Dirty Old Men [And Other Stories] (Zane Presents)

  “I do have a son.”

  “A young heartbreaker, ain’t he?” M.J. assumed.

  She smiled with deep dimples. “I don’t want him breaking any hearts. His father dun’ enough of that already.”

  “Well, I’m sorry to hear that, ahhh…”

  “Jessica,” she filled in for him.

  He held out his hand for a shake. “I’m Marion Jefferson, or M.J., like the famous basketball player.”

  “Who, Michael Jackson?” she responded hastily.

  Marion paused with a gracious smile. “No, Jordan, the other M.J. But I guess you’re right, it’s a lot of us M.J.’s out here running around.”

  “So, what kind of pills are you talking about?” she asked him again. She seemed to be particularly interested.

  “Viagra,” he told her straight up.

  Her girls were startled. After their embarrassed laughter, one of them stated, “Well, you ask the man a question and you get a frank answer. That’s how older men are.”

  “That’s about right,” M.J. admitted. “Yup.”

  “Like you said, we running out of time for bullshit,” his friend commented from his bar stool. He was in his late forties himself, and extra dark.

  Jessica remained poised and intrigued. She smiled. “That’s what’s up. You’re still active. I even ain’t mad you.”

  M.J. joked, “Yeah, I feel like I’m forty years old again.”

  “Well, how old are you?” she asked him.

  “Eighty-five,” he teased.

  One of her girls overheard him. “Damn! And you still walking around popping Viagra pills?”

  M.J. looked at Jessica. “She didn’t catch it, did she?”

  “Nope, it flew right past her.”

  “But I still will be popping them pills if I’m alive at eighty-five. What about you, you had a kid and haven’t kicked that habit yet?”

  His conversation was fluid, probing, and witty. He kept Jessica smiling.

  “Ahh…not quite yet, but I’m not as regular as I used to be.”

  “Shit, well, welcome to the crowd,” he told her. “If I get it twice a week now, I’m in heaven.”

  Jessica grinned. “They have pills now to make you feel like that, too.”

  He grimaced. “Make you feel like what, like you having sex twice a week? They got pills to do that?”

  It sounded incredible to him. Technology was something else.

  Jessica laughed it off again with her girls. “Maybe one day. But I was talking about feeling like you’re in heaven.”

  “Oh, here she goes with that shit,” one of her girlfriends spoke up. They had all begun to give their food and drink orders from a large table awaiting nearby.

  “All I need is a good woman now to keep me in heaven,” M.J. stated.

  “Well, why you taking Viagra if all you need is a ‘good woman’?” one of her girls called him out.

  “I said, all I need is a good woman now, since I’ve started taking this here Viagra.”

  He had no shame to his game at all. So his friend laughed out loud at the bar.

  “You tell ’em like it is, M.J.”

  Jessica couldn’t seem to get enough of him. She stood right by him and asked, “Have you ever tried anything else?”

  “What, for sex?”

  She nodded, still grinning at him.

  “Oh, now, you don’t wanna go there with her. She’ll have your ass addicted to ecstasy,” another one of her girls commented.

  M.J. responded, “Ain’t that illegal?”

  “So are weed, steroids, and underground gambling,” the same woman responded.

  “And prostitution, too,” M.J. shot back.

  The women laughed out loud again.

  Someone said, “Well, we can see where his mind is tonight.”

  As their food and drinks began to arrive, they got comfortable in their seats at the table.

  “Well, nice meeting you,” Jessica told him with an extended hand of her own.

  He took her hand. “So, what are these pills you’re talking about?”

  “Ahh…I would have to umm…contact you about that.”

  “Well, you need my number?”

  M.J. was suddenly pressed about her. She had a great attitude and everything.

  She took out her cell phone from her purse. “M.J., right? What’s the number?”

  “Yeah, Marion Jefferson,” he told her. And he gave her his 3-1-4 cell phone number.

