Abigail' Secret
This story concerns a burgeoning love affair between Abigail, a lady in her early fifties, and Tom, who is twenty-five years younger. The age gap is significant, but Abigail also has a secret.
The eponymous lady is based upon a member of staff that helped me out in a DIY superstore recently. My thanks to her.
I hope you enjoy this story and I look forward to receiving comments.
It all started after I decided that the downstairs shower was just too revolting to use anymore. The whole room needed updating, but I couldn't afford to do that so I decided on a quick makeover for the shower: strip the mouldy silicon sealant out and scrape away the grout that had turned orange with fungal growth. I'd got most of the stuff I needed but when I came to re-grout the tiles I found the tube of grout I'd got had dried up, so I popped into the local DIY superstore after work one Tuesday and that's when I met Abigail.
I wasn't in a hurry or anything when I entered the vast store with its endless aisles of steel racking and I spent a bit of time in the shower section looking at what I might buy when I refurbished the room. I found the tiles section easily enough, and a display with tile cutters and grouting tools and almost everything else you could think of - except grout and tile adhesive. I couldn't see them anywhere. I marched up and down aisles but drew a blank. Reaching the end of one aisle, I came across a member of staff. She had her back to me and was humming to herself as she entered data from a display onto a tablet. She wore the staff uniform of black polo shirt, with company logo on the back, and black trousers.
'Excuse me,' I said approaching her.
She turned to me and gave me a smile. 'How can I help you, sir?' she said in a clear and even voice, with just a trace of local accent.
My stomach turned over as I looked at her. I should say here that I'm a sucker for a mature lady and this one was close to my ideal. She was tall, around five nine, I guessed, with chestnut hair cut in a short bob. She had an attractively tanned face with full lips, hazel eyes and slightly hooked nose. When she smiled she showed strong, even teeth. Not film-star white but not yellow. She appeared to be in her fifties with marked crow's feet at the corners of her eyes and faint lines on her cheeks and above her upper lip. She wore a name badge that said "Abigail".
I swallowed, realising that I was in danger of gawping at her. 'I'm looking for tile grout,' I said. 'I can't seem to find it.'
Her smile broadened. 'Follow me.'
I fell in behind her, admiring the fit of the trousers around her bum and the length of her legs. She walked a few aisles along then stopped and pointed. 'Down at the end, on the right.'
I'd walked that aisle at least twice! Why hadn't I seen the bloody stuff? 'Thank you,' I said and she smiled at me again and turned away. I watched her disappear around a corner and then went and picked up tube of white grout and headed for the check outs.
And that should have been the end of it, except that I couldn't stop thinking about Abigail. She was gorgeous. A perfect example of a sexy older lady, at least as far as my sixty-second exposure to her had indicated. That night I thought about her while I masturbated; what she would look like naked; what she would look like bouncing up and down on my erection; what she might smell like and taste like; what her most intimate places might look like and if she made much noise when she came. The following day at work I thought about her some more, and again in the evening. I masturbated twice that second night and woke in the morning with another boner which had to be relieved before I went to work. On an impulse, I went into the superstore on my way home from work the following day, but there was no sign of her. I was unreasonably disappointed but that was that.
Except it wasn't. I went into the store the next evening, which was a Friday, then again on Saturday morning and Sunday afternoon. Nothing. I was tempted to phone the superstore and ask for Abigail, but somehow I didn't think that would work. On Monday I told myself to stop being so daft and I went straight home after work. On Tuesday, a week after I'd seen her, I told myself that maybe she only worked Tuesdays and I ended up going into the store during my lunchbreak, although it was miles from where I worked.
And there she was, putting packets of screws onto a display stand. I walked past her a couple of times to make sure I'd got the right person. She didn't notice me, although the place was very quiet that lunchtime and there was no one else in the aisle. It now struck me forcibly that I had no plan for talking to her. This probably sounds silly but I don't think I ever really thought I'd see her again, so I hadn't thought about what I'd say to her if I did. I walked past again and lurked by the masonry paint while I thought about what to do. In the end I just went up to her.
'Excuse me.'
She turned and smiled. 'How can I help you?'
'You showed me where the tile grout was the other day,' I began.
'Oh, did I?'
'Yes. And you'll probably think I'm a complete lunatic but I just wondered if you'd like to have a coffee with me, sometime.' I tailed off, my face flushing with embarrassment.
Abigail's smile faded a bit and she looked puzzled. 'You want to have a coffee with me?'
'Yes. I know it sounds crazy but... Would you?' I gave her my best "I'm not a nutter" smile. My smile is reckoned to be pretty powerful by the girls I've dated. I should add here that although I am very attracted to older ladies, I've never actually slept with a lady more than five years older than me; this was radically new territory. And whilst on the subject of my smile it may be worth sketching out what Abigail saw standing in front of her that Tuesday lunchtime: I'm about the same height as her, five nine, with a slim, athletic body. My hair is black and a bit curly and my features are regular, with blue eyes and a firm chin. I'm no Paul Newman but I look ok and I've never had a problem with ladies. Until now maybe. It occurred to me that I didn't even know if she was married. Someone of her age probably was, and I couldn't see whether she was wearing a wedding ring, so I stood and looked at her with a hopeful expression and she looked at me.
'You mean after work?' She was looking at me a little quizzically.
'Yes,' I said. 'I suppose. In the Starbucks up the road maybe?'
She eyed me critically for a few seconds. 'Ok,' she said. 'Why not. But I don't finish until six.'
A heavenly choir seemed to rise up and a huge sense of wellbeing enveloped me. 'That's great! I'll see you at six.' I turned to go then turned back. 'I'm Tom, by the way.'
'Abigail,' said Abigail. She gave me a final quizzical look and a sort of half smile then she turned back to her screws and I left the store.
The afternoon was a rollercoaster of emotions. At first I was in a kind of euphoric haze. Later I alternated between worrying that she wouldn't turn up and worrying that she would and I'd have nothing to say to her.
I finished at five and drove to the business park where the superstore was and parked outside the Starbucks. Inside I ordered a flat white and took it to a table by the window and sat looking out and sipping the scalding liquid. It was twenty to six. The next twenty minutes dragged by while I sipped my coffee and fiddled with my phone and stared out into the car park. By five past I was starting to wonder if she was coming. At a quarter past I was convinced she wasn't, although I stayed at my table. At twenty-five past I saw her crossing the car park in the direction of the coffee house and my stomach did a great lurch and I felt vaguely sick. She came through the doorway and stood looking around. It wasn't busy but a few tables were occupied so I waved and she saw me and came over and I stood up to meet her.
'I'm sorry I'm late,' she began. 'I told my friend I was coming here for a coffee with a stranger and she tried to talk me out of it.'
'I'm glad she didn't,' I said. 'What would you like?' Abigail opted for an Americano with hot milk and I went up to order and she sat down at the table.
When I got back we looked at each other across the table and I smiled and she smiled back and for a few seconds I had a horrible feeling that it was all going to go wrong and we'd have nothing to say to each other, nothing in common. In the end, to my shame, it was Abigail who broke the silence.
'So, Tom, what do you do when you're not having coffee with strange ladies?' She smiled as she said this and it was a kind smile and my stomach lurched again because I suddenly knew that it was going to be alright.
I talked to her about my work (I'm a junior lawyer) and I asked her about hers and she told me that she liked working in the superstore because her colleagues were good fun and the general public were generally ok and besides she only worked four days a week. And she told me that she liked walking in the Shropshire hills and cooking and sewing and I began to build up a picture of a lady with simple tastes and no pretensions; a lady that I could come to like very much.