The Education of a Cuckold

by Alex Hathaway

  The Education of a Cuckold

  A Story of Love, Lust, and Fate

  by

  Alex Hathaway

  Fanny Press

  PO Box 70515

  Seattle, WA 98127

  For more information go to: www.fannypress.com

  alexcuckoldstories.fannypress.com

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, brands, media, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Cover design by Sabrina Sun

  The Education of a Cuckold: A Story of Love, Lust, and Fate

  Copyright © 2013 by Alex Hathaway

  ISBN: 978-1-60381-544-4 (Trade Paper)

  ISBN: 978-1-60381-545-1 (eBook)

  Produced in the United States of America

  * * * *

  Acknowledgments

  I would like to offer a special thanks to those in my life who have given me an unflinching view of their sexual experiences, with and without me. Those honest views have allowed me to write stories that hopefully not only entertain the reader, but also contain the spark of truth and the intensity of self-discovery.

  Prologue

  We talk about love as a perk of maturity, something you can’t fully experience until you are old enough. I met the love of my life when I was eighteen. Of course, if you think “love of my life” means we locked eyes and lived happily after, well, that’s not the story I have to confess. But you’ll know soon enough—if I can find the guts to type these secrets.

  Chapter 1

  Beth was different. I knew it when I first laid eyes on her. I went to high school in Charlotte, North Carolina, where all the girls had sexy eyes, southern drawls, and plenty of attitude. Beth had been voted “best ass in school” when she was a sophomore, but that’s not really fair. She was so much more than that. Yeah, Beth did have an animal grace about her, a tanned flow from head to toe. Her body was made for sex. I was intimidated by her back then, even more so when she turned eighteen. Her breasts were modest in size, but at eighteen, Beth acted and looked like a full-grown woman. She always had these hunks from the swim team buzzing around her. I figured she was getting laid all the time.

  We had a photography class together. As the senior student photographer, I was the teacher’s assistant. I was always looking for a way to get to know Beth better. Beth knew me, but maybe not. I felt as if she saw right through me. I wasn’t a bad looking guy, but I was on the short side and more of a bookworm than an athlete. I tried to stay in shape but I was hardly a swim hunk. I needed a different way to get her attention.

  The opportunity came in a strange way. I was one of the first in school to get my hands on an mp3 player—this was before iPods came along. One Friday, I saw Beth sitting alone in the back, fiddling with her camera with a distant look in her eyes. You could guess by her expression that it was “boy problems.” I had a song I didn’t think she had heard before … I sucked up my courage and told her she might like to check it out.

  We stepped out behind the building, which had a small back porch perfect for illegal smoke breaks. I remember my heart pounding while she listened. Suddenly I had her all to myself, her browned skin reflecting the sun. I never wanted that song to end. It was called “Mad World.” You might have heard a cover of it in the movie Donnie Darko. It evoked the kind of emo-loner pensiveness I was really into at the time.

  She handed the music player back to me.

  “That was one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever heard,” she said. “Thank you. Do you want to go on a walk?”.

  The next hour was a blur. I can’t remember exactly what we talked about that day. I know we shared secrets we had never told anyone. Me growing up with a single father. Her dad and his drinking. We walked behind the stadium, into the woods, around the gym, and eventually back to the school. By the time we circled back, we were holding hands.

  I loved all the whispering around school. I felt like a prom king. When Beth got back together with the guy she’d told me about, it didn’t really bother me. It felt like our bond was deeper. Some of my friends made fun of me about that. But I knew I was right.

  I want to tell you realistically how our relationship developed, but it was less a succession of anecdotes and more of an evolution of feeling, the gradual uncovering of a pre-existing bond. I took to driving her home from school, and we never seemed to make it straight home. We’d stop in a park, walk along the river. Anything to avoid home and the problems awaiting us there. In the six months leading up to graduation, it felt like we spent all our free time together. Yeah, occasionally when I’d call, she wouldn’t answer. I figured she was with her boyfriend, and I’d feel a tug of a kind of pain that has become terribly familiar in the years since. But a day or two later, she’d always call.

  I only kissed her once, just a peck one night when she was a bit tipsy, but I didn’t worry about it. The fact that we would soon be kissing, having sex actually, seemed inevitable. I wasn’t in a rush at all. Some of my friends got frustrated; they tried to get me to date other girls who had crushes on me. I wasn’t interested. She was the one.

  It was only when prom night arrived that I realized my predicament. I never admitted to myself how much I wanted Beth to go with me—until the night arrived. I knew she had already agreed to go with Brad, one of the “swim dorks,” as the misfits I hung out with called them—that is, when we didn’t call them worse.

  I did find someone to go with me, a woman named “Deb” who was also on the swim team. Deb was a little scary. She was pretty good looking, but damn was she “available.” Looking back, I know that Deb was just a girl who hadn’t found her way in life yet. Spreading her legs was how she got by. I guess we took advantage of that. I didn’t want to go alone, and she was a nice person as well as someone who might be into something sexual that night.

