The Rusty Wheel

Stephanie walked into the Rusty Wheel and looked around, knowing that Anne would already be waiting for her.

When she saw her longtime friend, she hurried over and the two shared a familiar hug. Before it was over, though, Steph could tell from the perfunctory stiffness of her friend's greeting that something was wrong.

"Hey," she said, "you alright?" She sat down. "Did you want to meet because something's wrong?"

Anne bit her lower lip and looked around. "I'm fine. I...it's you I'm worried about. I've...got some news, and it's not good."

"Okay..." Steph was confused.

Anne seemed to struggle with something, then said, "Let's have a drink first."

"It's one o clock!" Steph was not much of a drinker. She'd always been a very controlled person, and alcohol to her was the epitome of being out of control.

"Believe me," Anne said cryptically, waving a waiter over, "you're going to need it."

After a few confused minutes where Steph watched Anne sip her drink, the other woman seemed to swell with concern and blurted wildly out, "Oh, honey...he's cheating on you!"

Steph blinked, literally not comprehending. "What?"

"Tom. I...I saw Tom. Dancing with another woman. Kissing her. Loving her." With that, she pulled out her phone. "Look!" She held up a picture of Stephanie's husband waltzing with a younger looking woman.

Steph gasped. "No. It has to be something else!"

Anne flipped through pictures. "These were two days later." More dancing, and pictures of Tom talking with the other woman at the bar. It hit Steph what she was seeing.

"These were taken HERE!" She gasped.

Anne nodded. "Tuesday and Thursday, last week."

Steph put her hand to her mouth. "He told me he was working late."

"I'm sorry," Anne shook her head. "I'm so sorry. There was...more...they were kissing, and..." She grimaced. "I should have recorded it, but I was too upset." She shook her head. "You two seemed so perfect together."

Steph was staring off into the distance, eyes welling with unshod tears. "He was my best friend from childhood," she murmured. "My one man. My other half."

Anne scowled. "The bastard. He threw that away."

Stephanie nodded absently, shellshocked. "He always told me he couldn't dance," she muttered.

Anne handed the other woman her previously untouched drink. "There's something else," She said. "I followed them again on Thursday. They were talking about taking a cruise next month. He said he had paid for it with his personal card to keep you from noticing, and that he planned on telling you he had a business trip."

Steph took another pull from her drink, almost seemed to miss the hint, then blinked. "I can look up his card!" she exclaimed. "I know the password!"

Anne nodded. "But you never look at it, do you?"

"No. Because I trust him!" Steph blinked at her own words, surprised. "I trusted him with my life."

"He basically told her that," Anne growled.

"How could he do this to me?" Steph moaned. "We were each other's only! How could he ruin that?"

"Who can know why men do what they do?"

"I have to check his card," Steph said with force. "I have to see it for myself!" Her mind raged with opposing feelings...an urge to trust her husband, unspeakable pain, and the image of him dancing with and laughing with another woman on a night when he'd said he was at work.

Anne grabbed her purse. "Let's go."

-

Two hours later they were sitting on the couch at Stephanie's, and she was sobbing on her friends shoulder.

"Is it me?" Steph wailed. "Did I drive him away?"

"It's entirely his fault," Anne insisted. "He was babbling some shit about you being too controlled, too uptight. Not wild enough sexually. He was just excusing his own shittiness."

The words 'controlled' and 'uptight' stung Stephanie. She'd always been proud of her self control, and of Tom's. Had he secretly seen it as a sentence, placed upon him by his shrew of a wife?

Shrew wife? Was that how he thought of her?? She broke into tears again.

"What do I do?" She asked. "I can't stay with him!"

Anne thought about that. "How do you feel about him right now?"

"I don't know. I love him. I hate him!"

"You should. He belittled you. He lied. He cheated." Anne was building up steam. "You should show him how that feels!"

Steph sniffled. "How?"

"He wants out-of-control? He wants a woman that's free and wild? Show him you can be that. Show him by being all that and more...with someone else."

Steph blinked. The idea of taking control of the story appealed to her typical self, but the idea of going wild was both terrifying and...a little thrilling. Mostly, she felt rejected, and liked the idea of not being herself for a while.

"What do you mean?" She asked slowly.

"Well, can you pretend with him for the next four weeks?"

"Pretend?"

