All Comments on 'How Do the Scales Balance?'

Bob is a Cheater, Wait until she finds out

The most flexible minds find their way back to basic principles. Some people however are like lawyers and scientists accustomed to coming up with arguments instead of looking at the big picture.

She just couldn't understand the knife she thrust in his back, while understanding the pain but not understanding why. Soulmates don't find other poles to ride.

The point isn’t whether or not it’s fucking or making love…. Jesus Christ u idiots. You know what if everyone thought like the fmc then basically you could commit crimes and as long as a cop isn’t actually present, then it doesn’t affect them, therefore you can’t be arrested for it. Solid point

Sex and making love are different things. And yes, there are people that can seperate that and there are people who can't. Just a random hookup is seldom making love.

Even in a marraige sex and making love can be seperated, but it has to be done by both. in a a lot of true wifesharing (or the more much rarer husband sharing) stries on this site this is the case.

In this case the problem was the differnet aproach on sex. Even as she knew her husband she never thought of what he would think if he knew about the sex with others. She just wanted to impose her opinion of sex on him after the outing, but never thought about his opinion even as she knew it.

For a happy ending both had to take a step from their position but the characters weren't written for this.

Sex is just sex.

Every time I hear,read,or see people who act on that I am dumfounded.

It's like Clinton's definition of sex. Totally mind blowing. No wonder our divorce rate is so high and foundations of marriages so shaky.

Brilliant. Loved it. Thanks for the effort. Much appreciated.

idk pretty telling that she could keep her legs close while single but she couldnt while married. i didnt like it do to the fact that the wife being made to be a good person but she wasnt. the fact that it was his problem not hers didnt sit well with me. they should have communicated better during their courtship. i think revenge does jack shit but make the doer a peace of shit. so glad they split as well as they did. the i didnt lie but she did unless she had some warped idea of exclusive. which i guess she did lol

I can't think of the last story I added to favorites. This is a true gem. Because they divorced, the story takes the more clinical black and white (His side) flavor. It would be interesting to see the same basic story, with a reconciliation it would "feel differently". That said, it is very rare to see two sides of a story so well explained. Thanks,

Seems to me that the only character that came out smelling like a rose was Bob.

A bland nobody who could never snag a hot woman like Tilly gets her at a discount. They don't marry so his assets are safe. He has no responsibly. for the kids. Gets all the sex he wants. Plus she cooks great and does all the parenting. Why should he care if she secretly fucks around on the side. No skin off his nose. And who"s to say he can"t get a little on the side? After all it's only sex. If they split, he forces sale of the house or has Tilly buy him out so he'll be financilly whole no matter what happens.

His only financial investment is 50% of the mortgage and ongoing housing costs. Aaron gets to pay child support. I think he's fat, dumb and happy in the catbird seat.

Tilly is getting all the sex she wants from whomever but has increased parentlng responsibilities as the custodial parent. Plus the kids know she's the one that destroyed the marriage. Their future relationship could be rocky.

Aaron is stuck with child support for years and being a part time parent. However, he has to wonder what effect Tilly shacking up with some stranger has on the kids preception of fidelity in marriage. She's certainly not a good role model. She's teaching the kids by her behavior that open marriages are OK or no marriage at all.

Aaron will continue to pay child support as well as trying to integrate his soon to be new wife and her kid with his.

Well one out of three living happily ever after it's all that bad.

5 estrellas muy merecidas.

Tal como lo planteo el autor, el carácter del mc no permitía nada mas que este desenlace.

Por otro lado, me gustó la escritura y si bien cayó en clichés, estos eran recursos narrativos válidos y bien utilizados.

The long winded excuses about her infidelity not affecting THEIR relationship and marriage sounded like she could NEVER be trusted. The fact that he never offered the thought to her if he were to take on a lover during their marriage, and her reaction to it, was a missing key in this story. I suppose her new man liked the idea of being a cuckold......

Still a 5 ☆☆☆☆☆ for a good story, and thank you.

5 Stars. Great story and good ending. I wasn't sure where how you were going to end this but you nailed it. - CindyTV

Love motivates loving things.

Doing something behind your partners back in secret is not love.

It's secret for a reason.

He forgave her fine but he demanded fidelity and needed to be able to trust it would be so.

