Snowed In

December Twenty-sixth

Sherry Ford had passed a strange night, one that she was sorry to emerge from alone, in a cold, empty bed.

After she had locked Neal out of her room -- secretly relishing the thought of him freezing his balls off in the den -- she had climbed under the many layers of thick blankets naked, with her fun little toy. She had spent a glorious couple of hours experimenting with it the previous night, and looked forward to exhausting herself with pleasure again.

The only trouble was, in the dead silent house, without even the heater to provide some occasional masking noise, the buzz of the little motor sounded like a jet on a runway, warming up its engines. She discovered that the vibrator made hardly any noise when it was all the way inside her, sounding like nothing so much as a meandering bumblebee. Which was fine -- way up inside her was exactly where she wanted the thing, and she spent a very pleasant half hour barely nudging it into her, holding onto the little bear, and enjoying the way his snout bumped against her clit. Since Vanessa had made her aware of just how easily her moans and groans could be heard, she was careful to muffle her face with a pillow, and confine herself to painfully silent gasps and moans as she imagined her fit, dutiful and capable younger lover, burrowing his cock into her and whispering filthy words into her ear.

After she had come (how intense it was, a silent orgasm!) she left the thing inside her, buzzing merrily away, and before long the burbling, droning white noise (not to mention three glasses of Scotch) sent her off to sleep.

Around three thirty she awakened briefly, thinking that she had heard noises in the house. She listened closely and could barely make out what sounded like voices. The dildo had slid out of her while she slept, but not before its tingling presence had inspired some lovely dreams. She switched it off to concentrate on the whispering sounds, but they were gone. Probably the TV, she thought, and she drifted off again.

She woke again around six, the first drab hints of light invading her room, and remembered: there couldn’t have been any television playing in the house -- the power was still off. If it was on again the heater would surely be going. She was also dismayed that the dildo’s battery was nearly dead -- she switched on the poor sticky, discarded toy and got only the tiniest of buzzes, even though it was switched to HIGH. She played with it for a few minutes nevertheless, before sliding into sleep again, and this time her dreams were not so good -- full of whispers and peering eyes, and ghosts lurking in the darkness.

Just before nine she woke for good, and climbed out of the warm bed only because she had to pee so bad. In the bathroom she remembered her dreams, and her poor dead dildo, and the mysterious noises that had disturbed her. Was the house haunted or something? And if it was, why did the stupid ghost have to just whisper in the walls? Why couldn’t it be a nice, handsome ghost with a supernaturally-charged dick -- who could flit through the walls at night and give her a little relief?

***

As he put the water on the stove Neal’s mind was full of miserable self-congratulation.

After all, only he could have created such an abominable situation. Only he, stuck in a house with no electricity and no car, could so arrange things that he had cause to dread the appearance of both of the two females sharing his captivity. Hell, only he could have managed simultaneously to piss off the only other female in his life simply by sending her an email.

Yes, indeed -- quite a track record he was acquiring with the female sex. Melanie now apparently had no use for him whatsoever, and had taken special pains to give his computer the equivalent of mumps, German measles and the backdoor trots all rolled into one. His wife of twenty years was now perfectly happy to consign his frozen ass to the den floor, and missed him in her bedroom so much that she was fingering herself silly at night. And to top things off, Nessa -- the apple of his eye, his one great solace in a harsh world -- had been allowed to watch, appalled, while her father jackhammered his own meat like a monkey at the zoo.

Yes, it was quite scintillating of him. No one else could have managed to singlehandedly isolate every woman in his life with so much vigor and verve.

And why, one is compelled to ask? Why? Perfectly simple -- because of his big, stupid, insatiable dick!

Neal shook his head and cursed under his breath, recalling the whole sorry affair. What was most appalling, what made him feel the most guilt, so that he cringed inside his own skin, was that while he had been pulling so ferociously at himself -- yes, even

at the exact moment

his only daughter had discovered him, he had been thinking of her naked body. His own flesh and blood, stripped bare and offered up to his mind’s eye for his despicable consumption. In great works of literature beloved daughters inspired their fathers to do good deeds, to tap hidden resources, to sacrifice their own selfish ends for their dear daughter’s sakes. But not Neal. His daughter inspired in him a huge, guilt-soaked erection, and the frantic need to jack off like a schoolboy. It was disgusting.

