It is October and that means that it is time for the annual Just Plain Bob Invitational. I am constantly bombarded with comments saying things like “You call that a story? My ten year old can do better than that.” Also heard a lot is “If that were my story xxxxx would have xxxxxxx and xxxxx would have xxxx.” So here is everyone’s chance to show me how it should really be done. Step up and put an ending to this story. There is only one rule. You must state in your opening that your story is a continuation of my story.
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It had been a long day. A ‘brown out’ had slowed things down at work and it couldn’t have happened at a worst time. The production run was already behind and we were up against a hard deadline. The contract had penalties for failure to deliver on time and we would have to work overtime on the weekend if we were to have any chance at all of meeting the deadline.
I was looking forward to a cold beer on the living room couch as I caught the news on CNN. There was a Harley in the driveway just behind Audrey’s Hondo Civic and I wondered who it might belong to. I walked into the living room and found Audrey sitting on the couch with some guy who looked just like the typical ‘biker’ that you see portrayed in the movies and on TV. A vest with all kinds of badges, pins and patches over a shirt with the sleeves torn off. Jeans, engineer boots completed the costume. His arms and hands were covered with tattoos and even without seeing them I would bet that he had a “hate” tattoo on his left hand and a “love” tattoo on his right.
Audrey stood up as I walked into the room and said, “Good. Now we can get this over with.”
“Get what over with Aud?”
“I’m leaving you Rob.”
That came as a surprise to me as I’d not seen any indication of her dissatisfaction with me or our marriage. I looked at the guy sitting on the couch and smirking at me while holding a beer that I’d bet came from my stock in the fridge. I nodded toward him and said:
“With this piece of shit?”
He didn’t like that and he started to get up. I ignored him and said to Audrey:
“Good luck with your new life.”
I didn’t waste any time with “Why?” or “What have I done?” or any of that other bullshit. If she was leaving and had asshole there to hold her hand it meant that she had already stabbed me in the back and cheated on me with him so she was history in my books. I turned to go to the kitchen and get me a beer and then the biker said:
“That’s it? Your bitch tells you she is dumping your ass and all you say is have a nice life? Oh well, she said you would be a wimp.”
I turned and looked at Audrey. “Did you say that? Did you tell asshole here that I was a wimp?”
Audrey looked away from me and I had my answer. I turned to the asshole and hit him. It caught him by surprise. Wimps aren’t supposed to get violent, right? He shook it off and came after me. He must have been still thinking of me as a wimp because he didn’t use any caution at all. He just rushed at me. I kicked the inside of his right knee and drove it outward and he screamed and went down as the knee gave way. I kicked him twice in the stones, lifted him up and slammed him against the wall and then I beat the living shit out of him. The entire time Audrey was screaming, “Stop it, stop it” but I ignored her. When I got tired I let him slump to the floor. I looked over at Audrey and said:
“How’s that for being wimpy Aud?”
I grabbed asshole by his feet and drug him outside and left him lying on the driveway next to his bike and then I went into the garage and got the half inch drive breaker bar and a screwdriver out of my tool box and went back to where the asshole was lying on the ground and moaning. I used the breaker bar to bust every light on the bike and then I carved “The wimp did this” into the paint on his gas tank.
I went back into the house and found Audrey sitting on the couch crying and I said:
“I hope you know how to ride his bike because I don’t think he is in shape to do it.”
“I can’t drive a motorcycle. I’m taking my car.”
“Oh no you aren’t” I said as I grabbed her purse and dumped it out on the coffee table. I picked up her keys as I said “That car still has my name on the title and we still owe on it. I don’t trust you to make the payments and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let you ruin my credit.”
Then I noticed the white envelope with First National Bank on it and I picked it up and looked inside. It was stuffed with money. I took my cell phone off my belt and hit the speed dial number for the bank. I punched in our account number and the mechanical voice said:
“Your checking account balance is six dollars and thirteen cents. Press two for withdrawal information. Press three for…”
I disconnected and snarled, “You bitch. You fucking whore! A house payment due, a car payment due and you cleaned me out and were going to leave me here holding the bag.”
I picked up her wallet and took everything out of it except her driver’s license and tossed it to her.
“Get out. Get your worthless ass out of here before I lose it and do to you what I did to that asshole you brought into my house.”
“All my things are in the car.”
“I’ll clean the car out and dump your shit in the driveway. Anything still there on trash day will go out on the curb with the rest of the garbage now get the fuck out of here.”
