Willow

Willow went on, "You know Ross, I would have stood by him had that been all. I told myself we all make mistakes and he was my husband and Ann's father so..."

"There was something else?"

"Yes; the media made a big noise about the case and then all sort of things came out. Other women...other girls came forward to accuse him. Where pregnancy was concerned he only slipped up once; the other girls and women could not really prove he'd seduced them, but then the practice nurse came forward and gave evidence."

"Practice nurse?"

"Yes, my husband was a doctor."

"And he had sex with the nurse as well?"

"So she claimed, but she also told of her suspicions as to what was going on. I think most of the women were really out for revenge. Each of them thought they were the only one and when it all came out about the pregnant girl and then all the other women, that brought a storm down on him. The trouble was it brought a storm down on Ann and me as well.

"But why, it wasn't your fault?"

"Perhaps not, but the media got hold pictures of Ann and me and they were splashed all over the place. Reporters practically besieged our house asking silly questions like, 'How do you feel about your husband?' How the hell did they think I felt?"

"What happened?"

"He was struck off the medical register for malpractice and they put him in prison for eight years. As I said, I might have been able to stand one stumble, even an under-age girl, but all the others, no. When it was all over my parents helped me to get away. As well as prison there were compensation payouts to some of the women. We were well off financially and there was money left over after all the payouts and I was able to sell the house and a few other things, so I'm not broke. When I came here I had been divorced for six months, and fortunately Ann was too young to really know him or understand what was happening."

Having experience such exquisite and gentle sex with Willow I had to ask the question that was burning inside me.

"Willow, what I don't understand is why having a lovely woman like you as his wife he needed to go elsewhere?"

She shrugged; "It often happens. You can see men with very attractive wives going off with quite plain women. In his case it was quite easy; he was charming and very good looking; he was in a position to meet lots of women in the course of his work and so...?

"But surely he must have known the dangers?"

"Probably, but I believe he went ahead because he had something to prove."

"What?"

"Well, you see, he had a very small penis and he had to be constantly proving his virility. I didn't know his penis was small because I'd never experienced one until I met him. It was he who used to complain about it to me, telling me that one day I'd go looking for what he called a "bigger cock to be fucked with."

That was an "Aha" moment for me. I now understood why she had referred to my penis as being so big and asking me to be gentle with her. I don't think I'm so big – not above average, but I'm not even sure of that since I've never made comparisons or taken measurements.

Willow was still speaking; "That was why I would have forgiven him over the girl. Feeling so sexually inadequate he needed to prove himself."

I felt a nasty jolt inside me as something Willow had said fully registered with me.

"Am I the 'bigger cock' that you'd go looking for?"

The moment I'd said it I knew how devastating my words were. Tears came to Willow's eyes; this time they were tears of anger.

"Is that how you see me?" she said in a tone that seared through me. "A slut on the loose looking around for the biggest cock she can find. I thought you loved me and I've loved you and trusted you enough to tell you my story, and you say a thing like that to me. I know it was me who initiated sex between us, but I thought it was for love, and now you think it was because...Oh my God, you've made it cheap and horrible."

I went to her kneeling down in front of her trying to take her hands but she withdrew them.

"You'd better go," she sobbed, "you wouldn't want to associate with a cock mad whore."

"Please...please Willow," I begged, "I didn't mean it...I told you I'm a clumsy fool...it's me. It's just that I can't believe that a lovely women like you would want to...could love me enough to let me...let me make love with her. Please, forgive me; you're the loveliest woman I've ever known and you've taught me so much about things...about love...so please..."

I took her hands again and this time she did not withdraw them. Still clumsy but desperate I said to her, "If you never want to have sex with me again then I'll understand, but don't send me away. I know what love is and who I love, so don't cut me off from you."

The previous night I had seen her almost like a child wanting to be sheltered from a storm, now it was me who was the child begging not to be sent to my room.

