Those Eyes Ch. 01

Author's Note: I'm not a writer and I don't fancy myself as one...but I love telling stories. The errors in this are mine and I hope you can look past them. It's also a real slow burn as I'm still working up to actually attempting to author a sexual encounter (or two). Patience with me will be a must. This story is a loose adaptation of an encounter I had. Any similarities to other works you may have read are completely coincidental. Finally, as I'm new to this, feedback would be appreciated, if for any other reason than as motivation to finish the story. Putting "words to paper" in this fashion is more difficult than I thought. Feedback about spelling and grammar are your right but will fall on deaf ears. Maybe if the writing "bug" catches me I'll reach out for edit/proof help on future submissions but this story "is what it is". Sorry in advance.

***********************************************************

Those Eyes (Ch 1)

I almost didn't recognize her as I passed. I had just deposited my empty coffee cup and napkin in the trash receptacle and was leaving the shop when I brushed by her as she was waiting in line to order.

The meeting was complete chance, and totally out of context, so it took my brain a minute to work through the steps of recognition:

1. Huh? She looks familiar.

2. Wait, I know her.

3. (mental Rolodex whirring...)

4. Look at the eyes. It's always in the eyes.

5. I got it! Mary Beth from Church.

My "Eureka!" moment wasn't really that surprising to me in retrospect because Mary Beth had unforgettable eyes. Eyes I'd fantasized about on multiple occasions up until a few months ago. That's when I'd broken up with my girlfriend who at the time was a member of the same Church where Mary Beth was the Pastor's wife. That break-up ended my time at that Church and I hadn't seen Mary Beth since.

I guess "fantasizing" about the Pastor's wife probably needs some explanation. It's best to start with the admission that I'm not much of a religious person and attending that Church was solely for the sake of appeasing my girlfriend at the time. That said, I am spiritual. I believe that there is something out there greater than me and the world doesn't revolve around me. Fairly simplistic view, but it works for me.

I didn't treat going to Church as a chore, it's just that most of organized religion doesn't speak to me. I did, however, treat my relationship as a chore because my ex and I were destined to fail from the start. We gave it a try, drug it out almost two years (a year longer than we should have) before we finally parted relatively amicably.

But the best thing I got from the relationship was now standing in line at the coffee shop. Those eyes.

Mary Beth is not a model. In fact, she's fairly plain with symmetric but unremarkable facial features. She's petite and dresses down with modesty so you're left with no real idea about her body other than she's not real curvy. She has a couple of light streaks of gray in her almost jet black, shoulder blade length hair and you really, really have to work to carry on a conversation with her. She was always pleasant when she did speak, she just deferred to her husband in his role as Pastor and let him do the talking. Which he liked to do. A lot.

But her eyes told a different story. They were always so expressive. They glistened with tears at sad news, they glinted with humor when something funny occurred, they flashed anger when she was irritated or perturbed. Her face was always a controlled mask of what appeared to be a calm, very much in-control demeanor. But those eyes, they are different story. If you were looking, paid attention and cared enough to acknowledge her eyes, they revealed a much more passionate and expressive person than the remainder of the package would lead you to believe.

Ice blue in color, generally, but would roll to a storm cloud gray when saddened. They'd flash almost white like a lightening bolt when angry and they'd twinkle like the stars on a winter's night when she was tickled with humor.

I noticed her eyes at an after service potluck on one of the first Sunday's I attended Church with my ex. At first, the expressive nature of her eye's just made me curious. I spent time wondering if others noticed them like I did. Not long thereafter, I accepted that it was only me as far as I could tell....which led me to question; How much in her eyes was simply my imagination?

Apparently, the question was rhetorical because in typical guy fashion, her eyes became my muse. Within a couple of months I'd come to think of Mary Beth as beautiful and I REALLY wondered what her eyes would look like if she were aroused sexually.

I pleasured myself to that thought on multiple occasions.

At no time did I consider doing anything else with her as she was married to a Pastor, is about 20 years my senior and each time I was around her I was in the presence of my girlfriend.

Two out of those three were definite deal killers. I don't cheat. And I especially don't pursue married women. The age difference? I could work with that.

