Never Too Late to Play: The Profile 4

Chapter 4

Stephen had girded himself for disappointment, but the reality was still hard to swallow. She’d gone along with writing the profile, but apparently she’d never been serious about it. He also knew that if he pressed, it could backfire. Julianna could be stubborn, and they’d made so much progress since Phoenix that he didn’t want to blow it.

Even still, this wild, destructive part of him had started to wonder if he should get in touch with Anthony. He’d kept the guy’s card, so had his contact information. He knew that the owner of La Bella Cucina had been one of the only men to break through to her. Maybe the man could do it again.

But no. Stephen may have been eager, but he wasn’t stupid. That was a line that he couldn’t cross unless he was completely desperate.

So rather, he contented himself with daydreaming, wandering through his days, sometimes losing hope, sometimes gaining it. He reviewed his history with Julianna, lingering on those incidents like the Nines, when guys would hit on her right in his presence. He let it slowly torture him, thinking about that delicious, angsty melodrama.

He thought about Aiden, wondering what would have happened if he’d left her alone, the way he’d left her alone with Anthony. Nothing would have happened, most likely, but maybe something would have?

There was one other guy in her life that made his gut squirm even more than Aiden, though. Just thinking this man’s name tickled like butterflies, even a decade later. Ethan Brooks.

This was just over 11 years ago. Julianna was 43. Stephen was about to turn 50. He was in the midst of a full-on midlife crisis. He was insecure about everything—he wasn’t cool enough for his teenage son, he wasn’t making enough to support their family, he was spending too much time at work and not enough time with Julianna.

At the same time, Julianna seemed to be blossoming. After years focused on motherhood and career, she started paying more attention to her appearance again. She wore more fitted clothing, started to style her hair. She wanted to feel desirable again.

It was around this time that she decided to get breast implants, partly motivated by this renewed focus on her femininity. “I want to feel confident and sexy in my own skin again,” he remembered her telling him, and of course Stephen supported her.

It also made him even more self-conscious of his own inadequacies.

That’s when he learned about Ethan Brooks, a young occupational therapist who Julianna had started mentoring at work. She’d mentioned him before in passing, and Stephen had even teased her about corrupting the rare male OT in an office mostly made up of women. She’d laughed it off, telling him he was being silly.

Then he picked her up at work one day and saw the guy standing outside of their clinic with her, and it was like the ground beneath his feet opened up  and all of a sudden he was falling.

***

It was the way she laughed that froze him. He was at a light across the street, waiting for it to turn green, when he saw Julianna standing beside this tall, extremely handsome young man. Even at that distance Stephen could see his blue eyes and sandy blond hair, long without being shaggy, swept back in a crest that curled around his ears.

He knew immediately that this must be Ethan. She’d mentioned him in passing—something about how young he was, about how different the newer generations were. The way she’d talked about him, Stephen had pictured a literal child working at the clinic, like a Doogie Houser situation. This man was clearly not a child.

And he was making her laugh—laugh in a way that rippled through her whole body. She put a hand on his arm, as if to brace herself, and that level of physical comfort struck Stephen right in the gut.

The man said one last thing, offering Julianna a smile that brought out a pair of dimples, before walking away, towards the parking lot.

Someone honked behind Stephen. The light had turned green. Julianna looked towards the commotion, and Stephen swore she looked guilty as he pulled up to the curb. But she didn’t say anything about the man she’d been chatting with, and Stephen was too afraid to ask about it.

But Stephen was now on high alert for all things related to Ethan Brooks, and because of that, he started to really notice that whenever she brought him up, she seemed to downplay anything remotely romantic between them, almost like she was going out of her way to make him seem like a friendly coworker.

Like how she walked in when Stephen was doing the dishes and said, “I need to stop taking you for granted.”

“Hm?”

“Apparently Ethan's roommate is a total slob. Left a pile of dirty dishes in the sink for days. Poor guy snapped and cleaned them himself.”

“Sounds familiar,” Stephen joked. Julianna was bad, but not quite that bad. “So he’s coming to you for domestic advice now, too?”

“Well, you know how it is. I told him he needs to set some ground rules or find a new place."

Other stories that stuck out to Stephen seemed to feature Julianna proving to him that Ethan wasn’t really a threat. She talked about his dating life and the trials and tribulations of courting in the era of Swipe Right. “Apparently he was matched up with this girl on OkCupid who turned out to be a total catfish. Poor guy was so disappointed!”

“Wait, the girl was a guy?”

“Who knows. He/she was a no show, but that’s what Ethan suspects.” She slipped up close to him. “I don’t think I could do that these days. Too complicated.”

