NO

God damn. You people are so gullible. Yes, we made up. It is absolutely true that Howard and Cheryl did come and see me in my office last week. Yes, they did apologize again. That is all very much true. I'm an honest man. I seriously am not lying about any of that. I actually did forgive them and welcome them back into my life. I may have neglected a couple of irrelevant facts, though. Coincidences, really.

Cheryl's family has several members that are, well, let's just say not above bending a few minor laws. Several of them are also quite large and have no compulsion against becoming involved in the occasional bar-room brawl. Although I put absolutely no stock in rumors, it has been mentioned on more than a few occasions that four or five of them may possibly be enforcers for one of the local shadier groups of 'businessmen'. Of course, that's just speculation by gossips who just don't like them.

Even though this is completely irrelevant to this story, a couple of days before Howard and Cheryl came over to visit, there was a story on the news about a personal trainer at one of the local gyms who was mugged shortly after leaving work. He apparently was foolish enough to attempt to fight it out with the five muggers. Along with the criminals taking his wallet, car, and stripping him naked, they proceeded to beat the fuck out of him, leaving him with a broken jaw, shattered nose, a few broken ribs broken arm, dislocated kneecap, and both testicles were ruptured. He will be in the hospital for a couple weeks, at least. The police really should do something about the crime in this town. Unfortunately, there are no suspects, since all the attackers wore dark clothes, gloves, and ski masks. The doctors did state that the blonde hair, blue eyed victim would likely make a full recovery after reconstructive surgery to his face and significant physical therapy. It would be unlikely that he would be capable of engaging in sexual intercourse ever again. He would be finding out over the next couple of months that his car was taken to a chop-shop and sold in pieces, his credit cards had been maxed out, his bank accounts were cleaned out, and the info in his wallet was used to steal his identity and put on the Dark Web. He would be fighting that for years to come.

Oddly, Wanda was rather despondent and mopey for about a week or so after the mugging. My only guess is that she is also worried about the increasing crime rate in the area. I did offer to increase the security for the house for her, but that didn't seem to placate her too much.

Monday morning, I called my lawyer and asked him to finish the paperwork and get it filed. I wanted her served on Friday late afternoon. He tried to talk me into some changes, but I was adamant. On Tuesday, the forms were ready for my review and signature. I met him at his office to finalize everything. He again warned me against my course of action. Thinking about it, I decided to humor him. I gave her the house. Hell, I even threw in the investments. Of course, I stipulated that I would not pay a dime for anything else. If she wanted to keep the house, she could pay the mortgage and utilities for it. Oh, and there hadn't been a dime in the investment accounts for over a month. I had no problem giving her 100% of zero.

What Wanda didn't realize was that I had been moving all my tools and equipment out of the garage. I had also been slowly moving things that I wanted to keep out of the house. Most of that was from my home office. Tools and larger stuff were being stored out on the ranch that Howard and Cheryl owned. Smaller stuff that wasn't really valuable was transferred to a small one-bedroom apartment in a complex owned by an offshore LLC. The owners of the LLC were surprisingly difficult to locate and verify.

Friday morning finally came. I headed off to work as normal. I had Howard help me move my truck to the office a couple days earlier. I dropped off my car, got into my pickup, and drove to the bank. Once at the bank, I cleaned out all the accounts, leaving $100 in checking and savings. I then went to the Safety Deposit box and cleaned that out as well. I drove over to the ranch and put all the cash and contents of the safety deposit box with my other possessions. I didn't want to take the chance of them finding a newly rented box at another bank and seizing it. I also didn't want anyone to trace a wire transfer either. Besides, I would probably need the cash later.

You may be wondering about why I was trusting Howard and Cheryl. It was rather simple. You see, the mortgage on their ranch was being held by a certain offshore LLC with rather murky ownership. Besides, even though we had our issues, he is still family. To us, you DO NOT FUCK WITH FAMILY. The rest of the family takes things like that personally. There was a lot of happiness in the family when Howard and I finally made our peace.

