The Book of Ruth: Coming Fast

I had, and still have, absolutely no moral qualms about having sex with married or otherwise 'committed' women. I do not especially seek them out; I do not refuse them when they approach me. Did they think their 'commitments', their vows, were no longer in effect? Did they want me enough to throw away whatever they had? That was their decision, not mine. I didn't and don't blame myself for unraveling their relationships.

Does that make me an amoral bastard? I don't think so. My morality is strictly grounded on a simple phrase you may have heard: "First, do no harm." I try not to harm others. But I can't stop others from harming themselves and those around them. I cannot run others' lives, only my own. I can't glue broken human fragments into the forms they once held.

Would I feel differently if it was MY relationship unraveling? Just wait and see.

"But life don't clickety-clack down a straight line track;

It comes together and it comes apart."

-Ferron, AIN'T LIFE A BOOK

Okay, let's get back to the story.

Alas, Mrs Shapiro wasn't the only person to wait for me at the door.

I was going to write here about the encounter I had with Ervin, a football jock recently graduated from Fairfax High. He dementedly thought Rachel was "his girl" even though she despised him. He ambushed me on the Shapiro's front porch, beating me, telling me to "leave his girl alone".

I could brag on my martial arts skills. I knocked him down and scragged him. Okay, so once I had his attention, I told him: Security cameras caught him attacking me. The Shapiros would call the cops. Ervin would be arrested, and would be roughly butt-fucked by nasty prisoners when he went to jail. He could avoid that. All he had to do was leave and never return. He left. Problem solved. We all lived happily ever after. Yada yada.

But that incident doesn't really matter to this account. So we'll move on.

--- Introducing Ruth ---

Rachel was sometimes 'helped' at her Fairfax Avenue sales cart by her little sister Ruth. (Yeah, the same Ruth this story is about. The preliminaries are over; we are now officially in Act One of this little comic drama.)

Ruth was just twelve that summer, a tall butterball (call it "baby fat") with her family's genetic face and an acquired bad attitude, toward me anyway.

I putted down Fairfax Blvd in my silver SAAB and pulled up near Rachel's cart. Just a few sidewalk steps brought me to the sisters.

"Hey sis, dipshit is here again, better act innocent," I overheard.

"Don't call him names. He's my boss. And my friend," Rachel defended me.

"Yeah, I know what kind of 'friend' he is. And he's mom's 'friend' too."

"Shut up, punky, you're just jealous. You haven't even grown tits yet."

Ruth glared at her big sister, then at me.

"What's that stink? Smells like stale old dog poop? Oh, it's just dipshit, Randy. Ewwww. I gotta go now, gotta snort some nice fresh smog."

Ruth skateboarded away. A passing bus blew a cloud of diesel smoke on her.

"There goes my sunshine," I joked, and gave Rachel a squeeze. She giggled.

"Don't worry about little Ruthie, she'll get over this in a year or three."

I gave her tasty butt a firm squeeze. "Yeah, right, I should live so long."

Rachel slapped my hand away. "Not on the street, remember?"

"What, I haven't even pulled your dress off and slurped your pussy here! Not yet, anyway."

Rachel looked annoyed. "That probably wouldn't help sales any."

"Yeah, we've gotta keep our eyes on the bottom line. Not on our butts."

Rachel slapped me softly and giggled. "Kiss my ass when I get home, okay?"

"A big wet one is just waiting for you!" I leered at her.

Okay, we'd had our fun. Now for business. We went over her activities since the last check-in: sales, discounts, specials, inventory, shortages and losses (none!), security, all the routine stuff. Yes, all vendors phoned-in reports daily, but I was there to get the "ground truth" and to make sure stocks were adequate.

I gave Rachel a nice hug and drove off. More vendors to check on. Busy busy busy.

-- 1978 -- Thanksgiving

Yes, I was busy all that summer. Yes, we expanded our range, with street vendors in more popular locales, and booths at crowded weekend events and gatherings: street fairs, festivals, busy parks, et cetera.

The day after Thanksgiving, I was back at cousin Doug's Venice apartment block. The pool was heated. The women were scantily clad. Doug and I reclined on loungers, digesting the family turkey feast. Cognac makes an excellent digestif, yes?

Doug peered at me over the edge of his snifter. "Ain't seen you here for a while. Welcome back. So what's been happening with you, kid? How's business and shit?"

