Shock Treatment

It was a Friday night, and she was sitting at the kitchen table when he came in. All the evidence of his guilt was laid out in front of her. The empty condom wrapper she'd found in his pants pocket; the matches from the Harbor View Motel, where they'd never stayed; his sport coat, smelling of a perfume she never used; and the pair of his boxers with lipstick on the fly.

Friday was her day off; she'd found the boxers that morning when she started to do the laundry. A quick search of her husband's things had turned up the rest. She had cried, screamed in the empty house, wandered aimlessly from room to room, thinking about nothing. Wondering about leaving him. Wondering about killing him.

Now she'd been waiting for an hour, planning just how she would confront him. She would be cold—icy but calm. She would be sarcastic but controlled. He'd be amazed by her rage and her composure.

Except that it all went to hell as soon as she saw him, saw his face, saw him look at the things on the table and realize that she knew. She burst into tears, and within seconds was sobbing uncontrollably, her shoulders heaving.

"You bastard!" she shouted at him, between sobs. "You cheating son of a bitch! How could you do this, after 19 years?"

He took a seat across from her, looking grave but calm. He didn't turn pale, or cry, or avoid her eyes. Instead he looked at her sympathetically.

"Julie, I'm so sorry," he said quietly.

"Sorry for WHAT?" she cried. "That I found out about you and whatever bitch you've been screwing? That now your fun will have to stop? That I realize what a selfish, dishonest, whoremongering jerk you are?"

He had to repress a smile at "whoremongering"—that was a good one!

"No, I'm sorry that you're hurt," he said. "I never wanted to hurt you—I have never wanted to do anything to make you unhappy. I love you very much."

Her face was streaked with tears. "You have a damned odd way of showing it! Weeks of 'bowling' on Thursday nights with Dan—only it seems you've been doing your 'bowling' in a motel room with some ... floozy! Did you think I wouldn't smell her perfume on you when you came home? You figured a condom wrapper wouldn't raise my suspicions, given that I've been on the pill for years? Or did you just not give a damn?"

"No, that's not true," he said, shaking his head. "I did give a damn, and I tried to make sure you wouldn't find out. I guess I didn't do a very good job of it."

He pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and reached out to hand it to her. Julie glared at him furiously, but took the handkerchief and wiped her face.

There was a silence. Then he said, "it looks like you've had some time to think about this, Julie. Are you going to throw me out?"

She stared at him, surprised. He was so calm about this, as though he'd suspected he'd be found out.

"Do you love her?"

"No, Julie, it's nothing like that. It was sex, pure and simple. I love you, and I want to stay married to you."

"Then WHY, Scott?" she asked, her anger rising again. "You say you love me—but you cheated on me, betrayed me—you humiliated me! How could you ...." Her sentence remained unfinished, as she was crying again.

He rose and went around the table, putting a comforting arm around her, but she angrily shoved him away. "Keep your goddam hands to yourself! You've lost the right to touch me!"

He went back to his seat and waited for her crying to subside. Then he began to speak, quietly but firmly, as though he had rehearsed what he had to say.

"You asked me why, Julie, and I want to tell you. I want you to understand why.

"For 19 years I've been your husband, and for 18 we've been the parents of Jake, and I have loved that. You are a wonderful wife and mother, and our life has given me so much happiness. I don't want that to end.

"But you also know that our sex life is not at all what I want it to be, and that I've tried over and over to get you to be a little more flexible and willing to compromise on that with me.

"I would like us to make love 3-4 times a week. For you, twice a month has always been enough, and you've fought me when I ask for more. You've always had a 'good reason'. Within six months of our wedding you were pregnant with Jake, and you felt lousy. Then you were a nursing mother, and you were sleep-deprived all the time. When he started kindergarten you went back to your school-teaching job, and you were busy with lesson plans and grading papers.

"When Jake was older, you said you were tired from driving him to soccer practice and clarinet lessons. Then there was the year you were visiting your grandfather in the nursing home. There's always been something, Julie. It's not that these things weren't real, but you've always had one excuse or another for not being more of a sexual partner for me.

