This is the story of how, as a man of 63, desperate and bereft after my wife died, I was eventually was solicited by and paid our 22-year old neighbor for sex. It's a story that in some ways is pathetic, but to me it's also erotic. I'll tell you right now that I came to love her, even though I don't think she ever loved me. She had affection for me, and I think came to really like me, and I know I made her come several times. But the reality is that she wouldn't have done the things we did together if it wasn't for the money. But Miriam may have saved my life. She was and is an amazing, complicated, and even now mysterious woman to me, and so it will take a while to tell our story—or at least my side of it. Like many things in life, our story was as much about the journey as the destination.
I was a professor of history for more than 30 years, and my wife, Helen, was a high school teacher. We fell in love in grad school, worked hard and got our degrees, struggled and then succeeded in finding jobs in a new city, had a boy and a girl, both now grown and with careers of their own far away. We had ups and downs of all sorts in life and marriage—and then suddenly, before I was ready (and thought I'd go first, somehow), it was over. As simple and as complex as that, one day my wife keeled over and died of a heart attack.
I was pretty depressed, and in fact still struggle with it on a day to day basis. In retrospect, maybe I shouldn't have retired early, even though the house and the cars were paid off, and at that point I was somewhat burnt out on my job and tired of my colleagues. Many professors, as you can probably guess, can be royal pains in the ass. And I include myself in that. Even though I didn't like the seemingly endless faculty meetings and committee meetings, and was finding publishing a bit of a challenge, I still loved the teaching. But the students kept getting younger and younger, and the tough truth was that I was beginning to lose my touch with that as well.
Travel, hobbies, and that historical novel I always said I was going to write called. Before we'd gotten to do much of that, though, Helen was gone. And then it was just a struggle to keep going day by day, and I didn't feel like doing much of any of that stuff I'd planned. I felt like I was going to die of a broken heart, and maybe I was starting to. The daily loneliness was often a lot to take.
This story begins six months after Helen's death. Our kids were no longer visiting much, I was still going to therapy and had my prescription for anti-depressants (that I didn't take, because I was worried about the side effects), and was still just trying to figure out how to survive.
It was when I was out walking my dog, and she was doing the same with hers, that I met her. My little rescue poodle Fluffy loved people, but wasn't so good with her own kind, and tended to bark as part what might be called her Napoleon complex. But suddenly this beautiful brunette with slightly longish nose that I hadn't seen before was smiling at me and my dog with amusement, and her sweet and patient golden retriever seemed to almost have the same reaction. She looked a lot like Natalie Portman in her early 20s, although taller and not quite as "perfect."
"Are you Mr. Benson?" She asked, as our dogs sniffed and wagged at each other, and Fluffy once-in-a-while barked. She was dressed in blue jeans and a medium blue form-fitting t-shirt, and I could see she wasn't wearing a bra, because her nipples and the entrancing shapes of her perky medium-small breasts were making themselves known through the fabric.
Looking at her liquid brown eyes, which were sparkling with amusement (I'm pretty sure she'd caught me admiring her breasts for a half a second), I said, laughing a little, "Yes—you must be a mind reader. But I'm afraid my powers are weak. I have no idea who you are! You can't be a former student, because then you would have called me 'Professor Benson.'"
"Well," she said, bending down to pet my dog and make funny faces at her, "if this is Fluffy, then I guess I am a mind reader."
I could only laugh for a second in amazement, as this beautiful young woman worked her charms on me and my dog. And I realized it had been a while since I'd laughed.
"I'm amazed at your powers, young witch," I said, trying to keep up with her, and added, "Are you a recent graduate of Hogwarts?"
She smiled at what was a clichéd cultural touchstone for both of us, but played along, and said, with an Emma Watson-ish British accent, "You've discovered me! But you must never tell."
"I won't," I replied, and I couldn't keep from smiling broadly as I got down to pet her dog as she petted mine. And then she finally said, as we looked at each other between the wiggling dogs, "I recognized you because of your dog. My parents told me to look out for a distinguished-looking gentleman walking around the neighborhood with a little, white poodle." As she got up, she said, "They told me who you are, and asked me to look out for you."
I had felt younger for brief while as this lovely young woman, seemingly from nowhere, flirted with me a little, but now suddenly I felt old again. I was "distinguished." An old man who had lost his wife and was being looked out for. A widower. I stood up.
Miriam saw what must have been a look of pain and weariness cross my face, and looked concerned.
"Are your parents the Ottingers?" I asked, trying to smile politely.
"Yes!" She answered with too much enthusiasm, but going back to her British voice: "You're a mind reader too! Did you learn Legilimency from Professor Snape himself? Or perhaps you taught him?"
"Yes. I taught Snape," I said in my faux British accent, rather like Alan Rickman's snide voice, which is something I did sometimes to amuse my American students, "Or, Severus, as I always called that little snot!"
She laughed, which was a sound like mischievous angels, or classical music mixed with alternative rock. She was genuinely amused and surprised, but I could sense she was also playing it up a bit to make me feel good.
"Well, I'm Miriam, their daughter," she said, holding her lovely, tanned, and slightly hairy arm sideways with her elegant hand out, almost as if she were inviting me to kiss it. I resisted the temptation (what would the neighbors say if they saw?), and gently but firmly shook her hand instead, saying, "It's very nice to meet you, Miriam. Your always parents speak very highly of you."
"Not always, I don't imagine!"
It was true that her parents, who'd invited me over for dinner shortly after my wife's death, had mentioned that their daughter was academically gifted, and a very hard worker, but also a bit wild. At the dinner, since I was still in the raw part of grieving, and had trouble keeping up my end of the conversation, they'd rattled on about their daughter a little too much, and a little too honestly. I knew, for instance, that she had lots of boyfriends, one girlfriend they'd been introduced to, and also that once she'd been busted for pot by the campus cops at her elite liberal arts college. With the legalization of pot in some parts of the country this seemed more amusing to them than awful, and I tended to agree.
"Anyway," Miriam continued, as I was clearly lost in thought and not sure what to say, "my parents asked me to look out for you so that we could invite you over for dinner again. Is there any day this week that would work?"
"I should check my calendar, but I'm afraid to say that I think all the evenings this week are free. I have symphony tickets at some point, but I think that's next week. Or the week after that. Anyway, please thank your parents and tell them I'll give them a call."
She smiled, and said again in her British accent, "I'll tell them, Professor Benson. And may I say it's been *such* a pleasure to meet you."
"The pleasure's mine," I said in my regular voice with a genuine smile, "but please call me Rick."
***
The dinner was good. Sarah and Michael Ottinger were both good cooks, and the food was delicious. But I had to keep myself from staring at Miriam, who was wearing a black, elegant and yet slinky, somewhat low-cut dress. The tops of her perky breasts were on magnificent display, and I had to be very conscious to maintain eye contact, and honestly when I thought no one was looking I sneaked a peek a few times. She was a knock out and she knew it, but why she was dressed like this for an old man like me, I couldn't figure. I guess when you've got a figure and a face like hers, and an outgoing personality to match, it's a case of "if you've got it, you flaunt it."
Finally, Sarah got around to asking me a serious question of how I was coping. As I've already said, I was pretty depressed still, and although I tried to hide it, the topic just didn't help conceal that.
