By all outward appearances Marguerite had forgiven Michael. She had not kicked him out of the house, and the couple showed up in tandem as they always had at various standing social engagements including Friday night wine walks at Lake Las Vegas and Sunday baccarat at The Bellagio. However, inside the four walls of their home Marguerite held her husband captive by holding his indiscretion like a thin blade to his neck. In a few short weeks—under the watchful eye of his mother-in-law by day and the pugnacious scowls of his wife by night—the entire downstairs had been retiled and repainted. In addition to the punitive lists of chores she handed him, Marguerite also prohibited him from speaking to her. Whenever he began to utter a word, even in response to a question she had clearly directed toward him, she would raise her hand and say cale a boca (Howtosayin.com—deemed worthy.)
“You know, I tought stooopidly it had been a one time affaaaire. Ta kind tat can safe a mar-i-age,” she said pulling apart a little piece from the green wasabi globe with her chopstick. “But of course our mar-i-age didn’t needed safe until de afaaaire. Te dawg.”
Marguerite had begun seeing a therapist on Gibson who was allegedly a renowned expert in the burgeoning hybrid field of infidelity and handwriting analysis. “You know, in Portugal we don’t go to terapists. We go to Madeira island with the pool boy.”
Landlocked, Marguerite was desperate. Dr. J had recently published a book, The Scoundrel: Caught by His Own Hand (OK, I made that up—I have no idea what his book is called), and that was enough for her. He had asked Marguerite to bring in something that Michael had written recently for in-depth analysis. She hadn’t been able to find anything, so one day she placed a pad of paper and pen on the kitchen table, instructed him to sit down, and began dictating a grocery list to him. She would have to put up with several nights of discount produce and cheap pasta (te cheap bastard), but decided it would be worth it.
She secured the list when Michael came home and took it with her the next day to Dr. J.
“Dis terapist,” she said while pulling a cigarette out of her purse, “He is very good. Renowned. And he should be. He costs me my arm and my leg.”
After examining the list, Dr. J had told Marguerite the obvious: it was quite possible she was living with a man who was a cheater, but he needed more material to be certain.
While Marguerite cried a bit more, I silently ran my own analysis on Dr. J’s groundbreaking prognosis.
Let’s see:
Cheater: um, yes. I believe this has been established.
Anyway, Marguerite shrewdly went home, made soup with expired vegetables and penned a letter to Michael expressing her (so false) conviction that they as a married couple would survive his infidelity.
Marguerite’s plan worked. Michael responded via a handwritten note. In fact, he kept responding via handwritten notes—9 in total.
“Tey were boootiful letters. One more gorgeous than te one before,” she said.
I could see the lights of the strip reflecting in her eyes as they welled up again with tears. “He apologized over and over again and professed his love and…”
“And?”
“And called himself a patetic dawg. I started forgiving him. I really did.” Her voice was quavering then. ”We had sex like fifteen times last week, but ten I took te letters to Dr. J Friday.”
Marguerite stopped and then was suddenly, embarrassingly inconsolable. I shooed the concerned waiter away and after a minute (or ten) Marguerite composed herself once again and pulled out a small pile of papers from her purse. She flattened them on the table--they had obviously been folded and flattened many times. I leaned over; Michael’s handwriting was, for the most part, surprisingly legible.
According to Dr. J’s further analysis, Michael was indisputably a cheater, obsessed with sex, a rule-breaker, a social deviant, and a con artist who was living a double life.
“It’s heartbreaking. Te letters are so beautiful. Beautiful f****** lies,” she said as she lit the cigarette. When the waiter came over and told her she couldn’t smoke inside the restaurant, but that she was more than welcome to step outside on the balcony, Marguerite said flatly, “Only if you want me to joomp.”
On a serious side note I must comment on the fact that Vegas annually vies for the top spot for suicide in the country. Out of the over 40 million visitors that come to Vegas each year, a little more than one every month successfully takes his or her own life. And, the risk of committing suicide for Sin City residents is twice as high as in the rest of the US.
Looking into this a bit more I learned that there is a bit of a debate going on in the ivory tower. On one hand some researchers argue that Vegas itself is conducive to suicide due to its culture of anonymity, impossible odds, and suspended rules regarding personal conduct. There is also the bacchanalian last hooray that lures those who have made up their minds and the potentially winning one last hand to be played for those who haven’t. As far as residents go, Harvard sociologists note that the odds of someone committing suicide drop if he or she moves or takes a vacation. However, others argue that the city itself is not to blame. They posit that Vegas is an appealing home to those who are depressed and in despair. I, of course, take issue with these guys and what their argument says about me, but then again…I didn’t arbitrarily move to Disney World, now did I?
Back to Marguerite. Before I had a chance to commiserate or to insert a bit of rational thinking regarding Dr.J.’s prognosis, she swept up the letters, announced that she was exhausted and snuffed out her cigarette in the middle of a squishy peach mound of Hamachi. Her short square fingernails were painted glossy Vamp. Marguerite’s nails were, in fact, always painted glossy Vamp.
On the ride home I didn’t have the heart to tell her that the letters Michael had written her were a mash of Kanye songs. It seemed, somehow, beside the point, as did the realization I had that if Dr. J.’s expert opinion is correct, then probably at this very moment Michael (Codename Rhonda) was in bed with an alien.
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