A Wicked Choice (8 page)

“Are you really that dumb?” a voice called out to me. 

Where did that come from? I turned around in a circle, but couldn’t see anyone or anything, other than the street, shops, homes, sidewalks, and flowerbeds. I peered through the lush ferns and fuchsias in someone’s yard, in the direction that I thought the voice had come from.

“Yes, I’m talking to you, dear.” There it was again. The voice sounded like…yes, it sounded like the voice of that old woman who had come to my class. Great. Now, I was hearing things. Without another thought, I ran to my car, locked the doors, and drove home chock full of paranoia.

Cameron Delaney Tyson sat at his worn brown desk at the Seattle High Road Recovery building. High Road Recovery provided treatment for substance abuse and DUI/DWI offenders, as well as various programs for women and men. Cam facilitated groups of abusive men, night after night. Court-ordered to participate, most of the men were manipulative and full of grandiosity, spending their time figuring out how to work the system, rather than change. Cam hated that. He often perceived himself to be a babysitter for grown men with the minds of childish bullies.

His office had flickering fluorescent lights overhead which drove him mad with their insistent flicker and hum. He’d asked to get it fixed on several occasions to no avail. Sometimes he wanted to take a hammer to it and be done with it. The walls were cluttered with posters about HIV, teenage pregnancy, and the escalating drug use in the greater Seattle area. A couple of miserable teens peered out at him from the poster, needles and pills at their side. In another, a beautiful young woman with bright smiling eyes was framed in a picture next to a snapshot of her current self: an old-looking, washed up 26-year-old woman with missing teeth who was hooked on meth. It was a sad poster.

He was dressed in a pair of light brown cargo pants, a green plaid flannel shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and a pair of Keen’s hiking shoes. His desk was, as usual, cluttered with papers, articles he had brought in, and books. If anyone tried to straighten up his desk, he got pissed, way pissed.  He knew where everything was in this landslide. He leaned back in his chair, a squeaky, clunky wooden chair from another era, and stretched. Man, what a long day. He looked up at the old circular school clock that hung on the wall. It was nearly 8:30 pm. He should finish up and head for home. Chérie would probably be there when he got home.

Chérie... he rubbed his hands over his jaw, lined with a day’s stubble, and thought of her. How he cared about her. He remembered the day he first saw her at U-Dub. She was virtually bouncing along, golden reddish lights shimmering from her short, glossy hair. Her slender body was vibrating with energy. Damn, he loved that body…all taut muscles and smooth, sensuous skin. And her face – it was fine boned with golden Lynx-like eyes that made his heart melt. He was hooked right from the start. At first glance, he wanted to wrap her in his arms and kiss her long and thoroughly. He had wanted to claim her, like some territorial beast. You, Jane... Me, Tarzan. Where the fuck did THAT come from? Jesus Christ, he got hard just thinking about her. And SO fucking sweet. She was probably the sweetest woman he had ever met. But goddamn it all to hell, he wished she’d stick up for herself. She let people run all over her, use her. He couldn’t stand that.

He’d been raised by one son-of-a-bitch father who slapped his mom around a lot. His father would constantly berate her and, when drunk, use his fists to drive home his angry points, whatever the hell they were. “You’re not doing this right, not doing that right.” Cam had hated it as a child, and he hated it still. At 17, he’d finally stood up for his mother, belted his father in the jaw, and got the hell out of there, moving in with his Grandma Guinevere. He had never looked back, never hit another person…he’d also never seen his mom again. He’d had enough of living with violence. That’s partly why he did these groups for men in recovery, if you could call it that. If he could make a difference in one man’s life, he felt he’d atone for his father’s failures.

Tonight he had had the WORST suck-ass group. Those foul mouth lugs that he was supposed to be guiding on their way to non-violence were too much to take sometimes. He knew he
wasn’t making a difference in anyone’s life in there. He got so tired of the stonewalling, the silence, and the refusal to take ownership of their behavior.  It was just like being in his childhood home.

