Hard Body/Soft Body

This story has some elements in common with a story I recently published in another category that was sparsely viewed, so if you're one of the few who read it don't freak out and think that this is plagiarized. This story has many different elements however.

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I'm Brian Rector; I had been married to Melissa Rector nee Zachery for 23 years at the start of this tale. We have three adult or near-adult children, 21 and 19 year old sons and a 17 year old brilliant daughter who was a freshman at Stanford at the start of this story. This is a narrative of soft bodies versus hard bodies.

In our 23 years of marriage Melissa had put on about 25 pounds and was sure that her tits were sagging and that her ass was flabby. While I had gained some weight during our first years of marriage about twelve years ago I made a concerted effort to lose weight and get healthier in general. For the last eleven years I have weighed only about three pounds more than I did when I played football at a Division III school at 220 pounds despite the fact that I had a desk job. My weight loss and health gains were primarily because I worked out five days a week, two hours a day, but I also watched my sugar intake.

I didn't realize it until much later, when there was a cataclysmic event in our marriage, that Melissa did not take my new health regime well. I found out that her initial reaction to my weight loss and health gains was indignation. She apparently took my perseverance as a backhand slap at her; she thought something like "Don't you like me just the way I am?" She even said this a few times which greatly confused me because I NEVER asked her to change, and weekly told her that she was sexy. So the bottom line was that she resented the fact that I was fit and it raised insecurities in her.

I later found out -- when it was too late -- that Melissa's irrational outlook was: "I fumed that Brian couldn't see that the healthier he pushed himself to be, the more my own self-doubts came into focus. I was projecting my insecurities onto him, but this self-realization hadn't yet dawned on me when I started my affair."

While Melissa's own unfavorable comparison of her fitness to mine apparently bugged her I believe that it was comparing herself to three of our mutual female friends that was the most disturbing.

Kathy, Bernice, and Nicole, three of our female friends who are a year or two older than Melissa is, are ultra fit. They never went around bragging or posturing -- it's just that fitness is naturally important to them, and they have hard bodies. They are also intelligent and personable. Kathy and Bernice have happy marriages however Nicole had caught her stupid husband cheating two years ago and divorced his ass so fast he thought that a train had hit him.

I was helpful to Nicole during her divorce proceedings. In addition to getting her in touch with one of the top divorce attorneys in Minneapolis I loaned her $20,000 (which she paid back within 18 months) interest free to keep her business afloat when the divorce strained her finances for a short period of time, and I helped her get a small house to move into once her divorce was inevitable and offered to testify on her behalf if her case went to trial (which it never did). I also commiserated with her about her situation, including at our house while Melissa was present and a couple of times at lunch. Apparently Melissa was resentful that I went out of my way to be nice to Nicole when she was going through her divorce even though Nicole was -- ostensibly at least -- just as much Melissa's friend as she was mine.

Despite the disastrous way Nicole's marriage had ended because of her husband's affair apparently even more stupidly Melissa thought that having her own affair was the solution to her malaise.

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Melissa had been acting squirrely ever since Nicole's divorce, but there wasn't anything dramatic. Our ordinary sex life did not increase or decrease in frequency or satisfaction, although for the previous seventeen years -- roughly since our daughter was born -- I was more interested in sex than Melissa was.

The way I found out about Melissa's affair was so cliché I'm almost embarrassed to relate it. I was on the proverbial out-of-town trip; but it was by car, not plane or train. The location of my meeting was roughly 160 miles from home. There was some ice and snow around so I was a little worried about how long it would take. I checked out the road conditions before I left my meeting and found a more than an hour long tie-up on the Interstate -- and a little snow was starting to fall.

I called Melissa to tell her that it would be at least four hours before I would be home, probably longer, so not to hold dinner for me. She seemed a little distracted during our conversation but at the end she said "Be safe; take your time."

As I got my car from a valet and tipped her she asked where I was headed. When I told her she said "If I were you I'd take Route 29 and get on the Interstate after exit 86. The latest report I heard is that the Interstate is a parking lot from exit 133 to exit 86 and it's only getting worse. If you take Route 29, to Route 16 West, you'll cut off at least an hour, maybe even two."

