Chapter 1
It was a beautiful fall day and Marcia was as usual urging her two boys, Aidan (10) and Mark (8), to hurry up so they wouldn't be late for soccer practice. Her husband of nearly 12 years, Connor, had gone out early, since his best friend Art had phoned him the evening before to tell him the fish were biting at Lake Canarsie. Marcia knew that this was more about the camaraderie than the art of angling for her husband, but she didn't begrudge him his time relaxing on the occasional Saturday with his best friend and his icebox.
They got to soccer practice late. Usually Marcia would just drop the boys off and get on with the errands she needed to run, but on this particular day she decided pretty much on a whim to park the van and stick around for a while. Maybe she would be able to meet with some of the other parents; perhaps she could even have a word with one of the coaches. Not about soccer, which she knew almost nothing about, but about her boys and how they were doing.
She had barely entered the field where they practiced until the weather got worse and they moved to an indoor venue when she came across Carina, whose son Collin went to school with her boys. Carina was a vivacious blonde who she knew Connor had a bit of a thing for, but this had never affected Marcia's relationship with her, as she knew how devoted she was to her husband Larry.
They talked animatedly about their latest news as the boys and girls were going through their stretching and warm-up routines prior to practice proper. Indeed, they got so involved in their conversation that they didn't notice that the practice had begun. Not, that is, until a ball came whizzing past them, just missing Marcia. A girl she hadn't seen before, who looked at first glance a bit too old for this group, ran past them to fetch the ball. Stopping briefly on her way back with the ball tucked under arm, she checked whether the women were okay, addressing her comments to Marcia, whose leg the ball had just missed. She spoke with a pronounced foreign accent, but she wasn't a Latino.
Marcia said she was fine, but as she did so she felt her heart skip a beat. Why this should happen, she didn't understand. She'd never so much as kissed a girl before, let alone fantasised about being with a woman. She could now see that far from being a participant, this girl (or rather woman) was one of the coaches. She couldn't be any older than 25, which made her at least five years younger than Marcia herself, who had just turned 31. She wore her brown hair in a ponytail and wore shorts and the official T-shirt of the company that organised the practice sessions. Her face was angular and spare as if she didn't get enough to eat; she looked to Marcia as if she had just arrived as an immigrant from a developing Eastern European country. Despite herself, Marcia noted that her chest was flat. In her mind's eye, she saw the girl suddenly strip off her shirt to reveal her sports bra but immediately dismissed it as inappropriate and unbecoming for her as a married woman of two children.
"She's an odd one is that Vesna," said Carina, looking after the athletic woman as she trotted away from them.
"Why's that?" replied Marcia, having recovered her poise.
"She only came over from Croatia a year or so ago and they say she leads quite a Bohemian lifestyle."
"Oh, Carina, you're showing your age," laughed Marcia. "Live and let live!"
"People say she has a lover - no, several lovers. And they aren't men."
"For heaven's sakes," said Marcia, trembling a little inwardly but fortunately keeping control of her voice, "this is the twenty second century. Being a lesbian, or at least bi, is the norm for young women these days."
"Well, it
isn't
for me," huffed Carina. "If I was a mother who had a daughter here, I'd pull her out of the class. Thank God mine doesn't like soccer!"
"Oh, Carina, whatever shall we do with you. I don't think this Venus, or whatever her name is -"
"Vesna."
"I don't think this Vesna is going to prey on 10-year-old girls."
"How do you know?" asked Carina, getting very emotional about things.
After a pause, she added, "I wouldn't trust her around my child whatever you or anyone else says."
Then, leaning in towards Marcia as if she was going to impart a secret, she added, "Even though people do say that she has a thing for older women,
married
women."
"Oh, Carina," Marcia said, taking every effort to keep her voice level as goosebumps spread up her arms, "you have the most over-active imagination of anyone I've ever met. The next thing you'll be telling me is that she's already hit on you!"
"She wouldn't dare," Carina responded. "Anyway, it wasn't me she talked to just now, it was you!"
"Perhaps she'll ask me for my phone number at the end of practice," countered Marcia with carefully crafted sarcasm. "Well, fortunately - or unfortunately - I won't be around then. I have errands I need to run. Call me during the week and we can grab a coffee together."
It was a shaken - and rather shaky - Marcia who made her way the short distance back to her car. The very idea that this Croatian girl (hardly a woman) could be interested in her (a Mid-West soccer mom) was so ridiculous that she actually chuckled to herself as she started the engine and backed out. But as she did so, an image of that angular face flashed in front of Marcia - so real that she stopped the car and checked the rear-view mirror.
"I know what you want," the face said, its lips moving in a strangely sensuous manner. "And one day you will come to me and I will give it to you."
Chapter 2
That evening, when Connor got back from his fishing a little the worse for wear, the boys were still up, it being a Saturday.
"Hey, Dad!" shouted Mark excitedly. "Guess what happened today?"
"I've no idea, son, but I know you're going to tell me."
"Mom nearly got hit by the ball. She was talking with Mrs Peterson not watching the practice and the ball was just this far from hitting her."
He closed the distance between his two hands to indicate what a near thing it had been.
"Not just that," chipped in Aidan. "Ms Coric - that's our coach - she ran over to check that mom was okay."
"Aidan, you do exaggerate so," said his mother. "She came over to fetch the ball. Of course, she wanted to check that Mrs Peterson and I were okay. That's called being polite."
"But normally the person who kicks the ball has to go and get it. That's the rule. Tommy was already starting to run when Ms Coric called him back and said she'd get it this time. And then we all saw her stop and talk to you. She must have thought the ball had hit you, but we could have told her it had missed you."
"Well, you know, these days people have to be so careful," said Connor helpfully. "They don't want to be facing a lawsuit for assault."
"You boys!" said Marcia, much relieved that the sting had been taken out of the situation byt her husband, even if she was hot under the collar beyond belief at the realisation that this woman had so obviously been making a play for her and had actually put some planning into it. "Such active imaginations you have!"
After the boys had gone to bed and she was lying on her bed still dressed while Connor was in the shower, she felt an overwhelming urge to play with herself. She did do this occasionally, but it was always when Connor was away on business trips and it was always him who she was thinking about when she touched herself. This time, though, it was this foreign woman, this stranger who filled her mind and caused the tingling down there.