He Can Do Her No Wrong

Story description: What's love got to do with it? Everything.

I want to once again thank Randi for another of her kind invitations to submit a story for her "When a Man Loves a Woman" event.

I've placed this story in the Romance section because that is truly what it is. It certainly isn't your average one though. If you are looking for a lot of descriptive sex, bitch burning, a treatise on morality, or are unable to see anything but black & white, you should probably pass on it. If you are looking to understand human weakness, appreciate redemption, and true love's ability to triumph over all obstacles, you will probably appreciate it.

I will warn you in advance, this is a bit of a long one, especially for me. (About 20,000 words) I would usually break it out into chapters, but I didn't do that here because I wrote this saga specifically for Randi's event. However, there are chapter breaks that I've identified if you just can't take any more in one session. (Personally, I'm only good for about 3-4 pages before taking a break)

Because, when a man loves a woman deep down in his soul, she can bring him such misery.

Main Characters:

Hayden Meridian: Husband. Bachelor of Science degree in Logistics Management.

Shelly Meridian: Wife. BA degree in Instructional Design with Eagle Graphics

Weston Meridian: Hayden & Shelly's son

Hailey Meridian: Weston's wife

Lewiston Caldwell: aged 23 recent college graduate, graphic artist.

Story:

It was a clear and crisp sun-splashed early Fall morning that found a middle-aged Weston Meridian standing in front of his parents' gravesite. At fifty years old he still retained a bit of his youthful appearance. His full head of hair had thinned noticeably, but there were only a few flecks of grey. He stood tall and erect as he was not yet completely worn down by the ravages of time. But his face displayed the deep lines from the stories of his life. It's the price one had to pay to be lucky enough, or smart enough, to survive their youth.

His wife of twenty-five years, Hailey, was pressed onto his side as they stood arm in arm. Their three young adult children surrounded them. They together stared at the granite headstones that showed the wear and tear of the harsh New England winters, although it had only been ten years that the monuments to his parents' lives had been exposed to it.

Weston remembered how dreary the weather was the last time he was here. Today though was glorious. This God's acre was typical of the Northeast. The setting was peaceful, and the grounds surrounded by trees still covered in leaves that fairly shimmered with light as the sun's rays flooded across the multi-colored fronds fluttering in the breeze. It only lasted a fleeting time because in little more than a week these same leaves would be brown and lying on the ground to become mulch in furtherance of nature's cycle of life.

This is the first time Weston had been back to see his parent's gravesite since their funeral. His family had never been. Why was that? It wasn't by design. The children only remembered that their grandparents had been sick many years ago, and that their deaths came rather suddenly.

Weston had enjoyed his childhood. His memories were mostly of pleasant times. He didn't carry the baggage from his upbringing that many did from past family traumas. He supposed it was circumstance more than anything that caused their separation.

He was a private person by nature, so he found explaining his parents' relationship difficult. He didn't feel the need to lie about it. He was neither embarrassed nor ashamed of it. He simply felt that most wouldn't understand it.

His career had carried him to the opposite coast right after his college graduation where he met his wife, and they raised their family. That had become the principal focus of his life. The rest, including the memories of his youth, just seemed to fade into the background. His story wasn't uncommon at all.

Several months ago, his baby, Kimmie, asked him about his family. She was working on an ancestry project near the end of her senior year of high school. And that then, is how they all came to be standing at this spot, in this place and time.

Kimmie broke the silence, surely asking the question for her brothers as well. "Did they love each other, Daddy?" The children rarely visited their grandparents during their youth, because they lived across the country. Both were gone by the time they became teenagers. Their memories were few and more of the pleasant interactions between them at rare holiday events than anything else.

"Yes, honey, they did. What I remember most however, was my father's unwavering love and dedication to my mother..."

Hailey interjected abruptly. "To a fault, if you ask me." Her comment wasn't meant to be caustic. Rather a simple observation. Hailey of course knew more about Weston's parents' relationship than her children. From the corner of her eye, she saw Weston give his patented wry smile. The one that seemed impish yet tinged with an 'I know something you don't,' edge to it. She hated that smile because he wore it every time, they argued about something, and it pissed her off!

