This is the first part of a story told to me in 1983 when I was in the midst of my surgical training. Janine was 58 years old at the time. She had come to our medical center with her husband Jean-Paul so that he could receive experimental therapy to arrest his cancer. His treatments were long and ultimately failed. One night, she was visited by a senior pilot from Trans World Airlines. After he left that evening, I stopped in after evening rounds. This is what she told me that night...
1944. The north coast of France. After years of Nazi occupation, the Allies have landed and liberation is finally at hand. Our family farmhouse, strategically but inconveniently located in the path of the Hitler's troops, had been annexed in the wartime way. Three years ago, when I was 16, I watched from my hiding space in the barn as a German officer got out of his car, lit a cigarette, drew his Luger pistol and shot both of my parents dead. I joined the resistance that night.
Our final rescue was an American pilot who had the bad luck to run into the last operational squadron of German fighters. Six Messerschmitts against one Mustang, but he shot two out of the sky before his own plane was hit and he had to bail out. Aside from a few minor bruises, he was unscathed. John was the quintessential 21 year old American fly-boy, with his dark hair and impish grin. He spoke French well for a Yank, courtesy of a Paris-born father who had emigrated to Boston after the Great War.
When the allied infantry triumphantly marched through our village the day after John's rescue, it was clear that the resistance no longer needed me and also that the handsome young pilot and I could share a private celebration as only two survivors can. We sang, we laughed, we danced. And we made love several times each day. John's muscular body was stronger—and his cock far larger-- than those the French boys who had shared my bed, and there were moments that I thought he might crash through my slender 5'5" frame. But he never did. His skills as a lover were exquisite, and I hoped that he would stay forever. But he did not. Eventually, he made his way back to England, to a hero's welcome in America and to a different life.
John married his high school sweetheart, a socially prominent woman who would bear him a son and a daughter. I moved to Paris and married Marcel, a painter as romantic as he was indifferent to the necessities of food, clothing and shelter. But his paintings sold reasonably well, and when Marcel died of an infection in 1963, we owned the small flat on the XXth arrondissement, and there was enough money to get by.
1964. Paris. The Tuesday post brought the usual collection of bills, notices and invitations to social events. But there was another envelope, this one from America with John's return address. My pulse quickened as I opened the letter. John was still a pilot, of course, now flying international routes for TWA. It wasn't that I hadn't seen John—we had shared meals and some afternoon delight when John was assigned the Idlewild-Orly route—but it was nothing more than the occasional harmless pleasure of long-ago love momentarily rekindled. And, truth be known, I had not been held by a man for more than a year. I hoped that he would be arriving soon.
Alas, he would not. But his 19 year old son Stephen, newly graduated from one of the well-known boarding schools and scheduled to attend West Point in the fall, would be touring the European capitals for six weeks. Would I be willing to show him Paris? John went on to add more details about Stephen, how he had excelled at both his studies and at sports, allowing that his social development was perhaps a bit behind. Dancing lessons aside, he went on, Stephen had been spared the distraction of young girls at the all-boys school. Socially graceful, I mused, but unskilled in the art of love.
I noticed that the envelope was not quite empty, and retrieved a photograph that took my breath away. Father and son, together at the beach. The years had been kind to John, who was just beginning to go grey and only slightly thicker through the middle than he had been two decades earlier. But it was Stephen's image that so captivated me. A carbon copy of his father, as he parachuted out of the French sky—the same impish grin and muscular chest and thick, powerful thighs. I found myself daydreaming about what was hidden by his swim trunks, and with a tinge of anticipation, suddenly quite wet between my thighs. A deliciously erotic plan began to take shape in my mind...
***
I counted the days –or more accurately the nights—until the 7th of July. I resisted the urge to meet him at the airport, deciding that he would be better off finding his own way through Paris to his hotel. His father assured me that Stephen's French was far better this own, and that he would have no trouble communicating with the sometimes cool Parisians. Instead, I simply left a note at the hotel that young Stephen should arrive at my flat at "vingt heures moins quart"—7:45 pm. Perhaps I was too forward, telegraphing my plans with paper carrying a hint of my favorite perfume.
At five in the evening, I drew a hot bath to soften my skin and to shave my legs. For the first time in months, I took care to trim and shape the red ringlets at the door to my sex. My clitoris began to tingle with anticipation as it hadn't for a very long time, but I resisted the urge to pleasure myself. I wanted to wait.
Stepping out of the bath and toweling dry, I was pleased with my still youthful appearance—short red hair, green eyes, smallish breasts that were still quite firm, and slender hips. Thinking about the evening ahead, I selected a black lace panty and matching lacy demi-bra that sharply contrasted with my milky skin. Not that I needed the support on top, but I remembered with fondness how John had fumbled with my bra the first time we ever made love. A touch of make-up and a drop of perfume on my wrists neck and between my breasts followed.
For this special evening, I wore a "little black dress", a wrap-around style that would later be made famous by designer Diane von Furstenburg. A jade necklace that matched my eyes completed the ensemble. Sophisticated, not quite demure and, I thought wryly, hopefully a younger look than his mother! I telephoned the bistro down the block to tell them that widow Janine would be escorting a young American to dinner.
Exactly on time, the doorbell rang. My heart pounded. What was I doing? What would he see in me? But there was no going back. I sprang up to let Stephen in.
To say Stephen was handsome would have been the equivalent of saying that there was nice art the Louvre. Clean-shaven, black hair and impossibly blue eyes, he could have been a movie star. He wore a blue blazer with brass buttons, light grey slacks, a blue shirt and a cornsilk tie. He was, if such a thing were possible, even more handsome than his father.
"Entrée, Stephen, s'il vous plait," I stammered, accepting the flowers that was carrying. It took every bit of will-power to stop myself from flinging my arms around him.
"What a lovely apartment –but so perfect for such a lovely lady!" he said. His father was wrong about at least one thing. Stephen might be socially inexperienced but he was hardly inept. First flowers, then compliments. Experience or talent, I wasn't sure. I also didn't care.
"We have reservations at a bistro down the street. The owner and my late husband were good friends, and I still eat there frequently. The food is wonderful, and you'll have a chance to watch Parisians in their native habitat," I declared.
"A field trip for my first night in Paris? What a treat!" he laughed, offering his arm as we stepped out into the warm evening.
The popular bistro was busy, but the owner had reserved a corner table for us so we could watch the crowd. As he seated us, he whispered "Janine, at least you have found yourself a handsome young lover. Your late husband would approve."
I must have blushed ten shades of red when I told him that Stephen was the child of an old friend who had arrived in Paris less than 24 hours earlier. A response, not a rebuttal.
Dinner was unfussy but elegant. We began with a frisée, endive and pear salad. Next, fish and steamed garden vegetables. A crisp Sancerre to wash it down. Fresh berries and whipped cream. A small coffee. Nothing to detract from the conversation.
Stephen told stories of his father, of antics at the boarding school and of life in the United States. The bistro owner came and shared a glass of wine with us, needling me by asking Stephen about all of the girls he must have left behind. Stephen parried, saying that his father had assured him that French women were the most beautiful on the planet, and from what he had seen so far, he could only agree. The owner winked, I blushed, and Stephen grinned.
"My dad told me how you looked after him after being shot down," he went on.
I quickly gathered that his father had omitted the intimate details, as well as the fact that we had not been complete strangers since.
"I am so glad that your war ended as happily as it did," Stephen added.
