When we came to the end of the first episode;
It was February 1975 and Billie and Jim had been married four and a half years. Their daughter Sarah was four and baby son Jon eight months. Jon's birth had been particularly difficult, requiring an emergency C-section which left Billie with an embarrassing scar on her abdomen, a constant reminder that the procedure had left her infertile.
Billie now sees herself as
no longer a complete woman.
A vital part of Billie's sex life has always been her ability to reach climax, but since the caesarean she has not had an orgasm during sex with Jim. She feels guilty that she is no longer satisfying her husband as she used to. Jim always saw her orgasmic responses as an important part of their lovemaking.
One evening in bed alone, she allows her hands to wander over her body. As she quietly masturbates, an image of Roman, the husband of her close friend Jana, intrudes as an unwanted fantasy in her mind. It trips her over the edge into an explosive orgasm.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
One Year Later
Jim had now been with his father Jack at JWSManufactures for three years and, at 27, had become the driving force in the business. While Jim was taking the business in new directions, Jack was spending more time on the bowling green. Jim was introducing new products and processes, as well as dealing personally with important customers. He decided that the family house was no longer impressive enough to meet his needs, so he bought a vacant block of land and engaged an architect and builder to build their dream home.
This added to Jim's daily workload, instructing the architect and the builder while running the business, so Billie became something of a go-between. Quite often her day would comprise taking Sarah to school, then taking Jon with her while she went to the block with their instructions for the builder. In the afternoons she would collect Sarah, go home and make dinner, then spend the evening discussing progress on the new house with Jim. It was all very exciting. Often, their discussions would lead to a new set of instructions for Billie to take to the work site tomorrow.
Making love between husband and wife was not as frequent as it had been in their heady days as newly-weds, or when everything had returned to normal after the birth of Sarah, but it was still frequent enough for a very busy couple and it was a reasonably satisfying experience for both of them when it happened. But Billie could feel that Jim was starting to lose some of the enthusiasm for sex that he had before she became so deeply scarred.
They had talked about the physical scar, and Jim understood that she wanted to keep it away from public sight and that she preferred him to avoid it when his hands roamed over her body. That was the easy part. What she found impossible to explain fully was the emotional scar.
She tried to get him to realise that with all the things that had happened to her she just didn't have the same feelings about her own sexiness. She tried to explain that she was upset that she wasn't able to satisfy him as she had done before the caesarean. "It's my fault and I can't do it for you like we used to," she said.
"Don't be silly, sweetheart," Jim dismissed her concerns. "It's all OK. You worry too much."
'If only I could get him to understand,' thought Billie. 'If only.' Although, when she thought deeply about it, she had to admit that she didn't fully understand it herself.
A few weeks after the end of the children's swimming lessons, Jana had invited Billie and Jim to her place for dinner. Neither she nor Roman had met Jim, and she was keen to strengthen the friendship she had formed with Billie. Billie was still a little wary of Roman, but Jim quickly became quite impressed with him and invited him to look through the factory and perhaps give some advice on the automation and control systems.
In turn, Jim and Billie invited the other couple to a backyard barbecue Jim put on for Billie's quarter century birthday. Jana flirted shamelessly with Jim, which he playfully reciprocated. "He can put his boots under my bed any time he feels like it," she said to Billie. Billie laughingly responded that she got him first and his boots belonged firmly under her bed and weren't going under anybody else's. But, she wondered, how far would Jana go if she ever had the opportunity?
Roman, on the other hand, behaved as the perfect gentleman when in Billie's company. She was starting to feel much more comfortable in his presence. 'Maybe I was wrong about him when we first met,' she thought. 'And maybe it was just an accidental brush in the swimming pool when he touched my boob.'
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Barrington
Jana had become quite interested in Jim and Billie's new home, and had visited the construction site on a couple of occasions with Billie. It was finally coming toward the lock-up stage and the builder was working with the tradies on the interior, the services and painting. The architect, Barrington, was now making frequent visits to the site, advising the builder on colours and fixtures and helping Billie decide on appliances and furnishings.
Barrington was what Billie described to Jana as "A bit of a lair." He was undoubtedly handsome, with longish sandy hair which he usually pulled back in a ponytail. "He really overdoes the 'architect as an artist' thing," she said. "He even calls his office 'The Barrington Design Studio'. He only seems to have that one name - I don't know whether it's his first name or his surname. And burning around the place in a canary yellow Lotus is a bit much for a bloke who must be pushing beyond fifty. I don't think it's a second childhood - he probably hasn't left his first one yet. But Jim reckons he's good at what he does and he uses a lot of stuff the factory produces in his commercial jobs. That's how Jim first met him."
"He sounds interesting," said Jana. "I've got a bit of a thing for older men. They're more experienced. Is he married?"
"Oh for goodness sakes, Jana," replied Billie. "You're beyond hope. Apparently he was married, but Jim said he went through a messy divorce a few years ago. Anyhow, the important thing to me is what he's doing with the house, not what he does in his private life."
"Well, I want to meet him. And he drives a cute little Lotus? So when's the next time he'll be at the house?"
One meeting was all it took. When Jana saw Barrington arriving and extracting himself from the Lotus, she said to Billie "Hmm, yes. Looks interesting."
Billie made the introductions and the three of them went through the house discussing progress and a few new items Jim had asked Billie to check with Barrington. Then they went outside to talk about the landscaping and the pool area. As Barrington prepared to depart, Billie went back inside to talk with the builder and Jana walked down the front of the block with Barrington to where he had parked the car.
"I'm going to Barrington's studio tomorrow," Jana said as Billie drove her home.
"Oh no!" exclaimed Billie. "Surely you couldn't? What, I suppose he invited you up to see his etchings?"
"He didn't mention etchings, but he does have a few models of some of the commercial work he's done and I said I'd be really interested to see them. If I do get round to seeing them, I'll tell you what they look like."
"I've already seen them; I've been there," said Billie. "I went with Jim." Billie put a lot of emphasis on that last sentence.
"Well then, it's probably best you don't tell Jim that I'm going there," replied Jana.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Jana's Story
"You didn't tell Jim anything about Barrington and me, did you?" said Jana.
It was two days after they had met Barrington at the house. They had delivered Sarah and Jason to school and Jana had invited Billie around for a 'coffee and a chat'.
"No, I just said that you did your usual thing when you met Barrington at the house. The same as you do with Jim. The same as you always do with men. I didn't say that you were going to the studio, or what I thought you were thinking you might do when you got there. You asked me not to," replied Billie.
"That's good. Barrington doesn't want him to know. They do business together and Barrington doesn't think it would be good for Jim to know that he fucked one of your friends."
"Oh no! You really did do it!" exclaimed Billie. "I really was hoping it wasn't going to happen."
"It happened all right," Jana laughed. "Twice. He's good."
"What did you tell Roman?" Billie asked. "Did he know where you were going and what you were going to do?"
"Yeah, I told him where I was going and I told him afterwards what had happened. But he's not all that interested in the details. He just wanted to know that I had a good time."
"So what are you going to do now? Are you going to see him again?" Billie was hoping that the answer would be 'No'. It was bad enough that it had happened this once and she was expected to keep it secret, but having to hide her friend's on-going relationship would be a horrible burden.