Chapter 2

By the following morning the cottage was in a tidy state; dishes were stacked in the cupboards and linens tucked away neatly in closets. Rita's mental state, however, was far less organized.

Eyelids thick with sleep, she awoke late the next morning listening idly to the chirp of sparrows gathering in the trees in the yard. Max had left earlier for work, grumbling as he stomped out the door and slamming it behind him. His negligence of his wife's feelings had depressed Rita so severely that she pulled the covers over her head and indulged in an extra few hours of sleep. Now, at ten o'clock, the earlier dullness of dawn had given way to a sunburst day and rubbing her eyes with the balls of her fists, she slipped out of bed and squinted out at the geometric beds of blooming roses outside the bedroom window. In a hazy state of awakening consciousness, she stared empathetically at the roses, experiencing the tragic reality that the brilliant petals would lose their delicacy by the end of the week. Their color, like her hopes for reconciliation, would fade and drop to the ground. Reluctantly, she tore herself away from the window and padded barefoot into the bathroom to prepare herself for another day of unhappiness.

Returning to the bedroom, the thin film of her pink nightie clinging tenaciously to the rich swells of her hips and breasts, her eyes fell upon Max's pillow, where he had left it, hanging half off the bed on his side. Wasn't that typical though? Didn't that explain the whole truth of his feelings (or lack of feelings) for her? Rita sniffled into a kleenex torn from the half-consumed box on the nitht stand. Marriage, like a disease, would have to cure itself. She was no healer, she could not salve the wound alone. Yet she harbored no dis-like for the man. That he had emotional problems with women was obvious and in time he would realize the need to face the unfairness of his accusations. Until then she must accept her role as lonely wife and accept this celibacy forced upon her.

Damn . . . why did she love the man? Rita blew into the kleenex and tossed it into the wicker wastepaper basket by the bed. A fine future she had in store, here in this depressing, gossipy town of small-minded woman and frustrated males.

Pink fingertips were reaching for a second kleenex when the telephone rang. The mounds of her milky breasts jounced as she sprinted to the hall telephone.

"Hello, Mrs. Henshaw," sounded a male voice. "This is the Superintendent's office calling."

"Yes.. . ? "

"I'm calling to tell you that as a rehabilitationist's wife, you're allowed to have one of our men from the program's work pool come out to your house to help you out a bit." The voice paused, and Rita could hear the man draw on his cigarette. "Lookin' at the files here, I see we got a young guy who's ready for the outside. You wan' him."

"Well, I . . . I hadn't.. . "

"His name is John Silverman . . . the quiet type, you know?" Apparently the man hadn't intuited her objection. "How 'bout I send him over this afternoon. That convenient for you?"

"Well, I guess so-" When she hung up the telephone, Rita sat back thoughtfully and mused over the idea of having a man of dubious character in her home. Was she letting herself in for trouble? Certainly the Superintendent would not have allowed the man privileges if they didn't think him honorable. Time would tell. Besides, having someone to talk to, even a rehabilitated alcoholic, was better than talking to the walls. More, perhaps this mysterious John Silverman could provide some insight into the strange problems that seemed to be preoccupying her husband.

She didn't rush about the house this morning; instead, she took her time at dressing and preparing a cup of extra strong coffee to perk up her spirits. In a pair of cut-off shorts and T-shirt, she settled down by the window to sip it. The air was warm and bright and, squinting through the window, she spied the tall, heavily muscled frame of a black man in the telltale Center's jumpsuit standing at the far end of the rose garden with his back to the house. Surreptitiously, he turned slightly, giving her a revealing angle as he pulled his glistening black penis out of his pants and began to stroke it rhythmically with his fist.

My God! Rita's mind seethed. What the heck? The audacity of the man defiling her rose garden with his perversions! The coffee in the cup sloshed over the rim as she watched the lewd spectacle before her in nearly hypnotized fascination. Shocked and disgusted by the black man's lewd actions, she could not bring herself to tear her eyes away from the sight of the huge dark staff of flesh he was working with his hand. A subtle little chill of titillation tremored down the length of Rita's spine as she shaded her eyes to squint at the tiny dew drops of glistening male seed beginning to ooze from the knobby purplish head.

