Amanda With the Long Legs

She had been head cheerleader during her high school years. She had been voted most likely to be everything that everyone else wanted to be. Her life lay before her like a blank canvas just waiting for the brush and the paint to spread the colour into her life.

The first couple of years after high school were bright: vermillion, ochre, crimson, with a few splashes of teal for the quiet days. A college degree that would mean a steady teaching job, if she wanted to. A handsome law student on her arm. So much for acting and dancing.
In the initial blush of love her dreams changed. Or were they put on hold? She had wanted to be an actress. She had wanted to be in film. She wanted to know that friends and family were walking by posters of her in her latest film each day as they went to their mundane jobs and carried out their mundane lives.

Then she met Ted.

She was half way through her second year of college as a Literature and Drama major. He was in his final year preparing for law school in the fall. He gave her all the attention she craved. She was the cheer leader again, not just a number.

College had been a bit of a let down up to this point. Amanda was used to being the center of everything. Everyone in her small high school had wanted to be with her, be around her, just know her name. Then, attending a school of ten thousand students, she became a number. Simply 'Miss Jones' to the teaching assistants. She didn't even have a unique name to make her stand out. Her good looks, her long, shapely athletic body only bought her lustful glances from boys too far from their home-bound girl friends and resentful glances from girls too busy with studies to take time to fuss with their appearances.

Then came Ted.

At the invitation of a lustful senior to a fraternity party, Amanda found herself leaning against a window frame staring out at the clouds as they raced one another across the face of the full moon. A heavily liquored drink in her hand, she sighed as she glanced back into the crowded common room. Her date was enveloped in two sorority sisters. Common girls with common dreams of marriage and kids and a common life. Girls that were easy for boys to love. Girls with dreams of Hollywood did not attract the boys. She was too complicated for them. But not for Ted.

He came late to the festivities. Last minute revisions of an assignment due the next morning had kept him up in his room when the party was just getting underway. Once it was in full swing he had finally given up and decided that the work was 'good enough.'

He had spotted Amanda at once. She was taller than many of the other girls in the room and her long blonde hair left loose about her shoulders reflected the many coloured lights his frat brothers kept around the room. Mood Lighting, they called it. Hard on the eyes, he called it. He was struck at once by her beauty and by the forlorn expression on her face. This was not a usual girl and so he took a deep breath and walked across the noisy, crowded room to join her at the window.

She was easy enough to engage in conversation. As long as the conversation was not too personal. The weather, classes, unreasonable professors, the lousy food in the main cafeteria. All easy. But, there was something else. A connection, a need. Two people floating around in a sea of souls with nothing to hold them down.

All too soon, they became each other's anchor. The conversations progressed past the mundane into the personal. She learned of Ted's dream of his own law firm, inspired by watching too many legal dramas on television and at the movies. He learned of Amanda's dream to be in those films, or any films.

Each encouraged the other in their goals. She knew that his perseverance and connections through his family would ensure his success. He knew that once she graduated and married and settled down she would grow out of her childish fantasy and accept reality becoming a beautiful and dutiful wife to a successful professional.

They maintained a long-distance relationship while he was at law school and she completed her final year of school. Once she graduated, Amanda joined Ted in a small studio apartment while he finished law school, began his article-ship, and took his licensing exams.

His certification was celebrated with an engagement announcement to his family. Ted had it all, a promising career, and a beautiful bride.

Amanda believed Ted when he said that once he became more established in his career they would re-locate to California. She just needed to be patient a few years. She had supported his dream and she saw no reason why he wouldn't support hers.

Ted convinced her that a baby would keep her busy during the years while she waited to start her career and she agreed. First one baby, then two, then a third (they had to have a son) and she began to fear that she would not be able to maintain her figure much longer. A few fine lines had begun to show around her eyes and lips. The bright blonde of her hair had begun to fade to a paler shade of its earlier glory.

Time worked the spell that Ted had hoped for. After ten years of marriage, Amanda asked less and less about 'the big move.' While she would never admit the truth to the light of day, in the darkness of night she would allow the tears to flow over the scars of her dreams, sealing them up tight.

