My Wife Dates A Senator

"Wow, Mom, Dad made us a big breakfast both days this weekend," crowed Elise. "Maybe you should go out more often on Friday nights."

Hess looked at the three of us, broke into tears and ran back into the bedroom. The children looked shocked.

"Did I say something wrong?" Elise asked in the sincere innocence of a seven-year-old.

"No, baby. I think Mommy was just sad that she missed the waffles," I said gently.

Later in the day, I was sitting in my La-Z-Boy watching my Chicago Cubs beat the St. Louis Cardinals when I heard the bedroom door fly open with such force that the door knob crashed into the wall behind it. Not five seconds later an agitated Hester was standing in front of me wailing unintelligible words and gesticulating wildly.

"Grr... brbrbr! How could you? Sus... sus... ents... slut!" or something like that came out of her mouth along with several strings of spittle. It was disgusting.

"Slow down, babe! I can't understand a word you're saying, and you're drooling and spitting all over yourself," I said.

"Aarrgghh!" she screamed as tears joined the mix of stuff on her face and blouse. "How could you tell my parents about my date? They now think I'm the biggest slut this side of the Kardashians!"

"What's a Kardashian, Mommy?" Elise asked as she and Nate came running into the room when they heard the commotion.

I raised my eyebrows at my wife and stared into her wild eyes. She made a very concerted effort to get a grip on herself before telling the kids to go play in their bedrooms.

She stood in front of my recliner while the children left.

"Start talking, mister!" she hissed when she heard their bedroom doors close.

"I didn't see any need to hide something like that from your parents since you were just accompanying a United States senator to a fund-raiser, as you so eloquently put it," I said. "It's not my fault if their assessment of the situation happens to be the same as mine.

"By the way, my parents pretty much had the same thoughts, and you might want to duck the next time my mom gets close to you."

"No. No. No. It was just a..." Hess started but quickly stopped.

"Wonderful experience?" I quickly finished for her.

If looks could kill, I would have been nothing but a grease spot in my chair. I didn't really care at that point. I looked at her and motioned for her to move over a few inches so I could see the TV.

"Grrr," she growled before storming out of the room.

I continued to sleep in the guest room for the next two weeks. When the children made note of it, I told them that I had a cold and didn't want their mother to catch it. I was pretty sure Elise knew I was lying, but she was smart enough to keep her thoughts to herself. Goddamn smart seven-year-old.

I didn't say anything, but just showed up in our marital bed one night. I crawled in about an hour after Hess had gone upstairs, and spooned up against her like I always did when facing that direction. She kind of moaned in her sleep when I first moved up against her, then settled back into me another inch or so.

When the alarm went off the next morning, she was spooned up against me.

"Mmm... this feels nice," she purred. "It's about time you came to your senses."

She reached around for my dick. I stopped her by gently placing my hand on her forearm and moving her arm back. I turned around so we were face to face in the bed. Some things are best done when you can look a person directly in the eyes.

"You'll need to get tested and show me results before I'll sleep with you again, Hess," I said gently. "You might be willing to trust Sen. Dickhead, but I'm not."

Her eyes teared up. She looked like she wanted to say something but thought better of it. Instead, she just nodded. That told me she and the senator didn't use condoms. This just keeps getting better.

My game plan was to stick around until the children graduated from high school. That meant another 14 years until Nate left for college. I could do that because I loved them. I wasn't going to go without sex for 14 years, however, especially when I had a beautiful woman living under the same roof as me. I knew that didn't say a lot for me, but at this point I really didn't care. The love I had for this woman took a huge hit two weeks ago, and continued to ebb with every moment of every day.

I watched as she got out of bed with the saddest look on her face. Until recently, that look would practically have destroyed me, and I would have done almost anything to make whatever made her sad disappear. Now, the pain in my heart wouldn't let me reach out for her.

Who had this woman become? The woman I married nine years ago and been together with for the past 11 years knew without a doubt that I would never agree to a date with another man, not even considering her having sex with someone else.

