All Comments on 'Repercussion'

From the sound and mind set. Tom is gone and Emily is history... Betrayal is betrayal no matter the why.. Well done

Leaving the wife was a not a bad move. Covering for her friend is not to far from cheating herself.

This sorta needs a second part. No RAAC but I guess some insights into the consequences of a stupid person’s action.

Last three paragraphs told exactly what was going to happen and why. Shoot an arrow at target, and assuming aim is true — John says of Tom, “... I'm in awe of your ability to just see life for what it is. You identify your path and you just live your life." — you hit the target. Then the last two paragraphs say what will happen with Emily and how. What’s to FTDS?

Now, it might be interesting to take a right turn — you shoot an arrow, and from out of nowhere a red tailed hawk swoops down, aiming for a mouse on the ground, right into the arrow in flight — but, even though an interesting twist, is very unlikely. John, obviously, acts first and thinks later. Tom, all along, thinks first, then thinks second, and when absolutely sure (aims true), acts.

So, really, unless the author were going to throw in a twisted ending, the story shows what will be happening, without holding your hand along the way.

He better have not lied to her, not even once, or the memories will cripple him forever.

Just saying.........

Great story.

Good story. Tom's reaction is a little hardline, you'd think they'd be able to work and overcome the violation of trust if the marriage was worth it. But maybe it wasn't, and anyway, they're his principles.

What I can't understand is Emily. She appears completely lucid and full aware that her marriage is tanked once the deception is uncovered, so she clearly knew her husband's opinion on the matter. But she still risked her marriage just to cover for a cheating friend? Looking the other way, maybe. Actively covering, though? And continuing to do so, even after it was clear that Amanda wasn't going to stop? She could've easily put her foot down, and said enough. The fact that Amanda was ramping up on the cheating meant that getting caught was inevitable, so Emily just doubles down and goes along with it for no good reason? Feels very odd.

Tom comes off as self righteous, arrogant, and narcissistic! Yes, Emily was wrong, but she did not commit adultery. She did allow herself to get caught up in and facilitated her friend’s deception, but unless Tom is as pure as the driven snow, he is being more harsh than the situation might call for. Clearly Emily was repentant of her role before facing her husband and that should be a mitigating factor. Consequences? Certainly! Dissolution of the marriage? Over the top! the repercussion may not fit the crime... still good story.

Learn to edit. Please. A story this short, there's no excuse to have that many simple, easily corrected mistakes.

I hope he never made a mistake, such are his high handed morals he would have to commit suicide

What a paragon of virtue he must be, what a high-minded champion of truth and justice he feels himself to be, it must be great to be him and know that every minute of every day he's basking in the glory of his self-righteous assholery, because of course he's a god-like model of truth and justice, he's never made a mistake in his life. Writers frequently model their characters on the people they know best, themselves, I hope for your sake you're not as sanctimonious, charmless, and repulsive as Tom, who never did a bad thing in his life.

5. Ignore the comments from the unprincipled cucks in waiting, below.

Good job she didn’t put too much sugar in his tea. That would have been unforgivable.

He can try to forgive her, but distrust never goes away. I agree with this conclusion.

"The problem isn't cheating, it's trust." A good summary of the whole Loving Wives section. You can break trust more ways than cheating, but cheating always kills the marriage: you will never trust the cheater again, and eventually, whatever hack-job of a fix is put together will fall apart.

Finally , some characters with morals and ethics. It is just stunning to me the comments by folks that clearly lack any sort of moral standing. It just show how far society has fallen in that standards are now so low that the wives behavior is seen as no big deal and completely acceptable. The common lw them of condoning cheating or not telling of known cheating is evidently a real world normal behavior.. "Oh, I so wanted to save your feelings so I did not tell you tha bad news." Yeah, not telling is so much better......

5 stars - I liked this story.

Trust can be earned BUT once that earned trust is destroyed, it can never be the same again.

Some individuals sacrifice themselves in the mistaken belief that they can deal with the lack of trust until the kids are raised. Trust me - that does not work out so great.

I gave it 5 stars. But would have liked to see the confrontation between him and Emily. See exactly what happens to her life going forward. I know a lot of people will think, he overreacted on this one, since she didn’t cheat on him. But by coveting for a friend so she could cheat, using the husband for a way to get the guy out of town, it shows Emily was ok with cheating, and was getting real world practice on how to do it. Everything considered, he needed to dump her.

Tom was too much of a hard ass. It is your story and your creation but come on, a marriage should be stronger than that.

Tom's reaction about his marriage is reasonable, though on the hard end. I completely disagree with anyone saying the story needed a confrontation with Emily or any more-it was fine ending where it did.

Despite the name confusion between *Tom and John which proofreading really should have caught easily, I gave it 5 stars.

