WEBMANCE:
Boredom. That’s all there was to it. Plain and simple boredom that drove her to spend more and more time sitting at her computer and less and less time with her husband, Ned. He was a good man by many standards. He’d never raised a hand at her. The few fights they had were usually over before they got started. He had worked for the same company for the last 15 years and was likely to remain there. They paid him well and he was well respected by his employees. He was good-natured and in good shape. They had a nice home and a beautiful little girl. They still went out for dinner or to the movies upon occasion. They had a little circle of friends that they socialized with. All in all it was a good life that many people would be envious of. But she was bored.
They had fallen into a routine that seemed to make him happy but she found increasingly dreary. Each day pretty much like the one before it. They got up, got showered and dressed, he left for work and she set about the day’s work. Three days a week she dropped Tess off at a playgroup he picked her up on his way home. She made dinner each night, they watched a little TV and then off to bed. Even their lovemaking was much the same time after time. On the occasions when they did go out it was to the same places, with the same people, and same conversation. She was tired of it. She needed something else to fill her time, to fill her mind. She needed to be stimulated.
They had a computer but she seldom used it before. He had a laptop he used for work and she was never much interested in learning to use the computer. But one day while dusting in the computer room she figured maybe she’d give it a try. See what the dusty old thing had to offer. Her friends told her there was a big world out there just waiting to be discovered. She doubted that but figured it wouldn’t hurt and certainly would be nice to have something different to do. Julie came over and helped her get started and then left her on her own.
At first she just surfed the net. It was a constant source of wonder for her. She simply couldn’t believe how much in formation there was out there. She went to shopping sites when she didn’t even have anything to buy just to see what they had. The web brought window shopping to a whole new level. She visited every website she saw advertised on TV no matter what it was. So often she found that she didn’t surf so much as cruise; from site to site and link to link she took a whirlwind tour of the net.
The results were positive. For one thing she was able to alleviate her boredom. For another thing it brought life to her marriage as it gave her and her husband something to talk about it in the evenings. He would sometimes give her a question to research. Nothing that much mattered, just some point of interest. Then when he came home they would have fun discussing what she was able to find out.
One night at dinner he asked her if she tried chat rooms yet. She’d heard of them of course and had run across plenty of links to "chat" but still hadn’t tried them herself. But he had piqued her interest and so she decided to try it. The next day she went to the link from her start page and signed up for an account. She picked a screen name that was a variation of her own name and then went in.
She was too nervous to chat at first so she just watched. It was a little intimidating being as they used code words and phrases that she didn’t understand. It took her awhile to pick up on them all but still she was hesitant to use them. They seemed somewhat silly in her opinion. After all it seemed easier to type "ha" rather than "lol" to indicate laughter. "Hugs" were the same. The word hug was shorter than all of those parentheses. So when she first started chatting she omitted all of the abbreviations the others used.
It didn’t take her long to find a chat room that she was suited to and form a little circle of friends. Each night she would laugh and talk to Ned about her "roomies," but eventually his interest waned. Gradually she shared less and less of the antics of the chat room. Before she knew it they were returning to their earlier routine, barely speaking, each evening spent much the same as the one before.
After only 6 weeks since she started chatting she found that she was missing it in the evenings. Once Tess was in bed there was only Ned and the TV to keep her company and both were becoming increasingly boring. One night sitting there clicking through channel after channel of re-runs she’d finally had enough. She handed Ned the remote and told him she was heading up to the computer. He was busy working away at his laptop and barely even acknowledged her.
She was surprised by the difference in the dynamics at night. Some of her core group was there but there was also a different set that rarely came in during the day. Many were considered "regs" that she’d never seen before. But it wasn’t just the names that were different. It was the atmosphere. People were looser, wilder, crazier than they normally were during the day. There were strip teases and wet T-shirt contests and even sex being graphically described. She’d seen similar incidents during the day but nothing of this caliber. She was having a blast.
She liked coming to the rooms in the evenings better than she did during the day and pretty soon she was there most every night. She increased her circle of friends with some of the night owls and got to know many of them quite well. She was an emotional person and she found that she truly cared about her online friends. In fact many of them meant more to her than quite a few people that she knew in her outside life.
Many guys had tried to gain her favor and lure her into cyber sex but she never took the bait. She was married after all. For the most part they understood that and she had remained friendly with them. However there were a few that didn’t. They made her glad that she had not given into their seedy requests.
People came and went from the room with frequency over the weeks. Even some among her circle left the group for good when real life concerns took precedence. She was always sad to see them go, but always understood the choices they had made. As sad as it was to see someone go, it was always nice to see a new face enter the group. Especially one that just seems to click with everyone immediately.