I made my way back to the house. It was late morning by this time. I pulled over a couple blocks away and checked the GPS that I had installed on Wanda's car. Sure enough, she was at the mall as expected. I hurried home and parked in the driveway. I had packed up the rest of my clothes and belongings over the past couple days and set them in the garage. Tossing the few boxes in the truck, I went inside and grabbed the rest of my clothes from the closer and dresser. I didn't even bother packing them up. I just grabbed them by the armload, hangers and all. It only took a couple trips to toss them all inside the cab of the truck. I didn't even bother closing the garage door or even the front door. My cell phone rang as I was leaving the house. It was Wanda. My guess is that her cards didn't work when she tried to check out with her purchases. I took one last look at the GPS signal and saw that it was moving in this direction. I just laughed and tossed my phone onto the table and walked out the door. Minutes later, I was several blocks away.

I arrived at my new apartment and transferred everything from my truck into the appropriate rooms. Three beers later, and everything was put away. I had just sat back in my recliner when my new cell phone rang. There were only a couple people who had this number, and my soon-to-be ex-wife was not one of them.

"Hello." I answered.

"She's been served. You should have the video shortly." The voice said.

"OK. Thank you." I responded before disconnecting.

Sure enough, 15-minutes later I received the video over my email. To say she was shocked would be an understatement. Unfortunately, I only had the video from her actually being served until she dropped to the floor like a sack of rocks. The man who served her checked to make sure that she wasn't actually injured, then turned and left. The video ended at that point. I would have liked to see her reaction once she actually began reading the divorce petition and realized that I had DNA as well as video evidence on her infidelity.

From that point on, things moved with all the speed of a glacier. I got several phone calls. There were a few from my old office. She had called multiple times to try and talk to me. Apparently, she didn't believe them when they told her that I had resigned and hadn't worked there for the last two weeks. Then, she actually showed up in person demanding to see me. That didn't turn out well for her. It took the police being called to escort her off property to get rid of her. Howard called a couple of times. She began harassing him to try to get ahold of me. I think she figured out that him suddenly showing up was just a bit to coincidental with my suddenly divorcing her. Restraining orders for both my former company and Howard were filed before she finally had to leave them alone.

It was two weeks later before my lawyer finally contacted her to find out who her lawyer was. She hadn't gotten one yet. First off, she was quickly running out of money. Really, all she had was the cash in her purse and a total of $200 that I left in the bank accounts. She was starting to lean on her parents for support. I was just hanging out and relaxing. I wasn't going to start on any projects for a while because I was planning on not being available for a while. That, and I didn't want anything laying around that she could take from me.

She finally did get a lawyer. Meetings were scheduled. I declined to attend and simply gave my lawyer his instructions. My position is firm. Not a single penny more. I am led to understand that tempers flared at those meetings. It eventually came to arbitration. Those, I had to attend. They didn't go well.

"Where's all the money, asshole?"

"What money?"

"All OUR money!"

"WE don't have any money. WE are flat broke. In fact, I'm living in the cheapest single bedroom apartment that I could find." Seriously. I was. Just because it was cheap since I happened to know the actual owner of the complex......

"All the investments, the checking, the savings...."

"All gone. I made a REALLY bad investment." Does investing in a cheating wife count? "Lost it all." Well, that was true. I didn't know exactly where all those offshore banks actually kept their cash.

"We're giving her the house with her name as the only one on the title." Offered my lawyer. Sure, he could have been a bit more forceful on that. Instead, he sounded more like someone looking at a tornado ravaged house and commenting that at least rubble hadn't caught on fire.

"IT'S FUCKING MORTGAGED TO THE HILT, AND THERE'S NO FUCKING WAY I CAN POSSIBLY AFFORD THE MONTHLY PAYMENTS!" Wanda screamed. It pretty much went downhill from there.

Child support? - Not my kids, not my problem.

Spousal Maintenance (Alimony for you Philistines out there)? - No job. No income. NO FUCKING WAY!

She's demanding 70% of the liquid assets. - No assets. Look all you want, ain't nothing to be found.

