Intended For Mature Readers

True To Life Story Line

Strong Sexual Content

Theme Music To Be Added At A Later Date

Mystique

The Downfall Of Sue Ann Simpson
___________________________________________

    She slowly drags her fingertips across the lines under her eyes and around her lips, remembering there was a time when she was a quite beautiful woman, but the years have been especially unkind to her and have left scars on her appearance as well as her soul.  Even so, she remains a very attractive 37 year old woman.  Her eyes search across the dresser briefly glancing at the picture of her most recent husband but both of her marriages were hollow institutions not bound by oath but convenience as a hopeful means of escape from past mistakes but they only created greater mistakes.
    She reaches into the dresser drawer and removes a picture of herself and Leonard Davis taken some 10 years ago and realizes the time she spent with him was the only truly happy time of her life.  She carefully places the picture back into the drawer, again stares into the mirror and knows she will never again have another chance at happiness as she did with Leonard.  That's why she keeps the picture out of sight.  Seeing it with the pain it always brings only confirms her lost happiness.  With tight lips, she curses and sweeps her hands across the dresser, shattering the small vases on the floor but leaving the picture of her last husband upright, bringing tears to her eyes and causing her to mumble, "That son of a bitch."
    Trembling hands rummage through her purse for cigarettes but she can find only an empty package that she throws on the floor and gasps, "God dammit!"  Again looking into the mirror, she brushes her comb through her pixie hairstyle, which is one of her many efforts to hold onto the past as though she could change some of it.
    The front door slams behind her without being locked, and she is relieved no one is on the elevator who would probably make one of those mindless comments such as, "Have a nice evening."  The doorman to her upscale, paid-for condominium says, "Have a nice evening," and gives her a little two-finger salute as she walks by.  Her last marriage was misguided, just as the first, but it had not been without its compensations.  Money or a place to live are not among her worries.  Before remarrying, she felt she needed something of a barricade between her past and future and thought she could forget Leonard if her marriage followed the natural course some feel a loveless marriage will take whereby the partners will come to accept the companionship and togetherness as a veiled understudy for love.  The marriage followed a natural course well enough - the same as rot and stench comes to a corpse.
    Her hands recklessly search through the glove compartment of her car for cigarettes but she finds nothing and throws her purse on the floorboard but immediately picks it up and removes a small bottle of bourbon.  She takes long swallows until the bottle is completely empty and smashes it against the wall of the parking garage.
    She backs her car and jolts forward making a long screeching sound and turns onto nearly empty streets.  Bitterness pushes tears to trickle down her cheeks; and as she has done countless times before, she drives over into the older part of Atlanta and half-way down Saint Charles Avenue where she parks her car and sits with her eyes fixed on the old house where Leonard Davis and his mother once lived.  Sue Ann had been immediately taken with him the first time she saw him in Karo Whitfield's Gym and felt so awkward in trying to conceal her wedding rings, as she could not take her eyes off him.  She saw him there several times, with her rings removed, and made sure he saw her staring at him.  His muscular physique, old-style flattop haircut and piercing blue eyes were captivating.  His quiet and solitary mannerism and overpowering good looks gave him an alluring mystique like no other man she had ever encountered.  It must have been the mystery of never knowing such a person, so different from her husband, that often cast her into an intense vaginal organism soon after he entered her with long, tender strokes during those afternoons at the Cheshire Motor Inn.  Her marriage was unhappy but until then, she had no compelling reason to end something that had grown stale, without romance and devoid of passion.  Some often view marriage in the various forms into which it often sinks and speak of "how to save it" without ever acknowledging ending something so worthless is the most humanitarian resolution.
    Her eyes scan along the circular porch of the old Victorian house and up and down the four-sided windows capped with a hexagon cupola on the top floor.  She doesn't see it as it is now with ivy masking the left side all the way to the roof, as if to conceal the misery that once existed within its walls, the cracking paint and overgrown yard.  Instead, she remembers the first time she saw it about a month after meeting Leonard.  His mother, Martha, had greeted them at the door in her wheelchair and immediately took on a threatened attitude towards her.  Leonard had told Sue Ann very little about his mother except that when she was quite young, a surgeon had made a critical error that had left her partially disabled.  The passing years had seen her grow more and more resentful and bitter both towards that son of a bitch husband that left her just before Leonard was born and how much of her life had been taken away by that goddamn doctor.  From the outset, it was obvious from her drawn expression that Sue Ann would never find the key to her friendship, because her bitterness was a fortification to anyone who tried to get through to her.  She would scream at Leonard night and day and find fault with everything he did to try to help her.  It's been years since anyone lived in that house, but some insist that late at night, they can still hear her  screaming at him and Leonard begging her in tears to be quiet.  Some even say they can see vague images of them glaring out the windows.
    As tears trickle down Sue Ann's cheeks, there is thunder in the overcast sky and there....there is the image of a man standing in the living room window with a woman in a wheelchair.  Sue Ann can hear Martha's course voice screaming at him...."You can't do that."....Don't you know I can't walk?"...."You can't leave me here alone."...."Why do you make me take all that medicine?" 
    She reaches into her purse for the bottle of bourbon and curses aloud when it isn't there.  She dismisses it all as imagination as her thoughts reach back over the years. 

