The Real

“You know Abbie, when I met my wife, I was in the middle of my own divorce,” he said carefully. “I’d been married eight years to my college sweetheart,” he explained as I looked over at him. “It was different.”

“How was it different?”

He thought about it for a moment. “It was like I was two different men. I’m a bit of a believer we can’t evolve with those we start relationships with when we aren’t full bloom unless you are capable of growing together. It’s too hard to sustain a relationship when you’re changing and embracing it and your partner is intimidated by it. My ex-wife was. It’s what ended us. Sometimes you just have to accept defeat to figure out it’s the only way you can really get anywhere personally.”

Another strangling beat of silence as I pressed my fingers to my forehead, Cameron’s words ripping at my resolve.

Love me anyway.

“What will you do, Abbie?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, I hope it works out. I remember feeling that helpless over a woman once.”

“What did you do?”

“I married her. We celebrate our fifteenth anniversary on Sunday.”

I closed my laptop, relieved to be out of the virtual meeting. I finally understood the meaning of the coffee cup that read I survived another meeting that should have been an email. I walked down the stairs of my three-flat, nervous for the first time in months. I’d shot off a text to Cameron earlier that morning and asked him to meet me. He’d replied instantly letting me know he would be there. I was finally ready for the answers. The ache of missing him, the need to know, was too much. I wasn’t sure if we had a future, but I needed clarity. Some sort of justification for the pain. He’d stopped texting me a week ago due to my refusal to acknowledge him. I couldn’t bring myself to answer any of his calls. I needed, no, I deserved the one on one. It was anger that kept me away. But it was also the anger that kept me lost.

Due to the meeting, I was already running late and did a last-minute change into black slacks and a cuffed purple blouse. In a rush, I grabbed my purse and paused when I opened my front door.

She stood in a long black designer trench coat, perfectly put together and I cringed at the guilt that must have surfaced on my face the minute my eyes met hers.

“Kat.”

I was fumbling for words that would never come. She had bared witness to the beginning of my relationship with her husband and heard about it as it evolved.

It was too fucked up to decipher. It struck me then she’d never once asked his name. She really was a bit narcissistic in that sense, and in all probability, feigning interest while calling Cameron ‘coffee shop guy’.

Even so, I’d given her first-hand accounts no woman should have to endure. I felt responsible and angrier than ever as she looked over to me. It was enough to make me second guess my decision to reach out.

But it wasn’t only Cameron’s deception that irked me. I didn’t know the truth from a lie where Kat was concerned. And though I was blissfully ignorant of the truth on her end of things, I felt a sense of relief seeing her at my house. But no words would come, so I let her take the lead.

“I’ve been standing here for twenty minutes trying to get the courage to knock.” It was a rare sign of weakness on her part. “I’m sorry to show up like this unannounced. I didn’t know if Cameron would be here.”

“Is that why you’re here?” I asked cautiously. If she wanted to stir the pot she had a leg to stand on at that point. I had no idea what was going on as far as Cameron was concerned, but I had every intention of finding out.

“No. I’m here to see you.”

“Okay,” I said carefully taking a step forward. “Kat, I didn’t know.”

She nodded. “He told me.”

“So, you have to know I told you what I told you out of friendship and confidence, not out of cruelty,” I said with a trembling voice. I’d felt so justified in loving him moments earlier. I needed that strength back, but looking at the ghostly thin woman in front of me, I was on shaky ground. Was she high? I would never know the truth, but I did want the truth that I could see building on the tip of her tongue.

“Did he leave you?”

She nodded. “Almost a year ago.”

Relief for myself and anguish for my friend ran the gauntlet.

“I don’t understand. Why would you act like you were still married?”

“Because I was,” she said harshly.

I felt that blow to my toes.