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Wicked Ch. 01

By: InkWolfe



Alli and Wanda were walking home from the bar. Wanda was talking about her new sports motorcycle.

"It's called the Interceptor and it's black. Honda, 2009, 540 pounds. I traded it for the orange 2007 and only had to pay $ 5, 000," She said with pride.

Wanda only drove sports bikes. She couldn't stand driving cars. 

"Coolness," I smiled. 

We continued walking. I was looking at a hulking figure across the street who looked like he was holding a gun when Wanda let out a shriek that was quickly cut off. I whipped around just as a huge hand was clamped over my mouth. 

"Got ourselves two pretties tonight," A gruff accented male voice said. I glared at a tall red haired wiry man that had walked around my right side and into view. The man holding Wanda was tattooed all over and was bald and all muscles. Suddenly there was a whoosh and the red haired man disappeared with a yell. I heard a squish and then a yell. And the bald guy disappeared and there were the same noises. And then I was set free. For a few seconds anyway. Something grabbed me and haulked me into the air. I yelped ad struggled. 

"Hold still," A voice growled into my ear. I couldn't not disobey that voice. I was jostled as there was a clang and then a sting in my throat. I yelped and then the horrible stinging was followed by intense sexual pleasure. I cried out and grabbed onto whoever was holding me. Quickly an orgasm raced through my body and I buried my face in warm hard chest that was unmistakably male. 

"Honey," A deep voice purred in my ear. I looked up into the most beautiful face I had ever seen in my entire life. He was gorgeous. Thick dark brown hair with light blond highlights and sexy milk chocolate brown eyes. We were standing on a fire escape in front of an apartment window. The window was open and my rescuer herded me through it into a bedroom. The bedroom was furnished with a maroon and gold comforter on a king bed, two dark oak nightstands with iron table lamps that had cream shades and a dark oak dresser. And a panther laid on the bed. I backed up against my rescuer in fear. The panther twitched it's tail tip and I could've sworn it looked amused. And in the blink of an eye Wanda lay in place of the panther. I gasped and leapt on her, pulling her into my arms and kissing every inch of her I could reach.She laughed and kissed me back. 

"You're a panther?" I asked, still a bit shocked.

"Yes," She replied. That was when I realized she was completely naked.

"Um..." I looked around but didn't see the sexy male anywhere in sight. 

"That's Aristotle. He's a vampire. He probably fed from you outside. If you had an orgasm, then yes, he did," Wanda explained. I felt my face heat up. She smiled and cuddled up against me. 

"I know it's strange. Vampires and Werebeasts. But honey, trust me, that's not all," Wanda chuckled.

"Damn. Six years and I never knew," I said quietly.

"Here," Aristotle was in the doorway. He had a pile of clothes which he threw at Wanda. 

"The others are on their way," He said, then left.

"Others?" I asked.

"Good people. Like Aris and I. Werebeasts and Vampires," Wanda answered. "There's even a witch."

"Wow," Was all I could say. "So now I'm the only human?"

"Not if we become mated. Then you'll become a Werecat like me," Wanda replied. I gave her a questioning look.

"You whore. We don't have time for that right now," She teased. I punched her playfully on the shoulder. She leapt off the bed suddenly and started pulling on the clothes Aristotle had brought. When she was dressed a huge buff guy with dark brown hair and chilling icy green eyes stepped into the room. His eyes swept coldly over me.

"Aris says it's time to go," He barked. His voice was a low rumbling rasp. He left quietly.

"What a cuddle bug," I said sarcastically. 

"That's Odo. He's a Werebear. He morphs into the biggest Grizzly I've ever seen,"Wanda said. She started toward the door. I followed her. What an interesting mess I'd ended up in. We went out to an open living room/dining room plan where there were lots of people. 

"There's twelve of us," Wanda whispered in my ear. As soon as we had walked out into the open, everyone had grown quiet. I observed the room quickly. About seven men and five women. Aristotle was talking to a tall leggy red haired lady in the far corner in shadow. 

"Ugh. Female on female relationships. Gives me the creeps," The red haired lady wrinkled her nose at Wanda and I. I bristled and took a step toward her. The man who was a Werebear held out a hand and held me back. 

"Stop it Quen," Aristotle growled.

"Why? It's disgusting." I was thoroughly pissed now and leapt forward. Something happened. Pain burst in my spine and when I landed on the ground it was on four paws. My paws were covered in silver fur. I held a paw up to my face in shock. Everyone was staring at me now.

Wicked Ch. 02



Chapter Two is here!!! i do not have an editor so any faults are mine :) I hope you like and please comment to tell me what you thought!



Oh hell, I thought. Wanda was the first to move. 

"It's okay Alli. Do you remeber what you look like in human form?" I opened my mouth to speak but only a small growl escaped. 

We can talk privately via thoughts. You morphed into a Canadian lynx. Wanda's voice said inside my head.

How... do I... morph back? I asked hesitantly, wondering if she would hear me.

Do you remember what you look like in human form?

Yes.

Keep that picture in your head for a while. Soon you will be human again, Wanda explained. I did not want to picture myself. That was ridiculous. But if I wanted to be a human again... After about a minute I was sitting on the floor naked. Everyone but Aristotle had vanished. A pile of clothes sat next to me. 

"When you morph you destroy or lose, your clothes," Aristotle explained.

"Oh," Was all I said. I was still shocked. Wanda took me into her arms and held me, crooning softly. I didn't see the quick glance she exchanged with Aristotle. 

"Well. You're one of us now," Aris sighed. I nodded. 

"Dress." His tone was sharp. It meant obey. I hurriedly stood and pulled on a black bra, black T-shirt, white cotton panties and jeans. 

"Let's go. We can't stay here anymore. They come at dawn," He walked over to a chair and picked up a huge automatic rifle. Aristotle saw me eyeing it.

"I may be a vampire but I still have some toys," He grinned. Wanda had turned off the lights. As we walked out the door she turned and threw something inside the apartment.

"A computer disguised to look like a large bug. Our computer expert Leon will monitor them when they get to the apartment," Wanda said.

"Them?" I asked. Aristotle and Wanda exchanged a look. 

"Newborn vampires and their master. They have been programmed to rip us apart. We call ourselves the Guardians of Merole. Our rivals are the Warriors of Metamorphasis. They will do anything to wipe us out. We must leave the city," Aristotle led us to a huge GMC All-Terrain truck. Without argument I followed Wanda in. She sat in the middle. Aris started the car and started down the street.

"I am actually 250 years old. My old name is Windsorn. I'm sorry I didn't tell you this sooner Alli," Wanda admitted. I was astonished.

"I am 2, 412 years old and my old name still is Aristotle. In public my cover name is Liam," Aris turned right. 

"So where did the others go?" I queried.

"To our hideout deep in the country. They ran once out of the city. Running is faster than driving," Wanda answered.

"So much information," I mused quietly. I heard Aris chuckle. We were now out on a backroad and driving through Sherman's Forest. Aris turned left and onto a dirt lane. After about two miles he parked beside a 2011 Ford Fusion. About seven other cars were there also in a parking lot. A wooden shack stood there and a chain link fence that looked to be about fifteen feet tall and topped with sharp looking barbed wire. A gate was open leading into the woods. 

"Let's go," Wanda shucked off her clothes and then her body rippled. Instantly she was a black panther. Aris looked expectantly at me. 

"Um..." I shyly pulled my clothes off, turning my back to him, and wondered how to morph.

Picture a lynx Wanda encouraged. I pictured a silver lynx and then I felt a strange sensation run through my body. My spine didn't hurt this time and I landed on four paws quietly. I was a lynx again. Right away Wanda started through the gate. I followed. I heard the gate clank shut behind us and knew Aris had shut it and was going to lock it. Wanda leapt beautifully over logs and such and I admired her. I struggled to keep up. Soon we were at a clearing. Cabins were in the shadows at the far side of the clearing. Odo and an huge albino man stood guarding the clearing. When they saw us, they nodded. Wanda slowed and trotted toward the cabins. I slinked after her, feeling the eyes upon me. She led me to a cabin in the far back and morphed, going inside. Hesitantly, I followed her. She tossed me clothes and I put them on. As she dressed I looked around. It was one room with a double bed, fireplace, wooden chair and two animal skins on the floor. A basket with fruit in it sat on the chair. 

"So you didn't go to work?" I teased.

"No," She answered, coming over and kissing me on the cheek. I followed her back out of the cabin, shutting the heavy door, and she went up to a blond guy who was gorgeous.

"Any word Leon?" She asked.

"No. But sunrise is just here," He replied. I looked over at the horizon. The sky was getting very light. Night had already passed? Wow. But it had been late morning when Wanda and I had left the bar. And ended up here. Movement on Leon's computer screen distracted me. A tall very pale man with dark brown hair and dark red eyes was prowling into the apartment. Suddenly men and women streamed past him, you could hear their growls and snarls as they sniffed the air and went looking around. The pale brunette man looked around then his eyes connected with the camera. A second passed and then blackness.



Wicked Ch. 02







Wicked Ch. 02



"He's a real dick, your ex. You want me to beat him up?" Ben said.

Ana gave a short bitter laugh. "Don't tempt me."

"I could if you want me to."

"Don't, he's still the father of my kids and anyway he'll probably punch your lights out. He was a boxing champion when he was twenty one."

"So fucking what?" Ben flexed his muscles.

Ana's tears stopped flowing but her anger was still there. Son of a bitch, hurt her through her kids, would he? The only sacred thing in her life right now and he promised to destroy that. She'll show him. "If you really want to hurt him, then don't leave right now, come here." She said.

"And then what?"

Ana motioned with her finger. When he stepped closer she grabbed his cock and went down to her knees. "This is A." Her delicate lips enveloped the soft member. She pushed it all the way in and her tongue tickled his testicles.

"I don't care for B." Ben said quickly. "Ooooh. A is the best. Fuck B and fuck your ex."

@@@@@@@

At eleven thirty Ana's mobile woke her up again. She snuggled closer to Ben.

She yawned. "Alice?"

"Did I wake you, sweetheart?" Alice said.

"A bit."

"David Copperfield would be proud."

"What? Who?"

"The magician." Alice sounded pleased with herself. "You pulled a disappearance trick on me last night."

"It was late and I couldn't find you, so I left."

"I guess the Chin, Chin club scene, is not right up your alley, huh?" Alice said.

"No, it's ok."

"We'll aim for a quieter place next time." Alice said. "Your style kind of place. Hmmm... They're having a bingo night at the retirement home in Herzl street tomorrow, what do you say?"

"Bitch."

"Grandma said that the food was terrible, but the sex, Wow!"

"You're twisted."

Alice laughed. "So the Chin Chin was a complete waste of time, huh? No one even caught your eye?"

Ana raised her head. Ben was sleeping with his finger in his mouth. "Nada. I went home and went straight to bed."

"I bet you did." Alice said.

"Yep, that's exactly what I did."

"And does Ben still likes to play A and B and wiggle his tongue where the sun don't shine?"

"No way!" Ana eyelids went a mile up.

The line went dead.

Ana called her sister. "Alice?"

"Sorry, sis, I just laughed so hard, I accidently dropped the phone."

"Bitch! Stop playing with me." Ana said. "How come you know about Ben?"

"You were sitting there like scarecrow, chasing all the birds of prey away." Alice said. "Who do you think sent Ben over? I even paid for the drink he bought you. The dummy is as cheap as they get, but boy, what a tongue."

"You did?"

"You're still half asleep, sweetie, go wash your face. I told him that you've just ended a bad relationship and that you desperately needed someone to storm the cotton gin, as they say."

"No you didn't."

"Well, I was more vulgar, but since you're a prude princess I won't tell you the exact words so I won't stain that innocent soul of yours... Oh, wait, I guess you're not a prude innocent princess anymore." Alice started laughing again.

"Shut up. I'm still a princess."

"So how is the princess feeling this morning?" Alice said

"Not so great."

"Come on."

"I just found out that what I thought was entirely my conquest was not mine at all." Ana said.

"Oh, sure it was, Silly." Alice laughed. "When I pointed you to Ben he almost lost his teeth when his jaw hit the floor. So how was he? Not the sharpest pencil, I know, but he can sure wham bam."

"He's still here, sleeping."

"Oh my God." Alice cried. "What time did you went to sleep?"

"I don't know. The sun came up."

"Oh my God!" Alice screamed. "How many times did you two do it?"

"Five times tonight and two more just this morning. Plus a delicious blow job."

"Oh...My... Goodness... Sister, this goes way... You'll start giving me lessons, soon. Wow, I wanna hear each and every gory, steaming, delicious detail. This is sooooo great."

"It was amazing, Alice, I've never felt so, so... alive."

"Nothing like Dan."

"I know it's a horrible thing to say, but it was different country better, hell, different planet better."

Alice whistled in mirth. "You don't know how happy that makes me."

"Well, Dan didn't take it so good."

"Who cares about your dipshit husband? The details..."

"We had a huge fight." Ana said.

"The days when he could tell you what you should or shouldn't are over. The idiot signed a contract, you're covered."

"I fear this is not the end of it." Ana sighed.

@@@@@@@@@

An hour later Ben had finally took off. He left behind a sweaty memory, his phone number, and a promise from Ana to call him soon. The house was empty. Dan didn't return from the kids' school, which was odd. She tried to call him but his mobile kept bouncing her to the voicemail.

"Come on, pick up..."

"This is Dan, I can't take your call right now or don't want to. So leave a message and I might call you back. Bip..."

Son of a bitch. "Dan, this is your wife calling for the tenth time. This is not about you and me, this has nothing to do with our fight. We still have two kids, and I want to hear how they are and if they arrived on time."

She busied herself by cleaning her bedroom, removing the traces of last night. Sweaty, stained sheets, used condoms, and her Chin, Chin Club reeking dress. She looked at the ruined bed and had a pang of guilt. She and Dan shared so many good memories on that bed. She had her two adorable kids made on that bed. Good sex too. When they were students Dan would take the three hour drive from his new work up north just to be with her for two hours on that bed, before he would hit the road back.

She started surfing the web for a new bed. Never one to leave a job half done, she went into Decorate-Your-House forums, asked the experts and compared prices on a large number of online stores. One store caught her as particularly interesting. It offered a huge selection of bedroom beds and accessories. The quality of the material was good and the prices more than reasonable. The only thing that bothered her was a popup for an online chat request from the site. The little window kept bouncing up every time she closed it, promising new sales and hot items. She was about to surf away when the popup window jumped once more.

"Try our High Performance Sex Bed. Mad, mad, mad sale this weekend only!!!"

"Am I talking to a chat bot?" Ana typed

"No, no, no, I'm a real person." The other side typed quickly. "People hate the bots, we don't use them anymore."

"Prove it." Ana typed.

"That's tough. Ok, looking at the sport headlines today, wow..." The other side stopped typing.

"Hello????" Ana typed.

"Maccabee Tel Aviv, sacked coach Pini Gershon, again. This sucks."

"I'm not into Football. :}" Ana typed.

"Football? Pini Gershon? Really? I'm talking to a woman, right?"

"LOL."

"So, you're into our High Performance Sex Bed? We've got a crazy deal for you."

"What's a High Performance Sex Bed?"

"Sending a link." The man from the site wrote.

Ana followed the link on the chat screen to a short movie that openly portrayed the adventures of a happy sexy couple. The bed had a canopy made of sturdy wooden poles crossing the top, with handholds made for convenient grasping. In one scene the woman was hanging from the poles, and her partner was bouncing her from behind. In another scene the woman used the poles to lower herself on her partner's pole. Everyone seemed very happy. Another scene showed a harness hanging down from the canopy, while the woman strapped to it, on her back, legs spread and swayed to soft music notes. A new partner joined. A tanned blond god with a huge chest and rippling muscles. Ana always had a weakness to the Thor God of Thunder type. She felt herself moisten between her legs.

She typed quickly "With your mad, mad sale it's still very steep. It's just a bed."

"Well, you're in luck. We have a special offer this week for women who don't know Pini Gershon is just the most famous basketball coach for the most famous basketball team in Israel. Oh, and you'll also be getting a bonus a free gift. The ultimate swing for lovers who want to take it higher."

Twenty minutes later Ana stared at the online sent receipt. She would have to open a saving account so she wouldn't deviate from her already limited budget. She felt kind of guilty because it was Tom's university fee she opened when he was born. But she had plenty of time to open a new account. She never indulged herself. Just this once. This is only fair.

Her mobile rang. It was Lin from her office.

"So how was the show?" Lin asked.

"The show?" Ana's heart started pounding. Was Lin talking about her bedroom show with Ben last night? What the hell?

"Yeah, Tom's Shavuot ceremony at school, you said he was performing."

"Oh, that." Oh my God, I forgot all about it. Not only did she not drive him to school for the first time, she also forgot to show for his ceremony. So that's why Dan didn't come back, he stayed to see Tom performing. "Oh, the ceremony was great, he's a star."

"Great, you took pictures?"

"My camera broke, but I'm sure I can get the video from one of the other parents." Those who didn't fuck a stranger last night.

"Too bad. So, when are you coming to the office?"

"It's Friday." Ana regretted the words the moment they left her mouth. Oh shit, the Shalom case was starting Sunday.

"Honey? Are you on drugs?" Lin sounded really pissed. "We are going to court on Sunday. You said you'll be here right after Tom's ceremony and I said ok, because nothing is more important than a mother's being there when her son preforms. But this is really... I'm not the nerd kid doing homework for the cool guys, Ana."

Lin sure had some unsolved school issues

"Lin, I'm so, so, so, sorry. I'll be there in a flash. I simply had a crazy week and it completely slipped my mind. I'm so going to make it up to you."

"If we blow this, I'm not covering for you." Lin said.

"We won't, Lin." Shit, shit, shit, I totally blew it.





Wicked Ch. 02



"What for?"

"Hell, I wanna know how it turned out. I'm involved now, and I feel kinda responsible."

"You're not."

She shrugged.

"Before you kick me out, can I ask you to do something for me?"

"Anything, honey."

Dan lowered his collar.

@@@@@@

A group of young people passed him by, laughing and talking loud, oblivious to the hot Tel Aviv street. They were conversing in Russian, some spoke Arabic, no Hebrew. They all disappeared into the Golden Gloves Boxing Club, but the last one, a slim youth with blond hair, held the door for him.

"Are you getting in, sir?" He said in Hebrew with a heavy Russian accent.

"Just a sec."

"The intercom is dead and I can't give you the keypad combination, so..."

"Every day, in every way I'm getting better and better." Dan whispered.

"What?"

"Nothing, thanks." Dan stepped in.

The Golden Gloves had gone through a facelift lately. New floor, new lobby, new boxing arenas but somehow it didn't feel unfamiliar. The sweat, the screeches of shoes, the grunts, the shouts and the heavy smacks of leather slapping leather. It washed over Dan like a wave and filled him with longing.

"What the hell?" A tall forty and something fellow turned to him, eyes opened wide. The young guys all around the man turned their eyes too. "I'm seeing a ghost."

"And hello to you too, Maor."

"Wait, wait, guys, you know who this is? Of course you don't know. You young schmucks only know how to press the Like button on Facebook. That's him." Maor pointed at a big wall picture that showed a much slimmer, younger Dan, holding high a championship cup. "He was the biggest Israeli boxing promise in the early nineties. Before he decided that his brain was too smart to let school dropouts like you pound it."

The youth around Maor stared at Dan, none of them looked impressed. Dan couldn't blame them.

"Alright, the break is over. I wanna see everyone here doing chin ups." Maor shouted. "The Shabbat is starting in three hours and I don't want to be late to the synagogue because of you limp dick wankers."

"Well, dump me in Thai Boxing Oil and call me Muhammad fucking Ali." Maor went over and hugged Dan. "I never figured I'd see your fat ass in here ever again."

"I was in the neighborhood, you know. Since when did you start going to the synagogue? Did Edna find the light again?"

"Works for me, you schmuck."

Dan gave him a slap on the shoulder. "Looking good, Maor."

"Too bad I can't say the same about you."

"Well, do like I always do." Dan winked. "Lie."

They both laughed and that felt familiar and also sad because it was another thing Dan was missing from his life for a long time.

"Do you have some spare equipment I might use, Maoriko?"

"Fuck me, you wanna train?"

"I'm kinda tired of not being able to say hello to my dick when I stand up. So I decided, if I'm getting back in shape, at least I'll have fun."

"Hell, yeah, I got everything. Gloves, shoes, I can even give you something decent to wear."

"Thanks. Oh, and please don't tell anyone I've been here. Especially not Mom and Dad."

"What's the big secret?" Maor scanned him through half closed eyelids.

"I don't want Ana to find out."

"Why, you want to surprise her?"

"Something like that."

@@@@@@

"Fucking bitch!" Dan pounded the heavy bag giving everything he got.

"Fucking whoring slut!" Potential muscles energy transformed into kinetic energy and created a satisfying Bam.

"You still got it, Dan Dan." Maor looked at Dan with something that was almost close to respect. It made Dan feel a little better. "But that's enough for the first time, you're not twenty anymore."

"Tell me about it."

"You wanna try the real thing?"

"What? Hell no." Dan gulped air, his lungs told him they hated him. "I'm totally out of shape."

"Come on, don't be a wimp, one round."

"With you?"

"I've showered already, try this guy." Maor pointed at a short youth that pounded a trainer's punch mitts.

Dan imagined himself in place of the mitts and saw himself disintegrating into tiny Dan bits. "You're kidding, right? The guy has no neck, he looks like a huge muscle."

"Yeah, he can bam, but he's got no technique. Come on. Yo, Stephan! Move aside, I want my little brother to have a go with Mahmud."

"Fuck." Dan climbed the small arena. He nodded to Mahmud. "Just thought I'd mention that I voted for Meretz last time and I'm totally into the two states solution."

"Don't be a lefti wimp apologizer. He doesn't understand a word in Hebrew, anyway." Maor shouted.

"What?"

"He's from the territories, Ramallah. Don't worry, his papers are in order."

"That's not what I'm worrying about."

Mahmud smiled at Dan, two upper teeth were missing.

"Every day in every way, I'm getting better and better." Dan took a deep breath.

@@@@@@

"Where the hell have you been?" Ana had a green evening dress on and her lipstick was smeared. A sure sign that she was nervous.

Dan felt sweaty in places where there shouldn't be sweat, every muscle cursed him. He knew he'll feel much worse tomorrow. Mahmud held back a lot, due to respect for Dan's age, but he managed to slip in a few nice ones.

"Don't look at me like a weirdo, where the hell have you been?" Ana raised her voice.

"Do you even care?"

"Look at yourself, we have dinner with the Zohars in less than an hour."

"Cancel it. We can't afford the restaurant anyway." He said.

Ana rolled her eyes. "Grow up, Dan. The kids are sleeping at my parents' and we're going. This is not a Friday night going out. We're meeting an important client."

"Oh, so we're just gonna go into that restaurant like a perfect bourgeois couple, everything is fine and dandy."

"We had a fight, Dan, that's all, couples fight."

"So that's what it was then."

"You acted like a baby, you still do, and I got carried away."

"Something is missing from the picture you're painting." He waved his hand in the air like a man drawing on canvas. "But I'm too fucking exhausted to fill in the obvious blanks. I'm taking a shower and going to bed."

"You're coming with me."

"Have fun at the restaurant, honey, give my regards to the Zohars."

"Dan, as much as I don't like to take you with me with your current mood, that's not an option. This is my work, the one that puts food on our table, and I need you to behave like an adult and to suck it up."

"Alright, I just need ten minutes to lie down, I'm bushed"

"Exhausted from what? Where have you been? You were supposed to go to the Supermarket, the fridge is empty."

"I needed a change in atmosphere. I went to meet someone."

"Who?"

"You don't know her. We had wonderful time together."

"You what?" Ana raised her voice.

"You heard me."

"You're lying."

"Sure." Dan gave himself a mental nudge on the shoulder.

"What's her name then?"

"Irit."

"From quality assurance in NICE Systems?" Ana wrinkled her cute nose to show she didn't believe it was possible.

"What do you take me for? A pedophile? She's nineteen."

"You don't know another Irit." Ana felt waves of jealousy rising up from her gut. She knew they painted her face red and hated herself and Dan for it. "You didn't meet anyone."

"Ok, I didn't."

"Where do you know her from, then?"

"Hello, hello, Miss Spanish Inquisition. Did I ask you from where do you know the schmuck you dragged here last night?"

"You're just trying to... Wow, what a baby. I don't believe a word you're saying."

"Who gives a fuck?" Dan took off his shirt and threw it into the bag of laundry on the stairway, their middle station to the laundry room. He did the same with his pants and socks too, giving Ana time to take a good long look at the two hickey marks Irit left on both sides of his neck. The young prostitute took her time with each bite, making sure they'll take a long to heal.

"I'm getting a shower. Upstairs. And I'm going to lie down. Upstairs." He rubbed his neck where the bite could still be felt and then climbed the stairs without sparing her a second glance.

Ana stood a very long time at the bottom of the stairs like a little volcano ready to erupt. But all that came were hot tears.

@@@@@@@

"I'm telling you, Alice, he had sex with someone." Ana tried to control her sobs.

"Who? Dan?"

"Are you paying attention at all?"

"You're blubbering, stop crying for God's sake."

"He has a hickey, Alice. Two hickeys. "

"Probably made them himself just to spite you."

"On his neck? He had sex, Alice."

"Good for him." Alice said.

"What?! Are you insane?"

"Ana, this was expected at some point, I didn't see it coming so soon, but hey. Dan, even with his double chin, is still very handsome; he could find someone just like you did."

"When did he even have the chance to meet her?"

"He was probably having an affair for a long time, you just made it legit."

"Dan would never... I swear, I'm going into the kitchen right now and I'll take the sharpest knife and I'll stab his cheating balls-"

"Stop now!" Alice shouted. "You're hysterical."

"I'm not."

"I'm hanging up unless you take a deep breath and go drink a glass of cold water."

"Alice."

"Now!"

"Ok, already."

"I wanna hear you make glug, glug sounds."

Ana went to the kitchen and took a bottle of Ice Tea from the fridge.

"I don't hear you glugging." Alice said.

Ana felt a little better as some of her anger drowned in the little cup. "You sound a little strange, Sis." She said when she finished the drink.

"Botox injection. Don't laugh. I'm having a big date tonight."

"Yeah, who?" Ana said.

"Noam Lewinski."

"Noam Lewinski, like the owner of Clal insurance, Noam Lewinski?"

"Yep. He's drowning in money. He's also really cute. I think I'm in love."

"Oh, oh."

"What?" Alice sounded annoyed.

"Those were the exact words you used when you met your first, second, and third husband."

"We're going to a French restaurant in Jerusalem. Eldad and That's It."

"Fancy." Ana felt a little jealous, it's been long since anybody took her to an expansive restaurant.

"Yeah, I'm planning to surprise him on the way back. I'll unzip his joystick on Ginot Saharov, and give him the blowjob of a lifetime. When we'll reach Shaar Hagai, he'll be totally under my spell."

"You're hopeless."

"Face it Ana..." Alice voice went numb. "I'm putting you on speaker, I need to pick a dress for tonight. Face it, men are pigs. Arik started screwing my best friend one day after we came from our honeymoon."

"Arik was a pig but Dan would never do that. He just did it to get back at me, fucked with some slut." She felt the rage coming back up. "I'll cut his dick off."

"Don't get me wrong, Sis, I'm totally on your side. But don't you think you're being a tiny little bit of a hypocrite?"

"What? Hell no. I didn't do it just to hurt him. I never meant to hurt him at all."

"Does it matter?" Alice voice became loud again.

"It matters to me. I got to know who she is. Dan would never go into a bar and pick up some floozy." Ana sighed. "Oh, and you should see his body. It's covered with blue marks, what kind of sex he was having? I'm too afraid to ask."

"Then don't."

"I threw myself at his feet for a year. I forgot that I ever had dignity. I practically begged him to fuck me. And now, out of the blue, he suddenly needs sex? The man had no libido a week ago."

"Maybe his libido needed a jump start. Sometimes being jealous would do that. I don't know, Ana, what are your options? You wanna cancel the whole open marriage contract?"

"Hell no! I ain't going back."

"What do you want to do, then?"

"I wanna kill him. And her." Ana burst into tears again.

"You know, it's the same possessiveness thing as when we were kids. You would go berserk if I even touched one of your precious jeans or borrowed your lipstick. You were never great at sharing, and that's the understatement of the century."

"Dan is not a pair of jeans."

"I'm just saying that maybe open marriage is not for you."

"I'm so gonna show him. That two faced bastard."

"Are you listening at all?"

"Fucking, cheating skimming, asshole. I'll fuck the next person I see on the street. God help me, I will."

"That would certainly pick up property value in your area. Ana, dearest, this is going the wrong way. It was never about Dan or starting a war between you two. It was a about you. You're making a huge step into making it ugly. This won't end well."

"What do you want me to do?"

"You'll have to come to term with the idea, that from time to time your husband will have sex with someone who's not you."

@@@@@@@

Ana looked at her watch for the hundredth time. "I don't believe we're gonna be so late, Amiram thinks being late deserves capital punishment."

"He's not your first grade teacher, Ana, he's your partner."

"The senior partner. He puts food on your plate, Dan, he decides who gets bonuses, he can even fire me if he wants to and then where would we be?"

"Watch the road or we'll be ten feet under and terminally late." Dan pulled the chair near the driver's seat all the way back. He was shirtless and during the entire ride he pressed a bag of ice onto a black swollen area above his nipple.

"We need to open the contract again." Ana suddenly said. "Obviously, we didn't think things through. I never agreed that you can meet some who knows who, and do whatever in some filthy hotel. This, Irit, is she married?"

Dan pretended to yawn.

"How old is she?"

"Twenty eight."

"Is she pretty?"

"I didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition. Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition." Dan took a bite on his thumb's nail and spat it out on the dashboard. Very few things disgusted Ana more.

"Done amusing yourself?"

"Our chief weapon is surprise...surprise and fear...fear and surprise.... Our two weapons are fear and surprise...and ruthless efficiency.... Our three weapons are fear, surprise, and ruthless efficiency...and an almost fanatical devotion to the Pope.... Our four...no... Amongst our weaponry...are such elements as fear, surprise.... I'll come in again."

"Done amusing yourself?" Ana tried to avoid a traffic jam and almost crashed their car into a van. The fact that Dan chose someone ten years younger than her was freaking her out. She couldn't stop imagining her husband in bed pumping some clueless skank who thought that estrogen is forever.

"I did that Python sketch in the eighth grade's graduation ceremony, it's amazing, but I still remember every word. Try not to kill us, Dear."

"Did you at least use a condom?"

"You're such a control freak, Ana, it never bothered me before. Maybe my love to you does begin to fade."

"Oh, come on, Dan, you love yourself only. You stopped loving me long ago, I'm convenient, not loved. People in love don't ignore each other's needs."

"What if the shoe was on the other foot, huh?" Dan rose and winced from the pain. "If you lost your job and you felt like a worthless loser?"

"You know, that's the first time you ever said anything about how you feel about something."

"You don't have a clue how I feel." Dan snarled.

"Tell me."

"I'll do better, I'll show you."

"What do you mean?"

"I have a little confession about Irit." Dan gave a bitter smile. "The sex. It was far better than anything you and I ever had. Light years better."

"Son of a bitch."

"So how is it? All fuzzy and warm inside, ain't it?"

Ana fought the lump in her throat. "When did you become such a heartless bastard?"

"I had an excellent teacher, hon. Hey, I see the mother of all parking spaces, stop before that purple Mazda steals it."

After they parked Dan put on a white shirt he hanged in the back seat. He avoided looking straight at Ana. Her beautiful features showed a struggle and he wasn't sure if she was about to cry or throw a fit of rage. For the first time in his life he had hurt his wife intentionally and the thought that it felt enjoyable frightened him.

"No problem, Dear." Ana composed herself.

"You think?"

"No problem, if that's the way you want it... Hell, no problem. Let's go, the Zohars are waiting."

"No problem." Dan echoed her though his heart was heavy and he stepped like a man on his last walk to the gallows.

@@@@@@@@

"So I asked Liana if she knew what a gentleman was." Dan stirred his drink, postponing for the story effect. "She said, sure, Daddy, a gentlemen is just the same as a lady, only he's a man."

Amiram Zohar and his wife burst laughing.

"It's like the joke about the kid who wants to marry his mom." Amiram wiped tears from his eyes. "And he told her that... Ow, shit, I totally ruined it."

"Auwww, too bad, sir," Dan said, "It was an excellent joke, classic, I could tell it was. Let's all just bow our heads in respect for two minutes."

Amiram slapped Dan's shoulder as if they shared the same Army tent for the three years mandatory tour. "You're a funny guy. I didn't know your husband was such a funny guy, Ana."

"Yeah, he's a riot."

"We should do this more often."

"Sure." Ana gave Dan a venomous stare. She never knew he was such a good actor. From the moment they entered the restaurant he oozed charm and wit. When he pulled her chair for her, earning impressed stares from Adi, Amiram's wife, she almost puked. A perfect husband.

Amiram and his wife chose a private booth in the corner of the restaurant. Amiram said that since their client was a public persona he preferred the intimacy. Ana for once was thankful to the dim light in their corner. It concealed the number of times she reddened with rage.

"You haven't touched the pate, pumpkin." Dan smiled at her. "Are you feeling ok?"

Ana kicked Dan's leg under the table.

"Look who's talking, you haven't touched your plate, Dan." Amiram said.

"I really need to cut down."

"Rubbish!"

"Ana's little brother is getting married next month and Ana asked me to be more presentable."

"Awww, sweetie, you're dieting for me?" She blew him a kiss. " He's something, Amiram. I can't tell you how lucky I am to have him."

"No, it's me who feels lucky." Dan said.

"Maybe I'll get luckier soon." Ana forced a smile.

"Maybe I'll surf to the Irit dot com, site." Dan said.

"Oh, but you can't, sweetie. Too bad."

"Of course I can."

"They shut it down for one month, it says so in the contract, Dear."

"Doesn't matter really, Honeybun." Dan gave his best shot at unconcerned visage. "Lots of sites out there just as fresh."

"It sure is good to see a couple with such a strong connection." Amiram filled his cup with red wine and motioned the waitress to bring another bottle. "Most kids your age just break up the package at the drop of the hat. Am I right, Adi?"

"You're always right, even when you're not." Adi eyed Ana and Dan with a raised eyebrow, it was obvious she thought her husband a fool and Ana's emotional display as anything but a love announcement.

"Oh, there he is." Amiram boomed and waved. "Nadav, come here."

A man, in his early twenties, wearing a black suit stood at the entrance. He was so tall he had to bend a little so not to hit the doorpost. He looked shyly around him. Most of the patrons stared right back at him.

"Hell no." Dan stared too. "Your client is Nadav Fine?"

"Your wife didn't tell you?"

"I don't think she knows who he is."

"He plays basketball, no?" Ana said.

"He's just the best shooting guard in the league." Dan said. "The man's a genius."

"Well..." Amiram smiled and burped. "More like a treasure trophy. We manage three lawsuits for him. He's got the IRS on his tail, a nasty divorce, and now he's trying to break contract with Hapoel."

"Dear." Adi placed her hand on Amiram's hand. "I think, enough with the red wine."

"What she means," Amiram winked. "That I'm being unethical. And she's right, client confidentiality and all that shit. Nadav, sit down." Amiram gave a generous motion. "This is my wife, Adi, this is Ana, our sharpest team member and this is her husband a very funny guy."




Wicked Ch. 03



Never thought I'd continue this due to life and the little enthusiasm it met on literotica. However, more than a few people emailed me and encouraged me to keep going, and sometimes asked me to "Stop writing and Drop, dead, Wuss." After which those brave rays of sunshine signed "Anonymous" 

I figured for everyone who wrote an email there must be hundreds of thousands, maybe millions, who wanted to but didn't (because they had things more important to do or don't know how to write). 

Anyhow, this is it, I'm already 8/10 of the next chapter way and this time I won't stop till I finish or till Obama bombs the Syrians I will be called for reserve duty and Assad will drop a gas bomb on my head (later denying everything claiming it was Al Qaeda and anyway he figured I wanted mustard on that shitty sausage the IDF issues). 

So first, thanks to my very patient editors:

Rexbrookdale

And

Cambria rose.

You guys totally rock. 

And thanks to all the nice people who wrote me and asked me to continue. That actually meant a lot. 





Wicked Ch. 03



"Hell no!" the doctor said. "I was an inmate."

"You?" 

"Poor neighborhood, poor family, poor choices. Same old boring story."

"That kind of story usually ends differently." Dan was impressed. Most kids at Jerusalem's Grace usually had 'prison' or 'dead in a ditch' written in their future. "You made a complete U-turn." 

"I'm still an inmate." The doctor winked. "We really looked up to you, I mean 'us' as in the kids. You were a boxing champion."

"Millions of years ago," Dan said. 

"Goddam bitch, she tried to kill me," someone raged outside and down the hall. "I want the police in here now! You hear me? Now! Not in five minutes, right now!" 

"Busy night?" Dan said.

"Eh." The doctor made a so-so sign with his palm. "That's ER in Jerusalem for you. Nut jobs flock in here faster than salmons to a Bar Mitzva. We had a Jesus Christ and a Moses last night."

Dan laughed. "Funny that you remember me from back then. I never thought I'd made an impact. That place was so full with young people with bad history. It was always so...."

"Hopeless, yeah, I know," the doctor said. "But you did make an impact. Jerusalem's Grace, hell, we called it Jerusalem's Anus. You were one of the things which made it almost tolerable."

"Nah, you must be thinking of Maor, my brother, he was the engine, I just tagged alone."

"Not how I remember it." The doctor rubbed his bristled cheek. "We trusted you, which is hardly trivial with the hard-ass bunch of idiots we were. We respected you."

Respect. One word I'm really missing these days.

"You always talked at eye level and never tried to sell us bullshit. You're good with broken teenagers."

"Thanks, really. That actually means a lot." Dan couldn't remember the last time someone had patted his ego. He'd forgotten how good it felt. "Sorry, I didn't catch your name."

"Dr. Dominick, to the ER desk," came an unreasonably chirpy voice over the speaker system (unreasonably happy given that it was three AM ). 

"That's me." The doctor reached out his hand. "I'm Dom." 

"Dom? Dominick? Sure, I remember you. You're that Irish kid ... On your first day, you beat the crap out of two older kids and one instructor, straight into the hospital."

"In my defense I gotta say...," Dr. Dom paused, he looked a little embarrassed. "Hell, I got nothing, I was one messed up kid." 

"Fucking bitch, fucking bitch, fucking bitch...." the shriek was louder this time, followed by intense sobbing.

A heavyset nurse peeked into the room. "Dommi, we could really use your help restraining him."

Dom shrugged. 

"What's happening there?" Dan asked.

"That's under physician–patient privilege," Dom said.

"Your sister bit that poor man's dick almost right off," the nurse said.

"And physician–patient privilege goes out the window." Dr. Dom looked at Dan. "You don't seem too surprised."

"Eh." Dan made a so-so sign with his palm. "That's Alice, my sister, for you."

Dom grinned. "Well, just make sure to be here when she wakes; I'll check on you later."

Dan sighed and reached for his mobile. 

@@@@@@@@

There was a huge gaping hole in Ana's plan ... or actually, a small and very tight one. She had really never tried anal; that part of her story was true. Dan had always thought the whole brown dipping thing unhygienic. She had pressured him one night after a party while he was under the influence. But (Butt) her husband's meat popsicle barely scraped the surface and definitely never popped in to say hi. Ana had gotten cold feet after three seconds of her intoxicated husband's clumsy attempts. 

Now that she looked at Nadav smearing on lube, she figured it might not be the wisest of ideas to inaugurate the supplier's entrance with a jackhammer. 

At third grade Nadav Fine's height was so off the charts, he'd extorted money from fifth graders. When he was fourteen he was the most popular guy when it came to sleazing party booze: the only fourteen-year-old who could buy beer without being asked for ID. When he was eighteen ... well, you get the picture. His cock just kept up the pace. 

"Where did you find that?" 

"It's honey scented body lotion." Nadav scooped a generous portion from the green jar. He sniffed it and then happily rubbed it onto his cock. "Very KY-like. Should do the trick. Oh, I think I messed up a little of your neighbor's bathroom. Her creepy-ass cat scared the shit out of me and I jumped and.... well, you'll clean it up later."

Do I look like a fucking housemaid? "Sure, no problem."

Her mobile beeped Star Wars.

Not gonna help you Dan. I've been chasing and craving your attention for so long. Now it's your turn to do some chasing. Hope you enjoy it like I did. She took the mobile and switched it to silent mode.

"Turn around and bend over that picnic table," Nadav said.

"It's an antique Pembroke." 

"Looks like a table to me."

"Mrs. Schwartz is way too classy for a picnic table."

"Snobbish you mean. You should watch her son vacuuming food. Mucho classy. All the players call him lard ass behind his back, and... Wait, who gives a fuck, turn around and bend over that picnic er... pembo."

"Huh?"

"Now!"

"Yes sir! It's called a Pembroke, sir." She bent, raised her naked ass in the air and wiggled it a little. "Like that, sir?"

"Girl, you've got some fine baggage. A serious badonkadonk butt."

"For my age, sir?"

"For an eighteen year old Hapoel cheerleader. And trust me, I've seen more than a few, without their cheerleader outfit." 

"Thank you sir. My aim is to please, sir." 

"Stop that."

"Sir?"

Nadav smacked her rump. It sent a shiver down legs, and tiny delicious tingling all the way to her clit. "What are you doing?"

Using his leg, he dragged a short stool that helped people climb in and out of the Jacuzzi. "You're too short."

"Too what? For a giraffe, maybe - ouch."

Nadav slapped her rump again. "Giddy up."

Ana climbed on the chubby stool that gave her the extra inches, and leaned forward on the Pembroke. She shivered a bit, and not because of the humid night air.

"Don't be frightened. You're my kick-ass girl, remember?" Nadav moved behind her and placed a large hand on each of her hips. He moved his hips forward, stood back up and stroked his cock up the inside of Ana's left thigh. His cockhead bumped against her mound. 

Ana caught her breath and gave a small shuddering moan. 

He repeated the maneuver along her right thigh and made her moan again. 

She turned her head back, surprised.

"Just getting you into the mood, trust the expert." He pointed his love pole straight to heaven, and laid the length of it along the crack of the Ana's ass. He leaned a little weight onto her gently. His cock nestled between the twin globes of Ana's ass like a sausage in a bun.

@@@@@@@@

Alice opened up a single green eye to a world of white. The hum of fluorescent merged with a bip, bip, bip of a monitor somewhere nearby. The air reeked from disinfectant. 

So hell is illuminated by fluorescent. Figures.

She remembered the accident. She remembered the car, upside-down, and the heat. Most of all she remembered Noam (fucking, cheating, married, yellow bastard, worm infested, may he rot in hell for a zillion years, I should have bitten his cock right off) Lewinski crawling away, sobbing, leaving her to fry in the inferno. In fact, she was still burning.

Her left arm was in a cast and her other arm was bandaged. Her legs were hidden under the sheet but they felt as if someone was dipping them in boiling oil. Alice opened her mouth to scream and nothing came through. Her throat felt as if she just swallowed a super-sized meal of sandpaper. 

