, as you called it. Or did you just make that up on the spur of the moment to assuage my concerns and justify your planned action?"
"Oh no, that's what he told me," she declared.
"And you believed him? How can you be so fucking gullible?" I questioned rhetorically. "Yep, brain dead. No woman with a genius-level IQ and a Mensa member could be so stupid. My dad always told me I should never argue with an idiot, because people won't be able to tell which-is-which." Picking up my keys and cell phone, I started toward the front door as I said bitterly, "I can't take any more of this idiocy from my 'loving wife,' I'm going for a walk."
When I got to the end of the block, I called my friend and golfing buddy Martin "Marty" Johnson, who just happened to be one of the best divorce lawyers in the state. I told him what Mary was proposing and asked if he could have divorce papers ready for me by Friday; I told him the grounds would be irreconcilable differences, and if she went through with it, amend them to adultery. He explained that under Virginia Code § 20-91, unlike other divorce grounds, there is no waiting period before filing for divorce based on adultery, otherwise there would be a delay. He assured me he could have everything ready before Friday and would, in fact, prepare documents for both contingencies, but asked why, as much as we both loved each other and had since early childhood, would I proceed with the divorce even if she didn't go through with it.
I told him it was simple. All women carry a stubbornness gene I call the "Eve Gene" that's passed down from Eve herself in the Garden of Eden. Once tempted or made curious, it has to be satisfied, either right now, next year, or ten years from now. It gnaws away at them like a dog with a bone until eventually that particular itch is scratched. I said, "I won't spend a lifetime waiting for the other shoe to fall. We were planning to start our family in three months, and if we have children, I cannot break up our family with a divorce to be a weekend father with little or no input in my children's upbringing; and I will not be another man's cuckold. My only option then would be murder/suicide with a family member rearing our orphans. So, as much as I love her and always will, divorce now is the only answer." He said he hated to see us break up, but he could find no flaw in my logic.
I walked about aimlessly for at least two hours and when I got back home, Mary was in bed reading. When I got into bed, she came on to me all sweetness and sex, but I told her I didn't feel very loving just then, turned off my bedside lamp, turned my back to her, and feigned sleep.
The following morning Mary was very loving and in fact had gotten up early and prepared my breakfast, something I usually did for her since I left for work a half-hour earlier than she. I asked, no I begged her not to go through with her planned assignation. Her response was sweet but non-committal and she added that he had already paid for the beach-front cottage they were to use. I exploded and yelled, "I'LL REPAY HIM FOR THE GOD-DAMNED RENT!!!" as I grabbed my briefcase and stormed out the door. As soon as I got into my car, I called Marty at home and asked if he could get his in-house investigator to find out Wally's address, phone number, any past affairs, the location of the beach cottage, and any rental agreement information. He told me he would contact his investigation team as soon as I got off the line and assured me he would have everything except the past affairs by mid-morning and information on the affairs by Friday
At 10:15 that morning, Marty called me in my office and told me to check my e-mail. While still on the phone with Marty, I opened his e-mail and there was everything he had promised including a copy of the cottage rental agreement signed by the asshole. I thanked him profusely and told him I had work to do with what he had sent to me.
I called Carola Thornton, introduced myself, and asked if I could possibly come by in a few minutes for a short chat. She said she remembered me as Mary's husband from the firm's Christmas Party the year-before-last, shortly after they had married. She said she was breast-feeding her baby at the moment, and asked if I could give her about an hour, and then she would be glad to have a chat. An hour later I was ringing her doorbell.
Carola answered the door with only a touch of light-colored lipstick to enhance her looks, and once again I was struck by the true beauty of this petite Sicilian woman, although she seemed to have lost a bit of weight from what I remembered from the Christmas Party, unusual since she had a baby just three months earlier. She extended her hand, and as I shook it she said, "Welcome to our home, Tom, your phone call piqued my curiosity, and I just had to hear what you wanted to chat about." 'There's that
Eve Gene
again,' I thought to myself.
As she led me through to her family room, she offered, "Would you care for coffee?" I noticed a coffee service and carafe of coffee on the coffee table as I answered that I would indeed like coffee. After she had served our coffees and offered me excellent biscotti, she asked, "How may I be of help; what did you want to talk about?"
"Your husband Walter and my wife have been talking at work, and when she told me what he had told her, I didn't understand what she was talking about, and when she couldn't explain it to me, I thought I'd go to the source for my explanation," I said.
"And just what is this mystery that has brought you to me for enlightenment?" she asked with a smile.