One night a guy with the screen name Newguy4u entered the room. He was just such an individual. From the time he first came to the room he was well liked almost instantly. He had a kind of charm to him that seemed genuine, not like a persona which is what you normally found in these rooms. He had a great sense of humor. He was liked equally as well by the guys as he was by the ladies. Well maybe a little more by the ladies. Most of them clamored for his attention. He did his share of flirting but was never less than gentlemanly. As far as she could tell he never took any of the ladies up on the copious offers he received.
In addition to be friendly and witty he also had a keen intelligence. He could speak well on most any subject and yet never made her feel as though he’d condescended to her. She enjoyed the many conversations she’d had with him and often found herself chatting to him into the small hours of the night. It was on one such occasion that she realized that she felt an attraction to him.
She didn’t tell him about it at all at first and went to bed that night chiding herself for being so silly. Of course she wasn’t attracted to him. She loved her husband and she barely even knew Max, which was Newguy’s real first name. Still when he entered the room the following evening she felt her heart race, just a bit. She gradually noticed that he spent more and more of his time in conversation with her rather than the rest of the room. It wasn’t long before other people started to notice as well and soon rumors were spreading that they were an item.
That was a silly notion of course. She’d seen other online couples and thought it was a profoundly stupid and profoundly bad idea. None of the relationships ever lasted, when they did end they ended poorly, and the entire drama is played out for the whole of the room. It surprised her that so many of the people who engaged in these "webmances" were married. For her this was a source of entertainment. It was certainly not worth destroying her marriage over. That was just preposterous.
She spoke to Max about this and he agreed with her. The idea that someone would put his or her marriage on the line for a webmance was incomprehensible. However he also felt that these individuals must have other issues in their marriages or they wouldn’t get involved in such a thing in the first place. She agreed of course. She almost always agreed with him. He had a way of explaining his views so clearly that you couldn’t help but agree. Her little voice was always there to ask her if it wasn’t the fact that she had the hots for him that made her agree, but as always, she ignored it.
Then one night he did something to make that voice impossible to ignore any longer. He came to the room full of smiles and laughter and showering her with compliments. Then he mentioned that he felt like singing. She was laughing right along with him, caught up in his enthusiasm, but stopped dead when she saw the lyrics pop up on her screen:
Her heart nearly leapt out of her chest and as her eyes moistened with joy she knew and she told them all that she was crazy for this guy. She could no longer deny that. The roomies all gathered to "ooh" and "aww" and tell them what a great couple they were. She was speechless. They were a couple. She couldn’t understand how this had happened. But it had and unbelievably, she was happy about it. He was telling of gathering her into his arms and then they went off for a private conversation.
He apologized for catching her off guard but he wanted to surprise her. She told him she felt it was very romantic of him. She told him how there’d been something about him from the first time she’d seen him in the room. Something that made her wish to be with him. She knew he understood that she loved her husband very much, but she just wasn’t fulfilled anymore. She needed something more and he was just the perfect something. He knew she wasn’t happy in her marriage and was only glad that he could bring some joy to her life even if it was only in the little snippets that life allowed them.
That was the first time he broached the subject of cyber sex with her. They were both cyber virgins but seeing as it was the only way for them to consummate their new relationship he felt they should give it a try. She was a little hesitant at first and he understood. He wanted them to be able to share their pleasure and knew that would come in time. She assured him that it would eventually. But she wanted to be careful. So far they hadn’t done anything that she had to worry they would be caught at. Cyber sex was something different altogether. She couldn’t bear it if her husband found out about that.
For a time they went on as a couple in the room with nothing more than "kissing" and "cuddling" to mark the "physical" side of their relationship. But ultimately they crossed the cyber barrier and it brought them even closer together. Soon they started to speak of trying to work out a weekend together. She felt this would be almost impossible but she was willing to try. She just didn’t want to push the issue. She figured the opportunity would present itself in time.
The happier she became with Max the more strained things became with Ned. There every conversation was forced and they barely made love. Yet she couldn’t deny that she loved him still. He really was a good man, kind and caring in his own way. But he lacked Max’s spirit and charm. Max wasn’t exactly faultless. He hadn’t held down a decent job for one thing. He could also sometimes show a flash of temper where Ned was more even keel. Numerous times she wished she could merge the two men into one.
As weeks turned into months it became increasingly obvious that she was in love with Max. She hadn’t intended it anymore than she’d intended them to have a relationship in the first place, but somehow, it had happened. One night after they made cyber love, she told him and he immediately returned her response. Then, with childlike enthusiasm, he returned to the room to share the news with their friends. He couldn’t contain his joy, explaining to everyone who would listen how happy she’d made him, how happy they were together. She couldn’t deny that she was happy. In fact she felt wonderful.
