Jill

by Jay Hughes

  I scratched my head. If Jill is fourteen, she's a full-grown adult. In Klinger years, she's ... what, 84? Wow. If Segoy is two, and capable of, as Jill had suggested, being an ambassador to the United Nations, then ... well, sleeping with a teen-ager isn't always a bad thing. "So you have no idea what life is like on S8?"

  "I have the archives and the images. Entire generations have come and gone since the ship departed. We aren't cut off, but it takes years to communicate with them."

  "Why isn't Segoy with you now?"

  Jill finished her pine cone and reached for a slice of pizza. "May I try this?"

  "Take the anchovy off it first. Nobody gets my anchovies."

  She flicked the little fish away. "We have incubator ships ... you might refer to them as daycare centers ... where we send our young. They stay there until they're old enough ... then they get assigned to a ship."

  "You just drop them off till they grow up? Weird. How many ships do you have?"

  "Fifty ... sixty, more or less." Jill got up and went to the computer. "I've stored some things here, knowing you'd want to know this all someday. When you get the chance, just pull it up and read about us."

  Six months into our relationship and she comes clean. I didn't know whether to kiss her or kick her out into the frosty February.

  "How many of you on these ships?"

  "It's three, sometimes four to a vessel. A few hundred in all. It can work. It would just be the females. The males wouldn't come down to the planet to live."

  "Men all over the world are celebrating. Does our government know this?"

  "Of course not."

  I didn't think so. I thought back to the day Jill had treated Betty's arthritis ... and about Klinger ... and the volumes of information being stored in the piss-vial labs and government offices ... and I wondered if any of it was useful ... of course, it was ... and how we'd use it.

  "It's a nasty world, lover."

  "I can't change that. I don't intend to try. We'll both be old or dead by the time all the ships arrive. By then, who knows?"

  Somewhere, in the other room, Klinger was ravaging his rubber rat.

  "Jilly, girl ... about the only thing I want to change right now is that couch you're sitting on."

  She walked over to me, put her arms around me and kissed me ... all over. "Let's go to the furniture store. They have some tasty-looking stuff in there."

  We almost bought that couch last summer, right after I got her the ring. The real ring.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  She looked happy. Being in heat had mellowed my sweetie. "I missed you," she cooed. "Fondle me!"

  "Didn't get much action out there, huh?"

  "I have too much work to do," she said. "Plus, I have to go to Europe in a few weeks. Now, fondle me!"

  I moved over and gave her a seat next to me on the back step. "Not just yet."

  "Why not?"

  "We will ... tonight. I need to take control here, just once. You want a ring?"

  "You got one for me. It's not like the others I've seen."

  I got up. "Feel like going shopping?"

  "What's that?"

  "We go to a store, you find something you like and I pay for it."

  "A ring?"

  I nodded. "Or a couch."

  ***

  "This one won't turn your finger green, will it?" I kidded the gray-haired woman at Lustre's, where they sell overpriced jewelry for discount prices. Or so they say. "I'd hate to have my sweetie's finger turn green."

  The woman looked at Jill. "Sir, we sell only top quality merchandise." She didn't know whether to smile or reach down under the counter for that bottle of gin I knew she had stashed away.

  "If her finger turns green, I'm bringing this thing back."

  The woman's hands shook as she put the diamond ring into the little fake velvet case. "We have a full warranty on all our products."

  "You hear that, Jill? If this rings makes your finger turn green, we bring it back."

  "Jay, my finger is already green."

  I looked at the woman. "She tries on a ring and ... see what happens."

  Pay for the ring, Jay. Nobody is buying this gag.

  A big diamond, several little diamonds and some little emeralds ... not bad for her first foray into the pigeon-plucking arena.

  "Which finger?"

  "Third, left."

  "Is there a reason for that tradition?" she asked on the way out of the store.

  "It means we're engaged."

  "Oh."

  We walked the downtown streets in relative peace for a change. By now, most locals had either met Jill or had no interest in her. Kids still streamed by on their bikes, asking for autographs. Today, though, I'd forgotten to bring a pen.

