The Story of Billy Martin

But her pussy was completely off limits, I could rub her through her panties but no touching underneath.

She had no reservations about undoing my pants, though.

I sort of didn't want to even mention that since Shelly Carlson was also in Sharon's lady's club and it wasn't just once, it was closer to 30 times one Summer right after high school.

But her panties stayed super glued in place.

"OK. I believe you. You know perfectly well that you were my first, and you are the only one, too, right?"

Yea, I sort of knew that because I had to go buy seat covers for my 1962 Chevrolet Biscayne, there was no way to ever get the back seat clean after that.

"Way back when Jimmy and I were...he kissed me some and he even tried to...you know..but back then I didn't even have any...?" Her hand came up and touched the front of her blouse.

"Tits?" I busted up at that one. Hell, Sharon couldn't have weighed 80 pounds back then.

"Then there was..Paul Miller." She blushed.

"Paul Miller?" Now that was a surprise, he was the resident athletic hero, always winning the high jump, on the football team at quarterback, no end to it.

One of the "special" kids.

In school we ignored each other.

"Paul was my junior prom date, and we parked and he kissed me. Then he got his hands inside my bra."

"That's all?" I asked. It was something I didn't know, and that really was no big deal.

"Just one more." Sharon was not looking at me now. In fact, she was looking down.

"OK. Who?"

"Billy."

"Billy? You are kidding me."

"No, I'm not. It was the Summer after we graduated, we were all down at the beach and some of the guys had some beer. Billy got me off to the side and he had his hands...you know."

"No, I don't know! How fucking far did he get?"

"He tried to put his finger in but I stopped him."

"Jesus Christ! I suppose you sucked his dick, right?" I practically exploded at that.

"No! No I did not! I never even saw it until...he showed us his movie." Sharon's voice trailed off. Then her eyes got damp.

"Hey, nothing to cry about, it's not that big of a deal. Just growing up stuff." I wrapped my arms around her, she snuggled up close to me.

One thing, I did not like Billy Martin any more.

+++

Maybe two months went by, no signs of Billy which was just fine with me.

Then comments started cropping up, in a small town like ours there are very few secrets.

Especially with a loud mouth like Billy Martin.

A couple of guys I knew told me that he had been spreading some shit, talking about how he and Sharon used to get it on.

I happened to know damn good and well that was a lie.

He was also yapping away about how he was going to whip my ass when he saw me, for "disrespecting" him.

After awhile, that crap got me pissed off.

So one day I was driving down the street and saw Billy's car parked at the Canteen. The place was still there but had expanded, now there was a tavern in the rear with pool tables and things like that.

On impulse, I pulled in and parked.

I should have just driven right on down the street.

I had no idea at all what I was going to say or do, but like I said, I was pissed off at Billy.

Billy was well on his way, and he was in my face before the bartender could even serve me the beer I ordered.

"Leave me the fuck alone, Billy." I told him.

"Yea? What are you doing coming into MY turf, asshole?"

"Since when do YOU own this fucking place, shithead!" I yelled at him.

"You just don't like it because I can fuck your old lady better than you can!" Billy yelled that out loudly enough to make sure everyone in the place could hear it.

"Take that crap outside!" The bartender yelled, before I could knock him on his ass for that.

"Coming?" Billy gave me a scornful look.

I went.

+++

They say that the guy that lands the first punch usually wins the fight. I would like to say I did exactly that but when I threw it I hit air.

The half dozen short punches coming back at me made my head swim.

Things went just like that for a quite awhile, by then there must have been 20 people gathered around watching.

I did get some licks in but it wasn't having a hell of a lot of effect, Billy was damned fast.

I managed one uppercut to his belly that got me a rewarding gust of air and he backed off for a few seconds.

The he came right back at me like I knew he would, I had seen Billy in many fights.

It didn't help that the parking lot was gravel, I couldn't get my feet set well enough to take his head off with a punch, and I was getting clipped with short quick tags myself.

At one point I got my hand on his right wrist, clamped down. Billy was fast, very fast, but no way was he even close to as strong as I was. He did everything in his power to get loose but couldn't, my right fist was landing nicely as fast as I could swing.

