Snowblind

Chapter 6: Slices of Life

Los Angeles, California

December 8, 1994

The Ohr HaTorah Synagogue was on Venice Boulevard in the west LA neighborhood of Mar Vista, a middle class and working-class section of the city where Sharon Archer, formerly Cohen, had been born and raised. Sharon and Nerdly, along with Rob and Jill, her parents, were all regular attendees of the Saturday morning Shabbat services conducted by Rabbi Levenstein, the man who had donned a Star Trek the Next Generation admiral’s uniform in order to marry the Nerdlys in a Heritage city park on Halloween day of 1989. Nerdly and Sharon were among the top ten most generous philanthropists to Levenstein and his house of worship, particularly these last two years as KVA Records increased their personal income quite nicely.

Rabbi Levenstein was dressed much more traditionally on this day. He wore a neatly pressed three-piece suit and jacket with a pale pink tie. His black and white robe, open in the front, was draped over this. On his head was a yarmulke, as there was one on every male in attendance, be he Jew or Gentile. He recited from the Torah to the assembled group of special guests who had joined him in the main hall of the synagogue this day. The parental Cohens were there, Rob in his own suit, Jill in a very expensive dress that Sharon had bought for her. Stanley and Cynthia Archer were seated near the front row, the two of them looking quite snazzy as well. Greg and Celia were just behind them, Greg having to fight to keep from fussing with his head cover, Celia in a modest blue dress that covered her shoulders and displayed not so much as a millimeter of cleavage. Jake and Laura were seated directly in the front, as they would play a part in the ceremony that was to take place. Jake was wearing his best double-breasted suit and a conservative red tie. Laura was in a pretty green dress she had bought just for the occasion. Pauline and Obie sat just behind the newlyweds. Obie looked quite resplendent in his custom-tailored suit—the likes of which Jake had never seen the country musician wear before. Even the yarmulke looked good on Obie.

And on Jake’s left, sitting together, were Nerdly and Sharon. In Sharon’s arms was the reason for the gathering here today. Born on December 1, at 3:33 PM, forced out of Sharon’s womb by an intravenous oxytocin drip after her doctor got tired of waiting for her to go into labor on her own, was a seven-pound, nine ounce baby boy named Kelvin Stanley Archer, his namesakes the international base scale for temperature measurement in science (this name was selected after a compromise between Nerdly and Sharon—Nerdly’s first choice for a boy name had been Quantum) and his paternal grandfather. He was snoozing contentedly at the moment, dressed in a white gown, a blue head hat, and a disposable size small diaper. He was thankfully quite oblivious to what was about to happen to him. Since, on the day of his birth, he had been evicted from Sharon’s body prior to sunset, today was the day of his brit milah, the Jewish ritualized removal of his foreskin to seal his covenant with God.

The rabbi finished his prayers and blessings, and then introduced Dr. Fredrick Rosenberg, who was not only Kelvin’s pediatrician, but was also a practicing Jew who earned beer money by serving as a mohel for members of the Ohr HaTorah congregation. He was in his mid-fifties, had two children in college, and had performed more than fifteen thousand circumcisions in his career as both a medical and religious provider. He, like every other male except Kelvin, was wearing a suit and tie, but covering his was a robe even more elaborate than Rabbi Levenstein’s. His closed over his stomach area, nearly touched the floor on the bottom, and had a hood that came up over his yarmulke.

Dr. Rosenburg, carrying an old wooden box that contained his instruments, went to a table that had been set up just in front of the rabbi’s podium. He said a brief prayer and then asked that the child be brought to him. This was Jake and Laura’s cue. They were to serve as the kvater, their responsibility to take the child from his mother and give him to the father so he could then be brought to the mohel for the procedure. It was traditional, Nerdly had told them, that a childless couple be chosen for this role as performing it would instill an automatic blessing from God that they themselves would soon be fruitful and multiply.

“Now wait a minute here,” Jake had joked when told about this part. “I’m all about being fruitful, but I’m not sure we’re ready to multiply just yet.”

“I think God will understand that,” Nerdly assured him, “and not override your contraceptive measures.”

“Oh, well I suppose we can do it then,” Jake said. “You know something? Your Jewish God is all right.”

“Yeah,” Nerdly said with a sigh. “I only wish I actually believed in Him.” Thus, was Nerdly’s dilemma. He enjoyed the rituals and covenants of being a Jew, and he deeply respected the message and culture of the world’s oldest monotheist organized religion, but his scientific and logical mind just could not quite make the leap of actually accepting the reality of an invisible, all-powerful superior being.

Jake and Laura stood and walked over to Sharon. Sharon kissed the bundled infant on the forehead and handed him to Laura, who took him in her arms, kissed him herself, and then handed him to Jake. Little Kelvin was now awake and not looking very happy about it. Soon he was going to be a lot less happy. Jake took two steps to the right and then leaned down and kissed the baby on the forehead as well. He handed him off to Nerdly just as he started to cry.

The ceremony was brief, and Jake did not really want to see it. He listened to the prayers by both Levenstein and Rosenburg, watched the doc put some wine in Kelvin’s mouth, watched him take out his instruments, even watched him apply a topical anesthetic to the baby’s little schlong (tradition dictated that no anesthesia should be used, as the ritual was supposed to be painful, but Nerdly and Sharon were not that orthodox), but when he broke out the scalpel, Jake found himself perusing the artwork on the walls and the vault where the holy scrolls were kept.

Little Kelvin’s cries of unhappiness suddenly changed pitch and became screams of pain. Jake continued not to watch. He knew that after the foreskin was removed there was some kind of a deal that involved a suction device and the drawing of blood. He didn’t want to see that shit either.

Soon enough, the deed was done and Kelvin’s little schwanz was wrapped up in some kind of dressing. While Sharon carried him off to nurse him, the rest of the crowd filed out of the actual synagogue and into the gymnasium of the religious school on the grounds, where a Seudat Mitzvah, or celebratory meal, had been set up. There were tables full of bread, meat (but no cheese), and vegetables, pots full of simmering soups, a salad bar, and, also in the tradition of Judaism, an abundance of alcoholic beverages even though it was only eleven o’clock in the morning.

Jake and Laura made themselves a couple of sandwiches, poured bowls of soup, and then, after setting these down, went to the bar and got themselves some properly chilled white wine.

“Mazaltov,” they told Nerdly and the Cohens as they passed. They then sat down and put some food and wine in their stomachs.