"Pretend you don't know. Pretend you don't hate him. Put off sex but make it sound like you wish you could?"

"I...don't know. Why would I do that?"

"So that you can hurt him like he's hurt you. The day before his secret trip, you can reveal that you've been giving another man everything he insulted you for refusing."

"Other man? What other man?"

Anne shrugged. "I'm a single lady. I know some very enjoyable single men. Believe me, you can have your pick."

Steph was torn. "I don't know."

"Come on," Anne leaned in. "Take your revenge. Don't let him crush your heart and walk off into the sunset. Here," she fished out her phone again, "look." She flipped through a couple of pictures of men, describing each one. Steph felt uncomfortable, and almost asked her to stop when suddenly the image of a late 20's shirtless Adonis appeared before her.

"Who is that?" She gasped.

Anne smiled knowingly. "Let me make a call real quick."

-

That night, Stephanie watched her husband go about his routines and surged with anger and hurt.

'Eight years old,' she thought at him. 'You were eight when I met you. I was seven. Thirty-one years ago. Is it possible that I still don't know you?'

"Honey," she blurted out, desperate to find out it was all a misunderstanding, "I was thinking...my aunt is in town Tuesday. Let's take her out for supper."

Tom winced a little and said, "Sorry, hon. Our Tuesday and Thursday meetings are still scheduled late. Will be for a few more weeks, until Jorgenson gets back."

Stephanie bit her lip, getting desperate. "Oh. Ok. I think I'll do some financial housekeeping. Can you remind me what your password is for your card? I need to see when the payments are due"

"Don't bother," he was suddenly moving towards the computer. "I'll do it." He looked nervous. But there was more to it than that. He seemed timid all of the sudden. And fat...like a weak thing. Had he always looked that way? He'd certainly gained twenty or thirty pounds in the years since he ran in college. Had she just loved him too much too notice?

And did seeing it now mean that she was losing that love?

"But shouldn't I know the password anyway?" she pressed. "We've always shared things."

"I'm thinking about canceling this card anyway. Why don't we wait until I decide?" He looked nervous.

"Okay," she turned, hurrying from the room and keeping her voice calm against all odds.

She took a shower that night, so she'd have someplace to cry.

-

Most of the next morning was spent fretting over details. She made the bed. She cleaned the house. She primped and prepped. She kept glancing out the window.

What would they talk about? Would it be awkward? Would Anne stay, or excuse herself after a while? Would this Danny guy expect to get lucky?

Would he?

She flushed at that one. Surely not! This was the first time they were ever going to meet!

How had Anne said it? "Just looking for a good match."

But still, she wondered.

When the doorbell rang, she jumped a little. But she also smoothed her summer dress, checked herself in the mirror, and opened the door.

There he was. Danny. Young and manly and smiling and strong underneath his imacculately messy clothes.

And those eyes, watching her.

But...Stephanie looked around. "Where's Anne?"

"She couldn't make it." Danny shuffled his feet. "I thought she told you. I can...go, if that's what you want."

"No!" Stephanie blushed at her outburst. She felt like someone who had drank way too much coffee. She couldn't stop looking at those eyes. "I...why don't you come in," she said. "I mean, you came all this way..."

He gave her that smile again...part smirk, but all warmth and kindness.

He was taller than she'd expected.

She realized she was still standing in his way, and moved aside.

Danny stepped into her house, and she shut the door behind him.

-

"So?" Anne asked by way of greeting.

"You ditched me!" But Stephanie wasn't mad.

"Stop!" Anne laughed. "How did it go?"

Steph hesitated.

"Come on!" Anne laughed. "Out of control, remember?"

"Well we didn't 'do it,' if that's what you mean."

"Why not?"

"Anne!" But Steph chewed her lip. "We...talked."

And heard the implied avoidance. "And?"

"We...kissed. A lot. He kissed me, I mean," Steph hurried to clarify, "and I didn't know what to do! So I just let him."

Anne winked. "How was it?"

Stephanie turned to the wall and studied the quiet, calm face she saw in the mirror. It seemed so controlled, so detached from the rolling intensity of her emotions.

"Well?" Anne blurted out.

She thought about the feeling of Danny, so close to her body.

In the mirror, the face began to smile.

-

Tom was flipping wearily through the channels, his feet up on the coffee table.

