February Sucks for Some People

It seems like everyone has taken a run at George Anderson's story "February Sucks". It is a story about seduction and infidelity. In the various telling and retellings of the story, the couple reconcile, or they don't. The husband takes physical or financial revenge on the player, or he doesn't. The player's friends take revenge on the husband, or they don't, and sometimes they admit that the player has done the same thing with their wives. I must admit that the story and its variations have each struck a nerve in me and leave me wanting to pick up a bat and play kneecap baseball with a certain football player.

I never thought I had anything to contribute to the story and I avoided any attempt to add to the growing list of variations until now. Tonight, with my mind wandering, I realized there are two variations of the story that have not been told. One is where the player seduces the husband, but that didn't interest me. Then there is this version. So, here is my poor attempt at playing with George Anderson's story. It is not a sequel to the original and I am not staying faithful to the original character development. I'm placing a somewhat different group of people with the same names in the same situation and allowing a different outcome to play out.

My thanks to George for permitting me to play with his story. You will find that my version is significantly shorter than George's, but then I had less to say. One more thing -- I decided to make Dee a hero rather than a villain. Like I said, it's not really the same story as much as a story inspired by the original. It starts with a few paragraphs from the original story and uses a few phrases from the original in key places.

* * * * *

"It's Dee, I have to pick up," she said apologetically. We had a loose circle of five couples that we hung out or went out with from time to time. We were closest to Dee and her husband Dave; she and Linda were almost best friends. Linda made an "I'll keep this short" gesture as she answered the phone.

I could see Linda getting more excited as she talked with Dee. She was all but glowing when she ended the call and plopped herself into my lap.

"What if we all got together, got sitters for the kids, had a really nice dinner, then some dancing at a good club, and then had hotel rooms for the night? That way we could get a little bit crazy and not worry about driving home, and we would end this horrid month right."

"Hmmm, I have to think about this..." I didn't really, but I was hoping that if I stalled, Linda would use one of her patented, guaranteed-not-to-fail Female Persuasion Methods to convince me. Instead, she seized a sofa pillow and bashed me over the head with it. "Ow! Okay, I've thought. Let's do this. But there's one condition." "What's that?" Linda was looking at me suspiciously. I took her sweet face between my hands and looked into her blue eyes. "You wear the dress you bought for Valentine's Day, that I still haven't seen."

The ten of us met at the restaurant. It was crowded on a Friday night, but we had reserved a large enough table that all ten of us could eat together. We laughed and talked and enjoyed a great meal, happy in each other's company and glad that February was finally ending. Linda was the most attractive woman in the room, and I must have told her so a half dozen times. I touched her arm or her shoulder or her hand as often as I could find a reasonable excuse. She returned the favor and smiled into my eyes. This was going to be a night to remember.

+++ +++ +++

The evening was going well, and we were all enjoying ourselves. We kept our wives on the dance floor as much as they wished, each of us trying to outdo the others with our grace and whit, and as good manners dictate, we also dance with each other's wives. There's nothing inappropriate about this. Actually, quite to the contrary, it's what polite people do. There was no jealousy, no sideways glances, and there was no grinding.

While the ten of us took a break, rehydrated, and nibbled on some treats, Dave looked across the room in surprise. "Isn't that Marc LaValliere over there?"

"Who's Marc LaValliere?"

"He plays tight end for the local football team."

"What's football?" Okay, that was said as a joke and we all laughed. We weren't exactly the big-time sports type. Some of us play golf or softball or even a little tennis in the summer and we were known to embarrass ourselves on the basketball court during the winter, but we did it for the social aspects and exercise rather than imagining ourselves to be some sort of alternate universe sports superstars. We were more likely to attend a Stephen Hawking lecture than sit through two hours watching millionaire athletes play catch.

For the moment, that was the extent of the LaValliere excitement, and we continued our conversation.

Dee and I were sitting closest to the dance floor with Dee opposite to me and Dave on her right while Linda was sitting to my left. I had no particular interest in what was going on behind me as everyone that mattered to me that night was sitting at the table with me.

I glanced at Dee who had a look of wonder and curiosity on her face. "Don't turn around, but I think LaValliere is coming our way." Well, you know what happens when someone says something like that. Everyone on the far side looked up and the rest of us with their backs to LaValliere turned around to see what was happening.

"I think you're right. Do you think he wants our table?" What can I say? We had all suffered through high school and we all knew a bully when we saw one.

