The Sex Addict

Miss Amy has put me quite to mind of several good stories tonight. She mentions a musician friend of hers, whose home was originally surrounded by ladies of ill repute and those that succumbed to all manner of addictions. Many an addict of one sort or another can be found - if you know where to look, and how to listen.

Did I ever tell you about the sex addict we had living right here in town amongst us? Modern though you think yourself, it will shock even you, but it was quite common knowledge when Mama was growing up!

Eddie Meghuns lived just a little ways outside of town in an old run-down rattletrap of a place. It was painted the most horrid green color you can imagine. The gutters always looked a bit skewed, the grass grew up a foot or two tall next to the fence, and there were always car parts thrown about. Eddie's wife Cora was a sight! To say she was a big woman would be an understatement!  We didn't see much of her here in town, because it was apparently too hard for her to walk far - well, you can just imagine. She had varicose veins, the poor dear, and you know how those can hurt. Eddie was a pretty small fella, so if they didn't make quite a pair when you did see them together, I don't know what would!

Eddie was a dark-haired latin type, if you know what I mean. Always looking backwards over his shoulder at a lady as she passed by, like he was checking to see if her stocking seams were straight. This was long past the time when women wore seams in their stockings, let me tell you! I mean, he stared!

He used to come into town twice a week like clockwork, go to the back of the store where the postmistress had her little set-up, back between the dry goods and the hardware, and pick up his mail. Seemed there was always a brown paper-wrapped parcel in there for him, and between his starin', and those parcels, well... folks did begin to talk. What was in them? Why did he get so many? If you asked the postmistress, she'd just get all huffy, and tell you it "weren't none of your nevermind" to know what was in other people's mail.

Cora Meghuns had two children from her first husband. (He died, back during the war.) Long grown and gone those kids were, though they did come back for a visit every Christmas. The boy was a handsome fella, even better looking than his daddy had supposedly been.  The girl was kind of homely, but always seemed to be pregnant. Never did hear if she had a husband, but I imagine she must have, don't you? Like mama like daughter, so they say. Cora Meghuns must have spent more than half her life pregnant. Every time you turned around, she was poppin' out another one. That Eddie must have... well, you can just imagine!

Now, Eddie and Cora and the kids mostly stayed to themselves, and if you were to go a-visitin', you would have found them together ninety-nine percent of the time. Eddie was a toucher, and Cora seemed to purr when he touched her. Those two would start staring into each others' eyes, then Eddie and Cora would disappear for a bit, always coming back with a smile on their faces.

If you asked Eddie what his business was, he'd smile, give you a wink, and say, "Sex!"  If you asked him what his hobbies were, he'd say, "Sex!"  If you asked him what he was gonna be doin' over the holidays, or the weekend, or what have you, he'd say, "Sex!"

So, there was the starin' at ladies, the brown paper-wrapped parcels, a wife and a daugher who were pregnant most of the time, and Eddie's own answers of "Sex!" whenever a body asked him anything. What was the town to think? Ha ha! Of course they did. The gossips in my mama's day decided that Eddie was a sex addict, having read about such things in an issue of Harper's (that they would have denied having, had you asked them.)

Out back of Eddie and Cora's place, were rows and rows of greenhouses. Six in all, if I recall right, though it's been quite a while since I was out there myself. Just to the south of that, in a quiet little clearing far off the road that ran past their place, were racks and racks of beehives. The flowers, his business, he propagated - plant sex. The bees, his hobby, had that whole "birds and bees" thing going for them. And in bed with his wife, a happy and contented woman, whom he loved dearly, was where he spent all his free time!

Oh, and all those brown paper wrapped parcels? Beekeeper's Daily, Home and Garden, Greenhouse Gazette... Eddie had an arrangement with the postmistress to wrap all his magazines in brown paper before she gave them to him, just for the fun of the mystery it created!