When she thought about it, Sarah had to realize a hard truth: that she didn't just love her husband. Deep inside her, she also had a contempt for him.
Sarah had been probing her mind because she had answered "no" without hesitation the night Tristan came home with a black eye and torn clothes and had asked her if he should call the police.
Tristan had apparently been just as surprised as she was by the answer. He had probably meant his question mostly rhetorically and expected a yes.
"Why not?" he asked in amazement.
She looked at him with a look she tried to make fervently. That made her look smart, she thought. In reality, she was just trying to drag out the time so she could come up with an answer.
"You can't prove anything anyway. They will drop the case, and... was it Clive, his name was... and his friends will laugh at you. It will only make matters worse," she said. Tristan still looked at her wonderingly.
"By not going to the police, you show them that you are not afraid of a fight. That you are a man with a capital M. It will make them respect you, and they will leave you alone another time," she continued.
She didn't believe in that in the slightest, but she knew her husband well enough to know that he would fall for the words of praise about his manhood. And quite right: Tristan accepted without further words that he should not call the police. He actually seemed to feel a little better.
"Come, let's go in and sleep," Sarah said softly.
In bed, Sarah put her arm over her husband to show him support and make him feel safe. But she couldn't get too close. She could not let him discover that her pussy was soaking wet -- a fact she herself was confused about, but which she could not change. She was so horny at the thought of her husband, who had been beaten by his bully from school -- first with a punch in the face, and when he lay down, with several kicks to his body, before his bully's friends found that it was enough and stopped it.
Xxxxx
Sarah had had a hard time finding a man to marry. Not that she had a hard time meeting men as such -- on the contrary. She had a small, but firm body with quite large shapely breasts. Her blond curls added some spice to her looks. She had enjoyed the attention she attracted from horny males, and she herself fanned the flames by dressing slutty when she went out.
When she brought a man home, or went home with him, it was because she desired him. She wanted a sexy man, but she always gave the men chance to become more than just lovers for the night. To become boyfriends. Often, however, it only lasted a week or a month before either he or she called an end to the relationship.
Some lasted a little longer, and then she introduced the men to her parents. Her father always tried to be open-minded, but her mother could not hide her displeasure with these men, who she correctly reasoned were not prepared to start a family and be responsible husbands and fathers, and who might never be ready to do so.
Sarah was frustrated that her mother couldn't hide her hostility towards her boyfriends, and they had several classic mother-daughter arguments about that.
But deep down, Sarah knew her mother had a point. And it became more evident as she reached her late 20s, and her friends, with whom she had roamed the towns bars, began to start families. They found men who may not have been the sexiest, but who were good and responsible. Sarah envied them. She also wanted a husband and children.
She reasoned that it was probably not at the bars that she would find the man of her life. A serious dating site was better. She created a profile and posted some nice yet sexy pictures to attract the men.
Offers from men also poured in, but most of them she could almost imagine drooling while writing to her.
So she toned down her profile. She made an effort to choose pictures where sex wasn't the first thing that came to mind. And she corrected the text so that it did not focus on her social life and favorite restaurants, but on her education and interests in the home.
It helped. There were still emails from men who obviously just wanted to fuck her. She was tempted by a few of them, but she pulled herself together and deleted these emails. Instead, she concentrated on the men who signaled that they wanted a wife and children.
She also went on a date with several of them. But they were usually somewhere between ugly and average, and they were often timid and shy. She quickly realized that she would never be happy with someone like that, no matter how many children came out of it. She began to consider whether she should just let herself get knocked up by one of the nice testosterone bombs she was used to attract. Then she would have to raise the child alone, but at least it would be a child who has good genes from its father.
But then she got an email from Tristan.
He wasn't the world's most handsome man either, but he was ok, and from the pictures it looked like he was training and generally taking care of his body and his appearance. But more important: He told her that he worked in an investment bank, and that he was successful and making good money. There was something masculine and attractive about his self-esteem when he told her about it.
She googled his name and found that he was not lying. She could find his name in analyses he had prepared, and there were scattered media stories about how he had been part of teams that had made big deals go through.