Hester and I met our senior year in college. We were dating exclusively three months later, and were married two years later. She was an actuary at a national insurance company, one of those faceless people who sits in a cubicle and figures insurance rates. I always thought of her as analytical and honest, if lacking a bit in spontaneity and humor. Those two qualities were my part of the equation, along with my being a bit disorganized and fun-loving. I thought we fit together well, each complementing the other, and would someday celebrate 50 years of marriage. I didn't foresee Sen. Tomas Norberto walking into our lives.

About 10 days after I returned to our bed, Hester handed me an envelope when I walked in the door after work. It was her clean bill of health.

"I hope you're happy, asshole," she whispered harshly to me. "You have no idea how embarrassing that was. I may never be able to look Dr. Sanjay in the eyes again."

"Not on me, babe," I said blankly. "Keep your legs closed with people who aren't your husband and you don't have to be embarrassed."

She growled breathily but didn't have a comeback. She started to move on, but I wasn't quite finished.

"How many times has Sen. Dickhead been in contact with you since the date?" I asked.

"We haven't been in touch..." she started to say before I stuck my hand out and she stopped talking.

She knew what I wanted. She grimaced before reaching into her pocket and handing me her phone. I quickly located what I assumed was his number, and found several texts and two phone calls associated with it. It didn't appear that they had gotten together again, although not for lack of trying on his part. While it didn't appear from the texts that Hess was encouraging him, it also didn't appear that she was discouraging him either.

"Son of a bitch!" I yelled. "We're on thin ice here, Hess. If I find out that you two meet again, our kids are practically going to be orphans, because I'm going to be in jail after I kill the two of you. Understand?"

I handed her phone back. She took it glumly and crammed it back into her pocket before heading off to the kitchen.

I knew nothing was going to happen that night, but the next night in bed Hess was all over me. I had barely stripped off my briefs before Hess had my dick stuffed in her mouth. Hey, I'm human, and the warm, wet feeling of her mouth had me rock hard in seconds. She licked me like an ice cream cone before starting to bob her head back and forth. I exploded in her mouth in minutes, my hands twisted in her red locks, and she smiled as she looked me directly in the eyes and swallowed my whole load.

Since it had been awhile since we last had sex, my big brain was taking a back seat to my little brain. After she finished sucking me, I went down on her like a starving man who hadn't eaten in weeks. A half-dozen orgasms later, I crawled up her body and sank my revived hard-on all the way into her hot, wet pussy in one stroke. I pumped her as hard and fast as I ever had, hearing her scream through two hard orgasms. It was definitely not lovemaking, just good old hard fucking.

"Oh, Reg... God, I needed that. You were fantastic!"

I smiled but didn't say anything in response. I was very aware that Hess was trying to get back in my good graces by fucking me to death. She was very good at it. Now Sen. Dickhead was on the small list of those who knew that.

Considering Hess's grand arrival home several weeks ago, I had to wonder what the neighborhood gossip was. Nobody had directly approached me, but I could see the pitying looks from some of the other guys, and the barely hidden smirks from some of the women. I didn't have to wonder too long, though, because Elise came up to me one night when I was sitting out on the back porch reflecting and Hess was watching TV in the family room.

"Dad, what's a slut club, and how did Mommy get to be a member?" she asked quietly.

Shit! My ego taking a beating wasn't near as bad to me as blowback reaching my children. I know I had to close my wide-open mouth before I answered.

"Where did you hear that talk, sweetie?" I asked, trying to sound non-committal so I wouldn't scare her off.

"The girls said that their moms have been talking and laughing about Mommy being a member of a slut club, and it doesn't seem like it's a good thing. Is everybody in the family a member of this club, Dad?"

I'd like to think I'm a pretty good poker player. I had to use every ounce of my ability to keep my poker face blank as I faced my daughter.

"Mommy made a mistake recently, El. It's a mommy-daddy mistake, nothing for you to worry about. The other mommies shouldn't have been talking about it, and shouldn't be talking about that club. I want you to walk away when the other girls start talking about that club. It's our problem, baby, not yours. I'm sorry the other girls were mean to you."

I crushed her gently with a hug. I hoped she couldn't see the tears in my eyes. This would be a memory I would have until my last day on earth.

