Divorced in Danville

by E. M. Sadler

  Even though I had to deal with Trish tonight, I was still pleased to talk with Polly. While Trish had been whispering in Dale’s ear, Polly had invited the girls and me over for dinner on Friday night and some girl time.

  Her sister, Tiffany, had recently decided to stop selling Jamberry nail care products and was having a clearance sale at Polly's apartment. Plus, there was a significant bonus to this evening. Trish felt like the evening sounded too childish and wouldn't be coming.

  Taking my leave and grabbing my things, I was surprised to hear the clacking of two very aggressive heals behind me as I walked towards the parking lot in the front of the school. Turning to see if I should move out the way of another parent in a rush to leave the PTA meeting, I found myself confronted by a furious looking Trish Samson.

  "Um, is everything okay, Trish?" I asked warily.

  "Oh, I just thought I should offer a little bit of advice," she said snippily.

  "Okay?"

  "Don't think that because Dale Wilson was nice to you tonight, that he would ever have any interest in someone like you. When things fall through with this Imogen, it will only be a matter of time before he comes to his senses and marries me."

  Well, she was delusional.

  "Umm..."

  "Dale and I make sense. You and he do not. I figured I would save you a little heartache since you're so new in town and don't know how things work around here."

  The entire time Trish is saying this, she had a possessive gleam in her eyes that reminded me of all of those Lifetime movies where people say, "She always seemed so normal, who knew she was a psycho?" Which is when the audience starts screaming at the screen, "Um, WE ALL KNEW SHE WAS PSYCHO!!!!!!!"

  I may not have the best self-esteem sometimes, but I knew for a fact that Dale would not be attracted to someone as fake and crazy as Trish.

  "Thank you, Trish, for that advise. Like I said earlier, I have a boyfriend, and I am very much in love with him, so if you please, I would like to go home now," I said in the voice I usually reserved for my mentally ill Medicare clients.

  "Ta ta!" Trish said with a jazz hands wave before turning on her heels and clacked away.

  Wanting to make sure Dale knew I was still on my way after being rudely sidetracked, I texted:

  Kelly –

  On my way – delayed by Trish.

  Dale –

  Oh, Lord! Doors unlocked, I'll be upstairs.

  He'll be upstairs? I hope that meant he would be waiting naked for me because, between Geoff and Trish, I needed to feel as close as possible to Dale right now.

  I knew their opinion shouldn't affect my relationship with him, but when you're recovering from a critical and oppressive spouse, it took time to build back the confidence you once had.

  Arriving at his house promptly at 8:50 pm, I immediately headed up to his bedroom and was disappointed to find Dale's bed empty. Well that was, until I felt arms wrapping around me from behind. Feeling his arms cocooning me with love, my body immediately sighed into his, and all was finally right in my world.

  "Looking for someone?" he whispered against my ear.

  "Just my boyfriend Fernando," I giggled, as I turned to find that he was indeed naked and ready for me.

  Pulling him towards the bed and not wanting to waste any time, I hiked up my skirt to my waist and yanked my underwear down so that I could straddle Dale's pelvis.

  "God, I love you!" he declared, as I rubbed my center against his.

  "I'm so glad you suggested this." Lord, was I glad! He had no idea how much his physical reassurance was needed for my self-confidence tonight.

  Our kissing became so intoxicatingly fierce that I didn't even care that I'd have a beard rash for work tomorrow. All I cared about was getting as close as a woman could to the man that she loved.

  Within a minute his great rod demanded entrance, and I lifted up far enough to slowly let him enter me. Cognizant of our time constraints and needing completion, I rode him so hard that my thighs felt like I was in the middle of an aggressive lunge circuit. It shouldn't have been plausible, but with Dale, it just took me three minutes before our dynamic friction had my body convulsing against his, pulling all of the stress from my core and replacing it with peace.

