Chapter 60

Monday morning came easily for Selena. She woke to the new work week with the same fervor for her job she always had. She had let a hum-drum that set in late in the previous week get to her psyche. That left her wanting more from herself, but she was re-centered now. Everyone at the Sunday Night Letter meeting at WSGG mentioned that she glowed and was more exuberant that usual. Once the bed of the basic letter was built during the week, Sunday usually left "just after closing" effects to dissect and discuss, as well as foreign market reaction. Since she and Joe tore apart the Sunday papers she had her usual yellow legal pages filled with ideas and trend markers. As the six agreed on which trends should be noted and watched, Deneigh's busy fingers recorded and struck as they wished. Their work continued until the final front page was built and added for fax, telex, and emailing. They had met at 4 pm, as was usual, and by 6:20 pm they were all headed back to their lives and families to finish their weekends.

As both of them hoped, Deneigh and Slim showed no reaction to each other besides normal pleasantries when they met in the big room. Selena had been watching them closely for body language and saw nothing to indicate any connection between the two besides a business and platonic relationship.

However, Joe would have given her a virtual slap on the hand when she went fishing for a tidbit with Deneigh during a little bathroom break before the final edit review.

"Our friends Shanna and Joe saw you at The Bull Market on Friday night. Sounds like you might have had quite the hangover yesterday." Selena said over the stall in the ladies room.

"Oh, it wasn't too bad. Thank God Slim was there to push me into a taxi and send me home. He's like having a big brother or uncle here. We stopped for a drink, that's right next to his building. I had too many and he wasn't going to let me walk home and he called me a cab. Thank God there was someone with some sense there for me. I didn't know you had spies around. (laughs)." Deneigh said quickly and confidently.

"That was a regular spot for Shanna and Joe before they had the baby and her Mother babysat for the weekend so they were out. They've both met you before."

"Yeah, Slim was like my big brother. He wasn't going to leave until I did, insisting he was responsible because he offered to buy me a drink to unwind with." Deneigh said covering.

"Yeah, he's a great guy." Selena said satisfied there was no smoke or fire to her suspicions, although she asked Slim the same question and got the same "pushed her into a cab, protecting her like a big brother" well rehearsed story.

Waking Saturday morning and devoting the day to her life's love and pleasures thus fulfilling any gaps she may have perceived in her existence. For the weekend, she lost count of the times they made love, the laughs they shared with friends, the times her spirit soared over the joy of 2 of her passions, live music and shopping. After the satisfaction of getting the Sunday Night Letter out so quickly she was still able to get back to Joe and have a nice evening to finish off the weekend. Sunday was one of the few nights they ALWAYS watched some TV together. Joe would fix fondue for vegetables, shrimp and crab with champagne or something of the like to reflect their mood as they cuddled and got sexy in their robes or pajamas. They saw each Sunday as a mile marker passed on their way to full retirement.

Deneigh on the other hand was spending her Sunday night alone on the phone with Robben as he began in earnest to convince her that this job opportunity was the best for them as a couple and he could not pass it up. She had not rehearsed her ultimatum speech fully but tonight on the phone he had pressed her into using what she had. Maybe it was the drunken night of hard sex that pushed her final buttons as Robben spoke his case to her. She knew she was lonely and yearned for him to be home with her and provide the sanctity of "relationship" she so craved. Her role of "drunken slut" was almost wiped from her memory in the conversation with the man she truly loved, but the "missing you" pangs of her inner sexual self reminded her of what she missed if he were home with her.

"Robben, I can't play this game anymore. I will NEVER EVER CONSENT to moving overseas, and I will NEVER, EVER live as your long distance wife. I am sick of being the long distance girlfriend or fiancé and I want you home. If coming back to the city to marry me and live out our lives HERE is not in your plans, just tell me now so we can end this amicably. I never want to be your enemy, but I can't live like this anymore and you should know that there is no way I'll move over there. New York is my home and the plans for the rest of my life are laid out here. I think I can parlay a partnership at WSGG and I've made that my goal. I love you, but this is a dream I can't walk away from." She said to Robben coldly and solemnly to be sure it held all of the gravity of her feelings.

The line stayed silent long enough that she wondered if they had been disconnected and her ultimatum went unheard, but she heard him exhale deeply.

"Wow, I never expected this Deeny. I thought we were destined forever. What brought this on?"

"Nothing brought it on Ben, you just haven't listened whenever you've talked about it. You've always said to think it over and I've always told you I didn't think I could do it. You've pressed me into making my stand now. I don't want you warming my bed once a month for a couple days, or even once a week. I want you here every night." Deneigh explained, choking back her emotion.

"Deeny, they've offered me the position and it will push me into 6 figures, you won't even have to work. If I turn this down, my position back there becomes untenable. Don't you see I did this for US?"

