Passion Beyond Youth

Jason Whitefeather pumped his legs harder as the sweat across his chest started running down in rivulets. A few more thrusts. “Don’t let this go”, he thought, “milk it to the last drop”. His last thrust pushed him over the edge and he finally felt the pressure on his thighs let up.

He knew this old bicycle would be a good idea. Years ago he would deliver newspapers on it to most of the houses in this valley. It kept him in great shape. Today he had a different task.

Selling soap. Laundry soap. It helped the kids buy uniforms for the football team. When he had noticed his old friendly Schwinn in the corner of the garage last week and that the mounted baskets were still intact, he knew it would be a great way to get some exercise.

Coasting down toward the next cluster of houses he felt the breeze starting to cool off his sweat. He hoped he had better luck in this area. Selling generic laundry soap door to door was not a particularly fruitful endeavor in the early 2000s. The soap selling for uniforms had been a tradition in this Northern California town for as long as he could remember. The team didn’t need the money at all. The selling of soap was supposed to “build character”. Each player had to sell 5 cases of 4 bottles each.

Each year more and more kids seemed to avoid it. As far as he knew, he was one of the few coaches or players even trying to sell the stuff, and on a bicycle to boot!. At least he was getting a workout.

Jason had been a linebacker on the team over a decade ago. He had some moves, but he had always been a tall, lanky kid. No matter how much he pumped iron, his body stayed the same. His coach had even teasingly called him “Hawkeye”, after Daniel Day-Lewis’ character in Last of the Mohicans. The name had stuck to this day. Most people just called him Hawk.

It didn’t help that he had similar facial features to Daniel Day-Lewis, shoulder length hair, and a slight british accent. His mother came from London and taught biochemistry at the local college. She was a pleasant woman, and the source of his quick smile. He always thought it made him look less manly, but she kept assuring him that it was going to open doors for him when he least expected it.

His father was whom he wished he would have derived more features from. His Navajo blood gave Jason his deep, dark eyes, but not much else. He loved his mother, but being half Native American gave him a strong sense of pride. If only he could have looked more the part.

Jason turned down the street adrift in his thoughts when he suddenly had to stop quickly. Thankfully, his years of experience with the newspapers prevented him from dumping the laundry detergent all over the road.

Just through a break in the trees he could see a young woman sunbathing by the pool below. She had on a white bikini, the brightness of which had caught his eye. It was too far away to tell for sure, but she seemed quite toned, almost buff. His view was of her back, and her butt muscles reminded him of those seen on gymnasts or dancers. He didn’t recall a pool being in this house before. Most houses this far North didn’t bother. That was an LA thing.

Finally, he decided he wasn’t going to find out by spying from a distance, so he pushed on and started coasting down towards the drive.

—————————

Sarah hated summer. Why someone would invent a fantastic place like schools to lock kids away, only to let them out to run around like wild animals in the blistering heat when the windows had to be open was beyond her.

When she married Charles years ago, he insisted that they could not raise a family in San Francisco and moved her to an estate just east of the city.. The plan was to eventually move his practice out there, but that never transpired. She had been one of the finest MMA instructors in San Francisco when they met. Now she was a suburban housewife with three kids and a pocketful of broken dreams.

Not long ago Charles approached her and said he had found the perfect home even further west and that it had a ready-made practice for him to simply “drop into”. To this day she could still feel her stomach churn as a year later the police opened up what was supposed to be his office and she saw how low he could really go. The only thing in there was a desk and a phone which forwarded every call to his office in San Francisco. He had been making excuse after excuse about why he hadn’t come home at nights, and occasionally flew in to keep his cover.

She had called him and told him that it was no longer necessary to bother with that anymore. His only response was a snort.

The doorbell ringing broke up the memory. Why did these suburbanites insist on making their door chimes some hair pulling cacophony that was supposed to sound like the real song? If she heard that sick, crackly version of “What’s New Pussycat” one more time she was going to take one of Charles’ old golf clubs and destroy the device.

