Enter The Black Oak: Chapter 10

AFEW HOURS LATER I’m sitting opposite Stella in our favorite Greenwich Village bar. The dimly lit joint with its rich jewel-toned walls is half-empty and the music is more subdued than usual, letting us chat without the usual Manhattan voice strain over ludicrously loud beats. We’re only bothered by occasional intrusions by a handful of straight men looking to pick something up for the night, which, in their defense, could be due to Stella’s unapologetic display of cleavage popping out of her tight burgundy bodysuit.

“Well, after that mouth-watering description of him, if you don’t,” Stella purrs as I recount the last two days spent with Sean and show her the text message I’ve just received from him reminding me of his invitation—the second he’s sent today.

I frown at her.

“I’m just kidding,” she says. “Relax, honey. You take things too seriously sometimes. If you’re going to stay with that asshole husband of yours—and by the way, I don’t recommend it…”

I frown again.

“But if you’re going to stay with him, the only way it’s going to work is if you do what he did to you, and sooner rather than later. If you don’t, you’re in for years of pain and suffering and self-torture until you end up a bitter, paranoid woman living in fear, at which point he’ll most probably leave you anyway for some brainless piece of ass—”

“You paint quite the picture, my friend.”

Her eyes soften as she observes my forlorn face.

“I didn’t tell you about Sean because I want to sleep with him,” I moan. “I mean, not really. It’s just that I’m so pissed off with Jack that I want to hurt him in any way I can, or at least do something that’ll make me feel better about what happened. I’m so angry I can barely think some days. I’m willing to do anything to not feel like this.”

“Well, making yourself feel better is never a bad thing.”

“But I’d just be using him. Sean, I mean. I can’t do that.”

“Using him? Honey, have you taken a look in the mirror lately? I’m not sure many men would complain about being used by a gal like you. Plus, you’re not using him. You’re two people with a physical attraction who want to have sex. It’s going on all around us. We don’t always have to make a big deal out of it. I had sex four times last week… with two different men. Wait, was it three?”

I almost spit my rosé out while attempting to stifle a laugh at Stella’s nonchalant way of talking about her conquests. “I don’t want to have sex with Sean. I mean, not really. I just want to talk about how I feel like to rip his clothes off with someone who gets it and doesn’t judge me. I love Jack, so much. I just don’t know if I can live with what he did. The pain is just un-freaking-bearable some days. It’s paralyzing.”

“I get it, sweetie. I’ve been there, as you well know.”

Stella’s great love, Ian, was her one serious attempt at monogamy which ended in spectacular fashion when she found out he was sleeping with a mutual friend of theirs. My staunchly independent friend has never quite been able to take relationships seriously ever since.

“I just can’t get the image of Jack…” I manage after downing half my glass of rosé in anger. It tastes awful. Everything tastes awful when wrath is your main source of nourishment. “You saw us together. It was real. I know it was. I just can’t underst—”

“You were wonderful and special. You are special. But we talked about this before you got married. About what kind of man he is. About what comes with marrying a man as rich and powerful and, let’s face it, gorgeous as him, even for a woman as stunning and accomplished as you. Men are… different from women. There are wonderful men out there, of course—”

“And some God-awful women,” I add.

“True. But with some men, the ego, the need to be desired, to dominate, the higher levels of aggression, the lower levels of empathy, it makes things difficult. And when you add Jack’s looks, money and power into the mix… Marriage is hard for most people, but with a man like Jack, it’s harder.” She leans over the table and holds my hand as she talks. “At least you don’t have kids, thank God. If you knew what my colleague Sylvie was going through—handing her six-month-old baby girl to a man who told her to abort and assaulted her while she was pregnant…”

“Yeah, you told me last week. I don’t want to think about it, Stella.”

“There’s no other species that rips apart nursing mother and baby.”

I sigh, having heard her unwavering opinions more than once this month. “Well, I guess it’s their responsibility to pick their partner very carefully so they don’t have to go through that hell. Some women don’t trust their instincts and pick men that are impossible to live with, and by the time they realize it, they’re pregnant and screwed. If they were less naive…”

That earns me a wary look of skepticism from Stella.

“Yeah, I know,” I sigh, aware that I’m hardly an example of how to pick a safe partner.

The candlelight on our tall table bounces off Stella’s freckled, sun-kissed cheeks and prominent nose. While my friend may not be the most empirically beautiful woman you could meet, her self-confidence and personality make her, in my opinion, possibly the most magnetic woman in Manhattan.

“I just… I didn’t think he’d do something like that. We had sex almost every single night. We only waited about three days after my operation before sleeping together again. I’m so turned on by him that I almost never turned him down. Literally.” I fiddle with one of the paper coasters on the table, resisting the urge to rip it to shreds.

“Sometimes sex isn’t really just about sex.”

“He doesn’t even watch porn for God’s sake. He says it’s desensitizing to men and dehumanizing to women.”

