Like many people in the public eye trying to put a personal crisis behind them, the Edwardses have allowed their friends to tell People, the gentle, lubricated tabloid, their side. The issue, which features Elizabeth posed in the crisp white shirt of a woman wronged (only with pants this time), and promises Her Untold Story, doesn't come out until Friday, but People has put up a teaser on their Website. Thus far, the details are unsurprising.

"There was anguish— excruciating anguish— for her in dealing with this," says Elizabeth's best friend Hargrave McElroy.

But there is one weird bit. "He told the truth slowly," another friend tells the magazine. The Post reports that he told her about the affair in "installments." Does someone think that makes it sound more gentle? Slowly, as in, the opposite of ripping off a Band-Aid? Installments, as in a soap opera? Slowly, as in, the way serial killers torture their victims? And then we realized: All this business about no paternity tests and all kinds of weird unanswered questions? He's telling us in installments, too. Sicko.

Elizabeth's Excruciating Anguish [People]