Whatever It Takes

by Gwynne Forster

  Marshall ran his fingers through his graying, but still thick, hair. “Of course he’ll mistreat her. His father told me he’s a cruel man.”

  “He must not have mistreated her so far.”

  He slapped his right fist into the palm of his left hand and stopped himself just before his fist pounded the table. “I want you to listen to me. Don’t tie yourself to a man because of sex, because you’ll have no power over him. You’ll be so besotted that he’ll hold all the cards. You should meet as equals, and for goodness sake, don’t be a cringing schoolgirl who’s too prudish to be a wife.”

  Maybe he’d said too much, but he wanted to spare her the tragedy that befell her mother and her sister. “Mark my word. The seeds of Cynthia’s and Kellie’s problems were sown years ago. Level with your husband. If things aren’t going as they should, talk with him and help him.” She put the food on the kitchen table and he said the grace. “Are you interested in anyone?”

  “Yes, sir. I’ve been seeing Douglas Rawlins, and I like him, but—”

  His eyebrows shot up. “But what? He’s a fine man. I didn’t realize you knew him.”

  “Well, he’s a widower, and I don’t like his nine-year-old son. The boy doesn’t like me, either.”

  He fingered his chin. “Hmmm. Does Douglas know this?”

  She nodded. “Uh-huh, and I told him I don’t see the point in our continuing the relationship.”

  “Well, I certainly hope he ignores you. It’s your job to teach that child to love you. When he learns that you’re not taking his father from him, but that you’ll bring more joy and love into his life, you won’t be able to get rid of him. Douglas has finished landscaping at my house. Why don’t you get him to work on this place? Pay him, of course.”

  “He volunteered, but I haven’t decided to let him do it.”

  “I’d better get moving. Dinner was great. Have lunch with me one day soon.”

  “I . . . uh . . . usually have lunch with Douglas.”

  He looked down at her and laughed. “No point in continuing the relationship, huh? If Kellie gets in touch with you, let me know. You look a little peaked. You’re settled in your house, and your business is taking off, so you get some rest now.”

  She kissed his cheek in exactly the way she did when she was a small child, and it brightened his life. But not for long, he thought, for he meant to find Kellie and Hal and deal with his daughter.

  Nevertheless, he left feeling better than when he arrived. Maybe having two fine and loyal daughters was too much to expect.

  Lacette sat alone in her living room with the television tuned to a 1940s movie starring The Three Stooges, not for the foolishness, but for the distraction. She didn’t want to think of the life her sister had chosen, consort to a man who no one seemed to respect. Her father’s advice also troubled her. Why would he tell her not to be a prude and that if things weren’t to her liking, she should discuss them with her husband? Kellie’s problem certainly didn’t suggest that she was prudish. Intuition told her not to ask her mother, so she dialed her aunt Nan’s number.

  She relayed her question to Nan. “What did Daddy mean by that, Aunt Nan?”

  “Sounds to me like a man speaking from experience. Did Cynthia ever tell you why she and Marshall broke up?”

  She stiffened, but who could she talk with about it if not her aunt? “No, but Kellie spilled it. Seems she was indiscreet, and picked the wrong time.”

  “What? Jumping James and John! With Marshall’s temper, she’s lucky to be alive.”

  “Aunt Nan, please don’t tell anybody that. Doesn’t it mean that he couldn’t have been talking about her?”

  “No, it doesn’t. It probably explains why she did what she did. Honey, some people don’t match, and they can try forever and nothing happens for the woman. Another guy comes along and makes the earth move. Of course, your mother was raised by a born-again stalwart who believed that if it wasn’t laid out in the Bible it was a sin, and when I first met Cynthia, she was even more pious than Mama Carrie. That must have been tough to deal with, even for a preacher.”

  “Are you saying that what she did was excusable?”

  “No, child, I am not. I don’t know any more than what you told me; I’m just surmising. Give her the benefit of the doubt, and take your father’s advice. It’s solid gold. If you can’t get it to work, get professional help. Plenty of experts making a living teaching people how to do what ought to come naturally. Thank goodness, Lim Sparks and I didn’t have that problem.”

