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"The divorce will be final in 90 days," said Mel's lawyer.

"Wait," I asked. "Where's my husband?"

"You don't have a husband any longer," said Mel's lawyer, who was a big mean woman.

"But I still have 90 days to change my mind right?" I asked. I knew that I didn't need 90 days. I didn't need 90 fucking minutes. I wanted Mel to come back home and help me throw those bastards out of our house.

"I was under the impression that I'd get to talk to Mel," I said. "Maybe it isn't too late to turn things around."

"That might be my fault," said my attorney. "In 90 percent of these cases, though it isn't necessary, both parties are usually present just in case something goes wrong. That doesn't mean that he had to be here. It was just expected."

"He isn't coming," said Mel's lawyer. "He signed the papers 3 days ago. He wants nothing to do with you ever again. Right now he isn't even in town. He's off on a cruise with his daughter. They're calling it the freedom cruise. I think you know why."

I sat there and stared at the woman. She seemed to derive great pleasure from the fact that I was miserable. "But what if I've changed my mind?" I whined.

They both looked at me and shook their heads. I could see that none of this meant anything to them. It was just another job. They started to put papers into folders and briefcases and pretty much just ignored me.

"I want to talk to Mel," I screamed. "I want...I want my husband back." I got the distinct impression that neither of them gave a flying fuck what I wanted. I was sure that the woman was trying her best not to laugh at me.

I grabbed her by the shoulders. She looked at my lawyer as if to ask him if he saw me grabbing her. I got the sense that if I didn't let go of her, I was going to get hurt. So I quickly backed off and tried a different tactic.

"You're a woman," I said. "Don't you have any sympathy for me? I've made a huge mistake. Can't you help me?"

"Why would I want to?" she asked coldly. "Besides, the kind of help you need, I'm not qualified to give you." She slammed her briefcase back on the desk and turned towards me.

"I rarely handle men in divorce cases," she began. "I like to look out for women who've been unfairly treated by their spouses. I made an exception in your husband's case because when I first saw him, he was in so much pain that he reminded me of some of the worst women I've represented. He was just shell shocked by what you did to him. If I hadn't helped to pull his head out of his ass, he'd probably have just given you all of his money and the house just to be rid of you."

"But..."I began. Her face took a harder expression.

"But nothing," she snapped. "Do you know how many women there are out there who are abused by their husbands? They get cheated on, beaten, stolen from, and ignored. Most of those women would die to have a man in their lives like the one you just shit on. You put that poor man through hell. Now he's finally free of you and starting to move on. But things aren't going well with your boy toy, so you've decided that you want your husband back. Tough shit, bitch. Life goes on."

She turned and picked up her briefcase and then gestured for me to leave her office because she was leaving too.

* * * * * *

Three weeks after the divorce papers were signed, Melissa and I were back from our cruise and I'd started puttering around in my workshop. I remember it in great detail. It was one of those moments that we just never forget. I don't know why I never thought of it before. I had an idea to hook a servo controller directly to its own processor and sensor. I made three of them just to test them out. The next day, I took one to one of my company's manufacturing plants. I worked with one of our machine repair techs and hooked it up to a machine that didn't run. It was great. My module gave the machine the ability to sense proximity to object around it and move to avoid them without it being written into a program. I thought I was onto something.

I had another friend who was working in robotics. I gave him one of my modules as well. I went home to refine the remaining module that I had left and in the space of a few days, I'd applied for my first patent. I worked with one of those companies that specialize in getting your inventions to market and things moved very quickly.

There were literally hundreds of companies that wanted to license my patent and more who were interested in buying pre-assembled modules.

I had to get a lawyer and an accountant. We set up two small companies. One would handle licensing of my patent and anything else I came up with. The other would handle manufacturing modules. We farmed the manufacturing work out to a small local shop that was struggling to keep the doors open. My plan was to eventually buy the shop outright and keep the owner on as the manager.

In less than three months I had more money than I knew what to do with. Melissa and I moved into a house that was even bigger than the one we'd lived in with her mother.