________________

    Karo Whitfield's Gym didn't have any of that modern equipment, and none of the members wore designer exercise garments.  Most of the members were competitive weightlifters who trained with lifting chalk all over their hands and forearms and made roaring noises when they worked out, often dropping very heavy weights from arms length overhead down onto the lifting platforms.  Very few women were members and what were could hardly be described as likely to find their way to the Miss America Contest.  But that was precisely what brought Sue Ann there.  She had enough of north side Atlanta where everything was so deceptively proper, everyone wore dark suits and carried those little square briefcases.  It was so pretentious but not nearly as much so as her trying to give everyone the impression that she was happily married just to blend in with everything else that was supposed to be so proper.
    Some of the lifters were practicing clean and jerks on one of the lifting platforms, and the Olympic barbells made loud crashing sounds that shook the building when they crashed down, often accompanied by profane observations both by lifters and observers.  Some of the women seemed especially interested in the men with full beards, tattoos and peculiar hair styles.
    Until she first saw Leonard, she was beginning to question the merit of coming to such a place and admit to herself the whole purpose in coming there was to meet a man - at least a man as different as possible from her husband.  Leonard's strong masculine features and athletic physique immediately fascinated her, yet from a distance, he seemed to have a kind and gentle demeanor, which could have been magnified due to the rather unpolished surroundings.  Nervous chills stabbed through her body when she watched him doing warm-ups, and she began to think of how she could contrive a situation in which to meet him.  At that moment, she could only decide on the most fundamental approach, so she began removing her sweat suit.  Her royal blue shorts were well above her knees revealing her tight skin, shapely thighs and diamond-shaped calves.  Her halter-top fitted just under her breasts and was tight enough to cause them to ooze out the top.
    For a moment, he looked at her before continuing his warm-ups.  She move closer to him - just close enough to hear him say, "Hi."
    She was becoming more and more nervous by the moment and started to simply go over to him and introduce herself but then a more novel approach struck her.  She removed a pair of light dumbbells from the rack and was standing there holding them with straight arms.  She dropped one of them and pretended it struck her foot.  She was dancing around on one foot and softly crying out, "Ooohhh, ooohhh."
    He slowly walked over to her and asked, "Are you all right?"
    She attempted to seem surprised and said, "I think so. I haven't been doing this very long."
    A smile came to his face, and he said, "I don't mean this the way it might sound, but you seem a little out of place here.  At least, that's what I thought the moment I saw you."
    Her confidence immediately began to build in knowing he had at least noticed her, and she could literally read his thoughts when his eyes tactfully scanned over her entire body.  She realized she was still holding one of the dumbbells, so she placed them both back in the rack and said, "That's why I'm here.  I felt out of place where I was."
    He looked at the other women glaring at a few rather unkept individuals on the lifting platform and said, "Don't tell me you feel in place now."
    She looked at the lifters, then at him and said, "At this moment, I do."
    His head tilted slightly, maintaining close eye contact.  He was somewhat hesitant and seemed to be wrestling with something in his mind.  Finally, he said, "I saw you the other day, just as you were leaving and thought if I saw you again, I'd ask for the opportunity to introduce myself."
    A calming and gratifying feeling rushed over her, and she thought to herself she never expected this to go so easily.  With a broad smile, she said, "That would be nice."

________________

     She's still sitting there on Saint Charles Avenue, staring at the old house. How many times over the years has she remembered the day they met or those night time walks through that picturesque little park in Garden Hills with its granite benches and tables and large trees throughout.  He would always hold her hand as they walked and very infrequently would mention his mother and how long she had been disabled.  He never implied any complaint as to how her illness had changed his life and would only say both he and she had undergone years of stress.  She especially remembers that one time when he mentioned that sometimes when he felt everything had been so unfair to him, he would ask himself what would he feel like if he were his mother?  Every time she saw him, she became more and more captivated with his kind and gentle mystique that seemed so sincere and unselfish.
    One night when they were in the park, he put his arm around her shoulder and said, "I'm so glad I met you."
    A very warm feeling came over her but quickly vanished when she stopped abruptly and said in a depressed tone, "I'm....I'm married."
    He placed his hand on the side of her cheek and said, "I know.  I've known since the moment we met."
    "How did you know?" she asked with obvious anxiety.
    He shook his head for a moment and stared at the ground before saying, "I don't mean this the way it probably sounds but even before I spoke to you for the first time, I had the feeling you were trying to get away from something that was making you unhappy, and you wanted to find an escape as different as possible from the life you have.  I must say that sometimes I feel like that myself.  I've often thought of putting my mother in a nursing home and telling myself that's the best thing for her when I would really be thinking of what was the best thing for me.  Then too, I often think of what I'll do when she's no longer with me.  That's even worse - I mean to be planning your own life after someone else is dead.  I suppose in some ways we're somewhat the same in that we both want something for ourselves we know we can't have - at least for the present."
    She released his hand, stepped away and began to gaze at the houses around the park before pointedly saying, "I decided the moment we met that I would get a divorce."
    He walked up behind her, placed his arms around her waist and asked, "Do you mean I've pushed you into something you might later regret?"
    He had hardly finished speaking before she said, "No.  You've read me like a billboard.  I'm unhappy, and it's got nothing to do with you."  She paused a moment and added, "Well, maybe it does.  Before we met, I didn't realize how unhappy I was."
    He kissed her on the neck and asked, "Why did you wait this long to tell me?"
    Still not facing him, she said, "I didn't realize you had already figured me out and was afraid you would stop seeing me, if you knew."
    He turned her around placed his cheek against hers, whispering in her ear, "No.  Meeting you is the best thing that ever happened to me."
    She collapsed into is arms, hugging him as tightly as she could.  He put his arms around her waist, drawing her abdomen close to his.  She felt a firm erection and sighed, rubbing the inside of her thigh up and down his leg.  They both knew what the other wanted, and in fact, could no longer do without.  It was only a short distance to the Cheshire Motor Inn, and she felt her passion growing as they walked into the rather modest room. 
    Neither said a word but her eyes were fixed on his.  She flattened her hands and rubbed them up and down his chest and began to unbutton his shirt.  She could hear and feel her heart beating very rapidly.  He placed his hand on the side of her face and gently stroked her cheek.  She wasn't surprised when he didn't make some cheap and often incorrect comment such as, "I'm going to drill you good," as her husband often did.  Instead, he maintained his kind and gentle mystique as he rubbed his cheek back and forth across hers. 
    Her hands slid down to his belt and unloosened it.  As his pants dropped to the floor and he stepped out of them, her passion continued to build when she saw his black, silk-like shorts with his erection bulging them away from his body.  Suddenly, it struck her that he had removed none of her clothes, and she immediately knew he wasn't sure what sort of response she expected from him, so she unbuttoned her blouse and pulled his head firmly against her breasts. He began dragging his tongue across the inside of her bra causing her nipples to stand straight out.  She quickly removed her blouse and bra and began to caress his organ.  She was so excited, the next thing she remembered was that they were sitting in bed with her legs straddling his waist.  Ever so gently, he was kissing her cheeks and lips and rubbing his tongue behind her ears.  He put his hand under her chin and began rubbing the tip of his organ across her stomach and towards her vulva.  She was panting and fell back into bed, leaving her legs widely spread.  He balanced his body above hers as she grasped his organ and guided it into her.  Before making full penetration, he made short strokes over her clitoris before very gently sliding full length into the vagina.
    She exhaled and gasped, "Ooohhh."
    His body remained motionless during several long kisses, and he then began several sort strokes before stopping and moving his hips from side to side.  As she began to breath more rapidly,  he resumed with long but still gentle strokes with the full length of his organ.  Never had she felt a man penetrate so deeply into her vagina.  With each move he made, she was gasping, "Uuummm, ooohhh, enth, enth."  She placed one arm around his neck and the other around his hips, bent both legs and began pushing up with the soles of her feet in perfect rhythm with his with his strokes.  Suddenly, she straightened her legs, jerked her head to one side and went into a clitoral organism.  His strokes became slower as he propped himself up with his hands and began short affectionate kisses to her lips until she again felt a possessing excitement.  He dragged his tongue across her erect nipples until she was again signing, "Ooohhh, ooohhh," and tightly wrapped her legs around his body just as he slid one arm under her neck and began making firm and rapid strokes.  She wrapped her legs around him, and they were both rocking from side to side in the bed.  She could literally feel the blood rushing into her vagina.  Soon, she  went completely limp in a full vaginal organism just as she could feel his warm sperm being expelled into her body.
    After a few more short strokes, he released her and balanced himself on his knees between her legs.  Her eyes were trained on the outline of his physique in the dimly lit room.  After a few moments, he turned her over on her stomach, straddled her back and began a soothing massage over her neck and back.
    From the first moment she saw him, she had imagined what it would be like to go to bed with him.  She expected some rough, animal-like technique like her husband's when he attempted to assert his masculinity but he didn't have the appeal or staying power to pull it off.  Once after a very brief embrace, he removed himself and without saying much, turned over on his side to go to sleep.
    She said, "That'll be $50," not expecting his laugh that followed.  She always thought her husband felt he should only use her to meet his own needs with no thought of what she needed and he didn't seem concerned that she rarely reached an organism.  Instead, Leonard's technique had been a manifestation of his entrancing mystique; and from the very moment he touched her, she felt he was showing an expression of love rather than just a physical act.
    The very next day, she began divorce proceedings.  When the divorce was final, she felt like another woman, truly liberated from the incarceration of what her marriage had become.  That very night, there was a story on the news of a man who had been released from prison after serving 10 years for a crime he did not commit.  Somehow, she knew the feeling she had must be exactly the same as his. 

