Well, Jocelyn, you don't look that bad for a forty-eight-year-old mother of four. Yes, not that bad. Mom always said that being Chinese helped in slowing down the aging process and as much as I hate to admit it, she was correct. While I have some wrinkles by the corners of my eyes and a little smile lines around my mouth, I've been told that I have a youthful face. Of course, below the neck...well...that's another story.
My breasts were never big, to begin with...apple-sized...but now they are a bit smaller, softer, and sag a little. But, hey, that's expected considering I breastfed my children for nearly four straight years. After all of that nursing, my nipples grew to be obscenely thick and long. Jeez, I now have to wear a bra...not that a respectable Chinese woman would be caught braless while out of the house...so that I won't have noticeable bumps in my tops. How terribly embarrassing.
At least I'm still the same weight that I was before I got married...yes, still got that slender figure of long ago. I guess that's due exercising and dieting now that Irwin is dead and the kids are grown and on their own. Too bad I can't do something about these damn stretch marks around my tummy and my hips...vivid reminders of having borne four children, one after another. But, hey, Ryan says that I look ten years younger than I really am.
Aah, Ryan...such a sweetheart and such a stark contrast to Irwin. God, how young and naïve I was when I first met Irwin. I had led such a sheltered life, having attended a Catholic all-girls prep school and then a small exclusive women's college. Other than through the media and movies, I was totally clueless when it came to men, having never dated or even associated with members of the opposite sex.
Then, my mother and his mother introduced Irwin and me with the clear intention of matchmaking. Irwin was what I thought a man should be - strong, virile, and aggressive. He was fifteen years older than me, experienced and worldly. Irwin was an established and successful lawyer with the city's prosecuting attorney's office and had a high convicting rate of violent criminals.
My mother viewed him as a good prospect with a solid career, and one who could provide for me and my future family. His mother viewed me as an attractive young woman, well-mannered, college-educated, and good daughter-in-law material, unlike the lowly barmaids that her son tended to take up with.
I thought Irwin was attracted to me because I could enhance his career and give him a wholesome family life. I took his suave and generous gestures as signs that he loved and wanted me. Letting him sweep me off of my feet, I felt that our romance and marriage was the stuff that fairytales were made of. However, as I would discover after I was married, Irwin saw me as a very innocent virgin who was naïve and could be dominated and controlled, unlike his more experienced barmaids and occasional jaded hooker.
They say that 'reality bites' and it did -- right between my legs -- when my so-called loving husband rammed his rock-hard penis into my unprepared vagina, shredding my fragile hymen and virginity on our wedding night. Irwin took me like the way a rutting bull mounted and took a prized young heifer...suddenly, violently, and without regard for me or my feelings. Throughout our honeymoon, he sexually brutalized until I was broken to his will, obediently doing whatever he wanted. Irwin taught an unsuspecting me my wifely duties that mainly entailed his erection being shoved in my mouth, my vagina, and to my anguish, my anus.
Without knowing any better, I naively accept our sexual life as the way things were between a man and his wife. I quickly and painfully learned not to say anything about our marital life for Irwin had a vile temper. While he never hit me where the bruises or marks could be seen, he taught me how my breasts, buttocks, and vulva could be cruelly and painfully slapped, pinched, or squeezed. Why did I endure such treatment at Irwin's hands? Sad to say, I foolishly thought I was keeping my vows that I took at my wedding -- "for better or for worse."
And boy, did things get worse. To this day I can't believe just how clueless I was when it came to birth control. As a good Catholic girl, I thought that I could safely practice the rhythm method. However, I did not consider my husband's sexual appetite for his new wife and my inability to deny his sexual demands. It never occurred to me that unprotected sex, when mixed with copious amounts of ejaculated sperm, would eventually result in me being inseminated. I was nevertheless astonished when I found myself pregnant.
I never realized that Irwin had viewed me from the start as his 'broodmare' who would give him the respectable children to carry on his line. I had Jonathan when I was twenty-three, and as soon as I was medically cleared for vaginal sex, Irwin labored intently between my legs until I was pregnant once again. Kimberly was born when almost a year after my first baby, Amy the next year, and I had Kevin when I was twenty-six. For over four years I had an infant or an older sibling attached to my tits and it is little wonder my boobs and especially my nipples are the way they look today.