She walked out the door sniffling and sobbing and I went to the fridge to get another beer. As I pulled the tab on the can I had a thought so I set the beer down on the kitchen table and went back outside. Audrey was digging through the car for something and the biker was sitting up, leaning against his bike and retching. I walked up and looked down at him.
“I know your type asshole. I know just what you are going to do. You are going to round up some buddies and come back here to show me that I can’t fuck with you and get away with it. I know you are going to do it and so I’ll be watching out for you. I’m warning you now that if I see your ass again I’ll do more than just beat the fuck out of you. Remember that asshole. You have been warned.”
I went back into the house and about a half hour later I heard the Harley start up and drive off.
I was in the living room getting asshole’s empty beer can off of the coffee table when I noticed a leather jacket lying on the floor next to the couch. I picked it up and on the back was painted a skull and the words “Diablo Riders.” I looked at it for a few seconds and then I called my cousin Lou who was a sergeant on the local police force and asked him if he knew anything about the Diablo Riders.
“Only that they are a bunch of bad mother fuckers. They are into dope dealing and prostitution, but we haven’t been able to hang anything on them. Why do you want to know about them?
I told him and he laughed. “I guess I know what Audrey will be doing this time next week. They’ll have her hooked on something and she will be out on the streets making money for them. But you have a problem cuz. They can’t allow what you did to go unavenged. It might give other people ideas.”
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I was watching the pregame show on Monday night football when the call came. I turned off the TV and went out and sat down on the front porch swing. Just a little over an hour later a car and two pick up trucks pulled up in front of the house and seven guys got out. One of them was asshole and I was pleased to see that he was walking with a cane. They came up the walk and I went down off the porch to meet them. One of them, a big ugly bearded dude said:
“You fucked up man. You don’t mess with one of our guys and get away with it.”
“I would suggest that you get off my property and do it now.”
“Oh we will be going shit face, but not until after we teach you a lesson.”
Two men moved in on me, one on each side and then the ugly dude swung at me. I didn’t try to avoid the punch; I just stood there and took it. All hell broke loose as cops came spilling out of the house and garage and police cars with lights flashing and sirens going roared up the street and pulled up in front of the house. It all distracted the ugly dude and I speared him in the throat with the stiffened fingers of my right hand. At the same time I kicked the right knee of the guy on my right and he went down. The guy on my left was already running, but he didn’t get far before two cops had him on the ground and were cuffing him.
Ugly dude lay at my feet gasping for breath and the other guy was clutching his knee and moaning. The rest of the group were all in handcuffs and being led away. All except asshole. He was standing there leaning on his cane as he watched his buds being loaded into the back of cop cars. My cousin Lou and another officer led him into the garage, sat him down on a chair and then cuffed him to it. Lou showed me two small cellophane bags and said:
“We found this on him. It is enough to take him down for possession with intent to sell. What do you want me to do?”
“Dump it or lose it. I don’t want him in jail. I want him out where I can get to him.”
Lou handed me the keys to the handcuffs and then he and the other officer left. I walked over to my tool box and brought out the half inch drive breaker bar and then walked back over to stand in front of asshole. I stood there lightly tapping my palm with the breaker bar and then said:
“They call this a breaker bar because it can usually break loose a stubborn nut or bolt. But you might remember that it can also break things. Remember the lights on your scooter? Remember what I told you the last time I saw you? I told you that if I ever saw you again I’d do more than just beat the fuck out of you, but you didn’t listen did you. Did you see the punch that your buddy threw at me? Did you see me just stand there and take it? That was the price I had to pay to get you in this chair. I had to take that punch so it could be caught on tape to show just cause for the cops to take down your friends. Maybe they will thank you for giving them the opportunity to spend some time in jail. Think?”
I swung the breaker bar at his right knee as hard as I could and he screamed. I grabbed a shop towel from my work bench and forced it into his mouth to quiet him down and then I beat his right knee into mush. He had passed out from the pain so he was dead weight when I loaded him into the back of my pick up. I drove to a park just outside of town, pulled him out of the truck and dropped him by the pay phone just outside the public toilets. I checked his pockets to make sure that he had enough change to call for help and when I saw he didn’t I put two quarters in his pocket.