I got out my map. Even though she was a millennial she could read it, and showed me the way. I gave her another $10 tip, and off I went.

Following the valet's instructions I got home faster than I thought possible. Once I got on the Interstate, because of the tie-up prior to exit 86, the traffic was lighter than usual. Further, there were no cops around, the snow had stopped while I was on Route 29, and I could go 80 mph.

When I got to my house at least an hour and a half earlier than I predicted there was the notorious "strange car in the driveway;" only it wasn't a strange car, and since our driveway is wrap-around it couldn't be seen from the street. The unwelcome car belonged to Fred Thompson, the head librarian of the municipal library that Melissa volunteered at. Fred is a disingenuous toad-like flabby soft-bodied fucker about 40 years old. I never liked him. I didn't see how it could be possible for Melissa to be sexually attracted to him, yet I could think of no reason he would be at our house while I was gone if it didn't have something to do with sex. I moved my car into the driveway that wrapped around the back of an unoccupied "For Sale" house across the street, and walked to our house.

I need to describe our house a little. It is an old house that would be called a "mini-mansion" if it were built today. I didn't like the house but Melissa loved it. For one thing it was way too big for two people now that the kids had left. Also, it required constant repair and upkeep -- in fact we had just had all of the wood floors re-finished and some things still needed to be done, like installing new carpet runners on the long main staircase (the ceilings are twelve feet high on the first floor). At the rear of the house is a bilco door and there is a rear stairwell, one not nearly as aesthetic as the main staircase at the front of the house.

I took my shoes off once I entered through the rear door and snuck up the rear stairs. Melissa and Fred were in the guest bedroom. They were still mostly naked and were talking about how great the sex had been, but were starting to get dressed. Most of what they said was muffled but I did hear Melissa say something like "The workout king should be getting here in about an hour and a half so I'll have plenty of time to clean up." I assumed that I was "the workout king" although I never, ever referred to myself anyway like that, and her tone indicated she thought that working out was either stupid or discourteous. Apparently what she and Fred had in common was flabby soft bodies -- and that turned her on.

An idea popped into my head. If the hallway and stairwell weren't lit it could be dangerous for someone to walk down the main stairwell and an unfortunate accident might happen. I quickly went back down the rear staircase to the utility room and threw the two main breakers for the house to the "off" position. Then I quickly went up the rear staircase, using a penlight to show the way until I got to the top, then turned off the penlight and crawled to the edge of the main stairwell.

It was pitch black in the house -- I couldn't even see my hand in front of my face. Melissa and Fred seemed to be very concerned and I heard Melissa say "Be careful going down the steep staircase Fred."

"I will," he harrumphed.

As he slowly proceeded toward the stairwell I put my hand out and when the toe of his right shoe came in contact with my hand I pulled it forward.

The screams as he hit a stair the first and second times were blood-curling. There was no sound as he hit the third and fourth times, just "thuds." He was silent at the bottom. Melissa started screaming.

As Melissa was starting to carefully work her way down the stairs I crawled to the back stairwell, used my penlight again to safely get to the bottom, put my shoes back on, wiped off the breaker handles with a cloth and using the cloth threw them to the "on" position, wiped off the back doorknob, and stealthily snuck back to my car.

I then drove to a Starbucks that was about two miles from my house and on the way to the Interstate highway, parked on a side street for about an hour, and then entered the Starbuck's lot from the direction I would be going if coming from the Interstate. I went through the drive-through line, and got two double chocolate brownies -- ostensibly one for me and one for Melissa -- then drove home.

Melissa wasn't there when I got home, but there was a dark red spot at the bottom of the stairs, with lesser spots on one stair about halfway up, and some red splatter on the wall near that step. I smiled. I went up the main stairwell, careful not to step on the blood spots, and saw that Melissa had not changed the sheets on the guestroom bed; I guess that she was panicked by Fred's fall. I bundled the sheets up, put them in a big plastic bag, and hid them in the utility room. I put the Starbuck's paper bag with the two brownies -- and time and date stamped receipt -- on the kitchen table then called Melissa's cellphone.

