Choke On Your Lies Part 19

"You kicked her to the curb, didn't you?"

"Yeah. I can't. Not even one more night. So, how's everything with you and Ashton?"

"There's a lot of talking still left to do. Soon as he gets home. Motherf.u.c.ker."

"It's hard, I know."

"G.o.dd.a.m.n him. I don't know what we'll do. I just don't know."

"You'll figure it out. Just make yourself happy first, though."

So she did. Stephanie reached for me and kissed me, hard and wet. Not just one kiss, but lots of small ones.

And when she was done, I saw I pure s.e.x in her eyes. "My house at eleven tonight. You'd better be there. We're going to f.u.c.k until sunrise, sleep a little while, then f.u.c.k again until we get hungry."

Whatever it was that made me turn down Frances reared up again, telling me that it was revenge f.u.c.king. Stephanie was p.i.s.sed and needed an outlet and, oh my G.o.d, it would be some amazing p.o.r.no-style s.e.x if I wanted it. But would it solve her marital problems or make them worse? Didn't she need a night alone to work through, same as I'd advised for Frances?

Probably.

But f.u.c.k that, my d.i.c.k was getting hard.

"Okay," I said. "See you in a bit."

She landed another kiss before leaving, pulling on my bottom lip with her teeth. Walked out with her a.s.s swishing, taking my breath along with her.

Looked at my watch. About three hours.

Then Octavia cleared her throat. It was going to be a long three hours.

TWENTY.

Of course, it wasn't going to be instantaneous. Octavia had to build up her outrage and hone her speech for maximum emotional impact. In the meantime, she left the office to Pamela, Carl, and myself, with Jennings and Moose as witnesses, to draft the agreement to our liking and sign it.

It was a surprisingly quiet and formal affair. Carl signed his name, then I signed mine-although my joke about having Moose do it instead fell flat-and then the witnesses, then Pamela. Carl shook my hand, said, "Congratulations," and was out. Moose waited about ten minutes, some of that spent apologizing to me, but mostly to make sure Carl was long gone before he left.

"Thanks to you, I'm pretty sure that son of a b.i.t.c.h will leave me alone from now on."

"Maybe you'll learn to steer clear of swinger clubs now?"

He laughed. "Are you kidding? I actually met a great divorcee there. We've been going out a few weeks already. Going well."

"And you're exclusive? Just with each other?"

He hemmed and hawed, blushed, then said, "To tell the truth, it was watching her get double-teamed by an admissions clerk and an archaeology professor that first turned me on. I asked her out as soon as they were done."

I didn't have anything to say to that.

After he left, Pamela and I chatted a bit. She was still thrilled at what had gone down here.

"I tell you, Mick, it was what you usually expect from TV. Like some sort of Perry Mason s.h.i.t. She's got a knack for it."

"Sorry I can't see it the same way. Guess I was too close."

"Anyway, some advice. In the future, should you need my services again, do not f.u.c.k up a good thing the way you did tonight. I mean, it was touching and chivalrous and all, but you are an attorney's worst nightmare."

We clinked our wine gla.s.ses together, then she finished her chardonnay in one big bolt, set it on the desk, and left me to my fate.

I savored some Pinot Noir and sat in silence for a good twenty minutes before I heard Octavia coming down the stairs, thumping slowly along. I'd been thinking of how the night with Stephanie was going to go. Was she going to answer the door in lingerie? Naked? Or would she let me undress her? Would it be romantic? l.u.s.ty? Like animals? Would I be kicked out on my a.s.s the next day, or would I be able to stick around awhile, get to know her better?

Speaking of that, where the h.e.l.l was I going to live? I'd need to find a place pretty quickly. I would need to get on with life. Write poems. Look for another job. But all in good time. No need to waste the whole year being busy.

And then Octavia was in the office. Her Golden Age of Hollywood veneer now smudged and rumpled. She looked exhausted and sad. Instead of heading behind her desk, she came over to my chair and stood beside it. I pushed myself up to stand with her.

She slapped my face nice and hard.

Like, I would've sworn she was wearing iron gloves or something if I hadn't seen her bare hands.

"You." Finger in my face. "You said it was okay to go after her. Punish her, even. So I did all of this for you, and you just made a complete fool out of me!"

