Somebody Else's Secret

It was an almost perfect party. Animated stories were being swapped over rapidly emptying plates, the wine flowing as easily as the conversation. But I found my mind drifting. Two of our guests, here with their partners, had each recently confided in us about affairs. Their partners knew nothing. This effectively increased the size of the gathering by two: It felt distinctly like the Other Lovers were there as well.

Neither of these friends fits the mental image I had of cheaters. When I was a kid, my clear understanding of adultery was based on watching television. A 50-year-old man with a bad comb-over buys a sports car, dumps his saintly wife, and runs off with a young blond chick, who, in turn, dumps him. This cliche appeared with such regularity, it became definitive. Cheating is how balding men ruin their lives.

In my adult life, the cheaters are often much younger and are just as likely to be female and, for that matter, have all their hair. The bigger surprise is that I find myself feeling sympathy for them. I'm old enough now to understand how long and lonely the road of love sometimes feels, and I've not yet met anyone who was unfaithful on a whim; what preceded each affair was painful and sad. When asked to keep things in confidence, I did, telling myself that I had no wish to heap more pain on the couple and believing myself too far removed from the complexities of anyone else's relationship to interfere.

Still, as much as you feel for both sides, there is a big difference between the nature of the sympathy you have for one who strays and the kind that you have for the person he or she has strayed from. The expectation of secrecy prohibits you from expressing your sympathy to the wronged party. So, as much as you tell yourself that you're not taking sides, you are. The cheater gets an outlet, and the partner gets to be kept in the dark. Your relationship with one party is now full of stories (steamy ones, no less), and your relationship with the other is full of silences.

So there we were, our small party feeling suddenly crowded, as the cheaters - unaware, as far as we knew, that they had this in common - and their mates stood chatting in a circle. I couldn't help wondering whether the cheated-on partners were as ignorant of the truth as I thought or if knowing is better or worse than not. My train of thought led beyond the circle: Maybe there were other Other Lovers in the room. Perhaps more guests were holding hot secrets close to their chests while trying to act as cool as possible. What if, unbeknownst to me, someone in the room looked at Jason and me and saw a trio? It was an unsettling thought.

Just as unnerving was envisioning a time after the party, when the faithful partners would learn about the affairs. When they found out that we had known before they did, how would that feel? I hated the thought. If it were me, I can imagine how my cheeks would burn the first time I looked into the eyes of someone who'd been allowed such a intimate glimpse into such a sad part of my private life. At one point, I snagged Jason in the kitchen, and we whispered about how surreal it felt to be "in the know" like that. We could only hope our friends who weren't would understand someday that we'd given them what we could: affection, welcome, a few happy hours in a difficult time. It was what we had to offer, and we knew that it might not be enough.

But we also knew that the old scripts about affairs were flawed in another respect. Cheating doesn't always end the relationship. Yes, it can wreak havoc, and it does cause pain. But sometimes affairs are followed by the beginning of a new era, one in which the Other Lovers become history and restored love becomes the future. That night, we had no way to know which way either story would go. There was nothing to be done except to attend to the people who really were in the room, keeping their glasses full and their spirits high, hopefully not for the last time.

David Valdes Greenwood lives with his husband and daughter in Arlington.