byVandemonium1
This story contains plagiarism. I openly admit that I found some sentences in Bigguy33’s ‘We Need to Talk’ so powerful that I borrowed them. I contacted him through the comments portal, sought and received his blessing, then published.
It has also been compared to an Sbrooks103 story. Again, there is a simple explanation for that. Before he began writing, we corresponded and I sent him an outline to flesh out. He did and published a story. Of course, he took the outline in a completely different direction to the one in my head. So different in fact, that I used the same outline for the story below. The slimy little toerag thanked me by backstabbing me later.
Much to the loving wife’s frustration, there is no sex in this story.
***********
hubris
[ˈhjuːbrɪs]
NOUN
excessive pride or self-confidence.
Chapter 1
Laura and Pete were sitting in the departure lounge of flight 3425 for Bali, holding hands. After all the planning and packing, it was nice to be finally through all the formalities. Laura closed her eyes, it had been a very early start after a late night of sex. She needed this holiday, it had been a long year. Yes, two weeks of sun and sex. Just what the doctor ordered. Pete let her hand go to pull his phone out of his pocket when he heard the message signal.
“That reminds me, Laura, don’t forget to turn your phone to flight mode.”
“I didn’t bring my phone.”
Pete distracted himself by looking at the screen of the phone. Laura was admiring his face when she saw it tense.
“What is it, Pete?”
Pete nervously handed the phone over and she read, ‘Peter Ower, lay one hand on that woman and you will regret it for the rest of your life.’
“God, Pete, you fool. You must have tipped off your wife, she knows.” Laura joined Pete in looking around at all the visible faces in the lounge area.
“Impossible, Laura. I packed everything last night when she was in bed and put my cases straight in the car. She almost killed me with sex when I finally made it to bed and gave me a nice kiss this morning. It can’t be her.”
“It must be a wrong number then, Pete.”
“No, it mentions my name, see. Could it be your husband?”
“Don’t be silly. He has no idea either. He thinks I’m going interstate for a two-week training course. Besides, how would he know your name and number. We’ve been incredibly discreet, absolutely no one knows about us. Whose number is it from?”
“No one I recognise. I do have some whacky friends and I wouldn’t put it past them to play a prank on me. Tell you what, I’ll ring Penny, you ring your husband. See if they sound anything but normal.”
Laura watched as Pete hit a speed dial number. It wasn’t answered, so he left a message saying he was missing her already. Pete hung up and looked at Laura quizzically.
“Are you going to ring your husband?”
“I didn’t bring my phone.”
“You can use mine.”
Laura started reaching for the proffered phone, then they both realised how stupid that might be. For the first time, Laura began to regret a decision she’d made.
Further conversation was interrupted by the call to board the plane. They stood in the line together but were no longer comfortable to hold hands in public. Laura noticed Pete scanning their fellow passengers for familiar faces. Laura found it vaguely amusing. He continued his search as they travelled to their seats. They took their assigned positions and once seated, Laura looped her arm in his and rested her head on his shoulder.
“Why didn’t you bring your phone, Laura?”
“It’s all part of my cunning plan, you’ll be proud of me for it, I’ll show you once we’re airborne.”
Half an hour later, the plane was at cruising height and Laura dragged out a laptop from her carryon. She fired it up and navigated to a Word document.
“I’ve made an investment in our future, Lover. When my husband goes to bed tonight, he will find a letter from me. If he doesn’t agree with what’s in it, we’ve lost nothing, if he does then this trip will only be the start of a new life for both of us. Here’s a copy.”
She handed the computer to Pete.
I love you and only you and have since we met 25 years ago. I look forward to spending the next 25 years with you or longer. It’s what I’ve always wanted and what I still earnestly want. I hope you agree that I’ve been a devoted wife who has asked little for myself.
I know you love me and would always want me to be happy and satisfied. As we love each other, I want to propose something to you. I’ve deliberately approached it this way so you have a full two weeks to process my idea below. If we did it face to face, then there would be a big danger of you getting all macho on me and saying something that we possibly couldn’t get past. I can’t risk that. For the same reason, I have left my phone there so you cannot contact me for the full two weeks. I’m not at a work course and no one there knows where I am, so don’t waste your time trying to contact me.
My darling, David. Please believe me when I say you are a fantastic lover and I never tire of being in your arms. However, I miss the excitement of having sex with other people, enough to risk your wrath by doing what I am. Before you get too pissed off, just keep everything in context. I’m away for two weeks with a friend from work. I have never been unfaithful to you and without your full blessing, never will be.
My proposal is this. With your blessing, I would like to have sex with other men. Why? Well, the reason is simple to understand but incredibly hard to say, so I will just blurt it out. I feel my needs have grown to the point where one man, not even one as talented as you, can satisfy them. It would never be someone you knew and I promise always to be discreet. In fact, I’ll be so discreet, you won’t even know when and where unless you want to. The slightest hint that anyone we know suspects what I’m up to, I’ll stop immediately. I’ll always give myself to you whenever you want me, as I always have, so nothing about that will change. If it comes to a choice between you and my lover, of course you will always come first in my affections and my bed. In a nutshell, it won’t affect us in any way, shape or form.
Think on this for the next two weeks please, Darling. If you love me as much as you say you do, then you will jump at this opportunity to prove it. I know how much you love me and that knowledge will be with me every time I go to sleep at night while I’m away. That love has given me the confidence to beg this little indulgence off you now.
Please, Darling, think on it for the next two weeks. If your answer is no, then I will abide by your wishes and would appreciate the opportunity to talk some more. I will try not to be offended too badly by any names you call me and your implied lack of trust. However, if your answer is yes, then all you need say is, “The answer is yes,” and we need never speak of it again, although I will be happy if you want to.
Your loving wife,
Laura
Pete finished reading and just said, “Wow.”
“Yes, it is good, isn’t it? I have to admit, I stole many of the concepts from a story I saw on an erotic fiction site, by a fella called Bigguy33 who wrote ‘We Need to Talk.’”
“Why did you call the letter an investment in our future?”
“Don’t you see? I’ve asked my husband for permission to have sex outside the marriage. If he says yes, when we get back, we’ll be able to carry on completely guilt free.”
Laura added in her own head, ‘Well, I’ll be able to continue. Two weeks with you and I’m reasonably sure I’ll be over you. But, your replacement? Now that’s a different story.’
“You’re that sure he’ll go along with it.”
“Of course. I gave the impression he has a choice, but that’s only so he can convince himself he has control. If he dares to say no, then we’ll have to continue sneaking around like we have been. So, how do you love it?”
“It’s not bad; forceful and logical. However, this will be a decision he will never base on logic. I hope he’s not a real he-man, otherwise it’s a little offensive.”
“What? No way could he ever take offence at anything in that letter. It took me days to get it exactly right.”
“Yes, but you have to see that you could have spent a year and still risked offending him. As a woman, you can never know how men’s brains work. My main take-out from this letter is that he is no longer able to satisfy you and that however good he is, he never will. You have to know, Laura, every man is a little paranoid about his performance. The thought of you going with someone else, who may be bigger or better, just fuels that paranoia. Frankly, Laura, there are only two reactions I can see to him reading this. One is to roll over and give in, the other is to come out swinging.”
“Well, I think you’re wrong. I know my husband. He will appreciate my honesty and think seriously about it. By asking before I’ve done anything, it’s completely risk free.”
Pete looked over at his soon to be lover and wondered how much of her own bullshit she actually believed. He was already seeing her in a new light. Sure, he’d bent the truth to get this pass from his wife, but Laura’s blatant lies and manipulation of her husband, were, well, disturbing. Part genuine curiosity and part bloody mindedness fuelled his next question.
“How did the Bigguy’s story turn out Laura? Did the lady get to pork all the strange she could take?”
He received his answer well before she opened her mouth. Her face became very serious, very suddenly.
“No, her husband threw her out.”
To distract her from questioning herself on whether she was doing the right thing, Peter changed the topic of conversation. After all the effort and expense of this trip, the last thing he wanted was for her to develop a conscience and actually do what the letter said she was doing. Having an innocent holiday.
“I didn’t tell you about the weirdo I saw in the international check-in, did I? He just stood about 25m away, while I was in line. When he saw I was looking at him, he just stared at me and ran his index finger across his throat in a cutting motion. I looked around to see if he could be doing it to someone behind me, but there was no one. It was creepy.”
Laura asked idly, “Oh yeah, what did he look like? The world is full of strange, disturbed people.”
“That’s the thing, Laura. He looked just like a normal guy. Over six feet, dark hair, goatee.”
