Gophers
By Rhett Bise
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SMASHWORDS EDITION
Copyright 2011 by Rhett Bise. All rights reserved.
Write to hertotransformation@yahoo.com
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Adults Only Please
This ebook contains graphic sexual content and is intended for mature audiences. Children under 18 should not be allowed access to this ebook. Some readers may find this subject matter offensive. You have been warned.
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The Gopher
The gopher digs. He pokes his head out of his hole, pushing out dirt from his tunneling and to eat some roots and grass. Then he pops back into his hole and digs. During his short and largely anonymous lifespan, this gopher has found a mate and sired baby gophers which have since grown up to dig on their own. For the most part, the gopher’s life passes by largely unnoticed by the world touched by sunlight. And for the most part, the gopher has little interest in that world, either.
Today, like every other day, the gopher was digging, occasionally poking his head out of one of his holes to eat some grass or roots before quickly ducking back into his hole to dig some more. It seems like just another day in a life of just another days for a gopher. Little did he know that this day would be his last day on earth, as he was about to face a cruel, violent, premature death.
But for now, the gopher nestles snugly inside the dark home he has created with his paws, protected from the cold dampness of the fading night above, peacefully doing what the gopher does. The gopher digs.
Above ground, next to one of the gopher’s freshly-dug holes, rests a collapsible lawn chair made of aluminum and crisscrossed mesh of purple and white strands of some plastic fabric that could withstand the elements sufficiently to survive for twenty five years while still holding Peter White’s butt off the ground. And this is where Peter sits. Holding a shovel, peering at the hole through the damp, cold darkness of the dying evening, Peter sits in the backyard of his cozy little Torrance home, which three months ago he finished paying the mortgage on, and waits.
It is three thirty in the morning. His neighbors are asleep, save for one woman across the street, a nurse who works an early shift and is getting ready for work, the college-age son of a neighbor down the street who is just coming back from his evening out, and a younger couple who are having sex in their bedroom. Peter has never met the younger couple; they seem to have little to do with the neighborhood, as far as he can tell.
Among those sleeping is Peter’s wife, a woman who is nearly the same age as her husband (a month and a half older, to be exact), but who looks twenty years younger than him. This apparent age difference is partially the result of her active lifestyle which includes yoga instruction, daily meditation, hiking, kayaking and participation in Tantric workshops (or “book club,” as she would tell Peter), all of which she does without her husband, as he has little interest in such activities. She has met the young couple down the street and has regular sex with the husband, and very little with her own, as he now has little interest in such activities. The other reason for their apparent age difference likely has to do with Peter’s lack of interest in activities. And his smoking.
The gopher digs.
And Peter sits in the cold, damp dark, shovel in hand, waiting. Grey sweat pants and a brown hooded sweatshirt cover his long, gaunt frame. Shivering slightly, he pulls the hood over his closely-cropped white hair and peers through gold colored wire-rim glasses at the hole in the ground. He shifts his weight in the lawn chair, stretching his back slightly as he feels his body tightening in the cold early morning air. Tonight is the night he finally takes care of this problem. The gopher has been making a mess of his backyard for months now, tearing holes in the carefully-manicured grass.
One could mistake the grass in Peter’s yard for crabgrass, but it is in fact a prevalent strain of lawn grass which has become so common in the yards of Torrance homeowners for so many generations as to practically be a native plant species. In fact this strain of grass is now the oldest resident in the city. And while it resembles crab grass in nearly every respect, Peter and many other residents will be quick to remind you that it is not crab grass.
Whatever species of plant this is, it is being torn up by the persistent gopher, who is largely unaware of the human’s previous attempts to end his life. First the human attempted to drown the rodent by flooding his tunnel system. This caused extensive water damage to the backyard while leaving the gopher unharmed. Next the human pumped toxic mist into one of the gopher’s holes, which forced the gopher to move himself several yards away from the affected area, but otherwise was mostly a mild inconvenience. The gopher did experience some mild nausea and excess mucus discharge over the next few days, but hardly more than a common viral infection. Finally the human placed traps and poison pellets around the yard, and while they were of little interest to the gopher, who was happy in his home and not interested in relocating to a trap or eating mystery pellets, the traps and pellets did attract the interest of neighboring animals.
Among the trapped animals were a possum, a skunk, which required a visit by Animal Control to remove, and the neighbor’s pesky cat, who apparently had no interest in rodents but had a strong affinity for rodent food and small animal traps. After much wailing and hissing on the part of the cat’s owner, kitty was safely released and Peter was forced to dispose of the traps. And after his wife began noticing an abundance of dead birds around the birdbath, and no dead gophers, Peter also had to stop using the poison pellets, much to the indifference of the gopher. The gopher digs.
So Peter resigns himself to taking care of this matter the “old fashioned way,” apparently believing that people in olden times had so much extra time on their hands that they could spend it fervently watching a hole, waiting for a gopher to poke his head out so they could chop him into pieces with a shovel. Living in busy modern times, Peter himself in fact does not have much better things to do. When he isn’t stalking gophers or tending to his yard, he is either working as an engineering consultant for a government contractor that made electronic parts, listening to talk radio or watching Fox News Channel. For vacations, he bores his wife with long trips in the motor home he recently purchased, where they would visit other states and he would sit around listening to talk radio or watching Fox News while she meditates herself doing something enjoyable.
Somewhere in a corner of a closet in Peter’s now-fully-paid-for house sits a box which has collected dust over the years. In that box sits a fraternity mug that reads “Peter White, President.” In that box are also two photo albums with pictures going back to college, where Peter and his wife-to-be met. There are pictures of a beautiful, young couple enjoying various facets of college life, including graduation. Neither one is sober in any of the pictures. None of the pictures has been viewed in decades.