The water began to boil as these thoughts sounded and resounded through his head. He opened the oven, which he’d cranked up to 450, to allow some warmth to flood down onto his stocking feet.

While he tapped coffee into the pot, throwing in an extra smidge to make up for his troubled sleep, he began to believe that he really was the cause of all his family’s current misery. All their suffering and heartache was down to him -- him and his unappeasable prick.

Well, that was being a bit melodramatic, perhaps. Josh and Nessa didn’t really seem all that miserable. If there was suffering and heartache churning inside their minds then they could conceal it well. It was one thing that made Sherry’s “for the kid’s sake” plea seem unrealistic; relatively speaking, the kids were fine. They at least seemed to have some secret method for escaping all the chaos and disorder he had caused.

But the rest of it -- he and Sherry’s desperate, depressing animosity, and poor Melanie’s jaded bitterness and spite -- yes, they were all his fault. His actions to Melanie, his words to Sherry now played over his mind like a bleak, late night movie on a snowy channel: half remembered, half incomprehensible, all of it dismal and disheartening. For the first time since his affair with Melanie had begun, he felt thoroughly ashamed of himself.

Noises on the stairway. He turned and stood before the stove, watching the kitchen door uneasily. Who would it be? If it were Nessa, how in God’s name would he look her in the eye?

It was Sherry. She was looking a little puffy about the eyes, a little disheveled. But she also looked warm and inviting in a way, wrapped up in her familiar mouse-colored robe with the tie cinched around her waist, her long brown hair hastily secured with a clip.

“Morning,” she said, standing at the door.

“Morning,” he said, amazed, even thrilled that something so mundane as a greeting could still pass between them. “Want some coffee?”

“Oh, yes,” she said, starting for the pot.

“No, no -- you sit. I’ve got it.”

“Oh.” She paused for a moment, then sat at the table. “Thank you.”

Maybe the worst thing of all, he thought, as his wife yawned behind him, was that he had robbed her of something. He wasn’t sure how to define it, and was damned sure he couldn’t put it into words yet. But for all her tenacity in defying him, for all her resolve in banning him from their room or pouncing upon the slightest pretext to argue with him, he could tell he had deeply wounded her. He could see it in her face, hear it in her voice. Her willingness to put all the blame on him annoyed him still, and her unspoken determination that he should pay unceasingly, abjectly, for his wrongs frustrated and angered him. Nevertheless, it was easy to see that she was not the same Sherry. Some essential part of her was missing, and he had taken it.

“Sugar or sweetener?” he asked.

“Brandy,” she replied. “It’s above the stove in the cabinet.”

He stirred the coffee silently. Brandy, in the morning? His wife, never more than a social drinker, was turning into a fish. He’d been noticing her frequent nips from one or more bottles lately, but this was something else. And there was the Valium she’d been popping. He reckoned it had all started about two months before -- which meant, about the time she found out about Melanie. One more thing for him to feel guilty about.He would have said nothing about it if, when he returned to the table, she hadn’t been lighting a cigarette as well.

“You’ve, uh, been hitting those rather hard lately, haven’t you?” he remarked, grim-faced.

“No,” she said. Then she laughed, joylessly. “Got nothing else hard to hit.”

“Well, between those and the booze --”

“Oh, shut up, Neal.”

A period of silence passed between them while Neal regrouped. He did not want to start the day with another argument.

“Stopped snowing,” he said.

“Good. I guess.”

“It’s about four inches, I reckon. Back home it would be nothing. But here, we’re practically snowed in.”

She nodded.

“I guess I should do something with the food in the fridge,” she wondered aloud. “Maybe put it outside, in the snow.”

“Good idea.”

“What about the eggs, do you think?”

He sipped his coffee thoughtfully. “They should be fine for a little while. But if you put ‘em outside they’ll freeze.”

She sighed. “I guess I should cook them up then.”

She started to stand. .

“No, no, no!” said Neal, rising and holding out his hand. “You sit there, get warm. I’ll put them on in a little bit, for us.”

“The kids might want some.”

“Oh . . . let the kids sleep. They’re probably worn out from . . . playing in the snow or something. Try to get them up now, as cold as it is, and we’ll have a fight on our hands.”

