The Residency Issue Ch. 05

At one point, her glass almost empty, Miranda breathed in and let out a deep sigh. I waited for her. She said, "I guess this visit to the lake is as much for me as it is for Taylor." She kept her eyes on the two in the water. "Oh, Vera," she said, "I'm so sorry. I feel I'm about to burden you with my troubles, and yet I barely know you." I stared into my own nearly empty glass. "Alma told me you had a kind heart and were a good listener," she went on. Then to herself: "I feel I'm about to burst if I don't tell someone."

I stood. "Miranda," I said, "give me your glass. We need refills, I think." And as I walked off I said over my shoulder, "Sometimes a well-intentioned stranger is just the thing."

Returning to the bench, I handed Miranda her glass of white wine, with its external beads of moisture, and sat down.

She sipped again, and staring out across the water. After another deep breath, she said, "My husband's being unfaithful."

I heaved my own sigh, and whispered, "Shit."

"It's such a blow!" she said. "I feel like I've been kicked in the belly."

"I know," I said. "I'm sorry."

Miranda got up walked about behind the bench. I heard her quietly sobbing. Her shoulders shook.

I walked toward the lake. "Paul?" I called. "Paul, Miranda and I are headed back up to the house, OK?"

Miranda glanced toward us and started toward the house, head down.

Back inside, her on the couch, me on a chair nearby. She sat staring. Her eyes looked bloodshot.

Quietly I said, "You're sure he's cheating?"

She looked at her lap and nodded frantically. And the tears started in earnest. I moved a box of tissues next to her. She had several wadded up by the time the storm blew over. As she calmed, I put a little waste basket next to her.

"I'm so sorry--"

"Stop," I said. "Stop right there. The very last thing in the world you need to do is apologize. Not to me, not to anybody...what some men get up to is utterly horrible."

"Why do I have this idea that it's my fault?" she asked.

"I haven't the foggiest," I said. "Now you need to agree with me that you have no fault in what your husband is doing. None! That is the one thing that bothers me more than any other, the assumption of guilt by the party clearly not guilty. If a man could run around on the likes of you, a pretty, sweet-tempered, intelligent, captivating woman, the mother of his child, then there's no explaining anything. Except that some men just act in a reprehensible manner. End of story."

I took a breath and continued, "My turn to apologize. I'm unloading here. But please listen to me for one second, sweetie, and follow the truth and the likelihood. I've seen it countless times; I know what I'm talking about. Some men have a terribly hard time not chasing after the next new and exciting thing, be it a woman, a watch, a car, or a promotion. They indulge themselves while making the excuse that they can't help themselves. It's lazy and it's selfish."

Miranda continued looking at her lap, but at least she'd calmed down some. "Thank you," she whispered.

"You're welcome," I said. "Besides seeing it professionally, I have some hard-earned knowledge in this area."

She talked on and off for a time, and I listened. Listened and validated what she was saying. It's well known that just talking something out, getting it off your chest, has a therapeutic effect. By the time Taylor and Paul came back to the house, Miranda was ready for her daughter.

"Tay-Tay!" she called out, with her arms raised up high. "You came back!"

Taylor gave her mother a surprised look, but allowed herself to be hugged and fussed over.

"Did you find anything interesting in the lake?" her mother asked.

"Yes, but," said Taylor, "we left it in the bucket outside. Paul found me some really pretty, sparkly pebbles, and we saw some really little fishes, and I dug down into the sand and pulled up a big rock that had some more sparkly parts in it."

"Did you see any birds?" Miranda asked.

"Oh yeah," said Taylor, "we saw some kingfishers--wow, they are very fast!"

"Hard to follow as they go along, aren't they, Taylor," Paul said.

"Yeah," Taylor said, "you can hardly see them."

"Well, honey," Miranda said, "Vera's got some wonderful things here for lunch. In a little while, it'll be time to eat, and you and Paul will have to get cleaned up."

We had as much fun watching Paul concentrating on Taylor, as we did Taylor's wide-eyed devotion.

