The Sweet Taste

Every one of us has had one. Maybe you still do. It's the dreaded "boss" I'm talking about. You know the guy you might have a beer with. Maybe you can talk about football or baseball, or even hockey. But there are certain things that are off limits. I mean totally off limits. He could buy you a beer and they would still be off limits. Hell, he could buy you a bottle of the good stuff, and they would still be off limits, if you're still sober enough to talk at all.

My name is Archie, as in Bunker, but Jones will have to do. My wife's name is Edith. Now, do you see the connection, and why we get teased a lot by our friends, neighbors, coworkers and the lady that goes from table-to-table selling roses on our night out. Archie and Edith Jones, that's my wife and me. We live in a good-sized city and both of us make good money for the area where we live. It's warm here year-round, only occasionally do we have to break out the electric blanket when a cold front comes through. I think the last time we did that was in .... well, it was a while back. One thing for certain; if the AC goes out, we get it repaired quicker than a dog running from a cat fight.

We're both still very young. We had, at this time only been married a month or two past our fourth anniversary. Edith and I had been together as boyfriend/girlfriend since the first day of summer vacation after our freshman year in High School. She was going to spend the summer with her aunt in Viginia. So, before she left, we decided to make a promise we would be a steady couple when she returned. We sealed that promise by giving the gift of our virginity to each other the night before she left town.

When she returned that autumn, we spent a lot of time hiding from our families while we got to know each other very, very well. I'm talking about knowing someone in the biblical sense.

Graduation came for both of us. We were able to get jobs, the exchanging of rings, and then it was non-stop sex, at least for a while. But, as everyone knows, neither man nor woman can live life on sex alone; no matter how hard they try.

I guess it was inevitable we would fall into a routine. Afterall, we had been together for what felt like a lifetime. It had only been a few years. To young adults like us (we were just kids), a lifetime can be squeezed into a month away from your moms cooking.

We gave each other our virginity, and to be honest, we had never tested the waters of another sexual partner; at least I hadn't. I couldn't speak for Edith. She was my first love, and I was hers. That's the way I felt, but I now find out my perfect life was just a fantasy.

The day the wheels fell off the bus was memorable. My wife, Edith and I had just finished doing the dance. You know the dance. The one where she says I need to lose a couple pounds and I just keep on trucking (so to speak). Well, I was enjoying the feel of her body holding on to me. Since we both work, we didn't always find the time, or the mood to do what we had just finished.

I slipped down her body a bit to lick up that little puddle of sweat that fills the divot between her breasts. That's when I hear the words that fill a man's mind with the urge to commit murder.

The afterglow of that moment went flying out the window when she said, "Do you know what your boss told me today?"

"No, sweety, what did my boss tell you today?" I spoke those words just loud enough for her to hear. Please remember I was busy drinking up the fluids of our love.

She didn't even hesitate. As bold as brass she announced. "He said if I went to bed with him, he'd get you a promotion and a raise."

I sat up so fast I must have scared her because her knee came up like a Saturn Rocket and crushed my gonads. I didn't know what was worse. The fact she said what she said about my boss. Or was it maybe the pain from moving my balls into my throat.

No matter the culprit, there was a lot of screaming, yelling and tears. That's what came out of me in the first three seconds. After that it was me looking up from the floor to the shocked look on my wife's face. I hit my head on the end stand, bounced off the dresser, knocked over a lamp, that hit me right square in the middle of my forehead. I suddenly felt I was being waterboarded with blood running over my face. That's when the pain hit the middle of my back and I think I passed out.

Let's not be stupid about this; I know I passed out. That's the only thing to explain how I woke up with some dude in an angel costume shining a bright light in my eyes. There was a lot of excitement with someone yelling, "he's coming to."

More angels showed up, more bright lights, and I was convinced. I had died and gone to heaven, and all these angels were throwing me a party for making the cut. It was then I realized it was tee-oh, to, and not tee-oh-oh, too. One of those meant I was alive, and the other meant I was in heaven.

