Talkin' In Your Sleep

"You missed a spot," he said. Somehow he was smiling. I looked to where he was pointing, but I didn't see anything.

"I guess life is like that," he said. "We all see things from different angles. Sometimes things that are obvious to us aren't quite as obvious to others. And sometimes people who aren't as close to things can have a better viewing angle and see things that we miss because we're too close to them." He paused and took the rag from me. He wiped away a smudge that I hadn't noticed.

"This thing between you two is only a bump in the road," he continued. "You two have been driving along on a smooth stretch of road. Then you hit a bump. While you're going over the bump, it seems terrible and terrifying. But a little while later you're looking back at the bump and things are smooth again. A little while after that, you can barely even remember the bump. You two will get over this and be fine."

"But sometimes a bump in the road, fucks up your suspension, or even breaks your axle and the car isn't worth shit anymore," I spat. "And most of the time if a bump is bad enough, you remember it and never go down that road ever again. You have to change the route you drive or the way you get from point A to point B, just to avoid that bump. Sometimes the best thing to do is just to fix the road so it can't hurt your car."

"When Tammy and I first got together, we made some promises. She's always known what would happen if she ever cheated," I said.

"Look, Dave, you guys have been together for seven years. It doesn't seem smart to throw all of that away, because she lost her head for a few weeks. She just wants to come home so the two of you can talk, okay?" he said.

"I think it would be better for her to go home with you two," I said. "I don't think we have much to talk about. I'll have my attorney call her so we can get the ball rolling.

"The only balls that should be rolling around here are yours and you know where they should be rolling," she said from behind me. "I love you, Davie. I did a dumb thing. Can't you forgive me? I'm in enough trouble already."

"You being in trouble has nothing to do with me, or what we used to call our marriage," I said. "You wouldn't be in any kind of trouble, if you'd kept your legs closed."

"You seemed to like it when they were open for you," she spat. "After seven God damned years, I slipped. So what? And you had a chance to try out someone else too. It had nothing to do with love, Dave. It was only sex. I was already bored with him. I only did it the second and third times because he said he was going to tell you about it. In a way, I'm glad you found out. When you're ready to act like an adult and forgive me, I'll be at my parents' house."

"I forgive you," I said quickly. She smiled and came closer.

"So I can come home?" she asked.

"Why don't you come home tomorrow while I'm out?" I said.

"Why do I have to wait until then?" she asked.

"Because that way you can grab as much of your stuff as you can carry and I won't be here," I said. "It'll be better for both of us. Well it'll better for me. You don't seem to give a shit about our marriage anyway."

"What do you mean by that?" she yelled.

"If you did care about US, you wouldn't have been screwing Bob, knowing that it would end things between us," I said.

"Dave, that's just it," she said. "I was under the impression that we loved each other enough to survive a small upheaval. I thought that you loved me as much as I love you."

"I think I loved you more than you loved me," I said. "I never cheated on you."

"Why are you using the past tense?" she asked. "You forgave me, remember?"

"Tammy, I forgave you because I won't really move on with my life until I let go of what happened between us. I have no intention of being one of those divorced guys who live in the past," I said.

"Why are you still talking about a divorce?" she asked.

"Tammy, I still love you. I probably will for a long time," I said. "But our marriage is over. There is simply no way that I could ever trust you again. Without trust, we have nothing. I won't change the locks until you have all of your stuff out." After that I left her crying in the driveway with her dad trying to calm her down.

Being around Tammy had only gotten me more upset. It had actually let me know how fucked up her attitude was. Even as she had walked away, I got the impression that she was sure that things between us would blow over eventually. She had no idea now serious things were.

A little more than an hour after Tammy left, someone knocked on my door. It was Samantha. She stood there shyly until I invited her in.

"Won't Tammy be upset that you have me in the house?" she asked.

"Tammy doesn't live here anymore," I said. "We're getting a divorce."

