Mike & Karen Ch. 09

The pulled back from the kiss and both exhaled loudly, sweating.

"Wah ..." Jeanie breathed.

"I am thinking we should stop with the shots, ja?" Freja suggested.

"Not like we have a choice," Jeanie sighed, picking up a two-litre plastic bottle and shaking it upside down over her shot glass. "We're outta root beer anyway. I knew that slut confessions between us would require at least ten litres."

"These confessions, they might have been easier if we had used alcohol, I am thinking," Freja mentioned.

Jeanie shrugged: "Maybe, but I didn't want that. I wanted to hear your sober confessions when it hurt, Fre. And I wanted to be sober when I told you that I loved you even more than when we began the confessions, no alcohol clouding my feelings."

She leaned in close, her lips almost touching Freja's, the sweet scent of the drink on their breath: "And I was right. I love you more than ever."

"I am glad, because I am loving you more too," Freja replied, kissing Jeanie and trembling in relief. Then she squirmed somewhat uncomfortably. "But I have drunk too much of your root beer, and now I am needings to pee."

"Okie-dokes!" Jeanie said cheerfully, shucking her tank-top off so that her breasts wobbled freely. "You go, I'm gonna watch, then I'm gonna take you in the bedroom and let you fuck me in half!"

Freja smiled slyly: "I like it when you watch me. And I love fucking you in half."

Hand in hand, they walked through their condo toward the bedroom and their bathroom, both managing to shed any remaining clothing along the way.

"D'you think we can do the fountain thing together?" Jeanie asked.

"With you, I would do that for free," Freja replied, squeezing her wife's hand.

"How about the last thing you told me?"

"We ... will talk," Freja laughed as she closed the door to the bathroom.

***

1986 ...

It was a somewhat strange transformation, she had to admit - this posh neighbourhood, full of luxury retail, upscale condos and expensive hotels, had once been the bohemian and hippie capital of Toronto, indeed Canada. Yorkville had certainly changed over the decades, although Karen was only familiar with this iteration of the location.

She remembered her mother talking about how she'd spent time in Yorkville in the '60s, when it was a neighbourhood for bohemians, hippies and revolutionaries, considered a blight or an eyesore on the respectable reputation of 'Toronto the Good.' Then again, her mother mentioned that she got to hang out with legendary artists such as Joni Mitchell, Neil Young, Leonard Cohen, Gordon Lightfoot and Margaret Atwood, so who cared what the city's councillors thought?

Her father didn't approve of most of her mother's hippie shenanigans, but they loved one another beyond question. The dynamic of raising their daughter certainly proved interesting. Karen's upbringing was framed in patrician terms, but she also displayed her mother's willful defiance and individualism. Her personal conduct aside, she was decidedly progressive in her social outlook, much to the dismay of the majority of the Blackwell and Gordon families, especially the former.

She didn't care. She was bisexual, and if anybody felt they were entitled to know her proclivities, they were met with imperious silence. She suspected her mother might have had an experimental sexual phase before marrying, but they'd never discussed it either. What mattered was that her mother encouraged her to be herself. Who she allowed in her bed was her business.

Miranda Gordon had, in fact, paid for what amounted more or less to courtesan classes for her daughter, where she learned manners, elegance, and how to conduct herself in just about any circles she might find herself in and still be a model of dignity and elegance. These lessons also included the option of how to learn to be a superb lover, and Karen had picked these lessons up willingly.

Disdaining the patriarchal notion that her worth was tied to her virginity, she placed no value on losing it either. Frankly, she wanted to be a ready and capable lover for whatever man (or woman) finally captured her heart. She'd lost her maidenhood to two teachers at boarding school and had been practicing ever since.

Of course, she had no intention of being a kept wife, a trophy or any such thing. She was no Jacqueline Bouvier, raised to be a perfect and obedient bride to some great man. No, she was no Stepford Wife, but she intended to dazzle society and to keep her spouse's heart with her exquisite skills in the bedroom.

Now she just had to find someone worthy of her.

The day was bright and pleasant as she stood outside the store window, considering a pair of shoes. She was wearing a black dress with white floral prints, the upper part of which hugged her curves while the skirt fluttered playfully around her thighs. A stylish broad-brimmed hat protected her face from the sun's rays on the broad boulevard. The small black purse she carried complemented her dress, naturally.