Peter stopped when Laura sat upright suddenly and fumbled for her laptop again. Firing it up and navigating to some files. She pulled up a photograph of herself and a man, standing in front of a house. In a voice trembling with concern, she asked, “Is that him?”
“It… it could be, Laura. It certainly looks a lot like him. I can’t be sure.”
Laura looked searchingly at Peter. Would he have an incentive to lie to her? Was he afraid that if she was sure her husband was on to their game, her pussy would be unavailable to him for the next two weeks. For the first time, it occurred to Laura that Peter was someone who was willing to cheat on his wife and was thus fundamentally untrustworthy.
“What was the guy wearing, Pete?”
“That’s another female question, Laura. Guys don’t notice what other guys are wearing. Didn’t you say he dropped you at the domestic terminal?”
“Yes, he did. I convinced him to just drop me off and go. When I saw him leave, I caught the bus to the international terminal.”
“So, he would have had to go back to his car, drive to the international terminal and park, then know who to stalk in the check-in line. Pretty unlikely, Laura. I think, more likely it was just a random nut-job.”
He knew he had to distract Laura, who was looking far from convinced.
“Is that your house in the photo, Laura?”
Laura, who was looking for a distraction also and was well used to people complimenting her on her house, went into autopilot.
“Yes, it is. Nice, isn’t it? We bought a property at the beach as a bit of an investment. It’s very steep and narrow. You wouldn’t believe the house is a demountable would you? It took my husband 15 years but he kept adding and adding to it and landscaping around it. You should see the inside. He’s a painter and every room has a theme in frescos. Nautical themes in the bathrooms and lounge. Business theme in the study. I mean, you go into the study and the atmosphere says, ‘work,’ so you do. I won’t tell you what the bedroom theme is. We’ve won all sorts of awards for the interior design and how the house uses the land. It even has a creek running under the house.”
The conversation morphed into talking about their families, a topic they’d steered away from in their relationship until now. They talked about Pete’s two children, six and eight years old. Laura told of her three. A 23-year-old girl, Sarah, just finished law school and working as a property lawyer, and her two still at home, Danielle 16 and Larry 13. Laura didn’t know it but she was desperately trying to distract herself. It worked for a while. Then, she pulled out her notebook and wrote, lawyer, house and kids. Without knowing if her husband was on to her, she couldn’t make any plans regarding him. She knew she had to cover her bases by protecting her house and family though.
After the pair lapsed into silence, Laura began berating herself for being a coward and not thinking about her situation, or possible situation. She pieced together a timeline. She’d packed Thursday night, being very careful not to include anything unbusinesslike or unjustified as wearing on the weekend between the two weekly courses. Bikinis and intimates, she planned to buy in Bali. Her husband had been perfectly normal that night and they’d made love. Friday, she’d gone to work at normal time. They wanted to do major work on her company car, so she’d arranged for her husband to pick her up Friday afternoon. He’d come into reception, waited for her to pack up, then driven her home. They’d taken the kids out for dinner, packed them off to the grandparents, then made love late into the night. She’d been particularly horny, in anticipation of the following night and because of her husband’s cluelessness about it. Saturday morning, early start, lift to airport. Laura remembered her nervousness when suggesting her husband just carried her bags to the domestic check-in line and leave her. Every other time, he’d stayed until the plane took off. She’d been relieved when he agreed straight away. She’d watched him all the way to the carpark, then waited until his car drove away. Now, his eagerness to leave took on a darker significance. She matched his behaviour last night and today, with her careful planning. Shit, no one from her work knew anything but that she’d taken annual leave, and her husband didn’t know anyone from her work anyway. He couldn’t know what she planned. The text to Pete’s phone was a friend playing a prank, the guy staring at him in the check-in area, a random nutter. ‘Relax Laura.’
What were the consequence if he did know? She’d lied to him about the destination, so what? The letter explained she was going away with a friend from work, without specifying male or female. She hadn’t realised she’d closed her eyes until they shot open. She’d imagined her husband was aware of her ultimate destination, at the airport and realised how it would look to him. The deception would make it look like she was sneaking away for exactly why she was sneaking away. That in itself was serious, but defendable with some fancy footwork. However, combined with the contents of the letter, it wasn’t in the slightest part defendable. Laura used the rest of the flight to cover her bases as much as she remotely could. The first priority was to destroy a letter, under a pillow, 2,500km away from her ass. Her second was to assure herself that she was unduly worrying herself over nothing.
Always the one to cover every contingency, Laura composed a long email to Sarah, knowing she couldn’t send it until Bali. In it, she begged her daughter to go to her house and do two things. The first was to take possession of her phone and divert it to Pete’s number. She covered that by saying she was too embarrassed to tell anyone she’d forgotten it and had bought a prepaid one for the duration of the trip. The second one was to retrieve the letter from under her father’s pillow. She begged her not to read it, as it was deeply personal, between husband and wife. Mother and daughter were very close, so she knew she could trust her to not only follow instructions but to be discreet about it. As an addendum, Laura asked Sarah to acknowledge receipt of the email, and again notify her when she’d done what she was asked.
As soon as Pete and Laura left the plane at Denpasar airport, Laura sent the email, then, taking a gamble that her husband wouldn’t check caller ID, rang him from Pete’s phone. There was no answer to any of her calls, then or during the hour it took to clear customs and get to their hotel. That had never happened before and set alarms bells ringing in her head. Just before the taxi reached the hotel, Sarah rang on Pete’s phone to confirm she’d done as asked. Laura managed to evade some probing questions on what was going on. When asked if her father was okay, Sarah triggered her mother’s decline into terror with her answer. Her father had rung to say he had some thinking to do and was taking the other kids to their holiday cabin in the country. Sarah was going to join them that evening. Laura had asked her husband what he intended doing that weekend and the answer certainly hadn’t included the cabin. Worse than that, the cabin was isolated from all 21st century communication methods. Laura was so distracted, she allowed her daughter to ring off with no further questions.
Chapter 2
Laura’s husband has just cooked a BBQ dinner for his three children at the cottage. They are nagging him to take them spotlighting to bag a Wallaby for their favourite campfire stew tomorrow. Sarah has sensed her father was distracted since she arrived but hasn’t pushed him on it. They are sitting around for a family meeting. Sarah opened the conversation.
“Is this about Mum, Dad?”
“Yes, she’s been acting funny for a couple of months now. Kind of emotionally withdrawn. Then yesterday and this morning, I found out some funny things.”
The feeling of dread that permeated the room, was only made worse by their Dad’s sigh to end this statement. They knew him as a strong but funny man, rarely serious. They waited.
“Your Mum told me she was going on a two-week course, interstate, for work.”
All three children chimed in that that was what she’d told them as well.
“Yesterday afternoon, she asked me to pick her up from work and I did. As I was standing in reception, I saw through the glass of an office that she was talking to a man in his office. Something about the way they were standing or looking at each other, just didn’t seem right. She didn’t come out for over five minutes and I wandered around reception. There’s a wall covered in photographs there, with pictures of all the senior people that work for the company. I recognised the guy she was talking to; his name is Peter Ower. I grabbed his business card off the reception desk. I just couldn’t sleep this morning, so I went downstairs. I’m a little bit embarrassed to say, but I looked through your mother’s purse. I found her passport in it and when I looked through it, I found a visa stamp for Indonesia, dated three weeks ago. I remembered back to last month when I saw her reading a brochure on Bali.”
Their father paused and looked around the room, obviously debating what to say.
“Bali is in Indonesia and isn’t ‘interstate’, it’s overseas. I didn’t say anything to your mother, it’s a big thing to accuse someone of deceit without proof, especially someone you love without reservation.”
Sarah cut in. “We know, Dad, we were brought up with your and Mum’s values, remember. Never cheat, never lie, always treat everyone with respect until they lose that respect, then just quietly walk away.”
“Yes. That’s why what else happened this morning is so difficult to understand, let alone, talk about.”
The feeling of gloom in the room intensified. They gave their Dad all the time he needed to collect his thoughts and decide what to say and how to say it.
“This morning, your mother asked me to just drop her at the domestic terminal and leave. She said she was nervous about leaving you home alone for long. Purely on spec, I agreed, then drove straight to the international terminal. I waited there, next to the Bali flight check-in and saw Mr. Peter Ower checking in. I hid and kept watching. Fifteen minutes later, I saw your mother appear and also check in. I was too overwhelmed to confront her.”
“You think…? “
“Yes, Sarah, I think your mother lied to me, to us really, and has gone to Bali to have an affair with someone she works with.”
Their father averted his face, but it was obvious to all three of his children that he was hurting badly. They had never seen the great man cry and would have paid just about everything they owned not to see his obvious pain now. One after the other, starting with Danielle, they enclosed their father in a hug. Sarah again took the lead.
