Live from the Game Ch. 05

"Have you heard from Jordan since?"

"Just once, right after Crystal had fired me. He called to bitch at me. His wife had had a video of us delivered, as well as video of the kiss cam from Wrigley field. He was very very angry – I guess I can't blame him for being upset, but he was more angry at Ryan than anything. He said Ryan had been in his apartment, posing as a buyer. He recognized him instantly. I remember saying that if that were true, then Jordan was a lucky man, because I would have expected Ryan to take his head off. I guess it was just curiosity for Ryan. Somehow he must have planted a camera or something, or maybe Jordan was recording our trysts, I don't know. All I know is that Ryan some how got hold of it. It was mentioned at the divorce hearings, but I never saw it and I have no desire to. I dread to think what I might have said. We said things that heightened the sexual tension, but neither one of us meant them. I know at some point I told Jordan I was fantasizing about him while making love with Ryan."

"And were you?"

There was a moment silence.

"I did once. It destroyed the entire love making session with Ryan for me. I had to fake everything because just that once, when it happened, the guilt almost overwhelmed me. I knew right then I had to push that compartmentalizing even more – I couldn't even think about Jordan or what we'd done at home, or I'd collapse. Doing it while having sex – no, making love – with Ryan, that just wasn't going to happen again. I know it really sounds self-serving, but I just didn't want to even think about Jordan and our...adventures, while I was in bed with Ryan. I just wanted to be there, with him, feeling the love and safety and all the rest he made me feel."

"You are right, it does sound a bit self serving and ret-conning history."

"I know, but there's not much else I can say. That's what I felt when it happened. Whether anyone believes me, well, I can't make them believe me. I can't make Ryan believe me. I can only say what I was thinking and feeling at the time. What's even worse is that Ryan tackled me on this directly when we last met, and I said I didn't know. I didn't know what to say, what he wanted from me. I said something stupid. I needed to just say 'no, he's an idiot, and I want to only be with you'. But I said something stupid. Again. I was confused, scared and I don't know what I was saying."

"Do you have any other things to say about your time with Jordan?"

"Not really. There was talk of an audio recording – my lawyer got to hear it and I heard a bit of it, and then had to leave the room, it made me so unwell. There was a part where Jordan apparently offered me up to the next owner of the apartment – Ryan in this case. I don't how serious he was; it's not the kind of thing you say as a joke, but I don't really understand it. Jordan and I happened because of the sparks between us, not because I was desperate. I wouldn't have moved on to someone else, and I know Jordan knew that too. Why he would offer me up, I don't know – he had to know it would never happen. I won't pretend it didn't bitterly hurt because it did – to be handed off like that, even as a joke, is insulting in the worst way. To be viewed that way, as someone you can just hand to someone else, it's just ego destroying and shows nothing but disrespect. But then, by now, I think I just deserved it. I was behaving like a slut, I guess he was just treating me like one. Just one more piece of shit to be shoveled on me, when I was already neck deep.

"I will say this though. I did enjoy my time with Jordan. It was wrong, on every level, but he was kind, he never hurt me, up til hearing about that audio file, and he helped me find a side of myself I would never have found otherwise. I'm not even sure that's a good thing, but you can't close that door now. I know it's there. I just want to be sure I'm not looking through it very much. I know that the time I spent with Jordan was wrong, but at the end of it, it didn't make even a dent in how I feel for Ryan and the kids – for my family. All it's really done is just confirm to me that there is no one else for me, and that what I had, I wanted and needed. I know it sounds stupid, given what I was doing at the time, but I don't know what else to say about it. I wouldn't take a phone call from him now though. Not because I hate him – he just took advantage of a stupid hormonal woman – but because I just don't want to even contemplate going over this ground again. I have no desire for him at all. Easy to say though."

There was a silence for a moment, then Jim said, "Since then, have you had much contact with the kids? How are they taking it?"

Deanna smiled at that – she did every time she talked about her kids. The love she had for family was obvious and never far from the surface. It was something that Ryan had missed when he talked to her, but it was hardly surprising, as damaged as he was both from what she'd done to them, and what he'd done in return.

