The Seven Deadly Sins: Envy

Friends. I have been really, really busy over the last few months and have written not a sausage. I haven't even had time to polish and submit one of the many I have near completion. This all changed yesterday. I looked at the recently published list and there was only one LW story with a good enough score to interest me. It was scoring 4.40 so I read it. At the risk of sounding like an arrogant wanker, it was awful. The guy lost his wife and kids in pages of unoriginality. That spurred myself and a friend to roughly polish a spare one and submit. Hopefully this one raises the quality of stories here and shows readers that there are still wild stories out there; plots waiting to be conquered, and that inspires them to write. I have gone back to my roots a little with this one. There is no sex and the husband is once again faced with a situation in which he appears to have very limited options.

My heartfelt thanks to Creativitytakescourage. Not only for the lightning fast edit but for reminding me that good things happen to good people.

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Until 5:30p.m., today was a typical day. Let me see now, how did it start? Up at 7:00a.m., showered, got the kids out of bed, then made their breakfast and school lunches. After that, I woke Tracey to make sure she got eleven-year-old James and eight-year-old Maddy on the school bus. She was tired from her late night tennis tournament. After kissing the kids goodbye, I left at eight for my job as foreman of the local authority's civil works gang. After a typical day, I headed home a little after five.

Today was pay day and I stopped at an ATM to get some cash for the weekend. The bloody machine swallowed my card. No message or warning; just refused to give me cash or my card back. In hindsight, it was maybe a little silly to put in my credit card to try to get a cash advance. It was Maddy's birthday on Sunday and I intended spending Saturday buying her something special. The bloody machine swallowed that one as well. The bank was closed so I just headed home.

At home, I noticed Tracey's car wasn't in the driveway. I rushed to the front door, hoping she hadn't made the kids come home to an empty house again. She knew I hated that. After the last time, I'd told her to ring me if she had something important on after school, so I could come home early.

As I was putting the key in the lock, I heard a voice behind me say, "Mr. David Brown?"

I automatically said, "Yes," as I turned round. A middle aged man held an A4, yellow envelope out to me with the name, 'Slugden and Pyke' in one corner.

He handed it to me. "You have been served, sir," and walked away.

Confused just doesn't come close to how I was feeling. I continued into the house. As soon as I got in, I felt it was unusually empty. Two minutes later, I'd discovered that, not only was it bereft of the three other members of my family, but all their clothes and possessions had disappeared as well. There was no note or message on the phone. Nothing at all. All I had to answer the swarming confusion I felt, was the damned yellow envelope.

Sitting at the kitchen table, I ripped it open. The first document, I soon discovered, was a divorce application. I'd never seen one before, but the title left no doubt. There were those little sticky labels saying, 'Sign Here', sticking out the side. I didn't bother reading it, just skipped to the next document. This one was a little harder to understand. Eventually, I figured it said I had two months to vacate my own house, so it could be sold. What the f...?

The third document was even harder to interpret. Eventually, the penny dropped—some guy called Michael Smith wanted to adopt my kids. At the risk of repeating myself, what the f...?

The last document had a title that brokered no confusion. The restraining order said I was forbidden from approaching within two hundred metres of my wife, my children, or Mr. Michael Smith and his residence of 12 Riverview Drive blah, blah, blah.

I felt completely bushwacked. The sheer enormity of the change to my life, threatened to completely collapse my soul. I think it may have, but for one thing which I didn't realise at the time. The problem was so enormous I couldn't grasp it in my mind in one bite. My automatic emotional defence mechanisms had cut in to save my sanity. My mind was blank to start with, then little certainties started to drip into my consciousness. My wife had left me to set up with some guy I'd never heard of. She'd taken the kids and wanted me to release them so he could adopt them. She'd closed all our joint bank accounts and wanted to sell our house to get that cash as well. Her partner in crime was called Michael Smith and he lived at 12 Riverview Drive.

What was making things worse, was my embarrassment about my naivety. If Tracey had taken this step, then whatever was happening had been building for a long time. I hadn't seen a single clue. I knew Tracey wasn't that smart, so the only conclusion possible was I'd been really dumb. I searched my memory for retrospective clues.

