When we last left our theologically challenged protagonist, The Reverend Doctor Green, he was facing charges of possession of illicit fungi with intent to devolve in rural Joseph, Oregon whilst twirling in a cloud of tie dye at the annual hippy blues and beer bust/fest. Dr. Green was at the time on a court ordered sabbatical from his duties as City Attorney of Canyon Valley, California. While the basis for the court order, or perhaps better put, the restraining order, cannot be divulged herein, it can be stated with a certain degree of confidence that the good doctor’s transgressions had nothing to do with guns, real property or that secretary over in community services he obsessed just might be hitting on him. He would have been wrong on that count, but then, perhaps there may lie the basis for said restraining order. [heh, heh]

with intent to devolve

hehehe

Not that any of it made sense, Dr. Green thought. Things never seem to make sense when he wakes up to a head throbbing to a heavy disco beat sans the actual disco beat. Like sleeping inside an active bass drum, the Good Doctor’s head was expanding and contracting to the point of rupture or perhaps, rapture. And yet, the Reverend didn’t believe in any of that tribulation bull shit. No sir. God dealt one a hand and that’s what you are going to play, thought the Rev. Bluffing, and cheating and calling and raising, but that hand had to be played. And sometimes, the Rev played his hand exceedingly well.

And yet, he knew he would miss the Cheerleader, the name he called the customer services secretary that he had a secret crush on for the last few years. A former model, she stood five feet eight inches tall, legs to die for and a body that saw the inside of a gym every morning at 4:30 a.m. He knew she was no good for him, and he knew she would destroy his life, but it didn’t make the pain of office crush lust any easier. But, he acknowledged, the timing was not right. And, perhaps, the timing would never be right.

Thank god for therapists.

Satire.

Portnoy's Complaint: A disorder in which strongly-felt ethical and altruistic impulses are perpetually warring with extreme sexual longings, often of a perverse nature...

(did you know Roth was also a lawyer?


More, More!

doh!

I think I've figured out who the Night Bard is!

The mid life crisis action plan was almost complete in that he took delivery of his new sport (ok, "sporty") car the day before. Glossy jet black, with a hood as long as he wished his dick was, it rumbled and roared to life with a flick of a key, and it played and cavorted on the freeway with but a flick of the steering wheel. Small compensation, he thought, for remaining faithful, at least for this week. And then, as he was putting the car through the paces, his wife leaned over from the passenger seat and purred in his ear, "And if I ever even so much as suspect that you're thinking of her again, I'll see to it you are buried in this car."

"OK," he thinks to himself, wind whistling past the window, "so the midlife crisis includes hot car sans hot bimbo if one wants to avoid another circumcision."

Got it.

He was sitting by himself having lunch at a little place across from the office when he spotted her.

He couldn’t help but spot her. It was almost like a radar thing anymore. If she was in the area, he spotted her. Close up, down the hall, across the parking lot . . ., it didn’t matter. He knew the exact clicking sound her high heels made as she walked, he could smell her perfume before she rounded the corner. He even recalled what she was wearing each of those infrequent days of past when she chose to single him out for her undivided attention.

But that was then. Before the hours of therapy. Before his wifes threats of divorce and subsequant reconcilliation. Before the countless solitary late nights getting drunk, staring at the moon from his private patio way out back on his estate, back beside his pool, the very pool he had almost walked away from for a late middle aged fools fantasy.

But now, he was sitting in the café, alone, near the window, when he saw her leading a group of co-workers coming back from lunch, the next restaurant over.

Tall, shapely, athletic, with perfect legs mounted atop her usual 3 inch heels, she looked fabulous. As always. And today, like always, she had a different male coworker tagging along side her, fascinated by every banal thought she uttered, trying hard not to appear too interested. The new guy. The clueless new guy. Like he had once been.

And, of course, this new male coworker was married. Of course.

That’s how she liked her tease.

Or perhaps, that's how she liked to share her pain.

