April in Texas

Louie was in the same place on the bed when I slipped back into our dark room. His wine glass was there, same spot, still half full, and CNN was on 'mute' but still playing. He didn't appear to have moved an inch in the five hours that I'd been gone. As quietly as possible, I crept into the bathroom, and I locked the door behind me. Louie hadn't awakened, as far as I could tell, he didn't appear to notice my return. Maybe luck was with me, I thought, but then maybe not.

Next thing, I made the necessary noises as if I was sick. It wasn't a tough pretend, I had enough vodka in my stomach, I knew that I would be sick if I didn't get it out of my system. There was semen in my hair and on my face, and I could feel semen oozing out of my ass and my vagina. Putting my fingers down my throat, I forced myself to vomit, once, twice, three times, and I flushed each time so that Louie could hear it. I even spit some vomit on the floor, and on myself, to mask the other sex odors. This charade I carried on for a half hour, Louie must have been asleep. He didn't ask even once if I was ok.

After steaming up the bathroom with hot water, I got in the shower for a thorough catharsis. The hotel water pressure was strong, and I stood under it, wondering to myself 'why'. I made a douche rag out of a washcloth, I twisted it, and I stuck it in my vagina as far as I could. Then I resoaped and I did it again. Next, I soaped my fingers and got them as far in my ass as I could, I gargled with the hot shower water, and I started to cry. What possessed me? What devil lives inside of me? Why was I never satisfied with my life, my job, with Louie, why did I need to pretend to be ten years younger. There was a real man, who was absolutely devoted to me and to me only, and I slipped out and screwed some strange bisexual weirdoes. Face it, I thought, I am sick, I need psychological help. Should I tell Louie the truth, or should I lie? I'll have to lie, I reasoned, the truth about my night out would kill him.

After the shower, and after I tied my hair in a fresh towel, I stared at my image in the foggy mirror. The lines in my face, the wrinkles between my eyebrows, I saw all of the age showing distractions that I'd accumulated over time. Reflected there as well I saw my father's face, in my own, and my mother's. I have no children, I thought, and these images from my ancestors, my appearance, their bloodlines, it all will end with me.

Then I heard a turn of the bathroom door knob, though it was still locked. "I'm going down to the breakfast buffet," Louie yelled through the locked door. When I moved to unlock the bathroom door, I heard the hotel door close. Looking out, Louie was gone.

The lights were on in the bedroom, and it was getting light outside. The room had been shuffled, our bags had been gone through, my purse had been gone through, it was as if our things had been sorted and divided. Maybe luck wasn't with me after all.

So I dressed, as casually as possible, brushed my teeth a few more times, found the other room keycard, and went searching for Louie at the buffet. I didn't see him, not at first, the buffet was packed with families with children, kids lined up for custom omelettes and pancakes, prep chefs everywhere, it was quite a production. Then I located Louie, sitting by himself, with a newspaper, a glass of grapefruit juice, and a cup of coffee.

"Hey...Guttentag," I said as Louie's eyes looked into mine.

"Right," was his response. I sat down across from him. Then Louie started singing some dumb old country song, 'here I am in Dallas / where the hell are you / how come you're not here with me / like you said you'd do'. Next, he changed 'Dallas' to 'Austin', and sang it again.

"What's up with the luggage? Were you just looking for something to wear?"

"No...what's up with the luggage is that I have split our stuff up. I found my airline ticket, boarding pass whatever. For fifty bucks, SouthWest will let me on a plane today, in San Antonio. The car alone is costing me twenty five dollars a day, then there's gas, food and hotel expenses through next week...figure that I am cutting my losses."

"You're leaving?"

"Absolutely. I'll return the rental car to Budget in San An, they have a shuttle to the airport, and I'll be in Columbus late this evening."

"Well...why?...and what am I supposed to do?...what about me?"

"You know, Sheryl, you're an educated, intelligent person. All along, I've figured that you must weigh your options, and I've figured that you always have an alternative backup plan should there be a change in circumstance. I'm not a shit. I could drop you at the Austin airport. Maybe your backup plan is to move to your mother's in Florida, or maybe go to Albuquerque and stay with the Ogdens. You could fly to Naples. Or if you like, you can ride with me back to San An, I'm sure Lamar would let you stay with him for a while."

"That's just great, Louie. Wonderful ideas. But you haven't answered the 'why' question, have you?"

"No, and you don't want me to, and I don't think I need to. I'm sure that you have contrived some fable about last night, and I'd just as soon as not hear it. Let's skip through the lies and move forward to the consequences."

"I haven't told you any lies! I haven't told you anything!"

