Read Being The Other Woman: Who we are, what every woman should know and how to avoid us Online
Authors: Micalle A. Culver
As I drove home alone, she finally spoke to me as we should have spoken two years before. She told me things that made my mind race, things that devastated me. I cannot remember everything she said, but nonetheless, the “bitch” sweetly comforted me for hours. In the morning, I woke to find her ringing my door bell to retrieve the keys to Blake’s truck. She spoke to me kindly again in my driveway, saying a friend of hers was watching her children so that she could pick up the truck. No one knew were Blake was, she told me.
Beth hugged me and apologized for what I had been through at the same time that I apologized for everything I had put her through. She seemed exhausted, as if she, too, were over it. There had been too much nonsense during the last few years.
I later learned that Blake had been arrested the night before and that Beth had hired an attorney before she had ever arrived at my house to pick up his truck. Some time after that, I was told that her kindness was in order to persuade me not to press charges and to keep the drama from creeping out into the public. I still don’t know what was real. In fact, I don’t know if anything I was ever told about Beth was real. But I believe that I saw a genuine person that day in my driveway.
My eyes were black and I had nasty cuts across my cheek and nose, and glass imbedded in my lip. I could not bear to see my children look at me. They couldn’t stop staring with sympathy and heartbreak. I felt like I was now weak to them. I felt like my life was a complete disgrace. I didn’t know what to say to my children, or how to explain myself. Now, not only did the entire business community know that I had spent two years in a foolish affair, but now I also looked like a battered and weak woman. I was mortified.
The following afternoon, I received a call from an attorney who represented Blake. He informed me that Blake had been detained the night before and that he was attempting to have him released. He hoped I would state to the judge that I did not fear for my life so that he would be let out of jail without much penalty. I was sick inside and believed that Blake, too, was in the pit of despair. I was certain that now, sitting in a jail cell all night, he was feeling the ultimate grief. I imagined him overcome with shame for hurting me and sick with concern about me and anger at himself.
I participated in a teleconference for Blake’s arraignment hearing. The judge spoke to Blake in a stern tone, instructing him that under no uncertain circumstances was he to contact me. Then in a sarcastic tone, he added, “Do you think you can handle that?” Blake replied with an arrogant and angry, “You bet, your Honor!” At that moment I realized that he blamed
me
. I felt a dagger in my heart. The teleconference ended, and within thirty minutes his attorney called me back and asked if I would come by his office with makeup on to take new photographs because, he said, “the photos from last night look so bad with all of the blood and I was hoping to get some better ones with you all cleaned up.” I was still digesting the blow of hearing no caring for me in Blake’s voice, and now I felt backed into a corner. All of these years, I had been used and I had allowed it by playing along, and now these people thought I was downright stupid!
I asked the attorney if I could call him back in a few minutes, then called an attorney I knew personally. After our conversation, I phoned Blake’s attorney back and told him what my friend had advised me. “Oh, shit,” was all I heard before he hung up. My attorney had advised against appearing in makeup to make the look all better, of course. He had also said, “Blake should be careful because you could sue him for a lot of money,” and my friend also followed up with me regularly to check on how I was doing.
My friend Tony, against whom Blake was so set, was one of the few people who knew not only about what had happened but also the extent of my despair. He was persistent in trying to pull me through my depression. He brought me books to read and dragged me out of the house to be sure I got some fresh air. He took me on hikes and listened as I ran my thoughts over and over out loud. He also weathered curious looks from passers-by who would see my bruised face and then dart their eyes towards him. Tony is now and always has been a true and wonderful friend. I’m not sure if I have ever expressed how deeply I appreciate his friendship. I am fortunate that he did not give up on me. Like other friends who stuck by me, he did not allow me to push him out my life.
