The Betrayal

"You just need to choose better next time", he says.

I can't tell if he's being resigned or callous. Either way it's obvious that his lack of empathy towards me is proof that he has officially checked-out of this relationship.

I'm sitting there --unable to stop the tears from flowing and my shoulders from trembling. All I want to do is stand and be strong; but I can't. My heart is breaking. Within 30 seconds the world I thought I was living in, was torn away from me. The truth was bearing it's ugly pussy head, and I didn't want to be anywhere near it.

He was the 'good one', or so I thought. It seems that my affection for him had somewhat blinded me to the awful reality that he was now so callously admitting to: his jerkdom. A selfish, convoluted, conniving swine.

I can't believe I've been duped again...

My mind does a double-back to all the events that morning. It's funny how hindsight really does offer clarity. It was so blaringly obvious that things were about to take a turn for the worse -- and, because I trusted him; I gave him the benefit of the doubt. His snapping at me just meant that he didn't get enough sleep last night. His averting my eyes must've meant he had a bad day at work. The ex-girlfriend calling incessantly that morning must just be a coincidence as he races out the door?

But it wasn't. None of it was. I had made excuses because my heart couldn't compute just how selfish he was capable of being. And I guess, I didn't want to admit to myself how little I actually meant to him.

But there we were; at a stand-off. Me, having no choice but to call him out. Him, having no choice but to be called out.

At first he tried to lie his way out of it. But the fact was, there was a complete inconsistency between his calm demeanor and the offense of his behaviour. His well-rehearsed charade was actually selling him out. I sat there more insulted than anything else. I was offended that he thought I was stupid enough to be wiled by a calm tone of voice and a smile.

It was in that moment that my heart broke the most. Not because I had caught him cheating on me -- or that I realized that I wasn't in the relationship I thought I had been in. It was his complete lack of respect for me once he was caught. He tried to be suave. He tried to pull the wool even further over my eyes. I suppose he would have continued playing us both, had I not had at least the self-respect to face him. It was his suaveness -- his lack of empathy towards me and my tears; that fueled me to have the courage to attack.

And as I confronted him, my heart was torn in two. Part of me wanted to protect and forgive the person who had obviously made a mistake. And part of me wanted to destroy him for having such little regard for my feelings.

It was a war within my mind. To forgive him meant that I wouldn't have to feel this pain. To destroy him meant I would carry regrets for hurting someone I cared for.

So I sat there -- too hurt to move at present; and feeling betrayed in the worst way imaginable. And as I wept, I only hoped for two things. The first being, that him and his Ex would forever enjoy a lifelong dance of unfulfilled encounters -- each too stupid and too afraid to ever be able to move past each other and give someone else (mostly themselves) a real chance at a healthy relationship. I hoped for neither to be able to tear themselves away -- a perpetual state of limbo. A convoluted hell to which they each deserved. A tryst for all the pain and suffering they caused others with their toxic and pathetic conspiracy.

And the second, the second wish was that I would be strong enough to walk away. That I wouldn't let the fallacy of good memories keep me from finding better. That I would be brave enough to eventually accept that it wasn't my inability to inspire him; but his lack of availability to engage. That I didn't do anything wrong; except, believe someone who was lying to me.

I also hoped that at some point, when I healed, that I would try again. More than anything I hoped that I would be able to reconcile in my heart that he never was, or never could be the type of partner that I had once thought him capable of. And with this knowledge, I hoped that the truth of the situation -- that he wasn't the one; would not be erased by all my hopes and dreams that were, and are, an unfortunate byproduct of being with him.