Getting Outside Myself

NOTES

This story includes infidelity, reconciliation, and impaired consent. Also a lot of graphic sex. If these elements are not to your liking, you may wish to move along to something else.

It is a work of sheer fantasy in all respects, intended solely for the purposes of erotic entertainment. In real life it is incumbent on all of us to ensure consent in any situation, and to show respect and empathy to those around us--not just with regard to sex, but in every aspect of life.

I appreciate positive comments and constructive feedback. I hope you enjoy it.

CHAPTER 1

Mike is nearly through the door before I catch him.

"What the

f-fmmgh

?!" (I censor myself just in time. Little ears are always listening.) "You said you'd take the kids this morning!"

He pauses in the entryway. From the guilty look on his face, I know he never for one second forgot that he's scheduled to handle transportation duty. "Shoot, completely slipped my mind. Stan called for a code walkthrough today, and I need to be there. I'll take them Monday, promise." Ducking as if to weather a hailstorm of recriminations, he edges in the direction of freedom.

Fuck! I really needed Mike to have my back on this. Instead, he's not only dropped the ball, he's essentially flushed it down the toilet. Offering to atone on Monday is worthless to me.

But... dammit, I don't want to start a fight. For one thing, I don't have time for a fight, any more than I have time to drive the kids to school. And as if that isn't enough, we've also got a big, romantic date-night scheduled this evening. If I lay into him now, we'll both be bitter and resentful all day, and the whole thing will be spoiled.

So, I choke down the venom and do my best to sound reasonable, accommodating. "I just wish you'd coordinated with me, that's all. You know I have that big presentation."

He interprets this as permission to flee. "Thanks babe, I'll totally make it up to you."

Once again I'm left holding the proverbial bag. But I don't have the luxury of brooding over the injury. Not right now, at least. Instead, switching into emergency panic mode, I plop the kids and their cheerios in front of

Bluey

, and cram an hour's worth of personal prep time into a white-hot 15 minutes. Hunting down an unstained blouse and skirt ensemble that isn't wholly casual. Wrestling my hair into 'suitable to be seen in-person' shape. Making a perfunctory gesture toward blush and lipstick. Finally, scooping up my iPad and purse, I indulge in a final glance in the mirror--not bad, really, given the circumstances.

After visually confirming that Kit and Jemma have their backpacks and lunches in hand, I hasten them outside and into the car. Treading my foot into the gas pedal, I careen backwards out of the driveway, until--yikes!! There's the blare of a horn, a squeal of breaks, and I lurch to a stop.

Oops, it's the neighbor kid Kyle in his beat-up old pickup. He was just heading out too, apparently, and I cut him off. Barely missed backing into him, in fact. He doesn't seem aggravated though--we make eye contact and he breaks into an easy grin, accompanied by a friendly wave. I offer up an apologetic hand in answer, before maneuvering awkwardly out of the jam.

The close call serves as a good reminder to obey all state, county, and municipal driving laws--something I strive hard to do whenever the kids are in the car with me. So, even though I'm dying to shave a few minutes off the journey to Henry Clay Elementary, I conduct myself like a model citizen the whole way.

The thing about Mike flaking on me this morning (I have time to obsess on the drive) is that I know those software hacks at Three-Rs Educational Software, and how they operate. It's not like we're talking about some cutting-edge, supercharged Silicon Valley startup here. 3Rs attracts the sort of coders who are baseline competent and don't like to work too hard. Why, I'd bet dollars to donuts today's 'code review' involves first ambling over to the canteen for hot Americanos, and then an hour or two of sitting around in the conference room talking shit. Probably at this moment, the single guys are showing off naked pictures of their latest girlfriends, while the married guys live vicariously through them.

Well, at least I

hope

the married guys aren't showing off compromising photos of their wives. I know for a fact that Mike isn't, because I've never let him take any. He pushed the idea, years ago, just for his private use (as he put it). But I never agreed. It's not that I'm prudish or self-conscious about being naked with him. Well, not much anyway. Mostly it's just that once a picture like that has been taken, you never know where it will end up, right? This way I don't have to worry about it.

