The Fury

Pt. XVIII

It got ugly.

My memory is off again, and I don’t know if it’s being selective or what, but things got very ugly.

David became a monster. Was he punishing me? Was he doing whatever he needed to do to move on? Was he just coming to terms with his own issues, issues he’d completely ignored and never given me an opportunity to address or change or fix?

Probably all of those things. And that is the last time you will hear me speak “evenly” about him.

* * * * * *

Suddenly I had rules. He knew I wanted to see him, he knew I took comfort in anything that resembled normalcy, so he started using that against me. He was living at his parents’ house and would not come to our house while I was there if I was going to try and talk about “us.” He would leave the house if I even hinted at it. He would scream at me if I said something he didn’t like. He would go days without contacting me.

He announced that financially we were just going to split everything down the middle and that he was being more than fair and we were going to use one lawyer – his uncle – and if I had a problem with that he would fight me tooth and nail and take everything.

He seemed only moderately interested in how things were going with my mother, and even in matters relating to her, he would lose patience with me if I cried.

* * * * * *

A couple things happened then, and I don’t know the order. It could have been much later in the summer, it could have been right then. But.

David had found out about Marcus. He’d accessed my email – I don’t know how; he gave me a story I’m not sure I believe – and knew all about it and never told me. I am absolutely certain that had something (everything?) to do with his suddenly cutting me, us off.

However. Turns out that David started dating some woman he used to work with the week he left me. The. Week. He. Left. Me.

How did that happen? How did he even get in touch with her? He, Mr. Anti-Social suddenly knew how to contact a woman whose name I’d never even heard, someone he’d worked with a year prior?

I will always wonder the timing of his contacting her. It absolutely could have been the same week he’d decided to leave. It is absolutely possible he found out about Marcus and I was immediately dead to him and he moved on to the first woman he could think of. And maybe he had every fucking right to do that.

I had always told him that if we ever ended it, I’d start dating immediately. That’s how I work. So he reminded me of that when he told me about her. I didn’t have a leg to stand on, he said, or something like that.

* * * * * *

And then it happened. My feeling miserable, responsible, completely at fault for ruining my marriage – that feeling changed.

He wasn’t giving me hope. He wasn’t willing to work on anything. He hadn’t given us an opportunity to work on his problems with me, ever. He snapped and shut off and said no and threw us away.

And you know what? I had brought it on, maybe. I had mostly fucked things up, maybe, but it takes two people to ruin a marriage. And given what I was going through with my family, with my mother...

...well, damn it. I got angry.

I was still damaged and broken and mostly empty, but let me tell you. I needed that anger. Anger is a powerful motivator. Anger is fuel. Anger allowed me to say fuck him when I needed to most.

I wasn’t ready to move on and I wouldn’t have chosen to. Hell, I DIDN’T choose to. He did. He gave me that.

(Oh, but do NOT think that I will ever say his leaving -- given when he did and how he did -- was a gift.)

But right, he gave me that. He gave me the opportunity to be mad at him. He made me not have to make the choice. He ended it in a way that gave me the "luxury" of saying this is not fair please don't.

So if nothing else, at least I could be angry at him and the asshole he'd become.

I was no longer trying to stay married to a generous, sweet, loving rock. I was suddenly married to a stone wall.

And I could do better than that.