I Wouldn't Call Her a Hooker Until Ch. 02

Aunt Maggie turned her gaze on me and paused.

"Your commission reported that the United states is kaput!" I said laconically. "It's not that I doubt your wisdom Maggie, but how do we know these experts on your commission know what their talking about?"

"How do you know you can sustain your independence out there on a cliff with the Pacific a hundred feet below your bedroom balcony?" Grace asked, now betraying her critical doubt about what we had seen during our visit to The Baja.

"Just think about it," Aunt Maggie said, glancing once more at her watch. "I have a board meeting in one hour at the Symphony Hall."

In a gust of wind Aunt Maggie was down the ramp and striding toward her Towncar. As Grace and walked toward our cars in the small designated spaces beside the hangar, she squeezed my hand.

Incredibly, though I had not indulged my sexual appetite since my wife's whoring debacle at the picnic, I had refrained from taking advantage of Grace. She made no effort to conceal her commitment to me in all respects.

With an equal candor, I had confessed my own readiness to make love to her; but we had agreed to play by the rules. Infidelity on my part would raise question in Grace's mind about my true character. We agreed that beginning a life time partnership on that note would beg questions about integrity.

Certainly, my wife's sex carnivals and super bowls involving multiple partners for money had doomed our marriage. Subsequently, Vernon's attitude and continuing high profile debauchery had hammered the final nail into the coffin of our marriage.

Cutting the knot, however, would bring unique problems. Divorce was inevitable; but Vernon, as the general counsel for the university, was leading an assault on the foundation that I administered. Her client, the Provost of the university, had laid claim to the billion-dollar Foundation.

Since I was also a dean of the university's New School of Social Sciences, her path in the developing war was treacherous, and my defenses would require a blood bath to the death, taking no prisoners and no holds barred.

Filing for divorce before end of the legalistic conflict would constitute a tactical error. Essentially, our married life would become an open book in the open records of the divorce court. Vernon's infidelity and whoring behavior would be exposed to the public, both harming The Foundation and providing the Provost's legal team material for cunning initiatives tantamount to extortion.

Not a clean stage for playing out the end game of our marriage.

We risked a pleasant kiss in parting. Grace had suppressed her gloom, though she made no effort to conceal her impatience begin our life together.

"Let's go in early in the morning," Grace said. "I am certain tomorrow is feces day."

We owed it to our loyal staff to be there. They had stoically withstood the unthinkable.

"You think the Provost's troops will come in force, huh?" I asked. "Is your information reliable?"

My question was unnecessary. Without a doubt, Grace's assessments had been reliable.

Some of our most loyal professors had kept a close eye on the Provost's office in the administration building. They had followed the Provost and my wife to the football stadium where they found hundreds of persons in small groups apparently being instructed.

Formalities of platoon instruction prevailed as the assembled learned the assault commands and "Fifth Amendment rules of engagement." They were rehearsing a variety of scripted responses. These humanoid-antigens-for-hire were preparing as if for war.

Grace had enumerated her assumptions; and, at the top of the list was the "unleashing of demonstrators. My staff predicted, on the basis of the administration's tactics in other disagreements, that my wife would send waves of thugs at the façade of our building. Of course, they would perform under the umbrella of the "demonstrator' fiction.

Though we arrived early at the ruins that once served us as offices, the gruesome factotums already were pelting our domain with a steady rain of debris. We discovered quickly that we were impotent in the face of their onslaught. Only live ammunition would suffice in our defense after their four days of practicing and mastering terroristic tactics.

Methodically, our marauders delivered bombardments of feces filled canisters. Their brick bats, already having smashed all window panes, came into our rooms with a homicidal velocity.

Throughout the day their speakers, mounted on small trucks, blared obscenities and mind fouling noise. Their message, however, was in their excremental media.

As the day began to close in deepening shadows, our tormenters lit their camp fires, several dozen of them, actually. Our tree-lined boulevard was lined with the deceptively calming flickers.

Now only a dozen news media vehicles remained aligning the distant curb.

In the glow of the fires we could see shadowy forms moving amoebalike, apparently cooking, serving and eating their supper. Grace elbowed me and pointed through window as a dark figure the street camps and moved furtively toward our building.

