Choke on Your Lies

by Anthony Neil Smith

  Stephanie.

  “Hi, Mick, um. Yeah, I really just wanted to see if you’d recovered from yesterday. You looked…not so good. I hope your date went well. If you feel like it, give me a call and let me know.”

  What? Not sure what to think. Especially if she was the one to tell Frances…

  Anyway, later. First I had to check the basement.

  Yeah, someone had been there. She had left a cabinet drawer open. But nothing was scattered, nothing out of place. It would take a few hours to read through and see what was missing, and even then maybe I would miss it. She was a step ahead of me every time.

  Footsteps. Fast, as if they were coming down the main stairs. Then the front door slammed.

  Up the steps three at a time. A mad dash for the front door, already shouting, “Wait! Goddamn it! Wait!”

  A glimpse of her through the door, sprinting down the sidewalk. I hadn’t even put shoes on yet, but I went running after.

  She’d changed her hair color. And had lost about six inches in height. Okay, so it wasn’t Frances. She looked over her shoulder, not running so well in her half-heeled shoes. I was pretty sure she was trying for the Honda CRV parked on the curb. But when she tried to reach down and take off one of the offending shoes, she tripped and fell into a neighbor’s yard.

  I slowed up and jogged the rest of the way, about twenty feet. She wasn’t in a hurry to go anywhere. I’d seen her before, I realized once I was closer and less crazed. She was breathing hard, looking up at me like I’d just run over her puppy.

  “Alice.”

  “Look what you made me do, Mick.”

  She was the Provost’s secretary. Excuse me—executive assistant. I’d dealt with her plenty of times, setting up appointments, waiting for appointments. She had a long severe face that reminded me of the eagle from the Muppets. Thin, short, and she always sounded as if she’d had too much nicotine and caffeine and just watched a bunch of porn. I swear, you’d sit in the office waiting for a meeting, and she’d say, “So, you and Frances plan on banging boots this weekend?” or “God, I’m so fucking horny I might just use my cigarette break to go hump Professor Grace.”

  And sometimes: “I like those slacks. They must feel nice up against your sack.”

  I didn’t know if she did that just with me or with everybody. I assumed she had to have a feel for you first. Or maybe it was just that she knew, being the Provost’s assistant, she could get away with anything. I never considered it flirting. More like someone who poked beehives for fun.

  I sat on the grass beside her. “Give it to me.”

  “Aren’t you supposed to do that at knife point?”

  “Whatever it is you took, give it to me. Otherwise, we wait for the police.”

  She pouted her lips, gripped her fists in mock fury, then reached into her jeans pocket for a folded piece of paper. She handed it over and I unfolded it.

  A purchase order from our college. It was for services rendered, but to a guy I’d never heard of—Ron Moore? And it was in my name. The signature, though, wasn’t so perfect this time. In fact, I would say it was Frannie’s handwriting.

  “This was here? In my house?”

  “You didn’t know?”

  Behind us, an elderly woman opened the screen door. “Can I help you two with something?”

  I waved behind me, climbed up from the ground. “Sorry. Just resting a moment.” Then to Alice, “Let’s go back to the house, sit down and have some water, and get to the bottom of this.”

  She hmphed me. “You can keep your water. I’ll take Scotch.” Then she lifted her hand. “How about helping a lady up?”

  ELEVEN

  Octavia’s voice over the phone rattled the speaker and made me wince. “No fucking way!”

  “Yeah, this is the one. I guess Fran didn’t think I’d ever go through any of those files again, and if I ever did, I wouldn’t think twice about it.”

  “But this is the guy.”

  “That’s what Alice said. But…I guess it didn’t have anything to do with me at first. Not until Fran was sure she wanted to leave me.”

  And I told Octavia everything Alice had told me. I could barely believe a word, as it seemed like one of Alice’s XXX-rated fantasies.

