I drove home to retrieve an important folder I had forgotten to bring to work. I would have asked Elaine to bring it to me, but she plays tennis every morning at this time.

I start my dying when I see a strange car in our driveway.

I park next to this strange car. I search my brain for any other reason why a strange car might be in our driveway in the middle of the morning, but my brain can imagine only the obvious. I feel as though I am in a bad movie.

On my way to our front door I peer into the garage window. Elaine's car is in the garage. Of course.

Now I understand what it means to feel empty. I take my keys from my pocket, anticipating the most unpleasant scene of my life. But I cannot enter. I find myself, somehow, back in my car.

I drive back to work.

I sit at my desk and stare; I cannot do my job, even though I should; I cannot eat lunch, even though I have always enjoyed lunch.

After a while – an hour, two hours? – I think to look up that license plate on the internet. My memory is so vivid I can read the plate number from it. He is a tennis pro. He is a nice looking man. He has a good web presence.

He is 25. Elaine is 26 and I am 31. I do the math.

Then – after 10 minutes? an hour? – I leave work. I drive, though I don't know where. Cars honk at me. I try to care about their troubles, but I cannot.

I stop in a parking lot. Like a bad movie cliche, happy children are playing in a nearby playground, providing a poignant contrast to my thoughts. I know I am not in a movie, but I also cannot believe that my new life is real.

My life, as I knew it, is slowly ending. I try to care about that, but I cannot.

I arrive home at my normal time and park in the same place the tennis pro had parked. I feel as though I am taking his parking place -- apparently I am already accepting this new reality. Elaine gives me a kiss when she greets me, like she always does, and I give her a hug, like I always do.

We act normal; we are carefully following our scripts. At dinner, I ask Elaine, "How was your day?"

"Fine."

Do I always ask that? I do not know. Does she always answer like that? I was not paying attention to our lives. It was a mistake.

I try not to ask, but I cannot stop: "How was tennis?" I wait painfully for her answer, pretending only a polite interest.

"Great, even though I lost in three sets to Amanda. I told you about her, she's my tennis friend. But it was so nice to get out and get some exercise. Tennis is such a great sport."

I hate listening to her lie, but I still cannot stop following my role, even as I wonder how many millions of men and women have suffered through this same conversation. "Do you ever take lessons?"

She startles slightly – only a husband would notice – and I realize I have asked an odd question. I attempt to appear naive: "I was just thinking, maybe that would help improve your game."

"Sometimes."

I wait painfully for more explanation. How often she takes lessons. Who she takes lessons from. Why she was home at 10 a.m. this morning when she just said she was playing tennis, and why that car was in the driveway.

We sit in silence. I do not know what she is waiting for. She is perhaps lost in her own thoughts. Finally she asks me, "How was your day?"

"Fine." I realize I have said the same answer as Elaine. "Good."

"There must be more than that!" She smiles playfully at me. Trying hard. I could still love her for that.

I cannot think of even a half-hearted lie. "Not really."

I realize, this is how a relationship starts to die. A strange car, which leads to a lifeless conversation. What comes next? I do not want to watch our relationship slowly disappear.

I do not want to be in this movie.

Imagining that I am in a different movie, I reach over Elaine's back as she reads in bed, and I fondle her breast. She sighs, puts down her book, and turns to me, smiling, willing to have sex with me.

I remember when she was eager to have sex with me. When she didn't sigh first. I remember wanting her so much.

When I am in her and we are having intercourse, I again have the thought that I am taking his parking place.

I hope they used a condom. That has become my hope for our relationship.

The next day, I leave work about 9:45 am. As I drive towards our house, I imagine seeing our driveway empty. I would still have to worry about yesterday. But a car in yesterday's driveway would be in the past, where I could worry about it from a distance, and it would only slowly destroy my life.

But his car is there. I should enter our house, stand in the broken shards of our marriage, and face my wife.

But I cannot go in. I was never a brave man. I return to work, though I cannot work.

While Elaine is taking a shower that night, I walk through our house. A picture from our wedding. Two pictures of us on vacation, both of us smiling and looking happy and in love. I feel like I am touring a museum. The spare bedroom for the child we are planning. Were planning.

The tennis racquet I bought a month ago for myself, thinking I should learn to play tennis so we could share that activity. Her encouragement, I now see, was lukewarm. The gun in the drawer next to where I sleep, my daydreams of protecting her from criminals and intruders. Being a man, protecting his wife.

