Chapter 1 In the Beginning
Author's Note: This chapter established the background for the rest of the story, which is why I placed it in the Non-Erotic category. Subsequent chapters will be spicier. I promise.
Sarah and Jim had recently celebrated their tenth anniversary of their marriage.
The couple had actually met in their first year in university, where both took courses in law school as it was their ambition to join the legal profession.
Initially, they were only friends. At that time, Jim had a steady girlfriend who he had been going out with for more than a year. When this relationship ended, he made a conscious decision to stay single and avoid emotional entanglements to concentrate on his studies. He even declined most invitations to various parties so as to focus on his studies and conserve his limited financial resources. His only indulgence during this time was his weekly martial arts lessons. A healthy mind, he reasoned, required a healthy body. So the money spent on these lessons was a good long-term investment.
Sarah also had a steady boyfriend but their relationship began about three months before Jim and his girlfriend broke up. However, that relationship ended a few months later. She too had made up her mind to focus on her studies with the aim of becoming a lawyer. She also shared the belief that a healthy body was necessary for a healthy mind. So her one indulgence was to take belly dancing lessons. She discovered that she loved to express herself through the movements of her body.
Sarah and Jim had shared a number of classes. So, they found it mutually beneficial to study together. Studying together soon turned into hanging out together. Initially, it meant just watching a TV show but their unmistakeable sexual attraction for each other soon led to mutually satisfying sex. After a bout of hard studying, a bout of sex was far more relaxing than any show on TV.
As the weeks and months passed, they found that they shared the same values. They moved in together.
Finally, they realized that they had fallen in love. They could not pinpoint exactly when that happened, but they knew they had found their life partners in each other. As they finished their undergraduate studies, Jim proposed marriage to Sarah, a proposal which she joyfully accepted.
For his part, Jim considered himself to be an extraordinarily lucky man. For starters, Sarah was very bright and just as capable as he was to become a lawyer. Secondly, she had a calm and thoughtful personality but was an unrestrained and adventurous lover. And finally, she was also outstandingly beautiful. Of average height, her figure could be described as voluptuous. She had a generous pair of breasts accompanied by broad womanly hips perched on a pair fantastic dancer-like legs. Just admiring her curvy figure was enough to make his cock salute her. She was a walking wet dream who enjoyed flaunting herself. She was no slut but she unrestrained in her lovemaking.
Jim was far from the only man to be drawn by her beauty and erotic allure. She had many suitors even when she was dating Jim. She could have had her pick of any man and could have become the trophy wife of a man with far more wealth and power than Jim had. Yet, she rejected them all. She had chosen him as her life mate. Jim always thought of himself as plain-looking and average in every way but Sarah always insisted that he was smarter, kinder, and sexier than he gave himself credit for.
After completing their undergraduate studies, both were accepted by the same law school. Although they both had part-time jobs at the time, it was proving to be very difficult to make ends meet. They were barely able to pay the rent and buy food. Luxuries were out of the question. In fact, with one more year still to go, their situation became so dire that Sarah decided to suspend her studies and take a job as a paralegal in a small local legal office. Jim objected to her decision, but at the same time, he recognized that their current situation, no income and rising debt, was unsustainable. Her reasoning was logical, sound and based in economic facts. They needed one of them to work so that the other could finish their studies and become a full-fledged lawyer. He lover her all the more for making such a sacrifice.
Jim graduated from law school and took up a year-long internship with Johnson, Hammer, Peters & Associates LLP, the largest and most prestigious law firm in the city. The firm recognized Jim's talent, his industriousness, and his ability to make others, clients and colleagues alike, feel comfortable in his presence. He was popular with the staff because he treated others, no matter what their station in life, as equals and with kindness and respect. The firm also recognized his professionalism and his political acumen and offered him a permanent position as an associate lawyer, specializing in corporate law.
Sarah was delighted by her husband's growing successes at work. Once Jim became an associate lawyer, she began to receive invitations to participate in social and charitable events sponsored by the firm but organized mainly by the non-working wives of the firm's employees. She accepted, partly because it was good politics and would help Jim's career, but also because she hoped to develop a network of social and professional contacts that might lead to a more suitable position in a larger law firm with better chances of advancement.
For the next five years, the couple worked steadily away at their respective jobs. Jim's reputation and standing at JH&P LLP rose during this time, while Sarah's career in an office with only one lawyers and three paralegals stagnated. She had even hoped that a position at JH&P might open up for which she could then apply, but the turnover at this firm was very low. The firm was considered one of the best in the legal business with better than average pay and benefits and excellent working conditions. What turnover did take place were mostly the result of retirements and were mostly filled by people already in the firm.
