This is a Valentine's Day contest story. Please vote.

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A woman fantasizes about living in the romantic Victorian Era

With Valentine's Day nearly over, having received the usual and expected Valentine's card, flowers, and candy, before being taken out to dinner, Susan planned to snuggle in bed with her book and a glass of wine hoping to get lost in a romantic fantasy. Even after all the attention and affection her husband paid her on her special day of love and romance, she couldn't help but feel that there was something missing. She berated herself. With so many people divorced, widowed, and otherwise alone, at least, she still had her husband in her life, the love of her life.

He was sweet to remember her on Valentine's day. The flowers were beautiful, the candy she didn't need the calories, but the dinner was a nice evening out and a much needed break from cooking. The Valentine's Day card, although not very romantic, had a lovable dog on the cover, a Golden Retriever that looked just like their old dog, Gracie. The picture of the dog made her cry, but in a good way and gave her some warm memories of her much missed and beloved four legged, best friend. He knew she'd treasure this card more than him giving her a card that contained a sappy sentiment, one that didn't mean as much as Gracie's memory.

Her husband was downstairs watching a boring hockey game. She had no interest in sports, but he was a real fan. Besides his occupation and avocation, she yearned for the time, when the only passion a man had was for the woman he loved and for the children he fathered. If only for a day, if only for one passion filled night, she wondered how different it would have been to live back at a time without television, the Internet, the telephone, and all those modern day conveniences that get in the way and that steal the attention that she longs to have for a loving and romantic relationship.

Her husband, Bob, real name, Bobek, was a Czechoslovakian immigrant. She fell in love with, so many years ago, when she was teaching him English, in an English as a second language class, so that he could pass his citizenship test. Love at first sight, so totally different from American men back then, he was as romantically engaging as he was handsome. Being Czechoslovakian and English, even though she was fluent in Czechoslovakian, with love, romance, and sex a universal language, they didn't need to understand one another's languages to know what they wanted. She wanted him and he wanted her.

Only, the longer he lived in America, the more American he became. Romantic and attentive before, so very European in his way and cosmopolitan in his manner, now he'd much rather watch sports, drink beer, and hang out with his American friends than with her. They used to watch movies together, while cuddling on the couch. Now, different tastes in movies even, he prefers the shoot 'em up and blow 'em up action movies and she enjoys chick flicks.

She watches movies upstairs and he watches TV downstairs. After being married for so many years, with the children grown and gone, and with her living alone with him again, as they did, when they were first married and living together in their small apartment, by his inattentiveness, she couldn't help but sometimes feel that she lived alone and was single again. She missed the erotic and sensual connection they used to have.

Other than her giving him a hand job or a blowjob, they stopped having sex. She couldn't remember when she had an orgasm last. Yet, more than that, she couldn't remember the last time he romanced her and seduced her. Yeah, that's what's missing, a slow seduction and a torrid romance. What he gave her before is what made her fall in love with him. Now, unfortunately, not much more than she got from her dog, Gracie, loyalty, companionship, and friendship has replaced romance, seduction, and sex.

If only for today, Valentine's night, he'd romance and seduce her, she'd be so happy. Is it too much to ask to have him give her a special evening of sensual pleasure one day a year? Is it too much to want to feel wanted and desired again? Too proud to ask, too hurt to make an issue out of it, even though his libido has waned, his desire diminished, and his excitement replaced by televised sports, he wouldn't understand that she still has needs and desires that her vibrator cannot fulfill.

She missed those days when he'd just take her in his arms and hold her, as if she was the most beautiful woman in the world, while gazing in her eyes, before kissing her. The way he made her feel then was so special and the moments he gave her were magical. A time before children and financial obligations, their life was uncluttered enough that they filled every waking moment with love and desire. Even though she'd never forget those memories, she wished she had them on video to replay them at a time like this when she felt so melancholy. If only she could have bottled some of those feelings of love and devotion to sprinkle on her marriage now. Always complimenting her, so attentive to her needs and desires before, now he farts in bed. Stuck now, albeit content with Bob, she misses her old Bobek.

Now, instead of the sex that they used to have and that they no longer have, the thing that keeps her in touch with her sexuality and that feeds her romantic soul is living vicariously through the words on the pages of a book. Reading romance novels allows her to create her own romantic fantasies to masturbate over later, when in the bathtub. Yet, not so much that but deeper inside, the words soothe her where she wishes he'd touch her in the way he did before, not even so much a physical touch, as a cerebral connection and an emotional feeling.

