This was my submission for the literary magazine at my school, way too short, way to under developed, and mercilessly violated by a 2000 word limit.
Closets
Ill be frank, I’ve spent way too much of my life in closets. This is not by choice I would like to add, except for a particularly interesting weekend in Baja. The first time it happened I was sixteen and in love, the girl was well proportioned blonde named Katrina who loved me right back. Her father on the other hand was not so fond of me. The rest of the story needs no explanation, suffice it to say that I was lucky to not have my ass blown to kingdom come.
For a while I could remember every single time I’de been trapped in a closet, the fear of god (or in more cases an angry husband) in my heart. I suppose that out of all of the things that I could have chosen to make common place, hiding from jealous spouses was probably not a great one. Still though, it kept my adventurous side in check.
College had provided me with ample professors to chase and sorority babes to woo. It wasn’t until I had graduated with a business degree and an abundant amount of debt that I found that the average sexual encounter was rather lack luster. Why this was escaped me. I knew that somewhere in my already deeply repressed psyche I had once been truly satisfied, It just never occurred to me that it might have been a booze addled night as a teenager. That is until I met Tasha.
Up until this point the various kinks of my sexual life had, with a few exceptions, been a roll of duct tape and a good slap on the ass. But Tasha was a different kind of woman, one with whom these various proclivities of mine would not suffice. Rather an expensive glass of bourbon and an expensive suit were the panty wetters of choice. Our meeting had been by chance, a stray glance at a bar one night, that was all it took for my curiosity to be peeked. I’m not entirely sure what made me offer to buy her a drink, nor am I sure that my life would have not been better off forgetting the entire affair. What is certain however is that I have never been more emblazoned by a women in my life.
I’ve often struggled to find a way to describe her, perhaps the closest I’ve gotten would be to say that she was my femme fatale. A petite blonde who walked the line between playful and dangerous. A girl who was truly the intellectual better of me, and for that matter most people I’ve ever met. She played innocent if only to drag down the men who got caught in her net. She was a hunter, a women in it for the thrill of the game. A game which I fell head over heals into.
I’de say a better part of my sexual escapades have been spent chasing her, the feeling that she gave me, which to this day still haunts me. It was like being allowed to taste the forbidden fruit, she was both the snake and the tree, I was twenty eight and had found paradise.
I like to believe that she loved me, in her own way. That I was not another pawn in a game of adrenaline and jealousy. That the chess match she played had not diminished the pure ecstasy of our relationship. Though the years have convinced me otherwise I find myself still clinging to this hope. That so many nights staring at a star lit sky, her in bed beside me, unable to speak for fear of diminishing the moment, had meant something. That through all the sweat and the lipstick, the booze and the smokes, that some part of her facade had eroded away. Of course I would not discover this until much later, for in those moments my mind was far from feeling regret. To be young and in love is a glorious thing, but it never lasts. Youthful as I was I failed to realize this, and so on that fateful day when her husband finally came home I was so utterly shocked that her emotionless pleas for me to hide hardly registered. I was a soldier, earning his thousand yard stare, love claiming another victim.
I don’t remember how long I stayed in the closet, or when I passed out. All I can recall is ever so quietly leaving the penthouse. Stealing only one last glance at the woman who had so entranced me. To this day I will never forget how she lay there, happier and more satisfied than I had ever made her. Through a series of rather complicated events which for the sake of my sanity I won’t go into, I discovered that I was not the first man to be drawn to this rapturous beauty. While this fact alone did not surprise me, what did was the reason why. It was all a game I was informed, her sick way of screwing with her husband. A man rumored to be the best of lovers but the worst of partners. She kept him for his money and his dick, but fucked enough men to satisfy her twisted need to torture him.
Still though, the experience was not without its lessons. Inside of me, trapped in that closet, I had discovered something dark. Within the throws of my depression, I had found a sense of pure joy, a beast burdened by years of repression. The fallout from the whole affair had allowed me time to think, and by that I mean drink. And drink I did. Drunk, I came to two conclusions. The first being that Tasha was a raging sociopathic whore (an opinion I would later recant). The second was that the thrill I had gotten from being trapped in that bedroom was greater than any I had ever experienced, sexual or otherwise.
In the morning though, when the alcohol had all gone away, and the night had left me with only a raging headache, I found that most of all I was afraid. Afraid of taking the path back into the garden, of following another snake. Im ashamed to say that it was this fear that led me to Virginia.