But he had a couple more months to finish his internship. He was finishing up a degree in counseling, and this gig at High Road Recovery was an important one. The only thing was, now that he was nearly finished, he wished he’d taken a different road. What he really wanted to do was become one of those Outward Bound leaders…take kids out into the world and change their lives through physical adventures…something like that. He liked creating change in people. He also loved physical challenges, craved them, and was good at them. Like when he was rock climbing, his hands knew where to go, where to reach. When he touched the wall, his mind raced with the information his hands provided.

Again, he thought of Chérie. He just loved stroking her tender skin, kneading her muscles, sore from all that exercise. Most of all he really enjoyed stroking her with parts of him that he would not share with anyone else…those parts that were stirring in his groin right fucking now.

He wondered why it was so hard for her to let go with him sometimes. Couldn’t she feel how much he cherished her? Didn’t she believe she was truly adored? It was probably her lack of self-confidence and her inability to say NO to him, to anyone. She groveled and shrank from people. She thought everything was her fault and that she had to fix it or just suck it up and chew on it. Like last night: he was pissed when he had come home from group. He’d taken just about enough of last night’s collection of men. Those men were just buying time in the class. Since the only reason they were there was to avoid jail time, they’d show up and sit through week after week, with no change in their behavior. He was so sick of it, he was, well, let’s face it – when Chér came in, he was having a tantrum, pitching books on the floor and stomping about.  He slammed a book on the table, right when she entered the room. He wasn’t proud of himself in that moment; he was just letting off steam. But she probably thought he was mad at her. He threw a newspaper across the room, and she had scuffled over to clean up the mess.

“Don’t do that. It’s my mess, not yours,” he had told her. He strode over and started picking up the pieces of newspaper, angrily crushing them into a wad.  Then he’d apologized, like he always did. He could be such an ass. But then he’d become mad at her subservience. That was just the way his mom had been with his dad. Mom just took it, night after night. So then he and Chérie got in another argument, like they’d been doing lately. He wanted to do right by her, he really did. But he wanted her to act differently, assume her strength. She was too good to be run over by the world. She had this spark of something inside, he could feel it.  And he wanted her to feel it too. He wanted her to be different. She just made him so mad sometimes. Man, he was starting to sound like the men in his groups. “She asked for it.” “I didn’t want to hit her.” Well, she, by god, was not going to feel anything but fear if he kept being a shithead. He knew he could do better than that. Fuck, he had better man up and act differently, or he and Chér were going to hit the skids. And he didn’t want that, not by a long shot.

He got up with resolve, picked up his brown leather jacket, and strode out to his forest green 1998 Range Rover, prepared to be a better man when he got home.

“You got some mail, from your mother.” That is what Cam first told me when I’d entered the door after hanging out with Michael.

I looked over on the table where we sorted the day’s mail.  Sure enough, there was one of Mother Clarice’s snail-mailed envelopes, stuffed full.  When she was drunk (which was often) and the mood struck (which was also often), she had this habit of sending me odd bits of news clipped from the paper, pictures, and articles from magazines – anything that caught her fancy and carried the message of the day. I made my way over and picked it up, frowning. What stupid thing did she want me to know about today? I pitched the envelope into the junk drawer to be opened at a later date.

I looked over at Cam. “Did you eat?”

“Yea, I snacked a bit…how about you?”

“I stopped for a sandwich on the way home.”

He gave me an intense look. “Come here, babe. I missed you.”

I looked at him quizzically and politely sauntered over to him. Hadn’t he just seen me this morning? He nuzzled my neck and slid his lips up for a kiss. “Mmm, you taste like beer.”

Pushing him back, I answered, “Yeah, I had a beer with Michael after my meeting with Jill.”

“Oh, I forgot about that meeting. How did it go?”

“Not the best. I have to work with this greasy guy name Mr. Dallas. He and Jill want me to dress up like a slut to sell their auction items.”

“Like a slut? What makes you say that?”

“That is what they said. Mr. Dallas told me, ‘Dress in something racy and we’ll sell lots of auction items.’  Jill agreed.”

“Wear whatever you want, babe. Don’t let them push you around.”

“I won’t.” I glanced over at Mac and Jack, staring at me. “Did you feed the boys?”

Mac saw me looking at him and sauntered over.
Did not.

Jack looked up from his grooming.
Empty bowls.

