Heroine Addiction Pt. 03

Poignantly Susan reached over and put her hand on mine, there was nothing sexual about it. It was then I knew I was giving off a lot more emotion with my face than my voice. Still, I made sure my voice was lower when I continued.

"Kari says what I heard through the bushes was just talk, but they thought they were alone, and they were making out. He had his hands on her tits and she had hers on his groin. Aaaand clearly ... it wasn't the first time they made out. They weren't discovering each other's buttons; they were pushing ones they knew about."

I had to be quiet for a while. I was ready to choke up.

Susan was too, "Oh Barry, this is much worse than I understood."

That seemed to be said a little loudly, and that made my antennae tingle again. Was she notifying someone else as well? There seemed more than a hint of rebuke in her tone, though certainly not meant for me this time.

"Regardless of how it started it seems Kari liked rolling in the shit like a dog does. That's hard to understand. What's unfathomable is that she expected me to wash her off and pet her behind the ear, and pretend it never happened, if not praise her for it."

I was having trouble, I had to breath a few deep breaths.

"B-But she kept it from me, so even if she didn't sleep with the piece of flea dirt, she doesn't love me. Not like I need; not like I deserve. And you, Susan, frankly you're not the friend I need. For you to ... to question me before talking to me! You said you knew me, that's outrageous in the light of how you took me to task when we got here. Is that how a good friend would help when someone close is really down?"

"But I came right to you and ..."

"Accused me." I cut Susan off, she hadn't been completely on the up and up with me. She was about to learn I could practice subterfuge too. "You just bought the bad narrative someone peddled about me. I can give you the phone numbers of the people involved, go to them if you don't believe me. You won't find me having an affair. You won't find me leading a double life. You won't find me lying. You won't find me refusing to let my side lover go when my spouse begs me to. You won't find me taking Kari for granted, or not respecting or loving her. All of which she did to me."

Susan pulled her lips into her mouth and bit them as she tried to keep tears out of her widening eyes.

We were here because she wanted to know what had happened. So, I let her know, "My wife never told me she was tired of me, or falling out of love, or that I wasn't enough for her any longer. If I hadn't observed things changing for myself and sought the reason why, I'd still be a clueless cuck. As others were in on it, I'm probably seen as something worse: a willing one.

"But you want to tell me Lewis was nothing, like Kari did, huh? If that's true, the only conclusion I can make is that in my wife's eyes I was less than nothing. While some people defend Kari, I've had no friends or allies defend me or my marriage. The ladies helped wreck my marriage while I helped save theirs. Susan, your attitude when I got here was right in lock step with everyone else. What the hell did I ever do to everyone? Why am I being punished for falling in love? Hasn't Kari falling out of love with me been enough punishment?"

"No, Barry," Susan broke in horrified, "I heard you left Kari and couldn't believe it. That's why I'm here! I know I was better friends with Kari, but I know you plenty well too. There was no way you just left, which some are saying. That's why, as soon as I heard it, I called Kari!"

My face wrote the sentence, I didn't have to speak it, but I did, "So, you already talked to Kari and then came to me full of bullshit. What are you really trying to accomplish here, Susan? Are you an agent of Kari's? What more could Kari want of me? Haven't I been dismissed thoroughly enough already?"

Susan looked a little green around the gills, she shook her head ruefully. She set her teeth on edge in a display of anger aimed inwardly. To her credit she looked right into my eyes as she brought her hands to her face beginning to cry angry tears, "Oh Barry, this is going to look so bad. It isn't what it will look like, I swear. Oh shit, I bet you've heard that phrase a whole hell of a lot lately. Barry, I swear ..."

Susan was cut off by a louder "Nooo," sounding at the same time in the booth behind me. Susan saw in my expression that an expectation was being met. I'd started putting the pieces together. Unsure of my reaction Susan took the floor.

"No, wait Barry, wait. Please, this is my fault. M-Maybe I did it wrong, but I did it for you. Maybe I don't understand you well enough. I thought I could bring you what you really wanted: to help you bridge the misunderstanding with Kari. But there was a lot more here than I knew. You guys were the best couple I ever met! I just thought ... I thought I was doing right by you, Barry. I know you love her. I swear I thought I was ..."