'You look so fucking bored,' she thought at him. 'Is it because you're stuck with me? And not out with your slut?'

He saw her watching him, smiled, and yawned. "Busy day," he said with apology in his voice.

"Hmm." She went back to her knitting. 'Well,' she thought at him, 'I had a busy day, too.'

And she squirmed.

-

Danny's hands defined her body.

They were big hands. Everything about Danny made Tom look small. Well, besides his stomach...

Every touch was electric. Every kiss drew blood.

And he kept making her dance with his fingers. He worked her up to a mindless peak, while he alternated between pushing those full lips to her neck and just watching her with those glorious eyes.

This was Stephanie's third time with Danny, and she was still mezmerized by the impossible rapture that he could create within her. It was the most pleasurable and physically fulfilling thing she'd ever experienced.

In spite of the power of her attraction to this new man, she'd fought off the urge to give in until the Tuesday after those first kisses, when Anne had sent her new pictures of her husband dancing with his mystery woman, clearly wearing the suit he'd put on that morning. She'd called his cell, he'd answered, and when she asked about work he'd lied to her...telling her he was still there.

She knew. He was dancing. With that bitch.

Stephanie had asked him so many times to take her dancing...

Well, if she were honest, she was now in many ways grateful that he'd failed her so terribly. His indiscretion had paved the way for her time with Danny. and that was a revelation.

It was amazing. It was multiorgasmic. Tom? He couldnt do a tenth of what Danny did to her. She was still heartbroken by the loss of their marriage, but she also couldn't imagine going back. Certainly not spending the rest of her life under that tired, weakened weight as it struggled to move in and out of her. Tom had always worked himself too hard for their financial survival, but she had suffered the consequences as much as he.

No. Her heart was broken, but Stephanie was devoted to escaping that pain by embracing her newfound passion for that simplest of pleasures.

She was drinking more, too. She would go out with Anne and an assortment of men and women, and Danny would come along as her boyfriend. It was fun. It felt good. It felt like losing control.

-

Lucidity comes in waves. Two days after reflecting on her joyous freedom, Stephanie called Anne with tears in her eyes.

"I just wanted to say thank you," she said. "You saved my life. After what Tom did..." Her voice still caught at the thought of her husbands betrayal, "...I was destroyed. You helped me realize that not only could I survive, but I could thrive. I could really be ME for the first time in my life."

Anne seemed strangely subdued. "Uh, yeah..." She paused. "Listen, I was thinking...maybe it'd be a good idea to cool it. just for a while. I..." Stephanie frowned as Anne started to sound genuinely upset. "I'm just worried that-"

Outside, a car honked.

"Oh, sorry," Stephanie scurried towards the door. "Danny's here! We're going to the lake. I'll call tonight."

"Steph-"

But she was gone. And she didn't call that night. Or the next day. As Steph fell more and more into her new, wild self...she thoughshoes and less about her old life

-

She sat across the table from Tom, fighting a smirk as she thought about the relaxed, if sore, warmth in her nethers.

'I hate you,' she thought across the table. But she was taken aback to realize how untrue that felt

She tried again, and only felt guilt. What was wrong with her? He had cheated on her! Lied! Stolen!

Yes. He had. But, she finally realized, that didn't prevent her from loving him.

She suddenly felt sick. What had she done? It had been so fun, the past three weeks, to let herself be free. To do things she'd never done, and to enjoy them beyond all understanding. But when she thought about the upcoming separation, she knew that she didn't want it. Tom was her other half! Why hadn't she talked to him? Why-

"Oh," he said, looking up at her with that weary old man face, "don't let me forget...I need to talk with you Tuesday about next month. There's some important news I need to share."

She thought about his cruise, and his whore, and his plans to lie to her about a business trip.

"Sure, honey," she forced a smile.

'One way or another, this is going to come to an end.'

-

Coming out of the Rusty Wheel, she leaned on Danny's embrace and giggled.

This had become one of their favorite places to go. Hardly anyone was there during the day, and Danny was happy to dance her the way Tom had always said he couldn't. She loved the thought that she was getting more use out of her husband's secret love nest than he was. And she was certainly getting more pleasure than his girlfriend could possibly be getting.

She was drunk, and horny, and when the friend that Danny had introduced and she had danced with joined them in the car, she felt no reservation.

She only felt the intoxicating excitement of anticipation.

