Have you ever noticed that every class has an asshole who thinks that he's being funny by insulting and putting everybody down? My high school class had one too — Frank Fortune. And to me, the big irritation was that no one thought it was funny when they were in his sights, but as soon as he started ripping into someone ELSE, they would be there laughing their stupid heads off too. Idiots.
Of course I had a big target painted on my back, just because of my name: Montgomery Tressor. Most people called me Monty, while Frank always stretched my name out more like 'Mont-gomer-eee.' That was when he wasn't calling me 'Gomer' after the dorky character 'Gomer Pyle' on television. Really funny guy.
But he was a non-discriminatory asshole. Kids with glasses (especially if they had unfashionable frames or really thick lenses) were always handy targets. Guys who were uncoordinated, or slow, or who couldn't throw a football or a baseball in P.E. were also subjected to his 'humor.' Et Cetera, ad nauseum...
I actually didn't care much about what he said about me. I was fit, popular enough and best of all, a good student who had been accepted to a number of colleges and universities that would get me OUT of my little hick town!
So I left, got my B.A. in Business (emphasis in management) and was living the life. I'd met a wonderful gal in college, Donna, and we'd been married about 5 years when this tale began.
After I graduated, I got a job with one of the Fortune 500 companies (you'd recognize it if I told you the name) and began working my way up the corporate ladder, but after I'd put in my time there I was fed up with the corporate culture, the slow pace of change and the way that the guys at the top were looting the company. I figured there wouldn't be enough loot left for me by the time that I made it to the top, so I decided to make the great leap over to a newer, smaller and more entrepreneurial company.
The benefit for me was that I was hired to manage one of their divisions. The downside was that it took me back to the town where I grew up.
Actually, it wasn't that bad. In the close to a decade that I'd been gone the town had grown substantially and now boasted all of the same national chains and stores and restaurants that festered in the rest of the country. To tell you the truth, I had also missed being close to the mountain peaks of the Rocky's, and had gotten really tired of the weather in southern Ohio (there you go — a hint of who I worked for!)
Donna was happy as a clam as well. She had her high school teaching credentials, but was hired by the local Community College to teach English lit. Her high school credentials were all she needed in our new location.
Now I should mention that Donna was an attractive woman. I often read about how so-and-so's wife was a 'walking wet dream', or 'gave every man in the room a hard on.' What nonsense! Donna had dark brown hair offset with light blue eyes and a complexion that was always flawless. Her features were regular, and she tanned easily. But it was when she smiled (something she did often) that people, both men and women, found her charming and approachable. She was medium height with an athletic build — medium breasts, good legs and a classic shape with her narrow waist. Intelligent, witty with a great sense of humor, she also had a fine voice. I enjoyed playing music on the piano for her to sing to.
Our sex life was very good (at least I thought of it as good) although she was inclined towards pretty vanilla, standard stuff — regular intercourse; oral was fine, no anal. She was also uninterested in most of the regular fodder of fantasy — I was told in absolute terms that trying to bring anyone else into the bedroom would result in a divorce (something that didn't bother me at all — I felt the same way). We tried (usually only once) a little light bondage, once dressing up in costumes (I was the pirate ravishing the captive.) She was completely unwilling to let me take any risqué photos.
I didn't complain; what we had was fine.
There was only one real issue between us and it was something that was absolutely no ones fault. Donna was barren. Her ovaries worked in every way except one — they produced no viable ova. The worst of all worlds: she had her monthly periods, but she was flushing out eggs that could never be fertile. So we accepted that and were living the pleasant lives of a childless couple. C'est la vie!
If Donna was attractive, and presumably hit on by others, well, so was I. I mentioned that I had always been considered handsome, or at least good looking, by women and I had maintained the same weight that I had reached during college — just a little more than I had been in high school. I worked out on a regular basis. And like Donna, I was considered to be a pleasant and charming man, never crude or rude. I tried to be kind and generous towards others.
Before I went off onto my tangent there, I mentioned that Donna had been hired at the local Community College to teach English Literature.
I couldn't say that I was delighted when I attended the first faculty get together with Donna at the President's official residence (a perk of the office) and discovered that one of the other members of the faculty was Frank Fortune, asshole extraordinaire.
He somehow managed to get it together long enough to get a four-year degree in art history and a teaching credential and he was also teaching at the JC (the shorthand that everyone uses to describe a Community College) But, as the old saying goes: the more things change the more they stay the same!
Alas, for all of the changes in Frank Fortune, he was still the same asshole. Only now, he was even more pretentious and obnoxious. He was still a poseur of the first order. Now, he was 'authority' and an 'artist.' Argh!
He was still the old Frank, though. Everyone else was dressed in 'business casual'; Frank was wearing jeans and a Hawaii shirt — projecting his bohemian image, no doubt. He still had the brown mop of hair, but instead of combing it back with Brylcream, it was cut short and spiked up. At 6' tall, he had filled in somewhat since our high school days, but he was by no means heavy. Probably just a good metabolism.