The announcement of my wife's proposal from my boss was still bouncing off the walls of my brain when my mind started to come back into focus. There were tubes coming out of my body like I was the center of the Universe. The first actual words I could comprehend were... "calm down".

There she was. When this angel entered the room, it was like the parting of the Red Sea. Everyone stepped aside as she strutted her superiority. She had plugs in her ears and she kept talking and giving orders right and left. She held my hands, checked my beautiful blues, squeezed my fingers. She pulled back the blankets and I could feel her gentle and almost exciting touch on my thigh. She moved to the bottom of my bed and gave me more orders, and I obeyed every request to the fullest.

Now that I knew these weren't angels at all, but a bunch of nurses and a lot of doctor want-a-bees, I was able to relax. Little by little they began to remove the wiring that was keeping me from moving too much. Someone held up a needle and a second or two later I was back in dream land. I wasn't really dreaming. I was back in that black hole... but it was a very soft hole, and one I kind of enjoyed.

When I regained consciousness this time, I was watching television. The Angels were in and out of my world. But according to the TV I had been a butterfly for about two days when I asked about my wife. (You know, the butterfly coming out of his or her cocoon). In a very professional way, they said she had been notified.

What's going on here. I have been watching the cartoon channel on TV for the last two days and still no wife. In fact, they took that clicker thing away from me so all I could watch was what they, the group of angels that were now morphing into devils, wanted me to watch.

I mean let's face it, I was getting no answers to my questions. My wife was A-W-O-L. I still had a tube in my weewee (that's what my mom called it). There was a tube collecting the most fowl smelling stuff any person could imagine; and it all was coming out of me...Whew!

But then there was my perfect bright and shining truth. She came in two or three times a day saying she "just wanted to check on you and see how you were getting along." If she was there, I was getting along just fine. She would look at my chart on a tiny computer, snap her fingers, and all the angels came back into the room to care for me. So, I looked forward to when she blessed me with her presence.

On day three after I broke free of my cocoon, there was a rumbling in the hall outside my room. The door pushed open to reveal my wife, dressed to the nines, strutting her way into my confined space.

"Oh, Archie, Archie, Archie! Are you all right darling?" She crossed the room to start planting kisses all over my face. The sad part, none of those kisses would end up growing. They were doomed to die in the circle of thick red lipstick that I immediately began rubbing off with a tissue.

What does that phrase mean? "Dressed to the nines." I guess when I was in the living world, people would say I was dressed to the twos...maybe the threes, but never the nines.

When I got my wife to calm down a little, I looked to see my boss standing in the doorway.

"What the fuck is he doing here?"

"Oh, don't worry darling, Rusty brought me right over to the hospital when I told him about you waking up from your coma."

"Why would you tell my Boss about me waking up from a coma, when he was the one that put me in the coma to start with." I don't know what expression I had on my face, but it wasn't pleasant. "I've been awake for three days. Where in the hell have you been?"

"Oh honey, you have been out so long."

Now that brings up an excellent question. How long was I in my cocoon? The person with the answer, just walked in the room.... My angel was coming for her regular visit.

As I live and breathe, Rusty, the most hated man in my life at the time, was salivating over the ass of my doctor.

That alone would get me out of this bed to kick his ass. But, for some reason I couldn't move. I could only guess the tube coming out of my weewee and the bag filling up with the discharge that usually comes out of my ass, had something to do with the reason.

Rusty was one lucky S-O-B. At least he was lucky on this day at this time. But the time would come... I promised myself... the time would come.

A couple alarms went off, and my Angel of a doctor started clearing the room of the infestations around my bed. Then after she had finished her routine inspection, she allowed my wife to come back in. I told her at the time, if Rusty, the sonofabitch, came back in, there would be hell to pay.

That's when I was told I had been in a coma for over three months. My Angel had told me they had more pictures of my brain and spine than they had patients in the hospital. She told me they found nothing wrong in the pictures, but I had some serious blood loss at the time of the incident. There was a fear of brain damage but there was no damage they could find at the time. I guess I didn't have a brain to start with, or the one I had was too tough to be damaged. Now that made no sense; after all, I was in a coma for three months. That's when they told me they had induced the coma to protect me from any unseen damage. With the word coming from my Angel, it sounded acceptable to me and I calmed down a bit from the trauma of discovering my wife was spending her free time with my boss, Rusty, the snake.

