Zeb and Frances Mercer

"I'll take my chances," he said, laughing. That was the signal for his nine hundred pounds of assistance to assist him in putting me in the black van—Jesus, what a cliché! These guys watched too many movies.

At the party I wasn't tied down, nor was I immediately accosted by her highness. I looked to see if her dad was handy. He wasn't. I was trapped, as one might say, in a gilded cage filled with high school A-listers and assorted invited outsiders. The music was loud and not to my baroque tastes. The food was a cholesterol loaded feast, and I toyed with the idea of maybe giving my heart something to complain about besides my dream girl's lack of attention. At any rate I declined to commit any gastronomic crimes and I just lolled around. The looks I got from a number of different guests were uniformly smirks. Evidently everybody knew I'd been shanghaied and probably the reason for it. I was pissed.

Somebody handed me an open beer bottle. I dropped it on the floor. It broke. I got looks for that, but nobody said anything. Well they didn't until she tapped me on the shoulder.

"Kinda juvenile of you wasn't it," she said, indicating the broken beer bottle and the now spreading mess.

"I don't want to be here, and I don't want anything from you. Nothing. Now, can I leave or are you going to sic your SWAT team on me."

"Zeb, look, I am so sorry for my thoughtless actions. I have had some sleepless nights because of them. I'd just like a chance to talk to you for a few minutes. And, no, if you really don't want to talk to me, you will not be forced to stay. Oh, and I'm sorry for today's theatrics, but I couldn't think of any other way to get you to sit down with me," she said.

"You still can't. Have a nice life," I said, and I started to walk out. I was sure that now she'd leave me alone. She detained me by very gently taking hold of my wrist.

"Zeb, please?"

"Look, Frances Parker, miss all everything. I know you're Trey's girlfriend. I know you don't like me. And I know, or think I know, that you feel a little bit sorry for fucking me over. But I'll live. Okay?" I said.

"Zeb, yes, I'm Trey's girl. But, it is totally untrue that I don't like you. I do like you—as a friend. And, I am more than sorry for what I did to you."

"Goodbye, okay?" I said. She dropped her hold on my wrist, and I walked out not even bothering to look back.

I walked the six miles home, and when I got there, my dad had a fit.

"Son, where have you been? You just graduated, and you disappear? Without so much as a word?" he said.

"Sorry, dad, I was shanghaied by some classmates, and I was just now able to get free," I said. Well, it was the truth. The fact that I knew for a fact that he would not believe me was, to me, irrelevant."

******

As valedictorian and having garnered a host of other academic honors in my high school career, I was awarded a full ride to Stanford, with Stanford Law as my ultimate goal. Yes, Law. I came late to the decision to make the legal profession my profession. By the end of my junior year, I was already accepted as one of the future big guns in that major on campus; well one of the potential big guns anyway; I still had my undergrad Philosophy major to complete. Anyway, that was the good news; and it was good news.

The bad news, as I saw it, was that both Trey and Frances were also going to be going there. Trey on a football scholarship; and Frances, as I found out later, on a prayer scholarship. Prayer scholarship you ask? Well, she was by no means qualified to be in a competitive school like Stanford, but her daddy's one million dollar donation got her in—provisionally. I presumed he'd be getting a hellacious tax write off for his largesse as well. Donation or not, Frances still had to take—and pray—that she pass all of her required classes: she was an Art History major; and again, as I found out later, she was assigned, up front, to mandatory tutoring in some of the harder Gen-Ed classes. Well, life is hard and then we die.

******

I did see the dynamic duo on occasion, but Stanford is actually a small city; it was pretty easy to avoid them. Plus, the Law majors didn't mix much with Art History types, and almost never with the jocks. I never really knew how good Trey was in school; he graduated with me, but I had little or no contact with the man, and no desire to investigate his intellectual skill level. At any rate, he sure as hell wasn't in the Law program.

A request by my junior advisor in my third year of undergrad put me in a situation that I could not have foreseen nor really done much about. I had a full ride, but I also had a few obligations to keep it. One of them was to tutor the intellectually less fortunate inmates. You had to know this was coming, right? But genius or not, I didn't see it coming until I was face to face with her.

"You've got to be kidding," I said. I think my frustration was showing.

"Zeb, I didn't know it was you they assigned me to until just now," she said.

"Like I'm supposed to believe that," I said. "Well, you're here. So, tell me, Frances Parker, what is it about Linguistics that's a mystery to you?" I said.