LaValliere reached our table and looking past me as if I wasn't there, he raised his hand almost thumbing my nose and said to Linda, "Hi, I'm Marc. Would you like to dance?"

I've known Linda since college, and we have no secrets. That's a good thing because we can read each other like a book and what I saw on her face at that moment was amusement mixed with a small amount of irritation. It was almost as if she said, "The audacity of this man!" I felt Linda's hand squeeze mine under the table and with a smile on her face she said, "Well, you'll need to ask my husband."

LaValliere didn't like that. He wasn't accustomed to being put in his place. He looked at me with what I can only describe as a condescending sneer and said, "You wouldn't mind if I dance with your wife, would you?"

I knew this man well even though I've never met him before. I know the type. He is accustomed to getting his way and not asking permission from those beneath him. I toyed with the idea of telling him "Yes I do mind", but that would have given him too much satisfaction. To someone like LaValliere, that would be an admission of fear and intimidation. Besides, I'm not accustomed to telling my wife what she can and cannot do. "The choice is hers."

He had a look of arrogant victory on his face and without repeating his request, he simply cocked his head, raised his eyebrows, and extended his hand further in Linda's direction. She gave my hand another squeeze under the table, stood, and walked out onto the dance floor with LaValliere.

I almost felt sorry for the bastard. She was way out of his league and he didn't even suspect it.

This is the point where I need to tell you a little bit about Linda, myself, and our friends. First, if I ever suggested to Linda that we try something like an open marriage, or swapping, or any of that nonsense, her response would be swift and clear. Then, after a few minutes had passed, and the extraordinary pain between my legs eased, I would pick myself up from the floor, take a seat, and quietly explain, "It was just a question." I like that about my wife. Infidelity offends her and I don't worry about her behavior ever.

Second, my wife and I, and our friends are all ridiculously over-educated. That's not a slight to anyone. It just explains who we are. We set goals for ourselves and we want to do something challenging with our lives. That means more than the usual amount of schooling. We aren't snobs and we have lots of friends with diverse jobs, but we pick our friends based on their character, not their occupations, and we do have some fairly high standards. For ourselves, we aren't the type to follow the whims of pop culture or lose our direction because the people around us lose theirs. I suppose that doesn't mean we're educated so much as it means we are adults and adults know that there are consequences to our actions, and you don't always get a do-over.

LaValliere kept Linda out on the dance floor through a fast set and then a slow set. I confess I was getting more than a little annoyed, but I assumed he had taken her over to his table to introduce her to some of the other celebrity athletes. It would be an interesting experience that she could tell our parents and siblings about, so I was content to wait.

At the end of the slow set, LaValliere was walking Linda back to our table with his arm around her waist and a smile on his face. Linda looked at me with that same look of amusement and irritation and said to me, "Jim, Marc has asked me to go home with him tonight. He has promised me the most incredible sex of my life, far better than you can ever offer me. I told him that I needed your permission before I could leave with him." There was a playful, almost impish, glee in her eyes and I knew she could barely contain her amusement.

I was having greater success than my wife at suppressing my amusement as I looked at this arrogant, overpaid jock. "I'm sorry, dear, but that is not acceptable."

"Oh, pooh! You never let me have any fun!" With that, she slipped away from a startled and very confused Marc LaValliere and took her seat next to me. She was done playing with him.

His confusion did not last long. LaValliere glared at me and said, "Look, cuck, the bitch is going home with me tonight, so just get used to it!" He really should not have used that word. It may explain what happened next.

I held up my hand to get his attention. "Marc, may I call you Marc? Marc, you need to understand something about the women at this table and their husbands. Between the ten of us, there are five engineers, two professors, two doctors, and a lawyer. You really aren't anything special to us. So just go away and try to impress some other man's wife. You've failed with mine."

LaValliere did not like that. I suppose it took him back to his school days and all those remedial classes.

I have to say that for a man who makes his living on his feet, where he needs to be aware of everything going on around him, his focus on me made him remarkably unaware of what was going on at the table. While I was trying to explain things to LaValliere, Dee had quietly slipped her hand into her purse.

As LaValliere growled, "Look, cuck!" and reached for my collar to press his point further, he suddenly let out a "Eeeeeah!" and dropped to the floor in spasms of uncontrolled muscular contractions. Dee had shot him in the groin with her Taser. Well, she was sitting right in front of him! She could hardly miss.

We all leaned over and looked down at him as he convulsed, those of us closest to him keeping our seats while those further away were required to stand.

"He doesn't look very comfortable."

"That suit is going to need dry cleaning."