"I've told you about Rachel. Yeah, I had fun with Rachel all summer, and her mom Deborah. And some of my vendors: Suzy in Malibu, and Evelyn in Dana Point, and Lola at Olvera Street, and Diane at Pomona's drag strip, and... but you get the idea."

I didn't mention sleeping with my sister and boss Jill most nights, and us with our mother Nina whenever. Gotta stay discreet.

"What? Rachel AND her mother? AND all those other chicks? What are you, kid, some kind of fucking love machine? Not that I didn't teach ya all you know, right?"

"What can I say? I do okay." We knuckle-bumped.

"Then there are the UCLA girls," I flaunted.

Doug groaned. I grinned and continued.

"So all summer, every other day, I was back with Rachel, a little at work and more for fun. But her pissy little sister Ruth was at the street cart nearly every time, and more than willing to dish a load of verbal shit on me before leaving in disgust. What's with little sisters?" I shrugged.

Doug shrugged back. "Yeah, mine are nuts too." As I knew, all too well.

"Jill and I started at UCLA this semester. Hey, it's close, and cheap. We still live at home. She's a junior in an advanced business program. I'm a freshman with a full load for my geography major and business minor."

"Geography? Why geography?" Doug looked puzzled.

"Real reason? It gives me a good excuse to travel everywhere." I sipped my cognac.

"Anyway, Jill still runs her business every day; I'm only in on weekends now. I honcho the fair-festival-park side of it. We promoted a couple vendors to run the street cart network. Which means I no longer see my vendors regularly. My sessions with Rachel (and Deborah) and my other hot girls have tapered off. At least Ruth isn't there to curse me, so there's some small relief."

We lay back and watched the eye candy saunter past us. Damn, are they ALL ex-cheerleaders here? Doug has nothing to complain about.

"So what are your plans now? You and Jill doing any more long business trips?"

"Yeah, over Christmas break, we'll head south again. It'll be a long, fast run. All the way to Guatemala first, for a load of jade, raw and carved. Then just north to Chiapas state for amber. Then back to Taxco for silver and finished jewelry. We won't have a lot of time for touring or playing. Just a quick logistics run, and to check in with the suppliers and artisans."

"Why do you guys drive the whole way? Why not just fly down and ship stuff back?"

"'Cause this stuff is valuable! Too much chance it would be 'lost in transit'. Jade and amber and many kilos of silver, are you shitting me? I won't tell you how, but just be aware, we have ways to make sure everything is okay when we bring stuff back. Security is part of the game."

Doug refilled our snifters. "You guys sure must like taking risks. I'd be nervous, no I'd be scared shitless, crossing borders, hauling treasure, dodging banditos and federales, and drinking the water. Did you two get all the guts in the family?"

"Yeah, Jill has a pair of big brass ones, doesn't she? I'm just along for the ride." I took another sip and looked at Doug.

"Of course, a 'quake or tsunami or meteor strike could wipe you out right here. Or maybe just some sloppy drunk driver. Everything's dangerous. Life is a terminal disease. Nobody gets out alive. I don't have time to be scared, just careful."

We toasted life and returned our eyes to nubile female bodies barely contained in bikinis or less. Ah, I love warm Southern California autumns and winters!

-- 1984 -- Summertime Again

Six years passed. Jill graduated UCLA and started an MBA program across town at USC while still running Thunderbird International (TBI). We still took regular trips south into Latin America, but also east to the Atlantic and north to Canada, as TBI expanded and morphed into a larger network.

I drifted away from the Shapiros. (Rachel moved to Chicago. Deb divorced Alex and ran off to La Jolla with her tennis coach.) I skirted serious relationships with a couple of UCLA girls -- separately, and together -- but we never reached the next stage. Just as well. Prenuptial agreements were not common then. My little head could have led me to disaster.

I graduated UCLA two years after Jill, then spent another two years there doing grad work. I could have finished sooner but Jill had shoved me deep into TBI's affairs. No, I had not expected my passport to list my occupation as 'businessman', but now I are one!

We were nominally co-owners, 65%-35% -- guess who had the smaller share? The ground truth: Jill was boss and I channeled orders. If we had naval ranks, she was captain, and I was executive officer, and gentle hitman.

TBI grew -- our corporate subtitle was Minerals, Metals and Materials -- but we kept our roots, although we had spun-off the retail arm as a subsidiary. I rarely saw our street vendors unless I happened to drive by a sales cart. I mostly interacted with suppliers, distributors, and our tiny staff. Jill manipulated the financial people quite well by herself.

