The Switch

Val showered with the boy who, without his gimp suit and under normal circumstances, became Kyle. Both men studiously avoided checking each other out, or making any physical contact, a fact which left Samara more than a little amused.

'Fine, I'll get out and you can stop pissing yourself laughing,' Val sighed, getting out and grabbing a towel.

'Come here,' she ordered.

He stood in front of her, his towel tucked around his waist. 'What?'

She hugged him. It took him a second to respond; he wasn't accustomed to being touched, and the affection made him feel stilted and awkward. He wrapped his arms around her, and buried his face in her neck as she stroked his back.

He was just getting into it when she pushed him back and rubbed his shoulders maternally.

'Take care of yourself,' she ordered.

'I will.'

It was a dismissal, and he was polite enough to obey it. He went to the room they'd played in, got dressed, and cleaned up as best he could. He appreciated that the hosts lent out bedrooms, and was always careful not to do anything that might make them change their mind about doing so in future.

Val went to return the towel to the bathroom, but the door was shut and he could hear Samara making tell-tale noises. She wasn't going to wait until they got home; she just wanted to wait until Val wasn't around. That was okay. He understood.

Val folded the towel and left it on the floor, then went downstairs to get something to drink. He was thirsty, and his mouth still tasted of condom. Oliver and another friend, Miles, were sitting at the breakfast bar, drinking straight scotch, and when they saw Val they stared at him.

'What?' Val asked.

Miles pointed to an iPad on the bench. 'We saw.'

Of course they did. The whole house was wired up. Val felt a faint flush creep up his neck. Oliver and Miles didn't understand. They took a different role in the games, and even if they weren't openly disapproving, there were times where their expressions showed their complete lack of comprehension as to why Val would let a woman dominate him.

'She remains the Queen of the Ruined Orgasm,' Oliver remarked.

She'd always been the goddamned queen of that, Val thought dryly. He'd hated it. He wasn't multi-orgasmic, and if she'd ruined his orgasm, it meant he wouldn't be getting any fun that night. She'd ruined a lot of his climaxes when they were a couple. It was one of the reasons they were no longer together.

'I gave him one to make up for it,' Val replied.

Miles snorted. 'So are you still telling us all you're straight? Because that's, what, the fourth guy you've blown?'

'Third. Well, second or third, depending on how you look at it. I couldn't get the first one to cum,' Val replied. 'And sure, why wouldn't I be straight? I want to date a woman. I want to have a sexual relationship with a woman. Men are just...'

'...do enlighten me,' Miles teased.

'Part of the show,' Val grinned, cracking open a can of Pepsi. 'Don't fear, Miles, I'm not interested in giving you head.'

The three of them laughed. They were good mates, irrespective of their differences, and Val knew they wouldn't have watched the proceedings if they hadn't been somewhat curious as to what was going to occur.

'How's online dating working for you?' Oliver inquired, neatly changing the subject.

'Shit,' Val admitted. 'I'm about to throw the towel in.'

'Maybe you should get some of the women to look over your profile,' Oliver suggested. 'They'll be able to tell you where you're going wrong.'

'I'm not sure I'm ready for that level of humiliation,' Val replied.

'What level of humiliation?' Samara asked, breezing past in a post orgasmic glow. God knows where the boy was. She may have left him chained up.

Oliver and Miles explained. Valery hoped she wouldn't find the topic interesting. She knew too much about him; his faults, his strengths, his weaknesses, every little fucking thing.

Samara gazed thoughtfully at Val. 'Why are you trying to find a vanilla woman?'

'I'm not. I'm just going to the places where most women go.'

She raised her eyebrows. 'Sounds dangerous. What are you going to do if you find someone you like, and she doesn't want to play your games?'

'I'll cross that bridge if, and when, I come to it.'

'Can I see your profile?' she asked.

He reached for his phone, pulled up his profile, and showed her. Miles and Oliver tried to look, but Samara shooed them away. Valery was grateful that Samara still felt at least some possessiveness and ownership over him. It was stifling when you were in a relationship with her, but quite handy on occasions like this.

'This is terrible,' she remarked, scrolling down. 'Hasn't anyone ever told you the rule about fishing photos? Or the one about making sure you're fully dressed? No one wants to see a shirtless man holding a tuna...'

