The Bastard

Chapter 4 of 5

by H. Jekyll

Chapter 4: “Love”

It’s hardest at night, when there’s nothing to distract me.

In the night I’ll remember sleeping with Elizabeth, or not sleeping. I’d be on my side and she would push herself up against my back. I’d be almost asleep and then I’d feel her breathing, first her chest, then her stomach, moving rhythmically against me. Sometimes her face would touch me straight on, and her breath would heat a spot in the middle of my back. Her breath was the warmest thing in the bed.

She wasn’t always like that, not nearly so romantic or dreamlike a sleeper. I found out that first night. I awoke at one point with her arm across my face. She was sprawled almost diagonally, spread all over the place. Later I woke up cold. She had pulled the comforter away and wrapped it around herself. It was nearly morning, but way too early to get up. Should I wake her? Hellfire. Not for anything. She was so damned cute, wrapped in my pilfered comforter. I walked around to her side of the bed and pulled it free. Gently. I spread the comforter out, then tucked it around her to make sure she stayed warm, but she corkscrewed back into it before I even got back to my side. Oh well. I pulled it back over, far enough to cover me, and gripped the edge until I fell asleep.

The next time I woke up it was morning and I was lying on my back. Elizabeth’s head was pressed against my shoulder and a hand was squeezing my arm. She was already awake, and grinning at me, looking about as superior as you can. “You were snoring, sweetie.”

“I’m afraid to tell you what you’ve been doing.”

She moved in with me that day. Or we moved back and forth with each other. Her place. Mine. It didn’t matter. We slept together almost every night. That morning she wanted to show me she could suck me without crying, and she could. We spent hours in bed, sipping hot chocolate and reading the Sunday papers and bothering each other.

Once we finally got up, she stood at the living room window, looking over the mass of alleys and buildings and the occasional tree. You could see a bridge in the distance.

“This is so beautiful.”

“Well, maybe if you’re going to stand there all morning you should put some clothes on.”

“Don’t you like me like this?”

“Everyone will like you like that.”

“Aren’t you proud of how your girl looks?”

“Yes, but I don’t want to show you off that much.”

“Why not?”

“A nice lesbian couple lives across the way. We’re friends, so I’d rather not have to fight them off.”

Elizabeth spread her front all the way across the window. Shy girl.

*****

When did I ruin it?

It wasn’t the day I passed an antiques shop in Brighton and saw an Art Nouveau lapel pin in the shape of a cello. Oh, she’ll love that! I bought it, though it was more than I could afford. While the shop owner wrapped it in tissue and put it in a small, white box of folded cardboard, I plotted how I’d give it to her. I finally decided to place it atop her pillow and let her find it. I could hardly wait.

It didn’t happen a week later, when we sat for forty-five minutes over lunch, in the middle of a park on the Charles, in bitterly cold sun, bundled under the comforter and drinking hot tea from thermoses, because Elizabeth missed the sunlight. I didn’t ruin it then.

*****

You want another scene? Imagine this. We’re naked, as usual, on my couch, nuzzling each other, and I’m stroking her puss. One finger quick down the middle. Caress. Repeat. We’re kissing and I like how her breath goes just so. I’m affectionate, but there’s her ass, and I want it again.

You’d think it was only her ass. You’d think it was only the sex. No, but God bless, to be in there. Why do I want that? Why do you want to know? Why does anyone want anything? I play with her crack, with her rim. I wet her and slip a finger inside, then two.

“Do you want my anus again?” I can’t tell from her voice if she’s curious or disapproving.

“You have such a sweet ass, sweeter than any other.” And it feels so fucking good.

She turns toward me. There’s a look to her.

“Have there been many others?”

“None as sweet as you.”

“Have there been many other asses?”

“None like yours. I love being in you.”

“How many have you been in?”

“You’re the sweetest, every part of you. Anyone else was just practice, so I wouldn’t fumble too much with you.”

She looks away, and I keep petting her. Curly black fuzz pushes back against my palm.

“Sometimes fumbling can be good.” Her breathing has changed. I don’t care if she complains. It’s almost time.

“When you fumble with me.”

“Isn’t that good?”

“Yes. When you fumble. My girl should learn on me.” How did the lines go? “Rapidly backwards and forwards, the early bees are assaulting and fumbling the flowers.”

“I know that one. ‘The Naming of Parts.’” She puts her face to my throat and her breath wets me. Now.

“You do the fumbling. I’ll name all your parts and assault your flowers, rapidly, backwards and forwards.”