________________

    In the weeks and months that followed, Leonard hired a full-time sitter so they could spend more time together.  They would often walk holding hands through the older neighborhoods and that charming little park in Garden Hills.  She especially enjoyed going back to the neighborhood where she was raised and telling him about the people that once lived in some of the houses.
    When some of her friends saw them together, they got around to asking her how he was in bed.  She simply said, "It's exciting and I can't get enough of it."  After that, they didn't ask for further details, and she took it their sex wasn't nearly as gratifying. 
    There was one very special time when she felt so close to Leonard.  They were at mass, and during the sign of peace he embraced her and said, "Peace be with you, my darling."  They both turned around and extended their hands to a very elderly man behind them, and he said, "You look like you belong together."
    She had never thought of it in precisely those terms but from then on, she began to think of how wonderful it could have been, if she had been married to Leonard instead of her husband.
    Leonard's alluring mystique was no put-on, because he cast his fascinating spell over anyone he met.  He was a hospital Eucharist minister, and once she had gone with him to take communion to Catholic hospital patients.  When they entered the room of a man who was obviously quite ill, there were several family members around his bed, and they immediately seemed annoyed that they were even there.  They must have expected some tiresome scripture reading and a recitation on how wonderful God's healing powers were but when Leonard introduced himself, he said to the patient, "You look like a working man.  What sort of work do you do?"
    The family's expressions immediately changed, as they must have noticed Leonard had said, "do"  rather than "did you do."
    It happened the man had worked in construction, and Leonard asked him on what sort of projects.  In a few moments, everyone in the room was engaged in a conversation about a local construction project that had been halted due to violation of building codes.  Leonard told them he knew very little about construction and asked the man to describe how engineers calculate stress principals and what size steel beams to use in certain sections of high-rise buildings.  All during the conversation, the family members drew closer to the bed and alternated their eyes between Leonard and the sick man.
    Finally Leonard said, "I have communion for you."  There was an immediate hush in the room, when Leonard looked the man straight in the eye; and in his usual kind and gentle voice, said, "This is the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world.  Happy are those who are called to his table."  He put the wafer on the man's tongue and said, "The body of Christ," and began his prayer.

    "May we pray recalling the strength and unity of the Holy Catholic Church has graced this world since the life of Christ.  Our Father, we remember your words spoken through an ancient profit. When you walk through the fire, you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you, for I am the Lord your God, and I love you.  Within this assurance, bless this man.  May his treatment restore his strength and set him on his feet.  Guide those who are treating him and console those who love him and worry for him.  May we always remember that while we cannot see into the future or undo the past, nothing can separate us from your love and that ultimately, there can be no pain, there can be no fear, and every tear will be wiped away."

    Leonard leaned over and kissed the man's cheek, and there were tears in his eyes as well as everyone else's in the room.
    As they were walking down the hospital hall, Leonard grasped Sue Ann's hand and quietly said, "The first time I used that prayer, it brought tears to the patient's eyes, just as it did now.  I went back to the rectory and asked Father Byron to visit the patient, because I had left someone in tears.  He shook his head and simply said, "Oh, that's a good sign."

