Heaven or Hell

"The stupidest thing about it all was that you were just waiting for me to ask you. I found the fucking engagement ring in your sock drawer the morning that I died. For about four hours I was the happiest woman on earth. I should tell you that I was wearing the ring when your best friend killed me. I'd put it one and hadn't wanted to take it off."

"Anyway, when he came into town, I wanted to call it off. He kept looking at me and trying to maneuver me into corners. Even the night that you, he and the guys went out, he kept trying. He sent me a text that he was going to pretend to get sick, and come over to our house to see me. I told him to wait until the next day and we'd talk. He came over a couple of hours before you were due home. There I was, even more madly in love with you after finding my ring. I was pretending to show it to people as I cleaned the house when he showed up."

"After talking to him for a few minutes and seeing how pissed he was, I decided that the best thing to do would be to just give him some pussy and send him back to Chicago. That way I wouldn't have to worry about him being angry and telling you about it. I didn't want anything to mess us up."

"Jimmy, it was the worst sex I ever had. I don't know how a guy gets to be that old and still has no idea of how to have sex. It was like I had to teach him. I've already told you how I have this habit when sex isn't very good of imagining that it's you on top of me. Well, with that psycho, it was the worst thing I could've done. There he was hammering away at me with his nasty sweat dripping down on me and it meant nothing. He didn't even know enough to lean forward so the top his shaft rubbed my clit."

"I ended up reaching down and doing it myself. Maybe it was the thought of you marrying me and me having your baby but I was really into it so I came really loudly and screamed, "Oh, Jimmy." That was it. He checked out mentally. He told me he was going to the bathroom. I lay there on the bed thinking about you and looking at my ring."

"The next thing I knew he was back and straddling me with his hands behind his back."

"I'm not Jimmy," he said. "We're friends, but I'm better than Jimmy in every way. That's why you wanted me to come here. Even though you're Jimmy's woman, you wanted me. You're only pretending to like him because you know that I'd never go for a whore like you."

"I thought that his feelings were just hurt from me calling out your name so I just nodded and said, "Yep, you're right." I figured that he'd have his ass out of our house and back to Chicago in a few minutes and my perfect life would resume. I also decided that he would be the last time I ever cheated on you in my lifetime. Okay, maybe one or two flings when I got old and needed to prove that I was still sexy, but that was it."

"Jimmy, I swear his eyes changed as I watched them. Veins popped out in his neck, arms and even his forehead. He might've popped some kind of pill while he was in the kitchen. But his arm came from behind his back so fast I barely saw it. He stabbed me so fast there wasn't any pain. I was in shock. He pulled the knife out and I saw it dripping red with my blood and he brought it down again on the other side. It was then that I noticed that I was having trouble breathing and that every breath I took caused bubbles to vent from my chest. Bloody bubbles came up with every breath. He leaned over me to keep me from flailing and he kept looking into my eyes. He put his hand over my mouth so I couldn't cry out. Not that anyone would have heard me. "

"And then when I was too weak to move and was having trouble breathing, the bastard got off of me and started pulling on his dick. He jacked-off over me and shot his sperm all over my chest where it mixed with the blood bubbles. Then he just looked deeply into my eyes as the life passed out of me."

"After that, my spirit left my body and I looked down on it as he cleaned himself up but made no attempt at cleaning me up or hiding the body. I knew then that he wanted you to find me. I think he wanted you to know what he'd done. But I was wrong Jimmy. He sat down on the couch and waited. He didn't watch TV or anything. He just waited until he heard the sound of that loud assed exhaust system of yours. Then he grabbed the knife and went outside."

"I saw you look up to wave at him as you got out of the car and then he stabbed you too. I gave you all of the strength I had Jimmy. I helped you fight that drugged out bastard off. If it wasn't for me you would have died too. So I need you to remember that."

I looked at her then. Rhonda, the woman I'd loved all of my life had just told me that she was basically a slut and had cheated on me more times than I would ever know. Surprisingly, with all of the shocks that I'd gone through recently, I wasn't angry. I was just numb.

"Say something, Jimmy," she said. "You have to have some kind of feeling about all of this."

"Well, you being dead sure eases up that whole two girl-friends thing," I said.

She laughed then. "Lots of men have two or more women in their lives," she said.

"Lots of men are fools," I said. "Most men have trouble handling one woman. When you get married you split your paycheck in half and double your problems. If it's hard handling one woman, trying to have more than one would just be stupid, so it's good that you're out of the picture."

She shook her head. "Well, thanks for telling me," I said. "Uhm, see you around."

"Jimmy, that brings me to why I'm here," she said. "I have two possibilities ahead of me. I can either end up in Heaven or in Hell."

"What does that have to do with me?" I asked.

"Well, you know that I could almost always talk myself out of anything," she said. "When I died, I went to the pearly gates and spoke to St. Peter. I need to tell you that if you're born a Catholic or any of the Christian denominations then all of that shit is real. If you're from a different religion you get a different experience. It's kind of like internet porn. The people who pay for the memberships get totally different videos and better quality than the people who don't get a membership.

Anyway, St Peter wanted to send me to Hell. He kept chanting...They're really big on singing and chanting in the afterlife. He kept chanting, "No hoe's in Heaven." He didn't even say, "No whores in Heaven." It was, "No Hoe's," I felt like I was in one of those black churches. But I convinced him to give me a chance. I haven't ever really done anything that was unforgivable. In fact, the only thing I've ever done that was bad was cheating on you. So you get to choose."

"What do you mean I get to choose?" I asked.

She licked lips and faced me. She gave me that baby doll stare that she'd always used to get me to do whatever she wanted. Every woman has one of those. They fluff up their hair and angle their faces so the light hits it just right. They may pout their lips, or stick out the bottom one, but they know how to do it and it works on us every God damned time.

