It was a joke - I swear - just a joke. I didn't mean it and I sure as shit didn't figure that she would take it as anything other than a joke.

Bea and I had been together a little over ten years, eight of them as man and wife. Like most men I was just not sensitive to the mood swings that can take place in women so it was quite a while before I noticed the change that had come over Bea. As is normally the case it was a small trivial thing that brought things to a head. I was dressing for work and when I went to my sock drawer I saw that I didn't have any brown socks.

"Hey Bea, I don't have any brown socks."

"They are on top of the dryer. If you weren't so damn lazy you could have taken them upstairs and put them in your drawer yourself."

That got my attention. In our eight years of marriage Bea had never barked at me like that. I went down to the laundry room, got my socks and underwear and took them up and put them away. I finished dressing and went down to the kitchen. As I sipped my coffee I watched Bea as she fixed the lunches for the kids to take to school. Her movements were quick and angry, like she was slamming things together only without the slamming sound. She finished the lunches and then set them aside and as she did she saw me watching her.

"What are you looking at?"

Another unlikely Bea action. "Nothing, just sitting here sipping my coffee."

She turned back to the counter and I walked over to her, spun her around and kissed her. When I let go she gave me a funny look, "What was that for?"

"Why does it have to be for something? Can't I just kiss the woman I love because I want to?"

Bea gave me quizzical look and then she went off to round up the kids and I left for work.

Driving to work I thought about Bea's behavior and wondered what was behind it. As I thought about it I remembered some other little things that had happened lately that were a little out of the ordinary. I was still thinking about it an hour later when Brenda, my secretary/bookkeeper/file clerk and all around Girl Friday came into the office.

"Why the long face boss?"

I told her about my morning.

"It sounds to me like the lady doesn't get out of the house enough. When was the last time you took her out for a night on the town?"

I sat there trying to remember the last time when Brenda said, "If you have to think about boss, it has been way to long. Get her out of the house. Take her away from the house and the kids for a weekend if you can, if not that, at least a night of dinner and dancing."

That night when I got home I made some phone calls. I arranged for my folks to take the kids for the weekend and I called and made reservations at a hotel on the beach. Then I went into the living room where Bea was watching television. I dropped down on the couch beside her and gave her the news.

"Are you serious?"

"You bet. Just you and me at the beach for two days and two nights."

"But I don't have a thing to wear."

"So what? You have three days to shop for what you need. All you have to do is be ready to leave when I get home from work on Friday."

It was too late to hit the beach when we checked in Friday evening so I told Bea to dress for dinner and a night of dancing. When I came out of the shower Bea was standing in front of the mirror looking at herself in a black cocktail dress.

"I don't know. I don't think I look good enough anymore to get away with wearing something like this."

"Nonsense. You look as sexy as all get out in that dress. You could have any man you want" and then I laughed and said, "As long as I get to watch."

It was a joke! Honest to God, I was just trying to cheer her up - give her some of her old confidence back. She gave me a queer look and then said, "Well okay, if you think that it looks all right."

The evening went great. A good dinner, with several glasses of wine, was followed by a night of dancing and several margaritas. By eleven o'clock Bea was feeling no pain and she had reached that giggly mood that I loved so well. When Bea reaches that stage she loses her inhibitions and becomes a pure sexual animal in bed. I left her at the table and went to the bathroom and when I came back she wasn't there. I looked around for her and spotted her out on the dance floor with a black guy who had to be ten years younger than she was. Getting up and dancing with a stranger and a black one at that was so unlike Bea that I began to wonder if she'd had one margarita too many.

I watched the two of them dance and while I couldn't be sure from my angle I thought that the man just might have his hand on Bea's ass. The song ended, but the two of them stayed on the floor and waited for the next number. The next song was a very slow dance and, at least to me, the two of them were dancing much closer than a married woman should allow. From what I was seeing, or thought I was seeing, the asshole was feeling up my wife on the dance floor. The music stopped, but the guy didn't bring Bea back to our table, instead he walked her to an empty table and sat down with her. They talked for a couple of minutes and while I sat there and watched I saw him drop his hand on Bea's leg. Bea didn't do anything to stop him as his hand moved up her leg and I wondered just what the hell was going on. Oh I knew only too well what he was up too, but what the fuck was Bea doing?

His hand moved up her leg another inch and I decided that enough was enough and I started to stand up and go over to the table, but even as I stood Bea stood up, leaned over and kissed the guy on his cheek and then headed for our table. She didn't sit down, but took my arm and said, "Get me out of here. Get me to bed baby, I need it bad."