The Colossus of Rhodes

[ChrisGibson]

Well, we do know that Ryan and Beth have no future, because their entire story is in the past. As for Cecile, though she may have been a bit cruel, I'm a hell of a lot more on her side than I am on Ryan's, especially from the race angle of wondering if, indeed, Ryan preferred Beth cecause she was white and easier to deal with. That's a very real feeling. But, I do have this question, where do you think Jayson went when Ryan asked him about his whereabouts?

 

[CharmedFan28]

I think you are right about Cecile being the right side to be on, especially if it was a race thing. I am not sure where Jayson went, I will have to wait and see about that.

 

[ChrisGibson]

Yes, well, just keep it in mind, because it will be revealed in the next section of the story.... whenever that one comes up.

 

[ChrisGibson]

CONCLUSION OF: WHAT FRIENDS DO

Dinner at Aunt Maureen’s doesn’t mean black tie. It means that Mom doesn’t feel like cooking so we all just show up there. Cecile looks sad and I try not to notice, but I do. Cecile has been my friend so long. I’ve hardly seen her at all this summer.
I follow her into the kitchen and corner her. “What’s wrong with you?”
“What’s wrong with you?” she says, surly as ever.
“I’m serious, Cile. Oh, you’ll be glad to know me and Beth are broken up.”
“I’m not glad.”
“You sure sounded like you hated to see us together.”
“My first serious boyfriend, the one who quit me, the only man who ever quit me, shows up and says he’s messing with some crazy white chick who’s richer than me, going to a better school than me, and I’m supposed be happy for you.”
I felt so stupid.
I told her so.
“You should.”
“If I hurt you--”
“You did,” Cecile said. “So don’t even worry about ifs.”
“Cecile,” I opened my mouth and closed it. She always made me so confused, so incoherent. I felt so ashamed right now, but this was probably the best I’d felt all summer. Things with Cecile either felt really good or really bad. But pain with her was sharp like just getting cut by a knife. With Beth everything was dull and weird.
“I never know where we are,” I said. “I thought... Nothing happened after you got back. So I thought.... Beth was... I knew where things were with Beth.”
“I didn’t fuck you as soon as you walked in the door,” Cecile said, “And Beth was easy and we were work, so you went to Beth.”
Again, I opened my mouth. I couldn’t deny that was it.
“And she was white,” Cecile added.
“See, why does that matter to you?”
“It matters to you,” she said.
“It doesn’t.” I was angry.
“Of course it does,” Cecile said. “Why do you think she was so much easier, that she demanded so much less of you? You understood her right off. Cause she was you. She was white. That has everything to do with it.”
I didn’t know if that was true. I still don’t. But it sounded right, and I didn’t say anything.
Neither one of us said anything. She’d said it all. There was nothing else I could say.
Except: “Ef says you’re doing horrible in biology.”
“Goddamn him.
“Yes. Yes, I am. Fucking up in something I don’t give a fuck about. I‘m taking it in summer school cause I was horrible during the year and now it doesn’t look like I’m going to pass it this time either. If I don’t take biology I have to change my whole schedule. I’m already graduating a year late. Damn!”
She stomped her foot, enraged.
“I can help that,” I told her. I wanted to help her. All my life I’d been this superstar, I’d been this big old colossus. But not with Cecile. That was why I’d gravitated to Beth. Cecile never needed me.
“I can’t help my being a stupid white guy, but I can help being a stupid white guy who’s really, really good at science. Let me help you.”
“Oh, Ryan,” Cecile shook her head.
“Let me help you,” I repeated. I felt so bad. Didn’t she know how much I loved her? And yet, she’d hit it on the head. She was different. Fundamentally different. Cecile was a whole other world, and in hers there was so much work! Beth wasn’t prettier or better. I never thought of it that way. But she was so much EASIER than Cecile.
She looked up at me.
“I’m going to help,” I said. “That’s what friends do.”


It’s so odd how we lay on the bed like this, in jeans and tee shirt, books spilled between us. It’s like nothing ever happened the good or the bad.
“The sky is so beautiful,” I say, and Cecile says, “If you were out in it, you wouldn’t think it was.”
“I should get you home.” After all that has happened this summer, she won’t stay here tonight. It’s not right. It’s not time.
“Do you think we can get back before the storm?”
“I think so,” I tell her.
“If not you can stay at the house,” Cecile says.
The wind is shaking the trees. They are black against the sky as we drive, and the horizon is white like light but the clouds are bruising black and grey. Cecile reaches over and shuts off the air conditioning. Now I can hear how the wind is battering things, sweeping trash up off the street as we speed up Aramy and head for Route 6.
“I wish I’d gone to the bathroom before we left,” Cecile tells me.
“We’re not that far from your house.”
“I know, but the rain is about to start.”
I look at her, confused.
“There was this woman down in Georgia,” Cecile said. “She sat on the toilet so she could take a shit, right?” But the lightning hit the house and went through all the piping, which is metal, and then struck her and she died on the bowl. Everytime it rains I think of that toilet as a death trap. I squat over the bowl, like it’s a toilet in a Marathon gas station, cause I don’t want to die.”
“You’re making that up.”
“No, I’m not making it up. I really don’t want to die.”
“I mean about the woman on the toilet.”
“It’s completely true. Also, don’t take a bath in a lightning storm, cause then the lightning could hit the tub and you’ll be sizzled like a lobster.”
“Are you serious?”
“See, that’s the problem with white folks. Ya’ll don’t believe nothing.”
“I didn’t say I didn’t believe,” I clarified. “I just didn’t know. I guess so. If a bathtub is essentially metal, and you’re sitting in it, and it’s filled with water--”
“Then your ass is dead,” Cecile said.
And just then there was a clap of thunder overhead, and then the white in the sky changed with the black clouds above it, and fingers of lightning shot out through the sky. We were in the Melbourne, almost at the Walker house, and when we came in, Mrs. Walker was on the couch saying, “I was hoping you weren’t out in the rain.”
“I wanted to get Cecile home safely.”
A splash of water hit one of the windows. Outside the sky was greenish blue. Almost black. And a branch from a tree crashed down.
“Shit,” Mrs. Walker murmured and shouted up the steps, “Efrem! Efrem!”
Efrem came down the stairs, bored looking, hands jammed in his pockets.
“Is the computer off?” she said.
“Yes.” he headed for the door.
“Were you going outside?” Mrs. Walker was incredulous.
There was a thump of something heavy against he door.
“I was thinking about it.”
“You’re nuts!” I shouted.
He shrugged.
“Don’t even think about going out there,” Mrs. Walker said.
“Fine.” Efrem said. “Fine.”
Efrem’s nuts like that.



