The Furniture Boys
A teenage girl's unconventional relationship with her mother collapses when they invite a pair of movers to party with them.
They were just some two-bit furniture boys. I must’ve been fifteen then. Maybe sixteen. My mom’s the one that answered the door and then after inviting them in she pulled me into the back hallway and told me if I wanted I could take the hot one. To be honest I didn’t think either of them looked so great. Like we’d definitely done better for ourselves in the past. But I went ahead and took the taller one. Christian his name was. And she nabbed the smaller scruffier greasier one whose name I didn’t even bother trying to catch Pedro or Juan or some such thing. She offered them vodka and gin. Told them they could cart in the sofa later if they wanted there was no rush. We were already pretty buzzed ourselves. It was something like ten in the morning. A Sunday. They were foreigners or I guess immigrants I’m not sure from where. From somewhere south of the border I’m sure. How far south was anybody’s guess. They had dark skin and thick accents like their mouths were full of dry bread. They took the vodka but wanted to know if we had any beer. We didn’t so the shorter one the one that was going to go with my mom said he’d run to the liquor store and grab some. I don’t really think they were taking any of it too seriously at least not at first. They were insistent about getting the sofa in which made sense since because it looked like it might storm again. Plus there was really nowhere to sit except for the hard uncomfortable table chairs from the kitchen. We had actually had a sofa up until a couple weeks before when the last storm caused the roof to leak and it got all wet. At first we were fine with it. We figured it’d dry but then it started to smell sort of funky you know like mildew and so the two of us dragged it out into the yard cause it was stinking up the place and we left it there by the street and a couple days later the city came and took it and we ordered a new one. It was kind of a cheap one if I remember correctly. So anyway they wanted to get it inside since that’s why they were there. So they did that and then the short one ran down the street for some beer and he brought back a whole bunch I remember it was like a 24-pack of something cheap in cans like he’d gotten it into his head that we were really gonna party. Mom and I didn’t really drink beer but we had plenty of vodka and gin in the freezer and even a couple bottles of wine.
After my dad left my mom I guess went a little crazy. But she did it in a way that was fun. She was depressed at first but it’s not like she stuck her head in the oven or anything. I was probably12 when my dad left. So my mom and me we were like totally on our own for the first time ever. We didn’t really have any extended family or even friends so she just got it into her head one day that she and I were going to be best friends and we were. It started out with letting me stay up late watching TV with her. Even on a school night you know I’d be up past midnight watching whatever she was watching. And that was a little before she started in on the harder stuff but she was always drinking like wine or champagne or what have you and she’d let me sip a little here and there. I remember one time she hadn’t come home from work yet and I had one of my girlfriends over and we raided her stash drank a bottle of something all to ourselves and got wasted. It was the first time actually I ever got completely shit-faced and by the time my mom came home we were both puking in the bathroom. I’d never seen her so mad. She literally lost her freaking mind over it yelling and screaming about how if child protective services or whatever found out I could be taken away from her. She made my friend ask her parents if she could stay the night because she didn’t want her going home all fucked up smelling like a bar. I swear she lectured us for hours. Lectured us while she got hammered herself mind you. So after that I stopped having friends altogether.
Some nights she’d go out and bring home men and I’d hear them doing it through the walls and I’d listen to the way she sounded how she’d moan at first and then start screaming until by the end of it she sounded like she was singing opera. When I was alone sometimes I’d try mimicking it to see if I could sound like that.
I got my first fake ID when I was halfway through 14. Once I got my tits. My mom helped me get it and that’s when things started going real crazy because I did look mature for my age like it was believable and all. So me and my mom on the weekends we’d go out to bars and get hammered and pick up men. We told everyone we were sisters. Sometimes we’d go to their place and other times they came to ours. And then for like the rest of the week we’d giggle about it and make fun of them about how small they were or how quickly they shot their loads or the way they grunted or any special requests they made. It went on like that for a while the two of us partying together and I don’t know how I did it but through it all I still got pretty good grades in school. Never did get a boyfriend. Not til I was much older anyway. I mean hell why would I have? I knew so much more about it than any of my peers that I figured if I tried hooking up with one of them I’d just end up embarrassing them and making them feel bad. Besides my mom and I were like super close and she never got a boyfriend either. It was like we didn’t want that to come between us.
