Answers (Some of Them, Anyway)

Her name's Amanda. She has red hair. She's not fat, but she's not skinny either. Yes, she has bigger boobs than me.

He is emphatically not in love with her. And he's sorry he slept with her. So terribly, unbelievably, ridiculously sorry. He will never, ever, EVER see her or contact her again. Never. He promises. He swears to God.

She's a massage therapist. Not the prostitute kind, the legitimate kind. No, she never gave him a massage. She offered, but he declined (he's never liked massages, I know this to be true).

He met her online. Back in November, he had obtained free tickets to the live audience of a certain sports-related radio show, and I was unable to attend, owing to the fact that we had a newborn daughter. So he posted an ad on Craig's List, hoping to find somebody who wanted to go with him. Nobody responded ... or so I thought. Turns out, nobody responded in time to actually use the tickets. But somebody did respond. Her.

They struck up an email conversation. About "sports and music," according to him. But yes, eventually it escalated to something, um, a little more involved. By January, they had agreed to meet in person.

On the night in question, he told me he was going to a work happy-hour. By 1:30 a.m., when I still hadn't heard from him, I emailed him. (He irrationally refuses to own a cell phone, but does have a Blackberry on which he can receive email.) Where are you? I emailed. No answer by 2 a.m. Still wondering where you are, I emailed again. Can't believe a happy hour would go this long. Still no answer. I kept emailing him each successive half hour ... by about 3 a.m., I didn't really expect an answer back, but by then I was simply trying to make a point. That point being: "I'VE been up all night. Where the FUCK are YOU?" My last email to him, at 4:30, was as follows: "At this point, I can only assume you are either seriously injured, dead, or cheating on me. I can't imagine where else you might be, since the bars have been closed for over two hours and you haven't been considerate enough to get in touch. We will discuss this when you finally decide to come home."

At 5 a.m., he staggered in ... just a half an hour before our beautiful daughter awoke, ready to start her day. He told me that when the work happy hour ended, him and one other guy had decided to go on to another bar. They kept drinking until the bar closed, at which point he was so thoroughly wasted that he couldn't drive, so he went back to his office of all places and passed out. Didn't wake up until 20 minutes ago. That was the truth, swear to God. I asked him if he happened to notice his Blackberry buzzing roughly every half an hour for the past four hours. Oh, he left his Blackberry in the car—sorry about that. Next I asked if it ever once occurred to him to call his wife when he decided he was so wasted he couldn't drive home. "I thought you would be sleeping," he said. And the best part was: He couldn't believe I would actually think he was cheating on me. The very idea offended him to his core. How could I even suggest such a thing? Really. As if he would ever cheat on me. Get real, honey.

And you know what? I fucking believed him. Fell for it, hook, line and sinker. The truth was, he was fucking her that night, for the very first time. He did go to his office happy hour, but by midnight his coworkers had all gone home to their spouses, and he had moved on to a completely different bar, specifically to meet up with her in a thoroughly pre-planned rendezvous. Proceeded to drink himself into oblivion, then go with her to her place, sleep with her, come home and lie about it to my face, with incredible ease. That was the truth. It only took me five months to find it out.

These were the first answers I got out of him that night. And there were more to come.