Sam was a short fat guy, with wispy red hair that had long ago thinned to wisps, and a red face from drinking so much and being Irish. Jake started to wonder if Sam was going to put a ring on Sarah to try to have dibs on her forever since she was so hot. Because she was smoking hot, Jake had to admit that. Sarah was the kind of blonde that would have walked onto the cast of Baywatch back in the day.
“I mean,” Sam continued. “She says it's over and that's that, so I'm just going to move forward.”
“Are you still letting her fool around with other people?” Jake asked him candidly.
It was Sam's turn to glance around the bar. He hadn't mentioned any of that when he'd been recollection how surprised he'd been to Jake just a few minutes before.
“No, that kind of played itself out,” Sam said. “It stopped being fun when I realized how submissive she is.”
Sam nodded and looked toward the video game at the end of the bar that had plastic shotguns resting in racks while scenes of deer and elk grazing in field. He wanted more than anything to have a few more drinks to make the game a challenge and spend the rest of the night waylaying herds of unsuspecting, digital game than try to figure out what the hell was going on with Sam. But it looked like he was going to get roped into the wedding. Sam was looking at him, knowing that Jake would let him know what he planned to do by the look on Jake's face, as old friends often do.
“All right,” Jake said. “Fine. You want to marry her even after all this bullshit. That's your business, and as your friend I support you in that decision, so I'll be at your wedding tomorrow.”
“Great!” Sam said, partially standing in his excitement, only to plop back down in his chair to raise his mug in a toast.
“To you, my friend,” Sam said. “You've done so much for this country, and now you're going to do so much for me as a friend even though I know you want to get some ass instead of hanging out at my wedding with a bunch of insurance salesmen you don't know.”
Jake raised his glass to toast, but hesitated.
“Is there an open bar?” he asked.
“For you there is!” Sam said.
Jake slammed his mug into the other with a loud *clunk* that drew the attention of the few people drinking around them for a brief moment before their eyes trailed back to televisions.
“All right,” Jake said. “So I show up. I do the best man thing. I leave.”
“Nothing to it,” Sam said.
“Do I have to give a speech or anything?” Jake asked.
“Oh. Yes. There is that,” Sam said. “I mean, you could just do it off the cuff, no big deal. Usually the best man gives a speech and he's too drunk to really do a good job, but he tries to make up for it by showing everyone how good of a friend he is to the groom by throwing out a bunch of trivia about him and following it up with inside jokes with close friends and family.”
Jake didn't like how that sounded. He wasn't going to the wedding to try to impress anyone. Hell, he was really only going because he knew he'd feel like a piece of shit if he told Sam to fuck off; so maybe he was, in a very round about way, doing it for himself.
“Look, I'll stay soberish and when the time comes I'll stand and say a few words,” Jake said. “You know what, I'll keep it brief and then I'll quote Shakespeare calling brevity the soul of wit, or however he put it. I'm sure it was a lot prettier than that.”
“Oh yeah, that would be great,” Sam said. “That would impress the shit out of people, actually. You should do that! Just get up there, say whatever you want about me but obviously keep it positive, briefly touch on the marriage and how you endorse it, then do the Shakespeare thing and call it good. Everyone will think you're deep as fuck, man. Jesus, that's fucking brilliant.”
Jake didn't think it was brilliant, he thought it was what Sam was going to have to be OK with because it was what he was going to do. Sam was right about one thing, though. People would think he was deep as fuck when he got up there and didn't give them what they were expecting, but instead gave them what they wanted—just a few honest words followed by a hasty retreat. There would be people in the audience who'd heard all about what had happened with Sarah and the would be best man, and Jake knew it wouldn't serve his image as a Marine or as a man to stand up there and bullshit them.
“I might not so much as endorse as acknowledge,” Jake said. “I mean, really, that's all people want anyway. They don't want to feel like they are being sold something.”
Jake hoped that Sam would be able to handle that. He could tell by the way Sam took another gulp of his beer that he wasn't excited about that insistence of non-endorsement, but that it might be a comprise he was willing to make. Sam looked into his beer, holding his mug in front of him cocked at a forty five degree angle. He peered at the suds on top as if trying to divine the future, or what to say next.
