Chapter 19

"There's a slumber party tomorrow night," Pete relayed. "Yeah -- why would I tell you if you weren't? With me, of course. I don't know -- I think Michael likes your sister. So? Is there a line? Maybe she should change her mind!"

I watched Pete wade through the minefield, pleased with his level of confidence. Joy was an easy mark, for a female, but a week ago he would have been out of his depth.

"Look, just come over tomorrow night, prepared to spend the night," Pete rasped into the phone. "It'll all be fine. We can talk about all this other stuff then." He handed the phone to Kate. "Women!"

Kate pinched Joy off. "Joy? I need to talk to Gina. You can talk to Pete all night tomorrow night -- just put Gina on the phone."

"I'm gonna need a gag," Pete mumbled.

"That's what cocks are for," I chuckled. "Don't worry about it -- I'm sure you'll find a way to distract her. It's fear. You guys didn't follow through very well, so she's worried that she's just a fuck."

"So? What's wrong with that?"

"Girls generally want something else," I advised. "With a girl, there is always the expectation that you'll come back to the well -- and you'll pay for it, one way or another."

"Do I have to listen to this?" Heather asked, rolling her eyes.

"You can leave," I retorted, "or you can learn something fundamental about the difference between girls and boys." I turned my attention back to the boys. "With us, sex is good clean fun -- but with girls comes the complication of reproduction. If they spread for you there is always the chance that you'll grace them with nine months of disruptive behavior by their own bodies followed by an obligation that lasts for life. That being the case, they look for a little more in the way of an investment. I'm not talking about money, here -- although it tends to end up costing it in fantastic amounts -- I'm talking about affection and protection and support. They want to know that if they start to sprout, you'll be around to help with the result."

"Jeez," Michael grunted, "Who wants to sign in blood for it?"

"Exactly," I nodded. "So it's a delicate negotiation -- especially the first time. If sex didn't have consequences, you could probably stop a girl on the street and fuck on the sidewalk -- they stand to get as much from it as we do and sometimes more. But there ARE consequences, so they're gonna press -- HARD -- to get you to sign their insurance policy. There ARE girls out there who are fuck-buddies -- but you generally know one by the way THEY bring the subject up and let you know all they want is the fuck, up front."

"So," Pete mused, "this crap with Joy..."

"Joy is a lightweight -- you know that. She wants to be cuddled and reassured that the minute you unplug from her you're not going to pretend that you don't know her. She has low self-esteem and more or less expects you to do just that -- but she has hope. You have a couple of choices; you can play her -- string her along while you get yours -- or you can be honest with her. The up-side with Joy is that she's malleable -- you can pretty much define how you want to deal with her and she'll adapt, because you're the only game in town and she's scared to death she'll be knocked out of play. But if you dick her over and she is unhappy about it, eventually, SOMETHING better will come along -- or even something that LOOKS better -- and she'll jump."

"So what do I do?" Pete asked.

"The temptation is to go with the flow and tell her what she wants to hear to make her happy," I advised, "but it isn't fair. Try to make up your mind -- even if it's just for now -- and be honest with her. She's gonna be a clinging vine -- you can enjoy it or you can hate it. If you enjoy it, it can be serious medicine for your ego -- but if it gets tiresome, shit hits the fan pretty quickly."

Pete grimaced. "Will it go on forever?"

"Well, probably not," I mused. "She'll probably grow some confidence eventually and get her legs under her. Then you'll probably wish she hadn't." I grinned. Turning to Heather, I asked, "Did I tell any lies?"

Heather frowned. "No, I guess not. So with guys, it's all about the sex?"

"Well, Hon, sex is more important to guys -- although I think girls enjoy it more, just because they deny themselves," I explained. "Guys -- especially guys your age -- are always about to boil over; nature has provided them with an almost inexhaustible supply of little babymakers under pressure to get out. Males don't have the instinct to seek protection for their offspring you have, either -- they were given the imperative to hit as many targets as they can. The purpose is the same -- propagation of the species -- but they're in charge of planting seeds and you're in charge of farming and harvesting. It's a different mindset. It's why guys cheat -- it's almost instinctive. I'm not making excuses, I'm just stating fact -- if a girl waves it in front of a guy, he's gonna bite -- it's his job to plow any woman who will let him. His brain shuts down and his dick starts thinking for him and he climbs in the saddle. Afterwards, he'll probably remember that he has other commitments, but the damage will be done. Similarly, it's pretty easy to hold a guy -- you just need to make yourself available to take the overflow on a regular basis so he doesn't have to wander, and generally he'll step up to the plate and give you what YOU want. But a lot of women think that marriage and motherhood is the goal, and once it's accomplished, everything is easy street -- and they forget that he's STILL producing that overage of babymakers and if she decides she's done, he WILL find another place to put them! Welcome to divorce!" I shrugged. "Am I oversimplifying things? Maybe. There is love and honor and duty and all that stuff. But look around -- I've just described the default behavior. Do you know the difference between men cheating and women cheating?"

