Idyll by Bill Tope
In which Steven finds himself at the corner of a love quadrangle, with dire consequences.
Steven stood alone in the hotel suite, listening as the key in the lock turned over and the door cracked open. He could hear the laughing voices from the other side. He drew a deep, expectant breath as the portal opened wide. The hairs on his arms and the back of his neck rose as the gun came into view and leveled. There was a shockingly loud report and then the air was filled with the acrid stench of sulfur and charcoal from the burning gunpowder. A body fell heavily to the floor.
Sam was in one of her moods again. Determined to right some perceived wrong or provide for some unlikely urgency, she sat determinedly at the kitchen table, surrounded by life insurance brochures, premium charts and the like. Approaching the table with his cup of coffee, Steven frowned and took a seat.
"We have to purchase some life insurance, Steven," asserted his wife.
"But, we're young," he pointed out. "We're in our 30s, for Christ's sake. And we're both healthy as horses."
"That's when you buy life insurance," she said. "If you wait until your 50s, then the premiums are outrageous, if insurance is even available after you're sick and take all kinds of meds. You buy into a plan and they can't kick you off," she went on. "My parents didn't get life insurance until they were sixty and they wound up paying big time, for just a pittance."
"How much money are we talking about?" inquired Steven.
"For you, at 31, it's $34 a month, for $500,000; and for me, at 33, it's just $24 a month for the same payout."
Steven soundlessly whistled. "That's a lot of bread for such a small premium," he admitted. "What do we need to do?"
Sam explained to him about the detailed medical questionnaire, the examination by the doctor, and all the rest.
"Alright," he agreed. "I'm in." Then he gave it not another thought.
As they had done for the past three of their seven years of marriage, the Robinsons took separate vacations. This year Sam went to the mountains and Steven, as usual, traveled to the shore. They never discussed their adventures, preferring to maintain their privacy. It had originally been his suggestion: a chance to unwind, get a change of scenery, a break. What went on during Sam's excursions, Steven had no clue. Personally, he hooked up with the same woman - a colleague from the law office where they worked - and had a hell of a time. Steven assumed that his wife behaved in like fashion. But he wasn't certain; since the tragedy of her pregnancy, she appeared to be broken.
For the two of them, their presumed mischief was an open secret.
Two days before Steven left on his sojourn to the sea, Sam told him that, "Someone asking for 'Stevie' is on the line."
Steven did a double take. Accepting the wireless extension, he said, cautiously, "Hello?"
It was Michelle. "You packed?" she chirped brightly. Steven sneaked a peak at Sam, who smiled wryly and shook her head before withdrawing to the other room.
"Why are you calling me on my home phone?" he asked furtively.
Michelle's laughter sounded like ice in a glass tumbler. "Stevie, your old lady knows all about us; has for years," she added confidently.
"Well, still," he said, "I don't like to rub it in her face in it, is all."
"You don't suppose that she goes all the way up Mt. Shasta to sit in a cabin by herself for a week, do you?" Michelle came back at him. Steven's face turned red. "And I know you're blushing now, Stevie," she said, with that damnable laugh again. "You wanna know what I think?"
"What?"
"I think Sam and Michael are hooking up on Shasta next week," she said.
Steven started. "Why do you think so?" he asked.
"Last year, same time, he went to Shasta. So did Sam. Coincidence? I doubt it, Stevie. Hey!" she joked, "maybe the four of us could get a three-bedroom apartment. Two of us would have our own room of a given night, and the other two could share a bed." She laughed again.
Steven shook his head. "That's too complex. I'm not sure I could handle an arrangement like that," he said, taking her seriously.
"Why, Stevie?" she asked playfully. "Would you be possessive?"
"I think so," he admitted.
"Of Sam, or of me?" she queried further.
He sighed. "Both, maybe."
Steven stood nude in the beach house, looking greedily at the bed, where Michelle was lying face down, her ample posterior inviting him to sample her delights. She stirred not an inch. He felt and then watched himself grow hard. With a primitive grunt, he advanced, climbed onto the king-sized bed and quickly slipped inside his lover. She moaned.
"Ooh, Stevie," she said passionately, that's just the way that Michael does it." At that, he pumped harder, wanting to hurt her just a little. She liked it rough. At length, their passion spent, he climbed off her and smacked her hard on the ass. "Michael spanks me, too," she purred. But, he thought, what was her point? Was she trying to get a rise out of him? It was working, he thought, growing hard again and turning her over on her back and mounting her again.
At the company's New Year's Eve party, Steven reluctantly found himself in the presence of Michael Durant, Michelle's husband of nine years. He ran into him every year, on the same occasion, but only briefly, and always felt he had nothing to say to him. Michael was a hair stylist, of all things, whereas Michelle and Steven were attorneys. While Steven nursed a Grolsch, Michael stood there, rapidly putting away Scotch whiskey.
"Hey, Michael," said Steven.
"Robinson," growled Michael. Now Steven remembered why he found conversing with the other man tiresome; he always called people by their last name. A sign of disrespect, thought Steven.
"Hey, Robinson, you seen my wife?" asked Michael.
Have I? thought Steven with a smirk. What he said was, "Not tonight."
He glanced at his watch: 11:30.
"Later, Robinson," muttered Michael. "I gotta take a piss," and he wandered off.
Was this mongrel really doing Sam? Steven wondered. With a shake of his head, he decided that he really didn't care. That ship had already sailed. He went in search of his wife. The venue for the party, a huge, upscale restaurant in the heart of the city, must have held 300 guests, all in various states of inebriation.