I woke him up with some smelling salts and when I had his attention I told him:
“I warned you last time and you ignored it. You can ignore this warning too if you want to and it won’t bother me at all. You like western movies? You know the part where one guy says to the other “This town isn’t big enough for both of us. You have until sundown to get out of town?” That’s where we are now. Here’s the deal. You need to leave this town and never come back. In two weeks I’m going to start looking for you and if I find you, depending on the mood I’m in, I’ll either kill you or put you in a wheelchair for the rest of your life and you will be taking all of your meals through a straw. One last thing. What happened to you tonight didn’t come from me. Call whoever you want and file any complaint you feel like, but I have five cops who will swear that I was playing cards with them. Remember. Two weeks and I come looking.”
I left him there and drove home.
Lou called me in the morning. The biker’s vehicles had dope and weapons galore in them. Three of the bikers had guns on them and two of the gun totters were on parole so they were on their way back to prison. Two were carrying knives longer than the law allowed and all of them had dope on them. They were all going to be going to jail for a while.
“The Tri-County Drug Task Force owes you and they told me to tell you that they have you covered.”
“What does that mean?”
“What it means is that unless you do something totally stupid you will probably never again get a ticket in the Tri-County area in this life.”
Two days later he called me again. “I talked with Audrey last night. She is staying with her sister. I told her what she almost got herself into and she said that she already knew and that is why she is at her sisters. Seems that after the boys headed for your place to pay you a visit some of the girls in the clubhouse clued her in and she split and went to her sisters. She asked me to call you and ask you if she could come home and talk to you.”
“No thanks cuz. She said it all when she told me she was leaving me and when I found out she had cleaned out the bank account it was all over.”
“Okay Rob, just passing a message. Be careful. There are still a couple of Diablo Riders still out there. They aren’t really hardcore which is why they weren’t with the bunch that came to visit, but better safe than sorry. Given your good standing with the Task Force we could probably get you a concealed carry permit if you want.”
“Thanks Lou; I’ll have to think on that.”
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Two weeks went by and one night when I came home from looking for asshole I found a woman sitting on my front porch steps. She stood up as I approached and I saw that she was a sexy looking woman although in a hard way if you know what I mean. I’m no judge of tit size, but hers were substantial and the tank top she was wearing showed plenty of cleavage. About five foot six, dishwater blond hair and she filled out her jeans nicely and altogether she looked like a lady I wouldn’t mind playing with. The only thing I saw that I didn’t care for were the tattoos she had. She had the ‘barbed wire’ one on her left arm and what looked like a bunch of flowers on her right arm at the shoulder. She probably had a couple more that I couldn’t see. I walked up to her and asked:
“What can I do for you?”
“I just had to come by and get a look at the man who was bad enough to chase DJ out of town.”
“And you are?”
“I was DJ’s squeeze. I don’t know if I should kiss you for making him leave or kick you in the balls.”
“Why the big spread?”
“On the one hand I’m glad he’s gone, but on the other it screws me up big time.”
“How’s that?”
“The rent is due and he split with the money. We’ve been late a couple of times before and the landlord said that the next time we were late we were out. Oh well, it won’t be the first time we have had to sleep in the car.”
She looked me up and down and the said, “Amazing. You don’t look anything at all like a hard ass.”
She started to walk away and I called out “Hey!” She turned back to me and I said:
“Don’t leave me in suspense here. The kick or the kiss?”
She smiled, walked back to me, put her arms around me and kissed me. “Thanks” she said as she turned to go and I said “You said we when you mentioned sleeping in the car.”
“I have two daughters.”
“Your landlord will really kick you out if you are late with the rent?”
“He said he would and that’s all I have to go on.”
I was probably making a big mistake, but my thinking was that asshole was all set to leave with my woman so what better than him to find out that I was with his. Also, if he came back for her I wouldn’t have to look as hard to find him.
“Can you cook?” I asked her before she could get away.
“Why?”
“I’m not that great in the kitchen and thanks to your ex-roomie I don’t have a cook and housekeeper any more. It’s a four bedroom house so there is plenty of room for you and your daughters. No strings attached. You will be the live in cook and maid and that’s all.”
“You serious?”
“You bet.”
“Why would you do something like that?”
“He was all set to walk out of here with my wife. Imagine how he will take it when he hears that the woman that used to be his is now living with me. He won’t know that all you are is a live in maid. He will think that we are doing the horizontal boogie and it will make him nuts. And I really can’t cook for beans. As I see it it is a win win situation.”
