Physical Therapy

My usual Saturday morning routine starts in the garage futzing around allowing the clock to reach a reasonable time before I start up the lawn mower. I don't want the noise to upset the neighbors. The couple next door are older but very polite and it is my habit to wait until after nine AM each week as to not upset them. I have all day and could spend hours in the garage if I had to. And that is where I was today.

My beautiful wife of three years was already at work for the day. As a physical therapist she worked every other Saturday. It was getting harder each day to see her leave for work. My love for her had exploded four months ago when we found out we were expecting a child. But her job allowed her to continue to work while carrying a child. So she continued.

Julie was in my eyes, the most stunning thing I had ever seen and yes I am biased. At five-four and barely one-ten she was in fantastic shape from running daily and regular exercise classes on Monday and Wednesday evenings. The running had slowed down from the pregnancy and at four months she was showing a small baby bump. But with long blonde hair usually wrapped in a ponytail I could not get enough of her glowing face and loving personality. Her smile could put me in a trance.

I was filling the gas tank on the mover when my phone rang. The caller ID said it was my brother-in-law Mark so I answered it.

"Hey Mark!"

"Ken, I am glad I caught you. I was wondering if you could do me a huge gigantic favor."

"I thought you guys were leaving on vacation today?" I asked.

"We are supposed to be on our way to the airport now but we are wondering if leaving the car at the airport for three weeks is a good idea."

"I don't know Mark, if it was me I wouldn't do it."

"Well then, here goes the favor. Could you drive your sister and me to the airport and bring our car back home? Saves us some money and we don't need to worry about anything happening to it while we are out of the country."

"I can but Julie took the car to work today, so you will have to swing by and get me. I can have her meet me back at your place later and drop yours off."

"Cool, we can shoot by in about thirty minutes if that will work for you?"

The ride to the Columbus airport and back to Worthington would only take an hour leaving me plenty of time to finish the lawn this afternoon. At the terminal Mark and I grabbed their bags from the trunk and with a quick hug from my sister Pam, they ran to the departure doors never looking back. The Saturday traffic was light and being as careful as I could in Mark's new car I slowly headed back to their house. However, as I was driving I decided to surprise my precious bride and stop by her work to deliver some candy or flowers. I was hoping it would be a nice surprise. I stopped at the florist and fortunately for me they had a nice arrangement of purple and white flowers. Don't ask me what kind of flowers they were, I just nodded my head when the girls told me. She wrapped them in the paper cone thing and with that I snatched them up to bring to Julie's work.

The parking lot was crowded as usual for a Saturday morning and when I pulled in, I was forced to park a few rows down from the front entrance in the lot. This gave me a slight advantage in that I would be more likely to surprise her because they would not see me walking up to the front door.

I arranged the fresh cut flowers in my hand to show their best colorful side as I walked. To capture Julie's surprise I pulled out my cell phone and turned on the video camera before I walked into the Therapy Center and began capturing the faces in front of me.

Just inside the front door at the front desk I got my first strange feeling. Becca who was always peppy and excited, saw me and her face turned cold. She had two people at her desk and didn't respond to me when I said "Good Morning!"

She quickly scanned the room looking for Cheryl the center's manager and Julie's boss. Cheryl was with a patient strapped to some walking assist device and froze when she saw me. Her mouth open wide in shock and she held up her finger saying "one minute". I was not a fan of Cheryl's. Julie had told me many stories of how hard and demanding she was to work with. Julie seemed to get the bulk of the difficult patients.

I ignored Cheryl's gesture with a deepening concern and looked around the room for Julie. Patients were scattered though the different therapy stations but I didn't see my beautiful wife. I continued walking through the room towards the back where the employee lounge and the private rooms were. Cheryl called out my name to divert my attention but I chose to ignore her at this point. She used my full name and said it loud enough to echo in the room. It was as though she wanted everyone in the building to hear her. Something wasn't right. And I was going to find out what it was.