There are pictures of dinners with the pretty young couple and friends in an apartment in Hermosa Beach. Pictures of a beautiful young couple in Paris, Rome and in a temple in India. Pictures of a beautiful couple scuba diving in a Caribbean island. Pictures of a beautiful couple at a ski resort. These were so long ago it’s hard to recognize the handsome, strong-looking young man in the pictures as Peter. Looking at the pictures, though, one could recognize his wife, who looks surprisingly similar to the beautiful young woman in the pictures, who seemed to adore her husband in the pictures.
There are pictures from their wedding reception that didn’t make their way into the wedding album - a separate album which sat under a table next to the white leather sofa, under some old bills and a thin layer of dust. There is a later picture of Peter with his wife at her law school graduation, where he looks a little thinner. And several of Peter making various improvements to their new house. Then there are some of Peter’s pregnant wife and the children when they were younger.
And then the time between pictures becomes more interspaced. Family pictures mostly made their way into family albums or Peter forgot to update his photo albums. There’s a picture of a much thinner and graying Peter with his very overweight wife and two younger children at the older child’s elementary school graduation. Then another from the younger child’s graduation – the boys look bigger, Peter looks grayer, the wife looks unrecognizably overweight, wearing glasses and a smile that seems forced from a frown. Peter was not smiling in that picture.
There is a brochure and news clipping of Peter White’s campaign for Torrance School Board, where he finished a respectable fifth place, a respectable loss. He looked younger and more energetic in the pictures, but was back to his gaunt, grey, worn-looking self by time the pictures of his boys’ high school graduations were taken. His wife, however, began to look thinner and more healthy.
It was around the time the boys went to high school, shortly after her husband’s school board loss, that his wife began taking an interest in yoga and other healthy things. Eventually, she lost the weight she gained from over ten years of depression, as well as her depression, and in so doing left her husband floundering alone in the sad spiral which they had co-created. Day by day he could see the love of his life, who he had agreed to join in life-draining, mindless depression and petty daily toil, evolve away from him.
It isn’t as if she is excluding him from her journey, he just can’t bring himself to join her. After slowly spiraling down from the joyous heights of his youth, it is simply too painful for Peter to look back up at the pinnacle of his past and attempt, at this late point in his life, to climb back up that hill he had joined her in sliding down for most of their time together. So he watches her climb, and eventually fly, knowing that he is losing her, and feeling happiness in her joy apart from him, which feels easier than the pain and effort of facing his past decline and trying to join her in recapturing those lost years.
Which leaves our hero looking down at a hole in the ground, waiting for a rodent who has known neither highs nor lows in his simple life. Shivering in the cold of the pre-dawn twilight, Peter waits in patient anger. And the gopher digs.
Peter looks at his watch. It is almost four thirty. In another hour he will have to get ready for work. He rubs his chin and surveys his yard. He created this. He built the terraces, he installed the sprinklers, he planted every tree and every flower, planted, watered and fertilized the grass. This is the one lasting legacy of his efforts on this earth. His two grown sons visit regularly, and he loves them as any father would love his sons. His oldest son married and Peter adores his new granddaughter. His family has been a drain at times in his life, but overall it’s a source of joy. The yard is Peter’s contribution to the world.
And Peter has had some success at work over the years. He was part of some important projects, received some awards and at one point was a part of senior management. Much like the rest of his life, his career steadily slid from its pinnacle to a plateau of mediocrity. Long ago his career went from a source of pride to a source of steady pay until the day he would be able to find the comfort level to retire and settle into an even lower level of productive existence than the one he is currently sustaining.
For everything he has done in his life, this backyard is his legacy, his one remaining source of pride, and the closest thing he has to a passion. He sniffles, breaking the silence of the predawn. A faint breeze from the west blows the scent of lilac and lavender toward him, the smell of home. A home intruded by the gopher, leaving holes in the lawn and killing his tender plants, a mortal threat to the heart of Peter’s life.
Breathing in one final inhale of his cigarette, he exhales a stream of smoke through his nose as he snuffs out his cigarette in the ashtray next to his chair. Then he reaches into the pocket of his hooded sweatshirt, pulling out his box of Marlboros, retrieving another cigarette, which he holds in his mouth while he replaces the box and finds his lighter in the pocket.
He began smoking ten years earlier, around the time his sons were both out of the house and in college. It was a time when his wife had stabilized her own practice and found her own voice, while Peter doubled his efforts at a small-time government contractor, taking on extra projects while assuming his director responsibilities. He worked late nights, many weekends, for a few extra dollars that helped keep his sons in college and him on track to paying off the mortgage on schedule.
To handle the stress of his work demands, and to distract himself from a home life that was becoming more and more empty, with the absence of his children and the increasing detachment of his wife, he took up smoking. His wife hated cigarettes, which was part of the attraction for him – he didn’t have to face the sting of watching the woman he loved pull away from him if he was pushing her away. For a while, she fought his habit, throwing away his cigarette boxes when she found them hidden around the garage and patio. Eventually she gave up and took to sleeping in the guest bedroom most evenings, to avoid the stench. Finally, she simply found it easier to just make the guest bedroom hers and the couple became part of the trend of married people sleeping in separate rooms.