Greg and Celia, carrying plates and wine glasses of their own, came to their table and sat down across from them. This was the first time the four of them had been together since the wedding. Jake and Laura had come home from their honeymoon in New Zealand two weeks before, but Greg and Celia had been staying in their Palm Springs home and had only driven back to LA for today’s occasion.

“That was an interesting ceremony,” Celia whispered.

“Yeah,” Jake agreed. “You gotta hand it to the Jews. They can turn anything into a party.”

“So, how was New Zealand?” Greg asked them.

“It was beautiful,” Laura gushed. “The most beautiful place I’ve ever been in my life, really.”

“Oh yeah?” Celia asked.

“It’s gorgeous there,” she said. “Jake took me up in his airplane and we flew along the coast of the island. Huge, snowcapped mountains with glaciers that come right down to the water. It was incredible. And we even saw the southern lights from the hot tub at night.”

“That does sound beautiful,” Celia said. “Greg, we have to go there some time.”

“I’d love to show you two around the place,” Jake told them. “But if you want to go sometime when I’m not there, that’s cool too. You’re more than welcome to stay in my house up in the hills.”

“That sounds very intriguing,” Greg said. “Unfortunately, we’re starting preproduction of my new project next week and I’ll be quite busy from that point until filming is complete.”

“Oh yeah,” Jake said. “The cop flick, right?” He rather enjoyed seeing Greg wince painfully at that term.

“Yes,” Greg said through gritted teeth. “The cop flick.”

“What’s the name of it going to be?” asked Laura.

“Us and Them,” Greg said. “It’s a reference to the siege mentality that career police officers develop after working the streets for any length of time. Us being the cops themselves, Them being anyone who is not also a street cop.”

“That’s deep,” Jake said with a nod.

“It’s to be a very deep film,” Greg said. “Part of my preparation for production is going to be that I go to Chicago and do two weeks of ride-a-longs with some actual Chicago PD patrol units on the south side.”

“The south side of Chicago?” Jake asked.

“That’s right,” Greg said.

“I hear that’s the baddest part of town,” Jake told him.

Celia chuckled but Laura and Greg both missed the Jim Croce reference.

“That’s what they say,” Greg said. “I’m looking forward to the experience. As a method actor, such preparation is invaluable to getting into character.”

“Aren’t you worried about him, C?” Laura asked. “Riding around in a police car in one of the worst neighborhoods in the country?”

“I’m not really worried about that part,” Celia said. “After all, is there a safer way to explore the baddest part of town?”

“I suppose not,” Laura allowed.

“I am a little worried about Greg’s costar in the project, however,” she said.

“His costar?” Jake asked.

Greg sighed the sigh of a man who had been over a particular subject more than he cared to but was being called on to do it again. “It hasn’t been officially announced yet,” he said, “but Mindy Snow is going to be my costar in Us and Them.”

Jake, who had been taking a sip of his wine, sucked some down the wrong pipe as he heard this. He went into a brief coughing fit. Laura pounded him on the back a few times before he was able to get himself back under control.

“That was kind of my reaction as well,” Celia said sourly.

“Mindy Snow?” Jake said. “Jesus fucking Christ!” He then remembered where they were and blushed a little at his last swear. “Uh ... I mean oy fucking vey.”

“It was a casting director decision,” Greg said. “Her demographic appeal and draw compliments mine, I was told. This decision was not overridden by the producer or the director, even though I asked them to use those override powers once I was told she was being cast for the role. I was given the choice to withdraw from the project myself if I could not work with her.”

“That chick is very bad news,” Jake told him. “Maybe you should think about doing that?”

“I have thought a lot about doing just that,” Greg said. “But they’re offering me nine million dollars for the role, plus a percentage of video sales.”

“That is a nice chunk of change,” Jake had to admit.

“And the money is not even the important part,” Greg said. “I need another successful film role to finish out the restoration of my reputation after the Northern Jungle fiasco. This is the best role that’s been offered, the only one that will put me back on the A-list.”

“That’s right,” Celia said with a sigh. “And as much as that woman creeps me out, I have to agree with Greg. He’ll get through it.”

“Have you ever met Mindy Snow before?” Laura asked.

“Of course,” Greg said. “She dated my friend, Mike Stinson, for a month or so.”

“You know Mike Stinson?” Laura asked, amazed.

“He used to be my best friend,” Greg said. “He was the best man at our wedding. And he was one of my supporting actors in the Northern Jungle. He and Mindy hooked up right after she filed for divorce from her first husband, Scott Adams Winslow.”

“Right,” Celia scoffed. “And she dropped him like a hot potato as soon as the reviews for the film started to come out.”

“Whatever happened to him?” asked Jake.

“Who? Winslow?” asked Greg.

“No, Mike Stinson. He was a likable enough guy—for an actor anyway.”

“Be nice,” Greg said. “He’s still living up in Beverly Hills ... for now anyway. He never recovered from the Northern Jungle. Hasn’t been offered any roles since then. Last I talked to him he was drinking a lot and thinking about running for treasurer of the SAG. His money is running out, you see, and he might have to sell his place and get something down in the city. He’s actually quite depressing to talk to these days, truth be told.”

“He did play the cheesiest character in that flick,” Jake pointed out. He looked at Laura. “Remember, he was the bad guy, the one they went all over the top with?”

“I’ve never actually seen that movie,” Laura said.

“Really?” Greg asked. “Then how do you know Mike Stinson? Northern Jungle was his most famous role.”

“I know him because he dated Mindy Snow,” she said. “I used to be a big fan of hers, from all the way back in the Slow Lane days.” She giggled a little. “I remember liking him a lot better than I liked Jake when she was dating him, but not as much as Scott Adams Winslow.”

“Oh yeah?” Celia asked.

“Well ... you remember what I thought about Jake when we first met each other?”

“That he was a scumbag, girlfriend beating, ass-crack sniffing degenerate?” Celia said.

“Don’t forget Satanist,” Jake offered.

“Oh ... right,” Laura said. “Satanist too. But then I got to know Jake better and realized that I had he and Mindy reversed in my mind from who they actually were.”

“Reversed?” asked Celia.

“Well ... Jake turned out to be the nice guy and Mindy turned out to be ... you know ... the bitch.”

“That term does not even come close to covering her personality,” Jake said.

“Jake told me the stories about his involvement with her,” Laura said. “That was the day we took the flight to get the soprano sax from Portland.” She smiled at her husband. “Later that night we had our first kiss. And then ... well ... some other firsts too.”

“Yes,” said Celia sourly. “We all heard those firsts.”

“The impetus behind Rule 17,” Greg said with a smile.