"It has stopped behind a tree on the lawn," Grace reported as I worked with some unsoiled documents at my desk. Fortunately, the bloody devils had neglected to disconnect the electricity lines.

"We can hope that the creature is only peeping," Grace said. "It's in a perfect position to heave a grenade through a front window."

We could only peer into the immediate darkness and hope for the best. Others among us volunteered to watch the strange being behind the tree.

By midnight the camp fires out on the boulevard were burning low. Most of the miscreants lay on the asphalt, their bong tubes in their mouths.

Patterns of human malfeasance caught Grace's interest.

"There are at least half dozen bongs in a line between each fire," she said. "And there are eight tined coming out of each bong."

Obviously, many engineer's hours had gone into perfecting the mass smoking of dope.

Our shadowy figure hiding behind the tree chose that moment to make a move. We watched as it crossed excrement littered lawn and tapped lightly on the front door to of our building.

"What do you want?" Grace demanded without removing the furniture pieces we had stacked as a barrier.

"Marcus sent me to ask for a meeting," a tremulous female voice responded. "Marcus and The Hammer want to apprise you of the seriousness of your situation and the consequences of resistance."

"Who's Marcus?" Grace demanded. "And did I hear you say that one of your leaders is called The Hammer?"

"Marcus is our project coordinator," the panic laced voice answered. "The Hammer is our onsite administrator."

"Wait!" Grace said. "I'll get back to you in a few minutes."

Grace climbed the stairs to find me on the roof surveying the enemy's encampment as well as the Golden Gate Bridge in the distance. I kept a premium pair of glasses in my desk, a necessary part of my "Bay Watchers" accouterment.

"I never cease to be amazed at how much there is to see on this body of water at night," I said in an unsuccessful attempt at diverting attention from the severity of our jeopardy.

When Grace had recommended that we meet this warlord, Marcus Brutus, I could find no reason to resist. It would be our initial appraisal of the field commander of the feces throwing assault force.

As Grace departed to admit the enemy leader, I sipped my tea and reflected on the name Marcus Brutus. It was the pen name of the French Revolution's instigating propagandist, probably a fictional common denominator identity used collectively and individually by many agitators. Any sympathizer who could write an inflammatory pamphlet was Marcus Brutus.

In the 21^st Century, the revolutionaries dispensed with an introductory war of words. They opened their siege with fire and brimstone held together by feces. So, Grace descended the stairs to bring the leader of my wife's dope smoking political gangsters to meet with me.

Standing on the sun deck atop my office wing, I attempted to focus on The Golden Gate's Girder 13, the world' most celebrated symbol of suicidal insanity. To accord the pathologically obsessive to play a defining role in the Golden Gate's history should offend to the core all carriers of the civilizing seed.

Apparently macabre activists have always been with us. Perhaps their existence was written into the scroll of Eve's curse. They validated the frightening creed "Conceived in sin, born in corruption."

No one seemed to care that this captivating structure spanning the Golden Gate, that umbilical to the Pacific, stood as a monument of free enterprise. Only one man had considered the bridge of sufficient importance to devote his life to getting it built. His seed money was privately subscribed. Such was the true nature of the capitalist spirit.

Only potheads leading the mentally unbalanced dwelt on Golden Gate suicide lore.

Grace returned accompanied by three individuals, two with the bearing of pugnacious deities and a young woman costumed as a model for a rag barrel fashion designer. Watery eyes and wooden facades betrayed their pothead orientation.

Permitting civil introductions was ludicrous; but I realized that we must collect as much information about the campaigners as possible in this one meeting.

"This is Dr. Frank Trafficant," Grace said before Marcus Brutus interrupted.

"We know who he is!" he man said, booming a snarling superiority.

"Who are your associates?" Grace asked, her voice controlled but devoid of respect. "We insist on knowing all the players."

"I am Dr. Bettina Sharif and this is Essence," the woman known as The Hammer responded with a mixture of vexation and arrogance.

"Is Essence your name?" Grace asked, turning abruptly to the young woman.

"My name is

"Address me! Do not speak to her!" The Hammer scolded. "Stop that crying, Essence!"