Right away, rumors began to circulate that were said to have started with Blake. There were tales of me waving a bottle at him over dinner at the restaurant we had dined at hours before our fight. I began hearing that he had struck me in self-defense. Many of these tales placed me in the position of attacker and him as defending himself. I was being made to look as a crazy person to my community to save his reputation. In my desperation to set the story straight and spare what little reputation I had left, I contacted my attorney again and filed a formal civil suit. I thought that by doing that, everyone would know the “crazy” tales weren’t true.
I also knew, of course, that what I was doing would surely lead to the end of my relationship with Blake for good. My coming against him in legal proceedings was sure to make him see me as the enemy. I believed by doing so he would never contact me again and I would never fall vulnerable to another promise in a moment of weakness. I stamped the death certificate.
Deceased.
In time I began to heal. In time I was able to try to open my heart again. In time I began dating Shane, a man with whom I had developed a caring friendship. This was a seemingly nonjudgmental man who supported my happiness.
During our developing friendship, I was speaking to Shane one day about my stress over the public conception of who I was after the affair with Blake. He said “Those people who say those things don’t know you, and if they believe them, they don’t deserve to know you.” This sentence touched my heart and opened me to chancing a start at a new relationship, one in hindsight I must have been desperate for.
For the first three months that Shane and I were together, I felt release. I was falling in love again and happy. I believed that I was with a soft, gentle and genuine person. He, too, seemed to be mesmerized by me the way Blake was in our beginnings. I was excited to introduce him to my family and friends and I booked a vacation for us to Florida. He would be the first man I’d ever taken to my best friend Janet’s home. I had visions of the two of us having a great time with my favorite couple. I jumped head first into my new life, wanting to risk love and not allow myself to turn bitter and scarred by my past. I was anxious to live this new life with the man who could stand on the dock of that dilapidated shack I had daydreamed about.
Our departure date was the day after Christmas. Christmas morning came and we shared our gifts with each other. Afterwards, Shane left to celebrate the holiday with his family. That Christmas night, he phoned me and abruptly canceled leaving with me. He said that he wasn’t coming because he had decided to get back together with his ex-girlfriend. He decided this, he said, because he believed that I would never love him as I had loved Blake.
That night I was a zombie while I packed random items into my luggage. Here I am again, I thought. Someone else was more valuable than me. I am not enough and losing me means nothing. Crushed is the only word I can think of to describe my emotional state, but using that word minimizes what I was truly feeling. Before departure, Shane showed up on my doorstep with a friend of his to help plead his case. He had made an error, he still wanted to go and in a whirlwind, we left.
When Shane and I started dating, I believed that he was honest and trustworthy. I remember thinking one night, if this guy turns out to be a cheat and a liar, I will never trust myself again. I was afraid that if he let me down in such a magnitude, I would turn into a bitter woman, never capable of trusting a man again. I felt there was no way that I could survive another painful experience. Shane seemed so innocent and grateful to be with me, I couldn’t imagine him turning out to be another bad guy. Instead of letting him go after his decision to return to his ex-girlfriend and then coming back again, I decided much of his insecurity was a Blake factor. I was fighting myself, wanting to believe that I wasn’t
really
this horrible of a judge of character. So I hung out, searching for ways to convince myself those good things I thought I saw in Shane were real.
I spoke to Shane often about my feelings about the lawsuit against Blake and my wish to not pursue it. Lawsuits take a considerable amount of time before they ever get to court. By now, so much time had passed since I’d seen Blake that I wanted to just move on with my new life and leave the past behind me. But Shane, my attorney and my friends all encouraged me to stick with the suit, saying that the only way for the kind of person Blake was to learn from his behavior was through his wallet. Shane was adamant that I had been done wrong and letting Blake off the hook would be a disservice to other women who had been abused. When I argued that if Blake worked for 7-Eleven, then I would not be suing him, and therefore it did not make sense just to sue for money because he had some, everyone insisted that what he had done was not right and I needed to serve justice. I had intended to donate whatever I won to a local shelter, but there was no honorable thing I could do. When I filed the lawsuit, it only caused “they” to start gossiping that my whole purpose for being with Blake in the first place was tied to his money.