She didn’t talk about him often—no more than she talked about her boss, Helen, or her other colleagues, but each anecdote and story felt like a needle into Stephen’s core. He stopped teasing her about the guy, and started to wonder if maybe there was more going on there.

And then came the conference. Julianna brought it up so casually, not even mentioning that Ethan was going—certainly not mentioned that it was only her and Ethan going. “Hey, I forgot to mention that there’s this big conference coming up next month. Helen wants me to go for her, as she’s got the board meeting. Would you mind watching Garrett?”

“Not at all. Great opportunity for you.”

“I totally agree!” They were actually driving to the gym together, Julianna behind the wheel, her eyes fixed on the road as Stephen studied her. “It’ll be nice to do some networking and learning about the latest trends. Can’t let this old lady fall behind.”

“You need to stop with the ‘old lady’ thing,” he said. Then, as casually as he could, he asked the question that was really on his mind. “So who else from your team is going?”

He watched her face for a reaction, but she was so casual. “Oh, it’s a smaller conference. It’ll just be me. Oh, and maybe Ethan? Helen thinks it would be good for him to get some professional development in, too.”

Stephen couldn’t tell if that was a flush climbing up her neck, and he didn’t know how to respond to any of it. So it would just be her and Ethan?

“I’m not sure how much time I’ll even see him. We’re going to split the seminar tracks, then meet up and compare notes. It’ll probably be pretty boring for him, to be honest. Lots of PowerPoint presentations and awkward small talk with strangers.”

“I don’t know,” Stephen found himself saying, watching her face as she clearly over-explained. “I think he’ll find something of interest while there.”

Julianna chose to ignore any innuendo. “Well, maybe I’m speaking for myself. I’d much rather stay home with you and Garrett.”

“I think it’ll be good for you, too,” he said, sliding a hand along her Lycra-clad thigh. “Breaks up the routine some.”

“I can think of other ways that we could do that,” she said, finally glancing at him as they stopped at a light. “Maybe when I’m back, we can plan a little weekend getaway, just the two of us? You keep promising me a trip to the Bahamas.”

“Now you’re talking. And that bikini I showed you online?”

“Scandalous, dear.” She laughed. “But for you, maybe?”

Despite the talk of their Caribbean trip, though, it was the conference that consumed Stephen over the next month. There was nothing suspicious going on. She barely mentioned Ethan again, but somewhere in the dark recesses of Stephen’s imagination, a wild thought started to take root: what if something was going on?

That hypothetical, more than any other—more than the flirtations and past boyfriends and guys at bars—forced him to confront his fantasy. He shouldn’t have wanted any of it. He should have been worried for the state of their marriage—and to be clear, he was. The rational side of him worried and feared and turned his insides to soup. But there was a part of him that found the whole situation so arousing.

That part of him kept his mouth shut as she prepared for the flight, as she packed and gave him instructions on how to heat up the lasagna like he was a child.

“We’ll be fine;” he reassured as he drove her to the airport.

“Set the oven to 350, okay? Otherwise it’ll burn—”

“Seriously, Jules, it’ll be fine.” Even as he reassured, he wondered if she was nervous about leaving them alone, or for something else. And that “something else” had his heart racing. “It’s only two nights. Don’t worry about us. Focus on the conference, okay?”

She nodded. They kissed. He watched her walk into the airport wearing tight, black leggings that made her butt look wonderful. Would Ethan notice, too? Stephen drove away, hoping that the younger man would.

Those two days were delicious torture. He knew he was just fantasizing. He was certain that his wife would keep things professional with her mentee. But in the dark, when he was alone with his thoughts at night, he couldn’t help thinking about the two of them back at the hotel, also in the dark, naked and rutting against one another. He jerked off, thinking about it, but refused to let himself come.

They talked as usual. She texted him throughout the day, and called him and Garrett at night before bed. It was totally normal. She did all the things that she needed to do to keep him from getting paranoid, and yet it was precisely because she was doing all of those things that he got even more paranoid.

Then came the day that she was to come home. It was late morning on a work day, and Stephen originally had meetings that kept him from picking her up. The day before, though, he barely slept, tossing and turning as he thought about Julianna having her world rocked by Ethan and his tall, hard body.

Stephen realized that he didn’t want to spend another minute without his wife. He didn’t want to wait through the work day. He didn’t even want to wait at home for her Uber to drop her off. He canceled his meetings, took a cold shower, and headed to the airport to surprise her.