Four years now he had been torturing himself over her, a slow agonizing watertable kind of torture wherein he just knew any minute he would drown from his misplaced lust. A dance, perhaps. A slow, sickening dance through the corridors of the executive suite, making eye contact on the not so innocent walkabout, accidentally showing up at the copier at the same time, her “interviews” of personal questions inquiring about the most recent status of ones marriage and whether one was happy or not in said marriage.

What he didn’t know, and what it took the better part of four years for him to figure out, was the every new man in the office got the “interview,” and the eye contact, and the flirtatious smile and the accidental rendevous at the copy machine. And some had even left their wives for her. And, for some reason, those same men later went running back to those very same wives. For some reason.

And what he didn’t know was that to those who had been through the “interview,” and who had then snickered at him and his obvious school boy crush on her, had given her her own, less than flattering nickname.

The Black Widow.

Or, as a much more mature man had confided to him,

“Sure she’ll fuck you. And it will be the best fuck of your life. And the she’ll bite your head off. And then she’ll make sure everyone knows what you’ve done . . ., even before your dick dries. Just for sport."

"Enjoy yourself, son. Unless, that is, you want to keep your job."

Things had started out innocently enough.

Shortly after he had hired on to a high level executive position he was introduced to all of the employees, including her.

That day she was wearing a brown patterned short sleeved blouse with a red skirt cut high up her thigh, a gorgeous well toned thigh that, he later found out, saw the inside of a gym every morning at 4:30 a.m. Her curly, almost frizzy honey blond hair was tossed up and over and maddeningly all about, and she beamed him with her infectious smile that pretended interest. He beamed her back with his own well practiced high octane smile that said, without speaking, “you look marvelous!”

“Mike,” his tour guide introduced, “this is Mona. Mona, Mike.” And that was it. Innocent. The exchanged their "Hi's!" and the tour continued. And as he walked on to the next introduction he glanced back at her and noticed her glancing back at him from her cubicle and that was it.

Innocent.

Until, say, about five weeks later. And then the heat turned up a notch or three.

It was the week before her 40th birthday, when she was still all of 39 going on 22. She was wearing a black miniskirt, a black sweater short sleeved sweater that didn’t quite come down to the top of her skirt, leaving just a hint of belly in view. She liked to show off her belly when she thought she could get away with it, regardless of how inappropriate a little hint of belly might be in the workplace. Her belly, like the rest of her body, most especially her backside, was wound tight and taught with perhaps less than ten percent body fat to be found anywhere on her. With that little body fat she didn’t have much to spare topside, but the perfect view from behind could convert any boob man into a fan of hers. She was just that buffed out. And she was turning 40 next week.

“So,” she asked, “its my birthday . . ., how old do you think I’ll be?”

Yeah, she was well practiced at being coy, and the age inquiry was her opening line for the afternoon tease feast. But then, she had never met anyone like him. He was, after all, a sorta kinda trial lawyer, a retired military officer, a one time attack helicopter pilot and one very experienced in the art of playing mental footsies with the very attractive. At least, back in the day before marriage and mortgages and kids and private school tuitions, he had been rather accomplished in the art of closing and engaging the very, very attractive. He simply sensed a weak point on his target of choice and then closed for the attack. And, he figured, a nearly 40 year old woman, albeit a very hot looking nearly 40 year old woman who dressed in spike heels and miniskirts at work as if she were competing with 22 year olds probably thinks she can still pass for 22. And that, he figured was her weak spot.

“How old?,” he mused . . . ., “I’d say . . ., maybe . . ., not a day over 45. Am I close?”

Her eyes flashed instant anger, the hook was set. “45!!?”

That’s all she said as she spun on her spiked heels and stomped off. But then, he thought, the sight of her taught backside shrink wrapped in black painted on miniskirt made it all worthwhile and his afternoon looked up from that point on.

