Our Prelude
My name is Daniel Cooper, and I have two problems from which all other problems I have arisen: First, I am, technically, a genius, in more than one sense. I still haven’t figured out what I’m a genius at (which I guess means I’m actually a savant, but that’s besides the point), but according to testing, I am a genius. The other problem, which, mixed with the first one, is at the heart of my most recent sadness, is that I’m lazy as hell.
So, I glided through high school. I got a 33 on the ACTs, which doesn’t seem that impressive until you realize that I took them in roughly 15 minutes (having fallen asleep for the first few hours of the test). I maintained a 3.7 GPA at a very difficult school, despite having somewhere around a 50% turn-in-rate on my homework. That, you see, was where my laziness kicked in.
So, to recap, I was an intelligent boy who loved reading, video games, and movies, and hated moving. That made for some lonely hours. Days. Weeks. Fine, okay, years. You happy? I hope so.
Besides loneliness, I never learned how to communicate with girls, and then with women. I just didn’t get it (a crime, to my supremely logical mind). However, I was surprisingly charming, when I actually got off my fat ass. A tribute, I would say, to my supremely loquacious manner of speech, and my innate sense of politeness. However, I was never physically attractive, and I always got nervous and bumbled before I could get beyond holding hands. I didn’t really mind, though. I wasn’t trying to get in the pants of every girl I met.
Anyways, college time rolled around (as it’s apt to do), and I had lost about fifty pounds in the last year, due to my near obsessive playing of Dance Dance Revolution. I am telling you, right now, that game is evil. Fun as hell, but evil.
It was there, in my sophomore year, that I met Betty Staldar. She was perfect for me, I knew it just from looking at her. She wasn’t the most beautiful woman I had ever seen, nor the brightest, nor the funniest. However, we hit it off right away. We shared so many interests, it seemed like fate. Looking back, I realize that it was probably God playing a cruel joke on me (because I had rashly sworn, once, that I hated the name Betty, and would never date a girl with said name). Who knows?
So, we dated each other exclusively all through college. We graduated, both near the top of the class. I took her home to meet my parents (who loved her). She was gorgeous that night. Her red hair (I have a thing for red hair) flowing in the wind as we drove, her mischievous green eyes dancing as she watched me, singing to the Stones as the CD blasted it’s music throughout the car. She loved them, couldn’t get enough. It was the one point on which we disagreed. My favorite band was, without a doubt, They Might Be Giants. No, I know you haven’t heard of them. Many people haven’t.
We slept together for the first time that night. I was a virgin, she was not. I didn’t care; it seemed so magical. The future was beautiful, that night.
I got a job teaching high school English. After my first year, I created my own class, for seniors, called Alternate Genres. It was an immediate hit. I compiled a list of every book I owned, and we dedicated 2 weeks of the semester to each type: Sci-fi, Romance, Fantasy, Graphic Novels, and Mystery. You name it, we probably read it. It was beautiful. When given a choice and some variety, most people will find something they like to read. I was blissfully happy. We got married after my second year of teaching (we had had some minor problems, but had worked them out). Every single one of my students came, from both years. She was working as a reporter, me as a teacher.
Four years passed, and my happiness rarely left me.
Her Bolero
One night, we went to a party. It was being thrown by another teacher in school. Miguel Kitrens. He taught music and dance, and was, in general, not very well known. Most students didn’t like him, but most students don’t like most teachers, so that isn’t surprising. It’s just how things are. A lot of the girls thought him handsome, for he was lean and well muscled, and his Latino good looks seemed to draw women in. But, to the girl, they didn’t trust him.
So, I had been working at the school for six years, and Miguel had been there for one. Betty and I were both 28 by then, and still no children. Earlier that week, I had found out that I was sterile. I was waiting for the proper time to tell her. We had so wanted children, and I knew that she would take the news hard.
But that night was a night for revelry, not sadness. So I withheld the news, knowing that she would be disappointed and hurt. I so hated to disappoint her.
I was mingling. My people skills had improved a great deal over the years. Betty had helped me out there. She had made me leave the comfort and safety of the house, and I was glad she had. I had made many friends, and was well liked, both among my students and among my colleagues.
