by T V Hartwell
After excusing himself from the dinner table in a tiff, Kirby retreated to the family room to watch Sunday night football with the NFL preseason getting underway. After sitting alone for twenty minutes, Charles joined him. Before he sat down to catch some of the game, Charles poured himself a Scotch on the rocks at the bar. He asked Kirby if he wanted a drink too, but Kirby declined.
“You looked like you were about to rip off Uncle Milt’s head back there.”
Kirby chuckled. “That’s why I left the room. I didn’t want Mom’s birthday party to end with one of her guests being taken out of here on a stretcher.”
“He was just fooling around, but I thought you handled yourself well.”
“I already have to deal with Mom begging for grandkids, and then to have Milt come out of nowhere talking like that. Where does he get off telling me I need to take care of my business? Stupid ass.”
“Show a little respect, Kirby, that’s your uncle you’re talking about. He was just trying to get a reaction out of you. Get you to tussle with him a bit, but you did the right thing to keep your mouth shut and walk away as soon as you could. No need to get caught up in a senseless argument over nothing.”
Kirby didn’t normally curse around his parents, but he had a good enough relationship with his dad to feel comfortable expressing his annoyance with his uncle in an unguarded way. Likewise, Charles had no problem communicating in an open and direct way with his son when the situation called for it, and he decided to use their brief alone time to inform Kirby of a change up in their financial arrangement.
“Listen, Kirby, there’s something we need to talk about. I want you to start working in the management training program at the bank. I’ve asked our director of training and professional development to work with you on building a rotation schedule that would get you exposed to each of the key aspects of our business operations. That way you can begin to develop a better understanding of what we do.”
“Dad, we’ve already talked about this.”
“I know we’ve talked about it, son.”
“Then you know that I don’t have time to do a management training program.”
“Well, I want you to start making the time. I don’t expect you to work full time at the bank, but I want you to start learning the business in a more structured way so that you have more than a basic, elementary knowledge of what we do.”
“What about the board? You said that I’d be put on the bank’s board eventually. Won’t I learn what I need to know through that?”
“Before you become a voting member on a bank’s board, you need to know something about banking first. The board is not for training, it’s for managing. And before you represent our family as a principal owner of the company on the board, you are going to have to learn more about our business than you currently know. A lot more.”
“But I’m in the middle of some projects right now, Dad. This is not a good time.”
“You are always in the middle of some projects, Kirby. All I’m asking you to do is to make some time in your schedule to work in our management training program on a part time basis, just like I make time in my schedule to pay for your insurance and weekends in Vegas, among other things.”
“So it sounds like I no longer have a choice in the matter.”
“You do have a choice. Now, I’ve supported you for four solid years without asking for much back in return. If you want that support to continue, then I need you to work with me on this and to stop resisting. If you want to reject our family’s obligation to the bank your great-grandfather started, then you’ll also need to find a job and pay your own way. You can’t expect the bank to provide for you if you have no intention of participating in its success. You’ve got to understand that what I’m asking you to do is in your own best interest.”
“There you two are,” Laren said as she entered the room. “We’re about to open presents and have some cake, and Joyce wants everyone back in the dining room.”
“Why don’t you chew a bit on what I said, and let me know how you want to proceed by tomorrow,” Charles stated as he got up to go back to the dining room to join the others.
Laren remained standing at the entrance of the room until Charles left before she came over closer to Kirby. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah, I’m fine. Why?”
“You seemed really upset at the table.”
Kirby didn’t respond. He just kept looking straight ahead at the TV.
“I didn’t realize your Uncle Milt was such a character. They all started beating up on him for picking on you and—”
“LAREN,” Kirby said firmly, stopping her. “I don’t wanna talk about it.”
Laren sighed heavily, feeling unwelcome and belittled. “That’s been your M.O. lately. You don’t want to talk about anything.”
Kirby continued to stare straight ahead at the TV, not responding to her.
