Chapter 2: Jeremy

If I were to die suddenly and somebody finds this journal and actually reads it, the one thing I would want them to know is that I tried to have a normal life. I tried. It just didn’t work out that way, in my case.

I tried to fit into society, lead a regular life. I married Debbie, a very pretty actress from our local community theater here in Rockville, Maryland. I first saw her on the stage of the Rockville Civic Center during a mime performance. She looked just like Marcel Marceau, in white leotards and black suspenders, with white powder on her face and black eyebrows drawn above her eyes. She moved with such fluidity and grace through the silence, creating an invisible wall with her hands, climbing an imaginary flight of stairs, holding a balloon and being picked up off the ground by the wind and flying away. I was enchanted with her from the first moment I saw her.

I finally got up the nerve to give her my card while she was leaving the theater one night. We discovered we had some things in common. Like Debbie, I had a degree in drama and an interest in the theater. Though a few years ago I’d given up on the idea of being an actor, I respected her desire to keep at it. I emotionally supported her need to be an artist, despite never being able to gain recognition for her work outside the suburbs of Maryland or make any money at it. She appreciated my support and I think that’s what initially drew us together. We started a relationship and several months later we were married.

You could make an argument I’m a rather nice catch for a single guy. I’m in excellent shape and I’ve been told I’m attractive. Due solely to my Dad’s efforts, I’m also rich. My father’s successful Neurosurgery practice as well as his savvy real estate investment in a large upscale high-rise condominium here in the heart of Rockville has made our family extremely wealthy. Eventually, my Father transferred ownership of the building over to me, and the rental income from the property brings in more money than I could ever hope to spend. Debbie was a struggling actress who needed to be financially supported in order to practice her art and I needed someone to love and take care of to feel worthwhile inside. So it seemed like a good match, at least at first. I became the typical doting husband; my only concern was for her happiness.

Looking back, I know now that I smothered her with my affection. I was very well cast in the role of the boring husband. I was constantly nervous around her, always at the whim of her ever changing moods and demands, running out to do various errands or buy things for her to make her happy. I stopped exercising and let myself grow quite soft around the middle, while she jogged five miles a day and seemed to grow lovelier each day. I changed her ashtrays like an obedient butler and kept her clothed in the trendiest styles. After two years of marriage, I could tell she viewed me as nothing more than a piece of unwieldy furniture that always seemed to be in her way. The more I loved her, the more our marriage grew stale and withered.

I’ve always wondered if the breakdown of our relationship had to do with sex. I always thought we had a fairly healthy sexual relationship. I’m not sure what is considered normal by society’s standards, but we usually had sex at least once or twice a week. I was very attracted to her and would do everything and anything to satisfy her in bed, but usually she preferred the basics, with me on top.

I often worried if I pleased her as much as she pleased me. I always tried to hold back on my ejaculation for as long as I could so she could experience her pleasure, but there was always a point of no return for me during sex, if you know what I mean. I always secretly felt I had let her down after letting go and ejaculating inside her into my condom or onto the pretty smooth skin of her belly or cute breasts...

When the end of our marriage came, my wife was in final rehearsals for yet another community theater production. It’s sadly ironic that there was this rich shallow husband character in the play, very similar to me. The basic plot involved Debbie’s character being unhappily married to her husband, cheating on him with another man and plotting with her lover to murder the lout in order to collect the insurance money. They are caught and arrested by a detective in the end, of course. I must apologize for the rather conventional plot of the play. Rockville is a suburban bedroom community of Washington DC, and I’m afraid that’s about the best we can do here, as far as the complexity of our theatrical productions go.

Around this time, a traumatic event in my life occurred, which I don’t wish to discuss in this journal, now or in the future.

Soon after it happened, I called Debbie on her cell phone, but the call went directly to her voice mail. Normally, I would never interrupt one of her rehearsals, but I felt a particular need to see her at that moment, so I drove over to the Civic Center. When I entered the darkened lobby of the theater, it was odd none of the actors in the play were present and the lights on the stage were dim. I thought perhaps the rehearsal had ended and everyone had already left. I was also about to leave when I smelled the pungent aroma of marijuana and heard muffled noises coming from the stage of the theater.

As I walked down the center aisle of the auditorium, I discovered my wife taking the “Method” acting technique to a new level, lying in a bed on the actual stage set, her legs above her head, with her co-star rutting into her, rehearsing. You may find the image mildly humorous, a tawdry affair between two community theater actors really getting into their parts. I might find it somewhat funny too, if it wasn’t happening to me.

What was it like to see my wife getting fucked by another man? It felt like my heart was ripped out of my chest and squeezed between two fists until it burst. We had this huge dramatic argument in the stage shadows. My wife was humiliated and apologized, of course. She gave a rather lame justification for their dalliance. After the rehearsal ended, the director suggested the two actors do an improvisation to create chemistry between them that would allow their relationship as lovers to be more believable on stage. They had gotten a little carried away, apparently.

“So you actually had to let this guy fuck you so you could know what it feels like to have an affair?”

“But the director said—”

“I don’t give a shit what the director said!” I yelled, my voice echoing through the empty theater. “Your character murders your husband at the end of the second act. Are you going to buy a gun and kill me now so you know what that feels like too?”

