Penny

As she left the bandstand I looked at Penny and she read my facial expression.

"Not all that good huh?"

"Let us just say that she shouldn't quit her day job and let it go at that."

Penny quickly changed the subject.

"Now that you are single I suppose that you are going to start dating again?"

"More than likely."

"I don't have anything going for Friday" she said and three months later we were married.

And now here I was eight years later going through it all over again.

I'd just finished my beer and decided to forgo another and was getting ready to leave when Bobby introduced the next one who wanted to be a standup comic. As she walked up to take the mic from Bobby I made a quick decision to stay. I didn't care if she would be funny or not. I'd be content to just sit there and look at her. She was drop dead gorgeous. Strawberry blonde and extremely well built. Just looking at her cheered me up. Funny or not I was going to stay and appreciate.

"Three men - a Canadian farmer, Osama bi Laden and a Biker Dude are walking along together one day and they came across a lamp lying on the ground. The Canadian picked it up and said, 'This could be a pretty item to have on my mantle if I polished it up a bit and he rubbed it with the sleeve of his shirt. A Genie pops out and says "I will give each of you one wish." The Canadian said, "I am a farmer and my son will also farm. I want the land to be forever fertile in Canada. POOF! In the blink of the Genie's eye the land in Canada was forever fertile.

Osama was amazed so he said "I want a wall around Afghanistan, Palestine, Iraq and Iran so that no infidels, Americans or Canadians can come into our precious land." POOF! Again in the blink of the Genie's eye there was a huge wall around those countries.

The Biker Dude said, "I'm curious. Please tell me about this wall." The Genie explained. "It is 5000 feet high, 500 feet thick and nothing can get in or out. It is virtual impenetrable."

The Biker sat down on his Harley, took a beer out of his saddle bags and then lit up a cigar. He smiled and then said, "Fill it with water."

She got a big laugh out of that and her next one was pretty damned good also.

"There were these four students that were taking chemistry together and so far they had an A for the course. They were so confident that the week before the final they decided to visit some friends and have a big party. They had a great time, but after all that hearty partying they slept all day Sunday and didn't make it back to school until Monday. They were still a little fuzzy headed so rather than taking the final then they decided that after the final they would explain to the professor why they missed it. They said that they had visited friends and on the way back they had a flat tire and couldn't get there in time.

The professor agreed that they could make up the final the next day. The guys were relieved and they spent the day and most of the evening cramming for the test. The next day the professor placed them in separate rooms and gave each of them a test booklet. They quickly answered the first problem worth 5 points. Cool, they thought. Each one in their separate rooms thought the test was going to be a piece of cake...then they turned the page. On the second page was written...For 95 points...which tire?"

Another good laugh, but her last one really cracked me up.

"Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson were on a camping trip. After a good meal and a bottle of wine they laid down for the night and went to sleep. Some hours later Holmes woke up and nudged his faithful friend and said, "Watson' look up at the sky and tell me what you see." Watson replied, "I see millions and millions of stars."

"And what does that tell you" Holmes asked.

Watson pondered for a moment and then said, "Astronomically it tells me that there millions of galaxies and thus potentially billions of planets. Astrologically I observe that Saturn is in Leo. Horologically I deduce that the time is about a quarter past three. Theologically I can see that God is all powerful and that we are small and insignificant. Meteorlogically I suspect that we will have a beautiful tomorrow. What does it tell you?

Holmes was silent for a moment and then spoke. "It tells me that someone stole our tent."

When she finished and left the bandstand my eyes followed her. She sat down at a table with two other women and I called Karen over and asked her to send a round of drinks over to that table. Karen gave me a disbelieving look and said:

"Do you think Penny would approve?"

"After what I caught Penny doing earlier today I couldn't care less about what she might approve of."

Karen shrugged and a few minutes later the drinks were delivered to the three women. I wasn't looking in their direction when Cookie delivered the drinks, but I saw it all in the mirror. Cookie set the drinks down and then pointed to me. She left the table and the three started talking and looking in my direction and I guessed that they were asking each other if any one of them knew me. Finally the strawberry blonde got up and came toward me. She tapped me on the shoulder and I turned to face her.