She withdrew one hand and touched my face with it saying, "Yes, Ross, perhaps you are a clumsy fool after all, but I love you for it. You're so open, so vulnerable and you say the first thing that comes into your head so at least you're honest. Any woman you love will never need to worry about you going off with other women; you wouldn't be able to hide it if you did."

"If I were married to you, Willow, I'd never need to go looking for other women."

She looked at me long and hard before she spoke again. "We can't talk of marriage, darling."

"Why not?"

"I'm older than you, I've had child by another man; you'll be starting your studies next week; you have your life in front of you."

"You mean I haven't anything to offer you?"

"Of course you've got something to offer me, something that's very precious to me, your love, but I couldn't let you make promises that you might come to regret in the future."

"I'd wait," I said, "Would you wait for me...wait until I do have something to offer you as well as love? You could teach me not to be so clumsy and I could prove I can be faithful to you."

She smiled wanly and kissed me softly on the lips. "All right my darling, let's leave it like that for now, let time do its work, and in the meantime, let's enjoy each other as much as we can."

Chapter 10 The Heights and the Depths

For the rest of the week and until my parents returned I spent every night making love with Willow, leaving early in the morning before Ann woke up. We also copulated briefly in the afternoons when Ann was sleeping. These were the halcyon days but we both knew they could not last. Once my parents returned our loving became a sneaky affair, but if we thought we could hide what we were doing we were wrong.

I had started my studies and so my days were taken up, but we came together in the evenings as often as we could. The frequency of my going out in the evenings had to eventually arouse my parents' suspicions and I'm sure some of our nosy neighbours were not slow in telling my mother where I was going.

I was nineteen and so was free to have sex with whoever I chose, but was also mindful of the fact that my parents had sacrificed a great deal for my future, so I was loath to let them think that I was putting that future in jeopardy. When the moment of confrontation came it was not just my mother this time but the parental team.

"I warned you about that woman," was mother's opening gambit. "She's got her hooks into you – and don't try denying it because you don't go over there every night to mend things. She's a conniving hussy and I've a good mind to..."

"Hang on a minute Freda," father interrupted, "He's not a kid so you can't put all the blame on her."

Apparently the parental team was not altogether of one mind.

"Look Jim," mother countered, "She's years older than him and she's got a child; she thinks she's on to a good thing with Ross."

I broke in at that point; "Mum, what good things do you have in mind, my money, the life of luxury I could give her?"

"Well, she's...she's like a lot of these women on their own; she sees a nice looking boy and thinks, 'I fancy him'. She's just leading you on, using you."

I decided on giving them a broadside and said, "Willow and I love each other, and if down the track she'll have me, I shall marry her."

"Marry," yelped mother, "What was I saying, she's got you well and truly hooked."

"If she has its because I want to be hooked," I said, starting to get angry. "If you took the bother to find out you'd find she a lovely woman, you said so yourself once."

"That was before..."

"Freda," broke in dad, "she's a bloody sight better than the tarts he used to hang around with and if he's happy with her why shouldn't he be?"

"Well...well...because it...because its not right."

"Why?"

"Because she's married," said mother making a desperate grab for anything to serve her argument, or lack of one."

"She's divorced," I said.

"Come on Freda," dad said, "she's a nice enough little woman and if she keep Ross away from those others we ought to be thanking her."

Mother humphed irritably and said, "But marriage?"

"Mother," I said patiently, "I said down the track if she'll have me."

"Well there you are then," chimed in Dad before mother could speak again. "She might even be good for him; teach him a few things." He gave me a surreptitious wink. "Come to think of it he's been a lot more reasonable lately so why make a big fuss about it."

"All right," said mother, "but don't let him come crying to me when she's had enough of him."

That seemed to settle the matter, but mother had one more shot in the locker.

"And don't think you're going to go and live with her, it'd be the talk of the neighbourhood."

I humbly agreed that I would not go and live with Willow, but not for the reason she thought; I had Ann in mind.