I make her get up and walk to the table. She can use a pillow for her face and arms, for cushioning. She glances at an empty beer bottle as she leans forward from the waist. The bottle is sitting on the side of the table. She’s careful not to touch it. Spread your legs. Hold yourself for me. Two fingers with slippery jelly go in easily. In, out, and around. Next my penis, nice and fat, just for her. I want to stretch her completely today. I’d like to go too far. Yes, I would. Don’t ask me why, damn it! If I could shove too far, force more than she can bear, and still have her take it, I would! I love her, but I would.

Take it, Elizabeth! Take it!

When she opens I slide right in and she goes “Ohh!” and it’s to the hilt. Yes, yes. Stay in. Play with her puss again. Fingers in. Pull on it. Thumb goes around in a circle while she holds herself for me.

Now for the beer bottle. I think Elizabeth knows what I’m going to do with it. I’ve been thinking about this ever since I used it in on Erica. Put it to her flower. Push it in. She grunts wonderfully. What is it like for her? I push the bottle in hard, and twist it, and hold everything tightly inside her, together, so she can experience all the pressure before I use the bottle on her. I’m still holding my dick motionless so I don’t come too soon. I think I can bring her off first, but she’s perfect no matter what. She’ll let me do anything.

*****

Then there’s what happened after the scene. Once we were cleaned, and rested. She had put on her undies, in case there was seepage, and a Red Sox sweatshirt.

“I was thinking of you,” she said, “and it came to me. It’s just a little thing.”

She took down the cello, dressed in sweatshirt and panties, in front of the fire, and she started playing. She began with four notes. She repeated them, as in a round, three or four times, then she played four higher pitched notes, then introduced variations on the rounds, and finally she spilled seamlessly to a lilting sequence that took her back to the original notes, where she began again. She had been thinking of me. It was something simple, and lovely, and for me.

What can you say? What can you do? She looked down shyly when she was done. She wasn’t sure about showing off. I wanted to pick her up and whirl her around until I could run off with her someplace. Instead I told her it was the nicest thing I could remember anyone ever doing for me. Nothing cool came for me to say.

*****

How did I ruin it?

It wasn’t that she found I had set up her audition with Robb.

“What makes you think that?”

“He told me. You got lunch out of it, didn’t you?”

“Maybe.”

“Edward!”

“Maybe. Maybe I happened to let it slip that you were talented. You know, wonderful on the cello, far more wonderful than any musicians I’d heard recently. Wonderful enough to need an audition. Maybe. Or maybe not. Maybe Robb was lying.”

“Edward! He only auditioned me as a favor to you.”

“Maybe. But I wasn’t the one who passed the audition.” I waited a second. “Are you angry?”

“Maybe. Maybe just a little peeved. But please don’t do that anymore.”

“Would it help if you punished me?”

“What did you have in mind?”

“Well, I could eat you…” I moved my tongue up and down, slowly, in a licking motion.

“Is that a punishment?”

“Maybe not.”

*****

I’ll tell you how I did it. I ruined it by carrying out the fantasy that first attracted me to her.

I did it twice. No, that’s not right. That’s partly right, but it’s also true that I didn’t do it even once. Even that’s not correct. I experienced it any number of times, over and over, while jacking off or screwing her. That’s the nice thing about fantasy, isn’t it? The downside is that it’s not real. It isn’t flesh. You need flesh to make it real. And that’s what did it, when the fantasy was made flesh. Yes. Then it cancelled itself out. But no, that’s wrong too. It more than cancelled itself. It destroyed us. That, at least, is completely true.

I did it with Elizabeth. Or I started to. I’d told her what I wanted. My pliable girl, do this for me, do it, do it now. Justine’s away, let’s play, let’s play. I’ll sit on the stool, the firelight warming me, my dick curving upward, while you hold your cello and squat down toward me. That’s right, my dear. Oh Lord, your bud is tight. Sweet Jesus, come down. Carry me over. Take me to the Promised Land.

“I can’t do it.”

I was too big tonight, too excited. It was too much when she sat on me.

“Come down some more.”

She was trying to hold the cello and lower herself, and I was guiding her. Down. She squatted. I lined up the head on her. “Come down a little more.” Her legs were trembling. I found her hole, moved around until it was pressing into her.

“Oh!”

“Come down some more.”

“It hurts.”

“Just a little.” She lowered herself some more and I was wedged in her. The sensation was incredible. “Some more.”

“It hurts!”

I grabbed her hips and pulled her downward to me, far enough down that I was halfway up into her, and I was feeling her wonderfully soft flesh slide along me, when she cried, “Ah! No!” and jerked. She tried to bring a hand back to her rear, and the bow went flying, and she leaned first left and then right to get off me, pushing with her legs, and suddenly she was off me and lost the cello, which banged as it hit the floor.