I cracked my neck. I wasn't going down so easily. "All you had to do was prove that they forged the quit claim. That's all. But that wasn't enough fun for you, was it? No, you had to bring up the G.o.dd.a.m.ned abortion and try to destroy her whole life!"

"Hers? My G.o.d, man, did you ever notice how much she f.u.c.ked up yours? You lost your house, your job-"

"It's a sabbatical. That's a pretty sweet deal."

"No, it's not! You lost your job! Who's going to hire you? You don't even write anymore."

"I'm going to start again. I've got a whole book in mind."

She laughed. A painful laugh that shamed me. "Mick, my dear. Don't you get it? You're a terrible poet. If it wasn't for this job, you'd have to teach high school English. I mean...your stuff is s.h.i.t."

Perhaps that hurt worse than anything else she'd ever said to me. I nearly choked on my own spit. I held my head high. Wanted to hit her, I did. But in the end, I took a step back. "I still publish. People still want to read me."

"The only journals who publish you are c.r.a.ppy things your old friends and students keep trying to start up. They're being kind to you. I mean, do you even try to publish in the Paris Review or Atlantic anymore? Is it all just one-offs from s.h.i.t community colleges? Jesus, how delusional are you?"

"I won awards. Grants."

She closed in. "Used to. Mick, I'm telling you this so you'll get your head out of your a.s.s and realize what you've just done. I was freeing you from all that. I was giving you your house, cutting you loose from the succubus who was sucking away your pa.s.sion for life, and making these f.u.c.kers fess up to what they'd done to you. I could've gotten you a f.u.c.king lifetime sabbatical and a free house if you hadn't opened your G.o.dd.a.m.ned mouth and tried to save poor little Frances, who didn't give one good powerful s.h.i.t about you when she told the Provost that she wanted to keep the house. You get it? Don't you see it?"

I stepped back once more. My shoulders b.u.mping the shelves. Nowhere to go. I steadied my breath and said, "I'm. A. Good. Poet."

I thought she might go after me some more. Dig the knife in deeper. And she wasn't wrong. Yes, I had been horrified to think she was smashing Frances to bits over an old grudge instead of concerning what was best for me. And I thought I had the humane solution. But Octavia was right. I had nothing now. Just an empty t.i.tle, meager middle-cla.s.s pay for a year, and nowhere to live.

I whispered, "s.h.i.t."

Octavia eased away, hands on her hips. "Yeah. s.h.i.t indeed."

She turned to leave the room, stopping a moment to take a look at the coffee stained floor. She shook her head, and I expected her to call Jennings to take care of it. She didn't, though. She said, "You're welcome to stay here until, well...whenever. I'm sure we can find some way to make you useful."

I sat in one of the medieval chairs facing her desk, away from her so she wouldn't see me cry. "Thank you."

After a long moment-far too long-I heard the floorboards protest as she walked back in the direction of her sun room and called out, "Alice? Are you ready for me?" I wanted until her footsteps faded to let loose all of the bile that I had stored up.

It was a good thing I had a date with Stephanie later that night. As much as she needed me to f.u.c.k Ashton out of her head, I needed to f.u.c.k Octavia out of mine even more.

Part II.

CUCKOLD COMFORT.

ONE.

In my dream, I was having s.e.x with Fran. It was silky, in a grand hotel room surrounded by a pool, with our bed as an island. She was on her knees, looking back at me over her shoulder, and I was behind her-which admittedly was never Frances' favorite position, but was favored much more highly by Stephanie, who I'd been sleeping with for the past week, so that should have been a clue right there.

No matter. Right then and there in dreamland, it was like having both of them at the same time-Stephanie feeling amazing as I pushed my c.o.c.k as deep inside her with every thrust, only without her accompanying guttural grunts, and my wife's more delicate body and sensuous moans, only without her awkwardness and need to control me in bed.

It had been a strange enough week, and I was already regretting that decision to hand the house over to Frances. Octavia had been right. She was actually trying to make sure I came out of it all in the best possible shape, which I unfortunately interpreted as her looking to crush Frannie's soul.

I was too much of a softie to let both of those happen.

But as consolation, I'd been able to f.u.c.k Stephanie-extremely angry to learn how her husband fell in love with Frannie-nearly every night. Although this past evening we had to make do with dinner and some oral because she was expecting Ashton home from out of town to hash out the end of their marriage. She was steadfast. At least, I hoped she would remain so. We had a good thing going, maybe even something that could survive the usual problems with rebound relationships.

