CLIMAXES – My Shockingly True Story

by Richie Drenz

an excerpt from

Climaxes

by Richie Drenz

“If I tell you I’m seeing my period you gonna be angry?”

I’m a man, I’d definitely be pissed, I answered, “No. I wouldn’t be at all. You’re seeing it?”

“You’d be disappointed?” An obvious lisp in the way she pronounced “disappointed.” The truth was I’d be absolutely crushed but I said, “No. Why? I don’t even have sex on my mind like that. If it happens today, it happens though. I’ve no plans.” I shrugged one shoulder disinterestedly. “Just going with the flow.”

“Ok. Good.” She observed my face as she said, “I’m on my period.”

My heart split into two pieces. Hell naah. This girl’s flipping mad? After all that, she knew she was on her period and didn’t even have the decency to mention it before? She didn’t think I had the right to at least know about it before?

“Just look at your face,” she giggled. “Stop opening up your mouth like that, Man.” Her finger playfully flipped my lower lip to shut my mouth…

CHAPTER 1

“Psst, Sexy.” The gentleman complimented, his eyes pasted on the girl’s ass.

She was in uniform, dark blue tunic, white blouse and was in seventh grade, she wasn’t ready to have such a great hatred to come. She was tall, five feet, eleven inches.

“Richie, can you believe? You saw what that man did with his tongue at me? Disgusting. Why won’t these big grown men stop looking at me like I’m pizza with extra toppings?”

Pim-Pim turned her back to his direction, rolled her eyes and scrunched her face. “Sexy? Hmphh. I know exactly what he wants. I know I’m sexy but . . .” She childishly blushed as the word “sexy” slipped by her tongue.

I wasn’t sure if she was really disgusted by the attention she was getting or if she secretly revelled in it. As a thought dawned on her, she lifted her chin sharply and said, “I’m keeping my virginity till I’m out college. And my first time will be with someone special, you know? Someone I love.” She smiled her cute smile. She seemed to always be smiling — nothing got her down.

Her name? Pim-Pim. Twelve years old, and bigger than her seventh grade teachers — she was the biggest in her class and wanted to be grown. When Pim-Pim’s parents weren’t home, she plastered her face with foundation, eye-shadow, lipstick and eyeliner.

She had a single mole. A black beauty dot nestled to the right above her feisty upper lip. That beauty mark was the only mark on her entire skin. Her over-protective father taught her to be careful of lurking men on the streets — he didn’t want to go to prison for chopping into mutton minces anyone who dared touch his underage little princess. But before her thirteenth birthday came, his little princess was no longer a virgin.

The person she first had sex with was a grown man three times her age, and she loved him. She wore makeup to the doctor’s office when she went to have the abortion.

She looked like an adult and was witty for a twelve year old—she lied to the doctor and told him she was nineteen so she could have the abortion. Pim-Pim wasn’t choosing to end the pregnancy because of her age, though. It was because of something else. Let me tell you why.

It was how she lost her virginity. Not that she misplaced it or anything. It was taken. By a person she loved and respected. Taken forcefully. She was raped.

Tears fell from her eyes when she told me the whole ordeal twelve years ago, in 1998. She lost her voice crying for help. She was raped on a Friday afternoon, at about one o’clock. Like all ungodly people, Pim-Pim doesn’t go to church anymore; she doesn’t really hate them, more like she’s afraid of churches.

She was mentally scarred so deeply that when she sees churches all she remembers was the Friday she was raped in one. She doesn’t wish to attend any because of the horrible memories and the feelings going to a church regurgitates.

The thirty-six year old who raped her towered about three or four inches above her. He had broad shoulders that mountained high up to his neck and thick chunks of muscles sculpted his upper back. He had heavy hands, large fingers, a rough bearded face. His beard grew from the base of his neck to under his chin. It covered most of his cheeks and was well-kept. Her childish voice had begged and cried as she struggled to get her hands free from his bionic grip. During the struggle she got her very first mutilation. It was horrible. The skin above her eye was torn wide open. The wound was open, bloody and red flesh pulped out the skin. The doctors had to give her thirteen stitches to close it up. The shape of her eye was disfigured for life. But her physical scars were nothing compared to the emotional ones that the rape permanently inflicted. She was never the same person after that. Ever.

The man who molested her knew her for years. Had watched her grow from when she was a child. He callously watched her bleed thick puddles of her virgin blood onto her white panties and onto the floor. Instead of feeling sorry and remorseful, he felt powerful while he rammed and battered the early-breasted child who hadn’t yet reached her teens. Her blood hardened into scaly, cranberry-colored scabs on her thighs. Right there in front of her, the pastor used her panties to mop her pizza-sized blood-pool off the floor. Who could hurt a child in this way? Pim-Pim was ripped and wrecked. Ripped and damaged. Ripped and marred. In so many ways.

He was the pastor of Marlborough Temple Hall Church. A pastor. Well-respected in the community for his long list of kind-hearted deeds.

Pim-Pim now has very little faith in pastors and is bitter toward the world. Where she once was cheerful and smiley, she has changed to being angry, with a wretched hatred for men—she finds no love in them. She has no qualms about using men. She is emotionally unattached when it comes to sex.

But eight years after being so close to Pim-Pim and being there with her through so many of her struggles, she grew to like me, then love me. I grew the same. But I tried to avoid it and went into denial for months, but finally the inevitable happened. We made love. It was a beautiful moment in our lives and an unbreakable connection bloomed between us from that day onward. And that, without a doubt, was a bad thing.

Pim-Pim hated her last name: Blaine. She hated it with a passion. She hated anything that reminded her of father—the minister—the man who raped her.

I’m no good with names. I’ve had a list of casual sex partners fifty miles long. I’ve forgotten many of their names and even some of their faces, but Pim-Pim is someone real, someone special, and a calamity.

She gave me a new meaning to what sex should be. Ever since sex with her, I’ve slowed down. Now I want to stop casual sex completely. Settle down. With someone right for me. Pim-Pim definitely isn’t that person. So I tried to end the relationship four years ago. But I couldn’t end the relationship with Pim-Pim, and this was just the tip of the problem.