Reading the comments it seems many forget no person is perfect somethings can forgiven, some cannot

A deep sad story well thought out, remember the Buddhists "nothing is forever", but for both of them, life goes on in a reasonable fashion

This is turning into a Cagivagurl story. Endless repetition of things already presented/stated. Facts already in evidence if you will

Well we certainly got a detailed description of the characters’ daily dietary menus! This author made the same mistake most make when switching POV’s. He simply repeated what was already described without adding any new analysis

Great story . Why do these cheating bitches always want to save the marriage they blow up?

Enjoyed the story. Thought you did a fine job of building the read. Thanks for your writing.

"...and he said he couldn't imagine how a perfect marriage could be demolished by a couple episodes of meaningless sex." (BTW, dumbass, it is NOT the sex- it is the breaking of trust, deceit and contempt.)

PERFECT! Two cheaters found each other!

They can now eff around each other to their hearts content!

She’ll cheat on Bob, eventually…

5 stars - second read.

I feel like I dodged a bullet by choosing my one and only wife, as my life partner for more than half a century.

She never compromised once, not one fucking time. She HAD to have him see things HER way. And she KNEW her way wS wrong enough to hide it from him. She's not stupid. But she made a ton of promises after therapy failed and she was sitting on divorce papers. She made the SMALLEST attempt to be faithful after the divorce was over.

Her priorities were all screwed up, and she deserved to lose him. She never made an effort to understand his side. She just had to be right. He did nothing wrong, he even gave her some small rope back up, but he never made the effort to climb back up. So we know he's not black and white like she claims. She's the black and white person. She refused to budge a singular inch. She refused to respect his POV, the one she agreed to before marriage. She's used to bamboozled others. It didn't work this time.

She was too self-centered and clearly had huge narcissistic tendencies. She definely loved herself more than her husband. You captured it well when she shared with us: "If only he'd been more flexible. If only he'd been more open. If only he'd have let me help him heal from his pain." She clearly not only didn't think she did anything wrong, but clearly wasn't going to change.

Bob's character wasn't so believable in his willingness to condone her cheating 5 times in 5 years of marriage.

Don't understand how a woman can think like this sex is sharing of the commitment people have has husband and wife.

@Crios: my experience (personal and as a pastoral counselor) is that the daughters will follow the mother’s moral code. I.e., they will not see the value in sex; it’s just meaningless fun to be shared by all. Obviously that’s not true in every case. The child’s underlying personality will ultimately guide them. In other words, if the child is more like the father, it’s possible that the child will then adopt the father’s moral code and see fidelity as a requirement for sex in marriage.

As I say, I’ve experienced this in both my personal and professional lives. A lot of the girls that I knew in high school, for example, came from broken homes. Some were due to infidelity on the mother’s part and some were due to infidelity on the father‘s part. Which ever parent the child was most like was the parent that they emulated later in life. Therefore the daughters who grew up with cheating mothers saw no issue whatsoever with cheating on their boyfriends and later on their spouses. One of them even tried to take my virginity by saying that her boyfriend, who had gone off to the Navy, was fooling around on her so she might as well fool around on him. I came to find out later, after turning her down, that she came from a broken home where the mother had cheated. That’s just one example. In counseling I’ve also encountered similar situations where the daughters saw the mother’s promiscuity as permission for their own.

@Anonymous: posted just below mine, is correct in stating the therapist in this story was committing borderline malpractice.

The writers who attempt to show vignettes of marriage counseling, they should have some idea of what we do and how we do it. In this case, the clients have two distinctly different personality types and perceptions of the marriage contract (the informal use of this word). Bringing them together requires change on both of their parts, which doesn't include acceptance or Aaron's part or intransience on Tilly's part. The breakdown came when the therapist asked Tilly if she could see instances where she might stumble again, and most of the examples in her own head were extraordinary examples (e.g. swapping initiated by Aaron), but the counselor failed to examine all those possibilities. That's because she did not understand their diametrically opposed perceptions. That is borderline malpractice!

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The goal should've been to have Tilly understand the value of a sincere apology and Aaron understand that her behavior was caused by a fundamental perception of love and fidelity. Initiating those two things would've likely saved the marriage. Backstopping her remorse with meaningful controls (i.e. change of attitude; different job with no travel; post-nuptial) combined with Aaron's scientific mind understanding the clinical difference in their viewpoints and acceptance of his wife's remorse/change would have given them a chance to succeed.

