause was deafening.

"My god!" he exclaimed, "Melissa never said a word about how he died."

"As she promised," Sylvia added.

"How horrible for you! Did Melissa witness it?"

She leaned against the back of his couch and sighed, heavily, from the relief of not hearing any rejection.

"Regrettably, yes," she said, "He was a terrible man, who got more violent every year. I was the stupid wife who stayed with him for the sake of our daughter. When Melissa was 12 years old, he decided she was 'woman enough to be introduced to the ways of the world,' as he put it."

She continued, "He grabbed her, and I tried to stop him, and he pushed me, hard, to the floor. I came at him again, scratching at his face, and he grabbed my left arm, and threw me across the room, breaking my arm when I hit the dresser. Melissa was screaming for him to stop. I remembered that he kept his pistol in the dresser and I got it out, released the safety, and pointed it at him. I yelled at him to stop. He looked at me, and went into a rage like I had never seen, and that is saying something. He lunged at me, and I fired three times, hitting him twice, both in the chest. He fell across my feet, dead."

"I hardly know what to say!" as Bill drew in a deep breath.

"I regret Melissa saw it, and I regret having to take any life. But, I can't be sad that bastard is dead. And it is my life's wish fulfilled that Melissa has not seemed to have suffered that much from seeing his death, nor my foolishness in marrying him. Of course, the only blessing was having created Melissa."

"Now that you have told me," Bill said, "I am, also, amazed that Melissa handled it so well. She had told me she hated him, and thought he was a worthless father...Wait a minute, was this that case in..."

"Yes" she interrupted, "He was Frank Edwards. Traynor is my maiden name.

"Lord, she is his daughter! I read about that case...thank god it was ruled justified self-defense. Plus, I think you are anything but stupid, and, rather, that you are very courageous."

"Thank you," Sylvia said, "Melissa told you that the Goth style was her response to being teased about her clothes, which she also was teased for, but the real reason was that the word got around school that I killed her father..."

Bill said, warmly "Then I am even more amazed at her inner strength, given how little it showed on the outside. I can understand why you are so nervous, given that you came to tell me all this.

"Bill, - If I may call you Bill? - that is the lesser part of what I came here for, and of what makes me nervous. Before I get to that, I first have to thank you for everything you did for her, emotionally.

"Yes, please call me Bill..."

"...It was you, Bill, that got her out of that funk. For the first time in her life, she had someone that acted like a father. You cared about her, listened to her, explained life to her, and let her cuddle against you. And she loves you, both as a man and her father, and you handled that wonderfully. For many years, I was too trapped in my own fears of men and my failed marriage, to be able to talk to her about anything involving relationships."

Bill was starting to see her calm a bit, and when she did, he saw more of Melissa's sparkle in Sylvia's eyes, and Melissa's wonderful smile. "More Fireball?" he asked.

"Thank you. I may need more than two, before I am done," she sighed.

"Please feel free to speak openly and frankly with me, if it helps."

"Thank you, I may need to. My daughter has told me everything about you, and what you two have done, together. I wish I had not found it so difficult to discuss such things with her. And, I already see what it is about you that appealed to her, so much."

Bill said, "You are very kind. I hope nothing I did with Melissa offended you."

"Offended me!?" she laughed, for the first time, and he heard Melissa's wonderful laugh rise from her.

She continued, "Nothing of the kind. You are a god send! It may not have been a method society typically endorses, but you gave her an immeasurably wonderful perspective on love and sex. I could not have done it, and I feared so much for her future when she only had me and school friends to look to for guidance. God, I agonized when she spent the night with you, but she had such faith in you, and she had told me so many wonderful things you had said and done, that I had to trust her judgement over mine."

"I have to say that a trust like that is one of the most amazing things I have known a parent to do, and is very flattering to me," he replied, relieved.

He was getting more impressed with this lovely woman, by the minute. "I must say that; I am so happy you came over here, both to know you, and know of Melissa's true history. I think it is a great credit to you, that she was as mature and collected, as she was, when I first met her."

"Oh, do you need to be somewhere?" she asked.