We’ve been trying to end it since it is wreaking havoc and contention in our love lives. It puts me at an inner turmoil about love. I can’t figure out if having great sex helps to make you love someone.

Or, does loving someone helps make sex great? Which is it? Now there are some questions to put some thought into.

CHAPTER 2

2010.

“Richie … Do the things I say make you want to cheat sometimes?”

Since Tori asked me this, I knew exactly what was on her mind, though maybe I was judging wrong. She doesn’t usually think a lot before she speaks. But even though she asked the question over the phone, I could tell from the pause before she asked that she had been deep in thought.

I wondered, is Tori a bitch? I know she has intentions of casual sex with me. And I also know that it’s only ok for men to have casual sex, but not women. But sometimes I wonder about the double standard: should women be liberal enough to have casual sex with whoever they desire without people looking down at them as bitches and whores? For some strange reason I believe women are born with a sex drive just as men are—then again, I may be wrong. Can you answer this, though? If it is okay for men to have casual sex, but wrong for women, then who should we men be having casual sex with? Hmmm? Mermaids and elephants? Cows and platypus?

I want to stop being a player. No more casual sex. Settle down. No cheating. I know that makes me a punk and it’s like I’m willfully deciding to give up one of my testicles. But so what? That’s what I want—not the one testicle—the settle down serious relationship.

The right girl for me to settle down with was Mary-Ann. As a matter of fact, we were to get married in three months and five days, on December 14, 2010. I had already told most of my family. Everyone was happy for me. Some were hypocrites, as usual, with their congratulations and pretentious smiles. The biggest hypocrite in my family who smiled a lot and pretended to be happy for me and really wasn’t, was—ME. Ever since this girl named Tori came in the picture, well . . . Ok, lemme just explain.

Call me stupid or an idiot, the choice is really yours, but I have Mary-Ann’s name tattooed on my neck in beautiful Sans Serif font. She has my name on the same place on her. I considered this to either be a Casanova romantic gesture or terribly foolish. Maybe I’d suggested us getting matching tattoos (yes it was I, the clever one, who came up with the matching tattoo idea, thank you) as my meager attempt to convince myself to stay committed to our relationship. And with the help of God I knew I could fight all my boyish urges and be a husband, a dad. Stay committed. Or maybe the tattoo plan wasn’t all that brilliant after all.

I’m Richie Drenz. I own one of the most popular urban clothing lines in Jamaica, Drenz Fashion. I don’t tell you this to brag. I’m telling because my position increases my chance of having effortless one night stands. Women like popular things, and popular guys, even if you’re as ugly as the devil’s pet frog. But at my age of thirty, I’m ready for a settle down relationship with Mary-Ann, to totally ignore the attention so many women are willing to give me right now.

I pondered about Tori’s question while lying on my bed. Cheat? Does Tori make me want to cheat?’ How did Tori come into my soon-to-be-married life?

Well I wasn’t trying to deceive Tori, or anyone on Facebook for that matter, when my relationship status said “single.” Mary-Ann had said to me,

“Don’t put that we’re in a relationship on your profile.” She wagged her skinny index finger at my nose and warned, “I don’t want the whole Internet knowing my business.”

She had even told me not to put up the pictures of our matching tattoos. I promised her solemnly I wouldn’t. And then I went and did it all the same behind her back. I changed the privacy setting on the pictures and blocked her profile so she couldn’t see that I posted them. She has always been the private type and rarely even uses Facebook, unlike me. I’m a very online person. I mean, if I’m not on it for three days you can call 911 and report me missing. I impulsively post all of my life on Facebook, even the dirty details. I guess that’s how I randomly added Tori as a friend in the first place.

Well, not quite randomly to be honest and since I’m being totally honest through this entire memoir, which is quite hard for me and embarrassing to write, at least you’ll understand how we men really think. No bullshitting, no sugar-coating, no trying to look good, I’m just giving the honest truth about how we men think and to explain why good men cheat. Yes, men are gonna hate me for this, I know.

CHAPTER 3

What happened was, Tori’s profile pic caught my eye, but seeing that I was in a relationship, I was only adding her for the sheer heck of it. I wasn’t seeking any sex or relationship or anything from her. I sent her a friend request just by manly impulsiveness. Let me clear my conscience. Women will never understand this about men, but it is scientifically true: we cannot, I repeat, cannot, see a sexy woman and not have her attract our attention within the first three seconds of seeing her. We have no control over those first three seconds, but after that we do. So, Ladies, if you think your guy didn’t check out that fly chick in the tight jean shorts passing by, sorry, he did. However, it doesn’t mean we must act upon the attraction. Some of us men have learned enough in life to understand it ain’t worth it, ninety-five percent of the time, especially when you already have someone who is worth your commitment. And I was in a committed relationship with Mary-Ann. No way was I going to fuck it up.

I have loads of inbox messages from females flirting with me—those fuck-every-hot-man type of women who I wouldn’t even as much as finger-fuck. I told them I was in a committed relationship, soon to be married. To the other women who wrote me, professional and ladylike and had great potential, I told them I was in a committed relationship and soon to be married. I was wholeheartedly decided on being committed to Mary-Ann—she had more than proven her worth.

But when we, as men, see, for instance, a gorgeous woman, such as Tori with wide hip bones beautifully fleshed out into perfect curves, long curly hair glowing skin, obvious breasts and pouty lips, we may, on a whim, send her a friend request.

I figured it wouldn’t be problematic at all to add someone so far away, right? What harm could there be? That three second thingy had more than passed when I clicked a friendly “add” on her profile, sending her a friendly friend request, hoping that she’d accept. Waiting for her to accept to go straight to her private albums and look for the one titled ‘beach whatever’ or plain ‘beach’ just to look at her sexy pics. That’s all. No other intention. Just peep around. Peep. I didn’t say stalk.