At length, he found Sam, in the company of a stunning brunette. Sam had her hand on the other woman's arm and seemed very comfy, thought Steven with a pang of jealousy. Across the room, he spied Michelle, talking to the CEO of the firm and gaily chatting her up. Steven glanced again at his wrist: 11:55.
"Get ready, everybody," urged a boozy voice over a microphone. It was Steven and Michelle's boss, Cartwright. "Grab the one dearest to you," he went on. "New year in jush' three minutes." Everyone began to pair off. Suddenly, Michelle was at his side; Michael was nowhere to be found. On a huge television screen, a shiny ball dropped in Times Square and balloons and confetti fell and an orchestra came up and pigeons were released. Steven searched again for his wife, but Michelle was in front of him, her lips already fastened on his. She gave him a little tongue and he gasped.
"Happy 1979!" a voice shouted.
"What's the matter, Stevie, never been kissed before?" she quipped. She grabbed his ass and squeezed, then disappeared back into the crowd. Steven drifted in the direction of Sam and found her in the company of Michelle's husband. Michael's hands were not on Sam, but on yet another snifter of liquor, which he was decanting down his gullet. Is drinking all he ever does? Steven wondered.
One Saturday, Steven observed the light on the telephone flickering, indicating voice mail. He pressed the recall button, but got nothing but a muffled voice he couldn't identify. He checked the caller ID and saw that it was the Durants' number. That sonofabitch, thought Steven, he was calling Sam at home. He knew it wasn't Michelle; after the last time she'd called, he'd had a stern talk with her.
Steven watched a FedEx truck motor down his street and stop in front of his house. The driver exited and inquired if Samantha Robinson was at home. Steven told him no, but he signed for the package, a slender bundle the size of a small shoebox. Placing the package on her dresser, he stared at it and stewed. Finally, he couldn't take it anymore, and tore open the bundle. What was inside stunned him: it was a battery-powered vibrator, flesh tone and large. A typed note appended to the device said: "Till we meet again." It was unsigned.
"Stevie," murmured Michelle thoughtfully over lunch one day in the employees' breakroom, "I think that Micky is having an affair."
"You already suggested that Michael and Sam were doing it," he reminded her.
She laughed without mirth. "I wasn't serious," she told him. "Samantha would never cheat on you," she scolded lightly.
That, thought Steven, was frankly a load off his mind. Despite his own freebooting lifestyle, he still felt proprietary about Sam. "But you think Michael is playing around," he said. "How do you feel about that?"
"I'm pissed," she said wrathfully, her face dark. "I mean," she went on, "we do it almost every night, and I do whatever he wants. Whatever floats his boat," she said resentfully.
Steven tried to ignore the irony in discussing with his lover the sexual perfidy of her husband. "Do you know who he's seeing?" he inquired.
Michelle shook her head no. "I asked him who it was," she said.
"How did that go?" he asked.
"Michael said he knows I'm getting it on with someone and it's only fair that he reciprocate."
Steven couldn't, on the face of it, argue with Michael's logic. "Michelle," he asked, "have you been calling the house again?" He recalled the muffled messages left on his phone.
She shook her head no. "No, not after you ate me out the last time I called, before we took our trip."
"Hey," whispered Steven, "keep your voice down." He looked furtively about the breakroom, but nobody was paying them any mind.
"But," she pointed out, "I like it when you eat me out," and she tittered softly. Steven rolled his eyes, but said nothing.
"What's your next step?" he finally asked.
"Maybe Micky and I should stop the separate vacations," she suggested wistfully. Michelle and Steven each got three weeks vacation per year from the firm, two of which they spent together; the third they spent at home with their respective spouses.
Steven started. "Stop the vacations? You can't!"
"Oh, I know that wouldn't be fair to you, Stevie, but Micky is my husband," she reminded him.
Steven said nothing. His mind was jumping. He reveled in the twice-yearly getaways. Sam and he hardly touched one another anymore, and the regular trips with Michelle were bacchanalias he wasn't prepared to forfeit. So he decided to lay it on thick.
"But, the getaways mean so much to me, Michelle," he said with a straight face.
"You having problems with the little woman, Stevie?" she inquired, paying scant attention to her plastic bowl of salad.
"I'm... disengaging from Sam," he told her. "There's no spark anymore, certainly no love."
Michelle grew still. "Are you saying that you... love me, Stevie?" she asked in a small, wondering voice.
"I do love you, baby," whispered Steven confidentially.
Michelle's eyes grew wide and her pupils dilated. She stumbled to her feet. "I... I've got to go. See you at the planning meeting, Stevie." And she was gone.
When his paramour was out of earshot, Steven chuckled. "Steven," he murmured to himself, "you are such a freaking liar!"
A week later, at his home, Steven's telephone jangled off the hook. He checked the caller ID: Durant! It was either Michelle or that bottom feeder Michael. But then, Steven considered, Durant was a common name. Impulsively, he snatched the receiver off the hook. He listened.
"Hello?" came a raspy voice. Michael! "Hello?" he said again.
"Yes?" replied Steven coldly.
"Robinson? Why didn't you answer like a normal person?" asked Michael querulously.
"What can I do for you, Michael?" asked Steven grudgingly.
"That's better," rumbled Michael. "Is Michelle over there?" he asked.
"Michelle?" he repeated. "No, why should she be?" he came back.
"Because," explained Michael. "Michelle said she had a brief or a report or some shit she had to get to you this evening. I need to get hold of her."
Steven ran all this through his mind before deciding it sounded reasonable enough. "No. Sorry, she hasn't been by. If she stops by I'll tell her you want to get hold of her."
