#73: The Friend gets separated
Time expires on my friend’s marriage and happy household.
Some time had gone by since the LAN gaming party. My mother had gotten cancer and had a successful operation, unfortunately the strain of it all caused her to go manic again. (I won’t cover the entire situation this time since I don’t think it adds anything you haven’t heard before.) This time I was an adult and had to deal with everything by myself. Combined with other stress, I was on the verge of breaking down.
I was driving around and trying to get my mind off things when I got a phone call from The Friend. He mentioned another friend of ours and said that he was moving in with him into their house. I figured that his $1700 a month mortgage payment had something to do with that, but at any rate I still asked him why. “Because my wife is moving out,” he replied. I thought I misheard him. “Come again?”
His wife clumsily explained to him that she had signed a year lease on a new apartment she was curious to see if “she could make it on her own.” (Um…wasn’t she doing that before she met The Friend?) She said that she no longer felt the same “spark” that was there early on in the relationship, and hoped that by giving this new situation a try she would eventually realize just how much she missed/loved him and then come back.
That was the most deceptive, confusing and muddled explanation that I had ever heard for a breakup. But that’s not what he needed to hear right now, and honestly I don’t think he bought it either. “I’m so sorry, buddy,” I said. “It happens, what can I say,” he bravely said.
I was kind of embarrassed that I hadn’t seen it coming. The signs were there. That incident at the LAN party, for one. Also she was going out clubbing a lot; even the women I talked to about it admitted that was a red flag for sure. Weeks later after my Mom’s recovery and return home, she had her say. “Bullshit! I’m a woman too and I know better. She’s fucking around on him. You watch!“
Sure enough, my mother was right. Some time later The Friend found out that she had been seeing a new guy. To add insult to injury, he admitted that she had actually committed forgery and signed The Friend’s signature on the separation papers, claiming that she needed them to get the apartment. WOW. All I know of the matter is that different states have different laws which sometimes involves having the people sign in front of a notary or whatnot, so I’m scratching my head on exactly what she did to get around all that.
Either way, it’s not flattering to The Friend at all and these actions were not of a woman who intended to “respark the flame.” If she still loved him and desired him, she would have stayed and the thought would have never entered her mind. No question, no excuses or rationalizations - bottom line.
Everyone vilified her for “having hot pants and breaking up that family,” as Mom put it, but I admit I saw it in a slightly different way…neither making her out as the victim nor the villain. But still, the situation stinks. I know The Friend better than anyone….nobody whatsoever has anything bad to say about him and he was NOTHING BUT LOYAL to his wife and family. He worked very hard and continued to move to bigger and bigger places in a four year span (two apartments, three houses) to keep his family happy. This is the kind of guy that any woman would dream of marrying. Yet look what happens just four years later?
But the real victims are not them, nope. It’s the kids. They don’t understand the situation at all and it’s so sad what they are going through and don’t deserve that. As someone said in my comments once - you can’t start relationships based on raw emotions alone. No matter how we rationalize to ourselves that we need to “work at it,” attraction isn’t a choice. Over time, emotions can change direction like the wind and people grow apart. If you don’t carefully make the right choice, you just never know whom you end up hurting in the future…some whom might not even be born yet.