  *

  She told me: “The provost, Carl, well, he’s kinky. He and his ex-wife both, we’re talking swingers here. I mean, you’ve seen them. They’re, what, about fifty and still gorgeous, right? So after settling in here for a while, they start invited couples over, three or four at a time, and over the course of several weeks, they see where it goes. Subtle, they’re pretty subtle, but you figure it out pretty quickly. Or in your case, your wife did. One of them makes a solo move, depending. It didn’t get that far with you, though. Shame. But if you’re not into it because it’s cheating, the other one comes in to let you know it’s okay.

  “It’s all the rage. Polyamory. Which is pretty much swinging, but more dignified, like spiritual, so they say. It’s all about feelings and acceptance. There’s love without jealousy. That’s why they mostly recruit married couples.

  “And don’t take this the wrong way, Mick, but after meeting you a few times, they just weren’t into your vibe. See, it’s all about a few things—power, like what you can do to help them if they need it, and the vibe, meaning you’ll fit in without blowing the gig somehow. And you, well, they thought you were a bit too sensitive.

  “Not Frances, though. She caught on immediately. Her and the Provost hit it off the very first time. I think she’s very free sexually, and Carl's wife, she wanted Frances for herself. But Frances didn’t care for women unless she was either really drunk or doing it to turn on a man.

  “Me, I could never. I’m all about the cock. But here’s a secret: I fought for you. I wanted you in. It wasn’t fair that Fran was keeping it a secret from you. Besides, I wanted to give you a try. Really. I can’t believe you hadn’t caught on to the hints.

  “So when Carl’s wife left and filed for a split, that’s when Frances and Carl got even closer. It’s been longer than four months. That’s just when the divorce happened. I think Fran’s been a part of this for over a year and a half.

  “Are you feeling okay, Mick? You went pale there.

  “Here’s what happens, though. You get involved, you think everyone’s playing fair. Anyone can be with anyone else. The women do the choosing, more often than not. The surprising thing is that no one gets left out. You’d think, but no. Then there are the splinter sessions, outside of the regular gatherings, people meeting up with lovers at lunch, or in their offices, or before they go home for the day.

  “What they don’t know, at first, is that Carl keeps track. I’ve been sent out to videotape couples who have met at the club once they start sneaking around at home, without their knowledge. Lots of very private stuff, and there I am, taping every second. I think that’s why he hired me—he knew I was very erotic, you know? Very free with myself, like Fran, and also very much a voyeur. The interview was barely about my office skills at all. It was more about how much sexual innuendo he could pour on me, and how much I could give it right back to him.

  “So I make movies, and Carl stockpiles them, and at some point he brings them into the office and tells our lovers what he’s done. He breaks it to them softly. And after that, he tells them they need to be more careful, and maybe only stray in the privacy of the group sessions. After he’s got the hard evidence, he usually backs away from any physical contact with them anymore, always preferring to try new, tastier fruit. And believe me, he had never been filmed with anyone. Not until Fran.

  “She got to him somehow. She turned on some pheromones or must’ve had a pussy that gripped him tight, because he couldn’t stop seeing her. Alone, at group meetings. He began to be overprotective, allowing fewer men to spend time with her.

  “Then, well, she messed up. I can tell that you already know, am I right? She slept with a student. We didn’t invite students, god no. Lawsuits, lawsuits. That was
personal, getting back at you for that exotic girl. Nuha, right? Yeah, we all saw it. Carl was going to fire her. Plus now we have video of her fucking one of our English majors. Wait, you even know which one, don’t you?

  “I’m so sorry. I really am. You know, if you’d like to get back at her by…okay, okay.

  “Listen: she’s brilliant. Smarter than I would have ever thought. I mean, you’ll defend her, I bet, to save face. Not like you married a stupid woman, after all. But she had taped herself with Carl. She had taped him at his home during a session, double-teaming Professor Brawley from Economics. And if Carl wanted to fire her over fucking David, then she would just have to show the world what sort of stuff he’d been doing. Hypocritical, to say the least. And also, if his blackmail cover-up were ever to come to light…my dear Mick, I think you might’ve won your house.

