Mother of Necessity

Melinda greeted Cliff at the door with a smile, as she always did. She looked pretty, dressed for their date in a simple black dress, low-cut to show off a hint of cleavage, wavy chocolate-brown hair down around her shoulders, horn-rimmed glasses framing her face. But Cliff could see weariness in her eyes, the telltale redness of recent tears.

"Hey," she said. "I just need to turn off my computer before we go."

Cliff followed her into the house, worried. Melinda's place had always been unruly, ever since they'd started casually seeing each other. She lived alone with two boys, now both legal adults, and the state of the house said "teenagers" far more than it did "adult." Piles of clothing, their state of cleanliness undetermined, hung across chairs and lay in piles on the floor. In the corner, a stack of pizza boxes threatened to touch the ceiling. Two garbage cans overflowed with mounds of take-out cartons and empty soda bottles. Game boxes, shoes, and other forgotten articles made a minefield of the floor.

Melinda had carved out a small niche for herself in one corner; an immaculately kept roll-top desk on which she kept her aging Asus laptop. As she walked to her computer - expertly navigating the piles of debris in her fetching ankle strap heels - Cliff peered at the screen. Some sort of game seemed to be paused.

"What is that?" he asked. A great deal of virtual flesh seemed to be on display.

"Um, a game I like to play," Melinda said, moving hastily to shut it down. Cliff approached to look over her shoulder.

On the screen, half a dozen naked CG figures lay frozen in tableau: a young woman with dark hair, on all fours in a sunny living room. An older man, naked and erect, prepared to enter her from behind, as another stood in front of her, presenting his cock for her open mouth. In the background, two more men applauded as they looked on.

"What kind of game is this?" he asked.

He glanced over to see Melinda blushing. It was charming to him that a woman of thirty-six could blush like that.

"Tertiary Existence," she said. "It's sort of a relationship simulator. You create little characters, give them homes, jobs, relationships..."

"Orchestrate gangbangs, apparently," Cliff said.

"Ssh!" Melinda said. "My boys are home." She glanced toward the box-littered hallway that led to the bedrooms.

"So who is this girl, and who are these characters?" Cliff pointed at the screen.

"Ah... well, this is Michelle, and this is her nineteenth birthday party... and those are her brothers. And her father. And her uncle. They're... giving her her present."

Cliff blinked slowly. "And they let you do this in the game."

"Not exactly," Melinda said, calling up the menu and shutting down the game. As soon as the screen went black, she slammed the lid shut. "I downloaded this mod that lets you break the relationship rules."

"What, poor young Michelle couldn't find a boyfriend?"

"Normal relationships are boring," Melinda declared, shouldering her purse as she stood up. "Ready to go?"

"Sure."

Melinda called into the hallway. "Dylan! Justin! I'm going out!" Only muffled thumps of music and the sound of video-game gunfire answered.

She smiled sardonically at him. "They're fine."

"Great," Cliff said as they headed for the door. "Have you thought about where you want to eat?"

"How about McKinley's?"

"Oh," Cliff said. "So tonight's a fancy date."

"This is not a date," Melinda said in a firm tone.

# # #

"So I want to hear more about this perverted video game of yours," Cliff said as he poured wine into both their glasses. They sat at a dark corner table at McKinley's, which was only moderately busy for a Friday night. Cliff thought her skin looked radiant in the dim light of the tabletop candles.

"Oh, God," Melinda groaned. She stirred the remains of her butternut squash linguini around with her fork, color flooding to her cheeks again. "It's just something I play to amuse myself, okay? I don't like violent games, and I'm shit at puzzles. The game is my little soap opera."

He grinned. "A very incestuous soap opera, apparently."

"Yeah, well," Melinda said. "I'm a pervert. You knew it when we started this whole friends-with-benefits thing."

"I'm not judging. So what? You just have all the characters fuck each other's brains out, whether they're family members or not?"

"No," she said, a little defensively. "You craft your own story out of screen captures and journal entries you write. They all lead very rich lives. That just happen to involve lots of incest and depravity."

Cliff chuckled. "What sorts of depravity?"

Melinda looked at him, one eyebrow raised. "You seriously want to hear about it?"

"Sure."

She shrugged and sipped her wine. "Well... Michelle's father, Gerald, has been lusting after her since she turned eighteen. She's been parading around in tight little outfits and deliberately teasing him, thinking he won't do anything. And Gerard's ex-wife, Linda, she seduced their son Michael soon after he turned eighteen, one night after he came home frustrated from the prom..."

