So I'm choosing now to write about it, because its the last day of the month, and when it all happened, it was the end of the month. It was the end of October. It scrambles my mind to think that it was so long ago, its been 10 months. I have thought about it every. single. day. since it happened.
So it was the day before his birthday, I was at home, I had just cooked my dinner and was looking around on Facebook to see if there were any good events going on for Halloween. To make a very long story short, I found a page for a club night that he had been to a couple of weeks before, a night out that he didn't even tell me about (the first sign I should have noticed), and lo and behold in that weeks pictures there he is kissing a girl.
I've never felt anything like that before, it was like having all the air instantaneously sucked out of your lungs, like being stabbed all over with hot knives. To suddenly be slapped with the reality that everything you'd ever had with someone just meant absolutely nothing. All gone, just like that, like it never even ever really happened.
I should have prefaced this with a little about our relationship before that point. It was flawless. We had one argument in the whole time we were together, and we were feeling silly and saying sorry within 5 minutes of it starting. It was trusting and loving and I would secretly feel so smug when other peoples relationships around us were so turbulent and messy, because ours was so smooth and perfect. Then one day out of the blue, one week before valentines day and one month before our first anniversary, and about 2 hours before I was due to go to work for a 10pm - 6am shift, he came around, red faced from crying, and told me while I sat there in my onesie, with my hair an unbrushed-birds nest from the sex we had had the night before, that he wasn't ready for a long term relationship.
There was no crying, no shouting, no screaming. It didn't even go on for a long time. I got a vague answer out of him. I thought nearly a year into it was a bit too late to realise that you weren't ready for a long term relationship, but I accepted it. What did I know about love? I had never been in love before him. I had broken up with every boyfriend and every guy I'd ever dated, because I never really felt anything for any of them. I'd never been in a relationship for longer than 6 months. But as much as it killed me, as much as it broke my heart and as much as I still loved and missed him, I knew that I didn't want to be with someone unless they wanted to be with me.
Since it was my first real break up though, I made the fatal error of not just cutting ties there and then. It started with us deciding to have a goodbye via skype, because the break up was so sudden and over and done with in about 30 minutes. Fatal error number two came after a lot of snivelling and feeling sorry for ourselves via skype, when for some reason I can't even remember now we decided it was just a great idea to meet up again. What followed was an entire hugely emotional night spent saying "I love you" snivelling and crying into each other on my bed until dawn.
It never occurred to me that we'd get back together, I thought this was just the final stages of the relationship dying. It was strange though, seeing him after breaking up with me. He told me that he hadn't been coping well. He'd punched a hole in a cabinet. He heard a certain song at the gym and couldn't take it. He read something I'd posted on Facebook and had a break down in the back of his friends car... Seeing him in person, feeling just as broken and miserable as I was, I never pushed the matter, but the thought at the forefront of my mind all along was that it was him who had initiated this. Yet I could see he was suffering just as much as me.
Predictably by now, we did get back together, probably around 6 weeks later. He told me that he had fucked up, that he had made a mistake and wanted me back. I asked him to make sure he was sure it was what he wanted. That I only wanted it if he wanted it. It was slow and tender at first, but afterwards it was just like it had never even happened. It was exactly the same as it had been before. There were never any issues surrounding it.
God I really wish I had taken more time thinking it over. But the reason I did go back to him was that as much as it had broken my heart, I could see that it had broken his too.
"I never want to break your heart ever again" he said...
As far as I was aware, between then and the night he cheated on me, everything had been fine. That's one of the many many little things that just made it even worse. I always thought that I would never be cheated on. I thought that was something that only happened to neurotic girlfriends, the girls that gave their boyfriends shit for staying out too late, and not spending enough time with them and not giving them enough attention, the people who had tumultuous relationships, fights every week, Facebook drama. But that wouldn't happen to me, because I was a great girlfriend, and our relationship had always been so easy. We had not been fighting before that night. So I really have no idea why he did it.
I never really cared about why, but I struggled with how. Reasons is reasons. Even though I never got to hear any of them, there is an infinite amount of reasons why he kissed somebody else. What I couldn't wrap my head around, was how could he physically do that to me? Fucking sick.
