--==--
CHAPTER TWO
--==--
Karen was up earlier than usual Saturday morning.
I wasn't all that surprised. Usually, on her "girls' nights out," she would stagger in around ten and have a glass of wine in the hot tub before coming to bed. This was a relatively new routine, one that I had initially viewed as an unspoken request for an extension of "me" time at the end of the day.
Now, I saw it in a very different and much uglier light.
A hot tub dip did, after all, seem like the best way to indulge in the relaxing afterglow of an evening of uninhibited sex. It helped to clean you off before bed, as well.
On this particular Friday, however, she had gotten home just after 9:30 and taken only the quickest of showers before staggering wearily into bed. She'd looked exhausted, stressed out, and more than a little ashamed of herself.
Still, even in the shade of this sudden change, I couldn't stop myself from studying her clothes, her hair, even the way she came in through the door. My eyes were hunting for evidence I didn't remotely want to find, or care about.
And this was MY newest habit...a horrible match to her own. It came on as a series of questions that were so small, and so unconsciously placed, that it sometimes felt like drowning in an inch of water. Was the fabric at the front of her outfit a little wrinkled? Was that stray hair frizzing up behind her right ear actually a rogue that had escaped her efforts to straighten up on the way home? Was she walking funny?
The urge to assess the unassessable was overwhelming. It was also unwelcome, and it made me sick to my stomach that I couldn't control it any more than I did. I didn't want to know the answers to the questions, of course. I didn't even want to know what the questions WERE.
But just try stopping, and see how you do.
She shuffled into the kitchen that particular Saturday morning in a robe and slippers, her face fixed with a baggy-eyed kind of determination. She got into it as soon as she had her breakfast in hand.
Just as I had been expecting her to.
"You caught me off guard last night," she husked. She punctuated this declaration by throwing me an accusatory look, and dropping her breakfast noisily on the table. "If you'd given me any time to think about it...any time at all...I would have refused. I would have stayed home in spite of your stupid little threats, and we would have talked about it. Talked. Like adults." The shake of her head was a nice touch. "You do realize that, don't you?"
Of course I do, you idiot. But why would you think that I would ever want to talk to you about anything, ever again?
"I considered the possibility that you might do something like that...that you might miss the chance to save yourself in some fit of egotistical defiance." I hadn't yet looked up from my paper. "That's exactly why I chose NOT to give you time to think. I was doing you a favour."
I could feel her exasperated stare. I rather enjoyed it.
"Goddamn it, John," she snapped, waving her arms. "LOOK at me! For one goddamn minute, set the fucking paper down and look at me!"
I calmly set the paper down and gave her my attention.
"I don't want THIS to be our marriage! I don't want to live my life apart from you, but with you making demands about how I spend my time! And," she leaned forward, lowering her voice, "more than any of that, I don't want to keep doing this to you. I can't keep doing this to you. It isn't right."
Well, that just beat all. "DOING this to me?" I gave a derisive snort. "Oh, I really don't think you understand, Karen. This isn't something that you're DOING to me. Not anymore. This is something that you've already DONE. It's been. It's acted upon. The bullet has left the chamber, sailed through air, and is lodged well and deep within the meat and bone." I leaned forward, "It CAN. NOT. BE. REVOKED. Do you get that? Am I getting through to you at all? We can stop hashing it over, because nothing we say can ever change what's been done. YOU, my dear wife, betrayed me. You lied and you cheated. On our family. On our life together. That will never, never not be a part of your story, or our marriage's story...it will never not be a part of who you are. And while it's certainly not something that I wanted, YOU made the decision without any input from me whatsoever. So now you don't like having to live with the consequences, but you don't get to undo it, hey presto, just because you've discovered that your little adventure has ugly ramifications for your life moving forward."
"Stop it, John! Just stop it!" There were tears in her eyes. I guess they seemed real enough. "Doesn't our marriage mean anything to you? Don't you care at all? It's not fucking fair that-"
"DON'T TALK TO ME ABOUT FAIR!"
My fist had smashed down onto the table, knocking my juice over and spilling it across the floor. I hadn't even realized that I was moving.
Shit.
Closing my eyes, I took a long, deep breath and thought of cool mountain streams. Then, with my self-control a little regenerated, I went on. "If you look at your situation clinically...if you really step back and think about the alternatives...then I think you'll start to realize where these doubts you're feeling now come from. They aren't love, or hope, or worry over your marriage. They are guilt, and they are fear. Do you understand? They aren't made from rational thought, they aren't birthed by any kind of desire...and they certainly aren't indicators of what you really want." I sipped my coffee. "The current situation is THE situation that is best for you. And it's the only one left that works for me. So while I appreciate the fact that you're...concerned...you don't need to be. Not about me, not anymore. It doesn't do anybody any good."
