Guilty Pleasures Finale

Welcome to finale of the Clark Howard series. I hope you enjoyed the buffet of tropes I tried to work up into an original format. This story went its own way on me as I wrote it, and I had fun copying it all down.

As always, I am not going for deep truths or gritty realism. The aim for me is a plausibly ridiculous course of events.

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Guilty Pleasures - Finale

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The Saturday move had been swift and efficient, with Wanda as eager for it to happen as Yancey was, which was to say, not entirely. Both of them had gotten used to Monica's presence, even when it cramped their style a little. We were done by lunchtime, and Monica ordered a couple of large pizzas for the four of us without telling me in advance, because, "That's how friends pay friends for help with moving."

The next morning, Monica shot up in bed as the sun rolled into the window. A naked Monica, shooting up from under the covers next to me was, I was pleased to discover, better than a double-shot of espresso when it came to inducing wakefulness and blood flow. And I had slept like a rock the night before, once we had finally let each other sleep.

I had forgotten how marvelous it was to have someone I cared for like this living with me...

"Clark! This is really my home now, right?"

"It better be," I said, pulling myself upright next to her. "You processed your change of address with the post office last night online."

"Then I would like to have a little light dinner for my friends this evening, so they can know that we are... this now."

"Sure," I said, not quite tracking. "We could also just bigfoot this Friday's festivities and move the neighborhood thing to here..."

"I said, 'friends,' Clark," Monica said. "I've learned an enormous amount about who my friends are over this Summer. I have gotten tremendous support and encouragement from our neighbors, and I will thank them all forever. But none of them really went out of their way to spend any extra time with me, just to be friendly. The same goes for my work colleagues. Support, accommodation, generosity. But no real outreach."

"So you want to invite Wanda and Yancey over," I said, thinking I had it, and happily so.

"And Becca," Monica added. "She needs to know we are living together anyway, before the next time she just drops by to get something."

Uh huh.

Uh oh.

Monica was looking at me, with a stern smile.

"Oh you have got to be kidding me. The hellions, too?"

"I love that name," Monica laughed. "But I prefer The Trinity. And of course, the girls too. Why wouldn't I? Why wouldn't

we

? Those three, those four, gently shepherded us together, consciously and unconsciously."

"This is going to be a shitshow," I grumbled. Not that I was going to say no.

*

Shockingly, it was not a shitshow. None of the few remaining secrets among all of us came explosively to light. Becca didn't so much as grimace at me and her friends. Not even when Mary put her arm around me, and her hand on my ass, while telling me her latest tale of relationship woe. (She had checked carefully to ensure that her parents were out of sight, but she missed Becca.)

I even behaved myself when Becca was teased about missing a morning class because... she had still been at Kent's dorm. It was hard, but I managed it. I also cornered my daughter privately and interrogated her about Rebecca. I was pleased to learn that my ex remained In Trouble, and there was little indication that she would be anything but In Trouble for a good while. But I was even more pleased that Becca didn't seem hell bent of it being a permanent state of affairs. With me, she had gotten a taste of how much fun it could be to lovingly punish a parent, and now she had a far better opportunity to indulge herself with her mother. I was quite content to let her run with it. I'd watch, and if things started to turn rancid, I'd intervene. But unless that happened, I would contentedly revel in Rebecca stewing in the juices of her own actions.

*

The following Wednesday, after I got home from beers with Yancey, Monica and I were cuddling on the couch, streaming some new foreign series. The plot was truly fascinating, the dialog veered wildly from utterly clever to stilted beyond belief, and the action and other production values were... quaint.

Then, all of a sudden, for no discernible plot reason other than that it was probably allowed for in her contract, the female lead got naked. Spectacularly naked. We are talking Hall of Fame gratuitous nudity.

I was... charmed.

So was Monica. "Wow... she is fucking hot," my babe breathed next to me.

Okay her reaction may had added a hardness factor or two to my already enthusiastic reaction to the full-frontal coffee-making scene we were watching. I had been leaving Monica alone for a while now, but my hands were suddenly back all over her breasts as we sat on the couch.

"Mmmm," Monica cooed happily at my sudden assault. "Someone is all horny when I appreciate a nice set of tits..."

"Those are not just merely nice," I observed. "And yes, I am."