Cliff laughed. "Wow, they really do lead complex lives. Do any of them have normal relationships?"

"I don't do normal relationships," Melinda said quietly, finishing off her wine and holding out her glass for more.

"Yeah, I guess not," Cliff said, a bit ruefully. He'd been holding out vague hopes to get to the next level with Melinda for awhile, but she'd never seemed interested.

"It's just a fun escape," Melinda said. "I get to control the lives of little people who aren't me and make them happy. There's a little fan community, and my stories make other perverts happy."

Cliff furrowed his brow with concern. "How are things with you? How's the job?"

"It's a waitress job." Melinda shrugged. "I'd say it pays the bills, only it doesn't really."

"Are the boys helping out?"

"Justin got a job at the carwash, and I told him he has to pay rent, on account of him being twenty. And he does. He helps around the house when he can, but he prefers to be out with his friends playing sports. And Dylan just lounges around the house all day, playing video games."

"Not the depraved incest games?"

She giggled. "No, the depraved violence games. Totally different." She sipped more wine, a look of worry crossing her face, and fell silent.

"Melinda, is everything okay?"

"It's nothing."

He touched her hand. "Come on. You can talk to me."

She took a deep, hesitant breath. "I just have a payment coming up on the mortgage. It's overdue. I don't know how the fuck I'm going to meet it. The bank won't really work with me anymore. Ever since Gordon disappeared-"

Cliff only knew about Gordon through stories. Melinda's ex-husband, a gambling and drug addict. He'd run out a decade ago and left Melinda to raise her boys on her own. It hadn't been easy, but she'd done as well as she could.

"Melinda, if you need money, I can-"

"No," she said. "I won't take anybody's charity. I'll figure something out."

"It isn't a problem, Melinda. I make good money. I'd be happy to-"

"Okay, let me revise. I won't take your charity. It would change things too much between us. I don't mean anything personal, Cliff. I just can't owe you like that. I hope you understand. " She gave him a warm smile that nonetheless indicated she wanted him to drop it.

Cliff raised his hands in surrender. "Of course."

"If things get really bad, we can sell the house and go live with my sister," Melinda said. "I don't want to do that, and we'll probably all kill each other living in her apartment, but at least we won't be homeless."

"How is Beth?" Cliff asked. Beth, a high school friend of Cliff's, had come into his studio one afternoon for some photography. It was how Cliff and Melinda had met in the first place. Cliff had long harbored a crush on Beth, but that, too, had never gone anywhere. Somewhere in the back of his mind, cliff wondered if he was dating Melinda because he couldn't get to Beth. But he pushed that thought away. Melinda didn't want to get married again. She'd made that very clear. Cliff wasn't keeping her from anything.

"She's doing well," Melinda said. "She loves the nursing job. She keeps offering me money, too."

"Why won't you take help from her?"

"She's trying to save up for a house. She has a chance for an amazing future."

"And you don't?"

Melinda smile. "I just want to have a fun evening, Cliff, okay?"

"Sure. Sorry," he said as the waitress brought the check. "Will you at least let me buy you dinner?"

"I can pay for my own meal."

"Come on, Melinda. Let me do this."

Melinda gave him a mischievous look. "Well, you are getting laid tonight..."

"I'm willing to call that even."

She grinned. "Let's get out of here."

# # #

Later, as they both lay sweaty and breathless in the sweltering heat of her bedroom, Melinda sighed happily. "I needed that."

Cliff kicked the covers down to the foot of the bed and turned over to put his arm around her, taking a moment to admire the lean lines of her body: the slim waist, lean calves, breasts that fit perfectly in his hands. They had both kept themselves in good shape; Cliff from his jogging habit, Melinda from morning yoga and being on her feet all day at the cafe.

"So will you let me buy you an air conditioner as an early birthday present?" he asked, toying with one of her erect nipples idly.

She laughed and pushed his hand away playfully. "Stop trying to give me things. We don't have that kind of relationship."

"Friends give each other stuff."

"You give me good sex," Melinda said. "Which is no small thing. I get so pent up around here."

"It's from playing all those pornographic video games all night," Cliff said. "Anyone would get pent up."

"A woman can't have a sex drive? I'm living here with-" she snapped her mouth shut abruptly.

