Hectic!

Almost 30 years have passed! A chance comic encounter with Irene Regan, a former lover, and memories consigned to Sidney Cuniff's mental attic tumble into the present. These escaped escapades assemble at his feet. Given their unplanned resurrection, he unsurprisingly finds himself reliving vicariously:

*

The divergence between Sidney Cuniff and Beryl Lind was tricky. No, twisty.

Perhaps had he been upfront at some point about Irene Regan their course of events might've been simpler and clear-cut. Instead what they once shared lingered improperly resolved over miles and years.

Having shared intimacy with Beryl, "nefarious" was not one of the attributes he'd ascribed to her. He saw her in mostly complimentary terms. Fortunately for him she never had an inkling of his liaisons with Irene. Because if Beryl had known then surely what eventually transpired never would've occurred.

In real life, that was. Certainly in the letters sections of men's magazines. Still, though, even the densest frat brother knew those stories were churned out in formulaic and assembly-line fashion.

Cuniff decided late on that fate, love and trust had coincided. Beryl wasn't using the occasion to discomfort nor intimidate him. Rather, taking an extensive now educated view, her gesture, as magnanimous as he'd ever heard or seen, proved the extent of her affection. Had he been less self-absorbed -- far less self-absorbed -- Cuniff would've recognized it and hurried to reciprocate, therefore solidifying their union.

While he grasped all the implications eventually, he acknowledged never possibly being man enough to abide such unquestioning belief.

Cuniff achieved sexual and emotional equilibrium between Beryl and Irene. His justification's perfection satisfied him almost as much as the girls' actual complementary charms.

Approaching that time of semester, Beryl grilled Cuniff about his previous Spring Break. He could've spilled completely, but had no desire to undergo any thoroughly subsequent interrogations. Sparing himself, Cuniff told Beryl he'd wasted the week away in Matzalan, a little resort town on the Mexican Pacific Coast. In reality, he'd spent much of that week bedding the woman whose guidance refined his urges, the same which Beryl and Irene enjoyed.

If Cuniff needed to keep Irene secret, no way he'd reveal ... Beryl might've parsed those interludes down to their molecular structure. Then he knew she would've culminated her auto de sexo by asking who the better of the two.

Any answer would've been unsatisfactory.

One early evening a few weeks before Spring Break 1979, Cuniff accompanied Beryl to the university's main library. These were rare occasions. Not his visiting the library, but going with her.

An essay was due. She absolutely required tranquility in order to write. As dead as he found a women's dorm during the week, she believed hers still had too much vibrancy. Beryl's academic struggles in a men's dorm surely would've made her skull explode.

Ordinarily, Cuniff simply borrowed books from this library. He didn't even bother haunting the stacks in search of sweet-looking susceptible betties.

Tonight, though, a rare convergence. "Triumph of the Will" had recently been screened in his Language of Film class. Impressed by the primitive propaganda, he scoured the shelves for writings about Leni Riefenstahl, the movie's director.

Through cursory reading, Cuniff learned the old Nazi had evaded major post-war punishment. In spite of having been in bed with the regime's high mucks, the director confessed to nothing. Or as Cuniff saw it she used the "piano player in the whorehouse" dodge.

Leni Riefenstahl had it right. When confronted by the facts deny everything! That often worked. It certainly did in her case. If she hadn't been an old Nazi who'd escaped serious reprimand, he might've admired her bald-faced lying as much as her work.

Cuniff knew Beryl would be holding down a table. He looked to demonstrate some diligence by keeping her company as well as separate Leni the artist from Riefensthal the fascist from the white-haired old lady who late in life became an advocate of animist sub-Saharan African tribes.

Somehow his inquisitiveness deviated into asking why the truly bad usually sought atonement for their misdeeds through prodigious botany or championing less advanced cultures. Oh, how Keyworth, Cuniff's professor, would cream over that theoretical switchback!

Their conversation sotto voce under color draining fluorescent lamps, Beryl suggested they take a driving excursion along the California Coast, from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Monterey, Carmel, the whole Pacific Coast Highway actually, particularly interested her.

He liked the idea. Over a year in the West and Cuniff had yet seen the Pacific. Besides, seeing Hearst Castle in San Simeon ought have clarified some questions he had about the movie "Citizen Kane." The vistas around Carmel were said to have been dramatic. Also, six nights with Beryl.