It was going to go off repeatedly before one of the kids finally answered it. She braced herself. She waited. Nothing happened. Did one of the kids already get it? Not a chance. Was someone important actually at the door? Even less likely..

Maybe she should check. She tossed her fishnet shawl over her shoulders, stepped into her sandals, and headed for the door. When she rounded the corner she could tell it was an adult on the other side of the door. A tall one. Straight black hair could be seen through the glass porthole at the top. Could it be a woman? Poor thing if she’s that tall.

She opened the door and… now there was a surprise!

A young man was standing there with a confused look on his face, but it quickly. dropped to a deadly go-to smile. He had the deepest brown eyes she had ever seen and a slightly hawkish look to his face – some Native American was in there.

She knew better than to flick her eyes downward, but the man was wearing nothing but a loose fitting pair of jean shorts and some Converse shoes. She thought he might apologize for not wearing a shirt, but he just started looking around as if there might be someone behind her. Despite being in a skimpy bikini and slathered in oil, he did not flick his eyes downward to look at her.

Instead, he flashed that great smile again and said, “I’m sorry to bother you, is your mother home?” He had a touch of a British accent. That made the question even more ludicrous.

She stepped back into the light a bit, put her hands on her hips, and said, “been out in the sun too long boy?”

———————

Jason cringed when the standard “is your mother home?” routine didn’t work. He really wanted to sell some soap today. He was hot, tired, and-

Did she just call him “boy?”.

The family must have been new in town because he didn’t recognize the woman before him. He wasn’t going to lower his eyes and start ogling her, but he could see enough to understand why he thought she might be younger. She had on a shawl to cover her shoulders, but it did nothing to cover her thighs and abdomen. Her features were smooth but her muscles were tight. Her legs looked capable of either strangling him, or making him pay if he didn’t stop trying to get a better look.

She couldn’t have been some transplant from the valley. They all had big plastic breasts. Hers were somewhat small, but more than enough to keep them peeking out from under the shawl she was wearing. Her bikini top was a dazzling white and, wait-

Were those freckles?

He took a look under her frilly hat and had to nearly stifle a laugh. She had red hair! Heaven save us Molly Ringwald had moved into town! Actually, she reminded him more of a famous country western singer. What was her name?

“Was there something you needed?” She had crossed her arms. That was not good.

“I’m sorry ma’am, I was thrown off by my previous faux pas. Of course you are the lady of the house and such a fine one it is”.

She rolled her eyes and tapped her foot. “Cut the shit. Are you selling something? I am not interested.” She didn’t move to kick him out, but he had obviously lost another sale. He was desperate.

“It’s laundry soap we have to sell to help buy uniforms for the kids football team. I apologize for all the pretense crap. I’m a terrible salesman and no one buys the stuff because the tradition has been going on for so long. I haven’t seen you before and I thought you might be interested.”

She looked at him with an odd expression. “You haven’t seen me before? Were you not the council member that approved my request to build a pool?”

He should have just turned around, rode home, and donated the soap to the Salvation Army. He couldn’t place her, however. He looked at her closely. She had deep hazel eyes that defied her apparent sense of being affronted. Then it dawned on him.

“You have three kids?” It wasn’t a question. It was incredulity There was no way she didn’t hear it. If she took it as a compliment, however, she gave no indication.

She turned and walked over to an entryway table to pull out her wallet. She started writing a check! Maybe she did take it as a compliment.

Any thought of checking out her backside was nixed immediately when he realized she was staring straight at him via a small mirror above the table.

“Is it any good?”

How could she have caught him? He didn’t even look!

“The soap”.

“Oh, erm”.

“Figures. And how much?”

“$5 a bottle”.

She turned to face him and her breasts seemed to turn on a different swivel, coming to a jiggling halt. It was an amazing sight. He struggled to keep his viewpoint above the neck. This wasn’t like him at all. What spell was this woman casting?

“Are you serious?” she asked.

Just then her son Seth slinked into the room. Jason recognized him from the High School. He certainly was not on the football team. He looked like he hadn’t bathed in days and was wearing a ratty t-shirt that had mustard stains. Probably a Rush fan.

