I eventually heard form Theo again, after around six months. He came back home to pick up some things he hadn't had a chance to take before.
I never changed the lock, so he had the keys, but he was sensible enough not to come and go as he pleased. He asked me before stopping by.
When he arrived, he picked up the stuff quickly, he said he was fine. And went away. With the same blank, absent expression in his eyes.
I never saw him again.
...
But he was "fine".
He had said that himself, and he appeared to be in good health.... Alive, at least.
His family said he was fine. His colleagues said he was fine.
Fine.
I had to force myself to accept that he was "fine"- and if he wasn't, he clearly did not want my help with it. I couldn't do anything about it.
...
And I had cut my hair short: it was much easier, and I liked it.
Theo would have hated it, but Theo wasn't ever going to see it now... so, it didn't matter.
...
And I had also picked up another old hobby of mine: writing.
I could get up on a Sunday morning, and write all day, until midnight, then look out of the window, and ask myself, how has it gotten dark already?? I've just started.
I didn't realize time had passed.
I think I always had a case of maladaptive daydreaming- or intense daydreaming, anyway.
My imagination is a worrisome thing.
I can close my eyes, and be flying over a green Irish hill. I can be walking through the streets of ancient Rome, smelling sweet wine, and maritime pines around me.
And through writing, I find my way to go on.
...
But even after all those months, I hadn't stopped asking myself, why had it all happened.
Was it my fault?
Had I deserved it?
Could I have prevented it?
Some days, I felt like I did nothing so wrong.
Some other days, guilt was crushing me.
I had started giving Theo for granted; work, and responsibilities, and the routine of everyday life, had gotten the better of me.
And the bills to pe paid, and have you cleaned up your beard from the sink? and we've run out of milk, can you make a quick trip to the supermarket after work, thanks.
I thought, sometimes, that I had become the old, boring, workaholic wife.
And maybe this new woman he was seeing, was, you know. New.
Young, fresh, and exciting.
No strings attached.
No responsibilities.
Maybe after Covid, I thought, he had been finding himself in need of that.
But he had never told me! He kept on the plans for the wedding. He read me the vows. He was talking about our future kids, non-stop.
And why hadn't he told me, if something was wrong??
Was I so emotionally unavailable, that he never found a glimmer of possibility to sit down, and talk to me?
Apparently, he didn't.
Or was it really so sudden? Had he decided it all within a few hours, that very day?
And then, I wondered. Was it really something that runs in our families, instead?
Is there a component of mental illness, in this?
Maybe for both of us.
Or was it our past?
Were we both so emotionally scarred, and insecurely attached, that we were doomed for the very beginning?
Unable to ever built a healthy, long-lasting relationship?
Some friends, Jasmine included, got to the point of suggesting that Theo had been intentionally lying for months, if not years.
Maybe, especially to get my money.
Could it be? Well, everything could be.
Though I keep asking myself, was it worth it??
Now he can probably earn that little sum he'd got from me, in a few months.
And years before, he had spent some of his own money to renovate the house where I'm currently living. So, the profit was very, very slim.
Seriously, would you keep up an extremely articulate charade, every single day of your life, sleep with a woman you dislike, every single day of your life... for such an insignificant amount of money??
It didn't make sense to me.
Though that fact that close friends and family thought that, is pretty scary, anyway.
They also said that maybe, Theo had never been fully honest- he just told me what I wanted to hear. Manipulated me.
But why, I ask myself again. For that little sum of money that he, eventually, in the last 2 or 3 years, managed to get??
It sounds like quite a long and complicated plan, doesn't it?
Maybe it was not for the money, Jasmine said. Maybe it was just a personality disorder, like, narcissism.
It didn't sound like Theo, at first.
I read, though. I read a lot about it.
Some traits... well, maybe. Having an "inferiority complex", where you always think you are not "good enough", that you have to "prove yourself"; show "how successful you are".
Yeah, he had told me he felt like that. Multiple times.
I read that narcissistic personalities tend to manipulate others. They look amazing at first. They say all the right things. And Theo did- oh if he did.
But eventually, they are unable to form really meaningful relationships with others, and they show their true colours.
Well... maybe.
It might be... in some instances.
But Theo did a lot of things for me. Supported me. Spent countless sleepless nights, holding my head when I was vomiting, in severe abdominal pain.
He was a good person. I know he was.
And maybe reality is not just, one thing.
It's many things, all together:
It's simply getting tired of your old partner, and meeting someone new, as it happens so many times.
And going through a traumatic experience, as Covid was.
It's a psyche never fully well formed, from years of abuse, or genetics, or both.
It's me working too much, and not dedicating my partner the time he needed.
Or me wanting to believe in my fairy tale so much, that I had refused to see the warning signs, when it had eventually started to fall apart.
Once I asked Jasmine, if he wanted to manipulate someone, why me?? There were people who obviously had much more disposable money that I did, when he met me.
She said, but you were the desperate one.
And yeah, ouch.
Thanks, Jasmine.
She never beats around the bush- maybe it's one thing I like about her.
I think she is overly judgmental of Theo now, anyway. She wants to see him as a monster.
I understand: we tend to do that. He hurt someone she loved, so, he's a monster.
Sometimes, I'd like to hear Theo's side of the story as well.
He might say, he just wanted to breakup with his girlfriend, he wasn't "in love" anymore: people say that, all of the time.
And she had a complete breakdown, cried and begged, and started stalking him, and obsessing over him.
Because, as much as it pains me, I must remember myself, that it's in his own right to decide to breakup with me.
He cannot be put on trial for not wanting to be with me.
I just... I just needed to understand.
...
Sometimes, other people say that I should be angry with him.
I'm not angry, only sad. Full of regrets. And memories.
People say I'm crazy when I say that "I hope he's fine".
But I do: the idea of him suffering, or seeing his dreams shatter, or feeling sad, insecure and lonely, once again... it makes me cringe to my bones.
And then, I just psychoanalyze myself: maybe I just need to be like that.
I exist only in my caring for others. I have no identity of my own.
I exist in worrying for Theo's wellbeing. And my siblings, and my friends, and my patients.
Without that, what is left of me??
...
And in the end, I had many questions, and many sleepless nights. Tossing and turning in my bed.
Analysing the situation, over and over again. Of course, I never got any answer.
Theo's mind was a deep ocean, that I had barely been able to scratch the surface of; though I'd like to dive in it again.
Even if he was not prince charming, and I was not the perfect Disney princess.
He was my person, anyway.
....
And I try so hard, to take him out of my mind.
I try so hard not to always go back.
To have my closure.
But he always sneaks in.
When I'm half-awake, falling asleep.
When I dine alone, with some sushi take-away, on my sofa.
When I'm walking around my town, listening to some sad music.
Or watching as the rain falls, through my window.
He sneaks into my inner thoughts, where no one else has ever been, and why, Theo?
Why has this happened to us?
...
*You touched my heart, you touched my soul,
You changed my life and all my goals.
And love is blind, and that I knew when,
my heart was blinded by you.
I've kissed your lips, you held my head,
I've shared your dreams, and shared your bed.
I know you well, I know your smell.
I've been addicted to you...
I've seen you cry, I've seen you smile,
I've watched you sleeping, for a while.
I'd be the mother of your child,
I'd spend a lifetime with you.
I know your fears and you know mine,
We've had our doubts but now "we're fine",
And I love you, Theo, I swear that's true.
But I must live, without you.
Goodbye my lover, goodbye my friend...
You have been the one, you have been the one for me*