It was about the fourth ring before she apprehensively answered. I got right to the point. "Where are you Melissa? And what's with the dark red stains on the stairs and the landing? I just got home and it looks like a disaster area?"

"Uh...well...uh..." she stammered.

"I guess I asked too much at once, Melissa. Let's start out with you telling me where you are?"

"Well...I'm...uh at Memorial Hospital. Uh...Fred Thompson...you know, the head librarian...well he was over talking to me about something at the library and he fell down the stairs," she moaned.

"What the hell was Fred Thompson doing on the second floor of our house?" I yelled.

"Uh...well...uh..."she stammered some more.

"What am I going to find when I go upstairs?" I yelled again.

"There's no reason...to go upstairs...I'll be home soon," she immediately replied with anxiety in her voice.

"Too late," was my only response before I terminated the call.

I gathered up some of my clothing and other things that I really needed, took them, the bag with the sheets from the guest bedroom, and the paper bag with the brownies and receipt, and drove to a hotel. Melissa called my cell when she got home. "Brian, where are you?" she plaintively asked.

"At a hotel; I'll be seeing a divorce lawyer tomorrow," I barked, and then terminated the call and turned off my cell.

Using the phone in my hotel room I called the divorce attorney that I had recommended to Nicole, who was also a friend of mine. I inquired about how she was doing, and after a couple of minutes of small talk I asked if I could meet at her office the next day to retain her services. "I'm sorry that you need me," she said, and then we made an appointment for early afternoon.

The police came to see me at my office a day later. "Mr. Rector; we're investigating the concussion, laceration, and broken bones injuries that Mr. Thompson got at your house a couple of nights ago, and that he's still in the hospital for."

"I thought that Fred's fall down the stairs was an accident," I nonchalantly replied.

"Well, it may have been, but Mr. Thompson seems to think that someone may have grabbed his foot; and the house mysteriously got dark and then light again and the utility company says there was no incident at that time."

"Really," I replied.

"So, to touch all of our bases, where were you at the time -- which was about an hour and a half before you called your wife at the hospital; that is where were you around 7:30?"

"I was driving home from a meeting 160 miles away, and an aggravating more than an hour delay on the Interstate. I left about 4:30, got to the Starbuck's on Maple between the Interstate and my house about 8:30, 8:45, and picked up a couple of double chocolate brownies for Melissa and myself, then went home and found dark red blotches and pools all over."

"Do you have any proof of where you were?"

"Well here in my office I have my valet ticket with both the in and out time stamps for reimbursement of travel expenses, and in my hotel room I think that I still have the Starbuck's receipt in a paper bag with one brownie left -- since I never gave one to my wife after I found out about her infidelity. As far as the traffic is concerned, you can call the State Police," I replied.

I gave them a photocopy of my valet ticket, actually went with them to my hotel room and gave them the Starbuck's receipt and told them to check the security cameras there, and then told them "This is all I have, and I will not be granting another interview. Anything else you think that you need you can contact my attorney about." I gave them one of my attorney's cards, and then went back to the office. I never heard from them again.

It didn't take long to end my marriage. My attorney got a court order for DNA samples from Melissa and Fred, and when both their DNAs in sexual fluid turned up on the sheets from the guest bedroom I had an unassailably strong position in the divorce. Many of my friends and extended family members called to commiserate, but depending upon the friend I either acted sad, resigned, or reasonably glad. Actually, the reasonably glad face was only for one friend -- Nicole.

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Two weeks after my divorce from Melissa was final I started on a road trip from Minneapolis to the American West. I needed to get away. In my mind I had gone through all of the scenarios and emotions of revenge (against Melissa -- my revenge against Fred was more than sufficient), reconciliation, separation, unsolicited advice, depression, anger, hate, regret...you name it. Now it was time to clear my head.

Unlike most 45 year olds who have been married 23 years I at least had the advantage of no money problems. I had worked hard building a company that made unique vertical axis wind turbines that I co-invented, and when I first found out about my wife's cheating I quickly accepted the most desirable of the several open offers to sell that I had received from large multinational corporations over the last two years. The offer that I had accepted was the best for my employees and the second best for me, the monetary difference between it and the best offer inconsequential. You can only spend so much money in your lifetime.

