Truth

I met Chanda at a party. We danced. We talked. We fucked. Aside from a few meaningless texts over the next couple of months, that was that.

A little over a year later I met Felice at the farmer's market. We shared a conversation with the old couple that sold honey. They thought we were a couple as we quizzed them on where the bees pollinated. We didn't argue their assumption. We did the opposite. We laughed with that couple for ten minutes as they wished us happiness on our recent engagement. They even gave us a bottle of honey as a gift.

So we obviously felt guilty. Our only solution, if we were to ever return to the farmer's market, was to return as a couple.

And by the following month, we were exactly that.

My bachelor days were surrendered to a marine whose father was a marine. Felice was military through and through. I found myself simply following orders and I didn't mind. I'm a pretty easy going guy and she never asked for anything out of the ordinary. Plus, she was amazing at giving direction so I took it.

But what I didn't know was that Felice was planning to leave the military. I found out at Thanksgiving.

At dinner.

With the rest of her family.

"After we get married, I'm going to stay at home and raise our kids," Felice calmly stated as she squeezed my hand. Her father's eyes would have burned a hole through my eyes had it not been for the poker face I had been valiantly wearing. We had been together for six months and never discussed living together - much less marriage.

Aside from the old, honey couple at the farmer's market, that is. They had photoshop pictures of our honeymoon.

Tears ran down Felice's cheeks faster than I could wipe them off, but I knew she was happy. And I had never been happier.

Felice had three brothers, but she was her father's marine. Her brothers attempted and failed to lighten the mood. Had I not had such a bond with her, I might have mistakenly accepted his unhappiness as a knock on me. But the disappointment he was feeling fell all on her shoulders.

"We don't have to..." Felice began to let me off the hook as the car door finally separated us from her family.

"Lie to Mr and Mrs Honeyfarm anymore?" I joked as we drove away. "We should probably learn their real names if we're going to get 'real' married."

With that joke I could feel Felice relax from head to toe. That night introduced me to my future wife.

Typically when we got home I was pleasantly told whether we'd be fucking each other's brains out or getting a good night's rest. Mind you, it wasn't that blunt, but there were never any doubts. Her signals were grope or yawn. Every evening around 7PM. Shortly followed by either a lewd suggestion of what body parts needed attention or a direct assertion of what chores should be done before bed. We would always stay the night because our apartment's had become identical. I was quite comfortable with this arrangement because we had small apartments with very few chores.

But everything changed that night.

There was no grope or yawn. Given the situation I was expecting a yawn, but I ended up with her nuzzled deep into my chest as we stood in the kitchen.

I didn't know what to do. I realized that for the first time in our relationship Felice was letting me lead. We stood silently for five minutes until I realized what was happening.

I was the man.

And like a good man, I took my fiancé to our room, undressed her and just held her until we fell asleep.

The next few days were the same, as she began to trade in her marine life for her new life. Her married life? I didn't know what to make of it. Or her.

But as the weeks passed and her relationship with her father settled, I realized that I was desperately missing something.

A grope. Not a yawn.

So one evening I gave her a soft kiss and a firm hug with my hand holding the small of her back. I was hoping to create a spark.

I started a forest fire.

My marine was impeccable with our sexual routine. She fucked like we were on a clock and there were positions we needed to maneuver before 0930. I was always satisfied and always exhausted and often surprised by some twist I wasn't expecting. "Mrs Honeyfarm doesn't need to know where I'm licking this honey from," she'd explain as I watched her spoon empty onto my dick.

But my future wife simply kissed me to the floor, stripped me and rode me like she wanted to feel at one with me. Her thighs squeezed me as her ankles wrapped tightly around my calves. Her breast pressed into me as she kissed me and breathed deeply into my neck. This wasn't sex. This was passion. This was lust. This was love.

As I could feel my impending orgasm, I instinctively rolled her to my side and grabbed her ass cheeks before entering her from behind.

"Please, fuck me, please, please!" she begged as her ass vigorously bucked back into me to let me know that my violent thrusts were far from hurting her.

As she "oh God" into my kitchen floor I realized that I'd never fucked her before because she had never let anyone fuck her before.

As her "yes, yes, YES" bounced from wall to wall I knew the time had come for us to get a house. With a yard. And a dog. And whatever the fuck married people had.

