This story was written in the the early 1990s around the time of the US invasion of Panama. It was published in an anthology of fiction and verse that was used in English classes at several community colleges. What were they thinking?

The conversation over the weekend about cheating reminded me of this. I want to tag it "funny" but I suppose some people won't find it funny.

THE DAN AND FRAN SHOW

I'm having a sleazy affair with Daniel, a 32-year-old community college professor. Two months ago, I break off with him. He falls apart, so we see more of each other. He tells his wife (but not everything). The marriage, already a disaster, gets worse. His minister gets involved. His mother and brother find out about it. Daniel and Frances see a counsellor.

Dan and I try to put some distance between us. This is getting too crazy for me. Dan has an obsession with me and phones me two or three times a day, secretly, from his car phone. He sneaks away to see me when he can. I encourage his obsession, maybe even share it. His family is watching him. They're going through his mail and wondering about the ten hours of local calls on his June Cantel bill.

On top of all this, he constantly tells me how much he wants to make love, but over the last two weeks, it's been mostly talk. I guess non-erotic encounters give him the illusion that he's working on his marriage. The relationship is meeting his neurotic needs for fantasy, more than my neurotic needs for intimacy.

Tuesday, I say, "Don't phone me unless you're coming over, and for that matter, let's back off for a while -- get counselling." He's been thinking, reluctantly, along similar lines.

Wednesday night -- the phone rings. "Is this Carolyn?" a voice says. "We've never met, but I'm sure you've heard of me. This is Reverend Crane. Daniel, Frances, and I will be coming over in ten minutes. A marriage is at stake."

A marriage is at stake and they want to see me??? What does this have to do with me? Dan's going to read the script they've prepared for him -- like a hostage held by terrorists: "They treat me well. They took the blindfold off. They feed me."

Some of my close friends are on their way over for a long-awaited night of revelry. "No, you can't come over tonight." Apparently calling me was Dan's idea. The reverend puts Dan on the phone. Surrounded by his captors, Dan says nothing.

Frances, his wife, gets on the extension. I say, "I don't want your husband. I don't try to contact him."

"I have your letters, Nadja," she says, referring to my alias.

They want to come over. Bad night, friends coming, my baby's still up. They plead and demand. They tell me to send my friends to Tim Horton's.

My friends arrive. I hang up. I tell my friends about the call. They say, "Dan, Fran, and the Reverend are all crazy! Don't let them in under any circumstances!"

After a bottle of wine, I phone the reverend back, but get Frances. "Frances," I say, "I'm willing to talk to you alone, but I don't want to see the others." (I've been wanting to talk to her for a long time. I have many ideas on how she can save her marriage.)

She says, "Why would I want to talk to you?"

I say, "Well, why would I want to talk to you? Meeting isn't my idea.”

She says, "It was Dan's idea." Dan's idea???

I finally agree to let them in -- on condition I get my letters back. I say they can come over in the morning. I'll agree to anything just to buy time. What does this have to do with me? I've told Dan repeatedly that if I ever met his wife, I'd betray him.

Thursday morning, 8:15, the church guy phones. My friends left at 6:15. I'm still quite drunk. The hangover doesn't kick in till 9:30.

Phone rings. It's Crane. Half-asleep, I say, "Is it time for the Dan and Fran Show already?" He laughs.

He explains the events that led up to the call last night. He says that if Frances could stop focusing all her anger at the "other woman," she could take a serious look at her part in the breakdown of the relationship. (After all, I've only known Dan for three months -- she's had him for nine years.)

Crane assures me he'll stay close to Dan when the marriage breaks up because, he says, the community will side with Frances, and Dan will need an ally.

Crane promises that they haven't written a script for Dan to follow and that meeting is Dan's idea, but I think Dan just wants an excuse to see me. Or is Dan just buying time? Frances is fed up and ready to walk out on him, but he doesn't know what he'd do with himself if she does. He doesn't want the rug pulled out from under him and will manoeuvre his own split-up when his alternatives are clearer: job lined up out of town, house in the country for us...