Laura looked at Jake and pointed her finger at him. “I told you they came up with that rule because of us!” she barked at him. “You kept saying it was because of the Nerdlys and their modem noise!”

“I was trying to protect your delicate sensibilities,” Jake said. “Of course they made that rule for us. You damn near broke a wine glass when you...”

“All right,” she hissed. “I get the picture.” She turned back to Greg. “Anyway, my point is you should be very careful with that woman. She’s nasty. I’ve never even met her before, but I know she’s trouble.”

“I’m aware of what she’s like,” Greg said. “Jake’s relationship with her aside, she is very well known in the inner circles as being a manipulative user, one who will do anything to shape her reputation, or get the role she wants, or get anything else she is after. I even heard that she somehow got Winslow to waive the prenup when she divorced him. How the hell do you pull something like that off?”

Laura and Jake shared a look with each other but said nothing. Nevertheless, just saying this seemed to spark a memory in Greg. “I seem to remember your name being tossed around a little when they were divorcing. Something about a New Year’s Eve party and her going to one of your concerts?”

“Uh ... yeah,” Jake said. “That was just the media spinning stories out of thin air.” This was true enough. The media had not possessed any facts about what had actually happened. He then told a blatant lie. “I had nothing to do with any of it.”

“Well, you can be assured that I will watch my ass around her,” Greg said.

“We’ve talked about this extensively,” Celia said. “Greg promises me that his interaction with Mindy will be professional and nothing more.” She patted her husband’s leg affectionately. “I believe him ... and I trust him.”

“Of course,” Jake said, thinking about the makeup girl in Alaska. The one who Greg had been unable to resist. The one who had undoubtedly been nowhere near as attractive or seductive as Mindy Snow.

“Oh look!” Laura said, pointing across the room. “Sharon and Kelvin are back.”

Everyone looked over to where the new mother, with new child in arms, were making their way into the celebration. Kelvin was no longer crying—at least not audibly.

“Come on,” Celia said to Laura. “She’ll need someone to hold the baby for her while she gets her food. I need a baby fix.”

“Right,” Laura said, standing up. “You two coming?” she asked.

“I’m going to finish my wine,” Greg said. “There will be plenty of time for baby holding later.”

“Me too,” Jake said. “Babies aren’t all that interesting at that age anyway, right?”

That earned him a few scowls of displeasure before the women trotted off, making a beeline for Sharon. Jake and Greg were now alone at the table.

Greg looked around a little bit and then leaned closer to Jake. “Listen,” he said softly. “You’ve dealt with Mindy on a much more ... oh ... intimate scale than I have.”

“Yeah,” Jake agreed. “That is a true statement of fact.”

“Tell me what you think about this then,” he said. “There’s something I didn’t tell C about this whole Mindy being my costar thing.”

“Oh yeah?” Jake asked carefully.

“Yes,” Greg said. “You see, when Us and Them was first accepted as a project for Merrimack and Jerry Lancing agreed to produce it—this was months before my name was suggested as the lead role—the role of Lyndsay, the reporter, was offered to Mindy Snow. She read the script over and gave Lancing a polite ‘no thank you’, telling him that it was not the sort of project she was looking for at this time. She turned down eleven million and video royalties without even coming in for an audition.”

“Interesting,” Jake said, failing to see what this information had to do with anything. “How do you know this?”

“Johnny, my agent, is tight with Frank Graham, who is in charge of production at Merrimack. That was how I ended up being offered the role eventually. Johnny and Frank are drinking buddies.”

“Okay,” Jake said. “So ... Mindy changed her mind at some point, obviously.”

“Yes, she did,” Greg said. “That ‘some point’ was right after I was named as the leading man for the project. The very next day, in fact.”

“Really?” Jake said, raising his eyebrows.

“Johnny tells me that Mindy called up Jerry Lancing that very morning and told him that she’d reconsidered and would love to accept the role of Lyndsay if it was still available. He said that she called him personally to tell him this, did not involve her agent in any way. And that furthermore, she continued to call and lobby herself for the role until they officially offered it to her.”

“That is very interesting indeed,” Jake said slowly. She’s up to something, his mind insisted.

“I know I have a bit of an ego,” Greg said.

“You? An ego?” Jake said with a smile. “Get the hell out of town with that shit, Greg!”

Greg shook his head and smiled. “I suppose I deserve that,” he said. He then turned serious again. “Anyway, even if my ego is taken out of the equation, I cannot help but feel that Mindy suddenly changing her mind about the role has something to do with me being named as the lead. True, I’ve only met her a few times in my life, but still ... this cannot be a coincidence, right?”

“It could be,” Jake said, “but I think you’re correct. It’s not. She’s up to something.”

“What could she possibly be up to?” Greg asked. “We hardly know each other. The times we have met I’ve never sensed any kind of ... you know ... connection between her and I. You know her, Jake. What do you suppose her game is?”

Jake shook his head. “I can’t even begin to imagine,” he said. “But I can assure you, there is a game afoot. Mindy doesn’t fart unless there is an ulterior motive for it.”

Greg blinked. “A rather crude but highly expressive analogy,” he said. “In any case, it doesn’t matter what her game is, I won’t be playing it.”

Jake sighed and took a sip of his wine. “Tell me, Greg ... will there be any ... you know ... sex scenes in this flick you’re going to be doing with her?”

“In this film,” Greg said, emphasizing the word, “there are several nude scenes and two sex scenes between my character and the Lyndsay character scripted, one of them quite provocative.”

“I see,” Jake said.

“A sex scene is nothing,” Greg scoffed. “True, it can be a bit awkward, particularly when full nudity is involved, but it’s far from a romantic or even alluring situation. There is a complete film crew surrounding you, for one thing. There’s a director shouting instructions and judging your acting. There are lights shining down on you. And every move that is made between the two actors is carefully choreographed.”

“Uh huh,” Jake said. “Yet, despite all that, you’ll be pressing your naked body against Mindy Snow’s naked body, feeling those magnificent titties of hers pressing into your flesh, maybe having her put her hands on your ass while she’s sticking her tongue in your mouth?”

“Well ... yeah ... that is all quite likely,” Greg admitted.

“Have you seen those titties?”

“Well ... not in person, of course,” he said, “but she has displayed them quite shamelessly in her last few films. I might have had occasion to take a glance at them in that context. They’re quite attractive, I will admit, but when you come right down to it, Celia’s are much more appealing.”

That is true, Jake thought to himself, but of course he could not say this. Greg did not know that Jake had seen them in the flesh—and he never would. “That’s not the point,” Jake said.

“What is the point?” Greg asked.