I'd hired Joyce away from my old company because I couldn't think of anyone I'd rather have as my assistant. Melissa worked for me too, while she continued in school. She'd begun to think about switching her major from liberal arts to business.

My in laws, whom I was still very friendly with, were happy about our success. They called to invite us to Thanksgiving dinner. Bob told me that I didn't have to worry about Melinda being there. She hadn't been welcome in their house since the fiasco at their anniversary, when she brought, "That man" as they called Greg.

I accepted for both Melissa and myself. After I hung up the phone, I went out to the pool where my daughter and a couple of her friends were tanning. "Mel, just out of curiosity, have you heard from your mother lately?" I asked.

She got up and ushered me into the house, leaving her friends to tan.

"Dad, she calls so often I had to have our number changed," said Melissa. "I don't know what's wrong with her. You gave her all of that money. Hell, the money she got from the sale of the house alone should have allowed her to live comfortably for 2 or 3 years, while she looked for a job or went back to school. I don't know what happened to her common sense. She lives in a crappy little apartment downtown now with Greg. Almost all of her money is gone. I've heard terrible things about him and his friends from people I know at school who also know them."

I looked at her seriously. "Dad, hearing about it would only hurt you. Let's just live our lives. Besides don't you have a date tonight?"

I smiled thinking about it. I was going out on a third date with a woman I'd met on our cruise. Even though we'd gotten along great while on the ship, it took me a long time to get in contact with her after we'd come home. Most of that was my fault. I just couldn't come up with a reason to call her. Finally, just after I'd gotten my patent taken care of, she called me. It turned out my nosy daughter had become tired of me moping around the condo all day and had called her.

Melanie Fitzgerald was a widow. Her husband had been killed in the service five years before we'd met on the cruise. One of the things that got us together was the fact that we'd both lost someone we'd loved deeply. It was a great thing for both of us and we slowly came out of our shells together. By the time that Melissa got us back together, we'd both been missing each other, but just didn't know how to reach out.

Our first date had been the traditional dinner and a movie. The second date had been dancing at a club and tonight we were going on a river cruise, with dinner and more dancing. I was hoping that things would go as well as the first two dates. I'd especially loved dancing with her. The feelings I got when she pressed her body against me let me know that things were going to be okay. I'd gotten kicked in the teeth by what Melinda had done, but I'd gotten up and kept on living.

I got into my Mustang and headed for Melanie's house. As I started the engine the stereo came on and almost took the top of my head off. Melissa had driven my car to the store that morning and had one of her CD's playing. The song she'd been listening to was Ozzy Osborne's "I don't want to stop."

I turned the volume down just a touch and then smiled and let it blast. It was a great driving song anyway. As I pulled away from the curb, I noticed that there was another car coming from the opposite direction. I wasn't paying any attention to it though. I drove to Melanie's house listening to Ozzy scream about how he wasn't going to stop.

"All my life I've been over the top, I don't know what I'm doing all I know is I don't wanna stop."

"Yep, you and me Ozzy," I thought. I hadn't noticed it until then, but the car, a brightly colored Honda, had followed me. The car looked like something out of a circus. It was one of those cars that only a teen aged boy who'd watched, "the Fast and the Furious," too many times would drive. The kid was probably following me hoping I'd race him. When I got to Melanie's house, I got out of my car. I'd turned the stereo down because she lived in a nice neighborhood.

Melanie had on a really nice gray velour dress that molded her curves nicely. She stepped off of her porch and literally ran over to me just as I got out of the car. She hugged me tightly and even kissed me. It was the first time we'd actually kissed.

"I'm so excited about this," she said.

"Oh, come on," I said. "We've been on bigger and probably far nicer boats together."

"Not the boat, Honey," she said. "It's being with you. I missed you. I haven't seen you in two days and after what happened on our last date, I'm still kind of worked up. I think we may have to rethink our policy of not going out very often during the week. Talking to you on the phone is great, but it's not enough."

We both turned as we heard a car door slam behind us. Melinda had gotten out of the clown car Honda and was walking towards us at a fast pace.