Things suddenly changed when during a disagreement with Shane, he snidely remarked to me that he wasn’t sure he wanted to date me anymore. He couldn’t handle the things that others were saying about me. Shane was new to the business community and wanted to be accepted by the cliquing folks of higher society. So he became chameleon-like—clinging and contributing to gossip about me. He was starting to question himself as to who I
really
was. In hindsight, I see now that I was neither strong enough nor equipped emotionally to move on in a new relationship at that time. I was still too vulnerable. I wasn’t healed enough to be centered and clear. My mind set was that there was something wrong with me and I needed to fix whatever it was. So I stayed with him adding four more years of struggle to my life.
I clung to the belief that through our time together, he would feel secure about the person I am and defend me.
But Shane was also filled with insecurity and mistrust caused by what I was dealing with socially. This perpetuated the cycle I was trying to remove myself from, and much of it was tied to the fact that I was involved with a lawsuit against my former lover, which Shane eventually concluded was my way of keeping me tied to Blake. In reality, it was the opposite. Had I not filed the suit, Blake and I would have eventually spoken again. I would not have been able to rid him from my life. Filing the suit, I was well aware, would cause Blake such anger he would never trust or speak to me again. In a sense, therefore, the lawsuit was the most solid way I could assure myself I would never fall back into the pattern with him again. I was putting my foot down. I was saying, loudly and firmly, “It’s over! I mean it this time.”
During our disagreement, Shane’s sudden harshness about the matter devastated me. No matter which way I went, I couldn’t win. I felt like, great, here I am trying to be happy in something new and honest and Blake was constantly screwing it up. If I sued Blake, it was because I was money-hungry and wanted to stay connected to my past. If I dropped the suit, it was because I was stupid, too forgiving, letting him off the hook again and wanting to keep the door open for him.
I sustained another emotional blow from Shane with regard to the lawsuit and his sudden, shocking feelings toward me because of it. This blow came right after I attended the funeral of a friend of my ex-husband’s and mine. The funeral was one of four I attended within a few months. My thirty-four-year-old cousin died quickly after being diagnosed with cancer, my friend Sasha’s nephew, who was only twenty one, was killed in a tragic accident, an extended family member in his mid twenties was killed after being in the wrong place at the wrong time and now this friend died tragically, too. On top of it all, I was alerted to my own health scare.
I kept quietly falling apart in my office after Shane screamed harsh things to me about being a money grubbing bitch, evident by my lawsuit and he laughed off my health concerns by telling me that Blake and Beth could dance over my grave.
It was more than I could take at that time in my life. My attempt to masquerade as someone who really had their act together wasn’t working. I was dealing with too many things and tottered on the edge of a nervous breakdown. Looking back, I don’t know how it was that I managed not to pull a Thelma and Louise.
I sat for hours, staring at the walls and sobbing. I felt lost. There were no right answers. There was no one who truly knew me in my soul. I needed the world to stop and let me rest for just a moment.
My hands dialed Blake’s number. I needed a real friend. I missed his kindness, his ability to comfort me and the kind of emotional support he’d offered. He would have never seen me as Shane had expressed so coldly. I was feeling so alone, so attacked, so mind fucked. I thought Blake was the only one who might really care for me. When he answered the phone, I could barely speak. All I said was, “Can you talk?” In shock, he said, “Is it you?” He held his breath and I started to cry and hyperventilate. “I just miss my friend,” I whispered. We got eight hours’ worth of closure, and in the end I told him that I had never wanted to sue him and agreed to drop the suit. He offered to pay my attorney bill, and three days later we signed the release with prejudice that concluded the war.
In celebration, with our sickened minds, we toasted the end at the very location where we had last seen each other before the war began. Sitting together as two old friends, we asked our server about a story we’d heard about a couple who had once had a big fight there. The bartender proceeded to tell us about that night. “Yeah, man,” he said, “it was brutal. This dude like busted his mug over this girl’s face and started carving into her. The whole top of the bar was filled with blood. She was laying in it, I dunno, like she was drinking red dye or something.”
