This is a writing Prompt from 2025 that I thought would be fun to break out but never got around to. The prompt is posted below with the mini outline below.
Monday, April 28th: He watched from the shadows.
He watched from the shadows. They thought they were so sneaky. He had no trouble following them to their rendezvous. He frowned to himself. How stupid did they think he was? That he wouldn’t catch on?
The secret glances, the new perfume and jewelry.
He hoped it wasn’t true.
That he was seeing something that wasn’t there.
But no.
He called telling Gina he was working late tonight. She said she was going out with friends for a girl’s night. She was practically giddy when she announced it. He hoped that when he followed her that he would see a group of women hoisting margaritas.
He hadn’t.
Instead, he saw a car pick up Gina. He knew she wouldn’t have ordered it as he checked the bank statements. She used her own car and never ordered one to pick her up. Someone else would have done that in case he checked.
He was already parked a few blocks over and easily slipped into traffic without being noticed.
She was taken across town and dropped off in front of a restaurant. He met her there.
Thomas.
Was it worse that he knew him?
Greg watched as there was a kiss hello that was far from general friendliness and debated whether he would prefer her sneaking off with a stranger.
The embrace was public. But who was to see, who was to know? No one either of them knew frequented this side of town, or if they did they were hiding their own nefarious undertakings. No one would tell on them.
Especially not to Greg.
As he watched them go into the building, he wondered who knew. How many people knew? Greg felt his anger deflate.
It was done, what did it matter who knew?
He drove down the street and turned back to the office. He would set up the paperwork for the divorce and bring it home. He wanted to know the truth before proceeding and now he did.
There would be no point in brooding over it. At least not now. Later, when what needed to be done was done, he could brood.
Greg pulled back into the office building and went upstairs. The building had night security, but it had not come on duty yet. No one saw him leave and no one saw him return. There were others in the building, he knew. But he knew they wouldn’t have seen him as they used the other entrance on the other side of the building. He was the only one from his office working late tonight.
He also knew when the security guard came on duty for the night shift, the cars would be noted. If anyone asked, he would have been in the office. He could, if he wanted, pretend he hadn’t seen Gina with Thomas.
He decided that unless things got ugly, he would continue to pretend. His friendship with Thomas would end, but he wouldn’t make the affair public if he didn’t need to. Greg sighed. Thomas went through women fast. None of them lasted. It was hardly the first time he had taken up with someone else’s wife. Greg knew he enjoyed the thrill of the illicit far more than he enjoyed those he had the affairs with. Once the divorce was in the works he was certain the thrill would be gone. There would be no public relationship for others to see.
‘Best not to mention it,’ Greg told himself as he slipped into his office and sat down at his desk.
‘Exactly where I told them I would be.’ He thought looking at the screen.
He figured when he told Gina he knew about the affair and the restaurant, she might assume that he hired a PI and had a slew of photos to back him up. He hoped that would just make it a neat and clean ending instead of a drawn-out messy divorce. He would not splash her infidelity over the courts and they could just sever ties.
He shook his head. They had been heading this way for a while, he just thought that they would end things first. He hated the feeling of betrayal more than anything. Greg opened his email. The box filled in the short time he had been away. He took out the relevant files that corresponded to the requests.
‘Might as well do the work since I am here,’ he thought. Once the problems were cleared away he could look to his own paperwork. He knew it would be a while before Gina returned home. He had the time and he might as well make use of it.
Greg started answering the messages sending out the responses and in some cases getting replies back. The neat stack of files spread over his desk as he shuffled from one to another. About the time he cleared away the general questions, he spotted a larger problem. If he dealt with it now he could keep it from becoming a catastrophe.
‘Apparently I did need to work late,’ he thought wryly as he dug in, prepared to clear the issues away before focusing on his own crumbling life.
Greg had been at his desk for a little over two hours when the phone rang. He was making headway and almost done. He picked up the headset swallowing back his own irritation.
It was the security guard on the other line.
The police were here.
There had been an incident.
SETUP: Greg’s marriage is falling apart. He suspects his wife Gina is having an affair and wants to know before he files. He follows her and sees she is having an affair with his friend Thomas.
COMPLICATION: Thomas is his friend but notorious for sleeping with other people’s wives he never gets attached. Since Greg wants a quick and clean divorce he decides he isn’t going to mention the affair unless he has to.
RISING ACTION: Greg sneaks back into his office as he told everyone he was working late. No one saw him leave and no one saw him return, but he gets to work responding to e-mails and finds a problem that needs to be dealt with that could be bad news for the company. Gets stuck in. The police show up. Thomas and Gina went to his place after the restaurant and gunshots were heard. Both were killed. At first he is suspected because of Gina, but soon cleared. As one of Thomas’ only friends he provides insight and sees ties between Thomas and the problem he found when he went back to work. Go through list of love affairs. Greg starts to see a non love affair pattern and how it might tie to him. Finds strange things at the house.
MEANWHILE: The police uncover the fact that Thomas wasn’t just after the thrill of the illicit romance but used his affairs to gain insider knowledge. Also find Thomas and Gina go way back and she was married to Thomas’ partner, their separation never official making Greg’s marriage null.
CLIMAX: Greg realizes Gina was gathering info from him. The partner comes after Greg, both for the gathered information and because he was jealous. He didn’t realize Gina would have to marry Greg. Police intervene at the last minute. Partner is arrested.
DENOUEMENT: Greg learns of the whole thing and how Gina and Thomas were going to cut the partner out as well as run off together. He realizes he was nothing more than a bit player in someone else’s drama. Wonders if he can really ever let it go.
Ten til Midnight 