Sure, Tracey had become a little distant about six months ago, but when I pointed this out, she'd snapped out of whatever funk she was in. Our sex life, that had shrunk to a shadow of its' former glory, came back with a vengeance. In fact, it had come back bigger and much better than ever. Out was the sexually repressed wife I knew. In was an adventurous sex maniac I didn't recognise. I smiled as a recollected some of the things that had happened in our bedroom recently.

Could they be things she'd been road testing with Mr. Smith first? No. That just wasn't Tracey. The solution to that one filled my veins with ice. I now think she'd always wanted to do those things but her repressive upbringing wouldn't allow her to do them with someone she respected. The logical conclusion to this was both sad and amusing. She'd lost respect for me six months ago; that was the sad bit. The funny bit was I was getting kinky-sex-Tracey, while Mr. Smith was almost certainly getting repressed, missionary-only-Tracey.

Hold that thought, Dave. You'll need every opportunity to laugh to get through what's to come.

I was still numb with shock as I decided on my first course of action. It may have been a surprising move to anyone who hadn't read my last psychological appraisal. My boss had come up with the trendy idea of getting all his senior staff profiled. I was proud of the line in their report, 'Mr. Brown is not particularly rule bound.' A subtle way of saying I was a bit of a cowboy who was results focused and got the job done using accepted guidelines as a reference only. This report was followed by my receiving the highest professional compliment ever at that years' performance review. My boss, who was as straight-laced as they come, had sat me down and said, "Dave, every time I have a difficult job that needs doing; I give it to you. On that day, I write in my diary how I think you will do it and how long it will take you. I'm happy to say I've never once been right." He then gave me the highest score possible and we had a good laugh. Unfortunately, that meant nothing, as I was already at the top of the tree my qualifications allowed. The pressure of supporting a wife and children had precluded me completing my Engineering qualifications to allow me to jump to the next tree.

Half an hour later, I was parked just down the road from 12 Riverview Drive. Let's just say it wasn't two hundred metres. Tracey's car was there, but there were no signs of life. This was the poshest neighbourhood in our town and what I presumed was Smith's house was as big as the rest in the street. It suddenly struck me the name was vaguely familiar. Could Michael Smith be that annoying guy on the TV adverts? The one that insisted on appearing in his own ads that changed every week with monotonous regularity. He was the owner of one of the town's few superstores. If memory served me right, he had taken it over in a hostile takeover about two years before. If I was right, then I was in trouble. This guy was loaded.

My reverie was interrupted when the front door opened and a guy walked out to his car and drove away. I recognised him as the same middle aged man that had served me a little over an hour ago. This prompted me to open the yellow envelope I'd brought with me and read the divorce petition. Talk about a declaration of war. Tracey was asking for absolutely everything—house, cars, money, alimony, child support; the works. I was also to be denied access to my children completely. I knew Tracey was competitive. She not only had to win everything but insisted on crushing her opposition while doing it. The petition was archetypal Tracey. I was still pondering this, when a half hour later, the door opened again. An early forties, well-dressed lady was propelled onto the top step. She stood there as a large suitcase was brought out and set down next to her by a 50ish man who retreated back inside and shut the door. The lady stood there for several minutes clutching a familiar looking yellow envelope. Finally, she rolled the suitcase to the gate and started walking down the street towards me. The look on her face was exactly what the inside of my head felt like. Totally confused.

As she neared my car I stepped out in front of her. She stopped two paces away and looked at me with glazed eyes, red from crying. She had her envelope in one hand and her suitcase drag handle in the other. I just held up my envelope and said, "Snap."

She looked at mine, then at hers and burst out crying. She made no move, as I lifted her suitcase into my trunk then held the door open for her. Knowing there was a fair chance we were being observed and even now the police were being called, I drove down the road, took a few turns and parked. Strangely, knowing she was in the same predicament, triggered my protective instinct and cleared my head a little. Even with her tear ravaged eyes, she was a striking woman. With no sign she was about to take the initiative, I opened.

"I'm Dave and I'm guessing my wife knows your husband."

