Fool's Gold Ch. 04

"When I met Alan at the restaurant, he must have caught my mood because he started to ask me all sorts of questions about what was wrong. He finally got me to admit that you and I had had a fight, and before I knew it, I had told him everything. All my fears about you having an affair, my doubts." Anne smiled bitterly. "I guess you could say that I gave him everything he needed to seduce me."

Anne hung her head in shame.

"I hate to admit it, but there's a lot of truth to idea that I started my affair with Alan to get revenge on you. I was so upset over what I thought you were doing, that it made me receptive to him."

Anne looked at me with sad determination. "But I can't blame everything on Alan. He just gave me the opportunity. I accepted it. He never forced me or made me do anything that I didn't want to do. He didn't entrap me into sleeping with him, and it never would have happened if I hadn't been petty enough to try to pay you back.

"Alan's a salesman. What he was selling to me was the once in a lifetime opportunity to be his lover." Anne gave a sardonic snort. "I fell for his pitch. He pushed me over the edge. He punched every button he could find to get into my bed that night. He didn't point out the weak spots in my fears; he amplified them. He didn't attack you, but he expressed just enough doubt to show that he thought that I was right. He encouraged every idea I had about getting even with you.

"The whole time he was doing this, he was working on my vanity too. Telling me how attractive I was and how he wanted to get to know me better." She grimaced. "He was a subtle as a sledgehammer but in the mood that I was in, it did the trick. By the time we finished the second bottle of wine, I didn't want to resist him anymore. He walked me back to my room, and I didn't really put up much of a resistance when he started to kiss me. From there, it wasn't long until we were out of our clothes and having sex.

"After he left, I felt terrible. Whatever petty satisfaction I might have gotten from getting back at you was destroyed when I realized what I had done. I was the worst type of hypocrite. I get all upset because I think you are cheating on me. Instead of dealing with you, I do the exact thing I blamed you for. Even if you were cheating on me that didn't give me the right to cheat, too. For the last day of the seminar my mood ranged from guilt, to self loathing, to an incredible fear that you would somehow find out and kick me out.

Anne looked at me miserably. "I was in turmoil when I started to think about the possible consequences. Hiding from the situation was no longer an option. Whether you had cheated or not, I now had inescapable proof that there was a big problem in our marriage. I had cheated. Now I was the guilty party.

"I made all sorts of promises to myself before I got home. I'd never cheat on you again. I'd talk to you and maybe suggest counseling. I'd make it up to you somehow. I'd do anything to get our marriage back on track. I tried; I really tried to live up to those promises. But Alan didn't go away. Now that he had gotten to me once, he kept on pushing my buttons."

Anne sighed. It was obvious that she didn't feel comfortable telling me about her affair with Alan. I couldn't blame her. I had no desire to tell her about my time with Jean, either, and that was after our marriage was over. I tried to keep my emotions in check as I waited for her to go on.

"At home, I was getting discouraged." Anne snorted in self-disgust. "I don't know why I thought that all our problems would disappear over night, but... nothing seemed to have changed. If anything, you seemed more distant than ever. We were both still working long hours and you weren't responding to the messages that I was trying to send about trying to fix things. I know it sounds terrible, but I was blaming you, because the wall that I had built between us wasn't coming down as fast as I expected.

I interrupted accusingly. "In case you never figured it out, I was still pissed at you over that dinner. You come back from Charlotte and for the first time in months your behavior is different. You told me everything about that trip except the one thing I wanted to talk about: why it bothered me for you to go out on a dinner date with someone else. Now I guess I know why you didn't want to talk about it."

Anne blanched at my comment. "Oh shit." She muttered softly as she stared into my eyes. "I was doing the same thing I blamed you for. I was trying to avoid talking about Alan and that dinner because I was afraid you would be able to tell what had happened. No wonder you were so cold towards me, you probably could tell that I was hiding something."

I stared at her for a minute before responding.