“What are you going to do, Dad?”
“I just don’t know, kids. I do know if she ever sleeps with another man, we’re finished. Faithfulness is the cornerstone of a marriage and any breach is unforgivable. If she hasn’t and doesn’t sleep with him, then I still don’t know if I can get past her deception. That’s why all I’ve done so far is to send them both a text to say that if they touch each other there will be trouble. That way I can defer the decision on what to do until I’ve had a chance to decide. Does that make sense?”
Sarah nodded for all of them, then told him something he didn’t know.
“Er, Mum left her phone at home, Dad. She wouldn’t have got your text. I know how to contact her. Do you want me to tell her not to touch the creep?”
“No, Sarah. I want her to respond for her own reasons. A decision taken due to fear of consequences, isn’t a decision at all. She has to have the right motivation. What number did she give you to contact her on?”
Sarah pulled out her phone and opened the long email from Laura. She read the first six numbers to her father, he read her the last four from the business card he’d withdrawn from his pocket. The absolute truth of his story was reinforced with all four people in the room by that one simple action. Silence descended.
“There’s more, Dad. Mum asked me to grab a letter to you from under your pillow at home.”
She went to her bag and retrieved the offending letter and handed it over. They all waited while he read it. He objected to reading it aloud, once he knew what was in it. Young Larry broke that impasse.
“Dad, that letter concerns our family. We’ve always made all major decisions as a family. You have to tell us.”
Dave looked at his youngest son and realised he’d never felt prouder. Here he was, with his siblings, in the middle of the greatest crisis their family had ever faced, and he was handling it better than his own father. They all were. They hugged again, then Dave began to read. He read through it three times, the second two of which had an emphasis on the third paragraph. Without the third paragraph, it was a legitimate plea from a wife to a husband and taken at face value represented a mature proposal. One sentence in the third paragraph however, made a mockery of the whole missive. “I’m away for two weeks with a friend from work. I have never been unfaithful to you and without your full blessing, never will be.” One proven liemade the entire rest of the message suspect, or just wrong.
An hour’s mature debate resulted in an assessment of their mother and wife’s motives that was remarkably close to the truth. With other solutions discounted, an obvious conclusion and course of action was reached. Depending on the answer to one question, their mother probably no longer deserved to be a member of their family. Dave did his best to stand up for the absent party.
“Look, kids. If there has been a crime committed, it is against me as your mum’s husband. You shouldn’t let that influence how you treat her.”
Again it was little Larry that answered for them all.
“No, Dad. The moment she lied to us all, was the moment that she voted herself out.”
Dave looked at his son searchingly. He saw the jutting out chin and serious eyes and realised this acorn hadn’t fallen far from the tree.
Chapter 3
Laura stunned Pete in the hotel reception by asking for a separate room, on a different floor to him. She booked it for two days with an option to extend, with a request for the right to first refusal if they got close to being fully booked. Pete then checked in and looked askance at Laura. He was told to think about it, go to his room to unpack and meet her back in the lobby in two hours. He confusedly complied.
They met at the appointed time. Peter hadn’t spent the time thinking but when he saw what Laura was wearing, thought he’d like to jump her bones. They’d been intimate for a month now, but apart from some kissing and groping, nothing had happened.
“What gives, Laura.”
“Think about it, Peter. We arrange to come here together, you get a text on your phone addressed to you by name, telling you that if you lay one hand on ‘that woman’, you will regret it for the rest of your life. That text arrived shortly after a man, who looked like my husband, made a threatening gesture to you. Are you with me? We arrive here and my daughter informs me that my husband is acting wholly out of character. For the last three hours, my husband hasn’t answered my calls, which again is way out of character.”
Pete wasn’t stupid, he knew what all this might mean, but failed to see or care what it had to do with him.
“I think there’s an 80% chance that my husband knows we’re here together. Don’t ask me how he found out; I haven’t a clue. I am 100% sure that if he discovers we’ve slept together, my marriage is finished. That’s a price I’m not willing to pay. If I was 100% sure he knows, then I’d already be on a plane flying home. If I did that though and he’s not on to us, how the hell would I explain coming back so soon without telling blatant lies. We’ve lived together for 25-years, he’d spot a lie in a second, if he’s on the alert. I’m sorry, Peter, but we won’t be sleeping together until I get hold of my husband and convince myself he knows nothing.”
Peter looked obviously disappointed with this statement. Laura could tell he was going to argue about it, so forestalled him.
“Peter, if you were my husband and suspected I was away having a fling with another man, what would you do?”
“Easy, I’d hire a PI and get proof.”
Laura watched as the logic of this made it through the filters of lust in his head. She was still frustrated that the seriousness of her situation wasn’t getting through his thick skull.
“Have you tried to ring your wife again since you got here?”
That got his attention. Peter immediately began looking around into every dark corner of the lobby, trying to see the camera.
“Good, now you get the picture. I’m sleeping alone in my room tonight and tomorrow night. When my husband gets back from the scrub and has a chance to ring me, we’ll take it from there. In the meantime, don’t come to my room, don’t approach me unless it’s somewhere public and don’t touch me. If my husband rings, don’t answer it or let it go to voice mail. Come find me as quickly as you can. Here’s the numbers he’ll ring from. Now give me a friendly kiss on the cheek and we’ll go our separate ways.”
Peter did as instructed, then they both retired to their rooms while looking around for any surveillance. If either had bothered to look at the phone number Pete’s threat had come from, they would have realised that Laura’s 80% was already 100%. She just didn’t know it yet.
Chapter 4
Four days later and the long anticipated trip was going far from expectations. Meals were taken in the hotel restaurant and all physical contact was avoided. Laura dragged Peter, protesting to numerous clothes shops to get outfits and they even went on a day tour together on the Tuesday. If they were being followed, it was by professionals. Laura insisted they spent all the days together in case Dave rang. On the Monday, Laura bought a throw away phone and had Pete practice diverting his to it, in case he got the expected call. Her stress level had only slightly risen. It was school holidays and it wasn’t impossible for Dave to have taken Danielle and Larry to the cottage for more than the weekend. Sarah, not replying to her emails was a cause for great concern however. Peter lasted until Tuesday night. He retired early, booked an extra room, snuck out of his after assuring himself he was invisible to surveillance and banged one of the imported Javanese hookers all night.
On Wednesday, Laura was worried enough that she stayed in her room all day and did some research on the internet. Research on divorces. Then she contacted her lawyer at home, via email, asking for confirmation on her speculation about the outcome of a hypothetical divorce. She used him for all the family’s personal legal issues. She handled all such issues for the family. He replied that though it wasn’t his field of expertise, he thought her suppositions were correct. Thrice daily phone calls to Dave and Sarah went unanswered. 80% had nudged up towards 90%. Cut off emotionally from everyone she knew, made her feel as lonely as she ever had in her life. She sent an impassioned email to Sarah, begging for contact. Dave didn’t use email.
With no response by Friday, Laura was tending towards protecting her future. She had her lawyer, who had all the requisite authorisations, lock up the family finances. The title of their one remaining vacant block of land, she put in a trust with Sarah and herself as trustees. Either signature could access the trust. The bulk of the family finances, she put in two separate trusts in the names of their minor children. Again there were two trustees, but this time, both signatures were required. The appropriate child and one other. She wanted the other to be herself of course but allowed her lawyer to talk her into making it the child’s ‘legal guardian’. It was more foolproof that way, he assured her. Of course, the child’s signature was useless until they turned 18. Reassured that if the worst happened, she controlled the purse strings and if it was all a storm in a teacup, she could reverse the changes, Laura slept better than she had all week.
Two bombshells arrived within an hour of each other, on the Saturday. The first arrived with Pete, who came to her room against her instructions. Worried about his unresponsive wife, he’d contacted his brother and asked him to go over to his house. His brother announced that he had. Pete’s wife asked him where his brother wanted the divorce papers delivered. She’d called his work and found out he wasn’t away on a business trip but was on annual leave. Well, that explained how Dave had found out anyway. Peter was flying home immediately to attempt damage control. Laura immediately contacted her lawyer with instructions to get all the changes signed, saw Pete off to the airport and moved into his vacated room.
The second bombshell was closer to home and much more devastating. She’d taken to checking the younger two children’s Facebook accounts. So far nothing had been added since she’d left. No clues to what they’d been up to and no response to the requests she’d made to contact her or in some other way acknowledge her existence. This time there was a new post on Larry’s account. He was announcing to anyone who was interested that his mother and father were getting divorced. “NO!” Laura screamed to an empty room, a world away from her family.
