Thursday, December 6, 2007

The Other Woman


Before I begin, please know I do not support cheating in relationships nor extramarital affairs. I even consider kissing cheating... but I was once the other woman...
I told myself that it wasn't that bad because I knew AJ first, actually he was my man just 16 months prior to him getting married. For me AJ was the big love of my life. We all have that one where everything is just right... my parents loved him, his parents loved me, my nephew called him uncle - it was a match in heaven yet in May 1998 we broke up. Our beautiful relationship was no longer working. By then he changed jobs, began working as an NYC Corrections Officer and the job was changing him. He was always smooth and sweet but after the academy and working on Riker's Island, my sweetie was showing signs of hardening and was slowly becoming desensitized. I wasn't the model girlfriend anymore either. I wanted to hang out with my girls more and more and even though everybody was pushing us to get married and I saw the glimmer in his eyes, I knew I was not ready and he would not be my husband.
But relationships rarely end so easily and we still hooked up for impromptu love sessions until I realized his lease on his apartment was up in November 1998 and he wasn't renewing it. He moved from his apartment and was living with someone else. That was when we really broke up and that was in December 1998.
When he came back in my life, just a month after getting married, it was supposed to be a one time thing. We still spoke on the phone. He would call me late or night or from work. I was always unaffected by him and his pressing to see me. But early one Sunday morning, he called and to make a long story not so long, he arrived at my house exactly 28 minutes after hanging up. What happened that day started a year long tryst.
We met at my house and sometimes he picked me up for a quickie in the car. We hooked up about twice a month, his wife usually wasn't home so if he left it didn't look like he was deserting her. I thought then that our rendezvous wasn't bad as far as affairs were concerned.
About 6 months into the affair, he called about 1 am to tell me that he was going to be a father. I was pissed and hurt. Women like to play games like men play but eventually our hearts do enter the picture and gradually heart break ensues. Everything I wanted with AJ was happening with another woman!!! As the months progressed I grew less and less emotionally attached to him and as much as I enjoyed the loving once, it wasn't that good anymore. Plus I was moving on to meeting someone else for myself. His wife eventually started picking up on his actions and ordered a copy of the phone bill. She saw my phone number and saw the times at night or early mornings that he called. Though I had the number due to caller ID, I never called him. Somehow she even got my job number.
One day he called me at my old job, they wouldn't forward him or give him my new number but they took his pager number and told me to page him. His wife had his pager that day and called the number she saw in the display. She already knew the number because she had been prank calling me once a week for about a month, yet I didn't know it was her. I was dealing with another knucklehead who wasn't ready to settle and I thought one of his dealings found my number and wanted to harass me.
When she returned the call, I had finally gotten through to him. He was on one line and now his wife was on the other. I hung up on her about 5 times and she kept calling me back. She wanted the truth out of me. She wanted to know why.
I told one friend about this affair and that was my limit. The one friend I told was DC, my ride or die. She doesn't judge me, she holds my hand, wipes my tears, she tells me she's proud of me, she tells me when I mess up but her friendship never changes. I digress...
I wouldn't tell his wife anything because then I would have to face my own actions. I started crying right there on the phone with her. She started crying too as I tried to hold the story in and be mean to her but slowly I spilled my guts. Before we hung up I wanted to clarify things on just one issue... I was not about to be the deranged and crazy ex-girlfriend who wouldn't let go. When I realized that he moved into her home in Queens, I was done with him. It was always him calling me and coming around me. I told her that I was sorry. I knew she was pregnant and this was just unnecessary stress that I brought on her.
I forgot he was on the phone and he stayed on hold for the entire 30 minutes plus that me and his wife spoke. When I got on the phone with him I was so drained that I just laid my head on my desk. It was the most unprofessional behavior I had displayed ever. He asked if I was fine and I told him I was but I was planning on the bottle of wine, which I would purchase at lunch and the after work session I would hold at some bar with DC. He apologized to me for everything that went down and I apologized to him. We both felt awful and we officially-officially ended things there.
Yet...
We kept in contact. We talked often but we didn't meet up for sex again. I loved AJ in a special way and even now he has a special place in my heart. I was big on this issue that I was not the one making moves on him but I was the one answering the phone at 1, 2, 3 AM. I was the one who let him in when he knocked on my door. I was the one who climbed into his Cougar and took off for parking lots and dark isolated areas. And even then, before he left his wife, I was the one still picking up my phone when he called to vent. Whatever I thought I wasn't doing by not having sex with him, it was still upsetting to their relationship and it took years for me to figure that out.

You would think I would have learned....

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

goodness, that could have been my story- give or take a few instances- we were seeing each other on and off b4 they got married (they were on/off too) and for first yr of their marriage- we hardly even spoke- but its been 6 yrs now and we are still in love- 3 kids later while i have none!! she's found out and confronted me and yet- it just makes us more careful... i can't help it- wish i could!!