“Can I trust you?”
“Like I’m going to say no you can’t? As long as your Honda keeps running you can leave whenever you think you can’t trust me.”
“When can I move in?”
“Right now if you want.”
She gave me a long look and then said, “I’ll need help moving my stuff and some of the guys who will help me are members of the Diablos. You sure you want them to know where you live?”
“They already know sweetie.”
“Kari.”
“Kari?”
“Kari is my name, not sweetie.”
“Okay Kari” I said as I handed her the keys to my truck. “Give me the keys to the Honda. You can get the Diablos to help you load the truck, but we won’t need them here. I’ll take care of the unloading.”
She looked at me with a strange expression and said, “The keys are in it. Why are you trusting me with your truck? That’s a ten year old car parked at the curb and your truck is almost brand new.”
“Trust has nothing to do with it Kari. If you aren’t back in a reasonable amount of time I’ll call it in as stolen and with all the friends I have on the local police force and in the county sheriffs office it won’t take them any time at all to find it.’
I didn’t mention the fact that the truck had Lo-Jack installed.
“Besides, I’m trusting that you want your daughters safe and not out on the streets if the landlord follows through on his threat.”
She gave me another long look and then she turned and left.
She was back in three hours and as she got out of the truck I got my next surprise. I don’t know why, but based on my best guess of Kari’s age I imagined that her daughters would probably be around eight or nine so I was surprised when twin girls who looked every bit of twenty or twenty-one got out of the truck with her.
Kari walked up to me and as she handed me the keys to the truck she said, “Close your mouth before flies take up residence.”
I looked at her. “No way. No way are you old enough to have twenty year old daughters.”
“They are not twenty. They are an extremely well developed sixteen.”
“Still, you are old enough to have daughters that age.”
“Of course I am. I had them when I was fifteen.”
She called the girls over and introduced them as Beverly and Barbara. They looked at me warily, but took my hand and shook it.
“Come on” I said, “Let me show you where you will be staying.”
I led them into the house and took them on a tour which ended up on the second floor. I pointed out the three spare bedrooms and told them to take their pick. The three of the looked over the rooms, made their choices and then we went down and unloaded the truck.
Once they were moved in I told them that I hadn’t been expecting company so the pantry was bare and I told Kari to check out the kitchen and the freezer in the basement and make a list of what we needed while I took a shower. I finished my shower, checked out Kari’s list to see if there was anything I wanted to add and then we went shopping. I dropped Kari and the girls at King Soopers and told her I had an errand to run and would be back before they got to the check out stands. I told her to buy enough to last us two weeks.
“Why two weeks?”
“Because I hate shopping.”
I left them to shop and I drove over to Home Depot and picked up a few things and then drove back to the store. When we got home Kari said she would whip up something for dinner and I went out in the garage and rummaged through my tool box for what I would need.
We had a dinner of hamburger steaks and gravy with mashed potatoes and green beans and when everyone was done eating I reached down by my chair and pulled up the Home Depot bag. I took out the three packaged sets of keyed doorknobs and handed one to each of them.
“I know that all three of you are a little worried about what you might be getting into so I got you these. I’m giving them to you in the package so that you can see that it has not been opened so copies could be made of the keys and I want each of you to be standing there watching as I open the packages, give you the keys and install the doorknobs. I want all three of you to know that you are safe in this house.”
I saw all three of them look at each other and maybe I just imagined it, but I thought I saw all three of them relax just a little.
“Okay then. A couple of rules to follow. Just as your rooms are off limits to me, mine is off limits to you. I have to get up at five to go to work so I’m usually in bed by ten or ten-thirty so try to keep the noise down after I sack out. There is a computer in the den and you are free to use it, but no porn sites. Porn sites are where most of the viruses come from. If there is anything in the kitchen that is especially yours label it otherwise what is in the fridge and pantry is up for grabs. And last of all I don’t know if any of you smoke, but if you do the house is a smoke free zone. Outside on the patio or in the garage if the weather is bad, but never in the house. Those are mine. Do you have any?”
The two girls looked at each other and then one of them, I’m not sure which since I had not yet learned to tell them apart, asked:
“Can we have friends over?”
“Of course you can, but you are responsible for them while they are here.”
“How about TV? Do you have any special shows we need to be aware of so we aren’t on it when you want to be?”
“There are a couple but I have a set in my bedroom if need be. Oh, one other thing. I despise rap music so if you play it make sure that I don’t hear it. Anything else?”