"I told you from the start not to volunteer and make yourself that open for change. As soon as you left you know they had to groom someone for your job here. What did I tell you?" She asked him in an "I told you so" attitude.

"You said I could cut the deck and go for a few days, but if I stayed and tried for the job, it was reshuffling. You can't unshuffle the deck. You were right, but the opportunity here is tremendous. How could I turn it down?" He tried to reason with her.

"Easy, by thinking of me first, but you thought your future was more important than me, just like I think mine is more important than you. I guess we've been wagging the dog all along in many ways. It hurts, but maybe we're better off finding out now." She said softening her tone.

With their hard words to each other the relationship came crashing down around them. Deneigh was hurt but somewhat relieved to get it over with because she had foreseen the end for a few weeks now and had futile hopes there was a way to save it. She knew if he was offered the job, they were done. That domino fell and only met the others in the line that were already crashing from the other end, in her mind. Right away she thought about her other prospects, the few offers for dates she turned down each week, wondering if a relationship loomed somewhere in that web.

She thought at first to sit and cry and drown the finality of her relationship with a bottle of wine, but she knew what sort of mood the wine would put her in. Instead she gathered her thoughts and went to the street and took a cab to Robben's apartment. With no malice in mind she quickly went through and took her personal things from the bathroom and bedroom. After going through the CD's and bookshelf she was satisfied that she had taken what was hers. Anything she deemed as "theirs", she left. There was still a part of her heart to break and she supposed if the break-up was done face to face she might feel differently than she did now. She didn't want to dislike Robben, she had too much joy in the relationship to do that. Satisfied that the two flat bottomed Bloomingdales handle bags she left by the door were all she could call hers from the relationship she went to the dining table where she knew he would sort his mail everyday. She slipped his key off her ring and then the diamond off her finger and placed them on a yellow legal pad he had set out for notes. She picked up the pen and wrote, "Goodbye, be well with your new life and please call when you want to talk. Love Always, Deeny."

Only her family and a few close friends from her childhood still called her Deeny but Robben had picked it up and liked how cute it sounded. She smiled as she wrote it but as the elevator delivered her to the ground floor and she walked to the street to hail a cab, tears began to form at her eyes. She would truly miss Robben in many ways, but she was sure of her decision. On Monday morning life would go on as she set her life's course towards her goal.

The message light on her phone was blinking upon her return and she pressed it to hear a long rambling narrative from Robben about how she hadn't given his proposal a chance and he didn't want to break up, basically everything they had talked about for a while now. Although she didn't want the confrontation, she decided to call him back and after 4 rings she was turned over to his answering machine. "I'm sorry," the computer generated voice said, "this users message bank is full, please call again later." She hung up mad because it was one of the things that bugged her about him, he didn't pick-up messages. She wondered if he kept the same password as his machine stateside. If so, she could erase the bank, leave a message and leave a page for him to check messages. Now, she didn't want to actually talk to him, she feared getting too emotional and losing track of the words she wanted to use. She redialed his phone and entered the number equivalent of DEENY at the tone, 4-5-5-14-25, with the intention of erasing the bank. When the prompt played to edit, play or erase messages her curiosity got the best of her and said PLAY. Her heart broke as she heard a long string of intimate messages from the same female voice; he was definitely involved with some one over there. She wanted to get upset, but now the breakup had become final in every way. She knew she had cheated with one night stands to satisfy sexual hunger, but he was trying to deceive her with a whole other love life in the UK. The break up had become easier now.

If her talks with Selena or her seeking of advice from Selena had taught her anything, it was that fact was fact. Wishing and hoping could not change what was cold hard fact. Steel yourself and move forward through the remains of shattered dreams, tossing aside self pity and a new hope, a fresh dawn will appear. With her heart breaking over Robben's deception and lies, a love lost as well as the inner security of intimate personal relationship, she opened her Columbia University Fall Evening Semester Guide to increase her workload to hasten her goal of partnership with WSGG. She knew she may never have the full financial savvy of a Selena or a Slim, but her professionalism, command of word power and presentation had helped lay the foundation of the new WSGG from the stodgy old WSG and the think tanks neo-twenty first century outlook and feel. When she had approached John Branniff and J Trace Fountain about the future possibility of partnership they assured her that her vast knowledge of the firm's direction would count heavily in her quest. She had become an unseen face in the recent makeover of the personality of the firm. They both gave her confidence that her goal was do-able and Selena's prodding solidified her aspiration.

