Sly

Last night I did something terrible.

This morning, I stepped into this lovely chapel with shame in my natural cocksure stride and tempestuous throbs reverberating out of my yoga-firmed rear. If I was a brighter man, I would’ve spun about-face on my polished Florsheims the second I saw him coming at me with that sly smile. But nooo, I had a point to make; I refused to leave without being certain said point was made. To show the rotten bastard that I was better than okay without him in my life over the past five years.

Even with me knowing his every move inside and out, I fell prey to his slick tricks early on. He lidded his toothy grin the second he had me within eyeshot, bowed his head, and approached like the disgraceful mangy mutt showing a dire need for forgiveness. Why wouldn’t I? Of all the places to reconnect with your ex, we lucked up on a wedding chapel, the last contention of our long relationship, as I was away on business a few years back when our first granddaughter came into the world, and we’ve been playing this great game of hopscotch with every grandchild thereafter. Thankfully, with him being the cause of our dissension, he had the wherewithal to stay over there after our brief reunion (as his ass should’ve) and politely weaseled his way around me and our grown children with that puppy dog pout of his.

He might’ve gotten away with it if he didn’t try so hard (even for him). It was innocent enough attaching his boisterous laughter to an inside joke of ours he knew absolutely nothing about. Then he began to inquire about me and my new car (was I able to handle it?) since in the thirty years we were together he never spoiled me with anything new or expensive that didn’t come with a sizeable discount from the Ford plant he retired from twelve years back. Once he felt he’d cross the line, he ran with his tail between his legs and became a pest to the other party’s family. Rehearsal commenced; food served in the reception hall. Everyone had at least one serving of overcooked chicken and undercooked rice when someone whipped out their fancy laptop and plugged in this awfully small speaker that blared the soundtrack of the seventies from across the room. Like a spell had been casted upon him, Sly popped up with his old ass and started flailing his hard arms and big feet to the amusement of the entire wedding party. I should’ve pulled his tired ass off the floor. He didn’t need to embarrass our son in front of his hunky fiancé and family even more. As I sat back, I had to admit (as much as I hated him) he still had some pretty good moves. Sly looked quite sexy out there with his salt and pepper beard. I stared too long. He caught me with those eerie green eyes against his charcoal dark skin and winked. I was somehow lured out to the dance floor with him. I said I went just to prove to the naysayers that I wasn’t still bitter about our demise. And although the two of us weren’t an us anymore, it didn’t mean he and I couldn’t still be civil. (We had no choice. With five children and grandchildren coming along, this wouldn’t be the last time we would be engaging each other.) And besides, Sly and I had far more good times than bad. Even the bad was rather petty in hindsight (Ever had World War 3 start over the under/over toilet tissue conflict in Bathroomlania?)—except for that one major thing.

My undoing? Forgetting that one major thing?

Letting the weasel sway me into his enchantment by piercing deep into my eyes, telling me how good I looked (“age only seems to enhance your incredibly good looks”). How good I smell (“let me quit sniffing that cologne of yours before I take you right here out on this floor!”). He isn’t kidding by the large loom I feel coming through on him. It isn’t long before I’m that shy nineteen-year-old boy enamored with the flashy new Ford Thunderbird pulling up and the much-too-old-for-me kat daddy inside blasting “Blame It On the Boogie” to my amusement. The next thing I know, like that teenager thirty-five years ago, I’m pinned to the front seat of his smooth ride being rode through the course of pain and pleasure begging for this thing to never end.

The difference between this time and now, being instead of The Jackson “Show You the Way to Go” in his ’77 Thunderbird, we were in his eight-year-old Ford Expedition listening to some unknown modern-day mumble crooner.

I made the mistake of inviting him back to my apartment after what was clearly meant to be a romp. There, we danced some more to some of our tastes in music, caught up on old times, and shared two more glorious bouts of entwinement that reached far beyond the grasps of ordinary sex—even for us. And after having the only man I ever loved (and even been with that for that matter) in my bed again, I woke up sore and alone like the day I left his sorry ass.

Returning to the chapel this morning, he was the first one I laid eyes on. He found the nerve to pivot on his heels away from me. Though, it didn’t help him much as he forgot we were seated together during the ceremony. I must admit. I did relish in the pig sweating like one, wondering if I was going to waste my breath to call him out about last night or bother to speak to him at all. I didn’t even look his way! I wasn’t petty with it. I refused to give him another window of opportunity. If that means putting up with sitting next to you for a half-hour, I will survive that, too!