Flash forward then, to the day I found out. I just had no idea what to do with myself, what to do about the situation. I was fairly stunned. There was no debating it, not even for the tinest fraction of a nanosecond. I knew the second I saw it that it was over. It was as reflex as blinking an eye. The only thing was how to go about it. I thought that just simply calling him up and telling him I knew was much more than he deserved, and to be honest I'm not sure I would have been able to even speak the words. I know you cheated on me. I saw the photo of you kissing somebody else. Did I mention that this was the day before his birthday?
I had bought all his birthday presents. If any of them were as valuable in money as they were in sentiment I would have had a lot of money and would probably have just returned them. As it went, I had spend time carefully and thoughtfully picking things that I knew he would like. So I just did the most passive aggressive thing I could think of. Everyone that has heard this story thinks is amazing. I would like to think that I am clever and cruel enough to have thought about doing it that way anyway, but the truth is that I just wanted it to hit him the same way it had hit me.
So I kept up the charade just for one evening. As I was texting him to arrange coming to give him his presents the next day and act like everything was normal, I was busy printing off an A4 sized copy of the infamous kissing picture, folding it up into a tiny brown envelope and putting in a nice gift bag with the rest of his stuff.
I went there the next morning, his birthday presents in one bag, and in another bag everything he had ever given me, anything that were reminders of our relationship, and long letter. When I arrived he kissed me. Strangest kiss of my life, having to kiss someone who has killed you. I gave him his presents, I told him the little envelope was a special present that had to be opened last. He was very excited and intrigued. When he finally opened the envelope, he unfolded the piece of paper and we sat there in silence for a little while while he digested what was going on.
For a very long time he just sat there, opposite me, in a stunned silence, occasionally letting out a loud exhale of disbelief and running his hands through his hair. "Happy birthday" I said. He didn't say anything.
I had gone there fully expecting to bawl my eyes out, to get an absolute explanation for everything, for it to drag out for a long time until I finally left, exhausted.
What actually happened was that he didn't say anything. I was so stupid to think that he'd at least have the tiniest bit of decorum to say something like "I'm sorry, and this is what happened..." But I didn't even get that. I knew at that point that I was flogging a dead horse if I thought he was actually going to explain himself. So I pretty much just left at that point.
There was a little dialogue, he went with the "I don't remember this" line. I asked him if thats what he was sticking to, just gonna tell me he didn't even remember it. I knew he did remember it, because I had seen a picture from that same night out, on Facebook probably about a week earlier, and since that was the first time I'd even known he'd gone out that night, I "liked" the picture. Not to start an argument or anything, but just to say "I've seen this picture". I was never even bothered whenever he went out with his friends, as I usually worked weekends at the casino anyway I didn't care. It was more just that I thought it odd that he didn't mention that he'd even gone out.
Strangely, a little later on I noticed that he had deleted the picture, but I really didn't think anything of it. Whats even stranger is that I so fully trusted him, that it just did not even occur to me that there was anything weird going on. Imagine trusting somebody so much, without even giving it any effort, that when something strange does happen, even that doesn't lead you to suspect anything. I will never trust anybody in that way ever again. That has been robbed from me. By the only person I had ever met that I would never dream would have done this to me. It's a funny old world, most girlfriends would have browsed the whole album there and then. If I had scrolled through the rest of that album there and then when I "liked" that one photo, I would have seen the kissing picture then.
Anyway back to the birthday boy. That is why I left when I did, because there was lying to my face saying that he didn't remember that happening, acting like he had never seen that picture before. I knew he had seen it before. That's why he deleted the other photo that was part of the same album.
So there wasn't much dialogue after that. I took the picture from his hands and I blu tacked it to the wall behind where I was sat. I had given him a picture of us together a while ago. It meant a lot to me because it was in the very early days of us getting together, and we weren't a couple who took loads of pictures together and so that was one of the only ones of us. I put that up next to the kissing picture. And still I waited for an explanation that never came.
