The hot August night was silent as I waited patiently with deep trepidation.
Where was he? It was early morning and I was alone, save for the dogs. I was filled with worry because I had no idea where he was. Was he on the side of the road somewhere? Maybe he was just really busy?
I watched the news, trying to keep my mind off things. On the television there was breaking news from Colorado. Apparently there was a mass shooting in a theater. I wondered is he was okay.
Granted, we were staying at a lakefront cottage in Monticello Indiana, but when you are consumed with worry, you wonder about silly things. Impossible things. My dogs were upon the bed with me. One was snoring contently while the other was awake, mirroring my worry. I smiled at the nervous dog and pet him. The dog graciously accepted my affections and for a brief moment both of us had been relieved We at least had each other. The sleeping dog awoke with envy. Perhaps she wasn't really asleep? She cuddled against my free hand The canine need for affection soothed my dread.
I continued to watch the news unfold. A man, obviously mentally unstable, had entered a theater and opened fire upon the patrons. I was sad that this was news rather than some early morning crime drama.
I got up from the bed and looked out the window. Having been on the road myself, I knew sometimes work could keep people late. This was the nature of the truck driving industry. Outside, the parking lot was dotted with a few cars of other holiday revelers, currently sleeping, I imagined.
But we weren't here for a vacation. He had decided that he had had his fill of Ohio and wanted to be close to his family.. Who was I to deny him of this? Our home was packed inside a U-Haul just outside the cottage. We had left many things behind because the truck was smaller than we had expected. But there had been plenty of room for us and the two dogs. When we arrived in Monticello, it was in the midst of a severe drought. The land was baked brown and heat shimmered off nearly every surface. This heat did little to discourage park attendance at Indiana Beach, an amusement park that had been around in the 1920s and 30s.
I returned to the cold glow of the television and found myself nodding off in the blue light. I awoke frequently with guilt. It had been our custom to be awake when the other came home. I wanted to call to see if he was okay, but the cottage didn't have a phone and the one cell phone we had between us was in his possession. I couldn't even call if I had an emergency. What if there was a fire? What if I had a stroke? I wondered and thought that in such a case, I would die alone. But then I pondered about my reasons for that worry. I was healthy and there was no obvious reason that I should just keel over. I went to the window again. Dawn was breaking. I settled back on the bed and drifted off a few more times.
Suddenly, the dogs had burst into a frenzy of barking and were bounding about the cottage. This could mean only one thing. And my hope was confirmed when he opened the door. he had returned, and his little blue Hyundai was in the parking lot, glistening in the early morning light.. I greeted him with great joy, but my welcome was countered with a response more frigid than a February Chinook. rebuffed by his attitude, I went back to y bed. I should have been relieved at his homecoming, but instead, the chilly response only increased my trepidation. Assumptions formed from this dark matter. I closed my eyes and wished against those thoughts. He told me that he would feel better after he slept. And so we went to sleep as the light sneaked into the cottage.
Later, breakfast as a simple affair on the deck outside of the cottage. It overlooked the lake and a staircase lead down to the shore of the lake, The wood of the deck was weathered and aged, sheltered by rich emerald foliage of trees that whispered in the hot summer wind. With spray from the lakeshore, the wind also carried upon it the smell of sausages, cooking on the kettle grill. A bowl of macaroni and cheese graced the picnic table we set to eat at. The lake water was dark, cool, and inviting as it glistened in the noonday sun. The wind whipped the surface of the water into waves that gently crashed upon the dock while the two dogs sniffed about, driven by the smell of cooking sausages.
He was at the grill attending the sausages. A few were to be for us, and a small portion for the dogs. We ate the sausages and pasta in relative silence. After that, he took his cell phone out and busily tapped at it. I thought little of his task and wandered down the stairs to the dock to take in the cooler air. The dogs were above me and whimpered for attention. As the stairwell was too steep for them to navigate they could not join me and I wondered briefly why they weren't pestering him for attention. I ascended the steps to see what was going on. When I was back on the deck, he handed me his phone and told me that there was something on it I needed to read. I thought little of this, as I would use the phone to check Facebook and check email. Instead there was a note and I read it in silence.
I kept my composure as I read the text. It was a letter of dismissal; a termination notice. And it was addressed to me. He had been unable to speak the words to me, and believed that it would be better if he had typed them out. Summarized, it said that he no longer loved me and he wanted me to leave.
I looked up form the phone and calmly asked if he was having hormonal issues. After all a few months ago he told me that he was transgendered and started to take estrogen supplements. He responded in the negative. That hot summer air turned icy against my bare skin. After 11 year of unconditional love, I was really being turned out. I had feared that it would have happened, but after we had celebrated out 10th anniversary, I thought that the possibility of such a thing happening was very small. With the phone still in my hand, I walked back down to the dock and started to dial up family. I didn't have time to weep. The need for survival was more important that crying, and when did crying ever fix anything anyway?In two days, I took what meager possessions were not packed away and the dogs and left. I was full of fear, and that fear prevented me from crying. But when I finally returned to Muncie, my ancestral home which I loathed so much, when I was out of sight and earshot of family, I mourned with every fiber of my being. I had no idea that our love, which was supposed to last "forever" really only meant 11 years.