  When Jessica joined her girls at the table, the oldest one asked her,

  “Now, what you plan on calling that old man about?” They all wanted to know; all five of them.

  Jessica grinned. “He’s just sweet. It’s nothing. It’s good to see an old man continue to have a sex life.”

  “Well, you ain’t planning on calling him up about what I think, are you?” her concerned older friend asked her. “Because he’s still a little too old for that, Viagra or not. And I would know.”

  Jessica grinned. “I know. Don’t worry about it. I’m not calling him for that.” She took a sip of her drink, case closed.

  Her older girlfriend gave her one final stare down anyway. She knew that Jessica liked to buck the rules and go her own way sometimes. That’s why she was hanging out with them instead of women closer to her age.

  “All right now,” her concerned friend warned her.

  Over at the bar stools, M.J.’s buddy had some questions of his own.

  “Hey, man, you really took some of that Viagra?”

  M.J. sat down beside him. “Yeah. I’m not walking around here with my dick not staying hard, Black. So, if you wanna do that, then be my guest.”

  Black grinned. “I have don’t no problems in that department.”

  “Well, when you start to have problems, then you’ll have to make your own decisions about it,” M.J. advised him.

  Black looked back over toward Jessica at the table, while holding his drink in hand. “Like you said, you give me a young fine one like that one, and that’s all the doctor ordered for me.”

  M.J. chuckled and looked back over toward Jessica himself, longing for her.

  Black asked, “You think she gon’ call you?”

  M.J. thought about it for a minute. In his wildest dreams, he hoped that she would call him But, in reality, he figured it was unlikely. So he shook it off. “For what? I basically put her on the spot right there, man. She didn’t want to hurt an old man’s feelings. But my sons and daughter are older than her.”

  With that said, he turned back to the bar and ordered his first drink.

  “Now let me look around in here for somebody that I can really get.”

  M.J. didn’t get lucky enough to go home with a second woman that night. But he did score a new phone number from another forty-something. Then at work the next day at the hardware store, he got an unknown call on his cell phone.

  “Hmm, who’s that?” he asked. He read the number on his cell phone screen inside the storage room toward the back of the store.

  “Hello,” he answered.

  “Hey, M.J.” It was the sweet, young voice of a woman.

  Marion paused. “Who is this?” He had a hunch, but he didn’t want to jump to any wishful conclusions.

  The woman chuckled. “This is Jessica from last night. How many new women did you give out your number to in there?” she teased.

  He immediately got excited. “I knew it.” Then he had to calm himself down. He was still at work. “Now what you doin’ calling me, and asking me about my women.”

  She laughed. “I wanted to follow up with you about our conversation last night.”

  M.J. spotted a coworker in the vicinity and was forced to camouflage his subject.

  “About that?” he asked her in code, referring to sex pills.

  “Yeah, you still wanna know about it?”

  “Yeah, ahh, call me back after six. I’m still at work.”

  “You want me to meet you somewhere?”

  Shit! h
e thought to himself. She’s putting me on the spot now.

  “What part of town you on?”

  “Southside.”

  “Well, you can meet me at the Botanical Garden after six. I work near there, off of Forty-four. Is that all right?”

  “That’s perfect.”

  When he hung up the phone, he couldn’t believe what had happened.

  “Did that girl just call and ask me to meet up with her?” It felt like a dream.

  “Hey, M.J.! We need you back out here on the floor. We got customers in here,” the manager yelled to him through the storage door.

  “All right, I’m coming,” M.J. answered, strolling forward. And his smile was worth gold in there.

  He pulled up in the parking lot area of the Missouri Botanical Garden after six, and Jessica had already beaten him there. She was waiting for him inside of her burgundy Ford F-150 truck.

  “Shit, this girl play for keeps,” he stated when he spotted her. “She got a damn F-150.” She made him feel like a wimp, especially working at a hardware store. He had given up his old Dodge Ram for a Chevy a few years ago. But she had him thinking about upgrading back to a truck. She even had nice rims on it.

