The Lie (23 page)

Of course I had
thought about marrying Heather a few times. Or I guess I should say I just kind of expected that after we got back together that second time we’d eventually wind up together, married. What I had really never thought about were the steps required to get to that eventual outcome. I had never thought about a ring, the wedding itself, the honeymoon, where we’d live, how I’d pay for any of it, if we’d have kids, none of that shit. As it turned out, I was about to start thinking of at least one of those things pretty fucking quickly.

Heather wanted to go to Homebar because a bunch of her sorority sisters were going to get together for drinks. I had met quite a few of her sisters during our freshman year but I had never really hung out with them because I never went to any of the parties they threw. I kind of saw Heather wanting me to go to Homebar with her as her making an effort to include me in that part of her life. Even before we broke up, it wasn’t a problem necessarily that she did her sorority thing and I wasn’t really involved, but I was happy that she was trying to include me in that shit.

Andrea was the only other girl from Heather’s sorority who was there when we showed up. I had met her probably a dozen or so times before that night and even hung out with her a few times freshman year before Heather and I broke up. I liked Andrea. She was always nice to me, while some of Heather’s other sorority sisters could be complete cunts to me just because I wasn’t in a frat.

As the other chicks started showing up, some of the cunts I mentioned were among them, which didn’t bother me all that much. Honestly I felt like Heather and I were so close then that nothing else mattered. At one point, when one of her cunty sorority sisters started kind of picking on me for spending too much time studying and not enough partying or whatever in the fuck she thought was important, Heather actually jumped in and said, “Can you seriously like leave him alone? He’s my boyfriend. If we’re really supposed to be like sisters and everything, you should be cool with him,” and it was one of those moments with Heather that, even after all the shit that led us to where we are now, I still think about sometimes, remembering why I loved her so much.

As the night wore on, a girl named Harlow showed up and all of the other Kappa Kappa Gammas kind of crowded in around her and were giving her hugs and generally acting like she was the Virgin Mary about to give birth to fucking Jesus or something. When I asked Heather what the deal was she said, “Harlow is the first senior to get proposed to.”

I said, “Okay, why is everyone acting so crazy about it?”

She said, “Uh, are you kidding? She’s like locked in already. That’s like seriously a big deal. I mean look at her ring.”

Then Heather made this girl come over and show me her ring. I didn’t know anything about diamonds or rings or any of that shit, but even I could tell somebody dished out a truckload of cash for this thing. It was fucking insane. I remembered one of the things Heather had to do when she was a pledge our freshman year was this fund-raising event for homeless and displaced children and women in Africa. All I could think when I was looking at this girl’s giant diamond ring was that the part of her brain that should have been registering the hypocrisy of the situation must not have existed. The diamond was probably worth enough to build houses for one hundred families in Africa, and what was even worse was that it was probably a fucking conflict diamond that led to the very families she was trying to help with her charity fund-raising being put out of their homes.

Harlow said, “I just had it cleaned. Supposedly it added like three percent more clarity.”

Heather leaned in, looked at the ring, and said, “Oh yeah, you can totally tell.”

I remember looking at Heather as she looked at that ring. Her eyes got big and took on a kind of creepy glint that was like fucking Gollum in
Lord of the Rings
looking at the One Ring. I saw that look in her eyes, but I was so in love with her that it didn’t even register with me as a potential problem. I just got another beer and was happy to be hanging out with the girl I loved. In no part of my mind did I think that her almost literal salivation over a diamond would ever be a factor in our relationship. And that inability to see things that are right in front of my fucking face is what has led me to where I am now.

The rest of the night was pretty unremarkable until the last of Heather’s sorority sisters decided to show up. Jenna, the girl I fucked at Brett’s house, came in already pretty drunk.

I hadn’t seen or talked to this girl since the night I fucked her at Brett’s house. I knew Heather knew we fucked, but we never really talked about it because I got the feeling she didn’t want to, just like we didn’t really talk about much of what she did during the time we were apart because I didn’t really want to know the details. But when Jenna walked in, that kind of unspoken moratorium we had put on shit like that went out the window pretty fast—through no fault of my own, I might add.

The drunken Jenna came up to us and said to me, “Hey. I like totally remember you.”

I looked at Heather and she didn’t look too happy about the conversation she already knew was inevitable.

Jenna continued on, “You were at Brett Keller’s house that one night and we like totally fucked, didn’t we?”

I said, “Yes.”

Jenna said, “And it was right after you two broke up, right?”

I said, “Yes.”

Jenna said, “But you’re like back together or whatever, right?”

I said, “Yes.”

Jenna said, “Oh, that sucks. Seriously I would fuck you again, you were pretty fucking good.”

Heather, at that point, had had enough. She said, “Jenna, he’s my fucking boyfriend. Can you like stop or something?”

Jenna said, “Sorry. Don’t like be mad. He’s a good fuck and you got him. Why are you like mad?”

Heather said, “I’m not mad. Can we just like not talk about you fucking my boyfriend, though? Would that be okay?”

Jenna said, “Fine. Sorry.” And then she gave Heather a sloppy and drunk hug and kiss and wandered off into the small group of Kappa Kappa Gammas.