________________

    She's been sitting there glaring at that old house for quite sometime and remembers Leonard more often spoke of his mother before that dreadful surgery than after she became ill.  When he was a child, he would play with his wagon and tricycle out on the front walkway, and his mother would sit watching him through the living room window.  A number of times he had mentioned that she always put him first and was so completely unselfish.  It led him to feel totally obligated to her, especially when she could not walk without assistance and needed help with everything except eating.  She had a very happy childhood but her father died the year she graduated from high school.  There were no good jobs in the small town where she lived and for awhile, she had a job at a small restaurant working 10 hours a day; and without thinking it through, she took her first chance to get away from it all by a misguided marriage.  Her husband was an alcoholic, not worth a damn and left her before Leonard was even born. 
    Her sister was so different.  She had come to Atlanta just after high school and got a good job at Railway Express Agency where she remained for 45 years.  Her marriage was happy and she always helped Leonard and his mother with rent, grocery money and clothes until Leonard was making enough to pay the bills.  Leonard never thought her sister would die before his mother but when she did, Leonard was all Martha had in the world.
    The time Sue Ann spent with Leonard was the happiest time of her life but now, she has both consoling and bitter memories of that time.  As Martha's health deteriorated, Leonard began to change.  He was preoccupied with worry and nervous tension and didn't seem to want to do anything except take Sue Ann to bed.  He would sometimes call in the middle of the night and say, "I need to see you now."
    She would always have on some entrancing outfit when he arrived and would usually say something like, "I want to as much as you do," but Leonard was then possessed by a strange mystique that found him closing everything and everyone out of is life.  Only infrequently, would there be any glimmer of the person with whom she had fallen in love.  It was though as Leonard's real self was trying to reclaim him but could not break through  what he had become.  Sue Ann no longer looked forward to seeing him.  Everything had become so tiresome, and she found she could no longer continue in a relationship that would lead nowhere and certainly not to marriage as she had hoped before Leonard began to change.
    Now, her thoughts turn back over all the years to that one terrible night she will regret as long as she lives.

________________

    They both liked fall of the year better than any other time.  But on that night, Leonard didn't feel like going anywhere except the park in Garden Hills and then, back to the Cheshire Motor Inn.  The night was clear with a harvest moon, and bright red and yellow leaves covered the ground.  This and the quiet setting seemed to calm his then isolated mystique, and as they walked along, she reached for his hand, and it was shaking.  He didn't close his hand around hers, and his eyes were on the shedding trees that rustled in a cool wind.  His mind seemed far removed from the setting they had both come to love.
    Her thoughts turned to those first wonderful months after they met but at that moment, she found herself deprived of the happiness she felt she deserved, partly because she felt she had done everything she could to make him happy and partly because she felt the world owed her something after that damn dreadful marriage.  Seeing Leonard undergo such a change left her feeling as thought she had been robbed.  Suddenly, a feeling of anger was boiling inside her.  She abruptly stopped, released his hand, looked him squarely in the eye and asked with the most piercing voice, "What's the matter with you?  What's happened to us?  All you want to do anymore is fool around and shack up in that damn cheap motel."
    He remained silent, looked at the ground and only shook his head.
    She waited for him to say something but then, anger forced words she has always regretted from that moment on.  "Last week, when we were going to the fall festival in Helen, you told me your mother was crying when you left, and you felt guilty in leaving her in tears with the sitter.  Well, I resent that.  Parties, trips and lifestyle are important to me.  I can't figure you out or know what you expect from me.  You're never going to make any commitment to me, and I'm tired of being your whore."
    With that, she slapped has face so hard it snapped his head to one side where it remained for a few moments before facing her and saying, "That's the worse thing anyone ever said to me."  He seemed to struggle as to what to say next until he almost whispered, "I....I thought I had put together an original way to do something but now, I don't suppose there's any point.  He pointed to one of the tables in the park and asked, "Do you see something shining over there?"
    She was enraged that he immediately tried to escape her point and almost screamed, "What in the hell are you talking about?"
   He put his hand behind her back and gently pushed her in the direction of the table.  After they had walked over to it, he reached underneath it and appeared to pick up something off the ground and said, "Well, will you look at that," as he held an engagement ring in front of her eyes.  He held it there for some while and tilted his head while observing the expression on her face.  He dropped his hand to his side and said, "I was going to say something like well, as long as we found it, we might as well use it."  He handed her the ring and closed her hand around it before dropping his eyes back to the ground and again saying in almost a whisper, "I'm glad you told me how you feel.  I don't want to involve you in anything like your marriage or how did you put it....a life style you can't tolerate."
    That was the only time he ever mentioned her marriage since the very first word he had said to her that night in Karo Whitfield's Gym.
    Neither of them said a word as he drove back to her house.  He opened the car door for her, as he always did, and had something of a trancelike expression on is face as they walked to the door where he stopped and brought his tearful eyes to hers.  He opened her hand, that was still holding the ring, and said, "Keep this.  Always keep it close to you and know that I have loved you the best I could.  You will remain in my heart always, and I will think of you everyday that I live."  He rubbed his trembling hand across his face; and as he walked back to his car, broke down in the most heartbroken sobs.  She has heard those sobs and been haunted by them everyday of her life.