  He pulled up in an open space beside her and rolled down his window as she rolled hers down.

  “Hey, you looking good in that thing. I wouldn’t have thought you had it in you,” he told her. He looked up from his window; she looked down from hers.

  She smiled. “You want me to follow you somewhere? I can’t talk about it out here.”

  M.J. paused. He thought, Shit, she must really be serious about this.

  “You don’t want us to be out in the public?”

  “Not if we can help it.”

  Damn! he thought. She’s straight up with it. So he went for broke.

  “You wanna follow me to my place?”

  “Where you live?”

  “Right off Page Boulevard.”

  She nodded and turned her engine back on. “All right. Lead the way.”

  Holy shit! M.J. thought. She’s following me to my house and we just met. Either this girl has a lot of trust or she’s plain crazy.

  He didn’t believe she would be that impressed with him. He was still an old-ass man. So he led her to his apartment with apprehension. He didn’t need a big house anymore. After his grown kids were off and gone, he divorced his wife of twenty-six years and jumped back into the single life for the rest of his days.

  Nobody’s gonna tell me when I can’t have no pussy. I was tired of that damn fish every year anyway, he noted.

  When he pulled up into the back parking area of his low-key, third-floor apartment, atop a block of retail storefronts, he marveled again at his great stroke of luck.

  “Had I known this would happen, I would have taken Viagra a lot sooner,” he joked to himself as he climbed out of his car.

  Jessica climbed out of her truck a few parking spaces over from his car. She walked over to join him with a large white bag over her shoulder, wearing a black skirt, a white top, and black stockings with her black heels.

  She must have a can of mace or either a loaded gun in that big-ass bag of hers, he imagined. He couldn’t help but to remain a little pensive and skeptical. She was making things far too easy. So there had to be a catch to it.

  “So, you live in these apartments? I’ve passed this place before a few times. A couple of my girlfriends live near here,” she told him.

  “Yeah, a lot of people pass this place by. That’s why I like it here. It’s right there in front of you, but because of the storefronts on the bottom, people barely notice the apartments up on top.”

  He led her into a security entrance area with his key, and awaited two elevators next to the exit stairs.

  She nodded. “Nice. So nobody can just walk up in here then.”

  “Nooo, I wouldn’t live in no place like that at my age. I don’t have time for the extra drama.”

  “That’s good. Me either.” Jessica grinned.

  They climbed onto the elevator and reached the third floor to head toward his two-bedroom apartment. Marion grew more anxious every step of the way.

  We almost at my door now, he told himself gleefully. He felt like a brand-new adult with his own personal space again. But he didn’t let on how anxious he was from the outside. He remained as cool as a cucumber. He stopped at apartment 312.

  “Here we go, right here.”

  Jessica continued to smile and waited for him to open it. Once they walked in, she took a casual walk around and nodded again.

  “Nice. So, this is where you bring your women,” she teased him.

  Marion laughed it off. “Now, just ’cause I took some of that Viagra don’t make me no gigolo. But I can’t say I don’t want to experiment with it.” Then he smiled in her direction and added, “So, like I told you all last night, I might have to find me one good woman who can keep up with me now.”

  That made Jessica chuckle again. “One who can keep up with you, hunh?” she repeated.

  “That’s what I said.”

  She walked over to his kitchen table and sat down with her bag. “Okay, well, can I trust you?”

  M.J. looked down into her eyes and frowned. “Trust me to do what?”

  Instead of answering him, she dug into her white bag and pulled out a loaded Ziploc of separated pills in six different bottles. She set them in front of him on the kitchen table.

  M.J. looked at her mini store of goods. “Shit. You weren’t lying about them damn pills, were you?” He sat down at the table across from her.

  She separated each bottle. “These are called Blue Dolphins. I would advise you to start off with these. They’re about the most basic ecstasy pills you can get.”

