Author's note: this is just a fun little infidelity fantasy. If that's not your speed, don't feel obligated, but I had fun writing it, and hopefully a few people enjoy it.
"So several of you are going to Raleigh for the week," James began.
"Oh, cool," I responded, trying to not convey too much trepidation.
"Yeah, we need someone to support the product launch there," he acknowledged. "The team in their office is panicking more with each passing day. I figure we send you guys, you work from there, have some meetings with them, smooth things over, and come back Friday night. Egos calmed, problem solved."
"Who all is going?"
"You, Vijay, Rochelle, Allison, and Denise."
Fuck, I thought. I could deal with or liked most of those people, but Allison was going to be a problem. A huge one.
I'd taken this job 9 months prior. For many years, I'd been consulting, basically acting as a liaison between the business guys in a company who go "We need an app that does this and that thing," drawing up requirements for the tech guys who actually build it and know what's possible and what isn't. It'd been good overall, I'd done long contracts for bigger banks and tech companies, and it had allowed us to pay our kids' college expenses, as well as stockpile a bit away for eventual retirement. However, the constant travel had definitely taken a toll on our family, and particularly my wife, who had gone into a depression over the last two years. She'd lost much of her zest for life, worked a lot less, and started staying home and just watching a lot of TV, also gaining a good 80 lbs as a side effect of both the medications and depressive eating. She'd even tearfully urged me to leave her or fuck someone else in her lowest points, which I didn't want to--I'd cheated on a girlfriend before her, and also my ex-wife's affair had broken up my previous marriage, and I wanted to make this work. Besides, I tried to convince myself that a large part of it had been situational--my daughter and her daughter and son were all close in age, and when they all went off to school and moved out over a four year span, I figured it was just a matter of time before she began to snap back to who she used to be. Thus far, it didn't seem promising though.
When I took this job at a major mortgage company, I was stoked to have a permanent gig with very little travel. Even though they employed a lot of rather attractive women, many of them were in their 20's and 30's, and with me pushing 50, I felt relatively safe from any office indiscretions. Until I met Allison.
Classically speaking, she wasn't gorgeous, but she was exactly my type. She looked stereotypically Irish, if you will, with long fire red hair, pale skin, lightly freckled, cute little upturned nose...but those eyes...God Damn, those gigantic, blueish-gray eyes. They locked on you and didn't let go. She was smart as a whip, an Analyst that understood our software platforms backwards and forwards, plus she was funny, self-assured, and she had this quiet grace about her every move and word spoken that was just incredibly, undeniably sexy as hell. Between that, and her mouthwatering figure that resembled something out of a renaissance painting (wide, curvy hips, a beautiful rounded ass, and big, ripe, mouthwatering breasts, it was difficult not to just stare at her sometimes. And the biggest problem, by far, was that we had chemistry.
At first I though maybe I was projecting. I'd catch her looking at me a bit, but then she'd shake her head or look away like she was just zoning out, and I'd chide myself for seeing what I wanted to see, a woman I fancied into me. But then I'd felt it several times. Like when we'd accidentally brush hands during a meeting and both reacted like a small jolt had hit us both. When we'd chat and lock eyes a little bit longer than appropriate at corporate happy hour, and one of us would look away quickly. One time, when we played on the company half-court soccer team, I'd reacted quickly on the field after a game and picked her up to spin her out of the way of a collapsing steel pole. It was hardly a life-threatening situation, she would have had some nasty bruises at worst, but something about the adrenaline and the close proximity was insanely sexy. I held her cradled in my arms to keep her safe and balanced, and as we separated, we lingered a bit, both panting, staring into each other's eyes intently. I both silently thanked and cursed the noise and concern from people around us, as it brought us both back to reality quickly. Had we been alone, I think there's a reasonable chance we would have torn into each other right there.
So it was a problem. But I was trying to be good. And mostly, I was succeeding, although this trip worried me. The rest of the team would help distract us, too. Rochelle was a bit of a flirt, but also a drama queen and, I suspected, a functioning alcoholic. Vijay was a typical software engineer, quiet, brilliant, but also personable and slightly funny. Denise was a literal grandmother and virtual one to the group who was very sweet, and often played peacemaker when tensions got high from too many meetings and not enough action. So I thought I'd be okay with all of them as a buffer on this trip. I'd spend days at the office, and at night I'd go back to my hotel room and beat off to kill the edge of being around her all day. No problem.
