She never spoke to me.
Maybe that’s for the best. She deserves happiness.
Checking her social media usually showed up bare, and the only thing I could gather a couple of years ago, when I was stalking her on there, was that she was traveling. Probably restless from everything I put her through.
Honestly, I’ve tried to move on, and pining after her hurt way too much. Not like I had the time to.
Work swallowed all of my attention, and then whenever I did have some personal time to myself, Sarah made herself a part of it.
There was a time I didn’t want to talk to her, but we worked together, so that was impossible. She was very professional. She had apologized for playing a part in tearing apart my marriage, but I couldn’t let her walk away with that credit. It was all me. I allowed my boundaries to be blurred and broken and crossed a few myself.
So it is what it is. And the September following the last time I saw Gabrielle, days after, it was her birthday and I’d left her that voicemail wishing her so, Sarah came over to keep me company at my house.
Sarah had initiated, but despite my body wanting that closeness and that release… despite how sexual I started to feel when Sarah took off her shirt and her bra, I stopped it.
“Not here,” I had said.
For all the disrespect I’d shown my wife, even though she didn’t live in our marriage house anymore, I wasn’t going to fuck another woman in our home. At the time, it still felt likeourhome. At the time, I still had hope she would come back.
Not to give myself credit or anything, but I did hold out for quite a while.
It was May of the next year when I finally gave in and had sex with Sarah again, when I was sure there was no hope of Gabby coming back.
Plus, Sarah was pulling away from me personally, and something about her being distant and sadder made me want to make her happy.
We couldn’t both be sad. If I could make one person happy, I would.
So I fucked her that day.
And then again and again until the guilt was no longer there.
The divorce had gone through anyway in December of the year Gabrielle left. No sense in hanging on.
As I settle in for bed, I type back to Sarah:
Me: no I’m really tired. see u tomorrow
Sarah sends me a wink instantly. I smile and then change tabs on my phone to go to my ex-wife’s social page. I haven’t beenon here in a while. It’s been about five months, probably. She’s posted some new pictures of places she’s been. She rarely posts herself, and maybe it’s just for friends.
Obviously she blocked me on my previous account, the one I don’t really use that much except for family. So I made this new one just to follow her. It’s kind of fucked up, but I know my ex-wife. She probably got some of the unwanted attention from my popularity, and so she privated her account.
So I had to be creative with trying to follow her, and I put my profile picture as some random Black woman from a stock photo. Funny. Didn’t take her long to accept my follow request after that.
I liked a few of her pictures, places she had been. I wanted so badly to comment, and the only thing I did comment was on a photo where Gabrielle had revisited Timbuk Canyon.
Leaving a comment alongside the face of the Black woman I’m using as an imposter, I wrote:
“beautiful place. i had gone there with my spouse. live your best life”
The fact that Gabby hearted my comment told me she had no idea whatsoever that this was me using this account.
At the time, I even thought about concocting a friendship with her as this woman, but where the hell would that go? Maybe it would be for my own personal satisfaction, to get information out of her. But Gabby is also very private and wary of strangers.
She’s nice to everyone, especially if they’re respectful. But I wasn’t going to pry, because something tells me I didn’t want to know.
It’s not healthy anyway. It’s not like we’re ever going to get back together, so after I left that comment, I hadn’t gone on the social media platform for a while… until now.
Looking through her latest photos, there’s one of her.
