Trudging up one isle and down the next, dodging busy workers and shopping carts, Baxter made his way unnoticed through the crowded store.
This was Saturday morning, and for Baxter that meant a trip to Cost Club. This is how every weekend started. A routine as reliable as clockwork. But today, that clock seemed a bit off. Something wasn't quite right.
Baxter had come to the store by himself. He felt like an outcast, a pariah. Not a single person spoke to him. Not one kind smile met him. No one looked his way. He was awash in a sea of people, yet was all alone. He wondered if was possible. Had he somehow become invisible.
The last few days had been a challenge. Tough times to say the least. He'd had a disagreement argument with his wife. The quarrel that followed was as bad as they come. Horrible words were used, vicious names were called, and accusations of infidelity flew. In the heat of the argument Baxter stormed out of the house in a rage, yelling out loud that he would not be made a cuckold.
Walking out that night was a mistake. Baxter realized that now. Ever since, Karen refused to speak to him. In fact, she wouldn't even acknowledge his presence... and it had been days since the fight. If you asked Baxter, he'd say she was overreacting. She was being kind of childish. Especially considering the things that Baxter saw.
Baxter tried to be the bigger man. He tried to put it all behind him. She knew where he stood. He didn't need to rehash it. What's done is done, he said. He assumed she would get over it soon. Surely she would go with him to the store. After all, it was her idea to make Saturday mornings at Cost Club their routine. That was the thought anyway, but that thought turned out to be wrong.
Sure Baxter had asked her to go. He even asked nicely. He'd extended an olive branch. He even swallowed his pride and said he was wrong. But she just ignored him, still pretending he wasn't there. Still acting childish. Still not talking. She was still pretty mad, he guessed.
Without his wife along, the store just wasn't the same. Everything seemed out of kilter. He felt as if he were sleepwalking. Nothing appealed to him. Not even the free food. Getting a sample just wasn't any fun without her teasing him about going back for seconds, or getting away with sneaking back for a thirds. It was just as well, he supposed. He wasn't there to buy food anyway. Karen hadn't cooked a single morsel for him since the fight.
Still, a free sample here and there would have been nice, but none of the nice old ladies in hairnets bothered to offer him anything. They all seemed to be ignoring him. They were all acting kind of like Karen. He didn't care. His appetite had been near zero ever since he looked in that box. The very box that caused the fight. The one that showed him Karen was taking a lover.
He thought that doing his regular routine would get his mind off that box, but it didn't. A weird state of mind had set in. Baxter was emotionally flat. Some would call it numb to the world, but truthfully he wasn't even that. Numb would have been a feeling, and frankly, he felt nothing. Since their big fight he had no needs, no wants, no aspirations... no desire to live. Depression can be such a cruel bitch.
Maybe a gift to fix up things at home, he thought. Maybe a peace offering would get her to break her silence. Then they could at least talk about what happened. It was then he spotted the latest miracle for the modern home. Karen had been wanting one of those. What a perfect idea. But as he was assessing its features, a young foreign family nearly pushed him out of the way and grabbed up the very box he was reading... joyfully carting off what appeared to be the last one.
Of all the nerve! Baxter should have been enraged, but he wasn't. Instead he just mumbled obscenities about them under his breath. It didn't matter what he said. They obviously didn't speak English, or maybe they just didn't hear him over their odd foreign sounding chatter.
That rude family was the last straw. He was done with Cost Club. Baxter chalked up this week's trip as just another bad idea. It turned out to be the second dumbest thing he'd done that week. The first was starting that fight with Karen. Yeah, starting that fight was destined to be enshrined in the dumb ideas hall of fame.
What to do next? Oh, what to do?... A quick visit to the men's room seemed in order. It was going to be a long walk home. "This should be simple," he thought, but even using the john was a disaster. He just stood there, unable to go, averting his eyes as other men used the toilets around him, most of whom stood far too close for Baxter's comfort. Making him wonder about sexual preferences these days, and what the world was coming to.
Washing his hands went no better. The sinks seemed to be in cahoots with his wife. No matter how he held or waved his hands, the faucets just ignored him. "Shit! What am I, invisible or something?" He asked himself. "These fucking auto sensing faucets never work. How's a guy supposed to wash his hands after he uses the toilet anyway? These things suck."
