The Celebration Girl

Part One: Second Bachelorhood

Above the California landscape, the crystalline blue sky spread itself, and the sun - blunt and abrupt - shone brightly from its six o'clock position. John had just come home from work at the factory; he hadn't bothered to shower - he was much too tired for that. He sat in his living room in the cool air conditioning watching television. It looked like it was going to be a long, hot summer, and it was only the beginning of June. He took a swig of his beer, looked about himself, and decided he had settled well into his post-divorce life. (Though he still could not part with the wedding ring snuggled up against the flesh of his finger).

Katharine - his ex-wife - had fallen out of love with him and their divorce had been finalized only two months prior. She had fallen out of love with John and found herself in the arms of another man, a hotshot ambulance chaser who lived in the city. John had given all he had in their nine years together, but he could give no more: he refused to be played a fool and he was the one who had initiated the divorce proceedings twelve months prior.

And now he was free. He was a 52-year-old divorced man, "ripe for the picking," or so his buddies at work had told him. But he did not feel this way. He did not feel freewheeling or out on the prowl. He felt lonely. He also felt - quite frequently - an all-surrounding darkness knowing that not only had his marriage failed, but the manner in which it had collapsed.

He was waiting for Molly to arrive. He avoided preening and perfecting his looks; he was not on the lookout for a date, and besides, this was just a neighborhood girl who he knew through her mother and father. Molly and her parents had lived around the corner from him for many years and when she graduated high school four years ago, she had left the small 'burbs in her wake and headed to the northern part of the state to study business. She had arrived back home some days ago and had been enjoying everything a parents' home had to offer: homecooked meals, a fresh bed to sleep in in a room of her own (instead of having to share a dorm room), top-notch air conditioning, and a bathroom she need not wait in line for with the pushes and shoves of other half-naked college girls.

In John's friendly acquaintanceship with her parents, it was his understanding that Molly was to come over this evening to lend a hand. John - much to the chagrin of his pride and his stubborn, independent streak - found that he had avoided taking care of himself this past year by the usual bachelor tricks: hiring maids to clean his house, ordering Chinese takeout to feed himself, and doing the best he could to tame his garden, which, inevitably, always seemed to sprout weeds.

This is where Molly came in. She was to help him cope with his second and newfound bachelorhood. He had only seen glimpses of her since she had returned home from college, mowing the lawn, going out and checking the mailbox, or piling into a car with friends. He thought nothing of it; she just seemed to be a normal 22-year-old who wanted to enjoy life with her friends now that the four-year stretch of soul-searching and partying had come to an end.

The doorbell rang. John put down his beer, clicked off the TV, wiped his hands on his jeans, and opened the door. Standing brightly before him, in an almost ethereal light, was Molly. The small and fleeting glimpses he had had of her in the last few days had not done her justice. This evening she was wearing a snug, skimpy outfit, appropriate for summer girls on the west coast. And she glowed. Her blond hair shone almost like a (tilted) halo, a cap that invited itself to be knocked off her head in the obscenest of nudges. His eyes quickly swept across her figure. His mind searched its corners for something cool and intelligent to say, but, as he grew in his jeans, he could only say the words that first came to him:

"Please, Molly. Come in." And he stood back so she could enter the front hallway.

She stepped into the house and looked around. "Thank you, John. Looks like you could use some help around here."

He chuckled. "Yeah, I think so."

The young lady set down her purse and walked into the living room. It was not quite as clean as John's fantasies had imagined it to be. There was an initial awkwardness with each other: Molly was nearly a stranger to him now, and her looks were testimony to how much she had grown and changed over the past several years. Her provocative appearance was a welcome development to the middle-aged man and as she casually looked at the photographs on his walls and shelves, making pleasant chitchat and trying to envelope herself in his territory, he could not help but notice her new body that was so becoming. He tried not to stare or gawk, but the youthful blond in the intimacy of his living room made his voltage meter dance.