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Ironically, the best way to protect children from growing up like their mother, or at least in this case, is for them to stay married and for Aaron to work with his therapist to assure that the girls would follow in his moral channels and not their mother's. Now, they have Tilly and Bob influencing them half the time. This is truly a case of "Keep your friends close and your enemies closer." Yes, you can live happily in opposition on certain salient points while still loving that person.

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This story needed some of the repetitive same-same, circular conversations edited out. You could make a drinking game out of the times Tilly told him "sex with Randy was meaningless." That's the first thing the therapist would've shut down, metastasized and dealt with for both of them.

Excellent 5*****

It was Christopher Walken, not William Dafoe, in Pulp Fiction.

Reads like a fucking incomplete end with the MC still hanging while the cheating cunt found her counterpart Bob. I was waiting to hear that she caught Bob cheating on her through mindless sex and how she would react.

Not one of your better stories.

Tilly never regretted cheating they were too far apart on fidelity a marriage without fidelity is not a marriage

I love this story and have reread it multiple times. I wonder though, who will have the greater influence on the girls’ view of marriage when they’re older. Will they grow up to be self absorbed like their mother or will they take their father’s position that marriage is all-in, all the time. No carve outs.

I’ve read where integrity is doing the right thing, even when no one’s looking. Tilly had no integrity

Her attitude and explanation about why she went outside the marriage killed it stone dead. Equating having sex to choosing a steak because she fancied that at the time just meant she would be unfaithful again in the future. She could always see reasons to allow it and justify it rather than reasons for not doing it. Typical of someone very self centered. I hope husband number two really can accept straying because she very probably will cheat on him too. Excellent story and again would love to see more of these characters. BardnotBard

The yin and yang of human relations--balancing the emotional, the intellectual, the spiritual, the physical. Our author does a good job of making clear we are individuals first; that is why fitting together and forever with a life-partner is a living dialectic that ever seeks to find careful balance. In the ether floating around this tale, for me, I sense the insightful words of Joni:

I've looked at love from both sides now

From give and take, and still somehow

It's love's illusions, I recall

I really don't know love at all

Though quite a powerful, deep and meaningful read, which I ultimately found touchingly tragic, I can only award it 4.9*/5!

Between a halfway down page one, and a halfway down page three, were at least two whole pages of constant repitition, duplication, re-iteration and repeats, that were so mind-numbingly off-puttingly drawn-out and boring that I almost abandoned all hope, and drowned myself in my pet skunk's bathwater!

Quite the very opposite of the very rushed conclusion, hurtled through with indecent haste!

But I rallied myself, and penalised the star award with a 0.1% penalty for each of these two infractions of good taste, instead!.

Otherwise a good, well reasoned treatise. Well done, thanks!.

R.S.

Extremely well written. The thought process of the husband and wife was very well done and beyond most stories on this website. But, I think Aaron should have just boiled his response to Tilly as "I don't want to be in a open marriage", end of discussion. She obviously didn't believe in all of the marriage vows she made before God, such as forsaking all others. Please rhetthebrat, keep writing, you are so talented we need more.

Very thoughtful story. Although I’m wired more liike Air in my view of monogamy, and even though Aaron’s rationale for not resuming the marriage is well reasoned i, I still would side on Giving Tilly the chance to prove her love and willingness to conform to Asrin’s view of the promises necessary to sustain that love. I’d give her at least the chance to prove her post-infidelity promise. Human beings will disappoint. I think it’s hard to live in the world with a “one snd done” mindset. Same with the search for perfection, which, as the saying goes, usually proves to be the “enemy of the good.”

She never saw sexual fidelity as a part of their relationship. He did. That's a deal that cannot be undone, nor does it ever really change for people. Sadly, the comments made throughout her parts of this story were all about getting HIM to changer, never seeing that her actions were the driving force.

Each of Tilly’s explanations was a different set of words that meant: ‘because I wanted to’. Ultimately it wasn’t that she’d cheated, but that she wasn’t trustworthy, and was highly self absorbed. When she said the other guy was years ago, I wondered about his daughters’ paternity.

"I was horny" the worst possible reason for infidelity. The story had a lot going for it, even in the face of her relentless hope that he would "see reason."

Trust, and lack of trust. That was the real bedrock of the reason for divorce. Pretty well written, albeit a bit overly wordy. Still, well worth four stars.