"Zeb, look, cut the crap, okay. If you can't at least be civil, then I don't want you to tutor me. I'll just tell my advisor that we can't get along and to find me somebody else.

"Yes, I was a shit in high school, but you holding a grudge this long has got to be some kind of record. Get over it, Zeb, it really wasn't that big a deal. So I stood you up. So, shoot me in the ass. Enough already!" I looked at her and deflated.

"Okay, you're right. Forget I said anything. If you need help, I'll do my job, and I guarantee you'll pass. I'll need your availability schedule, so I can set up the times." I scribbled my email on a post it I pulled from my shirt pocket and handed it to her—well hell, I was still a nerd. "Figure it out, your availability, and email it to me. And send me your cell along with it. I'll get back to you as soon as you do."

"Okay. Will do," she said. "And, Zeb, I really am sorry about everything." I nodded and she was gone.

And that was the start of it. At some point along the way; she caught Trey with another coed and their planned happily ever after fizzled.

I tutored her. She ended up with a 2.9GPA, not too shabby, and became a teacher. Two years into her teaching career, I finished Law school with an LL.D. And, six months after that we were married. Talk about unbelievable turns of events. Oh yeah, and we had dated a bunch before that happy day. But, and you had to know it; I was a virgin on our wedding night. Just didn't want to leave anything out.

******

Yeah, we made up during the tutorial thing, and being the gold plated, pussywhipped, wishful thinker that I was, I let her talk me into falling in love with her. Oh, and she assured me that she loved me to death, and that she wanted to spend the rest of her life with me. Beyond belief? Hell yes, but I had no problem with consciously deluding myself; I wanted her.

The wedding was a huge affair. Her dad had spared no expense. My dad beamed. Her relatives, I'm sure, looked at me as some kind of reclamation project—a charity case. And my friends were jealous as hell.

And so did my married life, my life with Frances Mercer nee Parker, begin.

******

"Well, we're finally, here," she said. "I almost can't believe it."

I looked her way as I started to undress; I stopped. The reception had been big and loud and happy, and for me, a little strange. I thought about that now. "Frances?" I said.

"Yes, honey?" said my new wife. She'd also been undressing.

"I guess I'm about the luckiest guy on the planet," I said. She gave off a small laugh.

"Damn straight," she said. She saw my serious look. "I feel pretty lucky myself, Zeb: pretty damn lucky!"

I hurried up my undressing, but, she beat me. I went to her, grabbed her around her waist and pulled her to me as I went to my knees in front of her. I kissed her belly her fur, her thighs. I worked my way down her legs, finally kissing her feet. "I adore you," I said, as I straightened up. She smiled condescendingly at her new husband.

She knelt down with me. I took her right there on the floor, not expertly, but very enthusiastically. The bed was three feet away, and I took her on the stupid floor. It was—I don't know—some kind of statement, but damned if I knew what of.

Rising from the floor after a brief period of huffing and puffing, we did get on the bed and she went to work on my penis. She turned out to be a regular virtuoso at cocksucking. She had me up again in short order. I took her from behind. There is just something seriously erotic about a woman pushing her hind quarters high in the air to accommodate her conqueror. I pushed into her and she groaned. My wife, unlike me, was no virgin; I knew it, and she knew I knew it, but we never made a big deal out of it. She was mine now, all mine, and that was enough for me.

We lay side by side a while later, again huffing and puffing.

"Honey?" I said.

"Yes?"

"Why me. I'm not good looking, not tall. Why me?' I said.

"Zeb, you're not going to believe me, but this one time, I'm going to lay it out for you. I'm not very smart, not like you for sure, but I'm not a fool. I know what's in a person's heart; I can sense it.

"Zeb, you actually love me. I know you'd give up everything you have to please me, or, to save me. The reality is very few men are like that. There were a hundred guys who would have crawled from here to China to get into my pants, but once the new car smell was gone; they'd be looking for some strange real fast. I didn't want that for me," She said. I had thoughts of Trey cheating on her for the exact reasons she'd just laid out for me.

"Yes, you're short. And yes, you aren't real pretty. By the way, you are not as ugly as you always say. You're kind of—what—manly looking." She suddenly morphed to a more playful tone of voice.

"But Zeb, I will be buying your clothes from now on and telling you what to wear. You really have no taste when it comes to things like that, Zeb. Sorry, but that's a fact. So get used to the idea, bub, it's how it's going to be. Got it?" she said.

