Chapter 3
Madge jerked her head toward the door. She thought she heard a scream. She listened and heard nothing more. Jittery, she thought. I'm a stupid, nervous wreck.
She paced the floor and glanced at her watch. Arny was due home any minute. She swallowed, and tasted the mouthwash. She felt silly, trying to hide the fact that she'd had a few drinks, running around the house making sure she had washed all the glasses, emptied all the ashtrays.
She had wanted everything to be perfect in her marriage. But some of John's ideas and philosophies, she was learning, were more difficult to execute than she had imagined.
She heard the purring engine and the door slam. He was home. Hastily, she brushed back a strand of misplaced hair, took a quick look at her face in the hall mirror and went to the door.
"Hello, darling."
"Hi." Arny's slender shoulders were sloped forward. He slid his precious valise down the hall and shed his jacket. "What's for dinner?"
"Love...." Madge walked up to him and put her arms around him. The martinis were still tingling her mind, and she had a sudden desire to make love. Maybe, if he would seduce her, she would relax and have a talk with him about the drinking. She didn't really see anything wrong with it. Especially now. She felt so warm and cozy in his arms.
"Have you been drinking?" Arny asked, whiffing her. His boyish, pale face was expressionless. Madge felt him tense and she released her grip around his waist.
"Yes," she said boldly, feeling angry and hurt. "The woman across the street came over and wanted one, and she wouldn't drink alone."
"So." Arny jerked back from her and pulled off his tie. His voice was cold and aggravated. "It takes a little temptation to forget the rules. Just some day-drinking floozy saunters in and twists your arm until you drink with her."
"Arny!"
"Don't Arny me, Madge. Look, we have rules. If we have rules then we try to keep them. Otherwise they're no good." There was no sympathy in his voice, no understanding.
"But I only had one, for goodness' sake, Arny," she lied and felt sick. She didn't know why she said one; it seemed like it might help ease the tension.
"One or twenty, I don't see the difference." He clomped into the living room, sank onto the couch, and picked up a paper. Madge followed him, not knowing what to say.
"I'm sorry," she finally said softly, hoping it would ease things.
"Sorry doesn't change it," Arny snapped. His gray eyes stared at the evening paper.
"I won't let it happen again."
"I don't believe you."
"Why?" she asked.
"People who break one rule, usually break promises too. Look, let's not talk about it. You just fix dinner."
Madge screamed. She felt like some mechanical doll that had made the wrong turn, said the wrong recorded message, and the inventor was about to scrap the whole project.
"The hell I'll fix your dinner. You can't just talk to me like I was a nobody. I'm not your slave. I'm a person."
"You're drunk." It was almost a whisper, hissing between his lips as he shuffled the pages of the paper.
"Drunk! Three martinis with a neighbor and I'm drunk, huh?"
"Oh." He put the paper down and drilled her with his eyes. "It's three martinis, now. A minute ago it was one. What next, ten?"
Madge sobbed. For the last three months of their marriage she had been walking on tiptoes, trying to make everything right for him. He was taking her for granted, never going out, just coming home and doing his work, asking for dinner, making hasty love to her. Now, the first time she tried to enjoy herself, he was being cruel.
"So I lied," she sobbed. "You're - you're such a prude. You never pay any attention to me. You keep me locked up in the house. You make love to me like I was your - your hand or something. Why shouldn't I have a drink if I enjoy it?"
"The next thing you'll be having, because you enjoy it, is an affair, I suppose," Arny snarled, slamming down the paper. He pulled his lanky frame up and walked toward her. "You can't keep the drinking rule. Why should you be devoted? I told you what happened to my father. He boozed it up all the time, and every time he got drunk he'd chase down some slut. Sometimes he'd bring them home. That's what happens, dear wife. You got to get your kicks someway - first it's booze and then somebody's body. I knew you'd been drinking when you cooed up to me like some gutter slut."
"Slut? Are you calling me a slut?" He said nothing. "Oh, Arny, how could you!"
Crying, she turned and ran down the hall. He heard the door click open and then slam shut. He took a cigarette out of the pack on the table and tapped it. Maybe he'd been too rough. She had been cooped up. Maybe he'd not given her enough time. His hand? God, that one had hurt to the quick. His hand? How could she say something like that? The more he thought about it, the more he burned. Angry, he snapped the lighter and the flame caught, rising up toward the tip of the cigarette. He watched the flame lick at the cigarette's end. It was like sex, starting with only a spark, flashing, burning ... click ... he snapped the lighter closed and walked out to the kitchen.
He looked around and then went to the cabinet. Opening it, he stood looking at the liquor bottles. Sometimes he didn't understand himself. He liked to drink; he liked the feeling when he had one. But he was afraid of it too. He knew he had to keep it in check - he'd seen it get out of hand, seen what it had done to people. An urge to break all the bottles surged through him. He let it pass as he stared at the smoky fluid. He had to keep it around, to serve when people came over - in the evenings. The last thing he needed now was for the other executives to label him-a prude. Prude. She'd shouted that. She'd called him a prude ... and she'd said he screwed like he was masturbating. Both thoughts infuriated him. He thought she'd be the one to help him keep away from the stuff. That's why he hadn't married one of the college girls. They were so phony, they lived on pretenses. He thought Madge was the wholesome kind of girl who didn't need the facade the others made for themselves. He didn't know. He just didn't know....
