So this is my story of love won, lost, won and lost and won and lost and.... Well, you get the idea. It's a story of manipulation, thoughtlessness and anger, and about how the ends never justify the means. It's meandering and a lot happens, so hold tight.
We were on a weekend away, with two other couples, out in the woods in Montana. Two weeks before, another couple friend of ours, Mark and Wendy, had suggested a weekend away, "Out in the wilds", and drunkenly -- as we always seemed to be around them -- we'd agreed. We were at a BBQ at Mark and Wendy's place, on a Sunday, where Mark was demonstrating his new method of searing steaks, but throwing Southern Comfort on to the hot grill. The resulting flame cloud was most impressive and I'm surprised he didn't burn his eyebrows off.
Two days later the other part of our very close social group, Jim and Kathy, had joined the plans, cooing with enthusiasm, and within days a cabin out in the woods had been rented for a long weekend and everyone was busy trying to decide what to take with us.
Chloe kept asking me things like "Do you think I should take my hair curlers? Do you think they'll have electricity? What about a refrigerator?" and while I'd sit there, staring off into the distance and reflect for a second on exactly how much of a city girl I'd married, she'd look at me impatiently, then run off to the phone to call Wendy or Kathy for advice.
Before we get too deep in this, I should give some background here. I'm Jason -- Jace as everyone calls me, or "J" to those closest to me. You can tell how I know someone by what they call me. If it's "J", then they are part of the inner circle of people I've known for years.
My wife is Chole -- we've been married about 9 years -- very happily. Chloe is 39 and I'm 42. We met in a bar, years ago, and the attraction was immediate. We were married in a small ceremony with a few friends and family, preferring to do it just because we wanted to, not for everyone else. Our life has been very much along those lines since -- we live for each other, share as much with each other as we can.
Chole is a nurse and her dinner conversation can be pretty revolting at times, something that she LOVES. I can tell from the gleam in her eye when dinner is served as to what disgusting operation or medical condition she encountered that day I'm going to hear about. As a job, I'm a software engineer, working for myself and while working on some big projects, never quite hitting that payday I'd like. Guess I'm a better engineer than I am negotiator. But we muddle along together and do ok. We have common interests, we both love movies, we run together, and so on.
Chloe looks good for her age -- she's 5"4', about 115 pounds, small breasted and very svelte -, something that annoys the crap out of her friends, since the ONLY thing she does to keep her figure is running -- she eats and drinks what she wants and never seems to put on a pound. Her older sisters, who are all substantial women, never stop talking about it. They are convinced she's either bulimic, has had lap band surgery or is sacrificing chickens to Beelzebub. She just smiles devilishly and laughs when confronted by the frustration of her peers and family.
I'm a larger individual -- 6ft, 210, part muscle and part pizza and beer. I'm not fat, but I'm also not a gym rat either. I'm... solid, and that's about the best description. I shave my head because the hair is thinning and it's just easier than all the farting around some men have with their hair. Other than that, I'm clean shaven and I do at least try and keep up the personal grooming, although I do draw the line a pedicures. There's just something not quite right about sitting there while some little Korean lady uses implements on the tips of your fingers. I'm sure it works for other guys but, just not for me.
We have no kids -- We've tried several times and spent a fair bit of money on IVF but after the last round, we gave up. Both the cost and the emotional turmoil we went through was, ultimately, not worth it. We both made our peace with the result and resolved to make the most of not having kids. Do things like take off to the woods at a moment's notice, simply because we can.
So here we were, at this little lodge that was deep in the forest that Wendy had found. We arrived late on Friday and had much laughter and silliness carting everything from each other's cars into the lodge. Wendy and Mark had gotten there first and grabbed the master bedroom. We were next and grabbed the first guest room. Jim and Kathy had arrived last and spent all evening mock complaining about how we'd grabbed all the best rooms, and how they'd be staging a midnight raid aimed at turfing us out of our rooms and taking them for themselves.