Cliff let the unfinished sentence hang in the air for a moment, wondering if he should pursue it. Melinda was examining the ceiling, her face cautiously blank, chest still heaving slightly from their exertions.

"What?" he asked at last.

"Nothing," she said, too quickly.

"No, c'mon, tell me. What were you about to say?"

"You'll think I'm horrible."

He shrugged. "Too late, I already think that."

She slapped him lightly. "Fuck you, Cliff."

"You can tell me."

Melinda sighed and sat up a bit, propping her head up with a pillow. She dabbed idly at the sweat on the freckled flesh of her chest. "I was going to say, I'm living with two muscular young guys who walk around half-naked most of the time."

Cliff waited to see if she was going to say more. When she didn't, he gestured that she should go on.

"It's just-" Melinda continued, speaking in a hushed tone even though the walls in the apartment were thick enough to muffle any sound. "Justin is in really good shape from all the basketball he plays, and Dylan's always been lean, and... they're both good-looking young guys. They remind me so much of their dad. I miss the dumb bastard sometimes, as much of a prick as he was. And when it gets to be a hundred degrees in here, the boys walk around without shirts on, sometimes in just their shorts and nothing else. And sometimes I look. And I like looking. I know I'm not supposed to think about them that way, but I still. I can't help it."

"I understand," Cliff said.

She looked at him hopefully. "You do?"

"I'm not judging you, if that's what you mean."

Melinda nodded with a grateful smile. She wasn't wearing her glasses, and Cliff marveled at how open and vulnerable she looked without them. "There's more. I haven't told anyone this."

"Okay," he said gently.

"Sometimes I dress skimpy, too, when it gets hot. Like, the smallest shorts I own and a really low-cut tank. And once this sundress I own that I'd never wear outside. But I'm not just doing it to stay cool. I'm doing it because I want them to look at me, too. Sometimes I go in to get Dylan's laundry and I bend down so that he could see down my shirt if he wanted. Or let him look at my ass. And I try to look to see if he's checking me out."

Cliff listened with interest. "And does he?"

She shrugged bare shoulders. "I think so. A couple of times. But he's eighteen. That boy would pop a boner over an open milk carton. Because he looks doesn't mean he would-" Melinda stopped talking, rubbed her eyes. "Do you think I'm terrible?"

"Not at all," Cliff said, stroking her arm with a fingernail. "So, this explains the fascination with that video game..."

"Yeah," she said with a grin. "I'm a filthy pervert."

He drew her close. "I knew there was something I liked about you."

As they kissed, Cliff felt the beginnings of a plan forming in his mind.

# # #

The next day, Cliff texted Melinda's sister Beth to arrange to meet for lunch at a riverside coffee shop. He chose a secluded table on the back deck, where they could speak with relative privacy, ordered for them both, and waited.

She arrived exactly on time. That was Beth: punctual and precise. He waved as he spotted her walk onto the deck. Beth was a head taller than Melinda, athletic and blonde. She had the same shapely hips and full breasts, with a tighter stomach and more muscular arms. She wore capri pants and a sleeveless tank, glossy hair pulled back in a high ponytail. He felt a pang of attraction: he still found her as alluring as he had in high school.

"Cliff!" She kissed him lightly on the cheek and sat down opposite him at the glass-topped table. "I haven't seen you in forever."

He slid a cup across the table. "Soy latte, your favorite."

"Well, aren't you sweet," Beth said, pushing her sunglasses up onto her forehead. Her eyes narrowed in mock suspicion. "What is it you want?"

Cliff scowled. "A man can't call up a high school chum without an agenda?"

"Not when you're boning her sister," Beth retorted with a smile. "Don't waste my time. You didn't text me just to catch up."

"Yeah, I didn't," Cliff said, taking a nervous sip of his coffee. "I have something awkward to ask you."

"Does Melinda want to get me in a threesome? Because if so, I could possibly be convinced."

Cliff choked on coffee, nearly doing a spit-take. Beth watched him with detached amusement, smiling coolly.

"Really?" he asked.

"Maybe," Beth answered. "But let's talk about your thing."

"Okay," he said, thoroughly disarmed. "Actually, it's sort of related. This is kind of awkward for me, so could we not joke around for a minute?"

"I'm all ears," Beth said, crossing shapely legs.

"Last night Melinda and I had dinner, and when I went to her house, she was playing this video game."

