by Pynk
“I guess it’s abnormal sexual cravings by a female. Like wanting repeated sex all the time.”
“Do you want it or need it?”
“I need it. I crave it. It’s all I think about. Before I finish an orgasm I’m honestly thinking about the next one.”
“Then perhaps you are indeed addicted. But you may or may not be a nymphomaniac. They’re not necessarily one and the same. Sometimes nymphomaniacs just have high sex drives. Some really need attention and gratification. It goes beyond the bedroom or the backseat. It’s really a need that even if met four times a day, still wouldn’t be enough. The root of the matter is attention, needing to be desired. Needing attention from more than just one person. The majority of nymphos can’t be monogamous.”
“Well, I’m telling you now, that sounds like me.”
“Do you want to be monogamous?”
“I don’t know.”
“Okay. See, you claim this is temporary. You say it’s renting you. So evict it. If you keep letting it live within you, chances are you’ll constantly cheat on your mate and have failed relationships. The truth is, we do tend to attract who we are.”
Miki nodded and twisted her mouth in thought.
Rachel Cummings said, looking around the room, “All of you who can relate to what Miki is feeling right now, this goes for you, too. What you need to do first is find out why. Why do you need it? Does it fill a need? Why do you need the attention? What gratifies you about sex? Those are your big questions.
“You weren’t born this way. None of us were. Marianne Williamson said our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. What are we afraid of, and who taught us to be fearful of ourselves? And what road would we need to take to fully love ourselves? Once you get that lesson learned, then you can begin to feel the power of healing. Then you can step through these doors knowing you’re on the road to healthy sex, one week sober, one month sober, one year sober, whatever. We all deserve it. This is serious. It’s life-saving serious.” She again looked at Miki. “You fell off the wagon, Miki, but it’s okay. We’re all family here. We’re you. Just get up and start over again. This is your life. It’s time to hug a new day.”
She looked at everyone. “Repeat after me. Stop lusting and become sober.”
“Stop lusting and become sober,” the members said back.
Valencia offered assurance to Miki by touching her fist to her heart.
Miki touched her fist to her heart back.
“Anyone else?” Rachel Cummings asked, looking over at a tiny woman with a red face, who had been sitting with her head down during most of the meeting.
The woman raised her hand and began to tell the story of what the last two weeks had been like for her. Sleeping with her boss on his desk in the middle of the day at work and getting caught. Losing her job. Leaving her toddler at home all night long while she snuck out to sleep with the man she met in the grocery store earlier that evening.
Miki sat still and listened. Her mind shifted to trying to recall all the exact words of her sponsor. How did I get this way? she asked herself. That’s a damn good question. She thought of her relationship with Tariq for a moment, and then thought back to her mysterious phone call.
After the meeting, as Miki waited in the hallway for Valencia to use the bathroom, Rachel Cummings approached.
“Hey Miki.” She gave Miki a hug. “I hope you don’t think I delved too deep there.”
Miki patted her back, smiling. “No. Not at all. That was helpful, actually.”
“Good. Listen. I know that I bring up faith as part of this program, and I wanted to invite you and the other new ladies to come by my church next Sunday if you can. It’s in Westchester. They’re cool there, you know, supportive and open. It’s more positive thinking than anything. Just thought you might want to come by. Not sure if you have a church home or not.”
Miki said, “I do, but I haven’t been in a while. I go to West Angeles but it gets pretty crowded there.”
“Yeah, I know. I’ve been there before. This is a much smaller congregation. I’ve already spoken to Brandi and Teela. They said they’d try to make it.”
“Okay. Sure. I don’t see why not.”
“I’ll ask Valencia, too.”
“Oh, I’ll tell her about it. She’s in the ladies’ room.” Miki pointed toward the bathroom door.
“Good. I’ll send all of you an e-mail with the address. It starts at eleven in the morning. I hope to see you there.”
“Great. Thanks.”
“Have a good evening.” Rachel Cummings turned to step away as Dwayne approached. “Hi Dwayne. Excuse me,” she said, as she passed.