My wife hung around for an hour or two. It was time for a shot to keep me calm and to rest for the remainder of the day till mealtime. That shot turned into my freedom. I woke up a few hours later and she was gone.

The next day I was in surgery to get my butt hooked back up, and the nurse removed the tube from my weewee. She gave me a choice of slow and steady, or quick to get it over with in a hurry. I decided on slow and easy. That was when her arm jerked, and my eyes watered and I began chanting the mantra, "Oh, shit!" I was getting some good drugs, but they weren't that good.

Later, when I was loaded back into my bed, and the bleeding stopped (I think), my wife was sitting next to the bed. My lunch came while I was out of the room, but she ate it. So, being the fresh new butterfly, I was able to con a couple nurses into calling the cafeteria for something special. I got soft food and gelatin. I would have killed for a pizza, but I knew why they did it and I was going to have to accept it or starve.

You know what comes next. The dreaded, "Rehab" was next. For some strange reason I had to relearn some of the stuff I was doing all my life. There was learning to walk again. "Wait a damn minute here.... I know how to walk.... You just wait till get up off the floor, and I'll show you how people to walk."

Fortunately, it didn't take all that long to get the left and the right figured out. Feeding myself with a bib on and my wife standing there fidgeting like she was missing something more important going on in the world.

"Just go, will you... I think I got this." I was growing very impatient with my wife. She didn't hesitate. If I knew it was going to be that easy, I would have kicked her out earlier.

Finally, the day arrived for me to get my freedom. Glory hallelujah I was going home. When that nurse wheeled me out to the front of that building, I was so happy. Little did I know it wasn't going to last. I knew I wasn't going to drive (yet), but I thought my wife would have a little respect for me.

When "they" closed the rear door, and I settled in, I looked up at the front seat and guess who was driving? Oh, come on... it wasn't my wife. But the guy that put me in this place to start with...Yep, it was good-ole-boy, Rusty, my boss.

When I saw the back of his head, I almost vomited right there in the backseat of my car. Well, it was my wife's car... but I make the payments. Doesn't that give me the right to claim it?

I guess it was my own stupid fault. All the time in the hospital or in rehab, I didn't ask why Rusty was even around. Rusty visited me in the hospital, but I guess I would do that too if one of my employees or friends were injured. Sure, that makes sense... doesn't it?

Edith could tell I wasn't in the mood for visitors, so she sent Rusty on his way. I had my instructions from my Angel, the classy, very sexy looking female Doctor from the hospital.

I know it sounds crazy, but when I think about her, I feel better. Maybe it's that when she leaned over to check my eyes or check my reactions by probing parts of my body, I felt a little tingle. I was kind of going to miss our flirtatious banter. Oh, well, the view down the front of her scrubs was, by any account, a stimulating view.

It was a little odd stepping into my bedroom for the first time since the incident. I was tired, so I welcomed the feeling of non-hospital sheets, and the absence of that aroma that lets you know you're not in heaven. Unfortunately, it had been so long away from my bed I even forgot what it was supposed to smell like. "Strange," I thought. "It's not that stuff my wife puts in the drier to give everything that fresh as a daisy smell.... Oh well, I'm tired.... I need to rest."

When my energy had been restored by a short nap, I walked into the kitchen, following the tasty odor of a promised home-cooked meal. "What the hell is this?" I thought, looking at the two dirty coffee cups in the sink and two plates with the remnants of eggs and hashbrowns. These were accompanied by two sets of unwashed utensils.

"Who puts ketchup on their eggs like I do?" I questioned myself. After a second or two of further investigation, I knew it wasn't my wife; she doesn't put ketchup on anything.

When she entered the kitchen, I was sitting at the table. I don't think I was doubting her loyalty in an obvious way. But I'll tell you one thing, it didn't look like she was the only one to be sitting at 'my' dinner table in the last three months.

