Tunnel of Love Pt. 04

* * *

"God, it's frightening...so terribly frightening...but last night, at Collette's house, it came to me, and I understood. It was after I'd realized, more clearly than before, what I'd done to you—and after I realized how everything that happened was my fault. Then, only then, I faced it—the true, ultimate horror in all of this."

"What?" Mike asked, everything but his words begging Jennifer not to continue.

"I didn't just play with fire, Mike—I got burned. I fell in love with James. And even after I learned the truth about him, I was confused...torn...right up through the little game I made Peter play on him. Right up to our date later that night, Mike."

Mike remembered that date well, and the carnality that ensued when they got home. "But that night...it was incredible. You weren't faking anything for me, were you?"

"No, Mike. But don't you see how close it was, that I was able to find my way back to you?"

Mike thought about it. "I guess if you hadn't caught Peter, if you hadn't found out the truth about James...it would have been harder to recover."

"Not just harder, Mike—maybe impossible. I got lucky that I found out. But I was luckier still that there was something to find out. Don't you see, Mike?"

He didn't, she could tell. This was it, then, Jennifer thought. The moment her "sister" had warned her about. She would have to stare at the horror again—and unleash it on Mike.

"We've talked about 'what if' I hadn't found out that James was a fraud. How it would have been harder for me to get over him. But Mike...what if James hadn't been a fraud?"

"Hadn't...been...a fraud?"

"Right! Imagine that he'd just been a regular guy. A regular, nice, lonely guy who joined a gym. Maybe...a guy like you, Mike."

Mike stared at Jennifer as she fleshed out the hypothetical scenario.

"He's there, minding his own business...and I, an attractive woman, come up to him. To help him? What's he really to think, Mike? That I'm hitting on him, that's what! So there I am, insisting that he let me help him...and he notices me, Mike. He finds me attractive.

"I tell him I'm married. He gets confused, maybe embarrassed, so he says he's not looking to date. But then we're on the treadmills, and I won't leave him alone! What's he to think now, Mike? So he takes a risk—he asks if we could be friends. And I say yes!

"Three days later, he gets to the gym. He looks around; I'm not there. He starts working out. Next thing he knows, I walk up to him and say I'm happy to see him! Then, I practically flash my tits at him!"

"But," Mike interjected, "you'd said you were married..."

"So what? Was I acting like it? No! I'm married; but maybe, he thinks, I'm looking to fool around. Or maybe I'm unhappily married, thinking about getting divorced, and lucky him...he's caught my eye. He likes me, so he opens up, tells me what he does, and wow... I express so much interest!"

"But...but it was an act...he was a fraud...he didn't care about kids."

"James? The hospital? Actually, Mike, James really did volunteer at that hospital, long before I came along; I'm sure of it. But we're not talking about James, remember? We're talking about someone else. Someone innocent, not out to get me.

"It's hardly impossible, Mike, that someone 'legit' could volunteer at a hospital. Maybe it could have been his job, even. Or maybe his job, or volunteer work, could have been something else involving kids, or some other good cause. Something else that would have kept me talking to him...because I liked his company...because I found him sexy and interesting.

"Or who knows, Mike...his job could have been irrelevant. You know what I told myself about James? I told myself I needed a friend at the gym. I told myself it was okay to make a new male friend, even though I was attracted to him, and even though I knew you wouldn't like it. I could have said that about anyone.

"My god Mike, it could have happened so many different ways, but all to the same result. This nice, lonely guy has a beautiful woman hitting on him, talking to him. He's not out to get me or hurt me, but he's taken by me...he's falling in love with me...and I'm not leaving him alone! I'm falling for him!

"Then comes the night Kevin died...or imagine some other trauma that I've put myself in a position to experience with him. Imagine he's as broken up as I am...as in need of comforting as me, maybe more so. So on a prayer, he asks if I'll have a drink with him. He's ready for me to say no, but I say yes! Not just yes, but that I'll go to his apartment!

"That's how it could have been, Mike...me, in his apartment, comforting him...this nice, lonely guy who likes me...he can't stand it anymore, he kisses me...he's ready to get slapped...but I let him carry on! So he kisses me again...still no objection...he thinks, 'my god, something's going to happen!'

