Blow your husband off [End]

Your husband never stops by your office. Why would he be here today? You sigh and get up from your chair, resolving to get rid of him as quickly as possible.

Brad is waiting in the lobby, dressed in a pair of blue jeans and one of those suits with the padded elbows he thinks makes him look smarter. His blue eyes are framed by his hipster reading glasses - he quit wearing the contacts around the time you were married. His chic, unkempt hairstyle stopped being cute when you realized his hair really was unkempt and just naturally looked that way. The one concession he seems to have made to appearing at your workplace is that he finally shaved off that godawful beard he was growing. Freshly shaved, he looks almost like the man you married.

He smiles and embraces you as you enter the lobby. You wrinkle your nose. Even that stupid cologne he wears is annoying.

"What are you doing here?" you ask, quickly pushing him to arm's length.

"It's our anniversary," he says. "I know I usually forget, but this year I put five reminders on my iPhone. I want you to take the rest of the day off and come with me. I have a whole thing planned. I've been a total asshole and I want to make it up to you."

You anniversary is today? You stopped caring when you realized he would never remember. Maybe he's right. Your expression hardens. It's not the time for him to be trying to make up years of neglect. He knows you have a crushing deadline today.

"I'm sorry, Brad, I can't," you say.

"I have reservations at Chau, that trendy restaurant you--"

"I mean it," you say, adding a little ice to your voice. "I've been telling you all week that today was a really bad day for me. Now I have about ten hours worth of work to finish in the next two. You've got to get out of here."

He looks crestfallen, but then some switch flips in his head and he seems happy again.

"Alright, well, I tried," he says.

"Sorry," you pat his shoulder. "Some other time."

"Sure." You watch him walk toward the doors.

"I'll be working late tonight," you say as he departs. He acknowledges you with a wave without looking back.

Feeling a little guilty about that - even though he totally deserved it - you return to your desk, put in your earbuds, and get back to work. You're like a machine, plowing through the stacks of numbers. As you get to the last pages things still aren't adding up. There was something in the junior accountant Haley's work that stuck out to you. Numbers disappeared from one column to the next. You just corrected them, but here you are at the end and things still aren't adding up.

Paging through Haley's work you find the error again. You go into the accounts and check. Your numbers are right. Her numbers are hiding some-thing. You check the transfer logs on the accounts and find several transfers, none huge, but together adding up to several thousand dollars, all missing from the account.

"She's embezzling!" you exclaim, recognizing what she is doing as a classic accountant's trick to hide expenses. You track down the routing numbers and find she is using a private bank account. If she had used a fake business her little trick might have worked.

As you pile the folders up in your arms to take them to Mr. Perry you realize it might be too late. it's almost seven. You were so intensely working you lost track of time. Miraculously you see Mr. Perry is still in his office. He's smoking a cigar and talking on the phone. When he sees you he frowns and waves you in. He finishes up his call and looks at you across the desk.

"You're late, Rebecca. I should fire you for that, but I'll give you one chance. If you made the numbers work then it will just be a warning."

"They still didn't add up," you say and drop the final hard copy on his desk.

Haley's deception is circled in red marker on top of the pile. "I'm afraid they will never add up, Mr. Perry. One of your junior accountants, Haley, was embezzling."

He drops the cigar into his lap and curses.

"It can't be," he says as he brushes the ashes from his pants. "You had better have proof."

You do. You meticulously explain it to him, showing him all of the routing numbers, the account, everything. There's one final piece of the puzzle that only Mr. Perry can provide. The name on the private account was Martin Tate. You assumed it was a fake name.

"It's her boyfriend," he says. "I remember asking if she was married when she wrote it down as her emergency contact when we hired her."

Why would Perry ask her if she was...oh, that's right, he was probably fucking Haley.

"You can go home, Rebecca." He says. "I'll deal with this on Monday. Oh, and there will be a bonus in it for you. Half of whatever we recover from Haley's accounts."

Feeling pretty good about working your ass off today, despite the distrac-tions, you stop at Brad's favorite pizza joint and pick up his favorite. The smell of the hot pizza fills your car. Your headlights sweep across the drive and you realize there is another car there. It looks familiar.

You head into the house through the back door so you can check the herbs you have growing in the garden. Nothing quite ready to cut yet. The house is dark, but you can hear music playing from the living room. You put the pizza on the kitchen counter and walk to the living room.

Your eyes go wide with surprise and your heart hammers in your chest. No wonder you recognized the car, it's your good friend Narumi's Miata.

You met her in college, a cute, spunky half-japanese girl with a pink streak in her hair and a party animal side.

You haven't talked to Narumi in months, but she's currently sprawled on your leather couch. She's wearing a schoolgirl costume with her skirt up around her waist and your husband's head between her thighs. As you watch she moans and pulls his face against her pussy, grinding his mouth like she's giving a lapdance to his tongue. The raunchy sounds of his tongue-work are audible even through the techno music playing.

"Ohhhh teacher, I've been a bad girl," she moans. "You'd better lick my asshole too."

She turns around, thrusting her little butt up at your husband's face. You leave rather than watch that happen.

Shaking with anger, you walk out the back door, never intending to return to the house. No, you'll be back for your things. He can keep the house and the stupid mortgage. God, you need a drink. There's a sleazy bar not far away.

You screech into the lot and sit down at a stool. Every scumbag in the joint is eyeballing you and you don't give a shit.

After your second gin and tonic a decently good-looking guy offers to buy you another. You look at him for about five seconds and decide you can imagine fucking him.

"Alright, gin and tonic," you say.

He sits down on the stool beside you and gestures to the ring on your finger.

"You married?" he asks.

"No." You don't even have to consider the question. "I'm completely available."

YOU MANAGED TO SAVE YOUR JOB, BUT THERE WAS NO SAVING YOUR MARRIAGE. YOU'LL HAVE A LOT OF FUN STARTING OVER!