Jan and Tim

"No Tim! I'm ashamed. . ."

"Ashamed of what?" he interrupted. "Of how you feel? That's my point. You can't control how you feel, only how you act. I've been letting my selfish feelings control how I've been acting and I've made your life and mine miserable in the process. I need to change things and I need to do it now!"

"Tim, I know you must hate me now but I'm asking you to forgive me. I want us to change things together. I love you. I know I haven't acted like it, but I do love you. I do."

Tim chuckled sadly, "I wish I did hate you Jan. It seems like it would be easier if I did. I don't hate Mike either. How can I blame him for loving the same woman I love. Your loyalty is misplaced. We need to make new starts you and I. I've been offered a new job. . ."

Jan was crying now and speaking was in sobs, "I know." She said before she realized what she was saying.

"Yes. I guess I should have known Mike would know." He said with a trace of bitterness. "Well, no matter. Jan, we're both really emotional now and although I had this planned out to cause you the least possible grief, things are not going according to my plan so let me get it out quickly and as painlessly as possible. You stay here in the house as long as you need or want to until it suits you to leave. . ."

"No Tim. No. I don't want . . ."

"If you have another place to go to now, please do it quickly and don't drag this out any further."

"I don't. I don't want to be anywhere without you! Please Tim. Please."

"This is getting to be too hard. Jan, you will see I've taken only personal stuff. . ." Tim's sobs were obviously becoming difficult for him to control. "Just clothes and . . ."

Tim struggled to regain control. Finally he said, "I love you Jan, I always will but we can't go on like this. As soon as I get myself together I'll be in touch."

Jan's burden of guilt, shame, fear and an overpowering sense of loss exhausted her. She couldn't speak or move and by the time she regained some semblance of control, he was gone.

***

The following Tuesday Tim's appointment as President and C.E.O. of Sedcor was announced. Jan had finally stopped crying and had stopped calling his cell phone as he neither picked up nor returned her calls. According to CNN, Harvey Jamieson, the current C.E.O. would officially retire in 2 months. In the interim, the new office holder would be taking an extensive tour of Sedcor's international holdings to prepare for the official take over.

Ironically, the news announcer added, "There is no information on whether Mrs. Winston will be travelling with him."

With tears rolling down her cheeks, Jan said sadly, "Well I certainly know the answer to that one."

***

The next 10 days were difficult for Jan but she saw that she had been the cause of her own misfortune and whatever pain there was to bear over it, she had coming to her. Although she hurt when she realized the pain Tim must have felt in their home that night he discovered her with Mike, it faded in comparison with the pain he had been carrying since Barbados.

She didn't realize she had called out Mike's name not once but twice while Tim was making love to her. Her shame was still physically painful. Although she remembered both those nights as thrilling and she knew she had fanaticised about Mike on occasion, in her own mind she didn't connect herself with Mike on those times in Barbados at all.

Strangely, her fondest memory of the trip was the last night in their hotel room when, of all things, Tim was unable to achieve an erection. He was so devastated and so vulnerable that her heart broke for him. She and apparently he, at the time, had chalked it up to too much booze, but now she knew differently and the pain increased.

She recalled it as if it were yesterday. The all too perfect Tim Winston, the guy who was successful at everything he touched had been unsuccessful that night. She had the privilege of being there for him, of holding and comforting him and, in spite of their love for each other over the years before that, she remembered now how she felt closer to him and more in love with him that night than ever before because for the first time, she knew he needed her.

How awfully things had deteriorated from there!

***

A week and a half after he had left their home, Tim called. He was calm and polite, even pleasant but when she had asked for a chance to talk he was firm. "No Jan! Please. It took all the strength I had to finally do what I should have long ago. Don't make it any harder on me than it already is. If you ever cared for me at all, please let's leave any conversation about us and our relationship until a time when I can better manage and not embarrass us both."

When she was silent, he said, "Thank you. I don't hate you Jan. If anything I hate myself for taking so long to deal with this so let's be friendly if not friends. Al Bleoun has a settlement proposal drawn up. When it suits you, drop into his office and he will go over it with you. He'll be flexible if you want to make changes."

