Blind Faith

"Aren't you afraid Hon might come home in the middle of day and catch you?" Mel asked one Friday.

"She's like a clock that never breaks," Balek said. "She's never home before the kids."

"What about the bed?" asked Bill. "Doesn't she notice anything?"

"First of all, Raven is a great homemaker, almost as good as Hon. When she finishes making the bed, it looks like no one has slept in it for days. But even if she wasn't so neat, Hon would never notice."

"Why?"

"Because she would never suspect."

"How can you say that? What if she noticed something different about you?"

"She knows that I would never cheat, just like I know she'd never cheat. That's why I can get away with it."

"What if she found out? Do you think she'd cheat for revenge?"

Balek laughed.

"Bill, you ask the craziest questions. She's never going to find out. I just told you why. You have to be suspicious first, and there's no way she'll ever be suspicious of me.

"As for her ever cheating on me, that's preposterous. You all know her. A woman like her just never cheats. I'm sure your wives are the same way."

A week after this, Charley carefully explored the limits of grossness when it came to Raven.

"Uh, Balek, does Raven do stuff for you that, uh, nobody else would do?"

They watched Balek's face. He knew who Charley meant by nobody else, but her name wasn't mentioned. Was he going to go off? For a moment, his deadpan expression disappeared, but then it came back.

"Before I answer that, Charley, I want to give you some advice."

"Sure," said Charley, with a sigh of relief. "What is it?

"You should always be careful of disrespecting people, no matter who and no matter if they're present or not."

"I agree a hundred per cent," Charley said. "What I said was not intended to disrespect anyone. And if you think that it does, please forget I asked."

"I'll accept that," said Balek. "All I'm saying is be careful. Anyway, it wasn't a good question. Too vague. Be more specific."

Charley looked around the table. They were all looking at Charley and Balek to see what was going to happen.

"All right," Charley said. "This is specific. Does Raven blow you? Does she let you fuck her in the ass?"

"Keep going. When you get to something she doesn't do, I'll stop you."

There was an explosion of laughter from everyone, including Balek.

"You liar!" yelled Mel. "You got us that time."

Balek didn't respond.

Jerry was laughing hard with the others, but he was also staring at his best friend with wide eyes.

When the laughter died down, Jerry spoke.

"Can I keep going?" he asked Balek.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean Charley only mentioned two things."

"Sure, keep going. Like I said, I'll stop you."

That set the table off like a rocket, and the bartender had to come over to tell them to keep it down if they were going to be gross. As each one thought of something extreme or disgusting, the next one tried to top it.

"Does she swallow? Does she show it to you before she swallows? Does she let you come on her face? Does she hold it in her mouth and give you a snowball?"

That one stopped the proceedings for a second as Balek yelled out "No!"

"Does she do ass to mouth? Does she let you come in her ass? Does she let you feed her your come out of her ass? Does she eat your ass out? Do you eat her ass out?"

They were surprised when he didn't stop them with that one.

"You really eat her ass out?" Jerry said.

"Why not? She gets it real clean for me and then puts in this perfume that smells like butterscotch. While I'm eating her ass out she's using her fingers on her pussy, and when she comes, she screams like an eagle. After that, she'll let me do whatever I want."

The group broke up late that night, and everybody but Balek had to go home in a taxi. He lived a few blocks away, so he managed to lurch home and fall into bed fully clothed. Hon was on a business trip, and the kids were both on sleepovers, so nobody saw him.

The kids were still not home the next morning when Balek woke up, looked at the clock and groaned. Half the morning was gone, and that meant some of the projects he had scheduled for himself wouldn't get done today.

He showered, dressed in clean work clothes and went down to make himself lunch. Might as well forget breakfast. Then he got busy.

It was almost four and he hadn't taken a break when he heard the sound. He was at the kitchen table, which was spread with a feast of parts, rags, oil and solvent. He had taken his ear buds out hours ago because he was moving his hands and arms around so much that the lines were getting tangled. So it was completely quiet in the house when he heard the sound of someone fiddling with the front door lock.

