Taking Credit....

A thing that happened years ago, decades, really...

Weakness isn't the issue, you know. It's when I'm at my strongest, most in control, Satan delights in giving me what I want, at least when I'm in a mood to put blame somewhere...else.

More accurately, when I'm inclined to tell myself the truth, I find that I dug my own grave. So many graves dug, strung out along the rutted trail of my life, each with a piece of me that won’t make it to the promised land. In the old days the dead along pioneer trails, those who were overcome by weakness, infirmity, or bad luck were buried where they fell and marked with carved wood and stone:

    “John Smith, d 1843, age abt 2 yrs

    Cholera

    God welcome him home."

Mine would be:

    “A. Dust, d 1989, age abt 38 yrs

    Tits, Ass, and Moonlight

    God slap him upside the head again.”

-------------------------------------------

We were in the truck, parked out on the high desert ranges like teenagers - well, truth to tell, she HAD been only a year or two before. My God, she was gorgeous.

Moonlight sculpted her out of the liquid night in soft chords, heartbreaking, pure, near-subliminal tones of sweeping dark and silver calligraphy; tumbling midnight hair cascaded to the delicate brushstroke of shadow curving down between perfect breasts to her navel. Naked, mostly, with only the barest silken wisp remaining, more accent than concealment, her lips half parted, brown eyes watching me from under hooded lids, and a low moan, almost a growl vibrated from deep in the center of her. I was literally lightheaded, intoxicated with the pure pleasure of her filling all my senses - and I don't care what the books say there are far and away more than five, or even six - to overload. I kissed her belly and licked and inhaled the downy fine trail to the top of the silk, my chin pushing the elastic down, my hands filling with the lush, firm weight of her as I lifted her to pull the gossamer away - then she stopped me.

"I can't," she said, almost a groan, "I want...oh my God, my God. I can't."

"Why?"

She paused.

"I'm so sorry, we shouldn't have started at all. It's my time of the month."

I laughed and told her I didn't care, and I didn't either, as I pushed further down toward the insane, rich, musky, pheromone cloud of electric currents firing straight into my limbic system, driving me into frantic, clawing, howling circles in the moonlight.

"But I do," she said.

And I grunted, literally aching for her, and assented, and she promised we would in a couple of days and she kissed me, her eyes on fire like a cat's in the near-dark, her breath half-held in the unbroken tension of what we'd been doing...

And never did.

I don't lie to myself. I would have broken the trust and the chain and the heart of my heart, I know I would, if she hadn't stopped me.

Just bad luck, bad timing, or second thoughts on her part? Or should I replace all those "bads" with "good?" Maybe she was lying, and stopped me in a fit of conscience or common sense or fear. I'll never know. All I know is that it never happened. In the morning's cold, sterile daylight I knew how close I'd been...and never again allowed myself to fall back into that place. Nor, now that I think of it, did she push to return, either.

So, another night when I didn't step off the track, another night of faithless faithfulness. And I wonder, does it count when I tally those records and times?

In Our Next Episode: Back to redheads. Because I KNOW they're dangerous, and the trap seen is the trap avoided...right?