Prolog: The Nobel Prize speech I can't give
Olivia giggled as I lifted her breast to my mouth like a microphone.
"Majesties, Laureates, Ladies and Gentlemen. I accept the Nobel Prize in physics for my invention of a time machine. My friend Olivia Smallwood is the reason I invented it. After she sent me the rejection letter from the Barton Institute of Technology, I knew I would someday have to go back in time to undo her decision; the 'we changed our minds, you're admitted' letter arrived two days after the rejection..."
Eyes shining, she touched my face, tugged me up for a kiss. "You are the only woman I have ever loved."
I nodded, "You are the only woman I've ever loved too."
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Part One: Changing her mind
As always, I was a bit disoriented, appearing in a spot as I faded into view. The weeping cherry in her well-groomed yard just starting to shed its blossoms, the crocus buds in her window boxes just opening. Breathing to calm my nerves, I rang Olivia Small's doorbell, knowing she would be alone for the rest of the weekend. Her fiancé Charles Wood was at a physics conference in Geneva.
She answered the door in a beautiful mauve blouse, her long dark hair neatly plaited. She looked surprised at having an unexpected visitor on a Sunday morning.
"Hello." She smiled uncertainly.
"Hi. I'm Robin Stein." I proffered a small bag with her favorite almond croissants.
She appeared even more confused. "Do I know you?"
"I'm one of the BIT applicants you rejected this year."
She looked askance. "But, you're, what, over forty, no?"
"Forty-seven. May I come in to talk?"
Still a bit uncertain, she opened the door widely and invited me to her bright, airy kitchen.
"Tea?
I nodded. She bustled a bit in the pantry as the kettle heated.
Sitting, we nibbled at our pastries for a few moments.
"What can I do for you today?"
I took a long cleansing breath. I had to approach this delicately.
"After I got my bachelor's and PhD from BIT, I went on to invent a time traveling system."
She looked startled. "I ... don't know what to say."
"Your husband was my mentor."
She nodded; she wasn't really familiar with his work but understood he was working on particles that could travel through time.
"I've come to convince you that I should be admitted to BIT."
Now she was really startled. "But the letters went out on Friday."
"I know. I still have both letters signed by you."
"Both?"
"The second one says you changed your mind."
"Oh?" Her eyebrows shot up. "Why?"
"Because I came back in time to convince you."
We each looked away at our teacups. My heart was racing.
"And how did you convince me of that?"
I hesitated. "I kissed you a lot."
"I ... I've never kissed a woman like that."
"I know. You told me I was your first and only." I hesitated. "And you are mine as well."
She gazed at me a long time.
"I ..." She swallowed nervously. "I have been tempted by a few of the students."
"You told me that too." I hesitated, then blurted out. "You told me about Elizabeth, about three years ahead of me, the beautiful strawberry blonde. Pointed her out to me on campus once."
"I would never..." She stopped. "I've never mentioned her to anyone, not even Charles."
"I never told anyone either."
We sat in silence, hearing but not listening to the ticking of the kitchen clock.
Finally her gaze met mine again. "Only kissed me a lot?"
I smiled softly. "Well, kissed a lot of you too." Her eyes widened. "And vice versa."
Her hand uncurled from her teacup, impulsively reached for mine. The warmth of her fingertips was palpable as the traced the veins on my hand.
A soft moan escaped from my lips as my eyes closed, breath catching. Fingers weaving together, we slowly followed the magnetic lines drawling our lips together. The flavor of her kiss was so familiar, the smell of her neck, the texture of her forearm, as if the last time we kissed was yesterday, not 30 years ago. Her heart audibly pounding, she kissed me for the first time, while I was kissing an old familiar lover.