She listened as he indicated that some "people" would be over to collect his computer and his home files. He would be leaving on his orientation tour and would be gone anywhere from 4 to 6 weeks. He apologized for all he had put her through by his inaction over his knowledge of her feelings for Mike and as he had said so many times in the past, "In spite of what he did behind my back, I've always felt that Mike is one of the finest guys I know and I'm hoping someday he and I will be friends again." He said goodbye and hung up.

***

About two weeks after that, Jan had finally got back to work with the accounting firm. She was trying to get back in the groove with an account she shared with Marianne Black with whom she had been friends since high school. Maybe not all that close, she realized, because she had recently become aware that Marianne Benley, who had dated Mike through high school and college and who had married Sam Black, had had an adulterous affair with Mike just before he deployed.

She knew, in fact the whole town knew, about Sam's drinking. Sam had never grown up and still thought it was cool to drink himself into oblivion and thinking back on it, she could see how Marianne might need to escape into an affair. Now it appears as if Sam had run off with Sally Meyers and left Marianne altogether. Marianne seemed to be O.K. but Jan felt the need to express sympathy.

Marianne, on the other hand, had heard the rumors that Tim had moved into an apartment before he left on his tour and after having worked up the courage to ask Jan about it, she held a sobbing Jan for over an hour as she poured her heart out. When they finally got back to the topic of her and Sam she said, "I'm fine Jan, but thank you. Sam and I have been apart for years really."

"I was shocked when he made a big deal out of me being with Mike. He's been fucking Sally for at least the past two years but Mike and his dad didn't know that and Mike's dad gave Sam a lot of money to keep quiet about Mike and I. I think that's what Sam used to settle with me. He's set up a divorce already and I'm sure as hell not going to fight it. My only regret is that Mike's Dad has threatened repercussions if Mike and I see each other again and we both know he's powerful enough to follow through."

Interestingly, she and Marianne became closer after that and they often worked together at the office or at her place or Jan's. They were working together at the office one day about a week later when Marianne, who had been unusually silent, finally said, "Jan I want to ask you something and I want you to tell me the truth."

Jan smiled gently in anticipation of what she knew was coming. "Sure go ahead."

"Mike Colton senior came to see me at the office on Monday. He told me he had found out about Sam and Sally and he apologized for the things he said and did. He said he thinks Mike really does care for me and that he's not going to make any trouble for us if we see each other."

"That's great Marianne. I am truly happy for you. Mike and I have been close friends since I don't know when and I think Mike cares for you too."

"Mike asked me to ask you something."

Jan could feel tension rising. She and Mike had seen each other twice since that fateful weekend and it seemed that both had gotten the other "out of the system" and were ready to move on. Mike, although now terribly upset over his role in breaking up Tim and Jan, had shyly mentioned that he wanted to see if he and Marianne could get together when it became known that Sam had left. Jan assured him she thought it was well worth exploring.

"Mike wanted me to ask you if you had anything to do with his dad's sudden turn around about me?"

Jan smiled and actually blushed. That was answer enough for her friend who, with tears in her eyes, hugged her tightly.

***

Two weeks later Marianne and Mike moved into their own apartment.

Jan filled her emptiness with work. She had gone to part time with the firm when Tim had been appointed VP at Sedcor and she had turned her Sedcor account over to someone else. Fortunately the company was currently very busy and she threw herself into full time work with her friends Marjorie and Marianne.

They fell into a regular routine, each taking on the main responsibility for different accounts then each of them helping the others with the routine entries. They met clients, when needed, at the office but each set up their own main accounts on their home computers. They would move to each other's homes to help out.

Jan began to slowly recover but it still shocked her to realize what she had done to Tim and how very much she missed him. She realized too that although he had taken the blame for not acting on their troubles, she too should have sought out the problem. With helping Tim regain his confidence in her and himself, she could, she believed, have avoided her passionate outbreak with Mike.