The next three months or so a familiar patterned developed that would be the hallmark of their non-relationship. She pretended to ignore him, he pretended to irritate her, she would glare him down in the halls, he would shoot her a high octane smile and then turn off the charm just as quick.. Business as usual mixed with just a touch of childish interplay along the lines of “I am so not interested in you,” countered by a return volley of “No, I am so not interested in you more.”

The verbal exchanges were brief and limited to a “Hi Mike,” and “Hi, Mona” as they went about their respective business, he general counsel and she administrative secretary for another department. That they didn’t work directly together was, perhaps, a mixed blessing or perhaps curse. If they had worked together he in all likelihood wouldn’t have gotten any work done, yet because they didn’t work together the slow burn tease continued, as each pretended to ignore each other, yet as they each caught one staring at the other from a distance.

And then, again, a perhaps chance rendevous at the copy machine where she proudly explained that she had just entered the real estate market by purchasing a condominium. He himself had owned several houses with his wife and now he and she had a common topic to discuss over pretend photocopying.

And then, she made what he forever after thought of as “her move” and he blew it.

“So,” she said, “I bought a couple of ceiling fans and now I need to get them installed, I guess this weekend . . ., Are you any good with electrical work?”

It was that quick . . ., and he froze up.

“Uh,” he stammered, “I’m not so good with electrical or plumbing,” he replied. Why plumbing, he instantly asked himself and just as quickly realized, it wasn’t her electrical that she wanted looked at! Damn!

“Yeah . . .,” she replied, just as quickly, “never mind . . ., forget I asked . . .” and then she was gone, leaving him by the copy machine wondering what the f just happened.

And thus the pattern was set. She looked hot and irritated at him one day, and then flirtatious and inviting the next. He knew she really wasn’t irritated at him and she knew he really wasn’t going to take her up on the flirtation. It kinda sorta worked for both of them or at least, it kinda sorta worked for him. He got a fantasy girl to occasionally dwell on. He’s not sure if she got anything in return.

But basically, they remained strangers. Though they exchanged the usual hallway pleasantries, and though it was obvious, at least to him, that they shared a mutual attraction, things were what they were. He was a married man with a wife and kids and mortgage and private school tuition and a pool on a big estate and while he made damned good money, he didn’t make damned good money enough to pay alimony, child support, two households and all the other crap that came if and when ones wife finds out one is cheating with a secretary from the office. And as much as he wanted to “go there,” he didn’t “go there” because, well, just because he knew that his future would be making damn good money and living out of a car if his wife ever so much as suspected that deep down, he really, really wanted to be boning that secretary from work.

So he tortured himself. Over, and over and over again. And he thought of her constantly. And he knew the sound of her heels clicking on the tile floors of the hallways as she walked up behind him, and he knew the smell of her perfume before she turned the corner, and he remembered the details of her attire from each chance encounter, and every six weeks or so she’d interview him once again at the copy machine, inquiring about how things were going with his marriage and whether he was happy or not and the usual sort of things. And he would play along and savor every moment of those chance encounters and relish her flirtatious moments whenever they came about. And at some point, he realized, his attentions became a sick sort of obsession with her and he couldn’t get her out of his mind.

Day, night, he thought of her. He woke up in the middle of the night and stared at the ceiling, thinking about her while his wife softly snored in the bed next to him. He was spell bound and disturbed and frustrated and obsessed. And he was making his life his own living hell.

And unfortunately for him, at the same time he is experiencing this weird kind of sorta maybe attraction at work, his marriage really is suffering at home. Perhaps he and his wife were getting bored with one another, perhaps he was putting in too much time thinking about work (ahem), perhaps it was a combination of things, but his wife was letting him know in her own personal way that . . , well . . ., things weren’t working out too well.

Mainly, his wife lost interest in the “marital” aspect of marriage. Peri-menopausal, perhaps. He getting a little too thick in the waist for her taste, perhaps. He not measuring up to her parents expectation, perhaps. Or maybe she just liked the fact he was gone 13 hours a day and gave her all his money. Perhaps.

