by Ben Boswell
I’d been to Rachel’s parents’ house many times, had swum in that pool, had soaked up the sun in those lounge chairs. The lounge chairs... is that where they’d done it?
The image in my mind was as clear as day. Young Rachel, eighteen, her body trim and tight, stomach flat, tiny bikini barely covering her perfect ass. And Tony, a wiry little punk, with corded muscles and skin stained with a jumble of dark blue prison tats.
She said he’d grabbed her hair, forced his hand into her bottoms. And then what? Had he forced her to her knees? Jammed his hard cock into her mouth? No, I could picture it. He’d torn off her bikini and pushed her to hands and knees on one of the loungers.
I could imagine her saying “no” in a plaintive, hissing tone, too embarrassed to shout out. I could see her expression, a mixture of shock and fear, and then wide-eyed as he rammed his prick into her tight little pussy. And then the look on his face, turning from sneering intensity to a huge grin as he felt how wet she was for him.
“You love it, you dirty slut,” he’d have hissed.
“No!” She’d insist.
But her body would have given her away. Her pussy getting soaked as he plunged into her again and again, her hips moving in languid, sensuous circles despite her protestations. Had he pulled out and come on her ass? In her mouth? No, in my vision he finished inside her and then forced her to her knees, made her clean up his slimy prick.
I was closer than I realized. I shifted slight in bed, and as my cock pressed into the mattress I came in my pajamas with a groan.
“Are you okay?” Rachel asked.
“Yeah,” I replied quickly
I hoped she wouldn’t roll over and snuggle me. Happily, she seemed content to stay on her side of the bed.
-----
Rachel spent the next couple of days avoiding eye contact. She was obviously embarrassed by her revelation. I probably should have done something to reassure her, to let her know that I didn’t think she was a freak, that I didn’t hold her in contempt.
But to tell the truth, I was just as happy not to have to address it. I wasn’t quite sure how I felt about it. And worse, I didn’t know what to do about it.
I realized right away that I would have to do something. The status quo was impossible. Rachel was too young, too energetic, too talented to remain locked away in our house like a wayward daughter consigned to a convent. She was an active, social person, and that meant that she would meet other men like Tony or Jack.
What would happen then? And even if she did resist the temptation, how would that affect us? Would she resent me? Would she ultimately give in? Could I live with that?
Was there some way to “cure” her? God, did I even want that? I hated the sound of it. Did I want to encourage her to suppress her sexuality, like those religious fanatics peddling treatments for homosexuality? Well, I knew that answer to that. No, that wasn’t the kind of person I was, nor the kind of person I wanted to be.
The more I thought about it, the more I realized that at the very least we needed to talk. I dreaded the very idea of it. Even broaching the topic seemed like running a gauntlet. But it was that or just give up, and I knew I didn’t want to do that.
-----
“Rach, can we talk?”
The kids were in bed. Rachel was in sweats, her hair in a messy bun, carrying a basket of laundry. I’d poured us two glasses of wine.
She nodded toward the pile of dirty clothes. “I really should do this.”
“No, you should do this,” I replied gesturing toward the end of the sofa where I’d placed a goblet of cabernet.
She hesitated, then slumped her shoulders. Looking a little like a condemned prisoner she took her seat.
She took of gulp of wine and looked up at me.
“I shouldn’t have said anything.”
I laughed. “Jeez, Rach. Good to see therapy is working if you feel that way.”
“Wait, you mean that’s not the lesson I should have learned?” She laughed as well. Then she added, “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“And I don’t want to lose you.”
She snorted. “You’d be better off if you did.”
I shook my head. “Am I allowed to make that decision for myself?”
“Max, you deserve –”
I cut her off. “Fuck Rachel, enough. Enough with the self-pity. God, that’s almost worse that what you did with Jack. You want to go, go. But don’t try to make it seem like you’re just sacrificing yourself for me.”
“I didn’t mean...”
I softened. “No, I know you didn’t. But let’s be honest about it. That’s the easy way out. I don’t forgive you; you don’t face any of it. We both nurse our resentments. Over time we turn each other into monsters. She’s a slut. He’s a controlling bastard. I know that’s not what you want.”
She nodded. “No, it isn’t. I don’t want to lose you and even more I don’t want to hate you, or you to hate me. But I wouldn’t blame you...”
I sighed. “Yes, yes, you’re a dirty, cheating whore. Okay, now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, can we talk?”
“I just... I just...”
“You don’t know what to talk about?”
She nodded.
“Well,” I suggested, “let’s begin with Tony and Jack.”
Her shoulders slumped again.
“God Rachel, I swear, I am not looking to score points. I am not looking to build a file against you. I just want to understand.”
She looked at me skeptically.
“Oh, you think you’re the only one with some sordid episodes in the past? I’ve had my one-night stands, my coyote ugly dates.”
“Coyote ugly?”
“You know, when you wake up cuddling a girl so ugly that you’d rather chew off your arm than wake her up and talk to her.”
She scrunched up her nose. “Ewww, that is so rude. Do guys really think like that?”
I laughed. “Oh, so now I’m the sexual deviant? But yes. Tequila is an evil bitch.”