Thus my second consolation: Octavia had agreed to let me stay at her house while I tried to piece my life back together during my sabbatical. That meant trying to find a new position teaching creative writing, although my poetry chops were pretty much shot and I'd been coasting in the sweet life of a middle-tiered academic. I would be lucky to end up as a Visiting Prof somewhere-or worse, grinding through Freshman Comp at a community college. Unless, of course, one of my few remaining friends at better universities might have pity on me. I had a year to find out.

Back to my dream, which was one of those so realistic, in spite of the fact that the two women I l.u.s.ted most for were somehow combined into one, that I was sure I would wake up c.u.mming all over the sheets...which had become a bit of a habit, unfortunately. My final weeks with Fran and the initial separation drove me to wine and despair, not so good for the s.e.x drive, but the excitement of our investigation and my renewed libido over Stephanie led to several nocturnal emissions on those two recent nights I had to sleep alone at Octavia's due to Stephanie hosting a friend from out of town, or as this previous night, allowing Ashton to come home and have it out.

The first time, I'd balled all the sheets together and tried to launder them before Octavia's butler, Jennings, could find out. But when I forgot to use bleach and he saw the stains, he said to me, "Mick, dear, don't even worry about it. If only you'd seen the messes from one of her nights with those floozy bar girls..." He rolled his eyes.

So I wasn't as ashamed anymore, and was prepared to let nature run its course as I gave Franephanie my hardest thrusts and smoothest moves. Until...

Well, we all know how dreams are. One minute, you're having a discussion with your dear old dead grandfather, with him giving you advice on how to be happy in life (even though he's for some reason driving his fishing boat on the interstate), and the next you're captain of the Starship Enterprise, making small talk with Worf about Klingon poetry.

I don't know why I looked away from Fran's smooth, perfect a.s.s, spread out all hungry for me the way Stephanie posed, but I did. A distraction. Maybe a song on the radio or trying to comprehend the painting over the bed-for some reason, I can't see paintings in dreams-and when I looked back, it was no longer Frances spread out Stephanie-style. Instead, it was an enormous a.s.s taking up most of the bed. Thunderous legs. A mountain of a torso. Yes, it was Octavia, all 340 pounds of her, naked, looking back at me over her shoulder. One eye was covered with her long dyed black hair.

"Come on, Mick. You know it's going to happen."

I shouted myself awake and expected to find my p.e.n.i.s e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.n.g. all over the sheets. The horror of that. It's not that I had a problem with a woman as unnaturally overweight as Octavia, and it wasn't that she was completely unattractive. When she was younger and lighter in high school and college, although never what one would call average or below, we had a strong bond that led us to "make out", say, or "get to third base", as the cliche goes. We comforted each other-the shy, sensitive writer and the aggressive, uber-b.i.t.c.h genius-which eventually led to expectations, resentments, and a number of other issues that had me holding her at arm's length for much of my post-university years, until I found a job back home in the Twin Cities.

And that obstacle, the same one that had me hold her at bay and caused me so much anxiety in my dream, was her hateful disposition, which some might go so far as calling evil. Her amazing intellectual capacity was often overshadowed by her bitter selfish personality and the need to cut nearly everyone in her life to the core psychologically in order to find out how best to manipulate them.

After the shout, which I quickly clamped before anyone came running to check on me, as unlikely as that was in a house this big, I realized my rigid p.e.n.i.s wasn't filled with s.e.m.e.n, but with urine. I was aching to pee.

So I got up. The morning light was beginning to stream into the windows in my room-a nice, big guestroom with a private bath, but now it was "mine". I was still living out of suitcases, while most of the belongings I'd gathered from my wife's house and my old campus office were tucked away in a storage unit Octavia was gladly paying for. By gladly, I mean she enjoyed shoving it in my nose that if I somehow angered her, she might slide open the storage door and let hoodlums rip into my stuff. All of my papers, my books, my photos, my chairs, wine bottles, artwork, file cabinets, and even my writing desk. I couldn't bring myself to set it up in my new room. I was sure only laughably bad verse would flow, if at all, as long as I was ensconced here at Octavia's.