The three of them looked at each other and then Kari said, “I guess not, but if we think of something can we bring it up later?”
“Of course you can.”
“Okay then” Kari said, “Come on girls, time to clear the table and clean the kitchen.”
As they got up I asked myself again if I knew what I was doing and once again the answer was “hell no!”
I was sitting in front of the TV in the living room when the girls finished and Kari sent the twins off to do their homework and then she joined me on the couch.
“I need to know some things Rob.”
“Shoot.”
“Is this just something temporary, just a couple of weeks maybe, while you work on some plan concerning DJ?”
“Not at all. I admit that it concerns DJ, but the time limit on your stay is up to you. That of course is subject to change if I end up with another woman in my life, but I don’t see that happening until I can legally get rid of the whore I’m married to and my information is that that little chore can take as long as six months. Why? Are you worried that I’m going to kick you out in a week or two?”
“I’m not very trusting when it comes to me Rob. They have taken advantage of me and fucked over me most of my life. It hasn’t helped any that I’ve made bad choices. I need to know if it is worth the time and effort to get the girls transferred from the school they are in to the one in this district.”
“That’s strictly up to you. All I can say is that you can stay here until you decide that you don’t want to or until I have a new lady in my life and she objects to our arrangement.”
“Okay. You need to know that I have a job. I wait tables at Patty Ann’s Café on the morning shift. I get off at two so I’ll still have plenty of time to take care of my duties here as cook, maid and chief dishwasher. Between me and the girls we will get the job done.”
“So you could have paid the rent at your old place?”
“Not hardly. I make enough to buy groceries and keep the girls in what they need. It is enough to take care of me if I was alone and living in a small one bedroom or studio apartment somewhere, but nowhere near enough to take care of the three of us in a place big enough for the three of us. DJ took care of the rent and utilities and I took care of the food and housekeeping.”
“So what happened that I got a kiss for kicking him out of your life?”
“He kept trying to get me to do drugs with him. He said sex was so much better when on a drug high, but I wasn’t buying it. I knew if he got me to try drugs I’d end up hooked and I’d already seen what other Diablos did to the women they got hooked. And then there were the girls. DJ’s friends were starting to pay too much attention to them. I’ll give DJ credit. He wouldn’t stand for any one messing with Barb and Bev, but I began to get the idea that that was because he wanted them for himself. I was already looking for a way out when you did whatever it was that made him run. What did you do?”
I told her the story and she looked at me and said, “That’s why I’m here isn’t it? You expect him to come for me and that is what you are hoping for right?”
“It was a thought, but now that I’ve heard your story I don’t think it is likely. I do hope that somehow he hears that you are living here with me. It should make him crazy.”
“Not that I care any, but why take it out on him because your wife was going to leave you? If she could do it that easily shouldn’t you have been thankful that he was getting her out of your life?”
“If he had kept his mouth shut and just left I wouldn’t have bothered with him at all, but when he started that wimp shit I couldn’t let it stand any more than I could turn my back on him coming after me with his buddies.”
“Would you really cripple him for life if you see him again?”
“Absolutely. Threats and promises aren’t worth spit unless you follow through on them. Too many people know about what I told the asshole and if the people don’t see me follow through the word will get around that I don’t mean what I say and I can’t be having that.”
“You told the girls they could have friends over as long as they take responsibility for them. Does that apply to me also?”
“Of course, but remember what I said; hold the noise down after I’ve gone to bed.”
She blushed. “I don’t have anybody waiting in the wings. It is too soon. DJ hasn’t been gone long enough for me to start looking for a replacement, but it will happen sooner or later. I’m a healthy girl with healthy appetites. When it happens I’ll try not to bring them here, but I did want to clear the decks just in case.”
“Consider them cleared.”
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Surprisingly enough it worked. Kari and the twins took turns cooking and between the three of them they kept the house cleaner than it had ever been.
The Girls changed schools and they seemed to be good students. Kari worried about them a lot and she hovered over them like a momma bear over her cubs. She was afraid, and justifiably so, that a pair of sixteen year olds who looked twenty would be hit on a lot by the older boys and it scared her to death because that is what happened to her.
She had been an impressionable and extremely well developed fourteen when the eighteen year old seniors at her high school started hitting on her. She got all starry eyed and believed one of the assholes when he told her that he loved her and then she watched as he ran like a thief in the night when he got her pregnant. She kept telling the girls to be careful because she didn’t want them to end up like her.
