Next Sunday


Neither the aroma of flowers decorating the altar nor the underlying
familiarity of the surrounds--rows of pews left and right, altar in
the middle, organ on the right, choir on the left--were much help in
alleviating my nervousness. It wasn't going to church for the first
time since adolescence that bothered me so much as being among a crowd
of people once again.

The church I grew up with was a dark, musty, unpleasant place, but
this newer building had a good deal of glass at the entry, making the
room well lit, fresh, and inviting. Side doors were open, allowing
June air that hinted of warmth but hadn't yet heated to flow through
the room. The congregation, however, seemed timeless: children in
their Sunday best, smiling adults, women in pastel dresses, even a hat
or two, still, and white-haired old ladies seated in the front row.
Attendance was sparse enough that I was able to sit decently near the
front, but not immediately next to anyone else--amid but not among the
congregation. At precisely eleven o'clock the organ began the prelude,
its pedal tones resonating with the part of me that still sought
tribal drums.

One absolute innovation was a young man with a portable microphone who
passed up the center aisle from back to front inviting new
parishioners and visitors to introduce themselves. As he approached
the row in which I was seated, I noticed that my dress shoes were so
old and neglected that the leather along the edges was dried and
cracking. The minister took a minute to welcome the people who were
new to the congregation, inviting them--us--all to refreshments and
fellowship, to be held in the patio outside the sanctuary immediately
following the service.

I doubt that the liturgy had changed since John Wesley first set it
down. After the sermon, a hymn, and the benediction, we all filed out
to the strains of the postlude. At the door, I shook hands with the
pastor, as custom required. Four steps further along, my hand was
seized by both those of one of the white-haired ladies who'd been
sitting in the front row.

"How nice to see you," she said. "This is your first time here, isn't
it?"

"Yes," I said. "I'm just visiting today."

"Weren't the flowers lovely?" she asked. "Every time I see flowers,
I'm reminded of God's love for us."

I gently extricated my hand from hers.

"Yes," I said, as I began sidling to my left, "the flowers were quite
lovely."

"Do have some coffee and cookies!" the woman called out as I continued
to move beyond the range of conversation.

Church ladies apparently still baked cookies, I noticed as I walked
away from the sanctuary. To my right, along the sidewalk leading to
the parking lot, several folding tables had been set up. On display,
to tempt the palettes of regular worshippers and guests alike, were
enough cookies to satisfy the entire congregation, plus aluminum
percolators of both regular and decaffeinated coffee. As I navigated
my way through clumps of people standing around and chatting over
coffee and cookies, I passed near one of the tables, and my right hand
was once again seized in the double grip of Methodist fellowship.

"Hi!" came an enthusiastic greeting over my right shoulder. "I'm
Margaret Wilson, but you can call me Peg. Everybody else does. What's
your name?"

I turned and looked to see who belonged to such an assertive greeting.
"I'm Alex, Alex Winham."

Peg was one of the middle-aged ladies in a pastel dress, fairly tall,
trim but not thin, on the attractive side of plain, with short, light
brown hair that had been blow-dried into a non-style--a walking ad
from the pages of the JC Penney catalog. Her grip persevered.

"How nice to meet you, Alex. Is the rest of the family with you
today?"

"No, I'm here alone."

"Oh, so you do have a family, then?"

"Yes," I said, "I do."

"Won't you join us for some coffee and cookies?"

Refreshments, fellowship, and recruitment, it looked like to me, and I
wasn't there to be recruited.

"No, thank you," I said, "I'm afraid I don't have time to stay and
chat today."

"Well, then, perhaps next week," Peg said cheerily, releasing my hand.

"Yes," I said, "perhaps next week."

As it turned out, there was no next week, at least not for the
Methodist Church and me. My not going to church didn't have anything
to do with the church. It was simply one of those days when I didn't
feel like looking the world in the face. I slept late, felt guilty,
and frittered time away writing in my journal and catching up on email
correspondence.

But I was back the week following, this time without any particular
nervousness about being there, and without feeling the need to observe
the order of service carefully. Predictably, this Sunday was just like
the one two weeks ago. This week, when the fellow with the microphone
came by, I was seriously studying a bit of architectural detail where
the east wall of the sanctuary intersected the ceiling. My feeling was
that I sat there and let the service flow past me. I wasn't there for
the religiosity of it, I wasn't there seeking Christian salvation for
my soul, and I wasn't there to build a relationship with the
congregation. My being there was a test, an experiment to how I'd
respond to the people around me.

