Unfinished Business

"Oh, as if I wouldn't have understood that you'd rather spend the evening reliving past glories," Clarice laughed.

"To be honest, there really weren't many glories to relive," Robert admitted without thinking about it.

"Oh really?" Clarice replied. "Then again, I should've already known that."

"Excuse me?" Robert asked, a perplexed expression flashing across his face.

"Oh, I really shouldn't have said that," Clarice replied after a moment's hesitation, "but since I did, well, I guess the reason I knew you weren't getting anything from Amber was that, if you had been, you wouldn't have been jerking off in our bathroom that night."

"Fuck!" Robert said, just loud enough to be heard.

"Oh, come on now, we're both adults, and it was a long time ago," Clarice said, surprised at his discomfort. "Things like that happen."

"I don't think so," Robert replied.

"They do," Clarice said. "In fact, a few weeks after you left for college, I came home early one afternoon and walked in on Gary and Lisa buck naked, going at it like rabbits on the living room couch."

"Omigod, what did you do?" Robert said, suddenly forgetting his own sense of embarrassment.

"What could I do?" Clarice replied, a sly smile at the corners of her mouth, "I pointed out that he had a perfectly good bed in his room, two of them in fact, and that I'd appreciate it if, in the future, they'd confine their sexual acrobatics to one of them and not my new couch."

"You didn't!" Robert said.

"I most certainly did," Clarice stated. "What else was I going to say? They were both eighteen and it wasn't like anything I said was going to keep them from doing it."

Robert couldn't imagine his own mother's reaction if she'd walked in on him and some girl naked in his bedroom, much less the living room. Not that anything like that had happened until after he'd left home. Her reaction, he was sure, wouldn't have been as blasé as Clarice's.

With dinner soon finished, Robert helped Clarice clear the table and load the dishes into the washer. After which, he excused himself to use the bathroom. As he took care of business, his mind again focused on the changes in Clarice, how different she was from the woman he remembered. If he had to pick a single word to describe the change, rejuvenated was the one that came to mind.

-=-=-=-

Robert returned to the kitchen, only to find Clarice nowhere in sight. He called out her name and was surprised when the reply came from out on the back porch.

"I'm watching the sun go down," he heard her say. "Why don't you come out and join me?"

Doing so, Robert found Clarice, who had earlier traded the dress she'd worn to the ceremony for a white short-sleeved shirt and black shorts, stretched back in an Adirondack chair, a bottle of beer in her hand.

"As a habit, I don't drink during the day," Clarice said as she motioned toward the empty chair next to her, "but when the sun goes down, I like to have a beer."

Sitting down in the empty chair, Robert noticed a second bottle sitting in the small ice filled bucket on the ground.

"I thought you might like one as well," she said when she saw him looking at the pail. "I seem to remember you having a taste for it, at least based on how bottles disappeared from the basement fridge when you and Gary used to spend nights down there studying -- or at least claimed to be."

Robert grinned as, reaching down, he pulled the chilled bottle out of the bucket and popped off the cap, taking a long swig of the cold brew. It did taste good.

While they watched the now reddish orb fade below the horizon, Clarice inquired more about his life up North, asking some of the same questions that Amber had asked. His answers this time, however, were a bit more expansive.

"No wife and kids?" Clarice had asked.

"Came close a few times," Robert replied, jokingly adding, "the wife part, not the kids. But I don't think I'm really cut out for either. I like having my freedom to do as I please too much."

"Well, I can't fault you for that," Clarice said after taking another taste. "Lord knows, I wish I'd had more time to enjoy life when I was younger. Don't get me wrong, I love my boys, but sometimes ... well, sometimes I wish it had gone a bit differently."

Gary, Robert knew, had been a late in life baby, born sixteen years after his older brother. A happenstance which caused Clarice to stand out from the other class mothers, most of them a decade her junior. Because of it, she made few friends among them. It also didn't help that, having already done the father thing, Paul Evans was quite selective about what parts of it he cared to repeat -- the result being part of the reason for the gradual collapse of the marriage.