"And now Jake has been at college for nearly a year and a half—we've got the house to ourselves—and nothing has changed. We still make love about twice a month, and only when I really insist. Only when I say, 'Julie, listen, it's been 11 days, won't you please?'

"And you know it's not just the frequency, either. We've talked about these things over and over. I want oral sex occasionally, and you almost never give it to me. Three times in 20 years, Julie! Three times your mouth has touched my penis, and you've never let me come that way.

"I want to go down on you too, and you hardly ever allow that. I want to make love in other positions, in other rooms, and you say no. I want to spend more time in love-making, have a lot of foreplay, touch and caress each other; and you say 'c'mon Scott, let's get on with it'.

"I finally realized that sex, to you, is simply making your body available to me. Sometimes you let me touch and please you; but you virtually NEVER do anything like that to me. It's not just the oral sex—you don't rub my back, or stroke or caress me, or any of the things lovers do to excite each other.

"And you can't say I haven't tried to work these things out with you. We've talked about sex over and over. I begged you to come to marriage counseling with me, and you flatly refused. Three years ago I even brought up the possibility of divorce, remember? I said I didn't know if I could live the rest of my life in a marriage where I felt so frustrated, where my love and desire for my wife was bottled up inside me.

"And you cried, and clung to me, and said you didn't want a divorce. You said you'd change, you could do better. And for about a month we made love more often, and you gave me oral sex once. And we spent a night in a hotel in the city, and made love that night and the next morning. I really thought I had gotten through to you.

"But after a few weeks we were right back where we had been before. I guess you thought the scare was over, I don't know. But we were back to twice a month, and you being tired, or having your period, or having lots of work to do, or needing to clean the house, or whatever excuse you could come up with."

Scott stopped. He was suddenly tired of talking. None of this was new to either of them.

Julie looked unhappy, her anger gone for the moment. Scott was right—their sex life was much as he described it, and even his threat of a divorce had only produced a temporary change.

"Scott," she said quietly. "Marriage is a compromise. We both know that. Neither of us is a perfect spouse for the other. Each of us sacrifices some of what we want. How is this any different?"

He looked pained, but nodded. "Yes, Julie, you're right. I've asked myself that question over and over. How can I justify making a selfish choice at the expense of our marriage vows? Do I have the right to greater personal satisfaction, if means sneaking around behind your back, or hurting you?

"And maybe what I've done is wrong. I know that it has hurt you, and I'm sorry. But the problems in our sex life haven't been a small compromise. It's not as though I like lamb chops and you don't, so we never have lamb chops.

"My sexual happiness is more important to me than that; and I guess I just reached the breaking point."

There was another silence, full of thinking on both sides of the table. Julie looked at Scott; he seemed to be waiting for her.

The more he waited, the angrier she became. Since when did his 'sexual happiness' come at the expense of destroying her happy marriage, the trust she had in him!

"Okay, Mr. 'Sexual Happiness' ", she said with a sneer. "You've been getting your jollies lately, but don't think you won't be paying for them!

"I don't know what I'm going to do about this—that's something I'll have to figure out over the next few days. But you can bet I'm not going to lie down and let you walk all over me like this. For starters, you can find somewhere else besides our bedroom to sleep tonight! And as of tomorrow, I want you the hell out of this house!"

She managed to hold back her tears during that outburst. She quickly rose to her feet and retreated to their bedroom, slamming and locking the door behind her.

*** *** ***

Julie was too exhausted to cry any more, but she had a night of uneasy, unhappy sleep. When she finally got out of bed it was nearly 10 am. The guest bed had been slept in, but Scott was nowhere to be found, and his car was not out in front.

Wandering into the kitchen, Julie found a freshly-made pot of coffee. She saw an envelope on the table addressed to "Dearest Julie" in his familiar spiky handwriting. She started to cry again. Furiously, she crumpled the envelope and hurled it across the room.

After two cups of coffee, and some eggs and toast that she didn't even taste, Julie called her sister. Almost as soon as Susan picked up, she found herself crying.

"Susan, Scott is having an affair!" she blurted out.

Julie heard her sister's shock on the other end of the line. "I'll be there in twenty minutes," Susan said.