"Wait!" a voice spoke cutting off Susan's words. Standing shakily beside me now was Kari, crying looking down at me with an expression of mournful loss.

"I-I asked for Susan's help, Barry, and she gave it. I think maybe hoping she could put us back together. If you came out against me ... like you did, then I'd hear you talk it out honestly without having the additional burden of convincing the woman you love how wrong she was. In Susan's mind if you simply explained it to her, with my listening to your conversation, you'd give me an unadulterated picture of your pain while you weren't busy trying to save me first. She knew I was here. I didn't want to ambush you, I wanted to listen to you, then set up a time to talk. Yes, I wanted to talk to you now, but believe me, I understand it's not about what I want any longer.

"If it was, you'd be in my arms, in our house, and in our bed. I love you! I screwed it all up. I explained to you, as I did to her, that I thought I could do this without altering us. I felt this deed needed doing. I thought as soon as you saw the smoking ruin of Lewis there before you, proving my veracity, everything would be fine. Stupid, huh? It was incredibly stupid! Especially because I knew you'd never allow it if I asked you first. Except I was sure you'd be proud afterwards. That's a pretty huge inconsistency that I've never solved, and which blew up and hurt us really, really, badly! I didn't mean to take your love for granted. I honestly didn't think I was, but I guess that's exactly what I did."

Kari cringed; her eyes became imploring.

"Barry, if the first you knew of the Lewis plan was after it was done, I could explain everything I did was cold blooded and calculated. You'd know I never stopped loving you, while pushing the bastard out of our neighborhood. I thought after Lewis was toast and looking to move, you'd see it exactly as I always saw it.

"It took so long to complete because I couldn't completely get into the part. I had to keep going back to finish the parts that should've been completed. That unfortunately meant more time with him. I consoled myself thinking the extra time would really reinforce to him that he was making headway with me. I never thought it would reinforce the same message to you. I know now simply letting another man think he had part of me was injurious to you. I was a complete fool, not you."

Kari looked like she wanted to vomit except she was desperate to explain her motivations, praying it would make a difference to me.

"The gals felt exactly as you said: guilty. They knew Lewis was dog crap, but his tales of adventure and greater wealth were intriguing. The gals liked to imagine themselves in those places and adventures. I believe they imagined being with their husbands, not Lewis. Alas, to get the tale and some compliments, and to be momentarily swept out of a life currently at the bottom of the career food chain, laden with bills, and soon babies and diapers, they'd stick around him and give him the occasional smile or touch on the arm. With no sports cars or fancy vacations on their immediate horizon, they'd talk to that miscreant for the mental pictures he painted, feeling guilty about it later.

"Baby, they wouldn't have felt they were missing out if Lewis didn't make them feel that way. We were all happy couples in the same boat. He was the fly in the soup. He planted a seed, and the ladies were beside themselves they let it germinate.

"They realized they'd already lost the chance to tell him to drop dead because they'd all stood there letting him eye bang them. You're right, all it would have taken was them telling him to drop dead. Except, by the time they came to me: the one gal who hadn't "given him the time of day", they were convinced I was the only one left who could accomplish the deed. They'd lost the power to do it themselves, that's why they turned to me, not because of any attractiveness factor."

Something in Kari's explanation started gears turning in my head. While my gears meshed Kari stood there fighting her welling tears, awkwardly making seal-like motions with her arms, bringing her palms together then parting them. Seeing I wasn't going to say anything she rolled on.

"So, what went wrong? A lot. Let's start with this: Barry, you don't respect Lewis because he's a schmooze and has no substance, right? The problem is it turns out the rat's ass bastard is a really good schmooze. He spins a compelling yarn. He compliments and cajoles and seems sincere. He doesn't try it on you, Barry, he knows he's wasting his time. It was the same for me until I started listening to his BS on purpose.

"Schmoozing is partially how he climbed a few rungs up the work ladder. He doesn't see his real advantage to his corporation was that he could commit fully to the job relocation because he had no entanglements. Moving got him a big bump. He's made the largest jump he can. He'll work the rest of his career for maybe three more rungs. He'll get those promotions eventually either for time served or to promote him out of a mess he's made. But career wise he's already done unless he makes big changes.

