The Night I Drank

"Bulls are colorblind" Kate informed me. "It's not the colour of the cape, it's the movement,. But I'm interrupting you. You were saying my naked daughter was in the room with you and..."

"And I moved to the side of the bed away from her to give her room. I held the sheets open. She jumped in with me and slipped off my boxer shorts. Again, I never even thought of stopping or telling her no. Even though we were in the house with you and Neil in the other room. I just assumed you were asleep and that as long as Annie and I were quiet, we'd be OK. So we started making out. My hands were roaming all over her body. There were no clothes at all on her or me, for once. It was great. It felt wonderful.

Another sip of scotch preceded my next words. "Then it was almost a replay of what had happened in the train when she straddled me. She threw a leg over my crotch, took my hard-on in her hand and started lowering herself down on it. I asked her in a whisper if she was sure and she told me she was. She said this was what she wanted. She took her time lowering herself, getting used to me inside her. I just put my hands on her hips and let her go at her own pace. I'm not sure who was more nervous, her or me. But eventually she bottomed out and I was all the way inside her. Then she started moving up and down a little and I started giving little thrusts into her. I asked her if she was OK and she told me that she was and that it felt good. I told her I loved her and she told me she loved me too. And we kept going like that."

"You didn't use a condom" Kate stated.

"No" I confirmed. "I knew Annie was a virgin so there wasn't much chance of any diseases. I'd gone in for tests after my last girlfriend so I knew I was clean. And she had talked about being on the pill with me long before we ever started even kissing. We tell each other anything and everything. I'd even caught myself telling her some slightly dirty stories of what I'd done with my girlfriends before she and I became involved. It's just that kind of relationship with us where we tell each other pretty much any ol' stuff. So that night, I didn't need to ask her if this was OK. We both wanted to take our relationship to the next level and so we did."

"You mean you wanted to take your sex life to the next level, and so you did" Kate postulated

"Well, I can't deny that" I admitted. "But finally consummating our relationship, it did change things. I think... Wait a second. I'm getting ahead of myself. Let me get back to that night. So she rode me in the cowboy position and eventually we both came. Her first, and me right behind her. I've gotten good at telling when she's close and letting myself go so that we climax close together. And that night was no exception. So afterwards, she collapsed on my chest and eventually I popped out of her and we said some sweet things to each other. She said she wished she could stay all night but I told her she had to go back to her room. I was a little sad to see her go, to be honest. And I think she was sad too. Because after that..."

"Wait a second" Kate ordered. "I'm starting to remember something else about that night. Or the day after, actually. I woke up and went to the basement and you were there with the sheets in the washer. You told me you'd had an accident in bed the night before and wanted to clean up before I found out. And you were really embarrassed. I thought you were cleaning up pee or shit maybe, but it wasn't that at all. It was blood wasn't it? Annie had bled on the sheets and you were washing them up before I could see it."

"Yeah, I'm afraid you're right" I admitted. "I'd also turned over the mattress because a little stain had soaked through the sheets. I guess you never noticed that. And Annie told me she kept to herself that weekend 'cause she was still bleeding a little for awhile. She stopped by the time we got together again on Monday on the train though."

"You son of a bitch!" Kate exclaimed more in admiration than anger, luckily for me. "You had me completely fooled. If you'd been on the witness stand in a trial, I would have totally missed it. Oh, I knew you were embarrassed about something, but like I said, I thought you peed yourself. I did think it was a little strange, as people generally only do that when they drink too much or something, and you never did. Until tonight. Tonight, you might want to go to bed wearing diapers. Assuming I don't kill you first, of course."

I asked myself if she was joking or not. The comment seemed rather lighthearted, but she was still aiming the gun at me. And after all, I had just admitted to taking her daughter's virginity. In Kate's own home no less.

As I contemplated this, Kate pulled my attention back to my story by stating "So you said after that things changed between you, and not just in a sexual way. Tell me what you mean by that."

"Give me a sec" I requested as I put my thoughts in order. As I did so, Kate took another sip of her drink, realized it was now half empty and then topped it off. Without any comment, she also refilled my glass. The ice cubes were now half melted so there was more scotch in my glass than there had ever been.

