Kate

by Dwight W. Hunter

Chapter13 - Girl Talk

  Letting herself into the condo, Rita found Julie curled up on the couch listening to a CD and reading a romance novel. First looking at her watch and then at Rita, Julie remarked.

  "With the pretty roses he gave you, it's amazingly early for you to be getting home and looking so disgustingly sanitary. Judging by the hour and from the way you look, it must have turned into a cold date. What happened? Did you two have a falling out over where you were going to settle for the night, his place or yours?"

  Laying her purse on a side table and slumping into a nearby armchair, Rita raised her hands in symbolic surrender.

  "It beats the hell out of me. I'm at a total loss as to what happened. He took me to the most expensive place around and conducted himself as a perfect gentleman the whole evening. We danced boob to chest most of the time and I flashed him nylon getting in and out of the car, which he seemed to enjoy, yet he never made a move to follow up on anything I did to lift his libido."

  "With you belly rubbing him while dancing and flashing nylon this dude must be made from Styrofoam for not coming on to you when offered those kinds of incentives. How much did you dance?"

  "It must have been an hour or more." Rita answered.

  "You mean this paragon of virtue did nothing, even when you boobed him. Did you feel him getting it up? Surely he didn't stay limp all evening. That's down right insulting to a girl if he didn't muster up a little bone," Julie exclaimed, sitting up.

  "That's exactly how it happened. So far as I could tell, he didn't so much as twitch. He left me standing at the door with nothing but a fatherly peck on my cheek other than bidding me good night. He just turned, walked to his car, got in and drove away, and that was it. End of story. He did thank me for an enjoyable evening however, but never mentioned if he wanted to see me again.

  I'm beginning to conclude Henry viewed me a dry entertainment rather than hoped for pleasure. He claimed to have enjoyed my company. When I look back on the incentives I offered him, I see myself as being a complete fool. I can tell you without equivocation; my experience with Henry this evening devastated my ego. This is the first date I have accepted, other than dear sweet John so many years ago, when the guy hasn't thought of me as an escapee from a petting zoo.

  I really thought of Henry as being nice and would have gladly split the sheets with him had he stroked and romanced me. I was beginning to get a little horny for him until he left me standing at the door with my mouth hanging open."

  Leaning forward with increased interest, Julie's face mirrored her confusion as she commented.

  "Can you beat that? I can't imagine any man in his right mind passing up the opportunity you offered him. Do you suppose the guy is queer?" But, if he is, why would he expend so much effort and money taking you to such an exclusive joint? Unless he wanted to be seen with an attractive lady as arm candy for some reason or other, we will probably never know about. God! He's a mystery sure enough. Did he tell you anything about himself to give you a clue as to why he may be so strange?"

  "No. Not a word, as a young man he married, but his wife divorced him soon afterwards because his work took him away from home a large portion of the time. He was a geologist with jobs requiring him to travel over most of the known world. He claims to have no close living relatives and didn't mention any on going relationships. No mention was offered to any illness or injury limiting him in any way. On second thought, I can see why a man would have no desire to publicize a lack of prowess on his first date. But on the other hand, it would have been more benevolent to me had he at least hinted to having a limiting condition; if he had I wouldn't have wasted so many boob pushes and so much nylon. Oh well, that's enough of my complaining. From the way you looked and talked this morning, I gather your evening with Sam met with and exceeded any expectations you may have had when you two left the dance."

  "How should I put this?" Julie said settling back on the couch. "It was a night of re-awaking, rejuvenation and pure enjoyment as being the most succinct way I can describe it."

  "Well! Rita nodded. "That's certainly a sanitized version from what I expected after your brief comments spoken while dragging your remains across the living room on the way to your bedroom this morning. I liked it better when you went straight to the meat of evening, that's meat with an 'a'?" concluded Rita, with a mischievous expression.

  "You know, you should have been a lawyer," smiled Julie. "With your way of cutting through the garbage, I doubt if you will rest until I tell you the whole story. Oh! By the way did you hear from Nellie?

  "Yes I did," answered Rita. "She called while you were healing up this morning. I joined her at the bowling alley for a late breakfast while she related her night's adventure with the cowboy, known as Buck. Now back to the rest of your story." Rita said, as she relaxed and scrunched back in her chair.

  "Come to think about it, there isn't really much more of the story to tell. We went to Sam's place, located rather close to the VFW in one of the nicer older complexes. He has a single bedroom apartment which he keeps neat and clean.

  Anyway, he mixed us a drink; we drank a toast to the evening and the next thing I knew we were in bed. He gentle playing with my boobs and rubbing around home base. I don't have to spend a lot of words on how after my long deprivation it didn't take much to get my furnace glowing. Man, I was ready to go in no time. I reached over and took a hold of Sam and gawd it was a dandy I'll tell you for sure. When that man goes to work its pedal to metal all the way.

  That pretty well gives you a picture of our happening. He sort of slacked off for a few hours and was back at it again after daylight. If I had kept score for times I peaked out, it would have been equal to a basketball game score for sure. Sam told me it might be well for us to heal up for a couple of days, but he promised to call me. He complimented me on being a good woman and said finding a good one wasn't easy to come by.

  He asked me to think about making it a regular thing with him. I told him not to be in such a rush about getting serious, even thought I did develop a warm feeling for him. If he continues to be the sweet kind of guy he was last night, I just may give his offer serious consideration," Julie concluded, with an amusing grim.

  Rita nodded and reentered the conversation. "You do have a graphic way of describing your night's experience. Sam comes across in the manner of an old expression of not being able to tell how far a frog can jump by its looks.

