Hi Folks, How do you follow last week? You don't. You just write another story and realize that some of them are going to do well and others will go over like a fart in church. The last two have been relatively aggressive so this time I wanted to do something little different. Two of my biggest influences are DQS1 and AlleyKat08. In the last story he graced us with, he mentioned that he doesn't think that cheaters are necessarily bad people they've just made mistakes.AK08 is radical about her views on cheaters. I thought it might be interesting to explore this and see if I could find a situation where she'd have sympathy for the cheaters. Some of you won't like this one (naturally) so next week will of course be something different. Thanks, as always, to the incredible Mikothebaby who turned my gibberish into a story and this week had far less time to do it. SS06

"Again today I sat alone. I watched the rain as it fell."

"Another moment passes by. That's when the loneliness is felt."

No a good start, I thought. They were probably the most depressing song lyrics I'd ever written. How the hell was I supposed to help it though? I tended to write the way I felt and on that rainy day only one thing was going through my mind.

I knew that she was with "Him," again. I couldn't help it. I wondered what they were doing and I felt sick to my stomach. I imagined him whispering into her ear, and I wanted to scream.

Of course, she always tells me that she loves me and only me. But what difference does that make?

I imagine him running his hands all over her luscious body or simply touching her and I want to strangle the bastard. Of course, he isn't a bastard at all, he's actually quite noble. It doesn't change a fucking thing. If I thought that for one second I could get away with it, I'd kill that motherfucker. But instead, I sit here on a rainy afternoon and write depressing song lyrics. My band is doing really well and we need new material.

I don't even understand why I do certain things and why I don't do others. Why, for instance, am I playing in a band? I'm twenty four years old and working on my Master's degree in bio chemistry. Between my classes and my internship at Harris Chemical, I'm pretty busy. I'd love to be able to spend the rest of my time with Priya. And to be honest, I really do. We share a lot of the same classes. We study together and our work schedules are the same so really the only time we're apart is when we're at work at our different jobs...

... Or when she's spending time with this bastard. He travels a lot and whenever he's in town, she's with him. In fact, he mostly comes into town just to see her and fuck up my life. After he leaves, it takes a while for us to get over the feelings of guilt and anger that he leaves in his wake. Sometimes it's her, but lately it's been me.

The last time he came into town and left, I'd been already asleep when he was done with her. She came into my room. I still don't understand why she didn't just stay in their hotel room until the next morning. Anyway she came in and crawled into bed with me. I pretended to be asleep. She tried to shake me and I mumbled but continued my pretense. So realizing finally that sex was off of the table, she snuggled herself into a spoon position right in front of me.

Her ass insinuated itself against my crotch and she even had the nerve to pull my arm around her. She let out a contented sigh the way a cat does after stretching and clawing up your fucking couch.

And that was what she'd just done to me. She'd just clawed up my fragile heart and treated me like my feelings mattered to her as much as the couch you aren't done paying for, does to that fucking cat.

I could smell the Indian food on her breath with its pungent spices and I could smell the shitty, flowery smelling incense that he burned in his hotel rooms in her hair. Either she didn't care that I could smell them or it just didn't matter. Maybe she thought that I loved her so much that she could just throw shit in my face and I had no choice. Maybe she thought that I loved her so much that I'd take her back no matter what. And the worst fucking things about it is that she was right. I did love her that much and I would.

From the very first time that I saw Priya, I belonged to her. She's exotic looking with an almost golden complexion. She has long, inky black hair that goes almost down to her waist. Her waist is so tiny that I can put my hands around it and have my fingertips touch. Her breasts are very large for her petite frame and her ass is very well rounded. She has very long, sculptured legs but despite all of that, my favorite of her physical attributes are her large almost luminous, golden eyes and her mouth. Whether it's her wry little smile expressing something, while her sarcasm cuts someone to bone, or the way she winks at me while we're in class; I love her face more than anything. The only thing that comes close to her face is her personality. Priya is everything to me. She's both best friend and girlfriend at the same time. She's my biggest fan and my harshest critic as well.

