11. Nights on the Couch

After dirtying up that which was clean, Lilah took out her ponytail and put on some light makeup while he got re-dressed so that they could go downstairs for breakfast - and a smoke for Tony.  They ate and talked about nothing in particular, but determined that they’d like the rest of the day to be more like vacation – light and easy.

She said she didn't care what they did, that it was up to him, and he deferred back to her.  It went that way a couple of times before Tony put a stop to it, asserting that they were going to follow up on her suggestion from the night before and go to "sex shopping".  He figured it would be good for a couple of laughs if nothing else. 

Only now that they were actually in the parking lot…

“This was a much better idea in theory,” his wife backpedaled upon seeing some of the shop’s clientele go in and out.  “I think I changed my mind.” 

Tony followed her frozen line of sight and laughed out loud.  He didn’t know what she was worried about.  The guy in the orange leisure suit might look a little sketchy, but the lesbians with the Mohawks seemed perfectly safe. 

“Stop laughin’ at me!” she ordered with a quick poke at his leg. 

“Well, Jesus, Filthy Freda,” was his chuckled reply.  “Their minds are probably cleaner than yours.  The store sure as hell looks to be.” 

The place wasn’t anything resembling the seedy images usually associated with the idea of a porn shop.  The Déjà vu Adult Emporium and Arcade looked more like a mall store than a sex supermarket.

“Filthy Freda?” She narrowed her eyes at him.  “Did you really just call me that?”

His hands went helplessly in the air, as his phone chimed with a text message.  “Hey, if the filth fits…”

“Most men would be happy to have an open minded woman at their disposal,” Lilah huffed playfully, giving him that lifted eyebrow thing she always accused him of doing.  “And keep that open-mindedness to themselves.  But not you.  Noooo…  My husband has to give me grief.  I might reconsider my stance, ya know.”

Fishing his phone out, Tony assured her, “No you won’t.  It fascinates you too much, just like this place does.”

“And exactly how do you know this?  I haven’t said squat other than I’d do whatever you wanted.”

“You’re cute, ya know that?” he asked, patting her cheek patronizingly with one hand and swiping his phone screen with the other.  “Bein’ all indignant and shit, when you and I both know you wouldn’t have fucking offered it up if you weren’t intrigued.”

[11:47AM]MATT:  How’s it going?

Her mouth twisted into a disgruntled knot.  “There are times when you can know somebody too well.  You’d do well to remember that.”

“Yes, dear.”  Tony tapped for the camera on his phone and snapped a quick picture of the store in front of them. 

“What are you doin’?”

A couple of further swipes and taps had the picture on its way to his baby brother in Jersey.  “Sending a pic to Matt.”

“How come?” 

The response from back home was almost immediate.  

[11:49 AM]MATT:  Cool.  Pick me up a cock ring.

“He likes that kinda thing,” Tony snorted, flipping his phone around to show her.  “See?”

Her eyes rolled so far back in her head, he wondered if she’d ever get them straightened out again.  “Oh for God’s sake.”

“Stop acting like you’re a prude,” he chastised, still laughing.  “I know damn well you have a vibrator.  Didn’t you go someplace to pick it out?”

“No.  Online shopping and delivery in a discreet package.”

He studied her speculatively.  “Is that what you’re doin’ while the kids watch cartoons?  Ordering vibrators?”

“When I’m not watching porn.”

She so casually and matter-of-factly, that Tony was momentarily dumbfounded, thinking that he had to have misunderstood.  His wife liked sex well enough, but she didn’t even like to acknowledge that she had a pussy outside the bedroom.  There was no way she was leisurely watching porn in the family room every evening.  Was there?

“You’re kidding me, right?”

Lilah’s straight face fractured into a million delighted pieces when she giggled, “Yeah. Sort of.”

Sort of? 

His little Filthy Freda didn’t know it yet, but they were going to sit right here and explore that little conversational gem in the fullest possible detail.  And if she happened to try pulling out the prude card…   Then he’d simply explain that her only other option was door number two – going inside the store with the mission of critiquing every dildo in the place.

Yeah, that pretty much guaranteed they were talking about it, and he was looking forward to it with great anticipation.  This had the potential to be way too interesting.

He dropped the phone into the console, turned in the seat, and draped an arm over the steering wheel to give her his undivided attention.  “What the fuck is ‘sort of’?”

Although her smile hung in there, her face and neck now flooded until both were mottled with vibrant pink splotches.  That little telltale sign had just effectively removed the option of door number two.  In fact, it slammed the damn thing shut and slapped a padlock on it.  This was going to be good, and he wanted to hear it.  No compromises.

“Well, are we goin’ in or not?” she asked cheerily and reached for the door handle.

“Don’t even try it,” he warned in a barely veiled threat. “It won’t be hard to embarrass you in front of a porn store, and I will not hesitate to do it.  Spill, Bluegrass.”

“Oh for pity’s sake!” The hand that had been in the midst of executing an escape fell limply to her lap with a grumpy little huff. “I watch it once in a while.”

“How often is ‘once in a while’?”

“Does it really matter?”

“Oh, it does.  It really does.”

His wife chewed on the corner of her lip and sighed.  “I dunno.  It varies.”

“Jesus Christ, Lilah,” he exclaimed in exasperation.  What had begun as intrigued curiosity was rapidly shifting toward annoyance as she dragged this out.  “Just tell me!”