"It's something that was building for awhile, i think" I told her. "After we crossed that threshold, it was like... Like we'd reached the summit. Like there was nowhere else to go. I mean, sure, there was some other things we could try that we hadn't yet. Anal sex or bondage or shit like that. But I was never interested in that stuff. It was kind of like, this was the end of our sexual journey. Not in the sense that we'd never sleep together again. 'Cause we did, on the train. But that there was nothing new to do after that. After that, whatever we did was because we loved each other, not because we wanted to see what this new thing was like. Fuck, am I making any sense here? I don't think I'm getting my point across."

"No no" Kate assured me "I understand what you're saying. Neil and I figured out what we liked and what worked for us a long time ago. There hasn't been a whole lot of new things in our sex life since then. But there doesn't need to be. We love each other, we love our sex together, and that's fine. You're saying you and Annie hit that point, right?"

"Exactly, yes" I concured. "I don't know that there had been any pressure for us to hit the point we hit. I know I never wanted to pressure Annie into doing something she wasn't ready for. But after that, we just kind of settled into some very comfortable sex together." I paused as once again, what i just said to my lover's mother dawned on me. My lover's mother with a pistol trained on me. "And after that, we actually started doing it less. Because we both realized that all the sex was cutting into our time together."

I took another drink of scotch and continued. "We didn't fall in love by kissing each other or buy having sex with one another. We fell in love by talking and just enjoying being together. And all this fooling around was stopping us from talking as much as we used to. Now, I'm not saying we stopped making love, 'cause we didn't. But we gradually started doing it less. By the time my birthday rolled around two months ago, we weren't even doing it every day on the train anymore. Oh, we'd feel each other up and kiss and such. But no, by then we were back to talking more often than not on the trip."

"Did you stop paying off the conductor?" Kate asked me.

"No" I admitted. "The son of a bitch's getting rich off me. Whether we had all our clothes on or not, I still wanted the privacy. But lately, we've spent a lot of our time together trying to figure out a future for us instead of fooling around and not thinking of the consequences."

"

Well that brings up an interesting point" Kate pointed out. "What, exactly, kind of future do you see for yourself and Annie?"

The question focused my mind past the haze all the alcohol had created. "I don't know" I conceded. "Neither does Annie. We're both starting to get scared about it. We don't wanna be apart, but at the same time, we can't be together right now. It's gotten too hard to hide how we feel about each other the last little while. Every time I come over for movie night and she and I cuddle up, i don't enjoy it anymore. Having to hide how I feel. It's the same with her. It's also why we decided she can't come work for me this summer. Eight hours of being in the same building, even if we were separated. We'd slip up, somebody would figure out that something was going on between us and then the office would just explode with gossip."

I paused and took yet another sip of scotch. By this point, I couldn't taste it anymore. I told Kate "Now, you know. You haven't shot me yet, so I guess there's a chance you're OK with it. Or might be OK with it in the future, maybe. Actually, can I ask you now how you figured it out?"

"A mother's intuition" Kate said as she took a sip from her own drink. "Annie always seemed tense when the subject of dating or boys came up. Always feeling like she wasn't pretty enough or good enough for that stuff. She was even talking about getting a boob job last summer, pestering me and Neal about it. Actually, more me because Neil was embarrassed by the discussion. But then that tapered off in the fall. If Neil or I brought up the topic of dating, she stopped being uptight about it. She'd just shrug and say something like "Maybe someday". I started wondering if she had a boy she was secretly seeing. She normally does her own laundry, but when I did a load for her during the holidays, I found some thongs in her clothes. You don't wear those unless you want someone to see you in them. A gift from you?"

"For me" I corrected her. "Annie bought those herself as a holiday surprise for me."

"I see" Kate said with a nod. "And then there's the subject of you. Lately, she hasn't been talking about you. For years it was "Stanley this" and "Stanley that" and then it's been tapering off more and more lately. I didn't put two and two together for a long time. I thought she had a boyfriend she was hiding from us while she'd outgrown her crush on you. But then tonight, I suddenly realized she wasn't talking about you on purpose. And that she had no time to have a boy on the side. If she had someone, it could only be you and she was covering it up."