As she was when she was a young girl, reading Charlotte Bronte, Virginia Woolf, and Aldous Huxley, she was relegated to reading romance novels as a mature woman, that is, before she met Bobek. It's sadly funny how life goes in cycles, now that she's back to reading romance novels again, instead of experiencing romance in her life. There's no doubt that her husband loves her, she just wishes Bob was more like the men she reads about and fantasizes over in her novels. Her life would be perfect, if only he'd pay her more attention and if only they'd have sex more often.

As she did back then and as she does now, every night she took a different romantic fantasy book to bed with her, when she'd rather take her husband with her to bed instead. She wished he were as romantic as when they were dating. She wished he was as passionate about her, as he had become about his sports over the years. His eyes only saw her then and not hockey, football, baseball, and basketball athletes on a playing field. Understandably, in the way that romance novels have served the function of not having a lover, she assumed sports replaced his passion for her.

She was his world and he was hers and even though that hasn't changed, the passion has slowly diminished with the years that have quickly passed. Now the distance that bridged their gap was so much more than him being downstairs watching television and she being upstairs reading a romance novel. When, occasionally, she felt the need to touch herself, where she wished he'd touch her, she wished she could share her love for romance novels with him by playing out some of what she read. Only, he'd never go for role playing, not in a million years. He'd think it was foolish nonsense.

It's been so long since they had sex, she can't remember the last time he made her sexually sated. Other than him groping her, before kissing her good night or him hinting and hoping to receive a hand job or a blowjob, he did little to fuel her passion to keep her interested enough in him for her to put down her book. Her book was her surrogate erotic escape and she loved reading romances of the Victorian Era, such as the Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton, one of her favorite books to read, a book exactly the same as the movie with Daniel Day-Lewis and Michelle Pfeiffer.

The flame of passion that they once had for one another and that she thought would never die, dimmed with the birth of each child, until the daily stresses of life extinguished their original inferno to an occasional fire that is now flickering embers. Now their marriage was one more of friendship and a loving companionship than it was of sex and romance. That's okay, she resigned herself to believe, when so many of her friends were divorced or widowed. Indeed, without doubt, she consoled herself again with reality that she was lucky to still have him in her life, her life partner.

With Bob's cheering in the distant background, as if they were 100 years apart, instead of just being separated by a floor, she opened her book, A Gentleman's Valentine for a Lady. The story she was reading now was about the love affair between Charles and Elizabeth, a Victorian couple that lived more than 100 years ago, in the 1890's, in Boston. Lost in romance, while imagining she was the main character, in this instance, Elizabeth, she imagined her husband, Bobek, as Charles, romancing her. Opening the book's cover, as if she was opening a door in time and a portal to the past, where she passed through to escape her dreary life today with an exciting fantasy of yesterday, she fluffed her pillow, made herself comfortable, and started reading.

They met under unusual circumstances and she never would have thought it possible, what was developing between them, just by writing to one another. Then, once they finally met, they enjoyed a series of long winded conversations, as if they had known one another all their lives. To think that it all started, when she inadvertently dropped her glove and he retrieved it, and went out of his way to return it. Her clothing custom made by her seamstress, her name and address was sewn into the lining of all her articles of apparel, even her gloves.

Their love affair was the kind of forbidden, albeit budding romance that a lady and gentleman, especially a lady and especially a lady of wealth and of position, would have been frowned upon by civilized society, when she brazenly accepted a ride in his closed carriage that first time. He was married, after all, something she didn't know at the time but suspected. Yet, even if she knew his marital status that would have been of no consequence to her. Feeling as if she was destined for this love with him, she was just as bold as he was, when he asked her to take a ride around the park.

With another man and at another time, convention would have forced her to decline his invitation of a carriage ride and forbade her to be with him alone without a chaperone, but she was tired of convention and what others thought how a lady should act, behave, could do, and not do, and in her case misbehave. Convention has gotten her nothing but moroseness and loneliness with her mind vexed on the growing reality of her soon becoming an old maid. Sensing she'd soon be whispered about, after making her feelings so blatantly known to Charles, no one would want her then, anyway.

