A Silver Celebration

"Where shall we go for our Silver -- after twenty five years we should do something a bit different, shouldn't we?"

This was Anne talking to her husband Martin, having their annual discussion about where to take their summer holiday. Over the years they had visited many of the most popular holiday destinations, from Spain to Australia, with a good few spots in between. The big difference this year would be that, as both of their children were now at university, it would be the first time for many years that they could go on their own. Although they had had tremendous fun visiting so many wonderful places, they were looking forward to a break as a couple, free to please themselves rather than having a family discussion (argument?) about what to do and where to go.

"Have you got any bright ideas -- somewhere a bit different, perhaps?"

"Like Afghanistan, for instance, that would really be different!"

"Come now, let's not be silly."

"How about France?"

"France? I suppose it's the nearest place, yet we've only ever been for a couple of long weekends in Paris. Well, I'm sure we could find a package for somewhere on the Med."

Martin suggested a package because that was what they had always done. As both of them worked full-time in their business, it made sense to let someone else do the organising of flights and hotels rather than doing it themselves. But this wasn't what Anne had in mind.

"Never mind a package, let's book a ferry crossing, take the car and just drive around, finding hotels and restaurants on the way. Without the kids to worry about we shouldn't have any problem finding somewhere to stay, and we can stop in each place as long as we like as long as we get back to catch the return ferry."

"That would be new, and could be a lot of fun, and we can find out how good our French is. So we'll just pack the Range Rover and off we go."

"Not the Range Rover. It's a super car, but this trip needs something special."

"Not the Bedford, surely? It's a bit slow for touring, not to mention drinking petrol."

"Are you being particularly thick today? The E-type, of course. It was made for galloping down French roads, it'll blow the cobwebs out of it."

"I never thought of that. It won't hold a lot of luggage, but that won't hurt. We usually take far too much. And my dad would certainly approve."

Martin's father, Paul, had been a driver in the army during the Second World War and when that little skirmish was over he had had the foresight to realise what a good future there would be in the road haulage business. He had purchased some military surplus vehicles at give away prices and, despite the restrictions involved due to the nationalisation programme of the Labour government, had managed to build a successful business which really took off after the abolition of British Road Services, brought about by a change of government. He then bought out a moribund heavy haulage business and the new enlarged company prospered even more.

As well as enjoying owning a fleet of modern trucks, Paul had a love of old models, especially army vehicles. One of the first war surplus vehicles that he had bought was a 15 cwt Bedford Model MW and this he had preserved and, as a hobby, he had overhauled it, helped by the then young Martin. Not only had he helped in the rebuild, Martin had learned to drive it, around the yard and private roads belonging to his father, and, when he was old enough to take his driving test he had gone for it on the old MW. The examiner was impressed by his ability to double declutch and his complete mastery of the old truck.

An even more impressive vehicle was the Scammell Pioneer which he had found, still in excellent condition, hidden at the back of one of the buildings that had come with the heavy haulage business he had bought. This eleven ton monster was used occasionally for recovering broken down trucks, but its principal reason for not being scrapped was that Paul was an enthusiastic member of a club devoted to the preservation of old lorries, especially military models. He regularly travelled to rallies and shows, taking the Scammell for local events or the Bedford if the journey would be too long at the lumbering pace of the mastodon, not to mention the horrifying fuel consumption. Martin always accompanied him, and when he got his licence he would drive the Bedford.

Thus it was essential for Martin that, when he found a girl friend, she should share his love of lorries in general, and old ones in particular. This was not the easiest of ideals to meet, heavy haulage not normally featuring high in young ladies' interests. However, in his sixth form years he got friendly with Anne, a fellow student in his French course. He had known her slightly for some time as she regularly attended the same church as himself, but it was when he idly remarked that he wouldn't be at church one Sunday because he would be driving the Bedford to a rally that he got a pleasant surprise.

"What sort of Bedford?"

"An MW, if that means anything to you."

