El Rancho del Corazón
32 Rat Bastard
THE MEMORIAL SERVICE was held at the funeral home. The Barnes didn’t have any church affiliation that I knew of. I guess funeral homes have a list of preachers that come to do services. I had a real problem going up past the casket and looking at my one-time nemesis lying there in his uniform. He looked at peace. And so… honorable. Ellen was crying pretty hard and sort of glared at me. Jessica stood stoically between her father and the chauffeur who escorted her. I wondered who that was, but it was obvious to me by the way she kept looking around that she wasn’t just a driver.
We were all asked to move from the viewing room into the chapel for the service. A few minutes later, the casket was moved in as well. It had been closed and draped in an American flag. Three soldiers accompanied it. They looked pretty old, so I assumed these guys were retired vets who volunteered for funeral duties. It was a good thing, because there weren’t that many people there. As far as I could tell, Jessica and I were the only ones of Drew’s generation present. The rest were parents, grandparents, and older relatives and friends.
The service wasn’t long. The preacher mostly gave words of comfort and didn’t really say much about Drew as a person. When he was finished, the soldiers rolled the casket out again and escorted the family to a car that would follow the hearse out to Greenlawn Cemetery. I drove alone. One of a dozen cars that followed with their lights on. I hadn’t been to Greenlawn in quite a while. I felt sad and guilty and angry all at once whenever I visited Denise’s grave.
There were a few words at the graveside. The soldiers folded the flag and as the casket was lowered into the ground they fired off three shots from their rifles. One of them then came to Ellen and Ford with the folded flag.
“On behalf of the President of the United States and the people of a grateful nation, may I present this flag as a token of appreciation for the honorable and faithful service your loved one rendered this nation,” the soldier said. He stood up, the three snapped a salute, and left.
I’d seen enough. I left and found my way to Denise’s grave with her father lying beside her. A year and a half had passed since we laid her to rest. So much was different. I wondered if she would have come to Bloomington with us. If she and Josh would have stayed together. If it would be different between Cassie and me. If I would ever have made love to Denise. So many ifs.
If I would ever be able to look at her headstone and not see Hawk’s body crumpled against it after I killed him.
A hand slipped into mine as I stood there with tears running down my cheeks. I turned to look at Jessica.
“I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t think about how coming out here would affect you.”
“It’s okay. I wanted to visit her. She still deserves more from me than I can give her.” I looked around and saw last of the funeral vehicles leaving the cemetery. “Did you miss your ride?”
“I told them to leave without me. Do you mind if I catch a ride with you?”
“Are you kidding?” I sort of laughed. “Where would you like to go, Heaven? Paris? Madrid? New York? Let’s go.” I offered her my arm and she took it, only to return her hand to mine.
“Is it too early to go to the hayloft?” she giggled.
“The house would be more comfortable. I have it to myself, so you don’t have to worry about dealing with any other people.”
“Really? Could we get something to eat first? I really haven’t had anything today,” she said.
“I didn’t get lunch either. How does Chinese food sound?”
Getting out of our somber mood took us a while, but before the fortune cookies came, we were laughing as we remembered funny stories from our childhood. Some of them even had to do with Drew. I thought I caught a glimpse of Jessica’s driver in a corner of the restaurant.
“The Rat Bastard got the last laugh after all,” she said. “No one wants to remember how terrible he was to us. They want to remember how heroic he looked lying there in his uniform as if he’d been killed in battle saving hundreds of American lives. But ‘Jessica couldn’t get along with him, so we had to let him move in with Aunt Sylvia and Uncle Ed.’ It was all my fault.”
“We know what really happened,” I comforted her. The anger was deep.
“No one will admit what really happened, even the way he died.”
“What?”
“He was run over by a tank he was hiding behind to take a nap,” she said. I looked into her eyes. I really didn’t want to disrespect the dead, but…
We both spit tea out of our noses in a display that would have made Rose proud. Between the tea and our laughter, we were both crying again, but it didn’t hurt quite so much.
When we got to the house, there were still several cars in the Barnes’s driveway. I pulled into the garage so no one would see Jessica getting out of my car.
“Could you run out to the barn for me?” she asked.
“Um… sure?”
