Chapter 6
Burt lifted the chintz curtain of his bedroom window and gazed at his fine, sweeping view of Forest Park. From his seventeenth floor vantage point, the golfers looked like little toy men trudging across the green landscape. That's where he ought to be on such a bright, sunny Sunday afternoon, he reflected-on the golf course. Oh, he'd be getting just as vigorous exercise here in the bedroom all right, but what could be found on the golf course was surely a bit safer, less complicated.
He turned to look again upon the naked woman in the bed. Their eyes met and she smiled coarsely at him, her nudity sprawled every which way atop the blue sheets.
He asked himself, did he really want this woman? Was he trying to prove something? Something suspect perhaps, and more than a little neurotic? Not that she wasn't attractive within certain limits. Certainly those ripe breasts which stood tall of their own strength even though she was lying on her back ... certainly they were sex objects you didn't have to be neurotic to appreciate.
Oh yes, even at his advancing age, which he seemed to be increasingly conscious of lately, he was still a believer in sex including purely physical sex. Sex for sex's sake. Nothing unhealthy about that if both partners understood the ground rules and nobody else got hurt by it. He'd go to his grave, he hoped, retaining a respect and appreciation for a good lusty romp in the hay. Even if it was just that, a playful romp and nothing more. The naked woman in his bed this afternoon certainly qualified as a suitable partner for a fun project like that.
But it was risky, bringing her here to his and Carla's apartment. He could have met her somewhere else. Carla had said she'd be gone all afternoon, probably until about six o'clock. But she was hardly famous for invariably sticking to pre-set timetables. There was always the possibility she might walk in that door at any moment. Yes, it was risky bringing the woman here.
A further thought struck him and started him slowly pacing across the room, his hands knotted professorially behind his nude buttocks. Maybe he wanted Carla to catch them. Not on a conscious level, of course. Consciously, he dreaded such a prospect-Then why take the calculated risk when there was no practical need to do so?
He certainly didn't want to break up his marriage. Against all logic, he loved that kooky, exciting, exasperating, nagging, gorgeous blonde with all his heart. That he was sure of but there'd been some elusive something missing from their marriage right from the start. Some intangible ingredient he was hard pressed to grasp, but which, he knew, frequently left him feeling less than a whole man. Either it was something Carla wasn't giving or he wasn't taking. How could he take it when he didn't know exactly what it was?
If it somehow had something to do with their sex life, which is, after all, at the core of the marital relationship, then just maybe his risking being discovered in a sexual indiscretion with this woman did make a kind of inverted sense. Maybe, in a perverse way he was trying to prove to Carla-and to himself along the way-that he was able to, firstly, get a woman and, secondly, satisfy a woman. Which, on one level, is proving that you're a man ... But why the need for such proof? He'd certainly gotten Carla herself, and recently. Wasn't he, then, satisfying her? Ay, there could be the rub. He didn't know. She never complained about their love-making, but...? He didn't know. Had he really gotten her in the first place? He, Burt Goslin, the man? Or had the fact of his semi-celebrity status in town been what clinched her acceptance of the marriage contract? That was a disquieting thought that had crossed his mind more than once. He needed a drink.
Padding to the bureau-his auxiliary bar, he often called it-he took the scotch bottle and two glasses in hand.
"Join me?" he cordially asked the naked woman.
"I don't mind if I do, Burt baby," she accepted, rising up on her elbow so that one heavy breast plopped on top of the other. Burt poured and came to the bed.
"Here you are, doll face", he said, handing her her glass.
"Thanks, precious", she answered.
He didn't really think of her as doll face, and doubted that she regarded him as precious. But hell, as long as they were playing the game, they might as well play it by the book. He nestled beside her, touching his hairy thigh to the smoothness of her hip. Placing a hand on her stomach, low down, he noted that her skin was smooth, and the flesh under it firm. He took a slug of his scotch.
Booze. It'd kill him some day he feared. He'd long since lost his capacity to hold it well. It was funny thing how when you were young and just starting out to drink, you couldn't hold it at all-Then, with the passage of time, your capacity built and built, and it would take more and more to make you high. Finally you started to go downhill and got where you couldn't handle any more than you could as a teenager. Sort of a cycle of life, in a decanter. He really should cut down. He'd been trying to train himself not to take his first one of the day until five o'clock and it was only three now. For once, Carla might be right about him staggering by dinner time.
The naked woman slid her hand up his thigh and fondled him intimately and waggingly.
"You know, you're kind of cute, Burt baby", she remarked.
"Oh? You think so? Now, how many men have you said that to?", he smiled at her.
"Oooh ... a few, I guess", she giggled.