And when I came I realized that we were no longer doing this for sport. Or love.

We were making a family.

One wedding, one house, two kids and a dog later, we were a family.

A simple family. The happiest family on earth.

Until the crash.

Felice went to visit her parents one sunny afternoon and was killed head-on by a delivery truck.

From the police phone call to the funeral I was numb. I focused on our two children and forgot to mourn. I told myself to appreciate the ten years we'd happily shared together and not to wish for a future that was stolen from us.

As expected, her family was inconsolable except for her father. He hugged his grandchildren and looked me in the eye with an apology. He understood what it meant to lose Felice. He knew what pain I was in.

I didn't.

So I ran away.

The house in the suburbs was too far from work and the kids didn't play in the treehouse anymore so we moved downtown. Felice's brothers all lived nearby so they took turns watching their niece and nephew. And their grandparents would spoil them at the movies on Saturday mornings.

For two years I was alone.

And every minute our kids were away I thought of Felice.

Until I ran into Chanda.

We knew we looked familiar but couldn't figure out where from. Once we realized our previous connection we erupted into laughter.

"Not a great time in my life," Chanda apologized. "I had some tough decisions to make and I needed a distraction."

My grimacing smile made her pause.

"The distraction I haven't been able erase," Chanda explained with a smile.

I would love to explain that the next twelve hours was an emotional breakdown of mourning the loss of my wife or the build up of sexual need corresponding to years of physical neglect.

Those would be lies.

Chemistry could only explain why I was fucking Chanda against the front door of her apartment after we'd bumped into each other thirty minutes earlier. My right hand contained her torn paisley panties that I'd ripped from under her skirt and my left hand held the condom wrapper that we pulled from her purse. Her hands pulled my ass cheeks toward her with every thrust until we heard someone walking up the steps.

It was the mailman.

It was 10AM.

We rushed into her apartment as we pretended we weren't busted. As she guided me through a maze of moving boxes to her couch I tried to figure out if she was moving in or moving out, but I was too distracted by her ass bouncing between the boxes to care.

Once we made it to the couch she pushed me down and straddled me. As her clothes shed I discovered an array of tattoos that had been completely covered just five minutes earlier - purposefully hidden.

Between her pussy grinding my dick and her body art warping my brain, I felt like I was about to explode.

"I'm going to come, too," Chanda announced as she could feel me tensing up. And just as we both began to climax I saw the tattoo on her left shoulder.

As Chanda shuddered and quaked I froze. When she emerged from her haze I asked her, before I pulled my dick from her ravaged pussy, "Are you in the marines?"

"Was," Chanda answered with a quizzical look on her face. "Oh, the tattoo?"

I began to lift her off of me until we realized I hadn't come yet and my dick was still rock hard.

"Dishonorable discharge," Chanda explained as she licked her lips and rocked her hips. "I don't take orders very well. I like to do what I want. When I want. How I want."

While I started to put my questions in order about whether Chanda knew Felice or her father, I lost focus. Her pussy was swallowing my dick in ways that I couldn't explain. As I mouthed words and looked into Chanda's eyes she ruthlessly grinned and said, "Come now. Talk later."

I really wanted to talk, but her pussy was too much. I came until I nearly passed out.

And then we talked.

For hours.

Chanda had never met Felice but she had heard of her father. She told me about her tours of duty and her discharge.

I told her about Felice and the honey and the kids and the car crash.

Then we fucked again.

And I left.

But she texted me.

And I texted her.

Then we went on an actual date.

And another.

And she met my kids.

And they got along.

A year later her boxes were packed again and we were all living together.

Chanda was neither Felice the marine nor Felice the wife and mother. Chanda was simply Chanda.

Felice's family even liked her.

And we were happy.

Our only wrinkle was that my children were getting older and more independent, which meant they would come and go as they pleased. Chanda and I could no longer enjoy our chemistry at home as often and as loud as we liked, so we would rent rooms around the city. A minor parental inconvenience was also an opportunity for adventure.

After a few months we knew which hotels had sturdy furniture and which bed and breakfasts had thin walls. We knew which windows overlooked the river and which windows could be seen by passers by. Though we were discreet around the maturing kids, they knew date nights rarely involved movies and were happy to be saved of the details. As for the details, Chanda planned most of the escapades but we were both connoisseurs of the hotel industry.

