1 Chapter 1
Jay Unfolds
Jay Mantra likes it rough in bed, but he never gets it rough. He’s lucky to get Becky to suck his cock, if anyone really wants to know the fucking truth. And for this to happen, he has to:
Let her go shopping without bitching at her.
Watch the kids for an entire weekend while she goes to the spa with her best friend, Winnie.
Cook for a week.
Clean the house from top to bottom.
Leave her alone while she’s watching The Bachelor
Never interrupt her while she’s telling one of her fucking boring stories.
Grocery shop.
Do laundry.
And complete the Honey Do-List hanging on the refrigerator, which doesn’t include her tight cunt that he likes so much.
He has no interest in Rebecca Lynn Mantra, though, not for six months now. It’s almost hate he has for his wife. Real hate. Dark hate. The twelve-year-old marriage is failing both of them rather unexpectedly, and easily.
* * * *
Becky thinks: If Jay doesn’t pick up his socks, I’m going to choke him with them.Think Desperate Housewives. Think CSI. Think Criminal MindsWhen they first were married did he pick up after himself? She knew he didn’t. And now he doesn’t. Why would she think he would?
Empty bottles of Bud Lite in the living room. Tom Perrotta novel sitting in the bathroom. Unmade bed, again. DVDs scattered all over the floor in the media room. Dirt in the toilet that he never cleans. Laundry in the basket that needs folding. Dishes in the sink that need to be rinsed and placed in the Whirlpool. Eight million other things that he doesn’t accomplish.
She thinks about the dirty socks on the bedroom floor. A left one. A right one. Are all husbands this way?
* * * *
It’s Grayville, he thinks. Miserable Grayville. The cycle goes on and on and on and on—
Driving Matty to school in the morning.
Going to work and dealing with a bunch of fucked up losers who need punched in their ridiculous faces.
Endless amounts of papers pushed from one side of his desk to the other. Insurance shit. Nothingness. One match can take care of it all. Poof.
Picking up Matty from school.
Driving Matty to hockey practice.
Waiting for Matty.
Driving Matty home.
Eating the same shitty meals day after day after day after—
Listening to The Bitch go on and on and on and on about her day; suffering in her own little Grayville, no doubt.
TV time.
Beer time.
Bedtime.
The cycle is damning.
And all he wants (cross his fingers and hope to die, stick a needle in his eye) is for a waitress, stripper, bank teller, or cupcake maker to suck his cock, at least once this year.
Probably isn’t going to happen, though. Is it? Afraid not. Get over it, pal. Join every other husband on the fucking recycling planet.
* * * *
Becky finds all of his porn: a hundred or more filthy DVDs in a box in the basement. Titles she can’t even dream of reading. Movies she wouldn’t be caught dead watching. Horrendous movies about nurses, baristas, actresses, flight attendants, women in the military, female cops, and disgusting teachers. Women who look cheap and easy, whore-like, slutty, and are always naked. Whores, unchristian woman, and sinners.
She finds a hefty bag and fills it full of his movies, totes the bag out to the curb because tomorrow is garbage day once again. Tossing a few of Jay’s things out. Or maybe tossing Jay out.
This causes Becky to smile. In fact, her world lights up a bit like evening stars around the sun; something that makes life a pinch tasteful.
* * * *
On Saturdays Jay doesn’t sleep in. He gets out of bed by eight o’clock, drinks two cups of coffee in the kitchen, reads the morning paper, and—
Shegets up, finds him in the kitchen, and starts to talk, even when he doesn’t want to hear her talk. The Bitch talks about a honey-do list: cut the grass, Jay; clean the garage out, Jay; wash the cars, Jay; fix the front door so it doesn’t fall off its hinges, Jay; give the dog a bath, Jay…
What he’d like to really do: slam his fist down the back of her fucking cunt throat so she shuts the fuck up, so he won’t have to listen to her another second, minute, hour, day in his life. But no, he’s calm, collected, and perfectly sane in Grayville (population one), and he simply says, “Yes, dear. Figure all of those things done.”
* * * *
Becky thinks about having an affair on her husband. Some twenty-year-old college student and mechanic flirts with her when she takes her Honda to get new brakes and an oil change. Tuckie Brice is the kid’s name. Half her age. A girl who makes her feel like a cougar. She can eat Tuckie up whole. Everything about her. All her blond hair and blue eyes and thin build and cocky walk and monkey grease on Tuckie’s chin. She wants the girl to press herself against her the way a married woman is not supposed to press against young women. This is what she thinks of lately. All because of an appointment for new brakes and an oil change on her Honda. Becky’s engine is revved now. She’s the one that needs the oil change. Married or not, she’s thinking about having the affair. Honest to God, she is.
