Saturday mornings had been our grocery day for years. Like a good husband I patiently navigate the shopping cart, waiting for Doris to make her selections. She always has questions for the stock boys about their schoolwork, grades and teasing them good naturedly about girl friends.
They usually humor her, treating like a favorite aunt. Although I have noticed some of them taking long leering looks her curvaceous five foot ten figure from a distance. She has gained about twenty pounds since our wedding day but in all the right places.
Those long stealthy glances always make me chuckle, pride of ownership I suppose. Most boys that age fantasize about older women and there's nothing wrong with that Doris of course does not see it that way and I never mention it; to her they're just nice young boys being friendly.
Whenever a new boy arrived, it never takes her long to reach beyond the nametag and ferret out all his business: what school, what grades, future plans, girl friends etc.
Everything took a different turn when a boy named Trevor was hired; a more than handsome Latino type, about five foot-six, with curly black hair and brooding dark eyes. It took a couple of Saturdays for Doris to break the ice with this extremely timid boy.
Once they became acquainted however, a strange bond developed between them and Doris began talking about him constantly. She found out through her gossip network that his parents had broken up the previous winter and simply left the city. He had been taken in temporarily by an older sister who didn't really have the financial means to support him; therefore he worked part time in the store. He was eighteen in his last high school year for the second time due to his parent's constant battles.
With no children of our own, me in my fifties and Doris in her mid forties; adoption had never been considered, mostly because of our careers. Now, due to downsizing we had both accepted severance packages. I had plenty of hobbies around the house but Doris was restless and now she came up with the insane idea that we should open our home to this young man. She wanted to give him a good home until he finished school and could look after himself. I told her that it was a crazy idea, he was not our responsibility.
But when Doris gets something into her head and assumes that far away trance-like look in her eyes; heaven and earth better move, or else...
She visited the sister - how she found the address was a mystery to me. To a single mother of two tiny tots in a one-bedroom apartment, my wife appeared as an angel from above. Strangely the woman did not see a problem with her kid brother going to live with total strangers.
Doris picked him up two days later and had him settled in one of our guest rooms. Trevor was polite and quiet and didn't seem at all phased by his new situation. Among his few possessions was a computer and he asked Doris if we had an Internet connection. We had never entered the cyber age ourselves but Doris immediately sent me out to arrange for a hookup. How else, would the boy do his homework she argued?
Once connected he rarely came out of his room. Doris fussed over him at meal times, wanting to know whether he wanted this or that to eat and then gradually changed our usual diet accordingly. After twenty-five years of marriage with no one else in the house I began to feel like a fifth wheel.
Doris could think of nothing else but her dear boy Trevor. She even began to great him with a hug when he came home which seemed peculiar to me; after all he was a star border not a relative but Trevor ate it all up. Those hugs gradually became lengthy mutual squeezes; I reasoned that he was lonely for the affection of a close knit family.
Her appearance changed as well, always a neat and well dressed woman but usually wearing loose fitting clothing around the house; although she didn't own a pair of jeans or other casual. Now I noticed a little more makeup, hair more immaculate, closer fitting shorter dresses or skirts accentuating and revealing her hourglass figure, particularly the form and cleavage of her generous bosom. If I didn't know better she was becoming more than infatuated with the boy and perhaps innocently leading him on.
I became envious, almost resentful of him, and Doris eventually became jealous of the computer, where he was spending more and more time.
One afternoon, after she'd been snooping in his room; she rushed down to my workshop with a crumpled towel. "What is the boy doing with this" she blustered. "Look, there are hard patches all over making it sick together" I chuckled at her, shaking my head.
"He's been playing with himself dear. He's a teenager; it's natural at that age. Put it in the wash and don't worry about it."
"Don't worry about it! Masturbation involves sinful sexual fantasies! You know that is wicked behavior! We must talk to him about it. He shouldn't be doing that; it's harmful and unnatural. Do you think he's looking at those awful ladies on that web thing?"
"He's a teen, they gets urges; it's better than him getting some young girl in trouble."
"Sandy I'm surprised at you. I'm going to talk to him when he gets home from school." I shook my head again but didn't argue with her, thinking that maybe the boy would be embarrassed enough to leave.
I was shocked that night when she very delicately told him about it after we ate. He wasn't embarrassed at all but strangely, almost pleased she brought it up.
"It's impossible for me not to do it ma'am ... Mrs. Cooper. I get these feelings and it drives me crazy. If I don't ... I get terrible head aches." He spoke in a pained voice looking, for all the world like a sick puppy. That was a new twist on that old headache standard that I'd never heard before.
"Oh you poor boy," Doris reached across the table taking his hand in both of hers, her fingers gently padding his hand and stroking his wrist. "Oh Trevor my dear boy what can we do to help?" He just shook his head, shrugging his shoulders and looked back at her with an actual tear running down his cheek.
"It's impossible for me not to do it Doris." That startled me, up until now it had been Mrs. Cooper or ma'am. "Oh Doris, the head aches they're terrible."
"But Trevor there must be some way to make you well; we'll do anything to help you. Won't we Sandy? I nodded, feigning sympathy, knowing full well as a man that there was no cure for his problem that we could help him with
"Well Doris ... well there is something but ... but no, that's impossible!"