I had to walk slightly bent to the bathroom, hand around my b.a.l.l.s, as I dodged my clothes and abandoned volumes I'd thought would bring me comfort the night before. No luck.

Standing before the toilet, I attempted to will my erection to subside in order to get control of my flow. It seemed every innocent, boring thought led back to Stephanie or Frances. G.o.dd.a.m.n it, I was like a fifteen-year-old boy all over again, unable to help myself. I started giggling at that. The burn was intensifying, pulsing, and I finally just had to bend forward and force my p.e.n.i.s towards the bowl. I let loose, but the constriction led to a high pressure spray that fanned out across the bowl and onto the floor and back of the toilet lid.

Now for some reason, that struck me as even more embarra.s.sing for Jennings to clean-up than my sheets. I pinched off and sucked in breath through my teeth.

"C'mon, c'mon," huffed to myself over and over.

I tried again and got more of a direct shot, but I still had trouble. Too much p.i.s.s trying to get out all at once. High pressure, low yield. The rigidness was fading, and I was about to try again when someone leaned on the front door bell.

It seemed unusual, someone dropping in for a visit unannounced, especially this early in the morning. There was a "No Solicitation" sign at the front gate, and even those brave Christian souls who believe the sign doesn't apply to their mission discover, as they reach the front door, yet another sign of a sort: a statue of a devil Octavia bought in her one and only trip to Mexico. Not that she believed in the devil-she didn't believe in G.o.d or Devil-but if she did, I was sure Octavia would sympathize with the poor guy.

"I mean, punished over being happy about what his maker gave him? What sort of a.s.shole creator does that? Lucifer was the first individualist, and he doesn't seem too broken up about the deal."

What I mean to say is that even the Jehovah's Witnesses steered clear of this place, let alone casual visitors.

Whoever was ringing that doorbell was insistent. Blaring, banging it over and over, the digital chimes cut in mid-ring again and again.

When it finally stopped, I figured Jennings had it under control. He was good with an intimidating eyebrow arch and dismissive tone. But then I thought I heard some other footsteps, voices getting louder, and I didn't feel very secure with my w.a.n.g hanging out half hard.

Back into the bedroom, I scooped up some boxers and a t-shirt, slung them on, and cracked the door to the hall. I was confronted with an eyeful of black silk.

It was Octavia in a robe that barely covered her. She pulled it tighter, tied her belt together, and glanced back at me.

She said, "Cops."

Right behind her, pet.i.te in boyshorts and a tight tank, was Alice. Alice had become Octavia's new girlfriend, apparently, over the last week. Something had clicked between the two of them-I don't even want to know how that went down-and Alice had been here all week. Both of them had very active s.e.x drives, so I hadn't seen either much, but then I'd had my own concerns, what with moving all of my things and sleeping with another man's wife. I didn't feel as bad about that as I had expected. Maybe it was because he had cuckolded me first.

Wait...did Octavia say Cops?

"How do you know?"

Octavia put her finger to her lips, then kept her voice low, above a whisper. "Security monitors in the bedroom. Five guys at the front door. Another six or seven have gone around back."

Around back could only mean one thing: Ocatavia's greenhouse full of marijuana. I didn't know what to say. "How did they? Who would've told? What's going on?"

"Shove your tongue in your cheek and shut up. Let's go." One final tug on her belt. I was surprised that she didn't look afraid one bit. The silk was translucent, and she was naked underneath. It barely covered her thighs and shoulders. The woman was a force of nature and didn't mind using her body as a distraction if it suited the moment. I admired her tenacity.

She led us down the stairs into the entryway, which was always dark like some sort of medieval castle, with gothic art and relics to set you further off-balance if the devil outside hadn't already done so. So dark that the open doorway in the early morning light was blinding, and I could only see shadowy figures arguing until we were on the ground floor. Then they all became plainclothes cops, in this case "plain" meaning jeans, sneakers, and Edina Police Department pullover Polos. These were definitely drug cops-"cooler" hair, unshaven, younger and hungrier than the murder detectives, but much more tired and jaded than the uniformed cops accompanying them. They wore holstered pistols and holstered cell phones. One guy loitering by the door wore a DEA jacket.

The lead cop had his fists on his hips and was saying to Jennings, "We're not waiting for anyone. I'm just being polite."