I passed the first open room and found it empty with the lights off. The next door past it was the lunch room and it was also empty. I was still banking on a surprise so I slowly opened the door to the only closed private room. I figured to take a quick look and close the door if I had to. What I saw when I looked in the room sent shockwaves through my nervous system. On the massage table was a large naked older man laying back with his eyes closed and Julie bent over his mid-section giving him a blow-job. Now this is something she never liked to do for me, and in fact I usually had to beg or pout to get her to even do it for a few seconds and I never was allowed to finish in her mouth.

She didn't hear the door open and if either of them had opened their eyes they would have seen me standing there holding the flowers and my cell phone. The man had his hand on the back of her head but didn't look like he needed to encourage her. Her top was unbuttoned and her puffy nipples and protruding belly stood proud. She was bobbing along pretty well on her own. After making sure I had enough evidence on my phone I tossed the flowers on the man's stomach and said, "Here Julie. These are for you. You should probably put them in water."

Julie screamed, "Oh Shit, Oh Shit." I didn't hear what else she said but I did hear the words: please, wait, sorry, etc. mixed into broken sentences. With my phone still recording I walked back out and headed straight for Cheryl.

"Did you know what she was doing back there?"

She tried to say something about it being the first time for Julie and this patient. This was a great customer who spent lots of money and Callie had the day off. It didn't mean anything. And more bullshit.

"Is this something all of you provide as a service?"

I didn't wait for an answer. I walked back out to Mark and Pam's car and sat stunned. I saw Julie come running out seconds later with her top buttoned back up. She looked back and forth down the sidewalk. She would never have noticed me sitting in the car I was in because Mark had recently bought it. She was frantically running ten feet in each direction on the sidewalk looking for me before she stopped and pulled out her phone. Hearing my phone start to ring only made me madder. I pressed the button to ignore the call and turned the car in the opposite direction and drove away.

My mind was in a daze. I knew I could not go home, she would look for me there first. She would also think I had walked and would drive slowly towards our home. I wasn't sure of my options and before I knew it I was pulling into my sister's driveway. I pulled into the garage, hit the remote to lower the door as I shut off the engine, and then leaned the seat back and felt the tears draining from my eyes.

We had spent the last few months saving everything we could for the baby. We only had one car to save on car payments. Because I started my day an hour earlier than she did, she would drop me off at work each morning and pick me up at the end of her day. I could work until she was ready and wait until she texted me to let me know she was on her way to pick me up. It was working for us, or so it seemed?

Could I have been this stupid? Did I miss any signs? How could this happen to us? Her having a car and me without one made all of this possible. She was secure in knowing I could never just appear out of nowhere as I had just done. And how long had any of this been going on? Was the baby even mine? Nothing but ugly thoughts crossed my mind. I cried to myself trying to fall asleep from an onset of mental exhaustion while trying to understand what the hell had just happened that morning.

My phone rang every twenty minutes or so waking me up but I chose to ignore it when I saw Julie's name. I was just about to turn the damn thing off around six thirty in the evening when my sister's name appeared on the screen. I wasn't in the state of mind to answer it, her car was safe in the garage, and she would leave a message if it was important. The calls stopped shortly after Pam's last call but I couldn't sleep in the uncomfortable front bucket seat. Knowing I couldn't stay in the car all night, and having Mark's keys to the house, I went into their family room to crash on the couch for the night. The good thing was that there was cold water in the fridge and a phone cable plugged into the PC in the corner. I plugged my phone in to charge and went to sleep.

It was dark, my back hurt from laying on the couch, and I was cold. I stood up to go find a blanket and alternative sleeping arrangements when my phone started ringing again. It was two thirty in the morning and Pam was calling again. She had to have landed in Europe by now. This time I decided to answer it.

"Ken where are you? Is everything OK? What is this message about Julie being in the hospital?" She screamed.

"What, I don't know. Where did you hear that?"

"I have a message from a nurse in the emergency room at Ohio State trying to find you. Julie is in surgery? What is going on Ken?"