In our marriage, Irwin was the breadwinner and I was his lowly stay-at-home housewife. He never got involved in the raising of our children but held me personally responsible for any mistake or incident involving them. Normally a parent would discipline a misbehaving child, but Irwin's way was to discipline the mother, me, physically or sexually, because he held me accountable for our children's actions. As such, our children suffered no consequences for their actions, and became empowered brats who like their father, treated me with disdain.
"Jocelyn," smirked Irwin as I sobbed in despair after having been viciously disciplined for Kimberly's poor math grade. "Haven't you figured it out by now? You have only three functions in life -- give me children -- raise them properly -- and satisfy me sexually. Yes, that right. I never really loved you when we married. To me, you were just a pretty plaything...a free and easy virgin...someone with whom I could have sexual fun. You were so goddamn docile, innocent, and so eager to please. I loved fucking you any way I wanted, and couldn't believe you never once questioned why or objected.
"Now, stop your complaining and crying, or I'm going to get really upset. Get over here, cunt, and quickly...unless you want another titty-slapping. Suck on my cock and make me nice and hard. If you're really good, I'll let you suck me off...but if you do a half-ass job, I'll give your ass a reaming that you won't forget. Hmmm, that good...yeah, what a good wife you are...yeah, a good little cock-sucking fuck-slut."
It was little wonder I didn't grieve when Irwin was violently murdered by the brother of a criminal he had prosecuted and sent to prison. Oh, I put on the proper mourning widow's face, wore black, and was subdued in my silent relief and joy. I should have been ashamed of my deception, but I wasn't. I was finally free of Irwin's domination and abuse. In addition, Irwin's posthumously retirement, life insurances, and investments gave me financial security and were viewed by me as restitution for my years of psychological, physical, and sexual abuse.
Irwin had set aside an education fund for each of the kids because he wanted them to attend a prestigious college. This was fine with me for they were already out of college and working in different states. After an appropriate period of pseudo-grief and the settlement of Irwin's estate, I sold our house and bought a nice condominium to preclude any of my children from returning home to a mother they never loved.
At forty-eight, I was a widow with no attachments, financially well-off, and residing in a nice new residence. I was ready to start a new life. The only question was how. For over two decades I had been a domestic servant to my children and a sexual slave to my husband. Those were hardly marketable skills. With no friends, family, or contacts upon whom I could rely, I was in a quandary as to what to do.
I thought that I might travel to see unknown places and meet new people. However, exactly where to go, how to do it, and doing it by myself reared as seemingly insurmountable roadblocks. As luck would have it, I happened upon a travel agency located in the distant corner of the shopping mall and on a whim, decided to pop in to explore the possibilities.
It was then that I laid eyes on a handsome but befuddled Ryan who was attempting multiple tasks all at once and failing miserably. "Hello! Come in and have a seat...will be with you in a moment," he blurted as he worked madly on his computer while the telephone rang annoyingly. "Of all time for my lousy clerk to quit..."
"Can I help?" came out of my mouth before I knew it. Having to juggle the demands of four kids and those of Irwin, the chaos the engulf this little travel agency seemed normal.
Looking up from his computer, Ryan 'saw' me for the first time and appreciatively smiled. "I could use a helping hand...I'm Ryan and you are?" After I gave him my name, he quickly said, "Jocelyn, if you could answer the telephone, it would be greatly appreciated. Just say that I'm out...listen to them...get their contact information...and promise that you'll get back to them as soon as possible."
It seemed that Ryan was running a special Japan tour for a small intimate group that he would be leading at an unbelievable price. As such, he was inundated with requests for reservations and millions of questions. His newly hired clerk turned out to be highly temperamental and being unable to handle the pressure of demands for reservations, just walked off the job, leaving Ryan high and dry. I, on the other hand, managed the inquiries and requests for reservations with ease, dealing with each customer on a friendly basis, soothing frazzled demands, providing what information I could, and leaving every caller with a sense of satisfaction.
While Ryan feverishly worked to make on-line reservations for the customers whom I had fielded, I couldn't help but notice that he was Japanese-American, in his early thirties, nice looking, a bit taller than me, and with a lean body. I like the way that he dealt with his customers when he called them back, cajoling them as he sought to accommodate their desires. I couldn't help but notice just how Ryan when compared to Irwin, was totally different, and this was interesting.
