Strike It

Lucy spit his dick out of her mouth just as Luis was about to come. He grunted in protest and then hastily grabbed his stiff member, gave it a couple of pumps and ejaculated, nearly hitting Lucy in the face.

“Stop,” Lucy said standing up. “Just everybody stop.” She extended her palms in the universal sign for ‘halt.’ But nobody was paying attention to her. Each was, in his or her own way, lost in that space between ‘do-me-baby’ and ‘got-a-cigarette?’

She looked back at Luis and shook her head.

“What?” he said. “Are we done?”

“This isn’t what I signed on for.” She turned away and then walked up to her lover, Michael, who was bent over at the waist with the transvestite buried to the hilt in his ass. Her hands on her hips, Lucy stared down at him to no affect – he had his eyes squeezed tight and was breathing fast.

Just then, the transvestite roared in ecstasy, dropping his toy gun to the floor as he did so. Half a second later, Michael responded in kind, arching his back and gripping the sides of the sink so tight his knuckles turned white.

“I can’t do this anymore,” Lucy said to no one in particular, and she headed for the door. Stepping over Bob, ‘the coitophobic night clerk’ and Penny, ‘the blind sex addict,’ she said, “You can stop if you want.”

Getting no reply, she shrugged her shoulders and walked up to the door. Then she pressed a red button on the wall. put her mouth up to a black panel and said, “Exit.”

“Are you sure?” a disembodied voice said. “We still have a fireman and a paramedic on deck.”

“I’m sure.” She reached down distractedly and placed her hand on the dog’s head.

After a few clicks and clacks, the door slid open. Lucy stepped over the threshold and past a man wearing a headset and green jumpsuit with the letters “XSF” embroidered over the right breast pocket. A woman wearing a matching suit held up a white terry cloth robe. Lucy let the soggy fur-coat slide off her shoulders and onto the floor, then backed into the robe and tied the sash. With her head down, she walked past a bench where a man dressed as a fireman and a woman dressed as a paramedic sat. The ‘rescue workers’ followed Lucy with their eyes as she stomped past them and proceeded to a bank of seats under a large sign that read, X-Treme Sexual Fantasies Inc.

Turning her back to the room -- a cavernous warehouse rigged with high tech special-effects equipment, a variety of animatronics, props and facades (including a hospital ER and some sort of zoo primate-habitat) – she plopped down in a chair, put her face in her hands and began quietly sobbing.

“I just need you to sign the fulfillment form.”

Lucy looked up with wet eyes,

“Right there,” an androgynous-looking woman said pointing with a laser to the bottom of a dense triplicate form. Lucy scrawled something beginning with an ‘L,’ and then turned away.

“Thank you,” the woman said in a monotone, “I hope your fantasy was everything you’d hoped it would be.”

“That and more,” Lucy said.

“Wonderful,” the woman said, not reading – or choosing not to read – Lucy’s sarcasm, “Help yourself to snacks and beverages.”

Lucy glanced up at a table laid out with soda and cold cuts.

“I’m a vegetarian,” she said. But the woman was gone.

Left alone with her thoughts, she wondered what her next move should be. Maybe she could answer that question if she understood her own feelings. Was she angry, hurt or just disappointed? All she knew for sure is that these fantasies always seemed to end the same way, which is to say, differently than she thought they would.

Just then she heard Michaels voice.

“Lucy!” he said rushing towards her, “What’s the matter? Are you OK? Why’d you leave?” He sat down next to her.

Lucy gave him a quick glance and turned her eyes away at once. She could feel the humidity from his still naked body and smell the pungent sex fluids evaporating from his skin. She put her hand up to her nose to keep from gagging.

“What is it?” he pleaded.

She turned around and glared at him. “Where the fuck did the transvestite come from?” she spat. “And the janitor. He was supposed to be an instigator, not a participator. I thought this was supposed to be about you and me!”

“What difference does it make?” Michael said rearing back defensively. “It’s all the same fantasy. It’s all about fucking and sucking, isn’t it?”

Lucy slumped back in her seat, crossed her arms and stared up at the ceiling. After several moments, she finally said, “No, it’s not.”

She didn’t want to get into a long thing with him – mostly because she knew it would annoy him -- but she longed for him to understand… maybe even take pity on her.

For his part, Michael thought she took their experimentations too personally -- it was a recurring theme with her.

“Why do you always get so serious?” he said. “It’s just for fun – genitals touching genitals.” He grabbed her crotch playfully.

“Yeah, well these genitals…” she opened her robe and spread her legs, “are attached to a person.”

She wished that, just once, he’d demonstrate some preference for her. But she wouldn’t tell him that. He had a way of making her feel embarrassed of her feelings for him, which were deeper and more complex than she cared to let on. She knew if she suggested that this was anything other than a game to her, he’d say something dismissive and she’d end up wishing she’d never opened her mouth,

‘What, you want us to be boyfriend and girlfriend?” he’d once asked with such a tone of incredulousness that she wondered if she’d suddenly sprouted muttonchops.

‘Why do you keep getting me involved in these things,’ she’d later asked.

‘Because I can,’ he’d replied a little too earnestly.

‘And I always go along because I can’t not,’ she’d thought.

Michael had a way of drawing out her optimism and self-confidence, kindling her imagination and ideals. That was a powerful aphrodisiac and she hated that she felt helpless to resist him.

“I’m going to get something to drink,” Lucy said standing up abruptly. “Do you want anything?”

“Yeah, I’m really thirsty.”

“What? Coke, Sprite… water….”

“It doesn’t matter. Anything to quench my thirst.”

“Typical,” she muttered.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“They’re each different,” she said whipping around and staring at him sharply. “Coke is not the same as Sprite. Coke is thick and acerbic. Sprite is light and refreshing! Don’t you have a favorite or do you just take what ever is available?”

“Whoa, what’s this about?” he said getting up from his chair. “Did I do something to piss you off?”

Lucy thought about it. In fact she couldn’t point to anything. As far as she knew, he hadn’t lied to her. Nor -- since he’d never committed to anything but the game -- had he broken any promises. She was tongue-tied.

“Look. I’m sorry if I said or did anything to upset you,” he said coolly. “I’m going to get dressed. Do you want me to wait for you?”

His face had gone blank and his voice had gone flat. She knew she’d lost him. What she didn’t know -- never knew – was for how long.

“No,” she said and thought, ‘yes, wait for me… come for me… pine for me.”

“OK. I’ll call you later.” And he walked away.

Lucy sat there for a long time trying to envision the immediate future. She stared at the neatly arranged precooked meat loaves -- noting blandly that the edges were discolored and slightly curled -- and felt a blanket of melancholy descend over her.


Finally she got up and left.