“So are you coming?”
“I’ll be there in a few. Go ahead. You don’t need to wait for me.”
At that point, Kirby could barely stand to be around Laren anymore. He didn’t hate her, but he no longer liked her. Her demand for his time and desire to be his girlfriend and wife became a burden he no longer wanted to carry. He had the feeling of being liked and pursued by someone in whom he had no interest, but the person persisted anyway. The only problem being that Laren was technically his girlfriend and he did at one point like her and even fathomed her as his wife before he concluded that he was really gay and no longer wanted to live a double life. But he only contemplated coming out as gay with Jake. With that now seeming like a silly fairy tale, he began to question whether breaking up with Laren was the right move after all. Might it be better for him to continue his double life, he pondered. Having kids and becoming a doting father would certainly make his mother happy.
Since the person he truly loved was getting married perhaps he should do the same thing, and convince Jake that they should continue their relationship on the down low as they always had. The more Kirby thought about it, the more that kind of arrangement appealed to him. He and Jake could continue to be best friends and secret lovers while married, raising their kids together, sending them to the same schools, doing joint family vacations and generally living the good life as they always had but this time with wives and kids in the mix.
Kirby’s mood brightened somewhat as he sat there alone and pictured himself in this reimagined relationship with Jake since his original plan fell apart. Although it might have seemed fanciful and indulgent, it was all Kirby had to keep himself going in the face of his present reality.
Chapter 20 “It’s Goin’ Down”
When Jake entered Amanda’s condo, she jumped into his arms, wrapping her legs around his waist and her arms around his neck. “Haaay, Jake,” she said, but before he could get a word out to offer a proper greeting in return, she landed a big juicy one on his lips. And she repeated her show of affection with a mix of repeated kisses and breathy words.
“I’m so happy to see you,” she said before kissing him again.
“I’m happy to see you too.”
“I missed you so much,” she said, caressing his face with her hands.
“Oooh, I missed you too,” Jake replied in a sensual, longing tone.
Kiss, kiss.
“Where have you been all my life?”
Kiss, kiss.
“What?” Jake started to crack up at Amanda’s melodrama. “It’s only been a day, baby cakes.”
“I know, love muffin, but it feels like I haven’t seen you in forever.”
“We saw each other around this time yesterday.”
“Ooh, that’s too long,” she said, before kissing him again and bouncing herself up and down in his arms while holding on to him tightly.
“I guess I should go away more often, if I’m going to get this kind of reception when I come back.”
As they continued to kiss, Jake slipped his hands under Amanda’s mini skirt. She wa
sn’t wearing panties again, which he knew she did just to make him crazy. Seizing the invitation, Jake began to fondle her, gently inserting two fingers inside her slickness and heat. Amanda sighed and moaned with happy delight at her man’s intimate touch. “You make me feel so good, Jake,” she said, holding his face, kissing him, and rubbing her nose against his while breathing in the masculine scent of his fresh, clean-shaven face.
In the background, Yung Joc’s “It’s Goin’ Down” started playing on the stereo. It was on Amanda’s IPod rotation that she often listened to usually in the car and at the gym when working out. Amanda and Jake, like many of their generation, loved Hip Hop music, this song being one of their favorites from their college days. When it came on Amanda went wild, swinging her hips and lifting her arms in the air, swaying them back and forth and snapping her fingers. Jake started swaying too, bouncing up and down while still holding his girl. Amanda quickly went from platinum princess to ghetto fabulous, pulling off her crop top and swinging it around with her left hand before throwing it to the floor. “Yeah, that’s hot, baby,” Jake said, as Amanda gyrated and popped around bare-chested, running her hands through her hair and then lifting them high to the ceiling, feeling and looking sexy while staring into Jake’s eyes.
Jake put her down and they continued to dance close, moving and swaying together side to side as Jake held on to her, moving his hands up and down her lower back and hips. They sang the lyrics of the song playfully to each other. Amanda gestured at him with her hands as if she were an original gangsta rapper.