In time he regained control, and while breathing very hard he rose from the floor. He reached for me again and shouted, "You cock sucking little turd, I'm going to..."

He never finished his threat. He also never saw the wires hanging from his groin. Dee hit him again and he fell to the floor a second time twitching and convulsing. As we looked on, LaValliere further humiliated himself.

"Oh, no!"

"Eeew!"

"Oh, that's disgusting!"

Raising my hand to get the attention of the bar, "Clean up on aisle 6?"

Well, you can't Taser a man, let alone a sports star, in a crowded room without drawing some attention and, besides, the smell was starting to reach the neighboring tables. LaValliere's friends were coming our way fast.

"Incoming!"

"Lock and load!"

They reached our little group, and at least one of them did manage to see the wires leading away from LaValliere's groin.

"What the hell did you do to him?"

"Really?" I thought. "You do see the wires, right?" Still, I kept those thoughts to myself.

"You don't get to do that to one of us!" and as they stepped toward us, Dee and the other women brought their Tasers from below the table. Now the situation was getting interesting. Four angry jocks were staring down the business end of five Tasers with their friend lying on the floor having soiled himself.

We let them stand there for what seemed like a very long time hoping they might reach the obvious conclusion without our help. They didn't, but I suppose they did become aware of the growing crowd of onlookers gathering around us and the bouncers who were busily sizing up their own muscles against those of the competition.

"Why don't you take your friend back to your table and pour some cold beer on his nuts." That got a giggle from the ladies.

After a few more glares and a surprising degree of indecision, they decided to retreat.

As we watched four of our team's finest frog walk their friend toward the men's room, presumably to let him clean himself up, Linda said, "Boys and girls, I don't mean to spoil the evening, but I'm not sure they're ready to let the matter drop. What say we leave and get some coffee and maybe a sweet or two down the road?" With no argument from any of us, we proceeded to drop bills on the table and gather our things.

As we left the club, I could not help but compliment Linda on her performance. "You know this is all your fault, don't you?"

"How is it my fault?" Okay, she was grinning and a little too proud of herself as she said it.

"You're just too darn irresistible." I pulled her closer to me and that got me a loving kiss on the cheek with the promise of more to come.

We soon forgot Marc LaValliere and his friends, relegating him to the butt of so many jokes when we gathered with friends and family. After a few drinks it became a game to see who could do their best Marc LaValliere impression which always involved lying on the floor, shaking and stuttering.

I would love to tell you that LaValliere never learned his lesson until a bullet fired by an angry husband passed through his knee ending his football career, but the truth is better. As I said, you can't Taser a man in a crowded room, let alone a sports star, without attracting attention. There were at least a dozen cell phone videos of Marc LaValliere lying on the ground, convulsing and soiling himself, and they quickly made the rounds in our city. The local news carried the story, although they edited the content considerably. It seems that his approach with my wife, as with others, was well-known about town and that part of the story was told, although Linda's name was left out. The local hunting store began to sell Tasers under the name "The Marc LaValliere Special" and they sold a lot of them. Whenever LaValliere and his friends walked into a bar or a restaurant and he began to approach some man's wife, someone inevitably would draw their Taser from their jacket or purse for him to see. It was not so much a threat as it was a humiliation and he soon ended his offensive behavior. His game fell off and he was traded to a city where his off-field history was less well known.

As for Linda and I and our friends, life is good. Our love is strong, and our children are growing up fast. When you have a partner you can trust, the Marc LaVallieres of the world aren't a threat to your marriage. They will puff themselves up, show off for the crowd, make their threats, and play their games, but in the end they will go home alone unless they find a spouse of less worth than mine. Pity them. They are hollow, empty men of little to no value and in their heart of hearts they know it.

* * * * *

So I confess that I've never viewed big-time athletes as something special. I just don't see what all the fuss is about. That said, I'm sure many are gentlemen and gentle women and I wish them well. As for the LaVallieres of the world, and not all of them play ball, their moment of infamy seldom lasts. The fans forget and go back to cheering on their idols and reading about the antics of the rich and famous. Bad behavior sells and everyone assumes it won't happen to them.

The scene where the five wives draw their Tasers comes from a deep, vague memory of a western where the bad guy walks into the saloon and everyone (man, woman, and child) draws a weapon. I think there might have been a monkey in there as well.

My apologies to Stephen Hawking's family. I know he has passed, but he seemed like the right person for that point in the story. Maybe I should have said Neil deGrasse Tyson?