Once again, after the service, I shook the pastor's hand at the door
and let the white-haired lady grasp my hand with both of hers.

"How nice to see you back again!" she said. "Can we expect to be
seeing you regularly now?"

"It's nice to see you again, too," I said. "I can't promise that I'll
be a regular, but I will probably be back from time to time."

"Weren't the flowers lovely today?" she asked. "Every time I see
flowers, I'm reminded of God's love for us."

"The flowers were lovely," I said, as I began sliding my hand away.
"They add a nice touch of freshness to the sanctuary."

This time, I was prepared to see the tables of cookies and coffee, but
I still didn't feel like standing around making chit-chat with the
parishioners. I believed that my reasons for being at church were
quite different from theirs, and, in truth, I no longer believed in
Christianity as the only pathway to heaven any more than I believed in
the Easter Bunny. It seemed to me that any conversations I might have
would be vapid, hypocritical, or uncomfortable for all concerned.
Again making my way around the clumps of people talking over their
coffee and cookies, I chose a path on the far side of the walk, away
from the tables and Peg. I did not reckon on Peg's keen attention to
the crowd.

"Alex! Alex!" she called over the heads of a dozen people. "Come say
hello and get some coffee!"

It's possible that if I had any real courage of my convictions, or
that if I really were as antisocial as I considered myself to be, I
would have feigned deafness and kept walking, or even ignored Peg
completely. But I couldn't bring myself to do that. I couldn't be
downright rude, regardless of how I actually felt about getting
involved with the church fellowship.

I edged back through the crowd and let Peg take my hand in hers in
that double-fisted fellowshiply way. "How _are_ you?" she beamed. "So,
you decided we were worth coming back to visit again after all, huh?"
Like I was a long-lost friend. Serious recruitment efforts, here. I
glanced down at our collection of hands and noticed that her left
hand, on top of the heap, was not sporting a wedding ring.

"Hi, Peg," I said. "Yes, I decided to come back again."

"Is the family with you today?"

"No, I'm here alone. We didn't attend church as a family."

"If church isn't part of your family, what's brought you by yourself?"

"It's kind of a long story," I said.

Peg, having released my hand, stepped back and looked at me
thoughtfully for a moment. "Oh," she said. Then, after a pause, "Would
you like to talk about it?"

Would I like to talk about it? Well, yes and no. Part of me would have
loved to unburden itself by pouring out my tale to an attentive woman.
The more cautious part of me, the one that was currently dominant,
warned that everything was too fragile right now to invest outside of
myself. I wasn't sure where my center was, and I didn't especially
want a witness to my fumbling around in search of it.

Peg took my silence as assent. "You're right," she said. "This isn't a
very good place to talk. Listen, all I have to do is serve. Since I'm
on the set-up committee, I don't have to stick around to put
everything away. Why don't we meet at the Kozy Kitchen in a half hour.
You know where it is?"

I could have backed out gracefully, but I still was, after all, flying
by the seat of my emotional pants. My own decisions, my own actions,
fate, and a slightly aggressive middle-aged Methodist woman had
combined to create this particular crossroads of time and place. Which
fork should I take? It seemed to me there couldn't be much threat in
having lunch with a church-going woman in a public restaurant, and it
would be good practice in reassimilating myself into the world. I
agreed.

The Kozy Kitchen, a neighborhood family restaurant a couple of miles
down the main street from the church, was full of Sunday brunchers and
breakfasters, some looking like they'd just come from church, and some
looking like they'd just come from bed. The mixed aromas of bacon,
coffee, and syrup hung heavy in the air. After a brief wait, I got a
two-person booth next to a window, ordered coffee, and waited for Peg
to arrive.

I hadn't finished my first cup of coffee when I saw her come through
the door, all pastel and smile, and look on tip-toes around the room
until she spotted me. She came to the booth and settled in, and we
both studied menus. After considering various socially and politically
correct breakfast options, I decided to blow a week's cholesterol
ration on the standard eggs, bacon, and hash browns; Peg chose a fruit
and fiber combination. The waitress, a sturdy woman in a black skirt
and white shirt with properly knotted black necktie, came and took our
orders. Then I began to have serious second thoughts about being here.

I'd told Peg that the reason for my coming to church was kind of a
long story, and I'd agreed to meet her at the restaurant, presumably
to tell her some version of the story. It had seemed, I suppose, like
a good idea at the time, but I hadn't thought very far ahead of that
moment. I didn't have a rehearsed speech to deliver, and I was in
jeopardy of just dumping out pieces of my insides that I wasn't sure I
wanted to reveal. In fact, my reasons for going to church covered a
lot of territory, a long period of time, a good deal of my personal
history. I didn't know where to start.