“What are you doing mom?” He said with almost a touch of insolence in his voice.

“Buying some soap, hun.”

The kid gave him a quick eye. “Why are you riding a kids bike to carry it all?”

“You are never too old for a fun workout”.

He looked like he couldn’t be any less interested, and left.

She went back to her wallet and asked, looking at him in the mirror, “how many bottles are you carrying on that little bike of yours?”

Little bike? Was she serious? This woman’s game was starting to get insulting. He was about to protest, but then realized she might be just about to buy the whole lot!

“Four and a half cases, 18 bottles”.

“You’ve only managed to sell two bottles?”

What? How? She knew more than she was letting on. He wasn’t one for games like this, but it was her house. Let her have her little foray into a sense of intrigue and mystery.

“I guess you better start bringing it in then.”

He couldn’t believe his luck. “How many?”.

“At the rate you are selling them, you may as well make it all”

His soap peddling days were over! He nearly skipped outside as he retrieved the first load. On the way back in he took the opportunity to see that she really did look like a much younger woman. The skimpy bikini did nothing to hide her ass. Not a hint of sag or lack of tone. “Where has this woman been working out” was all he could think of. There were only a few gyms in town and he knew them all.

She had caught him this time. He tried to look innocent. She didn’t change her expression.

“Where do you want them?”

“Here under the table is fine. She didn’t move an inch, just tapped the table to her left. He slipped the two boxes underneath and left to grab the rest. He caught a strange scent as he was near her. Most women used coconut oil in the sun. This was different, and mysterious. It reminded him of some of the herbs his father would point out when they were in the mountains.

He grabbed the rest outside and turned around to an amusing site. She had lowered the shawl, tying it around her waist. Ok he had been caught, but did she really think he was that out of control of his hormones? She was an older woman, after all. He wasn’t looking for that kind of a relationship.

He put the remaining boxes underneath and stood to receive the check. As she bent over to write it out, he noticed her ass was coming into view from the side in the patio door reflection. The image was perfectly detailed as the glass had been polished to perfection.

Her uncovered chest was now nicely filling out the bikini top as she bent over to write the check. He didn’t want to get caught staring, so he looked up into the mirror. That zoomed him into her cleavage far enough to see almost to the nipple. The sides of her boobs were clearly visible. He realized that tying the shawl around her waist was only meant to look modest. He had been made a fool of. She had reeled him in hook, line and sinker.

Somewhere between feeling foolish and the unusual smell of her tanning oil, he realized he was starting to get aroused. That was not going to happen! Older women had played games with him like this before.

She had made him put the boxes to where writing the check had brought her face to within inches from his crotch. He had to get out of there. She was going to win without so much as a batted eyelash.

Too late.

He turned to his left to try and hide his emerging hard on. She stood up immediately and was back to looking in the mirror. She handed him the check without looking away. Encounter over.

But then she asked, “Tell me, why did you laugh when you saw my hair was red?”

He dropped open his mouth and the only sound to come through was like that of the shoes in that old Flubber movie. He shut it before more could come out.

“I thought so”, she said.

——————–

Sarah watched to make sure he was well down the road, then made her son Seth take all the soap to the Salvation army in the next town over. Sarah had fine taste in clothes. She wouldn’t even consider washing a dog’s blanket with that stuff.

As she made dinner for the kids that night, she wondered why she had put that poor mouth watering stud of a young man through such grief. She knew who he was. Every woman in town knew who he was. He bred horses with his father and was about to take over the family business. He was a member of the City Council and was the favorite to soon be groomed as a state senator.

He also spent time coaching the High School football team. No one was perfect. Football disgusted her. That was Charles’ thing.

She started to laugh and calmed down. She was no Cougar. She hated the word, along with MILF and all the others that were being bandied about as if they weren’t insulting. Nobody seemed to respect the institution of marriage anymore. Certainly not Charles. Certainly not Hollywood.

She wasn’t about to start fantasizing about the guy every woman in town had slept with in her mind at least once, regardless of her age. Jason Whitefeather was a decent young man and had rebuffed all of their advances. Apparently he put his career above all else and was not about to be led astray. He was single, popular, and completely unobtainable.