“You know how sometimes life doesn't turn out how you expect,” Sam said without looking up.
Jake did know. Much more than Sam's understanding, Jake's recognition of the simple truth that life wouldn't work out like he wanted dawned on him between his third and forth deployments. By that time his faith in what his country was doing had started to waver, faltering in the sands, shimmering heat waves, and deserts of Iraq both existential and physical. Jake was going to say something, thought that Sam had paused so that Jake could take the reigns of the conversation for a moment, to be surprised when Sam continued.
“One of the groomsmen is bi, by the way,” Sam said. It was about the last thing that Jake had expected to come out of his mouth.
“What?” Jake said.
“You know,” Sam said. “He likes to fool around with guys as well as girls.”
“Oh,” Jake said. “Yeah. Yeah I get that. But why the fuck are you telling me?”
“What?” Sam said. “You aren't OK with it?”
Jake couldn't believe what he was hearing.
“No. What the fuck?” Jake said. “How did I become homophobic when I was startled you blurted out the sexual orientation of one of your groomsmen at the bar?”
Sam chuckled and looked around.
“Yeah, you're right,” he said. “You've always been better at avoiding impropriety than me. I guess that's how we are different, but at the same time the same. We are both aware of it, but you avoid it. I guess I just don't give a shit, sometimes. But yeah, dudes queer as a three dollar bill but not in the flamboyant way. In the suave, might even make you bicurious way. And I'm telling you, Mr. I'm So Shocked because he's probably going to hit on you. A lot.”
“Oh,” Jake said. “Well that's not a big deal. Guys hit on me all the time. I don't care about that kind of thing. Life is too short.”
Sam smiled and let his posture relax in his seat, for the first time revealing how anxious he'd been about the conversation.
“Listen, seriously, thank you for doing this,” Sam said. “I know you don't have to and I know I'm asking a lot. And maybe I'm an entitled civilian that I hear so many military people talk about, but you know what? My fiance walked into our house a few days ago, literally, with my now former best friend's dick in her. So, please, if I seem like I'm going through a hard time, or I”m a little distant, just cut me some slack. All right?”
“Fine with me,” Jake said as he finished his beer. “And I'm sorry about what happened. I really do mean that. That's some fucking shit I haven't heard in awhile.”
“What do you mean?” Sam asked before downing the rest of his beer and finishing the suds with a smack of his lips.
“In the military all kind of crazy shit happens. Not just, like, during military exercises and stuff, but stuff like this, you know? Like I knew a guy during the School of Infantry that walked into his bedroom—a bedroom, mind you, in a house that he owned—to find his cousin fucking his wife. And when he through her out on the street his mother, also living in the house with him on his dime, told him that he was being too hard on her.”
A few of the patrons looked over at Jake to se
e if he'd give some indication that he'd just made the story up. When there wasn't one, they looked back down at their drinks gloomily.
“Damn,” Sam said. “Is that true?”
“Fucking aye right that's true,” Jake said. “Would I fucking bullshit you on the eve of your wedding? Hey! Speaking of. What happened to the bachelor party?!”
Sam laughed sadly.
“You know, of all the people in the grooms party who end up planning things, the best man is the one who does all the bachelor party stuff. So when he got the ax the plan kind of fell apart since he'd booked everything on his credit card.”
“Fuck that, man,” Jake said, hopping out of his chair and onto his feet. “We can do something right now! I mean, we don't have to get hammered or anything like that. But, I don't know, what do you want to do?”
“Oh, I don't know,” Sam said. “I . . . I just, well, I'm not sure you'd be into what I'd want to do. Sometimes what I want and what other people consider normal part ways fairly quickly.”
“Yeah, yea, yeah,” Jake said. “What the fuck do you want to do that's so fucking crazy? Huh? Sell me some racy insurance or something?”
They both laughed loudly at this. Jake was starting to feel the drinks he'd been downing while he'd listened to Sam. He didn't know what Sam wanted to do, but whatever it was, by God Jake wanted to do it. And right then, not a second later.
