DITW 10-17: Unveiling

Reality thumped him like the world’s biggest pillow swung by a giant. He staggered aside, put out a hand in case he would fall, but made it to the couch and fell sitting on it. He grabbed his hair and pulled. “You fingered my wife?” He couldn’t even feel the couch, could feel nothing, as if he floated, or as if some part of his nervous system, the tangle of important cables strung in his spinal column, had been snipped by sharp scissors. Disconnected. Empty. Lost.

Devlin reacted to his loss of legs by lurching forward like he would prevent him from falling, but then putting up his hands in a braking motion, saying, “Wait, just wait, will you? Hold on. Let’s look at what you came here for first. Okay?”

His mouth hung open, his eyes wide. Some part of him had expected Devlin to deny touching Kimmy to his dying day. A flip had switched. His face veered toward Devlin. “Did you taunt me? Did they know?”

“Who know?”

“Glenn. Rumble.”

Devlin looked shocked, head darting away and brow furrowing. “What? No. No way. No, Josh. I swear they didn’t know. That thing I did was for you and me. It’s like a hunter using deer scent, you know? I’m trying to draw you closer to me, not make fun of you, not push you away.”

He looked at the floor, then back up at Devlin. “You really did it?” This was like the tent-dream, only he was lucid and alive, sitting here in Devlin’s apartment after enduring three days of time after arranging to meet him at all. The drive here, the walk up. All sober as a judge. This was real, so fucking real.

But didn’t he know it already?

He sat up an inch, a sudden autonomous urge to leap the distance between them and slug Devlin right in the fucking face. Instead, the urge dissipated like steam on a hot road and he sat back down. He punched himself. One right on the left side of the jaw, then one on the right. He fucking did this. It was him.

“Whoa, Josh, whoa,” Devlin said, getting closer and grabbing Josh’s wrists. “Relax, man, relax. Hold on.”

He struggled to free his wrists from Devlin’s grip, but Devlin was too strong. After a long session of helpless wrestling, Devlin said, “Do you want to hit me? Do you want to? I mean, I get it.”

Instead of struggling, now he sagged, retreated from his bully, falling back against the couch seat. Devlin let his wrists go.

“You fingered her?”

Devlin looked annoyed now, turning aside. “Josh, I don’t know what to say to you anymore.”

“What do you want from me? Why are you doing this to me?”

Devlin wheeled back, not angry, more like pleading. “I’m not doing anything to you. I’m trying to work with you and you’re making it so fucking hard. All that shit in Cayman, you were practically begging for a threesome. And I fucking told you I’m down. But you had to turn it into this like evil thing, this astronomical devastation just because I want to do it too.” He paced away, making aggravated sounds, then returned. “Like you’re hot and cold with me. You’re snide and insulting—when I’m Kimmy’s boss, I mean, her salary comes from me—you tease me, play like weird sexual games in front of me and then I’m the bad guy. . . . Is it you? I feel like this is your fault. Am I crazy?”

Josh rubbed his cheeks and his brow, flexing his neck, head going in circles. He’d done it. He knew he’d done it. He played along with the taunts, put Kimmy in Devlin’s reach, and now he wanted to blame only Devlin. His head went back on the couch seat, arms limp at his sides, palms up at his thighs. “You showed her your... Showed her your thing... You fucking took it out and like played with it.”

Devlin rubbed his chin and looked away. “Yeah. Kimmy told me she played you the recording. She felt guilty. Poor kid, man. I shouldn’t have done that to her. I mean, I thought I’d be going back with her to your place. The three of us. You know?”

“Why would you do that? Why would you take it out?”

“She wanted to see it.”

“You just showed it to her. She didn’t ask.”

Devlin tried to speak, moved his hands around, flummoxed, like he wanted to say something but thought maybe he shouldn’t; something like no, that Kimmy had asked to see it.

“Did she ask?”

Devlin held up the iPad again. “Why don’t you look at what you came to see?”

“I don’t think I can.” He could barely move.

“You came all this way. . . . Do you want a drink now?”

Josh shook his head and, with great difficulty, scooted his butt forward to the edge of the couch seat. He held out a hand for the iPad.

Devlin opened the iPad’s cover and woke it up. “I’ll get it up on the big screen.” He turned the huge TV on and it lit up in brilliant solid blue. The Apple TV menu replaced it and Josh resumed rubbing his cheeks. Maybe it still wasn’t too late. Maybe he could still leave and preserve his marriage, preserve his dignity.

Devlin hugged the iPad to his chest, looking down on Josh, almost like he’d changed his mind, and for Josh’s sake, he wouldn’t show the picture now. “I’m not going to hurt you, Josh. That’s not what I’m doing. This is for both of us to enjoy.”

“You’re enjoying this?” A healthy measure of defiance put strength in his voice.

“I am. And when you admit you’re enjoying it, too, you might not beat yourself up anymore.”

He put his elbows on his knees and covered his face, saying into his hands, “Just show me the picture, please.”

He could hear the iPad being laid to rest on the coffee table before the couch. He moved his hands away. Devlin said, “It’s all yours,” nodding to the iPad. “I’ll give you a minute alone. Put it up on the screen, whatever you want. I’m going to hop in the shower.”

They stared at each other forever, but at last Josh nodded. Devlin stepped away and then left the room, headed to his bedroom.

Josh stared at the iPad, laying screen up, just a menu with a handful of icons. He picked it up and put it on his lap. There was no way he could look at this, was there? It seemed like an easy thing to do when he was in Ajax, but now that he was here, he felt like he would burst into flames if he opened the picture up now.

The Photos icon glared at him, taunted him, dared him to touch her.

He did. His finger pad pressed the icon, and the menu whooshed to fill the screen.