The arrangement was in its fourth week when a surprising development took place. Bev came up to me while I was on the computer in my den and her mother and sister were in the kitchen doing the dinner dishes.
“Can I ask you something?”
“Sure, go ahead.”
“Are you gay?”
“Hell no. Why would you think something like that?”
“Why haven’t you made a move on my mom? She is as horny as a billy goat and is ready for a man. Does she need to carry a sign saying “Fuck me please” before you pay attention to her?”
“Maybe it is because your mom hasn’t shown any interest in having a move made on her. Maybe it is because I’m still married and I don’t feel right about going after other women before I’m divorced. Maybe it is because I have the hots for someone else.”
And then, probably because I was a little pissed at
her thinking I was gay and a little upset with her attitude, I decided to shock
her and I said:
“And just maybe it is because I want you and Barb and not your mother.”
“I expected her to turn purple and run from the room, but she looked me right in the eye and said:
“As long as you understand that it won’t be without a condom.”
I’m not sure, but I think I’m the one who turned purple. Bev gave me a little smile and turned and left the room. As I watched her walk I realized that Kari I had good reason to be scared. And so did I. I was painfully aware of the hard on that Bev has just given me.
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From then on the tone of things changed around the house. Bev and Barb (apparently they kept no secrets from each other) started openly flirting with me when Kari wasn’t around. I became aware that it was being offered to me if I was ready and willing to step up to the plate.
And no, it was not just my imagination.
Kari left the house at four-thirty to open Patty Ann’s Café and get things set up for the breakfast crowd. I was up and ready to leave the house between five and five-fifteen and until the night that Bev came into the den the twins were never up until after I was gone. Suddenly, once Kari was gone, the twins were getting up and trotting between their bedrooms and the bathroom naked! It was obvious that I was being deliberately tempted. And tempted I was. God knows I was. But I was also smart enough to know that slipping my cock into a sixteen year old, no matter how desirable she might be, was a one way ticket to a dark and gloomy jail cell.
About a week after the girls started running around naked in front of me I took a day off from work to go to the doctor’s and get my yearly physical so I was still in the house at seven-thirty. The girls normally left the house for school around ten to eight. I was sitting at the computer checking my email when the girls came into the room. Barb said:
“We want to know which of us you want to do first.”
“I’m not going to do either one of you.”
“Sure you are. Sooner or later one of us will get you so why fight it?”
“There are all kinds of reasons for me to fight it. You are under age and when I got caught I would go to jail and I would get caught because your mom watches you too close. That’s one and another is that your mom would kill me if she even thought I may have the idea of doing either of you. Then there is the health issue. No way I would be physically able to handle the both of you so forget it girls; it just ain’t gonna happen.”
“We don’t hear you saying you don’t want to, just that you are afraid to.”
“And that is reason enough right there.”
Bev said, “First off the only reason mom is worried is because she doesn’t want us to end up as single moms at our age. That won’t ever happen because even though mom doesn’t know it we are both on the pill thanks to an older friend of hers who pretended to be our mom when we went to the doctor and if you’ll remember I already told you that you would have to use a condom. You won’t go to jail because no one but the three of us will ever know. Your health won’t be an issue because we will set up a schedule and take turns. You can come up with all the excuses you want, but we have made up our minds so it is going to happen.”
She looked at her watch and said, “Got to run or we will miss the bus. While you are out today load up on condoms” and then she and Barb left.
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As I sat in the waiting room at the doctor’s office I was wondering how you were supposed to handle a pair of sixteen year olds that looked twenty and acted twenty-five. The best that I could come up with is that I was going to have to sit down with Kari and clue her in to what was going on.
Was I scared? To death man, to death.
I made sure not to go home before I knew Kari would be there. I did not want to be alone with Bev and Barb. I knew what I wasn’t going to do, but I didn’t know what they might do so I thought it best to avoid them.
Dinner was almost ready when I did get home and I went into the bathroom to wash my hands and in the mirror over the sink I saw Barb come in behind me. She opened her blouse to show me that she didn’t have a bra on and she cupped her tits in her hands and pointed them at me and said:
“Still want to say no?”