She turned her grief stricken eyes to me and gave me a weak smile. I saw the sorrow retreat a little as I watched.

"I'm Wendy. Is your wife's name Tracey?"

I nodded.

"I caught them in bed together last month. We were working it out I thought. Then tonight..."

She broke out crying again. I gave her time to settle. Somehow, the news that Tracey's betrayal of me was now total and complete didn't shock me as I would have imagined.

"Can I drop you off anywhere? Family or friends?"

"I have no family around here and Michael managed to alienate me from all my friends."

"Have you eaten yet?"

She shook her head. I checked my wallet. Less than $50. I drove to a cheap restaurant I knew and escorted Wendy inside. To cut a long story short, we exchanged life stories.

I was thirty-two, had married in my second year at university and quit the following year when we'd become victims of the fallibility of condoms. Tracey opposed an abortion and I'd willingly quit to provide for a family. Tracey didn't work and I thought we'd had a good marriage. I was slightly resentful of my wife's laziness but accepted it in our increasingly selfish world. One thing that annoyed the shit out of me was that Tracey appeared a committed mother when around other people, but in private, was a little uncaring and self-centred. I'd given up raising that thorny issue. I was different. In public or private, I doted on my offspring. With my parents gone, and being an only child, my family was all I had.

Wendy was actually forty-one, and the daughter of a mother who had abandoned her. Her father had done his best, but the stress had sent him to an early grave. Her marriage to the much older Michael Smith had appeared normal, but childless. Michael blamed her, refusing to take any sort of fertility test, pointing to his multi successful siblings. Her inheritance had been consumed expanding Michael's business.

At my suggestion, Wendy went to the ATM across from the restaurant to confirm none of her cards worked anymore. The conspirator's assault had been thorough and well planned. Given time we could mount a successful counterattack, but for now we were bewildered, confused, and lost. In hindsight, having someone else's problems to think about was the best therapy I could have had at this time.

Wendy was still in no shape to plan the future, so I invited her to share my big, but suddenly empty, house until she had a plan. I assured her I was only offering out of decency. I had no ulterior motives. We drove home and I helped her settle into the guest room. Then we shared a bottle of wine.

She reached over and put her hand on mine when I told her I was terrified I wouldn't be able to see my kids anywhere near as much as I wanted to, if at all. In fact, she even shed the tears at my obvious pain that my upbringing prevented me from doing myself. Our mutual problem sharing could be held up as a classic counselling session. By the end of the first bottle, we'd reached some insightful conclusions. Their tactics were obviously designed to keep us on the back foot and too broke to retain lawyers of our own. Whatever Tracey's motives were, she was obviously playing her best game to win. As usual. The idea of sharing the kids and the assets evenly after our marriage dissolved just wasn't in her nature, so ending the marriage nicely wasn't in the equation.

Wendy seemed like a thoroughly decent person and would make a helpful emotional ally. We went to our separate bedrooms knowing we weren't totally alone in the world. The next day was all about distracting each other so our new circumstances didn't overwhelm us. When she started falling into a funk, I would cheer her up with stories and jokes. When I felt the darkness approaching, she made me laugh somehow. It was a really bizarre day but we dragged each other through it. She was a bit of an enigma. For a gorgeous woman, she was strangely shy. With no other source of funds, we pooled our cash. With what I had in the cupboards and with shopping on a budget, we wouldn't starve for a couple of weeks. We had fun shopping like the poor people we now were. It was an obvious culture shock for Wendy who had been in clover since she married Mr. Smith.

We ventured into a conversation about planning for the future but stopped when it became too painful. We watched a companionable movie together Saturday night.

Sunday morning, Wendy was still in bed when I had surprise visitors. Tracey's father, John and kid sister, Beth. I invited them in for a coffee. We had always gotten on well, in fact, I suspected Beth had always had a crush on me. She'd been single for a couple of years since her former husband had run off with his secretary. As the coffee was brewing, Wendy appeared at the kitchen door in her dressing gown. She left apologising, obviously embarrassed to be seen dressed like that. John raised an eyebrow and looked coldly at me.