I remember times when I wrote songs for her that I thought were brilliant and that everyone in the band loved and she'd say, "Meh."

I'd asked her what was wrong with it. Neither she nor I had any formal training in music and some of the guys in the band were music majors. I always figured if they liked it, it had to be good. We'd try the song out at a gig or party and usually her reactions would be correct.

I remember asking what it was about the song that she didn't like. And she'd tell me.

"You can do better, Honey," she'd say. "This song sounds just like the song you wrote me for my birthday. So if you do this song and that song in the same night, most people aren't going to like it as much because they'll think they've already heard it."

She was always pushing for me to do more and do better. All of our friends had gotten to the point where they were simply tired of hearing us talk about each other. My friends got to the point where they refused to even listen to my opinion on women. I remember last week when the SI swimsuit edition came out. Being guys, we talked about it. There was even an argument going on over whether Kate Upton or Cintia Dicker was the most beautiful woman on the planet. They even asked a couple of the girls about it. But they never asked me, not even to break the tie. Finally, one of the girls brought me the magazine and asked me which one I liked. And I told her that I thought they were both beautiful but neither one was nearly as pretty as Priya.

She, on the other hand, sits around drawing little hearts with our names in them and sometimes gets so distracted doing that and dreaming about our future during class, that I have to give her my notes to study from. I guess it's not enough to be in love. We both think that the other was put on this planet just for us.

So the other night, when she crawled into bed and snuggled up to me, it hurt her just as badly I think, when I rolled away from her, as it had hurt me to think about the time that she'd just spent with him.

By now, all of the "He man" guys out there are thinking that I should go find the guy and beat his fucking ass. That isn't possible or likely because I am not Rambo. "Shit, Rambo isn't Rambo anymore. Stallone has had a couple of heart attacks and looks more like Liza Minnelli than Rambo these days. Sorry guys but you're thinking with your fists instead of your brains. This guy is an international figure and has a crew of armed bodyguards that travel everywhere with him. If I so much as farted in the same room with him, the only thing left of me would be a small stain on the floor.

By now, the wimpy guys out there are probably making fucking excuses for her and thinking about how evolved I am to let her do what she needs to do to feel fulfilled or something stupid like that. Well guys, again I'm sorry but your panties are probably too tight. Because you see, I'm not that fucking sophisticated. Cheating is just fucking wrong and Priya is mine. She loves me. She doesn't love him. What they do together is just ... well it's just necessary.

By now the moderates among you are probably thinking about this in what seems like a logical way. Like me, they agree that cheating is wrong and I shouldn't have anything to do with it. But they realize that my relationship is with Priya, not with him. So by now, they're thinking that I should either give her an ultimatum or just kick her ass to the curb. I should either tell her that it's him or me; but not both or I should just dump her. And truly, most of those guys are probably thinking dump her.

They're thinking that no matter how much I love her, she's disrespected me and for both my own piece of mind and my self-respect, I need to get rid of her. Seriously, her having another man implies that I'm not enough for her. She threw the whole thing in my face. She didn't even respect me enough to cheat on me. That makes it seem like I wasn't important enough to her for her to bother covering it up. Then there's the future. What if I did make her stop or give her the big ultimatum? How the hell would I know if she had stopped? And how do I even know that sometime in the future she wouldn't just do it again?

At any rate, the only opinion that matters here is mine. This is after all, my life and my decision. Especially when you guys are all wrong...

You see, Priya is cheating. But she's cheating with me. I'm the other guy. The guy she's with right now is her betrothed. In her country, that's the same thing as being married. She was chosen for him by their parents when she was four years old. Their families are both very old families with a lot of power and influence in their country. Her betrothed is in line to become the next Prince of Pacmanistan. Priya could become the next queen and help to set policy in the country. She came to our country to further her education. The two of us were never supposed to meet. We were never supposed to fall in love. But we did and everything is just fucked up.

