Guy Talk

This is the sequel to Girl talk, published on the 18th. If you haven't read that one first, this one won't make too much sense. This is another short one, because it details just one conversation.

*****

It's pretty warm today, in the upper 80s and humid, with a few clouds in the sky and the possibility of thunderstorms later this afternoon. Hi, I'm John, and I'm out at Tates Creek Country Club, playing golf with my buddies, and law partners, Paul, George and Ringo.

Yeah, with our names, Ringo's real name being Richard, we've been called the Beatles ever since we took up as friends. There's even more of a connection, as Paul's wife is named Linda, and George's last name is Harrison.

We've been doing really well in our professional lives. George was already doing work for the horse farms around Lexington, and as we started talking about forming our own firm, he suggested that if we specialized in all of the things the multimillionaires in the racing industry needed, we could make up a dynamite company, raking in some big-time fees. So, we formed Equus Law nine years ago, and it didn't take long before our firm really took off. We took the decision to keep just us four as attorneys, though we've done well enough to have three paralegals and four secretaries working for the firm. We pay above average salaries to our staff, which has kept our people loyal, and has given us a high quality of applicants from which to choose when we did need to add staff.

And by high quality, yeah, that means attractive staff, as well as smart and talented.

Anyway, Saturday morning was our regular golf time, having a reserved tee time at the Country Club of 10:15; we've had that for almost four years now, and standing reservations is hard to get. One of the things we had to do was, beyond being Country Club members, commit to our time and give advance notice of at least Thursday afternoon if we couldn't make it. Sometimes our wives don't want to understand: we have to keep our tee times!

Golf for us is great. We get to discuss our cases and what we need to do with the firm in a more relaxed setting, plus we're all competitive on the course. With the exception of Ringo, we're all pretty evenly matched, and he's only a shade worse than the rest of us; Ringo has won the day more than once, but he has to be on the absolute top of his game to do it. He wasn't at the top of his game today!

At any rate, we were on the eleventh tee, having discussed pending legal work, the newest paralegal's work, and looks, and, of course, politics. George and I were Republicans, and voted for Trump, while Paul and Ringo, though they thought she was a poor choice, voted for Hillary. We ribbed each other about politics, but we are all still friends. Then, kind of out of the blue, Ringo asked, "Do you guys ever wonder if the girls are screwing around on us?"

Wow! That was one Hell of a question! Our wives were all friends as well, drawn together by our friendship, and the odds were pretty good that they were all at Paul's house, right now, lounging around the pool, drinking wine coolers and working on their tans. The pool was pretty private, and ever since Linda had egged them on last summer, the girls all tanned topless, which was a pleasant surprise for us!

"Wow, man, I don't know," I said. "At least Jane has never given me any reason to think that she was, but, Hell, who can ever be sure? They certainly have the time to mess around, if they ever wanted to. Of course, Jane works, so that keeps her in an office from nine to five, and that restricts her time more than Linda's or Joan's, but it also means that she's going to meet more men."

"I know, Gail works, too, and the same thing: she's going to meet more guys, even if her time is constrained."

"Well, shit," George chimed in, "I guess that Joannie could mess around if she wanted to, because I certainly don't have the time to check up on her, and she's hot enough to attract other guys."

"They're all hot enough," added Paul, "no two ways about it. Every one of them is an 'eight,' and they've all kept decent figures despite popping out kids for us!"

"Yeah, well that's true enough, and I know that Jane, at least, is always watching her weight just because Linda is such a freaking hottie! She doesn't want to fall behind, you know. But Ringo, what brought this up? Something you need to tell us?"

"No, nothing really, it just crossed my mind that the girls could mess around, and we'd never know it."

"Me, I wouldn't want to know! My Linda's smoking hot, but let's face it, even if she was, I couldn't divorce her. None of us could afford a divorce. We held back our salaries to just $300,000 last year, to save on taxes, but face it: the firm's worth $68 million, we each own a quarter of it, and in any divorces, our wives would get half of each of our shares. We'd lose our houses, lose custody of our kids, and the women would get half of whatever salaries we gave ourselves."

"Maybe not half; Jane and Gail work, and make decent money, if not what we bring in."

"Doesn't matter; you know how the courts favor the wives, even if they were the ones screwing around."