  Talking with her aunt left her with as many questions as answers and with a sadness that she probably hadn’t been conceived in glory but in frustration. At home she went into her kitchen, got a glass of grapefruit juice and had begun flipping TV channels in search of a movie when the telephone rang. She raced to it hoping to hear Kellie’s voice on the other end of the line.

  “Hello.” It seemed strange not to say hello, this is Lacette, as she always did when living with her family.

  “This is Douglas. You okay?”

  “I’m fine, except I’m worried about Kellie. Daddy had supper with me tonight, and he said she moved into an apartment with Hal Fayson. Can you believe that?”

  After a longer silence than she thought necessary, he said, “I don’t know. If he didn’t kidnap her, it must be what she wants.”

  “I’ll never believe that, Douglas. Kellie has always been a snob. She believes most people are beneath her, and she lets them know it.”

  “You’re right on the money, but let’s not talk about Kellie, if you don’t mind, though I understand that you’re concerned for her well-being.”

  “Hmmm.” So he knew Kellie. Interesting. “You’re right. I am concerned. Daddy said you finished the work at his house. How about taking a look at mine?”

  “Be happy to. I had planned to ask you about it tomorrow at lunch.”

  She sucked in her breath and silently admonished her heart to slow down. “We’re having lunch together tomorrow?”

  “We are. Lacette, you’re gentle and loving, and I know that Nick would love you if he got to know you. Give him a chance, won’t you?”

  She wanted to ask why it was important to him, but she didn’t dare, because she didn’t want to deal with his answer. At least not then, when she was nearly traumatized by what she’d just learned about her parents and about Kellie.

  “I . . . how am I going to do that if he resents sharing your time with me?”

  “If you’re willing, I’ll make some opportunities. How about it?”

  “All right. But don’t force it on him.”

  “I won’t, and thanks for giving us a chance. I feel in my gut that we have something special, and I don’t want to lose it. See you tomorrow at lunch.”

  She told him good night, hung up and searched the telephone book for entries under the name of Fayson, found one and dialed the number. “Hello, does Hal Fayson live here?”

  “He did, but he moved, and I don’t have an address or a phone number for him. Sorry.”

  She assumed that the person with whom she spoke was Hal’s father. Dispirited, she hung up. “Unless Kellie quit her job, I’ll see her tomorrow,” she vowed.

  Kellie walked around the two-room, kitchen and bath apartment and told herself not to cry, that she’d fix it up and make it pretty. If she bought some paint, maybe Hal would paint the walls, and she was definitely going to buy a new toilet seat on her lunch hour the next day.

  “I put some ground meat in the refrigerator, babe, so we can have some hamburgers. The rolls are in that bag over there.” He rubbed her backside and then patted it. She whirled around and looked at him ready to denounce him for being familiar with her, but the grin on his face reminded her that by moving in with him, she’d given him free rein.

  Misunderstanding her reason for turning to him, he said, “You mean you don’t know how to make a hamburger? Well, now you’ll learn how the other half lives.”

  “I hope there’s some salt
and pepper here somewhere,” she said, controlling her temper so as not to incite his.

  “Yeah, and onions, too. Put plenty of onions in ’em.”

  Yes, she thought, and smell them for the next couple of days. She looked in the refrigerator and found the ground beef, and bag of onions, eggs, bacon, rolls, milk, ketchup, bread and the six-pack of Budweiser.

  She walked into the living room—little more than a large cubicle furnished with an old blue sofa, two chairs of the same color, a wooden and well-scratched coffee table, a lamp and a TV on a metal stand—and got Hal’s attention. “I don’t see any salt, Hal.”

  “Jeez, couldn’t you just run down to the corner? I’m watching Law and Order, for heaven’s sake.” He flicked off the TV, got his jacket and walked over to her. “Where’s the money?” She gave him a five dollar bill, and he returned with salt, pepper, and a bag of potato chips. If there was change, he didn’t mention it.