As a matter of fact, how stupid would it be of me to try and fuck one of Mary-Ann’s friends? That would ruin everything I was committed to. Well, I was assuming Mary-Ann and Tori were conversational friends, at least, because it was while Mary-Ann was scrolling through her friend’s list that my wandering eye caught a glimpse of a picture of Tori in her pink bikini. Mary-Ann had like nineteen friends on Facebook, sixteen girls and only three boys: her cousin, Craig, and two other dudes, Blanco Hotboy-Dillinger, a funny looking dude with a long pear-shaped face, heavy drooping bottom lip, widespread nose and a pleasant bald spot smack in the middle of his head. And then there was Sadiki Fellon, who she worked with. She didn’t chat with men much, was quick to shut them down. She only accepted friend requests from people she actually knew and talked with, which, as you can see, weren’t many. She totally didn’t believe in the concept of online friends. If she had never met you before and you sent her a friend request she’d never accept it. She even refused requests from old schoolmates because they were past schoolmates, not “friends,”—in her eyes they only wanted to pry in her business.

I, on the other hand, believed that was utter nonsense. I didn’t see any trouble with having a couple online friends. Facebook is a social network, goddammit, it’s there to make online friends and I had a couple of friends there. I had over three thousand friends, three quarters of which I absolutely didn’t know, but the number made me look popular, so I accepted every friend request and boasted on my friends that I had many online friends.

I remembered the day Tori accepted my friend request. If you’d ever heard about the word happy, and pictured many teeth between two wide grinning lips, then that was me when I saw that she had actually accepted my request. Without delay I was in her album titled “Beach Trip 09”. Yes, I knew a sexy, showy girl like her must have a beach album because having an album like that is the female’s way of innocently showing off her sexiness, without the worry of seeming stripper-like. Wearing panties and a bra on Facebook is a slutty girl seeking attention. Bikini bottom and top, now that’s a different thing. That’s quite acceptable and ladylike. And if women want to add classiness to it, they wear carnival costumes that are even tinier and more revealing than regular panties and bra. WTF ladies???

Aww well, let’s continue. I’m gonna be an open book with you, ok? Usually when we men see a stunning profile pic, it’s one of the better, if not the best, pics that the girl has and all her other pics are worse than her profile pic. With Tori, (I’m no pervert or anything), her pics were so fucking hot, I downloaded either two or three or twenty-seven of them to my computer. I wasn’t stalking her when I downloaded so many of her pictures. More a preventative measure. Just in case my Internet chose to start acting up, I could still look at her pics. She was perfect. Dimpled smile, big white teeth, glorious ass. The flawless picture of her, her skin wet, dripping beach water, was so beautiful that if you gave it to the great Stevie Wonder to look at, it would make him stiff, instantly.

What came as a shocker was that she lived in Jamaica. Clarendon, Jamaica, to be exact. I lived in Portmore, a bit of a distance, but why was I even mentally measuring the distance? Why? What if, you know, by some Lordly intervention, I should meet her one day, somehow, I pondered. Not knowing the devil was planning the same hot oil to boil me in.

I want you to work this out with me. Her wall was so festooned with lusting men dropping her slick, corny pick-up lines and completely inappropriate offers about what lewd sexual acts they wanted to do to various parts of her body. Could you imagine what how full her inbox was with so-called compliments? She definitely wouldn’t have time for little not-so-handsome me. Not that I wanted any of her time. Or that it even mattered. I’m just saying. Girls like Tori are nothing but trouble and crosses anyway, so it’s best I stay far away. And you know what, most pretty girls’ sex are lame. It’s so twisted that we men believe that if a woman is pretty or sexy, the sex will be on cloud ninety-nine automatically.

And some pretty women believe that since they’re pretty they can just lay lifeless on the bed like the precious jewelry they are, and the sex will be off the fucking the chain. Newsflash: just because the guy came doesn’t mean your sex was top-notch. What makes any sex great are the vibes, the shamelessness, the willingness to please each other, the connection you have with the person, not the looks, so chances are, Tori wouldn’t even be worth the effort anyway.

Still, I took a peek at her profile every day. Peek. I didn’t say stalk. Her statuses were remarkably lame but I read them every single day. Most of them were about her little sister, Gabbie. I wondered if she wanted a baby for herself. In thought I joked that maybe I could help her with that aspect of life, even though I haven’t yet gotten a child myself. I further considered two things: getting a dog to keep me company, and doing a thorough test on my balls at the erectile dysfunctional lab.

Two months later, I uploaded a picture of myself I got thirty-two likes, but only one like was enough—the one from her. My fingers itched to message her, like someone rubbed my hand in some strong country cow-itch bush or poison ivy.

The day after I uploaded the picture, I typed her a message that began, “Hey beautiful,” but then I backspaced it all, deleted it. I assumed it made no sense inboxing her, on top of the clutter she must already have in her inbox. I wasn’t trying to get a date or anything, besides, look how far apart we lived from each other. I only thought it would be cool to just be online friends with such a pretty girl. Mary-Ann had nothing to worry about because I only wanted conversation. Not a thing more. A week went by before the first inbox.

She inboxed me first.

My heart raced at an irregular speed when I saw the notification that I had a message from her. She wrote,

“Hey Richie, I like your clothing line. I would love to model your clothes someday.”

I thought she was gonna say that she liked me, but I guess the clothing line comment was a good enough starter. I thought out my reply from the tip of the “T” to the tail of the “Z.”

“Sure, have you ever modelled before?”

Clearly my note was to open up a conversation between us, because I’d gone through every one of her pictures at a minimum of, to say the least, about, twenty-seven times already, and had seen that she modelled and had also done a couple of video shoots. I took notice that she had up tons of pictures of baby Gabbie.

She replied to my message less than thirty seconds later. Obviously, no thought whatsoever went into her reply—it was pure impulsiveness. Just what I wanted. Good. She replied saying this.

CHAPTER 4

“Yeah. I do music videos, too. You can check out my pics. But I’ve never done anything for a clothing line before. I always see artists in your clothing. And I would look hotter in them than the girl you last you used.”

“You signed to a modelling agency”? I typed back, after some careful thought, though I didn’t care if she was signed to one or not. I wanted to seem professionally interested about only doing promotional business with her. Lie? Maybe.

“No, I do my things myself.”

“Oh cool, you’re doing great to be managing yourself. You’re a boss lady.” I hyped her up.