________________

    Driving back to Saint Charles Avenue, Leonard's sorrow turned into pity for himself.  His conscience was clear that he had done all he could to meet the responsibilities he had to his mother and give Sue Ann as much of what she wanted as he could.  His years of stress as a caregiver much of the time had made changes in him he could no longer control.  For one thing, his blood pressure was dangerously high, and he was literally frightened by a report he had heard on the news that according to some sort of medical statistics, caregivers have a 65% greater change of having a heart attack or stroke.  Everyday, he had made his best efforts to take into account what his mother's life must be like but he could not help thinking of what he would do if she were gone.  He always felt very guilty about planning his own life after his mother was dead.
    Along the way, he hoped he would be stopped by every traffic light to delay as long as possible his having to face more stress and more of his mother's constantly telling him that everything he did was wrong.  As he turned into his driveway, he tried to put all those thoughts out of his mind and how best he could prepare himself to face another day of stress.
    The lights were still on in the old house, and he immediately knew that something was wrong.  When he opened the door, the sitter ran to him and shouted, "I think she's had a stroke!  I've called 911!"
    Martha was sitting on the floor in the living room, propped up against the sofa.  Her mouth was twisted, her eyes were glassy and her left arm hung limp at her side, but when she saw him, she immediately began to shout, "You went off and left me!  You went off and left me!"  She continued to shout those words over and over until she passed out.
    The doctors in the emergency room confirmed that she indeed had experienced a mild stroke.  After remaining in the hospital for a few days, she went into a skilled nursing home for rehabilitation.  The employees there were among the sorriest individuals Leonard had ever encountered.  He stayed with her most of the time and observed what masters they were at doing as little as possible.  When she would put on her light, someone would usually come and immediately turn it off, say she would be back, promptly exit the room and never be seen again.  Once, she passed out during physical therapy, because she was left standing too long.  That same day, someone stole her wallet from her room.
    When she was strong enough to return home, she was more bitter than ever and still had a slight disfigurement on the right side of her face and could not bend two fingers on her left hand.  She continued to disagree with all Leonard did and would constantly insist all her clothes were wet and dirty and that she could see things flying around inside the house.  She was adamant that all the curtains be drawn and all inside doors remain closed, because she felt the neighbors were listening to all she did and were going to report them for putting disposable diapers in the garbage and making too much noise early in the morning.  Sometimes, she would call Leonard at 3 o'clock in the morning and insist on getting up, even though it was necessary that he get up every 2 hours to take her to the bathroom due to her many physical difficulties.  Leonard almost never slept and stayed under increasing stress during each day.  She felt he should sit with her every hour of every day; and even on those days the sitter was there, when he would go out to get groceries or medicine, she would scream, "Don't leave me here by myself!  Don't leave me here by myself!"
    Leonard's nerves became so bad, he had to have the sitter for longer hours and nearly every day, he felt he desperately needed someone just to talk to.  The few friends he had left at Karo Whitfield's Gym just were not all he needed.  He was afraid of trying to find another girlfriend because of his bitter heartbreak after the breakup with Sue Ann, but he desperately needed the companionship of a woman.  He finally did the only thing that was left.  On the one night a week the sitter would stay until midnight, he would go to bars where he knew he could find prostitutes.  Getting "dates," as the working girls would call them, was relatively easy, the girls were clean and relatively safe and they blunted his sex drive to some extent.  He never asked for anything unusual - only a normal sex act that the working girls called "straight up."  He never felt the need for anything bizarre, although most of the time, it was like being in bed with a manikin.
    After several months, he began to feel the need to meet someone who had been put where they both found themselves through some sort of circumstances such as his own.  Maybe they could come out of what they had become together.  He was intrigued by such a thought when one night, he was sitting in the Domino Lounge in the old Imperial Hotel.  There was Sandra, a woman he had taken to the Cheshire Motor Inn several times.  When she saw him, she walked over to him; and in sort of a musical voice, asked, "And what are you up to tonight?" 
    She wasn't exactly what he was looking for, so he tried to be polite and said, "To be determined."
    She appeared to be offended, said, "OK," and promptly walked away.
    The most disappointing thing about those nights in the Domino Lounge and similar places was not to find a date when he already had everything ready at the Cheshire Motor Inn.  He was starting to feel this would be one of those nights when he noticed a woman come in that he had not seen before.  She had red hair in sort of a ducktail style and a very striking figure.  When she sat down at the bar, he immediately went and sat down beside her.  When she didn't look at him, he said, "I haven't seen you in here before."
    Still not looking at him, she said, "You shouldn't be surprised.  I haven't been in here before."
    At about this point in such a conversation, the woman will usually say something like, "Hi, honey.  Is there something you have in mind?"
    He paused a moment and asked, "May I have the opportunity to introduce myself to you?"
    She jerked her head towards him and very impatiently asked, "Are you a cop?"
    He couldn't determine exactly what to say next, as her coarse disposition defied her appearance, so he just shook his head.
    Such an introduction process under such conditions usually followed a very structured format, and he was about to proceed to the next step when she asked, "Is there anyone in here who knows you?"
    He was reluctant to point out Sandra but was becoming more and more intrigued with her, so he said, "That lady over there."
    She walked to the bar stool beside Sandra and talked to her for a few minutes before coming back, displaying a completely different temperament, and said with a seductive smile, "She says you're hell in bed.  My name is Cathy."
    Most working girls don't care about discussing family history or waste time in being felt out as to how much the client is willing to pay, so he got straight to the point.  "I always go straight up for $100.  My name is Leonard."  With that, he didn't feel the need to go through any sort of introduction process and within minutes, they were walking towards his car.  He was always especially polite with prostitutes.  They always seemed both surprised and appreciative.  He reached out and held her hand.  With observable surprise, she looked at him for a moment but didn't say anything.  He opened the car door for her and felt something like an electric shock run through his body when her dress came half-way up her legs as she was sliding into the seat.  She had the most beautiful figure he had ever seen for a prostitute and immediately reminded him of the very first time he saw Sue Ann in her shorts and halter.  When he was behind the wheel, he gave her the money.  He always did that first, as it would relieve some of the tension between two persons who had just met under the prevailing conditions.
    As they walked to the motel room, he again reached out and held her hand.  She again seemed surprised and gazed at him for a moment.  Most working girls did not like for the man to remove their clothes.  That must have been the case with Cathy.  She began undressing as soon as the door was closed and stripped down to her panties.  Without looking at her, he stripped down to his black, silky shorts - the type he always wore on such "dates."  As he walked towards her, he was shocked at how good she looked.  Her skin was very tight,  and she had a suntan over her complete body.  He hips were firm and in perfect symmetry with the remainder of he body.  Her breasts were natural and seemed to stand up on their on, even without her bra.
    She casually glanced at him and said, "Most of the men I meet aren't in the shape you are.  I wouldn't think you would have to pay for it."
    He didn't dwell on the term "pay for it," as it would not suggest the impression he was trying to make that was becoming quite different from any other such evening at the Cheshire Motor Inn, so he just rubbed his hand through her hair, all the while becoming more and more taken with her and trying to avoid the mechanical process into which most of his nights there had deteriorated.  He gently patted one cheek and kissed her on the other, and he could immediately see that his manner was not one to which she was accustomed and might even normally seek to create.  He was careful not to stare at her body.  Instead, he maintained close eye contact for a few moments.  She had a very puzzled expression on her face and slipped her panties down.  Being very careful not to make any poor taste advance, he softly drew her close to him and pulled her head to rest on his shoulder.  He slid his hands down her arms, held her hands and guided her towards the bed.  At first, she seemed startled when he turned her over on her stomach but when he began to massage her neck and back, it seemed he could feel the tension escaping from her body.  He moved his fingertips across the backs of her legs and soles of her feet, and she turned her head to one side, rested it on her hands and began to breathe quite heavily.
    With her still on her stomach, he laid down beside her and rested one leg across her lower body while whispering in her ear, "You look very nice," and rubbed his cheek against hers.  He was very surprised when she turned over, placed both arms around his neck and one leg across his body, rubbing her foot up and down.  He pulled her over on top of him, began caressing her hips and could feel her breath on his neck.  His fully erect organ was compressed against her abdomen, and she said, "Uuummm.  He feels good."
    He didn't respond with a similar comment but said, "I was taken with you the moment I saw you.  I'm very glad we met."
    Again, see seemed rather surprised and asked, "How many women have you met in that place?"
    He was beginning to feel she was quite perceptive, so he didn't try to make up some sort of story.  He simply said, "Quite a few."
    "Why do you need to pay for a woman?"
    "This is the only type date I've had for quite a while now."
    "Some woman hurt you, didn't she?"
    "Is it that obvious?"
    She lifted up his chin and very lightly kissed him on the lips before saying, "You're different.  Most of the men I meet are from out of town and want a brief flight of imagination to get away from a lackluster marriage.  I had a different impression of you from the beginning.  You're not married, are you?"
    "No. I've never been married."  All the while he was rubbing his fingertips up and down her back and the sides of her legs.  Most working girls will not kiss a client, but since she had vaguely implied she would not place such restrictions on him, he very distinctly moved his lips towards hers so she knew he wanted to kiss her and give her ample time to pull her head away and not destroy what to that point had been a very effective foreplay.  She moved her hand to the back of his neck and pulled his head forward for him to give her a very smooth kiss, hopefully suggesting the pleasure of her company and not only the need to use her for his physical needs.  She returned his kiss with like tenderness and moved her head from side to side.
    He ran his tongue across her neck and whispered in her ear, "You're quite a woman."
    Somewhat curiously, she asked, "Why were you in a place like the Domino Lounge?"
    "You've already figured out what put me there.  Don't think I look down on you because of how we met.  I'm not ashamed of it, at least as long as I don't take advantage of whatever put you there and just use you."
    She sighed, propped herself up with her elbows and gave him a very long and passionate kiss before raising up, balancing herself on her knees and sliding his organ into her.
    He sensed she wanted to control the act, so he waited to see what she would do.
    She laid back down on top of him and began very slow up and down motions with her hips.  He dragged his finger tips up her back and to the side of her head, pulling it down to his lips and whispered, "That's very nice," just before moving both hands down to her hips and moving his body up and down in rhythm with her movements.
    When he felt he was close to an organism, he would increase the pressure on her hips and remain still for a few moments.  She understood without his uttering a word and remained motionless, which was quite different from most working girls who would seize any opportunity to get it over with as soon as possible.  Each time he would release her hips, she would resume her motion after several long kisses.  She was unlike any other woman he had ever brought to the Cheshire Motor Inn, including Sue Ann Simpson.  He had never before felt that a prostitute was not engaging in some paid for task but was actually trying to make love to him.
    When her body began to twitch and she began short, panting breaths, he knew she was close to an organism, so he took control of her by pulling her hips forward so her vulva was tightly against the bottom of his organ and began strong up and down movement that lifted them both off the bed.  Just as sperm began gushing into her body, she exhaled heavily and sighed. "Ooohhh, ooohhh, oooohhhh."
    He released all pressure to see what she would do.  Her breathing gradually subsided, and her body was completely limp.  When she was breathing normally, he gave her a very long kiss, lifted her off him and laid her on her side facing him.  He began light caresses to he cheek and whispered, "That was wonderful. I really enjoyed it."
    She closed her eyes briefly, opened them and gazed at him for a moment before saying, "So did I."  She continued to stare at him and again said, "You're different....You're different."
    That was the nicest thing a prostitute ever said to him, and he wasn't surprised when she didn't jump up and immediately get dressed.  When he pushed her over on her back, she placed her head on his shoulder, and they both fell into a sound sleep.