“A couple times a week!” she snapped back at him.  “More or less.  Are you happy now?”

No.  Actually, he wasn’t.  Because that translated into…

“So let me get this straight.”  He shifted in the seat so that he could get a good clear look at her face when he laid out his interpretation.  “Twice a week you pop a Disney movie on TV for the kids, so they’re happily oblivious to everything.  You dial up porn dot com on your laptop, watch people fuck, and do a little covert couch humping to get yourself off.  In the meantime, months go by without us having sex even once.  Do you see something wrong with this picture?”

Because he definitely did.  In fact, for each bullet point in that outline, Tony found himself getting a little more bent out of shape.  It had nothing to do with the kids.  He was confident that his babies were completely unaware of the situation, because Lilah would be vigilant about keeping it from them.  His beef was that she’d been vigilant about keeping it from him.

“You make it sound like I do it to avoid havin’ sex with you.”

His eyebrows shot up to his hairline.  “Yeah, that’s pretty much what I heard.”

“Then pick your ears, because that’s not what it is!”

Anger washed over him.  There weren’t many alternative interpretations to this scenario, but screaming that fact at her wasn’t going to help his anger or his injured ego.  His mind recognized that immediately, but if his mouth had a chance in hell of complying...  Tony closed his eyes and forced himself to breathe evenly for a slow count of five. 

She’s already defensive.  Yelling at her is only going to make it worse. 

It wasn’t much, but it afforded him the ability to then open his eyes and calmly request, “What is it then?”

Of course she didn’t answer the question.  That would’ve been too easy.  Instead, she did what she did best.

“I’d really rather not talk about this,” she deflected in place of a definitive answer.

He begrudgingly issued half a point in her favor.  For once, she’d admitted she didn’t want to talk instead of immediately shutting him out and changing the subject.  Right now, he wasn’t in a frame of mind to appreciate it as much as he probably should, but at least he recognized it.

“Too damn bad,” he told her flatly.   “Because, in case you missed the memo, this is part of what got us where we are.”

“It…”  One hand came up to rub the creases from her forehead, and her eyes briefly fell shut.  “I started to say it wasn’t, but maybe you’re right.” 

Oh, he was right.  Without a fucking doubt. 

Lilah let her head fall back to rest against the car’s seat, dully professing, “I do things that I’m not particularly proud of, and talkin’ about ‘em embarrasses me.  I figure you already think bad enough of me without givin’ you more fuel for the fire.”

Tony mentally declined the invitation to reassure her that he thought no such thing.  He remained stoically silent, banking on the fact that she’d eventually speak again just to fill the void.

“My… Ahem…  Humpin’ the couch, as you so eloquently put it, doesn’t require plannin’ and schedulin’.  It doesn’t depend on what kind of mood you’re in, whether I’ve showered that day, or if I have the energy to blow you.  It’s a tiny self-indulgence to get through the tediously exhaustin’ days.  That’s all.  There’s no reflection on you.  It’s just me bein’ selfish and lazy.”

“You got that right.”

She whipped her head around, her eyes round with surprise just before her lips flattened into a line.  The classic prequel to the Shield of Apathy.  “You gonna tell me you’re not locked up in that office, jackin’ off with your pasta sauce pimps?”

“Don’t,” he cautioned quietly.  “You don’t get to put up a wall this time, Lilah.  I’m the victim in this one.”

“I…”

“You what?” Tony pressed when she let that one word hang there, unaccompanied.  “You didn’t realize I might be offended you’d rather hump a couch than me?  Or that, if you’d made a little time to hump me instead of the couch, we might not have needed this trip to prevent a divorce?”

She took a moment before admitting, “Both.”

Her eyes reflected hurt and that pleased him in some sick way, because it meant she hadn’t put up the walls.  That was a victory in itself, and he wondered if they might actually manage to work through a problem.  That would be a new trick for them, so Tony strove to keep things unheated.

“I’m a guy,” he reminded her, hooking a finger under her chin when her gaze dropped.  “Guys enjoy porn, and I might like the chance to enjoy it with my wife.”

Her mind was working.  He could almost watch it happening.  She calculated whether or not he was pissed.  She weighed his sincerity.  She inspected her own actions for culpability.  She considered options for the future. 

“I might like that, too.”

Thank you, God!  They’d accomplished something without any silent treatments, slamming doors and threats.  Well, not many threats.

Tony leaned forward to touch his lips to hers, feeling inordinately optimistic.  “I eat better pussy than the couch, ya know.”

Her soft laugh warmed his face.  “Couches, chairs and the entire male population could all take lessons.  You are the master.”

The compliment was nice, but there were other thoughts vying for the forefront of his mind.  Thoughts that he wasn’t all that confident about expressing, because how bizarre was it that he was proud of them?

“Is it just me or was that another victory for ‘no bullshit’?” 

“I think it might’ve been,” was her thoughtful agreement.  

Honesty made things so goddamn much simpler.

Tell her about the house.

No.  Not now.  They’d waded through some of the shit that they'd let accumulate around them, and they deserved a break.  He wanted to take his faux-prude wife shopping for something that would cause her neck to break out in embarrassed blotches.

“So, it seems that I need to pick up a cock ring – or two.  Wanna go with me?” he invited with a smile.

“Sure.  If you tell me what a cock ring is.”