Devil In The Waters, 2

 Wow, everyone, what a wild couple of days. I've been away, and now I return with yet another irl story right out of KT pages. Close to home this time and painful for people I care about. Ever feel, though, like sometimes your reality is a construct, and you kind of shape the stories going on around you? Like, life is in the Matrix . . . (hits bong) Anyone know what I'm saying, maaan? Then this whole thing playing out in congress . . . ? This Katie Hill, huh? Right out of one of my books. I like her style too, just staying. The weed and the drinking, and she seems like she's got some power. The ethics thing is troublesome, but I'm still giving a secret head nod.

Now, as Glaucon pointed out, I have a character named Kevin, and his nemesis is named Devin.

Look, these things happen, and I apologize. Every KT book has name changes in the early stages, and this one's no different. I didn't like Devin's first name, so I changed it when I heard the name Devin and I was like, wow, that's perfect, and now the character is taking shape ... only, I didn't put it up against Kevin's or at least didn't notice. Kevin's had other names in my head, and now he reverts to an alternate name and I hope you all can hang with me here. Kevin Waters is actually Joshua Waters, or just Josh. Okay? Like Sukie's name didn't begin that way—I wrote her as another name for a while and then I heard that Sukie name and was all fired up about her character suddenly. Geoff Kane existed for a while in a whole different book without Nia as his wife, and his name was Miller. Things can be weird.

So, again, sorry for the mixup, but this is what it's like in the KT trenches I'm welcoming you into, and I hope it's part of the fun. This post then is the continuation from the first, but I've included the original now edited so if you'd like you could re-read from the beginning... if not, you can scroll past...

The dream began as though he were waking . . . 

* * *

The coarse whisking of the tent’s zipper roused Josh from a shallow, painful sleep. Dawning blue-gray light assaulted his eyeballs with the intense zap of high-beam flashlights. He winced and hissed, brain exploding with sharp stabbing pain. His neck throbbed, his brain throbbed, his back was sore.

While he was bewildered, there was a strange sense of place. The tent’s zipper gave it away; the awful sleep; the cold; the damp . . . He lay on a thin camping sheet, inside a sleeping bag that was zipped down to his knees, early morning chill stinging his hot, sweaty skin . . . 

Now the tent was jostling, the nylon tapping and dancing as someone came in. He reached instinctively for Kimmy, aware of a large shape looming over top of them that made him think of a grizzly bear.

“Kimmy, Kimmy,” he hissed, hand snatching outward trying to grab at his wife. She wasn’t there. His eyes fluttered open, and he looked now to see that large shape crouched at the tent’s door and zipping it closed again with a sharp, quick tug.

“What the hell?”

The figure turned, scooting down and squatting, taking Kimmy’s spot next to him. He blinked, clutched at his temples to push away the throbbing pain, trying to make sense of this.

The figure wasn’t a bear, but a man. Familiar yet unfamiliar, distant yet right here in front of him . . . His brain flexed and twisted trying to make sense. As the man’s features came into focus, things began to fit into place. Devin Stone. Dalton High. Class of ’09. Football. Lacrosse. Six-foot-two. Handsome as shit. Bully. “Stone?”

The figure said, “Waters, it’s done. Holy shit . . . ”

He worked up onto an elbow, pain shooting up his collar. He rubbed the back of his neck with his hand. “What the fuck is going on?”

“Holy shit, Waters, you were not fucking kidding . . . ”

“Kidding about . . . ? What’s happening?”

Stone frowned, brow working low, focusing on sleepy Josh, making him feel small and transported back to the frightening halls of Dalton High. It was one small piece of a larger puzzle. Now he began to comprehend the hazy periphery of this dreamy story. On waking he’d thought he was camping with Kimmy. He wasn’t. A reunion . . . A high school reunion. The ten-year reunion. Everyone gathering after the party in the gymnasium at Dalton for a weekend bash at Tiffany Hanson’s lakeside cottage. Bring your tents, bring your own booze! And he’d had a lot of booze, hadn’t he? His stomach was at once held in a vice and simultaneously a luscious, squirming thing. Acid burned, things rolled over inside him. He wanted to barf, burped instead, tasted bourbon.

