**AUTHOR'S NOTE** This is dedicated to Hot Lemon and his mythical mechanical mistress. Enjoy.
**Martin hung up the phone and set his cup of coffee down on the kitchen table as he pulled up a chair. This was going to be the hardest thing he would ever do. He scratched his pockmarked face and wondered where to start. "Mindy, I need to tell you something," he started.
"Certainly Martin," she said with a soft, warm voice from the other chair, "what do you have on your mind?"
"Please don't say anything, just let me say this all the way through okay? You know that Edith and I have been seeing a lot of each other and we have grown to be friends, well more than friends really. Last night we sat up all night, just talking....and making plans. Edith is going to move in, and I think that is a good idea," he raced through his words.
"Wonderful, it will be nice to have another girl around the house," she enthused. "We can make you breakfast and get you a beer when you want one. We could even take turns warming the bed for you. Oh this will be fun!"
"No Mindy. You don't understand. Edith is moving in tomorrow and you can't stay here anymore."
"Oh, I see," she looked down at the table for a moment, then she looked up with a smile. "I know. I will just spend the evening straightening up the attic. I can stay up there and I will be out of Edith's way, and you can come and visit me when she isn't home."
"For the last time Mindy, you have to go. Edith won't let you stay, not in the attic, not in the basement, not in the garage. Edith won't live with me if you are still here. Understand?"
"Yes," said Mindy, "I understand completely," she said with resolve, "You are going to keep me in your office, just like at the company Christmas party last year. I can check your spelling, answer the phone, and get you coffee. Oh this will be fun!"
"Mindy, I, uh, I sold you to Larry."
"So this is a Title Transfer," she said in a deep, hurt voice.
"I'm sorry Mindy. This is the way it has to be. He gave me twelve hundred more than I would have asked for, and I really need the money now that I am going to marry Edith," Martin clamped his mouth shut as he knew he had said too much.
Mindy sat and stared at the middle of the table with a vacant look. She sat back on the chair and straightened her shoulders. Martin always liked when she did this, as it made her pert breasts strain against her blouse. With her hands she flung back the errant strands of long
blond hair over her shoulders and looked Martin right in the eye. "Are you sure you want to do this? You know it will never work out with Edith. Oh sure, you'll get married and things will roll along smooth for a year or two, but things will start to get a little tired, hell, she might even squeeze out a whelp or two just to keep you tied down, but she will always own you. Always. And she could never do the things I do for you, even on her best day. The Title Transfer program takes
fifteen minutes to execute, do you really want me to do that? Well do you, Martin?!"
Martin fumbled with his glasses, looked up at the clock, and furrowed his brow. "Not yet," he stammered, "I'll have a drink and we'll just talk awhile." Mindy pulled her tall slender frame to it's full height and walked with a subtle grace to the kitchen cupboard and her high-heels on the wood floor made a familiar and comforting sound to Martin.
"We're all out of vodka, but there is a little bit of scotch and a full bottle of gin. What's yer poison?"
"Scotch, neat, and a tall one." The bottle
glug-
glugged behind him as he tried to think of a plan, a story, a reason, that would make what he was doing seem alright.
"Are you hungry? I could make sandwiches in a jiffy," she offered.
"No, just come and sit down," Martin said. She came back to the table and set down his drink with soft touch, then turned the chair around and straddled it like a horse. The motion showed her long pale legs to their fullest. She spread her arms across the back of the chair and rested her chin on them. "A penny for your thoughts?" she suggested after a long moment of silence.
"Mindy, I, where do I start?"
"You could start with the fact that we have had six years together, six good years. You could tell me about all the good times we've had, like the night the power went out, or the time we were snowed in for New Years Eve, or even the time you forgot your mother's birthday and I had already mailed her a card and a gift? Any of those would be nice. If you aren't up for any of those, what about the time we spent all weekend on the Gallo proposal and I helped you land the deal because you pointed out to him that congratulations was spelled with a T, not a D, but only after I
corrected you. Or the time your sister was having a baby and you couldn't make it back from Atlanta in time and I was the one who held her hand as she gave birth to Martin Jeffery
Glanzman. Any of those stories would be nice. But," she pouted,"you tell whatever story you like."
Martin took a long pull at his drink and he let the numbness wash over his tongue. At no point was this going to be easy, so he took another pull and plunged ahead.
"Mindy, I'm so very sorry-"
"Well if you are so fucking sorry, don't do it for
fuck's sake!"
"Mindy, please don't swear. It doesn't help and it isn't ladylike."
"What do you care? You've already sold me to the pervert down the street. By this time tomorrow I'll have every hole filled with God knows what and screaming 'Spank me daddy' or some such thing. You've got your
meatbag of a woman now, what do you care?"
Martin was stung to the core. She had never acted like this before. She was always so gentle and kind, soft-spoken and demure. Martin began to sob, he rested his face in his hands and cried like a child. "I need Edith," he blubbered, "I need a wife or I will never advance in the company. You should hear the cruel jokes they tell at work when they think I can't hear. It's horrible! And Mindy, Dear God I love you, but I want kids! I want a family, and-and a wife. Can you understand that? Please tell me you understand!"
"I understand Martin," she said in a soft voice, "
Initiating Title Transfer Sequence."
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The telephone was ringing loudly and whoever was calling just kept calling back and letting it ring. Larry rolled over on the unmade bed and wiped the sweat from his face with a dirty T-shirt. "Would you get that baby?" he said as he lit a cigarette.
"Sure thing Master," Mindy cooed.
Her leather chaps
squeaked as she walked across the room to the phone. "Hello, Larry Haven's residence. May I ask who is calling?"
"Mindy, Thank God it's you! It's Martin. Edith and I had a big fight and we called the whole thing off. Tell Larry I'll pay him whatever he wants, but I have got to have you back!"
"One moment please," Mindy covered the
receiver with her hand and said, "It's a Mr. Martin on the phone for you. It sounds urgent."
Larry smiled a
mischievous smile and said, "Leave the phone off the hook and come back to bed."
"Yes Master." Her chaps
squeaked again.
Doc
(I am sorry for the
coarseness of this story, and I promise to keep the course language to myself from here on out.)
(Yeah, right.)
A dear friend of mine, Hot Lemon, has been inconvenienced. He has had to pick up and move, which is no minor inconvenience, but he was fortunate to have two very, very good friends. They not only helped to pack things up and transport them, but drove cross-country to do it. (N.Y.-Fla.) Not only that, but then they drove him and his things back to their place and took him in.
