“It was midnight. On the water…”***In the dim dark recesses of the mind where dreams are born, my imagination created a world for me to live and play in without fear of consequence. And in that place, I could do and say the things I wanted to say to the one person I wanted to say them to the most.In this dreamworld, from out of the blue swirling void, the man took form and came to me with a smile. He was the light upon my dark and he took my hand in his as we walked along the moonlit shore of the midnight sea with the waves gently washing upon the sand.And when I saw the Ocean’s Daughter, I made a wish as I looked up into his eyes and whispered: “I can’t get you out of my head.”I was wrong. My life wasn’t a comedy. Or a tragedy.It was a fucking ELO song.***It was early Monday morning of Christmas week and the weekend had faded into nothing more than a distant memory for most but a life-changing one for some. Especially the young woman who was the talk of the gossip grapevine after what had happened Friday night just gone.The blind girl was sat with her friend in the far corner of the canteen as company life revolved around her.And all because of a kiss.And who she was kissed by.Babette already had them as an item.”She is very pretty,” she sighed as she munched away on her salad. I gave her my best, “Oh, good grief, woman,” look. Seriously, it was like being sat next to Tinkerbell. Working up in the clouds, I had only seen her a couple of times before and understood she was part of a special intake for people with disabilities. Watching her, I couldn’t even begin to imagine what her life was like and the obstacles she would have had to overcome to get into a place like this. She made my own little journey look like a walk in the park. And now, here she was, the hottest ticket in town. And, yes, she was very pretty.”Do you think he is in love with her?” wondered Babette as she knowingly glanced at me. What? Mike Sloane? I nearly burst out laughing at the absurdity of it. THE Mike Sloane? No fucking way. Not him. He was good looking. Smart. Healthy and rich. Heck, he had enough willing pussy to last him a lifetime and then some. Love never seemed to touch meatheads like himFunnily enough, I hadn’t slept with him. Which was hilarious since we were both practically cut from the same ideological cloth. To be honest, in all the years we’d known each other, I never felt the need to put out for him. Not sure why exactly but something made me keep my distance.Like me, I always felt as if he was looking for someone. To find that single reason to change and become something different. Call it fuckers instinct. Birds of a feather shouldn’t fuck together and all that.But that had been one helluva kiss.A proper kiss. The kind of kiss that strips away any semblance of normality and pretense. And it had happened in a bar full of people. That takes some serious emotional connection to want to do something like that in front of everyone.And if it was done because of love then I wanted on that train asap.***Babette excused herself and left me sat there contemplating the way life comes at you real fast and when you least expect it.Such was my idle musings, I didn’t notice the atmosphere in the canteen change as someone walked in behind me and went to get something to eat. A couple of minutes later that someone was standing in front of me.”Mind if I sit here?” a familiar voice asked.Surprised, I looked up and saw it was Scrooge McDick himself looking as awkward as fuck with everyone in the hall glancing in our general direction.”Sure,” I smiled as I watched him take a seat opposite me. Before he sat down, he glanced over his shoulder to where the blind girl was sitting with her older friend who I think was called Janet and was a team leader from general Administration. “Thanks,” he mumbled as he tried to ignore the attention.Picking up my coffee, I took another sip as I stared at him over the rim as he took several deep breaths. He actually looked ill at ease which was probably irritating the fuck out of him and he ate his meal with a determined frown on his face as he glanced up at me.I just smiled back. Even though he could be a total asshole at times, he was the type of asshole you could depend on and who would always be there to have your back if the shit hit the fan work-wise. “Interesting weekend,” I said as I sat back in my seat. He gave me a wry look. “You could say that.””Want to talk about it?””No.”I laughed. “Of course you do,” I told him. “You wouldn’t be sat here with someone like me if you didn’t. So I guess it’s true then. Never thought it would happen to a guy like you somehow. Weird how things work out.”He stared bursa escort