An Innocent Question Ch. 02

"So ultimately I wasn't guilty of anything, except a vivid and intense fantasy that contributed to some great sex, which Ellen and I both enjoyed.

"But Arthur, can I really say I'm any better than Ellen? We each have had some kind of insane attack of wild desire for someone else. She ran into her guy and acted on hers, while I never had that chance and never did. Does that mean I'm innocent and she's guilty? Or does it just mean she was faced by an irresistible temptation, and I wasn't?"

Arthur thought for a while. Then he said, "your last phrase, Dan, 'irresistible temptation', seems like the key to your view of this whole situation.

"Was your desire for Bridget truly 'irresistible'? Would you have been able to resist it if, say, you'd met her in a restaurant and she'd made a pass at you?"

I slowly shook my head. "I don't know, Arthur. I thought a lot about it back then, God knows I've thought about it this week, and I don't know. I'd like to say, Sure, I'm stronger than that, I'm devoted to Ellen, I would have said 'no thank you'.

"But at the time, my desire for Bridget just made me crazy. I thought about her all the time, wondered every time I went into the department office if she might by chance be there, fantasized about her in bed with me, with McAllister, with her husband.... I was pretty nuts for a while."

"We need to stop now, Dan," said Arthur after a minute. "But I think we should continue with this discussion when we meet again—is Tuesday OK? I think that your feelings about your obsession, and Ellen's, are going to be crucial in our thinking about the future of your marriage."

"Thank you, Arthur. I'm pretty sure you're right."

***************

The days passed. Work-days weren't so bad, because I had things to do that kept my mind busy. The weekends were awful: empty and lonely. I wasn't ready to confide in friends, so I spent the time alone. I took some long walks, hoping they'd help me stay in shape—they certainly gave me lots of time to think. I had a lengthy chat on the phone with each of my kids, though I didn't tell them anything about what had happened with Ellen. I even went to the mall for a couple of hours, something I normally hate, just to pass the time.

Life was a little easier once Monday came. The worst times were at night, when I lay in the dark wondering what the rest of my life would be like. Would I be alone? Would I have to try dating again, hoping somehow that I'd find another woman who could give me the happiness that I'd had with Ellen?

Or perhaps the nights weren't the worst. It might have been the moment of waking each morning—of looking around sleepily for Ellen, then remembering suddenly that I wasn't at home, in my own bed next to her—I was in a hotel room by myself. I was there because I'd left my wife. And I'd left her because she'd fucked someone else.

Arthur and I continued to meet twice a week. Our sessions focused, almost obsessively, on the question of Bridget and whether I would have resisted her. Somehow I couldn't get past that single point.

If I believed that I would have turned down an offer from Bridget, that I would have stayed faithful to Ellen in the face of that awesome temptation, then I just couldn't see how to forgive Ellen for what she had done.

But if I would have given in to Bridget, then I was no better than Ellen—I was just as vulnerable to temptation, and I had no right to feel morally superior. My faithfulness and Ellen's adultery were then reduced to a matter of luck, of pure circumstance.

Arthur tried to get me to see that the question was unanswerable—and that ultimately it didn't matter. He pointed out that I'd experienced the same kind of unexpected, irrational desire for another person that Ellen had. No one would ever know whether I could have resisted Bridget, but that wasn't the point.

The point was that I was in a position to identify with Ellen's feelings, to know what had caused her to act as she did. Now I needed to let my empathy rise above my outrage and hurt feelings. Truly, I knew how it felt to wrestle with that aching feeling of lust. Did I have it in my heart to forgive Ellen for her weakness?

I didn't know, but after my third week away I was ready to find out. I'd called Ellen every 3-4 days, but the conversations were always very brief, just letting her know I was still all right. Now I called on a Saturday with something else in mind.

"Ellen, it's Dan."

"Hi, honey!" She sounded happy to hear from me.

"I'm planning to come back home today. I don't know what will happen with us, but being alone in this hotel room isn't doing me any good anymore. I figure we have a lot of talking to do, and we might as well do it in the house."