“My overnight bag is in the hayloft. I didn’t know we could have the house,” she smiled. I let her in the house and ran to the hayloft. She was waiting for me when I came back into the house.
“What?” I said, handing her roll-aboard to her.
“Um… Upstairs isn’t your room anymore, is it?” she said.
“No. Moms and Dad moved up there when I moved to Bloomington. Why?”
“I just sort of looked.” Her eyes got big.
“No. Don’t tell me. I’m not going up there. Don’t tell me anything about it. Just tell me if I need to give you a separate room from where I’m sleeping,” I laughed. I had no idea what my parents had upstairs and I wasn’t going to look.
“If you put me in a separate room, I might as well go to my parents’ house.”
I took her to the master bedroom and she said she wanted to change out of her little black dress. I gave her privacy for that. Even when we slept together for however long we did last night, we were fully clothed. I wasn’t presuming anything. I tinkered around and decided to make some coffee. I was pouring water over the grounds when she came up behind me and lay her head on the back of my shoulder.
“That smells good. You know I don’t drink it, though, don’t you?”
“I guess I never knew that,” I laughed. “What would you like?”
“I would like for you to hold me.”
That was a pretty easy request to comply with. I left the coffee and led her to Dad’s big recliner in the family room. She’d changed into the same T-shirt and sweatpants that she’d slept in last night. I leaned back and Jessica crawled into my lap. In all our years that included sleeping naked together in the hayloft and my taking her cherry with my finger, this might have been the most intimate we’d ever been. We didn’t kiss or fondle. We weren’t sneaking around or meeting on the sly. We didn’t talk. She just let me hold her while she quietly cried. She dozed off again but before she did she whispered to me.
“Brian, have you made peace with Betts? Don’t let her think you’ve given up on her. Forgive her. Even if she’s a bitch, be her brother. After all, she never tried to sell you.”
When she woke up, I told Jessica all about my repaired relationship with Betts. Oh, Betts could still be a bitch if she was pushed but being a mother had really mellowed her. I told her about Betts giving me some of her milk and Jessica was truly amazed.
“You know, Doreen wants me to father her child when she’s ready,” I said. “I feel so young when I think about that. She wants to get pregnant the next time Betts does so they can take their babies out in strollers together.”
“That’s sweet.”
“I asked Betts if she’d be upset if her best friend’s baby was her baby’s cousin. She said she probably wouldn’t be upset if they were half-brothers.”
“Half? That would mean… She could mean she’d ask her husband to father Doreen’s child. Couldn’t she?”
“Yeah. Let’s assume that’s what she meant.” We looked at each other and started giggling.
“I need a shower after all the crying I’ve done today. And since I’ve cried mostly on you, you probably need one, too. Join me?” she said, sliding out of my lap. I took her hand and we went to the bedroom.
I was fascinated. She locked the bedroom door behind us. She went to each of the windows and made sure the blinds were down and the curtains closed. She looked at the ceiling, especially examining the fan in the middle. She opened the closet and shifted things back and forth. She looked behind the mirror and the dresser. I followed her into the bathroom and watched her take the same precautions, even opening the medicine cabinet and checking under the sink. She locked the bathroom door behind us and then turned to me.
“Will you undress me now so we can shower?”
“What was all that about?” I asked as I pulled her toward me and worked her T-shirt up off her body. She was wearing nothing under it and the sight of her breasts just about did me in. She was so incredibly beautiful. She got my shirt off and unfastened my pants.
“I should have had Amy do it, but there was no way anyone could have known I’d be here. Right? There is currently a $10,000 bounty being offered for any picture of me in the nude,” she said. “I trust you more than any person I know. But I don’t even trust Conrad, my manager. He isn’t happy that I even came back for the funeral, let alone that I’m off with you. Sometimes it feels like he’s following me.”
“That’s criminal!” I slid her sweats down over her bottom and they fell to the floor. Her flat tummy transitioned to the soft rise of her bare mound. My cock was pushing out my briefs and she released it from its confines. We started the water and then I joined her in the shower.