“They’re still nice titties. Believe me, I know. And Mindy is a hot piece of ass. Are you seriously telling me that if she is pressed naked against you and sucking on your tongue and feeling your ass and you’re supposed to be thrusting yourself against her to simulate fucking her, Little Greg isn’t going to want to poke his head up and take a look around?”

“Little Greg? What does...” He flushed as it cleared his circuits and then shook his head sternly. “No, it doesn’t work that way. A sex scene is just another take of the action. A little more awkward than some, but still just a take. ‘Little Greg’ will keep his head down where it belongs.”

“If you say so,” Jake said doubtfully.

“I say so,” Greg assured him.

“Forget the sex scenes then,” Jake said. “I just want you to understand how devious, how conniving, and how ... well ... seductive she can be.”

“None of that can have any effect on me if I don’t allow it to,” Greg insisted.

“That is true,” Jake allowed. “But ... all the same ... I think I should tell you a little story about her, just so you can appreciate the depth of her scheming and the sheer complexity of her planning.”

“Okay,” Greg said.

Jake looked around again, saw no one within earshot. He then turned back to the actor. “A few minutes ago, when we were talking about my involvement with Mindy and Winslow’s divorce and his decision to waive the prenup ... well ... I wasn’t being truthful.”

“You weren’t?” Greg asked. “You’re saying that you did have something to do with their divorce?”

“I had nothing to do with why they got divorced,” Jake said. “I’m sure Mindy had been planning that long before I came back into her life. But I had everything in the world to do with why Winslow waived that prenup.”

“Explain,” Greg said.

“This needs to stay between us,” Jake admonished. “Laura knows this story, and the principals involved here know it, but no one else does. I want to keep it that way, for reasons which will become obvious.”

“You have my word,” Greg promised.

“Fair enough,” Jake said with a nod. He trusted Greg. “This happened when I was younger, and dumber, and ... quite frankly, drunker than I am these days. Still, I wasn’t a naïve person even then, and I fell into Mindy’s trap as neatly as could be. It started when I was flying back from New Zealand after I’d been there to take care of some business regarding my property and the house I was having built. There were no direct flights back to LA, only flights that stopped in Fiji, so I decided to spend a day there and relax on the beach a little, enjoy a little tropical sun.”

“Fiji,” Greg said. “That was part of the story, I remember. You and Mindy met up there by chance, right?”

“Right,” Jake said. “That part was true. It was a complete coincidence that we met up there. But we did. And that’s when the game started. We had some drinks together on the beach and ... well ... my better judgement sometimes takes a vacation when I’ve been drinking and, when that happens, Little Jake starts to make my decisions for me.”

“And Little Jake made a decision that day?” Greg asked.

“He did. I went up to Mindy’s hotel room with her and we spent all night getting reacquainted with each other’s bodies.”

Greg’s expression darkened a bit. “You were ... uh ... still with Helen at that point, weren’t you?”

Jake nodded. “I was,” he confirmed. “That was after the Jenny Johansen deal, after they arrested her skulking around Helen’s property with a gun, handcuffs, and a freaking blowtorch, so Helen was in the midst of her going nutty stage and we were having problems and we were well down the road to the breakup, but ... yeah, we were still together at that point.”

“I see,” Greg said.

Jake told him the rest of the story, omitting nothing. He told of how, after the breakup with Helen, Mindy had quite literally shown up on his doorstep one afternoon and he stupidly invited her in. A hot, torrid sexual affair developed in earnest at that point. Jake knew Mindy was married to Scott Adams Winslow, of course, but that did not stop him. Mindy displayed nothing but contempt for her husband. She openly mocked him on every occasion, deriding his skills in the bedroom, the size of Little Scott Adams Winslow, even his skills as a director. On one occasion, a New Year’s Eve party at the Winslow mansion, Mindy had even enticed him up into her very bedroom and fucked him on their marital bed while Winslow was downstairs entertaining the other guests. She then told Jake she was going to get Winslow to eat her pussy out while Jake’s spend was still marinating inside of her.

“That is disgusting,” Greg said, appalled.

“Yeah,” Jake agreed. “I’m certainly not proud of that.”

He continued with the story, explaining how the climax (as it were) of the affair took place one night at the home of Darla O’Banion, Winslow’s personal makeup artist and the woman Winslow had been having an affair with for six months. Mindy had known about the affair and hadn’t given a shit. What Winslow had not known was that Mindy and Darla had been having a little affair of their own. Mindy had a touch of the bisexuality bug in her. She would not let women kiss her, or put their mouths on her in any way, and she would not do this for them, but she was not averse to having a woman touch her in a sexual way. And the word touch, as Jake found out on the night in question, covered a lot of territory. He and Darla had ended up double penetrating Mindy on Darla’s bed—Jake using Little Jake for his part, Darla using an eight-inch strap-on dildo for her part. At one point, Winslow had called Mindy on her cellular phone and she actually answered and had a conversation with him, all while instructing her partners to keep on fucking her.

“That is so incredibly depraved,” Greg said in awe as he heard this part of the tale.

“Yeah,” Jake said with a nod. “It was quite the experience.”

As it turned out, however, many of the private sex sessions between Jake and Mindy, and between Jake, Mindy, and Darla, were not really private. On multiple occasions, virtually every time they got it on anywhere besides Jake’s house, Paul Peterson, the sleazy paparazzi who had been hounding Jake ever since his first official relationship with Mindy, had been sequestered in a closet or some other place of hiding, snapping away with his Nikon.

“He took pictures of you and Mindy having sex?” Greg asked, horrified at the thought.

“Hundreds upon hundreds of them, I’m told,” Jake said. “Mindy had been planning this all along. She had been boning Peterson off and on for years, usually when she needed him to take some of his sleazy shots. For all I know, she’s still boning him. Anyway, he printed up the shots and gave them to Mindy. She gave them to Winslow when she told him she wanted a divorce.”

“She gave the shots to Winslow? For what purpose?”

“Blackmail, of course,” Jake said. “Why else?”

“How did she blackmail him by using evidence of her own infidelity?”

“That’s the whole point of the story,” Jake said. “This is how conniving she can be, how ruthless. She told him to waive the prenup and follow standard California divorce laws or she would release the pictures publicly and freely admit to the affair with me. She would tell the media about how inadequate in bed he was, about his small dick, about how he’d never given her an orgasm.”

“Humiliation,” Greg whispered, shaking his head. “My God. He never would’ve worked again. They wouldn’t let him sweep up the studio parking lot after something like that.”