Peg apparently sensed my unease. She dropped her extroverted church
fellowship and recruitment demeanor and smiled encouragingly,
personally rather than generally. "So," she said, "you decided to come
to church even though your family didn't attend church regularly, and
how you got there is a long story. It sounds like the story could be
an interesting one."

"I doubt it," I said. "It's pretty mundane stuff. The reason my family
isn't with me is that I don't live with them any more. My wife and I
separated about three months ago. My coming to church is just an
experiment, a test. I haven't done anything socially for a long time,
and church seemed like a safe place to be among people again."

"I should hope it would be a safe place," Peg said, "but that sounds
more like the end of a story than the beginning."

I sat quietly for a moment to collect my thoughts. Peg didn't press.

"What really happened, I guess, what really began the whole process
that resulted in my going to church, was that I realized I was living
two lives. I'd developed a split personality. Or something like that."

Peg's eyes widened perceptibly. "Two lives?"

"Life was 'ordinary' for a long time. I got up, went to work, came
home. Spent time with my wife and kids. Mowed the lawn, fixed leaky
faucets, read books--did all the ordinary things that ordinary people
did, and enjoyed what I was doing ."

"And then something changed?"

"Not so much had changed as did change, so slowly that I didn't see it
until the amount of change and my internal discomfort with it reached
a point where I couldn't ignore it any longer. Life at home had become
very uncomfortable, really shitty, if you don't mind my saying so."

Peg's face didn't move.

"My wife and I couldn't talk about hardly anything without arguing. We
argued for years, literally. Arguing became a way of life. The only
way we could communicate at all was through argument. We even argued
about arguing, for God's sake. And I got so sick and tired of arguing
that I couldn't stand it. My stomach was in a knot almost whenever I
was at home. We couldn't stop arguing through any kind of reason or
agreement, and I began to withdraw. Retreat."

The waitress bustled up, her arms lined with plates. The interruption
gave me the opportunity to see that I was teetering on the brink of
dumping my insides to a complete stranger, of exposing a flaw and a
weakness I found difficult to admit to myself. Huge issues of trust
and vulnerability began to gather about my thoughts like dark, heavy
clouds. I'd gone to church only as a means of dabbling my toes in
social waters. I wasn't looking for rescue or salvation in the form of
another person, another woman.

"Enjoy!" the waitress said, bustling off again. Peg looked at me
expectantly.

I stopped and cut a wedge out of one of my over-easy eggs and sopped
up the yolk with a bite of hash browns. Peg rearranged the pieces of
her fruit salad. And I had gone far enough that I was committed to
finish my story, whether I really wanted to or not.

"During the week, I led a normal workaday life. But on weekends, I
slept late and then hid in my room--my study--from the constant
judgment and wrath of my wife. I was scared to death to come out and
face the world without a 'legitimate' excuse--running errands, doing
chores, or making household repairs. Then I began to notice that my
retreat at home was affecting my 'normal' life. I was becoming less
and less willing to talk to people at work, becoming gun-shy about
conversations that might tend toward personal matters, and liable to
react angrily to people when anger was wholly inappropriate. My
perspective was shot. I felt like I was getting weird. That was when I
realized I was leading two lives: what I was on the inside was not
what I was on the outside, and I was scared to death that someone
would be able to see what I was like on the inside, find out who or
what I _really_ was."

I felt like my face must be getting red. There it was, my little
secret, right out there with the murmur of other conversations in the
room, scattered across the table around the salt and pepper shakers
and the bottle of catsup, in plain view. Peg stopped a chunk of
pineapple halfway to her mouth and looked at me with evident surprise.

"That's it? Those were your two lives?" she said.

"Yes," I said, unsure whether it was mortification or relief I was
feeling.

Peg put the piece of pineapple back onto her plate, picked up her
napkin, and dabbed at her lips. Then she started to laugh. She kept
the napkin over her mouth and laughed in a reserved way, but she
laughed nonetheless until the corners of her eyes were wet.

Mortification surged into the lead.

"Alex, Alex, Alex," she said. She reached across the table and placed
one of her hands gently on top of mine. "Please, I'm not laughing at
you, I'm laughing at myself. Laughing with relief. I'd prepared myself
for the worst. I had myself convinced that you were going to tell me
you'd taken to beating your wife to a pulp or robbing banks or
something, and that you'd come to church in a last-ditch effort to
save your soul. Really. Truly. It sounds to me like what you went
through is the same kind of loss of direction everybody goes through
when a marriage comes apart."

