Pleasing him was her greatest pleasure she told him before they went to sleep. She knew exactly what he liked and exactly how he liked it, so this was precisely what she did. She also knew how to please herself while pleasing him and she made sure that happened.
Afterward, she got up to get a towel and washcloth. She was wiping herself as she came into the bedroom, then went on to wash and wipe him.
“Good?” she asked.
“You bet.”
“I’m glad. I love you and I know you’re working really hard for us.”
“I am,” he said.
“I know it was never what you’d planned, even ever thought of.”
“That’s for shit sure,” he said.
He thought. The notion of being a cook, a chef, any kind of kitchen or restaurant worker, had never been in his frame of reference, not until the moment Robert whisked him away and into Suburban.
Ain’t it funny how the night moves?
He wondered now, now that she brought it up and he was thinking about it, if he ever would have fooled around if he’d never been in kitchens. The messing around had started almost instantaneously and it wasn’t started by him. How many times? How many times could you be tempted and say no? If you were tempted day after day, over and over, how long was it until you finally gave in? It was that same lesson he learned from his high school football days. Perseverance won out in the end. Bea, Alfreda, Marie—it was only a matter of time.
And now, in a hotel, a whole new set of women were on him. He’d hoped to stop fooling around once he actually got married. That hadn’t worked out too well so far. Arlene had made it nearly impossible. Then the move up to Cleveland was at least promising. There was the move and the interim when he wasn’t working. But then the hotel job was it. Not even a full calendar week yet and… Millie, Beverly and Rosie. Edelgarde was just waiting in the wings.
Done washing him and with everything she was doing out of bed, his wife switched off the light and slid back in under the covers. As she sidled up to him and settled herself against him he never felt more like a dirty dog. He was a dirty dog and that was that. For a moment, a very brief moment, he felt like blurting everything out, just throwing all caution to the wind and telling her all about his life as a cook. He thought maybe she would understand, maybe she would forgive him and let it slide. He thought maybe, when all was said and done they might be able to put his infidelity behind them and even as the newlyweds they were be able to start fresh, start all over, start anew.
It wasn’t a panic attack that stopped him from doing so. Nope. Quite to the contrary, it was a logic attack and a moment of clarity that stopped him, that brought him to his senses. You crazy? He asked himself this. You out of your mind? He was laying on his back. She was next to him. He had his arm around her and was softly stroking her on her arm. Yes, he thought. You are crazy. You are out of your mind. You really are out of your mind.
But he wasn’t out of his mind for wanting to come clean and wanting to get honest. No. Not at all. He was out of his mind for doing what he was doing and having done what he’d done. That was the truth as he saw it. That was the real deal as he lay there next to the one who continually professed her love for him and the one he said he loved.
But then one of those crazy thoughts came over him and he found himself asking himself if he really loved her. Do I? Do you? How do you know you do? What do you know about love? What you know about anything?
Well, he thought, what do you know?