All of nothing, Charles was her last hope at love and happiness. With her child bearing years quickly ticking by her, already 23-years-old and still without a husband, and without even a suitor on her love horizon, convention will surely make her an old maid. It was time for her to be just as bold and just as brazen as he was for inviting her in his carriage, by laughing in the face of convention and accepting his invitation.

She had seen him around town before and always wondered who he was, but a lady never inquires about a gentleman. It must be the gentleman who inquires about the lady. As it turns out, an accomplished man of means, they had mutual friends in common. In that regard, he wasn't so much a stranger and with that he quickly graduated to a potential suitor, lover, and husband even. Since he was listed on the social register and she had access to that information, she even knew where he lived in Boston's Back Bay. He lived on Beacon Hill, in a splendid three story brownstone that she imagined herself living there with him, too, while raising their three children, Charles, Jr., Margaret, and Emily, with help from their nursemaid and nanny.

He was handsome, of course, as well as charming and debonair. He was strong of character and, possessing a sound mind, was focused of will. Assuredly, he was a man who knew where he was going, but without being officious about his position, his wealth, his influence and power, or where he had been in regard to his journey, the continuation of a journey she was interested in taking with him.

Indeed, refined, well mannered, and educated, he was a true gentleman and a rare breed of man who understood and respected women. Unlike other men of the time, he was in tune to her needs and desires and so open with his thoughts and personal experiences that she was shocked at times, embarrassed even, by his boldness. His civility mixed with a well-honed sense of humor and an intellect beyond compare, her defenses dropped and, as a moth to a bright light, fluttering around him, she was drawn in almost against her will at first, until she became a willing victim to his charm.

Unlike many of the other men who surrounded her with their insincerity and false charm, he was a true gentleman alright. Because of her vast fortune, surrounded by ruffians, carpetbaggers, and scalawags, when it was clear they couldn't get at her money to swindle it away from her, they only wanted to bed her, so that they could soil and sully her reputation by bragging to their friends. Charles, on the other hand, was the kind of man she had only dreamt about and wondered if still existed. With all the good ones already taken, she figured he was married and, no doubt, he was.

The kind of gentleman who was all male and one who incited her deepest desires, there was something about him that made her weak, soft of heart, and defenseless to his advances. Privileged and full of themselves, too often the men of Harvard and Yale, who finished their education at Oxford, often became a bit effeminate by the enlightenment of the ordeal of their edification and too effeminate for her to appeal to her as a serious suitor. She had to have a real man, a manly male, one who never experienced homosexuality, as so many of the privileged men from Boston, New York, and Greenwich, who go off to England have done, while believing that having sex with another man would have no future repercussions in having sex with a woman later.

As it turns out, with a wife and a mistress, he already had a complicated life and was reticent about adding another lover to his bed. Yet, she wanted more than just disheveled and soiled bed linens. She needed more than lies and broken promises. Moreover, she was too much woman for any man to need another to share his bed. In that regard, love, sex, attention, and affection, she wanted everything. She wanted it all. She wanted him, body, soul, and spirit. She wanted him of one mind and of one eye for only her. In these modern times, the Victorian Era, with women coming to their own and needing and wanting more, was that too much to ask of a man, to be faithful?

She hadn't heard from him that he was married and that he had a mistress, he was secretive about his affairs of the heart concerning romance, commitment, love, and lust. Yet, after she found out about his other relationships, she felt that the obvious feelings he had for her were different than the feelings he had for the others, at least, she hoped and deluded herself to believe that to be true, while hoping to change his playboy ways, if not. In the way he looked at her and held her hand in his, she could tell that he was more than smitten, but captivated by her.

She sensed that he could easily fall in love with her. As if fated to meet, as if fated to be lovers, her flame of passion was calling to him from a fresh and deeper place in his heart, where no one else had touched him before, she imagined and enjoyed believing. A place that was somehow different and where her fears were eased, she knew he was the one.

It aroused more than her curiosity why he seemed unlike those from the past, even though, on the surface, with him having a wife, a mistress, and now showing interest in her, he was just like all the others, who more wanted to tease and play than to love and commit. Charming, until they needed not to be, too many men only wanted a woman to pleasure them, before disappearing in the shadows, after the gasman extinguished the light with the dawn of a new day. Only, she held out hope that he wasn't as fickle and was more sincere than the rest.

