Sideways

by Rex Pickett

  “Yeah. Long periods of abstinence have their virtues.” She chuckled. “I’m not on the pill, so don’t climax inside me, okay?”

  “Okay,” I said.

  She kissed me some more, then reached over to the end table, took one of the unfinished glasses of Richebourg, and lay on her back. She took a sip of the wine, closed her eyes, and sighed. With her eyes still closed, she held out the glass and instructed, “I want you to christen me with some of this, and then do what I was doing to you outside.”

  I accepted the wineglass from her and braced myself with a sip. I shifted to the region in between her legs. Hovering over her, I teasingly tipped the wineglass and trickled a little of Burgundy’s finest on her bellybutton. She giggled. I moved lower and poured a few more nectarous dribbles on her pubis and dyed it ruby red. She moaned audibly when I parted her legs and gently fingered her open and sampled the Richebourg sans Riedel. Palate properly whetted, I spelunked for her clitoris, tasting Bourgogne Rouge and

  After years of mostly frustrating experimentation I had finally discovered the perfect Pinot pairing.

  It was after midnight when we finally packed up, left the Cedar Spa, and drove down out of the mountains. Jack sat shotgun, while Maya and I nestled in each other’s arms in the backseat. Periodically, Jack would throw us a backward glance, flashing a smile that was both happy and sad—thinking perhaps of these times that we would never share again and how that was something already to be mourned.

  Terra dropped Maya and me off at the Hitching Post and then she and Jack continued on to her place. Maya and I shifted over to her car and she ferried me back to the Windmill Inn. I wasn’t sure if she wanted to spend the night, but we still had a half bottle of the Richebourg, so I invited her in for a nightcap.

  Inside the room, the red message light on the phone wasn’t blinking, which completely surprised me. Maya eased onto the edge of one of the beds while I rinsed out the Riedels in the bathroom sink. I poured off the remainder

  “What’s that?” Maya asked, gesturing to Brad’s Remington still propped up against the wall next to the cases of wine. “You guys hunting?”

  “No.” I tried to laugh it off. “It’s a long story.”

  “Tell me,” she said. “I want to hear it.”

  So, reluctantly, I told her the story of the aborted boar hunt that almost ended up in homicide. She laughed so hard I thought I saw tears pool in her large, flashing eyes.

  “You guys are nuts!”

  “How were we supposed to know he was going to shoot at us?” I said.

  Maya shook her head, still laughing. She sipped the last of her wine and asked, “What do you think of this Richebourg?”

  “Beautiful,” I said, bending my head back and savoring the last of a wine I probably wouldn’t experience again for some time.

  “Compared to the La Tâche?” She stifled a yawn.

  “They were just both literally transporting,” I said. “I think if I could die now, I would. What do you think?”

  “Two vineyards so close and yet producing wines so remarkably different. That’s what makes wine so fascinating.”

  Our eyes melted into each other’s. I set my glass down, stood and turned and sat next to her so that our bodies were touching. I bumped my shoulder against hers. She set her glass aside and then fell into my arms with a womanly warmth. We began a long, truly ardent kiss, as though

  In the dark, sated and resting under the covers, Maya lit an American Spirit cigarette she had rummaged out of her purse. I bummed one from her and we lay in the quiet of the room, blowing smoke up at the ceiling, each engrossed in our own thoughts. Mine were simply: I’m in love.

  “How’s your book coming?” I asked.

  “Good,” she said. “About halfway through.”

  “I’d love to read it.”

  She turned and smiled at me and I smiled back, our faces illuminated by the pale light of the parking lot seeping through the curtain.

  After painful consideration, I cleared my throat, the weight of our little world descending on me. “I have a confession,” I said haltingly.

  “You’re married.”

  “No,” I said. “That part’s true.”

  “You’re having trouble getting over your ex-wife and are wary of pursuing a new relationship.”

  “Why? Did I talk about my ex the other night when I was drunk?”

  “Well, you called her from the restaurant,” she reminded me, taking a drag of her cigarette and exhaling dramatically. “You must still be very attached to her.”