I couldn't help noticing the extensive bar that Jim had brought with him. Jim is a self-made millionaire, although very quiet about it -- he likes the finer things in life and isn't afraid to spend money on those things he cares about. The rest though, well, I don't know many millionaires driving a 10 year old Ford Explorer. Looking through the bottles there were 3 different types of Tequila -- which would make Chloe happy, since that's her tipple of choice -- several bourbons and whiskeys, a few vodkas and a bunch of mixers. I stood there, looking through the bottles and feeling glad I'd brought a couple of cases of beer with me, since I'm not much of a liquor drinker. I prefer beer. It takes longer and the buzz last longer.
Chloe hates me trying to help install us in a hotel room or anywhere -- she has her particular way of putting things, so while everyone else was dashing around, I was left to wander around the house we'd rented and watch everyone else act like chickens with their heads cut off. Sipping a beer, I watched Mark carry a bag of what looked like party hats up the stairs. Mark is an area manager for the local cable affiliate. He was a man who hated his job, but was perfectly happy with that, since the job was "Good Enough" -- his life was outside the job. He never took it home and was happy living his life in the 8 hours he was not at the office.
He was 43, a year older than me, and to be brutally honest, both better looking and a slightly better physical specimen. That didn't stop me handing him his ass at racquet ball most weeks -- he says I "just want it more", but still, he had chiseled looks, piercing blue eyes, mostly clean shaven, but this weekend he had 3 day stubble, and almost politician perfect hair. At 5'10" and 190 pounds, he looked the part.
Mark really wanted to be a psychologist, but didn't want to spend "several years and a hundred thousand dollars indulging my own desires" as he put it. So he spends his time psycho analyzing the rest of us. And we spend the time laughing at his armchair analysis, even if occasionally he does get uncomfortably close.
His wife, Wendy, came out of the bedroom and saw me looking and favored me with a dazzling smile. She was the school prom queen. The head cheerleader, the one who everyone lusted after. Unlike most girls in that situation, she was actually whip smart. Blond curls down past her shoulder, almost beautifully made up, wonderful smile, terrific sense of humor and about as right wing as it's possible to be and not be Gengis Khan. But we overlooked that because she was very fun to be around and very careful to not use her obvious beauty to get ahead, although as we frequently pointed out, it's not like she has to do anything for that to happen. I've personally seen he get out of two speeding tickets, just by smiling at the officer. I remember spending a day grumbling about that afterwards, since my smile just gets me deeper in trouble when I try and use it. She works out religiously, and her 5'7" frame looks great -- she looks as good as she did in high school. Long bronzed legs trim figure and gravity defying 34C boobs. We all knew what they were because Mark told us. Repeatedly. Not that we wouldn't have worked it out ourselves. Wendy never walked anywhere without at least 3 pairs of eyes helping her on her way. Yet she was devoutly loyal to Mark and they were as much in love as Chloe and Me, or Jim and Kathy.
Ah yes, Jim and Kathy. In they came, lumping a large chest between them, Kathy giving Jim good natured four letter stares.
"What is in this thing honey? Weights?" she said, huffing.
"Don't worry. You'll be glad of it later" he replied.
Kathy put her end down, cracked her back, looked over and me and the eyes narrowed.
"What the hell are you doing you lazy dick? Get over here and help a girl out."
I smiled, put down the beer and went over and grasped the other end of the chest, hefting it easily. It wasn't heavy, she'd just been putting me on.
"Yes Mam," I said, tipping an imaginary cap with my other hand. "Where would madam like the chest?" I asked.
"The bedroom will do, doorman. And be quick about it!" she said, flouncing off back the car, all in a good natured and exaggerated fashion. "And don't you be admiring the caboose," she shouted over her shoulder, knowing I was watching her retreat. "That is not for the likes of you, I'll have you know. I'll tell my husband, so I will."
I looked at Jim and he looked back at me and shrugged. "Can't live with them, can't kill them." He said, as we lumbered up the stairs.
