Rob and the Kiss of Death

"I'm a big girl Rob and I'm old enough to know that what is done is done. Crying isn't going to change any of it and the way I've chosen to deal with it is accept that it happened through no fault of my own and move on. So tell me Rob, why did you shit on me?"

I told her about Harv and Gail and how I'd taken it."

"You couldn't have talked about it with me first?"

"Why would I? We weren't anything permanent. I was just a guy who was willing to do what your missing boyfriend used to do for you. You made it clear that he was your main man. That's why you were dating others, right? You promised him not to get into a steady relationship? With that situation why would I doubt it when Harv led me to believe that I was not the only one getting your oral favors? You weren't my steady girl. Not that I didn't want you to be, but you were this guy Mike's and not mine."

"You wanted me to be your steady girl?"

"Of course I did."

"Well Rob, Mike is now history."

And that is how Mary Ellen became my steady then my fiancée and then eventually my wife.

When we left the restaurant Mary Ellen asked, "Can you afford a motel Rob?"

"Why?"

"I can't give you my virginity Rob, but I don't want our first time to be on a back seat."

My parents were home so my room was out. I had just gotten paid, but the check was mostly earmarked for my car payment. I'd just have to tighten my belt and watch my pennies until my next paycheck.

"I can afford a room" I said and Mary Ellen slipped her arm through mine and we headed on out Michigan Avenue to find a motel. It was a most memorable night. Mary Ellen and I made love four times before checkout the next day and after that first night it was sex four and five times a week. Mostly on the back seat of my car or on a blanket at some out of the way picnic ground.

My parents did like to spend weekends at the lake and whenever they did Mary Ellen and I made the house ours for the weekend. Once I made my last car payment we were able to make use of motels more often, but one way or another we managed.

++++++++++++++++++++++

During our last year of school Mary Ellen got a part time job as a file clerk at a law firm and it cut into our lovemaking time, but the fewer opportunities for us to be together seemed to make Mary Ellen more insatiable when we were. There were a couple of times she had to work late most weeks, but she made up for things on the weekend by trying to fuck me blind.

Six months before graduation I took a knee in front of Mary Ellen and asked her to be my wife. I received an enthusiastic "yes" and a night of sex that almost crippled me. We set the date of the wedding for six months after graduation.

Graduation came and Mary Ellen, who had majored in Computer Science, went to work full time at the law firm. I took my Business Management degree and went to work for the XYZ Corporation. Mary Ellen and I moved into an apartment together and started saving money for a down payment on a home.

Things were going great and the only fly in the ointment, at least from my perspective, was that the law firm had Mary Ellen traveling to conferences, symposiums, meetings and training sessions and on most of them she got almost no notice. I'd come home and find her packing and be told that she was leaving in the morning and would be gone X number of days.

It was hard to bitch given what they were paying her, but being gone three or four days a week one or two weeks out of the month wasn't setting too well with me and we got into a bit of a tiff when she told me six days before our wedding that she would be gone for the next four days. I told her to tell them that she couldn't go and why and she refused. It was her job to go and there wasn't anything that she needed to do wedding wise.

"Be reasonable Rob. I'll be home sometime late Thursday and the wedding isn't until Saturday."

"That's not the point Mary Ellen. The point is that I want you here at this particular point in time. I have no idea if there are going to be any last minute glitches and if there are I want you here. We are talking about one of the most important events of our lives. You need to be here."

"I'm sorry Rob, but I have to go. I need to be there when the new system goes on line."

I almost said, "You need to make a choice; that fucking job or me" but at the last second I held my tongue. Things were a little on the cool side between us before she left on her trip. I avoided her even though she tried to not be avoided and on Monday morning she left on her trip.

I was pissed so I didn't bother to answer her phone calls on Monday night and Tuesday night and I let the calls go to the answering machine. Wednesday the call was short and to the point.

"I'll call back in one hour Rob and if you don't answer there will be no wedding this Saturday. One hour Rob."