"Water," she whispered.

"Here!" Someone placed a glass near her lips and patiently waited as she slowly sipped.

"Dan?" she croaked. "God, it hurts."

"Where?"

"Everywhere."

"I'll call a nurse."

"Dan?" She tried to turn her head and failed. "Dan, is that you?"

A tired nurse in hospital green appeared. "Hey, Mrs. Adams, you're awake."

"Very perceptive diagnosis. It's White," Alice found her voice.

"Huh?"

"Adams is my third ex-husband's name. I'm Alice White. For Christ sake it hurts." 

"You want Morphine?"

"Nahhh." Alice tried to move her head, she was sure she'd heard Dan. "I'm cool like that with the pain and agony. Whaddayathink, genius?" 

"Annnnd, she's back." 

"Dan?" 

The nurse added something to her IV. 

Dan stepped forward so she could see him; he looked like he'd the one been in an accident. She had never seen him so squashed. 

"You look like.... Fuck me, this is so gooood, I love you nurse." Alice let her air out slowly when the morphine started kicking. "You look like shit, Dan."

"Wait, I'll bring a mirror."

@@@@@@@@

Ana was not sure how she should be feeling about the unfamiliar sensation. She pressed her buttocks back against Nadav, squeezing his cock between her ass cleft and his lower belly. Nadav's rod was searing hot against her anus. Its firmness intoxicated her and the jolts, as his rod jumped in response to her clenching buttocks, felt like victory. Her cunt pressed against Nadav's dangling balls and she felt a tickle there, gaining strength every second.

"Oh, god. This feels so good," she said.

Her mobile buzzed. Her husband again.

"Die, already," She screamed.

Nadav laughed. "A bit thick, your husband. Nobody likes a sore loser, Danny boy!" he shouted at the mobile. He then slowly slid his well-oiled cock up and down between Ana's smooth buttocks. She reacted by clenching them around him.

"I'm flying today," Nadav suddenly said, as if they were in a restaurant having a conversation over a mouthwatering sirloin. "Four days long overdue vacation. Rented me a villa in Crete."

"Ahhh, that's good." She wasn't talking about the Nadav's overdue vacation. Ana couldn't remember the last time she was on vacation.

His bow slid up and down her violin, up and down. Like a violin Ana began to moan between deep breaths. 

"It has a private beach. Have you ever made love on the beach, Ana?"

"Ahhh.... Yessss." 

"You have?"

"Have what?" She turned her head, more than a little annoyed.

"Made love on a beach."

"What on earth are you talking about?"

Keeping one hand on her hip, he took his cock in his other hand and began to slowly rub the head around her small opening. 

Ana moaned.

"It's a private beach. Got fences. You can walk naked all day. " 

"Oh, god. What ... what are you doing?" 

"Just rubbing around the way in. Mussels as much as you can eat, and free booze." His free hand snaked its way to her clit and started caressing it. "What do you say?"

"I didn't know it would be this good."

"And you wanted to save this for your thick hubby. Sheesh! But what do you say about Crete?"

"Crete?" She pushed her ass and felt her sphincter twitch. 

"How about going with me?" 

"Yesssss. Wha –?" She stopped. "Are you serious?"

@@@@@@@@@

"Where has that bulldog nurse gone to?" Alice sniffed the air and wrinkled her nose in disgust.

"Two feet behind you," Dan said. "And now she left the room with a not-so-happy face. Bought yourself another friend; so clever, Alice, really clever."

"Can you hear it? That's the sound of me not caring. Where's Ana?"

"I don't know."

"She's not here with you?"

"I came alone." 

Dan looks pissed. Probably has a right to be. God, I need Ana now. "She knows I'm here?"

"I don't know."

"Call her!" 

Dan reddened, opened his mouth to say something and then closed it ... opened it again ... then closed it. 

"You look like a dumb fish doing that." 

"Screw you, Alice."

"I can't raise my hand right now, but rest assured that under the cast my middle finger is raised. Oh, wait, this one is working fine." She raised her right arm that was only bandaged, her middle finger pointing up. 

Dan took a deep breath and sat down on a chair near her bed, his back turned toward her. 

"Look Dan. At least call Ahuva, she'll be here in a jiffy and you can go back home and be useless over there."

He turned to face her. "You mean, your very true best friend forever Ahuva Oz? Cause I already called her and asked her to come."

"Great!"

"She sends kisses and well wishes but she's ... some lie of some sort, I was too bored to listen to the phony details. So she won't be here in a jiffy or anytime this week. Any other best friends I might call?"

Alice gave him a venomous stare. 

"Didn't think so."

"Again, the middle finger, under the cast." 

"You know Alice, this might be a good time to make amends with your parents and brother."

"Yeah, like it's ever going to happen."

"The nurses are on strike, they only work holiday shift schedule. The doctors asked all the families with a bedridden patient, that's you, to have a family member stay and help." Dan massaged his face with his palms. He felt like a hundred-year-old and wanted to sleep for a week. "Look, Alice, I'm the responsible adult in this room so I'll.... You don't have money or friends or too many options. You'll need help to get you through this. Call your dad."

"Sure." She picked up an imaginary phone. "Hi Ofek, I know we didn't speak a single word since I was nineteen, but hey, Dan says that's water under the bridge. I need you now, I mean I need your fat wallet now. Yes, I know Dan is an idiot. Sure, Ofek, love you too, bye. " She hung up the imaginary phone. "He said you're an idiot and no way."

"Maybe you should start by calling him Dad instead of Ofek."

"I'd sooner be in a car accident. Oops." She giggled without much mirth. 

"Your brother is getting married soon. You and your dad can use the coming wedding as a ladder to climb off the high tree; you know, use the momentum."

"You're an idiot, Dan." 

"Do you have an 'off' switch? Wait, eighteen years? For Christ sake, Alice, your dad had prostate cancer five years ago; he had a ... not even then?" 

"Who said there is no poetic justice in this world?"

"Jesus, you're – " 

"A freak? A monster? You're an idiot, Dan."

"I guess that was well-established in the last couple of days."

"Ah, finally." 

Dan wanted to slap the smug smile off her face.

"I knew you had a reason coming here. Tell me how I was the bitch who destroyed your perfect marriage. Go on, spit it out, it's not like I can walk away on you."

Dan gave a short bitter laugh. 

"Go on sweetie pie, there's nothing you're gonna say that I haven't heard twice before." 

"I came.... I came, because someone had to. I came 'cause there's nobody else, and as much as I hate your skinny ass, you're still family. "

She stared at him.

"I wish you weren't."

She much preferred to have him curse her. "I don't need your patronizing, sympathy or help. Give me the goddamn phone."

With the hand that wasn't inside a cast she grabbed the proffered mobile. She typed nimbly with two fingers. "Big sis! This is Alice. Where are you? Need you now!" Pressed Send. Typed. "Call me back." Pressed Send. Then added "Please." Then she caught her image in the mobile's glass. Her hand reached instinctively to her head. "Dan, where's my hair?"

"You had a deep bleeding gash and it was half-burned and ... so they – "

"Where's my hair, Dan?" Alice shouted. 

"It'll grow back."

The horror he saw in her face was akin to that of a woman who just received news from a doctor she has five minutes to live. A huge tear formed and ran down her nose. She wiped it on the bandage but another followed and then the dam broke. 

Dan stared at her, stunned. 

The entire 'I'm the number one heartless bitch and no one and nothing can touch me' façade melted. On the bed sat a five-year-old girl, hysterically, heart-breakingly sobbing. At last, as if shaking himself from out of a dream, he did the only thing he knew was good for a sobbing five-year-old. He got up and hugged Alice close to his chest, whispering meaningless, soothing words that cannot heal broken hearts. 

@@@@@@@@@@ 

"Everything on my expanse, of course." Nadav centered his cock on the target and began to press against her. Her pink ring parted slowly as the tip burrowed further.

"Oh god."

"Did I mention I only fly First Class?"

The bulbous head stretched her. Ana's anus fought back. "Ahhh. Ahhh. Ahhh. Ahhh." She started breathing like a woman running the last mile of a marathon. 

"Don't do that. Relax, deep breaths. Think of the villa in Crete tomorrow."

She envisioned a sunny, golden, empty beach, with clear water. Just her, Nadav, and naked. Lying on the hot sand, fucking like teens in love. She sighed. "Too good to be true."

"Pack light." 

"You're not seriously thinking I'll be coming."

Nadav stepped back leaving a hollow emptiness in her buttocks. "Of course you are."

She was desperate to have him back pressing her anus. "I'm a married woman, Nadavi, I have kids. A job to keep, I can't just disappear. My boss would kill me. Literally. Anyway, most of the coming week I'll be working on your case."

"Just tell your boss you need to prepare me to go to court and I had to go to Crete so you had to tag along. "

"We're not going to court, silly, unless you want your lawsuit to end by 2050."

"You're coming." He took another step back.

Ana panicked. "Come on sweetie, be sensible."

Nadav planted his hands on his hips. He reminded her of her son when the stubborn-ass mood hit him. 

Actually, Tom is more mature. "Ok, I'll think about it." Like three seconds. 

"You're no Shark." Nadav said. 

"Ask the last guy I munched."

"Your boss called you a shark but you're more like a sardine."

"Have you ever seen a sardine do this?" She wiggled her butt sensually. 

"Yeah, you like to swim in the shallow water with all the other tiny fishes. You know why I'm so good at what I do?"

Because your mom did it with the giant from Jack and the Beanstalk? "Look, Nadav, I would love to fly to Crete more than anything, but – "

"It's because I'm a shark. I want something. I mark a target, wham. Just like I marked you."

I thought it was the other way around.

"You can stop a sardine in a net, same as the stuff in your life that is holding you back. You cannot stop a shark with a net."

Ah, I'm pretty sure you can.

"Sharks stop at nothing and for no one. Sharks only stop for bigger sharks and sharks don't mix with sardines." He took another step back. 

"Ok, I'll come, I'll come."

"You mean it?"

Of course I don't, idiot, grow up. "I'll tell my boss I needed an unplanned vacation, a family crisis." 

"What crisis?"

"I don't know. My husband is having a midlife crisis. He thinks I'm naughty with other guys." 

"Heh. That's better. You're promoted to salmon. Just imagine. I have my own yacht there, with a crew and a cook. We can sail anywhere." 

Well, there was no harm in imagining. Ana closed her eyes. She imagined herself on a white sails yacht, Nadav rubbing her back and a brown smiling Greek waitress offering her a choice of an array of tall glasses with umbrellas sticking out on top. Paradise. And why can't she make it more than wishful thinking? The world's ice caps will melt if she takes a couple of days off? Why do the Kids, Dan and work always taking precedence to what I need? "Hmmm. Ouch, hey!" Something warm wiggled its way into her anus.

"Just one finger, relax."

"Ah, Ah, Ah, Ah." Ana's breath came in short bursts. 

"Breath slower." His free hand found her cunt lips and started playing with them gently. 

"Oh, god."

He started wiggling his finger. "How does it feel?"

"Ah.... Different. Weird."

"Weird?"

"Good kind of weird. Don't stop. Ah, Ah, Ah, Ah." 

Her mobile buzzed another message. Ana lost her concentration. 




Wicked Ch. 03



Nadav pulled his finger out. 

"Don't! He's doing it to throw you off balance, did I mention my husband never matured mentally passed third grade?"

"Just makes me more determined." Nadav centered himself on her back opening and pushed. 

Again she felt her star slowly parting. There was a little pain, too. But there was no respite this time. Nadav kept pushing. 

"Oh, God. Oh God. Oh God. Oh God."

"Breathe slow!"

First the tip went past the barrier and then the entire crown of his cock made its way past the threshold of her ass. Then it went almost like a wine cork past the outer rim and the head blossomed inside her tunnel. 

Ana uttered a deep guttural "uuunnnnnn" and surprised them both when she pushed back against the Nadav's unrelenting cock.

"Breathe slow, girl. Just breathe slow."

His cock was deliciously warm and alive in her. Pulsing like a beast. There was no more pain, just a spreading warmth and a lot of pressure, as if she had, well, an enormous cock up her butt. "Ohhhh gods! I didn't know." she panted.

"Yeah." Nadav waited for her to catch her breath.

The nerves in her ass were tingling like a net of wires hit by lightning. Nothing she ever felt before was even close. With the curiosity of a newborn she reached out and felt around his cock. His wonderful cock. 

"Are you okay?" There was honest concern in his voice. "Ana, don't zone out like that, say something."

Drip, drip drip, drip... A tickle of warm drops started tickling from her cunt wetting both their legs. 

"I guess you're fine. You're hurting any?" 

Ana started to shudder. "N ... nah ... noooo, I want more! Please put it all the way in." 

Nadav pressed slowly forward. His hands massaged her back.

The drip became into a spray. "Oh my god." Ana heaved. "Oh my god."

"Oh my god," Nadav echoed. He waited for her orgasm to subside. "You're my first squirter. I mean I knew, but I never imagined, I mean. I had no idea. You're the best solicitor I ever had and probably will."

Ana couldn't hear his surprised blubbering. The blood was rushing in her ears. She wanted more.

He pushed more inches of himself up the wanton woman's grasping tunnel. Finally, balls deep, he forced a powerful moan from Ana.

"Good?"

"Hav ... hav ... having an orgasm!" she gasped. "Are you ah ... ah ... all the way in?"

"All the way, your tunnel is incredible. Whoa – " He caught her waist as Ana started to collapse and held her as her throes of passion subsided. "You ok?"

"Fuck me."

"Huh?"

"Fuck ... me ... fuck ... me ..." she repeated softly, out of breath.

"Crete. You're going to Crete with me even if I have to hit you on the head and smuggle you in a suitcase." He began to slowly stroke his cock in and out of her clenching sphincter.

"Uhnnn.... Uhnnn... Uhnnn...," Ana moaned each time he dived in. She started giving back, pushing herself against Nadav's cock. "Uhnnn.... Uhnnn.... Uhnnn...." She wasn't fucking, she was on a ship again, rising up on wave after wave of ecstasy. Higher and higher till she touched the sun. She wasn't a shark or a sardine, she was a tigress in heat. 

This was life as it was meant to be lived. Alice was right. Years of fucking in the dark, what a shameful waste. "How's this for a salmon?" she shouted and clenched her ass cheeks around his penetrating cock.

"Oh god, you're a barracuda."

Ana pushed back until his balls touched her snatch. She then sent her arms backward, sank her nails in his ass cheeks and pulled him deeper.

"Oh god, you're a shark. A great white."

I'll show you a thirty-eight-year old. She wasn't a shark, she was a jet warplane on fire. No net could stop her. She was a free woman and no fake society boundaries like husband and job could deny her what she deserved. She can go to Crete if she wants to. Hell, she could just whistle and Crete would swim over the Mediterranean to Israel. 

Bzzzzzzz. Her mobile buzzed a new message sending her back to planet earth.

"Fuck!" Ana screamed. "I'll show him." She grabbed the mobile, pushed Nadav a little back, aimed it at her ass and snapped two photos. 

"To my dear husband, I'm too busy having fun." She said it loud as she typed furiously. "Love, your wife." 

She stopped moving but when she pressed the Send Button the cock buried inside her exploded, flooding her with warm lust.

"Oh, ohhhhhhh...." Nadv was the one this time, who needed support. 

"Hey," she cooed. 

Nadav was breathing hard.

"You know what? I really am going to Crete with you." She tried to listen to her inner voice and smiled when she couldn't hear the old reasonable Ana. Ana the housewife was gone. I'll send her flowers when I'm sunbathing on a yacht in Crete. She picked up her mobile and messaged her husband again.

"That was...." he puffed. 

"Intense," she said.

"No...," he gulped air. "That was wicked. That was totally wicked."

@@@@@@@@@@

"Dan, you're squeezing my boob."

Dan pulled back, alarmed.

Alice hiccupped, an aftershock of crying. "God, you're such a nerd." She touched her head again. "Fuck!" 

"It's just hair," Dan said. 

"Just? What else have I got besides looks?"

"Alice, come on, you've been in an accident tonight and – "

"A lonely bitch without friends or family that spreads her legs to strangers so she can feel something. You said it, two days ago, no?"

"I was angry, terrified, and humiliated."

She scanned his face, searching for sarcasm. Alice wasn't used to naked honesty. Then she tried to shrug and found she physically couldn't. "The fucking irony about it is that you were right."

"I'm sorry."

"You're an idiot."

"Yeah." 

An ancient-looking lady in a hospital gown peeked from the doorway. "Excuse me, mister." she hesitated near the entrance sign to Burns Unit where it said 'Personnel Only!', "is Dr. Dominick here? I was told he's in Room One."

"Do I look like an information clerk?" Alice said.

"There are some people in this hospital you didn't insult yet," Dan said. "Should I bring 'em here?" He turned to the old lady. "I'll take you to him, Mrs. Guttmann." He was glad for a chance to leave the room. He figured Alice would be glad to see him leave. When Ana will come to her senses she would have to take all the hospital shifts; he'd had enough of Alice to last him a lifetime. 

Alice wasn't happy to see him go. She was scared. A lonely bitch without friends or family. Dan is right, and then add some, she thought. He's not an idiot, just perceptive and too gentle. She'd be bedridden for a couple of weeks. Months maybe. Self-employed, she'd lose the few clients she still had. She wouldn't be able to afford rent for her little apartment and then where would she be?

Her eyes rested on the Samsung Galaxy Dan had left on the bed. She let the air out in relief when she saw two messages from Ana. "Finally. God," she said to no one in particular. They must have missed the incoming messages sound when she was crying. Then she opened the messages and the attached picture.

"Shit!" she said out loud. "Jesus!"

The next message told him Ana was flying to Crete till Wednesday and that she'd call him to give instructions about the kids. Have you lost your mind, sis? 

She probably didn't even read my messages. Jesus. Her hand shook and she dropped the mobile. "Goddamn!" Luckily, it landed on the bed. She frantically searched the Delete Message function. Damn this bandage and damn these smartphones and goddamn you Ana to hell. When did you become such a cold-hearted bitch? 

Dan opened the door and she quickly hid the Samsung under the blanket.

"Do you know who that old lady was?" He had a smug smile on. "My socially-challenged?" 

"Socially-challenged? Oh I get it. Like humor, but different." 

"Rachel Guttmann, wife of the late Daniel Guttmann."

"The billionaire?"

"We're actually staying in a ward she contributed last year. Why did you hide my phone under the sheets?"

"I didn't. I'm feeling a little pain, can you get bulldog nurse again, please?"

"Give me that." 

"No."

"Right."

She tried to resist but it was futile. "Don't open it Dan, please." He did and with a very sharp pang of guilt, she watched as the color drained from his tired face.

Dan once brought a tiny stray cat home. Ana put her foot down, though. She was afraid of animals and she hated the mess. A week later they flew to Italy on vacation, and in a moment of rare wildness Ana tattooed a red cat on her left ass cheek.

"Because you wanted a cat so much," she had said. "And because I love you." They named it Toby the Ass Puss and it was the hero of many private jokes they shared. 

Toby winked at Dan licking one paw, the other paw pointed below. At a massive cock buried in his wife's bowels. 

Time froze.

He closed his eyes and opened them again. The picture was still there. Nadav Fine's tool was still there and his wife's anus was still stretching like a rubber glove in what looked like a comical attempt to accommodate it. His beautiful wife's perfect ass he loved to kiss and bite. Would he ever be able to look at it again? Would he ever be able to look at her again? The smartphone fell from his hands. It made a loud crunch when it hit the floor. 

"I don't get it," he said in a strange squeak.

"Dan." 

"Why didn't she go for the Full Monty? If she wanted humiliation she could have uploaded it onto her Facebook page and invited all our friends to watch." 

"Dan, don't."

"Don't what?"

"Just don't."

"I think I'm – " Dan didn't manage to finish the sentence. He ran over to the little bathroom attached to Alice's room, and puked his guts out.

@@@@@@@@@@@@

To be continued....

In less than a year 

And BTW, this took some effort. So if you think the story was good, please take the 3 seconds it takes to press on the voting Stars below. It shows you appreciate my efforts.



Wicked Ch. 04



Like I promised, less than a year. 

So first, thanks to my very patient editor:

Rexbrookdale

A good editor is like deodorant – Pretty much invisible and you stink if you don't use it. Unless it's Axe deodorant then it also gets you tons of hot babes (seen it on TV with my own eyes). 







Wicked Ch. 04



"Aha. How very thoughtful. Who are these two whores?" 

Nadav jumped on the bed, causing the blond to scream. "This whore's name is Ana, just like you. This one," he pointed at the brunette, "not sure. I didn't catch it. I'll call her Ana Three." He tried to grab blond Ana's tit, but she slapped his hand away.

The girl opened her eyes and asked in broken English, "Why your mother angry so much?"

"Sonofabitch!" Ana screamed and ran out, slamming the door behind her. 

She almost ran outside the house when she remembered that she was still in underwear and anyway had nowhere to go or the money to get there. She sat down in the kitchen and started sobbing her humiliation. At first she thought Nadav would come out of the bedroom and try to comfort her, Dan certainly would if he was here, but as more and more minutes went by her hope was replaced by cold fury.

Someone started licking her leg. "Thanks." She sniffed and patted the Labrador. "You probably think I'm a joke too."

The Labrador wagged its tail.

"Son of a bitch. Asshole!" she screamed at The Asshole. "Cheating asshole, peanut brain. Can't keep his dick in his pants for two seconds." She raised her mug of coffee. "I'm a joke, right? Thirty-eight housewife who thought she's in a fucking fairytale. Asshole! A romantic vacation." She threw the mug with force. It made a satisfying sound as it crushed into the wall. The Labrador, frightened, took off. She found a drawer full of plates and threw one on the floor. It didn't make her feel any better so she threw another one and a third just to make sure.

"What the fuck?" Nadav came rushing out of the bedroom.

"That's the local custom, sweetie. When in Rome, you know." 

"We're in Greece not in Rome, you dumb bitch."

"Three more IQ points and you might be a cucumber."

"What do you want from me, Ana?"

"I want those two SLUTS out of this house in two seconds. You said we'll be together alone on the beach. Alone! I want the vacation you promised me!"

"Fuck you bitch, if I wanted a bitch wife in Crete with me, I would have taken my own bitch wife with me." 

"Jesus, you're stupid."

"Fuck you, bitch."

"So original, sooo.... Wow." She threw her hands in the air. "I must be out of my fucking mind. I have no fucking idea what am I doing here."

"Close the door on your way out."

"My wallet was stolen, you inconsiderate douchebag. I don't even have cab money."

Nadav went to his suitcase, pulled out a bundle of euros, didn't even count, and threw them on the floor.

"So now I'm a whore."

"Nah, you're cheaper." Nadav turned his naked ass to her and disappeared inside the bedroom. 

She stood immobilized, staring at the closed door for a long time. Hot tears flowed and washed away all her plans. The old Ana was nodding her head from within in her pit, smug as hell. Bitch, that's what you are, a stupid cunt who threw away the life she had and for what? I told you you'll end like this. You're a housewife, not Angelina Jolie. 

From the bedroom came loud laughter; the blond sounded happy, then Nadav's throaty laugh answered her. It shook her out of her paralysis and she quickly gathered her stuff back in her suitcase.

Son of a bitch, I should ... I should ... What would Alice do if she was here, probably set the villa on fire. "Yeah, why not." 

Ana walked over to Nadav's suitcase stuffed with personal belongings: a tailored suit and several designer outfits. She removed her underwear, positioned herself strategically and released a golden torrent of hot, smelly vengeance. 

@@@@@@@

Sunday afternoon, Israel

The old Bauhaus building's lights were still blinking on the first two floors, albeit more desperately. Dan checked every corner of the darkened stairwell for suspicious would-be somethings. He wasn't sure what, but Michail the Georgian sounded like bad news. People who were named after the country they came from, as a rule, were bad news. Ask Guy Ritchie. 

To ease his mind and to announce his innocence to all lurking Georgians-at-large, he whistled the first tune that popped into his head. Then he remembered it was a theme song from Mary-Fucking-Poppins (Guy Ritchie again). Dan was surprised he didn't feel any particular fear. To be honest, he was feeling better by the moment. It'd been a while since he felt so needed and depended upon. True, he preferred that Ana would need him instead of Alice and Irit, but still. 

"Every day, in every way I'm getting better and better." He knocked on Irit's steel-enforced door, "Irit, it's me, Dan, there's no one outside." 

Someone whimpered on the other side.

Another damsel in distress, I'm like a fucking fat ass in shining armor. Who will save my behind from Ana and the dragon she conjured in our own marital bed? 

"Irit, are you ok?"

"Are you alone?"

"There's no one here, seriously. You scared me on the phone."

The door clicked and then swung open. Irit stood in the doorway with a baseball bat. 

Dan smiled and reached out his hand. 

"The Bear Jew, I presume." 

Irit's smile turned into a mask of fear; a sliver of a second later something hit Dan in the back of his head. The world swam a little. He stumbled forward, fell down, and managed to straighten himself back to standing. He turned around blinking like an owl.

"Yo, Yo, Biz'o sorry about that. I thought you was someone else. I thought you was her boyfriend, Biz'o," Michail the Georgian looked genuinely sorry. "You okay? Ookay?" He also looked genuinely tiny. Dan was a large man, six-feet-plus and wide. Michail might reach his chin, standing on tiptoes. And wearing platform shoes. With the tip of his index finger.

Could that fucking runt have been the one who hit me so hard?

"Biz'o, Biz'o, you okay?"

Dan shook his head. 

"Sorry, Biz'o, no hard feeling. Eh? If you're still looking for good time you can go across the street to Happy, Happy club. Say Michail sent you, they'll give you a fine, fine Ukrainian girl. Say Michail the Georgian sent you."

I'm seeing double and hearing double. He thinks I'm a client.

"I told you a million, million times, bitch, this is my turf, you either work for me or you don't work at all."

Irit stood on wobbly feet, the bat shaking in her hands between her and the runt who didn't for a minute appear intimidated. 

"Look," Dan raised his hand hoping Michail understood global gestures. "This is a misunderstanding, I'm sure –"

"You have problem with your ears? Kovlova, you hit poor Biz'o too hard on the head."

Dan turned and tried to focus.

Shrek's big brother stood in the doorway, arms crossed. He sprouted a halo of confidence, the kind Silver- back gorillas emit.

"Look, Michail, I think we can come to a reasonable arrangement." 

"Huh? You have problems understanding Hebrew, Biz'o?" 

"No, look –"

"Kovlova can explain, he's specialist. He explains slow, you get it very fast."

Dan raised his hand. "Okay, no need, I'll be leaving." He went over to Irit's bed, took a pillow and removed the pillowcase.

"You're one of them Biz'os who like to smell women underwear and women sheets? Huh?" Michail wiggled his bushy eyebrows and winked. Kovlova smiled too.

"No, no, but the first lesson my dad taught me was that the hand needs protection." He wrapped his right fist with the pillowcase and went over to the door. Kovlova was still smiling when Dan's fist rocketed into his jaw. It was a fast, massive right hook, and it connected with a crunch. Dan went into automatic, a skill learnt through years and years of training taking control. He didn't give Shrek time to call Fiona or even time to draw breath. A quick jab to protect his left, then a massive uppercut with his right to the sternum. 

Boom. 

Kovlova made a gurgling sound, something within the amplitude range of a choking toad and a molested motorcycle engine. No referee could stop Dan now. He fired two massive right hooks: Boom, Boom, both connecting beautifully with the surprised face, and watched with satisfaction as the tank of a man sunk to the floor. 

"Second lesson is always, protect the head, Biz'o!" 

"Watch out!" Irit screamed.

Dan turned and felt something sharp slicing into his left arm. He screamed rage and turned on the little man. Mikhail took a step back, a switchblade in his right. He assessed the situation, then made like a mouse and ran through the open balcony. Dan chased him, only to see the creep jumping into the neighbor's balcony below. 

"He's gone?" Irit asked from the room.

"Not for long, grab what you can, we're taking off in ten seconds." 

"Where.... Where we're going?" Irit huffed when they both dragged the limp body of one stunned Kovlova to the stairwell. 

"I thought you'd tell me. Your parents' house perhaps?"

"Do you seriously think I can show my face at my parents' house?"

"A friend you can crash, then?"

"Nope!"

"Shit!"

@@@@@@@@

There were two half-eaten pizzas on the table and Pepsi bottles on the dirty floor. Someone took Liana's entire toybox and dumped its contents on the living room carpet (Quantity wise, Liana's toybox could win a fight against a Toys R Us store). The perpetrator lay in a circle made of Barbie-Dolls, painting with felt-tip pens happy scenery that included dancing stick men and several smiling suns. Tom was smeared on the TV couch, a pizza slice frozen along the flight path to his mouth. He was zombie, staring at a commercial promising that 7-Up/Pepsi/Coke/Other could not only cure cancer and get you a date with Heidi Klum, but also a lifestyle that Keeps It Real. If Ana had stepped through the door, she would have had an immediate stroke.

"Christ, Dad, it's half- past nine." Dan almost stumbled over Tom's school bag that strategically placed on the doorstep. "Why is Liana still up and doing damage? You're waiting for her battery to run out?"

"Is it?" Like an island of tranquility, his dad, sitting in a comfy chair in the middle of the chaos, picked his head from the Boxing World magazine he was reading. "Hi there."

"Dad, this is Irit, she's a ... friend. She'll sleep here tonight."

"Daddy." Liana ran over and jumped into his arms. Some things at least remained the same. Dan hugged his daughter tight to his chest.

"Daddy, you're smothering me. You're pretty," she said to Irit. "Almog has a new cat."

"The bed you ordered came two hours ago," his dad said.

"What bed? I didn't order any bed. Tom, are you watching Big Brother?"

"Everyone in my class is watching Big Brother. They call me a baby just because you don't let me watch it." Tom wailed in the kind of voice that always made Dan wish you could hang kids to dry for two hours with the laundry.

"It's so tiny, it has six white spots, we counted, one two, three, four, five, six. We gave it milk. Can you get me a kitty, Daddy?"

The beverage commercial faded, replaced by the gleaming smile of Nadav Fine. He was brushing his teeth, while his Labrador ate cat-shaped gummy bears after which it picked up the brush too.

Dan pressed the remote.

"Hey, I love that commercial," Tom howled.

"I didn't watch TV, Daddy," Liana said with an angelic smile.

"See that. See that. She's always teasing me and then she –"

"Tom, shower! Now!"

"You're always taking her side, I wish Mommy was here."

"I wish Mommy was here, too." Liana said.

Dan felt a sharp pang in his breast. How about me? Do I wish Mommy was here, too?



@@@@@@



He showered Liana, made the beds, tucked his daughter and son in, and even managed to throw into the deal a new imaginary chapter in the Adventures of Cranky Shark. In this episode, for the first time in Cranky's funny-yet-educational career, there was a little violence as Cranky battled two nasty Orcas: one huge, the other tiny with the silly quirks of repeating words in a sentence unnecessarily, and calling everyone Biz'o. Tom loved the new twist so much he wanted to hear it again.

Kids asleep, Dan went into a whirlwind of cleaning the house, and then made the sleeping arrangements for Irit and his dad. Only when the living room was finally back in proper shape (Dan's opinion of proper, Ana would still have a stroke), he dragged himself into the bathroom. His head still throbbed from the beating and the wound from the knife stung. He rested his forehead against the wall and allowed warm water to wash away his fears. I wish I could sleep and wake up in 2015. 

His dad knocked on the bathroom's door, "What's going on, Danny?"

"What do you mean?"

His dad was silent for a few seconds. "What happened to your hand?"

"Just a scratch."

"Looks nasty, you need stitches. You need.... I've never seen you like this." 

"I'm okay, Dad, really, nothing wrong that a good night's sleep can't fix."

"Nothing's wrong, huh?" His dad shook his head. "Where's Ana?"

"I told you, the office had to send her abroad for some business thing.... Something that popped –"

"In Crete?"

"Yeah. Why?"

"The kids are asking about her, why didn't she call?"

"She did call.... Several times.... I've talked to her, everything is fine." We're a bunch of liars running in circles. "Look, dad," Dan forced a smile, "if you're thinking I had her buried in the backyard you're totally off-track."

"And that girl, who is she, really?" 

"Irit? She's just a friend. Look, I'm totally bushed right now and I still need to get back to the hospital."

"You need a good night's sleep."

"I promised Alice."

"Why can't her parents be with her for one night?" his dad said.

"I don't know."

"I'll call Ofek."

"It won't help. He and Alice quarreled over something so long ago they probably don't remember what it was. They never see each other. I've already asked him to replace me; he almost slammed the phone in my face."

"Jesus, what about her mom, then?"

"They never speak either," Dan forced an apologizing smile.

"One fucked-up family."

And then some.

"Look, Danny, I don't know what you're going through and sure hope you'll tell me one day. Okay? Whatever happens I'm here, you know. I won't judge, I just want to help."

Dan didn't say anything. He knew that if he opened his mouth he might choke. His father looked so old and thin, almost transparent. Once he had believed his dad's only weakness was Kryptonite. 

Wrapped in a towel and very much exhausted after two sleepless nights, he went into his bedroom, looking for anything fresh to wear. Worried about how he was supposed to drive back to Jerusalem and Alice without ending in a ditch. That was when he saw the new bed. 

It was an odd creature. Strange bumps and hills rose in places where a normal bed was supposed to be flat. Above it hung a royal canopy with white tasteless curtains, Nouveau-Riche-style. The canopy also had a distinctive top: a crisscross of metal poles.

What the hell was Ana thinking when she bought this monster?

He missed her; despite everything, he ached for her. She always loved kissing him after he took a bath. Where was she now and with whom?He picked up his mobile from the floor, sat on the bed and dialed Ana's number, but his finger hesitated on the send button. At last he put it down on the bed without calling. He rested his head, just for a second, then he'll be go like he promised.

Three seconds later he was snoring softly.

@@@@@@@@

Sunday Night, Crete 

Alice used to say in her delicate extra-feminine way: "You have already squeezed a streamer, why do you have the urge to knead it like dough?"

After all, I can wallow in my misery for the rest of my 'vacation from hell' or I can get royally drunk on high quality beverage.

"Thanks, I'll take this." Ana lifted the small tray of champagne glasses out of the dumbfounded waitress's hands. She emptied a glass in one go and placed the tray on the woodenbridge rail.

TheodoreMistakidis the Third's fundraisingevent was planned and executed in theMistakidismansion's Japanese garden. It meant that the honored guests, and Ana, had to cross three toy bridges over what could be only described as a tiny piece of paradise. Ana couldn't help being awestruck though she really wanted not to be. 

A chain of ponds and artificial waterfalls lay in an ever-growing spiral from the garden's center. White, orange and purple flowers bloomed everywhere, some the size of a dinner- plates. The canopy and bushes that formed the garden walls looked wild as hell, yet must have taken hours upon hours of nurturing to appear so. Spots and lamps, strategically etched within the scenery, gave the place a dream world quality. 

Sure, Ayelet is going to rub my nose in her married-into fortune, so fucking what? Staying in a cheap hotel waiting like a miserable wretch for my flight home would have been worse. I can handle the bitch, hell, seven more refills of this excellent champagne and I'll be comfortably numb till November.

"Hey, watch it." A young gentleman in a white suit ran across the bridge, tipping the tray and sending the champagne to the pond down below. The swans looked mighty happy.So much for the careful consumption plan, now where is that waitress?

"Ana? Ana White?"

She turned around. He hasn't changed, much. There were more silver hairs now rather than blond, but David Ben Abir always had that Ponce de León look. He could have been twenty. Probably would look the same when he's sixty. She was always a sucker for blond men. 

"David. Hey," she kissed his cheek, "very long time."

"What are we, some cold Europeans now? Give us a hug."

His hug was whole-hearted and warm, it made Ana wish he'd continue holding her. 

"You look," he stepped back, "you look ... amazing, Ana."

"I know."

He smiled. "Twenty years."

"Eighteen, actually. I can see the wheels spinning in your head as you try to calculate how old that makes me. I'll spare you the effort, I'm twenty-three now." 

"Still witty," he said.

"And you're still using that old trick, I see," she said.

"I am?"

"That hotshot devilish smile of yours. What did the squadron girls used to call it? Ah, 'Davidlicious.'" 

"I didn't know you had a nickname for my smile." His smile widened.

"Like hell you didn't," Ana snorted. "Me and Amit came out with that. Pretty neat considering it has David, devil and delicious and I'm embarrassing myself so I'll just ... shut up."

"Okay, Okay, I'll admit that I did, but I dropped the Tom Cruise Top-Gun bullshit years ago."

"Ha."

"I did. I'm a respectable Boeing pilot working for Arkia Airlines. Macho tricks might have dazzled eighteen-year-old IDF recruits but using them at my age is.... Well...."

"Pathetic?"

David laughed a whole hearted laugh, "Not the word I was looking for."

"It still does the trick, by the way," Ana said.

"Thank God," he wiped imaginary sweat off his forehead, "and I was thinking I was going to end the evening with no ego left."

"As I recall, you had bundles to spare."

"And I recall a softer version of you. God, who would have believed? Eighteen years." He shook his head, "Ana White."

"It's Jacobson, now."

"Yeah, I've heard. Your husband is here with you?" There was a gleam in his blue eyes.

She shrugged. "Couldn't come."

"A stunning woman like you on her own, that's bordering a major felony. Will you give me the honors, Ana Jacobson?" He offered her his arm, which she accepted with a smile.

"I've never seen anything like it," Ana ducked under a low hanging-vine blossomed with red flowers, each the size of her head. "Amazing! How much money does it costs just to run this place?"

"I gather you've never been here."

"I gather you have. I mean, I can't understand why Ayelet works at the consulate at all, it's not like she needs the salary."

His arm tightened around hers. "It's her way of keeping in touch with her old country. And yes, I've been here several times. My Arkia flight schedule dictates I'm in Crete every Sunday and Wednesday, so ... I thought you two kept in touch over the years."




Wicked Ch. 04



"Hell no, I just bumped into the Human Honey-Bee yesterday. I needed a new passport."

"The human what?"

"That's how the girls used to call her. You remember how the Hatzerim Flight Academy cadets are nicknamed?"

"Pilot Flowers? Oh.... That's just plain cruelty."

"Flies from one flower to the next and sucks nectar." Ana stood on her tiptoes and smelled a huge orchid. "Ayelet always had a thing for flowers. It's so beautiful here." 

"Well, lucky me, I'm walking with the prettiest flower in the garden," David said.

"Awww, I'm blushing." Ana said.

"No you're not."

"So what?" She slapped his ass and offered her arm again for the taking.

The evening was turning out much better than she would have thought it could.



@@@@@@@

Theodore Mistakidis the Third looked like a he came straight out of Lewis Carroll's Through the Looking Glass. Ana stifled an urge to ask him what does 'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves'meanand how did the king's men manage to put himtogether again.Well, perhaps more of an AO-rated Lewis Carroll. The original Humpty Dumpty surely could have taken his gaze off Alice's cleavage for more than two seconds.

"Dear, you never told me she was such a gem." Theo had a sweaty handshake, Ana hated sweaty palms. "Will you be staying in Crete for long, Ana?"

"I'm flying on Wednesday."Eyes up here, pervert.

"That's a shame." 

"Indeed."Let go of my hand, you sweaty Humpty Dumpty.

A line of people was already forming behind Ana and David, waiting to shake the host and hostess's hands. Theo was taking his time, though.

"We would love to have you here again before you leave. We always enjoy having Ayelet's old friends from Israel."

"My husband made plans for the rest of the week, but maybe next time we visit." I wouldn't build my house on that promise if I were you. 

"Now where is your husband? I really wanted to meet him." Ayelet was staring at David's arm where it hooked with Ana's. She appeared more than a little annoyed. 

"He was dying to come, but had some urgent business that needed attending. Luckily I found this good-looking pilot who took pity of my spouseless situation."

"It's a dirty job but someone's got to do it," David said.

"I'd watch out if I were you," Ayelet smile was anything but genuine, "she married a jealous boxing champion."

"He's a software engineer."Ana's smile was even less genuine.What the hell? Do Ayelet and David have something going on?



@@@@@@@@

"The next item is this beautiful white gold-necklace with a diamond pendant shaped like a rose." The auctioneer reminded Ana of a jellyfish; he practically oozed greed. "I would like to remind you, respected gentlemen, that every penny earned in the auction will be doubled by our gracious host. We'll start the bid at fifty thousand euros." 

Theo Mistakidis the Third insisted that Ana sit at the family table. It was a pity, because David sat way back at a far table with the 'less-important' guests. She found the white-haired British Ambassador on her right boring to the point of tears but kept the conversation flowing anyway. Her other conversation option was Theodore on her left, and his shameless undressing gazes were starting to get on her nerves.

"You should try the frittata," Theo said.

"It doesn't look like a frittata." 

"The ingredients are different than you've probably seen before; it's Sevruga caviarand lobster. The chef had it flown all the way from the Big Apple to my humble mansion."

It looks like a huge cockroach someone stuck in a pile of poop. And phony attempts at modesty don't work on this lady. "I'm not really hungry," Ana said. If Dan was here we would have made fun of all these bloated-on-self-importance dummies.  

"Have you ever in your life tasted Kobe Beef?" Theo picked up a juicy piece at the end of a double-toothed long fork. 

"Hamburger? Yes, we have that in Israel, it's a cuisine restaurant called MacDonald's, specialty. If you throw in two more shekels they'll even spoil you with extra Pepsi and french fries." 

"You're funny. I admire that quality in a woman."

"Right, but let's keep that admiration to a safe distance." She gently lifted the hand he placed on her knee. 

An orchestra started playing and several couples arose in response to the soft music. Near a fountain in which featured a leaping dolphin, Ana spotted Ayelet dancing with David and felt a momentary pang of envy. 

Theo picked another choice portion. "Kobe meat comes from a cow that drinks beer and enjoys daily massages."

"Sounds like my Aunt Sharon's vacation in Thailand."

He placed his hand on her thigh. This time his fingers were bolder and they pulled, little by little, the hem of her dress. "Raising Kobe is an old Japanese tradition. Very expensive dish, very classic." 

"Oh, you should see my Aunt Sharon. Classic is hardly the word that pops. And when a girl says no, it means no." She removed his hand again. "That's an old Israeli tradition."

"Classic is the only way I go."

Keep touching me, see where that'll go. 

"You're classic, Ana. Classic straight Greek nose, classic curves; a classic woman. When you walked in here this evening, you took my breath away."

"Now let's not all get too emotional here, okay, Theodore. Let's just focus and try to remember that my husband is a jealous boxing champion, okay?"

"A software engineer." 

Rats.

"Sixty-five thousand, once, for this amazing necklace contribution of Tiffany, Greece. Come on, gentlemen, you can do better!" cried the auctioneer. "Going twice ..."

"One hundred." Theo arose from his seat on his short legs. 

"One hundred thousand Euro." If the auctioneer could have oozed a little more, pieces of him would have started to fall off. "Going once, going twice, sold to our generous host. Ladies and gentlemen, let's give a round of applause to Cretan generosity." 

"Classic. A real beauty." Theo dangled the necklace from his finger when he returned with it a few minutes later.

"But doesn't it mean that you'll also need to match your own bid by another hundred K?"

Theo winked. "Tax-deductible. It's beautiful, isn't it?"

