I was never left alone for too long, which was fine by me because I did have my crazy moments where I was ready to burn everything down to the ground. My ego and pride were so wounded that there were times I almost said screw the long game; I want blood now.
Thankfully, my messy family’s interference gave me the space I needed to think rationally throughout the day so that at night when I went to bed, I was calm enough to scheme in a more civilized way. See, this is why you should never do anything in haste, especially when anger is involved. By taking my time, I have found innumerable ways to add to the long list of vengeful things I plan to do to my ex.
This is just one of the many things Gramps and the uncles have taught me over the years. I’m not sure why a five-year-old needed to know these things, but hey, they came in handyon the playground even back then. My sister sucked up all their teachings, and that is why I lived with two mothers my whole life. They drilled that sibling responsibility into her as the oldest to the point she thought, and still does think, that she’s in charge.
You’d think that with two babies and a crazy husband, she’d have her hands full, but no, her bright idea was to involve her husband, who, well, let’s just say Elliot Stanton Payne fits right in with the rest of the degenerates around here.
I’m almost certain that when the phone calls started coming from all over the place with the many reasons why my parents shouldn’t allow their daughter to marry him, they did more harm than good. Those poor souls could not have known that the more outlandish the story of Elliot’s escapades on the dark side, the more endearing he became to my father, at least.
I’m honestly glad they didn’t listen to the naysayers, not that my sister was going to listen anyway. She doesn’t care that her husband is almost thirteen years older than she is or that he’s a tattooed ruffian who talks more with his fists than his chompers; she sees what no one else seems to, I guess.
The truth is, at first, I thought she had some variation of Stockholm syndrome; you see, Elliot had been hired by my family to get Annabelle out of a sticky situation a few years back. She and her sorority had gone off to some hellscape disguised as an off-the-beaten-path type deal and got their asses snatched by some locals who were feeling froggy.
I’m not sure what the other parents were doing, but as soon as Dad heard wait for the authorities, he sprang into action. One of his doctor friends recommended his cousins, of whom Elliot was one. Whatever happened, the girls were home within twenty-four hours, and the authorities were still working out their negotiations.
Between getting her ass kidnapped and getting rescued, she met and fell in love with the most unexpected person in the universe. You see, up until that point, my sister was the preppy, bossy type. Her style ran to the spit-polish type with not a hair out of place and the latest casual wear fresh off the catwalk.
Elliot wears jeans and short-sleeved tees that show off his tats in the summer and long-sleeved Henleys any time after fall. His hair is an afterthought, meaning it’s sometimes down to his shoulders, but either way, there is no mistaking how hot he is. No wonder my sister fell head over ass in love at first sight.
As far as I can remember, there was only one conversation between her and the elders about her choice, but seeing the mutinous look on her face before she headed into the room with them, I knew the outcome before they did. That’s what you get for raising your kids to believe in themselves and go after what they want.
I don’t know if anyone warned poor Elliot because, by this point, it was obvious that he was running scared. He’d even tried to get Dad and the elders to talk some sense into my sister because, apparently, he was afraid of her. The first time I saw the two of them together, I understood why.
She’d just dragged the poor man into the house as I was coming down the landing. I watched as she slapped his arm and told him to look alive; she didn’t want her family to think she was marrying a corpse. She said some other stuff that I didn’t hear, but I was more focused on the way he was looking at her.
That’s what got me on his side more than anything else. He watches her like she’s a powder keg about to go off one minute, and the next, there’s a warmth in his eyes that makes you long for the same. And then he reached out and touched her hair, and she just settled right down. When she put her head on his chest and he rocked her, I knew he was cooked. I think that might bethe night he was informed that he was getting married; I’m not sure.
Anyway, this brother-in-law of mine just sat and listened as his wife, my sister, filled him in on my situation and why she was going to have to come to Mom and Dad’s every day until I was straight. When she was through ranting on my behalf, Elliot just simply asked if I wanted him to take Dale out with a straight face.
I smiled and assured him that I had it covered. Like understands like; he knew exactly what I meant. Funnily enough, he’s the only one who doesn’t seem to think I need babysitting. He has more faith in my abilities, it seems, while the rest of them are acting as if I’m about to break.
So, as you can see, the last few days have been taken up with dealing with my family all day until I drop into bed at the end of the night, exhausted and overfull because Mom’s love language is stuffing her kids like stoats.
I hadn’t responded to Dale as yet, but his calls and texts were getting crazier by the day. The last one was a doozy. Apparently, his Mom had gotten around to telling him about her run-in with Julius, and he was on a tear, wanting to know who was the man who had accosted his mother in my driveway.
Each time I left him on read, his crazy went up a notch, which was right where I wanted him to be. I find it ironic that now that I had left to give him space to pursue his lady love, he was too busy harassing me to pay her any attention.
It was fun reading the messages between them that they didn’t know I was privy to. I guess he either doesn’t have much respect for my genius when it comes to technology, or he gives me too much credit for playing fair. I used to be an ethically incorruptible sort when I was with him, so that’s the side of me he knows.
He would never expect someone of such high moral aptitude to hack into his shit and leave him wide open for my future perusal until such time as I have had my fill of destroying him and the woman he cheated on me with. Had he had a modicum of common sense, he would’ve realized by now that, since I found his burner phone, knowing what I do about technology, there is a chance that I had messed with it.
But no, he’s so sure of himself that it hasn’t even entered his mind that I would turn on him in ways he can’t even imagine. My silence thus far has been doing a bang-up job, so much so that he’s now complaining to his mistress about my coldness. His meltdowns have been giving me life.
The first correspondence between the two of them after I left still made me mad, but it didn’t take long for the tune to change. At first, there was excitement on her end; of course, that’s because he lied his ass off and made it seem as if he had come clean and told me about his undying love for the tart.
His sob story of how he just couldn’t take it a moment longer and just had to be with her almost made me show my hand too soon. I almost felt sorry for this poor girl who was being lied to by this scum, but my empathy didn’t last long once I remembered that she knowingly went after someone who was already in a committed relationship. No matter how much of a dick Dale is, she had options.
As I said, that first day and most of the next, their messages were flowery and sweet, with lots of plans on what their new reality was going to look like with me gone. She was so wrapped up in her new fairy tale that she didn’t realize his heart wasn’t in it.
His answers to her ramblings were short and almost cold, and by the time I’d left him on read for the fifth or sixth time, he was well on his way to becoming unhinged. Now he’s foaming atthe mouth at the thought that I had met someone else and was even accusing me of cheating on him; oh, the irony.
If I didn’t find Julius Blair to be such a despicable specimen, I would give some thought to using him to make Dale lose his shit even more, but to do that, I would have to get close to that menace, and that I am not willing to do. He’s already taken over most of my mind to the point that I have to force thoughts of him from my head at least twice every ten minutes.
All those years I’ve wasted training myself not to think about Julius, not to even let my mind recall that he existed, just for one unplanned run-in to unravel all my hard work. It hadn’t been easy erasing thoughts and memories of him; in fact, it had taken the better part of two years.
Once I realized that the only way to save myself was by cutting all contact with Julius, I had gone to great lengths to avoid him at all costs. I’m not sure if the family had ever noticed, but I had never been in the same room as him since the night of my twenty-first.
Oh, there were a few close calls in the beginning, but I became an expert at avoiding him, and I did it in such a way that no one noticed, or so I had always thought. But lately, I’ve been questioning that. For some reason, I’ve been feeling very exposed lately, at least whenever he enters my mind, which seems to be happening way more often than at any other time.
