A Very Dirty Christmas

by Sabrina Paige

  Totally mortifying.

  But Caulter laughs. "Has the guest house been soundproofed?"

  "Caulter!" I say.

  Rose finally turns, a wooden spoon in her hand and her eyebrow arched. "I seem to remember a library ladder that was mysteriously broken a few years ago," she says.

  Ella's eyes go wide. "A ladder!" she says. "You know, there's a lovely library scene in the movie I'm doing. It's about an older woman who seduces a younger –"

  "Stop, stop. That's enough. I'm not listening to my mother talk about seducing a younger man," Caulter says, giving me "that look," the universal sign for 'let's-get-the-hell-out-of-here'.

  "I'm not talking about seducing a younger man," Ella says. "It's a role. But you've given me some ideas about how a ladder could work. Now, were you holding her against the ladder or was she bent over --"

  "Are you actually asking about our sex positions, Ella?" Caulter asks.

  "Has the kitchen become the place to gather now?" My father's voice booms from behind us as he walks into the room, and I slide off the chair, taking this as my cue to leave. "What have I missed?"

  "Nothing!" Caulter and I blurt out at the same time.

  "We were just leaving," Caulter says.

  "I was telling them about a movie I'm shooting," Ella says. "And they were just giving me advice on this ladder lovemaking scene I'm –"

  "And, we're out," Caulter says.

  ***

  The four of us – me, Caulter, my father, and Ella -- are seated around the dining room table together for the first time since that summer. The silence is deafening and awkward, and it brings me right back to that dinner with our parents, years ago.

  “Casual,” my father says. “Casual but...appropriate.” He’s been droning on for the last twenty minutes, giving us a big lecture about tomorrow morning’s breakfast, the summer kick-off to his re-election campaign. I look down at my food again, picking at my salmon even though it’s my favorite. I'm trying to distract myself from the hell on earth I've found myself in, sitting here at the table with my father and Ella and Caulter. Ella nods enthusiastically and beams, while Caulter sits in the chair perpendicular to me, suspiciously quiet. He's not made a single sarcastic comment during the entire meal, and his weirdly pleasant demeanor makes me think my salmon may very well be poisoned.

  Caulter nods at something my father says, as if he's had some kind of personality transplant. Maybe he hit his head when I pushed him into the lake. That wasn't one of my finer moments, but Caulter damn sure doesn't bring out the mature side of me.

  I'm wondering what the hell he has up his sleeve, when I feel something on my calf and nearly jump out of my skin. I catch Caulter's eye and he winks.

  It's his foot.

  I jerk my leg over, glaring at him. Footsies at the table. That's real fucking mature.

  The memory makes me flush warm, especially when I think about what happened the next day, right before the pancake dinner.

  “I don’t want to come on --” I start, but he plunges his fingers inside me, swiftly and without warning, as if he knows how I'm teetering on the precipice, a bundle of need and desire. I grip his shoulders, the rational part of me screaming, Push him away – stop this before it goes any farther! But instead, I cling to him, closing my eyes and surrendering to the pleasure that washes over me.

  He strokes me, his fingers pressing against that spot inside me, doing things to me I haven't felt before…except that night in the hotel with him. My body feels weak, like it's melting into him, and I find myself grinding against the palm of his hand, taking my pleasure from him.

  “Tell me you don’t want to come on me,” he teases. His voice is thick, filled with lust.

  “Caulter,” I whisper softly.

  “Yes, Princess.”

  “Fucking...stop calling...me that.”

  Back then, I hated the nickname he gave me. Now, when he whispers it in my ear, his cock deep inside me, I come almost immediately.

  That thought makes me hot, and I have to bring my attention back to my food to distract myself.

  Damn it. Get yourself under control, Katherine. This is a family dinner.

  I clear my throat. Ella is talking about the wedding. “Your friends will be here tomorrow, is that right?”

  I nod. “Libby and Bailey will be here tomorrow night. Caulter’s friends should be here in the afternoon, I think.”

