#TripleX Read Online Free PDF Page A

out my car and fill the gas tank. But that was it. Lately, that’s what it had become—a partnership, a working marriage, a business agreement. I couldn’t even say that it was like we went from being passionate lovers to being friends. We weren’t even really friends anymore. We hardly even spoke or spent time together. Forget the lovers and sex part. Not even close.
    “I don’t know what you want. I feel like I just can’t read you anymore,” he admitted.
    “What do you want?”
    “Nothing, I don’t want or need anything… wait… that’s not true. I need some fucking toilet paper,” I said, disconnecting the call and flushing the toilet.
     

     
    Washing my hands, I stared at my reflection in the mirror. Nobody ever told me that once you hit middle age that you broke out in moles all over your face and neck. What in the world was that all about? God forbid the dermatologist have any open appointments between now and the turn of the next century. Looking at my face, I noticed a long, black hair protruding out of my chin. It was at least two or three inches in length. It was not there yesterday. Heck, it wasn’t there this morning when I brushed my teeth. Where in the world did that thing sprout from? I grabbed my tweezers and yanked it out immediately, noticing another one on my cheek—near my ear. God, give it a day or two, and people might mistake me for a freaking yeti.
    Leaning in closer, I examined the lines on my forehead. I refused to call them anything other than “lines.” Lines could tell a story—my story. Lines could have a positive spin. There was no “positive” to the other word. Hell, it’s not like they had facial irons to get rid of my “lines.”
    Holy crap!
    That was what I needed to do for sure. Create a facial iron! I’d make millions and get to retire from my thankless and penniless teaching job that students weren’t really benefiting from anyway. I’d be the face of the age-defying facial iron, the envy of everyone resembling a Shar-Pei.
    “Mom, what’s for dinner?” Bryce, my youngest son, wondered, barging in the bathroom. He eyed me suspiciously as I scrutinized my face.
    “Spaghetti and meatballs,” I answered, pulling my skin back, tightening the flesh on my forehead.
    “Again? I haaaaate spaghetti. Can I just have peanut butter?” he asked, dropping his pants to the floor and peeing in the toilet behind me.
    “Bryce! Watch what you’re doing. You’re getting pee all over the floor,” I groaned, grabbing a sanitizing wipe.
    “I can’t help it. It just builds until it explodes,” he whined, shaking himself off and zipping his pants.
    “Listen to me, you have got to control that. You start Kindergarten in August. You can’t just pee all over the bathroom floor… and you need to make sure you just pull your pants down a little, so everyone can’t see your butt,” I said, wiping the floor and toilet seat. Christ, can’t Matt be here to teach this kid how to pee? Why was it my job to teach a boy how to pee with proper public bathroom etiquette?
    “Why? What’s wrong with my butt?” Bryce asked, bending over.
     
    “Mom! Evan farted on my retainer again,” Kevin yelled, walking into the bathroom.
     
    “Did not!”
     
    “Yes, you did. I saw you and heard you.”
     
    “Kevin, why was the retainer out of your mouth again?” I asked, sighing and watching the skin under my chin jiggle with each syllable. “The orthodontist said not to take it out—ever.”
    “He takes it out when he calls Olivia,” Evan goaded.
     
    “Do not.”
     
    “Do too. What’s for dinner, anyway?” Evan asked. “Don’t say spaghetti either. We have that allllll the time.”
     

     
    I met Matt my junior year of high school. We had study hall together. He was the only other student in my study period who ever opened a book. The other kids in the class were there to sleep off their hangovers from the night before or plan when to hook up after school to smoke pot.