Reconcilation

Tom was just about at his wit's end. Ever since Ann had had her miscarriage, she had been distant, almost cold. Tom had tried everything he could think of to get her out of her funk. He had tried to be as understanding as possible, but Ann just didn't seem to respond. Tom had tried to get her to go to a counselor, but Ann had flatly refused, telling him that there was nothing wrong with her, and to leave her alone.

Tom was a partner in a private investigative firm, his specialty being in computer and network security. For that type of work, he really didn't need a private investigator's license, but he had gone ahead and gotten one, just so he could help Stan, his partner, with the other side of the business. So when Ann had her miscarriage, he was able to get a considerable amount of time off to stay home with her, and just be there for her. After two weeks, however, he went back to work, the same time Ann did.

Ann would get up in the morning, leave for work, and when she came home she didn't want to talk any more than was absolutely necessary. Often she would spend virtually the entire evening sitting in her chair, staring off into space.

The last time Tom had suggested that they go to a marriage counselor, a couple of weeks earlier, Ann had shown the first real emotion she had displayed in weeks, if not months. Unfortunately it had been anger, and they had wound up in one of the few real fights they had ever had. Tom had tried to explain that he felt there was something going badly wrong with their marriage, and Ann had told him that she just needed some time to get things straightened out, and that he should just leave her the hell alone.

Sex was virtually non-existent. Ann would submit periodically, but there was no passion, or really much in the way of response. At times Tom felt that he would get as much response out of a blow up doll. Ann had never been particularly responsive sexually, and in fact had seemed to treat sex as more of a duty than anything else. However recently, her lack of involvement had dropped to a completely new low.

Then last week, Tom had been given four tickets to the charity ball at the local country club by one of his clients, and thought he had something that would at least give him a chance to get her out of the house to do something other than go to work, and mope around the house.

Tom brought up the subject, telling Ann that they could give the other two tickets to her sister and her husband and all go together. Ann was initially responsive, but on Wednesday she had announced that she wasn't going, she just didn't feel like it. Tom got mad, and another fight started, with Ann finally storming off into the bedroom, locking the door behind her.

Thursday, Tom was still irritated about the whole mess, so when an out of town client called about a security breach on their network, instead of sending one of the people that worked for him, he just decided to go himself. He called Ann, told her that he had to go out of town, and that he probably wouldn't be back until Monday, although he would try to get back sooner.

By Saturday night, he had identified and plugged all the security holes, and run his final checks. He called the airline, and found that he could get a flight home very early Sunday morning. Tom called Ann, first at home, then on her cell phone, leaving messages both times that he would be back about 7:00am, and home about 8:00. Tom thought it was quite strange that Ann hadn't answered at least one of the phones, but felt that there just wasn't much he could do about it until he got home.

Tom arrived just as he planned, but when he got home he found that Ann's car wasn't in the garage. He went into the house, and saw that the answering machine still had his message on it, and that it hadn't been picked up.

Getting a little worried, he called Ann's sister, apologizing for calling so early, and asked if she knew where Ann was.

"We were finally able to get Ann to go to the ball last night, and she had a bit too much to drink, so she is sleeping in our guest room. Do you want me to wake her up?"

"No, I'll see her when she gets home. Did you all have a good time?"

"Yep, it was great getting out like that. Bob and I really enjoyed it, and Ann was actually dancing."

Tom thought Pat sounded a little strange, but didn't pay a lot of attention to it, and after a few more pleasantries, he hung up, got the morning paper, and settled down to read the paper and drink his coffee.

After reading the news and sports, Ann still wasn't home, so Tom was idly paging through the paper, when he saw the coverage of the charity ball on the society page. He just glanced through the story, when he noticed that there was a picture of Ann dancing with some man. She had her body molded to his, and when he looked at the other pictures there were two more pictures of her dancing with the same man. He could clearly see that the man had his hand well down on Ann's back, actually really more on her buttocks, pressing her against him.

