And hope for an opportunity.
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
Raymond Slater dressed for bed with the numb precision of an automaton. At no point was he conscious of the process. His fingers moved of their own accord, following patterns established over decades, drawing on his silk pajamas, pushing buttons through buttonholes, squeezing a small twist of toothpaste onto a brush that needed replacing. He spit out toothpaste foam in the bathroom sink, blotted his face with a paper towel, and stepped back to appraise his reflection. But the image in his mirror triggered something in the recesses of his mind, a dangerous spark of awareness.
He muttered a curse: “Shit.”
He flicked off the bathroom light and returned to the tastefully, and expensively, appointed bedroom he shared with his wife of twenty years, Patricia Louise Winston Slater. He flipped back the plush Laura Ashley comforter and crawled beneath freshly laundered sheets that smelled vaguely of pine needles. His wife, clad in a blue silk nightgown, set down the latest issue of Vanity Fair and shifted her considerable bulk, rocking the canopied bed as she turned to face her husband.
Raymond sighed. His wife always knew when something was bothering him. She was excellent at reading his moods, almost to a scary degree, but luckily, wasn’t so good at detecting hints of infidelity. He dreaded what was coming-one of those intensely earnest, supposedly heart-to-heart talks, the intent of which was to purge him of stress and set everything right in the world again. It never worked. Oh, he allowed Patricia to think the talks did him some good. He played that game, that age-old conjugal dance of deceit, and he played it well. Normally, he considered it a small price to pay, a necessary hoop to jump through so she wouldn’t suspect his real obsessions.
Patricia Slater made a clucking sound. “Something’s bothering you, dear.”
A statement. Not a question. Words that would brook no denial. He sighed again, an indicator of reluctance, of difficulty finding the right way to phrase how he really felt. It was a stalling tactic. Jesus, what could he say to her? He suppressed an inappropriate burst of laughter, twisting the smile that twitched at the corners of his mouth to look like a grimace of pain (this wasn’t difficult).
He imagined telling her the truth: Well, dear, today was a very interesting day. A truly singular day, in fact. I’ve never quite experienced the likes of it before. You see, a girl, one of my students, is a demon. Yes, a demon. I mean that in the most literal sense. A spirit. An incarnation of evil. A fucking DEMON. And, well, she’s forcing me to participate in something horrendous tomorrow. I suspect I’ll be dead soon. No, there’s absolutely nothing I can do about it. And how was your day, dear?
What he actually said was, “I suppose.”
“Hmm.” She touched his arm. Raymond only barely managed not to flinch. His grimace deepened as he watched her face form an expression of sympathy, which looked ghastly behind her mask of facial creme. “Is it that dreadful business at the police station? That boy, what was his name?”
“Trey McAllister.”
Patricia’s fingers stroked his forearm, her manicured nails lightly grazing his skin and sending an uncomfortable tingling down the length of his arm. “Yes, Trey, that’s it. He’s a student of yours, correct?”
Raymond answered with a grunt. He was trying not to acknowledge the steadily increasing intimacy of his wife’s touch. It was just possible she was feeling horny. She didn’t attempt to seduce him all that often, probably because she was having at least one extramarital affair of her own. He hoped like hell it wouldn’t happen now. He groaned when her hand left his arm and dipped under the comforter. Her fingers fiddled with the snap of his pajama bottoms before Raymond gave up and tossed the comforter back. Best just to get it done so he could get to sleep. Patricia giggled. She lifted the hem of her nightgown and straddled her husband. She gripped his limp penis with her left hand and slapped him several times with her right hand. He grew hard in her hand. This was the way they always did it now. It was the only way Raymond could perform with her. She mounted him and rode him until he spurted inside her. In the moment before orgasm, Raymond saw Myra’s face in his mind. The memory of the way she’d looked straddling his lap that afternoon was the thing that pushed him over the finish line.
Then, spent, he recalled the way Myra had looked moments later.
He whimpered.
Patricia’s face crinkled with concern. The layer of facial cream made her look like some sort of demon herself, like a bloated gargoyle. “Oh, honey. It’s awful, I know. I hoped I could take your mind off it for a while, but I can see how heavily it’s weighing on you.”
Raymond thought: Not as heavily as you, I can tell you that.
He wanted her to dismount, but he didn’t say so. This “intimacy” was bad enough-really, it was just shy of vomit inducing-but offending her was the last thing he wanted. The many people who loved Patricia would never believe the level of cruelty she was capable of in private, but her wrath was a truly awful thing to incur. Raymond put up with it because her worst moments were very rare. Enduring them was preferable to going through a very expensive and messy divorce.
He coughed. “Yes. It is. Very much so.” Best just to go along with this load of steaming horse shit. “I’ve had a rough time of it. I know I can’t protect my kids the way I’d like to.” When Raymond wanted to subtly showcase his sensitivity, he referred to the students at Rockville High as “my kids.” Patricia fell for it every damn time, and this time was no exception. She made a noise of empathy, and Raymond decided to lay it on a little thicker. “Trey McAllister has a special place in my heart, you know. I’ve long suspected abuse by his parents.”
Patricia shook her head. “It’s awful. Simply awful. There ought to be a minimum IQ requirement for becoming a parent in this country. Those McAllisters are trashy people. I well remember all the trouble you had with Trey’s older brothers.”
Raymond frowned. “You do? But…that was so long ago.”
“Mmm, yes, it was.” Patricia’s eyes were closed, and there was a dreamy quality to her voice. She tightened her vaginal muscles around Raymond’s shrinking cock and her large, drooping breasts undulated beneath the fabric of her nightgown. She rolled her massive hips and her torso began to sway. Her eyes came open-they were glazed. “I have a good memory, Raymond. An excellent memory, in fact. Photographic, you might say. Jake and Michael McAllister caused you tremendous aggravation back in the day. You would tell me about their escapades over dinner. That was back when you still loved me and would willingly share your troubles with me.”
The motion of his wife’s body felt nice. This was odd. He was enjoying physical contact with Patricia for the first time in…well, in a very long time. He grew hard inside her, and her rocking rhythm increased a little. Now this was beyond odd. An encore performance with Patricia? That hadn’t happened in many years. He smiled. And this time some of the day’s stress really did begin to dissipate. He felt very mellow, very relaxed, and pleasantly aroused.
He moaned.
He closed his eyes and focused only on the physical sensations.
Then his eyes snapped open. “Wait. Wait. What did you mean by that?”
Patricia smiled. “Mean by what, dear?”
“You know exactly what I mean. You referred to my love in the past tense.” It was true that Raymond didn’t love Patricia. He hadn’t for a very long time. But having this reality verbalized by Patricia made him angry and defensive. “That’s just ridiculous. It’s…cruel.”
Patricia laughed. “Is it?”
Raymond’s face contorted with rage. “It fucking well is. How dare you-”