“That’s right,” Jake said. “And it wouldn’t have hurt her reputation a bit. If anything, it would’ve made her more alluring, sexier to the public. Especially when you throw in the whole playing around with bisexuality thing. Winslow caved to her. What choice did he really have? He knew her well enough to know that she would have gone through with it. He gave her half his shit and she gave him the negatives for the shots.”

“How does he know that Mindy doesn’t have another set of negatives, or that Peterson doesn’t?”

“He doesn’t,” Jake said. “And neither do I. In fact, I’m quite certain that Peterson, at the very least, has his own set of negatives. Something like that is simply too juicy to give away. But none of those shots have seen the light of day and it’s been almost five years now. She must have paid Peterson a good amount of money to keep his trap shut and those pictures to himself.”

“Incredible,” Greg said. “And what happened to you and Mindy after this?”

“I’ve only seen her one time since this went down,” Jake said. “That was at your gig, the premier of Northern Jungle, remember?”

“I prefer to forget everything about that film, but yes, I remember. That was the night she and Mike came out publicly as a couple.”

“The same night that Pauline agreed to manage Celia,” Jake agreed. “I was actually shocked to see Mindy there. We hadn’t officially broken up or anything, but it was clear to me that I’d served my purpose and had been discarded. She made no mention of what had happened between us, make no allusions to it, acted like none of it had ever happened.”

“And you’ve not seen her since?” Greg asked.

“I’ve neither seen her, nor talked to her,” Jake confirmed. “I did write a song about her though. It’s on my first solo album.”

“Nothing is Different Now,” Greg said, naming that tune without even having to think about it.

“That’s right,” Jake said. “Take that title to heart, Greg. Take it to heart.”

The next day, Jake and Laura traveled in Jake’s BMW to the rehearsal studio that Gordon maintained in Compton.

“Are we safe in this neighborhood, sweetie?” Laura asked nervously as she took in the passing scenery of liquor stores with bars on the windows, dilapidated public housing apartments with homeys hanging out in front in trench coats drinking forties, homeless people pushing overloaded shopping carts, and their own faces the only white ones in view.

“As long as we stay in the car and keep moving, we should be fine,” Jake said with a shrug.

“Very comforting,” she said, seeing that a particularly dangerous looking young black man was staring at her intensely as they waited for the light to change at the intersection of Alameda Street West and East Compton Boulevard. She averted her gaze from him as quickly as possible and felt great relief when the green light allowed Jake to start driving again.

G’s studio was located just off Alameda Street, on a small lot just before the residential neighborhood began. The building was small and nondescript, and completely surrounded by an eight-foot chain link fence topped with razor wire. The building and the fence were both unmarred by gang graffiti, which was remarkable because virtually nothing else in sight could say the same. Jake had had been here a few times before, back when they had been working on Step Inside, and G had told him that the neighborhood gang all knew that the building was owned by Bigg G and that he rehearsed here, thus they had put out the word that the building was hallowed ground, not to be touched, and that no one who entered or left the building was to be fucked with in any way. This was mostly because the gang in question—it was a branch of the Crips in this part of the hood—respected G and the voice he provided the inner city, but it also helped that G made a point to spread some money around the neighborhood with generous donations to the youth clubs, the library, the community center, and the local high school music and sports programs.

As Jake pulled up to the gate that guarded the entrance, two such gang members came sauntering over in his direction. Both were dressed in jeans and long, baggy shirts that fell well below their waistbands to conceal the pistols they undoubtedly carried. Both had blue shoelaces in their Air Jordon sneakers and blue bandanas on their heads. They approached within ten feet of Jake’s car and then stopped, looking at the two whities who had invaded their hood. The one in front then seemed to recognize Jake. He smiled and gave him a nod of greeting.

Jake smiled back and returned the nod. He then punched in the four-digit code G had given him to open the gate. The control box beeped three times and the gate swung upon. With a final nod at the two bangers, Jake drove into the parking lot and parked in front of the main doorway.

“That was a little bit scary, wasn’t it?” Laura asked.

“Naw,” Jake said. “I’m sure they’re just G’s unofficial security force, keeping an eye on things. As long as we have the code to get in, they won’t fuck with us.”

“Again, comforting,” Laura said.

By the time they stepped out of the car, the bangers were nowhere to be seen. Jake opened the trunk and pulled out a guitar case. He slung it over his shoulder with the carrying strap and then pulled out a box that contained a few effects pedals, a pre-amp, and various cords for attaching everything together.

“Do you want me to carry something?” Laura asked.

“No, just close the trunk and then go push the intercom button on the door.”

Laura did this. G’s voice came on the intercom after a few seconds. “Who is it?” he asked, though there was a security camera pointed at the door and he undoubtedly knew who was there.

“A couple of tighty whities,” Laura told him.

“You got that shit right,” G’s voice replied with a chuckle. “Hang on, Teach. I’ll let y’all in.”

The door buzzed and Laura turned the handle, allowing them entrance into a large single room with a high ceiling. Near the back of the room was a desk where G sat next to Neesh, who, other than Laura, was the only female present. On the desk was a computer and a video monitor, the latter showing the view from the front door camera and the gate camera. In the center of the room the instruments had been set up. There were the two drum sets, the table where the turntables sat, and an electric piano. Surrounding the instrument area were the amps and the speakers, all connected together with black cables. Three microphone stands were arrayed in the front of all this. About ten feet away from the mics was a sound board, where everything could be adjusted.

G’s band were all sitting in chairs near their respective instruments: Ricky Mack at the turntables, James Whitlock and Fro Allen on the two bass guitars, Lucky Powell and Evan Jackson on the drum sets. At the sound board were High Top Biggins and Stinky Stewart, G’s primary sound men, both of whom were graduates of the same program at the same university where Sharon Archer had gotten her masters.

“Fuckin’ newlyweds in the house, homies!” G cried out as they made their way into the room. He and Neesh got up to greet them. “How’s it feel to be all official and shit?”

“It’s cool,” Jake said. “We finally get to have sex now.”

That generated a good laugh from everyone but the two sound guys. They did not seem to get it.

Jake put the box and the guitar case down and then did some of those elaborate handshakes with G and all the other guys. He then got a hug and a kiss on the cheek from Neesh. Laura hugged G and Neesh both, shook hands with everyone else—a normal, tighty whitey handshake consisting of a grasp and two pumps.

“All right then,” G said once the greeting ritual was complete. “How about we get Jake here plugged in and sound checked and try to accomplish something?”

“Sounds good,” Jake said. “You said you had an amp for me to plug into?”

