Читать книгу The Scarlet Letter Society - Mary T. McCarthy - Страница 6

“I’m your hell, I’m your dream. I’m nothing in between. You know you wouldn’t want it any other way.” —“Bitch,” Meredith Brooks

Monthly meeting of the Scarlet Letter Society

Zoomdweebies Café

Friday, May 4, 2012

5:30 a.m.

“The scarlet letter was her passport into regions where other women dared not tread.”

-The Scarlet Letter, Nathaniel Hawthorne

from:	Maggie mags@wingsvintage.com
to:	lswain@blackbirdspie.com, embradley@smithcohenbradley.com
date:	Tuesday, May 1, 2012 at 10:26 AM
subject:	Happy May Day, SLS! Greetings, SLutS! It’s that time again. Attached is your invitation to this month’s meeting of the Scarlet Letter Society. Don’t forget, next month will be our first book club discussion of The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne. So don’t forget to pick up your copy from Zarina if you haven’t already. See you Friday!

Scarlet Letter Society meetings were held monthly when the combination coffee shop/bookstore was closed, always at the same time: first Friday of the month, 5:30 am.

Comfy in her standard attire--a vintage t-shirt (today: Smurfs) and worn jeans--Maggie flopped into the orange 70s vinyl recliner. Maggie smiled, remembering the day she crammed the chair into the back of her ’09 Toyota Prius II without any rope; the chair dangling precariously the three blocks over to her building.

Wes, the director of the city’s largest theatre, lived a few blocks over. He’d arrived with wine, cheese and a movie.

“Burlesque, so we can talk about what a fucking delicious train wreck Cher is,” he declared. “So what’s new with your man, hussy?” Wes asked, opening the wine bottle.

Maggie narrowed her eyes at her best friend, Wes, who lounged across from her on a teal deco sofa. He was fifty, gorgeous, and delightfully, flamboyantly gay. The day she had started volunteering at the theatre, Maggie immediately fell in non-sexual love with Wes, and the feeling was mutual.

“He’s fine,” smiled Maggie.

“What do you mean ‘fine’? Someone’s not bringing home the hot beef injections the way they used to, or what?” Wes sipped, rolling his eyes dramatically. He served them each a glass of wine.

“Ted is, um, bringing home the bacon the very best same way he has for some time, Wes,” laughed Maggie. “How many details do you want about that?”

Wes seemed to ponder for a moment.

“Hmmmm, well, he’s a total hottie, but even though he’s a musician, he’s not vibing ANY gay, so I guess I might as well not torture myself by having to hear about his package and its delivery.”

Maggie laughed again. “Well I’ll spare you all the gory details, then!”

Wes thought to himself: Maggie looks great in this light. In her natural setting. Her apartment over the shop was the perfect size, with its huge bay window, and stained glass panes. Her orange chair and a small painted wooden side table formed her sitting area inside the window. Large plants were everywhere. He glanced at her old MacBook, the adorable small vintage lamp, and a framed photo of her girls when they were younger, watching a town parade from the sidewalk and grinning from ear to ear.

“So, are there more wedding bells in your future? You’ve been dating him forever!”

“Are you kidding me? I’ve already put one husband into a divorce court and another one’s on the way in there, Wes,” replied Maggie. “Why on earth would I want to put the Marry Mag curse on poor Ted? He hasn’t done anything to deserve it.”

“God, that’s true,” said Wes. “But I gotta say it cracks me up that you’re acting like a goddamn teenager about the whole thing.” He made a fake gagging motion, adding, “It’s so cliché. I mean, seriously, when do you think he’ll ask you to the prom?”

They laughed.

“I’m already shopping for my prom gown,” said Maggie. “Now hand me that cheese tray.”

“So how’s your little whore club coming along?” asked Wes.

“We don’t call it a whore club,” said Maggie, raising an eyebrow. “That’s an offensive term and besides, we’re not getting paid. Our Scarlet Letter Society is simply for women who are- well, to put it in some kind of bizarre politically correct term, I guess, who are fidelity challenged.”

