by KT Morrison
The sermon that morning was about the cost of love. Troy nodded as she spoke, everything she said hit home to him. He squeezed Emma’s hand in his. Love had a cost, she said.
If you fail at love you fail as a Christian. And love is sometimes dirty, but it rolls up its sleeves and it gets to work. It does what needs to be done. Love gambles and takes crazy chances, stretches itself so thin it might break but it never does. Love will move you, jump out and scare you when you least expect it—it’ll clutch your heart and push a finger through your soul. True love will persevere, it will make you do crazy things. But you do them in love.
Emma squeezed his hand now, said, “See?”
Troy watched her profile as she listened. Her eyes were clear and bright, she was intent on the Pastor’s words. She had a slight smile and he could see her nod very slowly as she took it in.
He felt a buzzing on his leg, coming through the pew bench. He moved his leg aside, could see Emma’s phone in its lime green rubber case. It was face up between them, vibrating twice to let her know she had a text. The screen was lit up and he could see that someone had sent her a message. He couldn’t read it, but something compelled him to look. A bad feeling. He squinted and got closer, read it before it went back to black.
Jamie: Hey Babe, can’t wait to see you again, txt me when yr free
Who was Jamie? He went through all the faces from the book club here in Tyler. No Jamie. There was a Jaime. Who was Jamie? Could that be a guy?
He picked her phone up and she caught him. She tried to take it from him, but he pulled it away. She let him take it. She couldn’t get it from him anyway and she wouldn’t want to make a scene in church. He pressed the button and lit up the screen again. He read the message from Jamie, a name he didn’t know. Calling her babe. Sounded like a guy. But maybe not. He could feel himself get mad at her, feel a tension spread across the back of his massive shoulders. It felt like an enormous weight spread across him, like walking out a squat he knew he’d fail.
He swiped the message, and it went to passcode. She didn’t have one before. He held the screen out to her discretely, shaking it for her to look down.
“Who’s Jamie?” he whispered.
She put her finger up to her pursed lips and shushed him without making a noise.
He whispered it again louder and she ignored him. He could feel an anger start to boil.
“Who. Is. Jamie?” he said, quiet, but loud enough to turn a few heads. She shrugged and avoided him, intent on the Pastor.
His legs were bouncing and he was flipping the phone around in his fingers. He looked straight up at the ceiling, at the wide metal chandeliers up there and the cobwebs. Why did it have to be like this?
He stood up and excused himself, squeezing his bulk stuffed in a blue suit past the knees of the people in his pew. Emma watched him go, he could see her face concerned, saw her bend and pick up her purse. He marched out to the parking lot letting the big church door close loudly behind him.
He wandered into an open parking spot and paced a circle in it. He pumped his fists in rage. Why was she doing this to him? He wanted to thrust his chest out and roar at the sky, but there were children around and this was his church. So he kept it bottled up and let his irrational thermometer rise up into the red. He saw her slip out past the big door and close it behind her. She stopped on the stone steps and watched him. She was afraid to come closer. He pointed to a spot in front of him angrily, mouthed Come here to her. She hesitated but she took a small step then rolled her head a bit, giving in to the inevitable and came to him.
He showed her the phone, said, “What is this?”
“Troy, I don’t know what to tell you.”
“Here’s an idea: Tell me the truth. Who is Jamie?”
She didn’t answer. He towered over her, he was more than half a foot taller than her but it looked much more than that because he was so wide. She recoiled a little bit, like she was succumbing to her guilt. If she were indignant she could have stood toe to toe with him.
“It’s what I think it is, isn’t it?” he said. “Give me your passcode.”
“That phone is my business,” she said.
“Oh, it is?” He wound up and threw it straight into the pavement and it exploded. It burst into a hundred pieces, sharp shards and little bits of tin showered up in the air. Her lime green rubber case bounced and went over her shoulder.
She was aghast, her mouth open in shock.
“Troy, that was my phone! I had everything in there!”
“Everything you do is my business. I can’t trust you any more,” he yelled at her.
“You made me. Look in the mirror you wanna blame somebody,” she yelled back at him.
She turned and marched through the parking lot and fished through her purse.
“I won’t share you with anyone,” he yelled at her back, “Not anymore!”
She turned and pulled the keys out of her purse. “You’re drivin me right into his arms!” She screamed it and she was crying now, she could feel the warm tears come down her cheeks. Her breath was trembling. She made it to the Hyundai and unlocked it and got in. Troy had given her the keys to put in her purse so it wouldn’t show in his suit. She locked the doors and put her face in her hands.
“Emma, open this door,” Troy said pulling on the passenger handle, shaking the whole vehicle.
“Leave me alone a minute,” she yelled out.
“Emma, look at me.”
She turned and looked at him standing there in his church suit, huge and mad, bent over so he could see in. He said, “Open the door.”
She put the key in the ignition.
“Emma, open the door,” he yelled, and slapped the side of the SUV.
She started it up and put it in reverse.
“Emma, don’t you dare leave me here.”
She backed it up and put it in drive and inched forward so she wouldn’t hit him. She didn’t know where he was.