  Caulter slides his hand across my thigh under the table, and his touch is electric. It's totally appropriate, until he moves his hand slightly, reaching between his legs. The movement is subtle, and he looks up at Ella, his face not betraying what his fingers are doing.

  “Did you have a bachelorette party, Kate?” Ella asks. “Caulter, have you had a bachelor party? You're supposed to do that weeks ahead of time. That's what my wedding planner recommends."

  "We have not had bachelor or bachelorette parties," I say. "Our friends are coming from all over the place, and won't be here until right before the wedding, and I'm pregnant, so…"

  Ella looks horrified. "So you're not having parties?" she asks. "It's traditional."

  I cover my pregnant belly with my hand. "This bride is knocked up, so this wedding is already pretty non-traditional, I think."

  Ella waves her hand dismissively. "Pish-posh," she says. "Pregnant weddings are a thing now."

  "Did you just say pish-posh?" Caulter asks, laughing. "Did you suddenly become British?"

  Ella ignores him. "Who's your maid of honor? And your best man? The wedding planner can help make the arrangements."

  “Kate wants strippers,” Caulter says. “I told her to make sure to get a private dance.”

  My father’s face reddens and he clears his throat. “Are there male strippers in Lake Winnipesaukee?”

  “I don’t want strippers,” I say, laughing at my father’s attempt to treat this like a serious conversation. “Seriously, the idea of staying up past nine p.m. makes me tired just thinking about it. And it's not like I'm going to be doing shots off some guy's abs, anyway."

  “We could go to a strip club during the day,” Ella offers helpfully, spearing a piece of salmon on her fork. “You know, I find strip clubs to be an aphrodisiac. Tacky, but sometimes hot.”

  “Really?” My father asks, his eyes fixated on Ella. She laughs, casually brushing her hand against his forearm, and I give Caulter a look again.

  Caulter makes a gagging sound and mock-vomits. “I don’t need to hear about aphrodisiacs, Ella,” he says. “Or my mother talking about going to strip clubs.”

  “You know, I was doing an interview in one of those women’s magazines the other day, and the interviewer said that I’ve become somewhat of an icon for women of a certain age – that sexuality doesn’t disappear with age. In fact, it gets even better. I think you become more willing to try new things, and --"

  “And, I’ve finished my dinner,” Caulter says, putting down his fork. I snort at his obvious discomfort. Ella has actually grown on me. She really gets under Caulter’s skin, but I kind of like her. And she was totally right about her wedding planner, too. The planner was a godsend, breezing in and taking over all the minutiae that had become major annoyances for me.

  “You can’t really object to this conversation after, well, what happened the other night,” my father says, pointing his fork at Caulter.

  Oh my God, my father is talking about walking in on Caulter and I having sex. Now it’s my turn to be embarrassed.

  “Could we please all just forget about that?” I ask. Caulter looks at me and raises his eyebrows, his expression a smug that's-what-you-get-for-laughing-at-me, and I give him my best glare.

  "Well, I for one am glad that you and Caulter are keeping up an active sex life during the pregnancy," Ella says. "It's very important."

  Beside me, Caulter sips his wine to cover the fact that he's about to fucking laugh, while my face feels like it's on fire. I'm stuck sitting her totally sober, and now mortified.

  It's bad
enough that we broke the bed and everyone walked in on us, but do they have to keep bringing it up?

  "Okay, okay," Caulter says, holding up his hands. "Kate and my sex life is officially off-limits for dinner conversation. Next subject."

  "It's not like we're talking about sex toys at the table," Ella says. "Really, Caulter. Don't be such a prude."

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Caulter

  It turns out that there were plans for a bachelor and bachelorette party after all, encouraged by Ella, I'm sure.

  "You dickheads better not be taking me to Vegas or something," I say, as I'm pushed into the back of a limo. My friends – my best man, three groomsmen, and a couple of guys from Boston – are crammed inside, drinking beers and being loud and obnoxious.

  "What, do you think I'm made of money?" My best man, Bryan, asks. I met him when I was backpacking through Borneo, and he moved to Boston last year to work at a non-profit. "We're not taking you to Vegas, man."

