Dear you,

When you got off work that night, I expected you to come home, like you always did.

But you didn’t.

Three days later, me frantic with worry and having called all your friends and family, you finally called me. I’ll never forget those words, “I can’t do this anymore.”

Did you take that line from one of the cheesy nighttime soap opera type dramas you used to watch all night long instead of talking to me? Maybe you heard that line on one of the sim-type video games you played all day long instead of being a part of the household, a part of the family.

I don’t know where the line came from, and even more than that, I’m not sure what you meant by, “I can’t do this anymore.”

Do what? You can’t sit around all day while I wait on your hand and foot, working 12 plus hours per day, while you work your 20 hour per week part-time job? Or maybe it’s that you can’t sit around and do nothing but eat my home cooked meals? Or maybe you are so worn out from all the lovemaking we weren’t doing?

Really, what exactly was it that you couldn’t do anymore?

So then, without even talking to me about what was going on, where you were going, who you were going to live with… nothing, you come by, tell me you wanted to pick up your things. I sat on the bed, watching you pack your clothes, numb, cold. Ice.

“Are you going to help me pack?” you asked.

Are you serious? “No,” I said, choking back tears, “if you’re going to do this, you’re doing it on your own.”

It would be the first thing you did all by yourself in our entire relationship.

If I’d known then what I know now, I wouldn’t only have helped you pack, I would have asked you to leave sooner.

You walked out the door, but you didn’t walk out of my life. Oh, how I wish you had.

A few months later, in a phone call, you had the nerve to say, “I guess we both made mistakes.”

Was that your version of closure? Trying to get me to take some blame? No, I didn’t make mistakes. I had and have nothing to apologize for.

I did nothing wrong.

I held you when you cried. I initiated sexual activity while you rejected me. I cooked for you. I cleaned for you. I washed your clothes and had them ready for work. I made and packed your lunches for your part-time job. I waited on your hand and foot, doing all the things a ‘good little wife’ would do. I listened to every story. I laughed at every joke. I loved you the best way I knew how.

The only thing you could accuse me of doing wrong was working too much, but with a growing family, and you only having a part-time job, someone had to pay the bills.

That someone was me.

So you’ve come and gone, moved on to the person you cheated on me with, and likely have moved on to the next person you cheated with too.

Nothing of you remains in my house, my life, my heart.

But still, I think of you. There’s no love behind it. There is, however, a residual sadness… a sadness I cannot explain and do not understand. A sadness I do not choose to touch. And yet, it lingers there.

Unfinished business.

There is no closure. It’s a self-destructive thing that I won’t give you closure, because by failing to give you closure, I deny myself that closure too.

Though I’ve moved on, though I am happy, though I’m finally with my heart’s desire whom I love so very much, I still can’t give you the one thing you need and want.

Apparently, I couldn’t give it to you when we were together, so now we aren’t together. Now that we aren’t together, I refuse to give you want you want.

You don’t deserve it.

But I do want to thank you. Thank you for making the choice to leave, a choice I should have made but wasn’t strong enough to do. My life has become infinitely better since.

Goodbye,
Me

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