My husband, David, is five years older than me. He is the oldest forty-five-year-old there ever was. He will often joke and say, "Danger is my middle name". That meant that he was likely to fall asleep on the couch while watching television before stumbling off to bed around ten.
I guess you can say he is predictable.
One wouldn't think he would agree on an open relationship, but he has made it comfortable to come out of my shell.
Having the house to myself at night gives me the chance to relax and remember some people I have encountered along the way.
I never met a stranger couple than Fain and JJ. Fain was a friend of Heather's and I guess through that, a friend of mine. We had never hung out together without Heather, but I liked her enough to stop by one afternoon while my husband was at work.
It had been a few days since we were all at Heather's house and her husband was entertaining us with the huge bonfire that he started so we could sit around and drink. JJ and Heather's husband threw an old couch into the inferno and we watched it give off an occasional blue spark.
"That's all the farts caught in there," JJ joked.
Every time another blue spark shot up, we would all laugh.
It wasn't the first time that JJ had hit on another woman in front of his wife. Their open relationship was out there for the world now and always.
"I have always wanted to fuck you, Heather," he drunkenly blurted out.
Heather's husband let it pass a few times. He was better at controlling his temper than most men I knew.. He finally snapped and almost kicked JJ's ass. He probably would have if the other men around hadn't got in the middle.
The whole time I was watching them, I wished I had what Fain and JJ had. I wished it was me he was talking to.
JJ was not an ugly man by any means. I think his personality made him seem that way. For someone who presented himself as if he were the ultimate prize for women, he wasn't much to look at. He had blonde hair under the baseball hat he wore to hide the fact that he had a bald spot in the back of his head. He wore glasses and dressed in coal miner bibs all the time the same way almost every man in town did. His beard was a three-day growth of blotches of dark whiskers that wouldn't grow all the way together to make it look good.
Still, I wanted him.
I had to be around twenty-three at the time and four years into a sexual nightmare where I wanted all my fantasies to come true and all my realities to disappear.
I pulled up to Fain's house and stopped the car at the familiar sound of gravel crunching under the tires. If I had to identify my whereabouts by sound alone, I could have been anywhere in that town.
The two-story house was quiet, and they shut the door, making it seem like there wasn't anybody home.
The music blasting in the pole barn across the yard told a different story. I could see Fain standing with her back to me. I let my slamming car door do the work of letting her know I was there.
Fain was a gigantic woman. Not obese by any means, but chunky, I guess, is a nice way to put it. We looked like a 10 standing next to each other. She wasn't pretty, though I guess she was pretty to some. I'm certain the only thing that attracted JJ to her was the fact that he could fuck other women and she would join in front time to time.
I hadn't known Fain as long as I knew Heather, but I knew her long enough to make what I was thinking awkward.
I wanted to make it known that I wanted to fuck and if she wanted in, that was okay with me as well.
"Hey" she said as she waved me over.
"Hey" I answered as I took the long walk across the yard.
It was still difficult for me to be the center of attention back then. It was challenging to walk normally when I felt like I was being watched. The nervousness that consumed me when there was a first kiss or touch still lingerie in my mind. I miss that. I'm not nervous enough anymore.
In the barn, there was a roomy living area with couches, recliners, and a large flat screen TV.
As I took the tour with Fain while JJ was watching football, I took in the four rooms that surrounded the main area that were closed off and used as bedrooms. Nothing fancy, mind you. Just a mattress and box spring on the floor and maybe a dresser beside them. One room only had a mattress without a sheet or blanket.
I didn't know where I was anymore. It was obviously a party house, but it was something I had never seen before.
"JJ wants to fuck you," she struggled to say as we sat at the bar on the far side of the barn.
