I started this story in 2006. I’ve started it. Stopped it. Restarted it. Stopped it. Changed the format. Changed the POV. Trashed it and started over. But finally, last night as I was getting ready for bed, I realized this had to be my next long-term project, the one I finish. And, the way I truly wanted it written shaped itself. I even remembered how I wanted to write it when I woke up in the morning, which says A LOT! Because I’ve lost more good ideas thinking I’d remember them in the morning. But, not this one. This story has stuck with me all this time until it finally had to get unstuck. So, I leave you with chapter one. This is all I’m going to share of it until it’s complete. It’s unedited so please forgive any typos.
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A JOURNEY TO ME
Chapter One
It took five years for the fog to finally lift. Not a literal fog. Not the thick condensation that creates limited visibility when you go outside. I’m talking about the all-encompassing proverbial fog. The fog that muddles the brain to create limited visibility when you try to live an actual life. That type of fog doesn’t lift when the sun breaks through, not in the literal sense, anyway.
Life fog dissipates when you have an epiphany in the form of a dream. Or a vision. Or you see your husband, whom you’ve grown to despise, working out in the home gym and the sight of his pasty, sweaty body fills your entire being with bile and you have to get out of his sight before he notices you dry heaving with your hand over your mouth. And then this epiphany grows and expands. It begins to take over and cause the fog to shift, to hide within the outer recesses of your mind, making room for clarity of thought. An idea takes root, buds, blossoms and grows toward the light that is starting to cautiously make its way from the clouds.
That’s when you act. Quickly. While you have the chance. Before that fog rolls back in and you’re trapped again, living a life you would hardly even call living. Before you’re back to self-medicating on the couch with food, romance novels and sleep while your two young children play with their toys, safely within the baby-proofed confines of the living room you’ve exiled yourself to during the day. Your friends, when you used to have some, still call on occasion to check in and you respond in false cheer that everything is, indeed, just fine and dandy.
You have to act quickly because you so badly want to enjoy being a mother to those children you fought so hard to have, stupidly coercing the man you married to have sex with you, so that you may have a family even though the unhappiness has already taken over. He graced me, once. And I was blessed with twins who are now two. You know you’ve been present during the first couple years of your children’s lives, mechanically going through a routine of diaper changing and meal feeding before planting yourself back onto the expensive yet cold leather couch with a giant box of Goldfish crackers and your Kindle. You half-watch those beautiful creatures you pushed from your body while you remain a prisoner of your misery, never fully reaching pleasure in the creation and growth of those miracles.
That was me, up until a month ago. I finally had enough, I finally hit my misery threshold for an entire lifetime. I finally got up enough nerve to jump from the high-dive I had been teetering on. I ran around the house, frantically packing things into plastic laundry bins; clothing for me and my two kids, packages of diapers, formula and necessities and I loaded them into the trunk of my practically unused, brand new Mercedes SUV that Thomas, my husband, had brought home for me. There had been nothing wrong with the Infiniti but Thomas, a slave to the Joneses, traded in my old car for this white beast.
Thankfully, Thomas had still been downstairs while I ran around the house like a lunatic. My kids, Ellie and Ethan, were still napping so I had some freedom to do what needed to be done. I went online to check my secret bank account, one I had started at the beginning of our marriage when I realized he wasn’t going to be adding me to his account. Instead, he would give me a fairly fat check, the first of each month, that was my allowance. I’m sure he figured I tore through it every month when I bought the kids clothing and groceries. What he didn’t know what how budget-minded I was. And, out of the four thousand dollars a month, I only spent a quarter of it. Over the course of the five years, I had saved between two and four thousand dollars a month. I had almost two hundred thousand dollars squirreled away for an emergency. Not to mention the tens of thousands I had in diamonds and precious metals I would sell to add to my emergency fund, those were stashed away in a box that I put deep underneath the kids clothing.
Yes, I married wealthy. Very wealthy. But, as I soon found out, shortly after the I-do’s were exchanged, money and happiness are not equals. Long-term happiness can not be bought. Money buys things that can create instant gratification which, in turn, may mimic happiness. But, unless happiness is present already, instant gratification disappears and doesn’t even say goodbye. And, all I was left with was pretty jewelry, nice cars and an empty soul. Not to mention, a selfish, spoiled, cheating Momma’s boy of a husband who never had a kind word for me or a second of time for our children. He was too busy appeasing mommy or going with the ‘guys’ on extended excursions to Vegas for alleged golfing trips. Except, I knew there was less golfing than there was having sex with other women. He didn’t know that I was suspicious and had login information to his credit cards and bank accounts. I knew when he bought jewelry that never ended up on me. I knew when he was buying expensive women’s clothing and cars, staying in 5-star hotels and dining in expensive restaurants. While I was home, wallowing in loneliness and taking care of children.