Giggling nervously, we leaned back from that first kiss, amazement and lust mirrored in our eyes. Taking her hand, I led her along the familiar path to her bedroom, the one I hadn't seen in nearly thirty years. Standing at the foot of her bed, my fingers sure, I started unbuttoning her blouse. My lips caressed hers, then found her earlobe, then her collar bone as I bared it. I slipped the strap from her shoulder, kissing along the faint pressure line down toward her nipple. Eyes on hers as she sighed her consent, I took her nipple gently into my mouth. I felt her opening the buttons on my blouse, then unzipping her soft grey skirt and letting it fall to the ground.
Somehow we shed the rest of our clothes on the way to the lavender duvet, kissing, kissing, kissing. Her eyes filled wonderment as I traversed her whole body with fingertips, kisses, licks, massage strokes, caresses, teases with my hair and breasts, finally kissing her thighs apart and bringing her to a long, sighing orgasm.
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As her breathing returned to normal, she murmured in my ear. "I thought you'd never made love with a woman. How did you get so good at that?"
"I've never made love with any other woman." I hesitated. "You taught me."
She looked askance at me momentarily, and then grinned, as she understood what I meant.
Eyes shining, I nodded. Then, "You know you have to call me now if you're admitting me."
She took a deep, contented breath, kissed between my breasts and then my face softly. "I'll do it now."
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Part Two: Learning how
My first week at BIT caused no nervousness at all. Orientation was super well organized, housing a snap, meeting my freshman advisor and devising my schedule brought only comfort. The safety lecture culminating in a lecture about safe sex and harassment prevention was familiar, but caused a lot of nervous tittering among my classmates.
Fall semester was a whirlwind. Calculus, physics, economics, cognitive science, meteorology classes filled my days and evenings. My dorm floor played every possible intramural game and I wound up playing about six sports. There was little time for socializing.
The evening before the first day of classes spring semester, my roommate was out at a mixer and I was reading on the extra long twin bed. I was lifted out of my reverie by a soft knock on my door. Opening it, I found a beautiful woman, looking nervously at me.
"Hello," I started.
She swallowed, held out her hand and shook mine. "I'm Olivia Small."
"Oh! Admissions office? You're the one who called me to say the rejection letter had been mistaken!"
She nodded, her eyes a bit unsure. "May I come in?"
I stood back and opened the door further. "Of course," I stammered.
She stepped in, leaving the door ajar. "I wanted to meet you,” she added. "I hear you're in my fiancé's physics seminar on quantum mechanics."
Mischievously, my eyes met hers. "Oh. You like to meet all the students in his seminar?"
She swallowed. "Well, no. You are the only woman in his class, though." She hesitated. "I've reread your application and can't understand why we didn't admit you right away."
"That's kind of you to say." I closed my eyes, transported back to the day the letter arrived. "I spent the next 30 hours in a funk until you called me that afternoon."
"Oh, I'm sure. I wanted to call you to let you know. And of course I sent out the corrected letter the next morning."
I grinned. "My mother framed both letters together in a diptych."
She giggled nervously. "I haven't smiled this much in months."
She hesitated, then added, "Would you like to come over for dinner sometime with Charles and me?"
"Charles? Oh, Professor Wood?" I had no idea whether this was normal protocol, but I really liked her already, and was really looking forward to his seminar.
"I promise you the food will be better than the commons food. And I'm pretty sure you will like him."
"When?"
"Sunday?"
I smiled. "I'll be there."
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I took a last small sip of wine. "Where did you learn to make lasagna like that?"
Olivia smiled, winked at Charles, and exulted, "I knew she would like it!" Looking back at me, she stage whispered her secret. "Prepared tomato sauce from Little Italy. Fresh mozzarella. Basil and spinach frozen from my garden."
"My Italian cousin's lasagna used to be my favorite. Not any more"
Charles looked at his watch. "I'm afraid I'll have to take my leave. Poker rests for no one."
I raised an eyebrow at Olivia.
"Oh, his weekly poker seminar. He teaches an intensive poker workshop during intersession, and then has weekly games with his graduate students. You should try it sometime."
"I'm not much of a gambler."
Charles winked at me. "I'm driving near campus. Want a lift?"