“You might be surprised,” Sam said. “And you might be unwilling. You are so sure, even after hearing the story I just told you? You, my friend, are the fool rushing in this time!”
Sam chortled loudly, then started coughing, evidently having sucked some last remaining sud in his mouth down the wrong pipe. When he finally got it back together he spoke again, this time with a tone of finality.
“All right, then let's head back to my place real quick then we'll hit the strip club up or something. All call us a cab since a DUI would be a real cherry on top of the last few days.”
Jake nodded even though he wasn't sure why they would need to go back to Sam's house for. Maybe he had a bunch of ones that he wanted for the strip club or something. Without giving it much more thought, and more worried that his buzz would wear of than anything else, Jake hopped in the cab with Sam.
Jake had a funny feeling about things by the time they made it to Sam's place. Sam lived in a gated community not far from the bar, but he spent the duration of the entire trip texting furiously. Jake didn't know if something was wrong, or if maybe Sam was trying to get a hold of some of his friends and let them know his bachelor party was back on. When he'd looked over Sam's shoulder he'd found that he'd been texting Sarah the whole time.
Now, as they sauntered into the house half drunk and horny for the strip club, Sam's demeanor changed subtly. He suddenly wasn't the usual kind of scatter brained smart guy he usually was. Instead he became quieter, but also more sure of himself. Sam fixed them both a drink and herded Ben into the living room.
“Well, what I want to do actually is pretty out there, I will admit,” Sam said. “So if you aren't down to do it, then it's all good. I won't hold it against you at all.”
“What are you talking about, Sam?” Jake asked. “I'm actually really curious to know. You should tell me, maybe I'll be all about it!”
Sam finished his drink and made another before flopping back on the couch to answer. It had been one of those moments when Jake wondered how much he didn't know about Sam. Jake had been away for years now, only coming back for a few days at a time and spending most of that time to chase skirts and get hammered drunk. When Sam hadn't answered him and instead sat quietly, finishing his drink, only to get up and make another it made Jake wonder what Sam had been doing for all these years. There had to be more to him than just a insurance salesman by day, lush by night persona that he projected.
“All right,” Sam said. “Well, here's the deal. I want Sarah to come down here and give you a lap dance, completely naked, but I don't want you to touch her or anything like that.”
Jake was shocked. He sat up in his seat as straight as a stop-sign, and with the same red face as one too. He should have known something like this was coming. He'd sensed that there was something weird about Sam and he should have just went with it and started speculating. The first thing that he would have said on his list would have been swinger, but then that would have been giving Sam too much credit. Really, Jake realized in a frantic rush of thoughts, Sam was a cuckold. He got turned on by the idea of other dudes fucking his fiance in front of him, or sending her to get fucked by someone else. Or maybe he was just turned on by the idea and wasn't into the humiliation that went along with being a more traditional cuckold husband. Jake had spent hours reading up on it one day while he was board standing a Sergeant of the Guard post, and now those hours spent reading about something so obscure that he figured he'd never run into it was being thrust into his life. It turned out to be Sam's fetish.
Jake thought about Sarah and about how good looking she was. Sarah was the kind of blonde that guys jaws hit the concrete over when she walked by. Sam had once told him a slurred story at the bar about how Sarah had actually caused an traffic accident by walking around the streets of Jamaica in nothing but a string bikini. He couldn't think of anything but how much fun it would be to play with her big tits, or bend her over the couch and spank her ass while he fucked her. But if he went along with this scheme of Sam's he probably wasn't going to get to fuck her.
“Well, I mean, if that's what you want to do then sure,” Jake heard himself say.
Had he really just gone along with it? Jake couldn't believe he was going with the flow so easily. Usually if he got into a situation that made him sexually uncomfortable, but this time was different. Jake reasoned that it had to be because of how Sam had spent time at the bar talking about seeing his banging hot fiance getting fucked from behind by another man. Why else would he be so accommodating to a fetish that would, at least this time, leave him unfulfilled sexually. Jake wanted to see the body that belonged to the woman he'd heard all night about called Sarah. He wanted to feel those tits rubbed in her face, and he wanted her to grind her pussy up against the bulge in his jeans. Jake was completely turned on by the idea and equally surprised at his own arousal.
