One bad Valentine's Day deserves another.
Here is my
Valentine's Day Story Contest 2024
entry. I wasn't planning on submitting one, being busy publishing my new novel, but I was watching some reaction videos on YouTube to Disturb's "The Sound of Silence" and an idea came to me.
All references to Chicago steakhouse restaurants and their proximity to fictitious or otherwise eateries are purely coincidental.
Relax; it's just a story, people.
My stomach was literally in knots as I approached the restaurant entrance. I had no idea how I'd be able to eat a thing. A gust of wind came up just as I was about to open the door and blew my umbrella out of my hand. Some of the water it had retained, because it was a damned cheap and almost useless umbrella, landed on my face, and in my hair that I'd spent hours doing for this occasion.
A greeter opened the door as I began to pull and nearly knocked me on my ass. With deft apologies, he reached for my arm and steadied me. I was sure my hairdo hadn't survived. With a sigh, I walked past him to the host desk.
Prime Angus Steakhouse was one of the top-rated restaurants in the windy city, which was our hometown. Well, maybe just my hometown, I'd have to see what kind of answers the evening provided but I hoped to say 'we' again when all was said and done. It was no Gene and Georgetti, but Josh had remembered that I'd always wanted to eat here, even after all this time.
"Mr. and Mrs. Conrad," I said to the Maître' d when he looked up. "Seven thirty."
"Ah, Alise and Joshua," he brightly replied. "Just one moment, please. We will escort you to your table shortly." The restaurant was known for taking and using first and last names in their reservation system.
It felt funny yet wonderful to hear our names mentioned aloud and in the same sentence again. My hair might have been ruined but you couldn't have ripped the smile off my face with a claw hammer.
I was informed that Josh hadn't yet arrived, but the host led me to our table anyway. Five minutes later, I was sipping on a glass of white wine. I'd wanted to surprise my husband by ordering his favorite drink, but stopped, considering it may be presumptuous. I didn't want to do or say anything tonight to derail the possibly happy reunion.
As I anxiously awaited seeing Josh for the first time in nearly a year, I thought back to better times - truly marvelous times - in our relationship. Josh and I met one week after I graduated college. My Father had helped line up a job for me with Wilkens & Bather, LLC, a major accounting firm.
Josh was a top-tier client, as a result of his parents' untimely death and a very large inheritance, not to mention the trust fund. Our firm managed the fund, and we were deep into the disbursement of his inherited assets.
At the time I had no skin in the game concerning Josh's finances. I was only an entry-level accountant. We both fell for each other at first glance, began dating, and married fifteen months later. It was actually my firm that suggested a prenuptial agreement be drafted and mutually agreed upon.
What I loved most about my husband was his charisma and energy. His personality perfectly grounded mine. We could talk about anything in those early years, before and after our wedding. The way he explained things, and the passion he exuded, made me see him as a man beyond his years.
I suddenly remembered the night when it all went away; the night Josh became grounded in silence. It happened on Valentine's Day one year previous, and it was all my doing.
Josh and I had a storybook relationship for our first three years. The love, the sex, the companionship were all present and I was content.
Content. That word would come to bite me, even haunt me. The fly in my ointment of contentment turned out to be one Brett Straton. He too was a wealthy client of my firm and by the time I met him, I was well on my way to junior partner. We all know how the story goes. Hell, even I knew the score at the time, but I went ahead and fell for it anyway.
Subtle little flirting made me flutter with anticipation. Dressing better, sexier, on days I knew he'd be at the office added more flutters. Turning him down for lunch the first time added as much excitement to the game as finally accepting his offer did. Then the little touches on the arm or the knee took the game and the risk to new levels.
I had it all under control until I didn't. Josh was as excited about our office holiday party as I was. He knew many people there, after all. By that time in our marriage, Josh had taken his hobby, tooling patents, to another level and an unexpected demonstration with a company in London came up the week before the party. For my husband, there wasn't even a second thought. He told me to have fun at the party, but not too much fun. He promised to check in on me at midnight the evening of the party to make sure I was 'okay.' I knew it was a bit more than that, but I didn't believe he had any reason to suspect me of doing anything inappropriate.
Brett kept my glass full that evening, but being honest with myself, I had already given it a thirty percent possibility that under the right set of circumstances, I'd do something with Brett. Maybe we'd only end up making out, but I knew deep down I never ruled out sex completely.
In a dark conference room, with the door closed and shades drawn, I had my first bout of infidelity. The sex was magnificent. Really good, mind-blowing sex. If it hadn't been I would have never gone back to the well. I wondered why none of the other staff had missed us when we returned to the party almost an hour later.
