Pleasuria

by John J. Jessop

  “What happened?” he asked when he walked through the front door. “Why is everyone so upset?”

  Lizzy, sobbing, said, “While you were gone Mommy threw up a bunch and then went to sleep, and we couldn’t wake her up.”

  Lilly cried, “Mommy fell down on the floor, and she wouldn’t get up. We thought she died!”

  Chelsea said calmly, “Everything’s fine. I felt nauseous, and I threw up a couple of times. I guess I got so weak that I either passed out or fell asleep for a while. Maybe I’m coming down with the flu.”

  Jason felt her head for a fever. “We’re going home tomorrow. If you aren’t feeling any better, you should go to the doctor and get checked out.”

  The next Monday morning, Chelsea called Jason at work, “I still don’t feel quite right. I made an appointment to see the doctor this afternoon.” At four o’clock Jason pulled his Toyota 4Runner into the garage and went into the house to relieve Connie of her daycare duties.

  When he got home, Lizzy said, “Please read to us, Daddy. We’ll sit on your lap.”

  Lilly added, “Yeah, Daddy. Read us Hop on Pop. Please, please, please.”

  He had read Hop on Pop so many times he could repeat it by heart. It made him a little crazy to read them their favorite books over and over, but he loved them and he figured a little more crazy wouldn’t kill him.

  When Chelsea called at five o’clock, he answered on the first ring; he’d been worried that the doctor might find something seriously wrong with her.

  “Hello, honey. What did the doctor say? Is everything all right? . . . Chelsea, talk to me. What did the doctor say?”

  “Jason, you need to sit down, honey, before I tell you what I have to tell you. You know when I threw up and passed out during our vacation in North Carolina? I didn’t say anything to you, but it really didn’t feel like the flu. I didn’t want to worry you, but I was afraid that there was something else wrong, perhaps seriously wrong.”

  “Oh my God, what is it? Brain tumor? Epilepsy? What?”

  “I’m pregnant.”

  His mind frantically searched for other things that she might have said that would sound like I’m pregnant. He thought, Maybe she said “I’ve got a pimple,” or “I’m panicked,” or “I’m present,” or maybe even a weather report, “It’s precipitating.” Perhaps she said something else. ANYTHING else!

  “Pregnant? I’m forty. Too old for more children—a new baby, no sleep. In my sixties when baby goes to college; no early retirement. Someone help me!”

  Jason dropped the phone and fainted, his head falling forward onto his chest. He was out for less than a minute. He came to still sitting in the chair and took the phone from Lizzy, who had been talking to her mom.

  “Sorry, hon, I took another brief nap, but I’m back. Did you happen to tell your doctor what we were told twenty years ago, about how we could never get pregnant? How my guys were DOA? What did he say to that?”

  Chelsea chuckle. “Yes dear, you better believe I told him what his colleagues told us. And he told me that studies have shown that sometimes a man’s sperm get livelier as he ages, resulting in pregnancy later in life. The doc asked me if you’ve changed your diet, eating more meat, chili peppers or tabasco sauce. Apparently, studies have now shown that eating these things also helps increase sperm motility.”

  • • •

  Jason didn’t sleep for the first three nights after that call. On the fourth evening, he came home from work in a daze. Chelsea met him at the door, saw that the right front bumper of his car had been demolished.

  “Jason, what the hell happened? Are you all right?”

  “It wasn’t my fault.” he said. “One of those damned trees around the corner on Elm Street jumped out in front of my car. Or maybe I fell asleep and ran off the road. I don’t know. Anyhow, it was an empty lot, and no one was hurt. It sure as hell woke me up. My poor 4Runner—it was still drivable, so here I am. Help me.”

  Eight months later, Lucy Lee Longfellow was born, the third and last of the Longfellow daughters. She was beautiful, and became one of Jason and Chelsea’s greatest blessings in spite of her surprising and somewhat late arrival on the scene. When he found out that this third child was also a girl, his first thought was, Three daughters, three beautiful daughters, what a lucky man I am. Then visions of a world full of danger, puberty, teenage girls, teenage boys, teenage pregnancy, college parties, and tuition skimmed the surface of his mind, and his happy thoughts were immediately followed by a more ominous one.