“All right, all right,” she said, settling back in her chair. She wore a different smile now, and he knew her well enough to know it wasn’t a generous smile -- not a well-wishing smile. It was more of a wiseguy grin -- an “I know what you’re up to but it won’t work” kind of expression.

Neal was so steeped in his newfound remorse that he did not begrudge her the look, nor the sentiment that inspired it. She was skeptical of him, and why shouldn’t she be? She didn’t trust his kindness -- what reason did she have to trust it? Or to trust him? Wasn’t he the same pig who’d been lusting after their daughter not twelve hours before?

Of course, there was another motivation developing for his courtesy to her, one which he was only dimly aware of at first. He could smell her pussy again, even under the thick robe. He found himself thinking what a perfect morning it was for lovemaking, that the kids would be sure to be asleep for hours yet, that it was cold just about everywhere in the house except in bed, that they could go nowhere and were expected nowhere anyway. And that for all their recent troubles, for all his reasons for resenting her, his wife was somehow exuding a raw, tangible sexuality that made him hunger for her. Long before he was aware he was doing it, he was fantasizing about her familiar and well-traveled curves and crevices, and remembering fondly just how good her pussy tasted, and picturing her breasts bared and splayed beneath him while he fucked her.

What was especially disheartening, even humiliating, was that he knew that she knew what he was thinking. That she had lived with him for so long, was so fluent in his expressions and mannerisms, she knew what questions he was asking before he even began to approach them. He also knew what her answers would be.

“I don’t even know why we’re doing this,” Sherry said, before her husband could say anything else.

“Doing what? We’re just drinking coffee.”

“No, any of this. Why you’re here, why you came back. You don’t want to be here, with me.”

“Yes, I do.”

“You wouldn’t rather be with Melanie? Are you honestly telling me that?”

As always when she mentioned the girl’s name, Neal’s face hardened and his eyes dropped. It was a stabbing tactic she had developed early on, a reminder that his infidelity was the sole cause for their problems. Sherry hated herself for using it now, when he was obviously trying to be nice. But she had read his meandering thoughts in his face -- had detected his lustful sniffing, and knew what he intended before he did.

Sniffing. Yes that was it, all right. He could smell her. She deliberately opened her legs beneath the table and hitched up her robe a little, hoping to infuse the room.

“No,” he told her. “I wouldn’t rather be with Melanie.”

“No?”

“No. I told you, I’m through with her.”

She squinted at him. “You’re through with her or she’s through with you?”

Again his face hardened. God damn the man! Had he been in touch with her recently? Yesterday, perhaps? Last night? There was definitely something kicking up his lusts, of that she was sure. It wasn’t just the scent of morning pussy.

“I am through with her,” he said, emphatically tapping the table. “Sherry, this is never going to work until you believe something -- anything! -- that I say.”

“I’m not sure you want it to work.”

“Yes, I do.”

She wrapped her hands around the warm cup and said nothing for awhile.

It was miserable, but it was at least a different kind of misery. Her happy little toy had scratched some itch in her, that was certain, and had drained the bile and the nervous fuss out of her argument. She could come at him coldly, almost impartially, while he was clearly in some sort of emotional straits.

Sherry knew she couldn’t do without a lover indefinitely. She couldn’t make do with just a dildo for her pleasure, anymore than her deviant daughter could. But it had steadied her nerves some. Whereas Neal looked a nervous wreck.

“Over well, please” she said.

He stared at her uncomprehendingly.

“With toast?”

“Oh,” he said, sighing.

While he was warming up the pan, she snuck a finger between her clammy pussy lips and sniffed it. Christ, she did have a smell -- she reeked! Knowing Neal, it was driving him nuts.

“You know what you need?” he asked, sitting down again, his face serious.

“Ho, what do I need, Neal?” she laughed.

“I’m going to tell you.”

“Yes? Tell me.”

“You need help.”

Now it was her turn to stare.

“

I

need help.

I

do?”

“Well, yeah, I need help too, but it’s probably too late for me. I’m a dirty, rotten bastard who should have his nuts chopped off -- we both know that. But that doesn’t change the fact that you need help. And I do want to help you, Sherry.”

She shook her head, as though in a fog.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said.