In appreciation of Peter’s sacrifice of his health, mental well-being, family life and time on this earth, the small government contracting company’s management blamed him for “cost overruns,” which were in fact reasonable costs that were grossly underestimated by the incompetent Vice President of Sales in order to land the contract. And to allow him to save face for not meeting the idiotic benchmarks set by the incompetent VP (for which the incompetent VP received large bonuses), Peter was given a “generous” severance package and allowed to continue as a consultant with no benefits. And in order to avoid the shame of being blamed for an undeserving VP’s incompetence, he accepted the severance bonus and demotion, which fortunately came at the time his sons were out of school, so he could maintain his schedule for paying off the mortgage.
He lost his job, but kept his cigarette habit. Now smoking was a habit and as much a part of Peter’s life as his gardening. Nobody who currently knows him can imagine him without the heavy stench of cigarette smoke and a pack of cigarettes at hand.
The red glow of the freshly-lit cigarette punctuates the hazy twilight. He emits a billowy combination of smoke and steam into the morning air. Behind him he can hear the rustling of his dog, who is waking and wanting to join him outside, rubbing the screen of the glass door with her tail. He checks his watch. Probably another half hour. Even when it comes to consultants, the HR director at work is a real stickler for punctuality, checking when every employee swiped in and out, so he had to clock in on time. Peter just hopes this won’t be a wasted evening.
Meanwhile, the furry visitor, unaware of his trespassing, and unaware of the death sentence for such an offense, sniffs his way toward the entrance of one of his holes, feeling a desire to snack on some grass in the early morning. As he approaches the entrance, he stops as he usually does when he notices a shift in the lighting in his environment. Then he inches forward a few inches, then quickly backs up. He inches forward again, takes a few bites of the grass around his hole, then quickly pulls himself back in.
He notices slight movements in the ground and remains still. But the movements end and the entrance seems safe. The grass is tempting. He pokes his head out for another bite.
He feels a searing and unexpected sting as the giant metal blade slices through his tail and one of his hind legs, collapsing the entrance to his home. He can’t understand the object that had severed parts of his body, except that it was sharp, hard, enormous and was killing him. He is in the one place that terrifies him more than anything else – outside his hole, on the surface of the ground.
He doesn’t know he is a trespasser, but he knows he is prey to something that wants to kill him, and he limps and hops as fast as he can in his adrenaline-enhanced state. His tiny heart pounding, his eyes squinting in the morning twilight, still too bright for his eyes, his wounds throbbing and searing in pain as he hops and runs in a confused pattern, feeling the rush of wind and shake of the earth as the giant metal hits the ground near him. And then again. And then he felt the searing mortal pain as the blade sliced through his middle. He struggled in agony, instinctively trying to flee despite his tiny body being nearly severed in half by the massive blade.
“Gotcha, you little bastard!” Paul laughs, sighing with relief that his night was not wasted after all. He scoops up the dying animal with his shovel as his wife comes out to check on him.
She winces at the sight of the struggling gopher and looks away. “Jesus Christ, honey, that poor thing’s still alive! At least put it out of its misery.”
The tiny creature feels himself drop to the grass. He doesn’t struggle anymore. Something inside tells him his struggle is over. He feels the blade press against his neck.
“How long were you out here? Oh, God. This is so gross.”
“Then stop watching, woman.”
And after one swift movement of the shovel, the gopher dies.
The Motorcycle Cop
On a curve in the road, a man waits. His Oakley sunglasses shielding his eyes from the brightness of the midday sunlight, he peers at the passing traffic. Sitting on his motorcycle, nestled in an alley between two buildings, he hides in wait, aiming his radar gun at the cars moving past him, waiting for speeders.
For most of the days he has worked this job over the past twenty five years, this is what he would do – sit on a motorcycle, and wait. When he was a young police officer and married, he was sitting and waiting. When he was still a relatively young police officer, freshly single after his wife had enough of his never-ending string of adultery, he was sitting and waiting. When he was an older man whose children had graduated high school, he was sitting and waiting. Through rain, fog, cold mornings, hot afternoons, and the string of forgettable days in between those moments, he was sitting and waiting. And hiding. And catching speeders.
And now the older man, his moustache sprinkled with generous amounts of white, his face carrying thick wrinkles which had evolved beyond the level of “distinguished,” his white helmet gleaming in the sunlight, sits and waits. And hides.
He requested this job. He received additional training to perform this job. And since he obtained this job, this has been his one job. Never seeking nor receiving any promotion, he has been content to simply sit and wait. When he is finished with his day, he goes home and usually watches television. On his days off, he usually rides motorcycles with the same group he works with. Sometimes he takes his motorboat out on the lake. Sometimes he just relaxes on the couch, sitting and resting.
He talks about the day he will soon retire from police work and live a simpler life.
A blue Mini Cooper speeds past him. The man captures the excess speed on his radar gun, then turns on his lights and pursues the speeder.
Peter curses as he pulls his car over. It feels so unfair that he was singled out. He notices other drivers passing him on this road, why weren’t they pulled over? First the gopher infestation and now this. It seems like he is being singled out. His hands tensed around the steering wheel as he thinks about the other drivers getting away with speeding. Then he reaches into his wallet and pulls out his driver’s license, and reaches into his glove compartment and finds his registration.
The motorcycle cop taps on the passenger window, which Peter rolls down. The officer sticks his head in slightly, briefly checking the inside of the car. “Sir, can I see your license and registration?” He speaks at a somewhat louder than necessary volume, which he has learned serves to create an air of respect. It is important to the cop that he establish authority with the speeders he encountered.
Peter hands the man the requested information and the cop ambles back to his motorcycle with the documents, leaving the speeder to further contemplate his predicament. He taps the inside of his thumb against his chin, hard enough to feel the vibrations in his jaw. He thinks about how he meant to bring a lunch today, but ended up leaving his lunch on the kitchen table, a result of his lack of sleep from his vigil.