Maybe, perhaps, he just hadn't met the right woman. How could he, when the right woman was her? Maybe, now that he met her, he'd forsake all the others for her and be true.

She told herself that he had been sent to her by God and directed here through the vast Universe.

"Twinkle, twinkle little star, where, oh, where are you, so far, too far away to see? Now that you're here, I hope you are here to stay," she said out loud for no one to hear, not even her chambermaid

She didn't know what the outcome would be but, as if her life had been preplanned, she believed that, in time, it would all work out as it should, especially now that he was finally here. Unlike the other woman of her period, she wasn't shy, retiring, and afraid to grab what she wanted and she wanted him.

"Charles, oh, Charles, I wish you were here with me right now, this very minute. I'd show you how much I want you."

Disbelieving a gentleman at his word was never done back then and at first she doubted him and questioned everything he said, but there was something in his eyes that made her believe all that he told her was true. Now, she was starting to wonder if he might be the one. She told him about a recurring dream she had about the future, as a young maiden so long ago, ten years before, in 1883. It was March the third, 1893, and coincidentally, the time was 3:33 in the afternoon, always it was 3:33, as if that was a number of some significance. Magically, mystically, inexplicably, when he rang her bell to return her glove, as if she was Cinderella and he was Prince Charming returning her glass slipper, it was March the third, 1893, at 3:33. More than odd, it was kismet.

"I have this reoccurring dream and it's always March the third, 1893--"

Before she could finish telling him her dream, he told her his dream and both dreams were the same dream. Suddenly feeling as if she'd just faint and die, she couldn't believe it, when he finished her dream with his. What more proof did she need that he was the one?

"Then, when I look at the clock," he said with a look of incredibility, "the time is always 3:33, no matter if I'm looking at the clock in the early morning or in the afternoon, it's always the same time."

Impossibly correct, with them sharing the same dream, how could she not believe that he was the answer to her dreams and that he was the one? For him to have the same reoccurring dream as hers, it was written in the stars, after all, and was the reason, of course, why she accepted his invitation to take a carriage ride around the park with him in the first place. It was too weird to be wrong about him. It was all too meaningful that he came into her view and into her life exactly at that year, month, day, and time not to be right and not to be her true love.

That dream had become such a significant part of her life and now here he is, as if delivered to her from Heaven. He was her angel of love, romance, passion, and desire. She couldn't explain the unexplainable. Just as it was beyond coincidence, it was beyond her comprehension. It was meant to be. She knew that as a spiritual man, a believer in God, and trusting the universe to provide the life that was designed for him, for her, and for them, just as she would never do, that he was not going to reject the idea out of hand that they were meant for one another. As much as she wanted to experience how it would all play out, she believed that he wanted to see where this adventure would lead them, too.
Her concern was that if she didn't protect herself from his charm, that she would become undone. A lady was never to become undone, especially in public, and especially one in her social position. Her disgrace could lead to untold complications and ruin her standings in the social community. No more invitations to parties and with everyone declining her invitations, she'd be ruined socially. She'd become an outcast. With nowhere to go and nothing to do, she'd be ostracized and exiled to live in her house alone forever, until the day she died.

Yet, no one would believe her and for her to believe what she believed was pure folly, nonsense, and utter lunacy. Surely, it would break her heart if he was playing her and not be true to his word in telling her that he loved her. She'd lose her mind, if the whole thing was somehow a ruse just to bed her. If he beguiled her and then deceived her, she'd need to summon the doctor to prescribe medicines that don't work and that would surely land her in the sanatorium, in the same way that happened to her cousin, Camille, when Jeffrey, her fiancé, dumped her for another.

There were doctors experimenting with a new cure for lunacy, called lobotomy and she wanted nothing to do with any of that rubbish. It sounded so dreadful to open someone's skulk and fool with their brain. Only, they'd think her crazy, if she dare tell anyone that Charles was meant for her and that he was the one because of a dream, pure fantasy on both their parts. They'd think they were both crazy.

When, in fact and indeed, since they shared the same dream, it was proof that it was kismet and just as she was no match for his charm, who was she to question her dream, especially after discovering they've been having the same dream? Now that he was here, he proved it all to be real and not imagined. To discourage her destiny by not taking this chance on love would be the real insanity.