She cradled the cello like a sick child.

Oh, we didn’t really fight. I apologized and said I’d pay to have the fiddle fixed. I don’t think there was anything really wrong with it. But after we’d dressed and she’d played with it for awhile, she sent me home.

*****

What bar is this? Oh. Yeah. I have more of a buzz than I should. I’m almost folded over the side of the chair. El foldo. You have to know when to fold ‘em. I keep seeing her fold. Fold, fold, folderol, what the hell did you do to your doll?

Someone is talking. Mickey. What’s he been saying?

“That musician. I hear yer going with her. The fiddler.”

“Elizabeth Peabody.”

“Yeah. Her. Billy Boy told me.”

“Okay?”

“So I know those two chicks over there. One’s a spare. Want to help me out?”

What fuck’s he talking about? The bar is smoky. It’s breaking the law, but who cares? It reminds me of a pub in London, one that Dickens used to use. It has the same low roof, the same smog. Did Dickens have woman trouble? Mickey’s girls are smoking. Not their looks. Cigarettes. I think they belong here.

“Sure. Which one do I get?”

“I just thought ya might not wanna.”

“Because?”

“On account of yer girl. I shoulda knowed you’d help me out.”

Shit. Fucker.

“Why shouldn’t I help you out?”

“Well, ya got a girl. But everyone knows ya wouldn’t let that stop ya.”

Shit. Fucker. Shit fucker. Fuck shitter.

“What’s that supposed to mean? I’m no different from any other guy. You chase tail all the time. Everyone does.”

“Well, yeah. I didn’t mean to imply nothing, Ed. It’s just that ya got a girl.”

“So?”

“Well, I shoulda knowed that wouldn’t stop ya. Not you.”

“Hell. I’m just diligent. I work at it harder. Anyway, she’s not my girl. Not anymore.”

“I was just sayin’.”

Does the ceiling need to be that low? You can’t breathe in here. The smoke is so thick. I can’t stay. I need some fresh air. I need to get out of here.

“Yah. Sure. Well, I have t’ go, Mickey. You’ll have t’ do both girls yourself.”

*****

I don’t want to get to the next part. I’ve been avoiding it. It was soon. A day. Two. Whatever. Elizabeth had told me anal was out. She wanted to be fair and tell me during the day so it wouldn’t come up in the middle of something. No pun intended. She was so correct about it all that she enraged me.

“I get sore, Edward. And it’s not… it’s not nice for me.” She had looked away, then back, and had hurried on. “We can do everything else, honey. Really. Just not that.”

How do you respond? Are you going to force it? The unstoppable force meets the immovable object. I don’t know. Let’s just stroll down the path that ends where we’re doing it like missionaries, Tuesdays and Saturdays, whether we want to or not. I exploded. I surprised me that it happened, but I shouted and we had a fight and I left. When I came back the next day, she was out.

But Justine was there.

“She’s gone to visit her mother for a few days. I think that’s what she said.”

“Oh. I see.”

“Of course the course of true love never did course through someone’s ass.” I stared. “The apartment is small,” she explained, “and you were pretty loud.”

“‘Grandmother, what big ears you have,’ said little Red Riding Hood.”

“They’re not the best part of me.” Justine drew me in with a little smirk. Her eyes were large and round and luminous green. She knew she had my attention when she raised her arms and brushed her fingertips over her breasts. She hardly touched them. Women don’t really do that. I’d never seen a woman actually do that to attract a man, and I’d had seen enough women work to attract me. It was over the top, but Justine did it, and my penis started swelling before her arms fell.

*****

It happened. Have a drink and I’ll tell you. I’m sure you would have predicted it. I guess I half knew it would happen. I knew it was a chance. I should be careful, but I wasn’t.

Justine was a player, and she was someone new, and I was furious at Elizabeth. In less than an hour we were naked and I was diddling her. Oh, I was more than diddling her. I was fucking her ass—doing it like I wanted to with Elizabeth. How is this day different from all other days? The edge is where I like to be, so there I was and I fell into a crevasse.

I fell because Elizabeth walked in on us. Out of town, Justine? Is that what you said? Did you plan this, or were you oblivious? I guess it doesn’t matter. The important thing is that one minute I’m fucking Justine and the next minute Elizabeth is staring at us.

It wasn’t as instantaneous as that. Not nearly. I knew what was going to happen before I actually saw Elizabeth. I heard the key and knew immediately. I could tell everything that would happen, but I couldn’t do anything about it.

