Mornington-By-Mere – (70) Cathy’s Tale

(Part 01)

The Maddocks family lived in the small country village of Mornington-By-Mere in the Finchbottom Vale which nestled between the Ancient Dancingdean Forest and the rolling Pepperstock Hills.
Which was a quaint picturesque village, a proper chocolate box picturesque idyll, with a Manor House, 12th Century Church, a Coaching Inn, Windmills, an Old Forge, a Schoolhouse, a River and a Mere.
They lived in one of the Brooke Side Cottages, number 1, in the part of the Village known as Manorside.

Cathy Maddocks was an attractive twenty nine year old widow who lived with her six year old twins, Lily and Iris, and an 18 year old step daughter Gillian.
Cathy’s husband John was much older than she was when they married but he was the love of her life and she was absolutely devastated when he died suddenly.
After the bottom fell out of her world she spent the subsequent two years following his passing in loneliness and celibacy and every night her dreams were filled with images of the man she so desperately loved and vivid pictures of the physical expression of their love which was why she woke up every morning exhausted and in tears.
Most days she would wake early enough to cry her tears and compose herself before she started her day but on one particular morning her 6 year old twins charged into the room and leapt on the bed before she barely got started so she hid her face from her children until she could show them a happy face.
Plan (b) was to cry her tears in the shower while Gillian gave the twins their breakfast, which was all going very well until the water went cold.
“Bollocks” she snapped and turned the water off.
“Perfect bloody timing”
It was so frustrating as the shower had been playing up recently and she had been meaning to ask her brothers best friend Dave Plunkett, who had his own business in Shallowfield, to look at it but she hadnt got around to it and as she stepped out of the shower Cathy really wished that she had.
That only left Plan (c) so Cathy dried herself and returned to her bedroom.
She knelt on the bed with a large white bath sheet wrapped around her and facing her dressing table mirror she put her head in her hands and sobbed her heart out.

Her tears flowed unrestrained when she became aware of voices on the landing and she looked to the door.
“Don’t come in, don’t come in, please don’t come in” she screamed in her head and the danger passed so she shed her tears in peace until she ended in a panting sobbing heap.
Cathy remained doubled over on her bed for a full five minutes after she finished then she raised herself up and wiped her eyes and attended to her makeup before she dressed so she could go about her day.

(Part 02)

Cathy had pledged after her husband’s death that she would never share her heart with a man again and she closed her heart to love for anyone other than the twins and Gillie.
There wasn’t much in the way of extended family and of those that did exist the Maddocks were only in contact with her brother Pete and his wife Clare and for Cathy that was enough.

Although she kept the world at arms length and the family were very happy there were always occasions when she had to let the outside world in.
Such as when the shower went on the fritz and she needed a plumber, so she had to call her brothers best friend David Plunkett.
A call that Dave was only to willing to answer, without a second thought, because Dave had admired Cathy from afar since he was in year seven.
Cathy was in the year above him but his friendship with Pete brought them into the same sphere on a regular basis.
Unfortunately he never managed to stay in her orbit long enough to make an impact but he always lived in hope of being noticed until the day when she married John Maddox and then he thought she was lost to him forever.
When John died suddenly after 7 years he saw a glimmer of hope but he had to sit on his hands while she went through the grieving process, but he didn’t know it would take over two years.
So when he took the call from her for the plumbing job he thought maybe it was finally his time.

When the day came to look at the problem it was something of an anticlimax as he barely even got a glimpse of Cathy, and he only really got to see the step daughter Gillian who he thought was very protective of her stepmum when he asked where she was.
She also hung around him and his apprentice Owen a lot and Dave was almost certain that if Owen chose to make a play for her that he would have been warmly welcomed, but he wasn’t there to play matchmaker.

