#NerdsUnite: Confessions of an Unwed Bride (My World Comes Crashing Down)

<editorsnote> Nerds, meet by buddy Julie! She's my roomie, we met on Craiglist, and she is 1,000 flavors of everything awesome sauce. The reason why she had a room in her apartment however is a mighty long story. See, Julie was dating a duderino for 8 years. Yep, they were engaged to be wed and all that snazzy jazzy stuff. Now the engagement is off and Julie is attempting to heal from her loss; these series of posts are her best attempt. HIT IT JULIE! </editorsnote>

#TalkNerdyToMeLover's Julie Wilson

Read my reservations about writing out this story and here's Part I of our ending.

The Days Leading Up To Halloween

We were fighting, fighting, fighting. Things were weird. His heart was conflicted and he didn't know how to tell me the truth; that he had feelings for someone else, his coworker.  

Unlike years past, he didn't even try to come up with a costume theme for the two of us so we could dress up together. We'd had some epic costumes in the past; Dr. Evil & Frau and Link & Zelda are my favorites. He picked out his own and started getting it ready. I felt abandoned. At the last minute I picked up a cat costume, just to have something. I had never done the whole sexy fill in the blank thing but I just didn't really care at this point.

Halloween 2010

On Halloween or the day before he asked if we could have a party. I was totally down. We put the word out and got some stuff for the party. I knew a lot of his coworkers from previous parties, so I had a lot of people to talk to. The first sign of weirdness that night came when it was time to take a shot. We ran out of shot glasses and he just drank right out of the handle of Captain. I remember looking up at him as he did. He drank a lot in that moment. I think this was the start of him drinking excessive amounts to kill the pain. He didn't like what he was doing or who he had become, but it wasn't enough to make him actually stop what he was doing.

Some long time friends came up from San Diego for the party. I gave them the last of the Save The Dates I would give out that night.

It was during this party that I realized how much of a problem this girl was. She had no idea who my ex was dressed up as (Hunter S. Thompson, how the fuck do you not know that? Later I would be super annoyed by this. You're going to fuck up what we have for some bitch that doesn't know who Hunter S. Thompson is? Seriously?!). I listened to the way he responded to her, the way he talked to her. There was this level of comfort there that stopped me in my tracks. I also got to watch them flirt at other points throughout the night. Right in front of my fucking face. Even when all of this shit is literally in front of you, it's hard to actually put 2 + 2 = 4 together when 4 equals "life as you know it is over".

Midway through the night, I was sitting at my kitchen table. She was standing in front of my kitchen sink. I looked at her. she looked at me. I cocked my head a bit to the right. Just kinda checking her out. Her eyes widened and she might as well have admitted it all right there with that. I often look like a bitch without trying, seriously, it's gotten me in trouble so much in my life. I look super serious and pissed off if I am not smiling. So I can only imagine what she saw, hahaha. It was me saying, "Yeah, I know." without speaking a word.

At last year's West Hollywood Carnival, they were going to attempt to break the record for the amount of people doing the Time Warp. I needed to be a part of this. I got a couple girls to leave the party with me and head back out. When we got back around midnight, everyone had left my house, which struck me as weird. But I thought, "Wow, I had a full Halloween celebration and I can go to bed at a reasonable time for work tomorrow. Score!" Nope, shit was about to get real.

November 1, 2010

Some people wandered back over to our house looking for some friends. It was at this point that my ex said, "I'll be right back". I figured he was going to help those people.

A half hour passes. I text him and he doesn't answer. I call him and he doesn't answer. He NEVER doesn't answer me. I start freaking because he's drunk and there are a lot of people outside walking the streets of West Hollywood. I go downstairs and walk out to Santa Monica Boulevard just hoping to see him or something. No sign. I went back to the apartment and continued freaking. I stood in my kitchen looking out the window and finally heard his voice down the street. I ran downstairs. "What the fuck were you doing that you couldn't even let me know you were okay?" I screamed. We went upstairs. "who the fuck were you talking to that was more important than letting me know that you okay?!!". I was sober so I had the upper hand here. I slapped him and then hit his wrist, knocking his iPhone out of his hand. I picked it up, hit phone and saw that She Devil was the last person and that they were on the phone for a half hour. He came up with some lame story that he was trying to figure out where everyone was hanging out at post party. I told him that it doesn't take a half hour to figure that out. I really can't even remember what happened next. Probably a lot of screaming. He slept on the couch that night as I lay in our bed crying. And waiting. Waiting for him to fall asleep.

I knew he was wasted so I wouldn't have to wait very long. I crept out to the living room and snagged his phone and brought it back to the bedroom. Even after all of that fighting, he had texted her, "The shit hit the fan." I read through their texts and it really sank in what was happening here. I might have fallen asleep or I have no idea what I did but I know at around 3am I went into the living room and woke him up to talk about everything. He was defensive and tried to turn it around on me. "Am I really the right guy for you? Do you even like me?" I can't recall the first part of that conversation. I remember picking up his phone and complaining about the texts and then I accidentally called her, thankfully she didn't answer. I do remember the moment I saw a piece of the person that loved me though. I uncovered him when I started to talk about the future we were supossed to share. When I talked about our children. His eyes grew wide when I said their names. It's so weird to look back on this now. At the time, those children were going to exist. Now they won't. They're almost like ghosts to me. Like in Back To The Future when the people slowly start to fade out of the photographs. My son was blonde and chubby like his dad was when he was a kid. We'd dress him in Marvel shirts. We would teach him about Spiderman. I would wake up to find my husband and son watching Saturday morning cartoons. We'd make breakfast together.

I don't remember falling asleep and I don't know how I got through work on November 1, 2010. But I do remember him picking me up from work that day. He looked so sorry, so sad for everything. He asked me if he should quit his job. I wish I had said yes. But I was always a super practical person. Never the person that did crazy things. The current me, a very different person from who I was a year ago, would have said "YES, QUIT!" and would have worried about everything else later. But the old, practical me didn't know how we would pay our bills. Plus, I don't think I thought thought that us ending was an actual possibility, even after everything I had experienced the night before. We were getting married. We would work through this. I didn't think that there was any other outcome that was possible.

#nerdsunite

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