Yes, John Barleycorn would be the death of him yet, he mused sadly, taking another staunch blast. It seemed like these days, these years, he couldn't do without it. Couldn't do the column without it. Not that he was loaded while he wrote, but so many of his ideas came to him while he was under the influence. That was the old devil: ideas. You had to come up with a new one every day-every cotton-picking day-week in and year out. It got harder as the years passed, to keep from repeating yourself like a senile old man. Sometimes the column seemed like a great yawning mouth, sucking the life out of him. How could that be? The column was his life. The booze made it harder, drugging his mind, slowing him down, and yet it was the only thing, it seemed, that gave him the strength to live under his own personal gun.
"Does this feel good, Burt?", the woman asked seductively as she cupped and squeezed and jiggled him.
"You bet, honey", he replied, his thoughts still far away. For some unapparent reason, he suddenly thought of Jeanne. Had she ever, perhaps, in their foreplay, said the same thing to him? Asked him if it feels good, in just that way? Cascading memories of her raced through his mind. Jeanne, the vivacious young wife, she of the sparkling, happy eyes and the ready, tender smile ... and the loving heart. He remembered the young newspaperman at her side. Barely past his cub reporter stage, he was. He'd just been raised to the munificent salary of $40 a week. How proud Jeanne had been of her husband and his pay raise. Now they could start a family ... Suddenly, Burt had to press his fingers tightly to his eyes and wag his head to cut off the quick, hot tears that tried to surface. He shouldn't think like that. He should never, never let himself remember the young almost-mother, dead, and the baby that never quite saw the light of day.
"Is anything wrong, Burt honey?", asked the naked woman.
"Naw", he responded gruffly. "I just got something in my eyes for a second." He breathed deeply once and opened his eyes to leer at her up and down. "Say, you're kind of a cute, sexy little trick yourself, now that I notice." He pinched her playfully near the navel.
"Ooh, that feels good too", she said, screwing herself up closer to him and grasping him more tightly with one hand.
Well, here we go, Burt said to himself as he slid his hand upward over her smooth skin to mount and cup one of her burgeoning bosoms. He found he almost had a let's-get-it-over-with attitude toward the love scene he was about to play. On the other hand, he noticed that his physical instincts were responding, as the woman kneaded him with a quickening beat.
"Oh, I like that Burt", the woman sighed in appreciation of his breast play. "Keep it up-You're starting to get hot too, aren't you? I can see."
He did not answer, concentrating on her breasts which were beginning to swell even larger under his tickling, tweaking, squeezing hands. She had a pretty nice pair ... a pretty luscious body all over, he appraised, glancing the nude length of her. A nice curve to the thighs, flat tummy, full, sexy hips that looked like they could give a man a rousing tussle. Her skin was very nice, very smooth. He took a persimmon-colored nipple between thumb and forefinger of each hand and manipulated them gently. They hardened rapidly as he rolled them back and forth, and he heard her breath becoming more labored.
He thought of Carla's breasts and smiled. Poor darling, she had such a complex about them, more than she'd ever admit straight out. She thought they were too small. It simply wasn't the case, by his tastes. He'd have to remember to always do his best to reassure her. Sure, they were nowhere near the size of these big melons he was hefting in his hands right now, but they were plenty ample. Juicy, firm, and springy and those spectacular nipples of hers! Yes, they were just fine by him. The kind he was playing with right now, might actually be considered a little too floppy.
"Oh, I'm starting to get very hot, Burt sweetheart. Are you?"
He twisted around, careful not to break his handling of her nipples, and snuggled his nudity against hers, full length. Yes, he noted pleasurably, he was starting to get hot. He moved one hand from her breast and snaked it lightly, slowly, teasingly down her body, playing in and out around the many hills and valleys of her quickening flesh. Prying her open, he forced a gasp of delight from her mouth as he suddenly touched her with wet boldness.
His hips began to work steadily against her side, as their roaming fingers on each others skins stroked and pulled their passions toward the surface.
The woman's breath rasped and gurgled in her throat as she laid herself moistly open to him, her hips writhing under his urgent touch.
"Oh, Burt, I'm ready, so ready. Are you ready? Can you...?"
He was ready. Shifting, he took her vigorously, and had an image of slicing into a huge piece of fruit, ripe and juicy.
"Oh my God, Burt, you're a regular tiger aren't you?", she squealed happily.
Yes, there was nothing like a good, lusty romp in the hay, he decided once more. Sex for sex's sake. Thrusting vigorously again and again, hearing the woman's delighted responses expressed in her incoherent gurgles of pleasure with each new plunge, he guessed he wasn't ready for the boneyard yet. Heck, this was pure fun! Who could get hurt?
Carla stepped into the bedroom doorway. Her blue eyes went wide at the sight of the two naked figures grunting and wallowing against each other in her bed.
The rapt love-makers snapped to embarrassed attention at her shock-sounding words: "Burt! ... Mother!"