Be Careful What You Ask For

I met my son’s friend Steve when he was fifteen and was just learning how to play a guitar. Together, the boys sounded terrible mimicking Motley Crue and Iron Maiden. I wasn’t familiar with those bands so I tried to ignore the boys, thinking that maybe they were playing the songs correctly. Weeks later I noticed they weren’t and being a guitarist myself, I studied the sounds on the records and helped show my son and his friend the right notes.
 
Time went by and the boys became better musicians. They spent a lot of time in my home practicing. I noticed how Steve was changing as he became older. A band was formed and Steve was regarded as the lead guitarist. He had a lot of friends from school, certainly more than my son, and they came over to the house to watch the band practice. A year went by.

 

I took the boys to concerts and dressed up like they did, looking again like a teenager. I hung out with all the teens in their black T-shirts and jeans and banged my head to their music. Soon, I was so involved I began producing concerts so they would be able to play for a larger audience. Another year passed.

 

Steve was becoming a very sexy rock star in my small town. He dressed well, played the guitar well and was quite a showman. My son tried to keep up with his stage performance but wasn’t able to but did excel better at the guitar and was able to play all the lead parts better than Steve. I didn’t notice though. I was focused on Steve and was becoming obsessed with him like all the young teenaged girls.

 

I had Steve on my mine day and night. I fantasized making love to him; I would write him poems and letters telling how proud I was of his accomplishments. Another year went by. I was falling deeply in love with the boy who was quickly becoming a young man. I quit smoking, dyed my hair and tried to look as young as he was.

 

One afternoon in July a neighbor invited my son, Steve and myself to go to the beach five hundred miles away in his car. We rode from the middle of north central Texas to the base of the state in an old car cramped up together, laughing and joking all the way. Steve kept asking our neighbor, Bill, where all the whorehouses were in Galveston. I just watched and listened and thought, “You don’t need a whorehouse, I’m here.”

 

After spending a day on the beach, we couldn’t find a hotel room and ended up sleeping in the back of an old El Camino with a blanket covering all four of us. Steve cuddled up to my back and began feeling my body. I turned around and reciprocated, making love to the man of my dreams. My son was quiet like he was asleep as was Bill. I knew I was in love. I couldn’t help myself; it was building up for years. Six months passed.

 

One night, Steve came over to my house very late and asked me to make love to him. We went to the bedroom and during the next several years made love on occasion, with him leaving afterwards, always with an excuse why he had to go home quickly. I dated others but was terribly in love with Steve. Six more months passed.

 

I wasn’t getting any younger and only knew if Steve was coming over if he called and that was randomly. I was lonely. I went out of town for a while and worked as a bartender, meeting a lot of different men. One man struck me as a sweet, attractive guy and he was single. I brought him back to my hometown with me and we began living together. He helped me with the house, the yard and even painted my toenails. He always wanted to hold my hand or put his arm around me in the car. He was handsome and sweet and he fell in love with me the way I loved Steve so we married.

 

 I saw Steve occasionally but he was always with another woman and was drinking. He was now getting old enough to marry and I believed our age difference was too vast so I married this other man who was closer to my own age. He was an alcoholic and I knew that from the beginning of our relationship. I just didn’t know how bad an alcoholic he was.

 

 Three years passed. My husband was picked up for driving while intoxicated and was imprisoned for eight months. During that time, Steve visited me and we made love once and it was a torrid, erotic exciting night. I knew I still loved him but he was drunk when we made love and I wondered if that was the reason for him coming over. I felt guilty for cheating on my husband but didn’t regret making love to Steve.

 

My husband was released from jail and from that time on, he began doing terrible things to me. He left for days and binge-drank. Although he didn’t drink at home when I was there, he sold my belongings for alcohol while I was at work.

 

He was seen in all the bars fighting and spent time with other women. Our days together were full of disagreements. He never took me with him when he went out and I was alone most of the time after being alone all the months he was in jail. I began to think of what I did and out of frustration, made a pact with the devil. I said I would do ANYTHING if I could make the time disappear that I had spent with my husband and instead, put Steve in his place.

 

 Lucifer heard my plea and after a night alone, I woke up to find my husband and all his things gone. In their place were Steve’s belongings.The house was cluttered with Steve’s clothes, his empty beer cans and bottles, and the ashtrays were filled to the brim with cigarette butts. I walked into the kitchen to find the sink full of dirty dishes, the floor nasty with ashes and spilt beer. The refrigerator didn’t have any food in it. All the cupboards were empty.

 

Steve walked into the kitchen, smelling like stale beer and asked me to order him a pizza. He said I would have to buy it because he spent all his money the night before at the club his band played in. Somehow, I remembered I had to get to work in several hours or I wouldn’t be able to pay the electric bill.

 

 A flood of memories overtook my mind how Steve quit his day job as soon as we married, tore up the car when he got drunk after his band played one night and I had to depend on others to give me a ride. He was a rock star, like I thought he would be, but those days of erotic love and passion were gone and he was consumed in his lifestyle. I was only important to him during his youth and not his adult life. I worked two jobs and was too tired to clean up after him. Steve had become an alcoholic who slept around with other women while I worked, and traveled for months with the band on the road. I wasn’t allowed to travel with him. My heart sank.

 

 What did I do? I wanted things back to the way they were. Lucifer paid me a visit.

 

“You said you would do anything to have Steve. Well, you have Steve and your soul is mine. You will live with this arrangement until you die. Your first husband met Steve in jail. They were both picked up for drinking too much. Steve will never divorce you and you will never love another man. Your first husband is  settled in a tight relationship and has quit drinking to keep her. You made your bed and now, you must sleep in it.” I heard him cackle loudly with glee as he left.

 

I saw Steve come home tonight from one of his practice sessions. He walked into the bedroom to find me barely conscious, with my empty sleeping-pill bottle by my side. I was barely able to finish writing this story before my eyes were too heavy to stay open and my hand became too weak to write. He called an ambulance and let me know it was on the way as he picked up his accoustic twelve string guitar and walked out the door.

Author's Note

I heard Steve practice with his band last Sunday from my house.

Reviews

A great story that is rich with moral value. I really like it- damn! lesson is to never eyeball anyone else thats for sure!