They rode the wave of joy that came with their newly expressed feelings. Before long talk of getting together in person became more serious. They were going to plan for it. Somehow or other they were going to make it happen. They had to, regardless of the consequences. Their need for each other was just that intense. Since there was only one state separating them it wasn’t going to be that difficult. They went to mapquest.com and found a place to meet halfway between them. Now they just needed to set a date and figure out what to tell Ned.
Ironically it seemed she wasn’t going to have to tell him at all. About a week into making there plans Ned came home and told her that he was taking a long weekend to go visit his mother and was taking Tess with him. He hadn’t been down to see his mother in a while and she missed Tess. Since she’d never gotten along well with his mother, he figured it was probably better that she didn’t go.
She couldn’t believe her stroke of luck. She practically flew to the computer to tell Max the good news. It was still earlier than he normally came on but she emailed him with the date of their weekend! She was as excited as a teenager as she waited for him to come online. The hour dragged by before he finally showed up and read her message. He was just as excited as her when he got the good news and shared his excitement with her intimately.
After they went to the room to tell their friends their news. Everyone was very happy that they were finally getting this chance. People said they were the best couple online and they’d been voted "most likely to succeed" by their roomies. Now they were finally getting their chance to put their love to the test, to see if it translated to real life. Neither doubted that they would pass the test. They were so much in love.
As the days past and their weekend drew nearer she became increasingly excited, increasingly nervous and increasingly guilty. She and Max had talked extensively about that last point. Being single it was not something he had to worry about. But for her the guilt was starting to overcome her happiness. Ned had been such a good husband and father. She didn’t know what would cause her to fall so hard for another that she would be willing to risk hurting him so badly. But that was precisely the risk she was taking. Not to mention how it would affect Tess if the ended up divorcing.
Somehow though no matter how badly she felt for what she was about to do, she knew she would not change her mind. Having this weekend with Max had become desperately important to her. She wanted it so badly it hurt. So when the day finally came for her to see off Ned and Tess on their journey she was practically ready to climb the walls. The minute they were off she ran to the computer to contact Max. They were leaving in a matter of hours and would be in each other’s arms by nightfall.
They went over their directions to the hotel for what seemed the 100th time just to be sure that they were going to the same place. Since they’d never seen a picture of each other they described what they were wearing so they could be sure to recognize each other. Both would wear jeans and red sweaters. She said her good-byes with hugs and kisses but they’d abstained from cyber sex for the past week in preparation for the weekend. She went to her room to pack her small bag and fight back the guilt that threatened to ruin her excitement for what was to come.
Even during the journey she went back and forth between excitement and guilt. Truth was she loved them both and she wished as she had so many times in the past that she could merge them into one being. On the final exit for the hotel she had a choice of turning north or south and for just a second she considered taking the south road and heading back home, but only for a second. She headed north, towards Max, towards her love.
The plan was not to check in right away but to meet in the hotel bar first. Her plan was to get a seat where she could see him come in but when she entered the bar she saw him immediately and her heart stopped. There, in a small booth overlooking the door, in jeans and red sweater, as planned, sat Ned.
Her mind and heart fought to accept the vision before her. One moment she thought, "Oh my god how did Ned find out?" In another instant she noticed the jeans and red sweater and knew that Ned was Max. In the next moment she thought how angry he must be that she would cheat on him. She sat there frozen in her confusion of everything crashing into her consciousness at once. He read her face and got up and guided her to her seat.
If it seemed they had nothing to discuss in the months leading up to that moment, that certainly all fell by the wayside as they sat in that small booth that evening. He loved her so much that he wanted her to be happy at any cost. He could tell that she was unhappy as she spent more and more time with the computer. At first he didn’t know what to do. Then when she started talking about the anonymity of the chat rooms he came up with the idea. He only planned on it lasting a short time, just enough to return the spark to her eyes and their marriage again. But somehow it had been such good fun and so wonderful to be so close to her again, he hadn’t wanted to give it up. Besides he had formed some pretty good friendships in that room as well. He didn’t want to lose them.
When the idea for the weekend came up it seemed to be the perfect way to both end his charade and regain his wife. He’d told her sister that he was taking her away for a surprise romantic weekend and she’d happily agreed to watch Tess for them. So they had their romantic weekend full of surprises and full of love. She sighed contentedly on her way home as she realized that she had gotten her fondest wish. She had Ned and Max all wrapped up in one man after all.