Anyway, Mike definitely could have skipped the meeting, whatever it is. He just didn't want to look whipped in front of the boys. He's never taken my career seriously, and today is merely the umpteenth confirmation of that fact.

Once the kids are dropped off, I jettison the safe-driver act, pushing my battered CR-V to the limit on the trip over to Pine Ridge Corporate Park. If I pound the accelerator mercilessly, run every fleeting yellow, and roll through every stop-sign, I can get there in under a half hour.

It's not that Mike is a bad person (oops, spiraling again). It's just that the hopes and expectations we brought into the marriage have turned out to be more mismatched than we probably realized back then. We were both excited about having children; and motherhood has turned out to be even more rewarding than I expected. But I never wanted to end up as a housewife. It was a rude shock when we started doing the math and realized that it would be cheaper for me to quit working than to pay for childcare.

Mike is perfectly content with the arrangement. Why shouldn't he be? Sure money is tight, but we squeak by. And meanwhile, he's happy the kids have their mother around instead of a random stranger--while he gets to escape every day to the pretty-fucking-easy, maximum-ego-boosting tech job he's always done.

Plus, the really great thing is, there's nothing

sexist

about it, right? It's just a matter of

logic

that male web coders should make three times what female marketing managers make. And naturally (he'd say), if the tables were reversed, he'd be the one staying home.

Yeah, right. If you believe that last one, then I've got some lovely beachfront property you might be interested in.

So, here we are, seven years later--me a part-time freelancer, trying to resurrect my pathetic shell of a career, while he goes right on assuming that his job should always take precedence. I understand how he slipped into that mindset, but I'm struggling to figure out how I can shake him free of it...

I arrive at Three-Rs Educational Software, mercifully breaking the acrid train of my thoughts. Most days I work remotely, but today I'm meeting the client onsite. And this client happens to be the same company where my husband works, 3Rs. Not that I owe the gig to any efforts on his part--I landed the contract through my own hustle and connections. Mike has zero pull there anyway.

In the lobby, I check in with the receptionist. I'm a little late, and Bryan turns up almost at once to escort me to the meeting. Maybe he's been fidgeting just around the corner, wondering where I was. "Thanks for finding the time Jess, I know your situation makes in-person stuff tough, but it'll be great to showcase you to upper management."

Beeping his badge against the reader, he takes me in-hand and guides me down the hall--clasping my arm just above the elbow, our skin separated by only the thin rayon of my blouse. Even in this southern bastion of retrograde thinking, the gesture is a bit too familiar to be entirely proper. And yet, innocent enough to be passed off. Bryan Jong is exactly that type of guy. The kind to press right up to the invisible line, without

quite

going over.

Well, it's no wonder he gets away with it. Bryan combines a perceptive social radar with polished confidence, and devilish good looks. His family is Korean, or something, but he grew up locally, so that his manner is 100% Dixie--like taking a stereotypical American homecoming-king and slapping a thin veneer of Seoul-colored wallpaper on him. Oh, I suppose the cadaverous blue-bloods of the local aristocracy would still view Bryan's features with a certain stigma. But the South is changing, slowly, and in everyday life he ticks more than enough boxes to earn the benefit of the doubt.

At a more personal level, meanwhile, I can't deny that Bryan is also the sort of guy to ignite a tingle between my thighs. Accompanying his strong jaw, and tall, robust physique, he's got the high cheekbones and glossy jet hair that I associate with a particularly Asian style of masculinity. Like, if I was the maiden in distress in a samurai movie, and he was the noble warrior come to rescue me, he could

totally

do me.

When Bryan first started hiring me for projects, I thought I'd done a pretty decent job of hiding my crush on him. But not good enough, apparently, because he picked up on my feelings at once, and asked me out for drinks.

And allow me to say: my wedding band may not be flashy, but there's no way he missed seeing it.

I was pretty flattered to be honest. I mean, objectively I figure he's a notch or two out of my league. But I'm also a married woman, so of course I turned him down. He respected that, and since then he's behaved like a perfect gentleman. More so than your average good ol' boy I'd have to say, keeping our interactions strictly business.

Even so, I can't help noticing how my face gets hot, and my heart thuds, and my manner becomes just a tad more effervescent whenever we're in the same room.

