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Realizing that was a shock to my system. I stood there with my mouth gaping wide.
He apparently took that as some kind of sign that I had come around to his way of thinking, and it made him much more pleasant. “You’re young – but you’ll get married one day, and you’ll see that there are things that happen in a marriage that don’t make sense to someone who hasn’t experienced a long-term relationship yet.”
That condescending tone was like fingernails on a chalkboard.
Fingernails on a chalkboard make me want to scream.
“I think I heard somewhere that in long-term relationships, you need to forgive people,” I shot back. “Or at least not lie and say you will, and then punish them for the next twelve years.”
BAM. That had the desired effect: his face suddenly became a mask of rage. “I cannot
believe
we are fighting about this again, when you clearly don’t know what you’re talking about!”
Underneath my anger, I got an eerie little chill. Like I had heard something very much like that before.
But not from Kevin.
“You can say I don’t know what I’m talking about all day long, but I’m not the one who lied and said I forgave somebody when I clearly didn’t,” I spat.
“That’s between me and your mother! Why are you even angry about that?”
“I’m not!”
“Oh,” he sneered, “what exactly are you angry about
this
time, then?”
Again, déjà vu.
“I’m angry that you can’t even talk about it like an adult without you losing your temper and treating me like I’m five years old!”
Suddenly he switched gears. His face relaxed, and he reached out and put his hands on my arms.
“Kaitlyn,” he said, his voice soothing. “I’m just not very good at conflict. Your mother and I don’t fight because of that.”
And look where that’s gotten you,
I wanted to say, but he seemed to be trying to apologize – or something – so I let him continue.
“You and I just haven’t been around each other much lately, so this is normal. We’re rubbing up against each other’s edges, raising each other’s hackles. No wonder things got heated. It’s nobody’s fault.”
Again, that eerie sense of having heard all this before –
And suddenly it clicked.
Derek.
He sounded like Derek.
The whole
What are you angry about THIS time?
crack was like when Derek had yelled at me when I called him out about ogling other women.
Now my father was using the same fake niceness – the same
It’s not your fault OR my fault, we just need space, no wonder we’re fighting
tactic
–
that Derek had used in Vegas, right before he went out and cheated on me.
The floor felt like it was dropping out from under me.
First my dad had channeled Kevin’s condescension and passive-aggressive bullshit. Then he’d swung over to Derek’s
What’s wrong with you?
blaming and fake-ass apologies. Not to mention he’d displayed the thing both my exes shared in common: a temper they couldn’t control.
But my father had come first. He had been in my life long before I had met either Kevin
or
Derek.
I’m no psychology PhD, but it was pretty fucking clear in that moment that the shit I had learned to put up with from men had its roots in my relationship with the first man in my life.
We hear stuff like that all the time, but it’s an intellectual belief, not a gut-level
knowing.
The first time you’re presented with those facts in an obvious, inescapable way, let me tell you – it’s a mindfuck.
I stepped back from him, shocked and horrified – and suddenly realizing that I wasn’t going to win this battle. I wasn’t even sure I could fight it right now.
“I have to go,” I said, zipping up my suitcase.
“Kaitlyn,” he snapped, reverting back to the temper.
“We have to get back to Athens,” I said numbly as I dragged my suitcase along behind me, out my bedroom door and down the hall.
“Kaitlyn! Don’t you walk out on me! DON’T YOU
DARE
WALK OUT ON ME!” he yelled.
I remembered someone else screaming at me in the rain in much the same tone of voice.
You walked out on ME, Kaitlyn! YOU WALKED OUT ON ME!
I walked out on my father, and this time I didn’t feel one tiny bit bad.