In fact, I shifted my attention to Miranda. She'd reset herself somewhat, and was looking refreshed, at least for the time being. Particularly once she mentioned what a good thing it was for Taylor to have Paul to fall back on as a male role model, I watched her watch my precious Paul. It did occur to me what a cute couple they'd make. I didn't want to think that, I tended to feel possessive obviously--it was back to that old see-saw: how long will I have fairly constant access to the boy? Was he going to be living with Alma more in the coming weeks? What about when he moved to Knoxville, would that pack of cougars give him a moment's rest? (I know, I know, I should talk! But he'd be leaving me to get on with school!) And what did Alec mean when he said I should be closer, that I would need to protect him?

Right now, I felt I needed to concentrate on Miranda. There were a number of issues involved: she was vulnerable and hurting, not a good time to be exploring new relationships. I didn't know what the chances were that she and her husband (Tom?) would patch things up. And what about Alma? How close was Miranda to her, and what kind of rivalry could occur there? I decided to watch how she interacted with Paul, who was too appealing and charismatic by half for me to feel safe about the two of them. I would try to do what I could to steer Miranda away from new entanglements, and for right now that meant Paul.

I was reaching this conclusion when, speak of the devil, in walked Paul from the porch. He had his phone in his hand and asked if I had a minute. I took him back out onto the porch and closed the door. Taylor was out on the grass.

"I just got off the phone," Paul said. "It was Nora. She was wondering if I could come to Knoxville...I told her we had houseguests and that I would have to call her back."

"Oh, Paul," I said, "so gorgeous and so smart!" I wanted to stroke his cheek, but kept my hands to myself. Miranda was just inside. Paul and I sat down.

I took a deep breath. "What are your thoughts--bearing in mind that you're Alma's guest and charge for the summer? It seems awfully pushy and premature."

"That's what I thought, too," Paul said.

"I wonder..." I said, "Maybe it isn't Nora at all, but some of the other women who are asking...Paul, this is going to sound self-serving, and maybe it is, but I think we need to hide behind Alma for the time being."

"Hide behind Alma?"

"Yes," I said, "use her as the excuse for keeping you in the mountains. They'll see you soon enough as it is. I guess that's the first and main point. And second, we could say how difficult it would be for Alma to transport you down there...They're a pushy lot aren't they?" I was about to say something about waiting their turn, but that would have simply been rude to Paul.

Paul started to call her back, but I added, "Oh and Paul? It wouldn't hurt anything to sound sorry, like you would have liked to, but it's out of your hands, you know? I mean you're turning her down, after all. No reason to do it harshly." I smiled at him. "You want to be known for your manners, after all."

Miranda and Taylor's visit ran its course. Taylor was a little withdrawn the second morning, knowing they would be leaving. Paul did everything he could to occupy her and help her forget they had to leave, sweetheart that he is. Miranda and I revisited her troubles only briefly; I extracted a solemn promise that she would call me if she needed a friendly ear. We hadn't known each other long, but I felt we'd bonded, and also believed she would call if need be. Some people hesitate to do that.

I watched as she said her good-bye to Paul. They stood next to her car with her door open. She talked quietly to him for a few moments, holding both his hands. Then she wrapped her arms around his neck for two beats, three beats, kissed his cheek, and climbed into her car.

As we headed back into the house, I said, "Looks like you might have another conquest there, Paul."

He looked me in the eye a moment. "I barely said two words to her..." he said.

"I know," I said. I put my arms around him and raised up on my toes to rub my crotch against that wonderful equipment in his shorts. I sighed. "But you were a total doll and a gentleman about entertaining Taylor. You can't know how much she appreciated it." I let go of him. "Come here," I said, leading him inside, "and sit down."

I told Miranda's sad story to him, including her statement about his being a good role model for Taylor, now that her husband was apparently getting ready to fly. He stared.

"Who would leave her?" he asked. "She's so pretty and everything."

"And everything," I said. "Exactly."

"And I love Taylor," Paul added.

I sat next to him on the couch, held his face, and kissed him. Then I remarked about missing him the prior night, and, holding his hand, stood up. That lovely sweetheart walked right past me with my hand in his, and led the way upstairs himself. A lady does love an eager lover, especially when he, you know, looks like Paul.

He laid me back on the bed and held the bottoms of my shorts and after undoing the button and the zipper, he said, "Come on, off they get." After I lifted my hips and he yanked the shorts off me, he knelt and brought his face into contact with my vulva. My arousal had started as he pulled me upstairs, and with his face against my sex, and him sensually breathing in my scent and humming his enjoyment, I was well on my way. I knew I was in a "golden age" as long as Paul was my live-in partner, but I tried to just take it a day at a time, an orgasm at a time, and cruise from one to the next.