I can remember that first afternoon that I saw her. We were both at a picnic on the beach with a large group of mutual friends. There were several unaccompanied girls there, but as I said, from the first time I laid eyes on her, I was hers.

There were also several single guys there and a few of the more confident guys also noticed her. They went over to her and took their shots and got shot down. I think most of them were smart enough after hearing about her situation to simply leave her alone. After all, there were other single girls there.

I saw her across the beach and never went over to her but I was smitten. Everything she did only made the attraction stronger. When I heard her speak, her clipped British sounding accent drove me mad. When she stripped off her T-shirt and shorts to go into the water I had a personal explosion and nearly blacked out. It wasn't so much an explosion as much as it was a painful diversion. All of the blood was diverted very rapidly from one head to the other.

When she got into the water, her screams of delight endeared her to me even more. And I still to this day have visions of her stepping out of the water with all of the wet hair streaming down her back and plastered to her face. To me it's the sexiest thing I've ever seen in my life.

After that, I became more social. I went anywhere that she was going to be, just so I could stare at her from afar. My heart broke every time some guy tried to talk to her. I rejoiced every time she repelled them. And I shuddered to think that her biting sarcasm would someday push me away the very same way.

Over time, we'd made eye contact a few times and it really seemed to me that there was something there between us. But I never made the move that would forever expel me from her presence. I wasn't really in her presence but I was on the periphery and that was far better than being rejected and dismissed.

Finally the fall gave way to winter and our group of friends started to pair off and the numbers of singles diminished greatly. Since winter also lends itself more towards indoor activities this presented an opportunity. There were several times when we went to see movies and all of the couples paired off, leaving the few of us that were singles looking at each other.

That had been an interesting time for me because, I'm not a troll. Almost from the beginning, there had been several women that had expressed an interest in either pursuing me outright or in having me pursue them. And being a young, hormonal, twenty something guy, there were times when I considered giving up. I wondered then exactly what I was giving up. I had nothing going with her after all. She, on the other hand, was seriously committed to someone else. She was also a virgin and in no way considering changing that status. So what exactly was I giving up?

By giving up Priya, or at least giving up secretly stalking her; I'd be giving up frustration. I'd also be giving up being alone and lonely. And best of all, I'd be giving up celibacy because most of the girls our age were not only willing to have sex with their mates but wanted it.

On the other hand, a lot of the girls we hung out with had asked me about Priya. And even more of the guys had caught me staring at her. So, some of our well-meaning friends pushed us together. The group started to do more of the indoor activities which started to include restaurants and bars and dancing. I often danced with a lot of the single girls, but I never once asked Priya to dance.

So it was a huge surprise to me when I sat down at a table after dancing and she just flat out spoke to me.

"Do I have food stuck in my teeth?" she asked. Before I could even look at her she kept talking in that clipped accent with that sarcastic tone. She lifted one arm and then the other.

"Shit, I probably stink," she said. "Is that it?" I had never heard her curse before but she was working herself up and I could see it.

"Or maybe it's something else," she continued. "Maybe it's the hair thing. I don't have sexy blond hair so you don't talk to me. Maybe you're not as smart as everyone seems to think you are. Maybe..."

"Lady, you don't know me at all," I threw in when I got the chance. She grabbed my statement and ran with it.

"Eric Peters," she said. "You're in the top three in your class in every subject. You're majoring in biochemistry. You have an internship with Harris chemical and aren't planning to work for them after graduation. You play guitar and write songs for a band that keeps changing its name. You have a nice voice but you don't like to sing. Your locker is 643 on the first floor of the Chem building. Your academic mentor is Dr. Sheppard just like mine. You don't live in the dorm. You have an apartment off campus. You drive a 2004 Mustang GT. Your car is the 40th anniversary edition and has a black interior and black exterior. You like that because they only made 25 of those and you tell everyone about it. You..."

