CH 02 - The thin line
This is a continuation. It won't make much sense to you if you haven't read the first chapter. This is my way of ending this story, but if you have a preferred ending, you have my permission to share it on Literotica. Let's face it, this tale could end in many different ways. Now about this chapter, I only ask one thing; please don't bail out on me. Read till it says "The End."
I dressed for work in silence except for some sobs coming from the bedroom. Without a word, I descended the stairs and opened the hall closet. I grabbed the suitcase that I keep packed for when I travel. As I walked to my car, I was dialing the reservations number for my favorite hotel chain. It's not the Hilton.
After reserving a room for a week, I made another call. I had never in my wildest dreams thought I would ever be securing the services of a divorce attorney, but it happened today. The first appointment available was three weeks hence, but a delay is to be expected when you're retaining the best in the field.
I was a little late reporting for work. As the day progressed my attention was divided between the tasks at hand and in visualizing what Tammy was doing at the Hilton. I knew I shouldn't care, but I did. My phone was on, but there were no calls from her. Guess that told me what I needed to know.
When my workday was over, I drove to my hotel. As I was getting my stuff out of the car, Tammy drove up beside me. She lowered her window and said, "Don't be ridiculous, Allen. Come home. We need to talk."
"We talked all we needed to yesterday, Tammy. From now on it will be your attorney talking to mine."
"That's bull-crap, honey. I didn't take the trip. I made the call instead. I've severed all connections to Buddy. No contract, no relationship, no anything. Come home with me. Let's start rebuilding what I destroyed. We have a good foundation to build on. I was careful not to bring the whole building down. My love for you was never destroyed. I had that conversation with you yesterday to avoid as much destruction as possible. It worked! I chose you, not Buddy."
"I don't see it that way, Tammy. I think there has been plenty of damage. I don't think the wreckage you caused is repairable."
"But it definitely is fixable, honey! If you won't do it for me, do it for Gloria and Dave. I'm prepared to make any and all concessions necessary to preserve our family. Come home with me, Allan."
"Even if I thought that was a good idea, I already have a room reserved for a week."
"I'll pay for damn room, Allan. Come home with me. We need to talk. Let's get some counseling. At least do that much for me and your children."
Her words got me thinking. I hear a lot about couples staying together for the kids, but is that a good idea? If the parents are unhappy and no longer in love, can they even begin to do a good job of raising children? There's a big difference between a family of convenience and a loving family. Knowing that, perhaps a counselor would be able to help. I said, "Tammy, if a counselor of my choice thinks we can survive what's happened and recommends that I come home, I will. That's the best that I can offer"
"Make the appointment, honey. I'll be there with bells on my toes. I want you home."
I did make the appointment and we both told our stories. The one thing that I noticed was that if Tammy had ever thought that Buddy just used her to get even with me, she never revealed those feelings.
To the surprise of Tammy and even me, the counselor suggested that I keep the hotel room. She said we needed to experience life without each other. We needed to see what a divorce would really be like.
To that end, she drew up what she called an interim agreement. It covered custody, visitation, keeping the house functioning, paying the bills, and such. Living under the agreement would mean living life as near as possible to an actual divorce. There would be no conversation or interaction between the two of us except as allowed by the agreement.
The counselor stressed that the agreement was just that, an agreement. It was completely voluntary and had no legal standing. Its purpose was to let us taste divorce before we took that plunge. At any time, either one of us could terminate the agreement and file for a real divorce. I'm not sure that either of us was happy with it, but we signed the papers. After signing, I canceled my appointment with the divorce attorney.
We began living strictly by the agreement. She had the house. I left the hotel and leased an apartment. The agreement specified that the kids could stay with me on one of the two weekend days. I was also able to spend two evenings with them during the week as long as I had them back to Tammy well before bedtime.
One thing that I didn't expect was when Tammy went ahead and became Buddy's agent. That disappointed me, but it was not a violation of the agreement. At least they made no effort to get married or rekindle their affair. Unlike when it all started, it appeared to be just a business arrangement between them.