“Yeah. You know it, I’m a hustler.”

“But you live in Clarendon, right?”

“Yeah. But I’m in Kingston often.” Kingston is much closer to where I live in Portmore.

On and on we chatted, then bantered about stuff that had absolutely nothing to do with business, but rather about becoming friends. We became online friends and occasionally messaged each other until a mutual friend of ours inboxed me that Tori was tripping over me. This is what he messaged me:

“Yow, Richie, Tori checking you out big time my boss. Every day she talks about you.”

Okay. So this dude that inboxed me was also a mutual friend of Mary-Ann’s. To play it safe and have a peaceful drama-free life, since I wasn’t sure if he knew about my and Mary-Ann’s relationship or our plan to be lawfully wedded wife and husband, I replied saying, “That’s cool. But I have a girl already. Thanks for looking out still bro.”

“You sure my boss?”

“Yeah Man. I’m cool, Bro.”

“Alright then. Respect my boss.”

Later the same day Tori inboxed me asking if I had a girlfriend.

“Technically no.” I typed back.

This was my very first inbox saying no to my relationship status. What was I to learn from this natural lie I told?

My relationship with Mary-Ann was no overnight or hurry come-up thing. We’d lived together for about two years and we were still in love when she migrated to New York for good. She became an air-hostess. She flew in quite often to see me. No, she wasn’t rich, but since her plane fare was cheap as a part of her benefit of being an airline staff, she took advantage of this.

She visited me in Jamaica very often sometimes at ungodly hours of the night, when I was mid-way into my nightmares. On one of the weekends when Mary-Ann was at my house, she asked me about another thing we had already decided on as if she were having some doubts for some reason or another. I don’t know what flew up in her head but out of the brawling blues she asked, “You sure you’re ready for a baby?”

A flickering thought of Tori sailed across my mind before my answer came to my tongue.

“Yeah, I’m certain. Tired of the run-around life. I want to settle down, with kids.” I looked at her then added. “And with you, Boo.”

“Please listen to me good, Richie, you know I’m not into games or anything. I was quite content in New York till you called me and told me you’re ready for this. But sometimes . . .” She stopped and shook her head in thought.

“Sometimes what?”

She shook her head again in a negative instead of answering me, as if she didn’t want to say what she was thinking. I asked her again, “Sometimes WHAT?”

She looked straight into my eyes. “It’s like . . . It’s like . . .” She lowered her stare to my chest to get rid of her stuttering thoughts and gathered enough courage to speak her heart without fumbling. “I don’t know you anymore. You’ve changed so much. Sometimes it’s like you’re not certain, or you’re reconsidering. And I think of all the things I’m giving up and sacrificing to be with you. You know? I’m basically changing my whole life to make this work and it’s a big decision. But your actions . . . they . . .” She looked back in my eyes, her eyes glossy and wet. “Honestly, Richie, I don’t want you to fuck up my life.”

She was sterner than her usual serious self. She was the one who seemed to have changed in large quantities, not me. She seemed a lot more angry and cold. I had never heard that distant sound of anger in her voice before.

“Boo, I’m certain I want you to have my kids. A bad little Richie Junior,” I said softly.

I thought I was adding some light humor to things but she snapped back, “When? Huh?”

The question of “when” seemed more like an attack than a lover’s convo.

“I’m ready now, Boo.”

She was lost in her thoughts for a moment then she burst out, “Be honest, Richie, when we lived together, you loved me?” She folded her arms and stared at me with a pressing strictness in her eyes that caused her brows to pull closer together as she interrogated, “So you said, right?”Her folded arms pressed harder into her bosom. “Then why didn’t you get me pregnant?”

“That was five years ago. I wasn’t ready. Now I’m ready.” I slowly pulled her folded arms off her flat bosom, gently put them to her side and kissed her forehead. She leaned in, rested her head on my chest, closed her eyes. I hugged her. She hugged back. I held her. She squeezed me.

CHAPTER 5

I hardly ever inboxed Tori for the next month. I stopped almost completely.

We had exchanged phone numbers and were calling each other every single day and night instead. Her voice didn’t match her face. Her accent was too country for her Hollywood face. I always wanted to smile when I listened to her. I just couldn’t imagine that strong Clarendon accent coming out her mouth. She had a terrible lisp, plus she talked really fast, which made it hard to understand her at first. But then my ears got acquainted to her high-pitched voice. Funny enough though, I was thoroughly captivated by it. It was never cloying or annoying. The more I heard her speak, the more I wanted her to keep chatting with that mighty lisp. Her voice was sexy, just sexy. Especially when we talked about sex.

The fun in our convos came from her unpredictability. I never knew what might jump out of her mouth. She might hurt my feelings, be sad, wildly happy or horny. She might make corny jokes or motivate me to do something extremely grand in life that I couldn’t achieve in ten millenniums. I’m talking about some sure-shot, flat-out failures—that’s if you’re a big enough idiot to take them on. At times she’d have these illusions of grandeur for herself, too. She’d come up with complex multi-million dollar projects that she’d design on the whim. In thirty seconds flat. Brand new and brilliantly ridiculous. Einstein had nothing on Tori; her intellect was beyond reach for the mere mortal man. And to top things off, she always projected some unreasonably short time to get it up and running. Always by tomorrow. When tomorrow came, she always said her first idea was shit and enthusiastically introduced you to her bigger and better plan that was twice as brilliant.

I didn’t want to be the fly in her soup that spoiled her party, so to keep our arguments lively, I usually just agreed saying “Of course you can do it, Boo.” Because I knew that the next day, she’d have a new ingenious business idea.

I think the poor child was bi-polar.

Kind of perfect for me, since I was, too, sometimes. Still am. Most of us Librans are.

Mary-Ann, on the other end, was smart. She was mighty tough-headed, too, a Taurus. And that’s what I hated most about her—that she was smart.

My watery lies would wobble under the pressure of her drilling questions. Not for the love of the Virgin Mary, would she just accept my nifty lies without some pretty thorough (and well-calculated, may I add) interrogations highlighting the obvious gaping holes in my stories that I had swiftly but intelligently crafted. When I lied till I couldn’t lie anymore and was finally cornered, I was usually left with a blank face thinking how un-nifty and dunce I was to ever have said them in the first place.