"But God help me, if you get in close to him and hear his schmooze it works. So ... eventually I did like listening to it. I swear to you, if he was telling a story about a romantic beach, I imagined being there with you, never him. His tales were like watching one of those travel shows all the ladies like. Then the power of the old seduction dance kicked in, or in my case, manipulation. Couple that with my inability to completely embrace him, literally, which meant more time on the case, and more planning on my part, and we have the makings of a big blow up."

I countered that last statement, "Kari, I've seen with my own eyes that you got over your "inability to embrace him".

She nodded saying, "I fell in love with my campaign, Barry, not with Lewis. I wanted to spend time with him because I was so looking forward to his eventual takedown. I didn't love the wild animal, I loved that I could break a wild animal. The individual can decide if he was a lion or a sloth, but we both know already. I took pride in taming and training the sloth."

For a moment I wondered why anyone would take pride in a such a thing. I shook off the thought and listened to what Kari was saying.

"The night you caught us I was going to build him up to thinking he was a lion, then let him know he wasn't passable by even sloth standards.

"Did I go too far? YES. YES! I won't debate it. I throw myself at your feet begging for your mercy!"

Kari actually got on her knees.

"Barry, I'm humiliating myself in front of a wonderful mutual friend who's giving me this chance, but I'll do it publicly time after time if you want. You're worth it!" Quietly yet intently she added, "You're every good thing in my life. You're everything to me, Barry. I can't stand that I hurt you. I've never even wanted to disappoint you. Avoiding disappointing you has been a major motivator for me. But disappointing you would've been so much better than what I did."

Kari ground her teeth for a moment finding her way back to her narrative.

"Y-You saw me with my arms around him, allowing his hands on me, saying things to him a married woman shouldn't say to anyone but her mate. If you'd come in maybe two minutes later you would've seen him with his pants down, two minutes and ten seconds later you would've seen me leaving laughing. Cruel? Yes, it was designed to be. But not to you!"

Kari shook her head not sure what to do next, though her body was still suggesting vomiting as the most likely choice.

"The beatings you all gave him served the same purpose as my endgame. But because of the neighborhood ladies, and especially me, considering when my plan was interrupted, he probably thinks he can turn on a married woman now. After everything I did and all the collateral damage I caused, I may have made Lewis worse! It's just not worth it any longer to show him he's wrong.

"Frankly Barry, my way would have been more devastating to him than yours. I understand what a woman can do to a man, which is how I know I broke your heart."

I slid over to the edge of the booth and pulled Kari up off the floor. At first, she thought I was reaching for her and sprang to put her arms around me. She saw at the last second reconciliation wasn't my intent, freezing her instantly.

I know what she did to me, but when you're in love you can't flip a switch and stop those feelings, no matter how much you want to flip them off. I was mortified at her mortification. Kari was shaking with shame and anger at herself. She was also embarrassed but more fearful she'd done something else to displease me. It's a strange world where your wife can be this dedicated and unfaithful at the same time.

I grabbed Kari by her hip and arm and pulled her onto the seat beside me, sliding us both deeper into the booth in the same motion. She shook more violently realizing I wasn't quick to remove my hands from her. She quickly grabbed my arm with both her hands. It was a physical expression of her wanting to lead me to see things in a different light, to make amends, to fix what she'd broken. She wasn't going to let go wanting to pull me along as if through a crowd on the midway to a new ride she wanted me to try. Kari didn't want me to see things her way; she just desperately wanted me to see things weren't as dark as I was seeing them.

"Please Barry, come back to see for yourself: you're a heroic figure cut from a fine tradition of men. That's how I see you. That's how everyone sees you. You stood up to far worse adversity than we women did. We all had protectors, hiding our actions from them shows our character was lacking. You stood tall! And did it alone for far too long. We all saw that. We all saw our plan come off the rails, we saw the flaming wreckage spin off in your direction. We saw it engulf you. You escaped the carnage by your own actions, picked yourself up and went to work getting the job done that we'd botched. You did it all for us and at a tremendous cost to yourself."

