I spotted her at Barbara's Bookstore. There were three teenage girls looking at a Playgirl centerfold and giggling. It was a hot day and all I was wearing a T-shirt, cargo shorts, and sandals. I admit that I got a bit turned on watching those girls ogling the naked stud in Playgirl and I had to shift my penis to avoid having an obvious hard-on. Hey I'm a healthy 21 year old. I get hard pretty easily.
This old lady - she looked at least my grandmother's age - was standing off a little to the side watching the girls and trying to peer over and see what they were looking at. When they put the Playgirl back on the stand (in the wrong place), she looked at it, but didn't quite have the courage to pick it up herself. Then she saw me looking at her and kind of blushed.
"Hi," I said.
"Hello."
I reached over and picked up the Playgirl and moved it to the right spot.
"Girls today are very forward," she said out of the blue.
"What do you mean?" I asked.
"When I was young, a young lady would never look at .. pictures like that."
"You mean pictures of naked guys?" I said.
"Well, yes."
I laughed. "Well we guys look at girls, so I guess they should have the chance to look at us."
She scanned my body pretty carefully and when I turned around to leave, she introduced herself.
"My name is Rose," she said.
"Hi, I'm Bryan."
We sort of stood there awkwardly for a moment. Then she said, "Bryan, would you have a moment to have a coffee with me," she said. "I don't get a chance to talk with a young man very often."
Was she trying to pick me up? This old lady? "Yeah, ok," I said.
But when we went across to Caribou and sat down with our coffees I began to wonder. She just started talking about the weather, the bookstore, and anything else to cover up her nervousness.
I said, "So you think girls today are forward?"
She smiled. "Well pictures of men ... like that ... were unheard of in my day. One didn't admit to wanting to see such things."
"But you did right?"
"Well," she smiled. "There's always a bit of curiosity."
"You married?"
"I was for 35 years," she said.
I shrugged, "Well ..."
After several minutes of hemming and hawing it came out that she had never seen her husband nude once in 35 years. They made love in the dark under covers and eventually not at all and slept in separate beds. "My God," she said, "I'm telling you things I've never told anyone."
"If you want to look at guys, you could just subscribe to Playgirl," I said, "and save yourself the trouble."
"Oh my, and have the doorman and postman know?" She shook her head at the thought.
I laughed. "Nudity is not such a big thing."
"Maybe not for your generation," she said.
Then she actually took my hand, looked into my eyes, and said, "I envy you, your youth and free spirit." By this point I was pretty sure she wanted to see me naked: like that was the whole purpose of the conversation. And there was something about the thought that was kind of thrilling in a way. I mean, there was totally no attraction to this old lady, but I sort of dug the fact that she was so into me and had gone her whole life without really seeing a naked guy.
We bantered a little longer. She didn't want it to end, so whenever there was a lull in the conversation, she started something else. Its like she hadn't talked to anyone for a year. She started to edge the conversation toward the area: she said she lived nearby in one of the high rises.
"Is it a nice place?" I asked.
"Oh yes, very comfortable, I've been here for more than 30 years."
Then a pause.
"If you'd like, we could continue our conversation there."
Now I was sure about what she wanted.
I looked at my watch. Then after a few second I said, "well ok, sure."
She seemed delighted.
It took 15 minutes to walk the three blocks to her place: she took forever. The building had a doorman, who greeted us. She introduced me as Bryan "who will help with some work around the house" as if the doorman needed to know. Then we took the elevator up to her place, which was pretty nice in an old lady way and had a nice view of the lakefront.
We went into her den and I sat down on the couch. She sat in an adjoining chair and turned on the TV. We sat there awkwardly.
"You really are quite handsome," she said. "You must be a college athlete."
I laughed. "Not really, no. I swim, that's about it."
More awkward silence. Was I wrong about what she wanted? She was so reserved, it was hard to tell.
I decided to break the silence.
"Rose, if you want to see more of my body, you can just ask."
"Would you, Bryan?"
"Yes, Rose, but just for show, ok? I don't want anything to happen between us."
"Oh .. yes, of course, yes ... no, no, nothing like that, " she babbled.
"OK," I smiled. "Then tell me what to do."
She blushed. "Oh my..."