Her response sounded pleased but wary. "That's wonderful, Dan! It will be so great to see you again... I've missed you."

"I'll be by in about an hour, OK?"

When I got home and dragged my suitcase to the door, Ellen was waiting. She smiled, but her face looked strained, and she seemed tired. I suppose she probably wasn't sleeping any better than I was. I wondered whether she'd spent any nights with Chris. It didn't seem likely, but I no longer trusted her enough to have any confidence in my own guesses about her.

I took the suitcase straight upstairs and put it on the queen-size bed in the guest room. Ellen, following me, had a look of shock on her face.

I was blunt. "I'm not sleeping in our bedroom, Ellen. Not after what you and Chris did in there."

She flushed, and I saw tears in her eyes. She looked down, but said nothing. I walked back downstairs and went into the kitchen for a cup of coffee. I poured another one for Ellen and we sat at the table. We hadn't touched since I came in the door.

I said, "here's where things are with me. I'm much calmer than I was when I walked out. I've had time to get used to ... what you told me. I'm still very hurt, but I'm not so angry any more. I'm more ... just sad, I guess. I haven't stopped loving you—I can't just turn that off like a faucet. But I don't trust you now, and I can't see how that trust will ever come back."

Ellen just nodded, looking miserable.

"But there's a story I have to tell you, something I don't think you know anything about. It's the main reason I'm back in the house with you, Ellen. It has to do with something that happened six years ago. Do you remember Bridget Zuzich?"

I told Ellen the whole story, pretty much as I had told it to Arthur George. She listened attentively, looking surprised once or twice but not interrupting until I had finished.

Then she said, after a little bit of silence, "wow, Dan. I can't get over how much that story sounded like what happened to me with Chris. Except, of course, that ... that you and she never ...."

I nodded. "Right. And I and the therapist I've been seeing have talked about that point over and over. Would I have been any stronger than you were? Maybe not, in which case I have no right to punish you for what you've done."

"No, Dan," Ellen said, with surprising firmness. "Whatever you may have fantasized, you never did it. Never mind the circumstances. You didn't cheat, you didn't break your vows or threaten our marriage. I did."

"Yes, but you also confessed to me, Ellen. You didn't let it become a long affair, and you didn't keep me in the dark about it."

After a pause, I asked the question I had promised myself over and over I wouldn't ask.

"Have you seen him again?"

She shook her head. "No, Dan. I told you, that's not going to happen."

She looked serious and completely sincere—and it broke my heart how little I believed her. What a fragile thing trust is! Once it's broken, how the hell do you put it back together again?

We had a quiet dinner, then watched TV together. I think we were both striving for a normal evening, neither of us wanting to have to tackle anything painful for a while.

But when we went upstairs to bed it was hard to avoid the fact that we were headed into two separate rooms.

Ellen said, "honey, I understand why you ... don't want to be in the bedroom. Could I ... could I join you in the guest room tonight?"

I looked at her. I had anticipated the question, and planned to say no. But a different answer came out of my mouth.

"I'm ... not ready to make love, Ellen. But if you'd put on a regular nightie, nothing sexy, it would be nice to hold you as we went to sleep."

She nodded, giving me a shy smile, and disappeared into the bedroom. After a few minutes of changing and brushing teeth, I was in the guest bed when she came into my arms, again looking very wary. I put my arm around her, and she gently snuggled up against me, her head on my shoulder.

I wasn't up to talking—the emotions were too close to the surface. Without a word I turned the light out. We lay quietly, hearing one another's breathing, and thank God I was soon asleep.

***************

It would be wonderful to say that once I moved back home again, things got better and better between me and Ellen. But it just wasn't true. We fell into a kind of uneasy semi-intimacy.

There were ways in which we enjoyed one another's company—at times we could find our way into our old routines, of lengthy talks about all sorts of crazy subjects. We worked well together with cooking and cleaning up, and with sharing the other household duties just as we always had.

But we didn't get back to making love, or even to hugging and kissing. Holding one another in bed each night was pretty much the only touching we did.

