They say love is blind and for me this turned out to be absolutely true. But first let me tell you a little bit about myself, my name is Elizabeth but everyone calls me Liz. Jack and I have been married for almost thirty years so you can gather that I’m no spring chicken at the grand old age of fifty-three. Luckily being a sports teacher I have managed to keep myself pretty fit even though gravity has had some affect on certain bits.
When I first met Jack I took to him straight away, he was a gentleman in every meaning of the word. I was a virgin and Jack was very patient with me, I can laugh about it now but I was even scared to touch his penis, but he slowly and gently guided me into the wonderful world of sex.
For the first five years we regularly made love and then I fell pregnant and nine months later gave birth to a beautiful baby boy, Jack called him E.T. for the first couple of weeks and we were both very happy with our new son. I lost interest in sex and once in a while I would do it just to keep Jack happy, but it got less and less and now for the past two years I had no interest at all. I know Jack gets extremely frustrated and he made many attempts to initiate sex but I just wasn’t interested even though I still loved him dearly.
Our son has since left home and set up house with his girl friend and our lives have become mundane and somewhat predictable.
It was a summer’s day and I was sitting in the garden reading a novel when Jack arrived home from work, he looked depressed and had a very serious expression on his face as he walked out into the blazing sunshine.
“What’s the matter, a bad day at work?” I asked innocently.
“We need to talk,” was his blunt reply.
I put my book down and turned to face him, he looked uncomfortable and kept fidgeting with his hands.
“What’s the matter?” I asked once more.
“I can’t take it any more, I’m not going through the rest of my life like this,” he said without averting his eyes from the floor.
“Then you’ll have to look for a new job,” I stated naively.
“It’s not the job it’s you, I do love you but I feel we are more like brother and sister, there is no way I’m going to spend my life in a sexless marriage, so I want a divorce,” he said with a slight quiver in his voice.
I was shocked, I thought things were okay and this came as quite a bombshell almost leaving me speechless.
After a few minutes I said, “but if you love me, why? Sex isn’t everything.”
“Not to a woman maybe but to men I’m afraid it is important and to this man it’s very important.”
We hardly spoke for the rest of the evening, I was still sure that come the morning he would have reconsidered his outburst, but it was not to be.
The next morning the silence continued over breakfast, Jack ate very little and suddenly left the table and went upstairs, a few minutes later I followed him in the hope of getting him to see sense. As I walked into the bedroom he had two suitcases open and was filling them with his clothes.
“Jack this is ridiculous, we still love each other and if sex is that important I promise we can make love at least once a fortnight.
Jack burst out laughing, “oh yes that will solve everything, you’ll force yourself to have sex with me, that’s what you are saying, and I thought you liked sex, at least that’s the impression I got when we did do it.
“I do, I really do, but my love for you transcends sex, you know I would do anything for you apart from the sexual things, I just don’t think much about it,” I knew my reply was a little tenuous but I was trying to find the right words. “Please this is silly, what do you want me to say?” I continued with a hint of desperation in my voice.
“If things change I’ll stay, but it has to be on my terms and no arguments. Firstly we will have sex no less than once a week and whatever I want and whatever I want to do we do otherwise its goodbye, he said authoritatively.
This was not the Jack I thought I knew, but did I want to lose him when all I had to do was open my legs when he wanted sex, was it such a high price to pay.
“I’ll do what you want, if that’s what it takes for you to stay, then you can have sex whenever you want it, except when the painters in of course,” I replied without really thinking it through.
“Whenever and however,” he stated once more.
I nodded agreement even though deep down my heart felt heavy that we can fallen to this level.
For the first two weeks we made gentle and caring love to each other and my fears were soon forgotten and to some degree I was enjoying the special attention Jack was giving me.
It was now the week when the painters were in so foolishly I believed Jack wouldn’t be interested in making love but it seemed he had different ideas. As I lay propped up on my pillows reading a Patricia Cornwall novel his hand wandered around my stomach and he hugged me, I gave a little smile which soon turned to a snarl as his hand moved to my breast and grazed my nipple.
“Don’t please, you know it’s the wrong time of the month,” I said trying very hard to control my annoyance that he was even trying.