“Sure. No problem.” Dwayne took a second to watch her walk away, right around the area of her rear end. He stepped to Miki and spoke in a low voice. “Hey. Are you coming by for a minute?” he asked, touching her arm. He gave her a suave look of irresistibility.
“I am.”
“Good. So I’ll see you in a few.”
“Okay.” Miki heard Dwayne’s “Atomic Dog” ring tone as he walked toward the exit door.
He answered, and said in an even lower tone, “Nothing. I’m going home and going to bed. Talk to you tomorrow…. Love you, too.”
Miki’s world was mightily rocked from the rooter to the tooter and all areas in between. Dwayne had serviced every inch of her. Tonight, even more so than the first time when he’d put her in wild-ass hood mode and had her talking shit, hanging off the bed. This time, he even found an erogenous zone she didn’t even know she had. That was one reason why she broke her rule and laid up with him upon his disheveled king bed, talking. Neither had on a strip of clothing. The soft lights graced the outlines of their long frames.
He lay on his left side, facing her. “Funny. You’ve never asked about my SA deal.”
She lay on her right, facing him, and said, “I told you it doesn’t matter.” Her hair was mussed.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean, it’s not gonna change anything.”
“But don’t you even care?”
“I do. I figure you’ll tell it when you’re ready.”
“I’m ready. It’s not all that uncommon. The regular members know all about me.” He rubbed the smooth, brown softness of her upper arm with his massive right hand while looking in her eyes. “Rachel Cummings labeled me a womanizer. And I agree. And just so you know, I have a woman.”
Miki did not blink. “I figured that much.”
“She knows about the first night we got together. She and I argued. But we got back together. But believe me, you’re not the only one.”
“Okay. But, does she know that?”
“No.” His eyes darted to the ceiling. “Well, yes. She thinks she knows it. I tell her she’s imagining it all. She believes it after a while. But such is life.”
“And why do you do that to her?”
He gave Miki a serious stare. “Same reason you do it. With so much opportunity and so many women all around, it’s all so easy. It’s just about finding the right woman who’ll deal with it. And she’s the one for now.”
“Why even have a woman, then?”
“Why do you have a man?”
She placed her arm over her head as she spoke. “Someone who I let myself care about, a little. Someone to share my day with.”
“And what if he wants something permanent?”
“I won’t let that happen.”
“But what about what he’s doing? Your man, I mean.”
“I can’t worry about that. I guess I’d deserve it. I’ve screwed around on men so much, life needs to give me a taste of my own medicine, I guess.”
“I guess.” He removed his hand from her arm and rubbed his eyebrow. “You don’t want more?”
“Like I said, I don’t let that happen. I don’t use the word permanent.”
“Some things are beyond our control.” Dwayne readjusted the pillow beneath his head.
“True.”
&n
bsp; He asked, “So doesn’t it bother you that I belong to someone else?”
Miki explained, “Sounds like your body doesn’t mind. That’s on her.” She gave him a comme ci, comme ça look and massaged her hairline.
“Do you ever think about whether the men you get with are married or taken? Do you ever think about what could be going on in the minds of the women who’re being fooled around on?”
Miki said flatly, “I think most men are taken anyway. It just happens that way. And that’s on them. I mean, a woman can’t really even ask a man nowadays if he’s single. We have to be specific because a man will lie to the hilt to get in our pants. We have to ask: Are you married? Are you living with someone? Are you in a relationship? Or better yet, is there someone who’d think she has the right to kick my black ass for getting with you?”
He chuckled yet looked serious. “I guess you and I could both say yes to that, huh?”
She nodded. “I guess so. But you still haven’t told me your deal.”
He rolled onto his back but turned his head to look at her. “I can never have enough sex. Enough women. Enough orgasms. I guess I’m the male version of you.”
She propped up her elbow and rested her head upon her hand. “Or I’m the female version of you.”
