Ed pulled to a stop in front of the Colony Cottage Recreation Center and slid off his cool leather seat. He stretched and glanced toward Morse Boulevard. A familiar white and blue golf cart with a NYPD logo on the side ducked off Morse Boulevard and went whizzing past on Colony Boulevard. Such specialty carts, like the NYPD police car, were easy to remember and commonplace in The Villages. There were UPS golf carts, Cadillac golf carts, golf carts that looked like fire trucks and hundreds of other specially-built carts. All you needed was a few thousand bucks and you could have the cart of your dreams. A simple man, Ed chose to have just a standard gas cart with a few nice graphics stenciled on the sides and Ed and Cathy written on the front. He remembered how excited he and Cathy were when they first got their new cart. They hugged and quickly jumped aboard, anxious to take their first ride into The Villages. But those days were gone; it had been weeks now since Cathy had even been in the cart. It seemed as if there was very little joy in their marriage now. Initially he blamed their troubles on Cathy’s love for tennis, but he was beginning to feel there was something other than tennis on Cathy’s agenda lately. Reserved by nature, Ed hesitated to confront his more aggressive wife, fearing that it could cause an ugly argument.
Ed pushed through the front door of the recreation center and headed for the rear of the building for his weekly karate class when a familiar voice shouted at him from the customer service desk just to his left.
“Morning, Ed.”
Ed paused and turned toward the friendly voice, “Good morning, Mary, how are you today?”
“Fine, how ‘bout yourself?”
“Pretty good, thanks. Woke up today and everything is working-so that’s good!”
The staid receptionist smiled, “Yeah, I guess so.”
“Seen any karate folks yet?”
“Not yet.”
“I guess I’m a little early.”
“I guess so.”
Mary stopped reading her spreadsheet, sat back and grinned at Ed. It was a kind of a fake little grin. “Your wife’s quite the tennis player.”
Ed was taken aback by the usually reserved Mary’s attention. “Why…uh, yes, she’s won a couple of doubles championships and so forth.” His quizzical expression begged more information.
“She certainly has. My husband Carl and I are in the same league and we played her the other night. I mean we played her and her new partner, Eric. I liked her other partner, Mr…uh ”
“Waring, John Waring.”
“Yes, that’s it. He was a nice fellow.”
Several members of the karate class walked by giving Ed and Mary a quick ‘hi, how are you.’ Mary waited until they were all out of earshot before continuing. Ed noticed the pause, his curiosity was growing.
“You a tennis player, Ed?’
“No, not really. I gave it up a when my back started bothering me.”
“You might want to get your back fixed. That Eric is quite a hunk, you know. And, you know the old saying, when the cat’s away the mice will uh,” she paused and looked at Ed, “Well, you know what I mean.” She gave him a flat-lined little grin.
Ed studied the usually reserved receptionist’s face and he didn’t like what he saw. She was trying to tell him something with that smile, something like, ‘you better watch out buddy, your wife’s getting a little too cozy with her new tennis partner.’ Ed chuckled uneasily, a little annoyed by the unsolicited advice from the quiet receptionist. “He’s handsome enough I guess, but I trust my wife. It’s not an issue with me.”
Mary looked away from Ed for an instant and then right back at him. “Your wife is lovely and I’m sure you want to trust her. Please forgive me for my weak attempt at levity. It’s really none of my business.”
A wave of nausea shot through Ed’s gut. Want to trust her? The cat’s away! What on earth is this woman trying to tell me? “No problem, Mary, we all need a laugh now and then.” Ed choked up a couple of nervous chuckles, but inside he was dying. The nosy receptionist had thrown another log on the smoldering fire of mistrust burning inside of Ed.
Mary pushed her glasses up on her nose and went back to work without further comment.
Ed turned and walked toward his class. His feelings of uncertainty soon turned to anger. He became indignant. Why would she say something like that to me? She’s just an uptight old biddy. How dare she! She’s just doesn’t know a good marriage when she sees one. People like her think every time you speak to someone other than your mate you’re on the prowl.
Feeling better, Ed shouldered his way through the door to his karate class and was greeted by a chorus of “good morning, Ed” from his classmates, who were all clad in their traditional Karate Gi outfits. Ed pulled his brown belt a little tighter around his Gi, crouched down and began to move up and down with an occasional kick to the side. Soon he was sparring with a live partner and all thoughts of Mary and her comments were out of mind-at least for the time being.