"Yeas, I get it. You can dress me any way you want. I will not gainsay you in anything. I only ask that you love me. And, you're right about the other stuff: there is nothing that I wouldn't do for you—nothing!" I said.

******

We got pregnant almost immediately. She'd damn near had to teach me how to stick it in because I sure didn't have any experience at it. Okay, maybe I'm kidding a little about that. But, she did teach me a lot, and especially how to do the things she liked. At any rate we were off and running in the race of life, our lives together. And, however good or not good I was in the sack; I proved more than good at producing superior offspring.

The first few years were terrific, no other terms fits. Then, as one might have expected things slowed down, and yes I'm talking about our sex lives slowed down. But, that said, things didn't stop; they just slowed down. But, what I didn't know was that in certain quarters I was considered boring.

******

Right after we'd tied the knot, we moved to Barton Oaks, a small town a hundred miles from where we were both raised. I was twenty-nine and Frannie was twenty-eight. We settled in and set up shop: she as a teacher at the local high school, and me in my own law practice in the center of town.

I should note that, before I'd set up shop in Barton Oaks, I'd done a two year at an all but minimum wage stint interning at a mid-sized practice in the city. At any rate, I had the urge to get out and on my own. I was smart enough, and I was willing to pay the price in the long hours and the hard work that I knew it would take to be successful.

To be honest, business at first was kinda slow. I found myself mostly doing wills and simple divorces along with the occasional partnership contract and the like. But, then I hit my stride. I hit it because of a lucky meet up with a stranger in a bar.

I was seated at the far end of the bar when a stranger walked in; well, he was a stranger to me. I was surprised when he headed straight for me and took the bar stool immediately to my left.

"Hi, my name's Mark, Mark Wilson, he said.

"Okay," I said. "Zeb Mercer, can I help you with something?"

"I expect maybe you can," he said. I looked him askance. "We have a common friend."

"We do? And who might you be referring to?" I said.

"Harry Gooden. He said you two went to school together," said Mark. I smiled.

"Yes, Harry. God I have seen him in an age. How is he?" I said.

"Good, he lives up in Fairoaks, as do I," he said. "Got a print shop."

"Really. Well, when you see him give him my best," I said.

"That I will," said Mark. "But, Mr. Mercer, I'm here for another reason, and Harry was the catalyst for it."

"Yes?"

"I need a job. I'm good at what I do, and I thought, and Harry thought; well, that you might be a good one to ask," he said.

"Look, Mark, I'm a lawyer. I run and small shop with one part time secretary named Lois. I..."

"Sir, I wouldn't cost you much...."

"Okay, let me ask. What do you do?' I said.

"I'm an ex-cop. But, now I'm a PI," he said.

That one stopped me. "A PI? A private investigator?" I said.

"Yes. I was bumped off the force for drinking on the job. But, I'm okay now. Been dry for a year," he said. I nodded.

"I see," I said. "Well, I'd like a little time to think about it. That be okay?" I said. I haven't had a lot of need for a PI so far, but..."

"Yes, sir, that would be fine," said Mark.

"Let me ask, what did you do, I mean when you were on the force?" I said.

"Neighborhood patrol mostly. Me and my pard, well we covered some of the inner city area. You know, the anti-gang thing," he said.

"Okay, here's my card. Call me in a couple of days," I said.

"Yes, sir, I will do that," he said. And just like that, I had a new resource with which to expand my client base and thereby my income base.

To make a long story short, Mark and I grew together, me into the top criminal lawyer in the southern half of the state, him into the Sword of Damocles hanging over the head of anybody with nasty secrets. Over time we developed a very close relationship; we trusted each other absolutely. Somebody with a big ass problem always got the both us; we were a package deal.

******

Things were great for Frannie and me once we got settled in to our lives. She was happy; I was happy, our two kids were happy. Well, we were all happy until the day I found out my wife had a lover. Now, all of us are in danger of becoming really, really unhappy.

Marlon Skaggs—you gotta love the name—is tall, dark, and handsome. He's got some money, not sure how much, and—well, and he has my wife's love. Well, maybe not her love, not sure about that either, but her lust at the least. He also has my undying hatred for seducing her, and putting us, the lot of us, in domestic jeopardy.

I stood there staring at the two of them fucking up a storm on the couch. He heard me, saw me, and ran from me like I carried the Ebola virus. My wife had the look of an interrupted fuckee; well, she was wasn't she. That is exactly what she was.

