The Misogynist (Republished)

Tamed

My new stepfather is pathetic. I tell him this straight to his face.

"Zedd, you are pathetic," I sneer.

A flicker of anger flashes across his face for the briefest moment, then it's gone.

He is hot, I'll give my mom that much.

But I've never met anyone so meek and mild and repressed.

He moved in just a few months ago, right after my 18th birthday.

Zedd works days and mom works evenings, so I end up spending a lot of time alone with him.

I've been trying to figure out how to push his buttons. I don't know why I'm like this. Maybe I just like to feel in control.

I started by shamelessly flirting with him. Giggling at his terrible jokes, stroking his arm a little too intimately when I passed by. Nothing. He politely ignored it.

Next I got bolder. I'd make excuses to parade in front of him in lingerie or a not-quite-big-enough towel.

"Oh, I was just getting dressed but I really needed a drink." I'd bite my lip and bat eyelashes before I bent down to get a glass from the low cabinet in a lace thing that left nothing to the imagination.

I'd turn around and he'd be facing the other way, absorbed in the newspaper like it was most riveting thing on the goddamn planet.

I was starting to think he was a closeted gay. But that didn't track with the noises I'd hear from my mom's room late at night. She would howl and moan like he was some sex machine.

It didn't exactly track with the bland, boring Zedd I saw every day.

I started to invite men over. Older men. Rough looking, tattooed, biker types. I'd time it so they'd leave just as Zedd got home from work.

"Who was that, Ursula?" Zedd would ask, politely.

"Oh, you know, just a friend," I'd giggle suggestively.

"He seemed nice," he'd say, without even a hint of sarcasm. Zedd was just so fucking nice.

For the record, I wasn't fucking these men. Sure, I'd give hand jobs, or even the occasional blow job to appease them. I was a virgin and didn't plan to change that until I met the right guy.

This show was all for Zedd. I don't know why I was so obsessed with cracking his veneer of dull domesticated man.

But I'd find a way to break him.

One morning as Zedd was leaving for work, he stopped in the doorway.

"I'll be home early today, about noon, to show the landscapers around the yard," he said.

"Okay," I replied dismissively. Noon.

Mom is away this week for a business conference. It will give me time to really put the pressure on Zedd. Let's see who he really is. No one could really be that nice.

Noon rolls around and I am stark naked, lounging on the couch, watching TV. This is my most outrageous stunt yet. I hear the keys in the door, hear Zedd's voice talking to someone.

Zedd steps inside. We make eye contact. He turns.

"Just give me a moment," he is saying to an unseen person outside. He closes the door. Eyes cast down, he grabs a coat off the rack and, holds it out to me, says, "Please, Ursula, we have company."

"It's my house," I say, bratty, standing up but ignoring the coat in his outstretched hand.

"Please," he implores. He sounds defeated but he's not yelling and he hasn't even looked up.