This is yet another cheating wives story, along with finding new love.
This story is long, so if you're looking for a quick read this isn't it.
This is longer than anything I've written before, including An Average Guy, I was in a car wreck and I'm currently in physio to recover the use of my legs so I'm real sorry it's been this long; been in a real fucking dark place.
Enough about me, enjoy!
T!
*****
I was working at my bar; The Blue Bear and we were running low on draught beer. Naturally, as the owner it was my responsibility to go and get a few barrels of the alcohol we were running low on. I have a manager for this, and rarely need to do it myself but she was on vacation at the time, trying to fix her marriage.
Claire was the kind of woman that loved everybody and would never say a bad word against them. Hell, I bet that even if someone punched her in the face she'd probably apologise to them. After the show 'How I Met Your Mother' became popular and had the long running jokes of Canada contained within we were continuously referencing them. She found them funny and tried to play up to them, even coming as a Mountie for a Christmas party we had one year.
She had recently found out her husband had an affair, around 18 months previously, because one of his friends dropped a comment to her that made her question his cover story. We never found out what his cover was, or what the question was, but none of us cared. She'd socked him in the face, a brutal right hook that none of us could have ever envisioned from her. He went down in one, and everybody in the bar - yes, the idiot came into the bar to try to patch things up - just stared in shock.
At the time, I was thinking "Thank God I'll never be in her situation."
Well, I was actually laughing my ass off, but you know what I mean.
--
So, I hopped into the Caddy and headed out for the wholesalers.
Now, I know that the second I said Caddy you're thinking of grandma in her Brougham. Well, banish those thoughts, because I drive a CTS-V wagon. Yes, I drive that fire breathing V8 "family car". Without the stupid auto. I drive a real stick.
As I accelerated smoothly out of the lot, heading towards the warehouses on the fringe of town I was thinking about my rapidly approaching evening with my wife. It wasn't often I took the evening off to be with her, simply because I was the only chef my bar had, and without me food was off the menu. This might be acceptable mid-week, but I don't like to let people down. Contained within my bar was a damn good food service, if I do say so myself. It was mainly grilled food, but we did offer simple things like soups. The soups were mainly outsourced, or else it meant hours of prep-work for me, including prepping the bar, and to be honest I couldn't be assed. Burgers and steaks were simple 'slap on and wait' type foods, so they were easy. Almost no prep-work aside from getting our blend of seasonings right, and making sure we had the stock in the freezers.
Before I bought the place, it was a full-blown restaurant, but I converted it into a bar due to the poor reputation that the place had, which was enforced when the health inspectors shut the place down due to poor hygiene standards. The bar is by far more popular than the shitty Chinese restaurant was anyway. It took months to generate interest in the food, but by God was the food service thriving. I mean, we'd never match the larger chains for profit, but on the bigger nights, especially when we had live music on, the Bear would pull in more than enough to keep the doors open for the month in food alone. Of course, a lot of this went to overheads, however we had the dedicated group of locals that habitually came in to enjoy the beer and food, and we always had newcomers so we didn't do badly.
I was heading out to buy more beer for tonight, and I pulled to a stop at the intersection, alongside a large black Suburban signalling left. I glanced left at the passenger in the high SUV, and it was Layla.
Layla isn't my wife. I know that's how these things usually go; husband is driving then sees his wife locked in a steamy embrace with someone in her car, all in a neatly wrapped bundle, but no. Not me.
Layla was a girl I knew way back in college, before I ended up moving to New York. You see, I originally decided to go into banking, and found employment as a senior manager. It didn't happen overnight, but it was damn quick when you compare some of the 50-ish year olds stuck in middle management. I'm 32 years old, and I was earning in the region of 400k per year.
Anyway, Layla was one of my best friends back in high school. I met her through a college party, as you'd expect, and ended up sleeping with her, repeatedly. We were a 'friends with benefits' type deal, but with a lot more friendship than benefits. I didn't mind though, it meant I had someone to speak to if I had a problem, but I also had someone to bang if I was lonely. There were people telling me that I was using her, or that she was using me. But it was nothing like that. We both got what we needed, and we both used each other to a point. I lost touch with her a long while back; last I heard she got engaged.
The light turned green and I hit the gas, letting the CTS-V punch me in the kidneys.
--
It was an uneventful trip, and I got everything ready for opening that night with two or three hours to spare. I decided to go home and relax. I was craving some shitty daytime TV and a mug of coffee.
--
I pulled into the driveway next to Alice's blue BMW. I knew she'd be home; she only worked a half day on Friday. Those are the perks of being your own boss. She ran a small accounting firm. She had staff so she could leave them to the last minute things before closing down over the weekend.
As I walked through the door I caught the scent of something cooking.
"Hey, something smells good!" I called, dropping my keys on the table by the door.
She stuck her head around the door and said "Just something quick, I'm going out soon."
"So there's none for me?" I asked, walking into the kitchen. My wife was one hell of a good cook.
"Nope, you'll have to get one of the girls at the bar to cook you something up. Or cook something yourself, like I said I can't stay long." She had been like this for a few weeks, almost dismissive in a way. It was nothing new, really. I was used to females; I have a primarily female staff.
Now, I know how that sounds, but it's really just that they're the ones that usually apply. The guys seem to think that bar work is beneath them in this town, and they'd rather go work up at the local plants. It didn't bother me in the slightest; I looked at the girls as an extension of my family. That's simply because of the sheer volume of time we all spent together.
I spend more time with Claire than I do with Jenny. It's not because I hate my wife, far from it, but I have to spend practically every waking moment nursing the bar. I love my job though. I really, truly do. I despised it at first, before I got on my feet, because with working in a bank I got used to needing to see figures in a positive, where in my bar, for the first few months we were making a loss. Now that everything has sorted itself, aided in part by the other bar in town closing, I love what I do. The social side of it and the work side is the most rewarding thing I've ever done.
I snagged Claire from the other bar in town just before it closed. She had heard the ship was sinking and wanted to step off. That really fucked them up. Next thing they knew they'd entered involuntary liquidation and had their assets seized. I genuinely felt sorry for them but it did make me a ton of money. So, all told I couldn't really feel that sympathetic. I'd actually offered pretty much all of their staff jobs. Only two of their staff, aside from Claire, accepted, the rest choosing instead to find jobs in other fields. And so Chris and Kate came to work for me. Chris and Kate both worked behind the bar, and we also had a number of waiting staff that weren't my responsibility. I dealt with Claire, and Claire dealt with everything else. She pretty much ran the place with only minor input from me.
It panicked me at first, because if she can step off when a business is hitting hard times then I was worried about what that said about her loyalty, but the reason involved a manager and untoward advances. No worry of that from me then.
--
Jenny left shortly after, with nothing more than a quick "Goodbye Paul."