"You do that, Robinson," said a grumpy Michael, and the phone went dead.
Next day, at lunch in the breakroom again, Steven told Michelle about Michael's call.
"Shit!" hissed Michelle. "That sonofabitch is getting as possessive as a pit bull. He won't let me out of his sight, unless I explain where I'm going, who I'll see, and when I'll get back."
"Where did you have to go that was so important?" asked Steven.
"Not you too!" she exclaimed, but then her expression changed. "I got you a present for your birthday, Stevie," and she extracted from her tote a professionally wrapped package.
"What is it?" he asked, taken aback and sore at himself for being even a little jealous. He carefully opened the package, slipping a finger under the paper and taking out the gift. It took his breath away. It was an exquisite Hermes necktie. It probably cost a couple of hundred dollars.
Michelle and Steven, as had come to be the rule rather than the exception, were assigned to the same case, a hit and run accident which entailed almost endless depositions and motions before the court. One night, as ten o'clock came and went, Michelle stepped in front of Steven's chair and reached languidly over the desk for her diet soda, rubbing against Steven's front. Instantly aroused, he pressed her face down onto the desk and ran his hands under her tight dress. Pulling the hem up to her waist, he pulled down her panties and entered her in a single abrupt motion. Michelle gasped, taken completely by surprise. They both looked up as a tat-tat-tat came through the closed door. They'd forgotten to lock it. A shadow fell across the glass framed in the door.
"Who... who is it?" demanded Steven, on the verge of coming.
"Janitorial," came back the reply.
"Later, please," called Steven, and the shadow fell away from the glass panel.
Michelle sighed.
Steven came, mightily, then he too sighed.
"Steven," murmured Sam in a sultry voice that he was unaccustomed to hearing.
Glancing up from the sofa, where he perused the inevitable legal brief, he said, "Umm?" He did a double-take.
Sam was dressed in a scanty yet fashionable red bikini. Once again, Steven remarked to himself what a stunning body his wife had. He gaped.
"What... what's going on?" he stammered.
"I got this swimsuit for my trip to Fiji this fall," she replied. "I thought I'd... see if it works." She smiled demurely. She turned toward her bedroom and without a word, he fell into step behind her.
After they'd made arduous love for what seemed like hours, Sam said with satisfaction, "Steven, you've still got it." Steven smiled. "I thought, after so much self-imposed abstinence, that maybe we weren't sexually compatible any longer, you know?" she ventured.
They'd made love only a handful of times since the late-term miscarriage, nearly three years before. Steven didn't know what accommodations his wife had made, but he had adapted well to the lack of marital loving. He had always held it a little against Sam, but now he began to have misgivings about the whole arrangement, as it had subsequently played out.
"I... love you, Samantha," he murmured into her hair, holding her closer than he had in a very long time. To Steven, at this moment, this was not a line.
"You'll always be special to me too, Steven," she acknowledged. "I've been a bitch to live with," she said. "You've always had a very strong sex drive, and I just cut you off after the baby..."
"Ssh," he said, and held her even closer.
She continued, "I thought that, after I... we... lost the baby, that I never wanted to have a man's hands on me again. But, time heals all wounds, I guess. Things are going to be different now," she told him. He pulled back and looked into her green eyes. "I promise," she said from the heart.
"I didn't believe Sam at first, Steven," said Michelle, standing over him and edging aside with her foot the gun that had fired a bullet into his belly only minutes before. It was a throwaway that the professional hitman had disposed of. "She told me that you would never love anyone like you loved yourself. She said that after the baby died, something inside of you died too. Sam said that you were just using me and that she could get you back in one night. I guess," she concluded sadly, "that Sam was right."
Steven lay bleeding on the carpet; in the background, the television was on but muted, with myriad colors flickering wildly on the screen.
Sam edged into view. "Michelle was right: you do look good in silk. I thought the Hermes was a classy touch; you might not think so, though. You see, Mr. X - that's how we know him - was supposed to recognize you by the necktie.
"I told you the truth last night, Steven," she said. "That I couldn't bear the thought of a man's hands on me again. Too many bad memories, too many nightmares. Michelle," she went on, stating the obvious, "isn't a man." Steven tried to form words, but found it too painful. "You always have good taste in women, Steven," she added winsomely, "even when you didn't appreciate them."
"Michael," he whispered breathlessly.
Michelle said, "We considered getting him a Hermes tie too, but Micky will be happy to be cut free so that he can enjoy his man friends unencumbered. Yes, he's a fruit. Or, as they say now, gay. He hasn't touched me in years, if that matters to you now, Stevie. He did say you had a nice ass, though," she added.
"But..." he managed to get out.
"Yes, dear?" asked Sam blithely, leaning closer.
"What... was last night?"
"Last night," she said simply, "was goodbye."
Image generated with OpenAI |
Sam was in one of her moods again. Determined to right some perceived wrong or provide for some unlikely urgency, she sat determinedly at the kitchen table, surrounded by life insurance brochures, premium charts and the like. Approaching the table with his cup of coffee, Steven frowned and took a seat.
"We have to purchase some life insurance, Steven," asserted his wife.
"But, we're young," he pointed out. "We're in our 30s, for Christ's sake. And we're both healthy as horses."
"That's when you buy life insurance," she said. "If you wait until your 50s, then the premiums are outrageous, if insurance is even available after you're sick and take all kinds of meds. You buy into a plan and they can't kick you off," she went on. "My parents didn't get life insurance until they were sixty and they wound up paying big time, for just a pittance."
"How much money are we talking about?" inquired Steven.
