Truth & Consequences: the Other Half

I'd like to thank capecodmercury for his permission to use his characters. This story is based on the story, Truth & Consequences, which I recommend highly. It was a letter by a wife, who had cheated, to her husband. It detailed her actions and feelings during and after she was caught with her lover. This story is *my* take on the husband's response. It in no way reflects the feelings of the original author, in fact it is probably the exact opposite. It would probably help if you read capecodmercury's story first.

Thank you for your time. I look forward to your comments.

I was sitting in the small kitchen of the little apartment I'd rented a month ago when there was a knock at the door. Even though it took no time to get to the door by the time I opened it there was no one there. I looked down and saw an envelope with my name typed on the front. Picking it up, I closed the door and moved to the couch.

With trembling hands I opened the envelope and found a typewritten letter. I wondered who would be dropping a letter at my door and why they didn't wait for me to answer. As I looked at the first paragraph it all became clear.

***

Janet,

I hope this letter finds you well. In spite of everything I do not wish you ill.

I must say that I was surprised to find you had moved out but I probably should not have been. Everything you've done for the past year has been for you and you alone. Your moving out was just the last in a long string of actions that proved the most important person in your life is you.

I read your letter with mixed emotions. As much as I was angry with you for what you did to our marriage I wanted to try to work things out between us. I didn't realize that I was treating you as badly as you made out but I will concede the point since I'm not seeing the world through your eyes. Maybe it would have been better if you had moved out in September, then I wouldn't have abused you so much.

I do regret using you for sex as I did. That was wrong. I was trying to see if I could ever have relations with you again with the memory of your betrayal constantly on my mind. The problem was I could only perform if I imagined you to be someone else. When you were 'seducing' me I felt sick. I thought of you and Jeff, doing the things to him that you were doing to me and I got cold inside. My problem is that I was weak. I've always thought you were the most beautiful woman in the world and there you were, doing everything you could to get me aroused, and my body betrayed me. You are right in your assessment that I used you as a toy, a plaything. If you were going to use your body to entice me I certainly wasn't going to turn you down.

I tried, I really did, to get into making love to you, but every time I did I felt my anger rise and my excitement wane. The only way I could continue was to treat you as a virtual stranger and the sex as just that, sex. I was no longer making love to my wife of many years; I was having sex with a beautiful partner who had aroused me. I tried to make it good for you, to see that you were satisfied as well but you are correct, there was no intimacy. The intimacy we had was shattered by you and Jeff and wasn't going to be regained over night. You thought you could get me to forgive you by having sex with me but you were pushing me away since it was sex that got us into the mess we were in. Rather than let me heal at my own pace you had to inject your schedule into my grief.

You say, continuously throughout your letter, that you understand how you hurt our marriage and me but based on the content of your letter I seriously doubt that. If you did you'd have understood why I had to grieve for what I'd lost before I could move on. You couldn't see my hurt at losing the marriage I cherished. You couldn't see the hurt I felt at the betrayal of our marriage vows by the person I had thought was my best friend. All you saw was the anger and cold in my eyes and you wondered why I couldn't forgive you. You hit upon the reason yourself, but you still don't realize it. I quote from your letter; "When you told me that you wanted to try to save our marriage, I jumped at the chance. I would have agreed to anything that you wanted. But, even then, I did not do it for us. I did it for me."

You see Janet, everything that happened, everything you've done has been for you. You told me in your letter you were being selfish and I agree. You told me that the reason you were tempted was because you were lonely and feeling sorry for yourself, these are your words, not mine. You say that at the time of your affair we were both working long hours and not making time for each other and that my call to tell you I would be delayed was when you lost it. I guess I can understand your frustration as I was frustrated too. I was missing my loving wife who I planned to grow old with. I was missing my lover and taking matters in hand so to speak until I could be with you again.