"Don't bloody patronise me. I presume it's an ex army fifteen hundredweight."

"Sorry, I don't think there are many people -- male or female -- who'd know what an MW Bedford is. How come you know?"

"My dad's a lorry nut, I've been going to truck shows since I was in nappies, and the only reading material in the house is vintage truck magazines."

"Can you drive -- stupid question, of course you can. How about missing church and coming with me in the Bedford, you can have a go if you like?"

That was the start of a lifelong love affair. Not only did she come with him and drive the Bedford -- very well -- but they became inseparable and in due course they were married. Although they had taken Arts subjects in their final exams, as soon as they ended school they had gone to university and learnt business management and accountancy. They had one object in mind, to work together in the haulage industry, and when they got their degrees, Paul took them both on to work in his company, Martin with a view to taking over when his father retired and Anne to help with the administration and run the office. However, both of them also loved driving trucks, and they both passed the tests to drive maximum size vehicles, which they did when they had any excuse. Anne particularly liked driving the old Scammell, and drew startled expressions when this attractive girl clambered out of the mighty beast at vintage rallies.

Apart from the vintage trucks, Paul was also fond of fast cars, running a variety of different makes and models, both modern and vintage, and in 1975 he bought an E-type Jaguar , a V12 drop head, one of the last ever built. This car was his pride and joy, and was always treated with the utmost care. He avoided using it in bad weather as much as possible, and it never went on the road during the winter when the roads were salted. As a result, over forty years on, it still looked and went as well as it had the day it left the showroom. In his later years he became increasingly unwell as an undiagnosed cancer grew, and he told Martin that he was giving him the car, though not until it had gone to a Jaguar specialist for a complete overhaul.

The cancer finally killed him, and he joined his beloved Martha, who had pre-deceased him, his coffin carried to the crematorium in the back of the old Bedford. Martin now formally took control of the business, with Anne running the administrative side. They were quick to seize any opportunity to expand, and one came when a small furniture removals company got into problems allowing Martin to take it over and add its vehicles to his existing fleet, though he employed the old management to look after the day to day running of the specialised removals trade.

Martin and Anne were on the verge of taking their holiday when Anne got a call from the manager of the removals firm to say that one of the furniture vans had been in an accident in Northern France, and would be off the road for some time while repairs were carried out, necessitating the despatch of another vehicle to take over the delivery. This would normally have not been a problem, but this was in the holiday season and there was a shortage of drivers competent to drive the large truck to France. Anne thought for a few minutes, then had a brainwave, and told the manager that she would ring him back in a few minutes. She went through to Martin's office and told him what the problem was, and offered her solution.

"We're due to go on holiday in two days, why don't we load the E-type in the back of the spare truck and drive it to France ourselves. Then Sid and his mate can get the load swapped and deliver it and pick up the return load. They should be able to fix the damaged motor in a couple of weeks and we can pick it up and bring it back ourselves. That way we get free travel and get the job done at the same time."

"That sound sensible, can we be ready to go tomorrow?"

"No problem -- and, by the way, I want to drive."

"We'll argue on the way. Will you get a ferry crossing fixed up, I'll get the truck checked over, and the Jag loaded and tied down."

Next morning early they climbed into the truck cab, stowed their personal gear, then Anne set the tachograph up with her as the driver, started up the big Scania and drove out of their yard. They made good time journeying to Dover where they boarded the ferry to Calais. They enjoyed a free breakfast in the drivers' restaurant, and by the time they had drunk their coffee the ferry was making its approach into the harbour. They were soon off-loaded and were on their way, joining the Autoroute towards Rouen.

