Eleanor was in charge of acquisitions for the library, but took her turn at the circulation desk like others on the small staff.
"Robert! How nice to see you. Gretchen said you would be home this summer."
The day was warm, and she wore a flowery summer dress in shades of yellow. Years ago, when she was my eighth grade teacher, I had a terrible adolescent crush. Now, after a marriage and a divorce, she had some lines in her classic features, and showed the effects of ten years of life in a small town. Tall, elegant, aloof. She was trim as always, but not in play. Her body language said 'not available.'
"Eleanor, you are a vision for my eyes. I come with an invitation for dinner. Mother says you must interrogate me about my foolish desire to finish an English degree."
Her smile was as quick as I remembered. "Oh yes, I certainly must dissuade you from that. Look what has happened to me, a single woman in a small town library with no prospects whatever!" The smile drifted into a momentary sad expression that said a lot.
"Then we can duel in front of Gretchen about life and love and the great American novel."
She reached out her hand to press mine. "You are the same young man who teased his teacher in the eighth grade, aren't you?"
I tried for a grown up male look with a challenge in it. "And you are the same beautiful woman who stirred me up in more ways than one."
The hand smacked my arm. "I see you have learned some grown up tricks. I will be there at six thirty. With wine." She turned to the man waiting with a book.
I jogged home the short two blocks, and changed for a more serious run. Mom, alone for several years, had a long list of house chores, but they could wait a little longer. I hugged and kissed her and was out the door. Running was my time to think. I'd spent much of the past year reading American novels, absorbing the uniqueness of our approach to an originally European genre. Americans were brash and idealistic about their great continent and its treasures. Europeans thought, in their cynical ways, we were hopelessly naive. And wrote counterpoint works full of irony and dissipated characters. At least they did until Faulkner and Hemingway and Woolf plumbed new depths.
I picked up the pace, substituting hard breathing for novelistic meanderings. I grinned to myself and looked at the watch. Three miles, time to turn around. Ever since humans developed consciousness, their minds had been at war with their bodies, never more so than when calling on them for a burst of energy to win a race. Now there was a good conundrum for the Darwinists.
My thoughts turned to Eleanor. She and my mother were good friends. Without men in their lives, they found things to do together and shared a common sense of the foibles of small town life. But neither was adventurous enough to do something about their quiet existence. I wondered what I could do to add spice and excitement.
Gretchen was sitting on the patio next to her new pool, sunning and reading a book. I leaned down with a sweaty kiss. Her arm went around my neck and the kiss deepened.
"Your father used to give me sweaty kisses. I would beat on him for being an uncouth rogue. He wouldn't say anything, just haul me off to the bedroom for sweaty sex and make me scream."
"If we weren't closely related, I would be hauling you off myself."
She pulled my hair and said, "You are a dear, Scott. I am so glad you are here. How long can you stay?"
I didn't answer, but dropped my shorts and washed in the outdoor shower before taking some laps. The pool was gorgeous, with black tiles in the bottom marking the lanes for laps. I had done a few when she turned up in the next lane, matching my strokes.
We rested at the edge and she said, "I called Eleanor and told her to come for a swim and a sandwich at noon. Perhaps you should greet her like this. She needs a man, but pickings are slim here."
"Cassie has won my heart. I don't chase skirts anymore."
"You are incredibly handsome. The young girls call you a stud, don't they?" She pressed herself against me and I pulled her tight. She needed a man too, and the pickings were even slimmer.
Even in the cool water, I was hard and she felt it. "Imagine, an old lady getting you aroused. I'm flattered." She wiggled and I reached down to grip her behind firmly and pull her hips to me.
I whispered harshly in her ear, "See here, Gretchen, if we are back in school and you tease me, there is only one result."
She drew back but her tongue traced my lips again. "I admit it, I was a terrible tease, but your father put an end to it. On our second date, I let his hands have my bare tits, and then tried to shut him down. It didn't work. I lost my virginity that night, and loved him for it."
I pulled her wet head to my chest and said, "I think I would have liked to know the coed Gretchen."
"But you have me now. Older and wiser and loving my grown up son."
I dried off and went to see about my email. She said she would fix some sandwiches if I made a nice fruit punch with some sparkling wine in it at the last minute. She hadn't bothered with clothes, nor had I, so we returned to the patio and lotioned up, relaxing in the warm sun.
I was dozing when a voice said, "Look at this. I'm shocked, simply shocked."
I sat up to find Eleanor shedding clothes as she walked across the terrace, smiling at mom and me.
"This is very decadent. Your son, ten years later, is making his teacher all hot."
As she shed the last of her underwear and dove into the pool, I said to Gretchen, "I had a terrible crush on her in the eighth grade, and never got to see that wonderful body."
"Cassie would complain about her?"
"Cassie is one of those wonderful women who trusts me, but knows I can't stop admiring the fair sex."
"How is she?"
"Torn over being away from me, but wanting to be with her parents, since this trip to Europe may be her father's last. His Parkinson's is getting worse."
Ten laps later, Ellie was in the chair next to me, handing over the sunscreen and asking for application.
"Gretchen tells me you have a wonderful girlfriend. May I have platonic application of lotion?"
"Foolish woman. You are every eighth grader's dream. Even college junior's dream. There should be a big husky male snatching my hand from you this very minute."
"Scott, when you walked up this morning, in all your grown up studliness, my girl parts tingled. If you weren't taken, I would be breaking small town manners and asking you for a date." Her look was molten and made my cock rise, which we both noticed.
Gretchen brought sandwiches and punch, which cooled the temperature. We talked about the library and how she enjoyed sharing her love of books and language with readers who were similarly inclined.
She explained that after her failed marriage, going back to Berkeley for a library science degree was a refreshing change. She hadn't intended to return home, but her ailing parents needed her. They were gone, but inertia and the comfort of her job had stifled thoughts of moving.
I put my hand on hers. "I loved the teacher, and I love the librarian. You will always be special to me."
She looked at a smiling Gretchen and then at me, her face tense with emotion. "Scott, that is the nicest thing a man has said to me in an age. May I have a kiss to go with it?"
She eased into my lap, the flawless warm skin reminding me of Cassie. The kiss was long and emotional. "God, I wish I could poach, but I won't. See you at dinner." Clothes in hand, the white rump disappeared inside.
I was hardly recovered when Gretchen was in the same place, another dose of flawless skin bringing back the same memories. She and Cassie had met at Christmas, and liked each other immediately.
"This is sheer torture. Guys my age are always on the lookout for fresh pussy. You expose me to two of the best and expect me to behave?"
I got a frosty look, "So your mother is reduced to being fresh pussy? That's a new one."
