Chapter One

Lisa could barely believe it had been six months since her husband admitted to having an affair. After twenty years of marriage, her husband, Collin, decided to throw away the life they had built together; seemingly without a thought. As she strolled down the crowded streets, her mind traveled back to that disconcerting time when he confessed of his infidelity.

I knew something wasn’t right; we always hung out like buddies. Our free time was spent going to dinner, sharing stories of our work week, seeing a movie, or just hanging out at home. We were happy, as long as we were together, or so I thought.

Then I noticed Collin started hanging with the fellas more and more. I used to be able to look at the clock and know within a five minute range what time my man would be walking through the door after a long day at work. He started calling at least twice a week to tell me that he would be a little late. Our weekends spent together, no longer seemed to satisfy him. He suddenly preferred going camping with his friends instead of spending time with me. I thought, When did he get this propensity for camping in the wilderness? He was always a sharp dresser but, he took this talent to another level. He began wearing the latest gear by the most popular hip-hop artists. On top of this, he also started listening to rap. I mean, we’ve always enjoyed a little ol’ school rap, but now he was into the new rap like T.I., Ying Yang Twins, Jay Z, even Lil Jon—now what man in his forties liked listening to that fool?

I have to admit there were some red flags that I should have paid attention to but I told myself that he was going through a little middle life crisis and it would pass. After about two months of this nonsense I confronted my husband regarding his change in character. Collin said I was crazy—there was nothing going on; he was just hanging with the boys, and after twenty years of marriage he thought our marriage could handle it. I thought he was right at the time, and I left it alone.

A week later, Collin started acting weird, very nervous and paranoid, and he wasn’t sleeping or eating much; which was a major red flag, because my man could throw down when it comes to food. I really became concerned when he started loosing weight. One evening I confronted him and I wouldn’t let up until I got some answers.

Well, I got my answer. Collin broke down and told me he’d been having an affair and the woman was pregnant. It felt as if someone had suddenly sucked all of the air out of the room; everything was getting dark, I was going to pass out at any second. It was like everything was moving in slow motion. He was still talking but I couldn’t comprehend the words coming out of his mouth. I was having an out-of-body experience, I felt as though my body had ascended and was hovering over the top of the room. I could see two people that resembled Collin and myself, but it couldn’t be us. Collin would never have said to me, the things that were said, that had the potential of shattering the life that we had built for ourselves. I forced myself to once again focus on what he was saying.

Collin said, “All week I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell you. I never wanted to hurt you.” Now, please tell me, How in the hell can you tell your wife you got someone pregnant without hurting her?           

I just walked out of the house. I couldn’t look at him for another minute without acting on the urge to slap the crap out of him and jab him in the eye with a screwdriver over and over again until fragments of his brain begin to ooze from his eye socket. So instead I drove for hours up the coast; it was dark, I felt like I was driving into a big black hole. I guess I wanted the night to swallow me up, anything to stop the pain. I ended up at a beautiful quaint little hotel. I checked in around 3 a.m. Thank God they had a vacancy because I was tired as hell. The bellboy—or is it bellman?—asked if he could help me with my bags. I told him no, I had nothing. I guess he could see the sadness and loneliness in my eyes because he looked at me as if he wanted to give me a big bear hug and tell me everything would be OK.

When I finally crawled out of the comfortable hotel bed, I called into the office to let every one know that I would not be in. I went home around 4 p.m. For some unknown reason I went straight to our closet to see if Collin’s clothes were still there; they were. What was I expecting? My stomach was turning flips, my head was throbbing, and my heart was beating so fast I thought it would overheat and I’d have a heart attack any minute.  

            As it got closer to 6 p.m., the time Collin usually got home from work, I became more and more anxious. When I heard the garage door open I suddenly had the urge to vomit. He entered house through the garage door and was startled when he saw me standing in front of him.

He said, “Hi, are you OK?”

“Oh yeah, I’m peachy, never been better.”

“No need to be sarcastic, Lisa, let me just take a shower and then we’ll talk.”

“Yeah, wash the smell of your girlfriend off before you sit down and have a heart-to-heart with your wife.” He ignored my sarcastic remark and went up the stairs. After about fifteen minutes I joined him in our room. He’d just finished drying off and putting on the old raggedy gray shorts he usually wore. We sat down in the sitting area and Collin looked me dead into my eyes and said, “I know you probably won’t believe this but I love you more than anything in this world and I never meant to hurt you. But I can’t turn back the hands of time, what has happened has happened. I only hope that in time you will be able to forgive me. I didn’t mean for my relationship with this woman to happen or to go on as long as it has.”  

“As long as it has?” I screamed. I wanted to beat the hell out of him and then choke the life out of his beaten body.

“Yes, Lisa. I have been having an affair with her for the past four months.” No this asshole didn’t just tell me that he had been sneaking around behind my back sleeping with this tramp for the last four months. I swear I wanted to kill him. So many thoughts were going through my head: How did this happen to us? I was a good wife. I had dedicated more than half of my life to this man. What was it about this woman that he would allow her to destroy our lives like this? Did he use protection? Well obviously not, since she was pregnant. Who else knew about this? His friends? I could picture the two of them laughing at me while wrapped in each others arms after having wild passionate sex. I shook these thoughts out of my head just in time to hear this jerk say, “I need to get a divorce.” I was getting myself prepared to hear him beg me not leave him, what happened?  Again, all of the air I had in my lungs disappeared; I don’t know where it went, I sat there breathless. I had to force myself to breathe. I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Not only did he cheat on me and get the woman pregnant, he took my choice away to evaluate my options of staying with him or kicking his sorry butt to the curb.

            I began to cry; I felt the tears dropping in droves onto my lap. The tears were from hurt, betrayal and anger. How dare he ask me for a divorce, when he should have been begging for my forgiveness. Collin reached out to me. I told him, “Don’t you dare touch me. Pack yo shit and get the fuck out.” I was so angry I could barely talk. I felt nothing but pure rage for him. I guess Collin could see death in my eyes because he just packed a few things and left without saying another word.

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