Chapter 8

"Mike, I know that you won't believe me but I want to make sure that you know that despite my horrible behavior I really do love you. I am sorry for what I have done to you and our children. That being said, I can tell by your behavior this morning that you have made some kind of decision about us. I'd like to know where I stand. Should I pack my bags or what?"

Mike just sat there looking at her for almost five minutes. At the end of that time, she was trying to hide her anxiety and not cry again. Somberly he said, "Your right, Mary. I have made a decision about our marriage, our children, and us."

"Before I tell you what my final decision will be, I believe that we need to talk. Although I have made a decision, it is not locked in stone and depending on some of the answers that you give me, my decision can be changed."

"Ok Mike, I know that you are aware that I've been in counseling for the past several weeks. I haven't figured out all the answers but there are some things that I have discovered about myself. Since you are the one who wants to discuss our relationship, I'll just let you take the lead."

"Thanks Mary. I know exactly where to start this conversation. This question has been on my mind for several months. I have tried and tried to find an answer but even now I don't have a clue." Mike looked at Mary and then taking a deep breath continued, "Why?"

Confused by the single word, Mary asked, "What do you mean why?" Then like a revelation, she suddenly understood. "You couldn't have started out with an easier question?" She laughed ruefully. "Actually if you want to know, my counselor and I spent hours on this exact question. There are many excuses why I had my affair. I had lost weight and was feeling good about myself. Sean was really pouring on the compliments and charm. You and I were not as close at that time as we had been. But these and others are only excuses and not the reason."

"There was no way that I could compete with that asshole." Mike said heatedly. How could I even come close? All he had on his plate was that half-assed job of his and getting in your pants. I had my job, our children, a wife, bills, house and yard chores, and all the other little things that would supposedly let you know that I was your loving and faithful husband."

"Yes I know and I understand now that Sean had been very single minded in his goals concerning me. He had never cared for a single moment about you or our marriage. He would never have been successful if I had simply shut him down. However, I liked his attention and he could see that I did. When I began to respond to him, he poured it on and the more I got, the more I wanted. After a while it was all I wanted."

"Getting back to your question, the reason that I was unfaithful was very simple. After all the excuses and other crap, it boiled down to one phrase. I slept with Sean because I wanted to and I continued the affair because I could. This is the one thing that Phil, my counselor, and I finally figured out. I knew that you loved me without any reservations. You had always tried to give me anything and everything I wanted. Over time I came to believe that if it was what I wanted than it was ok. In retrospect, I had become a completely selfish person. My wants and desires took precedence over you and our children. My husband and family became secondary to my needs and me. I'll admit that initially there was some guilt but it wasn't long before I never gave my actions a second thought."

With a little fear on her face and a slight tremble in her voice she continued, "I know that what I just said is probably very harsh. I could probably have tried to sugar coat it some or maybe give it a slant to try to make myself appear to be less selfish. I know that my words continue to hurt you. I simply cannot lie to you anymore. You can continue to ask me questions and I'm going to do my absolute best to give you as honest an answer as I am capable of doing."

She could see several emotions quickly cross his face. There was anger and hurt but the most prominent feeling was sadness. She couldn't repress the pain that she felt because of her insensitive behavior over the last two years. If anyone had asked her at that exact moment if she thought she was a good person, her answer would have been a resounding NO!

"Although I must admit your answer was very honest, it also ripped a humongous hole in my heart. I can't help but be surprised that even after all this time and all that has happened that I can still feel so much pain. Do you still love me and what do you want to do about this awful and very fucked up marriage?"

"This is much easier to answer than your first question. It is very simple and I can answer the first part with a straightforward YES! I do love you. I know that for a long time I did not show you my love and maybe even for a while I did not love you when my affair was at its peak. When you left to go to Hawaii, I did not really care. It's funny but the longer you were gone the more I came to miss you and the more I wanted your love and companionship."

"When you were here with me, I didn't have any reason to miss you. You were always there if I decided to become your loving, faithful wife again. Your absence and the more distant you became to me made me want you again. I can't explain it but maybe it is true that absence really does make the heart grow fonder. I know in my case, it is true. There towards the end, my relationship with Sean became to be more irritating that anything else. When I no longer had you and I only had him, It didn't take a long time to realize that with Sean I had no relationship other than the sex. There was absolutely nothing else there."

"I must admit that I was extremely naïve to expect that after your return, we would be able to make any kind of return to our marriage prior to my affair. In the back of my mind, I know that I was aware of Kelli but I hoped that if I ignored your affair I could get you back. I desperately wanted my marriage with you back and I was willing to overlook a lot of things to reach that goal."

"That's mighty gracious of you." Mike said with no small amount of sarcasm. "You will overlook a few months for me and all I have to do is overlook a few years. Of course I also have to overlook all the crap, deception and lies you fed me as well. In fact there are so many things you want me to overlook that maybe I should make a list to ensure that I don't miss any."