Mortification slowed its pace and relief edged forward.

"So, if you didn't come to church out of desperation, what did get you
there?"

Heartened by Peg's acceptance of what I was saying, I continued. "At
the same time that I admitted my split personality to myself, I
realized that my study, which had for years been my place of refuge
from the world, a pleasurable place for me to be, had become a cell of
fear into which I'd locked myself. Then I tried to remember what
weekends used to be like, what normal people did on Saturdays and
Sundays, and I wondered what I'd do with my weekends if I were free of
the restraints I was feeling right then. What I decided was that I'd
have to ease back into society after such a long period of exile. I
didn't think I could just jump into a world of people with a large
commitment. I'd have to do something passive, like sit in a mall and
watch people walk by, or perhaps visit an art exhibit, or maybe go to
church."

"Have you done those other things too, or did going to church win the
debate?

"Church won. It seemed to me, after thinking things over, that I'd
expanded my loss of faith and trust in my wife to a loss of faith and
trust in people. What I was really looking for was normality and good
intentions among people. I needed relief from the nuttiness of work in
the computer business as well as from my wife's anger. I decided that
just being in a crowd, like in a mall or at an art exhibit, wasn't
quite enough. I needed more reassurance than that. Fishing back nearly
thirty years in memory, I thought I recalled that church people were
likely to be friendly, or at least not threatening. People with a
focus and with good intentions. I know this doesn't make a whole lot
of sense, but I guess the process that got me to church was more
intuitive than logical. Or maybe desperate. I needed to put myself
someplace where there were people and be prepared to respond to what I
found when I got there."

The look on Peg's face seemed to suggest that I'd explained the long
story of how I got to church satisfactorily. "It makes perfect sense
to me," she said.

Our conversation--my near monolog--had been punctuated by bites of egg
and toast, pear and romaine. Peg was sipping her coffee as I finished
my second cup. The waitress had removed our plates and slipped the
check under my saucer.

"Thank you for listening to me," I said.

"Alex, sometimes that's what people are for. And not all people, not
all women, are your wife."

We scooted out of the booth. Peg waited in the entryway while I paid
the tab. In the parking lot, I extended my hand to shake hers, and she
once again covered our grip with her left hand.

"Alex," she said, "I haven't said much today, but before we go, let me
offer you a couple of things to think about. The picture I got of you
today was of a pretty okay guy. Confused and hurting after the breakup
of a long marriage, but pretty okay. When you were thinking about what
you'd do if you had the freedom to move about as you wanted, you
picked some pretty tame and healthy choices. You didn't want to get
even, you didn't want to take your anger out on anyone else, you
didn't want to get drunk or go on a sexual binge, or anything like
that. What you wanted to do was fix yourself. Maybe you should be a
little easier, more forgiving, with yourself. And try not to think so
damn much."

"I'll try," I said. "For me, that's not so easy, I guess."

"Will I see you next Sunday?"

"I think so. Right now, I'm planning on it."

We gave our hands a little squeeze and shake, and then went to our
cars. On the drive home, I realized that, while Peg and I were
standing in the parking lot, we did more than part with just a
friendly shake. We held hands for several minutes. I hadn't been
trying to hold hands with Peg. Of course, I couldn't know what her
intent might have been.

The next Sunday I did go to church again. It was now late June, and
Silicon Valley was experiencing the first of the dozen or so really
hot days it has every year, temperatures in the 90's and dead calm
air. Saturday it was hot and Sunday dawned already hot, with the
promise of nothing but more heat as the day progressed. In the church,
there wasn't a necktie in sight. Many of the men were wearing
short-sleeved shirts, and many of the women sleeveless dresses. Lots
of people fanned themselves with programs during the service. By now,
my third visit to the church, neither the people nor the surrounds
seemed totally unfamiliar. I nodded recognition to some of the
worshippers, but I still sat apart from them, and I still looked away
when the young man with the microphone came by. I was still there for
me, not for them.

After the service, I shook hands with the minister again, then just
went ahead to the coffee table, which today included sweating pitchers
of fruit punch, to greet Peg and chat with her. After we'd exchanged
greetings, I couldn't help but ask, "Where's the old lady who's
usually standing right outside the door, you know, the one who likes
the flowers so much?"

"She had a stroke last week," Peg said. "She's in the hospital, and it
seems unlikely that she'll recover."