He explained, “Maybe we’re both right. I grew up with my father. My mom died during childbirth. And Dad was your typical rolling stone. I’m a chip off the old block. Only I’m thirty-six and don’t have any children.”
“How’d you manage that?” she asked, looking amazed.
“Condoms. I use them even when I’m fucking someone I’m seeing all the time. But yeah, my dad has nine kids, all by different women. He never told me to chase women but he showed me how to do it. He showed me every trick in the book without even knowing he was showing me. I opened the nightclub just so I could meet women. I’ve always had public jobs just so I could meet women. I can’t be in a grocery store or Target or Lowe’s without looking at, lusting over, hitting on, flirting with, or trying to get at a woman. And everywhere I go, I see women who I’d fuck. It’s just that there are so many different physical traits that turn me on. They can be short, tall, fat, skinny, light, dark, big ass, no ass, huge tits, no tits, blonde, brunette, black, or white. I have fucked every nationality, I have fucked four women at the same time on the beach, I had sex on a plane with a stewardess, sex in the movie theater, and in the back of the fire truck when I was a firefighter. I got more numbers back then. And I get ten times as many now. I have all the chick-magnet factors. A big house, a little money, nice car, I dress nice, and I’m fairly decent looking, so I’ve been told.”
“Fairly.” She grinned. “They didn’t lie.”
He smiled for a quick second. “And still, I’m not satisfied. I need all the pussy I can fuck. I always wonder what it feels like inside the pussy of the one I see wherever. It’s simply my mission to find out.”
“I don’t know if I’d use the word simply, but you know. They say it doesn’t feel much different from the previous one most times. It’s all about the conquer. Sounds like it’s not much of a challenge to you. Sounds like chasing the pussy comes pretty easy to you.”
“It does.”
“So why me? Why me more than once? Why’d you call me? Why me instead of the other ladies in the group?”
“Oh, I did get with one before you got there, but she’s been cured and moved on. And yes, I did hit on Rachel Cummings’s fine, luscious ass, but I got nowhere.”
“Really. Rachel?”
“Yeah. She’s not feeling the dick anymore, anyway. But listen. I’ve been in group for eight months now.” He turned back to his left side to face her and, this time, rubbed his hand along the curve that joined her waist to her hip, up and back. “I guess you just seem different. It doesn’t feel like a fling with you. It’s like if I were right. If I was healthy. If I was fixed. If I was sober, we’d be cool. You fit the image of who I think I could be with.”
She blinked fast. “You don’t even know me.”
“I know.” He looked at her chest and then down at her belly button. “I mean your look, your class, your energy, your sexual appetite. It’s hard to explain.”
“And why isn’t your woman the one?”
“She could be. She’s conservative and square. She thinks everyone online is gonna get AIDS. Even if they have a MySpace page. God forbid they’d be on a dating site. She’s very reserved. Almost passive. I’ve just been trying to get her to loosen up. I think with you, we’d match better. But, it’s just a thought.”
“So that’s it? You’re a womanizer who’s never satisfied. Kinda like a pussy packrat, huh? That doesn’t sound too uncommon to me. Sounds like a whole hell of a lot of other men out there.”
“Miki, the truth is that I got arrested for assaulting my best friend’s wife when I was staying with them for a few days in Chicago. He went to work and she left the door to their bedroom open while she was getting dressed. I peeked in. She saw me looking and gave me a look back. I guess I misread that look because I opened the door and came on in and she said I forced myself on her. I thought she wanted me to. But I did jail time for that.”
Miki raised her eyebrows and formed her mouth to say slowly, “Wow.”
“I got arrested another time when I came to a traffic light and made eye contact with the girl in the car next to me. She smiled. I followed her home and she called the police. Another time, and this wasn’t that long ago, it happened after I had too much to drink. I was at my club, and a couple of dudes I know and I went home with this girl. She wanted us to run a train on her. Her man came home and pulled out a knife on us. We jumped him and we were all accused of assault. She claimed we tried to rape her. As part of my probation I agreed to counseling. They suggested I check into a sexual rehab program, and so here I am. And it really doesn’t feel like it’s changed much. I’m still thinking and feeling the same way. I think every woman wants me, Miki.”