In her closet, seeing the lingerie I bought for her. I had assumed only I would see her in it. Does she wear lingerie for him? Or is lingerie an unneeded obstacle to their passion? I do not want to think about it.

Mausoleum. That is the word I wanted. Our house feels like a mausoleum. A place for dead memories and expired dreams.

I have, again, left work. I have returned to the parking lot by the playground, where I let myself again be tortured by the sounds of happy children playing. I try to avoid facing reality, even though I cannot.

If I drove by our house for enough days, some day his car would not be in our driveway. Perhaps he would have other things to do. Perhaps their affair would be over. So I am being reasonable to hope that his car is not in our driveway today. I leave the park and drive towards our house.

I do not want to drive past like a coward, as if that somehow makes my problems go away. It does not. But I do not want to walk into my house and find my wife with her lover.

I do not want to have The Conversation. How she still loves me. That she doesn't know how it happened. That she is sorry.

She will promise never again to do this to me. Implicit will be her living a dreary life of being faithful to me.

I will believe her promise, only because I want too much to believe. Most days I will stay at work and wonder what she is doing. Some days I will leave work and check.

She will ask me to forgive her, and I will say yes. But I do not know how I could forgive her. She will ask me to forget what happened, and I will agree to that also. But I of course will not forget. When my hug for her is a second too slow, when my smile for her is a fraction too small, she will remember too.

Yes, she will choose a house and a stable relationship over excitement and passion and adventure. And I will accept this, because I am a selfish man. I do not want a lonely, meaningless life.

And she will always have someone else to compare me to. Someone she wanted more than me. Someone who did not make her promise to have a dreary life.

I'm at first surprised that his car is in the driveway – my hope of an empty driveway was that vivid.

I want to walk in the house and find them discussing insurance. That he is some long-lost cousin and they are planning some surprise party.

I do not believe those. I insert the key and unlock the door as quietly as I can. I slowly open the door. But my efforts to be quiet are unnecessary. I assumed they would be making love on the couch, or the floor, or the kitchen counter. Not in our bedroom. They are upstairs, making noises of passion I can hear from here.

I know the third stair creaks. At the last second I decide not to avoid it, but the creak too is lost in the noise of their passion. I open our bedroom door. I am not trying to be quiet, nor am I trying to be loud and dramatic. I simply open the door in the normal way and walk into the room. They are naked and uncovered.

I remember years ago when Elaine would be that excited with me. As I pass the foot of our bed, Elaine, who is underneath, sees me.

I did not want to experience The Moment. When I first see my wife naked with another man. When that image becomes an unforgettable memory instead of an imagined fear.

The moment when she sees me seeing her, viewing herself through my eyes. Unfaithful. Betraying me, betraying our marriage.

I see the moment when he realizes something has gone wrong, when he turns around and sees me, when he realizes he has been caught with another man's wife. The destruction of our lives is not his issue; his concern is the etiquette of the situation. What should he say? How quickly can he leave?

He withdraws slowly from Elaine. That is obviously the polite gesture. I do not enjoy seeing his slimy cock; I almost wish he had left it where I found it.

Elaine screams when she sees my hand reaching for my drawer, and she scoots away from me. My hand takes out my gun with the same slow care that he removed his cock from Elaine. Perhaps he does not like seeing my gun. My hand points this gun at them.

We all are motionless, the movie on dramatic pause, for a few seconds that last forever.

But I cannot shoot anyone. I am not a violent man. I will experience the slow death of our relationship, then the dejected life of a divorced man.

Then he moves in front of Elaine, to protect her. I remember dreaming that I would protect her.

I hear a loud explosion and feel the gun jump in my hands. Then I see a bloom of red appearing on his chest and a surprised look on his face. Wife's Lover Shot by Enraged Husband, the headlines will read, but I am not enraged.

His face goes slack, his body slumps, and he topples off the bed, leaving only a broken marriage between Elaine and the barrel of my gun. She has finished saying she is sorry and is now earnestly proclaiming her future faithfulness.

I hear another loud explosion, the gun jumps in my hand, and Elaine's chest starts turning red.

I change my mind, but of course it is too late. "Sorry," I say, but the look of surprise on her face is already gone and she does not hear me.

The pain of being in this movie is too great. My hand points the gun at my chest, I imagine the headlines, then I hear an explosion and feel only a moment of incredible pain.