Monday morning faces at WSGG offered no hint of the weekend's events nor the inner peace or turmoil behind the facade of "good morning" smiles. No one knew Deneigh was no longer engaged or in life distress and that she would spend her lunch hour on the phone with a guidance counselor at Columbia to increase her class load. Her game face was as it always was as she greeted each member of The Six and Slim. Even though Slim came in by himself there was no guilty smile or give-away whatsoever that they had used each other for hard core sex stress relief. It truly had meant nothing to her except a night of no strings pleasure. For Slim it reminded him of a life-style he was once accustomed to and tuned in with. Now that reminder left him with a shallow feeling and a deep yearn in his heart for the relationship he had built with Shelley.

Slim was convinced that it wasn't a rebound relationship and forward it should go. Today was the day he was to call her and tell her he wanted to go forward or not. He felt certain inside she would want to do the same. They had tried to reach this point without any sex at all, but they both gave in to their needs that gnawed at them like pimply faced teenagers. They had decided early on that sleeping together would color the relationship too much, but a night of petting too far over the line helped fine tune the definition of "sleeping together". At first it was just mutual masturbation and then it progressed to helping each other with the task. A third night in a row of this led Shelley to say she "couldn't help herself" and dropped her mouth over the penis in her hand. After cumming Slim reciprocated leaving both of them tuned to a pitch that only real intercourse would solve. It was then they decided to take the break from each other while Slim went to New York. Either of them visiting for each weekend would have resulted in long sweaty sessions in bed further clouding their questions about each other. Now it had been a month when either of them could test other waters if the situation arose. Slim gave into the pressures with Deneigh, but he knew it was her prodding and alcohol that made those decisions. He never really felt guilty over the tryst because he felt so coerced in the situation. He was well aware that Saturday morning he missed Shelley just as much, even though his machismo had been stroked knowing he had plundered the desirable morsel at the front desk. It reminded him of a person he didn't like too much in the long run, his old self. He still kept the skirt chaser persona, but now everyone he used it on knew it was a front. He had spent too many Holidays alone and wondering when he might settle down. Now he yearned to be corralled.

Although Selena may not have looked any more contented than her usual self that Monday, she had had a taste of what time alone with Joe, and time with no constraints with Joe might be like over the past few days and it made her soar. Now they had certainly experienced plenty of free days, weeks and even months where they were each others alone, but this past weekend had a different flavor to it. Joe was free and easy and quick to drop his routine just to be the other half of "them". Their lovemaking had been spontaneous and playful, yet intense to a point where their eyes would meet and burn like heat at the other as if they had plugged into each others electrical pleasure panel. Late Saturday morning in the confines of the large shower stall she imagined sparks flew as she offered him her bottom. The stall was not as big as the spacious glass enclosed unit of their home upstate, but still this true walk-in shower was the tipping point in their decision on this New York apartment. The stall was full of steam and their bodies were dripping when she pulled the towel from the door bar and laid it on the wet floor as the water still dripped from the shower head as it waited to be turned back up again. She lay on the towel face down, her upper torso propped up on her elbows and forearms as Joe took the lube bottle from the shampoo rack. Their playing had left her relaxed and easy to dilate as he squeezed a puddle of the copious gel between her gorgeous globes. She exhaled deeply as his fingers played and pulled a bit and let the gel run into her. A moment later she heard the sticky slick sound of him masturbating his cock with the same stuff, coating himself. He nudged her legs closer together as he knelt spread eagle with her body between his legs. Leaning up on one arm he fit his cock between the cute cheeks of her bottom and hit his target. As he slid deep within her pain seared in her loins but it quickly ebbed as he pressed within her fully and held himself tightly to her. He had, in one breath-taking stroke, filled her. If the pain of his intrusion was still there, it was taking a back-seat to the fulfilled longing of being stretched and filled by her lover. Joe's body may have denied him of a few athletic pleasures, but being able to drop and do a quick 20 push-ups was still in his repertoire. He wasted no time doing just that as he hovered over her and plowed her bottom as she tipped her head to catch his eyes as his stroking was hitting her spot and she was in pleasure free-fall. That meeting of their eyes is the precise moment that she swore sparks flew. Her orgasm was just taking her breath away and the days third deposit of cum for her was just poised to burn up his shaft. Time stood still and sparks flew leaving an imagined residue of sulfur in the air as he made a final thrust into her body and fell onto her, his hips still rutting at her little hole. His full weight on her and his hands now mashing the tits she still held off the floor with her arms he was fully encircled over and around her, as well as deep inside her. This was her nirvana. If only she could have him in her vagina as well and be able to taste the juice he had just shot up her bowels. It was all so surreal, like a being could rise from within her and watch like a voyeur as he finished his orgasm into her. All sense and memory left her for that split second. There was no thing in the universe that meant anything else except that moment. It was so intense that it was easy to recall and replay "that moment" like some bizarre snippet of video tape. But she knew the context of the replay and "bizarre" was hardly the word. It was more like the running sum of her feelings and every time she rechecked it, it was a larger number. She knew that their retirement would be full of those moments and the sum of their love would make them a trio.