"Ayelet will love it." Ana felt another pang of envy. The last time Dan had bought her a diamond was when he had offered her marriage.

"Ayelet has enough jewelry to buy a small country. This classic piece deserves a classic neck."

Jesus Christ. "Oh, seriously, I can't accept something like that."

"I'm a very wealthy man, Ana. One of the richest men in Europe."

"Some things are not for sale."

"Everyone's got a price tag."

The wisdom of Jessie J? Real classic. 

Boom. A fiery red and purple flower blossomed in the dark sky above the mansion. Another followed, and another, and then a hundred more.

"You know, the mayor wouldn't allow me to have fireworks. Regulations, he said. What do you think I did?" 

"Bought him?"

"I bought the city a new mayor. Since the last elections, the regulations suddenly changed. Now I can Aiiiiiiiiwwwww ..." Theodore Mistakidis the Third hit the high notes as the Kobe long fork skewered the hand he had placed on Ana's knee.

@@@@@@@@

"This place is huge," Ana said, "can you walk me to the exit?"

"Do I get to hold your arm again?" David smiled.

They walked together over the bridges. David was silent, so Ana didn't say anything either. Like a couple that is comfortable enough with each other to not feel the need to fill the silence with idle chat. Ana stopped at the Shishi Odoshi (Deer Chaser) fountain, tossed a pebble in, and followed it with her gaze as it spiraled to the bottom. 

"They say that if you throw a coin into a fountain, you'll visit it again in your lifetime," David said.

"If I ever come here again, Theo will probably call the cops."

"What? Why?"

"Call it feminine intuition."

David picked a red water lily and gave it to Ana. "Where is our host, anyway? I haven't seen him in the past half an hour."

"He had a utensils accident. Cheeky hands syndrome."

"Oh, he made a pass at you?"

"A pass? More like a highway."

"I'm not surprised, really. He's a famous local playboy."

"He's fifty-eight and he looks like Humpty-Dumpty." 

"He's got a regular column in the tabloids," David said. "A new scandal every week. Usually it includes some young, hot model."

Ana picked a red apple from a fruit basket, took one bite and replaced it back at the top of the heap. "Poor Ayelet." 

"I wouldn't be in a hurry to shed tears," he said, "what's sauce for the goose, and all that ... She takes care of herself."

"Yeah, I'd bet she does it every Sunday and Wednesday as the Arkia Airlines schedule dictates." 

He scanned her face then nodded his silent agreement. "How...?"

Ana shrugged "Feminine intuition. You don't look too embarrassed."

"Should I?"

"You look relieved."

"Huh?"

"Wait a second ... She told you to tell me, didn't she, David?"

"Tell you?"

"Yeah, she did, didn't she?" Ana stopped and placed her hands on her hips. "The little bitch told you to tell me you two are having an affair, and you were about to, I just beat you to it."

"Feminine intuition?" 

"I knew it. The little scheming bitch."

He lowered his eyes, searching for flaws in the decorated garden tiles. "She did tell me to drop a big hint about me and her being an item. I thought she was just jealous when she ... you know. We did walk arm in arm tonight." 

"She was always jealous as hell. She hated me, then; she still does."

"That was eighteen years ago, Ana." 

"You know very little about women and grudges, do you? I figured she wanted to rub my nose in her money, but that was just the aperitif. The main course was letting me know she scored with someone I had a crush on."

"You did?"

"That's beside the point, but – "

David pulled her arm and forced her to stop again. "You had a crush on me, Ana?"

"I might have mentioned it out loud once or twice to the girls."

"Ana?"

"It was a social thing, more than anything." 

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"All the girls said you're the hottest IDF pilot ever and I didn't want to fall behind. I was nineteen, my spine wasn't fully developed."

"Awww, come on." 

"Sorry, sweetie, I draw the line at guys shorter than me."

"That hurts, Ana; that really stings."

She slapped his butt. "Put an ice cube on it, honey."

"So she manipulated you into coming in here and manipulated me too, just because she wanted to tag you back from eighteen years ago. Nicely played, Ayelet, very mature." He laughed. "Women are dangerous." 

"And add some. Only she forgot something." Ana had a twinkle in her eye.

"What?"

She placed the tip of her finger on David's forehead. "That I'm not that nineteen-year-old chickenshit prune I was then," her finger traveled down to the bridge of his nose to his lips, "and I'm ten times smarter she'll ever be." Down the finger went, caressing his chest, "And vindictive as hell," the finger kept going south, down below the belt until it found a very prominent bulge. "And that my husband won't be here tonight." 

"Oh God," David choked.

"And that I'm dying to find out if the diamond myth is true," she whispered.

His face was flushed and he was breathing hard. "I know just the place to explore that myth."

"That's the correct answer," Ana touched his lips with hers. 

@@@@@@

Midnight, Israel

Something stirred.

Something tickled.

Hot breath on his neck.

Smooth skin brushing his; the velvet touch of a woman. He could feel her breasts, her nipples whispering against his skin. Then it was gone.

Just a dream.

Again. Delicate fingers playing on his chest, touching ... and then they were gone too; their sudden absence almost painful. Here they start again. Brushing, like the touch of a playful piano player. Fingertips traveled down his chest. Flip, flippity, flop, flip, they skipped. A long fingernail scratched his skin, trailing down, down, on its way south to Graceland.

How he missed her touch. The feeling was so potent that Dan's body heaved. 

Hot breath blowing again. This time down below, touching his manhood. 

"God, I ..." he whispered, "I missed you."

Her velvet lips on his skin. Trailing soft tiny kisses, down and down and even lower than that. Then a tongue touched the ridge of his cock. One, two, three times. He felt the underside of her soft membrane settling on the head of his cock. Then it went like a deliciously wicked windshield wiper. Swish, swash, swish, swash, right, left. 

"Ana ... Oh ..." He reached out and touched her wavy hair.

Wavy hair? What the fuck.

Like a bucket of warm piss. "Fuck!" he whispered. 

"That's the spirit," someone whispered back.

His hand scrambled to find the lamplight, he was not used to the new bed's height and his fingers bumped into the wall. "Ouch! Fuck! Irit?" 

In the cold reading lamplight her skin gleamed white. He stared at her, stunned. Ana had bronze skin and silky red hair. Irit's red lips enveloped his lower head. She sucked his raging erection in, lunging forward until he felt his cock hit the back of her throat. 

He moaned. "Irit, stop!"

She didn't. Instead, she did something Ana never could. He felt his cock head push past a barrier, and suddenly her tongue was touching his scrotum. Again she went for the windshield wiper. Swish, swash, swish, swash, right, left.

"Ohhhh, ahhhhh.... Gods ... Irit ... s ... stop!"

She finally lifted her head, but in slow motion. Her lips traveled along the ridge and she savored every moment of it. Velvet lips on soft skin, pressuring. Up she went, like beautiful torture. Her tongue played him inside her mouth, touching and whipping. At last, only the head remained within. She started sucking air in, like an obscene vacuum cleaner. Her palm gently hugged his cock, and she pulled. Out it came with an audible plop. 

"Stop?" She smiled up at him.

"Oh God, yes, no, I mean ... Oh, God ... stop!"

"Seriously?" One hand didn't let go of his cock, the other went down. She caressed his balls with a fingernail.

"I can't!"

"Said the man with the open marriage." She placed her lips on the head of his cock and kissed it gently. 

"No, I mean, you don't owe me a mercy fuck."

"So that's what it is."

"Isn't it?"

"I thought it was just a fuck. I didn't know it had an adjective."

"I promised Alice I'll be back in the hospital." 

"That's the second woman's name I've heard in the past two minutes, that wasn't mine. And none of them wants to put your cock in her mouth. You sure know how to make a woman feel desired." She licked his cock's underside, her tongue slaloming on his skin. 

"Stop!"

She giggled and licked the bulbous head slowly, like a lollipop. "You seriously think that I'm here because I think I owe you something."

He gently pushed her head back.

"I'm not some grateful damsel in distress, Dan." Irit gave his cock a final kiss, then dragged herself up and laid her head on his chest. "And by the way, I think you were amazing today. Where did you learn to punch people like that?" 

"That fragile old man on the couch." 

"Your dad?"

"He used to wake me every day at five-thirty for boxing practice, since I was eight. He thought he was raising the Israeli Mike Tyson."

"What happened?"

"Life did. Ana...." Dan's voice broke.

"Her again."

"Look Irit-"

"She doesn't deserve you."

"I was a shitty husband and a shitty lover for a very long time."

"Well, she's not here now, that was her choice."

Dan wanted to tell her to stop rubbing salt, but he kept quiet.

"I am here. And I want to check just how much of a shitty lover you are. No one is forcing me."

"Irit."

She lifted her body off of his chest, leaned forward, and kissed his lips. "I feel really unappreciated." She grabbed his cock in her hand and Dan jumped. "Okay, don't make that face. I'm going, your chastity is safe." She lifted her leg as if to get off the bed then in a flash, she sat down hard on her knees, one leg on each side of his stomach. Her hand never left his cock; she moved back and angled it until it touched her sensitive opening.

@@@@@@@

Midnight, Crete

"Nope, no diamond." Ana clasped David's cock head between finger and thumb and pulled hard. "I knew it was bullshit."

"Ouch, careful."

"Maybe it fell inside?" She placed her lips near the cock's head and gave it a taunting lick.

"Hmmmm ..." David closed his eyes. 

"Hellllloooo...." she shouted down his cock like a man shouting at the end of a tunnel. "Anybody in there? Diamond? Ruby? Gem of some sort? A dollar? Note to self: IDF pilots don't grow a diamond at the end of their dick once they get their wings." 

"Don't tell anyone."

"Maybe it's on the other end?" Her palm traveled between his legs and David jumped a mile up as he felt her finger pushing into his anus.

"Ana, whoa, slow down, girl. It's a metaphorical diamond –"

"No shit. You and I will be having metaphorical sex."

"You're sure? Cause it's a metaphor for great stamina and exquisite skill at lovemaking."

Ana gave the cock head another pull. "Aha. And what does it stand for, in your case?" 

"Just kick me in the balls and be done with it."

"If that's your kink, I'm not judging or anything, it's just weird." She aimed a kick at his family jewels (diamond not included). 

He was saved by her having worn an evening dress, and by his having jumped back just in time, knocking over the bar stool he'd quickly vacated. "You're crazy."

They were standing in what appeared to be a desolate bar. 

"What is this place? Hellooo." 

Stools stood at attention near green tables, waiting for customers who never came. The bar even had real bottles on the shelves, but clearly no bartender had served drinks here in a long time. Dust ruled. 

"It used to be a scuba-diving club, and a hostel for divers. It stood near the Mistakidis mansion fence, until Theo bought the grounds and the place. No one comes here anymore."

"Except you and Ayelet."

He shrugged. "It's convenient, it's near the house, and there's a hole in the fence that can get me in and out discreetly." 

"Theo knows?"

"I don't think he cares."

"And your wife?"

"How about your husband?"

Ana thought of Dan. She suddenly missed him. 

"Ana, why am I the only one without clothes on; that sort of misses the point, no?"

"I wanted to check first if that huge Boeing 747 was a compensation for something." 

"Hey!"

She smiled to ease the insulted puppy look he gave her. Men and their obsessiveness with size. Jesus. She did a quick calculation. He should be forty-five. Nice. Flat stomach, muscled legs, probably a runner like me. Doesn't have Dan's huge chest and big shoulders, that's too bad. But I've had big and dull all my life, time to try slim and springy. Open mind, girl. 

"Come here," he growled. "I want to undress you."

Ana tried to open the door opposite the one they had come through, and couldn't. She could hear the sea from the other side, calling to her. "Give me a hand here."

"Leave it; there's a beautiful double bed in the room behind the bar."

Ana kicked the door with little skill and broke her heel. "Shit!" She took off both shoes. "Come on." She pushed again, and the door finally gave way with a loud screech. It opened onto a wooden pier, crumbled and half-submerged in seawater. The Mediterranean lapped at her naked feet.

"It's totally rotten; you can find yourself in the water before you know it."

Ana took off her red evening dress and hung it on the door. She wasn't wearing a bra, only panties. Her naked breasts shone in the moonlight. 

David gave a sharp intake as she turned toward him.

Ana smiled and raised her hands, her magnificent body straight as an arrow.




Wicked Ch. 05



So first, thanks to my very patient editors and proof readers:

Rexbrookdale

And

tangentjoker

You totally rock.





Wicked Ch. 05



Once, in 2006, he had enlisted at the start of the war. It was the longest they ever were apart. The Fire Formation, the reservist division of the airborne brigades, had taken all the recruits' mobiles as a field security precaution. It had been the longest two weeks in Ana's life. When he had come back, thin and tired, she had dragged him; smelly uniform, sweat, and all, to bed. They had stayed the entire night awake together, her head resting on his broad chest. Now, he didn't even say "hi."

The sun touched her red hair and for a moment it seemed like it was on fire. 

"Can I borrow my husband, Missus?"

"Rachel Guttmann," the old lady smiled kindly and took her hand. "You must be Ana." The groomed hand reaching out had a diamond ring big enough to buy a Third World country. "It must have been horrible. I mean, being stuck in Greece, not being able to be here with your sister."

"I knew she was in good hands." 

"She was," Mrs. Guttmann looked at Dan and then back at Ana. It was obvious she noticed there was something amiss in the situation. "Your husband is an amazing young man. I've been exploiting his kindness in the last couple of days every chance I had." 

"Nonsense, it was a pleasure," Dan mumbled, still not looking up at Ana. If he would have been so kind to his wife then we might not have been in this situation in the first place. 

"I only need to borrow him for a few minutes then I'll return him and his kindness," Ana said.

"Of course, of course. I'll ask one of the nurses to help me."

"No!" Dan finally lifted his eyes. There was pain there, but also something else. The 'no' had come out a little too sharp and it drew surprised looks from both Ana and Rachel Guttmann. "I mean, I'll help Rachel get to the CT room first."

"I can't find Alice in her room."

"They put someone else there," he said.

"I figured she didn't turn into a fat middle aged man in four days, but he didn't know where they took her to."

"I'll take you there." 

"Dan, please. Just point me in the right direction."

"I'll take you there. Patience, sweetie. Delayed gratification, you know."

Ana's smile came out so crooked she was glad Mrs. Guttmann didn't see it. 

@@@@@@ 

"Very mature, Dan."

"Just helping a sweet old lady, Ana, what's the fuss? Her kids are a bunch of jerks; they never visit and the nurses are on strike." 

"Fuck her and her kids. She can buy all the help she needs. She can buy a fucking hospital, actually. Do you know who she is? She's the wife of Daniel Guttmann, the billionaire."

"Actually her parents left her millions. Daniel came with empty pockets into the marriage." 

"I know." 

"A bit like our story, only she never used her money to extort her husband into open marriage." His new way of talking to her without making eye contact was starting to get on Ana's nerves. 

"Maybe because her husband used her millions to make billions. I bet he never rotted like a bum in front of the computer all day." 

"Aha, had a good fucking trip, dear? Did you take many pictures of Crete and your ass?" 

It took a lot of effort not to slap him. "You want a megaphone, dear? I think some people at the other side of Hadassah didn't hear you."

"Don't you think it's a wee bit too late to feel embarrassed?" 

"We have a contract, for Christ's sake, Dan. Grow up."

"I should have burned the fucking thing. Where does it say.... Where does it say in the fucking contract you can run away for a week with your lover," Dan's voice broke on the word 'lover', "while your sucker husband takes care of your kids and hospitalized sister?" 

"That wasn't the only thing you've been taking care of, I bet." 

"What? Irit? Are you talking about Irit?" 

"You know what? I don't need this. Not from you, you hypocrite asshole. I fucking owe you nothing. I've kept our house and our marriage for so long I even convinced myself it's okay to be taken for granted. No more, sweetie. Not you or anyone else is going to make me believe I deserve to feel insignificant."

"Fucking with random assholes makes you feel significant?"

"Far better then you ever made me feel."

"You know, Ana. I always knew you were selfish, but I never knew you could be so cruel."

@@@@@@@@ 

"You're not supposed to bathe in hot water, just warm enough," said a bulldog-faced nurse who was fussing around Alice, helping her to get back into the hospital gown. 

"'Warm enough'?" Alice sneezed. "I saw a penguin jumping in. Honest." She picked up her iPhone, pointed the camera at Ana's face and clicked. "That's a keeper, I'll call it 'Ana popsicle'. You could at least make an effort to pretend I don't look like crap."

"Hey, Ali." Ana tried to smile, but it came out wrong, "and you look great, you idiot."

"Bullshit." Alice ran her hand over the fuzz of blond hairs on her head. "Like my new style? Should I keep it tied or let it loose?"

Ana finally overcame her initial shock. She hugged her sister and kissed her cheek. 

"Could have been worse." Alice sneezed. "You should see the haircuts they give in the oncology unit."

"It will grow back." 

Alice sneezed again. "If I don't die of pneumonia first."

"The bath was warm. Jesus," the nurse said.

"A bath? I thought you were trying to extract information. I was about to cave in and tell you who really shot JFK." 

"I bet it was you," the nurse snapped at Alice. 

"Hear that, Sis? You gotta take me home, Ana."

"Yes, please take her home, Ana," the nurse said, "or someplace else, as long as it's far away."

"Might be a problem," Ana said.

"No, seriously," Alice said, "the doctors say they might discharge me in a week. I'll take the Social Security insurance money and hire someone to help me around the house."

"That might be a problem," Ana said.

"Fuck, no. Just put an ad in the paper. Private nurse wanted for a thirty-something, charming ray of sunshine. Prerequisite: understands the difference between warm and the temperature birds start dropping dead out of the sky." 

"The problem is not in getting help. Avi left me a message today. He replaced your apartment's locks and cleaned out your stuff. It's in a warehouse in Ashkelon."

"Fucking bastard. I'm only three months behind rent and I was gonna pay...." 

"He said seven months." 

"Can he throw me out like that without a court warrant?" Alice's left side of the mouth started to tremble. 

"Hey, it's no big deal." Ana hugged her again before the dam broke.

"We'll sue his ass," Alice sniffed, "won't we? He fucked with the wrong bitch. You can't kick anyone out without a court order. That's illegal, right, Ana?" 

"So is not paying rent," Dan said. 

Ana shot him a murderous stare but he was looking out of the window, his back turned, and the effect was wasted. 

"Shit, I'll have to find another place."

"With what money? You're coming over to live with us until you're back on your feet."

"Yeah, no. Don't be offended, Sis, but not in a million years."

@@@@@@ 

"So, occupational therapy is mandatory. I get that, Doctor. Can we take her to Sourasky Hospital for debridement treatments? That would save us a lot of time."

The young doctor looked at his watch and scratched a massive mole that God had pinpointed strategically above the bridge of his nose. "Huh, sorry?" 

Ana killed an urge to kick him. "Debridement treatment. Can we take her to Tel Aviv and save us the ride to Jerusalem?"

"I...." the doctor began. He checked his watch again and the door. 

Rub that mole again and I'll puke. "I'm right here, Doctor."

"Huh?"

"You keep staring at the door."

"Sorry. I traded shifts with another doctor and he's running late ... never mind. I'm not sure about Tel Aviv. I'll have to ask. I ... I don't really know."

"Keep ignoring me, Ana. Jesus." Alice threw a pillow at her sister but her aim was all wrong. "Nothing feels better than being treated like a five-year-old. I told you, I'm not coming home with you. I'll find myself a new apartment in Jerusalem and take my treatments here."

"Ignore her, Doctor," Ana said, "can you check the Sourasky option for me now?" 

"No way I'll become a welfare case, sis, and I can't live with you anyways. We'll get on each other's nerves in two days. If Dan has to tolerate me for two more minutes, he'll start slitting arteries, mine and his. Tell her, Dan."

Yeah, tell me, Dan. Ana turned to her husband. Say something. Look at me for Christ's sake. Stop acting like some kind of a fucking martyr. You're no saint.

"You can take her for debridement treatment in Sourasky." A tall IDF soldier in uniform dragging a heavy machine behind him, entered the room. "They have an excellent burn unit there."

"What the hell, dude? The wedding starts at eight-thirty." Doctor Mole raised his hand and voice. "You said you'd be here by six."

"Blame it on our stoned pilot," the tall man in uniform swallowed a yawn and strapped his M-16 to the treatment bedpost. "He dumped us ten clicks off the mark. We jumped in the middle of a watermelon plantation. Took us two hours to find our Humvees and we missed the entire war game. Real tragic story." He didn't look particularly sad. 

"I told you I'm the best man."

"Couldn't they find anyone better? Look on the bright side, Daniel." He unbuttoned his khaki IDF shirt. "I packed my Subaru with so many watermelons I had to open the sunroof and Subarus don't even have a sunroof. Watermelon-wise, I'm good till two thousand and fifty."

"Funny staff, Dom."

"I'll make it up to you. How 'bout a watermelon?"

"Asshole."

"And you still owe me big-time for coming in today."

"Okay, jerk. Mrs. White, here, needs debridement treatment and her sister has a ton of questions and I'm off...."

"Wass'up, Dan? Wass'up, Mrs.White?"

"Hey, Dr. McDreamy." Alice smiled. It was the first time Ana had seen her smile since she came. A genuine smile; not forced. "How was reserve duty?"

"Terrible, Mrs.White. Imagine a bunch of old army buddies getting together, no wives or girlfriends, no night shifts, plenty of sleep. Ahh, I want to go back." 

"Been stealing watermelons?"

"God forbid, not stealing. Looting, Mrs.White. It's an honorable paratroopers battalion tradition."

"Will you drop the 'Mrs. White' already? I told you to call me 'Alice'. Actually, I told you to call me anytime you like." 

"And I told my girlfriend and she told me to stick with 'Mrs. White'."

"Gay. Isn't he dreamy, Ana?" 

Ana nodded. She tried hard not to stare at Dom. Tall, blond, handsome. Mark that last one out; insanely hot. Like a young version of Brad Pitt, only broader and better looking. God. 

"When he came to give me my first treatment I thought he was a stripper dressed as a doctor."

"Yeah, I get that a lot," Dom said.

"Really?"

"No. Okay," he examined Alice's patient sheet, frowned, and checked her IV. 

"What's with the uniform and the gun?"

"I'm on 24 hours leave; came back straight from the field and ... do you feel pain right now?" 

"A little; but I don't want morphine, I heard I might get hooked."

"Hmmm.... You are already, actually. No way around it," Dom gave Alice a reassuring smile and pulled out a syringe from a drawer. "They started to lower the dosage. I'll be here all night. Don't worry. When you feel the withdrawal symptoms, I'll give you something."

"Great. Be tender."

"Not that something. Something else."

"Hmmm...." Alice closed her eyes and smiled.

"Not that something, either." Doctor Dom shook his head and smiled at Ana. She felt her heart accelerating. "I need to take a quick shower before her treatment. Daniel said you had a ton of questions." 

Just one, how soon can I get you in bed? "Ana, I'm ... sorry, I'm Ana." Ana knew she was blushing like a schoolgirl and hated herself for it. 

"Dom." His handshake was firm and warm, she knew it would be. 

"I'll be taking her home with me in a week and I just want to know the...." she gave an embarrassed laugh, "I want to know everything, actually; treatments, medicine, types of therapy, plastic surgery, her legal rights.... I ... I know it's kind of pushy and probably not your job, but I'm really in the dark here. I just like to be prepared, that's all." 

"I'm just a control freak." Alice imitated Ana's voice. 

"Are you really sharing genes with her, Ana?" Doctor Dom emptied the syringe into Alice's IV chamber. Ana had a nasty urge to lick his ear. "'Cause that sounded like something a responsible adult might say." 

"Oh, Alice is adopted, we found her in a trashcan." 

Alice stuck out her tongue. 

"Don't worry, I have the answers to most of your questions," Dom said, "and I can guarantee I'll check whatever I don't know and if you're still not sure about something, I'll give you my private number. Sound fair?" 

"That's so unfair. I've been trying to get your number all week," Alice cried. 

"Good point," Dom said. "Don't let Alice get my number."

"I'm sorry, Doctor, she had this condition since she was a kid." 

"Oh, I don't mind. About taking her home –" 

"See? He doesn't mind, asshole," Alice stuck out her tongue again.

"He's just saying it, sweetie; he's being polite. That's what grownups do."

"Ahem," Dom interrupted. "Taking her home, take two. Her arm and leg will take a couple of months to heal. So for starters, what she'll need most is someone to help her around even with the most trivial stuff; shower, toilets, basic physiotherapy. Now, you should go to the Social Security representative office here in Hadassah. Depending on the severity of the injury, you're entitled to a personal nurse a few hours every week. That's by law, now –" 

"I don't think that will be necessary," Ana cut him in mid-sentence, "Dan is not working or doing much, aside from watching TV these days, so he would take care of that. Won't you, dear?" Oh, that finally made you turn around, sweetie. Think that's cruel? You ain't seen nothing yet. 

@@@@@@ 

"Wow, Sis, I've got so much to tell you," Ana lay her shapely ass on the hospital bed when they were finally alone. "You wouldn't believe what I've been through in the last couple of days."

"Yeah, I wanted to talk to you about that."

"Can you believe your prune sister? The dried-up, frustrated, undersexed housewife scored with a hot celebrity."

"She did?" 

"Nadav Fine."

"Oh, him."

Ana frowned. "What do you mean, 'Oh, him'? Do you know him?"

"Sure, Nadav Fine, the basketball star."

"Alice?"

"We sort of dated a few years back." 

"'Sort of?'" 

"Nothing big came out of it."

"Shit. Seriously? I thought that for the first time in history I did something so wild you never tried it."

"Kind of an asshole, if I remember right. Thinks a giant dong is a substitute for foreplay and being nice. But I dated him long before he was a star," Alice added quickly when she saw Ana's face darken, "success might have improved him."

No it didn't. 

"Look Ana, I've been doing some thinking, a whole lot of thinking actually, and maybe ... I, ah ... I'll just say it. I think you should stop." 

"'Stop?'"

"This whole ..." Alice tried to paint a big circle with her hand and winced in pain. "This whole 'open marriage' thing."

"What on earth?"

"You had your fun, but it's going places; bad places."

"Seriously?"

"You had your thing; Dan had his thing," she said. Alice stopped. "Christ, I only mention Dan with another woman and you make that face. Scary, but proves my point. You're not built for open marriage, neither of you. And ... and it's killing Dan."

"'Killing Dan.'"

"I haven't seen him touch food all week."

"Good for him, he lost the extra chin he was nurturing."

"Don't be cruel and stop insulting him in front of people. That ain't cool."

"I don't get it," Ana said. Ana's voice had gone past angry mode into furious land. "A month ago you pushed me to file for divorce." 

"I.... It was ... I didn't see things clearly from the outside. Dan and me, we've never been very close; and if I'll be honest for a sec, I was always a bit, you know, jealous." 

"You?" 

Alice bit her lips, nodded her head and went silent for a few seconds. Ana was the only person in this world she dearly cared about. This was tougher than she thought it would be and she hadn't been planning on easy street in the first place. 

"When you married, I felt like he was taking away my best friend. I always held a grudge; and I married three times, Ana. Three complete losers; three total disasters and on the other hand you had your perfect marriage.... Not ... not that you ever rubbed it in my face, but still. So what I'm saying, really...." 

"Yeah, what are you saying, really?"

Alice took a deep breath. "That listening to relationship advice from a girl whose longest relationship lasted five months ... not the smartest thing," she gave a weak smile but Ana didn't echo it.

"I don't fucking believe it." 

"Ana." 

"Let's see: 'Dan is a parasite, an emotional terrorist, self-centered schmuck, loser, spineless'," Ana counted on her fingers as she mentioned each of Dan's top qualities. "'You've got to divorce him, Ana'." Another finger went up. "Rings any bells, sis?"

"Sounds a lot like what me and my big mouth would ... seriously Ana, a girl can do much worse than being married to Dan. Yep, he's an idiot, for sure, but...."

"He's not an idiot," Ana said. 

"But all men are idiots. And he's got a lot of good.... I think he's one of the good guys." 

"What does that even mean?" 

"He's smart, educated, he's a great father, really good looking with or without the extra chin and he really, really, really loves you. You should have seen him when you weren't here and he thought you were calling ... I ... He broke my heart every time he looked at the phone. And that is not an easy thing, you know, to break the heart of a cold bitch."

"He loves me so much it took him five minutes to find some cheap skank to fuck."

"I don't think Irit is even real; just a childish scheme to make you envious. He loves you, Ana. I've never.... If someone would ever love me like that, I would.... If I knew there was someone, somewhere, who could love me like that I would fly to Mars and back to find him. It's not trivial, Ana. You don't want to give up on something like that for.... Really, Ana, that ain't worth it."

"You know what I think?"

"Ana."

"You are jealous. I think that you're jealous now."

"Come on," Alice looked scared but it didn't stop her sister.

"You were always ... even when we were little." She jumped off the bed. "What did the newspapers used to call you, 'the Israeli Charlize Theron', right? Well, I was always Charlize Theron's sister. Ana the lawyer; Ana the housewife. Now, I have my ten minutes in the spotlight and that really kills you."

"Come on."

"You couldn't let me win once, you had to belittle what I had with Nadav-fucking-Fine."

"It's not a competition."

"Now you want me to stop."

"Ana, I would never –"

"Guess what I've found? I'm just like you." Ana straightened her back and stood tall. "I can get any man I want any time I want." 

"I liked the less overconfident version of you better." 

"It's dead. Hell, the new version might be even better than you, that hot doctor –"

"Please, Ana."

"Yeah, purple-eyed Dom. Funny name, 'Dom'. What kind of a name is it anyway?" 

"I was only fucking with him, Ana, please. I would never dream of doing anything with him. He's one of the good guys, too."

"Really? I'll bet you I'll be having him and his goodness eating from the palm of my hand in five minutes. Those huge purple eyes of his are ... just, just, wait. We can sit together later, like we used to, only this time I'll be telling you how great he was in bed."

"Ana, you can't."




Wicked Ch. 05



"Watch me." 

@@@@@@@ 

Someone was taking a shower inside the room. 

She opened slowly the door that said 'Personnel Only', ready to bolt, and sighed in relief when there was no one there. 

Some genius's idea of decorating the doctors' dressing room included porn. The pale blue ceramics on the walls and floor had silhouettes and photos of naked models in various stimulating poses. If it hadn't been for the heap of dirty hospital sheets and dirty green hospital uniforms, she would have thought she had taken the wrong turn and entered some tasteless adult club. 

Dom's M-16 lay on a table, an uninvited guest, near a bunch of stethoscopes and first-aid emergency kits. A mobile that rested against the gun blinked an incoming message and Ana fought the urge to take a peek. She lost. The message was from someone called, 'Hadil – love of my life', and it blinked with a photo of a green-eyed beauty. Probably the girlfriend. 

From the bathroom, wisps of steam lazed into the room, carrying with them the deep, throaty voice of someone who was mighty pleased with himself or the hot shower or both. 

"She'll beeeee comin' 'round the mountain when she comes, when she comes. She'll be comin' 'round the mountain when she comes. She'll be comin' 'round the mountain and then something, something, something. She'll be coming 'round the mountain when she comes."

He sings in the shower, how cute. Dom was singing in English, but his accent wasn't American or British or anything she could pinpoint. 

"She'll beeeee .... fucking six white horses when she comes, when she comes. She'll be fucking six white horses when she comes, when she comes. She'll be fucking six white horses and a dozen or so divorces. She'll be fucking 'round the mountain when she comes." 

Ana took a peek. 

Nadav Fine thought he was hot. Some girls might agree; Ana amongst them. Well, Dom was a different league hot; another world hotter, and he didn't even think the sun shone off his ass.

Golden, tanned skin and muscles that rippled, six-pack included at half the price. The stuff wet dreams are made of. She was always a sucker for broad shoulders, and Dom's wingspan could shame an F-14 jet fighter. 

He was really going at it with the shampoo, singing some oldie, in Hebrew now. "Let me rest my head on a dune, let the muses thunder a little, let me rest on every step and give respect to the IDF." 

Ana closed her eyes. 

She imagined herself standing with him under the pouring flow. Her hands would fondle each wet muscle. She'd give him the medical inspection of his lifetime. She'd start with his kissable lips and suck slowly on each nipple. 

"Take your time and take it easy, nothing burns or really aches, only in a Walt Disney movie, the desert actually awakes." 

She'd glide behind him, her arms circling his huge chest, her head would rest against his shoulder and she'd nibble on his ear. Then she'd start kissing him. Softly first, barely touching that golden skin. Next, she'd make little love bites; she'd go down and down and down.

"Wars there are abundant, and troubles we have our share, so between a missile and a rocket, let me get some R&R in the shade." 

She'd taste his ass and would slowly kiss her way around him. She'd take that beautiful cock and lick it first. Dom would shudder and she would look up and smile. He'd whisper to her to take it. She'd tease him some more with her tongue and that warm creature would grow and harden in her hands. He'd ask her to take it in; this time more urgently. She'd tell him to beg for it. 

"Sooo ... let me rest my head on a dune, let the muses thunder a little, let me rest on every step and give respect...." The song stopped.

She'd wrap her lips around his cock, laughing, when –

"Are you lost?"

Ana panicked then opened her eyes and smiled. 

Dom didn't smile back, his eyes were cold, as he repeated, "Are you lost?" He picked up a towel and covered himself. 

"Lost and now I'm found. Don't be afraid –" 

"'Fraid?" 

"No one will disturb us, I locked the door." 

"Aha. Turn around."

She didn't and Dom shrugged, threw the towel to the dirty pile and picked clean boxers and an undershirt. 

"Can I help you with anything, Ana?"

"First I need to apologize for Alice, she can be sometimes ... pretty intense." 

He nodded. "Actually I wasn't just being polite when I said it's cool. I like her. You know, underneath your sister's piles of bullshit there's actually a nice person."

"I've heard Alice called many things, but 'nice person'? Really?" 

"It's hidden deep, but it's there."

"Alice?" 

"I'm not sure it's my place to ask, but did she go through some kind of trauma; I mean before the accident? Something like death of someone very close, violence, anything that – Did she ever pull a trick like she did on the highway? I mean, did she ever try to harm herself or-"

"No, not that I know of," she said cutting him short. "She wasn't trying to harm herself when she bit on that asshole's penis; she's just immature; she can't plan two minutes ahead. Actually I didn't come here to talk about Alice." 

"No shit." 

"Okay." She nodded. "Straight to the point." 

"There's a point?" 

"You're intelligent enough to guess what it is, Dom."

"So?" 

His features were unreadable. Suddenly she felt Ana the insecure housewife rearing up her mousy head again. "I like what I see, Dom, and I know you like what you see." 

"What about Dan?" he said.

"What about him?"

Dom stared at her, purple blue ice. 

"Dan? Dan is cool about it," don't put on your clothes; you'll be taking them off in a minute. "We have an open marriage."

"Are you sure?"

"What do you mean?" She gave an amused snort. "Of course I'm sure we have an open marriage, we even have a contract."

"I meant are you sure he's cool with it? I'm good at reading people and I'm pretty sure you need to recheck on his coolness."

"So?"

"So nothing," he said.

"And?"

"And nothing."

She smiled in order to relieve the tension she felt brewing. "Who was the interior decorator here, Larry Flynt?"

"The porno ceramics? Yeah, really in good taste. Totally my bad." 

"What do you mean? You picked them?" 

"Worse. I used to do odd jobs for the hospital when I was a med student here. I told the manager I could redecorate this room at half the price anyone else offered." 

"So these were on an eBay crazy sale?"

"Something like that...." He looked a bit embarrassed for a second and then shrugged his huge shoulders. "Actually, I nicked a truck with a load of ceramic tile, only it turned out the shipment was meant to go to some massage parlor." 

"Looting again, Dom?"

"No, actually I stole them. The truck people got the insurance money and I got money to pay rent." 

"Very ethical," she said.

"And you'd be an expert on that, now would you?"

"We have an open marriage. I told you." Her leg fidgeted on the obscene ceramic. "I don't cheat and I don't steal tiles. What's your excuse?"

"I have a flexible morals issue; I blame life," he said.

"Fine with me." 

"But the flexibility stops at my girlfriend." 

"Hadil?"

"How the hell?" He turned toward her real fast, his eyes were an ice-cold, burning furnace. Ana suddenly felt that there was violence hidden underneath the surface. Something she hadn't expected in the kind doctor she had seen earlier. 

"I peeked in your mobile," she said. "Sorry. You left it on the table." 

"Flexible morals issue?" 

"I blame life."

Dom's body relaxed. "Anyway, me and Hadil, we don't have an open relationship. She won't be cool about it."

"I won't tell her if you won't."

He slapped his forehead, "So simple; so brilliant. Look, Ana. We're both grownups. Let's just...." 

"What kind of name is Hadil?"

"It's 'dove's coo' in Arabic."

Ana raised an eyebrow.

"She's Palestinian."

"Seriously? That's a story I'd like to hear."

"Good for you. Look, I'm really bushed and I still got a night shift coming and this is one of the weirdest conversations I ever had. So, Ana, if you would be so kind...."

Ana arched her body sideways and pointed at the general direction of her tits. "Are you seriously going to turn this down?" 

"'Fraid so."

"Are you wussing out on me?" 

"Yup." 

"I'm not getting through here. I think it's because we're not on the same page. I don't intend for a sec to take you away from your Arab girl." Oh, yes I do, you marvelous creature. "I only want some 'happy happy time'. The best you'll ever have; no hidden catch, no strings attached. Who in his right mind would refuse something like that?" She pointed at her body again. "Aren't you a little curious?"

"I'm curious about a lot of things. Look Ana, let's call it a night. I'll forget everything that happened here and so will you."

"Are you sure?" She stepped forward and gently placed her palm on his bicep. She felt his muscles tense and marveled at how strong they felt. "Because, just like you, I'm very good at reading people, and I read uncertainty." Ana placed her free hand on his crotch. "Knew it! Someone is not telling the truth here." 

Dom gently took both her hands off. "Look, Ana,"he sighed deeply. "What I'm about to say might ... would probably surprise you."

"Shoot."

"Has anyone ever told you you're a fucking idiot?"

"What?"

"Go down the hall where it says Psychiatric Ward, find the nice doctors in white robes, and ask to have your head checked."

"Fuck off."

"Sure, but not here and definitely not with you. You don't mean to take me from my girl? Seriously? You'd need a ladder to reach the soles of her boots. I don't know what your husband did in his past life but it must have been pretty fucking awful to get you, in this one."

She opened her mouth but nothing came out. 

"There's a name for women like you where I come from. You can get them on the sidewalk near the old city for fifty shekels a blowjob. That wasn't uncertainty you were reading; that was disgust. I wouldn't touch you even if I was single and you were my last chance of ever having sex. I wouldn't touch you with a two-yard stick." He strapped his stethoscope and gun, automatically locking the bolt and checking the chamber for bullets. "So am I getting through here or do you think we're still not on the same page?"

To be continued.... 

(In less than a year)

Oh, And this took some effort than please take the two seconds to punch them stars below and show that you care.

10x



Wicked Ch. 06



First things first:

Thanks to rexbrookdale and Cambria Rose for helping with the editing.

And

Wicked Chapter Nine

Two months later

Slap. The sound of leather against leather bounced off the Golden Gloves club walls. It found a window to escape through, and flew outside into the humid Tel Aviv street. From Hassan Beck mosque rose the monotonic muezzin call for Zuhr, mid-day prayer, and it entered the club through the same window.

Dan jabbed twice with his left; the second one connected, and the ending twist opened up a nasty cut in Mahmud's cheek. The little bulldozer of a man had dodged, protecting his right side and jabbed with his left.

The punch went way too low and Dan snuck in a massive counter cross, past his unprotected flank. Kinetic energy exhausted its potential and Mahmud's head snapped sideways.

He is really going to feel that one later. Should have insisted on helmets.

Mahmud punched blindly; it flailed, way off mark.

Dan went left, right, left hook, right, left hook. Faster than the eye can follow, forcing Mahmud to put his hands up, protecting his head. Seizing the moment to dig down into the now-unprotected body, he opened another cut with a massive punch.

Mahmud jumped back, but no more punches followed.

"Stop!" Dan said. "What happened right now?"

Mahmud's passive face went blank.

"You can stop the dupe, kid. I know you understand Hebrew perfectly well."

Another blank look.

"Have it your way, kid, but the only way I can help you is if you stop playing games with me."

Mahmud looked around. It was early morning and the Golden Gloves club was almost empty. "How did you know?" His Hebrew was actually very good.

"I wasn't sure. Though I am now."

"You always go for a right hook," Mahmud said, "and my jab was too low. I'll be ready next time."

"Well, that was your first 'ass up'. Fighting someone taller and experienced, never throw your jabs below the shoulder, but that's cool." Dan threw him a towel and took one himself. "Everyone makes mistakes. But you fucked up when you panicked. That's the worst thing that can happen to you in a ring. Old timers like me can smell panic miles off; if this was a real fight I'd be on your ass, no matter how tired I was. Never lose your focus."

"Shit, I'll never ace this like you."

"Not with that attitude. Come on, let's take five on the balcony, I've got a business proposal I wanna talk with you about."

Mahmud stared at him with a sneer.

"Stop eyeballing me like I'm taking you to the casting chair. I ain't gay and you ain't my type. Go up to the balcony, I'll grab us a beer."

"I'm a Muslim."

"Yeah. But Isam and Samir both got a day off, and the balcony is empty, so, this will be just between you and Allah."

"I'll take a Heineken, then."

@@@@@@@@@

Mahmud sipped his cold beer silently, with a little contented smile he hid behind the raised bottle.

It occurred to Dan that he had never seen Mahmud with anything but tightly closed lips. Probably because of the two missing front upper teeth. Dan scanned the waterline. He liked to watch the Mediterranean going about its business because waves always helped him focus, and because of the many Tel Avivian chicks who packed only a bikini on their trips to the beach.

"How old are you, Mahmud?"

"Twenty one."

"You work for Sharif, right, the contractor? How long've you been working in plaster and structure?"

"Since I was twelve."

Goddamn this comeback of striped bathing suits. "And do you have some sort of a master plan?"

"Plan?"

"For life, you know, for the future." If there is justice in this world, somewhere in Africa there's a tigress wearing the skin of a divorced, Tel Avivian skank.

"Earn some money from construction and boxing, then I can get the fuck out of this stinking place."

Dan's internal striped-skank diatribe paused, as he turned to Mahmud. "Where to?"

"I dunno. Barcelona, London, New York; anywhere that's far from here."

"Running away from something?"

"Sure, from crazy fuckers like Isam and Samir who think they have Allah in their back pocket. And racist fuckers like Vladimir, who calls Arabs cockroaches and sand-niggers. Also from old fuckers who think that because they bought me one beer, they can nose around."

"Does it look like I think that?"

"You said you had a business proposal."

"What's with the act, Mahmud?"

"Act?"

"Why pretend you're a dumbo all the time?"

"How can you tell I ain't?"

"Seen you a couple of times with the slow kid from the kiosk, the one that hangs around here almost every afternoon. What's his name? Yusuf?"

"Yeah, so?"

"So I've seen kindness, and patience, and smarts, and.... Like when he wouldn't let go of the stupid golden cup, and even Maor was starting to lose it. You just sat with him for five minutes, you talked it out at eye level and he just let go. You remember that one?"

