Satisfaction Pt. 02: Ch. 08 to 09

The plant opened to a good order book, but I was working or on call for long hours. I also was out of town on a regular basis seeing customers and their set-ups of our machine tools. Jill and I did not see as much of the kids as we would like, and our sex life tapered off by unstated mutual agreement. We settled into a comfortable relationship with much more typical sex frequency than the horny couple we once were.

As a diversion and for relaxation I did resume my contact and occasional fun evenings with Helga and Hans. It was some years before I told Jack about these side trips.

In the meantime, it would be remiss not to mention that through all of this Joan held the family together. At times this was far from easy. We bought her a car and she took on our role as parents carting the kids around from one activity or event to another, as well as feeding them. We also brought in help for five days a week to do all the cleaning and tidying up. Between our combined incomes we could now easily afford such luxury.

In case you've lost track, this was 1985. Alan was 18 and going into his final year before going on to University to study Urban Planning. After his growth spurt that saw him almost reach the six-foot-tall mark, his coordination became quite good allowing him to do well at squash. During the summer he took a job at my office and saved enough to buy an old banger -- so he used to take himself off to tournaments.

Brenda was still as obsessed with the piano and took up singing as well. She entered competitions and steadily improved in her rankings. As she became known she started taking better care of her appearance. She was a good-looking girl who attracted attention, but she only had an interest in playing the piano and singing.

Carol was our problem child. I cannot bear to write about her.

In all of this our youngest, David, just sailed along marching to his own drummer. He was obsessive like Brenda but in his case, it was for knowledge and understanding. He continued to be the star academic. He skipped a grade early on and he took summer courses to set himself up to enter University two years ahead. He was well-liked, but not a social being. We worried about his integration with his cohort, but he constantly told us he understood our concerns but not to worry on his account.

It was the last week of the school year and the first week of the school summer holidays in late June when our world turned upside down.

Though the winter and spring our life settled down to a regular and comfortable routine. There were ups and downs with the kids, but on the whole, we were generally pleased with the way life was treating us. This all changed with at the end of the school year. I felt ambushed by events. Looking back, I now realize I was paying too little attention to the kids.

The first was the big surprise about Brenda. She regularly entered piano competitions and lately she was winning a few. She qualified to enter a North East America competition held at the school of music in Rochester, New York. We all went down to cheer her on (so to speak). She won. The prize was a full scholarship to the highly prestigious music school. She was to start in the fall and would get her high school diploma from there. We were over the moon and had a great dinner celebration. Jill and I celebrated in our own fashion when we arrived home.

Two days later Jill had some worrying news from Helga about Alan. Although we hardly noticed it at the time, but our now adult Alan was once more going over to see Helga on a regular basis during the last two months at school. We casually enquired if he was once more having difficulties with his original learning problems. Alan very smoothly reassured us and muttered that Helga was helping him with something else. We left it at that.

Helga was worried we might be worried and confessed to Jill that she and Alan were having sex. Apparently, for reasons I cannot understand, Alan was uncomfortable asking about sex from us even though he must have known we were quite active. He chose to ask his old teacher. Jill invited Helga to come over to tell us more about the situation when Alan was not around. Jill and I discussed what we should do about the situation. We spoke about the value of a good education, our friendship with Helga, and how to avoid our own hypocrisy, after all he was now an adult at 18. We came to no conclusions until we had heard more.

Helga explained that she gave him the basics. Alan asked more questions. Helga told us he was a virgin and had no idea how to react to girls. He masturbated regularly. (No surprise.) She learned his main fantasy was her - his old teacher. He then wanted to know about kissing to start with and then graduated to asking about blowjobs and getting women off with his mouth and tongue. He moved onto breast and nipple stimulation, fucking and then anal intercourse. He came over to Helga as completely naïve. She told us she was flabbergasted that this child of wild parents could be so ignorant.

According to Helga he was relentless in his interrogation, and Helga crossed a line when they returned to French kissing. He did not seem to get the attraction of such a technique. Helga said she felt a demonstration was in order. From there they moved on to erogenous zones -- the neck, shoulder and breasts. Helga told Jill she quickly found herself naked to the waist. As Helga expected Alan was a quick learner and pleasured Helga, much to her surprise.

Helga quickly becoming topless formed the benchmark for Alan's further explorations. Helga moved to educating Alan in the joys of a well-crafted blowjob. She coached him to talk about what he was feeling and tell his partner what pleased him. She also insisted he ask her what she wanted and then follow up on the preferences. Helga reported on something we perhaps should have known. He has a large cock. Apparently, it was as long as Hans' and maybe a bit thicker. Helga's eyes sparkled a bit when she described his fine penis.