What the fuck was David doing? Divorce followed talking, arguments and explanations. Yes, even sometimes it followed grovelling. The kids? So, she was the main breadwinner in the family and worked a lot. That had been inevitable when Dave quit education after high school and supported her through college. Sure that meant that Dave was the main influence on their children’s lives. This shit had gone too far. She prayed thanks to any god who might be listening, that she’d read the signs right and stopped her and Pete’s plans before they were consummated. If he didn’t already, Dave would soon have an incontrovertible PIs report that said nothing had happened and now, with Peter gone, nothing was going to happen.
After she cooled down, she began thinking rationally. With no one talking to her, she used her considerable intelligence to try to see impartially what Dave was seeing. She made some informed assumptions. Someone had found out about her trip to Bali. That someone couldn’t have been Dave. The only evidence of the plan was on their computer at home and Dave was computer illiterate. That somebody, probably Peter’s wife, told Dave, perhaps as late as the morning of the flight. All he could possibly know was that she had lied about the destination and was travelling with Peter. Unless? The letter! If Sarah had disregarded her instructions to not read the letter? If Sarah had shared the contents with her father? Laura quickly pulled up the letter and read it through fully opened eyes. It took three attempts, each to an increasing heart rate.
Paragraph 1, a simple statement of facts, no issues there. Paragraph 2, preparation for the commencement of bending the truth, but otherwise factual. Paragraph 3, all truth as she saw it. Of course, the definition of ‘unfaithful’ might have to be stretched a little. Dave was a wonderful lover but she had tired of being in his arms. That piece was self-evident to her and if he’d seen the letter, self-evident to him now. His PI report would show that being here with a girlfriend wasn’t the case and having a male friend that her husband knew nothing about, was inappropriate. In the cool light of rationality, she knew that if he’d sent her this letter with a blatant lie, everything else would be instantly suspect. Therefore, her professions of fidelity would be worthless. Going back to the beginning, her statement of his being a wonderful lover, would be suspect as well. All of a sudden, reading it through eyes that assumed it was at least partially lies, she realised his greatest issue. Peter was right; she’d called Dave’s whole belief that he was satisfying her into question. His ego would be severely dented. But she hadn’t betrayed him. His PI report should confirm that, at least as far as this trip was concerned. He would naturally assume she’d begun straying before this trip, but Laura already had a plan to counter that perception. When had the PI started his surveillance? If it was when they first entered this hotel, then they would already know the separate room thing was an afterthought. Hmmm, Laura thought, too many unknowns.
Fourth paragraph, that had seemed so considerate and loving when she wrote it, now, if he assumed it was all lies, was just hollow garbage. As was the whole letter when viewed in hindsight. It was revealed as the whole load of deceitful crap it was. Laura hoped like heck he hadn’t seen it. Conclusion; if he hadn’t seen the letter, she had some very fancy footwork to do. If he had, then she suspected that no amount of footwork would do any good at all. The irony of the situation almost brought a smile to her face. Her only saviour at this point was the PI report, proving nothing happened in Bali. Laura hoped the PI was good, but took solace in the fact that they were so good, she hadn’t spotted them, even knowing they were there.
Laura metaphorically kicked herself. Why had she done this? That took a full night’s thinking, alcohol assisted. Laura concluded that she was a classic wife who had everything and saw a future that was different to the past and resented it. A successful wife and high flying business woman who’d spent a career lying, covering all alternate possibilities, and yes, cheating. A woman approaching menopause that developed an itch that needed scratching. Then relying on her smarts and yes, her husband’s naivety, to scratch it without consequences. The new irony didn’t make her smile. Laura realised she might soon be a successful business woman and divorcee who still hadn’t scratched that damned itch.
The next morning, with no sign that she was going to get her answers here, Laura decided to go home as soon as possible. First, she decided to use her negotiating skills to delay her protagonist taking irreversible steps. She wrote an email to David, via Sarah. Laura made it vague on the basis that she had no idea if Sarah had shown the letter to her father, or if she’d even read it. Her plan; try to wriggle off the divorce hook but plan on coming out ahead if the worst happened. As she was someone who covered all bases, she researched counsellors in her home town and booked an appointment, online, with the one she chose. She then got dressed for the day tour she’d booked four days ago. There would be time to ring the airline later.
Chapter 5
Sarah walks into her father’s house and overhears the end of a conversation between her father and his next door neighbour.
“So, apart from telling this Peter guy’s wife about your suspicions, what else have you done, Dave?”
“Nothing. Hi Sarah. You know John Smith from next door don’t you? He’s a lawyer as well. He’s kindly agreed to give me some advice.”
“Oh, knock it off, Dave. After all the landscaping advice and help you’ve given me over the years, not to mention all the tools you’ve lent me, it’s the least I can do. Hello, Sarah.”
“Hello, John. Are you here to help Dad with the divorce?”
“Now, now, who’s talking about divorce? All we know for sure so far, is that your mother lied to us and is spending two weeks in Bali with someone. I, for one, will be waiting to hear what she has to say before I make any decision about divorce.”
“Please excuse my dopey father, John. He can be very naïve at times. Yesterday, Mum’s lawyer calls me in to sign a trust agreement, effectively stripping my father of control of a chunk of the family assets. Then we check all the bank and investment accounts and find that the vast bulk has disappeared somewhere. She’s doing everything she can to clean you out, Dad, face it. Now there’s this, it reveals her true colours, finally.”
Sarah handed two pages of printed out email to her father. He read it, then handed it to John.
Dear Sarah
Could you print out the attached please and give to your father. Again, I rely on your discretion not to read it. It concerns personal matters between he and myself.
Dear David
I surmise that by now you realise I lied to you about the purpose and destination of my trip this week. When I get back, we will talk about it and hopefully you will listen to the apologies I will give you about the huge error of judgement I have made, with the same patience you have always displayed. Just know two things and please don’t do anything until we’ve talked.
The first is that I love you and only you, always have and always will.
The second is that since we became exclusive, all those years ago, I HAVE been faithful to you. On no occasion have I had sex with anyone but you.
I accept that my actions of late have given you ample reason to doubt that, and am willing to do whatever is necessary to convince you of that one basic fact. What I suggest is that you line up a lie detector test for me when I return, hopefully in the next day or so. I’m quite willing to stop and do it on the way home from the airport, if you can organise it that way. You provide the questions and ask anything you like. With that elephant out of the room, I can then present my apologies for any disrespect you perceive I have shown you.
Please, please, please, don’t do anything hasty. We both know what the result of a divorce will be. You will lose the house you’ve put your heart and soul into and half the money we were planning to use for an early retirement. Think of the children. Divorces always polarise families and ask around, the mother always gets custody. That Sarah and Danielle will side with me is a given. It would be tragic if the split drove a wedge between them and Larry. I know you love the children and we both know not being able to see them whenever you want, will kill you. So please, don’t do anything before you give me a chance to explain.
See you soon.
Your loving wife,
Laura
John finished reading the letter.
“Wow, if it wasn’t for what we know she was doing behind the scenes, this would be really compelling, emotive stuff.”
“What do you mean, John?”
“Well, Dave, you must realise that in my job I see all sorts of tricks. This one is quite common. Your wife decided she wants out of the marriage. She looks around for a replacement, finds one and decides to, er, test drive him on a two-week getaway. I think the term is an ‘exit affair’. Now normally, if she made the decision that he was the one, she’d come back and quietly move all the assets out of your reach, then hit you with divorce. The really smart ones poison the relationship between the innocent parent and their children first. Like Laura has started doing with Sarah. Writing a letter that portrays you as a wimp, that Sarah was ‘allowed’ to find, is one of the subtlest things I’ve ever seen. The best way of winning in divorce is to hit the partner with it full on, restrict their access to good advice, i.e. keep you penniless, then get your children to choose who to go with. In this case the choice would be between a monetarily comfortable mother in the family home, or a devastated, broke father, living in a slum somewhere.”
“Surely, there must be another explanation.”
“I could prove it. Contact the best three divorce lawyers in town. The one or ones that refuse to take your case are already representing her. My bet is she’s given all three a retainer to head you off at the pass. By keeping you broke and getting the best lawyer around, this bluff will have the best chance of working.”
“What bluff?”
“That whole letter is a bluff, Dave. Her lawyer must already have told her that the mother getting custody of children the age yours are, is no longer the slam dunk it used to be, especially as you have a good case of being seen as the primary care giver. Dave, the purpose of this letter is simple. She wants you to stop doing anything, while she completes her preparations for an ambush. Her problem is that you cottoned on to her plan before it was fully mobilised. When her plan is complete, she will want the divorce completed as soon as possible, certainly before Larry turns 14 and has a say in which house to live. You can expect her to push you into counselling. In this country, the courts will only grant a divorce if you’ve lived apart for 12 months or if a counsellor says the marriage is irretrievable. Expect her to choose a counsellor and bully you into attending. The threats at the end are par for the course when women instigate divorces these days.”