The shocked look on Mary's face brought him up short. He immediately reminded himself that this was not supposed to be an opportunity to take cheap shots at his wife. "I'm sorry Mary. Even though that is exactly how I feel, this is neither the time nor the place for that type of confrontation. I will try to keep things under control so that we can finally have a real conversation on just what we each want from this whole mess."

"Thanks Mike. I'm well aware of how you feel and even though your comments are true, they still hurt. So, what is next?"

"Do you honestly feel any regrets because Sean is gone and you apparently have not been getting any sex for some time now? Do you think that maybe you should have kept him around until at least we decided if we were going to split or not? Finally, why did you even bother to stay married to me when, during your affair, you obviously preferred his company to mine and you absolutely preferred sex with him rather than with me?

"You probably think that I'm lying but I'm telling you the truth when I say that the only regret I have is that I ever was unfaithful to you. I have made many mistakes in my life but sleeping with Sean was worse than all of the others put together."

"This may hurt but you deserve the truth. I honestly did consider leaving you for Sean several times but when push came to shove, I just couldn't take that final step. I'm sure subconsciously that I knew I was not in love with him. I may have been falling out of love with you but I never got to the point of falling in love with him."

"In looking back over the years we have been married I now realize that if sex were my final criteria for choosing my mate than my choice would have to be you."

Mike couldn't help it. He laughed. He roared! Finally he was able to choke out, "That's the biggest pile of bull shit I have ever heard in my entire life. How can you say that with a straight face? Mary that is one of the funniest things I have ever heard you say. I may still be laughing about that into next week."

"It's not funny and I god damn sure am not laughing!" Mary couldn't keep the anger out of her voice. "I told you that I was not going to lie. We had years of a wonderful marriage with countless times of making love. I had less than two years with Sean and I couldn't even tell you if we ever made love. We fucked a lot but that will never be able to compare with the loving sex that you and I had for so long. That is my biggest regret. That I gave up so much love for so little ... I don't even know what I got from him but it sure as fuck wasn't what you and I once had. I will do anything and I mean anything to get that back!"

"Mike, don't you even realize the difference? What Sean and I got from each other we took and what you and I got from each other we gave honestly and freely with love. Can't you see that is why I have been trying so hard to get you to understand I don't want to lose you? I want to be yours for the rest of our lives."

"Well Mary we could sit here for the next several days and I could continue to ask you more questions. Somehow I am just too tired and I really don't want to continue this any longer. Do you have anything for me?

The surprised look on her face puzzled him and then she said, "Don't you want to know about me and Sean? I mean that I've been so sure that you would want to know when, where and how and everything else about my affair."

Mike looked down at his hands for a moment and then looking her directly in the eye, "At first I wanted to know everything. I just had to know what was so great about him that made it worth your while to throw away our marriage and family. I wanted to know about the relationship. Do you love him? Is his dick bigger than mine? Was the sex so much better with him? What different positions did you share with him? How many things did you do for him that you refused to do for me?"

Pausing again, he took another deep breath, "But now ... It doesn't matter anymore. The only thing that is important to me is the way you treated me while you were fucking him. The lack of love, lack of respect and the general apathy that you displayed towards me has hurt me and led me to despair so deep that it scares me. More than once I have even considered suicide. I almost justified that by saying that at least I was worth more to you dead than alive."

"Oh my god! I never meant to hurt you so badly. Mike, I was not trying to hurt you. My only excuse is that I was so deeply mired in my own selfishness that I refused to even entertain any thoughts about how this might have been affecting you. If you had hurt yourself or taken your own life, the guilt would have totally destroyed me. It might have even driven me to take my own life."

"Mary that is enough about that. I believe we are both well beyond doing anything as foolish as that. We must always remember that the children still need both of us. Now getting back on track, I don't believe that you completely understand just what kind of woman you have been for the last few years. You don't begin to come close to understanding my pain and anger. I loved you with my heart and soul. I trusted you with my life. I would have given my life to keep you safe. Despite all the obvious signs that you gave out, I just could not accept that you were giving your body and your love to another man. My love for your was so strong that I was able to deny your affair for almost two years. Two years of being your doormat and so cowardly accepting even the little affection that you were willing to give me. There towards the end, you didn't even bother giving me my quarterly mercy fuck. My trust in you is completely destroyed. If you said that the sun was rising in the east than I would immediately look to the west to see if you were lying."

"I hope that your counselor has helped you with some of your issues. I believe that you do need to understand how you became such a mean evil bitch. That is probably the only way that you will ever be able to have a relationship with another man. If you don't reach that knowledge than you will most likely become a cheater again in the future. As of this moment the only trust I could have in you would be in dealing with the welfare of our children. In any other area there would always be a level of reserve that I would have about anything you may say or do."