“Hold on a minute, and let me feed them.” I slipped from Cam’s arms and strode over to the cupboard where the cat food was kept.

“Cam…” I said in a tentative voice. “Do you think sex is fun?”

He paused for a second before answering. “I guess I never thought about it, but sure. Why do you ask?”

“Oh, Michael was telling me how much fun he has with sex.”

“Michael does not have a serious or committed bone in his body. When it’s a one night stand on his and his terms alone, how can it be anything BUT fun? Of course he said that.”

“It sounded good to me. I want it to be fun. Are you saying it’s not fun having sex with me?”

Now Cam tensed a little. “No, I am not saying that at all. I love making love with you.”

I considered that. “Yeah, me, too...  I just wish I didn’t have such a hard time letting go. I get so nervous sometimes. I…I just check out and tense up.”

“That has never bothered me,” Cam said.

I looked at his face, searching for a sign that he was telling the truth. “Well, okay. I believe you. But are you ever attracted to anyone else?” I asked, thinking about the dark haired guy.

Uh oh…
Mac thought.

Here we go
, thought Jack.
It’s this topic again
.

Cam narrowed his eyes. “Why are you asking me this? We’ve had this talk before.”

“I just wondered.”

“Well, don’t wonder. The same is true as always. I notice women, I look at them, but at the end of the day I only want to come home and be with YOU.”

“Uh huh.”

“What do you mean ‘Uh huh’?” Now Cam was getting visibly upset. “Are you attracted to Michael now?”

“God, no, not Michael…I’m attracted to YOU.” I smiled as sweetly at him as I could, pushing a persistent thought of the dark haired guy under my inner rug. I hoped Cam sensed that the hotness I was feeling was for him – not the dark haired guy.

“Then come here and show me,” Cam said, eyes still tightened.

When I did as he requested, I felt him relax a little. I slipped my hands under his flannel shirt and caressed his back.

“That’s better,” he murmured, offering a reciprocal embrace and calming even more. “Let’s take this into another room, shall we?”

I politely followed him up the stairs.

That night I had another weird dream. This time I was watching a woman stretched out on a wooden pyre. She looked extremely sad. Tears were falling down her cheeks, creating huge puddles on each side of her face. The puddles leaked down the sides of the pyre in long, uneven streaks. To the left of her were all these hovering, dark, ghostly figures. They were gazing at the left side of her chest. “There’s still a lot of work to be done,” they said in low sinister voices. “Still some heart left in this one. We’ll have to extract it soon.”

I felt a curious detachment watching them. I floated overhead to get a better view.  When I saw the woman’s face, I woke up with a start in the dream, lucidly conscious. That woman was ME. I tried to wake up for real, but could not. I willed myself to wake up. “Wake up, wake up, wake up, wake UP! Come on, come on, come ON!” I felt panicked and freaked out. I could not, or would not, wake up. “WAKE UP, Cheerio, WAKE UP!” I wailed, as the sight of me surrounded by those ghastly characters continued under my spectral gaze.

Then I felt myself rise in a sudden burst of swiftness like I was on a super-fast elevator. In the next scene, I was sitting in a desert somewhere, stars twinkling in the indigo night, a slice of new moon in the sky. The dark haired guy was sitting across from me, legs folded in a cross legged position.

“Hi, sexy girl…”

I stared at him, mouth open and aghast. His golden eyes were utterly hypnotic, reminding me of a show I had seen about solar flares. As he looked at me, I pictured those bursts of energy exploding off the surface of the sun, all magnetic energy and sudden gusts of mega-heat.

“My, my, that’s not a proper greeting. Here, try this.” He leaned forward and moved his lips inches from mine. I felt a curious surge of energy as his lips got closer. I thought he was going to kiss me, but he stopped when his lips were a mere half-inch away from mine. “Don’t move,” he said in a sultry voice.

I sat there, breathing slowly and quietly, as this pulsing sensation poured down me. On the in breath, I could feel warm, soft, honey-like, liquid-like energy coursing through my windpipe, passing my heart, and filling my pelvis. On the out breath I felt a rush of pleasure, rolling like a wave, from between my legs into his mouth. In breath, out breath, in breath, out breath…we inhaled and exhaled like that for a long, dream-like time.