I looked at the recorder for maybe a full minute and then I grabbed my car keys and headed for the door. I got in my car and pointed it toward my favorite watering hole. I wasn't anywhere close to being real smart when it came to women, but even I knew an ultimatum when I heard it and there wasn't any way I was going to start out on a lifetime commitment being given ultimatums. That was the same thinking that stopped me from saying "your job or me" but now I wondered if I wouldn't have been better off saying it.

I drank beer and shot pool until midnight and when I got home I ignored the flashing red light on the answering machine and went to bed. Thursday after work I hit the Olive Garden for dinner and then drove over to Murphy's Tavern and drank beer and shot pool until eleven and then headed on home.

Mary Ellen's plane was due in at three that afternoon and she wasn't home and that pretty much told me all I needed to know. When I got up the next day I called into work and took a vacation day and then caught a flight to Vegas. I caught a few shows, broke even at the tables and flew home Sunday.

I entered the apartment and Mary Ellen wasn't there. She had been though; the place was a fucking wreck. She had done a damned good job of trashing the place. There wasn't an unbroken dish or glass in the kitchen and anything else in the place that could be broken was.

The desktop computer was smashed, but I had my laptop in the car and I went out and got it. I logged on and brought up my banking accounts and saw that our joint account where we had been stashing the money for our house down payment hadn't been touched. I transferred all of the money into my personal account and then closed the housing account. Then, rather than clean up the mess in the bedroom I went to a motel for the night.

+++++++++++++++++++

There were a ton of messages waiting for me when I got to work on Monday morning. Most wanting to know why I hadn't been at the church on Saturday. I'd called my family from the airport before boarding my flight for Vegas so they knew not to bother being there, but I hadn't contacted anyone else. It was at times like that I was glad I didn't have a cell phone. I'm probably the only person I know who doesn't have one. I value my time too much to have it at everyone's beck and call just because they can reach in their pocket, pull out a phone and reach out and touch me just because they feel the need.

I called a locksmith and arranged for him to meet me when I got home from work. When he was done and gone I got to work cleaning up the apartment and making a list of what had to be replaced. The light on the answering machine kept flashing and the little orange light that meant that the machine was full was lit which meant that I had at least two hundred messages. I got tired of looking at it so I unplugged it. The answering machine was digital which meant that it did not have a tape. The only way to clear the machine was start each message and then hit the delete button and I did not feel like doing that two hundred times so I tossed the machine in the waste basket and put down getting a new one on my list.

Tuesday after work I stopped at Wal-Mart and got some of the things on my list. I went next door to Best Buy and bought a new desktop computer and then stopped at Kohls to get sheets, pillow cases and the like. When I got home I set up the new answering machine and plugged the phone back in. Bad mistake. The phone rang almost instantly. It was Mary Ellen.

"Hello?"

"Why is all the money gone from the house account Rob?"

"I'm fine Mary Ellen; how are you?"

"Answer the question Rob."

"I moved it until I can sit down and go through the deposits and calculate what we each put in. When I get that done I'll deduct from your share what I had to spend to repair the damage you did and replace what you destroyed. Once that is done I'll send you what's left. Drop me a note saying where you will be so I'll know where to send it."

I don't know if she was going to say anything else because I hung up on her. She called back almost immediately and I let the answering machine take the call.

"Pick up Rob. We need to talk. This is getting way out of hand. We really need to talk Rob."

Maybe you do I thought, but I don't.

For the next two days I shopped for what I had to and in several cases I upgraded what I replaced. It wasn't my money. The desktop she destroyed got upgraded -- a bunch -- and I bought a new coffee table to replace one that only had a few light scratches on it.

Mary Ellen's share of the house down payment money was $12,612.12 and the replacement costs came to $$4018.62. Being an asshole about it I added another $1000 to cover the cost of labor and the cost of gas from running back and forth to the stores and then got ready to write Mary Ellen a check for $7593.50 and then had a thought. I checked my receipts and found that I'd spent $1181.50 on various items for the wedding and I subtracted that. In the end I wrote her a check for $6412.00. I unplugged the phone and -- not for the first time -- congratulated myself for never getting a cell phone.