I ignored her and she laughed and left the room. Barb was sitting opposite me at the dinner table and even though I’m not a lip reader I had no trouble making out the word when she looked at me and silently mouthed the word “chicken.” It made me even more determined to have a talk with Kari and I decided to do it when she sent the girls off to do their homework. During the time between dinner ending and the girls being sent off to their rooms I rehearsed what I would say to Kari, but then I started thinking ‘what if she doesn’t believe me? What if she goes to the girls and they say that it is all bullshit and that I’ve been hitting on them and now I’m trying to make trouble for them because they kept saying no. What if…..? By the time they were sent off to do their homework I did what Barb had silently accused me of. I chickened out.
The next morning I made sure that I was up and out of the house a minute behind Kari. I would handle the problem with the girls by making sure that I was never alone with them. The Waffle House was open all night so I had a place to go to have breakfast and nurse a cup of coffee until it was time to go to work. That got old after two days so I knew I would have to find some other early morning activity to get me out of the house. I was looking through the morning paper and saw an ad announcing the grand opening of a fitness center and it said that the hours of operation would be from five in the morning until nine at night. It was $395 a year and I considered that a fair price if it kept me away from Bev and Barb.
That became my new schedule. Up and out of the house at the same time as Kari and waiting at the door of the fitness center when it opened at five and on the other end of the day I made sure that I never went home until I knew that Kari would already be there.
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While all that drama was taking place at home there was even more drama away from home and both had their origins in my confrontation with Audrey and DJ.
Kari has kept in touch with one or two of her girl friends who were still running with the Diablos who were lucky enough not to be in jail. They told her that the word was that as soon as the ones I had caused to be locked up got out they would be coming for me. I called Lou and told him that I was interested in that concealed carry permit he had mentioned and he put me in touch with the people I had to talk with. I already had a Beretta 92F and after a twelve hour course I had a permit to carry.
Next I tried to visit a couple of the Diablos who were in prison, but found out that the only way you could get on the approved visitor’s list was if the inmate requested that you be put on it. I finally got one who was curious enough about why I wanted to visit to put me on his list. I went to see him on a Saturday. He sat on the other side of the glass partition and I could tell from the smirkish smile on his face that he knew what was planned for me so I cut right to the chase.
“The reason I wanted to see you was to give you the chance to save your life.”
The smirk disappeared and was replaced by a ‘what the fuck you talking about’ look.
“Here’s the deal. I’ve heard about what you say you are going to do to me when you get out and here is what I am going to do about it.” I took my carry permit out of my shirt pocket and held it up to the partition so he could read it.
“They wouldn’t let me bring the Beretta in here, but I don’t go anywhere else without it. The way it is going to be is that if I see any one of you once you get out I will kill you. If we run into each other walking down an aisle at Safeway I will take out my gun and kill you. If I am in a gas station putting gas in my car and you pull in to get gas for your bike and I see you I will kill you. If I’m driving down the street and I see you coming up from behind in the next lane I will roll my window down and kill you when you get close enough. Get the message? If I see you anywhere at all I’m going to remember that you said you were going to get me when you got out and I will kill you before you get the chance.
“All my friends in the sheriff’s office and on the local police force know about your threat and they have already said to do what I have to do and they will make sure that it goes down as a justifiable homicide. So get your head around it. I will kill you if I see you. Tell all your buddies. If I see any of you you will die. I will not wait for you to make a move and then defend myself. I see you and I will kill you. Have a nice day.”
I got up and walked out of the visiting room. It was bullshit about the cops giving me a pass, but he didn’t know that. He saw all the cops I had waiting when he and his crew showed up at my place and he knew that DJ had been left in my hands when the rest of them were hauled away so I was betting that he believed me.
The other thing going on was that Audrey was fighting the divorce. All of a sudden I was the love of her life, she couldn’t live without me and everything that had happened was all just a huge misunderstanding. We could put things back together if I would just sit down with her and talk things out.
“Not a chance in hell” I told her through my attorney. She countered by having her attorney petition the court to order counseling and the judge did it. It was one of those open ended things where it would go on and on until the councilor decided that there was no hope of reconciliation and since he was paid by the session and not a flat fee he could drag it out forever.