"I remember Vladimir saying it was just one dumb beast talking to another dumb beast."

"Yeah, I remember that too," Dan said.

"Funny what people say in your face when they think you don't understand them." Mahmud's face, as always, was a blank mask. The kid played poker with life.

"Fuck Vladimir. You're different from all of the retards here. They make a sport out of giving the poor kid a hard time. You're different. Mature."

"My brother's got autism, too."

"Okay. But why the act?"

Mahmud shrugged. "It helps. Makes you not there."

"Not what?"

"If you look stupid, can't speak, like dust, you're not really there. Usually, that's enough. If you're not there they ... you know ... just uh, move on. I guess I got used to it."

Dan had a sad, fleeting image; wearing a khaki IDF uniform at the Hawara checkpoint, arguing with an old Palestinian, the age of his granddad. Not arguing. Arguing is an act between peers, and there is never equilibrium between the man holding the gun and the man looking at the gun barrel. How many checkpoints had Mahmud passed, during his short life, on his way from Ramallah in the occupied territories to Tel Aviv? Dan knew exactly what was the point of 'not being there'.

People adapt, no matter how bad the situation is... Was I willing to adapt to a life without balls? ...they take the beating and humiliation and they bend. But if they don't break they adapt. Ana couldn't adapt to life with an emotional zombie; she had snapped.

He didn't want to dwell on it. "There's an old lady I met two months ago," he said.

"You date old women?"

"I met her in a hospital, you cheeky tick," Dan was happy to see Mahmud peep out from his shell, "and I've completely forgotten about her. She called me, out of the blue, three weeks ago."

"'Kay."

"This old lady, she's a billionaire who likes to throw money at charity projects. She bought an old boarding school near Hertzeliya that's been closed since the eighties. She wants to turn it into a shelter for youth at risk."

"What's that?"

"Kids from broken homes, abusive families, violence, you know. Kids that need protection and somewhere that can help them. Both Jewish kids and Arab kids, by the way. She gave the renovation to a sub-contractor, but he's been dicking the dog for two years now, so she's suing his ass and trying a new approach. She hired me to pick up that project and to follow through from A to Z. She wants me to renovate the old school, and then she wants me to run it."

"Why did she pick you?" Mahmud looked sadly at the declining beer level in the bottle. "I thought you were the guy who did computers and stuff."

"I've done big projects before, I've worked in a shelter and I was recommended by a young doctor that she really appreciates. Anyway, I have some experience working in construction with my dad twenty years ago. But it's an outdated skill. I know things are done differently today, so I need help."

"You do that thing a lot?"

Dan lost his line of thought. "What thing?"

"When you need a favor from someone, you buy him beer and you think that makes you his friend?"

"I just figured you'd want beer; it's hot."

"I ain't your friend, Dan."

"Works for me."

"You're an Israeli Jew, I'm a Palestinian."

"Does it mean we have to be enemies?"

Mahmud scanned him from head to toe with a look that said, even though Dan was almost twenty years his senior, he had some growing up to do. "Just wanted to make sure you understand that. Maybe I'm just twenty-one but I won't let anyone screw me. How big is the ... how big, is the shelter thing?"

"Classes, a gym, warehouses, dormitories area, and they all need some heavy renovation. She wants me to build stables too."

"Inside the school?"

"There's a thing called riding therapy."

"I'm not a contractor," Mahmud said.

"I'm not taking a single big contractor, so I would need someone smart like you who can navigate the ship, our ship; someone who knows the ins and outs of working with subcontractors." Dan was already talking in terms of us, hoping his enthusiasm was touching the young skeptic sitting in front of him. "I need someone with experience who can tell me when a contractor is trying to pork me. I don't need a new friend; I need an assistant, someone reliable."

"Why me?"

"I could hire a construction supervisor but from my experience, you always find later that the guys they hired were their own buddies. Plus I know you and you're--"

"Cheap," Mahmud smirked for a second, then closed his mouth, a blank mask again.

"No. Not that. Okay, no bullshit, the woman may be a billionaire but she ain't stupid, she's running a tight budget and you are cheaper than any supervisor. But there's more."

"More?"

"I've talked her into turning an old warehouse into a boxing gym. Somewhere the kids can punch out their aggressions. And I would need a boxing instructor, someone who's good with kids and speaks both Hebrew and Arabic."

"What do I know about teaching problematic kids?"

"I never figured you'd be the one to puss out of a challenge."

Mahmud didn't say anything for a long time. He scanned Dan, probably trying to find the catch.

A tough kid ... with issues. Am I making the right choice here?

"My daily is two hundred shekels," he finally said, "I got a real permit, you know; I'm not illegal."

"I'll give you seven-K, monthly. Plus I won't grab half your paycheck like Sharif does for the arranging your permit with the DCL. Think about it, it's an opportunity. I'll go buy us two more beers while you do. If, that's okay with you, Not-Friend?"

@@@@@@@@@

Fifteen, come on, fifteen you fat-ass slob, you can do it. "Every day in every way I'm getting better and better." His body rose slowly higher. The lactic acid in his muscles was telling him insulting stuff about his mom's occupation, but he paid no heed. Fifteen, come on, fifteen. His chin rose an inch above the bar and he let go with a whoosh of exhaled air and a triumphal scream.

"Yeah, that's the ticket, you fat schmuck," his brother said.

"Who's fat, Maor?" Dan slapped his stomach and checked the mirror. His abs were finally showing; nothing to write home about, but the padding was gone. He had been an athlete most of his life. His body just needed a little push and shove, to remember. "Not bad, eh?"

"I bet Ana is happy."

Dan tried to keep a nonchalant face. "Wanna bam with this fat schmuck?"

Maor gave him the bird and turned his back, but when he passed near him he turned, all of a sudden, and slammed Dan a hard one in the stomach. Dan folded to the floor. "Fuck, that's how you do it, bitch. Prison rules, mother fucker." Maor reached out to help his brother up. When Dan was up halfway he punched a hook into his brother's jaw, sending him back down. "Fuck, yeah. Are you coming on Friday? Edna is making shrimp sushi."

"Doesn't sound too kosher," Dan tried to pick himself up, wearily watching for another attack. "I thought she found the light, or God, or something."

"Lost it again. You gonna tag along that crazy-ass of yours?"

"Why?"

"We need to get ready, you know; shine the bullet-proof vest, dust off the crucifix and the holy water, lock the kids in their room so they won't hear the language on that bitch."

"Get out of here, you're crazy about Alice."

"She's a cool cat, I'll give her that," Maor smiled, "not that I'd hook her up with someone I know or anything. I mean I would, but I wouldn't want to date someone like her. I mean I would, but not that I'd fall for her, or want to make little puppies with her ..." He paused in some grownup childish daydream, and then added, "Yeah, that would be awesome."

"When you're done wanking could you please get me the number for the Ramallah DCL guy who writes the permits, for Mahmud?"

"Why?"

Dan was about to answer when his mobile buzzed, and he signaled his brother they'd continue this later. He went back into the locker room, found a private spot, and dialed.

"Hi, sweetie."

"How're you doing, Iriti?"

"Settling down, you know, it's a good place. Quiet."

"How's the new job?"

"I quit."

"Why?" Dan cried, "you said it was perfect."

"Until I found out one guy from middle management used to be a regular client of mine," she said.

"Fuck."

"No, actually, he used to come dressed in shorts and school shirt, and wanted me to spank his buns, that's it."

"You shouldn't let someone like that put you down; it should be the other way around, especially if he's married."

"Yeah; no."

"Shit, how are you holding? You know I could send a little --"

"Back off, Dan, I ain't taking money from you. Anyway I called to check out on you. How are things back home?"

"Quiet."

"That's good."

"Cold war quiet."

"Ouch. And Ana, is she still...? "

"No, no she doesn't, no. Not since Crete. I'm not sure what happened but something shocked her back into her sane self. She's changed."

"How?"

"I don't know, she's not her usual self; she's quiet. I don't know, maybe I've changed. But she didn't go out with anyone."

"Are you sure?"

"Pretty much. She works hard, comes home, brings work back with her. It's like she's drowning in work these days. She's ... maybe she's depressed ... I don't know really. She goes to sleep every night at eight-thirty."

"Sounds weird. And you two? I mean the nuki? I mean, you know what I mean."

"She sleeps in her bedroom, I sleep upstairs."

"Ouch."

"We're like complete strangers living in the same house, we almost never talk anymore. I'd never thought I'd say this, but I'm really glad Alice is living with us. She's like an equalizer. If it wasn't for her, I think World War Three might have, you know...."

@@@@@@@@@

"Another round of peace talks will resume August 14th in Jerusalem amid fury over settlement construction, and following the release of 26 Palestinian prisoners. The White House released a statement today, calling both sides --"

"She's done something with her hair." Alice picked out a sunflower seed, bit on it, then spit the remains onto a small plate. One look from Ana, promising gratifying death after slow torture, sent her digging the sofa for the one piece of shell she missed. "Looks nice." She turned to Dan and rolled her eyes.

Dan punched the start button on his laptop. The desktop screen had somehow flipped, bottom-side-up and none of the icons were responding. "Who looks nice?"

"Yonit Levi, she's done something with her hair."

"Amazing how you can summarize watching news to a trivial remark about the newsreader's hair. Goddamn this fucking...!"

"What's new about peace talks?" Alice said.

"That's why people like you shouldn't be allowed to vote."

"We've been there a million times before, you condescending, kiss-ass lefty. It's a dead-end. The Palestinians want one thing and one thing only."

"Jerusalem?"

"That too, but they want to fuck me."

He checked the Windows processes. All looked fine. "You mean us. Israelis."

"Not us, me," Alice pointed at her body. "Everyone wants to fuck me."

"Everyone wants to fuck you, sure."

"We'll give them Judea and Samaria and East Jerusalem. Two days later, give or take, they'll be knocking at my door. 'Knock, knock, who's there? It's the Palestinians, we've come to fuck you'."

"That's the Alice-centric religion? Where do I not sign in?"

Alice stared at Dan and crossed her eyes. He couldn't help laughing. "Some computer nerd you are. We should call my grandma. She has more technical aptitude than you."

"I've no idea how that...." He suddenly noticed the mirth at the corner of her mouth. "Alright, what did you do, Alice?"

She burst out laughing.

"Goddamn." It took him another ten seconds. "You replaced the Theme with a picture of an upside-down desktop; these aren't icons."

It took her some time to stop laughing. "God, you should have seen your face," she burst out laughing again.

"You've got way too much free time on your hands."

She wiped away her tears. "Actually, I asked Tom to do it, I wouldn't know where to start. Tom," she shouted, "he fell for it."

"Why didn't you call me?" Tom came running downstairs, carrying with him a race game disc.

"It would have been too suspicious. God you should have seen him going at the keyboard." Alice pantomimed a hysterical version of Dan punching, and both she and Tom burst out laughing.

"You two are grounded."

"Can you play Mario Race with me, Dad?"

"I'm watching the news. Why don't you play Scrabble with your mature aunt, instead?"

"She cheats."

"Hey, not nice," Alice tousled his hair, "'Firnafir' is a real word. A kind of an Armenian armadillo."

"I googled it," Tom said. "No such thing."

"It's technologically shy, like your aunt. It doesn't know where Google lives, so Google never had a chance to put it in his Google-y notebook."

"Yeah, right."

"Would I lie to my only nephew?"

"Sure."

"Can I get some respect here, Dan?"

"On a plate or in a sandwich?" Dan hugged his son close, and tickled him into a giggling fit. "Know what? Get the Scrabble board and I'll join you two. I'm in the mood for revenge, big time."

"Hah!"

"Oh, smell that, Tommy? That's the sweet smell of a serious humiliation coming your way, you and Alice better give up now, I won't hold it against you."

"As if." Tom ran upstairs for the Scrabble.

For the past half-hour Ana hadn't really been doing any work. She had observed from behind her laptop screen; a scientist, supervising a social experiment behind a one-directional glass. What was wrong with this scene? Alice, Dan, and Tom, had played Scrabble, joked, teased, and had a riot of a time. Even Liana, enticed by the mirth she had heard, came down and was allowed to stay out of bed on Dan's lap. The house had been once again full with the sounds of laughter, dearly missed for a very long time. The perfect family portrait. So ... what was wrong with this picture?

She was not in it. It wasn't Alice's family ... it was her family.

Dan was a new man, bursting with energy. He was filling the kids' heads with promises of the new youth shelter and a stable full of gentle horses. Everyone in the house, even Alice, seemed to be swept by his newfound enthusiasm. Everyone, except for Ana.

The green-eyed monster slithered into her ear and found in her an avid listener to ugly lies and wild allegations. Every time Alice said something that had sent them all into a round of giggling, she felt a twist in her chest. Every time Alice had touched Dan with too much familiarity, it felt like a tiny dwarf was using her heart as a pin-cushion. She should be sitting there on the sofa, not her sister. Envy turned to bitterness, and bitterness to anger that lit a flame. Doctor Dom had placed a mirror in front of her nose, and what she saw had sent her running into a dark cave. Now, she wanted out.




Wicked Ch. 06



Fuck Dom! Fuck Alice, and fuck me.

It took her all her willpower just to rise.

One foot in front of the other. Come on.

With a sudden resolve she strode to the sofa and sank between Alice and Dan, wiggling her ass playfully, pushing them aside. "I wanna play too."

"But you never play Scrabble, Mom."

"Hah, just so you know, sweetie, in high school, I've been captain of the Scrabble team. Now give me the dice, my turn to roll."

"There are no dice in Scrabble, Mom."

"I knew that."

"Daaad."

"Hey!" Dan said. "Play nice." His face was a mix of shock and confusion, but there was a tiny smile forming too. "Let's ... let's ... ah ... let's make Mommy feel welcome and give her a big hurray for sportsmanship. Hip, hip...."

"Hurray," Liana mumbled from Dan's lap.

Ana placed her hand on his thigh and squeezed. She heard him gasp sharply and a tiny smile escaped her beautiful lips.

"I want to wear the white dress with the butterflies, Mommy," Liana said.

"But you already showered."

"Noooo. Not right now, for the wedding."

"Grandma already bought you a new dress." Ana kissed her daughter's tummy. She allowed her lips to slide as if by accident on her husband's palm.

"But I want the butterflies dress."

"Wait till you see the dress Granny bought you. You're going to be the most beautiful flower girl ever. I think you should wear the onyx tux, Dan."

"I ... I don't think it's gonna, you know, fit, unless I'll stop breathing for the entire evening."

She smiled softly and scanned him from head to toe, letting him know his diet and new healthier lifestyle hadn't gone unnoticed. "I think it will. You can have my green Jovani, Alice, it's a sure head-spinner, even sitting down."

"Very funny."

"We can find you something else if you don't like it."

"I'm not going, Ana."

"Don't be ridiculous."

"You'll have to drag me."

"Okay."

"Ana, I'm serious -- "

"So am I."

"I won't open this can in front of the kids," Alice said.

"So don't. Look, sweetie, it's very simple. Everyone is expecting you to be at your brother's wedding. Now if you can decide to be a grownup, everyone will be happier. If not, then not. Either way you are coming."

"Marianna Jacobson," Alice's face reddened, "I know you think you take turns with God, running the universe, but --"

"Who's Marianna?" Tom jumped.

"That would be your Mom," Dan said.

"What?"

"Ana is short for Marianna, after your great-grandma."

"Get out of here, Mom. You're gonna tell me you've been a Russian all these years?"

That sent the room into another uncontrolled burst of laughter. Even Alice joined but it was clear her heart wasn't in it.

@@@@@@@@@

Dan started his day at 5 AM with a two-hour Golden Gloves Club practice. It proved to be a mistake. He and Mahmud spent the first half of the rest of the day breaking walls with sledgehammers, and the second half transferring the piles of rubble on their backs. Between breaking and pulling he had managed to hire a crew of cement workers, lay off and call the police on a truck driver who had turned out to be an iron thief, quarrel with several contractors over the phone, and fill his schedule with so many job interviews and meetings he'd be able to squeeze in two minutes to take a leak, somewhere in December.

His gamble with Mahmud had paid off, big-time. The kid had stopped him from falling on his ass on several occasions. Plus, people tended to think Mahmud was as smart and observant as a concrete mixer. He was really good at not being there, and that's how he caught the truck driver ten minutes before the asshole took off into the sunset with forty thousand dollars' worth of structural steel.

It was physically, mentally, and spiritually exhausting. At 10 AM he felt ready to die; at 2 PM he was ready to die and take everyone at the site with him to an early grave. By 7 PM, he was willing to settle for a hot bath. However, Ana had gone with her brother Ilan to a caterer's private tasting; in quest of the perfect hors d'oeuvres, dinner, and desserts, for the wedding. This meant that after a long day Dan still had to make dinner, and bathe and put the kids to bed. By 9 PM, he was willing to settle for a short, semi-warm shower, but then the phone started ringing every time he reached for the soap.

"So I really appreciate the offer, Amir, but I got to say no. Yeah, I'm sure, sorry. I'll be in touch, really; good luck, man. Bye." Dan looked down at the kitchen floor. He was standing in a puddle of his own making. Without giving it too much thought, he dropped the big towel he had around his waist and started it soaking up the wet from the tiles.

"Nice butt," Alice said. "Someone's been working out a lot."

"Fuck!" Dan dove to retrieve the towel, almost crashing, head-on, with the floor. "How long have you been sitting here?"

"Long enough to hear you turn down your former boss. Why'd you do that?"

"Maybe because I already have a job."

"Come on, Rachel Guttmann can't be paying you more than a high-tech management salary can offer."

Dan looked at her then shrugged. "Less than a half."

"Are you nuts? Ana would freak out."

"I don't care."

"Yeah, sure."

"I'm tired of moving bits and bytes, and solving invented problems. And I'm tired of getting the boot every recession. And you know what? For the first time in my life, I feel like what I do actually counts. That feels really good."

Alice nodded her agreement.

"What? That's it? No sarcasm, no smart remarks? You feeling okay?"

She looked at the ceiling for a few seconds, then twisted her mouth, "Nothing pops. Consider yourself outwitted, if it helps. How about my --?"

"Already told you, the answer is no."

"Come on."

"I'm not giving you a shower."

"Please. I've got so much grease in my hair I won't be needing the wheelchair soon. You could just flip me on my head and slide me around."

"Should have thought of that before you scared away the Social Security nurse. Why did you have to tell her that she ate pork?"

"I had to stop her from gobbling everything in the fridge, somehow." She pushed the joystick on her wheelchair. It shot forward and when she was near Dan she grabbed his towel and tried to pull it. He held on, like a virgin protecting her innocence, and she had to give up. "I was only worried you'll have nothing left to eat when you come home."

"Why? Why do you always have to be so mean to everyone? You know, for once in your life you could ... sorry? Do I bore you?"

"Nah, I always yawn when I'm interested. Go on."

"I'm not giving you a shower."

"Please."

"It's inappropriate," Dan said.

"Do you use hygienic soap for your vagina, Dan?"

"Maybe Ana can give you a shower when she comes home with the kids."

"Yeah, right, that's really gonna happen."

"Maybe not." He tied the towel around his waist, but kept his hand on it in case she tried to grab it again. Life with Alice was a bit like going back to high school: you had to keep on your toes as the school's blond, sexy-legged, bully could strike at any time. "But you're gonna help me, Alice."

"As if."

"I've got this friend, a photographer, well not a professional, but she's really got talent."

Alice sat up in the wheelchair, suddenly interested. "A female friend? Someone I know?"

"She's really talented," he said.

"You said that already."

"And I thought, well, this is what you do for a living, don't you? You connect the talented people with the gallery people or ... the museum people or whatever.... Sorry that I never.... Anyway, maybe with your connections, you can help her sell a few photos?"

"Does she have a name, this photographer?"

"Irit."

"You're shitting me not." She opened her green eyes wide. She stared at him, and her surprise turned to something else. Dan thought he saw lines of disappointment, but he wasn't really sure. Why would Alice even care?

"So Irit is actually a real person," she said.

"You and Ana talk a lot, don't you?"

"Not so much, lately. You really went for the horizontal mambo with someone.... Wow."

"Know what? Forget it." He strode back to the bedroom, feeling like a drama queen and hating Alice for it. He was getting into his training pants and undershirt when she drove into the room in her electric wheelchair.

"Come on, Dan."

"It's none of your fucking business."

"Okay."

"Funny thing is, I never even slept with her. I swear to God, I couldn't."

"Okay."

"I never slept with her -- I.... What do you mean, 'okay'?"

"I believe you."

He searched her perfect doll face for sarcasm and could find none. "We've never done anything. I just ... I asked her to give me hickeys so that Ana would get jealous."

"That turned out well, didn't it?"

"Yeah," he buried his face in his palms. "I fucked up my life real good, didn't I?"

She was silent for a few moments and then he felt her hand touching lightly on his shoulder. "Come on, let me see some samples of what she can do. I'll see if it's worth anything."

@@@@@@@@

"So, what's the verdict?"

"Shush, can't you see I'm working, here?" She sat with the tablet on her knees, scanning through the samples. She took her time with each photo, enlarging parts, like Harrison Ford in Bladerunner trying to analyze a crime scene. From time to time, she would go back to one she had already seen, and the analyzing would start all over again. Dan watched, mesmerized. It was a new experience, to see her so serious and in control of what she was doing.

"You know, it's really difficult looking at photos like this without any coffee.... Latte, no cream, and I like the way you write things in the froth."

"Anything else, Sheikh Alice?"

"A neck rub would be nice."

He came back with the coffee and found her with the tablet turned off. "Well?"

"Well ... extremely talented with a great future in photography, she's not." Alice laughed when the disappointed puppy look took over his face. "Oh, you're just too easy. I'm fucking with you, Dan. She's actually good, surprisingly very good. Excellent eye, raw talent, she catches the drama with a sense of humor too; that's always good."

"So you think she could sell any of these?"

"Is she some mousey, high-tech girl?"

"Nope, not really. She's ..." he hesitated, then shrugged his big shoulders, "she was a prostitute when I met her."

"A hooker? Seriously?"

"She's not anymore. So you think she could make money out of photography?"

"Get the fuck off, Dan. I'm not telling you anything until you tell me everything."

So he did. He sat down and told Alice everything that had happened since the fateful day when he had gone out, looking for revenge, and instead had found the sympathetic ear of a working girl. He only skipped the parts that included Ana, because even two months later it was still too painful to talk about. He also kept to himself about the night Irit had come to his bed. For the very first time since he had known her, his sister sat down quietly and didn't interrupt once, even when he paused.

"That's ... wow. You did all that? That's totally off the charts. What the hell were you thinking?" She stared at him as if he was some green Martian that just popped into Tel Aviv, for some coffee and an anal probe. "What were you thinking? You could have gotten yourself killed. And who brings a girl like that home?"

"I couldn't think of any other solution."

"Wow, you're a real idiot; I mean, your heart is in the right place, but your brain...." She twisted an imaginary screw against her forehead.

"So you think you might be able to help her sell her photos?"

"I might have. But, alas!" She gave a theatrical sigh that wouldn't have shamed a Metropolitan Opera House performer. "There's grease in my hair that's keeping my creativity and goodwill down. If there was only some way to get it off."

"Oh, come on."

@@@@@@@@@

"Put more heart in it, sugar, that's right ... Mmmmm, Dan, that feels sooo good, yes, yes, oh, yes, yes, oh god, oh yes." Alice tried the When Harry Met Sally restaurant scene.

"Shut up."

She laughed.

"You're so enjoying this," he said.

"This's more action than I had in two months."

"No, you're enjoying yourself because it really makes me edgy, that's why."

"You nailed it. Lower, please."

"You're a bully, Alice; heart and soul."

"Lower."

"I'm not touching your boobs."

"Hey, that one went in my eye."

Dan dabbed her eye with a towel. "Sorry."

"Can't you do this with your eyes open? Jeez, you take me to the toilets twice a day, you've already seen everything that there is to see, a million times."

"Alice, you took your clothes off on the front page of Woman's Journal. Everyone in Israel has seen everything that there is to see. "

"So?"

"It's still inappropriate," Dan said.

"Do you still get regular menstruation or did you reach menopause? You know what? You're not a nerd, you're a hypocrite."

"Am not."

"Are too," Alice laughed happily, and tilted her head back.

He had peeked. How many times in your life do you get to shower with someone whom the newspapers once described as the 'Israeli answer to Kate Moss'? Like Ana, Alice had won her perfect bronze complexion from her mom's Moroccan side of the family. The contrast it made with her Ukrainian side's blonde hair and cat-like green eyes could cause the human heart some serious bleeding. Which it had done, many times.

She sat in a chair Dan had placed in the tub, her left leg lay elevated over the side to rest on another chair, preventing her cast from getting wet. For that reason alone, Dan kept himself behind her. He knew that if he stepped forward he'd get a marvelous view that, other than her gynecologist, few had ever seen.

Her hair had grown an inch in two months, and he marveled at its Japanese-doll quality, as he worked in the shampoo. He braced one hand against her forehead so water wouldn't flow in the direction of her body and legs. Her right leg still showed semi-healed scar tissue that was sensitive to hot temperature and would need, in future, plastic surgery to vanish completely. Every time he opened his eyes, he tried very hard not to stare at her boobs. They were perfect; grapefruit-sized spheres, symmetrical, and firm. She had never used them for breastfeeding and had added silicon a few years back.

Alice had started humming a happy tune then stopped, surrendering completely to his touch. It felt really good and also he seemed more relaxed now, so annoying him would probably produce a less-than-desirable effect. She had become so quiet, in fact, that he had opened his eyes to see if everything was all right, and regretted it immediately; Alice was rubbing soap between her legs.

"Huh? Did you say something, Dan?"

Don't look back, don't look back, don't look back.

"I need to shave my armpits, this is really getting gross."

Don't look back, don't look back, please. Dead decaying bodies, vomit, dog poop, fresh squishy dog poop on the heel of my shoe, rotten yellow black teeth, Grandma Jacobson in a nightgown.

"I need some triangle trimming too. It's becoming a jungle down there."

I had to wear boxers, didn't I? Zit-popping. Huge, red, bursting, zit on the belly of an obese, smelly guy. Garbage bag tearing, garbage juice dripping. Cockroaches. Intestines. Cockroaches swimming inside intestine juice. Fresh boogers. Justin Bieber.

Thank god for small favors, she hadn't looked back and thus hadn't seen his huge erection. Dan wrapped her body with two heavy towels and picked her up, gently. Like Ana she was lithe, but there was a lot of that litheness, six-feet-plus.

"Seriously, Dan, give me your honest opinion, as a male. Hypothetically speaking, let's say you're not married to my sister. If you met me in a pub, I mean the way I look right now. If you saw me, would you buy me a drink?"

"If I saw you like this in a pub I would suggest more clothes before anything else."

"And the dork-of-the-year award goes to: ta-tam, ta-tam, Dan Jacobson."

"Oh, wow, thank you, thank you, thank you. I would like to thank Mom and Dad and my third grade Arabic teacher, Mrs. Saiid." He tried his best imitation of smarm, but it sounded more like Marlon Brando in The Godfather. "This is a big moment for me, folks, Mom, Dad, academy people of Dork-Town, and especially my, Alice; you taught me that a day without making someone wish murder wasn't a capital offense, is a day wasted. Thank you for so many little moments of misanthropy. I'll cherish them all."

Alice stared at him for a second with a straight face, then her laughter rolled like fresh drops of happiness. Dan joined her, breathing deeply in relief.

"Fucking nurse from the fucking Social Security, Jesus, I've never seen something so big running so fast," he wiped tears from his eyes on her towel and then noticed that she stopped laughing.

She stared at him, eyes wide for a second, her lips curled in a half-smile or maybe it was something else. Then she wrapped her hand around his neck and pulled his lips to hers. She inhaled hard, tasted him a little and felt his aftershave tickle her nose. Her lips brushed his, waiting for him for two seconds or her entire life; she wasn't sure which. Waiting, waiting, and then waiting some more in brittle anticipation, until nothing happened. Dan pulled back, gently. She opened her eyes, saw the shock registered on his handsome face, and wanted to die.

"I made her run for the hills, didn't I?" she tried to smile and failed miserably.

"Yeah."

It was only a few steps to her bedroom, but they lasted an eternity.

He laid her down on the bed, gently. "Do you ... you need anything else?"

"No, I've got everything here, thanks." She tried to control her breathing, it didn't work. She stared at the door for a long time after Dan had left, her perfect bosom heaving, up and down. She felt herself slipping off her rope, and her abyss had never looked so close. She caught her own image in the mirror. The blonde, feral girl stared back at her, eyes wide with humiliation and regret. She picked up the plastic coffee cup and hurled it at the mirror. "You ungrateful, fucking, backstabbing, slut!"

@@@@@@@@

"I don't know." Ilan's mouth twisted sideways. He picked another tiny portion of the foie gras, smelled it, and dropped it on the tip of his tongue. "It's too liquid-y."

"Tastes super awesome to me," Ana said.

"I don't know, maybe another dish, Sean?"

Sean picked up the duck liver from Ilan's plate, gave it a healthy bite and washed it down with a Pinot Noir. "Look, Ilan," he said. "It's a hundred o'clock already. You have seven hundred guests. I need to order the ingredients at least a week in advance. So I need a 'clear-cut' and I need it now. Drag it another day and you'll have to settle for falafel and hummus as your wedding's opening dish. And by the way, the foie gras is excellent."

"I don't know."

"I need you to know." Sean caught Ana ogling him and gave her a wink.

She blushed and tried not to stare; it wasn't easy to do.

"You know what? Screw this." Ilan rose from his seat. "I'm late for a meeting. I don't want to decide. I'll leave you with my sister, whatever she says, goes; including the final price."

"Come on, Ilan, it's your funeral, not hers."

"Sean is right," Ana said.

"He's not right, he's just scared, Ana." Ilan smiled. "He already figured you're not someone he can butter up. Make sure you cut down at least twenty percent on any price he gives you."

"She can't. I'm not buttering up anyone and the price for each dish is pre-set, non-negotiable, man."

Ilan laid a comforting hand on Sean's shoulder. "I know that when you heard the name Ofek White you figured a heavy purse; you were right. But don't mistake the Whites for suckers. The foie gras is too liquid-y."




Wicked Ch. 06



"You know, Ilan, on my graduation year it won me first prize in the Traditional France Cuisine Competition."

"Where exactly did you study?"

"Nique Ta Mere in Paris." [French for 'fuck your mom']

"Never heard of it."

"It's every year in the top five chef schools in Va Te Faire Foutre magazine." [Go Fuck Yourself magazine].

"Good for you. Make the call for me, Ana." He kissed Ana's cheek and took off.

Sean stared at Ilan's back, started to say something, but then reconsidered. He sat down, lifted his legs onto the decorated table, then lit himself a cigarette.

"Don't let him get under your skin. He can be a bit tiresome sometimes," Ana said.

Sean turned to her and smiled. It was the kind of smile that sends young hearts under shapely bosoms, fluttering. Ana couldn't help but smile back.

"'Fuck Your Mother Chef's School' in Paris? Really?"

"Sure," he said, "it's on C'est Des Conneries Boulevards."

"I could have told on you," she said.

"But you didn't."

"You don't know Ilan, he would have blown the whole deal and I really don't have the energy to search for another catering service with him."

Sean took a nice hit, then puffed slowly and drew the little cloud back in.

"So where did you learn to cook so well?"

"In prison."

"Seriously?"

"Nah, I just use that line as an ice breaker."

Ana laughed and sat down beside him. She pretended to immerse herself in the catering's menus and brochures but she actually kept checking him out. Nothing wrong with just looking. "Is that a joint, Sean?"

"Sure hope so, otherwise I paid way too much."

"My mom used to warn me away from boys like you."

"My mom used to warn me from having sex with our cat. Boy she was right, if there's one thing I learned about sex with cats, is that you just don't do it."

"Too bad she didn't warn you about doing drugs."

"It's medicinal pot."

"And I never faked an orgasm."

"For my 'dealing with douche-bags' condition." He inhaled deep and closed his eyes, like a lazy cat taking a sunbath. "I used to beat up kids like your brother in school."

"How sweet the revenge, that the bully now wears an apron and has to suck up to the brainy kid, who now wears a suit."

"Philosophum non facit barba," Sean said [Latin: 'A beard doesn't make a philosopher']

"What?"

"It's Latin."

"But what does it mean?"

"It means that you and your brother aren't brainy, just born to the right parents. 'Heavy purse'. Jesus, what a douche."

"You speak Latin?"

"I speak Latin, curse in Arabic, rhyme in Italian, count in Spanish, reason in German, and court in French. But I only dream in soggy Belfast dialect. It's weird, but I never dream in other languages. He opened his eyes and caught her again staring at him with a hungry look. "What?"

"What?"

"You've been eyeballing me since the moment you came in here. Did we...?" He pointed at her and back at himself. "You and I...? No, we didn't. I would have remembered someone as hot as you."

"It's ... it's your eyes. They're ... so purple."

"My dad gave them to me, the only good thing the fucker gave away."

"I've seen someone with eyes just like yours, in Jerusalem, at Hadassah Hospital."

"His name wouldn't be Dom by a freak chance?"

Ana felt the blood rushing to her face. "You know him?"

"Nope, always been a big fucking mystery to me. He's my big brother."

"Oh." She could easily see the resemblance, now that she knew what to look for. Sean was the slimmer, rascal version of Dom. While Dom could send the most wild, free-spirited woman into heavy daydreaming about settling down and raising kids, Sean was the kind who could make Mother Theresa wish she could do bad things with him. So goddamn good-looking, it's so not fair. "I really should be heading back to work." She lifted her legs on the table near his.

"Me, too." He offered her the cigarette. "Wanna share?"

She nodded and he pressed the cig end to her lips. Ana inhaled deep and immediately started coughing, and her eyes begun to water. "I haven't smoked pot before, actually."

"No shit. How did you meet Dom?"

"He was my sister's doctor."

"He's a good doctor," Sean said.

"Yeah."

"He's like the best fucking doctor in the whole world; he's the best at everything he does."

"You idolize him too much."

"I hate him," Sean said. He pulled out a duffle bag from under the table, and to her surprise took out a concert flute and started playing a quick tune. She watched his long fingers skipping across the instrument, and envisioned them playing her body. It was a bit too much, and she closed her eyes. The music washed over her and surrounded her. She had a sudden urge to stay like this, under the noon sun, for a few more hours, or a week, or forever. It was one of those perfect moments in time, and it surrounded her like a bubble. All of her uncertainties and fears, including Dan and her marriage crisis, banged against its surface without a chance of getting inside.

"So beautiful," she said when he had finished. She hadn't meant just the piece. "Was it Mozart?" She tried the joint again and decided marijuana wasn't her thing. "My brother really is a douche, you know." She said, once she was done coughing.

"And then add some."

Ana freed her foot from the sandal with her other leg. She then glided her big toe along Sean's calf. Despite her casual demeanor her heart was running at the speed of lust. "You're nothing like your brother. He's, you know, a prude, big time."

"Watch it."

"Why, you can call my brother a douche and I can't call yours a prude?"

"Dom once took the blame for something I did, and went for a year-and-a-half in juvie because of it."

"Sounds like something Mr. Righteousness would do."

"And when I was in prison he paid big-time so I won't get messed with, and he ain't got a 'heavy purse' or even a light one, and he bought this business for me and practically every time I fucked up he was there to pick up the pieces even though -- God as my witness -- he should have given up, years ago."

"He's a saint."

"So, see that green garbage container? That's where you'll find yourself if you trash him one more goddamn time, and I don't give a fuck if your daddy's purse is the size of Canada, or if your leg feels nice."

She saw something in his eyes that reminded her of Dom's cold ice, and it almost sent her running. "All right, Mr. Touchy. I thought you said you hated him."

"I'd take a bullet for him."

"Make up your mind, which one is it?"

"Both." He nodded. "Both ... I think. Does it make any sense?"

"Actually, yes."

He sighed deeply. "So, we have so far: a 'complicated siblings' relationship, one rich father, one asshole father, a wedding, seven hundred guests, foie gras not too liquid-y, an ex-con, and Bach 'The Badinerie'. It wasn't Mozart."

"And me," Ana said.

"And you. What does it all add up to, beats me."

"A boner?"

Sean checked. "Yep."

@@@@@@@@@

Ana tried to breathe in deeply; her house was crumbling around her.

Liana was sobbing on the carpet, face down. When it had started, her crying sounded like a sad kitten that lost it's mom, but it was picking up momentum fast.

"So I regretfully have to inform you that we pulled Tom out of the Algebra-Excellency-Program. He may apply for re-entrance in January, based upon his achievements. Yours sincerely...." She stared at the note, then at Tom, then back at Liana.

Dan knelt on the floor beside their little daughter, speaking softly.

"Dan, please...." Ana signaled him to stop. He either caught it and didn't interpret, or was ignoring her.

Liana's crying picked up; she added floor-kicking to the show.

"I'm not angry with you because you failed the test, Tom. It's because this note was in your schoolbag for two weeks. I got a call from Mrs. Shultz. She asked me why I didn't sign it yet. Do you know how embarrassed I was when she realized I had no clue to what she was talking about?"

Tom's chin rested on his chest; he was searching for a secret trapdoor in the kitchen's floor through which he could disappear.

"I'm very disappointed. Very! What else are you hiding from me? Dan, please...."

Liana's shrieks hit a decibel that could cause a sane person to stick a pencil in his eye.

"Sweetie, come on," Dan said, "we can go look at the dress, if you like. Would you like to see it? You can't wear the dress now." He placed a calming hand on Liana's writhing body, but it only served to empower her tantrum. "We want it white and clean for the wedding tomorrow."

"Dan, stop!" Ana said "This is not crying; this is manipulation."

"But she's never done anything like this before."

"Unless you want it to be the first of many, you've got to let me handle it."

"How?"

"Tanya Baron's school."

"I don't.... I really don't like it," he said. But he picked Liana's body off the floor in a fatherly bear hug and took her upstairs for a timeout.

Alice slouched in the corner of the kitchen table, scratching her left arm, distant and withdrawn. The cast was off and she had been trying to do the physiotherapy drills instructed by the doctor, but soon lost interest. At this point in the day, she and Dan usually couched down for TV together, or some stupid movie she had downloaded. They had found that they shared a deep love of Monty Python. So Alice had downloaded every episode of Flying Circus she could get her bit-torrents on. They would Python it, sometimes into the late hours, roaring with laughter like two drunken friends in a pub.

Or just like a fucking husband and wife.

But something had changed in the last couple of days. Alice, in a very un-Alice like way, had withdrawn into her own shell. Dan too, seemed to have taken a step back. Nothing was said out loud, but the body language between them spoke volumes.

Just like a fucking husband and wife.

The moods roller coaster in the house, took its toll on everyone. Tom's meteoric decline with regard to behavior and homework, was a shock. Liana's sudden explosion tonight had caught everyone by total surprise.

In retrospect, Ana should have seen it coming. No, Alice has got to go and I've got to have my house back. Alice had overstayed her welcome. In the clinic they promised the leg cast should go off too in a few weeks., Ana would allow her a few days to rearrange her life. But that's it. She's moving out. Things are going to change, starting today. No, not today, right now. She gave her sister one last critical stare, sent Tom to his bed, and with a determined step strode into her bathroom in which she spent over an hour.

@@@@@@@@@

Dan slept. There had been no dreams for some time now; the upside of a total conk-out. No Nadav Fine, smiling his inferno smile above a moaning Ana. No dreams about Alice burning him with confusion and shame; not even the dream about the night Tom had died in the ambush. Dark, forgetful, bliss. It felt like sacrilege to be intruded upon, and yet it was happening; he was being pulled out of the depths.

"Dan, wake up."

"Huh?"

"Dan."

His teacher had once told his dad, 'Dan has only three speeds: slow, slower, and pause'. In the army he had always asked Tom to wake him at least twenty minutes before his watch.

"Dan."

His hand went automatically under the bed in search of the MAG. Did Tom take it back to the armory after shooting range practice, yesterday? "Give me a sec, man, I'm getting there."

"Dan, where do you think you are?"

He opened one eye. Someone had switched the light on. It burned his retina, so he closed it again. He wasn't in the army; he was thirty-eight, and this wasn't Sanur camp. Tom was still nineteen and would stay nineteen forever. Dan had named his first-born boy, Tom, even though Ana's father had demanded his first grandson be named after his own dad. It was one of the few times Dan had stood up to Ana.

"Dan."

"What time is it? What happened?" He sat up in bed and blinked like an owl, "The kids --"

"Are asleep. Nothing happened," Ana said. "No, actually a lot happened. Too much." She shook her head.

Dan stared at her stupidly.

"We can't go on like this," she said, "things got to change."

"I...." he croaked, then coughed, "I've done a lot of thinking, too. I have a ... I have a small apartment."

"What?" Her voice went a tone higher than usual.

"There are apartments for the youth shelter's staff, some are even in decent shape. As the headmaster and manager, I'm entitled to one."

"So?"

"So we'll do things slowly, the right way, like adults." He yawned even though he tried hard not to. "We'll take professional help with the kids, I want them to suffer as little as possible."

Ana felt her heart plunging; she hadn't seen it coming, not by a long shot. "Divorce? You sat down with yourself and all you could come up with is throwing all we have down the toilets?"

"Are you wearing a baby-doll, Ana?"

"This is your fucking solution. Every time I hope things will be different you disappoint me again. Did you really give it more than your usual five minutes?"

He was fully awake now and started noticing things. His wife was wearing a new, black satin baby-doll, that looked like an evening dress. "I think it's the best solution."

"You think!"

He nodded.

Fear rose from within the pit of her stomach, up to the roots of her hair. This was going totally downhill. She was certain that she had read the signs right during the past week, that Dan was ripe for reconciliation. She'd figured some crying together, they'll say they're sorry, have some of the good old boring sex, and spoon for the night. Then everything would return to what it had been. Her calculations were right; only, the equation parameters had changed. Dan had changed. Aggressiveness used to send him to a corner with a white flag; now it was met with an annoying, passive resolve.

"But things were getting better, are getting better," she softened her tone.

"They sure are. We say 'hi' every morning. We even cooperate when it comes to important issues. With Alice keeping us away from each other's throats we could even run this family like a successful business; but this is not a relationship."

"We're not getting a divorce, Dan."

"You're afraid. Me too; but I think ... I know it's for the best."

"How can you be so calm about this?"

"I'm not, Ana, we haven't slept in the same room for two months, this is --"

"I didn't ask you to go sleep upstairs."

"You never told me to come down, either."

"But I want you to, I wanted for so long. I miss you so much, I miss what we had." She touched his cheek with the tip of her finger. "Come down with me, please. We can make everything right again, I know you miss me just as bad."

"Ana, I ..."

She leaned over and kissed his cheek; then her lips went up to his forehead. Feather-light, like an artist applying his final touches to a painting. She took his hand and kissed it too, then placed it on her breast. 

"Ana, I ..." He gently pulled back. It took every ounce of will he had, and some that he didn't. "There is nothing more I want in this world, but I can't turn the clock around. What you did ... no that's not fair, what we both did to each other."

She felt her rage flaring. "So this is it; instead of fighting you'll just fold again, run away as usual."

"I'm not going to fight you, Ana, I'll let you and the kids have everything you need."

