More Than Thirty Miles Home

MORE THAN THIRTY MILES HOME

I had an idea to write a series of stories in the vein of a male version of Fern Michael's SISTERHOOD; to be a small group of men, wronged by women, who help men who have been wronged by women, sometimes years after the fact. Of course I wanted to see if that Idea had been used before, so I scanned through a number of amateur writer websites. There were a few cheating wife stories here and a few husband's revenge stories there; and then I stumbled across an amateur writer website which had, literally, thousands of ex-spouse revenge stories. This site; LE. So I did a lot of research and found that while there were a number of stories of a man's friends helping him get revenge on a wife who is cheating then, and a series of stories of a large, underground, international organization which helps wronged men and runs a camp to help them reclaim their dignity (Really neat stories, SADDLETRAMP1956!), there didn't seem to be an equivalent of my BROTHERHOOD concept...

But like many writing projects, this one got interrupted by all kinds of other neat ideas percolating to the top. While I do, very much, appreciate extra crispy BTB's, I have discovered a soft spot for reconciliations - but they have to be believable (fully understanding that 'believable' is a relative term, and given the wide audience here, settling for 51% is probably challenge enough.). Several stories seized my imagination to varying degrees, and here is an attempt to turn a 'slam dunk' BTB into a reconciliation story. There are actually two stories, since my test audience noted that the first attempt was too pat and the cheating wife did not suffer enough to earn her way back, so I re-wrote it with that in mind. Both are provided to show the evolution of an idea. No make-up sex here.

This is inspired by PAPATOAD's THIRTY MILE DRIVE story. It is highly recommended that you read that great FLASH story. In it, a wife has been cheating with the office Lothario a couple of times a month for the last four years, meeting up at a seedy motel far from home. After their latest rendezvous, he leaves, she takes a shower, and then leaves - only to find that her car has been towed, her phone cut off, and her credit cards cancelled. After realizing she has been caught, she pays the room bill and has only a few dollars left, and starts hiking to a nearby truck stop with vague thoughts of running away to hide her shame. This is what my imagination provides as to 'what happens after' that kind of a scenario, after tweaking on the names and the situations a bit. It might only peripherally be in the LOVING WIVES category, but I couldn't pick a better one.

PAPATOAD, I have tried to get in touch with you, but you have proved very elusive. I hope this does justice to your concept.

MORE THAN THIRTY MILES HOME (Version #1)

Cast of Characters:

Melissa - Cheating Wife

Dave - Melissa's husband

Carl - Son, Now 10

Billy - Son, Now 8

Andy - Son, Now 6

Matt - Affair partner

I had walked along the road only a hundred yards when a van pulled over directly beside me, and I jumped aside.

Great, I thought, I haven't even started and I am attracting predators. But when the passenger window rolled down, all I saw was the concerned face of an attractive thirty-something, brunette woman waving me over.

I approached cautiously and looked in. There was a normal looking, thirty-something guy behind the wheel, also looking at me with concern.

"Are you okay? I'm Bethany and this is my husband, Mark. We saw you walking and figured you were in trouble. Car break down?"

I shook my head, trying not to think of everything I had probably lost, instantly pretending to myself that it was a 'past life.' "No car, no phone and no money. I was going to see if I could hitch a ride," I nodded toward the truck stop.

Bethany stared at me for a second, then looked at her husband, then back at me. "Hitch to where?"

I gave a lopsided wince because I couldn't summon up a smile. "Vegas, I guess. That's kind of the place to go with no questions asked, right?"

She looked back at her husband, they talked quietly, or at least I couldn't hear them over the, whoosh, whoosh, whoosh, of the passing cars. Then she rummaged in the glove compartment. She looked at me and held up a brochure. "We are headed to Reno. We can get you close, if you don't mind country western road trip music."

I paused, glanced at the truck park, and threw dice in my head. I didn't know any truckers; but the stereotypes rattling around in my imagination weren't all that attractive. And I was pretty darn sure that the 'fare' for a ride that far would be pretty steep. I considered. I evidently had the bad luck to be caught; the bad Karma called down on me by my no doubt outraged husband, Dave, and a bleak future. All I wanted to do was run away and hide. I couldn't face anybody. Maybe this was the universe balancing out the day with just a whiff of good Karma or luck. Finally I nodded. "I would appreciate it. Thank you."