We drank with the furniture boys all day long teasing them at first you know getting them good and turned on but not delivering yet. Mom put some music on the stereo (I think it might have been like The Velvet Underground or Captain Beefheart or some such weird thing. My mom and I shared a wicked weird taste in music) and we had a little party They knew there was no need to rush anything that in the end they’d get it no matter what so they just sort of rolled with us getting drunker and drunker and waiting for when we’d tell them it was time. One of them said he had some weed out in the glove compartment of the truck so he went out and got that and we passed a joint around. They were much younger than my mom and just a little older than me. Mom was making conversation trying to get to know them better which was something she always tried to do asking where they were from and the kinds of things they did for fun their favorite night clubs how long they’d been furniture boys for you know basically making small talk while we drank and blazed until there was nothing else to talk about and then we got to it.
Mom took hers to her bedroom leading him along by his belt which she’d recently unbuckled so she could toy with his johnson while she talked his ear off. I took mine to the shower per usual because I was kind of OCD and wanted to make sure I was clean in all the right places and he was too. This one was a funny one and it was hard to keep myself from telling him so. He insisted on undressing me himself for starters. Removing one piece of clothing at a time. Tedious. He was really fucking tedious. And when he couldn’t get my bra I just shoved him back and told him let me do it why don’t you get your own clothes off and start getting washed up. In the shower he kept trying to make things like they were really romantic. Kissing me softly running his hands over my body between my legs sucking on my tits. Finally to make him stop acting so damn weird about everything I dropped to my knees and started sucking him. I was only down there a couple seconds before I could tell he was about to splooge so I made sure to stop just before he did and I got up and placed my palms flat on the wall and bent over in front of him so he could have me that way but I realized it was too late that he’d already started. I heard him go oh fuck fuck fuck SHIT fuck GOD-fucking-DAMMIT and then I felt it hot and thick in pathetic little spurts on my lower back. I waited until I was sure he was done and then I turned back to face him and washed his cock off for him massaging it with a warm bar of soap. I said well that was uneventful. He said the same things that they always said when they shot too soon: I couldn’t help it you know you’re just so good and you’re so fucking hot just give me a couple minutes I’ll be able to go again. Let me do you now. Honey I told him I think you’ve done already had your chance.
But he insisted me. So I turned back around and bent over again and let him tongue me a couple minutes his big hands gripping my thighs as he gnawed away like a starving gerbil until I grew bored and then I faked an orgasm just like my mom had taught me and that was that. After I turned off the shower and started drying myself he kept trying to kiss me trying to choke me with that big wet pink tongue of his. He put his hands on my waist and told me I was beautiful. I batted my eyelashes and said aw that’s so sweet. He reached into the towel and started playing with my nipples and kept kissing me shoving his tongue into my mouth and grabbing my ass and by then I was all wrapped up in a towel but he was stark naked still and I told him you better get dressed. So he did. I had to look away because I thought I’d giggle. I mean there are few things less attractive than a man putting his boxers back on just after the deed. I sat on the toilet seat and waited because I preferred dressing alone. As he was pulling his dingy orange and white striped Polo shirt over his big wet head he asked me he said you got a boyfriend? I literally almost fell off the toilet in hysterics. I got lots a boyfriends I told him. Most of em can at least wait to get it in my pussy before pulling the fuckin trigger. Then I told him to please excuse me so I could get dressed and I shoved him backwards out the door back into the hallways before he could get another word in.
When I came back out I could still hear my mom and hers in her bedroom and mine was on the new sofa watching something on the television drinking from his can of beer. When he saw me coming out he nearly spilled it all over himself in his rush to get up and greet me and then he asked me if he could get me a drink or something. I told him I’d take an orgasm on the rocks and he gave me this look like I’d stumped him right out of bed. Smirking I said never mind I’ll get it and I poured myself a gin and stood at the other side of the room leaning against the wall staring at him sipping my drink until finally I had to ask him if he’d mind if I had a seat and did he have any of that weed left? So he scooched over and I sat and he rolled a fresh joint and we watched the television just some clean Sunday sitcom rerun and smoked neither of us saying much though I could tell he really wanted to. Whenever the laugh track sounded on the TV he laughed with it and then looked at me as though expecting me to do the same. Of course I never did. I wasn’t even watching the damn TV. I was watching the back of his head actually starting to feel sort of sorry for him. I could tell he was really embarrassed and I remember sitting there all pensive-like looking at the back of his head trying to put myself in his shoes. I mean there’d been a time or two when I’d gotten off before the man did and I tried imagining a scenario like that where once I’d gotten off my pussy closed up and I couldn’t go anymore even if the man hadn’t finished yet and it made me so sad for him I just about cried.