Meet me in the trap it’s goin’ down
Meet me in the mall it’s goin’ down
Meet me in the club it’s goin’ down
Anywhere ya meet me guaranteed to go down
They pretended to have an audience as they turned toward the large floor-to-ceiling windows of her condo with their commanding view looking over the Sunset Strip, the Hollywood Hills, and the towering San Gabriel Mountains beyond in the distance. As Amanda danced, Jake got behind her and began to kiss her neck and nibble her ear while cupping her breasts in his hands. Amanda melted into him and lifted her arms behind her to rub her hands through Jake’s hair, and then he released her breasts and ran his hands down her abdominals and into her skirt to caress her pelvis.
When the song ended, Jake picked up Amanda and laid her on the sofa. Jake wanted to show his bride-to-be how much he appreciated her and wanted to reward her over-the-top welcome when he walked through the door. So excited and aroused by her enthusiasm and eagerness for intimacy, he cut the foreplay and went straight for the main course, pulling off her skirt and chowing down on her pussy as if he hadn’t tasted any in months. He feasted on her— sucking, tonguing, and using his fingers to manipulate her clit until her eyes were dazed and her breathing irregular. Amanda screamed in bliss as Jake landed his tongue on just the right spot. He knew her so well he intended to take her over the moon with pleasure. Her body shivered and convulsed as he squeezed her erect and hardened nipples while rubbing his nose, mouth, and chin up and down her vaginal opening as he absorbed himself in her taste and smell. They groaned together, lost in their desire for each other. The mixture of her wetness and his saliva on his tongue made his heart race with an insatiable thirst for her sex. He couldn’t get enough of her.
“Oh my God,” Amanda yelled suddenly, sitting up.
“What?”
“We’re going to be late to the concert and we’re supposed to meet Will and Kerry there,” Amanda said as she hopped up from the sofa and hurriedly picked up her skirt and top from the floor.
“Oh, I didn’t know they were joining us.”
“Well since you said Kirby and Laren couldn’t make it, I decided to invite them. We have the two extra seats in our box, so I hope you don’t mind them coming along.”
“No, not at all. Will likes reggae music too, so it’ll be fun to hang out with them.”
“Why couldn’t Kirby and Laren come? You didn’t tell me.”
“It’s his mom’s birthday today, and they’re having a little dinner party for her.”
“Oh, how nice.”
After Jake and Amanda cleaned up a bit, they rushed out to get to the Hollywood Bowl to see Ziggy Marley. Amanda’s family had box seats at the historic outdoor venue for years and always held season tickets for the summer concert series. Amanda looked forward to sharing the evening with Will and Kerry, another couple they knew from their Stanford days. Jake, on the other hand, mostly looked forward to hanging out just with his fraternity brother Will, who turned him onto reggae music during their time in college. With Will’s father a career diplomat in the U.S. Foreign Service, he lived in Jamaica for three years as a teenager, which led to his exposure to and love of the island’s music and culture. Although not into reggae music as much, Amanda knew and liked some of Bob Marley’s songs, and she thought seeing his son perform would be interesting and fun, especially since the concert was a tribute to his father’s music.
When they finally arrived, the show had already started, but Amanda phoned Will and Kerry from the car on the way there to let them know that she and Jake were running late.
Will and Kerry stood to greet Jake and Amanda when they made it to the box, exchanging hugs and bantering about with one another in happy, animated fashion. Although Jake played nice, he always felt a little awkward around Kerry, unsure of her close relationship with Amanda.
