We had just made love in the afternoon, in the big king size bed in the master bedroom facing the back where huge trees, none of them palms, a rarity in Los Angeles, had been growing for decades. And where there was a rose garden with mature roses, a little bench, a fountain, quite a set up for a “lonely bachelor” as he called himself when he showed me around the place. Actually, since I’d done my research: he’d been married and divorced four times, and had grown children. Was he close with any of them? Was he generous with his money? Did he love them? Did they love him?
I knew it was going to happen today, because I was going to make it happen today. And, after all, we are consenting adults: I am early fifties, he sixty-three. He’s pretending to be around fifty now. There’s a prescription for the pills in his medicine chest—I checked that out when I went in to pee forty minutes ago. He had done the same five minutes before that. The pill takes a quarter hour or so to activate. It says so right on the label. Sounds like a missile about to launch, doesn’t it? As in, ready set… I felt like asking him, “Are you seeing blue?” That’s one of the side effects.
Photo: Joel Goodman
It was my freshman year of college. We met at a mixer. I had half a dozen real dates with him before he did the dirty deed. He wooed, he tickled, he licked, he caressed, he bought dinner, he discussed, made sure the proper birth control was in place. On the night when “it” happened, he moved in for the kill swiftly, like a cat, total focus, breath drawn in. I remember opening my eyes with him above me, the terror of the thrust itself—the pain—then he moved off the body, got dressed and drove the corpse home, still dripping.
I came from a strict, religious family. It wasn’t anything like today: no Internet, no helpful sex education, no cell phones, it was a simpler time.
I was the only virgin in the dorm, my most experienced friend had told me to get it “out of the way.”
I didn’t get it, that I was going to get deflowered and dumped and that’s what it was all about. His game. I certainly thought I’d see him again. I didn’t see him again until after three weeks of wondering what happened and no phone call. I saw him at a mixer going through the same motions with a girl he had gone through with me. I watched him from the dark fringes of the room, music blasting, coming in on her. I did what I always do when something pierces me to the very core. I simply went dead, zoned out.
Left my body.
It wasn’t until years later, after I married, after I had children, and after the children were grown, when I was getting my hair done, and the young girl who was working on me told me about the ring she was wearing. “My father gave it to me. We had a ceremony, I pledged my virginity to him.” When I looked at her trying not to gasp, she said, “In our religion, we have a ceremony and our father gives us a ring. Then when we get married, we take off that ring and our husbands give us another.”
“They hand you off!” I was fascinated.
And then I realized what had happened to me all those years ago and what had happened to the others, I’m sure there were dozens of us.
This person who had just made love to me, and nicely too—had once been an assiduous cherry popper: an ancient ritual, as old as man and woman themselves!
Soon after, my own long marriage ended. My children left home. I had a short and very unpleasant brush with death. And decided since I was in remission, what I’d do with my remaining time.
We lived in the same town, after all, different neighborhoods, his much more plush. I found myself obsessed with killing the man who took my virginity like that. Yes, to get even with him. Do something to him. Why? Because he deserved it. I could probably even get away with it.
I bought a pretty little gun, a Smith and Wesson “Lady Smith”. The salesman assured me it would be lethal if the need arose. They were so helpful at the gun range and I learned to master the recoil and hit the target.
Last week I made a first attempt. I made an appointment pretending I was a journalist. He’s famous enough to have not thought it weird. But I chickened out.
Today I came back, seduced him, and he swallowed a pill that did or did not make him see blue, and here we are…
I’m not going to kill him today, I didn’t even bring my little lady gun. But I’m going to break his heart before I break his neck, or do something really awful to him. The bastard. He deserves it.
“That was wonderful,” I said, stroking his arm. “You’re such a stud, so manly!” I saw him smile in the dying light of the afternoon. The gloaming the English call it.
I got up. Went for my clothes, and heard him asking, “Don’t go, stay. We’ll have dinner!” And at the door his rapt expression, “When can I see you again?”
“Soon,” I replied. “Very soon.” And I closed the door firmly.
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