Still, it was cute to see him start to get stiff. Could he get out of there any faster? She had caught him checking out her ass briefly. How was it that her small breasts had done the trick? Didn’t he like the large breasted women from Hollywood like all the other men his age? Every middle aged woman in town was starting to get them. She had even considered getting small enhancements herself. It was only Charles’ disgusting eagerness that had stopped the idea.

Still, she hadn’t intended to do anything like that. To be honest, he seemed more like a putz than anything else, riding around on a kids bike intent on selling the soap.

Why did he have to laugh at her red hair?

That’s probably what had gotten her a bit miffed. She had been teased for it as long as she could remember. Even worse, the freckles. When she was a kid she hated her freckles so bad that she had nearly sandpapered them off before being stopped by her mother. That was a painful experience.

So, Mr. Whitefeather was just like all the rest and felt it was OK to tease a Ginger.? That was fine with her. Of course she knew his name. Of course she knew about the soap selling. She was well aware of what went on in town without having to resort to gossip like so many of the clucking hens did.

She decided to spend some time with her daughters. They loved to play chutes and ladders with her and had a great time. Seth even came in, to their surprise. He left after getting trounced by his sister three times in a row. Sarah shouldn’t have laughed but Hannah was only 2 years old.

After putting them to bed she headed into the kitchen where she stopped for some candles and a glass. She needed a bath. Her organic suntan lotion was getting pungent.

While running water in the tub she opened the secret panel hidden at the back of the towel closet. A dusty bottle of white zinfandel was inside. She hadn’t touched it since asking Charles for a divorce. She had put it away unopened that night.

Why not? She wasn’t sure how long it would last anyway. She picked it up and used the opener lying next to it.

The water continued to fill as she removed her clothes and stood looking at herself in the mirror. She wasn’t obsessed with aging like 99.9% of the women her age were. Perhaps she was lucky. She worked hard to keep her shape. Many women she had seen couldn’t seem to hold it together no matter how hard they tried. The erosion just kept creeping in. An extra roll here, an annoying pouch there. As far as she could tell, she was flawless. She didn’t have a good view of her back, but maybe she could ask the rude soap selling ginger teaser the next time she saw him. He certainly seemed eager for an eyeful.

Her face had shown some aging, but even there she was lucky. She had noticed a few years back some crows feet. Her big doe shaped hazel eyes drew all attention away from that. She didn’t really have that many freckles. Just a few on her face and a splash along her decolletage.

Her smile was what she knew drew all the attention. She had a Hollywood smile, pouty lips and all. No fillers here, it was all natural. It was handy, but she hadn’t used it to the full extent in years. Charles had seen to that.

She lowered herself into the tub and felt the warmth spread over her. She reached over to take a sip of the sparkling wine. Even more warmth spread through her body. She thought one last time of Charles. It was time to stop letting what he had done be responsible for her behavior and well being. She despised this city, but taking the kids elsewhere was impractical. Tomorrow, she was going to do something she had never dreamed herself of imagining. She was going to lease a studio and start teaching MMA again.

A smile came to her face. That made her feel good. So did the wine. So did the warm water. So did the warmth she felt in her loins.

Her soap peddling caller may have insulted her red hair, but he was very easy on the eyes. Arriving at a strange woman’s door without a shirt on was a churlish move, but was she going to hold that against him?

Were there other things she might hold against him? Like pressing her breasts into his back while she reached around to flutter her fingers over his abdomen? The stiffness in his groin was becoming more pronounced.

Taking another sip of wine, she lowered her hand in the water and started lightly touching her abdomen the way she had just touched his. The glow in her loins responded even further. She worked her way down to the inside of her thigh and smiled in admiration.

He had a full erection and it was making the loose fitting shorts look like a tent. Nibbling at his ear she deftly reached inside the jeans and undid each one of the buttons without a hitch. She hadn’t touched him, but his shorts now dropped to the floor and his naked member looked so stiff it had to be hurting him.