He Had a Secret, Too

My thanks to everyone involved in organising this jolly little jape and for Randi for editorial support.

*

Carl Summers wasn't surprised to receive a text message from Sally, his wife's sister.

Their 25th wedding anniversary and her birthday were coming up in a month, so the invitation to meet Sally (without letting Mary know) was hardly a shock. 'I expect Sally wants to arrange a surprise for Mary, but wants my help setting it up.'

When Carl arrived at the coffee shop Sally had chosen, he noticed when they hugged, Sally was tense and wearing a grim expression.

They sat in an out of the way section with their drinks and Sally started nervously, but determinedly. "Carl, I'm sorry to tell you this, but last night when I was with Mary, she let slip something that made me realise I really don't know my sister as well as I thought I did. There's not an easy way to tell you this, but Mary is cheating on you."

"Cheating on me? With whom? For how long?"

"This is the hard part. She's been cheating on you, to my knowledge, for 20 years, and with hundreds and hundreds of different men."

"20 years?" he yelped. "But that's almost the entirety of our marriage! Are you certain? Do you have proof?"

She nodded, glumly. "I recorded part of our conversation. You know how devastated she was when she learned she was infertile?"

He nodded. "That was a tough time for her, for both of us, really. I suggested IVF, a surrogate, adoption even, but she shot all of those ideas down. She started to blame herself, but I told her not to be silly. It was nature that had caused it, nothing she did. I was desperate to be a father. She even gave me the opportunity to divorce her and find a woman who could give me children, but I told her I took my wedding vows seriously, for better or worse, so I wouldn't divorce her, I wouldn't abandon her."

Sally added: "Mary and I chatted long and often about this. But about five years into your marriage she told me you and she had decided to open up your marriage. She swore me to secrecy, told me never to mention it to you or to talk about it in your presence, because you felt awkward about letting family and friends know of the arrangement."

Carl shook his head. "We had no such arrangement, Sally. This is the first time I have heard of it. I feel sick."

She took his hand and squeezed it. "I know that, now. We had an argument last night, she and I. I can't even remember the details about which we were arguing. It was some ancient wrong about which she accused me. She suddenly began to boast how she had pulled the wool over our eyes for 20 years; that she'd been cheating on you every week when she was using the fictional idea of our girl's night out to find and fuck other men, that you were, as she put it, her clueless cuckold. I managed to keep my temper under control, and I recorded the rest of our talk on my phone."

Carl was devastated. He dabbed his eyes with a napkin from the table. "Her cheating on me every fucking week is the damned thanks I get for loving her and taking my marriage views seriously? This is how she pays me back for my not divorcing her when we found out she was infertile? What the fuck did I ever do to receive this level of disrespect from that witch?"

"You did nothing, Carl, not one thing to deserve this. I asked her why she had done it; she said it was payback against the universe for her being barren. When I asked her why she chose to cheat on you for revenge, when it wasn't your fault, she laughed and said: "He had the chance to leave me and show what a real man he was 20 years ago. By sticking with me, he showed me that he wasn't a real man who could have fathered children with another woman."

"Fuck. What a sick bitch" was Carl's reply.

"I'm going to divorce her. I have to. There's something that mendacious, duplicitous whore doesn't realise. I had a secret of my own these past 20 years. I have been a sperm donor and I have fathered at least 200 children, so, despite her cheating on me, I am a father!"

Sally smiled and laughed at this development.