She was described as pretty, an understatement, as anyone who has seen her has commented that she's extraordinarily beautiful, a rare beauty. Her good looks were her good fortune, as well as her sad curse, as those men who were taken with her didn't possess the self-confidence enough to approach her. It was always the same types who chased after her and who pulled on her skirt, those short, fat, bald, older men with their self-assurance reinforced by position and fortified with wealth, and their self-centered confidence that long made them pompous by their power and arrogant in their influence. Always they propositioned her for marriage in the way they proposed a business deal, as if they were suggesting a merger and a stock swap, instead of offering her love and romance, and asking for her hand in marriage.

"Ahem, the way that I see it, Elizabeth," said her last hopeful suitor, Mr. Cyrus Abernathy, "you and I should marry."

With a proposal like that, don't hold your breath, little man. As cold and calculating, as if he was buying supplies from a new supplier for his manufacturing business, wanting her only for her huge fortune, no doubt, she needed someone who wanted her, as much as she wanted him. She didn't need his wealth, position, power, or influence. She had her own. She wanted love and she needed romance, not money, never money. Love from money and for the love of money was never any good. In the way that children can make a marriage stronger, money can ruin a romance and make a bond weaker.

Blessed with an abundant bosom that some would say was very large, she had the body of a woman who could provide her husband with several sons, as well as a daughter or two. Even though she reeked sexuality by her voluptuousness, by her comportment, everyone immediately recognized her as a lady and not as a whore, never as a whore. Intelligent and blessed with commonsense, the combination of a sharp mind and a shapely body was very appealing to the gentleman.

Even so, she still had no one willing enough and man enough to share her bed. Too much woman for any man, all of them felt overshadowed by her wealth and position and none of them were willing to go to her with hat in hand and offer her their heart. If only they knew their love was more important to her than money.

Even though she was refined and born from a privileged family, in opposition to her social graces, her humor could be quite bawdy and irreverent at times, especially when encouraged by a man who enjoyed walking on the wild side with her, too, as she occasionally enjoyed doing. A woman that confounded him, for sure, as much as she intrigued him, no doubt, she was glad that he took notice of her, while confessing to her that he wondered what other secrets she held. He told her that he loved that she would rise up to meet all of his challenges, no matter how difficult she found them to be.

"I've never met anyone like you," he said taking her hand in his, while looking deeply in her eyes. The first to say the line that worked so well then, but has become so overused in the last one hundred years, he said, "Where have you been all my life?"

Then, he kissed her. It was a kiss like no other and she heard bells. The tempest that brewed beneath her calm exterior and that was well hidden from all those around her, was enough to whistle her teapot cover clean off the stove. A raging inferno of love, commitment, and loyalty, no one would ever suspect the fire that burned deep down inside her.

She was a lady, after all, and ladies aren't supposed to show their sexual feelings. For sure, ladies aren't supposed to feel what she was feeling now. Reserved for men, this was the 19th century and ladies were forbidden to even show their emotions, sexual or otherwise, not to mention their opinions.

The intensity that steeped in silence, brewed a storm of lust, while she waited for the right man to expose her huge melons for them to enjoy, before sampling her fruit muffin. No doubt, he saw her fire and recognized her passion as his own that burned brilliantly through her eyes. She loved talking dirty, but saved that for her pillow, when she was alone and pleasuring herself. No man would have her, if she spoke in such a way. They'd think her common. They'd think her a whore.

Yet, how enchanting it would be, if she could talk dirty to her lover, while still maintaining her decorum of being that lady that she is and needed to be, when not behind a closed bedroom door. A lady on the outside and a wench on the inside, but only for one special man. Obviously glad that she saved her womanly charms just for him, glad that she was still a virgin, by the look on his face, she was happy that he could sense her intense passion and cherish her for more than a woman for his personal pleasure.

"I've been saving myself for you, Charles," she said giving him a soft smile and saying all that she needed to say with her eyes.

Her look told him, no doubt, that there was much held in reserve for him, the one special gentleman she waited for so long. In the way she looked at him, tightly held his hand, and placed it upon her bosom, before hugging him, she showed him that she was willing to take him where no other gentleman had gone with her before and where no other woman dared take him. Surely, without a doubt, he's had women before, but he's never had a lady, not a lady like her, who was a wench in bed and a minx in the bedroom.