When I mentioned a plan formulated as the fog lifted, it may have been a slight exaggeration. The only part of this so-called plan that was actually coherent was that I was just going to leave and never come back. I had no idea where I was going to go. My parents lived in Florida, that was too long a drive when you had two kids under three and we were in the throes of an arctic winter. A local hotel would have to do, for the time being. A place that was far enough away from our home, where I could strategize a long-term arrangement for the kids and myself.
It was Saturday, Thomas was still in the home-gym where he would probably stay for another hour. I knew the kids would wake from their nap soon, they had been sleeping for an hour already and I never let them nap longer than an hour and a half, otherwise bedtime was too late and it would throw their schedule off for the entire next day. As muddled as my mind was, I was a strict schedule nazi when it came to my kids. They ate their meals at the same time every day, they napped, bathed and went to bed on a schedule and they played on a schedule. The only thing I was lax about was television, that was on all day. It made for a great babysitter while I languished on the couch, usually reading a historic romance book which would temporarily take me far away from my real life.
I used the time in-between to throw on some clean clothes and swipe concealer underneath my darkened eyes. Sleep didn’t come to me the night before because Thomas had been out. And, despite the fact I hated him, I still didn’t sleep when I was alone in this giant house, even though he rarely came to our bedroom when he was here, he often slept on the couch in his office. My imagination made monsters and burglars out of the settling noises which caused me to bury myself under my covers, hiding until the sun rose and the nursery monitor alerting me to stirring children.
I had no idea what time Thomas came home and was surprised that he actually did, it was unusual for him to come home over the weekend unless his mother was going to show up. Then I remembered, we were supposed to have dinner at the country club with that woman, she was in town for a couple of days before she was due to leave on an extended European cruise. That gave me even more reason to get moving quickly.
Chatting over the baby monitor alerted me to the fact that Ellie and Ethan were awake and ready to go. I threw some of my make up into a bag and tossed it into my large purse that doubled as a diaper bag. Running into the nursery, I changed the diapers of my rested, rambunctious twins and lured them downstairs with the promise of a treat and an outing. They loved going out, we stayed home a lot and these two children were way more social than their mother had become. I did take them to the Mother-Toddler classes, swim lessons and toddler gymnastics. They made friends easily which forced me to uneasily chat with the other mothers. Only one of them I actually became friends with, her warmth drew me in like a street urchin searching for shelter. I was needy, she was giving. Where my long-time friends had given up on me, she didn’t. She would be the only person I would tell about what I was going to do. Thomas didn’t know her, he never was around when she came over for a playdate. She was my safe haven, my only friend and secret keeper.
I would call her when I was on the road. I didn’t have time to go into a full explanation but I expected she’d be relieved that I finally was making the move she had been encouraging me to take.
The twins were ready. I was ready. The car was already loaded and all that was left was to tell Thomas I was taking the kids and going out. I was taking the pathetic, passive-aggessive route and wasn’t going to mention I wasn’t coming back until I put a safe distance between us. I didn’t want to deal with him trying to convince me that staying was my best option because I was weak and I would probably end up agreeing to prolonging my emotional suffering.
So, with a promise of fast food and adventure, I quietly snuck out of the house burdened with a couple bags and a couple children. Buckling them into their seats, I kissed their curly blonde heads and shut the car doors. Pausing outside the drivers door, I took a deep, steadying breath before climbing in. The garage door quietly slid open as my car purred into reverse. As I was backing out, Thomas’ head poked out the door leading from the mud room to the garage. His thick black eyebrows were raised in surprise and I watched his mouth move. He was asking me something but I didn’t roll down my window to hear what he was saying. Instead, I saluted him as I carefully backed the car out. My heart was racing and my palms were sweaty on the leather steering wheel.
He must have thought I was taking the kids to a new class because he simply waved and went back inside. Relieved, I hit the button on the remote and the garage closed. I stared at the house as I backed down our long side driveway. The house held so much promise when we bought it before we got married. We couldn’t wait to start our life, filling the rooms with laughter and love. We moved in before we got married. Maybe that was the downfall, maybe we should have waited. Because, by the time the day of the wedding arrived, I was already feeling the fog roll in. From the moment we exchanged rings, that fog progressively thickened until there was nothing left inside me.
For the first time in five years, I was thinking clearly. As clearly as the sun shone on this crisp, frigid winters day. Hitting the accelerator, excitement coursed over me. I looked at my babies in the rearview mirror, they were happily sipping milk from their child-proof cups and shoveling my beloved goldfish crackers into their mouths with their tiny fists. A smile spread, “We’re going on a journey, my loves.” Ethan clapped, even though he probably didn’t know what the word journey even meant.
A journey, indeed. A journey to a new life. To happiness. To peace. To the unknown. A journey for us. A journey…to me.