I lay back and closed my eyes as he ran his fingers lightly up the insides of my thighs. This gave me tingles both on my legs and in my sex; he followed his fingers with his lips, trailing them across the sensitive skin of my thigh near my cunt. Finally he brought his warm mouth against me again and hummed as he gave my sex a big, welcoming French kiss. The shock was utterly delicious and I gasped and moaned my delight. I started caressing his head as he began to tongue my inner lips; my lubrication became a flood then. Reclining there, comfortable, I gloried in Paul's devotion. He was so accustomed to my timing and my hotspots...soon he was lavishing attention on my sensitive, demanding clit, his lips soft and his tongue insistent.

In a few minutes I could feel my crisis approaching when he inserted a finger, maybe two, and began to stroke that magic point on the upper curve inside my vagina. OH!! dear reader, everything went into overdrive--I came instantly! Taking me by surprise, this sensual, ecstatic explosion flashed through me from my clit, not once but several times--I lost count--I shuddered violently with each successive glorious wrenching coup. Maybe I made some noise, I must have. I held Paul's face against me for dear life--oh I was coming and coming! Your breathing supercharges, sometimes you black out for a few seconds, sometimes your vision flashes--maybe that's from squeezing my eyes shut.

Oh, none of it matters...I had a young, virile, beautiful swain of my very own, and he gleefully attended my every whim. I still held him against me, his mouth kept contact with my sated quim, he still held my thighs. My breathing had just retreated from its peak, this probably took 20 to 30 seconds, with me still conscious of his mouth on me and his fingers in me. He surprised my clit--and me--with a slow sensual stroke with his tongue and I gasped loudly and convulsed with a delicious mini-climax. He waited a few seconds while I basked in that bliss, and then he did it again, only this time he added a stroke inside my vagina with his fingers. I gasped again but then my hips joined in, rolling upward against his mouth. Apparently my body knew better what it wanted than my mind did. (My mind was only vaguely functioning anyway.) Once Paul noticed how my body reacted, he picked up again with his lips, tongue, and fingers, and soon I was holding his head again, tightly this time, because I was veering toward another lights-out orgasm, it was only a few seconds away.

Oh god, did I mention my creative, oh-so-attentive lover boy? Did I mention that for me he was the perfect package?

I came again, a blinding, violent, quaking, transporting climax that lasted so deliciously for fifteen seconds--my body was getting worn out by these convulsions. It felt like fifteen days of bliss. This time a few moments after coming, I touched Paul's head lightly, and he knew to disengage. I lay back in stunned exhaustion, a blissful, completely done-in old broad who'd been royally taken apart and left in pieces by back-to-back orgasms, provided by a skilled royal sex slave.

When I came to, Paul was kneeling by me. He had me raise my hips and he slid a soft white towel between me and the wet sheets, and then brought a damp washcloth and started to wipe down my thighs, butt, and vulva, which had been coated with my plenteous fluids. I even gloried in that treatment, so thoughtful.

He came back from the bathroom and I said, "Come lie here by me, sweet lover."

He lay down and stretched an arm across me; I backed up against his warm skin and cuddled against him. Placing my hand on his arm, I said, "I've been thinking, dear heart." He grunted. "Yes, frightening, I know," I said. "With you around I haven't been thinking nearly as much as I used to." He squeezed me closer, a delicious feeling.

I went on: "I would feel better if we talked out how we're going to...pursue your summer. I feel like we're just reacting to things, and not setting boundaries or parameters."

Paul said, "Parameters?"

"Yeah," I said. "Policy guidelines, like. When Nora called you yesterday, we had to react to that, or rather, you had to react to it, and it put pressure on you. Fortunately, you made the perfect answer, you clever boy." I took his hand and kissed it. "But, so we've kind of set a precedent for when any of the gals in Knoxville--however many they turn out to be--call. We just ask them to be patient, you'll be on campus in a couple of months, but are currently a guest of Alma, who is doing your father a favor. We'll see how that plays."

Paul moved his hips, and so his package, still in his briefs, against me while he grunted his reaction to my thoughts.

"My, but you're an impatient boy," I said. "Needy and greedy." He pulled me close again. I said, "Just let me get through the rest of my thoughts, okay?"

