Dishonor Thy Wife (14 page)

JAYDEN

Brad had been creepy at times during our masquerade, as if
he was trying to take over my life and really become me.

Oh, God, Traci,
I forgot to say good-bye to my
niece.
My heart twisted at the thought of Traci walking into school with
her
Bat
backpack slung across her shoulder. I will miss the child.
It
was fun being an uncle and having a niece to spoil. Maybe Brad could break the
news to Ronni that he has a long-lost twin brother, and I could visit, but the
thought of facing Ronni and Brad together knotted my stomach.

“What the heck?” Vanessa’s car was parked in front of my condo.

I pulled my car into the garage thinking maybe Vanessa being
here was not such a bad idea.

Before Vanessa could even say hello, I dragged her into the
bedroom and slammed my hand over her mouth to keep her from singing. I turned
my head to the side, pounded her, and then rolled to the side so we were no
longer touching.
Whew, that was not very good, unlike…

Vanessa purred like a cat. “This past week, Jayden, you
acted like you were bored with me. You even threatened me with a knife if I
continued singing to you.”

“What!”

She ran her finger down my chest, giggling like a little
girl. “Of course you were joking.”

“Yeah, I’m a real joker, Vanessa, if only you knew.”

She pulled at the hair on my chest rubbing her breasts
against my stomach. “You seem to have finally gotten it right again. I haven’t
had an orgasm since you came back from Philadelphia.”

I groaned, not caring to know any more about Brad’s private
life, especially his performance in bed. Vanessa was a hypocrite; I just had
sex with her and felt unsatisfied. Since when was Vanessa not good in bed? The
act was now empty, a lack of connection.

Ronni,
I thought with disgust. It was great with
Ronni last night. An hour ago, I wished to God to never have slept with my
sister-in-law and now longed for her bed.

Do not even think it. Don’t!
However,
I could
no longer deny that there had been something special with Ronni.

No way!
That something was not love. That thing
was sick perverted sex because our relationship was taboo, which added to the
thrill, much like a married man having an affair, only more so.

Slam, bam, you’re welcome, Ma’am, was about as far as my
relationships with the fairer sex usually played out. Sometimes a woman lasted
a few months until she became too clingy, like Vanessa.

If a man needed a companion, he could get a dog.

“I need a cold shower.” I slapped Vanessa in the face with
the sheet and walked into the bathroom. “You can see yourself out.”

“I’m not sleeping here, Jayden?”

“No, Vanessa, you’re not,” and I slammed the bathroom door.

I leaned my head against the wall, moaning.
What to do?
What to do?
There was a hollow feeling in my chest and an ache in my gut.

I sunk to the closet floor and held the phone to my chest. I
took a deep breath and called Brad’s cell. His phone was off so I left a
message. The matter was urgent so I tried his home phone.

Come on, pick up, Brad. Do not let it be…

Yipes! Ronni answered.

I hung up on her and dropped my head in my hands, groaning.
Hearing her voice made me feel guilty about sleeping with Vanessa. How crazy was
that? I accused Brad of being creepy; what was happening to me? I was not
Ronni’s husband and had the right to sleep with anyone. Ronni had no hold over
me. I always thought,
this time. This time will be the last,
or so I
promised myself until the next time she invited me back into her bedroom with
her eyes, lips and every gesture of her body language.

Note: You are not in danger of losing your head over your
brother’s wife.

Yet an odd sense of relief lightened my chest because Brad
was not at home with Ronni right now.

Or was he? Maybe they were having sex right now!

 I tried my best to shampoo my sister-in-law out of my hair.
Ronni was someone new so exciting. If I slept with her again, she would be
as disappointing as Vanessa was.
I snorted; my time in Austin posing as a
married man made me even more cynical. Women were always the downfall of men.

I stepped out of the shower, and Vanessa sat on the bathtub,
shaving her legs.

Yeah, Vanessa had moved all her shit into my bathroom while Brad
was living here—so much for his promise to dump her for me!

She lifted her head and broke out in song, some broken tune,
or other.

I wish I could get rid of that woman for good!

BRAD

Barbie calls to change our meeting place from the Congress
Avenue Bridge to Lovers Leap. “I aim to push you off, Brad.”

Very funny, ha-ha. I curse Jayden up the ass and down some
in an email, a phone message, and to the mirror. Her anger at me is his entire
fault.

Austin Saturday night traffic on Mopac is
the
Bitch
of the Black Tar. I exit to Ranch Road
2222
, as if the traffic crapped
on me four times, and then hang a left on Mount Bonnell Rd.  

Mount Bonnell has stairs and a flat top. The mount is windy,
and Barbie may push me off, or God may blow me across the little brick wall and
into the Colorado River.

I pace nervously on the cobblestones looking at my watch.