I ran my hand through the back of his hair and told him you know we can go again if you really want to.
He gave me a startled look like he hadn’t expected me to speak and he grinned sheepishly shaking his head. No. That’s okay. Thanks though. And then he leaned back on the couch and put his arm around me pulling me close to him. Smooth I said. But I let him anyway resting my head on his shoulder while he watched TV.
At the next commercial break he said they sure are taking a long time in there aren’t they?
Oh trust me she’ll have him in there all night long.
Really? He had this look of vague hopefulness about him.
Oh yeah I said. I doubt she’ll let him out before the morning.
So he said you want to maybe go somewhere?
I drained the last of my gin. Like where?
The carnival’s in town.
I threw my head back laughing. Oh you have got to be kidding me. You want to take me to the carnival?
But he looked serious about it like he and I were going to have a for real actual date or something. It was just starting to get dark out and I guess I figured it beat the hell out of that shit we were watching on the TV. So I said okay sure I’ll go why not?
But I wasn’t about to go carnivaling sober so I emptied some more of the gin in this flask my mom had and we set out him asking if we should tell them we were going and me telling him not to worry about it they’d be fine on their own.
He drove us to the carnival in his big furniture truck and it was so high up and plus I was a little drunk that I had trouble getting in so he put his hands on my ass to give me a boost and no joke not twenty minutes later just picture it there we were with our cotton candies strolling about in the bright neon lights after having just stepped off the Ferris wheel and already he’s trying to like hold my hand and put his arm around my waist and me I’m just sipping my gin sort of vibing with it all and every so often he’d go in to kiss me and we’d get on another ride and he’d ask me questions you know about where I worked and where I’d gone to high school (because remember he must have thought I was at least twenty) and I remember telling him about how I was a professional artist which at the time was what I hoped to one day become.
By the time my gin was done I was having trouble walking a straight line and the carnival was just about to wrap up so he guided me back to the truck and we got in and by now I was so wasted I was kissing him and feeling him through his pants and telling him all the things I was gonna do to him when we got back to the house which was sort of funny because I’d never talked that way to anyone before. I was feeling really really giddy actually and that’s why on the way back in my drunken inebriated state I asked him if he’d be mad if I made a confession to him and he reached over and grabbed onto my hand grinning at me and I told him how I had lied earlier and I’d never really had a boyfriend before. He said just the thing I expected which was: I can be your boyfriend. I threw back my head laughing gleefully feeling too drunk and I told him but that’s not really the confession.
So he asked what’s really the confession then?
She’s not really my sister I told him.
Who?
Barbara. She’s not my sister.
He asked so what is she then?
So I told him and he got this mildly disgusted look on his face and I felt his fingers flinch like maybe he wanted to pull away from me and he said how old are you anyway? and so I told him that too and then he did let go.
It was really dark in the cab of the truck but I could sense the rage like an odor bubbling to the surface next to me and for a long time he didn’t say anything. He just drove. Then finally he said very softly as though through clinched teeth: I could go to jail.
I rolled my eyes. You won’t go to jail I told him. I mean hell you haven’t even actually fucked me yet you know? I placed my hand on his crotch. But you will. I want you to. I just thought you should know.
Even as the drunk part of my brain was spouting nonsense from out my mouth the sober part was still there somewhere deep inside commentating like going Amanda you stupid fucking slut shut up just shut up what are you even doing just shut the fuck up.
Because you know I’d never actually talked to a boy like that before. At least not seriously like I actually truly wanted him. I could feel myself actually starting to like him and some part of me felt guilty over it and I couldn’t tell if the liking was the gin and the sober part of me the guilt or if it was the opposite with the sober part of me liking him but the gin making me guilty.