Dave excused himself, after asking John who the best divorce lawyer around was. Dave rang, gave his name and asked for an appointment. He was told they were unable to take his case. Unbeknownst to Dave, the best divorce lawyer in town had a full case load and was telling his secretary not to accept any new ones for the moment. Dave returned to the lounge.
“Okay, John, I believe you. What do I do now?”
“Firstly, you allow me to lock up whatever finances Laura hasn’t already. Then you restrict her ability to spend any more of the communal finances.”
“How do I do that?”
“Well, start by cancelling any credit cards in joint names.”
“Okay, but I’m still feeling a little uncomfortable about this. I mean, she sounds so convincing when she says she still loves me. That doesn’t really gel with the threats in the second half of that email though.”
“Dad, are you convinced Mum lied to you?”
“Yes, yes I am, Sarah.”
“Do you lie to people you love, Dad?”
“No, I don’t.”
“What have you always told us about the three pillars of any successful partnership, Dad? Love, trust and respect, wasn’t it? How many do you have left?”
“Er, one, now you mention it.”
“And how many is Mother demonstrating to you right now?”
“None.”
“Ta da.”
Chapter 6
Laura’s two credit cards were declined when she went to pay the penalty to get her flight date changed. She rushed out to an ATM which she’d used before. Declined. She went into emergency planning mode. The hotel and meals were prepaid, so she wouldn’t starve or be thrown out. She had a few hundred in traveller’s cheques, for just such an emergency, but that wouldn’t cover the extra. With no friends at home close enough to borrow money off, that left only her parents. A request to them to wire her money, would lead to questions she wasn’t willing to answer at the moment. She rattled off a quick email to her lawyer, asking what was going on with the bank accounts, then settled in for a boring, non-spending week until her scheduled flight out.
She wondered how her simple, foolproof plan to scratch an itch, could have ended up with Dave staring down the barrel of ruin so quickly. She knew he would never forgive her infidelity and had deliberately taken the risk of doing what she had, knowing the odds against being caught were astronomical. What could have prompted him to take such drastic action? He suspected she’d come on a tryst with another man, would know by now that man was gone and nothing had happened. He couldn’t have found out about her financial manoeuvres, he didn’t even know who their financial lawyer was. He’d always trusted her to look after things like that.
While she was gently beating her head on the desk in her room, two emails arrived that did nothing to make her feel better. The first was from Pete’s wife, sarcastically thanking her for destroying her marriage and jeopardising her children’s well balanced future. This might have really hurt her if the second hadn’t arrived while she was processing the first. At first it appeared as if it was one of her own emails to Peter, from two weeks ago, telling how much she was looking forwards to her trip. On the address line was his email address and hers, so it had been forwarded to herself. Added to the email was the simple question, “Why did you lie to us, Mum?” It was signed, Danielle. Her husband may have been computer illiterate but her children weren’t. This was the first time she realised, Dave wasn’t the only victim of her deceit and not the only one involved in her punishment. She also realised there was no answer to that simple question in the email. It also put Sarah’s unresponsiveness in a different light. Laura cried in loss and frustration. Then she sent an email to Danielle, basically saying she would explain the ‘misunderstanding’ when she got home. Her daughter must have been waiting for it, because the reply immediately came back, “It’s strange you chose to spend our school holidays with another man, rather than Dad and us.” Laura cried again.
It was an extremely stressful and boring week. On a strict budget, there was little to do apart from lie on the beach. She packed her towel. An hour later, she left the beach and went back to the hotel. She realised that returning home with a glorious tan was tantamount to rubbing everyone’s face in her lies.
Driven by frustration, she sent a long email home, via Sarah. Without going into detail, it mentioned errors of judgement on her part, being taken for granted as a wife, mother and primary breadwinner. It even mentioned her sense of entitlement, in an ‘that’s my excuse’ way. It mentioned twice, that during her marriage she had not once slept with anyone but Dave. It again urged them not to do anything hasty until she’d had a chance to talk. Significantly missing from the missive, was anything approaching an apology. That wasn’t the style of a strong business woman who knew she was in a strongly defensible position. She hit the send button and settled in to wait.
Chapter 7
“Right kids, it’s time to seriously discuss what we’re going to do when your mum gets home. I’m a little surprised she decided to stay over there and unless we hear differently, we have to assume she’ll be back on Friday as scheduled. How are we going to play it? Remember, all we know is she planned to go away with a guy from her work. We know nothing about if this was the first time she lied to us. You first, Sarah.”
“Well, all I needed was to read her latest email, Dad. It just makes her sound like an entitled bitch, who treated us like minor inconveniences to be worked around. Whether or not this is the first time she deceived us, is irrelevant in my opinion. She had a choice. Take some annual leave and spend it with her family or use it to disappear with someone else. She spends little enough time with Danielle and Larry as it is, with her long hours and business trips. I think her behaviour before and after she was found out, is just disrespectful of us all and dishonest. Without a major attitude shift on her part, I’m done with her.”
“Okay, Sarah. Harsh but fair. What about you, Danielle?”
“I just don’t think she gets it, Dad.”
“I agree, Darling. When we’ve heard from Larry, I’ll explain what I’m thinking of doing. Larry?”
“I’d don’t really care, Dad. So long as I get to stay with you.”
“I’ll do whatever I can to make that happen, Son.”
“Tell us your idea, Dad.”
“Well, I think for some reason, your mother went off the rails for a while, I dunno, being promoted last year just seems to have triggered a change. Kids, I hope you’ll support me in this, I think if she admits what she’s done and is truly remorseful, I think we should give her another go. What do you reckon?”
Sarah looked at her younger siblings and sensed agreement. Young children just want stability until they reach the reactionary age where they will throw out everything their parents believe in and try to change the world.
“Right, Dad. We’ll give it a go, but you’ve seen her latest email, I’ve read it 16 times and I can’t see any remorse at all. Strangely though, I believed her when she wrote that she’d never been unfaithful to you.”
“I agree, Sarah. That’s why I’ve planned a little shock for her. After experiencing it, she will know that we consider she has already committed a crime against the family. I think she doesn’t know how offended we are, that’s why she’s concentrating on the physical thing. After we shock her into knowing how we feel, the million-dollar question will be, what will she do about it. If she breaks down and apologises to us all, we’ll talk about it. If she doesn’t… then we’ll see. Now this is my idea.”
Chapter 8
The return email caught Laura by surprise. It came from Sarah but was addressed from Dave and all three children. It described a timetable for her return. After reading it, she was filled with a sense of foreboding. Like she wasn’t up to the task they’d set her. It assumed she’d be returning late on Friday afternoon. It told of the appointment she had with a polygraph business and pointed out that the questions had been decided by all four of the rebels. After the test, they’d booked her into a motel for two nights to consider her response. Any time after noon on the Saturday, she could request a meeting to discuss the family’s future. Laura resented being ordered around, but she decided to play along with their little game for the moment. One thing was sure, once she’d eaten her humble pie, some major ass kicking was going to occur. People needed to know who the boss was.
Relieved, she relaxed a little. She was happy that her suggestion about the polygraph had been taken up. It was the surest way of convincing Dave she’d kept her vows. She knew that if she could win over Dave, then the rest would follow. Now what questions would he ask? He knew she’d behaved in Bali, that was a given. The big question in his mind would be, had she done anything with Pete before Bali? If he asked the direct question, ‘have you ever had sex with Peter or anyone but your husband’, then she was home and hosed. She fretted that he might ask more devious questions, like, ‘have you, at all times, behaved like a wife should’, then she was on shakier ground. She hadn’t had sex with Peter, in the strict, Bill Clinton, definition of the word. Then there was Michael, before Pete. They’d not had sex either, but only because at the last minute, Mike had chickened out. Laura knew it was a mistake to anticipate the questions too much. She knew polygraphs relied on things like heart rate and perspiration. Taking the questions at anything but face value, risked increasing her stress levels and triggering a false positive reaction. She practiced answering her simple husband’s anticipated questions anyway.
Generally relaxed, she went to the airport at her scheduled time. She’d deliberately never told anyone what time her flight arrived. Using the excuse that everyone would be busy at work or at school, she’d insisted on a taxi. Couldn’t have the family turning up at the domestic terminal when she arrived at the international one, could she?
Walking out of customs, she couldn’t help comparing how she was arriving compared to how she’d anticipated it. Instead of purring like a satisfied kitten, she’d arrived with begging bowl in hand.