  After eating three hamburgers and drinking three bottles of beer while watching television, he flicked off the set. “Come on babe, let’s go to bed.”

  Horrified, she said, “I have to straighten up the kitchen and take a shower.”

  He walked over to her and grabbed her shoulders. “Are you stalling on me? You can clean the damned kitchen tomorrow, and if I say you don’t need a shower, you don’t take one. Before she could protest, he picked her up, strode the few steps to the bedroom and dumped her on the sagging mattress of what was their bed.

  “I haven’t brushed my teeth,” she said.

  “So what? We ate the same thing.”

  He flipped her over on her back, pulled off her jeans and bikini panties, knelt before her, hooked her legs over his shoulders and seared her with his tongue. She told herself that she hated him and tried to concentrate on the ugliness and untidiness around her, but he knew her. She tried to ignore the sensations that the tip of his tongue sent spiraling through her vagina, but he worked at her as if he knew she fought him and until she couldn’t control her twisting hips or the moans that escaped her.

  “Oh, Lord,” she screamed, as she thrust herself up to his rapacious tongue and erupted into orgasm.

  He stood, flung off his clothes and mounted her. “Get rid of this damned sweater.” She pulled it over her head letting her breasts hang free and threw it across the room. He sucked her left nipple into his mouth, thrust himself into her and started the tidal wave of ecstasy that engulfed her almost immediately. He stormed within her, guaranteeing her complete submission. She flung her arms wide in surrender as her body tightened around him, gripping him until he screamed his release, shook violently and went flaccid within her.

  If I can make him feel like that, why does he act as if he holds all the cards? Is it because feeling like that is nothing special to him? She wanted to turn over on her side and bawl, but he imprisoned her between him and the mattress, and she knew he’d want more as soon as he rested. Never mind that she had just turned a corner and hopped a speeding freight train away from all she’d ever known. If he empathized with her feelings, he didn’t show it. She felt him growing inside of her and closed her eyes.

  “How about some payback?” he asked her and rolled over on his back. She said nothing, but crawled down and did what was expected of her. In less than five minutes after she brought him to completion, he began to snore. She sat up in bed and let her tears fall in a puddle on the pink chenille bedspread.

  The next morning, she got up before he did, took care of her ablutions and dressed for work before going into the kitchen to cook breakfast. She had learned the night they spent in the motel that his morning sexual appetite was ravenous, so she got the bacon frying first hoping that its odor would put his mind on food. When he groped his way into the kitchen, she poured his coffee and set a plate of bacon and scrambled eggs in front of him.

  “Jeez, didn’t you at least toast some bread?”

  The words, good morning, nearly slipped from her mouth, but she bit them back. “It’s in the toaster. I . . . uh have to be at work in half an hour. If I’m late, I may get fired, and we need the money.”

  He stopped eating. “You don’t have to remind me that I don’t make as much as you, and if you do it again, I’ll let you feel the back of my hand across your mouth.” He swallowed the last of his coffee and patted his belly. “Get your things. I’m ready to go.”

  She wanted to ask if he was dressed to go to work but didn’t dare. He let her out across the park from the City Hall building. “You come home in a good mood,” he said. “I got some neat little tricks I wanna show you. I’ll have you climbing all over me begging me for more.”

  She wondered how she’d get to the outskirts of Frederick since she couldn’t afford taxi fare. “Can you pick me up here at four-thirty?”

  “All right, but don’t be late.” He drove off and left her standing there.

  She had never dreamed she would get pleasure from sitting in a half-cubicle at her desk and typing material that was so boring she paid no attention to its content. But on that morning, she saw only the good things about her job.

  “How’s it going?” Mabel asked her. “I hope you don’t mind postponing coffee a few minutes. I need this right away.”

  “No problem,” she said, and Mabel’s faced twisted into a frown. “You don’t mind?”