She'd had Jordan drop her off in Yorkville so that she could spend an afternoon out, instead of slaving over her studies. She was so far ahead that it was simply overkill to do any more at this point, and it seemed rather neurotic to her. So many students obsessed over their courses, even if they were acing them, as if distraction of any sort were grounds for karmic punishment.

So she found herself here, in the midst of the most splendid shopping district in all of Canada, and realized that she'd actually come here without any objective in mind. She couldn't think of anything she immediately needed; she had shoes, certainly. Dresses, most definitely. Purses? Lingerie?

She should have brought one of her friends so that she had someone to play dress-up with. Mona usually balked, citing that she wouldn't take 'charity,' whatever that meant, so Karen insisted only rarely. Janet was usually game, but because of her personality and presentation, which Karen could only describe as, well, lazy, she rarely looked good in anything Karen put on her. Lisa, along those lines, was so timid that even if Karen found something that suited her roommate, she couldn't pull it off because she was usually so withdrawn or nervous.

Karen just sighed and stared into the show window, wondering if she'd wasted a trip.

Just before she sensed a presence somewhere nearby.

She turned her head and smirked as DeBourne strode down the street, distracted by a book he was reading. The textbook looked like a kid's comic dime novel in his huge hand, and people stared at him, parting like the Red Sea in front of his bulk. He hadn't noticed her yet, engrossed as he was in his subject matter, no doubt Calabi-Yau Manifolds or some such thing.

"Where's the fire, Gargantua?" she asked, her voice pulling him instantly from his book. She turned to gaze up at him as he stopped, an amused look on her face, her hand resting on her hip. "Not like you to not be aware of your surroundings."

"Well now, if it isn't Uptown Girl," he replied, nodding and closing his book to deposit in his backpack. He just carried it in his hands wherever he went, because it wasn't nearly big enough to fit across his vast shoulders, and any backpack that was big enough qualified as definite overkill for the course loads. "In your natural habitat, I see."

"Oh, be nice," she chided, patting him with a gloved hand. "And it was ungallant of you to not answer a lady's question, good sir."

He shrugged: "Just heading to the museum. New specimen in the dinosaur exhibit, not to mention the Egyptian wing."

She thought about what he said. "The Museum's around here?"

"Yeah, it's ... about a mile thataways," he answered, pointed west, the direction he'd been heading. "It's not far from campus, Gordon. How do you not know that?"

She blushed somewhat: "A girl can't know where everything is, can she?"

He thought about what she was saying for a moment and then began grinning in amusement. "What's the closest subway station to where we are, right this second?"

"That's easy," she sniffed. "Davisville."

"Nope."

"York Mills, I meant." Karen corrected.

"Not even close, Gordon," Mike chuckled.

"Runnymede!" she almost hissed, her cheeks turning slightly scarlet.

"Now you're just naming stations you associate with historical events," he laughed. "How did you get here?" he queried.

She turned her head and looked at the ground, hoping the brim of her hat hid her embarrassment. "My ... Jordan drove me here."

"From your dorm?" he laughed, clearly greatly amused. "Gordon, the Royal Ontario Museum literally anchors the northeast corner of the campus. You're precisely one mile from your own dorm."

"So?" she said petulantly, still not looking up.

"Do you not know how to use the public transportation system?" he asked.

She said nothing, scowling at the sidewalk.

"Oh, princess," he sighed, shaking his head. "That's downright adorable. Don't worry, I won't tell anyone."

"Well, thank you for that," she said dryly, fixing him with a look. It would have intimidated anyone else, but there was a distinct possibility it wouldn't reach his face for another week or so. "My TTC-dyslexia isn't keeping you from your extracurriculars, is it?"

Mike shrugged again. "I was just killing time. I wasn't married to the idea; I just wanted to get out of the dorms, to be honest."

She assessed him for a few moments, looking up and down his enormous frame. He was wearing what must have been at least a 5XL T-shirt, but it barely fit across his massive chest, sporting a Motörhead logo. The faded jeans he was wearing bulged over his powerful quads and calves (and other, less mentionable areas). Beat-up sneakers contained his absurdly sized feet.

