"I feel bad for my brother sometimes but I guess they get along well overall...or they love each I guess." Meg started talking as soon as they were in the car. Without the kids.
"Yeah" Carl knew exactly what had her saying it "I used to like her more." talking about their sister in law, her brother's wife.
"Did you ever think about her?"
"No." then, "Did I ever tell you...I don't think I ever have..."
"What? Tell me what?" Sometimes Meg was like a little girl. Impatient; Carl found it so cute. He looked over at her from the passenger seat.
"Nah...it's nothin' " He knew she was looking over and up at him, "but I never thought of her."
"Not just by yourself. Or with me either?"
"No. Not with you. I don't know if I've ever, even early...well early on if I were thinking of someone else I wouldn't stay with you so no. Never with you. Without you is what I was gonna tell you...but...nah!"
Meg was checking her mirrors. They were on the highway. She looked like she was cutting lanes on a busy city street.
She pulled two lanes over into the slow lane then hit her hazards and got onto the shoulder. Carl was looking around, through the back window, his side, across through her's. Meg turned the ignition off and turned to stare up at him. Not a word was said.
Carl tried to defuse, "You've thought of her, I know that."
"Carl..." it was the voice she used for the kids.
"Whaaat?" he looked over...down, she was only 5'2". A full foot shorter. He half smirked. She sat, still, waiting.
"What?" he knew of course and was already calculating that he needed to answer. Megan had seen the process in his eyes and now reached gently over to touch his thigh.
"Carl..." she said softly, already won, looking right in the eye.
"So...you know I never beat off any more," Carl began. Meg just smiled, "but before I stopped, when we had arguments and you didn't like me looking at porn doing it...remember?"
"Uh-huh..." she had her 'understanding mom' attitude and voice now.
"I was still doing it and you'd get mad, but what I never told you was that by the end..." and he looked genuinely shy about saying it, "when I looked at pictures...they were photos of you; like in that red and black dress and even sometimes ones that didn't show your legs and you were just in jeans or whatever."
He'd started out telling her sort of humorously but now he sort of actually wanted her approval of it.
Meg smiled at him and reached over and stroked his cheek softly. Then she checked her mirrors and as soon as there was an opening she pulled back into highway traffic.
"Anyway...I thought you were going to say something about a fantasy with Mel or some stupid thing that happened with her." she smirked, "I bet all husbands jack off to their wife's image as fantasy..."
"You know they don't"
"MmmHmmm...you didn't start out that way either. Bet my brother doesn't think of Mel." she frowned.
"But she's empowered, bold, and brave..." Carl laughed, "In a corporate way."
Meg pulled his face down to her and turned from watching the road to give him a quick kiss and bite his lip, then back to driving.
"We don't have the kids, you probably don't feel like cooking tonight do you?" she asked after a bit of driving. They were getting close to home. "Why don't we grab something to take home and we'll eat after you get some of the kid's junk cleaned up so it looks semi-as if they don't live there." she laughed.
"Sounds good" Carl agreed.
Pulling into the parking lot of the plaza to get Indian Meg slammed on the breaks jerking the car to a stop.
"What the..." Carl blurted.
Meg looked over at him, he shrugged and nodded. She pulled the car up to the bumper of the car that had cut in to take the spot. She got out quickly. The other driver was just getting out too.
"Hey!" she called to him, "You cut me off and took my spot." stating the obvious.
The guy that got out of the car flipped her off and started away.
"Hey!" Meg yelled sharply.
The guy turned around and muttered something, probably obscene, then started to walk away again.
"Hey! I told you you took my spot. You need to fix that."
The guy laughed and started to turn.
"Come here!" he only slowed a bit, "Right now!" Meg ordered like she did with her boys. He stopped but didn't turn. He was in his early twenties, compared to Meg's thirty something.
"Come. Here." He turned, she stared coldly, waiting for him to comply.
He took a step in her direction, "What?"
Instead of responding Meg pointed at the ground in front of her and reiterated her command. As he hesitated Carl unfurled himself from the passenger side of the car.
The guy moved to where Meg wanted him.
"Look...I..." he glanced at Carl, who didn't do anything different or mildly threatening.
"Tst, tst..." Meg passed the air over her tongue so her mouth produced the sound, "Over here, you and I...talking...about what you need to do."
"This is ridiculous, there are other spots...just park there..."
"Good idea. Go park." She didn't blink.
"I don't want a big deal out of this..."
"Hey Carl!"
Meg looked, assessing the twenty-ish girl dressed from a workout in the gym three doors from the Indian place.
"Stephanie, how're you!" Carl smiled
"You guys know James?" Stephanie asked mostly Carl but assumed Meg was Carl's wife.
"Not formally." Meg waved to introduce herself.
After the situation was explained to Stephanie, who described she and James as friends; which James clarified, without denial from her, as friends with potential he decided to move parking spaces. Stephanie and Carl stood and talked while this went on.
When they all were decarred and back together in the parking lot...and James had told Meg he was sorry he'd cut her off (she reminded him that Carl had been in the car too), they discovered they were all going to get Indian at the same place.
Meg, intrigued more by Stephanie's influence on Jame's decision to re-park than on her saying hi to Carl, pointed out that their kids were at the grandparent's. Stephanie floated the idea that they all go out together to eat. Meg immediately accepted. Carl and James appeared enthusiastic though internally neither wanted other people joining them; both Meg and Stephanie understood that of course and so plans were in place to go out to eat and maybe drinks afterward.
At home, Carl tried for a quickie...and got one in the usual way, on his knees and not to completion. Meg was not relaxing for that but it did give her a nice long-term foreplay feel. Carl would rather something else but he enjoyed what he got to give well enough. He liked the sensation of Meg's taste in his mouth as they went to eat with another couple. Meg joked that Stephanie probably would've let him finish one way or another. They both laughed, Carl acknowledging that she was probably right, but not having near the interest in Stephanie that he did in Meg. Particularly right now.
Meg knew that Stephanie, at least ten years younger, was clearly desirable and that Carl was sexier than James but she wasn't jealous.
"What do you think of James?" she'd already talked about Stephanie. Carl used to workout at that gym. Periodically they'd run into someone, usually women who would greet him. Stephanie didn't have that vibe, of looking for something that wasn't hers. That kinda needy vibe always annoyed Meg.
"He's a gym guy. I don't think he played sports or, like works a job where he's lifting anything. He's young; right?"
"Yeah. You were young too. I just think...I don't know. Obviously she's not sure about him, but she let him kinda claim couple status."
"Yeah. I'm sure you'll figure it out from her." Carl smirked
"You like her, right? She should be happy, huh? Like me right, have her good boy..."
Carl smirked again, "I thought your's deserved a reward. But yeah. Not a simp or whatever, a man who 'gets it', yeah"