Now understand this: after the goings on last night and just generally, my home resembles the streets of Panama after the U.S. invasion. I'm thinking, Ok, you guys, deal with me. I'm seven years older than Dan, I'm not Christian, I have no sexual morals that I can recall, and you need radar to get through my front hall to the kitchen. On the other hand, they're all Calvinists! It's the next world that really counts for these people.

Wait. Slight amendment. My sexual morality has lately included the thought that I should be very careful whom I sleep with because I might end up marrying him. Since people tend to marry their lovers, it seemed safer to hang out with already-married guys. Nonetheless, an earlier conviction (to stay away from married guys) has been suddenly resurfacing!

Dan comes in first, followed by his polite and civil wife and Rev. Crane. Dan winks at me. In fact, he winks at me several times over the next hour as if there's a subtext that only he and I are in on, but you're on your own now, Dan. I'm joining the enemy.

They sit around the table. Dan asks me about the broken lock on the back door. I tell him my ex-husband was banging around yesterday. We chat politely about domestic violence. Crane says, "So, you had some friends over last night."

I say, "Look, you didn't come here to make small talk. What's this all about? If you have something to say to me, say it, then leave."

Crane says, "Thank you."

Dan mumbles about wanting to work on his marriage for the month of August. Fran says she has something to ask me. She talks about Dan as if he were a little boy caught with his hands in the cookie jar. She searched his office till she found the file containing an erotic letter Dan wrote me and much more! My letters were all signed Nadja.

She says Dan is confused and has no self-control. She thinks I'm stronger than he is (there's a bizarre thought), and if he phones me, she'd appreciate it if I'd hang up.

I say to Dan, "How does it feel when they talk about you in third person?"

Eventually, I throw Dan and the minister out and have a long talk with Fran. She's very cute and I would have liked to seduce her, but that didn't seem appropriate. I move my chair closer to hers and tell her how deeply sorry I am.

She says she doesn't have a grudge against me. She says she's glad Dan met me. If it had been someone less interesting, Dan might have been through three or four women by now.

She says that Dan has shown no interest in her for years, that he avoids her. She goes along with it because it seems to be what he wants.

I say, "I guess you have really low self-esteem."

She says she builds her self-esteem in other ways -- by being good at work, for example. She's a corporate accounts officer at the head office of Canada Trust.

"I generally build my self-esteem by hustling guys," I say.

We talk about self-esteem and guys for awhile. I show my lover's wife the letters I wrote her in which I imagine I'm her and speak in her voice about her frustrations with Dan (especially his irresponsibility towards their three-year-old child). She's amazed. I had never met her, but accurately expressed her unexpressed grief and anger.

She says when she read the letters in my file, she was really impressed with my writing and wishes she could write that way. When she read the erotic letter Dan wrote me, she was very hurt and angry.

We talk for a long time. She says she's terrified of AIDS. She says if Dan left, she'd be a single mom for the rest of her life. I tell her how different and wonderful it would be to find someone who appreciates her.

She says she would stay with Dan if he gave her the slightest sign that he wants her. I tell her that she deserves more than that. I tell her I'm attending a therapy group for women who've survived abusive relationships. She says, "Maybe I should join."

I tell her all the rational reasons why I can't get seriously involved with her husband. I compliment her on how thin she is. Dan and Crane come back twice and we throw them out twice. Reluctantly, she has to leave. She took the morning off work.

Fran and Crane go to the car. Dan lingers by the door. He says he's already planned to take me to lunch in September -- but he promised to give the marriage his best efforts for August. Dan says he loves me and misses me terribly and will be thinking about me often. I tell him to fuck off, go away, and leave me alone.

I take two more extra-strength Tylenol as my hangover reminds me of the previous night's indiscretions. By 3:30 in the afternoon, my hangover begins to recede and I sit down and write these thoughts, thinking maybe I should work on my life.