“Right over here,” said Stinky, pointing at a Marshall that sat on the floor next to a chair and one of the microphone stands.

While Jake opened his guitar case and pulled out his black Les Paul, Neesh spoke up. “I think this is the cue for me and Teach to ease on down the road for a bit.”

“Yeah yeah,” G said. “You two go out and have yourselves a good time.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Neesh said, casting a smile in Laura’s direction.

Jake noted that Laura looked a little uncomfortable with this statement and only gave a weak smile. “You okay, hon?” he asked her.

“Yeah, of course,” she said, her smile getting bigger now. “Let’s do this thing, Neesh. Shall we take Jake’s car?”

“Let’s take G’s,” she suggested. “I’ll drive. I’m more familiar with the hood.”

“Okay,” Laura said, and then, nervously. “Are we going to be doing our shopping and lunch ... you know ... around here?”

Ricky the DJ chuckled. “Girl, I would not recommend that shit.”

“No way, girlfriend,” Neesh said. “This neighborhood scares the shit out of me too. Let’s go do our thing in Redondo Beach. It’s not too far a drive from here. They have some bitchin’ shops and restaurants there. And after we eat, we can maybe take a walk out to the end of the pier.”

“Sounds like fun,” Laura said.

Neesh kissed G and Laura kissed Jake.

“Have fun,” Jake told her.

“I will,” she said. “The trick will be not to have too much fun.”

“How’s that?” Jake asked her.

She giggled a little. “It’s nothing,” she told him. “I have my cell phone on me. We’ll see you later.”

And with that, the two ladies headed out the door. It latched solidly shut behind them.

“All right,” Jake said. “Let’s get it on.”

“Let’s get it on,” G agreed.

Jake plugged in his pedals and pre-amp and then plugged that into the amplifier, which was, in turn, plugged into the speakers. He started out clean, with just the acoustic sound coming out of the speakers, making sure the guitar was still in tune (it was, he had tuned it the night before) and then followed the instructions of Stinky and High Top while they dialed in the volume to match the other instruments. From there, Jake began to play with the distortion levels, as the plan was to play his part of the tune with classic rock guitar sound. Even though the sound guys and the band itself were not familiar with distorted guitar, it still did not take as long to get dialed in as it would have had the Nerdlys been in charge.

“That sounds sweet, homey,” Ricky commented after Jake ground out a complex riff and solo once the check was deemed complete.

“Fuckin’ A,” said Fro. “I can kinda understand why you people like that shit.”

“My man Jake here can shred,” G said. “Have no doubt about that shit.” He walked over to his piano and picked up a pipe and a bag of buds. “All right now. Let’s get in the proper frame of mind for a jam session.”

They passed the pipe around, getting into that proper frame of mind. Everyone but the sound team took three or four hits apiece. It was pretty good shit.

“Let me and Jake show y’all what we got going here,” G told the band. “After that, we’ll start working on how to make it a full-on tune.”

Everyone nodded their understanding and settled in.

“The tricky thing about this tune,” Jake explained as he stomped on pedals and flipped switches to get his guitar back to the clean output, “is that we’ll be modulating keys throughout it.”

“Modulating keys?” asked Ricky, who, as the DJ, would have the hardest time with this. “I ain’t never done no shit like that before.”

“That’s why we rehearsin’ the shit, homey,” G told him.

“G’s going to be singing the verses,” Jake said. “His part will be in E major. I’m going to be singing the choruses, the bridge, and the outro. Those will all be in G major.”

“They’ll be at different tempos too,” G said. “My part will be at a hundred, Jake’s probably at around one-twenty.”

“This is some pretty complex shit you’re talkin’,” said Lucky, who would be the one to set those tempos.

“Don’t think you can handle it, homey?” G asked him with a grin.

“I didn’t say that, G,” Lucky said.

“Let’s do this shit, Jake,” G said. He turned back to the band. “We’ll probably come up with some kind of intro later, but for now, I’m just going to play and the sing the verse. Jake will then play the choruses clean. Watch how we integrate the modulations. It took us a while to work that shit out.”

With that, G began to play out the melody on his piano. He ran through it twice, getting the feel of it and letting everyone hear what he had. He then sang out the first verse. It would, of course, be converted into hip-hop later, but the underlying melody would remain the same. As he finished up the last line, he drew the final syllable out, modulating his own voice up into the higher range that mixed well with G major. That was Jake’s cue. He began to strum out his own melody, one markedly different than Gordon’s, at a faster tempo, and in the key of G major. He belted out the chorus flawlessly, his foot tapping the floor to keep time, his fingers pushing and releasing on the fret board. Once the last line of the chorus was complete, Jake did the opposite of what G had done. He drew out the last syllable while modulating his own voice into the low end of his range, bringing them neatly back into the key of E major.

“Nice,” Ricky said, nodding his head in approval.

They ran through the entire thing without making a mistake. This was unremarkable as they had worked on it, both separately and together, multiple times now.

“Well ... what do you think?” G asked when they were done.

“It’s tight, homey,” Fro said. “Complex, but fuckin’ tight.”

“Agreed,” said Lucky. “The way y’all modulated the key was smooth.”

“I’ll tell you something that’s gonna need to happen though,” said Ricky.

“What’s that?” G asked.

“I assuming you’re gonna want me to set the primary melody for the verses, right?”

“Fuckin’ A,” said G. “That’s what makes it hip-hop. I ain’t gonna be playing the goddamn piano on the recording.”

“That’s what I figured,” Ricky said. “I’m gonna need another turntable in front of me for the modulation.”

“You’ll need four turntables?” Jake asked. Even though he was a professional musician with working knowledge of how most standard instruments worked, he actually had no idea how Ricky and other DJs managed to do what they did, which was to produce actual musical notes by manually moving records back and forth beneath an analog needle.

“One-two-three-four,” Ricky confirmed. “It takes a minimum of two of the motherfuckers for me to produce the notes for a tune and both of them need to have some vinyl on them with tunes in the same key as the tune I’m producing for. Does that make sense?”

“It does,” Jake said, nodding. It made perfect sense, in fact.

“If y’all want to be changing key in the same tune, I’m gonna need two vinyls with E major tunes cued up and two with G major tunes cued up. And I won’t have an extra turntable for variations in the tone like I normally have, so the melodies are all gonna have to be pretty much the same throughout.”

“Actually, that shit won’t be necessary,” G said.

“What you mean?” Ricky asked. “There ain’t no other way for me to modulate.”

“You won’t be modulating,” G said. “You’ll only need the E major set up for the verses. There ain’t gonna be no DJ sound in Jake’s parts. He’s gonna grind that shit out on his Les Paul.”