"Hop in," Bethany said, rolling up the window.

The van was big and had no windows, but it was in good shape and nicely painted and announced that it was the property of 'Rostov's Flower Shop.' I opened the door, hopped into the dark interior, and pulled the door shut behind me. The space was open, and smelled strongly of floral scents, so I sat, cross-legged, just behind the front seats, the better to talk with my benefactors as the van rumbled back into motion. The lights came on in the back of the van, quite brightly, and I heard a throat clearing behind me. I spun around - and screamed.

There, on a bench seat across the back of the van, was my family.

Carl, my ten-year-old, Billy, my eight-year-old, and Andy, my six-year-old. And on the end was my husband of fifteen years, Dave. They had identical stony expressions. Stony? They were like flint knives. I almost dove for the door when I heard the door locks click and Mark said, from the front seat, "I wouldn't try jumping. I am coming off the on-ramp and almost up to 65."

"Running away?" Dave asked, frostily.

I couldn't look him in the eye, and the lie was off my tongue before I could curb it. "No. Just trying to hitch a ride - home."

Dave snorted. "Really? Then why did you tell Bethany and Mark you were headed to Vegas?"

Caught, in more ways than one. "Alright. I was running away." I still couldn't look anyone in the eye, and felt like a mouse, trapped in the dark, who had lit a match and found a cat sitting there. "Did you have to involve the kids?"

"Oh, you didn't think that your cheating wouldn't affect the whole family? If you had snuck off and left them without a word, that wouldn't have affected them?"

At least he wasn't shouting. He sounded like an angry man keeping himself under rigid control. "How did you - catch me?" Then I added quickly. "I never meant to hurt you, to hurt anyone. I was, tried to be, very discreet." The second the words left my lips I realized how silly they sounded - especially being said to my husband after what I had been doing.

"I didn't catch you. I trusted you completely. I never suspected. Matt's wife, Ellen, did."

I looked up. My eyes must have been as big as headlights. Not only had I been caught, but he knew who I was with. What else did he know? Strangely, I didn't spare any worry for Matt; part of me thought - we both gambled, it's only fitting we both lost.

Dave nodded, as if he were seeing the thoughts parading past the inside of my eyes. "Yes, Matt Roggins, roving troubleshooter for the bank you work for. Travels all over the region. Yes. Ellen came to me three weeks ago to let me know that you would be named in her divorce petition. Just a kind heads up, you understand, a courtesy so I wouldn't be blind-sided. I denied it at first. I insisted she must be mistaken. It couldn't be MY Melissa. You can imagine how shocked, and angry and humiliated I was when she showed me proof. I went into the bathroom and vomited. Anyway, when your good friend, Matt, gets home, he won't find a soccer game - he'll find the locks changed, all his stuff in the front yard in garbage bags, and a server serving him with divorce papers for infidelity. So he will shortly be available - if that's what you want."

I didn't even have to think about it; my head shook automatically, emphatically. I didn't want to change my life, or even lose it; Matt was just the - the - spice - to keep, to keep, well, just spicy. Suddenly I was confused. Dave must have seen that, because he seemed to take a shred of pity for me, and my voice seemed lost in the wilderness.

"I am here; you are here; because I am going to give you some information that I have learned about what is going on, and to give you three options, and you will get to freely choose one of them. That's why the kids are here. I want them to know that whatever choice you make, and however this turns out, YOU made it. It was totally yours and you own it and everything that goes along with it. I want this to be fair, and I want you to make the decision that you are going to live with for the REST OF YOUR LIFE. Do you understand?"

I managed to nod. I glanced at the kids. I could see that Carl was angry, and Bill was scared and Andy was holding back tears. I never wanted this to happen! I never THOUGHT this would happen!

Dave nodded and pulled out a big manila envelope. "Before you hear the options, I want you to hear some facts. You may already know this, but I am betting not." He glanced at the envelope and seemed to work through picking his words carefully.

"Were you aware of how many other women Matt has involved in this?"

Other women?! If Dave had tossed a grenade in my skull and let it go off, it would have shaken me less. I blurted out, in a dead flat tone, "Other women?"

"A total of eight women are named in Ellen's divorce petition, but only five of them are 'current', including you. Three are past. And all are veterans of Room 22 at the Sanders Motel."

"What?!"

