Just Too Happily Married

He interrupted, "Ryan I know. I have your comments. You've been quite, how shall I say, colorful in your descriptions. Your feelings, you said it yourself, your emotions ran wild. Your son said he thought you threatened a neighbor, an old friend. Ryan you understand you could have been arrested?"

I slumped, "OK, I over did it a little, but wouldn't you?"

He sat back, "I don't know Ryan. I honestly don't know. But I do know this; your wife is entitled to something here. Have you let her tell you anything yet? Did she ever get in a word, either that evening or at any time since?"

I felt overwhelmed, devastated, "No, I thought..."

"Ryan; eighteen years, two children, twenty years of devotion, and not even a word?"

I was cornered, "No I guess. I mean yes, I guess..."

He smiled, "So you'll let her tell her story. I don't think it will do any good, but who knows. You might at the very least get some closure?"

I started thinking, 'My father. I'm talking to my father.' I responded, "I suppose it couldn't hurt." I added, "It won't change anything."

The old judge folded his hands, "OK, let's look at the financial piece."

'Uh oh,' I thought, 'this is where I get drawn and quartered.' "Yes," I said.

He looked at some paperwork in his lap, "Your wife's income rivalled yours until her 'position shift'. And yes we know why she lost her supervisory job. The why doesn't matter, but she makes much less now. I've seen her knew habitation; it's a lot different from the house you and she have been buying. You still live there I believe."

"Yes sir I do," I replied. My mind was running away on me, 'I was going to lose my house. This will get back to my work. I'll be humiliated.'

The judge started to lecture me, "Not to punish you, but if your wife continues where she is she'll need your help. It will be your responsibility to set something up for her.

I see you dropped her from your health insurance. Hers is higher and the coverage is less. There are other expenses too. You cut her out of your car insurance. Companies will find out; they'll try to put her on an 'assigned risk policy.' You dropped her from your credit cards. You may have ruined her credit score. The credit card companies could have a field day with her. You see what you've done?

Ryan she's still technically your wife. She's the mother of your children. You've done things here. You've rushed into things that will hurt you, her, and your children.

He continued, "Son I know you're hurting. People where you work will talk; you'll be labelled a cuckold. The violence the night you evicted her will get back too; you could be branded a batterer. If she turns her lawyer loose...I know him, he'll be merciless."

He wouldn't let it go, "Think of her too. You loved her once, for twenty years you loved her. She's been demoted. She's a beautiful woman. You know how women are; she'll be humiliated every day she goes in. They'll call her a whore, a Jezebel. What of your children? Her disgrace and her adultery will harm them, but your vengeance will too. Every value the two of you have tried to teach will be questioned. They're hurting Ryan, and you're both to blame.

Now about the money; I'm afraid you'll have to help with some of it, maybe until the year is up."

I asked, "How much?"

He handed me a paper with some figures on it.

I stared at the paperwork in disbelief. "I can't do this. I'll have to sell the house. Judge it's the only home Elaine's ever known. I don't think Derek remembers...No sir I can't do this."

He took back the paper, "There's another way."

Desperate, I asked, "What's that?"

"You have a spare room in your house. Elaine says it's a small office."

I started shaking my head no.

He kept talking, "Elaine offered to give up her room for your estranged wife. The two of you could still be officially separated as long as you agree to avoid any intimate contact."

I kept shaking my head back and forth.

He kept going, "I could order that you be moved out till Elaine turns eighteen. Ryan the mother always gets first priority when it comes to children. I won't do that to you. Barbara needn't stay with you the whole year; just long enough to get her finances in order. That could take a few months, maybe just a few weeks."

I sensed the imminent axe, "I don't..."

"Mr. Greene they're your children, your future. You can't tell me you couldn't be at least civil to your wife for a few weeks. We'll be in counseling. Who knows? I'm not suggesting reconciliation, but you and your estranged wife will be around one another for as long as you live. Your children are entitled to something out of this don't you think?"

I slapped my hands on my knees, "I need to use the bathroom."

Judge Landis pointed to a nearby door. I excused myself. I went to the bathroom and looked in the mirror. How could she look so good, and me so bad? Why am I making all the sacrifices when she was the one who ruined everything? It's not my fault! It's not fair! But I knew I was beaten.