  Oh my God, three daughters. I’m a dead man.

  CHAPTER 3

  Jason had been working as a drug reviewer for the FDA for twenty years. He loved his wife and daughters, but he was bored. Over Saturday morning coffee, a couple of weeks after their discussion of his midlife crisis and buying a motorcycle, he tried to bring up this problem with Chelsea again.

  “When I started with the FDA, it was exciting and interesting reviewing drug applications from companies all over the world. But at this point every new application looks the same. I’m going to go insane if I look at one more. The walls of my office feel like they’re closing in on me. There must be something else I could be doing with my life. I know I have to keep working to support our family, but I need a change.”

  “Jason, you have responsibilities—a wife and three children. You can’t change careers at this point, and you can’t just drive off on a freakin’ motorcycle. We’ve already had this conversation. Grow up and tough it out.”

  “You know, Chelse, I’ve always loved murder mysteries—reading them, watching them on TV and at the movies, especially the hard-boiled detective stories with characters like Mike Hammer, Sam Spade, Philip Marlowe, and Robert B. Parker’s Spenser and Jesse Stone. My all-time favorite TV show was Murder She Wrote, where week after week the venerable Jessica Fletcher solved murder after bizarre murder. You know, you’re lucky, Chelse. If Mrs. Fletcher had come along first, I’d have probably married her.”

  “That’s great, if you like wrinkled old women. How old is Angela Lansbury now? A hundred? If Brad Pitt had come along before you, I’d have had sex with him first. But I met you instead, and here we are.”

  Chelsea was getting more and more concerned with this crisis Jason seemed to be having. She didn’t know where it was going, but it probably wasn’t to a good place. He was a little OCD, and once he got hold of something he usually wouldn’t let it go.

  Jason bought the DVD box set of Murder She Wrote and watched all the episodes over and over. His passion for murder mysteries, and especially Mrs. Fletcher, was wearing thin on Chelsea, and she became especially concerned when one morning, a few weeks into his unraveling, she found him in the kitchen trying to find a sharp knife to slice a loaf of bread.

  “Chelse, I can’t find the butcher knife. I’ll bet someone stole it and is planning to murder us. I need to ask myself, ‘What would Jessica do?’ She’d be able to figure it out.” After that morning, his catch phrase became “WWJD?” When a serious mystery happened, like losing his cell phone or the mail carrier delivering other peoples’ mail to the Longfellow residence, he’d say aloud, “WWJD?”

  Then he started seeing imaginary murders everywhere. At the grocery store, there was a guy napping in his car in the parking lot while his wife ran inside. Jason told Chelsea, “I’ll bet that guy’s dead. His wife probably killed him and left him there.”

  Chelsea shot him the death stare. “Sounds like a great idea to me. I’m looking forward to seeing if she gets away with it.”

  Then there was the neighbor that hadn’t picked up his newspaper from the front porch for a couple of days. Jason had said to Chelsea, “I’ll bet someone broke in and murdered Mr. Sully. His body’s probably rotting in his living room as we speak. Maybe I should go knock on his door, just to make sure.”

  “Jason, I know for a fact that he’s visiting his daughter in Pittsburgh. What is wrong with you? I’m beginning to think that I really do need to call the guys with the net
.”

  “Are you sure? Maybe that’s just what his daughter wants everyone to think. She might have killed him for his money.”

  Then there was the buxom redhead across the street that missed her usual Saturday afternoon jog. Jason noticed because he always managed to be near the front window about the time she headed out. She usually wore spandex pants and a low-cut blouse, and he enjoyed watching her bounce up the street.

  He said to Chelsea, “I haven’t seen Vicky, er . . . Mrs. Dawson out for her run this afternoon. I hope her husband didn’t murder her in the night. Maybe he caught her with another man.” Jason said this with a little too much twinkle in his eye.