She went on a bit more, talking about how, with both her sons now grown, with families of their own, and her husband no longer part of the picture, she'd taken stock of her life and realized it wasn't too late to change its direction.

"You think you'd ever get married again?" Robert asked, curious.

"I doubt it," Clarice replied. "I mean, why would I want another husband?"

"Don't you get lonely?" he inquired.

"Are you lonely?" she asked in turn.

"No, but I...." he started to reply, only to be interrupted.

"... probably have more women chasing after you than you know what to do with," Clarice said with a touch of mirth, "famous writer and all."

"I wouldn't exactly say that," Robert offered.

"The famous part or the number of women?" Clarice quipped.

"Alright, there have been women, but nowhere near the number that you're imagining," he said.

"Well, I'm sure it's more than the number of men who've shared my bed since the divorce," she countered. "It's not like Rockridge Creek has an excess of available men, at least not my age. And of those, well, there are damn few I'd be interested in -- even just for a night."

That Clarice's new frankness also included her sex life left Robert a bit stunned. A reaction that reflected on his face.

"Oh, don't act so shocked," she jokingly chided him. "We're both adults, having an adult conversation. I'm sure you've heard racier things from other women."

That, Robert had to admit, was true. But those women had been part of his adult life, not his teens. It was hard to break out of the parent-child dynamic that had governed those years.

"Besides, I've seen your dick, remember?" she unexpectedly added a few moments later. "It's a bit late for either of us to feel bashful."

Robert had just begun to swallow the last of his beer when Clarice made that remark. It caused him to nearly choke on the brew, spitting it out all over his lap.

"Now look, you've made a mess," Clarice noted in the same frivolous tone. "Of course, it's not as bad as the one you made on my nightgown that night. I had to throw the damn thing out."

"Do you want me to pay for it?" Robert said, not sure what else to say.

"Nah, I should've tossed that raggedy thing long before," Clarice said, finishing off her own beer. "I think I only kept it as a reminder of when Paul and I still had a sex life."

Their conversation had certainly veered off into an unexpected direction, but Robert found it too interesting to try and change it. It was as if, now that they'd finally addressed the elephant in the room, Clarice was determined to address all of it.

"You know, my walking in on you that night was probably the closest thing I'd had to a sexual experience in months," she added. "In fact, your cock was only the second one I'd ever seen -- at least in that condition..."

'No wonder she kept staring at it,' Robert thought.

"... and it was also somewhat larger than I was used to. So, you might understand that I was somewhat at a loss for words."

That surprised Robert. He'd been told by women that he was just average in size, and he was fine with that. After all, they'd said so as an observation, not a complaint. How much smaller could Mr. Evans have been? They had two sons, so obviously it had been enough to get the job done.

"I've always been curious about something," Clarice then asked, "who were you thinking about that night ... Amber?"

If Robert had taken a few more seconds to think, that was the answer he would've given. But like nearly everything else in last half hour, the question left him off balance. So instead, he said that he'd rather not say.

"Oh, come on, it was a long time ago," Clarice insisted. "You can tell me."

Again, Robert hesitated, saying it was too embarrassing.

"It wasn't me, was it?" she inquired, remembering an article she once read about teenage boys having sexual fantasies about the older women in their life, usually teachers or mothers of their friends. "I won't be offended if it was. In fact, I sometimes used to think that it might've been when I ... well, you know."

Robert now worried that Clarice was going to be disappointed if he said that it hadn't been her. That article to the contrary, he'd never had an illicit thought about any of the older women in his life -- at least not back then. In more recent years, he'd had a post-college affair with Maggie Crossfield, one of the book editors at his publishing company. The woman had been fifteen years his senior, and while the affair had been short-lived, it had been quite enjoyable.

The look on Clarice's face said she still wanted an answer.

It was, he realized, too late to say it had been Amber, and he didn't want to lie and say it had been Clarice, even if that might be the answer she hoped to hear. So, he told the truth.

"It was Lisa Ann," he finally said.

"Gary's Lisa Ann?" Clarice asked, as if there might have been another one in their circle of friends.

Robert just nodded his head.

"Oh my," she said in surprise, her daughter-in-law's name not having been one of the possibilities she'd ever considered.