Praises to God, this doesn’t happen when you’re with a small-brain girl. You can tell her you did overtime and get away with it flying. But not with Mary-Ann, no, no, no. Your ass will be properly French fried when she looks at your overtime pay-sheet. Exact date, time and all was properly recorded in her brain like some sort of witchcraft all women are capable of doing with dates. You’ll forget, but she won’t.

Tori’s calls got more frequent and as annoying as someone biting you on your teeth. At times I wished Tori would give me a break and not call so often, her voice ning-ning in my ears like Portmore mosquitoes. Most women don’t understand how medicinal most men find having some space. Sometimes that’s all a relationship needs. No, it’s not that we don’t love you; it’s just that we need some time away from you, away from each other, alone. Just without each other. To loosen the constipated tightness in the relationship and give it some air, sometime to breathe, to rejuvenate and for us to miss you.

Anyway, Tori was pretty and we didn’t have sex as yet, so all her annoying calls were worth it. Plus I hadn’t been getting many calls from Mary-Ann over the past few months. She hadn’t visit in over three months because she was working all the extra time she could and saving toward our wedding. Of course, you can guess that I was lonely and needed some sort of female companionship. Maybe deep down, I was horny, too. My penis was erect a lot and the last time I touched a breast was two months ago in a KFC box.

When Tori and I had been talking to each other for about three months, she asked one day, “Richie, the picture with the tattoo. Who’s the girl?”

Our conversations were often flirtatious. I was getting closer to her, and I’m talking about emotionally connecting with her, not just on a sexual level. I was really liking her sexy, bi-polar ways. I didn’t want to lie to her or hide my relationship status anymore. I told her the honest truth.

“That’s Mary-Ann. We’ll be getting married soon.”

“Married? Seriously? You said you didn’t have a girl. Look how many months we’ve been chatting. When were you going to mention this Wicked?”

A small guilty silence crept into me. I was waiting for an answer to come, but it was like waiting for February 30—it wouldn’t come. I just couldn’t answer. She asked even louder, “You were waiting till after you fucked me?”

“Well technically she’s not my girl, right? And it’s not like I’m trying to make you my girl or—”

“I can’t believe you’re saying this shit. So I am . . .?” She waited for me to fill in the blanks.

“We’re just friends. Have we ever done anything more than talk? We ever met?”

“Oh, so that’s it? Ooo-kay.” From the way her okay sounded—slow, dragging on the “O”—I was sure she wasn’t agreeing. Shit, we had spent wee hours talking freaky stuff about what we’d do to each other in her lispiest of tongue. I guess she felt somewhat cheated or belittled. Or objectified. I didn’t know.

“What does that okay mean?” I questioned her.

“Well I don’t like seeing them.”

“The pictures?

“Yes.”

“The tattoos are ugly?”

“No. I just . . . I just don’t like you having them up.”

“Okay,” I replied in a “so-what” voice.

“So what are you going to do about them, Richie?” I could hear she wasn’t putting up with any nonsense. I became confused, where was she going with this?

“What you mean?”

“Just that. What are you gonna do? You don’t understand English now?”

“I don’t know. What do you want me to do? Delete the pictures?”

Her request was preposterous. She’s not the boss of me. Why would I delete pictures of my wife-to-be for her? She can’t make me do anything against my will. It’s not like I’ve even met her face-to-face. But then again, the pictures didn’t matter to Mary-Ann anyway. Did they? She didn’t want them there in the first place. So I guess I could just . . .

I deleted all the pictures. I don’t think I did it because Tori asked me to. I did it for Mary-Ann, since she hadn’t wanted them there. And as soon as I did it the following day, I texted Tori.

“Hey, morning, Big-head. I deleted the pics for you. Miss you. Mwahz! xoxo.”

About five minutes passed, a text returned to my phone. I smiled. Picked up my phone. But it wasn’t from Tori. It was from Mary-Ann. My smile faded and my face straightened. I hoped I didn’t send the message to Mary-Ann by mistake.

Mary-Ann’s focus on her job made it more difficult for her to spending time with me, a hefty sacrifice she made. There had been small moments in time when I wanted to hear her voice and couldn’t. But with Tori, those small moments of missing Mary-Ann didn’t exist anymore. Tori had a lot more time for me than Mary-Ann, owing to the single fact that Tori didn’t have a job. The telephone chats between me and Tori were much lighter and had many more smiles and brawling laughs than Mary-Ann’s serious calls. Mary-Ann’s calls were constantly about the same circle of things. Every single call. Usually about us making a baby, marriage, house, problems with her sister, our relationship. So, when necessary, I lied incessantly that I missed her, too, in reply to her repeatedly telling me she missed me, as if she were a scratched record.

The text from Mary-Ann said, “Miss you, Boo.” If I saw that text one more time, I would puke.

I replied, “I miss you too, Honey. Love you so much.”

Yeah, I sound cold, but it’s the truth—all of us men do it. A woman’s emotional need is far greater than a man’s, so we often fake it. Every man does. Now you know the raw truth, no sugar coating.

The truth was Tori was my new ball of joy, my bell, my bing-gi-ling-gi-ling. Sexy, beautiful and fun to talk with. Unlike women, we men hate commitment and tend to want to try new women just for the thrill of it. Yielding to the temptation of lust doesn’t mean I love Mary-Ann any less. Just as how, when you sin, it doesn’t mean that you love God less. Does it?

In actuality, we men are able to separate lust from love. We’ll fuck anything in a frock without having any amount of love for them. We don’t even have to know their names. No, men are not dogs. In a man’s world, lust is different from love. We can actually have sex with a woman we hate if she’s sexy and the right amount of horny hits us. Sex to us is purely a physical thing, no love necessary. Sex is in a completely different continent of our body from love. They don’t correlate whatsoever for us.