"Pam I don't know. We had a fight and I left. Actually we didn't fight. I found her with a naked man at work and I left. I have been at your house all night. I..."

"Never mind Ken, go find out what is going on and call me."

I freshened up, grabbed one of Mark's polo shirts out of their bedroom closet and drove back towards Columbus. When I got to the desk I was told Julie had been taken to surgery and was recovering in a room upstairs. She handed me a pass and I ran to the elevator.

The nurse stopped me as soon as the elevator doors opened and before I went into her room.

"Sir, I want you to understand she is sleeping and heavily sedated. She lost the baby but doesn't know it yet."

"What happened?"

"Sir we don't know for sure. She came into the emergency room in distress. She had to go immediately to surgery and the option to save the baby was too dangerous for the mother's health. You'll have to wait and ask the doctor for more information. I can't offer any more."

She was hooked up to all kinds of wires and multiple bags of medicine hanging next to her. With a tube in her throat and no color in her face I fell into the chair next to her. Whatever it was that made her do what she did earlier had no factor in how scared I was at this moment. She was still my precious Julie. I laid my head on the bed next to hers so I could hold her hand.

Throughout the night I heard noise in the hallway but chose to listen to Julie's breathing. When I opened my eyes a few hours later, the sun was up and I could see Julie's scared eyes looking at me. I also could tell by her eyes that she already knew, we were no longer going to have a baby.

For the next few days I stayed next to her in the room. One of the nurses found a pair of scrubs for me and told me to take a shower while they attended to her. Julie and I cried together most of the day. She tried to explain but I did not want to talk about it. Her mother spend most of the visiting hours with us and tried to cut my body into pieces with her ice cold staring. She never liked me to begin with and made it very clear while Julie was sleeping that I had destroyed her daughter. My so-called temper tantrum was the reason all of this happened according to her.

After Julie gained strength back in her body and could sit up and stand if somebody held her, they would allow for her release. Her mother insisted that she stayed at her house when she got out to continue recovering where she could take care of her. Mother and daughter overruled all of my objections and I was left with little choice to go along in the matter.

They asked that I go home and pack a bag for her and then Julie asked for a specific outfit that she wanted to wear when she left the hospital. I made it back to her room in less than an hour. During that hour something changed. Julie was cold towards me and her mother just scowled. Neither responded to me and Julie chose to ride in her mother's car. I followed closely behind.

The spare bedroom upstairs at the back of the house still had a queen size bed and that is where they decided she would stay to heal. It was quieter and away from the daily commotion according to her mother. I was concerned about stairs but was told she would not be going up and down stairs.

Julie settled in and I made sure she was comfortable. She then convinced me that I needed a good night's sleep in my own bed and a desperately needed shower. I took the hint and after a long hug, did as I was asked. I don't even remember driving home.

When I returned the following morning after a much needed long night's sleep and a hot shower I was looking forward to holding her in my arms again. But my desires were stopped in the driveway. Her mother came out to the car as soon as I pulled in.

"She is resting and doesn't want company right now." She said.

"Well I am her husband, I am not company. I will come in and wait."

Needless to say the ice queen won the argument and would not allow me in. I asked her to have Julie call me when she was feeling better. I left text and voice messages all day on her cell but I never heard back from her.

The florist that I had been to last week asked me how the surprise went when I walked in later that day. I tried to explain my life fell apart that day without going in to detail. I ordered another arrangement to be delivered to Julie early the next day.

I knocked on the door a little after eight AM the next day but there was no answer. I saw the drapes move but no one came to the door. Her mother didn't answer her phone and the text messages to Julie went unanswered. I sent flowers each of the next two days before the girl at the counter asked me to take a walk with her to the other side of the store away from the counter and other customers.

"I thought you should know that each day the lady is not taking the flowers. She is refusing delivery."

"Can you do a favor for me and note my receipt to that effect?"

This went on for two weeks. The ice queen would not let me in and my messages did not get answered. I was at work on Monday of the third week when the receptionist said I had a visitor. My mother-in-law came walking into my office like she owned the place and set a large envelope in front of me.