"Well Honey," she said, in her best little girl voice. "St. Peter was tired of my whining and trying to prove where I should be sentenced for all of eternity, so he left it up to you. If you forgive me, I'll be waiting for you by the pearly gates wearing angel wings. If you don't..." She got extra pouty then.

I smiled my biggest smile right back at her. I blew her a kiss and she made a big sign of catching it and placing it ever so gently on her lips.

"Let's see," I said, considering it carefully or pretending to do so. "I've loved you for most of my life, whether we were together or not. You cheated on me and fucked most of my friends. I really did intend to marry you though and my mom and dad taught me that forgiveness is a good thing. You also did, if I can believe you, help save my life. Plus, there's the fact that no matter what I choose, it won't bring you back. And then there's also the fact that I think I've found someone new who may be the woman I can spend the rest of my life with, right?"

She nodded her head.

"Ah...Let's let bygones be bygones. I never knew what you were doing so it never hurt me, right."

"Exactly Honey," she smiled and said "Don't forget, I really did love you the whole time."

"Okay," I said. "I really am the forgiving type so...Go to Hell..."

She barely had time to scream before disappearing in a puff of smoke. A few minutes later I woke up with Amanda and Captain Greer standing by my bed. We painstakingly worked through all of the things that they had to tell me. None of which were anywhere close to the truth. They wrongly assumed that since Cary had never had sex with any of his other victims, that he hadn't touched Rhonda either. I pretended that I simply didn't remember Rhonda. After a few more weeks of therapy, I was cleared to return duty, but only from behind a desk. It took another four months for me to return to active duty and by that time Amanda had moved out of her condo and into my house.

We'd extensively redecorated the entire place and re-landscaped the yard. I'd also added siding to the house and painted it a different color. Inside and out, there was nothing to remind me of Rhonda.

Something else interesting happened. It took us a while to get Amanda over her fear of men, but not nearly as long as I'd expected. Almost from the beginning, when she held my hand and hugged me to help me get past my painful memories, we'd known that there was something between us. Even when we dated, we were always touching each other. We couldn't control it. There were plenty of nights, even before she moved in, that we were supposed to go somewhere and just ended up hugging each other until we fell asleep on my couch together. That led to us falling asleep in bed together and the hugs became kisses. Over time, the kisses became more intense and led to arousal.

One evening, when I didn't expect it, we were hugging each other and kissing and our clothes slowly worked themselves off. The next thing I knew, I was inside of her and she was moaning very heavily. It was the very tightest pussy I'd ever been inside of and the warmest. I took my time, letting her get used to the feel of it. I waited for her hips to start moving and then joined her, matching her slow and easy rhythm.

Amanda doesn't fuck like a bunny, but we make love and it's very satisfying and very intense. Her body is very slim but it excites me just the same. Her raven black skin and pale eyes are very beautiful. I barely had time to propose to her before she informed me that, "WE," were expecting. I guess we were so crazy about each other and sex was such a new toy for her that she hadn't bothered getting on the pill.

I don't really care if our sex life isn't full of fireworks and lap dances. I guess I never put very much stock in that shit anyway. The one thing I do know is that Amanda will never cheat on me. And you can be God damned sure after seeing what happened to Rhonda; that I won't ever cheat on Amanda either. Besides, I love her too much to treat her like that anyway.

As far as Rhonda goes, we did run into each other again. It was just last week, on the exact one year anniversary of our last conversation. I was downstairs in our kitchen, naked as a jaybird after making love to Amanda. You all know how after a particularly good fuck, women want to cuddle and men want...well, you're not really hungry but you want a snack? I'd come down for some ice cream for Amanda and I to share, when suddenly I realized that I wasn't alone. The clock on the wall had stopped moving. Even the second hand was frozen in place.

I turned and there she was. She looked a lot different. Her blond hair was burned black and she smelled like smoke. Most of her skin was red and peeling and in some places it looked like one of those hot dogs that have been left on the grill for way too long.

Her eyes were narrow and she was obviously pissed. Her chest was heaving and her hands were clenched in fists.

"Hey Rhonda," I said calmly. "How's it going? I hope you didn't fuck that clock up. It was a wedding gift from Manda's parents."

"Fuck that shitty clock," she hissed. Then she got her temper under control and spoke more calmly.

"Jimmy, it's not the clock; it's us. You and I are temporarily outside of the flow of time," she said.

"Oh, good," I said. "Manda really likes that clock. So what are you doing here?"

"This is my last God damned chance," she hissed. "It's the one year anniversary of your choice. I convinced St. Peter that maybe you'd made a snap decision. You'd been through a very traumatic experience and with a year of happiness under your belt now, maybe you'd thought about it some. I figured that when I asked you to make that choice, you were really pissed at me. Your ego was bruised by what I'd done, but you really are the forgiving type."

"Yeah I am," I said. "I always have been."

"Well, I can sweeten the deal a bit this time too," she said. "If you allow me to go upstairs, instead of back to the pit, I can leave some of my earthly traits and experience here on earth. Think about it. Your sex life isn't exactly earth shattering. I could leave all of my sexual experience and appetites in your boney little wife. She'd still have her personality and looks, but she'd fuck like me."

"Go BACK to Hell Rhonda," I said.

"Wait," she screamed. "Why?"

"Two reasons," I said. "The first is that I love Manda, just the way she is. Our sex life is just fine."

She looked as if she was holding onto the doorway to keep from being pulled back. "What's the second reason?" she screamed.

"You don't belong up there Rhonda," I smirked. "St. Peter said it best, "There's no Hoes in Heaven."

I grabbed the ice cream from the freezer and went back to my wife.

The end.