Misinterpreting her expression for one of dismay, Robert felt the need to explain himself, quickly relating the circumstance that had preceded the incident. Clarice listened intently as he recounted watching from the car as the spirited redhead sucked his friend's cock. A sight that not only wouldn't leave his thoughts, but had also left him with a raging hard-on.

Once he finished, Robert expected Clarice to be outraged. Instead, she now seemed more amused than anything else.

"Well, all things being considered, I guess I really can't blame you," she unexpectedly offered. "Lisa Ann was pretty fuckable back then. Not to say she still isn't; another grandchild on the way is proof of that."

That wasn't the sort of thing one expected a mother to say about her son's wife, but it was true. Also, when the incident had taken place, Lisa had only been a girl Gary had just started dating, not his wife.

"So, I forgive you," she then added.

"Then we're good," Robert said, "about anything that happened that night, I mean?"

"Not exactly," Clarice unexpectedly said.

"I don't understand," Robert replied.

"No, you probably don't," she said, "but before I try and explain, I want to make something quite clear."

Clarice paused as she waited a beat to be sure she had Robert's full attention.

"I meant it when I said that, when I submitted your name to the committee, I never expected you to ever come back to Rockridge Creek," she began. "That said, however, I will admit that, since I was told you were coming back, I have been thinking about you."

"Okay," Robert said, thinking that was certainly understandable, since she had been the one who'd had the idea of inviting him in the first place.

"I also want to say that my invitation for you to spend the night here was spontaneous and without forethought," she added.

Now Robert was getting a bit confused.

"Since the divorce, I've tried not to let opportunities pass me by," she continued. "I might not always succeed, but at least I know that I tried."

'Obviously, she's succeeded more often than she's failed,' Robert thought, considering the life she'd created for herself.

"Listening to what you said to the graduates, about not listening to the naysayers and following your dreams, I would hope that would be something that you'd understand."

"I do," Robert replied, even though he was still puzzled as to where this was going.

"It's funny, now I can't seem to find the words..." she suddenly said as she paused. "Has that ever happened to you?"

"All the time," Robert said, thinking of hours spent staring at a blank page in his typewriter.

"What I'm trying to say is," Clarice said, trying to get to the point, "that while you're welcome to spend the night in Gary's old bed, you're just as welcome to spend the night in mine, if you think that's something you might enjoy."

'What?' Robert thought, certain he had to have misheard her.

"I'm not really very good at this, never have been," she went on, determined to finish. "If I had been, maybe I would've said something that night. Of all my son's friends, I always felt that you were someone special, and I mean that in a way that, well, in a way a woman's not supposed to feel about young men less than half her age."

Now that there was no doubt about what she was saying, Robert found himself stunned into silence.

"But now," Clarice said as she brought her admission to a close, "that difference doesn't seem to matter as much, and the worst that could happen, I think, is that I'm making a fool of myself. That I could live with. What I can't live with any more is just letting things go by and not taking a chance."

As she finished, Robert looked at her and felt as if an opaque veil had suddenly been lifted from his eyes, one that had prevented him from seeing Clarice as anything other than the mother of an old friend. It was as if, for the first time, he saw her as a woman. One who had just told him that she found him desirable.

"You don't have to give me an answer right this moment," Clarice said. "Take some time to think about it. I'm going to head up to my room, and if you want, you can join me there. If not, well, I guess I'll see you in the morning at breakfast then."

Clarice got up from her chair and started toward the kitchen door. She'd just about reached it when she paused and turned back to face Robert.

"I just want to make one last thing clear," she said. "I'm just looking for the night, nothing beyond that. Just a bit of fun in an otherwise mundane life. If nothing else, you might find something worth putting in one of your books."

And then she was gone, leaving an even more perplexed young man in her wake.

'Fuck, what do I do?' Robert asked himself, suddenly feeling like the teenager he once was.

What was it he had said to the graduates? That life was too short to always play it safe, that there was no success without risk. And the best thing to do when trying to make decisions was to imagine the worst possible outcome. If you could live with that, then take the chance. To not do so would leave you nothing but a life of what might have beens.

