Jack's Muse

We were at a party celebrating our youngest daughter's graduation from college. My husband Jack had arranged the galla, much bigger than the party we had when our oldest graduated. Jack said since we were done with college tuitions, we could splurge a little.

Jack was talking to one of the neighborhood wives. She was looking at him with those eyes, the same way I use to look at Jack. He had a way of looking at you when he talked that made you feel important, that you were the only person in the world and that's the way he was looking at her, I think her name was Marge.

What Marge didn't know, and what I learned a few years after our oldest was born is that Jack suffered significant hearing loss. Through his teen and twenties, Jack was a musician in a rock band which killed his hearing. He wasn't just looking at Marge with rapt attention, he was reading her lips.

Jack's mother strongly disagreed with my conclusion that Jack was reading lips. "He might be now," she said, "But Jack always had that look when he was talking to someone, even as a little kid, way before the rock band thing started. It was so hard to be fair to his siblings, they quickly realized I would always say yes to Jack, so Jack became their spokesman even though he was the youngest.

Jack's days of touring the world were over when we met at a party, I fell in love with the way he looked at me. His days of touring were over but he still wrote songs for others and the royalties helped us live comfortably. It was the way he responded to our oldest that was my clue, Jack had no problem hearing her when he was looking at her but would never acknowledge her when she came up behind him, especially if there was some noise in the background. He didn't argue with me when I asked him to go see an ENT. When the ENT confirmed his hearing loss, he reminded me of a deaf Beethoven, composing music he would never hear. Jack began wearing hearing aids but he still preferred lip reading, saying it helped him hear better.

Someone once said that the thing you love most about your husband in the beginning will be the first thing you will grow to hate about him. I hated the way he and Marge looked at each other. This wasn't a jealousy thing because I was certain Jack would never cheat on me, especially with Marge. I hated whoever he happened to be looking at like that, man or woman, but if it was woman, it just made it worse because of the way they looked back at him.

The look was just one of a long list of things I grew to hate about Jack. Even tonight someone recognized him from his performing days and wanted his autograph. When we first started dating that shit thrilled me. God, our youngest was 22, so it was almost 25 years since Jack was on stage. And women drooled while Jack was signing whatever trinket they had.

Jack offered various reasons for the band to break up, most consistently it was the lead singer's accidental or on purpose overdose. Sometimes Jack would say he was just tired of the touring which felt like running on a hamster wheel, playing the same songs every night in a different city.

He didn't mind the money though and I have no idea how much money there was. Jack's manager insisted we sign a prenup before we were married so I never knew what kind of money he had. His accountants handled all of that. I was in love with Jack and would have signed anything to marry him. I was a fucking fool. Just one more reason to hate Jack.

His fingers could play my body like one of the many instruments he played. So many times he introduced me to god during my orgasms. Now I hated his touch, I couldn't remember when that started which was certainly bull shit. I knew exactly when it started but I wasn't going to let my mind go there, not tonight.

Marge had been replaced my one of our daughter's friends, asking Jack if he would play for them tonight. Jack politely refused, tonight was for his daughter and he didn't want to divert any attention from her remarkable achievement, graduating at the top of her class from an Ivy League college. Of course Jack would have the perfect response.

Just like writing music or lyrics, there was a perfect note or word that came next and it was always at Jack's fingertips. I used to love listening to him compose, the way his hands glided along the piano keys and then he would pause and write down the notes. There were computer programs that could do that for you but Jack still liked to write the little dots on the paper. And in the beginning, when he would start writing lyrics to the music he wrote, I knew those love songs were written to me. They became some of his most successful songs.

And if the song became a hit, people would remind me how blessed I was that a man would write such a beautiful love song to me. They called me his muse. I grew to hate that my love life was being hummed by people on the subway.

As I said, Jack wrote for others now so it was someone else that person was singing too. But not all of his songs were love songs, there was a bitterness to some filled with things that Jack would never say out loud to me, but when I heard the song I knew he was speaking to me. By then I didn't really care what he was saying. Jack could open his heart in music but not in real life.

I realized I was being unsociable so I made a circuit through the ballroom. But Jack was the star, trying so hard not to overshadow our daughter Amy. But Jack was her star too, I was chopped liver or worse. And it only got worse as hints of my infidelity came to light. Amy hadn't spoken to me in years. Jill was her older sister and I can't remember the last time she spoke to me. She was here someplace but I had no idea where.

Jack never acknowledged my infidelities, not in person anyway. I wish he would have, it would have been better than listening to how broken hearted he was in one of his songs. But those were long ago, he had moved past being heartbroken and now he sang of healing. I wonder how many people here knew I had been unfaithful to Jack or how many times. There were many songs written about those infidelities, I wondered how many people figured it out.

There are many sadistic assholes out there who take great pleasure fucking a married woman in hopes of fucking up her marriage. Being the great Jack's wife just made me a bigger target. Of course I was way too stupid to realize that. I knew Jack saw pictures from the first asshole although he never said anything. Well not to me, there was a song that went something about being murdered by a picture. It screamed up the charts, I forget who recorded it. Even Amy at 14 was smart enough to figure that one out. That was when people started ignoring me at events like this, just like I was being ignored tonight.

That guy was amazing in bed though, he fucked the daylights out of me one afternoon and into the evening. Jack made love to me but Carl fucked me. I was out shopping one day and I met him at a lingerie store. He made some comments about wanting me to model what I bought, I had never been with a black man before and I just said let's go. There was no seduction and after a few kisses in his apartment, he asked me to model my purchases. As I changed, he stripped off his clothes and sat on the couch. His cock was huge and as I modeled my different bra and panty set, it got bigger. I saved a baby doll outfit for last. He was stroking his cock and told me I had some work to do.