Miki smiled and reached down to find his hand and their fingers interlocked. He held her hand back and they looked each other square in the eyes. “I had no idea. Not every smile means ‘fuck me,’ Dwayne. Lord knows I know about variety, though. I believe I’m wired to cheat. But damn, that is some serious shit.”
In the next second, they heard a banging at his bedroom door. Miki released his hand and jumped out of her skin. Her smile vanished.
Someone tried to turn the knob over and over fast but it was locked. A piercing, high-pitched voice dug into their ears. “Bitch, get the fuck up outta there and get at me face to face. Fucking with my man again. I’ll bust the windows out your ugly-ass car if you’re not out of this room in three seconds. Or make it your Corvette, Dwayne.” She began to bang the hell out of the bedroom door. The door frame shook with each thud.
His hazel eyes leaped. “What the fuck?” He sprung from the bed, scrambled for his boxers, and jumped into them. He made a mad dash for the bedroom door, exited the room and quickly pulled the door closed behind him.
The livid woman continued to rant. “You dog. You need to get a fucking hotel room with your stupid ass. Why the fuck would you bring a bitch back to your house anyway? And as far as that skank-ass bitch is concerned, I’m not done with her.” She bellowed toward the door again as he snatched a baseball bat from her hands. “He told me you like to fuck. He told me you’re a damn addict. I will kill you, bitch. Come back over here again, okay? Try me. I ain’t no punk bitch. Bitch.”
Dwayne yelled at his woman, “Get your ass out of here, now.”
Miki held the black silk sheets to her neck. As much as she’d tried to look, the door had only been open long enough for Dwayne to exit fast, and she didn’t get to see the deranged woman’s face.
The woman still berated him with a shrieking mix of panic and rage and hurt. “Dwayne. You lied to me. You told me that night was the one and only time, and now you have the nerve to have her back over here. Have you lost your mind? You told me tonight you were goin
g home and going to bed, but you didn’t say who the fuck you were going to bed with. I put up with so much shit from you. I’m sick of this. And you, bitch, in my man’s bedroom. You’d better get the fuck up outta there, bitch.”
Miki hurriedly hopped up and scrounged around to grab her stuff while the two argued outside of his bedroom door. She looked around, trying to find a closet to hide in, when she noticed a window near the television. She yanked on the wooden shutter’s drawstring and slid the window lock tabs, lifting the sash as she kicked out the screen.
Miki climbed out with her shoes and purse in hand, and took off as fast as her bare feet could carry her. She reached her truck, pressed the car alarm, jumped in, started the engine, and took off down the street doing eighty.
Now, just like in the past, there was one more man in Miki’s sex life who had a woman she didn’t give a fuck about. Just another silly, jealous woman who needed to get a grip and learn that all men will shuffle the infamous fucking-around cards and deal them one by one. It was just that Miki had learned you have to come up with your own deck of cards and slickly deal them just as well.
Miki spoke loud while looking through her rearview mirror after making sure she wasn’t being followed. “That’s what the fuck I get for staying too long and laying up after the fuck. My bad. Damn, I guess I didn’t hug a new day very well today.”
Miki then thought to herself, Damn.Did he say she was reserved and passive? Not. And wait. Was it her voice that called my office that day? Miki tried her best to recollect the tone and the pitch. Especially of the specific word that was used to refer to Miki more than a few times… bitch.
16
“Single Ladies”
Teela
It was a happy hour Friday, and time for Teela and Brandi, newfound friends, to bond one-on-one. They found the last two available seats at the bar of the sleek and chic Whiskey Blue, where all of L.A.’s hipsters hung out. It was a trendy oasis-style restaurant, with ginger-colored bar stools and liquid-lava bar tops, cinnamon swirl walls, and laminate floors.