Jill and I still lived at home in Santa Monica with Mom (I mean Nina) and why not? It was roomy, comfortable, convenient, private, all paid for -- and was fully equipped with hot and cold running sex.

We 'kids' still ran and exercised together. Most mornings, when we were both in town, we got up early and jogged down the beach for an hour or more. That was a good time for private chats and wild ideas.

We usually tried to be back when Nina got home from her overnight dispatch shift. We all ate and showered together and made love. Afterward, Nina went to sleep, and Jill and I went to work.

We had an easy commute -- our home office occupied the apartment over our garage. Nice place to run an international operation! We also had a small office near UCLA with a few business machines and an extremely small staff -- just a few sharp business majors wanting hands-on experience and a little money. Yes, we kept our overhead low.

-----

Jill was deal-making in Quebec on this ordinary midsummer midweek day. I got up as dawn crept over the horizon, for a longer-than-usual run, all the way to the Venice Pier and back. I hoped to finish my run before the morning smog got too thick.

I slowed near the pier and ran in place for a minute before heading back. A couple young girls jogged by in the same direction. I ran along in loose formation.

One girl seemed familiar. Tall, slim-but-curvy, aquiline features, long walnut hair flowing out the back of her Dodgers ballcap, great legs emerging from her red running shorts, nice breasts inside her jog bra and thin yellow tee. Pretty hot!

Those legs -- they looked an awful lot like legs I'd had wrapped around me more than once. Whose legs? My memory ran through its internal Identi-Kit and drew a blank.

My black trainer shorts threatened to tent on me. Then she spoke.

"Hey there dipshit, how ya doing?" burbled forth.

I instantly drooped. I knew that voice. Older now, but still recognizable.

"Hi there yourself, Ruthie Shapiro. Killed any dogs lately?"

"I did *NOT* kill that fucking dog! I can't help if it ran out into traffic!"

"Yeah, while you jumped up and down and yelled at it. Good girl!"

"And up yours too, stinky." Her famous tongue was firmly stuck out at me. Her cute Latina companion giggled but said nothing. We jogged on together.

"So tell me, stinky, why did you drop my sister and mom? Weren't they good enough for you? It's not like they didn't fuck you to death."

"What makes you think I ever did Deb, er I mean your mom? And Rachel and I just went off in our own directions. Hard for me to stay with her when I'm in L.A. and she's in fucking Omaha. Hey, it's been six years. She's gone, kaput, sayonara."

"I know you did Mom because I saw you. And you know Rachel wanted to marry you. You broke her heart, dipshit."

"Yeah, I saw her heartbreak that evening I came in and she was doing a nice triple penetration with The Jakester, Wavy Davy and that Emiliano jerk. And Norm and Miguel were waiting their turns. I heard her heartbreak from a block away. Her heart broke for ten minutes at least, from the screams she managed to squeeze out when she didn't have someone's little dick inside her mouth."

The Chicana giggled again. Without breaking her stride, she asked Ruth, "So this is the famous Randy, the guy you've been creaming over since you were twelve? The one you promised would wear your slave tattoo someday? That Randy?"

Ruth's face was already pink with exertion. A little blush should not have been visible. But I saw her countenance darken a bit. What, Ruth gets embarrassed?

"Oh, just shut the fuck up, Katia!" Yes, Ruth was embarrassed.

I said nothing more. I just ran a little faster. The girls matched my pace.

"Are you trying to run away from us, Randy?" Katia asked, only slightly winded..

Ruth said nothing, just glared and stared into the distance.

"I'm not sure Ruth wants my company. I might as well dash off." I sped up.

Ruth ran faster too. "Wait Randy, just a minute." She drew abreast of me.

At least, her fine pointy breasts caught up with me. The rest of her lagged slightly.

I slowed my pace a bit and shortened my stride slightly so her shorter (but still nicely long) legs could match my muscular somewhat-hairy stems swinging along. "Yah?" I asked.

"Randy, I gotta talk to you. More talking than we can do while we're running. Can we come home with you? Are you busy this morning?"

I envisaged Nina arriving home; her munching a quick meal; us showering together and chatting about her work shift; our making love; her sleeping; my keyboarding. Damn, so much business has to be done on these fucking computers now! What ever happened to paper? But I digress.

I mentally tasted a morning with Mom (I mean Nina) and compared it with the potential taste of a possible close encounter with Ruth. And maybe Katia, too. Hmmm, different people, different flavors. I made a quick decision.

