Down and Out

"Richard, I have a confession to make," she said.

I looked at her with a gaze laden with suspicion. "Yes?" I said.

Well, all these months, I mean since you knocked on my door that rainy night, you have been my number one guy; you know that, right?" She said.

"Your number one guy?" I said, not quite understanding her.

"Yes, but well, there have been a few other men, not many but a few over that time period," she said. I think she was holding her breath waiting to see if I was going to blow up.

"You mean besides the drugstore cowboy!" I said. Now, I had questions.

"Yes, a few, not many," she said.

"A few, Winnie? How many is a few?" I wasn't quite out of control—yet."

"Maybe a half dozen?" she said.

"What the fuck! When was the last one, and give it to me straight," I said. I was clearly brooking no bullshit, not this time.

She said something, but so quietly I couldn't hear it. "What?" I said. She sighed.

"The day before yesterday," she said. She was not meeting my gaze.

"The what! The day before yesterday! And, you come in here expecting that I'm going to marry you and just forget all about all of this! Are you fucking crazy!" I didn't quite scream. No, I take that back; I was screaming.

"Richard, that—all of it—was before we were in a position to get married again. Now things are different. I will never again have another man. You are not only number one now, you are the only one," she said.

"And, I should believe you why?" I said.

"I don't know. I just know it's the truth. I have never loved anyone else but you. Well, there's my babies of course; but that's different," she said. I nodded.

"I don't know what to do here, Winnie. You've left me nowhere to go and with all kinds of questions. It's not a very nice place to be either," I said.

"But Richard, we have the money now. I won't lose the house. And you don't have to keep paying the rent out of your salary. You can have it all," she said.

"All of what?" I said. She looked at me like I was crazy.

"Why the money of course. And—me," she said, and that kind of quietly.

Now I was in a quandary. I knew how much that money meant to her. And, she was willing to give it all to me to get me to—what—accept her past playing around and to forgive her and marry her again. It was crazy, but I nodded.

"Richard, I have finally realized just how much I love you and more just how much you love me. I have to have you. There is no sacrifice I wouldn't make to guarantee that you'll be mine," she said.

"Okay," I said. "Okay, Winnie. But this is how it's going to be. You will hand over the money to me. And, you will sign a prenup that guarantees that if you play around on me that you will end up with nothing. If that program works for you, we'll get it all done forthwith."

"Yes," she said. "It works for me." And it did. And we were remarried a week later. And then we went on our honeymoon. But, there was still a little, eensy teensy, problem. I was a liar by omission. And it was about to play hell with my self-satisfied solution to all of our problems.

******

The ship was big and so was the Caribbean. The cruise was wonderful. I'd never been on one, but now I was, that is, we were. St. Thomas was still a day out. The cost? Ten grand. She was having a good time, so was I. But there was something that wasn't right. Finally, she let me have it. And it stopped me—cold.

"Honey," she started, "I can trust you right?" she said. Coming from her I thought it an odd question, but, as it turned out it was a fair question.

"Yes, of course," I said. "Why would you ask such a thing?" I had assumed she was referring to my being sexually monogamous. That twern't it.

"Honey, the money I gave you, you know," she said.

"Yes," I said.

"Well, I'm glad we were able to afford this wonderful honeymoon. But, well, I don't want to ruin it for us. But well . . ."

"Win? What is it you're trying to say?' I said, really not having a clue.

"Well, I know you couldn't afford this, this wonderful cruise, honeymoon, on what you make; so, I have to assume you used some of the money that I gave you.

"Richard, I was kind of hoping that we could invest the bulk of that money to ensure our futures, not spend it; well, you know, too loosely." I sagged back against the rail we had been standing at.

"Oh," I said. Now I had a problem. I had been meaning to out myself to her as to my real wealth, but I had wanted to do it in a staged manner so as to not get hit with the flack that now seemed certain to overwhelm me.

I had actually taken all of it, her money, and put it in an irrevocable trust account for her. I didn't need it, she didn't need it, unless she cheated on me; which was seeming less and less likely as the days passed. I coughed.

I eye'd her. "Win, I have a little confession to make of my own. Actually, I was planning on outing myself to you on our return, but I think that maybe now is the best time . . ."

"Richard! You haven't lost it, spent it, used it!" she said. She was actually terrified. "Richard you have always been so careful with money. I thought I could trust you. Richard what have you done!" she said. She gave me a look and stalked off toward our cabin.

I stood there floored. Talk about taking things for granted, jumping to conclusions. She just had and that big time. And frankly, I was a little bit pissed—again. But, well, just a little.

I headed for the nearest bar; there were a dozen of them on the boat. Two JDs later I found myself marching for our cabin door. I entered. She lay on the bed. She'd been crying. I'd been drinking. They're not the same thing.

"Richard, how could you, $83,000 gone!" she said to me. I took a deep breath.

"Winnie, it is not gone, not even a penny of it," I said. Her head snapped around.

"Huh?" she said.

"Winifred Cort, you need to stop jumping to conclusions and making crazy assumptions. And, you are right, I am careful with money. And you are wrong, I can afford a honeymoon like this on what I make," I said.

"Huh?" she said.

"Winifred, you playing around with those other men, and yes, I suspected it was more than just with the drugstore cowboy; didn't know it, but did suspect it. Well, it made me skittish about telling you anything meaningful. But, that said . . .

"I had just about gotten to the point where I was going to be trusting you again, when you came back from your great grandma's and laid the rest of your tale on me. I cannot tell you how disappointed I was to hear all of that," I said.

"But . . ."

"But, when you offered to hand over your inheritance, that caught my attention. I thought I saw a light at the end of the tunnel. You were willing to make a sacrifice, and to you it was a big one. And I was certain that it bothered you to do it, bothered you a lot. So, I thought, okay; I upped the ante, and got you to sign the prenup as well. That put me in control of a bad situation, bad for me. I need you to be faithful. If you are, you've got it made, Winifred Cort, nee Williams."

"I don't understand?" she said.

"Winnie, I was out of the picture, your picture for many years. A lot happened. I did good. Winnie, I'm a multi-millionaire: twenty million give or take actually," I said.

She started to stare, then convulse, then laugh, then faint. It was a true Kodak moment.

While she was out I set up my laptop. She came to with a little help from me after some several minutes.

Her eyes popped open. "Huh?" she said.

"Come here," I said. I set her in front of the computer. "Click." She did and my bank account came up. Choose accounts and look at certificates." She did.

"It says four million," she said. You mentioned twenty million.

"The rest is in property and other securities," I said. "They're not listed on the bank site."

"Properties?"

"For one is our villa in Torremolinos, Spain. It's small, but quite nice and the view really superb," I said. "There are others."

"We're rich?" she squeaked.

"Very," I said. She screamed and attacked me, first with kisses, then with hugs and kisses, and then with one humungous slap to the face!

"That's for scaring the shit outta me," she said, and then she began kissing me some more.

The sex that night? Kinky and fatiguing and destructive of one's physicality. We were going to make it. Yes, indeed.

******