You haven't cared about me for a long time, now. So why change?
I leaned down and wiped up the spilled juice. "I meant what I said last night, Karen...right now, I don't have any sexual feelings towards you whatsoever, and I don't know that that situation isn't going to be permanent. The thought of touching you makes me sick. So in that one very important regard you and I are done."
I also doubt that I could be that close to you and keep from wrapping my hands around your throat. I'm not prepared to risk finding out.
"But I also meant it when I said that I love you, and that I have no intentions of leaving. Obviously my feelings could change in the future, just as your feelings about me could change...but the only way I can see right now that I might leave is if you start using your affair to humiliate me publicly, start to show signs that you're falling in love, or break it off and try to make me be with you in a way that I'm unwilling to do."
"John-"
"I want you to be happy," I insisted loudly. "Can we at least both admit that this is the best, perhaps only, way for that to happen?"
"No."
"I'm afraid it is."
She swallowed. "I don't want to believe that."
"I don't care what you want to believe." I held up my hands, breathed out through my nose, and changed tactics. "Do you realize, Karen, how happy you have been the last few months?"
Silence.
"Oh, yes," I waved a hand. "Smiling, relaxed, laughing at bad jokes and listening as the girls told you about their day. You've been more upbeat and attentive than I've ever seen you before."
I'm almost not lying about it, either. When you get to feeling guilty about just what a good time you're having away from us, you show remarkable flashes of deep caring and concern. Maybe, if you see that as your way through this, it'll become true all the time. The girls would certainly benefit from that, and it would keep you out of my hair.
Come on. Do something for someone else, for a change, Karen.
"John," she stammered, "I...I didn't realize..."
"Of course you didn't. Why would you? Your attention was elsewhere."
She ducked her head. "I wasn't trying to throw it in your face, you know. I swear that I wasn't. I just...when I was...with him...I would miss you. All of you, I mean. My family. It made me realize..." She had her hand over her mouth, and was trying not to cry.
"I know." I took a bite of my food. "But then...was it three weeks ago? When his mom was sick? He flew out to see her, and you couldn't see each other for four or five days." I shook my head and chuckled mirthlessly. "You really turned into a monster, didn't you? I haven't seen you that pissy since you had all those pains during your second pregnancy." I paused to stab at my food a little more with my fork. I didn't bother to take a bite, though. "And I don't think I've ever seen you that downright mean. Not ever. We took the brunt of your anger at being denied something we couldn't even give you. So how fair was that?"
Now she was in full blown crying mode. "I...I didn't mean to-"
Good. Break her down, and then help her see the way back. And don't you dare give her a chance to reconsider her options.
"The point is, in general you've been happier than I can ever remember, and that has impacted the way you behave around the house. It impacted me and the kids, as well. Your happiness has made everybody's life a little bit easier. So why would either of us want that to go away?"
"I want to be happy with YOU," she insisted wetly.
We don't get to choose, though, do we bitch?
"You are happy with me. It's just that what you do with him supports that."
"I'm so scared," she wiped at her nose with the sleeve of her robe. "I'm scared that you're going to leave me."
"You know I won't do that."
She shook her head. "But why aren't YOU scared? If we were reversed...if you were doing this to me, I'd...I'd...God!"
I decided she was owed a bit of honesty...on just this one subject, anyway. She'd been so patient and accepting of all my little lies, so far. One little truth could be granted.
"I AM scared, Karen. In fact, I'm terrified. Do you want to know why?" She nodded. "I'm scared because it turns out that I'm all alone. Do you have any idea what that's like? No. Of course you don't." I set the fork down. "I felt like I had a lot going for me, for a very long time. I was privileged, you know? Victorious." I looked away. "I find, now, that I have very little left to lose, and I'm very scared that I won't be able to protect and keep it."
And it just so happens that the list doesn't include you.
But maybe she already knew that, because she ran from the room in tears.
I simply stood up, another mission completed, and put my dishes in the sink. Then I went outside to work in the lawn.
---
When I came in a few hours later, wiping the sweat from my face with my sleeve and looking forward to a cool shower, the contents of the envelope (as in "THE envelope") were spread out all over our bed. I'd been waiting for that to happen. I'd even left it out for her, knowing her curiosity would eventually force her to see how complete my understanding of her affair really was.