Stepping to the side and away from our core group, the young woman, who appeared to be ten years younger than all of us, had begun to weep. Fear emanated from her pores. Dr. Bettina Sharif moved with the quickness of a mountain cat and delivered a blow to the side of the girl's head than sent her rolling to the floor.

Grace shocked the universe of femdom when she methodically placed the muzzle of her Glock against the ear of The Hammer.

"No, Grace!" I shouted, fearful that I would fail to prevent Grace from blowing Dr. Bettina (The Hammer) Sharif's brains all over our debris covered viewing deck.

Maybe for the first time in her autocrat's bubble, Doctor Sharif knew the feel of abject terror. From the black void in her eyes, I could see that The Hammer feared for her life.

Grace was not a homicidal maniac. But she had lived 17 years into the 21^st Century. Intuitive restraint had slowly eroded, replaced by civil statutes as the only incentive not to kill.

Even civilized women could learn to kill. Even those with doctorates, the "pretty girls" who wore dresses and deemed the arcane "Americanism" worth defending, could gain an expertise in use of the mighty Glock.

Threatening the existential Republic with violent extinction had become a Feminist party game. And Grace had led her milieu in playing the game with an equivalent expertise without sacrificing her gender prerogatives.

"How do you like my little voting machine?" Grace asked, her voice low and as menacing as tempered steel scalpel. "It's called a Glock; and it is very decisive."

Marcus Brutus stood muted as if comatose. When he finally regained his composure, he once more attempted to swagger and dominate. I patiently awaited his delivery of the message he had brought. Obviously, the Provost, acting on the energy of my wife, had sent me an ultimatum.

"I presume that you have come to tell us to surrender," I said, surprising myself at my calm and aplomb. I was also wondering if Grace actually knew how to use her Glock.

"Your situation here is untenable," he said with the utmost gravity.

"And you have a plan for us to make our situation tenable," I said.

"We are empowered to offer you a reasonable compromise," The Hammer interjected with a toxic glower. "If you are too dense to accept, all of you will become ashes in the inferno that we will make of this building."

"Well! Now that's not nice!" Grace said, laughing without humor. "Frank! Do I put the first slug in her right eye or left eye?"

"Who empowered you to make his proposition," I asked, masking my contempt.

Marcus Brutus met The Hammer's questioning gaze. After a brief moment of thought, Marcus Brutus shrugged.

"Your wife is our client," Marcus Brutus said, triumphing in Sadistic pleasure. To The Hammer he said, "He would have figured it out, anyway."

"So my wife, the champion of the whore's rodeo, will cremate my ass if I don't do what!" I responded. "What is her offer to spare us from Dante's Inferno?"

Now Marcus Brutus was uncomfortable. He glanced at The Hammer with a blink of uncertainty.

"We walk out of here with your resignation from all your university contracts," The Hammer said, her words coming in torrents of suddenly rampant emotions. "You may keep your car, personal effects and $10,000 cash."

"So! You'll take my severance from the university, remove your sewer troops and permit us to leave unmolested," I said, hardly containing my laughter, "and expect me to leave more than a billion dollars behind in The Foundation."

Humiliation underwritten by fear and embarrassment flushed the faces of both warlords. They recovered their sinister facades quickly.

Forgetting The Foundation revealed the advanced degree of their stupidity. These captains of deconstructionist politics had forgotten the center piece of my wife's objective in hiring them.

"Of course, you must resign as CEO of The Foundation with a transfer of all your personal holdings to Miz Trafficant," The Hammer answered, almost hysterically.

"Don't do it Mr. Trafficant!" the young woman screamed. "They've already been paid to kill you."

The Hammer slammed the young woman to the deck once more.

Grace shot from the hip, placing the slug squarely between The Hammer's eyes. It was like the movies. I watched entranced as the extortionist politico killer slowly slumped to the deck and died.

It wasn't a measured response to a palpable threat. Perhaps it could be described as manslaughter; but that would beg another question. In any perspective Grace had executed the piece of human chaos personified.

Marcus Brutus began to tremble. Then came the convulsions. His breathing became erratic. His body remained upright, however, though his belly and jowls sagged.

"You killed Bettina!" the quaking giant wheezed incredulously. "You murdered her in cold blood."

"Just like you intended to murder us," Grace retorted.

"Take him back to his bong," I said to the young woman.