Tom was more than a little angry. First she had refused to go to the ball with him, then she let some jerk paw her. Finally, by the time Ann got home at nearly noon, he was calmed down, and had convinced himself that it was really pretty innocent. After all Ann certainly wouldn't have been doing anything out of line with Pat and Bob there.

When Ann finally arrived, she came in pretty bouncy, and told him all about the ball, and how much she had enjoyed getting out of the house. She thanked him for getting the tickets, kissed him, then invited him into the bedroom for what turned out to be some pretty good sex, well maybe that was an overstatement, but it was certainly better than it had been for the last few months.

By evening, however, she was back to her moodiness, and over the next month or so, she was still going off into her own little world, rarely talking about anything that didn't need to be discussed.

Tom did notice however, that while Ann had always been quite a nice dresser, she seemed to be back to paying more attention to her appearance, which he took as a positive sign. She hadn't become a slob by any stretch of the imagination since her miscarriage, but she had not been paying as much attention to her looks as she had previously. Now she seemed to be coming back to the Ann that had attracted him in the beginning.

Early one Friday morning, Tom's partner, Stan, called, and told him that Steve's wife had just delivered a baby, and so of course Steve would not be able to do the surveillance that he had been scheduled for. Stan asked if Tom would do the morning shift until Stan could get another man out there. Tom agreed, went by the office to get the paperwork he would need, and to pick up the surveillance SUV.

Tom's relief showed up a little early, and as Tom was heading back to the office, he realized that he was going right by Ann's office. He pulled into the parking lot, picked up his cell phone and called, thinking that he might take Ann out to lunch. Tom's call was answered by Ann's secretary, and when Tom asked for Ann, Susan told him that he had just missed her, that she had left maybe five minutes earlier, and had told her she would probably be gone all afternoon.

"Oh, I wasn't aware that she had anything going this afternoon."

"Let me look and see where she went. Huh, that's odd, normally I would have her meeting listed on my calendar, but there isn't anything there."

"Don't worry about it, it isn't anything urgent. I'll see her tonight."

Tom was just getting ready to start his car again, when he saw Ann come out of the office building, and get into a little Mercedes coupe. Tom now was a bit curious about where Ann would be going to a meeting in someone else's car, so he let the coupe get out of the parking lot, then turned out and followed them, not really sure why he was doing it, it was just a hunch he had.

He wound up just behind them, which wasn't very good technique on his part, but he could see Ann and what appeared to be a man quite clearly through the rear window. When they stopped at a light, he could also see Ann lean over and kiss the man.

Tom's initial reaction was to simply ram the coupe with his car, but reason prevailed, and instead he simply turned on the video camera that was mounted on the dashboard of the SUV. Then he picked up his phone and called in to the office asking for a license check on the Mercedes. Within five minutes he had a call back, telling him that it was registered to a Russell Anderson, at 1521 Alta Vista Way.

Tom followed them for another ten or fifteen minutes, grinding his teeth every time they hit a stoplight, because Ann and Russell would spend the entire light cycle kissing and hugging. By this time Tom was so angry that he could hardly function. Here he had been worried sick about Ann for months, and now she was showing more emotion and love with this asshole than she had showed him since her miscarriage. He didn't know whether he was madder at Ann or at the asshole in the car with her.

Just before they got to the Hyatt, Russell changed lanes just before the stoplight and Tom couldn't change lanes with him, so he wound up alongside the coupe, looking down into the car. He couldn't see Russell, but he could see that his hand was on his wife's thigh, stroking it, and sliding up under her skirt.

Russell turned left into the Hyatt, and Tom was forced to continue down a block and make a u-turn to get back to the Hyatt. He pulled into the parking lot just in time to see Ann and Russell disappearing arm in arm into the hotel. Tom parked, got out of the car, and walked toward the entrance. As he entered he could see Ann and Russell leaving the check-in counter, and walking toward the restaurant. Tom waited until they had disappeared into the restaurant, then went up to the check-in counter, and asked if Russell Anderson had checked in.

"You just missed him sir. He and Mrs. Anderson have checked in, but the room isn't ready, so they are having lunch. Would you like me to have him paged?"

"No, that won't be necessary. I would like a copy of that registration though."

