Professional

Ordinary life between spouses. Until one becomes a professional.

Key words:

Professional, unvoluntary cheating, yes my dear, Davalka, sociological terminology, marketing, holistic, customer satisfaction, businessman, Neandertal

Dear reader, it seems to have become good practice to warn you that this is my first work which I publish on the Literotica platform, so feel free to make sure that I will never ever try to do so again.

And yes, English was not my first language. Not even my second. Maybe you can play a little guessing game and find out what I might have wanted to write. And I dare to publish without bothering an editor first.

Of course, my work is copyright protected and I will happily sell licences of my publishing rights, in case they should be infringed, to some friends in Belarus and Serbia. They will collect their share; I am quite sure. Worldwide.

It also seems to be good practice to underline that all characters are above 21 or whatever legal age. And that no real bio or organic fruits or vegetables were injured during the research for this story. And all similarities with living or deceased or future persons are of course purely coincidental. And their names were changed as well, in case you should recognise something you saw or heard before.

And now, I hope you have a bit of fun.

------

"I have good news for you!"

We both stopped speaking, grinned and laughed.

"Stereo?"

We laughed harder, happy to have exactly spoken the same words at the same time.

Ilona embraced me and kissed me hard. I kissed back and had some trouble avoiding letting my briefcase with my laptop computer inside fall to the ground. With my free left hand I held her tight and swung her a half turn around. Although she had a sweet tooth and found small snacks everywhere, her daily runs, yoga and cycle tours had kept her slim during the five years of our marriage.

Finally, I set her down, laid my briefcase on the table and started to take off my winter coat. Big mistake.

"Oh no, your briefcase will not stay on the table. You know its place!"

I squirmed free of my coat. "I know, but please let me take off my coat first."

"Kurt, if I let you do this, then our house will look like a junk yard in no time. Priorities first!"

Luckily, I had learned early in our marriage to close my eyes before rolling them, so that she did not see it. I took a deep breath, swiped the briefcase off the table and vanished into the room which I used as home office.

"Kurt, your dirty shoes will pollute the whole house! Shoes off first! And now you will vacuum the house on Saturday."

I muttered "That is what I do every Saturday since we married", turned back to the entrance door, put my briefcase on the floor, held my coat with my left hand and balanced on one foot while taking one shoe off after the other.

As I put my coat into the wardrobe, she looked around the corner and frowned "First you put your briefcase on the table, now on the floor. Will you never learn how to keep order?"

I decided to say nothing, but put my shoes into the shoe cabinet, hung my coat into the wardrobe and closed both of them. As I bent over to lift up my briefcase, I heard "Don't tell me that your briefcase is still in the entrance hall."

Trying to sound happy, I replied, "I'm working on it!" and moved towards my home office. Before I could open its door, Ilona's beautiful voice sang out "And don't forget to take out the garbage."

I tried to answer in a nearly as sweet voice "Can't I do this a bit later?", hoping to get a bit of slack.

"Now!"

I inhaled deeply and suppressed to ask the question in which order I should take the trash, put on my shoes, plug one of her long blonde hairs that had - obviously without asking permission first - abandoned her blow-dried mane, but then decided to keep my mouth shut.

Ok. So, after moving into the kitchen and answering her question "Where is your briefcase now?" truthfully, I took the garbage bag out of the garbage bin, twisted it and had nearly left the kitchen when my next shortcoming was detected "Why did you not put a new garbage bag in?".

"Because I always do this when I come back, so that my dirty hands will not contaminate the garbage bin."

Which was followed by her friendly question "Can you not once do things the right way?"

I knew better than to argue, balanced the closed garbage bag in one hand and tried not to make a mess while putting a new garbage bag into the garbage bin with my other hand.

This gave me an instant reward "Oh dear god, why did you have to make all men act so clumsily?"

I made it to the entrance hall, put the garbage bag on the floor and started to put my shoes on when I heard "if you would have put the bag outside first, then the floor would not become dirty."