Heather turned to me and said, “You want to leave?”

I said, “Sure.”

As we drove back to my apartment that night I remember thinking that I realized Heather actually never stopped loving me even when we were apart. If hearing Jenna talk about the one time we had sex bothered her so much, I thought Heather must have just been confused or something when we broke up. That night actually made me love her more, or at least feel like she loved me more than she did. Little did I know how completely fucking wrong I was.

I was on my way back
from my first actual field exercise at a grade school in Flower Mound called Garden Ridge, where I basically just had to sit in this third grade classroom and like watch what the teacher did and how she handled the kids and everything, when I got this text from Brian. He was like, “What up? Haven’t talked n a minute. Wondering how u been. Hit me back.”

I ignored it at first because on the drive back to campus I was like seriously thinking about teaching and everything. After I watched that class I wasn’t really that sure I wanted to be a teacher anymore. Or I guess it was more like I kind of figured out that I never really wanted to be a teacher and it just seemed like something that was really easy to major in, which it was, for sure, but actually seeing what I was going to be doing if I ended up doing that as a job seemed really shitty. But it was like pretty much way too late to be changing my major and everything. So I figured I’d just stick it out and hope that whoever I ended up marrying would make enough money that I wouldn’t have to work. And then, as soon as I thought that, I started thinking that it was probably pretty likely I’d end up with Kyle. And then as soon as I thought that, I started thinking about if I really wanted to be with Kyle, because if he became a doctor he would probably make a pretty good amount of money and everything, but after college he would have to do medical school and all of that and a residency or whatever and that would take a long fucking time. It would be way easier just to get some guy who was already rich or who was going to have like some kind of business job making 100k right out of school or something. But as soon as I started thinking about any other guy besides Kyle I just couldn’t see it, you know?

Obviously, I hate Kyle now. Or, no, actually I just kind of feel sorry for him. But on that drive home I remember really coming to the realization that like I wanted to be with him, even if it meant having to work for a few years while he was becoming a doctor. I knew I wouldn’t like working, but I figured I could handle it for a little while, and then as soon as Kyle got a job as a surgeon or whatever I wouldn’t ever have to work again.

When I got back to campus I went to the Kappa house and started trying to write my paper that was due the next day in field experience. I had to report on how the class observation went, and write about what I learned and crap like that. I didn’t think it would take me too long, but then Brian started texting me again.

At first he was like, “U get my last text?”

And I just ignored it. Then he was like, “Plz dont ignore me. I just want to make sure ur ok.”

I totally knew he was probably feeling guilty for that night and he either wanted to make sure I wasn’t pissed so he could clear his conscience or what was actually probably way more likely was that he was scared I was going to tell somebody and he’d be fucked. I wanted to just keep ignoring him and let him wonder if I’d ever tell anyone about it, but I needed to write my paper and it didn’t seem like he was going to stop texting me so I was like, “Everythings kewl. Bye.”

Then he was like, “U think we could get together soon?”

I was like, “Why?”

He was like, “Bcuz I wanna talk.”

I was like, “What about?”

He was like, “Just catch up.”

I was like, “Not a good idea.”

He was like, “Why?”

I was like, “I have a bf.”

He was like, “I heard. So?”

I was like, “So, not a good idea.”

He was like, “I miss you.”

I was like, “Not a good idea. Bye.”

He missed me? What in the fuck was that supposed to mean? Was it like he missed fucking me, or he missed drugging me and letting his gross friend fuck me, or he actually missed me? We didn’t ever really do anything that wasn’t like partying or fucking when we were a couple, so I didn’t think he actually missed me. So he must have just been trying to fuck me again or something. Whatever.

He didn’t text me again for the rest of the night, but it started me thinking about Kyle and about Brian and about pretty much everything that happened since freshman year with every guy I had done anything with. All the guys I gave head to and all the guys I fucked and Josh and even Brett and like how I wanted to fuck him when I started dating Kyle and everything. And as I thought about all of those guys I pretty much figured out that Kyle was like the best of all of them. I’d never fucked Brett or anything, but most of my sorority sisters had and I heard the stories and he sounded pretty nasty. Like he did really gross shit to them and everything. Kyle wasn’t like that, and that night as I wrote my paper I was like pretty sure Kyle was exactly what I wanted. He wasn’t mean or gross or a fucking asshole. He was like the best boyfriend I had ever had and after I finished my paper, I went to sleep that night really feeling good about the possibility that I would probably be his wife one day.

Kyle’s apartment was nice enough.
I didn’t mind spending time there when I was driven from my own home by the presence of my father’s wife and when I was coincidentally driven from my room in the Alpha Tau Omega house by the unbearable Wednesday pornography night, of course designed and overseen by Greg, in which each member of Alpha Tau Omega was required to bring and screen the most disgusting pornography he could find, most often involving homosexual or transsexual acts, all while Greg performed “boner checks.” If a participant was discovered by Greg to be in a state of arousal at any point during the screening of the pornography, he would be singled out and required to masturbate to completion in front of everyone in a certain amount of time while being forced to watch a specific piece of pornography used specifically for this purpose. It was a four-minute clip referred to in the Alpha Tau Omega house as “Shitdick.”

