His buddy on the guard tower, Sparky Rollins, told him a shipment of generic Viagra had arrived last week at the Gitmo PX. Cheap. And, goddamn, it worked. Man, did it work. Not only for him, but, he discovered, for Rita as well. He decided not to tell her about it. Just let her get a taste of the new and improved Gomer for a few days. Show her that the big dog was back.
And once you let the big dog out, well—
She’d been surprised at his new ability and, after a few nights, even a little friendly. She wasn’t exactly all the way to the moaning and groaning stage, but she was allowing him to do what he wanted to do. Certainly better than the frigid ice bitch she’d been for months now.
He hid the pills from her way at the back of the top shelf of the little closet where she stashed the clean bath towels. The shelf was so high, she couldn’t reach it, even with the stool. But he could. And, like clockwork, he’d climb up there every night before dinner, take down the jar, and pop a couple. An hour later, stand back, baby, nobody knows how big this thing’s gonna get.
Couple of nights ago, climbing down from the stool in the bathroom with the plastic jar full of little blue pills, he’d had another one of his brainstorms.
What if he crushed up a bunch of them little blue wonders and sneaked them into the spaghetti sauce? Or soup or whatever the two of them were eating for dinner. Then just sit back and see what happened. Hell, couldn’t hurt. Not like he was putting poison in her food or anything.
It was like Spanish fly. Hell, he must have gone through a ton of Spanish fly when he was a kid. Problem was, nobody knew if it worked or not. It sure didn’t seem to work for him, but who knew? Other guys seemed to be getting lucky all the damn time.
This stuff definitely worked. Made her stone crazy in the sack. Couldn’t get enough of that big old dog, that was for sure.
She was moaning now, calling him names, words coming out of her mouth he’d never heard any woman say, begging for it, and she was going to get it, by God. Right friggin’ now! Oh, yeah—
A tinny rendition of the William Tell Overture started up on the bedside table. Shit. His cell phone. Nice timing, dickhead, whoever you are. He let it ring a couple of times, thinking whoever it was would give up and call back later. Groaning, he entered her and that’s when it hit him. What if it was—?
He reached for the phone, not missing a beat.
“Hello, Elvis,” said the familiar voice.
“Hey, how you doin’, amigo? Long time no see. Um, listen, could you call back in about—”
That’s when Rita whupped him up the side of his head so hard it knocked the phone out of his hand. He rolled out from under her and onto the floor, reaching around for his phone, hearing the tinny little voice coming from it. He grabbed it and said, “Sorry, baby, I—”
“Goddamn you!” Rita screamed, and in the moonlight he could see her grab the damn lamp off the table and rip it out of the wall, throwing it right at his head. He ducked, but it still hit his shoulder and hurt like hell. He stood up, rubbing his arm, and noticed he was still hard as a rock. Damn, this stuff was good!
“Listen, baby, I’m sorry. I just thought it might be an important call and—”
“Your little friend Julio Iglesias, maybe?” she snarled at him. “Or maybe it was Madonna. Or Mariah Carey. Get the hell out of here! Get out of my sight, you bastard.”
He was about to plead with her, beg, but then he thought, wait, it was them. Well, they’ll call back. Like any second now. He’d better get down to the kitchen and be there when the phone rang.
“Chill, baby, I’m sorry,” Gomer said, pulling on his jockeys standing on one leg. He stuffed the cell phone inside the waistband of his jockeys. “I’ll go. You try to get some sleep, baby. You’ll feel better and—”
Something else was hurtling at him through the darkness. Clock radio? He pulled the door shut and heard whatever it was shatter against the thin wooden door. He ran down the narrow stairway that led to the kitchen, Rita still hollering upstairs. Jesus H. Christ, this spy shit was tough on a marriage.
Now, there was a good question. Everybody knew that Jesus’ middle name started with an H. But how many people knew what the H stood for? Huh? How many?
Henry? Harold? Howard? Jesus Howard Christ. Didn’t sound right. Screw it. Leave that one to the nuns and the Bible experts.
He opened the fridge, one eye on the wall phone, thinking they might try that number, and grabbed a cold Bud. Popped that tallboy while he was in the laundry room, digging around in the dryer. He found a nice clean T- shirt and a pair of jeans.
He was zipping up his jeans, damn, he still had a friggin’ woody! Jesus, this stuff was—he suddenly felt something vibrating on his pecker. What the—? His cell phone. He had switched it to vibrate. Felt pretty damn good, he was thinking, reaching down and pulling his cell out, not bad at all. Pick up the wall phone and call his dick a few times.
“Hello?” he said, putting the cell to his ear.
“Fuck you doin’, Elvis, hanging up on me?”
“I’m sorry, man, see my old lady, she—”
“Tell it to somebody who gives a shit. We’ve got business to discuss, Elvis. Urgent business.”
“Okay, well, who is this? Who’m I talking to?”
“Julio.”
“Julio, my man! Whassup?” Gomer asked, trying to sound like he had his shit together and was ready for action. He’d had a few beers, but he’d learned one thing. You had to be sharp on the phone with these dudes.
“Listen carefully. It’s checkout time at the Roach Motel, Elvis. We just got the call. You know what you have to do?”
“Checkout time! Aw-right! My man, it’s about time! Let’s get it on! Let’s rock and roll!”
Gomer noticed his breathing was getting shallow and his mouth had gone dry like that old iguana, one who’d been lying on a rock out in the sun too long.
“You got the RC, Elvis?” Julio was asking him.
“Some in the fridge. Why?”
“The radio control box, you dumb shit.”
“Oh, yeah. That. Just kidding around. No. Not on me. I mean, I know where it is.”
“You remember how to work it?”
“Tell me again.”
“Are you drunk, Elvis? Tell me the truth, right now. If you are, you’re dead. You and your whole family, understand? Dead meat.”
“Hell no, I ain’t drunk, Julio! I swear it! I had two beers with dinner and I’ve been screwing my brains out for two solid hours! Jesus! Calm down, all right?”
“I’m glad to hear it. Now, listen to me, compadre. You go get that little bug box. You remember the little window with the red numbers?”
“Of course. Jesus. I’m not stupid. You’re talking to a petty officer third class here, pal.”
“Is it armed?”
“Uh, it says ‘armed,’ yeah.”
“Bueno. Now, you push the button on the left side. The numbers should all come up 0000. That’s step one. Step two, you push the button on the right. The numbers will start going up. Push the button again when they say 3000 exactly. The numbers will stop.”
“Okay, I’m with you,” Gomer said. He was scribbling furiously on Rita’s grocery store pad, trying to keep up. “3000. What if I go too far, you know, by accident?”
“No problem. Push the right button again and it will zero you out. Then you just do it again.”
“Cool. So I can’t mess up. Then what?”
“What time you got?”
Gomer looked up at the big kitchen clock, then at his watch.
“Exactly ten o’clock P.M.”
“Okay. Once you’re programmed, you don’t do anything, anything, until midnight. At the stroke of twelve, you push the left and right buttons at exactly the same time. You got that? Exactly the same time.”
“That’s it?”
“That’s it, senor.”
