The Misbegotten
Hurtful Past, Confused Future - Summer 2018

At 6 o’clock on the dot, later that morning, I awoketo the blaring tones of the alarm on my cell phone. They were the familiar beats and rhythms ofan old school song everyone used to bump to when I was only two years old:

“Go, go, go,go, go, go, go.

“Go shorty,it’s yo birfday,

“We gonnaparty like it’s yo birfday,

“We gonna sipBacardi like it’s yo birfday,

“And you knowwe don’t give a fuck, cuz that’s yo birfday…”

It was an old song, true. The fact I let it play for about half aminute before turning it off was a testament to the talent of the rapper whohad named himself after half a dollar’s worth of change.

I put the phone back on the nightstand and twisted onthe bed, surveying the entire length of the Loft.

Ramona was sitting back against the headboard of mybed, rubbing at her eyes. Next, she fidgetedwith her hair, her luscious tits about to flop out of her top. The silken garment had skewed downward and tothe right during her sleep.

Katie was stretching, languorous, on the far bed likeshe always did in the morning, and then rolled over so she faced me. Our eyes met and she blew me a kiss, which Ireturned. She looked scrumptious laidout on that bed, naked underneath her nightclothes, rested and ready.

At least to me, she looked ready. Her smoky eyes gave her away. The longer I stared. The more she grinned until her entire visagewas sparkling with the naughty thoughts crossing her mind. Naughty thoughts she knew I was reading fromacross the room. Come here, Estefan. Come hereand fuck me as hard and for as long as you want.

From the corner of my eye, I saw Tirza walk throughthe portal of the bathroom and out of sight. I knew she was going to wash-up. She had always been one to brush her teeth and wash her face the momentshe awoke. She had some sort of badbreath/gooey-eyed phobia. Thus, it droveher to rid herself of the residue of sleep at the earliest opportunity. Some thingsnever change. She hasn’t. It’s the same thing with my tineex-girlfriend.

“It’s gotta be a little weird for you, huh Steve?”commented Ramona with a question. Shegazed at me through her eyebrows, arms crossed over her breasts. She had put in their proper place beneath hersexy camisole.

“What’s that, my dear?” I asked, ignoring her use ofmy American name. I wasn’t in the moodfor her petty jealousies, coming and going in the blink of an eye.

“Seeing herhere in your room this early in the morning, must bring back a flood ofmemories.” She trailed off as if shewere trying to tempt me to go there.

Like I said, I didn’t want to waste time bandyingstupid shit with her after everything we’d gone through the day before. Sometimes my girlfriend’s comments justneeded marginalization. “Yeah, my love,it does,” was all I said as I crossed the room. I walked past the half-closed bathroom door and came up to my cousin.

Katie, upon seeing my intent, stood at the foot of thebed, quick to close the distance between us. My cousin stood on the tips of her toes, her arms opening, letting meinto her embrace.

I fell into her, my head bent downward as she upturnedhers to meet mine. It was a natural sortof ying and yang, coming together, culminating in a kiss.

My arms encircled her as our lips touched. I filled with such aching desire. It felt like I had stepped into an oven. A searing heat flowed outward from mystomach, inflamed my lions and made my face flush. I could feel a similar reaction from mycousin. The swell of her breasts pushedhard against me. The firm pressure ofher pelvic bone along the middle of my growing cock and the frantic clutch ofher squeeze.

“God, Estefan, you make me so fucking horny,” shemouthed around our kiss. Her voice madehusky and deep with lust.

I chuckled from the chest and whispered a long, drawnout, “Goooood,” but I didn’t stop. Ikept kissing my cousin. I parted herlips with my tongue, which she immediately began to suck. I let my hands fall to her firm butt cheeksand kneaded them hungrily. I used thisnewfound leverage to grind thickness my dick into her pubis. Her welcoming labium’s parted for me, throughour pajamas – perfect. I pressed againsther engorged clitoris.

She shuddered in my arms for a few moments thenreturned the pressure. She twisted herhips a bit, so my penis was rubbing across her little nob of pleasure. Back and forth she went with each twitch ofthe intimate portions of her body.

All the while, we kept kissing and kissing andkissing.

It was the sharp intake of breath and an astonished;“Oh my god!” That brought us both to reality like a splash of ice coldwater. We stiffened in each other’sgrasp, our kiss broken, both of us turning to look in the direction of thevoice - frozen in place. My hands were stillcupping Katie’s firm ass. Her own weredigging into my bare shoulder blades, nails biting. I hadn’t worn a shirt that night.

