The next day was Friday. When Hub got home from work, Doug was studying in the living room and Sue was setting the table for the evening meal.
"Hi, Hub. How'd it go today?" Doug greeted cheerily.
"You two go wash your hands," Sue called from the dining room.
"Supper's almost ready."
Ignoring Sue, Hub walked over to Doug. He took out his wallet and handed Doug a twenty-dollar bill.
"What's this for?"
"I want you to take Sue out tonight. Go to a movie, and make it a double feature."
Hub was all smiles as he told Doug of the date he'd made with Helen over the phone earlier in the day. Instead of going out again, Helen had suggested it would be nice to spend a quiet evening alone, just the two of them. She wanted to cook supper for him and then afterward there was a movie on TV that she would very much like to see. She would put the kids to bed early, Helen had said, and they could have a few drinks and get better acquainted. Helen's idea was to entertain Hub at her home in order to give him a false preview of how relaxed and pleasant this life as her husband would be, Hub suspected. Only Hub didn't want any kids getting in his way, so he'd turned the invitation around. It didn't take much persuasion to get Helen to come to his house for the same date, especially when, after Helen fixed Sue and Doug as babysitters, Hub offered to pay for Helen's regular sitter, saying it would only be fair since Helen was providing the steaks. And so it was all arranged, and Hub wanted Doug and Sue out of the way so he would have a clear field with Helen.
Sue didn't enjoy the movie. She kept squirming and shifting around in her seat, crossing and uncrossing her legs, pumping her crossed foot nervously to and fro. Her palms actually became moist with perspiration. She was jealous. It was crazy, didn't make a lick of sense, but Sue couldn't help the way she was feeling. She didn't love Hub. Actually she'd never even liked him very much, and now, since he'd raped her, she all but hated the big ugly brute. And yet, the thought of what might be going on between Hub and Helen while she sat there staring at the movie without really seeing it, made Sue's blue eyes take on a tint of green and caused her to keep absently catching her lower lip between her teeth and biting down on it until pain made her aware of the unconscious act.
Mental images of Hub and Helen having heated sexual intercourse flashed through Sue's mind, and she couldn't stand it. She became so keyed up that she felt like pulling her hair and screaming at the top of her lungs.
As they left the theater, Doug looked at his watch and suggested they go somewhere for a bite to eat.
"I don't want anything to eat," Sue snapped.
"But it's too early to go home, honey," Doug replied placatingly. "Hub said -"
"Hub said! Hub said!" Sue all but shrieked, ungraciously interrupting her husband. "I don't give a fat rat's behind what Hub said! Who gave that big slob permission to run our lives? I didn't! Did you?"
"Honey, keep your voice down," Doug pleaded, glancing around embarrassedly at the other people leaving the theater. "People are staring at us."
"So let them stare! Who the hell are they anyway?"
Doug took his anguished bride's arm and drew her over into a corner of the crowded theater lobby. "What's wrong with you tonight, Sue? Why are you so upset? Is it because of what Hub did?"
"Yes!" she yelled, and then, forcing herself to calm down, she added,
"No, I guess it isn't. I don't know. I just don't know, Doug. I've never felt this way before, for no reason. Cripes, what is wrong with me?"
"Is Hub keeping his word? I mean, he didn't do anything else to you, did he?"
"No," Sue lied. She hadn't told her husband about jacking Hub off and she never would. "It isn't that. He was a perfect gentleman last night when he drove me back from that… that woman's house."
"There, you see? I told you it would be all right, didn't I?"
If you only knew! Sue screamed silently as she forced a wifely smile and nodded her pretty blond head.
"Tell you what," Doug chirped. "Since you're not hungry, what do you say we go have a drink? Maybe two drinks. That'll make you feel better."
"I don't want a drink," she said tiredly.
"But you need something to settle your nerves, and we can't go home yet. Hub said-"
"Piss… on… Hub!" Sue hissed through gritted teeth, raking the fingers of her left hand down through her silky blond tresses as she stamped her foot and gripped her purse so tight the knuckles of her right hand turned white. "Take me home. Will you take me home? Will you just take me home right this goddamned minute?!"
The tension of their strained silence was oppressively heavy during the drive home. She jumped out of the car as soon as Doug braked to a stop at the curb in front of the house. Her highheels clicked rapidly and loudly up the walkway. Then, with her door key in hand, she all but tiptoed up the steps and across the porch. Quickly she unlocked the door and pushed it open. The sight which greeted Sue was not unlike her lurid imaginings. Helen was tipsy. She was lying on the couch with one nylon-stockinged leg hanging off. Hub lay atop her, between her legs.
He had her dress bunched up around her waist. He'd just drawn Helen's sopping-wet panty crotchband to the side with his fingers and was, at that very moment, sinking his huge erection into her hairy crack.
"What the goddamn hell!" Hub growled, instinctively backing his dick out of Helen when he spotted Sue standing in the doorway.
"Don't stop now, darling," Helen murmured. "You've made me want you and it feels so nice. Take me!" Then Helen's glassy eyes followed Hub's enraged glare and she saw Sue. Doug's head suddenly popped into view above Sue's shoulder. "OH, NOOH! YOU SAID THEY WOULDN'T BE BACK FOR ANOTHER HOUR, HUB!" she screeched. "LET ME UP! LET ME UP! OH, DEAR LORD