  I blew smoke in a sigh. “I suppose in a way I am and always will be.” She bent her head and looked at me in the dark but didn’t say anything. “But that isn’t what I wanted to confess.” Her cigarette sizzled next to my ear, as she waited for me to continue. I took a deep breath and came clean: “Jack … is getting married this Sunday.”

  Her hand with the cigarette froze in front of her lips as she bore the full nuclear winter of my words.

  I barreled headlong into the details, fully aware I was ruining a perfect night. “I’m the best man. We’re having kind of a last blowout before he becomes domesticated. I just thought I should say something because I understand Terra is kind of stuck on him.”

  Maya slowly brought the cigarette to her lips, dragged deeply, and exhaled two columns of smoke through flared nostrils. “Well, that’s great. Fucking great.” Her anger was palpable and her words throbbed with raw emotion.

  “It’s why I didn’t want to join you the other night. I didn’t want to encourage the whole thing. Point of fact, I tried to talk him out of it.”

  Maya stiffened next to me, partitioning the space between us. “Do you know what your asshole friend said to Terra?”

  “He’s an actor,” I said with disdain. “I can only imagine.”

  “She’s going to be beyond hurt when she realizes how used she’s been,” Maya said, folding her arms across her naked chest, a chest I would probably now never see again.

  “Well, I guess that’s part of the reason why I’m finally telling you this,” I said, hoping against hope that she could distance me from Jack and his outlandish behavior.

  “I wish you would have said something earlier,” she said harshly. “I think maybe you had a moral responsibility.”

  I sat up in bed. “First of all, Maya, I was a little drunk, and when I’m drunk, surprisingly I’m careful about what I say, and at the time I didn’t want to risk alienating my friend. And I thought that maybe for Terra it was just a fling, I didn’t know.”

  “She’s been completely lied to,” Maya said without meeting my eyes.

  I didn’t say anything. There was nothing to say. My words rang hollow and anything I said would have dug a deeper hole.

  Maya squashed her cigarette in a glass ashtray on the nightstand, then lay back down. She breathed in short bursts through her nostrils. “I don’t blame you, I guess,” she said, less critical. “But whether you like it or not I’m going to have to tell Terra, just so she doesn’t get massively hurt when she finds out a couple of weeks from now that your asshole friend is blowing her off and driving her fucking insane!” Her words echoed in the room.

  I finished my cigarette and put it out. “What kind of things did Jack say to her?”

  “Oh. That he loved her. That she was the only woman in ages who had rocked his world, how he was considering moving up here, getting a place with her, commuting back and forth to L.A. Other than that, I’m sure he was pretty fucking honest.”

  I squeezed my eyes closed; I wanted Maya to see me wince in disgust. I could easily picture Jack, liquored up, whispering those disingenuous endearments until Terra melted, until her knees weakened and she knelt before him and unzipped him because he was the one. “I think he believed every word,” I said to Maya. “Shockingly.”

  “But he’s getting married.”

  “I have no answer for that,” I said weakly.

  “Why do men say such outrageous things to wom
en, knowing it’s going to hurt them?”

  “I’m afraid the majority of men are pathological liars. They’ll do anything, say anything, to get a woman’s clothes off. It’s in their DNA. Some have more of the bad

  Maya laughed sardonically, but her laugh quickly faded.

  “If it makes Terra feel any better, a couple of days ago Jack was actually considering calling off the wedding. I think he really is taken with her, however ludicrous that might seem.”

  “That’s crazy,” Maya said.

  “He’s an actor. They’re inveterate liars, and they’re all fucking kooky.”

  “What’s his fiancée like, if I might ask?”

  “Gorgeous. Comes from a wealthy family. Everything a man could dream for.”

  “Figures,” she snorted. “What would she think if she knew what was going on?”

  “I guess ‘if she doesn’t find out then it doesn’t matter’ is probably Jack’s dumb-ass rationalization.”

  “And you support that philosophy?” she asked uneasily.