"Of course you won't fight me, you never do; me, or anyone. Pretty fucking amazing for a guy who won the heavyweight championship, but you never pick a fight that isn't a walk in the park. You're a wuss."

"Stop it."

"You are, I've seen you so many years, in work, everywhere, jokers with half your brain and talent pass you by, no, leave you behind them in a cloud of dust. People who contribute nothing to the company get a raise while you work seven days a week and get the boot. You're pathetic."

"That's not fair."

She rose up. "Oh, that's not fair? How do you think I feel about it? To be married to someone who doesn't care enough to fight for her? That sure makes me feel desirable." She wiped her eyes with her arm. "You're always so damn passive about everything. Instead of manning it up once in your life, you choose to run away from your problems like a real fucking coward."

"Okay, I heard enough --"

The slap resounded around the little room like an insult.

Dan massaged his cheek slowly. "That felt good, Ana?"

Slap. This time on the right.

"Stop it!" Her hand came down again, but he deflected it. She tried to land another one with her left, but he intercepted that one, too.

"You're a wuss, Dan, a real pussy."

He rose. "Stop it, you'll wake the kids, you know how long it took me to put Liana to sleep?"

"You're an idiot." She tried to slap him again, but again he deflected her. She kicked his crotch and he lost his concentration long enough for her to land another slap. This time she used her nails and it left three bloody trails on his cheek.

"Stop!"

"You're so damn passive, so thick, there's simply no way of getting through. An idiot."

"I'm not an idiot."

"The biggest ever...."

She tried to slap him again but he grabbed her hand. She tried with her left but he grabbed that one, too. He pushed her until her back and hands pressed against the cold wall. "I'm fucking tired of you, and Alice, and anyone else calling me an idiot all the time."

"But you are."

"Sure I am. You were so smart, you didn't have the grades to get into Jerusalem Law faculty. Daddy had to butter them up with a nice donation so they would accept you. And Alice, she went to some idiotic arts school, but I'm the idiot. I won an excel scholarship in mathematics. I fought like hell to get that degree and no one ever gave me a dime. My psychometric grade is 730, what was yours, honey?"

"An idiot."

His face was millimeters from hers, "I hate you."

"That's the spirit." Ana closed the tiny gap between them and closed her mouth on his. It wasn't a kiss, it was a lioness leaping on her pray.

Dan felt his lower lip go numb from the pain.

Ana licked the blood off her own lips and smiled her triumph.

"Jesus."

She lunged again.

This time, he answered with passion, and attacked right back. Their lips and tongues met. Nothing was tender about it. Like two snakes trying to strangle each other, they fought for domination. First, Ana's tongue pushed into his mouth, and then he pushed her right back. Their heads separated for a second, Ana gave a vicious laugh and lunged in again. She didn't let go this time and so did Dan. They weren't kissing; they were competing to see who would be the first to run out of air. It was Dan.

"Wuss," she raised her legs and wrapped them around his waist.

"Bitch."

"Do it!" Her voice came out raw and throaty.

Dan let go of her arms, pulled his boxers down, and tried frantically to pull her baby-doll up. There was a sharp ripping sound, followed by Ana's throaty laugh.

"Shut up, you'll wake the kids."

"Idiot."

"Shut up!"

"Do it!"

He lunged between her legs. There was a slight resistance, but she was already wet. His cockhead slipped for a second on her slit, and then she opened up like the castle gate hit by the enemy's ram. Her wet folds wrapped him in a loving grip he had missed so much that he almost came, then and there. It was a powerful lunge, full of anger and revenge and shame, but passion, too. Ana hit the wall behind her hard, and felt her butt being squashed, and still he kept pushing.

Something between a moan and a growl came out of her lips.

Dan pulled back.

"Do it!" He lunged again, harder; it hurt. She laughed. "Do it!" She sunk her nails in his back.

Wham.

"Do it!" She sunk her teeth in his shoulder.




Wicked Ch. 07



Thanks to rexbrookdale for helping with editing this story.

Glossary

darbukas -- goblet drums

franks - pejorative for Jews originating from Islamic countries

habibti (Arabic) - my love

kalb iben kalb (Arabic) -- dog son of a dog

vuzvuz - pejorative for eastern European Jews

ya binti (Arabic) - my daughter

yom asal yom basal (Arabic saying) - one day, honey; one day, onion

Wicked Chapter Ten

In good times and in bad; in sickness and in health, and ... in his parents' house. A lot, in his parents' house; because Ilan still lived there. There was something odd—if not totally fucked up—about a 36-year-old who still wanted his mom to cook him pancakes, iron his shirts, and fold his boxers. Even Ana agreed that Ilan's immaturity must be a sure deal breaker with any would-be Mrs. Ilan White. But apparently every pot has its gold-digger and Ilan was, after all, the vice president of White & Clean Industries. That, and his parent's house was a villa on the Mediterranean in Keisaria. A bride could do far worse.

Dan let the Mazda glide under the neon sign that shone purple and presumptuous: 'Garden of Eden, Events Bigger Than Genesis', below which a smaller sign pointed to 'Ilan and Efrat's wedding' A boulevard of giant pecans welcomed them to a road with a bridge that spanned an artificial pond. Candle lamps hung, swaying slightly, from every branch as they drove along it. The light poured and shattered on the water's surface, shining back in billions of sparkling winks. Even the valet, signaling them to an open parking space, looked inviting in his green suit. The effect was somewhat diminished upon closer inspection; the valet was pointing with the flashlight with one hand while with the other he fished treasures out of his nose.

"Look, a magic show." Liana clapped her little palms, and pointed. "Was I in Mommy's and your wedding too, Dad?"

"Sorry, sweetie, we forgot to invite you; maybe next time."

"When I'm a grownup I'll marry Tom, so we won't have to leave the house and go live somewhere else."

"As if." Tom was about to punch her, but Alice, who was sitting between them, tickled him under the armpit. "I'll only marry Mom ... and Dad," he added as an afterthought, because he didn't want to hurt Dan's feelings.

Liana's attention was already elsewhere. A happy Mickey Mouse and a bored parrot stood on a small stage outside the main gate, having just magicked a Bugs Bunny out of a giant stovepipe hat. The army of kids surrounding the entertainment partially yawned and partially indulged in more creative activities, like trying to kill each other. Dan shook his head when he noticed that the stage's curtain had blue and white 'If It's Not White It's Not Clean!' logos printed across it. His father never missed an opportunity to promote the family business, not even at his son's wedding.

"Look at that huge parrot, Alice," Dan pointed at the man in the parrot suit, "the Norwegian Blue. Beautiful plumage! I bet it's pinin' for the fjords."

He checked the car mirror. Alice's reflection glared back.

"'E's passed on! This parrot is no more! He has ceased to be! 'E's expired and gone to meet 'is maker! 'E's off the twig! 'E's kicked the bucket, 'e's shuffled off 'is mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisible!! This is an ex-parrot!!"

He checked the mirror again. Still glaring. Not even a smile? Come on, Alice. "You got to admit, Ana, it's a bit tasteless; provincial, nouveau-riche style."

"You know, Dan, for someone who grew up in a house the size of our kitchen, you are surprisingly snobbish."

"I'm not a snob, I'm just better than everyone else."

Ana leaned over and kissed his cheek. "Someone is in a good mood."

They parked and Dan pulled out Alice's wheelchair from the trunk. The doctor had recommended she go slower on the crutches before she over-exercised her arm and needed a cast again. Alice wouldn't even make eye contact while he carried her in his arms over to the chair.

One of the kids watching the show noticed the car, and screamed, "Dan! Dan is here!" The tribe of little people abandoned the show and mutual murder attempts, to come charging toward them with blood-curdling screams. A chaotic cacophony of hugs and greetings surrounded Dan and his family. Fond memories were dusted off, and a ton of new and important information was served, such as whose dad had bought a new car and who had aced in football.

"Dan, I wanna box with you."

"Dan, tell us the one about Cranky Shark and the school bus."

"Dan, Dan, see? My tooth has fallen completely off."

"Dan, look."

"Dan.... "

Everybody wanted a piece of him, if only to ride piggyback on his broad shoulders. He was, after all, Dan Jacobson; boxing champion, story-teller extraordinaire, and that unique, distant uncle who never felt it beneath his dignity to play with the kids.

"Hey, you already have dirt on your tux." Ana gently pried off the two little Indians hanging from his shoulders, one of whom was 'proud Tom, son of the boxing champion and don't you forget it, cousin'.

Dan picked up another munchkin, raised him above his head, flipped him, and pretended to drop him. The little guy shrieked; but when placed on steady ground immediately jumped up and demanded another go.

"All the little franks in my family adore you," Ana whispered in his ear, and nibbled it. "Yo, yo, Dan is in da house."

"Now who's being a snob?"

"Little racism never hurt anybody."

"Said the Jew."

"Amazing that you were willing to give up on all that love, just like that," she straightened his suit and gave him another kiss on his bull neck.

"Not everybody in your family loves me."

Ana glanced back at Alice who was keeping her distance behind them. "Nah, she'll get over it. She's just pissed because I made her come."

"What did you pull, to...?"

"I won't tell you," she said.

"It's a secret?"

"It was nasty and I'm trying to get back onto your good side. Don't worry; give her a day or two, and you'll be good friends again."

"I hope so."

Not if I can help it. Alice had never had a male 'friend', not even fuck buddies. Ana suspected there was more under the surface than Dan figured. Her marriage was too brittle right now to allow a wrecker like Alice to stick around.

"Dan, my kaparah." A tall, brown-complexioned woman leaning on a walking stick limped her way past Ana as if she was made of air, and hugged Dan.

"Hi, Aliya."

"That's it? I must be getting senile 'cause I don't remember sleeping with you last night."

"Sorry," he laughed, and kissed her wrinkled cheeks.

"Much better. Ach ya binti. Habibti."

"Hey, grandma." A smile finally touched Alice's doll face. "How's your leg?"

"Yom asal yom basal. Ya wel." She clasped her hands. "What have you done to yourself, darling?"

"It wasn't just me; I had help," Alice was looking at Dan.

@@@@@@@

Aliya's daughter and Dan's mother, Rachel White, was still a beauty at 58. She had won the Miss Israel contest in her youth, followed by a close run for Miss Universe. While she had never nailed 'world peace' she had succeeded in nailing a handsome millionaire for a husband. Dan thought she could have done better. 

"So, how is Rachel Guttmann treating you?" Ana's father had a 'one size fits all' smile. "I heard she's a tough bitch."

"She's fair," Dan said. "People think that because she's old and a woman, they can stack the deck; I don't make that mistake."

"Well, I guess you shouldn't be picky; good thing you found this job. We were beginning to worry."

"I hope you didn't lose much sleep over it," Dan said.

"She pays you same as Amir Rosenberg did—what was it—34 K?"

"Sure." Always the tact of an atom bomb in a china shop, eh, Ofek?

"Good, good." Ofek noticed Alice talking to her grandma, and his face darkened. "You can come work for me in three months, you know. We're expanding. Ilan is opening an office in Ramat Gan."

"I'll keep that in mind." I'd rather stab my eye with a spoon and watch it come out of my nose.

"Can I ask you for a personal favor, Dan?"

"Of course, anything."

"You know, we put a lot of work and money to make this evening perfect. It's Ilan's and Efrat's special night; I'd hate more than anything to see someone ruin it for them."

"What do you need me to do?"

"He needs you to find a hole in the ground you can dump me in for the night," Alice's voice was cheerful, her face was not. "He'll even throw you a job in White & Clean Industries if you'll promise to cover it up and never tell anyone where it is. If it's not White it's not clean."

Jesus!

Ofek didn't say anything; he stared at his daughter as if he was willing not only to dunk her in a hole, but also to tie her tiny ass to an electric chair and pull the switch himself.

"Nothing, Ofek? Figures. I used to be so scared of you, and frankly, right now, I can't figure out why. This is awesome. We should have done this years ago."

It suddenly occurred to Dan that Alice coming to the wedding was entirely Ana's doing. Her parents would have been just as happy to not have seen her there, as would she to not have come.

"Dan, don't be your usual sloth; try to keep up. This is a big opportunity for you," Alice said. "He's rich and powerful; there are no limits to what he can do."

"Errr ... right," Dan grabbed her wheelchair. People around them had begun to pick up on the familial friction. "Let's go find our seats."

"I'm good over here."

"I bet that's what Charles Whitman said when he was up in the bell-tower."

"Come on, Dan, I didn't kiss his ass, yet. How was the taste, by the way? Let go of the chair, let go of the chair, you moron."

"Sure." He started dragging the chair away, well aware that people were staring.

"We're just having fun, it's a happy fun night," she said.

"Like a pogrom."

"Well, fuck you very much."

Dan turned onto the trail that led from the reception area and circled around to meet an avenue of midget cypresses. He looked back as he turned, hoping not too many people had noticed the little drama. Alice shouted something. The chair bumped into one of the guests, and the man crashed to the ground.

"I'm so, so, so, sorry," Dan rushed forward and gave him a hand up. "Totally my bad, I was looking the wrong way. Are you okay?"

"It's okay, no harm done." The man smiled. It was a good smile. He looked familiar, but Dan couldn't pinpoint him anywhere from within Ana's huge family.

"I'm so sorry."

"David," the man shook his hand, "it's nothing, really. You're carrying such a beautiful load, I should have been more careful."

"Are you a Squadron 206 pilot, by chance?"

"Was. They closed the squadron years ago."

"I knew you looked familiar. My wife was an operations officer in 206; I'm pretty sure I've seen your face a couple of times in her Army photo album."

"Where is Ana? I'd really like to say hi."

"She's at the reception with her parents; I'm really sorry, David."

David slapped his shoulder. "No problem; I should have been quicker on my feet."

He had intended to ask if Dave was from the bride's side of the family, but the man had already walked away. Upon reflection, it was odd that while Dan had remarked his wife's having been in 206, he hadn't mentioned her name; yet the man had asked for Ana's whereabouts.

A minute later, however, Dan had forgotten all about it.

@@@@@@

Israeli men, between the ages 18 and 21, during their mandatory IDF service call each other 'bro'. It makes sense, because the guys who sleep with you in the same tent, and eat dust and sergeants' crap with you, are no less your brothers than that little tick who used to barge into your room when you needed quality time with your girlfriend. The 'bro' usually fades a few years later, when they realize that the army, just like high school before it or college after it, is just a phase. An overture to real life. However, some people are slower on the uptake. The jerk seated next to Dan was a prime example.

"So she said --get this, bro, she said-- 'I don't want to risk our friendship'." Dan's compadre emptied a wine glass in one go. "And I said, 'Fuck friendship I wanna take you high'."

"Okay."

"I never saw you in the factory, bro, are you from the Askelon branch?"

"I'm not working with White & Clean Industries."

The seats that had the Jacobsons' names were located at the corner edge of the Garden, away from the family seats. It was understandable, considering Ofek wanted his daughter and her big mouth as far away as he could get her, from the main event; preferably in Alaska. Dan scanned the garden. Alice was chatting with the barman who was mixing drinks for her at the speed of slosh. For now, at least, it didn't appear as if she was set on doing more damage other than to her liver.

"Anyway, bro, Efrat, well she said 'no' but you know her kind, dontcha, bro; playing it hard to get. As if. Paris Hilton is Momma Theresa, compared."

Why does he think I want to hear his ass-conquering tales? No wonder they put him in the corner with all the other personas non-gratas.

"So I send her a text, get this bro, 'Yo yo Efrat, don't be a slut, you got a world class butt'. Nice, eh?"

"Yes, very poetic."

"But he saw it. That was goddamn unlucky, well not really. Turns out he's checking her text messages all the time. But she said it was another Arik, not me, and that it was a stupid joke. I'm not sure he totally bought it. Anyway, what did you do to piss off Ilan, bro?"

One of the girls was spinning Liana around at the speed of 'soon-to-bring-that-cake-she-ate-back-up' and Dan signaled her to tone it down. "Sorry?"

"What did you do to get Ilan's G-string in a twist?"

"I ... what? I didn't do anything."

"Then why did they put you in the corner seats with all the other rejects?"

"Why did they put you here?"

"Are you stoned? I just told you. Ilan caught me sending Efrat a cool text message."

"Wait, when you said 'Efrat' you meant ... like, Efrat over there? Wearing the white dress?"

"Duh! More focus, bro. I'm Arik by the way." He burped, winked at Dan, and leaned over. You could have started a car on the fumes coming out of his mouth. "My friends call me Johnnie."

Do you have any? "I'm Dan." He shook the offered hand nonetheless. "You know, Arik, this whole seating arrangement ... this is a wedding, not high school, the teacher won't bitch if you go and sit with your amigos from the factory." Please do.

"Nah, I hate them fuckers. I'm good here with my best buddy, Dan," he winked. "So the joke is on Ilan if he thinks he's busting my balls. And I didn't just go hot texting with Efrat; I'd hit home run, so the joke's on him, twice. High-five."

"Okay, maybe it's time to slow down on the wine."

"Cool your jets, bro, half of White & Clean Industries greased the bitch. Last week I caught her in the office behind the drying room with Yaniv, pounding the duck. But does he get the corner seat? No! He gets the 13th salary. You know why?"

"I've got a feeling you're gonna tell me."

"Because his tongue is up Ilan's crack so deep they'll need surgery to take it out." He popped a pill into his mouth, and offered one to Dan. "Want some Moses Datz for clarity?"

"You shouldn't mix MD with alcohol."

"Chill, bro, you're tighter than my grandma."

"She takes uppers with white wine?"

"Goddamn. This place is so loaded with hot chicks. It's like we hit the jackpot of ass-land. I wanna tap that ass, and that ass, and oh I could rip that tushie in two secs," he nodded in the direction of a girl who couldn't have been more than fourteen. "Ever seen so much beauty in one place, bro?"

Dan had to reluctantly agree with him. All of the women from the Moroccan side of the family had inherited Ana's and Alice's tall, lithe look, high cheekbones, and perfect bronze complexion. The wedding looked like a models' convention for exotic, raven-haired beauties.

"Shit, bro, you should go for it, I already picked up three numbers; even an old gamer like you can score."

Arik had that very tall, rugged, macho look and aura that could probably pick up any easy girl in a pub. Dan felt sorry for any woman who had ever given him her phone number. "No can do, but thanks."

"What's up with that, bro? You're stirring the croutons, eh? Snacking on muesli?"

"Watch it."

"Because you don't have the look. You're working the fields, for sure."

"I'm married."

Arik punched him on the shoulder. "Even so. A tied up cow still needs to chew grass, no?"

Dan thought of Ana and her 'grass chewing'. Too bad nobody had invented a memory-wiping machine yet; he would totally go for a spin, right now.

"She's pregnant, you know."

Hell. What if Ana hadn't been careful with one of the assholes she took to bed? Wait. There was no way Arik was talking about his wife. "Who's pregnant?"

"Efrat."

Dan stared at the happy bride. "Doesn't show."

"She and Ilan should name the kid 'The Guys', after the father," Arik burst out laughing.

"Hey, that's not cool."

"Everyone knows it's not his. Ilan's got no nuts. Why'd you think the bitch is riding half the factory in the first place?"

"Look, Arik --"

"I'm not making shit up, bro; Efrat told me herself he couldn't pick it up, even if you pumped him two tons of Viagra."

Ana once hinted that a motorcycle accident in his youth had had some implication in her brother's ability to function in bed. Apparently this discreet family secret was no longer either a secret, or discreet. "If you like the man so much, why'd you come to his wedding?"

"He's my boss; you can't cut the boss's wedding. And anyway I figured his hot sister is gonna be here."

Dan imagined his fist going through Arik's face and then reassembling the smug, macho smile into something less annoying.

"Do you know who she is, bro?"

One under the chin and that smile will be missing some teeth; then a left.... I can dump the body, later, behind the bushes.

"Do you know who she is?"

"I have a clue."

"Alice White."

"Oh." Dan relaxed.

"You're stoned, bro? Alice-fucking-White, the supermodel."

"Seven years ago, maybe. She doesn't model anymore." Kicked out of every agency.

"Look at her; she's still totally fuckilicious."

It was true. Even in a wheelchair, nursing a broken leg and cropped hair, Alice still managed to look ten times more beautiful than any other woman in the crowd.

"When I was fifteen I had a poster of her under the mattress; you know, the one with the apple and the snake."

"Yeah, I remember that one."

"I used it every night, you know, spanking the monkey."

"TMI, Arik, T-M-I."

"Look at her going with the vodka. That's right girl, down it goes. You know what, bro? I'm so gonna go out there and talk to her. "

"You do that, man." That's going to be painful and hilarious.

"That's right, a bro lives only once, no?"

"Sometimes even less."

"I'm so gonna ride that bitch."

"All the way to pain city."

"You dissing me, bro?"

"Not sure."

"You think I'm like Ilan, I ain't got no cojones?"

You won't in sixty seconds. "No, man, go to her; you live only once."

Arik stood up on not-so-steady legs and wobbled to the bar. The fun was about to begin; Dan waited, but apparently the man's nut sack was much smaller than his big mouth. He sat down near the bar, skipping tequila shots, and didn't even try to establish eye contact with Alice.

The ceremony was reaching its climax. Most people stood up, craning their necks to see; because there's something about a grown man stepping on a tiny glass. Dan had finally located Ana where she stood near the chuppah behind her mother, and was moving to join them when Ana's grandmother, Aliya, caught his sleeve.




Wicked Ch. 07



"They poured sugar on the chicken instead of paprika; you got to go to the kitchen and warn them."

Dan was trying to grab Ana's attention. She was talking with that 206 pilot he met earlier, David. There was something he was reading in their body language that he didn't like. "It's Szechuan chicken, Aliya; it's supposed to be sweet."

"That is really wrong," she said.

Ana looked angry. Why the hell would she be angry with him? There was too much familiarity there for two people who had met, the last time, twenty years ago.

"Sweet Chicken.What will they think of next?"

"Totally life on the edge."

"You know, sweetie, just cause I'm eighty and was born in a village in Africa, doesn't mean a young schmuck like you can make fun of me."

"I'm sorry, Aliya, you're totally right, that was ... sorry." If I ever wondered where Alice got her genes from....

David leaned close to Ana, too close, and whispered something in her ear. She, in return, shook her head vigorously. The blond pilot backed off, and Dan lost sight of him.

The Rabbi now had Ilan reciting his vows: never to forsake Jerusalem or his tongue would get stuck to his palate. Ilan stepped on the glass and after the audible crunch the place burst into a torrent of hugs, kisses, and ululating shrieks from the Moroccan feminine side. Dan stood patiently in line, to congratulate the newlyweds and to kiss anyone involved. Efrat, whom he had met only once before, hugged him and insisted the photographer take a picture with her new hunk brother by marriage. After Arik's drunken confession, Dan could no longer see her as the bright-eyed, white bride such as she had been at the beginning of the evening.

"Ahlan wa Sahlan Ahlan Bikum." The DJ played the familiar Moroccan song, inviting everyone to join in. In seconds the dance floor blossomed with old and young people shaking to the happy guitars, meowing violins, and the jumpy darbukas. "Ahlan wa Sahlan Ahlan Bikum, Frahtu Albi Ulfrah Bikum, Zythu Ya Hababi Achala Elyom, Ahlan wa Sahlan Ahlan Bikum" Hello to you all and welcome, You've gladdened my heart I'll be happy with you, Dance my dearests what a beautiful day, Hello to you all and welcome.

It was a fast beat that took some skill to master, especially in the pelvic region. The Moroccan side of the family immediately showed its ass-rotating superiority. Ana had told Dan once that it was in the genes, but he suspected it had more to do with practice. Even Liana was already jiggling her hips and tiny buns, trying to imitate her bigger cousins. The effect was comical, but it filled Dan's heart both with pride and dread upon reflection that only last night his family had been on the brink of collapse. Happiness is fragile.

Like a bird of paradise among beautiful flowers, or like Venus among mortals, his wife danced with her eyes closed. His heart couldn't help but do somersaults as he watched. It wasn't just her beauty that sang out louder than the dancing beauties around her. It was an aura of pure sensuality. She practically shone. Her hips swayed to the beat, her short red evening dress swayed with them, silky red hair dancing around her face like a halo. He knew immediately that he wasn't the only one seeing it and the more he looked he realized most of the male dancers' eyes were on her.

Tom slunk his way over to his mom and performed with her his version of the dance, mainly jumping up and down like a chimpanzee on speed. Ana laughed, spinning him around, and Dan gave a sigh of relief. The spell was broken. She was no longer sexual prey or a predator; just a proud mother.

The DJ replaced the disc with a slower reggae rap. "Izzy on the mic, let's go, let's go, let's go...."

Dan grabbed his daughter despite her protests and lifted her on his shoulders. He always figured it toned down his obvious total lack of coordination. One cannot make sharp, precise movements, while balancing such a precious load on one's shoulders.

"Sits on the beat like a mustache on a Tel Avivian hipster, whatever Izz does you'll never get it mister, flow, Allah Yister, Joe on the kick-snare, Buchman, tap the guitars into the mixer...."

He started wading his way to Ana only to have Aliya catch up with him again and ask him to bring her a drink. When he came back with it she wanted him to escort her to her seat.

"I heard you're managing a special school for Rachel Guttman, Dan."

"It's a shelter for kids at risk and it's not ready yet."

"I really wanted to talk to you. Maybe ... maybe you can find a job for Alice too, I mean as manager you get to hire the employees, no?"

Dan thought of Alice and her short fuse, coaching distraught kids who already been through hell during their short life. It wasn't even funny. It was a terrifying vision. "Alice already has a job."

"But she doesn't seem to make money out of it, and she can't hold onto any other job more than a week. I thought that if she worked for you then at least...."

"At least I won't fire her because she's family."

"I'm really worried about her, every time we meet it's getting worse. She's full of demons."

"But no one can fight them other than her." He scanned the dance floor. Ana was again dancing sensually alone. No, not alone. That sleazy snake, David, was dancing close to her.

"If people could just give her a break, you know, she's worth it. She was such a sweet little angel when she was a kid. She has a heart of pure gold."

David was dancing behind Ana now, moving his hips in sync with hers. Sonofabitch. Tell him to piss off, Ana.

"I'm not senile yet; I know exactly what's going on."

"Nobody said you are."

"One girl gets it all, the other gets nothing; no wonder she's so angry," Aliya said.

"What?"

"Ofek bought you a huge house."

"So?"

"How many people your age live in a fifteen-million-dollar house?"

"He bought it for three and I don't see what it's got to do with --"

"Ofek paid for Ana's degree and fixed her a job with a friend of his. What did Alice ever get? Less than nothing. Kalb iben kalb."

"Aliya."

"You heard me right. My son is an asshole. What kind of father does something like that?"

"You know, Alice isn't exactly a garden of roses. They're both headstrong and ass-stubborn."

"I wish she was at least married to a blue-eyed vuzvuz like you."

The DJ changed the track and Dan didn't catch her last sentence. His eyes searched and searched the dance floor and the garden around them. Ana and David were nowhere in sight.

"I'm gonna pop some tags, only got twenty dollars in my pocket; I'm, I'm, I'm hunting, looking for a come up, this is fucking awesome. I'm gonna pop some tags, only got twenty dollars in my pocket; I'm, I'm, I'm hunting, looking for a come up, this is fucking awesome."

Yeah, fucking awesome.

@@@@@@@

"How many times do I need to tell you to go home?"

"I had to see you," he grabbed Ana's hand.

"Tonight?"

"There're seven hundred people here. No one will notice another guy in a suit; why didn't you answer my calls last night?"

"David, leave! Go home, now!"

"I can't go on like this."

"The door is open, David."

"It can't go on like this."

"Still open."

"Sneaking into your office like a thief. For ... for a quickie in the bathroom or in the parking lot; that's degrading. No, not like a thief, like a beggar; waiting for her highness to gracefully allow me to --"

"Didn't bother you with Honey Bee."

"It was different with Ayelet, I wasn't in love with her."

"You have some nerve, you know that? What if my husband sees you?"

"I already met him, he's a nice guy. I thought he was some jerk after the phone call you got from him in the car, but he's actually a nice guy."

Ana's slap almost made his head turn a full 360 degrees; she was getting real good at this.

"Jesus!"

She planted a finger under his nose. "If you'll ever go near my husband or kids, I swear, I'll slice your balls off."

"You said you have an open marriage."

"Was that clear enough or do you need a demonstration?"

He raised his hands, palms up.

Ana peeked out of the window in the darkened office in which they were standing. It was located in an isolated dark corner overlooking the Garden, and had excellent view of the wedding. "I think he saw us dancing together; you're such a jerk. Go home!"

"I'm the jerk who's willing to leave his wife and kids for you. Two weeks, Ana? Are you seeing anyone else now?"

"None of your fucking business if I do."

"The hell it is."

She turned around, eyes burning and David took a step back. She went back to the window.

David stepped closer and planted a soft kiss on the back of her neck. "Come on, Ana, don't say you didn't miss it."

Men are so full of themselves.

"I know you better than you think. Two weeks without sex? You?"

"Two weeks without sex, that's against the Geneva Convention." Sean entered the room through a back door and made them both jump. "I once tried celibacy for two weeks, my dick was so pissed it hitchhiked the first ride to Brazil. Never heard from him since."

"Who the fuck are you?" David said.

"Who the fuck wants to know?"

"Me."

Sean shrugged. "Maybe I'll tell if you'll be more polite."

"Sweet, get the fuck out of here, we're in the middle of something."

"Make me."

"You think I won't, punk?" David raised his fists; he was a little drunk and a lot pissed.

"I think you can't." Sean took off his white shirt. Much taller than David, he had his brother's physique. Like Dom, his body rippled with raw muscle-power. Several gang tattoos and scars hinted that this wouldn't be his first street fight, or even his second.

"I'm a black belt Dan three," David took a step back.

"I used to collect protection money for the Pardes Katzers."

"So?"

"So I usually take 500 for a beatdown, but in the case of a jerk off like you I'd go pro bono."

"All right, that's enough." Ana smiled and stepped between them. She would have liked to see Sean beat the crap out of David, but it could lead to complications later. "Sean, behave! David, go home!"

"I'm not going anywhere."

"You are, or I'm calling your wife right now and telling her everything. Last time I checked she didn't open your marriage. I'll even call Arkia Air-Lines and tell them what really happened on flight 447 from Crete to Tel Aviv."

"You wouldn't dare."

"You want to test that theory?"

"So that's it?"

"That's how it is. Sorry, David. Go home!"

The inner struggle bubbled up to the surface. His lip trembled; it looked like he was about to cry.

She felt a sudden pang of regret. "Go home, David," she said in a quiet voice. "We'll talk tomorrow."

He turned without a word and ran out of the room.

"Wow, what a douche."

She stepped behind Sean, hugged him and rested her head against his broad back. It felt so good it frightened her. "Thanks for standing up for me."

"For you? The man told me to get the fuck out of my own office."

"But you would have fought him for me."

"I'd give you away for free."

"Don't be a jerk."

"Something wrong with the meal?"

"No, it was excellent sweetie; everyone's been complimenting the chef and his crew."

"So why did you text me to come here in the first place?"

"I wanted David to see his replacement."

He unclasped her hands, turned and stepped back, sitting himself on his office's table. When she tried to step forward into his embrace, he pushed her gently back. "Ana, just to make certain we understand each other here. I don't do 'fall in love', and I don't fight over girls. I thought it was obvious, but if not, maybe you should run after Big Mouth and tell him you've made a mistake."

"Obviously."

"Are you sure?"

"Sean, I'm 38, a married lawyer with kids, you're a sweet 27 nobody. Do you seriously think I could fall for someone like you?"

"I have no bloody idea what goes in that mind of yours, Ana, and the little I've seen so far is starting to freak me out. Stop calling me five times a day and don't ever come to my work like you did this morning."

"I missed you."

"I don't do 'missed you' either."

That stung more than she was willing to admit. During most of their ride to the wedding she had daydreamed about his purple eyes, strong arms, and the fact that she was about to see him again. "I know what you do." She rubbed her hand on his crotch. "Hey, look who's back from Brazil."

"What?" he said.

"I knew your story was bullshit. Two weeks without sex? You?"

"I was seven when it happened."

She inserted her hand inside his pants and felt the big head of his cock. To her delight, Sean didn't push her back; he moaned. "Then I guess this dick grew instead of the one that ran away."

"I had two."

@@@@@@@@

If someone would have told Dan, two months ago, that he would be seeing wolves and skirt chasers lurking in every shadow, he would have sent that person for a head check. But that was before he thought Ana was capable of sending him a photo of herself during fifth base action with some jerk.

Five years ago in the office, the QA manager, a sweet girl named Nadine, had placed her hand on Dan's thigh as they reviewed a new software feature. It was anything but an innocent gesture, and yet Dan hadn't told her to stop, wanting to avoid making a scene near his colleagues and embarrassing the girl. Afterward, he had felt so guilty he'd called Ana and told her all about it. He had been certain their relationship was symmetric, and that Ana would never have dreamed of letting someone place his hand on her thigh. Now he was clinging to the hope that his suspicions would be proved wrong -- nothing more than paranoid delusions; the aftershocks of Ana's crazy week, two months ago. But even that hope was wavering.

He had already circled the garden twice, entered the kitchen, been to the parking lot and even peeked into the ladies room, earning scornful stares. Ana loves me. Ana loves me. Ana loves me. He kept that sentence circling and alive; but each successive time he said it with less conviction.

"Hoi, you there. Lose something?"

"I'm a guest at the wedding."

"I can see that, but this part of the Garden is a private area."

"Maybe you can help me. My kid spilled vinaigrette all over me; is there anywhere I can change in?"

"Sure, man, try that building over there, where the big sign says 'Garden of Eden -- Personnel Only.' It's the warehouse and the offices."

"Anyone there right now? Someone who can show me in? I don't feel like getting into someone's office uninvited." I'm like a fucking spy in a movie.

"Nah, that's cool. Try the catering manager's office, everybody uses it all the time; he's a cool guy, he won't mind."

"Thanks."

There was a cluster of two-story buildings at the south corner. The first floor looked like a warehouse; the second was an array of rooms overlooking the Garden and parking lot. None of the lights in the second floor were on. Dan climbed the stairs and checked every door. They were all locked. He was about to turn around when he heard a woman's giggle.

Ana?

Closing his eyes he put his ear to the door.

Nothing.

He checked another door.

Nothing. No wait. His heart started playing Moroccan drums.

Someone said something in low voice, someone moaned in return. Then a male voice, "Yeah, baby, take it all in."

Bile came up his throat. The images he tried so hard to bury bubbled up, and he almost puked.

He tried the door handle. Locked.

The door had a small window with a grating. Luckily, just a week earlier, he had assembled thirty doors of this same model at the shelter. The grating had a neat trick that enabled easy removal of the first grate. Leaning in, he wiggled his hand through the gap he'd created and found the door handle inside.

@@@@@@@@

"Ohhh." Ana moaned. "If ... if ... if there was an Olympic event for this, I'm sure you would have won the gold medal."

Sean took his fingers out of her wet pussy lips and softly massaged her stomach. He leaned and took her breast in his mouth. His tongue played on the rim of her nipple, never touching the pink hill. It was frustratingly intense. She grabbed the back of his neck and pushed him into her body.

"Lick the nipple, goddamn it," she growled.

He raised his head, a twinkle in his purple eyes. "There's good timing and perfect timing. Patience."

Ana moaned.

He gave her a small love-bite on her lips, and withdrew when she attacked.

"Grrrrr...."

He took her breast in his mouth and started trailing maddening circles again. One hand kept playing with her stomach, the other played with her red locks; she tilted her head back in pleasure at the touch of his fingers.

His tongue finally gratified the tip of her nipple with a swirl. She tensed up slightly, and a shaky breath escaped her as his tongue circled the stiff, sensitive hill.

Sean brought his mouth to Ana's other breast, taking her nipple between his lips and teasing it in the same way he had the first. His hand traveled south again and Ana's hips rocked against his hand, her body nectar flowing into his palm. His finger tapped a Morse Code on her clit. She climbed on a wave and tried to contain herself, then found she couldn't. Her thighs locked onto his palm and she felt a sweet orgasm wash over her, curling her toes and fingers. Another wave came and she bit her lip; her body rose and she dug her fingers into his back then gave a last satisfactory sigh, and dropped back.

"Oh, my God, that's a personal record."

He kissed her lips gently then licked the tip of her nose. It sent electric pulses all the way between her legs.

"Let me do you now, Sean." She grabbed his cock but he pushed her back.

She knew there was more to come. Each episode with Sean so far had been the most gratifying sex she had ever experienced. He was an explorer; taking notes, and painting precise maps. He already knew all the buttons that Dan never bothered to learn in their fifteen years together, and he was discovering new ones all the time.

His tongue was on her thigh, touching places that all of the men she ever been with, had neglected. It trailed across her bronze skin, slaloming like a sleepy brook, stopping at the pearly gates, and U-turning. Sean knew her body better than she did. She was too sensitive after an orgasm.

Where were you all my life? I can do this all day. So sweet, so good.

"Do you think I'm a horrible person, Sean?"

He lifted his head. "I don't do judgment, I'm a horrible person myself."

"I think I am."

He kissed her trail of pearls and Ana giggled.

"Did you ever betray the trust of the one person who truly loves you?"

Sean started trailing soft kisses down her thigh and up her calf. He reached her leg and licked her heel. Ana giggled again.

He started kissing his way down, following the same trail only backward. When he was deep down, near her bush, Ana pressed his head into her vagina.

Sean pulled away and started giving her other leg the same treatment.

"This feels so good, Sean; why does it feel so good if I feel so bad about doing it?"

He came back up, kissing her neck deeply. She ran her hand in his golden hair and he hummed. Without even touching a sexual part of her body, he could make her feel tingly. "I'm a horrible person and a horrible mom."

He suddenly stopped. "I slept with Dom's ex-girlfriend."

"That doesn't sound so horrible."

"She wasn't his ex then."

"Oh."

"She was a player and I wanted him to know it before he marries her and.... Fuck! That's a big fucking lie. I wanted to show him there is something in this world I'm better than him at. Fuck that, I just wanted to hurt him."

"What did he do?"

"Hurt. Hurt a lot. Mission accomplished." He said dryly. "Next thing I know is that I fucked up with some very bad people, the kind that bury you in concrete when you fuck up. Guess who pulled my ass out of the mess."




Wicked Ch. 07



"Saint Dominick."

"So if you think you're a bad person and.... Take comfort in knowing there is always a lower level you can aspire to. "

She stared into his purple eyes, surprised. A chink in his 'I don't do fall in love' armor. Her heart overflowed. She wanted to kiss him all over where he hurt. Butterflies were all over the place, promising her false happiness, with their little wings. "You're not evil, Sean, you're marvelous."

"Sure."

Ana thought of Alice. Does she wear Sean's glasses when she looks at her big sister? Was she a constant reminder to Alice of how much her life was a failure? "You know, sweetie, Dom is not half the lover you are."

"How would you know?"

She shrugged and smiled.

"Nice try, you didn't sleep with him."

"I totally did."

"Sure. Dom would slice his own balls before he'll cheat. He don't do random sex, he only does 'falling in love'."

"He's not the innocent saint you think he is."

"Dom can't be further from an innocent saint, and you're a liar. But you get points for trying to make me feel good."

"What do I earn?"

He smiled like John Dillinger before he'd hit the First National Bank. She felt her heart race. She ached to be ravished.

"Oh my God, you've got amazing eyes, Sean They're angelic. I think you fell down from heaven?"

"I think I climbed up from that other place." He lunged forward, their lips and tongues welded and his cock sliced between her legs. His powerful arms held her in a confident grip and her hands felt the muscles rippling under his skin. Golden skin, purple-blue eyes, and golden hair. She locked her arms around his neck and pulled him, surrendering heart and soul to the breathtaking kiss. It all came down to one perfect moment. In the years to come, Ana would remember that moment whenever someone else would kiss her deeply.

She was dizzy when he pulled back. Gods. "I want you," she said, and meant 'I love you'.

He lifted her leg above his shoulder and flipped her over on her stomach.

"Oomph. Gently."

I can't be in love with Sean, can I? I love my husband more than anything. I love my family. She felt trapped.

Sean placed the head of his cock at her entrance. He pulled her toward him and guided the tip of his penis to her hot opening and slowly pushed in. Ana let out a long, pleasurable sigh as the walls of her vagina tightened around him.

"Christ, stop teasing."

He thrust up from behind, almost lifting her off the floor and driving so deep into her that she arched her back.

"Ohhhhh, Sean."

She had a sudden sensual overload, and started trembling. Sean stopped moving and laid a calming hand on her back.

"Jesus, how do you do it?"

He leaned over and started kissing her back, still notched deeply inside her.

Ana nodded her head and gave a deep sigh.

His cock slipped out of her and she ached for its return. Her cheek was smeared on the blanket he had arrayed for them on the floor. It was the worst bed she ever had sex in, and yet it was the best sex she had ever had. Her perfect round ass was up in the air, open and inviting. She flexed her inner muscles and her opening winked at him.

"That's funny," he said. "Do that again."

She laughed, clenched her muscles, both her vagina and ass contracted.

"It looks like they're talking to me."

"What do you think they're saying?" She clenched again.

"Private property, keep out?" He played with the head of his cock on her lower lips.

"Please."

He pushed slowly inside and her wet walls hugged him in a loving embrace.

Ana moaned.

Sean did a slow series of entrances and exits, almost tantric, then switched to a gong-like set of hammer blows. Her inner muscles contracted. Dom might be the best at everything, but Sean was the best where it counted.

Pound, pound, pound, like a precise sex machine. Each time he felt she was about to explode, he would slow down and kiss her shoulders. She was trapped, addicted. He wasn't just pushing in and out; he was screwing, in the literal sense. He rotated his hips, and like a giant screw she felt him burrow and touch every crevice and nook inside her body.

She came somewhere in the midst of it, but never felt like stopping. He was carrying her on ecstasy waves, one after the other. She simply rested her head on her hands, and closed her eyes with a happy, content smile.

Sean leaned his body against hers. She thought he needed to take five but he kept drilling her slowly from behind. Kissing the back of her neck and massaging her body with his. His cock kept doing magical tricks inside her wet folds.

"You're amazing," she whispered.

Pound, pound, pound; he seemed to be able to last for hours. A mobile buzzed somewhere.

Sean picked it up.

"Hey," she said.

He placed his finger to his lips. "Yeah, man, sure; a couple of minutes and I'll be there."

"Hey, don't go," she said.

"Okay, but I'll have to make it quick."

"Don't be an ass, I don't need charity."

"Okay." He pulled out.

"Don't you dare."

He pushed right in and started pounding, no relenting this time.

"I won't cum like that, it's a total turn-off."

"Sure." His hand went under her to cup her triangle, pushing it against the cock that was plunging in and out of it.

"I won't," she panted, trying hard to delay it but it felt like Sean had dropped a live grenade inside her pussy, and she exploded to pieces.

"Ahhhhhh, Ahhhhh, Ahhhhhh, Ahhhhhh, Ahhhhh, Ahhhhhh, Ahhhhhh, Ahhhhh, Ahhhhhh."

He pulled out and rested on his back, stretching like a big golden cat.

It took her some time to regain her breath; Sean already had his shirt on.

"Come here this instant."