Three years ago, during my final year in college, I had a fling with a professor almost 20 years older than me. Let's just say I left that rendezvous a MUCH more experienced lover than the one I was when she bedded me. One hell of a weekend. Suffice it to say I never imagined a room service champagne bottle could be used in that manner. Repeatedly.

So, no. Mary Beth's age wasn't a problem for me in that regard.

But back to the coffee shop today as I walked past Mary Beth, recognized her, stopped myself prior to leaving and now stood considering the possible results of turning around and greeting her. What do I say to a Pastor's wife who is in line at a coffee shop almost 4 months after I'd quit attending her Church?

What is there to say?

And did I really want to dredge up my ex and have that discussion?

Nope. Best to just move on.

But those eyes. Damn. I had to.

So I turned around and approached her again from the other side. My movement toward her caught her attention and she glanced at me as I neared. Flash of recognition, muted smile and a pleasant, "Hi, Scott. Long time, no see."

"Hi, Mary Beth," I replied, "It's been a few months. I thought it was you so I wanted to say "Hi" but don't want to interrupt what you're doing."

"Nonsense, Scott. I'm glad you took the time. How are you?"

"I'm well," I said, "How about you?"

"I guess as well as can be expected," she replied somewhat remotely, "I suppose you've heard the divorce is final."

"I'm sorry, WHAT?!?!" I couldn't quite process what I'd just heard. Pastor's and their wives don't get divorced. Do they?

"My and David's divorce is now final."

She repeated this in a way that seemed like saying it out loud spoke it into existence and made it cathartic for her.

"I'm so sorry to hear that, Mary Beth. Jenny and I broke up almost four months ago and I haven't been attending Church. I hadn't heard."

"Oh," she said, "that makes sense since that's about the time I left David and I've also been away from the Church. I didn't know about you and Jenny. I'm sorry to hear that."

"No worries," I quickly replied hoping to get past this part of the discussion. Time to shut this topic down.

"Jenny and I were friends who never found our stride as a couple, so we parted like adults and are better off because of it." I added a grim smile at the end of my synopsis as a form of punctuation mark to end this part of the discussion.

"That doesn't surprise me," she immediately came back with, "there never seemed to be much spark."

Wait. What?

"What do you mean by that?" I couldn't help but almost bark this response back at her.

"Oh, no!" she quickly offered, "I didn't mean that the way it sounded."

At this point, it was her turn to place her coffee order and she asked me pointedly if I would stay and have coffee with her so she could explain. I could see in her eyes that she felt she'd offended me and her look pleaded with me to accept her offer to make amends.

"I'd love to stay," I said, offering her a crooked smile to ease her concern that I was offended, "but I've had my coffee so I'd better just have a water."

We picked up our order in silence and Mary Beth headed to booth in the back corner of the shop. Not really secluded or intimate in any real way but we could have as private a conversation in this area as the establishment allowed for.

Once seated, Mary Beth looked at me and said, "I'm sorry, Scott, I didn't mean to sound all judgy back there about you and Jenny."

Her eyes were back to pleading and I was so mesmerized by the expressive nature of them I felt compelled to let her completely off the hook.

"Mary Beth, you simply caught me off guard with the observation and your willingness to voice it but you're not wrong. Jenny and I never found the spark."

In letting Mary Beth off the hook, I guess I also let my guard down because I followed my acknowledgment to her with, "I'm more curious in how you knew this? You surprised me with it more than anything."

I'd looked down from her gaze as I opened the conversation about Jenny and I was currently finding interest in the lemon wedge stuck on the rim of my water glass as I chastised myself for letting her disarm me enough to allow the topic to continue.

"It was your eyes, Scott," she said very softly, "they never showed that spark toward Jenny."

That brought my head up. I fixed my gaze with Mary Beth and we both sat quietly for about 15 seconds and just searched each others eyes. I had a lot of questions that flashed through my mind. In fact, a crazy number of thoughts flashed through my head but the one prevailing feeling that overrode all of them was that Mary Beth was lonely. I could see that in her eyes. Loneliness.