But things weren’t working out too well at home. And he was tortured. He did, after all, love his wife. He did, after all, bust his ass to give her and the kids a good life. He did, after all (OK, he blew it, but we won’t go there), turn down the opportunity to inspect the Cheerleader’s electrical and, more likely, plumbing (and he still pains himself with mental images of what he imagines are her perfectly groomed girl parts).

No love at home. Not allowing love at work. Mental health devolving into mental hell.

It was his life, and it was his doing. Like combat low crawling over ten miles of broken glass, he set himself up and now he was living in his own personal hell.

And he couldn’t keep his heart from racing each time he heard that special click of heels coming down the hall or that special scent of perfume about to round the corner.

And so he gets drunk on his special patio on the back of his estate out by his pool, staring up at the moon, wondering why the hell he did this to himself.

Chapter 2

The problem with radar, or at least for the natural uninitiated, is the inability to control what comes in. Good, bad, second glances, hair raising on the back of the neck, visions floating in space . . ., its all there, and it all comes in.

And by radar, what he really meant was an innate natural psychic clairvoyance passed down from generation to generation from his families gene pool. He didn’t ask for the gift and he didn’t really want to explore too far into realms that use gifts such as his, but there it was, nonetheless.

He had, however, learned to listen to his radar from an early age if for no other reason than to avoid recurrences of those times where he just knew the outcome of an event before hand and yet he still insisted on rushing headlong down that path with, he would later realize, the predictable outcome that he had, in fact, predicted the very moment he chose to peer down that probable path.

Which may be why, despite his attraction, he hasn’t followed up with the Cheerleader and why he tries to limit his contacts with her to those few, infrequent copy machine interviews which seem to reoccur about every six weeks or so. Because, he tells himself, he just knows that no good would come from engaging in a dalliance of any kind, let alone a workplace dalliance.

The moments before he met his wife, however, he had a far different kind of feeling.

He was stationed at Fort Rucker, Alabama at the time, a 27 year young Army flight lieutenant. He stood six feet three inches tall and weighed in at a strapping 205 pounds of lean man machine. Back in those days his knees were still in top shape, or at least healthy enough to carry him on a five mile run six days a week followed up by an hour or so in the base weight room. After his workout he would shower, shave and then zip himself into his skin tight army gray Nomex flight suit. If the workout was in the morning, he would depart the gym to report to the flight line for his daily mission. If the workout came in the evening after his flight, he would head out to the Officers Club to hook up with base nurses willing to play Monte Hall with him in search of what lay behind flight suit zipper number one, two or three. The Lets Make A Deal line, coupled with a buffed out million volt smile worked for him just about every time.

The era of his military duty happened to coincide with the release of the Tom Cruise movie Top Gun, and military pilots once again found themselves in Top Demand on the dating scene. Yet for him, being stationed in the South presented cultural shocks which had to be overcome the morning after if he wanted something more than frantic up close stick and rudder instruction with coupled with touch and go landing practice, he being a West Coast boy and all.

Cultural shocks like the fact that the local girls thought he talked funny or the fact that the local girls didn’t get the references to jokes that would crack up the girls from Sacramento. Innuendoes, references, double entendres, the entire witty package he had worked on so strenuously to perfect out west landed with thuds on the local girls. But then, the local girls could be very cute and he was buffed out and he could still be charming enough to make it through the night and score mission objective, what with his Monte Hall “What’s Behind Zipper Number One, Two Or Three” routine. And well before morning he would get up and get out of there and get on with whatever he though he was doing in his life, with military precision at that.

And two weeks before his 28th birthday his neighbor in lovely Enterprise, Alabama, a young Jewish hottie whose husband was going through flight school on base let him know her girlfriend, Marta, would be coming out from Los Angeles for a visit and could he maybe show her around and maybe show her a good time?