Robert stood at the railing overlooking the beach a while longer, watching the surf wash up on the shore as long minutes slowly passed. Even as a horny teen, he'd never have imagined making a move on Mrs. Evans, but what if she had been the one to make it? What would he have done?

'But this is now, not then,' he reminded himself, 'and just as you're not a teenager any more, she's not Mrs. Evans. She's Clarice, a woman who just invited you into her bed. So, what are you going to do about it?'

That answer didn't take long to make.

-=-=-=-

Reaching the top of the stairs, Robert was about to turn to the left toward Clarice's bedroom when the sound of running water from the bathroom at the end of the hall caught his attention.

'She's taking a shower,' he thought.

As he climbed the stairs, a scene from 'Twilight's Kiss,' his second novel, flashed through his head, one in which the female lead's lover surprised her by waiting naked in her bed. Clarice had expressed an admiration for the book, and he thought she might like to reenact that chapter. But now, he had a different idea.

Carefully he tried the knob on the bathroom door, pleased to find it was unlocked. Then, still standing in the hall, Robert quickly stripped, leaving all his clothing in a pile by the door. He opened the door as quietly as he could, slipping inside the room.

A thin cloud of steam filled the air, but not enough to obscure the figure beyond the ceiling to floor glass doors. The shower had been the center of the renovation, replacing the old-fashioned bear claw tub with an oversized shower that, Robert happily recalled, was large enough for two.

Standing as quiet as he could, Robert watched the figure standing under the streaming water. Her back was to him, but just the sight of her shapely ass was enough to send a thrill through his own body. When she turned far enough for him to catch sight of her breasts, still round and firm, despite her having been a mother twice, he felt an even stronger stirring between his legs.

His heart raced as Clarice ran a soapy hand across her breasts, then glided it, first across her stomach, then down between her legs as she washed her most private of places. Even in his limited view, he could tell that she was enjoying her own touch.

'If I wait much longer, she might not need me,' Robert humorously thought, taking a careful step forward.

He took hold of the handle on the rear half of the glass enclosure and slid it open, quickly closing it behind him once he stepped inside.

Clarice was startled by his sudden presence, the sound of running water having obscured his arrival. But that passed almost instantly as, even as his arms wrapped around her, she turned within them and, slipping a hand around the back of his head, drew him in for a kiss.

Robert's affair with Maggie Crossfield had long ago removed any thought that kissing an older woman might be any different than kissing one his own age. The press of Clarice's lips against his, and the thrust of her tongue as it slipped into his mouth, reinforced that belief. He felt the press of her breasts against his chest as she pulled him tighter, as well as the softness of her thigh as she slid her left leg into the gap between his, rubbing it against his quickly hardening cock.

"Not that I'm complaining, but I thought you were supposed to meet me in my room," Clarice said once their lips separated.

"I thought you might enjoy this more," Robert offered.

"Sort of returning to the scene of the crime?" the smaller woman quipped as, sliding her hand downward, she closed her fingers around his cock, a smile filling her face as she felt its hardness.

"More like taking care of unfinished business," Robert replied.

Clarice's response was an even deeper kiss, one that the younger man felt in nearly every part of his body.

As water continued to rain down on them, Robert ran a hand down the length of Clarice's back, gently running his fingertips along the curve of her thighs and then the cheeks of her ass, squeezing the rounded mounds softly. The older blonde responded with a loud sigh that encouraged him further.

He parted her cheeks and, stretching his fingers between her legs, caressed the bottom of her thickly haired pubic mound, causing an even louder moan to spill from her lips.

"Oh, that feels nice," Clarice said, the intensity in her tone making it clear that it had been too long since anyone else had touched her there.

Robert shifted his body so that he could withdraw his hand, then return it to the prize from a more accessible direction.

"That's even better," Clarice said.

The next few minutes were spent just rubbing their bodies together, with Robert's hand against her pussy and hers around his cock. They were in no hurry; they had all night. Clarice had handed him the bar of soap that she'd been using, and the younger man wasted no time covering her body with a thick layer of sudsy foam, an action she duplicated with his once he handed it back to her.