Life Is Like Shit - Not Chocolate

To be p-e-f-e-c-t-l-y clear, this is just a dry-wit storyline about a guy whose life gets turned around by a mysterious Asian American woman called 'The Fixer' after his gold-digging ex-wife takes him to the cleaners. It is an imbroglio of bar scenes, a gold-digging ex-wife's cheating, payback, criminal intent, arson, near death, and sensual sex; a fine afternoon soap opera event. Amidst it all, like a box of chocolates, it introduces a mystery heroine who cleans up the victim's life by going outside the boundaries of the law to accomplish this off-the-books non-sanctioned mission.

It ain't real. It didn't happen. And I am not here to try and piss you off. So, if the divorce theme might be a bit upsetting, this story isn't for your enjoyment.

However, if you like dry humor, can tolerate obscenities, and enjoy a bit of a twist in a country-type setting, you might like this one! There is adult, consensual sex between a mysterious Asian American "Fixer" and Danny, the protagonist. It's Literotica, after all. It's one of the mandatory ingredients!

You may have heard that classic question: What do you get when you play a country western song backward? This fictional story answers that question, including what happens to his dog, in this regaling tale situated in El Paso, Texas!

El Paso, Texas

The music was thumping out of that old jukebox in the corner, but nobody was dancing to my bucket of quarters. Who does that at 5:30 when the joint is half full or half empty, depending on how you look at it? The music was just some noise to drown out my errant thoughts of suffering and grief. Most guys here are on their way home to a house full of kids, and a flagging, loving woman caught up with rug rat chores at the wind-down of a long day. They just needed a mug of courage to make it all the way home.

Me? Just chilling after a hard day's labor; before starting my second job of the day. No one is waiting for me to come home to kiss or hug. I'm just sitting on my favorite stool covered in house construction sawdust and looking pretty much like a weary old man - 'cept I'm not old; just exhausted.

My best bartender friend, Ray or Roy or Rich, was just wiping up some spilled beer at MY end of the bar. The corner still needed a sign saying, 'Commiserating Corners - Open for Business.' At least that was the one I thought about hanging up there today. This is my corner. My stool. My time of the evening to unwind. Tomorrow, well, there could be a different sign, but just now, this one fits my mood just fine. Everyone here has a spot, even though there's no name tag on it. Like cattle lining up at the evening feed trough for grain -- each of us has our place to suck down some suds before calling it a day. Don't take a man's place at the trough if you're new here -- that just ain't right.

Larry, my personal bartender, yeah, it's Larry! Well, he heard me talking to an empty beer mug; in a deep, serious conversation. The mug and I was discussing about thinking how I needed to see a head doctor. Larry insinuated himself into our private conversation.

"For my two cents worth of advice, kid, people don't need a head shrink. For two hours a day, much of your life can be self-analyzed just by sitting on an ass-polished barstool. A few bucks and a few rounds for a few like-minded guys sitting there with you provide all the diagnosis required. You don't have to pay for some psych doctor to tell you that life is like a bucket of shit."

"All he's going to tell you is, as you get near it, you can start to smell its pungency. Get right up on it, and your nose rebels at the stink of it. But, hey, walk by it after the third day, and the stench is not so bad. You find yourself getting used to it, kid! Hell, three weeks into -your kind of troubles - and you don't even think about it as you walk by."

"Hell, kiddo, you could probably eat your lunch next to it, and it probably won't even bother you!" he snickered as he wiped up the last of the suds.

He slung the beer-soaked rag over his shoulder as he collected the last of my change off the bar counter and said, smiling, "Thanks for the tip! I think you've had enough for today, kid. See you tomorrow!"

I'd made it through another day's work of framing up a new build of another subdivision home and back to my favorite stool at Liquor Dicks when a stranger strolled up into my space asking if the next stool was taken.

"Well, stranger, now that you ask, this other barstool is free. Welcome, and yeah - my life has become like a bucket of shit. It had gone to hell three years into my marriage with Rita."

"Names Jack, Jack Wilson," he breathed out his handle as he sat on the stool next to me.