BECAUSE IT’S SUMMER I CAN do this. In summer when the sun rises early and sets late, it’s harder to feel cheated about things like staying in an office all day. Even when we come out, yawning, backs hurting, stretching, the sky is still light.
“Wanna go to the bar?” Kevin says.
But the bar reminds me of the club and the club reminds me of what happened two years ago. And then... I’m tired. I don’t know how people have night lives. I’m so tired after my day life I just want to go to bed.
I’m gonna go see Cile, cause I should, and then I’m going to head to bed.
“It’s light in the sky,” Kevin says, that old look in his eyes that wants to play.
“It won’t be when I get to my house,” I tell him. There will be no playing today.
Jinny and Sara are at the Walker house. So are Efrem and Isaac. It’s almost as crowded as the O’Muils, and I realize that my house is the only one that’s rarely crowded. Lately, Jayson’s friends have started hanging out here, but I never had my friends over. I thought I was so popular. Wasn’t I? Where were my friends? Why weren’t they drinking up Mom’s Sunny-D and congregating around the kitchen table like these guys.
Jinny and Sara are in Cecile’s room. Cecile is folding laundry, saying, “Six of these socks look alike. I never know if I’m matching up a real pair or two left socks or two right ones.” She is frowning. “The worst part? I don’t even know if I can tell when I put em on my feet. I have to squint and frown. Ryan!” she interrupts herself.
“Socks?” I say. “Blessing or curse?”
“Mixed blessing,” she says. “Jinny, Sara, I need to say something to Ryan. Hold on.”
She drops the socks and comes out to me.
“I was about to go home,” I tell her, but I just wanted to see you.”
“Listen,” she says. “Don’t talk. I have a few things to say.
“Number One: I want you to quit that silly job. Number Two: starting next week you’re going to be at City College taking creative writing classes.”
“What—?”
“Because, Three: you’re already enrolled.”
“But how…? But, Cecile… What are you talking about?”
“I enrolled you.”
“How?” he said. “I mean, who paid?”
“I paid,” she said. “I’m not completely broke.”
“But I am.”
“I know, That’s why I did it.”
“You shouldn’t have,” I say, miserable “Cile, you really shouldn’t have. I mean, I can’t pay you back, and I—”
She hooks her hands in my hair. They are so firm and soft and she is smiling up at me and she says in her voice that is sometimes deep but sometimes light, like it is right now.
“I believe in you.”
She kisses me on the mouth and says:
“That’s what friends do.”

TOMORROW WE WILL RETURN TO WARM DARK STONE, AND NEXT TIME WE COME TO RHODES OHIO, WE WILL FINALLY DELVE INTO JAYSON'S STORY

 

[CharmedFan28]

It was nice to read Ryan and Cecile have an honest conversation. I also liked that they helped each other in the end. That was an excellent conclusion and I look forward to Jayson's story. Have a great week!

 

[ChrisGibson]

I certainly plan to have a much better week. (That may require a PM) I like the way things came together for them, and this is really their story more than anyone else's. Not that Jayson would agree, and I guess in a week or maybe two, we'll learn some stuff about him and Anne.

 

[ChrisGibson]

AND NOW WE LEARN OF WHAT WAS GOING ON WITH JAYSON THAT SAME SUMMER RYAN BROKE OFF WITH BETH NELLIGANT

Flesh

Jayson Laujinesse​

Scooter thumps on my door and declares, walking into the house, “Now, I need you to say yes to what I’m about to ask?”
“Ey?”
“I need us to go on a double date.”
I look at him.
“Aren’t we supposed to actually have two other people to make a double date?”
“Well, I got a girl for you.”
“You—” I stop. “Wait a sec? You got me a girl?”
“Yeah,” said Scooter. “She’s hot. On the debate team at Whitman and everything.”
“I have to know: How do you just... procure women?”
“Never mind that. I need you to ask your cousin out for me.”
“Jinny’s much too old for you.”
“Stop being stupid.”
“You wanna go out with Anne?”
“What?” Scooter looks at me. “You sound like she’s got a disease or something?”
“She doesn’t,” I recover. “It’s just... Nobody ever wants to go out with Anne.”
“Well,” now Scooter looks like he’s the one trying to recover, “someone should. And now someone does. Go ask her for me.”
I shrug: “Alright, I guess.”
Scooter’s rocking back and forth on the balls of his feet.
“Oh, you mean now.”
“Yes!” he almost shrieks.
“I hope she’s home,” I hear him saying as I pick up the phone and dial.
“Anne’s always home.”
“Hello. Anne? Listen.”
“What?” she says.
“You wanna go out—”
“No--”
“Not with me. I mean, yes with me. But it’s a double date.”
“Hell, no. I don’t even know why you would—”
“Scooter Nelligant would be your date.”
“What should I wear?”
“Huh?”
“I said,” Anne repeated, “what should I wear? Something hot I guess. I mean--”
“You’ll go?”
“Yes, I’ll go,” Anne said. “Scooter is hot. He looks like the man off of Quantum Leap! Is he still going to Yale?”
“Harvard.”
“Whatever. Harvard and he looks like a young Scott Bakula.” Anne stops. “Did you plan this?”
“No. He asked to go out with you—”
Scooter shouts out, “JAYSON!” the same time Anne screams in something that sounds like horror, but could be delight.
“Scooter Nelligant wants me!”
“Yeah, I can’t see why, either—”
“Go to hell, Jayson. It’s cause I’m sexy.”
“If you say so--”
“I do.” Then she adds, “Bitch. Is he hot looking right now?”
I look at Scooter, and then say, “I guess. Hot as he ever looked. Do you wanna talk to him?”
“No!” Anne shouts, and hangs up the phone.
A few seconds later the phone rings. I pick it up.
“What time are you picking me up?” Anne’s voice is calm now.
“I thought you could just come over here.”
“What time are you picking me up?” Anne repeats.
I get the picture.
I look to Scooter and say, “About nine o’clock?”
He nods.
“Great,” says Anne. “I’ll be ready at eight. Don’t be late.”
And then she hangs up.