“That’s not the same thing!” Debbie cried out, grabbing her bra and panties.

“You fucked another man! We’re married! You cheated on me, Debbie! You betrayed me!” I shouted after her as she exited stage left.

When the actor disappeared with Debbie back stage, I got a good luck at him. He was younger than me and much more muscular. It was clear he spent a good portion of his time at the gym, since I could see the veins bulging out of his forearms. It only made the knife twist deeper in, knowing he was in much better shape than me.

Debbie didn’t return home that night. Early the next morning she came back distraught and collapsed on the living room couch, exhausted. I felt angry and hurt. When she woke up late in the afternoon, she lit her first cigarette of the day. Debbie felt guilty and apologized profusely. I know she felt terrible about cheating on me. It only happened once and she never meant for it to happen, she claimed. After the first cigarette, she lit another.

We tried to make another go of it. She tried to be affectionate to me, kept asking for my forgiveness. I just couldn’t get over her betrayal. I shut down emotionally, stopped talking to her. We tried to hold on, but our marriage became like a dying carcass we dragged around the apartment. I never made love to her again after seeing her with another man.

A few months later we separated. My lawyer initiated the divorce proceeding and I paid her a generous settlement for her short time we were together in our marriage. No kids thank goodness, only a kitten which she got custody of. The divorce became official just last week. I guess I should’ve tried harder to get over the affair and forgiven her, but I couldn’t.

Since my Mom moved away to live with her younger sister, I’ve lived alone in the palatial estate my Father left us in his will. My dream was to leave Rockville too and head for California. I’ve had this fantasy of driving across the country and going directly to the tallest snow covered mountain outside of LA. I would hit the slopes in the morning and then drive down the mountain two or three hours west to the nearest beach, rent a board and surf all afternoon until the sun set. Of course, it’s just a fantasy, but it makes me happy to think about it. The truth is I’ll probably never leave the suburbs of Maryland. No wonder my wife had an affair and fell out of love with me. I am a pretty boring guy, I suppose.

But then, while puttering around one day, I came up with this crazy idea of creating a Harem in my house with a Pleasure Room, stocked with goodies. I raided the inventory of adult toys, accessories and lingerie outfits at our local sex shop on the bad side of town, buying everything I saw. Everything else I needed I bought online. Maybe I did go off the deep end a bit, but I think it’s safe to say that Jeremy is a boring guy no longer.

I thought it couldn’t hurt for me to try something new, to indulge in this fantasy of being sexually involved with more than one woman at a time, rather than being so fixated on one person. Maybe I’m still recovering from the shock of my ex-wife’s infidelity. Even after a year, I still think of the moment I saw Debbie on the stage with that actor, hundreds of times each day. I don’t know how she felt about me, but I was in love with her. When she had sex with that actor, something inside me died back then. Is seeing your wife with another man something you can ever actually recover from? When you’ve been hurt like that, can you ever get over the feeling of betrayal and start a relationship with someone new? I don’t know. I’m not a psychiatrist. But I thought if I created a Harem, at least it would force me to interact with other women again and I might finally be able to let go of what happened.

Also I had these repressed fantasies I’d kept hidden all my life of tying a woman up to a bed and kissing her all over her body. It always aroused me thinking about it, late at night. I’d never done it before, not even with my ex-wife. Perhaps I could meet someone who was also secretly into bondage and domination and explore this side of my sexuality. It was worth a try, to break me out of this funk.

I met confidentially with a lawyer and told him what I planned to do. After he raised his eyebrows somewhat disapprovingly, he wrote up a simple contract to have the participants sign before joining the Harem, to protect me from being sued. Also the women could read the contract, to see if the Harem idea would suit them, before trying it out. The only real rule on the contract was that I wanted them to wear sexy lingerie around the house. We could just be friends, or if they were attracted to me, lovers. If they were into B and D, we could play some sexy games. They could come and go from the Harem whenever they liked.

God. Now that I’ve written this down on paper, I must sound like a real pervert. I suppose I am. Go ahead. Lock me up in a mental asylum and throw away the key. Anyway, for better or worse, this is exactly what happened.

I worked out heavily for a couple of weeks, running on the treadmill, doing push-ups, sit-ups and lifting weights. I had to get myself into the best shape of my life if my plan had any chance of working. After all, who wants to be involved with an overweight gigolo? I started dropping the pounds. When I was feeling better about myself physically, I set my plans in action.

On a Google search I found this website called Adult Friend Finder, which seemed to be just what I was looking for. I posted a message on it that I was looking for unmarried women between the ages of 24-34 who were searching for non-exclusive alternative relationships and uploaded a picture of myself. I was surprised when I got a few immediate responses. After chatting back and forth by email, I was able to set up a few discrete meetings at the Starbucks at Wintergreen Plaza on Rockville Pike. I thought it was a rather safe location to meet, in order to offset the general sleaziness of what I was proposing. But the first two women never showed up for their appointment. I emailed them, but they never responded again. I think they liked the idea of flirting over the internet, but felt afraid of actually meeting me. As they say, the third time was the charm and Cynthia came into my life. I hadn’t uttered a word to another living soul for over three months until I met her at Starbucks today. But if I wasn’t paying attention, she would’ve slipped out the door before we even had a chance to talk.