To her credit, Tammy pulled a pretty good trick out of her hat. She decided to go big in an attempt to put Buddy's career back on track. She let it all hang out and put all of her eggs in his basket. She scheduled a big "Buddy Black Comeback" tour. The first comeback concert would be televised on a major network.
I kept one eye on what she was doing, but I had my own fish to fry. Everything just moved along smoothly until the day that Tammy called me with fire in her voice. "Do you hate me and Buddy this much?" she screamed.
I was at a loss for words. Finally, I asked her what brought that on. She shouted, "Like you don't know! I see your fingerprints all over this big concert called "A New Woodstock!" It just happens to be on the same night as Buddy's tour-opening concert. What did it cost you to get a show like that together and air it on a competing network in the same time slot as ours? You took your time, but you're finally getting your revenge on Buddy and me. When did you become such a bastard?"
It was my turn to yell. I shouted that I didn't know about any such concert, but I was kicking myself for not thinking of it. I assured her that I had nothing to do with it in any way. I pointed out that no client of mine had been signed to appear on such a show. I suggested that she should get her facts straight. I asked her if she had done any investigation into the concert before she made this call; or did she just assume that I was behind it. She just dropped the connection.
I did some investigating on my own and traced it to another agent that represented several big competitors in Buddy's genre. That agent would profit majorly by hindering the comeback tour. I never liked the guy. In fact, I couldn't stand him and Tammy knew it. I called to set her straight. When she answered the phone, her first words were, "I apologize. I'm just so upset. That Woodstock thing will ruin our comeback tour. I have all of my assets tied up in it. Is this revolting development some kind of karma for what Buddy and I did to you?"
I told her I didn't put much stock in karma. I said she should just focus on doing the best show possible and hope that the new fans were not all that interested in "A New Woodstock." I told her that while I didn't have any clients in the genre anymore, I would give her a list of my clients that would be available on the night of the concert. She could pick any of them that she wanted and I would let them appear on Buddy's big gig at no charge. As I said, I didn't like the agent that they were up against. I'd had more than one run-in with him.
I heard tears in her voice as she thanked me for the offer. Having said that, she never responded when I sent her the list. She went it alone.
It turned out that there were many more people interested in "A New Woodstock" than in a "Buddy Black Comeback." Buddy's TV show ratings were dismal, but even worse, the comeback tour had to be canceled halfway through the schedule. Ticket sales had been extremely disappointing. Tammy had included many of her other clients in the comeback effort. They began leaving her agency. I grieved at her failure and felt no elation when Buddy announced that he was retiring to California. After all, I was not completely heartless. I remembered good times with both of them.
As the agreement gradually became our lives, we slowly drifted apart. I wasn't very happy with the drift, but as they say: it is what it is. Everything was going as well as could be expected until the day that Tammy was terminated by her agency. She tried all of the other agencies in the area, but her name was mud because of the comeback fiasco.
She had depleted her assets funding the comeback tour and now, she had no salary. She was no longer able to pay her share of the mortgage or utilities. Out of necessity, we agreed to violate our interim agreement slightly. I was able to sublet my apartment at a slight profit and move into the basement recreation room at what now, per the agreement, was Tammy's house. I slept on the somewhat-lumpy sofa.
Almost every night when I headed to the basement, Tammy told me that I was welcome to share her bed. After many nights of this harassment, I reluctantly relented. Just like that, we were violating another clause of our agreement! I, being a rather fitful sleeper (throwing my arms and hands around a lot), accidentally touched or grabbed some forbidden areas of Tammy's anatomy quite regularly. That sometimes triggered an autogenerated response by her body. You would be surprised at how often those accidents resulted in some unintentional orgasms!
I was eating my meals with the family, taking everyone out to restaurants, watching tv movies with Tammy, playing games with the kids, and attending sporting events. It was just like we did back before Buddy came on the scene. Page by page, we were shredding our agreement. One cold night, Tammy asked me to build a fire in the fireplace. She handed me a stack of paper saying, "why don't you use these to start it?" You guessed right; it was the pages of our interim agreement.