I take my bike to Scooter’s house. His house is up and down over hills for about four or five blocks. It’s like ours, white and two stories. The second story’s a dormer. It’s hot. I’m in jeans though. I don’t really wear shorts. These are the old jeans, so thin it’s like wearing bedsheets over your knees. I need a haircut.
I always knew Scooter. He went to our church, but not to school with us. His parents sent him to public school, and he went to CCD. When we all got confirmed we met the CCD class, and he was there. I don’t remember anything special. He had glasses. Anne was in my Confirmation class, and she always had these pimples. Her skin was too red. She leaned across me and said, “He’s cute.” All the girls thought he was cute. I didn’t get it.
And then the next year he got contacts and suddenly even I got it. And he was head of our class too? Everyone liked Scott Nelligant. And then Scott liked me. Before I knew it, I was in the group. Without even trying. I never understood. It was so many people who weren’t. We never intended to make a group. It just happened. I was in, Scooter was in, Kris was in. People like Will Parker were only half way in, but really there was no half way. You were either in or out.
So that day I rode up to the house and propped my bike along the inside of the hedge, and then went up the walk to the house, and and knocked on the door.
My brother’s ex-girlfriend of two days opened it. She was the same height as me, but I felt like she was looking down on me. I didn’t get it.
“Hi,” I said. Would she even know me? “I’m looking for Scoot—Scott.”
“Come on in,” she said. I did. I shut the door behind me. I looked around. This house felt really empty. It was like the emptiest house in the world.
“Do you want something to drink?” she said.
“Well, yes. Thanks.”
She went into the kitchen. I followed her. Beth was saying, “We’ve got Kool-Aid, and chocolate milk. Soda. I don’t like soda.”
“Milk is good,” I said. “Since you have it.”
“Okay, I’ll bring it right to you.”
I took this as my cue to go sit down on the sofa.
A few minutes later she came out to me. She was pale and skinny in white shorts and a white tee shirt. She was moving kind of lazy, like she was drunk. But she wasn’t. I could understand why Ryan had dropped her.
“Thanks,” I said, and began to drink my milk.
She smiled. It was a weird kind of smile and I drank. It tasted like butter. It was thick and took a long time to get down. Where the hell was Scott?
“Scott’s not here,” she said. “He’s with Jonathan.”
I almost coughed on my milk. What the fuck? I’d been here this long and Scott wasn’t here?
“Oh,” I said. The milk was half finished. I wiped the milk moustache from under my nose.
“I’ll go as soon as I finish this.”
I had to finish it. You just don’t leave something half eaten or half consumed when you’re a guest. Mom always told me that.
She said, “Take your time,” and she just kept looking at me, dreamily. I was afraid. I thought maybe she might do something to me.
When I was finished Beth said: “How’s Ryan?”
So she did know me. I’d never met her before. Scooter must have told her. Or maybe she picked up on some resemblance. I remember thinking, My God! She DID poison me?
“He’s... fine.”
“You’re so like him,” she said.
So she did see a resemblance.
“And so not like him,” she added. “He’s bulkier. You’re light and.... How old are you?”
“Sixteen?”
“Just turned it?”
“Um hum.”
She began to stroke my hair in a muzzy, half awake way, like I was a cat and she was drifting off while drinking a cup of tea. But I wasn’t a cat. And it was the middle of summer in the Nelligant living room.
Beth pressed herself right next to me, her thigh touching mine. She kept stroking my hair and saying, “So like him, really... But not.”
She was saying stuff like that, and then I was her cat. She just kept stroking my hair and my shoulder, the left one, the one she could get to. And then her hand plunged straight to my crotch, and I gasped, her hand holding me.
She gasped, like I’d touched her.
“So—” she didn’t finish saying what she said. It happened in a series of out of control moments. I’ve heard people talk about situations where they aren’t in control at all, and don’t know what the hell is happening, and some say just the opposite. Some say they can recount every moment of the incident, and some that the moment of crisis was a collage, shot through with black blanks.
There was the moment when her hands were in my crotch, and then the next second where my jeans and my underwear were down and my dick was pointing out all hard, and then the next second when she was sucking down on it. My fingernails when into the sofa, I was on the balls of my feet. It felt so weird and crazy, and bad.
But past all that it felt so good. Not good like right. Good like... sublime. She was sucking something out of me, and then the next thing she had stopped, and she was struggling, and then I was on my back, and there was silence and muffling and she was riding me. She was pushing it and and pushing it and she was wet and I was sweaty and I could smell both of us and see the ceiling and then it was coming, somewhere from me the force was coming and my toes curled and my hands gripped the sofa and I arched up and then it was out of me.
Beth was still on top of me. I was still stiff inside of her. I felt like I’d just shot myself out. I was exhausted and sort of hollow and confused. My heart was beating. The room was spinning a little. I was getting limp and she was climbing off.
“Hold on,” she said, her voice catching like someone who had just run a race. “Let me get something to clean that up.”
I nodded. I didn’t know what to do. I thought of pulling up my pants, but I don’t like to be dirty, and I was still leaking out semen. I could smell her on me. I wanted to clean that up. I lay on the sofa with my knees drawn up, my underwear and pants around my ankles. The whole time I was staring ahead at the Nelligant door thinking, “What if Scooter comes?” Or: “What if Ryan shows up?”
“Here you go,” Beth said, turning her head away as she handed me two hand towels. One was wet, the other was dry. I remember thinking she’d probably done this for Ryan too. I cleaned up, drying myself with the last hand towel, and thought, “I wonder if this is exactly how Ryan would do it?”
“It shouldn’t have happened,” Beth said. “I’m so sorry, Please go.”
I nodded, my mouth half open, the two hand towels still in my hands. I went to the door and walked out. It wasn’t till I got to my bike that I realized I still had the hand towels. I dropped them in the grass, mounted my bike, and rode for home as quick as possible.


MORE TOMORROW NIGHT

 

[CharmedFan28]

It was a welcome surprise to see this story back! I am very curious to see what happens next. Sorry I don't have more to say I am a bit tired. I hope you have a great day and night and I look forward to more tomorrow!

 

[ChrisGibson]

Well, I thought you said these days are always late days, so that's the way it is, but of course I always appreciate your responses. I've gotten up late to do a few things so that's why I'm online to respond back, but it's time to go to sleep and thank you so much for reading and commenting. I really am grateful.

