The Ex

27

The basement was almost completely dark except for yellow pools of light spread by bare overhead bulbs. Visible in the dimness were jumbles of ductwork above, and junk below. There were ripped screens, an old sawhorse, an upside-down tricycle without wheels. A row of wooden storage lockers faded into the blackness, its walls constructed of slats with two-inch spaces between them, solid wood doors with hasps for padlocks.

In the dim light of a paint-splotched lightbulb back near the boilers, David had Deirdre pressed against a wooden wall of one of the storage lockers. He was standing. Her wrists were bound above her head to the slats with one of David’s old silk ties. Her skirt was hiked up and her legs were locked around his waist.

Beside them was the duffle bag containing David’s workout clothes for Silver’s Gym, where he’d told Molly he was going. Later, he would slip out through a side door of the apartment building and actually go to Silver’s and work out. Though right now he doubted if another workout was necessary.

He was thrusting into Deirdre, causing the loosely nailed slats of the storage locker to slam together. Something fell inside the locker with a sound like glass breaking on the concrete floor.

“Too much…noise, David!” Deirdre moaned desperately between thrusts. “God, too much…noise!”

He didn’t let up. “You’re the one who…insisted on doing this down here…”

Getting winded, he paused and took a deep breath, then leaned forward and bit her earlobe, hard. Punishing her for making him need her. Her arms strained against their silken bondage.

“Shit, David! Don’t draw blood!”

He drew his head back to look closely at her in the musty dimness. Her eyes were puffy and dreamy with lust but still held their glint of calculation. She was losing herself only ninety percent.

“You never minded before,” he told her. “Besides, turn-about’s fair play.” He bit her ear again, but not nearly as hard. She tried to move her head away but couldn’t, her movements restricted by her upraised arms.

“I’m a working girl now. I have to wear earrings.” She giggled. “For those I need ears.”

He’d stopped biting her and resumed driving himself into her, watching her eyes lose focus and become slits and her lips tighten and withdraw over her perfect teeth. She was his a hundred percent now.

And he was hers.

He felt her body tense and her legs clasped him more powerfully. After a few more strokes he pressed hard into her, holding himself tight against the bulge of her pubic mound and grinding her against the raw wood slats as he spilled into her. He heard himself moan. He held her pinned against the slats afterward, hard enough to make the old wood boards creak with the strain, as he valued every second.

Finally he withdrew from her and she lowered her legs and was standing on her own. He quickly untied her wrists and slipped the silk tie into a pocket.

They kissed long and feverishly, then smiled at each other, eyes serious, and began reorienting themselves to the postcoital world as they rearranged their clothing.

“I love dark and dusty old basements,” Deirdre said, rubbing her wrists. “I’ve had more fun in them than anyplace else.”

David checked to make sure he’d zipped his fly. “I don’t like Molly being right upstairs.”

Deirdre gave him a lascivious grin. “I kind of do.” She spread her legs slightly and held her wadded panties to her crotch beneath her skirt. “Wow! You must have come a gallon, the way you’re running out of me. It’s lucky I only have to make it to my apartment in this building, or I’d leave a trail.”

He winced, not only at her indelicacy but at her casual attitude about them all living beneath the same roof, the wife, the lover, the cheating husband. It was one of those moments when David gained some perspective and was terrified.

There was a soft scratching sound from another part of the basement, and he and Deirdre stood still for a few seconds.

Then she kissed him and said, “Only a rat.”

“So there’s another one down here.”

“You’re far too hard on yourself, David. We’re not the only two people having an affair, and Molly’s not the only wife who’s in the way. You should learn to embrace your destiny the way you hold me.”

“It isn’t just Molly. What about Michael?”

“I don’t want to see him hurt any more than you do. But his world isn’t going to come to a close. Did you know the children of divorced parents are a majority in public schools now?”

“The statistics don’t bear that out, Deirdre.”

