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Click here"I wanted someone to love me again like Karen had. Like Karen had given me and then taken away. I tried to love her more in order to get that depth of love back again, and she seemed to appreciate it, but didn't need it. She already had someone who loved her utterly.
"And so, in weakness, I turned to Maeve. We went out to dinner and talked and talked, just like Karen and I had always done. We ended up at her flat and for a long time, we just cuddled, spooning and talking. It was an inevitable progression, I guess. Karen and I hadn't had sex for almost eight months. I was an all-too-easy target. That doesn't make it right; it just was what it was.
"I felt terrible afterwards. Strangely the guilt wasn't so much about the sex as the intimacy of the thoughts we'd shared. I'd broken that just as much as Karen had. And when I got home really late, she guessed immediately what I'd done -- even if she didn't know any of the details. I'd never lied to her before, and I wasn't going to start then, it never even crossed my mind to do so. I answered all her questions honestly and she threw me out. She and Alison were both crying and screaming at me, and in a way that was a perfect illustration of what my life had become -- a partnership of two and a lone one.
"And now I don't know what to do."
He turned to look at me.
"You're my best friend -- probably my only friend now -- unless you don't want to be any more. What do you think I should do?"
I opened my mouth to urge him to try and make it work with Karen; try to get her to forgive him. Obviously that was what he should do. She loved and needed him now more than ever.
But then I closed it again. What if he was right? What if I urged him to go back to a marriage in which the love had been halved, where an extra person hadn't doubled the love, but simply taken away from what was there? Would that be enough for him? Should it be? After being given the gold medal, could he be happy as an also-ran?
In the end, all I could come up with was a compromise.
"I think what you need to do is go to Karen and tell her exactly what you told me, in exactly the same words. She's at least as smart as you are, so ask her what she thinks you should do. And if you're not sure she'll listen to you, I'll do it for you. I'm sure I could get her to hear it in your own words."
I was absolutely certain of that.
He pursed his lips and nodded slowly. "I really appreciate that. I don't think she'd give me the time of day right now. Actually I don't think she would piss on me if I was on fire at the moment. Please, if you would do it, maybe she'll be able to offer a solution that I just can't think of. I'm at the Royal in town. It's offseason so I can afford it for a while, and then I guess I'll look around, depending on what she comes up with.
"You're the best friend a man could hope for, you know that?"
He paid the bill for both of us, grabbed my hand and did the A-frame chest bump thing that men do to ensure their dicks never get too close together. Then he left, leaving me to some cold thoughts.
Twenty minutes later, Caro arrived, her thick coat making her look heavy. Admittedly, her baby-bump was mostly the cause of that, but I liked to think it was entirely the coat's fault and that my beloved's figure was as lithe and supple as ever.
She frowned at my beer until I told her about Jeff and then she couldn't care less, listening to the recording I'd made on my phone with avid, almost manic concentration, shaking her head and shushing me sternly whenever I tried to butt in to expand on a point. Then she listened to it again, while I quietly finished the beer.
When she tapped the phone to close it, she looked at me, reached for my beer and took a swallow before grimacing and handing it back. She was never a beer person.
"What do you think Karen will say when we play this for her?" I asked.
"I don't know," she replied, her expression showing her distress.
"What would you say?" I asked. We loved each other as deeply as Karen and Jeff did. In most ways, we were their mirror image.
There was a long, long pause as she looked down at the bar, deep in thought.
"I don't know," she whispered.
And when she looked up at me, her hands pressed to her burgeoning belly, in her eyes were fathomless pools of fear.
- COMMENTS
Anonymous5 days agoFor me the story doesn't compute. From some of the comments I take it that people have gone through a similar situation, I get that. What I can't comprehend is the depth of the connection between the MC. When I was twenty and fell in love for the first time the intensity and the all-encompassing nature of that, at first, unreserved, unconditional feeling. At that time I served in the military, so I had to be my own person, so to speak. I couldn't wallow in the feeling to merge with the loved one into one. But I also grew up as a person and lost a lot of illusions.
I must say I was sort of a "lone wolf" guy for most of my life. Similar to the MMC there was no deep connection to my parents, and as far back as I remember, to the age of four, my mother was very reserved, there was almost no physical contact, except from the unavoidable. I don't wish that on anybody, on the other hand I became my own person very early. Of course no human being is like a remote island, but I think you get my drift. So I began reading books before my life as a schoolboy began and developed an interest in many topics, watched a lot of tv and still played hours on end with the neighbourhood kids until I was eleven or twelve.
Consequently I've connected with a number of people throughout my life. One of the lessons I learned early on: human relations are almost always assymetrical, even if it doesn't feel that way at times. I didn't become a cynic and held nothing back. But, except from that first time of being in love, I always was aware that I only assume my feelings are reprocicated as strongly as it seems, that they might change and diminish over time, and that there probably would be goodbyes. So I took what I could get, went through the pains of loss, but never crumbled and fell apart. It's extremely foolish for an adult person to hang onto the illusion you could become one with someone you love, I can't even begin to understand that concept. I can only advise everybody to educate themselves on sociology and psychology. Don't read guidebooks that contain a few snippets of science, pseudo science or the experience of a single person and from there out give you directions on how to act or react. Read some popular science books on how the human animal's mind is working and you'll see how the fog is lifting before your very eyes.
TheMTOneabout 2 months agoDamn, now I want a few months later and then a few years later sequel to this. It's a good idea that I don't think has been expanded on, at least on Lit that I have read.
Jalibar623 months agoI think... now that Caro has heard what happened to Jeff and Karen... that she will be on guard.
When my daughter was born... sure, our priorities changed, how could they not? But it didn't come at the expense of each other.
Still, an interesting conversation. Even though it appears that Jeff chose the route of cheating, rather than talking to his wife.
A_Bierce5 months agoSome men are better than others at dealing with the fall from #1 to #1-after-the-children (and maybe any pets). I wasn't very good at it. Brilliant story, as usual.
Fat_Homebody5 months agoAnother brilliantly written and deep short story. I can relate because this happened to me. My wife and i had a lot in common: similar hobbies, interests, and careers. After 7 years or marriage, we had our first child. I quickly became a distant 3rd in priority after our daughter and my wife's job. My daughter is 17 now. My formerly 160 lbs wife now almost tips the scale at 300 lbs. Ive tried every approach to help her, but she prefers to be a "fat homebody", which is what she has told me that she would prefer me to be. I love my daughter more than life itself. She embodies the best of my wife and I: a brilliant mind, an unquenchable curiosity towards science, a quick wit, and an enormous heart. All of that is wrapped up in a 5' 6" slim body that shouldn't ever have to worry about ballooning up to 300 lbs. This story helped me realize that i am not alone in what I've been feeling for the past 17 years. Thank you for writing this story and sharing your gift with us.