++++++++++++++++++

When I got to work the next morning the receptionist gave me a stack of message slips along with a look that said, "Please get me out of the middle of this."

There were nine slips and seven of them were from Mary Ellen. I looked at Linda and told her that I would try and take care of it.

"She might ignore what I tell her, but I will try."

At nine I picked up the phone and called Mary Ellen at work. After her "Hello" I said:

"Stop calling me at work Mary Ellen. Stop calling me at home. We have nothing to talk about. You chose your job over your wedding and that told me what our marriage was going to be like. Then you issued me an ultimatum and that also told me what I could look forward to in a marriage with you and I decided that those were things I could live without. I hope you have a good life Mary Ellen; it just isn't going to be with me. Goodbye."

I hung up on her and then brought up my computer and started going through my email. One caught my eye and I printed it out. I kept going back and reading it and at the end of the day I called my bosses secretary and asked her if I could get in to see him. She told me she would check and get back to me.

At five I was in Barry's office. I asked him if I could be considered for the position that had been opened in the Denver office. He stared at me for several seconds and then asked:

"How soon can you leave?"

It turned out that I only needed a week to break in my replacement and then I was in a U-Haul heading for Colorado. The truck and the car on the trailer I was towing were packed solid with everything that I owned. I'd left nothing behind in Michigan except Mary Ellen and I was missing her terribly before I even crossed the Michigan/Ohio state line. I loved her and I would be a long time getting over her, but I was a realist. What I'd told Mary Ellen on the phone was one hundred percent true. Given the way things were we didn't stand a chance.

++++++++++++++++++++

I spent four years in Denver and they were good years. I met a lot of fine ladies and bedded several, but I never found one that I wanted to settle down with. The major problem and I knew it was that I compared them to Mary Ellen and they kept coming up short.

I received a couple of letters from Mary Ellen that had been forwarded from my old address, but I tossed them away unread. Since she didn't hear from me she might have thought that I didn't get them so she sent one registered with a return receipt requested. I signed for the letter and then tossed it unread into the trash.

I was doing fine career wise and had received two promotions. I knew that I had been doing a good job, but I had no idea that the company thought as highly of me as they apparently did. I got a call from my old boss and he asked me if I was ready to leave Denver. When I asked why he told me that he had been kicked upstairs and he wanted to know if I wanted his job. In three days I was on my way back to Ypsilanti.

I found an apartment in the same complex I'd lived in before I moved to Colorado, but I did slightly better for myself and got a second floor apartment overlooking the pool. It was summertime so the view was awesome if you liked girls in bikinis.

I settled into the new job, looked up some old friends and had dinner with my parents once or twice a week. I did not ask about Mary Ellen and no one mentioned her to me, but I still found myself looking for her when I frequented places where we used to go.

I spent a good part of my weekends lying around the apartment pool and I made the acquaintance of a few of the bikini clad ladies. I dated a couple of them and ended up in a friends with benefits relationship with one. Chelsea made it clear up front that she did not want a serious relationship.

"I've had enough of those and they don't turn out well for me."

"Why not? You seem to be the complete package; good looking, charming, intelligent and all around good company."

"And I attract guys like honey attracts flies and every man I've ever been in a serious relationship with starts feeling insecure and tries to be overly possessive. I just don't need any more of that. I do have urges and if you are willing to take care of them without starting to think of me as your property we can have lots of fun together."

"You sound like exactly what I need in my life right now."

Chelsea did indeed have urges and at times they came pretty close to crippling me. Chelsea and I got along great together. We were pretty damn near to being a perfect fit for each other and after about six months I decided that I was going to have to convince her that I wasn't like the other guys she'd had serious relationships with, but before I could do it though something happened.

I'd been back almost a year and one day I was having lunch and screening the financial pages of the newspaper when someone sat down opposite me at the table. I looked up from the paper and saw Mary Ellen sitting there looking at me.

