Chapter 15: The Last Goodbye

“It wasn’t the whole sex thing, you know? It was embarrassing knowing you knew, and especially with you looking over my shoulder. Jeez. That was so weird, with you and Nick and everything.”

Mel just nodded, putting out a hand across the counter to touch Tracy’s arm. It was the first time they had woken up together since that fateful day almost a month past. Tracy had gone through a lot, had experienced a lot more than just five stages of grief, and was only now coming to accept and deal with and finally control what had set it all off.

“What crushed me,” continued Tracy, “was realizing that Tina was in on it, was the one doing it. It would be like finding out you were selling video of me in the bathroom. I loved Tina, trusted her. I think I’ve told you that she was like a big sister to me, a woman I could finally do anything with. And it was great, like having a sister and a mother and an aunt and all of that rolled into one big Amazon of a woman.”

Mel nodded again, simply saying “Yeah, you said that a number of times. I was envious, kind of jealous, but also happy for you. Not too often you can find a mentor like that. I’m really sorry it turned out the way it did.”

Mel had to stop himself from saying any more, keeping his words small and simple and short and to the point, not wanting to say too much, to say something stupid as he so often did. But he also didn’t want his words to get in the way of Tracy’s train of thought or flow of feelings. It had been a long rough month, and she was finally calm enough, in control enough, to finally sit and talk it out without becoming angry or turning in on herself and saying nothing. It was good to hear her voice, to have her at his side, and Mel was just happy to know she still trusted him enough to again open herself to him.

“Mentor. Yeah. Some fucked up mentor she turned out to be, right?” Tracy shook her head and looked beyond the sliding glass door and into Mel’s back yard.

Late spring was starting to show itself, fruit on the peach tree pulling the limbs low. It was a beautiful day, one he really should be ignoring while embedded in his office at work, but Tracy was too important and Mel just called in sick and gave himself over to all that Tracy needed him for.

“And she fucked it all up.” Tracy’s eyes continued to look out into the yard, but Mel could tell that she was really looking inward, digging up and holding back the past. “All that daughter shit, everything I told her, shared with her. And I was a fucking piece of meat.”

Mel squeezed on Tracy’s arm and did his best to reassure and comfort her, hoping just to deflect the anger that he knew was again taking her over. “That was Tina, sure, but not you. You were sharing, she brought out the best in you, and it was her that abused your trust. Don’t turn this against yourself Tracy. This is all about what Tina did to you, not what you did.”

Tracy threw out a short laugh and got off her stool, shaking off Mel’s hand and walking over to his sliding glass door. “Yeah, she did it to me real good. Boy was she good. But just to let you know Mel, I was better. And I’ve got to admit I liked it. She sure threw that in my face. Told me I was a natural, a real fucking nympho with a face and tits and pussy no other could match. Yeah, she sure threw that right back at me.”

Mel nodded but stayed silent, thinking back to the days after he and Nick had shown Tracy the porn site she played a starring role in. Video after video was available online, showing Tracy in all her sexual greatness, performing every sexual act imaginable before a camera lens, doing everything conceivable with any range of men and even some women. But while showing off the beautiful body and sexual lustiness god had given her, obviously enjoying the sex she and Tina participated in, Tracy had no idea it was all being uploaded into a pay-for-porn site. When Nick and Mel had opened her eyes to what Tina was doing, streaming videos of Tracy for money, Tracy had blown up like a volcano and then collapsed in on herself.

First she called out Nick and Mel for even being aware of the many online videos that starred Tracy in any number of sexual encounters and acts. Then she accused them of being responsible for uploading the videos, and then quickly turned to Tina for the real story. To her credit, Tina never tried to deny what she had done. Yes, she had videoed just about everything Tracy ever did, both in and out of the bedroom. From simple make-out sessions with a dildo to getting it on with a dog, if a camera wasn’t pushed up between Tracy’s legs then there was one hidden on the bookshelf. Absolutely, and with no apologies.

