No Ordinary Proposal

There was a light mist coming down as I drove out to the airport, that annoying drizzle between fog and rain, just enough to need the wipers. I stared out the windshield and thought about the last couple days and tried to make sense of it and failed. Her hand slid over my leg giving it a gentle squeeze as she dangled her hand between my thighs.

"You're too quiet."

"Sorry. I'm still trying to put it all together."

Joanna didn't respond right away but I could tell by her thumb rubbing back and forth on the fabric of my slacks that she was thinking, probably as much as I was.

"We talked about trust last night, but I think we forgot something." She started. "We never thought to ask if you trusted us. Now is as good a time as any." She turned her head to look at me. "Do you trust me Bobby?"

I hesitated to respond instantly and looked over at her. Her green eyes reflected the gray light of the day. I looked back to the road and said that I did.

"Good. Things are going to be a lot clearer soon. Once you have the whole picture then there will be a lot to talk about." She gave my thigh a reassuring squeeze.

"When?"

Jo sighed. "I'd say next week, after we get back from Houston. Scott said he'd talk to you when you play golf on Wednesday, that will probably clear up a lot of things. Depending on how he feels we'll probably have you over for dinner."

I turned onto the access road for the airport and the domestic departures terminal.

"Thank you for taking me in this morning. This way we only have one car to take home on Sunday."

"You're welcome. What are friends for?"

"I can think of a lot of things friends are for." I could hear the smile in her voice and her hand slid up my thigh. "We're early. Find a spot and come in and have a cup of coffee with me." Her hand slid out of my lap and she began digging into her bag and came up with a hair clip. She leaned forward and with a dexterous little sweep, twist and flip she had it in place. She flipped down the visor finding a mirror on the back and turned to make sure she'd gotten all of it.

"Park a little further down." She gestured down the row of cars.

Once I pulled in she stopped me from opening the door with a hand on my leg. "Put your seat back. I want to give you a little something to remember me by while I'm gone."

"Jo..." I stopped, not knowing what to say at the implied offer.

Her eyes opened wider. "Bobby, when a pretty girl wants to put your cock in her mouth, you let her." She said scolding me. She unbuckled her seat belt and turned to me reaching for the front of my pants and took control of the situation. She was even better than she was the night before. Her head bobbed gently up and down and all I could think about was never wanting her to stop. Unfortunately she was better than I and brought me off in just a few minutes, this time swallowing every drop. She sat up and smiled, licking her lips. "Well that covers the cream, now all I need is the coffee." She cleaned me up and tucked my cock back into my pants. I dropped my head back on the headrest and tried to catch my breath.

"I have no idea what is going on, but for some reason I don't really mind."

"Good, now if you wouldn't mind popping the trunk so I can get my bag, that would be even better. I watched her remove the hair clip and shake her hair out. She flipped the mirror down and dabbed at the corner of her mouth with her finger. She opened the door, got out and stretched giving me a wonderful view of her denim clad backside and with a little shake of my head I wondered again what was going on.

We were both quiet once we got inside the terminal. Jo went and checked in and got her boarding pass. She wheeled her carry-on around the counter and we went off to find the coffee shop. We sat at a little café table with steam rising from our cups and a giant cinnamon bun between us. She had carved it up into smaller pieces and was peeling apart the layers when she suddenly began giggling which blossomed into fits of laughter.

Her mood was infectious and I smiled. "What?"

She closed her eyes to get herself under control, with a head shake she replied. "I'm just imagining the things that are going through your mind right now," she giggled again, "and I had this flashback to the swinging Sixties." She emphasized the 'swinging' before she opened her eyes and continued to laugh.

"You definitely have the legs to pull off platforms and a vinyl mini skirt." I said smiling.

"You're damn right I do." She added with a wink. She reached for another piece of the bun and the light flashed off her wedding ring. I felt my smile fade. "You just now noticed?" She said tearing off a piece and bringing it to her lips. "I take them off before I uh," she looked around at all the people, "you know online. I put them back on last night when I went to bed."

I took a deep breath and let out slowly. "Since you're the psychology major. Is there meaning behind the fact that you didn't put them on before I got there?"

