The Wind Is Rising 1

by Daniel Steele

  “You can tell me now that if I’d been honest with you you would have changed. But you’re lying…to me and to yourself. You’d have been hurt…and defensive….and you would have withdrawn even further from me.”

  She reached out and put one hand over his where it lay on the table.

  “We have to talk about it, Bill. It’s been a problem since before we got together. I can’t help that you’re shorter than me. I can’t help that you’re….an okay looking guy, but nothing special. I can’t help it that you’re not…hung. You’re not huge. Most women don’t give a shit….usually. I’ll admit, I liked them big. And I liked Doug’s. But it wasn’t, and it never would be, the main thing I’d look for in a man.

  “You never did have….self-confidence. Maybe because you’re short and girls can be damned cruel when you’re growing up. But I always had to keep propping up your self-esteem, your confidence. And I know that it didn’t help that I’m….attractive and I’ve got big boobs and guys have always hit on me.

  “But again, I didn’t do it. I didn’t make you what you are or me what I am. We’re the people we are. I could have worn potato sacks to hide my boobs and never flirted, but that’s who I am. That’s who I was when I met you. That’s who you fell in love with, or at least that’s what you told me.”

  He rubbed his lip.

  “You’re right. I’m what I am and you’re what you are. I guess the answer would have been never to have gotten together, or for me to have just fucked you like all your other boyfriends did and then walked away.”

  “You’re trying to hurt me, Bill. You couldn’t have done that. That’s not who you are. And you had to know that I loved you.”

  “Until the last few years.”

  “Maybe. I got so damned tired of having to make you feel like a man. I got so damned tired of you being sweet and reasonable instead of rolling me and fucking me. I got tired of all those damned nights when I lay alone in bed and had to jam a vibrator up inside me because you were working late.

  “I got tired of being jealous, and contemptuous, of you at the same time. I couldn’t stop myself from thinking, on a lot of those nights, that it would have been so easy for you to bend Cheryl, or any of the other women in the office, over a desk and fuck them and I’d never know. And it made it easier to understand why you stopped pushing me for sex.”

  “I stopped pushing because a lot of nights I was exhausted, and other nights you were exhausted, and….I felt bad pushing you when you got angry with me.”

  She pushed herself back from the table.

  “Words. Bullshit. Excuses, Bill. When we first got married, there were nights I wasn’t in the mood until you got me wet enough that I was the one who wanted it.”

  “Do you hear yourself, Debbie? When we first got married I was 24 and you were 22. Jesus Christ, we were kids. I could get it up three or four times a night. How the hell could you expect me to keep up that pace when we’d been married nearly 20 years, when it wasn’t new or fresh or exciting fucking you like it was at the first? It couldn’t be. We got to be an old married couple.

  “And even when we first got married, I couldn’t have competed with Doug. I was 5-8, and my dick wasn’t as big, and he was a hell of a good looking guy. I wasn’t. So if I couldn’t compete as a young man, how the hell could I have competed as a 41-year-old? The thing is, it shouldn’t have mattered. You shouldn’t have been available. You shouldn’t’ have been shopping around for a bigger dick.”

  “And you shouldn’t have left me alone to the point that I was vulnerable to someone like Doug.”

  He sat back and shook his head.

  “According to you, I’m to blame for leaving you alone, for choosing my job over you. I should have tried harder, I should have kept myself in shape. From where I’m sitting, you bailed out on the marriage without giving me a chance to save it. Chicken or the egg? Who’s responsible? Who’s the bad guy? It doesn’t matter. Not anymore. Maybe it would have mattered six months ago. But now….you’ve got your own life. And I’m….with Myra.”

  “I know it. I…uh….I don’t know, Bill. I don’t know why I’m here. I’ve wanted to talk to you like this for a long time. But today….I don’t understand. Have you ever done something and had no idea why you had to do it?”

  “Yeah.”

  He reached out and held one hand lightly in his.