I got up to leave after my son and his new husband and their groomsmen partied their way down the aisle. One by one my children snaked around to check up on me. Not because they know a thing about last night, but because everybody feels I might be a teensy bit jealous about the whole ceremony. I committed thirty years to a man just to get my feelings hurt over a marriage that was never going to be and my effeminate son bats an eye post-doctorate degree at the first dumb jock he thinks is cute and just like that he gets the wedding of our dreams!

Gay marriage was legalized in our state six years ago (ahead of national legalization) and I stuck around sure I was going to get my ring, too. Why not? Thirty years?! When I brought up the “notion” a year after our statewide legalization, Sly, the man I gave thirty years of my life to, said to me, in my face, everything was good the way it was. Why ruin what we built with a dumb marriage certificate?

After spending the next few minutes ensuring everybody I was fine, that I was over the moon that my son found matrimony, I moved over to the bar to down my troubles. I’m not much of a drinker, but I went for something to get my mind off things. Don’t get me wrong. I don’t regret not one moment of the wonderful life I had with Sly. Better than bad, right? I did regret last night, however. I learned early on I wasn’t built for this casual sex thing. I needed love and compassion and sheer intimacy with my dying lust. Deep down, Sly built me that way the first time he slicked me with petroleum jelly. My cherry popped; our bond sealed forever. I tried not to think about it anymore. That part of my life long gone like my virginity. I made nice with the young bartender, and once he discovered I was the gay fathers of one of the grooms, he hooked me up with a special concoction with a dash of flirt that slightly lifts my middle-aged spirits. That was, before I smelt the all too familiar scent of Drakkar Noir whiffing over my shoulders.

“How did you sleep this morning?”

“Sylvester.” My buzzed killed while letting my favorite mangy mutt know I wouldn’t make the mistake of ever getting caught off guard again.

“That’s how we’re going to play it, Bernie? Sylvester?”

He hated being called that. Sly sounded so much cooler than the imagine of a black and white cat that never caught the canary. Or, for folks that know-know the “queen” that sang!

I took a deep breath. Tried to unplug the eye roll and the anger out of my voice when I laid into him. “If you would’ve stuck around this morning, you could’ve found out firsthand, couldn’t you?”

“I know.” My mangy bright-eyed mutt hung his head.

“Let me guess, you had other, more important engagements?”

“No. I just couldn’t bare waking up to you this morning and knowing you weren’t mine anymore. We got caught up last night, yeah. But that isn’t to say you hadn’t moved on with your life in these past few years. You might have a boyfriend or something somewhere. I wouldn’t blame you. You’ve always been a damn good catch. I knew that and you were very special from the start.”

I don’t admit that I had a brief connection with someone three years ago, when I finally accepted he wasn’t going to come run after me like every romantic movie produced ever promised. Also, I couldn’t be with the guy without thinking I was cheating on Sly. I couldn’t give Sylvester the satisfaction of knowing that morsel of my life.

“Another line?” I shrugged off, pushing away from the bar and the fading smile of the younger bartender who assumed I was a shoo-in for his daddy-fantasy one-night stand.

“Huh?”

“I asked, ‘another line?’ You know those things very well, Syl-ves-ter. You say ‘em to get me on that tired little dick of yours?” Okay. Never in his life has the man ever been “little” in that department. The first time he whipped that thing out I made sure he put hand to God that he wasn’t going to do me in with that thing of his.

“You got off quite fine last night with my tired little thing. Three times, I recalled. Not to mention the decades of smiles I put on that sweet face of yours every time.”

“That was before I understood I was nothing more than that to you. Some time. I got that now.”

I walked away tossing my delicious drink in the trash. I wanted to go home and bury my head in a pillow. If I did, though. Even head in the direction of my car, I was sure to ruin the reception for my son. And after giving thirty years of my life to someone, a few words over the course of several minutes wasn’t going to do much to ease the pain.

“Now wait a minute.” Sly seized me, pushing me through the door of an overcrowded broom closet with dingy sink and closed the door behind him.

“No, you wait a minute, Syl-ves-ter. I gave my life to you, and I’m not good enough to marry. Fine. We have our prerogatives. But then I find out I’m only good enough for a pump and dump. I’m not even worth sticking around the next morning for. Do you know how humiliating that is for me?”

“Boyfriend?” He mouthed, his lip trembling. Mangy old man.

“Bullshit. I never once cheated on you. So why would I cheat on anyone I considered giving my heart to? And for your information, it’s just been you.” Damn. I just lost my ace in the hole!

He never thought about that. He stood there looking pitiful to the point I almost felt sorry for him—almost.

“Marry me.”

I broke out in laughter, almost to the point of tears. “You got to be shitting me, right? Marry you?”

He took my wrists in his callused hands and forced me to look at him. He was serious as the heart attack he had twenty years ago.

“Why now?”