Unlike the spontaneity Irene presented him, sex with Beryl was too regulated. Mood seldom struck. The time always had to be right. The loosely structured approaching vacation week should've opened opportunity aplenty for them to indulge in mindless, feckless sex play.

Only after he wholeheartedly endorsed the road trip did Beryl mention Coral. She didn't pop his balloon, though rude fingers on its surface sure emitted skin-crawling squeaks.

"Beryl, darling, why do you want to bring Coral along?"

"You don't want her to come?"

"I see it as a time we can have all to ourselves," Cuniff said. "We won't have to be nice, kowtow or accommodate anybody else. We can be alone and do what we want when we want without worrying about maybe inconveniencing others. We can be selfish with each other."

Beryl owned an uncanny knack for shredding his solid reasoning.

"You mean we can stay naked a lot longer after we fool around that much more," she said.

"Well, there's that, too."

"Sid, right now chocolate wouldn't melt in your mouth."

Cuniff slid fingers into the notch between the folds of Beryl's shorts. She carefully glanced around. They faced the second floor stacks. Behind them a picture window filled by a lighted Arizona Stadium. She reflexively clamped her thighs together.

"Give me two minutes I'll make this melt 22 times in my mouth," Cuniff said.

Beryl bolted upright.

"C'mon, baby," Cuniff cooed. "Let me be your 60 Minute Man."

The refrain from an old entendre-laden tune forced her to stifle a snigger. One big snigger. While her upper torso remained straight, Cuniff's below-the-belt fingering made her wriggle.

"Aye!" he said. "There's the rub!"

A brittle trill running through her voice, Beryl said, "Fuck, Sid, I'm gonna --"

" -- Scream!?" Cuniff answered.

Her inner impropriety alarm must've rung because as much as she obviously enjoyed Cuniff's manipulations, the frisson increased thanks to their public exposure, Beryl forcefully concluded the session. Using both hands, she clutched his pleasuring hand's wrist. Drawing every reserve of Swede farm girl strength, Beryl dredged his appendage from her lap. His resistance more for show than effort, she still struggled. Beryl thumped his forearm on the table. After looking around once more, a clear coast allowed Beryl to perform a most unlady-like shimmy in her shorts.

Cuniff asked, "Are your nipples hard? Mine are."

"No doubt," Beryl sighed, unbunching her clothing.

"We ought to give these books a break and find an unoccupied bed someplace," Cuniff said. "What luck! I happen to know of one that's close by. C'mon, Beryl, you know how I like to see your --"

Beryl knew exactly what he liked to see. Her widening eyes and tightening mouth shushed him. He gave the amorous stuff a rest. His face sloughed off its wolfish cast. He hoped it settled into one that appeared at least mildly interested. Cuniff weaved his fingers behind his head and leaned back in the seat.

He conceded the conversation to Beryl. Eagerness replaced her perturbation.

"I know it's an imposition having Coral come along," she said. "I wouldn't insist if I thought all it'd do was piss you off."

"I'm not pissed off," Cuniff said. "The week should be ours, is all. Ours alone. Hitting the Coast is a perfect suggestion you skewer by including Coral. If she wants to see the Pacific, fine. There must be some guy who wants to go, who's looking for some chick to go with. You and I, we put our heads together, we can find him, pair them up, then go our own way."

"It's that simple, huh?"

"That's linear thinking," Cuniff said.

Beryl slid her hand into his crotch. His shorts were baggy. She deftly managed finding his cock among the confining folds. Alone the pressure of her palm was enough. Her teasing strokes elicited one big Pavlovian response.

"This is an entirely girly answer," Beryl said. "I need you to do something you wouldn't understand now because doing so later will prove how much you would do for me."

"That's convoluted, isn't it?" Cuniff asked.

She pled in an insinuating tone. "Do this, Sid, and the result will be reciprocal. I will be grateful. I promise."

Cuniff pondered while she kneaded his joint. Beryl had done much for him and been much as well. Mostly a challenge. Until tonight the adjective "grateful" had enjoyed little currency between them. What was her ulterior motive? Oh, yes, there must've been one. She wouldn't simply drop Coral on him out of goodness, mercy and kindness. Coral was clutter. Beryl functioned in a precise calculated manner. That was the kind of discipline which should've been exploited at the track and various games of chance.

Now his curiosity was engaged. Cuniff wondered about the urgency behind Coral's incipient third-wheel-hood. Beryl had to have known his agreeing would make her beholden to him. Her stroking blurred all the angles.