I looked over, intending to study his face a bit, then looked up, then up some more. He was a really tall guy, even sitting down. He had that chiseled jaw and muscles that had muscles on those first muscles, kind of like that character John Henry that song Johnny Cash used to sing about. Yet, he had a friendly smile -- and for an offer of free beer, I told him my story.

"To be candid, most of our first year was - almost all roses. My cock was like a pleased puppy. Rita stroked it, nuzzled it, and kissed it like a newborn pup. Rita and I cuddled in the morning, mostly starting with spooning her from behind, then making passionate love before we rushed like crazed newlyweds running out the door, racing the clock to get to work. Then home again -- sometimes on the table while dinner got crispy on the stove. It never failed that she would have me rolled up in the sheets at bedtime as we did the naked tango for two while moaning and groaning as we got each other off.

"The second year had some ups and downs. It was like a mixture of wildflowers, dandelions, and crabgrasses. I couldn't pull them out fast enough before they grew back in again. She got restless, fussy, and sex -- well, that kind of cooled on her part, but not that I didn't want to put effort into it, you know?

"By the middle of the third year -- God, that was a real bucket of shit. Especially the day I signed over the house, the car, my bank assets, and my imaginary third nut to her fricken ass!

"My lawyer all but said, 'Might as well bring some axle grease to the table - the judge is gonna make you drop your britches, bend over, and grab your ankles, kid. You know what the grease is for, right? Kid, you ought to be glad y'all didn't have kids. Now, about that mangy ass-licking dog, you love so much ...'"

Now, Mr. Wilson seemed to be a good listener. Not much of a talker, however. Have to admit, then again, too, I seemed to be monopolizing the conversation -- pretty much a soliloquy, you might say. He bought me another beer.

"I had no place to go, found myself crawling home to my momma with my tail between my legs. Momma was the only one I had left that would take me in after the divorce settlement. From the moment I hit her back door, her dialogue would be the same as the one she preached to me before I got married.

"Her words came out like a jukebox pop tune. 'She ain't nothing but a gold-digging bitch! Looking to get rich! I can see it by the way she leads you around. You pussy whipped dipshit! Mark my words, Danny! She's gonna get your money -- honey - and run off the first chance she gets!' she said then and, now, reminding me of it nearly every -- damn -- single day!

"Did I listen the first time? Hell no! Rita was fun, a bit wild, and with titties as big as the headlights on a Cadillac. She could blow all kinds of tunes on my piccolo, ending with, 'Do me, honey! Dick me with that big, big cock of yours!'

"As it turns out, Mamma was right. Rita liked gold - anything with gold - jewelry; even gold-colored shit caught her eye. Six months into our marriage, she knew she needed a fancy new gold Cadillac. She saw it in the dealership window across from the diner where she worked. Real nice one, too.

"'Sugar,' Rita said, 'It matches my long Barbara Streisand locks of hair! You and me are gonna look real classy riding around in that big old gold Cadillac!'

"I took out a loan for it -- cause Rita was right. The first week I got royally treated each night. She sure could hum a lot of tunes that were louder than a bugler! As I said, that lasted about a week and then tapered off as the excitement of showing it off to her girlfriends waned.

"I came home one afternoon, and Rita greeted me at the door in a lovely new devil-red negligee. She was all smiling! I thought, maybe I'd missed her birthday or something. It was something - how she pulled me onto that new leather couch I was making payments on and set to riding my cock. The old spark was back!

"When she had her way with me, she announced, 'I'm buying us a house, sugar!' Rita needed a lovely house now that we were married and all.

"It'll make us look so respectable!" she said, "Can't live in this damn cramped apartment anymore, baby. It ain't right; the neighbors can hear every squeak of our bed. I can't show you - how much I appreciate - what you do for me, babe - with these thin walls!"

"Honey, It's time to move on up!" she cooed into my ear as she got on her knees for me. I was about to stick it to her, doggie style, in the heat of the moment. Right as she said, "Your momma is gonna treat us - you, I mean babe, with more respect when she sees how well we are doing, darling." Her grin showed me she liked that idea as she wiggled her rump and backed herself up against my stiff hammer handle.