He grabbed a lead pipe and walked on his toes to the door and got behind the drapes next to it. A second later, the lock turned over and the door opened. He raised the pipe high as he waited for the intruder to enter. Then he almost fell over backwards.

It was Hon. She was just inside the door and bent over. For a second, he wondered if something was wrong with her, but then she straightened up, and he saw that she had just taken her shoes off. He started to come out and say something but decided to wait to see what she was going to do.

She turned back to the door and slowly closed it, twisting the handle carefully so the latch hardly made a sound. He smiled. She was trying to surprise him.

He caught a glimpse of a serious look on her face as she turned and began tip-toeing up the stairs in her stockings.

He waited until he didn't see her feet anymore and got out of his hiding place. He also tried to make no noise as he slowly followed her. He stopped halfway up and watched her sneak up to their closed bedroom door and put her ear against it.

After a moment, she straightened up and slowly turned the handle and then quickly opened the door and turned on the light. She stood in the doorway looking into the room and then stepped in.

Balek quietly walked to the bedroom door and looked inside. She was next to the bed and bent over it as she slowly pulled the covers and blanket back.

"Hi, Hon," he said.

She screamed, jumped in the air and turned quickly to look at him.

"You scared me!"

He couldn't keep from laughing as she glared at him. He finally controlled himself.

"I'm sorry. I couldn't help it. I know you were trying to surprise me, but I got you first."

He had to laugh again before continuing.

"You're lucky. When I heard you coming in, I thought you were an intruder, and nearly bopped you with this."

He nodded to the pipe still in his hand.

Hon was sitting on the bed breathing deeply and looking at him.

"Are you all right?" he asked her.

"Yes."

"I saw you were looking at the bed. I'm sorry I didn't make it. I was at Oblivion's too long last night, and I was a mess when I got home. Good thing the kids weren't here. This morning I overslept, and I had a lot of work to do. I thought you weren't coming home until tomorrow, so I left the bedroom like this."

Hon took a deep breath and smiled at him.

"Don't worry about it. The conference wasn't productive, so I decided to leave early and surprise you."

"That's great news! I'll finish what I'm working on as fast as I can, and we'll go out for a nice dinner and have a relaxing evening. Tomorrow we'll get the kids and do something fun together."

Hon looked at him a moment before speaking.

"That sounds perfect, except for one thing. I know what relaxing evening is your code for, and I'm really beat. I wouldn't be any fun."

"You're always fun, but if you don't want to, I'm not going to get upset. Maybe you'll feel like it in the morning before we get the kids."

"Maybe," she said. He noticed she didn't sound enthusiastic. He decided she must really be tired and decided to scale back on some of the strenuous activity he was thinking about for Sunday.

She unpacked and he went downstairs and back to his work. He was almost done when she stuck her head in the kitchen and told him she was going over to Val's for a few minutes because she needed to talk to her about something. After he finished, he should clean up and make reservations.

When she came home from Val's, her face was long, but when he asked her if everything was all right at Val and Jerry's, she quickly brightened and said, except for Jerry's hangover, everything was fine.

On Sunday, her energy was back, and the family spent the day at the go-kart track. By the time they got home, the heat and fumes had exhausted everyone.

The following week, she came home late every night through Thursday. He had to be at work by eight, so he was already asleep and they didn't have sex at all. He guessed she was probably working on mastering some new software program that she would be training employees on. Friday morning he found out that he had guessed wrong.

"I'll only be a little late tonight," she said. "I've had to take some long meetings after work all week, hire some consultants and set up some temporary secret operations. But everything will be in place by tonight, and I'm not going anywhere this weekend, so when I come home, the kids and I will pack."

***********

That night at O'Blivion's, Balek told his friends he could only have two beers and wasn't staying long because the next morning the family was leaving early for a two-day getaway in the mountains.

Maybe because he was leaving early, they began peppering him with questions about Raven. Things got raunchy fast, and they escalated to another level when Charley told everyone to shut up.

"This is important," he said in a slurred voice. "You told us how you fuck Raven in your office and store room and the park and every place else. But when you bring her to your house, do you only fuck her in your bed?"

Balek laughed.