“Mmhmm, whores. Well at least they aren’t still stoning you or burning your asses at the stake anymore,” said Wes, passing the Havarti and rice crackers. “The funny part is, you’re in a club you technically can’t even be a member of because you’re not even cheating on your pretty little boyfriend! Unless you count the fact that your divorce isn’t even final, which hardly counts.”

“So technically, I’m still married,” responded Maggie, “and thus a practicing adulteress, if you ask the Catholic Church.” Making the sign of the cross while rolling her eyes, Maggie added, “And since I’m cheating on both of my husbands with Ted, I’d say I’m not just the founder of the Scarlet Letter Society, but also a quite active member.”

“Well, Sister Margaret Katherine. ‘Veteran Vixen Vaginas’ would be a great name for your website,” said Wes. “You should totally lock down a Twitter handle for that.”

“We’re starting to read a book each month for the Scarlet Letter Society meetings,” said Maggie. “Historical or modern fiction about women who cheat on their husbands. I mean, the novels are usually written by men and end up with dead women, but it will be interesting to get the perspective on how things have changed. Or haven’t. We’re beginning by reading The Scarlet Letter.”

“Ooooh! It will be like the HO-prah Book Club!” squealed Wes, clapping his hands.

“Let’s watch the movie, goofball,” Maggie said warmly.

Subdivision streetlights cast the only light through the bedroom curtains as Lisa snuck out of bed to check her email. As the floorboards creaked in a house that was only built three years before in this McNeighborhood she loathed beyond words, she knew Jim would hear her.

“Where are you going?” slurred Jim gruffly. “Don’t you remember I’m going to be going away for a few days to the conference?” he asked, pulling her back into bed.

Lisa grimaced slightly.

“I was just going to get some shop paperwork done before I go into town.”

So much for Jim leaving for his trip before she woke up. And here came the scene she had been hoping to avoid.

“I guess there’s no time for a foot rub then,” said Jim in the whiny voice that made Lisa want to drive icepicks through her own skull. She looked over at him in the bed, and then she saw it. A bright red Christian Louboutin stiletto peeked out from under his pillow.

“Jim! Those are $6000 shoes!” said Lisa, exasperated. “Why are you crushing one of them under your pillow?”

“I bought them for you, Lisa,” responded Jim, sulking. “You know I got them online for way less than that, and it’s not my fault you continually refuse to indulge my fantasy.”

Lisa shuddered. A foot fetish, of all things. How had she managed to marry someone with such an annoying addiction? She would never wear those stupid shoes. They weren’t even new. Gah! Who knew where they’d been, or what she’d have to clean off them.

She thought to herself, I have already honestly tried to go along with the whole “fantasy” thing, as he called it. Remember when I wore the thigh high black leather boots (and nothing else) to bed? Or how about the time I let you masturbate into a gold pair of stripper heels bought especially for the purpose? But she was sick of him being more interested in her feet and her footwear than her preferred parts.

“Honey,” she said, “I need to get to the bakery. Maybe you could just pack the shoes in your suitcase for the trip.”

“Don’t be mad that I spent the money. They’re beautiful! Like you,” said Jim.

“You damn well know we need that money for the fertility treatments,” said Lisa. “I don’t even want to look at them!”

She went downstairs, grabbed her laptop, and headed to the downtown bakery. Beautiful, my ass, she thought.

“Welcome to Keytown!” the town’s sign cheerily welcomed her, and she breathed a sigh of relief. Bakery therapy. She arrived at her shop, prepared batter, popped the first batch of cinnamon buns into the oven, and washed her hands, absentmindedly wiping them to dry on her apron. She sat down at the counter stool, opened her laptop and hit “compose.”

from:	Lisa lswain@blackbirdspie.com
to:	Ben bnidale@starfishdesign.com
date:	Tuesday, May 2, 2012 at 8:10 AM
subject:	My logo Ben, It’s hard to believe we have met three times and I still don’t have a mockup of my new logo. I demand customer service. Sincerely, Lisa Swain

She smiled as she hit ‘send.’ And her friends thought she was licking cherry juice off this guy? Geez, wouldn’t that be amazing. So far in real life versus Scarlet Letter Club fantasy league, she’d simply had two “brainstorming” lunches and a shop visit to “gather information.” And of course the email fluttering back and forth like middle school notes passed from classmate to classmate. Is Ben taking a long time to produce my business materials so he can prolong this? Lisa thought, doubting herself. Or am I just being silly? He’s probably just busy.