"Sure thing girls, come on over, clean up if you want, and get changed, we have spare clothes around."

I thought of shooting for a trifecta: Bring the girls in AFTER I put Nina to bed. Nina, then Ruth, then Katia, yummm... But the timing could get tricky. No, just play it cool. I would certainhly see Nina later.

Ruth ran beside me and only talked roundabout. That was fine with me. Whatever important stuff she had to say could wait. Katia ran beside Ruth. She did not join our quasi-conversation, just giggled occasionally at Ruth's avoiding-the-subject chatter.

"You come running here a lot, Randy?"

"Yeah, most every day. Usually with Jill when she's in town."

"You still tight with your sister then?"

"Well, we live at home; we work out together; we run a company together, that kind of stuff. How's *your* sister anyway?"

"Don't start there, guy," Ruth stonewalled.

"Okay then, how's your mom?" I teased.

Ruth glared at me, then concentrated on the path ahead. I guess she didn't want to discuss women I'd had sex with. Especially Shapiro women. Such as her mom and sis. Katia giggled again.

We reached my house just before Nina was due home from her night-owl work shift. I left her a note on the kitchen table ("I HAVE COMPANY") and bundled the girls off to my rooms.

"Save water? Shower together?" I asked straight-faced. No leering right now.

Katia giggled again. Ruth looked at her, then at me.

"Er, I think no, not right now. You mentioned clothes? You got towels too? Can you wash our sweaty stuff?"

"Yeah, I'll run your jog-togs through the laundry." I waved at my bathroom cabinets. "Tees and shorts and stuff on the left side of the shelves, towels on the right side. Soap and shampoo in the rack. Leave me some hot water and don't poke any holes in the walls, okay?"

"No holes, gotcha. Now get out."

I waited till they passed me their sweat-soaked attire. I sniffed the rich body scents. Ahhh... I ran their clothes to the washer, then walked the hall to my book nook and plopped at my old study desk. I sat and played with my latest little tool, or toy, or whatever it was.

Apple had recently released a compact new computer, the Macintosh, with something called a GUI (graphical user interface). It promised to be easier to use than the common CLI (command-line interpreter) shells we had been using for business.

But we didn't really find the primitive Mac useful as a general business machine. The adage was true; it was "designed by geniuses to be used by idiots." We depended on PCs and Osbornes and their warez, mostly the spreadsheet and database systems.

The Mac hosted some dumb games. Duh. Much better were the useful music and art and publishing programs. Composition and drawing were pretty easy. Jill and I had spent time creating various presentations, and layouts for catalogs and maybe a newsletter, that sort of stuff. Our fancy laser printer stayed busy.

The Mac had a nice feature: I could (and did) plug mikes and video cameras into it. A Betamax VCR turned my nook into a full-featured audio-video studio.

I had set up a basic surveillance network inside and outside the house. The Mac could monitor just about anything -- including bathrooms and bedrooms. I could (and did) watch and listen to Jill and Nina when they brought infrequent dates home. And I could (and did) spy on Ruth and Katia in the shower. A voyeur, who, me?

They undressed before starting the spray.

"Why did you have to go and tell him about the slave tattoo thing? What are you trying to do to me?"

"Like you didn't need your chain yanked? You probably planned all this."

"How the fuck would I know Randy's schedule? It's just dumb luck."

"So you think you're gonna get lucky with him? He *is* quite a hunk of man!"

"Don't remind me. I've tried to forget him for years."

"Sure baby, that's why you talk about him all the time. When you're awake, in your sleep, doesn't matter. When we shared that tent, camping a few months ago? I heard you rubbing yourself and moaning his name at night. I smelled you. You were wet for him! All these years later!"

They turned on the water and stepped into the shower stall. Spray noise turned their talk into watery mush.

I watched their sleek and curvy young bodies, so nubile, so fresh! And I tweaked a noise-reduction filter on the Mac's audio control screen to block the shower noise. Their voices were clear again.

"You're gonna make a move on him, aren't you?"

"I want to. I DON'T want to. He just pisses me off, he's so, so... Randy! Strong and smart and ruthless. I could see him as an executioner. He scares me but I want him."

"So, melt his heart. You gonna flash him your tits or something?"

"That might work. They're pretty much the same tits Mom and Rachel gave him."

"If their tits were so good, why isn't he fucking them right now?"

"I dunno, maybe he found better, and anyway, they're not around here now. But maybe I've got a chance at least."