It was pointed out to me last night that the story of the boy has now surpassed 30,000 words. That's 1/3 of a novel. In two weeks. Kind of makes you wonder what I could accomplish if I actually committed myself to finishing one of those novels that have been sitting incomplete on my laptop forever now, doesn't it?
But alas, I am far too sucked into this story myself right now to walk away from it before it's finished. So if you're just joining us and feel like catching up on 1/3 of a novel, check out parts one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, and ten first.
Just as promised, he called the next night.
And the next.
And the next.
He started calling every night.
Without fail.
We would talk until we were each struggling to keep our eyes open. Hours at a time of just talking.
Every once in a while he was completely sober.
More often than not he had kicked at least a few back with the guys he was out there working with before I heard from him.
And on a couple of nights, he was absolutely smashed by the time he called.
It was one of those nights when he told me he had been talking to his mom about me that afternoon. And after he had finished telling her some story about something I had said or done, she had apparently started laughing and said “You are totally going to end up with the whore!”
He was poking fun at me when he repeated it, but then his tone shifted a bit and he went on. “I told her she was right," he announced. "We’re totally going to end up together. You know that, right? Like – happily ever after together. You and me. Mark my words. I’m calling it now."
It freaked me out a little bit. I wanted so badly to latch on to that, but there was a part of me that was still incredibly pulled back when it came to anything he said about our future. We could talk for hours on end about his day, and my day, and what we were thinking, and what we were doing, but... as soon as the conversation turned to "us", I couldn't help but feel a protective barrier going up.
I got quiet before telling him that I would be lying if I said that wasn’t the outcome I was hoping for, but before I had a chance to continue my thought he said “Just wait. It’s going to happen.”
On one of the nights when he was waxing poetic, I called him on the fact that he was really quick with the sweet words when he was drunk. He suddenly became somber and assured me that every word he had said to me was true, while admitting that it was just easier for him to own up to when he was drinking because then he didn’t over-think it all the way he did when he was sober.
But he assured me it was all real. That sober or drinking, I was the one he wanted to be with.
On another night, when he hadn’t consumed quite so much, I let him know how guarded I was still feeling with him. That I didn’t know how to trust the things he was saying to me. That in the back of my head, all I kept hearing was him telling me that none of it was true. That he didn’t have any feelings for me at all.
He said he understood that, and that he wanted to work towards getting me to trust him and his feelings for me again.
He went on to apologize some more. And to promise me that he was going to do whatever it took to fix this. To help me to trust in him. In "us".
He did admit that he was scared too though. And that he was also having a hard time trusting in what we had. Not because of anything I had said or done, but because of his own past. There was one night in particular when he told me he was really struggling, because he remembered feeling the exact same feelings he had for me, for her. It stuck out to me so much, because it seemed like such an intense thing to say. He said he remembered being so sure of her and the future they had when their relationship was just starting out too, and that it scared him to think that he could be wrong about it all again. That he could be trusting in the fact that he had found the person he was supposed to be with, only to have me walk away in the end as well.
We talked about it. We talked about it all. About how unsure we both were now. How hard it was to trust in something that seemed so unstable. No matter how much either of us wanted it.
But as the days passed, we talked less and less about it.
We just fell into talking. About our days. Our jobs. Our lives.
How excited we were getting to see each other.
We just talked.
That weekend I went to a pig roast thrown by friends of his. It was strange being there without him, but so many of these people were becoming my friends too. Everyone had been quick to make sure I was coming, even though he wasn’t in town. They had wanted to make sure I would still be there. That I knew I was invited, with or without him by my side.
And to be fair, I probably would have gotten an invite anyway. Seeing as it was my beautiful pregnant friend's sister and brother in law who were the hosts. I had my own "in", even separate from him. Something I had to keep reminding myself of as I struggled with whether or not it was weird to go on my own.
Everyone wanted to know how he was doing, and when he would be coming back. They shared stories of his antics from previous pig roasts, and no one ever once made me feel awkward in being there.
