Max woke beside the toilet. It was very early in the morning and he felt horrible. His head was throbbing and there was a sour taste in his mouth. His bowels were boiling. He hadn't felt that bad since the time in high school when he had polished off a bottle of vodka one night. He had never been able to stand the taste of vodka since then. He hoped the same would not be true for beer from now on.
He stood up and looked at himself in the mirror. He looked terrible. At the least, small kids and grandmothers would be frightened of him – maybe. He took a little water from the tap and rinsed out his mouth trying to get rid of the horrible taste in it. Then he drank a couple mouthfuls of water trying to rehydrate his body.
"At least I don't have to work today."
Turning to the medicine cabinet, he rummaged through it searching for some pain relievers. He found a small box of children's orange flavored aspirin. For a moment he wondered how old they were, but decided it didn't matter. He took a half dozen and chewed them.
A shit, shower, and shave later he was ready to emerge from the bathroom. He didn't feel great, but he did feel better than when he had awakened. He stepped out of the room. His wife was awake, but still in bed.
"You're up," she said.
He replied, "Yes."
"You said some pretty nasty things last night," she said.
It was time to make a stand. Max replied, "The truth hurts."
"Is that what it was?" she asked.
"Yes," Max answered.
He sat down on the edge of the bed facing away from her.
"Yesterday, I was laid off of work," Max said.
"You're kidding. They laid you off after you made that big sale?"
Max answered, "Yes."
"What are we going to do?" she asked.
News that he was unemployed changed things significantly. The events of the previous night were immediately displaced by worries about the bills. She didn't have to ask about his drinking the night before. Getting laid off explained his drunken state.
"I'm not worried," Max replied. "I'll find another sales position somewhere and life will go on."
"What about the bills?"
"I'm getting a reasonable severance package. The commission check will be pretty good this month. There's unemployment. We've got some savings," Max said.
"It won't go far," Marylou said.
"It will go far enough," Max replied. He scrubbed his face with his hands.
Marylou said, "I saw the video from the bar on the news last night."
"One of my better moments," Max said. He looked over his shoulder at his wife to see her reaction.
"I almost didn't recognize you," Marylou said. "I didn't know you could be like that."
"Like how?"
"Violent. You were grinning the whole time that you were kicking that guy," Marylou said.
The image of her husband grinning madly while beating that man was stuck in her mind. She would never look at Max the same way again. Her mental image of him as a sedate middle-class white collar man had been turned upside down. She saw that a brutal beast dwelt within him – a beast that emerged without warning and was capable of successfully taking on an armed man.
In a strange turn of events, the video had excited her. He had suddenly become an alpha male. For the first time in years, she had gone to bed and masturbated while dreaming of him mounting her.
Max said, "I must admit that I enjoyed it."
"It looked like it," Marylou said.
Max said, "I thought I had a bad day, but after talking to the other three people there I discovered that it wasn't so bad. I saw that it could have been a whole lot worse."
"How?"
"Well, the woman discovered her boyfriend in bed with her best friend. Guy was told by his doctor that his wife had given him a dose of gonorrhea," Max said.
"That's horrible," Marylou said.
"That wasn't the worst," Max said.
Marylou asked, "What was the worst?"
Max answered, "Cody discovered that his daughter had opened a sex website in which she was the star attraction. You don't even want to know what kinds of things she was doing on it."
"That is horrible," Marylou said.
"On the ride over here, he was telling me about his daughter and what she was like when she was growing up. I swear that he was describing Barbie," Max said.
"Barbie wouldn't do anything like that," she said.
"Don't bet on it."
Marylou said, "You can't possibly think that poorly of her."
"She's a spoiled rotten little brat," Max said. He looked over his shoulder at his wife. She looked like she was going to argue the point. He said, "Don't make her breakfast this morning and see what kind of tantrum she throws."
"She's just cranky first thing in the morning," Marylou said.
Max said, "She can be as cranky as she wants. If you aren't in the kitchen, then you won't have to listen to it."
"She doesn't like breakfast foods," Marylou said.
"She can make own breakfast," Max said.
"She'll just skip eating until lunch," Marylou said.
"Don't fix her lunch," Max said.