Although the moniker given to the clip by the members of Alpha Tau Omega is accurately descriptive, it by no means conveys the worst of what the clip has to offer. In the clip, three men are engaged in sexual activity. Two of them are performing oral sex on each other in a standard sixty-nine position. A third is fucking the man in the top position of the sixty-nine in his ass, occasionally removing his dick and forcing the man in the bottom position to perform fellatio on him. This continues for a solid two minutes until the third participant forces his dick back into the ass of the man in the top position at the same time the man in the top position’s asshole expels a significant quantity of fecal material the consistency of a mashed banana. The feces coat the third man’s cock, balls, and entire pubic region, which doesn’t deter him in any way from continuing to fuck the man in the top position. As the third man’s dick rams in and out of the man in the top position’s asshole, the feces slide down onto the face of the man in the bottom position, into his mouth, eyes, nose, et cetera, which does nothing to deter him from continuing to suck the cock of the man in the top position. This continues for another minute or so until the third man pulls out and jerks off into the asshole of the man in the top position and into the face of the man in the bottom position. In the finale, all three of the men kiss one another and lick the semen and feces off each other’s faces.

If the Alpha Tau Omega brother caught in a state of arousal was unable to reach orgasm by the end of “Shitdick” he was then forced to do a “Row Run,” which required him to run the entire length of fraternity row naked. It seemed strange to me that no one ever opted to do the “Row Run” outright and avoid the clearly homosexual behavior that was masturbating in a room full of men.

At any rate, I found both my home and my room at the Alpha Tau Omega house to be uninhabitable at this time, and so I was at Kyle’s apartment playing
Mario Kart
with him when Heather unlocked the door and walked in without knocking. This was the first time I came to learn that Kyle had obviously given her a key. It wasn’t that disturbing to me, based only on the fact that I hadn’t noticed a large number of her belongings in his apartment yet. While she had free access to his home, she had not, at that point, made it her own.

She was always strange around me throughout the second incarnation of her relationship with Kyle. I assumed it was because she feared that one day I would divulge to Kyle the details of some other depraved act I had witnessed her participating in at a Greek party, something beyond the dick-sucking, something maybe she didn’t even remember doing. What she didn’t know, however, was that Kyle was convinced he couldn’t be without her. I felt, at that point, I could have shown Kyle a video of Heather being fucked by the entire SMU football team and he wouldn’t have cared enough to break up with her.

When she came in she engaged me in brief conversation, attempting to seem interested in what I had to say about whatever matters she had brought up. It was clear she had some agenda in the conversation that she was waiting to engage, giving me time to speak so the transition to her topic would seem more natural, hoping that in random conversation I would deliver a segue that would make what she would say next seem prompted.

If my memory serves, I was in the middle of talking about cryogenics and how it seemed less than likely that any science would ever find a way to reanimate dead flesh, but that nonetheless even if the odds were less than one-tenth of one percent, those odds of cheating death were literally infinitely better than the absolute zero of burial and hoping for a spiritual afterlife that simply does not exist, when Heather chose her time to force a conversation about engagement rings.

Aside from clearly reminding me why I despise all women, the conversation served an even greater purpose. It illuminated the disturbing level of devotion Kyle had developed for Heather. I’m not suggesting that the game of
Mario Kart
had any importance in the grand scheme of life, but certainly it rivaled the conversation about the cut and clarity of stone Heather desired in whatever engagement ring she was to receive that Kyle abandoned the game for.

As I sat on his couch with the game paused I was forced to listen to Heather drone on and on and insist that her engagement ring needn’t be overly expensive but that she really couldn’t see herself wearing anything less than two and a half carats and the setting had to be platinum or white gold and she wanted a princess cut and a million other meaningless things that all faded into a general high-pitched whine as I stared at the pause screen.

The net result of this conversation between them was that Kyle was certainly more than willing to entertain the idea of buying her an engagement ring. I wondered how aware Heather could have possibly been of Kyle’s financial status. I knew something about rings, only due to the fact that my father had purchased two during my lifetime, for his current wife and for the one prior. I knew the qualities Heather was demanding were by no means qualities possessed by the most expensive rings in the world, but neither were they possessed by any ring Kyle would be able to afford in the foreseeable future. I could only assume that Heather had no concerns about Kyle’s ability to get the funds to purchase such a ring or what he might have to do to get said funds.

The most disturbing part of the conversation came when Heather opened her wallet and removed several pictures of engagement rings that she had cut out of magazines and catalogs. She had subsequently drawn diagrams on each of these pictures illustrating which qualities in each ring she would most want to be synthesized in her own ring. The attention Kyle paid to this was astounding.

At the conversation’s end, Heather left the room, explaining that she didn’t want to take up any more of our quality time. She left her diagrammed engagement ring pictures lying on Kyle’s coffee table, as if to insinuate that she was leaving them for him in order to aid him in the purchase of her ring.

I was more than disgusted as Kyle unpaused the game and we continued to race.