...swordfish,' Val corrected.

'Swordfish. No one is attracted to a man without a shirt on, holding a swordfish,' she pointed out, not unkindly. 'You should have included a photo where you're smiling. You have a nice smile. Oh, and leave out the part that you play cricket. No woman wants to hear that you're either going to be unavailable for half of each weekend during summer, or she's going to be dragged along so she can be bored witless watching you.'

Val sipped his drink. 'Well, what do you think I should write?'

'I'll just fix it for you,' she replied, as she made her way out of the room.

He would have preferred that she didn't, but he wanted to stay on her good side. For one thing, he still liked her as a person, and for another, he had the feeling he was going to be single for some time still. If he was nice to her, she might invite him to play again.

The three men watched her leave.

'Are you worried?' Miles inquired.

'Sort of,' Val admitted. 'But I probably need some help. What's so wrong with a fishing photo?'

'How old are you?' Miles asked.

'Thirty-six.'

Miles shrugged. 'And you've never heard a woman talk about the 'no fishing pictures' rule?'

'I work with men,' Val argued. 'When would I see or hear a woman?'

'Therein is the problem,' Oliver grinned. 'You've forgotten what tits look like. You're slowly turning to men, one day at a time. One blowjob at a time.'

Val flipped him the bird. 'Fuck you.'

'Ollie's jealous,' Miles sniggered. 'He wants you to suck him off.'

'Mate, there is no fucking way one earth...' Oliver began.

Val had had enough. There was only so much grief he was willing to cop in one night. He made his excuses and left the lounge room. He glanced in the lounge room, and saw that Samara and a few of the women were huddled over his phone. There was no use asking for it now; they wouldn't give it back until they were ready.

He went outside to his car, opened it, and fished through the glove box for his weed. He hoped Oliver - who was a cop, and inclined to get cranky at him over drug use - would stay inside, as he rolled and lit a joint.

He was thirty-fucking-six, single, pretty goddamn desperate, and he'd just given the third blow job of his life. He hated his job, had a house that the previous owners had painted an interesting shade of pink, and a daughter that called another man 'Dad'.

Val sat in the driver's seat, pondering how life had come to this. He'd been in Australia for thirty-one years now, and while every other member of his family loved it, he felt lost. Worse, he felt even more of an oddity when he returned to what was the USSR when he left it, and was now Russia. He fit in absolutely nowhere.

He finished the joint, and stayed in the car, letting the comforting blanket of marijuana wash over him. He always felt melancholy when he'd engaged in sex with a random person - or people - who didn't want to stay and cuddle with him afterwards, but the weed made it better. The sorrow seemed less pathetic, and somehow dignified.

God knows how long he sat there, staring out the window. At some point, though, Samara came up and tapped on the window.

'Sorry,' he apologised.

Her face contorted as she recognised the smell, but she didn't comment on it. Instead, she handed him his phone.

'So did you fix my profile?' he joked.

'We not only fixed it, we found you your next girlfriend,' she replied confidently. 'I hope you like redheads.'

He grinned and took the phone. 'Sure. Thanks Samara.'

'You heading off?'

'Yeah, I am.' He reached for his keys, then realised they were already in the ignition. 'Thanks for tonight. I really appreciate it.'

'The boy wanted to play.'

'Did you?' he asked, the drug giving him an unusual boldness. It always did that; always allowed him to say things he ordinarily wouldn't dream of.

She didn't reply.

'No,' he guessed. 'In which case, really, really, thank-you.'

Samara forced a smile. 'It's not that I didn't want to. I was just scared of your reaction. How are you coping? Olly said you're not having a good time at the moment.'

'I'll be fine. I just need to get in the right headspace again.'

'Call me if you need to talk. I'll always listen.'

'I know that. Thanks.'

She stepped up on the side step and kissed his cheek. 'Take care.'

He drove home quietly and slowly. The radio was on, and he didn't like the song, but he didn't want to change it. He lived only a few streets away.

As he pulled up to his house, he wondered what Samara had meant by 'we found your new girlfriend'. Whoever it was they had picked, he doubted it was anyone he would find interesting or attractive.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Aimee was only three weeks into online dating and already equally petrified and horrified. Maybe it was her. Maybe there was something about her that attracted men who were just plain weird. She had friends who claimed they attracted cheaters or men who were only after sex, but Aimee seemed to have the market cornered when it came to men who were just bloody strange.