When they said hello and bade good-bye, she made it clear with her kiss that she was filled with love and wanted to share her love with him, her love of a lifetime and nothing else and no one else would do. She knew without doubt that if he was with her, he'd never leave her bed for the sake of another. He'd have no need for a mistress, when she could do anything and everything that a mistress could do and more.

They wrote and spoke to one another for months and their friendship developed quickly before blossoming into a love affair. These were different times back then. What may have begun as a nightclub encounter and casual sex today was more of two houses loaded with family, furniture, and fortune slowly moving towards one another before uniting as one. There was much protocol and decorum that got in the way of romance.

She trusted him and really liked all that he was. Having so much in common, he mentioned the same likes and interests to her, as if she was telling him all of her likes and interests. No longer holding back in reserve for the sake of convention, she was as smitten with him as he was with her and she wasn't afraid for him to know her feelings, just as she appreciated his willingness to reveal his feelings for her.

Bordering on the modern age, perhaps, through to the fifties, a time when most people still never said what they felt and revealed who they were, their relationship was already decades ahead of the Victorian Age and similar to a sexual relationship experienced in the sixties. Still, this need to reveal her reoccurring dream to him was a first for her, as she had always been protective and reserved about her innermost thoughts and emotions. Yet, it was so easy for her to reveal herself to him and she finally felt free of what everyone expected her not to be. Loving and caring, as well as naughty and forbidden, she was all of that with him.

The passion and desire was building for her to such a crescendo that she was unable to hold back any longer. Wanting to experience the thunderous cannon fire of the 1812 overture, but how does a lady approach a gentleman and let him know about her wanton sexual desire to have an orgasm without looking like a fallen woman and common whore? Women back then weren't supposed to enjoy sex. Sexual pleasure was reserved only for men. A duty instead of a need, women were only supposed to have sex to procreate.

She needed his trust and reassurance to go where no other woman during that time was willing to go. He needed to respect that she was not to be played and toyed with and that she was, after all, a true lady, but one with sexual desires and needs equal to his. For sure, if he mistook her as any other lady of the period, he would use her and toss her aside, as he's done with his other women, his wife and his mistress.

Yet, if he thought she was his equal to his sexual libido and worthy of his love, then they could have unparalleled passion and lust, while safely secure behind the holy vow of matrimony and locked bedroom door. Only, could he go against convention for her, as she had already done for him? She feared upsetting his sensibilities in having him think her too lewd and too vulgar.

From the surreptitious looks he made in that direction, whenever he thought she wasn't looking, she noticed that he had shown much interest in her breasts. She saw his furtive glances out the corner of her eye ogling her ample bosom. Still, in the way that he stared at her breasts, she could tell that she was much more than a big breasted woman to him.

Having finally seen him with his wife and after her friend described his mistress to her, she realized that he was accustomed to being with a small breasted woman. Since he had been with small breasted woman, maybe he preferred small breasted woman. She couldn't help but think that maybe her breasts were too big for his taste but, by the attention that he paid them, whenever they kissed and touched, he was just as enamored with her enormous breasts as he was with her.

Then, when they finally made love, he was crazed, when she hung her big breast down in his face, while being on top of him and riding him, as if she was riding her stallion, Precious, sidesaddle on the country back roads. Back then, it was always the man on top. It was always the man making love to the woman. It was never the woman fucking the man, but that's what she was assuredly doing, fucking him, while controlling him with her big breasts.

"That's not fair," he said with a laugh. "You know that I'm crazy for your big breasts and you continue to tease me with them. Lower them closer to my mouth, so that I may fondle, caress, and enjoy them, while sucking your nipples."

Pleased that he enjoyed talking as dirty to her, as she loved talking dirty to him, she thought, good, because she didn't plan on playing fair, not this time and not with him. She's already given him her virginity, he had better come across with a ring, especially now that he's divorced his wife and no longer sees his mistress. Time was fleeting and they were not in the season of their youth. She didn't want to waste any more time with anyone, who didn't want to have children and be with her for the rest of their life.

Then, it all happened so quickly, everything suddenly fell in place. Deciding to throw caution to the wind and not worry about her social status, she told him what she hoped he needed to hear.

"I love you, Charles."