Meanwhile the cop routinely checks Peter’s license plate and DMV records. No recent tickets – the guy could easily handle this one. He takes an extra moment to send a text to his girlfriend, who like the other women who have been in his life, is attracted primarily to the shiny metal object on his shirt. Then he walks – slowly, deliberately - back to Peter’s car.
“I have you going fifty-five,” he shouts, because volume commands authority. Peter follows a drop of spittle flying from the officer’s mouth and landing on the passenger seat. His eyes rest on the spot on the passenger seat which absorbs the small ball of spittle. “Do you know this posted speed limit on this street is forty?” The officer hands Peter a metal clipboard with Peter’s driver’s license and ticket clipped to it.
“No,” Peter thinks to himself, “I never drive this street.” Peter would never speak like this to an authority figure. “Yes, I do, officer,” he says outloud in a tone of resignation, signing the ticket and handing the clipboard back to the officer.
“You in a hurry?”
Peter bristles at the question. Apparently this is how guys like the officer get their jollies, he thinks to himself. “I guess so,” he sighs, speaking as he’s expected to when confronted with authority.
“Well, you need to slow it down.” The motorcycle cop hands him the ticket.
Great advice, Peter thinks to himself. “Don’t get pulled over by the police, I’ll write that one down.” Again, he only thinks these things. “Okay,” Peter says meekly. Then something compels him to a higher level of boldness in the face of authority. “Officer, I’m not trying to argue out of this ticket, but I can’t help but notice there are a lot of drivers going a lot faster on this stretch of road than I was going. A few have whizzed by us since you pulled me over.”
At that moment, he followed a black car speeding in the direction Peter had come from. He recognizes the driver as one of his coworkers, a younger man who works in a different department. While he has little to do with Peter, he is still an object of frustration. The young man seems to spend little time and effort on his job and Peter has chosen to make it his business to be bothered by this behavior, even if it has no impact whatsoever on his own job. And now this guy was speeding and getting away with it!
“See?” Peter pointed at his speeding coworker.
“It’s not your job to regulate the speed of other motorists.” The officer enjoys his moments when he can demonstrate his wisdom in his area of expertise, namely traffic. He also enjoys pushing down meek citizens at the first sign of courage. It’s his opportunity to feel important. And it reminds him of his days in high school. “Just focus on your own speed, and slow it down. Have a good day, sir.”
The motorcycle cop walks back to his motorcycle. His personality is well-suited to the steady, white-noise nature of his career. His life, and his career, has moved along much like the traffic on the street in front of him. And much like the rest of his life, he nestles into his spot, waiting, stopping anything that strays too far out of the ordinary.
The Slacker
Everything Randy does brings out her ruthlessly expressive animal passion. Even the faint electric tingle of his feather-touch tongue caressing her clit was unleashing a dam of violent desire in her that she never knew existed. Grabbing his hair with primal fury, she pulls her lover’s head toward her face while locking her legs around his body and with an energy that seems to be generated by some animal inside her, she begins twisting both of them over until she is straddling the young neighbor’s chest.
The young man looks up at the athletic woman, who gazes back at him with an intense desire he has rarely seen in a woman, an intensity that keeps him returning to her, every lunch break he could sneak in. He knows it is getting him in trouble at his work, where watching the clock was the human resources VP’s full-time responsibility, to say nothing of the possible danger of his wife discovering his affair with the tempting older woman living just down the street. Yet her passion is addictive, so he continues to risk everything to feel this animal desire, even from a woman thirty years older than him.
She locks gazes with the young man as she slides her hips down his torso and reaches behind her to find that hardness, holding it for a moment in her hand. It feels exhilarating to feel this beautiful young man completely turned on for her – it makes her feel young, alive, sexy.
Primal. Uncontrollable.
“You’re imagining how good it’s going to feel, aren’t you?” He whispers deeply, regaining his composure. He was becoming used to her violent play, though he sometimes finds himself longing for slow, teasing foreplay. “It’s going to feel so good when you slide down on my cock, feel that hard cock filling up your pussy.”
She can’t believe the emotions and passions that are coming from her around this man. She feels more alive, more passionate, more energetic and excited about sex and life than she can ever remember. And the things she found herself wanting to do with him, she just kept finding more exciting, naughty things she wanted to do, things she would have never considered doing with any other man before. Things she would have considered too taboo to even find enjoyable before this man have become a regular part of her sexuality.
“I can’t wait,” she exhales in a quiet tone slightly above a whisper, gripping him more tightly and sliding her hips and body toward him as she leans forward, kissing from his forehead down his face . “I can’t wait,” her voice rising, becoming more forceful, almost demanding.
He turns her on to the point where she can barely contain herself. She thinks about him constantly. Hot, intense thoughts, the kind of thoughts that lead to fantasies and explosive orgasms just from masturbating. The kind of turn on that has feels like a never-ending foreplay, making her ready for him before she even sees him. The kind of turn on that has her at the edge of climax from a long kiss. The kind of turn on that has her attacking him selfishly every time she sees him.
He moans with delight as she lowers herself onto him. A loud, deep moan. She loves his noises, how he lets her know how much he enjoys her. So much volume, energy and passion. Noises of pleasure that make her feel like sex goddess, and amplify her arousal. Sliding her hips hard and fast, she lets out a deep sigh and feels herself release.
“Baby girl, coming so hard and fast,” he whispers. “Drenching me.” He grips her butt with both hands, grasping her tightly and thrusting into her as she lets out a whimper, her body shivering. “You’re going to come over and over and over, all over my cock.”