"I'm sorry to hear that," I said. And I was. This was, it seemed to
me, where the rubber of religion met the road to eternity. I had to
wonder whether her apparent years at church had prepared the old lady
for this moment, whether she would in fact be the recipient of God's
love for her.

"Peg, thank you again for listening to me last week. I feel like that
was a bit of an imposition on my part, taking your time that way just
to vent at you."

"Oh, Alex, for Pete's sake," Peg said. "I was happy to have the
opportunity to get to know you better. Hey, look, want to have lunch
today?"

I hadn't planned on having lunch with Peg today. But, then, I hadn't
planned on not having lunch with Peg today, either. Why not?

"Sure," I said. "Want to do the Kozy Kitchen again?"

"It's so hot today," Peg said, "and my house stays nice and cool
during hot weather. Why don't we go there? It's only a few blocks
away."

"That sounds fine to me."

"Okay, why don't you mix and mingle here until the crowd thins and I
can get away, then you can follow me over."

I agreed. I didn't exactly mix and mingle, but I moved among the
groups of people, mostly eavesdropping to learn what these folks
talked about during their fellowship time. It was quickly apparent
that many of them had known each other for a long time, and they were
chatting about mutual friends and family members, catching up on the
news. By now I did have at least a nodding recognition of some of the
people, and we nodded and shook hands in greeting, though we didn't
speak beyond pleasantries. The church people were, of course, glad to
see me back again and hoped they'd be seeing more of me. After a half
hour or so, most of the crowd had dispersed. Peg touched my arm to get
my attention, and we walked off to the parking lot.

Though the drive was short, in fact only a few blocks away, I could
feel sweat trickling down my chest before we got to Peg's. It was in
one of the mature areas of Santa Clara, almost but not quite in the
shadow of the Mission. The lot was landscaped, complete with squatty
palm trees, to look like a piece of old Mexico. The walls of the house
were blinding white in the sun, resembling the plaster and whitewash
finish of an adobe, and the windows were faced with dark, rough-cut
wood, studded with black iron fittings. The roof was the typical
alternating semi-cylindrical red tile. The portals on the front porch
were made of massive, rough-cut beams, and the front door consisted of
dark wood planks bound together by black iron bands. At eye level was
a peep-hole guarded by wrought-iron latticework.

Inside, the house was cool. A red-tiled entryway opened into a large
living room with _vigas_ and _latillas_--the crossing large and small
beams peculiar to adobe construction--on the ceiling, and _bancos_,
benches, beneath the windows. Peg had carried the Mexican theme into
her furnishings as well, dark heavy frames with plush cushions. The
whole interior was dark, subdued, which lent to the impression of
coolness in contrast to the glare of the sun, and smelled of oiled
wood. The darkness did not feel oppressive or sinister, but inviting.
To me, it indicated comfort and security, peace and insulation, the
expression of someone who was perfectly content to lead a private,
self-contained life, a sentiment with which I could empathize. We went
from the living room through a dining room, which contained a heavy,
dark table and chairs, into the kitchen.

"Have a seat," Peg said, indicating a lighter, more modern breakfast
table. "Please excuse me for a moment. I've just got to get out of
these shoes."

I sat while Peg went down a hallway off the other side of the kitchen.
The house was deceptively large, much bigger than a quick glance at
the front might suggest. Although the kitchen cabinets were made of
the same dark wood used in the rest of the house, the Mexican theme
was relaxed. A serving counter with cabinets overhead separated a
generous cooking area from an uncrowded breakfast room. Through a
sliding glass door at the far end of the breakfast area, I could see a
swimming pool as the dominant feature in a heavily landscaped back
yard.

"Tuna salad be okay with you?" Peg called as she came back into the
kitchen. I hadn't heard her bare feet coming down the carpeted
hallway.

She had indeed got out of her shoes. She was wearing a pair of white
Spandex shorts stretched to the point of translucency and a loose
fitting cotton tank top with a wide scooping neck and deep arm holes.
As she passed by the table, I could see, in the triangular shadow
around her crotch, every pubic hair molded in detailed contour. What
her pastel dresses had been hiding was one of the most remarkably
well-maintained forty-something bodies I'd ever seen. Here was a lady
who must spend serious time at the gym. I decided that my best course
of action would be to remain cool in all regards.

"Tuna salad will be just fine," I said.

