The Seven Deadly Sins: Hubris

Sarah cut in. "We know, Dad, we were brought up with your and Mum's values, remember. Never cheat, never lie, always treat everyone with respect until they lose that respect, then just quietly walk away."

"Yes. That's why what else happened this morning is so difficult to understand, let alone, talk about."

The feeling of gloom in the room intensified. They gave their Dad all the time he needed to collect his thoughts and decide what to say and how to say it.

"This morning, your mother asked me to just drop her at the domestic terminal and leave. She said she was nervous about leaving you home alone for long. Purely on spec, I agreed, then drove straight to the international terminal. I waited there, next to the Bali flight check-in and saw Mr. Peter Ower checking in. I hid and kept watching. Fifteen minutes later, I saw your mother appear and also check in. I was too overwhelmed to confront her."

"You think...? "

"Yes, Sarah, I think your mother lied to me, to us really, and has gone to Bali to have an affair with someone she works with."

Their father averted his face, but it was obvious to all three of his children that he was hurting badly. They had never seen the great man cry and would have paid just about everything they owned not to see his obvious pain now. One after the other, starting with Danielle, they enclosed their father in a hug. Sarah again took the lead.

"What are you going to do, Dad?"

"I just don't know, kids. I do know if she ever sleeps with another man, we're finished. Faithfulness is the cornerstone of a marriage and any breach is unforgivable. If she hasn't and doesn't sleep with him, then I still don't know if I can get past her deception. That's why all I've done so far is to send them both a text to say that if they touch each other there will be trouble. That way I can defer the decision on what to do until I've had a chance to decide. Does that make sense?"

Sarah nodded for all of them, then told him something he didn't know.

"Er, Mum left her phone at home, Dad. She wouldn't have got your text. I know how to contact her. Do you want me to tell her not to touch the creep?"

"No, Sarah. I want her to respond for her own reasons. A decision taken due to fear of consequences, isn't a decision at all. She has to have the right motivation. What number did she give you to contact her on?"

Sarah pulled out her phone and opened the long email from Laura. She read the first six numbers to her father, he read her the last four from the business card he'd withdrawn from his pocket. The absolute truth of his story was reinforced with all four people in the room by that one simple action. Silence descended.

"There's more, Dad. Mum asked me to grab a letter to you from under your pillow at home."

She went to her bag and retrieved the offending letter and handed it over. They all waited while he read it. He objected to reading it aloud, once he knew what was in it. Young Larry broke that impasse.

"Dad, that letter concerns our family. We've always made all major decisions as a family. You have to tell us."

Dave looked at his youngest son and realised he'd never felt prouder. Here he was, with his siblings, in the middle of the greatest crisis their family had ever faced, and he was handling it better than his own father. They all were. They hugged again, then Dave began to read. He read through it three times, the second two of which had an emphasis on the third paragraph. Without the third paragraph, it was a legitimate plea from a wife to a husband and taken at face value represented a mature proposal. One sentence in the third paragraph however, made a mockery of the whole missive. "I'm away for two weeks with a friend from work. I have never been unfaithful to you and without your full blessing, never will be." One proven lie made the entire rest of the message suspect, or just wrong.

An hour's mature debate resulted in an assessment of their mother and wife's motives that was remarkably close to the truth. With other solutions discounted, an obvious conclusion and course of action was reached. Depending on the answer to one question, their mother probably no longer deserved to be a member of their family. Dave did his best to stand up for the absent party.

"Look, kids. If there has been a crime committed, it is against me as your mum's husband. You shouldn't let that influence how you treat her."

Again it was little Larry that answered for them all.

"No, Dad. The moment she lied to us all, was the moment that she voted herself out."

Dave looked at his son searchingly. He saw the jutting out chin and serious eyes and realised this acorn hadn't fallen far from the tree.

Chapter 3

Laura stunned Pete in the hotel reception by asking for a separate room, on a different floor to him. She booked it for two days with an option to extend, with a request for the right to first refusal if they got close to being fully booked. Pete then checked in and looked askance at Laura. He was told to think about it, go to his room to unpack and meet her back in the lobby in two hours. He confusedly complied.

