Countdown to Heartbreak

Have you ever noticed that right when you think things are going your way, life fucking knees you in the balls and kicks you until you vomit from the pain? Alright not my best work I admit, but fuck life. Fuck it.

I spent the weekend cooking for her while she went and spent time with her family. When she finally got home on Sunday night she was a stressed out mess. When I showed her all the things I'd made, she suddenly felt better. You could actually physically see the tension in her neck release. I'd never felt like I'd been able to provide that for someone before. I was usually a leading cause of problems.

On Wednesday we all left the house together. We dropped Chrissy and Carrie off at day care together and then like the dysfunctional family we were she drove me to the clinic to get tested.

Christ the nurse there was up for some slut shaming. The lecture I got about being more careful, when I am fucking careful. The incredulous look she was given just for being there with me. Like 'girl, please tell me you aren't letting this douche bag put his dick in you'.

This wouldn't have been half as bad if it weren't for the fact I was fucking clean. All these lectures about making poor choices and I had nothing wrong with me.

We drove home and I sat in the passenger seat seething.

"What's the matter with you? You're clean. Shouldn't you be happy?" She asked.

"I just don't like being made to feel like some dirty, little, deviant, fuck up when I haven't done anything wrong." I said.

She rubbed my thigh. "I know. She was a bitch. Fuck her. Or better yet, don't fuck her. That'll teach her."

I laughed. "Thank you."

"It's okay. It's your life you're living. Not anyone else's. All you can do is do the best with what you've got."

"Why do you think I haven't heard back from that publication house? They seemed so keen. Now I don't know if I should try somewhere else."

Her hands suddenly tensed on the steering wheel. "They're probably just working with accountants and lawyers to draw up a contract for you. It was a really good book, you know?"

"Really? You think it was good?"

"Yeah. I really do."

We were heading up onto an overpass and a car that was several lengths ahead of us threw what looked like a pillowcase with something in it out the window. It bounced along the shoulder and came to a rest. She veered into the shoulder slamming on the breaks.

"What the fuck did they just throw?" She yelped. "It's moving."

She jumped out of the car and ran towards it picking it up and looking inside. The look of pure abject horror that crossed her features is not one that I ever want to see again. She ran back to the car and passed me the bag, as she jumped in.

"Use your GPS to find the closest emergency vet." She yelped as she pulled the car back out onto the freeway.

"What is it?" I asked looking in the bag. Inside was a small black and brown puppy. It was a mess. Blood and two of it's legs looked obviously broken.

People are often too quick to call the ones who do things like this animals or monsters. Quickly dehumanizing the perpetrators so they can be seen as apart from the rest of us. The truth is, they're people. Just like us. That's the horror of it all. You can never tell what the person you're about to meet is capable of.

I put my hand in the bag and stroked the tiny puppy over its ear. It whimpered at my touch.

"Why don't we just take it to your clinic?" I asked.

"What?" She said looking at me with both confusion and frustration. "Why are you wasting time. We need to get it to someone."

"Your clinic. You could fix it up right away." I pushed. "If we go to another vet they might be treating another animal and we'll have to wait."

She suddenly stilled, a plethora of emotions crossed her features. Pain, anger, sorrow, confusion. "I'm not a vet. I lied okay. Please! Just find somewhere."

I pulled out the GPS and typed in nearest vet. The directions came up and I stared at her.

"What do you mean you aren't a vet?" I asked.

"I lied! I lied about being a vet! Please, we'll talk about it later." She was frantic.

"Why did you lie? What do you do? Are you a hooker?"

She made a frustrated groan. "Yes, I'm a successful day time, business hours only hooker. Please. I promise I'll tell you later."

"Why can't you tell me now?" I pressed.

"Because I'm going to hurt you. And I can't do it while we're in the car, driving."

Countdown to the point where she breaks my heart, starts: now.

We took the puppy to the emergency vet. It wasn't as bad as you would have expected a puppy thrown from a car travelling at 80 miles per hour would be. Both its left legs were broken as was one rib. It had a claw ripped out at the root, and it needed stitches in a wound along its left shoulder. Otherwise it was holding up. We agreed to take it home. That meant buying around $100 in puppy supplies. She paid.