  Jill gave out handshakes instead. With her left hand.

  Nice ring, lady, if it doesn't turn your finger green.

  We decided against getting a couch.

  Klinger and such.

  ***

  Minutes without Jill turned into hours and into days ... and I saw less and less of her as summer wilted into autumn.

  She spent most of September in Europe, first in Vienna, then off to London, Paris, Kiev, then on to Beijing.

  Hawaii on the way back.

  San Francisco, Denver ... Coffee Creek by the end of the week.

  Before I knew it, I was up to my ass in paperwork, getting paid for work that seemed endless and useless ... and all I had to show for my long lonely evenings was Klinger and his wonderful rubber rat.

  Most of October.

  No Jill.

  I kept up with her because television kept up with her. From time to time, a Virginia license plate would show up in my driveway. I guess they suspected I'd smuggle in another one when they weren't looking.

  I wasn't about to smuggle a female of any species into my house. Klinger is picky about that sort of thing.

  I confined my companionship to the wealth of intellect I picked up on Thursday nights at Soapy's, the one night of the week I gave myself.

  Vicki, Essie and an ornery old gal named Blanche met me for pub darts, winner take all. Vicki could hold her own at the game, and Blanche was a monster ... two hundred pounds of sheer juice and joy ... and young at age sixty-six.

  Essie? She had no talent at darts, but she was in love with me and told me so in Spanish.

  "Te amo, tambien," I told her.

  "She's serious, Jay," Vicki confided.

  "She's out of luck."

  "Tell her."

  "Essie, you're out of luck."

  "Yo se." She knew.

  "Maybe just once," I whispered to Vicki.

  "I'll tell Jill."

  I guzzled my beer and headed for the dartboard. Blanche and Essie were kicking our asses. I wasn't concentrating. I hit one bull and two duds ... "fuck it!"

  Blanche guffawed. "This boy needs some moo-pa, Vicki."

  At Soapy's, you get sympathy.

  ***

  Jill wandered back into town on the fifteenth of October.

  "How was London?"

  "Awful."

  "How was Moscow?"

  "Don't ask."

  "How was Madrid?"

  "Nice."

  Everything related to the weather, and October, being what it is in Coffee Creek, coughed up another excuse for us to go shopping.

  "It doesn't get that cold here in November," Emelda Perkins told Jill.

  "It was cold in August," Jill said. "I want the parka."

  "Honey, you'll look like a freak wearing that around this time of year. Come January..."

  She gave me an icy stare. "I'll look like a freak! You people think that's what I am now."

  "Who pissed on your celfa bark?"

  "I'm tired and I'm cold. Buy this coat and take me home. Then you can fondle me."

  I gave Emelda that I-guess-we're-fucked look, gave her the credit card and pointed toward the shoe department. There, I excel.

  Boots.

  "What's snow? I've s
een pictures and read about it," Jill said, fingering the vast and diverse choices. There's nothing here I can wear."

  "Most women aren't six-feet-two with replicas of the Titanic attached to their ankles," I said. "There are eighteen shoe stores in this mall." I ignored the question about snow. I prefer not to think about it.

  She persisted.

  "It's white and wet and cold and it comes from the sky instead of rain," I said. "It happens in the winter and it sticks to the sidewalk and makes driving difficult. You can make a snowman out of it or slip on it and go to the hospital."

  "Fuck me in it."

  "Do you leave your coat on for this adventure?"

  "I like rain," she said. "It makes me strong."

  "Did you not hear me mention the part about it being cold?"

  "Fuck me in it anyway."

  We got the usual points and stares as we wandered the mall, looking for something big enough for Jill's feet. A lot of the boots had artificial fur, which meant plastic, which meant ... about a hundred-eighty bucks for something she could wear.

  Then I remembered. I'd bought purple undies for her ... where in hell did I put them? So many panties, so little time. "You didn't come across some purple undies, did you?"

  She looked at me. "Whose are they?"

  The girl had a mean streak.

  "Yours."