And then she showed him a picture of Marta and he thought, well, she’s kinda cute . . ., sure, I’ll try to show her a good time.

And that was that.

***

What intrigued him about Marta’s photo was that she wasn’t like the kind of girls he usually dated. Its not like she wasn’t cute or anything, because there were some requirements his shallow mind refused to overcome. It was more that he was happily plowing his way through a Big Beautiful Blond era (bottle will do fine so long as cuffs and collars match up) and here comes this little petite brunette with a great set of knockers, her own million volt smile and a reputation as a “fun girl,” whatever the hell his Jewish Hottie neighbor meant by that.

But, then, his Jewish Hottie neighbor never failed to smile when she spoke about Marta and his Jewish Hottie neighbor also made a point of letting him know Marta’s parents were rich. Like Brentwood Rich. Like Marina Del Rey Yacht Club Rich. Which he didn’t quite get, being more familiar with the trailer park scene back home or the low rent apartments of the local girls during those times he would not quite spend the night.

And so it was set. He would come on over to the Jewish Hotties house on what turned out to be the night before his 28th birthday. He and Marta would hang out and if they hit it off, well, she would be in town for another five days or so after that.

The timing though, caught his attention. Which is to say, Marta was definitely making a larger than usual blip on his radar, and that came to him as something of a surprise.

Not that he should have been surprised. He had been told, at a reasonably young age, exactly how his life would unfold, and when major life points he could expect to hit. He had also been told roughly when he would meet his wife and under what circumstances. His reader was one of the best he had ever met, a little old lady named Dean out of Walla Walla, Washington that his mother took him to see for a “life reading” shortly after his 21st birthday. With his mother, taking her children to see a psychic for life readings was something of a milestone event akin to other families where dad took son to see a prostitute for his first “life event.” It was just one of those things that happened in his family. The life readings thingy, not the prostitute.

But Dean, as good as she was, also let slip some negative info, such as she saw him having two wives and she felt one of those wives might die early. The negative info just kind of slipped out and Dean tried to cover up, but the rung bell can’t be un-rung. The info was out there, not that he thought much of it. He was after all 21 at the time and the future seemed so far away and unrelated to his then present experiences that he didn’t think too much of anything other than, would he be getting laid maybe hopefully some time in the next six months or so . . .

And then it was time for him to meet Marta. He had finished a inclement weather flight in a UH-1 Huey that day under full instrument conditions and he was just a little stressed out but he was looking forward to meeting up with Marta. He didn’t really know what to expect but then, he had a feeling about her that he couldn’t explain away. The thought, ok, he hoped, that he might see some action with her, but that alone couldn’t explain away his anticipation. There was just something about this Marta . . ., something he thought he couldn’t place his finger on . . ., yet something he well knew.

So he hit the gym after his flight to assault a stack of metal weights followed by an extra long session in the sauna to sweat out his anxieties. A shower and a shave later and he had run out of any further delays which could prevent him from walking out to his pickup truck for the short drive over to the Jewish Hottie’s house.

It was time to go and meet his future, it dawned on him. Denial swept away, he just knew on the drive over to the house that this was a meeting with long term consequences. His radar was on full alert, but no necessarily the alert associated with incoming danger, but rather the hyper vigilance of awaiting the return of the fleet. He wasn’t about to meet someone new, he realized, rather he had an eery feeling he might be about to reacquaint himself with an old friend.

And as he parked his truck outside the house he held back for a few moments. And he asked himself, are you ready to do this? He knew he could turn the key on the ignition and drive away. And he knew he could suck it up and walk into that house and meet his future . . ., and either decision scared him at that very moment.

And yet, like a good lieutenant, he made a decision, right or wrong, he made a decision, and he swung his spit shined combat boots out of his pickup truck and crunched his way up the gravel driveway, nervous finger pressing on the door bell.