After the taxi ride, she sat in reception at the polygraph premises for an hour until one of the technicians led her into the room. He then outlined the basic procedure of preliminary test questions to calibrate the equipment to specifically her physiology. The technician then pulled out a file and frowned at it.
“Oh, that’s right. This is that one.”
Laura blushed slightly. Knowing the nature of the questions, she knew the operator would soon guess her recent history.
Mrs. Brown, the questions I have are in a fairly unusual format. Rather than a list of questions, like normal, they are in the form of a flowchart.”
“Eh?”
“Yes, I’ve seen it once or twice before. There’s a first question, then depending on the answer to that one, a choice of what to ask next. It slows the process down slightly, but doesn’t affect the validity of the tests I assure you. Are you ready to go?”
“As ready as ever.”
The operator then launched into the eight calibrating questions, then paused to open the file again and read.
“Question 9. Two weeks ago, did you go to Bali with the intention of having extramarital sex with Mr. Peter Ower?”
“Yes.”
The operator looked at the polygraph readout and made a note. Then he consulted the file. Laura wasn’t surprised by the question. She braced herself for the next one. Would it be if she actually had sex with Pete in Bali or the one about if she’d had sex with Pete before the Bali trip. She hoped like fuck that it was in a form that she could plausibly deny. She could answer no to the simple question, ‘have you ever had sex with Peter Ower’ and pass. Please let it be simple. The technician closed the file and began removing the paper from the machine.
“Thank you, Mrs. Brown. I have the email address to send the report to. You’re free to go.”
To say Laura was stunned would be a very large understatement.
“What the hell did that mean?”
“What, only the one question? Yes, unusual. I’ve only ever seen it once before and I know that guy was trying to make a point. I guess whoever wrote these questions was as well. Your husband?”
Laura automatically nodded.
“What point was he trying to make, because it’s lost on me?”
“The point your husband is trying to make, I guess, is that he doesn’t give a rat’s ass if you actually had an affair in Bali. He just wanted to confirm that you intended to. He’s saying, loud and clear, that your intention to have sex with this Peter guy is enough for him. Good luck, Mrs. Brown, there are some business cards for a couple of really good divorce attorneys on the reception desk.”
Laura wandered out of the room in a daze. She’d based her whole defence, her whole cognitive process, on convincing her husband she hadn’t slept with anyone else. Being of loose professional virtues, she had no idea of the offence he took at her dishonesty and mere intensions. Frustrated and angry, Laura made her last mistake. Ignoring the opportunity to go somewhere to allow time for rational decision making, she jumped in a taxi and went home. In her mind, it was a straight battle of wills now. Her competitive instinct had been triggered. Dave had fired the first shell in the battle and now it was her turn for counter battery fire.
The taxi deposited her at the entrance to her block. From the car across the street, Dave Danielle and Larry looked at each other sadly, after they watched the pissed off woman striding towards the former family home. They were thankful for the contingency planning of last night. The last thing Dave wanted, was to be cruelly abused in front of the children, that would definitely be unhealthy for them. They drove to the suite of rooms they’d booked for Laura, checking their phones were turned off.
Chapter 9
No one heard a word from Laura until Monday. Hopes were faint that she’d used the time to think rationally, but present nonetheless. That last hope was dashed, when an email arrived for Dave, via Sarah, late on Monday. It berated him for his low tactics of poisoning the children against her. It told of an emergency family court session her lawyer was arranging, to decide on temporary custody of Danielle and Larry. Playing right into John’s predictions, it also told of the appointment she’d made for them with a counsellor the next day. It demanded a family sit down Wednesday night.
Laura had been thinking over the weekend and as usual came up with a plan she thought covered all bases. First was an attempt to save the marriage Dave seemed to have written off. That meant a counsellor. A female one, of course, to maximise the chance of her explaining her thought process to her husband. Second was a family sit down to explain her actions to the children. Third, of course, was the contingency of the courts to make sure she came out ahead if the worst came to the worst.
Laura was already in the counsellor’s room when Dave arrived right on time, Tuesday. He took an instant dislike to the mid-forties woman that was dressed like a throwback to the sixties. The chairs were arranged facing the counsellor, but more than an arm’s reach apart. After introductions, during which significantly, Laura was Laura, but, Dave was, Mr. Brown, the aging hippie invited Laura to go first.
Laura explained their marriage history, then stated the facts as she saw them. She’d been a loyal wife and mother until for some reason, she’d left the rails, lied to her family and arranged to go away with another man. No sex had occurred, as her husband’s surveillance of her would prove, but yes, the intention had been there. While away, she’d been stunned to learn that her credit cards were cancelled. She regretted what she’d done and her sincerest wish was to just put the whole episode behind her and move on with her marriage to David.
The counsellor looked at Dave.
“Firstly, I’d just like to say that I’m appearing on behalf of myself and our children. My children’s main grievance is that their mother lied to them, used two weeks of her annual leave, half a years’ worth, to go away by herself and left her phone behind so she couldn’t be contacted if an emergency occurred. To set the record straight, I did not commission any surveillance on Laura in Bali.”
That stunned Laura. As it was the first thing she would have done, she couldn’t believe it was true.
“In fact, I didn’t even want to believe she was playing away until our youngest daughter hacked into Laura’s email account and discovered the trail of arrangements she and her lover had left. Also, for the record, I was advised to cancel the credit cards after my eldest daughter discovered that my wife was in the middle of locking up all the family finances in a way that would leave me helpless.”
Again, Laura was stunned. She’d no idea her precautions had been discovered and hadn’t ever considered how such actions would be interpreted. The fact that both her daughters were actively working against her didn’t improve her mood either.
“As for what my wife wants out of this process, excuse me for no longer trusting a bloody word out of her mouth.”
The vehemence of his words finally got through to Laura just how offended her husband was by her actions. Before she could react, the counsellor addressed Dave.
“So, what do you hope to achieve by these sessions?”
l
“I hope to understand why my wife thought it was acceptable to lie to her family and arrange to go away to screw another man.”
The marriage of David and Laura was still recoverable at this precise moment in time. That changed in an instant. The change wasn’t brought about by husband or wife, but by the counsellor, when she muttered, almost under her breath,
“Oh, we have a dinosaur.”
Dave, who thought Laura had set this all up to expedite a divorce and had deliberately chosen the counsellor to minimise the chances of reconciliation, snapped. He’d heard of counsellors like this and thought it just wasn’t right. He stormed out of the room. Laura, who might have stood a faint chance of averting disaster by running after Dave and begging his forgiveness, took out her frustration on the counsellor. By the time her tongue lashing was finished, Dave was long gone. The counsellor apologised and talked Laura into a one on one session with her the following week. Then she would apologise to David for her inappropriate behaviour and do a one on one with him as well. That being the third mandated session, would lead to a decision whether to continue or give up.
Chapter 10
The family meeting the next day, went no better for Laura. She just didn’t get it. Once you lie to someone, trust becomes a footnote in the history books; just above Tusked Woolly Mammoth.
She invited them all to dinner before the meeting, but Sarah reminded her that she couldn’t cook worth a damn and told her they’d all be there at 7.30PM. Laura tried to hug them all as they came in, but they all treated her very coldly. Laura made the mistake of sitting last. By the time she was ready, she found herself alone facing four staring pairs of eyes from the couch. She tried to get her best friend, Sarah, to move to her side but to no avail.
Frustrated once again, she launched into her prepared speech. It was light on for apologies and heavy on the ‘I didn’t actually do anything’ and excuses. She felt unappreciated as both a woman and the main bread winner of the family. The attention of her husband had become a given and she’d started to miss the attention single women took for granted. She was starting to feel her age and unattractive. When a younger man started to pay her attention, she fell for his charms. Laura tended to focus on Danielle and Larry while speaking. She had trouble meeting Dave’s eyes and Sarah was rather annoyingly making marks on a notepad behind raised knees. Finally, the silence from what she’d come to think of as ‘the opposition bench’, reduced her to silence as well. Sarah spoke.
“Damn, Mum, you disappointed me again.”
“What? Why?”
“On the cliché test, I can only give you 85%. If you’d mentioned that no one would be hurt if they didn’t find out, I could have given you 100%.”
No one knew if Laura went bright red because of anger or whether it was because she realised she’d meant to say that as well but it had slipped her mind. Whatever the reason, she realised she was going to get little sympathy from her children while Dave controlled their hearts and minds.
“David, in the kitchen, now please.”
Laura rounded on him as soon as they were alone behind a closed door. She hissed at him through clenched teeth.
“Does it really have to be like this, David? Me breaking you until you have to come crawling back, begging for my forgiveness.”
Dave stared right back at her with a look of sadness, because he realised she remained a slave to her own nature.