“Well, there are liars, darned liars, and statisticians. Anyway, sometimes people have to recognize reality and give in to its power. It’s like this big roulette wheel that spins and decides whose lives get mingled and changed. This time it’s you, me, and Molly. She might not like it, but it’s fate.”

“Another thing she didn’t like was you being our baby-sitter the other night.”

“That’s just because she’s too suspicious. She’s paranormal.”

He felt to make sure his underwear had soaked up his sperm and her wetness, and the front of his pants was free of telltale spots that would have to dry before he could leave the basement. “You mean paranoid. And why wouldn’t she be? She’s got a lot of stress in her life lately.”

“We can’t help that.”

“Can’t we?”

“You’re not down here with me against your will, are you, David?”

He spread his fingers and raked them through his hair, scraping his scalp with his nails. “I’m not sure I’ve got any will left.”

She laughed loudly, causing his heart to skip as he glanced around nervously. Hardly anyone came down to the dusty, gloomy basement, but if someone they knew did happen to discover them here, it would add another layer to his guilt and fear and might be devastating. Deirdre’s roulette wheel in the sky, jolting his future again.

“It sure seemed like free will a few minutes ago,” Deirdre said. “That’s the part you don’t understand. The choice is yours but you can’t help yourself, David. You can’t help loving me.”

“I can’t help fucking you.”

“That’s close enough for now.”

She moved directly in front of him then reached out and laced her fingers behind his neck, leaning back slightly so he was supporting her. She stared into his eyes with a gloating but desperate gleam that seemed too bright to be the reflection of the nearby low-wattage bulb. He gazed back at her with more hopelessness than passion.

“Molly didn’t like you baby-sitting Michael,” he said again.

She seemed incredulous. Injured. “Why not? Did she think I was going to harm him?”

“I don’t-”

“Whatever the reason, Molly must be going off her rocker chair. She oughta see a doctor, David, really.”

His irritation made him want to slap her, hurt and shock her. His voice was tight but level. “Stop saying she’s insane.”

“Why should I? She’s saying things about me. What’s good for the goose is good for the rest of the flock.”

“Oh, Jesus!”

“I’m serious, David. You don’t want to admit it, but the way she’s been acting lately, she really does need professional help.”

He thought for a second he actually would strike her. Then he knew where it might lead, that it wasn’t a solution or even an option.

Without speaking, he reached back and unfastened her hands from behind his neck.

Then he turned away from her abruptly, picked up his duffle bag, and walked into the darkness.

The worst part was, he suspected she might be right about Molly needing help. And it was his fault as well as Deirdre’s. He was caught in a terrible, destructive dance with her, and no matter how much he hated himself, he couldn’t stop dancing.

At the gym he worked the Nautilus equipment, then the free weights, with a determination and a fierceness that pushed him to surpass his previous limits.

“Aren’t we full of piss and vinegar today?” Herb Mindle remarked. “What the hell did you have for breakfast?”

David wiped perspiration from his forehead with a towel and smiled grimly. “You don’t want to know.”

“Sure, I do,” Mindle said. “It’s my business.”

David paused and nodded. “That’s right, I’d forgotten.” He chalked his hands, stretched out on his back on the padded bench, and gripped the barbell at the proper width for maximum-weight presses.

He still felt strong, but lying as he was, staring up at the lights on the ceiling, he felt a curious dizziness come over him and erode his confidence. Everyone was human; everyone was weak and broke more easily than they imagined.

“Better spot me on this,” he said. “It’s ten pounds above my previous high. If I don’t make it, the bar might come down and break my neck.”

“Then why not try only five extra pounds first?” Mindle asked.

“Because I decided to go for ten,” David snapped, tired of Mindle’s probing. There was no excuse for it, even considering his profession. He had no right to keep prying, eliciting information, analyzing.

Mindle moved around to be in position to grab the bar in case David lost control. He looked pensive, as if musing over David’s answer to his last question.

“Pertinent,” he said with a grin. “Pertinent.”