I had noticed her dancing closely with Miguel, and I smiled. They were dancing fast and dangerous, showing off a bit as the rapid Latin beat thrummed through the room. Despite my mastery of Dance Dance Revolution, I couldn’t dance at all without the happy little arrows telling me what to do, but Betty, she loved dancing like she loved life itself. She and Miguel were masters. I went back to the story I was sharing with a small group of fellow teachers, trusting my wife implicitly, happy that she was having such fun.
She loved me, and I knew it. I loved her just as much. Why would I doubt her?
So, I finished the story, and then looked back to the living room. My wife and Miguel were both gone. No longer dancing, they had apparently left a little while back. I wasn’t worried, even then. This seems to support my savant theory over my genius one, doesn’t it?
I reached a long hallway up the stairs. The master bedroom, the guest bedroom, the bathroom, a closet. I could hear, in one bedroom, a small thumping noise. Curious, I approached the door to the guest bedroom. Just as I was about to open it, I heard a moan. A woman’s moan. I cracked the door, and could see a dark pair of male buttocks humping rapidly between splayed white thighs.
Oh.
Well, I had thought this was a grownup party, but apparently some things never die. I smiled softly, closed the door slowly, and walked back downstairs, wondering where Betty was. Maybe she’d be interested in reliving her school years a bit? I snickered a little at that.
God, I hate myself.
Anyways, I searched to no avail, until suddenly, I realized where I hadn’t looked. Outside!
I stepped outside, and lo! and behold, there she was. I smiled a little as I watched her from a distance. I didn’t deserve a woman like her. She was good and kind and faithful and loving and…
Miguel had just walked up and kissed her on the neck, whispering in her ear. I saw her flush and giggle, and then pull her shirt off and put it on properly. It had been inside-out!
Remember when I said I didn’t have much human contact growing up? How my emotions were mostly those of nervousness. Well, safe to say, I had never really built up any immunity to jealousy.
I saw red, for a second, but when my vision cleared, they were gone. The swing was swaying gently in the breeze. There was no trace of them.
Had I been mistaken?
I relaxed a little at the thought. It was comforting. It was understandable. It was human. It did not involve me having my heart torn from me and spat upon by the one human being in existence I truly loved and trusted. It was safe.
So, we went home together. Neither showed any hint of any event transpiring. Ignoring it was safe.
So, we got home. We got up to her bedroom, and I pulled her into my arms. She melted into me. I smelled his cologne on her; I ignored it, desperately.
I pulled her onto the bed with me, and pulled off her shirt. Her bra was gone. I could feel the rage rising up in me. She pushed me away, protesting that she was tired, that she had had too much to drink. I let her fall asleep.
I checked, afterwards. She didn’t have any panties on, either, and just a trickle of cum stained her otherwise pristine thighs.
3. Aubade of Spirit
I woke up the next morning in a haze. My life, my faith, my trust: All had been placed in a lie.
That wasn’t fair, I realized. Maybe it had been an accident. Maybe, like she had said, she had had too much to drink. Maybe, this morning, all would come clean and she would apologize and life would go on.
I got up smiling, hoping to put it all behind me. I walked down the stairs, whistling tunelessly (for I have, of course, less ability with music than I do with dance). “Hello, love,” I said to my wife, kissing her on the cheek. She was cooking me breakfast (French Toast, my favorite), which she almost never does. It screamed guilt offering.
“Hello, hon, breakfast will be ready soon,” she said cheerily, all sunshine and roses. Silence reigned for a few minutes, as she cooked and I read the latest novel I was working on.
Finally, we sat down to eat. She just cheerfully munched down her food, never saying a word.
Maybe she was expecting some sort of prompt? “So, did you have fun at the party last night?” I asked.
She looked at me and smiled. I didn’t like the look in her eye. It was new. It was hiding things from me. “Yes, I had a lovely time. I found your colleagues as charming as ever.” She went back to eating.
My frown deepened. “Did you do anything…interesting?” I asked, shading the question slightly to make it sound knowledgeable.
She choked on her food. Hastily, she looked at her watch. “Oh,” she exclaimed, “look at the time!” She rushed to her feet. “Rinse off the dishes, and I’ll take care of them when I get home. Love ya,” she said, kissing the top of my head and rushing off.