“I’ll say,” she replied.
“Have there been others?” I asked.
She shook her head. “No, Max, I swear, the thing with Jack, it was a one time thing. I’ve never cheated on you.”
“No, I know that.”
It was weird. I didn’t really know it. Except I did. Somehow I did.
“I meant before you met me,” I clarified.
She rolled her eyes. “God, this is so embarrassing.”
“Why? You were single. Sowing your wild oats. It’s sort of hot actually.”
“Oh really, Max? Hot like cheerleaders banging the football team, babysitters screwing dads, hot like that?”
I shook my head. “Huh?”
“It is such a fucking cliché. Nice Jewish girl, her daddy is a doctor, and she’s got a taste for some rough trade.”
“Rough trade? Is that from a 1970s gay bathhouse?”
She raised her eyebrow.
I shrugged. “I read it in a book.”
She snarked, “It is almost as pathetic as a Southern belle craving dark meat.”
“Dark meat?” I laughed.
I’d never heard Rachel talking like this. I didn’t even know she thought in those terms.
“You know what I’m saying,” she continued. “It’s like the plot of a bad porno.”
I shook my head. “No. That would be a good porno. At least it would have some depth, some characterization.”
“Maybe,” she replied.
I noticed that she was less anxious. She had curled her legs beneath her, taken a sip of wine.
“We can discuss what makes a good fuck film later. But for now, will you answer my question?”
She hesitated, and then nodded.
“Yeah, it’s always been my weakness. You know, in college, I knew I should be dating that serious pre-med guy, but I was always attracted to the bad boys.”
“Were there a lot of bad boys at Brandeis?”
She laughed. �
��No. But,” her voice rose into a high, giggly schoolgirl tone, “come on Brenda, let’s check out that bar on Moody, I hear they have a cool band.”
“And?”
“And, well, there weren’t a lot of pre-meds there. Ugh. Band guys, townies... believe me, it was like a mutual understanding. Blue collar guys looking for slutty college girls, slutty college girls looking for...”
“Rough trade?”
She nodded.
“So, that was your college experience? Hit a bar, bang a construction worker?”
“Yeah. Not always. I mean, it’s always been more of a fantasy, but yeah, sometimes.”
“How often?”
She grimaced. “How many men have I been with that I couldn’t, wouldn’t, bring home to mom and dad?”
I nodded.
“Five or six, I guess,” she sighed.
I sighed as well, in relief in my case. I had been expecting, fearing a much bigger number.
She sensed my reaction.
“Really Max, how many men do you think I’ve slept with?”
“I don’t know. You’ve built this up so much that, well, I wouldn’t have been surprised if you said fifty.”
She groaned. “Oh God, Max, really? If that is what you thought, how could you stay with me?”
“I don’t know. I mean, what difference does it make?”
“So, you’d be okay knowing I’ve been plowed by fifty guys?”
“Plowed?”
“I’m just trying to use guy lingo.”
“Your command of guy lingo is a little unsettling... and I hate to say it, weirdly sexy.”
She gave me a strange look. “What is wrong with you?”
I was a little taken aback, but then realized what she was saying.
“Rachel, I’m not upset about your fantasies. I’m upset that you needed to go elsewhere to get them fulfilled. I don’t care what you did before me, either. I don’t think you’re weird or impure or whatever.”
“Even if I do?”
“Do you?”
She sighed. “A little. More than a little. There was always a lot of guilt associated with it. You know, I’d indulge it, and then hate myself.”
“Why?”
“Oh God, Max. Because it was inappropriate. Because I was too easy.”
“Those are different things.”
“Yeah, they are. The men I ended up with –”
“Men?”
She laughed. “You’re catching every detail. Yes. That was my mindset. College boys versus real men. I can’t really explain it. Having sex with older, dangerous men made me feel grown up. With college boys, I... I felt like I was doing them a favor.”
“And with me?”
“You weren’t a boy when we met.”
“But I wasn’t inappropriate either.”
“No. It was something of a point of pride for me that I was having a normal relationship and that it felt good.”
“But I never excited you the way...”
She put her hand on my forearm. “Max, please don’t.”
“Rach, I just want to understand.”
“Maybe there are some things better left unsaid.”
I wanted to press on. I wanted to get inside her head. Really understand. But I realized I’d pushed enough for now. And anyway, I was no closer to a solution. When Rachel finally got it all of her chest, what was I going to say?
CHAPTER EIGHT
I tried to do some research on my own. The Internet didn’t provide any solutions. Type in “rape fantasies” in Google. Or, for Christ’s sake, don’t. We live in a dark, dark, weird world.
I wanted Rachel to be honest with me. But the reality is, I wasn’t sure I could handle the truth if it turned out to be like what I’d seen online.
Even some of the things I read were wildly disturbing. The human mind is a weird thing. We cope with tragedy in strange ways. We eroticize our worst fears. We sometimes feel compelled to relive our most terrible experiences, in a strange way gaining control over them in the process. But it did make me wonder what had happened to Rachel as a girl. What had happened to make her, wearing nothing but a skimpy bikini, go out onto her pool deck occupied by an ex-con?
