Chapter 14: The Incredible Sulk

I arrived home tired and a little bit nervous about what my wife might say about our invitation to a party for one of my ... uh ... customers, I guess. As I reached for the knob, the door was nearly yanked open in front of me and a parade of women and girls spilled out in front of my house. My daughters led the way, followed by April, then my wife and Melody bringing up the rear, so to speak. My wife grabbed my shoulder and spun me around.

“Come on, we’re going to be late!” she admonished.

“Late for what?” I asked.

“Katelin’s party, of course.”

“Silly me.” I shrugged. Why should I be surprised that I was apparently the last one to know that there was a party tonight. Doesn’t much matter, I guess. I act at the whim of the women in my life.

We piled into the van and navigated our way to the Jacobsen’s. The chatter from the younger girls in the back was nonstop the whole way. They were obviously excited about the party. April, Melody and my wife were a little harder to read. They were excited as well, but there was a bit of current passing in the air between them as if they were all tuned into some radio frequency that I was too dense to pick up on.

I didn’t have too much time to dwell on it. We don’t live in a huge city and it only takes about 15 minutes to get anywhere.

The girls and women piled out of the van and worked their way to the front door.

“Shouldn’t we have brought a gift or something?” I whispered to my wife as we neared the door.

“We did.” she replied as she rang the bell.

The door opened and Katelin rushed out to greet us. She gave my wife and I cursory hugs. Mine was actually quite friendly for the length of time that it lasted. She was very good at not tipping off the others that we had previously met, that day even, had quite a lot of fun with each other.

The hug she gave Melody lingered just a bit longer, then she moved on to the girls. Squeals and giggles soon followed as she led them into the house and apparently to her room.

By that time Lisa and Stanley had appeared at the door and invited the adults in.

“I heard you and the girls had a nice time today.” Stanley started.

My eyes locked with Stanley’s. He smiled. I then looked to my wife. Nothing in her demeanor suggested that she was upset by hearing about my first “appointment”. In fact, she appeared to be wearing a rather smug little smirk.

It was quite apparent that I was way, way out of the loop. For some reason, it made me angry.

“Alright, will somebody please tell me what is going on?” I shouted.

“What do you mean?” my wife asked. She now looked concerned.

“I mean that you seem to know everything that I do well before I do it. You know everything that I know well before I know it. I get the feeling that I am being led around by a string and I just want to know what is going on.”

“Oh, that’s all? Sit down.” She said as she led me to the couch.

Stanley pushed a glass with a deep amber liquid and a few ice cubes into my hand. I took a gulp. My throat burned as the liquid passed on it’s way to my stomach. My eyes watered. Dammit, why didn’t somebody remind me that I don’t normally drink. This only made me angrier.

“Where do you want me to start?” my wife asked.

“How did you know we were supposed to come here tonight?” I snapped.

“Lisa called me.” she answered.

“Do you talk to her often?”

“Yes, a couple times a week or so.” she answered.

“So you know all about her and Katelin and I,” I offered, “and she knows all about April and Melody?”

“Yes”

“I see. Will you please tell me how this started?”

“It was all very simple, really. Lisa is friends with April’s mother. You know a bunch of us from work get together and go out for lunch every so often. One time Barbara, April’s mother, brought her along with her.”

“For some reason, the conversation turned to sex that day. Lisa reluctantly mentioned that she didn’t usually find it very satisfying. Before thinking, I mentioned that I don’t usually have that particular problem.”