Tina pointed out that Tracy knew about a lot of the camera work, even held the camera a few times when Tina wanted to be the star of the show, and both of them had sat down and watched hours of sex tape, both of them getting off on the raw footage. Tracy had to admit to that, admitted to enjoying both participating and watching, but Tina had never told her about selling Tracy, uploading it all to a porn site while making money off of Tracy’s voracious cunt. That was the one sin that broke Tracy, made her collapse in the rain and cry. Mel couldn’t do anything about that, and it broke his heart.

Worse was that Tina really had been a wonderful friend and lover to Tracy, a woman Tracy gave herself over to completely. When Tracy finally found out about the porn site and went to Tina for an explanation, Tina just threw it back in Tracy’s face. As Tracy put it, “She just told me to grow up, that I was acting like a kid. She threw it right in my face, saying that I was just a hypocrite, enjoying the show but now wanting to act all clean like a virgin.”

After Tracy had talked with Tina, and been thrown into the gutter for all her effort, she wound up at home, sitting in her room and staring at the wall. Her mother was so worried that she begged Mel to come over and talk to her. Mel was surprised to find Tracy willing to talk, though obviously depressed, at best cynical, at times snarky, her eyes dark and grim and without the light of joy that had always shone out from her beautiful face. Tracy had closed her bedroom door, told her mother that everything was fine, and filled Mel in on what Tina had said. “Yeah, just like you showed me Mel. The whole fucking site has her fingers all over it. A real moneymaker. ‘How else did you think we could afford this house’ is how she put it.”

Tracy went on to tell Mel how Tina pushed back and tried to blame Tracy for being young and naïve, then shaming her for being a slut and loving it, and finally trying to bring her back in as a partner. “Guess what Mel? I’m not the only one. She has a couple of other girls she does the same shit to, and I’ll bet her husband has a handful of young men he plays with in front of the camera. But I’m the star. After telling me I was a fucking ungrateful cunt, Tina told me I was her most popular girl, five erections out of a possible five. Told me she was willing to bring me in, make me a kind of partner, even do some real films for distribution. Me, a porn star. Can you believe that Mel? I could sell imprints of my pussy lips for fifty bucks a pop. Maybe a hundred for a pair of used panties.” She laughed at this, a high dry cynical laugh, then saying “Didn’t know you had a gold mine in that underwear drawer of mine, did you Mel? Bet you could get double if I peed on them a little.”

Mel tried to move closer, to pull Tracy in and tell her to ignore what Tina said, but Tracy just moved away, saying “Not now Mel. You should go. I’m tired.” So Mel had left, had told Tracy’s mother to keep an eye on her and that he’d be next door if she needed anything.

The ambulance came blaring down the street toward midnight, Mel easily woken from a troubled sleep, then wide awake and running for the door when he saw where the ambulance stopped. He was intercepted by Tracy’s mother who started pounding on his chest, crying, screaming out accusations that he had done something to her daughter, that it was all his fault.

Mel could see the EMTs wheeling Tracy out of her house, her body covered, blood showing thick and red through the cloth that was wrapped around her head. Then the policed showed up, and after a few minutes with Tracy’s mother they came over to talk with Mel. They didn’t want to say much but did admit that Tracy had tried to commit suicide with a gun and that the mother had blamed Mel for giving her the gun. Mel had to admit to this, that he owned the gun, that he had “loaned” the gun to Tracy, and finally admitted that Tracy didn’t have the training or license to carry such a gun. The cop shook her head, said he was in deep waters, might have to answer for homicide if Tracy died, and advised Mel to find a lawyer.

That was a nightmare, one that lasted many days. Tracy had kept the gopher gun Mel had given her in the closet, waiting for the next time they could make it to the shooting range. Seems that she had pulled it out, somehow held it up and at her head and pulled or pushed on the trigger. The gunshot was loud enough to wake her mother, who found her daughter laying on the floor next to the gun and in a pool of blood. Mel didn’t even like to think about the scene, of what her mother had to face, but worse was Mel being aware of everything that had led up to Tracy’s attempt to kill herself. Mel should have known, should have seen it, and in his own lumbering and stupid way he had missed all the cues. What an asshole.

Everybody piled on Mel for him giving a rifle to Tracy, for leaving it with her even when everyone knew she was a young woman undergoing deep psychological distress. Her mother, Nick, Tim, everybody. Even Tina came by the hospital and lashed out at Mel for being a cocksucking idiot. Mel felt terrible.

