Three's a Circle Not a Triangle

Everything changes for the better when a new neighbor moves in across the street.

Obviously, as evident by his intense interest in his new neighbor, William's marriage to Liz was over. Dead for a long time and living a lie, they maintained a happy facade for the sake of their friends, their neighbors, their children, and for the rest of the family, especially over the holidays. Maybe because he was older and fed up with the charade of being nice to people he didn't like, but the holidays, always a difficult time, were especially exhausting this year.

Not wanting to show a public display of affection for his wife, he spent the day at her parents' house and at his parents' house avoiding the mistletoe. With them visiting the relatives and no one visiting them, they didn't even bother with decorating a Christmas tree. There used to be a time when they looked forward to Christmas but now it's just another day.

Always looking forward to giving than receiving, buying Christmas gifts used to be exciting. Now Christmas gifts was more an awkwardly uncomfortable chore than it was a pleasurable exchange. He remembered those times when he surprised her with a vacation trip, a mink coat, and a puppy. Now he just goes through the motions. He buys her things that she wants and needs, instead of buying her things that he'd like her to have and she buys him the same stuff every year. Christmas once exciting is now boring.

"Merry Christmas Liz," he said kissing her cheek after giving her diamond earrings, Donna Karen Cashmere perfume, 2 flannel nightgowns, an 800 down vest, and a Polartec jacket.

Everything she wanted and asked to have, he bought her, but for a shotgun. He wondered if she was taking up hunting with the flannel, down, and Polartec. He could see her sitting in a blind with shotgun in hand while wearing her diamond earrings, perfume, down vest, and Polartec jacket over her flannel nightgowns while waiting for the ducks and geese to fly by overhead. Only, his wife wasn't a hunter. The only hunting she ever did was when she bagged him. After she married him, she never had to work another day in her life. Living a life of luxury, she wanted for nothing.

Without even having a clue what to buy a woman who has everything and a woman he's known longer than he's been single, he had to ask her hairdresser, her friends, and her sister for hints of what his wife would want for Christmas. He even dared ask his wife what she wanted for Christmas. How absurd was that especially when he always knew what she wanted for Christmas, birthdays, and anniversaries before? No longer interested in pleasing her and in celebrating the holidays with her, even he was embarrassed by his lack of knowledge, concern, and consideration for his wife. His lack of feelings were highlighted, spotlighted, and culminated with the advent of Christmas in the selection of a Christmas gift for her that she picked out and asked him to buy her. With no surprises and joy, there was no fun in shopping for gifts and wrapping presents.

"Merry Christmas William," she said handing him his yearly $100 gift card to Starbucks, renewed subscription to Penthouse and Playboy magazines, a selection of assorted tools, a bottle of single malt scotch, and Adele CD's. He loved Adele.

Sometimes, when he was alone and especially horny, he masturbated to her CD's as he imagined her singing to him while she's topless. Unlike his wife, Adele has big tits. Only, as soon as she opens her mouth to speak in that God awful Cockney accent that she has, as if she was a hillbilly from Kentucky or Tennessee, she ruins the moment and the image that he has of her as a sexy diva. Still, he loves her voice and her songs erase the misery that he has now living in a loveless marriage.

"Don't talk," he imagine saying to her. "Just sing while I masturbate and feel your big tits Adele."

Beyond wanting to be finally free of Liz and sometimes wishing she was dead as he used to do when they first started drifting apart, he was the one who had already died in living his life or, more appropriately, not living his life while still with her. Now. as if strangers sharing a house and a kitchen, they just coexisted in strained silence. No more small talk. No more belly laughs. No more watching television together and sharing what happened in their days when apart from one another.

Sometimes they go days without seeing and interacting with one another. Now that the kids are gone and busy living their lives, when he could and should be doing things and going places with her, he does everything without her. What many men wish they had, a life free of their wife, he wished he had her in his life again. Only, with too much water under the bridge, he had no idea where to throw out a lifeline to save his broken marriage. Tired of doing things and going places alone, his marriage was a sham and he was wasting his life living with her. He should be happy but he's miserable.