We wrestled about a bit as the all too brief flesh show ran its course.

As if to make us pay for the sudden sex explosion, the show cut to the comic relief being neither. That character was a serious weak link in the production. I snuggled Monica down against me and I sighed. "You know, you've been teasing me for a while now about whatever sapphic experimentation you ended up trying. I know, it is fair dues, you don't have to tell me because it happened before there was an Us, but I still am dying to hear the tale," I prompted hopefully.

"You know," she said, sitting up and smiling, "I kind of think there has been an Us for longer than the last two weeks, don't you?"

I considered that. "I hope so." Then I leaned in with a companionable leer. "So does that mean I have a right to know who you hooked up with?"

Monica looked at me and shrugged merrily. "Sorry, Clark. Your lesbian porn fantasies remain unfulfilled."

"What? But I thought..."

"Oh, you are fun to tease, you know," Monica chuckled.

"Well, shit," I grumped, flopping back on the sofa with my arms crossed.

She laughed at my antics, but sobered just a little. "You know, just going out and finding some hot lesbian willing to give a girl a walk on the wild side is not that easy," she pouted.

"It has to be easier when you look like you do," I assumed.

"Thank you," she smiled. Then we both winced as the male lead took a bullet that grazed his upper arm and spun him around. We shut up for the gunfight.

When it was over, and the heroine was patching up the guy, Monica resumed talking. "You know, when we started this show, I didn't think it was going to have any sex to speak of, and I didn't feel like it needed it. Now after that scene in her kitchen, I'm just totally derailed by the disappointment we aren't watching some nude nursing here."

I was feeling the same way, actually, and nodded along.

"I do want to try it. At least once. If the opportunity presents," Monica said again, almost tentatively.

"Nude nursing? I'll pencil in a sick day," I teased.

I got a poke for my trouble. "Dingus! You know what I'm talking about."

"Please do not let me stop you," I snorted. I was picturing her with the heroine on the TV, and not hating the imagery.

"I didn't think you would," she scoffed, then shoved me a little. "Would

you

?"

"Would I what?"

"Try it with another guy?"

"What?"

"Oh, you big baby!"

"I am not a big baby. I am a big, old man who is happily heterosexual, who has made it this far in life without interacting with another naked dude with an erection, and who very much wants to keep that streak alive and well."

She giggled and snuggled in against me. "Okay."

There. That settled that.

"But if I ever get a chance to be spit-roasted, I'd prefer to have you be one end or the other of the rotisserie," she said, stroking my thigh.

"No," I said with visceral fervor that surprised both of us.

"Really, Clark? I'm not suggesting you'd have to touch whoever at all..."

"It's not that," I said definitively. I'd never really visualized fucking a woman while she blew someone else before, and the concept... was surprisingly intriguing. But not if the woman was Monica. She looked at me as I did some mental inventory. "I think the problem would be that I'd have to see you doing it."

"Clark..." she began, confused.

"I do not, at any time, want to

see

you with another man," I said. "Flirting, sure. Coming on to one even, that's... okay. It's actually fun to watch you work your mojo. But I do not want to see you actually having sex with, or even so much as kissing another guy. Ever. I just don't see myself bending that way."

"We are a weird couple, aren't we?" she asked.

"Yep. Oh, and if you do find yourself being turned on a spit, I am going to want to hear about it later in as graphic a detail as possible, please."

She laughed. Then she paused, and looked thoughtful. "I don't think you are going to get that story, Clark..."

"Oh?" I prompted, curious, but not wanting to push.

"Two guys? Uh... I do this... I both need and enjoy doing all... this, because it reaffirms that I am free, and always will be. And that you are free, and... whatever," she waved off our larger, hideously complicated issues for the moment. "But two guys at once, and neither of them is you? No. My trap radar would be going off so hard, no matter how much I liked them both, no matter how awesome it might or might not feel, I'd just be feeling trapped, no matter what."

"So, no two dudes for you?" I asked, hoping she wasn't going to need me to find a way to step up for her, and set aside my own hangups.

She just chuckled happily. "Somehow, I think I will be able to find ways to get my jollies in as much variety as I like without messing with your head, bucko!"

"As long as we both make each other happy, right?" I asked.

She nodded.