"Sir, I can't do that, it is strictly against our policy."

Tom reached into his pocket, and pulled out his identification, with his fancy private investigator's badge. He knew that ninety percent of the time, people would just assume he was some sort of cop, and give him what he wanted.

He flashed the badge, and told the clerk that he could simply give him a copy, or he could come back with a court order and get it anyway. The clerk apologized, quickly ran a copy of it off, and handed it to him.

Tom folded it up and put it in his pocket, then walked over to the restaurant entrance. He could see Ann seated at a table with her back to him, and Russell sitting beside her, holding her hand.

Tom had thought that Russell looked familiar when he and Ann had walked into the hotel, but he couldn't place him. Now the pieces fell into place. He was the same man that had been dancing with Ann at the charity ball.

As Tom walked across the restaurant, he could see Ann lean over and kiss Russell, her hand going behind his neck as she did. Tom walked up behind Ann, putting his hand on her shoulder. Ann spun around, and he could see that she didn't have a bra on, and that her blouse was unbuttoned enough to show a good part of her cleavage.

"Oh my God, Tom!"

Russell started to stand up; asking what the hell was going on.

"Russell, if you want to keep those pretty white teeth, just sit the fuck down and shut up."

"Don't come home Ann. You don't live there any more. I'll drop your things off at your sister's place."

Tom turned and walked away, seething. As he was driving past the entrance to the hotel, he saw Ann come running out the door, frantically looking around.

Tom hadn't gotten more that a couple of blocks before his cell phone rang.

"Tom. It isn't what you think." Ann started.

"I know exactly what I saw, and I am not in the least interested in talking to you any more."

Tom hung up and although the phone kept ringing, he didn't answer it, finally turning it off so he didn't have to listen to the damn thing ring constantly.

Tom drove to his bank, immediately canceling all the joint credit cards, and starting a new credit card account in his name only. He also opened a new checking account in his name only, and took exactly half of what was in the checking and saving accounts and putting it all into the new account.

Tom didn't even bother to go back to the office; he just called Stan and told him he wouldn't be in for the rest of the day. He stopped off at a U-Haul rental agency and bought several broken down boxes, then drove home and started packing Ann's stuff – if it could be called packing. Tom would just put a box together, dump a drawer of her things into it until it was full, then start on the next box.

By six, everything was stuffed into boxes, and loaded into the SUV, the locksmith Tom had called had replaced all the locks, and Tom had changed the access codes for the alarm system.

Tom arrived at Pat and Bob's house to find Ann's car parked out in front, just in front of her Aunt Maggie's car. Tom backed the SUV into the driveway, and just as he was reaching for the doorbell, the door opened and Bob stepped out.

"Hi Tom, what the hell is going on? Ann is with Pat and Maggie, almost hysterical – something about how you have thrown her out of the house."

"Yep. Sure did. I've got all her crap here in the car. If you will open the garage, we can get this all in there and I will be on my way."

"Is there anything I can do?"

"Just help me unload this stuff."

They worked in silence, and just as Tom was getting ready to climb back in the SUV, Maggie came to the door.

"Tom, can I see you for a minute."

Tom closed the door again, and waited for Maggie to walk over.

"Tom, Ann is telling me that you have thrown her out of the house, and that it is all a misunderstanding."

"No misunderstanding. We are done. I'm going to see an attorney first thing Monday, or at least as soon as I can get an appointment."

"Can you at least come in and talk with us for a few minutes?"

Tom sighed, and felt that he might as well do it and get it over.

"Maggie, you are one of my very favorite people, and I know you have been essentially a mother for Ann since her parents were killed, but in this case I don't think it is going to do any good. As a favor to you, I will come in, but I guarantee you it won't be pretty."

Tom followed Maggie and Bob into the house to find Pat and Ann sitting in the living room, Ann's face streaked with tears.

"Tom. You have to understand, it isn't what you think it is."

"Well you just tell me what you think it is."

"Russell is a client; I was just having lunch with him."