With the holidays finally over, the reality of spending another cold, miserable winter with his cold, miserable wife was something that he dreaded. He hated watching those fucking absurd Cialis commercials with those tall, thin, good looking models laughing and talking while acting as if they're so happy to be with one another before climbing in separate bathtubs. Why separate bathtubs? What is that about? If they're about to have sex, shouldn't they be sitting in the same bathtub? Perhaps because, unlike Viagra, only good for four hours, Cialis stays in a man's system much longer so that he can bathe in his own fucking bathtub to have sex later.

'Assholes. That's just stupid,' he thought every time he saw that commercial.

He was envious of their imagined relationship. He wished he had their imagined life. He wish his wife looked like one of those thin, beautiful models in the commercial, not that his wife is bad looking, she's not but there was something about seeing those models that made him blatantly realize that he was missing out on living his life. Moreover, those models were a good twenty years younger than his wife and he'd love to have an affair with a hot 40-something-year-old woman.

Yet, time and again, every time he saw that commercial he wished his life was more like their portrayed lives. Truth be told, paid actors just playing a part to make old men like him feel sexually frustrated, alone, and lonely, the couples they showed on the Cialis commercials aren't married to one another which is why, no doubt, they look so fucking happy. Always, it hurt his heart to see another couple his age, a bit younger or a bit older, happy to be with one another when he's so alone, sad, and lonely. In reality, he wondered how many times those models were married and how many times they were unfaithful in their marriages. Maybe had he had an affair, he wouldn't feel the way he felt right now, sadly unhappy and depressingly unfulfilled. Maybe had he had an affair, he wouldn't feel as if he was missing something but the same old stuff with a different woman named Helen or Betty instead of Liz.

"I should have had sex with my secretary," he said for no one to hear.

'She was ready and willing. Always giving me the eye, flashing me her panties in up skirts and her bra and cleavage in down blouses, she was always coming on to me. She would have had sex with me right in my office. She wanted me in the way Liz once did and in the way I wish she wanted me now,' he thought while rehashing his inability to cheat on his wife, even in a marriage that was over and had been dead for years.

A difficult step to take, one he never thought he'd go through, the best thing he's ever done and the best sleep he's ever had, was when they decided to have separate bedrooms. Railing against sleeping in separate rooms before, having a good night's sleep now instead of hoping for sex then was a real blessing. Maybe had they had separate bedrooms from the start, they'd still be a couple instead of being estranged while still living in the same house. For merely financial reasons they live together while remaining apart.

"Maybe we should have separate bedrooms," she said nonchalantly without even looking up from her book after he complained that she was snoring all night.

Her words hit him as if they were the final nail in their marriage coffin. 'Til death do you part, he'd rather be dead than to go on living like this. This was no way to live. For a man with his education, career success, and money, he should be having fun. He should be going out with friends, going places, and doing things, just as those models do in those Cialis commercials, instead of hiding in his house.

"Separate bedrooms? Out of the question. I'm not sleeping alone. I can't sleep alone," he said. Something he never thought about before she had him thinking about now.

Able to masturbate in private, now that he sleeps alone, he feels rested and younger instead of feeling tired and old. Instead of trying to fart in silence, now he allows his farts to rip through his pajama bottoms without worry that he'd be waking her and stinking up the room. Yet, sadly, not even privy to seeing her remove her clothes to change into her nightgown, as if closing the lid on the coffin of their zombie like relationship and dead marriage, it was then that he realized that their marriage was finally and officially over.

Mourning the loss of her in his life as if she had died, even though she was right there every day, he didn't know how to fix what was broken between them. Just as he couldn't remember when they shared a belly laugh in the way they used to always do, he couldn't remember the last time they had a real conversation. Always strained, disjointed, and truncated by interruptions and their thoughts in desires going off in different directions instead of jointly meeting somewhere in the middle, their conversations always ended with her bitching at him and him walking away in frustration. He was the type who'd leave rather than argue, a peculiarity for a lawyer to flee a confrontation without first arguing his case and pleading for her indulgence and mercy. Only with all of his appeals exhausted, trying to argue with her was a mute point and a nolo contendere decision.