"Sorry, if I gave that impression! No, you are quite welcome to stay as long as you want. I am quite enjoying your company. Are you still nervous?"

"Yes" she said, "I guess I had better get to the hard part."

He questioned, "After all that you have said, there is still a hard part?!"

"Yes" she replied, and dipped her head and looked up at him, with a small grin.

His mind exclaimed, "That was 'The Eyes'!"

She continued, "I actually came here with ulterior motives."

"Now you really have my curiosity running rampant."

She looked up at him, and then swallowed the rest of her second Fireball, before pouring herself a third glass.

Sylvia took in a deep breath, and let it out. "You have not only helped Melissa, more than I can ever thank you for, but you have helped me, as well. As Melissa told me everything, I started to fight my own fears, and I stopped hiding behind them. I am trying to get back into a normal, happy life, if I can know such a thing. You made me believe in good men again; you in particular."

He said, his words coming out unevenly, "I am amazed...and honored that I could have...unknowingly, helped you as well."

Sylvia's voice quavered, "I have come to you to ask for your help."

Tears started to come down her face.

Bill reached out and took her hand. "How can I help? Anything I can do, I will."

"It took every bit of courage I could find, plus Melissa's pushing, for me to come here today. But, I told myself I wouldn't cry!"

Her emotions were too much for him, and he moved over next to her and held her in his arms. "It will be alright Ann, I will make it...I'm so sorry, Sylvia. Ann was my late wife's name."

She looked into up his eyes; hers no longer crying, but still quite wet. "My full name is Sylvia ANN Traynor."

"I...uh...well!" he stumbled, "What a coincidence."

"Is it?" she asked, "I love rose bushes, too." Clearly fighting to get the words out, she continued.

"I came here to...ask you to...ask you...to...Oh, damn! ... I WANT YOU TO SHOW ME WHAT BEING CARED ABOUT FEELS LIKE...and what Ann, your Ann, felt like when you showed her much you loved her.

"Uh, Wow!...to say this is surprise is an understatement!?

She hurriedly added, "If you don't want to, I fully underst..."

"I didn't say that," he interrupted.

"Then you...?" she said, as she started to cry again, this time happily, and scanned his face to be sure he meant it.

"I would be honored to help...But...I can't..."

Her fingers on his lips stopped him. "I know. Melissa told me EVERYTHING," Sylvia said, quietly.

She reached up and kissed him softly.

He looked at her, his eyes pleading that she really understood him. "So you know that I..."

"...can't fuck," she finished. "Okay, here is where I take you up on your offer to speak frankly," she said, her hands shaking, "I was fucked, brutally, for over 10 years, in every hole I own! I was groped, raped, and beaten. There was never a moment of kindness or caring from Frank. I took it for Melissa. Now she is safe and whole, much of that due to you. Fucking, I don't need. I want to be whole for once; to feel what is to be desired, to relish in a man's touch, to know tenderness, even if the emotions are only manufactured by you!"

He looked down at her smiling, crying face, and stroked her hair. "Oh, the caring and the emotions will be quite real."

He smiled, wryly, and asked, "You want to watch some TV?"

Sylvia laughed. Then she stood, wiped the last tears away, and extended her hand, while wiggling her fingers at him, enticingly. "You have some place you need to be...all night?"

He took her hand, and she gave him a small tug, to hurry his rising from the couch. She started walking him to the back of the house, when she stopped and turned to him.

"One question," she blurted.

"Anything," he asked, with a slight look of concern.

"Is this the ONLY time?"

"I think you have paid enough; you have earned the unlimited ticket," he said, smiling, broadly.

-------------

A little over two years later, nearing Christmas time, the phone rang. Bill answered, "Hello."

"It's me!"

"How is my girl doing out there?"

"I AM ENGAGED!!" Melissa squealed, "But only if you approve, Dad! Can I bring him home for Christmas?"

"That would be wonderful. I looked forward to meeting any man you would pick!"

He lowered the phone down to his lap. "Sylvia Ann, our daughter is engaged!" Sylvia took the phone, with her head still in his lap. He pressed the mute button on the TV.

--The End--