Three months ago, Randy attended Amy’s yoga class. He went with the intention of finding exercise alternatives to his weight lifting. He found himself impressed with the fitness of the older instructor – strong, graceful, with a thin, tight body. It amazed him how a woman could look so good for her age.
When they first spoke, he assumed she was more than ten years younger than her actual age, and she has done nothing to disabuse him of this assumption. Usually, she liked to tell her class her age, as a way of inspiring her students and demonstrating the benefits of yoga, but she didn’t tell Randy’s class. And since Randy signed up for the next level, she has stopped telling her classes her age.
It is not that Amy thinks he will have any issue with her age. In fact, she has a sense her true age might serve as a turn-on for the young man. With Randy, she feels so alive, so passionate, so sexy her actual age seems like a lie. With him, she is more than ten years younger. Feeling wave after wave of orgasm rush over her as she slides steadily over this beautiful young man, she is in her sexual prime. In his arms, she is at the perfect age, and assigning a number to it, one that doesn’t represent the level of her energy and passion, seems inauthentic.
The intense energy builds, seeming to radiate from the tip of his cock, radiating up through her pelvis, into her chest. She heaves – deep, gushing, sighs, expanding into screams as the energy builds through her body, building until it fills every part of her body, exploding in a joyful fountain of ecstasy, connection and release, leaving her resting - limp, panting, and with a sense of contentment and fulfillment she never knew was possible before this man found her.
This man - a blonde, twenty-nine-year-old financial analyst who works at the most painfully boring, intrusive, incompetently-managed company he could imagine possible. A man who surfs, mountain bikes, snowboards, and still goes out drinking regularly with his friends from his college fraternity days. A man who has been finding newfound interest in yoga, meditation and self-improvement. A man who plans to make a ten day silent meditation his next vacation.
A man who feels an obligation to “settle down” and start living the productive family life he sees as his duty and destiny, yet who keeps finding himself straying far from his well-intended path.
He holds her head with his hand, her body collapsed in surrender on top of his, his lips next to her ear, whispering. Reminding her how good she feels. Telling her to keep coming, even as she is collapsed in ecstasy, motionless, as he holds her butt with his other hand and continues thrusting – deep, slow, even, delicious thrusts. She lets every part of her surrender, just taking in this man, this amazing man. At fifty eight, Amy has found her sexual prime.
Holding her head and butt firmly, Randy rolls the two of them over, then raises his head and gazes into her eyes, stopping his thrusting momentarily. He smiles wryly. “You know what’s coming next, don’t you?”
She moans, nearly out of breath. She wonders if he was secretly disappointed when she was in this state of surrender, unable to move. But it feels so fucking good!
Randy leans back, grips her ankles and slowly raises her legs until her feet are by her ears. He admires her shape in this position. “All that yoga is paying off,” he says in a low, deep voice. She loves his voice, almost as much as his screaming. And she loves feeling dominated like this, as he teases her, pulling himself out of her and leaning back to appreciate her body. “God, you’re beautiful.” He observed her for a moment, then brought the tip of his hard cock to her opening, pausing. “I love watching me go all the way into your sexy body,” sliding himself in slowly, completely, as she sighs instinctively.
He always imagined himself being married and having a family, giving his children the happy childhood that he enjoyed, and he struggled against a life that seemed determined to pull him in the opposite direction. His love life was littered with failed relationships – beautiful, amazing women whose hearts he broke. There was always some imperfection, or some other challenge in his life, or often other women who distracted him.
He thought he had found the ideal relationship, the “girl next door,” who he could be happy with and finally find that stable life he destined for himself. She was beautiful, smart, successful, and madly in love with him. She would be a wonderful mommy. And he found himself even more drawn to other women and sexual adventures.
And the same pattern showed up in his work. Randy expected that by now he’d be on a solid career path, making very good money and providing for his family-to-be. Instead, he had bounced from one job to the next, making decent money but always looking elsewhere, or looking over his shoulder for the axe. He never seemed to find that “traction” he felt he needed in his career path.
So the man, who has a fairly stable income, even if it wasn’t entirely predictable, and who has an abundance of interesting women and adventures coming and going in his life, is always lacking that “stability” he thinks he need. And so, for someone who has a full plate of fun and enjoyment, Randy spends very little time actually enjoying the things in his life; all of his attention goes into striving to be someone other than Randy, convincing others in his life that his is that someone else, then cleaning up the broken pieces when reality strikes. For a man with an abundance of happiness in his life, Randy was surprisingly unhappy.
And that’s what makes this encounter so fulfilling to him – it has absolutely no potential for stability. In fact, its life energy is derived entirely from its lack of stability. Because there is no way Randy could possibly turn this into a stable relationship, he can let go and truly be himself. Which is why Randy is a hero to Amy in a way he has never been with any other woman. He could enjoy the best sex of his life, give the best sex he’s ever given to a woman, and feel happier and more fulfilled than he has ever felt – he is actually being Randy, which he’s actually very good at, as opposed to being a “stable family man,” which he was pretty lousy at. While Amy goes crazy at night imagining this man giving this kind of passion and intensity to his wife, day after day, the truth is his wife would not recognize the man in bed with his neighbor’s wife.
She could feel him growing harder as he savored watching himself penetrate her with slow, even thrusts. “It’s like we were made just for each other,” he says in his deep voice, between moans, “it feels so fucking perfectly good inside you.”
She nodded vigorously. “Uh huh,” she sighed, the most she was able to summon up to say in the moment, though she completely agreed.
Leaning his body against her legs, he moves closer to her, thrusting harder, faster. She was amazed at the intense sensations this man was bringing out in her. She was moving from being spent to building up even more intense arousal than before.
The moaned together – loud, passionate, cathartic moans.
