Dear Feisty,
It all started when I walked into a restaurant and this guy who worked there started talking to me. I’m married, but I liked the attention.
Over the next couple months he started flirting with me more and more. I laughed it off and we became friends- and he gave me his cell phone number just when it seemed I was hitting a rough time in my life.
Then he started texting me. Things like, “I want to take you for walks in the mountains.”
And soon came…
“Too bad you’re married.”
“You are so damn hot.”
“I have so much love for you babe, I just wish I could show you how much.”
“You should send me a pic I would really like.”
Again, I laughed it off. Then about a month ago, I went on vacation and when I told him about my trip he texts me, “If you love me, you’ll buy me a shot glass.” So I decided, since he was my only friend in this damn town, I would.
Then he texts back, “I feel like you don’t get this. I’m getting back with my WIFE. I enjoy you as a customer and that’s about it.”
Now, I love my husband but that hurt a little and pissed me off. Then his co-worker told me how he was just trying to get in my pants and that he can play me like a toy and yada yada. I want to drive him nuts. There’s nothing a man hates more than a woman he wants but doesn’t know is alive, so he will hopefully learn a lesson.
He still jokes with his co-workers about how he flirted with a 21-year old (being me) and how “he didn’t have to pay the price for flirting with a married woman”.
Again, he flirted with me. Is he attractive? Yes. If we were both single, would I like to date him? Sure. But he started the whole damn thing and I don’t like it when someone plays with my emotions.
I want to get back at him. I know he loves it when I wear my short skirts and shorts but that isn’t cutting it. I need to step up my game. Any suggestions for a poor girl?
Signed,
21, Married and Vengeful
Dear 21, Married and Vengeful,
Let me first start out by asking you, what game? Because from here my dear, it appears you haven’t got any.
If you had game, you wouldn’t let yourself get involved in this kind of nonsense. You’d be handling business at home.
If you had game, you’d have the sun, moon and stars perfectly aligned ensuring your man is doing everything he possibly can to keep you happy.
Instead you’re up late nights butt hurt, plotting revenge on a married guy who has carved out a little place for you in his one-act play starring you, The Fool.
He dropped you like a pair of day-old drawers not before feeding you a million lines of bullshit you bought into hook, line and sinker. By humiliating you telling his buddies you’re an easy little wind up toy ala married attention-starved freak, all the while trying to score some nude pics, stroking his ego and being an ass.
I shouldn’t have to remind you, you’re a married woman. One that you should be reminding yourself he found delight in treating like a cheap, desperate hag.
You’ve allowed texts, lies and bullshit be front and center to the entire fakelationship, which I’m guessing emanates out of routine and boredom- for both of you. Alas he’s gone back to his wife, and he now has no room left on his plate for any more risky business with you.
Meanwhile your husband must be busy working late nights making all the bread, while you have enough time on your hands to contemplate revenge, short skirts and lessons you’re never going to teach the married, twisted mind game-playing restaurant guy.
You’ve allowed yourself to wander into forbidden territory. You’ve conjured up all kinds of useless thoughts that function as a lonely escape because your reality is one in dire straits. Your marriage is in trouble- enough that you let some married toolbag lie to you and you were lonely and vulnerable enough to actually believe him.
BS and shenanigans aside, I can definitely say that I sympathize with your feelings. It can be very, very flattering to receive attention from men as a married woman. It affirms that you are still attractive and desirable even though you are devoted to someone else- or at least appear to be.
The attention can be like a drug and it can be very easy to fall prey to an earful of meaningless, calculative horsecrap coming from a smooth-talking, fly-by-night doucher who knows good and damn well he has no business even saying a word to a woman like you.
However honey, it isn’t very flattering being referred to as somebody’s play thing. And it isn’t very flattering to be made out to be the cheap thrill ala naive married jackass him and all his co-worker buddies are laughing about out back in some loud, greasy, smelly kitchen.
Move on. And remember, you got off cheap. You didn’t wind up mind-fucked and pregnant, nobody found out about your dirty deeds and nobody got hurt (and I sincerely hope no one ever does).
He’s out of your life. Keep it that way and start stepping up your game with your husband.
Buy a negligee, go out on a date and have a decadent meal. If that doesn’t put the spark back in your marriage, maybe you ought to get busy considering divorce. Because cheating is the symptom of something big- something you can’t hide from forever.
So how do you get back at this guy?
By putting him out of your mind completely.
Never visit that restaurant again. Change your phone number so that he can’t contact you and make sure you go to great lengths to pretend like he never existed. As soon as you can do that, the sooner you can get back to worrying about what’s truly important. Your marriage.
Get back at him by getting busy getting back to your own business. You’re married. Start acting like it.
Best of luck to you, you’re going to need it.
Melissa aka FeistyWoman
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Amen Feisty. That was a powerful response. My recently ex-wife chose to pursue attention outside of our marriage, similar to the person who posted the question but she’s in her 40′s rather than early 20′s. After almost 20 years of marriage and several years of trying to make it work and get her to understand how her actions affected me, I said adios and haven’t regretted it for a minute since.
I’m so sorry to hear about your marriage, Steve. 20 years is a very long time.
I’m pretty fed up with people trashing marriage- and it’s because of people like the woman who wrote in that nobody believes in marriage anymore.
Marriage is a wonderful thing, if you can find the right person. That’s a tall order these days.
FW
“I’m married, but I liked the attention.”
As soon as I read that I knew it was going downhill. Sigh. Attention is a shallow filler for voids. There was no game here and she only lost to herself. She is very lucky that this situation didn’t end up messy.
“Attention is a shallow filler for voids.” LOVE IT. And you’re exactly right. And I could definitely see her husband going apeshit and possibly winding up in jail. It’s a common tale. She dodged a bullet.
FW
Oh God. Another woman thinking she has game, who met a wannabe player boy. Are you sure you love your husband? Married and vengeful, since you have no game here is some player advice. Ignore that guy, all the way. He will try to pursue you again. But seriously you want attention from a five star dork?
Whenever a woman is not fully happy or satisfied in her marriage and it’s just piling up, she’ll want attention from the side. Not necessarily sex, but simply flirt and attention from other men can make an unhappily married woman feel cheered up, alive and still needed..
Oh and I loved that phrase “There is nothing a man hates more than a woman he wants”…
Soo true! But I wonder WHY??
Sofia, I’ve never heard that phrase. But by gawd, it’s true alright. Did you make that one up?
FW