Heather blinked. "No."

"With women, it's about having someone else steal their shot at motherhood. It's about losing their stability and their protection. It's about the asshole guy reneging on a contract to take care of her and their kids and wandering off to poke some slut who might end up with a call on his resources -- meaning she'll have to share, at best, or lose out, at worst. Guys, on the other hand, usually get pissed because they've SIGNED that contract in order to reap the benefits -- and in many cases, they're STILL not getting enough, but they're trying to settle -- and the little bitch involved is letting someone else use the facilities he's paying for."

"You make it sound like we're a collection of holes for guys to stick their penises in!" Heather groused.

"If you take away some of the finer emotions associated with it and boil it down to biological essentials, that's the case," I replied. "Now, without those finer emotions, sex is just masturbation with a body, but when we're talking about base motivations and biology, that's what you get. If a guy comes up to you in a club, what is your first assessment of his motives?"

Heather pursed her lips. "He wants in my panties."

I nodded. "And you would be correct. Frankly, in most cases, if he didn't have that imperative, he wouldn't bother with you -- women are notoriously cantankerous beasts -- grasping, bossy, harder to control than herding cats -- it's probably why we were allowed more or less direct means of control over most of history. We just don't have the tools to spend a lot of time making you happy by guessing at and then fulfilling your little wants and needs. Giving you a quick swat upside the head so you settle for what you've got is a damned sight easier." I chuckled. "Look around -- all the rules that have been put in place to protect women's equality has virtually killed dating among adults -- now you have to go to an online dating service -- which is an admission by the female that she REALLY DOES want a man -- to lend any degree of safety to dating." I shook my head. "It's also one of the reasons that homosexuality is on the rise -- people of your own gender understand your needs and are more likely to sympathize and put up with them -- particularly if they, too, are unsatisfied. Homosexual males can get sex fairly easily from another homosexual male -- without strings, because their mutual interest is unloading excess jizz. They can -- and do -- do it totally anonymously. Neither of them is going to be likely to ask for an emotional commitment -- it isn't required. If they do, it's because they think they've got a good thing going and want to keep it. Lesbians will get their cuddle and mutual protection and fulfillment in each other's arms. Frankly, the sex isn't optimal in either case, since nothing is being put where it belongs, but they just reorient themselves by saying 'but it's so much easier -- so much better... ' and they live with the substitutes."

Heather shivered. "That's a cold and ugly viewpoint."

I shrugged. "It's based upon observation and experience. Look at your mother..." I changed the subject. "You girls need to get your party organized." With that, I attempted to escape.

Amy blocked my path. "Uh uh. You need to finish this seminar, Cletus. Enquiring minds want to know."

"Look," I replied, "I'm just saying that men and women have different needs and goals, and that while they ARE complementary, it sometimes doesn't seem like it. Recently, we've put some things in place as a society that sound wonderful, but they lead to relationship issues involving gender roles."

Amy cocked her head. "What?"

I looked around. Everyone else was hooked, too. I sighed. "Let's settle in and relax, and I'll try to explain the world according to Cletus." Amy and Kate basically pushed Michael off his lounger so they could both occupy it -- so he moved to a straight chair, and Heather settled into the third in the set, Pete holding the second. "Marriage. Marriage is designed to be a partnership that capitalizes on gender roles -- that set of complementary needs and goals between guys and gals. But recently, we've handed a bunch of male roles to gals and we've removed any redress to the situation by guys. Now guys are signing that contract and discovering that it has no teeth -- or worse -- it HAS teeth, but only to bite HIM with. That's largely because in some places the legal system hasn't caught up with society, either, and laws put in place to protect gals from abuse back when they had no other protections are being used to extract more than their fair share of things now. Now, you can talk about getting even and the pendulum swinging and all that bullshit, but the fact is that males coming up now didn't do a damned thing to deserve what they're getting -- or what they're NOT getting. It's similar to the myth that whites owe blacks for the slavery gig -- whites might have enslaved blacks, but that was THEN and people living NOW didn't have shit to do with it."