back at me for a second before nodding. “Yeah,” he sighed. “I know. Believe me, no one is more surprised than me about what’s happened, Carol.”He seemed genuinely shocked and I wondered how far down the rabbit hole he had gone. It is one thing to chase after something and quite another after you’ve caught it. In his case, there was one absolutely huge elephant in the room and he knew it.”The girl is blind, Mike,” I said quietly. “That is something and someone you don’t fuck around with. Imagine what’s going through her head right now sat over there. From what I hear, a lot of people are looking out for her. Don’t do anything stupid that you’ll regret.”His face turned into a frown as he stared at his hands that were wrapped around his mug of coffee. “I know,” he said slowly. “It’s just that things have moved on and we..”He stopped and shook his head as he looked away.Oh boy.He’s already slept with her. I didn’t reply and he looked at me before nodding as he saw the look on my face. He knew that I knew what he had done.”Saturday,” he said. “Janet brought her to my apartment. She thought we should talk. Which we did. Then it just kind of got really complicated. And it happened. And it was..”The man looked completely drained. Emotionally wiped out. He wasn’t the same person he had been when I had last spoken to him a few days ago. He had changed and it was obvious the reason why.”Are you in love with her?” I asked him.Our eyes met and I could see the confusion and surprise in them. For Mike Sloane, it had finally happened. He had reached the end of his little amorous adventures in Pussy land because love had come knocking on his door. And it looked like he’d answered it.The lucky son of a bitch.This was one helluva way to start the working day which just happened to be the same day as the company Christmas party. *** There was a blue moon over Bedrock when my mobile buzzed.”Hello?”It was Babette. She always did have impeccable timing.”Watching cartoons,” I told her as I grabbed the remote and switched off the tv. The Flintstones are my go-to thing when life sucks for whatever reason. Fred and Wilma have the kind of relationship I’m looking for. Nothing too complicated. Nice house with a view. Loving husband. Lots of prehistoric sex. A “Bring your dinosaur to work” kind of life.It had gone nine and I was still in bed. Naked. “No, not today. Think I’ll just work from home. Uh-huh. Nope. Really? Okay. Uh-huh. No, I didn’t drink too much. Honest. I got a cab,” I laughed. “Yeah, seriously. I left the party and was back home in bed by midnight.”I yawned and stretched as I listened to my secretary ramble on as she eventually got around to what she really wanted to talk about. “It was beautiful,” I sighed. And it had been. To see two people so infatuated with each other that nothing else mattered in the moment. It also broke my aching heart as I sat there watching them as he carefully danced her around the floor making sure she was safe in his arms. “The Scoundrel and his Blind Lady” was one helluva headline.Daydreaming, I found myself staring down between my splayed breasts at my sex which I could feel gently throbbing as if it was trying to tell me something in pussy code. It had been nearly two weeks since it had last seen any action.Two whole fucking weeks. Was that a record? Maybe I just needed a good work out to sort things out. It might even get me out of this funk I had found myself in. Could one fuck themselves out of love? Hump myself silly until I got him out of my system? Was I willing to even do something like that?”No,” I murmured as I ran the index finger of my right hand over my little mound of pleasure gently nudging the sexuality of my rosy pearl. That felt good. Real good. My secretary said something and I shook my head guiltily snatching my hand away like it had been caught in the cookie jar.”Think I’ll go for a walk,” I told her. “Just to clear my head. Yes, I know what it’s like outside. No,” I sighed as I got out of bed and headed to the bathroom. “I’ll be fine. Okay. No problemo. I’ll give you a call later. You too. Bye for now.”