Dee and I had gone hiking earlier in the week, and were definitely starting to bond over our shared history. It was the first time I had been able to introduce she and Lindsey, and the three of us huddled up in a corner of the yard talking about all things endo. They were each going to be embarking upon IVF in the next several months, so it had meant a lot to me to bring them together. I knew they would be huge resources to each other as they walked down that path.
Around this same time, Dee mentioned that she had run into the boy’s ex that day. That they had made plans to get together for lunch that weekend.
I tried not to over think it too much. They had been friends for years before she had left. I knew Dee, and many of the others within their circle of friends, had been hurt by how quickly she had cut off contact with everyone when the end had come. I figured that it would be a good chance for them to catch up.
But there was a voice in my head telling me there was something more to it.
I tried to ignore that voice. To swallow it down and will it away.
When the boy called that night, I didn’t mention any of this to him. I told him about the pig, and all his friends who had asked about him. I told him about conversations I had, and people I met. But I didn't mention Dee's run-in with his ex.
Maybe I should have, but we were just doing so well. He was doing so well.
I didn’t think it would do him any good to know.
And I wasn’t in any hurry to put her back on his mind.
Right before we got off the phone that night, he told me that he couldn’t wait to come home.
That all he wanted to do during his short time in town was see his mom, and spend as much time with me as I would allow.
I couldn’t help it. He was cracking away at the wall I had built up.
Two nights later, we were talking and he asked if I would go camping with he and Dee and her husband over the 4th of July weekend.
We had talked about getting dinner. We had absolutely talked about seeing each other.
But, this was different.
This would be us cooped up together for days on end again.
We hadn’t seen each other at all since that night.
It scared me to think of us jumping right back into this.
Scared me to think of us going too far too fast, only to have him push me away again.
I told him I needed to think about it, and he said he understood. It was Monday, and he was supposed to be getting back in town on Thursday. He said I just needed to make a decision by then, because he wasn't going at all if I didn't go with him. He asked me to just consider it. Said he thought we would all have fun, and he wanted me by his side for the weekend.
We got off the phone, and he told me he would call me the following night.
The next day I may have called Dee to get details on the trip, and to probe her on whether or not she thought I should go.
She was excited he had invited me, and started pushing for me to join them. Promising that no matter what, she would be there to keep me entertained and happy. But hopeful that after everything that had gone on, the boy would be on his best behavior.
Not 5 minutes into our conversation, my decision was made. I went out on my lunch break to pick up boots and other supplies I would need to play in the river – not wanting to have a repeat of that freezing night spent in a tent months before.
That night, when my phone rang, I reached for it quickly. Sure it was him. Excited to tell him I had decided to say "yes".
But when I looked at the phone, there was his name. This wasn’t the remote number he had been calling me from for the last 2 weeks. This was his number.
Which meant he was here. In town.
He wasn’t supposed to come home for two more days, but… he was here.
All my inhibitions gone, I practically squealed as I answered the phone.
And immediately, I knew that something was wrong.
He was sober, but… his voice. He sounded like something awful had happened. Like he was having trouble even just spitting out the words.
He told me that he had just gotten off the plane. That he had convinced his boss to let him come home early, and he was going to surprise me. But then, as soon as he turned his phone on, there was a text from her. From a few days before. Asking him if they could get together to talk.
He was on the other end of the phone, making himself crazy trying to figure out what she could possibly want.
And all I could think was…. Dee. She had talked to Dee.
So I told him that’s who he needed to call first. That she might know what was going on. I explained what I knew about them getting together; why I hadn’t told him already. He said he understood, but he got off the phone almost immediately to call Dee.
Or, that’s what I thought he was doing. In reality, he called her first. Frustrated and annoyed and confused and just wanting to get it out of the way. She didn’t answer though, texting him immediately after that she was in a movie and asking if she could call him the following day.
He didn’t respond. But he did pick up the phone to call Dee.
And when he got done talking to her, he called me.
Hurt, and confused, and lost, and unsure.
She had apparently expressed a lot of regret when she’d had lunch with Dee. Said that things had happened so quickly, and it hadn't really been what she wanted, but once it started… she couldn’t figure out how to stop it. She mentioned there was part of her that wanted to fix things. To start over. To maybe even just start dating again.