"The waitress said that we had you to thank for the round of drinks sent to our table. That true?"

I nodded a yes.

"We would like to thank you. Would you like to join us?"

Would I like to? Hell yes! I would do my ego a bit of good having three good looking ladies asking for my company. I got up and followed her back to her table. As we walked toward the table the blonde said:

"My name is Tanya and you are?"

"Norm. Norman Jakes."

When we got to the table she introduced me to her friends Joan and Gail. I took the empty seat and once I was seated and settled in Joan asked;

"So tell us Norm Jakes, just which one of us have you set your sights on?"

"To be absolutely honest as a red blooded fully heterosexual male I'm attracted to all of you and would be hard pressed to make a choice."

Gail said, "Oh wow girls. I've always thought they were a myth, but we have us an honest to God real live silver tongued devil."

The three laughed and I said, "I sent the drinks over as a thank you to Tanya for making me laugh after having a truly rotten day."

"Work was that bad?"

"No, not at all. Work was fine."

"I see the ring" Tanya said, "Fighting with the wife?"

"Not yet, but I fully expect one when I get home tonight."

"You pissed at her or is she going to be pissed at you?"

"Let us just say that she is going to have some explaining to do. I'm going to want to know why she was holding hands with another man this afternoon."

"Someone told you?"

"Nope. Seen it myself."

Tanya reached over and took my hand and said, "I know just what you are feeling. I caught my ex playing with his secretary when I walked into his office one day. It hurts for a while, but it does get better."

She reached into her purse and took out a card and handed it to me. It read Tanya Ensign and gave the name of a real estate company and had a bunch of phone and fax numbers on it.

"Sometimes it helps to be able to talk to someone who has been through it. Use the cell number. I always have it with me."

"And if you need cheering up call me" Joan said handing me a piece of paper with her name and number on it."

There was a little more small talk before I ordered another round for the girls, thanked them for their company and then got up and headed for home.

I didn't know if Penny would be there or not, but I kind of hoped that she wouldn't be there. I would like to have some time to cool down and get myself under control before we had the confrontation.

No such luck. Her car was in the drive, but it looked like the confrontation would have to take place later. There were three other cars there; her parent's Dodge, her brother's Chevy Silverado and a car I didn't recognize. I wondered what was going on that we had the family over. I didn't think I'd forgotten a pre-planned dinner or a birthday party.

The front door opened onto the living room and when I walked in Penny saw me, jumped up and ran over to me and threw her arms around me.

"Where have you been? I've been trying to call you all day."

"I turned my phone off when I left the restaurant" I said as I took in the group in the living room. Mother- in law, father- in law, brother in- law and - surprise surprise - the man Penny had been with at the restaurant.

"I tried to catch you before you could get away so I could explain. It wasn't what you thought."

"How would you know what I was thinking?"

"Oh cut me a break Norm; you should know by now that I'm not some bubble headed bimbo. I knew as soon as I saw the look you gave me that you were thinking of what was going on the night that we met and you were thinking that history was repeating itself and you were dead wrong."

"Jack" she said and the guy stood up. "Norm, this is my cousin Jack. Jack, meet my husband Norm. Jack was my favorite cousin when we were growing up and seventeen years ago he moved away. He just moved back, found out from mom how to get in touch with me and called me at work. We arranged to meet for lunch and that's what was going on when you saw us."

I looked at the in-laws and saw then all nodding their heads in affirmation so I stuck out my hand, Jack took and we shook hands as I said, "Pleased to meet you."

The rest of the evening was spent with Jack, Penny and the in-laws playing the family catch up game. After everyone was gone Penny said:

"Now don't you feel silly for doubting me?" I nodded a yes and she said, "I'll let it slide this time Mr. Jakes, but don't let it happen again. Now come on up to bed so I can fuck you into a coma."