  "I've heard that line before. Jay, if I catch you with another woman, I'll chew your head off."

  She had the teeth to accomplish it. That didn't interest me. What I did notice was that she was coming around, in a sense, in developing some human emotions.

  I planned to ask Doctor Vicki about that.

  We left Sugar Lump with a coat, a pair of boots, a carving knife, a silk scarf, a cotton nightgown and a bag of hard pretzels.

  The store manager gave us the nightgown, on condition Jill told everybody where she got it.

  Perks.

  "Salt gives me a rush," she said with her mouth full of pretzel in the car back toward Soapy's, where she said she needed to stop because she hadn't talked to Vicki in ... yeah, Jill ... about two months.

  I've been alone here on Earth with Klinger, folding your purple panties over and over again ... playing darts, filling out this form, cashing this check.

  Oh, London was awful.

  At least you got to leave town.

  The skinny guy gave Jill some slack when she walked past the pool table. She grinned and showed her shiny sharp chompers. "Hi." She headed back toward the dartboard room, just snooping around.

  "Nice to see you again, Miss Jill."

  Now that's the attitude I like a man to have. Gentle, polite, scared out of his fuckin' mind.

  "Brew me, Vick and dissect my brain."

  "Is she even going to say hello to me?"

  "I told her not to. I think she's on the rag."

  Vicki raised her brow. "She is not and you're still walking. So, that's two lies."

  "I think she's jealous."

  Vicki shrugged. "The purple panties?"

  "What the fuck? Never mind. Jill!"

  Jill fashioned an entrance. The skinny guy moved over again and flinched when she made a mock move toward him.

  "She doesn't bite, Ed," Vicki laughed.

  "Yes I do," Jill said, and found a seat next to me. "Brew me, Vicki."

  "Hey, Vick," I said, "Jilly wants to fondle me in the snow."

  "Is it snowing already?"

  I looked out. "Hard to tell. Too much bullshit on the ground. So, what's up with the party?"

  Vicki snickered and poured shots to the big and little guys at the end of the bar who were gazing down at me. I sat back and their gazes didn't shift. Hey, stop leering at my girlfriend.

  "What party?" Jill asked.

  "Halloween," I said. "It's an annual tradition when adults dress up like kids and pretend they're somebody they're not."

  "We have something like that," Jill said. "We wear scarves over our faces and dance. The elders say the ancients believed it frightened away evil spirits. We call it ... something else."

  "What?"

  "Hulledeen."

  I think I need to speak to Brother Zeke.

  ***

  Vicki brewed me four times before we left and didn't brew Vicki at all, promising to do it some other time.

  "Can you drive, Jill?" Vicki asked.

  "I never did."

  "She has no license."

  "And you have no sense, Jay."

  ***

  It was only a little scratch and no tickets were issued. There wasn't a cop in Coffee Creek who wanted to take Jill in for any offense.

  I wasn't loaded, just horny. Jill hadn't said anything about it yet, so I decided to make my own move. "Fondle me."

  "I was wondering when you planned to ask." She shoved me back onto the couch. "Here, or under the spruce tree?"

  "Maud won't like it."

  I don't know where Jill learned the art of the blow job, and she'd avoided it up till now, maybe fearing she'd bite off my pecker.

  She didn't.

  She also didn't swallow.

  "That takes all the fun out of it," I grunted in a post-orgasmic rush as I watched it drizzle down her sweet green cheeks.

  Then she puckered and spit it all over my chest. "It tastes awful."

  Who knew?

  ***

  "You sure this will come off?" I said as she smeared the green scum all over my arms and back.

  "It's just charka extract."

  "It's the same color as you are."

  "It's a basic element in our body composition. Lift your arms. Let me get it all over you."

  I turned to her. "I look more like you than you look like me."

  We used a quart or two of makeup to give Jill a flesh color. When she put her hair into pigtails and applied the red lipstick, I knew. Add the winter parka for effect and ... Halloween parties are so much fun.

  Except for the politicians who found Soapy's a gold mine.