As Peg moved about the cooking area preparing the food, we chatted
inconsequentially--about the heat, of course, traffic, the general
degradation of the Silicon Valley environment over time. When she
turned and reached while going about her tasks, profile views of her
small, firm breasts were part of the overall picture. As she was
carrying food and utensils to the table, a fork clattered to the floor
near my chair. At the same time that I bent to retrieve it, so did
Peg, and her suddenly bare breasts were no more than two feet from my
face. I looked, and then looked away. Neither of us said a word.

Peg sat down opposite me and smoothed a napkin into her lap. "Hope you
like it," she said.

I took a taste--tuna salad with a vinaigrette base rather than
mayonnaise. The rest of the meal consisted of a fruit compote and
low-fat, whole wheat crackers; peach nectar, fresh coffee.

"Delicious," I said.

For a few minutes, we ate in silence. Then Peg said, "Still thinking
about things?"

"No. Yes. Well, it's hard to turn off the thinking machine."

"Any more thoughts about trust?

"Hah! No. I came to a conclusion about that. No further thought
needed. Right now, anyway."

"So, what was the conclusion, then?"

"What I finally realized is that my wife never trusted me, and because
I never knew how she was going to react to something I said or did, I
came not to trust her. My guard was always up."

"Yeah. Your guard's still working just fine, I think. I probably
shouldn't ask, but I will: did you do something to earn her distrust?"

"No, I didn't, and that's the great irony of the situation. She always
knew where I was and what I was doing. I never even had an opportunity
to misbehave."

Peg looked down at my empty plate. "More tuna?" she asked.

"No, thanks," I said, "but I would like some coffee."

Peg poured me a mug of coffee, then continued. "No nights out with the
boys? Baseball games? Fishing trips?"

I laughed. "Not hardly. Those aren't my things. I like reading and
writing and tools and making things. If I wasn't at work or running an
errand, I was at home. I think my wife's truster is busted. Whatever
it is that permits a person to trust others, my wife just can't do."

Peg stood and began gathering our empty dishes. As she was rinsing the
plates and placing them in the dishwasher, I put the salad bowls and
odds and ends on the counter. When everything was cleared away, Peg
wiped her hands and said, "Want a two-bit tour of the place?"

"Sure," I said, following her down the hall out the side of the
kitchen away from the living room.

The rest of the house consisted mainly of three bedrooms. One of the
smaller bedrooms Peg identified as a guest room, and the other simply
as "her room," a combination sitting room and light workout room, with
a Nordic Track occupying a good deal of the space.

Peg had carried the Mexican theme into the master bedroom. The chest
of drawers was made of the same dark, heavy wood as the furniture in
the living room, as was the four-post frame around the queen-sized
bed. The drawer pulls on the bureau looked as if they were made from
hammered black iron, and the corner posts of the bed frame had black
iron rings attached to them, something like little hitching posts. The
stylized Aztec calendar of the quilted bedspread was reflected back at
itself from mirrors on the ceiling.

"I like the Mexican architecture and furniture," I said. "The whole
house looks solid and comfortable, a good place to feel safe from the
world."

"Yes," Peg said, looking into the master bedroom. "It's taken me a
long time to make my house the way I want it. I like it here." Then,
turning to me, "Would you like another cup of coffee?"

"Sure," I said. Back in the kitchen, I sat down at the table again.
Peg poured me a cup of coffee, then leaned on the back of the chair
opposite the one in which I was sitting.

"It's so hot today." she said. "Would you like to go for a swim?"

I laughed. "I'm afraid I didn't bring a bathing suit to church."

"You don't need one," Peg said. "The yard's completely secluded. "

I looked more closely. If she wasn't making an attempt to conceal, I
couldn't see any reason why I should make an attempt to be
surreptitious. Sure enough, no tan lines. I looked out the sliding
glass doors, across the cyan plane of the swimming pool, barely
twinkling in the still air, at the greenery, then back at Peg. What in
_hell_ was I afraid of, I asked myself. What did I possibly have to
lose by going for a nude swim with a woman I hardly knew? In you're
going to be in for a dime, I told myself, might as well go for the
whole enchilada.

"Sure," I said, "but you're likely to be blinded by the reflection off
my skin. I haven't been out in the sun for ages."

"I'll risk it," she said. "You can undress in the guest room, if you
like. There's an extra closet in there with hangers for your shirt and
slacks."

So I went to the guest room and undressed. This would be the first
time I'd been nude with a woman not my wife in twenty years. Male
doubts set in enough to make me look down at my crotch. But only
briefly. In for a dime, in for the whole enchilada, and what
difference did it make, anyway.