50% of the business! - Good luck with that one.

50% of the retirement. - What part of 'Lost it all' are you having trouble with?

Yeah, arbitration failed spectacularly.

That leads us to our day in court. As mentioned at the beginning, it was in front of the very dishonorable Judge Marie Matthews. She was the most feminist man-hating family court judge in the history of the world. She actually seemed to be even harsher on men whose wives had cheated on them. Of course, if it was the man who cheated, he would usually need to be carried out of the court room after his balls were removed by her gavel. Yeah, I was screwed.

So, y'all are planning on leaving me a bunch of comments for being stupid enough to think that I could successfully convince them that there was no money. You would be wrong. I knew full well that they could simply look at the accounts from a couple of months ago and see how much was in there. I was not the least bit surprised when the judge used those numbers to calculate exactly how far the screws were going to be turned into me. The thing is, they had no way to access it. I needed the time in order to transfer it around through different banks and different accounts. I even went so far as to personally pull all the money out of one bank, then go to a few separate banks and deposit parts of the withdrawal into several other accounts. Of course, those accounts were in several different names.

One of those rather shady businesses that Cheryl's family was involved with was a gag gift shop where you could buy fake ID's 'For Entertainment Purposes Only'. That was even printed on the ID cards. I had one that even said I was Jesus Christ. I loved it when I would pull a prank, the victim would exclaim "Jesus Christ!", then I would p0ull out my phony ID and agree with them. The fakes were really well done, and the only way to really know they were fake was because of the 'Entertainment' statement on the front. They usually cost about $50. For a few more zeros, they would 'accidently leave off the 'entertainment' warning on the front. I then electronically transferred the money into other accounts. Sure, there might be a way to track it down, but it would be extremely expensive and take months -- if not years. By that time, I would be long gone.

So, here I was back in front of the man-hating bitch. It had been 60-days into my 90-day stay as a guest of the county. These short-term sentences were done in the county jail, not State prison.

"So, have you learned your lesson yet?" She sneered.

"You mean the lesson about not marrying a cheating whore? I learned that one long before I was ever in your court."

"I was referring to your attitude in my court." The vein on her forehead was beginning to pop. I didn't think that was too good for her blood pressure.

"Hmmmm. Can't say that I find anything wrong with my attitude while I was being railroaded in front of a bunch of kangaroos." I was seriously beginning to worry about her health. Her blood pressure must peg the meter during her doctor's visits.

"You are aware that I can extend your stay in jail, aren't you?"

"And?"

"If that's the way you intend to be, I'm adding another 30-days. Now, I brought you here today to discuss why you haven't made your first two child support or maintenance payments to your ex-wife. And where is your lawyer?"

"Odd. I was under the mistaken impression that you needed to be really smart to be a judge. Thank you for correcting me on that. Perhaps I can explain it to you so you can understand it. Sorry if it's still over your head, but the lowest I can go is so a fifth grader can comprehend it. Do try to keep up." I really was becoming concerned about her bench catching on fire from the flames she was snorting at that point. I was starting to think that she actually didn't like me. "I am in jail. I have no access to any money. Since I have no access to any money, I am unable to send any money. Since it was your dumb ass that put me there, perhaps you can explain why YOU are the reason that the slut can't get the money that you are trying to steal from me to give to that whore. Now, did you get all that, or do I need to explain it to you slower?"

So, I was escorted back to my cell for another 90-days. 30 from my original sentence, 30 from her first tirade, and another 30 that I managed to catch at the end. To be honest, it really wasn't that bad. Sure, the food sucked, but I still ate it. I had a nice bed to sleep in, and lots of free time to relax. I made good use of the weights and exercise machines. I didn't have many problems in there. First off, it didn't take too long for my courtroom antics to become common knowledge inside the jail. That made me a few friends. Second, did I mention that Cheryl's family has a few connections that could be of help to someone on the inside?