Let it be damned! She wanted to see if his passion was a match for hers and decided to verbally make love with him. What a concept, but it was all that was available to her at the time. A period of socially inept and backward sexuality, her decision to push the romance envelope forward by seventy years with sex and sensuality obviously enchanted him. She couldn't believe it, when he answered in kind.

"And I love you, too, Elizabeth. You make me so very happy. Never have I met anyone like you. You totally enchant me."

As she continued making love to him, her body began to viscerally react to every word and she was shocked and stopped. After a slight pause, she decided to pour all that she had into this attempt because she wanted him so desperately. Knowing she wouldn't want another, she believed this may be her only chance and if he rejected her advances, she didn't want to regret not trying.

It would be up to her gentleman to decide if he wanted to accept and join with her in the way that she wanted and needed to make love or not. And so she began once again. Only, this time, she lowered herself, where no lady of her status was allowed to go and paid oral homage to a place where only women of the night serviced their paid gentlemen. She took his cock in her mouth and engulfed his erection with her tongue.

"This is for you, Charles," she said before lowering her mouth down upon his stiff appendage.

"Elizabeth! For God sakes, woman! What are you doing? How dare you?"

"Relax and enjoy, Charles, because if you marry me, you won't need a mistress to do this for you. I'll not only suck your cock but also you can cum in my mouth and I'll swallow."

"Oh, my God! I never thought this possible," he said watching her suck his big prick. "Suck my cock, Elizabeth. Blow me," he said putting a gentle hand to the back of her head and fucking her face with his hips.

"Will you marry me, Charles?"

"Of course, I'll marry you, Elizabeth."

Her name was Elizabeth and, as much as she loved her name, Elizabeth was his favorite name, too. She loved how he said her name, as if chewing it, "Elizabeth," clearing pronouncing and enunciating each syllable without running any of them running and making her feel, as if she had four distinct names and was four distinct women. She was so thrilled whenever he said her name during their secretive conversations that, now that he's divorced, they no longer needed to be so secretive. Finally, they can take carriage rides through the park and walk hand in hand out in the open.

His name was Charles and she loved saying it over and again in her mind, while she thought of him and spoke his name in the dark, loneliness of night. Endlessly, she doodled his name. Never Chuck or Charlie, but always Charles. Finally, he proposed and gave her a ring. Engaged to be married, they waited for their special day, March 3rd, 1894. It was a Saturday and Charles, with Elizabeth agreeing, gave strict instructions to toll the wedding bells at exactly 3:33 in the afternoon.

After a yearlong courtship, the wedding day arrived. At the church with all their friends and relatives in attendance to witness the wedding ceremony of Mr. and Mrs. Charles and Elizabeth--

"What a game! Wow! What an incredible game," said Bob coming in the bedroom and bursting Susan's romantic bubble right in the good part of the story. "Happy Valentine's Day, honey. Thanks for letting me watch the game. I know that I should have been up here paying more attention to you, but now that I'm here," he said reaching over to fondle her big breast, while fingering her nipple, "maybe we can fool around a little."

Still dazed from the story, her mind more there in 1894 than here in 2011, she closed the book with the disappointment of her reality. Susan gently placed the book on the nightstand, as if trying not to disturb Charles and Elizabeth's wedding. Even after thirty years of marriage, he still calls it fooling around a little but she calls it making love.

She put her head back in the softness of her pillow, while imagining that Charles was touching her. Still enjoying her romantic fantasy, she imagined she married Charles instead of Bob. Only, she had to turn off the light and close her eyes to imagine Charles' full head of hair, muscular body, and slim waistline. Charles was a man in his late twenties instead of late fifties, and she'd need another glass of wine, a whole bottle, to imagine that Bobek was that young and that buff.

"Touch me," she said wanting to say, touch me, Charles, but she didn't. It was enough that she thought that her husband's fingers were Charles' fingers.

Bob lifted her nightgown and touched her where she needed to be touched. She was horny from reading about Charles and Elizabeth and she knew she'd be sexually frustrated after taking care of Bob. She imagined making love to Charles, sitting on him, while her big breasts bounced up and down and swayed side to side. She imagined his big cock buried deep inside of her pussy and sliding in and out with each of her humps and each of his thrusts. Then, as a special treat, she imagined lowering her body halfway down the bed to take Charles' big cock in her mouth.