Molly was a marvel. She had not grown much taller since he last saw her up close (he guessed she stood about 5'1"), but her figure had grown out: her breasts were beautiful and full and slope-shaped, and her legs seemed long despite her short stature. She was wearing an outfit that he couldn't help but take notice of: Daisy dukes and a half top that was spread taut against her youthful, torpedo-like boobs. Her tummy was flat and toned, very small, and he was surprised at how tan and healthy she looked after only being home a few days. He noticed - to his new bachelor eye - that the rounded, lower part of her asscheeks protruded perkily, youthfully out of the legs of her denim shorts. (They, too, were also a delicious, tanned color like the rest of her body; he yearned to knead her tightness like sweet cookie dough).

Molly - sweet Molly whom he was liking more and more every instant -, her hair was a golden blond color, streaked yellow by the sun, and it ran halfway down her back. But her eyes - oh, those beautiful eyes he had never before noticed - how they seemed to reach into his soul; they were a light lilac color, and when she had greeted him at the door only a moment before, they had looked up at him under black, curled lashes, slowly, seductively, and a smile followed, a lovely film star smile that had immediately made his knees buckle and his penis drip with desire.

"Good grief, just look at this place," she said abruptly and picked up a food carton and sniffed it. "How long has this been here?"

He blushed. "A while," he answered vaguely.

Her expression softened to compassion when she saw his embarrassment. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have been so rude. What would you like for dinner?"

"Oh, I don't really care." He paused. "Thank you for coming over."

She waved her hand nonchalantly. "I'm happy to. Tell you what, you clean up the living room and I'll start on a great feast for dinner. Does pasta and bread suit you?"

He grinned. "It sounds great, thank you." He hesitated once more then spoke: "If you will share the dinner with me."

The obvious romantic suggestion seemed to go right over her head, and she nodded vehemently. "Oh, of course. I made the meal, I should be able to eat it. I'm an excellent cook, by the way."

And they got to work.

The two of them - coconspirators in a quest for a clean house - began their chores. Molly tinkered in the kitchen, occasionally making a noise with a pot or a jar, and John began working on the sitting room, collecting old sandwich wrappers from McDonald's, beer cans, newspapers, food cartons, and a copy of

Penthouse

that he didn't realize had been sitting out. Two red circles of embarrassment once more lit up his cheeks and he threw the magazine in the garbage bag he had, billowed and ready to be filled.

John had been so caught up in the attractiveness of Molly that he had neglected to think about his own appearance. He assumed he looked an awful fright, being that he had worked nearly half a day at the factory and had not bathed when he came home. His face was darkened with a five o'clock shadow; he was really a man who needed two shaves a day. But when he was showered, shampooed, and shaved, he realized he was an average-looking man with a twinkle of mischief and sexuality in the corner of his eye. His frame was tall and dominant at just a smidge under six feet and atop his head was a thick, beautiful head of hair - dark hair with little specks of gray - that he fretted with when around pretty girls. (And he found himself doing this now, preening and straightening the inconsistencies of his locks). Upon his nose he wore glasses, and behind the lenses were two, beautiful, intense aqua-colored eyes.

Being that he was in good shape from the physical labor at work, he often wore tight clothes that showed the subtle muscle and leanness of his frame. He was far from a bodybuilder, but his chest was taut and broad, and was tight enough to stretch a t-shirt from sleeve-to-sleeve across his pectorals. His thighs were strong and thick, but what he was most proud of was his rear end: it was not voluptuous or curvaceous like a woman's was, but it was flat and uninviting and plain except for a tiny

oomph!

where his buttocks met his thighs. This little plateau on the otherwise flat land drew the occasional woman towards him like a magnet, wanting to feel that cute pinch of tiny flab he had to offer.

After some time, Molly stuck her head around the corner into the living room. "How are we doing in here?"

He jumped with a start, and she giggled, a very high, feminine giggle that sounded like the flowing of a water stream, clear and crystalline. "Good, good. I'm doing good."

"Are you about done?"

"Just about. I just need to throw this bag out into the garbage and then I'll be finished," he said, holding up the bag of black plastic that stretched and shone.