Then he nearly shouted at me: what do you think I am some sort of pedophile?
I couldn’t help but cackle at that one. I said you know what they say if there’s fluff on the muff then she’s old enough.
He glanced at me sidelong. You’re just a little fucking girl he said.
By the time we got back to the house he was hardly even talking to me. I’m sorry I said as we sat there in the darkness outside the house. All the lights were on and I could hear music very faintly. Then he looked at me with eyes that were somehow different. Disdainful. They were shiny and hateful and I could see his jaw working his entire body trembling with a kind of latent rage as he thought things over. Then he punched me. He punched me so hard my head shot back and cracked the window. I held my nose. Blood ran between my fingers. He called me a whore. He said you fucking little whore. You fucking little filthy little slutty little whore he said. He asked me if I liked it when he talked to me like that. But he didn’t give me a chance to answer. He grabbed my neck and slammed my head against the window and with his other hand he reached up under my skirt struggling with his clumsy fingers to move my underwear out of the way so he could finger fuck me jamming his fingers up there all the way to the knuckles with his jagged nails basically lacerating me and I could feel myself starting to bleed. The whole time he kept his other hand clinched around my throat so I could hardly breathe pressing the side of my face into the window holding me in a way that kept my eyes averted so I couldn’t even look at him. Honestly I thought he might actually kill me. I started to whimper. And I know it sounds stupid now looking back but the whole time I just kept thinking to myself as he pulled me down onto the seat by my neck fumbling with his belt and then his zipper until he was inside of me getting to do now what he hadn’t gotten to do earlier and me crying and sobbing and blubbering but biting down on my lip as hard as I could to keep it in control I just kept thinking over and over again you didn’t have to do this. I would have let you. Really and truly I would have let you. It didn’t have to be like this. Why like this? Why like this?
I swear I thought he’d never come. He hammered away at me for what felt like hours though it was probably just a couple of minutes. It hurt really bad because he’d cut me up with his fingernails and I could tell I was bleeding pretty badly. Then finally I felt him tense up as he finished and then he reached over and opened my door and shoved me out. I fell backwards onto the grass whimpering and curling into a ball holding onto my privates. He got out of the truck and from the way I was positioned there on the grass I saw him upside down as he walked across the lawn and into the front door and a couple minutes later he came back out with his buddy who saw me and said what the fuck man what the fuck did you do? And he said she’s just a fucking whore bro. Let’s get the fuck out of here. Then the truck started and I remember hearing it pull away and then seeing my mom running toward me in her long white silk gown and she just kept saying oh my god oh my god oh my god holding my head in her lap and crying going oh my god what happened baby tell momma what happened what’d that boy do to you? almost certainly asking it perfunctorily for she must have spotted the bright red blood smeared on my inner thighs. Once I could stand again she helped me up and I grabbed onto her wrapping my arm around her shoulders limping as she guided me back inside. I collapsed onto the sofa and remembering where the sofa came from I vomited suddenly and violently until all the gin and cotton candy was out of me and even then still dry heaving as though if I kept at it long enough I could expunge him out of me as well. When finally I couldn’t even dry heave anymore I looked up a long goopy string of spittle hanging from my bottom lip slowly elongating as gravity pulled it earthward to see my mother on her knees on the carpet with the phone trembling all over trying to dial something but trembling so bad she kept hitting the wrong numbers until she finally stopped altogether placing the phone back in its cradle looking at me helplessly apologetic the gravity of it all descending on her slowly dawning on her for surely by then she must have recognized the same thing that my furniture boy had understood about us (otherwise how could he have been so fearless and bold)—that really there was nobody she could call because then she’d have to spill everything.
And then still on her knees she took my head in her arms took my head and pressed it against her chest so I could feel her heart pounding against my temple and she was sobbing
weeping
lamenting.
As though vicarious.
Saying I’m so sorry baby. I’m so sorry. But I don’t want them to take you away from me. You’re all I’ve got. You’re all I’ve got left. I don’t want them I can’t let them take you away from me.
That night we had another storm. We hadn’t thought to do anything about the roof (who the hell knows how that slipped our minds?) so of course it leaked again. By morning the new sofa was useless.
A coma nightmare