there. Guys aren’t any different. If you go to the right bars you can see them hanging out, looking.”
“And you go to these bars?” Neil asked. If I didn’t know better, I would have thought he wanted to head to one of them himself.
“Sometimes,” Jay answered. There was that smile again. “When I’m looking to hook up.”
“Looking for a sure thing,” Dave interjected. It seemed like he really had heard some stories. Did that convince my husband Jay was the perfect man to take me to bed?
“Maybe. But these women, I hate to say cougars, really are just looking for a good time. They want to go out to a bar, meet a guy, have some fun, and move on. They aren’t looking for entanglements, and they are looking to get their freak on. All those things they were self conscious about when they were someone’s wife are on the table now. They want to feel dirty.”
Jana was staring at him like he was a god. I know she was imagining him making her feel dirty. I know it because I was imagining much the same thing. She touched his arm, and asked, “But they aren’t all divorced?”
“No, they aren’t. I think the married ones are crazier because they don’t really have that freedom. They’ve been with the same guy, doing the same thing, for years and there’s no end in sight. They probably have a couple divorced friends telling them how they’re getting laid every night. These women have kept themselves in shape, but maybe their husbands haven’t, and they just don’t feel appreciated. They’re looking for someone to make them feel hot. They want to feel dirty too, in a way they could never feel with their husbands.”
“Do you think their husbands have any idea what they’re up to?” Dave asked. Of course he asked that.
“I can’t imagine,” Jay answered. “Or if they do, they’ve just decided to let it go. They’re probably cheating too.”
“And these women don’t feel guilty?” Jana asked. She was hanging on his every word. I love my friend, but I could see her out at some bar, all dressed up and hoping to meet a guy like Jay. It didn’t mean she didn’t love Neil, but she loves attention. Not that I had any room to talk.
“We don’t talk about that sort of thing. We don’t usually talk about much, especially afterward. They just grab their things and go.”
I couldn’t help but feel Jay was describing me on a hot date—all dressed up to meet a guy, small talk and flirting, then going somewhere private if we hit it off. We fool around, and I take off right afterward. Knowing what Jay liked only made me more paranoid that my husband had brought him home for me.
“Don’t you feel guilty?” Neil asked, judgment in his tone. “You could be ruining families. You’re fucking other men’s wives.”
“It’s not like I would fuck a buddy’s wife behind his back or anything like that. There’s a line. And it’s not like I’m going out intending to bang a married woman, but if she’s throwing it out there, and she’s hot, I’m not going to say no. If it isn’t me, it’s going to be somebody else, right? I don’t have affairs with these chicks, and probably, their husbands are never going to find out.”
The tension in the pool was palpable. Neil did not look satisfied with Jay’s answer, but that made sense given the way his wife was cozying up to the hot construction worker. Jana was floating on her back in the middle of all of us, but right in front of Jay, so her entire body was laid out for him. Jay looked at her, of course, but I was pleased that his eyes kept flicking over at me, too. Unlike Neil, my husband didn’t mind that attention at all.
Dave changed the subject to ease the tension. Perhaps he felt he’d accomplished his goal, whatever that was. He asked what the guys thought of the Patriots’ chances in the fall and the subject of horny, untamed cougars was dropped. Except, I know it was still on my mind, and probably Dave’s too. Jana didn’t push it
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