Chapter 9: The Conversation Part 2

It was well after three in the morning when he'd finally worked out why he was so mad. That damn bitch was robbing him of the illusion of the happy marriage he'd thought he'd had. She had made a fool of him for years and that made him mad as hell. What robbed his sleep though was anger at himself that he still cared about what she had done and why. He didn't love her, that was certain, but he felt a deep need to understand what had happened, why he'd been so wrong about the most important relationship in his life.

Even Early's sour mood couldn't destroy the epicurean's delight they were served at lunch. By mutual agreement last night's discussion wasn't mentioned until they'd left the restaurant and were strolling the ship looking for an isolated corner for a private chat.

As they strolled they discovered vast empty spaces, whole lounges as empty as a honky-tonk at breakfast, but Early couldn't settle and they walked on making small talk. Finally, Susan said, "Early, my cheating never humiliated you or made you less of a man. I know that technically I made you a cuckold, but you never accepted it, not even for a second, and it doesn't reflect on you at all, except perhaps because you looked at me through the lens of love and didn't see what a horrible person I really am. In your defense, no one else ever knew either. I never felt the need to 'share' my stupidity with my girlfriends or with anyone else. Not one of the men I cheated with ever knew my name, much less yours. You never saw them and they never had anything to lord over you. Not that you have to believe me, but I've never had a sex partner whose skills put them in your universe, much less in your class.

"My cheating had nothing to do with you, but only with the rottenness of my character. I was very careful, except with John, never to do anything that might be discovered by you. There were always days between the time I was with someone else and when I was with you. I never gave you sloppy seconds or anything like that. I never thought about any sex partner when I was with you, never, not a single time. I did think about you every time I was with someone else. I think that was one reason that the actual sex was never very good. Oh, and I certainly never did anything with a sex partner, that's what I called them, and how I thought of them, not really men, just sex partners. I never did anything sexually with them that I refused to do with you. The only position was standard missionary.

"Early, you have nothing to hang your head about. I'm a smart woman and a skilled liar, I'm a lawyer, and I'm trained to hide my real feelings which I did well. You need to understand that you're the 100% victim here. My bad behavior began years before I ever met you and the only reason you caught me was because I was actually trying not to be involved with John."

Early whirled on her, "So you thought no harm no foul? What I didn't know wouldn't hurt me? What about AIDS or a hundred other things..."

Susan gripped Early's arms, "Yes, to an extent I thought 'no harm, no foul.' I was that stupid, but I had had years of experience that PROVED I would never get caught. Early, I'm not trying to justify what I did. I will suffer the rest of my life for it and I will never complain that my punishment is unfair. The major reason was that I just didn't think of what I was doing as cheating on you. You weren't any part of it. I said the words 'forsaking all others, ' but I never meant them. I would never have agreed to an open marriage, but after thinking about it for the years since that weekend with John, I'm sure I would not have accepted you doing what I did either. It's not logical and I wasn't fair. I was a selfish bitch and awfully stupid for such a smart woman."

Early felt his blood pressure rising, "And you think I should just forgive you and pretend none of this ever happened? Well that's..."

"Early! You do have to forgive me, you don't have to pretend it didn't happen, you don't even have to let me try to make it up. I don't mean by marrying me either, I mean by making you whole. That was a terrible letter; my only excuse is that I was dying inside while I wrote it, but there were a lot of things I got right even back then. I didn't mean to try to manipulate you, it was... I guess I was trying manipulate you but I didn't expect you to come back to me. Even then I knew that wouldn't be best for you and I want what is best for you more than I want anything else."

Early felt his guts twist. He was engaged in a sort of emotional judo. Every time he lashed out at her, he felt like he was kicking a puppy, and his self-disgust out-weighed any pleasure the emotional hitting may have brought him. And most frustrating to him, he didn't think he was any closer to understanding the answers he so desperately wanted. "Susan, in the simplest terms you can, why did you cheat on me?"

Susan looked up at him, her eyes full of love and sadness. "Early, until you understand it wasn't simple you won't understand my answers. The closest to simple was Stickner. He was putting pressure on me to reward him for his help. I had some vague plan to turn the tables on him; he was a pretty slimy creature, but for heaven's sake I had all the family money to be totally independent. For that matter I could take him on in a sexual harassment suit that would have ruined him. I agreed to break my own rules because I wanted to make sure that he would never reveal what we did and he wouldn't hit on someone else who didn't have my resources. He was the only person I ever spent the night with besides you, and that includes my old lovers. I had wired the room we were going to be in that night, but he wouldn't have gone if I hadn't agreed to all the stuff we did at his house first. I'm so sorry you had to see that.

