Chapter 1

I never saw it coming; but then, I guess no one ever does. It comes straight out of the blue, nine times out of ten, like an unexpected lightning strike. While this strike won't really kill you, it does hurt your heart, and kills love, trust, and respect.

What am I talking about; divorce, of course. Yeah, a word that instills fear in everyone's heart. It rips the heart out your chest, and then stomps on it while it's it still beating away, desperately trying to understand why and how could this happen?

I'm Gerry Dunne; thirty-five years old and average in every way, I guess. I'm 5'11", weigh in at 195, and I'm starting to get a little 'tire' around the middle. I'm an electrical engineer by trade, and I do a little editing for some author friends on the internet. I met my lovely ... no, strike that! I met the bitch who I married in college. I was in my junior year, and I bumped into this girl running out of a classroom. It was a Monday, and I was walking fast to make my next class, when this redhead slammed into me, knocking my books, as well as hers, to the floor.

"Watch where you're going, Asshole! I'm now going to be late for my next class, because of you, you big oaf."

"Excuse me, Miss, but I was watching where I was going, and you just rushed out of that door without looking and ran into me. No problem; I'll get your books for you."

I bent down to pick our books up. I hit my head on her head as she too bent forward to pick her books up.

"God damnit, now look at what you did. You have got to be the biggest, dumbest, clumsiest idiot in this whole fucking school," she said.

She stormed off with her books, and that was it.

I was standing there scratching my head about what the heck had just happened. As I picked the rest of the books up off the floor, I found that my Calculus II book was missing, and a Principles of Marketing I book was in its place. I looked inside the book, and it had a name and phone number. I hoped that the name and number belonged to the rude girl, so that I could get my Calc book back. I had put my name in it, but that was all.

I went on to my drafting class and thought nothing more about it. I would contact this redheaded hellion after classes today. I'd at least try to see if the name written in the book was really the person who ran into me earlier. I had two more classes after my drafting class; and, of course, Calculus was one of them.

Upon entering Professor Hardesty's classroom, I asked him if he had an extra textbook that I could use since mine was accidently taken by another student. I explained about our little run in to him. He handed me a book from his bookcase and asked that it be returned to him after class. I thanked him and sat down ready for class. I returned Dr. Hardesty's book after class, and left for the student union. Once there, I used the pay phone and called the number listed in the book.

"Hello, you have reached Gail and Colleen; we're not available right now, but if you leave a name and phone number, we'll get back to you as soon as we can. Please wait for the beep ... beep."

"Hi, I'm Gerry Dunne, and I hope that one of you has my Calculus II book. I have a Principles of Marketing I book that belongs to Colleen O'Brian. You can reach me at the following number after six this evening; thank you," I said, and gave my dorm's phone number.

I did my duty and could wait a bit, since I didn't have Calc again until Wednesday. I did have some homework, but I could use my roommate's book to get it done. Thank goodness that we were both engineering students. I left the student union, drove my truck to the dorm, and headed up to study for tomorrow's classes.

There was a knock on my door shortly after six. Gary Noonan said that I had a phone call in the hall.

"Gerry, I hope that you can understand the bitch on the phone. She started cussing me out until I said I wasn't you. Man, what's gotten into her?"

"I have no idea, Gary, but she is a redheaded Irish woman by the name of Colleen O'Brian. I guess the redheaded temper comes with the name and the hair."

"You might want to hold the phone away from your ear, because she sure cleaned the wax out of mine tonight."

"Thanks, Gary. I'm forewarned."

Picking up the receiver, I said, "This is Gerry, you must be Colleen."

Gary was right, what I got was uncontrolled screaming.

"How dare you take my book? I needed it for that next class and I had to wait until now to call you to get my book back. Where are you so that you can bring me my book?"

"Excuse me, Miss O'Brian, but you also have a book of mine that I would like returned. I can meet you either in the library, or the student union, in a half an hour, so that we can exchange books, if that's convenient. Please let me know if you have another place in mind."

"Get your dumb stupid ass over to the library in fifteen minutes or I'll have your ass handed to you on a platter. Now get going, you fucking asshole!"