"You all know Raven's religious. She calls it anointing. We've anointed every piece of furniture and every room in my house -- even the hallways and the walk-in closet in our bedroom. The only virgin rooms left are the smaller closets."

"What's her...?" began Charley.

"Oh, I forgot the garage," Balek said, interrupting Charley, "both cars -- inside the cars, over the hood and over the trunk. What were you starting to say, Charley?"

"I wanted to know what her favorite place was?"

"She has several favorites. But I know she really likes to lie down on her stomach over the washing machine and then turn it on once I get behind her. The vibrations from the washer and me give her screaming orgasms, and by the time the spin cycle is finished, she's as limp as the clothes inside.

"Right now, we're working on the stairs. We started at the bottom. She's ahead of me, and I'm behind her. We take it slowly and crawl up the stairs. Each stair, I either put it in her ass or her pussy. When she has enough, she crawls up to the next one, and then I put it in the other hole.

"I don't know how she does it because she's moving like crazy and groaning the whole way, but she says she's keeping track. Her goal is to come at least once on every stair. She hasn't done it on the top five steps yet, she told me, because by the time she gets there, she's too worn out. But we're working on it."

Balek spoke in fits and starts because their laughter -- and his -- kept interrupting him. Then Bill dampened everyone's mood.

"You keep saying Hon will never find out," he said, "but don't you know that sooner or later, someone will tell her or Gavin, or else you or Raven will make a mistake. Val and I love you guys. Aren't you afraid it will destroy your marriage?"

Balek pretended to take the question seriously for a moment before laughing and replying.

"I'll start with the easiest part."

He turned to Mel.

"Mel, Raven told me she ran into you at the drugstore. Do you want to tell us about your chat?"

Mel shook his head.

"Then I will. Raven told Mel she didn't care what I tell you. She doesn't mind us having fun at O'Blivion's. But she warned you about Gavin, didn't she?

"She's not worried about what anyone tells him, because she knows he'd never believe it. What she's afraid of is Gavin's temper. If he thinks someone has insulted Raven, he goes into a rage. Did she tell you Gavin saw combat?"

Mel nodded.

"So what we say has to stay at O'Blivion's because nobody wants to find out what Gavin's reaction would be if he found out we've been talking about Raven.

"That's another reason why you guys want to make sure Hon never finds out. She might tell Gavin, and our lives wouldn't be worth two cents.

"So, back to you, Bill. You see now why nobody will ever tell either Hon or Gavin.

"But as you pointed out, even if nobody says anything, she could find out if we make a stupid mistake. All I'll say about that is Raven is the smartest woman I know, outside of Hon. We've thought of everything. Nobody has ever seen us together, and nobody ever will.

"You can never think of everything," Jerry said. "What about last week?"

"What do you mean?"

"Hon was at our house Saturday afternoon. You told us she was gone all weekend. She must have come back early. You can't always know where she is."

Balek got up before he spoke again.

"I've got to go. It's not as much fun when I'm not drinking as much as everyone else."

He turned to Jerry.

"You know more about technology than I do. Are you seriously telling me that there aren't a million ways to know where someone is every second? Tracking used to be expensive, but not anymore. And it's easy to hide. What I'm saying is I know exactly where Hon is all the time.

"I've already told you the number one reason I can be so sure. Even if someone she really trusted told Hon about me and Raven, she wouldn't believe it. She just couldn't imagine something like that.

"You know how I can be so certain? I know exactly how she thinks, because I think the same way. No matter what anyone tells me, I know she could never cheat on me.

"I've got to leave, but I'll buy the next round so you can talk about me when I'm gone."

*************

Hon focused like a laser on Jeremy and Pam during their trip and only exchanged a few words with Balek. He knew she sometimes felt guilty about not being with the kids as much as he was and tried to make up for it by smothering them when she had a chance like this, so he tried to be supportive.

On Saturday night, the kids poked fun at him for crying when they were roasting marshmallows around the campfire.

"No fair!" he said, pointing at Hon. "Your Mom made me do it. I looked at her and couldn't help it."

Tears were streaming down her face.

"What's wrong, Mom?" asked Jeremy.

"Nothing!" she sniffed.

"I'll tell you," Balek said. "It was what Pam just said."