She was saying the right things but talking failed me before. I didn't feel like I was done though, so I kept listening. However, Kari could tell she wasn't doing a great job of moving me.

"Barry, listen to this at least. The ladies plan took all summer to formulate, put into effect, and run. Yours took less than twenty minutes. I'm very impressed by your efficiency, though more impressed by how you stood alone with no reinforcement, taking on the woman you love, as well as a man you detest, and all the neighborhood women who were in on it as well. You didn't falter. Alone against all that, you prevailed.

"You stood up for what was right and never gave up on me until I proved myself trash, as you put it, in front of your own two eyes. Even with all the support I have, all the ladies, and I think all the men now too, I can't make things better without you. I went to each household apologizing, telling the complete story to the husbands and my true motivation. Even with all those allies I simply cannot stand without you."

"You did just fine standing against me, Kari," I answered tersely.

She grimaced, "No. No please, that's not what I was doing. Though you couldn't understand what I was doing until Lewis' smoldering worm-like corpse was laid at your doorstep."

I considered that. No not the veracity of the claim, the possibility of the prospect. Smoldering worm-like corpses weren't on my daily flight plan. Gross certainly. A heck of a clean-up for sure. But if it was Lewis, would it be worth it? Definitely. I noticed both women were looking at my dream like expression.

Kari looked at me closely while hesitantly restarting. "I wasn't fighting you, Barry, I was fighting for time! If you can't follow your heart right now, follow your nature. Come back to save me; I'm definitely a damsel in distress. I-If you want, make me earn you all over again! You haven't filed for divorce, and I never will. I don't want a divorce: I want you! You say I lowered myself to his level, okay, sure, treat me like it. Treat me like a tramp, just please don't leave me."

Kari looked at the Susan and back to me. I'm sure I appeared unmoved. Kari's eyes flared with desperation and resolve, "I wanted to play the hero for those women, but I failed. I don't think I had an affair, but you absolutely believe I did. But you haven't filed. You're purposely leaving a door open for me. I'm not a hero, I've proven that to everyone, but I must save the day. Not for them, Barry, I need to save the day for us, especially for you. Please Barry, I want to save the day for you. Just let me try!"

Now broken and sobbing Kari marched on, "Please, please. I was never going to touch him there, where you saw my hand, not skin on skin! I know what you saw. I know it was too much, but that was it, as far as I was going: the final salvo. I had to break him! It had to end that night because I had to come see you!"

She was sobbing and choking through her words. "I had to come see you with his head as a trophy because you'd left me! You had to see how broken he was. Originally, I wanted to embarrass him and make him go away, but you discovered the plan and misunderstood its nature, which hurt you. So, I was going to be cruel and destroy him to make an example of him: something you could see immediately, all to prove I never wanted him. I always wanted you.

"Damn it. In the initial plan you were supposed to see him cowed and tail tucked, never to bother any of us again. Then the ladies and I would tell you I brought him down. Then I would re-pledge my continued never-having-faltered loyalty to you. It all seemed terribly romantic to us. It seems so ugly the way you see it. Though I see them I still can't reconcile the differences.

"It was supposed to bring a heroic Fourth of July type atmosphere, "Ding Dong the witch is dead" kind of joy. The gals would be impressed with us, and yes, especially me. The guys were supposed to be impressed by you having such a devoted wife, because I would have to confess getting way to close to the scum to melt him. You wouldn't be hurt or have doubts because of the smoldering corpse we'd all be standing around. But I wouldn't have defiled myself, only having gotten inside of Pig Pen's cloud, never making landfall."

Boy, Kari was painting too many mental pictures for me to process. I felt like I was out for a run. And she was still going.

"Afterwards I was going to take you away being seductive as I could, keeping myself eyes-only for you. Everyone would know I was yours, and ... oh God, don't you see it for what it was now?" Kari pleaded.

I knew Kari well, she believed this. She could also tell I thought she was deluded. Now I had to decide. Was all of this only her being deluded or was I drawing conclusions before their time. Was she partially deluded and partially not?