"Get your hands off of him," she shrieked. I quickly got between Melanie and Melinda.

"Melanie Fitzgerald, this is my ex-wife, Melinda Harris," I said.

"It's Melinda Conrad," snapped Melinda. "Can I speak to you, Mel?" she asked.

"We have nothing to talk about," I said. "I have lived up to the letter of our divorce agreement. You didn't get an alimony check last week because your alimony ended two months ago. I was nice enough to give you one extra check last month but I'm done. We no longer have a connection of any type. So if you'll excuse us..."

"Mel, we'll always have a connection. We have a daughter together," she said.

"Melissa is a grown woman," I said. "Your relationship with her is none of my business. I can't and won't attempt to influence her one way or another."

"But, Mel, What if I made a mistake?" she asked.

"Then you pick up the pieces and go on living, like I had to," I said. "I made a mistake. I picked the wrong woman to fall in love with. And it came back to hurt me twenty years later. For a while, I didn't think I'd make it. But now my life is great again. You can put your life back together too."

"Mel, we need to talk. There are a lot of things I need to tell you," she said. "And I don't like the idea of you dating someone until we get this straightened out."

"I didn't like the idea of you fucking someone, while we were still married. But that didn't seem to bother you. So, what I do, now that we're divorced, is no concern of yours, Melinda. We have nothing to talk about." I opened the door and helped Melanie into her seat. Then I got into my car and drove away leaving Melinda standing there.

Two weeks later, I was sitting at my desk pondering a weighty problem. I wasn't sure if I was pushing things too fast with Melanie. What we had was great but I wanted more. My door opened and there she was. As I saw her step into the office and head for me with that big beautiful smile, I quickly tried to stuff the papers I'd been looking at under my desk.

That was one of the problems I had. Melanie made me feel so special every time I saw her. It was as if seeing me, just made her day. It was never that way with Melinda. Everything I did for Melinda, she acted as if it was something she deserved. She never appreciated anything. Maybe that was what led to our break up more than anything else. Well, that and her fucking that guy.

"Are you trying to hide your porn from me, Honey?" asked Melanie still smiling. "You know you don't have to. Let me see what it is that interests you so much. Whatever it is, I'll try it for you."

Melanie had this way of just making me melt. So when she reached down and pulled out the papers I was trying to hide, I just let her take them. She looked down at them and what I'd been looking at registered. I'd thought that her smile had been bright before but it went to incandescence.

"Mel, are you looking at these for me...for us?" she asked. I nodded. "You really want to...me?" she asked. I nodded again.

She started crying and threw herself at me. My office chair couldn't handle the impact and it flipped over spilling us both to the floor. The noise brought Joyce running into the office where she found us on the floor hugging each other.

"Uhm, not to interrupt, but you have to see this," smirked Joyce. She pulled both of us through the outer office and into a conference room. We looked out into the lobby at about twenty people who were applying for jobs working for us. Some were office workers or secretaries. Others were interviewing to work in the shop manufacturing my sensor modules.

"Look," said Joyce. She pointed out Greg. "HR flagged him because he claimed to be a friend of yours."

"Well in a way he is," I laughed. "If it hadn't been for him, I'd still be married to Melinda."

"Should they hire him?" she asked.

"Hell no," I said. "Come on Mel, let's go buy a ring."

* * * * * *

Things all came to a head a short time after I confronted my husband with that woman. I'd barely kept it together when I saw them together. He was still the shy caring man I'd fallen in love with, the one I'd taken for granted. But he seemed to just glow. He was really happy. I could tell just from the loud music he was playing in that damned Mustang of his.

And her body language was scary. She couldn't wait for him to even go to her door. How stupid could she be? Doesn't she know that you can't let a guy think you're too eager to see him? You lose your advantage that way.

Before his car even stopped moving, she came running out of the house and jumped all over him. She was rubbing herself against my husband like a cat in heat. And the dress she wore let me know what she was planning. That dress molded itself to fit every curve in her body. It was pretty much the way she was molding herself to every curve in Melvin's body.

