An Only Child by Les Roberts

Author:Les Roberts
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Down & Out Books

There are times to meet people, spend a certain amount of time with them, even know them for thirty years, and they never really become a friend, just someone who just fills up the gaps in one’s life. There are other times when a first meeting lasting ten or fifteen minutes makes them family.

Forever.

When Cassidy Hammond first ran past me at North Avenue Beach, I hardly paid any mind to her, as I was totally wiped out after a long run on the sand. “Pretty girl” popped in and out of my mind within seconds—a flash of movement against the background of a choppy lake and a fairly deserted beach. It was not until she stopped, came back, and told me she’d read all my books that she got my undivided attention.

I find myself most attracted to women who are beautiful in a way most women are not. The ones that make my heart flutter simply don’t look like other women. The face comfortably oval. The hair? Like many men, I prefer hair that spills across the pillow, but I love the much shorter look, too. The mouth soft and inviting. The eyes—I couldn’t tear myself away from her eyes, which are windows for what hides behind them.

That was Cassidy, in one explosive moment at the beach. Not that she outshines every movie star or high-fashion runway model who ever was. But what beauty there is about her just struck me, hard. I can’t explain it—but then few men can when they fall in love at first sight.

How could I fail so miserably? I didn’t plan having sex with her just twenty-four hours after I met her. I knew how long it had been and how I needed time to focus, think about it, and wonder whether everything worked properly. It was Cassidy who invited herself to my apartment, but she was no wham-bam-thank-you-ma’am. I figured another drink or two, kiss a lot, and then say goodnight and we’ll get together soon, even set a date.

Then, to both our chagrins, we somehow got to the bedroom, my sexual performance closely related to that of a sixteen-year-old boy screwing for the first time. Though she was kind and tender, even saying she looked forward to the next try, I was terrified our kiss goodnight was the last kiss ever.

My late wife had never been family, nor Aubrey, and my adoptive parents were really not blood relations either, because I was biologically conceived and birthed somewhere else.

But Cassidy Hammond, after a brief meeting on the beach, one evening, after one disappointing sexual try, both of us out of breath and dripping perspiration, to me she was family.

It will surprise no one I didn’t get one minute of sleep that night, tossing and turning and taking a cold shower and even imbibing two more drinks of single-malt Scotch, neat. Nothing would help, and I was in the worst turmoil of my life, even during those first months in prison.

Still an only child. Still an only adult.

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