Here’s exactly how it went down: I’m in Justine’s ass when I hear the key. Justine is sitting on me, impaled on me. She likes it. She’d grown excited when I explained it. Her violin, the music, and the pressure as I’m pushing all the way to the end inside her. “Oh! God! Oh!” It was a chance, and I took it. I’m pulling hard on her hips. These things can always be arranged, if you want them badly enough. That’s how much I wanted it. But there is the sound of the key and then there’s Elizabeth. I can’t get out of this! I start pushing on Justine, but it’s far too late. I know before Elizabeth does that she will find us, and what she will find. It’s maybe a ten-second head start, but that’s time enough. Time enough for a thousand regrets, but not time to lose my erection, and certainly not time to hide.

Maybe if Elizabeth hadn’t come in that day I’d have got over it. I’m sure of it. Fantasies go, as well as come. It needed a little time, that’s all. I’d have worked through it. You need to see it from my side.

No. No. No you don’t. There’s no ‘my’ side. I have no side at all. There’s just Elizabeth at the door, taking another few seconds to realize what she’s witnessing. She can’t seem to grasp it at first. There’s no ‘my’ side. There’s no ‘Let me explain -- I can explain.’ It’s not, ‘Ha-ha, we’ll look back on this later one day, and laugh.’ Because I can’t, and we won’t. There won’t be a later. There’s only Elizabeth with wide eyes and mouth open in an ‘O,’ and I can tell the exact instant it all becomes clear to her, the moment her heart is torn from her chest.

When is that? It’s when she folds like a chair. One hand goes to her mouth, the other to her stomach, and she leans back against the door frame and slides to the floor, going down, down, down, until her ass touches the floor right behind her feet. Justine is off me by then, her naked, gap-assed housemate, and there’s nothing I can do to keep Elizabeth from seeing my shit-smeared dick. What can I do now? I don’t have a plan. I just stand there until she starts screaming at us to leave. There isn’t much more to know.

Please, Elizabeth. Please. Let me explain. But you know the answer to that.

It’s worse because I can’t simply walk out. I have to wash off and get dressed and then walk right past her. She’s crying the whole time. I can hear her all the way from the bathroom, and she’s still there when I come back out.

Please Elizabeth. Don’t cry. Get angry. Please.

I need to step half over her. We almost touch.

There’s one more thing. I keep seeing it, seeing her folded against the door frame, down on the floor. I can’t make it go away. I can’t stop seeing her. When I blink she’s still there. I can’t make it stop. I try but I can’t.

*****

People think it’s romantic, losing her, losing him. They’re wrong. There’s nothing romantic about it. Nothing at all. There’s just my apartment growing dimmer. I’m sure it isn’t my imagination. I’m sure it was brighter before. There is no end of books and films about the poor, romantic, bereft loser. Chick lit. Chick flicks. Why do women like them so much? Whatever was inside you, whatever made you alive, drains away. All the meaning of the world circles down. Maybe women want to imagine the happy ending, so much happier when set against misery. Maybe they hope against hope the true-love ending will come to them. Maybe that happens sometimes, but not here.

There’s the window Elizabeth stood by, the time she told me the view reminded her of Mary Poppins’ London. I stood on that spot for a while, today, straining, looking at what she saw, but I couldn’t sense her. I’m leaning against the couch where she slept nestled against me. She isn’t here either. Come this way. Here is where we slept, on this bed, where she let me use her even when I knew she didn’t want me to, where she slept pressed against me and stole the covers. Gone. Look! Out here! She opened that refrigerator door, looking for butter and milk. Remember how happy we were? Can I feel her hand if I touch it? If I pull the handle? Not even her ghost is here. In this entire apartment, though I’ve walked around and around it through the day and into the evening, looking and listening, there is no Elizabeth, no anything of hers, no presence at all. She is as gone from my world as you can be.

*****

I ran into Anne Derindorf the other day. She left Paul and she looks better, more rested, more content. I tried to have a conversation, but it didn’t work.

“What’s wrong, Ed?”

“It’s nothing. Girl trouble.”

“You?”

“Me? Yah, me. It’s okay. The Devil loses too, sometimes, y’know? I’m fine.”

“Is it the cellist?” I just looked at her. Let’s not do this conversation. So she changed the direction. “Why don’t we get some coffee?”

“I’m sorry, Annie. I can’t. Not now. I’m sorry.” I just wanted to get away.

“You’re not okay at all, Ed. It’s not like you. You need to talk with her.”

