Love Letters From the Grave(47)

For the next month or so, the letter writing continued at work. Charlie was aware that his notes were becoming longer and more ardent, inspired by the fact that Molly began to answer them more frequently, albeit with short responses.

They also carried on playing card games with George and Muriel, alternating between Molly’s home and Charlie’s. Muriel was pleased with these get-togethers – she obviously liked the other couple and enjoyed any excuse to forget that she was a young mother of nearly four children – and George seemed to be reserved but tolerant about them. It was as if Charlie and Molly could convince themselves that they were not in love with each other, as long as they had the counter-balances of their respective spouses involved.

Outside the factory or the card-games, however, they would have lunch together in a nearby café or restaurant then end with a quick kiss before returning to work, or sometimes park in a secluded street and pour out their passion for each other in snatched moments.

They stopped having lunch together in the factory lunchroom, thinking that it was best that they not be seen together too often.

Molly, in particular, was careful to ensure that their conversations were not overheard, and that they weren’t appearing too “friendly” to their co-workers.

Before too long, it became clear that they couldn’t carry on like this. They both wanted more – more time together, more intimacy, more honesty in the expression of their love – and being married to different people, no matter how wonderful they were in their own way, was not the way ahead.





Chapter 15




* * *



The Sinner



* * *





Princess, your love and kisses seem to get better all the time.

Got the radio on.

They just played ‘Remember me, I’m the one who loves you.’

It set my old ticker to pounding.



Charlie’s love letter



Molly was becoming highly suspicious, almost to the point of paranoia, that their co-workers - and perhaps even Muriel, George and her beloved father, Jesse – knew what was going on between herself and Charlie. They agreed to stop holding the card games as two couples, in case it was simply parading their feelings for each other in front of George and Muriel.

Molly wondered if she was a home-wrecker, and hated herself for even the notion of it. Often, when she closed her eyes she could picture a pregnant Muriel and her three beautiful children, all crying their eyes out, or the image of her stern-faced father scolding her for her terrible sin.

But was it really a sin to love someone? Because she did love Charlie, she knew that now, and with a certainty and a fervor that she had never known before. Tommy had been a husband on paper only, and while George had been loving and generous in so many ways, and she did love him in the manner of a sweet, gentle companion, it was true that in recent years she had felt increasingly like one of George’s possessions, as if she were a new motorbike, or a cruise through the Baltics.

Charlie always did his best to console her when these fears began to take over, assuring her that what they were doing was so right that surely God would take care of the details, and everything would work out the best for all concerned. ‘You can’t shake my faith on this, Molly,’ he told her frequently. ‘I know He wouldn’t let us feel this way if He didn’t have a plan for us to be together.’

‘I don’t know that I can ever agree with that, Charlie,’ she responded. ‘We both took marriage vows.’

‘I know,’ he said, his eyes reflecting a concern that he didn’t always express. ‘And I meant every word of them. I just feel,’ he continued, grasping her hand, ‘that I said those words to the wrong person.’

And she knew what he meant. She had gone through two wedding ceremonies, and was committed to every word she uttered in each of them, but it didn’t stop her realising that sometimes, life changed.

It changed even more when they went to the cabin at the lake.

For some time now, their kissing had been becoming more intense. Molly could feel stirrings in her body that had never been so strong, and she knew that Charlie was feeling the same way. It was if she hadn’t minded George’s impotency until Charlie had awakened her sexuality.

The chance to spend a whole night together was becoming an increasingly sweet prospect. Molly could hardly begin to imagine the joy of being held, caressed, intimate with the man who loved her more than life itself, as he revealed to her constantly through his impassioned love letters. He even called himself ‘her husband’ in the notes, and she had begun to respond in kind and even allow herself to dream of a time when that might become a reality.

It was Molly herself who opened the way to a few hours in each other’s arms becoming a possibility.

‘Now George is Vice President, he’s always away,’ she commented idly to Charlie one day, thinking they might be able to enjoy some time at the movies again.

‘He leaves you on your own?’ Charlie shook his head, as if that was impossible to believe.

Molly laughed. ‘For days at a time.’

She felt the air crackle between them.

‘So what do you do,’ asked Charlie casually, ‘when George is out of town?’

‘I usually stay at my father’s, or sometimes at a girl-friend’s.’ Molly held her breath, hardly able to believe what she was about to say. ‘He’s away for three days early next week.’