She smiled and he smiled at her too, his eyebrows arched upward in a moment of complete submission to her charms, unbelieving at the beauty that had just simply shown up at his home as a favor through his struggle. "Good. Take the garbage out then go to the bathroom and clean up. Dinner is in five minutes."

John realized quickly that she was a bossy little thing, but he did as he was told and then sat himself down in his modest dining room that held a circular, wooden table and four wooden chairs. As Molly stood at the stove, doling out the food upon the two plates, his eyes glided to her inevitable, youthful glow once more, the soft sway of her lower back seemed designated for his hand. But he held off his urge and continued to watch her in the light above the stove, like some kitchen angel wearing obscene clothes.

John, realizing he did not want to appear useless, fetched them two sodas and sat down at the table just as she was serving the plates and a wooden bowl with bread and a plate of butter. As he lowered his body into his seat, he watched her pink, glittering fingernails put the plates down on the table, and, in the background, her tummy shone with youthfulness and health and a tan, summery glow that had been absent in his now ex-wife.

She, too, sat down and they ate together. His whole house - and his yard, for that matter - needed a feminine touch to make it presentable, if not beautiful again. But this was now and that was then - even God couldn't create the world in a day. They sat across from each other, quietly talking over the pasta. They had not known each other intimately from when she was younger, they had only known each other in passing. But this rule was to change sooner than either of them had expected.

Part Two: Mutual Attraction

The next couple of weeks found the older gentleman and recent college graduate together quite a bit. John would go off in the early mornings to his job at the factory and Molly would spend her days at the beach or going shopping or simply enjoying the arctic coolness that her parents' place had to offer. But, as each day drew to a close, the two of them came together, and John realized that much of his surrounding darkness had disappeared and was replaced by a profane and girlish light.

They had yet to be intimate; it seemed impending. The more Molly was around John, the more she liked him - he brought out the need in her to be a Florence Nightingale. She wanted to take care of him. Her more bossy, bratty side was often countered with a sweet, nurturing side and this latter facet of her personality is what John saw more often than not. His withdrawn nature that had made itself apparent when they met that first evening was rarely there anymore, and instead deep, chuckling laughter and high-pitched giggles took its place.

Over the fortnight, Molly had found herself more and more attracted to the older man. He was very sweet with her, always gently placing his hand on the small of her back when they entered a room together, or, standing by the stove preparing a meal that she had taught him to make, he reached for her hand to point something out; she always reciprocated his warmth and put her small, soft hand upon his shoulder, pressing her protruding breast into his side where he could feel the perk that nestled into him.

But in addition to that, Molly was delightfully devastated by how deep her feelings went. She had dated plenty in high school and college, and although she and John were not a couple, and had not yet kissed despite their casual touches, she found each thing he did solitary from every other man, and for that these things were all the more special: the way he'd nudge his glasses up on his nose while he read the paper and she cooked; that distinct and sexy way his age would show when he'd grin, and the lines around his eyes would spread out like the fingers of a hand fan; the way his deep chuckle would vibrate and sometimes carry itself throughout the house while they watched a bit of TV together, or when they laughed at something silly her parents had done in the past, the two of them finding it both amusing and ridiculous, not to mention arousing that their bursts of laughter seemed to match one another's open, breathing mouths.

Though it was not modern to do so, Molly had always envisioned a life where she would be a wife, mother, and caretaker of a family and household. This was not practical at her age or common, but she enjoyed each evening making sure that the material things in John's house were in order and that his spirit was high. They even tended to his garden by his front porch and as they knelt in the grass, side by side, planting flowers and extracting weeds, beautifying it in a way Lady Bird Johnson herself would approve of, they huddled in closer together as they gardened, the proximity of their bodies to one another becoming smaller and smaller as the attraction for each other grew.

For John's part, though it had only been a year since he had initiated the divorce proceedings and nearly three months since the divorce was finalized, he felt every bit of warmth for Molly that she did for him. He loved the way she stood at the stove, her belly button exposed, that smallness of her waist that he so gently wanted to encircle with his large and hairy arms. She was such a sweet girl and would've looked like she possessed the innocence of an angel if it had not been for her suggestive clothes and her flirtatious manner with him, her reciprocal manner when he reached out for her touch. And yet they had even to kiss, though his yearnings to neck with her rivaled that of a high school boy.