Shaking her head in the negative, the young woman began to scream. When she calmed sufficiently to talk, the terrified being refused to leave.

I seized Marcus Brutus by the belt at his back and propelled him down the stairs to the front door. Without considering my jeopardy, I frog-walked the behemoth across the dark lawn to the first camp fire.

Eight still bodies lay in a circle around the dope bong nearest the paved walk leading to my building.

All eight semicomatose hustlers were sucking on vinyl tubes attached to the base of ten-gallon bong bowl. They remained prone watching me as I dragged Marcus Brutus to the fire. My pretense of throwing his ass into the flames elicited cries designed by terror and pleas for mercy.

"I should have told Grace to put bullets in your balls," I snarled.

When I realized that I was alone in the enemy camp, I, the pseudo conquering hero, began to doubt that I had any balls either; for I was petrified. I would say that I ran like a deer across the lawn back to my office, but I made an effort never to lie to myself. Truth be told, I stepped in so many piles of excrement that my progress was measured in sewage decimals.

Once back on the deck with Grace and my associates, I suggested that we abandon the fort and board Aunt Maggie's jet for San Diego, there to escape into The Baja. Suddenly Aunt Maggie's escape to the future in her The Baja Citadel had gained the preponderance in credibility.

Much later, when I had recovered from the toxic gasses pervading the tenor of our existence, Grace nodded toward the terrified young woman left behind by Marcus Brutus.

"Tell us about yourself," Grace said without rancor. "We know Essence isn't your name."

When I had convinced myself that my wife and my life could sink no lower, the young woman's story revealed the depths of my naivete.

Jennifer Schaeffer had worked for my wife as a litigation specialist for three years when she accepted the toxically fated invitation. She was honored to accompany Vernon and her culturally dark friends to one of their "Rest and Relaxation" retreats.

Though she was admired for her high tech expertise, Jennifer was inexperienced and naïve when facing the lure of Vernon's thrill seeker's theater of the absurd. Jennifer could not know that my wife's counterculture carnival survived on insidious toxins. These recreational drugs created frightening "highs" that always became mind crushing "lows."

Casualties that reduced the ranks after each "retreat" were a problem. Never ending recruitment of new blood tormented my wife mercilessly.

After smoking her first dope, under tutelage of Vernon, Jennifer agreed to "Sample" a small snort of coke. Before the weekend climaxed about noon Sunday, Jennifer had "sampled" a variety of "party energizers" including rohypnol and ecstasy.

Deathly ill at times from the side effects of the drugs, she had experienced 30 hours of ceaseless sexual acrobatics. Combinations of hormonal chemistries were incalculable. Abbreviating the history, Jennifer told of becoming Vernon's second for the Gangbang Tournaments and special assignments. Her life with Vernon came to know no limits of depravity.

"About six months ago, Vernon sent me to be the liaison between this 'Legal Effect Team' and her office. That's when I met Marcus and fell in love with him. His creativity in feeding my unconscious appetites was epicurean in indescribable extremes. Marcus had made Hedonism into a psychosocial science and an art mixed with fantasies yet undefined by ordinary erotic thinkers.

"Vernon had fired my base instincts beyond human endurance," the debauched woman said," but Marcus Brutus excelled and surpassed your wife in both the art and science of producing insane orgasms."

Drifting though conscious, she reflected as if distant, "I loved the nuances of what he called 'Sadism striking the antithetical anvil of masochism and penetrating into the omniscient, the essence revealed in the orgasm.'"

Jennifer's body jerked as her eyes snapped. Now her face was animated and her demeanor changed. She presented a façade of animated cogency.

"Of course, it was social science from the sewer, and my illusions of love ended when I realized that Marcus and Bettina had hooked me on sex and drugs for a very unscientific purpose," she said, "but it was too late."

Pausing to search our faces for judgmental signs, she became more impassive.

"I was disoriented, hooked on coke and absinth," she continued, her voice almost in monotone.

"I think she's sociopathic," Grace said as if to herself.

"I cannot survive without Marcus's daily dose of coke and orgasms," she whispered without inflection.

Jennifer Schaeffer, who wanted nothing from life other than her employer's respect and support, had said it all, I thought. It was her summary statement that proved me wrong. Grace prompted Jennifer with a final question.