"For you, at 31, it's $34 a month, for $500,000; and for me, at 33, it's just $24 a month for the same payout."
Steven soundlessly whistled. "That's a lot of bread for such a small premium," he admitted. "What do we need to do?"
Sam explained to him about the detailed medical questionnaire, the examination by the doctor, and all the rest.
"Alright," he agreed. "I'm in." Then he gave it not another thought.
As they had done for the past three of their seven years of marriage, the Robinsons took separate vacations. This year Sam went to the mountains and Steven, as usual, traveled to the shore. They never discussed their adventures, preferring to maintain their privacy. It had originally been his suggestion: a chance to unwind, get a change of scenery, a break. What went on during Sam's excursions, Steven had no clue. Personally, he hooked up with the same woman - a colleague from the law office where they worked - and had a hell of a time. Steven assumed that his wife behaved in like fashion. But he wasn't certain; since the tragedy of her pregnancy, she appeared to be broken.
For the two of them, their presumed mischief was an open secret.
Two days before Steven left on his sojourn to the sea, Sam told him that, "Someone asking for 'Stevie' is on the line."
Steven did a double take. Accepting the wireless extension, he said, cautiously, "Hello?"
It was Michelle. "You packed?" she chirped brightly. Steven sneaked a peak at Sam, who smiled wryly and shook her head before withdrawing to the other room.
"Why are you calling me on my home phone?" he asked furtively.
Michelle's laughter sounded like ice in a glass tumbler. "Stevie, your old lady knows all about us; has for years," she added confidently.
"Well, still," he said, "I don't like to rub it in her face in it, is all."
"You don't suppose that she goes all the way up Mt. Shasta to sit in a cabin by herself for a week, do you?" Michelle came back at him. Steven's face turned red. "And I know you're blushing now, Stevie," she said, with that damnable laugh again. "You wanna know what I think?"
"What?"
"I think Sam and Michael are hooking up on Shasta next week," she said.
Steven started. "Why do you think so?" he asked.
"Last year, same time, he went to Shasta. So did Sam. Coincidence? I doubt it, Stevie. Hey!" she joked, "maybe the four of us could get a three-bedroom apartment. Two of us would have our own room of a given night, and the other two could share a bed." She laughed again.
Steven shook his head. "That's too complex. I'm not sure I could handle an arrangement like that," he said, taking her seriously.
"Why, Stevie?" she asked playfully. "Would you be possessive?"
"I think so," he admitted.
"Of Sam, or of me?" she queried further.
He sighed. "Both, maybe."
Steven stood nude in the beach house, looking greedily at the bed, where Michelle was lying face down, her ample posterior inviting him to sample her delights. She stirred not an inch. He felt and then watched himself grow hard. With a primitive grunt, he advanced, climbed onto the king-sized bed and quickly slipped inside his lover. She moaned.
"Ooh, Stevie," she said passionately, that's just the way that Michael does it." At that, he pumped harder, wanting to hurt her just a little. She liked it rough. At length, their passion spent, he climbed off her and smacked her hard on the ass. "Michael spanks me, too," she purred. But, he thought, what was her point? Was she trying to get a rise out of him? It was working, he thought, growing hard again and turning her over on her back and mounting her again.
At the company's New Year's Eve party, Steven reluctantly found himself in the presence of Michael Durant, Michelle's husband of nine years. He ran into him every year, on the same occasion, but only briefly, and always felt he had nothing to say to him. Michael was a hair stylist, of all things, whereas Michelle and Steven were attorneys. While Steven nursed a Grolsch, Michael stood there, rapidly putting away Scotch whiskey.
"Hey, Michael," said Steven.
"Robinson," growled Michael. Now Steven remembered why he found conversing with the other man tiresome; he always called people by their last name. A sign of disrespect, thought Steven.
"Hey, Robinson, you seen my wife?" asked Michael.
Have I? thought Steven with a smirk. What he said was, "Not tonight."
He glanced at his watch: 11:30.
"Later, Robinson," muttered Michael. "I gotta take a piss," and he wandered off.
Was this mongrel really doing Sam? Steven wondered. With a shake of his head, he decided that he really didn't care. That ship had already sailed. He went in search of his wife. The venue for the party, a huge, upscale restaurant in the heart of the city, must have held 300 guests, all in various states of inebriation.
At length, he found Sam, in the company of a stunning brunette. Sam had her hand on the other woman's arm and seemed very comfy, thought Steven with a pang of jealousy. Across the room, he spied Michelle, talking to the CEO of the firm and gaily chatting her up. Steven glanced again at his wrist: 11:55.
"Get ready, everybody," urged a boozy voice over a microphone. It was Steven and Michelle's boss, Cartwright. "Grab the one dearest to you," he went on. "New year in jush' three minutes." Everyone began to pair off. Suddenly, Michelle was at his side; Michael was nowhere to be found. On a huge television screen, a shiny ball dropped in Times Square and balloons and confetti fell and an orchestra came up and pigeons were released. Steven searched again for his wife, but Michelle was in front of him, her lips already fastened on his. She gave him a little tongue and he gasped.
"Happy 1979!" a voice shouted.
"What's the matter, Stevie, never been kissed before?" she quipped. She grabbed his ass and squeezed, then disappeared back into the crowd. Steven drifted in the direction of Sam and found her in the company of Michelle's husband. Michael's hands were not on Sam, but on yet another snifter of liquor, which he was decanting down his gullet. Is drinking all he ever does? Steven wondered.
