A New Mythology

An Author's dubious interpretation of Ancient Greek mythology, Elizabethan drama, 20th century poetry and...the ideal way to prepare a roasting chicken for the oven.

*****

Chloe is sunbathing. She lies on her belly on a horizontal chaise on the screened lanai near the glittering blue pool, her feet splayed off on either side of chair's aluminum-framed end. Her bikini top is unfastened baring the full of her bronze back. She wears a patterned bikini bottom, but it is so minimal in height it bares the top of her ass-crack. Above there, of course, is the "tramp-stamp" she acquired one drunk night in her sophomore year of college: a trio of bing cherries with interlaced bright-green stems. The symbolism, if any, remains a mystery.

Chloe's entire body, from shoulders to heels, wears an even sheen of sweat and bronzing oil, SPF 15. Underneath the chair, in shade, stands a bottled water, two-thirds empty. While next to it an old-fashioned hard-copy novel lies open and thickly face-down on its early pages. It's a one-time best-selling 600-page romance melodrama set during the last civil war. Some shit. Chloe's well-toned arms are raised and her hands grip—limply—the top of the chaise. Her thick golden-brown hair is pulled to one side and her head is facing the pool—in the opposite direction from where her husband of four months stands staring at her through the tinted sliding glass that divides a spacious, modern, minimalist, luminous though muted, livingroom on the right—a Klee above the mantel—from the also spacious marble-topped kitchen on the left, with its central island and array of wall-mounted Heinkels.

Aaron too is wearing a bikini—a patriotic Speedo. It is not a good look for him. The young man's torso is too long and his legs too short, giving his tricolor bottom a compressed appearance. As if God's afterthought. A mistake.

Nevertheless you put your hand on it, and give it a gentle squeeze, as you come up and stand beside your son-in-law.

"Beautiful sight isn't it?"

"Oh yeah," Aaron agrees.

"Know what you should do..."

"I don't think you should be doing that," referring to your circling, caressing hand.

"What?"

"That."

"This?" another squeeze. "Chloe can't see. I think she's sound asleep."

"Still, dad..."

"I love it when you call me 'dad.' Know what you should do though? You should go out there, get down on your knees and rub more lotion on her back."

"I don't think so."

"Why?"

"Cause she's sound asleep like you say and I'd just piss her off."

"Then you know what you should do?" looking around—and down—at Aaron's front side. "You should drag a chair over and lie down next to her. Women like that. You, joining her. It's symbolic. Like agreeing to go grocery shopping with them."

Aaron made a face. "Symbol of what? Plus I hate the sun. And I wish you wouldn't do that."

Your hand is now down—tight—inside the nylon seat of Aaron's Speedo. You're squeezing his firm young flesh directly. "Why don't you loosen the bow."

"No way. Chloe could wake up at any second."

"Not likely. She looks like she's out of it. Her two-martini lunch."

"She can't hold her liquor," Aaron observes.

"No shit. Just look at that tattoo. Did you know her then?"

"No. Not till grad school."

"Oh, that's right. There've been so many guys..."

Aaron looks over at you. He's relented and pulled the bow, the thick white string, at Speedo's front and center, freeing both your hand of its constraint and his erection. You're not sure if he got it earlier, while staring mutely at your daughter, or if it came on just now, when you started playing with his ass. At this age they can come on in an instant. Ah to be young...

"You didn't seem to mind on our fishing trip."

"What, the gay stuff?"

"No," you laugh. "The sun."

"Oh. Well, honestly? I did." He coughs, nervously. "I just didn't let on. I didn't want to leave a...bad impression. A pussy, you know? Besides, that was in the spring. It wasn't so hot then."

Another laugh. "It's October, son."

"It's still hot." Curiously, though, he passes a shiver. "I don't get that whole roasting your body in the sun thing. It's like climbing into an oven."

You don't know much about Aaron but you do know this: His great-grandparents? They were survivors. Chloe told you this at the very beginning. "I just met this guy I like? In law school? His grandparents? Supposedly they..."

"Besides," Aaron continues, on an almost equally dark note—as dark as his long curls, "my grandmother died of skin cancer last year. People just don't realize what they're doing to themselves."

Your finger has found the boy's hole. The membrane? Sticky.

"I remember that about your grandmother, now that you mention it. Sorry. And sorry you didn't enjoy our little fishing trip."

Aaron looks over again, your enquiring hand having now swung around to his cock. He has a nice one, a hard one, if slender. But you already knew that.

"I enjoyed the trip," he claims. "I just didn't enjoy..."

"The sex?"

"The sun. The sex? Was...confusing, but..."

"You seemed to," you say. "Enjoy it. Maybe not at first..."

"I was confused," Aaron repeats. "At first."

"Just fun and games," you say, trying to sound dismissive. A verbal shrug.

"The whole gay thing..."

"Bi."

"I may be bi. Now. Kind of," Aaron says haltingly. "We. I don't know. But the sex was definitely...guy."