  Kellie realized then that she was treating Mabel as she did Hal and reversed herself a little. “It can’t be so long that I’ll miss my morning coffee. Let’s see it.” She looked at the short manuscript. “I wouldn’t need but fifteen minutes if you had ever learned to write.”

  As if relieved to have the old Kellie with her, Mabel smiled. “For a minute there, I was afraid you’d gotten docile. You watch it, girl.”

  Yeah. No matter how she sliced it, she had hills to climb.

  “Tired as I am, if I could afford to do it, I’d cancel this date,” Lacette said to herself two days earlier as she headed for Baltimore. But if she was going to succeed, she needed customers outside of Frederick. Higher education was a thing she understood, and she knew she could help that university increase its student body and attract more corporate support. She made her pitch to the university’s Board of Regents, the provost and the president and expected to hear the words, “We’ll let you know.” Instead, one of the regents invited her to lunch, after which she returned with him for a continuation of the morning meeting.

  “We believe you can do the job,” the president told her. “We know you can’t accomplish what we need in a year, so we’re offering you a three year contract, and we’ll give you the budget you asked for, but no more.”

  She signed the contract, shook hands with those present and left. In her excitement, she forgot that she was almost too exhausted to drive.

  “Thank God I got back here safely.” She breathed the words silently as she parked in front of her house. “I’ll put the car in the garage later,” she told herself. Inside the house, she kicked off her shoes, stretched out on the living room sofa and went to sleep. She awakened to hear the telephone ringing, looked at her watch and realized that she had slept almost four hours.

  “Say, were you asleep? It’s only nine o’clock.”

  “Hi, Daddy. I was just snoozing. I had planned to stop by Kellie’s office today, but I had to go to Baltimore, and I didn’t get home till five. Daddy, I got the contract, and I’m going to put that university on the map. They gave me a nice budget, and I can do it.”

  “Of course you can. I don’t know when I’ve heard such good news. Don’t forget the Lord while you’re swimming in your success. You hear?”

  “Yes, sir. I’m going to drop in on Kellie tomorrow morning before I go to work.”

  “Call me after you leave her. I expect she’s all right, but I need to know for sure.”

  She made two peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, got a glass of milk, took the food to the living room and turned on the television. “Oh, dear,” she said when she remembered that she promised Douglas she would
call him when she got back from Baltimore. She ate one of the sandwiches, drank some of the milk and dialed his number.

  “Hi,” he said after she greeted him. “When the phone rang, I swore that if it wasn’t you, I was going to report you as missing. How did it go?”

  “I got the contract.”

  “Congratulations. That’s worth a celebration. If it wasn’t so late, I’d invite myself over. I have some news, too. I now possess a house and a mortgage. Want to help me choose some furniture?”

  “I’m glad you bought that house. It’s a great environment for a young boy.”

  “Thanks. If you don’t help me, I’ll have to hire a decorator.”

  She didn’t ask him the questions that came to her mind, such as why did you want my opinion on the house, my advice about its furnishings, and why do you want me to love your son? “Don’t make me laugh,” she said. “I can’t imagine you handing your house over to a decorator. I’ll help, but I warn you my tastes run to dark woods and earth colors.”

  “Mine, too. I’d like to start the landscaping on your house tomorrow after I leave the hotel. Will that suit you?”

  “Of course. Buy whatever you need and give me the bill.”

  “See you at lunch tomorrow. Sleep well.” He hung up, and she knew he probably wouldn’t accept the money.

  The next morning, Lacette left home half an hour earlier, drove to within a block of City Hall and parked. She walked across the park, inhaling the sweet scent of flowering hyacinths, freshly mowed grass and the young tree leaves still damp with early morning dew. She strode past the fountain that formed a centerpiece for the Federal buildings that surrounded it, many of them—built by the English and German settlers who founded Frederick in 1745—relics of a pre-Revolutionary War era.

  “Hi, Herman,” she said to the building guard, “I just want to see Kellie for a few minutes.”