This is where most women go wrong when trying to figure out us men. They believe that because they associate sex with emotions, that we men are the same. But we are wired totally different. This is why, generally, men’s behaviour is opposite to women’s after men get the pussy. While a woman grows an emotional connection after sex, some even falling in love, there’s no connection there for men—it was purely a physical act and we want to move on, but women want a relationship.

It’s just the same old saying: the lust is always sexier on the other side. We men have to be strong and call upon our inner counsellor to counsel our penises, assuring it that the women we haven’t had sex with always look greener and are not worth the risk of pursuing while we’re in a relationship. This is something men like me who are trying to be faithful and committed have to chant to ourselves always, seeing that we’re naturally gifted with the defect of succumbing to lust. It’s an everyday fight and I was fighting it now. I can assure you it’s no walk in the park to resist other women. Why do you think most men lose this battle? It’s hard. Women cannot understand that men are genetically hard-wired to salivate over new pussy; it’s like waving a bone before a dog. We have to respond all the time.

We fall to greener or newer flesh. Somehow the temptation of “new” pussy, whether the girl is ugly, slim, fat or ratchet, is almost irresistible for us men. Now chew on this: Tori was new pussy, far from ratchet, far from ugly and far from bony. Lord, what a battle.

Mary-Ann had no curves. Well, she had a nice high ass for her skinny limbs, but her physique wasn’t one to alarm the boys when she walked by on the street. She’s a bit bony. I wondered sometimes if being with Mary-Ann for the rest of my life was the right thing to do. It was now a constant thought of mine. Whether it was an excuse I was mentally conjuring up so I could be closer friends with Tori or if it was indeed questionable I had no idea, but the question took front residence in my mind since I met Tori.

Tori and I had been having constant talks over the phone for the past seven months. And her annoyance was thick now. I mean, we talked for hours and hours, yesterday, the day before that, the day before that and the day before that. We’d had phone sex and she wanted us to have webcam sex but that wasn’t really my shit. Though we were still only friends, sometimes our conversations got carried away like that. She was an in-the-moment girl. She didn’t consider things too much and once we were in a sexual moment she’d react sexually, without thought. I don’t even know if I felt guilty about doing it. But we phone-sexed more than once—about eleven perverted times.

My phone rang. Tori had called me more than once in the day already. And now at 3:43 A.M., it’s her again. Tori had asked me to meet up with her before, but I was busy so I told her I couldn’t, knowing deep down inside even if I could, I wouldn’t so that I could avoid my twisting bundle of confused feelings.

I didn’t want to cheat on Mary-Ann and I didn’t want the casual sex thing. And if it’s not casual sex I want from Tori, then what do I want from her? It couldn’t be a real relationship, obviously. Friends with benefits? Does friends with benefits involve her getting maintenance money? Do I support her, help out? What? What is it I really desire from Tori?

I’m certain it’s more than just physical, more than just sex, but with the clingy and demanding type lover it seemed she was, I knew I couldn’t have her as my side-chick. So if not a side relationship with her then should I walk away? I couldn’t. Though I must admit that the sex factor influenced my desire to be with Tori, it was still a lot more than just that. Our connection was natural. I was actually fond of her and her annoying calls, her energetic bi-polar ways, her lisp tongue. Truth be told, she made my day, every day. No, I’m not confused.

I knew that even if we met in a public place, the raw passion I felt for her, her body, and her blatant sex appeal provided a chance of me slipping and being unfaithful to Mary-Ann. So I had avoided it. But now I wanted to meet her, only as a friend. I respected her as a friend and I wouldn’t violate our friendship like that. In any case, I’d bought her a surprise and I had to see her to give it to her anyway. Though I could mail it, I preferred to hand it to her.

I looked at my phone, saw it was her calling and didn’t answer. I put my head back on the pillow and closed my eyes.3:45 a.m. My cell, the screen laid downward right next to my pillow, rang again. I had no idea this phone call was the phone call that would change all things.

I crankily reached for my cell, and the change began with me saying a simple hello. I shifted slightly in the bed to more easily hold the cell phone to my ear. My eyes were shut, my mouth tasted stale, and I was still half dreaming. Her voice was wide awake when she spoke.

“Good night.”

She sounded skippy in fact. But from her listening pause that came after, I could tell she was waiting to search the tone of my voice to see if I was annoyed at her for calling for the eleventh time, or if I just didn’t want to talk to her. She didn’t want to seem too clingy or attached, but after eleven calls in one day, it was too late to hide that.

“Good night,” I answered in a flat croaky tone. I said nothing more, only listened to her awkward pause until she finally spoke, not to me, though, to her baby sister, Gabbie.

“Yes, you can come. You don’t want sleep with Mommy?” I couldn’t hear Gabbie’s response clearly, it was some gibberish sleep-talk and then I heard a shuffling, less distant, closer, as if Gabbie were getting into Tori’s bed. Tori said, “Hold a sec, Richie.”

God I wanted to sleep. Sleep was intoxicating and taking over my state of mind. I could fall back to sleep in less than three seconds. I heard her phone bounce or bump on the bed, then a low sliding friction sound, as if, without any thought, she had recklessly thrown the phone on her bed rather than placing it down.

I wasn’t fighting with the heavy sleep pushing down my eyelids, it gently overpowered me. My eyes shut, I dosed off. I don’t know how many seconds or days passed before I heard a louder rustling noise as she picked up her cell. Her movements sounded carefree and energetic “Gabbie’s cute when she’s sleeping. Hehehe. Look at her mouth . . .”

I didn’t hehehe back at her. I said nothing and there was another awkward two second pause.

She then chipped in and spoke speedily, “Anyway, was just calling to say good night . . . I’m kind of sleepy . . . Just telling my little bunny good night before I sleep.”

She called me her little bunny, how sweet is that? I continued my silence. Another awkward fullstop once more. I knew she was waiting on a reply from me, to encourage her to talk, as lovers do in the wee mornings. The problem was, we weren’t lovers. Even though we often expressed ourselves to each other as that, we weren’t. And somehow, without the physical part of our close friendship, no face-to-face, it was becoming strenuous and tiresome on my part. Just chatting, chatting, chatting over the phone and nothing else. When nothing came from me, she continued.

