She was facing me with big brown eyes, all right, and they did get bigger, though since she was on all fours on the bed, getting it from behind, I’d have to say it’s surprising her eyes had the capacity to get bigger. Maybe he wasn’t in her backdoor. Maybe it was just rear entry. That’s a detail I didn’t explore.

I didn’t know the guy. He had what we call a farmer’s tan back in Ohio, although the paleness of his flesh was blocked out by a lot of hair. Real hairy-chested bastard, about thirty-five I’d say-really old, I thought at the time, old enough to be her father. Now I know my math was way off, but that’s one of the things that popped into my head.

If I’d had a gun on me, I’d have killed them both. In that position, one bullet could have done the trick-a shot through her open mouth could have penetrated his chest, too, and it would have been your classic two-birds-with-one-stone parlay.

“ Jack! ” she said.

I said nothing.

Also, the guy said nothing-he just looked confused and irritated, pausing in his pumping, his hands on the bikini-white of her ass. I would have preferred that he look embarrassed or maybe scared. I couldn’t even be sure he knew who I was. I mean, we’d never met. And I didn’t see my picture on her bedside table.

I just turned and got out of there. She was screaming my name but not following me or anything. Far as I know his dick was still in her when I slammed the door and shut off the sound.

This was in the afternoon, and I didn’t call her that night. Actually, I never called her at all. I knew of a girlfriend of hers, who had kind of liked me when Joni and I had been dating, and from her I found out the guy’s name was Williams (I’ve forgotten his first name) and that he worked as a mechanic at a garage a couple blocks from Joni’s house. A house I had mistakenly thought of as “our” house.