My plan is to make this the first of several stories following Walter Winthrop as explores the world of sex and himself, but I can't promise anything. I hope you enjoy it. Warning: It contains some incest role-play, but no actual incest.
I looked gobsmacked, I'm sure.
"You look gobsmacked," Trilby Archer said to me with a wry smile.
My family's attorney had just informed me that I was a millionaire, potentially.
It had been two weeks since I arrived home to discover part of our home in flames. It was almost 10 p.m. and I was finishing my commute from my job as a computer technician and member of the Nerd Herd, a service offered by my employer whom I will call Optimal Purchase.
I was gobsmacked then, too. Firefighters were crawling all over grounds and structure. Hoses were everywhere. A patrol car with lights flashing had closed the road. Neighbors were gathered on their lawns to watch. I parked my car curbside and proceeded to the patrol car.
Zombie-like, I walked toward the house, probably slack-jawed. A police officer put his hand on my chest to stop me. I guess I hadn't heard him. The contact jolted me out of my stupor.
"That's my fucking house!" I shouted in alarm. "Is my mother OK?!"
He sighed, walked me to his patrol car, opened the back door and seated me facing out.
"Are you Walter Winthrop?" he asked. I acknowledged my identity with a nod.
"Mr. Winthrop, I'm very sorry to inform you that your mother is dead."
I must have looked ready to faint because he reached out to steady me.
To say my mother and I had a tense and troubled relationship would be an understatement. Gwen Winthrop was a 60-year-old former dancer and golddigger turned reclusive alcoholic. At his own death 10 years before, my much older father, a decrepit playboy who had spent what remained of the family fortune, had left us nothing, acorrding to my mother. That's why my mother had refused to pay for college and was charging me rent to live at home. Now, Trilby Archer, our very preppy lawyer, was telling me facts that contradicted some of that narrative.
Despite living as a virtual pauper, my mother had left liquid assets of more than $900,000 and benefits from an insurance policy almost equal to that same amount. Next, I learned that in addition to those sums, I was acquiring ownership of the Frank Lloyd Wright-designed home we had lived in for decades. It was now damaged but still salvageable.
Trilby continued, "The last bit of business involving the settlement of your mother's estate are the paintings — the two Matisses and the Picasso."
I smiled.
"They're good reproductions, Mr. Archer, but I doubt they're worth much and now probably fire damaged as well."
"No, I mean the ones in storage."
I asked him what he was talking about.
"She really did tell you nothing at all, did she?" Trilby said with a weary shake of his head. "Those reproductions are so good because the artist your father hired was working from the originals. The originals are in super-secure storage in a fine-art storage facility out west, and they belong to you now."
This is the part where I got smacked by gob, so to speak.
"An estimate for insurance purposes a few years ago valued them collectively at a total of almost $100 million. That was a conservative estimate made at a low point in the high-art market."
My head was spinning.
"They are not insured for their full value. Your father only could afford policies that covered much less than that, and he only agreed to buy that insurance because the Vault required it. That's what people call the place out west."
"Wow," I said. "What do we do?"
Over the course of the next few months, we did what Trilby suggested. The paintings were sold at auction, the house was sold to a well-heeled neighbor who had lusted after it for years. When all was said and done and taxes paid, Trilby collected a handsome fee, and I was worth more than $60 million. It was good to be 27 and a millionaire in reasonably good health. I half felt I had earned it for putting up with my parents' lives and a lot of other bullshit.
In the interim, while the house was being repaired and restored by its new owner and before the final settlement of the estate, I moved into an apartment in Cliffside. It was on the edge of "Edgetown." If you don't know Central City, it's in the quote-unquote bad part of town at the south end of downtown and between Cadron Boulevard and the Cadron River. Once it had been home to working and middle class folks-- downtown shopkeepers, employees in the railyard and factory workers. Now it was peopled by a mix of working poor, immigrants, criminals and low lifes.
My apartment was in a restored hotel just off Cadron. Trilby was one of its owners, along with some partners. They'd bought it in the aftermath of the Great Recession. Finished what little remained of its renovation and started renting units. The area of Edgetown I was in had been in the early stages of redevelopment when the downturn happened. It was starting to pick up again and I liked being walking distance to downtown. My fellow tenants were single men and women my age who were starting careers at Central City banks, law firms and companies in inner Central City. That and some newly married professional types. The building was quiet and about half occupied.
All my stuff was either smoke damaged or not worth saving from the house. As executor, Trilby was able to advance me about $40,000 on the estate to give me something to live on until the settlement. In actual fact, the insurance paid up sooner than expected, long before the $40,000 had run out. So, I started buying new clothes, a good bed, a new laptop, a computer desk and a couch and TV. I wasn't sure what I was going to do with my life now, so I was reluctant to buy more right away. I used a folding card table for eating meals.
Just so you don't think I'm a complete coldfish, I'll say that yes, I did have some bad days. Although our relationship was not ideal, she still was my mother and my only living relative. I think she had some cousins in Nebraska, but I'd never met them. At times, I was lonely. At other times, I was lonely and mourning. Still, I never let myself brood or mope for more than a few hours before I would force myself out the door to shop or grab lunch or do whatever. Of course, I quit my job, which I retrospect might have provided a helpful distraction until the settlement. My other focus was on getting laid.
