But I was…
I was innocent.
I blinked a few times, shaken by his words and insults. Then I cleared my throat. “This place is in my name, and I’ve been covering the bills for it. I’ll need you to move out.”
“Excuse me? No. Okay, slow down. We can work this out. I mean, yes, we were both unfaithful and—”
“We?!” I gasped. “Jeff, I have been nothing but faithful to you.”
“Oh, please, Stella. Stop with the good girl act. You think I’m an idiot? You think I don’t see how you look at Damian? Or hell, how he looks at you? He stares at you like you’re the freaking sun. And you expect me to believe that you two haven’t been screwing this whole time?”
“Uh, yes because we definitely haven’t. I would never do that!” Plus, Damian didn’t look at me like that. He was just a friend.
Jeff pinched the bridge of his nose. “You’re a damn liar! You’ve been screwing him from the jump, I’m sure. Because you are weak and can’t deny yourself the temptation. I mean, hell, Stella. You married a man when you had a boyfriend.”
“Because of you! You told me to do this. You told me to agree to this arrangement.”
“I was joking!” he remarked. “Why would I want my girlfriend of ten years to marry another man? Use your brain, Stella. I know that’s hard for you to do.”
He was gaslighting me. I felt it deep in my soul as he began to twist the whole situation of what had unfolded right before my eyes. He was making me the villain in our story when I’d been loyal to a fault to a man who clearly never loved me.
I parted my lips to speak, to defend myself, but I didn’t see a point. Some people were determined to misunderstand you in order to help clear their own guilt of the hurt they inflicted.
“Leave your keys on the counter. I’ll be back on my free day to go through some things,” I explained.
“Wow…” He blew out a cloud of hot air. “Just like that? You’re done with me? After all these years together? You’re really going to allow this man you’ve known for six weeks to walk in and ruin something that was so solid?”
“I don’t know if we were ever truly solid, Jeff.” If we were, we wouldn’t have crumbled so easily. It turns out longevity in a relationship meant nothing if love and trust weren’t a part of the equation. Millions of couples stayed together for a long time simply because too many days passed, and they thought that meant it was too late to go.
Mama and Kevin wouldn’t want that for me. They would’ve never wanted me to stay in a place where love didn’t exist.
“What about my loans?” he asked.
“What?”
“The money I took out and spent. I’m in a hell pile of debt, Stella.”
“I told you not to take that money out. That was never a part of the plan.”
“Okay, but you can’t leave me high and dry! You’re not a bitch like that.”
I narrowed my eyes. “You’re right. I’m not a bitch. But I’m also not responsible for your bad choices.”
“This isn’t you. It’s that asshole, isn’t it? You’re not confident or strong like you’re acting. That ass got in your head and is messing with your thoughts.”
I raised an eyebrow. “You’re saying I’m only standing up for myself because of Damian?”
“Absolutely.”
I stared at him, baffled by his words. Did he truly think so little of me? Did I really allow a man to believe such awful things about who I’d been? How could I have been so stupid thinking that what Jeff felt for me had even an ounce of love within it? If this was love, I’d rather have hate.
Then again, he wasn’t wrong, in a way. Damian did help me find the confidence that I didn’t even know I’d deserved to have.
“Leave the key, Jeff. I’ll be back in a few days.”
I turned to walk away, leaving the house with a pool of nerves in my stomach.
He chased me out to the street, shouting, “You’ll regret this! He’ll never actually give a shit about you. He’s just in it for the check, Stella. Then you’ll be left alone. I was doing you a service by loving you.”
My eyes watered over as I stared at him, stunned by his coldness. Who was this monster I loved for the past ten years? “Goodbye, Jeff,” I whispered with a shaky voice.
He chuckled, baffled by my choice to still walk away. “Give him this word of advice: he should screw you with the lights off. It makes it easier to stomach all of your stomachs.”
I cried the whole way back home. Then I sat in my car and cried for a few more hours. I went to bed and cried for the remainder of the night.
The next morning, I found Damian in the dining room. He stood the second I entered the space. I must’ve looked as awful as I felt because his eyes were filled with sadness. I could almost feel the pity he was shooting my way through those irises.
“Hi there,” I softly spoke.
“Hello,” he replied.
“How was your outing with Denise?”
He grimaced.
Seemed about right.
“I’m sorry you had to grow up with these people. I get how they could mess up someone’s head. There was a lot of gaslighting going on with her toward the server.”
“Denise is good at making people think they are crazy,” I joked. “It probably explains some of my issues.”
“I hate her.”
“Don’t. Besides…she might be your mother.”
“Don’t care. Still hate her.” He glanced around, almost uncertain what to do or say next. He cleared his throat and scratched at his neck. “Are you all right? After your talk last night?”
“No.”
“Did you get any sleep?”
I shook my head. Tears burned at the back of my eyes. “No.”
“Don’t cry.”
“Okay.”
I cried.
He stepped closer. “You’re crying.”
“Sorry.”
“No apologies.”
“Okay.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a tissue. “Figured you might cry, so I shoved these into my pocket.”
“Thanks.” I took it and wiped my eyes.
“Do you only have mostly one-word replies today?”
I nodded. “Yes.” Any more words, and I was on the path of falling completely apart. I didn’t want to talk about what happened because it hurt too much. I didn’t want to face the fact that my friend and boyfriend had been sneaking around behind my back for God knows how long. If I spoke the words, I’d shatter.
“I… I mean… They…” The words faltered off. My brain was too exhausted and overwhelmed to even try to form a full sentence.
“Words are overrated,” he said, looking down at the floor. When he looked up, his lips sat in a heavy frown. “It makes me upset, though.”
“What does?”
“When assholes make you cry. So, I made you something.”
I raised a curious eyebrow.
He slid his hands into the pockets of his gray sweatpants. “Whenever I’m enraged or filled to the brim with hurt, I find a rage room. It’s a place you can go and break a bunch of shit to get the energy out of your body. I figured you wouldn’t love that as much as me, so I made you something else.”