“You love it when I fuck you hard like this, don’t you? You love being fucked hard by your man, just like this.”
She nodded and screamed in agreement.
“You’re going to come harder than ever, aren’t you?”
She knows she will; all she can do is pant in agreement as he brings her closer. He tells her to come – and it seems like second nature, like it’s no big deal to her that this man is telling her to come, and she does, as if on command.
Randy knows these lunch visits are only making things worse at work. This is a company that routinely looks through employees’ computer files and desks, audits key swipes and reviews security tapes. The Human Resources director takes these measures as a matter of course in his job, with or without cause. Yet despite the oppressive and intrusive work environment, he can’t keep himself from ignoring his work and distracting himself with things that only serve to get him in more trouble. Whether it be surfing the Internet, leaving his desk for long periods of time to socialize, meditating in his cubicle, or leaving the office for an extended lunch break every day to have an affair, he is managing to do all the things to get himself noticed as someone who slacks at his work. And his efforts are noticed.
He took this job because it seemed stable and secure. The company promised regular hours and a decent pay. But after a couple months he found that familiar feeling of unease which had crept in at every job. He felt bored; his job felt meaningless; and he found himself struggling to maintain stability while being pulled in every other direction but the one dedicating him to the task at hand. And unlike his recent sex life, he has never experienced moments of satisfaction in his career, only periods of unease or fear.
Shaking her her head back and forth on the pillow, squeezing her eyes and face, gripping the bed sheet, Amy feels the wave rising higher and higher. She feels him rising with her, their moans becoming louder and more urgent. The surging energy in their lover commands each of them higher. The energy and power rises to new heights in both lovers – surging, tingling, buzzing, cresting ecstacy. Then she feels the opening rip through her body. He joins her and, for a moment, they share timeless, breathless, orgasmic silence. Then she explodes in a deep, panting, cathartic scream of pleasure and release as he withdraws, bringing himself to her mouth. She grips him tightly as he moans, locking her lips around him, pulling him toward her as he releases his fluid.
For several minutes, they lie together in complete stillness, savoring the peaceful pleasure and aftershocks of their encounter. In those few minutes, Randy finally discovers that peace he had been missing. The cloud of uneasiness lifts and he enjoys a brief few minutes at ease with himself and the world. This is how it feels to be Randy, to feel unapologetically sexy, being the way he wants to be, when he isn’t telling himself what he should want.
Only after Amy is able to regain her normal breathing and begins having thought again does she realize what just happened. She can’t believe what this man has her doing, things she had never thought of doing before were second nature. She turns toward Randy, still in his moment of peace, runs her fingers through his hair.
“What are you doing to me?” She examines his neck. “I don’t think I left a mark.”
“That’s good,” he smiles slightly. “If I get kicked out, I’m moving in with you. I hope Peter doesn’t mind.”
“He probably wouldn’t even know. You know he spent all morning killing a poor little gopher?”
Randy laughs. “I drove by him on the way here. Pulled over by a cop.”
“Great,” she sighs “I’ll be hearing about it all night.” She places her hand on Randy’s chest as he lifts himself up to put his clothes on. “My god, the things you do to me. This is fucking crazy.”
“No kidding. I’m having the best sex of my life with my neighbor, the wife of one of my coworkers, on my lunch break, when I’m supposed to be working.”
“Really?” She was struggling to suppress the desire to become attached to him. “You don’t have to say that to make me feel good.”
“I wouldn’t.”
“Seriously, Randy,” her voice was softening as she was losing the battle to suppress her attachment. “You know how… Jesus fucking Christ… I don’t have to tell you how beyond mind-blowing-“
“It’s the same for me. I wouldn’t just say that. You can tell I sound… very happy.” He began dressing, realizing how late he was for work.
“It drives me crazy thinking about what you’re doing to your wife every night.”
Randy stops dressing himself for a moment, looks down at the floor and sighs. His moment of peace is gone now. He gazes at her with a mournful resignation. “It’s not like this,” he sighs. “Not even close.” The vague and all-pervasive feeling of unease had returned.
The Poop-Leaver
A round old woman plods slowly, warily, laboring to move her weight down the street. Her body is tired and aches. Every step feels like a challenge. But her perky yellow cocker spaniel needs a walk, so Maureen walks. Slowly. Painfully. Heavily.
In the white, tidy house on the corner of the street, she lives alone with her dog, two cats, and gout. Ten years ago, she retired from being the teacher students hated. Fifteen years ago, she went on her most recent date. Twenty years ago, she and her last boyfriend ended their relationship.
Standing in front a house halfway down the street, she stops. Her dog sniffs the neighbor’s lawn for an acceptable spot. She watches Randy quickly exit the house across the street and drive away as her dog begins to poop on the lawn. She hates Randy. She hates Amy. She hates Peter. She even hates Randy’s wife, although she can’t point to any particular reason why. There is a long list of people Maureen hates, most of whom reciprocate her feelings.
She stares angrily at the young man driving away, disgusted with his behavior. Someday she will be the one to tell his wife what he has been doing. But for now, she will do what she does every day – allow her dog to take a crap somewhere in the neighborhood and leave it there, thinking nothing of it.
She hates the “bitch” who lives in the house whose lawn her dog is crapping on. And she hates her husband, although, again, she cannot point to any particular reason why.
Maureen has never been married. She has no children. She never will.
The dog finishes, pointlessly kicking his hind legs afterward. Then, with a heavy sigh, she summons the effort to continue her walk down the street, her dog tugging at the leash as she plods. Slowly. Painfully, Heavily.