“God,” he said, “holy shit, what time is it?”

Stone said, “It’s almost five. Oh, wow, dude,” then ran a big hand through his head of thick black shining hair, “that was close. I almost got caught . . . although . . . ”

“Caught what?”

“It was cold out here, we went inside but we got caught in the can . . . ”

“What does that mean: caught in the can?” Nothing made sense right now . . . 

“The bathroom, Kimmy’s friend caught us, what’s that one . . . I don’t remember her name . . . ”

“Who . . . ? Caught what?”

“Dude. What we talked about . . . It’s done.”

Josh nodded, afraid to irritate Devin by still straying behind. Best to agree and wait for the storm clouds to blow over. “Oh, okay . . . ”

Devin scowled, but seemed amused, which was a relief. “You’re not getting it, bro . . . ” Now he shook his head and chuckled, “Holy shit, Waters, I’m so glad I sat down and talked to you last night . . . ”

“What do you mean?”

“Waters, man, wake up,” Stone laughed. “You want to hear about it or not?”

“Yes, I want to hear about it—hear about what?”

Stone studied him, a puzzled look on his face. He was an arrogant asshole, never a friend of Josh’s. Through the early part of high school and public school Devin’d been a bully. There were a lot of times where he’d made Josh’s life miserable. There was even a time when Josh’s own mom and dad marched him down to the Stone household to tell Devin’s father what his son was up to. Only Papa Stone didn’t care. Smug asshole. When he and his parents went home that night his mom broke a glass in the sink she was so mad. “Fucking prick,” she’d called Devin’s father, and Mom never swore. That was Papa Stone. Young Devin Stone had always been on the path to full Fucking Prick status.

Devin said, “Are you kidding me?”

“Kidding about what?”

“Dude, right out there,” he said pointing at the closed door of the tent, “that picnic table right up back of your SUV. You and me last night, God, I don’t know, one in the morning . . . ?”

“Oh yeah,” he said, not really remembering, but not wanting to infuriate big Stone. Even at twenty-eight years old now, the guy packed a whack more solid muscle than he had in high school. He had a big frame, large hands, square jaw . . . 

“Well, it’s done.”

“Good,” he said.

Devin tilted his head like he would look out the tent’s door though it was zipped closed. The muscles in his stubbly jaw flexed as he smiled. “She’s still inside, but I’m telling you—we might have got busted.”

“What do you mean busted?”

“Got caught.”

He nodded but the act of moving his head too fast got him swooning with sudden seasickness. He burped, said, “Who’s inside?”

“Kimmy . . . what the fuck is wrong with you?”

“Oh yeah, okay,” he said, “Kimmy’s inside.”

Devin scowled at him. “How much did you drink last night?”

“I don’t even remember.”

“We would’ve gone again—fuck, a whole bunch of times—but she shooed me out of there because there were people up in the kitchen.”

“Shooed you out of where?”

“We went in that bathroom, the one on the main floor just past the family room . . . ”

“Who . . . you and Kimmy?”

Devin shook his head. “You really don’t remember?”

“No . . . maybe . . . ”

“Out on the picnic table,” Devin said, scooting a little closer so he wouldn’t have to raise his voice, “You and I had a talk . . . ”

“What did we talk about?”

Stone moved closer so he could whisper and be heard. Josh could see the cold blue steel of Stone’s eyes. He smelled like sweat and something else . . . Devin said, “You told me your fantasy about Kimmy having sex with another man . . . ”

* * *

Josh’s eyes narrowed in incredulous challenge. “I did not.”

“Don’t pull this now,” Devin said, plucking at the sleeping mat he lay on. “I knew you would do this.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Last night you told me about your fantasy Kimmy would have sex with another guy, and I joked I always had a fantasy of being with Kimmy ever since high school. You told me to do it, you told me you wanted me to do it.”