This probably explained why she'd agreed to meet for lunch with a man who'd contacted her for the first time last night. He was the first normal sounding man she'd come across. She'd replied to his message this morning. He'd been online at the time and replied soon after, and the ensuing conversation had gone so well, they'd started chatting. He claimed he was single. He was attractive. He was employed.

There had to be a catch, and she was determined to find out what it was. When he asked if she was doing anything today, and she'd admitted that no, she wasn't - her mother had taken her son out for the day, to give her some time to herself - it had seem natural to agree to meet up for lunch.

She thought that maybe he wouldn't show up, or maybe he'd look totally different, or maybe he'd be socially inept, but he was none of these things. He did, however, have an accent and she wondered where he was from.

They sat at a table and ordered drinks, while they each carefully surveyed each other. When he'd first approached he'd looked scary and intimidating, but that had changed the moment he'd smiled at her. His smile changed him completely.

He was tall, much taller than her, and he dressed well, but simply; jeans and a button through shirt, short, well kept beard, and a shaved head. There was a gold chain around his neck and a gold and diamond ring on his finger. It was on the finger where men traditionally wore a wedding band. She realised this all too late, and her throat constricted. Not only was he married, but he was too arrogant to remove the ring.

'I didn't realise you were married,' she said.

He looked up, an expression of surprise on his face. 'I'm not.'

She gestured to the ring. He smiled and twisted it around his finger.

'Oh, that's just cultural,' he explained. 'Everyone in my family wears their wedding ring on their right hand. The left hand is for decoration.'

She felt foolish. 'Where are you from?'

'My family's technically Chechen, but my family had moved to Moscow in the forties for a variety of reasons. They immigrated to Australia just over thirty years ago.'

'And they like it here?'

'Oh yeah, definitely. It's a totally different climate and lifestyle, but there's no corruption, no chance of being tortured, and they've developed a fondness for meat pies.'

'In which case, there's no going back,' she agreed.

He smiled. 'No. We freeze every time we go over. How about you? You're Australian?'

'I am, but I don't have the skin tone for it,' she replied, twisting a lock of red hair around her hand nervously. There were strawberry blond redheads, and there were full on ranga redheads. She was a ranga through and through. Her hair was brick red, her eyes hazel, and her skin was covered in freckles. 'Thank God my son didn't inherit the pale skin. His father was from Cape Town.'

'How old is your son?'

'Eight. Ben's eight. You said you have a daughter?'

'I do,' he said. 'Bella's just turned eleven. She lives in Melbourne with her mother and stepfather.'

'That must be hard.'

'Not really,' he admitted, fiddling with his wine glass. 'I didn't know she existed until she was two. I fly down once a month to see her, so she knows who I am, but I'm not really her father per se.'

That was curious.

'Why didn't you know?' she asked.

'I spent a weekend with her mother, and that was it. She was the friend of a friend. She found out she was pregnant a few months later, but she didn't know my full name, and to be honest, I don't think she wanted me to find out. She had an on-off relationship with her boyfriend at the time, and they agreed to raise the baby as his.

A few years later, they split up, and the boyfriend decided he didn't want to be financially responsible for a kid that wasn't his. She tracked me down because she wanted child support, I found out I was a father...' he shrugged. 'The rest is history. She ended up finding another man, got married, and the husband became her father figure.'

'Wow.'

Wow was an understatement. Ben had been conceived with her husband two years after they got married. Nine months after his birth, Chris had been killed, and she'd raised her son on her own. She'd only had two short relationships since then.

'She comes up every Christmas for a few weeks,' Val added. 'We just get used to each other again, and she goes back.'

'Do you find that weird?'

'Umm,' he frowned. 'It is, but it isn't. If I'd raised her from birth, I'd probably say it was, but this is all either of us have ever known. I'm quite conscious not to interfere too much in her life. I'm not the one who has to do the day to day grind.'

'I'm sorry for prodding.'

He shrugged and gestured to show he wasn't offended. 'It's better to ask. How about you? Where's your son's father?'

