What They Don't Know - 7. The Problem Escalates.

The next morning I met up with Ethan and we rode in to work together, as usual. As we entered our department, we were somewhat surprised when several of our coworkers began welcoming us back, because they also seemed eager to learn if we had a good time at the wedding. We weren’t exactly ready for this type of greeting and didn’t understand how so many of them were aware of what we had supposedly done.

We had only told Maria about the made-up details concerning our trip before we left, because Ethan and I didn’t feel we should share this information with more than just her. After all, ‘our trip’ was entirely fabricated in the first place and we realized that it was usually best not to spread a falsehood. This was due to the fact that the more people who knew about a ‘lie,’ no matter how innocuous and trivial it might seem, the greater the likelihood that someone would uncover the truth and you’d get busted. Therefore, we tried to remain silent on this issue, but it now appeared as if someone else must have spread the word about what we were supposedly up to.

When it came to the question about why both of us took the same day off, Ethan and I had anticipated the others would conclude that we had done it so we could go to an appointment, run some errands or possibly that we had something else planned that was far less exciting than going on a trip. We never expected they would assume we took the day off so we could go somewhere together, let alone to a wedding, but apparently that wasn’t how it turned out.

Since we’d only told one other person about our cover story, it now appeared that we’d discovered something else about Maria. Along with everything else we’d suspected about her, it now seemed as if she also liked to gossip. I would definitely try to keep this in mind when I had any future dealings with her, especially if there was something I wanted to keep secret.

This bit of knowledge also provided me with the answer to another unasked question I’d been wondering about. If she was the one who told everyone in our department about what we’d supposedly been doing this past weekend, then it seemed only logical that she would have also told Chad about our plans. Even if he hadn’t directly asked her to seek out this information for him, I felt he probably still knew about it anyway. After all, I was fairly positive she wouldn’t have excluded filling him in about this bit of gossip, since they often spent time together, or so it seemed.

Actually, I should be fair to Maria and not automatically assume that she was the one who told EVERYONE else about our plans. It was possible that she might have only told one or two others about it and then those people spread the word to the others in the department, until everyone knew the story. Even if that was the case, Maria still had no right to tell ANYONE else our business.

This situation was still on my mind when Ethan and I went out to lunch that afternoon, so I decided to check with him about something else that had been bothering me. I wanted to know if Maria had approached him again, in order to gain more information about our fictional weekend away.

“Did Maria ask you about the wedding?” I confronted him, as soon as we were in the car.

“Yes, she did, but I just gave her an abbreviated version of the cover story we’d agreed upon,” Ethan advised me. “Did she ask you about it too?”

“She certainly did and I told her the same story,” I confirmed. “When did she come to you?”

“I ran into her shortly after we first arrived this morning,” Ethan informed me. “I was heading back to get a couple of things out of the supply cabinet when she stopped me. She made it sound as if she was just being friendly.”

“Friendly my eye, but that means she got to you first,” I announced, sarcastically.

“So when did she ask you about it?” Ethan wondered.

“She didn’t ask me until mid-morning,” I confessed. “I was on my way back from the men’s room when she stopped me in the hallway. I’m not sure if she followed me out there and then waited for me to finish up my business, or if she just happened to be there when I came out. It certainly makes me wonder though.”

“Yes, I think it would definitely be more worrisome if she followed you out there just to ask you about the wedding,” Ethan confirmed.

“I’m not sure I follow your line of thinking,” I confessed. “Why do you think that would be worse?”

“I suspect that if she followed you out there, then it would seem to indicate that she wasn’t just trying to sate her own curiosity,” Ethan explained. “Otherwise, I think she would have just waited and asked you the next time she ran into you. I have a feeling it means that she’d been requested to get this information for someone else instead. I think that hunch is corroborated by the fact that she asked both of us the same types of questions again.”

“Why do you say that?” I followed. “She didn’t do anything different than what she did before we left, because she asked us both about our trip then too. So why do you think this time was different or worse than before?”

“Well, I understood why she asked both of us the first time, since I kind of brushed her off and only told her we were taking the day off for personal reasons, “ Ethan reasoned. “This time, however, I gave her a decent answer, so my explanation should have been sufficient to satisfy her curiosity, if she was only interested in seeing if we’d had a good time. Since she asked both of us again, it makes me think she was not only trying to find out what we did or if we’d had a good time, but I have a sneaking suspicion that she was also trying to trap us and find inconsistencies between our stories.”

“Ok, I see what you mean now,” I replied, “and that prospect would definitely be quite troubling. If she did follow me out there, then I agree it would certainly indicate that she is working with Chad. How do you think we can find out for sure if that’s what she did?”