He barrelled into the Hyundai full speed and she yelled out. The whole vehicle shook, rocking back and forth on the squeaking suspension. It was like she’d been hit by a car. He must have dented the door. He was so powerful. She put her foot on the gas and roared out of the parking lot. She heard him yell her name two more times, running after the car but getting smaller in the rearview. She couldn’t stop crying now. She could barely see past the tears and her back was racked with sobs.
She had never seen Troy so mad in her entire life. It scared her. She’d really got him this time. She hadn’t been thinking it would be like that. She was scared that he would hurt her.
She was barreling down the Thirty-Five now, heading south to San Marcos.
This was it between them. They’d never raised their voices at each other. Never said a bad thing, even when things had got strange for them in the last six months. She couldn’t stand to see Troy like that. What had she become?
She swung off at the Aquarena Spring exit and followed that past the Bobcat Stadium. She took the McAllen Parkway past Rio Grande Park and then under the Interstate and into the east side of the city.
She barely knew where she was going. She’d looked it up last night, but without her phone she was lost and she couldn’t call Jamie. She didn’t even know his number.
She was on River Road now going slow letting people pass around her, looking for a sign she would recognize. She got to the end of the road and turned around, going back the way she came. She found it, missed it on the first time past. Rio Grande Mobile Home Park.
She pulled in and crawled through the little tight packed community looking for his truck.
Jamie was twenty-two, a student at Texas State. She’d found him on craigslist looking to swing with couples who wanted a well-hung boy to add to the mix. She’d messaged him to see what he was like. Some of the guys she knew were duds right away. They’d come back way too strong, talking dirty off the bat. She wanted someone young to play with. Someone cute and clean, who she could get along with. As l
ong as he had all that and a big one between his legs she would be happy. Jamie was funny in his messages, seemed like he could be a good guy. She didn’t ask him for a picture of his thing and he didn’t offer. She liked how he seemed confident about it. Like he had a big one and he knew it, didn’t care what anyone else thought. He didn’t go around wanting to prove it.
She had lunch with him yesterday at a little café in Austin. He was so cute. He was young and trim, he had a beard and unkempt hair. He looked like a student and she really liked that. He was arrogant too, like a young guy could be. He was third year of a Bachelor and he didn’t have any idea what he was going to do after that. He was perfect.
He told her that he rented a mobile home in the Rio Grande, and she saw him get into his truck when they were done lunch so she knew what to look for. They left it hanging yesterday. She didn’t kiss him, or touch him, just gave him a hug and he said just let him know anytime she wanted to hook up. She knew she would call him. Now she’d been driven to him.
She saw it up ahead on the right. A lifted stepside pickup from the eighties parked in front of a tidy taupe mobile home with a groomed hedge. The whole community was clean and well cared for. She didn’t know what to expect when he said he lived in a mobile home. It was bright and sunny on a Sunday afternoon but the streets were quiet, the whole Park was probably mostly retirees.
She pulled into the tiny drive next to the pickup. He wasn’t expecting her. This was going to be a little weird. She looked in the mirror, saw it was obvious she’d been crying. She got out and went to the door. She opened the aluminum screen and knocked on the wood. A curtain moved next to her, and there was a flash of a face in there peering out. She heard two locks being undone inside hurriedly, and Jamie opened the door.
“Emma? What are you doing here?”
She tried to tell him, but she couldn’t help herself, she just started crying. He stepped to her and put an arm around her, brought her inside to the living area.
Jamie was shirtless, just wearing some track pants and slip-on adidas rubber sandals.
“What’s wrong?”
“I’m sorry, I didn’t know what to do,” she said through tears.
He sat her on the couch and put himself right next to her.
“It’s okay, just tell me what happened.”
She leaned on him, felt him hug her to him.
“My husband found some messages between us.” She could feel him bristle. She said, “He’s done with me. I’ve really ruined it this time.”
“It’s okay, Emma. It’ll be all right.”
“I don’t think it will, I ain’t never seen him so mad.”
“Did he hurt you?”
“He has in the past. He didn’t mean to. I get scared of him sometimes,” she broke down after that, sobbing with her hands over her face. She collapsed into his chest and he put his arms around her, let her cry. He soothed her back while she let it out.
14
Jamie’s place was what she’d expect for a guy his age still in school. The furniture came with the home, and then you could see where it ended and his stuff began. All over the plain furniture there were textbooks, cigarettes, beer cans, sneakers, laundry, Xbox games and the like. He had a big-screen TV and a stereo in the corner, and a bicycle inside for some reason, leaning up against the wall under the picture window.
He came out of the kitchen and brought her a cup of tea. She was still on the couch, and she’d balled up a bunch of Kleenex that he’d given her. Her face felt swollen and puffy, but she felt better letting it out.
“Thanks,” she said. “I’m sorry for just showing up like this. I didn’t really know what to do. I didn’t have anyone else to call or turn to. I woulda called but he smashed my phone.”
“That’s all right, Emma. Come here.” He held his arm out for her, and she scooted over to him and leaned on him.
“The whole way here I was thinking how mean he was. How he scared me. But I don’t know, maybe he’s right. Maybe there’s something wrong with me.”
