A/N: I've decided that Jessica needs a "face" – Jennifer Lien, of Voyager fame.


---THREE---

Slow Roasted Pork

"Hey there, Sugar – coffee?"

I offer up the sort of smile I imagine most women find charming, "Love some thanks – Sugar."

She titters in a silly, girlish sort of way and pours me a cup. "You need a menu – or ah – you see somethin' you think you might like to try?"

I let my smile deepen, "I think I'll have the roasted pork. Thanks." I wink. She smiles. "Oh – say – y'all don't happen t'have any cherry pie, do you?" I add. "For desert."

"I think I just might have some in the back," she wiggles her ass in my face as she goes to get my pork…

Pork. I have never appreciated it until today. I mean that.

Really, if you think about it the so-called other white meat has been thoroughly maligned by the American Heart Association for it's high fat content – yeah, as if you've never seen any fat Jews. Not that I think there's a great big whopping Jew population out here in – where the fuck am I again? Oh yeah, just the other side of the Kentucky boarder. But don't worry, I'm dressed like a local, so I fit right in.

And just what is this city boy doing slumming – well, that my friends is quite a story. It all started three weeks ago on a lovely spring day, a perfect day in fact for a wedding…

…………………………………………….

I look over the place cards on the table I've been assigned to – number nineteen of twenty, don't I feel special – and I smirk around my cigarette. "Somebody has a sense of humour – probably the bride." My room mate's girlfriend. Er – fiancé. Well – I guess his wife now. Ceremony should be just about ending by now – I ducked out of the church early to come check out the country club – never been in one of these things before. Let me tell you, they are highly over rated. I couldn't even get a decent beer at the bar.

"Jeff – ?"

I force a smile and pull the shades off my face, "Hey, Jess."

"Well – I see Anna hasn't lost her sense of – irony."

I just smirk some more. The bride. Paul's wife.

"You're still doing her, aren't you?"

"Not at this very moment. How's it been?"

She shrugs. And winces.

I can see her try to cover it but I'm pretty good at reading body language. I don't say anything about it though. "Can I get you a drink?" I offer.

"No. I'll take a cigarette though."

"Thought you quit," I pull out my pack and feeling rather gallant – or at least a little smug – I light it before I pass it over to her, watching the way she favours her left side just a little as she takes it – the way she won't quite meet my gaze.

"I started up again. You taking a survey or something?" her tone is harsh – but it's covering up something else and I'm really not so full of myself that I think it has anything to do with me. Her tone changes again, though, "It's been a while – are you – you know – here with anybody?" what she really wants to know is if I'm seeing someone.

I just shrug. "You know me."

"Yeah. I sure do."

"You – seeing anybody, I mean – ?"

"Yeah. I am." Her tone is lukewarm at best.

"He here?"

She takes an awful long drag off her smoke, "No. You know – I think I'd like a drink after all – I'll get my own. Thanks." Her tone has gone from lukewarm to ice cold….

….. Six or seven vodka martinis later has me and Jess dancing to some sappy Journey song. Her body still feels – perfect – next to mine. We're dancing close – and I didn't push the issue, this was all her. She leans into me and – yeah. Man. She can still get to me without even fucking trying. (I'm sticking to my beer, by the by. I've had two. I'm not sure what Ms. Manners would have to say, but I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to get blitzed before they've even cut the cake.)

Jess lays her head against my chest and – for just about three seconds – yeah. It feels real good to have her next to me like this. She fits just exactly right against me – it's like all her curves fit just exactly into mine like we were cut out of the same mould or something… I take in her scent and it finally hits me what's been bugging me. I mean really, really bugging me – only it gets real hard to think when she wraps her arms around me and digs her fingers into my back the way she used to when we made love… so for the rest of the song, I let my mind drift back to that place. "You've changed your cologne," I finally get around to murmuring as one sappy slow song slides into another.

"Chuck didn't like the other stuff."

I did. She always smelled like wild flowers or – or I don't know, what do I know about shit like that, I'm a guy, I just know that I liked the way she smelled just as much as I liked the way she fit against me. "So where's this Chuck tonight, anyway?"

She goes stiff – it doesn't last long but – but I file it away for later, just like I've filed away a bunch of other little things she's said or done over the course of dinner away in the back of my brain for later. Jess makes some lame excuse about him having a big game – he plays baseball it seems. He thinks he destined for the pro's – who knows, maybe he is. All I know is she's back to hanging onto me so I wrap my arms around her and hold her close for no other reason than it feels good.

The song finally ends and something with this obnoxious disco beat comes blaring over the speakers, practically blasting the petals off rose bushes around the reception area. "Disco is alive and well," Jess laughs, practically falling into me.

I laugh with her and guide her off a ways from the dance floor and the reception area where we can get a little air. We find a bench near the little man made lake that separates the "flower gardens" from the golf course. "Can you get over this place?" I ask; I'm suddenly not sure what I want to say, I just know I want to say something because I like being with her and I've got these little knives tap dancing around in my gut and I just don't know why…

Jess just shakes her head and – smiles – this – this amazing bright smile up at me and her smile – makes me feel so alive inside and – over and done with, fuckmook. Water under the bridge. Yeah. Water under the bridge.

