KICKING OVER THE TRACES
Tom heard the floorboards creak and knew it could only be Karen walking past his bedroom door. She was a restless sleeper and to be woken by her moving around was nothing new.
It had been that way for the two nights that she had spent in the house. Her stay was prompted by his wife, Julie, suddenly being taken ill and having to go into hospital for an operation. This turn of events had left him with a problem; how was he to juggle the demands of his work and also care for Becky, their three-year-old daughter?
"The answer's simple enough, I'll ask my mother to stay here and look after Becky...to look after the two of you," Julie had soon suggested in her assertive voice that she kept for moments like this, telling him what she had decided upon. "She's widowed and often feels alone, so it will be a good change and take her mind off things."
"I guess you're right."
He had not let on that he would welcome the woman's company and had listened in and heard them talking excitedly on the telephone as the arrangements were soon made. As the days passed he was able to go to work and know that Becky would be doted upon and he would not have to be unduly worried.
What did concern him, before Karen had driven onto the driveway and he had heard Becky's excited cries, was how he would get through the days and nights knowing that Karen was in the house and what she would make of tending to him also. He had met the stilled look of her eyes on him and seen the hint of a smile on her lips as he had approvingly taken in what she had chosen to wear. The work he had done in helping her through after Derek's loss had blunted the edges of what had once been their relationship.
He got out of bed and soon tugged on a pair of lounge pants that lay on the floor. He slept naked most nights, just as Julie was given to do, but having Karen in the house had changed familiar habits.
"I'll go, Karen!" he called out to her.
The bedroom door was opened, the brilliance of the night light that he had checked before coming to bed, revealing how her silhouette could not be fully concealed from his view, her nightdress shaping her. He felt a surge of longing for the lovely woman with her smooth skin and very attractive face; a woman of some sixty years old who was not overweight and still possessed an hourglass figure, the fullness of which was not to be concealed by her nightgown.
As Karen wore nothing underneath, he could not help but stare at her firm breasts and dark nipples that were shaped by an undoubtedly provocative garment. Her slender feet with their painted toenails poked out from under the swaying hem.
He was mesmerised by the sight and sighed, knowing that he couldn't keep his eyes off her.
"I got up because I wasn't sure if you'd heard her crying." Karen paused, disconcerted by his admiring gaze. "Tom?"
Even in the poor light, she could not mistake his approving look upon her. Tom's and Julie's house was modern, not as cold as hers was, and she had decided to take with her a choice of nightwear, just in case it was too hot to sleep comfortably. She now realized that the lace trim to the neckline and shoulder straps, the flower also in lace and that stretched down over the bodice, only made him look at her intently, perhaps for a moment too long.
"I'll go to her." He said it in a voice that suggested she had woken him from a dream.
"I'll be with you, just in case," she answered, softly, and followed him as he stepped over the carpet and pushed on the partially closed door of Becky's room.
She had always kept her feelings for him under control, dismayed, as she often felt, that she appeared attractive to the young man who had swept her daughter, Julie, off her feet some five years ago, and their married life soon becoming so much more following the birth of Becky.
"Darling, it's Daddy," he cooed.
Karen bumped against him, one hand brushing his skin as she sought to stop from pushing him against the door. "Sorry..."
"Your hand's warm," he blurted out, disconcerted by her touch to his shoulder.
"Your skin's cool," she confessed, instantly, as Tom moved away but not before he had instinctively reached back and touched her hip. What a riot of emotions now flared up inside her following the lightest of caresses to his bare skin and his response to her.
Good intentions, the denial of Tom pursuing his claims upon her and what she thought right and proper, would be to deny the place that he now had in her thoughts. A bond had formed between them ever since Derek's death, and Tom had undertaken the most prosaic of tasks in fixing things in her garden, around the house, even the simple task of washing her car, a Peugeot runabout that she had come to rely upon more and more.
And then, there was also the emotional prop that he and Julie had become when Derek had finally succumbed to the damage that excessive drinking had caused on his liver. Julie had confessed that her father had a mean, even violent streak, and Karen was relieved that her marriage had ended in the way that it had and not through divorce.
"We'll settle her together, then..."
"Yes," she whispered, "perhaps it's for the best. I may have over-excited her with all the dancing we did after supper."
"You look after her so well and it was nice to see how you two got along." He lifted Becky into his arms and rocked her to console and comfort her." Did you have a bad dream, darling?"
"Yes...yes!" she sobbed and reached out a hand to Karen. "I was with you!"
"Go on, you take her...I'll watch."
Karen's arm brushed against him and he suppressed a shiver of longing once more, the ache in his penis impossible to ignore. Her skin felt so warm and he sensed it as she reached out to take Becky out of his arms. They were sharing the moment, in something new, given the circumstances. She was helping him and willingly did so. Her actions brought to mind what Julie had told him. "She won't say it, but Karen appreciates all that you do and have done for her, even if it should have been my father who should have done those little chores for her."