Louie took a sip of his juice and stared an unforgettable, unblinking stare deep into my eyes.

"The phrase is 'rude awakening', dear. The TV woke me up, about 1:30, with war news. Obviously, you weren't there, so I dressed and went looking for you. Probably in the bar, I thought, but you weren't. It was closed. Everything was closed, the pool area was shut down, you were nowhere to be found. I continued to search for you, and I had the car keys so I knew you hadn't taken the car. I was worried. We've never been in Austin, I thought you might have been abducted."

"Well I wasn't. And I'm here with you now, Louie."

"So I went to hotel security, which was open. They video everything, all the common areas. After describing your appearance, they reviewed the video of the hotel entrance area - you had not left the building. Then they checked the video of the pool area, at the time it closed. What a surprise. Two couples still in the hot tub, flirting and drinking...need I say more?"

"Louie, I told you that I was going back to the hot tub, you just don't remember. And what's so wrong about that?"

"What went wrong – what cooked your goose - was that the security guards started laughing. I thought they were simply laughing at two drunk couples staggering toward the elevator, but that wasn't so funny...they knew something I didn't know, so I asked."

"The guard said, 'sorry, buddy, you don't want to know'. 'Of course I do' I said, 'tell me what the hell is going on."

"Fine", he said, "but don't flip out on us, or try and be a tough guy. We'll have you arrested. Ok with that?"

"I said sure."

"So he told me. There are a group of 'swingers' staying on the third floor, two young guys and a knockout gal. They've been here in the hotel for a week. They work for an internet porno site, one that specializes in picking up older women, the women over forty types. Sometimes the young, pretty gal acts as a lead, but once they get the old gals up to their room, and once the old gal is so drunk she won't say no, they gang bang her and they take photos of her being fucked in every possible position. The photos then get posted on their web site."

"How can you be sure it's the same team?"

"In the week they've been here, we've seen at least a dozen forty year old broads getting on the elevator with them, I've even talked to them about it. It's a fun job, they told me. They say the sex is always consensual and that usually it's started by the old gals. The gals, they told me, will eagerly do everything. They pose for the nastiest fuck photos and get a kick out of seeing themselves being ass fucked on the internet. Hey, it's not rape, and they don't screw children, they're not prostitutes, and they're room is paid for in advance. And not one of the old gals has complained."

"As he talked, the guard then checked another computer screen," Louie went on. "Their room was accessed at 12:30 A.M., the guard said, right after the pool closed. The door hasn't been opened since. There's video here of your wife getting off the elevator with them. Your wife has been in their room for hours, and what she's doing in there...you can only guess...but the photos of her being gang banged will be on the internet soon enough."

I was speechless. Red faced. In shock. No, I wasn't going to admit anything, other than my own stupidity. Every piece of that puzzle fit precisely. I felt so ashamed, and I knew that my tryst had torn Louie's heart to pieces. I imagined the humiliation, the total embarrassment and the pain he must have suffered when those guards told him the truth, yes, the truth about me. I had been set up for somebody's lewd entertainment. What if my company finds those photos on the internet? What if some judge, or a lawyer friend of Louie's finds them. In a short few hours time, our relationship had been shattered, and it was all my fault. With my own tears swelling, I mustered up the courage to speak.

"I want to go home with you," I said. "When we get back home, I promise you that I will admit myself to the psych unit at Riverside Hospital. I'll apply for disability leave from Public Entities and I'll stay in treatment, on happy drugs or whatever, until I recover from this disorder."

"N.G.B.R.I." Louie said.

"What's that?"

"The insanity defense. And to invoke 'Insanity' is an admission that the act occurred..."

"I am not arguing with you about what happened, what I am doing is asking for your help. I am sick... I am mentally ill... you've known it for years...my mother and my brother have the same depression disorder... you're the one who threw my pills away, you said I didn't need them..." I was sobbing, breaking down at the breakfast buffet. "Please, let's pack the car, get out of here, and let's get on that plane. I just want to go home, to go home with you Louie."

Louie got up to leave and I followed him. Two hours later we were dragging our luggage from the Budget rental shuttle into the San Antonio airport. And six hours after that – our delay was a stop in Nashville – we were on the ground in Columbus. In the flash of a half day, our trip to Texas was over, and we were back home in Ohio. Later on, after Louie threatened to sue the porno website, and threatened to have them prosecuted for using the date rape drug, my photos were confirmed as destroyed. Myself, I have some fond memories of Texas, and some bad memories too. But the remaining time spent living with Louie, in his country house with his sons, that will need to be detailed in different volumes.

ET FINI