Let’s cut to the most important part: Tracy was fine. She absolutely had tried to kill herself, but instead of doing the womanly thing of swallowing pills or draino, she had pulled the rifle out of the closet, pointed it at her head, and pulled the trigger. Easy to say but difficult to do when it’s a rifle. If Tracy had stuck the thing into her mouth then maybe something would have come of her efforts, but just trying to hold the gun up and pulling the trigger altered her aim, skewing the angle and cleaving a line across the side of her head while the bullet wound up in her wall. And let’s not forget that a rifle and bullet meant for shooting squirrels would only rarely do real damage to a healthy adult human. Score one for low powered rifles in the hands of a novice who really didn’t want to die.

Mel had to do some fast talking, and after a quick visit with Tracy in the hospital they got their story straight and stuck to it even in the presence of doubtful police investigators. Seems that Tracy was only looking at the rifle, was planning a trip with Mel to the shooting range, and somehow pushed on the trigger at the worst of times. So stupid of her. Suicide? Of course not. Mel agreed that he should never have left the rifle with Tracy and fully understood that he faced the possibility of having his license and guns taken away for his poor judgment. In the end, nothing really came of it. Tracy was released after only another two days for ‘observation.’

Tracy turned away Mel and everyone else for the next week, but then she answered the door, told Mel that she was fine, that she just needed to rest and time to think and that she’d be over to see him soon. He kept up the attempts, leaving the oatmeal cookies she loved and then lasagna and even a bottle of white wine on the doorstep, ringing the bell and walking away. When Tracy came to the door he would stay silent but throw out a low wave and upward nod of his chin. He knew all would be fine on the day Tracy came out and gave him a big hug, a long hug, and cried in his arms for a good five minutes. But then she turned and gathered up his offerings and went inside, throwing a smile back at him and mouthing the word “soon.”

That led to Tracy knocking on his own door just the day before and sharing his dinner and finally even his bed. There wasn’t the easy feel of trust and intimacy of prior months, but also not the guilt or shame or tears or forced sex that Mel had feared. They were coming to reacquaint themselves with one another and Mel was simply hoping to show Tracy that she could trust him, show how much she still meant to him. The sex was wonderful, but more importantly Tracy opened up, was able to talk more about herself, about getting past Tina and her duplicity, and maybe on to living her own life again.

Mel was hoping and then expecting Tracy’s future life to include him as a central figure. Hell, with Tina gone, maybe he could be her whole life. He wouldn’t have minded. But later in the week, Mel already making plans on taking Tracy camping in the quiet and peace of the nearby mountains, she does a right turn that throws him off base.

“What do you mean you’re going “clubbing” with Nick? You said you would be happy with whatever I had planned for this weekend?” Mel didn’t mean to whine or sound like a spoiled kid, but he was a bit peeved at how easily she had pushed his big weekend plans aside. And with Nick. Damn but that guy always knew when to step in and push Mel aside.

“Come on Mel,” scoffed Tracy, rolling her eyes and shaking her head in a fashion that showed some of her old attitude. “A nature hike is one thing, but two nights in some campground with a shared pit toilet? Not going to happen.”

Mel was upset at losing Tracy, at having her all to himself for a long weekend in the middle of nowhere, and was especially jealous that Nick had been the one to walk up and pull her aside. He knew Tracy had been in contact with Nick, even with Tim, but Mel hadn’t planned on Nick moving in so quickly.

So what do you do when your competition pulls the rug out from under you? Do a backflip of course, and Mel is proud of coming back and telling Tracy that “it wasn’t just camping. The nearby town has a bar and live music. If you won’t let me have you for the weekend, then how about just this Friday, not so much drinking as dancing at a local club?”

Tracy had to smile, made a joke about his limited dancing ability, but then nodded and said it sounded good to her. And it was. A simple dinner out, a club that played more to the Latin beat than Mel could keep up with, but it still made up for losing Tracy to Nick’s whims and lusts for the next couple of nights.