“I haven’t any ideas, unless someone else saw her do it, but now there is something I want you to tell me,” Ethan replied. “How in the world did you know we’d need a cover story in the first place?”

“I didn’t know we would for certain, but I did figure that she might ask us more questions about the wedding once we got back,” I answered. “Since she had seemed so curious about what we were going to be doing before we left, I merely assumed that she’d also show the same amount of interest about it when we returned.”

“So you came up with the story because of a hunch?” Ethan followed, while eyeing me with a fair amount of skepticism.

“Sort of. As you know, I’ve become extremely suspicious about her intentions, because I’m still toying with the idea that she’s actually working with Chad,” I confirmed. “I really would like to know if she’s doing that for sure, so we’d know whether Chad sent her to ask us those questions or if she did it on her own. It’s possible she may have simply been curious, or just plain nosy if you’d prefer. The reason I say that is because there wasn’t a great deal of time after word got out about us both asking to take Monday off for Chad to put her up to it before we left.

“The thing is,” I continued, “she did seem really interested in what we’d be doing when she asked me to give her all of the details about our trip. I’m not sure why, but I still got the feeling that she didn’t want this information just for herself. Even if she had acted alone the first time, they definitely had time to conspire before we got back, so I’m slightly more convinced that by quizzing us both when we returned that she’s definitely working in collusion with Chad.“

“If she isn’t working with him, then it tells me that she must be the biggest gossip around,” Ethan observed. “It was kind of obvious that everyone else knew the supposed reason for our trip, so I can only assume she must have told at least a few of them. I have to admit that it really surprises me to discover this about her though, because I’ve always trusted her and never suspected that she suffered from this particular character flaw before.”

“So you didn’t know that she was a gossip before this happened?” I asked.

“I know some of the other people in the building like to spread stories around, but I’d never heard that she was one of them,” Ethan told me, before pausing briefly. “You know, now that I think about it, I can remember another time when Maria might have been the one to disclose information she was asked to keep secret. Out of the blue, I just happened to recall another incident and now can’t help but wonder if Peggy Gruber told anyone else about her pregnancy or if Maria might have been the one to spread that story around too.”

“Huh?” I followed, somewhat moronically.

“Peggy Gruber is a woman who used to work here,” Ethan answered, “and one day when she was in the break room with Maria and me, she accidentally let the news slip that she was expecting. As soon as she realized what she’d done, Peggy made us promise not to tell anyone else. I wasn’t sure why she did that, except possibly that she was worried the State would make her start her maternity leave before she wanted to, but I didn’t think it was a big deal. At the time, I didn’t suspect Maria would share this bit of information, especially since Peggy had sworn us to secrecy. That’s why I was totally surprised a month later when I heard that some of the other people in the building knew about Peggy’s situation and were planning to throw her a baby shower.”

“So do you think Maria was the one who told them, even though she had promised the woman that she wouldn’t?” I challenged, to make certain I understood what Ethan was saying.

“Looking back at what went down, I certainly have my suspicions now,” Ethan confirmed. “Peggy told us that she was waiting to reveal the news to her husband on his birthday and didn’t want to take the chance that someone else would tell him before she had the chance. Unless she’d made a similar mistake and told another person about it later, then Maria had to be the one who started spreading the information. I know for certain it wasn’t me.”

“So what happened when word got out?” I asked. “Did it create a big problem?”

“Yes, someone happened to say something to Peggy’s husband before his birthday and it created a major hassle,” Ethan explained. “Peggy and her husband even ended up getting divorced because of it, a few months after the baby was born, and Peggy never came back here to work.”

“What! They got divorced just because someone else told her husband about the baby? Why would he do that, just because someone else told him she was pregnant?” I wondered.

“Peggy’s husband thought she hadn’t told him because she wasn’t sure if the baby was his, not because she wanted to surprise him,” Ethan informed me. “He felt that since she was trying to keep this information from him, it meant that she’d been having an affair. Even after the paternity test proved the baby was his, he still had his doubts about whether there had been another man. Besides, by that point too many things had been said and too many feelings had been hurt to make the marriage work again.”

“Damn, that’s awful! Did you explain to Peggy that you never told anyone?” I wondered.

“I did and she thanked me for keeping her secret,” Ethan responded. “She also informed me that she wished others had been so considerate.”

“Wow, I guess Maria really screwed things up for Peggy then,” I mused.

“It certainly appears that way,” Ethan agreed.