It was a similar story a month later when there was a leak in the kitchen and he only got to see Gillian so it wasn’t until three months after that when the boiler died that he finally managed to reaquaint himself with Cathy.
It was a day when he was on his own but it was not an altogether happy reunion as he found her colder and more distant than before and she had thawed very little by the time he reached the end of the job.
“Well that’s me done” he said as he packed his tools away
“Is there anything else you need me to do before I head off?”
“Um” she responded and then fell silent again
Dave waited for her to speak again but when she didn’t he said
“Ok, well if you have a problem you have my number”
But as he reached the door she blurted out
“Yes, yes there is”
“Ok” he retorted and returned to the kitchen “what do you need?”
There was a long pause and then without looking at him she quietly said
“I want you to kiss me” Cathy said
“What?” he asked almost certain he had misheard
“I want you to kiss me” she repeated and he plopped down on a chair.

(Part 03)

“I want you to kiss me” Cathy said
“What?” he asked almost certain he had misheard
“I want you to kiss me” she repeated and he plopped down on a chair.

If Dave was surprised by her request then it wasn’t as much as a fraction of the surprise Cathy fely, in fact she was astonished.
Even though she had been wanting to do it ever since his first visit to fix the shower.
Because even though he had not seen her she had watched him through the partly opened bedroom door and from that moment on she had thought of little else but kissing him.
And very very much so on that day, even more than usual, because Gillian had to go to work early so she had to breakfast the children and get them ready for school and she had to let Dave in and with him in the house and needing access to every room she couldn’t hide herself away after she dropped the girls at school.
She had always known that Dave fancied her, she had known it for years and she also knew by the way he looked at her that he still did.

“I’m not sure” he said not beleiving his good fortune.
“Oh please Dave” she entreated “I havent felt the touch of a man lips since John passed and….”
“And?”
“And I know you want to” she said
“Ok” he agreed
They never made eye contact all during the discussion, infact she never looked at him once, but after hearing his acquiescence she sat on his lap with her back towards him.
As soon as her bum hit his lap she turned to face him and leant in for the kiss.

Although Gillie Hopcroft was Cathy’s stepdaughter it was only by virtue of the fact that she had married her stepfather John.
After losing her father when she was four years old, she lost her mother four years after that and then when she was 9 her stepfather John married Cathy, who she fell in love with imediately and nothing that followed over the following 9 years altered that love.
The only thing that came close was when she made a startling discovery.

Cathy thought Gillie was a godsend, she was a great help with the twins who she loved as if they were her own sisters and they loved her equally.
Normally she got up first and got the twins ready for the day to allow Cathy to lie in for a while.
But there were times when Gillian had to do early shifts up at Mornington Field and Cathy had to get the girls ready herself.

She got back home from work about midday and walked into the hall to be greeted by some unfamilar sounds and she walked slowly towards the source of the sounds, which were eminating from the kitchen, when she made the startling discovery.

(Part 04)

Cathy was sitting on Dave’s lap with her arms wrapped serpent like around his neck and she was snorting loudly as passion was taking hold when they were discovered.
“What are you doing?” Gillian screamed “leave Mama alone”
Dave was taken by surprise and broke away from Cathy’s mouth.
“No don’t stop” Cathy begged “Please don’t stop”
“Mama?” Gillian quiried “you want him to?”
“I asked him to” she confessed
“Tell the truth” Dave instructed
“I… begged him” she admitted.
Within moments of her admittion Cathy was kissing him again as Gillie stared wide eyed like a deer caught in the headlights.
When the kiss ended, Dave and Cathy looked at the young girl who went beetroot red and ran out of the room.

Cathy sat on his lap and looked at her reflection in the window and smiled weakly and thought she hadnt felt that alive for more than two years and at the same moment Gillian had run to the front door.
She was cross because she had embarrassed herself, not that she was shocked to see her step mum kissing a man, nor was she angry at the situation she loved Cathy and it was about time she started to live again, the overwhelming emotion she felt when she watched them was jealousy.
Not that she wanted to kiss Dave and she certainly didn’t want to kiss Cathy, she didn’t love her in that way, she was jelous of the intimacy and the tenderness, she wanted that but she wanted it with someone else.
Gillian opened the front door and was surprised to see Dave’s apprentice, Owen Mumford, standing there.
“Oh it’s you” she said and threw herself into his arms, the very arms she had pictured herself in a few minutes earlier.