Without going into too many details I told Willow what had occurred with my parents, and that we didn't have to hide our relationship from them any more.

Thereafter we may have been, as my mother said, "the talk of the neighbourhood" for a while, but it quickly died down. Willow, Ann and I went out together frequently and my relationship with Ann developed to the point where I could almost have moved in with Willow, but Willow still wanted to give it more time.

At the end of the first term of my course there was to be a week long study seminar at a convention centre up in the hills. It was an opportunity to hear guest speakers and demonstrators from other parts of the country. It was hard to be separated from Willow for a week, but she seemed to understand and all seemed well.

The week before I was due to go to the camp Willow seemed unusually tense and the night before I due to go away there was something almost frantic in her love making, and as the time came for me to leave she began to cry.

I tried to comfort her saying it was only for a week and she nodded miserably. Her last words as I left her were, "Remember I love you."

It struck me as odd that she should be so upset at not seeing me for a week, but I suppose I found it a bit flattering.

The week proved exciting as we were introduced to new concepts and technologies, and I returned home full of ideas.

Naturally my first action after dropping off my gear was to go and see Willow. I rang the door bell and there was no answer. I tried several times, and then took a walk round the house in case she was out the back, but there was no sign of anyone, not even the dog Penny.

I felt a bit put out as we often do when we call on someone and they're not there, especially when it was someone like Willow whom I hoped would be expecting me.

I went back home but during the course of the evening kept going back to Willow's house. The place was silent and in darkness. I told myself that she must have gone away, perhaps to the seaside for a day or two. Next day I tried again with still no response; finally I bit the bullet and asked mother; "Have you seen anything of Willow the past few days?"

"No, but Mrs. Beasley saw her drive off in her car with Ann and the dog; haven't seen her myself."

I started to feel really anxious. I kept going over to the house and it had that shut up look about it, as if the owner had gone away for some time. Over the next couple of days I continued trying with still no result. Then I had to get back to studies.

Sick with worry I came home late one afternoon to a triumphant mother.

"There, I told you so, she's gone."

"What do you mean, gone," I gasped.

"Removal van came today and took her things."

I felt an air of unreality and my head was reeling. "Then she must have come back...you must have seen her...what did she say?"

"Didn't see her, there was some fellow there who looked like an agent, but she wasn't there. Gone hasn't she; told you she'd dump you when it suited her."

I raced over to the house, unable to believe that Willow would have gone without a word. A glance through a window told me she had gone, left without a word. I felt like vomiting.

"She can't have left me, not like this," I told myself, but the following days and weeks adequately demonstrated that she had done just that. I tried to find out who the man my mother thought was agent was. No one knew; they had not even noticed the name on the side of the removal van.

I tried every way I knew to find out where she had gone without success; it was just as if she'd disappeared into the ether.

From being triumphant my mother started to become concerned. I felt ill, and was ill. I couldn't eat or sleep and I even had crazy thoughts about killing myself. It was as if with Willow gone from my life I had lost half of myself, the best half. And then one morning I collapsed on the kitchen floor.

They called it all sorts of things that I couldn't comprehend and dosed me up with medication. I was given what they called, "Professional help," but it was the lady who came and cleaned my room who really understood. About fifty years old and working hard for a pittance she said to me, "You're love sick son, and when you've got it bad it does terrible things to you." She kissed me on the cheek and went on, "You'll have to give it time." Of all those who had talked with me she was the only one who really seemed to understand, and I loved her for it.

They discharged me soon after and I went home and tried to pick up my studies again. I scraped though at the end of the year and got a lot of "Tut tutting" from the head of the department.

"One of our most promising students and if you'd got any less marks you wouldn't have been allowed back next year."

Another long vacation; one year since I had first met Willow, and still I was infected by her; I had no enthusiasm or wish to pursue my old ways with the girls. Willow had left me without a word, yet I still loved her and perhaps, with youthful sentimentality, I thought I would spend the rest of my life waiting for her.