"I took out a thirty-year loan for that too. Like the car, my dick got royally treated for a few months as a token of appreciation. I had to work damn hard for that, even taking on a second job and all. It was beginning to wear on me a bit. Of course, she wanted roses, frequent dining out, and fancy clothes to go along with those things.

"I'm proud of you, darling!" she said every time we went for dinner to show off her new clothes!

"In the second year, Rita was generally cranky. She whined, 'I am tired of being pinned down! We never go anywhere anymore. You didn't even take me back to Vegas like you promised for our first anniversary.'

"I didn't exactly remember promising to go back there; that would be a bit hard working two jobs plus most weekends. Then too, her crankiness might have been due to her having back problems. Too hard on her shoulders -- work, that is. She announced that one day out of the blue. She had to give up working! It didn't seem to be something a doctor called for - just something Rita self-diagnosed.

"My momma had the same thing," she told me. I guess it ran in the family.

"Still, her shoulder pains didn't seem to interfere with her jazzercize classes, yoga classes, and late nights out dancing with the girls while I got some rest for my early morning job and the night shift at the auto parts store. Most of what was left from working two jobs that didn't go for the car and house payments bought those fancy things she claimed she needed to go with our new lifestyle.

"Rita, early on, announced, 'Danny, babe, you can't be tearin' up the new car driving to no damn construction sites to frame up houses. Besides,' she said, 'You couldn't expect me to sit home all day and wait for you to get home.' She needed the car to go out and put some spark in her life. Rita couldn't be treated like some stay-at-home blow-up doll stuffed under a mattress, could she? I took weekend side jobs to cover my old '67 Chevy pickup repairs.

"Somewhere, toward the end of year two, my tired ass and under-serviced dick were getting less home care. Rita got really pissy. It seemed she thought I wasn't living up to her standards.

"Danny, sugar, you're just not inventive enough to keep my cunt entertained. I need more excitement in my life, honey!" she gasped out one night after we had sex. Got to say that hurt my pride a bit, but then it was just Rita, after all being pissy.

"That's when she cooed in that giggly voice, 'Honey, let's get adventuresome! How about you tie me up? Hang me upside down from the ceiling, sugar. And do some rough stuff, baby! Please, please, Danny?'

"That, she calculated, would make for some tremendously explicit pictures. I thought that was a bit out there, but what Rita wants - Rita gets. It took a bit of work to get hangers into the ceiling joists. Rita seemed to have some fancy ropes from her macramé classes. Hell, when did she sign up for those? While I hung the ropes, she pulled out a box she'd hidden in the closet and changed into a weird getup. It came with straps and studded belts that wrapped around her titties. She looked like someone from one of those sadomasochistic explicit sex videos. Not like I watch those, Mr. Wilson. Hot, however. I took all the photos she wanted with lots of close-ups of my dick in her face, her cunt, and her posterior side ... until she was content.

"The next afternoon, I didn't get lunch; a police detective from the sex crimes unit drove out to my job site with a process server. Two for one, it turned out. Rita used the photos to get me arrested! Delivered me a restraining order for spousal abuse; to boot, the process server handed me official filing for divorce papers. I couldn't even get in the house to get the rest of my tools. She sold them on some damn website -- like they were just yard tools! Kept my clothes. Kept my dog Humpy, too!

"That's about the time I hired the only lawyer that would take my case. He looked at the pictures of Rita hanging from the ceiling and the statements from Rita's girlfriends, and well, you already know what he said, 'Kid, you're fucked!' That is the gist of it.

"Seems I was pre-destined to work two jobs for the rest of my life to pay for Rita to live in and entertain her new friends at my expense. At least, that seemed to be my life's destiny. The divorce papers said I had to care for her - unless she remarried. That seemed to be my only out.

" 'God,' I prayed every morning I woke up, 'let Rita find a rich fucker today and take away my burdens!'

"The divorce papers, I found out later, didn't say anything about Rita having sleepover guests. I saw him the day after the divorce. I drove by 'my old house' on the way to work. He was standing in the front door, squeezing her bare ass with both hands as he kissed her, wearing a shit-eating grin and one of my leather jackets to boot!"