I let him know up front in the very first session that there was not the slightest chance that I would ever take the bitch back. The first session was ‘what were the major problems between us?’ I told my side and Audrey kept butting in and telling me that I was wrong, that I just didn’t understand the situation and if I would only let her explain…..! I stood up and started to leave and the councilor asked me where I was going. I told him there was no sense in my staying there and trying to tell my side if he wasn’t going to tell her to shut the fuck up and stop interrupting me. He told Audrey to keep quiet and that she would get her turn when I was finished. I sat down, finished my say with:
“Counseling is not going to do any good in this case. It will only work where both parties want to see if they can save the marriage, but it won’t work here because no way am I staying with a lying, cheating, thieving whore.”
Then it was her turn. She had never cheated on me and she wasn’t really leaving me. It was just going to be a trial separation to give her some time and space to work on some issues she had with our marriage. She wasn’t running off with DJ; he was just a friend she had there with her in case I tried to stop her from leaving. And she didn’t mean to take all of the money out of our account. She only meant to take half, but she was nervous, sweating the coming confrontation with me and here mind was elsewhere when the teller at the bank told her our balance and she automatically wrote it down on the withdrawal slip. She realized the mistake on her way home and she intended to give me half the money before she left, but I never gave her the chance The bottom line was that she loved me, really, really loved me and it was all just a huge mistake and that we could work things out.
The councilor said that was enough for that session. He told us each to make a list of the issues we each saw in the marriage and bring it to the next session to discuss. I wanted to tell him there wouldn’t be anymore sessions, but I couldn’t. My lawyer ha already told me that the divorce was stalled until the court had the report from the marriage councilor saying that no hope of a reconciliation existed and that no councilor was going to say that without at least four sessions.
The second session was more bullshit from Audrey as she listed the issues she had while I listened and shook my head. I dropped my dirty clothes on the floor. I left the toilet seat up. I never called when I was going to be a little late in coming home. I got up Saturday morning and cut the grass even though I knew she liked to sleep in on the weekends and the mower motor would wake her up. She was willing to watch football with me, but I would never watch Oprah with her and on and on and on. She made herself look like an absolute doofus.
He asked for my list and I told him that I didn’t have one. I told him I was perfectly happy with my marriage right up to the day that she and DJ ambushed me in our living room. Actually, I didn’t say it quite that way. What I said was:
“Until the whore cheated on me and tried to steal my money.”
“I explained all that honey.”
“And I don’t believe a word of it.”
Then the councilor said that the next session would be a one on one with Audrey followed by a one on one with me after which he would decide whether or not we needed to go any farther. After Audrey had gone I asked him what good it would do to have the one on ones when he had to already know that I wouldn’t get back together with Audrey at the point of a gun.
“I have to do it because the judge ordered it. If it were Judge Harriman or Judge Spiegel I could go back after one session and tell them there was no hope and say that further sessions would be a waste of time. Your judge and three or four others insist on a minimum of four sessions. Be thankful your judge isn’t Whitman. He has been known to specify eight or ten sessions. And before you ask, no. I won’t let you not show and say that you did. If your wife or her attorney somehow found out I would be toast. The best I can do for you is to schedule your one on one for a Monday night and we can watch Monday Night Football on the TV in my office. And that is just what we did.
On my way home from watching the game it suddenly occurred to me that I was being stupid. Audrey didn’t want a divorce so by God I wouldn’t give her one. We were in a no fault state so she would end up with half of our assets. She couldn’t touch the house because it had been left to me by my parents and I had never added her name to the title or the mortgage, but she would get half of the cash, household furnishings, one of the vehicles and part of my pension and 401k when I retired and probably some alimony since I made more than she did at her part time morning job. No divorce, no divorce settlement. Audrey was thinking no divorce meant she would move back in, but that would be a cold day in hell.
I called Audrey as soon as I got home and told her that after having my session with Henry I decided to drop the divorce.
“When can I come home?”
“When hell freezes over. I’m dropping the divorce because I’m not going to waste any more of my time fighting with you over it, but I still don’t want anything to do with your lying, cheating ass” and I hung up on her. That wouldn’t be the end of it and I knew it, but it would take her a while to figure out what to do next and – more importantly – come up with the money to do anything about it. The next morning I called my attorney and told him to do what needed to be done to stop the divorce proceedings.
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Back on the home front I was still doing everything I could to avoid being alone with Barb and Bev. They were tempting as hell and I had been without long enough that I occasionally had some impure thoughts where they were concerned, but thank God my big head was still in charge.
To be continued.
My ending to this story is already written and I will post it thirty days after the first part is posted. I believe that I have given plenty to work with and it will be interesting to see what others can come up with.
JPB October 19, 2009