"Well, bravo counselor" I congratulated her. "You made a hypothesis and it turned out right." Considering how drunk I was by this point, it's a bloody miracle I was able to enunciate the word "hypothesis" correctly. At least, I think I did. Honestly, my memory of this conversation can get a little fuzzy sometimes.

"Just figured it out tonight..." I said, articulating my thoughts as they entered my mind. "You haven't told Neal yet, have you?" It wasn't really phrased as a question as I was pretty sure of the answer. Drunk or not, I still had some faculties left.

"No I haven't" she confirmed. "And with his mother about to pass on, I don't think I'll share this with him for a little while. But you know, he's going to find out eventually, unless you plan on breaking it off with Annie before that happens."

"I can't Kate" I declared. "I can't do that. I don't wanna do that to her. I don't wanna break her heart. And even if I could, which i can't, I don't wanna break my own heart either. It took me a long time to find love Kate. A long, long time. I want Annie to be part of my life. A big part of my life. I want her to be my wife Kate. I haven't asked her, of course. We'd have to be in a place where everybody knew about us before I'd feel comfortable doing that. And that's the problem now. I'm tired of loving your daughter in secret. I'm tired of having to go behind everyone's back. I don't wanna be ashamed of this anymore. I know it's unusual. Borderline scandalous even. But I don't care."

"So what'll you do?" asked Kate.

"I don't know Kate" I confessed. "I just know this. You know now. You know, and you're gonna have to be the first one to decide if you can accept this or not. And if you can't, if you've listened to everything I've said and you don't want me to be with Annie, well then..."

I took a deep breath and one final sip of the scotch. Not to steady my nerves this time, but to bolster my courage.

"...well then you're just gonna have to pull that trigger. I don't wanna live without having you and Neil and Annie in my family. Yes, all three of you. I want Annie to be my wife, no, i NEED Annie to be my wife. But I also need you to accept this. I need you to be OK with this and to accept me as your daughters husband. As your son-in-law, now that I think of it. I don't wanna take Annie away from you, and I never will. Our houses are 10 minutes away from each other and I never want that to change. I never want you to feel like you can't come over or you can't have me over. I want the rest of the world to accept my love for Annie too, but you and Neil are the most important ones. You're the ones whose acceptance I can't live without."

Silence descended on the room. After a tense minute or so, Kate broke it with "And if I can't accept it? Or if Neil can't?"

"Then you'll have to shoot me" I calmly told her. "I don't see any other way out of this. I can't live without Annie. Not anymore."

Another moment of silence settled between us. I stared at Kate's face, trying to discern what she was thinking. Her brow was furrowed. Beyond that, I couldn't notice anything else about her. There was no trembling in her lips or her hand or anything. She wasn't being indecisive. She was formulating some kind of response to my ultimatum. And then her features changed. Her face lost any expression at all. She took a breath and told me "I'm sorry I have to do this then."

I knew what she was going to do so I told her "I forgive you."

For the first time since she'd sat down on my couch, Kate's right arm, the one with the pistol in it, rose from the armrest. The Beretta was now aimed dead centre at my heart. She held it steady as she and I both prepared ourselves for what would come next. The seconds seemed to stretch into an eternity. I waited for my life to flash in front of my eyes. They say it does that right before you die.

Except it didn't. All I saw was.Kate changing the angle of her hand so that the pistol was now aimed away from me as her thumb flicked the safety catch back on. With her other hand, she opened her purse and then dropped the gun back into it.

All I could do was sit there and blink in disbelief. After all this time, I was delivered from the mortal peril I'd been in.

"I had to know" she explained. "When you said you'd rather I shoot you then live without Annie, I had to be sure you meant it. And you did. You really love her that much. I gotta tell you Stanley, I'm really impressed. And happy for my daughter. Oh fuck it, I'm happy for me too. You're gonna make a great son-in-law. But not yet. We've still got a ways to go before we can get there."