"It was obvious that you didn't want to talk about it, but I didn't even suspect you of cheating on me. I didn't think you would do that to me. I just figured that you knew I was still angry, and that you were trying to make me forget about it by playing nice. It pissed me off, because I thought you were manipulating me. I figured that if I gave you the cold shoulder long enough you'd get pissed and we could have it out."

Anne nodded the distress evident in her face.

"Instead, I took as a sign you didn't care. I thought I was trying to do everything to make it up to you, and I was rubbing it in your face. God, did I screw up!

"The worst part is, when you didn't respond the way I wanted to, I started to give up. I gave in to the pressure Alan was putting on me. After Charlotte, Alan wanted a full-blown affair. He was doing his best to sweep me off my feet. He kept on telling me that he had fallen in love with me and that he wanted us to be together. It took him about a month, but he finally got to me again.

"One afternoon he was in the office when you called to tell me that you had to work late again. The girls were at a sleep over, and I was hoping that you and I could have some time together. Alan saw my disappointment and my anger and he took a shot. He commiserated with me and offered to buy me a drink so I didn't have 'to spend another night alone waiting for you to decide to show up.'"

Anne looked at me with a guiltily pained expression.

"I don't have any excuse, Bill. When I accepted his offer, I knew what he was looking for. What's worse, I knew that I was most likely going to give it to him. There is no way to justify what I did that day. I knew exactly what I was doing.

"In my mind, that's the real day that our marriage ended." Anne gave a humorless laugh. "No, let's be honest. That was the day I killed our marriage. Even if you never found out about my cheating, I couldn't forget. I might have been able to justify or explain away Charlotte as an aberration, but when I went back a second time; there was no getting around it. How could I expect you to forgive me when I couldn't forgive myself? As I drove home, I knew our marriage was over."

Anne teared up and sat there for a moment softly sniffling. I just sat there in pained silence. I had thought that the hurt and anguish from my divorce was safely walled away, but Anne's confession had ripped through the scabs like they weren't even there.

Just before the tension grew too much to bear, Anne looked up at me sadly. "I'm not going to try to tell you that I always loved you. How can I make you believe that when it's hard for me to believe? There is no way that I can tell you that I loved you when I think of what I did, when I was seeing Alan two or three times a week over the last few months of our marriage.

"But I hope you can believe this. As strange as it may seem, the reason I pushed you away so much while I was having the affair, was because I did still care about you. I found it too hard to look you in the eye when I was betraying you with Alan. The only way I could deal with my guilt was by avoiding you as much as possible. Every time you looked at me or touched me, it reminded me that I was lying to you."

Anne brayed a sardonic laugh.

"Maybe if I hadn't cared about you, it would have been possible for me to live a double life until my affair was over. Who knows what would have happened? Maybe we could have kept a shell of our marriage together, while I kept on running around behind your back, and we kept on drifting apart. Maybe we would have stayed together until the kids were grown, and then we'd go our separate ways."

The pain was obvious on Anne's face as she continued.

"I couldn't do that to you, or to me, if only because of all of the good times we'd shared before I got us into this mess. I didn't want to end up in that type of worthless marriage.

"It's ironic. One of the reasons this whole mess started was because I suspected that you were just going through the motions and pretending to love me. Now, because of the affair, I was doing the exact thing I blamed you for. I was the one living a lie, and it was tearing me apart. I knew our marriage was over; I just didn't have the courage to take the next step. I was trying to figure out the best way of ending it, without hurting the girls.

I snorted in disbelief. It was easy for Anne to tell me that she was hurting during her affair, but all I remembered was the cold shoulder, and the strain.

I couldn't stop the caustic comment that I blurted out.

"Well, I'm sure that fucking Alan helped keep you mind off your troubles."

Anne flinched in anger and tensed up to respond with an angry retort. When she looked over at me, the pain must have been written on my face. She bit back her response, stopped, and sagged in despondent acknowledgement of my position.

"You're right. I did use Alan to make myself feel better. The more I did it, the easier it became to justify my cheating. I knew that I had already passed the point of no return, so there was nothing to stop me anymore.

