Anything For Her

The next day, my head was splitting and my knuckles hurt like hell as I got up and noticed that it was nearly noon. Our bedroom door was open, but Janice was nowhere to be found. Her car was not in the driveway, and there was no note. I stumbled into our room, stripped, and took a shower. Then I took four Tylenol and climbed into our bed.

I woke up around 4 that afternoon, and discovered Janice had finally come home. The silent treatment wasn't over however, and we avoided each other through the rest of the weekend. By Monday morning, I had had enough time to consider my behavior, and I was deeply mortified by my treatment of Janice, and genuinely concerned with whether or not I would still have a job when I got into the office.

But Janice still wasn't speaking to me.

When I got to the office, my worst nightmare was realized. My stuff had already been gathered together in a box, with a note on top from Chris to come see him immediately. Chris was a sight to see, with his split and swollen lip. He showed no sense of humor, and I suddenly found myself wishing he would assume his old cocky demeanor. With nearly no frills or fanfare, I suffered the first firing of my career.

Broken and despondent, I was back home before 10:00 in the morning. Janice, who was burning a few of her remaining vacation days before the year was out, finally spoke to me, and asked why I was home. Breaking down, I blurted out that I was fired. To my great dismay and surprise, Janice showed no compassion, saying instead, "You stupid shithead!"

I was furious that she was not going to show me any support in this time of need. It was my turn to go silent, and I turned away from her and went back out to the car to bring in my box of personal belongings from the office. Then I grabbed a beer and camped out in front of the TV. There I sat basically for the rest of the day. I didn't even see Janice, but I knew she was in the house.

Finally, around four in the afternoon, Janice came into the living room, yanked the remote control out of my hand, and turned off the TV. Then she sat down directly in front of me on the coffee table, and said, "Alan, listen carefully. You need your job. I'm not going to let you fuck up our life like that. This house," she said waving her arm around her, "costs money. Our clothes cost money. Our FOOD costs money. OK, Alan?" Her tone was exasperated and sarcastic.

"Now I've called your boss and I'm getting your job back, but you are going to have to do everything and anything I say from here on out."

In spite of myself, I reacted with great relief that she was finally talking to me again, even with that tone. I adored my wife and I would do anything for her. "OK," I said meekly, "what do I have to do?"

"You'll see," she said with what seemed like a little amusement, "now get yourself cleaned up. Chris is coming over for dinner..." She met my shocked and angry reaction with a stern one of her own, saying, "You fucked up, Alan, I don't know how else to say it. If you want to stay with me, you're going to do everything I ask from here on out!"

Her tone was demanding and serious; I was taken aback. I surprised myself as I weakly stammered, "OK."

"Good. Now get cleaned up. He'll be here around 7:00 pm. You WILL be apologizing to him, and doing some other things to make up for what you've done."

I got up and changed into some better clothes and washed my face to shake the effects of all the beer I had drunk. I found myself admiring my wife's new assertive position. She seemed to have such strength, and I felt a bit cowed by it. Secretly, I felt a strong erotic attraction to this "new" demanding Janice. Still, part of me deeply resented that Chris was talking to MY wife behind my back, and that the bastard was actually going to be a guest in my home, invited by my wife.

I was so engrossed in my thoughts, I nearly tripped over the tripod and video camera that we sometimes used to make our own private porn videos. I'm a bit of a video and audiophile, and I had wired the whole house so that we could watch videos from any of the four VCRs that we had in the house on any of the other TVs in the house. I had done it mostly so that I could use any machine to dub movies on any or all of the other four VCRs. I was quite proud of the setup.

I didn't remember leaving the camera out, but I began to think it would be great if we could make another one of our private movies tonight after that bastard left. Maybe Janice would go for it if Chris gave me my job back. I began to feel more cooperative.

Janice seemed visibly anxious as Chris showed up about 15 minutes late. His whole attitude was arrogant and victorious, and it really set my teeth on edge. I repeatedly caught him chuckling as if at some private joke. What was worse was that Janice seemed to fawn over him, going a little overboard with the perfect hostess crap, I thought. Although I rationalized that she was just nervous because this meant getting my job back, and that perhaps I really WAS just paranoid, her behavior seemed to confirm to me that she did in fact have a thing for Chris.

Part of me was going to be damned if I would work for that prick again after this, but remembering Janice's admonitions, I kept my cool. Still, I was shocked that given her awareness of my jealousies regarding Chris and the trouble that that had started, she continued to touch his arm, and get too close to him. In fact, she actually started openly flirting with him, laughing at off-color remarks he made and even making a few herself.

Since I knew that my wife, whom I loved dearly, had set this whole thing up, for the first time my anger and outrage gave way to a deeper hurt and humiliation that she would do this at all, let alone right in front of me. I grew quiet and subdued. I saw that she noted that, and yet, she seemed to become even more flirtatious with Chris. It was as though she were enjoying my obvious emotional pain at what she was doing.

While they laughed and joked with each other almost as though I weren't there, I quietly ate my dinner feeling more and more crushed by her seeming preference for Chris over me, especially since she knew that I viewed him as an arch enemy.

At one point, Chris got up to use the bathroom, and when we were alone, Janice finally addressed me. "You earned this, Alan," she said. "I know you're upset, but I'm telling you right now, you better get over it, because things are going to get much worse for you in a little while. I'm telling you though, that no matter what happens you better just keep that whipped puppy look on your face, because now we are going to do things MY way. I'm going to get your job back, but I'm going to get something out of the deal too. If you don't like it, I'll divorce you in a minute, I swear!"

This news hit me like a brick building! My wife was acting more aggressively than I'd ever imagined she could. She seemed cruel beyond recognition. The really scary thing is I found myself submitting to it. The feeling I had at that moment was vaguely reminiscent of the feeling I sometimes used to get when I kissed her ass. Let's face it, we can't all be completely clean all the time, and on those occasions that I kissed her ass when she wasn't clean, I felt a sort of stinging humiliation at what I was doing. Still, it gave me the greatest hard-ons when that happened.

Now it was like our whole life together was taking on the aura of those isolated occasions, bringing to life a whole new level of submission to her. These thoughts roiled through my mind, and before I could think of a response for her, Chris returned from the bathroom. Suddenly things began to happen very quickly. As Janice studied my reaction to her shocking new attitude, her face began to take on an expression strangely similar to the satisfied, smug arrogance that Chris exuded. And like Chris's arrogance, it was clearly directed at me.