It was Tirza, who had come from the bathroom in arush, likely thinking I was still on the other side of the room. Only she found me on the side she was facing,making out with my cousin.

I know we looked like we were two seconds from rippingoff our clothes and going at it.

It was the moment of truth. Either Tirza was going to accept the taboo ofmy intimate relationship with my first cousin. Or she was going to go ape-shit and blow the whole fucking thing tokingdom come.

Instead, she just stood there on the balls of her feetlike a deer in the headlights, as immobile as us. Her lower jaw was the only thing moving, in aweird sort of half-closing, half-opening rhythm. It was strange to watch. Was she unconsciously biting off word afterword? Was she in a state of flux unableto express herself? She appearedanimatronic, not alive at all.

From farther back, on the opposite side of the Loft, cameRamona.

I watched as my girlfriend sashayed toward the rest ofus.

Her round hips jutted left, then right as she cameupon bare feet. She gripped the carpetlike a tiger, like a prowling female feline about ready to pounce. “Aren’t they delicious to watch?” she asked onceabreast of Tirza, who had still not moved.

“W-what?” sputtered my ex-girlfriend.

“Doesn’t it get you all mojada just watching them?” clarified my girl. She used the feminine word for “wet” inSpanish. When spoken in a sexualcontext, it meant “soaked”.

Now Tirza was more than confused and came to rest uponthe bottoms of her feet. Her gazeshifted to my girlfriend. “What!?!” Her brow knitted.

The three of us giggled like elementary kids afterhearing someone say a bad word for the first time. Tirza was more Valley Girl than Latina fromthe day she was born, though both of her parents spoke fluent Spanish.

Her head whipped about between the three of us, angergrowing behind her eyes. She was thinkingwe’d played some sort of cruel joke at her expense.

“It means ‘wet’… only in a girlie sort of way,”supplied Ramona. Her eyebrows rose asshe tried to get the point across to my ex-girlfriend.

Katie and I unglued ourselves from one another, thoughwe continued to hold hands.

We all watched the comprehension dawn upon the tinyteen before us.

“Eeew, Ramona, why would you think that would turn meon?!?” It affronted her, the thought ofbecoming aroused from watching Katie and I going at one another.

“…Because it does exactly that to me…,” was all shesaid. Then she gave me and my cousin oneof her magnificent smiles.

Tirza’s jaw dropped like an anvil. “You can’t be serious,” she managed after atime.

Her eyes danced toward those of my ex-girlfriend,until she was looking at her out of the furthest corners. “I amserious, Tirza.”

This boggled Tirza’s mind. It was plain for us all watching. Her tiny body shook with what had to beincomprehensible thoughts. “How… Howcould that be true, Ramona? That’s hiscousin and you’re his girlfriend, how could you share him with her? They are blood relatives.”

I had never heard such indignation from Tirzabefore. Not even when we’d argued overreligion or Theology in the past. Thosewere two of the most important topics of consideration in her life. Still, she hadn’t shown as much disdain orloathing of my opinion of the Church in one’s life than she displayed rightthen.

Katie went livid, her cast darkening. Tirza had made her angry.

I gripped her hand hard for a moment and she glancedup at me. I shook my head in a minusculefashion. It was imperceptive to all butKatie.

Not now, mylove. Not now.

“I can’t change what this is, Tirza. I think one day you will understand it all asmuch as I do, and as they do.” Shemotioned toward me and my cousin. “It’ssomething I can’t quite explain, and yet, I know it is a truth I cannotdeny. I couldn’t change this even If Iwanted to. It’s hardwired into us, akind of mental tug that draws us all to him. It’s getting stronger with every passing day.

“Isn’t that right, Katie?” asked Ramon. Her voice filled with meaning, yet there wasa measured quality to it. A churchconfessional came to mind, though I don’t know why.

It was my cousin’s turn to grasp my hand. “Yes,” she murmured, looking into my eyes.

It was amazing to see the love behind hers - pure,simple, and unblemished. I imagined atthe time, it was like that of a child’s love for its parent – devoid ofconditions. Only Katie had taken her loveone step further. She wanted to be mywife.

My gaze was drowning in the hazel pools of my cousin’sorbs when Tirza stomped of a sudden. Sheexploded with an exasperated huff, stalked over to the bed and sat down heavy. She crossed her arms across herself andstared up at Katie and me. “Do you knowhow much it hurt me when you spoke her name while we were making love?”

