Last Train to Sweatyville
“Hey Hon, how `bout a ride on the old bone roller coaster after you put the kids down for the night?” He is smirking, a big silly grin stretched all over that sweaty red face of his. That's my Bob, he loves his little sayings.
Of course it could be worse, Bob's also fond of doing the `sofa slalom' and the `horizontal mambo'. He loves to play `hide the salami.' Those aren't as bad as the ones he makes up himself though. He's most proud of a little phrase he coined one weekend when the kids were with a sitter and he was feeling particularly inspired.
That night we were playing the strict nurse and the incorrigible mental patient. (I was the nurse in case you're wondering.) So here we are, running around the bedroom in full get-up no less, (costumes Bob rented special just for that particular fantasy, which, just let me say was his, not mine.) I'm chasing him, (not very enthusiastically, I have to admit,) and yelling, “Mr. Rosenthal, I said it's time for your medicine.”
Finally he lets me catch him and just as we're getting down to business he yells, “All aboard the last train to Sweatyville!” and just starts going for it.
Now I ask you…Sweatyville? How am I supposed to react to that? It was a turn off, that's what it was. But the fact that I lost interest didn't stop old Bob, he just kept goin' at it like a house on fire. He's single-minded, Bob is. Once he gets going on something, he'll finish come hell or high water. What an asset that kind of dedication could've been in the courtroom…but I'm getting ahead of myself.
See, the strict nurse and the naughty school girl and beautiful bare-breasted spy and the harem girl who turns out to be a dominatrix in disguise- I didn't sign on for any of that. I know some people go for it and maybe I could too if it was a once in a while kinda thing but like I said, Bob's single-minded. I never dreamed of all the kinky things you can do with a can of whipped cream and a bull whip before I said `I do.' Not to mention all the inventive ways to get carpet burns. No, I was dreaming of romance…
I thought our future would be gilt-edged and gorgeous. I imagined spontaneous getaways to Paris, sunny months in Spain and weekends in a cozy bungalow by the beach. I dreamed of candlelit dinners, dozens of red roses, and dancing `till dawn, high on expensive champagne and our love for each other. I guess I was kind of a romantic. But it all seemed so possible back then.
I was just a poor girl when I met Bobby Barney Mahoney Jr. Or maybe disadvantaged is a nicer word. Anyway, I didn't exactly come from the right side of the tracks and Bob did, (at least to hear his Mother tell it, anyway.) I knew I'd be marrying up in the world when I accepted the ring he was holding behind his back in that big, beefy, sweaty palm of his.
When he brought it out, the little crushed velvet box it came in really was crushed, and soaking wet too. That's another thing about Bob- he's a sweater. It could be forty below in the Arctic Circle and he'll still be sweating like a pig, God love him.
So he's down on his knees to me, proposing, and I didn't care that you could've wrung a pint of sweat out of the box the ring was in because the ring was so beautiful. Almost half a carat and I knew how he probably had to scrimp and save to get it. It touched my heart, it really did. Also, I was pregnant. But that wasn't why I said yes.
I said yes because Bobby Mahoney was going places in the world and he promised to take me with him.
He was in his first year of law school when I met him, at a mixer at my room-mate's friend's cousin's sorority. The sorority wasn't one of the nicer ones, either. I don't know if all the sisters that pledged there were color-blind but let me tell you, even on my end of town turquoise with purple is a no-no. Turquoise with silver, maybe, but not purple.
I noticed Bobby right off the bat because he stood out from the crowd. All the other guys there were getting plastered and falling all over themselves, shouting and grab-assing and acting like a lot of fools. Bob was just standing there, quiet as could be, leaning on the back of this repulsive Indian print couch, a little red in the face but otherwise looking completely sober. That attracted me, I like a man who can hold his liquor.
I'm not the kind of girl to be shy- when I see what I want, it's as good as mine. I'm motivated that way. So, I went over and introduced myself and he was very polite if somewhat sweaty when he shook my hand. We got to talking and when I found out he was a first year law student, you could've knocked me over with a feather.