Things progressed with Helga fucking Alan, or more accurately the other way around. He was apparently polite and thoughtful in his pleasuring of Helga. She became flushed as she described Alan's quick progress as a student. Both Jill and I also became flushed as Helga became more and more graphic in her descriptions of what Alan had done to her. She was almost in rapture as she extolled his stamina. She, and we, were aroused. She stood up and wiggled herself between us as we sat on the edge of the sofa. Helga looked at me and pulled my head to her lips and we kissed for a minute or so, then she turned to Jill and did the same, at the same time reaching for my hand, which she pulled to her breast. I could feel her hard nipple. Her hand left mine and found its way to my now very ready cock.

We started and eventually finished a long languorous threesome two hours later. Helga dressed and left without any resolution of how we should approach Alan's relationship with her.

The following few days Jill and I avoided talking about Alan, and Alan kept going over to see Helga for a few hours at a time. The only casual remark that was made referred to the fact Alan would be gone to University in late August.

I think Jack covered that fairly well. Although I must say I felt a tinge of double jealousy both for Helga, who I loved in a special way, and for Alan as a man and my son. I did have the wicked thought that I had to see his cock and contrived to "accidently" go into his bathroom when he was showering. He was singing to himself loudly and pulling himself off under the shower. He did not see me, but I did see him and had a fairly clear view that confirmed what Helga had told us.

It was two weeks after we were celebrating Brenda's success and a week after Helga's revelations that tragedy struck. They say things come in threes. Carol was killed in a car accident.

She was out with her older friends in a car. They ran into a tree at the end of a curve in the road at over seventy miles an hour. The only consolation, if it can be called that, was that death must have been instantaneous for all of them. I can write no more than to record this terrible event.

I will add nothing to this. The period of blackness lasted for over a year for all of the family.

I tried to bury myself in my work, as did Jill for a while. We both found we were no longer working the ridiculous hours and spent more time at home together. We saw Helga and Hans on a regular basis, but purely on a friendship basis.

Alan was away at University, Brenda was in Rochester and David was studying the whole time, hell-bent to move onto University. We had all the usual family gatherings. These events did get lighter as time went on. As the grief slowly fell away, I think we all felt there was a hole in our lives, as we still do to this day. A new normality established itself. The only person to never recover was Joan. She wore black for the rest of her life and cried at the slightest and even oblique reference to Carol. The life went out of her and we found ourselves forced to look after her considering all the years she had done the same for us.

Again, Jack has that about right. I also cried a lot that year, as did Jack.

Things changed quite quickly after two years of our quiet stability. Our factory was a great success. It was a case of being careful what you ask for. We were subject to a hostile takeover by one of the American giant companies. We were unable to resist the takeover. I quickly became surplus to needs. I blessed my friend Mike. I could retire on the compensation from my parachute package.

A month later Jill was called in by the new Japanese boss who had been appointed to run the Canadian operation that an organizational restructuring was to be implemented and her position was going to be redundant. She was offered several alternative positions, none of which attracted her. After we had some long conversations, she agreed to go for the alternative of a severance package.

On the principle bad news comes in threes the third thing, once more, was blow. Joan was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. She refused all chemo treatment.

We were both free from work obligations to nurse her through the last six months of her life. The kids, bless them, came home to visit Joan as often as they could.

We enjoyed our newfound freedom until David took off for his undergraduate degree in biochemistry. (Our sex life picked up a bit, but I was still seeing Helga on a regular basis.) Then we spent a full month touring around Europe eating well, trekking, drinking copious amounts of wine and beer and touching many of the cultural spots. We regained some of our intimacy but never to the degree we had earlier in life. (Even better. Had a few dalliances with young men in Italy, a woman in Switzerland, and a pair of male dancers in Berlin. For me it was all about forgetting.)

Our arrival home was fun. Helga and Hans put on a welcome home party with all our friends and all the kids. Alan brought home a girlfriend, taller than him. She gave a stunning impression with her long legs, blue eyes framed by a pretty face, slim figure with small breasts and long blonde hair. (I suspect from the way she looked at Alan she benefitted from being well-serviced as a result of Helga's tutelage. I wondered if she knew about Helga.) Brenda played and sang for us. We were able to shoulder the gap left by Carol's absence with some stoicism. At the party I saw Jill was earnestly chatting to Mike in the corner. I had become somewhat more possessive of Jill over the last few, difficult years, and felt a pang of jealousy for a moment.

The next day I asked Jill what she had been chatting with Mike about. She told me that he would speak to me directly. I was now curious and a bit suspicious. I called Mike. He asked to come over, not wanting to discuss anything over the phone. I was even more suspicious.

After we had settled down with a cup of tea Mike gave his spiel. It was nothing like I had imagined. He proposed that we all form a limited liability partnership as industrial consultants. I had a track record in product development and implementation. Jill had linguistic, accounting and semi-industrial sales experience and he knew the legal side of matters. I liked the idea and was getting antsy sitting around at home. Jill felt the same, I think. (True.)