She was right. She was cutting it close. The timing, however, was extremely fortunate…for her.
I stared at my plate incomprehensibly. The French Toast had gone to ashes in my mouth.
I called in sick that day, for the first time in six years. They were worried about me, of course, but they didn’t question me. I must have sounded like hell.
I felt like it, that was for sure.
A new resolve washed over me, that morning. I had realized that a new day in my life was dawning. I would have to be dependant on no one but myself.
That morning was a new dawn in my soul, in my mind, and in my heart. A song was in my head, a song of morning, a song of new beginnings.
I smiled.
Vengeance Bebop
First, I needed evidence. Then, I needed revenge.
We were both well liked in the town, neither more than the other. Truth to tell, we weren’t even really thought of as a separate entity.
To get revenge, I would need proof of her infidelity, a paradigm shift to set over the whole of the town, and the help of a great many people. A quick, staccato beat blazed through me as I planned. It would require deft handling to separate us while still punishing Betty and Miguel. And anyone else who became involved.
So, I immediately set out to follow her. I knew she didn’t have to work today. I had checked her schedule book. So I grabbed the recorder, and set out after her.
I didn’t need to go far, of course. She was with Miguel. I smiled grimly. No longer worried about emotions, I could concentrate all my creative energies on revenge.
The adrenaline was magnificent.
I got to a window as they were making out on his couch. How…incautious of them.
I started filming on her face, then zoomed out. There would be no doubts as to the identity of the woman in question. His lips were on her neck, one hand up her prim dress, the other deftly opening her blouse. A moan came through the window, and the video recorder heard it.
I love technology.
I saw him open up her silver, gleaming blouse. She had again gone braless to meet her lover. I wondered, absently, how long they had been together.
His lips had reached her nipples, and his tongue caressed them expertly. They were stiff within seconds, and her moans continued to reach my recording device.
Her panties came off while he was tasting her ripe breasts, and his pants were, somehow, already unzipped.
She pushed him away, suddenly, and I was filled with a renewed sense of hope. Maybe she had changed her mind! Realized her love for me and had come to break it off…
No, she pushed him down where she had been and dropped to her knees in front of him. She took him swiftly in her mouth, and this was not the work of an amateur. She was deep-throating him by the third stroke. She had never even given me a hand job, let alone a blow like this.
I think I lack animal magnetism. Oh, well. You win some, you lose some.
He cried out that he was coming, but she didn’t pull away. She swallowed him to the pubes and swallowed furiously, as if being fed the nectar of the gods.
After she finished swallowing, they got up and laughed, and he fondled her a bit more. Then she sat back down and he took her position. He began to eat her.
Now this I was familiar with. I had done it often enough.
She came quickly. Then she came again. She hardly even noticed as he climbed up her body, positioning his unprotected cock up against her slit and shoving it in.
Her loudest moan yet reverberated through the house and out to me. I smiled and shook my head as he began to pump furiously in and out. Her moans increased in volume and her words became steadily more clear.
This was too perfect. I was catching such classic phrases as “Oh, gawd, fuck me you bastard!” “You’re so much bigger than my husband,” and the always classic “Oh, oh, yes, fuck your baby into me. Make my cuckold husband pay for your bastard!”
Seriously, I couldn’t have set it up better if I had tried.
He soon did just as she asked, and shuddered atop her as his seed filled her womb, spurting up there in, no doubt, plentiful amounts.
I walked away laughing.
Badinerie in Three Parts
Now, it was time to set up the fall of the two of them. First off, of course, was separating my wife and I in the eyes of the public, garnering sympathy for myself.
She came home to a loving husband. I claimed I was too tired for sex that night, which she appeared grateful for. The next day was a Friday, and so I went back to my classes, the same as always.
I prompted her, that night, to have a night on the town with her girlfriends. They normally went out to the bars and such on Friday nights anyways. She smiled at me, kissed me, grabbed her purse, and ran off into the night. She thought she could get away with anything, that she was invincible. How had she hid this part of her for so long?
O Lord, what fools these mortals be.