By the time Susan arrived, Julie had gotten dressed, cleaned up the kitchen and washed her face, but she burst into tears again when her sister hugged her and said, "oh, Julie, I'm so sorry!"

The two sisters sat on the couch in the living room, Susan listening attentively while Julie recounted the previous night's confrontation with Scott. Despite how close they were, Julie had never before spoken about her sex life to her older sister. But now, devastated and hurt, she revealed everything that Scott had said to her.

As Julie spoke, Susan's face took on a more and more quizzical look. When Julie had finished Susan began talking at once.

"Is all that true, Julie? Sex once every two weeks? And you guys don't have oral sex?" She appeared stunned.

"Of course it's true," Julie replied testily. "You're not telling me that it's any different for you and Brian, are you? You've been married even longer than we have!"

Susan only laughed. "Honey, we have some talking to do. I had no IDEA of how things were between you two. I hate to say it, but ... no, scratch that thought."

Susan told her astonished sister about her own sex life with her husband, Brian. They made love at least twice a week, and frequently more often since their own two children had moved out of the house. Once in a while they would take a Saturday or Sunday and spend the entire day in bed, leaving only to bring some snacks up from the kitchen.

Oral sex was a regular part of their repertoire. Susan enjoyed giving Brian head; and although she didn't like to swallow, she was happy to let him come in her mouth. He, in turn, took great pride in being able to lick and suck her to two or three orgasms in a session.

They occasionally played games, too. They'd experimented a little with bondage and with toys; and every once in a while one or the other would suggest a new position or location to make love. The month before, Susan said with a laugh, she'd stood naked on the dining room table, her legs spread wide, while Brian had avidly fingered her pussy and sucked her clit, which were right at head height. They'd done that until she couldn't stand up any more, and then he'd carried her into the living room and fucked the hell out of her on the carpet!

"We share our fantasies sometimes, too," Susan concluded. "Like pretending that we're strangers who picked each other up in a bar, and we're cheating on our spouses. I'd never dream of actually doing anything like that, but the pretending can be a real turn-on."

There was a silence. Susan could see that Julie was not only stunned, but more unhappy than ever. She slid over and took her little sister in her arms, as she had done so often when they were children.

"I ... I don't know what to think," said Julie in a tremulous voice. "Have I driven Scott away? Do you think he's right, that I'm just a cold fish who's been depriving him all these years?"

Susan spoke with care. "Nothing can justify cheating on you, Jules. You know I like Scott, and I'm pretty surprised and disappointed in him. No, I'm furious at him! But ... I will say that I can understand the frustration he must have been feeling. I just wish he had talked to you about it and tried to work it out with you, instead of ... doing what he did."

Julie burst into tears again. "But he did try! He did talk to me about it, over and over ..." She told Susan about their previous conversations, about his request that they try marriage counseling, even about his bringing up a possible divorce.

"Now I'm afraid it's too late, Susan. Now that he's been ... sleeping with somebody else. He's probably been getting everything he missed with me! And how could I even think of letting him touch me, after what he did? I feel so humiliated!"

The two sisters spoke for another hour, without resolving anything. Susan was loving and sympathetic—but it was clear to Julie that her older sister also felt sympathy for the situation Scott had been in.

"Jules, you need to decide what you want now. Whether you still want to be married to Scott, and if so whether there are changes you're willing to make. He's done something awful—horrible! But he must still love you, or he would have simply moved out long before now."

When Susan had gone Julie made a sandwich and forced herself to eat. Then she idly wandered around, straightening up, unable to focus on much of anything.

She found the crumpled envelope from Scott and picked it up. Opening it, she began to read the letter he had left her.

After a moment she gasped, and dropped the letter on the floor with a cry. She felt faint, and quickly sat down in a chair, trembling.

It was several minutes before her shivering eased, and she was able to retrieve the letter, smooth it out on the table, and read it carefully.

*** *** ***

Dear Julie:

I am so very sorry for the pain I have caused you. You need to know, right away, that I am NOT having an affair. I have never even kissed another woman in a romantic way since we started dating nearly 20 years ago. The evidence of my 'affair' that you found was a set-up by me: I've been waiting a couple of weeks for you to confront me about it.

