An Accidental Affair (6 page)

I massaged the bridge of my nose and whispered, “That was unexpected.”

“Not for me,” she answered. “I’ve wanted to get to know you all day.”

Then arrived the awkwardness that came after the first time strangers had stolen sex.

She coughed, caught her breath, and said, “Glad I did this. So glad that I did this.”

We stopped moving, our breathing thick and labored, like we had hiked Mt. Fuji.

I asked Patrice, “How do you feel?”

“Alive. I’ve been feeling dead a long time.”

“You’re married and you feel dead. Better than being married and feeling like killing.”

“Marriage can start to feel like a slow death. I had no idea it would be like that.”

“Not for everybody. Marriage is supposed to be about a new life, a new beginning.”

“Look at divorce rates. We really need to start learning from other people’s mistakes.”

“I stand corrected, statistically, but still I don’t think that it’s a slow death.”

“Your marriage did you a lot of good, Varg. It is Varg, right?”

“You forgot my name.”

She hadn’t forgotten my name. I had forgotten my name. I was James Thicke. Being Varg was new. She had come here for Varg Veum, not to welcome James Thicke to the area.

She laughed. “Okay. What did you say your name was?”

“Yeah, it’s Varg.”

“Your name got my attention too. It’s different. Makes you seem exotic.”

“A name is just a name is just a name is just a name.”

She took another deep breath then pulled herself to me. We kissed again.

“The woman or women that you go out with, do you like to see them in makeup, in heels and jeans, in business suits, in soft pants and heels, or in a nice fitted skirt and heels?”

“I can’t date you, Mrs. Evans. I need you to know that right now.”

“That’s fine. Just let me come by for an hour at a time, like I’m on vacation.”

“This isn’t Club Med. It’s Club Cuckold.”

She asked, “Was your wife pretty?”

“Like a movie star.”

Then my mind was gone, felt like it was a billion miles away from this room.

Patrice was next to me, but I was with Regina Baptiste, holding my wife’s hand as we walked through the circus of tourists at Hollywood
and Vine. Out-of-work thespians were dressed up in superhero costumes. They were taking snapshots with tourists while other travelers searched the Walk of Fame for names of their favorite stars. We walked the strip and held hands. We were across from where they filmed
Jimmy Kimmel Live!
And that night Regina Baptiste was scheduled to appear on the show, her face on the electronic billboards that lit up the strip.

I asked Regina Baptiste, “Are you excited? In four hours you’re taping his show.”

“Very excited. I hope I do a good job. I hope he’s as funny as Letterman.”

“You will do great. They love you in New York and L.A. Everyone loves you.”

She paused, removed her sunglasses, put on her trademark smile, and I used my Nikon to take a dozen photos. Tourists recognized her, Asians, Blacks, Whites, women, men, even the thespians in superhero costumes flocked to her. She posed for a few photos, posed with tourists, Spider-Man, The Hulk, and Catwoman. The crowd became crazy fast and I had to play bad cop and pull her away from her public. I never grew accustomed to the part of her that I had to share with the world. We’d never be able to take a peaceful walk through any part of town until her fame had diminished. And she loved the rise to the top. Fame was very profitable.

It took a strong man to be with a beautiful actress who would go to work and kiss other men, handsome men, rich men, men who were on the front of the magazines. It took a strong man to be able to watch her have pretend sex and share her real tongue with other pretend lovers over and over as many watched. A man had to be secure to be able to watch his wife bare her body in front of many, a body that she worked hard to keep looking like a work of art. A man had to be trusting to watch her topless or naked in scenes that the world would
see, then still feel as if her kisses and nakedness was special and, somehow, just for him.

We ran away from the crowd, ran away laughing as cameras and cell phones flashed in our wake, took to a side street and resumed walking hand in hand, arms swinging like children.

She said, “I wish that I could turn this fame on and off. You can go to the bathroom without people following you and yelling through the door while you sit and do your business. You don’t have people taking your picture or shoving cell phones in your face because they want you to talk to their momma or listen to their dog bark ‘The Star Spangled Banner.’”

“Yeah. But the people love you. They’re just showing you their love.”