It wasn't until the door from the study cracked that Jake realized that Sam had already set everything up with his soon to be wife. There wasn't another egress from the small study except the door into the living room. Sam leaned forward eagerly in anticipation and Jake leaned back and hooked his thumbs in his jeans belt loops—as if that would be the boundary that he would keep, his hands hooked to his jeans so he couldn't touch.
At first the door remained just cracked, but then it was flung open. There stood Sarah, her amazing body adorned in Victoria Secret frills. She looked like a Playboy Bunny, and Jake felt his dick getting even harder, which wasn't something that he thought was possible until he realized the tightening in his pants was increasing again. Sarah walked over to Jake like a minx, batting her eye lashes and smiling coyly, as if she didn't know what she was about to do, as if she'd just so happened to be waiting in the study dressed in some of the skimpiest undergarments that Jake had ever seen.
There wasn't much left to the imagination. The curves of Sarah's breasts and ass were only barely covered, in the most minimal sense, by the see through lace of her lingerie. Her nipples were perfectly round and an exquisite shade of pink that was so light it reminded Jake of some of the flowers he'd seen at fancy shops in Paris. Sarah wasn't toned, but she also wasn't fat by any means. She was the kind of hot that reminded Jake of Maryland Monroe. As Jake's eyes looked up and down her body he saw that she kept her pubic hair trimmed to a nice and neat little landing strip. It was sexy to Jake when a woman took the time to groom herself so that everything looked just so.
“Hello,” Sarah said. “What's your name?”
She came over to stand right in front of Jake, and before he could find his tongue to answer undid her bra and let
it drop to the floor, then slipped her panties down over her hips so they could follow.
“I . . . uh . . . my name is Jake,” he stumbled through his words like a teenager seeing a girl naked for the first time.
“How do you think I look, Jake?” she asked him.
Jake didn't know what to say. Here was this beautiful goddess that Sam had somehow gotten to say yes to marriage, who was so hot that Jake was starting to understand why Sam might not care if she occasionally scratch an itch that he couldn't get to with another partner. Jake wondered if there was a right or wrong answer. If Sarah was expecting him to gush about it, or if she wanted him to not give her any real compliments like how some girls thrive over being treated poorly. Jake looked over at Sam to see him rubbing his hand over the crotch of his dress pants. Then Jake looked back at Sarah and tried his best to say something intelligent.
“I think you look fucking amazing,” Jake said. “And I'd love to fuck you.”
Sarah leaned forward, letting her breasts hang in front of Jake's face, and ran her finger from the base of his neck up to his chin to point his face up to her own.
“I'd love to fuck you,” she said. “But I only can if my husband says so. Last time I fucked one of his friends he wasn't too happy with me at all. I really hurt him, and I don't want to do that again.”
“You aren't, don't worry baby,” Sam said breathlessly. “But for now just give him a sexy lap dance and grind you pussy on his hard dick through denim. Maybe in the future we could talk about more, but for now let's just do this. And, by the way dear, I'd like to introduce you to our new best man. I've known Jake for many, many years now. We went to middle school, then high school together. But back in the day he wasn't like he is now. He was more of a nerd than anything. But I think most people knew that if he applied himself to the gym he'd become the hard body we see today.”
Jake didn't know if Sam was talking so much because he was nervous or afraid, aroused or repelled and trying to cover it up. He figured that maybe the fetish wasn't as black and white as he had thought before. Maybe Sam was all of those things at once sometimes, and that's what he liked the most about it. If so Jake could kind of understand that, although he wouldn't ever want to put himself in the situations that Sam put himself in for the very reasons that Sam was having heartache now—there was just too much gray area for anyone that had hard and fast boundaries, especially one partner lets the other do whatever they want while being a submissive.
ROMANCE: His Reluctant Heart (Historical Western Victorian Romance) (Historical Mail Order Bride Romance Fantasy Short Stories) Page 56