***Mom always used to say that snow is God’s way of cheering you up.It was still falling as I walked through the park making the most of the peace and quiet away from the noise of city life. It may not sound like it but I have a serious romantic streak running through me which is all well and good when I use it on other people and not myself.There are two types of love in my book. Your basic everyday love where you suddenly find yourself with a ring on your finger and next thing you bursa escort bayan know, you’ve got two point four kids hanging off each nipple as you sit there in a dressing gown, curlers, and poodle slippers watching daytime tv. And then there’s the other kind. Soul deep romantic love. The Disney kind where that special someone knocks on your door asking you to try on the glass slipper to see if you’re the one for him. I guess Frank Caprica was destined to be my knight in shining armor.But the thing with those kinds of stories is that they never come true, do they?Life was a Christmas card. The dark clouds had closed in and street lamps flickered through the haze of the falling snow as I made my way across the concrete jungle. Not so much Bedrock. More like Bedford Falls right now. I had reached the entrance to the park and crossed the road to where the neon sign of one of my favorite little diners lit up the mid-morning gloom.The place where the owner said she made the best cup of coffee in the neighborhood. A lady who went by the name of Lucille Le Plante…***”Did you hear about the mermaid?”The what? I shook my head as the owner poured me a refill of her best brew while we sat chatting at her counter. Lucille just smiled as she winked at me with that knowing look she had. If you wanted to know what was going down in the neighborhood, this was the woman you came to see.”He brought her here yesterday,” she continued with an amused laugh that sounded for all the world like bells ringing. “She is a very impressive young lady. No wonder he can’t think straight. He probably doesn’t know what day of the week it is.”The penny finally dropped. “Oh, him!” I laughed. “It’s the talk of the town in our place. I spoke to him yesterday and he was punch drunk with love. Serves the asshole right,” I smiled. Lucille grinned and flicked her duster at me. “Well, if it can happen to someone like him,” she teased. “Then it can happen to anyone. Including you.”Oh sure. Like hailing a cab.The cafe was pretty quiet due to the weather with a few regulars sat here and there making the most of the warmth, excellent food and hot drinks as old school Christmas songs played on the radio above the counter.It was then I noticed a young girl sat on her own to my right slurping on a strawberry soda glancing up at the clock on the wall every now and then. When she noticed me looking at her she gave me a smile.”Hey,” I said as I turned on my swivel chair to face her. There didn’t seem to be anyone with her from what I could tell. She looked about ten years old and was wrapped up tight in a black coat with a red bobble hat perched on the side of her head. In front of her was a small pose of flowers in a plastic wrap.She smiled back. “Hi.”I looked around. “Are you waiting for someone?”The pretty girl nodded. “Yeah,” she sighed. “My Dad. He’s late as usual. Think it had something to do with work,” She pointed to the building across the far side of the street. “Lucille is keeping an eye on me in case I get into trouble.”Lucille came over and pulled up a chair beside her. “Hush, sugar,” she laughed. “You ain’t no trouble at all. Your Dad will be along as soon as he can. Is that school done for Christmas?””Uh-huh.”There was a sudden swoosh of cold air as the door opened and someone came in as I turned to see who it was with a curious smile on my face.A smile that froze as I stared at the man standing there brushing the snow off his coat and stamping his feet. The next thing I knew, the girl was out of her chair and wrapping her arms around his waist in a hug.”Daddy!”Oh. Uh. Hang on.***Funny how things can change in an instant.When a moment can become something different in the blink of a child’s eye. That what you think is a given thing can turn out to be a situation the complete opposite to what you imagined it to be. And how it only took a few words from a little girl to rock your world.Hugging her Father as she sat in his lap opposite me, his Daughter smiled shyly at me and asked: “Do you want to go see my Mom?”***Under a naked Oaktree, in a far off corner of the cemetery, the girl knelt and put her pose of flowers on her Mother’s grave as the snow gently fell around her.Her father crouched behind her as I stood watching at a respectable distance as he put an arm around his daughter and pulled her close to him while they shared a private moment with someone they had both loved and lost a long time ago. This was a different kind of love. The deepest kind between a husband and wife and a mother and her daughter.The girl’s name was Charlie and on this cold winter’s day, she was a wisp of bright white light as she turned and escort bursa looked over her shoulder at me.”Come say hello,” she urged.I glanced at Dad who gave me a sad smile as his girl wrapped her arms around his neck. Oh, look at the two of you. You