One Saturday, Steven observed the light on the telephone flickering, indicating voice mail. He pressed the recall button, but got nothing but a muffled voice he couldn't identify. He checked the caller ID and saw that it was the Durants' number. That sonofabitch, thought Steven, he was calling Sam at home. He knew it wasn't Michelle; after the last time she'd called, he'd had a stern talk with her.
Steven watched a FedEx truck motor down his street and stop in front of his house. The driver exited and inquired if Samantha Robinson was at home. Steven told him no, but he signed for the package, a slender bundle the size of a small shoebox. Placing the package on her dresser, he stared at it and stewed. Finally, he couldn't take it anymore, and tore open the bundle. What was inside stunned him: it was a battery-powered vibrator, flesh tone and large. A typed note appended to the device said: "Till we meet again." It was unsigned.
"Stevie," murmured Michelle thoughtfully over lunch one day in the employees' breakroom, "I think that Micky is having an affair."
"You already suggested that Michael and Sam were doing it," he reminded her.
She laughed without mirth. "I wasn't serious," she told him. "Samantha would never cheat on you," she scolded lightly.
That, thought Steven, was frankly a load off his mind. Despite his own freebooting lifestyle, he still felt proprietary about Sam. "But you think Michael is playing around," he said. "How do you feel about that?"
"I'm pissed," she said wrathfully, her face dark. "I mean," she went on, "we do it almost every night, and I do whatever he wants. Whatever floats his boat," she said resentfully.
Steven tried to ignore the irony in discussing with his lover the sexual perfidy of her husband. "Do you know who he's seeing?" he inquired.
Michelle shook her head no. "I asked him who it was," she said.
"How did that go?" he asked.
"Michael said he knows I'm getting it on with someone and it's only fair that he reciprocate."
Steven couldn't, on the face of it, argue with Michael's logic. "Michelle," he asked, "have you been calling the house again?" He recalled the muffled messages left on his phone.
She shook her head no. "No, not after you ate me out the last time I called, before we took our trip."
"Hey," whispered Steven, "keep your voice down." He looked furtively about the breakroom, but nobody was paying them any mind.
"But," she pointed out, "I like it when you eat me out," and she tittered softly. Steven rolled his eyes, but said nothing.
"What's your next step?" he finally asked.
"Maybe Micky and I should stop the separate vacations," she suggested wistfully. Michelle and Steven each got three weeks vacation per year from the firm, two of which they spent together; the third they spent at home with their respective spouses.
Steven started. "Stop the vacations? You can't!"
"Oh, I know that wouldn't be fair to you, Stevie, but Micky is my husband," she reminded him.
Steven said nothing. His mind was jumping. He reveled in the twice-yearly getaways. Sam and he hardly touched one another anymore, and the regular trips with Michelle were bacchanalias he wasn't prepared to forfeit. So he decided to lay it on thick.
"But, the getaways mean so much to me, Michelle," he said with a straight face.
"You having problems with the little woman, Stevie?" she inquired, paying scant attention to her plastic bowl of salad.
"I'm... disengaging from Sam," he told her. "There's no spark anymore, certainly no love."
Michelle grew still. "Are you saying that you... love me, Stevie?" she asked in a small, wondering voice.
"I do love you, baby," whispered Steven confidentially.
Michelle's eyes grew wide and her pupils dilated. She stumbled to her feet. "I... I've got to go. See you at the planning meeting, Stevie." And she was gone.
When his paramour was out of earshot, Steven chuckled. "Steven," he murmured to himself, "you are such a freaking liar!"
A week later, at his home, Steven's telephone jangled off the hook. He checked the caller ID: Durant! It was either Michelle or that bottom feeder Michael. But then, Steven considered, Durant was a common name. Impulsively, he snatched the receiver off the hook. He listened.
"Hello?" came a raspy voice. Michael! "Hello?" he said again.
"Yes?" replied Steven coldly.
"Robinson? Why didn't you answer like a normal person?" asked Michael querulously.
"What can I do for you, Michael?" asked Steven grudgingly.
"That's better," rumbled Michael. "Is Michelle over there?" he asked.
"Michelle?" he repeated. "No, why should she be?" he came back.
"Because," explained Michael. "Michelle said she had a brief or a report or some shit she had to get to you this evening. I need to get hold of her."
Steven ran all this through his mind before deciding it sounded reasonable enough. "No. Sorry, she hasn't been by. If she stops by I'll tell her you want to get hold of her."
"You do that, Robinson," said a grumpy Michael, and the phone went dead.
Next day, at lunch in the breakroom again, Steven told Michelle about Michael's call.
"Shit!" hissed Michelle. "That sonofabitch is getting as possessive as a pit bull. He won't let me out of his sight, unless I explain where I'm going, who I'll see, and when I'll get back."
"Where did you have to go that was so important?" asked Steven.
"Not you too!" she exclaimed, but then her expression changed. "I got you a present for your birthday, Stevie," and she extracted from her tote a professionally wrapped package.
"What is it?" he asked, taken aback and sore at himself for being even a little jealous. He carefully opened the package, slipping a finger under the paper and taking out the gift. It took his breath away. It was an exquisite Hermes necktie. It probably cost a couple of hundred dollars.
Michelle and Steven, as had come to be the rule rather than the exception, were assigned to the same case, a hit and run accident which entailed almost endless depositions and motions before the court. One night, as ten o'clock came and went, Michelle stepped in front of Steven's chair and reached languidly over the desk for her diet soda, rubbing against Steven's front. Instantly aroused, he pressed her face down onto the desk and ran his hands under her tight dress. Pulling the hem up to her waist, he pulled down her panties and entered her in a single abrupt motion. Michelle gasped, taken completely by surprise. They both looked up as a tat-tat-tat came through the closed door. They'd forgotten to lock it. A shadow fell across the glass framed in the door.