Only one photo in the whole library. One photo, and even from the very small thumbnail, he identified it as the complete picture he’d come here for.

He touched that image.

Another whoosh, and now he was looking right at the entirety of the partial image that had haunted him all week long. A woman on her back with her legs open. She wore a business suit, the jacket open, and the skirt hiked up above her hipbones in a rough band. Her long, so very, very long legs were pulled up and opened, the spiky heels almost touching. They were high heels, expensive ones, red on the bottom. Kimmy’s shoes. A hank of torn fabric hooped around one slender ankle. Her panties, all black and lacy. Her shirt had been unbuttoned and parted on her narrow chest, and her bra, what he could see of it, was askew.

But the central focus of the picture, the unavoidable, undeniable source of this photo’s power, was the shimmering center-point, glistening with wet. Kimmy’s pussy. Kimmy’s perfect little pussy, skirt up, showing it to the man who took the picture. He’d seen only a small portion of the picture, about a tenth of its square footage, a bathmat on a bathroom floor. The picture was everything he’d imagined, everything he hoped it would be. And, at the same time, the thing he hoped it wouldn’t be. Kimmy’s petals were engorged and parted, her core exposed, her canal opened like it had been fucked. Did he fuck her? Had Devlin just fingered her?

He hugged his stomach, held one finger on the picture until a sub menu appeared, then he launched the photo to the big and ready TV.

Now his naked wife was in full view, big screen, naked and legs parted, begging someone, anyone—Devlin—to fuck her.

“Oh my god,” he breathed, slipped off the couch and went to his knees, walking to them before the TV like a supplicant, ready to place his forehead down to prove his devotion to the woman he worshipped.

His cock throbbed like electrified steel, and he shifted and grunted, his uncomfortable underwear strangling his poor member. Pre-come pulsed in a steady flow and the only thing that saved him from insanity was the ever-loving knowledge that he could go home right now and climb into bed with the same woman in this pornographic photo and put his arms around her. He could hug her and kiss her. He could make love to her if he wanted. He could even say he had a headache and ask her to jerk him off and squeeze and smack his balls.

I would do anything for you, Josh.

His breaths came in sudden gusts and he realized he’d stopped breathing for a moment. He laughed. Inexplicable. Overwhelmed. Flooded with too many emotions. Or maybe he really had crossed the sanity Rubicon.

“Oh my god,” he sighed again, and reached for the TV. He’d touched that leg so many times, caressed those knees, rubbed those feet. He knew how everything in this photo felt under his touch. And Kimmy had shown it all to another man.

“I did this,” he said. “I fucking did this.”

Kimmy’s flesh. Kimmy’s beautiful skinny legs. Kimmy’s perfect tawny pussy, the inner flesh blushing in cherry-stained color, slick and greased, prepared for fucking. Her pubic hair. Her hip bones. Her hands. Her slender thumbs, her nails...

But no face.

The face had been framed out of the photo.

But it was Kimmy. He knew it was.

He grabbed his cock through his pants and squeezed it until his whole body shuddered with exquisite pleasure. God, he was on the verge of orgasm from the painful revelation of his wife’s brutal debauchery.

He moaned her name under his breath, saying it again and again, admonishing her bad behavior—but not blaming her. He was the one to blame.

He stared at his wife for an eternity.

He stared until Devlin reappeared, reentering the room in gray sweatpants and a clean black T-shirt, his hair wet and combed back. Devlin stood beside kneeling Josh and looked at the screen and Josh didn’t prevent him. What was the point? The man had taken the photo.

Then Devlin let out a long, admiring exhale. He said, “Josh, look at her. She wanted it. Wanted it like she needed it, like she was in heat. How could I reject that? Seriously, look how beautiful she is. Oh my god. Asking me to do it? I couldn’t say no.”

“You fingered her?”

“Josh, I couldn’t say no.”

His eyes hadn’t left the screen. “What’s she on, some sand bags or something? Where is this?”

“It didn’t happen there, Josh.”

“Where did it happen? On the couch?”

“These are things you need to ask Kimmy, Josh. Not me.”

“You took a picture and showed me.”

“You broke her, Josh. Kimmy’s gone. Won’t talk to me, doesn’t hardly come into work anymore.”

“Good,” he said.

Devlin crossed his arms and snuffled disgust through his nostrils. “You’re going to rob her of everything she’s dreamed of, Josh. Be careful with her. She’s an amazing human being.”

He sighed and bowed his head. “I did it. I made it about me.”

“It’s not too late, Josh. Not too late to do the right thing.”

Now he looked up at Devlin and right away saw the enormous horse-cock bulge in his sweatpants. No underwear, his over-sized manhood hanging down and bowing out the fabric, halfway down his thigh. The sight was ugly and garish and turned his stomach. Devlin had taken that out in Cayman and showed it to Kimmy.

Maybe Kimmy asked him to.

He said, “You’re uh, you’re... hard.”

Devlin pulled his gaze from Kimmy’s open legs. “Aren’t you?”

Josh swallowed. Knew what was next and knew it would come, eventually. Had sworn off coming tonight because of it, but then couldn’t stay away. Couldn’t stay away, so in the end, he complied with Devlin’s stipulation for tonight’s attire.

He stood up, got on his feet next to Devlin, and looked away. Then his hands came to his waist and unbuttoned his jeans and drew down the zipper. Devlin half-turned from the TV, arms still crossed, and watched him do it, smirking, one eyebrow raised.

“What are you showing me, Josh?”

Even and monotone, acidic bile on the back of his tongue, he said, “What you wanted.”

Devlin stepped back, eyes turned low to watch Josh push his pants down his hips and show Devlin he’d done what he was told. He’d come here tonight wearing the panties he’d found in Devlin’s couch.