They met at the appointed time. Peter hadn't spent the time thinking but when he saw what Laura was wearing, thought he'd like to jump her bones. They'd been intimate for a month now, but apart from some kissing and groping, nothing had happened.

"What gives, Laura."

"Think about it, Peter. We arrange to come here together, you get a text on your phone addressed to you by name, telling you that if you lay one hand on 'that woman', you will regret it for the rest of your life. That text arrived shortly after a man, who looked like my husband, made a threatening gesture to you. Are you with me? We arrive here and my daughter informs me that my husband is acting wholly out of character. For the last three hours, my husband hasn't answered my calls, which again is way out of character."

Pete wasn't stupid, he knew what all this might mean, but failed to see or care what it had to do with him.

"I think there's an 80% chance that my husband knows we're here together. Don't ask me how he found out; I haven't a clue. I am 100% sure that if he discovers we've slept together, my marriage is finished. That's a price I'm not willing to pay. If I was 100% sure he knows, then I'd already be on a plane flying home. If I did that though and he's not on to us, how the hell would I explain coming back so soon without telling blatant lies. We've lived together for 25-years, he'd spot a lie in a second, if he's on the alert. I'm sorry, Peter, but we won't be sleeping together until I get hold of my husband and convince myself he knows nothing."

Peter looked obviously disappointed with this statement. Laura could tell he was going to argue about it, so forestalled him.

"Peter, if you were my husband and suspected I was away having a fling with another man, what would you do?"

"Easy, I'd hire a PI and get proof."

Laura watched as the logic of this made it through the filters of lust in his head. She was still frustrated that the seriousness of her situation wasn't getting through his thick skull.

"Have you tried to ring your wife again since you got here?"

That got his attention. Peter immediately began looking around into every dark corner of the lobby, trying to see the camera.

"Good, now you get the picture. I'm sleeping alone in my room tonight and tomorrow night. When my husband gets back from the scrub and has a chance to ring me, we'll take it from there. In the meantime, don't come to my room, don't approach me unless it's somewhere public and don't touch me. If my husband rings, don't answer it or let it go to voice mail. Come find me as quickly as you can. Here's the numbers he'll ring from. Now give me a friendly kiss on the cheek and we'll go our separate ways."

Peter did as instructed, then they both retired to their rooms while looking around for any surveillance. If either had bothered to look at the phone number Pete's threat had come from, they would have realised that Laura's 80% was already 100%. She just didn't know it yet.

Chapter 4

Four days later and the long anticipated trip was going far from expectations. Meals were taken in the hotel restaurant and all physical contact was avoided. Laura dragged Peter, protesting to numerous clothes shops to get outfits and they even went on a day tour together on the Tuesday. If they were being followed, it was by professionals. Laura insisted they spent all the days together in case Dave rang. On the Monday, Laura bought a throw away phone and had Pete practice diverting his to it, in case he got the expected call. Her stress level had only slightly risen. It was school holidays and it wasn't impossible for Dave to have taken Danielle and Larry to the cottage for more than the weekend. Sarah, not replying to her emails was a cause for great concern however. Peter lasted until Tuesday night. He retired early, booked an extra room, snuck out of his after assuring himself he was invisible to surveillance and banged one of the imported Javanese hookers all night.

On Wednesday, Laura was worried enough that she stayed in her room all day and did some research on the internet. Research on divorces. Then she contacted her lawyer at home, via email, asking for confirmation on her speculation about the outcome of a hypothetical divorce. She used him for all the family's personal legal issues. She handled all such issues for the family. He replied that though it wasn't his field of expertise, he thought her suppositions were correct. Thrice daily phone calls to Dave and Sarah went unanswered. 80% had nudged up towards 90%. Cut off emotionally from everyone she knew, made her feel as lonely as she ever had in her life. She sent an impassioned email to Sarah, begging for contact. Dave didn't use email.