She had never once asked if he was seeing anyone else. Almost like the thought had never occurred to her at all.
Dee hadn’t revealed much during their time together. She’d just sat and listened to her old friend, without weighing in one way or another beyond telling her that she had really hurt the boy. Perhaps beyond repair.
When they’d left, she hadn’t given Dee an impression one way or another of what she was going to do.
I guess Dee had just been hoping she wouldn’t do anything at all. But hadn’t wanted to step in the middle either way.
Which, I get.
He was a bundle of emotions. Initially angry. Angry that she would even be thinking these things at all now, two weeks after everything was final. Angry that she was popping up to mess with his head again. And angry that she was doing this when he was just making strides towards moving on.
He was so angry he said he had no interest in talking to her at all.
But... Everything inside me was shutting down. This entire time I had been dating a guy who I knew wasn't completely over his ex wife, and that was one thing. But it was something entirely different if his ex wife wasn't over him either.
I let him get out all the anger. Let him say everything he needed to say. Everything he was thinking. Everything he was feeling. And then... I built all my walls back up.
I could feel myself shutting down. An emotionless robot, about to say all the right things.
As if I had no stake in the end result at all.
I told him that I had listened to him over the previous months telling me how much he had loved her. Lamenting the end of their relationship. Hurting so badly over the pieces of what had happened that he just didn’t understand.
He still had so many questions about how things had ended.
Questions that some nights, were still literally tearing him apart.
I told him that he owed it to himself to hear her out. To see if they could fix things. To see if he even really wanted to after everything was said and done.
I was calm, and rational. There was no anger in my voice at all. I know I was speaking to him with kindness.
But I was shut down. Resolute if only as a byproduct of being empty.
At first he resisted everything I was saying, but then he started talking about what his heart wanted versus what his head wanted.
Arguments I had engaged in with myself about him 100 times in the previous two weeks.
So I recognized exactly where this was going.
The heart always wins.
Always.
I told him the only way he would ever get the answers to some of the questions that still plagued him would be if he heard her out.
There was a part of me that believed that even if they did start talking again, it wouldn't take long before he realized she wasn’t what he wanted anymore.
The truth is, there was a part of me that thought maybe that would even be for the best.
The way things had ended between the two of them; she had given him no choices. No power. She had made a split second decision to end their marriage, and then hadn't looked back.
I couldn’t help but wonder if maybe, in entering a realm where dating again was a possibility, he wouldn’t be able to regain some of his power simply in being the one with the choices to make.
And at the heart of the matter, I knew he would never really be able to forgive her. I knew there was a part of him that wanted to. That wanted to go back to the life they had lead and pretend that the previous months had never happened. But I knew there was a bigger part of him that understood how impossible that would be. And if things did start down a path of starting over with them, I knew that in a few weeks time - he would be the one to realize it wouldn't ever work. He would be the one to put a stop to it.
And in that, I hoped there would be healing for him.
I even hoped that in that, he would find himself missing me.
What we had.
What we shared.
But no matter what the outcome was, I knew he had to either close or open this door once and for all.
For him.
For her.
And for me.
So as much as it hurt, I encouraged him to walk down that path.
I shut myself down, as I told him to open himself up.
To hear her out.
To listen to what she had to say.
I encouraged him to give her a chance.
While also telling him that in doing so, he would need to let me go.
Because I couldn't be there waiting in the background as he tried to decide what it was he wanted.
I couldn't be the one he voiced his concerns and worries to while navigating the path back to her.
I couldn't be his therapist as he debated the pros and cons of repairing his marriage with his now ex wife.
I encouraged him to hear her out.
But explained that I couldn't be a part of the process.
I told him that I didn't want to hear from him again. Not until the point, when and if, he had fully let her go.
And just as he was agreeing to everything I was saying, thanking me for being so there for him, for being so understanding... just as he was telling me that he thought he would see what she had to say, and that he would stay away from me until he knew for sure what it was he wanted...
She called.
Beeping in on the other line.
And he managed to say only a quick goodbye to me.
Before switching over to her.
(to be continued...)
ADSPACE