“Because I love you so much! I’ve always loved you, Bernie.”

I wanted to cry, but I don’t. This would’ve worked five years ago right when I stepped out on him. Hell, it might’ve worked three years ago when I was pining over him after I found out I couldn’t make it work with anyone else but him.

“I’m no longer that nineteen-year-old boy that can be manipulated by the sweet-looking kat daddy in the sweet ride offering me a lift out the rain.”

“I don’t know if you know this or not, but I’m no longer that thirty-five-year-old kat trying to holler at that sweet-looking kid with the bookshelf booty outside the disco either.”

I laughed.

“I see you over there, Bernie. Still keeping it tight and keeping it right.”

“Yoga.”

“It’s becoming of you. Though, in my opinion, you never needed any help in that regards. You can’t perfect what nature gave you.”

Sly. “I’m still mad at you.”

He gripped my wrist with his familiar strength and kissed me square on the lips. “I know. You should be.”

“I am.”

“As you should be, Bernie.”

I kissed him. Guiding his strong overworked retired factory hands to my waist, encouraging him to encircle his bulky factory arms around me.

“I’m still mad at you.”

He kissed me at the bridge of my nose as a tear welled up in my eye. “I know.”

“Why? Why do you want to marry me now? This isn’t some wedding bliss domino effect, is it?”

“No. I’ve always wanted to marry you, but—

“But what?”

“Let me ask you a question: How did it work out for me before?”

“Evelyn.” His ex-wife. How could I have been so blind?

“Things didn’t work out.”

Nearly a year after he took my virginity, I learned he was married. He could’ve left me soon after he got what he wanted and went back home to his lovely wife, but he didn’t. He kept on coming around while I busily tried my best to shake him. I made the mistake of falling deeper in love. What I didn’t know he found himself there long before I knew the way. Evelyn found out about us. A friend of a friend told her when we were spotted rocking in the Thunderbird. Her divorcing him freed the reigns of us being together. But never in a million years could I have imagined he wanted to take that chance, to build something incredible with me. I moved in with him before my parents had a chance to put me out. He bought us a house at auction in one of the roughest neighborhoods around and assured me we were going to be fine. We were. So fine in fact, we daringly took on five siblings we later adopted. Not to mention the three kids he and Evelyn had that I had a subtle hand in rearing.

“Sly.”

“We knew we weren’t right for each other. Our church forced us to get married because we were the only two young people in the congregation and our parents foolishly signed off on it because it was assumed it was a sure bet in the name of ‘keeping us saved’, especially after being drafted into the Army. Next thing I know, I’m a working man with a wife and kids and though I’m doing all the right things, I feel like something was wrong. Something was missing.”

“Have you found that missing link?”

“I found you. And everything was right, and that thing I felt I was missing found. A little younger than I suspected, but I found just the same.”

I chuckled. When there is a sixteen-year age difference between you and your man, you have to find the humor even thirty-five years later.

“And when we could get married, I saw all these people who had no business getting married jumping the bandwagon. Making a mockery of the very thing so many people have been working hard to fight for. Then it wasn’t an option for me anymore. I had no right to take that away from you, though.”

“You didn’t take it away from me, Sly. It’s good to know you didn’t budge on the issue if that’s how you felt about it. Especially if you still feel that way now.”

“I don’t. I know now that other people’s marriage, including my own, isn’t the determining factor of doom and gloom especially if you do it with the right one.”

“You know it doesn’t have to change anything.”

“That’s where you’re wrong. It changes everything. I know now it can be for the better, the best. It means I get to be your husband and not some longtime roommate that gives you good loving with his tired little thing.”

I lidded my eyes. “Sorry about that. Never in your life had you had a tired or little thing. In fact, I’m a little curious about how big I can get it right now?”

“Bernie.”

Sly pressed into me taking out all the guesswork. He was still very much strong after all the work he put in last night. My hands reached for his belt buckle and his zipper as I had a time undoing both. His kisses met mine. His tongue penetrated my gob as his hands steadily distracted mine busy feeling me up and meeting me in stride undoing my clothes.

He swung me around and sat my bare-naked rear onto the sink, my legs spread and his Prince Albert tickling the sensitive hairs around down there. “You sure you want to do this again? In here?”

“My fiancé doesn’t want to make love to me?”

“Say that again, Bernie.”

“What? Fiancé?”

“Yeah. It’s sounds kind of hot. Fiancé. And look we’re in luck?” He showed me a small jar of petroleum jelly he found next to my thigh.

He pushed me back into the mirror and into me with the hair grease he slicked us with. Unlike the night before, in the car, in my bed, this was entirely different. He wasn’t just a passing fancy from days gone by. He was completely mine again, and I was his.