 

[ChrisGibson]

TONIGHT THE STORY OF JASON CONTINUES


That night at Aunt Maureen’s house, everyone’s there. Ryan’s not in as shitty a mood as he was. Now I feel shitty and weird. Dirty like the first time I masturbated. Confused. What happened shouldn’t have happened. I feel violated. But girls get violated, not guys. And violation is supposed to feel bad. So why did part of me like it? What’s wrong with me? What’s wrong period? Ryan thinks I fought with Scooter. He’s all concerned suddenly, and he asks me what happened. It bugs me. I wish he’d just go away.
“Butt out.”
He flicks me on the head, trying to be funny. It just makes me angry. I want to punch him but he’d punch me back so I just ignore him. I’m gone. I’m not here. I’ve left me body.
I don’t really like my body right now.
Ryan won’t leave me the fuck alone. Everyone else will, but not Ryan. He says, “Did Scooter slip you some drugs or something?”
“Ha ha! You’re a riot, Ry. For your info, Scooter wasn’t even there.”
“Then why were you gone so long?”
Does he suspect now? He was with Beth? Is he thinking something happened.
“Why are you Mother all of a sudden?” I snap. That’s the end of it. I don’t want to deal with him. I just fold my arms over my chest. The anger in me rises to this point and then all of a sudden I want to cry. My brother, who never deals with me, is bugging the shit out of me and I just lost my virginity for Christ’s sake. I realize that suddenly. I just lost my virginity.
To my big brother’s ex.


2.

I think that once I objected to church on Sunday. It was on grounds that I didn’t really think it had a purpose. I didn’t believe in it. My dad said that unbelief was not an option, and so there it was. We went to church like clockwork.
We were all pressed and ready that Sunday, the Sunday after what had happened. I had on a shirt and tie and I think Ryan was wearing a suit. Anne and Jinny were there with Aunt Maureen and Uncle Pierce all sqeaky and clean coming to squeaky clean Saint Antonin’s.
Now, real Catholic churches aren’t like the ones you see on TV. Those have all of these saints and the big altars and they glisten. There’s lots and lots of incense. There’s a big old organ behind the choir loft, and all that old Latiny, holy singing. Lots and lots of priests come in procession. Everyone looks all classic with rosaries, black beads wrapped around their fingers, and there are these grottoes and shit with statues of the Virgin Mary. She’s got all of these red candles burning under her feet.
Real Catholic churches aren’t like that at all. My mom says that Saint Antonin’s used to be. But now the choir is in the front where we can all see them, and they can’t sing. There’s this fat chick and she plays the piano. She’s got a really nice voice, but it’s not a religious experience or anything listening to her. There’s a pale wooden crucifix suspended over the altar and on it Jesus is kind of shrugging, like he’s apologizing for the whole mess. There are stain glass windows, but they’re pale and lots of light comes through them. It’s almost what you’d call a happy go lucky place. But I can be happy go lucky anywhere so why here, this Sunday?
“How do you know it’s really Jesus?” I said once. I don’t know who to, but maybe it was Ryan. I can just see him saying, “Of course it is, stupid.”
It’s not that Ryan’s religious. It’s just he needs to believe in something and I need to question it.
“I mean, if you bite down on it, would he say ouch?”
“You’re being blasphemous,” Mom said.
Mom always says, “You’re being blasphemous” or “Stop being blasphemous.” I think she has this fear that God is sitting in the sky and he’s got this TV, and on the TV he flicks and flicks to see all the Catholics in the world. If someone’s talking about him bad, or saying something that he doesn’t think is funny, then he sticks out his finger and blows them up. Just like that.
But it’s a lot of shitty people in the world, and I’ve yet to see fire come down from heaven and blow one up. So it can’t really be like that. Can it?
Anyway, Mass is only about forty-five minutes, but it feels so long and so fucking pointless. It drags and drags and then we get to to the “Holy, Holy, Holy” and ashes, ashes, we all fall down. I get up here cause I have to pee.
Whenever I get up I always feel like people are watching me. If I went to church by myself then I’d be in the back. But I guess if I went to church by myself I wouldn’t go at all.
We’re in the middle of the church and I walk out and head to the vestibule, and then turn to go into the basement for the bathroom. Over me I can hear the rumble of the congregation murmuring stuff and then the piano playing as the fat lady sings:

Dying you destroyed our death,
rising you restored our life!

Everything is lost in the dull flushing of the toilet and then I scrub my hands with the smelly pink soap and come out.
And Beth Nelligant is standing right there.
“Beth,” I mouth the words.
But she puts a finger to her lips and then pulls me away. The basement is where youth group meets. I just want to say I never did youth group. There are posters on the wall about trips planning to go to see the Pope at World Youth Day and to petition abortion clinics and lots of free, cheap plastic rosaries are lying around. If you ask me, when I see and hear about all the Catholic Church used to be it’s gotten a little too free, cheap and plastic for me.
We’re in the coatroom and I say, “Wha?” kind of like I’m half asleep. There are no coats because it’s summer, and then Beth’s hands are in my pants and pulling them down, and before I know it, I’m getting hard. I can feel my dick getting bigger and bigger and then she helps me lift up her summer dress. She guides me so that her back is against the wall and then the next thing I know it’s the first real thing I’ve felt this morning, and she’s pulling me inside of her and this time I’m there for it and ready and her hands are in my hair, they’re running through it all savage and part off me is thinking I’m going to look a mess. But the rest of me is fucking her and we’re both breathing really hard. I can’t see her face, I can just feel her shudder, and I’m pushing into her again and again, harder now, and she’s pulling me deeper in. In the distance, like another world, quiet compared to the way my heart is beating, the way I hear Beth’s heart beating, the piano is playing again, people are coming to their feet after kneeling. I’m rising up on the balls of my feet. I can feel it. Somewhere in the basement of me there is something. It’s like fire and honey and sugar, all at the same time. It’s like the first time I drank liquor, or even like the good wine they almost never have at Communion, and she’s pulling it out of me. Her hands are on my ass now. My underwear’s sliding down my knees with my pants. She shouts and at the same time I startle myself with a loud groan.
I keep on shooting. I lean up again her. She’s pressed under me and my body keeps lurching forward as all of it shoots out. It’s like my body’s tensed until all of this comes out, like it had to come out, and then I’m gasping and I’m pulling out of her.
She says, “That’s much better than the first time.” She’s breathless and tired like me.
“Are you all right?” she says.
I don’t speak. I just nod.
“That was better than the last time,” she says again. “Wasn’t it?”
A little of me is dripping onto the coatroom floor. A slow sad song is playing, “Bread For the World”. Communion has begun.
“We need to go back up,” Beth says. “How about you first?”

