This is the older woman/younger man version of a set of four separate, three-part stories. All are basically the same with slightly different character relationships. "It Doesn't Count" involves a brother and sister, "A Mother's Lust" involves a mother and son, "It Doesn't Matter" involves an older woman and her daughter's young ex-boyfriend, while "It Shouldn't Matter" involves a young woman and her younger sister's ex-boyfriend. You can read any or all of them, according to your tastes, but the vast majority of all parts of all stories are the same.
This is the third of three parts in the "It Doesn't Matter" short series.
-- The Author
*
Mrs. Laura Carver waited nervously in the bar, sipping her drink. It had been almost a week since their last encounter. They'd talked some, and met for lunch, but neither mentioned any of the events of the weekend. They flirted a bit with each other, but not much. It was as if none of it had ever happened. Now it had grown unexpectedly awkward.
Danny was her own daughter's boyfriend. Okay, ex-boyfriend, but Stephanie still loved him. She'd gone too far away to school for them to keep it together. And they were both young. They needed to experiment. They needed to experience other people, other lovers. But she wanted Danny back in the end, everyone sort of knew it.
Laura was never really sure what Danny himself wanted.
She should know, she thought. She knew him well enough. She'd known him since he was a little boy. She drove them on their first, cute little dates. She guided them out the door to the prom. She saw the look in his eye, pride, joy and terror at perhaps being exposed, when he'd taken her daughter's virginity, as if she didn't already know, or couldn't guess. She could still remember that look.
She helped the damn boy do his laundry.
It was all so close to incest, and cheating, it was hard to ignore. Yet Laura didn't feel the slightest bit guilty. It didn't bother her that they'd gone as far as they did. It bothered her that they hadn't gone farther. But she was afraid now that Danny never would, or worse yet that it might have driven them further apart. She couldn't bear that.
And she wasn't sure what he thought of her now. Was she a slut in the boy's eyes? Had he decided she'd gone too far? Had she ruined everything?
At least he'd agreed to meet her here, at a pub on a Friday evening. That was a good sign.
* * *
Mrs. Carver sat primly and properly at the bar, seeming stiff and distant. She must be embarrassed, Dan thought. Or she could be having second thoughts about everything. He'd never imagined she could be this bold, not Mrs. Carver down the street. She was careful, and reserved, even timid. She could be the life of any party if she ever tried, with her smile and her looks and her wit, but she always chose to hang back and play it safe.
He'd never seen such a beautiful, sexy wall-flower in his life. He couldn't understand why she was so reserved and insecure.
At least, she had been until they had started their game. Then she seemed to change before his eyes.
Not entirely change, Dan thought. She'd always acted that way with him, to some degree. She was always more open, and more in control, and more self confident with him. It was almost like she was a different person for him than for everyone else. She was always the loving, protecting, mothering type for the little boy down the block, the one that everyone thought would marry her daughter some day.
But now she seemed to be backing off.
"How was your day?" he asked her.
"Good."
"Just good?"
"Long. The day dragged on forever. The whole week has."
"Because you couldn't wait to see me?"
Dan regretted it the moment he'd said it. It sounded needy. He hated that, and he knew women hated that. Women didn't like needy, insecure guys. They liked a guy in control, a guy brimming with confidence.
But Mrs. Carver brightened at the comment. She smiled widely, then tried to hide it by taking a sip of her drink while fighting it back.
"Yes, a bit," she said after composing herself and swallowing.
* * *
They talked for a while about different things, stupid, meaningless things. Danny was a lot more comfortable and relaxed than Laura had expected. She started to think she'd had it all wrong. She got her confidence back. She decided it was time for one more try.
"My next exams are going to be a bitch," he was explaining. "Too much blowing off lately, and the courses are a lot tougher than my friends lead me to believe. I thought this semester was going to be a breeze."
"I'm sorry," she said.
"It's not your fault they're tough, or that I've been blowing off."
"No, not about that. I owe you an apology. I'm sorry."
"So I'm going to have to study harder. Maybe stay up an hour later every night, trying to catch up."
"It was my fault, not yours. I am sorry."
Dan was avoiding her gaze, looking into his drink.
"You don't ever have to apologize for anything, Mrs. Carver. Laura. I'm a grown man, now. I do what I want. You haven't made me do anything."
"Not for that, silly. When you were sixteen."
That got his attention. He looked at her with an expression of confusion held in check.
"Sixteen?"
"Yes, when you were grounded. For a month, I think it was."
"That doesn't narrow it much. I was always grounded, and it always seemed like it was for years."