I really, really want to kiss you
, I thought in his direction.

I really, really will not
, he thought in return.
No more thinking, just breathe
. We breathed.

My thoughts arose again, this time with insistence.
I really, really, REALLY want to kiss you
.

And I really, really, REALLY will not. If you won’t stop thinking, this will end
.

I tried to just breathe, but my wanting was so acute I ached with need. Unable to stand this any longer, I started to move my lips towards him. With a burst, the dream disappeared. I woke up, completely aroused, next to Cam. I shot out of bed with a start.

“What’s the matter, sweetheart?” Cam asked drowsily.

“Nothing…it’s nothing. Go back to sleep.” My breath was coming hard and fast, like I’d been running. I slipped to the other side of the bed and kissed Cam’s cheek. “Go back to sleep. It’s nothing…odd dreams.” I stood there, naked and shivering, until I heard him go back to sleep. Then I grabbed my robe and headed downstairs.

Sitting in the dining room, in the dark, I listened to the night sounds coming through the open window. There was the hoot of an owl…the yowl of a cat. I hoped the cat was not yowling because of the owl then thought better. The owl wouldn’t exactly announce his presence, would he? This thought made me smile. “Hey, cat – over here,” I pictured the owl saying with a hoot. Wouldn’t happen...it was more like “Hey, cat – watch your back. I’ve got my eyes trained on YOU.” I heard the bushes rustle softly and wondered if a deer or raccoon was moving about. As I concentrated on these sounds, my breathing started to slow. I rubbed my forehead with my fingers, and then pressed them into my temples. I still felt the stirrings of arousal from my dream-meeting with the dark haired guy.
Shit, shit, shit
, I thought. I was not prone to cursing, but they just seemed like the right words at this moment.

To distract myself, I padded my bare feet over to the junk drawer to find the bottle opener. Maybe I would have another beer. I was not much of a drinker, but this moment called for it. Moving my hand around inside the drawer, I came across Mother Clarice’s latest news packet. That would distract me. It might even upset me – even better.

I pulled the large envelope out of the drawer and ripped it open. Emptying the contents onto the dining room table, I turned on a soft lamp. An assortment of paper clippings and pictures were spread inside. There were notes in the margins, paragraphs circled with red pen, and Post-it notes if the message couldn’t fit in the margins. The notes read: ‘Chérie – here is an article on aerobics for children…thought you might like it.’ And, ‘Chérie, read about banking problems in the Midwest before you think about investing.’ Like I had any money to invest. Here was a good one: ‘Chérie – here is tax advice about filing under married status.’  The word “married” had been underlined twice. She knew Cam and I were not even considering getting married.

I dropped the clippings and their respective notes into the trash can in the corner and saw some photographs flutter out. I picked them out of the trash. Mother Clarice had written on them in ink: ‘Here is your uncle George.’ And, ‘This was our last family reunion. Wasn’t that a blast?’

No, it sure was not
, I thought. I picked up another photo – this one black and white – that read: ‘You, as a child, with your Uncle Anders, your cousin Samantha, and your aunt.’ I squinted at the picture. I had never seen it before or at least don’t remember seeing it. Uncle Anders? Aunt Something or Other?  I didn’t recall that pair. Did they die? Were they on my mom’s side or my dad’s? I looked all of about seven or eight years old in the picture. There was a scowl on my face, my mouth was turned down. I stood between my supposed aunt and uncle, arms clenched around my tummy, legs stiff and crossed at the ankles. I wore little shorts with a flower on one leg and a collared, short-sleeved shirt with buttons down the front.  My short bangs were uneven and poked out at funny angles. I didn’t remember anything about that picture. How odd. I sure looked miserable.

My uncle in the picture was looking down at me, beaming. My aunt’s shadowed face was looking at my uncle with an accusatory glare. This Samantha girl was looking down at the ground. “What a weird shot,” I mused, tossing the picture into the trash with the remainder of the
envelope’s contents. Foraging in the refrigerator, I found a beer in the back. I took it out and twisted the top off, then chugged it down my throat in one long, mind-numbing swallow.