Slowly, very slowly, life seemed to normalize in our house, at least according to me. It was a new normal, however, because whether Hess accepted it or not, we were never going to be as we were before her date. I could never completely trust her again, and I could never forgive nor forget the incredible disrespect she showed me... and our family. Love... well to quote the Tina Turner song, "What's love got to do with it?"

Six months later, Hester finally figured it out, or at least finally had the guts to say something. We had just finished a wild session of fucking and sucking, initiated by her as always since the date, and as usual, I had rolled onto my side away from her to go to sleep. I heard the sniffling before she spoke.

"Reg... Reggie, can we talk?" she asked timidly.

"Yeah," I sighed.

"Can you turn around?" she asked with more than a hint of annoyance in her voice.

I sighed, trying to sound as annoyed as her. I then turned to face her, looking directly into her eyes. She held my gaze.

"Do you realize we haven't made love since..."

"Say it, Hess. Say it," I demanded. "You had the guts to do it. Have the guts to own it."

"We haven't made love since... my date. I've noticed. You bang the shit out of me, roll away and go to sleep. You make sure I get mine, but it's just physical. Hell, you haven't snuggled me since then. I miss that... intimacy."

"You can't even say the words, babe," I snarked. "Your date... hah! You fucked the guy. Admit it. I'm not an idiot. You go out on a date with another man and don't return until the middle of the next day. Do you think I'm a fucking gargoyle?"

"You make it sound... cheap and tawdry," she wailed at me. "Yeah, we fucked Saturday night, and it was great, but we made love on Sunday morning, and... he was tender and gentle, a lot like you, in fact. It was an experience I will never forget..."

"And that's why we no longer make love, Hess!" I cried. "Don't you see it? You gave something to him you promised was only mine. And you enjoyed the whole experience. It was unforgettable, you just said."

"Oh, come on, Reg. It was just one night... two days... out of all the thousands of days we will be married. That's nothing, mathematically. We can get past this, Reg, if you really want to try," she said.

"Thanks for the math lesson, Hess, but I've never looked at our marriage like a pop quiz on percentages. Would you be so flip if I had slept with Mary Jo Young?"

Mary Jo Young was a big-boobed blonde divorcee who lived down the block. Virtually every other woman on our street watched her like a hawk when she had any kind of conversation with their husbands.

"Wait. You want to have sex with Mary Jo? No, that's not happening. You can't do that," she wailed.

"Are you listening to yourself, Hess? I didn't say I wanted to have sex with Mary Jo. You did. I asked you if you would be so forgiving if I had had sex with her," I said.

She looked confused until her brain caught up with her ears. Then she looked pissed.

"I can see your answer. You don't have to verbalize," I said smugly.

She stopped looking directly at me.

"Do you know that the other little girls in the neighborhood were picking on Elise a few months ago because their mothers called you a slut? Yeah. That was a fun discussion... not," I said.

Her face had morphed from anger to shock as I said the last bit.

"Elise never came to me... ohh," she exclaimed as she thought it through. "I'm so sorry."

"Not sorry enough, babe. You described the date as unforgettable. At least you were accurate there. It was unforgettable... to me as well as you. I will never be able to forget your betrayal. Never," I said.

With that, I turned my back to her and went to sleep. I have no idea if she got any.

I've got to give Hester credit. She really put in an effort to be a perfect mom the next few months. I was usually the caretaker parent when it came to the kids' activities, but suddenly Hess was doing her share of chauffeuring kids to sports and music and being the supportive fan parent. I had to wonder if she had now realized that the best way to keep our family together was to focus on us, instead of focusing on her selfish desires. What a concept.

The kids seemed to really like the extra attention they were receiving, but once again my daughter showed me how exceptional she was in her power of observation. She was wise beyond her now eight years of life.

"Mom's really trying hard, Daddy," she said to me one day. "I hope she's apologized good for whatever she did wrong."

I tried to give her a sincere smile knowing how observant she was.

To the outside world, there was nothing wrong in the Wilkerson household. I worked very hard to keep up appearances. For her part, I think Hester would have walked through fire to not only keep up appearances but also get back in my best graces. We were two people living in the same house with benefits, although I know she desperately wanted a return to complete normalcy. For some reason, she was sure that I would give in to her.