She looked down at her coffee for a moment, then took a sip and nodded. "Separation." She replied softly. My eyes flew wide open. "Not that kind." She shot me a look. "Guilt management. Does that make better sense?"

"So it wasn't only me that felt that." I sighed in relief. I was glad for that since it made me feel less horrible for what we had done.

She exhaled sharply, the smirk still on her face as she rolled her tongue against the inside of her cheek. "I just don't want you to think we've lost our marbles. There's a purpose to it all, and I'm gonna love you no matter what happens, or what you decide to do Bobby." She looked at me and paused for a moment. "Since I probably won't see you before you and Scott play golf on Wednesday I want you to know this. The things he's going to tell you are probably going to shock you a bit, but understand that he does speak for me. We've had a lot of time to talk and we've shed more than a few tears, and we felt this was the best way to talk to you about it. The truth is, things weren't supposed to go like that last night. Scott thought things could get out of hand if you and I were left alone and we talked about it and he gave me his blessing if they did." She laughed. "Boy did they." Her cheeks turned a deep pink color. "That's why I called him, so you could hear it straight from the horse's mouth."

I closed my eyes, shook my head and tried and make sense of what she was talking about and couldn't. "Jo, I've known you what, about seven years now? I've known Scott for twenty or so, and I have never been more confused by anything in my life." I held up my forefinger to stall her interruption. "I understand that there's some major announcement coming, and that I have some role to play here since you keep making statements like,

'no matter what you decide'

it's that I'm just not sure what I'm getting pulled into. I feel like I'm on a game show and I'm being told that I have to choose what's behind curtain number one or curtain number two and I'm either going to get a goat or a trip to Hawaii."

"Ooh, if you get Hawaii will you take me?" She grinned. "I'll shop for a new bikini in Houston."

I laughed. Here I was about ready to start pulling out my hair and she was cracking jokes. If it had been anybody else I would have already told them both to count me out of whatever it was they were cooking up. I'd been friends with Scott since college. He took me under his wing when I pledged. We'd stayed in touch over the years before we both eventually landed back where we started, he in his career and me in mine. There wasn't much I wouldn't do for the guy and here I was thinking about his beautiful wife, in a bikini on a beach and me with the tanning lotion in hand.

Jo reached across the little table and took my hand. "I know that the last forty-eight hours may seem a little, surreal, but I promise you this, it's going to make much more sense in a few days, and we did have our reasons for approaching it this way." She gave my hand a squeeze. "Honestly if we'd come right out and given you the run down you'd probably have thought we'd both lost our minds. You may still. We'll have to wait and see."

I looked into her eyes for a long moment and nodded my head. "Okay."

"You have a few days before we're back, and you're probably going to cook up some crazy ideas with the little you know right now. Please, please, please don't freak out over this."

I chuckled. "I'll do my best." We cleaned up the table and headed to the check in line.

She stopped me before getting in line, set her bag down and turned to me. I expected her to say goodbye, what I didn't expect was how she did it. She wrapped her arms around my neck and drew us together in a lingering, sweet, cinnamon flavored kiss. My hands went naturally to her waist as I fell into her soft lips.

"Goodbye sweetheart, I'll see you in a few days."

"Bye Jo," was all I could say as tried to get my breath under control. She kissed me again, this one more chaste, and got into line to go through security. I watched her pick up her shoes and purse from the bin and take her carry on case off the counter. She turned to look at me knowing I was still there and gave me a smile and wave before turning the corner to the gate.

I got to the car and sat there for a moment staring through the windshield. Over the rooftop of the terminal a jet climbed slowly upward from the runway making its way to some exotic locale. The thought made me chuckle as I realized it could just n as easily be going to Newark. I reached to start the car when I felt my phone vibrate. I took it out and saw I had a text from Jo and looked up at the terminal building then down again.

"In case you forget what I look like."

Attached to the text was a picture of her lying in bed completely nude blowing a kiss up to her camera phone. Another picture came through of her other hand between her legs, her fingers out of sight. A moment later another picture downloaded and her fingers were in her mouth. My pants were uncomfortably tight as the follow up text came through.