"Guy?"

Your son-in-law gives his curly head a shake. "Gay! You know what I mean. Like this. Now."

"This?" your stroking hand going still. A tiny pearl having just filled the slit, the eye, of cock's rosy circumcised head.

"This! Exactly!" sounding petulant.

"Just fun and games. Two guys..."

"I feel like...," Aaron begins. "I feel like whenever I'm around you, alone with you..."

"Yeah?" right hand resuming its vertical pumping motion. "What, son?"

"I'm hypnotized. I'm in a hypnotic state. You've hypnotized me somehow. I lose control of myself. Next thing I know..."

You let go of his cock, abruptly. It hovers in the air. Pulses in delay with his young vibrant heart. "Know what you should do?" Then, laughing, "Why're you rolling your eyes?"

"Because you keep coming up with stupid ideas. Sorry, dad, but they're stupid. Stupid."

"No, son, this one's a winner. What you should do," slipping a hand around his long torso's low waist. "What you should do is go out there right now, stand over my daughter and lose your load all over her."

"What!"

"Did you guys have sex last night?"

"No. Why?"

"The night before?"

Silence.

"I'll take that for a yes," you grin. "Assent. Like Thomas More. Although he lost his head. Then, that means you're good and ready. At your age? You should go out there right now and...Here, I'll open the door for you..."

"Stop!" a loud whisper.

"She can't hear. And shoot your load all over Chloe. All over her back."

"You're crazy! She'd kill me!"

"At first, yeah. First reaction. She'll be furious. But then later," you continue, "after she calms down, you throw yourself on her mercy and tell her 'Baby, I saw you out there and you were so beautiful,' blah-blah-blah, 'I just...I couldn't help myself.' You'd be like that figure in Greek mythology, whatshisname, who spilled his seed and something, some kind of flower bullshit, crocuses?...sprang up? In the spring? Some shit."

"No! Close the door!"

"Do it. I know Chloe a little better than you? OK? Slightly? My own daughter? And believe me, by dinnertime or whenever, after you explain yourself? You'll be her hero. Look that Greek mythology shit up. Doodle it. Use it in your explanation. Your alibi. Whatever."

"It's not an alibi it's—"

"You lawyers," you smile. "You never miss a trick. At any rate, write her a love note. Hand it to her when you go to explain yourself. Better? Mr. Legal-eagle? Use the Greek mythology analogy. She'll love it. Eat it up. Like cum."

"You think? What did you just say?"

You laugh again—to yourself. This asshole's actually considering doing it! "Believe me, son. I know my daughter. Go out there. Now. Do it. She'll think it's raining at first. Then a passing seagull. Then—"

"My ass is grass, dude."

"Give her two hours to calm down. Three. Then...she'll be putty in your hands. The note, just remember the note."

"The Greek thing?"

"Exactly. The Greeks. The gods: everything was about sex and promiscuity and incest and...Christ! Those fucking Greeks were—"

"Should I leave my bathing suit on?"

"Son," you advise patiently, "how can you leave your bathing suit on if you're gonna ejaculate on the girl? All over her?"

"No I know, I mean..."

"Get out there. Do it. It'll be a hoot."

"For you maybe." Aaron is half out the sliding glass door, one foot on the lanai, left hand holding his flag of a bikini. He looks back: "Know who you are? Remind me of? Othello? The play? Shakespeare?"

"I'm white, son," you grin.

"Always cooking something up. Always plotting some shit. I...I should really do this? Now? Nude? Like this?"

"Do it. She'll love it. In the long run. Trust me. Do as you're told. Just like in the cabin..."

And it's not Othello you dumb shit lawyer fuck I wanted to say in parting, as I shoved my son-in-law completely out the door on his misguided mastubatory mission. It's IAGO!

Chloe is helping out in the kitchen as you prepare the chicken for roasting. The secret? Do not stuff the bird's cavity—not with cornbread or the like at any rate. Sea salt in moderation, cracked pepper and a fragrant stem or two of fresh rosemary. That's it. Oil the bird's outside or drizzle it with melted butter. Then salt and pepper it as well. Preheat the oven to 500 degrees F. Litter the roasting pan perimeter with new potatoes, red skin on, thick carrot slices if you like, and onions, skin off of course. Pop the pan in the oven at 500 degrees for 20 to 30 minutes depending on size (this applies to turkeys as well); then lower the heat to a normal 325 degrees for the rest of the roasting cycle. The high heat will turn the bird's skin a beautiful golden-brown (like a suntan) and, more importantly, seal in the juices.

Once the bird is thoroughly cooked remove it and all the vegetables from the pan and make from the drippings a red wine reduction, first, with shallots; then add chicken stock, season to taste, and further reduce to concentrate the dark, intense flavors. The resulting sauce (gravy)? Fucking delicious!

"Can you believe my asshole husband would walk out there and jerk off all over me while I'm sleeping?" a still-steaming Chloe asks rhetorically, and not for the first time this afternoon. "Is he fucking...INSANE?"