And the central, painful topic of Ellen's romp in bed with Chris hung like a cloud between us. Neither of us wanted to mention it, but the feelings it stirred up weren't going away.

I continued to see Arthur George. I had developed a plan to test Ellen, and he couldn't talk me out of it.

"Dan," he said, "you need to see that you have nothing to gain with this idea. If she 'fails' your test, you'll be convinced you need a divorce. And even if she passes it, that is not going to lay all your fears to rest. There's just no point in doing this!"

Part of me knew he was right, but I stubbornly refused to back down.

I had picked a morning when I knew Ellen would be at work to come home and check through her email. Her computer at home was linked to the OSU system she used at work, so I could see all her incoming and outgoing email from the home computer.

First I checked to see if she'd had any communication with Chris since the day he spent with her in our bed. I didn't find anything. Then I went ahead and wrote him a carefully worded email, which I signed from Ellen.

Here's what it said:

*****

Dear Chris:

I've been thinking about you a lot since the day we spent together. Could you come to the house this Thursday at 7 pm? Dan will be out that night until 10, so we can have time to be together.

It may sound silly, but please don't email me back—just come, if you can. And when you come, please pretend I never sent you this email. I'd be grateful if you just acted like you were spontaneously coming over to see me, OK?

I hope to see you Thursday—

Best, Ellen

*****

When Thursday came, I called Ellen from work at about 2 pm and told her there was a major server re-installation that we had to do that evening, and that I would be stuck at work until 10 or 11. I told her to go ahead and eat dinner without me, and I would scrounge something when I got home.

Of course, there was no server re-installation to do. And at 6:45 pm I was sitting in my parked car, six houses down from our house, in a position where I could see when Chris arrived and when he left.

My "test" for Ellen was pretty simple. She'd either send Chris away, or tumble into bed with him again. I figured that if they just talked, he wouldn't be in the house more than say 30 or 40 minutes. Once an hour had passed, the bad news would be pretty obvious.

As I said, Arthur thought this was a pretty bad idea all the way around, but I just couldn't let it go.

So I sat, listening to my car radio and wondering about the rest of my life. Chris pulled up at 7:05 and went right up to my front door. I couldn't see Ellen opening the door, but after a moment or two Chris went inside and the door shut behind him.

I sat some more, not really hearing the music. The first half hour wasn't so bad; then it started to be really difficult. I willed my front door to open, but it didn't move. I closed my eyes for ten-minute stretches, but when I opened them again only thirty seconds had passed.

At 8:15, I realized the worst. My wife was fucking Chris again—and I had set it up! I'd wanted an answer, and by God I'd gotten one!

At 8:30 I realized I was crying.

At 8:45 I couldn't stand it any more. Why was I just sitting here? I could at least storm in, catch them in bed, and play out the final scene of my marriage. I started the car, and then just before I put it in gear I saw Chris come walking out my front door, get in his car, and drive off.

I quickly drove down to my house and ran in, hoping to catch my guilty wife cleaning up the scene of the crime.

When I came into the house Ellen was sitting at the kitchen table, fully dressed in the clothes she'd worn to work. She looked up at me in surprise and said, "Dan, did you finish early?" Then she saw my tear-stained face—I must have looked awful—and cried, "honey, are you all right?"

Ignoring her, I looked around wildly. I saw two empty coffee cups on the table. I ran upstairs to the bedroom. The bed was neatly made. I yanked back the bedspread to see the sheets, but they were clean and unwrinkled. I quickly checked all the beds in the other rooms, with the same result.

I could hear Ellen coming upstairs, saying, "Dan, what's going on?" Ignoring her, I went into the bathroom searching for signs that someone had showered, but the shower stall was dry. I looked in the hamper, then in the closet and under the bed for any clothes she might have been wearing when they started making love, but I found nothing.

Frustrated and confused, I slumped down on our bed. Ellen looked at me with concern in her eyes. "Dan, what on earth is the matter?"

Suddenly I was sobbing. "I know Chris was here tonight! And I know you fucked him again!"