Nick and Mel had of course discussed Tracy at depth, talking about what she needed and how they could help her overcome the shocks of the past month. In the end, they agreed to treat her as a friend, as an adult, but also as a woman they both wanted to keep solely for themselves. Nick made fun of how soft and gullible Mel was, and Mel woke more than once that Saturday night wondering if Tracy ever thought the same thing. Do nice guys always finish last?

He needn’t have worried. As the sun rose high on Sunday, Mel’s attempt to move his zucchini plants was interrupted by Tracy yelling over the fence that he was invited to dinner, compliments of her mother. Mel hid his glee, relieved to know Tracy wasn’t still sleeping the night off under Nick’s covers, but he did have to ask, “What happened to you and Nick and the wild weekend?” Tracy waved him off with a laugh, but later that night she cuddled with him and gave up yet a little more of herself. “Well, we drank, we hit a few bars, only one giving my ID any kind of inspection, and we went home. It was fine, you know, until I go into the bathroom and find somebody else’s bra in there. Kind of wet, newly washed, right? It shouldn’t have bothered me, but it did. It made me feel weird, like I was just another one of his tramps, and like I was cheating on you. I didn’t say anything, but I just wanted to come home. I couldn’t of course, but none of it was the same. I almost asked him to wear a condom.”

The following weeks found Tracy at Mel’s more and more often, and he came right out and asked if she would move in. “OK, not my fiancé, but like a serious couple.” Mel didn’t get down on one knee, but he was holding Tracy by the hand, a bottle of wine and a full moon on an early summer evening making it seem magical, at least in his imagination. Tracy only grew more quiet, subdued, then turned, took him by both hands, kissed Mel on the cheek (definitely a bad sign) and told him that she and her mother were planning on moving to Texas.

Mel was floored, going speechless and taking a step back, looking at Tracy as though she had just told him she had joined the marines. Closing his open mouth, Mel reached out, pulled Tracy back over to sit on the couch and stammered out his confusion. “What? What the fuck Tracy? What do you mean?”

“I know what you’re going to say,” said Tracy, using a standard defensive line that never explained anything. “It’s not about the whole sex and Tina thing, not even about my stupid suicide, and no it has nothing to do with you. It’s just that everything here has a past, has me written all over it, and I’d like to start something new.” Mel wanted to complain, to question everything even before he heard it, his eyes blinded and mind numbed by the thought of Tracy leaving, of no longer being a part of his life, but her mind was set.

Tracy had a long explanation, something she had to go over again and again with Mel as the week wore on. Her mother was worried about her own mother, living in Texas and with all sorts of medical and social problems. There would be a place to live, family to connect with, a university that had courses she could take (thanks to Mel’s push for her to study and get a better job), and best of all, nobody there knew anything about her. “Mom is happy, making all the plans, arranging the move, even organizing a huge yard sale for next month. Don’t worry, it’s not like I’m leaving tomorrow, but I am leaving.”

Each time he had to face this fact, Mel wound up silent, stunned as though being hit with a sledgehammer. He didn’t whine, didn’t badger or attempt to coerce. That was something Nick was more likely to do. But Mel seemed to be in a constant state of shock, and every time he asked for more information and every time Tracy took his hand and walked him through the upcoming move, he had to sit and stare at the floor, waiting for the dizziness to recede and the white noise to clear from his head.

Tracy was kind, spending more time at night with Mel, the warm evenings turning into hot summer nights, Tracy attempting to fill each one with a memory Mel could keep and soothe his soon-to-be empty future with. It was ironic, Mel finally having everything he ever wanted, Tracy essentially moving in and living with him, walking around his house as though it was hers, clad only in panties and a smile, a wan smile, with just a bit of sorrow pulling at one edge of her lips. Each time he would pull her in, kiss her and feel her, pushing away the thought that in only a month, in only a few weeks, in only days, she would be gone.

Mel did his best to fill their days, taking time off from work, dragging Tracy off to everything from a hiking trail to a three star restaurant to that same old club for some dancing. He was really just trying to keep busy, to somehow push away the thought of her leaving, and perhaps just maybe give her more reasons to have her mother leave on her own. At the end of almost every day she would snuggle into his arms and talk about nothing, pretending that at the beginning of August she would still be around.