She hung up. Wow, what a temper. I did kind of notice that she was about 5' 4", at about 125 pounds, and had fiery red hair. I see that her temper is just as fiery as her hair ... and what a mouth on her!

"That is one bitch that I will have to stay away from ... far away," I said.

I now see why. She didn't change; she just mellowed a bit, aged until the current time, and has now exploded into a maelstrom of hate and destruction. More on that later.

I went back to my room, grabbed her book, and hotfooted it over to the library. Thank goodness that my dorm was only three buildings away from the library. I checked inside and she wasn't there yet, so I waited outside. I was there about fifteen minutes, and no fireball had showed up yet, so I went inside again, looked around the checkout desk, and didn't see Colleen. I asked the librarian if she had seen a short redheaded ball of fire, and she said no. So I went outside again to see if she was out there. Long story short, I waited almost an hour before I saw her headed my way. I could almost see the heat waves coming off of her as she headed up the steps to where I was seated on the wall by the entrance.

"Well, it's about goddamned time you got here, Colleen. I've been waiting for over an hour for your scrawny ass to show up. Here's your book; now where the hell is mine?" I asked, trying to defuse the fire I saw in her eyes.

"You're wrong on both counts, Asshole. I'm not Colleen; I'm Gail Sanders, and I saw you walk into the library not five minutes ago."

"Yeah, I walked into the library five minutes ago, looking to see if you came in a different door. I got here at 6:22, and I've been either sitting out here, or going inside to look for your sorry ass, ever since then." I looked at my watch and said, "It is now 7:36, and you told me to be here fifteen minutes after you called me. I left my dorm at 6:11, and I was here within that fifteen minutes, but you weren't. So where is my Calculus book, Bitch?"

I would never have expected the response I got from my tirade.

"I'm so sorry, Mr. Dunne, here's your book, and may I please have my roommate's book? I'm very sorry about my earlier outburst. I had grabbed Colleen's book by mistake today. Please accept my apology for the way in which I've treated you. I assumed that you were some asshole who bumped into me to take advantage of me. I never expected someone like you. You were so sweet over the phone, and then I'm so late coming here. I was shocked by your attitude and by what you said; but I guess that you had every right to cuss at me, like I did to you, both when we first met and over the phone. That's not the real me; it is kind of a defensive mechanism that I use when I am embarrassed or upset. Please forgive me."

"Of course, Miss Sanders. Shall we try this again? Hello, I'm Gerry Dunne, and I am pleased to make your acquaintance, Miss Sanders. Would you care to go over to the student union and have coffee or a Coke? My treat."

"Why, thank you, Mr. Dunne, I think I'd like that very much."

That is how it all started. We had a Coke. Well, I had a Pepsi and she had a Dr. Pepper, but all sodas are Cokes down here in the south. It's not uncommon to hear, 'What kind of Coke did you want? We have all kinds.' We got to talking, and then we noticed the time. It was midnight and we both had early classes in the morning.

I called Gail on Wednesday to see if I could take her out to dinner and a movie on Saturday. She accepted, and I had asked for her hand in marriage by January of my senior year. We visited both her parents and mine during spring break of that year, and I formally asked her father for her hand. We stayed engaged until she graduated a year later. I graduated a year ahead of Gail, and got a great job at a major electronics firm in Austin. Gail was able to find a job at Geiger Manufacturing, and we got married a year after Gail graduated.

Things went fairly smooth for the next five years. We had a few hiccups, and a couple of arguments where Gail became a super-bitch, just as when we first met; but things went well, overall. I asked about children about a year after we were married, and Gail asked to wait another year so she could get established.

Jeremy came along the next year, and Bethany came into our lives a year later. Gail called a halt to the baby factory. We didn't want to mess with pills, patches, diaphragms, foam, or condoms, so I got snipped. I was all for it. It could be reversed, and was fairly painless compared to having a baby. When Bethany and Gail were still in the hospital; I went to my doctor, and got clipped. I should be ready to continue our sex life by the time the doctor cleared Gail to resume bedroom activities. We continued to have a very active sex life, three to four times a week, and that was fine by me.

Anyway, fast forward ten years. Beth is in fifth grade, Jeremy is in sixth, and things were looking up. Gail was due for a promotion to Marketing Manager, and I had been made Manager of Engineering Services.