Week from Hell

When it finally stopped, I went upstairs, shaved, showered and got ready to go to work. When I came downstairs again, Sara was in the kitchen, breakfast almost ready, something neither of us had eaten except for weekends for quite some time.

"Neither one of us ate last night, and I thought you needed something before you went to work."

Sara looked like shit. Her eyes were puffy, even after the shower, and she looked like she hadn't slept much the night before.

"What was with the long shower this morning? You took one last night too."

"I can't seem to feel clean anymore. I scrub myself, but it doesn't seem to make any difference."

"Tom, I love you more than anything in the world. Keith means absolutely nothing to me, and I made a horrible mistake. No, not a mistake, a horrible error in judgment, can you find it in your heart to forgive me?"

"I honestly don't know. Time will tell, but right now, I can't make that call, I don't know if I can forgive and forget."

The rest of the meal was in silence.

I got in to the office early, just right at 8:00, and as I was walking in, I saw Bev, our accounts payable clerk, who also dealt with our expense reports. Bev owned me a couple of favors, so as we were going up in the elevator, I asked her for a favor.

"Can you get me a copy of Keith's expense reports for the last year?"

Bev looked a bit confused, then: "Why would you want those?"

"It is something personal, that I really would rather not talk about."

Bev didn't say much, but about 30 minutes later she came into my office with a folder, which she slid onto my desk.

"There are two copies of Keith's expenses in there. They only go back about 10 months because the rest are in archives that I can't get into right now. Just remember that you didn't get those from me."

With that she turned and left.

It didn't take me more than 30 minutes to see the pattern in the reports, because he had apparently been filing them monthly. Yes, Keith had been taking other purchasing agents out to lunch or dinner, but none of them more than once every six weeks or so. Sara, on the other hand, had been taken out like she said, every three weeks or so. I compared the dates that he took Sara out, and with just a couple of exceptions, every single time was when I was out of town.

I put all this together in a calendar, revised my letter of resignation to reflect what I had found, and headed for the CEO's office.

Greg was astounded when I handed him my letter, as well as my laptop, and wanted to know why.

"Keith has been setting me up so he can see if he can seduce my wife."

"What?"

I gave him a copy of my calendar, along with a copy of Keith's expense report, and a copy of when I had been to the suppliers. I pointed out the "coincidences", and left it at that.

"So what about the seduction?"

"He succeeded night before last."

"How the hell do you know?"

"My wife told me, when I came home unexpectedly."

Now Greg is kind of a funny guy. Very moralistic. Goes to church every Sunday, but doesn't frown on those of us who don't, like Sara and I. But he is hell on anyone screwing around with other people's wives. I know for a fact that he fired one account representative because he was named in a lawsuit for alienation of affection, it didn't matter that the two of them eventually got married, he was gone for good.

"Tom, let me look into this. I will get back to you today, or at the latest tomorrow. In the meantime, I assume that your marriage is not in the best of shape right now?"

"Yeah, that is putting it mildly."

"I am not accepting your resignation. Take two weeks, not vacation, not sick leave, just take two weeks off and see what you can do with your marriage. In the meantime, I will do some investigation and get back to you. For now, you are still on the payroll, but I don't want to see you in this building, or hear of you doing a damn bit of work for us."

I wasn't sure I had ever heard him say "damn", but I understood his meaning.

I went home, and of course Sara was off at work, and I had the joy of just sitting there and thinking about what had happened.

Epilog

Greg called me the next morning, and informed me that Keith had been terminated for cause the previous day. He also offered me Keith's job, along with a hefty increase in salary, numerous stock options and so on. I told him I had to think about it, and he immediately agreed. I think he might have been worried about a potential lawsuit. In any event, before the two weeks was up I told him that I would take the job, but that I wasn't doing any travel. He agreed, and I signed the offer a couple of days later.

Two weeks after I quit, Sara moved out to her sister's house. I didn't throw her out, but the coldness on my part had been obvious, although she did everything I could imagine to make things better. Neither of us has filed for divorce or separation, and we still have joint bank accounts, and Sara's paychecks are still being paid into our joint accounts, we just don't live together.

I don't know what Sara has told the kids, but the kids seem to be a bit ticked off at her.

It's been three months now since our anniversary. I miss Sara, and our talks in the evening. The talks we have always had, even when the kids were small.

It's hard to throw away 25 years of marriage, but on the other hand, every anniversary I would be thinking of what happened on our 25th.

I suppose it might have been easier to forgive and forget if she hadn't stayed the night, then fucked the bastard the next morning.

Sara has been going to counseling, and trying to get me to go to marriage counseling with her, but I keep telling her, until I can get to the point of forgiving and forgetting, what the hell is the point of marriage counseling? Yes, she was naïve, and got set up by a pro, but she didn't have to spend the night, and she sure as hell didn't have to fuck him the next morning.

Oh, one last thing. Tara called me this morning, asking if Sara and I had had another confrontation. I told her we hadn't, and asked why.

"Well, I was finally able to find out who our sibling is. His name is Keith Zolinkowski, and there is only one in the phone book. I told Sara last night, and she started acting like she did the first few days she was here. You know, sitting in her room and just staring at the wall. She won't eat much, and spends a whole lot of her time crying. I don't quite know what to do."

"You won't have to look very hard to find Keith. Sara knows where he lives. That is my old boss, and the guy Sara was fucking that screwed up our marriage."

I guess Sara had never told Tara what Keith's full name was.