"Your husband told my wife that the two of you were in an open marriage; he told her that you both freely engage in sexual activities with partners outside your marriage and that the "reclaiming sex" as he called it that you share with each other following the return from one of your trysts is the best sex ever. He used that fact as one of his ways to talk my wife into spending the upcoming Memorial Day weekend with him in an ocean-front cottage at Rehoboth Beach," I told her bitterly.
"Tom, I can assure you," she said with confidence, "We do not have an open marriage; quite the contrary, it is rigidly closed."
"He also belittled my manhood, bragging about the size of his cock and also bragging that he had fucked every woman in Mary's office except her. Tell me, Carola, just how big is his cock, have you ever measured it?"
"Oh yes, I've measured it," she said, "I've measured it many times; his cock size is an obsession with him. He's seven and three-quarters inches long and one and three-eighths inches across at its widest point. I think he's hoping that someday I'll measure him at eight inches long," she said with a chuckle.
"Well, if they go through with it, Mary's in for a big surprise and a big disappointment," I said.
"And why's that," Carola asked curiously.
"Because my penis is eleven inches long and two and three-quarters inches thick," I told her. "Mary and I were virgins when we married. Apparently I come from a long line of heavily-endowed males. My dad warned me of this before our wedding and told me to use lots of lubricant, take everything slow and easy, and to let Mary set the pace. It was the third night of our honeymoon before Mary could take the whole thing, although somewhat uncomfortably, and the fifth night before she really began to enjoy it. Since then it's been Katie-bar-the-door; she can't seem to get enough of it. Since mine is the only one she's ever known, I'm sure she thinks they were all the same; heaven knows what's she's expecting from Asshole - I'm sorry, that's how I think of your husband."
"Tom, I'm sure our spouses have had some pretty raunchy conversations at work, and I know Walter likes to brag about his cock, but you are mistaken about their going away together this coming weekend. My husband will be in Philadelphia all of the Memorial Day weekend at a golf tournament; he never misses a tournament. I hate to tell you this, but I fear your wife knew of Walter's golf trip and has viciously used my husband as an unwitting pawn in her own nefarious plans to explain her actions," she responded as any good wife would when faced with her husband's possible infidelity; she was no longer smiling.
"Carola, your reaction was exactly what I'd expect of a faithful and loving wife in defense of her husband," I said compassionately. "There is no way I could ever imagine any husband allowing and even encouraging a woman as beautiful and loving as you to freely have sex with other men.
"It just didn't make any sense to me, since it would mean that the identity of your baby's father would be in question. That is why it pains and shames me to share with you something I have brought with me," I told her as I opened my brief case and handed her a document I took out of it. I watched in sadness as she first recognized what the document was, then saw her face go from shock to horror, and finally to intense anger as she recognized the rental contract for the beach-front cottage, its location, the period of rental and remuneration, and finally the typed name and well-recognized signature of her husband Walter Thornton.
Her anger had transformed her beauty into something truly frightening as she said through gritted teeth, "Tom, I can assure you that this assignation will never take place. You see, I am the baby of a first-generation Sicilian family of ten siblings and the only female. My nine older brothers will see to it my husband will never physically be able to keep this tryst nor ever again desire another, if he even survives."
"Carola, I asked my wife if she had considered the possibility of contracting STDs from her tryst, and she said, 'Oh, Wally assured me he's clean as he only has sex with married women.' I asked her if she was listening to herself. I told her that she had just told me that he bragged and her girlfriends confirmed that he'd had his cock in every pussy in the office except hers and I pointed out that over half of the thirty-five women in her office were single. I went on to remind her that if a married woman would cheat with him, they would cheat with others, and that cheating wives usually did most of their cheating with strange men that picked them up in bars on 'Girls Night Out' where most of the screwing was quickies in the back seat of a car in the parking lot. I strongly advise that you heed the warning I gave to my wife and get yourself tested for STDs," I warned.
I told her that I understood her shock and pain as I had experienced equal pain since my wife had told me of her plans the previous evening. I told her that with no large family of my own to share my pain, I did the only thing I could think of, bring it to her attention and hope that what her husband had told my wife was indeed a lie and that somehow I could relay that to my wife before it was too late. As I rose to leave, she stood and hugged me and we both held each other tightly and cried great sobs for several minutes until I was finally able to leave.
I drove to Marty's office and found that his investigators had already collected quite the file on Carola's philandering husband. I told him all about my visit to Carola and everything we told each other. After I told him about her nine older first-generation Sicilian brothers and what they were likely to do to Wally, he and I spent the rest of the afternoon planning all the things I had to do, the places I had to be, and the people I had to be with to ensure I had every second accounted for between now and Friday afternoon and ironclad alibies for every second so I couldn't be accused of whatever was to befall Asshole. I finally left, arriving home at my usual time.
