Margaret and I have been married for nineteen years now. Both in our mid-forties, we are comfortably well-off. With two jobs and no children, we are comfortable within ourselves and comfortable with each other. We didn't realise it at the time, but that was our problem. There was no longer any drive or passion in our lives or in our relationship. Neither of us was unhappy, but nor were we really making the most of life any more.
Like most couples, our sex life had started off frantically for the first few years and then had slowly settled into a more routine pace. But in recent years it had sort of drifted away almost completely. Now it consisted of a very occasional, roll-on roll-off, missionary fuck that was performed more out of duty than passion and a more frequent, self-administered hand-job after viewing some on-line porn late at night.
It had been such a gradual process that I really didn't seem to miss it much anymore. On a business trip to Thailand a couple of years back, I had the opportunity to take a stunning young Thai girl back to my room for the night for about the cost of night at the pub back home. In fact her "Mama" was practically forcing her on me. I admit I thought about it, quite hard. But I walked away, partly from a sense of fidelity to my wife and, let's be honest, mostly through fear of a sexually transmitted disease.
I guess we should have talked about our problem and maybe sought some professional advice but we didn't. While everything else was steady, a sense of inertia settled over the sex side of our marriage and we seemed to have come to terms with it.
Margaret has a sister, Jill, four years younger than her. Jill had married around the same time as us, but had left her husband some five or so years ago. It turned out that, through some hereditary quirk, neither Margaret nor Jill could have children. Margaret and I had quite quickly come to terms with that, but Jill had tried IVF several times. The lack of success put a huge strain on her and her relationship that eventually she could not manage and they eventually split.
We had been quite close to Jill and her husband Peter through that time. But after the divorce Jill upped and moved to the other end of the country for a new start and now we rarely saw her, though she and Margaret spoke at least once a week by phone.
A couple of weeks back, during a call with Margaret, she mentioned that she was having some work done on her house and wondered if she could impose on us to come and stay for a few days. She had suffered a major water leak and the house needed to be dried out for a day or two before the redecoration was done. We hadn't seen Jill for more than a year, so Margaret immediately agreed.
Jill arrived on the Wednesday evening. Having traveled all day, she went straight to bed after exchanging the initial pleasantries. We were both at work on the Thursday so Jill was able to sleep in and spend the day on her own at the house.
Margaret and I arrived back from work around the same time, just after seven pm to find the table laid, a dinner in the oven and two opened bottles of wine on the table.
"I couldn't remember if you liked white or red" explained Jill.
Margaret and I showered and changed quickly and we all sat down at the table. Jill had prepared a huge roast beef dinner with masses of vegetables and, my favourite, Yorkshire pudding. Both bottles of wine were swiftly consumed and two new reds opened in their place.
A cheese board, with an excellent selection, followed the dinner. I poured the girls a large port each and a good shot of single malt whiskey for myself to go with the cheese.
By the time we had finished it was past ten thirty. We were all feeling pretty full and just a little tipsy from the drink. We sat on the sofas and talked for a bit until Margaret got up and said she was ready for bed. I was a little surprised as she had arranged to take the Friday off work to spend some time with Jill. I was the one who had to work in the morning. Nevertheless, she went upstairs, leaving Jill and I chatting in the lounge.
We exchanged news of what had been happening in our lives in the last few months and then Jill asked me if I had been in touch with Peter recently. I said that I hadn't seen him for over two years.
"But you two used to be quite close," she said.
It was true that we had spent quite a bit of time together through their problems and the divorce but Peter had changed a lot over that time and I hadn't liked the changes I saw, particularly when he had been drinking too much, which had become a more and more frequent occurrence. Eventually we had simply stopped contacting each other.
Jill wanted to know more and I explained that the main issue was the way he would talk about her when he was drinking. He was really quite bitter about the relationship and its breakdown, but he bottled it all up until he had a drink or two, which he usually did when we met. I had never taken sides in their disputes and wasn't going to start.
"So what would he say about me?" asked Jill.
"It was usually just stuff about you not being able to have children," I replied, not really wanting to take this conversation any further.
"Oh!" Jill exclaimed and I could still see the hurt in her eyes.
Without thinking, and in a stupid attempt to lighten the mood, I said "Yes he could never understand how a girl who loved sex so much couldn't get pregnant."
Jill's eyes shot up and she gasped. I realised I had stepped way out of line. Peter had often told me how much Jill liked sex and how good she was at it. In fact he hardly ever stopped talking about it and went into far too much detail. He swore it was the sex that he missed most of all after the break-up.
"You two talked about him having sex with me?" asked Jill.
I apologised but confirmed that was the case. I was now feeling very awkward and looking for a way to get away and join Margaret in bed. But Jill was seemingly not going to let that happen.
"So what exactly did he tell you?" she asked.
