She sat at the computer keyboard after having just signed out of a messenger service. It was amazing to her that there were people just like her. Married and lonely. She didn't think it would be this way when she married again, maybe it was her own fault. She worked too many hours and the spark grows cold, walls are built and are difficult to tear down and impossible sometimes to get around.
She listened to the man setting in her living room, pounding the floor to get the deaf cat to stop grooming herself.
"For God's sake" she said "leave the cat alone, that's what cat's do, they groom."
"Responsible pet owners don't let their pets lick their private parts in public" he said sternly.
"She is a cat, just a cat, the only thing you are doing here is upsetting me and I don't like it" she responded.
"So what are you going to do, go back to work?" he sneered.
"No" she answered as she picked up the cat and went back into the sewing room, then closed the door.
This was her haven, the place she went to when she needed to escape. It was her room, soft mauves and blues decorated the room, her sewing machine sat beside the window. Looking out she could see the big oak tree in her front yard. It was always the last on the block to bud in the spring and the last to change into it's fall colors come autumn. The cutting table was neat, but the sewing table always looked as if the winds had blown in and project flung about willy-nilly.
On the front wall of the room sat her salvation, the computer. She could loose herself for hours there on the Internet, writing her stories, researching and reading about everything that caught her eye. She walked over to it, sat down and logged on again. She was contemplating ways to overcome her loneliness, searching for someone to be a friend, someone to confide in, and frankly a lover. She wasn't ready to give up on having a sex life yet, nor was she ready to write off the company of having a male friend.
The modem dialed. the computer flashed online and she checked her e-mail. It wasn't long until her friend from the messenger service opened a chat window. She smiled and answered back.
"Hey Sugar" the screen read.
"Right back at ya" she typed.
"So what's going on with you tonight?" he asked
"Same old, same old." she answered.
"Then let's do something different." he suggested
"What do you mean?" she responded
"Meet me" printed on the screen.
"Tonight?" she asked "Yes, now. We are here in the same city talking via computer, both of us are lonely, meet me" he said.
She thought about it shortly and the typed in the word "where".
Twenty minutes later she pulled her car into an empty parking spot at the county library. She was nervous, they had talked so often on the computer, she knew about his likes and dislikes, his sense of humor, his working hours and that he hadn't had sex for a year, other than by his own hand. What she didn't know was what he looked like, nor did he know what she looked like. She had told him that she was a large woman, he had said it didn't matter, but that was when they knew only a monitor and keyboard. Now he was going to see her, short, round, fair, freckled and over 40.
It wasn't long until another car pulled in beside hers. The man got out and walked over to the driver's side window of her car. He seemed tall, but most people did to her, average looking man, with a smile that could light up the world.
"Hey Sugar" he began just a bit unsure if this was the woman he should be talking to, and wondering what in the hell he was going to say if it wasn't. It didn't take but the next breath until he was certain.
"Right back at ya" she smiled.
"You forgot to tell me that you have the most beautiful eyes in the world, but I'm sure you have been told that before" he said.
"Once upon a time, there was someone that told me that, " she said "Would you like to set here and talk awhile?"
She unlocked the door and he walked around to get in the car with her. They talked about this and that for awhile, a bit unsure of each other, maybe a little shy. Then he leaned in close to her and put his hands on her shoulders.