“I can’t do that. It’s over. I’m sorry, Annie. I’ll call you later.” I hurried up the sidewalk.

My world keeps getting smaller. It’ll disappear completely, soon enough.

*****

This evening was the second time I saw her. I guess I already told you that. It will be the last time. I can’t chance running into her. It’s too hard. I’m sorry Elizabeth. I’ll fix it. I’ll do what I can.

It was just another reception. I’ve begun to hate them. If I’d been able to go out earlier I could have had coffee with the benefactor and skipped it entirely, but I couldn’t make myself do anything. As it was I was late. The streets were full of slush and it was supposed to snow some more, heavily, bad driving weather and worse parking weather, so I took the T and walked the rest of the way. Maybe it would clear my head.

I should have known better. The moment the door opened I recognized her playing. No one could mistake that for anyone else’s. I stood in the doorway, thinking I should leave, wondering how to get out of my appointment, wondering what to do, making a muck of walking through a door, so that people behind me began pushing. “It’s cold out here!” Somehow I got inside and found myself more or less standing around. A hostess offered to take my coat.

You dumb shit. You’re not sixteen anymore. Get over it!

I can’t think of all of it straight. Different parts of the memory jostle each other, so the moment I begin playing it through, my mind goes to a different part. I know there’s an order to it. I even know what it is. I just can’t follow it. To my left, in a large corner, they were playing. Elizabeth was concentrating on her music. She wasn’t interacting with her new guy, and he wasn’t talking to her. It was all music, all professional.

The donor found me. He just wanted to talk. He seemed to be a nice guy, ill at ease though, wanting to be friends, as though he weren’t rich as Croesus and about to make the day of the Museum of Fine Arts, the Boston Ballet, and the Huntington Theatre in one swell foop. I would get the commission. I just had to make it through the next half hour. We got drinks. I tried to stay on topic, but, from the corner of my eye, I saw Elizabeth glance around. She saw me! I turned my back so I wouldn’t have to acknowledge it, and I felt chills and burns on my back where she must be looking.

Witchy woman, please don’t do that. Look away from me. Ignore me. I’m not here.

I introduced the benefactor to the appropriate people. I’m sorry. I’m under the weather. I can’t stay long.

I remember Anne Derindorf was looking at Elizabeth. That stands out. When did Anne get there? I hadn’t noticed her before. Where did she come from? You know where this is going. Do I have to walk you through it? She was considering something. I knew what she was considering.

Don’t do it Anne! Please, dear God, my God, don’t do it!

She walked toward Elizabeth in little, hesitant steps.

Annie, don’t play angel here! You can’t fix everything!

But they were talking. I excused myself and went toward them as Anne got to the subject and Elizabeth’s faced changed. Where was her guy, to protect her? I yelled, “Anne! What are you doing?” They both turned toward me, but for Elizabeth it was only for an instant. She stared directly into my face, then turned and walked away, with that stiff walk you use to show finality. “What did you do, Anne?”

I half ran to the coat rack. I couldn’t wait for the crowd. I couldn’t catch my breath. Hurry! “I’m sorry. I have to hurry. Please, let me through!” Anne came up from behind and touched me on the shoulder. “Leave me alone!” And I was out the door.

*****

The snow is sporadic.

I stopped at a bar back down the street. Some people were there—Mickey and some others—but, I couldn’t stand to be with them. That’s how I ended up here. Now I’m going to walk all the way home through the snow. The better to think, though thinking isn’t going to help now, any more than it did before. I’ll listen to the slush splash. At least I’ll have some time to sober up and to plan.

So that’s it. Good-bye to Elizabeth Peabody. Dear Anne wanted to earn me a second chance with her. There isn’t a second chance for Ed Hyde. I don’t even want one. Anne was just trying to help. I know she loves me and wanted to make it better for me. I’d like to thank her for trying, but I don’t think there’s time.

I was happy before I met Elizabeth. Not happy. That isn’t exactly it. I was interested. Aware. Focused. I was focused on the game, and I was good at it. I played it right until something happened. What happened, Ed? She became my Elizabeth. That ruined it. Elizabeth the music nerd. The shy one I sexed on our second date. The lonely young woman with the H. P. Lovecraft apartment. The artist. The one I could listen to practicing for hours. She became mine. I’m so sorry. She thought I was sensitive. I sure disabused her of that, didn’t I? My Elizabeth. The one who would do almost anything for me, who liked pleasing me, who would take on my kinks as acts of love.

My sad little Emily. She really was mine to lose. At least she won’t have to see me anymore.

End of Chapter Four