Looking Back

The messages and missed calls didn't stop until nearly dawn. I'd drunk myself into a coma long before that. I decided to wait till after our live conversation to listen to the calls from last night. Probably wasn't going to matter much anyway.

Her phone rang exactly once before she answered. "Oh my God are you alright? I've been trying to call you all night and you never answered."

"I wasn't in the best frame of mind Karen; I couldn't talk to you without losing control."

"I understand that, and I'm sorry"

"Okay Karen I've had time to think and some time to get my anger under control. I am going to give you this chance to tell me whatever you need to say."

She led off with the cheater's #1 hit of "it wasn't what it looked like"

"So you're going trying to say that when I got to the table and you were in the throes of an orgasm on his fingers that I somehow misinterpreted that. What you just fell onto them or something."

"I know how bad that must have looked but I didn't know what was happening. I had a lot to drink and maybe he drugged me or something."

"I watched you for a long while before that Karen. He wasn't forcing you into anything. You were not drinking all that much either."

There was a silence before she asked "how long were you there?"

"I got there just after you did. I watched you with him for a long time Karen, too long really."

I told her I had watched her ignore my first try at saving us and then lie to me when she answered the last. I told her that even though I knew she had probably already had sex with him that we might have had a chance if she just would have stopped and come back to me. But watching her blow me off and go straight to her lover ended any chance of that. She began to cry then and for a second my resolve wavered but just for a second.

The analyst noted there was no denial of having had sex with him.

She started going through the cheaters all-time hit list then. Leading with that old favorite "it didn't mean anything".

If she believes that then there is no way to get over this. Her fidelity and my trust in her mean the whole world to me. If sleeping with another man didn't mean anything then we are doomed. It should have made her feel so bad that she would have stopped. Matter of fact the first time she kissed another man or let him feel her up or anything on a long list of inappropriate acts for a married woman to do should have meant a great deal to her and stopped her before we got to this point.

When I shared that opinion with her she didn't have a good answer so she cued up the next top hit with the good old "I never meant to hurt you."

I answered that with; "You never meant to hurt me, really what in the hell could have convinced you that I would not be hurt by what you were doing. You may not think you meant to inflict pain but there is no way you can spin it where when I found out that I would not be hurt by it. That is just an excuse to ease your guilty mind."

A pause followed as that one sunk in. And after the short break we get treated to that old standard "But I don't love him, I love you."

"You don't love him, you love me. That is pretty much laughable. Oh I can buy the not loving him part. He was way too young to be a permanent addition. Now for the part where you say love me. Well you may say it, but your actions show something else altogether. No one that cared for someone let alone loved them would act like you did. Sorry I'm not even partly convinced of that."

"But you have to understand it was just sex."

"It was just sex. Did you really just say that? I mean really it isn't just sex, it's a death blow to faith and trust and love. If you believe that having sex with another man isn't a big deal then what would count. Would it take having sex with more than one? Wait have you done that yet? Never mind it doesn't matter anyway. What if I told you I had sex with my assistant, would that be a big deal to you?"

"I can see know how stupid that sounded, please give us another chance I'll never do anything like that again"

"You'll never do anything like that again. You may be telling the truth. Then again you may not be. How would I ever know for sure? I would have to monitor everything you did for a long time if not forever. No, that's not going to fly; I won't be a jailer or a cuckold. You killed my faith in you and there is no coming back. What made you do it anyway? Or do I even want to know."

A long silence from her end tells me she knows I am right. Her sobbing is all I hear for a while before she says "It was just something I needed to get out of my system. Just something I had to do once."

"Just something you needed to get out of your system. Is that a one-time thing like chicken pox or something more often like a seasonal allergy? This is just like I'll never do it again. You felt the need to do it once. The fear would be with me for life that you would feel the need again. Sorry try another tune I won't dance to this one."

"It all just got out of control. It was supposed to be a one night fling and then we'd be back to normal. You were never supposed to know about it."

"I was never supposed to know. So that makes it okay then. What I don't know won't hurt me right. You can have sex with anyone you wish and as long as I don't know there's no harm. Bullshit pure and simple. This goes back to the never meant to hurt you thing. It's a lie you tell yourself to make it okay."

"Baby I know now how badly I screwed up. I know we can get through this. I don't want to lose you."

"You know we can get through this. Finally something I agree with. We will get through this alright, No not together but as newly single people. You don't want to lose me, seems I lost you when Rachel took over. You lost me the first time you were with another man; we were over when this began. I didn't fully understand that until last night but you left me months ago.

"I guess I cramped your freedom too much and Rachel showed you how to have fun again. You have the freedom to do whatever you wish now. We are done as a couple, you killed any chance at having a life together, and divorce is our only future. You're free now to go and have fun!

At that she began to scream as if she was in pain and I hit the button to end the call. Then I pressed the power button to shut down the phone.

For me there was only the process of getting unmarried ahead of us now. She had said her piece and I had said mine. She didn't seem to see it as a big deal and for me it was. Sure there were options like counseling and therapy and all that but most of the good that could have done would have been before she gave herself to another man.

Her thoughts were different of course. She fought the divorce several ways. First there was court ordered counseling. Talk about a waste of time and money. Even the counselor told her there didn't seem to be any way I could go back to trusting her.

She fought over terms and conditions just to delay it until I agreed to sign any settlement she offered.

She cried, begged and promised anything if I would try again. But what's a promise from a liar worth really. She never seemed to understand the one point I tried to drive home time and time again. It simply could not work without trust, I still loved her probably always would, but I'd never be able to trust her.

The other huge, like 300 pound gorilla in the room was even though I still loved her or at least the memory of her there was no way to erase the pictures in my mind. There was never going to be a time when we tried to make love that her face wouldn't look like it did that night in the bar and bring it all back down on me.

So there you have it. No burn the bitch, no scorched earth, no retaliation. None of that changes anything. She still gave herself to him, he fucked my wife, and her friend helped her choose the wrong path. All that will be the same even after some devious revenge the only thing that would change is you. You become the monster, you are the madman.