  “I hope you figure it out, Debbie. Have you…..talked to anybody. You know, a counselor or something? I really haven’t been trying to insult you. It’s just….you became a stranger the last few years. But since…the blowup…it’s more than that. You always seem pissed at me. I know…I know….I’ve been angry as hell at you. But you….

  “I know your aunt had something to do with it. I still get angry when I think about her, but I understood her. I felt sorry for her. I know she filled your head with a lot of shit, but….how could I fight back against that. I knew you loved her and anything bad I said about her…just made me look like a shit.”

  She sat back down at the table.

  “I know. I just…Dr. Teller has always said that we should have talked….before everything went to hell.”

  “Teller? You’re seeing that Dr. Teller?”

  “Yeah, my ob-gyn suggested I see him. I was having a lot of problems a few months back. I was getting nauseous, having these terrible flashes of anger towards you. I mean, I was really pissed at you in general, but this was way, way over the line. You’d have been pretty damned amazed – and probably a little worried – if you knew how angry I was at you. He’s a pretty good doctor. He’s helped me out a lot.”

  “He is a good man. Did you ever figure out what got you so pissed off at me, other than my ruining your life?”

  “You didn’t ruin my life, Bill. I know that. We did it together. I’m not sure. I listened to Clarice and after she did it just got into my head that you had to be cheating. Even though it didn’t make sense because another part of me said no other woman would want you.

  “And part of me was so angry about your choosing that damned job over me and the kids. Part of it was anger, and part of it was frustration. If you had been cheating with another woman, I could have handled that. I’ve never worried about competition from another woman….except….you know, the French bitch and Miss Juggs. But how could I fight a damned job?

  “So there’s the whole abandonment thing and your working too long. And my getting tired of always proving to you day after day that I thought you were good enough for me. And your letting yourself go and not caring enough about yourself or me to sacrifice some of your precious office time to get yourself back into shape.

  “And your becoming a couch potato. I went out dancing with my friends and other men because you just didn’t want to. You weren’t the life of the party when we were in college, but we went out and had fun. Dennis Leary, your friend that hates ‘every fucking prosecutor’, told me about your going to that costume party with Myra.

  “ I could count on the fingers of both hands the number of times in the last ten years you took me out to a party that wasn’t business related. And you took that bitch Jessica Stephens out to O’Brien’s. When was the last time you took me to a bar. Or a nightclub. Even when I begged you to go out. You were always too busy.”

  He still held her hand. He gave her the shadow of a smile.

  “Don’t hold it in, Debbie. Let it out.”

  She returned the slight smile.

  “And there’s something else….something I can’t figure out... or not yet anyway. It’s like a word and you know what it is and you know you know what it is, but you can’t quite grasp it. It’s getting closer and pretty soon I’ll have it. . I have the feeling Teller has an idea, but he won’t come out and tell me. Teller says that when you understand what makes you feel the way you do, you can decide what you want, where you want to go in the future. He says that what you don’t know CAN hurt you. And I’m beginning to think he’s right.”

  He put his hands out and c
overed hers with them. As he did she saw the Fleur de Lis ring on his left ring finger, and what had been their wedding ring on his right hand. Those two rings said it all, said everything, told the story of the past seven months.

  “I hope you figure it out, Debbie. I really do. We were married too long for me to want you to go on hurting. No matter what went down between us, I never wanted you to be hurt that bad. Maybe I did, a little bit, at the beginning. But that was just me being hurt. I want you to be alright.”

  She squeezed his hand.

  “No, you aren’t the kind of guy to enjoy seeing someone you cared about hurting. You know that’s one of the reasons I fell for you in the first place. Not just that you were brave and honest and ambitious and funny. But you were, and are, a good guy. You’re the most decent guy, the nicest guy, I’d ever met. That I’ve ever known.”

  “And we all know what happens to the nice guy.”

  She grinned at him for a moment and as he watched her she saw an expression fleetingly appear and vanish in as long as it took to recognize it. And she realized all over again how badly she had hurt him.