“Who teaches their dog to bark ‘The Star Spangled Banner’?”

In some ways I was as envious of Regina Baptiste as she was envious of me.

I wondered what it would be like for that many people to demand to touch me, to demand a piece of me because I had written the words that actors had regurgitated with style and flair.

Someone yelled, “Hey, look over there,
it’s Regina Baptiste
.”

Laughing, we held hands and took off running again. Driver was there that day, shadowing us as he drove one of my cars. That day I think it was the Bentley. Might have been the Double-R. We ran to the car and fell into the backseat laughing like we owned the world.

I said, “Sing that Janis Ian song you like.”

“Driver, please pop in the Janis Ian CD. Play ‘At Seventeen.’ Volume at thirteen.”

Then she sang and gave me kisses.

It felt like she was here with me now, her warm tongue inside my mouth, her sweet lies inside my ear. Her hand moved across my chest, touched my nipples and I licked my lips.

* * *

I snapped out of that trance when Mrs. Patrice Evans rubbed my chest again.

She said, “Did you hear me?”

“What did you say?”

She caught her breath and said, “Today is my fifth wedding anniversary.”

I blinked marital memories from my eyes.

She sighed, moved her hair from her face, and said, “Five years with Ted.”

I opened and closed my damaged hand. “Even mistakes have anniversaries.”

“I doubt if he remembers that today is our anniversary. He didn’t mention it all week, said nothing this morning. No card, no flowers, no hugs and kisses. So I decided to have sex. I just didn’t know if I was going to have it by myself or with you.”

“He forgot your anniversary.”

“Or worse. He remembers and just doesn’t care.”

We listened to cars racing over speed bumps two stories below, to loud conversations that came from open windows, to music, to crying babies. The noises were unending. Even words of kindness were loud. It was a world where no one spoke, but everyone yelled like they were in a kitchen shouting orders. It was evening and everyone was returning home.

A tense moment passed before I asked, “How much time is left for us to share?”

“Enough time to make me come again.”

“Is there?”

“Put your finger here; make me come with your fingers.”

I was about to, then I saw blood on the sheets. Not much. Just a couple of streaks of red. Just enough to remind me of the blood that had covered me after I’d beaten Johnny Bergs.

I said, “You’re bleeding.”

She sat up, saw the results from our war, from our round of vengeance, and cursed.

She asked for a towel then hurried to the bathroom and washed herself.

When she came back she asked, “Can we do this again?”

“Sure. On your sixth wedding anniversary.”

“Don’t tease me like that.”

I asked, “Did your husband do something else to deserve being fucked over like this?”

“He fucked me over first. He broke the Eleventh Commandment.”

“Which is what, exactly?”

“Thou Shalt Keep Patrice Happy.”

“Your unhappiness is his failure?”

“All I know is that I hate California and I was very happy in Pensacola.”

“Nobody is happy in Pensacola.”

“There are plenty of happy people in Pensacola.”

“Why you’re straying, why you’re unhappy, it has to be deeper than that.”

“I told you.”

“The child’s version. Tell me the adult version.”

She paused. “I like sex. I need to feel a man get hard inside of me, and I mean real hard, not weak like Ted, and I need to feel a man the way he’s different sizes inside of me, need to feel a man grow inside me and lose his mind and come for me. I’m addicted to that sensation.”

“Hundreds of men are in this complex.”

“All losers with the same street address.”

“Tens of thousands of men live in this city.”

“When I first saw you at the U-Haul truck, I lost it. Yesterday I
didn’t even know you existed. Now, I’m excited about you. I tossed and turned all night thinking about you. Yeah, it might seem like coming here was easy, but I played this out in my head all day. I’d imagined that you’d take me as soon as you opened the door. That you’d throw the cookies across the room and manhandle me, take this Pensacola pussy like you wanted it as bad as it wanted you.”

I didn’t say anything, just lay in silence and took in my claustrophobic surroundings.

She asked, “Was I okay in bed?”

“Mrs. Evans. You were very good. But I wouldn’t quit my day job.”

She chuckled. “You’re older and you keep calling me Mrs. Evans.”

