Many thanks to talented author/editor
HMAuthor
and SevenSwans252 for first editing and improving this story.
Grateful thanks to chimicawriting for revisions that made it better yet.
"At last!"
I shouted from joy, exasperation and relief after I sneaked a peek through the front blinds.
Laurel, Felicity, Mimi and Bianca were getting into their cars after they had once again destroyed half my Sunday.
"What is it with your friends?" I asked Ellen.
"What do you mean?"
"It happens every time I'm around when they come over. Today you were planning someone's bridal shower in the kitchen. I stayed in the living room. How did each of them somehow get close enough to push me, bump me, scratch me, step on my feet, slap my ass, give me a wedgie and worse."
"Worse?"
"I mean Tinker Bell. She may look like a little doll, but she's a sadistic savage. She stuck her hand into my robe and reached into my pajama pants. She actually grabbed my balls and squeezed them. Then she pushed a finger into my butt crack. I moved away fast. I don't even want to think about where she was going with that one."
"Why didn't you put on your clothes and go out somewhere?"
"I should just let them drive me out of my own home? Sorry, I mean our home. You know them better than you know me. What's going on?"
"You know," Ellen said.
I swallowed hard as I looked at her.
"That was eight years ago," I said, trying in vain to keep the memory pushed back into the deepest, darkest corner of my mind. I already knew I'd fail and be depressed the rest of the day.
***********
There was only one really bad thing I ever did to Ellen. She's completely forgiven me for it and never brings it up, even when we have a fight that makes her so angry that she won't speak to me for days. Not days. Thirty-six hours is her record.
The problem isn't her, it's me. Whenever I think about it, my body shakes in fear and I feel like my brain will explode. Sometimes I still have nightmares about it. Once Ellen told me I screamed in my sleep. I told her I didn't remember what I was dreaming, but I had a good idea.
Someone as stupid as me has no right to be happily married to the most loving, loyal, forgiving and beautiful woman in the world.
Take the argument that caused the silent-treatment record. It was about my habit of reminding her how perfect she was and how lucky and undeserving I was. She threatened to leave me if I didn't stop. She claimed she was as full of faults as I was, and it made her squirm when I talked about her like she was a goddess I was worshipping.
To end the fight, I told the biggest lie of my life. I said that I was just having fun with her by exaggerating, and, of course, I knew she was only human. I promised to stop thinking of her as a divinity. She fell for my whopper, and I've mostly kept my word, although it's been hard at times to bite my tongue so I don't tell her and everyone else what I really feel.
My guy friends think what I did to her isn't such a big deal. They point out that we were all jerks in college, and the girls weren't any better. They share some of the cruel things girls did to them.
But none of them are married to Ellen. When I met her my sophomore year, it was as if she stepped out of a cloud and floated down to me. We knew immediately we were soul mates, and we moved in together the next year and announced our engagement the summer before our senior year.
Then I lost my mind. What drove me mad seethed with sexuality and drew me to her with a power I still can't understand. I became so obsessed with her that I turned into an animal. My veneer of humanity was stripped away, exposing a single-minded pursuit of sexual pleasure.
I had barely enough decency left to break off the engagement to Ellen before began having sex with my obsession. So technically I didn't cheat. I only went insane.
Ellen was first stunned, then devastated. She asked me over and over what was wrong with her. I tried to tell her that it wasn't her, but she wouldn't believe me.
The next day, I heard from each of the Gang of Four. The conversations all went the same way. They were confused. Why did I dump Ellen? What went wrong? I can't remember what I told them, but I'm sure it didn't make any sense. All I could think about at the time was my nymphomaniac and how soon she and I could rut together again.
A few days later, I got a second call from each of them, and they let me have it. I was called every vile name in the book. Their imaginations knew no boundaries as they described to me the painful things they'd like to do to me. One of the milder ones was reaching into my sockets with their fingernails and tearing my eyeballs out.
Nothing they said affected me until they started calling my new girlfriend names. I became chivalrous and stood up for her. I said I was sorry about Ellen, but it wasn't anybody else's fault but mine. At least that was honest. How noble I was!
They told me that Ellen had gone home, but they were going after her. They wouldn't let her ruin her life, and they would get me for what I did to her no matter how long it took them.
I saw Ellen on campus a few weeks later, and she looked like a zombie. Despite my obsession, I did feel a twinge of guilt and was happy that her friends had brought her back. They had already taken everything of hers from my apartment. While they were moving her stuff, they continued to verbally abuse me.
It took me almost five weeks to realize that I was making the biggest mistake of my life. I awoke one morning, and my insanity was gone, replaced by a reality that came down on me like a ton of bricks.
I had thrown away the only girl I ever loved and the only one I would ever be happy with. I had humiliated her and driven her temporarily insane, to the point where she had thought there was something wrong with her. My life was over. I might as well kill myself.
My survival instinct was strong enough that I struggled against the quicksand before I went under. When I tried to get to Ellen, the Gang of Four ran interference for her. I soaked up their cruel contempt like a sponge. At the same time I was frantically trying to get around them, I loved them for saving her and defending her from a monster as ferociously as I would.
I decided to stalk her. My opportunity came when she and Mimi were shopping at a mall. I saw Mimi leave the clothing store they had gone into and walk into a boutique a few doors down.
As soon as Mimi was out of sight, I ran into the store and surprised Ellen coming out of the dressing room. I fell at her feet and begged for a second chance.
Ellen is smart, but that day she was stupid. In seconds, we were on the carpet holding each other and sobbing as customers and salespeople gathered around us.
That's where Mimi found us, and when she saw what was going on, she became like a lioness protecting one of her cubs. She slapped, punched, pulled and scratched at me to tear Ellen loose, pull her to her feet and drag her out of the store so fast that Ellen seemed like she was flying away from me.