Then we paused the show because we had stopped watching and didn't want to miss any more potential gratuitous nude vacuuming scenes or the like...

*

I made a quick two-day trip to Palo Alto for work the following Monday and Tuesday. It was weird not having to spend time buttoning up the house for departure, since Monica was there now. Convenient, but weird... and wonderful.

I came

this

close to being able to take Carrie-Anne with me as my sidekick. When the opportunity showed itself, I had pushed as hard as I dared to make that happen, I assure you. But in the end, she just wasn't the right person to go. It was too bad, because her idea from my meeting was clearly gaining steam, and she had already gone out of her way to let me know she was quite grateful for my proactive insistence that credit went where it was deserved.

On the plus side, had I been distracted by Carrie-Anne, I would not have ended up spending a very rewarding evening with one of our VC's consultants, a well-maintained woman of my own age with the filthiest sense of humor I had encountered in a woman in a decade... and the sort of life attitudes that meant a lot of her humor sprang from personal experience.

We each added to the other's personal experiences. Monica was pleased when I got back.

*

The next week went by uneventfully. Things were smooth at work. Monica and I had great sex. We were old enough and experienced enough to not feel like we had to fill every waking hour with each other. I had drinks with Yancey. Monica went to a movie with Anne. We even had our first little fight, over how toilet paper is supposed to go on the roll. My position is, it comes over the top and down the front, just like God hung it for Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden. I even won the argument. I banked that feeling away, because I am also old enough and experienced enough to know I would not win many more such over the rest of my life...

I could get used to this new normal.

Neither of us got up to any outside shenanigans either. It was the longest stretch where I could remember with that being the case in a long while. And it wasn't because we were intentionally trying to 'be good', or anything. For instance, I was very aware that I had a finite window in which to let Carrie-Anne... express her gratitude where it could be easily controlled as just that, and not have to worry that I was giving her the wrong ideas. I was carefully considering options of how to take advantage of that window. She always looked hot in those Rainbow Sparkles shirts, but when she had rocked up Friday in a tight blue tee with a big red Supergirl S on the front, I had to bite my lip.

Monica had her own longer-term projects, of course.

We were sitting on the couch again the next Tuesday, watching the Braves play from our home instead of at BW3, for obvious reasons. I mean, we had better beer, right? The Bravos has clinched the division already, but had zero chance of getting top seed for the post-season, so this was a completely meaningless game, played mostly by AAA players. It was relaxing.

"Oh wow," Monica said, reading a text. She typed quickly, frowned and typed more. "Mary and her boyfriend broke up!"

I made that 'huh' sound you make when you are unsurprised and unconcerned, really. "The dude that Becca and company have all been so lukewarm on, at best? Good for her."

"He broke up with her!" Monica said, still typing.

"Did the moron take a blow to the head?" I asked. Any male his age with regular access to Mary Franklin should spend each morning making lists of ways to keep that access...

Monica agreed that a head injury was obvious, and kept texting for half an inning, fuming much of the time. Apparently, this was now a four-alarm Thing.

A new calendar event popped up on my phone.

'MARY GET-TOGETHER'. The address was our house, and it was for Thursday. It was on Monica's solo calendar, not our household one.

She looked at me. "I kinda think I need to throw you out of your house Thursday."

"Our house."

"Thank you. Then I'm kicking you out of

our

house from at least seven to nine on Thursday. We are going to have some girl talk."

"Don't give them too much alcohol," I said in my best... me impression.

"Moi?" Monica asked innocently. "Those girls are still under-age!" she protested in a voice that wouldn't melt butter.

I made a note to buy more White Claw on my way home Wednesday after happy hour.

"Mary is going to want her thanks for Stephanie soon, I imagine," Monica said idly, snuggling up against me. My woman was definitely weird, because she was definitely getting horny at the idea.

"For crying out loud," I protested, rolling my eyes--and thinking about the same thing, damn me.

"What?" Monica asked, all innocence... except for the way her hand had moved to my lap. "I mean, think about it. You are the perfect rebound date, Clark. You aren't an emotional danger, and you aren't a future opportunity wasted by coming along too soon. You are just a great fucking lay with zero strings."

"Thank you," I said drily, but flattered as hell nonetheless. "You do realize that I have to have drinks with her father, my best friend, tomorrow night, right?"