"Remember that old song you used to sing years ago, 'Me and Bobby McGee'? I felt just like that line from the chorus, 'Freedom's just another word for nothing left to lose.' That's where my mind was. I didn't have anything else to lose. My pride and my self-respect were long gone. I was doing everything I could to drive you away from me. Our marriage was on the rocks. I had crossed the line when I fucked Alan that second time.

"So, yes, I did continue to see Alan. What's the point of closing the barn door when the animals have already escaped? There was no reason to stop and at least some reasons to continue. I knew there was no way to fix what I had done. I couldn't go back and not have an affair with Alan. And I couldn't deal with what I had done to you, and to the girls. I had to live with the mess that I had created.

"Do you remember when Lacey didn't make the soccer all star team a couple of years ago? How she tried to pretend it was no big deal, and that she didn't really want to be on the team anyway? Well, I was behaving the same way, like a petulant child. Since our marriage was as good as over, I tried to convince myself that I didn't care, that everything was just the way I wanted it.

"I didn't know how to face you. In an effort to salvage my pride, I tried to convince my self that you were to blame for our troubles. I transposed my behavior onto you and assumed you had started it by sleeping with Heather. I wanted to drag you down to my level, so I wouldn't feel responsible."

Anne flashed me a look of defiance. "So, it's true. I did use Alan to make myself feel better. He was my safety net. I continued the affair, so I could feel like I still had some control. I got him to say all those pretty words like how he loved me, and was going to leave Claire for me. I tried to convince myself that I was in love with him and that it wasn't just an affair it was 'true love that could not be denied.'"

Anne paused and a grimace of distaste twisted her lips. "What I was really looking for was assurance that everything would be okay. That Alan would take care of me when things went to hell.

"But I was just 'whistling as I passed the graveyard'. I couldn't kid myself that much. The only thing Alan and I had in common was the sex. We both knew that he was just making pretty words and empty promises. He wanted 'no strings attached sex', and I gave it to him."

Anne paused thoughtfully. "It took me a long time to figure this out, but an affair is a lousy way to find someone to love. At least the type of affair that Alan and I had. We might have been getting together two or three times a week, but it was all rushed and meaningless. We couldn't risk exposure so we never spent much time together. Mostly we only had time for some quick sex. When you're sneaking around, you don't really have much time to really get to know someone. Everything is superficial. You mouth empty words to your partner, but you never really take the time to get to know them.

"Truth is, Alan and I didn't have a chance of making it as a couple. When it came right down to it, I wasn't even willing to move in with him when you kicked me out. That was why I moved in with Patty from work. Neither of us wanted the commitment, despite all the promises we had made.

"We did continue to date for a while after you and I separated. But it didn't take long to figure out that Alan and I had nothing in common. Our compatibility lasted just about long enough for us to get our clothes off. Going out on a date with him was a disaster. Once he had succeeded in seducing me, we had nothing to talk about." Anne shook her head in disgust. "I fucked the guy for months, and never realized that the only attraction was sex.

Anne started to tear up and continued in a whisper as she fought to maintain control.

"I know it sounds stupid, but it wasn't until Alan and I broke up that I realized how much I had just given up. I had destroyed the most important thing in my life, my marriage to you, for a meaningless affair."

Anne sat silent for a moment before a look of self-depreciation and loathing crossed her features.

"So, that's why I did it. That's what happened. There were a lot of things that led to my affair, but it all boils down to one thing. Just like I tried to tell you, I was a stupid fool that ended up doing the exact same thing that I was afraid you were doing. And because of that, I ended up throwing away the best man I have ever met, for the exact type of guy I was afraid you might become. I threw our marriage away for nothing!"

After Anne finished, she sat there staring at me anxiously. Her soliloquy had answered a lot of my questions, but I would have to think about what she had told me before I could come to terms with it.

One thing was definite. Parts of her story infuriated me. The sheer randomness and triteness of the affair offended me. It had been bad enough when I had believed that Anne had left me because she had fallen in love with Alan Johnson, but to hear that it was just meaningless sex was a real blow to the self-esteem. It was like the situation where a sports team loses to a badly overmatched opponent.