Parking, he realized that it had been ages since either of them had actually gone into the airport to pick the other up. They were long past romantic gestures like that, and it felt good to do it now. He headed for the terminal exits, scanning the crowd for arriving passengers. He spotted her walking down the long ramp, dressed in tight, dark jeans and a tight sweater that hugged and accentuated her new silhouette.

And there, beside her, walked Ethan. Even from all the way across the concourse, Stephen recognized Ethan's sandy hair and broad shoulders. His stomach dropped. His scalp felt aflame. He shrank back, just a little, slipping behind a column. He hadn’t called or texted ahead, telling Julianna that he was going to meet her. She didn’t know.

He watched them approach, noticing the easy rapport between them. They seem so engrossed in conversation, their heads tilted close together as if sharing a private joke. Suddenly, Julianna stumbled slightly. Ethan's arm shot out, steadying her with a firm grip around her narrow waist.

The touch lingered for a beat too long, Ethan's hand resting on the curve of Julianna's hip. To anyone around, it was nothing. To Stephen, it was like a bolt of lightning right through the top of his head. He saw all of the charged and unspoken intimacy.

Before Stephen could react, and long before they got close enough to him, Julianna and Ethan parted ways with a warm hug. Again, the embrace felt one beat too long. Or maybe that was in his head. Then, Julianna was walking towards him, smiling to herself.

As Stephen watched his wife approach, he noticed a flicker of something cross her face when she spotted him. The look was gone in an instant, replaced by a brilliant smile, but Stephen couldn’t shake the feeling that it was… guilt. This was that moment from before, when he’d picked her up from work, and this time, he knew he wasn’t imagining things.

Before he could process it, Julianna had her arms around him, pulling him in for a tight hug. Her body felt wonderful and warm and familiar against him. “I thought you had to work?” Her voice was breathless with surprise.

Stephen held her tightly, breathing in the scent of her hair. “Work can wait. I missed you so much,” he murmured, his mind still reeling from the sight of Ethan's hand on her hip.

“Aw, I missed you, too.” She kissed him, and it was a familiar, friendly kiss—the kind of kiss shared by two people who’ve been together for ages.

Stephen could barely focus during the walk to the car. His thoughts keep drifting back to the airport, to the easy familiarity between Julianna and Ethan. Walking along at his side, Julianna chatted away animatedly about the trip, filling him in on the conference highlights, apparently oblivious to her husband’s state.

Had something happened between them? The rational part of him insisted ‘no way.’ But the look on Julianna's face when she first saw him...it hinted at secrets, at hidden desires.

Even if nothing physical happened, maybe Julianna fantasized herself during those long nights in her hotel room. Maybe she’d imagined Ethan's hands on her body, his mouth claiming hers—just like Stephen had. The thought sent a jolt of conflicting emotions through Stephen—jealousy, arousal, and a perverse sense of excitement.

And how did Stephen handle it? He bottled it up inside until years later, when they were finally able to talk about his fantasies. But if he had to pinpoint a time when his thoughts turned from paranoid fear to fantasy, it was that trip.

***

“Can I ask you something?” Stephen said as Julianna walked into the house. He looked like he was going to be sick, and that, in turn, made her nervous. She’d still had her encounter with the guy from the coffee shop, Jonathan, on her mind—along with all of the other confusing thoughts that had swirled since Phoenix.

“Uh oh,” she said, forcing calm into her own voice. “Never a good thing when you need to ask permission to ask something.”

“You’re looking nice, by the way,” he said.

“Random compliment. Double uh oh.”

“It’s nothing. Just…” Stephen was blushing hard. This definitely wasn’t nothing, and he was making her even more nervous. Had he seen her flirting with Jonathan? “You know you can tell me anything, right? What I said back in Arizona, when you told me about Lori’s affair…”

She blinked, recalling the conversation. “How you said that if you were Luke, you would have forgiven me?”

“Yes. That. You believe me, right?”

“I, uh, do, yes. But honey, you don’t have to worry. You never do.” Then it occurred to her—he must have followed her, maybe had been for a while. Maybe he thought that she was seeing Jonathan regularly. She might not have noticed the guy, but perhaps Stephen had? “Is this about the guy from the coffee shop?”

Now it was Stephen’s turn to look thoroughly confused. “What? There’s a guy from a coffee shop?”

And now it was Julianna stammering. “No. I mean, yes, but not like that.” She grew even hotter as his eyes widened. She could practically see where his mind was going. “There was a guy, Jonathan, who kind of hit on me at the cafe I go to.”

“When?”

“Just today. Earlier. Between appointments.”