His heart began to pound in his chest; his neck swelled with pulsing blood. As it hit his brain and temples, it felt like his head exploded. He winced, lurched forward, held his stomach. Everything in him wanted to come right back out again. He was still drunk, still full of whiskey . . . that had to be it, because there was no way this was real. This had to be a hallucination.

“No . . . I didn’t . . . That’s impossible . . . ”

“You did. You told me to, and I thought you were kidding at first, but you were so serious. I mean, the idea isn’t that crazy . . . Once you crashed, I laid it on your wife and, Josh, she was an eager little bunny rabbit . . . ”

Josh frowned and moaned, wanted to fight back and knew what he was hearing was ridiculous. Devin taunting him was nothing new, but this crossed a line. You could taunt him—the man—but Devin’s reference to his wife was off limits. Try as he might to formulate a response, instead Josh’s cheeks hollowed, his lips pursed, and he faced a strong interior desire to hurl. He closed his eyes; still felt spinning.

“I’ve never seen anything like it, Josh, I’m still rock hard right now. If there weren’t so many people around, I would be in there going round three . . . ”

His voice was a tight squeeze as his insides clenched: “Round three?”

“Kimmy can really go. Makes me wish I’d fucked her in high school . . . ”

“No way,” Josh said, leaning back, putting his hand over his heart, feeling its ridiculously high rate.

“I am like a fucking crowbar right now,” Devin said, rubbing the top of his head and raking back his thick shock of black hair. “Shit, maybe we should get out of here, go get breakfast somewhere and I’ll take her into the bathroom . . . ”

“No, no, no, no,” Josh muttered, head nodding forward as his eyes closed, his mind reeling with disbelief at the absurdity of what was happening and what he was hearing. “What are you . . . why are you even saying this?”

Devin grunted. “Look at this,” he said and when Josh opened his eyes, Stone’s steely gaze was locked on his, chin nudging downward indicating for him to look. His eyes moved down Stone’s masculine chest, the man’s muscle stretching out a plain black T-shirt. A thumb hooked in the front of his sweatpants shorts, pulling them outward; Devin wore no underwear, and from a nest of thick black pubic hair his huge tree trunk of an erection protruded. It was massive, twice as long as Josh’s, and thick as a woman’s wrist. It was a darker brown color than Devin’s already tanned skin, and the foreskin retracted over a shining purple-gray helmet the size and shape of a ripe plum. “Josh,” he said, “your wife is so tight.”

A small groan creaked in his throat; lightning flashes shimmered in the corners of his vision. The urge to retch came in again like a wave, washing up the back of his throat like sea water on a nighttime beach. He swallowed, blinked, shook his head and narrowed his eyes on that awful part of Devin Stone being revealed to him. The whole thing farcical yet not unfamiliar. It was unreal that a man was in his tent showing him his erection, but simultaneously this was not his first time seeing Devin’s penis. All through school Devin Stone took great glee in swanking his endowment around to all the other boys, and enjoyed in ribald comparison of his size to any poor shower-goer caught peeking at his extra-large penis or accidentally making eye contact. Or sometimes only because he was a cruel asshole.

Josh closed his eyes and turned his head away. Stone persisted. “Feel it,” he said.

Eyes still closed, Josh scoffed, grunted, “What—why?”

“Feel how hard it is, Josh.”

“Just get out of here,” he moaned, his head nodding, his mind softly riding imaginary waves that lurched his stomach, Devin just a voice in his head.

“Come on, little Joshy, put your hand on it. I have a reason.”

“Mm, I’m not doing that . . . ”

“Give me your hand,” the gravelly voice said. Stone’s large strong hand closed on his wrist, guiding him lower. From a lifetime of acquiescence, Josh allowed himself to be manipulated; and soon his fingers closed mid-shaft around Devin Stone’s massive erection. It was hot and gummy in the middle, the girth surprising his grip. He shut his eyes tighter, and complained in his throat.

Devin said, “Kimmy makes me so hard, Josh . . . I wish there weren’t so many of her friends creeping around the house.”