"Well, it was complicated, that's for sure..."

Hailey gave a short, derisive laugh. It never seemed that complicated to her. "Your mother wore the pants in the family. She was the dominant partner, by far, in their marriage, Wes. That isn't even up for discussion." She folded her arms across her chest and peered intently at him.

Weston sighed and addressed his family. "Let me first tell you their story as my father told it to me in the last weeks before his cancer finally took him. I had essentially the same observation that you have, Hailey, so I asked him about it directly.

"I also spoke with my mother the week before my father passed. I relayed what my father told me, and my mom readily confirmed that what he had told me was the truth." Weston met his wife's stare with an equal amount of strength, that smile having never left his face. "When I'm finished with the story of their life, then you can judge for yourselves."

A CROSS TO BEAR

Hayden and Shelly were a mismatched pair from the moment they met. Shelly always described it as the result of a comet strike on a planet. The matter from both was cosmically fused together for eternity. Hayden concurred, but sometimes it was accompanied by a sorrowful melancholy.

They met when they literally bumped into each other in the campus quadrangle as both were rushing to get to their next class. They apologized to each other quickly so they could continue on to their respective destinations. They soon realized they were heading to the same first-year English class all new students were required to take in their initial semester at the local state college.

They were never apart from each other for the rest of their lives. Well mostly, never apart. Their friends and later their families could only shake their collective heads in amazement that the two of them hadn't killed each other. They had absolutely nothing in common. Hayden was a quiet introvert. He was one of those rare individuals who could be lonely in a crowded room and joyfully fulfilled while alone reading a book in his dormitory room.

Shelly, on the other hand, constantly needed to be around people, exciting people. She fed off their energy. When alone, she became morose, and uncertain. Shelly always felt the creative spark she experienced when surrounded by imaginative creative individuals was life-affirming. It was a similar sensation to the white-hot sexual flame she experienced while having sex.

Hayden proposed at the end of their junior year. Well, to be fair, Shelly proposed to Hayden, but neither had any doubts as to where they were headed together. They agreed to wait until after graduation to marry. Although it was a bit 'old fashioned,' they felt it was a good idea to live separately until after they married. They maintained their own dorm rooms until they finished school. Of course, Hayden and Shelly would have been lying if they said they never spent the night in one another's room. Their needs were no different than most twenty-one-year-olds in that respect.

Because of their different personality types, they tended to have separate groups of friends and study group members. Both were very comfortable with the situation. Early in their senior year, however, an incident occurred that angered and disturbed Hayden tremendously.

One warm evening as Hayden was returning from an off-campus study group session, he heard a familiar flirty giggle from one of the sidewalk cafes surrounding the campus. It was funny how he could pick her laugh out of the loud cacophony of integrated noises synonymous with the area. He was detail-oriented but never very intuitive until now. He sensed that, at this moment, her girlish laughter wasn't a good thing.

Everyone knows that when you are twenty-one, you think you already know everything you need to know about life and the world you live in. And, when you are forty, you realize that you didn't know shit when you were twenty-one. But Hayden hadn't been forty yet, so seeing Shelly sitting between two pretty boy types as he would describe them, shamelessly flirting, was a shock that caused him a momentary paralysis.

Hell, she wasn't just flirting with them. Each of the Adonis-type schmucks had a hand on one of her breasts kneading them gently under her regularly braless blouse. Her breasts were on the full side, and it was a constant source of irritation to Hayden that she refused to wear a bra. The braless look was still in vogue in those days, especially on college campuses, so it was not that outlandish, but it still bothered him. When he first questioned her habit, she told him she liked the way it felt. He told her, she was going to make the entire male population of the campus cross-eyed. She just laughed and told him, "Good!"

Shelly's hands were below the table, one in each lap of the boys he didn't recognize. Because of the darkness, and the angle of his vision, he couldn't really see what she was doing. But based on the motion of her arms, and the looks of euphoria on the dumbshits' faces, He knew.