"Oh, that one over there works." Baxter was surprised to see that other men were having no trouble. "That guy is practically drowning in water. I'll try that one when he's done."
"What the hell? What's he doing? Fuck! He's washing his hands, his arms, his face and even slicking back his hair. If he gets his balls out and starts washing them, I'm outta here. Fuck it... Never mind... I didn't piss on my damn hands anyway. Hell, I can't remember pissing at all. I am so done with this place. I'm going home."
Baxter left Cost Club in yet another huff, muttering and kicking at imaginary dirt clods nearly every step of the way. Ever since he wrecked his car he had to walk. Of course there was the bus, but those useless pieces of shit never went anywhere he needed to go. So walking it was, and everywhere he went he grumbled about how long it was taking the shop to fix this car.
Having to walk was humiliating, but not having a car was even worse. The lack a car was keeping him from making up with Karen. Surely a romantic weekend to Singing River Falls would smooth things over. Of course the key to that plan was the long scenic drive to get there. The road to the falls was called Lover's Loop for a reason. True to its name, it was along that very drive where Karen first told Baxter that she loved him. Getting that car back meant everything.
Baxter was halfway home when he tried calling Joe. Certainly his best friend would have some advice for melting the ice between him and Karen. After all, it was Joe who introduced them. But all Baxter got was the distant sound of a phone ringing at the other end of the line. Joe never picked up. The call didn't even go to voicemail. It was just like every other call Baxter had made since the fight. The faint echoey ringing just went on and on.
"Maybe Karen got Joe," Baxter joked as gave up on the call. "Yeah she got to both Joe and that sink back at Cost Club. She must have convinced both of them that I deserved to be ignored."
Baxter's life seemed empty. He never felt so alone. No one had said more than two words to him in days. Even the little girls playing hop scotch on his way home seemed to ignore him, and he had practically walked through the middle of their game.
Indeed, Baxter felt as if he had become invisible. He knew that was impossible, but still he wondered why people ignored him so. He figured it was all about the horrible mood he was in. The look on his face must have been dreadful. The incredible sadness he felt must have been warding people off. No one wants to be around that kind of darkness. Baxter tried to make himself smile, but his face wouldn't cooperate.
He had been afoot for more than an hour, but Baxter finally made it home. As he walked through the front door he called out to Karen. Of course she didn't answer. Still mad at him, he figured. He wandered around, hoping to find her. That's when he heard a sound. A sound that told Baxter his wife was in the bedroom... and he could have sworn she was masturbating.
Now Karen had always claimed she doesn't do that, but Baxter was pretty sure she did. It had been days since they last had sex. In fact it was well before the fight. She was probably in need of some relief. Since she had the house to herself, why not go for it. Knowing it was unlikely she would get caught.
Of course rubbing one out in an empty house is one thing, but what Baxter was hearing is another. If she was simply pleasuring herself, there would be no reason for Baxter to hear what he heard. There was a man's voice coming from that room. Now who the hell would be visiting on a Saturday morning, he wondered.
It must be the TV, Baxter decided as denial set in. There are those shows she never misses, he figured. Romantic crap he couldn't stand to watch. In fact she had their video recorder so crammed full of that stuff there was little room for anything else. She always says it's about the drama. She liked to claim the characters speak to her.
But that's not the whole story. Not by a long shot. Baxter knows exactly why she watches what she does. It's all about the fit handsome men who somehow end up shirtless in nearly every episode. Those shows are like porn for women. If she was going to crank one out, surely it would be while watching some of that tripe.
So he stands at the end of the hallway carefully listening. Wondering which Hollywood hunk she is pining for now. What he hears tells him his wife is really going to town on her pussy, but she isn't as alone as Baxter had hoped. There is no doubt she has some company. His wife is in that room with a man. A man made of real flesh and blood, not some hunk on the TV.
Baxter was right all along. She had been planning to cheat. Now he feels vindicated. He feels he was right to have fought with Karen. That gift box was something he wasn't supposed to find. The sexy lingerie inside he was never supposed to see. Those sexy things were no doubt a gift from another man. A man who intended to bed her.
Baxter was right to confront her, and of course she denied they were hers. She denied she had a lover. She denied she was a cheater. She denied everything. Of course she did. He now had her dead to rights. He had all the proof he needed. She couldn't deny this now.