"Okay," I said. "I surrender. You do know ABOUT me. But you don't know me."

"Okay," she continued, "you're probably not a racist but I think you must be a xenophobe ... you know a nationalist..."

"I know what a xenophobe is," I spat. "I have a good vocabulary and..."

"Yes I know," she continued. "Almost no one will play scrabble with you. I've seen you dance a lot of times with Terri, she's black. You've also danced with Amy and Sarah. You've even stumbled around the floor with Rosa and she's a Latina. But you've never asked me to dance even one time. Terri and Rosa have boyfriends and you danced with them. Amy and Sarah are single. Amy likes you. But once again you've never asked me to dance even one fucking TIME. Why is that? Are you sure I don't stink?"

"Respect and sanity," I said. "I respect your situation and your choice. I'm also sane enough to understand futility." I said.

"What the hell does that mean?" she asked.

"It means that I've watched guys who are far better looking than I am, guys who have a lot more charm and all of that bullshit that girls go for, struck down and then ground down by you. My ego probably wouldn't take the humiliation, so I steered clear."

"You're pretty charming yourself," she said. "How do you know that you wouldn't succeed where the others failed?"

My laugh punctuated the conversation as I walked off. It was the perfect period at the end of her improbable sentence. Surprisingly enough, she followed me as I tried to walk away from her.

"Eric, you're perfect for me," she said. It was bad enough that she was teasing me. Was there really a need to humiliate me as well? The woman I'd fallen for from afar was some type of exotic ball breaker. It wasn't enough for her to freeze out and put down every guy who tried to talk to her. Now it seemed she was expanding to going after guys who weren't bothering her, just so she could humiliate them as well.

"Please find someone else to toy with," I said. I waved at a few of my friends and left the bar. A few moments later I was safe in the arms ... well the seat of my girl. The only woman I had ever loved before I saw Priya. My glass black 04 Mustang GT.

I started the engine and basked in the sound of over three hundred horses channeled through an after-market exhaust system that had been custom made for my car.

As I pulled away from the curb, I saw Priya staring at me in my rear view mirror. I wondered as I drove away if I was making the biggest mistake in my life. I actually had nothing to lose but my pride, and not really much of that. After all, Priya had already blown off every other guy who'd tried to talk to her. If I'd tried and failed, I'd have only been one more guy on the list. And since I had a pretty good reputation as a good guy, it would probably have said far more about her than it did about me.

On the other hand, she'd really had me going when she'd said, "I was perfect for her." Shit, my heart had started beating so hard that I had to get the fuck out of there. I'd even left without saying goodbye to most of my friends. I just had to get out of there so I could breathe.

More than anything else, I wanted the world to flip. I wanted to be in a world where instead of being lumbering, hairy, brutish creatures, men were the graceful beautiful ones. Priya was so God damned beautiful that I sometimes couldn't stand to look at her. Her grace and beauty were evident in everything she did. Watching her walk along the beach as I'd done during the early fall when the weather was still warm enough for that, was like watching a symphony. She turned the simple act of locomotion into an almost balletic performance.

I was so crazy about that woman that it hurt. But the first time I actually speak to her I find out that beneath all of that grace and beauty, she's just another ball-breaking bitch. What a world. The funny thing about it is that most women wonder why some guys don't want to own a woman; we just want to rent them.

I spent the rest of the evening alternately mooning over what could have been and cursing her memory out for the bitch she tried to be. I resolved that since she and I never had anything going except for the imaginary relationship I'd dreamed of since I met her, an imaginary break up was in order.

I spent my last conscious moments before sleep overtook me considering the pros and cons of some of the other single women in our circle. And I decided to be logical and only consider women who had expressed some interest in me. The problem was that when compared to each other, they all had varying degrees of attractiveness and merit. But if I ever compared them to her they came up lacking.

