Two years! That's what it had been. Two years since Roger left me for that floozy ... that jezebel. What's a 46 year-old (now 48 year-old) woman supposed to do at that point? It's not like I could really start another life. I was smart and had a good education. I went to a great college—which is where I met Mr. Right, who turned out, over the next 25 years, to be so wrong. But a quarter-century old degree in English literature—even from UCLA—wasn't going to open any career doors for me now.
I didn't need a career for the money. I'd been a stay-at-home mom for my entire adult life, while Roger rose in an aerospace engineering company from engineer, ultimately to Chief Operations Officer. He made a ton of money and the judge decided half of everything we owned and half of everything Roger made for the rest of his life should go to me. I was in fine shape financially.
And it wasn't really that I'd lost such a prize. Over the years, our relationship had not just cooled; it had gone into a deep freeze. To tell the truth, there were times when I couldn't stand Roger—when just the sound of his voice or the noise he made when he brushed his teeth made me shudder.
It wasn't a great marriage; it wasn't a great life. But it was my marriage and my life. And now it was gone. And there was nothing to put in its place. I tried getting involved in community groups, reading groups, church groups—all of that. But most of the people bored me to tears. After a while my time and attention gravitated to gardening. I could have paid some undocumented alien to do the yard work. He would have done it better and faster than I could. But I had to fill my life with something. This seemed as good as anything else I'd found. So, with the exception of mowing the lawn, which I was happy to subcontract out, I took care of practically everything. I planted the annuals, pruned the roses, trimmed the trees (at least the short specimen trees) and raked the leaves.
It was pleasant enough. My house, which used to be our house, was a large one, on a hill overlooking the local community college campus. There was often a pleasant breeze to refresh even on a warm summer day. And, through most of the year, I enjoyed watching the students walking to and from the school and mingling around the public areas of the campus.
As time went on, I began to enjoy my gardening and watching the students. And my enjoyment grew in the early spring when the track team and the soccer team would work out. The soccer fields were just down the hill from my house. And both the soccer team and the track team had a running course through the neighborhood that took them right past my house.
I got to know the individual athletes—not by name, of course, but I recognized them. I started to take what was probably an unhealthy interest in them. In my mind, I named them—sometimes for some actor they looked like (a 'William' for a William Hurt look-alike, an 'Owen' for one who looked a bit like Owen Wilson), but sometimes just randomly. They noticed me noticing them. Some of them started waving to me. At first, I thought they were mocking me. Maybe they thought of me as that crazy old lady on the hill who's always out in her yard puttering. But as I got comfortable enough to wave back to them, I came to think that they were really just being nice.
When it got warmer in the late spring, I began setting up for them a large pitcher of ice water and glasses. I'd put it on the low stone wall at the front of my property and invite them to stop for a second and get a drink. I didn't know if this was somehow breaking their training, but they certainly appreciated it. They were always grateful and very polite, "thanks, mam," "that was great, thanks," and so forth. We never exchanged more than a few words, but it was a pleasant time of my day.
I won't pretend that my interest was purely altruistic or maternal. I liked looking at these young, hard bodies. What woman wouldn't? It reminded me of when I was young and made me think of the boys I'd dated before picking my Prince Charming, who turned into a frog. I especially liked it when the guys were sweaty. I'm not sure why. I was never really into muscle types. But their bodies glistened with fresh sweat and I found that very erotic.
One day, after the guys had already gone by, I was out trying to trim a tree with one of those cutters on the end of a telescoping pole. I shouldn't have been trying to trim this tree myself. Even with the pole cutter, it was a hard reach and branches I was trying to cut were big enough that it was really difficult for me to exert enough force to make it through the branch. I was standing on my tiptoes, trying (without much success) to push up on the pole while pulling down on the rope, when I heard a voice behind me.
"Would you like some help with that?"
It startled me and I spun around, letting leaving the pruner dangling in the tree. It was a guy I'd dubbed 'Tom' because he bore a passing resemblance to Tom Hanks. He had the same friendly, folksy smile.
"Well, sure. If you can spare the time." I was grateful for the help. I'm not sure I could have gotten through the branch on my own.
Tom, as I still thought of him, stepped up to grab the pruner and made remarkably short work of lopping off the branch. Unfortunately, the branch twisted as it fell and the rough end of the branch scraped a long scratch down the inside of his left leg. It didn't look too bad at first and Tom tried to shrug it off. But within a few seconds, there was a line of blood down the entire scratch and it was actually dripping from the scratch in a few places.
"Oh, we've got to get that cleaned up," I said. I felt terrible that Tom had hurt himself trying to help me.
"It's okay. It's only a scratch. It will stop bleeding soon."
"No," I said resolutely, the maternal instinct in me coming out. "We've got to get that cleaned out. It won't take but a second. And I won't have you going home bleeding from helping an old lady."