  When prom night finally arrived, I got distracted by Beth and Brad. At one point I saw them slow dancing, and a surge of jealousy blasted through. Deb could see that something was wrong. I wasn’t my usual wisecracking self. At the after party, I found Beth outside on the patio making out, Brad lying on top of her. I felt an unwanted sexual thrill watching them writhe around in plain view.

  Deb seemed annoyed by my inattention, at one point asking me what was wrong.

  Later, while I was trying to keep an eye on Beth’s make-out session, Deb tapped me on the shoulder.

  “Jason …” I barely heard her first request.

  “Jason!” she tapped me on the shoulder.

  That time I turned around.

  “I got a ride home with Becky …” Deb said.

  “Okay,” I said, a bit absentmindedly. I didn’t mean to be rude to her. I was just so wrapped up in what was going on with Beth.

  “You really need to get over her!” Deb said in disgust and walked off.

  Ugh. There was a break in the music right when she said it, and our friends overheard her. Being called out by Deb was an unpleasant reminder that my feelings for Beth were at best unconventional. For the first time it occurred to me there might be something wrong with me, something abnormal. That’s the last thing a high school student ever wants to feel.

  I stormed out of the party, making sure to make enough of a scene that Beth knew I was upset. I drove out of town, pretending I was hitting the open road like my heroes Jack Kerouac and Hunter Thompson. But that was not my life. I was in my mom’s beat-up Toyota Camry, and she needed it for w
ork the next day. After I got an hour out of town, I could see less neon, and the exits were fewer and farther apart. Nothing to do but turn around.

  I slid the keys on the plant shelf outside my mom’s bedroom, then proceeded to cry my way to sleep.

  But a few hours later, I woke up.

  And for the first time, I masturbated, not thinking of myself having sex, but of my “girlfriend”—if I could still call her that with any sense of self-respect—having sex with another guy.

  Beth didn’t call the next day, or the day after that. At first I could barely eat. The second day was worse. On the third, she called.

  “I heard you left the party all wrecked out,” she said.

  “Yeah …”

  “I … I was in a whole other world,” she said. “Sorry I wasn’t there for you.”

  I didn’t say anything, letting the silence be my weapon.

  Finally I had mercy on her.

  “It’s okay. I had some things I had to reckon with.” I always talked like that back then, portraying my existential battles as some kind of glorious struggle.

  “What did you do?”

  “I went on a long drive, got my head straight,” I said.

  “That’s good,” she said. “You still sound kind of weird though …”

  Things felt really awkward. No! I couldn’t let this fall apart. I had to bridge the gap.

  “But as you know, I’m pretty tilted to begin with,” I said.

  We laughed, more out of relief. Things would be okay. That comfortable bond eased its way back.

  After we hung up, I was a little troubled. Then I realized what was bothering me: I had never flat-out told her how I felt about her. There was no way around it. But not until after graduation. I wanted to get my courage up. Plus I didn’t want to be forced to see her every day if it all fell flat.

  Graduation was bittersweet. My friends were heading to colleges up and down the East Coast. I had a decent scholarship myself. Things were looking up. College would bring new adventures, not to mention hot girls. I threw my graduation cap as high as I could. If anything was going to stop me, in that moment I couldn’t think of it.

  I was feeling brazen, so I figured I’d roll with it. Asking Beth to go on a walk down by the sand dunes suddenly felt like nothing. We held hands as we always did. It was hard not to think about her white summer skirt floating against her strong fit body. I fought off an image of swimdork Brad peeling it off her as I desperately wanted to do.

  I sat Beth down on a bench and I took the plunge. I said I had always loved her, that I couldn’t explain why or how. The cockiness left me—I felt like I was falling. Maybe that’s why I didn’t say everything I had planned; I didn’t know how. It was all I could do to lay it all out there. But I did it. I could see her eyes well up as she clutched my hand.

  Then she pulled me to her and kissed me. It was a moment I had built up beyond fairness. Now that it had arrived, I was the one confused. It wasn’t everything I had expected. Maybe it was my insecurities, or maybe she was holding something back. We walked back from the dunes, still holding hands, but quiet. As we got closer to her house, she pulled her hand away.

  I wanted to light up that spark in her that would make her run to me, but how? We said an awkward but emotional goodbye. I drove into the night, pushing the speed limit, wondering how I would find a way out of this “almost” situation. It was thrilling, yes, but it was also humiliating. Then, a terrifying thought flashed in and out. The humiliation was a little thrilling also. I couldn’t hold that in my head for more than a second—my high school brain couldn’t handle it. Anyhow, I knew I could triumph over those feelings if I could just get her to love me, to want me.

  I felt a sudden urge to get away before all of this came to a head. I had a couple friends who were making a go of it in Fort Lauderdale, why not get the hell out of here? They had already asked me down there. All I had to do was get permission from my folks and find a way down.

  I ran. Or to be more precise, I pooled my meager restaurant wages and got on a plane. I didn’t do it to break Beth’s heart or make her want me more. I did it because I had played every card in my hand. After that day of confessions, seeing her would make me search compulsively for another move I didn’t have. So I went to Florida to make a life, or at least a summer.

