Becoming A Slut Husband: Jerry

"Since you are doing it I am going to do it too."

Patty didn't know what I'd done and what I obviously wasn't going to do anymore. What I would do was do everything in my power to make it up to her even though she would never know what I had done.

+++++

It didn't work out that way. I just wasn't the kind of guy who could do what I had done and then go through life pretending that everything was fine. I could do it as long as I thought I was staying even with Patty, but once I found out that she hadn't done anything it changed everything. I could not face her. I couldn't bring myself to meet her eyes. I couldn't even bring myself to make love to her because touching her with my cheating body would defile her. I had truly gone and destroyed my marriage and fucked up my life.

The stupid part was that it didn't have to be that way. All that I would have to have done was step up and say "This is what I think is happening and this is why I am thinking it" and we could have talked things out. Knowing what I knew after hearing that locker room conversation I'm sure that there was probably a reasonable explanation for the suitcases in her trunk, but I never gave her a chance to give me that explanation.

Now I was fucked. I couldn't face her. I didn't have the courage to sit down and tell her what I had done and why. I was a coward and I did what cowards do - I ran.

I went to my boss, told him I'd caught my wife cheating and I was going to move on.

"I like the company and I like the work I'm doing and if you have an opening somewhere else I'd like to transfer to it. If not I guess I'll have to give my notice."

He picked up the phone, made a call and just that quick I was on my way to Colorado. I told him my wife would probably come looking for me to cause me trouble and I asked him to tell her that I'd quit without notice and that he had no idea where I had gone.

The next day while Patty was at work I loaded everything of mine into my pickup. At the last minute I penned a simple note - "I'm sorry" - and put it on the kitchen table. It was a rotten thing to do to her, but she would get over it in time. She deserved better than me. She could get a divorce for "abandonment" and get on with her life.

+++++

That happened fourteen months ago and not a day went by during those fourteen months that I didn't think of Patty and what we'd had and that I had so stupidly destroyed. Fortunately there was a lot of work for me to do and it kept my mind and hands occupied for ten or twelve hours a day, but the nights killed me and waking up alone in the morning was murder.

When I first got to the job site my solution was to hit the bars after work and drown my sorrows, but that got old in a hurry. Going to work every morning with a hangover was not a good thing and all the beer was ruining everything that the gym and running had done for me. So I put myself on the wagon, found a local gym and started getting myself back in shape.

After I'd been there six months I noticed several ladies who seemed to be taking an interest in me, but I didn't do anything about it. My head was still full of Patty and I didn't know if the day would ever come that she would fade away and allow me to have thoughts of another woman.

+++++

I opened the Conoco statement and saw that I had overpaid and had a credit so I tore it up and dropped it in the trashcan. I didn't bother opening the Visa statement; I knew damned well I didn't have a credit on that one and I wouldn't be making the payment until my next payday so I put it in my pocket. I held up the letter from Patty and stared at it. I held it to my nose and imagined that I smelled her scent on it and then I dropped it in the trashcan.

"That's it?" said a voice from behind me. "You don't even open it, just throw it away?"

I turned around and found Patty standing there. "Hello Jerry, long time no see."

I just stared at her. I couldn't even run because she was between the door and me.

"Cat got your tongue? I'm not surprised. You always were a man of few words. I only got two when you left - "I'm sorry" - and I didn't even get to know what you were sorry about. I've spent the last year wondering. I'll never know why you wasted that extra word. You could have done it with just one. "Goodbye" would have accomplished the same thing and you could have saved a word. Come on Jerry, say something."

"How did you find me?"

"I'm not saying. If you run again I might have to use it again. I'm not about to give you another way to cover your tracks. The bottom line is that I am here and I'm not leaving until I know it all."

"Not here. Follow me to my apartment."

+++++

"So what in God's name made you think I was cheating on you?"

"You were showing a lot of the classic signs of a cheating wife. All of a sudden working late when you had never done before. Increased sexual activity with the husband because you either felt guilty or your lover had you at a fever pitch by the time you had to go home so you had to get the husband to put out the fire. Or maybe because it turned you on to give him your lover's leftovers. Night when you stopped for drinks with your co-workers that kept you out later and later. Then I found the suitcases in your trunk full of sexy clothes that you had never worn for me. Put all that together with walking in to your Christmas party and seeing you tongue wrestling with a guy while all your co-workers were hollering at you to get a room, to take it to a motel. You don't say things like that to people that you don't already know are lovers, at least the people I know don't. It all added up to cheating wife."

"You poor, stupid boob. Why didn't you talk to me? The suitcases were Ann's. I told you that the airline lost her luggage. They found it, but by then Ann was in the hospital in traction and she asked me to pick it up for her. And the overtime was real Jerry. All you had to do was look at my paycheck stubs.

"You were right about the increase in sex being caused by guilt, but it was guilt at having to leave you alone so much. I knew it bothered you and I was trying to make it up to you. As for the Christmas thing, it meant nothing. I had too much to drink, I was pissed at you for not being there and since you weren't there to give me a Christmas kiss under the mistletoe I grabbed Mike. Yes, it did get a little steamy, but if you had stuck around you would have seen us break apart and then go to different tables and he didn't even dance with me the rest of the evening.

"God Jerry, I can't believe that you just took off on me like that and didn't even try and let me explain."

"That isn't why I left Patty. I left because of what I did in response to what I thought you had done."

"And what was that?"