Ping, came the sound of a new email, and her heart rate quickened.

from:	Ben bnidale@starfishdesign.com
to:	Lisa lswain@blackbirdspie.com
date:	Tuesday, May 2, 2012, 8:13 AM
subject:	Your pie You know that I feel strongly about the image that is presented for your business, and that I’m trying to get a feel for the message you want to send to your customers. Don’t try to rush the creative process. Are you free for lunch? We can discuss this further, as customer satisfaction is my goal. Ben

The blush crept up from her neckline to her face as Lisa nervously wiped her hands off again on her apron before hitting “reply.”

from:	Lisa lswain@blackbirdspie.com
to:	Ben bnidale@starfishdesign.com
date:	Tuesday, May 2, 2012 at 8:17 AM
subject:	Customer satisfaction Thank you for your prompt response. I agree a lunch meeting is in order. Meet me at Provence at noon. L

Oh yeah, middle school was definitely on the phone, wanting their geeky note-passing routine back. What was it about written communication that made it so sexy? Lisa stood up, realizing she had just sent out a lunch invitation. She looked at the clock, and down at her beat-up Gap jeans and worn cotton t-shirt. I can’t wear this to the Provence. A visit to Maggie’s shop for something to wear was in order as soon as those cinnamon buns came out of the oven.

Zarina smiled as the women entered the shop for their monthly meeting.

“Good morning, Zarina,” said Maggie as she came in. “Always good to start the day at Z’s!”

Zarina’s mom had never really ‘decorated’ the shop per se, just covered it in a scattering of 80s memorabilia she’d picked up over the years at yard sales and online auctions. Pac Man memorabilia, Bon Jovi posters, shadow boxes of scratch-and-sniff sticker and Garbage Pail Kids cards, plastic Gremlins, and other vintage trinkets bedecked the shop. On the wall hung a large 80s-font print featuring a shop-namesake quote: “Screws fall out all the time; the world’s an imperfect place.”

Eva and Lisa crossed to the brown leather couch area as Zarina locked the door behind the ladies. She didn’t flip over the ‘open’ sign since their monthly meeting was private and the shop didn’t technically open for another hour. She busied herself getting their standard order ready: two Neo Maxi double espressos, a caramel macchiato for the bakery lady, Lisa, plus warming up the blueberry muffins she baked last night.

“So how’s everything with Ben, Lisa? And have you figured out a way to deal with that foot fetish husband of yours?” Eva smiled.

“Ben and I took a walk the other day to Bailey Park,” said Lisa, “and we ended up having sex in broad daylight under the covered bridge.”

Maggie and Eva laughed. “Well that’s a new one,” said Maggie. “Bravo, kid. You’re lucky Keytown’s finest weren’t patrolling the park at the time—or worse, some poor mom and a toddler going for a walk.”

Lisa grinned, cursing herself for making up such an outrageous story.

“Well I got a can of homemade whipped cream unleashed into my vag,” said Eva, breaking into laughter. “The chef had prepared it especially to be organic.”

“That was thoughtful,” said Maggie. “I mean, you wouldn’t want any of that trashy-ass grocery store canned whipped cream up there.”

“It was of course delicious, too, when I sprayed some on him and got to taste it during the expert blow job I served up.”

Lisa, ever the junior member of the club, asked, ”Where did you learn to give great blowjobs? I mean, I’ve been married for five years and dated before that, and of course there’s Ben now, but I’ve always worried I’m not good at it. Not to mention I don’t like it. I did order the spray we talked about last month...”

“Art of the Blowjob,” said Maggie and Eva at the same time, chuckling.

“What’s that?” asked Lisa, fishing her journal out of her purse.

Maggie replied, “It’s a website where this auburn haired chick does instructional videos on how to give the perfect blowjob. It’s not porny or tacky. It’s quite helpful!”