“Ermm . . . You sleepy?”

I figured she didn’t just call to say goodnight.

CHAPTER 6

I may be the only guy in her life right now getting this amount of attention. Little not-so-cute me. The only person she spends so many long hours at night, every night, with. I meant something to her. And she meant something to me. She wanted to chat, laugh, sex talk, hug her pillow and listen to my voice till she was really too sleepy to speak, then we both remained silent over the phone and slept with each other over the distance. She didn’t even care if we had nothing to say to each other on the phone, she just wanted to be with me. But how could she admit that? She definitely was too proud to want to seem clingy or emotionally needy of my attention. So she hid her desires and hoped my conscience would push me to sense that she really wanted to talk with me.

I didn’t want to talk. Sleep was beating me left, right, and center.

“Yeah, I’m sleepy. So, good night,” I dryly told her.

She didn’t hang up.

“Love you,” she said, and I could feel some trueness in her.

“Love you too, Boo.”

I didn’t mean it. I was just going through the familiar procedure. I wanted to get off the phone. And somehow she could sense that my response was automatic, with no truth. She hates when I don’t miss her. She hates me when she has to be doing all the calling. But sometimes, I love when I don’t hear from her.

“When am I going to see you, Boo?” Though her voice was whiny it sounded sincere—she wanted to see me.

That got me perked. I rolled on my side, faced the fan blowing a low cool breeze on my face, my face resting on the back of my hand that was on the pillow. Over the months since I haven’t had anyone in my bed, I grew accustomed to having the other pillow between my knees. It made me feel less lonely.

“You don’t see my pics on Facebook?” I smiled while saying that.

A good feeling burst inside me to know she cared about seeing me. I barely opened my eyes. My small room was lonely, silent. Inside was dark except for the pale light the computer screen was emitting onto my bed. I was still logged into Facebook but that wasn’t the tab showing on the computer screen. I had two tabs open in Mozilla Firefox. One was redtube.com, my favorite porn site. I slowly lowered my eyelid, my smile still pushing my cheeks toward the opposite sides of my face.

“I want to meet you tomorrow. The person. Not Facebook.” No whiny voice this time, she sounded firm and decided.

“To . . .?” I waited for her to complete what I’d prompted, but she didn’t pick up, so I repeated louder, “TO . . . ?”

“To see you. What else?”

“Just that?”

“Yeah. What else? Don’t you have Mary-Ann? You forget?”

Ever since I told her about my plans with Mary-Ann she was always quick on the draw to rub it in my face.

“I only asked if it’s just that. I didn’t say anything else. Did I?”

“Friends. That’s all we are. Right, Richie?”

This question caused me to turn in the bed again. I dragged the pillow from between my legs. I lay on my back looking up at the white ceiling that looked grey in the dim light. I placed my hand on my belly and my finger in my jeans waistband. I still had on my jeans from when I fell asleep talking to her earlier. The jeans felt rough against my skin and I wanted to get out of them.

I answered, “Yeah we both want that. But, do we mean it?” This was a very good question. Did we mean it? Were we only friends who wanted to be only that?

“Of course,” she reassured me. I then asked her a question that I thought would help to show her that she was in denial.

“Do you call any other of your friends six times in one day, because you called me eleven?”

I crossed my outstretched legs over each other. And I pondered, should men shave their legs? That question came from out of nowhere in my head. Tori was answering my trick question.

“No. But, you know, we’re like brothers and sisters, more than friends.”

We were both in denial. Though I’d told her she was like my sister, I was hoping she’d look through it and realize that brothers don’t spend so much time on the phone with their sisters. No brother even wants to be around his sister constantly.

“Do brothers and sisters discuss sex as often as we do?” I asked her.

I pushed my hand farther down into my jeans, and then shovelled my hand into my boxers, the heel of my palm resting against my abs.

“But we’re not actually brothers and sisters, this type is different. So of course we can,” she rebutted.

Obviously she wasn’t about to admit it. I took a different angle.

“Tori, we have phone sex like jack rabbits. What are you talking about friends?”

In the silence that came from her end of the phone, I could hear princess Gabbie snoring heavily close by, maybe on her bosom, or in her lap.

“Then tell me what I am to you?”

I tried answering. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t find what to say. I didn’t even believe in casual sex anymore. What was Tori to me? Then my mind flashed to someone who meant a lot more to me. Pim-Pim. What was Pim-Pim to me? I wasn’t sleepy anymore. My mind was pounding. I switched the phone from one hand to the next, and then rested my free hand behind my head. Since I couldn’t come up with an answer, I asked her, “So you want to go all the way from Clarendon to Portmore, just to see me, to talk? Like we do every day and night? Hmm?”

“Yes. So what’s wrong with that?”

Her reply was swift. I thought about her coming over to my house. The thought was pleasant. Then she punched some air out of me when she said, “But then again, I’m not sure I’m gonna have fare enough to come tomorrow, because the little money I have left I have to give to Gabbie for lunch tomorrow. Mommy’s broke right now.”“What about the money you’re saving to buy the Blackberry?”

“You mad? I can’t touch that.”

“No, Man, it’s okay, use it. I’ll give you back the money when you reach here. Cool?”

“Alright. Cool.”

“Are you coming to my house or what?”

“Doesn’t matter. Whichever.” She didn’t even think about it for a second.

I was thinking about the consequences of me and her alone at my house. Alone. My hand hugged around my cock. It wasn’t soft anymore; it was up and straining to burst through my boxers.

“You can sleep over if you want to, you know.” I kindly suggested.

“Yeah.”

She answered swiftly again without thought and as she finished saying “yeah” it seemed a thought hit her. “But noooo, Richie. Remember, I have church in the morning.”

“Oh. Forgot you go to church on Saturdays.” She made sure she cleared the air early on and set things straight saying, “But wipe it out your mind. Nothing’s going to happen.” She went on to hum a song as if she were happy. I couldn’t pick up on which song it was. Somehow my feelings were a bit wrinkled about what she had said.

“So why do we talk about sex so much, and have phone sex so often, if you don’t want to do it with me?”