She had known what would happen. She was too smart not to. She went out there knowing she would be... what... propositioned... seduced... raped? Was that what she desired? Would she have been disappointed if he’d simply made a pass at her, taken no for an answer?
I didn’t know. Couldn’t know. Not until she confided in me fully.
And where had this come from? I shuddered at the worst case. Was her dad, Dr. Bernstein, an abuser? Jesus, was my sweet Rachel just reliving some horrible formative experience?
Still, I realized that we tend to pathologize female sexuality. If a woman just wants to get fucked, she’s a slut. Damaged. A man with the same desires is just a man. I understood that intellectually. And yet, faced now with the fact that the woman I most cared about was attracted to dirty, unemotional sex, I didn’t know how to react.
Women are supposed to want to be cherished. Protected. They’re expected to like deep passionate kisses, slow tender sex. They want a deep emotional connection. Most of all, they want respect.
It is a fucking cliché. Will you respect me in the morning?
But that was not Rachel. At least not always.
I watched the videos, read the stories online. Could women really be the author of those scenarios? Even now, I doubted it. In the catalogue of degradation that I witnessed, it all felt like crude male fantasies, misogyny run amuck.
Still, there was something exciting about it. About the idea of taking a woman. Using her for my pleasure. It felt so wrong. So disrespectful, so uncivil. But also so hot. And if that was what Rachel wanted...
-----
God damn, she looked good. The kids were at her folks, and she had just come back from yoga. Those stretchy pants were just obscene. She still had a sheen on her from the exercise. She’d be showering soon.
I thought of her soaping herself up in the shower, lathering up her breasts, her nipples firming under her touch. I could see her washing her ass, her hands rubbing her trimmed muff. Would she give herself a little tease, let her soapy finger slide along her slit, tweak her clit?
I thought to wait for her outside bathroom door with a bottle of champagne, usher her back into the bedroom. I would dip my fingertips in the bubbly, trace a line along her jaw line and lick it up after. Then another dip, more kissing and licking down her chest, circling her nipples...
But that was nice Max. Gentle Max. Considerate husband and lover Max. And I knew now that wasn’t what she wanted.
Instead, I walked up to her, and firmly ordered, “On your knees, whore, and suck my cock.”
She looked at me in shock. I fought back the immediate urge to apologize.
“What did you say?” she asked.
Was I supposed to slap her? Grab her hair? Push her to her knees.
“I... I said, get on your knees and suck my cock.”
Her shock turned to amusement. She looked away.
“Um... okay,” she said softly.
Was I supposed to reprimand her for not calling me “sir” or something?
She edged down to her knees and looked up me.
Our eyes met. It was supposed to be fiery. Instead it was just absurd. We broke at the same time, laughing like maniacs. It made my sides hurt.
She tried to control herself. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she said as she clawed at my pants. But she couldn’t stop giggling.
I grabbed her hands and sat down beside her.
“Well, that didn’t work,” I said with a chuckle, wiping away tears of laughter.
“You, you just took me by surprise,” she said. “Let’s try again.”
But the notion of repeating my demand seemed even more ludicrous now.
“Um, I don’t think so.”
Instead, I shooed her off to shower. After, we cooked together. I made the s
alad. She seared the shrimp. We opened a bottle of wine. We both wanted to talk about it, but neither of us broached the topic.
Instead, we cuddled up in front of the TV, under a blanket. We watched one of the kids’ movies, Despicable Me 2, which was just cute and harmless enough for where we were emotionally.
Later, we climbed into bed and made love. It wasn’t fiery. It wasn’t hot. It was, however, for the first time since the affair, genuinely comfortable and enjoyable. When Rachel came during our lovemaking, as far as I knew for the first time in weeks, it almost moved me to tears, this time of joy.
God I loved that woman so much, that fucking complicated, half-insane woman. It would have been so much easier if I didn’t. So many people hate their spouses, though they may not realize it. Their every peculiarity becoming oppressive. For them an affair is almost a Godsend, an escape, an excuse for the collapse of intimacy.
My ham-fisted effort to give her what she craved had broken the ice. It had let her know I was willing to struggle. And yet, it had been a laughable disaster. Well, not a disaster. That’s too strong. Maybe a fiasco? It hadn’t scratched her itch. It hadn’t come close.
-----
It was another couple of days before I broached the topic of Rachel’s fantasies and her past again. It was a weeknight, so we were in bed early. She was reading one of those appalling James Patterson books, mass produced in some Bangalore sweatshop. I turned toward her.
“I want to know more about how you were before we met... and before you can say it, yes, it is important to me.”
She suppressed a sigh and sat up, “So what do you want to know?”
“So, when you were with these inappropriate men. Your word, not mine, by the way –”
“Oh, they were definitely inappropriate,” she insisted.
I put that aside for the moment. That seemed like an issue to raise with Michelle.
“Okay, okay, but how did these things come about? Were you always having these fantasies, and then what, at some point it would build up and you’d find yourself in a dive bar?”
“Um, well, actually, sort of. But not quite. I mean I’ve always been, pretty much, a serial monogamist.”
Pretty much. That was a loaded little qualifier. I’d save that for later as well.