________________

    After his first night with Cathy, he never went back to the Domino Lounge, because he seemed to have met the woman he had been searching for during all those months.  It was such a good feeling when she invited him to her house for future dates; and although she never again mentioned money, he always paid her.  Inviting someone  to her house is something barroom working girls would almost never do.  He felt so relaxed with her and sometimes, they would go out on a normal date with no involvement of money.  He always made it a point never to ask her how many other men she knew and not treat her as a prostitute.
    Finally, he decided to take her to that little park in Garden Hills but this time, he would have no preplanned script as he did with Sue Ann.  He would be very careful how he asked her what she thought of him.  Depending on what she said, he would tell her he cared for her quite a lot and could no longer continue seeing her unless she would become his girlfriend and discontinue seeing other men.
    He had always avoided calling her at night, because if she did not answer, he would have wondered where she was and what she was doing.  Wondering about that nearly every night was becoming quite nerve-racking, and he could no longer endure the additional stress.
    As her telephone was ringing, his hands were trembling, because he was afraid she would not be there but thankfully, she answered, and he was so relieved, all he could think to say was, "Leonard."
    She seemed so glad to hear his voice and said in a very happy voice, "Hey."
    He could literally feel the apprehension flowing out of his body and said, "I hope you aren't doing anything tonight.  I'd like to see you.  I....I mean not for a motel date or anything like that.  I'd just like to take you somewhere I have in mind and talk about a few things."
    There was a long pause, and his heart began pounding so rapidly, he could feel it in his throat.
    Finally, she said in what appeared even more of a cheerful voice, "That would be nice."
    He couldn't describe the feeling that streamed through his entire body but he had never felt anything so consoling until that moment.  He was so happy when he said, "Good.  I'll see you soon."
    He walked into his mother's bedroom where the sitter was reading to her.  When he came to the side of her bed, he expected her to tell him he couldn't leave her there with the sitter but she smiled and extended her hand to his.  There was an expression of kindness on her face he could not recall having seen in years.  He leaned down and kissed her cheek, and there was a small tear in the corner of her eye.
    As he was walking out of the room, he began thinking how he could introduce Cathy to his mother.  Perhaps he should take his mother to her house.  Maybe that would lessen the threatening feeling that her life was being invaded that she had experienced when she first met Sue Ann.  He was smiling as he hurriedly walked down the hall, so eager to see Cathy and so hopeful she had come to feel the same about him.  Suddenly, there was a sharp pain in his chest, and his right arm became completely numb.  He felt tightness in his throat and could not breathe.  Beads of perspiration were all over his face.  He brought his hand to his forehead and tried to turn around in the hall but his feet collapsed, and he fell to the floor.  The last thing he saw in this life was the picture of Sue Ann hanging over the hallway lamp.

