Flavor of the Week: Family Ties

I met Monique at her family reunion in northern Canada. I had been doing enough of this synthetic morphine that I kept waking up in odd places—the foot of my bed, the hallway, the middle of the street, a construction site—so I was up there to get clean and get my head together. When I walked by the tent that was hosting Monique’s family reunion, she came right up to me and, assuming I was a relative, introduced herself and kissed me on both cheeks. She was around my age, thin and pretty with big brown eyes.

I was bored out of my fucking skull and horny as a goat. So I followed her into the tent. There were shitloads of people. Turns out her grandfather had come from a family of 24 children, each of who had had between 10 and 17 kids of their own. Now, I know how babies are made and I knew that all that procreating meant one thing for Monique—she was genetically programmed to get it on.

We drank cup after plastic cup of wine.

I had my uncle’s car, so I suggested we go for a swim. She wore a turquoise bikini and looked incredible. Then we went back to her hotel “so she could change.” I kissed her when she came out of the bathroom, and it was like throwing a match on a pool of gasoline. We ended up having incredibly torrid sex.

Afterward, she was a little sketched out and suggested that she walk back to the gathering so that we arrived separately. “It may not be such a good idea for my parents to see us together,” she said. That may sound a little old-fashioned to you, but I heartily agreed with her; I didn’t want anyone to see us together, either. Monique’s family reunion was also my family reunion. She was my second cousin.

We had never met before, so it wasn’t weird—or at least it wasn’t as weird as some of the weird shit I’ve done. It was taboo and in poor taste and probably violated some local if not federal statute, but so do most of the things I enjoy. So the guilt I felt was familiar, almost comforting. We hooked up once more on the sly that weekend, which was great: her slight, muscular dancer’s body; her long, thin limbs...

Then all too soon, it was over. I was going back to the wilds of Saskatchewan to toil on my uncle’s farm, and she was going back to Quebec with her family. Or so I thought. I found out on the last day that she had cozied up with my uncle and solicited an invitation to visit so that she could come and spend more time with me.

So Monique came to the farm and we kept fucking whenever we thought we could get away with it. I don’t remember ever being so eager to wear a condom with a girl. I think I once actually suggested I wear two. And I was increasingly paranoid about being outed to my family as a cousin-fucker. My family subscribes to the type of Catholicism so devout that it kind of borders on voodoo. Now, I’ve never read the Bible, but I understand that boning your cousin is not something they’re into. And I’ll guess they don’t make exceptions just because she’s wicked hot.

The worse the secret is, the more it burns to escape you. But I didn’t tell a soul. Monique, of course, told her summer BFF, my 17-year-old partygirl cousin with the big mouth, who promptly told her BFF, yet another cousin. It seemed impossible for me to escape to New York with the secret intact. Monique told me not to worry. “At least we’re keeping it in the family,” she said.

And then, the worst. Monique told me she had fallen in love with me. “What? That’s ridiculous, we’re related! What’s going to happen, we’re going to go on the run, travel under assumed names?”

I asked. “If I have to go to jail, I want it to be for something way cooler than cousin-fucking.”

“It’s OK,” she said, “in Montreal, it’s not illegal for cousins to get married.” Marriage? Listen, there are things even I won’t do.

Finally, the summer was up and Monique went back to Montreal. I flew out to Houston to play a bunch of shows with the underground comedian Bob before I returned to the city. Bob is a professional loudmouth and a drunken anarchist, and I was leery of telling anyone, especially him… but there was no one who would appreciate the story more. So, after eliciting a solemn promise that he would tell no one, even when he was fucked up, I unfolded the pathetic story for him. “That’s gross, dude,” he said. “Congratulations.”

We assembled backstage before the first show: me, Bob, the other comics, wives, girlfriends, hangers-on, probably 15 people having some drinks, getting loose, texting the various drug dealers we knew in the Houston area. After the MC warmed up the crowd, I went out and played some songs, and it went over pretty well. I felt good, too. I had gotten off the drugs, transgressed a serious societal norm and returned with my secret intact.

When I got back to the Green Room, everyone was smiling at me. Good, I thought, they enjoyed the show. But then they didn’t stop smiling. Bob raised his bottle of Miller High Life to me in a toast: “Good show, cousin-fucker.” C