"You ever think about us, Jeff?"

I shrug and pull out my cigarettes. "Not really." Of course it's a lie. I don't obsess or anything but – I'm thinking about us right now and I know that counts. "You?"

"Once in a while."

"So how long have you and this Chuck been going out?"

"I don't want to talk about him."

"Oh?"

"Oh," she plucks the cigarette from my lips and kisses me. I mean – really fucking kisses me. And it has got to be the vodka, because one thing Jess has never been is forward – which isn't to say I'm not kissing her back for all I'm worth. "You don't ever think about that?" She takes a hit off my smoke before putting it back in my lips.

"I – guess – once in a while. You ok?"

She just shakes her head, "Yeah. Sure. Peachy."

"Come on, Jess – talk to me – what's going on here?"

"Why do you care – you're still fucking the fucking bride," she keeps her voice down but her tone is – angry. Hurt. It reminds me of our last conversation.

"I guess you're right. I don't care," I stand up to leave. I don't need this shit –

"Wait – Jeff – " she catches my pant leg and when I look down – I see the tears. They're not falling but – they're there, brimming up in her eyes – her gorgeous eyes that used to look up at me – or down at me – ever time we made love – she never closed them the way other chicks do... "Would you ever – consider – maybe – giving you and me another shot?" and there is such hopefulness in her tone – in her face – I – I actually think about it for about half a second. But then I pitch my butt, right into the roses and offer up a cold hard smirk:

"Why would I? I'm still fucking the fucking bride, remember?"

"You're such a pig," she sobs at me as I walk away.

Yes, yes I am… a real pig.

I find Anna and say my good-byes – and I really wonder what Ms. Manners would have to say about that, too… while she's straightening herself back up, I slip out to make a stealthy exit and I've just decided I'm in the clear when Paul spies me – he and the groomsmen were having a toke out behind the valet shack. Yeah, what a class act is right.

"You're not leaving already are you?" Not only is he high, he's a good three sheets to the wind.

"Sorry – I gotta go – "

"Come on Jeff – the party's just getting started – you want some'a this? It's good shit, man – "

I just smile, "I've had about all the fun I can take for one night but – give Anna a kiss for me," and I make my exit.

………………………………………………………….

It takes about two weeks to put it all together – Jess hooked up with Chuckie boy a couple of months after dumping my ass. No, I didn't keep tabs on her – in fact, I did my best to steer away from her, even going so far as to go out of my way rather than take the short cut that would put me near her apartment or – or anywhere where I knew she liked to hang out. I wanted my space, that's all.

So – as I was saying, I put it together that she and this Chuck guy got together a couple of months after she dumped me and then I found a couple of other girls he used to date and – yeah. I was right. It takes me very little time to decide what I'm going to do with my new found knowledge because I have truly zero tolerance for bullies. And as it turns out, implementing my little plan takes even less effort than I'd thought…

…. I pay off Chinquitta – or whatever the fuck her name is – she's not much more than a two dollar whore and I didn't even have to set that up. He went and found her all on his own and I just had to make my move…

She thinks I'm playing a prank on my ol' pal Chuck here. The joke is on him. (And I'm in disguise just in case Chinquetta here hears about a missing local boy - a curly wig, dark glasses and fake stash make me feel pretty good that I won't easily be recognized as me.)

By the time Chuckie boy wakes up – neatly trussed and gagged in the trunk of the car – we're across state lines. By the time we reach our destination, I'd wager he's worked himself into a good panic. I'm sure it only gets worse when I drag him into the cabin I've rented and deposit him in the middle of the plastic drop cloth that I've taped to the floor…

I suppose in the name of good taste, I should spare you the gory details – suffice it to say by the time I'm through, he's more than learned his lesson and would – were I to give him the chance – never touch Jess or any other woman ever again. But some people just do not deserve second chances.

And you know, I remember reading in some spy novel or another that the first time you kill someone is the hardest, but really, that was no trouble at all. In fact the only thing that proves at all difficult is the disposal of the body – but I'm out in this particular little patch of fucking nowhere'sville entirely on purpose. See, there's a pig farm just a few miles from here. And when I say pig, I don't mean sweet little Wilbur or Arnold Ziffle. I mean PIG. Big, huge, honking, ugly, smelly swine, and swine as you may or may not know will eat just about anything…

Over the next couple of nights I go and feed the piggies a little bit at a time just in case human is as bad for them as pig is for us. Wouldn't want to give the big ugly guys indigestion or anything…

Freezer and hack saw, in case you're wondering. Crude, but it worked. It's amazing the things you can get out of cheesy spy novels...

Chuck's personals go into the fire along with my cloths and everything gets scrubbed down with bleach. And it turns out Chuckie's got enough in his wallet to not only cover the cabin rental but for me to pay for a mighty fine local-raised pork dinner on my way home. Now if that isn't just fucking irony, I do not know what is….