JPB

I very much enjoyed this story and have read it several times. As I was thinking about it today, it struck me that Tilly, in addition to having brutally different expectations of what a marriage should be, was also behaving like a spoiled, entitled brat. Unlike the wife in Cruise On, Bye, Tilly never comes to the realization that what she did was just plain wrong. Not just wrong for hurting Aaron but the acts themselves. Would have been interesting to hear Bob's take on fidelity. "Oh, honey, it's okay if you're on the road and horny and you want to get some strange to get you over the hump."

Too much psycho babble for me.

Willem Dafoe isn't in Pulp Fuction, though.

Very Good ---- 5

That was an infuriating read but in a good way, Tilly was so bonehead in her unwillingness to see why what she did was wrong it was frustrating. Helped add to the story, maybe felt a bit of what Aaron felt with her continued "it didn't matter" spiel. I appreciated Tilly as a character even if I disliked her, she was not some evil monster or heartless witch, she just had a WILDLY different view on infidelity from her husband to the point she casually hurt him by sleeping around. She knew she hurt him but just couldn't understand WHY she was hurting him. I kinda expected the story to end with trouble in paradise from Tilly and Bob where she wanted some casual hoop up with Aaron and Bob not being so understanding. 5 stars, excellent story.

5*

Tilly: "Honey, I had the best steak at Ruth's Cris last night! Oh, and I fucked Randy too."

.

She knew it was wrong, that's why she lied by omission.

I really enjoyed the role reversal of Tilly being the spouse that see nothing wrong with sex on the side that’s normally the male point of view. Good for Aaron for not giving in there is a lot to be said for integrity. Another winner! Thanks

Love it. I’m an epilogue fan so of course I wanted the story to give Aaron and Dee further life. Also Tilly’s thoughts about aaron and dee.

Tilly was definitely different from most of the usual cheating sluts in the LW stories I've read (and I've read a LOT). It seems she had a radically different view on things than most people. She doesn't even see what she did as wrong and uses inane justifications to support her actions. For a supposedly smart women she can be really dumb. Why would a women commit to marriage vows, which are implicitly immutable, when she knows her nature conflicts with it? On that note, her husband knew her nature beforehand and didn't consider this a possibility? I'd say it was strongly hinted at. Sadly her behaviour seems innate and not something that therapy or counseling could "fix"; there is nothing to fix; it's simply a core part of who she is and she can no more change it than she could grow an extra hand. Too bad as they were almost-perfect together.

Til the end she blames Aaron for not forgiving her and reconciling. She just never got that was she sid was actual infidelity. Yes if a tree falls in the woods, it happened. The Shockwave from the fall, the sound, the new space for a new growth from its carcass, etc. These things happen. Worse even if Aaron never learned of her cheating, she is an active participant and observer. It affects her behavior. Which is reflected back on their marriage. The king she gets away with it the more she will think of Aaron and their marriage differently. The less respect of her husband and/or guilt of her actions (thiugh she has zero guilt, because she is mentally wired abnormally). Divorce was the only option. There is no doubt she will cheat on Bob for the same reasons. Or maybe he will grant her a carte blanche. Dunno. But it isn't the MC's issue anymore. Not his monkeys. Not his circus.

Excellent, well written and triggered many emotions. 5 Stars! - CindyTV

Tilly has an impulse control issue. It's one thing to be jonesing for a hit of your favorite food or drink, but when you can't delay gratification when the urge strikes and you don't care where the urge strikes, you're in trouble. Stay away from military bases in foreign countries...

You carried these themes, especially wifey's, through the story well.

We don't know much context about wifey, other than she carves out, and believes in, exceptions.

How does the rest of her family feel about her behaviour and beliefs? Does her Daddy agree? Does her Mother agree? Siblings? Did they live that sort of lifestyle? How did everyone react to the news and reason for the divorce?

How are we supposed to believe no condom the first time with Randy, but condom after that? Randy continued to cheat on his wife with a woman who lessened the experience for him after? ... for only 1 orgasm, no afterglow or repeat that evening? She enjoys sex without a condom, so the sex was important enough to have even WITH a condom, lessening the experience for her as well. The intimacy with another person has no value to her? That is hard to believe, unless she is actually a slut or a never-quite realized slut. However, even sluts appreciate time together afterwards, for the warmth, scents, relaxation, sweat, vibing together...

Does she not know how to satisfactorily masturbate?

If another person NEEDS to be there, then, something a bit more is going on that our wifey will not admit to herself.

Exceptions are like that, something a bit more than we expected.

Plus, someone so smart getting a company pen dipped in her inkwell repeatedly does not actually sound that smart...