I caught myself. "But I digress. Part of the current problem is the universal push for self-actualization -- everybody is told that they should get theirs and fuck everybody else. But married people enter into a partnership and have responsibilities to each other. Complicating this is the gender role thing. Let me see if I can explain -- realize, now, that this is the male viewpoint -- but most of the changes have been about how females are dealt with, so I don't think it's THAT skewed. Use your own judgment."

The disclaimer out, I proceeded, "Guys and gals meet because they are attracted to one another -- usually a big component of this is physical, especially at the start. Two people meet at a club, they dance, they talk, they feel each other up, they like what they see and hear and feel and they move on to dating and sleeping together and so on. The sleeping together thing is important -- women know this instinctively, so they play it, using it as a tool, withholding it or granting it according to the situation. Oh, sure, it gets away from them, romantically or physically, but ultimately, it's their primary weapon -- and if she puts it out there when she has to and makes it attainable but not too simple -- meaning not without commitment -- she'll probably reel the guy in. Marriage ensues, and everything is rosy. They build a home together and maybe she gets pregnant and all is right with the world." I paused a moment and sat back.

"But here is where society has torqued things. Back in the caveman days, the male was in charge of putting food on the table and the female was in charge of making sure he had a place to come home to, the food got made edible, and a shitload of kids got punched out to take some of the workload off both of them. Part of that set of duties was rolling over and spreading her legs for the old man to get the only jollies the world allowed him before TV. Now, evolution is a wonderful thing, but societies evolve faster than species; men haven't changed all that much, and to be fair, neither have women -- but society has, and it has mapped roles for both sexes that are very different than what we have programmed. Women work outside the home -- many HAVE TO -- and this means that there is no one AT home to take care of the home fires. Women are told that they need to compete with men -- and there are leftover rules on the books that tend to make it possible to win..."

I scratched my razor stubble. "So we come back to our happy couple. They're infatuated with each other. Everything seems rosy. But time and altered circumstances come into play. She works -- she has to, because he's in an entry-level job and they couldn't eat if he didn't. But when they come home, he wants her to cook, too. Uh oh ... Maybe they get past that. She gets pregnant -- and again, everything is rosy, because guys find pregnant chicks to be incredibly sexy. The reason is simple -- he can point to her belly and say, 'I'm a man -- I did my job, see?' But after the birth, we again have problems. You see, the woman is more than likely to see that some of her major goals in the relationship have been met at that point, and the priority is now on motherhood. She doesn't want to work outside the home -- she now has a full-time job INSIDE the home and she's very happy with her lot -- because the whole little house with a white picket fence and two point five kids is well in hand. HE, on the other hand, has to take a second job to cover her lost wages. With motherhood in the forefront and the realization of a good many of her spoken and unspoken goals, she is fat, dumb, and happy -- sometimes literally -- but HE is suddenly seeing zero return on his now massive investment! You see, the sex that was a part of their initial chemistry and a basic part of the contract between them has been withdrawn -- the kids interrupt all the time, or she's tired, and so on. He's tired, too, from working two jobs; he doesn't want to chase it and put up with a bunch of crap and make three hours worth of preparations -- he wants mama to roll over and put out. And there are added dimensions; remember when I told you that papa thought pregnancy was cool? Well, it was cool when she was swollen with child, but when she's still swollen six months after the kid has left the womb, that's not as cool. Remember that physical attraction is a big draw, here -- and now it's greatly reduced. Add to that the fact that she's happy with where she is and complacent and not trying to do anything about getting that attraction back -- maybe even working at being less enticing in order to avoid all that tiring sex -- and things are crap for the male. The female is NOT performing her duties according to the contract -- but since those duties are not carefully specified -- 'cleave unto thee only' is still fulfilled as a promise if she cleaves unto NOBODY -- society jumps in and tells him he has no right to expect what he got into the contract for in the first place. If you go eight weeks without and decide not to take no for an answer, you end up in jail for raping your wife, because 'no means no'. She's a happy, devoted mother who is queen of all she surveys, thoroughly self-actualized according to society's model, and he is a stiff working two jobs and coming home to a fat bitch who won't even put out -- and he has NO RECOURSE! Divorce ensues -- and he gets the knife AGAIN, because marriage is the only contract where the non-performing party can extract a penalty for the rest of her life for having the contract broken." I sat back. "I honestly cannot recommend marriage under any circumstances in this day and age."