Monica just laughed. "I guess he does have his little edicts he likes to lay out."

Yancey laid out edicts?

"The scrawny bastard has never, not

once

, actually told me to stay away from his daughter. Never even really tried to," I said grumpily. Yancey would really make my life easier if he would.

"No shit?"

"No. Shit. Most he's ever said was that he really doesn't want to hear about it."

"So if you have tacit permission, why are you so much more jumpy around Mary than the other two?" Monica asked perceptively.

"I..." I paused, then went on sheepishly. "I guess it's that I'm gun-shy with Mary. We did get caught both times we tried anything, remember? If I let her get me alone again, I'm kind of certain that my mother is going to walk in on us. Or probably the Pope."

"By the way, when do I get to meet your mother?" Monica asked, laughing at my nightmare image.

"When do you want to?" I asked back.

"Maybe give us a little while?" she asked, wisely.

"She's gonna love you, but yeah, maybe not quite yet," I agreed. "But another reason that I'm uniquely squirrelly about Mary is that I have never met any of Carol's or Anne's parents, I doubt I ever will, and I really don't want to," I went on in fervent explanation.

"Oh, I think you might like meeting Anne's mother," Monica teased.

"Pull the other one. Why?"

"First, she's divorced. Did you know that?"

"No. Really? I did not know that," I said, genuinely a little shocked.

"I didn't know either. Anne's handled being a child of divorce as well as Becca has. You should be proud of that, by the way."

"Thanks, but why does that make a difference?"

"Do not tell me that you think there is any way that that hot little apple fell far from the tree," Monica laughed.

Oh God. Monica was trying to open whole new avenues of guilt for me to labor under.

No way.

Still... I could easily imagine what a late-forties version of Anne would look like, and... Shiiiiitttt...

*

The concept of my daughter coming over to my house, while I was intentionally not there was... alien. But I went with it. Instead, I went over to Yancey's and we hung out, drank beer, and watched UNC play a Thursday night football game while arguing about basketball's impending season. Wanda had gone to my house. This Mary thing had turned into a summit.

I was glad to be absent, though in my heart of hearts, I was more glad that the first really bad breakup in a while had happened to someone other than my daughter. They all needed an object lesson that men are pigs.

You know, except for me.

"Holy shit, Clark!" Yancey exclaimed, as the football came back from commercial. "It's your cheerleader!"

Sure enough, there was Stephanie, featured in a routine going on just as the TV came back from commercial. She was smiling like a lighthouse and the camera angle was from below her. That was because she was doing a complete split while being held high overhead, held aloft by an incredibly buff male cheerleader who was supporting her with just one hand placed firmly on her crotch, with his fingers brushing one of the world's great asses.

She looked like eighteen and a half million bucks.

We both just sat there and stared for about nine glorious seconds. Then Yancey rewound the DVR.

"The sonofabitch is gay." Yancey said flatly.

"Come on. That's a stereotype and you know it," I scoffed.

"He is standing there, with her legs spread like that while he looks directly upward, with his hand on her cooch and his fingers on her ass. You've had a better version of the same view, I assume, but it can't have been all that much better," Yancey chortled. "And the front of his fairly tight pants is un-bulged. Entirely un-bulged. He's gay."

I shook my head, and Yancey re-wound again.

"Yep," I said. "He's gay." Monica would have been pissed, if she'd been watching.

If I'd been in that kid's position, I'd have... I'd have never gotten Stephanie off the ground in the first place, and if I had miraculously managed that much, I'd have collapsed instantly, like a house of cards. But if I had been able to pull the lift off, I'd have ripped the front of those pants out like a chest burster in Alien.

When I got home, I was told that good humor had been moderately restored, all the White Claw was gone again, and I was shocked to discover that some cooler head somewhere had prevailed and I did not have a date with Mary already on my calendar. As far as I knew, at least. I trusted none of them, even Monica. Hell, not even Wanda...

I would be careful.

*

Saturday, Monica and I went to the park which was her favorite for taking a good woodland hike, and we took such a hike. The quiet, early fall day was lovely, with dappled sun coming through the still leafy canopy and warming us lightly as we walked. Even though, with no UNC game that afternoon, the park was fairly crowded, we felt like we were alone together.