“What people say and what they do are two different things,” she utters softly.

“No shit. Apparently, he was making his own porn instead.”

She smiles and takes a sip of her Riesling.

“I don’t know if I can ever forgive him, but…”

“But what, honey?”

I sigh, hating that I’m talking about my stupid self and dysfunctional marriage so much. “I know how this is going to make me sound, but the idea of being without him makes me feel so… empty. I’ve never been with a man so sensational or smart or strong. Plus he’s the only man I’ve ever been with that I’ve ever felt truly safe with. I can’t imagine not being in his arms ever again.” Tears teeter on my waterline ready to spill over. “It just feels so wrong to be away from him.”

“Oh, baby,” says Stella tenderly, getting a tissue out from somewhere and passing it to me. “If you love Jack, really love him, and if you really want this to work, then you have to get this out of your system before it eats you alive. Call that plumber up, or whoever. There are about a dozen men I know whose faces light up whenever you walk into the room. Call him up and get this out of your system. You’ll feel much better and you won’t feel like to stab him in the eyeball every time you see him—your words.”

“I know. Every time he comes near me, or tries to kiss me, I flinch.”

My friend shoots me a knowing look and runs her fingertips through her super-short auburn hair. “Yeah, that’s called hating someone’s guts because they’ve hurt you too badly. You’ll never get past the anger until you cheat on him. Trust me. I’ve been there. Once you’ve cheated on him, preferably with someone smoking hot who gives you unforgettable sex, you’ll start to feel better, I promise you.”

“I don’t know, Stella. What would my marriage even mean anymore if I did that?”

“What does it mean now? Listen, I want nothing more for you than to be the happiest, strongest person you can be. You still love Jack—I get it. And I know he still adores you, but, Jess, the reality is that you will never be able to get over this unless you do the same thing to him. Never.”

In the taxi home, I know Stella’s right. I also know that I could never do that to Jack. Despite everything, my marriage is too precious. Doing what he has done could never be the answer.

Or could it?

Murky dread invades me as I turn the key to our apartment.

“Jess?” Jack appears from out of the living room, his usually vibrant aquamarine eyes looking hollow.

“What’s the matter?” I ask.

“Nothing. I just missed you. I want us to talk… about everything, so we can put it behind us.”

An hour later I’m standing on the balcony, smoking a cigarette from an old packet we keep hidden in a vase for guests, watched by Jack who’s standing five feet behind me. The hour I’ve spent asking my husband questions about Lydia and the other woman—their conversations, places they met, what they did, where they fucked—have done little to assuage my suffering, even though I’m fairly sure Jack’s been giving me the PG-13 version of events.

“You said you wanted the truth,” he says, a drop of shame lacing his words.

I suddenly understand how true Be careful what you wish for can be.

“Does anyone else know about all this?” I ask.

“Of course not.”

“Not your brothers? Or Robert? Or Markov?”

“I haven’t told anybody. Just you.”

Turning around, I find him just a foot away. “And what about them? Those women, if you can call them that. Do they know that I know?”

“No.”

“They must be curious why you broke things off so suddenly?”

“I wasn’t nice about it. I told them I want nothing to do with them. They’re not stupid. They both know not to cross me.”

“Do they know about each other?” I ask.

“Yes.”

His answer knocks the wind out of me and that familiar feeling of being out of control leaves me dizzy. “Why?”

He glances at the arms wrapped protectively around my waist before meeting my eyes again. “Lydia was starting to become… indiscrete. I gave her a warning, but she didn’t get the message fast enough for my liking. I asked Andrea for advice.”

“So was she jealous?” I ask icily.

“What do you mean?”

“Well, when Andrea found out you were cheating on her with one of Manhattan’s good-time girls…”

“Of course not. She knew the score. She knows how much I worship you. Jess, I told you, we shouldn’t get into all the details. It’ll only make things worse.”

“Worse? How could they possibly get worse? Actually, scratch that. I don’t want to know.”

He lets out a deep breath.

“And so what did she advise you to do, this Andrea?”

“She said she’d have a word with Lydia.”

“A word with her?” I shout, restraining myself from screaming obscenities. “Can you imagine for one second how humiliating it is to have the two women who are sleeping with your husband get together, laughing at the poor dumb wife? Can you imagine how that would make you feel?”

“It wasn’t like—”

“Of course you can’t! Because I would never, ever do that to you.”

Jack takes a step forward, pulls the cigarette out of my hand and stubs it out. “I’m telling you these things because you asked me and I want to put all this shit on the table so that we can put it behind us once and for all.”

My revulsion doesn’t prevent his savagely rugged face from sending a flicker of heat into me as I find my gaze meandering over his wicked mouth and up to his eyes. They look so blue in the late-evening light, like pools of clear water reflecting a cerulean sky. His face is so beautiful, his mind so sharp, his body so strong. I’m painfully cognizant of how weak I feel when I’m near him.

