No Way Out

The confrontation came out of the blue, he stood no chance of defending against it. Like a raptor from above with the sun behind both sets of talons ripping into the prey. He lost any altitude, well at six foot three he never really had any.

The talon in this case was an index finger firmly grinding into his sternum.

The hissed, "I no longer love you and want a divorce," then in her normal voice, "no, this is THE divorce you have enough in your bags, wash your clothes at the hotel or send them out I don't care what you do from now on, because you no longer live here!"

His stuttered start of any defence cut off as his now ex-wife, both hands on his chest pushed/shoved him out the door he'd tried to make his way through not even thirty second before. Not unlike the effects of a D12 would have had, he had no way of stopping her surprised attack. The door slamming shut ended any discussion.

"Please, honey! Let me in to discuss what's going on please, how can we resolve anything?"

The door was yanked open, he stumbled back a step, shocked at the banshee now standing level with him, The once more hiss reappeared like an asp dripping venom, "fuck off you limped dick excuse of a man, just fuck the hell off my fucking property, you no longer live here; keep this shit up and you'll be crawling over broken glass to get access to my daughters!"

It may have been the red splotches of anger on her face or the spittle at the corners of her mouth, although the comment of daughters was lost on him right there and then, at a subconscious level he must have registered the threat. Almost falling down the five verandah steps, back tracked to his car loaded the bags in his hands on the back seat, made his way round to the drivers door and departed.

He made the end of the street with out running into or over anything or one, on auto-pilot, turned right and headed into the city. Still in a daze he booked into a hotel, his membership of a large provider meant the lack of booking was easily overcome. Regardless of the home eviction by his wife he still had access to a very large sum of money, all legally earnt and painstakingly saved for a raining day. A day unlike the one he was experiencing; it was for the whole family not just him. Good fortune then that his wife had no interest or idea of their financial affairs.

Safely ensconced in his hotel suite, sank into the comfortable chair at the desk. The laptop magically appeared and he logging into his electronic side of life. Listlessly trying to make head or tail of what had just transpired. As a non-drinker the escape into a mind numbing drunken haze was never an option. He did the only thing he knew would blow the smothering cobwebs of confusion away. Off came the three piece suit and dress shoes, to be replaced with sweat wicking T and shorts next came the running socks and shoes. Dropping the key card at the check-in desk headed off towards the boulevard and harbourside.

Slowly the disjoint of who had suddenly been ambushed and turfed onto the street by a previously loving and caring wife began to morph into a person. What the flaming heck had just occurred? Why had I not fought back, stood my ground and demanded an explanation to her outburst?

My mind drifted back over the last few years running through all the possible red flags. There were no obvious ones. No griping about not enough money, time together, time for and with the kids, no not helping out with raising the kids either, nor showing affection, nor sexual satisfaction or wanting more than was on offer and we were above average in offering ourselves to each other so that was definitely not it.

As all men are want in doing slapping the metaphorical tape measure against my prick, gave that a Tick; blessed with an above average appendage, I kept fit and was healthy, ate healthy, exercised, mentally stable, well read, and learned. So not me physically that I could see. Okay work had me travel, infrequently at that and at random. Never more than two nights away from home, actually thinking about it that was at most twice a year all other contracts were dealt with on a overnighter. No I was not having an affair with anyone or thing, woman or man [that made me laugh, men were not on my friend list, they were competition] no beast made the grade, no activity could replace my wife and two daughters, I lived for them, they were my world.

No even our business got in the way, it was structured in such a way that it never got in the way. The reflection saw me run a few kilometres further than I'd wanted to, I turned and headed back and stopped trying to make sense of the debacle. My focus was now running, lifting the pace and holding it to the corner of the hotel block and did a half hearted cooldown. The shower helped, shaving also helped, it was Saturday so no work as such, I was not at home so no mowing, gardening or maintenance. A light breakfast and my head was back in the game.

Two phone calls told me that the business was indeed in great shape in good hands and making money. The business monies were separate from our private, so all good there. A look at our personal financials online told me everything was where it should be. We did not have negative credit card balances nor was there anything amiss in our automatic deductions, so what the heck was going on? I was to find out sooner or later that was for sure.