I watched Jack Wilson taking in my story. Every once in a while, he would nod his head as though he understood my drift. He kept an eye on the front door as though he was waiting for someone to meet him at the bar.

"My local country-western bartender and I see one another most every night. I paid for this stool I'm sittin' on with the change Rita doesn't get."

I looked around the bar to see if anyone else was listening to my conversation. They weren't. Most everybody there had already heard my tale of woe. I found myself a bit choked up to admit it -- to a stranger, no less.

"Mister, it's been a long while since a woman and I have -- spoken, if you know what I mean. I'm kind of like a man who squatted in the woods and got snake bit in the ass - too scared to venture out into the woods and squat again and too scared to touch another woman. I've even had to get reacquainted with Rosey Palm and her five sisters - if you know what I mean."

Jack Wilson pursed his lips and studied my long face for a minute. Then he drawled, "Hang in there, mister, it's always darkest before dawn, you know? Excuse me, Danny, I see my date is here. Nice talking with you, kid. You'll get through it -- trust your momma!"

I watched that big oak tree rise off that stool -- caught a glimpse of a badge pinned to his belt just under his leather jacket. Snickered to myself -- hell, I just told my story to Marshall Wyatt Earp! I watched as he stepped away, taller than I first thought. He was broad at the shoulders and narrow at the hips. His legs looked like tree trunks stuffed into those well-shined cowboy boots. The marshal strolled over to a table where a petite young woman with really long, long hair just sat down with her back to me, facing the doorway. She was doing one of those 'read the room moves' with her head. I thought, 'Lucky bastard, you got someone to hug tonight.'

Life was a bitch ... just like a bucket of shit!

Mamma's sister, Ima, came down with something. I forget what, but she had to drive back to the ranch for two weeks to take care of her. That was like a ray of sunshine from Heaven. The minute she left the house and drove off. Her place seemed to creak and sigh with a profound sense of relief. At least I did. Bless her heart, that incessant harangue about Rita day in and day out was getting so damn old! I just wanted to let it go ... but that guy's hands on Rita's bumper pads kept creeping into my dreams every night.

The second day, after Momma was off to see her sister, I was alone in an empty house. The quietness of it all began to seep into my soul. I left the television off. The silence felt so - damn good. I needed that silence. A feeling of relief seemed to flow through my bones. It felt really good to be alone right about now. Maybe this blessing would give me some self-analysis time. The library books I'd taken out to read about divorce trauma sat on my old bedside table. I started to read. Halfway into it, my eyes began to water; they blurred my vision a bit. I could see myself on most of the pages. As I slowly read about myself on each page, it got wet. Roof leak, I guessed. How else would the moisture get there? Funny, I didn't remember it raining outside.

On the third day, which would have been the next day of quiet, I went to work as usual. We'd completed the dry-in stage of a new home in the subdivision. Damn good thing, too. Darkness was crossing the upper valley area and headed our way. I just threw my tools in the bed of Old Rusty Bucket '67 and sped out onto the blacktop to beat the rains. From the far-off lightning, it looked like a monster storm was crawling across the land. The lightning was spectacular, and I could hear thunder rolling closer now.

I intended to drive straight home from work, skipping the barstool polishing session. However, I did make a pit stop at the icehouse to grab a few things for dinner -- I needed that case of Shiner Bock for sure!

The further I drove, the darker it became. The weather was rapidly changing, not just because the evening was approaching. Ominous dark clouds raced across the sky. Gusty headwinds were buffeting my truck like a bumper car game. Rain was indeed not too far ahead, I surmised. I turned off the main loop around the city and onto the highway juncture leading over to Momma's place. By the time I got to the turnoff, buckets of rain were slamming against Old Rusty '67. Every damn tool in the bed would have to be hauled out and wiped dry. It felt like I was inside a drive-thru car wash!

The windows were getting foggy on the inside. I had one hand on the steering wheel, one wiping the window over it, and my right leg on the gas pedal - pushing it harder than I should have, given the weather and all. I felt like a spinning plate juggler at a three-ring circus, trying to keep all the plates on their poles without dropping one. I was busy wiping the fog - it was just instinct, or was it a premonition that kicked my leg? It tickled the hairs on my neck for sure.