I couldn't help it. I found that my losing Anne to a vapid affair was humiliating. It just made it that much harder to understand.

I sat there lost in a fog until I notice Anne squirming with nervous frustration. I shook off my introspection and got back on task. I could continue my contemplation of her explanation later. For now, there were a few other matters that I still needed Anne to explain.

"There's something else about this whole mess that is bothering me Anne. Why did you try to lie to me that first night? Why were you hiding the affair, when you knew that I was going to find out from Claire? You had to know that would piss me off. I never realized you could be so dishonest as to try to pull a shitty stunt like that."

Anne had the grace to look guilty and embarrassed. "You're right Bill. That was terrible. I can't tell you how much I regret that decision. The only explanation I can give you was that I panicked.

"Our marriage was a time bomb waiting to go off. I knew that I couldn't keep on living the way we were, but I didn't have the courage to talk to you, or to admit that I was cheating. I kept on putting it off, using the girls as an excuse. I'd tell myself that it wasn't a good time because of school or sports. Truth is, I just didn't know how to tell you.

"In the meantime, I was trying to pretend that I had everything under control, and that I was ready for the consequences if you ever did find out. But I was deluding myself. When Claire confronted Alan and me walking into that hotel, everything hit home. As soon as she told me that she was going to let you know, I knew that it was over. I couldn't hide from the truth anymore. My so-called control was gone. I didn't know what to do and I panicked.

"In desperation, I decided to ask you for the divorce before she talked to you. I knew you'd still find out about the affair sooner or later, but I decided to deal with that at a later time. It was an effort to salvage some of my pride out of the situation. If I asked you for the divorce, I could pretend it was something I wanted, and not something I forced us into.

"As for the rest, all I can tell you is that I took some bad advice. I let myself be persuaded that I needed to do everything that I could, no matter how rotten, to get the best deal in the divorce. I was told that if I could get you to leave the house and the kids it would help me gain custody and give me a better chance of keeping the house in the property split."

Who gave you that advice?" I asked sourly. "Alan?"

"Kind of. After Claire confronted us, we took the afternoon off from work and we tried to figure out what we were going to do. He called a lawyer friend of his who agreed to help both of us. He was the one who told me that I had to start thinking about what would happen in the divorce. He told me that I had to look out for myself," Anne replied softly. "I can't remember who it was that came up with the actual idea of trying to railroad you. I know Alan had some ideas as well as some of my other 'friends' who had gotten divorced."

Anne looked troubled. "I know that it was a dirty trick, but everybody told me that I had to play cutthroat. I had to look out for myself, and not think about you. I didn't do it just to hurt you. I didn't know what to do, and I didn't want to lose the girls as well as you. I tried not to think about how it might look to you, once you talked to Claire."

I shrugged my shoulders dubiously.

"Whatever. But I have to let you know that that hurt me as much as anything else in this whole mess. It just seemed like you had no respect for me whatsoever."

Anne hung her head in shame. "I realize that now. It was a crappy thing to do and I'm sorry I did it. I started to realize how big a mistake it was the next day, when you told me what a cold and heartless bitch I had become. Until then, I don't think that I ever allowed myself to realize how much I was hurting you.

"Bill, the more I think about the way that I behaved through this entire fiasco, the more ashamed of myself I become. I didn't think about you, or Sarah, or Lacey. All I saw was me. And in return, I got treated far better by you and the girls than I ever deserved. When you proposed that truce, and offered to let me move back onto the house, I felt like I was getting a pardon that I hadn't earned.

"Sometimes it's difficult to see how your behavior is affecting others, until it gets rubbed in your face. It would have been real easy for you and the girls to hate me, after the way I treated you. I was expecting to get treated the way that I had treated you. But instead, you took the high road, and allowed me to get some of my dignity back. When I compare my behavior to the way you were treating me, it sickens me."

I stared off at the pond for a moment trying to make heads or tails of what I had heard. Finally I sighed and looked over at Anne.