Annabelle had her back to me and I ran my eyes up and down her body, silently admiring her form - the curve of her thighs and butt, the way her shoulders looked in that sleeveless shirt. Even from behind, on this angle, I could see the fullness of her chest.
She turned and smiled at me as she handed me a tall glass of water.
"How are the boys doing?" she asked.
Her son Pete and my son Max were playing the in the sandpit in her backyard.
"They're good. No fighting at all so far this morning," I replied before taking a sip of water. The day was starting to warm up and the humidity was rising.
"They're good playmates," Annabelle said. "I'm glad they get along so well together. Pete gets on with Max better than anyone else in the group."
I had known Annabelle since before little Pete was born. She and her husband Richard were part of the same parent's group as me and my ex-girlfriend Jenny. Now our kids were toddlers and a core group of about eight couples remained good friends. We all lived within a few blocks of each other and although only some of us knew each other before having kids, we got on well.
Annabelle and Richard seemed to have something of a fairytale story. They were highschool sweethearts who had been married for almost 10 years. They had been trying to conceive and after a period of worrying that they might not be able to, they had the child they'd been yearning for.
Jenny and I, however, were something of a smouldering disaster. Our relationship was passionate but volatile and we fought like cats and dogs. We had been together for almost a year when I decided the relationship had to end. We were in a perpetual cycle of fighting, followed by intense making up, followed by more fighting, over and over.
I'll never forget the day we agreed to meet for coffee after I'd resigned myself that I would end the relationship. It was a Sunday afternoon and we'd been fighting all week. I'd decided to make a final break - no more getting back together. When Jenny sat down I could sense something different about her and before I could launch into my speech about how we needed to end it, she said those two mortifying words - "I'm pregnant!"
Part 2
"I really admire you and Jenny for how you worked things out," Annabelle said, leaning her butt slightly against the kitchen bench, glass in hand.
"You did the right thing, for both of you and for little Max."
Annabelle placed down the glass and put the palm of her hand on the bench for support. I pretended to be staring at nothing but let my eyes take in the bend of her elbow all the way up to her armpit, which was now shaped like an inverted crescent because of her pose. The dark hairs of her pit were clearly visible and I allowed myself to savour the view for a few seconds before meeting her eyes again.
"Yeah, it was hard to start with but it's much better now. We're both doing really well at staying friends and it's working better than we expected," I replied, looking at Annabelle's dark eyes.
When Jenny insisted on keeping the baby we both agreed to see a relationship counsellor. Things settled down for us during the pregnancy because it basically became our only focus. Things went well after Max was first born as we were buoyed by that buzz you get with a new baby in the house.
However, by the time he was about six months old we started having the same fights again. We went back to the counsellor but after Max's first birthday we realised that we just weren't meant to be together. Thankfully, for all Jenny's faults, she is very warm-hearted and we both agreed that Max was our most important priority.
We worked out the custody arrangements and were surprised by how supportive our friends and family were of our decision. Most people agreed it was better for Max to be raised by two people who were happy, rather than a couple that was miserable. My parents and Jenny's parents have been great and he's now being raised by his father and grandparents one week, and his mother and other grandparents the next.
"I'm proud of you both," Annabelle said, leaning forward and squeezing my forearm. She left hand there for a few seconds before leaning back against the bench.
"Did you know Jenny has a boyfriend at the moment?" she asked.
"Yeah," I replied. "I met him the other week. He's a nice guy actually. And they seem to get on well," I said with a chuckle.
"You're not jealous?" she asked.
"No, I'm not the jealous type."
"That's good to know." Annabelle smiled. "And how's your love life?"
"Pretty quiet. I'm still looking," I replied.
"Still looking, eh," she said, raising an eyebrow. "Do you ever look at me?"
I was shocked by how blunt her question was. I went to have a sip of water but realised my glass was empty. Annabelle watched me as I tried to think of what to say.
"Honestly ..." she said softly. "Do you ever look at me?"
I swallowed hard and said in a dry voice. "Honestly? Yeah, I do ... but I try not to."
"Really? Why? Why do you try not to?"
She was still speaking softly.
"I thought that would be obvious," I said. "You're married. I shouldn't be staring at you because you're married. It's wrong ... somehow ... for you and for Richard."
A little smile crept across her face. "I know you look at me. I just wanted you to admit it."
In my mind I tracked back a few weeks. It was my weekend to look after Max and we were in the park, I was crouched down, playing with him on the ground. An older boy - about four - wanted to hang on the monkey bars but couldn't reach. Annabelle walked over to him and offered to help. I was a few feet away and watched as she bent over the boy to pick him up.
It was a warm day and she was wearing a tank top and her cleavage was obvious. She lifted the boy up by the hips holding him steady while he gripped the bars. Her arms were up, elbows pointed out and her pits were fully exposed.
Both of us were wearing sunglasses and I stared at the concave curve of her pit. The position meant the curve of her underarm was at its most full and her pits looked their deepest. I'd noticed her armpits before but this gave me an uninterrupted view of the lovely covering of dark wavy hair in her underarm. Her hairs weren't overly long - maybe half an inch - but they were thick and covered a great expanse of her pits. From the area where they started, down near her chest, going up towards her elbow I think the hairs would have covered about four inches of her underarms. The strip of short, wavy black hair was not in an exact straight line, more like the beginning of a lazy "s" and at its widest was probably about one to two inches across the pale skin of her pit.
She put the boy back on the ground. "You liked that, didn't you? Want me to do it again?" she said in a sing-song voice.
The kid nodded and in my head I was screaming, "Yes! Please, do it again!"