She finally broke the spell of our gaze with, "Aren't you going to ask me what I mean by that?"

I paused, taking a deep breath that I exhaled slowly through my nose and said, "No, Mary Beth, I'm not. In fact, I know exactly what you mean and I appreciate your honesty. It's refreshing."

This was the first time I'd ever seen Mary Beth truly smile...and I was now looking at a completely different person. Where did those dimples come from? And her nose crinkles up a bit. How cute is that?

Mainly, though, it's what it did to her eyes. Uh oh. It was the first time since meeting up with her again where those eyes again took on "that" meaning. And with the revelation of what that smile did to those eyes, the feeling was more powerful than ever. I felt a twinge down below and I knew I'd be masturbating to those eyes later. Likely twice.

With my guard completely down, the next thing I said just spilled out of my mouth before I could try to run it through any type of social or appropriateness filter.

"I'm curious, Mary Beth. What is it that Alice Johnston did that made you find her so distasteful?"

She didn't flinch. Just froze, still staring at me with her mouth slightly ajar.

Back when I was still attending Church, Alice Johnston was the number one reason I'd see anger or irritation in Mary Beth's eyes. From greetings at the front door, to meetings and committee functions, to fellowship and pot luck events, every time I'd seen Alice enter into Mary Beth's company I'd see that white hot lightning bolt flash through her eyes.

A very quiet, "How did you know?" escaped from her lips and hung there between us. It was her turn to look down and study her coffee cup.

"Same as you. Your eyes gave it away," I said matter of factly. "I don't mean to pry. Just curious."

She swirled her cup around in her hand and continued to stare into it like she was looking for dregs. After a few seconds, she looked up with the same sadness in her eyes I'd seen before when she had the duty to console Church members following the loss of a loved one. There was a mist in them and they'd taken on that storm cloud gray.

Mary Beth still didn't answer. Just looked at me. I tried to give her the respect of maintaining our eye contact since I'm the one who'd kicked over what definitely seemed to be a can of worms. Not the time to back down. If it offended her? I'd apologize. If she chose not to answer? We'd move along.

But the eye contact was hypnotic. All of those earlier indications of searching, loneliness and even pain flashed through the sadness in her eyes. I was caught up in her stare.

"I don't think I have the time to fully answer that, Scott," she finally said, "at least not right now."

Her reply just hung there.

"Well I asked it, Mary Beth, and I am curious. I'll listen to the full story whenever you have the time to tell it...should you ever choose to share it with me."

Screw it. In for the penny, right?

"I'd like that." she said under her breath, suddenly sounding every bit like a shy teenager who'd just been asked out on a date.

Okay. So that just happened. And rather than feeling strange about what just seemed to have happened between us, I felt excitement. Including a definite interest from down below.

I was on autopilot at this point, and my mouth apparently no longer needed input from my brain, because I came back with, "I'd like that too. When would you like to get together?"

"I'm free most evenings now so I can make about anything work. What works for you?" Mary Beth volleyed back.

"Well...I'm the one that put you on the spot, Mary Beth, so I'd like to undo any damage I caused sooner rather than later, unless you need some time...?

Send her back one more noncommittal chance to push this off on the calendar and maybe even avoid it outright if that's what she really wants to do.

"Let's do it tonight, Scott," she kind of rushed out as if she was afraid by waiting she was going to chicken out.

Okay, I'm still a 25 year old dude. The double entendre of her reply was not lost on me. This fact must have shown in my expression because Mary Beth opened her mouth to say something else, paused, closed her mouth and looked down to her empty cup. I could see her cheeks flush red and there was an almost imperceptible shake of her head.

I must have chortled a bit at her reaction because while her body would not let her raise her head to look at me, she did glance up at me through some wisps of her dark hair hanging across her forehead to make eye contact.

Damn. That was a new version of her blue eyes I'd never seen before...but I'd sure as hell imagined them. And that's when I decided I was all-in on getting back together soon with Mary Beth.

"Okay, Mary Beth," I said maintaining the eye contact with her upturned eyes, "let's do it tonight."

With that, I winked at her, smiled and saw some of that color return to her cheeks.

TO BE CONTINUED...