Salvation on a small scale
There is the concept of the hooker with the heart of gold. That is pure drivel. But the concept that all prostitutes are reprobates without a moral center is equally nonsensical. Prostitution is a decision which is informed by economics, as much, if not more, than anything else.
But you know that, right? And you know that a hungry sixteen-year-old is not going to think twice about the choice if it provides the ability to fill a belly when there are no other viable options. So why the kid is hooking is not exactly a fucking mystery. Why she doesn’t have a family to provide for her, will, I am sure, become clear soon enough. But if Jecim thought there was an issue I needed to fear in that area, I have no doubt that she would not have pushed for the solution she requested.
The girls do go to the clinic as I requested. That was ten days ago. I haven’t touched either of them in the intervening hours. What I need to know, at the moment, is how well the two can coexist here, without friction, before I change anything else.
I have also been thinking about what I need and want. That isn’t as simple as I thought in one way, and very simple in another.
What I don’t want is love. I don’t believe in it anymore. It is a term without real meaning. Love is a lie. The need for safety, now… that is real. The need for compassion and caring is real; of offers of compassion and caring, as based on benefits to be received. These are security, stability, safety, solvency, dependability, pleasure, and the ability to achieve long term personal goals.
There is a calculus in relationships that survive. There is a calculus in why they end. I can see that very clearly now. Love, as some suggest, has nothing to do with it. It is short hand for, you meet my needs, for now. It means nothing more than that.
There is no fucking way in the world that I am going to believe it means anything more in general and I, sure as hell, am not thinking it means much at all when uttered by a kid of sixteen years.
Jomar, the PNP officer, thinks it’s OK if I take his niece to my bed. I suspect it’s because he believes that her economic prospects are better being my mistress than they are in any other possible scenario open to the girl. He may be right.
Jecim saw the danger in the possibility of my taking an older companion. She knows I will not limit myself to one person now. That the concept of trusting that ‘one’ person is not something I will ever do again. So what does she do? She gloms on to her school friend. Then she is less at risk, and maybe she hopes that I can and will limit myself to two companions. She sure as hell didn’t require Jezryl to be tested as she wanted Zenny tested.
It is a reasonable assumption on her part, and she may be correct. Maybe she hopes that by including Jezryl as a sexual companion, it will put to an end my resistance to bedding her. In that she is right. I have already come to that conclusion though I haven’t said a word to her about it.
There remains the open issue of whether Jezryl is here for the long term, or until her belly is full for long enough that she feels confident to move on.
In that, I don’t really care. I will enjoy her for as long as she stays and be OK when she moves on. I no longer think of any relationship as being ‘forever.’ They aren’t. And if both girls move on, it will not surprise me and it will not hurt me. I will enjoy them while they are here. That is all.
I am not building my hopes and dreams around them. My world does not depend on them, nor does it depend on any one person. I guess if I was an extrovert, I might need a coterie of associates and loved ones from whom to take sustenance. I am anything but that. I have always been a solitary person. The guy who could disappear behind a stack of forms, papers, numbers, and books. Now I disappear behind a block of wood.
At the moment, the block of wood in question is a nice highly figured chunk of Amboyna, the burl of Narra wood. I think I can make some beautiful figurines from it. Others might have chosen to use it for a table top, or wall sconces, but this chunk of wood is art, in and of itself and that which comes from it should be art as well.
I am thinking of visual jazz. Take a form, a recognizable form and find a way to stretch it and transform it, while at the same time, still honoring it. When we hear it, yes that is jazz. I am not sure what to call it when we do that with sculpture, but it is what I want to do with this wood.
And so, while the girls figure out their dance moves within the confines of the sanctuary that is my home and the world it represents for them, my mind, my heart, my passion, is encompassed by, and pulled into, this block of wood.
I work on it from early each morning until the light dwindles around five in the evening. The girls don’t allow me to do things such as clean up the shavings, and so I retire to the bedroom, wash up, shower and change into fresh clothing. I come down each night for supper at six.
They have jazz playing for me, a beer on the table, and my plate set out. They may have already eaten or will eat later. I eat alone. The house is quiet, peaceful, and my countenance is relaxed. It may not be the way Filipinos like to live, missing the noise and hubbub of their preferred world, but this is now my world, and it is mine alone. I do not share it with a wife. I do not make compromises. It is how I want to be.
Tonight, once dinner is over, and my plate is cleared, at Jezryl’s suggestion, while I remain in my dinner chair, I receive a “chair massage.” Jezryl did it the first few times but she has been getting Jecim involved. The two work in tandem. To say that I like it, is to acknowledge the obvious.
Following the massage, I move to my easy chair in the Sala, where the girls bring me a warmed glass of good brandy. Filipinos drink brandy over ice. I find that a crazy custom. Brandy, just like its upper class version, cognac, should be warm when imbibed.
Speaking of cognac, all cognac is brandy. It comes from a specific grape, the white ugni grape. In Europe, it not only has to be of that grape, but from the Cognac region of France. No such rule regards the region exists outside of Europe. Cognac is typically more expensive than is Brandy. The funny thing is I don’t like cognac. I prefer the Spanish brandies far more.