  “Me? No, forget it. You don’t want to know what he’s got me doing on tape, so I would never turn on him. He’d have to be dead, and I’d have to see the entire collection go up in flames before I would speak out against him. All this I’m telling you, I would never repeat.

  “Yeah, you’re on your own, hon.”

  “So she managed to find a way to blackmail Carl. I mean, he’d been so careful before, and it hurt him because I think he really fell in love with her. He trusted her. Can you believe that? His lover cheats on her husband without his knowledge for over a year, and he trusted her. I know, I know.

  “Maybe you should get a glass of water.”

  *

  I did. I got a glass of water. Halfway down, I threw it all back up into the sink. Alice, bless her, was sweet as could be, patting me on the back, asking if I needed anything. She said she would stay all night if I needed her to.

  Yes, I was tempted. I’d always been curious about Alice, if she was all talk or actually had some moves to match, and now to know what Frances was really up to, the last year and a half. Wow. I was angry. I wanted to do something, anything, to get back at her. But not this. Not becoming another notch on Alice’s belt. I realized the irony—me, the horndog professor, turning down sex from a couple of women now. For me it was about the pursuit. The challenge. I was a poet, damn it! It couldn’t be just sex for the sake of sex. No, I wanted sex with women who enthralled me. I wanted it to be a hard climb to the top of Mount Ecstasy. I wanted her to shiver at the touch of my hand. No drunken one-nighters, no “polyamory”, no sad, lonely people doing it in order to feel anything other than the sadness and loneliness.

  I told her, “Thanks, but no. I’ll be fine. Thank you.”

  We stood at the kitchen sink together, me trying hard not to erupt again. Deep breaths, through the nose.

  She stepped closer, touching me, and stood on her tiptoes. She kissed my cheek. “You’re playing hard to get. I would love to conquer you.”

  Well…turnaround is fair play. Still, I wasn’t on the menu.

  Plus, she’d distracted me now. Almost made me forget about the receipt.

  “Carl sent you here to get that paper, right?”

  Alice rolled her eyes and smirked. “No, it was Frances. Someone told her something about you being gone last night. But I got the wrong paper. She sent me back today once we knew you had found another place to sleep.” A sigh. “Listen, it’s okay if you’ve already found someone else. All I’m asking for is a couple of hours. We could do it in the shower. Frances says you guys have the best shower—”

  A nice bit of mental porn for me to think about—sudsy, all the steam, so so wet. Alice smelled like sweat and scotch right then, so a good rinsing would be appropriate. But hey, how much of our sex life did Frances blab about? Made me feel shy.

  “Sorry, but I’m not so sure I wouldn’t end up the star of one of your home movies. I’ll pass.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  “Frances sent you here to get the receipt and that‘s all.”

  She looked at me for a long moment. “You already know.”

  “Try me.”

  She batted her lashes. “In case I got caught, I was going to seduce you, of course.”

  I grinned. “Some advice—maybe start poking around for a new job? Perhaps in the film business?”

  Alice finished her liquor in one pull, rubbed the back of her hand across her mouth, and slinked out the door empty-handed.

  *

  On the phone, Octavia said, “Bring the receipt over, and we’ll let Pamela take it from here. And while you’re at it, tie that cunt secretary to the back of your car by her hair and bring her along.”

  “Hey, she was helping here. No need for that.”

  “If she really wanted to help, she would testify for you.”

  “But the position she’s in—”

  “Which one? Seems like she’s in a lot of them quite often.”

  “Jesus. Look, I just want to keep my house. I’m not after worldwide vengeance.”

  “Would you settle for campuswide?”

  I told her I would be there in an hour and hung up the phone. After that, I wandered around, trying to outsmart Frannie by guessing what she might come after next so I could take it with me. But I had a brainfart and kept re-remembering things Frances had told me during the year and half she’d been cheating. All the “I love yous”, “You’re my one and onlys”, “My sweetnesses”. The spontaneous sex at three in the morning, sudden and passionate, but she never had anything left for our waking hours—dinners ended early by headaches, too much grading to catch up on, preparing syllabi, trips to the gym. “We can’t schedule sex, Mick. It’s just not romantic.” Meanwhile, she was scheduling sex all the time. Living for it.