At night she was his, Mel very aware of how hard Tracy was trying to be nice to him, fulfilling his sexual fantasies without any complaint, even pushing him to go a little further in directions she wouldn’t normally care for. Once she oiled up her own ass, sitting down on his erection and slowly taking his entire erection up her anus, deep into her rectum, and riding him as hard as any cowgirl could ride a bull. More than once after he had unloaded his initial needs into her, she slid down and cleaned his cock off, swallowing down their shared release while giving him a balls-deep blow job. She always got hers, but she did her best to make sure he got his first.

Yet for all the overt sex Tracy and Mel experienced with each other, Mel’s favorite turn-on was watching Tracy walk around in nothing but panties, maybe lying with her on the bed, giving special attention to her pouting lips, trying his best to get her nipples to harden, to hear her voice turn from a murmur to a moan, and to kiss his way down from her breasts to that area of the lower stomach just above where her thick pussy lips rose forth from between her thighs. It was that special area, just below the panty-line, that somehow always caught his attention and made his cock leap to attention. Not much pubic hair, Tracy keeping her fur trimmed low, and it was all beautifully edged by her tattoo. Whether watching her from across the room or massaging this area of the mons with his most recent dose of cream, he could never get enough. “You know it’s just because you can see my pussy lips right there,” pointed out Tracy. “sticking out from between my legs. And I bet you’d say this to any girl.” Mel would disagree, giving the rose that stuck just out and above her labia a kiss, saying “Every part of you is special to me, but especially here.”

So the days were good, and the nights were a joy, even magical. But then came the mornings, when Mel would open his eyes and realize he was one day closer to losing her. Mel felt blessed, though unsure if he had the world’s blessing as he shared life with an angel or was cursed with the worst of luck, having the best life can offer only for it to be ripped away forever. He never fully gave in, always let Tracy know he wanted her to stay, to never leave, even planning out new scenarios for her that most revolved around flying her mother to Texas.

Then came the fateful night, just a week from D-Day, the dreaded day, when Nick showed up at his door. “Hey. Tracy called, invited me over, told me to bring something other than cheap beer, so here I am.” Mel knew Tracy had dropped by Nick’s from time to time, and the few Fridays on which Mel met Nick at the bar for lunch they tried but failed to think of new ways to keep Tracy from leaving. Nick arguably remained a close friend if sexual rival, still the only man Mel was aware of Tracy shared her favors with, but he chose to never ask for details.

Tracy had been cooking in Mel’s kitchen and shrugged off Mel’s demand for an explanation, for why Nick was all of a sudden coming to share their dinner. “Because I wanted to share an evening with two of my favorite men. Both absolute assholes at the worst of times, but always good for better times. Wait here.”

Tracy told Nick to open his bottle of wine (white or some version of) and disappeared into the bedroom, coming back dressed only in a very skimpy bathing suit bottom, her magnificent breasts open and free for the men to see and the bottoms with hardly enough fabric to hold-in her lower lips. She took a glass of wine from Nick, raised it as though in a toast, and said, “To my favorite guys, good cocks all. This is how we came together, so I figured this is just as good a way to say goodbye. Together.” That’s when she ruined it by starting to cry, leaning her head into Mel’s chest and spilling her wine on the floor. They stood together, even the men with overlapping arms, until Tracy pulled back and instructed Mel to get the food. “No way I’m going near the stove dressed like this,” she joked.

So they ate stir-fry and rice, some deep fried tofu and spicy green beans, drank wine and beer, all involved doing their best not to bring Texas into the conversation. But it had to happen, had to come up, Nick being especially stubborn about digging out details Mel was already too aware of.

“And what the fuck are you going to do there? A bunch of racist shithole Texans, and you’ll probably be stuck waiting tables in a Chinese buffet place. Why bother? I can get you a better job.”

“My uncle is one of those shithole Texans” shot back Tracy, “and he’s promised me a good job. Between my own skills and an online course I just completed and a couple of classes I’ve already signed up for, I’ll be all set to earn almost twice what I’m pulling in now. And I have a bunch of family there. Not like the northern clan, or so my mother says.”

