Once a year my extended family would get together. We are a close-knit tribe so it wasn't just the descendants of one set of grandparents but multiple interlocking groups with 3rd cousins multiple times removed included. I could never keep track of who was who beyond my aunts and uncles and first cousins. Each year organization of the event would pass from one major branch of the family to another, and this time one of the wealthier members had gone all out hosting the event at his palatial estate. Tents were pitched, sports fields created for competitions, live music, dancing in the evening. You get the idea. It was more like a wedding with good food than anything else.
One dirty little secret was that often times one distant family member would end up hooking up with another distant family member. So the family tree had quite a few interlocking incestuous branches! My family had moved out to California in the 1950s, so we were the more laid back and progressive ones. But the majority of the extended family still lived in the same 100 square miles area it had originated in. The majority were conservative, church going, and a bit boring to be honest. I only came to humor my mother and to get to see all my closely related relatives.
I was a bit long in the tooth for this crowd still to be single at 40. It's not that I didn't want to settle down it was just that I had prioritized making a living and being a financial success above all else for so long that I never had taken the time to take a breath and realize that so much time had passed by. Sure, I'd had girlfriends along the way - but nothing serious. Word had gotten around that a good looking, fit, and well-off single man was at the party and discrete inquiries were made by distant aunts and uncles to my parents about several prospective old maids and divorcees. But I wasn't interested in goods past their expiration with probably difficult personalities. Instead I threw myself into having fun with my cousins most of whom were a decade or more younger than me.
As the night wore on, the older folks left the stage, leaving me with the younger crowd. There was one gaggle of barely legal girls that looked like they were still in high school that joined our group on the dancefloor. They were gorgeous with thin coltish figures and pert breasts. One girl in particularly came over to me. We danced a while on and then took a break to have a drink and cool off. Her name was Brianna, she had just turned 18, and she was fortunately very distantly related to me. She had magnificent mane of orange ringlets, piercing green eyes, pale alabaster skin, long toned legs and orange sized perky breasts. She was cute and girly - not quite a woman but not a child either. She was debating what to do next - take a year off before college, go to college right away, or just get a job. I told her to seize the next opportunity that would further where he long term goals were. She was refreshingly honest that what she wanted more than anything else in the world was to be the mother of children and to support her husband. It wasn't very 21st century she admitted but she needed to be true to herself. She asked where I was staying and what my cellphone number was in case she wanted to follow up on the conversation. I thought to myself she was smart, articulate and beautiful with a kind heart. I only wished she was 10 years older and with a bit more life experience under her belt. We parted ways when her friends grabbed her away to do something else.
Around midday the next day I got a call from a local number that I didn't recognize. It turned out to be Brianna. She was wondering if she could come over and see me before I left the next morning. I wasn't really sure what to say - she was less than half my age after all. Not exactly girlfriend material and what would the wider family think about it all. But in the end, I rationalized that we were only ships passing in the night and I probably wouldn't see her again for another four years when our next family reunion was scheduled. So later that afternoon, I heard a soft knock on the door, and ushered Brianna into my hotel room. Brianna was wearing a fashionable white blouse that tied at the back showing lots of flesh, and a pair of khaki shorts that emphasized her long beautiful legs. I would be lying if I said I wasn't immediately aroused.
She came up to me and gave me a gentle embrace pushing her breasts into me chest and blasting the scent of her fruity smelling hair into my nostrils.
"John, it's so good to see you again. I've been thinking about what you said last night about seizing your chances in life and making the best of them, not letting anything pass you by." she said.