"Yeah, and factor in Paul screwing that secretary for Bagley."

"Hey, she was an awesome redhead, and you know that redheads are the bomb!" Paul had a smile on his face, remembering her.

"So, if you are so smitten by redheads, how did you marry a half-Korean girl, with hair as dark as midnight?"

"Best blow jobs in town, son, best blow jobs in town!"

"Even after you married her?"

"Yup, even after we got married. Linda is outrageous in bed. Hell, it's a real job keeping up with her!"

"So," I ribbed him, "you can always use the help." I ducked out of arms range from Paul.

"No, I don't need help."

"But how do you know you aren't getting some help, on the down low?"

"Like I said, I guess that I don't. I mean, I haven't noticed any signs, but it doesn't make much sense for me to look too hard, y'know? I'd get raped in a divorce."

"You'd get raped?" That was George. "Joannie put me through law school, so you know I'd get taken to the cleaners, having to pay her half of everything I made, from now until I croak."

"You guys make me glad that I let the Army put me through law school," I said. "Eight years in, an officer on restricted duty, in Germany, with no college loans to pay off. Germany's great. But still, yeah, if Jane was cheating on me, I'd still get screwed in any divorce. I don't think that she ever has, but Paul's right: it wouldn't be too good of an idea to look too closely."

"Well, how many of you think that your wives might have cheated?" That was Paul.

"Like I said, I don't think that Jane has ever cheated on me, but Hell, there's really no way to know. I can tell you that I've never even been suspicious about her."

"Joannie? I don't know, maybe? I mean, I don't think that she is now, but after law school, when I was starting out, and had to produce forty billable hours a week? I barely saw her, she was working, and anything could have happened. And, Hell, she was putting me through law school, so I couldn't have said anything if she had been getting some on the side, you know? I'm just glad that we aren't working sixty/seventy hours a week anymore."

"God, I hated those forty billable hours! Gail accused me of screwing this receptionist, but I didn't; I didn't have the time or energy. My guess is that she might have had a quick fling or two, but I don't know, don't want to know. What about Linda, Paul?"

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure that she did, too many strange things about five, six years ago, but I was never sure, didn't hire a P. I. or anything, and the strange stuff stopped. Besides, that was right after I was screwing the redhead, so I couldn't say much. Don't know if Linda found out about her, but if she had, and then was having an affair of her own, the courts wouldn't have punished her for it in a divorce. If we'd gotten divorced, she'd own an eighth of Equus right now."

"Just you be sure that she doesn't hire a pool boy named Raoul to take care of your stuff!" Everyone laughed at that.

"Oh, I took care of that already; I hired the pool boy! He works at the pool for the Country Club, and when I saw that he was a flamer, I hired him to take care of our pool once a week. Hell, Linda likes to lay out topless, and it doesn't faze him at all."

"Hmmm, I hadn't thought of that; I wonder if there are any gay lawn care services in town."

"Damn it, John, you made me miss that putt!" That was George.

"What, the gay lawn care service crack?" I had a big smile on my face over that one.

"Yes! The thought that there might be such a thing, and that we'd want to hire them just so our wives weren't paying our regular guys in trade."

"Heck, at least that would cut the fucking bills! It's be a lot worse if they were screwing our wives and we weren't getting a break on the price." We all roared at that one.

We started talking about other stuff, and had made it all the way to the 17th tee, when I pulled Ringo off to the side, just to talk. "Look, dude, that was an interesting conversation, but it was a strange one for you to start. Really, are you worried about Gail?"

"I don't know, man, maybe. She was all weird like yesterday, didn't want to talk about work, you know, like something weird was happening, but then she practically raped me last night. I sure wasn't complaining, but Gail never starts things, you know, at least not since college. And sometimes you hear it, a woman finds a boyfriend, and then she gets feeling sexier toward her husband as well."

"But she didn't bring you home any 'surprises,' did she?"

"No, not that I could tell, and really, I got home only a couple minutes after she did, so she couldn't have done anything yesterday. But it got me to thinking, wondering what's going on. I said that I don't want to know, you know, but maybe I do."

"So, what are you going to do? That divorce lawyer is right next to our office; you could always find out who she uses as a P. I. if you decide that you want to check."