I have always been very polite and respectful to the woman next door. I'm not sure exactly what ethnic background the family is but it was obvious that it was one that deferred to the matriarch. And that woman was one of the most dictatorial matriarchs it has ever been my misfortune to encounter.
She ruled her little family with a rod of iron. What she said was the final word in all things, and she had a lot to say. She liked to spread her influence around the neighbourhood, laying down the law in all directions.
She liked me because I was always so polite and respectful of her opinions, unlike a lot of others. She never seemed to really notice that while I agreed with her every pronouncement, I still went off and did things my way.
She had three children, two boys and a girl, and they all seemed to firmly under Mummy's thumb. Even though the youngest, Maria, was nearly twenty, they all still lived at home, though the two boys were now engaged to Mummy-approved young ladies. I assumed that they would be moving out of the house once married. For the future wives sake, I sure hoped so.
It turned out that Mummy had a problem. Maria, her daughter was still a virgin. To my surprise she turned to me to discuss the matter. She explained the problem like this.
In the ethnic culture from which she came, a woman was supposed to initiated into sex by a fairly close relative or friend of the family. The problem the woman was facing was that Maria's father and brothers were too close a relationship and she had no other family members nearby that she could call on.
Accordingly, she had looked around at friends of the family and her eye had fallen on me. I was old enough (about thirty) to be experienced, was properly respectful of women (I appeared to obey her dictates) and wouldn't insist on carrying on an affair with Maria afterwards (Mummy considered me a playboy type) or want to marry her (I wasn't rich enough).
After Maria was properly initiated, Mummy could look around and choose a husband for her. Would I be kind enough to help out her Maria?
Maria, nineteen, nearly twenty. Cute as a button and very nicely stacked. Virginal. (That last surprised me. Probably too scared of Mummy to lose her pants.) Would I be willing to initiate her into the joys of womanhood? I suspected I could force myself.
Then came the bargaining. Mummy thought that since I would be having sex with a virgin I should pay for the privilege. I pointed out that as she wanted me to initiate Maria, she should pay for my services. Mummy pointed out she could arrange to get someone else to do the job, possibly fly out a relative from her homeland who would conveniently take himself away afterwards. I pointed out the cost of flying the relative in and out and putting him up for a few days.
At the end of it all, by sticking firmly to my position, Mummy agreed to pay me five dollars for my services. Hey, it may not be much but it was the principle of the thing.
The next Saturday afternoon Maria came waltzing in with an envelope bearing a message for me. She was to wait for an answer she told me. The envelope contained my five dollars and a note. I was to keep Maria for the afternoon and teach her what she needed to know. And for once, Mummy had chickened out. She hadn't actually told Maria what she had planned. She'd let me do that. Thank you, Mummy!
So there was Maria, sitting innocently on my couch, waiting for a reply to the message. My eyes flicked over her, taking her in. She was slender but shapely, and that very nice shape was currently clad in a flirty skirt and a loose top that dangled off one shoulder, revealing a red bra strap. And it was now my job to tell her she was going to be screwed.
Leaning back I considered her. How the hell do I broach this subject?
"Tell me, Maria," I said. "Do you know much about your ethnic heritage?"
"Not much," she said with a laugh. "I leave that all to Mum. I do know that she says the women rule the roost, so to speak and we're all supposed to obey her. She makes that very clear."
"Has you mother mentioned marriage customs to you?"
"Just that she gets to choose our partners. She's picked a couple of mice for the boys, but she's going to have to do a lot better than that to pick a husband for me."
"Did you know that's she's started looking?" I asked. "Or I should say she will start looking as soon as one little cultural problem has been resolved."
Maria groaned.
"Well, I can tell you right now, unless I approve of them I'm not marrying anyone she selects. And what is the cultural problem she needs to resolve."
I smiled at her. "Your virginity. Apparently your mother believes that you can't get married and do right by your husband unless you've been properly initiated into sex."
Maria was looking at me, shocked.
"And how do you know that?" she demanded.
"Easy. Your mother told me and hired me to relieve you of your virginity."
I sat back and waited for the explosion. It didn't take long in coming. Who would have thought that a sweet little girl like Maria knew such language. To sum it up, I was informed it would be a cold day in hell before I got a chance to have sex with her. Not only were my services not wanted but they weren't needed. She wasn't a virgin, no matter what her mother might think.
"OK," I said.
Maria looked at me, taken aback.
"What do you mean, OK?"
"You've refused my services. I'll just let your mother know and that will be the end of it."
"Oh." Maria considered this and the ramifications.