  “If I catch you gawking at Mrs. Dawson in one of her jogging outfits again, I might just kill you in your sleep. Then you can investigate your own murder.”

  Jason started to point out that he couldn’t possibly investigate his own murder, but he realized the absurdity and just let it go. He said, pouting, “Well, she never misses her Saturday afternoon run. It’s certainly possible that something bad has happened to her. I’m just a concerned neighbor.”

  Soon Jason started talking about becoming a private eye. The real kicker was when he signed up for online classes to get his private investigator’s license. When Chelsea found out, she snapped.

  “Jason, you’ve got to be kidding. You already have a job. You’re commuting, raising a family, helping with the chores. When in the hell are you going to have time to finish the classes, let alone investigate imaginary murders? And you better not say you’ll do less around the house.”

  • • •

  On a Sunday, a couple of months later, Chelsea tried her best to talk Jason out of this insanity.

  “Jason, when you started talking about getting your PI license, I thought you were kidding, just teasing me because I give you such a hard time about watching Murder She Wrote. But you’re almost finished with the required sixty hours for an online detective course. What are your plans from here? We need your government salary, and you have no experience with law enforcement. Aren’t most private investigators ex-cops with real-life experience investigating crimes and arresting criminals? Don’t you need a firearm? You know how I feel about guns. I need to understand your intentions. Are you just doing this as a hobby? Do you plan to work as a private investigator on the side, or are you actually planning to quit the government and work full-time as a private snoop? What the hell are you doing? You are driving me crazy!” The longer she talked, the more upset she got, and the louder she became.

  Jason remained surprisingly calm as he answered. “Don’t worry, dear. Everything will be okay. I don’t plan to quit my day job. I’ll finish my sixty hours of private investigator’s training online, apply for my official license, get a business license, and probably do the required firearms training for a concealed carry permit. But no worries. I only plan on doing PI work on the side, taking cases that I can do on weekends for fun, for some variety in my life. Most PIs don’t deal with anything serious anyhow; the cases generally involve tailing spouses for proof of an affair, or helping someone find a long-lost family member. I might actually be able to pick up some extra cash on the side.”

  Chelsea could hardly believe her ears. She knew Jason very well, and he was not one to do a half-assed job at anything.

  “Are you nuts? You’ve never done anything part-time in your life. You are an obsessive-compulsive workaholic. Jason, we need your government salary to pay the mortgage and for the essentials—you know, food, clothing, shelter. You can’t go off half-cocked pretending that you are fucking Sherlock Holmes and forget to provide for your family. You are a grown-ass man with a wife and three daughters to support. If this is part of your midlife crisis, why don’t you just have an affair or buy a sports car like most men your age? I wouldn’t like it, but at least I could understand it. But a PI? That’s crazy. If you do this, maybe I’ll change careers too. Hospital administration is boring as hell. Maybe I’ll just decide to become a stripper or pole dancer. I’ve heard there are a couple of places up in Maryland looking for exotic dancers; what do they call them now, gentlemen’s clubs? You can be Sherlock Holmes, or maybe you’d like to borrow one of my dresses and turn into Jessica Fletcher, your heroine, and I’ll start stripping for a living. How about that?”

  Jason, still unusually calm and seemingly committed to his decision, said, “Honey, why is it so crazy to want something new and different with my life? I’m tired of sitting in that office day after day, looking at the same data over and over. I want some excitement. I’ve been trained as a scientist, and Sherlock Holmes used the scientific method to solve crimes. I might make a good detective, although I’ll give you the fact that I’m not likely to become another Jessica Fletcher. I’m too tall and my legs are too hairy to look good in a dress.” He smiled, trying to lighten the mood, but he was glad they were not in the kitchen where Chelsea had easy access to a frying pan or kitchen knives; she was not looking all that friendly at the moment.

  • • •

  Jason finished up his sixty hours of online training, obtained a business license, bought himself a 9 mm Glock pistol, got a concealed carry permit, and set up a website advertising himself for hire as a private investigator. On his website he branded himself as The Effective Detective, but his wife cleverly pointed out to him that it should say “The Defective Detective.” She was not a happy camper.