Interesting story of a couple discovering that the main way they are polar opposites eventually undoes them.

It's insane that she puts up this argument that it wasn't a big deal. I've seen solid arguments on why the "it was just sex" thing is so vastly different between men and women. Level headed stuff related to evolutionary biology rather than talking about master keys and shitty locks. Yeah it's blatantly obvious stuff but I think it would have worked well to have it laid out for Til since everyone seems to fancy themselves as smarties in the story.

It's also maddening not only did she never see things her husbands way but she got herself a doormat to agree with her.

I am glad they both ended happy. What bugged my was Tilly was never sorry for the actual sex she had outside the marriage. Having sex is not the same as having a massage.

"I try not to dwell on what could have been, if only. If only he'd been more flexible. If only he'd been more open. If only he'd have let me help him heal from his pain."

Even to the end, she believes they couldn't reconcile because of Aaron's shortcomings. She never once thinks, "If only I hadn't cheated. If only I had been faithful. If only I had understood the importance of trust and respect in a marriage."

She never once accepts any responsibility for the destruction of the marriage, no remorse at al for her actions, only regret for the consequences once she was caught.

That is why Aaron was 100% correct to divorce her. If she could not accept that what she had done was wrong and feel real remorse for it (not just for the consequences of being caught), that means that there is no way she could be a trustworthy partner going forward.

A stark contrast between monogamy and infidelity... the wife saw no infidelity with having sex outside the marriage as long as it had no observable effect on the marriage, while the husband experienced real effect on the marriage with total infidelity, betrayal, and loss of trust... the real problem with Tilly's beliefs and actions was that she knew what she was doing was wrong, destructive and hurtful or she would not have kept it hidden from Aaron. She would have openly told Aaron the truth and would notify Aaron when she engaged in sex with another partner so as not to be deceptive... but, she knew Aarons beliefs and the consequences and decided to keep her dalliances to herself without thought of the hurt it could cause if caught. 5-stars

Very realistic and I just don’t know why the word , biggest one trust wasn’t front and center. He rationalized it all she in her head felt bad he was hurt but fucking the guys wasn’t the problem only getting caught . She never even saw how a hubby would be embarrassed, emasculated and who destroyed by hearing her coworkers talk like it’s a regular thing his wife fucking the guy which means he brags . I’m surprised she didn’t offer for him to fuck someone and he never said I don’t believe it was only 3 times it could’ve been every day especially the way the guys were talking about it. He never called her a dirty whore slut in anger. I also with the shame of hearing the guys knowing the devastation it will cause the family how with the sneak opportunity to smash the guy just once. She never pleaded or begged or offered to leave the place for another firm. He’d also be thinking is she cheating.

Lol she'll cheat on Bob soon enough and he'll do the same, Aaron finally dodget a bullet after being shot for years so good for him

There was no reason for Aaron to tell Bob about Tilly's infidelity because Bob already knew about it. It just wasn't something that was very important to him. Which was why Bob was a better match for Tilly. Unfaithful people are best paired with partners who don't think fidelity is important, rather than with partners they're going to cheat on and lie to.

And I'm certain that a lot of real life marriages are like this, but stay together and something is always JUST NOT QUITE RIGHT. It's always lurking there in the background. I wonder if Tilly had apologized and said, "You're right, I shouldn't have done it, I can't believe I thought it was okay...." Maybe that would have tipped the scales towards reconciliation.

Well written!

Can not belive that women.

I'll never get the it didn't mean anything position. If it didn't mean anything then why do it?

I suspect that this story is intended as a rejoinder to Cagivagurl's excellent "Confessions and Consequences," posted about a month earlier. The endings of both stories feature a chat between the MC and the LW's new husband, who asks why the MC would leave such a great woman over a short-term, relatively inconsequential affair.

It's fascinating to read the two stories side-by-side. Both feature a rational MC who is completely uninterested in revenge but can't see a way to stay in the marriage. Both authors are among the very best currently posting on this site. But they see the same situation through very different eyes.

Believable story. I think Aaron should have told Bob the reason they got divorced was, he couldn't put up with her recreational sex outside the marriage and he couldn't trust her anymore.

This was realistic, profoundly thoughtful snd authentic, far from the usual reflexive LW tropes. In others words, this was real, honest strife, born of genuinely different thought processes and thinking styles, the real stuff that divides people, even good, thoughtful, smart and well done. Not the usual slut tropes. Thank you. More please.