"Well, Paula has figured out most of what happened. She's no dummy that one. She's incredibly pissed at me and most conversations are monosyllabic. The other two are just confused about why I don't live at home any more. But there is still love there. It's not the same and it's not right and they growing...hardened. I can see it. There's a way they've changed in how they look at the world. Paula, in particular, is far more fatalistic about the world now. I don't know what to do about it – I keep reaching out to her, but she's just not interested. I try and get messages to Ryan about it, through Melissa, since they talk occasionally when she goes to get the kids, but I don't know if it's getting through."

This was the first time Jim had heard this, and he made a note to call Ryan himself. This needed to be addressed.

"What about Ryan? He came here three times, but he made it clear it wasn't about reconciliation – he just told me that he was here to give background from his side because it might help you understand why you did what you did?"

"As far as I can tell, he's as miserable as I am. He's hanging out with Jonathan Bruty a lot more now – Jonathan was someone he knew casually through an ex-girlfriend of his, someone he dated in college. Jonathan is also his company's lawyer. Angie, Jonathan's wife, is a friend of mine, although she does tend to keep me at arms length these days. I think she's lost all respect for me, and it's hard to blame her. I know his friend Simon and Jonathan keep trying to get him to go to Vegas for a weekend, but that's just not Ryan.

"I think he's hurting. I think his ego has been smashed, and I think I did it. I ache for him, for what I've done and I need to do something to try and...well, I can't really salve his hurt, but I need to do something. I can't just sit at home and brood and sit here and whine.

"I worry both that he won't move on and also that he will. I think that, knowing Ryan, he's been so damaged by this, and by his reaction to it, that'll he'll never have the poise and posture he once had. I think his own internal credibility will have taken a massive pounding and he's probably having nightmares about his own perceived ability to make me happy."

Jim made another note. Deanna had proven before that when she wasn't focusing inward, she was unusually perceptive. He could completely believe everything she was saying because it was his prognosis after meeting Ryan too.

"And nothing could be further from the truth. I tried to tell him that, when we met, but I don't think he really heard me. Ryan is nothing but warmth, humor, love, safety, protection and all the best things in a man. He's a great lover, and does it for me. I...lost sight of the value of that, but no more. But I don't know how to get that message to him. Nothing he did was at fault. I don't know what he could have done to prevent this. I failed here, not him.

"The divorce is...reasonable. I don't want it and I keep hoping he'll stop it, but I won't stand in his way. If this is what Ryan needs to move on and have some resolution, then I'll do it. I just hope he'll let me keep his name. Not having the same name as my kids...not havinghisname, it'll destroy me again. I know, it's not the same as what I did, but it's death by a thousand cuts in my case, rather than the single, hard stab I gave to him. At the end, you are just as dead.

"And then I worry hewillmove on. If he does, I have no chance. I don't think I could take that..."

There was a pause, while Deanna just looked at hands. She looked small and fragile.

"So, you've gone through all the feelings and justifications you used in the past, what about now, Deanna? What do you think now? The dust has settled, the music is paused, everyone has switched chairs – what do you think of what happened now?"

Deanna looked around the room, looking for something.

"I...this is the hardest part, you know? Facing yourself? Admitting who you were, who you are? I am so ashamed of myself. I am so ashamed of who that person was, the thinking she indulged in. Sometimes I have to distance myself, and consider the past me a separate person entirely, because otherwise it's just too painful. That I could do what I did. That I could compartmentalize what I was doing with another man, then come home and be cheerful miss home body. What kind of personisthat? Who can do that?

"I mean, just the utter utter bullshit I believed in. The rationalizations I trotted out. I just..."

"Take a second Deanna," said Jim, leaning forward and putting a hand on her forearm.

Deanna smiled gratefully at him and put her other hand over his.

"It's ok. I'm...ok. I'm just...so disgusted. How could I be that person? I mean, it took what, eight weeks, before I could even really face it? How fucking blind do I have to be? How immeshed in my own bullshit was I? I've finally had my eyes opened and what do I see what I do? The absolute train wreck I've made of my life, of my family, of my husband, whose only crime was to love me? It's enough to make anyone sick.