The failed attempt to reach out to her and talk, had me call her sister.

"What!" Yelled Helen down the speaker almost bursting my eardrum.

I repeated what had happened, if Helen did not know then what chance did I stand, "hang on I'll call you back after I've spoken to her."

"Thanks Helen."

They must have had a really long talk, Helen only called back on Sunday. I almost missed her call, I'd just stepped out of the shower, following my run.

"Helen, how did it go, did Linda explain what's going on?"

"What not even a hello or hi Eric?"

"Sorry, hello Helen."

"That's better, look you are so deep in the shit ledger I doubt talking on the phone will achieve anything, where are you I'll come over and try lay it all out for you, although that should be the legal boffs doing it not me."

I babbled off the hotel and room number, as an after thought suggested we meet at Giuseppe's a very good café. The coffee was way better than the hotels. Besides Helen like a vino with her lunches, "is Fred coming too?" I asked.

"That idiot? No, this needs to be you and me without the clowns additions to your pain."

Great, if things were that bad...

I'm afraid to report they were way worse than bad...

The upshot was Eric Crabtree, that's me, was totally fucked on the wedded bliss side of his life. Funny thing is while all this was going down, the business was off to new levels of brilliance. A very good thing I had structured it the way I had. To be honest my input was negatable in the way things went. Our staff all did very nicely with end of financial bonuses, so all good all the way round.

By the end of the second week I was out of the hotel and into an serviced apartment, it was a hopeful halfway between work and what used to be home. I had yet to be given access to my daughters. At fourteen for Anne and twelve for Zara it was a difficult time for them, I was hoping Linda was not poisoning the relationship between them and I. Up until the talons in the chest bit we had a really close relationship.

At week four I finally was given the opportunity to see how deep Linda had cut, if I was hurt by her actions before, after the girls had left twenty minutes into a supposed half day, saw me stunned and even more stupefied. There was still no demands for divorce on paper, it remained verbal, the separation was very much entrenched, not just from the wife but now my children. I could only imagine what punch drunk was and what I was feeling had to be way, way worse. Like there was no solid ground under me. My world lost all colour, it became grey, full of shadow.

Helen became a bit of an internal informant for me, feeding me updates for the cost of lunch at Giuseppe's. Hell, I would have taken her to a three star Michelin restaurant to get the information. There was no one else in Linda's life, no dalliance, toyboy or girl come to it, she was not after money at this stage and why would she our finances were the same as ever and she had access to our bank accounts. There was no increase or decrease in spending. Really, I was at a total loss as to what was going on. Ride the storm was all I could do, I had engaged a lawyer, advice given by them, "sit tight, do and say nothing to upset the apple cart."

At six months I'd moved into an apartment block close to work. The girls did not visit nor contact me. Linda did not contact me other than now we had a formal separation. Eight months to go for automatic divorce. I knew what I was up for sixty percent of my earnings that would go to Linda, it included child support. Something I'd have to shell out until they were at least eighteen years old. If Linda remarried I'd get twenty percent off, yippee do dah day! My Mata Hari kept me informed on the war, it did cross my mind she could just be a double agent but really Helen was by this time openly hostile towards her sister, with me that is and honestly the idea of sex simply did nothing for me.

I was still in love with my 'mad' wife, actually still adored her. Certain that she must have had a breakdown or some such thing. Yip, how blind can an individual be? Answer, very! Helen told me with four months to go to my annulment, that she and Fred were toast. The rat had been having it off with her best friend. Her lost out-weighted mine, [almost in my mind,] loss of best friend and husband. For all her comments about him she was really deeply in love with him.

My daughters? I had had no contact with them following the one and only. My hurt was still raw but work now filled a bit of the void. Helen and I were spending more time together in solidarity against spouses who dealt in dishing out emotional pain for their own obvious pleasure, well fuck then said Helen, this ship was not going down with out a fight. But me? I was sunk rock bottom, the shrink was no help and she was jettisoned quick smart, the next one went the same way, he was a fucking goose, honestly trying to slip his how do you feel about that crap. Fuck could he not see the blood dripping from my eyes?