Very well written story, an instant classic and a pleasure to read. It left me sad and depressed, so I guess it had emotional impact at the very least. I'm in mourning in spite of the other significant others.

It's amazing that two such intelligent protagonists weren't able to clarify what monogamy meant to them before they got married! I actually think this is one of the most important details. How can I maintain love and strengthen trust if I don't discuss loyalty as an important point? 4*!

Normally enjoy your stories BUT this ending was not only wrong .... it was an ABOMINATION!

To be blunt .... Tilly is a narcissistic , selfish CUNT! She lives in her own contrived world, believes she is above recrimination and views her partner, Arron, not as a equal, but as some type of pet she can lavish her affection on when it suits her. She has never been nor will ever be a woman ANY man can believe in or TRUST!!!

The fact that YOU chose to provide her with a "happy ending" shows how much you mirror your female mc!

Never thought you, one of my favorite authors, could miss so badly with one of his stories!

An unfinished symphony, pity as it showed all the signs of being great and complete but the latter dropped off. Still a very well written story worthy of a read.

What puzzles me is all the clearly bent if not broken Anons who demand that the woman (bitch) be burned. Nothing else in the story matters, especially how well it was written and how well the tale was told. Nothing else matters, except for the pound of flesh.

Pathetic lack of introspection.

Still a five star story, one of the best.

JPB

A very well rounded tale, with excellent character development. A nice mix of narrative, dialogue and introspection. A happy ending, too. Too bad we didn't learn more about Dee, but that's okay. One of the most solid five star tales I have read in LIit.

JPB

Interesting because it wasn't the usual burn the bitch story which gets flogged like a dead horse around here

It is unrealistic for a married woman to assert surreptitiously fucking other men was acceptable. The author never had Tilly defending her point of view with parents, children, friends and co-workers. Certainly those people's reactions would dramatically affected her social life and force her to see why her assertion that infidelity is meaninless was ridiculous. Many would shun her, forcing her to act more normally.

Therefore 4*

This is probably one of the most true to life stories I’ve read. Maybe not in all the details, but in how rationalize behavior. Well done.

Excellent story, with a MC that wasn't a Navy Seal or a computer wizard, just a guy no longer able to trust his wife and fully aware that fact is a deal breaker for him. That she never was remorseful for what she did, and being unable to guarantee that it would never happen again locked in the divorce as the only outcome. Even after the divorce, she still didn't get it. Adios bitch. My only disappointment is that Aaron held back from enlightening Bob about what his future would likely be. 5 *s

Worth 5*. Really well written.

CastAdrift wrote “The company owners are clearly without ethics, but perhaps that's the private sector reality.”

You believe that government employees are more ethical than private sector workers? You think that bosses in agencies are angels?!? That’s absurd!

ZK

Two pages with the fact that Aron could not get over his wife,s commonplace infidelity. You could have done 1400 words and relate this train wrek. And the end no resolution. No sex. Pretty boring.

I would have appreciated an ending rather than a stopping. Well-written and heart rending.

Ed

So I guess she would have been as casual if her partner was scewing around on her. If so then she has some parts missing.

she got away for cheating - poor ending

A lot of complaints, but I liked the journey that you took us on. In the end, the MC finally figured out that despite a lot of love, they weren't right for each other. So many commenters rail about her not getting punished, but the MC felt his life was in balance after divorce so what would he care if she got a punishment. Whether or not anyone agrees with her philosophy on casual sex, that's how she feels. It's probably best she's left with a guy like Bob that apparently doesn't care.

Anyway, a good story in my opinion, and a sorta happy ending for the Aaron.

Just didn't work. IF the cunt was really that delusional then burn her and move on.

While the ending felt a bit lacking to me, the writing throughout was absolutely superb. I've been an LW consumer for years, and I believe this story is a better offering than virtually all the others I have read. Bravo!

@sbrooks,

All of your points, questions or other comments are moot, rhetorical or speculation. Which means that everything you said is not worth a plugged nickel.

There's more people complaining about Dafoe not being in Pulp Fiction, than about the fact that she suffered absolutely ZERO damage for her cheating and hurting MC. YOU NEED TO SORT OUT YOUR PRIORITIES people!

/

This was pretty well written, and the MC wasn't a complete wuss, so 3.5 stars. Would have been 4 if he didn't seriously consider staying married to her until he realized 100% certainty she would cheat on him again guaranteed. Would have been 5 if she was punished in a meaningful way (and no, divorcing him and marrying another walking money-and-emotions-ATM wasn't "punishment").