“Jess, even when I was with them, I could smell your skin, your hair, taste your mouth.”

I shake my head. “Where do you get these lines?”

“It’s true.” His eyes mist slightly and it takes herculean effort not to put my arms around him and comfort him.

“Did you always use protection?” I ask.

“Jesus, do you honestly think I would put you in danger?”

“Danger is the right word. You know, I know of at least four men that that whore—sorry, I hate that word—but Kevin told me about four men Lydia’s been linked to in the last two years, three of them married. Are you aware of that?”

“I used protection. Every single time. Without fail,” he says, reaching into his pocket. “I went to a clinic last week, had a whole STD panel worked up.” He takes his smartphone out and logs into the electronic health account we’re both signed up to which allows us to access all our test results online. He passes me the phone and I scroll through his test results dated one week ago: negative for all diseases, blood panel all within normal range, no STD’s. The picture of health.

“I know,” I say, handing the phone back to him. “I had myself tested for everything under the sun last week after I found out. Do you know how humiliating it is, as a married woman, to go to a clinic and ask for an STD test?”

“Jessynia, I love you,” he says sternly, tucking a strand of hair behind my ears. “I wouldn’t fight this hard if I didn’t.”

As his loving words bounce off the hard shell that I’ve erected around me, a thought comes over me—a ghoulish thought that I’ve tried to push out of my mind since the night of the gala. I work up the courage to say it out loud. “The other woman—I don’t think her name is Andrea. I think that it’s Alexandra. Alexandra Frost.”

The color seeps out of his face, leaving it pallid, and he sits down on a wicker chair near the balcony door and runs his fingers through his hair, staring at the floor, heaving breaths leaving the depths of his chest.

“Jack, if you don’t tell me the whole truth, we will never be able to get over this. Is it Alex?”

He lifts his eyes to meet mine and nods.

Feeling the blood drain from my face, I don’t speak for a full minute. I vaguely hear Jack say my name a few times, but the sound is little more than a muffled beat in my ears.

“I need to go to bed,” I finally whisper, amazed at the deep calm I feel despite finally having confirmation that my husband chose to screw around with a woman so rich, so powerful, so ruthless. A woman who has slept with so many men. A woman I have feared for so long.

“Jessynia, wait—”

Without turning back, I walk upstairs to the guest room, lock the door behind me and collapse onto the bed.

In the dead of night, as I lie crawled up in a fetal position, eyes wide open, I don’t cry. The smile on Alex’s face when she saw me at the gala sears itself into the night shadows around me. The fear of seeing my little world crumble around me has never felt more acute as I wonder how I can ever get over his affair with a woman whose husband seems to own half of Manhattan. Every second crawls by as the adrenaline of indignation and humiliation keeps me awake into the early hours as if I’m a prisoner held in a bare cell under fluorescent lights.

It’s in the shadows, in the empty void of night, that my mind takes over, playing games with me, tormenting me, sending bursts of hellish rage into me, leaving me off-balance and brittle as cracked glass. Perhaps I always knew deep down that something would go wrong. Maybe that’s why I insisted so hard on getting a prenup despite Jack’s months of protests. Maybe I thought it would make breaking up easier once that moment did inevitably come.

I should just pack my bags and leave. I know it. God, I know it.

Unfortunately, the love I still feel for Jack has me feeling like a hostage. I love the man because I feel as weak when I’m with him as I do when I’m without him; because he makes me laugh more than anyone else I know; because he defends me when my mother’s teasing turns to berating; because he once stood outside a subway station for an hour waiting for me to get home because the night didn’t feel safe to him; because we’ve skied together in Colorado, skydived in Sedona, danced our asses off at country music festivals we happened upon by accident, watched bad theatre in New Jersey, and traveled around Europe in a minivan; because he looked after me when I was so sick that I could barely move my body; because when he talks to me, every word moves me; and because he is the most breathtaking man I have ever known and when I married him, I knew I could make love to him every day of my life with no effort.

I think of Maddie’s mother who dumped her cheating husband in a fit of righteous indignation only to fall into a spiral of depression, financial precarity, weight gain and hoarding while he went on to marry again and live a life of apparent bliss with a woman fifteen years her junior. I’m already picturing myself post-breakup living in a trash-filled apartment with only cats for company.

What the hell is wrong with me that being alone seems like such a scary concept? Perhaps I don’t have any right to expect anything different from a man as sensational as Jack? Perhaps I should just do what other wives we know do and look the other way to maintain their safe life, closing their eyes to the cheating until they too become callused, emotionless predators, lusting after every tradesman they can get their hands on who will relieve them of some of their pain.

And yet I do expect more because I would rather live off the Earth alone than allow my still-beating heart to turn to stone.

Like a light in the darkness, Stella’s words echo loudly in my ears:

You will never be able to get over this unless you do the same thing to him.

Tonight, I think she may be right.