I looked back and Jim and wondered, yet again, at our friendship. I had known both Jim and Mark from college days. We'd all been at high school together, but they had run in very different circles from me, me being the nerd and Jim being the compact Jock and Mark being the Hard Worker -- he'd had a job all through high school while the rest of us were out getting laid and drinking beer, or in my case, in front of a keyboard and monitor. We were friends, and we'd seen some times together. We were radically different people and wanted different things out of life, but we all had common ground and genuinely liked each other and our company.
What was weird was how like the 3 musketeers we were. Mark would come up with the plans, Jim would finance them and I would act as the brains and the social conscience. When Jim wanted to hire some mercenaries to confront that Midwest church who protested servicemen's funerals, and they were going to show up to a funeral of a local guy, it was I who talked him out of it, and Mark then came up with paying some of the local bikers to do it instead. As it turned out, once we talked to them, the bikers wouldn't hear of taking money to do it. But then Jim had a large container of bike parts delivered to them anyway. He was good like that.
Jim was compact -- he hadn't grown past 5'5" but he was well muscled. He was blond, with curly hair, and looked nothing more like a dude surfer, even though he habitually worse a suit during the week. He had made a few million starting up, of all things, a window cleaning business. I'd helped him out on the computer side and after a few years, he'd swallowed all the local competition. Eventually he sold the whole kit and caboodle to an office cleaning company and never had to work again. He did -- he maintained an office and as far as I could tell, he was some kind of small scale local VC -- I was never really clear on it. I just knew he'd helped a number of small businesses locally, since every now and then I'd get a coffee and the servers, knowing I knew him, would gush his praises.
Either way, though he'd lucked out in business, he'd scored big with his wife, Kathy. She was dynamite. She was actually someone I dated in high school, but it had been clear from the second day that I wasn't going to be enough for her. She had aims, ambitions and had a certain degree of social climber built into her, coming as she did from working class-with-aspirations. We'd dated a few times and then she'd made it clear that unless I was going to get out from behind the keyboard and get out into the world, we had no future. I didn't have the heart to do the Bill Gates vs Michael Jordan comparison for her - that wouldn't have ended well -- and while she was nice, I just let it go.
In fact, it had been I who re-introduced her to Jim 10 years ago, and they'd married within 2 years and were going strong since.
Kathy was another one who worked hard for what she had -- nice and trim, petite, like my Chloe, - but more toned and bronzed. She used a sun bed regularly. Very tight and with very small breasts -- most of the time she simply didn't bother with a bra and while she was small, she wasn't _that_ small. More than once we'd seen them slip through the side of a tank top and someone had to cough and point it out, while she went bright pink. Dark curly hair cascaded down her back, and no one had the courage to ask if she dyed it.
Jim and Kathy had two kids, both barely toddlers, and had a stay at home nanny, something Wendy completely approved of and, secretly, Chloe and I were aghast at. But it was their choice and their money and frankly, we were probably a bit jealous too.
Either way, here were. At this nicely-appointed-but-in-the-middle-of-nowhere lodge, for a long weekend. Jim had brought fishing gear and Mark his bow and me? I'd brought a laptop. With extra batteries. I wasn't stupid. Screw the outside world -- that's for the birds. Literally.
I knew they'd all want to watch movies on it anyway, once they got bored of the great outdoors.
Once we were settled, it was planning time in the kitchen.
"Right!" said Jim, raising his voice over the hubbub of various conversations we were all having, the boss till the last. "The long weekend starts NOW. And, with the admonishment 'Start as you mean to go on', we start with a shot of Tequila! Here, grab one." He gestured to several pre-poured shots.
Everyone grabbed one, except me. I looked at my watch. It was 11:15am.
"Little early, don't you think?" I said, good naturedly. Jim lowered his glass and looked at me. "You driving, are you?" he asked, exasperatedly.
"No, of course.. fine, fine." I said, and grabbed one. Chloe grabbed my arm, pushed herself against me and said "Go on. Let's have a weekend off and relax. Let's get blotto." She knew it made me laugh when she used British expressions, knowing as she did my family's British heritage.
Mark said, in a low voice, "I think someone needs to remember some of our college evenings. Get back into that spirit."
Without turning, I said "Yes and other people need to remember