  Weak from frantic exertion, Dale thankfully took over from there. He threw us onto our sides and began pounding into me over and over again as desperately as I had ridden moments earlier. When I came down from my high, I watched as his face's intensity both turned me on and worried me that Dale could be upset about something.

  Realizing then that he had needed me just as much as I had needed him, my body reawakened from my post-orgasmic state to meet him thrust for thrust. Grunting and yelling, Dale continued to ride me harder with a desperate need to claim my body. When I felt his body finally begin to shutter as if in shock, I felt an overwhelming need to remove some of the intensity from his face. That's when I kissed him and whispered, "Come for me, my love!"

  Needing to feel him come while on top of me, I rolled myself onto my back, pressed my hand to his butt cheek and squeezed tightly so that there was no question regarding how deeply I wanted him to go. Then he cried out, and I could feel his warm fluid pumping into my womb. Not even anticipating it, the friction caused by his last thrust into my body had my chamber gripping hard, which caused a violent joint orgasm that rang out every last drop of his beautiful sex.

  Coming out of my blissful state, I pulled back enough from his fierce embrace to stare into his eyes.

  "Kelly, tonight was torture," he declared with a tight swallow. "Not being able to tell everyone that you were mine when all I wanted was to touch you, just about killed me!" he said, before kissing me and adding, "Please make some friends soon."

  Catching my breath, I offered a compromise with, "How about when winter break starts?"

  "Ugh! Baby, that's still almost two months away!" he said in exasperation.

  "I'm very sorry. You have no idea how badly I wanted to tell those women to back off tonight. But I don't want to be the most hated person in the PTA," I said with tears streaming down my face because tonight had been torture for me too. The way Trish felt the need to claim MY Dale had my gut in knots.

  "Oh honey, please don't cry," he said while kissing me reverently. "I can wait! I'll try to be less of a caveman, okay?"

  Now I was crying for a whole new reason. Anytime I would cry in front of Geoff, he would tell me that I was trying to manipulate his actions and walk away from me. The worst was when he wouldn't even acknowledge my feeling at all. The only reason why he was caring during all of our miscarriages was that his sister-in-law was always there to tell him not to be an ass.

  "I love you so much, Dale!" I said, wanting him to know that I was all his.

  "I love you too, Kelly. But I want to say one more thing before we get dressed and head back to your house."

  "I'm listening."

  "Regardless of what those women say to or around you, YOU are the one I plan on marrying one day, not them."

  Though I should have been shocked by this revelation, I was instantly comforted knowing that I felt the same way about our future.

  Kissing me one last time he pulled out of me so that we could dress quickly and he could go pick up the twins. Thankfully my house was only five minutes away, so if we left now, we would still have two minutes to spare.

  Chapter 42 – Dale

  The rest of the week went relatively fast. Thursday, we had our weekly play date at Kelly's house due to rain but were unable to stay for pizza. The day was especially sad because Joan was called in regarding the shooting of an officer and couldn't get to the courthouse thanks to the rain flooding the access bridge. Thus, instead of pizza night, Joan called in her assistant and turned her living room into command central for all things PR.

  Thankfully, Joan was able to handle the damage control surrounding the shooting and when Kelly called me later that night, she advised me that the officer’s doctors were able to remove the bu
llet from the officer's heart. The best news of all was that they expected her to make a full recovery.

  Friday night during our scheduled call we decided that Kelly and the girls would meet me at my parents' cottage for breakfast before her community Medicare meeting. I was so excited about introducing Kelly to them that I barely remembered to run this by my mom earlier in the week, and she was giddy, yes giddy, over the prospect of a new love in my life.

  Kelly's community meeting was scheduled for 11:00 am, so we decided to arrange the meeting with my parents at 9:00 am, which would give her some time to get to know them without feeling overwhelmed by a long visit. What surprised me most was that the person she hit it off first with, was my father.

