Who would have thought in a million years that I, straight- laced, by-the-book, keep-her-promises Michelle, would ever be in the position I now found myself?
If it was not my life I would have thought it was a bad movie. Or at the least a very bad and unbelievable book. I knew better. It wasn’t something I’d made up. It was real and it was happening to me.
Chance Morgan was real and so was Blaine MaDia. I would stake my life on the fact that I believed neither man was conning me. Hell, I’d staked my marriage on it. What did my life mean?
“I called the kids.”
“You did what?”
I walked toward him no longer worrying if he was in the room to assert his marital rights. I had not thought that far ahead. I felt my stomach roll over. I wondered if he told them about the affair.
“What did you tell them?” I managed to whisper.
“I told them the truth,” he answered me. He eased his body from the bed and began walking toward me. “They’re in agreement. They think maybe you’ve been conned. If you keep insisting that this nonsense is true they’re in agreement with me that I should take you in for an immediate psychiatry evaluation.”
He was standing directly in front of me. He reached out a hand to touch my hair and I began to tremble. I wondered if there was any possible way Larry could carry out his threats.
“I want you back in our room, Mick.” His eyes looked feverish; there was a thin film of sweat lining his upper lip. “I’m not going to allow you to destroy what we’ve worked so hard to build.”
“Larry, why are you doing this? I told you the affair is over.”
“It’s not over until you’re back in our bed.” He ran his hand over my hair, then down the front of my gown, letting it fall and linger on my left breast. “I’m fighting for us, Mick, like it or not. I will protect you.”
I wanted to push my husband’s hand away, but at that moment I was afraid. I knew I needed to use my head to keep him calm. The last thing I wanted to do was make him go past the point of no return.
“You’re not going to throw me away,” Larry said. “You’re not going to find me another place to live. You made promises. You’re my wife. I’m going to make sure you honor those promises.”
A sudden flash of awareness skittered across my soul. He was thinking about his mother. He was remembering her abandonment.
“I told you, I’m not asking you to leave. I’m not your mother. I’m not abandoning you. I’m still here, I’m not going anywhere.”
He dropped his hands and stared at me for a long moment. “What are you talking about?” He looked confused. “My mother has nothing to do with this.”
“You said I wasn’t going to find you another place to live. Larry, that’s what your mother said to you.”
Now it was he who was backing away from me.
“Drop it, Mick.” I heard the pain in his voice. “You know damn well what I meant. The woman always wants the man to leave and she takes the house. That’s what I meant.”
“It’s not what you said.”
“So now you’re a shrink. Listen, I’m serious. You get this notion out of your head that we’re sharing a house only. It’s not going to happen. We’re sharing a bed. If you don’t come back to our room, I’m moving in here.”
I moved to the opposite side of the room. “Can’t you give me time to work through this?”
“How much time are you talking about?”
“I don’t know. I want to go see…”
“Don’t you dare say his name.”
“Not him. I want to see Blaine.”
“Why?”
“I think he can help me.”
“Help you with what? How much money did this guy charge you? Do you think he’s going to help you out of the goodness of his heart?”
“I want to see if he can help me with Viola.”
Larry slammed the open palm of his left hand against his forehead.
“Damn,” he muttered loudly. “That again?” Then he marched determinedly toward me, grabbed me by the shoulders and began shaking me.
“Do you have any idea how many innocent people have gone to jail for hitting a pedestrian? Don’t you know how much juries hate people as privileged as we are? Just because you have money you could have had the book thrown at you.
“Do you think anyone would care that it was an accident? Did you think I was going to wait around and trust your life to the system?
“Hell no, Mick. I love you! I kept my promises to protect you. If that’s what all this nonsense has been about, I’m getting sick to death of it.”
He shook me one last time, then stalked away. I thought he was afraid of being so close to me. No matter the reason, I was just glad he moved away.
“You’re not a stupid woman,” he screamed at me from his new position across the room. “I gave that woman more money than she’s probably ever seen in her entire life. I didn’t cheat her, Mick. There was no reason why you should have gone to see her.”
“But, I promised her, Larry.”
He sighed loudly before throwing me a look of pure disgust. I was beginning to wonder if he didn’t think me a backward child.
“Then you shouldn’t have broken it, should you? Tell me something, Mick. Why is your promise to her so important, but your wedding vows you managed to break so easily? Did you enjoy sex with this man? Did you scream out his name? Did he rock your world? Or did you fake it with him also?”
It was finally out in the open. Hurt and humiliation claimed my husband’s features. I bit my lips wishing to God I had never met Chance.
“I don’t fake how I feel for you.”
“Don’t,” he whispered. He put his hand up as though to ward off a blow. “Do you enjoy it more with him?”
“This isn’t about him, Larry. We’re talking about Viola.”
“Then consider the subject switched. Did he give you what I haven’t been able to give you in twenty-eight years?”
“I need to know if the accident was my fault. I want to know what I was doing before I hit her. I’m hoping Blaine can help me remember. It’s important that I remember. You never saw her, the fear in her eyes, you never saw her blood or the groceries spilling in the streets.”