And I'm damn well sure that he notices it too.

3Rs isn't that big of a company, and the upcoming sales campaign is a major deal. We've booked huge displays at a couple of educational conferences in Boston and DC, and in-between we've scheduled meetings with dozens of superintendents and principals and school boards. All told it's slated to consume a sizeable chunk of the annual marketing budget. So, even though some of the deposits have already been put down, Bryan's supervisor still wants a meeting to review our plans and give the final green-light.

As the room fills, I note that a lot of the big brass are there--folks I've never met before, but recognize from doing my homework on the 3Rs website. There's the CFO at the other end of the table. The person he's chatting with is the VP of Sales. And the head of marketing is here too, of course. He's Bryan's boss.

Bryan leads me straight over to the man "Hey Harv, let me introduce Jessie Tanner. She's been a lifesaver. After Sheila quit, there's no way we could have pulled all this off without her."

'Harv' must be close to retirement age. He's taller than Bryan, and once, back in the day, could probably have been termed athletic. Now, he presents a ponderous, overstuffed figure, topped by a florid round face and receding gray crew-cut.

I feel the slimy caress of his sagging eyes as they run me up and down a couple of times. Pretty sure Harv can still remember that golden era when he would have given my ass a welcoming squeeze without thought of a harassment suit, and regrets the loss profoundly. Instead he's forced to rely on his words.

"Delighted," he wheezes. "Bryan's been talking my ear off about you. Wants me to bring you on fulltime. So how about it honey, can we tempt you?" With a labored wink, he adds in a stage-whisper: "Rest assured, the offer's based solely on your skills. The way you pretty the place up? That's just

gravy

."

Sigh.

I smile so that my teeth show, batting my eyes demurely in the way everyone expects. "It's awfully nice of you, Mr. Chatham. But I'm not looking to go fulltime right now. I've got little ones at home to think of. Best to keep things flexible."

His reply shifts into a more expansive register. "Well, I know where you're coming from, Jessie. Why, when my Lilah was little, she pretty near drove the wife to drink. And that was back when you could hire a decent nanny, too."

"Still," Bryan interjects, "there's a lot more work we could be throwing her way, right Harv?"

Harv nods, and then glances away. Taking in the room and cinching up his trousers, he raises his voice to be heard over the buzz: "Can't everyone take your damn seats?! Let's get this dog and pony show on the road!" This was evidently mostly preening for my sake. Before taking his own seat, he leans in close to my ear like he's about to talk dirty. "Tell you what, darling--I'll have Stu bring you in on the press blitz we're planning next month. Plenty of billable hours on that one."

As the lights dim and I queue up my powerpoint, I try to look on the bright side. True, I'd prefer it if scaring up work didn't leave me feeling this scuzzy. But, my upcoming engagements calendar had been looking awfully empty...

CHAPTER 2

I'm zipping back to Clay Elementary now. The pitch was a big hit--everyone loved the plans we'd put together, the booth design, the swag, the interactives and collateral and press releases. Tedious stuff that's really just a waste of my talents, to be honest. But when I do a thing, I do it well. Also Bryan was gallant, highlighting my contributions and making sure I got more than my share of the credit.

It was tough to escape afterwards, though, so now I'm running late again. Like a dolt I signed up to coordinate the

Reading Rulez!™

enrichment program at school. The volunteer-readers are scheduled to come in Monday morning, so I need to get everything set up today. Otherwise, our Ferdinand-the-Bulls will get muddled with our Fourth-Grade-Nothings and there will be hell to pay.

My mind drifts back toward Mike again as I rattle through suburbia, trying to channel the positive vibes I brought from the meeting into tender feelings for him. Although there are moments like this morning when my husband can be frustratingly tone-deaf, it's not really fair to blame him for all the patriarchal dysfunctions of our society, nor for the impossible tradeoffs that capitalism seems to demand (from everyone, but especially mothers).

Fatherhood has been a lot for him to process too, and he's been good at it, all things considered. Once work is over, he's mostly there with us, and takes on his quota of the bathtimes and read-alouds and temper-tantrums without complaint. Plenty of dads around here can't be bothered with that stuff.