Dave nodded and held out the envelope. I had to force myself to take it, and my hand was shaking when I did. I looked inside. There were pictures. And it was room 22 alright. The same room I'd been going to for four years. And I recognized some of the women. They worked at the bank, at other branches. I ran into them occasionally. Then I came across the pictures of me. My eyes got teary and my breathing got ragged. There I was, naked and being, being, being FUCKED - in more ways than one. I hadn't gotten to anger yet; I was still neck deep in humiliation. "How, how, did you get these?"

"I didn't. Ellen found them. Matt evidently liked to take pictures of his conquests. He hadn't hidden them all that well when she went looking for them. He obviously hid a camera in the room, somewhere."

All of a sudden I had a clear image of laying on the bed, while Matt was between my thighs, staring at the ceiling. The big ventilation grill on the ceiling at the foot of the bed.

"He took video, too," Dave added remorselessly.

I shoved the pictures into the envelope and threw them on the van floor, sobbing; seriously considering trying to force open the van door and hurl myself onto the freeway and into oblivion. "The bastard," I whispered. Then louder, "The fucking BASTARD!"

Andy burst out, "Mommy! Language, mommy!" he said that through his tears, as his brothers hushed him.

"Mommy's sorry, Andy. Mommy's sorry," I whispered, hoarsely. I looked up at Dave's stern countenance. "Mommy's REALLY sorry."

Then Dave nodded slightly. "Evidently Matt is an extremely skilled serial adulterer who had hoodwinked his own family for at least six years, maybe more." Dave sighed. "I was livid when I found out. That was three weeks ago. I still couldn't believe you would do that to me; to us. Two weeks ago Ellen and I drove by the motel, and there was your car. It was lucky she was driving, because I was crying too hard to steer."

My guts twisted terribly. I had never meant this to happen. This was never supposed to happen. My husband, the father of our children, the man who went off each morning and came home each night with never a bad word to say about me, was hurting, badly - and I had done it - cold, and calculating and planned.

"You probably didn't even notice that I haven't - touched - you in three weeks. It probably didn't even matter to you. I couldn't bring myself to... you know."

Now I was horrified. I wracked my brain, but actually couldn't remember the last time I had made love to my husband. Why did I have to try if I was getting my thrills, my support, my - emotional needs - satisfied elsewhere? Numbly, I shook my head. I, I couldn't even remember the last time I kissed him. I was hit by a tidal wave of nausea; if I would have had anything in my stomach, I would have puked it up all over the floor.

He closed his eyes and seemed to make an effort of will to quell the grimace of pain. Finally he spoke. "I, I, have been talking to a lawyer, and a counselor, and Father Carson. It was hard enough pretending that I didn't know. It was even harder pretending that I was just working late the last three weeks. Every evening I was spending an hour or two with either the lawyer or the counselor or Father. And then having to come home and eat dinner and do chores and tuck the kids into bed - and then crawl into bed next to YOU, and pretend that everything was normal."

I was disoriented. I wanted to lash out. I wanted to die. I wanted to just run and hide. The - BETRAYAL - by Matt had thrown me completely out of reality. This must be a bad dream; a nightmare. If I could only wake up, I'd never, ever stray again. Oh, God, help me here! "Sorry," I croaked.

Dave pulled himself together and pulled out three more envelopes. I knew there were three because each had a big number on it. He sighed heavily. "After talking it over with my lawyer, counsellor, Father and the family, you have three options to go forward with. These are your ONLY options. Understand? If you try for anything else we leave you by the side of the road. We are driving in a really big circle on the freeway. In a little while we will get off at that truck stop and you will make a choice. Understand?"

I nodded. Unsure, but realizing that I had been caught dead to rights. I had walked right up to the gallows, eyes wide open and put my own neck in the noose. I couldn't blame Dave if he pulled the lever.

"And I want to introduce you to the most recent additions to my company. Mark and Bethany Gethers. Mark is a Cracker Jack analyst and a CPA. He will be notarizing whatever option you pick. And Bethany is really special. She used to work for the FBI. She's a trained human lie detector - flicking of the eyes, nervous drumming of fingers, that sort of thing."

I felt Bethany turn the passenger chair around. It was then that I noticed that there was a mirror in the back of the van, above my kids' heads. I could see Bethany's absolutely neutral expression perfectly - which meant that she had a perfect view of my face. God, was I fucked. No lying. No hiding. No escape.