  “No. I said I didn’t. I was pissed off. But what was I going to do?”

  “Are you like that, too?” she asked, gentler now. “You did say all men are like that.”

  “I probably used to be. But I’ve reformed. I believe in fidelity. Hard as that may be to accept.”

  She raised her head from my shoulder and regarded me with an expression of misgiving. “Is that why you got divorced? You cheated on her?”

  My eyes strayed away from hers to the wall, fantasizing about another cigarette and rewinding the tape to that Edenic moment just before my confession. “There

  Maya apparently couldn’t wait another moment, because she lunged for the phone. “I should call Terra right now and tell her all this.”

  “Maya?” I grabbed her wrist and gently held her back. “We’re leaving Saturday. Just wait. He’s going to blame me, and you’re going to destroy a long-standing friendship. Remember, I didn’t have to tell you. Not that that makes me a saint or anything.”

  Maya hesitated, then slowly replaced the receiver on its base. The annoying dial tone stopped. Sighing, she lay back down on the bed. I started to kiss her, but she didn’t want to be kissed and turned her face away coldly.

  “Look, I’m sorry. I guess we’re just a couple of fucked-up guys.”

  “Yeah, hello,” Maya singsonged, not intending it to be funny. The way she said it made me feel pitiful and I rolled over and sank into my own self-loathing.

  We lay in the dark without speaking for a long time. I could feel her anger and disapproval, palpable as the crappy sheets that scratched my naked body. The heater came on and warm air started blowing into the room, momentarily drowning out the crickets and the sound of Maya’s breathing next to me. I wanted to gather her in my arms and hold her—it had been a long night and so much had happened and I was drained and desired the comfort of her body—but I sensed her affections had long since been withdrawn. Like all writers, I hate rejection, so I remained on my side, wretchedly alone, not needing her to verbally affirm our sudden disconnection. Eventually, we both drifted into an uneasy slumber.

  Sometime in the early hours of the morning I felt a painful stab of yearning as I heard Maya slip out of bed and disappear into the bathroom. A moment later, the shower started running. I rubbed my eyes. Early dawnlight produced a salmon-hued corona around the edges of the curtains. We couldn’t have slept more than a few restless hours.

  She came out of the bathroom, toweling off her hair, and dressed hurriedly. I didn’t get out of bed or say any-thing; I just followed her movements in the murky light and waited, letting her leave without saying good-bye if that’s what she wanted.

  After Maya had finished dressing, she sat down heavily on the edge of the bed with her back turned to me and sighed. She bowed her head, unsnapped her purse, and removed her wallet. I could hear the rustling of bills being counted and I sat up in bed. She laid a raft of fifties on the covers as if she were a blackjack dealer spreading out a deck of cards.

  “Maya?” I asked, puzzled.

  “Now, I have something to confess,” she started.

  I looked from her to the bills on the bed and back to her.

  Her eyes strayed to the wall for a moment, as if she were wrestling with a dark confession. She sucked in her breath and said quickly but deliberately, “Jack gave me a thousand dollars if I would bust out my best bottles and essentially seduce you.”

  I could feel my eyes blinking, struggling to bring this picture into focus. “What?” I said, staggered.

  She combed a hand through her long, bed-tangled hair, visibly ill-at-ease. Her face looked sad and tired. “Of course I wouldn’t have done it if I didn’t want to, if I didn’t feel anything for you,” she continued. “Jack said

  I stared at her, speechless. It was all a little too much to absorb.

  “I’m sorry.” She rose implacably from the bed. “I hope you don’t hate me.” She looked at me one last time. “And I did think there was something between us last night besides just sex. It’s too bad it had to all shake out like this.” She picked up her purse and fled, slamming the door behind her.

  “Maya?” I called out after her.

  The room plunged back into darkness. I tried to swallow what I was feeling, but I couldn’t. I crawled off the bed and staggered jackknifed over at the waist into the bathroom. I collapsed to my knees in front of the toilet and threw up over a thousand dollars’ worth of Burgundy’s finest.