“That’s who you are. Mrs. Evans. Mrs. Patrice Evans.”

“Can we do this again tomorrow evening?”

“You want to have a daily vespertine affair.”

“And you sound smart. Very smart. Where are you from?”

“Norway.”

“Wow. That’s hot. I did it with a guy from Norway.”

“I’m tired. I need rest. Have to unpack. Day after tomorrow might be good.”

“And get condoms. We rode bareback this time. Felt good, but can’t do that again.”

While I pulled on my pants and T-shirt, she said that she’d leave a blank Post-it on my door. Nothing would be written on the Post-it. She would return later. If I was available, the Post-it would be removed and the Domino’s Pizza ad would be left on the door handle.

I said, “That’s why you brought the Domino’s door hanger.”

“Guilty.”

“Nice meeting you, Mrs. Patrice Evans.”

“We did just have sex, you know. You should call me Patrice.”

“Okay. Patrice. And thanks for the cookies.”

“Welcome to the neighborhood, Varg. I’m going to be glad that you moved here.”

Her cellular rang and she jumped like she had been hit with a stun gun.

She tightened her lips for a moment then said, “I have to go.”

When I opened the door, someone was waiting.

Driver was in the hallway. He was one door down, looking in the opposite direction. He stood motionless. Patrice saw him, saw his back to her, and started walking, a quick and nervous walk that changed into a jog. She didn’t want her face seen. Driver didn’t look at her.

Driver came up to me and handed me three bags, all from the Apple Store at the Grove.

He said, “New iPad 2. New MacBook Pro. Disposable phone with four SIM cards. Don’t use your old computer. Or the other iPad. GPS is tied to your MobileMe. Shut it down.”

Another box was on the floor. A box that weighed twenty-eight pounds.

He said, “I brought Underwood separately.”

I nodded. And took a step back so he could come inside. He picked up the weighty box that held Underwood and made his way to the kitchen counter, found a clear spot, and put it there; then he saw the cookies that Patrice Evans had left behind and helped himself to one.

He asked, “Want me to send somebody over to help you unpack and clean?”

“I can manage. It will give me something to keep my mind occupied.”

“Typewriter paper, ribbons?”

“No hurry to work. No hurry to reconnect with anything concerning Hollywood.”

“I’ll drop some off anyway. I’ll expense you for it, if you’re not in jail, plus gas.”

“Just when I thought we were friends.”

“You pay me on time, I am your friend. Stop paying on time, end friendship.”

I motioned at a stack of magazines that had been taken out of a box. British magazines that were more literary than entertainment-driven with Regina Baptiste’s beautifully made-up face on the covers. She was on the
Yorkshire Post
. And on the cover of
The Week: The Best of British and Foreign Media
. “Regina Baptiste on the Perils of Stardom.” A year ago, she had appeared on BBC on the
Graham Norton Show
and admitted her love for the Swedish pop singer Robyn, saying that she loved her style and the song “Who’s That Girl” so much that she sang almost every morning in the shower, like a rock star. Graham Norton dared her to take her inner rock star to the stage and show his audience her little shower act, and to outrageous laughter and huge applause, Regina Baptiste accepted the dare, let it all hang out, and the girl from Livingston covered that UK hit, covered it and set the UK on fire with her singing and dancing, two hidden talents that the world hadn’t seen, talents that would land her in musicals, and that day we escaped London, six thousand fanatics followed her.
The Week
called her performance “The American Invasion.” A simple magazine brought back images so strong. Next to them were American magazines that reflected the frivolity of a nation at war, articles proclaiming that Regina Baptiste had the prettiest thighs, prettiest face, prettiest and nicest shaped buttocks, female-driven magazines that dissected and evaluated her existence body part by body part.

They were surgeons then and they were surgeons now, cutting us to shreds.

Driver said, “Word on the street is that Johnny Bergs abandoned his car that night.”

“I was there. He ran away from his car like Cinderella escaping the ball at midnight.”

“Bergs has four brothers and a junkyard dog for a father.”

“I’ve seen them before. Johnny’s clan can do some damage. Looking for trouble?”

Driver shrugged and picked up a bottle of water. “He might be with them. Hiding out.”