A Work In Progress

Chapter Nineteen: A Proving

As the days had turned into week and the weeks into months, I was settling down. It was nice to have Mari to talk to, but as things degenerated between her and her husband, we spent less and less time together. Over the last few days, she had barely even spoken to me at the office and I was getting worried. I had called her a few times to see if she wanted to go out and talk, but she usually kept the conversations very short and I did not want to press her.

So it came as quite a shock when, as I was painting my bedroom, she called me and asked if she could come over. I had told her it was fine and rushed to finish the paint treatment I had been doing.

I had gotten all of the painting stuff away but had not had time to change by the time Mari arrived. I had told Ralph she was coming and to let her right up as soon as she arrived. She rang the bell and I let her into my apartment, with the spare room closed due to the paint fumes. I took one look at her and my heart broke for her. Her eyes were pussy and red from crying and she was carrying a tapestry duffle. She came in and made straight for the liquor cabinet.

“Don’t ever marry.” She poured herself a tumbler full of scotch and drank it all down. “They aren’t worth it and can’t keep a fucking vow.” She refilled her glass.

“Mari,” I was pleading a little, “come sit down.” I gestured to the new sofa that had replaced that awful black leather one I had bought to impress the ladies that came up to my apartment. She come and sit and I sat beside her, forgetting that I had wanted to shower to get eh paint sprinkles off my skin and to change from the overalls I was wearing. No, they were not sexy, but for painting and stuff like that, I could put them on and not worry about blouses or shirts or anything of the like. If the overalls got all paint covered, it didn’t matter. I sat with my side against the back of the sofa cushions. “He was cheating?”

“Bastard.” She took another slug of her scotch.

“SO he told you?” I asked softly, not wanting to pry but she had come here for comfort and talking about it would make her feel better.

“No.” She said with a rueful chuckle. “I got proof and he still denies it.”

“Even after you showed him the proof?”

“What’s the point in showing it to him, Jamie?” More and more that name was coming up and I was fighting it less and less. “I asked him flat out if he was cheating on me and he said absolutely not. I know he and he knows that he is. If I toss the pictures out in front of him, what does it accomplish?”

“You have pictures of him with her?” I asked incredulously.

“The private investigator I hired got the pictures.” She closed her eyes and leaned her head back. “I just don’t know exactly how to feel about them.”

“I think you do, Mari.” I stroked her hair, feeling sorry for her and wondering why I had never seen just how pretty she was before now. I had wondered that a few times. Sure, she was older than me by a decade or so, but she was a lovely woman with a very coltish frame and lovely skin. She had a few gray hairs that most likely bothered her but I thought they were not so bad. “I think you are already feeling it.”

“You do?” She cracked one eye open and looked up at me. “Think you need to look at the pictures before you say that, hon.”

“Okay.” I agreed, reluctantly.

“In that big envelope.” She pointed to a manila envelope sticking out of her bag and I stopped stroking her hair to get it and open and dump the contents of it into my lap. I went back to stroking her hair. It was, I suspected, as calming for her as it was for me, so why not do it. The first picture was of her husband, Mike, having lunch with a couple. The two men and woman seemed to be having a good time. There were a few pictures of them leaving the restaurant then a few of the three of them entering a hotel. The next picture was from a much poorer quality camera but it was Mike and the couple all close in a hotel room, then one of Mike kissing the woman and the other man undressed her, the of mike kissing the man as the woman undressed Mike. I went through the next few photos in utter shock. Mike was not having an affair with another woman, he was having an affair with another couple and from the looks of it, Mike was the lowest on this sexual food chain. There were pictures of him orally servicing both the man and the woman as which ever one did not have their genitals at his mouth spanked him with paddles and crops. There were picture of him licking where the man and the woman joined as one. The last few photographs was of Mike stroking himself to orgasm into a cup that the man’s semen had dripped from the woman's well used sex and then drinking from that cup. I put the pictures back in the envelope.

“Wow.” It was such a stroke of brilliance, but it was all I could manage to say.

“Mmmmm hmmmm.” Mari agreed and handed me her glass of scotch, which I was happy to take a drink from as I collected my thoughts on what to do for my best friend.