He couldn't have been more than twenty feet from the porch window, close enough for Rita to clearly discern the heavy blue veins that ran like a road map over' the thick underside of his black meaty penis . . . and the fat, blood-fed tip that seemed to swell and throb as the man contentedly stroked his penis with quick, jerking movements. Not fear but fascination was her reaction. Of course she was safe from his lustful actions, the heavy pane of glass and locked doors her guardian. And it was not his lustfully distorted black features that mesmerized her, but the sight of his dark-skinned meaty hand moving rapidly along the shiny stretched skin of his penis.

The black man threw his head from side to side with an insane excitation as he hunched over, working furiously at his organ, knees bent and mouth fallen slack. He jerked his hand faster and faster, pushing the thick foreskin back and forth over the thick head of his uncircumcised cock until it looked to Rita like the dark eye of a snake. Abruptly, then, Rita noticed a burning sensation on her fingers and looked down to see the cup so tightly clenched in her hand that she was burning herself.

Quickly she released her grip on the porcelain handle and raised her dainty fingers to her awestruck mouth, her eyes never leaving the stroking hand and the thick girth of man-cock gripped in its pumping grasp. A tickle of fear at his frenzied lust scorched her cheeks and then it happened. She watched him tremble violently, and from the head of his lust-inflamed penis shot a heady stream of thick white liquid, spurting out to dew the pink tea roses on the bush in front of him. Rita watched horrified as the sticky sperm splattered on the delicate roses, the weight causing the proud heads to bow in subservience to his lustful actions. It was as if the roses had lost their virginal beauty . . . had been raped by this insensitive brute. . . . Just as Max had raped and defiled her on their wedding night! Disgust clogged her throat and for a moment she thought she might be sick.

Still her gaze lingered as the towering column of dark flesh he was grasping began to deflate like a punctured balloon, shrinking and falling an inch at a time to one side. Rita could see rivulets of sweat course down the cheeks of the man's shiny face as he straightened himself to his full height and squeezed the drooping penis between his thumb and forefinger, shaking it gently until the last of the milky fluid dripped out and end and splattered on the tilled ground at his feet. Apparently undisturbed by the tremor that had just shaken his body, the man bent over to inspect the damage to the roses now weighted down and beaten by his sperm load. A slowly growing smile crossed his lips.

Rita felt herself shaking with indignation. How dare he: How could a man defile something as delicate as a flower and then feel smug over his contamination?

Rita felt her cheeks begin to burn with annoyance and casting caution to the breezes, she stomped out onto the back porch, throwing wide the door with a thunderous bang that made the black man's head snap around in surprise. She stood in the doorway, a five-foot-one inch figure scantily clad in shorts and T-shirt, hands positioned on her hips in obvious anger. "Who are you? she snapped.

The burly man turned languidly around and to Rita's shock, he was only now zipping up his trousers, a dime-sized wet spot widening from the juices seeping still from his cock tip. A wide toothy grin creased his shiny black face as he leveled his eyes on the dainty blonde female. His dark eyes roved casually over Rita's proud bumps and curves as she stood in the doorway.

"Why, am' you a pretty one," he drawled in a thick, lazy accent. "My friends at the Center calls me Rover . . . " He licked his thick lips in a salacious gesture which unnerved Rita to the core.

"That says nothing . . . what are you doing in my rose garden?" she repeated heatedly.

"Ah's a gard'ner, miss. I takes care of ever'body's roses who lives in the cottages. I got my own kinda fert'lizer . . . makes 'em grow real good."

The sardonic glint in his eyes made Rita seethe with anger. He was putting her on, teasing her like an eight year-old child. Shocked and disgusted as she was by his cool insolence, she decided this was one humiliation she did not have to accept.

That such a loud voice came from such a tiny woman amused Rover. "Get off my property this minute-before I report you to my husband! He's one of rehabilitationists at the Center who's worked to gain freedom for perverts like you!"