"Next thing he knows, we're making out, and I'm kissing him... Maybe he's still a little reluctant, he thinks it's wrong... But then I go for the jugular! I go for...for his..."

Mike seemed drained by Jennifer's hypothetical and everything else he'd endured this night, but summoning what little energy he had left, he flashed with anger.

"Jennifer, you're changing the facts. Coltez was a bastard. He played you. He played you, but you stopped. You should have stopped long before...but eventually you did stop, you left, and you stayed away."

"Because he was a fraud, Mike, and because I found out! Until then, it was close! You saw the video. He cried, Mike! And I apologized! I wavered...yes, I stopped and stayed away, but what if he hadn't been a fraud?

"James left me alone after that night because I was a game to him and the game was over, but imagine a guy in love with me...and imagine me, caught in my own web, in love with him! Do you think it would have ended?"

The look on Mike's face suggested that he was beginning to understand this "horror" that Jennifer had grasped last night. Sensing it, Jennifer nodded at him.

"That's right, Mike, one of us would have approached the other. Either way, my resolve could have weakened, and...my god, I could have talked to him again, Mike. I could have met him, somewhere. And...and...it could have started all over again...and gone farther...

"So imagine where I could be now, if James hadn't been a fraud. Imagine me, desperately in love with him, seeing him, maybe f-f-fucking him...all the while, deceiving you...torn between him and you...my god, the horror..."

"But," Mike whispered, his voice nearly gone, "that's not where you are now. It didn't happen, Jennifer! The last time we were here, in this office, you told me that you love me, that you don't love him, that there's no conflict, that we can recover."

"Yes, but how can you believe that, Mike? How can either of us trust me? Respect me? Love me?

"You know, Mike, I used to think I had this wall around my heart. A wall of love—love for you—that would keep anyone else out. It did, for a while; a long while. But you can't just take a vow, put up a wall, and think that's the end of it. You have to maintain that wall! It's going to crack. You have to watch out for those cracks, patch them...not only that, you have to defend that wall, Mike!

"There are people out there...people we could love, if we were not already with someone else. You can't let those people get close to you. You have to put archers on that wall; you see someone coming who might be able to scale that wall, or tunnel under it, you shoot him down! You don't...do all the things I did. You don't let him in, telling yourself that he'll leave when you ask, and that you will want him to leave.

"James...James was a walking battering ram, sure, but I opened the damn gate for him! I let him in, because I wanted to! Sure, he turned out to be a Trojan horse, but that was luck...pure luck...

"The day I met him, I told myself that life is about choices. That I couldn't help feeling attracted to him, but I could control my actions. I thought those things, Mike, and then look what I did! Some choices I made! Some control I exercised!

"And that's why you have to leave me, Mike. No matter what I say, no matter how much it seems like I love you...you can't trust me. And you won't ever forgive or forget. You'll always see what was on that video. Worse, what could have been on that video. Worst of all, what could still be happening now if there'd been no video...no Peter, no scheme, no seducer, except for me...in love with two men, right now, carrying on a double life...imagine..."

Her voice trailed off into sobbing. Mike's voice, in contrast, seemed to recover some strength. As if Jennifer's last words had somehow arrested, not accelerated, his free-fall.

"Jennifer, stop it. What you're saying...didn't happen. You want to imagine things? Imagine something else. Imagine me, if I leave you—"

"What if you don't leave me?" Jennifer interrupted, almost hysterically. "What about your pride, your morals? How will you bear the pain, the doubt, the fear? And how will I bear it? I'll be a constant reminder, a constant source of pain for you, Mike. I can't be that...I can't watch you go through that, and not be able to help you. I have to let you go. Let you find peace...love...somewhere else. With someone else, as much as that...as much as that thought devastates me."

* * *

Gayle stared in wonder at the woman across from her.

Who are you, and what have you done with Jennifer Chancey?

The vain, naïve, sometimes childish Jennifer that Gayle had known was nowhere to be seen. In her place stood a humble, insightful, mature version of Jennifer. It was as if she had suddenly caught up from years of arrested development and blossomed into someone as intellectually and emotionally intelligent as she was beautiful.