________________

    How many times has Sue Ann remembered that night, lying there in her bed, sleepless beside her former husband?  It is so vivid in her mind.  Her telephone rang, and she was shocked to hear Martha's voice.  She was screaming over and over, "Leonard!  Leonard!" and in hysterics.
     Her husband wasn't especially concerned when she said, "Something's happened to someone I once knew," quickly got dressed and ran to her car.  That had been the first time she had ever spoken to Martha over the telephone, and there were cramps in her throat as she turned off Ponce de Leon Avenue onto Monroe Drive.  As she turned onto Saint Charles Avenue, she could see glaring red flashes in the trees and against the walls of Leonard's house from the revolving ambulance lights.  She brought her car to a dead stop, just where it is sitting this very moment when she saw a stretcher on Leonard's porch with a white sheet completely drawn over a body.  She slowly walked the remaining half block and could hear Martha screaming, "My baby's gone!!  My baby's gone!!"
    Sue Ann walk up on the porch but her feet froze.  She could not move any closer to Leonard's body.  All she could hear was Martha's screaming and one of the medics on the radio transmitting, "10-79 at scene."  Somehow, she knew that was the code for dead on arrival at a location.
    She couldn't look at the stretcher any longer and walked through the front door, remembering the first time she saw Martha in this house.  She was sitting in her wheelchair and screaming, "Leonard, my baby!  Don't leave me!  Don't leave me!"
    The medics were having a casual conversation as to precisely how they should handle the situation.  One of them said something to the sitter as to what funeral home they should take the body after Leonard had been pronounced dead by a doctor.  Finally, all of them began to nod their heads, and they simply rolled the stretcher into the ambulance and drove away.
    Martha struggled to get up, and the sitter was holding her upright as she staggered to the doorway.  She became completely quiet and stared at the ambulance until it was out of sight.  Her glassy eyes turned to Sue Ann, and she said, "He's gone, Sue Ann."

________________

    Now, Sue Ann sits there in the identical place her car was on that horrible night when Leonard died.  Her hand is sliding across a small chain around her neck that holds the engagement ring he gave her that night in Garden Hills Park.  She's never taken it off since then, except on those infrequent times her second husband was making bungled attempts to make love to her.
    As she stares down at the ring, she sees the neck of a gin bottle protruding from under her seat and remembers she brought it the last time she came to Saint Charles Avenue.  She picks it up and begins slowly sipping from the half-filled bottle.  There is louder thunder in the east; and with one bright flash of lightening, she sees a child playing with a little wagon in the yard of Leonard's house.  There is the dark image of a woman watching him through the living room window.  She attributes it to the alcohol but remembers Leonard had once told her his mother would often stand at the living room window and watch him playing in the yard.  There is another flash of lightening and wait....wait, there is a stretcher on the front porch with a sheet drawn over a body and casting a long shadow across the front porch.
    She gets out of her car and begins a staggering walk towards the house; and all the while, she can hear Martha screaming at Leonard and see a woman's image in her bedroom window.  The door is ajar.  The night is pitch-black but there is an eerie, dim glow inside the house.  Martha's voice becomes louder. "What are you going to do - throw me away in some nursing home and marry that damn woman?"  Then, all is silent.  The room seems to be spinning around but it comes to a stop, and she can hear the faint sobs of a man crying.  She walks into the living room and is stunned to see Leonard sitting at a small desk.  He looks up and the moment he sees her, he stands up, backs against the wall and holds his hands up with the palms forward as though he were trying to keep her away from him.
    Cold chills stream through her entire body, and there is a frightful dryness in her throat.  She hears the front door open behind her and the sound of a woman walking in high heels.  Without moving, she slowly turns her head.  It's that damn cheap, redheaded whore Leonard took up with shortly before he passed away.
    Leonard sees Cathy and immediately stops crying.  A placid smile comes over his face, as he extends his arms and begins walking towards her before they both disappear, and the room is suddenly completely dark.
    Sue Ann's head is swimming as it does each time she has a hangover.  She's lying just outside the front door and pulls herself up on a rocker that's covered in mildew.  She slumps down into the chair and buries her head into her hands in the most overwhelming heartbreak.  Tears are trickling down into her palms.  Finally, she manages to stand and steps onto the walkway but she is no longer outside Leonard's old house.  She is in the little park in Garden Hills and can see Leonard and that wretched whore walking hand in hand towards the table where he had picked up her engagement ring from the ground.  Just as she sees Leonard reach under the table, the same way he had done the last time she was with him, she falls to the ground in a drunken stupor and remains passed out for hours.
    She can see glimmers of the streetlights through the branches of the large, old trees.  She is on Leonard's walkway and struggles to her feet.  She begins walking towards her car, every few moments looking over her shoulder at the old house.  She's sitting in her car and her hands are grasping the steering wheel as tightly as she can.  Only then, does she notice her clothes are soaked from the overnight dew.  Memory, heartbreak and illusion are all welded together in her troubled mind.  The thunder draws nearer and nearer until suddenly, there is a vivid flash of lightening that strikes the transformer box just ahead of her.  A bright ball of fire rolls down the electrical line and into the roof of Leonard's house.  Within minutes, the dried wood in the 100-year-old house is in consuming flames.  Her eyes are in a dazed glare at the conflagration until the house, street and yard cannot be seen for the profuse, black smoke but all at once, it all disappears and she can see only a fog-like ambiance that gradually fades away until she is seeing the little park in Garden Hills.  Leonard and that despicable whore are still walking hand-in-hand towards the table.  He reaches under the table, faces her and puts his hand on her cheek before gently kissing her and putting the ring on her finger.
    The roaring sounds of the fire engines bring Saint Charles Avenue back into her shocked vision; and as she so often does, she reaches for the engagement ring on the small chain around her neck.  A sickening and startling feeling clutches her when she feels the unbroken chain, but the ring is not there.