  "Strip club!" One of my groomsmen, Joe, shouts, and inwardly I groan. When you're being let into bars and strip clubs when you're a teenager, the thrill kind of wears off by the time you're an adult.

  I never thought I'd say this, but seeing tits gets old after a while, especially since I've been spoiled by Kate's.

  "We have something better than tits," Bryan says.

  "Nothing is better than tits," Joe yells, his drunken voice loud in the limo.

  "Shit, Joe, ever heard of volume control?" Scott elbows him. "I'm going fucking deaf in one ear and I can still hear you."

  "What's better than tits?" I'm almost afraid to ask.

  "Shots!" Joe yells.

  Bryan reaches into the cooler in the limo and pulls out two bottles. "Edward Fortyhands is better than shots," he says, laughing.

  Before I can protest, the bottles are duct-taped to my hands and they're chanting "drink, drink, drink."

  I take a drag on one of the bottles and nearly gag. "God, how do people drink this shit?"

  "I don't know, buddy," Ken says. "But you're going to drink up before we get to Boston. Those forties aren't going to drink themselves."

  "We're going to Boston to watch strippers?" I ask, warily.

  "No, man. Your father-in-law got us courtside Celtics tickets," Bryan says.

  "Courtside!" Joe echoes loudly, pumping his fist in the air. "Fuck, yeah!"

  "Seriously?" I ask, downing more of the malt liquor from the bottle attached to one of my hands. Courtside Celtics seats. The Senator is really trying hard to step up.

  Those tickets are definitely a point in his favor.

  "Drink up, buddy!"

  So I do, even though the alcohol is probably the most foul shit I've ever tasted. I'm warm and everything is slightly fuzzy by the time we get to Boston, because I’ve finished drinking both bottles.

  I pull out my cell phone to drunkenly text Kate.

  R u wrng panties?

  A few minutes later, she texts back.

  LOL. Are you wasted?

  I type my response. I mean to type yes, but it comes out "yras" since Joe grabs the cell phone from me.

  "Are you texting your wife at your own bachelor party?" he shouts.

  I reach for the phone. "Shut up, asshole. She's pregnant."

  "Whipped, so whipped," someone says, imitating the sound of a whip cracking. "You can't keep your cell on you at your bachelor party. It's the rules."

  "Seriously," one of the others says. "Confiscate the phone."

  I protest, but the phone disappears, until I get a chance to slap Joe and take it back.

  So I'm whipped. So what?

  Kate is pregnant. What if there was an emergency?

  My buzz wears off by the end of the first quarter of the game, and I text Kate again, but she doesn't respond. She's probably too busy stuffing dollar bills down the G-string of a stripper, most likely a female one, if Libby and Bailey have anything to say about it.

  I look at my friends in their jerseys, drunkenly waiving green foam fingers in the air and hollering loudly ("Come on, ref, don't you have eyes?" "Kill the referee!"). We're definitely the most obnoxious group of fans, which is saying something because there are some total crazies here tonight.

  I don't even notice who's near me, until a girl walks over and sits down, leaning forward to talk to me and placing her manicured pink nails slides on my thigh.

  "Caulter Sterling," she says.

  I turn to look at her, vaguely recognizing her but not recalling her name. We used to date in Malibu, before I was shipped off to Brighton. Well, dated isn't exactly the word for it. We never did much outside of the bedroom.

  She looks the same as she did back then, except that everything has been augmented – bigger boobs, bigger lips, and bigger hair. She has that L.A. plastic surgery look going on, and it's definitely not a turn on.

  "Your hand is on my leg," I say.

  She laughs and leans forward, sliding it down further. "Debra Atwood," she says. "Tell me you don't remember my name."

  I shrug, taking her hand and placing it back on her lap. "No offense."

  "After all of the things we used to do together, Caulter?" she asks, pouting her lower lip. "I hope you at least remember that."

  God, I hate that pouting bullshit.

  I don't answer, looking back out at the game in progress. Debra was always clingy, even though we were never a couple. When I left for Brighton, I got love notes and packages in the mail from her for months until she got the fucking hint that I wasn't interested.