So I was looking forward to a random Tuesday morning text inviting me to the Smith.

Every engagement at the Smith began with an envelope at the front desk with instructions I would read as I ascended to the top floor.

The instructions always read, "Naked. In bed. Drapes closed. No talking."

As always I followed orders and waited for Chanda's signature rosemary scent.

But I never smelled her approach as she climbed upon me in the dark. My brain, hopped up on pheromones, neglected to listen to the signals my senses were relaying. Though every touch, sound, taste and smell was familiar they were clearly not Chanda's.

The hands that had caressed me from ankle to chest were getting acquainted with not only my body, but any body. As familiar as the touch felt, the slow curiosity of each touch lingered as a discovery more than an act of sensuality.

As my brain began to decipher the inconsistencies I trusted Chanda would never do anything to hurt me. Perhaps she'd invited a third to our session. I wasn't sure if that was okay but I wasn't sure if it wasn't.

But as the touches turned to kisses I had a haunting realization that this familiarity was no coincidence. I began to freak out.

As I reached for the night stand I dared not say the name that came to my mind because it was impossible. Unthinkable.

But my hand never reached the nightstand.

"Just fuck me," came the voice of a ghost that took the air out of my lungs. "Please." And that's when my senses reached my brain.

There was no smell. There was no sound. This was stealth. This was military precision.

Only the touch was clear. More tone in muscle and definition than Chanda or Felice as I remembered, but coupled with multiple scars from head to toe. Her head was practically shaved. Everywhere else was shaved. The only textures I could feel were muscles and scars. I wasn't being seduced by the ghost of my dead wife. I was being asked to fuck a soldier.

As I realized what was happening I felt the her warm body press against mine. My body succumbed to her envelope and I felt a tear land upon my cheek. "I need you to fuck me," whispered the naked soldier above me.

And so without hesitation or thought, we flipped over and I pressed her to the bed. My mind immediately transported to the kitchen floor and I began to push my dick into her. As I realized she wasn't wet I began to pull back.

But she pulled me in deeper. The pain she must have felt was less than her need to have my dick inside her. And once my dick was deep inside her I knew that she'd joined me on that kitchen floor. Her pussy began to overflow with a wetness that I couldn't help but remember.

What may have began as soft and exploring turned to an overpowering need to fuck each other as hard and as fast as we could. My thrusts were equal parts passion for the first woman I ever loved and the pain of having my life torn to shreds by a lie. I wasn't trying to fuck her. I was trying to fuck through her!

But the feeling was mutual. An ordinary person I would have broken. This soldier, however, was taking every thrust and getting stronger. Her grip on my shoulders drew blood. Her ankles around my calves were like a cobra. I was being crushed.

As much I tried I couldn't fuck her hard enough. For me. Or for her.

But without warning we both trembled in orgasm before we were ready. As I melted inside of her I didn't want to stop and she wanted to keep every drop inside of her.

I wanted to kiss her.

But I couldn't.

This soldier had killed my wife. My children's mother.

I was starting to think again when she flipped me to my back and pressed her tear drenched lips to mine. "I will always love you," she said as she slid from the bed and cracked the door of the room stark naked.

Stunned, I raced for the door and swung the door wide open. There were two surprised maids in 100 yards of empty hallway.

"Are you okay, sir?" The polite maid asked as though I weren't naked from head to toe.

Minus the okay, Chanda asked me the same question when I entered our living room.

I had a thousand questions but I realized I was physically hurting.

I dressed. I left.

"They're away at camp this week," Chanda explained as I looked around for the kids. Once I realized they weren't around, I began to collapse.

Chanda caught me before I hit the floor and helped me to the shower. I could see the blood swirl into the shower drain as she scrubbed me down. I felt as though I had just been beaten to a pulp - physically and emotionally.

The natural reaction might have been to run away from all of the lies. Why would my wife fake her death? Why would she leave us? What did Chanda know? What did her father know? What was going to happen next?

But I simply didn't have the strength to ask any of those questions. So I looked at Chanda and quietly asked her, "Do you even love me?"

"Silly," Chanda smiled with her own tear to shed, "since day one."