See, all my life I've been fascinated with the law. When I was a kid, when other girls my age were playing barbies and house I was playing lawyers and judges. As a teenager, I never missed an episode of LA Law. These days, I'm a confirmed Court TV addict. I even took a few Paralegal classes in business school and I made straight As, too.
So Bob and I started talking about the law and before you know it, three months later he'd convinced me to do the `salami slither' only he wouldn't wear a condom `cause of his Catholic guilt and before you could say, `I object, your Honor', I was, to put it nicely, `with child.' But I didn't mind because I knew Bob would marry me and as soon as he finished law school and made partner our beautiful life of romance would really begin.
So we got married and I worked hard to support him so he could finish law school since after he married so `beneath his social station' as his Mother put it, his parents cut off the financial aid. But I knew it was only for a while.
Six months before he graduated, though, we got this hysterical phone call from Mother Mahoney. Seems Bob's Dad had a minor heart attack and he can't continue to run the family business on his own or it will kill him. Or anyway, that's what she said. I can still hear her now…
“Bobby, dearest, consider how we've scrimped and saved to put you through law school,” she says, completely ignoring the fact that for the last year and a half it's been me working two jobs and raising a new baby on top of it (and little Horatio was no piece of cake to raise, either- what a screamer) to put her darling boy through school and we got not a dime from them because I'm just white trash not fit for their son.
Not that I am bitter, you understand. I'm just saying… Anyway, “Bobby, it's you duty as a son to come home and help…” Well, you get the idea.
Six months he's got, just six months to finish but can she let him wait? No, he's got to come home right this minute, or it will be the death of his beloved father. So Bob, being the Mama's boy that he is, drops out of school and comes running.
That's how I found myself married to an insurance salesman with a house in the suburbs right across from my in-laws, three kids that need constant supervision (every one diagnosed with ADD, I swear) and a husband who loves to `act out' his fantasies.
So about a week ago I get a call from Bob's doctor, Dr. Jansen, that is. He says that Bob's stress test came back abnormal, a possible blockage and they want to do a heart cath pretty quick. In the mean time, Bob should be careful not to get over excited or do any stressful activity.
“You know what I mean, Mrs. Mahoney,” he says to me and boy do I ever. At first, all I can think is, Thank God, I have an actual excuse not to go along with his craziness for once. But as I hang up with the doctor, something else occurres to me.
I go into the hall closet to think it out, (it's the only place the kids can't find me.) I'm thinking hard about what the doctor said and what comes to mind is the insurance policy Bob took out on himself the year before. To prove he has trust in the product he sells, you know. He's always telling prospective clients how he believes in the insurance he sells so much he's got a two million dollar policy himself. (He only took out fifty grand on me though, he doesn't mention that.)
So, I get to thinking and what I think is, two million dollars is a lot of money. More than enough for a person to move away from their annoying in-laws, hire a nanny and go back to school full time. Maybe even law school, who knows?
I've been thinking about it for a while and so tonight when Bob comes in and asks about a `ride on the bone roller coaster,' I just smirk at him and say,
“Wait `till I put the kids down, big boy.”
His face gets even sweatier if that's possible and it's not long before the kids are tucked in and I'm wearing his favorite outfit, the whore-nun from Bangladesh.
“I wanna be on top tonight,” I say and Bob is willing, after all, it's the first time in a long time I've showed any enthusiasm for his little games.
“All aboard!” he yells as I climb up the side of his haystack belly and find my seat. He starts to move and it's like a riding a bucking bronco, (more like a bucking whale.) Like I said, Bob really goes for it. His face gets red, then redder. He sweats like there's no tomorrow (and maybe there isn't) until I'm actually in danger of slipping off.
“God, Baby, you're hot tonight!” he gasps, puffing away like a bull with asthma. As his face begins to turn a very unnatural shade of purple I smile.
“That's right, Bob, I'm hot,” I tell him.
It's the last train to Sweatyville.