  Because Kelly's mom, Joan, had worked in the JAG offices when in the Air Force, Kelly had grown up around lawyers. Her unique understanding of a lawyer’s style of communication, gave her an insight into my father’s personality and made my normally quiet father and Kelly fast friends. Within minutes they quickly became absorbed in their own conversation, leaving my mother and I to look on with shock as they chatted away like old friends.

  I don’t think I could remember a time when my father was ever chatty, especially around strangers. It used to drive Maggie crazy that he would "refuse" to carry on a conversation with her. But my father only had a handful of people outside of the courtroom that he would speak to conversationally.

  That's why it was so unbelievable that Kelly and my Dad had been speaking for 20 minutes straight. After the first three minutes, my mother even looked at me and mouthed, "What the hell?"

  My mother and I attempted to join the conversation a few times, but when we went to interrupt them around minute 15, they switched their conversation to a jury duty stint Kelly had taken part in, and we gave up.

  Since the kids were busy watching a cartoon in the living area and Mandy was testing out those invisible magic markers that only draw on special paper, Mom and I decided to sneak into the kitchen and touch base.

  "What do you think of Kelly?" I asked nervously.

  "Though I haven't had a chance to talk with her thanks to your dad finding a new BFF," my mom said with a pointed stare of hilarity, "... she seems like a lovely person. The fact that your Dad likes her should tell you a lot. Especially since he is such a good ‘judge' of character," she added while laughing at her joke.

  Full disclosure, I laughed too.

  "Maybe I can take dad to the pro shop to help me pick out some new clubs right around the time she's due back from her meeting. That way you ladies can chat. Do you think you can handle all four kids for 10-15 minutes?"

  "It will be easy-peasy. Especially since the three older kids seem to entertain themselves and Mandy is such a focused little thing that I don't think she'll be much trouble."

  Before we could continue our conversation, Kelly walked into the room carrying some dishes. "I should leave now so that I can set up for the meeting, are you sure you guys don't mind watching Mazie and Mandy for the next two hours?" she asked my mother.

  "Not at all, Kelly! I'm looking forward to helping the girls with their cute little press-on polish you brought for them to play with. What a sweet little invention," my mom said while looking dreamily at all the children playing in the living room.

  Over the years I could tell that Maggie's infertility had been a hard blow to my mom’s dreams for a large family. Though she never mentioned it to my ex for sensitivity's sake, I knew that my Mom had always dreamed of a house full of grandchildren to make up for only having one child, so having to wait for so many years to add to her family had been a struggle. This was mostly because of her own fertility issues.

  During my birth, mom had started bleeding out so quickly that the doctors were worried that she wouldn't make it. Luckily, they were able to stabilize her, but the doctor told them that it would be too dangerous if Mom ever carried another baby.

  The idea of losing my mother had scared my father so completely that he called in his fraternity buddy, who was a urologist, in on a Saturday and asked for an immediate vasectomy. The finality of not being able to have another child at such a young age was devastating to my mother, but she found ways to cope throughout the years. Mostly her coping involved free babysitting anytime she heard one of the women in dad's office needed a sitter.

  Yeah, my mom was going to love having Kelly's kids around.

  Later that day when dad and I returned from our pro shop diversion, I was happy to find Kelly drinking coffee companionably with my mother and laughing over a video her cousin David took of the kids milking a goat.

  Leaving them to their conversation, I went to sit in my mom's recliner and glanced over to see my father with a goofy smile on his face. "You have yourself a strong partner in Kelly, son," my dad said in his proudest voice. "Just remember that you deserve each other. Divorce can be destructive, but in the case of yours, I think it was a blessing."

  AN HOUR LATER, AFTER saying our goodbyes to my parents before dinnertime, I found myself dreading the idea of dropping her off at home. Even though I knew we were meeting for ice cream after church in less than 24 hours, I decided to risk asking, "Any chance you'd consider bringing the kids back to my place for a S-L-E-E-P-O-V-E-R tonight? I promise to behave."

  Noticing the internal struggle going on in Kelly's suddenly stressed features, I added, "I understand if it's too soon, we can just plan for the trip to your uncle's farm being the first official overnight."