Even though they slept in separate bedrooms now for a few years, as if she's no longer of this Earth, he still mourns the loss of his wife in his life. He misses the way his life once was with her always so happy to see him and to please him. With no one to talk to except for his friends and neighbors, unable to share the secrets he once dared to share with his wife, he's lonely. For so long his wife was his best friend, his lover, and his companion and now there's no word for what they are. They're nothing. They're over. Just as he doesn't care where she goes and what she does, she doesn't care about him either.

Still feeling that she was in his life because he saw her every day, unlike a divorce the sorrow of her not there anymore has yet to hit him. Nonetheless, with no one to cuddle and no one to spoon, he's grown cold without her warm body there in his bed to let him know that he's not alone. He wished things were the way they once were before they had children and with the responsibility and expense of maintaining this big, empty house. Once thinking he was so handy that he could fix anything, a lawyer who could unravel any problem and give advice to any stranger for a perfect solution, he was at a loss how to fix his own marriage and how to continue communicating with his own wife. He was baffled by his wife and troubled with his life. A diversion from his misery, he didn't know what else to do other than to lust over his new neighbor.

'She's a real beauty,' he thought continuing to watch his new neighbor from his office window. 'She has big tits too, at least a D cup, maybe even a double D cup.'

Torn between thinking of Liz and watching this neighbor, he mindlessly watched his neighbor while trying to figure out what to do with his wife. How could something that burned so hot for so long turn so cold overnight? She treated him as if he had an affair when he hasn't. A line he's never crossed, yeah sure, he looks at other women while imagining what they'd be like in bed but he never touches, solicits, and/or propositions anyone, even though he's had plenty of opportunity to do so.

When they first met, Liz was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen. Unable to eat, sleep, and breath without her, never had he wanted to be with a woman as much as he wanted to spend his life with her. Tall, striking, and shapely, even now, three and a half decades later, she still casts a sexy silhouette and dark shadow over him that he can't escape. Truth be told, even though she's been a real bitch to him lately, he still loves her. He still wants her. He still wants to stay married to her but not like this.

Even now with just a look, a laugh, or a smile, he sees glimpses of the woman he fell in love with and the woman she once was, fun, funny, and exciting. No doubt, for the love of her, she's made him a better man, albeit now a sexually frustrated and confounded man. What he thought he'd have in her as a companion later in life when he retired, she acts as if she doesn't even like him, never mind love him. He had no idea how to fix what was broken.

There was a time, especially when they first met, that they couldn't keep their hands and lips off of one another. Having sex day and night when they were first married and continuing like that for three, happy years, he noticed a change in her when she became pregnant with their first child. Maybe it was hormonal, maybe it was motherly instincts, and/or maybe it was a path that she had to walk to continue on with her life but, whatever the reason, she changed for good. Taking much of the blame himself then, he wasn't so free to blame all of it on himself now, especially now that he's seen a different side of her, an angrier and bitchier side, and a side he's never seen before.

It was when he was building his career and making his mark, his reputation, and his name that they drifted apart. With him working long hours, he was never home. A difficult time for both of them, understandably, with her priorities changed too, she was more focused on her baby then on him. More than that, as if watching her with her child from afar, feeling detached and excluded instead of included, it was then that he faded from her attention and from being the spotlight of her attention to being just a blip on her radar screen.

He wasn't the one who had given birth and, instinctively, she was unable to include him in all that she felt while holding, breast feeding, and caring for her child. Instead of being her lover, he was relegated to being her husband and the father of their children, a role that he wasn't ready to play all day and every day just yet. He still wanted to be her lover.