"The doctors operated on Bob for four hours," she said. "He's uhm, stable. They removed the spike from his brain. There was surprisingly little damage to his brain stem. That's the part of the brain that is responsible for respiration and controlling most of the body's systems. It's hard to predict the level of brain activity that he'll be capable of when the swelling goes down. His parents came in so I could come home and get some sleep."

"The police have decided not to charge your wife," she said. "They seem to think it's an accident. I have to tell you though, Dave, my lawyers are filing a wrongful death suit against her."

After that Samantha and I ended up just sitting on my sofa staring at the walls. Life was really funny. It just had a way of knocking you on your ass when you least expected it. I think at that moment both of us were a little bit broken.

Samantha was far less broken than I was. Bob had a history of cheating on her and complaining about everything she did. She had considered divorcing him several times, but didn't have it in her to pull the trigger. There was also the fact that despite appearances, she and Bob had been barely staving off bankruptcy. They were always on the verge of foreclosure on the house. They were so far behind on the payday advances they were constantly taking out to pay the bills that they no longer really had any income.

As bad as it seemed, what happened to Bob wasn't necessarily a bad thing for her.

On the other hand, I was in so much shock and pain over the reality of Tammy's betrayal that I could barely function. I needed someone ... something ... anything to hold onto and anchor me through it. I had talked a good game earlier that evening to Tammy's face. But I was a wreck. If it hadn't been for Samantha, I might have called Tammy that first night.

We were both so emotionally drained that we fell asleep together. We awoke the next morning wrapped in each other's arms and smiled awkwardly. Samantha ran across the street and showered while I did the same. We met for breakfast as usual only this time I was heading off to work as usual, while Samantha headed back to the hospital.

Strangely enough, being at work made me feel better. I called the lawyer that I had chosen and had him draw up the papers and serve them on Tammy. There was no sense in waiting.

Two days later Tammy got the divorce papers. She also got the news that the DA had decided not file charges against her for Bob's injury, it had been ruled a tragic accident. But it was also the day that Samantha's lawyer filed his wrongful death suit against her.

The doctors were convinced that the injury to Bob's brain was simply too severe. There was very little chance that Bob would ever regain consciousness. The only thing ahead was a lifetime of him simply existing and breathing, but not really living. Samantha was prepared, as cold as it seemed, to pull the plug on Bob. His parents, especially his mother were fighting her tooth and nail.

My lawyer decided that we should wait until after the wrongful death suit was settled because it could lead to a better settlement for me. I didn't really care about a settlement; I just didn't want to be tied to Tammy forever.

So that morning in court as the lawyers argued with me trapped there on the stand. One question went through my mind over and over. But before I worked anything out. I was told that I could step down. I was out of it.

"No further questions," said Tammy's lawyer again, as I sat there shocked. Somehow, I managed to get back to my seat as they called the next witness, but the debate in my own mind was ongoing.

I had always been gifted with the ability to see things in a linear fashion. I could put patterns together and predict with relative certainty the outcomes of seemingly random facts. So as the lawyers dickered and dunked at each other about whether or not Tammy was responsible or at least liable for Bob's condition and possible death, if they pulled the plug, I began to wonder if I was the guilty person.

I had, several weeks before Bob's accident, done nearly the same thing to myself. I had stepped on that same rake and knocked the shit out of myself. A few days later I had put the spike in the rake.

A short time after that, I had discovered that Bob was screwing Tammy and I had wanted revenge. I had watched on the security cameras what happened if Bob and Tammy were interrupted. I had seen Bob run into the shed when the teenagers had rang the doorbell. I had actually planned that Bob would do exactly that when I confronted him. I had arranged for myself and Kirk, who would serve as a witness, to drive up in my Mustang which could be heard from inside of the house. And finally I had watched as Tammy had thrown the rake haphazardly into the shed, in her hurry to get into the house for sex with me, the night before her weekly tryst with Bob.

I had even noticed the location and orientation of that rake as we went inside of the house. Although it hadn't been what I had planned, I had literally put all of the dominos in place for what happened to Bob. I don't think that I consciously intended for Bob to end up the way that he did. But I did think that it was a very good chance that he'd have been maimed or injured. I guess at the time I'd hated Bob for what he'd done to our friendship and my marriage. In a way I did feel a little bit better, but I don't think he deserved what he got.