“I’m glad I know this about her now and I’ll make certain not to tell her about anything that I don’t want spread around,” I replied. “It reminds me of the old navy saying during times of war that ‘loose lips sink ships.’ We don’t have a ship, but she could sink us nonetheless, especially if Chad is on a fishing expedition.”

“You’re right about that and I’m certainly glad you made us coordinate our story before we came back to work,” Ethan announced. “If you hadn’t been smart enough to have us do it then we might have given her conflicting stories and aroused their suspicions even more. Then, she and Chad could have screwed up our lives as badly as Maria did for Peggy.”

It was a somber and terrifying thought.

When we returned to work after lunch, the rest of the afternoon proved to be fairly quiet. No one came over to talk to us about anything besides work related topics and we didn’t run into Chad until we were going to the car on the way home. This immediately raised my suspicions, because it appeared as if he was waiting for us.

“Hey, guys. Did you have a good weekend?” he asked, as soon as we got close.

“Yeah, it was better than most,” Ethan responded, without elaborating.

“I take it to mean that you had fun at the wedding then?” Chad followed.

Although we were both somewhat surprised that he came right out and asked this, Ethan managed to keep his cool and answered his question, nonetheless.

“Yes, we did,” he confirmed.

“I was just a little surprised when I heard that you two were attending the wedding of a mutual friend,” Chad followed, “Since Bryan just moved here a short time ago, I didn’t think you would have had time to make any friends in common yet, except here at work.”

We both thought this comment was more than a little forward and indicated that he’d apparently put some thought into it before confronting us.

“Yes, I suppose that would seem a little strange,” I responded.

I did this because I noticed that Ethan appeared to still be considering the implications of Chad’s last statement. Since I didn’t want Chad to read his silence as an admission that his assumption was correct, I came up with another story on the spot.

“In fact I was a little surprised myself when I discovered that Ethan knew someone I had grown up with. You see, I went to school with the bride, since we grew up in the same town, so I was surprised to discover that Ethan had met her after she had graduated from high school,” I stated, but didn’t elaborate further.

“Wow, it certainly is a small world,” Chad commented. “It’s even more amazing that you were each close enough to her that she invited both of you to the wedding.”

“That’s not exactly how it happened,” I clarified. “The bride originally emailed me to ask for my current address, so she could send me an invitation. Since I hadn’t spoken to her in a while, I emailed her back and asked for her phone number, so I could call and give her the information instead. We ended up spending quite a bit of time on the phone catching up on what each other had been up to. Then, after I gave her my new address she told me she went to college with a guy who lived in New Mexico and told her he was applying for jobs in the Santa Fe area. When she mentioned Ethan’s name to me and asked if I happened to know him, I was temporarily in shock. Not only that, but she was absolutely flabbergasted when I explained that I not only knew him, but we also worked together.”

“So that’s how you found out you were both invited to the same wedding?” Chad pressed.

“No, she hadn’t invited Ethan at that point, since they’d lost touch and she didn’t know how to contact him,” I added. “After she discovered I worked with him, she asked if it would be alright if she included him on my invitation and said we could both bring dates, if we wanted.

“When I told her she could definitely include him on my invitation,” I continued, “I also informed her that I wouldn’t be bringing a date, since I hadn’t met anyone I was interested in yet. I told her I’d find out if Ethan was going to come and if he wanted to bring someone with him, and she told me that would be fine. Then, she stated that she hoped I could talk him into coming with me and even made me promise to tell him that she’d love to see him again and hoped he would attend the wedding. When I relayed her message to Ethan, he said it sounded like a great idea, because he’d like to see her again too.”

“So you were close to her in college?” Chad followed, while staring at Ethan.

“We had quite a few classes together and took part in a great many of the same study groups, since we had the same major,” Ethan interjected.

Fortunately, Ethan seemed to pick up on my story and then built upon it.

“That is truly amazing,” Chad responded, while giving us the impression that he didn’t buy any of it.

We finished our conversation shortly after that, so Ethan and I got into my car and drove off. As soon as we were heading out of the parking lot, Ethan turned toward me and spoke.

“How the hell did you come up with that story so quickly?” he wanted to know.

“Well, I realized Chad was correct in thinking that it was a long shot that we would know the same person, especially since I haven’t been in the area for very long, so I just took it from there,” I replied.

“Yeah, I got that, but how did you come up with the story you told him, since we never discussed anything like that before?” he challenged.

“I know we hadn’t talked this over first, but I grew up having to think on my feet, to cover for the fact that I was gay,” I began. “I merely figured that since I’d told them the wedding was in Florida, then it would be more likely that I would have known the person from when I lived there.”