I turned to face the sitting girl, feeling shame and chagrincreeping up and over my shoulders with its’ sick touch. It made me cringe. “It was mistake, Tirza, an errant slip of thetongue. You were never supposed toknow. No one was, not even Katie.”

Tirza’s face bunched. “No one was to know you secretly wanted your cousin? You wanted to keep secret that you werethinking of her while you were screwing me that day? Doing the same things to her that you weredoing to me? These were big things,Estefan. What I was doing with you whenwe were together, I hadn’t done with anyone else. I trusted you, because I believed in what wehad. You told me that you loved me,dammit!”

“I did love you, Tirza,” I said at once. The memory of that emotion flooded into melike water gushing through a failing dam. It was small at first, but grew exponentially until it was all I couldfeel. I was submerging in the memory ofher.

Tirza cradled her head in her hands, shaking her headback and forth for a few seconds. Thenwith abrupt ferocity she sputtered, “How could you love me when you were lovewith your cousin at the same time?!?”

“I did… I was!” I replied just as assured as her.

She looked away from me, crossing her arms about herperson once more. She pursed her lips, suckingat them with obvious acrimony and misdoubt. “Oh my god, such a typical answer to hear, at a time like this,especially from a guy.”

“He’s not lying, Tirza.”

All three of us turned to peer at Ramona. She had maneuvered herself, so she was nowstanding before the tiny teenage girl on the bed.

“How do you know that?” Tirza snapped. She wanted to pick a fight. It was evident by her tone.

“Because, he’s not,” was her succinct retort.

My ex-girlfriend glared at my girlfriend through eyessquinting with distrust and frustration, and some degree of antagonism as well.

Ramona bent at the knees and squatted beforeTirza. They were more or less at eyelevel with one another. “He is notlying,” she began, placing one of her hands upon the other’s knee. “He is different, Tirza.” She chanced a glance in my direction. “Very different,” she went on, “and you haveto understand this difference, if you are ever going to understand him. He might say or act like other men his age,but, on his most basic level, he's made in a different way. He will always be apart from them. That is what you have to remember or he willdrive you crazy.

“He would be dangerous to women if he used his willagainst us. He could cause more traumasto our sex than any other man in the history of Mankind. But, that would only be true if he put hismind and his body to the full extent of his ability. He could have us all in his palm. He could crush our hearts by pitting usagainst one another or by making it a game to win his heart. He could set himself as the prize among allprizes if he chose, but he doesn’t. Thankfully, he doesn’t. He’s notbuilt that way. He chooses to loveinstead, because he has a massive heart. I think it allows him to love more than one woman.” She stood and sauntered up to me. “So far, Tirza, I can see five women - five women - he will love. And these five women who will love himback.” She paused for effect. “That might not be all the girls. There may be more.”

“Five?!?”croaked Tirza.

“Five,” repeated my girlfriend.

I shook my head, not willing to believe that Leda,Sandy and Tirza would all want me oneday. It just seemed too far-fetched tobe true. Even back then, I wasn’t a bigfan of the fantastic or fantasy. Myparents’ divorce had washed that away from me, like the storm surge of ahurricane. Once those turbulent watersreceded, the landscape that had been me was forever altered. I was now barren of flighty dreams andwhimsical childhood thoughts.

“There may bemore,” continued Ramona, reiterating what she had said before. “I’m not too sure about that, but what I am sure about is, one of them is you.”

Tirza started to protest, but my girlfriend forged on.

“You don’t see how that could be possible now, but youwill. You will. I know him much better than I know you. When he realizes, somewhere in the center ofhimself, he still loves you, that those feelings never went away. His astonishment alone will draw you like abee to the pollen of a flower. It willbe so natural, so instinctual, you won’t even realize when you made theconscious decision to love him back. Youjust will and that will be enough, no further explanation needed.”

I rolled my eyes and left. This was too much, too soon. Everything was happening at the sametime. I spun on my heel and went to thebathroom to wash up, though behind me Roman was still talking. As I put toothpaste to my brush and behind tocleanse my teeth of the detritus of the night, I could hear them all in deepconversation. I frowned at my reflectionin the mirror as I brushed with unnecessary vigor. I was certain they were sharing notes, whichirked me. Some things, some topics,should remain unspoken. They shouldremain private, especially if I’m in the next goddamned room!

Not with you,Estefan Ernando, I thought at Istared at myself. You’re different remember?

Fuck you! I yelled without sound at the image before me.