"She gets irritable when her blood sugar gets low."
"Bullshit. There's a time when you have to face facts. She's spoiled rotten and you're the one doing the spoiling," Max said. "Why does she have to eat something different than all of the rest of us?"
"She's particular about what she eats," Marylou said.
Max shook his head. He shifted his position on the bed so that he was facing his wife. In a very serious tone of voice, he said, "I'm serious. It has to come to an end. Today."
Seeing the unhappy expression on his wife's face, Max added, "She can go hungry until she decides to eat when we eat and eat what the rest of us are served."
Marylou said, "She's not going to be happy."
"Don't worry about that. I'll take care of her," Max said.
"That's what I'm afraid of," Marylou said. "You really hurt her feelings last night."
"Good."
"You're not going to apologize to the kids for what you said to them last night, are you?"
"Nope," Max said.
"Robert said that you were serious," Marylou said.
Max said, "He got it right."
"You expect too much of them," Marylou said.
"You expect nothing of them," Max said. He snorted and then added, "Between the two of us, we'll hit a happy medium."
"You're going to make Barbie get a job," Marylou said.
"Yes I am. They are also going to start earning their allowance. We've been giving them twenty dollars a week for doing nothing around the house," Max said.
"Twenty-five."
"That's even worse," Max said. "They are going to have to earn it from now on. Robert can mow the lawn and Barbie can vacuum the house or do laundry."
"You aren't making this easy for me."
Max laughed. "I'm going to make it real easy for you. You won't have to cook two different menus for every meal. You won't have to vacuum the house from now on. That should help you out a little."
"Maybe you're right."
"You bet I am," Max said.
Marylou asked, "Did you have to bring up oral sex in front of the kids last night?"
"The question just kind of popped into my mind. You never did answer it," Max said.
"I don't like the taste."
Max said, "It seems to me that my cum spends more time in your mouth if you wait until you can spit it out than if you swallow it."
"Maybe," she admitted.
"Try swallowing the next few times. You might discover it ain't so bad," Max said.
"Okay, I'll try it."
She glanced at the clock on the bed stand. It was time to get up and get the kids ready for school. She hated the mornings. "I better get up and start waking the kids."
"I'll get them up," Max said with a grin.
"Yes, dear," she said knowing that it took twenty minutes to get them moving in the morning.
Five minutes later, Max was in the kitchen opening the drawers in search of something. While preparing the coffee maker, Marylou kept glancing over at him wondering what he was doing. She was about to ask, when he opened one drawer and then pulled out a large wooden spoon. Waving it in the air, he said, "Perfect."
"What are you going to do?" Marylou asked as if she didn't know.
"I'm going to wake up the kids," Max answered. He left the kitchen, stopping only to pick up a pot. "This is going to hurt me more than them. I've got a horrible hangover."
Max walked into Robert's bedroom. Taking a position next to the bed, he started hammering on the bottom of the pot with the wooden spoon. It was driving stakes through his brain, but he didn't let that stop him. He shouted, "Drop your cocks and grab your socks! Out of bed, boy!"
Robert nearly wet himself climbing out of bed. Half asleep and confused, he staggered around trying to make sense out of the sudden noise.
"It's time to get ready for school!" Max shouted.
"Jesus!"
"What are you doing standing there?" Max shouted.
"Uh ... Ah ... I don't know," Robert answered with eyes the size of dinner plates.
"Get dressed," Max shouted. He turned and marched out of the room satisfied that dominance had just been reestablished with one of his children. It was time for the other child to learn the new pecking order in the house.
He marched into Barbie's room banging on the pot. Having already wakened as a result of the noise from the room next to hers, she screamed, "Get out of here."
He looked at her and then shouted, "Wash that shit out of your hair. You look like a diseased parrot."
Before she had a chance to respond, he turned and walked out of the room. He wasn't going to give her a chance to argue. She was quickly going to discover that arguing was not a winning proposition.
His wife had heard the commotion coming from the bedrooms. The kids were not going to be happy. She poured a cup of coffee and held it out for her husband. In a way, she appreciated the way he was taking charge. He could be the bad guy.