"Before you embarrass yourself, Dad, that is the wife of the man your daughter is shacked up with. He threw her out of the house Friday, the day I met her. I offered to let her stay as she had nowhere else to go. You see, I'm not the only one your offspring is trying to crush."

"I'm sorry, Dave. Tracey's mum was going to come as well but she's too embarrassed. We know what Tracey's done to you and I just wanted to let you know I'm extremely pissed off at her. I stopped short of telling her to get the hell out of our lives, but you know how it is, grandkids and all?"

"I understand, Dad, and thank you for your thoughts. The one thing that confuses me more than anything is why she's doing this. I understand her tactics. Taking all the money, leaving me without a cent and wanting the house, is just her playing to win. But why?"

From the look on his face, I could tell the news about the money and house was previously unknown to him. His eyes opened wide.

"You mean she took everything?"

"Yes, Dad. All our accounts seem to have been closed, I don't have a bean. She's had me served with a notice to move out of the house and a restraining order against me seeing the kids."

John's eyes were as wide as saucers now, as the full horror of what his daughter was capable of sank in. He couldn't make eye contact with me.

"I'm sorry, Dave. What a bitch. I can answer your question though. She explained why to her mum and I yesterday. In a nutshell: money. She said you'd gone as high as you would ever go and she wanted more. She thinks shacking up with a rich guy will give her what she wants. He's over fifty, and I can tell by the way she talks about him, she doesn't even like him that much. If I were him, I'd watch out. I reckon after she marries him, she'll ditch him and take him for everything she can get. How I raised such a mercenary bitch is beyond me."

"That's bloody rich, Dad. It was her decision not to terminate her first pregnancy that made me give up university. If I'd kept going, I would be part way up a tall tree rather than at the top of a little one."

John just shrugged.

"So why take the kids, Dad? We both know, deep down, she isn't really the motherly type. Why not just take the money and leave me with my kids?"

"I...I don't know, son."

At this point, I noticed Beth looking rather incredulously at her father, but she said nothing. Obviously embarrassed beyond words, John made his final apologies and they left, after he shook my hand. I made him promise to give a birthday hug to my daughter from me. Beth gave me a hug and whispered in my ear, "Back in an hour." It was all rather intriguing.

Wendy and I were sharing breakfast when two mutual friends of Tracey and I showed up. They'd seen Tracey and an older guy out at a restaurant the previous night and wondered what was going on. I explained things from my point of view and Wendy told her story. They were both offended by Tracey's actions. They were both bemused why she'd taken off with the kids. Apparently, they'd seen through Tracey's good-mummy-when-people-were-around, act. We'd just finished telling them the story when one of Tracey' friends turned up. We all told the story this time. She was as horrified as everyone else. We still hadn't finished when Beth arrived back. She pulled me aside and handed me an envelope.

"There's $1,000 in there, Dave. Let's call it an 'atoning for bitch sister' loan, shall we? No, I insist, take it."

As a proud man, I had real trouble accepting the envelope, but I was desperate. I took it, thanking her profusely.

"I also wanted to tell you Dad wasn't being totally honest with you. Tracey came around yesterday and dumped the kids off. She told us almost everything. I wangled the rest out of her later. I have to tell you, she's playing a very complicated game, Dave. Asking for the money and the house was the Shithead's idea. They intend using the cash as a bargaining tool which they will "reluctantly" give in on if you cooperate and allow the divorce and let him adopt your kids. He is childless and really wants someone to leave his empire to. After your divorce, she has convinced him she intends to have a kid with him. After that, he will have his legacy and she will have her lifestyle. If you can wait that long, Dave, I'm sure she will lose interest in Jimmy and Maddy and hand them back to you."

I stared at Beth incredulously. However, it all made sense in a cold, sociopathic way. He had a trophy wife already, so that answered my question of why he would be attracted to Tracey when she wasn't that much of a catch. The lure of an overtly fertile wife would be a powerful magnet. However, I couldn't accept Beth's last thoughts. Tracey had suffered severe preeclampsia during both pregnancies. During her second caesarean, she'd opted to have a hysterectomy concurrently. She obviously hadn't told either her family or her new beau. That, as much as her other actions, told me what a conniving bitch my wife had turned into.