Heidi's Guide to Four Letter Words(61)

I push myself up into a sitting position on the couch, letting the blanket fall from my shoulders as I pull my legs off Aunt Margie’s lap and hug them to my chest. I spend the next few minutes telling them everything.

After a week of crying non-stop, I thought my tears were dried up, but I was wrong. They come pouring out of me again when I recount everything that man said to me in his bedroom, how he listened to my podcasts without telling me, and how our entire relationship was one big lie. I leave out the part about how I had to turn my cell phone off because he wouldn’t stop calling and texting me, telling me he was sorry over and over, asking me if I was okay, and begging me to tell him where I was just so he could make sure I was safe. I don’t need them to know each and every one of those texts and voicemails almost made me waiver and go running back to him. They don’t need to know how weak he makes me, even though I’m sure they can obviously see it right now.

“So he basically only went out with me because he felt sorry for me, and now I don’t ever want to see him again. I think I’ll probably have Dad go pack up my house, and I’ll just live here forever and never trust anyone ever again, because all men are liars,” I finish dramatically, swiping the tears off my cheeks with the back of my hand.

Mom and Aunt Margie are quiet for several minutes, and I almost start to worry about what they could possibly be planning to do to get revenge on the guy who shall not be named. I mean, this is Minnesota, and the meanest thing they would ever do is not apologize for bumping into his shoulder if they ran into him in public, but still. They would be thinking a lot of bad things about him, so there’s that. It makes me feel better than I have in seven days imagining all the bad things they’re thinking about him right now.

“So what you’re saying is, he listened to all your recordings?” Aunt Margie finally asks.

“Yes, my podcasts,” I confirm with a sharp nod.

“The podcasts that are all on your website thingy?” Mom questions.

I nod again, almost feeling like I could smile if I put some real effort into it that my family gets me and totally understands where I’m coming from.

“The podcasts that are, you know, available to the public, for anyone to listen to, that you don’t have a fancy password or lock or something protecting? How dare he listen to something thousands of other people have listened to,” Aunt Margie states.

My eyes narrow as I glare at her.

“I thought you were on my side?”

Aunt Margie shrugs. “I am. But I also think you’re being a tad overly dramatic.”

I turn to look at my mom, hoping she isn’t going to be a traitor as well.

“I love you, Heidi, but I have to agree with my sister. Did you even hear anything Brent said to you? He’s proud of you. He loves you. And he didn’t listen to those things to hurt you. It sounds like he listened to them to better understand you, because you were still trying to find your voice and didn’t know how to tell him those things at the time,” she explains softly. “While I agree you have a right to be a little mad and a little hurt that he didn’t tell you he listened to them, you also never told him you were recording all those things, talking about him, for everyone to listen to. In the last few weeks, I’ve been stopped by I don’t know how many people telling me they listened to your recordings. Oh, sure, you never mentioned him by name, but anyone in this town who listened to them and knows you knows who your neighbor is.”

For the first time since we broke up, I start to feel a little guilty at what she’s saying. I too have been stopped at random places like the grocery store by someone who wants to tell me they listened to my podcast, and that even though my language was a little too colorful, they still enjoyed what I had to say and loved listening to my transformation from shy, quiet, weird girl to strong, confident, sexy woman, who is still a little weird but owns it now instead of trying to change myself.

It’s not like I knew my podcast would blow up and thousands of people would be listening to it week after week. But once it did, I never stopped talking about him. I never thought about his privacy or how it might make him feel that people he might know would be listening to it. People in a town where he’s still considered the new guy, where not everyone has gotten to know him like I have and don’t really know what kind of person he is. Sure, I said a lot of great things about him, but I also complained about him not making a move on me. I made him sound like a giant… pussy who didn’t know how to please a woman.

Oh, God! I made him sound like a giant pussy, and he didn’t even get mad at me about that!

He never once got mad, or accused me of making him look bad, or told me to delete the podcasts. He told me he was proud of me. He told me I amazed him. He told me he didn’t admit he listened to them, because he didn’t want to ruin what I was trying to do for myself. He let me take charge, because I needed to do it for myself, and he knew that. If he had asked me out like he wanted to when he first met me, if he would have led our entire relationship from the start, it never would have helped me. I would have just let him make all the decisions and make all the moves without even giving it a second thought, because it would have just been easier and it’s what I’ve always done. And nothing would have changed. I wouldn’t have realized I do have a voice, and I do have confidence, and I can be sexy and courageous. I never would have fallen in love with him, because he would have been like every other guy I dated—someone who didn’t understand me at all.