There were still vestiges of my love for her in there somewhere. I just couldn't turn off nine years of her being the most important thing in my life.

She also made it harder for herself by keeping in contact with Sen. Dickhead. Since I had taken her phone and looked at her phone calls and text messages soon after her date, she made it a point to keep those cleared, but she didn't have a clue as to how easy it was to clone somebody's phone to have access to all their messages. It seems he kept in touch on a regular basis, while she at least seemed to be trying to keep him at arm's length, at least so far.

"Can we do another date sometime in the near future? I'll be in town," he texted not quite a month ago.

"Husband still being a dick about the last time. I don't dare take the chance," she texted him back.

Needless to say, I was unimpressed.

A month later, we celebrated our 10^th anniversary with a family outing to Chuck E. Cheese. The kids had a great time; Hester not so much. She waited until the kids were playing some games before she expressed her disappointment with me.

"We've always celebrated our anniversaries just the two of us with a special night. You've changed the rules... because you're still being a vindictive bastard. When did you become such a small, petty man?" she commented.

"Once again, the answer to that question is the same as many of the other questions... the day of your date. You did this... to me... to us... and to you," I said.

"Can't you just get over this?" she pleaded.

"How often do you two correspond?" I asked pointedly.

She had the temerity to smirk. She then reached into her pocket, pulled out her phone and handed it to me. I tossed it high in the air and caught it when it came down.

"I know you're a slut, but I also know you're not stupid. I'd bet money that there's not a trace of a correspondence between you two on that phone; since I took it the first time. But there are transcripts of texts and phone calls that were on that phone. I know you didn't initiate, but I've never heard you flat out tell the guy, 'no.' Why is that?"

She blushed and looked away.

"Yeah, I knew it was a rhetorical question," I mumbled.

My job and my kids were what kept me sane during the time period, although several of my co-workers noted that I looked like I needed a good night's sleep... or six. I was pretty sure I was working on an ulcer, I was drinking more and yes, I was sleeping less. There were some nights I laid in bed for hours, staring at my wife and wondering what had happened. She kept insisting she loved me. She kept telling me that what she did was outside of us. She "deserved" her night out with Sen. Dickhead, and she wasn't sorry for her experience, although she was sorry that she hurt me.

I kept waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Surprisingly, one of the most helpful people for me during this time was my mother-in-law. She repeatedly apologized to me for Hester's behavior.

"We're sorry, Reggie. Her father and I didn't raise her to be a selfish... bitch. But I have to tell you, I really hope you can find some way to get past this. I know you're doing it for the kids," she said one time when she called to check on me.

I walked into the kitchen and reached for another cooler of beer to take outside. We were hosting one of the summer get-togethers that we had once a month on our block.

We had two grills going outside and there were hot and cold running food, fruits, desserts and all kinds of alcoholic and non-alcoholic refreshments. The day was perfect: sunny, 80 degrees and almost windless. The get-together had been going on for a couple of hours, and would probably go on another five or six. These were always great fun events for both the children and the adults.

I heard feminine voices coming from our home office. The office was off-limits to non-family, so I was about to shepherd whomever into the family room or living room. While most of the activities were outdoors, occasionally somebody would come into the house to soak up some air conditioning or talk quietly. Not a problem, except in that room.

"Yeah, sometimes when Reggie's really putting it to me I think of him. He's big, strong and takes what he wants. Sometimes I just can't help drifting back to that night. That's a great memory I'll always have."

I was about to walk into the room when Hester made her statement to whomever she was with. I stopped dead in my tracks; actually my knees wobbled and I almost fell down. Fuck! How many people know that I'm a cuck?

I heard giggling. Sounded like there were three of them in the room. I didn't hear whatever else was said because I was too busy trying not to throw up right there. I was proud of myself for making it into the bathroom before losing my lunch, my breakfast, dinner the night before...

When I finally cleaned up, I brought the cooler of beer outside and cracked two open, bringing them to the two guys manning the grills at the moment.