"What?" he asked suspiciously, seeing the wheels in her head turning.

"You, sir, are to sartorial elegance what napalm is to shrubbery," Karen mused, regarding his shirt.

"Are you sassing me?" he asked, still suspecting her motives. "Are them fighting words?"

"Fortunately for you, no," she replied simply. She was probably right. "I forgot to bring anyone with me to accommodate my need for applied haberdashery. I didn't think ahead when I chose to come to Yorkville."

"That's a very strange way to say 'None of what is happening concerns you, Michael DeBourne,'" he stated. "Is there a point here?"

"Absolutely," she confirmed. "Here I was, in a predicament, and you happened by. Providence? Without question."

"What's the predicament?" he asked, getting impatient. "Do you need me to escort you to one of the subway stations and show you how to use a token?"

"Very droll," Karen said, clucking her tongue. "No, I should have brought one of my girls with me, so that I could buy some dresses, but I failed in that regard. Now, here you are."

"I am not wearing a dress for you, crazy lady." Mike said firmly.

"Don't be silly," she giggled. "You're actually a dream come true."

"Thanks?"

"You're welcome. What I meant was that I can take you to a men's store, and we can see if they have the skill to make a suit that will accommodate your Brobdingnagian frame."

He frowned: "Why would I agree to this?"

"You already said you're not doing anything of import," Karen pointed out. "And it would be interesting to see if anyone is up to the task."

"What if I don't feel like being a lab rat for you and your Savile Row Rembrandts?" Mike almost growled.

"Do you even own a suit, DeBourne?" she queried, not backing down.

He faltered, although he didn't know why. "I ... no."

"I'll go out on a limb and say that no one in the mighty metropolis of Kapuskasing was up to the task, yes?"

Now Mike was the one scowling at the ground. "So what?"

She sighed and patted him again. "I am not trying to sound classist, good sir, but every man should own a decent suit. It wouldn't do to have one of our most accomplished minds at the university excluded from important functions because no one was able to properly outfit him, would it?"

"Look, Gordon," he said irritably. "Even if your thread monkeys did manage to make a suit for me, how the Hell am I supposed to pay for it? I can't. Simple. And you don't expect them to spend valuable dialectical hours slaving away on an experiment just for show, do you?"

She rolled her eyes: "No, I'd buy it, of course."

"Yeah, no," Mike announced. "Not to rain on your parade, but no."

"Why?"

"I can't just accept expensive suits from people," he protested. "No matter how warped their personal genius makes them."

"Is it because I'm a woman?" Karen asked.

"No, but being a woman is the only thing that has kept me from turning your nose to the other side of your face for presuming." Mike said somewhat tersely, a voice he regretted using on her. He couldn't believe he'd done it, but she was out of line. "I'd've knocked a guy out by now."

Karen ignored the implications, in spite of the chill it sent down her spine. He'd never strike her, or even threaten her, but it reminded her exactly how dangerous this leviathan was. "DeBourne, as I've already stated, this is something akin to providence. I came to Yorkville lacking purpose, and you've provided me with a great one. Why object?"

"Gordon, finding yourself stuck in a posh shopping district without knowing what to buy hardly qualifies as a life crisis requiring intervention by the Almighty," he insisted. Why was he considering this? "And I'm not a charity case for you in any event."

She sighed, ready to explain again: "You happened to show up. It could have been anyone I knew. I'm also reasonably certain that anyone else would not be putting up such a fight. Why are you being such a hard-ass about this?"

The normally proper and respectable Karen Gordon using the rather vulgar and pedestrian term 'hard-ass' snapped Michael out of his oppositional state. As exceedingly strange as this moment was, he was having a hard time justifying his protest to her plan. In her place, with her resources, he would have been doing the same thing constantly, and would have been baffled when people objected.

"Fine, look," he said eventually. "Let's say I acquiesce to your little scheme here ... how do I reciprocate? Because I guarantee you, this plan of yours is going nowhere without that aspect being resolved."

Karen considered: "Well, if it's still open, take me with you to the museum."

Mike blinked for a moment and she gave him a wry look. "What, I can't like dinosaurs because I'm a girl?" she asked. "And I happen to be partial to Egyptian history, thank you very much."