I took a deep breath and told her about Sally, Marla and all the others and how I was able to keep the marriage going because my cheating was keeping me on an equal footing with her cheating.

"And then when I found out that you weren't cheating my life just came unglued. I couldn't face you knowing what I had done to you and I realized that you deserved better than a cheating asshole so I left."

She sat there staring at me as she tried to absorb what I'd just told her and then she said:

"How did you find out I wasn't really cheating?"

I told her about overhearing the conversation at the gym. Her face lost some of its color and she said:

"My God, what a fucked up mess." She kept looking at me and shaking her head. "Let me see if I have this straight. You thought I was cheating so you cheated so we would be even, right?"

I said yes and she went on, "So, as long as we were even you felt we could have a marriage and that everything would be all right, everything would be cool, right again?"

I shook my head yes.

"It was only when you stopped thinking that I was cheating that everything went to hell, is that it?"

I said yes.

"So if you had never heard that gym conversation we would still be living together? You would still be playing with your dollies thinking you were staying even with me?"

"Probably."

She stared at me for another minute and then asked, "Did you love me?"

"Yes I did. I still do. The only reason I stayed when I thought you were cheating was because I loved you to much to leave you."

"You do know I love you, don't you? My being here should tell you that. I was devastated when you left me and not knowing why made it worse. I need you in my life Jerry. I need you to move back home with me or I'll move out here to be with you, but one or the other Jerry, please."

"I can't Patty. After what I did I just can't. Being with you would be a constant reminder of just what a cheating asshole I'd been. I just couldn't face you every day knowing what I'd done."

"But you could do it if I was cheating on you? As long as we were even you could face me?"

I shook my head yes.

"Then come on home Jerry, because we are even. I was cheating on you. You were right, you just used all the wrong information to come to your conclusions. On the nights I was working overtime Mike and I were fucking like a couple of sex crazed rabbits. It started one night just before we finished the shift. We bumped into each other, looked at each other and it was like a sexual spark jumped between us. He just grabbed me, turned me, bent me over a packing crate and took me. And I let him. Didn't say a word, just let him take me.

"After that almost every night we worked overtime he would catch me in a dark corner or behind a stack of boxes and fuck me. I never said no. I never said yes either; I just let him take me. It was fun sex, exciting sex, gloriously illicit sex and I loved it. I loved the sex baby, not Mike, just the hot illicit erotic sex. I never even kissed him. That kiss at the Christmas party was the first and only time he ever kissed me. I had it made; a husband who loved me and who I was crazy about and who made fantastic, passionate love to me and a part time stud who treated me like a slut, a bitch in heat and made me love it. And then I had to go and fuck it all up."

"You fucked it up? How did you fuck it up?"

"You were starting to act a little strange and I thought you might be getting suspicious. The conversation you overheard was a set up. It was supposed to put your mind at rest and keep you from finding out that Mike and I were fucking up a storm. Instead, it broke us up. If I hadn't tried being tricky we would still be together. You would still be with me and be thinking that the playing field was even."

"You would still be fucking Mike you mean."

"No Jerry, that is the most ironic thing about this. That faked conversation that sent you away from me ended it between Mike and me. That night when we worked overtime he brought the two guys he had the conversation with in with him and told me that all three of them were going to fuck me and I walked away from him. Since that night all I've done is work and try and find you.

"I need you Jerry. I'm not complete without you. Please baby, can we put the past behind us and start over? We are even baby, can we please start fresh?"

I stared at her and my mind was running a hundred miles an hour. I loved her to death and I missed her so much that a day didn't go by that I didn't think of her and want to be with her. But could I go through it again? She must have read my mind.

"It won't ever happen again Jerry, I can promise you that. The last fourteen months have been a living hell Jerry, they have been the most miserable of my life. Being without you is killing me and I won't ever do anything that will put me through that hell again. Please Jerry, I'm begging you, come back to me. Back home or here, just let me be with you."

+++++

There really wasn't any question as to what I would do. I'd only run from her because I thought I wasn't worthy of her. Given how much I loved her if she wanted me back knowing what I had done I'd have been a fool not to go. As for what she had done I had already accepted that when I started playing the "staying even" game.

Would we make it? We should. She loved me enough to lie to me, to paint herself as a slut that she never was. She never had an affair with Mike, she just told me she did so I would believe we were even and come home to her. How did I know? When I got back home I rejoined my gym and one morning as I was doing my workout Mike came in. I don't know why, but I kept looking at him and after a while he came over to me and asked:

"Do I know you?"

"No, but you knew my wife well enough to have an affair with her."

"Whoa up there guy. I ain't had no affairs with no married women."

"You deny having had an affair with Patty Bradley?"

"Hell yes I deny it. What makes you think I had an affair with Patty?"

I told him the story and he shook his head. "I would have loved to have made it with her, but that Christmas kiss is all I ever got, not that I didn't try. The conversation you overheard is the truth. I don't know why she wants you to think that I'm her lover. All I can tell you is that I wanted to be and I tried like hell to make it happen, but she would never even give me the time of day. Hell, I was stunned that I got the Christmas kiss."

Will I ever tell Patty about my talk with Mike? No. I'm not going to do anything to upset the apple cart.

She did buy me that Bass Boat and in a perverse moment I named it and put the name in large gold letters on both sides of the bow. Every time Patty and I climb on board "Mike's Toy" we are reminded just how fragile relationships can be and how hard you need to work at it to hold it together.