________________

    It has been months since that frightful experience when she watched Leonard's house burn.  She has managed to stop smoking and drinking by rejoining Karo Whitfield's Gym and resuming the exercises that she and Leonard would do together.  Most of the time, she barely notices anyone and does her exercises alone in the vacant aerobics room.  She has made very good progress, and about the time she had lost 10 pounds, a few of the sweaty weightlifters would make some very inept attempts to meet her.  She would discourage them by asking them things like, "How old are you?  I'm almost old enough to be your mother?"  Most of them were perceptive enough to get the message.  Her body has regained its youthful contour but nothing can remove the scars of heartbreak from her face.
    She's sitting there at her dresser and again moving her fingertips across the lines in her face.  She begins to comb her hair and decides she will go to the gym, as exercise normally relieves her nervousness to some extent.  But no, she decides against that.  She is especially depressed on this night, and that place reminds her so much of Leonard.  She remembers there is an art exhibit at the Georgian Terrace Hotel, so she decides to go there.  She puts on her new dark blue suit, with the skirt slightly above her knees, and a white sweater.  Some of the tension departs her body as she drives up Ponce de Leon Avenue and sees the turn-of-the-century architecture of the old hotel building but then, she notices a number of young couples walking hand-in-hand up and down Peachtree Street.  She can manifestly feel Leonard's hand holding hers as he always did when they went anywhere.  At first, she had thought it was rather childish but ultimately, it only added to his innocent mystique. 
    Now she so much feels the depression creeping over her that has ruled her life for so long.  She turns her car into the first side street and circles back onto Peachtree Street, having no idea where she is going until she realizes she has started for Saint Charles Avenue, as she has done so many times before.  She sharply pulls over to the curb and stops her car.  There is a gnawing in her throat and her tongue feels thick.  Her hands are trembling, and she says aloud, "Maybe if I just had one drink."
    Now she is back on Peachtree Street, again not knowing where she is going but sees the Peachtree Manor Hotel in the next block.  She continues to talk to herself.  "Maybe they have a bar."  Her eyes scan the building and come to rest on the side street beside the hotel and a lighted sign reading "Jokers Wild Lounge."
    She parks her car and begins a brisk walk towards the bar talking aloud, "I'll just have one drink.  I'll just have one drink."  She walks into the dimly lighted lounge and finds a barstool well away from anyone.
    The bartender tilts his head and squints his eyes, obviously surprised to see her, but she doesn't know why.
    As he walks towards her, she doesn't wait for him to stop and says, "Gin and tonic."
    When he returns with her drink, he still has that quizzical expression on his face but still doesn't say anything.  Sue Ann is sipping her drink very slowly, determined to have only one, and begins to hope she had gone to the gym instead of ending up in some place like this.  She's staring at the glass in front of her and rocking the liquid from side to side when someone sits down beside her and asks, "May I join you?"
    She continues to stare at the glass for a few moments before turning her head to see an executive-looking man in a dark suit with neatly combed, snow-white hair.  He sits down beside her, even though she does not reply.  Just then, she begins to search around the bar and sees several younger women in very revealing outfits leaning forward and whispering to each other between long glares at her.  All at once, it strikes her the man thinks she is a prostitute.  Only then does she notice that her legs are crossed with her skirt well above her knees and somehow, the top two buttons of her sweater are loose revealing her bra and the tops of her breasts.  Somewhat stunned to find herself in such a position, she immediately begins to compare herself to the other women in the bar.  She must be at least 15 years older than any of them and is wearing no makeup, which is quite a contrast to the rather novel appearance of the other women.  
    The man seems somewhat disquieted that she hasn't said anything and finally leans closer to her, saying in a low voice, "I didn't expect to see anyone like you in here tonight."
    She is becoming entertained to some extent and finally looks straight at him.  Her eyes are fixed on his as she asks, "Why not?"
    He seems relieved she has finally said something and leans closer to her.  "I always come her when I'm in Atlanta on business and really didn't want to meet any more of those younger women.  I was hoping I could meet someone closer to my own age."
    She maintains close eye contact for a moment before slowly looking down at his hand and seeing he is wearing a wedding band.  With a slight laugh, she says, "Well, at least you're honest."
    Sue Ann smiles and again looks straight at him seeing his eyes are fixed on her crossed legs.  He appears somewhat embarrassed as he quickly breaks his stare as she says, "I would think someone like you would want to prove himself with younger women.  If you come here often, don't you have a few regulars?  You know what they say, proficiency improves with familiarity - at least to a point."  She takes a short sip from her drink and adds, "Or are you at the point you're bored by regulars and want, what is the term, some strange stuff?"
    His manner becomes more unsettled, and he senses the need to get straight to the point.  "I'm not trying to prove anything.  Please don't form any opinions about me until you know what you're talking about.  I don't ever give anyone in here a concise biography of myself and try to justify my paying for a woman's company.  I keep a room upstairs and usually offer some of these women $200 but I wouldn't offer you less than $500."
    All of a sudden, she feels she no longer needs a drink and pushes the glass away from her.  Her eyes are trained on his, and she asks, "How do you feel afterwards?"
    "What do you mean?"
    "I mean guilty, cheated, not worth $200, never want to see her again or do you feel you should call the woman the next time you are in town and stay away from the pass-arounds you find in here?"
    "Most of the time I feel deprived of what I was looking for?"
    "And what would that be?"
    He draws even closer to her and pointedly says, "Someone different.  Someone with a quiet and intriguing disposition such as you have.  The first thing those others utter is something like, 'How much money do you want to spend, honey?'  They never look at me straight in the eyes as you have.  Your eyes are an enigma and have made you such a mystery that I desperately want to solve.  Will you please join me, if I promise to remain a gentleman?"
    From her two unhappy marriages, she suddenly identifies with him to a small degree and knows exactly how he must feel - much the same as she did the first time she saw Leonard.  Perhaps he feels as she does, because now she knows that Leonard was her only chance in finding the happiness that everyone seeks but that chance has gone, and she will never be happy.  She says nothing but slides off the barstool, stands directly beside him and extends her hand for him to hold.
    This is but the first night of many that will follow with many different men.  She is much older than most prostitutes but has regained her youthful figure.  That and the vacant stare of her eyes and the hurtful expression engrained on her face from years of regret have made her the much sought after VIP companion, because now it is she that possesses an entrancing mystique that will spellbind anyone who is searching, searching for something or someone who can set him free, if for only a moment, from his unhappy life.