I put all of those thoughts away as the trial ended for that day. More than likely, I wouldn't be back to see how it all came out. I actually had no vested interest in how it was resolved except for in the way that it affected my divorce. My lawyer could monitor the case for me.

As I put on my Ray Bans and headed for my Mustang, I heard footsteps running up behind me. I turned and saw Tammy heading for me.

"Davie, can we talk?" she asked. I wondered what she wanted. We had been sparring in lawyer's offices for weeks at that point.

"I ... I miss you," she said. I could see the sadness written on her face and in her eyes. Before I could answer, Samantha was there. The two women looked at each other and before words were issued, the tension was so thick you could cut it.

"I guess I know why you haven't answered my phone calls, now," said Tammy. "I'm miserable. I cry all the time. Poor Bob, or what's left of him, is languishing away in a hospital, meanwhile the two of you are getting cozy."

"The difference is," spat Samantha. "That we didn't start getting cozy until "AFTER," you and Bob had ruined two marriages. And to be truthful, Bob and I didn't have much of a marriage. He was very dissatisfied with me. And I was no longer under the spell of his bullshit. That's why he needed to find some stupid whore to fuck outside of our marriage. Guess who he found?"

"That isn't true," said Tammy. "When I started with Bob, I did it because ... well ... it was supposed to help my marriage, not ruin it."

"That's the stupidest thing I've ever heard of," laughed Samantha. "When you cherish something, you try to protect it. You keep it away from harm. It's like Dave's Mustang. Did you ever see him just hand over the keys to anyone? Nope, he never even lets that car get wet, unless he's washing it. And that's how he treated you. He treated you like you were precious. And you repaid him by sleeping with some another woman's husband. You're an idiot."

"Then stupidity must be contagious," said Tammy. "Because it looks like you're trying to do the same thing."

Samantha just shook her head. "See what I mean," she said. "You're too stupid to even see the difference. Bob was always cheating on me. Bob was never satisfied with what we had or what we could afford. He always thought that he deserved the best whether we had the money for it or not. And then when we got what he wanted, he always wanted something else. Once he had something it had no value. Bob didn't love you, Tammy. Before you knew it he'd have been letting his friends fuck you, too. Just so he could seem like a big shot." Tammy's mouth dropped open but she didn't say anything. I knew that she was remembering the fact that Bob had brought another guy the last time.

"Dave on the other hand loved you so much that he got pissed at Bob for even suggesting that we swap. He broke off his friendship with Bob for even suggesting that he share you. Maybe I'm not as smart as you and Bob, but that sounds like love to me. My husband, the man I married, sent me to Dave to offer myself to him, just to convince Dave that we should swap. Does that sound like Bob valued me?" Tammy shook her head and tears rolled down her cheeks again.

"It was a mistake," she said. "I've already admitted that."

"No," I said, joining the conversation. "A mistake is something unintentional. It's something that you didn't intend to do. Screwing Bob was a deliberate act. It was the consequences of that act that you didn't intend. But even then, you knew how I felt about cheating. So you knew what would happen if you were caught."

"Davie, we've been married for seven years," said Tammy. "Haven't you ever thought about trying out another woman?"

"I'm human," I said. "I look all the time. There are some really beautiful women out there. But I married you, Tammy. And seven years is nothing. It flew by like the blink of an eye. I always thought that we'd be married for more like seventy years."

There was really nothing else to say. I turned and walked to my car. Tammy and Samantha continued talking. I later found out from Samantha that they had mostly talked about Tammy's hope that even though they weren't really friends, Samantha would have enough class to wait until our divorce was settled before trying to start something with me.

The judge ruled in Samantha's favor. Even though Bob's accident had been self inflicted, the judge felt that Tammy was partially responsible. He only awarded Samantha a hundred thousand dollars, though. He left it up to the lawyers to determine how it would be paid since Tammy didn't have a source of income. There was also the fact that since I had already filed for divorce and Tammy and I were not sharing a residence, I was in no way responsible for paying any of it.

