Unfortunately the Mailman Had a Beard

Unfortunately the Mailman Had a Beard

The husband and wife had been married for quite a bit of time when things started to slow down for them. It was a natural progression. She had always been slowly on the uptake. Since the beginning. Even when they were dating they maintained different schedules. Back then they were very young and didn't know much about how things operated. He was always ready and wanted actions to unfold on a regular basis. She didn't always feel the same way, but she loved him and had an infinite amount of patience and alacrity. Even back then things were lopsided and the one of them that instituted the behavior usually walked away in a state satisfactory. The one that did not institute the behavior was not disappointed, just a little confused as to what the point of all it was. Sometimes when he was patient and attentive, she understood what the point of all of it was. But those moments were not the normal outcome and over time she grew less patient and less attentive. The husband loved his wife and did not mind that she had a different schedule than he did. He knew he had a greater desire for action than she did. Over time he learned to take of things himself and grew to understand her desires to the point that she no longer wondered what the point of all of it was, though it did not increase the frequency of her schedule, in fact, her schedule disappeared and only made itself amenable when she had reached a peak of interest, a moment of natural confusion on her part because she rarely, if ever, thought about her physical needs with regards to her schedule until she was ready to tip of and spill like a full glass of water placed haphazardly on the edge of the kitchen counter.

Still the husband's schedule persisted. Never changing. He grew to understand his own schedule. Like clockwork and a calendar, he knew which days of the week to behave which way, when to shower, when to remain in bed after his wife got up in the morning. There was nothing devious about it, just nature unfolding and with quick intense spurts of relief that rendered him satisfactory in his own body. It was not a complicated thing he observed for himself. He knew when his wife would find herself feeling like a glass of water, he would drink from her glass until she was satisfied, then he would take care of his own schedule and the cycle would reset itself. In a sense there was a game to it. A feeling of great trickery and manipulation that came not from malice but from love. If things were not stressful in life or at home or at work, then the husband could drink two glasses of water a week, if things were stressful in life or at home or at work, the husband could drink only one glass of water per week. Then the next two days he would shower. Then on the third day he would ignore his thirst, then the next day he would become too distracted by thirst he would either get to drink a glass of water, or he would have to shower. It was a simple system that rendered fantastic results.

Their schedules and cycles went on and on like this for years. The husband's wife never the wiser, never the victim, but never the manipulator. They found love in this satisfying dance of theirs. Happy, content. Neither of them looking elsewhere for any other kinds of love or calendars. The husband, yes, a man that looked around in a visual world, not for something to satisfy his craving, but out of pure distraction. His stomach would burn and his focus would falter. He would see a thing in the world and his brain would kink and his ability to go about his daily business would come to a halt. These were the times he would either attempt to drink from his wife's glass of water or he would shower. Then he would go back to zero himself and his cycle would begin again. It was not complicated and it worked and nobody was harmed and there were no outside desires for any other kind of love. Still, the husband's cycle was relentless. So relentless that he began to enjoy his body's ebbs and flows. He began to enjoy how hot his stomach would get or how distracted he could become. He too, began to enjoy his wife's reluctance. His wife's slow moving cycle that only once in every fifty cycles did they match up, like two different sized cogs rigged with similar timing belts. It was a beautiful thing when it happened because for two or three days straight they would enjoy the equal calendar and by the end of the cycle they would both be very satisfied and a full two cycles the husband enjoyed, and one full cycle, the wife enjoyed, without once getting together on the physical plane. Then the two different calendars would begin again in earnest and the operation would begin anew.

Nearly a decade into this manipulation the husband had been operating without knowledge from his wife, the husband noticed something very simple and obvious that he laughed afterwards. It had been an odd moment in time for both of them. The wife was starting a new job and was feeling insecure about what she was doing with her life, the husband, was looking for a new job and was feeling very insecure about what he was doing with his life. They were older now and one way the husband dealt with his unwelcome free time was to grow a beard. At first the beard was pokey with stiff bristles that made him look like an overgrown boy, like a teenager trying to pretend to be a man. The wife didn't like it, but she was so overwhelmed with her new job she didn't have the energy to prevent the beard from growing, she simply accepted it and moved on, certain her husband would shave the abysmal atrocity when the time came. And the time did come, but before the time came, a few cycles had run through there system with no water to drink and only showers to be had. With time though, the beard grew, and with time though, the wife relaxed from the stress of the new job and had inside her a build up she did not even know was there. One morning, for unknown reasons, the wife reached over and touched her husband in bed. What happened next was a great thing with fantastic operations. The husband, well, his neck hurt afterwards. His nose was sore and his chin was as slippery as a beaver pelt. This was the moment that he had the epiphany that would change everything. For him, and for his wife.

