Smoke and Mirrors

“You need to just confront him,” Diane mutters as she scrapes the last few bites of bourbon barbeque chicken together on her plate. We’re at the Fire Station Restaurant for our weekly lunch together and the food is delicious. The conversation has come around to Michael’s cheating, as I knew it would. Lately, that seems to be the topic of most of our conversations. Diane is hell bent on me confronting him, and even though I know she’s right, I don’t know how to go about it. “It’s not that easy, D,” I answer, feeling somewhat pressured by her insistence. “I mean, I don’t have any concrete evidence yet. If I confront him now, he’s smart enough to find a way to wiggle out of it.” “What more do you need? I’ve chatted with him online, so I can tell you what he’s doing and saying.” “Once again, that’s just talk. I’d have to actually catch him in the act, and I don’t know how to do that.” “Then get some woman he doesn’t know to help you catch him in a honey trap.” “I can’t do that! He would never forgive me for something like that.” “Forgive you? My God Maia, stop trying to play the clueless wife. I know you’re not as dumb and innocent as you pretend to be.” “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” “You’re always telling me Michael doesn’t allow profanity; Michael doesn’t like anything but missionary sex; Michael doesn’t want this, and doesn’t allow that. You may not have actually spread your legs for anybody before you married Michael, but you were cussin’ and drinkin’ and I’m sure you got pretty damned close. Then he comes along and you turn into a freakin’ Stepford wife. Now you can’t even make a fuckin’ routine decision if it’s not what Michael wants. But while you’re at home being the stupid little wife, he’s out fuckin’ any and everybody, doin’ all the things he told you not to do. What the hell? The drinks she’s downed have obviously loosened her tongue. “Don’t hold back Diane, damn, let me know how you really feel!” “I’m sorry Maia. I know you probably don’t want to hear it, but you’re being stupid, and it’s beginning to piss me off.” “Why is what I am or am not doin’ with my husband pissin’ you off?” “Because I’m your friend, Maia. A real friend. I don’t want to see you continue to get played because you’re buryin’ your head in the sand while warning signs are glarin’ all around you.” “So maybe I should do what you did, Diane. Maybe I should take out a full page ad in the Washington Post proclaiming that my husband, a top notch attorney and supposed man of integrity, is having an affair; then sit there with a stupid look on my face as he walks out the fuckin’ door!” “Obviously you can’t understand it, but I am better off without him. Sure, it cost me financially, but I was not gonna stand idly by while my man is disrespectin’ me and his mistress is flauntin’ it in my face. I have enough goin’ for me that I don’t have to take that kind of shit.” “And I don’t?” “That’s just it, honey, you do; and I’m tryin’ to get you to see that. You have to respect yourself enough to be able to let him go if he can’t treat you like you deserve to be treated.” Oh, how very cliché. “Some men have a lot of respect for their wives and they still cheat. In fact, it’s because they respect their wives that they cheat. They don’t want to imagine their wives doin’ some of the things that turn them on, because they don’t want to defile their image of her.” “Are you kiddin’ me?” she squeals, gawking at me like I’ve just landed in a spaceship from Pluto. “You can’t believe that.” “I’ve heard of that kind of thing before, Diane, and yes, I do believe it. Why do you think married men go to prostitutes?” “They go to prostitutes because they’re goddamned cowards, Maia, not because they have such great respect for their wives. They’re a bunch of sick fucks who can’t keep it in their pants, or else they’re afraid to let anyone find out that they’re into some twisted sex shit. They pay prostitutes to do it and keep their dirty little secrets quiet.” “I, for one, wish Michael would tell me he wanted to do some kinky sex thing, ‘cause I’m damned sure tired of the missionary deal.” My attempt to lighten the mood falls on deaf ears as Diane presses on. “So if you found out he was cheatin’ on you because he was into some kinky shit and didn’t share it with you out of respect, you’d be okay with that?” “I’m not sayin’ I agree with that line of thinkin’, but I can kinda understand it. I mean one person can’t be everything that another person needs. There are just too many roles to fulfill. Right now my roles are wife and mother.” Diane drops her head into her hands, as though one of her migraine headaches has washed over her. She props her elbows on the table, and begins rubbing her temples. “Get some help girlfriend,” she grumbles. “He’s got you brainwashed.” “Brainwashed? You’ve got a lot of nerve. You’re so bitter about Carlos, you can’t even think straight. That’s why you’re gettin’ all caught up in my business and lettin’ it send you over the deep end. “I’m goin’ over the deep end? You’re the one tryin’ to romanticize infidelity.” “I’m not romanticizin’ anything. It’s painful and I’ll give you that, but I am not gonna lose my husband over some sex.” “Sex?” she asks incredulously. “Do you really believe it’s only about sex?” “Yes, I do.” “Okay. Let’s say it is only about sex. While he’s out fuckin’ random chicks off the internet, how do you know he hasn’t picked up some dreadful disease? Did you even consider that? How do you know he’s not climbin’ into your bed at night with AIDS on his dick?” “Because Michael is one of the cleanest men I have ever met, and he’s not fuckin’ some dirty prostitutes he found on the corner; he’s meetin’ women on the internet. Regular women like you and me.” “Like Julia Roberts said in Pretty Woman, that’s just geography.” “What’s that supposed to mean?” “It means whether he’s meetin’ them on the internet or on the corner, they’re all the same.”