precious things. I was so choked up I wanted to cry. Maybe I should just go back to their car and give them some privacy. That would be the sensible thing to do.But as the man looked at me, I knew we were way beyond being sensible now. This was something else. Something special and I could feel it with every fiber of my being.It was as if fate had drawn a line in the snow and to get from where I stood to where they were waiting together, I would need to take a leap of faith and leave my old life behind.In the end, it was the man who came for me as he lifted his right hand and silently asked me the question I had always wanted him to ask from the moment he came into my life.In the cold light of day, the warmth of his hand covered mine as I stepped forward and stood there feeling him gently caressing my fingers as Charlie got to her feet and wrapped her arms around me. Reaching up to brush the hair from her face, I looked at the inscription on her Mother’s stone and finally understood my place in their world as everything became crystal clear.The man got to his feet as we stood there with the breeze swirling gently around us as it danced between the trees. Emotionally radiating my love towards him, I realized that we didn’t really need to say anything at all. Whatever I wanted to say was there for him to see in the tears shimmering in my eyes as I stared into his. More than anything, I wanted to know what love is and I wanted him to show me.It was his daughter who broke the spell.She stepped up and whispered in my ear. “He likes you,” she said. “A lot.”It was then I realized that the Ocean’s Daughter was this little girl who had come into my life to change it for the better. Finally, on this cold winter’s day, she took my hand in hers and we made our way out of the cemetery towards whatever future we three would make for ourselves.***Epilogue.Well, here we are. I guess this is the end of our little emotional journey together through the pantomime that had been my previous life.As you can tell, I’m not the same woman I was at the beginning. With age comes wisdom. Wisdom brings knowledge. And knowledge is the mother of the conscious mind.Such a personal journey should be transformative both for the writer and reader. After all, we’re both in this together to whatever end we finally reach. For me, finding love has led me to a life that has never been less than perfect. All those little insecurities, doubts and fears I carried around with me have faded away as time and the years have passed.Right now we’re on a boat.Sailing gently away on the crest of a wave into a warm sea breeze with my man at the wheel and our three kids showing him the ropes. Charlie is twenty now and the head of the Goof troop. There is an eleven-year age gap between my eldest step-daughter and my other two girls who both came into the world just over a year into married life. Both redheads. Both take after me. Both drive daddy around the bend and he wouldn’t have it any other way.And here’s me. Happily married. A regular soccer mom.Babette is here too. Sat beside me taking in the sun under a Mister Blue Sky that stretches to the far horizon. Above all others, she is the one who guided me when I needed it the most and made sure I kept on the straight and narrow no matter how much I bitched at her. I owe that woman so fucking much. Though I’ll never forgive her for that sex toy thing.I turned forty a month ago.Clark Kent asked me to marry him a month after our first proper date and I said yes before he’d even got all the words out. The man has turned out to be a revelation to me. He is the rock upon which I live my life. My port in any storm. He is the one that keeps me right. The one who I know will always make things better.Looking back, there have been so many little moments to cherish. First date. First kiss. First time together. Hand on heart, the sex that night was the best ever as I screwed us both to heaven and back. For a second, he probably thought I was going to put him in hospital as I had lust to burn and an imagination cranked up to eleven. At least I didn’t get anything stuck back there this time.We both still work for the company. But things have changed. I’ve changed. The bullshit and bravado have long gone and the only thing that matters is to be happy in the moment with those you love and who love you. Life really is that simple. In the end, as in ancient mythology, it was the man Perseus who slew the Gorgon Medusa by making her face her own demons. Once her spirit was free, he then captured her heart and showed her the truth of what love means between a man and a woman.As the record goes: “It’s a ‘Livin’ Thing.'”Thanks for reading.***End.