Fred's letter

"... then Suzie comes in, starts screaming at him and tells him to pack his bags! Can you believe it!? He told me himself, from man to man."

"Holy moly! This is like... wow!"

"Yeah, right! This just happened!"

"Oh, my God!"

"I know!" is his instinctive response. "Loren, you should call your sister. Loren ... call your sister. Now."

She picks up her phone nervously and types in her sister's number. Riing...Riing...

"Hey, Suzie! Your big sis' here. How are you? Have you got a minute?... aha ... aha ... oh, really? ... aha ... no way! ... aha ... did he? ... and what did she say? ... oh, I see ... ok, no no no that's absolutely fine. ... I'll call you tomorrow. Ok then. Byyyye!"

"What did she say?"

"Fred came home late apparently. He was due to be back from his team building weekend last night but only got home a few hours ago and-"

"- She smelled someone else's perfume on him!"

"I don't know about that. She didn't say. But she is furious. The neighbours came in to calm her down. They have just left her house."

"So, what happened?"

"Well, it sounds like he was the only one who had got home late. The only one beside his boss. You know, the new guy from Paris... uhm... Jonn Pawl ... John-Paul-"

"- You mean, Jean-Paul. So, what about Jean-Paul?" Matt was getting nowhere close to hearing the full story. "Well, come on, then! What happened next, Loren?!!!"

"Okayyyy!", she yells back.

She stands up from the sofa to distance herself from him and heads for the fridge where she pours herself a glass of white wine. She returns the half-empty bottle in the fridge, closes it carefully and takes a deep breath in.

"It sounds like he was having an affair..."

"What! Jean-Paul and him?!" Matt asks incredulously. "No way!!" His right hand combs through his hair before falling flat onto his lap. "There is no way in the world that your brother-in-law is having an affair with Jean-Paul! No way! Not in a million years!"

Loren watches Matt pacing their living-room.

"My sister does not actually HAVE any real proof other than the fact that he came home a day after the training. He said that he had spent the night at Jean-Paul's and-"

"- and that's why they must have slept together! That's it?!" Matt scratches his face. "There could be hundreds of other reasons why he did not come home last night", Matt suggests tentatively. "Maybe they had to finish off important business that could not wait until Monday", he interjects. "Or maybe... maybe Jean-Paul needed someone to talk to and Fred volunteered his time." Dead silence.

"I don't know! They could have been involved in something after the two-day training..." he ventures.

"Suzie said to me that Fred had come home wearing a suit that did not belong to him. She seems to vaguely remember Jean-Paul wearing one very similar to the one Fred was dressed in."

Matt's pupils are moving left, right, then left and right again, as if trying to make sense of what has just been implied. He is now staring at his wife in disbelief.

"Your sister has got it wrong, Loren. He loves her. He has always loved her so much. This weekend was their only weekend apart since they got married. This is not right..."

He sits down on the sofa again, facing the TV on mute. From the open kitchen, she can see his head going down. He is now massaging his neck.

"Matt? Maaat...? Is there something that you have not told me?" She is now standing in front of the TV, facing a man who seems to be avoiding her gaze. "What were you two talking about over the phone? ... You said you had talked to Fred."

"Fred had come to see me just before the training weekend. He came to ask me for money to buy himself a new suit."

"Aha..."

"He wanted it to make a good impression. He wanted to impress his boss to... to get a promotion. He had it in his head that the start of this new year would be the start of a new him. He had made plans for a better future."

"Go on..."

"Fred told me that he was onto something good that would allow him to be the man he had always wanted to be and ..."

"And...?"

"He didn't go home last night because he... because he..." Matt buries his face in his hands, tears flowing through his fingers.

"He didn't go home last night because he was scared."

"Scared!? ... Of who?! Of what?!" Loren goes back to the fridge resigned to finish the bottle of wine.

" Somehow during the training, someone left an envelope addressed to him. In it, he found some official documents. He told me that he had looked at them on the way home, at the end of the training but he could not TELL me what it was about. He stayed at Jean-Paul's because he could not face his wife."

"And that's why you asked me to call my sister..." It all made sense. "But guess what? She has thrown him out of the house so we'll never know..."

Ping!

Matt searches for his phone and finds a message from Fred. He reads the message out loud:

" 'Sorry I didn't get to say goodbye or explain. Tell Loren I love her. And tell her to look after Suzie. I need some time to process what I have just found out.' "

Both Matt and Loren are puzzled by the mystery behind these words.

Ping! Matt reads out the second message:

" 'Whoever did this for me did us all a favour... I guess. Can I come for a sec? I am in front of your house.' "

Matt and Loren stare at each other. Fred is here... Just as Loren prepares to open the door, another message comes through.

"No message" Matt says. "Just two attachments." He opens the first one, a screenshot of a letter: "Hi Fred, upon checking the validity of the documents you received, I can confirm that they are authentic. The content has been checked by my lawyer friend who can be contacted on 0453231547 should you wish to discuss the implications of your recent findings. Take care, Jean-Paul."

"The second one is a printscreen. Something about DNA tests... "

Matt meets his wife's eyes.

"Loren, you need to sit down. This DNA test confirms that Fred and Suzie are.... related... According to this picture, they are... they are siblings..."

"He is my brother..." Loren's glass hits the ground, she runs through the main door and hugs Fred who falls apart at her sight.

For the pain is real. The hurt, agonising. Change, daunting. A new man this year, Fred will be.