I hadn't seen him in nearly two weeks. He was 12 and able to make his own decision about such things, even if his dad did just appear out of the aether after letting me do all the parenting for just over a decade. He always was a selfish prick.
Even so, he was also a determined prick. If I fought him, we would end up in court and, since the lawyer I had consulted with said I wasn’t likely to win when the courts allowed children 12 and over to weigh in on what they wanted to do, it wasn't worth the upset. Especially not to Duncan.
I did my best to let it go and convince myself that a boy needed his father, but I didn't believe it was true in every case. A father figure, perhaps, but not necessarily their biological father. Especially one like Dave.
The whistle added its contribution to the tune, bringing the movement to a definitive end. The dull few dozen marched in conditioned unison toward the punch-clock. The lockers had a rhythm all their own. Clunks and clicks accompanied by high squeaks.
The drawing that was hung above the clock was surprisingly good. I had never suspected that there might be budding artists among my colleagues. The spurt of cum was a bit much, but the cock had been rendered in vivid detail, the black sharpie standing out against the industrial orange of the locker. Ignoring the leers and jeers of the men around me, some of them young enough to be my children, I started on the lock.
I was only forty, but the management didn't seem to have any qualms about hiring high schoolers, particularly if they were related by blood. Nepotism was alive and well in the 21st century.
Technically, I should have had my own locker room, but the factory was built in the days before women in the workforce were commonplace. Because the work overalls didn't require me to actually get undressed, just get in and out of coveralls, and the because the owners were fucking cheapskates, I was put in with the men.
The pain of the hand swatting my ass wasn't too bad. I hadn't really seen it coming. I’d been a bit too occupied with making sure no more notes asking for lurid sexual favors had been dropped through the slots in the door.
He had also already taken off his boots, so I hadn't heard him coming. I sure felt it when he passed, though. I consoled myself with the fact that they had gone from pinching, which really hurt, to spanks.
The thick material of my overalls absorbed most of the impact. I couldn't quit because I needed the money. They knew I couldn't complain because I was hanging on by the skin of my teeth as it was. The threat of a discrimination lawsuit was the main reason I wasn't turned down out of hand.
It wasn't like it was my dream job. I actually wanted to be a painter. I’d gone to art school and everything. I even got some of the highest marks in my class. A teacher who was notoriously difficult to please, part of his first day speech including a bit about how it was against his religion to give out As because such perfection was reserved for the Lord, took me aside and commended me on my work.
I got a B+ in the class, which I considered to be high praise. Then I met Dave. Tall, handsome, charming Dave. Master of his own universe and King in his own mind, who came walking into the art supply store where I was working, just waiting for the galley show that I knew was just over the horizon and told me he was there to rescue me.
Sadly, the guy I thought was a prince turned out to be a villain who, as soon as we were wed, took over every aspect of my existence until he discovered our six-times-a-day sex sessions, always without protection, led to me getting pregnant.
Then he turned into a wizard, vanishing from the world without a trace, only to reappear at the worst possible moment. It was almost like a superpower.
Ignoring the barrage of insults and come-ons, as if I was walking past a factory as opposed to out of one, I got in my truck and drove away from it all, refusing to give my tears the satisfaction of falling.
The mass of metal and glass refused to move. I had known full well what I was getting into, but at the time it had seemed like a sweet relief. Sliding in the CD, I let the sweet tones of Nine Inch Nails lull me as the traffic stood silent in the August sun. The pack of people were all leaving at the same time, in the same general direction. Whoever came up with the idea of New York rush hour was one of history's greatest monsters.
I was headed home like most of the rest of the millions when my phone let out its happy jangle. I wasn't actually driving at the time, so I answered, still leaving it in the hands-free mount. Just in case, by some holy miracle, the traffic cleared before the call was over.
“Whato-ho?” I inquired.
“You're only a ho if someone's payin’. I am a bit of a slut, though.”
“Mercy.”
“More like charity, but close enough,” Mercy said, smiling down the line.
I had a psychic image of the entire thing.
“Charity how?”
“I'm taking you out.”
“Thanks, but -”
“But nothing. How long has it been since you've had a frivolous night out?”
“I-I can't quite recall,” I said, searching the files of my memory.
“Three years, four months and thirty-two days.”
“Good memory,” I marveled.
“Only for the important things.”
“I don't suppose there is any point in trying to resist?” I asked rhetorically.
“Nope, resistance is futile.”
“I know,” I confessed, “I just wanted to hear you say it.”
“Cheeky vixen. Meet me at McGinty’s as soon as you can.”
“As you wish.”
Despite the name, neon shamrock and sign declaring it an “authentic Irish pub,” McGinty’s was founded by a Russian immigrant by the name of Morolov. However, given the anti-Russian sentiment after the war and New York’s very large and rather old Irish population, Sergei decided to hedge his bets and deceptively bill it as 100% authentic Irish.
If you ask me, it turned out to be a good decision. Most people who weren’t local couldn’t tell the difference, and those of us who were local didn’t care.
It was surprisingly quiet for a Friday evening. All but five of the freshly painted spots in the parking lot were utterly vacant. Pulling up near the door, I slung myself down out of the truck cab, landing like a cat, owing to years of practice.
I could hear it before I got there. The European soccer playing on the wall-mounted TV, the only pub I had seen who did such a thing, accompanied by the raging fiddle music from the P.A. system. The only way Dimity, Sergei’s oldest son, could try any harder was if he made ‘top o’ the mornin’’ the official greeting and dressed the staff like leprechauns.
“You sent for me, mistress?”
“Not so loud,” Mercy chided.
“What?” I asked, in purest innocence.
“Hey, no judgement on anyone. I’m into a bit of bondage and spank from time to time, but I am firmly with the menfolk.”
“Oh,” I said, the quarter finally dropping.
“Relax, I’m just messing with ya,” Mercy said, nudging me playfully.
The origin of her name had become something of a family legend, with the usual amount of embellishment, contradictions and exaggeration. The brass tacks of it were that Mercy’s mom, a lifelong atheist, had gone into labor unexpectedly and with more than a few complications. Exactly what these were, was a matter of some conjecture. The long and the short of it was that Mercy’s mom was rushed to the local Sisters of Mercy, who saved not only her, but Mercy, too.