It is rare when someone recognizes the significance of a life-altering moment in real-time. It's easy to look back and spot those scenarios, but it's not when you are living in the moment. Hayden did, however, once he overcame the shock of what he was seeing. So, without a further moment of indecision about confronting her, Hayden headed straight for the amorous threesome.

He grabbed an empty chair and dragged it behind him, at least he thought it was empty, on his way to their table. He had actually reached them before any of the three saw him. He sat down noisily as the legs of the metal chair annoyingly scraped on the cobblestone surface. "Hey, Shell. Are you going to introduce me to your friends?" All three were startled. It was the trio's turn to freeze up. Despite his anger Hayden thought it was comical that the three lover's jaws dropped open simultaneously, in a Three Stooges-like parody.

Their brains were having difficulty processing what was happening, so the scumbags' hands remained frozen on Shelly's breasts, as did her's, on their dicks. Shelly returned to consciousness first and hastily removed her hands from their crotches, and viciously slapped the offending hands of her stunned lovers away from her breasts. Hayden noticed that her engagement ring was missing from her hand.

"Ah, hi, ah, Hayden...W-w-what are you doing here?" She winced at the stupidity of her question.

"Oh, I just thought I'd stop by and say hi to my fiancée." He glared into the eyes of her playmates. The faces of the Romeos, who by now knew they weren't getting laid this evening, had registered shock at his pronouncement. It was obvious to Hayden that neither of them knew she was engaged. He filed that insight away for the time being. It was an illuminating moment, so he switched his intentions.

"Well, I can see you're busy, Shell, so I'll leave you to get back to your fun." Hayden left without further comment nor having looked back. He thought he heard Shelly yell out. "Wait, Hayden, please!" He never slowed down.

Hayden, not being very sophisticated in matters of the heart, specifically the breaking up part, managed to avoid Shelly for all of about forty-five minutes before she pounced on him. She literally did pounce on him, like a lioness on a gazelle. Her tackle would have made Dick Butkus proud. She actually knocked Hayden to the ground just as he got up from the park bench, he had plopped himself onto about thirty minutes prior.

It had taken Hayden ten minutes to angrily walk from the bistro to his dorm building. But rather than go inside, he sat on the bench next to the entry and tried to make some sense of what had just happened. He truly didn't know what to do next. He just knew his life as he understood it was over. His thoughts ranged from how he could have been so wrong about Shelly, to whether it was somehow his fault? His emotions vacillated between rage and sorrow, to melancholy and despondency, then back to rage and sorrow. He had just settled on sorrow when he was struck by Hurricane Shelly.

The astonished Hayden could only lie on his back as his hysterical ex-fiancée tried to beg his forgiveness. Her rationales fired from her lips like a machine gun. "I'm so dumb, I don't deserve to live...I've known those guys for several years...I had too much to drink...I'm so sorry...I would never cheat on you...You know what a receptive person I am..." There were a lot more I'm sorry, please forgive me, and I love you so much's, thrown in there, but her rapid-fire manner of speech made it all blend together in an incoherent stream.

Hayden needed to free himself before he drowned in Shelly's bodily fluids that were splashing onto his face. It was a mixture of tears, spittle, and snot dripping from her nose that he had to keep brushing off his face in order to save himself. When she finally wound herself down, Hayden made the mistake of suggesting they go to his room as they were becoming a public spectacle.

Shelly agreed, and within five of minutes being inside, they were naked on Hayden's bed and making love. Once she had time to catch her breath, Shelly's usual whispers of affection and moans of pleasure were quickly replaced with a broken record of, "I'm so, so sorry...I can't live without you...please forgive me. To Hayden, these words seemed extraneous, given the fact that he was as much involved in their lovemaking as was Shelly.

When they both had finished and calmed significantly, Hayden asked, what to him seemed a simple but particularly important question. "Shell, how is it that the guys you were with tonight, your very good and long-time friends, were unaware that you were engaged?" That set off another fifteen-minute stream of variously worded and frenzied mea culpas from Shelly.