“No shit?” Ricky asked.

“No shit,” G told him. “That’s the whole point of this tune. It’s a fusion of hip-hop and hard rock.”

“Damn,” Ricky said in wonder.

“Let’s go through it again,” Jake suggested. “Everyone try to feel the melodies, particularly the rhythm section. Once you start to feel it, we’ll switch up and I’ll show you what my part sounds like with distortion.”

“All right,” Ricky said. “Fire it up.”

They fired it up. The second rendition was even smoother than the first.

Since it was a winter weekday, Neesh had no problem finding parking near the pier at Redondo Beach. The weather was pleasant enough for December, fifty-eight degrees with a steady onshore breeze blowing, the sun out and shining. Just barely sweater weather and both the ladies were wearing jeans and sweaters.

They had chatted freely with each other on the drive over, as two women who were friends would, and the subjects had stayed well away from girl-time or anything related to it. Laura was more than a little nervous about this outing with Neesh—it was to be the first test of Neesh’s promise to not try to seduce her unless she was begged—but as they got out of the car and started checking out the shops on the large, seemingly endless pier, she gradually started to become more comfortable. After all, even if Neesh did not keep her promise, it took two to tango, didn’t it? And she was a married woman now, with all the responsibilities that went along with such a relationship. Even if Neesh did try to seduce her again, she had the willpower to resist her. Didn’t she?

She thought she did. True, she could not deny that she was still attracted to Neesh, quite powerfully, in fact. She felt a little flushed every time she saw those full lips and remembered what they had felt like kissing her on her lips, on her nipples, down below. And when she saw the shape of Neesh’s breasts beneath her sweater, when she saw the jiggling of them as she walked, she could not help but remember what they had felt like in her hands, in her mouth.

Steady, Teach, she told herself. Attraction and fantasy are fine. You can rape Jake all you want as soon as the two of you get home. You just can’t act on anything that Neesh does.

They shopped for almost two hours without ever leaving the pier, both of them burning holes in their virtually limitless credit cards. Neesh bought a new dress and several pairs of shoes. Laura bought a couple of sweaters that Neesh had declared would look good on her (Laura knew she had little to no fashion sense and relied upon her friends to make her shopping decisions for her) and a few pairs of designer jeans. The two of them even went into the dressing rooms together and stripped down to bras and panties (and what a mouth-watering sight that was, Laura thought helplessly), but Neesh made no move, not even inuendo.

When their parcels started to border on too much to carry, they strolled a little further down the pier and found an intimate little seafood restaurant. There, they shared a bottle of wine and a shrimp appetizer plate. Neesh then had grilled halibut with rice pilaf while Laura enjoyed a seared scallops plate with grilled vegetables. The wine made them giggly and their talk turned a little risqué, but the innuendo remained confined to heterosexual matters.

Since Neesh had driven, Laura picked up the check and left a generous tip. After securing her credit card back in her purse, they left the restaurant and walked further down the pier, going further out over the ocean. The smell of the sea was strong and the onshore breeze had picked up a bit, bringing a little more chill with it. A couple of sea lions were playing in the water below and Neesh smiled as she saw them.

“Anybody down there you recognize?” she asked Laura.

“Very funny,” Laura said good naturedly, but also realizing that this was the first indirect reference to girl-time that Neesh had made.

They reached the end of the pier and stood side by side, looking out at the ocean. The sun was sinking in the sky but still had a few hours to go before sunset.

“Definitely a better view than anything we could’ve found in Compton,” Neesh remarked.

“That is a scary place,” Laura said. “The drive in made me very uncomfortable.”

“It makes me nervous too,” Neesh said. “And I’m a sister ... well, kind of anyway.”

“Why does G keep his rehearsal studio there?” she asked. “I’m sure he could afford to rehearse in Beverly Hills if he wanted to, right?”

“It’s for street cred,” she said. “For a rapper, street cred is everything, almost more important than the music. As long as he maintains that cred and keeps putting out good tunes and isn’t perceived as a sellout, he’s perfectly safe there, as are all of us.”

“Does that mean that Jake has street cred with the black community as well?” Laura asked.

“I don’t think the community thought too much about him one way or the other until Step Inside came out. Now he has some tentative cred since he played guitar for G and it’s known that he hangs out with him and they appeared at the awards ceremony together. Once this new tune they’re working on comes out, and if it’s as good as G and Jake seem to think it’s going to be, I think Jake will be made an honorary member of the community, with all the rights and privileges.”

“All the rights and privileges?” she asked.

“Girlfriend, the two of you will be able to walk into a bar in South Central or Watts and order drinks and nobody will kill you. In fact, they’ll probably buy those drinks for you; especially if it becomes known that Jake is paying college tuition for Elsa’s grandkids, or that you used to teach in the ghetto.”

“Wow,” Laura whispered, imagining that. “I don’t think I’d ever be comfortable doing something like that.”

Neesh chuckled. “I’m not suggesting you should,” she said. “I’m just saying that you could if you wanted to. And the street cred has more practical applications as well. Run into a couple of hard-hitting niggers while you’re walking the streets down in Hollywood and they’ll leave you alone instead of robbing you. Walk into one of those soul food joints downtown and you’ll get premium service, extra portions, and they won’t spit in your food.”

“Are you making all this up?” Laura asked.

“No way, Teach,” she said. “This is the gospel. Look at me. I’m from an upper-middle class family and didn’t even know where the ghetto was until I met G. Now I’m a sister that other black women look up to. G is considered quite the catch, you know. As is Jake. Rich and powerful men who didn’t sell out to get what they have.”

Laura nodded as she thought this over. “Very interesting,” she said.

“Isn’t it?” Neesh asked.

They stared out at the ocean again for a few minutes.

“How’s the married life treating you so far?” Neesh finally asked.

“I like it,” she said. “I know it shouldn’t feel that different than before; after all, we’d been living together and sleeping in the same bed and all that before we were married; but somehow, it is different.”

“Hell yeah, it’s different,” Neesh said. “You’re married now. It’s legal. He can’t just break up with you if he gets it into his head to do so. There’s paperwork involved now, and division of assets.” She shook her head in admiration. “I still can’t believe he didn’t ask you to sign a prenup before you said, ‘I do’.”

“I’m not interested in taking Jake’s money,” she said. “I love him. I really do. I mean, don’t get me wrong, I like being rich. It’s nice to go out and buy whatever I want and not have to worry about whether or not I’ll be able to pay the rent, or my electricity bill, or my car payment, but I would’ve married Jake even if he’d been poor.”

