Acts of Desperation(5)

“It’s a sweet offer, but no thank you.” I chuckled. “I just can’t believe he threw everything away on some cheap lay though—and believe me, she looked cheap,” I said, blowing my nose.

“I don’t doubt that,” she said.

“He didn’t even apologize. He was more annoyed that I caught him.”

“Typical. Men can be such douchebags. They do something wrong then twist it around like it was your fault. Remember Jason? He did that all the time. Been there. Done that.”

“Me too…sadly,” I said, shaking my head. “I can’t believe I thought he was the one. What a waste.”

“Well, I never thought he was the one for you,” she said, taking a sip of her wine.

“You didn’t?” I smirked. “You never say anything.”

“I was waiting to see what you saw in him. I figured there had to be something special about him if you liked him so much, but it never happened. Every time I was around him, he rubbed me the wrong way.”

“Really? Like what?” It was all news to me. I never suspected she didn’t like him.

“There was something off about him. It was weird the way he’d get crazy jealous if any other guy glanced your way or even dared talk to you.”

“You thought that was weird?” I asked. “I always thought it was kind of sweet and endearing. Like it was his way of claiming me,” I said.

“No, it was weird. You remember the fight he got into when that poor guy offered to buy you a drink when we all went out a while ago.”

“Yeah.” I sighed. “But he didn’t always act like that. That was one time, and he was drunk that night. ”

“Um, once?” she asked with her head cocked to the side.

“Ok, maybe it was more than once,” I said.

“All I’m saying is that it wasn’t normal. He couldn’t stand for another guy to even talk to you, but he would never hold your hand. It never made sense to me.”

“He always said holding hands was lame though,” I said. “But, that was annoying.”

“Face it. You were settling for him, and I say good riddance. You’re young, smart, and beautiful—I’d kill for your eye lashes. And your Mr. Wonderful is still out there somewhere.” She grabbed a blanket and wrapped herself up. “Hopefully he’s hanging out with mine because damn am I sick of waiting.” She chuckled.

I snickered while blotting my tears. I knew she’d find a way to make me laugh. And, in that moment, I realized she was right, I had settled for John. I used to think, so what if he didn’t hold my hand. He treated me well behind closed doors. He kissed me and hugged me and always told me I was pretty. But, in retrospect, I guess those things will only get you so far, and oftentimes, I felt alone. I’d been overlooking the things that were inherently wrong for quite some time. There had to be a reason why I never felt comfortable sharing my problems with him—I should have felt comfortable doing that, but I didn’t.

A flood of phone calls and texts came in from John throughout the night. Liz eventually grabbed my phone and turned it off in an effort to save my sanity. There wasn’t anything he could say; it was over.

Liz and I stayed up well into the night talking until I’d thoroughly beaten the dead horse. Somewhere after one o’clock, Liz and I crawled into our beds, sufficiently bombed. My eyes were swollen from crying, and thankfully my body finally gave in, and I passed out. It had been an awful day, but at least it was over.

The next morning, I woke up with a throbbing headache. I knew I had to call my family though to let them know about my change of venue. So, I grabbed some Advil from Liz’s medicine cabinet and headed to, what was now my room, to call Sarah. I sat on the edge of the pale lavender silk Pottery Barn quilt adorning my queen sized bed and seized my phone off the antique white nightstand. I went into my contacts and tapped Sarah’s name and looked around the perfect-shade-of-beige walls as the line rang.

When Sarah answered, I went through the abridged version of everything that had happened; it was too painful to go through all the gory details again.

“Well, I’d like to say I’m shocked but nothing seems to surprise me these days.” Sarah chuckled uneasily. “I’m really sorry. Liz is a good friend. I know she’ll take care of you the way you take care of me.”

“Yeah she took care of me last night, and I’m rocking a pretty solid headache right now,” I said.

“That’s what a good friend does. She made you laugh when you were crying though, didn’t she?”

“She did.”

“Of course she did. That girl’s hilarious,” she said.

“She really is.” I laughed. “Well, anyway, I just wanted to let everyone know where I was.” I sighed and drank a big gulp of water. “So, any news on a ruling yet?” I asked.

You remember the river of problems I mentioned Sarah was up against? Well, Anders had filed contempt charges against her when she took the kids on vacation shortly after she filed for divorce. She’d been gone a couple days over the two weeks she’d been entitled to in her temporary custody order, and Anders tried to insist on paying them a visit on her vacation because of it. Sarah didn’t allow it under the advice of her counsel. The trial had taken place earlier in the week, and Sarah had been traumatized by the experience. I’d assumed Chuck, her lawyer, would have told her what to expect from the trial, but he hadn’t. I could only describe her as being shell-shocked afterward “Seriously?” she said. “We can talk about me later. I’m sure you need to talk this out a little. I know you.”