After being discovered in the act Cathy concluded the kiss with Dave but after Gillian had left the room Cathy suddenly felt foolish and self concious
“I need to go and find Gillian” she said as Dave watched in silence unable to formulate a response.

Half an hour later he was just leaving the kitchen with his stuff when Cathy walked back in
“Is she ok?” he asked
“I couldn’t find her” she replied
“Oh”
“How are you feeling?” he asked
“Confused” she replied and turned away

Cathy sat on her bed and looked at herself in the mirror she really hadnt felt that alive for more than two years but although his intimate kiss was intensly electrifying the pleasure he had given her was a double edged sword.
She wanted him but she felt guilty at betraying her husbands memory despite how much she wanted him and how much she enjoyed the kiss.

She dismissed Dave after the kiss and went in search of her step daughter.
But while she was sitting alone on her bed lamenting what might have been, she made the decision to live her life.
So the next day she phoned Dave to say that one of the radiators was leaking and he said he would be round as soon as he could.

(Part 05)

Cathy Maddocks was an attractive twenty nine year old widow who lived with her six year old twins, Lily and Iris, and an 18 year old step daughter Gillian.
Cathy’s husband John was much older than she was when they married but he was the love of her life and she was absolutely devastated when he died.
After the bottom fell out of her world she spent the following two years following his passing in lonely celibacy.
But when the shower went on the blink she phoned her brothers best friend Dave Plunkett, who had his own plumming business in Shallowfield and a huge crush on her.
She was aware of that fact and avoided him on his first two visits but on completeing the repair of her boiler she surprised them both when she begged him to kiss her.
It was a wonderful kiss which didt diminish even after they were discovered by Gillian.
However she dismissed Dave after the kiss and went in search of her step daughter.
But while she was sitting alone on her bed lamenting what might have been, she made the decision to live her life.
So the next day she phoned Dave to say that one of the radiators was leaking and he said he would be round as soon as he could.

The leaky radiator was a fabrication, it was merely a device to get him through the door.
While she waited she got herself dressed in preparation because getting him through the door was only part of the plan and so what she was dressed in was designed to keep him there.
But as she sat and waited for him doubts crept in with every tick off the clock and her resolve began to ebb away.
So she opened a bottle of wine and poured herself a large glass.

By the time Dave knocked on the front door she was just poring her third.
“Come and have a drink” she slurred when she’d opened the door
“Ok” he said doubtfully and followed her but he declined the drink and waited for her to tell him why he was there.
In the end it was Dave who broke the silence.
“When I asked you how you were feeling the other day, you replied, “Confused””
“I did” she agreed
“What about?”
“I was just confused about my feelings” she replied which he suspected but he didn’t see the next bit coming
“And I wasn’t sure about yours”
“Really?” he asked “well you needn’t be, I’ve wanted you forever”
“Ok but I’m scared” Cathy admitted
“I can fix that” Dave said
“I’m scared” she admitted
“Why?” he asked “You want me and I want you”
“It’s my first time” she confessed “Since John”
“It’s our first time” Dave said “but there would be a condition”
Cathy didn’t reply but she put her wine glass down and looked up
“What condition?”
“That you let go of the past” he replied “and no holding back”
“Shut up and kiss me” she said
So he obliged and it was everything she had hoped it would be and as he stood holding her he asked
“So it’s really happening then?” he asked
“Yes but…”
“But what?” Dave asked
“I’m worried about Gillie” she said
“Is that all” he said and laughed
“I’m serious” she snapped “I’ve upset her badly”
“Come with me” he said and took hold of her hand and led her into the lounge and over to the big window where he pulled the net curtain aside to reveal the sight of little shy Gillian sitting in the front of the plumbers van snogging Owens face off
“Oh” Cathy exclaimed “She’s ok then”
“It looks like it” he agreed
“In that case” she said a moment before she pushed him backwards onto the sofa and leapt on top of him.