Meanwhile I had put on my shoes again - not bothering with the shoelaces - and lifted the bag. Checking the dark grey slate beneath it, I confirmed my judgement. No trace of any dirt.

Coming back into the house, I started to take off my shoes when I heard "Did you check the mailbox, honey?"

Meanwhile my originally good mood had mostly evaporated. "Ilona, you do not have to work and should have had the time to check the mail. Why do I always have to do it? You pass it every time you go to Yoga, to the hairdresser, to jog, to cycle, to meet your friends, to shop and so on."

"Because I don't have time. And that is why we have to talk about my good news! Are you not curious to hear it? What is keeping you so long?"

When I walked into the living room she did not sit on the couch like normal, but at the big dining table, already facing me and pointed to the chair on the opposite side. Something was different. Very different.

"Kurt, don't look so quizzical. Everything is good. I am turning professional."

"Oh."

I decided to better not say anything more, but put a smile on my face, nodded supportingly and looked at her, interested in what that actually meant.

This seemed to irritate her a bit, but then she sprang to attention, brushed a nonexistent hair from her face and started.

"You know that, based on our different formal education levels, which, of course, do not relate in any way to our competences, skills, efficiency and so on, we had decided that you earn money for us while I work on our social standing and on everything else. Right?"

I nodded.

"And we have already talked about that all we earn is our joint income and that this house is our joint house. Everybody has the same voice and we discuss everything so that we never have any reason for any disagreement. Right?"

I nodded again.

"After several consultation rounds even included some of our neighbors, my friends and I came to the conclusion that our efforts, would they be appraised professionally, would be probably more worth than the work of our husbands. Right?"

I inhaled, raised my bushy eyebrows and opened my mouth, but was cut short. "I see that I must explain a bit more."

"I, for example, work as a cook, a professional cleaner, a kindergarden ward, a hygiene expert, a housekeeper and at least once a week as a sex worker. Plus, as an escort whenever we go out to church, to meet friends or even your business partners. And I do a good job at all of these things. Right?"

This time I needed to disagree. I was definitively no child that needed a kindergarden ward (and we had no children yet). And as a sex worker she was not exactly...

But before I could even open my mouth, the best wife of all rattled on. "I see that you have no objections. So, now imagine that you would have to coordinate all these different specialists, which would be the task of a project manager and if you would have to pay for all the travel costs to and from work and all the other expenses. You see?"

I tried to object, but was not fast enough.

"So, we calculated a bit around and came up with around 70 to 80.000 Euros per year. And this is an estimate on the low side. You see?"

This time, lacking further information on how she calculated, I nodded to show that I was still listening, although my mind drifted towards questions how I should best re-organise my new department at work.

She droned on for some time and I nodded slightly every time I heard "Right?".

After some time I thought that I should be a bit more attentive although my input was obviously not worth asking for. I mean, apart from being rhetorically asked. We had had many fights before because whenever she presented a problem to me, I tried to find a quick solution. Which was never appreciated, but just lead to lengthy discussions without a solution.

Although this was never taught at school (so much about 'non schoelae sed vitae discimus' - 'we don't learn for school, but for life'), I was - for a man - not totally stupid and had learned that women probably did not seek solutions, but simply support whenever a problem arose. And I had found out that nodding was the second-best solution to every problem she came up with. Social experts would utter fragments like 'oh really', 'what a shame', 'that must have felt terrible', 'someone should really do something about this' and so on. But, as I already stated, on my intermediate intellectual level, nodding was obviously considered as sufficient.

Finally, she looked at me and smiled "So, now you have understood that my work is so much more worth than yours. And even better, I can add to this! Isn't this really good news?"

I looked at her, knowing despite my significantly inferior intelligence level that nodding would not be the right reaction to this statement and question. "And how much better would that be?"

"Oh Kurt, I know that this might hurt you, but please know that I really, really love you and that I consider you as an equal partner to me." And she continued talking for several minutes, but gave no really relevant information. At least not for my inferior IQ. She ended with "Now that it is clear that this will change nothing between us and even enhance our resources. Do you agree?"