But it'd been hard enough being around her five days a week. When she'd worn a mesh lace shirt (with a built in bra that really didn't show off anything indecent), just the sight of her bare back and delicate tattoos had forced me to cross my legs to keep from getting too hard. When she'd worn perfume and sat right beside me at meetings, I'd had to force myself not to lean in and try to kiss her lovely neck. Even when she wore a loose-fitting flannel shirt on casual Friday, I had to keep myself from glancing at the tiny hint of cleavage that peeked out the top. And the truth was, when I'd actually talked my wife into sex roughly once a month, I'd several times replaced her face and closed eyes while she took me into her mouth in my mind with Allison's gorgeous orbs, staring back up at me. I was smitten, and I could try to lie to myself, but I knew deep down what a lie it was. So I was a bit worried, but there was absolutely no way for me to bow out of this one gracefully.
We landed early evening Sunday, and after the six-hour flight from LAX, we were all a bit wiped. We quickly descended on a place to eat, chatting amiably about the upcoming week, sprinkled in with a bit of personal conversation. Vijay had just gotten married, so we joked with him a bit, and attempting to be PC, I remarked tamely "I'm sorry we're making you travel and interfering with all of the newlywed sex." He immediately began laughing and blushed almost comically.
Everyone seemed to be having a good time, though I noticed Allison was being just a bit distant. I asked her if anything was wrong, and she responded, "Nah, I'm just tired and my body's clock is a bit off." I shrugged it off, and we caught a Lyft to the hotel, our home for the next week. I groaned internally when I realized that we were all on different floors, except for Allison, Rochelle, and I, who were in a row on the third. At least having the office gossip and drama queen nearby will keep me honest, I thought.
I flopped down on the bed, turned the TV on low, and called my wife. She was nice but a bit perfunctory, mostly telling me about her day and her discussions with my daughter Christine, who was coming to visit the next day, secretly to help distract her while I was gone. We chatted amiably for about 15 minutes, and eventually she told me she wanted to go lie down. I cursed a bit inwardly, as it was only 6pm there, so I knew that she'd likely go to sleep and not wake up for 12 hours or more--the depression made her want to stay in bed most of the day. She'd sleep through letting the dog outside, and he'd likely pee or shit in the house, and then as she cleaned it up she'd curse herself under her breath while she slid further down into her hole of self-hatred. I held back tears, forced my voice to be normal, told her I loved her, and we disconnected the call.
So I sat there on the bed, in my boxers and a tee shirt. I flipped channels a couple of times, and nothing was on that piqued my interest, or perhaps I was just too far lost in my own thoughts. Thoughts about my wife, about the state of my life, and that literally next door there was a girl I was incredibly attracted to but couldn't do a thing about. And then I was snapped out of my thoughts by the knock.
I sprang up, and went to the hall door. I swung it open, only to see no one. I poked my head out, and looked left, which was empty. Turning my head to the right, I noticed a Latino woman in a housekeeping uniform about a hundred yards away slowly pushing a housekeeping cart. Was I losing my mind?
Knock knock knock. I craned my neck and listened hard for the sound. The adjoining door. Allison's room! My stomach dropped, and letting the hall door close behind me, I went over and undid the slide and deadbolt, opening the door.
"Hi," she said in a slightly small, unassuming voice.
"Uh, hi," I responded.
"Can I come in?"
"Yes, sure, please," I said, quickly gesturing her in. She reached to her side, grabbing a grocery bag off the credenza. I took her in as she stepped inside, her bare feet showing off cutely painted red toes that matched her fingernails, her full thighs and hips covered only by a pair of high thin shorts, her skin creamy and smelling fresh, like she had just showered. She wore a simple but flattering T-shirt with some design on it that I tried not to read, because then I'd have to stare at those glorious breasts. She padded over to the little round table by the window, setting the bag down as she gracefully settled in the chair.
"What's in the bag?" I asked as she dug in.
"Beer," she said, producing a 6-pack of some local looking craft brew. It had some graphics of fruit and something else on the side, I didn't really scrutinize it too hard.
"Ah. What's the occasion?" I replied.
"I wanted to talk to you about something a little weird, and I wanted to try and make it a bit more comfortable," she responded, twisting off a cap and handing me a bottle. I shrugged and accepted it, and as I sat, she quickly uncapped one for herself. She took a healthy swig, paused, took another, and then looked at me for a few beats longer than comfortable.
"So..." I began.
