“You cannot possibly think that I am about to accept an ultimatum from you!” came the incredulous remarks from the next table. The discordant sounds of marital bliss. I almost laughed out loud as the argument progressed. It was difficult to suppress my sudden mirth, not to comment out loud on the obviousness of the universe’s ploy.
“Okay! I get it! This isn’t a problem I can run away from! And it’s obviously not a problem unique to my life!”
I had fled to the coffee shop in an attempt to escape the conflict which had erupted in my home and in my heart.
The stupid thing was, that there could only be one possible response to such an ultimatum. However, I was in shock, feeling hurt and betrayed.
He had known what I was all about when we had started dating. We sat down and discussed things again, when he had asked me to marry him. We had even taken to, every year on our anniversary, revisiting what we wanted and expected from each other and this relationship.
And everything was going smoothly, until the the books started flying off of the shelves.
It is every writer’s dream come true to have something they publish be as well loved by the readers as it is by us. And now here was that dream coming true for me. I was elated to be able to pay off not only my own debts, and our collaborative debts, but his as well! Some of my friends thought it was foolish of me to be quite so generous with my money, however, they were soon quelled to silence with one simple statement; It’s my money, and my Karma.
If they thought I was someone who thought they could buy loyalty or love they were sadly mistaken. Bradley and I had always maintained both a joint and separate bank account. We had always put a minimum of %10 of what we earned into the joint account to cover bills and home and car repairs. Vacations were another matter. We had always shared the burden of extra expenses such as going out for something fun, or household purchases or gift purchases. As far as I was concerned, there was no reason that I shouldn’t begin paying for our just for fun items and let him keep his hard earned money. I had never been one to be a miser with my money. If I had it to spare, I was more than willing to part with it.
However, when the disturbing photograph arrived in the mail, accompanied by a blackmail demand, my only reaction was to forward it to my PR person. Forewarned is forearmed, after all. I sent it by courier, and was not at all surprised to see my phone light up with Janelle’s shining face about an hour later.
“Are you going to confront him?” she wanted to know. No banter, just straight to the point, it was one of the things I admired about Janelle; she knew when to cut to the chase.
“I suppose I’m going to have to, aren’t I?” I muse aloud. I’d spent the last hour in front of my laptop, writing furiously, trying to lose myself in a world of my own creation, and escape the problem at hand. I had never been one for drama. Preferring to turn the other cheek, as it were. However, the minute that the Blackmailer had decided to flex his muscles, he was forcing me to deal with the situation head on.
“She,” Janelle piped up.
“Hmm?” I wondered.
“I bet you lunch at Double Sushi that the blackmailer is the other woman,” she stated, steadfastly.
I sighed and wiped a hand across my face, trying to plug that bit of perspective into my newfound reality, that money really did change some people. Though in my case, it would appear to be the people around me, as opposed to myself. “I’d like to take that bet just to prove I have a little faith left in humanity, but this is a cesspool of human depravity at this point,” I confessed.
“Well then, why don’t we make lunch my treat. Day after tomorrow?” she offered, doing her best not to push, but encouraging me to deal with it promptly.
“Ya, sure,” I sigh again. “I’ll talk to him tonight.”
I set the phone down, and stared at the screen in front of me, willing the characters to come back and chase away the turmoil threatening from the emotional quadrant of my brain.
Three chapters later, I looked up to see the time. Bradley would be home any minute. I saved the document I’d been working on, and closed the laptop, making my way to the kitchen in a bit of a daze.
I fished a bottle of white wine out of the fridge and pulled the cork, pouring two glasses and taking them to the living room. I set them down and settled in to wait. Thankfully for my racing mind, I didn’t have long to wait.
“Halloo the house!” he called from the front hall, as was his wont.
“I’m in the living room,” I answered, and took a steadying breath as I heard him deposit his keys and toe out of his shoes. I stood to greet him with our customary hugs and kisses, and helped him out of his jacket, motioning him to join me on the couch. I laid his jacket aside lovingly and handed him his glass.
“To the end of a long day!” he quipped cheerfully and tapped his glass to mine, taking a swig. I joined him in the swig of wine and held the glass cupped in my hands, a faux pas with chilled wine, of a surety.
“I’m afraid the day may about to get even longer, Brad,” I gently informed him.
“Oh?” He quirked an eyebrow, perhaps expecting a last minute dinner invitation from the neighbours or my parents.
“I received something in the mail today.” I paused. “It was a photograph,” another pause. “Accompanied by a blackmail demand.” My voice was calm, and I hoped, so was my face. His went from curiosity, to shock, to incredulity. I didn’t give him a chance to play dumb. “Who is she Brad? How long?”
I looked at him with what I hoped was an open countenance, wanting this discussion to be as frank and without histrionics as possible. He stared into his wine glass, gently swirling the liquid. A foible of his when he was uncomfortable. “Sidney. We met at the conference I went to three months ago.” Just after sales took off, I noted silently. I waited for him to go on. He knew I wouldn’t pry, or beg. I’d just wait him out.
The long moments drew on and on before he finally took another swig of wine and stood up, pacing. “I didn’t set out to hurt you, Ava. You have to believe me. When things got complicated, I....I just didn’t know what to do.”