The Fascist Human Resources Director
Peter scratches the side of his head reflexively, shifting in his chair. He briefly holds the gaze of the man across the desk, then shifts his eyes toward the empty notepad resting on his lap. “I don’t like to be complaining about other coworkers like this, but it’s not fair that Randy is goofing off like this every day while everybody else is working like crazy.”
The tall, stocky human resources manager peers warily at the employee through his square glasses, then rubs the top of his shaved head as he leans back in his chair. To him, every employee is a problem in some way or another, whether the slacker analyst or the tattletale consultant. Everyone has a problem that needs to be corrected.
It’s why Dan insisted on having security cameras installed in the building, and it’s why he watches the tapes on a daily basis, just to “make sure everything is kosher.” It’s why he imposed a policy that every employee swipe their badge upon entering or exiting the building, and why he checks those swipes against employee timecards, even for employees who are salaried and have no reason to be at their desk at any particular time. It’s why he personally edits every employee evaluation, even though such a task is far beyond the scope and capabilities of his position. It’s why most employees, and even some consultants, are afraid of him.
“Peter,” Dan begins condescendingly, “you don’t even work with the guy. He’s not even in your department.”
“I know,” Peter atarts tapping his pen against his thigh and crosses his ankles as he shifts in his seat. “It’s just really demoralizing to walk by his cubicle and he’s sitting there with his eyes closed, or see him coming back late from lunch. I’ve even heard rumors he has a girlfriend on the side.”
Dan raises his hands with an air of authority. “I’m not going to go there.”
“I know,” Peter backpedals, “that’s not the point. Everyone’s working and he’s not doing anything.”
“Okay,” Dan leans forward, his voice softening into the voice one would use to speak to a small child “but he’s not hurting you. He’s way over on the other side of the office. You have to go out of your way to notice him.”
“Okay.”
“I understand that Randy has some issues, and I’ve heard complaints from others. I’ll have a talk with his supervisor and look at the key swipe records, and if he’s violated policy, I’ll deal with that. But my other concern here is that you’re getting really nosy in other employees’ business. Now, I understand that we all work together, but you really don’t collaborate with him, so you really shouldn’t be spending your time worrying about what he’s doing. That’s his boss’s job.”
“But it’s a real distraction,” Peter whines in a small, childlike voice. He models the behavior he unconsciously senses authority figures expect from him. Sometimes that skill works for him, and other times it is less than effective. This is one of those other times.
“Peter, I’ll make sure Randy does his job. But you need to be focusing on your job. That means sitting at your desk, doing your job, not looking around at what other people are doing, gossiping about coworkers. That’s not what we’re paying you by the hour to do. So I’m going to make a note of this and put one copy in our friend Randy’s file, and another in yours.”
“Why? Because I said something?”
“It’s a little more than that.”
“Wait a minute. How is it that I’m a consultant, but I have an employee file?”
“We kept your file open when you were converted to consultant status, we consider you effectively an employee.”
“This is,” Peter stops himself. He wants to say something about the absurdity of firing an emploiyee but keeping their permanent file. He wants to say something about even having an employee file when he’s been told he’s a vendor. He wants to say something about Dan’s asshole behavior that seems to be entirely about Dan’s exercising of authority, no matter how ridiculous or inappropriate. Instead, He stands up and walks out of the office, sighing in frustration.
“Um, watch that attitude, Peter,” Dan says as he’s leaving, allowing the office to hear his reprimand. Dan looks at his assistant and shrugs his shoulders. “Can you believe that?” His assistant, unable to do anything else, shrugs back and smiles. When she leaves, she won’t give any notice.
Dan picks up the phone. “Larry, can you grab Randy and come in here in about fifteen minutes? We need to have a talk about his obvious not working-ness that’s going on lately. He’s not back from lunch yet? Okay, all the more reason to have this meeting, right?” His voice tone smoothly transitions from domineering and overbearing to sarcastic and condescending, covering the range of voices a person would use when on a power trip.
He is also very good at “smarmy.” When Dan isn’t making it his personal business to meddle oppressively into every aspect of the employee’s work activity, he is the self-appointed personal assistant to the president of the company. He pre-reads, and often responds, to all of his letters, email and voicemail; when employees make suggestions to the president, it is Dan who personally reads the suggestions, weighs their merits, and replies to the individual in the president’s name. He is exceptionally skilled at executive anal copulation.
He searches the directory for the latest card swipe database and writes Randy’s card swipes for the past three weeks on a tablet. Then he looks through Randy’s timecard files. Randy is an exempt employee, which means that he is paid to do a job, not by the hour. And there are many days where he works more than a standard eight-hour day. In fact, for most weeks, Randy works considerably more than forty hours, without any additional pay for the extra time. But he has a habit of being late to work and taking longer lunches. And this is the part of Randy’s work record Dan was focusing on.
Unsurprisingly, the company Dan works for is losing money.
Dan designed the work area – a square floor of square cubicles surrounded by executive offices. It was Dan’s idea to eliminate pay increases for employees, on account of the fact that the company was losing money. It was also Dan’s idea to quietly increase the annual bonuses paid to executive management, after the announcement that employee raises were eliminated.
When he isn’t at work, Dan lives alone with his cat. He will often go out drinking at happy hour. He has no other hobbies.
Like his boss, Dan drives a BMW. Unlike his boss, he is a chain smoker.
Randy reads the email from his boss, complaining about his momentary absence from his desk and telling him to go to Dan’s office. This is how Randy’s boss communicates about everything, email. Randy’s boss works in an office that is fifteen feet away from Randy’s cubicle. He feels the vibration of his cell phone. A text from Amy.
