Bill and Kathy had once been very good friends of mine. Several jobs ago I met Bill at work and one evening I came over for dinner. I soon became their little hobby -- they would invite me over at least once a month, often to try to set me up with a potential girlfriend. There's something about an eligible single person that married people just want to fix. During this time I was like a brother in the family, in fact, I had a key to the house; I used to house-sit while they were out of town, and one time Bill simply said "Keep it." Since that time (if I came over when I was expected) I simply let myself in so they wouldn't have to come to the door.
Over the years our relationship cooled a bit as Bill and Kathy's marriage cooled. Bill began to treat Kathy very disrespectfully, and was on his second serious affair that I knew of. Myself, I didn't see anything about Kathy to disrespect; she was intelligent, cute, good natured, and sexy. In fact, when I looked at the skanky women Bill was hanging out with, it looked like a big trade down to me. Anyway, I just started to feel uncomfortable around the two of them together, partly because of the embarrassing way Bill would put down Kathy in front of me, and partly because I was privy to Bill's affairs and I didn't like the idea of being part of a lie against Kathy, even though I was 90% sure she knew about it. Really, how could she not know -- sometimes he would spend the night at this woman's house? But because I liked Kathy, even if she did know about the affair, I didn't like the idea of her seeing me participating in the deception by pretending not to know about it myself.
I still liked Bill's company though, and sometimes we would do things together: go to a boat show, play pool, go fishing, and that sort of thing. We weren't great friends because we had a different way of looking at things, but like lots of guys we didn't have any other options, so we would hang out together. That brings me to the Saturday I'm going to describe, when I came over very early to go fishing with Bill about an hour before sunrise. We had set up the fishing trip a couple of weeks earlier.
Letting myself in through the front door, the first thing I noticed was that only one light was on in the empty living room. I had expected Bill to be waiting for me there. The second thing I noticed was how quiet it was. I didn't want to wake Kathy up, so in a loud whisper I said, "Hey, Bill! Bill! You there?"
No answer. The kitchen was dark, but they kept a dim light on in the hall at night. I crept quietly down that hall, up to their open bedroom door, and standing discretely around the corner out of the doorway, I whispered loudly, "Hey, Bill! Wake up buddy." Then I listened. After a few seconds, I heard rustling sheets, and Kathy's dopey, slow, confused-sounding voice.
"Jimmy? Is that you? What're you doing here?"
"Yep. It's me. I didn't mean to wake you. I'm here to get Bill."
There was a long silence. I was beginning to wonder whether she'd gone back to sleep when Kathy mumbled "What time is it?" At the same time, I heard the sound of something falling over on the nightstand, rolling, and dropping to the floor, some sounds like fumbling in the dark, and then the click of a lamp being turned on. Then Kathy's voice, sounding groggy. "Come on in."
I came into the room, and took in a few details. Kathy was lying under a down comforter with only her head poking out. Her clothes were in a heap on the floor by the bed. A heap that included a bra and panties, I couldn't help noticing. I saw that she was the only person in the bed, and the layout of the comforter and pillows on Bill's side of the bed made it clear that he had not been in that bed since the last time it was made. I noticed that Kathy is one of those people who wake up looking attractive, that she actually looked cute and waifish with her short blonde hair mussed, her half lidded eyes and a dimply, friendly little half-smile.
Although I never admitted it to anyone, Kathy was really my type – a lot more so than the girls they used to try to set me up with. She was small, thin, and athletic, with a perfectly round little butt and perfect round little tits. She always smiled and spoke musically to me when she talked, although overall she was the quiet type. She was kind, considerate and caring; the kind of woman that just makes you feel like a better person just by being around them. To tell the truth, I usually avoided being alone with Kathy because I was afraid someone might notice how attracted I was to her, and in my view of things she was off limits. But now, here I was. She reached a bare arm from under the comforter, and patted a spot at the edge of the bed about even with her waist, and then returned the arm under the comforter leaving only her head visible on the pillow.
I felt myself reddening as I walked over to the bed where she lay. Sitting down where she indicated, I asked, "So where's Bill? We were supposed to go fishing this morning."
Kathy made a disgusted little snort and smiled wryly. "You really want to know?"
I just blushed.
Kathy watched my discomfort for a moment, and told me, "He's at your place. He spent the night with you. Remember?" Her voice was a mixture of sarcasm and disgust. Not only had the bastard forgotten about the fishing trip, but he had used me for an alibi with his wife without bothering to tell me about it!
I looked at her, feeling pity for a moment, but it soon faded. I realized from her tone and bearing that this was no surprise to her. Her expression showed me – what a relief! - that she had known about Bill's cheating for a long time, and had come to accept it. Or maybe accept isn't the right word. She had gotten to the place that Bill's affairs no longer had the ability to hurt her; where I had feared there was a wound, she had shown me a scar.
I said the only thing you really can say. "I'm sorry."
When the cat's out of the bag, people have a tendency to relax. We now had opened a secret between us and our relationship dropped naturally and comfortably into a new level of intimacy. To make myself comfortable, I turned to face Kathy. I reached over her waist with my left hand to support myself, tossed a knee up along the edge of the bed, and leaned over her comfortably to talk. This had two symbolic effects. One, I had her caged so that she couldn't leave without asking me to move. Second, I had her obviously naked body within inches. In one sense it was as proper as an overcoat, but in another it was scandalous in the same way that a bra is sexier than a bikini top.
One of Kathy's eyebrows ridged, which informed me that she saw the erotic possibilities of the situation while leaving me in doubt about her opinion of it. That's how I read it, anyway. I smiled at her and holding her eyes, I flatly stated the obvious; "Bill is a jerk."
Kathy batted her eyes like a ditz, and said "Really?" Then she smiled to take away the sting of this gentle jab.
I smiled back, but spoke seriously. "Yes he is. And you don't deserve to be treated this way. You've been very good to him. And loyal. And you're so, well..." I looked down. "You're so cute." Kathy had been enjoying my discomfort, and at the word "cute", her eyebrows bounced and her eyes twinkled.
"You think I'm cute?" She was teasing me.
I coughed and looked down again. "Well, yeah. I always have."