I looked pensive "Can you please repeat the numbers again?"

Ilona rolled her eyes "Kurt, this is so easy. Even you should have understood the first time. But you might have had a bad day, so I will repeat myself. My household work alone is worth about 80.000 Euros per year. And with my additional new professional addition I will add up to 50.000 Euros per year to that! And I only need to work one or two days a week! Without any negative aspects for you! Isn't this phantastic?"

I nodded and added cautiously "If I understood the numbers correctly, then...".

She laughed with this happy, singing laugh that would melt any man's heart like butter in the sun. "Yes. Don't worry. Wladi explained all this. Everting is true and verified."

I must have looked quite surprised "Wladi?"

She laughed again and even touched my hands, that I had put on the table between us, for the first time.

"Wladi is my manager."

I must have looked even more surprised "Your manager? You took a new job? What kind of job?"

I was a bit shaken, too. We had both agreed that all major decisions had to be discussed and agreed before any decision between us both. Major decision like which concert we would attend, where we would go for holidays, which TV program we wanted to see and so on. And of course, even bigger decisions as well.

When I had arrived home earlier, my intention had been to get her approval for accepting the position as chief department manager, which was offered to me today. Coupled with a nice, six figures income. Plus a bonus scheme coupled to our company's share price.

Ilona beamed "The opportunity was just too good! Wladi said that he could only offer it for a few hours and that if I did not take it it would be gone forever. So what could I do? Decline the opportunity to step up from being the bigger contributor to our marriage to now becoming the dominant contributor to our partnership? I had to make a quick decision. The early worm is caught by the bird, right? Oh, I am so lucky. And you are, too! I love you!"

She jumped up, spilled a bit of the glass of wine which stood before her and pirouetted.

Then suddenly she stopped, sat down, brushed another non-existing hair out of her face and proclaimed "Sorry, I should behave more professional now. I am professional now. I am a professional PR manager now."

I took some deep breaths. Something had happened and I wanted to understand the facts as well as the dynamics behind.

"Oh darling, I am so happy for you! Which agency are you working for? And where are their offices? How did you convince them of your competences? You have a bachelor's degree in medieval music, how does that relate to PR?"

"Hihi, now I see that you are envious. But you don't need to worry. Nothing will change for you. Except that we will have a lot more money and that I get more appreciation for my professional work in addition to being a perfect wife."

What could I do in this situation? Being a supportive spouse is probably the biggest task of the husband. Of course, I had to be happy, but I was still interested in getting a bit more information.

"Oh, this really sounds lovely, and I wish I could have been part of this wonderful decision! So, what is the name of your company and where are their offices?"

"The agency is named Davalka PR and it has a really unique business model. It does not require offices like those old-timer companies, but it works project based, remote and distributed. Its core value is holistic customer satisfaction, sustainable profit, and a cross-functional commitment to profitable growth. And we might even get a certification for being CO2-neutral, although there seem, to be some problems with getting labelled as organic and vegan. Isn't this wonderful? And before I forget, it also supports the ILO in its work against child labour and has committed to several of the UN's 17 sustainable development goals like zero hunger and clean water. Just imagine me being part of all this!"

And she jumped up, spilling the rest of the wine, pirouetted again and even gave me a big kiss over the table before brushing another nonexistent hair away, sitting down and assuming attention.

"Sorry, I need to work a bit on being totally professional."

"Oh. Wow. You really learned that part of the presentation well. So how did you find them?"

"You won't believe this! Two weeks ago, on our girl's night out, we went dancing a bit and Natasha, you know, the good looking blonde with the professional clothes, met two friends of hers there and asked them to come to our table."

I held up my hand "Natasha? You mean duck-lips Natasha?"

I must explain that Natasha, though being basically a good-looking, may be a bit extrovert, girl, had strategically enhanced her appearance. My guess was a chin liposuction, an eye lid tightening, some lip injections and, of course, a silicon breast enhancement. Plus some face hair removal and some permanent makeup. Through her usually quite transparent blouses you easily detect numerous tattoos and piercings. Her lip injections were so gross that I could only think of her as duck-lips Natasha.