“Yes, I got that part too, but how did you come up with the story about me?” he continued.

“I just figured that if she and I had grown up together in Florida, then the only way you could have known her too was if you had met her in college,” I explained. “Didn’t you like my answer?”

“Like it? I thought it was absolutely brilliant,” Ethan confirmed. “I was totally impressed that you were able to come up with the whole damn story off the top of your head and it was all totally believable.”

“Thanks, and I’m glad you jumped in at the end, but I’m not sure Chad bought it as well as you did,” I confessed. “He acted as if he thought the entire story was just too big of a coincidence to be believable.”

“It wasn’t any more unbelievable that we knew the same person than having him show up at all the same places, and at the exact same times, when we were there,” Ethan replied, as his way of letting me know it didn’t matter. “We both know he’s suspicious of us anyway, as we are of him, so why should we care if he didn’t really buy your story? Even if he doesn’t want to believe it, your explanation still made sense and was very plausible, at least as plausible as anything Maria and he have cooked up so far.”

I had to agree with his analogy, but I was still slightly worried that this wasn’t the last time we’d hear from Chad on this matter. I was concerned that he might keep digging until he discovered a flaw in our story.

After we arrived at Ethan’s house, I stayed there for about another half hour so we could make out for a while. Even though we were a little concerned that Chad might have driven over to see what we were up to, we weren’t about to let that stop us. We had double-checked and made certain there was no way he could see into the house to find out what we were doing, so we didn’t give a damn if he sat outside and contemplated what we were up to. Since our little discussion in the parking lot, we didn’t think he’d have the balls to actually walk up and knock on the front door now.

Before I left, Ethan told me he was going to arrange for us to get away and spend a little more private time together this weekend, but it wouldn’t be an overnight trip this time. He’d concluded that since Chad was appearing more aggressive about his suspicions concerning our possible relationship that it might be best if we didn’t hang out together locally. Instead, Ethan said he’d figure out something else we could do together, away from the local area.

While we were discussing this, we also agreed that we’d try to get away for an overnighter at least one weekend a month, but without journeying too far away from home. These excursions would be just far enough from the local area that we’d be out from under the attention of prying eyes, meaning Chad’s, and none of these forays would be as elaborate as our trip to Las Vegas.

We also agreed that we wouldn’t be taking off any more days from work whenever we went somewhere. We felt it would definitely cause way too much suspicion if we were to take more time off together or advertised that we were going places with each other too often. I’m certain doing that would only play into Chad’s suspicions and help to confirm that we had something to hide. We still were going to do it, but we were going to keep everything under wraps.

In addition to that, we also concurred that after we finished doing whatever Ethan came up with for us to do this weekend, we would hang out for a while at my place afterward. I know we both wished we could spend the night together as well, but it was just too risky, under the circumstances. We concluded that it would be best if we spent the night alone and slept in our own beds, just in case either Maria or Chad were to drive by either place to see if both cars were in the driveway. It would be difficult to explain that away, if they noticed it late at night when the house was completely dark. This wasn’t a perfect solution, but it was the best one we could come up with for now.

While we were at it, Ethan also informed me that he was going to start exploring some other employment options as well, such as finding out if he could transfer to another department with the State. He was also going to look into what other positions might currently be available at one of the other local businesses. The only problem with this plan was that it wasn’t exactly a good economic environment in which to be job-hunting. Regardless of how difficult it might be, Ethan felt it was still worth looking into, especially if it would allow us to be together and not have to sneak around any longer.

Since the employment situation was so tough in the current economy, Ethan had also considered merely requesting that he and Chad be allowed to swap positions, since he knew Chad wanted to move to our department. Ethan then explained that the biggest problem with this idea was that Chad had a very boring and dead-end job, which could effectively curtail, or possibly even end, Ethan’s career. It would definitely reduce any chance he might have to move ahead with the State.

You see, such a move would effectively put him in a situation where there would essentially be no way to advance within that department and he would only be able to make lateral moves. The only chance he would have to move up would be if the department manager were to leave, and since there were several others in the department with more seniority, the likelihood that he’d be the one chosen to replace the manager was extremely slim. Knowing this, it would mean that Ethan would either have to transfer to another department later in order to get ahead or leave government employment completely and try to get a job in the private sector.

Seeing those would be the same choices he was currently facing, Ethan figured he might be better off just going ahead and exploring those same options now. Since he had come to this conclusion, he decided to forget about the idea of swapping jobs with Chad. It did, however, explain why Chad was so desperate to transfer to our department. The only question left was how desperate was he and how far would he go to get out of the terrible situation he found himself in?