With no response by Friday, Laura was tending towards protecting her future. She had her lawyer, who had all the requisite authorisations, lock up the family finances. The title of their one remaining vacant block of land, she put in a trust with Sarah and herself as trustees. Either signature could access the trust. The bulk of the family finances, she put in two separate trusts in the names of their minor children. Again there were two trustees, but this time, both signatures were required. The appropriate child and one other. She wanted the other to be herself of course but allowed her lawyer to talk her into making it the child's 'legal guardian'. It was more foolproof that way, he assured her. Of course, the child's signature was useless until they turned 18. Reassured that if the worst happened, she controlled the purse strings and if it was all a storm in a teacup, she could reverse the changes, Laura slept better than she had all week.

Two bombshells arrived within an hour of each other, on the Saturday. The first arrived with Pete, who came to her room against her instructions. Worried about his unresponsive wife, he'd contacted his brother and asked him to go over to his house. His brother announced that he had. Pete's wife asked him where his brother wanted the divorce papers delivered. She'd called his work and found out he wasn't away on a business trip but was on annual leave. Well, that explained how Dave had found out anyway. Peter was flying home immediately to attempt damage control. Laura immediately contacted her lawyer with instructions to get all the changes signed, saw Pete off to the airport and moved into his vacated room.

The second bombshell was closer to home and much more devastating. She'd taken to checking the younger two children's Facebook accounts. So far nothing had been added since she'd left. No clues to what they'd been up to and no response to the requests she'd made to contact her or in some other way acknowledge her existence. This time there was a new post on Larry's account. He was announcing to anyone who was interested that his mother and father were getting divorced. "NO!" Laura screamed to an empty room, a world away from her family.

What the fuck was David doing? Divorce followed talking, arguments and explanations. Yes, even sometimes it followed grovelling. The kids? So, she was the main breadwinner in the family and worked a lot. That had been inevitable when Dave quit education after high school and supported her through college. Sure that meant that Dave was the main influence on their children's lives. This shit had gone too far. She prayed thanks to any god who might be listening, that she'd read the signs right and stopped her and Pete's plans before they were consummated. If he didn't already, Dave would soon have an incontrovertible PIs report that said nothing had happened and now, with Peter gone, nothing was going to happen.

After she cooled down, she began thinking rationally. With no one talking to her, she used her considerable intelligence to try to see impartially what Dave was seeing. She made some informed assumptions. Someone had found out about her trip to Bali. That someone couldn't have been Dave. The only evidence of the plan was on their computer at home and Dave was computer illiterate. That somebody, probably Peter's wife, told Dave, perhaps as late as the morning of the flight. All he could possibly know was that she had lied about the destination and was travelling with Peter. Unless? The letter! If Sarah had disregarded her instructions to not read the letter? If Sarah had shared the contents with her father? Laura quickly pulled up the letter and read it through fully opened eyes. It took three attempts, each to an increasing heart rate.

Paragraph 1, a simple statement of facts, no issues there. Paragraph 2, preparation for the commencement of bending the truth, but otherwise factual. Paragraph 3, part truth, part total lies and he now might know it. He was a wonderful lover but she had tired of being in his arms. That piece was self-evident to her and if he'd seen the letter, self-evident to him now. His PI report would show that being here with a girlfriend wasn't the case and having a male friend that her husband knew nothing about, was inappropriate. In the cool light of rationality, she knew that if he'd sent her this letter with a blatant lie, everything else would be instantly suspect. Therefore, her professions of fidelity would be worthless. Going back to the beginning, her statement of his being a wonderful lover, would be suspect as well. All of a sudden she realised his greatest issue. Peter was right; she'd called Dave's whole belief that he was satisfying her into question. His ego would be severely dented. But she hadn't betrayed him. His PI report should confirm that, at least as far as this trip was concerned. He would naturally assume she'd begun straying before this trip, but Laura already had a plan to counter that perception. When had the PI started his surveillance? If it was when they first entered this hotel, then they would already know the separate room thing was an afterthought. Hmmm, Laura thought, too many unknowns.