"No, all that is the flimsiest cover on the real reason, I wanted to see what it was like to be with someone who used other people sexually like I did. It was worse than horrible by the way. Oh, the sex was almost adequate, but if he'd been a lover he would have been the worst. That's part of what made it so bad. It was the only time I had ever felt like I was cheating. When we talked on the phone that first time, when I lied to you, my stomach hurt. I'd like to say I'd decided to change to stop fucking around before you caught me, before I knew the consequences, but I can't honestly swear that he would have been the last one. After Stickner I would have stopped, but I don't know that I would never have started again. Early, can you see what an awful person you were married to? Can you see how much better you are off without me as your wife? Why did I cheat? Because I was a cheater and I didn't value my vows. Because I loved the tension of..."

She turned away, crying again. Early had to hold one hand with the other, knuckles turning white, to keep from taking her in his arms to comfort her. He hated her yet it hurt to see her hurting. It bothered him to hear her talk about herself the way she did--he felt an impulse to defend her. At the same time he wanted to rail at her, to call her every vile name he could conjure up. Turning on his heel Early marched off, leaving a sobbing Susan leaning over a railing.

By dinner time Early knew that he was releasing some of the anger that left his muscles twitching. That anger had been a constant part of him since he first saw the private detective's pictures. He was relieved that he didn't see her in Signatures that evening, although a small part of him wanted to lash out and tell her to stay out of his way, a part he couldn't understand wanted to hear more, to understand. Have I become a glutton for punishment or what?

The next day the ship re-lived Monday all over again as they crossed the International Date Line. Early spent much of the day in his suite just thinking and trying to understand why he was reacting the way he was.

On Tuesday May 2nd they arrived at Bora Bora right on schedule at 9:00 AM. Early left with the first group but didn't take the excursion he'd booked. Instead he set off wandering and soon found himself in the poorest section of the island. He was struck by two things--first the squalor of third world poverty. But it was what he noticed second that had the stronger emotional impact. He saw little scenes of people who were laughing, who seemed happy despite their poverty. The irony wasn't lost on him. In the hierarchy of the ship, his cabin suite placed him at the pinnacle of wealth and luxury, yet these people whose lifetime earnings probably wouldn't pay for his twenty-seven-night cruise seemed so much happier than he.

And all because a cheating bitch decided to dump me... Early paused in mid-thought. He'd dumped Susan she hadn't dumped him! She'd never wanted the divorce, she wanted...

Early had continued walking but now stopped dead in his tracks. She had been the one to throw the marriage away. By cheating on him, right from the start she'd never valued their marriage, never valued him! She had never put him first, she'd never forsaken all others... He'd done what he could to punish her, but now looking honestly at the situation he understood that a major reason he hadn't been able to move on was because he hated being dumped, especially when he didn't understand it.

This whole cheating from before they'd even met didn't make any sense. He believed her, but it was just so out of character with everything else he thought he knew about her. Forsaking all others meant so much more than not having sex outside of the marriage. It meant that your spouse would be the most important person in your life. More important than your parents, more important than your children... He'd always been sure Susan had done that. She'd shown in so many ways by her actions that he did place his happiness above her own... except... except... The pain of her betrayal had receded over time, but the pain of having her shred the most important relationship of his whole life hadn't faded even a smidgen.

Susan had forced him to throw her out; she had understood that he wouldn't tolerate another man in their marriage, but even though she gave, and had always given, every indication that she wanted their marriage as much as he, she'd made it impossible. She hadn't attempted to excuse her behavior with psychobabble about being a sex addict or any other such nonsense, but... but why did she feel the need to cheat? Early still didn't understand, and it made his guts twist.

Early spent the next three days involved in doing tourist stuff, first on Moorea then at Papeete. He did some sightseeing, the obligatory para-sailing, but he spent as much time as he could snorkeling. One of the things that Early had learned on this trip was that he loved snorkeling. He knew that the tour boat operators fed the fish at the same locations every time to draw fish, but then so did deer lease operators. What was important was that it felt like you were swimming in an aquarium.

Over his life, Early had made many attempts to have an aquarium. He shuddered to think about how much he'd spent trying to have one. At one point he was buying 25 Neons a week while cleaning his tank every other day. Some people have a green thumb and others a talent for raising fish... Susan had a talent for both. Their garden had always been beautiful, and she'd had a gorgeous aquarium before they married.

By that time Early had given up years earlier, and in a rare pique had told her he didn't really like private aquariums. Truthfully, he'd been afraid he'd kill them and didn't want the responsibility of trying to maintain Susan's beloved fish. Susan had given her aquarium away and never mentioned it. How can a woman love me enough to give away her favorite hobby, yet cheat on me?