A Bundle of Wild Cards

A little after 4.30 a taxi pulled up in front of our house and she came out the front door and entered the taxi. I followed them to the Hilton Hotel. I stopped on the other side of the street and saw she went into the coffee shop on the ground floor. I parked the car and bought a paper, found a chair in the lobby and watched her ordering coffee. I settled in for a long wait.

At 5.15 she glanced at her watch for the first time. 5 minutes later she started to look at her watch repeatedly, and at 5.30 she took up her cell phone and dialed a number. To David I presume. She put the phone down on the table rather quickly, took up her purse, looked in her notebook and dialed again. This time she lowered her head as she had got a sad message, I was too far away to see if she cried. But it seemed to work, he had most likely said again as instructed; "sorry, wrong number."

It was time for me to enter the scene. I walked into the coffee shop, went to the counter and bought a coffee and walked over to my wife and dropped into a chair opposite her and said: "I have been sitting in the bar with Robert. He just left and when I saw you here alone I thought I would join you until your friends arrived. They are late, have you got the time right? You have been crying, something wrong?"

"Yes", she replied, "To your first question, yes I have got the time right. To your second question, yes something is wrong. My friend will not come, I will most likely never see her again, and I am sad." She shook her shoulders like she wanted to shake off some unpleasantness, made an effort to smile and continued, "But what about you and Robert, did you have a good talk? Has he made up his mind about what to do? Tell me about your meeting," she asked.

"We had a long talk. He did ask me to say to you that he valued your suggestion. He acknowledges much of his resentment is male pride, and considering their age, he felt that it would be a good idea not to rock the boat, so to speak. To summarize, it lies in the past and as there is no sex involved anymore, he will let it be. But he did cry a bit, he said it had hurt him so much to learn that his wife had cuckolded him for 25 years, and he could not understand that she could betray him in such a way."

At this point Annie started to cry, and said between her sobs;" I'm so sorry, I ... "

Before she could complete her sentence, which I knew would be an admission, I interrupted quickly; " Annie, are you sorry for him or for her? I don't think you should cry for either of them. It is not our problem. Annie I'm so happy to be married to you, I know you would never behave in such a way and put me in such a very difficult situation." I reached out my hand and held hers and continued; "I love you and I know you love me. Please, Annie, don't cry for them, it is not us."

She dried her tears, and asked: "Do you think they will be OK, then?"

"Oh yes," I said, "He told me that for the last two or three years he had no or little sex with his wife, she is not so keen any longer. It is the same with her friend, he had learned that from the letters. On the other hand he is still virile and has needs. He reckons that she, unbeknownst, has given him a bundle of wild cards. And he has decided he will try to use some of them. Being 70, it will not be easy, but he will certainly try. One thing is sure, he will never be able to use them all. As he was ignorant, so will she be. He considers no harm will be done as she no longer craves sex."

"A bundle of wild cards, wild cards, what's that?" she asked.

"If one spouse gives a wild card to the other, it means the recipient of this wild card can have sex once with another person than the spouse," I replied.

"Oh! So a bundle means he is going out to find not one woman to have sex with, but several? How can he cheat on her like that?" She asked.

"Yes you said it, how can he? She has only had sex with one person outside of marriage over more than two decades! What the hell, let us talk about something else," I said.

After sitting talking for another 20 minutes about family matters, and the possibility to find an offer for a trip to a warm nice place for a week, she looked at me and said;

"Why don't we go home, I'll make a nice dinner and we can share a bottle red wine."

"Sorry Annie, I can't. I have an appointment in a little while. It will take 2 or 3 hours and then I will be home." I rose up from the chair to leave.

"Where are you off to?" she asked, disappointed.

"Oh, I'm only off to use a wild card," I replied while turning away and walking out of the coffee shop without looking back at her.

Once outside the hotel I walked past the windows without looking through the window at her. At the corner I turned left towards the big cinema complex, the newest James Bond film, "Casino Royale", was showing and I had wanted to see it the past few days. I was going to enjoy it thoroughly before going home to Annie.

The End.

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