"Kurt, this is awful. She just underlined her natural beauty a bit by changing her hair colour and doing some make-up. I don't know why you cannot accept this. Are you envious?" And she giggled for nearly a minute.

After she calmed down, I nodded and asked "So how did they come to talk about the PR work?"

Ilona smiled broadly "Oh, first we danced quite a bit and they saw that we were sufficiently hydrated. By the way, we must try Strawberry Daiquiris at our next neighborhood party as well!"

"Strawberry Daiquiris?"

"Oh yes, they are so tasty! With many vitamins! And very good against dehydration - at least if you drink enough."

"Hm."

"Oh yes, and then we played a few games. No, I don't like that look on your face. They were quite innocent. And everything was consensual. Yes, they insisted on that. And then we talked about their concept. It is very sociological and probably not easy to understand for engineers like you."

Now, this did not make me very happy. I stopped wondering about the use of the word 'consensual' and sensed some anger growing. You should understand that engineers are - at least from an engineer's point of view - at the top of the education pyramid. Oh, ok, together with physicists. And medical doctors. And computer scientists - well not, they don't count as I consider them engineers as well.

"So, what do I not understand?"

She is not dumb and immediately understood her mistake.

"Oh honey, I just meant that some of those words of sociological terminology might be a bit unfamiliar for engineers in general. I mean, especially for mechanical engineers, not electrical engineers like you, of course.

I nodded, content that I had such a cunning and intelligent wife. I was really lucky!

"Well, what does this dabbawalla PR do?"

"Oh, my dear, it has nothing to do with Indian lunchboxes, it is..."

"But that is what dabbawalla means..."

"Honey, the name is Dawalka PR. I don't know what that means exactly, it might be a family name, but I never asked. They sell services that ensure holistic customer satisfaction."

"And what does this mean?"

"First of all, it is a holistic approach. This entails that we do not intent to cover only a small part of a customer's problem or desire, but that we encompass it holistically. Therefore, we look at the complete experience including, but not limited to, the psychological aspects as well as the physiological ones..."

I really did not pay too much attention, unfortunately, but was still struggling with the word 'holistic'. Somehow this rang a bell, but I could not exactly place it.

"Ilona, this holistic approach, I mean, well, I don't know, but somehow, I keep thinking about detectives and some guy named Dirk, but it all does not make much sense to me. Does it to you?"

Ilona laughed "You probably read too many books from authors like Adam Douglas or the like. Wladi said something about it. Did you listen to what I said and are you ok with it?"

Damned! Should I confess that I did not really listen and receive another verbal humiliation? On the other hand, the truth is what sets you free, isn't it?

So, I nodded.

"Ok, that is what I assumed. So now let us celebrate. Oh, by the way, what was your good news, honey?"

I had nearly forgotten. As I had learned in recent years, my perfect wife was not too much interested in listening to my stories from work. I decided to keep my answer short.

"I was offered a promotion at work."

"Well, this is so great, honey. One more reason to party! So, you finally get your chance to lead a small team?"

She had obviously either not listened closely during the last years or simply forgotten. I had become a team leader two years after our marriage, then a group leader one year later and early this year a head of department, being in charge of nearly 100 architects and engineers.

Environmentally, we were also striving to develop sustainable products, we were for example working on new machines that would enable to omit plastic labels on food. A prototype which I had partially invented, was soon about to be tested.

"Sweetheart, I did a good job after my last promotion and when our company bought our largest competitor and half of their managers left, we decided to reorganize everything. So now my team consists of two...".

My wife interrupted me, not letting me add the words 'hundred and seventy', cried out a shriek of joy and hugged me. "I knew it. I always knew it. You are my hero, Kurt!"

She let me go, smiled and asked, "So how much more will you earn now?"

I stood straighter, grinned, and proclaimed happily "I will now earn nearly two...."