*Author's note. I am in the process of editing and rewriting a number of stories from my collection, as well as editing those of a few other authors. I hope that you enjoy the tidbits that I am able to throw at you until the first flood of fiction hits, and then I can only hope you don't hit back.
In the meantime, here is a little something to hold you over. The story is in two parts, though there is little character relationship between the two halves. If there is any demand, from readers or my muse, then there will be further chapters. Parts 1 and 2 are being submitted on the same day.
The little black ball pt 2: Her point of view, by Seurat
This will not make very much sense unless you have read part 1.
Susan Small, a mid-level saleswoman for a not so successful east coast company, sat in her first class seat and stared at her hands. Cupped inside was a little black sphere, about the size of a golf ball. Across the aisle sat a not-unattractive man that she had gotten to know very well over the past week. He was just as lost in his thoughts as she was in hers, and it was better that they stayed apart while they figured out what their future would hold.
As the storyteller, at this point I would say 'It's not what you think', but I know better. You have, by now, read about Gary, the man in the other seat. You know what Gary will do when he gets off the plane, at least as far as the little black ball is concerned. You know that these two are not lovers, and that when the plane lands, they will go their separate ways. This is the tale of what Susan did with her gift of a little black ball. If the story sounds a little familiar to the first, it's because the parallels in Susan and Gary's situations are what brought them to that episode in their lives.
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When Susan's plane arrived in Philadelphia, she was not greeted at the gate by a loving family. No kids rushed across the mezzanine screaming, "Mommy! We missed you!". No husband was there to shower her with hugs and kisses and take her bags. Susan had no kids, and probably never would unless something drastic changed in her life. Heck, she was married, but most times it didn't feel like she had a husband.
Daryl was on a trip of his own, to San Francisco or L.A. or some such place on the far side of the country. He would be home later that same day, but only for a few nights before he had to jet away once again. She could wait and share a taxi, but they both knew that exhaustion was a major factor in their lives for the next few days. Waiting in an airport wouldn't do either of them any good.
Susan's trip home was a blur, and before she new it, she was sitting in the study of their small South Philly row house. She held in her hand a memory card her husband had 'lost' just a month ago. In reality, she had confiscated it in a moment of clarity. She had used his camera to take a few pictures of damage done to their car while it was parked outside, and when she went to download them, she had an epiphany of sorts.
Some spouses discover their mates infidelity through hints and subtleties; a misplaced word, a caller identification not erased, a hotel matchbook or credit charge that just doesn't seem right. Others experience the cold rush of ice water in the face when they walk in the bedroom after coming home early, only to find their loved ones professing their lust to another. That was the type of epiphany Susan had.
Three pictures had not been deleted from the camera card. Somehow, someway, Daryl's last trip, to the cold and rainy city of Seattle, Washington, had included a beach and lots of sunshine. Susan had no doubt that he was nowhere near Seattle, at least from what she could see in the pictures. Unless palm trees had suddenly started growing in the great Northwest. He must have had it planned long in advance, she thought, as he started sessions in the tanning booth a month before the trip so that any extra skin color could be easily explained away.
The pictures weren't too graphic. They didn't need to be. The first was of a beautiful blonde woman, leaning on the railing of a balcony overlooking a beach. She was stunning, in Susan's mind, in her little bikini top and bare bottom. In the foreground of the picture, almost completely unnoticeable if you were looking at the woman and not at the other things in the room, could be seen a left foot with a purpled big toe. The person taking the shot was sitting on a bed, and had almost framed things perfectly, except for the appearance of the foot. She could still see the tape marks from the small splint she had applied before he had left home.
It was the toe Daryl had broken just before he left on his trip. Stumbling around in the dark one night on the way to the bathroom, his foot had connected with the bottom of the dresser, and presto! One broken toe. He had thought enough to take the splint off while he was at the beach, so that it's presence wouldn't leave a tan line.
The second picture was a reverse shot in a mirror of the same woman. She was dressed to kill in an evening gown, and her makeup was perfect. The picture had been angled to show her in the best possible light, but once again the photographer was just a little off in his composition. On the vanity in front of the mirror Susan could see her husband's shaving kit and his gold watch. The gold watch she had gotten him last Christmas. If she blew up the picture, she could almost make out the engraving.
The third picture was the worst, and the most damning. Her loving husband, stretched out in all his naked glory, in a rather compromising position on the hotel bed. His hands were handcuffed above his head, a blindfold was in place, and she could still see the remnants of shaving cream were his pubic hair had been removed. Written in lipstick on his chest were the words, "pussy hound", but he didn't seem to mind. The big grin on his face and the even bigger erection between his legs made it obvious that he wasn't too upset about his new nickname, or his situation. She remembered that he made a point of telling her he had shaved himself in order to add a little spark to their sex life.
Susan looked at the pictures again and again, and tried to find some way to explain it away. Daryl had known about the pictures, that was for sure. He just didn't know she had copies. They were at the tail end of a sequence, most likely of his last day he was there. That much could be ascertained by the numbering of the pictures on the card. Susan figured that he had been copying and deleting the pictures, and had somehow missed these last three. The card was secreted away, just in case she could figure out how to undelete the other former pictures. A clean replacement had been put into the camera so that the missing one wouldn't be noticed.
For two weeks she watched him for any sign of guilt or shame or further indiscretion, but she saw nothing. Not that it mattered. She shut down the intimacy they once had, claiming sickness, while she figured out what to do and where to go. There was no grand confrontation, with them screaming at one another or things thrown in anger. There was a lot of numbness on her part, though, as the implications of the scenes in the pictures sunk into her thoughts.
At first she thought nothing could be worse but the more she thought about things, the worse the situation became. She couldn't stand to be around him at all, and he acted completely innocent. His life went on in blissful ignorance of her turmoil, while everything he did or said had implications in her life. Was he still seeing this woman? Was she better than Susan as a lover or a friend? She was certainly more attractive, and the little bondage scene was something that Susan would never have thought of in all their time together.
Was it a one off event, or was he even now plotting time for this other woman? Would Susan be thrown out of her own house to be replaced by a new and improved model wife?
She couldn't confront him yet, not without a plan of action. Her upcoming trip would give her time away, time to think. A revenge fuck with a total stranger? No, that wouldn't fix things, and it wasn't in her personality. He wouldn't care, probably. He already had somebody else. She would need something to make her feel empowered in the situation. Something to put her back in control. Slowly, the love she had for her husband changed to contempt, and then outright hatred.
Then she went to South America and her world came apart as the rest of her life was thrown into complete turmoil. This time, she got an answer for her questions. She got her little black ball.