“You think so?” Neesh asked. It was obvious that she found this very hard to believe.

“I know so,” Laura insisted.

Neesh smiled at her. “That’s what makes you so damn cute, Teach,” she said. “That wholesome, Pollyanna thing you got going. It’s charming as hell.”

Laura felt herself flush a little. “Are you saying you wouldn’t have gotten involved with G if he wasn’t rich?”

“No way in hell,” Neesh said without hesitation. “Don’t get me wrong now, I really do love the man. I love his personality, I love how he treats me, and I wouldn’t have gotten involved with just any old rich guy who showed interest just because he was rich, but G wouldn’t have had a shot in hell at even getting a kiss-off from me if he hadn’t been G.”

Laura nodded thoughtfully. “At least you’re honest about it.”

“To thy own self be true,” she quoted.

“I suppose,” Laura said.

“And how about you?” Neesh asked. “Are you being true to yourself?”

“What do you mean?” she asked carefully.

“I’ve seen you checking out my boobs ever since we got in the car,” she said. “Are you telling yourself you don’t want me?”

“No,” Laura said quietly. “I’m not telling myself that at all.”

“I kept my promise,” Neesh said. “And I intend to keep keeping it. Are you planning to do any begging, Teach?”

“I’m not,” Laura said.

“You sure?” Neesh prompted. “It wouldn’t even have to be serious begging, because I been looking at them boobs of yours all day too.”

Laura shook her head. “Sorry, Neesh. It’s not going to happen.”

“A pity,” Neesh said with a sigh. “Well, how about we start making our way back to the car then? I guess we should go see how those men of ours are doing.”

“Sounds good,” Laura said.

They walked slowly and companionly back to the car for the drive back to Compton.

Jake, G, and the boys managed to get a lot accomplished while Neesh and Laura were gone. They worked their way from playing out the melody on piano and clean electric without distortion, to having Ricky lay down the basic melody for G’s verses while the drummers and the bass players kept the beat and the time. The key modulations for the changeovers between verse and chorus were still a little rough and, quite plainly, needed a lot of work in order to sound smooth. Jake’s choruses, however, were coming along better than anything. The two hip-hop drummers and the two hip-hop bass players found they rather enjoyed the hard rock beat that was required to accompany Jake’s distorted electric guitar and strong, melodic tenor voice.

“I’ll make heavy metal musicians out of you four yet,” Jake told them at one point, after a particularly fine representation of the form.

“Shit, that’ll be the fuckin’ day,” James chuckled.

It was close to four-thirty in the afternoon when the computer buzzed and flashed, indicating that someone had entered the main gate with the code. Gordon stepped away from his microphone and checked the video display, seeing that it was his car coming in.

“The bitches be back,” he told Jake, without bothering to wait for the buzz of the intercom so he could open the front door. Neesh had a key card that would let her in.

“Cool,” Jake said, making an adjustment to the tone on his Les Paul. “Let’s see what they think of it.”

“Sounds good to me,” Gordon said.

The door opened and the ladies came in, Laura carrying a couple of shopping bags in addition to her purse.

“Uh oh,” G said as he saw this. “It looks like they been spendin’ some money, Jake.”

“And probably not at Walmart,” Jake said with a chuckle.

“Definitely not at Walmart,” Neesh agreed. “How’s it going in here?”

“We’re making some headway,” Gordon replied. “Wanna see how we’re doing?”

“Sure,” Laura said.

“All right, homies,” G said. “Let’s run through what we got.”

Naturally, now that they had their first audience, they screwed up the beginning and had to start over. But once they got rolling, they all seemed to give it their best and, perhaps because of the small audience, it was their best rendition yet.

Ricky spun his turntables in E major, putting out the verse melody while the bass players and the drummers kept time. Gordon sang his verses in classic rap style, belting them out in harmony with the beat. And then came the switchover to G major. Again, it was slightly rough as the rhythm section was still getting used to it, but Gordon’s voice carried off the change in key long enough for Jake to kick in with his distorted electric and lay down the rock and roll riff. The drummers and the bass players began to pound out the beat in rock and roll rhythm now, all of them grinning and nodding their heads as they got into it. Jake sang out the chorus, belting it out much more powerfully and angrily than he’d done in the acoustic version.

They played all the way to the bridge and then stopped before mounting it. They still were pretty weak on that part and they all knew it. There was no sense disillusioning their audience.

“Well?” Gordon asked the ladies once all the instruments were silenced.

“That’s impressive,” Neesh said, clapping her hands. “I think people are going to love it.”

Laura, the musician (and the one who was really only fond of jazz) was a bit more critical, but she was kind about it.

“I like the overall feel of the piece,” she said. “It needs a lot more work though. Very rough on the modulation from E major to G major and back.”

“Yeah,” Jake said. “We’re going to need to work to smooth those changeovers out. But not bad for the first go around, huh?”

She smiled at her husband. “Not bad at all,” she agreed.

The band decided to call it a day. They would be meeting again three days from now for another session. In the meantime, G and the band had nine other tunes they were currently working on. They wanted to be in the recording studio in Oakland by the end of February.

“Anyone up for a few drinks?” asked Gordon.

The band were all up for this, and Jake wasn’t opposed to it, but Laura asked him if he minded if they just headed home.

“Uh ... sure,” he said a little regretfully. “Sorry, guys. Boss lady wants to go home.”

“I’m a little tired too,” Neesh said to Gordon. “Do you mind terribly?”

Gordon simply shrugged. “Naw, baby. I got to get up early in the morning anyway.”

And so, the rest of the band packed up and headed for a local watering hole while G, Neesh, Jake and Laura climbed into their cars for the trip home.

“Did you have a good time?” Jake asked Laura as they headed for the freeway.

“We had a blast,” she told him. “She’s really fun to hang out with.” She gave him a look he recognized well. “Listen, do you mind if I suck your dick while we drive?”

“Uh ... no, go for it,” Jake told her. “I’ve never had a blowjob in Compton before.”

She undid her seatbelt and leaned over him, undoing his belt and unsnapping his jeans. As she fished his already stiffening manhood out, she looked up at him. “And when we get home,” she said, “I want you to eat my pussy out.”

“I can do that,” Jake agreed.

“And then fuck me,” she added.

“Naturally,” Jake said.

She smiled at him one last time and then went to work. He enjoyed the experience greatly. It had been a while since she had blown him in the car.

Just before he shot off in her mouth, it occurred to him that she was almost always in an extremely randy mood after visiting Neesh.

Wasn’t that interesting?