The Master Swim Team, Volume II
Chapter Four: One Beer...
Bill circled the block again.
What am I doing? he wondered, as he pulled out of the parking lot of Maverick's and drove up the road. It was almost half-past seven and the sun was setting out over the water, casting a warm glow on its shimmering surface. He had already passed the restaurant three times.
It wasn't that he didn't want to see Geoff again--quite the contrary--but when John had broken things off with him the first time, he had thought he had put the whole cheating on Mary thing behind him.
But then came summer, and like a stranger riding into town at sunset, John walked back into his life. Just like that, all those emotions he had thought he'd let go forever came rushing back. Only this time, Dennis was involved, complicating the already complex feelings he had toward the man. Bill knew that walking down that path again was a mistake, but it was one he had no choice but to make. And now, just as it had the first time, it had ended. This time, it was his own doing, but that didn't make it any easier.
Go home, a voice said inside his head. It was the voice of the man that still loved his wife. He knew he should listen to it. Breaking things off with John was a good place to stop all of this cheating nonsense before his infidelity caught up with him. But that feeling deep in his gut reminded him that the last time he had tried to be intimate with that woman he loved so much, she had shut him down.
He pulled back into the lot for the fourth time as the memory of that night played in his mind. They had just gotten into bed--Bill had been naked, as he always was when he slept, while Mary had decided to be modest, as she often was those days. They lay there as they always did, exchanging their final thoughts of the day. He liked those moments next to her; they helped him unwind before he drifted off. For some reason, on that night, he wasn't tired, and the vision of his imperfect wife--Mary wasn't as skinny as she had been when they'd met in high school, and her body hadn't seen a proper summer sun in decades--before him stirred something in him. He reached forward, his finger sliding into her waistband, and began to run his finger through her pubic hair. She didn't pull away immediately, as she had done the last few times, so he allowed himself to grow, anticipating he might finally get some relief. He slid his hips toward her and gave her panties a little tug. As he did so, Mary retreated. Without a word, she rolled over and faced the other way, shutting him off. Frustrated, Bill slid his cock into the gap in her thighs and thrust until he came. Mary hadn't made a sound, and Bill wasn't entirely convinced she hadn't slept through the whole thing.
Somewhere along the line, the relationship had grown stale, which in many ways was more depressing to Bill than his failed affair with John. They'd been together since high school, after all, and even if there was a part of him that Mary could never fulfill, he still wanted things to work out between them.
As he reminisced, a knock came on his window. Bill jumped a bit, startled by the sound. He turned away from his unhappy memory and saw Geoff looking in the window at him. He took his hand off the wheel and pressed the button to lower the window.
"They don't allow beer out here," Geoff said casually, as if they were old friends.
Nerves swelled up in Bill, and he muttered, "Right." It was too late to bail now. He pressed the other end of the button and rolled the window back up. He turned the car off, opened the door, and stepped out. "Sorry, I'm late," he said, apologizing nervously as he walked alongside the other man. "It's just, I don't do this very often... well, never really. Just the once with John."
"What?" Geoff asked, turning toward Bill. "Drink? Life's a lot more fun with a drink."
Geoff had the most piercing blue eyes, Bill noticed. They were worn but kind, as if he too had known his fair share of disappointments, and they looked at him through a pair of oversized glasses that were far too ordinary for the cool-guy façade Bill knew the man to present. He liked this everyman look better.
"No," he replied, smiling, cooling off a bit. "Well, you know what I mean."
"John told me all you wanted was a beer. Said you could use a break."
"I thought..."
Geoff reached for the door. "You thought what?" he asked, raising an eyebrow. "That we were going to have sex? I'm a married man."
Bill stopped in the open door. Even just hearing the word sex out loud in public was awkward enough for him, but to hear it said directly too him was too much to bear. His face flushed red, and he began to second guess himself again. "I'm sorry. I... maybe I shouldn't have come." He took a step back. "I'll just go."
"Relax," Geoff said, stepping toward him and grabbing his shoulder. "It's just a beer. If you've had enough of me after that, you're free to go home to your sexless marriage."
Bill's jaw dropped and he started to protest. "I--" He stopped. The grin on Geoff's face spread from ear to ear, and suddenly he was falling into those eyes again. "You're joking. Of course, you are."
Geoff nodded. "You'll get used to it soon enough." He wrapped his arm fully around Bill's shoulder and ushered him inside.
* * * * *
"I don't think I knew you were married," Bill said. He was sitting across from Geoff in a booth at the back of the restaurant. Televisions and sports memorabilia lined the walls, covering every inch so thoroughly that the hodgepodge of clutter almost seemed tidy. Leggy blondes in thin strips of tight fabric that barely constituted clothes carried platters of beer and wings to men who could be their fathers; the men gawked as they came and went. It was a sight that made Bill uncomfortable, even if he thought them pleasant. "That is," he continued, "before John mentioned you were having some difficulty."
Geoff took a sip of his beer, not at all bothered by the atmosphere. "He told you about that?" he asked, his eyes wandering as one of the waitresses walked by.
"Not really," Bill gushed. He feared he had said something he shouldn't have. "Only enough to get me to agree to come out with you."
"Needed a little convincing, did you?" Geoff said slyly. "Our time together on my boat wasn't enough to do the trick?"
"Oh, it was great," Bill assured him, the memory of his back on the table, the blue sky above, Geoff gazing down upon him as he took him for the first time. "I just... I have this thing about cheating on my wife. It seems--"
"Wrong? I know what you mean. You'll get used to that, too."
Bill swallowed and stopped picking at the label on his beer bottle to look once more in Geoff's eyes. "What if I don't want to? Get used to it, that is. What if I just wished everything was the way it had been in the beginning?"
"When you were trapped in a sexless marriage sneaking peeks at dicks in restrooms?" Geoff offered.
"He told you about that?" Bill gasped.
Geoff shrugged.
Bill let out a sigh. "I need to stop telling John things."
"You really should," Geoff agreed.
"What I meant was, I want things to be the way they were when we first fell in love."
"Don't we all? Nobody would ever cheat if things stayed that way forever."
"I suppose you're right," Bill responded, taking another sip of his beer. He pondered the thought a moment in silence. "What's the point then? If we're all destined to grow apart while simultaneously being stuck together, how do we possibly ever find some semblance of happiness?"
