My Story Part 9

Part 9 ~ The Marriage

I knew who David was through Kristie. We would see each other at her parties and I never thought anything about it. One night when everyone was out by the bonfire I went in the house to go to the bathroom. I didn’t think anyone was in the house and when I rounded the corner he was there. He scared the hell out of me. We started talking and I thought maybe I was kind of interested. I knew where he lived so the next day I showed up at his apartment to hang out. He was very charming and seemed like he had his shit together. I was kind of drifting. Working and going to school but I didn’t know where I was going and he seemed settled. I was attracted to settled. In no time I had moved in. One day when I came home from work I found all my things piled up by the front door. I wish I would have taken it and gone right then. If I only had known, I would have. I would have never looked back. That is not what happened. When I looked closer I saw that he had gone through everything I had. All the things a teenage girl hangs onto, old notes from old boyfriends, pictures from high school, and yearbooks were in my boxes. He had blacked out every picture of every guy, blacked out every address I had with a guys name on it, and laid out all my old love notes to make it look like I was cheating on him. This was within a month of us being together. I guess I had cheated on him with all my life I had before him. Somehow he could always twist things to make me feel like I had done something wrong. He would wake me up in the middle of the night by leaving notes on me and leaving or just acting like he was gone. He would make things up because there was nothing real for him to complain about. He always thought I was cheating. When I was at work sometimes I would see him looking in the windows. He somehow was able to alienate all my friends and family leaving just him. I felt I like I would be in trouble if I talked to them and then he would leave. I don’t know why I was so afraid of him leaving. I think partly it was because I was pregnant by then and I didn’t think I would ever be able to do it alone. I didn’t want to go home alone, much less with a baby. We got married in the courthouse the day after I turned 20. There was no engagement, or celebration; it was an arrangement. I didn’t love him but I made do. I made things ok. I tried my best to just keep them smooth. I learned to navigate his lies and not to ask questions but to just accept them so we didn’t have a fight.
After I had Skylar he would just quit jobs and not work so we couldn’t pay our bills. He did this, he later admitted to me, so that I would agree to move to Texas. I had some family there and he wanted to go there and start over no matter how he had to get there.
We moved into my Grandma and Grandpa’s house for 10 months. My grandma once described me this way, “it’s like the lights in your eyes just go dark once he comes back.” She was completely right but I had convinced myself that miserable or not, this was my life. This was how it was going to be and nothing could change it. I got pregnant with Fallyn and had her two months after we moved into our house. I was now 24 years old with two kids, a house, a husband, with no friends and no outlet. I loved the girls. I loved having babies and I loved taking care of them. I passed the time with planting roses and gardenias. I made a vegetable garden and got some cats. I had things to do, but really it was just a mask. My spirit felt really broken. I wasn’t me anymore. I didn’t care about taking care of myself at all. I remember many nights laying in my bed and just crying myself to sleep because inside of me I could feel the outside world and I knew it was passing me by. I was forgotten. I felt that there were things waiting for me out there and I had no way of getting to them. I hated him. I felt bad for him eventually because really he had no one. His family didn’t know who he really was. I don’t think anyone did or does.
When I got pregnant with Jezalyn I was surprised, I wasn’t ready for her but I knew I would have three so this would be the last baby. After I had her I felt like my spirit was coming back. I felt stronger somehow. When J was a few months old, I met someone online. I honestly did not mean to. I was looking for someone for my friend to meet hoping so would find someone where I lived and move. It sounds crazy but that’s what happened. So I started talking to someone and realized I liked him. It was wrong and I am sorry for hurting someone but I can’t help but think it was also good. It was like someone breathed life back into me. It was like I woke up from a horrible dream and suddenly remembered who I was. This girl living in a shadow of her former self was not me. I began looking for a way out. One day my dad called me and for whatever reason, he asked me a simple question. Do you want a divorce? I broke into tears and said yes. He said he would be there tomorrow. He packed a bag and drove 24 hours to Houston. Within two days I had filed for divorce and moved out. When I left David, J was only eight months old. I feel like I cheated her out of being a baby. I feel like with my head being so many other places, she didn’t get what her sisters did from me. It haunts me. I moved in with my Grandpa while I figured out what I wanted to do. I took the kids to Ohio for 6 weeks a month after that. I came home and had so much fun being with my girls, my friends, and my family that I knew I needed to move home. It wasn’t easy though. I felt really sad because my grandpa was down there with no one and I had become really close with my aunt Pam. So I returned to Houston where I was constantly stalked. I would find him creeping around the house or peeping in my bedroom windows.
I was officially divorced January 2004, and I went back and forth between Houston and Ohio for months before finally just not returning to Houston. I got an apartment on my own with the girls and I hadn’t been that happy in years.