The chill October breeze sent a shiver through my body as I closed the front door of my parents' house who I had been visiting that evening. As I locked the mortice, I heard a sound to my left. I looked round and, in the frame of light created by the open front door of the neighbouring house, I saw, over the dividing fence, my 'childhood sweetheart' struggling to manoeuvre a large fridge/freezer over the precipice of the doorstep.
I last saw her at the funeral of her father a month previously. We exchanged a few niceties, but not much more as there were a lot of other guests for her to look after while her husband circulated with trays of sandwiches and petit fours. However, she did plant a hot, and longer-than-necessary kiss on my lips before I departed, awakening memories that had been dormant since we were children.
"Hang on Janey," I called, "I'll come round and help you with that."
"Oh, hi Don," she replied, "Thanks, I'd appreciate the help."
Together we managed to 'walk' the object over the step. "Where do you want it put?" I asked.
"On the kerbside for collection in the morning by a special uplift."
"OK then, isn't your hubby here giving you a hand?"
"He's away on business, won't be back until tomorrow evening."
It wasn't too difficult moving the fridge/freezer the rest of the way to the kerb.
"Thanks for the help, will you come in for a glass of wine?" Janey asked.
"Well, I have to be getting back to my wife, but I can spare the time for only one glass, bearing in mind that I'm driving," I replied. "Besides we didn't have much time at the funeral for more than a few words and we can catch up on each others' lives since childhood."
We went inside Janey's late father's house and through to the kitchen where I observed a glass of white wine partially consumed. Janey poured a fresh glass for me and topped up her own glass, which she picked up and then led me through to the lounge.
The room was in darkness, so Janey switched on a table lamp which exuded a soft, intimate, light. She sat on the adjacent sofa and beckoned me to sit next to her. Angling herself towards me, Janey commenced the conversation, "So you are married, why isn't your wife with you when you were at your parents tonight?"
"Good question," I replied, "I'm afraid that my mother and my wife don't get on with each other, so I keep them apart and do my parental visits on my own."
And from there it progressed, with probably each of us, certainly me, omitting the downsides to our lives, until we got to the current date. But I did learn that Janey was readying her late parents' ground floor flat for letting. Her mother had died when she was still a child, and it was that event that had separated us during childhood. Her father, had sent her to a boarding school as he wasn't able to maintain his job and care for Janey at the same time. She had just had the kitchen re-furbished, and while the contractors had disposed of the old appliances when installing the new, fitted, appliances, they would not dispose of the fridge/freezer because of the environmentally unfriendly refrigerant (CFC type substance). Hence the fortunate cause of our re-union.
Janey refilled her glass with wine, but I had been sipping slowly because I had to drive later, so refused a top up. Nevertheless, I was feeling the effect of the wine -- but, on reflection, it was probably the combined effect of having a prolonged accompaniment with my first love plus that of the wine, for a single glass does not normally affect me.
Janey returned to the sofa, and my eyes followed her from the moment she re-entered the room. Her figure was slim, and her jean clad hips swayed, perhaps exaggeratedly, or maybe it was my perception, and, her small breasts, which I estimated at 34B (anything below 36 I regard as small, but then I prefer small), thrust out against her black sleeveless top. Very nice for someone 25 years older. She sat on the sofa facing me and hooked her right leg on the seat and crossed her left leg over her right ankle, which left her crotch open. Of course it was covered by her jeans, but that did not prevent my eyes from gazing at the view, which was stirring a reaction in my loins that necessitated me to hitch my left ankle onto my right knee in order to hide any visual indication of my predicament.
We continued our conversation which then regressed back to our childhood, and the memories that were briefly awakened at Janey's father's funeral began to resurface. That did not help the predicament that I was experiencing in my loins, so I rapidly emptied my wine glass and announced my departure.
"Before you go," Janey, almost pleadingly, said, "Come upstairs and see where we used to play as children. It may be the last time you see the place before it is emptied of all its junk."
My memories of that place had now fully revived, and I hoped that Janey's memories were not as vivid as mine. So I replied hesitantly, "Alright then."
I know I indicated that the property was a flat, but it is a lower villa flat. The original building was a villa with servant's quarters, and was divided into two flats. The servant's quarters were attached to the main villa on the upper level above the kitchen, but are only accessible by a flight of stairs from the kitchen. The upper level living quarters terminated at the kitchen boundary.
Janey preceded me up the steep stairway, carrying her glass of wine, and turned on the lights of a short landing, off of which were two reasonably sized bedrooms and a very compact bathroom, the tub barely large enough for one to sit in, a toilet bowl, and a miniscule wash-hand basin in the corner opposite the toilet and behind the door. She went into the largest of the two bedrooms, the one in which we played, and turned on the lights. It was much as I remembered it as a child. An iron bedstead in the far corner, still with its horse-hair mattress. The cupboard was still stacked full and the same packed boxes seemed to line the back wall.
The memories of what we did up here came flooding back to me, and just as I was hoping that Janey wasn't going to bring hers out into the open, she took a sip of her wine and said, "Remember what we used to do up here?"
'Of course I remember but I was hoping you'd forget' I thought to myself as I wished I had a glass of wine in my hand so I could take a gulp while I thought up a suitable answer. All I could do was, stifling a stammer, reply, "Yes, I remember quite clearly."
"Oh good," Janey said, moving against me so that our bodies were in contact.
My heart was now pounding, most likely in fear but more probably in anticipation. The earlier stirring in my loins was now most uncomfortable pressing against my jeans, and I slowly edged my blind-side hand into my pocket to turn it upwards.