“You can’t blame yourself.”
“Can’t I? You don’t know the things I done. He has reason.”
“Come on now.”
“He makes me do em. You know—that’s right. I don’t want to do those things I do. He turned me into this. He’s a monster.” She looked up at him. His young face. She kissed him gently, pulling on his bottom lip with hers. His hand came down and across her stomach. He kissed her back.
She pulled from him, said, “It’s his fault. He turned me into someone I can’t stand. Someone I hate. He did it to me.”
He pulled her back to him and kissed her deep and she let him do it. She sucked his warm wet tongue into her mouth, put her arms around him and squeezed him tight.
She pushed him off her abruptly, she said, “I just cain’t. I’m sorry, but this is why I hate myself.”
He pulled her to him, but she turned her head. He said, “C’mon, Emma, that felt so right.”
“I’m a married woman. I think I need to remind myself—”
“I don’t care that you’re married. Why are you here if you care? You know what you want.”
“Please, Jamie, I just needed a shoulder to cry on.”
He stood up and she could see he was mad. The front of his track pants showed a bulge too, swinging stiffly behind there as he walked off.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I know I blow hot and cold.”
“I don’t get how you came here. Why you come or how you found me.”
“Jamie, I don’t have anyone to turn to, my family and friends are all in Georgia, I don’t have anyone, I’m all alone. I thought we had a connection yesterday, I felt like I could trust you, turn to you. I’m sorry I came here.”
He had his hands between his legs pushing his thing down, he said, “No, Emma, it’s all right.”
“I remembered where you said you lived and I know your truck. I’m so sorry, I just didn’t know what to do.”
He sat on the arm of the upholstered chair across from her. He said, “I just...I was looking for people to hook up with...I wasn’t—”
“You weren’t looking for trouble?”
“Right. Sorry.”
“Well, if I suck your cock can I stay here for a while?”
“Emma, I’m not an asshole.”
She looked up at him, making herself seem small on the couch. She threw the Kleenex on his cluttered coffee table. She stood up and walked to the door. He grabbed her arm as she passed. She could have pulled away but she let him stop her. She didn’t turn to him but she could feel him staring at her.
Finally, he said, “You can stay...I want you to stay here.”
She looked out the front door a while, made him wait for it. “And I was going to fuck you anyway. You almost ruined it.”
“Almost?” he asked her, swinging her arm, smiling and trying to cheer her up.
“I’d like to stay,” she said.
“You can stay a couple days, how’s that?”
“Thank you,” she said and she put her arms around his shoulders while he sat on the chair. “I just need a little time to get myself together. I can’t just walk in and fuck you. I just had a horrible experience. A big part of my life came to an end. I’m not in the mood, but I will be. I want you to fuck me. It’s all I could think about since yesterday. I really like you.”
“I’m sorry I came across like a total asshole.”
“That’s all right. You have a T-shirt or somethin I could change into? This is my church dress.”
He went into his bedroom and she threw herself down on the couch. She untied her lace up dress shoes, kicked them off, and pushed them under the table. He came out and gave her a grey U of T shirt. She stood up and held it out, it would come down to the tops of her thighs. She didn’t want to go in to his bedroom to change, she could picture him coming in behind her and attacking her. But if he wanted to do that he could have done it right here on the couch. Nevertheless...
> She put the T-shirt over her head and slid it down on top of her dress. She didn’t have her arms through the arm holes and she just undid the buttons underneath the shirt. She opened it right up and let it fall to the pale blue carpet. Then she put her hands behind her and undid her bra. She took it off and let it fall in front of him on the coffee table. She popped her arms through the holes and sat down.
“That’s so much more comfortable,” she said. She put her heels up on the edge of the couch and put her head back. She knew he’d be able to see the crotch of her bright green panties. She hoped he was thinking of all the dirty things he was going to do to her.
Emma sat on the couch and watched him play video games for two hours. It was still bright and sunny outside, but she’d got sleepy and had laid out on her side along his sofa.
Finally, she sat up and put her feet on the floor. She picked at her hair with her arms up, her hands behind her head. She peeled her braids apart while she watched him play. Jamie became aware of her. He would tap the buttons like crazy, lean as his soldier shot on the screen or looked around a corner, then dart his eyes over to her.
She got her hair undone and pulled it out, fluffed it and shook her head. She got up, pulled her panties down, shimmied them to the floor. She squeezed in behind him on the big soft chair. He kept playing and she ran her hands over his bare back. He was fit and thin, she felt muscles at work under his tan skin. He had tattoos around the tops of his arms and on his shoulder, and one on his back, a tiger in the jungle and it spread across his shoulder blade. Her hands went around to his front and she felt him flinch and he laughed.
“Ticklish?”
“A little,” he said, and his player threw a grenade.
She kissed the warm skin of his back. It was smooth and soft. He wasn’t dirty but he hadn’t showered in a while and she could smell his body, smell his underarms. She let her hands come down his slim belly and her fingers dipped into his waistband. She left them there and kept her lips moving across his back. He paused his game and he threw the controller into the mess on the coffee table.