"My daughter would like a divorce. All of her problems are as a result of being married to you. You will find this is fair, so just sign them so she can get on with her life."

There was no way in hell I was going to sign these and I told her so. I told her I wanted to talk to Julie before I did anything. Her mother left in a huff. Two hours later I got a text from Julie's phone that said, "I have nothing to say. Please just sign the papers."

To say I was furious would be an understatement. I told my boss I was leaving for the day and went down a couple of floors to an attorney's office. The different attorney's and I all used the health club on the first floor of the building and were somewhat close to each other.

"I don't know Ken, why don't we have you meet with Karen. She is the one that would be in the best position to help you." One of them said.

Karen was a good choice. She and Julie had talked on more than one occasion when they were downstairs at the same time taking an aerobics class. First name basis and friendly to each other.

"First of all, these forms look like they were printed on the internet. I also never have heard this name before but I checked, he is a licensed divorce attorney in our state. Is this what you want Ken?"

"No, I don't want a divorce. I want to talk to her."

"Ok, give me until this time tomorrow to see what I can do. And just as a side note. She is not trying to burn you in anyway. This is just a break-away divorce petition and she isn't asking for anything."

It didn't matter what she was asking for. I didn't want a divorce. I walked out of Karen's office more angry than I had been. As I was leaving the office, I ran into Joe Calson one of the attorneys I had known since I was working there. He might have been the first person I met while working out downstairs shortly after I was hire. We had talked ever since and walked across the street to grab lunch on many an occasion.

"Ken, do you have a minute?"

He took me into his office and shut the door. Asked if I wanted a water and sat down and stared at me for a few seconds.

"Ok, spill it. What is going on? And remember it is me you are talking to."

I explained everything about that day and Julie's hospital stay. He watched the video from the therapy center. I talked about her mother and the roadblock she had become. I mentioned the flowers that never made it in the door. I told him that her mother delivered the divorce papers and not a process server. I told him at this point I didn't think the text message came from Julie.

"Do you want my opinion as a friend?"

He went on to lay out a few options. The video on my phone could be enough to cause severe damage to the reputation of Julie's employer. A suit may provide lucrative results but it doesn't solve my divorce problem. Joe's opinion after watching it was similar to mine and he believed based on Cheryl's response that Julie probably had been reluctant to do it and that the video suggests that she wasn't the first. It appeared that it was expected by management.

"Ask big. Show them the video. They will not want this in the courts."

It took about five minutes before he convinced me to file against Cheryl and the employer.

The next day I received a call from Karen. She met the same road block I had. Julie's mother and rookie attorney would not allow her or me to talk to her. Karen said it would be up to a judge to order.

On Joe's front the news was much better. He had contacted the corporate office of the physical therapy center. At first the response was 'Oh Well, his word against ours!' but quickly changed to 'let's talk' when they received a copy of the iPhone video.

"Ken, I am sure there is some panic in the home office right now. They will want to control the narrative on this one. Do you want me to keep pushing?"

Three days later Joe called me with an option. They had agreed to 549 thousand to keep this quiet. The facility where Julie worked closed at noon that day and all employees were let go. I told him to take the offer. I never asked how they came up with the 549 figure.

It didn't make the next day at work any better but Julie's mother came storming into my office as I was clearing my desk to go home.

"You are just a mean and nasty man. Can't you just leave my daughter alone? She has suffered enough. Now you go and get her fired?" She screamed at me with vitriolic hatred?

She tossed another set of papers on the table and shouted, "Just sign them!" So I did. I wasn't defeated but Karen said she wasn't asking for anything and the judge may allow me to see Julie.

Karen wasn't happy with me when she heard I had signed them, but she understood. I also got a rundown on what I had signed. Julie left me the house, which we had very little equity in it. She took our checking account and didn't want the car. She asked for no alimony or anything else. Our savings wasn't mentioned. Karen told me if I really loved Julie I should feel sorry for her because her mother and attorney screwed her over big time with this settlement.