The year was 1970, and still very much reeling my from escapades with Tasha, I was introduced to a lovely young women by the name of Virginia Cooper. A polite but vivacious assistant who had started to attract the seedy looks of many an executive. My colleague and best friend had decided that It would be a good thing to have us meet. He had come to the conclusion that a nice piece of ass was what I needed, a good one nighter. I married her six months later.
The wedding was nothing special, an affair conducted without a hint of cynicism. Flowers were thrown and me and my smiling bride waltzed out of the church and onto to a beautiful island in the Pacific. Nine months later our son came into the world in the usual way. By that time we had packed up the silvers spoons and hung a moon above a small crib that would sit next to our bed for the next few years. Events big and small came and went, wars happened outside, my salary became larger and so did our house. I became gray, a man whose life was nothing more than another shitty little box containing the American dream. These were the years I lost my passion for living, I buried myself in work, unsure of what was wrong. I was a terrible father, a man who had little time to play ball with his son, or the patience to deal with the wife I was slowly loosing.
In some ways it doesn’t surprise me that I found him, a man just like me, curled up in my closet. His naked sweaty body staining my suits as pure fear pumped through his eyes. I didn’t even bother saying anything, I just walked out, ignoring the cries of the former assistant to stay. Six hours later I found myself in the house of a women I didn’t know, while she screamed at her husband. My body covered in sweat, pure fear in my eyes, I was happy.
The divorce was a drab affair that came and went with little fanfare. I was kind, or more to the point just didn’t care. I gave her half and went on my way, promising to come and see my son on the weekends. Part of me, the cynical half, knew I was lying, that the future held only the wreckage of this empty vow. It wasn’t the first, it wasn’t the last.
The weeks were spent tirelessly slaving so that my salary might grow one more decimal place, the weekends invading the bed of every housewife from Seattle to San Diego. I had been set free, the monster whose seed had been planted with Katrina all those years ago had finally sprung forth. It was all I could do to control it. Night after night were spent hiding, furiously fucking my revenge into anything that was halfway committed. All the while promising good times with my son when I came home. This became the passage of time. Birthdays marked by vague phone calls to a young man I barely recognized, the youthful admiration still lingering in his voice. Half the time my cock was just inches away from the mouth of a Stepford lookalike, but I cared not. I hung onto him in my own way for as long as I could, I’m not sure why. I cared little for him, as terrible as it sounds. He simply was another reminder of the days when my hair had begun to grey, of the melancholic missteps I had made.
I didn’t notice when the phone calls stopped, at least not at first. The reckless abandon with which I had pursued my thrill had long since consumed my past life, save for the weekly checks that were sent to Virginia. Time had begun to move faster, I watched from afar at his high school graduation, an affair I had grudgingly attended, my mind more focused on the pretty ginger I intended on bedding that night.
College came in a flurry of bank account charges. I could no longer stop the graying of my hair, of becoming distinguished. My life itself changed little, save for the cost of my apartment and the number of zeros in my bank account. Disillusionment began to creep in, my revenge finally wrought upon my ex wife, my frustration over my ex lover spent.
For me his college graduation was a somber event, one blessed with too many drinks. It was the first time I had ever had a real conversation with him. It was the last.
Far too late had I realized what I had done, and far too little did I care. Perhaps I could have saved things, but instead I went back to what I was best at: Making money and fucking women I had no right to. I stopped caring, for there was nothing left to care about.
That is until today, when I, at sixty years of age slipped my way into the house of a lady I had never met. As I danced her to the bedroom I saw pictures of a child dressed in blue, memories from some better time. As I seduced her I thought little of my life, of my lack of love. Nor did I think as I rushed for the closet, the routine permanently carved into my brain. Nothing was different today, until I heard a giggle. Not the sound of the woman who I had never met, but another voice, a younger girl. I heard her scream, “What the hell!
Jealousy a shield for hypocrisy, she screamed until she could scream no more. I heard nothing from the man as she stormed into the bedroom and ripped open the closet doors, revealing my naked, aging, form for the cheating husband to see. I expected a shocked glance, anger, jealousy, but that is not what my eyes show me. Rather they show me a face, one I recognize. A face vaguely taken from post cards a women named Virginia sends me, signed with her new husbands name. It is my son, and his face is blank.
I stared at him as he stares at me. Admiration having grown up just like me. We stared for the longest time, until we were but mirror images of each other, reflected through time. He too is a man who is too grey too early.
