Thank you for all the feedback on Part One of
Miriam's Fall
. It always amazes me how many people will take time out of their day to drop a positive comment and a little helpful constructive criticism. Of all the feedback I received on the first part of this story, I do want to address three things:
1. To all the people who were upset about Miriam's infidelity and thought that Giles should have left her, you know its fiction right?
2. To the person who pointed out the problem with the second monitor. Damn, I didn't think about that. Miriam would have obviously been using her home laptop to watch BBC porn and not her work laptop.
3. Yes, I should have finished it. Now I have. Please enjoy.
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"Should we talk about what happened today?" Miriam asked cautiously.
I gave Miriam a smile and squeezed her hand before I pointed to the white bandage that was wrapped around her head, "maybe not tonight dear, for I see you have a headache."
"Giles," Miriam scolded me. "Don't you dare try running away on me."
I was already up and reaching for my coat. "We will have plenty of time to talk about this tomorrow when you are well," I smiled weakly.
"I am no relationship expert, but I feel this is something we must address. Afterall, you did find me naked and knocked unconscious while straddling a rather large dildo."
"No," I stopped, to correct her. "I never saw you straddling anything, and I found your rather large and slippery friend wedged under your desk."
"Really?" Miriam scrunched up her nose like she always did when she was having trouble figuring things out. "How did it get there?"
"Well," I stopped gathering my things for a second to think about the physics of the problem. "I guess it largely depends on how you had the," I struggle to think of the right word to use to call it, "'the apparatus' secured to the floor and the amount of downward force you were applying to it at the time."
"It has a suction cup on its base, and if I am honest, I was squatting down on it rather vigorously," Miriam said with a hint of defiance in her tone.
"Well then, I would say that the elastic force, like you would find with a bow and arrow, would have been sufficient to send it flying across the room," I confirmed.
"Thankfully, I didn't have it aimed towards the window at the time, otherwise I may have broken something," Miriam laughed as she reached down and gave her privates a quick rub through her hospital gown. "That might also explain why I am so sore down there."
I blushed at her vulgarity and stood there for a moment with my jacket in my arms, while we shared an awkward moment of silence. Eventually Miriam spoke again.
"Did the paramedics suspect anything?" she eventually asked.
"They were both very professional and did not say anything about the situation, but I suspect they must have. Afterall, you were knocked unconscious, naked on the floor, and the whole room smelled of cherry lubricant. Also, I was worried sick that they were going to think that I was some sort of sex pest who had attempted to murder you."
"The Doctor did ask about that," Miriam conceded.
"What did the Doctor ask? And when?" I demanded a little shocked.
"When I went in for my MRI and the Doctor made you wait outside. She was very sly about it. She asked if I was okay, and if there was a history of domestic or sexual violence in our relationship," Miriam threw out in a casual way.
"What did you tell her?" I asked.
"I told her that you are a kind and supportive husband, and all of this was an unfortunate accident at my own hand," said Miriam as she reached up and gently poked at the white bandage wrapped around her head. "Then I reiterated the line you have been using that I fell after getting out the shower."
"That's a relief," I exhaled. "I did my best to clean up and hide everything I could before the paramedics arrived."
"Everything?" Miriam asked.
"I didn't have a lot of time, so I gathered up all of your toys and threw them into the lower drawer on your desk."
"That's where I store all my work files," her eyes got big.
"Sorry," I said.
Miriam stopped for a second and I could see her squeeze her butt cheeks together, which lifted her just a little off the hospital bed. "What about the anal beads? Please don't tell me you threw them in there as well."
"I did," I said a little defensively, and a little shocked that my wife of 25 years even knew the term anal beads or would ever use them in a conversation. "The paramedics crew was pounding at the door, and your friend was on the computer telling me that I had to remove and hide them, so I panicked."
"My friend?" Miriam's eyes got big.
"See, this is why I did not want to talk about it. Now we are going to have to get a divorce like all of our friends, and you are going to run off to the south of France with your new lesbian lover where you will set up a cat sanctuary, and grow chorizos or something else foreign and exotic," my chin quivered.
Miriam gave a soft laugh and reached out and grabbed my hand. "First, I do love the south of France, but am certain that chorizos are Spanish, and you don't grow them. And second, she isn't my lover, and we have no plans to run away together, or to open a cat sanctuary. In fact, she too is happily married with children and has no intention of running away with me."
"But aren't you a lesbian?" I asked a little confused. "I heard it has become very fashionable to come out late in life these days. And I'm sure the kids would understand."
"I'm sure they would, but I can assure you that I would make a terrible lesbian," Miriam said with a careful laugh as she shifted her legs a little further ajar. "I don't have the patients for a full-on lesbian romance. All those feelings. All that poetry. All that drama. No thank you."