Chapter 1

David Howard was not exactly in the mood for any nonsense that evening, as he came home from work a bit early. Predictably, his boss and former friend, Steven DeLong, had continued to rag on him about ending their bromance, which had become sexual on more than a few occasions, and he had simply clocked out for the day. If Steven wanted to fire him, good riddance! David was seriously thinking leaving Jersey altogether, despite it being the only state with a working government and no ghost towns in the whole USA. The price of continued law and order had been very high: continued subservience to La Cosa Nostra, the Italian Mafia, which had come out of the woodwork stronger than ever in the wake of Doomsday.

That was when David walked in on his wife, Andrea, in flagrante delicto with a man who he didn’t recognize, but who looked suspiciously like a “made” man with the syndicate. Well, that made sense in a way. Andrea wanted to curry favor with people who were connected and influential, and these days, that was the Mafia again. They were back with a vengeance and they ran the Garden State tighter than a drum. Getting on their bad side was an awful idea, which was one of the reasons that David kept his cool with the whole situation.

The other was that Andrea’s affair was just another reason for him to leave the state, and if he left Jersey, he doubted that he would take the missus with him. That being so, why the fuck would he stress out over his wife’s infidelity, especially that he had, until recently, a same-sex friend with benefits who just happened to be his boss? Weren’t they both just using their bodies to get around, or they had been, he supposed, being done with it himself?

Andrea didn’t bother to stop while David took a shower, something that she found rather odd about him, as he hadn’t spoken to her at all. He didn’t jack off or watch the whole thing, so that ruled out one possibility. Whatever else, she knew that the man wasn’t a cuckold or wittol type. He didn’t get off on humiliation it seemed. She didn’t think that he would be a masochist or cuck, but she wondered if perhaps he would be in too much shock to move. Instead, he had been cool as a cucumber and calmly decided to wash himself clean. At least that gave her the chance to finish before he returned, if nothing else. She didn’t know what he would do after that, to be honest, she hoped that he would stay, even if not as a voyeur or wimp.

When David returned, he didn’t return to the bedroom, where his wife had shown a remarkable willingness to even use the marriage bed. She clearly didn’t have any taboos, or so it seemed to him. Instead of facing her just then, David went to the kitchen, grabbed a bottle of bourbon and poured himself a double shot on the rocks. The burn was nice, cleansing, if you will, a chance to purge his head of the anxiety, jealousy, etc. and his throat of the lump inside it as the whiskey went down to his stomach. Whiskey was his drink for precisely that reason. Andrea had always been a mixed drinks kind of girl. David never used chasers, never had highballs or cocktails, never used anything but whiskey on the rocks, so he could feel that purifying burn as it went down his throat, clearing away all the mess inside him.

After he had steadied himself, David went to the bedroom and told his wife, “Okay, Andrea, bring your little guest over to the sofa. We have something to talk about, I imagine. Starting with the issue of marital infidelity, of course.”

By now, David was in more comfortable clothing, in this case a polo shirt, khakis, and sneakers, so he felt more relaxed and less tense that way, too. He was remarkably civil, but his tone also left a hint that he wouldn’t be a pushover. This was still his home, at least for now, the other man was still just a guest, not some landlord or whatever, and he would insist upon some respect. For one thing, he was convinced that this would impress the man a bit more, especially the gangster type like this character. Theirs was a very patriarchal culture, was it not? A man who stood up for himself earned their respect, if nothing else.

“David, I won’t insult you by saying that it’s not what it looks like. It is, in fact, how it appears. But then, this is the kind of rough and tumble world we live in now. Civilization is in shreds and, strange as this may seem, Gianni and men like him are among the few, if unlikely, sets of folks still holding anything together at all. That, with it, carries some ... special benefits, rights, and privileges for the extra dangerous work that they do to keep lawlessness and anarchy at bay. Think of it like droit de seigneur, the rights of a lord that unfortunately have to trump those of a husband here. That’s just how it is.

“I still care about you and I still want us to work it out, if we can. Besides, there are times that I wondered, not about other women, but about you and Steven. Sometimes, the bromance was a bit less ... platonic, from what it felt like to me, so maybe I felt that I was getting some of my own back here,” Andrea told David, right in front of Gianni.

“He’s gay? In that case, I don’t see where this is a true marriage or I did anything wrong at all!” Gianni blurted.

“First of all, Gianni. May I call you Gianni? We’re on a somewhat intimate basis, given that we’ve apparently shared a woman. Okay, I’m not gay, but yes, I had a fucking fling with Steven. It’s over, and I’m probably fired for ending it and telling Steven off, truth be told. Secondly, that’s a new fucking rationale, at least for America, or what’s left of it. I halfway expected some feminist bullshit, but then, that doesn’t fly around here. That’s one of the few positives about the GSA’s rule, I guess. No feminist crap.

“As for keeping me? No way in Hell. This is the last fucking straw. Yes, I cheated on you, mostly due to Steven hitting on me hard when he knew that I was a bit stoned or drunk and my inhibitions were low, plus I was experimenting with my sexuality. It doesn’t excuse what I did, but I guess we’re even now. That’s assuming that you haven’t cheated on me before. Thank God we have no kids together! Seriously!