  Elections and Soapy's go together. Always did, always will.

  Even Ruth Burr, the woman running for mayor, tried her hand at it. She'd come dressed as a political candidate and all of us were impressed.

  "Jill, I just do so love your ... attitude toward our town. If you could support me, we could get that old geezer out of office."

  The old geezer happened to be Wilt Perkins, Maud's nephew and Emelda's brother.

  Jill and I debated Ruth's platform. Sure, why not?

  ***

  The president was re-elected and Ruth Burr won in a landslide.

  Jill had no idea what that meant.

  Neither did I.

  Maud was pissed, however.

  ***

  After that, Jill went back to work with the piss-vial techs and the upper-crust fuckers at Nabisco or one of those federal agencies.

  We spent our rare days together gathering walnuts and acorns ... stocking up on winter supplies, she called it. I called it ripping off the squirrels. I'm sure Klinger had an opinion about it.

  By now, I was seeing her on Sundays.

  Winter set in, the snow arrived and she spent Christmas Day in Houston with some NASA bigshots.

  She called around five that afternoon.

  "Yeah," I said, "we're fine."

  "You don't sound fine."

  "I am. Have a nice time. We'll see you on Sunday."

  Klinger sniffed the package, gave me that let-me-out-to-piss look and I settled in to watch the digital-imaging-dot-com football game between Utah Tech and Texas State. Maybe it was Marshall against Duluth.

  Jilly, it's Christmas.

  ***

  When she popped in on Sunday morning and got a whiff of the Christmas tree, all bets were off. She nibbled on one of the branches, took a deep breath and turned to me. "Fondle me!"

  "They must have had a fake tree," I laughed. I led her to the bedroom and gave her what she deserved. Twice.

  "Again!"

  "I have a gift for you."

&nbs
p; "Again!" She grabbed me and shoved me onto the floor, sat up and stared down at me. "Get back up here and fondle me again. I want another orgasm!"

  "Wanna go outside and do it in the snow?"

  "The weather outside is frightful."

  I crawled to my feet, scrambled back onto the bed, grabbed her ankles and spread her legs apart like I meant business. I'm goin' in alone, boys ... and all I have is this here tongue.

  I was going to eat Jill's pussy until New Year's Eve if necessary ... she had it coming and she was gonna get it.

  "Again!"

  I ran out of steam after round four and staggered to my feet. My neck felt like asphalt. My tongue was tired. "Walk this way."

  She turned and got up. She followed me.

  I found the box. "Here, it's three days late, but Klinger told me he didn't mind."

  "A gift from you?"

  "No, this one's from Klinger. Mine's different."

  "A box of dog biscuits?" She bit into one. "Not bad."

  My gift was a bit smaller.

  "Emeralds?"

  Necklace, earrings and a brooch.

  "I like this."

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  No, I didn't understand and I was as scared as hell.

  Jill paced the room. "She's lost."

  "Probably stopped off to look for a bathroom, just like you did."

  The doorbell rang.

  "At least she doesn't rip the door off the hinges." I answered it. If this girl is two, I'm a cockeyed maniac. I let her in.

  "Hello, mother."

  "Hello, Segoy."

  That's it? I stood there, looking first at Jill, the gorgeous green woman, then at Segoy, the other gorgeous green woman. It is impossible to explain what was happening to my stomach.

  Segoy stood about six-four and I wondered what it meant to be two years old. Coach Lewis, I think we have a power forward for you. She looked strong enough to throw her mother around, and I cringed. Please don't hurt me, Segoy.

  Now this was a two-year-old. Or was she fourteen? A little brighter green than Jill, which I attributed to her not having suffered through the winter on Earth.

  "Don't you two ... ah ... hug or something?" I asked. I pointed Segoy to the couch. "It's lumpy. Klinger, you see."

  "I've heard about him."

  I went to the bedroom. "Come out, you little snot."

  Klinger bolted for the living room, gave it his best Wallenda leap ... and poom ... into Segoy's lap. When he took off to find his rubber rat, all was well in Klinger-land.