What I don't understand is why this frustration would cause you to fall off the fidelity wagon so easily. It's not as if we had been arguing constantly. It's not as if we hadn't been in contact every day of my trip and professed our love for each other. I agree that we had become comfortable in our marriage. I thought that was a good thing. I didn't ignore you nor did I treat you like I was taking you for granted. We were in a period of greater than usual workload in both our jobs. If working a lot and not seeing each other for a few weeks was the catalyst for cheating then our marriage meant a lot less to you than I thought it did.

What you don't know is that I too met an old lover on my trip. I ran into Marge on my next to last day away. She was in the lobby of my hotel and she noticed me standing at the reception desk getting my messages. She came over and tapped me on the shoulder. I turned and saw the woman who I had been very serious about during our first two years at college. We dated exclusively for almost a year before I asked her to marry me but she turned me down. She said she wasn't ready to settle down as she wanted to establish her career before she even thought about marriage.

I really thought at the time that I could deal with just dating her but the rejection played on my mind and we broke up about six months later. I met you soon after that and all thoughts of Marge left my mind. I fell for you like a ton of bricks and my feelings for you only grew from there, at least until you went to that convention and met Jeff that first time.

Anyway Marge and I had dinner that night and we flirted a bit, she more than me, but we both flirted. It was fun to see her again and some of my old feelings for her came back. She had matured very nicely, the years had been kind to her in that respect. I found out that she was now divorced and had been for the past two years. She mentioned that she and her ex grew apart after a while but they were still friends and saw each other socially a few times a year. I told her about you and our marriage and how happy I was with my lot in life.

After dinner there was a band in the hotel and we danced and had a few more drinks. I admit it, I was enjoying myself with a woman who wasn't my wife but since we had been so close I didn't see anything wrong in doing so. I'm ashamed to say that during our dancing I got an erection and though I tried to hide it I'm sure Marge noticed. All too soon the evening came to an end and we walked to the elevator together. Marge was staying two floors below me so, being the gentleman that I am, I walked her to her door. All of a sudden she was in my arms and kissing me very passionately. I was stunned at first but a second or two later I gently moved away from her. I told her that I couldn't do what she wanted because I was happily married and I wouldn't do anything to damage the relationship between my wife and I. She had noticed the erection in my pants and hinted that at least a part of me was interested. I told her that she was very beautiful and if I wasn't married I would have been more than happy to continue. I thanked her for a lovely evening and turned to the elevator. She called my name and I halted, turning around. She told me that my wife was a lucky woman to have a man like me. I smiled, thinking about you and told her that I was the lucky one.

When I got to my room I again took matters in hand to relieve the frustrations Marge had invoked but the only woman in my thoughts that night was you. The next night was when I called you to let you know my trip was being extended. The frustration we both felt was palpable that night but never in a million years could I have imagined what would happen while you were away. It is said that men think with their little head, and that may be true for some men, but it seems you were thinking with the big hole between your legs since you all but had a sign around your neck advertising your availability. I truly believe, after everything you told me in your letter, if you hadn't met Jeff there would have been some other man enjoying your charms at that convention. You told me you were frustrated and lonely, a perceptive man would have picked up on that given how beautiful you are, Jeff was just the first to get to you. I can't blame Jeff for reacting to the blatant signals you were giving off if he was the least bit interested. I can, and do, blame you for giving off those signals.

What has really soured me on you and our marriage is how easily, and continuously, you lied to me. I questioned you on your absence when I called and rather than tell me the truth, that you had met an old friend, you lied to me about your whereabouts. Was I such an ogre that I would begrudge you time with an old friend, even a male one? I trusted you! I knew you were the love of my life and would never hurt me as I would never hurt you. I had no reason to even consider that you would want to be with someone else until the evidence was too great to ignore.

I didn't want to believe that you were being unfaithful, that you could even consider it. I spent hours considering what you had told me and how I could be misinterpreting the 'facts' as I saw them. I wanted to give you every benefit of the doubt. I really tried to convince myself that I was wrong to be suspicious about you. However, time and time again the only theory that fit the facts was that you were lying to me. Once I came to that realization the fact that you were being unfaithful was then next logical progression. What other reason could there be to lie to me? I thought we could tell each other anything so you being unfaithful would be the only thing you wouldn't want to tell me.