My friendship with my Mata Hari came to an abrupt end when she suggested a revenge fuck! Seriously what next film it and post it on the web? My mumbled declining of said offer, really should have been done a bit more forcefully, we drifted apart slowly thank goodness, Helen took off and fucked anything that moved, I could see she was not getting anything from it and suggested she may want to regroup, reassess, plan and kick butt a different way with out hurting herself. It took a little while but she did.

D-day came, neither of us attended the hearing our lawyers did it all. I received the maximum sixty percent. Still I was well off on my forty. She could not touch the business in any shape or form even though her lawyer tried it on. Win for me, an empty hollow one. Without my family it really had no meaning for me. The house was for them, maybe one day we would sell it. Our bank accounts never changed for some strange reason; payments went in she'd use some of it, and lot remained untouched, the bills were paid as usual, if I wanted to, I could snoop about and see where she was spending but I did not. Then I had always intended to have the business as a golden goose for us all, so they would get it in the end anyway.

I wondered not for the first time why this had all gone down and if I should not take up drinking, the idea of anesthetising myself every night sound like a valid plan. I never did nor did I reach for any alternates. I just ran, sometime too far and paid the price for that.

I moved again to a better apartment block, we, the firms accountant and I worked out the best way to do it was have the business purchases the apartment as a way to use up my bonus payments, as well as dividends. So now I had a great view of the water and a fantastic series of running routes. My bed was devoid of love and affection, besides which one had to be active in looking for love.

Helen drifted back into my life, a little sorry for herself. We must have made a great looking pair, not! I let her stay with me, that was in one of the spare bedrooms. Slowly she got back on her feet and started to rebuild her shattered life.

"I think I should reach out to Linda and try re-establish our sibling love, we use to be good for one another. What do you think?" she asked one night out of the blue.

"Good idea, with out family you don't have much in life, just look at me."

"Must suck not having any brothers or sisters to lean on."

Well, there was no answer to that comment. Come to think of it I did not even have any friends of note. Linda had in a roundabout way slowly cut me off from them very early in our dating and then married life. It really hit home once I was dumped. Not for the first time I wondered if she had planned it from the beginning to the end. No, was the answer surely not. She had never come across as abusive like that.

Anyway, Helen did reach out and surprise, surprise they mended the rift. She, Helen did say to me she made no mention of the fact she stayed in my apartment with me. She did play out the lonely divorcee role very well now and never gave up the offer to me of jumping into the sack with her, as in casual or permanently way. Sisters, well my two in question did not mind sharing in a little too graphic detail the merits of their once upon a time chosen love interest.

After the umpteenth offer from Helen, curiosity got the better of me, "Helen! What is this crazy desire to bed me!" My exasperation magically came across with the correct tone, volume and interest in the continued assault.

"Wellll...you know how Linda and I have always sort of shared..."

"NO WAY..."

"Yes way, anyway in her words, 'between Eric and the next best, light years, he does things to me that has me tingling for hours after,' so you see, I want some of that please."

"Sorry but no Helen. That is well just too um, well... I'm not wired that way; you are too close for me to see you that way."

"What, not even a little kink in you?"

"More than you would know."

"Yeah, she said that as well."

"Fuck."

"Yes please."

"No, Helen, just no, not going to happen."

It was not as if I had not tried, I had been 'out' with a few ladies, everything went grandly until the end of the evening, nothing, absolutely no desire to see if we were compatible in the bedroom. Linda's ghost it appeared, cast a very long shadow. From the waist down, I was rather disappointingly dead.

Following our talk she became the model housemate. Life continued around me. Obviously work was my normalcy and as with most things it bled into my every day private life. I began to regenerate, noticing how beautiful the world was, the greys became a limited pallet of pastel. Ever so slowly the pallet increased in number.

Helen came home one night rolling drunk and fuming, nothing she said made any sense, one long garbled sentence littered with profanities and her sisters name, surprisingly verbs seemed to be in abundance. I poured her into bed, added the glass of water and bucket to the mix just in case. Someone was going to be very ill in the morning, well maybe late afternoon.