"Who... who is it?" demanded Steven, on the verge of coming.
"Janitorial," came back the reply.
"Later, please," called Steven, and the shadow fell away from the glass panel.
Michelle sighed.
Steven came, mightily, then he too sighed.
"Steven," murmured Sam in a sultry voice that he was unaccustomed to hearing.
Glancing up from the sofa, where he perused the inevitable legal brief, he said, "Umm?" He did a double-take.
Sam was dressed in a scanty yet fashionable red bikini. Once again, Steven remarked to himself what a stunning body his wife had. He gaped.
"What... what's going on?" he stammered.
"I got this swimsuit for my trip to Fiji this fall," she replied. "I thought I'd... see if it works." She smiled demurely. She turned toward her bedroom and without a word, he fell into step behind her.
After they'd made arduous love for what seemed like hours, Sam said with satisfaction, "Steven, you've still got it." Steven smiled. "I thought, after so much self-imposed abstinence, that maybe we weren't sexually compatible any longer, you know?" she ventured.
They'd made love only a handful of times since the late-term miscarriage, nearly three years before. Steven didn't know what accommodations his wife had made, but he had adapted well to the lack of marital loving. He had always held it a little against Sam, but now he began to have misgivings about the whole arrangement, as it had subsequently played out.
"I... love you, Samantha," he murmured into her hair, holding her closer than he had in a very long time. To Steven, at this moment, this was not a line.
"You'll always be special to me too, Steven," she acknowledged. "I've been a bitch to live with," she said. "You've always had a very strong sex drive, and I just cut you off after the baby..."
"Ssh," he said, and held her even closer.
She continued, "I thought that, after I... we... lost the baby, that I never wanted to have a man's hands on me again. But, time heals all wounds, I guess. Things are going to be different now," she told him. He pulled back and looked into her green eyes. "I promise," she said from the heart.
"I didn't believe Sam at first, Steven," said Michelle, standing over him and edging aside with her foot the gun that had fired a bullet into his belly only minutes before. It was a throwaway that the professional hitman had disposed of. "She told me that you would never love anyone like you loved yourself. She said that after the baby died, something inside of you died too. Sam said that you were just using me and that she could get you back in one night. I guess," she concluded sadly, "that Sam was right."
Steven lay bleeding on the carpet; in the background, the television was on but muted, with myriad colors flickering wildly on the screen.
Sam edged into view. "Michelle was right: you do look good in silk. I thought the Hermes was a classy touch; you might not think so, though. You see, Mr. X - that's how we know him - was supposed to recognize you by the necktie.
"I told you the truth last night, Steven," she said. "That I couldn't bear the thought of a man's hands on me again. Too many bad memories, too many nightmares. Michelle," she went on, stating the obvious, "isn't a man." Steven tried to form words, but found it too painful. "You always have good taste in women, Steven," she added winsomely, "even when you didn't appreciate them."
"Michael," he whispered breathlessly.
Michelle said, "We considered getting him a Hermes tie too, but Micky will be happy to be cut free so that he can enjoy his man friends unencumbered. Yes, he's a fruit. Or, as they say now, gay. He hasn't touched me in years, if that matters to you now, Stevie. He did say you had a nice ass, though," she added.
"But..." he managed to get out.
"Yes, dear?" asked Sam blithely, leaning closer.
"What... was last night?"
"Last night," she said simply, "was goodbye."
The half-deceit (the partner knowing and not knowing) was provocative. I didn’t know where the miscarriage came from. There was no mention of it earlier. I had a hard time hating the murder victim. It seems his mistress and his wife wanted him dead. He didn’t love them, from their point of view. They (the women) seem to have found each other. Why would that not have been enough? Why need to kill him. I couldn’t feel relief at his death. He seemed stupid more than anything…thinking…like fatal attraction…that the affair would not have consequences. He seemed immature…not evil. Like all quadrangle/triangle stories, the dynamics are captivating. The women found in each other what they had longed for from him. Fascinating! I read the story 4 times. I just wanted to understand all the angles. Well done purring in so many angles!! Thank you for this excellent story!
ReplyDeleteHiya June. The nominal reason for wanting the MC dead was the life insurance policy I mentioned on the first page. In one version of the story I mentioned the miscarriage about 1/3 way through the story; apparently when I submitted it to FOTW I sent the wrong version (Drat!), so I can understand how it seemed to come out of nowhere. That was carelessness on my part. I think you nailed Steven’s true nature: immature, stupid, somewhat hedonistic, but not evil. The machinations of the professional hit and the manner in which it was handled might have been a little clunky – I haven’t orchestrated a real hit for many years, so maybe I was remiss – in fact, Doug Hawley protested that it was a “so-called pro hit” and maybe he’s right. I ain’t no Dashiell Hammett. As always, June, thanks so much for taking my work seriously and offering your reflections. I always appreciate your observations and insights.
DeleteBill, I’ve handed in a draft before! I get it! Ohhh! The money!! I should have figured!! My fault. Thanks again for the wild ride of a story!!
DeleteI enjoyed this story immensely. I’ve (happily) never experienced such a relationship as these, but the believable dialogue, complex characters and immersive descriptions hooked me and didn’t let go. A nice twist at the end as well. Good one, Bill.
ReplyDelete-David Henson
Thank you, David, for saying such nice things. And to any readers who might not have such positive remarks: bring it on! All constructive comments, good or bad, are welcome. And David: It’s been nearly a year since your wonderful “The Green Hoodie.” When are we goiong to be treated to an encore performance. Or should I address the query to Mr. Charlie Fish (Ha-ha). Thanks again, David!