  “Yeah, I know what happened to this one nice guy. He wound up getting fucked blind by this pretty girl who’d been trying to get him to realize she was interested in him for three months…and she kept on fucking and sucking him regularly from then on. It’s not the worst thing that could happen to a nice guy.”

  She saw the gleam in his eyes and did that thing with his lips that he used to when they watched tearjerker movies together. For a man who dealt with bad people, she’d always teased him about being a big softie.

  “No, I didn’t do badly at all, Debbie.”

  They sat there quietly for a few minutes.

  “If I had it to do over again, I’d never have said those four words.”

  “ ‘When we were married?’ It wouldn’t have mattered, Debbie. It would have come out. You wanted it to come out. I’ve figured that out. You were leading a double life. Had been for a long time and it got to be too hard after Doug came into the picture. You were trying to keep your feelings about me, about Doug, about our marriage, hidden from me. And you’re not a natural liar. You didn’t do it consciously, but you wanted me to find out.”

  The outside door opened and a moment later Myra was in the kitchen. She glanced at the table where Bill still had his hand over Debbie’s. She didn’t say anything, just placed a coffee carrier with two large Starbucks coffee cups in it on the counter along with a bag reading, “Le Patisserie.”

  She walked over to Bill, placed one hand on his shoulder and leaned a heavy breast against his arm, then leaned down to kill him on the side of the cheek. He turned his face up to hers and she gave him an open-mouthed kiss.

  She looked at Debbie.

  “Your half hour is up. I want him back.”

  Debbie sighed and pulled her hands away from his, then stood. She looked down at him for a moment. His eyes gleamed.

  “Alright. Thank you, Bill. We finally had that talk.”

  “Good luck with Teller, Deb. I hope everything goes well for you.”

  She let herself out, glancing back for just a moment before she left the kitchen. Bill still sat at the small table. Myra had both hands on his shoulders, squeezing. She looked up at Debbie. It wasn’t an unfriendly expression.

  November 5, 2005

  Saturday, 11:40 A.M.

  I stared at the door to the kitchen and then I heard the outer door open and close.

  Shit. I blinked to keep my eyes from filling.

  Myra sat in my lap as we heard the front door close.

  “Are you alright?”

  “Why shouldn’t I be?”

  “Because you have tears in your eyes, big strong man.”

  “I’ll be fine. She just wanted to talk. To have The Talk, the one we should have had a long time ago.”

  She kissed the top of my shaved head and enveloped my body in her soft, yielding warmth.

  “You don’t have to explain. She can still get to you. I knew that. But she’s hurting too. Anybody could see that.”

  “Everybody’s hurting from something. The human condition….”

  After a moment…

  “Did it help?”

  “I think so.”

  She bent down and we locked lips for another few moments.

  “Well, what now, Mr. Maitland?”

  “Well,” I said, gently shifting her to her feet and standing myself.

  “My plan is to have some coffee and a croissant or two. And then to take you into the bedroom and lick every square inch of your glorious body with my tongue and then….when I’m through….do it all over again.”

  “Sounds like a plan to me.”

  CHAPTER FIVE – YOU HAVE TO KISS A LOT OF FROGS

  November 5, 2005

  Saturday, 7 P.M.

  There was a band setting up in one corner of the large room, but fortunately it was too early for the Saturday night crowd to be getting into the drinking and dancing mood so right now there was only canned music and the chatter of mostly middle-aged customers seated at tables in couples and groups of four.

  She walked in and looked around the room. Glances came her way and the male glances tended to linger. She tried not to meet them because that would only encourage them to approach her and try out pickup lines she could have recited in her sleep. A handsome guy with a big head of black hair stood behind the bar and his look she met. It was cool and appraising. Somehow, somehow although it made no sense, he reminded her of Clint. But he let his gaze wander and she continued her circuit of the room until she saw the person she was looking for at one of the back tables.