I spent the rest of your trip in a severe depression. My world had just collapsed and everything I thought was good and true was built on a lie. I wondered what had happened to the woman I married, the woman who was my best friend? Do you have any idea how it feels to have your best friend betray you? You probably don't since it has never happened to you. I sincerely hope it never does since I wouldn't wish the hurt I feel on my worst enemy. I mourned my loss and the years I felt I had wasted being blissfully ignorant that the woman I loved more than anything was living a secret life outside our marriage.

Once I progressed through the stages of grief I knew I had to protect myself from further hurt by gathering evidence of your infidelity. By doing that I was able to regain some of the self-respect I had lost by your desire for another man. You told me that my abilities in the bedroom were not the reason for your infidelity but I doubt that is true no matter how much you want to convince yourself otherwise. If the sex hadn't been better, at least in some way, you wouldn't have gone back that second night. I don't know if it was the combination of a former lover and the frustration you felt that caused you to fall the first time but think I could have forgiven that, I really believe I could, if you'd been honest with me. You didn't stop after one time; you went back again and again, the whole time lying to me about how bored you were and how much you were missing me.

Somewhere, deep in your soul, Jeff gave you something I wasn't giving you and since you kept going back I can only guess I never could. You were getting your needs taken care of outside of our marriage and no true friend would ever do that. Character is sometimes defined as how one thinks and acts when no one is watching. I always thought your character was beyond question but I now know you failed the test of character when it came your turn to be tested.

You mentioned that I seemed no different to you after your return from that first trip and that emboldened you to assume that I was not suspicious of you. I admit I was a better actor than I thought since I wasn't sure I could pull off treating you the same as I always had after I came to grips with the fact that you had cheated. Even after all of this soul searching I didn't want to throw away our many years of marriage. The years and been good and while I was extremely disappointed and angry that you had cheated I was willing to forgive and forget if you showed no signs of continuing the affair. How I determined that you hadn't stopped contact with Jeff you've already figured out. I was able to access your email accounts, both at home and at work, and I monitored you. You may consider this monitoring an invasion of your privacy and I would too if you hadn't already violated the sanctity of our marriage. Trust but verify became my mantra. As I verified that my trust was not warranted more and more of my suspicions became certainties.

It was obvious from Jeff's first email, innocuous as it was, that something more than two old friends going out for dinner had taken place. While I had hoped that you would realize what you had done was wrong and would tell Jeff not to contact you again that did not happen. It was quite obvious from your replies that you were flattered by the attention he paid you and that you did nothing to discourage him. It was at this point, in my opinion, that you stepped over another line by bringing the affair home. While it was bad enough that you cheated while you were at the convention we are all human and subject to human frailties. As I said before, I think I could have gotten past that if I had been assured by your communication with Jeff that you were truly sorry and would not allow the affair to continue. When you didn't immediately shut Jeff down I knew then that nothing I could do would matter. My best friend had 'died' and in her place was a lying, cheating slut who was playing me for a fool.

You had the gall to tell me in your letter that the excitement you got from this cybersex exchange with Jeff was brought home to me through better and more frequent lovemaking. What was really happening was I was getting sloppy cyber-seconds from good old Jeff and he was laughing at me behind my back. The more explicit the emails became, from both of you, the deeper the knife you stuck in my heart went. By the time the second convention came around I knew that you were going to be with him again so I vowed to catch you in the act and end this charade on my terms.

Given what you planned to do I don't know why you even bothered to ask me to go with you on that trip. Maybe it was a cry for help that I ignored, and from your point of view it was, but I saw it very differently. I saw it as an attempt to deflect any suspicions I may have had about your trip. After all, if you asked me to go along you couldn't be planning to do something I would not approve of. You have the audacity to question my motives now that you know I planned to catch you in the act. Like every other cheater who is caught it is always partially the other partner's fault this happened. I did nothing to stop you when I knew what you were going to do so *I'm* the bad guy and you question my love for you.