"Tertiary Existence?"

He started. "You know about it?"

Beth nodded, blonde ponytail bobbing. "She got me into it for awhile. You can share characters and create collaborative little story lines. But I had to quit. Work and night classes. Why?"

"Well... her story lines seemed to be-"

"Incredibly perverted and full of incestuous sex?"

"So you know about that."

She flashed a grin. "Oh yeah, I knew. She was obsessed with it. Her boys know about it, too."

"They do?"

"Oh, yeah. Few secrets in that house. She'd ask them for suggestions. I'd go over there and they'd be talking about it. Those boys have some fertile imaginations."

"Huh." Cliff turned his coffee cup idly in his hands, thinking. This was all going easier than he'd thought, which was in itself intimidating. "So, okay. She said something else, too. About how she'd occasionally think about Dylan and Justin, in ways that were-"

"Something a little more than motherly." Beth sipped coffee. "She told me about that one night, after Justin turned eighteen. She said she'd look at him when he was working in the yard, or sometimes walk around the house in a towel to see if she could turn him on. I think she really liked the idea of arousing them."

"You don't seem to have a problem with it," Cliff said.

Beth shrugged. "Melinda's had a hard life. Her job sucks, and when she's not working she's stuck in the house with those boys. I guess I could see how it could happen. They're good-looking guys. Dylan especially. Justin's a little too rough around the edges for my taste, but Dylan's a tasty morsel. And yeah, I know he's my nephew."

Cliff nodded, thinking. He waited so long, Beth finally tapped his hand with a forefinger.

"Why are you asking?"

"Do you know how she's doing financially?" Cliff asked. "She seems to be worried."

Beth nodded. "There's a big payment on her mortgage. She has nothing. Her car's about to fall apart. She can make groceries every week and keep the lights on and that's about it. She'll probably lose the house unless something happens."

"And she won't take your offer of help?"

She laughed. "Christ, no. Not money. She's incredibly stubborn about accepting money for nothing. I'm surprised she agreed to live with me if she loses the place."

"Why does she have such a problem accepting help?"

"Sweetheart, that's a question that would take much longer than a lunch hour to answer. Let's just say it comes down to our early family life and our parents' ideas about social welfare. They fucked us up pretty hard."

"Do you know how much she owes?"

"As a matter of fact, yeah."

Cliff leaned his elbows on the table. "Do you suppose, if someone offered her money but asked for something big in exchange, she'd go for that?"

"What sort of 'something big?'"

"I have a crazy plan," Cliff said. "If you're interested in being a part of it. In terms of money, time, and... scheming behind your sister's back."

She grinned. "I'm intrigued. And interested."

# # #

The next night, just as the sun fell below the horizon, Cliff parked his Lexus on an outlook on the north side of Weaver Park.

Melinda sat next to him in the passenger seat, hands in her lap. She wore a camisole top and a short black skirt, her hair up in a messy bun. "Wow, I haven't been parking since my high school days."

Cliff shut off the engine. Dim red light from the sunset flooded in through the windshield. "I wanted to talk where we could be alone."

"I hope you're not thinking about popping the question, Cliff."

He laughed, even though the preemptive rejection stung a little. "No. It's not like that. I have a business offer for you."

She half-turned toward him, unfastening her seat belt. "Okay?"

"This is kind of sensitive, so I don't want you to get offended."

"Well, that's a sure way to get me to relax."

He grimaced. "Sorry. Okay, I'm just going to blurt this out and see where it goes."

She looked at him expectantly, a patient smile on her face.

"So, you know I have a lot of wealthy clients in my photography business."

"Sure."

"As you might expect, some of them have some... exotic tastes. And occasionally they make some discrete requests of me. Things I can't share with other people."

"Uh-huh..."

"I have one such client right now. He's looking for a... particular kind of erotic photography."

He paused, waiting to see if she would stop him there, if she would object or get angry. She simply waited, hands in her lap, listening intently.

Cliff continued. "He has a preference for photos of... family members. Together. Nude photos. And he's willing to offer a sizable sum of money for them. They wouldn't be made public or go on some website somewhere. They'd go in his private collection and stay there. And I wanted to see... if..."

He trailed off. Melinda stared at him in silence for a long time before speaking. "And you want me to... pose? With one of my boys?"

"I want to see if you're interested. I can understand if you're not. It's kind of an awkward-"