"I don't do orders either, Ana."

"You don't do this and you don't do that, do you have all your don'ts written down somewhere?"

"Don't you have a wedding to attend to?"

"I had four amazing orgasms, you didn't cum once."

"You can write me a thank you letter."

"Sean, this is humiliating, please, come here."

He kneeled near her body and gave her a loving kiss that lasted several seconds.

"You're so sweet, I could eat you." She grabbed his cock, licked it, and tasted her own juices. "I can do a lot better than a thank you letter; a lot better."

 @@@@@@@@

Dan opened the door to the dark office. Heavy odor of pesticide, a lonely desk with a flickering flat screen, and nothing else.

I'm hearing voices in my head, now, dementia here I come.

Then, "Yeah, babe, you're a fucking pro."

A large, sliding glass door gaped open like the mouth of Hades, and muffled voices sounded from behind the curtain covering it. His eyes, accustomed slowly to the darkness, and began noticing shapes. A dark silhouette stood behind the curtain and another silhouette was sitting or kneeling beside it, moving to an obscene rhythm.

His wife was giving David a blowjob and doing an awesome job by the sound of it.

"Take it, take it all the way, you love the anaconda, don't you?"

Moan.

"Oh, yeah, here it comes, bitch."

Dan had a sudden urge to commit genocide. He felt like exploding and smashing everything that he could get his hands on. But first he'd take the computer screen, bash David's head to a red pulp, and then use the cord to hang Ana from the balcony.

He pulled the curtain and found himself on a balcony facing the parking lot.

"Hey, bro."

Dan let out the breath he was holding.

They had brought with them a tray, packed with tall wine glasses and short cocktail shots. Dan couldn't understand the point. They were both already heavily under the influence, and it didn't look like they needed to shed inhibitions with booze; not by a long shot. Arik was leaning against the rail, his black trousers around his feet. Alice's luscious lips were wrapped around his erect cock. One of his hands held her wheelchair frame, preventing it from rolling backward, the other held the back of her long neck, pulling her further onto his cock.

He rotated his pelvis hard and hit the back of her throat, making her gag.

"Yo, bro, it's not a freaking peepshow, get the fuck outta here."

Their two months of friendship opened him up to a new Alice. A strong, smart girl, who had had a habit of driving everyone around her completely nuts. But he couldn't help seeing beyond the spines during those small moments when she had let her guard down; her kindness, the fact that she deeply cared for the few people she let inside her world, and her vulnerability.

Yet here she was and this was her, also. The image that he would have conjured two months ago when thinking of his. A slut. He felt betrayed, as if she tricked him into believing she was something else, and now the mirage had been lifted.

She can drink her own poison; it was none of his goddamn business. He turned around and then stopped.

Alice was choking. Arik was pulling her hard, oblivious in his drunken stupor, to her red face. There was a bulge in her throat where Arik's cock's head drilled her and it kept going down. But there was something else that stopped him. He saw a plea in her eyes and not a small amount of loathing, though he wasn't sure if it was loathing for Arik, herself, or him.

"Let her go," Dan said.

"Piss off."

"I'm counting to three, Arik, then I'll stop being polite. One."

"Get your own pussy, bro."

"Two."

Arik was maybe an inch taller, and he had the drunkenness-aggression factor as an added advantage. Dan compensated by having twice the shoulder-width, and a barrel chest.

"Three."

Reason won. Apparently the man wasn't as baked as he looked, which only made his behavior more appalling. He let her head go and pushed her chair back.

Alice coughed, puked a little, and cleared her throat.

"She's all yours, the fucking bitchin' whore ain't worth the shit anyway," Arik said and a second later he was picking himself off the floor, tasting blood in his mouth and not quite sure how he got there, because the ecstasy he took had nullified the pain.

Dan helped him up by the scruff of the neck, kicked him out through the office's door and watched him stumble fast down the stairs. Returning inside, he found that Alice still trying to get her breath back. He leaned his suddenly weary body on the rail, and closed his eyes for a minute.

"Give me that." Dan grabbed the cocktail shot from her shaking hands because the first thing Alice did when she stopped heaving was to pick one up. "Are you trying to kill yourself?"

"Fuck you and your cat."

"I can just push you over the rail if you have a death-wish. I'm totally in the mood."

"Do it," she said.

"I will."

"Fuck you and your cat."

"And what's with the cat? I don't have a cat. Ana doesn't like cats."

"Just for the record I would have let you adopt all the fucking cats in the world."

"Just for the record, you're shitfaced."

"Am not...." Alice leaned over the rail and puked a healthy mix of foie gras, clams, white wine, and sperm.

All the lights in the garden behind them suddenly went off. A pink star rose up from behind the pecan trees, and exploded with a bang into a hundred yellow sparkles. Another followed, and another, and the cloudless sky became a stage for a fireworks ballet that wouldn't have shamed the Independence Day celebration. In the greenish-pink light Dan saw David below him, marching stiff-legged to the parking lot. His car was blocked by the kids show's van. The valet spoke to him and he shouted some profanity back, then kicked the car blocking his.

Dan vowed to stop listening to his paranoid instincts, and to give Ana and their marriage a real chance. Ana loves me. Ana loves me. Ana loves me.

"You think I'm a monster don't you?" Alice suddenly said.

"No, I simply don't get it."

"That's because you're an idiot."

"You're a beautiful woman, no, that's not true; you're one of the most beautiful women out there. You have good instincts, you're smart, you're funny, and you're independent. You could get any man you'd want."

"But not the man I want."

"What are you talking about? Any man."

"You're such an idiot."

"And still, in a crowded room you always zero in on the most fucked up, stupid, douche bag that could turn any girl into a miserable wreck. I really don't get it. Are you trying to punish yourself or something?"

Her lip started trembling.

Dan tried to put his hand on her shoulder but she lashed at him like a crazed lynx, claws extended. "Don't you fucking dare touch me!"

"Okay."

"I wanna go home."

"I'll take you home."

"I don't want to go back to where you and Ana live. Fucking ass kissers, both of you. Why don't you go inside and kiss Ofek's ass some more? You and Ana could take turns; have yourself a royal ass-kissing party. Maybe he'll buy you a bigger house with a bigger swimming pool."

What do you know? Grandma was spot on. "Know what? I'm sorry."

"Aha."

"I'm sorry your dad bought Ana a house with a pool. See? That wasn't difficult."

"Amazing."

"Is it? Two simple very important words, I'm sorry. That's the problem with this country; everyone is too busy being right all the time, god forbid if anyone apologizes."

"You're an idiot."

"I'm sorry." He shouted. "From the bottom of my heart. Maybe you can try it sometimes. Say, 'I'm sorry, Daddy, for whatever stupid childish quarrel that made us strangers'."

Alice laughed, it was the kind of laughter that comes from the dark place you never want to visit. "First Irit, now me. I bet you think you're some kind of a superhero; flying around wearing a red cape, saving whores in distress."

"You're not a whore you're just drunk."

"And you're not a superhero, you're a joke." She took one of the wine glasses and before Dan could take it away she hurled it over the rail. It shattered into million pieces on the parking lot pavement. "You think you're some kind of hero but you're a fucking pathetic excuse for a man, Dan. Everyone is laughing behind your back; you're the only one without a clue."

"What did I ever do to you?"

"You want to know why Ana started fucking real men?"

"No I don't."

"Because you're a little girl."

"You mean I'm not a real man like Arik."

"You're a wuss, Dan. One hit and you fold like a baby and cry in the corner for a year. Oh my god, they fired me, I don't have a job. Get a pair. Everyone pisses all over you; your wife pisses all over you and you, you just keep smiling like it's fucking raining in the desert. An imbecile."

"Okay, maybe I'm a wuss. And Ana --" his voice broke. "What Ana did.... Fuck that. She loves me. Ana loves me, wuss and all, and you know what? The rest is just bullshit because she does."

"No she doesn't, I lo--.... No she doesn't."

"You can repeat that a million times over, it doesn't change anything."

"There's not a girl on this planet who could love a pathetic rag like you."

Dan sighed deeply. "We got to get you cleaned somehow before we get you down. How did you two lift the wheelchair up the stairs anyway?"

"Fuck you!" she screamed, then sunk her fingernails into his arm until she felt the skin break. "Is there a human being under there?"

"Stop it!"

"Why can't you, once in your life, hit back?"

"Don't feel like it."

"The girl who just choked on some loser's dick calls you pathetic. Don't you get the irony? Can't you fucking come out with something insulting? Are you really that obtuse?"

He made a fist and released it.

"Do it."

"I'm not really an idiot or a coward or obtuse, Alice. I could hurt you real bad."

"Do it."

"You and everyone who wronged me. Nadav Fine and Ana included."

"So?"

He shrugged.

"Don't you have an ounce of self-esteem?"

"And maybe I sat in the corner and wallowed in self misery for a year, but no matter how pathetic or sorry I felt for myself it never, never, never, made me want to crap on people. Especially not on the people who care for me."

That must have hit home, because she buried her face in her palms and started crying again. "I'm so sorry," she sobbed.

"Try skipping the kicking under the belt part once in a while; you might not need to feel sorry all the time. It's so easy to hurt people who care for you, they're the most vulnerable. Me, your dad, your mom, and your brother. I don't buy for a second your 'Ana was the favorite, she got a big house and I didn't'. Any asshole can start a fight and your dad is maybe a jerk, but it takes only one person to act like an adult and ... if I can try and forgive Ana, and believe me I have to try really hard, so can you try and forgive them. There's nothing that can't be undone."

"You're right."

"I know I am."

"And with you, when you're right you're so right."

"I think I'm more right than you're willing to admit."

Alice started laughing, and that was far more frightening than her tears. "Yeah, Ana was his favorite, for sure. I was his favorite!" she suddenly screamed.

"You know what? Let's just go home."

"Since I was twelve, I was his favorite every night. He'd come to my bed, crawl under the sheets and then, shhhh...." she put her finger to her cherry lips. "Daddy's special little girl. Fucking favorite."

The balcony suddenly felt unsteady underneath his feet and he had to sit down.

"Five years, Dan. One thousand, eight hundred, nights. The fucking pig almost never missed an occasion."

Dan stared at her, eyes wide, terrified.

"Have you ever been fucked by a fucking pig, Dan? Have you had someone hurt you so bad that you felt so small you wanted to die? I have. So you think I should go and kiss him and say 'I'm sorry Daddy'? Huh? Fucking pig!" She threw another wine glass all the way out into the parking lot.

"Your dad. I let ... Liana. I let that man take her camping."

"Oh, I bet you're really glad now, they had his balls snipped when he had prostate cancer, aren't you? I told you it was poetic justice, and you thought I was a monster."

"Why.... Why did you never...?"

"Tell anyone? I did. I finally had to, when he.... I was pregnant, Dan. You know what my mom did? She called me a slut and a liar. She said I let some fucking kid at school screw me. Me, Dan, I was the monster; not him."

"You had a...?" It was too much to grasp.

"I didn't have shit. They arranged for some private hack fuckwit to make the little problem disappear. Three husbands and no kids; ever wondered about that? Shit happens when you have an abortion at some fucker's basement when you're sixteen. And I thought that was okay, you know, that's what life is all about, that I deserve everything he's doing to me."

"But you ran away, you left your house when you were seventeen," he almost pleaded.

"Ilan caught us in bed. So the next day, he decided he wants some of that, too. After all, why should his role model hero of a dad have all the fun? He should get some of the house whore's ass too, no?"

"What did you do?" Dan's voice was barely audible.

"I kicked his nuts all the way to Mars with a baseball bat and I ran away. I never looked back."

He thought of the meaningless sea of nobodies she had taken to her bed, and her quests for self-destruction; pieces of a puzzle that had always lurked in a corner of his mind. His heart broke.

"Ana, Ilan and me; three monsters brought to you by White & Clean Inc. You married into the Addams family, Dan. Fuck it, I bet you wish now that you'd really married into the Addams family instead of the Whites. If it's not White, it's not clean." She had started to laugh again; but then it changed into sobbing.

Dan hugged her close to his chest. She tried to struggle but he wouldn't let go, so she sunk her nails in his palm. Still, he wouldn't let go. They sat on the balcony, melded together like lovers or enemies or like two little orphans God had forgotten, outside the Garden of Eden.

Soon, her grip embedded in his palm had softened, like that of a kitten retracting her claws; her breathing became shallower, and the ache in her chest less intolerable. She had lied to Liana. There were monsters in real life. The world was certainly a sea of obtuseness, selfishness, and wickedness; but there were always islands of kindness out there, and that's undeniable too.




Wicked Ch. 08



First things first:

Sorry it took so long, life and [enter lie of some sort].

I'll use this stage to thank several people who read and did some editing, so I won't fall on my ass.

BGMISFUN, Ohio, ViFrisk, and Cambria Rose. You guys totally rock.

Thanks to all the good people who sent me supporting e-mails and those who promised me a gratifying death if I ever touch a word processor again. It means you care. Thanks to all the nice people who leave a message down below -- even if it is only to say that the story is horrible and boring and they'll never read it again, until the next chapter pops.

So here we go: 

Wicked Chapter Eleven

Ana's father, Ofek White, believed that if life gives you lemons, it's because you don't have leverage on life. A smart man hires a PI to sniff out the sewage. Maybe life is a respectable community member, but it has an embarrassing fetish for shagging sheep. Next time life wants to give you lemons, you stick the dirty pictures under its nose, and make it an offer it cannot refuse.

"Everyone's got invisible buttons, Ana. If you're strong enough, you can use them to your advantage. Ilan is too stupid and Alice is too soft, but you and I are made of the same stuff."

"But how can I find people's buttons if they're invisible?"

"Tell them what they want to hear, not what you think. Talk to their emotions, not their logic, and always guard your own. Just remember, nothing is more important than blood. Never press the buttons of those you hold dear. Your family is sacred." He was already visiting Alice's bed, nightly, at that time.

It took Ana almost twenty years to follow suit. She had been using manipulation and deceit since she was young, pressing people's buttons to get ahead in life, but her husband and family were always a taboo. However, once she crossed that border, it took her almost no time and cost her little remorse. After all, Nadav Fine got something right. She was a shark in a world of sardines.

@@@@@@

A week after her brother's wedding Ana sat down in the office of Lin Young, a colleague, and wondered if she should push some buttons. After getting back from Crete she convinced her boss, Amiram, to relieve her off Nadav Fine's lawsuit and to dump it on Lin. When she came this morning, however, she was told that the case was going right back to her desk.

Apparently Lin Young, not a sardine, knew a little about buttons pushing.

"You need help?" She asked Ana, drumming an irritating staccato on her polished nail with a pen. "It's not a crossword; you just need to copy the files."

"Sorry, your computer is a tortoise. Ask Amiram to give you my old one. It's faster." Ana smiled on the inside when she saw Lin flinch. Rubbing the little lawyer's nose in her seniority; always felt nice.

"Okay, make sure you take Nadav's lawsuit's files. Check all the folders between June and July."

"I'm not exactly tech savvy, but I'm not a complete retard, either. I get it, Lin."

Amiram's daughter, Anat, the office's front desk secretary, peeped into the room. "Ana, you've got a phone call. Someone named Sean or Don, he says he found your mobile. Will you take it here?"

"Great." Her heart jumped. "Lin, can you give me some privacy? I think this guy stole my mobile."

Lin gave her a look that said 'I want to tie you naked on a fire ants' nest'; it was her office, after all. She stretched her five foot and a little and tried to stare Ana down. Like a small child standing his ground for a second, facing the school's bully, even though he knows he already lost. Then Lin turned her shapely bottom, and left the room without a single word.

The school bully picked up the phone. "Hi, who is this?"

"Yeah, right."

"Sean? You got my Galaxy? I thought it was stolen again."

"Did you play nice with the kids in school today?"

"What?"

"Dunno', feels like I'm talking to a ten year old. You seriously want me to believe you just left it in my office by accident?"

"You never call and you don't return my messages or emails. I stopped by your office twice this week, and twice that fat cook of yours told me you'd just left."

"So instead of taking the elephant sized hint, you forgot your mobile on my desk. How old are you?"

"It worked."

"So does genocide; doesn't mean you should give it a shot."

"Don't tell me you don't miss my lips around your cock." She felt naughty for saying cock and licked her lips thinking of his large member growing in her mouth. "Tell me you don't miss it."

"Sure, whatever."

"Come on, lover boy."

He took a deep breath. "Let go, Ana. You and I can only end with tears. Trust me, been there."

"I miss you."

"What's your address? I'll mail the Galaxy to you."

"Why don't you come over and bring it in person?"

"In case you didn't get the subtext; when I said, I'll mail it, I meant, piss off."

"You're an asshole."

"Big time."

"Want me to beg, it that what this is, Sean?"

"I want you to leave me the fuck alone."

"I don't get it; the sex was awesome. What happened?"

"It sort of lost the, you know... the novelty."

He might have punched her in the stomach. She lost balance. "We've been together for three weeks."

"Practically the closest I've ever been to having a relationship. I don't do relationships, Ana."

"Try something new; take a leap of faith."

"With a thirty eight year old, married mother of two?"

"My husband is going away for two and a half weeks for reserve duty. My kids are going to be with mys a lot. I'll have the whole house to myself. What are you doing next week?"

"I'm busy."

"Doing what?"

"I'm busy not giving a fuck; seriously, it fills up my calendar."

She finished downloading the lawsuit files from Lin's disk to a flash drive. On the desktop sat a folder Lin named 'Private Stuff', simply begging Ana to click it, which she did.

"I'm not asking you to be my husband, just my lover. Any other guy would have killed to be in your shoes. What are you so freaking afraid of, huh, Sean? That you'll like it?"

"I ain't afraid of shit."

Oops, found another button to press. "Chicken."

"Piss off."

"Maybe you're afraid of my husband?"

"What?"

"I don't do falling in love, I don't do relationship, I don't do the Macarena. Bullshit. It's okay, Sean, it's all right to feel intimidated, he's a big guy, my hubbie."

"I'm a big guy."

"Give it a chance, come here, and stay for a week. I'll spoil you. You won't regret it. I've got a swimming pool. Think of it as a fun vacation, sex and drinks included. Unless you're afraid my husband might come back and kick your ass. "

There was silence on Sean's side of the call. The folder 'Private Stuff' was mostly empty except for some photos of Lin's daughters and another folder called 'SW-Party 2010'. It was full of movie files.

"So what do you say?"

"How big is the pool?"

"25 meters. Tall fence. We can do lots of fun stuff outside. Naked."

"Fuck. I haven't been on vacation for ... can't remember really."

Her heart started beating fast and she seized the momentum. "I've got a new sex swing that I've never tried. I've got a sex bed."

"You're living in the suburbs or in Hugh Hefner's mansion?"

"So it's a yes?"

"I'll think about it."

"Think positive." Ana clicked on a random movie and her jaw almost hit Lin's keyboard.

"A private swimming pool, you say."

"Sure, sweetie, got to go, something just popped. Remember that, 'no', is not an option, bye."

On the screen, Lin was riding bronco, naked and sweaty on a hard cock. Lin's back was turned towards the camera, but she immediately recognized her tiny frame and coal shiny hair. Ana was certain that it wasn't Lin husband's tool she was riding. Lin's husband was a runt, just like her, five feet and a little. The guy she was riding was a body builder and tall, with a love pole to match.

"Go all the way up, sweetie, show me that cock," said the man behind the camera. He sounded familiar and Ana had another shock as she realized it was Michael, Lin's husband.

Lin rose; her tiny vagina seemed to grip the huge cock in a vise. She left a sticky trail of body fluids as she went up.

"Oh my god," her husband said. "It's a big one, isn't it?"

"Yeah." Lin blurted. Then her thighs stopped pushing, her tiny ass slid down, and the hard cock disappeared. It looked like a magic trick, like a magician swallowing a sword that was way too big for his throat.

"You're getting in deep."

Lin moaned.

"You want more lube, honey?"

Lin turned her head to the camera and shook her head. Her tiny brow was wrinkled but she was smiling.

"Go all the way up, show me that cock again."

Lin rose. She looked like a dolly on a stick. A lollypop.

A brownish long legged girl suddenly stepped into the frame. She slapped Lin's bottom and the little lawyer slapped her hand away. The girl laughed.

What the hell? Some kind of a fucking orgy?

"Are you done?" Lin checked into her office and Ana bit her lip to avoid screaming.

"Just five more minutes, okay?" She closed the movie and started copying the entire directory into her flash drive.

"Is everything okay? You look flushed. Did the guy steal your mobile?"

"No, no, just a good Samaritan, he found it. Everything is fine, everything is just perfect."

Lin shrugged and gave a fake smile.

She was a barracuda, but Ana was about to demote her to sardine rank, a stupid, careless sardine. When she was told to take the lawsuit files from her computer, Ana asked her to copy the files for her, but Lin refused, saying she had no time and she wasn't Ana's secretary. Serves the bitch just right. She wasn't going to do anything particular with the movies. She'd just filed them under 'Lin Leverage', to use in case the tiny bitch needed a rub. Her dad was right, everyone's got buttons. You just need to find them.

@@@@@@@@@@

Dan Jacobson thought that if life gave you lemons, it didn't give you an excuse for being an asshole. It wasn't as easy as it sounds. He could, early on, have turned out a bully, since he could punch the lights out of any guy. However, his dad had taught him the Immanuel Kant version of ethics. Value is derived from duty. It doesn't matter if the other guy deserves it, if you just lost your job, if someone craps on your head, or if it's raining or sunny. One must act according to what he believes is good and that notion of good is intrinsic.

"How will I know if something is good for me, Dad?"

"I said good; not good for you. Sometimes they are like chalk and cheese."

"Then why choose the first?"

"Because you want to do the right thing."

"Why?"

"If you search the logic, then you didn't understand a word of what I've said. Sometimes, 'because I want to do the good thing', is the best answer, Danny. That's what makes a decent man."

So he couldn't abandon Alice to fare on her own in the hospital, even though she didn't deserve an ounce of kindness; just as he couldn't abandon Irit to the dangerous pimps, even though they frightened him. He also couldn't abandon the wife that he loved, even if it was the hardest thing he ever did, all because of his dad, and that son of a bitch, Immanuel Kant, and the intrinsic notion of good.

He watched, for a while, as Alice was learning to walk again, hands on the parallel bars, tongue peeping from the corner of her mouth, and cheeks all rosy, a lovely sight. She noticed him fidgeting on the physiotherapist's doorstep, and a smile formed from one cheek to its partner. He pointed at his watch, and she nodded that she wanted a little more practice.

Dan thought of his depression that evolved from losing his job and how she was handling the cards the universe had dealt her. It didn't make him too proud.

His parking call sang to him; his reservist recruitment officer finally cleared the line.

"Yaron?"

"Yaw?"

"It's Dan, Dan Jacobson."

"Dan, bro, how are you? And the answer is no."

"What was the question?"

"If I can, I will give you an out of jail free card for reserve duty next month."

"Come on. PUMA driving course [Heavy IDF APC]? Really?"

"Gonna be fun."

"Like scabies. Yaron, I've got this thing at my age against driving vehicles that don't have an air conditioning switch."

"It's got a remote controlled 762 instead; 1200 rounds per minute. Gotta love the firepower, grandpa."

"That's two and a half weeks course at a very bad time for me, man. Throw me a bone, here, or at least get some lube when you bend me over."

"You think you're the only one in your unit who had called today for that favor?"

"I had been out of work for almost a year and the line had been deader than the Dead Sea; now just as I've started a new job, the IDF feels we'll lose the next war if I can't drive an APC."

"You've got a new job? Congrats, bro."

"Thanks. I'm building a shelter for kids at risk, in Herzeliya."

"The Rachel Guttmann's project?"

"You read about it on the Friday local?"

"Yeah."

"And you know what, Yaron, I already got a mile long waiting list for that shelter. Kids that need a solution today, not in a month, when it's ready. They need it today. If it delays for two and a half weeks -- you don't want something like that sitting on your conscience."

"You're breaking my heart, bro."

"You don't have one."

"Okay, I'm not promising anything, but I'll see what can be done."

"You're the man."

"Look, ma, no hands." Alice let go of the parallel bars and took a few hesitant steps. She was smiling, but her white tank-top had dark blotches up and down.

Dan clapped heartedly and then wrinkled his nose when she approached. "Awww, rank. You need a douche."

"Found one." Alice flipped him the bird. "Thanks for coming, but I could have taken the bus home."

"Ana told me to drive you to check out an apartment for rent in Rishon."

"The landlord will only be there in three hours."

"I know, but I thought we can grab something to eat on the way."

Her face brightened with surprise. "Like a date? You're on, mister." She made a small victory jig, trying not to lean much weight on her left. "I know I'm getting well, because people of the opposite sex want to date me again, even if it's just you, Dan. No offense."

"None taken. Has anyone seen my self-esteem? I think it's dead."

"You've made a great progress, but take it easy; it had only been two days without the cast." Rose the physiotherapist rolled her eyes behind his sister's back and pointed an imaginary gun to her head, pulling the imaginary trigger. She appeared just as exhausted as Alice.

Alice limped off on her crutches to wash off the exercise's sweat and Dan called Mahmud to make sure things didn't go fubar just because he was absent for thirty minutes. To his surprise no one fell to his death from the scaffolds or exploded, and even weirder, the stable casting was proceeding on schedule.

"She's lucky to have a brother like you," Rose said.

"She needs a little luck."

"She needs a muzzle."

Dan sighed. "Okay, what did she do?"

"Nothing special. Well, this time. She only bitched non-stop. The air-conditioning is broken, so it's hot; deal with it. She called my boss, 'cheap', to his face for not fixing it. If she wasn't Ana's sister... I don't understand how you've survived for three months. You're a saint."

"Don't be cruel, Rose."

"Come on, we've been friends for fifteen years? More. I think I can speak openly here."

"Or, we can keep it closed."

"I'm just worried about you and Ana, and about what this woman can do."

Dan glared at her. Rose's husband was Ana's friend from law school. He never really cared much for him or her, and lately he was having a hard time tolerating people who believed Alice was a legitimate punching bag.

"Ana, well, I can't blame her, she's her sister after all, but I know you and I are on the same page."

"What book are we reading?"

"Alice the Home-Wrecker."

"It's a romance, right? 'Cause I can just feel the love."

"Hah."

"Come on, Rosie, give her a break."

"Me? You used to call her Samantha Jones. Alice Walk-Of-Shame."

"Opinions change."

"That girl destroys everything she touches. You shouldn't have let her stay so long with you."

"What did you expect us to do? Dump her in the street? She's family."

Rose's nostrils did an evangelical preacher in smite-the-sinners' sales pitch imitation. "Moshe Silver dumped his wife because of her."

"Who told you that? Moshe was deep in divorce settlement procedures, long before he and Alice even met."

"And she dragged the poor man to court again, only six months after their marriage."

"Should have dumped his sorry ass in six minutes. He was screwing behind her back left and right. She's been through hard times; give her a break."

"Wait till she makes a pass at you."

The image of Alice's luscious lips on his, popped, and the part of Dan's brain responsible for guilt painted his face with the hue of shame. "Come on, Rose."

"Wait, she already did, did she not?"

"What? Bullshit!"

Rose planted her hands on her hips, and smiled. Her guess was anything but spontaneous. What's worse, she now owned a steamy pile of gossip she was going to circle around, no matter how hard Dan denies it. "She made a pass at Roni."

"Roni? Your husband, Roni?"

"At the New Year's Eve party in your house, two years ago."

"That's very unlikely, I-"

"He told me himself, Dan. She's a total slut. No red lines for that bitch."

"She's not."

"That woman is pure evil."

"Simply not-."

"A wicked witch! Ask my husband."

"You know what, Rose? I don't believe Roni for a second. Especially since he chases anything in a skirt the moment you look the other way. He probably made a pass at her and ran to you for an alibi."

"Dan!"

"And you know what else? It is hotter than hell in here and it's been like that a week ago and a week before that. So tell that cheap ass Ebenezer Scrooge boss of yours, he can afford to install a new air conditioning unit."

"Dan!" Alice cried. "I'm really sorry, Rosie, I don't know what's gotten into him."

Dan and Rose turned as one.

Alice leaned on her crutches at the treatment room's doorway, eyes wide with shock. "He's been such a timid soul before he had his whorish imposed on him. And just for the record, Roni had made a pass at me, at New Years' Eve. I had to tell him that I'll have a chat with you to make him stop. So the little toad had run to tell his lying side of the story; only he couldn't find you, because my ex was shagging you in Dan's garage. Moshe told me himself. Come on, boy-scout, you promised me a date."

@@@@@@@@@

"I need the list of all the 'gifts'," Ana made quotation marks sign; "that the Hapoel management ever gave you. Any training camps that had been a cover for a ski and spa in Zurich, that Maserati of yours, anything. And the last idiot who had tried that ended in the ER."

Nadav Fine took his palm off Ana's thigh and flashed his million dollars smile. "Come on, Ana," he winked, "I think we're past that phase."

"I was at the phase of transferring your lawsuit to Lin."

"You're the best lawyer here and I told Amiram I want you. So I'm back."

"Like a bum check."

"You owe me an Armani suit, Ana."

"Should have torched the villa around your big, empty head instead of just going number one on your suitcase. I hope those skanks gave you syphilis."

"You're a shark."

"You're an ego-maniac with a brain that inserted into a bean, could be used as a rattle. Fuck! There's so much left to do. I don't understand! Didn't Lin go through any of this with you?"

"She's stupid."

"Talk about pot calling the kettle - Wow! Just wow." She closed the curtains over her office window facing the hallway. Just in case Nadav feels he can take juristic liberties again.




Wicked Ch. 08



"I wanna hookup again."

"Well, I wanted a vacation on a private beach in Crete."

"Maybe in a restaurant, with your wimp ass hubbie, what's his name, Ron? We can go shakalakaboom under the table, again."

"I don't have an open relationship, anymore. It's over."

"Dan, that's it. Dan the clown. That's his name."

"I know the oxygen on your way to your brain stops for a drink, but you'll get there. I'm positive."

"Too bad."

"See, I knew it would sink in."

"We can still go one on one." He winked.

Ana punched the intercom on her desk. "Lin, could you come here for a sec? That would be all, Nadav. I don't need to stress just how important it is that you complete the homework I've given you. We're one step from closing the deal with Hapoel solicitors' team, and you don't want them to pull any rabbits during money time."

Nadav picked up his long form out of Ana's chair. On the way out he signaled Ana to call him and then gave a tongue in cheek blowjob mimic.

If I shoot him, would that be considered a mercy killing? She felt she was entitled to a little respite for having to endure fifty minutes of Nadav, so she clicked on her favorite show. Lin Young feat -- threesome. One body builder sort of guy was doing the little lawyer, doggy style, while she had her lips wrapped around another man's cock. Her husband was filming again.

It was some sort of a swingers club. Ana already recognized several faces from other movies that were taken on various dates on various locations. It was hot. For the first time ever, Ana masturbated in her office, touching herself behind her desk. She wondered if she could convince Dan to try swinging together. It was better than going behind his back. Most of the movies showed Lin having sex, but one showed Michael buggering a tiny blond. The thought of Dan going at it with that blond hottie infuriated her, and she realized her current situation was the best for them both.

Lin peeped into the office; a raccoon smile on her face, a gloating kind of smile. Why the hell would the little bitch be gloating?

"Just met Nadav outside. That man, wow! How can you stand him? He's like a walking ego attached to a person," Lin said.

"He can afford it, and with what we charge him, he's entitled to."

"I guess so. But working with him; God, a nightmare." Lin was still wearing her annoying smile. "At least he's nice to look at."

"Eh. Not my cup of tea."

"Really? I would die to go one on one with him. He's packing."

What the...? "Lin?"

"What? I like big, it's just so ... big. " Lin winked.

"Really?"

"You can't argue with big."

Ana laughed.

"Just a wicked thought," Lin winked again. "I'm glad you called."

"Is there a problem with your eye?"

"It's called subtext."

"I'm really bad with subtexts. Why don't you just lay it out?"

"Hmmm... I'd rather we don't do it here; how about lunch?"

"Ahhh, lunch, such a nice concept. Sadly, I need to skip lunch today, tomorrow, and next week. Because someone had Nadav Fine's lawsuit on her desk for three weeks, and apparently what she accomplished..." Ana made a show out of ruffling the pages in front of her. "Meeting with Hapoel legal team... had been canceled. Interview with former coach, Yaron Levin... hmmm. No, that one had been cancelled twice. Getting the Toothgate Total commercial contract ... nope. Freezing assets warrant ...ah, no. Dubbing Ziv Schwartz' incriminating recording from Russian to Hebrew.... "

"I didn't do it."

"Really? Getting in touch with Nadav's trust fund representative... No. You're getting the pattern here? Let's make it simple, what did you actually accomplish?"

"Well-"

"That was a rhetorical question, dear. "

Lin picked up a framed photo from Ana's desk. It showed Dan and Tom, from a few years back, just after a rafting track on the Jordan River, both laughing at some joke, eyes bright with the adventure they just shared. Ana loved that picture.

"Two good looking men," Lin said.

"Thanks." Are you seriously hoping to weasel your way through your incompetence by flattery?

Lin licked her upper lip. A quick cobra like movement, in and out. "Dan is hot."

Take your whorish eyes off my husband's body.

"He looks a lot like Bruce Willis in Die Hard. 'Yippie-Kai-Yay, Motherfucker' style. Did I tell you we went to the same high-school? "

"Several times. I asked him about it, he doesn't remember you." Actually Dan did, but she couldn't skip an opportunity to step on Lin's toes.

"Top student, top athlete. He was really cute, not a jerk, a bit shy. Half the eleventh graders had a crush on him."

"You too?"

"No. I had a boyfriend."

Sure. In your face, bitch, he's mine.

"Did you like my movies, Ana?"

"What?" Ana started coughing.

"You liked them."

It took her some time to rearrange her breath. "What movies?"

"If you were half as smart as you think yourself to be, you'd be twice as smart as you really are."

Ana tried to do the math in her head and then realized she better focus on denial. "What on earth are you talking about?"

"I've installed a spy application on all my computers, just in case my husband thinks he can try and have some extra-fun outside the boundaries of our parties. I know you copied the movies, so don't bother with the charade. Did you like what you saw?"

Ana stared at her.

"Come on, you seriously think I would have forgotten something like that by mistake on a folder that says 'Private Stuff'? Why did you think I insisted that you come over and copy the files yourself?"

"Why would you, really?"

"Because I know how you think, sweetie. You may fool the other dimwits, but I read you, sister. So you liked it?"

"Liked?"

"We're a very small, tight, group; high class kind of people. We don't allow any Tom, Dick and Harry in."

What the hell?

"Eight couples; all of them upper class, all of them good looking."

Ana didn't have to pretend she was shocked. She thought she had all the cards, but apparently Lin was playing another game. "You're shitting me not."

"I'm always on the lookout for new people, though; quality people; like you and Dan."

"I'm flattered," Ana tried to smile, it came out crooked.

"Keeping it fresh, you know."

"Amazing. And how do you...? What-? How-? What exactly do you do in those parties? Other than- Just curious. Do you have a theme, like doggy style or threesomes?"

"So we're pretending now."

"Pretending you don't have a screw loose."

"Come on, Ana, I know you and Dan are swingers."

"What?"

"I gotta hand it to you, I would never have suspected. Open marriage, you?"

"Who told you that bullshit?"

"You think I would have let you in if I didn't know you and Dan were into it?"

"You know what? I don't even want to know who is spreading filthy lies about me." Ana snatched the photo from Lin's hands. "And you better wipe that stupid grin. If I were wearing your shoes and one of the partners would have told me my performance was less than -"

"A minor partner."

Bitch. "If one of the partners was on to the fact that I neglected one of our top clients, I wouldn't be smiling."

"Whatever."

"Whatever? Whatever disgusting things you and your husband do in your own free time is none of my business, Lin. I don't know what you have heard or you think you've heard about me; and frankly I couldn't care less. Amiram is so going to hear about how you handled Nadav's lawsuit. Now if I were you, I would be more worried about my annual evaluation than about recruiting people for my perverted hobbies. "

"Not as worried as the lawyer who had sex with a client. One of our top clients. I bet Amiram and the Bar Association would be thrilled to know."

A five ton hammer of condensed fear hit Ana's heart, hard.

"So Nadav is not your cup of tea, eh? Perverted hobbies my ass. Your ass, actually, from what I've heard." Lin rose and flashed a huge smile.

Ana stared at the door a long time after Lin was gone. She tried dialing Nadav Fine's number, to warn him against saying anything to anyone. Her hands shook so hard that she kept punching the wrong numbers. When she finally did it right, it suddenly hit her that the only way Lin could have known about her, Nadav, and her open marriage, was because the mush-for-brains big-mouth had bragged about it himself.

"Fuck!!!" Her scream echoed through the entire office.

@@@@@@@@@

Ron White (the standup comedian) says that if life gives you lemons you should find the guy whom life gave vodka. What do you do if life gives you lemons then craps big time on your head?

Alice White thought you still need to find the guy whom life gave vodka, hose down the pain with the bottle, and then fuck his brains out until you're numb. It used to do the trick for her, but then she fell in love for the first time, at the age of 37.

"Damn good ice-cream." Her tongue trailed around the small mountain of chocolate chips and vanilla. Alice tried to remember when was the last time she felt so happy and couldn't. It was an illusion, a sweet one, but it wasn't real. On the restaurant's sound system someone played Regina Spektor's 'Better', and she felt she could relate.

"If I kiss you where it's sore, Will you feel better, better, better, Will you feel anything at all?"

Dan was on the phone again, it seemed like the phone was an extension of his ear, these days. The ice-cream ball touched his cheek and he smeared it in an absentminded cleaning attempt. She killed a frightening urge to lick the trail it left. Instead, she wiped his cheek with a napkin, took the cone of pistachio out of his hand, and gave it a healthy bite on its left side.

"Hey!" He stared at the half green ball she left him, so she took it from his hands, and gave another bite on the right.

"Hey, twice!"

"Sorry, I'm a sucker for symmetry."

"I've never seen you say no to food," he said. "How come you always look like you're on a diet of foam and carton?"

"Moroccan genetics to die for, mixed with self-hatred. So I was Samantha Jones, and Alice Walk-Of-Shame, eh?"

"I'm not too proud of it, right now, so I'd appreciate if you let it slide."

She had another frightening urge to taste his lips, to drown. Stop it, you idiot!

"You need a new physiotherapist, Alice."

"You need to tell Ana you're not invited to Roni and Rose's barbeque. She was looking forward to it."

"She'll live."

"Maybe insulting people is something you should leave to professionals." She pointed her thumb at herself.

"What are you on about? I've seen Rose's bubble burst plus I don't get to go to the petite bourgeoisie convention of the year. I feel so lucky I should buy a lottery form right now. Did she and Moshe ...? In my garage? Are you sure?"

"Maybe she needed an oil check. Grow up, boy scout."

"Jesus, the world is full of disgusting little secrets. Everyone is cheating with someone," he said.

"You're not."

"I'm an idiot, remember?"

"No you're not; you're the smartest person I know."

Dan gave his ice-cream a halfhearted lick then offered it to her. He picked up his mobile that was buzzing again. "Hoi? You're kidding? Sure, sure, no problem, I'll be there, thanks. Yaron, you're the king, Lio Messi, Michael Jordan, and Elvis combined. Thanks, I owe you a big one."

"What was that?" She couldn't help but smile at the happiness she saw on his face.

"That was my officer from the Fire Brigade. I just got a free pass from two and a half weeks of dust eating. I-" He looked a little embarrassed. "I kind of manipulated him into believing that the shelter schedule depended on it."

"Such a conniving rascal; you could give lessons to Frank Underwood."

"I already fixed everything at work for two and a half weeks of absence. So I'm gonna take a week off."

"Wicked."

"I'll buy two tickets to Italy and me and Ana are going to have a week in Florence. A second honeymoon. I have it all mapped right here." He tapped his forehead.

"Oh." Suddenly the ice-cream didn't taste that good.

"This is so great. Ana has been dying to go on a vacation for ... yeah."

Alice thought about Ana's vacation, two months ago, to Crete. She already took, by force, what she was dying for; treating her husband like a common doormat. Dan was probably thinking about the same thing because a shadow of pain crossed his handsome face.

"It's going to be amazing. We're going to celebrate our anniversary at Alfredo's restaurant on the Arno, just like we did fifteen years ago."

"Nice."

"Don't tell Ana anything. Yaron wants me to enlist for two days to help prepare the tools before they'll drive south. So I'll pretend that this is it; that I'm going for to the full APC course. I'll arrange everything with her office."

"You want to surprise her?"

"I know what you think," he said.

"You do?" Alice panicked.

"That I'm sticking my head in the sand, nope... nope, nope, up my ass. I'm pretending that nothing happened. Believe me; nothing could be further from the truth. Every time I look at Ana I can't help thinking about everything she did with those jerks."

"It sounds like you're fishing for my approval. It's your life, Dan."

"Not approval; understanding. My marriage is one tiny step from being history. And you were right."

"Me?"

"I am a wuss. I never fight where and when it counts."

If I kiss you where it's sore, will you feel better? Will you feel anything at all?

"I don't want to be that man anymore. It's like I'm trying to get out of a very dark place and maybe a trip to Italy will remind me - us of what we once had."

"Yeah."

"So you understand?"

"What's not to understand, you still love her."

"I can't forgive her, as much as I try, but on the other hand -- Without her... Without Ana I can just close the curtain on the whole... I can't imagine my life without her, there's just no point."

Alice felt her heart squeeze, tried to push it away, and gave up. It was bitter sweet and new. Painful, but also refreshing because it made her feel alive, and it didn't even require sex to amplify nor alcohol, or drugs to nullify.

"I always thought that you can't love someone like that," she said. I don't anymore.

Dan gave a weak smile.

"Go to Italy, I'll stay with the kids."

"Really? Because my dad can-"

"What you're going through is my fault -- well, a lot is; and I know you forgave me, because you're such a fucking Care-Bear, but let me at least -- you know, I owe you a few plus. I'll stay with the kids, we'll have fun."

"It's really okay; I already talked with my dad."

"You don't trust me with Liana and Tom? Seriously?"

"Of course I do, you just have a lot to deal with right now."

"Okay, Dan," she signaled for a timeout, "you gotta stop treating me like I'm made of glass; it's not fun being with you anymore. So you know a dark secret about me, so fucking what?"

"You don't have a dark secret; Ofek does. Nothing you did was dark or wrong. You were twelve; a little bigger than Tom."

"Yeah, it's..." A look of surprise touched her face. "Maybe you're right, I never thought of that. Still it's not something - never mind. Thanks."

"What Rose said about you, what other people say about you, it's mostly bullshit."

"Stop! I am what I am. I deserve most of the crap I get, and I can handle it. So stop. I'm still a hundred times tougher than you'll ever be, Dan."

"I used to think you are; I don't anymore."

"Well, you're an idiot."

"I know, I know."

She threw her arms in the air. "It's not even fun trying to tease you, anymore. What good are you without those joyous moments when you bring up the insulted-puppy-frown, huh?"

"Your grandma was right, you're locked in a pattern and it's not going to disappear on its own. It's getting worse. Seriously, I'm worried about you, Alice."

"Then stop."

"Can't help it."

