It’s kind of a weird feeling thinking Wayne was also someone else’s “the one.” I always knew he was mine, for me, my other half, my pea pod mate.
But a couple weeks ago an old boyfriend (for lack of a better word, he really wasn’t a boyfriend exactly) looked me up on Facebook. That was fine. Others have too. One of Wayne’s old girlfriends looked him up too. It happens.
But then mine decided to send me a Valentine’s FB “card.” You know those apps you can forward on to people? It’s not really a card, but it was for Valentine’s on Valentine’s. Worse, it had this little kid couple on it.
Wayne flipped. And he never flips. But little kids are our thing. Specifically the little kids dressed in old-timey clothes that are usually shot in black and white and maybe one thing is color, like a rose. I know there’s an artist whose style that is. I just don’t know the name. But you can find it on cards, plaques, wall hangings, figurines, etc.
Wayne almost always gives me a card with those kids on it for birthdays, anniversaries, and, yes, Valentine’s Day. Including this past one. He has for years and years and years now. It really bothered him to see some other guy he’d never even heard of before giving me something similar.
In all honesty, I’d forgotten all about the other guy. I saw him back in college. It was just one of those things. I didn’t even remember his name! (I remembered his first name when he friended me, but I’m not sure I even knew his last name.)
But apparently it wasn’t just one of those things to him. He remembered me 20 years later.
He’s married now with 3 kids. He lives in Louisiana. It’s not like anything’s going to be rekindled.
But it brought up some dark days in Wayne and I’s early years. And hurt feelings. Wayne spent last night scrolling back through all my FB wall posts. He found all the other comments P (I’ll just call the other guy that) left…and started reading stuff into them.
I would feel the same way really. It’s kind of funny, in fact, that the shoes are reversed like this. Normally I’m the one making a mountain out of mole hill.
Anyway, so we had a big talk last night with me feeling bad and us prancing down a memory lane that really sucked. One where we broke up because Wayne refused to propose and I started seeing someone else. It was a really ugly time back before we got engaged.
There was also a girl back then in Wayne’s life who helped make those dark days darker. Not that he was seeing her necessarily. But she was a pot stirrer and she spent a lot of time stirring ours. I had this niggling feeling that if my P had contacted me, it wouldn’t be much longer before Pot Stirrer contacted Wayne. Maybe she already had.
So I said something about it. But this just made Wayne more suspicious about the P person and was I hiding more than I was letting on.
Well, then we started talking about Kelly, a girl Wayne had…I don’t even know what with back in his senior year of college. All I know is she sent him letters to his home address signed “love.” Years later he confessed that if she had been a smidge better looking he probably would’ve dumped me for her because he loved her. But nothing physical had transpired between them. But emotionally? They were tight. (Which hurts more than if they’d had sex to be honest.)
Kelly had looked him up late last year. That was cool. He actually told me about it. (After I had a niggling feeling that was going to happen and asked him if he’d heard from her yet. A few days later when she did friend him it flipped him out. I keep trying to tell him there’s something to women’s intuition and I have it but he doesn’t believe me!)
Anyway, he told me that they’d caught up. No big deal.
Until last night. During our talk hashing out all the FB nonsense with the beau from my past, he made a comment about how she’d written something on his wall.
I never saw anything. So I went back to look, because Kelly is the one sore spot, the one threat I’ve never fully trusted has gone away.
Yes, she had written something. And Wayne can say it was nice. I see it differently.
Wayne was clearly her “one.” I knew it back then when I’d find her letters that he’d try to hide from me. I read it in her comment now.
Her very first one in their little exchange was about how she was glad we were together and how he’d said even back then I was the one.
That’s what she had focused on. Not that he was a CPA after all just like he’d set out to be or that he no longer lived in Colorado, but who he had married. And that’s all she had said.
I learned a long time ago that whatever people bring up first is what matters to them most. Wayne still mattered to her, and it was clear even from her seemingly innocuous post that she saw him as the one that got away.
She’s divorced now and you can’t tell me she didn’t look him up out of curiosity. Then come to find out he had married me…after all the volatility we knew back when she also knew him. He used to love to throw me under the bus and grumble to garner pity about how I mistreated him. (Which, in his defense, I was pretty controlling and jealous back then. A lot has since changed on that front I am happy to say.)
But he didn’t help my jealousy issue when he wouldn’t introduce me to friends like Kelly and he’d take their side over mine.
Anyway…that’s not the point. We both acted badly back then.
The point is, it kind of stung to realize he’s still her one. That he set her benchmark too.
Luckily he was very open and hid nothing when she contacted him. I think he respected that would’ve caused major problems.
Last night talking about Kelly and P, he broke down crying remembering how close he’d come to losing me forever when I walked out on him in ‘93. It reminded me how important he does view our relationship, even though he’s not always been quick to admit it.
I think we both agree that some of the drama we knew from our past just needs to stay there. We don’t want to deal with that stuff now.
However, we both agreed it makes us realize how happy we are with each other. It’s nice to catch up with people from our past, but as for the catch of our lives? We’ve got it. No regrets. No throw backs.
