Page 26 of Stay Away from Him

“Fine,” Melissa said.

“Was that all…okay?”

She softened at his sudden timidity, his vulnerability. “Yes. It was good.”

“But?”

Melissa wasn’t sure what to say. Not sure how to name the disquiet that had come over her, the sudden animal anxiety thrumming in her veins, the feeling of having stepped recklessly into a place where unseen dangers lurked.

But she had to say something. So she opened her mouth.

And started talking about her ex-husband.

***

Melissa met Carter when both of them were in their midtwenties. Trained in accounting, Melissa was the bookkeeper at a small software company where Carter worked as a quiet coder. Melissa still didn’t know what it was about his shy, soft-spoken nature that attracted her to him. But something about him gave the impression that he had a secret, a great one that he’d only tell if you really earned it. And she wanted to earn it.

Melissa did know that she thought Carter was beautiful. His gentle doe eyes, his soft brown beard, and his hands—God, his hands. Even now, knowing everything she knew of the shit show that their marriage became, she loved to think of his hands, both strong and delicate at once.

She was the pursuer at first, flirting with Carter at a couple work happy hours. He mostly just smiled and received her attentions quietly. Later, Melissa asked him out, and he said yes.

It wasn’t exactly a legendary romance. Carter was awkward on dates, fumbling in the bedroom, not knowing what he was doing. But there was a sweetness to him, even a sadness, that kept her close. Melissa realized now, in hindsight, that she may have pitied him a little bit, saw him as fragile and breakable, like a baby bird she’d picked up off the ground after it fell out of its nest. Something for her to keep and nurse to health.

His secret, meanwhile—the thing that lay behind his quiet eyes and initially drew Melissa to him—Carter revealed slowly, fully divulging only once they were married: a deep-seated insecurity and even self-hatred that she foolishly spent years trying to fix.

An emotionally weak man, she’d come to believe, was amongthe world’s greatest threats to a woman’s well-being. An unhappy woman would usually turn her problems inward and hurtherself, emotionally or even physically. But an unhappy man tended to make his unhappiness everyone else’s problem, tormented and devoured and sapped the life force of those around him—especially the women in his life.

Melissa was that woman, for Carter. The cause, he seemed to believe, of all his problems—and he had a lot of them. He was awkward, socially isolated; he didn’t have many friends; he struggled to make small talk; his coworkers didn’t respect him; his boss didn’t like him; he couldn’t keep a job for more than a few months at a time. Other people, but especially men, made him feel small, weak, less than. His life was a constant barrage of imagined slights, perceived humiliations, overblown affronts to his pride and self-respect. And he took each of those injuries home to Melissa, where he’d make himself feel better by making her—the one person in the world he thought he was better than, the one person he could safely push around—feel worse.

Carter never hit Melissa. Maybe it would have come to that eventually. The hits in their household were emotional, verbal. He’d insult her, subtly: critique her clothes, her hair, her makeup. He’d imply that he’d be happier if he wasn’t married, wasn’t stuck with Melissa. He’d cry and whine about the terrible circumstances of his life, hold pity parties and demand that Melissa attend, demand that she comfort him—then berate her for doing it wrong.

There were good moments too. Moments when he was, briefly, happy—and when, as a result, Melissa was happy too. But those moments were short-lived. Something would always happen. A thoughtless comment from a coworker. A restaurant server ignoring their table for too long. A man in a truck cutting them off in traffic. Whatever it was, Carter would get quiet, a sour look coming to his face. That look was all Melissa needed to see to know that afight was brewing. And it was no use avoiding him, letting things blow over. Nothing ever blew over with Carter. Not until he’d spewed whatever venom had collected in his brain onto Melissa. Poisoning her with it.

Melissa sometimes thought she should have left earlier. Ultimately, it was when she had Bradley that she knew she had to get out of the marriage. For a second during the pregnancy she thought, foolishly, that Carter would be different with a child. That becoming a father would change him. But it didn’t. She shuddered, still, at the memory of a grown man angry that the baby in his arms was crying, or calling a three-year-old “stupid” for not being able to tie his shoes. She couldn’t think about it for long—it was too painful to remember.

Eventually, she left. Divorced the bastard and got custody of Bradley, even though Carter made a play to keep things fifty-fifty. Melissa’s divorce lawyer hired a child psychologist to interview Bradley, who then told the truth as only a child can tell it. He was afraid of his dad. His dad thought he was worthless. His dad hated him.

Melissa would be paying the legal debt for years. But she still regarded the money she spent getting away from Carter—and bringing Bradley with her—as the best money she ever spent.

***

Melissa told Thomas all this, and he listened, his head turned sideways on the pillow. At the end, he waited a few seconds. Then he said, softly, “I’m sorry that happened to you.”

“Me too,” Melissa said. “It hurt me, Thomas, in ways I don’t even fully understand. You told me you were broken—well, I’m broken too. And I’m scared, okay?”

“Scared?” Thomas said, his head lifting off the pillow. “Scared of what?”

“I just need to know…” Melissa said, a hitch in her voice. “I need to know if this is real.”

Thomas pushed himself up further, propping himself on an elbow. “Real? What part of it?”

“All of it. This thing between us. Andyou.”

“What about me?” Thomas asked, his tone grown sharper.

“Are you for real?” Melissa asked. “This whole dreamy doctor, great dad, nice guy thing. Are you…are you actuallygood? Or is it all an act? I need to know, Thomas. I need to know if it’s real, or if you’re just like the rest of them.”

Her uncertainty just then stood in stark contrast to what she had said earlier, in the wine bar—You’re a good man. But in that moment, she needed assurance. Because she’d made a bad decision when she fell for Carter. Marrying him was a mistake that had cost her years of her life. She couldn’t do something like that again.

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