I don’t make it for Communion. Anne says, as I kneel beside her, “I guess you had a lot to get out.”
I don’t even answer. What would I say? I don’t even know how I feel. I know how I should feel. I’ve just had sex with my brother’s ex girlfriend in the coatroom of our church at the holiest part of the Mass. The scripted Catholic emotion is guilt. But I basically just feel numb.


MORE OF JASON AND RHODES THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW

 

[CharmedFan28]

Sounds like Jason is really going through it with his feelings after what happened. I am very interested to see what happens with him and Beth. Great writing and I look forward to more in a few days!

 

[ChrisGibson]

What do you think of Beth?

 

[CharmedFan28]

I don't know what to think of her. I think I will have to read more before I make a decision.

 

[ChrisGibson]

TONIGHT, JAYSON MEETS SOMEONE NEW, BUT STILL HAS TIES TO THE OLD.

3.

Those nights in the paper room are over now. That hurts. I thought I’d regret not staying in Colorado after Ryan graduated, but I don’t . I’m glad I came back just to have one more of those crazy weeks when me and the guys wheeled about on chairs in the computer lab finishing up the yearbook and writing the school newspaper. We didn’t do drugs. We didn’t drink. Though there was that one time when Jonathan tried to take up smoking. We binged on papers and homework and caffeine.
In a few weeks we will all go our separate ways. Except me. My separate way will be staying right here, and I wonder if that was right or not. We’ll be split up, but I can remember us being together and asking questions other people didn’t ask.
The computer lab was at the very top of the school in a room we called the Tower. If I go back, maybe it won’t be such a tower. Maybe it will just be the highest room in the school. But it was a tower for us. When I was there I felt like I was above everyone else, above all the mess that was school. Above all the stupidity.
One night Scooter says all of a sudden:
“There’s no point to this story.”
We all look at him. We’ve decided to take a break and he’s reading Grimms’ Fairy Tales. He says, “There’s no point to this. It’s this old couple and they have a son who is rich. Because he’s a thief. And the count of the place where they live sentences the boy to death unless he can do these three impossible things. So the thief outsmarts everyone and then the count says, ‘You win for now. But never show your face here again.’ And then the thief goes away. That’s the end. There’s no point.”
Jonathan turns and says, “You’re real bugged about this, man.”
“I am,” Scott says. “That’s life, isn’t it? There’s no point. You just gotta make your own point. But to do it, you’ve got to pretend there is one. But what if you can’t. It doesn’t mean anything.”
He looked really disturbed about it.
“That’s why I don’t go to church,” he went on. “Mom and Dad don’t make me anymore. Dad never did in the first place. It just doesn’t mean anything. I mean in church if you do the right thing you go to heaven, do the wrong thing you go to hell. It’s all these rules and everything works out this way and that way. But.... It’s not really like that, is it?
“And if there is a God... then he can’t really be like that either.”
“But,” says Jonathan, “if it doesn’t mean anything, and if the Church is totally wrong, then where do we go? I mean, what else is there?”
“I don’t know.” Scott says.
And then I try to laugh.
“I think you think about too much.”
“What about you?” says Kris.
“I don’t think about it at all.”
Scott shuts the book, “Oh, come on, now.”
“You come on now,” I say. “Are you trying to tell me that unless there’s a God—or unless the Catholic Chruch is right—and it never is—life has no.…”
“Meaning,” Scott said.
“Well, why’s life gotta have meaning anyway?” I ask. “Why can’t it be good even if it doesn’t have purpose and meaning and a plot and a theme and all of that stuff? Why can’t life just be good? Just live and let live.”
“You think that’s enough?” Jonathan says.
“I think it has to be enough. Because that’s all we’ve got.”

By the end of that summer when I turned sixteen, Beth and I have worked out a few things. There is no way she can come over to my house, and I could only come to hers when no one is home. Scott is at computer camp in the afternoon, and so that’s when I come. However I felt the first time, I can’t stay away. I’m going to get free sex, and it feels too good. It’s the only thing in my life that I can say is unquantifed bliss.
Beth is what is known as a freak. The weirder the sex is the more she likes it. There isn’t a thing we don’t do in her bed and though I never ask it, I think, She did this with Ryan. My brother was in this bed before me. Everything we’re doing he did with her. It’s sort of a view of my brother I don’t want. The view from the inside.
Did she get on her knees and suck him off? Did she teach him cunnilingus or did he do that already? Did she mount him or have him on top? Did she make him lay down and then lick him all over, make his hands grip the bedsheets while her tongue went up his nipples, down his stomach and over his thighs, swallow him, lick his balls. Did she eat out his ass? When her head is down in those secret places, when I’m trying to stop making noises, when she leans over me and makes me come and watches it come out of me I try not to think about Ryan.
When it’s over we lay in bed, and now that summer’s almost over I’m confident enough to hold her, though I know she’s five years older and doesn’t love me. Though I know she’s using me and doesn’t really take me seriously.
Her hands reach between my legs and she starts to stroke me.
“I’m going back to school next week,” she says. “But I’ll be back for Thanksgiving.”
She’s quiet a while, and then she says, “You were a virgin, weren’t you?”
“Yeah,” my voice sounds kind of defensive.
“I think that’s sweet,” she says reflexively.
“You know?” she says, “Last year I walked into Scooter’s room and caught him masturbating to porn.”
That’s something else I didn’t want to think about.
“Boy’s are so different,” Beth says, stroking me to prove it. “I was a virgin when I was sixteen. I didn’t get boys at all.”
Her voice is all singsongy.
She’s manouvering under me. I’m getting hard.
As I enter her, as I begin to shuttle inside of her, I realize that I don’t like her.
Now I’m totally in Ryan’s shoes.
She’s moaning under me, And I’m fucking her. I like it, but I don’t like us. Right now I don’t like much of anything.

So over a year later, when Scott gets bugged about there being no morals and no meaning, I’m thinking about this. I’m thinking about how church is cardboard, and ultimately school and going through the rat race is cardboard, and how there are so few things that feel real. What you need, what you want is that real feeling, the real moment of bliss. It doesn’t have anything to do with right or wrong. That’s why Beth who never comes to church snuck into church and had sex with me in a coatroom during Communion. That’s why when I snuck into my best friend’s house and had sex with his sister, my brother’s ex-girlfriend, who was five years my senior, the sky didn’t explode…

I shuttled faster and faster, fucking her. She cried out louder and louder, and then my hand hit the wall and I braced myself.
And the only explosion that came was from me, hidden under blankets on Meyer Street. Soft, silent, hot and white.

