The Story of Us

Fourteen

I'm a little hesitant to share this, but here we go. While working at Dunn Edwards, one of the assistant managers started sexually harassing me. Apparently, he did this to all the females in the store. He made comments about sending nudes and invited me over to his place, even though he knew I had a boyfriend. I knew I couldn't stay there, plus Disney requires weekend availability and Dunn Edwards couldn't give me weekends off. So, I left Dunn Edwards and began looking for a job in my field of study. I was only four months away from my bachelor's after all.

But nowhere cared. They all wanted the degree posted. I couldn't even substitute teach without it, even though I had passed the CBEST. I worked hard to scrounge up as much of the rent as I could, making sure I always gave at least half of the rent for the month. That's what Stephen had asked for; at least half. I hated that I wasn't fully contributing. I vented about it to his sister and even got 10 free therapy sessions from my EAP at Disney because of it. But, every time I expressed my worries to him he told me "Don't worry about it, mama. I got you. We are a team." I struggled so hard to accept this. I got a part time job in May finally teaching, but then got offered more jobs because I had finally graduated. June I was finally able to help him with my full portion.

But let's go back to April. My mom was getting married. I was so excited. Stephen and I slow danced to "Faithfully" by Journey and he sang the words to me. He let it slip that he had been talking to my family about proposing. I was even more excited than I was at the beginning of the day. I made jokes that we would get married before my sister and her boyfriend (who are already engaged). I said we would be the next ones to get married, and it made sense. I fully believed we would be getting married in the next 2-3 years.

I began asking questions, and it became a game. Who knew? What did they know? Did he have the ring? Or did someone else? Would it be soon? At one point, he said maybe his friend in Arizona had the ring. We had to go to Arizona for my graduation and he saw said friend. My stomach flipped thinking he was going to propose to me out there as a graduation gift. But he didn't. He didn't give me anything for my graduation.

June and July were good months. July his now ex-friend moved out and a different friend had moved in by then already. Actually, he had moved in with us in April and was living in our living room. He was supposed to photograph my mom's wedding but flaked last second. That should have been a sign to me; he fucked me over and left me scrambling for a new photographer after he promised. He also said he would clean the apartment but that also was a good joke. He only cleaned when Stephen did. They never asked me to help.

To be fair, I was depressed. All I wanted to do was work and sleep. But had Stephen encouraged me to help, I would've done it for him. Because I loved him more than I hate myself. And that is a lot.

The roommate and I started begging Stephen for a pet. I don't know why we did that, but we did. I saw tons of kittens on Facebook who needed to be rehomed, but I was shot down every time.

That is, until August.

July 31, 2023. Stephen told me he was going to our roommate's parent's house. I wanted to tag along, but he convinced me not to. Of course I was a little hurt, but I had a therapy session anyways. In the middle of my therapy session, our bedroom door opens and in walks Stephen, with a German Shephard Malinois mix puppy. I cried.

But here is some back story.

We talked about getting a dog, but I wanted a small dog. I have always had small dogs growing up and, living in an apartment, a small dog made sense to me. But, I was outvoted. The argument was that both guys had big dogs their whole life so they would be more comfortable with a big dog. I told him I never had a big dog, to which he said he would teach me how to have a big dog.