  CHAPTER 4

  The stress of Jason’s daily commute from Herndon, Virginia, to Maryland, working full-time, and raising three daughters was killing him, and getting his PI license hadn’t done anything to ease his midlife crisis. To get relief from one of his problems, he decided that he needed to carpool, so he put up a sign on a bulletin board at work and the very next day was contacted by Dr. Joanne Shipley, who wanted to meet him in person to discuss a possible arrangement. They met for lunch at the cafeteria.

  Dr. Shipley was in her mid-thirties, tall at five-eight, and athletic, with slender arms and the long, muscular legs of a runner. She had long, straight brown hair ending at her shoulders, and a face with the standard beauty worthy of a Maybelline commercial—big brown eyes, a little button nose, and perfectly applied makeup with dark-red lipstick. She wore a dark, tailored women’s business suit that said, “I’m a serious professional. Don’t give me any grief.”

  She had come to the government from a job with a drug company, which explained her meticulous appearance. Those on government salaries tended toward the frumpy department-store look. As it turned out, Dr. Shipley’s office was on the same floor of the sprawling government building as Jason’s, and she only lived four blocks from him in Northern Virginia.

  “So, I’m surprised we haven’t run into each other before, since your office is just up the hall from mine. Are you new to the FDA?”

  She looked up from her salad and said, reluctantly, “I’ve only been here for a few weeks. I’m kind of an introvert, and I prefer to stay in my office and work.”

  He could see that while her appearance gave the impression of a confident professional, she was painfully shy. He tried again. “Well, as I said on the phone, I’m looking for someone to carpool to work with. Would you be interested?”

  She paused for a few moments, thinking, Some of the men at my last job were overly aggressive. Honestly, I probably could have filed for sexual harassment a couple of times. This guy seems nice enough, though, and he doesn’t have any obvious disgusting habits.

  “Are you married, Jason?”

  “Yes.”

  “Happily?”

  “Yes.”

  “In that case, yes. I’m interested. We live close to each other, and you don’t look like a serial killer, so I guess it would be all right.” She blushed a little as she said it.

  He responded, “Well, I don’t know what a serial killer looks like, but I’m not particularly difficult to get along with. My wife and three daughters trained me well.”

  “Three daughters. That must be interesting. I
have three sisters. We never got along very well, and it made our father crazy.” She was now smiling. “I’m married, too. My husband’s name is Tom, and he just started working for the Environmental Protection Agency. We have twin boys, age ten. We recently moved here from Chapel Hill, North Carolina.”

  “Twin boys. Wow, that must be a handful. I only have experience with daughters, although I’ve heard boys are more physical with their fights and break things more often. But I can’t imagine that they are any worse than my older two. Lizzy and Lilly are thirteen and eleven, and they fight all the time. They also break stuff, but the worst is the back talk, especially the teenager. There are entire weeks when I want to run away, but I know that my wife would just find me and drag me home.”

  Joanne smiled. “Oh, Jason, it can’t be all that bad. I’ll bet they are little angels. I still want a girl, but we just started new jobs and Tom wants to wait a while before we add to the family.” In spite of her shyness, she seemed to be getting more comfortable with Jason.

  “So, I need to get back to work. How about the carpooling?” Jason asked. “We could start on Monday morning.”

  Joanne thought for a moment, and then said, “Sure, let’s give it a try. Who’s going to drive the first day?”

  “I’ll pick you up at five thirty on Monday. I’ll drive the first week, and we can go from there.”

  Jason told Chelsea that he was going to start carpooling to work, but he failed to mention that he was riding with an attractive brunette. The following Monday morning he picked Dr. Joanne Shipley up in front of her house and aimed his car towards the Dulles Toll Road on his way to I-495 and on to Maryland. Joanne had barely said a word, but by the time they passed through the toll booth and were headed toward the exit for I-495 North, she seemed to perk up some. In fact, to Jason’s surprise, she became quite chatty.