_______________


She is so beautiful.
“Her name’s Siona,” Scott says.
“I am perfectly capable of telling him my name,” she says and sticks out her hand: “Siona Murphy.”
“I hear you’re on the debate team at Whitman.”
“Yeah.”
“My cousin went to Whitman. She liked it.”
“How long ago did she go?”
“About... five years ago. My brother went there. He really liked it too.”
“Well,” Siona shrugged. “It must have changed.”
She’s so pretty. She’s got those great low riding jeans on and a little pink top that shows off her belly button. She has the brownest hair I’ve ever seen and these deep green brown eyes. I keep looking away because I’m afraid she’ll catch me staring.
“I like your house,” Siona says. “Why don’t you show me what’s what?”
And so I do. She reminds me of Anne, because she’ not mealy mouthed or anything, waiting to be shown. She’s just like, “Show me, right now.”
I take her around the whole house. Scooter is following us. Actually, I take her all the way around the first floor and then she says, “Is that it? I don’t get to see the top floor. What about your room?”
“My room?”
“What?”
“It’s just... I thought... Isn’t it improper for a guy to take a girl to his room.”
“Actually, if the two of them are alone and it’s midnight then it means sex is about to happen and it’s improper. But since it’s not quite eight, and the sun’s still up and Scooter is with us, I think it just means, ‘Hey, show me what your room looks like.’”
Scooter laughs out loud and I chuckle a little. We go upstairs. No one is here. Mom and Dad are out. Ryan must be out too.
In my room Siona says, “You can learn a lot about a man from his room?”
“Really?”
“Really,” she says. “Like.... You haven’t found your identity.”
“Huh?”
“Scooter has Bob Marley and Albert Einstein posters. He talks philosophy, but he has physics books all over his room. You don’t have anything in your room. Not really.”
She looked around.
“Nothing.”
I didn’t know what to say.
“Don’t feel insulted,” she said.
“I don’t,” I protested.
“Yes you do,” Siona said. “A little.”
“I think we should get Anne,” Scooter said.
I couldn’t tell if he was saying it to make peace or because he just couldn’t wait to see her. Much to my disbelief, I think it was the latter. All the way to Anne’s house, I kept trying to imagine her as beautiful.

“You look great!” Scott said as soon as he saw Anne.
Most un-Annelike, she covered her face and blushed.
“Are you ready?”
“Your voice…” she began.
“What?’ Scooter said.
“It’s sexy.”
Scooter’s eyes went wide, and then he went red too. I caught Siona shaking her head, and laughed.
“Let’s roll,” she said.
And we were gone.

Siona is amazing! I can’t tell you a thing that she said, but it was all amazing. She made me want to laugh, but I didn’t. I was just in awe of her. Except I kept feeling like I was nothing. Like: what do I matter, right? Why am I even here? Does she like me? And what she said was starting to sting. The whole time I was sitting next to her I was thinking, I really don’t have a life. I really am nothing. I really am not passionate about anything. Scooter and Anne were laughing, and looking at Scooter I realized something. I started thinking about The Guys and realized that I was the fake. I was the one who wasn’t anything. Jon had his thing and Kris had his. Scooter had his stuff. And they were all going off to really big schools. But I was staying here because I belonged here. I wasn’t anything.
I don’t know who I can tell this to.
I look over at Anne. Anne would understand. She wouldn’t even make fun of me. I know that.
Anne and Siona are talking ninety miles an hour. They are so alike. They are so... free. The way girls are free. Girls usually don’t care about anything. Still, these are the freest girls I’ve ever met. They’re laughing and chattering like cheerleaders and like all those dumb girls that hang around Saint Jude, but there’s nothing dumb about them.
“Oh, I know!” Anne says to something Siona says. I’ve never seen Anne hang out with another girl. Well, almost never. She hates most of the girls at Little Flower.
Of course there is a difference between Anne and Siona.
I think I’m in love with Siona.
I know that I’ve never really been in love before.

Scooter was the one who drove Siona to my house, which means Scooter is the one driving us all back. When we get to Siona’s house I get out of the car with her and walk her up to the front door. I can hear Scooter’s car sitting on the street and I can practically feel his eyes and Anne’s eyes on us.
“If we kiss, they’ll watch,” Siona says.
“Do you care?” I say.
“Not really,” says Siona. “Well, maybe a little. Not enough.”
And then she kisses me quickly and it’s over before I knew it happen. I’m blinking at her. I probably look really stupid.
“That’s the first time I’ve really kissed someone,” Siona says.
I open my mouth and know I’m telling the truth when I say, “Me too."

MORE TOMORROW? IT WILL BE A HOLIDAY SO I'M NOT SURE WHAT'S GOING TO HAPPEN YET.

 

[CharmedFan28]

By all means take the holiday off, it doesn't bother me. That was a great portion! This new character Siona intrigues me more then Beth did. Excellent writing and I look forward to more whenever you post it. If you want to take tomorrow off as I said it doesn't worry me.

 

[ChrisGibson]

Well, I enjoy posting so it wouldn't be totally for your benefit if I did post. I just don't know what's going to end up happening (which means its more than likely I will post). Siona is more interesting because she is more everything. I'm sort of showing my hand in how I feel about Beth, so I'll stop talking about her and maybe we can address Beth again when the story is over and we've had the fullness of her. Anyway, i'm glad you enjoyed reading cause I enjoyed writing.

 

[ChrisGibson]

BETH NELLIGANT STILL MANAGES TO EXERT HER HOLD


THAT THANKSGIVING NOTHING HAPPENS. In passing Scott mentions that his sister is home and Jayson says, “Oh, I bet that’s nice.”
“It is,” says Scooter. “She’s not as crazy as she used to be. You ever meet her?”
A strange look comes over Jayson’s face.
“Maybe once or twice. You know. Cause Ryan used to date her.”
Jayson is thinking that whatever he and Beth Nelligant had, this was a fling. It was a weirdness that happened over one summer, and now it’s over. Unless Beth came seeking him out, he wouldn’t seek her out. She’s probably got someone college aged. Appropriate. Jayson is not deceived. He doesn’t think it was love. This wasn’t a romance. It was many things, but not romance.
He sees her at church on Sunday. He can’t help but look across the aisle at her. Scott, who’s come once, thinks he’s looking at him. Why are they here? The Nelligants gave up God.
And then, after that, Ryan is gone back to Colorado and Beth is back in California and Jayson is thinking that Out West must be a really strange place.