I told him that if he didn't want to be with me, he could have just said so, I told him that he didn't have to get back together with me, that I hadn't asked him to come back to me, that I would have been fine by now if we hadn't got back together. He whimpered something about how he did want to be with me. "I don't know what to say". "How about goodbye" I offered. He said "I'm sorry".
"yeah, so am I".
And that ladies and gentlemen, is that! I left feeling unsatisfied, but as I walked back home I felt like such a huge weight had been lifted. There were a few standard grovelly texts after that "I fucked up/I know I ruined what we had/I'll always remember how amazing you were". Vom.
I couldn't shake it though, I still felt like I was owed an explanation. And I know its really cheesy but I just felt like I needed closure. It did more or less all fade out after that, what I didn't like was how cut and paste he was about it, he'd say things like, delete my number, don't forgive me. Which riled me up a bit, firstly because it felt like he thought I was owed no say it the matter and he just wanted me gone. And a little bit because it was just a bit pathetic that he didn't even try and fight for us. Thats a silly one because it would have had absolutely no bearing on anything, but eh I dunno.
So anyway for a while after that I did try to arrange something with him briefly, but he started getting real dickish about it. Messages were having to go through Facebook because he had no credit on his phone. All I was saying is that I wanted to see him once more, to get an explanation and then for him to get out of my life. But he was even making that difficult, at first he said he would be willing to do that, but he'd read my messages and not reply for days, and then when he did it would be one sentence answers. I finally gave up on that, and told him to forget it and that I was just done and wasn't going to keep waiting for him. He seemed a bit apologetic in the end, but quite pathetically had nothing to say for himself and just regurgitated back to me everything that I had said to him on his birthday.
I never missed him when he was gone. One of the things from that time that I absolutely loved though, was the environment. I can't speak highly enough of his mam, she's one of the most brilliant wonderful people I've ever met and I'm so much more gutted about not having her in my life any more than I am him. I bumped into her about two months after it had happened, really unexpectedly in a pub and she was so good to me. I'm actually tearing up writing about that. I've never teared up any any other part of writing this post. Let that be a testament to her. I miss her. I loved being at their house, he had brothers and sisters and they always had their friends round, and there were some really great parties there. I'm used to living with my mam and it only being us which is fine. But being at their house, its how I always imagined a proper home should feel. I loved every part of it.
Maybe I'm clinging so much to that because its actually all that is salvageable. There is nothing else left. I am unable, and I wouldn't even if I could, remember fondly any times I spent with him. Every little tiny private beautiful moment and times we ever had, it doesn't matter if they meant something at the time. The way I feel about it is that it is all null and void now. Inaccessible. They never really happened, it all meant nothing. Its frustrating because if he had just broken up with me instead of cheating on me, I could still remember things without a sour taste in my mouth. The way I see it now is that if it never really existed, then I don't really have anything to be upset about. Which is a good way of looking at it, I think.
The first break up was horrible, I have never cried so much in my whole life as I did in that time. I mean, I coped fairly well, I went to work and did all the usual stuff, but feeling so shit for so long was awful. I felt constantly just sad, and fragile, like if I fell over maybe I would just break up into pieces.
This has stung way more, but I have cried way way less. I guess my body knew its not worth it this time. Its taken a deeper toll than just crying though. I was such a starry eyed romantic dreamer before. Love was the only thing that I ever actually believed in, I had endless amounts of faith in love. I think I'll feel that way again one day, but I fucking despise that he has taken that from me. It was the one thing I never thought I would lose sight of.
Right, I've finally gotten it all out. Regular programming will resume shortly!
As shitty as all that was, I want to clarify that I am absolutely fine these day (this time yesterday I was kissing with a boy considerably younger than myself!) The more time that passes the less shitty I feel about it. And it has been 10 months worth of time. I know I said earlier on that I think about it every day, and I do. But nowadays its getting more and more like a passing thought each day. Compared to the first few months when I thought about it constantly and felt like shit about it constantly. My little goal is to fall into bed one night, and upon reflecting on the day, coming to realise that it hasn't crossed my mind that day. And I feel closer to that every day, and I especially think that writing all this down has brought it closer. Maybe I was really just waiting to write this all along.