Absently, his regret vague, Cuniff approved.

Beryl ceased working his meat over and kissed him. Not a cheek peck, but one full on the mouth passion exchange. This gesture further raised his suspicions. Beryl was not into such overt displays of affection. Especially in a site as holy as the library.

Nonetheless she piqued his interest as well as tented his pants.

Roomy as Beryl's car was Cuniff couldn't quite shake how the three of them crowded it. While he drove the lions share through Southwest voids, Beryl and Coral navigated city lanes.

Coral's was a chirpy presence. She prattled incessantly. Funny thing was Beryl kept pace. Until the radio signals faded, ceding the dial to country/western or religious stations, he heard them as competition against music. Yet once appreciable reception weakened, their diversion became relief.

Listening as closely as he did, Cuniff still failed making heads or tails of their references. To him theirs was a plain language code whose simple key lay maddeningly just beyond his reach.

While his time behind the wheel mounted, Beryl started spending more and more miles sprawled in the back seat. Glimpses of her were becoming rarer. Maybe if he craned his neck and canted sight he might spy her wind-blown auburn curls and mystery-laden placid expression. Otherwise there was only Coral's constant being beside him. Whenever his eyes swept the three mirrors (to break the asphalt's hypnotic effect), Coral's sight always seemed leveled on him.

The frequency discounted coincidence. After some several hundred miles Cuniff realized he was Coral's focus. Any more blatantly and she would've been staring. On one hand, her insistence should've creeped him out. On the other, Cuniff was a 20-year-old man -- women making him the center of their universes was his due by dint of everything masculine.

Naturally that last self-serving observation kept him from sharing his realization with Beryl. Somehow he knew she'd take offense at being just another satellite orbiting his sun.

Since Cuniff "endured" hundreds of miles of Coral (mostly in three-quarters profile), he used the long seating to really appraise her. Over miles her lively face, one framed by light brown bangs, became less goggle-eyed. Instead, he gauged an appealing brightness and liveliness, behind which burned piercing expectation.

Coral's mouth was small, her lower lip fuller than the top. He bet her lips would be sweetly responsive slivers to an attentive man. Especially one with thick lips such as his own. Several times his gaze lingered longer than both knew necessary and she blushed lightly, her mouth's corners twisting into intricate curlicues.

In spite of himself he met Coral's smile.

A generally northwestern blaze through Arizona, Las Vegas, the Mojave and Central Valley poured them into San Francisco. Spending two nights in Vegas, they indulged in a truncated Rat Pack crawl along the Strip, making poor people's bets in the Flamingo and at the Frontier, then enduring cheesy lounge acts at the MGM Grand. For true ring-a-ding-ding splendor, they nursed drinks while swapping excitement as the city boldly twinkled below them from atop the Sands' rooftop revolving bar.

To each person, Vegas failed lasting long enough.

The Mojave did not broil in March. Indeed, conditions were such that an inversion sealed cool and fog against the desert floor.

Endless verdancy aside, the Central Valley held little appeal for Cuniff. He wasn't an Aggie and agriculture bored him. Besides, he'd seen more than his fill of companeros in Eloy, a town astride the Interstate between Tucson and Phoenix. Whether the crop cotton, pistachios or now in California, vegetables, he knew the back-breaking, hand-wrenching toil hard yet badly compensated.

One absolute about Northeastern elementary and secondary schools -- there were always overly conscientious teachers who spared little guilt while illustrating the relative privileges of their students' lives. Their kvetching was well meant. As utmost professional agitators, um, educators, as they were, most, if at all possible, would've fed students chunks of "Let Us Now Praise Famous Men" intravenously.

It was seldom enough to read "The Grapes of Wrath" when a petitioner from Cesar Chavez' organization could be procured to lead the class in a discussion concerning the plight of current migrant workers.

Of course Cuniff loved table grapes.

San Francisco wasn't New York but Boston squeezed onto a smaller Left Coast landspit. With the girls along there wasn't any visit to the Mitchell Brothers theater. With the girls along there was one unsteadying sojourn through the Castro District. Believing himself secure enough in his manhood, Cuniff still lacked exhibiting the total indifference required while being perused and cruised by gays.

Funny thing was men objectifying Cuniff raised his estimation in Beryl's eyes. Coral chimed in, calling him "a pretty man." A being of all surface, Coral possessed no sense of drollery. He accepted her bald statement for what it was: a bald compliment.

