I smiled and replied, “You never know. Still, if you ever get nervous, a quick blowjob will probably distract me.”
That got Marilyn to laughing. “You’re so full of shit!”
“Just so you aren’t!” I replied, waggling my eyebrows lewdly.
It took her a second to figure it out, and then she cried, “Gross!”
I snuggled up next to her and ran a hand down and began rubbing her ass. I whispered to her, “I’ll make you a bet. When the time comes, by the time I get done with you, you’ll be begging for it, and you’ll come like you’d never come before.”
Her eyes widened at the thought, but then she smiled. “Never going to happen.”
I just rolled on my back and smiled. “We’ll see.”
Any further discussion was saved by the bell, or in this case, by the ringing of the telephone. I sat up and grabbed it, to find Professor Rhineburg on the other line. “Lieutenant Buckman,” I answered.
“Carl, how are you? It’s John Rhineburg.”
“Professor, it’s good to hear from you. Where are you? Do I need to pick you up?”
“I’m here in my room. I just got up here. The switchboard put me through. How are you? You obviously made it.”
“Yes, sir. I’ve actually been waiting for your call.”
“I hope that wasn’t an imposition.”
I glanced over at my fiancée lying naked and seductive on the bed. “No imposition at all, sir. I’m looking forward to seeing you again. What are your plans for tonight?”
“Dinner. I’m hungry. Would you care to join me?”
“Yes, sir, I’d love to. Professor, Marilyn, my fiancée, is with me. Would it be all right if she came along?”
“Certainly. I’d love to meet her. Any choice for dinner?” he asked.
“I can’t say as I know that much about DC, Professor. The restaurant here is nice, but if you’ve got any preferences, I’m game. Be expensive. We’ll figure a way to charge it to the Army!” He laughed at that and he said he would unpack and clean up and make a few calls, and then call me back. Whether I could charge it to the Army, I had no idea, but I wasn’t worried. I owed the man a lot, so I would cover it no matter what.
Marilyn and I got out of bed and decided to clean up. I knew that I needed some food and drink before discussing any husbandly duties my fiancée might have wanted me to perform. Fortunately, the worst husbandly duty of all involves a lawn mower, and I don’t think she had that figured out yet! I let Marilyn have the first shower, and then when she got out, I got in. Needless to say, the professor called me back while I was in the shower. I never even heard the phone ring, but Marilyn stuck her head back in the bathroom and said, “Your professor is on the line again.”
“What’s he want?”
“He mentioned a seafood restaurant and wanted to know if we were interested.”
“Fine by me. Okay with you?”
“Sure.”
“Okay, ask him what the dress code is and find out when he wants us to meet him in the lobby.”
Marilyn left and I finished my shower. When I came out, she said, “Half past in the lobby, and it’s supposed to be casual.”
I always hate that description. Casual means what, exactly? Casual to the Rockefellers is a blazer and ascot; casual to the Lefleurs means a clean pair of beer goggles. “Did he say what he was wearing?”
She grinned at me. “I knew you would ask that. He says slacks and a sport shirt.”
I smiled back. “That we can handle. Why don’t you put on a sundress and I’ll put on slacks and a sport shirt, too.”
On the way down to the lobby, I asked Marilyn, “Did you pack that blue dress I got you in Vegas?” Marilyn blushed but nodded. It had been a few years, but there weren’t that many places in Utica to wear a dress like that. I had told her before she came down that at least one night I would take her someplace nice. “I thought so. I noticed the matching shoes. Let’s see what we can do about that.” I stopped on the way to the lobby and spoke to the concierge about a ‘nice’ place. He recommended a steak house called Mortons, which at the time I had never heard of but since then have learned was one of the more expensive places in an expensive city. It’s where the powerful go to see and be seen. Since it was the middle of the week, he was sure he could get me reservations for tomorrow, and he was extra sure after I slipped him a couple of twenties as I shook his hand. How he knew what I was slipping him without looking at it is one of those concierge superpowers, like flying and X-ray vision are for Superman.
Dinner was at a seafood restaurant down on the Potomac, casual but expensive. Everything on the Potomac in Washington is expensive. Well, that’s why I had an American Express card. I had made a solemn vow to never have a credit card on this trip through. I had never had one before until I started working for the Lefleurs. They insisted I get one so I could use one for company expenses and then get reimbursed. Wow, what a disaster that turned out to be! Interest charges ate us out of house and home!
The Amex card is different. You pay it off, in full, every month. End of story. You don’t pay, you lose the card. There is no carry over and no interest. So much simpler, and in the long run, so much cheaper. Marilyn hated the charge they made every year, without thinking about the interest charges you weren’t paying.
It was good seeing Professor Rhineburg again. He’s not one of the television caricatures, tweedy and absent-minded, but was of an average size and height, middle aged and getting a few pounds around the middle, and starting to go bald. He wasn’t one of those professors who has his grad students over to his house on weekends, but you got to know him fairly well regardless. I made sure to let him know that he and Janet were invited to our wedding.
Most of the evening’s conversation surrounded three topics — the conference the next day, Marilyn’s and my wedding plans, and what I was doing in the Army. He was simply astonished that the co-developer of the Rhineburg-Buckman Equations (his phrase, not mine!) had left math behind and was now jumping out of airplanes. I shrugged and smiled. “I like the sense of purpose, like I’m accomplishing something. I need a sense that I’m doing something important with my life.”
He looked at me sharply. “And you couldn’t get that teaching and doing research. You’d be a natural at that. Hell, you’d make full professor by the time you were thirty!”
I just laughed. “Maybe someday, professor, but for the next four years Uncle Sam owns me. Who knows after that?”
We ended up talking about the upcoming wedding, and Marilyn was complaining that she’d never be able to get it done by July. She gave me a list of problems, and it all came down to the fact that she was completely unorganized. Originally she ended up waiting until after graduation to even try and do anything, which is why we delayed to Labor Day for the actual wedding.
“Where are you going for your honeymoon?” asked Professor Rhineburg.
Marilyn and I looked at each other. She said, “We haven’t really discussed it yet. Have you thought about it?”
“Actually, I have. I wanted to talk to you about it this week. You didn’t have any ideas?” She shook her head, so I continued, “Ever thought of a cruise?”
Marilyn’s eyes lit up at that. “You mean, on the ocean?”
“Exactly.”
“My parents took one last year and they loved it! They went to the Caribbean, a bunch of islands down there!”
I glanced over at the professor. “Any ideas? Ever been on a cruise?”
“Janet and I did one a couple of years ago. We enjoyed it. Don’t miss the boat, though, or they’ll sail without you!”