“Man, that sounds intense,” Blake said. “Were you there?” (We both knew full well he had not been there.)
“Yeah, man,” he replied, “I was like trying to resuscitate her.”
We closed the chapter in our typical comic fashion. We were able to laugh at the extreme spin our story had taken and felt united in nostalgia as the ones who knew they just didn’t get us.
With nothing legal to keep us apart, Blake began to call me when I just happened to be with Shane, who soon came to believe that our communication happened more often and was about much more than it really was. Knowing that Shane felt insecure about our relationship, Blake started doing little things to torment him. Such as sending Shane anonymous text messages, emails and voicemails. This put me on another roller coaster ride that I was afraid to get off. I was sure everyone would think badly of me because Blake was again the issue. I had enjoyed my developing relationship with Shane in the beginning and the initial affection he had offered. Shane seemed to offer the gentleness that had been missing from my life for so long. I thought that he was an innocent and caring person. Like Blake, in the beginning, he seemed to be enamored and in love with me, like I was unique and special. I felt fortunate to have finally found a situation where I thought real love and kindness had found me and this time, I was allowed to have it. Maybe by that time, I was so desperate for approval and affection, that I didn’t see everything else that surrounded who Shane really was either. What is evident to me about those days, I needed everyone to know that I had gone on with my life. I wanted Beth to know that I wasn’t going back there, that I had moved on. But the process seemed always stifled no matter how great my desire was to let go of the past and focus on the future.
Through the years Blake and I have remained friends. I don’t hate him. How could I? Despite the bad, we also shared much good. I have never seen any reason to hate someone you once loved. Occasionally we speak or write an e-mail or two back and forth, and on a rare occasion I meet him for lunch. But I have never been tempted to return to the relationship the way it was, even though there were times when things were not going well in my new life and Blake’s failure to choose me was rubbed in my face, I would then hope out of pride that he would finish things as he had promised and tell me it all was a bad dream so that I could show those who insulted me “I told you so.” We stay fairly caught up with one another, and I still care for him and with genuine sincerity wish him happiness. Blake has asked me to go with him on many trips, but I have always since declined. He will still comment on occasion, his hope that someday we will have everything we wanted in each other. But each time we speak, it’s the same story I have listened to for almost six years now. He is always closer than ever to getting his divorce. He is always more miserable than he ever was in his marriage. He still remains an overall wimp, claiming to be helpless with regard to his ability to control what he wants for his own life, which is never an attractive quality.
As part of our new found friendship there was the recognition that we mix well in business. Using that connection, he once dangled the carrot in front of my nose by offering me a business contract that would typically sign allowing six months for performance. If I performed, the deal held the potential of earning me a large commission. He gave me one month to do it and I did. The problem was I don’t think he expected me to succeed, and he was away on Aruba at the time, which left me to conduct business with Beth. To her astounding credit, she was both kind and professional toward me, but when Blake returned, he canceled half the transaction, saying his reasons for cancelation was due to Beth’s inability to have to deal with hearing my name on a regular basis. Then he used what I had procured to close out the last half, cutting me out of fifty percent the proceeds I had secured. I was later told that he informed mutual business acquaintances that he was forced to sign that contract with me as part of the law suit and that my business phone calls to his office were me stalking him. I don’t know if I believe he said that… frankly, I never know what to believe anymore. There were so many people fighting to save face, or create gossip, I could write a book about it!
Though he constantly takes vacations and is rarely in the state, which further detaches him from his marriage and its perpetual state of dissatisfaction, I feel sympathy for him. He says he is “just living.” Like Peter Pan, he is searching for Neverland. He has had several new lovers since our parting, and he still doesn’t get it when I try to explain how my life has been traumatized as a result of our relationship. He speaks of himself saying, “My life was altered, too.” He “just wants to be wanted” he says, lamenting his own loneliness while he leaves Beth alone to handle their life responsibilities.