One day her eldest daughter came home from high school practically bouncing out of her skin in excitement. She had made the cheer leading squad. Amanda hugged the ecstatic girl and swallowed down the lump in her throat. The same blonde hair flowed down her daughter's back and the same long legs flashed by in the short cheer costume. A bitterness took place in Amanda's chest were her hopes and dreams had lived.

She was proud of her children. She loved them totally. Ted was a different matter.

Over the years he had become more and more aloof. He felt secure in his life. He beleived that his still stunning wife had out grown her childish ambitions and was content with the comfortable life he had provided for her. He didn't see the detachment as misery, he thought she was just bored in their marriage. He would take her on holidays to exotic places and the change of pace would breathe a small measure of life back into their stale marriage.

Eventually, the boredom began to affect him. Amanda was consumed with their children. She spent all her energies on taking them to dance lessons, ball games, and any other pursuit that took their fancy. She obsessed with making every whim come true for their children. He tolerated it with a small measure of grace. He looked like the indulging father and his partners and clients praised him for it.

However, he felt unfulfilled.

His wife and children had a whole life without him. He was nothing more than a figure, a symbol in his own home. That was when he met her.

Following the trends and desires of his clients was what made him successful in his dealings. This habit led him to the cafe across the street from his office complex. He was to meet a client here for a brief consultation on matters than did not need the formality of his office.

The barista was a tiny little thing. Brown hair, brown eyes, light brown skin. She also smiled sincerely at her customers. He fell for it.

Running late, his client had left Ted sitting in the cafe alone far longer than was truly necessary. He never even noticed. She would wander by his table with a soapy cloth to wipe down a newly vacated table, or to collect dirty mugs left on the window sill by some backpacking students. Each time she would smile at the mature-handsome man in the blatantly expensive suit and highly polished shoes and make some idle comment on the tardiness of people, on bad manners resulting in leaving someone stranded, or just about the bright sunshine of the day.

As one hour progressed into two, Ted fell in lust. He wanted the girl. He had never wanted anything this badly since he had fulfilled his dreams for his career.

He responded to her mediocre attempts at conversation as though she were a brilliant philosopher. By the time his client had finally arrived two and half hours late with apologies of car troubles, Ted had earned the girl's phone number and a promise to meet the next afternoon.

One meeting led to another and another.

Meanwhile, Amanda continued to bury herself in the dreams of her children.

The scent of a fruity perfume would hit her nose as she collected her husband's clothes for the laundry. Late evening meetings began to become more common place. Meetings that Ted had not had to partake of in many years. Her instincts told her that something was wrong.

It was a lunch with other wives from the firm that confirmed her suspicions.

The wife of the most senior partner, with a malicious smirk smeared across her face questioned Amanda.

"My husband has noticed that Ted seems to have many client meetings outside of the office these days. However, he doesn't seem to be billing for them. Amanda, my dear, are you and Ted having a second honeymoon?" her snicker was meant to convey a lewd meaning, a hint at clandestine meetings between husband and wife, Amanda was not fooled.

She simply shrugged off the question with comments of a 'misunderstanding' or feigning disinterest altogether. Her stomach, however, had tied in knots. The intuition which had been beating against the inside of her skull for the past several weeks burst forth and swarmed over her mind, blocking out the inane conversation of the other pampered wives.

She returned home that evening unable for once to put on the performance that she usually greeted her dissatisfying life with. She ordered pizza for her children's dinner and locked herself in her extensive bathroom with a bottle of wine, a slab of cheese and a sleeve of crackers.

How did it come to this? How did her life come to such a dead end?

She felt lost. Yes, she had three beautiful and loving children. They were the only thing that had kept her sane over the years. But, she had nothing for herself. She was a shell. The fading casing of a used up tube of lipstick in a colour they no longer produced.

The bottle of wine empty on the floor, the children kissed goodnight, a fine silk dressing gown wrapped around her still athletic body, Amanda waited for her very late husband to wander in the door.

Ted set his case quietly on the floor inside the door when he finally arrived home. He pulled off his tie and dragged his arms out of his blazer. Both he threw it onto one of the leather wing chairs in his study. He stepped to the desk and switched on the green hooded lamp. His heart nearly lept from his chest. Amanda was seated at his desk, partially turned away from him, staring at the wall of texts.