Eva added, “You have to admit it is kind of hilarious that there is just this, like, DICK that appears from the left side of the screen. You never ever even see the guy.”

“He must be a pretty happy guy,” said Lisa.

“Yeah, nice work if you can get it, huh?” said Maggie.

Eva took a sip of her coffee. “So what’s the latest in your ever-active love life, Mags?”

“Divorce number two will be final pretty soon. Everything is going fine with Ted, but I actually have a new friend now, too.”

“Holy Mary Magdelene loving Jesus!” declared Eva. “Can you ever just be shagging one person, Margaret Hanson?”

“Well if that ain’t the tramp kettle calling the slut pot black, I don’t know what is,” snorted Maggie as a grin spread across her face, now lined with smile lines at 47. She crossed her vintage cowboy boots and adjusted her brown corduroy skirt.

“It so happens,” announced Maggie, “that I’m sort of cheating on my lover with a very adorable professional in town.”

“A professional what?” laughed Eva with an eye roll. “So what’s this one’s name?”

“Well, smarty pants,” said Maggie, “I’ll have to tell you all about it later.”

As the women left the shop, Zarina raised the store’s front window shade and flipped the sign to “open.” Then she texted her boyfriend, Stanley. He loved to come over and hear all about the morning meeting, especially since it always made her a little horny for some reason. Flying estrogen? She entered two words into her battered iPhone 3: “Booty. Call.”

When Maggie asked if Zarina could have two copies of The Scarlet Letter (Eva read on a Kindle app), she was happy to accommodate her favorite customers, and appreciated them supporting the store. She found three gently used copies at a great price, ordering the extra copy for herself. Ha! I will be in their book club and they won’t even know it, she thought, laughing to herself.

Zarina smiled at Stanley as he entered the shop a short time later.

“Yes, I’m here for one Booty Latte, extra cream, please,” he smiled.

“Coming right up,” said Zarina, winking at him.

I love how much fun we have together, thought Zarina as she made his coffee, and how he makes me laugh.

Stanley interrupted her coffee making by grabbing her from behind and planting heated kisses on her neck. She turned, put down the cup, and pulled him by the belt hook of his jeans into the small bathroom. She locked the door. Just the necessary amounts of clothes peeled away as he scooped her up onto the bathroom sink. Nothing like forbidden sex, thought Zarina, smiling at the possibility of a customer coming into the store at any time.

Ten minutes later, Stanley and Zarina were sitting on the couch next to each other, playing Words with Friends together on their phones.

Stanley looked at Zarina.

“Thanks for being my old person,” he said, and gave that silly, crooked grin that simply undid her.

When Stanley came into her shop for coffee one day, they just sort of clicked: finishing each other’s sentences, laughing at stupid things no one else would think were funny. Stanley joked that they were kind of like… old people who would play on a Scrabble board in their retirement community in the same way they played WWF on iPhones. It’s the same game, seriously, he’d said.

“I love being old people with you,” she said.

Love is awesome, thought Zarina. Except when it sucks. She listened to the ladies at the SLS club each month, and they talk about doomed love and who’s having sex with whom. I mean Jesus Christ, she’d tell Stanley, these bitches are horny!

“Maybe they’re in some kind of full blown mid-life crisis,” Stanley had said, “but man, they do seem to be gettin’ it on.”

Zarina believed, despite it sounding “all hippy-dippy” as her mom would say… she believed love is the thing, not sex. It was about the personal relationship; the intimacy of spirits, not bodies. You can have sex with anybody. Love only happens with someone really, really special.

She put down the Words With Friends game she was currently winning and brewed some coffee. It made the world go round, and all.

Her day’s first customer checked out and left, and the sound of the door clicking behind her threw Maggie into a trance.

The dreaded sound: a soft click of the front door locked behind her mother as she left. 9-1-1 was written in huge letters next to the phone. Maggie always pretended to be asleep so her mother wouldn’t worry she’d been awake and frightened. Maggie would watch the minutes tick by on the old-fashioned alarm clock, and sometimes it would be 2:35 or 3:07. And then one day, her mother packed Maggie’s things into two brown paper grocery store bags and brought her to the home of a foster family. She told her she loved her, that she didn’t want her to feel cold or be in the dark anymore, and then she was gone. Maggie was six. She never saw her mother again.