I suppose that you are right to question my love for you based on my actions that day. I admit it I didn't love you then, nor do I now. I very much love the woman I married but you are no longer that woman. You'd grown or matured or changed into the person who would use the excuse of overwork and sexual frustration to justify an affair. The Janet I married wouldn't even consider doing what you did. The Janet I married and fell in love with would sacrifice herself before she would hurt her mate, as I would have done for you before Jeff came into your life. Once you took Jeff into your bed and your body you forfeited the devotion I had for you and you became another person, one I didn't like and didn't want to be around.

In your letter you asked me why I never confronted you with your lies after that first trip. You were at least honest enough to say that even if I had you might not have come clean but since I did not I was now complicit in your affair. I'm very sorry Janet but that is just another way of placing the blame for your actions on someone else. We are all individuals and as such we are responsible for our actions. It was you who made the choice to cheat. It was you who made the choice to lie about where you were. It was you who responded to Jeff's initial email and it was you who went to the convention with plans to get together there to continue your affair. Please, if you do nothing else, take responsibility for your own actions and don't expect me to have stopped you from doing something you didn't consult me on before you did it the first time. If you had called from the convention that first night and told me how lonely and frustrated you were I would have dropped everything and flown to be with you. You did not. You didn't think about our many years of marriage at all once the old feelings for Jeff came back to you. You seem to have blamed the alcohol you drank that night for lowering your resistance to Jeff's advances and maybe it did. But if you were not receptive to those advances in the first place, unless Jeff raped you, there was no way the alcohol would have made you have sex with him.

You blame me for acting normal around you while knowing that Jeff was pursuing you via his emails. While I was aware of what was going on it doesn't lessen the fact that as long as I was showing you that I was blissfully ignorant of your cheating ways there was no need for you to stop. You claim you were feeling guilty the whole time you were corresponding with Jeff but the guilt you felt couldn't have been too great since it never once stopped you from continuing, did it? No, whatever guilt you felt was overridden by the excitement of the affair and the secret life you were leading outside of our marriage. I didn't stop you because you no longer deserved my compassion. You took all the years of our marriage, all the good times we had and all of the wonderful lovemaking we did and threw everything in the gutter. Why would I show any kind of consideration to a person who could do that to a friend? With friends like you Janet, I don't need enemies.

Right up to the night you moved out I still held out hope that we could work things out despite my feelings for you up to that time. You asked me to go to counseling and I told you I wasn't ready. By the comment in your letter you interpreted that as I wouldn't go. That was not the case. I wasn't ready to discuss our problems with an outsider yet. I hadn't come to terms with my anger and I knew that going to counseling in that frame of mind would be counterproductive. You weren't happy with the pace of my progress though. You seemed to have thought that since you had worked through everything in your mind and were ready to move forward that I should have been as well.

No one can know when a person is ready to move past an event like we experienced but the person who has experienced it. If YOU truly loved me as much as you claimed in your letter you would have waited for me to heal. Because I was not ready you accuse me of abusing you. I never once raised my voice or my hand to you. I did not berate you nor throw your affair in your face every day. I was hurting! You claim to be so apologetic about the hurt you caused but you couldn't see that I was hurting since you were too busy feeling sorry for yourself at getting caught. Even now, after only six months since I caught you with your lover, you tell me that you aren't going to wait forever for me to get over your betrayal. You ask me why I don't want to fight for our marriage but I was not the one who threw it away for a few hours of illicit pleasure. You ask me to justify my actions to you when my actions were not what led us into the situation in which we find ourselves. You said that saving our marriage requires action from both of us, that you can not do it alone. You are right and neither can I save the marriage alone and that is what I am, now that you have left.