“You’re hurt. And you have needs, and you have drives. And I don’t want to see you that way --”

“Oh my God,” she interrupted, setting her cup down. “Well, I’d like to say nice try, Neal, but it wasn’t. It’s pathetic. Honestly, was that supposed to --”

“It’s not supposed to do anything. Quit second-guessing every fucking thing I say!”

Sherry stopped. His eyes were a little crazy, and the finger he pointed at her was trembling -- actually trembling. Whatever he was saying, she knew he was sincere.

“Now . . . it’s all . . . all turning to shit between us,” he continued erratically, “and it’s my fault. Okay? It’s my fault, all of it. And I’m unbelievably, just unbelievably sorry for that. But you -- you’re not yourself, Sherry! You’re in some kind of trouble and you need help. And I’m just . . . I’m trying to say . . . ”

“What?” she asked, as his voice trailed off. “What are you trying to say?”

What happened next was a total surprise. There was a noise at the kitchen door, and he nearly fell on the floor, he was so surprised. It was Vanessa, sleepy-eyed and bedraggled, but smiling.

Hi, Mom -- Hi, Daddy

she chirruped, like she had a thousand times before. But when their little girl passed by them, kissing her father’s forehead on the way to the stove, there passed such a look of confusion and shame and desperation over Neal’s face that for a moment, a few seconds only, Sherry thought he was going to burst into tears.

***

The day passed surreally: unthinkably quiet, deadly slow. All the normal signs of their life were mysteriously absent, replaced by unfamiliar impressions and sounds. No sunshine, only charcoal skies and white lawns. No birds singing, only whistling wind. No television sounds, only the weather report on Josh’s portable stereo.

They passed much of the day inside the kitchen, mere inches and feet apart, only rarely acknowledging each other. Vanessa read a book about pregnancy. Josh either smoked or ate constantly; Sherry just smoked and drank pots of coffee. Neal stared out the window. It was like they were strangers, all waiting for the same bus to arrive.

By three o’clock, Sherry actually went to find some board games in the hall closet -- monuments to “family nights” that hadn’t happened in years. When she returned, Neal had snuck away, and she set up to play

Clue

with Vanessa.

“Daddy went for a walk outside,” Vanessa said.

“Oh. He all right?”

“Yeah. He just seems a little . . . preoccupied. Ooh, can I be Miss Scarlet?”

***

Neal spent the better part of the colorless day trying not to think -- about Sherry, about Melanie, about Nessa, about his own frantic state of mind. Naturally his uneasiness made him uncommunicative, so he could do nothing but think.

His half-selfish, half-well meant seduction attempt that morning had been ruthlessly shot down by Sherry’s quick wit and penetrating stare. If he could have walked away from it mad at her, he might have been okay. But instead he found himself wanting her all day long. Not since they were kids had he wanted her so badly, thought about her so much.

As for Nessa, Neal had expected a wide variety of reactions from her, but not the one he got. Far from seeming hurt, or scared, or unsure, she positively fawned on him. Jumping up to fill his coffee cup, rubbing his shoulders, giving him little kisses. Did she always treat him like that? Given his enormously guilty conscience, he couldn’t be sure -- everything she did seemed so suggestive, like a big tease. Once he thought he caught her and Josh grinning at each other, as though they were sharing some private joke.

Her stance, her smiles, even her very proximity to him now seemed suspicious, questionable. He spent the entire wretched day torn between a desire to fuck his wife and a desire to feel his daughter. Since both were (for different reasons) out of bounds, Neal was beside himself with frustrated tension by nightfall, and wasn’t even sure he could rely on conventional methods of relieving it.

Without actually asking, he let Sherry know with a look how much he wanted to sleep together that night. She didn’t say no at first, but when he followed her upstairs with his guttering candle she was waiting in the doorway with a troubled expression.

“I don’t think we’d better, Neal,” she told him. “There’s still . . . too much we need to talk about.”

He wanted to scream at her, to vent his rage for the whole terrible day in her direction. But he only nodded, and slouched back down the stairs. His bed on the floor was already made up for him.

By Sherry or by Nessa, he wondered, as he crawled in.

***

“Oh Jesus, you have got some kind of balls, Ness,” her brother said, laughing.

“Thanks,” she said sarcastically, pulling her bra strap over her shoulder. “That’s a great thing to say to a girl who just let you fuck her.”

He was shaking his head, still laughing, and grinning inanely.