"How long do you intend on continuing to lie to your family Ted?"

The discussion quickly escalated into a heated argument. The three children woke to hear their usually calm mother screaming at their father and his voice booming back at her. They huddled at the top of the stairs, not wanting to listen but unable to return to their rooms.

The study door flew open so suddenly that the terrified children were unable to react fast enough to bolt for cover, so they simply started and froze in place, a huddled mass of quivering cotton pyjamas in the shadows.

Ted flew out the front door so quickly he did not see his children hiding at the top of the stairs. Amanda did.

She stepped out into the hall, thinking only to lock the door behind her fleeing husband when she heard the sniff of her younger daughter from behind her.

After a quiet chat in the kitchen over cups of hot cocoa, Amanda was able to reassure her children that they would be alright and get them all back to their rooms. Only her eldest daughter questioned her mother.

"Are you gonna stay with Dad?"

"I don't know, sweetie. Right now, I just don't know. Get some sleep. We can decide what we want to do later."

Ted moved out. He felt just guilty enough to not force his wife or children out of the house that had been their home for nearly fifteen years. He took a loft apartment only a short walk from his office. He continued to see the barista, having her spend nights in his lonely little apartment. He missed the comfort of his home. The smell of his wife and her perfumes. The sound of his children playing, arguing, laughing.

In time, he came to resent the little brown girl and the smell of coffee that would come off her skin when she would come over straight from work with no shower.

The divorce was finalized quickly and cleanly. Amanda would keep the house and continue to raise the children. They would visit with him as they chose, they were old enough to decide for themselves. His youngest two would eagerly visit with their father feeling that they were on a new adventure but the novelty soon faded and they would visit less and less, their own lives far more interesting than the stranger that was their father. His eldest daughter wanted nothing to do with him. His betrayal of his family was too much for her romantic teen sensibilities.

About six months after that fateful night, Ted pulled into the driveway of the home he had worked so hard to provide for his family. He shook his head at the thought that maybe he should have worked harder at being a father and a husband than at being successful.

He could hear the notes of Amanda's favourite music coming from the back of the house.

Stepping around to the back and looking over the rose garden that Amanda had so carefully cultivated since he had brought home a small rose bush for their first wedding anniversary, he caught his breath and froze in place.

The creature tending his wife's roses was unbelievable. Her blonde hair had been highlighted by the summer sun, her skin kissed with a golden tan. A simple white cotton shift dress barely reached mid-thigh on her gloriously long legs. His wife was stunning. He watched as she straightened from tending one bush and moved gracefully across the garden to collect a watering can and returned to the same bush to continue her ministrations.

Overcome with grief and self-pity at his selfish mistake, Ted choked out a greeting.

Amanda straightened, turned her head and flashed a brief grin at the hesitant man that used to be her husband. She held her head proudly as she moved towards him. She had channeled her anger and betrayal into positive action. She spent time caring for herself as much as her children. She exercised, and read, and practiced. She was reviving the buried college girl with the lost dreams. She may not be able to make the glorious career that she had dreamed of but she could reach for something that was totally her and not just what everyone wanted her to do.

The children were excited by the plans their mother shared with them. Once the school year was over they would make the move to California. Her husband's career had put her in touch with so many different people. One of them had been a casting agent.

The agent had sensed the sadness in her lawyer's wife when they had met a number of years ago. She had also recognized the beauty of the woman hiding behind the appropriate clothing and mannerisms. When Amanda had sent her some photos, Valerie knew she held a promising character actor in her hands. Amanda was too old now to embark on an A-list career, but she could definitely keep the divorcee working in small but challenging roles.

Amanda was elated. It was not the career she had imagined but it was hers. It was the new Amanda, the real Amanda. And the real Amanda could only look at her ex-husband with pity. He was remembering the vibrant beauty he had married. He was looking at what should have been, what he had taken for granted and he had lost.

Amanda patted him on the hand as she walked past him into the house they had once shared. She laughed freely with her daughter as they discussed the new wardrobes they would buy for themselves once they had arrived in California.

New lives meant new clothes and Amanda was very much ready for new clothes.