-

She had expected a couch sit-down talk, so she was surprised when Tom showed up in a tux and asked her to put on a dress.

"Where are we going?" she asked.

"To the Rusty Wheel. I need to own up to something, and that seems like the right place to do it."

'Well,' she thought, 'if he thinks he's going to be safer there, he's got another thing coming.' And she called Danny from her closet, telling him and Jamie to meet her there. She imagined revealing her newfound sexual freedom, watching her new lovers beat her cheater husband into the ground, and then leaving for a night of glorious release.

Danny, naturally, loved the idea.

Things were silent on the way. Tom tried to make conversation, and even seemed upbeat at first, but grew concerned as Stephanie refused to engage.

'You just wait, you bastard.' And she stared out the window, unnerved by the panic she felt now that the moment was at hand.

At the restaurant, she steered them towards a table where Danny would be able to easily see her. But before she could start her attack, she was stunned to see Tom's mystery woman and a well dressed man come over and sit down with them.

"Hi," the woman said warmly.

Stephanie didn't respond. What on earth? Was this man their lawyer? Amazingly, her chest tightened with the realization that this was the end.

But it only got stranger. "Honey," Tom smiled, "this is Amanda and Kevin Masterson. My confession is that they have been teaching me to dance for the last three months." His smile grew. "I was taking lessons when I said I was working late, so that I could learn in anticipation for tonight..." He reached out and touched her hand. "Our anniversary."

Stephanie was in shock, and confused. Dance lessons? Tonight was their anniversary? This had to be wrong. All she managed was, "What?"

Amanda hugged her "husband." "We host couples' dance lessons here on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Tom showed up alone, which we don't usually accept, but when he explained what he had planned we just had to say yes! Anyway," she motioned to her husband and they stood to go, "we just wanted to meet you. After all this time, we had to at least say hi." She gave a wink. "He's worked really hard, hon. He even danced with my Kevin a time or two! And he's gotten pretty damn good! You'll see." With a nod at Tom, they left.

Stephanie stared at nothing, trying to figure out what was happening. Tom was looking at her, somewhere between proud and concerned. For some reason, she couldn't stand him looking at her.

"Excuse me," she stood up. "I...I'll be right back."

Before he could reply, she was moving towards the door. In the entryway, trying to calm down, she noticed a paper on the peg board.

Dance lessons! Tuesdays and Thursdays! Contact Amanda or Kevin at...

With growing horror, she realized that she had walked past that sign for weeks. Had even noticed the clip art dancing couple on the corner.

She'd just been too distracted by her lover.

Stephanie felt sick. Could this really be happening? Had he really...

She called Anne. "Tell me the truth."

Her friend was silent a long time. "You know, don't you?"

"Tell me!"

"I followed him again two weeks ago. I wanted to get evidence for the...for you." There was a sob. "That's when I learned the truth." She paused, then blurted out, "I tried to tell you! you wouldn't-"

"What about the kisses? The story about-"

"I exaggerated!" Her friend was crying. "I was so sure! And I knew you would let him walk all over you if you thought there was a chance. Please, Steph, I was only trying to he-"

Stephanie hung up. Oh god. Oh god.

He hadn't cheated. He hadn't betrayed her. He was still only hers, as he had always been.

But she...oh, she.

She could never be 'his' again, could she? Even if he never knew the truth. Even if she could force herself to fake it for another thirty years.

And that's what it would be now, wasn't it? faking. Playing the uptight role she had created for herself, while remembering how perfectly pleasurable wild sex had been, for that one beautiful month. Knowing how she yearned to be wild again, but having to live in the tightly-constructed house she had so foolishly built. Feeling alone. Being, really, alone...as all liars are.

Assuming, of course, he never found out.

She began to cry.

What were her options? She did still love her Tom...and knew that, as the truth of his fidelity began to sink in, that love would grow even more into what it once had been. But could she live without the free and passionate hedonism of the last four weeks? Without the lust? The toned, well-muscled playground? Could she introduce some of those new things into a marriage that she had always actively kept them out of, without creating suspicion? Would it be the same, teaching 40-year old Tom what 27-year old Danny did with natural ease?

Well he'd learned to dance, hadn't he? He'd worked hard and risked humiliation, to give her what she'd always wanted. Because he loved her so.

Sure. He did that...while she gave someone else everything she had to give.