"His name is Olu Shango and he lives to fuck and breed white women," Dave said then paused for a moment for his words to sink in while he took a swig of his beer. He wiped foam off his lips, cupped a fist to his mouth and belched, then pushed his glasses up the ridge of his nose before continuing. "He's from Nigeria. He works in immigrations, and he's got plenty of clout to do whatever he wants with foreigners like you and I that enter the country."
"Exactly what do you mean by 'whatever he wants'?"
"Think of him as king of his own slice of jungle. When it comes to women—white women—he can hook up with just about any that crosses his path. Don't ask me how he does it except I know this for fact. I've seen him in action—you saw him in action with me the other day. What did you think?"
Howard smoked his cigarette. It was early evening and they were sharing a table outside a bar not far from their neighbourhood. Howard had wanted to offload the mountain of crazy thoughts percolating in his head that had been on his mind all morning and now further enhanced by the latest circumstances regarding his secretary's subtle attraction.
Howard had driven home and observed something intuitively different about April. There had been a certain bounciness about her that never had been when he left for work in the morning. Insomuch that he was curious to know what, he still harboured the weight of discord they shared with regards to conversation. The invincible wall existing between them still got them ignoring each other, though he was starting to feel the problem a major fault on his part for keeping it up. He still found it hard ignoring the revelation April had opened up to him regarding her secret salacious life with Jenny. It hurt just contemplating that image with her being his wife. And now with this strange character Olu Shango veering into the picture he sensed things were only beginning to get complicated as he felt himself drawn towards wanting to find out more about him and of whatever benefit, however morbid it might be, that he could gleam from whatever Dave had to share regarding his cult personality-type hold on him and Jenny.
"The way he fucked that blonde, I thought for real he wanted to rip her apart or something," Howard reflected. "Who was she by the way? Not some prostitute I hope."
"No way. Shango doesn't do prostitutes," Dave answered earnestly as if the mere thought of his Master fucking a hooker was abhorrent to even imagine. "Besides, why would he when he's followers in the city and across the state who'd turn their wives over to him even without asking. You've no idea the sort of man that he is."
"Is he some New Age cult guy?"
"This has nothing to do with any of that, Howard. Come on, get with the program here."
"Well, I did see you suck his cock, so that tells me pretty much a lot," Howard paused to glance around before leaning closer to continue. "My God, Dave, really?"
"That's the least of what I'd do for him," Dave said, unfazed by what his friend had said. "If he asked me to lick his toes or drink his bath water, I'd do that too; any cuck worth his salt would." He sipped his beer.
"Did you say 'cuck'? What's that mean?"
"You've never heard the word before? A Cuck? As in cuckold?"
Howard shook his head. Dave shook his head in dazed surprise then lit himself a cigarette.
"You can look it up online if you care. There isn't really a definitive term for it, but basically a cuckold is when a man lets his wife screw around with other men. That's a simple definition of it. But now I've said that I can tell just what you're thinking already."
"Yeah, what am I thinking?"
"You're thinking that sounds like infidelity, am I right?"
Brain conceded by throwing up his hand. "Every time I think about the stuff April told me, that's pretty much what I feel. She really went all out and cheated on me."
"That's what you want to think but you're far from the point," Dave explained, but he stopped to suck on his cigarette and scratched an itch on the end of his nose before continuing. "When it comes to cheating, the wife—in this case, April—never would have told you what she'd been doing. She'd have carried on with never once knowing. That's where it differs."
"But she did cheat," Howard emphasised stubbornly. "Twist it however you want Dave, the fact is she never told me about it beforehand. She and Jenny had been going on about this God knows how long before her conscience decided to come clean about it."
"It was not that long. Come on, you're making it sound like she'd been at this with Jenny going on a year now. And whatever makes you think she never before tried telling you but clamped up because she was afraid?"
"I don't know. But I probably would have respected her more, sort of, if she'd told me this was what she wanted before she went out and did it."
Dave could not hold back his sudden burst of laughter. "Listen to yourself. You want to tell yourself that but you know you don't believe it. But what I mentioned about the meaning of the word cuckold, that's a straight-forward way of looking at it. When it comes to what's underneath the surface there's a whole lot more to it than that."
"What're you talking about?"
"With some couples it ain't about letting the wife go out and bang whomever she wants regardless of whether or not he's white or black—for couples that swing, it's never about how much meat the guy has got but that the couple just want to share. Sometimes it's about the husband wanting to be submissive to her and her lover the way you saw me with Shango."
"You mean that part of you—"
"Yes, that part," Dave stressed and smoked his cigarette. "Jenny and I started out as swingers, as I've told you before: she'd have fun with another husband while I'd have fun with that same husband's wife. It was really fun except work and everything else got into the mix and we sort of stalled before we'd even realised. But even back then, I loved nothing but to watch her having fun a lot more than I had mine. You get where I'm heading?"
"I guess," Howard said, still soaking up his friend's revelation. "You're saying you craved watching her fuck more and didn't care too much about getting yours."
"That's right, but we both preferred black men and still do. We got invited to a swinger's party in Vegas and that was where we met Shango. That night just sort of sold to us whom she ought to be fucking."
Howard heard what his friend was saying and still was not sold on a lot of things.
"We keep coming back to this Shango character, and I still don't understand what sort of magnet he's got on you. I mean, besides him fucking married women, what else makes him so special? I still don't get the benevolence thing."
"You probably won't if you keep looking at it the way you are. And me sitting here explaining stuff to you I know won't do either. How about you meet with him? I'll bet he can help."
"Help with what? And who said I need any help? Only help I need is making April quit from doing all the crazy stuff you and Jenny sold her on."