Yet there are similarities to her other self, of course. Resemblances. It's like meeting an older...hmm.

Gayle had been wondering what Jennifer had been holding, sometimes squeezing, in her hand all night. Gayle had caught glimpses of it, enough to tell that it was a folded piece of paper—but a thick piece of paper, one side bright and glossy, the other side darker.

Photographic paper? A photograph...of Mike? Mikey? No...someone else.

It was a wild guess, maybe—but maybe not. Gayle's gift for intuition, her years of experience, her weeks of counseling the woman across from her, and something that woman had said just now combined to spawn a piercing insight, as piercing as a diamond bullet. Gayle suddenly felt a focus, a purpose.

I have your key, Jennifer. An angle; your trigger. The one Coltez used to greatest effect. Well, turnabout's fair play.

Now...what about you, Mike?

This night had solved all the mysteries about Jennifer's adventure with James—at least, as much as they ever could be solved. Mike had all the answers; but as Gayle had warned him, not all answers are good answers, and some are little better than no answers at all. What does a man do, Gayle asked herself, when the answers don't amount...

When all the answers...

"When all the answers, they don't amount to much..."

My god, could that be it?

Yes, I think so. He's been stuck in that album. But like the artist did, he needs to move on. Move on to the next album.

It's not much to go on. But it won't take much, if he gets close on his own. If he doesn't... well, then I'll be irrelevant.

Gayle breathed deeply. She had both keys now; both angles she needed. But could she do it? Did she have it in her? If she failed, would she cause more damage...irreparable damage?

And would it be the nail in my coffin, too? If they don't break through, if they leave here tonight to go their separate ways...I won't be able to sleep. And I'll never be able to take another case. Not ever.

* * *

Before him, Mike saw his wall. In his heart, he felt he belonged on the other side of it with Jennifer. But Jennifer had made a strong case that he would be better off without her.

Mike turned and looked the other way. All he saw was darkness. Perhaps somewhere, out there beyond the darkness, was a place of light? That's what Jennifer was suggesting, but would Mike ever find that other place? And if so, would he escape the barbarians there, or would they still hound him?

"Life is about choices," Jennifer had said. It reminded Mike of something Dr. Seymour had told him, the first time he met with her privately.

"It's not to say that I'm positive that Jennifer's going to give you an opportunity to get past this...I'm just saying that if I can help Jennifer—and I probably can—then an opportunity may come. At that point, it's going to be up to you."

Perhaps this was it, Mike thought. Time to make his choice. Ironically, Jennifer was trying to take the opportunity away. But as he'd told her, Mike would make his own decisions in this.

"We can't always control our feelings, but we can control our actions," Jennifer thought. Well, now she has another chance—the rest of her life—to control her actions. And last night, at Collette's house, I controlled my actions...bringing me to this choice. So what's it going to be?

He'd had an answer, but Jennifer had thrown it into doubt. Maybe she was right that he needed a fresh start. Maybe she needed a fresh start too.

She'll find someone else, certainly. She's as beautiful as ever. And she's grown, matured...

Like I told Collette, a man would be a fool not to be interested in that.

* * *

Jennifer felt trapped. Trapped behind her wall—a wall that encircled her. A wall that once stood to keep other men out, but now kept Mike out as well.

It had to be that way, she thought. There was no safety, no comfort for him with her. The video, and Mike's dissection of it, had made the case—beyond any reasonable doubt—that she was guilty of physical and emotional infidelity. Yes, there were explanations; some might even say excuses, though she would not.

But what happened wasn't the issue. Her "sister" had been right about that. The issue was what could have happened. There was no way to dismiss it; she was still shaking from the horror of it.

She'd hoped her ordeal this night might somehow end her life. She'd felt herself burning, melting...yet, she survived. The pain, however...the pain had seared deeper than anything she'd ever known, deeper than the death of her sister, even, and it lingered.

* * *

Mike could see the pain on Jennifer's face.

She needs a fresh start? But with what—pain? Where would that lead?

What could have happened with Coltez, or someone else...Jennifer's right, it's horrible. So she talks about trust, what could happen in the future...but what could? All this again? Really?