She was aware that she thought fondly of Mike and no longer felt those explicitly sexual urges she had previously. She was watching the calendar too, looking forward with hope and trepidation to Tim's return. His appointment had been met with much support, as he was so popular with the company's employees and with the community that almost everyone was keeping up with the news from his trip.

***

Miles away, Tim, like Jan had filled the void with work. His trip had been planned with several short breaks of 2 or 3 days, originally planned so that he and Jan could holiday as he toured Sedcor's world-wide holdings. He soon realized that the breaks were difficult to bear alone, so he too threw himself into his work. He scheduled extra visits when the schedule could not be re-arranged and after 5 ½ weeks he had finished more tasks and had met more people and toured more facilities than originally anticipated.

As time passed he realized he missed Jan terribly but on the other hand he didn't miss the self-loathing he had carried inside since Barbados and on the whole he felt he was managing well. He had no idea what to expect when he got back. He had deliberately avoided all personal news and David, his admin assistant and friend from school days, was aware that he and Jan were "separated", probably due to his "heavy workload" and his "neglect of his family", Tim had stated. He was clear to David that he did not want to be bothered with gossip from home.

Like almost everyone else at Sedcor, David liked and respected Tim and didn't let on that he didn't believe a word of the "neglect of family" story, but he respected Tim's wishes nonetheless.

One highlight of the trip was the discovery of the hidden leadership of a woman named Julia Crystal. On one of the "breaks" that was originally scheduled in Taiwan, Tim had visited a village that provided most of the assembly employees in the Company plant. On visiting and talking with the people of the village, he was surprised to hear her name repeated over and over as the one person they respected and trusted.

Acting more on instinct than anything else, after having met and spoken with her, he appointed her as divisional manager in the area. He stayed there for a few extra days to help her get oriented and to make sure her authority was firmly established. He need not have worried as she was so well respected that that in itself had established all the authority she needed.

The appointment made newscasts world wide and pictures of the two of them were a major part of every news broadcast in the world for several days. Inevitably, some newscasts and almost all gossip magazines suggested there was more to their personal relationship than had been revealed.

Having tried to bury herself and her sorrow in work, Jan had little time for personal entertainment and rarely even watched the television but, as sleep often would not come right away, she would turn it on in her bedroom as a distraction. She certainly paid attention when she saw Tim's smiling face and upon tuning in and seeing that Tim was with this woman, an entirely new and foreign pain struck her.

The thought of Tim building a life with someone else was overpoweringly devastating! Was this how Tim has felt thinking she wanted to be with Mike?

She had noticed as well that Tim looked a great deal better than he had the day he broke the news to her. He was recovering and apparently coping well.

***

Toward the latter part of the trip Tim began to take more time to attend to details but in his heart he knew he was stalling so he finished up and completed the excursion.

Tim kept up the pace of dawn to dusk working days for the first few days back. He kept so busy that few people outside the home office even knew he was back. He met every day with Harvey Jamieson to finalize the changeover then threw himself into working with the day to day management staff. The only break he took for himself, of any consequence, was a mid-afternoon lunch, which he took by himself.

***

Marianne and Jan had been hard at work trying to finish up the routine entries for Jan's largest client. They had been at it since Monday morning and now, Wednesday afternoon, they were just beginning to see the end of it. They should be finished tomorrow. As they were hard at work, they were both unaware of the black Navigator driving up the road toward the house and its driver, seeing the distinctive metallic gold Mercedes in the drive, continuing on past.

Marjorie arrived back from the office about 3:00PM with some data they needed to include with the entries. She handed over the documents and sat down with an odd expression on her face.

"What's up with you?" Marianne asked. "You look like the cat that swallowed the canary."

"Yeah. What took you so long. Did you go home for a quickie? Is Carl still home?" Jan teased her friend.

They all laughed at that and, seeing Jan laugh, which had been so rare these days, Marjorie was reluctant to continue but before she could cover up, Jan, with a much more serious look on her face, asked, "What's going on Marj?"

"Umm. You know Tim is back in town don't you?"