"I didn't ask if I could join you because I was afraid you would say no. How are you Rob?"

"I'm fine Mary Ellen and you?"

"Older and wiser Rob; older and much wiser. How long have you been back?"

"About a year now."

"And you never tried to get in touch? I'm crushed."

"What would be the point Mary Ellen?"

"You just might have found out that I'm a changed person and nowhere near the woman you left standing at the alter."

"Left standing at the alter?"

"Yes Rob; I was there."

"You said you wouldn't be there and I took you at your word."

"Why would you do that?"

"Because you were supposed to be home Thursday and you never came home. You still weren't there by the time I left for Vegas the next day. You said there would be no wedding, you never came home and in my book one plus one always equals two."

"We got hung up and couldn't get done on Thursday and the only flight we could get on Friday was a late afternoon flight."

"And that is exactly why I told you I didn't want you to go; why you needed to be there. You say that you were there Saturday, but what if you hadn't been able to get that Friday flight. What then? I would have been at the church, but you wouldn't have been there. Again, that's just one of the things that could have happened that wouldn't have happened if you had stayed home."

"All right Rob; I was wrong, but you were supposed to have loved me. You could have cut me some slack. I was trying to make a name for myself at the firm. I was trying to balance work and you. You could have..."

"Forget it Mary Ellen, it is water over the damn."

She looked at me for several seconds and then said, "I've never forgotten you Rob."

I noticed the rings on her left hand and said, "But I see that you have managed to get over me."

She saw where my gaze was and she raised her hand and looked at it. "A mistake Rob; a very big and bad mistake that I'm in the process of correcting."

"And that means?"

"We are going through a divorce, but I won't take off the rings until it is final. When it is may I call you?"

"Why would you want to do that?"

"I can't get you out of my mind Rob. I think that it means that we were meant to be. I'd like to find out if that is true."

I'd never been able to get her out of my mind either so I got stupid and said:

"When it is final call me."

She took a pad and pen out of her purse and handed them to me and I wrote down my home and office numbers and gave her back the pad. She took it, dropped it in her purse, stood up and then leaned over the table and kissed me. She said she would be in touch. As I watched her walk away I wondered if I had done the right thing. I didn't linger on it. For all I knew the part about the divorce could have been bullshit, but even if it were true I wouldn't be having any part of Mary Ellen unless I was one hundred percent sure that her marriage was ended.

When I was making love to Chelsea that evening it was Mary Ellen that I was thinking of and it was pretty much the same every time we made love for the next several days, but eventually the thoughts of Mary Ellen slowly faded. I heard nothing from Mary Ellen and I was back to where I was thinking of trying to talk Chelsea into giving the two of us a go. She was the only woman who had me thinking that way since Mary Ellen and while I knew that thoughts of Mary Ellen were likely to remain with me I also knew that it was time for me to settle down. It wouldn't be the first time that some one had settled for second best and made a go of it.

+++++++++++++++

I decided that the way to approach Chelsea would be with an engagement ring in my hand and I was actually looking in the Yellow Pages for a jeweler close to the office when the phone call came. It was seven months from my meeting with Mary Ellen at the restaurant.

"Hi Rob."

"Hello Mary Ellen."

"My divorce was final at midnight last night. I'm having a "Mary Ellen set free party" and I would like it if you could be there."

"When and where?"

"My place tonight at seven. Can you make it?"

"Yeah; I can be there."

She gave me directions and told me that she was glad that I could make it. The address was a house on Campbell Street and I knew the neighborhood. I arrived at ten after seven and was a little surprised at the lack of vehicles parked in the drive and on the street in front of the house. I was pretty sure that Mary Ellen had said seven. I rang the bell and Mary Ellen opened the door in a bathrobe. I was confused and said:

"Did I get it wrong? It was tonight at seven right?"

"No baby, you got it right. Come on in."

She closed the door behind me and said "Rob" in a husky voice. I turned to face her and she let the robe slip off her shoulders and fall to the floor. She stood there in thigh highs and heels and nothing else.