I stood in the doorway and waited for Peg to emerge from her bedroom.
As she approached me, with several towels clutched to her chest, I
took a quick look at her bush. Very nice. I saw her drop a quick
glance to my crotch. Then I let her lead me down the hall, through the
kitchen, and out the sliding glass door, watching the sway of her hips
and the jiggle of her bottom all the way. It wasn't just trust that
had been missing from my life, I thought.

I made a clean, shallow dive into the pool and coasted in the cool
blue silence. One breast stroke and a frog kick brought me to the
other end, where I surfaced with a whoosh. Peg popped up beside me a
few seconds later.

"How's it feel?" she asked.

"I'd forgotten how good a swimming pool could feel on a hot day," I
said.

Peg splashed water in my face. Of course, I splashed water back in
hers. And then we had a full-scale water fight for a few minutes. When
we settled back down again, I realized that, for those few minutes, I
hadn't thought about anything. I'd just behaved automatically.
Played--for the first time in how long?

After that, we swam a few lazy laps in the short pool. Then we tried
sitting on beach balls under the water, and laughed when we lost our
balance and the balls rocketed to the surface. When we'd exhausted all
the possibilities the balls had to offer, we bent Styrofoam noodle
floats into odd shapes and tried balancing ourselves on them, with a
good deal of whooping, hollering, and splashing. In the process of our
play, we collided, we touched, and various parts of our bodies slid
past each other.

After an hour or so, we were floating quietly with our arms draped
over the noodles, facing one another. I looked at my shoulders and
pressed them tentatively.

"I've had a marvelous time in the water," I said, "but if I don't get
into some shade soon, I'm going to cook myself."

Peg floated over until her face was less than an arm's length from
mine. "How'd you like to try an experiment in trust?" she asked.

All my mental machinery went back into motion, and I went rigid. To
say that I didn't feel threatened by Peg wasn't to say that I was
ready to extend trust to her. My truster was busted, too.

Peg put her hand on my forearm. "Hey," she said, "relax. I know
trust's a scary thing for you right now, but you have to start
somewhere. Give it a try. If you feel too uncomfortable anywhere along
the line, all you have to do is say you want to stop."

I'd come out of my shell to the extent of going to church. I'd agreed
to have lunch with Peg, first in a restaurant and then at her home.
I'd agreed to go swimming with her nude, and, I had to admit to myself
almost grudgingly, I'd had fun doing it. Today seemed to be a day for
taking risks, and I _knew_ I was going to have to become emotionally
healthy again--despite how I felt about it at the moment--if I was
ever going to lead anything like a reasonably normal, happy life. But
I wasn't sure I could demonstrate any kind of trust credibly.

"All right," I said.

Peg beamed, and gave my arm a little squeeze. Then we abandoned the
noodles, swam to the side of the pool, and clambered out. Patting
myself dry with a towel as I walked, I followed her jiggle back
through the sliding glass door and the kitchen, down the hall, and to
her bedroom.

In the bedroom, Peg stepped up to me and hugged me, wrapping her arms
around my waist and pressing her body full against me. I was very
aware of her breasts against my rib cage and my penis against her
stomach, just above her bush.

"Alex," she said, "I trust you. From what you've told me about your
marriage and divorce and from what I've seen and sensed in your
behavior with me, I truly don't think you'd do anything to hurt me,
physically or emotionally. I trust you, and what I want to do is show
you that I trust you." Peg pulled away from me and looked straight
into my eyes.

I must have appeared dumbstruck. That was how I felt. _She_ trusted
_me_? I'd been so wrapped up in myself, stewing and fretting about my
inability to trust anybody else, my fear of showing some trust in Peg,
that I'd never stopped to think that what she might have in mind was
to show her trust of me. She was giving me her trust. My wife had
never given me her trust in twenty years at the same time she was
demanding my trust in her. I didn't know how to respond to Peg's gift.

Then Peg turned and stepped to her bureau, where she opened a drawer
and took out a number of long silk scarves.

"Here's what I want to do," she said. "I want you to tie my arms and
legs to the bedposts, loosely, but securely enough that I can't pull
free. After you have the restraints in place, you can do anything you
want to me, subject to one condition: if I say the word 'ping-pong,'
you must immediately stop what you're doing. Do you agree to the
condition?"

I swallowed, my mouth suddenly dry. "Of course."

Peg lay on the bed, spreading her legs and arms so that they pointed
toward the corners of the mattress. Starting with her ankles, I bound
her as she'd instructed, tying the scarves through the little rings on
the bedposts. When I'd finished, one scarf remained. I held it up, and
looked at Peg questioningly.