It was a Friday and it was 3:00 p.m. and it was time to blow out of the office for the week. He had his weekend planned with Marta, two nights at a bed and breakfast in the hills above Ojia, California, with nothing to do but screw, smoke weed, sip margaritas and screw again. He and Marta were celebrating their twentieth wedding anniversary and for today, this day, they were happy.

It hadn’t always been a happy marriage, even though it started out, like most marriages, with much promise some twenty one years earlier when he pressed the door bell on a brick rental home on a cold December night in L.A. “L.A.” as in Lower Alabama, right outside Fort Rucker, where the Army trains its helicopter pilots. Which he was. An Army Helicopter Pilot, that is.

He waited a count of ten for the door to open, shivering in the cold night even though he was still dressed in his flight suit and flight jacket. Even though Lower Alabama could see summer days to hot and steamy you could pass out from heat exhaustion after spending only minutes outside, the winter climate could swing in the opposite direction towards frost and chill and down right miserable crunchy frozen grass kind of cold. And he was cold, coming from that other L.A., sunny Los Angeles.

And on the count of eleven, just as he was about to spin on his heel and make a run for his pickup truck, the porch light snapped on and the front door opened and there stood this little petite woman of about 30 years of age, 5'3" with a frizzy permed out brown hair afro and cute smile.

“Hi, I’m Marta,” she greeted him, “you must be Mike.” He just smiled back at her like a big oaf dressed for battle and said, “yeah, hi.” “So you coming in or what?” Marta giggled.

“Would you like a beer,” Marta asked him and he nodded in affirmation. He found his place to the couch and noticed the TV was playing some cable evangelical show with a man and wife crying and pleading for cash for Jesus. “That’s the Jim and Tammy Show, Mike. Don’t cha just love it? I mean, camp and all. You can’t get that kind of entertainment back on Los Angeles. Look at Tammy’s makeup run when she cries! Do you think its all staged? Anyway, you wanna smoke a joint?”

He had to tell her that while he had nothing against smoking weed, his employer did, and he would have to pass, but thank you anyway and hey, that beer tastes might good. And he’s thinking, ya know, she’s really cute! What’s she packing in that sweater? 36Charlies? And they look Standard Issue and not Silicone Remanufactured, another good point in her favor, he’s thinking, while in the back of his head he’s already plotting out how to cop an impromptu topographical field inspection.

“But if you want to smoke, that’s alright with me,” he told her. “Cool,” she replied as she fired up her joint and teased an exhale of pungent smoke in his direction. “But I’ll smoke the rest of this in the garage. Be right back,” she said, leaving him sitting on the couch.

And he waited on the couch for a few minutes and Marta and her friend giggled and laughed out in the garage and every few moments they would pop back in and Marta would stick her head in the living room and ask if he was doing OK. “Yep, I’m doing fine,” he would reply and Marta would giggle off and he would catch a glimpse of her little butt, guessing that she was maybe all of a size 4 petite, just a cute little thing with a little ass and big boobs and a giggle and a stoned outlook for the evening. Things were looking real promising, he figured.

And then she was back and sitting on the couch with him and they were both real friendly and talkative and telling about places they had been in Los Angeles and places they wanted to see and for a moment he could forget that he was stuck here in Lower Alabama on active duty flying helicopters and chasing local trailer trash talent in his off time. And she would sit just a little closer to him on the couch when she came back from the kitchen on her frequent trips to collect another beer for him or chips and dip for them or a dash to the bathroom to fix her hair or whatever girls do in there. And she laughed at his feeble jokes and made him feel at ease and in the space of about two hours or so she was sitting right next to him and touching him innocently on the arm and leaning in to share her stories with him. And he would listen intently as she listened intently to him and their eyes focus on one another, pupils subconsciously, noses flaring, phernomes flying.

And then her friend came in the room and said she was turning in for the night and don’t you guys worry about it, enjoy yourselves. And then they were alone for the first time and for just a second, it got awkward.