What should have strengthened their marriage, having children, albeit three demanding and all consuming, ungrateful, little being, it was then that their marriage began to suffer and crumple. The strong foundation they once had quickly eroded with outside pressures, complications of interfering grandmothers, and mandatory invitations to see relatives he'd rather not see. In between all of that was all the cross country and international trips he was required to take and the long hours he had to work. Ready to breakup on the rocks, his marriage was adrift on stormy seas.

As if they were stranded and marooned on an deserted island and so alone with their bad selves, he watched her and their children fade from sight while he paddled off for work. Gone for days on business trips, with his children walking and talking without him sharing the joy of their first steps and first words, he missed so very much of all that happened in his absence. With his mind on the legal issues of others, even when he was there with her and their children, it was obvious by their strained interactions that he was no longer an integral part of their life and of this family. Half a world away, with London, Tokyo, Hong Kong, and Beijing waking up when he was going to sleep, his attention was always somewhere else. With his mind filled with other things, his focused attention changed from her to his work.

With the romance over, an exciting blip that didn't nearly last as long as he hoped it would and as long as their marriage promised to last, he felt cheated that he only had one, short, albeit exciting ride on the big rollercoaster of his quickly fading and changing life. Seemingly, by the joy she still has in her children and now her grandchildren, something that makes him feel even more detached, disconnected, and alienated, she's just beginning her fun at the amusement park with her family by her side, while he's wandering off alone and without being there to experience all the fun and pleasure. Being that he's been the one paying for all of their admissions to the fun fair, never able to relax enough to experience their fun because of his high pressure job, he was on the outside looking in while watching his family do all the things that he wished he could do.

"What about me? When is it my turn? I'm tired of working so hard for all the things I miss," he said with sadness.

'No one said that life would be fair,' he thought to himself while watching his new neighbor carrying in personal items from her car.

'Damn, she's such a beautiful woman. Maybe because she's so tall, blonde, and busty, she reminds me of how Shannon Tweed, Gene Simmons wife, used to look before she got old and had that ridiculous facelift.'

Too late now. By the time Liz focuses her attention back on him, if ever, he'll be too old to care. The grieving widow, he'll be dead and buried by then. Just one more time, he'd like to have one last, long ride on the rollercoaster of his sexual life while throwing up his arms in the air, screaming with joy, and cumming with excitement.

While imagining her naked and in bed with him, he watched his neighbor walking around outside and instructing the movers what to do. Just one more time, he'd love to know what it felt like to make love to a woman as beautiful and as sexually exciting as Liz was back then and as beautiful as his neighbor is now. He wished he could go back in time to relive their romance to figure what went wrong. Was it just living too busy of a life that interrupted and ruined their love affair? Whether it was with Liz or with someone else, just one last time, he'd love to have another chance at a love affair before he died.

In an out of her house carrying things, he watched his new neighbor open her car door to lean her hot body inside her small car. Away from the view of the movers but in direct view of his office window, he watched her short skirt climb higher as she reached longer. She had nice stems, the nicest legs his seen in a long while.

"Bend just a little more honey and you'll give me an up skirt shot of your panties, that is, if you're even wearing any."

Just as he thought that, flashing him her bright, white bikini panties, she leaned all the way in her car to get something, a pair of jeans.

"Now where are you going to change into those?" He watched her sit in her car seat, kick off her shoes, and put on her jeans beneath her short skirt. Then, removing her skirt, she abandoned her shoes for her sneakers. "I have a feeling that this neighbor is going to give me a nightly, striptease show," he said. "Exhibitionist woman, meet voyeuristic man."

Now that they barely speak to one another, he's taken residence upstairs with the dog and she lives downstairs with her damn, spoiled, special diet of a cat. Much in the way she's grown to be, with the cat being so fussy, the dog will eat anything and everything put down in front of him, be it dog food, cat food, or cat poop. He couldn't imagine living the rest of his life like this, alone with his bad self in a room with the dog as if they're caged animals at the zoo. Yet, things could be worse. Better than getting a divorce and splitting everything he worked so hard to amass in half while paying exorbitant legal fees for something that he could do himself, at least they don't argue.