Barbie drives up in a pickup and yells at me through a megaphone,
“You slept with a bunch of Philly hookers, Brad!”

“Come up here, and I’ll prove my innocence!”

I flip out a picture from my wallet taken in Philly of me
and Jayden and shove the photo under Barbie’s nose. “That’s my twin brother and
he was impersonating me.”

She studies the image, rubbing my brother’s face, scratching
his chin, and letting her fingers linger on his lips. Then her index finger
slides to the zipper of his pants and she scratches. “You know, Brad, I think
your brother is a bit cuter than you are. I bet he has a better-looking dick. Maybe
I should have tried harder to screw him.”

What!

She cocks her head as if aiming a gun. “Sensitive men make
the best lovers.” She laughs. “With Jayden, it would have been like making love
with a kinder, gentler Brad. Wouldn’t that be a riot? Huh?”

She wants to make love with my brother! Why does she say those
words, go and hurt me like that? “Barbie, please don’t!” Goddamnit my voice is
ragged; her words are ripping out my tonsils.

“Ah, poor baby.” She smiles with pity in her hazel eyes.
Pity!

The vein in my temple pounds so that my head may explode.

“Don’t worry, Brad, your poopsi whoopsi is here to make you
feel all better.” She wiggles her hand inside my pants and gives me a squeeze,
chuckling at my hard-on. The witch is so attractive that I’m like a frickin’ $3
Remember the Alamo
fridge magnet stuck on her tight rump and the bitch
is sitting on me, smashing my heart.

Barbie takes my hand and leads me to the bed of her pickup.
She came prepared
with a
blanket and quilt spread out. I have marched through hell for this woman and
she wants a sensitive lover? A gentle lover? A Jayden lover?

I rip the zipper from her jeans and grab such a big handful
that I even tear the front of her underpants.

“Brad, you’re hurting me. Your nails are like claws.”

I pant like a wild animal. My eyes barely focus but I can
smell her fear.

She scoots back until her head bangs against the pickup. “Brad,
quit hurting me!”

Does she think she can push her skull through the pickup
wall and get away from me?

I slam her hips down on the bed of the pickup and twist her hands
above her head, pinning her with my heavier weight. “So you want my brother?” I
hiss.

“I was only fooling, Br…Bra…Brad.”

“You liar! When you looked at his picture, you crossed your
legs tight like Jayden was inside you.”

“He looks just like you, Brad.”

“I’ll give you my brother. Say Jayden, I want you.” I grab a
handful of yellow hair and yank her head back. “Say it!”

“Jay...Jayden, I want you.”

I ram into Barbie with the intent of hurting her.

She starts grunting like a pig. Barbie always sounds like a
pig during copulation, tiny little grunts.

She is not supposed to enjoy sex with Jayden!

I try to pull out but she locks her legs around me. She rocks
her hips, grunting and snorting, and shaking all over. She runs her hands over
her breasts and squeezes. Her eyes are closed and she is panting. She screams
out, “Jayden,”

My sword goes limp and shrinks to one of those little dull knives
for spreading soft cheese on a stale cracker.

Her head falls back against the bed of the pickup. An evil
gleam sparkles from her eyes. “You know I said Jayden on purpose just to goad
you, sugar pie.”

I turn my back to her and zip up my pants. This has never
happened before, not being able to finish to completion. Bubba has a difficult
time in bed but then he is old. He ordered a pump. Barbie always laughs about
men who are not really men.

She smiles with her legs spread. Her eyes cloud with the
aftermath of good sex. She licks her lips and moans.

Is she still thinking of my brother? But...it was I, not
Jayden, who made her scream out with pleasure. But...she screamed out my
brother’s name.
My Goddamn head is throbbing. I am confusing myself with
Jayden. The same thing happened in Canada a few times with my slut Vanessa. No,
she is my brother’s whore. Barbie, the woman I love, wants to get it on with my
brother.

Barbie leans against the back of the pickup, sighing
contentedly. The vamp could care less about my aching heart. She lights a
cigarette. “Bubba asked me where I was going, and I told him to the hospital to
visit a friend so he let me out of the house. You being gone so long helped. My
hubby is not so suspicious any more, lover. I’ve been working on Bubba since
you came back from Philly.” She frowns and mumbles, “I mean, since Jayden
traded places with you.”

She said my brother’s name with a deep sigh and she
clenched her crotch, her eyes all dreamy.

“Bubba really believes me when I tell him how much I’ve come
to love only him.” She laughs and then snorts like a piglet. “Old fart looks at
me all starry eyed like I make him the happiest man who ever lived. We still have
to be careful though. Ugh! His touch is like a reptile.” Barbie shudders and blows
out smoke through her pinched nostrils, the result of too much cocaine.

I sprinkle some coke on her bare feet, rolling up a $10 bill,
and snorting from her toes. Instant high, though sweat drenches my face and my
heart is going like a roller coaster. “So when are you gonna leave Bubba for me?”
I ask in a sulky voice.

