Interlude: Time Travel

Anna Lee snapped out of her stupor, gunning for the kitchen and throwing on her t-shirt. She hastily stepped into her panties as she stumbled towards the door.

“Daddy, wait! Just listen to me!”

“No, I think I’ve heard enough, Anna Lee. I never thought I’d see that in a million years. I wish I could forget it. I heard you. I heard those things you were saying. And I put it all together. You guys are perverts. This is so sick. It’s twisted. It’s not how marriage is supposed to be!”

Anna Lee grabbed his arm, pleading, but he shook her off.

“First of all, you know better. You know better than to fuck one of them,” he said, acid dripping from every word. “You know it’s wrong to mix with their kind.”

Anna Lee bowed her head in shame, crying.

“Second, you are married, Anna Lee! No man should be with you other than your husband. What would your mother think? Did you talk him into this? No, no you didn’t. I bet this was his idea, the fucking queer.”

“No, daddy! It wasn’t his idea. He’s just…trying to make me happy.”

“Well, he shoulda told you no! And what the fuck is wrong with you, anyway? This is what you ask of your husband? It’s not right!”

I stood on the porch, speechless. Everything I tried to say got caught in my throat. What could I say? How could I explain that I liked watching my wife fuck other men? This was never supposed to happen.

Finally, he broke down. The sight of his little girl crying, begging for forgiveness was too much. He really did love her. **** back tears, he wrapped his arms around her. His daughter was a whore. But she was still his daughter.

I walked back inside. Jamal was already dressed.

“I…I think I should go,” he said.

I sighed. “Wait…just wait until he leaves.”

We stood in the living room, peering out the window — the same window Anna Lee had watched Jamal through just a few hours earlier.

As father and daughter embraced, the night air chirping with crickets, the dusk was suddenly pierced with headlights. Three cars filed down the driveway.

“Oh, no…”

The other three. This was supposed to be a gangbang.

Anna Lee’s father stood dumbfounded next to his truck as three more black men parked their cars and stepped out onto the driveway.

“Evenin, sir!” One of them shouted. The other two greeted Anna Lee and her father cheerfully.

“Beautiful night, massa!”

“Guys…” I tried to signal them, shaking my head and motioning a cut across my throat. “No, no...”

They didn’t get the message. Just as quickly as the hint of reconciliation had appeared, it vanished.

Anna Lee’s father nodded. “Okay. I see. So you’re just a fucking slampig, then. Okay.”

“Daddy…” she could barely **** the word out as she reached for him. He shoved her away.

“Goodnight, Anna Lee. Have fun with your husband.” He started his truck and sped off down the driveway.

I had never in the entirety of our relationship seen such sheer devastation on her face. This was uncharted territory. All of us — the six of us — stood in silence as Anna Lee’s father peeled out around the corner. Reality itself was beginning to fray at the seams as she stood in shocked horror.

Then, something strange happened.

First, my vision went fuzzy around the edges. Something like a tornado appeared in our front lawn, clear as day. It looked like a cyclone of particles and light. I knew I wasn’t the only one who saw it, because everyone was reacting to it. Once, in college, I’d taken a healthy dose of LSD. That was the only thing I could compare it to, but that wasn’t quite it. This was something else entirely. This was real.

Everything became warped in the path of the cyclone. Anna Lee could see it too. No one had any time to run, to process the otherworldly scene unfolding in front of us. As my awareness faded, what looked like a black hole had opened up inside her head, and everything began to orbit around her gravitational pull. It was almost dreamlike, but inescapably real. Most frighteningly, it all happened without warning.

What is the connection between consciousness and physical reality? Is it possible to have experiences so intense, so mind-altering and **** that they rip the fabric of spacetime itself? Is it possible for sheer humiliation, horniness, or some combination thereof to create a hurricane of sexual energy, a **** of nature akin to a black hole or a supernova? If anyone could, it was her. Anna Lee was powerful. Anna Lee was a **** of nature to be reckoned with. I’ve seen reality bend to her will, and I’ve seen time itself obey her spirit.

As I felt myself pulled into the hurricane, my last fleeting thought was peaceful, loving, and beautiful. I loved my life. I loved everyone in it. I loved this beautiful existence. I still felt it was all a dream.

The sky went white.