He kept jumpong sideways every time I swung which took away most of the effect, so I took my own advice and started hitting his arms, his shoulders.

Any one of my blows would have cold cocked a normal man, but it was like Billy's fucking head was made of rubber, I just could not quite land squarely.

When he gave a kick at my balls I managed to shift and took that on my leg, but in the process I lost my balance.

He tripped me and was on top, pounding at me. When I clipped him upside the head from flat on my back, he jammed his head forward.

I bit down on his ear, the first time in my life I ever did anything like that. Billy jerked back and stood up, I was on my feet right with him.

Something rubbery was in my mouth, I spit it out just as I saw his hand come up to the side of his head, blood spurting.

That was the opening I needed, my fist connected squarely with the point of his jaw and down he went.

For a moment I thought I had killed him, but then he twitched and moaned.

I got into my car and went home.

Sharon took one look at me, went and got a pan of water, some towels and bandages.

She didn't have to ask, she knew.

+++

More stories, of course. Someone had even had the time to run up the street to get the town cop but as soon as he realized who it was and what was going on, he wanted no part of it so he stood there and watched, too.

The papers even ran a story, calling it a drunken altercation which ended up with Billy Martin being hospitalized. I guess they did try to sew the top portion of Billy's ear back on but it didn't work.

They did misspell my last name, I didn't care.

I just went about my business, refusing to even discuss it with anyone.

Billy of course kept right on with his bullshit, now it seemed I was his worst enemy in the world.

Several months passed and things seemed to have all settled down. I did see Billy a few times but just driving by on the highway, without fail he gave me the finger which I ignored.

Other than that, nothing, so I did my best to forget about it.

I did go buy a gun, a .45 caliber revolver, loaded it with hollow points. I fired it just one time, the thing kicked like a mule.

That scared the hell out of Sharon so I put it way in a drawer, left it there.

More months went by, things were actually rather peaceful around our house. We seldom had any guests, mostly we kept to ourselves.

We were even talking about dispensing with the condoms and trying for a baby, the farm had a couple of good years so we had a few thousand dollars in the bank.

+++

All hell broke loose one evening.

A light switch in our hallway made a sizzling noise and the light would not come on.

I knew that was a real good way to end up with a fire.

Glancing at my watch, it was 15 minutes to eight O'clock and I knew that the hardware store in town was open until eight.

I jumped into my car, now a 1967 Impala and headed down there, it was just four miles.

Sharon was sitting in her chair watching TV when I left.

I never noticed Billy's car but he had to have been watching.

It took me a few minutes to get the right switch since it was one that worked sideways instead of up and down, our house had started life as a mobile home and then been built onto.

Those older switches were rare. Finally the clerk told me he thought he had some in a box in the back, he went back and sure enough, out he came with one.

"Sorry for keeping you late." I told the clerk since it was now 20 minutes past eight.

As I made the turn for the quarter mile long drive up to our house, I saw a car parked there at the end of the driveway pulled off partially into some brush, but it didn't register, not really.

I was thinking about the light switch, and how I needed to shut off the main and have Sharon hold the flash light for me since it was dark outside.

I heard the screaming the moment I opened the car door, I ran up the steps and into the house.

Sharon was on her back on the floor, naked. Her face was bloody, Billy Martin had his hand at her crotch, his fingers obviously buried inside of her. His other arm was across her throat, Sharon was hitting at him.

The living room looked like a tornado had hit it.

Billy came up off the floor at me, I saw his pants were undone but partly, the end of the belt flopping.

Everything was like it was in slow motion, I swing by instinct and missed. Then I felt the bite at my side. My hand came down and came back bloody, I saw Billy's hand go back and come at me again, that was when I saw the knife.

I grabbed the blade, twisting it away from me, feeling the edge slash my hand to the bone.

Backwards I went, down with a crash. My fifty pounds advantage should have been enough, but Billy's face was crazy with rage. I could smell the stink of booze, knew he had been drinking.

I was trying desperately to flail at the knife, I felt it bite into me again but it hit bone that time and didn't go deep. Already I was feeling my breath labor as one lung filled with blood.

Then there was an explosion, so loud my ears went numb.