Their mutual fantasies provided them both with fitful, restless nights of sleep, one thinking of the other only around the corner, wondering if the object of their dream was, indeed, spotting that same star that he/she was, or if their little memories of the day prior was haunting the other in the quest for a good night's sleep. Their bodies tossed and turned as they tried to capture the ever-elusive art of sleep. Their bodies tossed and turned simultaneously, though in separate beds, and they preferred to imagine themselves rolling with this potential new lover, this new person they had had on their minds for what seemed like eternity.

And then the day of John's birthday was approaching; he would turn 53 on July 7. Molly knew that John had a gaggle of guy friends from his workplace - the eat, drink, and be merry kind of boys. Although out of this group, she had only met one man and his name was Frank. Frank was a short, stout man, shaped like a teapot, and wore a heavy beard and a thick mane of brown hair. He looked like a lovable lumberjack. He was joyful and always cracking a joke - usually at someone's expense, though this made it even funnier.

Molly had met Frank once while she was over at John's house. She liked him immediately in a platonic way - he was a jolly good fellow. Determined to top off the midsummer stride she had made with John with a bit of wet fun and adult entertainment, she asked for Frank's phone number (and, like any man would do, he gave it to her); she memorized it and called him the next day. She proposed the idea to him on the telephone: How about they plan a very

adult

, very

raucous

, very

sexy

birthday party for John at an adult venue called Sasquatch's Club? John had had a tough fifteen months and it was time for some fun. Frank quickly and wholeheartedly agreed to the plan, keeping all the nitty-gritty details between themselves, not ever squeaking a word of it to John, who was as naïve to the idea as a kindergartener.

A space at Sasquatch was rented for the evening of July 7. John would be there, willing victim to their party conspiracies, and so would Molly and Frank, along with four other of John's closest friends from the factory. They were all - as Molly guessed correctly - rough-and-tumble kind of guys, and when the six of them of them all sat down in the booth of a bar to plan the event, from the cost, to which club room it would be held in, to the food, drinks, entertainment, and music, each man, ranging in age from fortyish to nearly seventy marveled at the maverick brain of the young woman, not to mention the fabulous figure she flaunted in front of these panting adult men who had been fucking cheerleaders longer than she'd been alive.

And it was to be one hell of a celebration.

Part Three: The Celebration

Molly and the rowdy boys had made it to Sasquatch. It was July 7 at around nine o'clock in the evening. After downing a glass of wine to relax, Molly took one last look in the mirror. She was dressed in a one-piece swimsuit, a pale pink color, which cupped her breasts quite nicely in two big circles. Dressing her petite feet were stilettoes of the same color. Her makeup and hair were done in a 1940's fashion: her lips were a painted red color, her face shone with just a smidge of glitter upon her cheekbones, her distinctive lilac eyes were lush and bright with black mascara, and her long blond hair curled at the ends and was parted on the lefthand side, stuck with hairspray to keep it in place.

Frank and another man - whom she did not know the name of - helped her inside the cake. The "cake" was a four-foot-tall facsimile of an edible cake; a fake cake, you may say. It was held together by thick cardboard, glue, and staples. On the outside, it was pink with thick ropes of white "frosting" upon each of the three tiers until it narrowed to the top where she was to pop out at the end of the boys singing "Happy Birthday to You." John was en route to the adult club right now and, as he always complained, he was "the last to know."

In preparing for the party, Molly and the men had had the second floor of the Sasquatch Club rented and decorated for a wild night of partying, drinking, eating, dancing, and a good time. Streamers swooped from angle to angle in the octagon-shaped room where the main party was to take place. The room wore a rustic feel of wood and soft carpet, along with comfortable furniture for everyone to sit in. There were birthday balloons, a buffet table of meats, cheese, ribs, chicken wings, chips, and all sorts of other tasty little morsels that men liked to munch on, not to mention John's favorite: a chocolate cake. The stage was set, and the lights were dimmed.