William Corry's wife gave birth almost exactly nine months after they were married. It was never clear to either of them whether the conception took place before or after the ceremony, from a contraceptive failure or the forgetfulness of being tired and happy. But they were very content with the result, though they had intended to wait a while.
They did wait almost five years before trying for a sister for Robert, but Esther Corry died in an auto accident when she was five months pregnant. William did not think that he could care for a child by himself, but he did.
While he never remarried, he did come close a couple of times. And, in honesty, he slept with more women than that in the next dozen or so years. Maybe paradoxically, he was concerned about setting a good -- or discreet -- example for his boy, so all the bedroom activity was at her place or in motel rooms. Though by the time Robert was out of high school, he probably knew what was going on.
When the parents of his boy's girlfriend Holly called William that summer to talk about the plan to have her go off on vacation for two weeks in the woods with his son and him, he figured that Holly and Robert had been happily screwing for a while whenever they got a chance. And while he assured her parents that the two of them would be put in separate bedrooms at the cabin and that Holly's room had a door that could be locked from the inside, he did not mention that the rooms were adjacent. Or that he wasn't planning to watch for wandering in the night.
On the trip out into the country, Holly rode on the seat beside him, helping to navigate. You might think that she would want to be in the back with Robert, but after all they were going to have two weeks together. He saw that they had already gotten in a little fooling around in quick moments while they were loading up. And it did make it easier for him not to have to fiddle with the maps while he was driving.
After they got there and after they ate dinner, the three of them sat around talking about a lot of things. Holly said that the long trip, or that and a grease-fire they had passed, had given her a headache. And later he could make out from a half-glimpsed half-heard conversation she had with his son that she wanted him to postpone his advances for a while.
Robert took it philosophically, it seemed (they had two weeks together, as we've said) and he went to bed early. Holly stayed and talked with him for a while. Only a few minutes after Rob's door closed that night, however, she moved up to him on the couch and reached out her arms.
"I want you very much," she said to him.
He pulled away and said:
"Holly, I am much too old for you, as you have to know. This sort of thing would never work. You are much better off with someone your own age."