The gentle tinkling of the small bell that hung from the handle of the 1884 original door to her Victorian commercial building once again served as an alarm to Maggie’s daymare. She grabbed a pill from her purse and chased it with a sip of her coffee. Putting down her copy of The Scarlet Letter, she saw Ted as he entered the shop. He was holding a handful of peonies. When she saw the flowers, she knew two things: that they’d come from the huge light pink bush near his building across town, and that he’d already taken them inside to wash off all the ants that perpetually plagued the sweet-smelling blooms.

“Good morning, beautiful lady,” he said, dramatically presenting her with the handful of freshly cut (and only slightly drippy) blooms.

Maggie smiled like a schoolgirl. She loved the way he always said “good morning” to her, even if it wasn’t morning. She thanked him, took the flowers and put them in a big, old turquoise Ball jar on the counter.

“Thank you for that ant removal service, dahlin,” she said, and Ted grinned at her pronunciation: her New England accent had always been sexy to him. “It was nice of you to remember I love peonies, but hate ants.”

When she finished with the flowers, she walked around the counter and put her arms around his neck. He returned her kiss eagerly with a soft, exploratory prod of the tongue followed by a gentle grazing of her upper lip with his teeth. She slapped him playfully on the butt of his worn, faded jeans.

“You know, I’m open for business around here, mistah, and it’s not that kind of business.”

“I’d like to have you open for business right now upstairs, ma’am,” said Ted. He grabbed the curly auburn ponytail through the hole in the back of her baseball hat, looked into her green eyes, and pulled the cap of her hat aside so he could kiss her.

Maggie found herself glancing over at the clock. 10:30. Hmmm. It was a slower time of morning, but she didn’t know if she could risk someone coming into the shop, especially close to lunchtime. She narrowed her eyes at him. He looked back at her, his tall frame in a fake slump, his hazel eyes drooping, and a ridiculous cartoonish frown on his face. It was the glance down at those faded jeans that won her over, for it was there that she saw his very enthusiastic interest in her. His passion for her never seemed to end, and she sighed.

Looking directly at his rising erection, she said, “You win. The customer is always right.”

She walked over, quickly locked the door to the shop, and hastily hung the “Back in 30 Minutes” sign on the door.

She took off her red vintage 1980s Snoopy half-apron as she walked toward the back narrow staircase to the upstairs apartment. She looked over her shoulder and smiled at his fake running motion and wide eyes.

She stopped on the fifth step up.

“I don’t think I can make it all the way up to my apartment,” she smiled sheepishly.

“No need,” said Ted.

He stopped on the third step and grabbed her around her waist. He lifted the vintage Sesame Street t-shirt and kissed her belly. She raked her hands through his curly mop of dark hair and kissed him with all the desire she’d felt from the moment he’d entered the shop. They never seemed to be able to get enough of each other.

She eagerly dashed her tongue into his mouth, moaning when he returned the kiss with equal excitement. She leaned back on the wooden step and lifted her hips to feel the full effect of his complete hardness.

Grinding her jeans against his, they both sighed in anticipation of their typically amazing lovemaking.

Ted lifted her t-shirt over her head, her Boston Red Sox baseball cap falling onto the step as her moppy curls spilled out. She tugged at the button fly of his jeans as he removed her bra in a matter of seconds. Then his mouth was on her nipples, and once again she rested back on the step. His tongue, his teeth, the pressure—everything was perfect and she found herself grinding on his hard-on until her body exploded. She shook as he started to undo her jeans.

He smiled down at her as he gently twisted her nipples with his expert thumbs and forefingers. She managed to gather herself, her shirt, her bra, her hat, and turn to go up the stairs.

“We would probably be more comfortable upstairs,” said Maggie, clearing her throat and still shaky from the intense orgasm. Dry humping! At my age! She smiled at Ted.