  Chapter 2

  We didn’t talk much while I was gone. I didn’t call her. Somehow I willed myself to leave her alone. She called me a couple times, but she seemed nervous, distant, maybe even a little angry. As if I had abandoned her. Summer flew by, and college was coming. I didn’t get laid that summer, but the beach, the bonfire parties—all those irresponsible nights you miss like crazy when you get older—those were more than enough.

  Finally it was time for me to go back home and pick up my stuff. My mother had already moved out of the house, relocating to Los Angeles in pursuit of professional dreams she had put on hold for me. I could only cheer her on after all the double shifts she had worked. The new buyer was ready to move in, waiting for me to clean out my room and drop off the key. It felt hollow to pack my childhood in boxes. This place I called home was over. As I taped up the last couple of boxes, the tears welled.

  The next problem was finding somewhere to stay for the next couple of weeks until college began. I did have a fall back option, though it wasn’t one I particularly wanted. Beth had an extra room at her place. To this day, a part of me wonders why I didn’t try harder to find a buddy’s couch. I guess I just missed her. Or maybe I craved what was about to happen. At any rate it was a fork in the road and boy did I take it. Calling her about a place to stay was a relief for both of us, a reason to talk besides the hard stuff. Beth agreed quickly. She seemed so happy that I was immediately glad about the decision.

  I haven’t mentioned Beth’s sister yet, but she enters into this story prominently. Beth’s sister Jamie was six years older than her. Jamie had such a wild child reputation that even six years out of high school, people still talked about the crazy things she did, or supposedly did. Sex with a teacher (albeit after she graduated and was of legal age) was just one of the stories that trailed her.

  Jamie had a different thing going than Beth. Beth was shorter, smaller breasted. Jamie was taller with full breasts and long blond hair (Beth generally wore hers shorter). Jamie was your classic heartbreaker, the kind of girl I would never think of approaching. She was a few inches taller than me in height and had tons of “I’m out of your league” attitude. But it was worse. Jamie was one of those women I always felt could see right through me. She was so cocky in how she moved through the world. It was like she could see every motivation behind my social façade. To tell the truth I felt naked in front of her. She was terrifying. Much later in life, when I explored the fetish world, I realized that Jamie was what you would call a “natural Domme.” As far as I know, she had never participated in BDSM subculture, but she seemed to understand the weaknesses of men as well as any Domme a submissive man might conjure. She was a Praying Mantis.

  I wasn’t sure what Jamie thought of me back then, but I knew she didn’t look upon me with much fondness. Once when I came to see Beth late at night, I came through the back door and startled Jamie in the kitchen. Her response: “Stalk much?” For the last couple of years, Jamie had been living at home again, helping to run her dad’s telecommunications business. She was living in the garage apartment, but it had a bridge into the main house. Sometimes if I was up late with Beth, Jamie would surprise us by coming in from the bridge stairs and raiding the kitchen. Maybe I was paranoid, but she always seemed to be hiding a mocking smile when she was around me, as if she was cruelly thinking, “You don’t have a chance with Beth.”

  A few days into my stay at Beth’s house, all the dominos fell. I was supposed to be out all night at my buddy Neil’s party. Beth had to work—or so I thought. She was a waitress at Friendly’s, pulling in a few bucks. Plans went awry; Neil’s parents got wind of the party and shut it down early. Af
ter knocking softly as usual, I came in the back door of Beth’s house and went into the kitchen. Jamie was there, spooning out of a pint of ice cream.

  There were also empty beers cans on the counter. Jamie was known to suck a few drinks down. Alcohol tended to make her even less inhibited—if that was possible. Beth had told me a story once that I wasn’t sure I could believe about Jamie and an ex-boyfriend who had cheated on her. She had allegedly sucked down a six pack and then fucked his arch-rival right in front of him at a party. It was one of those legends that followed her around but without sticking to her like it would most girls.

  “Uh-oh,” Jamie said when I came in, looking at me real funny.

  “What?”

  “Well, maybe it’s just as well.” With a knowing smile, she added, “Come with me. I think it will be better to, uh, show you.”

  I had never been all the way down the narrow hallway where Jamie led me, beyond the guest rooms her family maintained. Toward the end was a basement room their doctor father had turned into a private den, his own sterile version of a man cave. Turns out the girls used it as their “make out room,” sneaking boys into the house whenever he was out of town, or even sometimes when their parents were asleep. There was a back staircase to the den that for some reason had never been completed. It led to a landing the family used for storage, where the boxes were piled high.

  Jamie turned off the hall light and quietly opened the door to the landing area, pressing a finger to her lips to shush me. As she opened the door I heard the unmistakable sounds of sex.

  It was dark behind the boxes, but Jamie pulled me over to a section that was opened up a little. The boxes had been stacked in a way to allow someone to peer between them and get a good look at the sprawling, half-finished room below. Jamie pulled me over and pointed my head down toward the opening for a good view.