  THURSDAY: REVELATIONS

  Around ten thirty that morning the door opened and Jack swaggered in. I rose swiftly from the chair I’d been parked in for four hours, stepped forward, and slugged him right in the face. He staggered back a few feet, then sat down hard on the carpet, clutching his nose. I shook my hand, which hurt like hell.

  “What the fuck was that for?” Jack yelled, sprawled on the floor.

  “You know what the fuck that was for!”

  Jack stared at his bloodstained hand in shock. “I’m bleeding.”

  “Get up, motherfucker,” I said, standing astride him.

  Jack remained anchored to the floor. I could see that he wasn’t getting up right away, that there was no retaliatory fight in him, so I found a hand towel in the bathroom and tossed it to him. “I hate the sight of blood,” I said.

  He wadded up the towel and pressed it to his nose. “What’d you hit me for?” he said crossly.

  I scooped up the fifties and flung them at him wildly. The bills fragmented in the air and rained down on him like large feathers. “You actually gave Maya a grand to have sex with me? What the fuck is up with that?”

  Jack heaved himself to his feet, still woozy from my haymaker. He plodded over to a chair and planted himself heavily in it. “So what’s the big deal?” he said feebly.

  “What’s the big deal? You turned the woman into a fucking hooker. That’s what the big deal is.” I spread my arms in disbelief. “And just when I was beginning to have feelings for her.”

  “It wasn’t my idea. It was Terra’s.”

  “Oh, right. She put you up to it? Is that what you’re telling me?” I telescoped my head forward, daring him to explain himself.

  “That’s right.” He glanced at the towel, saw that he was still bleeding badly, then returned it to his face.

  “Come on, give me a fucking break.”

  His voice rose a little as his argument started to take form. “I told Terra that you had a problem sleeping with someone just for the hell of it, and she was the one who suggested I give Maya some money and set the stage, so to speak.”

  “It was really Terra’s idea?” I said.

  Jack nodded.

  “Jesus. I thought I’d hit rock bottom. But I guess I’ve got a few more floors to go!” I sat on the edge of the bed and buried my face in my hands. “I just don’t fucking believe this.” I lifted my face up out of my hands. “How do you think this is supposed to make me feel?”

  “Well, she wasn’
t supposed to tell you for Christ’s sake!”

  “But she did! Now, among the other indignities in my life, I’m left with the ignominy of a woman having fucked me because she was paid to.”

  “Don’t go Webster on me.”

  “I need an explanation here before I head for the nearest overpass.”

  “She wanted to sleep with you, Homes. She digs the shit out of you. You wanted to sleep with her. She was waiting for you to make your move. I just orchestrated it, lubed the chassis.”

  “Did it ever occur to you that maybe there was a reason I wasn’t making my move?”

  “Yeah, what?”

  I didn’t say anything in response. It was all just too absurd.

  “I just wanted to get you laid, man,” Jack said remorsefully.

  I looked over at him gloomily. A malignant silence fell over the room. I was a hair’s breadth from packing my bags and abandoning him on the spot, but in my anger I still possessed the requisite forbearance to realize that this rash move, no matter how warranted by his traitorous actions, would severely compromise him. Besides, I had resolved in my paradoxically moral way to somehow make sure that he made it to the goddamn altar. If for no other reason now than that I could jettison him from my fucking life.

  “How was she?” he asked sheepishly.

  “Fuck you.”

  “She gave the money back.” He gestured to the bills scattered on the carpet. “That means she likes you.”

  “Did it ever occur to you when you were dreaming up this nuttiness that if I did like her and found out that you

  “Oh, come on, don’t be like that.”

  “I can’t believe you did it.”

  “I just wanted to give her a nudge.”

  “A thousand-dollar nudge?”

  “That was way over a thousand dollars’ worth of wine, you fucking grape geek. It was our birthday gift to you.”

  I shook my head over and over again. I couldn’t decide if we’d just been drinking too much and had momentarily lost our grip on reality, or if there actually was a justifiable foundation to his madness.