DeleteThe women are both horrible characters....Steven thinks he's getting a great Hermes necktie as a gift, but it's really a symbol of sealing his demise. Steve is a slave to his sex drive, and having two women at once provides him with a lot of great sensation. Michelle takes advantage of that for a time, then Sam has a last session, then the women kill him for the insurance. Michelle's sexual willingness and response is likely all an act, all manipulation. "Michael spanks me too," she tells him, but in the end we know he likely doesn't, he's gay. She tells a lot of other stories about Michael's actions that are likely lies, too, like he's a jealous guy. She's a truly reprehensible character, and Sam's not much better, but why she'd become involved with Michelle exactly we don't know. Because Sam could have killed Steve herself and kept the money....and I'm thinking maybe it was Michelle's influence that drew her into this plot. The story keeps me guessing and there's lots of action!
ReplyDeleteHarrison, you certainly paid attention! I guess they are all pretty horrible characters. Like June pointed out, Steven is rather a sex addict and stupid, but the women are evil. Thanks for the synopsis and I’m glad the story held your interest.
DeleteI read this I while ago. Beat and I are mutual Betas or Gammas or something, but it is OK because the Men In Black caused me to forget the ending. I also questioned the motive at one point. Mr. Mirth
ReplyDeleteI forgot. We used to be fierce competitors, but I've been left in the ink.
ReplyDeleteDon’t feel bad, Duke; I forgot the ending myself. Duke Hanley and I are still stiff competitors, but he’s left me in the dust, with 836 publishing credits – and counting. BTW, we have a celebrated literary feud going on. He’s Truman Capote and I’m Jacqueline Susann, or vice versa. Thanks for the comment, Duke.
DeleteAs usual, Bill, your story rattles along and keeps the reader in suspense. The prose and dialogue is good. However, I am not convinced that these two women had to kill Steven. For the insurance? Michelle is a lawyer in 1979. She probably had to fight tooth and nail to earn her position. I don't get the impression that Michelle and Sam are so financially desperate that they would risk killing him. They have too much to lose. Michelle enjoys Steven sexually right up to the end. During the story, she never displays any kind of jealousy towards Sam. She's happy to enjoy Sam's body, too. In a classic noir story, sex, jealousy, envy and lack of money create the perfect storm. Steven has never even denied Sam a divorce. Sam didn't want sex with Steven anymore, so why the feelings of betrayal and revenge? For murder, I would give these women better reasons to kill him.
ReplyDeleteHi Rozanne! As usual, you cut right to the chase; thank you! I understand your point of view: nearly 50 years ago, with the inequity between male and female lawyers, Michelle would had to have had an exceptional mental adroitness to compete with male lawyers. She would have probably been Steven’s boss in this day and age, and not his sexual object. I never delved into what Sam did – if anything – for a living. I purposely wanted to leave that open to speculation. It was my position that Michelle did enjoy Steven’s company, like you say, up to the end. When he lies to her by telling her he was in love with her, it gives her pause, but Sam’s sexual reconquest of Steven shows Michelle that Steven is a lost cause. Insofar as financial resources are concerned, I don’t know what a young – 30s --female associate would have earned from a legal firm fifty years ago, but it couldn’t have been a great deal. Perhaps easy money might have turned Michelle’s head. She seems like a bit of a wild card, a loose cannon, in the best of times. Regarding a possible divorce between Sam and Steven, perhaps he was happy enough with the way things were going – undemanding women at both ends – and didn’t want to become available to Michelle for a commitment. You’ve given me a lot to think about, Rozanne, as usual. You made some very good points, as well. Thank you!
DeleteHi Bill, thanks for your gracious response. Yes, Michelle is a wild card ... but is she in love with Sam? Or not? Sam seems to be in love with her. From the text, I don't get the impression that Michelle ever cared about a commitment from Steven. It seems that if you clarify who loves who, things will fall into place. Personally, I think Steven has feelings for both of these women. I don't think he was entirely using Michelle, and he still loves his wife. He is immature, but not a devil.
DeleteHi again Rozanne,
DeleteI felt that Michelle played the playful faux femme fatale because she didn’t want to get hurt by Steven’s actual indifference. That’s why, when he tells her he loves her, it makes her stop and reassess. But then, Sam’s “taking him away” from Michelle for an evening puts the lie to that idea. And did I ever say that Sam and Michelle were “in love?” Maybe they were only lovers of opportunity and partners in crime. I’m enjoying our dialogue.
I enjoyed this piece.
ReplyDeleteHowever, though intriguing, it's fairly convoluted to me as a reader.
I guess I would have appreciated more foreshadowing and less complexity.
There are moments of violence juxtaposed against moments of emotional drama with intricate personal relationships and hidden motivations.
I suspect however that is all part of the charm of the Bill Tope style!
(Also, wow, the 1970’s - I was just a baby - it must have been fun to be an adult then…. Separate vacations and extramarital affairs, my Gen X would think this ridiculous in any normal marriage. So much sex, infidelity and polyamory… When we hit puberty in the 1980’s our sad reward as a generation was a new sexually transmitted disease which *killed*... sigh….)
“Intricate personal relationships” and “hidden motivations?” Yikes! Was all that in my humble little story? I should demand double the fee from Charlie, but then, what’s 200% of nothing? Ha-ha. I appreciate your critical eye, Adam, and your expressing your impressions. So many commenters feel that if they can’t saying something favorable, then they should maintain their silence. In that instance, “Comments” might as well be renamed “Blandishments.” I appreciate it. I also “appreciate” your noting that in the 1970s you were “a baby,” but not as much as Doug Hawley does, because he’s REALLY OLD. All kidding aside, I’ll take your suggestion of foreshadowing to heart and keep it in mind for the next time. Thanks very much, Adam!