Jan nodded, a terribly sad expression on her face.

"I'm not absolutely sure but I thought I just passed him on the street when I came in. He has a black Navigator, right?"

Jan's heart began to beat faster. A huge mix of emotions flooded through her, the strongest of which was a longing to have Tim back in her life, back in her arms, back in her. . . their bed. At that moment she knew she would have to make a move.

They made little progress and finally Jan said, "I've had enough for today. Let's pack it in. We can finish tomorrow."

Not getting any argument from her friends, they packed up the documents and Jan walked with them to their cars. Marjorie was parked behind Mike's Mercedes, which Marianne had been driving all week, as her car was being fixed. It was actually repaired but she was enjoying Mike's car so much, she hadn't bothered to get hers back.

***

"Not eating lunch today Tim?" David asked his boss. It was 2:30PM Thursday and Tim would normally be out at this time.

David was sure he had upset Tim somehow. Something like pain flashed on to his face but he quickly covered it.

"Are you O.K. Tim?"

"I'm fine. I ate earlier and I think its coming back on me." Tim lied. He knew his determination not to see Jan had broken down but after three trips back to the house to visit her, each time seeing that distinctive Mercedes in the driveway, he had felt himself die a little more each time.

Wednesday night he managed to get enough control to realize he was back to his old behavior of waiting and hoping things would improve. It was time, he realized, that those faint hopes he had of some kind of reconciliation were foolish and he had to get on with his life.

***

Jan picked up the ringing phone as she had been doing all week in hope that it would be Tim. She was both disappointed but anxious to hear Mike Colton Sr. on the line.

"Hi Jan. I'm returning your call. Before we get into anything let me say again how grateful I am for your advice on Mikey. Marianne has turned out to be a great gal and I don't think I've ever seen him happier or more content. Thank you again."

"You're welcome Mike and I agree. They seem so happy together. Mike, I need a favor and to get it I fear I may have to ask you to default on a promise."

"If you're going to ask me what I think you are, you'll be right on two counts. One that I'd have to default and two, for you, I'll do it in a heartbeat."

***

With renewed determination and a great deal of excitement and no little fear, Jan took the information Mike Sr. had given her and set out to accomplish her task.

About 35 minutes later she arrived at the address she had been given but couldn't find a parking space in the visitor's area. She did see Tim's truck but she was taken back to see Mike's car parked only 2 spaces away. She knew Mike and Marianne had moved into an apartment but that was far from here. Before she had enough time to process this information, she saw Marianne come out of the building, get into Mike's car, then drive away.

Jan had spent a lot of time and energy getting psyched up to go and see Tim but this unexpected turn of events floored her and she turned out of the parking lot and went home.

***

Marjorie arrived first on Friday morning and was asking if Jan thought they would finish up by noon as she and Carl were planning on getting to their camp early for the weekend. Jan said she doubted if they would even be as late as noon. Marianne arrived a few minutes later and only moments after the three of them had come together, Marjorie had the distinct impression that there was tension between her two friends.

"Would somebody like to let me know what's going on?" she asked.

Both her friends had somewhat guilty looks, each, for a different reason and, each unknown to the other.

Finally Marianne said, "We're almost done right?"

"Yes. Why?" Jan asked, wanting an answer to a yet unasked question even more.

"Well I um . . . I . . . Jan I've told a certain someone that you would probably be here alone today anytime after about 11:00."

Jan could feel the excitement rise. "Who?"

"Tim."

"You went to his apartment last night." It was a statement not a question.

"Yes. Sort of. How did you know that?"

"I saw you come out of his building and how where you "sort of" there."

"You SAW me?" Jan could see Marianne's hesitation but it was brief. "I went there to pick up Mike but they were still talking so I went home. Mike called me at about 10:00 to come and get him. That's when I told Tim you would be here alone this morning."

***

Later that morning, his heart pounding excitedly in his chest, Tim drove up the lane to see Jan swinging in the chain chair. He stepped out of the truck and walked, more confidently than he actually felt, up to the veranda.