Max grabbed the cup upon entering the kitchen. He took a swallow of the hot liquid and then breathed a sigh of relief.
"Happy?" Marylou asked.
"Tremendously," Max answered. "It did make my headache worse though."
"I feel for you," Marylou said with a grin.
"Ready for act two?" Max asked.
"Yes," Marylou answered.
Robert was the first to enter the kitchen. Suspicious of what he was going to find, he watched his father out of the corner of his eye. There was no way he was going to directly challenge his father this morning.
"What time do you get home from school?" Max asked.
"Uh ... three-thirty," Robert answered.
"More than enough time for you to mow the law this afternoon," Max said.
"Yes, Sir," Robert said.
Max grinned broadly. Robert sat down at the table and prepared a bowl of cereal. He did his best to look small.
Barbie entered the room and stared defiantly at her father.
Max slammed a hand down on the table. In a low growl, he said, "Wash that shit out of your hair or your ass is going to be repeatedly introduced to my hand."
"I'll call family services on you," Barbie retorted.
Max laughed.
Robert looked shocked.
Marylou looked worried.
Max said, "Fine. Do it. They'll put you in a foster home so fast your head will spin. By this evening, you'll be someone's little fuck bunny. It'll probably be some guy with only half his teeth, with a face that looks like he shaves once a week, a gut that hangs over his belt, and smelling of cheap bourbon. You'll love that. It'll be three years before you ever see us again. Family services will make sure of that."
Suddenly her threat didn't sound so threatening. In fact, it didn't sound like a viable option at all. Everyone had heard stories about what happened to people who got pulled into the system.
Maintaining her defiance, she said, "You won't spank me."
"Yes, he will," Robert said.
"He will," Marylou said. She couldn't believe the feelings that her husband was generating in her body. The alpha dog was home. She licked her lips and said, "I'm not going to stop him."
Barbie looked around the room searching for someone to come to her rescue. Robert was cringing in his chair. Her mother was staring at her father with a strange look on her face. She'd never seen her mother look that interested in her father before. Her father had a strange, almost scary, grin on his face.
"Okay. I'll wash my hair."
"And put on a dress. You look like a bag lady," Max shouted to her retreating back.
Max turned to his wife and asked, "Are you ready for round three?"
"I can't wait," Marylou said.
Ten minutes later, Barbie returned to the kitchen. She had washed the purple, red, and green dye from her hair. Much to his surprise, she was wearing a dress. Max couldn't remember her looking that good in years.
She announced, "I'll have French Toast this morning."
"We're having cereal," Max said before his wife had a chance to respond.
"I want French Toast," Barbie said.
"Fine. Make it yourself," Max said.
"Mom makes it," Barbie said.
"Not today and not tomorrow," Max replied. Turning to his wife, he asked, "Do you feel like making French Toast Saturday morning?"
"Sure," Marylou answered.
"There you go. She'll make it Saturday morning," Max said as if he had just granted Barbie her wish.
"I want it today."
"Make it yourself," Max said.
"I don't know how to make it," Barbie said.
Max said, "You can help your mother Saturday morning. She'll teach you how to make it. Then in the future, you can have it whenever you want."
"I want French Toast now," Barbie whined.
Max said, "The nearest diner is two miles from here. You better start walking."
Realizing that she wasn't going to get her way, Barbie sat down at the table and grabbed one of the boxes of cereal. She poured it while glaring at her father.
Max turned to his wife and said, "How about we spend a couple of hours in the bedroom after the kids leave for school?"
"Any time," Marylou replied. This had been the best morning she'd had in years. She couldn't remember the last time she had been able to actually sit at the table and drink an entire cup of coffee without interruption.
"It's a date," Max said.
Robert cleared his throat and asked, "How will we get to school?"
"You've got a bike. I know because I bought it for you. I suggest you use it," Max answered.
"I haven't been on it in over a year. The tires are probably flat," Robert said.
Max said, "I guess you'll have to walk."
Barbie was staring at her father. She couldn't believe what he was saying. No one walked to school. It just wasn't done.
Barbie said, "Mom always takes us to school."
"Not today."
Afraid of the answer, Barbie asked, "Why not?"
"She's going to be busy in the bedroom."