It had been six months since I cheated on my husband. During that time, I had tried to tell him. How do I tell my husband that I had slept with another man, not only another man but a black man. A black man while we were on vacation with our kids, while my husband was in the next room tending to our children.
Every time I got the nerve to tell him, I backed down. I knew it would mean the end of our marriage. Timothy was raised in the deep south, while I was what some people called "city south." I still had my country ways but living in Atlanta was much different from being raised out in the "sticks" as Timothy proudly called his low population hometown.
Now we were living in the outskirts of Atlanta in a lovely suburban house, and we were content on the way things had turned out. Timothy worked for a prominent construction contractor, while I worked in a hair salon.
Our three children went to a lovely school, and things were perfect. That was until we went on vacation. I cheated. I was that woman that slept with another man, let that man fill her inside with his... I couldn't even bring myself to think of it. I literally begged him to cum inside me.
I sat up in bed and looked over at Timothy. He had his reading glasses on as he read one of his new contracts. I couldn't bring myself to sleep with him. I promised myself that I wouldn't until I told him. After being married for the number of years that we have been, it was easy to make up excuses or make myself not available. However, I knew the moment was coming soon. I would have to tell him.
*************
"Fuck that!" Lexis shouted at me from her spot in the corner.
"I am with her," Natalie agreed as she did her client's hair.
"I owe it to him," I said as I washed out the last of the shampoo from my client's hair. "He is my husband."
"So," my client said. "I have been cheating on my husband and my other boy toys for going on five years," she said as I pulled her head up.
"They cheat on us," a woman said from her chair. "They cheat, they lie and then expect us to accept it because they are men. Get the fuck out of here!"
This was the usual talk that happened in our salon. We knew each other most of our clients were regulars. They came in every week wanting the same thing.
"You can't tell me that it wasn't good?" Tonya asked. She was the owner of the establishment.
"Of course," I said, even though I had regrets about cheating. I wouldn't lie to myself that it didn't feel good at the time. Hell, for a week after I was on cloud nine and ready to do it again. That was until I came home.
"Did you get off?" Natalie asked as she came back to her station.
"Yes," I nodded, a couple of times.
"When was the last time your husband got you off like that?" another patron asked.
I looked around all of them was staring at me. "A while," I shrugged as I turned the stool, so it faced the mirror.
"How long is a while, exactly?" Tonya asked.
"A few years," I admitted.
"Well then, you don't owe him shit!" Natalie shouted.
"Actually, he owes you," one of the women said. To which the others agreed. I nodded.
It took a while, but the subject changed to other matters. My mind still lingered on what I had to do. I knew it was time to do the right thing.
"Thanks, Susan," I said as I hung up the phone.
My neighbor was going to take care of the kids tonight. I looked at the table. Everything was set, I had prepared all of his favorites, not that it would matter. I am sure most of it would go in the trash or worse hit the wall.
I heard his pickup truck pull into the driveway. My heart raced, this was the point where I usually backed down, finding an excuse of why I shouldn't do it. I could hear my mother's voice in my head. "Excuses are for those that can't do. It is, or it isn't there is no in between," she always said that to my sister and me anytime we made excuses why we didn't do something.
I heard Timothy talking to the neighbor.
I remembered a time back in high school when I told one of my guy friends that I hadn't had the time to talk to him or call him because I was busy. After I hung up, my mother gave me a look. She turned and walked away. She told me that she had never been so disappointed in me. It was a lie, a blatant lie. I tried to make an excuse for the reason why I did it. She held up her hand and said she didn't want to talk to me. The next day she was killed in a hit and run accident. I never forgot that look.
I sighed and sat down.
"Hey," Timothy said as he entered the dining room. "Where are the kids?" he asked as he sat down.
"Susan has them for the night," I nodded.
"Oh no," Timothy smiled. "What did you do? Moreover, how much is it going to cost me?" he laughed as he began to make a plate for himself.
My eyes began to fill with water. "Come on," Timothy said as he grabbed my hands. "Whatever it is we will work it out, we always have."
I pulled my hands back. "I don't think we can with this one," I shook my head.
"Trust me," he smiled. "Come on tell me."
I took a deep breath then looked into my husband's eyes. Then I let it out and told him. I told him everything, not leaving anything out. He sat there and stared at me, not saying a word until I was finished. Then there was silence. Ear-splitting, nauseating silence that seemed to last hours. I knew it was only a minute or two but watching him look at me and say nothing made it feel like a day had passed. Slowly he stood up and walked towards the garage.
I listened to the amount of swearing that could make a sailor cringe. There were words I never thought I would hear my husband say about another person. Other words he had promised he would never say again. Then things began to fly and hit the walls. Timothy had a temper. He had never beaten the kids or me. He always went out to the garage.
I sat still not moving, not attempting to go out to him like I usually did. Then I heard the door open, and he walked back in. He sat across from me as I stared at the floor. "You can't even look at me, can you?" he asked.
I shook my head. My long blonde hair was hiding my face from him. "How?" he asked. "No, Why?" he corrected himself. "You know what, I don't want to know."
"I am taking the kids to my mom's place for the week," he said as he stood up. "When I come back, I want you gone."
I nodded. Timothy slammed the door as he went out and I began to cry.
***********
A week isn't a long time. Sure, on a calendar it looks like a long time. When you have to pack and get most of your belongings out of a house, it goes by in the blink of an eye. That wasn't the hardest part, the hardest part was explaining to your fourteen-year-old son, why his mother wouldn't be home when he got back. The young girls didn't understand or wouldn't understand for a while, but he knew why his father was mad. Also, he had questions many questions most of them were about him.
I couldn't believe my life was crashing down over twenty minutes. Twenty minutes from the time I went into that other hotel room, to the moment I left. That's all it took to crack the foundations of my life.
"I will send for the rest," I told Timothy over the phone. He had called to make sure I wasn't home before he left his mother's house.
"Fine," he replied. "The papers?"
"As soon as I get them, I will sign them," I nodded as I got into my car.
"Good," he said.
"I still want visitation rights!" I said, I knew I had done a horrible thing and I had no right to be a full-time mother, but they were still my children.
"We will see," Timothy said as he hung up.
"We will see, my ass," I said as I put the car in gear and left the house.
My new place was a dump. It was all I could afford, and it was in a bad part of the city. Luckily, I had nothing valuable to steal. Most of my things were in storage.
I looked up at the hideous monstrosity that hovered over the area where I would be putting my bed.