And so, with warm brandy, good jazz, and a foot massage on feet that have been freed of my indoor sandals, I relax. A pasha, a potentate of my domain.
Eventually, all this gives way to a book I am reading at the moment, until the hour of nine and time for me to retreat to the bedroom and bed, alone.
The thought does come across my mind. What am I waiting for? I could have taken Jecim any of these past ten days. I gather that Jezryl’s tests have come back negative. She is disease free.
They know it too. They know that it will be my choice. That I am not pawing them, not drooling, and grasping, has the benefit of giving me the power, and removes it from them. Let them stew a little longer. The first one I take will be Jezryl. I want Jecim to feel that fully. When I take her, I want it to be one of total and unquestioned submission.
Maybe I will start tomorrow. Maybe.
Speaking of tomorrow, I need to make a trip to the pharmacy, the Mercury Drug store. I have no idea if I will run into Zenny. If I do, maybe I will ask her to add some condoms to my purchases, just to tease her or tick her off. In any case, she is not on my shopping list.
But now it is time for bed, and rest.
Mornings start earlier for me here than they did back in the States. I am up here at about five thirty each morning as the sun brightens the bedroom. By six fifteen I am drinking coffee downstairs. By seven I am out on the terrace with my wood. These days, my walking stick leans up against the wall waiting for the opportunity to impress those who will encounter it as I walk past them.
Today, the trip to the pharmacy is too far for a walk. I need to drive there and so my good friend will hold the wall up in my absence.
But I have two hours with my precious wood before I leave for the pharmacy. Inside the small block that I have cut from the larger chunk, I will find the form that strives to exist in the world. It has not come out yet, but parts are close to the surface. That form needing to be released is there. I can sense it. I can feel a tingling in my fingers as they move over the surface.
But the time arrives and I put her down. Yes my wood seems to contain a ‘her.’ That is how I think about her.
And so, I put her down gently, on a soft cloth, clean myself up, climb into the car and drive down the road. I live on a small lane off the main road, but there is only one main road.
About the main road… This small island has a mountain in the middle, the road is circumferential and it is called Biliran Circumferential Road. On one side is the ocean and the other the mountain. (There is one road that crosses the high country and it does end, or begin, in Naval. But if you are shopping, you won’t take it. It goes up to the falls and that’s nice.)
Naval is a small piece of land on a small island. The population is a little less than fifty-five thousand folks within forty square miles. Naval is pretty much square, six miles by less than seven miles that leans a bit. Much of it is high country with small populations. So leaving the house is only a question of which way on the road.
Driving on the road is a slow affair and I reach the pharmacy in ten minutes. Neither to my happiness or despair, I do not see Zenny. I approach the counter, display my senior citizen card, my booklet for authorized purchases, my prescription, and a debit card from my bank.
The pharmacy assistant, a cute girl of maybe in her early twenties, takes it, looks at the paperwork, looks briefly at me again, a very brief smile crosses her lips, before asking me how many pills I want.
I’ll take ninety, three months’ worth, please.
Yes, Sir. Just a moment, Sir Roland.
OK, so she got my name off the script or the card. That is to be expected. There is no other customer in the place. The assistant returns, hands me the senior citizen slip to sign. Her name tag says Myra. I sign and hand it back to her. Thank you, Myra.
Yes, Sir. Sir, you know you are the talk of many here?
No, I am not aware. I have no idea why I should be the subject of anyone.
It is Zenny, Sir. She say you are a good man but have weird tastes and weird ideas.
I see. Well, Zenny is a tabi1.
Yes, Sir, but I admit I am interested. Maybe I will like it?
Like what, Myra? The music?
Everything.
I see. Are you single?
Yes! Of course yes. And no boyfriend, Sir! I live with my sister. There is no problem, Sir. Maybe you think I look OK?
I think you look very nice, gwapa.
Thank you, Sir!
So you want to come for supper?
Very much yes!
Well, if you really think you like weird, bring a bag with you. OK, so that is uncalled for, uncouth, and unfair. But she was the one who pushed the ‘I like weird’ shit and I don’t really want another night like I had with Zenny. Better to stop her in her tracks right now if I can, in case she is just faking it.
Yes, Sir. That was my plan.
Good. So I guess I need a few condoms as well. Why don’t you pick out the ones?
She giggles and goes about doing exactly that. I guess it is going to be an interesting night.
I am amused, amazed, at the same time not amazed, and a little irritated that it took a wife abandoning me to see reality for what it is.
I get home long before lunch time, so after putting things away in the bathroom and bedroom, I return to she, who has been waiting patiently, to be released from her wooden cocoon.
I wait until lunch to give my pair of girls the warning, instructions, and guidance, regarding how I want the evening to go. The results are interesting and instructive.
Jezryl, thinks the whole thing is a blast and she is all for it. Jecim, is pissed, scared, and freaking out. I allow her to vent for a good few minutes. I am going to say something, but it isn’t required. Jezryl does it for me. It tells me a little more about how Jezryl is ordering her world.