Rita was shocked at her outburst. It was not like herself to degrade someone so harshly, and yet she felt a sense of relief at having taken out her frustrations on someone so righteously deserving. In her arrogant role of social superiority, she barely noticed that Rover's eyes had narrowed at the mention of her husband's position at the Center and that he had begun to regard her with a less amicable gaze. Coyly he camouflaged those feelings beneath a toothy grin as he said:

"Don' wanna get you riled, missie," he continued in his slow drawl. "Fact is, I could make you really happy. You see how good I done with the roses?" With that, he broadened his smile and turned to stroll, hands thrust in jumpsuit pockets, out of the garden in a casual gait.

Damn himl Rita was beside herself with rage as she stomped back into the kitchen and locked the door securely. What was his last smart remark supposed to mean? Obviously, Rover was one of the work pool men who'd been let out to work in the Center's employees' homes. She wondered what his crime was? Wife beater? Child abuser?

That thought brought a knot of fear to play in Rita's sixty-one inch frame. Immediately she stepped toward the telephone to call Max, but quickly reconsidered her decision. He might become annoyed and accuse her of meddling in his work. No . . . better she handle this matter on her own; yet the loneliness of being caught in the midst of a situation as potentially dangerous as this was overwhelming. She needed female company.

A moment later she was banging on the neighbor's door. A tall, attractive auburn-haired woman answered.

"H-hello, I'm Rita Henshaw, I live next door . . . "

"Oh, come in. I've been considering calling on you, dear, but I didn't want to be pushy," she said, smiling graciously. "I'm Sharon Goddard, wife of the Superintendent at the Center." The woman's kindly demeanor was a salving relief compared to the idiocy of the backyard incident. Rita's shoulders relaxed with the easing of tension. Now how to bring up the reason for her call.. .

Tactfully, Mrs. Goddard broached the subject first as she gazed into the young woman's fear tightened, childish features. "Is something the matter, darling?" she asked in a maternal tone that put Rita to rest. "You look terribly distraught." Hospitably, she gestured toward an overstuffed chair which Rita collapsed into gratefully. Since the incident with Rover her knees had turned to jelly.

"I.. . I came to ask if you know of an inmate by the name of Rover . . . I-I found him in my backyard."

Sharon tutted. "Oh, dear, I certainly do. Why they let that man out and around I'll never know. But who are we to question our husband's decisions?" she said in a sigh of resignation.

Rita thought she detected a note of bitterness in the woman's voice and wanted to quickly change the subject. She was too involved with her own problems to delve into those of a stranger. Besides, she must think of Max's career, and though she suspected that nothing in the compound happened without the entire community knowing, she chose the path of ignorance. What she didn't know she couldn't relate, and she had the distinct feeling that this woman, as sophisticated and hospitable as she was, could very well be the root of the grapevine.

'This Rover . . . is he dangerous?"

"If you call rape dangerous, yes, I would say so." Sharon leaned forward in her chair and stared into her visitor's eyes as if she was about to reveal the world's secret. "You can't be too careful with these work pool men. They're all a bunch of sex starved perverts, if you ask me." Her wide green eyes implored of Rita an echoed agreement.

"You think it's safe to have them come into your house to work? I got a telephone call this morning asking me to let John Silverman come work for me. But after seeing Rover I'm not so sure I want to." Rita shrugged her shoulders, feeling very immature next to the elegantly dressed woman whose hair was pulled back into a modest bun, a simple string of pearls stranding her neck.

Sharon flapped her hand in the air in a have-no-fears gesture. "John Silverman is a honey. A little slow up here," she laughed pointing to her brain, "but a nice fellow. It's when they gang together that I'd worry. Don't ever let the office send you two men at once. That poor little Johnnie is a sweetheart. You see, he wasn't really an alcoholic, he's a loner from these parts with no family. Some say he has a few emotional problems, but then don't we all, dear?" The question, direct in tone and gaze, demanded an answer.

"I . . . I guess so." Again the discomfiting feeling that Sharon Goddard was trying to delve into the personal depths of Rita's life circumstances left the blonde -haired wife with a troubled feeling. She was beginning to feel trapped living this close to the Center; those on the outside were as walled-in as the inmates behind the stone wall. Without reluctance, Rita rose from the chair and headed for the door.

"Please come back soon and let's have a chat over coffee, honey," the woman said solicitously. "Just the two of us . . . "