There was two things Hayden was sure of at that point. First, Shelly would never be able to lie to him, and second, she'd be a terrible poker player.

After she once again composed herself, Shelly gripped him even tighter. It was a normal occurrence after a round of lovemaking that Shelly would hold him. Typically, Hayden would be on his back while Shelly draped her nude frame across his right side. Her leg would be thrown over his torso, thus effectively pinning him to the bed. They would usually awaken in the morning in this same position. Both would be in desperate need of the bathroom.

However, in this case instead of falling asleep, Shelly spoke to Hayden from deep within. "Honey, you complete me. I didn't know what love was until I met you. I couldn't live without you." She was teary-eyed and intermittently sniffling, but coherent. "I promise you every person I have ever come across in my life will know I am engaged to you by tomorrow night. And, they will know that you are the center of my universe. I promise." She made the 'cross my heart' sign across her chest as she spoke the words causing Hayden to smile at her sincerity.

"I know I did a terrible thing. I wouldn't have cheated, but I know what I was doing was way out of line." She was up on her elbows, staring intently into Hayden's eyes as she continued. "I won't make excuses for what I've done. As you know, I'm very tactile and I guess I let things get out of hand. I wouldn't trade one session of our lovemaking, for a hundred white-hot sexual encounters. They pale in comparison to what we share. I used to think I needed the excitement that sex provides me until we made love.

"But, Hayden, there is something you have to understand. Being married to me will be complicated. Just because we get married doesn't mean I am going to lose who I am. Ours will not be an Ozzie & Harriet life. I will have my own career. I will need my own friends around me. Don't worry, it isn't a bad thing. I will be devoted to you, but that doesn't mean it won't be sometimes trying for you. Our life together will be filled with excitement and passion. But, But because I am not perfect, we will have our fights and disagreements. I'm sure you will be disappointed with me on occasion, but I promise you, it will never be boring."

Whether it was his inexperience or just exhaustion on Hayden's part, he missed the significance of Shelly's last statement. They didn't speak of the incident again. It was like it never happened.

They graduated, married, found jobs, and settled into their careers. To Hayden, it seemed odd that one's first trimester of their adulthood could be summed up in a single sentence, but it was nonetheless true. Hayden progressed within the field he had chosen that fit his personality. He was the newly promoted Senior Logistics Manager for Twin Falls Transportation. Shelly, a Creative Design Manager for Eagle Graphics, Inc. Hayden was surrounded by facts, figures, and solutions. Shelly by strong creative personalities and opportunities.

For all intents and purposes, they were leading a normal middle-class life indistinguishable from millions of others.

One time, after a few pleasant years of marriage for the odd couple, Hayden's confused parents, being the very direct individuals they were, asked the two of them what they saw in each other. Not unexpectedly, they gave completely opposite explanations. However, upon hearing them, Hayden's parents understood. It gave them an uneasy feeling, but they understood.

Hayden told them that Shelly drew him out of his carefully constructed and rigid world. He felt emotions that he never had. He admitted that her powerful personality sometimes intimidated him. But, at the same time, it challenged him to experience life more spontaneously and meaningfully.

Shelly said Hayden grounded her. No one ever had that effect on her before. Without being graphic, Shelly explained to his parents that when they made love for the first time, she had never felt so warm, safe, and wanted, in her whole life. And those feelings had compounded every time they were together since. She laughed and said he was like 'Crack' to her.

It was during that same conversation Hayden's parents asked them about grandchildren for the first time.

IN THE FAMILY WAY

Hayden and Shelly wanted desperately to have a family, but they felt it was better to wait until both were settled into their careers. They began to talk more earnestly about having a family after the conversation with Hayden's parents. But it was still a couple of more years when they reached their mid-thirties before Shelly and Hayden actively tried to have babies. After over a year of trying, and despite Shelly's tireless research being put into practice, they still weren't pregnant. Frankly, Hayden was exhausted, both physically and mentally.