I didn't begin to feel guilty until I got in my car to rush home, making it in the house only four minutes before Josh was to call.
"Miss," I was shaken back to the present. "Are you still expecting your guest?"
I frowned and looked at my phone. Josh was twenty minutes late, even with a grace period. I made an excuse to the server and decided on an appetizer for the two of us, to stave off any possible embarrassment. I began to wonder where he was. The other fleeting thought that came, I pushed to the back of my mind immediately.
With a visible chill, my mind went back to those fateful few weeks after the party. Josh called right at midnight as promised. I pulled it together and pulled it off, and by the time we said our 'good nights' I was sure he had no clue what I'd done.
Laying in bed that night I considered my predicament. There had been no Martian ray gun. No ditzy loss of brain function. I knew what had happened and why - well, mostly why. As I thought about the wonderful sex I'd just had, and what led to it, my mind started to rationalize. It was a certainty that I had to give Brett another whirl or two, maybe three. That would be it though. I convinced myself that it was something just for me, separate from what Josh and I had. I beat the idea like a rug, much like most cheaters or porn addicts do, when in a committed relationship. I also knew that Brett didn't mean anything to me, at least not anything like my husband did.
The next time Brett and I got together was after one of our lunches. Besides another round of fabulous sex, I was given a gift, in the form of a burner phone.
Brett knew Josh, or at least, knew of him. They had met at two different company functions where both associates and clients attended. Both knew of the other's money. Looking back, Brett may have been a bit jealous that Josh's net worth was significantly more than his own, but he never let on in so many words. We were together three times from the Christmas party to early February, and never once did Josh's name come up, before or during our pillow talk. I'd promised myself just three times, so I should have ended it. Doing so would have changed everything.
The fly in the ointment became a full-fledged invasion two days before Valentine's. Brett texted me on the burner phone, something he'd never done before. Usually, he called during hours he knew I'd be at work. He wanted to spend a few hours with me. On Valentine's Day. I immediately told him NO. He pressed on, semi-begging. He asked me to find out what my plans were with Josh and what time. He assured me we'd work within those parameters, and I'd be home in plenty of time.
I threw up roadblocks. I made excuses, even for the obvious. I played right into his hands. I also knew I'd relent even before I said so out loud. Everything inside me screamed not to do it, but I ignored my inner voice and threw common sense to the wind.
There was no sex that afternoon. I made an excuse about working a few hours extra, promising Josh it wouldn't interfere with our special night. Brett and I met at a swank restaurant on the south side, far away from my home. My only gift that night was a very expensive necklace, which only meant one thing, and it shook me back from my fairytale. Brett was falling for me and I couldn't have that. I refused his gift which he didn't handle well. We argued until we noticed the looks of staff and patrons alike. Then he made an impassioned plea, while I gave a laundry list of reasons why we'd never be a couple.
In doing so, we were at the restaurant twenty minutes later than we should have been. When I realized this, I panicked and ordered Brett to take me back to the office to get my car. I would now be forty-five minutes later than I'd promised Josh.
I might have pulled it off, and ended it amicably that night, no one but Brett and I any the wiser. If not for that flat tire, we'd have never been found out. Well, that and that damned phone tracking app. To this day, I have no idea how or what caused the flat tire. It was raining, and Brett was trying desperately to change it himself, concerned about my being late and the possible ramifications. At least his heart was in the right place but he'd never fully grasped that life skill.
When, forty minutes later, I stared out the foggy windshield and saw my husband's hurt face through the pouring rain, I felt like my life had ended, and not figuratively.
What felt like a very long time, but was probably only thirty seconds, Brett saw him just standing there too. He quickly came to the front of the vehicle, I supposed but never knew for sure, to try and provide some sort of excuse. Whatever kind of rationalization he tried to make fell on deaf ears.
Josh never took his eyes off mine until Brett had finished, and then my husband sucker-punched him in the face, knocking Brett to the cold pavement.
That finally got me out of my seat, and out of the vehicle. Josh had already shown me his back as I begged him to stop, even as I squatted to attend to my paramour. Brett shot up off the sopping wet street, his five-thousand-dollar suit completely ruined.
Seeing he was alright, I started running after my husband, until I felt a strong grip on my arm holding me in place.
"Let him go," Brett said sternly but softly. "He's going to need a minute - or a day - and he isn't in the mood to talk to you just now. I can tell you if I were him, I'd want to be alone." The look he gave told me he was 'him' after the way I'd treated his gift and his feelings for me.
