Hi You,
S and I Part Three – A Crack in the Planet, Again and Again and Again…
Have you seen the movie, Spanglish? For me, Adam Sandler’s character summed it up perfectly when his wife tells him she cheated on him, “I couldn’t hear you. There was a crack in the planet. WOW… that was noisy!” At that moment, there was nothing left to say. I didn’t have the words, I didn’t want to find them either. All I knew is that I had to get out of there. I got up, went into our bedroom, and grabbed my phone. I called my friend K, and stoically asked, “Can you come get me? I’m home but I need to leave.”
“I’m on my way,” she said without question. K and I weren’t really close, but she is the first and only person I thought of. The night prior we were hanging out, putting up flyers for a garage sale she was having that weekend. I had just nailed one to this telephone pole and she looked at me and said, “you know if you ever needed me, I’d be there. You could call me.” If that isn’t some foreshadowing, I don’t know what is! Does life really give you clues like that? And how many had I missed up until that moment?
I took my bag, my phone, my stuffed polar bear that S had gotten me from the San Diego Zoo and sat outside till she arrived. It was only minutes, but it felt like an eternity. Everything around me was quiet, that noise in my head had gone away. When I got in the car, I still didn’t have the words, I just sat there holding that little bear. She didn’t say anything, but she knew it was bad, she put her hand on mine and started to drive. “He cheated, I said.” K looked over at me and started driving faster. When we got to her house, we flew right passed her husband, J, and straight up to the spare room. She yelled to him, “we’re going to be in here, smoking and drinking, and you’re going to be ok with it.” J made a mean cocktail, but he didn’t really like it when she smoked. That night, he brought us the ashtray.
We spent most of the night talking and crying, but the only part I really remember was when K asked me, “what are you going to do?”
I said, “I love him.” I already knew I didn’t want to leave, I wanted to try to work it out. Growing up, I always told myself if someone cheated on me, that would be the end. No questions, it was unforgivable. But when I found myself there in that very situation, it wasn’t that easy.
The next morning, S called and asked if I was coming home. I said, “Yes.” When he came to pick me up, I met him outside and quietly got in the car. Boy was it awkward! I knew we needed to talk, but did I really want to know more? Once you hear it you can’t un hear it. Or was knowing better than having your imagination run wild? I had to know. Yup there was no way around it. “So, tell me more, what happened?” He said it was in Korea, on their last deployment. They were in a bar and this girl they were sitting with took his hat from him. He was drunk and followed her back to what ever brothel she came from. I’ll spare you the rest of the details. After that, every time I closed my eyes, I saw the two of them together.
Finally, we decided, together that we were going to work through it. It wasn’t going to be easy, but we wanted to be together. I told him that I was going to need his help regaining his trust and at times I would need his reassurance. I told him about the haunting image in my head and that I needed him to be there for me when it happened. I said, “when it starts to appear, I’m going to squeeze your hand, and when I do this, I need you to help me get through it.” I remember one night, we were driving back from the beach, as we neared the Dole Plantation, it started. I squeezed his hand so tight in hopes that it would relieve the pain in my heart. He leaned over close, squeezed my hand right back and said, “I love you and I’m right here.”
We were just getting comfortable around each other again and there seemed to be this dim light at the end of the tunnel. And in a very strange way we were even closer than we were before. Until one night a couple months later, apparently, he had more to share, more stories that he couldn’t keep in. It had happened again and again. There was a girl New York and then one in Australia. (sigh) “Are we really here again? Was our whole relationship a lie? Do I even know this man that I’m married to? Is this really everything or is there going to be more one day? Why is he telling me this now? Where do we go from here?” So many questions and no answers.
xoxo
Letters to You 