"The disrespect I handed out. I don't understand how I could – I mean, you've shown me that you can't do these thingswithoutdisrespecting your spouse, but I spent some much time justifying that Iwasn'tdisrespecting him, by never giving Jordan anything he didn't have, I didn't see that I was desperately re-arranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.

"I mean, we've talked about this – that it wasn't disrespect for Ryan per se, but more dissatisfaction at my life, at what it was made up of. Jordan was a free pass to child free, responsibility free fun. Ryan just the short end of the stick because he was in the way. But you can't do thatwithouthaving disrespect for what you have, surely? I can't find anything he did or didn't do that would have made me go 'What a wimp', even subconsciously."

Jim raised an eyebrow at her.

"Well. There must have been something I guess. Maybe he just gave in to me too much. Maybe he wasn't assertive enough. But at the end of the day, I loved him. No, I LOVE him. It's current. I just can't rationalize it."

"Well, we still have work to do Deanna. That's why I said I thought this was premature. We haven't explored everything yet. I'm sure there are more skeletons in the closets yet."

Deanna snorted, and then carried on.

"The fact is, my ability to compartmentalize and justify my own behavior scares me. My own desires in terms of risky sex terrifies me. My reaction to it is just...wrong. I did it without my husband and spent an inordinate amount of time hiding from him and my family."

"Well, Deanna, your reaction to high risk sex is part of your makeup. It's not Wrong or Right. Its just part of your personality. What was wrong was who you were with when you discovered it and what you did with it. Having it, that's not wrong," interrupted Jim.

"Yeah, I know, I'm just short cutting it. The fact is, I behaved so abominably, I hurt the people I love more than life itself, and now I'm sitting here trying to put all the pieces of humpty dumpty back together again and realizing there's a very real chance I can't. That my life is going to be what it is now.

"Whatisyour life like now? How are you coping?"

"My life is just shit. I have a crap dead end job, working as a sales person at Ross Dress for Less. I live in a massive house that is more like a mausoleum than a decent place to exist, with a sister who I've learned was serially cheated on, and as such, regards me as though I've got a social disease. She's made it clear that she is helping me out because we are family and nothing more. My brothers won't talk to me at all – one even put the phone down on me at Thanksgiving, when I called to wish them a good day. Most of our friends won't give me the time of day and I'm hit on constantly by scumbags, looking to get off, once people recognize me. I've been the target of two Internet memes, and believe me, until that happens, you don't know how mean some people can be.

"I've had two dates, and they were both utter utter disasters. I didn't even know I was on one date until the guy told me how bad it was. I thought I was just filling out group numbers for someone at work. The other one was an attempt to find out if I even could move on, and believe me, I did find out. And I can't. He was pissed when I got up and walked out in the middle of desert.

"I have seen Crystal. She took me out to dinner about three weeks ago, looking to reconnect. She wanted to see how I was doing. I think, like Melissa, she thinks she'll be infected by social leprosy if she's seen with me. She told me some things I didn't know, like how Ryan caught her with some guy and how he used that to find out what was going on. She was very worried that I held animosity towards her over that, so she'd let time pass before talking to me again. To be honest, I'm just so grateful for a friend to talk to, I would forgive her anything. She's trying so hard to make it work with Charlie. She even wondered if I would think about a threesome with him, like that's going to happen. It was good though. I was able to laugh. She did too. She said she had to ask – there was almost no one else she could.

"It sucks a bit that she's the one who cheated for years, and when she gets caught, she gets away with it. She has to fuck her husband. That was Ryan's sentence for her cheating, to fuck her husband often. Why couldn't someone have caught me and given me that sentence? I cheated once and my life ended. It's not even remotely fair, but then what I did to Ryan wasn't either, so I can't go on about it.

"She did say she might be able to push me some staging work, but I told her I didn't even want to think about it. I'm thinking about starting a blog for interior design – a sort of How to Stage a House thing. I don't know, I'm just marking time in all honesty. I just need something to do while I wait for the weekends.