Friend! Don’t be stupid. You and me, we his girls! This Myra, she his plaything for the night. She a whore he don’t pay for. He just feeds her. Maybe we like her, maybe not. We like her, good. We not like her, she not stay. We his girls. We the ones who make him happy. He know that. Why you not know this? I don’t care who he fucks. It only fucking. I like it when he fuck me, cause I like to fuck. But I don’t care if he fuck another. That OK. He ours.
Jecim looks at her friend and looks like she wants to cry. But she turns to me and only asks, Is she right?
Yes. So long as you want to stay, you are my girls. Myra is not.
Am I here forever?
Forever is a funny thing. I had a lifetime warranty on a watch once. It died after five years. I filed under the warranty for a replacement. It was a lifetime warranty. right? Well, the company told me the lifetime for that watch was five years. You are here now. And unless you start causing me problems I will not ask you to leave. If you never leave and I never ask you to leave, then in the end, you and I will agree it was forever. For now, yes you are my girls.
What you ask us to do, you making it hard on this Myra to think she has you to herself?
Yes.
OK. OK, I do it.
For the afternoon ‘she of the wood’ holds my undivided attention. I am not giving the girls or Myra any of my time. She wants out and I am trying carefully, so as not to nick or hurt her, to get her out of that which she tells me is a prison. She wants to feel hands on her. She wants to feel the ocean breezes bring moist air to her. She is not patient, but I must be. It is slow and careful work.
As the light dims, I have no option but to disappoint the girl and put her down on the soft cloth to await the morning, once again.
Up in my room, I shower, shave, and dress. The bedroom is in good shape. I would have made sure of it, but my girls have done it for me.
Dinner tonight is not the ham and potato dinner of last time. I have taught them how to make baby back ribs just the way I like them, along with my own bbq sauce recipe. I have also taught them how to make coleslaw to my liking, and hushpuppies. It will be a beer night, as I can’t conceive of wine with this.
I told the girls to get some of the small cloth dish towels, wet them down and put them folded on plates by both table settings.
Jazz is playing and all is ready when Myra rides up on a motor scooter, a small bag slung over her shoulder. She is not wearing a helmet. Instead, she has a scarf under a ball cap. The rest of her is encased in white shorts and a very thin see through red blouse over a black bra.
I am in the Sala, in my easy chair. The girls meet her at the door. They take the bag that probably has her overnight things from her and ask her if she would like to freshen up. She does and they escort her upstairs to my bedroom and leave her there with her bag. I want Myra to come down when the table is already set and waiting. I tell the girls to call her to come down only then. That happens, as she comes down at just the right time.
When she does come down, she is in a flowing red diaphanous skirt of the same material as the blouse. Her black panties are in evidence. If she is trying to make a point, she has.
At maybe five feet, she is taller than are my two girls. She is seated at the table and I join her.
Sir, I am prepared to eat something I have never eaten before. Am I going to be right in that?
I have no idea. You will have to tell me, once you are served.
I had understood you had one maid. But I see two. Did Zenny report incorrectly?
Zenny reported what she saw. The world is not a static thing.
Yes. This is true. She also said that the maid was not a mistress. Is that true?
If you are asking me if the maid who was here when Zenny was here, was then or is now my mistress, all I can say is that there is no mistress in this house. Discussing this further is improper, and I don’t intend to make an exception tonight. All else I will say is that Jecim and Jezryl, keep this house as I want it kept. And to that extent, they are here as long as they do that and they want to stay.
This music… what do you call it?
Jazz. This is jazz.
It’s nice. Not evil. Fun to listen to, I think.
I am happy you like it.
At this point, as we dig into our ribs, slaw, and hushpuppies, I have the girls behind us. Jecim, is massaging my shoulders, Jezryl is doing Myra’s. I get a curious look from Myra. I ignore it and pay attention to the food in front of me.
My instructions are for them to keep their hands active. To grab the towel when needed and clean a chin, or fingers on occasion, but to be connected the entire meal.
If Jezryl senses that Myra is OK with it, she is to expand the scope a bit and give a breast a squeeze, a cheek a stroke, her temples attention. Jezryl thinks the plan is genius and works it to the hilt. Myra may not be into girls, but Jezryl has her squirming in her chair as the meal progresses.
For Jezryl, sex is a physical thing. And she loves it. It seems that it doesn’t matter if it is a boy or a girl. For her it is play. I have heard her express that to Jecim a few times. Now I see the proof of the claim. But it was what she had said to Jecim, which gave me the idea to do this in the first place.
What do you call this?
Oh, it’s a hushpuppy. Do you like it?
Yes! The cabbage, what do you call it? It is very good.
Coleslaw. I am glad you like it.
I like everything, including the attentions of your girl. Why are you doing this?
To see if you are just talk or if you really will be a good companion for me.
How I doing?
I don’t know we have just started.
1 - Gossip [Cebuano].