I went back to where Judge Landis was waiting, "I'm not promising anything, but I guess if she stayed out of the way..."

He neither smiled nor frowned, "I'll be talking with Barbara. Maybe then we can all three get together again," he stood up and held out his hand, "Ryan, these things happen; you'd be surprised sometimes they work out. I'm not suggesting a return to something that's clearly been irretrievably lost, but some kind of amity isn't totally beyond the realm of possibility. One day your children may marry. There may be grandchildren. Someday you and Barbara will have to at least pretend. You may even be friends again."

I wanted to cry, just cry, but I knew he was right, not right about being friends though.

~~v~~

I had no idea where things were headed. I hoped Barbara would refuse to move back, but I wanted to keep the house. Even if I only held it for another couple years, just long enough to get Elaine out of high school and into college. I needed that house! All that looked less promising as it was; Elaine's grades had already collapsed.

Late Thursday, a week after Thanksgiving I got a call from Judge Landis's office. Barbara wanted to move back, but she'd take the small office room. Elaine could keep her room. We set the date for her move for that Sunday.

Sunday came. I hired some movers, and within four hours Barbara was back where it all started. The kids were jubilant. Barbara seemed wary. Me, I was miserable. I left. I stayed away all day. I ate out, and didn't get back until it was time for bed.

While I was gone Barbara and Elaine cleaned the whole house from top to bottom. Derek got Barbara's car and washed it. He stopped by the station we usually used, it was closed, but he told me he left a note; he wanted them to look it over. Derek said the thing, an old Chevy Cavalier, was in petty bad shape. Elaine and Derek worked out a system where they'd split their school driving so their mother could use one their cars to go to work.

Our living arrangements brought changes I hadn't foreseen. Except for Barbara's small room I still had free run of the house, but everything else was different.

Barbara had all her clothes so Derek gave up all his closet space and moved his stuff downstairs. We had a simple cellar bathroom; a toilet, small sink, and shower. Derek started doing all his cleaning there.

There were no bath facilities in the old office, but Elaine's room did have a full bathroom. Barbara and Elaine shared that. I still had the master bedroom, our old king-sized bed, a full bathroom with a shower and Jacuzzi. The master bedroom had a huge double closet. Before the break up Barb's clothes took up most of the space. I offered to share, but no one took me up so I had an enormous closet that was mostly empty while everywhere else things were piled up.

Downstairs was set up so I got the living room, the dining room, the kitchen, and the laundry room whenever I wanted. Barbara and the kids said they'd only use the kitchen when I was at work or in bed. They told me if I wanted to use the kitchen they'd immediately vacate. I got the living room and the TV whenever I wanted. Elaine had a TV so they decided they'd do all their watching in there. I could go in if I had to, but they'd stay out of my way everywhere else.

I had the whole house almost to myself. That first week when I went into a room they'd all just disappear. Barbara literally jumped to get out of my way.

Sometimes I felt like she was hiding from me. Once I went to the kitchen to get a soda. I heard her and found her standing in the back of our walk in pantry.

I stepped to the door and asked her, "Why are you hiding in here?"

She scooted out with a sheepish, "I'm sorry."

Damn it! She acted like she was afraid of me. Sure I hated her. I hated what she'd done. She'd broken my heart and ruined everything, but I would've never hit her! I think it was deliberate; Barb was playing the martyr. It just wasn't right!

By the end of the first week I was miserable. I had the house, but felt like an outcast. Wherever I went they left, if I was someplace they stayed away.

I saw a movie once where a guy had died and came as a ghost. He saw everyone. He'd try to talk to them, but they acted like he wasn't there. That was the way I felt. If things didn't change I knew I'd be leaving. I didn't want to do that. I had as much right as anybody to be in my own home, but they were deliberately ostracizing me.

~~v~~

Time marched on, and I felt an increasing sense of alienation. It wasn't right. It wasn't fair. I was the father. I'd done everything a dad was supposed to do. I'd been the primary bread winner. I'd set the disciplinary standard. Barbara had been the pal. I taught them how to ride their bikes, how to ice skate, how to drive. In wintertime I was the one who shoveled the walk. All Barb ever did was make brownies and cocoa.