I was crying. “You weren’t the one who urged her not to worry, who promised to be there for her. I was. I promised her and I’m the one who broke that promise.”
He glared at me then. “If it was that important, why didn’t you go?”
“Because,” I answered him, “from the moment we said I do and became husband and wife, for twenty-six years I’ve been doing what you wanted me to do. For twenty-six-years I’ve been trying to please you, to keep a promise I made to you. That’s why I didn’t go.”
Larry’s fists were clenched at his sides. “So you do blame me. Why in the hell don’t you get it over with? Why don’t you just tell me that you’re angry with me?”
I don’t know how it happened. It was as if his razor sharp glare released years of resentment. I found myself screaming at my husband.
“Yes, I’m angry with you, Larry, for acting as though I can’t cross the street unless you’re there to tell me the light is green.
“I’m angry that, as usual, you convinced me to do something I didn’t want to do. I wanted to go visit that old woman and it’s my fault for not going.
“I’m an adult. I should have told you to go to hell, but I didn’t. Instead, I allowed you to convince me that it would be easier that way. I wanted our home to remain happy.”
I started laughing hysterically. “Funny thing, about that. I’m not happy. I don’t know the last time I’ve been happy. You’ve been telling me all these years how happy I am, but I haven’t felt it.”
The tears were running freely down my face now. I had no more to lose. My marriage was over. There was no longer any reason to keep my feelings damned up behind a façade, so I continued.
“Baby, I’ve been too busy walking on eggshells to be happ
y. I always wanted our marriage to work. I was afraid to fight with you. I didn’t want to be like my parents any more than you wanted to be like yours.
“You always thought it was so wonderful that I was raised in a home with two parents. You never heard me when I told you how miserable my childhood was.
“I can understand how hard it was for you to have been abandoned, but maybe you were better off. Maybe you had a better life because your mother left.”
A look I was unfamiliar with from Larry came into his eyes. It took me a moment to recognize it as hatred. He thought I was deliberately trying to hurt him but I wasn’t. I was trying to make him see he’d painted a fairy tale world that had never existed.
Before I could say another word he’d stormed out of the bedroom and headed for the front door, pausing only long enough to retrieve his keys from the kitchen counter. I ran behind him, barefoot, screaming for him to stop.
“Larry, don’t go. I wasn’t trying to hurt you.”
I banged on the car window. He ignored me and drove away, the screech of tires ringing loudly in my ears. I looked up to see a neighbor staring at me and realized how I must look. I was in my nightgown, my hair matted and uncombed, screaming at a now invisible car. Without a word I turned and walked back into my house.
It was three days before I saw my husband again. Three days of agonizing over where he could possibly be. During that time I cursed his mother for having left him. I cursed Larry for asking me to assume the burden and I cursed myself for accepting it and letting him down. Lastly I cursed fate and my dreams of a dark- haired man.
It was only my incredible guilt that kept me from cursing Viola. My hitting her was the catalyst for everything that had happened in the past eight months. I could only go so far in not accepting blame for my actions. My mind refused to travel down that path. Viola was not to blame. I was.
I could have said no to my loneliness and pain. I could have tried harder to make Larry understand what I was going through. But I had chosen to take the easy way out. Even I had to wonder what I was trying to prove by returning home to sleep in separate bedrooms. What was that all about?
I closed my eyes against images of Chance and more recently the invasion of images of Blaine. Blaine’s face was a constant onslaught of pain. I shivered each time his face came into focus. I remained stunned at the images I’d seen when he touched me.
I’d meant it when I said the affair was over, but I didn’t think I could so easily put Blaine into my past. I had to see him again. I had to talk to him. But not before I was sure my husband was fine. His safety was the most important thing to me at that moment.
For the first time in our marriage, I believe Larry heard me, but only the parts that caused him pain. Maybe Larry and Chance were both right. Perhaps I slept with Chance to punish Larry.
I thought about that for a long time. It wasn’t true. I loved Chance. Our being together was meant to happen. If I only had a crystal ball so I would know what was coming next.
Blaine. The name whispered across my brain with an intensity that couldn’t be ignored.
If I’d ever needed a psychic, I needed one now. Ironically, the only thing that kept me going those three days was Erica and her constant, annoying phone calls. The first dozen or so had been scolding calls. She was determined that I would know the error of my ways.
Initially I tried to hold my tongue. She was right, I was wrong. I had indeed hurt her beloved father. Finally I could take her sharp tongue no longer. I did what I had wanted to do for many years.
“Erica Jean.” I spoke her name fully and loudly. I had to, for her to hear me.
“Butt out. This is my marriage. What happens between your father and me is our business, not yours. I would suggest you take care of your own husband and leave me to take care of mine.”
There was an angry silence on the other end of the line. I knew the sound of it. I was used to it.