Amy, for instance, had a cute face. She also had a nice rack. If you considered simply volume and eliminated proportion, her boobs were bigger than Priya's by far. Amy was also a nice girl and she was interested in me. So if I was looking at things in a purely logical manner, Amy was the girl for me.

But I've never been the type of guy to consider things on the basis of pure logic. Sure Amy had big boobs but when you compared other factors, such as proportion, Priya's boobs were smaller but her body compared to Amy's is much tinier. Proportionately Priya's boobs were bigger and her waist was a lot tinier. And Amy has no ass at all. If you watched them walking next to each other, the way I had several times during the summer, it was like a graceful gazelle walking next to a cow.

To put it in non-zoological terms it's like driving through a twisting and technical Grand Prix race circuit. If you need to drive that course, do you want to drive it in a semi or a Ferrari?

When I woke up the next day, I'd already figured it out in my mind. The decision I'd made wasn't the one a nice guy would make, but it was probably the best one possible for me. I'd start spending time with Amy but I wouldn't lead her on. I wasn't going to allow it to turn into a relationship, but if she wanted to hang out that was fine. It was also fine if she wanted to turn the non-relationship into a "friends with benefits" thing, because I was all about the benefits. But I was not going to start calling us a couple. The way I looked at it, some pussy and no hassle although with a cow, trumps no pussy and humiliation from a gazelle every day.

Unfortunately, the decision was taken out of my hands. I was on my way to my first class and a little early when I ran into Amy. I waved at her and she came right over to me and looked like she had something on her mind. She did but it wasn't what I expected.

"Eric do you know how to skate?" she asked.

"Well," I said. "I'm not a hockey player, or an ice dancer, but I can probably make it around a rink a couple of times without embarrassing myself or falling all over the place."

"Good, because we're all going skating at the plaza downtown tomorrow night and maybe you can make up for last night, and get your good guy card back," she said.

"How did I lose my good guy card?" I asked. "When we danced last night we seemed to be fine. Oh Shit, sorry I left without saying anything. But I just had to get out of there."

"After making Priya cry, you should have left," she said. I was shocked at her words.

"Amy, how did I make her cry?" I asked. "We had a conversation that's all."

"Eric, you've never asked her to dance," she said.

"Is dancing with her a requirement?" I asked.

"Well ... no but it would be nice," she said. "Eric, you just don't understand life in her country. The women over there are treated like shit. They're second class citizens."

"Amy, you don't understand life over here. Men are treated like shit. WE'RE second class citizens," I said laughing.

"Okay explain that one," she smirked.

"Amy, if you take a typical guy like me, life sucks. I'm not rich. I'm not handsome, I'm a normal guy. The hot women look right through me to see some asshole, that'll end up abusing them or cheating on them or ignoring them. I'll end up with a nice little woman, that'll turn into my mom over the next twenty years. I'll never have an overwhelming passion for her, we'll just be stable. We'll have a couple of kids and by the time we're 45 one or both of us will have cheated on the other. Maybe we'll put it behind us or maybe we'll divorce. If we do divorce, pure loneliness will drive us to someone else."

"If we do divorce, I'm screwed no matter who cheated on whom. I'll get raped in court because that's the way it works. Probably as many as half of the men out there want divorces, but as they say, it's cheaper to keep her."

"Eric, what does this have to do with Priya?" she asked.

"How many guys have you seen ask her out?" I asked. "Lots of them right?" she nodded.

"Have you ever thought about how difficult it is to be a guy? You have to summon up your courage and approach a veritable stranger to ask them if you can spend some time with them. The poor guy has no power. He's at the whim of that woman. How much self-esteem does he have left when she rejects him? Some girls try to be nice about it. They make up excuse after excuse and the guy finally takes the hint and moves on. Other girls figure they don't want to beat around the bush and stretch it out, so they just say no. It' hurts more, but you get over it and move on quickly. But your friend is the type of woman who enjoys putting guys down. She just beats the shit out of them with sarcasm and destroys their ego. I think she gets off on it."