She looked directly at me and said, "yes, Chris was here. But no, I didn't fuck him. I'm not going to fuck him ever again, Dan."

I couldn't stop crying. It felt as though weeks of painful feelings were pouring out of me, and I couldn't control them. "Then what the hell were the two of you doing in this house for almost two hours?"

Ellen sat down next to me on the bed, and gently pulled me into her arms.

Quietly she said, "we were talking, Dan. He probably came over with the idea that we'd go to bed again—but he didn't touch me, and I didn't touch him. All we did is sit in the kitchen, drink coffee, and talk.

"And now he's gone, and you need to tell me what the hell is going on. How did you know he was here?"

"I set it up!" I cried. "I sent him an email from you, asking him to come see you tonight, and that I'd be out late. And I sat in the car down the street and watched him—when he came, and when he left.

"I figured if you didn't go to bed with him, he'd be gone in half an hour. But he was here an hour and forty-five minutes!"

I couldn't get control of myself. "Jesus, Ellen, do you see what I've been reduced to? Skulking around, playing silly bullshit cloak-and-dagger games with my own wife? The poor cuckolded husband, trying to catch his wife in the act!"

She didn't answer, just held me close while I cried. When I grew calmer, I sat up and looked at her. She'd been crying, too—her face was streaked with tears.

Suddenly I couldn't stand to be near her—I couldn't stand feeling her arms around me, or looking at that loving, pitying face. I abruptly pulled free of her and went off to the guest room.

I undressed, brushed my teeth, pulled on my boxers and climbed into bed. The door didn't lock, but I closed it—sending a message to Ellen, since every night since I'd come home I'd left it open.

I longed for sleep, but it didn't come. After more than an hour I was still awake in the dark, restless and miserable.

Then I heard Ellen quietly slip into the room. I rolled over in bed without a word, so that if she got in my back would be towards her. Ignoring this silent rebuff, she slid in and spooned tightly behind me, pressing her breasts into my back, sliding her arm around my chest beneath my own arm. She didn't say anything, thank God. I didn't want to hear anything she had to say!

After a few minutes of lying still, just holding me, Ellen began touching me. Her lips brushed the back and side of my neck over and over, and her hand drifted around my chest, stroking my nipples, then dipping down lower, beneath my boxers into my pubic hair.

I really didn't know what to do. I wanted to reject her, but I didn't want to speak to her. Also, it felt good! We hadn't had sex in more than a month—we hadn't even necked in all that time.

Somehow I hoped I could silently reject her, simply by not responding, by not getting aroused in response to her caresses.

For a while it worked that way. She began to move her body against me, and I could feel her erect nipples against my back. Her hand held and stroked my cock lovingly, gently. Under most circumstances I would have been rock-hard within a minute, but I remained totally limp. Good! I thought. Fuck you! I don't want your pity fuck!

But after a while the pleasure of her hand on me, her kisses against my neck, and her wonderful breasts caressing my back, began to have their effect. My penis thickened, then rose in her hand. She cooed happily into my ear, and slid her hand down further to pleasure my balls. I felt her pubic hair rub against me through my boxers, and realized that she had come to bed naked.

I was still totally torn. Her body, her lips and her hand felt great, and I wanted more. But at the same time I was angry and hurt, and full of an irrational desire to reject and hurt her. If I had felt that she were seducing me out of her own sexual desire, it might have been all right. But I couldn't help feeling that this was just Ellen trying to win me back, just trying to make up with me. 'Give the poor guy a good fuck, make him think that I want him, and he'll come around.' I felt manipulated, and that made me far more angry than horny.

Without a word, I suddenly wrenched myself free of Ellen's embrace. I rolled out of the bed onto my feet and left the room. Without looking back, I headed down the stairs and into the living room. I found an extra blanket in the closet and settled myself down for the night on the couch.

I listened for sounds from upstairs but heard nothing. No words from Ellen, no crying. I lay awake for awhile longer, miserable, wondering whether I had done the right thing. No answer ever came.