"Congratulations, Mr. Hickman." That's my name. Hickman. Lee Hickman.
"Thank you, Kris, But what have I done to deserve congratulations?"
"The baby, of course. Mrs. Hickman just left with the news."
"Oh, Uh...uh. She did?"
"Oh, yes. Dr. Lassiter talked to her about an hour ago."
That was the conversation I had with the receptionist in my Doctor's office seven months ago.
"I want you out of this house by the time I get back you lowlife, cheating son of a bitch."
"What are you talking about?"
"You know good and well what I'm talking about you cheating bastard."
"Cheating bastard?"
"Yes. You can't get your own wife pregnant, but you can get some other poor, dumb woman pregnant."
"What? What on earth..."
"One hour. I'll be back in one hour and you better be gone."
That was the conversation I had with my wife, Judy, nine months ago. Needless to say, I never left the house within the hour I was given. I wasn't leaving until I found out more about what she was talking about. I was still there when she returned. She walked in. Saw me. And stormed out to her car. Twenty minutes later two police cars arrived and I was under arrest for spousal abuse. She had called them and reported that I had hit her after she had asked me to leave. I had refused to leave and had hit her.
In the six years of our marriage I had never once threatened physical harm to her much less actually hit her. And only twice had I ever raised my voice. My denials fell on deaf ears, however and I was taken to jail in handcuffs.
I used my phone call to call my best friend Todd. He didn't answer so I called my sister. She had an attorney down there four hours later. Marcus Hughly was his name and he was probably the biggest person I have ever seen. He couldn't take three steps without stopping to rest and every breath was a wheeze. Judy, during that same four hours and on the strength of my arrest, was able to get a restraining order which prevented me from going near either her or the house. It didn't matter for that night because I couldn't see a judge until the next day so I was spending the night in jail anyway.
I spent a sleepless night trying to figure out what the hell had happened to my world. The next day my bail was set and I bonded out. My sister paid because Judy had made sure I had no access to any of our money and all my credit cards had been cancelled. The first thing I did was call my boss and apologize for not calling sooner but I needed the day off. He didn't seem surprised. My next call was to Todd. Still no answer. Strange. He always answered my calls. I even called his work number. They asked who was calling and I told them. They then informed me that Todd was not available.
My sister, Louise, and her husband Lou had picked up my clothes (which had been scattered up and down the street in front of our/my/her house) as well as my car (which had all of the glass broken out of it and all four tires flattened). After a shower and change of clothes I found myself in my attorney's office.
"You're fucked." He wheezed.
"But I haven't done anything!"
"It doesn't matter. You're still fucked."
"Okay. Explain it to me."
"In this state women basically control the courts. Your word means nothing and in your case, the truth means nothing. At least not yet. We have to wait and see what she will do next. I'm sure it will be divorce papers and then we can see what the grounds are. Until then, don't do anything stupid. And listen to this: don't communicate directly with her under any circumstances. Do you understand? Do it through me. If she calls and you recognize the number do not answer it. Call me immediately. If you answer the phone and it's her hang up and call me. If she bumps into you on the street run don't walk away from her and call me. You cannot under estimate the importance of what I just told you. Don't write her or text her. Nothing. It is not unknown for women to get restraining orders and then purposefully lure the man into a situation where he is compromised and he goes to jail for violating the order. Look me in the eye and tell me you understand."
So I did.
"A couple of good things have happened in your favor, however. First, she had to release half of the money you had in the bank. The investment account is also frozen so she can't take that. Also, one of your neighbor's took video of her smashing up your car so she will have to pay for that.
"So all I can do is wait for her?"
"That's correct."
"That sucks. I can't even start fighting back."
"That is also correct."
"What about my job? She and I work for the same company in the same building."
"Wow. I didn't know that. Does the company have more than one building?"
"Yes."
"Okay. Here's what you do. Call your boss before you go back to work and explain the situation to him and see what he says. Maybe he can put you there temporarily."
When I left his office, I headed back to Louise and Lou's house. They had loaned me the old pickup truck they kept to haul their boat to the lake while my car was being re-glassed and re-tired. After I fixed myself a sandwich I called my boss.
"Arthur, this is Lee Hickman. Thank you for letting me have the day off. I need to talk to you about what's going on." So I filled him in.
"Holy shit, Lee. What are you going to do?"
"I don't know. I still have no idea what Judy is talking about. I've done nothing wrong. Her restraining order says that I can't get within 500 feet of her. That makes going to work pretty difficult. Any ideas?"
"Give me a couple of hours and let me see what I can come up with."
"Thanks, Arthur."
For the rest of the day I paced the house and went over the last several months of my life almost hour by hour and still concluded that I had done nothing wrong. I tried several more times to call Todd but kept getting the 'his inbox is full' message. By seven Louise, Lou and I had finished eating. Well, actually, they finished eating and I was working on my fourth screwdriver. I was getting ready to go to Todd's apartment when my cell phone rang.
"Hello."
"Lee, this is Arthur. We need to talk."
"Where and when."
"The Spike on Weaver Road in 20 minutes?"
"See you there."
Eighteen minutes later I was ordering my fifth screwdriver of the day. Arthur came in and sat.
"Okay. I talked to Judy's supervisor. He told me that Todd Mason has been spending a lot of time in his department and with your wife."
Todd Mason and I have been friends since kindergarten. He's my best friend. We're even blood brothers. When we were 11 years old we each scratched one of our fingers with a nail. You could barely see any blood but we rubbed those scratched fingers against each other and called ourselves blood brothers. He and Judy worked in the same department. As a matter of fact, Todd was instrumental in Judy getting her job there.
"That's not unusual. He spends lots of time with us."
"This is different, Lee. For the last several weeks they have taken long lunches together to the point that they have been warned about it. And both have taken the last three Wednesday's off. Did you know your wife was off on those days?"
"No, I didn't."
"Do you know Janet Thompson?"
"Barely. She has 'a thing' for Todd and they have been to my house a couple of times. Why?"
"For a couple of weeks she's been telling everybody that she's pregnant. Three days ago she walked in and quit without giving her two week notice. She then went to Judy's desk and told her that you were the father of her child. Then she left."
"Oh my God, Arthur I barely know the woman; and I certainly have never had sex with her."
"Well, that's not what she says and your wife believes her; and apparently your friend, Todd is not doing anything to dissuade your wife from believing it. I believe he is stabbing you in the back. Now, about work. As you know we have an office in St Louis. We can send you there temporarily. They have the same facilities and you can do your work there. How does that sound?"
"Fine except for the fact that if I leave I won't know what's going on here."
"We can take care of that. We have an investigator we use to check up on prospective employees and various other matters in the company. I can introduce you to him."
"There's no way I can afford to hire an investigator, Arthur."
"Why don't you let me worry about that? I can fund it through the employee welfare program."
So now I thought I knew why Todd wasn't answering my calls. If Arthur's suspicions were true not only had I lost my wife, but my best friend as well. I had never felt so alone in my life.
So I went to St. Louis. The first week I was very busy so had little time to think about what was happening at home. The second week, however, was different. I received a call from my attorney. He had received the divorce petition and adultery was, indeed, the reason she cited. Not only that, but Arthur's investigator revealed that Judy was basically living at Todd's apartment and that they were being seen together socially. He had pictures, but no video yet.
Three days later, he had video. I flew home over the weekend and met the investigator at my attorney's office. We started watching the first of two videos he had gotten. One had been taken at Todd's and the other taken at what used to be my house.