I watched him as he drifted around the room making 'jokes' about people, right to their faces, laughing them off and expecting them to tolerate his insults because they were 'sophisticated' people — they were clearly above taking his insults seriously. Yeah. I could read their faces and body language. They weren't really amused.
In fact I noticed that a number of Donna's fellow faculty members had a similar approach to Frank. I admit that over the intervening years Frank had become more subtle with his insults: double entendre and backhanded compliments rather than directly aggressive insults.
When he made it around the room to where Donna and I were hanging out, he seemed surprised. I don't think that until that moment that he'd put it together that Donna 'Tressor' might be my wife. After all, I'd headed off to the big smoke years before. Now he realized his error and was anxious to pounce.
"I'll be damned if it isn't 'Gomer' Tressor! Long time no see."
I took the offensive right back.
"Frankie boy!," I exclaimed, "Still being the same old asshole, I see! Going around giving everyone a load of shit!" Then I smiled and laughed. Donna stood there looking shocked.
"I don't know how you get away with it. I guess it's OK so long as you can take it as well as dishing it out — you old shitkicker." Take a guess — did he ever really 'take it' well? Hell no!
Frank hadn't looked pleased from the time that I called him 'Frankie boy', but by the time I was finished he had no choice to save face except to go along with me, smile and laugh like we were two old buddies, used to insulting each other for fun.
But he pretty quickly backed off. Like most bullies, once someone stands up to them, they retreat.
"Monty, good to see you again. And you too Donna — I never had a clue that you were married to an old high school classmate!"
He smirked again and continued making his rounds. As he did, I noticed a few of the other faculty members who had overheard our little chat looking my way and very slightly smiling or nodding their heads over the way I'd dealt with Frank.
Maybe what I did that night was a mistake, but I don't know that there was anything I could have done that would have changed the eventual outcome.
At home that night my wife wasn't pleased.
"Damn it, Monty! Why did you have to embarrass me in front of all of my colleagues this evening? The way that you treated Frank was completely out of line," she told me.
"Donna, I've known Frank Fortune for a lot longer than you have and I could see that most of your 'colleagues' were tickled to death that I gave him back as good as I got," was my reply.
It was a cold night in our house that night, but by the morning everything was forgotten and forgiven. Or so I thought.
~~~*~~~
After that I would ask Donna about Frank from time to time, but other than her insisting that, "He's a perfect gentleman to me; charming and polite and very involved with the local art scene," I never heard her talk about him.
I was a tad curious about some things having to do with Frank.
He seemed to live a pretty expensive life style for someone being paid just a little bit more than a high school teacher. But he wasn't married, so he had no wife or kids to spend money on; just himself. How apropos.
His house and his new 'Z' car were fairly upscale, on the surface more than you would expect. Then again, maybe he'd gotten the house when his parents passed away or something. Turned out they were still alive, in fact they lived just a couple of blocks away from my folks. So maybe his hidden wealth came from an inheritance from a rich uncle or something.
Having been raised in town, I also knew men from high school who were part of the local constabulary as well.
My old acquaintance Larry, now a Sargent with the local PD, and I talked about it once at a BBQ held at a mutual friends place.
"Yeah," Larry said, gently scratching his head, "We've taken more than one look at him. Seems to have money to spare, but that's not a crime. We think that he does some pot, but, again, everyone in the local 'cultural' scene probably does that too. What are we going to do? Arrest them all so that they can be fined $100? It's not worth the energy when we have real criminals to catch."
I did get another clue when a local 20-something laughed when I mentioned his name.
"Frank? Yeah, he usually has some good shit to sell, but he only deals if he knows you and trusts you."
I guess that left me out.
By then, even I didn't really care. Life was going on and everything was just fine.
Then I got a call from a true friend. My life was turned over during a two-minute phone call. It would never be the same again.
I was angry out of my mind that first night. I even growled at Donna before I apologized, told her I wasn't feeling well and went to bed.
By the next morning, I knew what I was going to do. It was just a question of how and when.
Frank could have insulted me forever, but he had crossed a line that I would not tolerate.
~~~*~~~
Six weeks later, the party to be seen at, if you were one of the town's 'A' list group was taking place at Nancy Ann Smythe's place. She'd been a regular 'Smith' in high school, but now she was 'an artist.' She was also, at least nominally, Franks girlfriend. Nancy was actually a surprisingly nice woman and had always been. In high school she was a cheerleader (with all that implies), but unlike the others, Nancy was genuinely sweet and friendly with everyone in the class. It was a shock that she would be attracted to Frank, simply because she had always been the 'anti-Frank' — the complete opposite personality type.
I would venture a guess it had something to do with the fact that she had majored in Fine Arts, in fact she had a Master's degree and was a fairly well known painter, at least regionally. But all of that is a digression.
I didn't quite crash the party; I'd been invited to them all since I returned to town because of my position. But this was the first time I'd actually shown up. I was on the prowl that night and I was stalking my victim.
I spent a little time at the party before I approached Frank. I waited until I could catch him alone.
"Hey, Frank! Got a minute?"
He looked at me rather suspiciously.