"What did I say?"

"You said something that you and Jeremy think of as a happy thought, but when you're our age, you think it's sad."

"I don't get it."

"You said how wonderful it is that we're all together like this as a family and that you hope we can always be like this."

"What's wrong with that?"

"Your Mom and I see how quickly the two of you are growing up. Before you know it, you'll be gone, living your own life. You'll get married and have children. You'll have to do things with your spouse's family.

"Maybe one of you will move away with your family because of your career or your spouse's. Getting together like this will be hard. That's why we're sad. We'd like everything to always be as perfect as it is tonight, but life isn't like that."

At this, Hon put her face down into her hands and began sobbing uncontrollably. Her whole body was shaking. The children rushed to her and hugged and kissed her and comforted her.

When she had recovered and they were sitting around the campfire again silently looking into the dying embers, Jeremy spoke.

"Dad, you're terrible. Mom may have been sad at what Pam said, but then you had to turn it into a funeral for our family. I'm giving you a wet blanket for Christmas."

He and Pam both started laughing, and Hon and Balek joined in.

**********************

On Sunday, when the kids were in bed and Balek and Hon were cleaning up, she surprised him.

"We have an appointment with a salesman tomorrow night," she said.

"About what?"

"Home security."

"Is this connected to something you're doing at work?"

"No, it's connected to your gun. The NRA sells your membership information, so we get calls from sales people trying to sell us stuff.

"This guy called a couple of months ago, and I blew him off, but last week I was thinking that maybe we should see what he has."

"What does he have?"

"I don't want to try to explain it, because I might get it wrong. He told us the presentation wouldn't be long, and then he'll answer our questions. Between you and me, we'll be able to decide whether it's worth doing or not."

The salesman was selling household security cameras. He showed some startling videos, gave them copies of their state's gun laws and went over them almost line by line.

His pitch was that if you own a gun, you need high-definition security cameras recording video in every room and passageway of the house because if you ever need to protect yourself, the prosecutor may come after you instead of the criminal.

"But we know the laws about when we're allowed to shoot and when we're not," Balek protested.

"I'm sure you do, but what if the housebreaker lies? It's his word against yours. It becomes like any court case. Who does the judge or jury believe? Or maybe it's who has a better lawyer? Is it worth losing your business to find out?

"Since you and your wife will sign a form authorizing the cameras and recordings to be running, whatever is recorded is admissible as evidence in any court of law, criminal and civil. You have the most credible witness of all."

The salesman explained that cameras in each room would be triggered by either motion or sound and the videos would be saved to a hard drive. Once it was full, the oldest twenty-four hours would be overwritten every day. There would always be at least thirty days of videos available.

"If we're out of town, can we look at the live cameras?" Hon asked.

"You could," the salesman said. "We can set it up so that everything's uploaded to the cloud. That package costs more and there's a monthly service charge. We sell that to businesses. I've never sold one to a home, but it can be done.

"What if we want to shut it down?" Hon asked.

"Oh, yes," the salesman said. "Sometimes when you're at home, you want, uh, privacy more than security."

He cleared his throat.

"There's a simple master switch we install wherever you want. It looks like a light switch. Whenever you want to shut down the cameras, just flip the switch, but don't forget to flip it back when you're, uh, done."

Balek wasn't sure they needed the system, but Hon reminded him that he had a similar setup at his business and asked him if their lives were less important than his equipment. They ended up placing the order that night, and the next day, Tuesday, everything was installed. The master switch was put in a corner of the mud room.

Thursday, Raven dropped Balek off ten miles out of town to retrieve a half-ton pickup, and on his way back to the yard, the dashboard buzzed and showed there was barely any oil in it. He was close to his house, where he had some cans of oil in his garage, so he decided to make a quick stop.

As he pulled into the driveway, he was surprised to see a man in a uniform walk down the front steps to the street, get into a paneled van and drive off. He didn't get a good look at the van, but did see some lettering on the back that suggested it belonged to an electrical contractor.

When he walked into the house to get to the garage, he got a second surprise. First he smelled something, and he followed his nose to the kitchen, where Hon had several things going on the range and in the oven.