"Look, sweetie, I..." She gave a sad smile, "it's nice that you care but it is what it is; nothing anyone can do about it."

"Maybe it doesn't have to be so," he said.

"All we need is to take that gun you have in your safe, borrow H.G. Wells' time machine, set it 26 years back when I was twelve, park the time machine near Ofek's office, aim at his balls, and shazam; we're good."

"Get real. Where would we find parking in Tel-Aviv in the middle of the day? I've got a better plan." He took a deep breath, "My plan... Okay, but first you got to promise you won't try to kill me."

"Like hell! What did you do?"

"I dated this girl, Aviva Ben-Tovim, in high school."

"Huh?"

"I met her in a school reunion two years ago, and we became Facebook friends."

"I know it's not an affair story, because it involves you, so I'm wondering when the boring climax comes."

"She's - She's a psychologist."

"Hell, no!" Alice raised her voice.

"High caliber therapist. A doctor, a psychiatrist. But she's also a psychologist, and she specializes in women who went through-"

"So fucking no!"

"Come on, it's the 21st century; everyone has a psychotherapist; don't be a cavewoman."

"I don't believe in psychologists."

"They're a myth?"

"Don't make me regret that I told you."

"But you did and I'm involved now."

"I was shitfaced. No chance in hell I'm gonna talk about it with some head-shrinker. I want to put it behind me. It is what it is, Dan."

"You know, when they kicked me out of my job it was humiliating. I was the man everyone depended on, and just like that, in a single day, I became useless, a liability, the man who can't take care of his family. But that wasn't the worst part."

"You're seriously comparing yourself to me?"

"No, but the worst part was that I felt totally alone. Ana never bothered to find out what I was going through. In retrospective it was idiotic to go into despair. I could have found a job as a programmer in a flash; I was afraid to let down everyone, and it sort of fed itself. Sometimes you can't find the solution yourself; you need someone on the outside. Irit, a total stranger, gave me compassion and perspective."

"Irit?"

"What I'm saying is that you've been alone in this for twenty years."

"It's my burden."

"But you're not alone anymore. I can't pretend that Ilan's wedding never happened."

"And I can't afford a therapist." She pretended to clean ice-cream drops from her high boots, to avoid looking at him when she talked. She really wanted to kiss him right now, or slap him; probably both.

"I already paid for the first session."

"Fucking awesome! So you're Ana now? Running people's lives for them?"

"Give it a shot, Alice, for me. You owe me a few plus, remember?"

"Will you go in with me?"

"I would if Aviva says it's okay, but I think it's a private journey."

 @@@@@@@

Lin Young believed life gave her lemons, because they gave all the good stuff to the tall bitch down the hall. Ana was born with a silver spoon in her mouth, had breathtaking beauty, married Dan, whom Lin thought was the hottest man on planet earth (bar Bruce Willis himself), lived in a huge house, and was nominated to partnership over Lin.

Not surprising that the current situation almost felt like a sweet lasting orgasm. She pretended to be immersed in the document she was writing; every time Ana opened her mouth she signaled for her to wait just one more second. In fact, she was punching random letters on the keyboard, savoring the moment. Let the tall bitch wiggle just a bit more.

"We need to talk, Lin. Stop pretending you're typing."

"Now you want to talk?"

"Come on, Lin. What did you expect?"

"Nothing much."

"I -- It's so embarrassing. I thought I would die of shame if anyone in the office knew."

"Nobody does. Ana, just me."

"Nadav told you?"

"It's under client attorney confidentiality." Lin's smile was anything but kind.

"It's bullshit."




Wicked Ch. 08



"Really? I don't remember what the law says about sexual misconduct, but I'm pretty sure it doesn't dismiss it as bullshit."

"No, the fact that you know. You just caught me unprepared. I'm sorry that I jumped you."

"Like a Rottweiler."

Ana faked an apologizing smile. "It was an embarrassing moment for me."

"Why? You already saw what I do on my free time."

"But -- This is really embarrassing. My husband, he's..."

"What?"

"Dan thinks that you're -"

"What?"

She had to sacrifice a few pawns to win this. "We played this little fun game, when we opened our marriage. We called it: 'Whom would you do?'"

"So?"

"Your name, sort of, came out on his, would do list, Lin."

"My name?" Lin's tone rose two notches "What? Sort of...? Sort of came?"

"Sort of really."

"My name?" She almost panted like a puppy and Ana gave herself a mental pat. "Am I at the top of the list or like-"

"It's a short list, Lin, don't push it. What would you do if your husband told you he fancied someone and then that someone tells you he thinks your husband is hot, then a moment later invites you and your husband to... you know. I freaked out."

"Okay."

"I'm new to this whole... I know it's ridiculous."

"It's okay to feel insecure. I know if Michael would have said he fancies you..."

Yeah, as if I would ever touch a midget like your runt husband. In his dreams, maybe.

"Maybe you should talk about it with Dan?"

"I already did."

"Oh."

"He said, why not."

"He did? Did you tell him everything?"

"I didn't mention you thought he was hot, no."

Lin laughed.

"So I'm a little jealous, so what? I say we go for it."

"Great. The next party is in two months."

"How about next week?"

"I like the enthusiasm, but these things require planning. We need to hire a place --"

"How about mine?"

"Your house?"

"It's huge. It's got a big pool. Lots of rooms. Just one neighbor and she flew to the USA last week. My kids will be with their grandparents. It's a onetime opportunity."

"Are you serious?" There was a struggle on Lin's face. Ana knew that her natural suspicion battled with her lust for Dan. "I'm not sure I can arrange for everyone to arrive on such a short notice."

"Even better. More discreet."

"Hmmm... I don't know, Ana."

Throw her a hook. "Well, only one condition, you don't get to touch Dan."

"Come on. Be a sport."

And the nasty runt fell for it. "No. That's a final no. Non-negotiable."

"I'll let you have a go with Michael."

Yuck. "No, Lin."

"Cut me some slack here. This whole thing is about sharing, not hoarding close to your chest. Be generous with me and I'll be generous and forget some silly issue about misconduct."

Fucking bitch. "You know what? Maybe."

"Great."

"But only on my terms," Ana said.

"What terms?"

"I'll have to think about it, and I said maybe."

Lin smiled like someone who just won a big game and he's trying hard to tone it down because the loser is standing right there in front of him. "Then I guess I have some phone calls to make."

When Ana went out of Lin's office, her head was buzzing. Only when she was back at her desk she allowed herself to breathe out in relief. She had set the chessboard, now she needs to align the tools. She picked up the phone.

"Nadav, it's me. Yeah, I know you did, sweetie, that's great. I'm calling about the other thing. I gave it a second thought. I do want to hookup again. Great, Nadav, that's fine, Mr. Fine. But I need a favor from you first. I think you'll like it. How about going to a party with me?"

@@@@@@@

"You're very good at this, Aviva," Alice said. She had her back to the psychologist, and was looking out of the window at the playground below. Dan was waiting for her down there with Liana. He was convinced that recreational facilities were death traps in disguise, so he followed his daughter, hand in hand, up and down on every slide and jungle gym. Right now he was trying to squeeze through the transparent slide tunnel, which was sadly designed for five year olds and not for a 38 male with the physique of a heavyweight boxing champion. Not only did he lag behind his daughter, he was also creating a traffic jam of annoyed kids. This stressed him greatly; he tried to pick up the pace, and bumped his head, hard, against the low ceiling. Alice laughed. God, what a dork. How could I have hurt him so badly? Ana would have never started this madness if it wasn't for me. I don't need a therapist I need a 38 caliber to the brain.

She always imagined psychologist offices with a soft couch that smothers you with its comfort. Aviva's office had chairs, and only one of them looked comfortable. Sadly, Aviva occupied it. What a bitch. "You're really good at this," she said. "I feel ... relieved. We made a great progress today."

"I can't force you to talk, Alice."

"So I'll just keep standing like that for --"

"Thirty three more minutes."

"And still you'll take the money."

"That's how it works."

"I missed my call in life."

"Go on."

"That wasn't a confession; that was a rhetorical trick called cynicism. I don't know what I'm doing here."

Aviva Ben-Tovim looked like a farmer that spent most of her days under the sun, operating combine harvester, not like someone who worked in an air-conditioned office. Alice tried to imagine how she looked when she was seventeen, and dating Dan. It made her jealous.

"I've picked up from the internet an interview you've given to Yediot," Aviva said.

"When was that?" Alice asked.

"It's from ten years back; when you married Amir Paz."

"Oh, that one. Sweetie, you're the only one who actually read it. Everyone else opened it just for the boobs and ass photos."

"I've read it."

"A piece of nonsense; ninety percent bullshit and ten percent utter crap."

"Okay."

"All the so called, juicy gossip items," Alice snorted, "I invented them, on the spot. Like cooking dinner and waiting for Amir, wearing only an apron. Yeah, that really happened."

"Go on."

"What about? The whole marriage was a joke. His agent had thought it might give a push to his dying acting career. My agent had thought it was a great idea. We were the tabloids' favorite couple for two months, and that's it. Everything I said on that interview... Doing it like rabbits, well, we were; only he was doing it with his boyfriend."

Aviva raised both eyebrows.

"It's under patient confidentiality, right?"

"Of course."

"Does it surprise you? You're too old to be one of the fourteen year old screaming fans that wanted to bear his children."

"Probably."

"He's gay, not even Bi. I don't even know if he's any good is in the sack."

"Do you feel that marrying Amir might have been pushed on you by your agent?"

"Hell, no." Alice gave a short bitter laugh. "And compared to my other two marriages, Amir and I were a success story. He never tried to hurt me or anything."

"Go on."

"That's about it."

"You said your other husbands hurt you."

"I said, tried to."

"And?"

"And! Go on! Okay! You don't contribute much to the conversation, do you? 'Cause I have given quite the monologue. There's nothing wrong with me, you know. I ain't crazy."

"Believe me, you don't have to be crazy to talk to a counselor. I'm not here to make you feel awkward or uncomfortable in any way. I'm here to help you live your life to its fullness."

"Awwww, so sweet. Do they make you memorize that bullshit speech on counseling 101?"

Most people would flinch when she lashed out like that, some would attack right back. Aviva did neither. She looked at Alice with her brown eyes, two deep wells, that could contain the world's sorrow and still it wouldn't be too much. Alice knew immediately why Dan loved her once, and hated her for it.

"There was a part that--," Aviva paused. "Well, it must have caught the interviewer's eye too; because the headline he had chosen for the interview was, 'The Acrobat'."

Alice turned her back to Aviva, a little too fast. Dan was spinning Liana on the merry-go-round at a speed that could bore a tortoise. She ached to sit with them. If only I had a father like him. Something rose from the deep place where she kept the sad remains of the little girl she once was, her frightening secrets, her dead, unborn child, little pieces of what might have been. Lately it was getting crowded in there, her rope felt so thin it was almost not there.

"You said in the interview - if I can remember the exact words - that you feel a lot like an acrobat. An acrobat on a high rope."

She felt her rope shaking.

"One wrong step and you'll fall into a dark pit."

"Yeah, like I said, the interview was just a pile of bull."

"Okay, and you don't think that feeling always one step from disaster is a-"

"There's nothing wrong with me."

"So maybe-"

"There's nothing wrong with me."

"I didn't say-"

"There's nothing wrong with me."

Something rose and then popped.

"Well, maybe there's this one thing, that my dad raped me since I was twelve." She turned to Aviva. "If you'll say, go on, I'll shove this ashtray down your throat. No? Good! And ... and my little brother tried to rape me too, once he could find his dick. And he got me pregnant, my dad that is, not my brother, and I had an abortion, and now the only way I can have kids is if I order them by mail, you know. Funny stuff."

Her heart was dripping through her eyes and the words felt like they came from someone else's mouth.

Aviva offered her a tissue but she didn't take it.

"So I ran away and tried crack, and sometimes vodka, and sometimes crack and vodka. That didn't turn out so well. So I tried fucking assholes, plenty around. It helped. It felt like victory each time I enjoyed sex despite everything he had done to me. And I was really hurting my dad fucking all them assholes; so a win, win. Yep... I bet he hurt a lot over it, being such a delicate soul that he is. But other than that there is nothing wrong with me. How about you?"

Aviva didn't smile and Alice thought it was a shame because smiles sometimes made reality less intolerable.

"I- ... Other than that there is nothing wrong with me. No, that's a big fucking lie. There is something really, really wrong with me."

@@@@@@@

Saturday

Dan started the last set of pull ups on the patio's pergola crossbeams; three times ten set. The weather report girl promised 80 percent humidity, but it felt like the humidity had a little air percentage in it. His back was a river of salty sweat. A few hours ago he had a three rounds match against the Golden Gloves Club's current hotshot, Vladimir, and he dominated every glorious second of it. Pulling his body up, he squeezed a masochistic pleasure, from his muscles' loud protests. He jumped down and felt charged enough to run a marathon.

Dan stood for a moment under the searing Israeli sun, eyes closed, and didn't care that it burned his face. He took a lungful of air, full of ripe peaches and mowed grass, and it tingled from his nose down to the soles of his bare feet. Yesterday's sorrows evaporated, forgotten under a moment of bliss.

"Every day in every way I'm getting better and better."

He taught Tom to swim proper freestyle, worked two hours in the garden, and still he had energy to spare. So he hung himself upside down on the beams and started a sit-up set when Ana came out of the house, wearing a gold chemise, carrying ice coffee with ice-cream.

"Wow." He huffed.

Ana spun, like a ballerina, on her toes. "Wow the coffee or this new sexy thing I bought?"

"Both."

She grabbed his cock through his shorts.

"Christ, what are you doing?"

"Just checking the goods, hot stuff." She pulled his pants up.

"Tom might go out any moment for a swim."

"He's running Beyblade episodes on the VOD, so bar Atomic war, power failure, or pizza, he'll be a zombie for the next hour." She stood on her toes and gave the head of his cock a lick. Despite being upside-down, Dan felt the blood rushing to his loins.

"Okay, wait." He grabbed the beam and lowered himself down. Let me take a shower, I'm sweating like a hog."

Ana pushed his broad chest and took a lungful whiff. "Smells like hard work." She pressed an invisible button in the air. "Like."

"Wait." He pulled his pants up.

She slapped his hands away, lowered herself on the white tiles and pulled his pants down. Her lips closed on his erect cock.

"Ana, oh God."

"Goddess, not God." She gave him a nasty bite.

"Ouch, wait."

"No." She gobbled his tool, tasted sweat as it filled her mouth, and cradled it against her tongue.

"Oh."

She pulled back. "That's it? Oh?" She punched his stomach. "On your back, I need some hard exercise myself."

Dan laid his back on their lawn and felt the grass tickling. Above him on the pecan tree, the pair of nesting parakeets were laughing at some parakeet joke.

Ana mounted him and lowered herself on his cock. She wasn't wearing panties. They both moaned at the same time. "Finally! A six-pack." She pinched his abs.

Dan did a sit-up, just to show off, and she pushed his broad chest down.

She compared him to Sean; and came up with a tie. Her husband with abs and muscles, that started bulging again, was really hot. She wanted them both.

Dan pushed up, totally off rhythm. As far as the art of lovemaking goes, he should take lessons from Sean.

She started pushing herself up and down on his cock, singing a nursery rhyme by the national poet. "Swing, swing, up and down, down and up. Who is up? Who is down? Just you and me, me and you ouhhhh, ah, ah, ah, ah, ah."

"I don't remember that line from my kindergarten."

"It's the R rated ver - , ah, ah, ah, ah, shit, God, too soon."

"Did you just...?"

"Yep." Ana glowed.

"Crazy."

"That's what having a sexy husband does for ya." She sunk her nails in his chest.

"Christ, Ana."

"Don't you dare Christ me; I just had a phone call from Rose Shultz."

"Yeah," he grabbed her ass and pulled her deeper. Ana moaned. "I forgot to tell you; It slipped my mind. Honest."

"Selective memory much?"

"Officially," Dan thrust upwards; Ana rose with a squeal. "Officially the Shultz couple was voted off our friends list."

"Says who?"

"It was a secret ballot; I can only reveal that it was a unanimous vote."

"You insulted our friends because of Alice?"

"I insulted Rose because she's a self-righteous hypocrite bitch." Dan thrust again, harder. He got a happy umph sound from Ana for his effort.

"You know, we're having better sex than we had in ages," she said.

"My aim is to please, milady."

"Appreciated. Is there something going on behind my back between you and my little sister?"

"What?" Dan pushed Ana off him; she fell and her naked ass slapped the grass.

"Hey."

"Are you nuts? Rose told you?"

"Maybe."

"What a snake in the grass. And you believed her?"

"Why are you blushing, Dan?"

"Are you for real?" He sat up.

"Did you take Alice out for lunch or didn't you?"

"I totally did."

"What? Why?"

"I needed to talk to her."

"What about?"

"Making love schedule."

She slapped his chest, hard. "Not even as a joke."

"I convinced her she needed to see a psychotherapist."

"Why?"

"Are you serious? It's Alice we're talking about."

"So?"

"The Israeli-Palestinian conflict has fewer issues than your sister. She's post traumatic, Ana."

"What?"

"The psychologist said that."

"She's post something, that's for sure."

Dan stared at her in a shock. "I just told you your sister is suffering from severe trauma. The stunt she pulled on road number one; she wasn't just trying to hurt that asshole, she was trying to hurt herself."

"Nonsense. She's been the center of attention all her life. She's just coming to term with the fact that she's no longer an Israeli icon. That no one cares about a 36 ex-supermodel. So she's throwing tantrums like Liana."

"I can't believe that you belittle -. You know, she loves you so much, Ana. You're the only person in this world she really cares about."

"Alice cares about Alice, and very little else."

"I don't believe what I'm hearing."

"I love her, Dan." Ana tried to sit back on his cock but he pulled back. "I do. Other than me, she has no one. But you got to admit that she's selfish, and childish, and manipulative as hell."

"No! What...? Manipulative? You know what? That's bullshit -- you can say a lot about Alice, but at least, with her, what you see is what you get."

It was Ana's turn to blush. "What do you mean, at least with her? As opposed to whom?"

His mouth clenched.

"You're talking about me."

Dan rose to his feet, Ana followed.

"Oh my God, she's doing it, again."

"Doing what again?" He said.

"Turning us against each other. Can't you see?"

"I can see a lot of things that I didn't see before, or maybe I saw them, but it was easier to pretend that I didn't."

"Who do you think talked me into doing all that crazy...? I'm too ashamed to even say it out loud. It was her, Dan, Christ, you're so naïve. If it wasn't for her, I wouldn't have dreamt about this stupid open marriage idea."

"Alice?"

"Can't you see what's going on, baby? She's using you just as she used me."

"Using me? Using you?"

"That's exactly what it is."

"Alice is a puppet master." Dan's body started shaking and he clenched his fist to make it stop.

"Yes, no, well she's not that smart but-"

He took a deep breath. "Ana, please, stop." He said in a low voice.

"You don't know her like I do."

Dan felt a sudden calm wash over his face; the parrots stopped their bickering and the air was still with anticipation.

"I should have seen this coming from a mile off," she said. "First she manipulated me. Now that she'd failed, she tries another angle."

"Who do you think you're talking to, Ana?"

"What?"

"I'm Dan, remember? Your husband for the last thirteen years plus two kids."

She tried to touch his cheek but he stepped back and her hand dropped.

"I've seen you manipulating people so many times; lying to people. I always hated it, but looked the other way because I was- because it's easier to belittle the failings of the one you love so much. I guess I deserve what I'm getting now."

"Getting what?"

"The same treatment. Did Alice force you to have sex with Nadav Fine? To dump me and your kids on a whim and go on a week vacation with some asshole you barely knew? I was with Alice at the hospital when you sent me that picture. Did she manipulate you into sending that filth to me?"

"Nadav did it. I didn't know he was going to. I swear."

"Stop lying. Please. God, I beg you. Stop."

"Dan."

"When did 'us' stop being sacred, or maybe it never was?"

It was Ana's turn to start trembling. She had never seen him so calm during a conflict; it made her stomach twist.

"Alice is not the only one who is going to seek professional help, Ana. I've scheduled us for marriage-counseling. We're going, once I get back from reserve duty."

"But-"

"But what? You thought everything is cool over here?" He pointed at himself and back at her. "We're a happy couple? Family?"

"It's a process, Dan."

"Every time we sleep together I can't stop thinking about those assholes, and I can't stop wondering. Is she really here with me or is she with someone else?"

"You! Always you." She almost wailed.

"I can't even trust that, anymore. I so want to, Ana. I so want to; it hurts. And I'll do everything to -- I'll try everything, I'll take any help. But if I ever catch you lying to me again, then I can't anymore, I simply can't. You've got to grow up and stop blaming other people. I need to hear the truth from you, even if it hurts. I need to see you take responsibility. It wasn't Alice's fault. You did what you wanted, what Ana Jacobson wanted, not anyone else. And you did it when I was knocked out and bleeding, and you did it even though I begged you not to. That's something I'll always have to live with."




Wicked Ch. 09



First things first:

Sorry it took so long, life and [enter lie of some sort].

I'll use this stage to thank several people who read and did some editing, so I won't fall on my ass.

BGMISFUN and Cambria Rose. You guys totally rock.





Wicked Ch. 09



"Oh," Ethan moaned.

Ana took her hand away. "We'll be right back after these messages."

"Hey!"

"Kiss the Alpha female, dummy." She suddenly stood up. "What happened to the music? I wanna dance."

"We'll dance alright." Nadav tried to grab her but she took off on her long legs, laughing, and ran outside to the pool area. 

"What did you give her?" Ethan asked.

"Probably too much of it. Fuck! I've got a feeling of déjà vu." He turned to Ethan. "I'm too baked right now to get that hot roadrunner on my own. Wanna help me catch her?"

"Only if I get to do her first."

"Like fuck you are."

"Then let's share." Ethan assessed the other so-called Alpha in the room and felt a little like an Omega. 

"Fuck. Why not? But keep away from my junk. I ain't into that Bi horseshit."

"Fine."

"It's Nadav Fine; number one shooting guard in the league," Nadav growled. "And don't you forget it." He pulled down his trousers and pulled out his penis, which was the only other human made item, outside of the Great Wall of China, that could be observed from the moon. 

@@@@@@@

Ana's red flimsy dress lay like a battle casualty on the patio tiles. The owner of that dress was swinging on the swing that Dan hung last week from the pecan tree. Her eyes were closed and she was humming an Arabic tune.

"Habibi ya einee, Ya einee ya leilee." [Love, oh my eyes, my eyes, my nights]

Nadav had to stop for a moment and stare; not everyday you get to see a naked nymph on a swing. An epiphany. He walked slowly, his big feet made crunching sounds as he stepped over the leaves. Ana opened a single eye and watched him approach. She giggled. "Remember the game rules? You'll have to catch me first." 

The yard was lighted by a spotlight and colored lamps Ana had hung in advance. Her bronze skin gleamed, beckoning. She was one of the few women on planet earth who could cause Nadav's soldier to stand at attention just by taking off her dress. 

"Who's your man?"

"Dan."

"Wha'? That wimp? Who gives you mind blowing orgasms?"

"That would be Sean."

"Who?"

"He's blond, and tall, and he can –" Ana stood up on the swing and smiled. "You'll never catch me."

"Been there, done that."

"Been where?" Ana jumped off the swing and turned to run away from Nadav. She made four strides before she slammed into the broad torso of Ethan. They both fell to the soft clean grass with an 'oomph.' Ana landed on top of the tall bodybuilder. 

"Hey, you," he smiled.

"Let me go, you idiot."

"Christ, I don't think I ever wanted a woman more." 

She felt him hard between her legs and pinched his buttock. "Let go of me."

"Want me to go back to Danielle?"

She licked his lips.

Ethan kissed her mouth to mouth, his tongue exploring, touching and going. Ana moaned. She felt him pressing and felt her flower opening to accommodate his girth. 

"You're big," She whispered. 

"God, you feel so great," He pressed upward, skewering her. 

Ana moaned as her pussy stretched. She felt Nadav's big hands on her back and panicked. She tried to get up but he pushed her shoulders down, hard, impaling her, balls deep, on Ethan's cock. Her heart started thumping hard, but she could feel her juices flowing from the brutality of the act. Dan was always so gentle; she loved it when Nadav took charge. 

"Push that Bambi," Ethan huffed. 

Nadav gave her back a kiss, and took a bite from the curve of her swan neck. 

"Hey, wait for your turn."

Ana felt something pressing her anus and then cold substance squirted inside. 

"Hey."

Nadav started rubbing her ass cheeks and she felt his finger pushing her pink ring, then the barrier opened and it burrowed inside her. She clenched in fear. 

"Shhhh baby, relax."

"It's cold."

"I've got something to warm you up." His finger boldly wiggled inside her ass. "Nice?"

Ana moaned. Ethan impaled her with a grunt. His hands squeezed her tits. Nadav inserted a second finger inside her pink entrance. She felt her back opening stretch as it easily slide in. She was no longer the back door virgin from a couple of months back.

"Oh, God." 

The fingers went out leaving emptiness. She pressed her buttocks back against Nadav, squeezing his cock between her ass cleft and his lower belly. Nadav's rod was searing hot against her anus. Its firmness intoxicated her. She clenched her strong thighs around Ethan and moaned. 

Nadav placed his big palm on Toby, the Ass Puss tattoo, and spread her ass cheeks. Her starfish blinked at him, moist with blue jell, and still not completely shut after the finger invasion. 

She suddenly remembered her conversation with Alice in the gym a few months back, when Alice told her about her first threesome experience. It was the talk that opened the Pandora box. It happened in another lifetime. 

She clenched in fear.

"Don't do that. Relax, deep breaths."

The bulbous head touched her starfish and stretched her. Ana's anus fought back. "Ahhh. Ahhh. Ahhh. Ahhh." 

"Breathe slowly!"

First the tip went past the barrier and then the entire crown of his cock made its way past the threshold of her ass. Then it went almost like a wine cork past the outer rim and the head blossomed inside her tunnel. 

Ana uttered a deep guttural "uuunnnnnn" and pushed back against Nadav's unrelenting cock. Ethan thrust from below. His tool was strumming her strings and Nadav's rocket was banging on the nerves in her back tunnel. She was close to exploding. 

"Breathe slowly, girl. Just breathe slowly."

Ana screamed as the orgasm hit. Her fists clenched and unclenched, her vagina muscles closed around Ethan's cock and her anal muscles pushed in vain attempt to expel the intruder. Someone detonated an A-Bomb inside her head and she screamed her pleasure.

"Hold her," Nadav puffed. "She's strong, Jesus. She's breaking my dick. This is soo awesome, that Alpha bitch is from outer space." 

@@@@@@@

There were several cars in their usually empty street that Dan didn't recognize. It was odd because his only neighbor, Tamar Schwartz, had flown to the USA, visiting her grandchildren. As Mahmud parked the truck, he saw a couple entering a fancy BMW; the man staggered and the woman laughed too loud. 

"Where's the party?" Mahmud asked.

Dan shrugged and strapped his rifle on. First thing you learn in the Army is 'never leave your weapon anywhere unless you want a vacation to military jail.' He offered Alice a hand, helping her off the cabin, but she didn't take it. She struggled with the height then leaned on the truck for support. She looked vulnerable under the cold lamplight, almost wispy. Still unearthly beautiful. 

"You okay, Alice?"

"Yeah."

"Alice."

"Just a little dizzy."

"Fuck that." His heart suddenly overflowed and he gave her a bear hug. "I can only guess what you're going through," he said in a low voice, "but whatever you choose I'll support you a hundred percent. Okay? I never abandoned a friend in trouble and I'm not going to start now, no matter what Aviva said. Okay?"

Alice didn't answer; she wanted to push him away because that was the right thing to do, but his arms around her felt too good, that she simply gave in. She leaned her forehead on his broad chest and for a few seconds in eternity, pretended that she was his girl and he was in love with her and not with someone else. 

@@@@@@@

"Did your wife throw a party?" Mahmoud asked.

"I..." The living room had piles of beer cans and tall wine glass. Candles were the only illumination. "I don't..." A deflated sex doll sat on the sofa and stared at him, mouth agape. Maybe a bunch of high school delinquents decided to break in and have a party? What the hell? He checked the entrance door where a carved sign said "Here, having fun: Dan, Ana, Tom, and Liana Jacobson." Yep, home bitter sweet home. "Ana?" No answer came. 

"What's going on in here?" Alice said.

"I... Ana?" He shouted. He punched the living-room lights switch. Someone definitely had something in here. 

"Maybe she's upstairs," Alice said.

More signs of a party littered the stairway. The second floor looked deserted. In Liana's room the table-lamp was on and someone was sleeping on the bed. 

"Ana?" Dan opened the door and switched on the lights. 

A black haired naked Danielle blinked like an owl on the bed. Mahmud opened his eyes to a dinner plate size; it was his first real naked woman, ever. 

"Who are you?"

Danielle yawned and smiled. "You're Dan, right? She told me you were hot. You look like a young Bruce Willis."

"Who told you what?"

"Lin."

"Who the fuck is Lin?"

"Lin Young."

"Ana's colleague?"

"Come here, Bruce Willis."

"What?"

"You know, the people outside this house are zombies, the walking dead."

"Are you stoned?"

"A little," She giggled. "And super horny. Come here." 

"Lady, I don't know who you are, but if you're not getting out of my kid's bed in two seconds I'm calling the cops. What the fuck is going on Alice, this is-?" Alice was looking out of Liana's window at the backyard. She paled, turned to him, tried to say something, and then turned back to the window. 

"What?" Dan said.

"Dan, don't."

It was too late. It took him two seconds to register what he was seeing under the bright lights, and when he did his heart shuttered to a million tiny betrayals. All the little lies and the big lies crumbled. All the ugly suspicions people like him pretend to hide under their subconscious; everything shattered in one pure instance of searing catharsis. 

He closed his eyes, opened them, it was still there.

Ana, his beautiful Ana, the love of his life. Ana, who could make him laugh at his darkest moments. Ana who could make him drown. Ana the lawyer, the lover, the mother, the wife, and the whore.

She was achingly beautiful, painted by passion. Crazy for the man she was riding and the one who was riding her. As he watched he saw her exploding, sinking her nails in the stranger penetrating her. Nadav pulled her red silky hair violently back, the same hair that Dan so loved to stroke gently. 

"Ana."

Nadav Fine hammered her ass in long strokes and kept pulling her hair, like a rider riding pulling on the reins. She didn't slap his hand away. She turned her head and kissed him so gently, it was even more gut wrenching than the animalistic mating. 

"Ana," Dan croaked.

Nadav Fine thrust hard and Ana arched her back, eyes closed. Dan tried to remember if he ever saw her more consumed by lust. Her head nodded to the left and right. The man underneath her shouted something. He was climaxing. Ana opened her eyes and French kissed him. 

Who the hell is this stranger? 

Nadav Fine took her off the other guy and sat down impaling her on his immense tool. Ana wrapped her long legs and arms around his tall body. She sucked on his nipple like a toddler, while he was penetrating her. 

"Ana."

Her head went back and she was having another orgasm. 

"Dan, don't." Alice's palm on his shoulder broke the spell. He forced her hand off, none too gently. 

Mahmud blocked the room's entrance. "Man, stop for a second." 

The young Arab's voice sounded to Dan like it was coming from the end of long tunnel. Mahmoud used to talk with his teeth half clenched to hide the broken upper teeth. Now it seemed to Dan as if he was leering. Everyone was. Just like Alice had said, everyone was laughing behind his back; he was the only one without a clue. 

"Dan, wait, please," Alice said.

Ana sat there at the top of the pile, laughing her ass out. Little cuckold wimp. 

"Don't do anything stupid, boss."

The rifle butt went up in a flash and hit Mahmoud's jaw. The man collapsed on the floor, mouth bloody. One of Dan's keys was a master to the entire house inner rooms. He slammed the door behind him and locked Alice and a stunned Mahmoud inside. 

Alice banged on the door from within, shouting something. Dan shut her off. She knew about this, everyone knew, everyone was laughing. 

Funny little cuckold, the butt of so many jokes.

On the stairwell between the two floors, hung a tall photo of him and Ana on their wedding day. Dan always thought it was narcissistically obnoxious to hang your own image on the wall, but it was the custom in Ana's family. 

He was standing behind her, hugging her waist in that photo. She looked stunning in her white wedding dress, and he looked so happy. Both were young and beautiful, starting at the horizon of their bright future together. It was taken in midday noon sun on the Mediterranean beach, but the photographer added a sunset filter for the dramatic effect. Phony picture. Just like their marriage. The rifle butt went up and the picture glass shuttered. Dan ripped the photo off the frame and then ripped it in half. 

The M-16 went 'click' as he pushed the magazine into the feed. 

@@@@@@@

The door stood ajar, which was a bit unnerving. Sean let himself in. It was not like it was the first apartment he went in uninvited. "Yo, Ana, you there?" Nothing. He figured he should dump the mobile on the table and take an azimuth towards the door. Maybe go out tonight; plenty of non-married chicks out there who would be willing to help him forget. He could tell Ana on the phone that their days as a couple, are like the Israeli Palestinian Peace-Process, dead. 

Someone left a six-pack on the table, and never a man to waste an opportunity, he helped himself with one. He was opening a second when he saw Dan coming down the stairs, rifle at ready. Fourteen years have passed since Jerusalem's Grace juvie, but Sean recognized him immediately. 

"Who the fuck are you?" Dan growled. 

"I'm Sean, Dan, you probably don't remember me, I-"

"What the fuck are you doing in my house?"

Sean raised his hand, slowly; palm extended in what he hoped was a calming gesture. "I'm just leaving."

"Sit down!" 

"Chill, man."

Dan cocked the M-16 and pushed the safety. "Sit down!"

"Okay, okay." Sean served in the Givati Samson Foxes reconnaissance in the IDF. He experienced situations where he found himself at the wrong end of a rifle; but never at such a personal range. He sat down near the table, biding his time. "Look, Dan-"

"Shut the fuck up!"

He wasn't a coward, but dying like that seemed particularly stupid. "What are you going to do?" His voice was unreasonably calm. 

"What are you doing with my wife's Galaxy?"

"It's your wife's?"

"That's her leather case with a photo of my kids you're holding."

"I didn't steal it."

"Did you fuck her too, Sean, like the assholes outside?"

"Look, Dan, chill-"

Dan raised the rifle; looking at Sean through the sights. 

"Okay, Okay." Think fast; the moment he's distracted then you jump. "Look, Dan, I didn't know-"

"Didn't know, eh?"

"You're making a huge mistake. What are you going to do, shoot me? Shoot her? Shoot everyone else in this house?"

"Why not? I think it's my turn to screw things around."

Think fast, talk to his reason, he's a reasonable man. "You know, I remember one time in Jerusalem's Grace when you talked about duty."

"What the fuck are you on about, who are you?"

"You said a real man always puts duty first. There are people who still rely on you, Tom and Liana, right?"

Dan snarled like a wounded bear in a trap. "If you'll say my kids' names again, I'm gonna pop one in your skull."

"They need a father, not someone who's in jail or dead." 

"So how was it, eh? Fucking another man's wife? She always had a thing for blond men. Give me one good reason for not-" Dan's finger on the trigger trembled.

Think fast. Ana said she sent her kids to hers. Sean touched the mobile's contacts, there were only two Jacobsons. Sean punched the first name and prayed.

"Hello? Mommy?" Came Lian's cheerful voice from the other end. "Is that you? Are you in Litaly?"

"Give me that phone." Dan snarled.

"Hello?"

"Sweetie?"

"Daddy, hey Daddy, are you and Mom in Litaly already?" 

"It's Italy, not Litaly, sweetie," Dan's voice broke. 

"Can you bring me a turtle from Litaly?"

"I don't-"

"Granddad's neighbor, Mr. Kashtan, has a turtle; its name is Mordi the Turtle. Granddad took me to play with it today, and I gave Mordi lettuce and carrots. Can you bring me a turtle from Litaly?"

"I don't know if they have turtles."

"You're funny, Daddy, there are turtles everywhere." 

"Maybe when I get back we can go to the fields near the iris reservation, we'll find you a nice turtle; an Israeli turtle."

"When are you and mom coming back from Litaly? I miss you." 

Dan felt his aching heart stretching even more. What the hell was he doing? There were people who relied on him, how could he be so selfish? 

"Soon, honey, I'm coming soon."

"Will you take me to find a turtle?"

"I promise, Liana, I promise. You know I love you so much."

"I love you too, Daddy." 

Dan hung up the phone; he felt he couldn't talk another word without bursting in tears. The red haze lifted and he sat down trembling near Sean. 

The door upstairs cracked and broke; it probably gave way to the little tank of a man that was Mahmoud. Alice came running down the stairs. 

"Dan!"

"Dan!" Ana stood on their backyard opening. She had an open silk gown on; an angry red mark stood ashamed on one her naked tits. Nadav Fine's tall silhouette towered behind her; he was glistening from the effort. "Dan?" She said in a low voice, the color draining from her face. "What are you doing here?"

"I live here, remember?"

Ana nodded, too numb to say anything. 

"Dan, Dan the clown," Nadav Fine in all his naked glory took a step forward. "Wondered when you were gonna show up. Nice house."

Dan glared at him. 

Sean placed his hand on the rifle. 

"Any new jokes, man?" 

"Just get the fuck out of my house," Dan said. 

"No need to be rude."

Dan said nothing.

"Awesome party, I didn't have time to try the food, but I tried the hostess, she's – wow." Nadav slapped Ana's butt.

Dan just glared at him.

"I think I'm not full yet, maybe I'll take another bite, what do you say, Dan?" He fondled Ana's breast. 

Dan rubbed his eyes with his palm.

"You're not crying or anything like that, dude?"

"Just get the fuck off, you retard freak," Alice hissed.

"Alice? Alice White?" 

"Put on your trousers and get the fuck out of here or I swear I'll chop your dick off." 

Nadav put his clothes on, slowly, and took time buttoning his shirt. Everyone else in the room kept their stunned silence. "Ethan, you got to come here right now, you know who this is?" Nadav hollered, "That's Alice White, Ana's sister, the hot model. She's your sister, right?" 

Ana was still too numb to talk.

"Alice Free-Throw that's how we used to call her. You dunk one for free then you throw her to the next guy on your team." Nadav burst out laughing. "Wanna go for a ride in my BMW, I've got treats in the back seat? You know, for old times' sake?"

"Don't talk to me, don't touch me, don't even look at me," Alice hissed. 

"Don't be like that." Nadav grabbed her breast. Alice screamed and sank her nails in his hand, so he slapped her face, hard; which was almost the last mistake he ever made. 

He heard Dan growl and even managed to spin, only to catch the boxer's fist straight in the jaw. Two upper teeth, part of the smile that did toothpaste commercials, left the vicinity of Nadav's mouth and landed on the table. 

Nadav hollered his rage and raised his fists, but regular people, even large and athletic people, can hold their ground for a maximum of two seconds against professional heavy boxers. A massive uppercut caught him below his jaw and like a mighty oak, he went down. 

Dan grabbed his shirt before his head hit the wall. Punch, one of Nadav's lower teeth broke. 

"Don't ever," Punch, the straight nose caved in, "Come here again." Slam, another tooth left the mouth, "I'm gonna bury you," Bam, blood blossomed, "under the fucking tiles." Bam.




Wicked Ch. 09



Ana started screaming like a banshee. Sean grabbed Dan from behind and received a massive punch to the sternum, which made him fold. 

Ethan ran over to the table and picked up the rifle, aiming it towards the enraged man but before he could do any damage, Mahmoud slammed into him like a defensive tackle and they both hit the floor. 

Dan picked up Nadav by the scruff of his neck; the tall man rotated his hands in a feeble attempt to push him away. 

"Please," Nadav croaked. 

A small palm closed on Dan's fist that was ready to strike. From faraway, outside the cloud of rage, he heard Alice's gentle voice, "Please, you're killing him." He shook himself up, amazed, touched her tearful face and finally let go of the bloody basketball star. He looked around at his living room, and then back to the floor at Nadav who was blinking, eyes wide with panic. He took a final last long look at his crying wife, their eyes met, and Ana shuddered because of what she saw there. 

"Dan."

He turned around and started running, in two seconds he was out of the house. Alice ran after him crying his name, but she couldn't keep up on her damaged leg and she lost sight of him. 

Sean picked himself up and the rifle, from the floor, taking out the magazine and removing the bullet from the chamber in case anyone had another bright idea. He then checked Nadav, who was breathing hard on the floor. "Call an ambulance, Ana, now!" 

"Jesus, Sean, what am I going to do?"

He shook his head and laughed, then turned and started walking towards the door.

"Don't go, Sean, please."

He turned, "You know what I hate most about my brother? He's always so fucking right. Right about you, right about Dan, right about everything; I can't stand that. Have a nice life, Ana."

@@@@@@@@@

A week later.

At seven o'clock Dan watched, hidden, from the corner of the street, as Ana left the house. She wore her black, no-nonsense, lawyer suit, and still managed to look hot in it. He wasn't sure because he was too far off, but he thought he saw dark circles under her eyes. Before she entered the car she took her mobile from her purse and dialed. His mobile buzzed, she was calling him. He waited for the voicemail. 

"Dan, baby, it's me, for the millionth time. I know you're angry and I know I deserve everything you think I deserve, but please, we still have two kids," her voice broke and she started crying, "Dan, please pick up the phone, I'm begging."

She got into the car and rested her head on the wheel. For a second Dan wanted to go to her, to hug her and to tell her everything was going to be alright. He searched his heart and found only pity, which almost made him cry too.

He waited for her Mazda to disappear around the bend and entered the house. He pulled two large suitcases from the closet room and went to their bedroom where he started pulling shirts, pants, underwear, stuff that he'd need, laying them in no particular order on the floor. At first it was a fast process, undiscriminating, but as he dug more and more pieces of his life, he slowed down. Here was a tie Ana bought him when they were a month together and she wanted him representable to her cousin's wedding; the first tie he ever owned. Here was an ugly Eifel Tower alarm clock that never worked, but they kept it anyway because they bought it on their honeymoon in Paris. When he found in the album Ana helped Liana make for him, for last year's Family Day, he started to cry. The first page had a photo from a field trip they took to the Hermon Mount near the Syrian border. Dan was holding Liana in his arms while Tom tried to push his snow sledge between his legs. The next picture showed all three of them after Dan crashed to the snow, laughing hysterically. Ana took those pictures and lovingly arranged them in a small album that Liana decorated with a ton of butterflies and sunshine. He stood in the middle of the room, helpless; how can you put fifteen years inside a suitcase? 

"Dan?"

He turned around blinking, Alice stood on the doorstep.

"Oh my God, Dan, I saw your car around the corner." She ran over and hugged him. "Oh my God, oh my God, I thought I lost you. Where were you? Everyone is looking out for you?"

"I had to take a timeout."

"Everyone is searching for you. Your parents, your employer, the IDF, Mahmoud, the police, me." She kissed him gently on his cheek. "I thought I lost you."

"Nadav went to the police?"

"Hell no. I paid him a visit in the hospital and told him that if he files a complaint I'm telling the cops he attacked me in front of eye-witnesses, and that you protected me. They found drugs in his blood; the official story is that he was involved in a car crash." She kissed his neck. "He didn't go to the police, I did; I needed help finding you. I was worried sick." She kissed his ear, gently. "How could you?" 