She leaned over and gave my balding head a kiss as she walked past. Yes, there was a spot at the back of my head that is a little less covered by hair.

"Do you think we should talk about the elephant in the room?" I asked.

She plastered a look on her face that looked like it came out of a Cracker-Jacks box. "What are you talking about dear?"

"Don't give me that smug look and then wonder what I'm talking about. You know damn well what I'm talking about. Hell, woman I don't see that man as much at work, let alone in the hospital."

Taken by surprise, she immediately fell back into her standard defense. "I just don't know what you're referring to, Archie."

"I'm referring to Rusty, the man that offered to give me a raise in pay if you would go to bed with him... That guy... remember him?" Honest to everything holy.... this woman acted like I had been living on another planet for the last, however long it was.

"Archie, honey I would never do anything like that. You know I just love you and only you." She reached across the table and rested her hand on mine.

"Now I remember...." Things were beginning to clear a little.

"Remember what honey?" she asked, seemingly begging me to forget the question.

"I remember that smell on my pillow when I was resting this afternoon." I paused and looked around the room like a lightbulb had just gone off in my head. "It's the same after-shave Rusty swims in after a shower. It's so strong, his office recks of it at work."

She feigned a laugh and said... "Those sheets are fresh, I just put them on last night."

"That's exactly what I mean. Rusty slept in my bed last night, making love to my woman, taking advantage of my absence." Suddenly I was standing. I was furious! I was screaming! And with my blood about to boil out of my body; I felt faint.

Slowly and as calmly as I could, I sat down. My eyes were boring holes through my wife. "I don't need to listen to some bullshit story about how he helped change the sheets. Or, how he was painting the ceiling, or he was helping you test out the mattress to see if this one was firm enough. I need to know what the hell is going on."

Edith began crying. She put her face in her hands and began repeating over and over the phrase.... "Forgive me.... please forgive me."

I had to wait a moment or two to let my mind catch up with my body. When it did, my thoughts were all over the place. It was hard to make any sense of what I had just heard. The constant crying and begging for forgiveness. What was this story going to be about? (You've probably asked yourself that same question).

Finally, I got hold of myself and the first thing I did was try to calm Edith down to where I could at least understand a single word she was trying to say. She was crying and trying to talk at the same time, and it was just a string of words that didn't mean anything. Even if a person tied everything together, they would make a computer programmer scratch his head. So, I had to wait till she calmed down enough to figure out what she was trying to say.

"I ... got ... fired ... from ... my ... job...." She was finally able to blurt out between sobs.

"Okay, you got fired... When did that happen?" I asked.

"The week before our little accident."

There went the blood pressure again. "You got fired and you didn't feel the need to tell me?"

"I came down to see you at the plant and Rusty was there...."

"You told my boss you got fired from your job.... before you told me?" There went another ten points on the BP.

"Well, he was so understanding, and all..."

"Yeah, he understood his way right into my bed." I was now close to passing out from the pressure on my chest.

"But when you went into the hospital, he kept you on the payroll, and gave you a promotion to boot."

"Jesus H Cristo woman," I practically was screaming now. "So, you've been giving out with the goodies ever since I went into the Hospital?"

"Well," she paused. "Actually ... it was a few days before we had our little mishap."

"You mean you were already sleeping with him, before you told me about his proposal." My entire body was about to explode from anger. "I was getting sloppy seconds. And it was with my boss... the biggest asshole this side of the moon." I paused just long enough to catch my breath. "Well, I have news for you, and for him and for the whole fuckin' world... You can all just kiss my ass."

I think, and I'm not certain, but I think that's where I passed out. The next thing I remember was a sexy little gal looking back at me through the plastic face mask I was wearing to help me breathe. There was a loud siren sounding that seemed very close. And for some reason, my wife was holding my hand. I mean why would she be holding my hand when I wanted to knock her on her ass?

I checked out fine at the hospital. They were going to keep me overnight to make certain I didn't do any damage. That was fine with me. I just might get to see my special angel again.