"Well, you certainly scared the shit out of Marlon," she said, about as casually as she ever said anything. Still naked, she'd reached for the decorative afghan that was spread over the back of the easy chair that she'd been bent over as he screwed her. She covered herself.

"What the hell was going on here, Frances Mercer," I said. Yeah, it was a ridiculous question. She laughed.

"What was going on? You're kidding, right," she said. "He was screwing me, Zebulon. He was fucking my brains out. I hope I'm not being too vague." I got quiet. What was there to say. Her attitude said it all. She didn't care what I thought. I felt my eyes begin to mist up.

"What, you're going to go all silent and cry! What a pussy I'm married to. Calm down Zebulon, you don't need to worry; I'm not going to divorce you. Actually, I'm quite fond of you. Really. I love you if you care to know. I certainly don't love that jackass, Marlon Skaggs. Good in bed, real good, but otherwise....He's a fucking used furniture dealer for godssakes. What's to love? But, he does beat the hell outta you as far as bedroom skills are concerned."

It had taken two decades plus, but I finally got around to figuring out what it was that Frances Mercer, nee Parker was into; it was humiliating me. High school, college, now in our family life. The gods hated me; I was sure of it. Fuck!

I turned to go. I stopped, turned again, and looked her up and down. "You sure are pretty even with your makeup all messed up; I'm gonna miss you a lot. I'll have the papers filed on Monday. I'll see to it that you get free visitation with the children, but no support. You're on your own there. Don't fight me on it, the divorce I mean. You can't win." I turned once again, and I was gone.

******

In year one of our marriage we'd been blessed with a son, Jan Michael. In year two Valerie came along and we opted to limit ourselves to them. Two were enough. Oh, and I should mention, that at our wedding, Mr. Parker did indeed present me with a bottle of Gentleman Jack; that for guessing wrong about how Frances would react to my breaking in on her and Trey Mitchel at the prom.

Frannie's hair was long now, her stature at five-nine was intimidating to some; she was truly beautiful. Me? At five-four any number of people questioned as to how I could ever have landed such a beauty. Hell, I'd asked myself that question a whole bunch of times; I was just glad she'd opted for me instead of her then boyfriend, Trey Mitchell. Well, I had been glad. Our children now thirteen and twelve, were beautiful too and were our respective pride and joys.

Socially, we were active. The draw was always Frannie; she was the toast of whatever we did and wherever we did it.

I'd had no clue that our marriage was in trouble. Oh, we'd had some disagreements of late. Most recently at a Christmas party for the faculty at her school. It had started out okay. We'd danced a couple of times, had our first drink; and then she was off socializing with everybody but me. It was a little disconcerting, and, irritating. I didn't know her friends on the faculty that well, so I was kinda just left to hang out by myself. I'd tried a couple of times to get her to sit with me between dances, but she'd just ignored me and let man after man sweep her out onto the floor. It was a good two hours before she even came back to see if I wanted to have a dance with her; I think she was feeling a little guilty—very little. By then, however, I was suitably miffed, and embarrassed, and kinda sulking, and I told her no. She smiled.

"Okay, you had your chance," she said. I left. The aftermath at home—don't know who delivered her—was pretty animated. She was mad. I just shrugged.

"You abandoned me at your party, so I abandoned you. You've got no gripe," I said.

"We'll see about that," she said. But, in point of fact, in the A.M. the next day she'd mellowed, or seemed to have; and things got back to normal.

But, back to the bad day at Black Rock—to borrow an old phrase. As I'd driven home that day, the day of reckoning, I'd made a promise to myself to spend less time chasing the big bucks and to concentrate on revitalizing our home lives. I was no fool. I knew that it was going to be an uphill battle to get her to change her attitude; but I was committed to the effort.

The strange car in the driveway hadn't been a strange car. It'd been that of her fellow teacher Marlon Skaggs; I'd seen it often enough. He'd even been to a barbecue or two at our place. One can imagine my surprise as to what degree he'd made himself to home—in my home, and, in my wife. Now, as I drove to the town's only inn, The Marquee, I wondered how long and how often she'd been hanging horns on me. The love of my life had made me an unwilling cuckold, and in so doing had killed my love for her. I knew I was going to be sad later, but at the moment, as I pulled into the inn's parking lot; I was just flat angry, very angry.