I remembered the cocoa and brownies because of something that happened. I came in the kitchen one night and they were sitting at the table with, yeah brownies and some cocoa Barb had just made. Before I went in I heard them laughing and talking; it sounded like it did from when before. I came in, and they got up and left. Elaine wrapped up the brownies and stuffed them in the refrigerator. The three of them silently just took their cups of cocoa and went upstairs. They left me without saying a word; I just stood there alone in the kitchen. Elaine or Derek could have offered...

Now that we were estranged; separated but in the same dwelling I felt like I had to beg for approval from the people who should be seeking mine. My children avoided and ignored me and it hurt.

~~v~~

That day of days finally came.

Barb, the judge, and I had met two times; three more were planned. I repeatedly listened to Barbara apologize. I heard her tell me and the judge time after time, over and over, how she'd made a mistake, how regrettable her actions were, and how if she'd had it to do over again she wouldn't. I was tired of hearing her tell me how she wished she hadn't done what she had. I was sick of her regret. I regretted it too.

She traded on the judges and my emotions with her constant crying. Over and over I was told to be patient. It was tiresome.

The sessions were supposed to be confidential, but someone was talking and it wasn't me. My kids had taken sides. OK, I told them they could do what they wanted, but I knew Barbara was telling them 'her side' of our meetings. I wasn't going to enter into that. Worse, I have two sisters. I know they'd sided with Barbara. They knew in detail my anger the evening I threw Barb out, but their understanding of what she'd done to me and our family was skewed. I was being 'ganged' up on.

I knew what the judge wanted; he wanted reconciliation. I thought it was a possibility; a very far off, remote, distant, way forever away possibility, like in some other lifetime.

Somehow I had allowed them to persuade me to put reconciliation back on the table, but I wanted answers. Why had she run around like she had? Had I done something wrong? Had I failed? Had I been indifferent to her wants and desires? Was I a bad lover? Had I been insensitive? I just didn't know. If I had failed what was it that she saw in that 'boy' she didn't see in me? Why had she been so willing to throw everything we had, everything we'd built away?

Sometimes I felt like Barbara was being coached by the judge. I mean it was all too pat. I was close to the edge. I didn't see any purpose to the counseling sessions. Back at home I felt like I was being driven away. At work all I got was piteous looks. In my spare time I started scouting around for an apartment. I mean what was the use?

Then one morning it happened; it was our third of five scheduled counseling session. The flood gates just burst open, and I got my answers.

I was so terribly distraught. I'd laid it out for like the umpteenth time. I said, "No more bull shit. Barb tell me. Get it off your chest. Why him? What was it?"

I was totally surprised. She finally decided to open up. I watched the judge try to stop her. He said, "Barbara don't jump into this. Ryan's not ready."

Barb said, "I can't hold it in any longer. He's got to hear."

I watched the judge; he just started to shake his head.

Barb opened up.

"Ryan," she said, "Matt was different. He was young. He was exciting. He was unpredictable. Once instead of just going to the bed he threw me on it. He lifted me up and threw me on the bed. It was so terribly exciting!"

Once she got going it was like a tsunami, "We did it in the shower at his apartment. You remember I told you I went on a seminar in August. I lied. It was a phony seminar; we slipped away and rented a cottage. While we were there one time he leaned me over the kitchen table and we did it doggy fashion. I mean every time we were together it was like an adventure."

She really pressed in the knife. She was good too, "He made me feel young and sexy. He kept telling me how beautiful I was. He loved my hair. He snuggled me, and hugged me, and he kept touching me. He said I was irresistible. He wasn't better. I mean not physically, not that way, but he was so daring, so 'devil may care'. He held my hand wherever we went. He made me feel alive! Once he just took cream and rubbed it over my whole body."

I couldn't resist, "Did he see where they took out your appendix. You remember that. I do. I guess your hero was maybe six then."

She wasn't listening; she kept going, "Oh I love you Ryan, but you'd become so uninteresting so boring."

I thought, 'Boring? Well I guess so. After twenty years things get pretty predictable.'

She was killing me, "You're so normal so dependable. You took care of me, you took care of things, but everything was always the same. I always knew when you wanted a big romantic evening because you always, I mean always showed up with flowers, or perfume, or candy. Sometimes I felt like the gifts were a down payment for sex. Every Valentine's Day was the same. You were so predictable.

