Definitely not a stroke story and definitely not the usual fare you find here. You have been warned.
Not a day goes by without my thinking of that day. Nor do I ever expect a day to pass without recalling it. I remember the events in exact detail.
It started less than a week before that day. Doug had returned from a business trip early Sunday afternoon. He is a superlative salesman and this trip was his most successful ever. The commission he earned from this sale would have paid off the remaining 25 years of our mortgage in a single payment. In spite of the magnitude of the success, he was acting strangely. He had trouble meeting my eyes and he was very quiet. I asked him what was wrong but he denied that there were any problems.
It is not in his nature to lie and he is very bad at keeping things from me. I didn't even have to press him. On Sunday night he came clean.
"You know the kinds of things I have to do to connect with the clients, to lubricate the social wheels. Well, the client wanted to celebrate so they took us to a tittie bar. I objected, but that was what they wanted to do and you pretty much have to keep the client happy."
"That's your big problem? They took you to a strip club? What happened, did they get you a lap dance?"
"No. I refused. But they took the party back to the hotel and they hired one of the strippers for a private party. I was drinking along with them and it became more difficult for me to argue against it. Well, it seems they paid her to do more than strip. Both of them and Tom fucked her. I wasn't interested in any of that but it was kind of hot."
I was kind of hot. I was getting ready to tear into him but I decided to wait. It might not have been as bad as my imagination.
"Then everybody was saying it was my turn and I absolutely refused. She came over, put her arms around me and rubbed her naked body against me. It was very sexy but I still told them I wouldn't cheat on you."
That sounded like Doug. So why was he still telling me this story?
"And then Larry, the guy who signs the contract, said okay, they wouldn't do anything that would hurt my marriage, they wouldn't force me to cheat on you. But he said she could give me a blowjob; the President said that wasn't cheating, it wasn't sex. I argued, but they all kept pushing for her to give me a blowjob. And, well, you know it's easier to do something in a group that you would never do by yourself. So I gave in and let her blow me. I felt terrible about it when I woke up and I just couldn't keep it from you."
"The President says it's not sex so you get a free pass?" I was almost shouting.
"Well, no. I told you I felt terrible about it. I'm really sorry. I'd do anything if I could take it back. I'll do anything to make it up to you."
"There isn't anything you can do to make it up to me you bastard. You cheated on me." I confess that I was about as angry as I have ever been. How could the love of my life do that to me? I had never, would never cheat on him. "There isn't anything you can do, but I can. You're going to pay for this." I walked out of the room and started to consider what I was going to do to get even with him.
The first thing I did was to move his pillow to the guest bedroom. I banished him there for the rest of the week. I decided upon a course of revenge and made all the arrangements in the ensuing days. I set the plan in motion at lunch on Saturday; I snuck some sleeping pills into his coffee. He told me he was tired and was going up to take a nap.
I took the baby up to the nursery and put her down for her nap. She would sleep the remainder of the afternoon.
I gave him an hour and then checked in on him. He was dead to the world. I took the rope I had bought during the week and methodically tied him to the bed. I tightened all the ropes at the end in case he woke up but he was too far under to even stir. I fastened them so snugly that he couldn't possibly free himself. Then I made the phone call.
I went down and unlocked the front door and returned to the bedroom to wait for him to wake up. I read a book while I waited. It took another hour.
"What the hell have you done, Helen?" I can't move. What's going on here?"