They go to the mall one afternoon. This almost never happens. They are nor mall people, him and Scooter, Kris and Jonathan. They are still in their sweatshirts and school pants. Winter and the newspaper room have made them pale. They do not have the latest haircuts. They walk into the American Eagle Outfitters store. They see all the preshrunk and pre-faded ripped jeans, the necklaces, the tight tee shirts, the checked table cloth shirts, the wrap around shades, the over priced sandals that some people are silly enough to wear in winter.
There are sofas in that store and there is a big screen TV and it’s always playing American Eagle Outfitters commercials. In one these people are all dancing, and then they’re skiing, and then they’re sitting around in a ski lodge, partially naked and fabulous looking. All the girls have blond streaked hair, and all the guys have tints in their curly hair. Unlike Jayson and Jonathan and Kris and Scott, these white people are not pale and Midwestern. The guys are red with health and have a day’s growth of beard. The girls are brown with tanning. They are laughing and being sexy and Jayson thinks, This is how Ryan must live. This is what it must be like to be Out West. Is this what Beth knows? All of this summer makes no sense. Everything they did. If this is the world she comes from.


JAYSON

Scooter invites us all over the day after Christmas. Mrs. Nelligant is cooking this big meal, and Jonathan says, “You’re a lot better than my mom. She didn’t even want to cook yesterday, and you’re doing it two days in a row.”
I’m thinking the same thing. Mrs. Nelligant just laughs as she sits down and Mr. Nelligant wraps an arm around her like he’s saying, “That’s my wife.”
It’s me and Jon and Kris, and Beth is there too. She’s not looking at me or any of us. She’s just acting like this summer didn’t even happen. And that’s weird, and then I catch on, and it’s cool. It’s better to forget. Right?
After dinner we all go up to Scooter’s room and we’re thinking about going out some place because Jon got his new SUV from his parents, but we just really never make it out of Scott’s. Scooter’s parents got him a DVD player, and it’s really loud and his room is big and on the other end of the house, so we just sit in his room getting stuffed on popcorn and watching Star Wars.

I just realized right now that I don’t like Star Wars.

It gets late and we get tired and Scooter has two extra sets of pajamas and Jon says that he doesn’t wear pajamas.
“You’re not sleeping nude in my house,” says Scooter, and Jon wads up a microwave popcorn bag and launches it at him, then says, “I’m sleeping in my jogging pants.”
We turn out the lights, leave the TV on and talk a lot until one by one we’re all asleep.

When I wake up the room is blue from the light of the TV, but everyone is snoring. I’m in Scooter’s huge easy chair that’s shaped like the inside of an egg, and I don’t want to get up except that I have to pee so bad, and I think I might have to shit too.
So, at last, I get up and go out of his room. Now that I’m up I’ve got to be quick and I race to the bathroom. I do my stuff quick and wash off my hands and then head back down the hall.
There is a light coming from under Beth’s door.
And then I’m standing there in front of the door, just staring. I don’t know what I’m waiting for.
Then I hear her say, “What is it, Scooter?” and know she knows I’m there.
And then next thing I know, the door is open and she catches her breath and says:
“You.”
I don’t think she’s ever used my name.
We’re the same height and she’s just looking at me. I can’t tell the look on her face and I don’t know the look on mine.
And then she points below, and I have a boner, and it’s popping out of Scooter’s pj pants.
She pulls me inside and closes the door.
Beth locks the door and pulls down my pants. She gets on her knees and begins sucking my dick. It’s the best feeling in the world. She’s just pulling it out of me, sucking on the head and my hands are on the back of the door. I’m looking at the ceiling. She stops. She always stops. I look to see if the curtains are closed. They are. She’s in basketball shorts and a tee shirt. She pulls off her clothes in a moment and I’m looking at her pubic hair, one golden triangle. Her breasts are like these buds. And my body remembers everything from this summer, and then she pulls me and I tumble a little over my pj bottoms. She pulls me on top of her, and then she takes my penis, and puts it inside of her, and the next thing I know she’s guiding me again. She’s doing all the stuff she did this summer. Only this time I know what to do, and every time I’m about to come she tugs down on my balls, and whispers, “Not yet. Not yet!” I can’t believe we’re doing this. She’s trying to keep from making noise and she keeps putting her hand over my mouth. I’m fucking Beth Nelligant. In the end I’m doing it hard. I can’t hold back anymore. When I explode I do shout. And her eyes open in fear.
I’m still in my tee shirt. It’s soaked through and I’m straddled over her. She’s gasping. I roll over. We’re both mostly naked on her bed. There is a strange smell.
“That was good, Jayson,” she says. It’s the first time she’s ever used my name.
“But we better not do this again. You can’t let on you know me. And I don’t know you. This has to be it.”
She adds after a while, still breathing kind of shallow, “You should find yourself a nice girl your age.”
I reach out and touch one of her breasts. My fingers stray toward a nipple. I lay on my back. I’m so tired.
“I think I should go,” I say.
“Yeah,” says Beth. I can’t tell how she feels about that.
I climb up off the bed and pull back on Scooter’s pajama bottoms, twisting the door, forgetting it’s locked. And then I unlock it, look down the hall and go back to Scooter’s room.
The blue light on the television is still shining in the room and everyone’s still alseep. I climb back into the chair. It’s as if nothing happened since I got up and went to the bathroom.
And that’s the last time I ever talked to Beth Nelligant.

THE CONCLUDING PART OF JAYSON'S STORY TOMORROW NIGHT....

 

[CharmedFan28]

That was a very interesting portion. Beth does seem to have a hold over Jayson but I am kind of glad that their sex sessions are over with no one harmed. Great writing and I look forward to the conclusion to Jayson's story tomorrow!

 

[ChrisGibson]

That was a very interesting portion. Beth does seem to have a hold over Jayson but I am kind of glad that their sex sessions are over with no one harmed. Great writing and I look forward to the conclusion to Jayson's story tomorrow!

From a certain point you could say that, but you may want to read the story again one day and reassess.

