tree and waited. Just so we could have this scene of “Thank you for finding me . . .”
He never came. Instead, I fell asleep, sitting against a tree. I woke up to the tingling feeling of a trail of ants climbing up my arm.
Hello, rock bottom, I thought.
It was after 4 A.M. and the sun was just starting to creep up. I had run so far from home that now I had to walk back. Step after step of utter Charlie Brown defeat. I held on to the glimmer of hope that Chris would be waiting at the door, frantic. I planned out my apology to the police, who I was certain would be swarming my house after Chris’s call about a missing person. “I just needed some air.”
When I got home Chris was fast asleep up in our room, snoring to the heavens. He could not be bothered.
You are right to wonder if we sought professional help. There were indeed forays into couples therapy. The first one, we had the luxury of choice. We were on the Titanic, asking to see the bar menu. We decided we wanted a black woman, and a Christian woman at that. We thought she would shame us into being together. Fifteen minutes into our first session, before we even got to any of the tough stuff, she stopped us.
“This isn’t gonna work,” she said. “You guys don’t belong together.”
We’d been dumped.
“How dare she?” I scoffed before we even got in the car.
“Who does she think she is?” snapped Chris.
Oh, we were going to show that woman. Things got better for a bit, in that every once in a while we would have a great night where we laughed. Maybe this is enough, I thought.
Our friends didn’t think so. One sent us to another therapist named Sally, whom our friend credited with saving her marriage. Like the good Christian sister therapist before her, Sally also marveled how we ever got past the dating stage, but she was committed.
We lied to Sally constantly. Chris and I were both terrified of being judged. When one of us would go out on a limb and share some uncomfortable truth, the other person would act blindsided. My eyes would widen like I couldn’t begin to comprehend where any of this was coming from. I wanted Sally to like me, so I couldn’t tell her the truth. I wanted to win.
Sally called me on my competitiveness pretty early in our sessions. “You think in terms of winning and losing,” she said. “But if you’re winning, who’s losing?”
“Him!”
“That’s your husband,” she said slowly, like this might be news to me. “You’re not supposed to want him to lose.”
“Wow,” I said. “You don’t know me, huh?”
Chris decided to stop coming to the appointments. I kept right on like the good student I was, needing that A.
“Now that we’re here alone, you need an exit strategy,” she said, leaning in. “Why don’t you give yourself six months to mentally, physically, financially, prepare to leave.”
Sally was talking truth now. I kept going alone, and I started to get a plan together. There was an actual date in my calendar, and the date came and went. I knew the milk was not just spilled all over the floor, it had been left out to curdle. And I was spooning it up, saying, “I can still eat cereal with this.”
THEN CAMERON CAMERA ENTERED MY LIFE. THAT’S NOT HER REAL NAME—her working name was even dopier—and I resent protecting the identity of a woman who tried to extort me after sleeping with my husband, but I am not sure of the etiquette.
Chris and I went to a summer potluck with a bunch of couples. There was this woman there, serving up Sexy Librarian and being very flirty with all the husbands. At one point, a bunch of guys were missing, and I found her showing them all her Web site, Cameron Camera, where people paid to watch her in various stages of undress. Great potluck, everyone! Gentlemen, hide your hard-ons!
A lot of people wanted to go out after the potluck night, including Chris, but I had a girlfriend drive me home. He ended up hooking up with Cameron Camera in our SUV. And of course she left an earring, probably one she got ten-for-a-dollar at a pharmacy for just such occasions. That gave her the excuse to call him at his office—the one I got feng-shuied—which gave him the excuse to have sex with her