As I entered my street, I slowed down and drove more carefully. The city council had still not fixed that dangerous bump in the middle of the road, despite my weekly phone calls and letters. Our street was at the bottom of a steep hill, which caused cars coming in to speed more than they intended to, and I was worried someday there would be an accident. Apparently it did not merit fixing, as I never got any response beyond "we are working on it". Well, perhaps I would work on voting for the opposition at the next election.
As I came closer to my house, I noticed a big car I didn't recognize parked in my driveway. I wondered if Emma had a friend over. I was well acquainted with her friends, and from time to time they hung out at our place, so it would not be strange, but the car didn't look like anything her friends might drive.
Emma and I had been dating for four years and living together for the last one. I knew she was expecting a ring soon, and it was in my plans to give her one, as soon as I came out with a proposal memorable enough to make it a lifelong memory. Turns out she was about to give me my own lifetime memory instead.
I parked inside the garage, and entered the house, announcing my presence:
"Honey, I'm back from work!"
She was sitting in the living room, sharing the sofa with a man I had not seen before. I had a very bad feeling about this, but I decided to give her the benefit of the doubt before becoming angry.
"I didn't know we had a visitor. Who is this, Emma?"
"Welcome home, dear. Mark, this is... this is Donovan. I think... I think we need to talk."
My fears confirmed, I tried to remain calm about the situation, knowing that there was nothing to gain by being violent.
"What is there to talk about? You know what this looks like and I really hope I'm completely wrong about it and you have a wonderful explanation instead."
"Well, you see... you know how we have been dating for a long time now, and I really want to marry you and grow old together... but I would like to explore some things before we settle down for good. I don't want to be sixty and regret all the things I didn't do, so I want to get it out of my system while I'm still young and unmarried. I've been seeing Donovan lately, and I don't want to continue doing this behind your back. I felt it was only fair to let you know. I want to make you a proposal so we all can be happy. Don't you think it would be good to open our relationship?"
"Open the relationship? Fair? What is fair about this, Emma? This is just a bunch of bullshit!"
"I hoped you wouldn't see it like that. I understand that by agreeing to this you would be free to get to know other women, but i trust you enough to know you would come back to me. I won't pretend i like it, but for a relationship to succeed, both partners must play by the same rules, so i can't deny you what I want for myself. Give it a chance and you'll see how much stronger we come out of it. Even if you are not fully convinced, I'm sure in a few months you'll just see it as just a little bump in our relationship."
"Are you even listening to yourself? You have not been playing by the same rules at all, have you? You carry an affair behind my back, and have the gall to pretend it's an open relationship to avoid feeling bad about it? A little bump? God, you are insane. Were you always this dumb and I just didn't notice?"