“Are you crazy?” she shouts. She flicks her cigarette away,
no longer in the mood for a smoke. “I’ve seen Bubba’s will. If he dies of a
heart attack because I leave him for another man, then I get nothing. You think
I put up with that old fart all these years to walk away with just the clothes
on my back?”

“I ought to murder that husband of yours, and then we could
be together.” I sit down beside her and she inches away from me. I sling an arm
around her and nibble on her shoulder. Many times, we have imagined Bubba’s
death.

Barbie shoves me. “You leave Bubba Simpson alone, Brad
O’Boyle. If he dies under any mysterious circumstance, I will get none of his
millions. Zippo. Nothing. His entire fortune will go to his kids.”

“Would you leave Bubba for Jayden if he asked you?”

“Well your brother doesn’t have a wife and a kid does he?
Maybe you ought to kill your wife and I would consider it,” she says laughing.

“My brother has a fiancée. Jayden is engaged to a beautiful
woman.”

She rolls her eyes. “Quit acting insanely jealous, Brad. I
don’t really know your brother.” She dusts off her jeans and pulls her t-shirt
out to cover the rip on her zipper. “I’ve got to go over to the hospital and
pick up something at the gift shop so Bubba will know I was telling the truth
when I said my girlfriend was sick.”

Barbie jumps off the pickup and climbs in the driver’s seat,
revving up the engine.

I pound the window with my fist. “Lying cunt! What really
happened between you and Jayden?”

Quick, she locks the doors. The wheels of her pickup spin in
the dirt, and Barbie nearly runs over my toes and disappears in a cloud of dust.

I slam the door so hard of my Mercedes, the car rocks on its
tires.

She wants to fuck Jayden!
The thought keeps going
through my brain and I can barely make out the road.

Okay, calm down. Do not get so upset that you crash into
the car in front of you. Don’t drive down Capital of Texas Highway like a crazy
man.

I cuddle with my folks, and then drive home.

Ronni’s romantic candlelight dinner
she prepared for the two of us is piled in the
sink.

Ronni cooked me a romantic candlelight dinner.  Before I
went to Philly, she would have liked to poison me.

Just what was Jayden up to with my wife?

The bitches all prefer my brother, Vanessa, Ronni, and now
Barbie.

BRAD

I mumble, half-asleep, “This is Dr. O’Boyle,” using my title
out of habit.

“This is Dr. Tremblay. You asked Vanessa to marry me!”

 “Can’t this wait, dude? It’s two a.m. here.”

“No, it cannot wait. I distinctly told you to break up with Vanessa.”

“I’m not a trained monkey you can just order around, man.”

“The breakup was the only reason I agreed to our charade. You
had no right asking her to marry me; I mean, marry you.”

I jerk up in bed, banging my skull against the headboard. “I
already have a wife, remember? The marriage proposal was a joke.”

“Well, I’m not laughing. You bought her an expensive
engagement ring charged to
my
credit card!”

“You don’t want to be cheap when asking a woman to be your
wife.”

“Get back to Canada and break up with Vanessa, now!”

“Tell her to get lost yourself.”

“You promised to dump her.”

“Fine. Whatever. I’ll fly back tomorrow after work.”

“I’ll book two flights and email you the travel
arrangements.”

Jayden slams down the phone. Ouch, my ears.

I tiptoe down the stairs, snapping on the study light. Thorns
cut my hands as I yank roses from a vase, ripping petals and leaves from the
stems. I break the stems over my knee, pushing some thorns into my naked thigh.

I roar from the pain and march into the den with my arms
held out like a zombie in a monster movie.

There are three dozen frickin’ roses in here and I slam the
vases on the floor, drowning some of the carpet in water.

I stand there with blood dripping down my arms and legs
thinking Jayden played his own joke on me with Barbie, and it is not funny, not
by a long shot.

Ronni has been nicer and acting lovey-dovey because she
thought I sent her the roses, even though there was no name on the card for
recipient or from sender. Of course, the roses are mine, which was why Jayden
left the names of the recipient and sender blank. The flowers were a thank you
for letting him masquerade as me.

He wrote me four notes with his four dozen roses and I now
see a sinister meaning.

The note with the red roses reads: For taking advantage of
me.

No, you took advantage of me!

The note with the black roses reads: For giving me what I
wanted.

You mean, for giving you Barbie!

The note with the yellow roses reads: You light up my life.

Well, that is very true.

The note with the white roses reads: Because I am sorry.

And I’m sorry, too, that I ever met you, Jayden Tremblay.

I claw the sides of my face, drawing blood.
This is
Jayden’s face, his skin.

I fall to my knees, sobbing like a baby.

Dammit, why couldn’t my brother love me!