“But, anyway, here’s the deal. You can keep the house, most of the stuff inside it. Go for an annulment, claim that I’m gay, if it helps. The lack of children would tend to support your case. I’m not gay, but to what’s left of the Catholic Church, which is all cozy with Giannia’s ‘family, ‘ it’s six of one, half a dozen of the other, anyway. To them, gay activities amount to homosexuality, period. They have no fucking nuances or notion of bisexuality, I think. So, get a fucking annulment or if you don’t care about the Church, and bear in mind that when the new Pope is elected, he might change a lot of crap, I don’t know and I don’t care, not being Catholic, file for divorce on grounds of desertion or whatever.

“You can keep most of the non-liquid assets, but I want the most liquid ones. A cash payout of sorts. Buy me out completely, as I’m leaving town ... and the state. You guys won’t be troubled by my like anymore. It’s over. We’re through. Not because you cheated per se. It’s just the final push to get me to leave town. I don’t have anyone new to sleep with, not yet, you see, so I don’t want to be a cuckold, which is what a faithful husband of an unfaithful wife is, plus I probably lost my job, so there you go. Steven was just too crazy for me anymore. I couldn’t take his psycho behavior one more day, so perhaps firing is a good thing in that case. Or quitting or whatever.

“Gianni, are you married? If not, you could always take her to wife and have children with her. Just a thought. I think that she wants kids and has resented me for not wanting them just yet. I had my reasons, but this is one reason that I’m glad that we have no kids. Nothing to tie me down to her, an unfaithful wife. So, anyway, I’m leaving, skipping town for good. You’ll never see me again. Sayonara. Ciao. Proschai! Farewell!” David declared his intentions to move out of the Garden State.

“Ordinarily, I would say, no way in hell, because I don’t marry a slut, but if you’re messing around with men, I don’t care what you call it, bisexuality, homosexuality, whatever, to me, you’re a fag, so that to me doesn’t make her a slut but a wronged wife. So, yes, I can set up an annulment. I can also arrange a much faster payoff to Mr. Queer here, so he can go on his merry, faggoty way and I can keep you for good. Just bear in mind, Andrea, that I’m not the faithful type and never have been.

“Don’t like the double standard? Tough! I’m a made man. We have our own rules and fuck that equality bullshit! If you can handle being faithful to me while I fool around, with women, mind you, then we have the start of a good marriage, assuming that the Church concedes, and in lieu of a Pope, the bishop will grant you an annulment, I guarantee it. Anyway, first things first, I respect that you stood up to me, even if I don’t respect that you’re queer. I never knew that fags had that much backbone, to be honest!

“So, here it goes. Here’s the going rate for a desperate housewife these days, I figure. I’ll give you, how about, seventy grand, to buy you out entirely, for the house, the minivan, the whole domestic package, if you’re cool with it. We won’t ask Andrea if she’s cool with it. She’s all but admitted that she knows that the feminist bitch don’t hunt no more. Like she said, the rights of a lord. But in this case, I see an easy, shortcut solution that doesn’t leave bodies on the floor. I don’t like murder and leaving a widow, if I can avoid it.

“But I will. I will you, faggot, if you don’t take the deal. So, take it or leave it. Seventy k, for one Andrea Howard, plus your house, your minivan, and the whole enchilada. Deal or no deal, bearing in mind that ‘no deal’ is the next to the last choice you’ll ever have, the last one being the style of your coffin. Get it?” Gianni proposed, making Andrea and David both blush in spite of themselves.

“Make it eighty and we have a deal. She is pretty good in bed,” David told him, making his estranged wife blush and giggle a bit, “and since I’m presumably not getting a last roll in the hay with her for the road, that extra ten covers that lack of a good send-off.”

“You seriously trying to haggle? For a wife that you don’t love anymore, if you ever really did, and bearing in mind that rejecting the deal would be ... how shall I put it, very bad for your health? Well, I agree with you that she’s rather hot to trot in the sack, so this is my final, and I do mean, final, non-negotiable offer. No more haggling. I’ll tack on five grand, because I refuse to watch her get it on with even her husband in front of me. Use the extra five grand for a hooker, or two or whatever, if you want. And that’s just because I agree with you that you’re losing a damn good lay,” Gianni was trapped, as he didn’t want his prospective bride to be mad at him for implying that she was only worth seventy after David had asked for eighty on such flattering grounds, “not a penny more. The last five grand were shaved off because she technically committed adultery, at least at the time that you caught her and she didn’t have the sense not to know that you were queer.”

“David, I appreciate you raising my value, but seriously, take the deal before he caps you. I love you still, at least a little, and I really love your brass balls in asking for eighty grand for me, not to mention the flattery of saying that I’m that good in bed, but it is time to fish or cut bait, I think. So, please, take the deal. And thanks, Gianni, for admitting that I’m worth paying out another five grand so that you don’t have to share me, even once. That makes my heart flutter for sure. So, we’re agreed. Gianni is basically practicing simony here, buying the office of husband, if you will. Buying David out. Do we have an ... understanding, a final divorce or annulment settlement?” Andrea seemed eager to get the mess over with, even if part of her was heartbroken that David wanted to leave ... she could understand his motives, at least in part ... he wanted to escape his old life and start anew.

“Deal. I’m not so keen on that extra five grand that I’ll die for it. I’d say that you ... made me an offer that I couldn’t refuse?” David threw in a last joke and blew a kiss to Andrea, not daring to go for one on her actual lips in front of a jealous mobster.