Monday 22 October 2007

The Sugar Daddy

The Sugar Daddy was 38 when we became involved. As a friend of my father's, he had been in my universe for several years and watched me grow up. I had always thought him very attractive, I guess because he bore a strong resemblance to William Shatner... Captain Kirk of the Starship Enterprise.

When I first started to work in Town as an 18 year old, I used to meet my father and his friends after work in a pub. I have fantastically clear memories of the pungent smell of draught beer emanating from the open doorway and wafting up the street as I turned the corner, the taste of corned beef sandwiches made from thick slabs of crusty bread, with pickle or mayonnaise if I hadn't had time for lunch, the noise of the music and the laughter. We would travel home on the train and again the smell of beer, cigarettes and newspaper print assails my nostrils even 30 years distant.

I can't remember how it first happened but, every evening, I would be sitting next to the Sugar Daddy helping with the crossword and he would hold my hand under the outspread newspaper, right under the nose of my seemingly unnoticing parent.

And then, one day, he called me at work. I don't recall how he got my number but he wanted to know if I would go for lunch. I was a little nervous, but I accepted. The Cherry Picker was away at Uni and I was being a good, faithful girlfriend but a drink with one of my father's married friends could surely not constitute a threat to my fidelity?

And so began the first of a number of visits to establishments in what, I think, may have been Soho. I recall that I got the tube to Oxford Circus and I can remember Libertys. It is all a blur. Maybe I was always a little drunk and giddy with the alchohol and the excitement, maybe it is something that I don't feel particularly proud of and so I try to forget... but I certainly enjoyed it in a strange way at the time. I think there may have been naked women dancing elsewhere in the club but he was respectful enough to keep me well away from them.

This went on at least once a week for a couple of months. I felt a little guilty about the Cherry Picker, but his letters from Uni were becoming few and far between and, whilst this man would put his arm around me and enjoyed having me lie with my head in his lap when I'd had too much to drink, he never took advantage.

Until one evening, he asked me to go to a different pub from the one where we met everyone else. This is all such a blur so you'll have to excuse me if it's disjointed. I just remember having some drinks and letting the alcohol take me. Then he asked if he could put his hand on my breast.

I have always had fabulous breasts. Too big for my small frame and yet so pert and upwardly mobile. I am not ashamed to say that, with the arrogance and impunity of my youth, I used them to full effect in the workplace. Sometimes I would wear diaphanous blouses without a bra to show them off, sometimes just a little boob tube to keep them in check without detracting from their swelling splendour.

On this day, I was wearing a pale blue summery cotton dress. Totally covered up, but the material was so soft to the touch, so sensual and clung to every curve, accentuating its fulsome promise. I nodded my head in a cautious agreement to his request. He turned us so that my back was to the wall and his body blocked me out from the rest of the punters. Very very gently, he placed his palm on the swell of my breast under the silky soft material. I caught my breath with excitement, feeling the reaction of my nipple as it hardened against the pressure of his fingers... but I couldn't meet his gaze. I was scared. Afraid of where this was going. He was so much older than me, so much more experienced, so married... Every instinct within me told me to look him in the eye and challenge him, meet his desire head-on but I was too shy to lift my head and draw his gaze. I think he mistook the shiver of excited confusion that ran through me for real fear and he withdrew his hand. We finished our drinks as if nothing had happened and made our way to the train station and home. We continued to see each other for drinks but he never made any further advances.

Also at that time, I would go out for lunch with another male friend who knew both The Cherry Picker and The Sugar Daddy and suspected my relationship with both. From my less than subtle encouragements, he would regale me with stories from The Sugar Daddy's social circle. With tales of minor indiscretions, major affairs and mental infidelities... some of which related to the Sugar Daddy's wife. I don't know if these goings-on had any bearing on the commencement of the Sugar Daddy's interest in me. Maybe the thought of a young girl to boost his virility as he stared his wife's dissatisfaction and his own middle age in the face?

Our strange relationship lasted for several months but when he heard that I had started seeing The Future Mr Cake, his calls stopped and he found an excuse to catch an earlier train which negated the need for the stop in the pub beforehand. He was ever the perfect gentleman.

I saw him again at a function some 20 years later. We did not speak, merely gave the acknowledgement of eye contact from across the room. His resemblance to William Shatner had only increased as they had both got older. It was such a shame. His lean, hard body turned to a beer bellied paunch. His eyes squashed into his puffy face with the skin stretched shiny tight and rosy over his cheeks.

I was now 40, two years older than he had been when our lives had brushed against each other. It was the year of my transition. The year I started to realise that I was beautiful and began to emerge from the cocoon. I had actually been taken to a party and I had made an effort so I was dressed in a skimpy little black dress that clung to my fit body in all the right places.

As usual my Husband had replied to my plea for approval with his usual response of 'You look fine' but I knew from the way the Sugar Daddy was watching me appraisingly that I looked far better than 'fine' and I revelled in it.

13 comments:

Vi said...

So, nothing sexual actually happened between the two of you?

nitebyrd said...

What a titillating story! Even though you never really engaged in actual sex, it seems as though it was very sensual.

It's so exciting to see the emotion in someones eyes, isn't it?

Jenny said...

Sometimes, less is more. I liked this story.

Juno H said...

I love how you paint such a vivid picture of the long-ago, eighteen year old you and the older man, especially the flash up to present day.

A beautifully told story, Cake. Fablious.

Bittersweet said...

vi !!!!! wasn't that the epitome of sexual??

i found it very sexy, cake, although it took me awhile to read (defensively) as my father's friends was not so good to me.

Gorilla Bananas said...

What a pity he didn't make love to you once, very slowly and methodically sampling every part of your body. A fellow as smooth as that would have teased you until you were begging for it.

Peach said...

interesting story, but I was sad to read that it took you until 40 to come out of your cocoon...

Constance said...

Good Monday afternoon to you, Cake !

Memories like that, the past catching up with present... Well told !

Blog Archive said...

Wow ... great story of a very interesting encounter. As a writer, I like those ambivalent moments when we feel both turned on and a bit confused.

BenefitScroungingScum said...

Definitely interesting! Isn't there always a parental friend who's watched you grow up and takes an 'unhealthy' interest. I'm glad yours was so relatively benign Cake x

George said...

Good story ... happy memories?

Paris Hilton said...

If he was William Shatner, I'd pull him aside and do him in the closet.

Joanna Cake said...

Vi - Sorry, no, nothing physically sexual but...

Nitebyrd/AB - yes, there was a definite attraction which was bubbling under the surface...

Juno/Me/Marcelle/BG - I think he took fright in the end because I was so much younger and because of his friendship with my father and also the proximity to his wife. He could have got into a lot of trouble if it had got out.

GB - I soooo wish that I had responded differently to that one physical moment which could have had such an impact on my sexual future. The idea of a really experienced lover in his 30s... the patience as well as the passion :)

George - Yes, happy memories - if a little confused

Peach/Loving Annie - From 19-30, I still maintained the outward appearance of confidence, despite my bouts of anorexia but from the age of 30 to the time I was 40, I became a shadow of my former self.

Paris - Yup, I still find him attractive in his Boston Legal role.