Dave must have noticed my expression, because he said, "When I hired them, I wrote the check from the family account. The checks with both our names on it. So they are working for BOTH of us. That way YOU can know that I'M speaking the truth, too." He paused, and then added, in a strained voice, "Fair is fair."

I nodded numbly. That was Dave, alright. My Dave. Always thoughtful. I wondered if there was any spark of love still in his heart for me, or if I had ruthlessly crushed it all out.

He pulled out the envelope with the big letter 1 on it. "Option 1. Running away. You can go with your original plan. But I'll be damned if my wife, or ex-wife, is going to fuck her way across country to wherever she's going by being some trucker's whore." I could see the children flinch, and Carl stop Andy from blurting out his evaluation of his father's language. My own chest clenched like a heart attack at Dave's words. "So your car is at the truck stop. It has a full gas tank, $2500 dollars in the glove compartment, and your mother packed a suitcase of necessities for you and it is in the trunk."

It took a moment for that to filter through. My mother? My mother! "Oh, God, Dave, you didn't tell...."

"You think cheating doesn't affect the whole family? If you disappeared, even if I showed them the evidence and said you'd run away, don't you think that someone might think I'd - done you in - and hidden the body? That the police and the neighborhood whispers wouldn't chase me? Chase the boys? Chase the families? For the rest of our lives? The ONLY way out of that for me was to swallow my pride and bring the families in and show them the evidence." I moaned, thinking of the pain, the agony, my parents must have gone through seeing - those pictures. For a second I hated Dave, and what he'd done, but then had to admit it was what I had done. Dave continued, " - and get their approval; their buy-in on the three options."

Dave took a deep breath. He pulled a sheet of paper out of envelope. It had writing on it and a bunch of signatures and looked as official as a death warrant.

"The family has agreed, and signed, that if you pick Option 1, and abandon the family, then the family abandons you. The minute you drive away, you are dead to us. No one will ever attempt to contact you. No one will take a call from you and any letter will be 'returned to sender' unopened. You will not be at graduations, proms, weddings, births, birthdays, or funerals. Nothing. If you are OUT, you are all the way OUT. Make good arrangements, because if anything bad happens to you, no one in the family will even claim the body."

Dave's harsh words shook me, right to my core. I tried to speak and couldn't. Not be at our children's graduations? Their weddings? Not see our grandchildren?

Dave continued relentlessly. "I will file for divorce due to abandonment, one year and a day after you leave. When it is final, which my lawyer says would be about six months later, any time after that you can contact her, her card is in the glove compartment, and there will be ten thousand dollars in an account for you. With that we are done. Ellen will NOT name you in her divorce petition; you will simply be 'Unknown Woman' and all videos and all but one photo will be burned." He took a deep breath, a bit shaky. "That is Option 1. Do you understand Option 1?"

I nodded; there didn't seem anything else to do.

"I said, 'Do you understand Option 1'?" Dave repeated with a little more heat.

I swallowed hard and dredged up what was left of my voice. "No. I mean, yes, Dave. I understand."

"Do you have any questions about Option 1?"

I managed to steady my voice. "No. No, Dave."

He set down that envelope and picked up one with a big number '2' on it.

"This is option 2. Divorce." I winced and felt purely miserable. "You drive your car home. You pack up your things and move into your parents' house. They have agreed to have you with them until the divorce is finalized and then you have to get your own place. We do this the RIGHT way. The LEGAL way. The ACCEPTABLE way. The CIVILIZED way." Every time he emphasized the word through gritted teeth I cringed. "And have our lawyers negotiate terms. The divorce petition will be for infidelity, the pictures and video become part of the record for not only my petition but Ellen's petition. Neither of us is to 'see' or 'date' or 'cozy up to' any other people until the divorce is final." He pulled out another impressively official document covered in signatures. I could even recognize Andy's block letters. "Everyone in the family has agreed to this in the event you choose Option 2. You remain a part of the family, but it is at their discretion as to what to invite you to - or not. And they agree to keep us apart for the rest of our lives. I could not stand to come to a family event and see you there with a boyfriend, or significant other, or second husband. If they have to have two parties, or invite us to half of the event each, so be it. And they have also agreed to make sure that any guy you bring round, you have told them, exactly and truthfully, why your marriage ended. Any relationship you have going forward will have to be TOTALLY HONEST. If you don't tell the guy, they will. The family have signed up to that too."