I sat there, staring at him in shock. I knew he drank—there had been beer cans here and there around the house—but I had no idea it had been that bad.
“I was sick. Then one day, I got pulled over and was arrested for a DWI. I should’ve been put in jail immediately, but if you remember, my mom worked in an attorney’s office back then. He worked his magic and got me released and my charges dropped on a technicality. A month later, I hit a car and the couple inside was seriously injured. Another DWI, another arrest, more charges. That time they stuck.”
I was fully engrossed in what he was telling me. I’d had no idea about his arrests.
Who had bailed him out? How had he been able to keep that from me?
“That’s when I decided that I was no good for you and the girls. Whatever happened to you three, you would be better off without me. I also knew that if I told you I was leaving because I was such a fuckup, being the devoted girlfriend that you were, you would have fought for us. Most likely, you would have won. Walking away from you and the girls was the hardest and stupidest thing I’ve ever done.”
My heart hurt. Knowing that he was in all that pain and had all those problems, and I was so oblivious was rough.
“Anyway, you thought I was at work one morning, but my mom took me to meet with the lawyer she worked for, who proceeded to tell me I was in deep shit. Later that afternoon, Christina came over to babysit and I made a split-second decision. I threw my shit in my car, scribbled a note to you, kissed the girls good-bye in their sleep, and that was it. I sobbed as I kissed them. That night, I drove past the house at least a dozen times, so fucking close to coming home and begging you to forgive me. I pulled in the driveway once. I remember it clearly.” He stared at the table, lost in his memory. “You had Lucy on your hip, still wearing your scrubs. You pulled the curtain back to see who it was, but you were blinded by the headlights. I started to pull out of the driveway and you walked away, assuming it was just a car turning around.”
Oh God. I remember that. It was so dark. I prayed it was him, but the car pulled out and I lost all hope.
He sniffed and wiped at the corner of his eye, still not making eye contact with me. “Anyway, after that I spiraled. I moved from couch to couch, drinking a case of beer a day, sometimes more. After awhile, beer wasn’t enough, so I started drinking more hard liquor. I just wanted to numb everything. When I was sober, all I thought about was you and the girls and all I was missing out on. I chose liquor over my girlfriend and daughters. It was the lowest point in my life, or so I thought.”
My eyes teared up and I was thankful he wasn’t looking at me. Like him, I’d also imagined what it would be like the first time I saw him after all these years. I pictured myself screaming at him, slapping him, spewing the most hateful things I could come up with at him. Instead, I was pinching the inside of my arm as hard as I could to try and distract myself and keep from crying. Those five years’ worth of anger I’d clung tight to had evaporated instantly into confusion as I found myself hanging on his every word.
“Somehow by the grace of God, and my mom, I was able to stay out of prison. My mom pleaded with me to get help. She offered to pay for rehab, threatened to come to you and tell you everything, and begged my dad for help; but as you know, he was a drunk himself. I was turning into him a little more every day and I was too out of control to notice. One day, I was sleeping on the couch of some girl I met in a bar and my sister found me. She told me that Mom had just had a freak brain aneurysm and died the night before.”