“Bernie.”

“Sly…Sly!”

I couldn’t imagine all those years ago the older kat daddy behind the wheel of the Thunderbird would turn out to be the love of my life. My fiancé, my soon-to-be-husband. That three months after our initial meeting we would be getting it on in that car and fast forward thirty-five years later in a broom closet at our son’s wedding, and that with each stroke it would get better and better than the last every time. Yes. Yes! Oh god, yesss, Sly!!!

He threw his hand over my mouth. “You don’t want anyone to hear us, Bernie.” He cuffed one of my ankles. I rounded his neck in my grip. There is nothing in the world like being rocked rough by a hardworking factory worker, even if he was retired from the post.

I playfully bit into his bear palm. I was coming without trying. He hit the spot just right like always. He rocked harder thrashing my poor tingling insides, my luscious spot. I creamed, I cried. I licked his salty mitt after I was done on my end. He rocked us harder, harder. The sink crashed from beneath my shivering body hard. He still had me, in me, holding me, and came in stride pinning me to the wall on the side of the mirror so that it didn’t break and do damage as well.

“Damn that’s good.” I straddled his thickened waistline.

He kissed me gingerly along my jaw. “I knew that ass was a showstopper. I had no clue it was bad enough to take out a sink!”

“I didn’t do it all by myself.”

“So is my tired little thing still gets the credit for this one too, huh?”

I brushed my hand across his chest, heated and sweaty and knotted in a bloom black and gray hairs. “How long do you think it’s going to take before someone comes running this way after we took out a sink?”

Right on cue, from the other side of the door, “Is everything okay in there?”

“Fine. Though I think we might’ve lost the deposit taking out this sink.”

I snickered at his lackadaisical comment, losing his silky deposit along my inner thigh as he finally let me fall to my feet void of the broken porcelain.

With no sink available, we used paper towels to clean up the best we could. After we got dressed, we parted ways in our walk of shame. It would’ve been totally weird to have spent the last five years at odds and suddenly explain to everyone that we emerged out of a broom closet happily engaged, happily satisfied at that. How fucking romantic, right?

“When are we going to tell everybody about our plans?” Sly circled around an hour later.

“Let’s wait until I get a ring and then we’ll decide.”

“You mean this ring?” He reached inside his pocket and retrieved a small box that was bigger than a typical ring box. I took it, opened it to find a double-thick black cockring centered by a very expensive white gold diamond ring.

“Okay,” I retracted my statement, on the verge of tears, choking up at the sight of it like I never done before. This was the most expensive thing I think this man has ever given me or anyone on the face of this planet! “Let’s let our son and his hubby have his day and then we’ll talk about our plans. Sly, where in the hell did you get this?”

“I bought it, of course.”

“When?” The better question.

“Promise you won’t get mad?”

“I can’t make such promises but go ahead.”

“I bought it a few years back with the renewed hopes at the birth of our first grandchild, I thought I might run into you and old flames might possibly reignite—if you were still single. I know it was a long shot, but I had to be ready just in case. So about an hour ago I ran back to the house and pulled it from the safe.”

“A safe? You got a safe?”

“Behind you, this is the only other valuable thing I got. I needed to keep it safe from all intruders—like I should’ve you.”

As far away from the fantasies of storybook proposals as we’re groomed to believe, I couldn’t even get mad at the sly dog. After thirty-some-odd years I learned many things worth getting, worth having don’t come in picture perfect form.

I took the box and slipped it into my blazer. I wanted desperately to slip both rings on then and there, but as I explained earlier, we both understood why that wasn’t the moment.

“Thank you.” I mouthed silently in lieu of a kiss, which he was sure to get passionately the second we were alone.

“I love you, too.” He replied. “And if you want a big wedding, I’ll hold out for whatever date you want. But if it was up to me, with our history from the car to the broom closet, I wouldn’t mind cruising down to the county courthouse Monday morning and get a justice of the peace to do his or her thing.”

“Really?”

“Shit yeah.”

“Too bad I got to go to work, though.”

“They still offer lunch breaks at work, right? What? You act like you’re scared to marry me now.”

“During my lunch break? Really?”

“Why not?”

“That way you can ask for the time off when we decide to go on our honeymoon. You always wanted to go down to Puerto Rico, right?”

“Yeah, you remembered?”

“Of course. And if we like it down there, like you always thought you would, I don’t see why we’d ever have to leave, if we tie a pretty little bow on the business we got here to finish up.”

“Look at you, willing to turn your world upside down for me.”

He winkled. “It wouldn’t be the first time, baby. It wouldn’t be the first time.”

And with that, I had a little pep in my step and the love of my life inside this lovely wedding chapel.