Chloe has one job to do. One. Break the bottoms off the fresh, limber asparagus stems...and she's somehow managing to fuck even that up. Perhaps she's drunk. The two of you are already several glasses into a magnum of Grand Cru Bordeaux. An '09. A very good year. Still young but drinking wonderfully. Fucking...delicious!

Your daughter still wears her bikini. After rinsing off under lanai's outdoor shower post-orgasm. Her dipshit husband's. Rinsing off, drying off. Now she is further cloaked in a shapeless but diaphanous wrinkly cotton sun-dress that hangs to her mid-thighs. Frankly, it is more like an oversized tee shirt that sat in the dryer too long. And you further reflect how your lovely daughter's body has thickened up since college; even since grad school. The chicken is almost ready, and lying directly on roasting pan's bottom. No rack. Another secret.

"I'm sure he meant well, darling," you say. "And where is Aaron, by the way?"

"Oh...said he had a migraine. He gets those when stressed. He's in the guest bedroom—not MY bedroom the guest bedroom. Cloth over his face. Lying down, the sick prick..."

"So let me get this straight," you say, sprinkling the pan with aforementioned vegetables. Tubers actually. April is the cruelest month... "You're minding your own business, lying out by the pool, and—"

"Sound asleep by the way, yes."

"Sound fucking asleep," slurping down yet more Chateau La Lagune. The Goon! No... "And Aaron...Aaron? That nice boy?"

"He's 25 years old, dad."

"A boy to me. And he...he relieves himself on your tits?"

"My what? I was lying face-down, daddy. I told you."

"Oh. I mean on your...back?"

"And he didn't, like, pee on me, dad. He...I thought it was a fucking...seagull."

"Through the screen, dear. I don't think so. I just had it replaced, after the storm."

"You know what I mean. I was sound asleep! I was dreaming about the beach..."

"What about it?"

"Seagulls! That's what I thought when his..."

"Darling, if you don't break those asparagus properly, like I showed you, they're all gonna be, like, four inches' long."

"Like dipshit's cock."

"He's a lot longer than that, dear."

A sharp look, her mother's. "How would you know?"

A shrug. I was scraping carrot and onion peelings into the garbage. "I saw him once. In the pool. You and—"

"He's sick, dad. He has a sickness. I'm convinced. He's..."

"That's a little strong, don't you think? Dear?"

"OK, weird then. I think...," your daughter coming over to throw a thick, semi-hidden hip into you, while whispering, "...he's gay. My husband."

"No."

"No shit. Yes. The things he tells me in private, when we're..."

"Like what? Why're we whispering? I thought you were asleep."

"I'm standing here in the kitchen with you, dad. WHAT?"

"Him, I mean. Aaron."

"I won't even go there, dad."

"Well, I'm sorry, dear."

"Not your fault."

"He seemed like such a nice, bright young man when we went to the cabin together last spring, before the divorce."

"Divorce?"

"Marriage I mean. Your marriage." Your arm is still arm your daughter; your left hand having raised a wine glass. Hers, yours, who knows? You're rocking, you and her, in your marble-topped kitchen. You drink. You squeeze your daughter's rather wide ass. "So promising..."

"What?"

"I just thought, given his qualifications...this is a confused young man, very talented in the law however, who someday might end up in our nation's...whatever. On a Senator's staff. Or somewhere. An investigation..."

"Oh god. Just what I need. A husband in politics. More bullshit."

"It could be worse."

"How? A gay lawyer? On the Hill? Fuck. Fuck me!"

You pat your daughter's bikini bottom. Through thin cotton. You pull her closer, kiss the top of her head, her sunbleached hair. "What you need, darling, is a good..."

"Tell me about it..."

"No, now. Like the night before last when you guys...arrived. And you snuck out."

"That was fun, daddy. Sneaking out? Like old times? Snuck?" Your daughter laughs.

"A different boyfriend, but..."

"Husband this time. Down for the count. He gets these migraines and...whatever reason...he's, like, not even there for 24 fucking hours."

"Shame." You kiss the top of your daughter's hair again, the wiggly part in her golden-brown. You squeeze her ass, much as you had done her husband's hours before. She still smells of suntan oil, Chloe. "We should go fuck."

She looks up at you. "Now?"

"Why not?"

"Uh...like, dinner? Dad?"

"We have a half hour, darling. Before I turn the heat down and put the water on for the asparagus you've totally fucked up."

You both laugh. Another sideways hug. You're hard in your pajama bottoms and it is this—THIS—your daughter intuitively grasps through the black silk with a backwards hand.

"Oh daddy."

"Baby."

"I want this so bad...As long as you shoot it in me," Chloe smiles, "not in me."

"Huh?"

A drunk Chloe sways. "On me. On me I mean..."

"Promise. Dear. In you."

"You're drunk...daddy!"

"Yup! You?"

"Let's go!"

"Wait. One little...second, baby."

You open the oven door.