In the distance I thought I heard a siren coming for me, though I do not know if it was real or imaginary. But when Murton cut the ties that held me against the steel beam and lowered me to the floor I was sure I saw my mother. She stood behind him, her face radiant and the room was somehow brighter with her presence. She shadowed Murton’s efforts, her hands over the top of his as she directed his movements and though I tried to reach out to them both I could not move my arms. The effort of it all was too much and once again I slipped away from myself, uncertain of my fate, my body warm in the hands of my past.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Jenny Anderson needed something. Trouble was, she just didn’t know what it might be. She was bored. Not just in the moment, the I’ve-got-nothing-to-do-right-now kind of bored, but bored with her life. She had no children to care for, her and her husband Bob found out long ago they would never conceive a child-her anatomy, not his-but it never bothered them enough to look at radical methods of child bearing like having someone carry a child for them. That just didn’t seem right. “Might as well adopt a kid,” Bob had said one evening about ten years ago. So they talked about that-twenty minutes all told-before they decided they didn’t want the fuss and bother of the paperwork, not to mention the expense.
She didn’t work. No, Jenny was not a worker. She was a stay at home wife. Yawn. Had nothing against work, really. Work was a tool. You used it to earn income to provide for yourself and your family. The problem with work was, if it wasn’t a career, a real love-what-you-do kind of thing, like a doctor, or lawyer, or in her husband Bob’s case, Air Traffic Controller, what was the point? It’s not like they needed the money. The economy sucked anyway. Let someone else trade their time for cash minus taxes, thanks just the same.
Friends? Sure, there were a few, but nobody she’d take a bullet for. The truth of the matter was, Jenny was sort of stuck between good ol’ Mr. Rock and Sir Hard Place. She liked her solitude, but it sometimes bored her right out of her god-damned gourd.
And why in the world had she just knighted Hard Place?
Jenny walked outside to the pool with only one thing on her mind, the one thing that kept her from losing her mind.
Sex.
Yes sir, if there was one thing that got Jenny through her days it was good old fashioned sex. She’d knock one off with Bob before he left to play his video games at the airport, and usually hit him up at night before bed, but Bob was, what? Worn out? No, that wasn’t it. Fact was, it wasn’t about big Bob at all. It was about her. She just couldn’t get enough. She’d had a few guys on the side from time to time-one had even been a co-worker of Bob’s-but that had fizzled like all the rest when they found out how insatiable her desires were. So most days she did what she liked best. Herself. Then, not long ago, she discovered something that killed her boredom like a big ol can of Bore-B-Gone.
An audience.
She stuck her big toe in the water of their built-in pool, more of a ritual than a gage of temperature. The gas heater kept the water at a perfect eighty-five degrees throughout the season. A glance at her wrist watch told her the time, and a slow, almost wicked smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. She undid the tie that held her robe closed and let it fall open, the front of her naked body exposed to the expanse of the back yard and the tree line beyond. When she was sure he was out there-she’d caught just a hint of movement at the corner of the tree line, she let the robe fall to the ground and stood nude, her body his to admire.
As K.C. and the boys would say, Jenny was puttin’ on her boogie shoes.
The Sids were in place and ready, Junior with the rifle at the edge of the tree line, Senior back near the van, covering the road in case anyone from the Cell company showed up. It was unlikely, but it paid to be thorough. When the woman came out to sunbathe, Junior would take care of business and they’d be out of there.
Nothing to it.
Jimmy Hamilton had a situation. One of those you’ve-got-to-be-fucking-kidding-me situations. His house-okay, his parents house-sat on the other side of the access road from the Anderson’s. A tree line, much thinner than the one on Mrs. Anderson’s (A.K.A. Hot Babe, A.K.A. Trophy Wife) side separated his yard from the narrow gravel road. You could cross the road in two quick steps, nothing to it. He’d done it twice a day for the last month since school let out. Sometimes three. Both his parents worked, so he was alone during the days. Weekends sucked because Mr. Anderson was home, as were his own parents. But the weekdays were his. His and Mrs. Anderson’s.
Jenny.
Jimmy was naked from the ankles up, the only clothing that covered anything at all on his body of sixteen years was a pair of New Balance sneakers. He had his back and butt pressed tight against the chain link fence that bordered the cell tower’s base and it was starting to hurt. He cursed himself for the foolish, even perverted bravado he had displayed. His shorts were on the other side of the road, his side, where he’d left them before crossing over and into the thicker trees. He should have kept them with him, but over the last month he grown more and more daring as he looked for ways to increase his level of excitement.
The first time he’d seen her laying nude by the pool he was just out exploring the area, looking for a nice quiet place to spark a doob. He crossed the access road and ventured into the tree line, sat on a log and lit up. When he heard the music he walked a little deeper into the trees and that’s when he saw her. She was completely naked, just floating around in the pool on a couple of those foam snakes, one under her arms and one under her knees. Jimmy dropped his doobie, then his shorts. It didn’t take much, six or seven tugs tops before he came and when he did, he let out a moan that caused Mrs. Anderson to raise her head and look at the tree line.
Jimmy froze, an honest to God deer in the headlights freeze. He didn’t know if he should run or not. But then something happened, something that made Jimmy hard again almost immediately. Mrs. Anderson got out of the pool, looked toward the trees, right where he was standing with his Johnson in his hand, and waved at him.
Jimmy had to hold onto a tree with his free hand to keep from falling over.
Over the next few weeks he watched Jenny swim, he watched her exercise, he watched her lay in the sun, he watched her masturbate, and once he watched her blow her husband when he came home from work early. That had been the best.
This was only the third time he had ventured over nude. The last two times he had actually stepped out from the tree line and into her backyard and when he did she immediately started pounding away at herself. When he took a few steps forward toward the pool though, she held up her hand, palm out indicating she wanted him to stop. He guessed it was because of his age.
He guessed right. The next time he showed up there was a hand written note stuck in the branches of the tree he always leaned on. It wasn’t addressed to him, but it was for him. It simply said: You’re too young. I can’t allow anything more. But please keep visiting me. I love to watch and be watched.
Jimmy couldn’t believe it. Sure, he was disappointed that he couldn’t have her, she was hot, hot, hot. Fucking-A perfect, in fact. But the please keep visiting me part? He’d take that in a heartbeat. For now anyway. If he could keep her going for another two years, really only a year and a half, he would be old enough to cross the backyard and go all the way.
But right now, today, he had a problem. A genuine OMFG, shriveled up nutsack sort of problem. He had no sooner begun to cross the road, naked as a Jaybird as his grandma would have said, when he saw the white van creeping along through the turn. He just managed to duck behind the cell tower’s shack-there wasn’t enough time to turn around and dart to his side-as the van came around the bend in the road and made a U-turn right in front of the tower’s perimeter fence. He couldn’t go back and he couldn’t go forward. For the moment, he was trapped.