Reaching up, he touched a bottle of scotch. The glass felt cool around his hand. Maybe he'd show her what it was like to have a drunken husband. Maybe that would teach her a lesson. Maybe he'd get loaded every night for a week -just for one week -and that would make her sick. That would make her understand why it was important for her not to tempt him, to help him keep away from it. Yes, he thought as he poured a splash of the amber liquid into a glass, I'll get roaring drunk for a week and teach her a lesson.
As he sat back on the sofa, glass in one hand, bottle in the other, he didn't think of where his young wife was, or what she was doing. His only concern was the golden-colored, burning liquid trickling down his throat.
"Madge, why, come in. What a surprise."
Beth took Madge's arm and led her into the plushly decorated living room. She looked up at John and shrugged, signaling her amazement.
"I'm sorry-" Madge sobbed and Beth squeezed her arm comfortingly around the woman.
"That's it, baby, cry it out. You're with friends." Beth waved John out of the room and he slid into the next room without Madge ever noticing he was there. This was too much, Beth thought. The pigeon was in the nest.
Beth steered Madge to the couch and pulled her down beside her. "Tell me about it, Madge. What's the matter?"
"We-we -had a fight and he called me-a...."
"Say it," Beth urged, a smile on her face. "Purge yourself. Say it, say what he called you."
"A slut." Madge hunched over and began sobbing. Beth pretended she didn't hear what the word was.
"I didn't hear you, Madge. He called you a what?"
"A slut," she repeated. "He said because I was drinking I was a slut."
"How cruel." Beth licked her lips and snuggled close to the crying woman beside her. "Cry it out, darling. Everything will be all right." Beth let her hand rub the woman's back. She began at the shoulder and worked down toward the small of her back; her fingers spread, pressing in and covering as much flesh as she could. She halted at the bottom of the spine and decided the time wasn't ripe. Beth didn't want to stop, she wanted to keep rubbing down toward the woman's firm buttocks, pressing each cheek gently and then carefully running her fingers up her crack until she squealed and hugged her and begged her not to stop. But that would come, that would come.
"Would you like to spend the night with us?" Beth offered, her trembling voice almost revealing her true feelings.
"I - I wouldn't want to impose, I -"
"Not another word," Beth said firmly. "I don't think you should face him tonight. Show him you're independent. Let him worry about you for a change." The sage advice came easy for Beth; she was well-practiced at cleaving marriages and then melding them back together after she and John were through with them.
"I don't know...."
"I know," Beth stated crisply. "I haven't had a girl friend stay over for a long time. It'll be like schooldays again. We'll play a few games, have a good laugh or two, a drink, and sleep it off. Tomorrow, you two can go over your problems, and you'll have the upper hand. Believe me, Madge. I know how to handle men."
Beth pulled Madge's head against her shoulder and caressed the back of the woman's neck as she sobbed. Beth could feel the warm stirring in her loins as she ground Madge's hair against the soft flesh of her neck.
"Why don't you go wash your face, freshen up, and I'll introduce you to my husband. He's anxious to meet you."
"Please - please don't say anything to him about-"
"Your secret's safe, Madge. I'll tell him your husband is out of town for the night and I've asked you to stay over with us. How about that?"
"Fine," Madge sniffled. "And, Beth-"
"Yes?"
"Thank you. Thank you very much."
"I'm sure it will be all my pleasure," Beth smiled. "I'm sure."
Madge followed Beth toward the bathroom, thankful that she had met such a nice, honest, friendly woman. She was sure they would have a lasting friendship - a long, lasting friendship.
John was lying on the bed naked when Beth walked in.
"How's the home for wayward wives?" he asked, spreading his legs.
"Fine," Beth said, lowering herself between his haunches and licking his balls. "We couldn't have asked for anything better." She laved her tongue around her husband's bulging testicles, nibbling at the loose skin with her teeth. Her hands circled his half-hard cock.
John lay with his fingers laced behind his head, watching his prick-happy wife. He loved every lecherous inch of her cunningly sexual body. He had spent ten long years looking for a woman who thought as he did, who read his mind, who gave him thrills no other woman could. Beth was more like a partner in a holdup than just a bizarre sex partner. Everything she did was carefully plotted out, designed in her sharp-witted mind. She had the art down to a science and was so good at it she could prepare the couples without any help from him. All he had to do was appear, drop the right hints, and the couples were on their back, begging. Recently, Beth had been using a new gimmick - blackmail. It was a vicious, cannibalistic method - but it was also hellishly exciting.
"Are we going to use the dirty B on this nice kid?" he asked with mock chagrin.
"Ummm," Beth moaned, her mouth sliding up and down his long, stiff cock.
"Ummm, what?"
"Ummm, sure," she said, sucking off the tip with a loud pop. "Just because I like the girl, doesn't mean she should get any preferential treatment. Anyway, I'll enjoy watching her husband squirm. Any man who would call a woman a slut -"
John wrapped his legs around her head and laughed. "You're a wiseass, little shit of a cunt. And I love you."
"Just don't ask me to eat out your ass, or I'll go running home to mother." She laughed wildly and gave John's cock a few more deep, long sucks before she pried herself loose and told him to get dressed.
"I want you to make an impression on her."
"You mean in her, don't you?"
"You knew what I meant when I married you," she quipped.
"Be out in a minute."
"Mix the drinks - strong."
"Right."