I’m a grown-ass woman, and Blake, fiancé or not, can’t treat me like that.
“What the hell has gotten into you, Bristol? You embarrassed me tonight in front of our closest friends!” I expected it, I guess I should be thankful he waited until we were at home rather than in the car, where the Uber driver could listen in on it. His words grate on me, and while I would normally slink away and avoid this conversation, I’ve had enough.
“Closest friends?Are you serious, Blake? In case it wasn’t obvious, I can’t stand Joffrey and Lexi! Have you even been paying attention? You really think they’reourclosest friends?” I snap as the tears break through and cascade down my face. Crying has always been a traitorous affliction when emotions are too strong, and the goddamn wine isn’t helping keep it at bay now.
“What are you talking about, Bristol? You like them!” Blake’s voice rises, and my stomach swoops. “You and Lexi get along just fine. They may be above the level of people you like to spend your time with, but I work with them, and this is part of the gig. I don’t know what happened tonight, but you need to text Lexi tomorrow and apologize for any awkwardness. The last thing I need is for there to be tension between you and them. I’m not going to tolerate it. Not from anyone, but especially not my soon-to-be wife.” The last phrase is said with so much venom that it almost feels like a threat.
I stare back at the man I’ve been with for the past few years of my life and can’t believe he doesn’t understand. He stands there in his pristine suit, his perfectly coiffed hair without a single strand out of place, and I wonder who the hell he is, because I don’t know anymore. Maybe I never did.
I’m a smart woman, but I’m struggling to catch up with the reality of what’s happening right now. Does he truly think he can control me this way? Has my compliance led him to believe that he has the right to dictate any part of my life?
“Blake,” I say calmly, wiping away my tears as they quickly cascade down my face, internally cursing my body for making me appear weak.
“I’m not texting either of them. I have nothing to apologize for. If you hadn’t tried to dictate how much I was drinking, which by the way, was two measly glasses of wine, it wouldn’t have made things awkward.” I take a steadying breath before continuing, wringing my fingers together in my opposite palm. “You don’t get to tell me what I can and can’t do. You’ve been snappy, rude, and hurtful lately. I’ve made nothing but excuses in my head for the way you’ve been treating me, and I’m not going to do it anymore. We have to make some changes. I’mnot happy with the way things have been going.” I release the words through my tears. It was the truth I had been masking, and now it was out there, floating in the universe and unable to retract.
His face remains stoic, unmoving, and not at all like a man who had just been told the woman he was marrying was unhappy, the woman he supposedly loves. As if I needed any more proof of the state of our relationship, this was it. Blake looks at me like I’ve inconvenienced him rather than ripped his heart out, forcing mine to plummet to the bottom of my stomach.
“What do you even want me to say to that, Bristol? I have busted my ass to start this life for us. Everything I’ve done has been for us. If you only fucking knew! You have no idea the lengths I’ve gone to provide this life for us!” he yells, turning and pacing the length of the living room. His voice echoes off the walls, angry and scaring the shit out of me. I back up until my knees hit the edge of the couch. “You’re so fucking ungrateful. I hardly ask anything of you, and you can’t even play nice with our friends at dinner because I interrupted your plans to what? Sit on your ass and watch reality television? Good use of time, Bristol!”
I stumble on my feet as he throws the words in my direction, falling down onto the couch, shocked. Blake has said his fair share of backhanded comments, but nothing ever this straightforward. Never while yelling. My hands shake as the tears flow steadily over my cheeks, blurring my vision as I process his words.
Should I have been more understanding? Should I have done more? Possibly, but Blake could make me feel like a priority, like my needs and wants matter just as much as his do. And he shouldn’t be fucking yelling at me. None of this is okay.
Blake rubs his hand along his clean-shaven jaw and lets out an irritated huff, his shoulders dropping like the weight of his anger is dissipating before my eyes. He walks over to me, standing tall above me. I can’t bear to look at him as I bat the stupid tears from my eyes with my trembling fingers. How can he treat me like this?
“Look, it’ll be fine in the morning. We’ll figure it out,” he says with a gentler tone. His fingers run through my hair. The flinch is automatic this time. I jerk away from him, looking up to meet his eyes.
“No.”
He jerks back as if I smacked him, true shock written all over his face, but then it morphs into something I can’t quite decipher. Something more sinister that makes my skin crawl. His eyes seem to darken right in front of me, his voice dropping to a deeper baritone that I’ve never heard from him before.
“I’m sorry, what do you mean,no, Bristol?”
I brace myself, my nails digging into the arms of the chair as I pull my shoulders back. “Exactly what it means, Blake. We will not be fine in the morning without talking all of this through. You can’t treat me like I’m disposable, like I’m your property, and just expect it to wash away while we sleep. We have bigger problems than just dinner out with your friends. You really don’t see it?”
“What are you saying, then, Bristol? And be explicitly clear.”
“I just can’t continue on the way we have been. I can’t be herealone. I’m alone, Blake! We don’t have sex, we don’t spend time together. Do you hear the way you just spoke to me? The way you spoke tome before dinner? I have been making excuse after excuse for why we aren’t in sync, for why we don’t spend any time together. For what you snap at me and dictate things. You prioritize work, and I love that for you, I really do. But I need more than that.”
He stares at me for a long moment, the silence deafening. My heart does a funny thing in my chest, not breaking like I would expect it to, more like frozen in shock. We’ve never fought before, not really. But I stand by everything I said. I had to communicate how I’ve been feeling. If this relationship, this eventual marriage, is going to work and last, we have to talk through it all; we both have to work to make sure the other person’s needs are being met and considered.
Blake nods slowly, his lips pursed as if my emotional and desperate meltdown is a frustrating inconvenience. “Okay, Bristol. I hear you. I promise everything will be okay. You know I love you. No one will ever love you like I do. Everything will get better, okay?”
I want to believe him, goddamn, I really do. Exhaustion weighs on me like a thick blanket, a mix of my emotional purge and the wine not doing my body any favors tonight. I nod in agreement. Holding out my hand to pull him in next to me on the couch. Wanting to be comforted, wanting to be held and reminded why we’re together in the first place.
Instead, he clasps my hand in his, his skin cool to the touch, and gives it a firm squeeze.
“I’m going to get some work done. I’ll be in my office.” He drops my hand without any further action, his footsteps retreating until I hear the click of his office door being shutbehind him.
My eyes stay glued on the empty space that separates us, the distance both literal and metaphorical. I’ve felt the distance growing each day, a fissure expanding until we both stand on opposite sides of a cavern.
I don’t know what I expected of him, but it wasn’t this. Not after deciding to spend the rest of our lives together. I sure as hell expected more of a conversation.
He didn’t look me in the eye.
He didn’t reach for me the moment I started crying.
He didn’t want to comfort me or make me feel better.
