Jake kept his promise, all the while visiting Emma Codd two or three times a week. They would still occasionally watch television, but only after they were both exhausted by the “lessons.” Then they would watch together, each in a postsex daze, crumpled on the sofa, naked and sweaty, each drinking their own Tom Collins, and Jake smoking one of Emma’s Chesterfield Kings. She taught him everything a boy and a girl could do together, including things he had never even imagined in his dirtiest thoughts. He was particularly astounded, and baffled, by Emma’s physical reactions. Sometimes she would shake so hard that he thought she must be having some kind of medical seizure.

A week before Christmas, Emma told Jake that he needed to stay away for the next month and a half, since her boys were coming home from college, and her husband was taking two weeks away from the office.

“I’ll miss you,” Jake said.

“I know what you’ll miss,” she said back. “You’ll have to find some innocent girl your own age to corrupt. Shouldn’t be too hard.”

“I would never do that,” Jake said.

“Why ever not?”

“Because of . . .”

“Because of what we have? Jake, sweetheart, what we have together is perfect, as you know, but you are a young man and I am an old, married woman. Don’t ever forget that.”

Jake did as he was told, and stayed away for the remainder of December and all of January. But after a February nor’easter, Jake took a shovel and walked to the Codd house. Emma was alone again, and after Jake dug out her driveway, she greeted him at her front door with a mug of hot chocolate, then led him to the bedroom.

Afterward, she asked him what he’d done over Christmas.

“Nothing,” he said.

“No nice young girls?” she asked.

“No. I thought about you.”

“You’re very sweet, Jake, and you’re a smart boy, and I’m going to fill you in on a secret. The worst thing in the world—the absolute worst thing—is growing old. There’s not too much you can do about it, but having a lot of money does help some. Have you met Mr. Codd? I can’t remember.”

“I saw him once, I think, at the Fourth of July parade.”

“He’s much older than I am, as I’m sure you noticed. He’s turning sixty-five this year. He’s made more money than he’ll be able to spend in his remaining years, of course, but let me ask you: Would you trade places with him? Would you agree to be sixty-five in return for all his money?”

“I guess not,” Jake said, thinking that was the answer she wanted to hear.