The Pacific Coast Highway was the only way they considered going south. Sure, blasting along I-5 would've been faster, but Coral wanted to see Pebble Beach -- who knew she liked golf? -- Beryl a winery and 17-Mile Drive, while Cuniff's goal waited in San Simeon.

In San Francisco they fulfilled the touristy circuit. Coit Tower. Lombard Street. Drinky-poohs at the St. Regis. Sourdough bread and chocolates in Ghiaridelli Square, eating the day's catch on Fisherman's Wharf. Cuniff knew from New York that these venues mostly the province of out-of-towners like themselves. He wondered if the locals were numb to them like he was to the Empire State Building and the Statue of Liberty. Although he lived barely half an hour distant from both, Cuniff had yet ever visited the observation deck or sail to Liberty Island.

And skate at the Rockefeller Center ice rink -- forget it!

Such absences conferred echt New Yorker status, no?

Fortunately, Beryl and Coral toted along their cameras. Back in Tucson, the results weren't brilliant but after reflection touching.

Aboard an Alcatraz Island tour boat, Coral had snapped several of him and Beryl. The deep blue of the bay further drew the color in Beryl's face that the morning's chilly breeze stirred. She wore a contented smile, her eyes warm. Frozen in the photograph her wind-whipped hair became lustrous under the bright sun.

It was the most beautiful Cuniff had ever seen her. He should've told her then. Afterwards, after seeing Coral's results, he ought to have again. Yet such were their power, combined with the trip's latter phantasmagoria, that he reluctantly withheld the effusion. Emotion and an unspoken though nonetheless imposed feeling of obligation might've transformed his simple declaration into one ambivalent claim of love.

Cuniff could not speak the words because he did not believe them. Having Irene Regan on the sly proved that. Still, in his later years when the chosen course stopped looking so sure, Cuniff unearthed and gazed upon that perfect frozen moment before taste succumbed to male gluttony.

Until San Simeon, sleeping arrangements were tolerable. Seeing themselves worldly enough, Cuniff and Beryl shared one bed, while Coral sprawled in the room's other. The miracle behind America's hospitality industry assured those beds would always be queen-sized twins, the gap between them ample enough to muddle his and hers bundling or frottage.

After all the communal screwing he'd done at Stennerson's, Cuniff found it odd to be so solicitous of Coral's propriety. He worried she'd view their intimacies as inconsiderate. Or worse, mistake them for instances of blithe abandonment. Her lack of suitors was the biggest reason Beryl insisted having Coral accompany them. She didn't want Coral moping around a pretty devoid campus during Spring Break. Watching or hearing them carry on might've made them all regret Beryl's kindness.

When clothed friction just wouldn't suffice, Cuniff and Beryl maneuvered themselves into positions whose efforts emitted as little noise as possible while exacting the greatest amount of pleasure. Excruciating and ridiculous, it was all the pair could do not to curse or laugh aloud at their plight.

Thankfully after her first rugby party Beryl never returned to Stennerson's. Drunkenness nor brutish behavior kept her away, but the sheer excessive frivolity of those bacchanals. She believed the dissipation witnessed that night could only have been exceeded by what remained unseen.

As Beryl often told him she had quite an imagination.

How he didn't flatten that claim by cluing her in Cuniff never knew. Obviously some part of her didn't want him wallowing at party central. However, Beryl must've also reasoned that demanding his curtailment in those social spectacles might certainly have been seen by him as her intrusion.

Nonetheless had she asked Cuniff would've complied. Yet his subsequent attempts at not resenting her would surely have strained both. In the end her "outta sight, outta mind" stance diluted their likely discord.

Different than Irene's or any girl he made at Stennerson's, Beryl's love-making wasn't demonstrative. No great yelps of passion from Beryl. Her limbs didn't thrash. Cuniff liked how she took him. She lost herself in his exertions, transported to places he'd only suspect, transformed behind closed eyes and dreamy expressions.

Often Beryl's palms and fingers completed soft circuits of his tensed shoulders and arms. Through this contact along his contour she not only acknowledged his presence but also subtly directed him.

In San Simeon, Beryl introduced an unexpected variable. At first Cuniff saw it as an ingenious device by which she hoped to expose his indiscriminate bed-hopping at Stennerson's, as well as his more passionate rampings with Irene. Ultimately Cuniff concluded Beryl's machinations were from immense empathy, not sinister motives.