Oh Ryan, I loved that in you, but Matt was so wild and free and uninhibited. You were the stable one. You protected me. I felt safe; you managed the budget. You looked after the cars. You saw to the house. Everything was so orderly. Oh I loved all that in you, but Matt was so unrestrained. He didn't undress me; he tore my clothes off."

Then she delivered the coup de grace. She slit my throat. She opened my heart and I watched twenty years of love spill out on the floor, "Ryan," she said, "you were easy. You were easy to please, easy to fool. You believed everything I said. I could have told you anything and you would have believed me. Oh God Ryan, right up to the end, right up to the moment when you actually saw and read my texts you believed it was Matt who was chasing me. For you to even consider that I would cheat on you; it just wasn't in you. For you I could do no wrong. You were so easy to fool. I led you on. I lied. I made up stories and you didn't even suspect, not once. I could get away with anything I wanted."

Then, like though I was already dead, she had to finish it one more time, "And when you found out, when you realized it was me who chased Matt you changed, you changed right in front of me. I honestly thought you'd be able to handle it. I was sure you'd manage it. I thought if I got caught you'd sit down with your computer or calculator or a piece of paper or something. You'd make a list. You'd work it out. You'd solve the problem. You were so methodical. I knew you. I knew what you would do, or I thought I did."

"But you didn't. You didn't do what I expected. The Ryan I'd known for twenty years went berserk. I never unexpected it. I never saw it coming. You went wild. You terrified me. You became a different person. You suddenly became dangerous; not exciting dangerous like Matt, but terrifyingly dangerous. I couldn't trust you anymore."

I felt like she'd knocked me down, beaten me to a pulp, and to finish me off she'd scraped my face across a concrete sidewalk. I was flattened, I had no comeback. I managed, "You couldn't trust me? I was...methodical? I'd handle your adultery like it was some equation? Was that all I was to you; a mathematical formula, a machine, some kind of computer?"

I realized she never knew me.

At that moment the judge intervened, he said, "I'm sorry I let you go so far Barb. Ryan I'm sorry she said these things."

Then Barb looked at the judge, "I'm sorry too. I just wanted Ryan to know how trustworthy he was, how much I depended on him. How no matter what about Matthew I've always been able to count on Ryan."

That's when the judge finally stepped up for me. He knew what I knew; the damage she'd done was irreparable, "Barbara," he said, "for twenty years Ryan's been there. He's been your rock. He's been there out of love. The flowers, the candy, the perfume they weren't bribes for sex. They were gifts. They were his gifts of love. I've been listening Barb. This is nearly our last session. We've been at it for quite a while. You know what; there's been one thing missing from everything you've said. I haven't heard you say the word love once. Not once have I heard you tell your husband you loved him; not in our sessions anyway, not in front of me."

Barb replied, "But I do love him. I love everything about him."

Judge Landis the counselor disappeared, Allen the man emerged. He finally buried what was left, "Do you really? Have you ever, really?

That was it for me. I stood up and said, "That's it for me. Judge this is over. I know we have two more sessions, and I'll come, but after that...sorry."

Barbara started crying...again.

I went on. I felt dead but a little alive too, "Barb you know what I always wanted to be."

She looked. All I saw was confusion.

I told her, "I wanted to be a cowboy. When I was a kid "Poncho and Lefty" was my favorite song. Then Toby Keith came out with "Should've Been a Cowboy." I was in high school. I even bought a guitar, got pretty good too. I think it's still in the attic someplace. Do you even remember I used to play the guitar? I don't think you do."

I had to have it out, not so much with Barb as with myself, "Barbara I had a friend who left Maryland and went to Australia. I never saw or heard from him again. I wanted to go too. I was only eighteen at the time. I joined the National Guard instead. My dad said, 'Join up. Do the right thing. Serve your country.' I was supposed to go to college. So I went to college. I got a degree in accounting. I met a girl, we got married, we had two kids, we bought a house. I did all the stuff everybody said I was supposed to do."

Barb was crying so hard. I don't think she heard me, but then...I had to go on, "Look at me. I became the regular normal guy everybody wanted. I did all the things expected of me. I played by the rules. I was always the 'good sport'. And Barb, what did you do? You went out and fucked a kid."