He loosened his grip, moved to pull his hand away, but Stone still held him in place by the wrist. Josh said, “Are you kidding me?”

“No, why would I be kidding you?”

Josh opened his eyes in thin slits, saw Stone leering close. He whispered, “Did you have sex with my wife?”

Stone waited a moment, drawing in an easy breath then exhaling. “You told me to, Josh.”

“You really didn’t have sex with her, did you?” His voice was high and pleading, thin with disbelief.

Devin smiled. “Here,” he said, “smell your hand,” guiding Josh’s wrist back up to his face. Josh recoiled, groaned and closed his eyes, but Devin pushed the hand closer. He submitted, opening his hand and smelling the palm.

“You smell pussy? That’s Kimmy’s pussy, right?—you recognize it . . . ”

Now he didn’t want to smell it, recoiling further, collapsing onto his back, his head missing the pillow and knocking into the thin camping sheet over hard ground. It was enough to send him over the edge. Brand new pain oscillated through his body in radiating waves from the crown of his skull. His stomach tightened and he tasted bile in his throat. But in his nose was the smell of sex. Whether or not it was his wife’s insides was indecipherable; it was just the funky body-smell of sex—and it was impossible that Kimmy had sex with Devin Stone. A strange hot stone of jealous rage and hurt throbbed in his heart now, his tormentor’s lies getting in his head and working their magic.

Near his ear, he could hear Devin’s whisper: “I got balls deep in her, Josh. Balls deep. You should have heard her—bet she never made a sound like that before . . . ”

“Go . . . jus’ get out . . . fuck outta here . . . ” His weak voice slid out on an exhale, and his hand faffed outward to push Devin away—but careful not to be forceful as any force would be met with double in return, those were long-established rules.

But his hand met nothing, only air next to him. He made a soft crying sound as his temples boomed with throbbing ache. One eye squinted open. Devin was still there, up on his knees now, unzipping the tent’s door, the front of his shorts humped out by his massive erection, muscles in his arms bulging as he worked the zip, then peeked out into the dawn. He glanced Josh’s way, smiling.

Josh said, “I don’t believe you.”

Devin shrugged, unaffected, unconcerned with convincing. He said, “You made a deal with the devil last night.”

“I didn’t make a deal with you.”

“You did, my friend. We have a contract, and it’s open ended.”

“We don’t have any contract, Devin, just tell me you didn’t, it’s just crazy, okay . . . ”

“I did what you wanted, Josh. I’m going to do it again.”

“I don’t want that . . . ”

“Kimmy wants it, believe me. Like I said, if there weren’t her friends around the house right now I’d have her knees up over my shoulders, dumping in her guts. She begged me to come inside her.”

That was the real crossing of a line, and for the first time he was roused to angry action. But his body was pinned to the earth, his eyes fading closed even while his heart burned with rage. He said, “That’s not fucking funny—that’s not fucking funny, you asshole . . . ” There was no way she could’ve asked for that. This was taunting; this was bullying. And Stone didn’t know how low he’d gone.

"Kimmy’s a dirty little slut, Josh. Your wife’s a dirty girl . . . ”

“Get out of here,” he hissed, the force making his ears ring.

“This is your fantasy, Josh, you started it.”

“You didn’t really do it. Kimmy didn’t do it. You’re just an asshole.”

“Keep telling yourself that, Waters,” Devin said, getting up on his knees now, poking his head to the outside and looking around. He ducked back in. “Kimmy says you’re out in Ajax now.”

“So . . . ?”

“I get through there at least three times a month.”

“So . . . ?”

“So I’ll be seeing you.” With that, the door was zipped wide open again and brighter dawn light filled the tent and made him squint his eyes shut. He held up a hand to block the light and watched through narrowed eyes as Stone climbed through the gap, turned around, winked, zipped the tent door shut.

As he heard the man’s footsteps passing through the grass, his head sought the softness of his pillow. He rolled to his side and begged for this all to be an awful nightmare.