In fact, there was only one problem. It came from one of Wanda's less intelligent cousins. He had the wild idea that he could get arrested for something small, get sent to the jail for a week or so, and use that time to 'teach me a lesson'. First off, literally, the entire jail population knew exactly who he was before he even set foot inside the compound. From there, it didn't take much brain power to figure out what he was up to. He was spotted halfway across the yard. Unfortunately, one of the inmates ran into him as he was trying to catch an 'errant' pass while tossing a football back and forth. I'm sure the elbow to his gut was purely accidental. Once he was able to stand up and brush himself off, he stupidly continued on his quest. After another 20-feet, he got beaned in the side of his head by a basketball. The guy who made the 'bad pass' apologized profusely. The elbow to the chin while he was being helped up was completely accidental. After shaking his head to clear the cobwebs, he again began his trek in my direction. There were a two more incidents before he finally arrived at his destination. Since my back was turned, he thought that a sucker punch would be a good idea. Unfortunately, I was far from clueless. Before he even had time to bring his fist back, I got the signal, spun around, and drove my foot into his crotch as hard as I could. It was a clear 65-yard field goal.

Since his misfortune from all the accidents seemed to finally catch up with him, he was taken to the infirmary. Two days later, he refused to come out to the yard to exercise. He spent as much time as he could in his cell until he was released.

Aaaaannnnddddd, I'm back before the evil queen.

"Are you ready to apologize?"

"For????"

"For your vile outbursts in this courtroom."

"Really don't know what you are talking about."

"Whatever. Perhaps you can at least keep a civil tongue in your head and not extend your stay."

"So, I take it that another judge is taking over then?"

"Boy, you are standing on my last raw nerve."

"Are you telling me that I should start stomping my feet now?" I should probably see if they have a suggestion box around somewhere. I need to suggest that they have EMTs posted in the court room in case she actually has a stroke.

"Again, you have not paid a single child support or maintenance payment yet. You have also failed to pay the mortgage on the house or any of the utilities as I ordered."

"I thought that we went through this last time. I can't pay anything as long as I'm cooling my heels here in jail. Second, since you put me in jail, I can't work and make any money to pay anything. Third, they ain't my kids, so I don't know why I would pay anything for them. Fourth, my ex-wife is a cheating slut, and I don't think I should have to pay for her to whore around on my dime. If she wants to fuck anything that moves, she should get a job and pay for her own sex life. Maybe she can start charging for it and make some money that way. And finally, you gave her half the business. She should have plenty of money from that."

"Your honor?" Wanda's lawyer piped up. "We have been unable to take possession of my client's part of the business. It seems that Mr. Neilson sold his company to an overseas company approximately two months before he filed for divorce. At this time, we haven't even been able to determine who the actual owners are in order to contact them about the court order."

Suddenly, a rather attractive woman stood up and asked to approach. "Your honor, I represent the board of directors for the firm that purchased the business in question. I have a motion here to dismiss the ruling giving Mrs. Nielson any part of a business formerly owned by her ex-husband. It is highly irregular to award one party any ownership of a business that is not party to the court case in question. Since the purchase was completed prior to the divorce being filed, this company has no bearing on this case. Therefore, we reject any claim of ownership in said business by Mrs. Nielson."

"But, what about the money from the sale?" Whined Wanda.

"The transfer of ownership and payments were made overseas. I am not privy to that information, but my understanding is that the money from the purchase has never entered US territory and is therefore not subject to US laws. I'm afraid that you will have to take any claim on that money up with your ex-husband. That may need to take place in whichever country the money is located in."

"What country is that?" My ex-wife's lawyer asked.

"The original transfer of funds was in Belgium, but my understanding is that the money was transferred somewhere else shortly after the sale. I have no idea where it was transferred to." The young woman replied.

"Your honor." My ex's lawyer spoke up again. "My client is desperate right now. The house is going into foreclosure because the mortgage hasn't been paid in three months. The utilities are about to be cut off. My client's parents were able to help a bit when this first began, but it is getting to be too much for them. My client has found a job, but it is waitressing at a local diner. It doesn't pay near enough to maintain the house."