Dream Lover Read Free Page A

the table with her open palm for emphasis.
    “It isn’t such a big deal nowadays. You couldn’t stand Mark, anyway. Remember how he kept hanging the baby Jesus by his toes last Christmas?” Mark had insisted on picking the plastic doll out of the manger and swinging him around by his feet, in spite of my mother crying out to him to stop, yelling, “You’re making all the blood rush to his head!” Heather had put her head down on the table and pretended she was crying, but she was really hiding laughter from our mother, who was on the verge of storming out of the room. If that happened, it would be weeks before we would get her to talk to us again. This was all blasphemy.
    Fred went on. “And what about him dressing up like an apostle for Halloween? A gentile apostle! No, I say good riddance to Mark. Besides, Mother Dear, gluttony is a sin, too, yet I don’t hear you yelling at me to stop eating so much.” Fred, a three-hundred pounder, had found something good to eat and was taking it back to his room. He was one of three children still living at home. My mother was furious.
    “Heather Ann, stop laughing at me this instant. I’m so upset right now. What’s keeping your father?” She turned to the telephone and picked it up to see if there was a dial tone. She would call him and make sure he was coming home. Fred had already given him a heads-up. He would calm her down, as only he was able. However, she wasn’t finished with us.
    “Why’d you ever marry a Jew, anyway? I told you this would happen! He thought he was better than us. He made fun of every celebration we had here.” Her arms were crossed over her chest and she had her best ‘I told you so’ expression on her face. Heather couldn’t argue with our mother because she knew it was true. They never should have gotten married. They married for lust. The folks hated him and it filtered down to Heather, who ended up siding with our parents because she had too much to lose if she didn’t, forgetting her husband in the process.
    “Yes, well hindsight and all that, Mom. I’m sorry I hurt you and Daddy. However, this isn’t easy for me. If you’re going to yell at me every time I come home, I won’t come anymore.”
    My mother thought about this. “So you’ll come for Christmas?” The woman was one-track, there was no arguing that.
    “Yes! I’ll come! But promise me you won’t mention his name!” Mark’s name came up once during Christmas weekend that year. My mother mentioned him in a prayer and the entire family moaned. What would my parents say to me when it came time for my unveiling? I’d have to give them some background. Their beloved eldest daughter had had an affair with a married man. Heather and Mark would seem like a gift from heaven after my revelation.

    After that first time in the hotel with Jack, I had serious doubts about the future of my relationship with this man. For one thing, the sex was not that great. He wasn’t interested in my satisfaction at all. The expression “getting his rocks off” fit Jack to a tee. I kept thinking that a hand job in the bathroom wasn’t much different from the hotel experience, and it was cheaper and neater, too. He did ask me to do a few weird things for him. He asked me to pose in my underwear. I was to take my panty hose off (he hated panty hose) and put my shoes back on, and then remove my clothes. Not like a striptease, just like I was normally undressing. He would go nuts. If I wore long pants, he asked me to turn my back to him so he could watch me bend over to take them off. I thought he would pass out from that one.
    He liked me to jump on the bed, too. He’d lie next to where I was jumping and laugh and laugh. And then he would tackle me. That was his foreplay. Now that I think of it, I never had an orgasm with Jack in three years. He wasn’t interested in it; never asked, “Did you come?” We never discussed sex. I was just to assume that we would do it every single time