Two years ago we reconnected when your father passed away. I happened to find his obituary on the internet a mere month after his passing. That led me to search for an email address for you. When I sent you a message of condolences I wasn’t even sure if the email would reach you. Much to my surprise, it was, indeed, your email address. Even more surprising, you replied. I still recall the first line from that first reply after 20 years, “My, my … isn’t that a pretty name I haven’t seen in a long time.” 

Suddenly, twenty years after our divorce we found ourselves communicating on a daily basis much like the way we got to know each other through marathon phone calls when we were in high school.  All the familiar laughter and banter easily came back between the two of us. You will always make the best cat voices in the universe. Your signature cat voice conjures up a vision of a handsome debonair Latino alley cat, which is a bit odd since you’re most definitely not Latino, but you can play one on the radio. Now that I think about it, this particular cat voice of yours is a holdover from our college days in the 90’s when you would take on the voice of Ren (from Ren & Stimpy) for sport. You would even refer to me as Stimpy. I strangely did not mind. Not then, and not two years ago.

Two years ago you were on the heels of losing your dad, the one parent that was always on your side, always had your back. You also declared that your marriage had long been over, and you were waiting for your daughter to reach a certain age before you made your move to split, though I can’t recall now what magical age you waiting for. And talking to you brought such a treasure trove of memories that are still out of the reach of my own brain because of my own DID. Though it was sad to not recall some of what you were relaying to me, it was still fun to listen to you. You were just as shocked as I was that I did not recall imploring you to go dumpster diving for my coupons when you accidentally threw them out. You were only a Private in the Army and I was in college. We did not have a lot of money, and I took coupon clipping very seriously.

It was comforting talking to someone who knew me as a kid, knew my family mess, knew my past and current struggles, yet accepted me as I was and as I am.

We both fell hard for each other. I was over the moon, goofy, happy like a teenage girl. I told the universe that I was getting back together with my ex-husband. No matter that you had a family, and a life several states away. Why should reason and logic factor in when you fall in love again? I naively believed you when you said you would move and uproot yourself to be with me.

Sometime after you told your wife your plans there was a meltdown of some sort on your end. The details are still sketchy to me, but this sums it up: your wife admitted she also wanted out of the marriage, and told you to do what you needed to do, but then changed her mind and begged you stay; a series of days ensued where you said you were still coming, suddenly communication became very sporadic with an eventual short apology email ending things followed up with an epic drunken letter that will go down in history as the greatest combination of crazy love ever jumbled into correspondence. I was simultaneously heartened and disturbed by that letter, and I’m still haunted by this line, “I’ll carry you in my heart for the rest of my days, every day without you is a wasted day.”

This next part is hard, very hard. But it must be said.

You proposed to me when we were riding in the trunk of your friend’s car my senior year of high school. I said no, and continued to say no to you. Then one day you said to me (as best as I can recall), “Let me do this for you. Let me get you away from your crazy parents. I know you love me, and I love you. And I know you wish you were going to college like all the rest of your friends. Marry me. You can go to college if we’re married. Your stupid stepfather’s salary will no longer count against you, and I love you. Let me do this for you.” 

I couldn’t go away to any college because of my stepfather’s salary, and he and my mother made it clear that they weren’t going to help me go away to college. They wanted me to live at home. I wasn’t kidding when I said to people that my choices after graduation were my own place, a homeless shelter or death. There was no way I was staying in my childhood home after graduation. I had to make daily commitments to myself not to run away while I lived there. If it hadn’t been for you I likely would have run away while in high school.

As happy as I was to marry you, we both know that would not have happened if I had the opportunity to go away to college like the rest of our peers.

We did not choose each other out of any mutuality. We found each other out of a desire for a connection. We needed each other for the sake of being needed and needing someone.

And here’s the hardest thing of all to say: We were and are not soul mates.

We are two people who were there for each other as kids, and were there for each other 20 years later. But our connection is a love addiction, at least it is for me. I love the way you love me. You love me intensely, wholly and completely. It’s a crazy burning love that is hard to walk away from. It’s a drug I want more than you know, but I know it’s the feeling I want. I thirst for the intensity of your feelings for me. Hell, in that drunken letter you sent me you were quoting lines from Adele songs and Christopher Cross’ song The Best That You Can Do, all the while telling me that you measure all women against me.

But we are not sustainable on a long term basis. We both yearned for an intense love, and that is why we wound up together in high school.

I do love you, but it’s out of gratitude for everything you did for me when we were kids. It’s not love that can sustain us as a couple.

I got your email last night. Yes, I want to reply to it, but I cannot for all the reasons stated above.