Like Warm Sun on Nekkid Bottoms - Charles Austen [38]
“You don’t know she’s a gold-digger,” I said. “You’re judging her on no evidence…”
“More evidence than you have that she’s NOT a gold-digger!” Grandfather snapped.
“I talked to her at least. On a more non-threatening level than you apparently did…”
“You’re in no position to comment rationally,” Grandfather interrupted. “You had already surrendered to the reptilian brain. A hot dick looking for a hotter hole. Mark my words, that woman is in it for the money.”
“You don’t know her…”
“And you do? I saw your expression. You didn’t even know she had parents, did you?”
I lowered my head sadly.
“How long have you been acquainted with this woman?”
“Well, technically we met a couple of weeks ago, but…”
Grandfather glared, and I hesitated. When I finally spoke again, my voice was so shallow I was surprised he could hear me at all.
“Since this morning.”
“Since this morning, you said? This afternoon, more like. And not more than a few hours later, she’s naked—in a closet—with you. Proper women don’t behave that way.”
Aunt Helena sniffed. “Proper women have always behaved that way. ‘Proper’ society just pretends they don’t. Especially the proper men who stick their hot dicks into their even hotter holes.”
“You, of all people, have no business commenting on this.”
I wasn’t sure what that meant, but Aunt Helena lost her smile and stopped talking immediately. Clearly, I was going to have to start paying more attention to family gossip.
“This woman is an opportunist,” Grandfather continued, apparently getting back to Ms. Nuckeby. “She saw a chance, and she took it.” He turned to me. “Whether to snag you into a sham marriage, or—more likely—simply to find an opportunity to sue for whatever she could get. It’s well known we Wopplesdowns are an easy mark.”
“And whose fault is that, Mister Hot Dick calling the kettle black?” Helena slid in. I was glad to see Grandfather hadn’t silenced her completely.
“We can’t help it if, genetically—with the exception of Corky, here—Wopplesdowns are oversexed.”
“Harassment has nothing to do with sex,” Helena snarled. “It’s about power.”
“Pshaw!” Grandfather said. It was something my grandfather said a lot. I was never able to find the word in any dictionary. “Women have all the power, my dear sister. And you know that better than anyone.”
Again, Helena was momentarily silenced. But with the opening she had created I tried to regain the upper hand—which I never had to begin with, but you know what I mean.
“How can you possibly know…?”
“Did you talk,” he interrupted, taking away even the illusion of an upper hand, finger, or nail, “you and this Nuckeby girl?”
I said nothing.
“Did you discuss family?”
The wind blew.
“Moral values?”
The house creaked.
“Current events?”
Someone far away coughed.
“Child rearing, religion, the environment?”
Who did first look at sheep, and…
“Does she enjoy watching people do strange things to animals with electricity?”
I wasn’t sure how anyone could possibly answer that one.
“Did you say, or do, anything that might give her any idea that you would be someone with whom she was, in any way, mutually compatible in a long-term relationship?”
I returned my attention to the carpet.
“No. You got naked in a closet. Hormones and intent. You had hormones, and she had intent. Take it from someone who knows all too well.”
Studiously fighting off the horrifyingly uncomfortable visuals of Grandfather bare-assed in a closet with anyone, I began to find myself wondering about Ms. Nuckeby. I really did know nothing about her, and—other than the fact that the tiniest breeze seemed to arouse a sudden stiffness in my loins—she knew nothing about me. Why was she attracted to me? Why would anyone be?
The downside of an argument like Grandfather’s was: it didn’t rely on logic or facts, and worked