We picked the girls up from day care. They were very excited to see the puppy. They wanted to keep it, but she seemed completely stressed out by the idea. Like she was barely managing to keep their family functioning with just them in it. I said I'd keep it at my house, but that it could be their puppy. They named it Freddy. Like in the song they love. They then sang the song to remind me. I now have a puppy that will kill me in my dreams. Just what I always wanted.

I ate dinner with them. Staring at her the whole time. Willing her to talk to me. The girls took turns with the puppy on their lap. They were so gentle and kind with it, I never wanted to call them monsters again. They weren't demons, or monsters. They were kind little girls who had the worst fucking thing you could ever imagine happen to you happen to them, and they came out still with enough empathy that at four they knew this little puppy needed gentle touches and quiet words.

She put the girls to bed, while I took the puppy to my place and set it up in a box with blanket beside my bed.

I came outside and waited. It felt like forever.

She came over and sat down. Neither of us said anything.

I watched as she rolled the joint, taking time and care. Drawing this out so that she could have as long as possible without me being destroyed by her. She put the joint to her mouth, lit it and drew the smoke slowly into her lungs. She passed it to me and held her breath while I repeated her actions.

We released the smoke together.

"Well?" I asked.

"I'm the editor in charge of approving your book." She said.

"You're fucking what?"

"Your book. Your book! I was the one that sent you those letters. That was me."

"What the fuck? Why did you tell me you were a vet?" I snapped.

"You said you were an author. Do you know how many 'authors' I've met who have given me their shitty fucking manuscripts and expected me to magically have them published so they can all achieve their dreams? Like I somehow have the magic ability to make people want to buy their piece of shit, Mary Sue, cliché ridden trash?"

So my work was a piece of shit, Mary Sue, cliché ridden, piece of trash I guess. Great. Just great. If you're keeping track of the point where she broke my heart. That was it. Right there.

"Okay? So you lied when we met. We've known each other for six fucking months! Six months I thought you were a vet! Six months I've been going back and forward with my novel with someone unknown entity to perfect it. And it was you! You could have said something!" I yelled the last bit. We were in the courtyard of an apartment building taking illegal drugs and I was screaming at her.

"I know! I know! You know how many times I thought about saying something? I didn't know how."

"So tell me? Were you just stringing me along to mess with me? I'm not getting it picked up am I? That's why I haven't heard back. You couldn't think of anyway to make me re-write it again, and so you threw it out and moved on." She opened her mouth to say something but I just continued to yell over her. "Was it fun? Did you get some sort of sick thrill messing with my life like that! I need to sell this book to live you realize? I am currently living on drying up film royalties and my Granddad's inheritance."

She was crying now. Ugly crying. Under normal circumstances that might have made me want to comfort her.

"I'm sorry. I wasn't stringing you along. It was good. It just wasn't good enough. We don't normally tell people to change things, we just say no. I wanted to help you."

"You wanted to help me? You should have told me so I didn't have to jump through all these fucking hoops!"

"I'm sorry. Your changes made it exceptional. But I still have to have someone else approve it. They're just taking forever. I promise you'll get the contract. I promise."

"How can I believe you. You wasted six months of my life! You could have told me exactly what I needed to to, but you messed with me instead!"

"I tried to tell you what to do but you wouldn't listen to me." She cried.

"Because you told me you were a vet!"

Someone from an upstairs apartment stuck their head out the window. "Shut the fuck up out there!" They yelled down.

"Fuck you, man! Mind your own fucking business." I yelled back.

"I'm sorry. I didn't want to hurt you. I just ... I got scared." Her voice was barely over a whisper.

"Fuck your sorry and fuck you. This is my life you fucked around with." I got to my feet and stared down at her. "You kept telling me that there was no way you would ever fuck me. Looks like you have been doing it the whole time. I just didn't know."

I threw the joint on the ground and stormed off. Leaving her on the bench to cry.

This time I felt nothing.