I was a 27-year-old male with limited sexual experience. I'd had some drunken sex with girls in college, but it was vague and dim in my memory. I was and in many ways still am a classic geek--- bachelor's in computer science, Star Wars nerd, comic book collector. I was terribly shy around women--- not quite Raj in "Big Bang Theory" but close. With enough beer or liquor, I could be brave and seduce a young woman who was equally drunk. That same inebriation robbed me of the experience though. I decided I would use my free time to end that cycle. Maybe it even would alleviate some of my loneliness emotionally. I didn't want any more drunken sex. I wanted to feel and experience everything about it. I'm not sure what my motivation was other than the usual primal ones, but maybe it was the death of my mother. Suddenly, I didn't want to waste any more time. She certainly had.
Now that I had more free time, I started hitting the gym daily. I just had to walk a few blocks over on Cadron to get to a downtown gym that catered to the business crowd and folks who lived over in the Yard. I became quite pleased with my new toned look. I've always been slender but now I looked really fit-- no six-pack but tight. I took photos of my physique wearing Speedos and from the neck down. Despite the upgrade, I still was shy. I offered face shots on request in my online ads-- CraigsList, Tindr, et cetera.
Most of the responses I did get came from gay and bi dudes, even though it was in the hetero section. I was upfront about the virgin thing. Maybe that's what drew the guys, or my photo. I'll admit that I was a bit bi-curious but I wanted to give straight a try first. So, I didn't get the responses I wanted and continued to use porn and such as an outlet. After a month of junk and two failed meet-ups with women, I took my ads down. I waited a week before getting up the nerve to post a new personal with a face shot. I just listed my interests and desire for companionship basically.
Three days in, Valerie responded.
XXXXXXXXX
Valerie said she was bank executive, 45, who worked downtown. She had divorced about three years ago and had an adult daughter who was married a career Army officer and relocated to Europe. "I guess we both are empty nesters," she wrote.
Valerie said after her divorce she had coped by burying herself in work, winning a promotion that actually allowed her more free time. Extra time also meant less distraction and more loneliness. Our situations were similar that way too. Both of us were looking for more, and while definitely not a virgin, she admitted her dating skills were rusty. My lack of experience made me less scary to her.
It's funny even writing that now because Valerie exudes confidence and somehow manages to walk the line between strength and bitch professionally. On an interpersonal level at that point in time, she felt more vulnerable though and I appreciated her honesty. It helped relieve some of my performance anxiety. Her other big secret was that she was a Star Wars fan. We laughed about it. Princess Leia was an important role model growing up. Oddly, she was not much of science fiction geek, just had the Star Wars bug.
That gave us a common topic for that always awkward first meeting-- coffee at Starbucks on a Thursday after work. We shared our excitement about the new movie and managed to talk about other things too -- family, other interests, even religion.
"Look, what do you think about me now that we've met?" she asked near the end of our visit. "Am I too old, Walter?"
I laughed and said, "No, not at all, you're hot."
I immediately blushed but she gave me a big smile.
"Well, I think you're cute, too. I'd like to take you to dinner tomorrow night."
"Oh," I said. I was taken aback that she was asking me out.
"Is that a bad day? I know it's short notice."
"No, no, I'm flattered. ... Uh, sure. What time?"
"Six o'clock. I'll meet you here, and we'll grab an early bite and continue the conversation."
She didn't seem unsure of herself like she seemed in her emails.
"That sounds good," I said.
As she got up, I again took in her chic business attire. She was a tall five-eleven compared to my five-eight. Valerie loomed over me in my seat with her three-inch heels, and looked down at me, smiling.
"See you about this time tomorrow then," she said turned and exited the store.
That's when the thunderbolt struck. Her black stockings got me. Valerie also cuts quite a figure, noticeable breasts more commendable for their round fullness and shape than enormous size. She had curves in her hour glass, too. Her straight black hair, face and glasses gave her a bit of a Tina Fey look that I found sexy.
XXXXX
While our relative age difference gave Valerie a confidence boost, the two cocktails made her positively bold. For the reasons previously stated, I stayed 100 percent sober. Dinner at Lush Life was fun. The food and drinks were fantastic. I'd never had antelope steak before, but it was delicious.
"Where do you want to go next, Walt? You pick."
I thought for a minute. Lush Life was a place she knew well but I had never been to before. I tried to think of something different.
She already had told me at Starbuck she had never been to a hookah bar, and and I guess she might like an after-dinner smoke.
"How about Hookah on the Corner?"
She laughed.
"I'm not a hookah! Are you going to try to pimp me out or should I pimp you, Walt?"
A bad pun, but we both laughed and got up to walk the six blocks to the hookah bar.
They'd only been open since 5 p.m. and it was still quiet. In my experience, the place never got busy until 8 or 9.
We settled into a sectional, and I ordered a mint shisha.
As we sat down, she patted the cushion next to her and said, "Come sit next to, mama."
I'd never harbored the slightest erotic thought for my own mother, but somehow this excited me.
Most of the next few minutes was taken up by me explaining hookah to Valerie. We relaxed into a silent rhythm of smoking that almost seemed erotic. Flirting occurred with the eyes, a touch, holding hands.
"I never had a son," Valerie said outloud but in a whisper, almost as though she was speaking to herself.
"I no longer have a mother," I whispered in reply.