"If you get frustrated while I'm away, just look at this and know that I wish they were your fingers, and your mouth instead."

"Holy shit." I whispered before starting the car. I drove home and tried to clear my head because Jo was right. I was going to think about this the entire weekend. I tried to get some work done and finally gave up, unable to keep my mind on what I was doing. I ended up having a beer while I half watched a ball game on TV.

I wasn't able to sleep very well over the weekend. Deep in the night I had a dream about Jo, part of it was based in reality but things didn't always stay there. I half dozed, half dreamt about a party that her and Scott had thrown last year. It was a bit formal, a few of Scott's business partners were also invited as well and I was in the kitchen with Jo, helping her set something out, I don't remember what. In the dream Scott came in and made a joke about me spending all my time with Jo in the kitchen and I had replied with something like I was helping her out so she could get out and enjoy the party too. I felt a pang of jealousy and I wondered why I dreamt it in the first place. When I woke Monday and got ready for work I was relieved to have something to get my mind off of the previous weeks events. I knew that if I tried to do any work from home I wouldn't get a thing done so I dressed and went into the office.

Coworkers greeted me as I passed them. One made a wisecrack about not having seen me in so long that he though I'd quit or got canned. We laughed and I turned and rolled my eyes as I went into my office. I plowed through some technical information on a new plane that one of the aircraft makers was designing for the mid-size private jet market and I was looking over the options they were offering versus what our clients were in the market for. I went over the specifications that Scott had sent me for their purchase. He was looking for something in this range, and the current exchange rates made this one a good buy. I was going to Montreal the following week to look at the prototype in person.

Having kept busy for the first few days of the week hadn't let my mind wander much before Wednesday rolled around. Scott had asked me to pick him up rather than meet at the country club. I pulled into his driveway and parked the car.

"Hey Bobby!" Jo answered the door with her usual bright smile. She kissed me skipping my cheek and laid it on my lips. "Scott, Bobby is here!" She hollered as if announcing a childhood friend had arrived for a play date. I smiled realizing that this was the adult version of exactly that. Scott came out of his office dressed for the links. I noticed he wasn't moving very fast and seemed a little off. He stopped to kiss Jo goodbye and said that he'd have his cell on in case she needed anything.

"Hey Bob, let's get your clubs and take my ride, it's a little more roomy. I nodded and waved to Jo as we went out to the driveway. We got my clubs and bag stowed and he yelled, "shotgun!"

"It's your car Scott." I said laughing. He tossed the keys to me and they went wide but I was able to reach out for them just in time. We started off towards the club in silence. I had no idea how to start or even where. "Gee Scott, your wife came after me like a nymphomaniac last week and when she called you for permission to blow me you gave it to her. Seem odd to you?" I thought to myself.

"How was the trip to Houston?" I asked in an effort to cut the thick atmosphere that had developed. I glanced over and Scott's face had gone from a pensive stare to a rough laugh.

"Of all the things I expected out of you once we were alone, that was not it." His laugh faded away but he didn't respond to the question. Instead he nodded as if he'd made a decision. He took a deep breath and let it out slow and began to talk. "A few years ago I wasn't feeling so hot. After a week or so of what I thought was the flu, Jo prodded me to go to the doctor." He glanced over at me then back out the window. "It wasn't the flu. When they ask for more tests, you start to get worried. I know I did. It was a few days after that I got a call, they wanted both Jo and I to come into the office to talk. It was cancer."

"Oh shit." I said looking over at Scott.

He laughed again. "My thoughts exactly. Here I was at thirty-eight, like you now I think, and I had just been kicked in the nuts by mother nature. They caught it early enough, the doctor said, scheduled all the treatments recommended at that stage. Surgery, chemotherapy, radiation, you know, the works. Jo bawled her eyes out at first, but then she kicked into guerrilla mode. Suddenly bacon was off the menu, everything in the fridge was organic. She even made me get up and exercise with her! You know me in the mornings. I'm a give me coffee, and shut the hell up until it's gone, kind of guy."

