My best friend wasn't the smartest guy in the world.
I'd known him all our lives, and we knew each other's secrets. He had more than I did, and a big part of our lives growing up was him getting in trouble and me getting him out of it, mostly with girls and later with women.
So it was no surprise a few years ago when there was a knock at my door and he was standing there with a goofy look on his face and holding a suitcase.
"She kicked you out, didn't she?"
I didn't even wait for an answer. I just opened the door wider and stepped aside. That was the beginning of our last act as best friends.
He'd been living in the next town over with his wife Kelly. They had no kids and had been married for 10 years or so. I don't think they were ever happy. At least she wasn't. Like I said, Kyle wasn't the smartest person in the world.
"She caught me cheating again," he said, slumping into a chair as I handed him a drink.
The story was typical. Younger woman, on the road. He'd come home from a business trip with a guilty look on his face. She knew it as soon as she saw him and after he got drunk and went to bed, she checked his clothes and his phone and his credit card receipts and put it all together.
His closet was empty when he woke up on the couch. His clothes were in the front yard, and he had a text from the young girl from out of town.
"i think your fucking wife texted me last night."
Sure enough, he scrolled up and found a message that he'd never seen before.
"Hey baby," it read. "Loved the weekend. Hope to see you again soon."
"Muah. Loved you taking advantage of me."
"Bitch."
And that was it.
Kelly was gone and Kyle was on my couch, drunk and stupid and headed downhill.
Again.
He was gone in the morning, probably checked into a hotel and late for work and making excuses as his life spun out of control. I couldn't help him this time, and I knew it. But he didn't. The last thing he said to me was a plea to go see Kelly and try and talk her into giving him one more chance.
I'd had that conversation before, and she wasn't going to listen this time. I didn't tell him that. I told him I'd go see her.
Kelly was a better friend to me than Kyle, to tell the truth. We'd all known each other in college. She was my ex-wife's best friend in those days, and Kelly was always there for us when times got hard.
When my marriage ended because my ex cheated on me one time too many, Kelly broke her friendship with her and came to my aid. Over the years, we became close. Not in a sexual way but certainly in a way that was somehow deeper than friendship. We were wounded survivors, and I think deep down we always knew we would end up together one day.
But not once had we ever mentioned that to each other. It was just a quiet bond between us that whenever we were both free or whenever one of us needed the other, we would be together.
Which is sort of how I ended up on her front porch that Friday night, just as the sun was going down. She answered the bell, fell into my arms and immediately began to cry.
Not a sad cry but an angry cry. I knew then there was no going back. Kelly was done with Kyle. For good this time.
She did most of the talking. I mostly nodded and sipped a drink. She gulped down one glass of wine after another. By midnight, she'd polished off a couple bottles and was about passed out on the couch, her head in my lap as she mumbled and sighed and absent-mindedly played with my hard cock.
She didn't even know she was doing it. Not that I stopped her.
When she finally fell asleep, her hand was grasping the outline of my throbbing cock. She snored quietly as I moved her hand along the outline of my shaft and moaned softly. She seemed to sense it, rolling over onto her back and sliding her hand to her crotch, where she rubbed herself, still asleep but in a half-dream, licking her lips and masturbating through her shorts.
I rubbed her tits through her tank top as she made sexual noises and wet herself. She was soaked when I managed to pick her up and carry her down the hall to her bedroom. I stripped her bottoms off and pulled the covers over her. Then I kissed her on the mouth and let myself out.
I called her early the next morning.
"What happened last night?" she asked sheepishly. "Did we..."
"No," I said, interrupting her. "No, we didn't."
I think she was disappointed but I couldn't know for sure. I told her I was going to be in town and asked if she needed anything.
"Wine," she said. "Somebody drank all my wine last night."