"I hear you and maybe Shango can help with that, too. You'll never know."
They had themselves one last round of beer before calling it a night. Neither had bothered bringing a car and also it was a perfect evening to share a walk back home. Dave counted off several anecdotes regarding the mystique that was Master Shango as they strolled back towards their separate homes. Howard listened to every word, undaunted that he was getting more intrigued and curious about this mystery man. He soon realised too late that he had forgotten to bring up the subject pertaining to his secretary but afterwards thought it wise that he had not. For now he wanted that to remain his best-kept secret till he figured what to do about it.
They came to street junction and they shook hands, said good night to each other and then Howard crossed the street towards his home while Dave continued up the street towards his. Howard got to his home and let himself inside and felt somewhat chagrined when he saw he had the living room to himself, yet he did not feel like retiring to bed early. He went into the kitchen and filled himself a glass of water and brought it with him to the living room and sat down in the comfortable darkness and drank his water. He thought of his secretary Becca. He thought of the kiss she had planted on his lips, especially how long it lasted, followed by the inviting pair of eyes she gave him afterwards.
The lights came on and Howard was startled to see April standing halfway in the living room in her night dress.
"Aren't you coming to bed?" she asked.
"I will in a minute. Soon as I get done drinking this," he indicated the glass of water in his hand. "Why don't you go on up, I'll catch up with you soon."
If he thought that was going to get rid of her he was mistaken. She ventured into the living room and propped herself on the arm of a chair waiting on him. Howard felt the need to snap at her to leave him alone except he could not bring himself to do that. April looked to him like she would not mind sitting there waiting for him to finish his glass of water.
After what felt like a long moment of silence she said, "One thing I want to know. Are we going to resume talking like regular couples again or are you going to keep avoiding me like this?"
"Who said anything about avoiding anyone?"
He meant to sound humorous but the inscrutable look April gave him meant either she did not get the joke or did not seem to care.
"What I meant is I'm not avoiding you. I'm just wary of you."
"And why are you wary of me?"
"Come on, April. Quit punishing me for tonight, okay? I'm really not in the mood."
"I'm not in the mood either. But it looks like between us right now there seems to be one adult in the room. Actually I should be the one saying that I'm wary of you. Which is sad because really I'm not. I'm far from being wary."
"Oh yeah, well then tell me what you've got on your mind then. You can tell me since you're so very good at that."
"I don't want to fight with you, Howard. It's pretty late and if we did only we'd end up waking Carl and the neighbours and that's something I don't want. What I'm saying is I understand I hurt your feelings and nothing I say is going to make up for that. But maybe I can do something to loosen your strife."
"What are you getting at, April?"
"What I'm saying here, and God knows this is hard for me to admit, if ever you want to do some sort of adventure away from home. Something to sort of make up for the pain I've caused you, then, I'd like you to go ahead and do that."
"This is a joke, right?"
She shook her head.
"You're offering me some sort of hall pass to screw around while you're busy screwing around? That what you're saying?"
"Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying."
He fell silent, contemplating her offer, not wanting to believe what he had just heard. Howard laughed afterwards but April didn't join in instead continued staring at him waiting for him to say something.
"You can't be serious," he said eventually. "With everything that's going on with you, this is the best solution you can think of? You and I out there screwing whoever we want like a pair of out-of-control horny idiots? Do you know how crazy that sounds?" he felt like exploding in anger and probably would have except April's demeanour remained calm and never once took the bait.
"Is it any crazier than us sitting here pretending all is fine when we know it's not? You're the one who's avoiding me, not the other way around."
"Look, for the record, I'm not avoiding you, okay. You've gotten my head locked in a daze since that night and I'm still trying to get my head around it. Now here you come making an offer you know I won't like, trying to make us into a replica of Jenny and Dave. Don't think I don't know what you're doing, April."
"Can't you just understand that I'm not doing anything I wouldn't expect you to do, Howard," April choked on her words as finally she could not hold back her emotions any longer. "Why is it that you're afraid of me? Why can't you try and see things from my viewpoint instead of only yours?"
"Because I know your viewpoint enough already. Jenny's spoiled your mind and given you a hankering for black dicks which according to what you said last night you don't intend giving up no matter what I say. I truly get that. But now you're trying to rope me into your crooked fantasy life and if that's your game then please deal me out of it. I'll rather wait till whenever you get your senses back."
April left the arm of the chair and came and sat beside him. She took the glass of water from him and held his hand with both of hers.
"Do you remember a couple of nights ago when I could not sleep. You asked me what was wrong and I asked you if you still thought of me as being sexy. Do you remember?"
"I don't know, I probably do. What about it?"
"You told me I was sexy. Later I told about how I wanted something more and do you know what you then said to me?"
Howard shook his head.
"You said, and I'm paraphrasing here, 'we all want something more. But don't try and force it; just let it come to you.' Those were your words exactly."
"I was sleepy at the time. What has any of that got to do with now?"
"I'm not saying it does. Maybe it doesn't really mean anything, and yet maybe it means a lot of things. I just think you should think about what I proposed and give it a try. If anything, you can decide not to do it. I just don't want Carl thinking we're avoiding each other for some reason." She tapped his arm then stood up. "I'm going back upstairs. You coming or do you still want to remain here?"
"You go on up," he said. "I'll be up in a little bit."
She took his glass and went and dropped it in the kitchen sink before returning upstairs. Howard's eyes followed her till her shadow slipped from view and all that was left was the sound of her feet climbing up the stairs. Howard sat in reflection, especially about the peace offering free pass she was giving him. He could tell she was serious about it. As he sat there thinking about it, the image of his secretary floated like a lit bulb before his eyes and it raised a smile on his face as he pictured her without wearing any clothes.