'Dead. He was killed in a hit and run when my son was nine months old. He and Ben were crossing at a pedestrian crossing, and a driver didn't stop. My son didn't have a scratch on him. My husband had a closed casket.'

'Shit, that's rough. What happened to the driver?'

'I don't know. They didn't stop, and they were never caught.' She forced a smile. 'That's rather grim, isn't it?'

'It's pretty bad,' he agreed. 'I can't imagine that was easy for you.'

'No, but it was a long time ago. You move on.'

They changed the topic of conversation to work and life. He said he was a heavy machinery sales representative. She told him she worked in child care.

'I'd rather work with kids,' he said.

'I prefer kids to adults,' she agreed. 'When I left school I wanted to be an acupuncturist, so I got a job at a natural therapies clinic and started studying. What I didn't realise was that the girl who had my job before me used to give men 'happy endings' to their massages for a bit of extra cash. I lasted three months before I realised I was never going to stop getting dicks shoved in my face. So, I went to work in child care, where, incidentally, you get to see toddler genitalia more often than you need to. I work with two to three year olds. I spend my life toilet training kids.'

She stopped suddenly and went bright red. Holy fuck, what the hell had she just said? She'd managed to turn a get-to-know-you conversation into one that combined prostitution, penises and the toileting habits of toddlers.

Val, thank God, laughed.

'Sorry,' she apologised. 'I always forget to think before I speak.'

'Don't apologise; I do the same thing. Give it time and I'll come out with something ridiculously bad.'

She doubted it, but it was nice of him to say so. He seemed very in control of everything. Stable. Solid. The more she talked with him, the less intimidating he seemed, and the more genuine he appeared. He thought about her questions. He gave her answers that weren't the socially accepted 'right' ones, but were good answers all the same. If he was playing her, he was doing a great job of it.

They got caught up in conversation and it was only when the people next to them were served their lunch that it occurred to either of them that the food they'd ordered hadn't arrived.

They asked where their lunch was. Inquiries were made, and they were told their lunch order had fallen to the floor in the kitchen and, as such, it wasn't made. Furthermore, neither of the options they'd requested were available. Oh, and the kitchen was closing in half an hour.

'At one thirty?' Val asked incredulously.

The waitress shrugged. 'Everyone's had gastro.'

Aimee and Val exchanged horrified looks.

'We'll just pay for the drinks and go,' Aimee suggested to the waitress.

The waitress's 'are you sure?' response was met with a lot of head nodding and agreement. Val paid for their drinks. He refused to accept the change the waitress offered, thus giving an eight dollar tip on twelve dollars worth of drinks, presumably, Aimee figured, to avoid any extra contact with gastro germs.

They hurried out before another staff member could offer them to food, and Val promptly invited her back to his place.

'I used to be a chef,' he said. 'When I left school, I thought it'd be a really cool career. I made it three years into my apprenticeship before deciding I wanted to work less than sixty hours a week, and to have public holidays off.'

'Was the job fun?'

'At times. Mostly it was shit. I probably shouldn't say that, though, as I wasn't the one being propositioned on a daily basis.' He touched her hand. 'Come with me. I'll drive you.'

Aimee had a keen interest in not being murdered. The last thing she wanted was him taking her back to his house, killing her, and disposing of her body. At least if she followed him, the police would be able to trace her car. 'It's okay. Give me the address and I'll follow you.'

She followed him to his place, all the while wondering if she was going to be killed. Maybe he wanted to have sex with her. Maybe he just wanted to wash his hands, given that he'd touched and drank from a germ ridden wine glass. Aimee could definitely understand the last point. She'd worked in child care long enough to have had every gastro bug imaginable.

She'd thought that he'd live in a modern home, or perhaps an apartment, but his house looked like something old people would live in. It was a bright pink single level weatherboard house, and there were a lot of hedges, shrubs and painted concrete out front. It was on a huge block of land and there was a jacaranda tree out front with a swing hanging from it. Ben would have loved it. They lived in a unit, and he always complained about the lack of space.

Aimee parked out the front and followed him through the creaky iron gate. A cat ducked out from underneath a bush and bolted past. Another sat on the tiled front porch, staring magnanimously at them.

'Is that your cat?' she asked, pointing to the one on the porch.

'They're both my cats. There are another four around somewhere. They came with the house.'