"I'm miserable beyond belief, I miss my kids and my life and I live for the weekends when the kids come over. I just want to find some way to talk to Ryan and let him know where I'm at, what happened, that none of it is his fault. This is about the only way I can think of."

"What is it you want, Deanna? What message do you want to send Ryan?" asked Jim, as a final question.

"I just want him to know, I love him. I can't tell him how sorry I am. I mean, now I look back, I can't believe I did it. It's just...not who I thought I was, at all. I don't know where it came from. I keep trying to work out the definitive answer as to why I went into the bedroom with Jordan instead of just slapping him, like I should have. I keep coming up with other reasons but it scares me that I don't know myself enough to be able to say, 'that's it. That's the reason'. How I can expect Ryan to ever give me another chance if I can't even trust myself?

"But I'm not going to give up. That life, that husband and that family is like what I need to breath and I'm not going to give it up without a fight. I want it back. It'll never be what it was, but then I'm not who I was either. Discoveries have been made, and something new needs to form. But I want it, and I want it with Ryan. I want it more than anything and I will give or do anything to have it."

Deanna turned to the camera and looked directly into it and said, lips quivering, "You hear that Ryan? I'm coming for you. I told you I would, and I need to get better and understand myself more, but when I do, I'm coming. I want you, I need you and I love you and I will find a way for us to be together, to get past this, to move on and rebuild. I will. I will do anything. Anything you want, anything I can think of. Anything I can to make this up, somehow. To get your forgiveness and understanding. To make you love me again."

Deanna was becoming agitated and Jim said, in an attempt to calm things down, "Ok, I think we've covered that. I think we have covered what you wanted, right Deanna?"

She looked over at Jim, twisting her hands in her lap and nodded.

"Ok then, time I think to turn this o..."

I turned off the TV and sat back, taking a swig of the Jameson in my glass. The ice had all melted now and diluted the drink. I wasn't sure if I liked that or not. Might be time to invest in some of those steel ice cubes or something. Oh look,morediversionary thinking! I was getting good at spotting that.

The thing is, I just didn't know what to make of it. It all seemed genuine enough, but like I said to Jim, the first time I saw him, I just can't trust her any more. If he'd seen how unbelievably unflappable Deanna was, while we were at home and all this was going on, how I – and I like to think, everyone else – had no clue what was happening, well, what would he expect?

Sheseemedcontrite, but then she hadseemedto be exclusive to me at the same time, and gave me no clue she wasn't. She wasverygood at keeping it all under wraps. Although, there was another point of view on that, as Jim had pointed out. That I truly was clueless. Oh he didn't say it out right, but the intimation was there. I didn't even argue about it. He may be right for all I know.

If what she'd said was true, it did fill in some of the blanks for me. While I knew the story, knowing the background changes how you view the main event a bit. But still, knowing her justifications, where her mind was at, it still doesn't take away the sting of betrayal. The blow to my ego hurt just as much. It's not good saying 'It wasn't your fault, it was all me', because I just didn't believe it. Totally happy wives don't fuck other guys on a second meeting after they wave their cock at them. They just don't.

The biggest problem I had, I realized, through the fog of Jameson's, was that Iwantedto believe her, that everything I saw there was true. It would take a load off if it was. But I just...couldn't. I don't know why, perhaps I was just still protecting myself. Hard to know after the events of the past weeks.

I sat there, fiddling with my iPhone for a bit, hoping the kids stayed upstairs. I needed some me time. They had all discovered some new kids show called Phineas and Ferb and were bingeing on it, big time. It looked like a badly draw cartoon of kids with triangle heads to me. Where was good old Tom and Jerry when you really needed them? Kids today. Bah. Not only will theynotget off my lawn, they won't mow it either.

I had another Jameson. I could get used to this. It was way smoother than I expected. I'm not much of a scotch drinker – wait, thisisn'tscotch, is it? It's Irish. I smiled. Solomon would have laughed at that. Now he'd discovered the effects of Alcohol, with a typical sociopaths attention to detail, he was intent on sampling everything. Paul was not pleased, but at least Solomon was doing it in a scientific manner – he even had a blog posted about his thoughts on everything he was trying.