* "Tom needed to figure out John's side of the story and the best way to get that would be from Tom himself. While it was a physical risk that Tom might attack him again ..."

Good story - fine concept. Tom seems way over the top. Need proofreading

Since she didn't cheat I might have tried counseling, but then again there are times when the lies are worse than the sex.

I despise authors who leave a story u finished!!!! For that reason I gave it one star!!!!!

Anti-climatic.

On the one hand, trust is indeed vital for a marriage to work. If Emily is not trustworthy it would be very risky staying with her and especially risky having kids with her.

However, what if the sexes in the story were reversed? Wife #1 beats up Wife #2 because she found her husband was cheating and thought that Couple #2 were facilitating the affair. Turns out that Hubby #2 was facilitating the affair albeit reluctantly but Wife #2 didn’t know about any of it. Should Wife #2 divorce her husband???

Bros before hoes.

Slut leading a puppet.

Any guy who lives his life according to a rigid, unforgiving code of absolute morality has never grown up. One can’t get through life without flexibility.

The trope of the unyielding, unforgiving, absolutely virtuous man is a creation of novelists and Hollywood filmmakers.Actually, when one thinks about it, forgiveness is an absolute virtue, if religion gets a say. So an unforgiving man is NOT so virtuous. Interesting!

Bros before hoes. Second the motion! 5*

Just a great story.

Well done Tom....getting away from the hoe Emily

Sorry for the forgiveness crowd but Tom's real issue is that his wife chose her friend above him. It is not so much her lying....but where she placed her priorities. She chose outside vs inside the marriage. Tom found himself in second place.

I would say her without letting her know what I know: Dear wife, either you are telling me now everything till the last smallest event, and it will be the last time you ever hidden ANYTHING from me, or you get papers next week. God help you not "forget" anything!

I'd let her feel her mistake by the last cell of hers, and then look what left. Apparently she already has an idea.

"Sorry for the forgiveness crowd but Tom's real issue is that his wife chose her friend above him." Well said, Anonymous.

Wenttoo farshe waswrong to help friend cheat but endin marriage is not the answer thatis why so many marriages end in divorce people don't work on their relationship and give up tooeasily

Maybe it's just me, but this paragraph confused the hell out of me.

"Tom needed to figure out John's side of the story and the best way to get that would be from Tom himself. While it was a physical risk that Tom might attack him again it seemed to be the most direct way to set a baseline understanding of what had happened. Then he sit down with Emily to talk about their role in what happened and what caused John to think that Emily and Tom had been disloyal."

4 stars - not quite equal treatment for both women. One is a SLUT and the other is just foolish to support her friend instead of her husband.

The SLUT needed to be kicked to the curb.

The other woman needed to be forced to undergo significant therapy and at least a six month long legal separation - with a bunch of conditions. 24 hour video and audio surveillance for the entire six months - to guarantee the TRUST issue - with years of trying to make it up to her husband.

Disagree with those who say husband of non-cheating wife is going to far. Trust is trust. 5*

I'm not sure it would necessarily lead to divorce but it is likely, as you show here, that it will. It's all about the trust and that has been pretty comprehensibly destroyed here. In the end it might come to just how much Emily had actually lied to Tom and how much was more lying by omission. Thank you for posting it.

The friends wife lied and said she was going to work to get her laptop along with covering for the cheating slut. Trust is completely gone

His wife seems kind of weird. She'll lie. But she won't cheat? Does he figure that eventually she will cheat? Because I don't believe that. He's being precipitous. D

I really enjoyed the added layer of Tom being a bystander to the infidelity. The knot of deception that the women create has dramatic consequences that are as entertaining as the actual cheating.

Name switches are bad enough but in the same sentence? Give me a break. Despite that it was a good read and a very interesting variation on a familiar theme.

JR

It seems that many of the comments want to minimize Emily’s sin. Let’s walk through this step by step.

Adultery is EVIL. The only thing worse is premeditated murder. So, let’s make some comparisons. Let’s say that your wife’s best friend has been torturing animals, and your wife’s been covering for her. Would you stay married to someone who enabled a puppy burner? Of course not. Well, adultery is worse, so do the math!!!

ZK

The immediate, unconditional forgiveness Tom gives to John for the surprise assault seems a rather extremist nod to living by "bro code." John says the thought that Tom had betrayed him hurt him more than his wife's actions did. If that is true, did he not owe his treasured, life long friend the time and restraint required to be certain of the facts before placing him in the hospital? John's actions were the friendship equivalent of a spouse who, suspecting infidelity, goes for a revenge fuck with their spouse's greatest enemy only to later learn their partner had, in fact, been faithful. The vengeful spouse always ends up rightfully divorced in those stories.

Good story, but I wished the author made the story a bit longer. 5 starts though.

This story had potential but you didn’t finish it. Too many unanswered questions and other details. Frustrating read.