She didn't much love him that night

He lay sleepless in the bed, feeling the warmth of her female body next to his. Once he would have been aroused instantly at the delicious sense of lying naked next to a naked woman. Now he just appreciated the warmth and the occasional fleeting touch of skin against him. He did stir a bit, but stretched his legs out sensuously and felt the comfortable roughness of flannelette sheet, his left leg brushed against the smoothness of hers. Sleepily she reached over and fondled him, almost absent-mindedly, then she rolled the other way and drifted into a deeper sleep.

Did it matter that the love had died, he thought? Here he was, warm, comfortable - old enough now not to need, as he did when a young man. Mind you, he thought, it would be nice, just once in a while to play, to laugh, to tickle - to feel himself within her again. But no, there was too much pain lying just below the surface, waiting to strike. No.