  “Hi. I’m glad you were able to make it.”

  “Alan wasn’t too happy with me when I told him I was coming out to meet an old friend, but what I promised him I’d do to him when I got home tonight was enough to keep him happy.”

  “I didn’t mean to mess up your weekend, Evelyn. I’m not even really sure why I called you.”

  Dr. Evelyn Crider reached out to grab her hand.

  “No need to apologize, Debbie. Alan has been a lot more loving since….we had our problems, but it never hurts to keep a man on his toes. He knows I’m not out here meeting another man, but….I might tease him a little when I get home. Just to remind him what he’s got.”

  "You’re bad.”

  “No. Just married 12 years. And I want to keep my man horny and a little off balance. As long as they’re not 100 percent sure you’re not looking, they’re going to keep on trying to nail you down. No pun intended.”

  As Debbie slid into the booth where Crider was already sipping on what appeared to be a white wine, two men in suits and ties, both in their early 30s, materialized beside them.

  The taller one, a dark haired insurance type with wire rim glasses, leaned over Debbie looking down at her cleavage and said with a smile, “I know this is going to sound cliché as hell, but two ladies as lovely as you shouldn’t have to buy your own drinks. Could my friend and I buy you whatever you’re in the mood for. No strings attached.”

  “I’m afraid not,” Debbie said, forcing a smile. “If we let you buy us drinks we’d have to chat for a little while and give you guys a chance to make your pitch. And no offense, but we’re both married and committed and old friends. We just came out for a drink. You’ll be wasting your time and money on us. Go work your wiles on some unattached ladies.”

  “Are you happily married?” the wingman said, leaning in toward Crider. “Look, ladies, we respect the sanctity of marriage. It’s a great institution, but you don’t have to be fanatic about it. Give us five minutes. Just talk to us and if we can’t convince you to give us just one dance, we’ll bow out gracefully. And you get free drinks. That’s a deal.”

  “But not a good enough deal,” Crider said, turning to Debbie, seizing her face in her two hands and planting a firm kiss on the lips that she held. Debbie, not sure what was happening, played along. Crider turned back to the pl
ayers.

  “You don’t have what we’re looking for outside of our marriages, gentlemen. You lack the appropriate equipment. Now why don’t you go looking for some ladies that are in the market for what you’re selling.”

  The two men just stared at them and Debbie had the sinking feeling that instead of turning them off, they probably were nursing erections right now. Girl on girl action didn’t cool off some guys. Most guys, she thought.

  The bartender with the big hair and deep black eyes appeared behind them and said, “Are you ladies alright? Can I get you anything?”

  “Some privacy.”

  Big hair put his hands on both men’s shoulders and said, “I think you heard the ladies. Go on up to the bar and have a free drink on the house, okay?”

  They gave each other a look, then the taller one shrugged and bent over to take Evelyn Crider’s hand with a big diamond on it and raised it to his lips.

  “We really didn’t intend to make pests of ourselves ladies,” he said with a small smile. “My friend and I spend a lot of time here. I hope we’ll see you again sometime.”

  “Not likely, but thanks for the compliment.”

  Crider looked at Debbie and shook her head as they walked away, saying, “What can you say, girl. If they weren’t hitting on us, I’d probably start worrying.”

  “I don’t think either one of you ladies has to worry about that anytime soon.”

  The two women stared at each other and then up at the dark haired Hispanic. He was handsome in a Latin way, but not too handsome. It made him more attractive, somehow.

  “I’m not hitting on you, ladies. My name is Armando Guzman, and this is my establishment. And I don’t hit on customers. You don’t fish in the pond behind your house. But please welcome to my humble business. ‘The Last Call’ is always pleased to welcome beautiful ladies. You’re good for business. Could I refresh your drink, Ma’am, and what would you like,” to Debbie. “On the house.”

  Debbie leaned over to her friend and whispered, “Isn’t that just too damned bad. You’re married and I can’t handle a man right now. And he’s cute.”