I'm Glad My Mom Died(74)

“Steven, I… quit therapy.”

I can’t believe the words just spilled out of my mouth like that, the words I was so nervous to say ten minutes ago. Maybe I just said them to say something, to fill the dead air. Or maybe I said them to take the focus away from church. Regardless of why, I said them and now they’re out in the open. I wait for Steven’s reaction. He stops rummaging through his bag to look at me.

“That’s fine.”

Really? It’s fine? I can’t believe it. This feels too good to be true. He opens his mouth to say more.

“You don’t need therapy. Not if you have Jesus.”





74.


STEVEN AND I ARE SITTING in one of the back pews of a Southern Baptist church in Glendale while a choir wails on a hymn. The hymn itself is whatever, but some of these women are downright stars.

Despite the talent of the choir, I’m sitting here with my eyes drooped half shut. This is the fourth church service Steven and I have gone to in a week. I didn’t even resist it. I’ve just been grateful that he’s not forcing therapy on me. Humoring what I imagine will be a very short-lived phase for Steven feels like a low price to pay in exchange for never having to see Laura or any other therapist hell-bent on ripping my narrative of Mom to shreds.

First we went to a Catholic church service, which Steven said didn’t feel right to him. Then we went to a nondenominational service in Hollywood, which Steven felt was too Hollywood. Then we went to the Scientology center, which Steven was wary of from the get-go but wanted to try just in case. It’s the Goldilocks and the Three Bears of churches, only GoldiSteven didn’t find one that was “juuust right” in the first three, so now we’re at church number four.

Steven seems genuinely engaged. He nods his head along with the sermon. He opens his notes tab in his iPhone to jot down scripture verses. He lifts his arms in praise during the hymns. Finally the service lets out. Hallelujah. This is the closest I’ve gotten to believing in God all day.

By the time we get home I’m ready for a glass of wine mixed with vodka, same as I’ve been doing for the past few months. Steven is going on about the service. I’m checked out until he says…

“And Jenny… I’ve prayed about it and I don’t think we should have sex anymore. I’m taking a vow of celibacy.”

“I’m… sorry? Excuse me?”

“Yeah, I just… don’t think we should be sinning like that anymore.”

My fingers clench into a death grip on my wineglass. Steven goes on.

“I prayed about it, and I really don’t think we should be having sex anymore. It’s a sin. I hope you’re okay with that.”

I’m… not. Our sex is the best sex I’ve had. I wouldn’t want to give that up even if my life was soaring in all the other areas. But it isn’t. My life is miserable right now. Sex is a reprieve. It’s where I lose myself. I do not want to give up this shred of silver lining in my life.

“What if I’m not?” I finally choke out.

I gulp the last of my winodka down and set my glass on the table as seductively as I can manage, letting my fingers linger on the rim of the glass just so. Fucking Marion Cotillard over here, don’t mind me. I lean over and start kissing Steven. He kisses me back, tentatively at first, and then passionately. Got him.

Pretty soon my hand’s on his dick. It’s hard. Real hard.

“Look how hard you are for me,” I whisper in his ear.

“Jenny, stop,” Steven says, his face flushed.

“You want me to stop?” I say in my best dirty-talking voice, which lands somewhere between curious toddler and whiney tween but still seems to work. I’m amazed at what a little horniness will forgive. I start to pull my hand away.

“No… no. Don’t stop.” Steven takes my hand and places it back on his dick. I unzip his pants, pull them off, and lean over to start giving Steven the blow job of a lifetime. I’m pulling out all the stops. I am living, I am giving, I am working it. There are blow jobs, and then there is this blow job. I’m sucking, I’m stroking, I’m whispering, I’m licking, I’m caressing, I’m giving it 150,000 percent. He cums in my mouth.

I pop up, proud and expectant, sure that Steven is going to announce that it will be impossible for him to not have sex with me. That he wants to, NEEDS to have it with me every second of every day. I’m just about to swallow with as much seduction as I can muster, when Steven starts to stroke his chin.

“Yeah, that didn’t feel right, Jenny. We can’t do that again. We really can’t do that again.”

There is such finality in Steven’s eyes that I know I’m getting nowhere near that dick for the foreseeable future. The cum slides out of my mouth and down my chin. It dribbles onto my lap. Dead in the eyes, I stare at him. What have I done?





75.


“SO WAS THERE EVER A good phase of your relationship with Mom, or was it always… how I remember it?”

I’m familiar with Mom’s side of the story, that Dad was “probably cheating” or “didn’t do enough for the family” or whatever the qualm of the day was. “Your father is lazy and incompetent, no other way to slice it. He’s a distant man with the emotional range of a potato.”