I could tell that she intended to fuck him as soon as she could. I went over to them, determined to break them up. I had to get him away from that woman before it was too late. I'd made the decision that morning to get him back. I was also going to have to get rid of Greg. What did I ever see in him?

I guess I'd just been a stupid, bored woman who thought she deserved better and thought her life was in a rut. I'd thrown out the best part of my life.

After the first time I'd caught Greg cheating on me, I'd let him convince me that it had been my fault for withholding sex from him. That had simply opened the flood gates. Greg now brought home women at least a couple of times a week. He said that we had an open relationship. He reminded me that when we first got together, I was still having sex with Mel. He didn't seem to think the fact that I'd been married to Mel made a difference.

The sex I had with Greg had simply become a chore. I guess it had only been the excitement of having someone new that made it anything special to begin with. The final straw came when last night after he finished with me. I noticed that one of his friends had been watching us. Greg wasn't embarrassed or shocked and he didn't even try to cover me up.

"You want a turn with her?" he asked. Before the man could answer I got up and got dressed. I left my apartment and drove to my parents' house. It took a while but I convinced them to let me in. I told them the whole story and they let me stay there for the night. While I was there, I noticed that there were new pictures in the grouping on the mantle.

"Those were taken on Thanksgiving," my mother told me as I looked at them. One of the pictures took an axe to my heart. It was a picture of everyone who'd been at my parent's house for Thanksgiving dinner. At the center of the group of friends and family there was a sub grouping. Between my parents were Mel and that woman. They had my daughter Melissa between them. They were both hugging Melissa and the three of them were cheek to cheek to cheek; Mel, Mel and Mel together again.

They were all smiling and obviously having a good time. It was exactly like a picture the three of us had taken back when our family was together. It looked like my husband and daughter had simply gone out and replaced me without so much as a thought. Even my own parents had preferred their company to mine.

Tears rolled down my cheeks as I looked at the picture. Everything in me said to throw that fucking picture against the wall or into the fire. It took more strength than I ever thought I had, to simply place the picture back on the mantle. I took great pains to make sure I'd placed it back in the exact same position if not in the same spot.

"What did you expect?" asked my dad from behind me. "I guess you thought they'd wait for you forever huh?"

"Daddy, you didn't even invite me for Thanksgiving but you invited her," I cried.

"Honey, your boyfriend pretty much fucked up our anniversary party. You made it very clear that he was the man you wanted to be with, despite what everyone told you. You even gave up your own child to be with that...that...I can't call him a man, because as old as he is, he acts like a spoiled kid. And that's the way you acted." My dad sat down on the couch.

"My granddaughter told you that she wouldn't come back into your house until you got rid of him. That was your own child. You let her walk out of that house. That sent a clear message to everyone, that you thought being with him was more important than her or us too for that matter. Melvin tried to avoid running into you, he let you have what you wanted. You can't fault him for trying to find someone that he could be happy with."

"As far as Thanksgiving goes, we told you at the anniversary that you couldn't bring that bastard you were with back into our house. And you're still with him. We invited Mel to come for Thanksgiving because whether he's married to you or not, he's a part of our family. He may not be your husband any more but he's still our son in law because he's my granddaughter's father. And the woman he brought with him? He asked our permission first, unlike the way you just showed up with your second asshole."

"Melanie is a great lady. I like her a lot. And if Melvin couldn't get back with you, she's exactly what I'd want for him, and for my granddaughter. She's polite, courteous, and helpful. She's welcome in this house anytime she comes. She's not you Melinda. She's not my daughter. But Melvin has a right to be happy too. So we should be glad if he's found it."

"But Daddy, I want him back," I screamed. He just shook his head.

"Melinda, from the way the three of them got along and the things they talked about, it may already be too late for that. Even if Melvin doesn't end up marrying her, he still might not want to get back with you. You hurt him pretty bad. Why would he want to put himself in that position again? And what about Melissa, you picked your fuck toy over your daughter. Is there any wonder why she doesn't answer your calls?"