“What they’d pay thousands of dollars to get a picture of, I gladly give to you,” she whispered. She put her head under the shower and I began to shampoo her. Water clung to her nipples and droplets like tears formed. She sighed as I rinsed her hair and massaged her conditioner into it. She’d removed all her makeup before she changed clothes, so she simply lifted her face to the water to let it wash away the tracks of her tears. And there, for the first time this weekend, I kissed her throat and held her naked body to mine. I washed her thoroughly. Her armpits, legs, and mound were every bit as smooth and silky as Samantha’s, though there was soft blonde down on her tummy. She guided my hands to make sure I cleaned every crevice as thoroughly as possible. Then she returned the favor and washed me just as thoroughly. When we’d finally rinsed and dried, she peeked through the door into the bedroom and looked around again before she led me to the bed and we slipped beneath the sheet.
“I’ve always loved you, Jessica,” I whispered as I held her naked body next to mine. “But we don’t have to do anything else. I’m happy to hold you all night and wake with you in the morning.”
“I… I’m not a virgin now,” she whispered back. “I’m twenty years old, but I’ve only done it once. It wasn’t very good and doesn’t excite me much, I guess. You make me feel so loved, though. I know I’m ready.”
“Jessica, there’s something you need to know first. It’s something you told me years ago. You said sex is a promise. That really hurt me when you came back to have sex one night and then leave the next morning.”
“I was so blind and selfish. I’m sorry, Brian. I’m still a selfish woman. I guard my body so much that Amy even holds a sheet for me so I’m never exposed to anyone. It’s such a stupid industry. But I can give myself to you,” she said. “I know you love me.”
“I’ve made love, as in full sexual intercourse, with fourteen women,” I said. She looked at me and smiled.
“Quite a conquest.”
“That’s just it, Jessica. It isn’t a conquest. Every one of the women I’ve made love to is still my lover. The real question is, what are you? I want you. I’ve wanted you for as long as I can remember. But I don’t need and won’t have a conquest. I love you, Jessica. I want the promise that goes with sex.”
There was a long pause and for a minute, I thought she’d already gone to sleep.
“I’ll bet the tabloids would pay another fortune for the story of the boy Heaven keeps throwing herself at, who always refuses her,” she sighed. She put a finger to my lips before I could object. “When Sarah left for college, I started calling her. I call her every few weeks. I’ve learned a lot. I talked to her the week after the first time you made love. I was so jealous of her. But I’ve learned a lot. I learned what a fiercely loyal and protective man you are. I talked to her after you rescued Hannah and I wanted to come home immediately. I was in Japan. I’ve even talked to her this summer and found out how you took care of your entire clan and made them a home.”
“I didn’t do that much.”
“And that you never accept credit for all you’ve done,” she laughed. “But there is one other thing I learned. I learned that you know, understand, and respect boundaries. Brian, I give you explicit permission to make love to me tonight in every way except penetration of your penis in my vagina or rectum. That’s not what I want. I want you to claim my body and my heart in every way possible. But I don’t trust myself to make the promise yet. I’m still too selfish—too wrapped up in my career—to trust that I would honor you the way I know you would honor me. The way you honor all your lovers. Make love with me and hold me. I love you, Brian. I’m just still the same stupid selfish girl that would never date you while we were in school. Can we? Please?”
I made love to Jessica most of the night. We explored each other with abandon. That narrow channel I had poked a finger into years ago, now welcomed my fingers and my tongue. The very hint of her fragrance brought back memories of playing in the hayloft. My very first scent of an aroused woman. I tasted her. I suckled at her perfect breasts. I kissed her until we both needed water. And I came with her. In her mouth. In her hand. Against her stomach. Against her back. Every way we could rub each other to gain pleasure, we did. And when we woke in the morning with my erection wedged between her cheeks, she rocked against me until I’d splashed her again and she’d cried out as I fingered her clit.
We showered and she dressed. She wore a beautiful pair of black slacks and a blue silk blouse. Of course, her heels lifted her enough that she towered over me. But I didn’t care. She called her driver across the driveway and I pulled my car out of the garage so she could pull hers in. The driver never spoke to me—didn’t even get out of the car to open Jessica’s door. I kissed her one more time and when she was safely in the car, opened the garage door.
They left and I wondered, as always, if I would ever see her again.
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