“I don’t want to get married,” she told him. “I don’t even want you to kiss me goodnight later. I just want to blow you. What’s so bad about that?”
Nothing, as it turned out.
He agreed, finally, and it turned out to be a lesson, because he offered suggestions and feedback as she went along. And somewhere along the way she graduated, because there was a shift in the energy and she was in command, she was in control, and what a delicious feeling that was.
Afterward, he suggested that maybe he should open a school, an academy of fellatio.
“Won’t you offer any other courses?”
“Like what? Brian Van Horn’s Academy of Fellatio and Hairdressing? I don’t think—”
“There must be something else you could teach me,” she said. “And I’m not talking about hairdressing.”
Rita looked at her, took a deep breath, and took off her own nightgown. “And now you can see
So hot.
She had never been with a woman. It was not as though it had never occurred to her. But whatever thoughts she’d ever entertained had stopped somewhere between speculation and fantasy. She’d certainly never thought about acting on them.
Or acting them out, as Graham Weider would put it.
It would be so easy now. They were both naked, they were both touching themselves, the whole evening was about nothing but sex, and all she had to do was cross the room.
And then what?
Would she have to kill her?
She considered the question later, lying alone in her own bed. She had stayed in her chair, and had confined her caresses to her own body. There had been that moment when they might have made love, and they hadn’t done so, and the moment had passed. Now they were in their separate bedrooms, and all that was left to do was sleep.
But what if she’d made love to Rita?
Or not. How could she be sure?
When she stepped outside herself, when she allowed herself a little perspective, it wasn’t hard to see why she acted as she did. The signal event of her childhood and adolescence was the long affair she’d had with her father, who’d very artfully seduced her and then, ultimately, rejected her. And she’d erased that blot from her life by erasing the man himself, and once he was dead it was as if he had never been.
Except, of course, that it wasn’t. But he wasn’t alive, couldn’t sit smirking, remembering what he’d done to her, what he’d taught her to do to him. He remained on the list, but there was a line through his name, and whenever another man had earned a place on that list, she’d seen to it that his name had a line through it.
All but four names.
If she had sex with a woman, would hers be the fifth name? And would she feel a compelling urge, an actual need, to draw a line through that name?
No way to know. Not for sure.
She didn’t want to kill Rita. She wanted to kill Graham, Christ how she wanted to kill him, and she thought of all the other men, most of their names metaphorically crossed out almost as soon as they’d been inked in. She’d wanted sex with them, and afterward she’d wanted them dead. For a while it was a matter of taking care of business, but when she thought of Steve in Phoenix, she realized that it had become something more than that. She’d reached a point where the sex act itself wasn’t complete as long as her partner had a pulse. That was the true orgasm: when she struck like a cobra, and the man died.
Withheld, she was left with an itch she couldn’t scratch. Even now, after God knows how many orgasms, after she’d finished herself off with the vibrator, its surface still dewy with Rita’s juices, even now she found it maddening, infuriating, that she’d found a Graham Weider who’d become immune to her powers. Was he going to be on her list forever?
The answer came to her in a flash. With it she felt an emotional release none of the evening’s orgasms had managed to provide, and she drifted off and slept like a baby.
THIRTEEN
“Graham? It’s Kim. Please don’t hang up.”
A silence. Then, “All right.”
“First of all, I want to apologize. I don’t know what got into me yesterday.”
“That’s all right.”
“No,” she said, “it’s not all right. It was completely inappropriate and wholly unwarranted. I was disrespectful to you and made a fool of myself in the process.”
“I’ve had plenty of apologies to make,” he said. “So it’s not hard for me to accept yours, Kim.”
“Thank you.” She drew a breath. “Those apologies,” she said. “Would they be in connection with those meetings you’ve been going to?”
“It’s a 12-Step program,” he said, “and yes, making amends is very much a part of the program.”
“You told me the name of it, but I—”
“Sexual Compulsives Anonymous.”
“Right, SCA. Funny how I can’t seem to remember the name. Or maybe it’s not so funny after all.”
He waited, and she let the silence stretch.
Then she said, “My life’s not working so well these days.”
“I see.”
“Not just these days. For quite a while now. What was the term you used? ‘Acting out’? It seems like all I’m ever doing is acting out, or trying to, or thinking about it.”
“I understand, Kim. I’ve been there.”
“Can anyone go to these meetings? Or do you have to be a member?”
“Would you like to come to a meeting?”
“Would I like to? Probably about as much as I’d like to have root canal. But it’s that or lose the tooth. Graham, it’s not a question of would I like to. I think it’s something I have to do.”
“Hold on a minute. Okay, let’s see. There’s a meeting in downtown Seattle this afternoon, but I’ll be busy. If you don’t mind going by yourself—”
“I think I’d be more comfortable if you went with me.”
“Well, let me see. How’s lunch time tomorrow? There’s a 12:30 meeting I sometimes go to in downtown Redmond near Marymoor Park. I could meet you there and we could walk in together.”
“I’m not sure I could find it. And on a bike—”
“No, that’s too far by bicycle. Maybe—”
“Graham? Suppose I come to where you work? I could meet you in the parking lot. At twelve? Or maybe a little earlier, so you can tell me a little about it before we actually walk in?”
She stayed out all day, ate dinner by herself at an Indian restaurant that served bland food dumbed down for the Western palate. She got the waiter to bring her hot sauce, and that helped, but she’d have been happier if