And she damned near did it.

______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

I was sitting at my desk looking at the business card and the slip of paper trying to decide which one to call. Should I got with Tanya or so I go with Joan? Tanya was the hottest of the two, but she had only offered me a shoulder to cry on; someone to talk to who had been through the same thing. Joan on the other hand had said call her if I needed cheering up. Cheering up is something that I needed so I picked up the phone to give Joan a call.

What?

Oh yeah. The rest of the story.

I don't know if it is true in every case, but at least it was for me. Once you have been cheated on you never again completely or fully trust everything. You hardly ever take anything at face value any more. Yes, Penny's entire family backed her story that Jack was just what Penny said he was. However! One thing you get to be when you have been cheated on is more observant. You tell yourself that if you had paid more attention to things you would have caught the signs early on that Angela was slipping away and you could have been pro-active and maybe saved the marriage. That said I have to say that I did not expect Penny to cheat on me, but then I had never expected Angela to either.

I guess it is best to say that post Angela I never took anything for granted anymore and so it happened that I was paying a little more attention to things when I was introduced to Jack. It was a little thing and I don't think any of my in-laws saw things the way I did, but I saw the way Jack looked at Penny and I saw the way Penny looked at Jack. I had several extremely good looking cousins and I had never looked at them the way that Jack was looking at Penny. And I had never seen any one of my cousins look at me the way Penny looked at Jack. Something was there that did not seem quite right to me. Something told me that I should be wary of what those looks might mean. I couldn't ask Penny outright because if something was there it would put her on her guard.

I went online and in less than ten minutes I found several ways that I could put a tap on our home phone line and bug the rooms in the house. The next day I hit Radio Shack and bought what I needed. I took some time off work during the day while Penny was at work and went home and got the job done. Then it was just wait and see

It could be that I'd just wasted some time and money, but I could at least tell myself that I had bought some peace of mind. Then again maybe not. If there was something going on they could be doing all their talking on cell phones or Penny could be talking to him on her phone at work. Penny got home an hour earlier than I did so if they did talk on our landline it would most likely be during that hour.

For three days there was nothing on the voice activated recorders and nothing of any consequence on the phone line, but on the fourth day the money and time spent were justified.

"Hello?"

"Hi sweetie; it's me."

"I take it that it is safe to talk?"

"He won't be home for at least an hour."

"I hope you aren't calling to cancel."

"No way sweetie. I'm looking forward to it as much as you are."

"You sure of the timing?"

"Positive. He always golfs on Saturday mornings unless the weather is bad. He leaves the house at seven and he's never home before two."

"You can't imagine what I'm going through right now. I can't wait. Lunch time quickies are okay, but being able to spend several hours with you? It can't come soon enough. But I still worry that he might come home early and catch us."

"Not a problem sweetie. We won't be completely naked and the garage door opener makes enough noise when it is running that we will have enough time to get our pants on and be in the living room sitting and visiting when he comes into the house."

"Long lunch tomorrow?"

"You bet."

"Same time and place?"

"No. I've got a meeting that will run till at least twelve-thirty so let's make it one and change the location to the Palms. It is closer to work. One thing though and I hate to keep repeating myself, but I have to make sure that you understand that Saturday will be the last time."

"I don't understand it and I don't like it, but I guess that I will just have to live with it."

"Good. See you tomorrow."

Well I wanted to know and now I did. I'd heard enough to tell me what I needed to know, but for some stupid reason that I couldn't even understand I felt the need to see it for myself. The next day found me parked where I could see the Palms Motor Court and at ten to one I saw Jack get out of his car and go into the office. He came back out, got in his car and moved to in front of room 107 and then sat in his car and waited. At one Penny drove up and parked next to Jack, they both got out of their cars and went into the room. I'd seen all I needed to see so I went back to work.

