Geena had been out of sorts for almost a month and I knew that something was wrong, but every time I tried to talk to her she would tell me that nothing was wrong, she was just tired. Well I could understand that. Taking care of a full time job and two kids can do that to you. I'm sorry to say that I wasn't feeling all that sympathetic toward her problem. She didn't have to work and I hadn't wanted her to go to work, but she said that she needed to get out of the house during the day when the kids were in school. She got a job as a secretary at a firm not too far from the house and it seemed to keep her happy and when she was happy she kept me happy so I stopped arguing with her about it.

The one thing that I didn't really like about Geena working was that one night a week she would stop after work for a drink with her coworkers. I'm not against a little social drinking, but several times Geena had come home in a condition that bordered on being drunk and I didn't like the idea of her being out there driving like that. She insisted that she was all right and promised me that she would call a cab or call me anytime she had what she considered too much. I didn't press things, which was a mistake, one of several in fact, and it was a mistake that probably ended our marriage.

I came home from work one night and found Geena sitting at the kitchen table and crying. I wouldn't let her put me off and I pushed hard to find out what was wrong. In retrospect I should have left it alone. It was a classic case of what I didn't know hadn't hurt me. Geena was overcome with guilt because she had been cheating on me and once the admission had been made the story just poured out of her.

It had happened the very first night that she had stopped with her co-workers for drinks after work. There were fourteen of them sitting around three tables that had been pushed together and after a couple of drinks one of the guys had talked Geena out onto the dance floor. She hadn't really felt comfortable doing it, but most of the others were out on the floor and she didn't want to be a party pooper. A couple of more drinks and she was pretty loose and she had danced with all six of the men sitting at her table. A couple more drinks and when one of the guys kissed her she didn't resist. She didn't think anything about it because it had happened at other parties that she had attended with me and no harm had come of it. Soon every one of the guys had kissed her and a couple had felt her up and all of a sudden she found herself on a back seat with her legs up on a man's shoulders.

"I didn't mean to do it. Honest to God I didn't. I don't even know how it happened. One minute I was dancing with Tony and then all of a sudden he was screwing me. I don't even remember walking out to the car."

Tony had fucked her three times and then they had gone back into the bar. Geena had expected the other girls in the party to sneer at her and treat her like the slut she felt like, but the other girls acted like it was normally accepted behavior. It turned out that it was, but Geena hadn't known it at the time. She left the bar confused over what had happened and fearful of what I would do when I found out. She hadn't planned on hiding it from me - she had intended to confess and ask me to forgive her, but the closer she got to home the faster her courage drained from her. By the time she reached our front door she was determined to keep me from finding out what she had done.

"You might have forgiven me for being unfaithful, especially since I was drunk, but I knew that you would never forgive me for the other."

"What other?"

"He was black."

To understand Geena's reluctance to bring up the subject of her black lover you have to know a little about me. I was born and raised in South Carolina and in the 30's, 40's and 50's South Carolina was not a hotbed of desegregation. Quite the opposite. I grew up with the attitudes of my family and friends. In short - I was pretty much a racist. I was a product of the times when there were separate drinking fountains and separate restrooms for blacks and whites and the word 'nigger' had a prominent place in my vocabulary. After leaving South Carolina and seeing some of the rest of the world there were some changes in my attitude. I served with blacks in the Army, I worked with quite a few in different jobs and in time I came to accept that ninety percent of what I was taught when I was young was bullshit. But a few things still remained and chief among them was the belief that blacks and whites should keep to their own. My wife knew this about me very well. Her fear of my reaction to being told that she had just been fucked by a nigger was well founded.

My disgust at her revelation registered on my face and Geena saw it, but instead of intimidating her it seemed to make her more defiant and the rest of the story started coming out. The following week she had not stopped with the girls after work. The next day at work they asked her why and she told them that she had been so mortified by what she had done with Tony that she was having a hard time facing them at work, let alone after. The girls had laughed and then had told her that they all had made the trip out to the parking lot at one time or another. In fact two of them had been out there at the same time she was. They also told her that the other guys had been looking forward to having fun with her now that Tony had broken the ice. Geena told them that the first time was a major mistake and that she couldn't let it happen again. She was assured that she had nothing to be afraid of as the guys always accepted no as an answer.