Jenny Lynch's marriage was in trouble. She suspected that her husband James was having an affair. He made her feel fat and ugly but she was neither. After ten years of marriage and two children she was in remarkably good shape.
She was proud that was back to the weight she was before children. She was tall and lean. She jogged and did Pilates. She had just begun yoga. She watched what she ate and it showed. Her breasts hardly sagged. They were small but looked good on her. They suited her frame. Her long, dark hair glowed. She had expressive blue eyes that sparkled when she was happy.
James was ignoring her. For the last few months he had begun staying late at work and spending time in the office on weekends. Their sex life was in the toilet. They hadn't made love for a long time - she couldn't remember when they were intimate with each other.
Worse than that they stopped talking to each other. They had always made time for each other each day but that had completely stopped. Spending time just with her girls gave her time to mull over what was going on.
She rang her sister on the West Coast to rant about her husband. "He never wants to touch me...he is always working...he doesn't care about me...I try my best for him and he ignores me"
And on it went. In her sister she had a sympathetic ear. Janet was divorced and seemed to be much happier without her ex, Jake, around. She made all the right sympathetic sounds.
They spoke over the phone every couple of days and it was always the same. Jenny complained about James and Janet agreed he was being unreasonable.
One time she said, "James won't even touch me. I don't know how long it is since we've had sex. He doesn't seem interested anymore. He just wants to go to sleep. Nothing I say or do seems to make any impact on him. Janet what do I do?"
Janet replied, "Well, I don't want to alarm you but usually if a man doesn't want sex then he is usually getting some elsewhere."
"What do you mean, James is having an affair?"
"Probably. I'm sorry Jenny but it certainly looks that way. The same thing happened with Jake and me. He lost interest in me and just wanted to work, work, work. I know I got caught cheating but it was because he wouldn't look after my needs. So I looked elsewhere. I'm better off without him now anyway."
She'd had enough. This had gone on too long. Her sister had said that she needed time out to see what she wanted. She decided that she would talk to him as soon as he got home.
At about eleven o'clock that night he finally walked in the door. She was in the living room waiting for him. He was surprised to see her still awake.
"James, we need to talk," she said.
"Yeah, what about?"
"Us. What's going on with us? We never talk anymore. Hell, we never even see each other. Your two daughters hardly know you any more."
"Yeah, well, I've been busy at work."
"Bullshit, James. You don't care enough about your job to spend that much time there."
He made no reply. He just made to go to the bedroom.
"James, talk to me. I'm at the end of my patience."
"What are you saying, Jenny?"
"I need to work out what's going on. You don't seem to care much about your family any more, or your marriage. I need to know whether I do."
"And..."
"And, I need to take some time out. I want to see if this marriage is worth saving. To do that I need to have some time alone."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean tomorrow I'm going away, by myself. Janet has invited me over and I'm going. The girls will be at mum's place. You can pick them up from there after work tomorrow night."
"Alright, Jenny, if you think that's what you need, then I guess I'll be hearing from you."
I turned away, tears in my eyes. 'He isn't even going to fight me on this. He doesn't really care,' I thought. Jenny went into the spare bedroom. She would sleep there that night and fly out to visit her sister the next day.
That morning she stayed in bed until James went to work. She took the girls to school and reminded them that nanny was to pick them up. She called her mother to remind her. Then she called her sister, who was ready to welcome her with open arms.
That afternoon she went to the airport, boarded a plane and settled in for the two-hour flight to her sister's home.
When she arrived her sister Janet was there, waiting for her. They hugged for ages and eventually when they let each other go Janet said, "Jenny, you've done the right thing. We are going to do some stuff while you are here that will blow your mind. And you'll know by the end of it where you want to be, I guarantee it."
"Oh, Janet, that sounds exactly what I need."
Since her divorce Jenny knew that Janet lived a life that was unusual to say the least. She had been a bit of a wild child growing up and was very experienced sexually by the time she settled down into married life. Unfortunately settling down wasn't quite the case. Her husband had caught her at a sex party at a private club where she seemed to be the centre of attention. Fortunately they had no children so when they divorced there was no custody battle.
Janet continued her free-love lifestyle after the divorce and, to Jenny, looked as happy as she had ever been.