"I stayed with Irit."

"I called her."

"I told her not to give me away; I really needed some time alone."

"Jesus!" She kissed his forehead, "I was so afraid I'd never see you again."

"Sorry."

"It's alright." She kissed his lips.

"Alice."

She kissed the bridge of his nose.

"Hey." His voice didn't carry alarm, only caring. "What are you doing?"

"I'm not giving a fuck anymore." She kissed his left eye. "That's what I'm doing."

"It's-" 

She kissed his lips to shut him up. "I don't care if Aviva says I should keep away. I thought I lost you and... Fuck that." She kissed his right eye.

He sighed. "It's not the time or place."

"It never is, never has been, never will be; I don't care anymore." 

"Alice, stop."

"Yeah, no." Her cherry red lips were a heartbeat from his. "You remember that time you gave me that bath?" She said in a low voice. "I'm going to kiss you again, only this time if you won't kiss me back I'm going to die right here on the spot. So if you want that on your conscience... Yeah." 

Her lips touched his and maybe Dan wasn't a lot of things, but he wasn't an asshole too. He opened his mouth, kissed her right back, and Alice sighed, a little relieved and a lot excited. She hugged his neck and didn't let go for a long while. Eyes closed. She explored his mouth with her tongue. When she felt his arms around her body, her heart jumped. 

"I want you." She breathed into his ear and took a step back. She unbuttoned his shirt, hands shaking with anxiety. 

Dan stood in the middle of the room, arms crossed, like a confused teenager. 

Alice kissed his neck and broad shoulders. She had dreamed about this moment for so long that she let herself get carried away by it. She licked his chest, then went south to his hard abs. She kissed and licked his bellybutton, cooing like a dove. She unbuttoned his pants, when she suddenly registered that she was dancing tango on her own.

"What's wrong?"

"Alice."

"Don't you want me?"

"It's nothing like that."

Alice stood up. She had a dark simple dress that emphasized her impossible mannequin body. She pulled it above her head, and opened her bra. When God made her, he was especially generous. She effortlessly carried the model heroine chic and the symmetric face of an angel. Her Moroccan bronze skin emphasized her huge emerald cat eyes and short blond hair. Soul friends turned worst enemies over her charms. Paparazzi used to hound her steps at the beach to get a photo of her in a bikini, and she was a fantasy for a generation of Israeli males. Yet Dan stood with his arms crossed and a face that she couldn't read.

She took three steps back and spread her arms. "Don't you think I'm beautiful?"

"Of course you are. You're the most beautiful woman I ever met."

Alice sighed. "You're such an idiot, Dan." 

"I'm sorry."

"Why the fuck are you so sorry all the time?"

"Sorry."

"You owe her nothing." 

"Alice."

"She wants other men, but I'm here and I want you, only you," she said and regretted it immediately because Dan's fist clenched. 

"Alice, I'm ... It's too soon for me."

"Is that really it, Dan?"

"What else?"

"When you look at me, what do you see?"

"What do I see?"

"Is it because I'm ..." Three months ago she had no problem calling spade a spade and herself a slut. In front of the only man she ever loved, she choked the word. " Is it because I'm ..."

"You're what?"

"The way I live my life, jumping from bed to bed."

"Don't talk like that." Dan hugged her, and it dawned on Alice that this might be all she'll ever get from him. Sympathy and empathy. She wanted to cry, or to break something. Then she decided that she'd take whatever he's willing to give, and to the seven hells with it. "I'm hurt," she whispered in his ear, "You're hurt. Together desperation is still desperation but it can be much more convenient. I want you, Dan." She pushed him towards the strange canopied bed, the one that replaced the bed that Dan made. "I'll take care of you, Dan, I promise." She kept saying his name because she wanted to make sure they are both real. She sat down on the bed and pulled his trousers down. He was hard. Her perfect body was still good for something.

She placed one hand on his cock and with the other she cupped his nuts. "Come here!" She growled. 

"Alice," He started laughing.

She tagged hard on his cock and Dan cried. "If the mountain is not coming to Muhammad, Alice is going to pull his nuts." 

Dan laughed and sat down beside her on the bed. "Hey." 

"Hey yourself." She kissed his mouth and her hand started rubbing his back. 

Dan caressed her breasts and she sighed, "Yeah, baby, that's the spirit." Her body responded and she felt its temperature rise. She straddled him, her knees supporting her body. 

"Tell me I'm beautiful."

"You're amazing, Alice."

"You know that's the first time I feel like the hunter, not the prey." She pulled his head hard to her breasts and Dan started sucking on her perfect round mounds. "Yessss." She ran her hands through his hair as he sucked, and she kept pulling him hard towards her, never giving him respite. "I didn't know what I was missing."

The room became heavy with his breathing and her soft moans. 

She felt that familiar tingling in her loins and she pulled his hand to her clit. He touched her lower wet lips and that sent her to an orgasmic shiver that shook her body from top to toe. She rested her head on his shoulder for a few seconds, then guided him inside her.

"Oh, Dan." Her senses went to overdrive. "I wanted you for such a long time." Her body moved like a wave, sensually. 

Dan placed his hand on her shaped ass and pulled her deep.

"Don't close your eyes. Look at me."

He laughed. "I always do that with eyes closed."

"Not with me. You don't." She lowered herself to him and gave his lips a bite. "I want to see those beautiful blue eyes looking back at me. Did anyone ever tell you they're your best feature?"

Up and down she went and Dan started massaging her clit.

"Yeah, baby, keep the... ohhh." Her breaths got deeper and more urgent as she felt her fantasy coming true. A second before her eyes rolled, she grabbed his head, "Ohhhh, you're such an idiot, Dan." Before he could tell her he already knew that, she attacked his lips and French kissed him. Her body arched as the orgasm hit, and she circled her arms around his head and kissed him almost brutally as wave after wave hit her. 

"Oh my God." She rolled off him and started laughing. "That was amazing."

"Yeah."

"Two. Perfect."

"Hey, what about me?"

"Hell if I know." 

"I didn't have one."

"Poor thing." 

"Come here, Alice."

"Nope, I'm good."

He rolled fast and grabbed her hips, turning her over on her stomach. 

Alice giggled, because she finally felt his need and that excited her. She made a mock attempt to scramble away and her heart made a jig when he grabbed her hips. "Oh, Dan." She held on the bedpost and wiggled her perfect buns toward him. 

Dan got to his knees behind Alice and spread her to get lined up with her opening. He rubbed the head of his rigged member up and down the slippery wet slit, scrapping it across the hard bump of her clit. 

"Dan." 

He penetrated, held still for a moment and enjoyed the feel of Alice totally engulfing him. The ripple and slide of the undulating muscles. He slowly, so very slowly, pulled out. When the head almost popped out, he reversed and just as slowly returned to the depths.

"Ohh. Faster." She pushed back against him. 

He pulled out a little faster, rotating his hips as Alice turned her head. Her lips were slightly open and she wetted them. Dan plunged hard and she moaned. With no pause this time, he bounced off Alice's ass and moved sharply to the rear. Topped out and slammed back to bottom. Grunt, jerk, gasp, he increased speed and force. The grunt got sharper and faster. The jerk and gasp got sharper and louder.

She could feel his balls slapping her body and felt his fingers on her clit. Her ass started to buck back to meet his thrusts. He increased speed to the max. The grunt became a growl and the gasp was now a growing moan. 

Alice started a series of "Oh, oh, oh, oh," as an orgasm hit her again. She arched her back and clutched the bedpost. "Ohhhhh." She rolled under him onto her back, and started laughing again.

"Wow, that was... Wow."

"What? Did you? Again?"

"Fastest gun in the Middle East."

"Great."

"Did you?"

"Almost, then you decided you're good."

"Sorry, baby, I'm so sensitive down there when I have an orgasm."

"And no one ever complained before?"

"It usually takes me much longer. Sorry." She rolled onto her side. "Let's start again, I'll think of unsexy things, promise." She lifted her leg and Dan spooned into her. 

"I still want you so much." She turned her head and hugged his neck, pulling him close. Their lips connected. They kept kissing slowly like newlyweds, as Dan slowly went in and out of her wet folds. Alice came once more before Dan managed, but she held fast onto him and didn't let go until she felt him spray his seed inside her. 

Desperation became more convenient and the two new lovers held onto each other. After making love, Alice White snuggled against Dan Jacobson in Ana's bed, and they fell asleep like little children.

@@@@@@@

Let's pretend we're orphans, cross over the fence, 

And sleep in the whispering weeds.

We shall sleep and wake up, wake up and sleep.

The house floats on the storm in an ocean so deep.

Reality we shall keep locked behind a door, it waits and it's an abyss.

And it's sneaking through the cracks in the night.

Tomorrow we'll see everything in the light. 

An Israeli song. 

@@@@@@@

Ana the shark became Ana the hare caught in the headlights of her own schemes. The hare tried to scramble, unseen, into her office, but Amiram already saw her and waved like a madman. 

Got to keep up the charade. She stared at her reflection in the window, combed a juvenile delinquent strand and stretched on her business smile. "Hey, boss."

"Hey, yourself." Amiram was all smiles. "How was Italy?" 

"Amazing." Just amazing. She called the day after the party to say she needed a day off, only to learn that everyone thought Dan surprised her and they flew together to a second honeymoon. 

"You look tired. Partied much? How do you feel?"

She felt like crying. 

"A romantic guy, your husband." 

"He's the best."

"Were you surprised? Nah, not a chance. Knowing you, you probably were on to him, but you acted the part for his sake."

"Oh, I was genuinely surprised."

"Great." 

"Yup."

"I want to see pictures later; but right now I really hope you've recharged your batteries in Florence. We're swamped and one man short. Did you hear about Lin?"

"Lin?" Ana felt the cold hand of the little woman's wrath on her spine. 

"She gave me a resignation letter on Monday." 

"Oh."

Amiram shook his head. "Yeah, things went a little crazy last week, and Nadav, " he shook his head again, "you know about his car accident?"

Ana nodded.

Amiram leaned over and whispered. "The stupid son of a bitch tried a cocktail of alcohol and drugs, and then crashed into a tree. I don't believe I'm saying this, but that's one client I'll be glad to see walk out the door and never return." 

"Same here."

"Are you okay, Ana?"

"Just a little tired." 

"I need you sharp for today's signing; Hapoel's legal department is famous for pulling last minute rabbits."

"Let them try." Ana pulled out an imaginary gun and shot two imaginary rabbits. 

"That's my shark lawyer. Now go kill them."

@@@@@@@

They say that the dog resembles its owner. Steven Gorlitzky, head of Hapoel's legal department, looked like the evil twin of Ziv Schwartz, Hapoel's manager and owner. Actually Ziv looked just as evil. They were short, bold, fat, moonfaced and instead of walking they had a tendency to ooze. 

"Hi, Ana," Ziv smiled, "how are you?" 

What are you so smug about, repulsive little rat? "Great, I'm great."

A few years back Ziv Schwartz moved in with his mom, Ana's neighbor, after his divorce, and Ana had the unpleasant opportunity to know him personally. It wasn't anything particular about the man, but every time they greeted each other on the street she had an urge to run home and scrub her body with bleach.

"And how is Dan doing?" Ziv winked.

The million dollar question; I wish I knew. "Dan is doing great. How's your mom?"

"She's in the States again visiting my sister; but you already know that, you're supposed to water her precious plants."

"And feed Zangwill," Ana said. 

"Do the world a favor and drown that little stinker."

"I'm telling your mom on you."

"Kidding, kidding; I totally love that cat, he's like the brother I never had." Ziv winked his version of conspiratorial which actually looked lewd. 

After the initial un-pleasantries they followed Amiram into the office's conference room. Several members of Hapoel Legal team were already seated around the long table. The IT technician was busy opening a video conference with the Israeli basketball association. Amiram always insisted that the conference room remained undecorated, Spartan, and he didn't allow refreshments served in it. He wanted no distractions during a meeting to keep them to a short minimum. 

Nadav Fine sat on the opposite side of the table. There was something new in his eyes, not the usual smugness. Life had finally served him lemons, big time. The basketball star's face were puffed and bandaged, and he had a cervical collar. When he saw Ziv, Steven and Ana, he snarled. It was a scary snarl because half his teeth were missing. He wouldn't be doing toothpaste commercials any time soon. 

"Okay," Amiram opened up, "we all know the drill; this should be brief."

"Let's just sign so we can be in time for lunch," Steven offered Ana a block of papers and tried to look charming, causing her a little nausea. "I heard about that new Italian down the street, everyone says it's out of this world."

"So are the prices." Ana started skimming through the pages but soon her face darkened. "Is this supposed to be a joke?"

"What?" Amiram said.

"It's not what we signed, not even close."

"What do you mean?"

"Look for yourself; it's the first draft, their first draft."

"What?"

"The same offer they had given us in May; their first offer. They didn't even bother to change the dates. This is bullshit." 

"Steven?" 

"Sorry about the short notice." If Steven could look more smug his face would have had exploded and all the cockroaches locked inside his skull would have been set free.

"I was warned by several good people that you guys play dirty, but this is ridiculous."

"What's going on?" Nadav squinted his bloodshot eyes.

"Your basketball team's legal department apparently wants us to drag them to court," Ana said, "where I'll personally make sure to rip each one of them a new one."




Wicked Ch. 09



"Okay, this is childish." Amiram stood up. "Care to explain, Steven?"

"I'm really sorry about the short notice, Amiram," the Hapoel lawyer looked anything but sorry, "we've just discovered that your client breached his Hapoel contract. In view of that, we feel that our initial offer is fair, not to say generous."

Ana laughed without mirth. "And how is the weather on your planet, Steven?"

Steven shot her a nasty smile.

Asshole. "What is the imaginary breach you came up with?"

"On June twelfth, Nadav Fine had a practice scheduled. However he called sick that day. We found out after an inquiry, that it wasn't the case; he lied."

Ana almost laughed in relief. She was scared that the breach had something to do with Dan beating Nadav to a red pulp, or worse, about the drugs that were found in his blood. If the Hapoel Team got their hands on the hospital report, Nadav could be in serious trouble. But this was ridiculous; Hapoel's solicitor was just playing games. Part of his job. "Are you for real, Steven? You're seriously considering raising that claim in court?"

"Sure."

"Because you're tired of being a lawyer and want to be a standup comedian?"

Steven's smile oozed from his lips as he pulled out a tablet from his case. "This film was taken at 3 AM from a security camera on the night before the practice. As you can see, your client looks anything but sick."

At first there was only a blurred picture and sound of some woman laughing.

"What's that?" Ana said.

"Give it a few seconds; I'll fast forward to the good part."

The woman in the film moaned. She was obviously naked, and there was a tall man stooping behind her.

Next, the woman turned her face to the camera, which focused to a clear, almost HD resolution, and Ana suddenly wished for an atomic war with Iran. A nuclear missile on Tel-Aviv would have probably been more merciful.

She was staring at her own face contorted in orgasm, almost three months ago in Mrs. Schwartz's Jacuzzi, the day before she flew to Crete. The camera changed its angle, focusing on movement. It made a nice close-up on Nadav's tool entering her bowels, doggy style. The huge cock popped out of her anus and Ana heard herself say, "Oh God, Nadav, put it back."

Nadav aligned the head with her opening. "Who's your daddy then?"

"Huh?"

"Me or your hubbie?""

"You're like a five-year-old in constant need of positive reinforcement."

"Me or Dan?"

Porn star Ana, in her debut film, turned and kissed the head of the giant cock. "Satisfied or do you want that in writing?"

Nadav plunged his massive tool into her bowels again and started pounding. The only sound coming from the tablet was the wet splotch as his cock went in and out Ana's anal tunnel.

"I don't know," Steven smile was triumphal, "doesn't look sick to me. I'd say healthy, even virile. What do you say Ziv?"

"That I'm sure glad I made my mom install security cameras last summer. You don't know what you're gonna catch. People watering plants, feeding the cat, having fun in the Jacuzzi, pretty amazing stuff. Looks like someone is ripping a new one to someone else." 

People started sniggering around the room.

On the tablet Ana moaned as she started climbing another peak.

"Stop it!" Amiram rose. "Stop this thing immediately!" He was pale with anger.

Steven touched the screen and the porn show ended with a delighted moan from the star actress. Everyone in the room started breathing again and all the eyes turned to the real life Ana.

"This is irrelevant and abusive," she shouted.

"I'm certain his wife's divorce councilor wouldn't think it's so irrelevant."

"Are you seriously trying to blackmail us, you, you slimeball?" Ana hissed. "You heard that, Amiram? Are you going to let them get away with it?"

"Of course, Nadav, this whole unpleasant nonsense can just go away." Steven made the tablet disappear back inside his suitcase, "Nobody outside this room needs to know." He pushed the agreement towards Nadav. "I mean, Ana has a point. Even if you breached the contract, I'm not sure we can prove it in a trial. It's better settled here than in court where everyone will have to see this."

The basketball player stared at the pile of papers as it was a black mamba snake about to strike.

"Don't be silly," Ana heard herself pleading, knowing she was too late. "He's bluffing. This is blackmail. They can't pull this off. We'll sue their ass."

Nadav picked up the agreement like a man under hypnosis.

"Nadav, stop!" 

"Shut up!" He suddenly screamed, making everyone in the room jump. "Shut the fuck up! If the press leeches get a hold of this, if my wife does, I'm ruined. You've ruined me. I wish I never laid eyes on you, you whore."

Ana opened her mouth, but nothing came out.

"Jesus Christ." Nadav sat back. He cleared his red eyes and everyone could see he was crying. "God almighty. What an idiot, what a fucking idiot. You fucked me real good. You're the worst fuck I ever had. I hope you just die." He turned to Steven, "Where do I fucking sign?"

@@@@@@@

No one talked to her as she left the conference room; no one even looked her in the face. Half an hour later Ana sat at her desk, staring into space. She tried to control the buzzing beehive inside her head, without success. Always on top, and a control freak, she watched helplessly as the train of her life was spinning fast off tracks.

She had worked half her life to build this career. It was her pride, her power, something she could always lean on when all else failed.

She wanted to curl into fetus form in some corner. She wanted to jump into the sea, to wash her shame, and hide under the waves for a million years. Most of all she wanted Dan; forgiving, loving Dan, who could always contain her frustrations, anger, and failings. She wanted to lay down her head on his huge chest, so he could play with her hair and tell her it's nothing and that everything is going to be alright.

She sat staring into space feeling small and very sorry.

An hour later, she still sat in the same position when Amiram entered her office, his face grave.

She didn't say anything as he placed her dismissal letter on her desk. There wasn't anything to say.

@@@@@@@

Alice wore a white dress decorated by little yellow corn ears with laughing human faces. She was happy that none of her friends in school could see her, because twelve year-old-girls didn't wear childish clothes with laughing corn faces; still, she loved that dress. She didn't fear her popularity status at school might suffer because she was always the prettiest girl around. However, sometimes she wished she wasn't that pretty. Maybe if she was ugly he would leave her alone. 

She walked a field of yellow chrysanthemums and the air was full with the smell of spring and promises. Yet her heart was heavy. He was coming. He was always coming.

A thunder boomed somewhere in the distance and a dark cloud swam over a mountaintop. She didn't look, but she knew the cloud was there. And he, he was always there. Nine steps from his room to hers. 

Boom. The first step fell heavy, just like the thunder; Alice started running, knowing it was futile. It was always futile.

Boom, another step, she wasn't in the field. She was in her bedroom, the walls decorated by Guns and Roses posters. She pulled the blanket over her head pretending it was a dark tunnel that could hide her. It never did.

Boom. She was in the field, the rain started falling, drenching her. Alice looked down to her dress; it had drops of blood on it.

Boom. Another heavy step. He was right outside her bedroom now. Ofek. She'll never call him dad; her tiny mutiny.

Boom. She was in the field and she reached the chasm. There was always a chasm, dark abyss smiling cruelly below, and a thin rope hanging across it. She spread her arms, gaining balance, and took a deep breath. The acrobat.

Boom. One leg following the other; don't fall.

Boom. She hated and feared him so much, that sometimes she felt like there was nothing left of her body except fear and hatred.

Boom. Please stay away this time; please stay away.

Boom. The door to her bedroom opened and Alice lost her balance on the rope, falling, flailing and screaming into the abyss below. She knew she would fall. She always did in that dream, over and over every night, caught in a cruel endless loop. 

Suddenly the wind whistle stopped. It was inconceivable, that was not how the dream worked. It took her forever to register that she was no longer falling. For the first time in twenty five years the dream changed. A strong arm grabbed her hand, and lifted her to solid ground.

"Dan?"

"Hey."

"What the hell are you doing in my dream?"

"I thought you needed a hand."

"I don't want your help and I definitely don't want your condescending pity."

"So what do you want from me?"

She felt like slapping him. Why can't he get it? "Who said I want anything?" 

"I'm here. It's your dream. You must want something from me."

"Why do I always have to spell out everything for- You're such an idiot, Dan."

"I know."

She wanted to tell him that every time she said that what she actually meant was 'I love you,' but then she woke up. 

Dan was breathing heavily, face contorted in effort or sadness. Probably battling his personal demons. She rested her head on his chest and kissed him lightly. It felt really nice. Safe and quiet, solid. It felt so nice she pinched herself twice, just to make sure. 

Dan moved his head in a dream, and whispered "Ana" once. It stung like hell so she kissed his lips, hard. 

He opened his eyes and stared at her, eyes wide. 

"Yes, you're in bed, I'm in the same bed, and yes, we're naked."

He caressed her back and she made a conscious effort not to purr, but then he suddenly sat up. "Jesus, what time is it?"

"Huh?"

"I don't want to be here when she ... you know. I'm not ready to meet her yet."

She nibbled his neck. "Still early morning." 

Dan breathed out in relief. 

"We have plenty of time to ..." She gently touched his cock.

"Oh."

She trailed little kisses from his chest down to his stomach.

"Alice."

"Sweetie?"

"Yeah, can I...? Can I ask you something?"

"You need an assertiveness course, big boy." 

"How was I? When we, I mean ... Like on a scale of one to ten. Like ... Yeah. How was I?"

"Are you like six years old?"

"Sorry."

"Who asks a stupid question like that?"

"The guy who is so good at sex his wife had to find strangers to compensate for what she wasn't getting at home."

"Ouch."

"And add some."

She started kissing the left side of his chest above his big heart, wishing there was a real way she could take away his heartaches. 

"I always thought sex was just it, sex. You know, Ana was my second girlfriend, I never really... It's stupid. I did a lot of soul searching last week. One of the many things I've decided that I want to change is this."

Alice took a mock bite of his nipple and he pushed her back. "I'm serious, Alice, I'll probably never be Nadav Fine."

"Thank God."

"I mean in bed."

"Thank God."

"I can try being more like him."

"A self-centered prick? Yeah, that will get you far. You're an idiot."

"But I'm also a top student, and I know once I set my mind I can learn and improve any skill. I know I can."

"Like Obama?"

"Can you be less supportive?"

"What do you want me to do? Fill a feedback form? Dork."

He lay back and crossed his hands behind his head. "You don't have to be so cruel all the time, you know; take a break."

Alice sighed. "Alright."

"Like, well, for instance, ummm, sex position wise."

"Which one?"

"Is there any one you specifically prefer?"

Alice grabbed his palm and pulled it down between her legs. She was wet and wanted him to know that. "Of course there is."

"Well?"

"Hmmm... Nadav Fine lying on the floor and you pounding his face was kind of a sexy position. Can you do that again?"

"Really?"

"Dan, just relax. Do you seriously think I faked four orgasms? Jesus, don't give me that insulted puppy frown. Okay already, dork. Ask away."

"So what's your favorite sex position? Is it like doggy or spooning, maybe cowgirl?" 

"Maybe, maybe, and maybe."

"Maybe yes?"

"And maybe no. It's a fifty percent chance."

"Come on."

"You said you're a top student; prove it. Make a field research." She pulled off the blanket and pointed at her magnificent naked body so there wouldn't be any uncertainties as to the location of the research site.

"There are hundreds of sex positions out there."

"Thousands. I'm not going anywhere."

"How will I know which one is your favorite?"

"Oh, you will, I'm vocal. This weird bed might actually help." 

"It's a sex bed. Ana bought it three months ago; I don't even want to imagine what she planned doing with it."

"Maybe this?" Alice jumped up and grabbed the canopy poles. "Get up!"

Dan did as he was told and Alice raised her lower body and grabbed his torso with her long legs. Laughing, she lowered herself down on his cock and sighed in pleasure when he entered her. She let go of the canopy poles and hugged his neck. Their lips met and she gave a relieved, happy laugh. 

"What's so funny?" 

"I don't know; the world is a funny place." 

They sat down on the bed, face to face, her legs still wrapped around him. She kissed him long and hard, and Dan felt that maybe she was right. "I want you." He whispered and she gave herself willingly and completely.

@@@@@@@

They were totally immersed with each other, oblivious to the fact that they had an audience. Ana, who had to leave work early and permanently, watched them making love on the bed. They looked incredible together, almost glowing. 

She stood silent at the doorstep of her bedroom. She tried to breathe but it felt like someone vacuumed all the oxygen. She saw it coming way before Alice even did. She read it in the way she looked at him. At some point she knew it for certain, but she was just as certain that Dan would never betray her.

"Nice." She suddenly said. "I was certain something horrible happened to you and that's why you don't answer my calls. I cried all week, Dan."

"Jesus." Dan stopped moving on the bed. 

"And hello to you too, beloved husband. So there's nothing going on behind my back between you and my sister, eh?" 

"Ana, look-" Alice started.

"Shut up! I wasn't talking to you. I don't want to talk to you, or hear what you have to say, or hear about you, or to see you ever again. Get it?" 

Alice nodded and picked up her dress from the floor. 

Dan started dressing. "Nothing happened between us until today." 

"Sure."

"I don't care if you don't believe me." 

"This is payback, right?"

"You lost your privileges for asking me these sorts of questions."

"Don't tell me you think she's your girlfriend now." 

"Again, none of your business."

"And you'll just ride hand in hand with her into the sunset? That creature over there is Alice White, Dan. Ninety percent of Tel Aviv's males had been her boyfriends for a night."

"You're losing fast the last shreds of respect I still had for you."

"She can't keep her legs closed, Dan. She'll screw behind your back left and right."

"Have you looked in a mirror lately?"

"So payback. That what it is; petty revenge."

Dan shook his head, and started shoving the little piles he made into the suitcase. 

"What do you think you're doing?"

"What does it look like?"

"So that's it?"

"What did you expect?" 

"You know, I did burn the contract, but it was only a copy. I still have the original in a safe at the office. If you go out that door, you're going with nothing. No house, no savings, no nothing. You're 38, Dan; do you really want to start from scratch?"

"So the open marriage contract still exists."

"I had to protect myself."

He shrugged. "Can't say I'm really surprised, you know. I'm done being surprised by you."

"I'll fight you for the kids. I'll make sure you never get to see them."

"You'll stoop that low." He shook his head. "I believe you. Doesn't matter, you'll lose, Ana. One good thing that came out of this is that you made me find strength in myself that I never imagined I had. Whatever doesn't kill you ..." He gave a short bitter laugh, and she saw that his nonchalant apathy was only a façade. She recognized the fire behind his eyes and shuddered, but it also ignited a glimmer of hope. He still harbored deep feelings for her. She changed her voice, trying tenderness. "It doesn't have to be like that, you know." 

"What do you suggest?"

"Stay."

"Like a good puppy?"

"Like my husband."

"And you'll feed me a bone from time to time while you'll be collecting boners from Sean, Nadav, Tom, Dick, and Harry."

"I'm done with that, Dan."

"I'm done believing you."

"If you'll stay -. Stop packing and look me in the eye for fuck sake. I'm your wife." She closed the suitcase, but Dan simply opened the other one and continued packing. "Right now it might seem like the hardest thing in the world, but we're bigger than this." 

"Sure."

"Dan, please."

Dan continued packing.

"You want me to beg? Is that what it is? You want to see me down on my knees? I'll do that if that's what it takes."

"I don't want you to beg." Dan continued packing. 

"What then? What do you want me to do?"

"I don't want you to do anything." 

"Stop this passive aggressive shit for a second. Talk to me." 

"What do you want me to say?"

"Anything. Call me a slut, a whore; tell me how much you hate me right now."

"I don't."

"Sure you are, please, just please-"

"I'm not mad at you, Ana, I'm done with that too. If you want my forgiveness, you can have it, for what it's worth."

"What?"

"I'm not going to spend the rest of my life being bitter and angry. I forgive you."

"Then stay."

Dan sighed and continued packing.

She felt the ground opening up to a dark pit beneath her feet. "I love you so much, Dan. I never stopped loving you. That must count for something. I never wanted to hurt you. You don't know all the facts. Lin Young, you remember that bitch, she blackmailed me. I had to do what you saw me do to save my career."

"Sure."

"I'll prove it to you. I'll show you what I did."

"Did you?"

"What?"

"Save your career." 

"You earn half as what you once did and we have a huge hole in our account because of the year you stayed home."

"You make it sound altruistic." 

"I had to do this for us."

"There is no 'us' anymore, Ana."

"Please, stay, at least another day, a week; just to make sure you're making the right choice. I'll do anything." 

"I can't."

"Of course you can. We'll go to counselling like you wanted, we'll forgive and grow. We have a family, Dan. You can't give up on us like that."

"I'm sorry. It's broken."

"We can fix it."

He shook his head and she realized what she thought was anger was actually a deep well of sorrow. He zipped the suitcase and turned to go. On the doorstep of their room he turned for the last time and she saw the tears in his eyes. "I'm so sorry, Ana. There's nothing to fix. I don't love you anymore."

@@@@@@@@ 

Epilogue 1

Once upon a time there was a red haired princess, and she grew up in the house with some fucked up people. And they made her heart black or maybe just selfish, but perhaps they're altogether two sides of the same coin. And she learned to conceal her true self behind society expectations such as a loving wife and a career woman, until she couldn't anymore. Now she lived in a big house, like a princess from a fairytale. A big empty house. Sometimes she would scream just to make sure she was still a real person. 

Ana stumbled a little on her way to her car, she tried to insert her car keys to the keyhole and fumbled the attempt miserably. 




Wicked Ch. 09



Tamar Schwartz, her neighbor, who was watering her plants outside, watched her with a smile that was half contempt, half pity. "Good evening, dear. Started early, I see."

"Good evening my ass. How was your trip to the USA? I hope none of your grandchildren caught a brain tumor or drowned."

"No, they're fine, dear."

"You can shove it up your ass."

"Thank you, dear."

"You know, you didn't have to give the security tapes to your son. So Hapoel would have been a little poorer, they could have handled it. But nooo! You had to ruin my career and my life." 

"I thought you were doing a great job of that yourself, dear."

"And you think you know somebody. I always thought you were a gentle caring old woman."

"I always thought you were a role model wife." Tamar Schwartz gave her a nasty wink.

Fuck that. Ana snarled and tried inserting the keys into the keyhole again. She'd hit the new pub in Tel-Aviv; there were bound to be hot studs just waiting for action. She won't go to sleep alone in that big house. "You know what?"

"What, dear?"

"Fuck you and your smelly cat. I'm bigger than you and your pervert son. I'm bigger than any of this. I'm bigger than Amiram and the stupid Bar Association. I'll make things go back to how they were. You'll see. You'll all see. I'll have Dan crawling back to me and then I'll make you pay, everyone will pay. You know, I didn't have to fly to Crete with Nadav. I can just whistle and Crete will come over the Mediterranean to me." 

"Then whistle away, dear."

Ana whistled. Crete didn't come.

Epilogue 2

Once upon a time there was a golden haired princess, and she grew up in the house with some fucked up people. And they didn't make her heart black or selfish, but not for lack of trying. And she learned to conceal her true self behind the façade of a hedonistic shallow slut, until she couldn't anymore. Now she lived on hope that was more brittle than fairy wings. 

She sat in a restaurant on JFK airport, sipping latte, wishing she had the power to make the clock tick faster. In sixteen hours she's going to see him. 

"Earth to Alice."

"Sorry, what did you say?"

"I was reading you the review in the New York Times," Irit, who once was a hooker in Tel Aviv and now an aspiring artist in the Big Apple, picked up her tablet, "Listen to this: Irit Adams, the new kid on the block, "Tel Aviv Contrasts" in the Morgan Library & Museum is a gimmicky exhibition. That might sound bad, but it's not. Some gimmicks are better than others." She stopped reading. "Can you believe it? Fucking Ken Johnson." 

"Yeah, it's a positive vibe."

"Positive? He's gushing. Shit, I wish you could stay longer, Alice, just till after the weekend."

"You don't need me to hold your hand anymore." 

"Still, what if nobody comes on Saturday?" Irit made a half sour half cute face which emphasized her freckles. 

"There's enough buzz around you to make all the wannabes and the had-been and the never-would-have-been crawl out of their decorated lairs. You're a success story, baby; live the dream."

"I am." Irit tried to look modest and failed utterly. "Yoni gave me an invitation to this weekend party. The party with the capital T. They say Woody Allen is gonna be there and play the sax. Woody fucking Allen."

"You're way too old for him, sweetie." 

"You're saying this as my agent or as my friend?"

"Both. Never let it go to your head. This business is as cruel as it gets. On your way down, suddenly, all those gushing people," Alice signaled a quotation mark, "Suddenly forget your number. Believe me, been there. What's that?"

The waitress came over, smiling, holding a tray with two tall cocktails. "From the two gentlemen near the bar." She handed Irit a note. 

"Get this, Alice. 'To the two exotically stunning women sitting by the window.' Wow! Exotically stunning? I think he's talking about you, Alice." Irit sniffed. "My buddy and I would consider ourselves the luckiest guys in New York, if you would share a drink with us." 

"Give me that," Alice grabbed the note. She flipped it over and started scribbling on the other side. "Dear old farts, sitting near the bar. I don't know which one is more hilarious. Believing that your ten-dollar investment in a tall glass would cause me to ovulate and want to make children with you, or your ridiculous comb over. I hope you don't take our premature breakup to heart, but as they say in these situations, it's not you, it's me. I hate stupid ugly people." 

"The tall one is rather cute," Irit said. "Hey, what are you doing?" She said, because Alice took the note, ripped it in half and dumped it discreetly in her purse.

"Just thank them for us," she said to the waitress, "but tell them we're both happily married." She turned back to Irit. "I promised Dan I'll try to be nicer to people; I'm half way there." 

"Yeah, I've been dying to ask, what is it between you two? You're a couple?"

"Why'd you ask?"

"It's not a complex question, Alice."

"We're just friends," Alice shrugged and tried hard to look nonchalant, "with benefits. He's busy right now, building his life back up, so ... yeah. It's hard on everyone, especially on Liana and Tom."

"It's surprising that he got full custody, I mean, with his wife being a lawyer and all that."

"Her license was revoked." Plus I convinced the judge that letting the kids stay in the vicinity of my pedophile dad is a bad choice. 

"Just a sec." Irit picked up her vibrating phone. "Hi, yourself. We should have talked about winning the lottery, me and Alice, we were just talking about you, sweetie."

"It's Dan?" Alice face darkened. "Why the hell is he calling you?"

"Maybe because we're good friends, and he saw the article in the Times. Yeah, Dan, I'm back with you. Yeah I know. Isn't it amazing? You should check the Daily News photography section. Yeah, she's here. We're at the airport. He wants to talk with you."

Alice grabbed the phone and tried to rearrange her breath. "Hey, sweetie. Yep. I'm landing in fifteen hours. Great. No, I'll come over to the shelter. No, I won't be tired, I'll sleep on the flight. No, you don't have to pick me up from the airport, I'll take a cab. It's okay. Really, Dan, it's okay. I'll see ya. Bye." 

"What the hell was that?" Irit said.

"What?" 

"One second I was talking to Alice White, toughest bitch in the Middle East, then he calls and you turn into this fluffy marshmallow." 

"So?"

"So friends with benefits, my ass. You're totally in love with him."

"Fuck, no!"

"He's a real catch, you know. So when I'm next month in Israel, is it okay if I'll ask him out?"

"Is it okay if I run you over with a Jeep?" 

"He doesn't know, does he?"

"And if you'll ever say anything to him, I'll pull out your liver and let you watch while I eat it." Alice tried to put on a happy face but her lower lip trembled. 

"That's childish. Just tell him how you feel, Alice."

"Yeah, no, he's not so much with the talking about his feelings and such, and I'm not so much with the balls to ask him complex questions."

"What are you so scared of?"

"That I'll tell him, and he'll mumble something about how it's not the right time, that he's emotionally still struggling and I'll die on the spot when he does. Or worse, he'll say something stupid like I love you too, because the fucking Care Bear wouldn't want to hurt my feelings. He still whispers her name in his sleep, Irit." 

"Ouch."

"Yeah, ouch, every time he does I cry myself to sleep. So I'm better off in limbo; at least I have the benefit of a doubt." 

@@@@@@@

Sixteen hours later. The Shelter for Youth at Risk.

"But why do we have to hold hands all the time?" Dan asked.

"You have a problem with that, buster?"

"Feels a bit teenagerish."

"Aviva told me I should try all sorts of new things." Alice clasped his hand tighter. "I skipped the part in life when couples walk hand in hand, and anyway it feels nice. If you have a problem with that, you can bite me."

"Yeah, I'm too scared of you to do that. Hey! Aviv!" He shouted at two boys on the football field that were warming up towards murder. The tall one took a step back and gave the ball to the other guy.

"Just a misunderstanding, Teach." 

"Seen that?" Dan beamed to Alice. "A month ago he would have gone kamikaze on the other guy. Instead he defused the situation; that's what I call a triumph. "

"Yeah, because you were here. He's just afraid of you."

"Aviv? He used to stand up to his dad, every night; so the drunken violent asshole would leave his mom alone. He's seen jail from the wrong side, twice. That kid ain't afraid of nothing and no one. He did it because he didn't want to disappoint me." 

"That's your big victory?"

"You can't fix a lifetime of abuse in a day. Baby steps, Alice."

"Tell me about it."

He gave her a hug instead, and Alice decided that convenient desperation wasn't enough. 

"Let's go back to the dormitories." He started walking and she followed. "I need to ask you something. Your apartment, I think-" 

"I love you," she cut him in mid-sentence.

"I know."

"I said I love you."

"I know you do."

"Since when?"

"Since before Ilan's wedding, maybe longer. I'm not really stupid, Alice." 

"And?"

"Works for me."

She stopped walking and placed her hands on her hips. "Did you know that you're an insensitive asshole?"

"That's a new one."

"I just figured what the problem is. You never talk about the things that really matter."

"Like what?" 

"Like feelings. Like you and me. It's below his highness' level to talk about those embarrassing common people issues." 

"Maybe because every time I try to lower my guard, you say I have a vagina and call me a dork."

"So fucking what? Suck it up, you jellyfish."

"Why should I?"

"Because," her voice trembled, "because I really need to know where I stand right now, even if the truth is going to hurt."

"So you want the truth?"

"Don't tell me I can't handle the truth. I'll kick you in the nuts if you do."

He took a deep breath, looked at the sky and then at the woman with the golden hair in front of him. She looked so beautiful under the noon sun, it hurt. "The truth is that I love everything about you, Alice White. I like your beautiful smile, I love how you smell in the morning, I like it when you're funny, I even secretly like it when you're being mean to people who deserve it. I love the way you pretend to be tough and uncaring, because I know that's just a mask. I love your stupid laugh. I love the way we make love, I even love it when you call me stupid because I think I know what it means."

"It means you're stupid."

"Most of all I love being with you, and I hated that you had to go to New York for so long. And the thing I wanted to talk with you about is that I would love if you'll move out of your apartment and come live here with me."

She stared at him too stunned to speak, suddenly wondering if her policy of not airing her fears wasn't simply idiotic. 

"Look. I think it's ridiculous that you keep that tiny apartment in Holon. You're paying outrageous rent which you always struggle to meet and I know this place is not exactly a palace, but there is a bigger apartment under reconstruction that might be ready by October. The kids would love to have you with us, and it's close to your office so a win win, and -."

Alice threw her fears to the four winds and jumped into his arms, attacking his lips, chin and the rest of his face.

"I guess you approve?"

She took a nasty bite to his ear and then almost chopped part of his lip.

"Come on, the kids are watching."

"They're learning a valuable lesson."

The team stopped its game of football and was showing great interest in the valuable lesson. Some started whistling.

"Come on, Alice."

"Then you better take me somewhere more discrete, like your- sorry, our, our apartment." 

"Right now?"

"Three seconds from now I'm going to take your shirt off, and after that, all bets are off." She started kissing his neck.

"I'm getting a treat?"

"You'd wish." She slapped his butt. "It's been some time since we played 'Alice's Perfect Position;' you've been slacking."

"Nope, I've been a diligent student, honest. I'd found this site called 1000 sex positions for happy life."

"What do you have in mind?"

"V on a table looks not too complicated."

"Nice."

"So I'm guessing by that lukewarm response that it's not it."

"It?"

"Alice's favorite sex position."

"Maybe it is. I'm not telling. You'll have to find for yourself."

"Catherine Wheel?"

"Maybe."

"Two headed crane?"

"Now you're just throwing random names."

"Maybe." He scratched his chin. "Just to clear this one out. Your favorite sex position isn't a threesome, right?"

"You could go for a threesome, Dan. All you'll need is to find two consenting women. Then you'll need to find a third to be your new girlfriend." 

"You could just tell me what it is, the position, you know."

"What's the fun in that?"

She could tell him the truth. She found out her favorite sex position on the morning they first fell into each other's arms. Because the best sex position is any sex with someone you truly care about. She could tell him. But what's the fun in that? 

"Tell me again why you love me. Start with I love your beautiful smile."

"I love your beautiful smile, and I love the way you smell in the morning, I-"

"Dork."

"Had to get it out of your system, didn't you?"

"You know, Dan?"

"Aha."

"When you're an acrobat walking on a high rope, sometimes the best thing you can do is take a leap."

"That sounds like a smart advice. Not."

"I jumped. I didn't fall."

"Where was gravity in your case?"

"The scientists are still checking on it, but I think I just figured how to fly."

"Are you feeling ok?"

Saline wind picked up from the Mediterranean and ruffled her blond locks, making her look like a little girl again, fresh, before sins and sorrows. She leaned over and kissed him gently. "Never better."

The End. 

Took me some effort, so please take the three seconds to punch the stars below, or drop me a note to show you care, or both. 

Yep, a long journey. It started almost two years ago as an attempt to write a story about two sisters and how they switch places, roles in life, and also switch the perspective of how the readers perceive them. So that's Alice and Ana for you (Dan just had to come along for the ride). I hope you enjoyed them, at least most of you, I know I enjoyed making them, and I learned a lot. 

One thing I learned is that Loving Wives audience are tough as hell, but I like a challenge and I never get frightened by criticism, so, yep. 

Big thanks to all of the kind guys who encouraged me to keep writing and even you guys who threatened to dunk me in tar and feathers, 'if I ever touch that word processor again.' I'd like to think it means the story touched you in some way.

Good night, and be good to each other. 

Cheers

Metamorphose (Someone asked about the name – it's the name of the professor from Bulgakov's "Heart of a Dog" – the guy who takes human balls and a dog and create a man out of it, one of my favorite authors and stories).