We started on the next phase of our life. We developed our business plan and gave it five years to take off to be a solid income source.

Our main challenge was to find clients. I used my computer skills to develop an online presence on the new Internet, but Jill did most of the hard work. We identified our markets together, but it was Jill who sold our services. We worked out of Mike's office where he kept a stripped-down legal practice going, using his secretary and a clerk.

After a period when we were unable to get our foot in the door, I thought we'd been foolish to attempt forming the consultancy, then after about eight months the work began to flow in slowly at first but gradually built to a flood. Word had got out.

Oh, Jack. Sometimes you are so naïve. I worked like a dog to get those initial orders. And yes, a few of them were acquired on my back. That sounds harsh. Actually, it was fun to flirt and lead guys on. If they didn't suggest a drink together after a late afternoon meeting, I did. Usually at the hotel bar. I chose the way I dressed carefully. Bar stools are great for showing off plenty of thigh. If there was chance of closing a deal, I put out more and more. On those occasions I landed the contract in my hotel room. I secured handful of the early deals in that way. I know this is news to you, Jack. Forgive me partner, I took one (well actually more than one, or two or..) for the team.

Do you remember our first big contract? The one for the after-market auto accessories with everything from tow bars, hubcaps, modified exhaust systems and so on. It was a medium-sized firm that had effectively broken into the American market. They couldn't keep up with demand and were a mess but were reluctant to let work and sales go by. The firm employed about sixty and was owned equally by four brothers and one sister who had taken over from their father who'd developed the company from scratch. We ended up having an ongoing contract with them. I landed that deal.

You may not remember, Jack, the weeks we took to develop a good sales package and the slick flip chart presentation I put together (long before PowerPoint was invented). I must have shown it to almost thirty companies without so much as a dollar's worth of business. I carefully tweaked the presentation after each failure. I was frustrated at the lack of success. I also blamed myself for the failures. I was also was quite desperate to land our first contract. We were ready. I was ready. Why could nobody see what we had to offer?

With the foregoing background, let me tell you how it went down. You are free to believe this or not.

I met to make the pitch to all five of the principals. The oldest guy was between forty-five and fifty, and the youngest was the woman who seemed in her late twenties to early thirties. All of them were good-looking dressed in jeans and casual shirts. The woman was dressed in smart dress pants and loose sweater.

Their offices were located in a rather rundown, separate single-story building away from the plant. The meeting was held at the only time they claimed they had available -- Friday afternoon at 4:30, in their rather musty boardroom, decorated around its perimeter with samples of their products. We met at snooze time. They were not much for comfort with old chairs around a solid conference table. It was soon apparent they were all a bit skeptical that we could do anything for them. I had my flip charts and was barely into it my pitch when I noticed one of the guys was already nodding off. I kept going. When I saw another head begin to nod, I suggested a break.

I was going to give you a blow by blow, so to speak, of that meeting, but I'll just give the bones of what went on. Basically, I improvised. I proposed a slow strip tease in reward for questions they asked. Two questions for one button undone on my blouse. It certainly prompted a response. And so we proceeded. I ended up naked. The sex challenge started next, ending up in an old-fashioned orgy well into the evening. I was well fucked. and landed the contract. I proposed the package you soon saw and had them sign on the spot. Perhaps it is the only time a major contract was signed with all the principals totally naked.

You may recall that we did get that company improving efficiency by over 100% and allowing them to expand into the US market where they made a killing. We are still on retainer to them to this day, as I remember it. You may also recall I used to make an annual reassessment of their operation It was one of the highlights of my year.

There is not much more to say -- the consultancy continues today with well over a hundred staff. It is a publicly-traded company that developed a life of its own nationally and eventually internationally, diversifying into all types of industries and activities.

I can say with certainty that the company may have been built on the shoulders of successive generations of bright people, but it started on my back.

The only coda I can add was the fact that all our children did very well, marrying and having fulfilling careers, with each having children of their own. Unfortunately for us, the only grandchildren nearby are Alan's. Brenda settled in London, England married to a high-powered banker with a love of opera. David lives in New York working at a high-level in the UN administration and married to gorgeous Kenyan lady who has given us all three lovely children.

Helga stayed in our life on and off. Hans died in his late fifties. Helga was called in to help Alan's son with some of his reading problems and we believe she also educated him in matters of the heart and groin in the summer after he was eighteen and before he attended University.

Helga is still a good friend. We still hold hands and talk regularly laughing about our antics when were younger. Celia, Brenda's eldest daughter, is in England and has had no first-hand contact with Helga as far as I know, and certainly not with Hans, so the mystery of the naming of the great-grandchild remains.