Billy's body jerked, then sagged. I shoved his weight off of me, got to my feet. The knife was still in his hand, I kicked it away with my foot.

Sharon had fallen backwards against the couch, her face was a mask of blood and shock.

By her hand was the .45 revolver I kept in a drawer, then one she did not want me to have because it frightened her.

The recoil had knocked her backwards, she had never fired the weapon and had no way to know what to expect. Weighing barely 110 pounds, the recoil of the weapon was more than she could hold.

I had no idea at all that she even knew how to fire it.

I glanced at Billy, he was not moving. From less than four feet away, Sharon had been accurate, the round hit him in the back and came out the right front side of his chest.

From what was left of the front side of his chest, the round had to have missed me by inches on the way through.

If she had known the bullet would go all the way through, she might not have fired, and I would likely have died.

Perhaps she would have, also.

She grabbed me and broke down into hysterics, all I could do was hold her. Then she saw the blood coming from my mouth, reached for the phone and dialed.

I touched Billy's neck, no pulse. I knew he was dead.

"Sharon, you need to get some clothes on." I told her, then I could no longer stand.

+++

The police came quickly, State this time. There were a lot of them.

An ambulance arrived, men came in, that was all a blur. As they worked on me, I glanced over Sharon's way as she lay there, men using towels to wipe up the blood, looking for wounds. They did place a drape over her lower body after doing what appeared to be taking samples.

I wanted to go cover her nakedness, but no words would come out.

I looked at Billy, his body was now covered by a sheet. I know my eyes got damp.

In the hospital, there was an operation to repair my punctured lung and sew up the slash on my rib cage, another huge wound on my left arm I had not even felt.

Sharon sat by my side every single day, all day, quietly.

Then the day they let me go home, I looked down and saw the light switch still laying on the ground in our driveway where I had dropped it.

I picked it up and walked inside, did the repair.

It worked perfectly.

It was weeks before Sharon and I had a talk about what happened that night, since even a mention of it brought tears to her eyes.

Finally she managed to tell me, I already knew of course because she had told the police and I did read their report.

It was a few minutes after I had left when the door had slammed open, Billy walked over and grabbed her without a word. She had fought him with all her might, at one point breaking free and grabbing a knife from our kitchen.

Billy hit her and took it away from her, then he hit her again. She came to as he was tearing at her clothing, fought some more to try and stop him. He managed to strip her naked, ripping some of her clothing in the process.

When he let go of her, stood to try and undo his pants, she had broken free and tried to get away from him again. She was throwing everything she could get her hands on at him, but he was laughing and ducking.

Finally he had cornered her and dragged her down on the floor. She was hitting at him when the door burst open as I arrived.

I held her in my arms as she cried.

110 pounds, yet she had managed to hold him off for nearly a half hour of terror.

+++

We sold the place and moved, the new house is nicer, too. Even my new job pays more, but I do pause when I leave for work as Sharon sets all four of the dead bolt locks.

The looks from people in our small town were just too hard to take, lord knows what they thought, believed. I was hoping the 2000 miles we put between ourselves and our former lives would be enough, yet I am unsure if the world has a place far enough away.

My wife some days seems normal, others I can tell she has the visions of that day in her thoughts.

There were no charges filed, but there was quite a scandal in the papers after they searched Billy's apartment and found all of his tapes.

Quite a few of them featured some rather well known people from around our town. I think they expected to find Sharon and I on some of them but of course they did not.

We were under suspicion for quite some time, the questions they asked repeatedly told me that. I also had to tell them several times about the earlier fight.

But Billy had been an obvious intruder, my wounds and Sharon's showed that.

The rape kit of course showed she had not been, although it was clear she would have been had I been just minutes later.

Finally the detectives seemed satisfied and left us alone.

+++

I do feel a small amount of guilt when I think of that day, finding Billy Martin hiding in an alley.

Scared of Jimmy White and what he might do, not understanding that Jimmy White was just a big bully, nothing.

I encouraged him, it was my words that changed him from a frightened little boy into something else entirely. Of course, what he turned into was just an extension of what he always was, I tell myself that.

I think sometimes I should have just left him there, frightened and alone in that alley.