“No, it doesn’t have to be like this at all. If you just did what you should know is the decent thing to do, the result doesn’t have to be inevitable. If you ditch that stupid bitch you chose as an impartial counsellor and we went to see… “
“I’ll see you in court, David.”
Chapter 11
On Thursday, Dave moved into a three-bedroom rented house. This obviously wasn’t going to be over any time soon. He was also notified that a preliminary hearing on custody of Danielle and Larry was scheduled for the next Tuesday. With the name of the family court judge he’d been assigned, he rang John. John told him that he’d lucked out and pulled the one judge that had never given custody to the father. Dave refused John’s offer of representation but did ask for a meeting over the weekend to learn about procedures and what he could and could not say. He was going to have one go at using the system properly, then revert to his own tactics. Doing what he had to do to ensure the emotional wellbeing of his children.
.
A fun weekend was spent personalising the rented house. Dave sat the kids down and was fairly honest with how the short term was going to look and what his longer term plans were. They perked up at that and joined in with the planning. Together they researched what they needed on the internet.
Tuesday, Laura’s lawyer was a little shocked when he discovered Dave intended to represent himself. He knew what an awkward position that put Laura in, being grilled by her own husband. The court was running late that day, so only administrative items were discussed before the end of the session; then they were all ordered to attend the next day. Word got out overnight to a couple of local reporters on this slow news week.
The next day started with Laura’s lawyer going through the details of ownership of property, relative earning capacity and other details. Then Dave got to ask questions. Laura was visibly nervous, a fact that wasn’t lost on the reporters. He started off gently.
“Did I build the family home with my own two hands.” “Yes you did, I was busy working and making most of the money,”
“Did you go back to work within two months of the birth of all your children? Yes.”
“Who usually made our children’s breakfast, school lunches and dinners?” “You did, I was working long hours.”
“Would you say I was the primary caregiver?” “Possibly.”
“Did you recently lie to me and your children and go to Bali for two weeks with the express purpose of having sex with another man?”
“Objection, your honour. Someone should tell Mr. Brown that adultery is no longer a factor in child custody disputes in this country.”
“Excuse me, your honour, I don’t care about the adultery, I just want to highlight the character of my wife, who thinks she is a fit mother.”
“Objection overruled.”
“Well?”
“I went to Bali because I needed a break and I happened to go with a male friend from work, yes.”
“When you left for Bali, after lying to your family, did you leave the following letter for your husband to find?”
Dave then read the letter in full. Out of the corner of his eye he could see both the reporters scribbling furiously. Laura didn’t have to answer the question; her look of rage did that for her. This was embarrassing.
“Is it true that after returning from your sneaky trip, you never once attempted to apologise to your husband and family for the deceit and the clearly immoral intentions?” Again, silence was the stern reply.
“Your honour, your decision would appear to be an easy one. I am the primary caregiver of my minor children and always have been. They should be awarded to me along with the house I built and they have lived in most of their lives. I never cheated on my wife and never told blatant, damaging lies to her and my children and I challenge her to contradict that. She has shown by her actions that she is not fit to further influence my children.”
Dave took his seat with his back to Laura. Her angry eyes attempted to burn holes in the back of his head. The judge fully woke up and gave her judgement immediately. The gist of which was that countless studies had shown that children were always better off with the mother in divorce cases. Her judgement was that temporary custody and residence of the family home was given to Laura. Laura smiled smugly. Dave remained neutral. It was exactly what he’d been expecting after talking to John. He stood.
“Your honour, may I address the bench. I would just like to point out your own rulings in Harper vs Harper, Smith vs Smith, Fulton vs Fulton and others too numerous to mention, where you awarded custody to the primary care giver.” With no response from the judge, Dave went on to cite three academic papers contradicting that children were always better off with the mother.
“What is your point, Mr. Brown?”
“I was just wondering, your honour, is it possible for someone with a penis to win in your court?”
The judge glared at Dave. He stared back stonily. She then declared case closed and called the next one. The journalists scribbled frantically. Dave walked over and gave them copies of Laura’s letter. He then walked out without a backward glance. Laura’s lawyer came over and congratulated her. She didn’t feel like celebrating. Dave’s speech about her never expressing one iota of remorse for her actions, had struck a chord. Unfortunately, her reflex to win any fight she was in, made it impossible for her to back down once the game was afoot.
His marriage finally written off by Laura’s smug smile, Dave totalled up all those that had offended his sense of justice and required re-education. It stood at three and plans were already in place. He’d already bounced them off Sarah to get a second opinion and made the changes she suggested. In fact, one of her suggestions was much better than what he had in mind. He went home and through a friend of a friend in the Federal government, passed an email to the federal Chief Justice, laying out his accusations of bias against a certain judge. He then waited for Danielle and Larry to come home from school. They readily agreed with his request they spend at least the next two nights with their mother. He then gave them the equipment for stage two of his plan.
The two newspaper articles the next day, were unflattering of both Laura and the judge. Dave cut them out and emailed them to a friend of a friend.
Chapter 12
Laura went home on time for a change, on the Wednesday afternoon. Danielle and Larry were there but made it plain it was under protest. When they deigned to answer her questions, it was with the bare minimum of words. She had to be prompted to make their school lunches the next day. It had been so long since she’d done it that it slipped her mind. With nothing suitable in the cupboards, she ended up giving them money for the canteen. She returned home at 4PM to get changed for the 5PM solo counselling session.
At the session, she laid out her conditions for accepting Dave back. That took half the session. The rest was taken up by the counsellor probing into their marriage history. Laura admitted to two inappropriate liaisons before Peter. One with a work colleague and one with a neighbour. She stressed that with all three ‘friends’, no actual intercourse had occurred, without mentioning that in the first two cases, it wasn’t by her choice. She expressed genuine confusion why Dave was taking such offence against her actions, seeing as how nothing had happened. The counsellor committed to sounding her husband out on her conditions, but cautioned her that reconciliation was unlikely, given that Dave’s objections seemed to be based around the dishonesty and intent, rather than the actions.
Dave’s session the next day was short, sharp and just a little frightening. To the question of what he wanted from the session, Dave simply gave her two choices. He either wanted a referral to another counsellor, one that didn’t blatantly condone cheating woman, or sign off that the marriage was irretrievable. A little alarmed that her statement from the first session could damage her career, the counsellor quickly made the report to the relevant authorities that the marriage was over. One more report on her to her professional body, she knew, could well be the last.
When Dave got home, Danielle and Larry were there and looked quite settled. A policeman knocked at the door and said he was in contempt of a family court order. He pointed out that he wasn’t, his children were. The only way he could evict them was by force and that would constitute assault. The policeman asked the kids to come with him; they refused. He left to get instructions. Before he returned, Laura stormed in.
“David, I told you already, it doesn’t have to be this way. Just tell Danielle and Larry to come with me, give me the house and I will be generous with visitation and the division of assets.”
“Laura, please leave my property. I will not force the children into a situation that they don’t want and will damage their sense of right and wrong.”
“David, we’ve known each other for how long? You know me, I’m not a bad person.”
“That’s the problem, Laura. I don’t know you. The woman I married wouldn’t have done what you did. She certainly wouldn’t have done what you did, then not only show no remorse but tell our counsellor to give me an ultimatum to accept your behaviour or lose everything I hold dear. Certainly not since I found out from your counselling session yesterday that you’d tried to start something with two other men before Peter. Tell me, Laura, exactly what did I do to deserve what you’ve done to me and what you plan on doing now?”
The realisation that she’d been sold down the river by the counsellor, made Laura see red. Her fundamental guilt wouldn’t allow her to take out her anger on Dave. The bitch counsellor was a whole other matter. She was now the focus of all Laura’s anger.
“She’s not allowed to tell you that.”
Dave made no overt or subliminal comment on that statement. Laura stormed off in a rage. Dave went and wiped the recorder that Danielle had put in Laura’s purse before the counselling session and retrieved afterwards. He was confident that righteous justice was about to visit the counsellor. He was right. Three days later, the counsellor received word that her services were no longer required. One down, two to go.
Child services turned up Saturday morning, but left frustrated when it became obvious that the only way the kids were leaving was if they were dragged out kicking and screaming by force. They made the mistake of trying logic in an extremely emotive situation. Said the senior officer to Larry,
“The courts have decided that you are better off with your mother.”
“Then the courts got it wrong. Neither Danielle or I wish to live with a liar that hurt our Dad.”
That was the end of that. Laura spent the next week trying to get all three of her children back on her side. In the end, they refused to take her calls and immediately deleted her emails and phone messages. She tried talking to Dave, but once he established the conversation wasn’t going to include an apology, he terminated it. Finally giving up, he engaged John as his divorce lawyer. He also went to see Sarah’s boss to confirm the advice she’d given him.