It was the first time Anne had driven on the "wrong" side of the road, but she had no problems, helped by Martin's occasional mutter of "keep right". After Rouen they joined one of the Routes National, the non toll road which took them further towards the town where the damaged truck was situated. The GPS on the truck had been loaded with the location of restaurants with parking for heavy goods vehicles and at noon they stopped at one that looked suitable. This was their first experience of a Relais des Routiers restaurant, set up to cater for lorry drivers but also extensively used by car drivers and the local inhabitants. The food was excellent and cheap, starting with a huge buffet of hors d'oeuvre which included oysters among may other delicacies, a choice of six main courses, a cheese buffet and a pudding buffet, with wine served as requested. Historically a lot of drivers had partaken of far too much wine, but with the introduction of alcohol limits and breathalysers this was now a rarity, and French roads had become a lot safer in the afternoons as a result.

After the mandatory rest period they had continued their journey and they stopped for the night at another truck stop, this time one with secure parking. Again the food was excellent and now they were able to be a bit more casual about the amount of the very reasonable wine that they drank. After the meal they sat in the lounge watching French television for a while, which they understood but found boring, then went back to the truck and drew the curtains all around the cab. There were two bunk beds in the back of the cab and they were soon in bed, Martin in the top bunk, Anne below.

Despite having been married for twenty-five years, the sex life of this couple was, to put it mildly, unexciting. The church in which they had grown up had looked upon sex as simply a tool for procreation, and the idea of getting pleasure from physical intimacy was totally taboo. A man climbed on board, put his penis in her vagina and, with luck, a baby would be the result in due course. Obviously the man got relief from his orgasm, but the woman would just need to tolerate this intrusion and deal with the results. Birth control was frowned upon on the general assumption that, if you didn't want babies, you wouldn't have sex.

Like many couples with their background, Anne realised that Martin needed the relief of ejaculation, and took the pill to ensure that they could settle for just the two children that they both wanted. The pleasure she got from this was virtually nothing, made worse by her finding that when he reached his orgasm she was starting to get a sense of arousal that she found intensely frustrating, though, as she had never reached a full orgasm herself she wasn't truly aware of what she was missing. For the earlier years of their marriage she had also suffered the discomfort of a dry vagina being invaded by a large dry cock. Fortunately she had read about vaginal lubrication in a woman's magazine, and used it to ensure she was better prepared on the occasions when she guessed he might wish to have sex with her.

While Martin had the benefit of the release of an orgasm he didn't find sex particularly satisfying, and vaguely sensed that it could and should be more than an animal coupling, Anne got to realise this feeling in him completely by accident. One day when she was alone in the office her laptop had succumbed to the dreaded blank screen syndrome while she was in the middle of searching for some information on freight rates, or something equally fascinating in the transport business. She had crossed to Martin's desk and opened a search engine on his desktop computer. Knowing that he would have used the same sites as herself, she opened his search history, and quickly found the site she was searching. Unfortunately she was a bit casual with the cursor and clicked on to an adjacent site. When the site opened she was amazed to find that she was offered a choice of selecting various categories of sex video. Fascinated, she clicked on one at random, and soon found she was watching a naked couple in bed, with the woman busy taking a very large cock deep into her mouth. Hearing the sound of the outer door opening she quickly changed sites, but not before she had noted the site name - "Porn for Women".

It wasn't her husband entering, but one of the drivers, and, by the time Martin came back she was back at her own desk, sorting out her laptop, which had suffered nothing worse than lack of power, as the charger wasn't properly plugged in. The next time she was alone at home she had opened the porn site and had spent quite some time scanning through the various categories of sexual performance on offer. She found the variety of activities most revealing, and realised just what possibilities were available to couples of an adventurous disposition. Amongst other surprises was the realisation of how varied human bodies can be not just in overall size -- not surprising -- but in what might be termed physical accoutrements. Big cocks, little cocks, fat and thin, vulvas of tight neat lips and with protruding large ones, not to mention the shape and size of breasts. All obvious to you, dear reader, but a revelation to one brought up as had been Anna, who had never really seen her own husband nude, never mind anyone else, male or female. In fact she'd never really looked at her own body in a critical way.

