It’s all my fault.
Or is it?
I’ll never know for sure.
Jackdude and I are madly in love. He meets my friends. They adore him. I do get a bit of a heads up from one friend that gee whiz, he sure can put away the Jack Daniels, and another, Monica, your relationship seems a bit weird.
But I am in love, glorious love!! HA! I win!
I waited for this moment so long, this Holy Grail of a goblet awkwardly stuffed into the hole in my being left when the church so abruptly disposed of me. Now my life is complete, now I can be happy! The whirlwind overnight romance drowns what’s left of me and I happily concede to its waves, willfully dissolving my own interests and pursuits so I can immerse my life totally in Jackdude.
We spend weekends together. We go on trips. We dance. I endure his shitty country music. He is indifferent to my jazz. We make love as ice blue eyes gaze into my own. It’s a bit ridiculous, I feel I’m living a Harlequin Romance life. I love it. I watch him sleep and kiss his unmoving warm lips. I know, I know. This is stupid writing, but it fits. I’m stupid in love and I already dream of being married to this prince of a man. I even doodle my name. Monica G. Jackdude. Ridiculous. Utterly ridiculous.
Aaaaaand… we drink.
I readily conform to his lifestyle, a barhopping tour of Big Suburb from stem to stern, a drunken swim through an ocean of alcohol served by a constant rotation of bartenders gleeful to receive the seemingly endless Andrews from Jackdude’s money clip. He won’t let me pay for anything. Ever. I don’t open a single door. He leaps to the rescue of this damsel in distress and saves my poor aching fingers from the effort. After all of the men who did nothing for me, he is making me feel like a spoiled debutante. He provides whatever I want. I’m living a fantasy with Jackdude.
…but did I mention we drink?
One night we sit at a bar and after he’s all Mr. Chatty with another couple, I comment how exciting it is for me to be with an extrovert for once. He immediately contradicts: “I’m not an extrovert.” Whaaa?? Yes, you are, Jackdude. You talk to everyone. But he gazes at me steadily, points to his glass and flatly states, “That’s because of this. I can’t socialize without it.” Huh. Ten points to JackDude for honesty, zero points to me for not picking up a red flag as obvious as the artificial panic in the voice on your phone exclaiming “Your Car’s Warranty Is Expiring!”
Monica, you fool.
I’m at my niece’s house up north and answer my phone, and he rants a drunken tirade on repeat about how much he loves me, which is awesome, but also really funny. He’s so damn loud that she can overhear most of the conversation, and she’s laughing hysterically because he’s slurring loud enough for the next county to also know he’s drunk and in love.
And we drink.
He usually picks me up around eight and we start the round of taverns (is it only a tavern if it’s in Wisconsin? Right up there with calling a water fountain a bubbler. Bubbler is wrong, by the way. My book, my rules.), him with his beer and shots of whiskey, I with my ever present Chardonnay.
And he drives. He seems just fine, but I know he’s not. I question him one night. I ask why doesn’t he just Uber or Lyft, and he looks at me with this dead gaze and drawls, “I don’t do that. ” End of conversation. Waking up one morning in a hotel, he asks me if I know where he parked the car. Honey, after last night, I wouldn’t remember if you had parked it on the roof. My brain is deteriorating and I can’t see it. I don’t want to see it. I’m in loooooove!
He calls one night from a town about an hour away. He’s drunk. He wants to see me. I say get a hotel and stay put. An hour later, he knocks on my door.
Looking back now, I can see the problems, the crumbling foundation, see things coming to a head. This house of cards is fixin’ to get Wizard of Ozzed right outta Kansas.
One Sunday he calls around noon, can we meet at 8 pm? Yes, of course! and I drop my original plans. 8:15…8:30…9…9:30 all pass by and he’s nowhere to be found. I keep calling, but it’s going straight to voicemail. Where the hell is he? I call. I text. I call a friend of mine because I’m so worried. She comes over, we drive past his house but see nothing. She tries to keep me calm, I’m freaking out. Where could he be? Did he get a DUI? Do they let you keep your phone if you do? And if that’s where my brain immediately went, shouldn’t that be a warning sign? 11 pm he calls at last with a million apologies. He went to a car show (translation: day drinking) and fell asleep (translation: passed out) and can I meet him right away at the bar by my house (translation: more alcohol) and as usual, once I meet up with him, all is forgiven.
JackDude is massively into Harley-Davidson, and of course the only place worse than in a car with someone who shouldn’t be driving is on the back of a Harley with someone who shouldn’t be driving. Thankfully it’s only April, and the bike is not out yet.
But eventually it is, and I hesitantly climb aboard, my mother’s years of being an ER nurse echoing in my head: “The surgeons come in after a motorcycle accident, look at all the human hamburger, throw up their hands and say ‘What the hell am I supposed to do with THAT? that…that…that…‘” …but her voice is drowned out as we roar off, breaking the silence of an unusually warm spring night. I remember I had a pedicure earlier that evening, sipping a glass of Chardonnay because, why not?? I would wonder later…had I not started so early, would things have turned out differently? But of course, I didn’t know we were doing anything at all that night, because he never made plans. He’d just text me in the evening and I would drop everything to go be with him in some bar. Yeah. I did that.
We make our first stop, a little divey biker bar with simple, yet unbelievably incredible food, and I have the most amazing chicken tenders and fries I’ve ever had in my life. I don’t know what kind of crack this cook is putting in the food, but I’m hooked. Jackdude buys his usual round of drinks for the whole bar, and he has a… wait, what is THAT?? His shotglass is bigger than normal… what IS that?? I’ve never noticed it before. How long has he been downing these double shots? But the question goes unanswered as we talk, laugh, and touch each other in a PDA celebration I’m fairly sure no one else was too interested in seeing.
We visit bar #2 of the evening, a dive of a place but cute, and continue our endless public makeout session, and no one minds the any of it when he buys a round for the bar. And at last, we head to:
Bar #3: I’m getting a bit murky. We are at our final destination bar where we met, one within walking distance of my apartment. The events unfold in my mind like a film reel pulled from a fire…much still perfectly clear, some distorted, but a few scenes entirely burned out of the celluloid. And as it plays back, we’re there, he’s chatting with folks at one end of the bar, and I can’t remember why, but I take a seat further down the bar next to a vagrant looking twentysomething seated before a pack of cigarettes and a greasy wallet that had clearly seen better days. He says hi, and we start to chat. Turns out he’s a musician…Wait!! I did music once, maybe I can make a connection. I talk to him for maybe ten minutes, and he gives me his Facebook information for his band. I enter it into my phone, saying hey, if you ever need a singer… I’m really grasping at threads, though, I haven’t done anything music related since the church tossed me, and I’m not really sure I’m even up to snuff any longer. Jackdude comes up to me as I’m concluding this conversation, and he wants to leave.
I think.
Only I can’t exactly remember. To this day I will never know.
I remember walking with him back to my apartment. I remember sitting down and taking off my boots.
I don’t remember exactly what words I said.
I definitely remember him storming out the door.
Worship Leader Gone Wild 