A fictionalized account of a disputed relationship agreement.
My wife, forty-six, went to Puerto Vallarta with a friend. We had been married thirteen years and had previously discussed some sexual experiences outside our usual routine. Before the trip, I made a joking reference to an erotic massage she had enjoyed on an earlier holiday.
I understood that as permission for a particular kind of encounter. Looking back, we had relied heavily on a shared joke instead of stating the limits plainly.
When she returned, she described a massage and sexual contact, then gave evasive answers when I asked what else had happened. Later, I checked her messages without permission and found a description that suggested intercourse as well. It did not match the account she had given me.
My reaction involved jealousy, but it was not only jealousy. There was a possible difference between what I had agreed to and what had happened, followed by an account I no longer trusted.
I needed to acknowledge the phone search without allowing it to become the only subject. She needed to explain the discrepancy. We also needed to examine whether either of us had treated an ambiguous joke as a sufficiently clear agreement.
The other person’s nationality and appearance did not answer those questions. Insults would not make the boundaries more precise.
Being open to an experience does not mean agreeing to every possible extension of it. Equally, a partner cannot be expected to infer a detailed rule that was never spoken. We had to distinguish the ambiguity before the trip from the honesty of the account afterwards. They were related problems, but not the same one.