“And now?” I wondered.
“I- Well, now that you know...” he floundered. He’d been hoping that I’d find out and become furious. He was hoping that I’d show some spark of jealousy, the same spark that he’d been insisting I had to house, that his own outrageous jealousy was only natural. Well, he was about to be sadly disappointed.
“Do you love her, Bradley?” I asked, genuinely curious.
He sighed, and slumped back down next to me, deflated. “Ya, Ava, I really do.” I could hear the but, and waited for it. “But maybe if you stopped writing so much, and we focused on us more-” he let it hang between us. I’m sure he thought he was being magnanimous, offering us a way to salvage the situation. I saw it for what it truly was, an ultimatum.
I took a long drink from my glass and set it down, empty. Standing, I made my declaration. “I don’t want her in my house, Bradley. If you can’t use her place, get a hotel.” The photo had been taken in our livingroom. “Use the joint account.”
He looked confused. “You’re not going to fight for me? You’re just going to give me your blessing? And then what? Continue on with business as usual? Are you planning on supporting me and my mistress while you continue on being a best selling author? Am I just a trophy to you? A sign of accomplishment? Husband and home? Shall we put in a picket fence?” He was blustering now, and I wasn’t going to have any of it. He wanted histrionics, and I wasn’t about to give him the satisfaction.
And so I had taken my purse and walked to the nearby café. I had sat nurturing a cup of herbal tea, basking in the heady steam rising from between my palms. And then the Universe had piped up, refusing to let me ignore the issue at hand.
I sighed, defeated, and dug into my purse, pulling out a notebook and pen, which no writer should ever be without. I sat there with my tea getting cold, and drafted a separation agreement. He wasn't going to win in the way he wanted to. I wasn’t going to let him destroy what tranquility I had garnered after several waves of deadbeat boyfriends before him. I wasn’t going to let him tear apart the path I had set out for myself.
I detailed out an agreement that any of my friends would have wailed to see, and he wasn’t going to have anything to complain about. I’d done enough research into divorce for the last book to know what to offer to keep any bloodthirsty lawyer he came up with, satisfied. There would be no long drawn out process here.
I walked back home, the agreement clenched in my hand, and let myself back in. I hadn’t been gone long, about an hour. I wasn’t sure what I’d find. As it was, I hallooed the house, and he answered from his office, out of habit. I walked steadfastly to the door, and watched as he stepped down from the orbital, wiping sweat off his face and neck with a towel. He was shirtless. He knew I loved it when he was shirtless. He gave me a small smile, an uncertain, school boy smile. I walked over and placed the folded sheets of paper in his hand, before turning to leave again, this time, headed for the bedroom.
I pulled a pair of suitcases from under the bed and went to the closet, emptying half of the contents into them, repeating the process with the dresser.
“What are you doing with my things?” he demanded, from the doorway, the sheets of paper open and dangling from his fingers.
“You’re leaving. I don’t care where you go. To her, to your mother’s, to a hotel, but you’re leaving.” I informed him.
“You can’t just kick me out Ava. We have to talk about this.” he appealed.
“There’s nothing to discuss, Bradley. You knew what you were getting into. We discussed just these eventualities. What we’d do if I made it big, What we’d do if we separated after that. And this is what we agreed to. Now, I know were never took into account your cheating, but I think I’ve done fair by the spirit of our agreement. Now please, take your things, and leave.” That was what had made the agreement so easy to draft. We’d already hashed out most of the details verbally, over the years. I just had to commit them to paper.
“You can't just-”
I interrupted him. “Shall I call Wayne?” That shut him up. Wayne was Bradley’s older brother. He had always adored me, and had been privy to many of the details contained in the document still dangling from my husbands listless fingers. He had warned Bradley a hundred times not to screw this up, and that if he was ever stupid enough to do so, not to hurt me in the process. Wayne would not be pleased if his baby brother put up a fight at this point.
I zipped up the last suitcase and handed him a small toiletry bag. “You can feel free to have your lawyer look over the papers before we sign them. I’ll be meeting with mine, and with Janelle the day after tomorrow.” He took the bag and skulked to the bathroom, I followed him, leaning in the doorway. “Do you want to tell your brother or should I?” His spine stiffened at this one, and I could see the wheels churning by his reflection in the mirror. He looked at me plaintively. He knew that how Wayne reacted would very much depend on the precedent that I set.
I took pity on him. “I’ll speak to him, Brad. It’s fine. Just, just make this easy, okay?” He nodded, looking defeated, deflated. He couldn't possibly be disappointed. He was getting everything that he wanted, minus the fireworks.
He moved to the shower, and hesitated. He was covered in sweat from his work out. “Go ahead,” I offered, and tore myself away from the doorway, and the sight of him peeling out of his track pants. This hurt more than anything else had, letting go of the small joys, like joining him in the shower.
I heard the water start as I retreated to the sanctity of my own office, putting on some soothing music, and booting up my laptop. I stared at my phone in my hand, wanting to reach out to someone, but not sure who to lean on in this particular hour of need.
I knew spending the night alone was not such a good idea. It was times like this that I wish I hadn’t given up so easily trying to talk Brad into getting a dog. Well, I guess that wasn’t going to be an issue anymore.
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