"I think you're wrong Eric," said Amy. "She does have a weird sense of humor, but Priya doesn't have a mean bone in her whole body."

"Amy, yesterday was the first time, I've ever spoken to her. She just walked up to me and started calling me names," I said.

"Eric, she was frustrated and hurt," said Amy. "We spent the whole week trying to teach her how to dance. They don't have many dance clubs in Pacmanistan. And young ladies from good families especially on her level, simply don't dance in public. And then there was you. Like you said Eric, she's had to tell a few guys off. And trust me, Priya has a mouth on her and she isn't afraid to use it. But most of those guys were asking for it. Eric, she can't go on romantic single dates with guys because she's engaged. She can go out in groups with FRIENDS though. She's a really pretty girl Eric, but she doesn't see it. And shit, I'd love to be built like her. But guys don't see it like that. Most of them aren't really angling for a date or a friendship. They just want some pussy and they see dating as a way to get it."

"Eric, you danced with all of the single women in our group yesterday and some of the attached ones. Terri's gigantic football player fiancé doesn't mind you dancing with her whether he's there or not because you're not an asshole and you respect limits. The only girl in our group that wanted to dance that you didn't dance with was Priya, Eric. She was almost in tears. So yeah, she kind of went into attack mode, but what did you expect?"

"Amy, there are other guys in our group. Like you said, someone could have and should have danced with her. It didn't have to be me," I said.

"Eric, it really did have to be," she hissed.

"Why?" I asked.

"Most guys hate dancing," she said. "They do it as a means to an end. With Priya there's not going to be an end. So someone has to do it just to be nice and you're the nice one. The two other single guys that we hang out with are either desperate or a dirt bag, so it really did have to be you. The guys who have girlfriends had better not dance with her or their girlfriends are going to be jealous or angry so they're not going to volunteer, so it should have been you. As a matter of fact, I told her before we got there that you'd probably dance with her. That's why she went after you."

"So everyone just assumed that I'm supposed to be some sort of non-sexual saint. I'm supposed to rescue old ladies and orphans and dance with angry women with no thought of personal gain?" I asked.

"Yes Eric," she laughed. "That's what you're supposed to do."

The next day I drove downtown to the plaza along with a group of my friends. Those of us who had cars drove them and picked up those who didn't. I rented skates and tried out my rusty skills. After an exploratory lap around the rink, I was smiling and enjoying myself. I did a quick jump turn and suddenly remembered how to skate backwards. After that, I skated in time to the music and watched as several of my friends fell and got up and continued skating. Amy was an amazing skater. I skated with her a couple of times. The second time, she started waving something around in her hand.

"We're going dancing tomorrow night if you want the chance to get this back?" she said.

"If I want what back?" I asked.

"Your good guy card," she smirked.

"Amy, why do the girls always get together and decide where we're going?" I asked.

"Because if we let the guys decide, we'd just stay in someone's basement playing video games, drinking beer and fucking," she said smiling. "So are you going to get this back tomorrow or what?"

"Why wait?" I asked. I skated over to the sidelines quickly and leaned over the railing by the table that Priya was sitting at.

I leaned over the railing until our faces were very close. "Why aren't you skating?" I asked.

"Because I don't know how?" she said, sarcastically matching my exact tone.

"If we got off on the wrong foot yesterday, I'm sorry," I said. "I'm kind of shy and I just thought that I'd get humiliated. No one really wants to be hurt, and coming from you it..." I hesitated.

"What do you mean coming from me?" she asked. "I watched you earlier. You went over to Amy and you skated with her. You skated with her more than once. But when you went over to Sarah, she told you no and..."

"Did you see the reason that Sarah told me no and how she handled it?" I asked. "Sarah told me no because she thinks I skate too fast for her. See how she's holding onto the railing as she goes around. She smiled at me and said no way Eric but I'll dance with you when we're done. It was friendly. When you tell guys no, it's not like that."