He dated Kerry briefly during their sophomore year at Stanford, before he started dating Amanda nearly a year later. It was a typical short-lived college romance. They drank and flirted with one another at a frat party, made out, and liked the experience enough that they started dating afterward. For Jake, he knew Kerry wasn’t his forever love, but rather just another cute sorority girl with a nice body and kind of a slutty personality, which at the time seemed hot to a young, twenty-something, college sophomore with an overcharged libido. Kerry liked to party a lot and seemed to enjoy giving off the impression that she bedded a lot of guys and could have whomever she wanted. But she was really more of a tease and liked to flirt and lead guys on even while she dated Jake. Although Jake liked her at first and found her fun to be around, he eventually tired of her after three months and broke up with her. He simply told her that he wanted to date other people and didn’t want to be in a committed relationship. However, after initially believing that things were amicable between them, Jake came to feel that Kerry was bitter and jealous of him dating other girls.
Jake heard that Kerry started telling people that he wasn’t a good lover and that he didn’t perform that well in bed. He also heard that she insinuated to people that he might be gay and how that might have been the real reason why he broke up with her. Jake didn’t know where that came from. Kirby was the only guy Jake had ever touched, but he attended college in LA and knew how to keep his mouth shut, so she would not have known about him. When Jake decided to confront Kerry about the rumors, she flatly denied everything. She acted shocked and surprised that she would be accused of spreading the rumors, but she nevertheless apologized as if she was in fact to blame. It had left a bad taste in Jake’s mouth.
Then Kerry started dating Will not too long after Jake and Amanda started dating during their junior year. Kerry had mellowed considerably by then and Jake was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt. When she and Will became smitten with each other, they all became friends over time, mostly as a result of Jake and Will’s friendship and fraternity connection. Amanda seemed to genuinely like Kerry even though Jake had gone out of his way to fully disclose their history to her. Otherwise, Jake would’ve had little to do with Kerry. Even though it had been four years since they all graduated from Stanford together, Jake still found Kerry annoying and not entirely trustworthy. Kerry also seemed to love pestering Jake every now and again, which drove him crazy.
“Awww, that’s our song,” Amanda exclaimed as Ziggy and his band started to play “Is This Love.” The audience began to groove as a few scatt
ered throughout the large venue got up to dance to the familiar song. Amanda too began to sway with the tune, clearly enjoying the melody.
“Jake, aren’t you going to ask your girl to dance?” Kerry said. “She likes this song.”
Although enjoying the song and swaying along as well, Jake wasn’t in the mood to dance and didn’t respond to Kerry.
“Want to dance?” Amanda said to him.
“Nah, not really. Let’s just sit here and dance in our seats,” he said sheepishly.
Amanda giggled at his response. She could tell that he didn’t seem comfortable dancing around in that particular setting. They were in a box, which would have meant stepping outside of their box and into the aisle to really move around.
“You guys should dance to this song,” Kerry leaned over and said to Amanda, attempting to force the issue.
“He doesn’t want to.”
“Jake, don’t be chicken,” Kerry yelled. “Get out there and bust a move with Amanda,” she demanded.
“Why don’t you and Will get out there?” he yelled back.
Kerry responded by trying to turn the situation into a dare. “We’ll dance if you guys get up and dance first.”
“Yeah,” Will said, egging Jake on, knowing that Kerry was bluffing, but he wanted to steer the attention away from himself as he really didn’t want to dance either.
“Come on, let’s do it,” Amanda said to Jake.
Now feeling pressured and imposed upon, Jake grew defiant. “No, I don’t want to,” he snapped.
Feeling rejected, Amanda rolled her eyes at Jake’s stubbornness. “You don’t have to be such a baby about it.”
“I’m not being a baby just because I don’t want to get up and make a fool of myself in front of 20,000 people.”
“Other people are dancing too, Jake.”
“Good for them,” he said curtly.
A song that Jake and Amanda looked forward to hearing and were initially enjoying became a source of discord and conflict. They both felt relieved when the song finally ended. However, Kerry continued to pile it on, leaning over to Amanda as if trying to be discreet, but speaking loud enough so that Jake would hear her. “See, I told you Jake doesn’t know how to be romantic.”