I went with my parents on trip, first to a seaside town and then to the mountains. I swam, I climbed and walked and slowly I seemed to recover. As my cleaning lady had said, "Give it time."

After the vacation I went back to studies and over the following years my work improved and I finally graduated near the top of my year and had a number of job prospects. Before taking them up I decided on a few days hiking over the hills that lie at the back of our city. There are a chain of hostels scattered over the hills and I arranged to sleep in a number of them.

My mother drove me to the start point of my walk and for two days I trudged along the tracks. Even after all that time Willow had never left my thoughts. At times I hated her for what she had done to me; at others I knew I still loved her passionately.

On the third day I came to the top of a ridge, and below me in a valley was one of the small towns that are scattered throughout the hills. I was carrying dry food, but decided to buy a pie in the town. There was just one shop that sold a whole variety of goods; the sort of shop that was once often seen before the coming of the supermarkets. I entered it.

Chapter 11Confrontation

The customers were served and left. The shop was very quiet as Willow and I stood looking at each other. The shock of seeing each other and the consequent banalities left us speechless. Her face was ashen and I think mine must have looked the same. One word welled up inside me and came out as a whisper; "Why?"

She made no answer and simply stared at me as if paralysed.

Anger born of years of incomprehension and misery rose up in me and it took all my self-control not to seize and shake her; "Why, why the bloody hell... why?"

My vehemence seemed to shake her out of her immobility and she said in a husky voice, "Please Ross, don't shout."

I was really furious and I spoke even more loudly. "You left me without a word, not a single bloody word. You must have known that last evening before that week I went away...you must have had it all arranged...you had to have it arranged, and all the talk of love was so much bull..."

"Ross, please, you're frightening me."

"Frightening you! Bloody hell woman, what do you think you did to me? You could have stopped the thing right from the start but you let it go on...you led me on with your soft words, the poor little innocent woman who needed help who took my love and then chucked it back at me. You used me; God knows why when there were plenty of horny guys who would have fucked you with no consequences, no commitment, but you let it go on."

"Ross, I did it for..."

"Was it fun, did you have a good laugh when I wasn't around, do you have a good laugh telling whoever's fucking you now?"

I was fuming but another customer came in looking curiously at a frighten little woman and a furious young man. She asked nervously for something, paid and scuttled out of the shop. I open my mouth to continue my ranting but Willow got in before me, this time with ferocity of her own.

"Be quiet Ross, you may be able to frighten me but you shall not talk to me like that. It's foul, evil and whatever I deserve it's not that."

I spoke more quietly; "So tell me what you do deserve, and while you're at it tell me why."

"I did it for you, it was the best I could do for you Ross."

"Best for me! God help me if you ever decide to do your worst for me."

The shop was one of those places where the owner lives in accommodation behind it. There was an archway screened with long plastic strips that obviously led into the living area. The plastic strips moved and Willow saw them and said, "In a moment darling."

The lower part of the door was hidden by the counter and Willow made a move toward whoever she was addressing. She was too late. A small child of about three came round the edge of the counter and for the moment I thought it was Ann, but then realised that Ann must be at least six years old.

Like Ann the child resembled Willow with her elfin look but as I stared fixedly at the child I could see there was one marked difference, it had dark brown eyes.

Willow hustled the child gently back into the living area quietly telling her that she would be with her in a moment. Then she turned on me, this time with a defiant look.

I was gasping for breath but finally managed to choke out, "Is she..."

"Yes; I didn't want you to know but since you've seen her you might as well know or otherwise you'll be calling a whore of something worse."

There were no words I could find. Given the terrible things I had said to Willow her next words were unexpectedly gentle. "You look terrible, you'd better sit down. Come out the back and rest, later we can talk."

She led me into a room that I took to be the lounge and suggested that I stretch out on the sofa. "You've had a shock, rest for a while and when I close up we can talk. Now, I've got a business to run so don't start shouting anymore; come along Rebecca."