I tried to articulate my gratitude to her, but I was too overcome with emotion. And also plastered. I was really, really plastered at that point. I tried to get up to give her a hug but as soon as my ass left the easy chair, the room picked that exact moment to start shifting. I lost my balance and fell right back down onto the chair

'Easy there kiddo" Kate told me with equal parts amusement and concern in her voice. "I think you're better off not trying to walk around for a while. You hid your relationship with Annie from me and this is my revenge on you. You're gonna be messed up for the rest of the night and tomorrow you're going to be hungover like a motherfucker. Ann I'm going to call you to make sure you're suffering to my satisfaction. But once you're past that, you and I are going to be OK again. And don't worry. I'll talk to Neil. Not right away, but I'm going to make him understand how you and Annie feel about each other. And how he'll have to accept it. It won't be easy. He still sees her as his little girl. But I'm going to soften him up, and then you're going to talk to him man-to-man and ask his permission to court his daughter. It's a little old-fashioned, but he's just that kind of guy."

"Yes" I realized. "That's the way to do things. Except I won't mention the sex. That's a bad idea."

"Yes, that's probably a bad idea" Kate agreed with a chuckle.

"But why did you need to know so much about it?" I asked her, summoning my last reserves of clear-headed thought to do so. "Did it really show that I loved her more when I talked about what we've been doing on that train?"

"No" Kate admitted. "That was because, well... I guess because Annie is her mother's daughter. Because Annie fell in love with an older man and so did I, once upon a time. I was pretty much the same age as Annie when it happened too. Of course I was in college then, not high school. But I fell in love with one of my teachers. Except that in college, we call them professors."

"Really?" I asked. "Not about the professors thing, that makes sense. No, the falling in love part. I thought you and Neal said that you'd met in college. But he's the same age as you, more or less."

"A couple of months younger, actually" Kate clarified. "But we met late in my time at college. Before that, I was with Professor Brian. Not openly of course. A professor sleeping with one of his students would have caused a scandal and gotten him fired. So it was all done in secret, just like with you and Annie. And it was just as complicated. Not because I knew his parents or he knew mine. Because of his wife."

"Ah" I said.

"Ah indeed" she agreed. "He was married and he was still in love with his wife. And she seemed like a nice lady. I met her a few times and as much as I wanted to hate her, I just couldn't bring myself to. I loved him and I didn't want to hurt her. Meanwhile, he loved the two of us and didn't want to hurt either one. Of course it all ended in tears. But it took a good long while to get there."

"What happened?" I asked her.

"Nothing" she answered. "That was the problem. We carried on our affair for a year and a half. He didn't want to leave his wife and I wasn't asking him to. He didn't want to break up with me and I wasn't asking him to do that either. At some point, i realized it couldn't go on. He wasn't going to do anything about it so I was the one who walked away. Didn't feel too good about it, but it had to be done. But I won't lie. I'm glad I had the affair with him. I learned things about myself. As to why I needed to know about your sex life with Annie, it was to see if she was learning what I learned. A man with some experience can introduce a younger woman to sex far better then a boy her age who has no idea what he's doing."

"Oh" I said. "I think I understand now."

She continued with "I wasn't a virgin when I started seeing Brian the way Annie was when she started seducing you. Or at least, that's how you seem to describe it. But all kidding aside, I'd had a few experiences with boys before college and they weren't that great. Being with Brian, well, it really put me on the right track. Made me realize how good it can be. He encouraged me to try different things and find what I was comfortable with. That's why, after I was alone again and then I met Neil, I had a good idea of what I wanted from him in bed and he was more than happy to oblige. He wasn't quite as experienced as I was, or as comfortable with sex at first. But he was more than happy to learn and get to where I was. And since he has, we've been crazy happy together."

"Good for you" I said. "And at the risk of you pulling that gun on me again, I guess it's pretty damn good for Neil to. So, speaking of Neil, how do you think he's gonna take all of this?

"Not so great at first" Kate admitted. "That's why you're not gonna tell him anything until I have a chance to work on him. Get him used to the idea gradually. Let him accept the fact that you and Annie are in love and want to date each other. And then, after a while, we'll open it up so that some other people know and can get used to the idea too. After that, you'll prove to Neil that you're serious about Annie by going to buy an engagement ring."