Bethany and I met when neither one of us was actually looking for someone. We'd both been dragged by our friends to a bar as their designated drivers. While the others drank, mingled, and danced we sat at the bar with our watered-down sodas. Sodas from the bar-gun are never as good as the bottles. That was the first thing we talked about.
It was very different meeting a girl while we were both sober. This is what the bar scene lacks: honesty. Bethany had shoulder-length chestnut hair that she usually tied back. She was almost a foot shorter than me and athletically built for a girl from playing lacrosse during high school. Her breasts were average, but more than enough for my hands, and she possessed a marvelously plump ass, which she hated, but I loved it.
We formed a real relationship, and it became a steady thing. Everything seemed to be going well, but there was a huge problem: she didn't care for sex. We had it often enough, and she did all the right things to make me feel good. She gave the absolute best blow jobs I ever had. She would feign pleasure when I tried very hard to please her, but if I pressed her to tell the truth, she admitted that it wasn't actually doing anything.
"I'm sorry," she would say with tears in her eyes. "I'm trying—really I am. I just don't get anything from it, but I want you to enjoy it."
It was hard to explain to her that such an arrangement would be an open wound for I would always know that I was taking and not giving.
I held her, and told her that it would be all right. That's what a guy is supposed to do. I didn't want to give up. We moved in together and refocused on enhancing the other aspects of our lives. She did go and see a doctor, but they couldn't find anything wrong with her physically.
"Everyone is just different," they said.
Bethany got a job at a pharmaceutical company, and I went on as a civil engineer. Things didn't work out for me, and in a year I was unemployed and demoralized. However, she did very well professionally, and rose quickly within her company. She talked about getting married. Once again I felt that inability to explain how much of a failure I felt like. Not only could I not make her enjoy sex, but I was also relegated to being a dependent.
She tried to reassure me, and that reversal was a hard one. We continued on, but I was desperate. There had to be a way to please her. When there was nothing within my own environment, I had to think about hers. She worked for one of the biggest drug companies in the state. There was no way that I could bring myself to have her look into it. That would only make her feel guiltier than she already did, but I could do it myself. That led me to one of her colleagues from work: Dale.
I had met him a few times at company parties and trite little social events like that. He was a few years younger than we were and just out of college. Dale maintained that strangely long hair for a guy, which I swear was only popular for like five minutes ten years ago. A youth spent on Coronado had left him with a tan and thin surfer's body. There were a few occasions when seeing him made me self-conscious. I was still in decent shape, but sitting at home surfing the web all day had started to take a toll. After swearing him to secrecy, I explained the problem that Bethany and I had.
"I really wish I could help you," he said, "But so much of our stuff isn't even ready for human trials. It takes years to get that stuff cleared, but there are other things you could try."
"We have and she isn't interested in trying anymore. She still has sex with me, but it's only sex out of loyalty to me. She doesn't want to. Come on, there has to be something."
Dale mulled it over for a long time. He said that he'd think about it. Two days later he sent me a text message:
Possible solution. Café Rouge 4:00.
Bethany would still be at work, and she often met her friends for drinks. I texted her that I would be out looking for a new job, and went to go meet with Dale.
When I got to the café, I found him sitting nervously at a table in the corner drinking a blended drink. He had a shoulder bag on the table, and looked like a thousand other people who might appear at a café in the city. I ordered my own coffee, and then went and sat in the chair across from him.
"So you do have something", I said. "Tell me about it."
"Not so fucking loud," he whispered, and then looked around like we were in a spy movie or something. "This is not only illegal, but it could cost me my whole career."
He pulled out a small rectangular box from the shoulder bag, and slid it over to me.
I not sure what I thought it was going to be. I opened it, and inside was a vial of an amber-colored liquid. I titled it up and down to see how thick it was, and Dale nearly jumped out of his seat.
"Are you crazy?" he asked, and grabbed at it, but I held firm. In our struggle he pulled off the lid and stared in horror as some of the fluid got on his hand.
"Oh my God," he said.
People were stating to notice. In a today of freaky psychos doing shit to people in public places you really don't want this kind of attention.
"Chill out," I said trying to be a loud enough. "It's only cologne. You didn't spill much."
People seemed to accept this as plausible enough even if it was a little weird, and they went back to their high-caloric drinks and mooching off of the free Wi-Fi.
"You don't know how strong this is," he said. "I can't believe that I got exposed."
He wiped at his hand furiously with a napkin, and even poured some of my coffee on his hand as if that would do something. By this time I had retrieved the lid and sealed the vial after taking a brief whiff of it. The smell was acrid at first, and as it settled into my nose it got very musky.
"So, what is it?" I finally asked.
"A synthetic aphrodisiac combined with different pheromones and hormones."
I sighed in disappointment. "I bought this stuff on-line and all it caused was a rash."
Dale shook his head, his long hair getting in his eyes. "Not this stuff. This is the real deal. Not only is it an aphrodisiac, but a true sexual enhancer. Technically it doesn't even exist at our lab yet. I assisted one of our doctors and read his notes. He seems to have a lot of hope in it. This is the concentrated stuff though. So I'm a little skittish around it."
"All the advertisements say stuff like that."
"Look," he ordered in frustration and pointed under the table at his crotch. The front of his pants was tented by a massive erection. "You think I want this. God, I want to fuck something so bad right now."
Despite the awkwardness of the situation, I was very impressed. "How will it work on Bethany?"
"Not sure."