Fourth paragraph, that had seemed so considerate and loving when she wrote it, now, if he assumed it was all lies, was just hollow garbage. As was the whole letter when viewed in hindsight. It was revealed as the whole load of deceitful crap it was. Laura hoped like heck he hadn't seen it. Conclusion; if he hadn't seen the letter, she had some very fancy footwork to do. If he had, then she suspected that no amount of footwork would do any good at all. The irony of the situation almost brought a smile to her face. Her only saviour at this point was the PI report, proving nothing happened in Bali. Laura hoped the PI was good, but took solace in the fact that they were so good, she hadn't spotted them, even knowing they were there.

Laura metaphorically kicked herself. Why had she done this? That took a full night's thinking, alcohol assisted. Laura concluded that she was a classic wife who had everything and saw a future that was different to the past and resented it. A successful wife and high flying business woman who'd spent a career lying, covering all alternate possibilities, and yes, cheating. A woman approaching menopause that developed an itch that needed scratching. Then relying on her smarts and yes, her husband's naivety, to scratch it without consequences. The new irony didn't make her smile. Laura realised she might soon be a successful business woman and divorcee who still hadn't scratched that damned itch.

The next morning, with no sign that she was going to get her answers here, Laura decided to go home as soon as possible. First, she decided to use her negotiating skills to delay her protagonist taking irreversible steps. She wrote an email to David, via Sarah. Laura made it vague on the basis that she had no idea if Sarah had shown the letter to her father, or if she'd even read it. Her plan; try to wriggle off the divorce hook but plan on coming out ahead if the worst happened. As she was someone who covered all bases, she researched counsellors in her home town and booked an appointment, online, with the one she chose. She then got dressed for the day tour she'd booked four days ago. There would be time to ring the airline later.

Chapter 5

Sarah walks into her father's house and overhears the end of a conversation between her father and his next door neighbour.

"So, apart from telling this Peter guy's wife about your suspicions, what else have you done, Dave?"

"Nothing. Hi Sarah. You know John Smith from next door don't you? He's a lawyer as well. He's kindly agreed to give me some advice."

"Oh, knock it off, Dave. After all the landscaping advice and help you've given me over the years, not to mention all the tools you've lent me, it's the least I can do. Hello, Sarah."

"Hello, John. Are you here to help Dad with the divorce?"

"Now, now, who's talking about divorce? All we know for sure so far, is that your mother lied to us and is spending two weeks in Bali with someone. I, for one, will be waiting to hear what she has to say before I make any decision about divorce."

"Please excuse my dopey father, John. He can be very naïve at times. Yesterday, Mum's lawyer calls me in to sign a trust agreement, effectively stripping my father of control of a chunk of the family assets. Then we check all the bank and investment accounts and find that the vast bulk has disappeared somewhere. She's doing everything she can to clean you out, Dad, face it. Now there's this, it reveals her true colours, finally."

Sarah handed two pages of printed out email to her father. He read it, then handed it to John.

Dear Sarah

Could you print out the attached please and give to your father. Again, I rely on your discretion not to read it. It concerns personal matters between he and myself.

Dear David

I surmise that by now you realise I lied to you about the purpose and destination of my trip this week. When I get back, we will talk about it and hopefully you will listen to the apologies I will give you about the huge error of judgement I have made, with the same patience you have always displayed. Just know two things and please don't do anything until we've talked.

The first is that I love you and only you, always have and always will.

The second is that since we became exclusive, all those years ago, I HAVE been faithful to you. On no occasion have I had sex with anyone but you.

I accept that my actions of late have given you ample reason to doubt that, and am willing to do whatever is necessary to convince you of that one basic fact. What I suggest is that you line up a lie detector test for me when I return, hopefully in the next day or so. I'm quite willing to stop and do it on the way home from the airport, if you can organise it that way. You provide the questions and ask anything you like. With that elephant out of the room, I can then present my apologies for any disrespect you perceive I have shown you.