You could not blame me for being bitter. I work hard and I work all day; and when I came home that night, my wife was sitting on the sofa. She had been swimming in the lake, and she wore only a skimpy bathing suit which showed to best advantage the ivory fire of her young body.

A man was sitting with her, dressed in a pair of bathing shorts. His arms were around her. Her arms were around him.

I did not know the man.

I only knew that I wished he—wasn’t. If he wasn’t, then I could be happy with my wife. I’d be playing a game, it would be pretense, but I would be happy. If he wasn’t; an intriguing idea.

Gloria got up, brushing her hair back with her hands. She said. “Don’t make a scene, Gerald.”

I smiled. “It was you who made the scene.”

“Gerald, I didn’t know you were coming.”

“Oh. Oh, I see. That makes everything fine; you thought it would be all right if you did this behind my back. Strumpet—”

The man stood up. He was bigger than I, taller, wider, stronger. “Don’t get nasty,” he said.

I wanted to get nasty. “You just shut up and leave this to my wife and me.”

He didn’t want to shut up. He told me it was his business, too—and I must have raised my hands as if to fight, because he hit me. It was a good solid blow on the side of the head, and I sat down hard. It took a while to focus my eyes, and when I did, he was standing over me, hands on hips, waiting for me to get up.

I did not get up. Now, in earnest, I wished he wasn’t. This would be the ideal time to put into practice my theoretical thinking. I slid further back along the floor, and Gloria began to laugh. She told me I looked like seven different varieties of a worm.

I pointed my finger at the man. I said, “You don’t exist.”

Gloria screamed. “Phil!” she cried. “Phil! Where did he go so fast? He just disappeared...”