Lies We Tell

By Rod Kackley

Love, Lust, Lies

Cathy and Phil were in lust with each other in high school and are ready to rekindle that emotion forty years later even if they have to lie to their spouses to make it happen.

She really doesn't want it to happen, or so Cathy lies to herself. Phil wants to put her notch back in his libido and won't take "no" for an answer.

Tom is the only problem standing in the way of their lustful dreams, just like in high school. You see, Tom loves Cathy and Cathy loves Tom. However, the lust just isn't there anymore, if it ever was. And why let marriage and love stand in the way of lust and infidelity?

Jan understands, and tells Cathy that lies like that are more important than sex. "Have you ever gone a week without telling a good lie?" she asks rhetorically.

It's the same with Phil and Mary Ann. She realized a long time ago Phil will never love anyone more than he loves himself. But he lies to Mary Ann and she chooses to believe him. It's easier that way.

Who does Tom lust after? That is one of the lies he tells. And one of the secrets Cathy discovers. 

Lies We Tell , a short story of marriage, infidelity and love is typical of the short Stories of St. Isidore tales of a quirky little city where everyone lies to each other, has sex with each other, and some of them even kill each other.

This is realistic fiction. It could happen, it has happened to many of us, maybe even all of us.

Lies We Tell. Be honest. How important are they to you?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Rod Kackley
• Release date: Sep 18, 2015
• ISBN: 9781513020037

Rod Kackley

Rod Kackley is a journalist and author who writes most of his books armed with a MacBook, a blueberry muffin, and a Grande cup of Starbucks coffee at the Barnes & Noble store in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Special thanks to everyone at B&N who keeps the Starbucks hot and the muffins warm!

Book preview

1

D oesn’t it bother you that we have to tell so many lies to make this happen? Cathy said as she cuddled with Phil in the front seat of his Kia.

He understood what she meant, but really didn’t care. They might have been sitting in his 2011 Kia, but they were parked in the same place they had been more than forty years before when he had learned enough about parallel parking to get his driver’s license.

Phil took the opportunity then to take Cathy to St. Isidore Park, just like scores of teen drivers had done with their prey of the night for decades. When opportunity knocked again thanks to Facebook, he didn’t hesitate to open the door.

So, here they were, back again, trying to recapture the magic after spending four decades apart. Again, Phil was taking advantage of an opportunity, just like scores of Baby Boomers were doing now that they could see the finish lines of their lives.

For so many years, Phil and Cathy had only been the memories behind late night smiles on each others’ faces until Facebook brought them together along with the rest of the St.Isidore High School Class of 1973 for a reunion at the Lamplighter Bar & Grill.

Nostalgic curiosity and wishful thinking took them to the Lamplighter.

Lust took them to St. Isidore Park and put them in the backseat of Phil’s Kia.

The pot had helped too.

St. Isidore Park hadn’t changed a bit. The oak and maple trees were taller, true enough, but their leaves were still as golden, red and brown as Cathy remembered them being the first time Phil had opened the clasp of her bra and then dipped his fingers below her panty line, whispering and spitting into her ear.

The years since high school had not changed Phil and Cathy all that much, either. Phil was a little smoother, Cathy thought. He still whispered but he didn’t spit, and his digits’ dive into her bush was much more confident than it had been the first time they heard  Seals and Crofts playing Summer Breeze through the dashboard of his 1965 Dodge Coronet.

Phil was thinking the same thing about Cathy. She seemed so much more confident than forty years ago, so much more sure of herself, and so much more willing to do whatever he wanted. What the hell? It’s not like she’s going to get pregnant, right?

That certainly helped. Say what you will about menopause but from the guy’s point of view it relieved much of the pressure and worry. Not that teenage boys worry about their girls getting pregnant when what needs doing is being done, but it has to be at least in the backs of their minds.

Maybe it was that. Maybe it was the scores of women that Phil had taken to backseat and bed since his first time with Cathy.

I wonder if she feels the difference, he thought. I hope I can be as good as I once was.

Since their earliest days of fumbling together, Cathy had graduated from high school, left home, went to college, and in violation of all her dreams returned to St.Isidore with a teaching certificate, bound for a return to the cinder-block walled classrooms of St. Isidore High School.

Phil never went to college, But