“Goodbye, Erica,” I said at last. “Don’t bother calling again unless it’s to apologize for the way you’ve talked to me.” I severed the connection feeling a lightness I hadn’t felt in weeks.
A few hours later Larry walked through the door, his face unshaven and drawn. His clothes were rumpled; his entire demeanor reeked of a bone weary tiredness. My husband was grieving and I grieved along with him
I went toward him. “Larry, are you all right?” I moved closer to him, not liking the pasty color of his skin.
He lifted his eyes up toward me slowly. He didn’t answer. Just turned from me and walked toward the bedroom. I followed him, ignoring the fact that he slammed the door in my face. I opened it up as he was shedding his clothes, dropping his expensive but rumpled suit on the floor.
I called his name again. “Larry, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to hurt you.”
He had shut me out effectively, leaving me with nothing to do but pick up his clothes and put them in the pile for the cleaners. I went through the drawers and laid out fresh underwear on the bed.
I went to the kitchen. He looked as if he hadn’t eaten since he’d left. When he was done with his shower he came to the kitchen, ate the food I placed before him and ignored my pleas for forgiveness. He refused to meet my eyes. It was as though I wasn’t even in the room.
An involuntarily shiver touched my bones. My husband could forgive my infidelity, but he couldn’t forgive me mentioning his mother. He couldn’t forgive me for breaking the bubble that he wanted to maintain of my perfect childhood.
We co-existed like that for two weeks. Not once did Larry object to my sleeping in Erica’s room. Not once did he say so much as good morning to me. He ate the meals I prepared, wore the clothes I laid out and ignored me. If he was watching television and I attempted to join him he would go into the bedroom and close the door.
It was a living nightmare. Every morning and every evening I would tell him I was sorry. I even left messages on his pager and his answering machine at work, after hours. Once I even left a message with his secretary, not caring that she would wonder about it. Still nothing.
I was at the end of my rope. My home life had gone straight to hell and my professional career was heading there also. I received a reprimand masked as a polite question. My boss had peered at me from behind his horn-rimmed glasses.
“Dr. Morgan called. He said his office is out of samples. He was wondering if we could ship him some.”
The man smiled at me in an undertaker sort of way before reminding me that it was my job to service the doctors, that they should never run out of samples and have to call for them. He had smirked as he told me how the scripts the doctors wrote were our bread and butter. Damn. I wasn’t a new rep. I was a senior rep. I knew that.
What could I say to him except that I was sorry and it wouldn’t happen again? I wanted to tell him that the doctor had a ton of samples and there was no way he could have used them all but I didn’t. I told him I would rectify the problem immediately.
I left my office and went immediately to the post office to ship off samples to Chance. If he thought I was bringing them, he had another thought coming. I would do that in a pig’s eye.
I went home exhausted, not wanting to spend another night in silence. As Larry and I sat at the table I went for a bottle of wine in the fridge.
“Larry, don’t you even care that I was unhappy until I met you? You changed that for me. I didn’t mean to hurt you with that remark about your mother.”
I watched as he propped his hands on the table and entwined them together. For the first time in weeks he was looking at me.
“Were you really unhappy as a child?” he asked. The look on his face was pleading with me to say no.
I answered honestly. “Yes. I’ve told you that many times. My parents fought constantly. I lived in fear that my father would kill my mother. He was cheating on her and we all knew it, but she stayed because of us.” I sat down in the chair. “I don’t think she made the right choice.”
“You wanted your parents to
get divorced?”
Funny, but in all the years we’d known each other he’d never asked me that.
“No, I wanted them to stay together, despite all my fears. I didn’t want my father to leave home. I blame myself sometimes for my mother staying. I was a daddy’s girl. She knew how much I loved him. She said she stayed for me. When it was finally over she said he left because of me, that he couldn’t stand the thought of having a crazy daughter any longer. She said it was my dreams, my saying that I’d lived before.” I stopped and looked at my husband. “They were both afraid that I really was nuts. The dreams that you call nightmares, I’ve had them my entire life. My father and mother fought because they couldn’t decide whose side of the family I inherited my craziness from.”
“I’m sorry, Mick. I just never understood. You had what I wanted. I wanted to believe that you were just talking. I needed to believe families can be happy.” He looked down then, toward the floor.
“I was determined to recreate your childhood for our family. I guess you’re right. I guess I didn’t listen too well.”
Larry looked me over then and I felt my skin warming from his gaze. “You’ve lost weight,” he said at last.
“Yeah, I guess I have. Finally!”
“How much?”
“About twenty-five pounds.”
Now I saw concern taking over. He didn’t want to worry about me but it was a habit that wasn’t any easier for him to break than it was for me.
“Were you trying?”
“No.”
I started to smile at him then caught myself. Now was not the time for smiling. “It’s been a rough month,” I answered at last.
We continued our dinner in silence, but the tension was not as thick. This time when he started to watch television in the living room I walked toward my room. He called out for me to join him. When the news was over we shut the set off and headed toward our separate bedrooms. We couldn’t have been more civilized.
THE AFFAIR Page 14