And right up to this very minute Tilly still thinks she did nothing wrong, aided in her delusion by her new guy Bob. Who is just begging to be fucked cuz he already told her in no uncertain terms that a lil recreational sex wouldn't make him let her go. Geez no thanks.

Tilly thought she had everything in their relation under control, even Aaron... she felt she could master any problem and that an affair or two would either never be known or if it became known she could handle the fallout by articulately gaslighting Aaron into submission... not only was what she did distrustful but also, betrayal and disrespectful... and, since she did not see any of that she could never be trusted again... Aaron made the right choice... good story with the right conclusion... 5-stars

The biggest plot hole is the woman not knowing the customs of the planet she lives on. Since we had her point of view, we know she was honestly baffled at her husband taking umbrage at her infidelity. She's either an alien or has a mental problem.

I thought it was a well told story. It strikes me as sad that such an intelligent woman failed to see having sex with other men if her husband wasn’t around and she felt like it was fine. Still, that was the whole point of the story. Thanks for sharing it with us.

I thought they belonged together and they should have been able to get past it. Liz was an idiot for that “meaningless sex and she learned her lesson. She wanted Aron back and he was ridiculous in his obstinacy. They both settled for second place.

Just a thought. What if, in the course of going to the therapist, Aaron had pulled out a set of papers and said, “Tiff, I believe you, the sex was nothing and the most important thing is that we stay together. I hope you have seen, however, that your extramarital fuckfests do mean something to me and while I will forgive everything that I know about and everything that has probably occurred under my nose that I never knew about, I need to go on the record that if you cheat on me again — whether it’s an “affair” or a 5-minute hookup in a bathroom stall, it’s over between us. Here is a “post nup” agreement for us to sign. Briefly, if either one of us has sex with anyone else, divorce is immediate, according to the terms we agree to here. The innocent party gets 80% of all assets and sole custody of the children; the offending spouse gets 20% and reasonable supervised visitation. I’ve already signed…the lines for you to sign or initial are all flagged for you. Here’s a pen….”

Something tells me she would not sign!

Excellent story. Tiff never did get it. When asked “why” she could only provide the “how.” For a brutally honest person, she could never be honest about the “why.”

Tiff: “Why? Because I wanted to and because I could.”

Ending made sense but I wish there was some kind of payback so that Tiff could understand her husband and why he couldn’t just go along and forgive and forget her actions. At the end, the scales still don’t seem balanced.

It was Christopher Walken, not Wilhelm DeFoe…I get those 2 mixed up all the time too!

Come on, how realistic is it for someone to be that removed from reality that it didn't mean anything, it was just sex and had absolutely no clue what she did was wrong?

Dafoe was not in Pulp Fiction. It’s so pleasant to read something from a true writer on this site. The LW section has become a dung heap. But then, every now and then, we get something like this. 5*

Very nice emotional writing..It's these style interractions that make me glad I'm not part of

the younger generations of people who grew up without sexual morals. Tilly sounds like a

95% perfect woman, but the remaining 5% is toxic enough to spoil the rest. She spoke of

fidelity in her earlier relationship with Aaron, but never connected that pledge to sex.

Also - the ending felt a bit empty...Maybe Aaron could have shown a bit of payback revenge

and let Tilly to 'discover' Aaron and Dee fooling around somehow, or maybe hire a hooker to

seduce Bob in front of Tilly (Feb sucks style?) so she the pain of fidelity lost first hand..A guy

that emotionally crushed can't just walk away without some sort of retribution....

Not sure what version of Pulp Fiction you saw, but Willem Dafoe was not in it

Always amazes when someone in a relationship says “it doesn’t matter” about something that jeopardizes that relationship

If it doesn’t matter, then the relationship doesn’t matter to the same degree.

Outstanding story. Excellent character development. It breaks my heart that love couldn't allow these two to find a point where compromise could allow forgiveness to walk through the door. Tilly should have offered post nup, we will take the family on business trips and stay together, I will retake my vows from Air's perspective and value system.

If only Tilly could see that Air needed to be considered. That making unilateral decisions when you are a sexual pair is a formula for poisoning your relationship.

Boy howdy I enjoyed this story, sad though it may be. Thank you for bringing me along for the ride.

All the best,

Dave