We'd barely made it through the doorway before Zoe ran up to my wife Mary, threw her arms round her neck, and clung on as if she'd not seen her in years.
Mary hugged her back, stroking her long black hair. "I've missed you too, kitten," she said. Bonny leapt over, her tail wagging, almost knocking them over. I knelt and stroked her head before she could jump up on me and get her muddy paws all over my best shirt.
"We're in the garden!" Alison shouted. "Come on through!"
I snagged a beer on the way through, slapped away my eldest boy's hand as he reached for one for himself, and headed out into the glorious sunshine that was peering into the tiny brown-grassed garden of their council house.
We'd been friends with Alison's family for years; our kids met up at school and had grown up together. Everything had been great, until Alison's ex-husband's legendary drinking turned nasty. She loved Russell, but the threats and violence had escalated. The police seemed powerless or disinterested, but Alison and the girls were terrified. One night, while the scumbag was ten pints into a session down at the local pub, we packed as much of their stuff into our cars as we could, and drove them down to family in London, abandoning their lives in our once-idyllic town. Now, three years and a few mould-infested rental properties later, they were finally getting back on their feet.
Zoe had finally broken away from Mary, and caught me in the garden. She grabbed me from behind and wrapped her arms around me. Awkwardly, I felt her very female figure press into my back. Tactfully I pulled her laced fingers apart, and stepped out of her embrace. "Hey, kitten," I said. "You okay?" Through Mary - who follows all the girls' social media - I knew she'd just been through a horrid break-up; her long-term boyfriend had been cheating on her for months with her best friend. At a stroke, she'd lost her lover and her support network.
She looked up at me, and shrugged. "Okay, I guess." She looked at her feet, avoiding my gaze. Her black hair, highlighted with blue flashes, fell in front of her eyes.
"Chin up," I said, gently pushing her head back with a crooked finger under her jaw. I swept the loose hair back and tucked it behind her ears.
Mary and Alison wandered over. "You know what, fuck the pair of them," Alison said. "You're better than them both. You'll be with someone hotter by next week."
"Damn right gorgeous," Mary added. "With a figure like yours, you'll be beating them off with a stick."
Zoe looked embarrassed, and sidled closer to Mary. Alison smiled. "Well, you don't get it from me, that's for sure." In her past life, before her ex-husband knocked her up, she'd been a dancer; once pregnant she'd had to give up what could have been a promising career as a professional. Alison was short and slim, not exactly flat-chested but nothing to boast about. Unlike her eldest daughter, who more closely resembled a younger version of my wife. Zoe affectionately referred to Mary as "my mammary-mammy". Heaven knows Mary had enough to spare. Those genes must have come from Russell's side of the family; Julia was a waif, like her mother - and it was a constant battle for Alison to stop her youngest from stealing her clothes.
"Will you please stop growing, or you'll out-boob me!" Mary joked. Zoe looked embarrassed, but Alison just laughed.
"Those boobs are ridiculous; I swear I'm getting her new bras every fucking month."
I shuffled away. I mean, what was I - a forty-something man, an honorary uncle if not father-figure to the girl - supposed to say? "I agree, what nice big tits your teenaged daughter has"? I mean, talk about inappropriate. I suppose she was a woman now, her eighteenth birthday was months ago, but it still felt a bit icky to me.
Unfortunately, the conversation had sowed the seed in the wrong part of my brain, and being honest it was fertile ground. There was no denying she was attractive; stunning, even. It had been awkward, that week when Russell had broken Alison's ribs and the girls stayed with us while she recovered in hospital. I was accustomed to walking round the house naked in the night; now, I had to cover up. But they didn't seem so concerned with modesty; I'd accidentally catch a glimpse of skin and lace before clamping my eyes shut. Or I'd assumed it was an accident - they were just kids, after all. I was glad when they could go back home, so I no longer had to avert my eyes.
But Zoe was now an adult, turned eighteen half a year back, A-levels done and passed with distinction just before their recent summer holiday. She was undeniably feminine. Improper and inappropriate though I knew it was, my eyes continued to flick across to catch a glimpse of cotton pulled tight over her chest, or a peachy arse fighting the constraints of blue denim. Inappropriate not for her age - we'd both be legal, and between consenting adults age is just a number, onlookers be damned - but because of our past relationship, with me having played the role of informal guardian in lieu of her father.
But then I'd catch her eating - a hotdog, a banana, an ice-pole, somehow it was always something phallic - and my thoughts would run straight to the gutter. Was she looking at me funny, as she slid that ice across her tongue? I chided myself, guilt eating me up inside, and downed another glass of red. But my eyes knew no shame.
///
I sat on the sofa, in the dark, scrolling endlessly through social media.
Mary and I had forgotten to arrange which of us was going to drive home; by the time we realised, we'd both had a few too many. The kids were all bundled into the girls' bedroom. Mary and I had a sofa each in the lounge.
I couldn't get comfortable - I was far too tall to lay on the sofa. I was hoping that if I stayed awake long enough, numbing my brain with shit off the internet, that I'd just fall asleep sitting down. I looked enviously over at Mary, curled up and dead to the world. That woman could sleep anywhere, through anything.
The lounge door creaked open, and a head poked around. Zoe shuffled in, wrapped in a duvet. She looked over at Mary, realised she was asleep, and looked a little disappointed. Then she glanced round at the space beside me. "Can I join you?" she asked. I nodded, and she smiled. She dropped the duvet onto the floor, and plopped herself down onto the sofa next to me.
"Can't sleep?" I asked.
She shook her head.
"My boys keeping you up?"
"Nah, they're zonked. Bloody Julia keeps fidgeting and kicking me in the ribs."
The sisters were supposed to be top-and-tailing in Zoe's bed, my boys doing the same in Julia's. It had worked when they were all a lot younger, but really they were too tall for that sort of thing nowadays.
Her well-worn and beloved cotton nightie was too short for her, and so as she sat down it rose up over her bum. I couldn't help but notice the pink lace of her French knickers before she tucked her legs up onto the sofa, in front of her chest, and pulled the nightie over the top and down to her ankles, sadly hiding her curvaceous figure.
I tried my best to ignore her. But again, my eyes were my enemy. I could see the swell of her breasts, pressed out by her knees, casting shadows by the glow of her phone screen. I forced myself to look at my own device, making sure to close the more inappropriate feeds I'd been browsing. This was not the time to be caught aroused, and my animal nature needed no further encouragement to act inappropriately.
She scrolled on, seeming agitated. I saw her face, deadpan, but lip trembling. A single line of mascara ran down one cheek.
"Hey, kitten, come here," I said, and she slumped against my side. "It's okay, it's okay," I said, as I wrapped my arm round her shoulder. She slipped her thumb into her mouth, like she had when she was a little girl, and started stroking her nose with her index finger.
I could feel her shoulders shaking. "Sssh, it's okay, I'm here, you're safe." She sniffed, and buried her head in my shoulder.
Her phone fell into my lap. The motion and brightness drew my eye. It was a picture of a sexy woman in a tiny bikini, laying out on a towel on a sun lounger. The woman had a great figure - nice full firm breasts, lifted as her arms were hidden over her head, yet presented sexily in the top, and shapely thighs slightly crossed to conceal yet somehow highlight the space between. A toned stomach was decorated with a tasteful belly piercing. On the table beside her, a fancy cocktail with fruit and a paper umbrella.
My eye ran down the legs of this beauty, down to the comments underneath. There were a few likes... But it was the words that caught my attention.