“I kinda like these steps,” he said, following her and grabbing her hips. Still both in jeans, he pressed his hardness against the crease between her back pockets. She lowered her jeans over her hips so she could feel every bit of that stiffness, automatically leaning into a sort of modified downward-facing dog yoga pose. She wore no panties under her jeans. Happy for the access, he reached around to her front and slipped two fingers into her, sliding them effortlessly in and out as he circled his hips around her ass.

Maggie enjoyed this amazing sensation for a few moments, and then couldn’t take it anymore—it was time for his jeans to go.

She reached behind her and lowered his already-unbuttoned jeans. She felt him step out of them and his boxers and now, finally, she could feel him against her. She reached back to stroke him and he moaned softly in appreciation. She flipped back over, sitting on her jeans to cushion her from the hardwood floor steps.

She felt him move down two steps, scoop his arms under her waist to raise her toward his mouth, and he used his tongue to arouse her even more, if that was possible. She rested her head on her arm and let herself get close to another orgasm, but this time, she wanted him inside her. She reached down, grabbing his toned waist, and lifted him up toward her, gently stroking him for a few moments before bringing him closer to her. She teased him there for a moment until he couldn’t take it anymore and entered her with every inch of himself.

They both made the same sound-- a release of tension, sexual energy, passion, complete bliss. He began to move inside her and she arched her back to meet his thrusts. They expertly worked against each other, pleasure cascading into simultaneous orgasms.

They sighed, then laughed. He followed her up to the apartment so they could grab a quick shower before moving on with their days.

Maggie chatted with Ted in the shop for a few minutes before he had to get back to work.

“I had an interesting experience last week,” she said, wondering if this was really a good time to be talking about it.

“Oh yeah, what’s that?” Ted smiled.

“I met someone new. A professor at the college.”

“Don’t tell me you’re cheating on both your estranged soon-to-be-ex-husband and me with some hot chemistry professor hunk,” he said, teasingly.

“Actually, no, it’s not a chemistry professor,” said Maggie, feeling slightly awkward about how this conversation was going to go. “It’s a literature professor, a customer here at the shop.”

Ted looked quizzically at her.

“So what, he’s a new boy toy, someone you want to have a threesome with that includes me, or what?”

Maggie looked at Ted. They had an open, honest relationship and she knew that the news would not be something he would be completely shocked by. He was pretty sexually liberal. Divorced, he had dated a number of women, encountering during his work as a musician some non-vanilla stuff, including a few threesomes she was aware of.

“Just a hook-up, I guess,” she said, although she looked uncertain about it.

Ted laughed. A deep, hearty laugh from all the way down in his stomach. She glanced admiringly at the wrinkles the smile created on his face. The gray hairs sprinkled in with the dark brown were so sexy, she thought as he ran his fingers through it.

“Maggie, you sex queen, you!”

“I’m certainly not a sex queen,” Maggie responded. “This must just be some kind of fluke thing. I mean, I was attracted to the professor, and we sort of hooked up, and I don’t know what it means or what is happening.”

Ted walked over, pushing the freshly re-fitted baseball cap aside again, and kissed her passionately. But as he pulled away he had a huge grin as he asked, “Is this the part where we start using the term ‘mid-life crisis?’ Are the professor and I here because you need us to make you feel young again?”

Maggie smiled at Ted and straightened her baseball cap.

“I don’t know what to call it,” said Maggie.

The shop entry bell jingled again.

“Hey Lisa!” said Maggie as her friend walked in. Ted beamed from ear to ear watching Maggie blush. He knew her glance at the clock meant she was thankful Lisa hadn’t arrived ten minutes earlier.

“Hi Ted,” said Lisa. “Good morning, Maggie. I have an, um, a sudden lunch meeting and I came downtown today in these ratty clothes. I was wondering if you could help me find something to wear.”

“Of course, dear,” she responded, and Lisa loved the way it sounded: de-ah.

Ted hugged Maggie goodbye, and she thanked him again for the flowers.

Maggie looked at Lisa. “We’re going to want to find an outfit that says, I’m just the local baker, but please fuck me under the covered bridge again, then?”