Being that it was Valentine's Day, for a foolish moment, she thought about role playing and so wanted to ask, but Bob would never go for that. Never like that before, when they were dating and first married, now a slam bam, matter of fact type of man, he was more of a non-fiction, black and white, kind of guy than he was filled with fiction with colorful prose and explicit pillow talk. She so wanted to continue her romantic fantasy with Bob and pretend he was Charles by calling him that, if only for one night, if only for tonight, Valentine's night.

While he fingered her and sucked her nipple, she reached over and fondled his cock. It didn't take long for the touch of her hand to give him an erection. Still pretending he was Charles, still caught up in the romantic fantasy of living so long ago, she pulled out his cock and stroked it, while pretending she was stroking Charles.

She wished he'd make love to her, but that was out of the question. Just as he needed to get up early for work tomorrow, she knew how this night would end, with her giving him a blowjob, him cumming in her mouth, and she swallowing, before he kissed her goodnight, rolled over, and fell asleep. He was a good man, but he was clueless. No doubt, just as she had romantic thoughts about A Gentleman's Valentine for a Lady, he was replaying his hockey game in his head. She was interested in romance and he only wanted to score.

"What are you reading?" He looked over at the book on the nightstand.

"A Gentleman's Valentine for a Lady," she said glancing over at it, too, with a heavy heart, while thinking of Charles with Elizabeth and wondering about their Honeymoon.

"What's it about?" He reached over her for the book.

Suddenly, with him asking about her private world, she felt invaded. He had his sports, but this was her secret fantasy. She was surprised, this wasn't like him, stopping her, to reach for her book, when she was just about to suck his cock. Maybe he was being kinder and more attentive to her because it was Valentine's Day.
"Well, it's a story that takes place in the Victorian Age in Boston, in the 1890's. The story is about Charles and Elizabeth and they gradually become lovers, before getting married."

"That's the kind of stories, you like to read, huh?"

He opened the book and read a few passages and stopped to look at her. It was odd how he was looking at her, as if noticing her for the first time in a long time. The way that he looked at her now was how he used to look at her, before they were married. The way that he looked at her now was how she imagined Charles looked at Elizabeth.

"Yes," she said holding her breath, while waiting for him to say something hurtful out of his insensitivity and ignorance. She figured he'd question her obvious need to read a romantic novel and for her to want to imagine her foolish fantasies of love and romance.

"You read about romance because you feel that romance is missing from your life," he said looking from the book to her. "Is that it?"

Dumbfounded into silence, she was shocked by his insight but embarrassed by her admission.

"Yes," she said exhaling, as if her fantasy was suddenly deflated by him taking an interest.

Her heart hurt. Only, she couldn't tell if he was hurt and angry or interested in how she truly felt. Maybe there was something symbolic about that hockey game he was watching that would make him score points now with her. Indeed, he was scoring points with her, so long as he didn't finish by saying something stupid to hurt her feelings and ruin the mood.

"I used to be romantic," he said. "Do you remember?"

"Bob," she said suddenly feeling awkwardly uncomfortable that he now knew that she vicariously lived through her romance novels. Feeling that she needed to explain, while defending her need to read about love and about romance, she said, "You're the love of my life. I don't need to read--"

"I can do this," he said reading more of the book. "I can be your Charles and you can be my big, breasted Elizabeth. You already have the big tits," he said with a grin. "I'll call you Elizabeth and, if you don't mind, you can call me Charles."

She couldn't believe it. A dream come true, she swooned at his sensitivity. What a wonderful man he is.

"Oh, Charles, I love you," she said removing her nightgown with his gentle nudge and hint by him lifting her hem, before throwing her arms around his neck and kissing him, as if he was Charles.

Bobek and Susan made love. Only this time was different. With her being Elizabeth and him being Charles, their lovemaking was better than the first time they made love, even better than the lovemaking they had during their Honeymoon. A sudden resurgence in their relationship, now every time Susan brought home a romance novel, Bobek looked forward to playing the part of her love interest. Depending on the story, sometimes they laughed, sometimes they cried, but always they made love.

No longer separated by a floor with him watching television and with her reading her book alone in bed, while pleasuring herself, this Valentine's Day was the best one she ever had and one she'll always remember.

*

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