February Sucks Until It Blows

The third wave was transfers. Notices were not posted at large, instead you had a quiet face to face with a manager or director. The manager interview was a take it...or leave it transfer to a different facility. Leaving it resulted in termination with a reasonable letter of recommendation and a decent severance package. The interview with a director was a promotion and transfer. Once again, take it or leave it. At least that's how it happened to me.

"We're intending to bump you two levels, give you a 25% pay raise plus appropriate benefits. The move is mandatory and we need to know in seven days. Lack of notice is an assumed 'no' with appropriate severance, etc., etc. to follow."

"Where am I going?"

"All the way across the country, San Diego, California. Because it's California there will be a substantial housing allowance to help with the move. I understand you have school age children. The school term begins in ten days. We have a contractor that helps with all that, so once we know what your decision is we'll make the appropriate...

"I'm in. I am definitely in."

Once I got home I went straight to Linda and asked her to join me on the couch. The kids were busy watching some program in the other room. "I had my interview with the director today. My da..."

"What happened? I've been talking to job placement people and they don't see much hope around here, very little growth. If we have to move, then we have to move."

"I'm done here."

Linda was immediately crestfallen, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. "I've tried Jim, I've really tried."

I was shocked. Not so much by Linda's reaction as my own. My heart went out to her in a way absent since that February night. I took her hands, my thumb rubbing the back of hers.

"It's going to be okay. I'm not fired. They are sending us, you, me, the kids to San Diego California. I'm being transferred."

Linda jumped up and hugged me. She proceeded to give me a very congratulatory blowjob complete with swallowing. I was then dragged to the bedroom and fucked vigorously. Dinner was late that night.

I know, you're thinking why did I say transferred and not mention the promotion. I nearly did, the word 'promotion' was right on the tip of my tongue. Yet it was never uttered. And I wish I could say that the differential in pay did not end up in a completely separate investment account, but I can't.

The move happened and we struggled at first, Southern California living ain't cheap. Some sacrifices were made, Linda ended up driving a Toyota mini van instead of a Lexus. We were in a great school district, but not in one of the high end neighborhoods of that district. We enjoyed all kinds of 'when not in school' activities. We family camped and took advantage of local vacations (easy to do with the proliferation of entertainment venues in Southern California.) All the while my personal investment account grew in its proliferation of zero's.

And so the years rolled on. The kids reveled in their new community. They made new friends, they did well in school.

To an outsider ours was a successful, though quiet, marriage. Only those who knew us from before (before Grand Asshole Marc) understood its relative lack of passion. Oh there was love and affection, but as evidenced by my financial dealings I was not as committed to the actual relationship as I might have been. Be that as it may, Linda rarely complained.

As the company grew, so did the salary, with a portion always apportioned for my 'peace of mind, comforting my heart' account. About the time the kids started high school Linda finally got her Lexus. And surprisingly I ended up getting two unexpected performance bonuses about the time college tuition was due.

Our 20th anniversary was tropically themed. We did a sail boat cruise of a number of Caribbean islands and we had a lot of fun.

Unfortunately the 30th anniversary never came to be. Two things happened and that's when I made my choice. Once the kids were through with college, they left Southern California to live lives of their own. The second thing was the company offering me a huge promotion and with it a transfer to London.

I shared the news with Linda and asked her if she was game. She loved San Diego, loved her friends, and she really loved our house. She didn't think she would like leaving. I told her I was going. She reconsidered, I offered her no real alternatives. It was take it or leave it.

So Linda and I sat down with a lawyer and put together a very amicable divorce. And yes(surprisingly to me), a goodly portion of the amiability was the 'sharing' of about 1/3 of my peace of mind investments, which we divided 60/40 between us. Linda getting the 60 percent portion. The opportunity to split just over a million dollars was very compelling to keeping things moving forward. For my part I was comforted by the two and a half million she and her lawyer didn't know about and never found. We remained friendly if not actually friends.

London was delightful. I was assigned two PA's; Fiona, a ravishing English cockney-speaking bird happily married to Rebecca, and Andreea, a brilliant Romanian beauty, multi-lingual, widowed, and available. That she possessed a very dirty and disturbingly creative mind was an added bonus.

I was happy.

Linda was happy.

The kids were happy and visited now and then.

And thus the Marc LaValliere Affair came to a close.

EPILOGUE

I know, I know, you're disappointed, "That's it, that's the end of the story?"

Well, yeah. Perhaps the RAAC-ers wonder why I finally pulled the plug. The BTB-ers might wonder why I stayed so long. I get it.

We did try to rebuild our marriage, Linda tried, I tried. It didn't really take. And by that I simply mean the ties that held the marriage together post-Marc were fragile. Think of it this way, you have a house you love and it's destroyed in a fire, hurricane, whatever. And the insurance money is not enough to rebuild it the way it was let alone replace everything lost. You can still build a good house, one you can live in. But it will never be the same of what was destroyed.

Would we have divorced if I turned down the promotion - maybe. Becoming empty nesters revealed a lot of time we did not fill as a couple. What if Linda had decided to transfer with me - good question - I don't know. But her moving away was very unlikely, she showed no enthusiasm for moving abroad. Some marriages don't last as long as ours did without the adultery or other challenges. Some marriages suffer through multiple infidelities and keep going. Others may barely get started before the 'we just grew apart' card is played.

I can tell you one no doubt about it fact. Had we been childless, the divorce would have been immediate and without doubt. Done. Over. Finished.

But that was the crux of it all, there were those two innocent, wonderful children. They deserved our best effort to raise then to adulthood. And I think Linda and I did a pretty good job.

I've been asked, 'Why didn't you go after LaValliere?'

My response, as unsatisfying as its going to be, "To what end?" He simply offered something to my wife. He didn't physically force Linda, he did not drug her and he didn't date rape her, or blackmail her. It was Linda who said "yes" every step of the way. LaValliere never promised me anything, Linda had promised me her fidelity.

Not that I wished him well. My default response, carefully cultivated, was "May the fruit of his actions return to him ten-fold."

And damned if it didn't!

It was years later, LaValliere was long retired from professional sports. The last couple of seasons had been physically hard on him and he got hurt to the point that no amount of rehab could get him back out on the field. So he retired. And while somewhat hobbled he became the very successful owner of a number of car dealerships. In time he met and married a much younger and incredibly beautiful woman. They ended up having two adorable kids. By all appearances Marc was living the perfect life.

Perfect. Absolutely perfect. Right up to a traffic accident that eventually revealed that the kids were not his. They were siblings, there was just no way that Marc was their genetic source. Unsurprisingly, because he had been their very proud poppa for all those years, that simple fact held more sway in the courts than whether or not he actually fathered them.

The divorce was very public and brutal; he ended up paying alimony, child support, and she got the house.

The media was merciless and his wife's kill shot quote was especially vicious, "I could work around the occasional bouts of impotence due to the pain medication he took, but when I found out he was also infertile, I had no choice but to deal with that problem directly and personally. Although I must admit that there were times during the "donor" interview process that were wonderfully memorable."

OUCH, couldn't have happened to a more deserving guy.

So that's it, that's all there is.