  She's always given off a crazy vibe, and the fact that she's suddenly shown up somewhere I am makes me slightly concerned she's seriously going all stalker here.

  "I followed you in the news for a while," she says. "Until you ran off to Southeast Asia and I was dating a Wall Street guy. We were going to get married, too. I tried to get in touch with you when I got engaged, get your permission. But I couldn't, so I called off the wedding."

  "My permission?" I ask. "Why the hell would you need my permission?"

  "Oh, you're so sweet," she says. "The way you always let me spread my wings and fly, gave me some space."

  Okay, this girl is completely batshit.

  "So when are you out in Malibu again?" she asks.

  "Never," I say curtly.

  I wonder if she's on meds. Or has just been released from a psych ward.

  "This is my friend, Amber," she says, gesturing to her friend, a mirror image of her, blonde and over-enhanced and made-up like crazy. She leans in close to me, reminding me that she's always been into men and women. "Amber and I are in a hotel here, if you want to play."

  "I'm getting married," I say loudly, over the noise of the crowd. "This is my bachelor party."

  Right about now, sirens are going off in my fucking head: Psycho Alert! Psycho Alert!

  I turn away from her, focusing intently on the game, but she doesn't take the hint. She puts her hand back on my leg. "Well, if you'd like to celebrate your last night as a bachelor, we can help you do it right."

  The offer of a threesome. The old Caulter Sterling would have walked out of the game right then and there with both bimbos draped on his arm – crazy bitches or not -- and fucked them outside in the limo. It's not like I haven't had my share of threesomes.

  The problem is, I'm not that guy anymore.

  Completely repulsed, I remove her hand from my leg and drop it back in her lap for the second time tonight. "I doubt my pregnant fiancé would like that very much," I say, standing up and walking down to the other end of the group. I send Joe to take my seat, and the two bimbos give me dirty looks across the crowd.

  Total psychos.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Kate

  "Oh my God, did you guys send strippers?" I ask in response to the knock on the door. Bailey organized my bachelorette party in a hotel suite at one of the hotels near the lake house, but I have no idea what they're up to.

  "I don't know," Bailey says brightly. "We'll have to see!"


  "Trust me, sweetie," Libby says, putting her hand on my leg and patting it. "The last thing I want to look at is greased-up and spray tanned men shaking their hot dogs in front of my face."

  "Gross." The thought of a hot dog makes me want to vomit.

  "You're telling me," Libby says.

  My girlfriends, buzzed on margaritas and fruity cocktails, answer the door, squealing loudly for the woman who walks inside armed with giant tote bags. “She’s not a stripper,” Bailey yells.

  Several of my bridesmaids boo loudly.

  "I thought there would be strippers," Janet says.

  "I have something better," the woman says, holding up a dildo. "Sex toys."

  "Oh, I love sex toy parties," my friend Amanda squeals. "Mama needs a new vibrator."

  "I've never been to a sex toy party," I say, feeling practically virginal as the girls grab seats in a circle around the woman who introduces herself and passes out catalogs.

  "You've never been to a sex toy party?" Libby asks. "That's appalling. Really. You'd better stock up for your honeymoon, girl."

  Soon, the room is filled with giggling as the woman who introduces herself as "Linda, the Sex Toy Goddess." Before I know it, I'm laughing along as we play a game she calls Fake An Orgasm Bingo, which is like regular kind except instead of numbers the board is filled with words like anal beads, dildo, handcuffs, butt plugs, and lube, and instead of yelling the traditional phrase, the winner has to fake an orgasm.

  When Libby whoops loudly, her hand in the air, waving, Linda the Sex Goddess stops her. "We need to hear your best orgasm!"

  Libby clears her throat and gives us all a look that says she's delighted to be the center of attention, before closing her eyes and faking the longest, most ridiculous over-the-top porn star orgasm I've ever heard in my life. When she finishes, the group bursts into applause before another wave of giggles overtakes us.

  "Damn," April mutters under her breath. "I think I might have a girl crush.”