61 Frames Per Second by John Constantine Today in Nerve's videogame blog: Street Fighter. The movie. A new one. With that chick from that Superman show. Don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about!
The Remote Island by Bryan Christian Mad Men's January Jones struts her stuff in Vanity Fair. Plus: Damages returns, the latest Gossip Girl guest star and Donna Martin capitulates.
The news of the Giuliani-Hanover separation just about wrecks me. What chance have Max and I got if all it takes to bust a couple up is a little political betrayal, cancer and adultery?
Having been, in the privacy of my own mind, flogged by twisty-sneaky ex-candidate Rudy and pussy-kissed by lovely ex-monologuist Donna, I try to picture having sex with them in some position that reconciles the two. But my clit keeps flat-lining. That's it. I can't just sit on all this anxiety anymore. So when Max comes home, I tell all: how worried I am about my portfolio not recovering from the tech stock dive, how I know he fucked that Belgian heiress to get his film funded because I read her letter and how worried I am that I haven't made enough cash to keep him from going "fund-raising" again.
As I'm explaining, he unbuttons my blouse. Then he kisses my temples and says, "Kitty," over and over, which means he has a stiffy.
Flattered that he wants me even at my most insecure, I unzip his pants and reach in. He's got a nice tough pup in there, a pet who loves me no matter what.
"My luck," I pout, "to marry a man who gets a hard-on when you catch him sneaking out." It's not that at all, Max claims; it's that it excites him to see me so emotionally fluid again, because I'd been going around with my face in a knot for so long. Now that the lying and seething and deception are out in the open, he thinks we can move on.
I can't move on, I say, unless I know how much money I must bring in if I'm to keep from ending up like poor Donna — with no husband to humiliate and nothing but soap operas to star in.
Max cups my breasts and buries his nose between them, so I make him repeat his muffled answer, which is that (a) he loves me and he's extremely sorry he did such a stupid, back-handed thing, (b) he used a condom and (c) money wasn't the issue.
I don't believe (c).
Mr. Pup is now bounding around eagerly in its Fruit of the Loom jacket, its warmth and energy making me tingle with interest. "Then what was the issue?" I remember to ask.
Max sits back with a sigh. "You're wanting me to pretend to be Trump." He says it casually, but the look in his eye is a bit accusing. "It made me feel like I wasn't enough of an asshole for you."
I say, "Oh Max," tenderly, then add, "You know you are the only asshole for me!" and it makes him laugh. He pulls me to him suddenly. His breath is heavy in my ear, like the air before a thunderstorm.
Now that Max thinks he's out of the doghouse, he lets Fido off the leash. It's jumping my leg, practically barking. I only have to move my head two inches in its direction to make Max himself whimper with anticipation. I slick up his love pup with the flat of my tongue and then plunge it into my mouth, like a cat swallowing a sardine. When it hits the back of my throat, Max is so happy he forgets to hang onto my crotch, dammit, and I have to rub up against his arm to keep my end of things juicy. Don't let anyone tell you that marriage isn't work.
Seeking some sexual healing, I pull him into me and he sinks his flesh into mine. We go at it like a couple of animals in the alley and as the surfaces of our bodies melt away, whatever force it is that binds us so powerfully together bubbles up out of the quicksand of daily life and buries all our resentments in puddles of timeless whooshiness. Max may not be entirely faithful, but I don't doubt at this minute that he's entirely mine.
After, though, I have to ask. Did he ever think about that Belgian blond when he was fucking me?
He shakes his head "No" vehemently. He cites a New York Times poll that says about fifty percent of Americans think it's cheating to imagine someone else while having sex with your spouse. And he's in that half!
I, of course, am in the other.
"The only time I ever pretended you were somebody else, that somebody was you-before-I-met-you," I say, sweetly. He beams, flattered, and, for the first time since I discovered that Max cheated on me, I feel hopeful, because something tells me that when Rudy first did it to Donna, she did not come up with as adorable and loving a lie to even the score.