Particularly rewarding to me were the unique circumstances that allowed me to avoid sharing any of the proceeds from my company's sale with my ex-wife, although she did get half of everything else we owned (and kept the house by buying me out), enough to leave her fairly comfortable (if she got a paying job) but not filthy rich like me. Before I could get a loan to start my wind turbine company seventeen years ago the underwriter had insisted that my wife sign away all of her rights since the underwriter could not take the chance of a change in management. For that assignment Melissa had been paid $200,000 that she put into an account that I signed away all of my rights to. She was very happy with the money at the time because she had no faith that my business would succeed; she wasn't so happy once she found out how much I made on the sale of the company (ha, ha).

My 21 and 19 year old sons, one a college graduate the other a sophomore at the time of filing the divorce papers, had accepted my decision when the facts became known. My 17 year old brilliant (a freshman at Stanford, with her tuition prepaid, at the time of filing of the divorce papers) but highly emotional daughter was pissed that I wouldn't reconcile. She told me that my wife, her Mom, had strayed because "she has a bad self-image and no longer felt attractive so she was just trying to have some positive reinforcement; and now she's over it and sorry;" like that was a magic wand that would make everything go away. It didn't help me one iota.

There probably was something to the low self-esteem argument, however, for the reasons that I discussed earlier, however that wasn't something that I could forgive regardless of the reason.

After travelling for about two weeks, with stops at various national parks and monuments, typically staying over two or three nights, I pulled my Tesla Model X into Hualopai Lodge in Peach Springs, Arizona, adjacent to the Grand Canyon. After two fun days there I decided to go on a guided hike with an overnight on the floor of the Canyon. The hike leader was a roughly 50 year old guy named Rex who looked like you would picture a mountain man. The other hikers were a 40-somethings couple from England, two college guys from Montana, two sisters, Monica and Lizbeth, who were in their mid to late 30s, and Bethany, Monica's 17 year old daughter.

I later found out that Monica was 39 and Lizbeth 36.

They were a friendly group, and we actually got to know each other fairly well between when we started at 8 a. m. and when we were ready to turn into our sleeping bags for the night at about 10 p. m. It was early fall and the temperature was warm but not brutally hot; that is nothing was particularly hot except Monica and Lizbeth. The sisters were -- to put it bluntly -- walking wet dreams.

Monica was married but her husband had work obligations and would be meeting them at Zion National Park in a few days. Lizbeth had recently divorced. Bethany was a good-looking teenager, but she was the only one in the group that seemed up-tight, and it appeared to me that part of the reason for this trip with her mother and aunt was to get her to loosen up a little. As it turned out I sat between Monica and Lizbeth while we ate dinner and drank some bourbon which I had brought along, and I made a big hit with all of the campers -- and even Rex -- by telling two ghost stories, The Vanishing Hitchhiker and The Bell Witch. Then Rex took over and told the Bloody Mary ghost story -- one that I was also familiar with, especially the ending.

I could tell that Bethany was enraptured with all three stories, and was sitting on the edge of her seat (a rock) as Rex neared the conclusion. Just as he got to the scary punch line I snuck up behind Bethany and grabbed her shoulders and yelled "Bloody Mary is here!"

I think that Bethany set the world record for the sitting broad jump and twenty yard dash as she screamed and ran. When she heard the laughter she turned around, at first mortified, but when I chimed "Gotcha" she started chasing me. Monica and Lizbeth joined in the chase and I let them catch me and put sand down my shirt. When I tried to act as uncomfortable as possible everyone laughed heartily and Bethany stuck her tongue out at me the said "Got you!"

To be honest, it was a little hard for me to sleep that night and not because of the small amount of sand that clung to my back. It was hard to get to sleep because I was thinking about Lizbeth -- I sure didn't mind it when she "held" me on the ground while Bethany put sand down my shirt. Lizbeth is a hard body who reminded me a lot of Nicole, only taller with bigger tits.