One thing I know has been especially rough for Mike since we had kids is the feeling that I'm less there for him, physically. When it comes to relationships and intimacy, we were pretty much each-other's 'firsts' for everything. Partly this was a function of having rather straight-laced upbringings, partly due to being natural introverts, but also just because we paired off so young. We met during our senior year in college, got engaged within a few months, and married right after graduation. It hadn't been my plan, and I don't think it was his either, but we just sort of fell into it.

At a nuts-and-bolts level, inexperience didn't pose any major problems for us. We had a few false starts, but soon reached the point where intercourse was consistently good. Nevertheless, in retrospect, I'm not sure coupling so early was great for either of us, and Mike in particular. To leap straight from total inexperience to having me all to himself, it seemed to jumble up self-worth and intimacy and sex in his mind to an unhealthy degree. Like, to the point where he gauged my feelings for him solely through that lens--only experiencing validation and love when we were fucking.

That was certainly never ideal. However, we were both still in our early-20s, and my sex drive was vigorous enough to provide him with fresh jolts of such gratification on a frequent basis. The whole thing appeared basically manageable.

And then, we had kids.

Pregnancy was a bitch for me both times--nauseating, swollen-up, profoundly unerotic. After that came the fatigue and stress and neediness of two infants in close succession. Honestly, years went by when I just didn't have sex in me, and I found myself turning down Mike's overtures, again and again. He was nice about it, superficially, but gradually he gave up trying to initiate, and I could see how strained and bitter it made him on the inside, eating away at our closeness like a slow poison.

I wanted to respond, wanted to be there for him. But as long as I was still dealing with kids at home all day, it took a supreme effort of will to gear up for intimacy, and I rarely managed it. I'm not sure we quite reached the clinical definition of a 'sexless marriage,' but matters languished in that general vicinity for a long time. It didn't mean I loved Mike any less, only that I had very little to give in that particular regard. But I could tell that he took it as a reflection on himself, both as a lover and as an all-around person.

Fortunately, over the last year, with Jemma finally off to kindergarten and boosted by the energy of restarting my career, my libido has been on the uptick. I'm experiencing the itch again--feeling like sex could be better than ever, in fact, now that I'm more mature and in touch with my femininity. Plus, I'm definitely guilty about our long dry spell. I want to be more giving with Mike, and to make up for lost time.

I've even been taking active steps to try and rekindle the sparks--scheduling sitters, making reservations for candlelight dinners, buying lingerie, that sort of thing. Yet, vexingly, perplexingly, those sparks have mostly fizzled. I expected Mike would be thrilled that I was feeling up to it again. Expected him to be off-the-charts eager with pent up lust, to be honest. But instead, his response has been oddly stand-offish and sullen. The few times we have had sex, the encounter has been more awkward than ecstatic, more frustrating than fulfilling. In truth, I'm been tearing my hair out trying to figure out what's up with him.

That's why I'm so determined for tonight to go well. I've pulled out all the stops--arranging for the kids to stay over with Gramma and Grampa, and booking a fancy suite downtown. I only hope it's the medicine we need to finally get unstuck.

There's a workroom (read: glorified closet) set aside for PTA volunteers across from the school library, and for a while I have it to myself. Moving efficiently, I decant the books from the cardboard boxes where they were chucked willy-nilly at the end of last school year, organizing them into separate stacks for each teacher according to the class lists I was given.

I'm nearly done when Peggy comes bustling in. Her arms are full of tambourines destined for the 'rhythm and motion' cupboard. Once these are safely stowed, she glides over and shoots me one of her patented shiny plastic smiles. "Jessie, I'm so glad I caught you. Did you hear, there's an opening on the PTA council next year. Hai-Lin's youngest is off to middle school so she's aging out. We can count on you, right?"

Margaret "Peggy" Archer is the president of Clay PTA--a statement which should be understood as an eternal, timeless truth, much as we might say the Earth orbits the Sun. She's also queen bee of the 'good mom' set. This is a rarified clique which deigns to admit lowly me to its outer fringes; so that although I don't really have the time and energy demanded by performative motherhood, I strive valiantly to pretend I belong. Hence my dalliance with

Reading Rulez!™

.