What she didn’t know is that I had slipped her a mild stimulant before she left, and had replaced her Altoids with sleeping pills that were weak enough to make her pliable, but conscious.
Oh, yeah, and I also slipped a little camera in her bag.
What she doesn’t know I saw when she came home is this: Her, lap dancing for an overweight truck driver, letting him suckle on her in the club (in full view of more than a few townsfolk), and then leaving with him, and a few other men from out of town.
They took her to their pick-up truck, and laid her out on a mattress in the back. She spread her legs willingly (her panties, not surprisingly, were already off), and let the first truck driver hump her until he seeded her womb. She moaned like a whore the whole time.
Overall, nine truck drivers, humped her soppy cunt until they came. She was taking fertility drugs, and at her most fertile time of the month. Perfect.
In the eyes of the town, she was, officially, a whore. But that wasn’t enough. Not nearly enough. Nature would take its course there, though, and so I moved on to part two of my plan.
By that Monday, everyone knew of my wife’s antics. I pretended as though I didn’t as I arrived for my Alternate Genres class that day, 9th period.
The students expected me to be downtrodden and sad. When they saw that I had no idea what my wife had been doing, they immediately felt defensive of me. They, sadly, explained what my wife had done.
I feigned shock. Disbelief. I dismissed the class ten minutes early (bringing them further on my side), saying I needed time to think. I left.
The next day, I returned, telling my students that I had found my wife sleeping with Miguel that day. I let my eyes mist up, winning over the girls, but wouldn’t cry, winning over the guys.
The seed had been planted. Miguel’s classes were nearly uncontrollable. He seemed to lose all authority over them. Over the course of the next week, Miguel seemed to be completely failing in his attempts to control his students.
It wasn’t enough, surprisingly. They wanted blood. My students truly cared for me. I smiled, glad that, through all of my mistakes, I had been making a difference with some people. I loved my students, each and every one. They were the children I would never be able to have.
Completely without my knowledge, the students hatched a plan. I would have been content with just getting Miguel fired. I would have loved it. My students wanted more, though. They wanted him to suffer for hurting me.
So, Nina, a 16 year old with a reputation as being a little…loose, seduced Miguel, in his own office. Mike, a football player, went to the principal, and said he had heard noises coming from Mr. Kitrens’ office, and that he was worried.
What the principal walked into was Miguel screwing a silently sobbing Nina bent over his desk.
Miguel was fired, and Nina claimed that he had said that he would try and expose incriminating pictures of her (giving a blow job to her boyfriend) if she didn’t submit. The photos were a plant by her, of course. The entire plan was flawless.
Miguel was sent to jail for statutory rape, extortion, and rape. I heard he was a fan favorite in prison.
Anyways, phase three was to commence by then, so I pretended in class like nothing had happened, and they pretended the same, and we had a special secret to share amongst us all, a bond.
Finally, phase 3. I knew she would throw a surprise party for me when she found out I was pregnant. I had read it in her planning book.
So, that night, I came in with the test results proclaiming me sterile. As soon as she made her happy announcement to all our friends, I put on as sad a face as possible, and said, “But, honey, that’s impossible. Our doctor just told me I was sterile.”
All hell broke loose.
In the divorce proceedings, all the sympathy and evidence supported me. I got everything.
I gave her 50% of the money, garnering more sympathy (and because, despite everything, I still loved her. I didn’t like her, but I loved her nonetheless).
Life went on.
My Nocturne
After that, my life was a haze, a bad dream that I was partially in. I got revenge, yes, but now I had nothing. Betty remarried three years later. So far as I can tell, they have an ideal relationship. Neither has strayed. I made sure of it for awhile, but lost interest soon enough.
She was no longer in my life.
I didn’t realize how much I needed her. I had focused everything on her. When that illusion was shattered, I was. Vengeance kept me focused, on a path, but could no longer sustain me. I had had my vengeance; where was my love?
I had none.
Or, did I?
I wallowed for a month or two, until I remembered who I loved. What I loved.
My students.
My life was a joke. My hopes were in shambles, and my emotions were so damaged that they may as well have been dead. But the children, the students, the young men and women of the school. They had a whole future ahead of them. A life of hope and promise.
It was to them I would rededicate myself.