“Who said I don’t want to?” She continued humming the same jolly melody.

I knew the song had something to do with sex and her pussy. I also knew that no one’s sex could compare to Pim-Pim’s, but was hoping that if anyone was close, it would be Tori. Deep down in my thoughts I truly wanted to have Pim-Pim forever, though I knew it was impossible. The relationship with me and her was quite complex, so I totally stay away from her. We cannot see each other and not have sex. And every single time we do it sends me to the place where angels live and sip on honey. But, especially with Mary-Ann and marriage now in the picture, I didn’t want to avoid Pim-Pim anymore.

I NEEDED to.

For a peaceful life. I didn’t want to be a cheating husband; I really wanted to be a committed one.

But obviously, I was beyond addicted to Pim-Pim, and her to me. We both are trying so hard to stop seeing each other, yet we had sex five months ago after promising ourselves for years that it would be the last time. Whenever sex crossed my mind, I thought only of Pim-Pim. Not Mary-Ann. Though if I was to get Mary-Ann pregnant I wouldn’t have a worry in the world. But I was a bit worried because the last time I had sex with Pim-Pim, I came inside her. Months had gone by and I had not heard anything from her so I guessed I’m not a father, still childless and maybe infertile.

Sometimes I wished, well all the time I wished, sex with Mary-Ann was even half as heavenly as it is with Pim-Pim. But if Tori was as open-minded as she claimed she was, then Pim-Pim may finally be in my past. Plus knowing Tori was far less complicated to deal with was more than a bonus, it was the lottery.

Tori stopped humming and her perky voice broke my chain of thoughts.

“I want to give you some, I think about it all the time, but just not on our first date. We need to really know each other first.”

“But it’s not our first date really.”

“Of course it is. I’ve never met you before, Dumb-dumb.”

“First date is getting to know the person. We both know each other inside and out, basically. Why must we wait?”

My phone was getting loose in my hand. I clenched my fingers tighter around it and held it closer to my ear and mouth. When I felt the heat on my jaw I knew the phone was getting hot, which meant that we had been talking for a while now.

“How would you view me, if the first time we met we went to bed? Eeh? Be honest.”

“I wouldn’t view you in anyway bad.”

“Well, honestly, I don’t believe you and I still would feel cheap. Like I don’t have any respect for myself.” She didn’t take a breath as she continued, as if she were spilling everything she had on her mind in one go. “And if you respect me, you wouldn’t try to fuck me on the first date either, Richie. You’d do that to Mary-Ann? If you’d fucked Mary-Ann the first day you saw her would you even consider marrying her? Eeh?”

There she goes again. She just kept pecking at me with the Mary-Ann situation. I breathed a harsh gust of air onto the hot phone and it ricocheted a grainy feedback.

“Whether it’s the first date or not, once a man sees a woman as not worthy to be his wife or, say, his bonafide woman and he just sees her as a conquest, whether he gets her the first date, fifth date, tenth date or whenever, then that’s it. And if he found her as wife material from the start and he’s looking and ready for a wife, first date or tenth date, he’d still respect her.” That’s what I told her. Then I asked, “So on the second date then?”

“No. That’s still too early.”

“Huh? You want me to wait till the oil in my back turns concrete?”

“At least five times first.”

“Five? You’re a mad woman?”

I turned onto my belly. It was uncomfortable with the ruffle of sheets under me. Instead of pulling them out, I flipped back on my back. She was talking and I didn’t want to miss a word she said, but all of a sudden the fan humming was interfering with listening to her as closely as I wanted to.

“Wait Tori, wait.” I shifted the fan off me and spun the white knob at the top to off. “Okay, what’d you say a while ago?”

CHAPTER 7

Her voice came up louder. “Yeah. I said five, so I can get to know the real you. People can pretend to be whoever online. Meeting them and getting to know them in person is different.”

“Why put a number to it then? Why not just work with the flow? Plus if people can pretend for years till after they’re married to show the real them, then what is five dates?”

“Don’t get loud with me.” The funny thing was she was telling me not to get loud and she was already talking louder than me. “I still want to wait. I’m not worth it?”

“Fine.” I breathed loudly in the phone again and used my thumb and index finger to squeeze on both sides of the bridge of my nose. My forehead wrinkled, I cringed and shut my eyes. “I’m not saying I won’t wait. Okay.”

And hey, even though it sounded like I was trying to be patient with Tori, it wasn’t really that. After what? About seven months, spending so much of my time and effort on Tori, that shit was an investment. I didn’t want it to go down the drain. I went on. “But just letting you know that me waiting won’t make me respect you more or less. If I plan to leave you right after I get the pussy, then as soon as I get it, long or short wait, I’m gone.”

“Ooh! So that’s what you’re planning? Eeh?”

“No. Just saying it won’t change anything.”

“Well it will for me.”

“Okay. Fine. Do you.”

“So watch here! You vex?”

“No. How can I be vex? It’s your pum-pum.”

In actuality, I was overjoyed. Why? We had never had an open serious conversation about actually meeting up and having sex. This was a dream coming true that started from just one friend request. Whether we waited five dates or not, the fact that we actually intended to one day had me going bananas. But of course you know, I couldn’t show her my joy, as if she held me that weak by the balls. But how soon would five dates happen? Another seven months? Three weeks? What? Would it be okay to tongue kiss her on the first date? Suck her nipples on the second? Intense foreplay on the third, and so on and so forth? What was the arrangement she had in mind?

“You’d be frightened to know how many of these artiste vex with me when they ask me and I tell them no. They ask me like they think it’s patty or burger they’re ordering… or as if I should be star-strucked.”

“Like which dancehall artiste?”

“Don’t worry yourself, I’m not calling no names.”

“Just say it Boo and stop being a hardball. You know I won’t snitch to anyone.”

“Why are you so eager to know?”

“ Mi inquisitive!”

“You love the mix-up and drama too much.”

“Wanna know who’s begging you for it and not getting.”

She tittered with a lisp as if she were trying to hold back the chuckles.

“Come on, talk if you’re talking and stop hiding it Boo.”

“Talk what?”

“Which artiste vex with you over sex?”