I never realized he was filming me, I thought we were playing a game, me begging him to fuck me with his big black cock, telling Carl I was his whore and would never let my husband fuck me again with his little dicklet. I don't know where I got the shit I was saying, maybe from a bad porn movie. Then fucking Carl sent the pictures and video to Jack, threatening to release them if Jack didn't fork over five million dollars. Carl literally disappeared and 'Murder by Pictures' made Jack a lot of money. But he never touched me again or talked to me.

Although I was trying to be sociable, none of my conversations lasted more than a minute. That was the norm after "Murder by Pictures" climbed the charts.

There would be a weddings someday for Jill and Amy but I wouldn't be invited and I would be thankful. Surely Jack would divorce me by then. I believed the only reason he hadn't was because he wanted Amy to finish college before we separated. That was a farce anyway, Amy hated me for cheating on her father and Jack knew it. Sometimes I thought he kept me around just to rub my face in the hate I created.

Living with Jack included all of the luxuries that being married to a successful song writer provided. I had a significant amount of money at my fingertips, luxurious cars, maids, housekeepers, clothes. If we divorced I would have to give it all up because of that fucking prenup. I hated Jack and that fucking prenup. I hated his manager too who insisted on it.

There were other lovers after the asshole. There was a young guy around Jill's age who had staying power. He could fuck me all night, he made up in stamina what he lacked in technique. He professed his undying love for me and wanted me to leave Jack. He was poor and I wasn't giving up my life of luxury so he could fuck me all night. Even after I explained the prenup to him he still begged me to leave Jack and marry him. I laughed at him, maybe that was mean but I never wanted to struggle again. Jack wrote a song about him too, "You Can't Afford My Love," or something like that.

Jack's best songs were always driven by emotions. I don't know who the muse or muses were before me but I had been his muse for the last twenty years, good years in the beginning.

After the guy who couldn't afford my love, there were a string of one night stands many of whom I couldn't name. Jack wrote a song, "What Was Your Name," that was also part of the chorus too followed by 'never mind, it doesn't matter.' Another hit for Jack. I wondered how much money he was making off of my affairs.

During dinner I sat to Jack's right, Amy was on his left with her latest boyfriend. What was his name again but it didn't matter. She went through men faster than I did. Jill sat to what's his name's left with Vicki. Jill and Vicki had been together since before college. Amy had to spell out for me that Jill and Vicki were lesbians like I was an idiot. And I was an idiot, the idea that they were lesbians never occurred to me. Of course Jill wasn't talking to me by then so she never came out to me. Amy told me that Jill did come out to Jack who welcomed Vicki to the family with a warm embrace. Just another fuck you mom and anything Amy said to me by then was wrapped in fuck you.

Vicki was always nice to me or at least tried. Outside of the staff, she was the only person who would speak to me in my house. One day, Vicki was raving about the way Jack looked at her, "I swear I wanted to throw my panties at him and I play for the other team."

I remembered watching a U-tube video of one of Jack's performances where women were throwing their bras and panties at Jack. The stage was littered with women's underwear. Jack's mother told me it was that way almost from their first performance. It embarrassed her watching her son perform on stage, ducking bras and panties in the small clubs when they first started. It pissed off the lead singer, who felt he was the one the girls would swoon over. As they played bigger venues, the whole stage would be covered, especially after they waited off stage before coming out and doing an encore. I hated Jack, to have that much fame and just walk away from it.

When I was cheating on Jack, I wondered how many women he fucked before me. It could have easily been hundreds. No wonder he could trip my trigger so easily. I think I also hated how good he was in bed, way better than any other man I found, and I had found a lot over the last few years. After 'Murder by Pictures,' Jack never touched me again.

The party started to fade, most of the guests had headed home. Jack's brother and two other former bandmates were still there along with our parents and the kids. Jack had hired a professional photographer to take pictures. I didn't understand why but went along. I was tired as the photographer arranged us in different groupings. There was the shot of Jack and I with the two girls, then the grandparents were included. Vicki was included in some as were Jack's bandmates. I wasn't paying attention as he moved us here or there. My parents had been standing to my right and I was to Jack's right.

There was a space between me and Jack, the photographer took some pictures of me and my parents. Then a man was standing there handing me an envelope. The camera was still flashing as I opened the envelope and pulled out the divorce papers. The remaining guests were standing to Jack's left and they began applauding. I was in shock as my parents led me out of the ballroom and into a waiting car.

The limo took me back to my parents' house, two hours away. I was in shock the whole drive. Why I wondered, I expected Jack to divorce me when Amy graduated but I never expected him to do it in such a public manner. When we got to my parents, my old suitcase was sitting on their front porch. I knew what was inside, the clothes I owned when I married Jack, which is all I was entitled to keep according to the prenup.

At least I wasn't returning to my old bedroom. When we were first married, Jack bought this house for my parents. It was a lot closer than where they use to live but not too close. It allowed both my parents to retire early.

The grand foyer was filled with moving boxes when we walked in.

"The house always belonged to Jack and he allowed us to stay here until now. Fortunately we never sold our old house, we let your brother and his wife stay there. Tomorrow we're moving back and you can have your old room back," my mother said.

"I can't believe Jack would do that to you?"

"He showed us the pictures, he was kind to let us stay here this long. We don't blame Jack, you on the other hand should concentrate on finding somewhere else to live besides our house," my father said.

A month later, "Murder by Pictures -- Reprise" was released by a good friend of Jack's. There was a picture released with the song, me standing by myself holding the envelope with the rest of the guests off to the side clapping. Jack was the only one not cheering, he looked as out of place as I did.