TURN THE PAGE: Part Four
Preface:
The tale of Theresa 'Terri' Murphy continues with her leaving her hometown of Medford NJ to cross the country, moving to Los Angeles CA to await her husband Dean's return from Tokyo Japan. Her love of literature, and her meddling family, had caused Terri to join a creative writing class in NJ. It was there she met Abraham, a writer turned lecturer, who opened her up to another type of sexual experience along with cementing her desire for black men. He also encouraged her to take ownership of her base desires by writing up her sexual adventures and learning from them.
Mid-March has found Terri moving into Dean's rented apartment in the Playa Vista area. It was quiet, safe, and best of all only a short run to the beach. Her contact with Dean in the week since he had left for Japan was sporadic at best and had only entailed texts and emails because of his workload. If Terri had been suspicious, she might have thought he was avoiding her but since she was the one who had been cheating on him, she assumed it was her own guilty conscience twisting an innocent situation.
There had been one final parting gift from Abraham before Terri flew out to California, she now sported a barbell nipple piecing on each breast. The procedure had been quite painful for Terri, but she had to admit she liked the effect and how they looked under a tight t shirt. The healing process was underway but there was still sometime to go.
Waiting for Dean's return, a complete stranger in this new city, Terri had already fallen back on her old habits of solitude, but she was trying to mitigate it through achievements. She would rise early, go for a run on the beach for a few hours. Her physical appearance had now become very important to her since Abraham had admired it so much. After her run and lunch, she would write for a few hours, quickly reread, and edit her work before sending it on to Abraham. This writing routine had been in place for a few weeks now and she felt she was improving all the time; Abraham had also been very complimentary about her submissions to date.
Chapter 1:
Terri stretched out at the end of Venice fishing pier. It was still early, just after 8am on a beautiful Friday morning, so the foot traffic was still fairly light. There were a lot of negative things someone could say about living in this city but the view of the Pacific early in the morning as the sun rose behind the city, adding a sparkle to the waves, that was certainly worth living here for.
It was her fourth day exercising, her fifth day in total in LA. She normally took a leisurely stroll from her apartment down to Venice beach before warming up by stretching and then running the length of the beach from the pier to Crescent Bay Park and back again, a distance of nearly 5 miles.
She took her time on the runs, enjoying the sights and smells of the beach community. There were a few others like herself who preferred a run at this time of the day, and she exchanged nods of greeting with those she had passed before. It was a lot warmer than home at this time of year and a sheen of perspiration covered her skin by the midpoint of the run, alleviated slightly by the light waft of wind from the Pacific. However, once she got back to the pier and started to cool down, she found the cool ocean breeze to be less beneficial than it had been during the run itself.
Terri carried a small backpack with water, a towel, and her sweats to cover her running gear. Both her shorts and top were form fitting and perfect for running, just not so much for wandering the boardwalk afterwards. Terri had noticed more than one man staring at her breasts, the piercings quite visible, as she exercised.
After a warm down stretch, she would put on her sweats and wander down the boardwalk, getting a drink and maybe something light for lunch. As she had each day before, she gravitated towards a small informal chess area, just some picnic tables that were being used by people to play on. There were a lot of older men here, a large proportion of them black and each day Terri had found herself relaxing, looking on as they played.
There was one man in particular who had caught her eye and she thought, well hoped actually, that she had seen him glancing at her as well.
He was sixty she thought, perhaps even a couple of years beyond that. His head was shaved clean although he kept a well-groomed goatee of grey/white hair. Physically, he could only be described as a handsome man. Tall, unbent by age, he wore a sleeveless top that showed still strong arms and a torso that hadn't surrendered entirely to middle age spread. Although to be fair she couldn't deny that he had a thicker build now than he probably would have sported in his prime. He didn't appear to have any tattoo's which again made him stand out from a lot of his peers who were gathered there, however Terri could see a puckered scar, just above and lifting his right eyebrow, giving him a slightly sardonic expression. Overall, he looked every inch the older Alpha she was drawn too.
Curiously, unlike the others seated playing, he tended to play either alone or with one of several young men, all black, who would occasionally wander over, play a quick game, and then leave. The others tended to play with their own age groups.
The first three days that Terri had seen him she had hung back, content to watch while she drank and ate some snacks. She had kept her sweats on and her head down mostly, feeling less than attractive after a 5-mile run. This day was different though.
Terri hurried through her warm down stretches, eager to get changed. As she worked her Quads a young man approached her. Like Terri he was dressed for a run although he appeared to be getting ready to start rather than finishing up. He was good-looking, reminding Terri of the poster type for Californian surfers with his long blonde hair and blue eyes.
"Hi" he began cheerfully as he walked over to her. "I see you are just finishing up, do you run here every day?"
"Yes" she replied continuing to stretch, "Same time, same place so far."
"Maybe you'd like some company next time? I could..." He trailed off as Terri firmly shook her head.
"Sorry, not looking for company." She said and flashed her wedding band towards him.
Crestfallen he moved off, starting his own warm up routine a bit further down the beach. Terri walked over to a café she'd been frequenting on her days by the beach. She waved to the guy behind the counter and went straight to the restroom. She had added some makeup to her backpack and Terri tried to fix her damp hair, added some lipstick, and generally tried to look less sweaty and dishevelled. She had also fitted the Q pendant to her navel piercing, the first time she had worn it in public since arriving in Los Angeles.
Terri felt a flush of pride as she regarded herself in the mirror. The shy uncertain girl from New Jersey was barely to be seen in the reflection. The old Terri was a pale shadow on her memory now, this was a new Terri, more confident in her life, her looks and her desires.
She collected her drink and smiled her thanks to the café attendant and headed out to the Chess area as she had come to think of it.
Moving past the few casual onlookers around the tables she found a position on the edge where he couldn't fail to see her, she also opened the front of her sweats so that her tight top, which was cropped in order to expose her bare midriff, could now be seen.
He was still studying his board, absently stroking his chin, and talking softly to the younger man across from him. To be honest, even standing this far away from him, Terri found him intimidating. He had a presence and it wasn't just her, she had seen how others had given him a wide berth when walking through the area and no casual passers-by had tried to strike up an impromptu game with him when he was alone.
While she was engrossed in studying him, she had failed to notice his companion had left, so that when he looked up from the board, he caught her openly staring at him. Terri swallowed nervously, she couldn't look away, just like a deer caught in the headlights. He smiled but it didn't seem to reach his eyes. The man then swept his hand towards the now empty chair, clearly inviting Terri to join him at the table.