Studs like Coltez don't come along every day. Players like him...well, maybe there's never been a player like him. He had everything in place. Played her like a fiddle. She was there in his apartment, busted up over that kid's death, her blood boiling like mine was last night in Collette's kitchen, his big dick out, only slightly more obvious than Collette's nipples...

And she stopped. She faced the sorest test of our marriage in twelve years, the sorest test she could ever face...and she got up and left. I can't say she...passed...but she didn't fail completely. Would she do better next time? Could there even be a next time, like this?

Can I trust her? Yeah. I think I can. That's the easy part, maybe.

It's getting over what she's already done that would be the hard part, wouldn't it? Forgiving her...wanting her back...living with the pain of the damage done...

Jennifer seemed to have a point. Taking Jennifer back, after what she'd done, seemed to Mike like it would require surrendering his pride. He had a right to his pride, he supposed, and no obligation to swallow it in this matter.

But how proud would I feel to let Wombert win? To let that son of a bitch piss all over me and my family?

If pride is a virtue, not to be compromised, what's the truly prideful course of action here?

I hate everything that's happened. I hate how I feel now.

But how will it feel to condemn Jennifer to who-knows-what, maybe alcoholism and promiscuity like Collette fell into. To condemn my son to a broken home and all that shit that I read about, that I saw in Bobby Davis's eyes. To deny myself a chance at having some, or all, of what I had with Jennifer for more than twelve years...

If I divorce Jennifer, then I lose, Jennifer loses, Mikey loses...and Wombert wins.

* * *

Jennifer stole a glance at Mike, saw the pain and indecision on his face, and wondered if she was taking the hard way out...or the easy way.

I'm telling him to leave me but...for his sake or mine?

Mike's always fighting through things. It's that stubborn boy scout in him. Nothing has ever stopped him yet. Sometimes, he just needs a little help.

Abandoning him, instead of standing by and helping him—is that really the answer? Tell him to be brave, get on with his life, while I run away, like a coward?

But how could I help him? Someone else...wouldn't someone else be better?

* * *

The room was quiet. Gayle couldn't hear the Chanceys' thoughts, but moments ago she'd listened to the final stages of their dialogue with sadness. It was disjointed, confused, fruitless. Each of them was talking to someone who no longer existed. Talking about someone who no longer existed.

Any verdict, any judgment about the old Jennifer is moot. Convict her, acquit her—it doesn't matter. The defendant is dead. Mike burned most of her away, and when he tried to save what was left, she destroyed it herself. Take her back, or divorce her...moot, moot, moot. That "her" is gone.

But another Jennifer has risen from the ashes; or should I say, she's been melted down and re-forged. Maybe she doesn't have enough credit yet to be worthy of Mike's love; but there's promise there, promise of a worthiness far exceeding the old Jennifer's. From what I've seen, the old Jennifer pales in comparison to this one—and this one's just getting started.

This horror she speaks of...that she speaks of! Mike didn't lay it out for her in some angry diatribe, gunning it into her like lead from a machine gun. I didn't lay it out for her in some pedantic lecture, forcing it down her throat like medicine. She realized it herself, and laid it out for us. And that's why...

That's why the lesson will stick.

This new Jennifer would never cheat. She won't even be able to look at other men; they will only remind her of what happened with James, and what could have happened. Pain, unimaginable pain, will hit her.

Archers? Hell, this Jennifer will have cannon on her wall. God help any man that tries to get close to her. He'll end up like that Wombert character, or worse.

As for Mike...the sunny, cheery boy scout that Jennifer wants to protect...well, he's dead too. He will never again find that place of innocence, light, and safety. The words tattooed across his knuckles...love and fear...they'll always remain.

Could he find someone else? Of course. But would the pain ever go away? To heal him—what a burden for some other woman to bear. Impossible, perhaps.

It was all coming into focus for Gayle. She studied Jennifer.

She's made good points, brilliant points about many things, but when she says Mike would be better off without her, the lady doth protest too much. That's shame talking. Pushing him away, to deprive herself of him. Punishing herself.

And there's something more. It's in her hand, literally. All those years ago, she saw pain and couldn't do anything about it. Couldn't help. Later, she tried to become a doctor, but she couldn't face the pain, the risk of failure...

Gayle looked at Mike.