The husband, not a man of science, but a pragmatic and intelligent man, he shaved his beard and found a job. The job he found was not a demanding job but it was a simple job that allowed for an entertainment one can easily find at the library. The husband had some ideas and those ideas meant he needed to learn a few things he was not sure what they were. At first he assumed he needed to read science books about human behavior. Biology books and the like. Soon he found himself frustrated. Soon he realized the books he needed to read were books about human nature and the psychology of the mind. They were not therapy books he read, but books about dogs and chimpanzees and rats and young children. He remembered the name Pavlov from his youth. He remembered something about a bell and saliva and food and something about tricking an animal into doing something without thinking. He felt naughty about this, but he reminded himself he loved his wife and he was just experimenting, there was nothing nefarious about what he was thinking, he just wanted to see, like going to the ice cream truck to see what kind of flavors they had, he didn't need to eat the ice cream, he just wanted to know. The husband read the employee handbook during these days and learned facial hair was permitted as long as any beard or goatee was neat and well trimmed. He also learned that sideburns were permitted, information that was irrelevant, but information he found interesting.

The husband set about doing experiments with his wife. He started growing a beard right after his cycle and calendar met up with his wife's. Then, after the next cycle he shaved his beard. The days would go by and their cycles would match again and he would drink from her glass of water and start growing a beard again. He did this over and over, one cycle with a beard and one cycle without. At first it seemed to backfire, because his wife did not seem to respond very well to his beard. She didn't like how it looked and she grew irritated with that fact that he so frequently made himself look like a foolish teenager. The husband persisted though. He would ignore her protestations and then when their calendars aligned, she would enjoy how he drank her glass of water and things physical would be very satisfying and the husband would get a bent neck and he would think of himself as a very clever person.

For weeks and weeks this went on. The wife, irritated with the husband and his beard, then she would enjoy his approach to drinking her waters and then the next cycle he wouldn't have a beard and something was missing, but she couldn't figure out what it was. For weeks and weeks the husband trained his wife to feel this way. Half the time annoyed and satisfied then half the time not annoyed, but underwhelmed, but satisfied. When the husband noticed that his wife was starting to understand the difference and suddenly, seemingly out of nowhere, that maybe he looked better with a beard, the husband suddenly switched the cycles. When before he was growing a beard, he was now very clean shaven. Every day of the week he shaved. Sometimes twice a day he shaved. Once in the morning and once at night, so there was never a suggestion of stubble, never a suggestion of the growth of a beard. And when their calendars aligned, the husband would drink his wife's glass of water with satisfactory results, though they were never as intense as the times when he drank her waters with a beard. But now, the husband was growing the beard during the second cycle. And grow it, he did. He did not shave from the moment after he drank her waters until the moment after her waters hurt his neck. Then, the husband would get up, right afterwards and shave his beard. And the wife, not knowing why this upset her so much, would grow irritated with him and he would tell her that his work wouldn't allow him to have a beard of any sorts, that they also would not allow sideburns, two lies in the same sentence.

For weeks and weeks the husband manipulated his wife with the opposite cycle from the first cycle. The scheme became diabolical at this point. No longer was it just a husband to get his wife to enjoy her husband drinking her waters. She had been truly and totally tricked by him. It wasn't the beard itself that created the new desires in his wife, it was the action of growing the beard that triggered something in her that she didn't know what it was. At first she could go about her business and not feel anything different, but then the moment a five o'clock shadow appeared on her husband's face, her stomach grew hot and she needed relief. A day would go by and she would see a man walking down the street with any sort of facial hair on his chin and the next moment she was too distracted to do anything. She would get home and what used to be moments of catching up about the days happenings, she would be dragging her husband into the bedroom, throwing off her clothes and spilling glasses and glasses of water everywhere.

It was a glorious moment for the husband, all of his hard work had come to fruition. All he needed to do to get what he wanted to match the calendar with his wife, was to let a little hair grow on his chin. It was an amazing time for both of them. The wife, a lifelong slow burner of physical affection was an entirely new person. Day after day after day she desired her glass of water to be emptied. And her husband, for his part, he was able to keep up with her. He loved it at first. He craved it at first. But like she had always been, he grew worn out and slightly less interested. The husband loved his wife very much and wanted her to be satisfied all the time, but he started to have issues at work. He grew stressed out and tired, not every day, but some days. On those days, he shaved his beard and signaled to his wife that he was not available. An action she did not understand. Like before when she had been annoyed with his foolish beard, she now grew annoyed with his freshly shaven face. She didn't like it. She told him as much. She didn't know why, but it really bugged her. They had fights about the beard and the fights were idiotic because he couldn't admit to her that he had basically Pavloved her and she didn't know that she had been basically Pavloved. Sometimes they screamed at each other in a way that was so inane she would have to go outside and sit on the porch wondering what had come over her. She felt like a teenager this way, full of unknowable frustration. One day when she did this, it was on a Saturday in the middle of the afternoon when the mailman came by to drop off the Saturday mail. The husband had stormed out of the house just moments before, screaming hatred for the entire neighborhood to hear that she should surely go straight to hell. The wife had told her husband the same with some added vitriol. Then the mailman appeared. The mailman, well, unfortunately the mailman had a beard.