Rubbing his bloodshot eyes, he staggered out of the bedroom. "What is your problem?"
"I am not the one with the problem! Give me my damn daughter, I am taking her away from you!"
"No, it's 4am and she's my daughter too."
"But I didn't go out and cheat on you! And stay out all night! And not even answer one goddamn phone call!"
"What the fuck! I didn't cheat on you, and I didn't hear my phone because I was beatboxing with the band."
"You were out with a girl! At a bar! While I was sitting home, 7 months pregnant with your third baby!" Her screams dissolved into sobs. "I hate you!"
"I was not!"
"Don't lie! My sister texted me that the stupid horse bitch you were out with texted her that you two were going to the bar!"
"And you're going to believe your sister why? She likes to start drama."
"I had a friend go to the bar to make sure! I wanted to believe you were out with your friend from Queens! But you lied! He saw you together, and people have been telling me shit about you all night! And then you don't answer the phone? Fuck you!"
"You had someone spy on me?" he stared at her, incredulous.
"You think you can go to my fucking town and people won't tell me what's going on? All those guys you think are your friends, they would give you up in a second to me. They have my back, not like you. If I wanted, I could have had someone beat the shit out of you as soon as you stepped outside that bar! I want my daughter, asshole!"
The slap to his face resounded throughout the now silent room. Grabbing the sleepy toddler, she slammed the door as hard as possible, burying her tears in the child's pajamas.
This post was written in response to this week's RemembeRED prompt from Write on Edge. Recreate a pivotal conversation with us this week. Remember, this is memoir. You can only record what was actually said. Save the bon mots and imagined snappy retorts for fiction.
Dear Alison, you've painted a very vivid picture of a volatile relationship here. I could feel the pain and relate to the betrayal and anger that this woman feels. It is my hope, however, that this woman is not you. If it is, then I'm sending all my love and warm hugs to you...
ReplyDeleteOh, this is heartbreaking. But I felt like I was right there, watching it.
ReplyDeleteOh...I wince on your (her) behalf.
ReplyDeleteReading this hurts my heart :( I hope that she (you?) are able to figure this out (or have already done so.)
ReplyDeleteThis is heartbreaking, raw, real.
ReplyDeleteYou captured the back and forth, and without saying much else at all, you also conveyed what a hard toll this conversation took.
(I'm so sorry.)
Ugh. Like other people said, this is heart breaking. I'm so sorry-but thank you for being strong enough to share your story, I know how unbelievably hard that can be.
ReplyDeleteThank you all for the comments. This was an incredibly hard post for me to write because the incident is still a sore spot for me and it does still come up sometimes, even though it happened over a year ago.
ReplyDelete