  So I stopped trying to be smart and just changed the alarm code to something she would never guess—the hour and minute Alice told me how in the dark I really was.

  TWELVE

  Pamela held the receipt off to the side and leaned back in the chair before saying, “Seriously?”

  Octavia nodded. We were in the “theater”, which was really just where she kept the sixty-inch flat screen, Bose sound system, and latest Blu-Ray technology. On the screen at the moment was a frozen image of a severed head from Andy Warhol’s Frankenstein. I don’t know how she could watch stuff like this. Gave me the creeps, but before she’d installed this state-of-the-art screening room in her basement, I had silently sat through hordes of horrific films with her in the past just to be a friend, usually at midnight showings full of freaks. She doesn’t go anymore—hard to fit in the seats—but waits for everything on DVD. She watches these sorts of movies to relax.

  The office would’ve been preferable, but I believe Octavia wanted us here at this specific point in the movie in order to drive a message home: Severed head = “Punish the Bitch”.

  “So,” Pamela continued. “I should find this Ron Moore guy and see if he has any connection or knowledge to a robot pen, and then subpoena his records.”

  “It would really help me out,” I said.

  That made her laugh, more like a rumble. It was deep and throaty. You could sense the German in her. A well-built woman who could take me in any fight, anytime, with one hand behind her back. She wore a light-gray power suit, crossed her legs, and below the hem of her trouser was revealed a perfectly chiseled ankle and size ten foot wearing a magnificent Jimmy Choo high-heeled leather sandal. I only knew that because Octavia had asked about them when she first sat down. They weren’t Octavia’s style, I knew, but once she heard the designer, the price clicked in her head, thus another piece of info to file away about one of her closest advisors. It occurred to me that here was a woman who, no matter how ballsy and comfortable she appeared, felt she couldn’t come over in anything less than a very powerful power suit and seven hundred dollar heels.

  “Something I said?”

  Pamela waved the receipt. “You ready to proceed criminally, too? Because it’s not just you versus your wife anymore. This man committed a crime. Why in the hell would he want to own up to it?”

  “If the proof is in his records, he�
��s done anyway. I don’t know, can’t we threaten to turn him in unless he anonymously helps out?”

  She dipped her chin. “What’s a judge going to say to that? Really, think ahead, dear.”

  I smoothed my hair across my scalp, one two three times, trying not to raise my voice. “I just want to keep my house.”

  “I don’t know if you can without putting a whole bunch of people in jail or on the front page.”

  I never knew if her folksiness was a put-on. You could certainly hear the dirt in her voice, from having been raised on a farm in South Dakota, and it carried a powerful punch.

  And through all this, Octavia didn’t say a word. Didn’t even look at us.

  “Pam, I’m not a lawyer—”

  “Got that right.”

  “—but, listen, please, tell me there is some way to convince Frances to stop this without it becoming a thing.”

  She scrunched the paper in her fist. “This already is a thing!”

  Octavia finally spoke up. “Okay, then, fuck it.”

  We both turned to her.

  “Fuck it. Let’s tell her lawyer we’re concerned about the legitimacy of the paperwork, especially the signature on the quit deed.”

  Pamela huffed. “That’ll give them time to construct a narrative—”

  “Then we go to court and tell a judge! Someone, anyone, who will blink when we stare some fucking truth at them.”

  She was pretty loud. Pamela mushed her lips around and waited for more. I smoothed my hair back again, palms getting greasier. I wiped them on my pants.

  “Are you telling me,” Octavia said, under control, “that even with evidence, it’s unlikely Mick would win right now?”

  “No, what I’m saying is that in order to do it, he needs to be prepared…sorry, Mick. You need to be prepared for a long legal battle. We’re talking fraud, theft, and as for this orgy stuff…” She whistled. “If the secretary won’t talk, then you have to find someone who will.”