Just Once: Ric's Reply

My (somewhat belated--it was initially rejected) response to Kalimaxos's kind invitation to add to his story. My version has the wife, Marcy, finding and reading a letter from her husband, in response to the one she wrote him. If my attempt to imagine my way into the minds of his characters has missed the mark, then I humbly apologize. My thanks to him for providing me with a place to begin.

Marcy didn't call out for Rick when she entered the house, after unlocking the front door. She hadn't spotted his car in the drive, or in the garage, when she'd peeked through the window to see if it was there. Also, of course, he hadn't been at the hotel to meet her, as she'd asked him to. She'd waited until it was over four hours after her flight had landed, on time, before going back down to the desk to let them know she wouldn't need the room, after all.

He's gone, she realized. The only question was, is it for good, or is he still just getting over being mad at me? As much as she had tried to prepare herself for the possibility that their marriage wouldn't survive what she'd done, she still hoped it might.

Leaving her suitcase at the foot of the stairs, she kicked off her shoes and went into the kitchen to get a drink. On the way she noticed that the place was clean, but a bit musty smelling, as if it had been uninhabited for a while. She found a half-full bottle of chablis in the fridge, removed the cork, and smelled the contents; it didn't seem to have turned, so she poured herself a glass and sat down at the kitchen table. She recalled meals here, with the kids, when they were young, and Rick was halfway across the world. She had made sacrifices to be an Army wife, and she had not complained. She had been good--faithful--loyal--even when those qualities had been severely tested, as they were in her meeting with that awful woman, who'd come on purpose to humiliate her, and taunt her with insinuations of her husband's infidelity.

Well, Rick, she thought to herself, this time it was your turn to be tested. And I guess we will soon know the results, if we don't already.

As she was thinking this, she spotted a single sheet of paper on the table, at the other end. Picking up her glass, she moved to the chair in front of it, and picked it up to read what was written there.

Marcy,

You've probably figured out that, since I wasn't at the hotel to meet you, I've chosen option 2. I can't say that I don't love you, anymore, exactly, but any affectionate feelings I have left are all for the person you used to be, not the person who so coldly--and, in your words, quite cowardly--left me to live with another man. That's the person I would have to be married to, going forward, and she's not someone I even want to have to look at, much less talk to, or sleep with.

I know you've justified your behavior to yourself, so I won't bother trying to persuade you how wrongly I think you've acted. The simple fact is, you wanted to do what you did, and you found

your reasons for doing it, in spite of the harm you knew it would do to me, and to our marriage. Now it's my turn, so know that I want a divorce, and I will have one, regardless of how you may feel about it, or what you may think you can do to change my mind. Your letter to me--you know, the one you had Leslie deliver for you--made it pretty clear that you wouldn't care, much, if that's how things turned out, so I don't expect you'll make a fuss about it, now.

That's not true, Rick, she thought, as she put the paper down. I do care. I didn't want this. I wanted us to be together again, and I will miss you. But I knew that this was a risk I had to take. She saw that there were another couple of paragraphs, so she picked it up again to finish the letter.

The children know. I gave them copies of your letter, because they didn't believe, at first, that you would treat me so coldly. I didn't do it to harm your relationship with them, although I realize that it has. But I didn't think that it was right that my relationship with them should suffer, which it would have if they thought that I had been the one to turn away from you. And yes, I had some difficult discussions with them about Diedre. I told them, truly--as I did you--that I never had an affair with her, although I did, once, let things go too far with her (but we never slept together, or even shared a bed to have sex). I have nothing to gain by lying, at this point, and they seem to believe me. Whether you do or not, I really don't give a shit.

If, as I suppose, you're wondering about whether I took Leslie up on her offer, then I will only say that I'm disappointed in how little you seem to understand me after all our years together. Encouraging that poor woman to drive a wedge into her marriage so you could assuage the guilt that YOU feel because of your betrayal was a mean, small, ugly thing to do. The Marcy I used to know wouldn't have been capable of such a thing.

So this is our last communication. I have found another place to live, I have evenly divided our checking, investment, and retirement accounts, I have consulted with a realtor about selling the house (she will contact you soon), and I have retained a lawyer to handle my end of the divorce. A copy of the filing should arrive at our home, addressed to you, by registered mail, in the next day or two. If you fail to sign for it, we'll have to send a process server, but I don't see any need for that, do you? You can communicate with my lawyer, and give his contact information to your own, if you decide you need one. But do not attempt to speak or write to me. I've blocked you in all my contacts, security at my work has been notified to keep you from entering the premises, and your family and our friends and neighbors know not to try to intercede with me on your behalf. Above all, do not try to use our children to get to me. You wanted out: well, okay, you're out. As you wrote, if you want to take up permanently with Doctor Wifefucker, that's your business, and not anything I need or want to know about. I already had the good Marcy; I couldn't care less now what happens to the bad one.

"If you love someone, give them the chance to fuck you over, and if they do, then make sure they never get another opportunity."

There was no signature.

Well, shit, she thought. I am the good Marcy--I am! What I did was not so bad. Yes, it was coldly, and even unkindly done, and I am sorry for hurting him. The coldness was really just to spare his feelings--to let him know that there was never any chance that he could have persuaded me to change my mind--so that he could accept what I needed to do. If he could have accepted it, we could have survived this. I would have made it up to him, so that he could forget, and we could have been happy. But I miscalculated, I guess.

I don't want Trey. He was a tool--something I used to boost my ego, to give me a last leg up to help me make it through middle age into what I was hoping would be a long and happy retirement with Rick. I meant it when I told him he was the love of my life. Now I have to decide whether to go on alone, or else settle for someone who was never really marriage material, and either never found a wife, or had one who found him out and got rid of him, or else one of those sad men who've been broken by divorce or widowhood. As long as I can keep up my looks, there will be plenty of Treys to play around with, but to marry one I'd have to be a bigger fool than I'm willing to admit I am.

I guess I'm not surprised that he never took Leslie up on her offer. He's wrong, though, about my doing it to assuage my guilt. I honestly don't feel any. I'm sorry he can't understand, and I'm sad for the end of our marriage, but I think I'd feel worse now if I hadn't taken those six weeks for myself--if I'd just gone and denied myself an experience that I know had no effect on my feelings for Rick, or my wanting to stay married to him. It's like the old song goes: "if you can't be with the one you love, love the one you're with."

Rick will probably come around to his own version of that. He'll want a wife, although I don't think he'll ever find anyone who will suit him as well as I would. I know that he won't have much trouble replacing me, when he's ready. He's still fit and handsome, with a good job, and he has that--presence, I guess you'd call it--of military command that just melts a lot of women--like Leslie--even when he isn't using it to turn them on. God, what if he does find another young thing like Leslie? I'll be having hot flashes while he's busy raising family no. 2. He could have kids the same age as our grandchildren! Won't that be weird?

Finishing the wine, she stood up from the table and crumpled the letter into a tight ball before dropping it in the kitchen wastebasket.

What was the old saying? Oh, yes, it came to her: "After all, tomorrow is another day." I can't remember who said it, she thought, but things worked out well for her, didn't they?