"Of course," he said. "Go for it."

"Thank you," I said. "Now as far as Alma and I are concerned, I think we just go along with whatever time she wants with you. Does that sound right?"

Paul sighed. "Yeah, it does. This, my being here by the lake, is her doing, right? And--this is going to sound funny, like it's all about me--but I like the both of you a real lot."

I turned to face him and nudged him flat on the bed. "I'm glad," I said, "that you see it that way, you sweet thing. We're both," I kissed him, "pretty enthralled with," I kissed him again, "you, too." A final kiss.

I said, "You are such a beautiful, compliant, sweet lover," I said as I started kissing down his chest. "You must have been dropped from heaven."

As I kissed a trail down his abdomen, he said, "No, just Charlotte." He grinned down at me.

"Oh, you..." I pulled his pretty green briefs to his ankles with a yank, and gave the base of his lengthening cock a playful little bite.

That elicited an "Oh!" from Paul, part surprise and part excitement. He had some precum on his delicious tip, and I rubbed my lips around it, spreading the lubrication and adding a bit of saliva. Paul had been humming tunelessly as I did that. When I opened my mouth to suck him in, that humming changed to a delightful "Oh!"

I worked and worked on his sweet cock, trying to repay him for the heavenly gift he'd just given me. He was rock-hard in seconds, and I ran my tongue on his sensitive underside with each plunge I made on him. Between a couple of these lavish plunges, I said, "What a stud. Oh, so hard." One or two more plunges, my mouth on his cock, and I said, "I want what's in there, Paul." More plunges, twisting my mouth and tongue on him, and stroking him with a hand. "Give in to the feelings, Paul, surrender." I ran my tongue on the under side of his cock. Mouth back on him for a second. "Give me all your cum, lover, it's mine, I want it!" I knew he was close, maybe already starting to come. His breathing was shallow and ragged. As I put my mouth back on him and sensually sucked, he erupted in a series of gasps, "AH! Oh! Oh! MMMMMM-Ah!" I tried to catch it all in my mouth and swallow, sometimes a rather desperate act as I tried to keep up. I couldn't believe the force of his ejaculation, or the amount of jism shooting into my mouth and down my throat.

Eventually he emptied and relaxed, sated and spent. I even gloried in that.

The days were warm and glorious. Our routine was simple, and how could one describe a day starting with cunnilingus by a beautiful, ardent, young lover as anything but sweet? However, a day to two after Miranda and Taylor went back to North Carolina, Paul sat at the breakfast table with a pensive look. He looked at me a couple of times as though he was about ready to ask a question, then opted not to.

I said, "Okay, honey. What's on your mind?" I sat down across from him.

He looked down at his bacon and eggs and took a breath. "It's a little hard to talk about--kind of embarrassing."

"Embarrassing?"

"Well..." he hesitated. "Yeah, embarrassing for a couple of reasons."

I waited. He said, "You know how we've been talking about me squiring women around...That's not embarrassing, you've been really nice and flattering to me, and worried about me..."

"Worried?" I said.

"Yeah," he said, "like you're looking out for me, you don't want me to be cheated or taken advantage of. That makes me feel good, and like I want to measure up to what you want me to be."

"Sweet lover," I said, "if you're concerned that you're not measuring up..."

"It's not that so much," he said, "I know you're happy with me--in bed and all."

"Mm-hmm..."

"But what I mean is..." he hesitated again and took a breath. I waited. This was something he was gingerly trying to build up to.

"But you also want me," he said, "to help other women to have an excellent time too."

"That's very true, Paul," I said, "and I don't think you're going to have any trouble there."

"Um, thank you," he glanced at me bashfully and it hit me right in the gut. He was glorious, he was vulnerable, he was intoxicating. "But I was thinking there was one place where I could work to get better." I looked at him and tilted my head a little. He continued: "I love everything we do in bed together...but one thing we don't really do is play with my butt."

I raised my chin and let it drop. A kind of single nod. "No," I said, "you're right, we don't do that, basically because I've never really been into it. I think because my partners haven't been into it, by and large." I took a breath. "So...is that something where you want to get better, more experience?"

"I think it might be," Paul said. "The way Nora got totally excited when I kind of surrendered to what she wanted to do...it made me happy to see her get excited, and the way she kind of carefully went ahead...in the end I kind of enjoyed it."