Some things started to click into place. For the prior few years after Scott and Jo were married, he and I were both pretty busy, only seeing each other a few times each year. Then about a year ago he contacted me and asked if I still played golf and if I was able to join him for his regular game. It had become a regular thing every time we were both in town. We had spent more time together in the past couple years than we had in the previous five and I glanced over at him. "What's the prognosis?"

"After about six months the chemo and radiation were done and I was in remission. Success, or so we thought." He let out a little snort. "A check up a few months later I learned what the term metastasized meant. Things had seemed okay but it had actually silently spread. They started the chemo and radiation again and six months later things seemed to be getting better. I felt like shit. The problem is that if the cancer doesn't kill you then the cure will. We waited a month and it had only stalled during the treatments but hadn't gone away. I finally said enough was enough. If I'm going to go then I want to do it under my own power. I told the doctors that I'd had enough. Joanna and I had a lot of very long talks." He reached up and wiped his eyes as I pulled into the parking lot of the club.

I stopped the car. "Scott, we don't have to play if you don't feel up to it."

"Like hell. I kicked your ass last week and I'm going to do it again. When I do you're buying lunch, again." He said smiling as he opened his door to get out. I shook my head and got out too.

I took both bags and got an evil glare for it but he didn't make a scene in the parking lot. When we signed in I found that he'd requested a cart this week. We usually walked the course, though never in a hurry, letting others play through if they overtook us. We made our way out to the first tee and started playing.

"Jo said that the two of you had a nice evening last week."

I sliced my shot half way back to the clubhouse.

"So is that how you're going to win by messing with my head the whole game?" I said causing us both to laugh.

"Well it worked last week. You know that old age and treachery will overcome youth and skill." We played up to the green, he made a long putt and I double bogeyed before we moved onto the next tee.

"Okay Scott," I was ready for more information, "you've started putting the puzzle pieces together, but I still have no idea what the whole picture is yet."

"We'll get there. There are going to be parts that seem unrelated but they're going to come together. Bear with me as I explain how things went on from there." He went on to explain that Jo had been talking about starting a family about the time he was diagnosed. As soon as he was off the treatments they tried. "Boy oh boy did we try. There's something to be said for not succeeding the first time, because the trying is fun as hell." He smiled and gave me a bit of a knowing look. I wondered just how much Jo told him about our dinner and subsequent antics. He put his head down and lined up his shot and made a nice drive down the center of the fairway. "Thing is, the therapy had done me in, I was firing blanks. We both shed tears over that. Jo had her heart set on having my child. She said she wanted to hold on to a part of me."

The enormity of what he was talking about in such a calm, off-hand manner washed over me. "Jesus." I whispered. "How long do you have left Scott? Did the doctors give you a timeline?"

He looked down the fairway and nodded. "We'll get to that." He took a practice swing before stepped up to his ball and put it at the edge of the green on his next shot. "Do you remember that holiday party we had last winter?"

I did, it was the one that I recalled in the dream. Their home was done up like a Christmas showcase. "That was pretty amazing. I just had an odd dream about that party and I couldn't pinpoint why. I brought Amy as I remember, we had a good time." I'd been with Amy at the time though things had already begun to go down hill with us. We were humoring each other by going to parties together so neither of us would appear to be alone for the holiday.

"Don't bullshit me, you were fucking miserable with that girl. It was plain as the nose on your face, even Jo mentioned it to me, several times. She was pretty upset about it, she wants you to be happy. 'As happy as we are,' she'd said." He turned back towards the cart so we could move down the fairway. "She's always had a soft spot for you." We drove down the fairway and I began to wonder where this conversation was headed. He looked over at me and added, "It's mutual. I know that." He put his hand on my forearm and gave it a squeeze. "Fact is I've known it since soon after I brought her home and the two of you met. Can't say as I blame you. I was completely gobsmacked by that girl, still am to be honest. It's hard not to fall for a woman like her." We got out and he took his wedge to chip up onto the green. He'd stopped talking and the topic was making me uncomfortable all over again. He lined up his shot and hit the ball within a yard of the hole. I nodded to him to play it out and he switched to his putter and made the par. He made a weak little cheer and grinned broadly. I chipped high catching more of the grass than the ball and it curved onto the sand trap, I ended up with a six for the hole. We moved onto the next tee without a word.