"With that one, you blindfold me," she said.

After the blindfold was in place, Peg said, "What's the special word?"

"Ping-pong."

"Right," she said. "Be sure you don't forget it."

The first thing I did was just look at Peg, lying there completely
relaxed, as if perhaps preparing to sleep, her arms and legs spread,
her breasts flattened to her chest, her bush fluffed out from
toweling, and her labia dry and closed.

Then I began to smell her, starting at her ears. Not touching her, I
softly inhaled and exhaled across her face and down her neck, past her
shoulder and down her arm. When I reached her hand, I reversed
direction and moved back up her arm, making puffs of air in the crook
of her elbow and her armpit, continuing to her breasts and her
nipples; then down her midriff, around her navel and her bush, down
and back up her legs.

After I'd traversed her body with my nose, I repeated the circuit with
my lips and tongue, starting not with her ears but her lips. I kissed
her, as softly as I could, and found the tip of her tongue waiting to
touch mine. When I reached her hands, I sucked on her fingers. When I
reached her feet, I sucked her big toes and ran my tongue around and
between the others. I kissed her arch and her instep. After I'd
kissed, nibbled, and licked my way back up her thighs, I moved onto
the bed, kneeling between her legs. Her labia were now opening, and
moist. I looked at her face--her lower lip was curled in, held between
her teeth.

Bending forward, I probed her vagina with the tip of my tongue, then
licked and kissed along her labia, helping her open, helping her
become wet. After a few minutes, she was moving her hips and breathing
faster. I shifted my focus to her clitoris, ticking it as lightly as I
could, with just the tip of my tongue. Peg started to hiss air in
through clenched teeth but exhale quietly, giving the impression she
was inhaling until she might burst. When it seemed that her climax was
mounting, I held her there... and held her there... and held her
there... and then applied enough pressure to take her over the edge...
and she came, saying, "Ahhhhhhhhhhh" with a long sigh.

I raised myself up on my knees. When Peg's breathing had returned to
normal, I said, "Now, can I ask you to do something for me?"

"On, yes!" she said, without a moment's hesitation.

I slipped off her blindfold, then removed her bindings. Peg looked at
me, blinking as her eyes became reaccustomed to the light.

"For the next little while, will you pretend that you love me?"

She extended her arms in invitation and smiled widely, her eyes
shimmering.

I leaned forward again, rubbed my penis between her legs to lubricate
myself, then entered her slowly and gently, a bit at a time. When I
was all the way in, I pressed against her and remained motionless for
a minute or more. I flexed, and she squeezed in response.

Then we made love, slowly. We weren't teens, and our coupling wasn't
about lust. The medium was sex, but the messages--my needs--were love
and trust. Peg seemed to sense exactly what I needed, and responded to
my mood as well as to my body.

At some point, my spirit left the exclusive domain of my body and
hovered in and about both of us. Lost in a transcendent world, I
wished that I could be both her and me at the same time, that I could
penetrate her and receive her at the same time, that our molecules
could merge and we could be one together rather than merely two
joined.

In that timeless between-world I floated, moving in and out of Peg
with body and mind, until I felt my climax approaching and then came,
with a physical and emotional release that struck like a
thunderclap--and rumbled, and rumbled. Peg came with me, clenching
inside and out, gripping me ferociously with both arms and legs.

Presently, the thunder faded in the distance. My breathing and my
heart rate slowed. Peg's clenchings diminished. I kissed her, then
withdrew and rolled to the side. Peg turned on her side so that she
was facing me, and draped her arm across my chest.

"Thank you. You're a very good actress," I said, turning to her with a
smile and a wink.

"Sometimes, getting into a role requires almost no effort at all," Peg
said, tilting her head to kiss me.

We lay together in silence, touching but not quite hugging. I started
when I felt myself drifting into sleep, and looked at the clock on the
nightstand.

"I'm sorry, Peg," I said, "but I have to go. I have a dinner date with
my sons tonight."

"I understand," Peg said. We kissed one more time, then got up.

Peg slipped into a shift, and watched from the door of the guest room
while I dressed. Together, we walked to the living room. I took Peg
into a gentle embrace and kissed her, a touch of lips and tongue. When
we separated, I took her right hand as if to shake it, and covered it
with my left. Then I brought her hand, cupped in both of mine, to my
lips and kissed the back of it.

"Church next Sunday?" Peg asked.

"Yes, church next Sunday."

"Lunch after?"

"Lunch after."