One day when she had taken a day out of the office to catch up with some cooking for a forthcoming dinner party, in a lull in the cooking she had sat down in the lounge and had opened a porn site and got totally involved in watching two women performing vigorous oral sex on a well endowed young man. Suddenly she heard the smoke alarm in the kitchen emitting its warning screech and had shot up to go and rescue the saucepan that had boiled dry and to try and salvage its contents. While she was doing this, Martin entered the house. As he passed the open lounge door he had caught sight of her laptop screen, which was showing the aforesaid well hung young man ejaculating over the open mouths of the two women. He quickly crossed the room and closed the screen down, then left the room, went back to the front door and called out to Anne that he could smell smoke, was something burning.

So there were two people, still very much in love after twenty five years of marriage, who had both come to realise that their sex life was capable of offering them so much more pleasure. Both knew that the other was watching internet porn, but each not knowing that the other knew that they themselves were doing it -- is that clear? Both had decided that they needed to do something about it, but couldn't think of a way to introduce the suggestion that they should suddenly change the habits of a married lifetime.

As you may have forgotten by now they were both in the bunks in the lorry cab. Anne had decided that she would do something about it the next day in the hotel where they would spend their anniversary celebration. In anticipation of the bright future, she imagined some of the activities she hoped would take place, and as she dreamed of the possibilities her fingers strayed between her legs and found her very receptive clitoris. The idea of touching herself there was new to her, having been brought up to believe that touching yourself was dirty, and only to be done when washing, and even then in a very brief and perfunctory way.

Whether it was a result of thought transference or just that the unusual environment gave Martin the idea that sex might be a good idea, as Anne began to feel her vagina moistening under her attentions -- another new sensation for her.

"Do you think that there's room for two of us in your bunk?" he enquired.

"It's a bit small, but you can try if you like."

She slipped off the knickers that she had been wearing and pulled up the long tee shirt that completed her night time attire. As Martin normally never saw her at night time, she wore just what she found the most comfortable, though she had packed a sexy nightie on the off chance that it might come in handy if she could get Martin interested. Now she slid back the duvet to allow him to crawl in beside her, which was a very tight fit leaving him more on top than beside. As always they had not turned on the light, and he carried out his usual routine -- a brief caress of her breast, then climb aboard and park his penis abruptly in her now moist vagina. Again as usual it didn't take long before he was dumping his seminal fluid into her, then, after resting briefly on her, he gave her a kiss, muttered his thanks, and returned to his bunk. Anne felt the fluid oozing from her and made up her mind firmly that next time would be different, for better or worse.

Next morning they arose early, probably woken by the noise of the lorry adjacent to them starting his engine, and put on track suits before crossing to the restaurant building where they used the showers provided in the toilet block. As Anne was showering she took down the shower head on its flexible pipe and sprayed it up between her legs to clean her private parts. The shower in their bathroom at home only had a fixed head, and this was the first time she had been able to do this, and took full advantage. The last occupant had left the head set on the optional pulsing setting, and when she pointed the spray at her vulva, she suddenly found the pleasure of the throbbing jet impinging on her clitoris. She held it in place for a few seconds, but found the sensation so intense that she moved it away and washed herself quickly. She then resolved that she would get a shower like that fitted in their bathroom at home. She also resolved that, if the shower compartment at the hotel that night was big enough, she would tell Martin to come in and wash her back, and she was sure they could progress from there.

After they had finished their toilet they went into the restaurant and enjoyed a breakfast of freshly baked baguettes, followed by croissants. They were then quickly on their way, and after a short drive they arrived at the garage where the damaged truck was being repaired, And their driver had retailed the story of how an elderly French peasant had driven his battered Renault 4 onto a roundabout straight in front of him. Apparently he was suffering from the delusion that the very old French rule of the road, that gave priority to the vehicle coming from the right, was still in force, with the predictable result. Happily no significant injury had ensued despite the demolition of the Renault, but the damage to the truck was sufficient to take it off the road, and repairs were delayed by a lack of parts.