Just a little prologue...
I'd discovered Marjory my wife cheating on our marriage with a sociologist from State College. He'd been driving way out of his way to make the hook up, and it had taken him nearly six months before he'd scored. My wife's perfidy aside, I thought the whole thing seemed suspiciously odd. Why would a man drive so far out of his way, and take so long just to get a piece of tail? Was he that cautious? Was he that afraid of being discovered that he'd travel scores of miles in an effort to not get caught? No, there had to be more to it. But what?
Then there was my wife, and... my son. I've always loved my wife, and even after my discovery I still loved her, just not nearly so much. Then there's my son. I've loved him without question since the moment I first set eyes on him, he'd become my life. I believed an uncomfortable, no constrained, family life would be infinitely preferable to a broken home so I decided on an informal separation rather than a full scale divorce would be preferable. Sounds weak to some I know, but marriage and parenting means responsibility. If we'd not had Ryan I'd have been gone in a New York minute. So I decided to wait and if I had to, I'd move out at some future time.
So I stayed. Did I trust my wife? No. Did I believe she was capable of staying faithful after once cheating? I doubted it. Did I care? Yes, I hoped she was strong enough and caring enough to not fail twice. Did it matter? I'm not sure, I didn't think so. I figured, if I didn't like the train of events I'd pull out once I satisfied myself regarding the mystery of the sociologist.
Where we live:
Our house is on a small lot. We have an above-ground pool, a tool shed, and a few flowers in the back. There is a garage, but it's filled with the accumulated debris of a fifteen year marriage.
Inside we share three bedrooms; one for my wife and I, one for our son Ryan, and a third is filled with my wife's extra clothing, mostly shoes and nearly every outfit she'd ever wore since high school. There's also a small, but functional bathroom.
On the first floor there's the usual living room, dining room, kitchen, and pantry. A stairway leads to an unfinished cellar where we do our laundry and stockpile other "needed" though really unnecessary materials.
We've been using this house as an equity builder. She and I have been looking, and we found an old farmhouse a few miles away; it looks pretty rundown and has been on and off the market several times. We had talked and believed with a little luck and a lot of elbow grease we could restore it.
The past couple years Marjory's been wandering up and down the region chasing antiques. I've always had a funny feeling about antiques. I know thieves will study the obituaries to spy out an old house. They'll scope it out, see if it's unoccupied and pull in with a truck long about sundown. They'll break in and spend the whole night emptying the place out. I'd hate the idea of buying somebody else's stolen treasures, even if they aren't worth much. Marjory knows how I feel, and she's been careful. I'd rather buy something that's old and looks like an antique than actually buy something stolen. I guess we do have a few antiques; there's an old wind up Victrola, a high boy, and an expensive secretary I know is an antique because it was my great great grandmother's. Ryan sleeps on an old double bed my granddad said his grand-mom, my great great grand-mom lost her virginity in. We even have the old gal's hairbrush and hand mirror. Nobody uses them though. We have two old spinning wheels too.
Why have I wasted all this time describing where we live? I think that should be obvious; I love the place, and if Marjory and I did permanently split up all the time, effort, and love we'd poured into it would be lost. Only a fool would throw away fifteen years of love and hard work without first trying to think things through, and if I'm nothing else, I'm a thinker and a planner.
So here we are!
My discovery and first reprisal against Marjory occurred in August, but things got complicated after that. No surprise actually, summer had always been a busy time, and by August we'd looked about and realized there was still so much more that had to be done. We'd promised Ryan a trip to Del Grosso's Amusement Park because of the water slide. Marjory's mom and dad owned a small cottage over on Deep Creek Lake in Western Maryland, and we'd promised them a few days of swimming and fishing. Of course there was church, and around Labor Day our church has its Rally Day. Marjory's a Sunday school teacher, and I'm on the finance committee so we'd have to stay a part of that.
I'd like to forewarn anyone listening; the one committee a person should ever volunteer for is finance. There are some good reasons for that. For one no one wants to spend any money so every meeting leads to bickering. What's worse is once on that committee one sees who does and doesn't contribute. It really tears my ass to see people in the congregation get up and shower some wealthy family with praise for what they do when I know they don't give squat. It tears my ass even more when I see the old widows sitting off to the side or in the back; they're the real givers, but quite often the other congregants act like their doing those old ladies a favor by letting them sit in a pew.
Del Grosso, Deep Creek Lake, and Rally Day aside there was still my parents to consider. I grew up in Western Maryland, and my mom and dad are farmers. Pennsylvania doesn't have a state fair, but Maryland does, and it's during the week of Labor Day. My mom always has pies and cakes in contests, and my dad is a clogger so, me being an only child means it's always off to Timonium, Maryland for at least two days. To be honest, I enjoy the State Fair. I enjoy wandering up and down barns filled with animals, and I especially enjoy the competitions and the seafood. Believe it when I say there's nothing in the world like Maryland steamed crabs or Maryland crab cakes. It's like nobody else in the world has ever heard of "Old Bay" seasoning.
How was I going to get out of the dilemma I faced?
I thought I'd figured things out. I'd taken Marjory and Ryan to the Perryville on a Wednesday where she'd get to see her "paramour" out with his wife and kids first hand. Of course the event had exposed and humiliated her. I thought I'd let her sweat it out by following up with a string of days wherein she got to ponder what I planned to do. Then I laid it all out; no outright divorce, but a separation. I was sure my decision would destroy her, and it did, but her reaction was the inverse of what I expected. I was sure she'd be so humiliated and so ashamed she'd want to keep it from her parents. I guess I'd overdone it; she was so crushed that just as soon as I disappeared back to work she was on the phone to her mom and dad and to my mom and dad. No that wasn't correct; she called her parents and then went over. She called mine, and begged to see them too.
Not a week had gone by but I got a call from my dad. "Son," he said, "we got a call from Marjory."
I thought, "Shit!" Then I said, "OK, dad, what'd she tell you?"
He said, "Maybe we should get together and talk."
"Shit," I thought. I just knew it, he was going to be on her side. "All right," I said, "let's get together tomorrow night. I'll come down."
"Don't come here," he said, "your mom's a mess. You know what she's like."
"How about the Wagon Wheel," I suggested. The Wagon Wheel was a restaurant and bar not far from where my parents lived. They had good club sandwiches and they served onion rings. I added, "Say seven?"
"Yeah, I guess so," he said.
So there we were; it was seven-fifteen at the Wagon Wheel. I'd ordered a Turkey club, onion rings, and a Pabst. Dad got a Pabst. While I waited for my food I asked, "All right, what'd she say?"
Dad looked kind of glum, "Everything son. She told us everything."
I kind of figured she'd massaged the story so I asked, "So do tell, what exactly did she say?"
By the look on his face I could tell he didn't like the way I phrased my question but he started anyway, "Some college professor, some sociologist started showing up where she worked. He showed a lot of interest in what she did. They started talking, then having lunches together, the lunches got longer. He started asking questions about the two of you. He talked her into meeting with him at a restaurant in Chambersburg. He got her to go to a motel where they could study his research together, and it was there that he seduced her."
"Not too far off," I said. "Did she tell you how I found out and what I did?"
"No, only that you got a call from an old friend who told you, and you went to Chambersburg and caught her."
"Did she say anything else," I asked?
"No, that's about it."