Delete(Bill, I second your concern about “blandishments”.
DeleteStyles differ. Tastes differ.
I know you are a good writer, you know you are a good writer.
This can be said for most, if not all, of us regular commenters.
Most of us have been published in multiple venues.
It feels great to hear how much others enjoy a story, but it’s the critique from each other that is useful, the more specific the better. It helps us grow and evolve as writers.
When people are overly concerned about causing offense, their comments become meaningless and useless.)
I enjoyed this piece, however found the character motivations unequal to the twist ending. As the character interactions were both complex and believable, I would have loved to have seen more insight into Sam’s motivation for committing murder. Further, I feel some foreshadowing towards the revelation of Sam and Michelle’s relationship would have strengthened the twist.
ReplyDeleteHaving said that, this is the second story of yours I’ve had the pleasure of reading, and I appreciate the consistent quality of your writing style.
Good morning Donovan, and thanks for your assessment of my story. You, Rozanne and Adam seem to be in agreement, that there is something amiss in Denmark. I really appreciate your honesty and it will make me more circumspect in future, regarding foreshadowing and motivation. Regarding the latter, I suppose it’s insufficient to say that Sam was just having a bad day, huh? Seriously, though, I am happy you took the opportunity to offer your valuable insights. Again, thank you, Donovan!
DeleteLove your dialogue, Bill, been really enjoying your stories and this one was markedly different from the first few that I came across over here. What I knew from the start was, aha!, these insurance policies are going to get someone killed, but becoming familiar with your work, hmm!, bet I'm surprised at how it actually turns out. And, yep, I didn't see it coming the way it came. I believed the two women together at the end because of Steven's little spasm of jealousy at the party when he thought another woman was a little too touchy-feely with Sam. Thought it was executed well and enjoyed the conclusion! Thanks for for more time well-spent reading you!
ReplyDeletePS: One question, did caller ID exist in 1979? Maybe I grew up just a little too lower middle class to remember it among friends or family, but that one mention did make me sort of scroll back to double-check that New Year's date. Tiny thing, just curious.
Hi Cliff, and thanks for reading and commenting! And where is “over here?” Are you in the UK or what? With FOTW, one never knows; at any rate, welcome! I got a little more grief – or as the late U.S. Rep. John Lewis might have said. “good” grief – from readers this time, but I love you one and all! Flattery, however, is always welcome! I’m glad you caught the point I made about Sam getting way too comfortable with another woman; I wanted Steven to be conflicted over his wife and I’m glad it showed through. And as to your query about caller ID: I researched it and discovered that caller ID was invented in 1976, so presumably it became popular enough by the late 1970s to have had an upwardly mobile household like Sam and Steven’s acquire it. Prescient observation, Cliff. How did anyone write before the web? Once again, thanks so much for reading and writing.
DeleteHi Bill, thanks for the clarification on the caller ID ... yes, I never imagined I'd kill an entire night paging through 1970s Magnavox advertisements or old Long Island Railroad schedules for the sake of some extra story flavor (and a little fun, I'd say too) ... and that latter part provides the answer to the where--no I'm in the US, Long Island, NY. Looking forward to your next story, my friend, though hoping I can get something else accepted and up over here for you to read sometime soon myself!
DeleteCliff, I don’t know if you are a new writer or if you have stories in magazines in the four corners of the universe, but I wanted to take this opportunity to tell you about some other amenable journals:
DeleteLiterally Stories – great feedback from a dedicated readership
Freedom Fiction Journal – has published some of my “Big Yellow” – type stories
Synchronized Chaos – a marvelous journal featuring many ESL writers
Humor Times – publishes faux news articles, mostly of a political nature
Horror Sleaze Trash mag – (HST), known colloquially as The Truman Magazine, publishes humor and raunchy stuff
Good luck, and I’ll see you in (virtual) print.
Thanks, Bill. Started at this a long time ago without any success, took a 15-20 year hiatus to build a classic film site (reviews, biographies, etc.), but have been hunkering down working exclusively on my fiction for the past few years now. I've managed to get about a dozen of them picked up so far, but your list of markets are all new to me ... except that last one--it's funny, that was going to be the next stop for my Weird Family story but it now comfortably lives over here (I only found FOTW late last year). I have a few similar in tone, so I'll definitely be adding those other journals to my list. Thanks again!
DeleteHi Bill, I've been meaning to come back to this one and give it the reading it deserves. You are masterful at both character development and plot, all within completely real and believable scenarios. The tension and pace in this tale of deceit and plot are superb and as usual you give the reader such a great mix of real life characters. I truly hope one day I walk into a bookstore and see a collection of short stories, or a novel, with the name 'Bill Tope' on the spine as that's where writing of this calibre should be and you can consider me a loyal customer!
ReplyDeleteYou’re gonna turn my head with flattery if you’re not careful. There is nothing sweeter or more rewarding that compliments on your work, tendered by an artist you equally admire. Thank you. I’m got enough material for about three books of short stories – plus a book of poems and a novel, no less – but they tell me that unless your name is Steven King or James Patterson or Michael Connelly or Nora Roberts, you can’t interest a publisher in a volume of short stories. They say I’ll have to score with a novel first (Yikes!). What are the chances of that in my lifetime? I’m 70-years-old! But, I keep trying. Thanks you, my friend!
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