“What happened?” He wasn’t accusing her of being bad. He was so clearly into it, fixating like a PTA mom on the latest neighborhood gossip. She laughed, the tension breaking. 

“Nothing really. Honestly. We just chatted a little and… and he complimented me.”

“What did he say?” Stephen’s eyes practically bored into hers.

“He called me stunning, or something.” I shouldn’t say this, but you’re absolutely stunning, Julianna. She couldn’t say it all out loud, feeling self-conscious, even as she blushed harder at his words. “Then he asked me if I wanted to get a drink.”

“No way! What did you say?” Juliana giggled at her husband’s excrement, knowing he’d like the second part.

“I told him no, of course.”

“But you could have said yes.”

Julianna found it as thrilling to think about as her husband clearly did. “But I didn’t.”

He looked… disappointed. Shouldn’t he look relieved? “So if that wasn’t it, what did you want to ask me?”

“Oh, right.” He scratched the back of his neck and winced.

“Just say it, Stephen. I won’t—”

“Do you ever sleep with Ethan?”

“What?” Julianna felt like she’d been struck. “How could you even ask that, Stephen. I’ve never…” She felt heat climb up her neck as she came to realize something. “But you’ve always thought that maybe I did.”

It wasn’t a question. This was a revelation, and Stephen confirmed it by casting his eyes at the floor.

“Oh, honey,” she said. She could have been angry—in almost any other circumstance, if he’d accused her of this, she would have been. But right now, all she saw was vulnerability. This question had been a decade in the asking.

“I wasn’t sure,” he mumbled. “You two were always… and there was that trip.”

Julianna’s chest fluttered at that. “Nothing ever happened between the two of us,” she said, seeing him deflate a little. “But…”

He perked up, looking at her. “But?”

She took his hand and pulled him close. “But it didn’t mean that I didn’t notice him looking.”

Stephen took a sharp, quiet breath. “Really?”

They moved to the sofa, cuddling together. She needed him close. She needed to be able to look him in the eyes as they talked about this. 

“I actually may have had a little crush on him, too.”

“Really?”

“Let’s just say that if you and I weren’t together, and he didn’t work with me, maybe something could have happened.” She blushed at the confession—one that she could have only made recently, knowing what she knew now. “But I swear to you, nothing happened.”

“So you didn’t spend the nights with him at that conference?”

“That what you wanted to happen?”

“No,” he said. “Not rationally, but… also, is it weird that I’m a little disappointed that nothing did.”

Yes, definitely weird, she wanted to say. But that wasn’t the moment. “Makes me a little sad that you didn’t trust me.”

“Oh, honey, I do trust you. And I didn’t really think anything happened. But a part of me kind of got… excited.”

“A part of me got excited by Ethan, too.” She remembered the way he’d look at her. The way her heart would begin to race when she got ready for work. “He was actually one of the people who made me feel sexy again, after years of being just a mom.”

While she never “let herself go” as they say, she’d definitely wrapped her identity up in motherhood first, then her career. It was only when she saw a guy like Ethan looking that she started to reclaim her femininity. It felt good. He helped her get confident and sexy in her own skin again.

“You have always been sexy,” Stephen said.

“Thanks, hon, but you know what I mean. I was in a funk. You got a Corvette, I got a new wardrobe.”

Stephen slid his hands over her chest. “And other new things.” When Julianna blushed, he made a connection. “Wait, did you want to get these done for Ethan?”

“Don’t be silly. I did that for myself.” She chewed on her lower lip. “But I did like the way he looked at me after.”

“You’re bright red, Jules!”

“Am I?” She giggled nervously.

“I’m sorry I ever questioned your faithfulness.”

“And I’m sorry that I wasn’t honest about my crush.”

“Hey, I didn’t tell you about my fantasy for way longer than that.”

She nodded, thinking about Ethan—then about all the other men she could have, if she wanted. This was fun, and it was even more fun doing it with Stephen.

“Let’s post the profile.”

“Really?” Stephen looked like she’d just announced that it was Christmas tomorrow.

“Yes, although we are just posting it. For fun. I’m not going to meet anyone, okay?”

“Okay, yes. Just posting. And maybe responding to some?”

Julianna giggled. “One step at a time.”

“Come on,” he said, grabbing her hand and jumping to his feet. “Let’s do it now.”

“You’re eager.”

“I want to do it before you change your mind!”

The slow burn continues, but I hope the journey is as hot as the inevitable ending (or not ending, but beginning of the new phase). That's the intent of this story: to document how this lifestyle often really does unfold.

See you Friday!