 

[ChrisGibson]

THE CONCLUSION OF FLESH


“DO YOU THINK—?”
“No.”
“Do you think—” I began again, and again, Anne said, “No.”
“I’d like to get the sentence out of my mouth, please.”
“No matter what it is, the answer is no,” Anne said. We were in Uncle Pierce’s study. “At least,” she added, “until twelve o’clock.”
I just cocked my head at her.
“No,” she said, smiling. “There’s no particular reason. Except that I LIKE twelve o’clock.”
“You’re weird,” I told her, and she just smiled.
“What I was going to say—”
“Scooter kissed me last night,” Anne said. “He kissed me while you were taking Siona to the door. He stuck his tongue down my throat. It was almost bad, but then it got good. And then I wanted him to keep going, but you were coming back to the car.”
“You stopped for me. That was gracious.”
“When he dropped me off at his house I grabbed his ass,” she went on. “I wasn’t all outloud about it. I just sort of let my hand graze across it.”
“This is gross. You grabbed my best friend’s butt.”
“No,” Anne corrected. “His ass. His lovely, round, soft, ass. It was like a bun. It was great. I can’t wait to do it again. I’ll have to drop things and make him pick them up for me. And then... I’ll just swoop in for a little feel.”
“You are not like any girl I’ve ever met.”
“I think I’m like every girl you’ve ever met,” Anne said. “Only girl’s don’t tell everything to guys, and I do tell everything to you. I bet Siona cupped your ass a couple of times too.”
“No,” I said, though I wasn’t sure now. Maybe she had, and I just couldn’t tell because I was stupid.
“Siona thinks I’m dull,” I said.
“No, she doesn’t.”
“Yes she does,” I disagreed. “That’s what I was trying to tell you. Siona thinks I’m dull, and.… Well, she didn’t really say I was dull. She said... I can’t remember exactly. That I didn’t have my own personality yet. That I didn’t have my own things. Because my room is bare. That Scooter has more of a life than I do.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t listen to that bitch.”
“You just said you liked her.”
“That was five minutes ago. Who the hell walks into a stranger’s room and tells them they don’t have their own thoughts or their own life?”
“Firstly, you would do that. Secondly, she didn’t say I didn’t have my own thoughts.”
“That’s what she meant.”
“Oh my God!”
“What?” Anne looked at me.
“You agree with her.”
“What? No, I don’t. I just called her a bitch, didn’t I?”
“You agree with her, don’t you?” I said. “Don’t you!”
Anne was subdued for one of the few times in her life before she spoke.
“Well, that’s not the issue. The issue is, do you agree with her?”
“You’re getting all psychological and shit now.”
”No,” she said, even though she was. “I’m being real. DO you, agree with her?”
“Well... a little. I mean. Maybe she’s right. Jonathan’s going to Yale. Scooter’s going to Harvard and Kris is going to Princeton. They’re all going somewhere, and I’m going to Saint Clare’s.
“So am I.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
Anne shrugged.
“They have all of these interests, and maybe I’m the imposter. I was thinking. Maybe I snuck into the group. I don’t feel passionate about Bob Marley or Einstein or Princeton.”
“Who the hell should?” Anne said. “Don’t let that bother you.” She stood up. “Find something that does interest you.”
“I don’t know if anything does.”
“Look,” Anne said. “There are six billion—or maybe eight billion, I can’t remember—people in this world, and they are all interested in something. They all have an obsession and a life. So I’m sure something will come to you.”
For once I didn’t believe Anne. Even when we argued over the existence of God I never not believed her. Now I disbelieved her completely. I thought she was naive on this one.
“You’re wrong, Anne,” I said. “They’re lots of people who don’t care about anything....
“I don’t want to be like that.”
Then I said, “Anne?”
“Yeah?”
“Scooter’s my best friend.”
“I know he is.”
“But I didn’t know it until now. I didn’t know until now and he’s going away.”
She looked at me, sad, like my mom only my mom isn’t really motherly, and she sat next to me and put her arm around me and said, “He’ll be back. He’s gotta come back for Christmas, Thanksgiving. Summer and all that.”
“It’s not the same. People change. It’s hard to keep something going.”
“Well,” she said in a voice that told me I was right... but not completely. “Just because something’s hard doesn’t mean it’s difficult. Does that make any sense? I mean, guys are stupid about things like this, but if you don’t want to lose Scooter, maybe you should tell him.”
“I can’t do that. We’re not gay.”
Anne shouted in what I think was exasperation, and her comforting hand flew off of my shoulder and smacked me on the back of the head.
“See what I mean by ‘guys are stupid about things like this’? Well, then I’ll tell him.”
“You’d better not!”
Anne gave me a mysterious look that told me she probably would anyway. And for some reason this made me happy.
“And then I said: You know Scooter’s sister?”
“Beth? That crazy bitch Cecile went postal about? Ryan’s ex?”
“Yeah.”
“What about her?”
“I had sex with her.”
“What!” Her eyes were bigger than a bug’s.
“Not today,” I said.
She put her hand to her chest in relief at first, and then she was realizing something else.
“Well,” she sat at last. “When?”
“About two years back.”
“What? When you just turned sixteen?”
“Yeah.”
“I don’t believe it!” she said. “You couldn’t even drive back then! Not that you can really drive now, but... My God!”
And then she said, “Well, that sick bitch! She’s like... She’s Ryan’s age! That was like a crime. No.…” Anne realized. “It was a crime. It was statutory rape is what it was.”
“Anne quiet down.”
“Oh, Jayson!” she said at last. She crushed my face in her hands. She kissed me. She should have gone out for drama club in school. Really, her talents are wasted.
“What the hell was wrong with you! What the hell happened?”
Anne jumped on me and hugged me tight. It was all really silly, but for some reason I didn’t ask her to stop. No one knew back then what was going on. I sort of needed someone to treat me like a kid now and be all motherly and goofy now that I’d had to pass through that on my own.
“Anne,” I said, after a while. “It’s over. It’s been over.”
And then she took a breath and said, “I can’t believe you’re not a virgin. I... I always thought I’d know. I feel bad about knowing. Or not knowing… I can’t say which. Why didn’t you tell me? Well, I guess you wouldn’t have but...”
She was talking to herself, getting really silly, but I realized that if Scooter was my best guy friend, then Anne was my best friend... period. I guess. We fought all the time but I knew right then that she would be hurt that I kept this from her.
Then she said, “This is one of those things I won’t be sharing with Scooter.”
“Please don’t.” I said.
“Or Ryan.”
“Or anyone,” I told her. My voice was more serious than I expected it to be.
She looked at me startled and agreed:
“Oh, hell, no!”


NO POSTING TOMORROW. HAVE A GREAT DAY.