  Surprisingly, Kelly said, "It's not too soon. I was trying to remember where I put my extra pack-in-play."

  Smiling like the Cheshire Cat at each other, I said "Great!" and had to remind myself to focus on the fact that we weren't alone. Just the idea of sleeping in the same room with Kelly filled my soul.

  "But you will have to be on your best behavior because we'll need to set up the pack-in-play in your room. Mandy doesn't sleep well in strange places, so we'll have to get her used to sleeping in your spare room gradually."

  Was it crazy that I was ready to have this woman be in my home on a regular basis? To be able to wake up with her every morning would be the highest honor she could bestow on me.

  The only thing stopping me from asking her to move in with me like a lovesick fool, was that our county still required leaders in the education community to sign a morality clause. Though it didn’t prevent sexual relations, it did state that regular cohabitation with someone other than your legal partner was grounds for dismissal.

  Surprisingly the idea of marrying Kelly sooner rather than later wasn't as frightening as it should have been. It just seemed fortuitous. But now was not the time to bring that up. Maybe by Christmas time, we would be ready to talk about the possibility of an engagement.

  Once we had collected the kids' things from Kelly's, we headed over to my place and got everything set up for the sleepover.

  Initially, the plan was for Mazie to sleep on Katie's trundle bed, but when John realized that he would still be sleeping in his own bedroom for the evening, he had his first tantrum since he was two years old.

  John felt left out of the girls' party, so in the end, we pulled out some old blowup mattresses and set the kids up in the family room for the night.

  Having the forethought to grab one of her pre-prepped freezer meals, Kelly was able to persuade us to have a home cooked meal for the evening instead of my previously planned pizza.

  "It's a slippery slope, Dale!" she said. "Otherwise, I'd eat pizza every night and gain 30 pounds."

  To which I replied by snatching a kiss and saying, "You'd still be ravishing," before I walked back into the family room to check on our kids.

  Our kids! We were all going to be a family, I was sure of it.

  Chapter 43 – Kelly

  The sleepover at Dale's went smoother than I had expected and when we woke up in each other's arms, it felt like we had been waking together for ten years instead of the handful of days we'd snatched over the last several months.

  Needing to
get the kids ready for church, Dale volunteered to make breakfast, so that I could get all three girls ready.

  According to Dale, "Us boys only need five minutes tops to throw on our church clothes."

  What surprised me most was that instead of going to either of our regular church services, Dale took us to the Catholic parish 30 miles out of town so that we could worship together and not worry about being exposed.

  It was the first time I had worshipped with a significant other without having to worry if they were going to give me the silent treatment as punishment for asking them to sit through a service. It was for that reason that the only time Geoff worshiped with me was during funerals and christenings, and even then, I was made to feel sorry for forcing him into an hour of boredom.

  When mass had ended, Dale announced that he had obtained tickets to the Renaissance Festival two counties over instead of the preplanned ice cream trip. Thankfully, the kids didn't object and spent the afternoon overcome with smiles and giggles.

  It was a perfect day.

  After burning off their energy, both Mazie and Mandy were already asleep by the time we arrived back at my mom's that night.

  "This was way better than Trish Samson's BBQ," I whispered as Dale helped me unload my things.

  "I agree. I wish I could wake up with you every morning."

  "Me too!" Even without the sex, it was still a great start to a day.

  While he was thoroughly kissing me goodbye, a little part of me felt like half of my family was going to be driving away that night. The feeling was so overwhelming that I swear my heart ached as severely as when I had dropped Mazie off for her first day of school.

  The next week passed by in a flurry of activity. Since Saturday night's sleepover had been such a success, we decided to add an additional sleepover that Wednesday, even if it was a work night.

  But even the extra time, left us unsated since we weren't able to find time alone. Thus, by the time Friday rolled around for the Halloween Festival weekend getaway, Dale and I were about ready to rip each other's clothes off.