So she met him, and he did not disappoint. He was full of confidence, and he was kind to Sarah.
And when she introduced him to his parents, the tone was completely different from what it used to be. Her mother had talked and giggled like a schoolgirl, and after Tristan had left, she praised him in high tones. "Yes, he's a real mommy's boy," Sarah said, and when her mother looked at her disapprovingly, she added, "Relax. I'm just joking. I also really like him."
But again, in retrospect, she realized that she had happened to say something that she was thinking deep down.
Xxxxx
While it was happening, she was just happy and relieved that she had found the man she was looking for. They dated for a few months. Then they began to live permanently with each other, and within six months, the wedding was agreed. It was a great wedding in the local church and not an eye was dry. Tristan's parents loved their new daughter-in-law.
The local newspaper even showed up and took pictures for an article titled "up-and-coming banker marrying local beauty."
They moved into a house in a nice neighborhood. It needed a major renovation, but they got it at a good price. Tristan's salary was enough to pay the mortgages, and it was an understanding between them that when they had children, Sarah would give up her part-time job as a receptionist in a law office and become a housewife in the home, that they could by then afford to renovate according to the latest fashions.
It turned out that they had plenty of time to save money, because even though they had sex more or less every night, Sarah did not get pregnant. They started talking about seeing a doctor and getting some tests.
On the whole, everyday life presented itself. Sarah could see that even though Tristan would probably get her a nice home that most of her friends would envy her, it wasn't an investment bank superstar she had married. He would never be one of the top-dogs in the industry.
He hadn't lied to her. He was talented, and he achieved the results he was so proud of. But more is needed to get to the top. Sarah shrank when they attended social gatherings in Tristan's company and she could see how colleagues were better at handling their careers and climbing the ladder. She had also noticed several times that Tristan had been outmaneuvered or exploited without him even noticing.
She discreetly tried to give him advice and help him, but he dismissed it every time. He was sure that he had everything under control and that it was a matter of time before he could write CEO on his CV. It was exactly the self-confidence she had fallen for, but now she was annoyed by it because it kept him from facing reality.
She predicted with horror that it would only get even more embarrassing as they got older, and Tristan wouldn't get the promotions he was convinced he was in for. Would he become bitter? Or would he be in denial? She could imagine the latter. Tristan who bragged, even though there was now no longer anything to brag about, and he was a mature man in a young man's job.
Xxxxx
This was the situation for Sarah: She had a good husband, but also a husband who would get into trouble, and on top of that, they obviously had a hard time having the child she longed to have more and more.
She was often in a bad mood. Some days she felt almost depressed. That was also the case the day Tristan had come home with the black eye and the torn clothes.
"What has happened?" she asked, frightened, when she saw him.
Tristan threw himself on the sofa, where he sat for a while with his head in his hands. Then he said:
"I had been to a meeting in the neighborhood we lived in when I was a boy. That was before dad and mom got rich and bought the house... We didn't have much money back then, and I went to a school where many of the others were children of... workers."
Sarah didn't like it when her husband spoke in a condescending tone about people who were less well-off than himself. But she didn't say anything.
"I got sentimental anyway and went for a walk in the neighborhood. I passed a grill bar we came to back then after school. Can you imagine, it still existed. I couldn't help but walk in. The place was no longer for pupils but instead for craftsmen and the like, who apparently do not eat at home. I bought a soda and a snack anyway."
Tristan was silent for a while before continuing:
"Then three men entered. They were in filthy orange work clothes and rubber boots. One of them saw me and said my name. Then I recognized him. It was Clive. An old.... schoolmate. Or rather, he wasn't my mate. He made my schooltime a living hell. He threatened to beat me up if I didn't give him money. Once in a while he beat me up anyway..."
A little silence again.
"I don't like to talk about what happened back then. It was so... humiliating."
It was then that Sarah noticed that she was horny. She put it aside by telling herself that the strong, dirty man who dominated weaker men had always been one of her fantasies when she masturbated.
"But now he seemed friendly," Tristan continued. "He asked if they could sit at my table. I thought that now I could get my revenge. As you know, success is the best revenge against a bully."