"Oh, so you weren't there for a little friendly hugs and kisses? Like the kiss I saw you give him as I walked up in the restaurant? How about all the hugs and kisses I saw you giving him in the car on the way to the Hyatt? Would you like to review the videotape in the car that captured the whole thing? What about the way he had his hand up your skirt just before you turned into the Hyatt? Was all that just friendly client relations? Oh, and by the way, do you take your bra off for all your clients?"

"You followed me?" Ann gasped.

"By accident. I was coming by to see if you wanted to go to lunch, but Susan told me I had just missed you, and when I asked where you went, she didn't know. She had nothing on her schedule like she tells me she normally does."

"Oh, and let's not forget the registration at the Hyatt. Mr. and Mrs. Russell Anderson, at least that is what the clerk called you."

"Okay Maggie, I've given you your five minutes."

Tom turned and walked out as Ann burst into tears.

Tom spent the weekend moping around the house, trying to come to grips with the idea that his marriage was essentially over. Over and over he went through everything since they were married, trying to figure out what he could have done differently, and not coming up with a single answer. The phone rang nearly every thirty minutes, starting early Saturday morning, and continuing into the evening. Finally he answered, and Ann voice came through.

"Tom, please, we need to talk. Please Tom, I'm begging you."

"Ann, we don't have a damn thing to say to each other."

With that Tom hung up the phone and ignored the continued calls, which finally stopped about midnight, only to resume Sunday morning. Tom would simply look at the caller ID, and if it was Ann's cell phone, or Pat's phone, he just ignored them.

Sunday night, he finally got a different call, this one from Maggie.

"Hello Tom, do you have a couple of minutes?"

"Sure, what's up, as if I couldn't guess?"

"Well, Pat is madder than hell at Ann, and apparently it got so bad that Ann asked me if she could stay here for awhile. But that is not why I am calling. I wanted to ask if you would consider going to marriage counseling with Ann."

"Why bother? She has flat ruined our marriage; she has lied to me; she has been screwing around on me; hell, she wouldn't even talk to me half the time before I caught her, so I really don't see any point in it at all."

There was silence on the other end of the phone for a few moments.

"Tom, you once told me that if there was ever anything you could do for me that you would do whatever it took to make it happen. I'm calling in the favor now, and asking you to go to marriage counseling with Ann."

Tom was, in turn, silent for a few minutes, remembering that he had always been so proud that his word was his bond.

"All right Maggie, I'll do as you ask, but that wasn't what I meant and you know it."

"I know, but you two really were meant for each other, and this is the only way I can see to get you two back together. I know you don't want to talk to Ann, so when we get an appointment set up, I'll call you and let you know when and where it is."

With that, Maggie hung up, and Tom went back to his drink, and the book he had been trying to read all day, without much luck. He would read a few pages, then have to go back and read them again, because he had forgotten what had been said.

The following Thursday, a little after 5:00pm, Tom arrived at the office of Joyce Ayers PhD, marriage counselor and psychologist. Ann had already arrived, and as soon as he checked in with the receptionist, they were ushered into Dr. Ayers' office. Ann had tried to talk to Tom when he came in, but he just looked at her, then ignored her.

After the introductions were made, Dr. Ayers asked; "Why are you coming to see me?"

Ann spoke first. "I did something incredibly stupid, but not what my husband thinks it was, and I want to put our marriage back together, and move on with our lives."

"Are you living together now?"

"No. Tom has essentially locked me out of the house. I am staying with my aunt at the moment."

"Actually, after I caught her with another man, I told her not to come home, and delivered her things to her sister's place."

"Please Tom; you'll get your turn to speak, let me finish with Ann first."

"Were you with another man?"

"Yes, but it wasn't what Tom thinks it was."

"Well, we can explore this a bit more later on. Tom why are you here?"

"Ann's aunt called in a favor, so I agreed to come."

"Have you filed for divorce yet?"

"No, I haven't had time to get to an attorney, my appointment is not until next week."

"Good. I'm going to ask you to hold off on filing the divorce papers. I've found that marriage counseling is much harder with a pending divorce action. It really is up to you, but my preference would be for you to hold off until you know whether you can reconcile or not."