Samantha was another matter entirely. She was beautiful and she was also free for the first time in a long time. She had already begun to lean on me for emotional support. I guess we helped each other through the worst of things. Samantha was locked in a legal battle with Bob's parents over the decision to take Bob off of life support. They managed to settle out of court. Bob's parents allowed Samantha to keep the hundred thousand dollars that she had won from Tammy. They were going to foot the bill for Bob's care. Bob's insurance company used a loophole in the contract Bob had signed for the insurance policy to refuse payment. Since Bob had been killed in the process of committing an illegal or immoral act, they didn't have to pay. Screwing Tammy had been legal, but it was clearly immoral.

As for Samantha and me, there was no need to wait. We had already started sleeping together. But sleeping together was all there was. Bob was an asshole with a capital "A" but he was a pretty good judge of pussy. Samantha, as beautiful as she was, had the distinction of being absolutely terrible in bed. As bad as the first time had been, I gave her the benefit of the doubt a couple of more times. But she was just awful. I could see why Bob had cheated on her.

Another thing was that Samantha's personality was not all it was cracked up to be. Samantha was very aloof and very cold. She also had submissive tendencies that I was sure that Bob had manipulated. I wanted a woman that I could love and who'd love me, not someone who just did what I told her to do.

A very kind judge gave me my divorce a few weeks later. Since Tammy's involvement with Bob was a part of the court record, I didn't need to prove infidelity on her part. I was awarded 60 percent of our assets. I bought our house from Tammy, for her forty percent of our equity. Tammy's share of our assets plus her share of the equity only amounted to about eighty thousand dollars. She had to get a job and arrange a payment plan to pay off Samantha.

Bob's parents had him moved to a facility where his care was much less expensive than it would have been in the hospital. For the first few months they visited him every day. Then it was a couple of times a week. After a while that became a couple of times a month. On the day that Bob finally gave up the fight, he was alone.

Samantha made out like a bandit. She sold Bob's printing business to Kinko's and sold her payments from Tammy to an annuity company. After a long heartfelt talk about how we simply didn't fit, she moved back across the country to the town she grew up in. I wished her well and we remained friends.

There were a lot of women around town for me to date and I tried a lot of them out. But nothing seemed to click for me. A big part of it was that I no longer had the ability to just blindly trust and give my heart. Tammy had taken that away from me. There was also the problem that when it came to sex, Tammy was hard to match.

It just seemed so unfair to me. Everyone had gotten what they deserved, except me. Samantha had become rich. Bob was dead and Tammy would be working her ass off at Seven Eleven while living with her parents for years to come. Why was I being punished? It just didn't make sense. It was as if the fates were out of synch. Whatever happened to all of that bullshit about those who did wrong had bad things happen to them? Well that had come true. But the destiny of the good was to have good things happen to them. Where the fuck was my destiny?

One day in the fall, about six months after Samantha had moved away, a taxi pulled into my driveway in the middle of the night. A drunken Tammy got out of it. She looked like shit. She stumbled up to the door and looked through her purse for her keys. She got them and opened the front door. I had never bothered to change the locks. She came up the stairs as I watched and took off her clothes and got into bed. Almost a year apart had changed her. Tammy had never been as beautiful as Samantha, but she was warm and loving and hell on wheels in bed. She also had a body that was simply made for sex.

The bags under Tammy's eyes and the color of her skin suggested that Tammy had been drinking a lot more than she should. This was the first time that I had ever seen her drunk. Her body was also not what it had been only a year before. She was thicker around the waist and her ass and thighs had picked up some cellulite.

I picked up the phone from the table beside the bed and called her parents. I told them that Tammy had showed up drunk and got into my bed. Her dad apologized and told me that she'd been having a rough time. He told me that he'd be right over to pick her up. I told him that it was late and that I'd drop her off the next morning. It would be Saturday, so I wasn't expected anywhere.