  She placed a small blue pill into his hand to see it.

  M.J. looked at the small pill in the palm of his hand. “Shit, they actually got dolphins on ’em.”

  She smiled at his wonder. “That’s what everybody says when they see them. So, you start with one and then see if you can handle two. And always have about five to six hours to clear the effects out of your system before you go anywhere important, like work, or to a family or business event.”

  “Unless I plan to get my freak on there, right?” he joked.

  She took the Blue Dolphin from his hand and returned it to its bottle. Then she moved on to the next pill. It was a white one with a small number “9” on it.

  “This one here is called Cloud Nine. Now that one’s a little stronger. It’ll have you going all night and still up the next morning. But that’s mainly for like, the weekend, and people who want to party all night.”

  “Shit,” M.J. muttered. “So, that’s like them Rock Star energy juices.”

  “Yeah, but much stronger,” she warned. She continued her demonstration, moving on to the next pill.

  “This one’s called Business Man Trip. And it relaxes you, and makes you feel like you’re enjoying a vacation.”

  Then she paused and looked at him. “Now, these other three, I wouldn’t even sell to you. They’re all hallucinogens. But while I have them out on the table, I’ll tell you what they are.”

  M.J. sat across the table and thought, Well, I’ll be damned! She’s actually a real drug dealer! And to think that she was so damn sweet.

  “Seventh Heaven, Blue Mystic, and Salvia are pills I mainly sell to white people. Blue Mystic is the safest. Seventh Heaven is a little stronger. And this Salvia stuff…” She stopped and shook her head. “I didn’t even wanna sell that shit, to tell you the truth, but they kept asking me for it.”

  M.J. sat there blown away for a minute. “And you actually…deal with this stuff, like on an everyday basis?”

  She shook it off. “Not every day, no. I mean, when I have my son with me, I don’t bother with it. I have a few people who work with me. But you can’t run around talking about this stuff like you talk about Viagra.”

  “You don’t say,” he quipped sarcastically. He didn’t know
what else to say or do. He really didn’t want to get involved with sex drugs and hallucinogens.

  “So, how much do you sell them for?” he figured he’d ask her, for the hell of it.

  “Ten to fifteen dollars, depending on how many they want.”

  “And how many do they usually buy?”

  “Shit, some people buy up to twenty of them at a time.”

  “So, you can make plenty of good money off it.”

  “Yeah,” she admitted. “I wouldn’t do it, if not. You wanna try the Blue Dolphin?” she asked. She slipped it in there as if they were talking about having a drink of coffee.

  M.J. hesitated. “Ahhh…well…” He didn’t want to seem like a pussy by backing down, but he didn’t want to be a fool either.

  “You want me to take one with you?”

  M.J. looked into her face and studied her meaning.

  “Now, if you take it with me…” He didn’t see how he could turn that offer down.

  She said, “Then I’ll stay for awhile and let you fuck me.”

  M.J. couldn’t believe his damn ears. And she was so damn smooth about it. So instead of responding to her, he began to chuckle.

  “Shit,” he let out. “Now…” He wanted to ask if he could fuck her without taking the pills, but he hesitated again. She had the old man backing up on his heels.

  “I mean, I’m not gonna force you to; you’re a grown man. But since you were so adamant about taking Viagra… And then you started asking me about everything else. So, I figured, you know…”

  He nodded, following her logic to a tee. She was calling his bluff and basically punking him out. He was all mouth and no action.

  “Well, is this how you usually, ah…”

  “Hell no,” she cut him off with her first frown. “I don’t sleep around with these people like that. I told you, I don’t get it like that anymore. But I thought that you were a nice older guy. So, you know…I thought about it and said, ‘Why not?’ I figured I would make your day.”

  Marion’s Viagra-enhanced dick was already rock hard under the table. He didn’t need any Blue Dolphin pill to fuck her; jut listening to her made him want to fuck.