Previous Parts

It became a routine. Every morning at two-OMFG-thirty, Mr. Hot’s alarm would go off. He’d lean over and kiss me and whisper, “I love you. Be back soon.”

I’d struggle to the surface of consciousness long enough to mutter, “Be careful.” (The “Be careful” to any loved one leaving my house continues to this day. We all do it. Come visit and you’ll see!)

And then he’d be gone - delivering papers on a rural route in the hills of West-by-gawd-Virginia for three hours. He’d come home around 6; we’d eat breakfast and hang around the apartment. We’d read or watch television. Go for walks. Make love.

Around dinnertime, we’d drive the forty-five miles to my house and wait for the phone to ring so I could keep up the pretense with Practice. Our conversations were stilted, to say the least, but I wasn’t supposed to say anything about the future until he got home. He made sure that it was always his way.

*********************

There were two conversations I remember while we played this fucked-up game.

I had, somehow, managed to get straight A’s that Fall semester. I had Calculus 2, Physics, C-Programming, Assembler (another programming language) and Engineering Graphics. It was the one thing I wanted to gloat about. Practice never thought that I was very bright - and yet, I managed to four-point my first full semester back in school. He immediately took the credit. “Yea, you wouldn’t have been able to do it without my help.” He summed up his view of our relationship pretty neatly in that one sentence.

The second conversation was with Practice’s father. Mr. Hot and I had fallen asleep at my house. Well, he had fallen asleep and I was watching him pretty intently. (And liking what I was seeing - but I suppose that goes without saying.) The phone rang around 8 p.m. Practice’s dad says to me, “I got a notice that you didn’t pay Practice’s student loan payment last month. What’s going on?” I explained that I had run out of checks and had ordered new ones, but they hadn’t arrived yet. Probably because of the holiday. I could tell he didn’t believe me, but it was the truth.

*********************

We had less than a week in our 1-bedroom Camelot. I had “moved in” on the 27th. Practice was due back on New Year’s Day.

On the 31st, Mr. Hot and I went out to dinner. We couldn’t celebrate the coming of 1991 - we didn’t know if there would be anything to celebrate. Afterwards, we went back to what we now called home and spent one last night together. When he got up to deliver papers the next morning, I couldn’t go back to sleep. I waited for him. I paced. I cried. I couldn’t believe it was over already - and I had to go back to Practice’s house that night. I got the feeling that Mr. Hot thought I was leaving for good. Nothing I could do or say convinced him otherwise.

The worst part was I had to drive back to the airport in Ohio. The flight was landing in the afternoon and I had a five hour drive. I wanted to stay with Mr. Hot as long as I possibly could, so I left the cats with him - I couldn’t take the time to drop them off at the house. I would think of an excuse on the way.

*********************

These were the days when you could still get through security without a boarding pass and go directly to the gate to wait for someone. I was sitting next to the door, my head leaning on the cinderblock wall with my eyes closed when the flight landed. Soon the passengers were off the plane and Practice was standing in front of me. He grabbed me to pull me up from the seat. I resisted at the same time. As I fell back into the chair, my head slammed back into the cinderblock. Immediately a knot rose on the back of my head and I had an instant headache.

*********************

Once we dropped R off, and headed down the road, the questions came.

“Where were you last night? I called several times. The florist said the flowers I sent you were left at the neighbors.”

I told him that I had gone to a girlfriend’s house. My head was throbbing and I was concentrating on staying awake and as alert as I could. I knew if I did tell him where I had been, I ran the risk of him driving off the road - and I was in no shape at that point to prevent anything from happening. He told me that he knew I was lying, he’d called that girlfriend’s house. I told him I was at Mr. Hot’s apartment. (He still didn’t know that this was the man I was in love with. He thought he was just the cat sitter.) For some reason, that shut him up.

When we finally made it back home, I told him I was going to bed. I took some Tylenol and slept.

The next morning, I told him everything. I told him I was in love with Mr. Hot. I told him I’d spent the entire week at his apartment and that everything was over between he and I. He argued with me. He cried. He swore that things would be better.

The phone rang.

Practice picked it up and yelled Mr. Hot’s name into the mouthpiece. I lunged for the phone. Whoever it was had hung up. There was only a dialtone on the other end. I knew Mr. Hot hadn’t yet hooked up the phone. I had no way of calling him back if it had, indeed, been him calling. I felt completely helpless - but at that point, right then and there, I knew what I was going to do.

I didn’t need anything. I took off my wedding rings. I took off the emerald he’d bought for my birthday the year before. I told him I’d take the old car - the one that was paid off - and I left. It was the last night I ever spent in that house.

…to be continued…

—- It ended up that the mysterious caller was the girlfriend Practice had called on New Year’s Eve. The one that told him she hadn’t seen me. She heard him yell Mr. Hot’s name into the phone and hung up to call a mutual friend of ours who was a lawyer. By the time she called back with an offer of someplace to stay and the name of a divorce attorney, I was long gone. —-

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