Mel had to nod, said Tracy knew enough about his own job to be able to pull it off on her own. Nick just grumbled and brought up other points of how much he disagreed with Tracy leaving, Mel finally having to tell Nick to knock it off with the negative talk. “Fine, I’ll stop. So tell me something good about all of this. I get drunk every night just thinking about it, especially with Tracy here spending most of her time with you. Tim and I share her for the occasional lunch or afternoon while she always winds up here to spend the night. Fucking unfair.”

Mel was shocked at this unwelcome bit of news and had an answer of his own to throw in Nick’s face but Tracy cut in, saying “Fuck you Nick. I’m leaving. That’s it, and you’re supposed to be here with Mel so that I can show you two how much you mean to me, not so you can unload your balls and roll over to take a nap like you normally do at lunch.”

There was a moment of uneasy silence, and Tracy wisely pushed the anger aside and took charge of the conversation. “The really good news is that we have a buyer. Mom was afraid she’d have to rent the place out, maybe get Mel here to manage her property and pay him a hefty fee to kick out bad tenants, but it’s all worked out. And guess what? It’s a relative. Good job, no hassles, it all works out.” Mel nodded, raising his glass to good news, all the while wishing the mother would break her leg and be forced to cancel all plans for the move. Cheers.

There was a little more talk, a little more wine, but with the beauty and overt sexual allure that a near-naked Tracy threw out into the room the two men were soon on either side and giving her all of their attention. She knew, had planned for this, and after five minutes of heavy petting on the couch they quickly wound up in the bedroom.

It was awkward at first, at least for Mel. He had never shared Tracy with another man, not since that first night when she had first bared her tits to the group for the football game. It happened to be Nick then as well. Odd how it all worked out. He had seen her with other men, watched her on video, heard her stories of what she did with men, of what they liked to do with her, but to Mel she was still only his. In his bedroom all her past was shut out and he was the only man that mattered in her life. But now Nick was there with him, again, reminding Mel of the wide and varied sex life that Tracy seemed to revel in. It was weird, but maybe Tracy needed it, to have her two main men make amends and come to an understanding before she left. Mel just swallowed his sadness and anger down and focused on showing Tracy how much he loved her and lusted for her.

Nick on the other hand seemed to have no compunctions about pulling Tracy in and taking her over. The two men had undressed, Tracy sitting on the side of the bed and watching but leaving her thong of a bikini bottom on. Nick was nice enough not to just push her back and fuck her, something Mel had heard Tracy complain about more than once. Nick did push Tracy back, but then pulled her legs up and over his shoulders as he knelt by Mel’s bed, hands pulling her ass up and into his mouth, one hand pulling the thin edge of the suit aside as he locked his lips around Tracy’s clit. Tracy didn’t mind, sitting up, hands around Nick’s head as she pulled him even tighter into her thighs.

Mel hesitated, taking a deep breath as he watched the love of his life grind her pussy into the face of his best friend, but he got over it. Mel crawled up and knelt behind Tracy, hands around to hold and feel her breasts, play with her nipples, his lips giving light kisses to her neck and cheeks and lips, breathing her scent in, loving her even as she rose to a moaning climax. Mel was initially upset, Nick taking over Tracy’s pussy and giving her a nice orgasm, but as she spasmed and her legs locked around Nick’s head, she moaned out “Mel, oh god Mel,” as though Nick wasn’t even there. A very selfish and childish Mel was only too happy to hear her words even as Tracy bounced on the bed and crushed her black forested cunt into Nick’s face.

Of course Nick had his own way, pulling Tracy into his chest and down onto his lap, not bothering to remove her bottoms, just pulling them aside as she dropped down onto his fat little cock, impaling her and then rolling her over onto the rug for a long hard fuck. That was Nick, doing his best to put distance between Tracy and Mel. Rather than moping on the side, Mel kneeled by the prone Tracy, one of her legs still up on the bed, the other held out by Nick’s hand, her bathing suit no hindrance to the ongoing pumping of Nick’s hips. Mel held her hand, a hand down to pull aside her long hair, looking into her face as she looked up into his, her mouth open, gasping for air as her body responded to the hard pounding fuck Nick was putting her through.