"Okay, deal," he agreed. "But what did you mean if the museum is still open? It's only eleven in the morning. How long can it take to fit a damn suit?"

She smiled and shook her head. "Nobody makes suits in your size, Atlas. They'll need to measure you and then begin forging it. I have no idea if the museum will still be open when they're finished."

"You mean this could be an all-day thing?" he exclaimed.

"Whose fault is it, exactly, that you displace more water than a whole Maritimes fishing village?" Karen reasoned. "It may take some time. I promise, an afternoon of exposure will not turn you into the haut monde you seem to be so offended by. And if the museum is closed, well, then you can buy me a drink, peasant."

Mike shook his head, even as she put her hands around his massive forearm and cast her gaze around. "Now then," she mused. "Who would be up to the challenge? Harry Rosen? Emporio Armani?"

His head turned to look down at her. "Did you just say Armani? Don't those suits cost a couple of grand?"

"One would hope," Karen replied casually. "You get what you pay for, after all."

"God save us all ..." Mike muttered as she tugged him toward a store just down the way.

***

"Lemme get this straight," Alex asked as he worked out alongside his father at the gym they attended. He was using the pectoral machine, pushing out a considerable amount of resistance. "Mom bought you your first adult suit?"

"Not like I was given much of a choice," Mike replied, lying on his back and lifting the entire available weight of the press machine. One woman tripped over a dumbbell as she stared while walking by. "She has this incredible gift for bafflegab that subverts one's will to hers without you truly realizing it had happened. She almost makes it look like you had a choice in the matter."

Alex considered and shrugged. "If Alexa ever wants to make sure I do something, she just uses her cutesy voice and rubs her boobs on my arm while she does it. Guess it's a genetic thing with the Gordon-Blackwell women."

"You have no idea," Mike sighed, sitting up and stretching his arms over his head. "Pity it won't work for them next week."

"Yeah, they're gonna be in for it," Alex admitted, letting the weights clank back into place and standing up, rotating his shoulders. "Is it really okay to not go as backup?"

"We don't have to like it, we just have to accept that it's how your mother wants to handle it," Mike replied, standing now. "And I get it, because if we keep acting as her goon squad, they'll always see it as weakness on her part. We know it's not true, but that'll be the narrative they play to keep going after her."

"Pisses me off," Alex growled, his expression darkening considerably. "She's trying to hold the family and the legacy together, and those jackals are just in it for the money and power trip."

"Well, Alli is her secret weapon this time around, so they won't be ready for that," Mike mentioned. "They know she's coming, but I somehow doubt your mother will allow this first meeting to be at all typical."

"Sounds like mom," Alex said dryly, towelling off his blond mane. "Still wish we were going."

Mike stood and shrugged, now towering over everyone in the gym. Even the more muscular men looked like stunted saplings next to him, not that he either noticed or cared. "Well, we're not, so don't dwell on it, bucko. Got any plans for you and your wife before they leave?"

Alex nodded: "Yeah, amongst other things, I'm gonna take her back to the glade for a romantic interlude."

Mike grinned: "Good call, Alex; she'll love that."

"What about you and mom?" the younger DeBourne asked as they headed toward the sauna. Neither remarked on the stares they were drawing, tacitly ignoring them. It was old hat by this point.

"Oh, dinner out at her favourite club, then some dancing," Mike replied as they got to the cedar room, uninhabited except for the two of them. "A classy establishment is never classier than when your mother is gracing it with her presence."

"True enough," Alex admitted readily as he settled down on the top row of seating. "When she's not wearing plaid pants and singing karaoke with you, she's got a lock on regal, doesn't she?"

"That was her upbringing, yes," Mike agreed, as he sat on the lower level of seating, at the corner, which supported his weight, but still creaked in protest. "She was meant to move in the very highest circles when necessary. She went through extensive manners training from the time she was little until she headed off to university. Tea with Her Majesty the Queen wouldn't be a challenge for her."

"Good thing she's got nerves of steel for this week," Alex sighed. "I know Alexa will do everything she can, and has her own part to play, but not having you there is gonna be tough on mom."

"She's the strongest person I know, Alex, never forget that," Mike said seriously, stretching out his massive arms over the upper ledge. "She's held that family together for nearly twenty years now, ever since your grandfather started having his breakdown and the wolves closed in."