“Hahahah! I cant believe u got a ticket 2! And after seeing IH get one. Tooooo funny! Um… still feeling it…”
“IH” is her code for “idiot husband,” because “cuckold” is too long to type.
“Looks like im in trouble with HR 4 being l8… well worth it :-)”
Randy walks into Dan’s office after making eye contact with his boss, who follows behind and closes the door. He sits calmly, casually holding eye contact while his boss sits in the other chair, looking at his feet.
“Randy, there have been a number of complaints that have come to my attention about your activities here at work. These have come from more than one source, each one outside of your department, which is a bit of a concern that these sorts of things are distracting other employees.”
“I’ll say,” Randy blurts. “Doesn’t speak well for those employees.”
Dan pauses momentarily. “This is kinda serious. Now I did some investigating and found that, just over the past week, you swiped in later than eight thirty every day. Sometimes it was five or ten minutes late. A couple days were fifteen minutes late. One was a half hour late. With no adjustments on your time card.”
“Most of those days I also worked later than the time I put on the timecard, too. Should I be adjusting those times as well?”
Randy once submitted a suggestion to the president of the company: “Get your out-of-control HR Director off his power trip. Signed, Everybody else who works here.” Dan was unable to tell from the security tapes who put the suggestion in the suggestion box.
“We have standard hours here. When you signed your employment agreement, you agreed to the hours. It’s important that employees be here during those hours. The agencies we contract with expect this.” The company Dan works for is a government contractor, a fact Dan uses as leverage to expand his authority. For every abuse of his authority, Dan cites the need for governmental compliance. And yet the company has failed every government audit of internal controls.
“You mean those agencies that are not renewing because we overpromised and underdelivered? If you want, I can get you the analysis report which shows how basically lied to them. Those reports are what I do. I could also attach the justification for the sales VP’s bonus, even though he’s done nothing but cost us business since he got here.”
“Randy, it’s just that attitude that is becoming a disruption here.”
“Truth telling. Kind of sad that’s a disruption. But I guess you’re right. It’s defiantly out of the norm around here.”
“Randy, did you agree to come to work at eight thirty? Do you remember that agreement?” Dan raises his voice. Very rarely does he encounter an employee who stands up to him, like the rare kid who stood up to his bullying in school.
Randy, for his part, was struggling to suppress his comments, which were coming from somewhere else inside him, a place that seems intent on getting him fired.
“Yes.”
“And I also see that you’ve been regularly taking longer lunches than the hour allotted. Exhibit A, your coming in late just this afternoon.” Randy shrugged in agreement. “And people have been noticing you being away from your desk for long periods of time, chatting with the receptionist, or various other women in the office.”
“I talk with dudes, too.”
“Okay, but you’re supposed to be at your desk, working.”
“Would it be better if I was outside smoking? And by the way, Dan, you think we can drop the bullshit trashing of my character for no reason?”
“I’m not trashing your character, I’m just noting the facts.”
“No, the comment about my talking to women was clearly not noting the facts that was selecting a handful of facts and using them to tarnish my character. Kind of like this whole meeting, really.”
“I’m not here to attack your character. You’re here because you’re violating company policy. Now continuing, when you’re at your desk, people are noticing you on the Internet, on your phone, or asleep in your chair.”
“Meditating.”
“But not working, right? And Kevin has noticed a decline in your work productivity.”
“Really?”
“Yah,” Kevin says, finally speaking up. “I’ve noticed certain reports aren’t getting back me as quickly.”
“All the reports you ask of me I get to you before their deadline, and I haven’t forgotten anything.”
“I’ve noticed some mistakes on a couple recently.”
“No kidding? This is the first I’ve heard of this. You should’ve sent me an email, you’re usually pretty awesome with the emails, Kevin. Hey, maybe you could actually give me some meaningful work once in a while, so I had something to keep me busy for a full day and wouldn’t be out doing horrible things like… talking to women.”
“The reason you’re not getting more work,” Dan snarls, “is because you can’t be trusted with the work you’ve been given. Your performance is subpar, which probably has a lot to do with your lack of commitment. And your attitude here isn’t very helpful. I was going to make this a verbal warning, but after this discussion I’m going to make this a written warning.” Actually Dan was planning to make this a written warning, but it sounds more menacing when it seems it was elevated from a lesser form of disciplinary action. “We expect your performance, and your attitude, to improve. A lot. This is not acceptable. You’re disrupting other employees and violating company policy. And I’m sure if I did a search of your Internet files, I’d find an excess of Internet usage, which would be another violation of company policy. This is serious, Randy. If we don’t see a significant improvement, there will be a final written warning and then termination. Do you understand?”
“Yes,” Randy monotones. “I’m not looking to be a disruptive influence here. I get that I need to be better with my time management and making better use of my workday. I’m sorry it’s come to this and I will do better from now on. And I’m sorry about the snide comments earlier, I’ve had a frustrating day, just got a speeding ticket, now this. I’ll make a concerted effort to change and work with Kevin to make sure I’m doing the work that needs to be done in a timely manner.”
Randy feels that sinking feeling of unease growing as he signs the warning letter, the feeling that he is signing away more of his life into something that just makes him miserable. And that it will not matter, he will lose this job anyhow.
Dan, meanwhile, feels a sense of accomplishment – another unnecessary and pointless job done well. After filing the warning letters in the employees’ files, he decides it‘s time to take a walk outside and smoke. He doesn’t notice the sign indicating the floor had been recently mopped. As he walks towards the front door, he feels his feet slip from underneath him. He instinctively reaches down with his right hand to break his fall as he falls backward. He feels a sharp, unforgiving pain that lets him know, too late, that he chose to wrong way to break his fall.
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