But life went on. Any thought Sarah had about going back to law school was overtaken by the demands of daily life.
Because Sarah and Jim were a frugal couple, their combined income enabled them to pay off their student debts and then make down payment on a house which they had bought shortly after JH&P had hired Jim as an associate lawyer.
As the couple approached their fifth anniversary, they decided that, if they were going to have children, now was the time to do it. Sarah dispensed with birth control pills and let nature take its course. As the couple were still sexually quite active, she soon became pregnant.
During her pregnancy, the doctors discovered that Sarah had a medical condition which made it dangerous for her to bring a baby to term. Although the baby was successfully delivered thanks to the miracles of modern medical science, her gynecologist strongly advised her against having any further pregnancies. On leaning that she took belly dancing lessons, the doctor encouraged her to continue with it as a way to regain her figure and keep fit.
Sarah subsequently discovered that belly dancing gave her body a higher degree of flexibility that easily allowed her to move in a very sensual way. Once in a while, when she was in the mood, she would dance in front of her husband while slowly removing her clothing. Invariably, she achieved the desired result. Her husband would look at her like a hungry wolf and then pounce on her for sex. On those occasions, she relished the sexual hold she seemed to have on him. However, once she was well into her pregnancy, she decided to do her belly dancing while Jim was at work. Although the vigour of his manhood was normally exciting to her, she wanted their lovemaking to be gentler until she had recovered from her baby's birth.
On the medical front, Sarah, with Jim's support, decided it was in her best interest to undergo a tubal ligation after their baby was born. Although Jim was disappointed that she could not give him any more children, he loved her dearly and accepted the situation. At least they had a daughter, who they named Lucy, to give joy to their lives. And of course they still had each other. Once again, Sarah had sacrificed for their family. Jim could wonder how lucky he was to have such a woman as his wife.
As a result of her difficult pregnancy, Sara had to quit her job. For the next two years she was a stay-at-home mother. With only one income to support their small family, albeit Jim's income was reasonably good one, the pressures of work and family dampened their sense of fun and leisure and negatively affected their sex life was impacted, which had become both less frequent and less passionate. On top of all of this, Sarah's father died in a car accident.
Throughout this period, Jim was a always very supportive husband. Knowing that his wife valued the ability to make an independent contribution to their well-being, he assured her that she was still an equal partner in their relationship. Only her role had changed. He urged her to see the last few years as nothing more than a detour on the road to the realization of her goals and ambitions. He promised to do everything he could to help her.
For Sarah, the saving grace during this difficult period in her life was her participation in the wives' social club, This club was mostly run by women who were the housewives of the law firm's employees. It also included the wives of senior managers as well as a number of the firm's female employees. Through this club, Sarah was able to develop friendships with both female employees and employees' housewives.
Originally, Sarah had joined the wives' social club because she thought it might advance Jim's career in some way while giving her the opportunity to develop a network of contacts who would help her rejoin the job market when she was ready for it. But what started off as friendships of convenience soon turned into real friendships. The value of these friendships became apparent when the wives supported her through her difficult pregnancy, the aftermath, and the unexpected loss of her father.
The day arrived when Sarah announced that she wanted to go to work. But there were obstacles in the way. She had to find daycare for their daughter proved to be a more difficult task than she had anticipated. In fact, another year passed before a spot even became available at a nearby daycare.
Having then found a nursery, Sarah found herself in a double bind. She needed daycare to find the time to look for a job with an income, but looking for a job also meant paying out for daycare with an income they did not have. Either she had to find a job as quickly as possible, very soon in fact, or she would have no choice but to turn down the daycare spot she had just been offered.
Jim told her put Lucy into daycare as it would allow her to focus on her hunt for a job. Yes, money would be tighter because they still relied on Jim's income to sustain the family. He understood that it was not within Sarah's personality to be satisfied with being just a simple housewife and mom for the years to come. She wanted to work and contribute to their family's economic welfare too. Otherwise, she would by unhappy. He genuinely believed that a happy wife meant a happy life for him too. Later that evening, they sealed the deal with a happy ending.
Having decided that she would put Lucy in daycare and search for a job in earnest, Sarah was then surprised to receive a phone call from the wife of one Jim's colleagues who tipped her off about a part-time paralegal position that had just been posted by the firm's HR department. The caller turned out to be the Janice, the wife of Robert Johnson, who was one of the firm's three senior managing partners with special responsibility for the firm's corporate law practice. She informed Sarah that a part-time job as a paralegal had opened up and asked if she was interested. Sarah jumped at the chance and quickly gladly applied for the job. She wanted to become a lawyer and this was a step in the roight direction. An unexpected benefit was that she would for the same legal firm as her husband.