The hardest thing for me was at no time had I ever been given a reason why Linda tossed me to the kerb. No accusations or hints, a big fat zero for cause. Helen had dug very cautiously but had never uncovered one iota of cause. Then the way my daughters had suddenly turned away from me, while that cut me to the quick, I was positive they were coerced, or threatened into that stance. It was enough to make me cry all night long when I sunk into self-pity. To defend myself it was easier not to allow myself that luxury.

My new shrink was more to my liking, we worked well together and she had let me move at my own speed. I will apologise to her two predecessors; I was just not ready for them. The water under the bridge made sure there was no going back for Linda and me, it was the real turning point for me, coming to that realisation. For Anne and Zara I would make allowances and hoped like crazy they would eventually reach out. My plan was to let them have their head until Anne turned eighteen; if by then I'd not heard from them I'd be the one reaching out. Helen agreed any sooner would see them shy away.

Helen finally surfaced at midday, feeling very sorry and embarrassed for herself. The tall glass of water emptied in a few gulps, her outstretched arm silently requesting more. Her groans were real and full of hurt, the coffee followed and a piece of dry toast.

"Sorry, Eric was I bad?"

"No, we're good," I said softly.

The silence only broken by the occasional snarl of a motor drifting upward, the sea breeze wafted into the lounge lifting the curtains away from the balcony's triple doors.

"I was fuming after dinner with her, it was all I could do in not blowing my stack. You'd be proud of me, three quarters of a bottle of Merlot and I still managed to still my tongue."

"Surely more than that the condition you were in."

"I may have stopped off at The Fortune on the way home..."

"That would explain it, how was Sally?"

She flapped her hand about in reply, the silence settled again.

That was my cue to change, I like to dress up a little when I headed out to pay my respects to my parents. Their ashes were laid to rest off the Heads. She was looking a whole lot better when I came out of my room.

"Today?"

The nod of my head all that was needed, "can I come with?"

"Sure, I'm more than likely going to be all afternoon, there's a lot I want to talk to them about. Then I'm going to eat out."

"Can you wait half an hour?"

Another nod saw her gingerly race to her room, I did wish she'd close her door. I knew why she did not, the enticing flash of flesh for a normal person should elicit a roll in the hay. Not for me, broken is broken I guess.

The early Autumn weather was to die for, sheer perfection. Helen was perfect as well, she just accompanied me, in total we would have said three words the whole afternoon. I watched the long stemmed orange roses lazily arc out and then tumble into the sea. How long I stood watching them ride the swell I had no idea, the inevitable conclusion that the rip would take them out to sea, which it duly did. I sat on the bench and asked my questions of the two who would never be able to reply. Any one passing would think I'd lost it, and if Helen was paying attention she never showed it.

Cathartic was the feeling to actually speak the words, it must be the forming then uttering of them that does more than just thinking them, what ever it worked for me.

She must have dozed off as the afternoon ebbed out, as it took a touch to her arm to get her moving again.

"Hey, I'm starving! Come on."

Knowing that she just like myself had not eaten properly today decided on an early dinner; only most the decent places only opened a six for that. We hit the jack pot stumbling across an out of the way mom and pop Mediterranean, thanks only to the bad directions Helen gave me, funny how a left turn when she meant right works out. The home style meal was perfect for the mood.

"So, tell me why the melt down last night and leave out the flowery language please," I hoped my smile defused the comment.

Helen told me of her night; "So, two and a half years later she finally says to me, and I quote, 'I made a mistake Helen, I should not have done that to Eric.' At this point I'd only had a sip from my first glass of wine. She went quite for a good few minutes and then opened up to me. 'I think it may have been my medication, actually it was my meds, I misread the dosage, and one of the side effects is irrational anger. By the time I had discovered, well, the GP did when I went back for a new script with repeats...but it was too late, I had crashed and burnt my life and I'm too embarrassed to tell Eric, he had always said I did not need "that shit" but no I had to just have something wrong with me, didn't I?' I was this close to punching my own sister Eric, how I managed to finish eating and control myself I have no idea."