At the end of the following week, he heard, through Sarah, that Laura was going on another business trip all the following week. He took the week off and he put in a phenomenal week’s work, assisted by the children after school and work hours.
Exactly what the effort was all about, was revealed to Laura when she arrived home the following Friday. She drove in the driveway and did a double take. There was her beautiful landscaped block, complete with hanging swimming pool. There was the brick garage. What was missing was her beautiful, award winning home. Her demountable palace had been demounted. In its place was a solitary, very damaged replacement building. Obviously bought at one of those insurance write-off auctions after being damaged in transit. In a daze, she opened the door, realising that Dave had gone to the effort of replacing the locks. There were all her clothes, some of the furniture and all her personal items. She was torn between rage and deep sadness. Sadness won for a while. Lying on the floor, just inside the door, was a copy of the title deeds to the property. She read, ‘land and dwellings at’ and the address. She realised she’d been cleverly gazumped. The land was hers and it DID have a dwelling on it.
She rang her lawyer to confirm there was nothing she could do about the house, then as an afterthought, she rang her financial adviser to change the only financial arrangements she’d made that were reversible at the moment. The trust the spare block of land had been put in. Only to be told Sarah had already exercised her right and moved those deeds to her name only. Laura’s last act, before losing it completely, was to curse her own arrogance at assuming all three children would take her side. She realised then, the evidence of the strength of feeling the rest of her family must have against her. Dave for stealing her house. The children for not standing by her. She came very close to accepting the enormity of her crimes, but unfortunately, her self-pity morphed into anger again before the connection was fully made.
She sent an email to all three children, “Do you really hate me that much?” There came back a solitary reply. “We don’t hate you. You’ve always known I’d do whatever was necessary to protect our family. It’s just unfortunate that you’ve put me in a position where I have to protect them from you.” It was signed, Dave. Laura collected some personal items, then went and checked into a motel. She drove there via Sarah’s block, just to confirm the modules of her old house were neatly lined up there, awaiting placement and connection.
She received Dave’s petition for divorce on Monday at work. He apologised for having her served there but explained he didn’t know where else she would be. She spent the next hour trying to read between the lines of the settlement, which at face value appeared to be generous. It gave her 100% ownership of the property they’d shared, which, with the bulk of the other assets being locked up, was the vast majority. Several itemised amounts were requested to be subtracted form the value of the property. They included the cost of airfares and a hotel room in Bali. A note explained that these were the amounts that Dave considered Laura had stolen from the marriage. Also included were subtractions for the cost of the divorce and the costs of unravelling her financial shenanigans, including half of the expected interest in the money locked up in trust for the next two and five years respectively. It requested the children be given into the custody of whichever parent they chose. For the sake of unity, if either Danielle or Larry chose a different parent, then Larry, as the youngest, would get to decide. Family unity was paramount. Laura rang her financial advisor and asked what the chances of her reversing the two trusts in the children’s names were and was told nil. He’d done his job well.
Through her divorce lawyer, she tried to get another counsellor appointed. But as the first had already signed off on the marriage, that was impossible without Dave’s agreement. When she requested such an agreement, through her lawyer, Dave reminded her that he’d offered an alternative counsellor weeks ago and been rejected. Now that Laura was seemingly motivated only by the prospect or her impending destruction, it was too late. Laura signed the deal realising it was the best she would ever get. With the family court sure to award her custody of Danielle and Larry, that gave her the assets locked in the two minor children’s trusts, as their legal guardian. That meant she would only lose the value of the second block of land.
With all the Is’ dotted and Ts’ crossed, the divorce proceeded quickly. Her lawyer assured her that they would be allocated the same family court judge, now they were on her books and she had a reputation for being very biased. The lawyer usually advised his male clients that went up against her, to give up and save their money. Knowing her vindictive plan was on track, that she would win and Dave would end up destitute, Laura relaxed. She wondered if Dave’s pride would allow him to come crawling back, in which case she would be magnanimous, with conditions, or whether he would accept his pauperhood with bad grace.
Chapter 13
With her confidence restored, Laura strode into court, a month later. To be greeted by a worried looking lawyer. He pointed out a woman in a suit in the front row of the public gallery.
“See that woman? I went to law school with her. I heard she works in the federal Chief Justice’s office now. There’s something going on and I don’t like it. He was clearly rattled and it infected Laura with nervousness.
The judge opened proceedings with the announcement that this was her last case, as she was taking early retirement. She certainly didn’t seem to be happy with that. Then the lawyers started. Laura’s opened with a counter to Dave’s request that Laura be saddled with all the legal costs. He proposed that Laura paid Dave’s and vice versa. John didn’t agree to that, pointing out he was acting for Dave pro bono. It went downhill for Laura from then. John painted an accurate picture of the married couple and their relative merits as guardians. There was little Laura’s lawyer could do, he seemed to be regretting putting his faith in the judges record and not preparing much factual evidence.
The case lasted all morning and was decidedly one sided. Again the judge gave her settlement there and then. With frequent glances at the suited woman in the audience, and speaking like she had a mouth full of broken glass, she said the facts of the case were straight forward and as the clear primary care giver, Dave was awarded custody. She even congratulated him on the generous offer he’d made Laura on the asset split and hoped he could do a good job raising them on the share he’d accepted. Her voice dripped with insincerity the whole time. Laura was so shocked, she missed the judge’s final gavel rap.
She went back to her lonely one-bedroom apartment and wondered which bus had hit her. She couldn’t wallow in self-pity though. She had a property settlement to attend. In anticipation of the financial judgement, she’d listed her old property for sale. Being a steep, awkward block, suitable only for a very specific house, the price she’d agreed to put on it was very low. Unless someone replicated her old house exactly, even the landscaping would have to go. It had been spectacular before, but only because of Dave’s imaginative house design. This afternoon was the settlement time. She wanted to hand over the title deeds to the new owners herself, and wish them as much enjoyment from the property as she’d derived.
She was disappointed when the man that attended announced he was only an agent for the new owners. They would be along shortly if she wished to wait. When Laura saw David’s car, leading four trucks carrying her old house, followed by a crane, she decided to leave.
At her new place, she looked at the meagre cheque in her hand, all the reward she had from the train wreck she’d turned her successful life into. Still slightly numb, she wrote in her thought diary, an initiative a friend had recommended to help her cope. She grabbed a red felt tipped marker pen and wrote in large bold capitalised letters.
NEXT TIME YOU HAVE AN ITCH, GO TO THE FUCKING PHARMACY! NEXT TIME YOU FUCK UP, FUCKING APOLOGISE! YOU’RE ABOUT HALF AS CLEVER AS YOU THINK YOU ARE.
About eight weeks after she should have, Laura left to eat some humble pie. She bought a bottle of champagne to congratulate the new homeowners when she got there.
The end.
What do you reckon, dear reader? Good advice at the end perhaps. I have some more that you can take or leave. Whenever two people invite a third in to help solve a problem, whether it is a counsellor, a well-meaning lawyer or the guy next door, they give up some control over their own destiny. Wherever possible, solve your own problems and always treat those close to you with dignity and respect.
I don’t know if the following saying is specifically Australian or not. “Be careful of the toes you step on today. They may be holding up the ass you have to kiss tomorrow.”
As the above wasn’t as sequel to a US story, it was written in Australian, or as we call it, ‘Strine’. For those that don’t want to go to the effort of looking up unfamiliar terms in an Australian dictionary, a ‘creek’ is a stream and going to the ‘scrub’ means going away from the city. Australians are an irreverent race, who don’t automatically respect authority. A fact that often frustrates the shit out of our politicians who take themselves way too seriously. In fact, some of our most prominent politicians in the past were amongst the biggest larrikins of all. In the 70’s, we had a Prime Minister named Gough (pronounced Goff) Whitlam. He was being pressed, in an interview, by an aggressive female journalist, who wanted him to declare which side of the abortion debate he was on. Like many politicians, Gough wanted to keep his personal views on this very divisive debate secret, but she was hammering him badly. Finally, he snapped and gave her his opinion, during a live interview. “Madam, I’m in favour of abortion, and in your case, I would make it retrospective.” He jumped 20 points in the opinion polls.
I apologise for my recent absence but I’m currently in prison. I love reading stories about the heroes of the past and recently read the one about the little Dutch boy who saved the day by sticking his finger in a dyke. I’ll spare you the details, but I was so impressed, I tried it myself. With good behaviour, I should be out in about six months.
Good One. Realistic
What about a sequel wherein Laura comes back to Dave realusing the cost she has paid.