What I've been doing on Thursday nights is just what I told you—bowling with David, at the Lincoln Lanes. Sometimes his wife Anne joins us, and can confirm to you that I've been there. They don't know anything about my deception. I told them that I was free on Thursday nights because you had a weekly teachers' meeting. The credit card receipts for the bowling and for my shoe rentals are in the envelope with this letter.

The Monday nights I told you I'd been working late, I was actually at the office, working. I know you called there several times. I purposely didn't answer the phone, and didn't return your calls for a couple of hours, so that you'd suspect I wasn't at the office.

The matches from the motel I just picked up in their lobby—I've never stayed there. The perfume is "Obsession". I bought it at a drugstore and keep it in my desk at work; I've been putting some of it on my clothes before I come home on Mondays and Thursdays. I also bought a condom and left the empty wrapper in my pants.

When you hadn't mentioned any of these things to me, I thought I should make it more obvious. So I put the lipstick on my boxer shorts myself Thursday morning while you were showering, using one of your lipsticks.

I swear to you on my mother's grave that this is all true. I have not cheated on you, and I never would.

So why did I lie to you this way? What did I hope to gain by hurting you so badly, and making you so angry at me?

Sweetheart, I have been at my wits' end. I have tried so many ways to reach you, to let you know that, as much as I love you, my frustration with our sex life together has been making me miserable. If we are fortunate enough to have 30 more years of life, I don't want to spend it feeling angry and hurt about our lack of sexual intimacy.

The only other step that I can imagine is to end our marriage. As I said, I have never cheated on you, and I won't be unfaithful to you while we are married. But I don't think I can spend the next three decades feeling like a normal man locked up in a monastery.

Julie, I love you. Please think about what I have written.

Much love,

Scott

*** *** ***

Julie sat holding her head in her hands. She'd read the letter twice, unsure whether to feel better or worse. He hadn't cheated on her! However, he'd deceived her, cruelly, and left her feeling hurt and betrayed. Was that any better?

She checked the envelope, and there were the bowling receipts he'd mentioned. She knew that they didn't prove his innocence; but she believed him. She had known Scott for a long time, and he didn't take lightly an oath on his mother's grave. As painful as his trick was, it seemed more in character for him than to have begun an affair with another woman.

She found herself shivering. Getting up from the table, she climbed the stairs to the bedroom, took off her shoes, and huddled under the blankets fully clothed. Within minutes she was asleep.

Hours later when Julie awoke, it was dark outside. Feeling clearer in her mind, she picked up the phone and called Scott's cell. His voice-mail picked up, and she waited for the tone.

In a serious voice she said, "Hello Scott, it's me. I read your letter earlier today.

"I'd like a couple of days without seeing you, if that's all right. I'll be out tomorrow morning, if you want to come and get some clean clothes. Then if you're willing, I'd like you to come home on Monday night and have dinner with me. Just give me a call to let me know if that's OK with you. Bye, honey."

The next morning, which was Sunday, Julie left the house by 10 am to do some shopping. When she returned in the early afternoon there was a brief note on the kitchen table. "I'll be here tomorrow night for dinner at 6:30. I love you. Scott"

*** *** ***

When he entered his house on Monday night Scott didn't know what to expect. Julie's phone message had been calm—not hostile, but not loving either. He could understand why she'd need some time to adjust to the pair of shocks he had administered. But he didn't know if he was in for a happy reunion, a serious talk, or a tongue-lashing.

"Hello, honey," he said hesitantly, entering the kitchen. Julie turned and came to him, giving him a hug and a kiss. "Hi, sweetheart," she said with a smile. This seemed like a good start!

They had roast beef and potatoes, a salad, and some ice cream. A nice dinner, though nothing fancy or out of the ordinary. By unspoken agreement they avoided any reference to the emotional events of the past few days. They talked about work, about Jake at college, about upcoming holiday plans.

Scott was relieved that Julie spoke matter-of-factly about visiting his relatives and hers over the Christmas break—there was no sign from her of an imminent break-up. And he was surprised that they finished an entire bottle of wine; usually Julie drank no more than a glass, but tonight they each had two or three glasses.