This story involves infidelity, if that offends you, please read something else.
A Wild Rose on the River
This game they were playing was a dangerous one. She had fallen for him hard. She hadn't seen it coming, and for some reason couldn't let it go. She had no right to him, nor he to her. They were both married, but each clearly not happy with their spouse, and neither one wanted, or had the will to keep any distance from the other for any length of time.
Rose had been married forever it seemed and had raised two kids while her spouse did his forty hours a week and nothing more. She had taken care of the kids, the house, the yard, and still had time to take classes and eventually get a part time job, at the local junior college a town away.
Still she had been expected to do all for everyone. Now that the kids were grown and off at college she thought she could focus on herself. That was short lived. She was losing her extra weight and was dedicated to adhering to a healthy diet and exercise regimen. Her spouse started to complain that she was never home, while he sat in a dark room watching the television. She had no intentions to sit beside him, she had done that for so many years that her life had half slipped away. She would not concede on this matter!
When his old techniques had failed to manipulate Rose to what her spouse wanted, he decided to try a different route, if she was never around anyway, she should get a job that would provide benefits, so he wouldn't have to pay for the medical out of his own pocket. Her spouse had chosen to work for himself, because he didn't want to work for "the Man," and he was in the habit of getting what he wanted.
Her spouse's efforts were so transparent, and he didn't realize what thin ice he had been on for years. She had quite frankly had it with him. She had stayed in their marriage the last seven years just because of the kids. There was little love left for him there, although her spouse wouldn't know it.
Rose wasn't even sure if there really truly had ever been love there, or if she had believed he would be the only one that would ever ask her to marry him, so little was her self worth at the time, and why she had agreed to be his wife. She was still looking for her identity back then, not the confident woman that she now was.
She looked back now at the insecure girl she had still been at twenty-two, and then objectively at the forty-nine year old woman she was today, and thought, I will take the older wiser me any day. Not only was she ten sizes smaller now, but she was very confident and comfortable with herself, and lately hadn't taken shit from anyone.
Her younger self had tried way too hard to please others, thinking that she would get the same back. Her current self knew not to expect anything from anyone but herself, and that the only control she had in her life was control of herself, which was why she worked out so hard and lifted so heavy. She refused to be dissuaded from her goals. She was making up for half a life wasted.
Other than raising her children, she hadn't done a damn thing that had been on her bucket list, in fact, she hadn't even put serious thought into what she had wanted to accomplish before she died, because she had figured she would never get the chance to do any of it anyway.
Marriage to her husband had produced two wonderful children, but that had not come without great cost to herself. She had sacrificed a full twenty years of her life to raising them. She loved them all very much, but hadn't even wanted children when she had met her spouse.
The truth about her husband hit Rose hard when she realized that he had managed her throughout their entire marriage. She had nearly gone mental a few times because he had never given her a break. For example, when the kids were all under four years old, she would wait all day for her spouse to get home from work to go to the store for groceries, so he would watch the kids when he got home, and she could have a few minutes of peace, but he would always word things so she ended up taking the kids with her anyway. After twenty- five years of this, she was DONE!
If she had to go get a job that provided benefits, and quit the two jobs she had now that she liked, then she could probably make all the bills on her own, and frankly didn't need him! He always claimed that the house and property and all that was on it, were all because of her, but she had never asked for it, nor, if she was honest, needed it, or really wanted it.
She wasn't a homebody, truly, never had been. Home was for eating dinner and sleeping. He was the one who spent as much time at home as possible. She would much rather have been hiking, or fishing, or kayaking, or skiing, or anything outdoors. Fear had kept her from doing these things with the kids when she was raising them. The funny thing was that before they were married, her husband had been into all of those things too. She didn't understand how he had changed so much.
***
Steve had picked his wife because she had been a beast at the gym and had fawned all over him, showering him with compliments, making him feel like a hero. After they had married, and children had not been an option for them because they found she couldn't have them — which suited him just fine — his wife had gotten lazy and complacent. She was not the woman that she had made herself out to be, to land him. She knew that he would never divorce her, so she became lax in any kind of workout routine. Now she worked, and while she managed about six miles a day on her job, she sat around a lot and ate things she shouldn't eat.
His spouse had been cute and energetic when they were dating, not anything super special, but her enthusiasm had been infectious and she had made him laugh, and still did on occasion. It was different now somehow, he wished that she had stayed true to who he had thought she was. He was frustrated and unhappy that she had changed so much. She used to want to do all the things he did and had been super disciplined about working out. She had wanted to spend all her time with him. Now his spouse never went to the gym, nor hunted, or hiked, or fished with him, and the few hikes he had persuaded her to go on were less than fifteen minutes of walking.
That wasn't a hike, that was a warmup, he would think, but he would praise his spouse for the effort so he could persuade her to go out again soon.
His wife didn't want to go out into nature with him, she didn't want to go anywhere with him or even by herself, unless it was to spend money. She loved to spend money. There was always something new in the house that he would notice on his next set of days off.
She did the grocery shopping, too, but that made sense because she worked up in the city and he worked rurally. Steve was gone most of the time; when he wasn't working or preparing meals for the next week of work, he was fishing, hunting, out off-roading with his side-by-side, or on foot hiking.
He took his dog with him whenever he could, so always had a constant companion. He worked hard and played hard, always on the go. He was a bit of an adrenaline junky if he was honest with himself, and his spouse had turned into a nondescript homebody who didn't seem to want any adventure.
****