  I'll give him credit for asking you to think over his offer of wanting to develop a lasting relationship. Most men have a tendency to take such things for granted. When I met him last night I wouldn't have given high odds on him having the where-with-all to perform in the manner you just described. I suggest you do a little Sam Spade (no pun intended) work to see if he's a one-woman man or running a trap line. If he goes at it with the vigor you described, I can't hardly understand how he could be servicing others at the same time. Maybe he's getting tired of chasing and is ready to settle down to a steady diet. At any rate he must have knocked loose some rust unless you've been holding out on me; it's been a long time since you have mentioned getting any."

  "What exactly do you mean, holding out on you?" Julie asked, with a startled look. "You know damn well how long it's been since the last time I got laid. Speaking of being laid recently, hell, its ancient history since you've had the pleasure. Sometimes I think you run on ice water instead of blood. Then on the other hand, I must confess you surprised me by thawing out and warming up to this Henry feller, for all the good it seems to have done you.

  At least you're showing signs of rejoining humanity. I hope you keep up the good work; a little practice will do you good. And when it comes to loosening up the rust, you can speak for yourself. There have been times when I thought for sure you must be using WD40 to keep your plumbing working, except I never found any empty cans laying around."

  "Such gratitude!" Exploded Rita. "How you do rattle on
about me. God! If you weren't my belly button confessing buddy I'd be taking offense at such caustic remarks such as, 'ice water for blood' and 'using WD40 for intimate purposes'." The only problem is, others have made essentially the same remarks about my blood type, but I have to admit, using WD40 is new and creative. It has never been easy for me to shine up to men. I still think of Daddy bringing that pig, Sophie, home and telling me she was my new mother. Later when I returned to the house, I could hear them screwing in the next room and it almost caused me to puke at thought of them having sex. In a way it may have been a good thing, the disgust I felt about sex probably kept me from messing around when I was younger and getting myself knocked up.

  Having to work around and for men all my life who held to the concept women should leap into bed with them at crook of their pinkie or be kept at the end of a dusty road, barefoot, broke and pregnant didn't encourage me to have a charitable position about sex.

  Now that I don't have to play silly word games with them I can relax and learn to play another type of game, only this time I get to play by my rules. I can see how once I allow my guard to drop and let a few emotions come to the surface there is a danger of being hurt. Seems like I heard something about, 'no pain, no gain'. My, how I do run. Do you suppose it's because I'm getting old or sentimental?" Rita ended, settling back in her chair and looking unfocused at the window.

  "Thanks for still considering me as a friend," Julie replied. "Sometimes you need being brought back down to the level of being a semi-normal human female. In all our days of knowing each other I've never heard you talk so unguarded and open. I take your sharing as a compliment and most of all it makes me feel good to know you're willing to loosen up and take a chance. And yes, I know very well men can hurt you something awful for a while, but with a little time one gets over it. They also bring us a special kind of joy and if you pick 'em right they're a heck of a lot more fun than a vibrator.

  I've pretty much learned to live in the moment and let tomorrow take care of its self. I'm also mindful about the quantity of tomorrows counting down at a faster rate than they did when we first started living together back in good old Westbank. By the way, whatever happened to your father and Sophie?"

  Still looking out the window Rita picked up the story.

  "Daddy kept Sophie around for about six months. It got so all she would do was lay around and let the housework go while complaining about how lazy and useless my brothers were. Daddy finally got his fill of supporting the do-nothing-slob, loaded her up, took her to St. Louis and dumped her along with giving her two hundred dollars. After getting rid of Sophie he hired a neighbor lady to come in once a week to do the laundry and some housework until the boys left. After he was alone he rented a room from the same woman and lived there until he died about a year after my youngest brother was killed.

  I'm afraid Daddy never enjoyed very much happiness in his life. He spent all those years after Mama died without any companionship that I knew about, until he started fooling around with Sophie. When the Korean War came along, both of my brothers were drafted because they were not in college. They were sent to Korea immediately after basic training, neither of them came home. I was in Germany at the time, so I wasn't in any position to be of help to him. I must have been a serious disappointment to him because he thought I should have quit work, got married and given him some grandkids. When it's all added up, trying to get a family going during the depression, Mamma dying, two wars, the loss of both his sons and no second-generation kids to carry on. I believe he couldn't see much future in living and just gave up."

  "With such a history, your family had more than its share of lumps." Julie sympathized and changed the subject to a lighter mood. "What did Nellie have to say? I'll probably get a repeat later, but you can give me the highlights"

  Returning her view to Julie, Rita began,

  "It seems Nellie and the cowboy, Buck, have known each other for some time. During a previous encounter he drank too much, got her in bed, promptly went to sleep and left her with severe doubts about his capabilities. Last night they went to a motel where Buck came through magnificently.

  Buck apparently thought Nellie was pretty well heeled monetarily because during their refractory period he suggested they should join up and cut some spectacular land deals. You know how it goes when certain types of men goes for your bankbook after getting into your pants 'Honey, with your money and my ideas we can make a million' sort of thing. Nellie told him to forget any thoughts he may hold about her having money lying around just waiting for him to use for cutting big deals and to get lost. After telling Buck how she thought about his grandiose ideas she got up and left.

  I proposed we join forces and give Good Ol' Buck a kick where it would hurt the worst? in his bank account to remember us by. It would give us something to do along with helping to settle a few old scores each of us has stuck in our craws."

  Julie chuckled. "It looks like this Buck character was elected by unanimous vote to become the unsuspecting victim of a land con game. I get a feeling you two are about to be out and out mean to this poor old cowpoke character. As an innocent spectator, I can see where it's going to be fun watching this financial castration operation unfold.