I didn't confront Penny because I wasn't sure that that what I had on the phone tap would hold up in court and my saying that I saw both of them go into room 107 wouldn't mean much since I couldn't possibly know what they did in there. Just because I was sure that they were in there fucking they could say they were just in there to get away from people and have some peace and quiet while they played cribbage. I was going to need at least the tape of what they were doing on Saturday to prove my case.

For the next two days I did my best to keep Penny thinking that everything was fine between us and I guess I was successful because she seemed to enjoy the sex we had on both nights. I didn't bother listening to the phone tap anymore since I already knew what I needed to know.

Saturday I was up and out of the house and on my way to the golf course as usual. I had the worst eighteen holes of my life. Worse even than when I first took up the game. Knowing what was going on back at the house just wouldn't let me concentrate on my game and it was noticeable. The three guys I always played with asked me what was wrong, but I shrugged it off and blamed it on problems I was having at work.

On my way home I toyed with the idea of surprising them by not pulling into the garage and giving them warning that I was home, but then decided that I didn't want to go through the next however many years with the image of the two of them fucking on my bed bouncing around in my head. Even though I knew I would hate hearing what I would hear when I listened to the bedroom recorder I did want to hear it before confronting Penny.

They were both sitting on the couch talking when I came in. Even if I hadn't known ahead of time that he would be there I wouldn't have been surprised to see him since his car was parked outside against the curb. When I walked in Penny got up and rushed over to kiss me.

"Have a good time" she asked and I lied and said that it was one of my best rounds ever.

Jack stood up and said, "I need to be going so I'll get out of here and give you two love birds some privacy."

He left and Penny asked, "Want to work up an appetite before I fix dinner?"

Getting used pussy was not high on the list of things I wanted to do, but pussy was pussy and God only knew when I'd get laid again after confronting Penny. She didn't feel any different the last half dozen or so times we had made love, but then why would she? I'd been getting seconds all along and hadn't noticed anything out of the ordinary. I wasn't getting sloppy seconds though and I guessed Penny either made him use a rubber or pull out just before he shot his wad. The bed wasn't messed up so I assumed they did their fucking in the guest bedroom. Penny probably felt safe doing that as I never looked into that room, but I'd had the foresight to put one of the mini-reorders in there. I'd even put one in the laundry room just in case they got their jollies doing it on the washing machine during the spin cycle.

Penny was her usual enthusiastic self and when she was done with me I wasn't sure I even had enough energy to get up and walk to eat dinner, but I managed. I helped with the dishes and then we cuddled up on the couch and watched TV until bedtime and then she tried to kill me again. There was no doubt in my mind that I was going to miss her when she was gone from my life.

In the morning while she showered I collected all the recorders and put them in my briefcase. The spare bedroom bed didn't looed messed up, but curiosity made me pull the bed covers down and I saw the dried spot where Jack had dumped his load, I put the covers back in place and headed for the kitchen to start the coffee. Monday when I left the house to go to work I expected that the goodbye hug, smile and kiss that I got would be my last.

At work, once I got all of the things that needed my attention out of the way, I told my secretary to hold all my calls, locked my office door and then took all the recorders out of my briefcase and started to listen. There wasn't anything of interest on six of the seven, but the one that had been in the spare bedroom was loaded. I ignored all of the undressing and fucking noises and then got to the part that I was most interested in - the pillow talk!

At first it was just Jack whining over the fact that it was to be their last time together and him trying to talk Penny into continuing what they were doing and Penny saying she was sorry, but it had to stop.

"I've already taken more chances than I should have. I must have been insane to let it start in the first place. I love Norm to death and it would kill me to lose him."

"Then why did you let me?"

"I don't honestly know. I guess it was because there seems to be a special bond between a girl and the guy who was her first. She looks back and remembers how special it was. I wanted to experience that special time again and when you moved back and got in touch and then hit on me I gave in. I found that the special feeling was still there, but it wasn't anywhere near the feelings of love that I have for my husband. I very stupidly let the past almost fuck up my future with my husband as there isn't any doubt in my mind as to how Norm would react if he found out about us.