124 Christa Drive

The clock chimed ten times and I knew by the late hour that my husband, Eddy, would not be home until very late, and most likely a bit inebriated from a long evening of drinking. It worried me when he drank and drove home, but he ignored my fears and kept doing it. My computer dinged and I looked down to see a little figure bent over with laughter. It was my online friend, Jesse, and he was my constant companion in the evenings lately. Eddy would leave for the lodge right after dinner and once I did the dishes and settled in for the night, Jesse and I would talk until we were both tired.

The reason we had started our relationship was Eddy began an online affair with one of the women that was in our online group of friends. We all used to meet online in the evening and play games and chat. But Eddy took it too far, and I turned to Jesse for help. Otherwise, I doubt we would ever have started chatting outside the group.

I had to make a decision soon but it wasn't easy. Jesse had left his wife and moved to North Carolina where he was waiting for me to leave my husband and join him. I didn't want to tell him but I hadn't made up my mind yet about what I was going to do. Eddy and I had been together for fourteen years, and that was a long time and a lot of history to let go of for someone I didn't really know that well. Still, Eddy didn't want a thing to do with me, just the lodge and his lodge friends.

I blew a kiss at the computer screen and closed it down for the night. Jesse had to be up early and I still had things to do before I went to bed. Unfortunately, I tossed and turned all night not getting any rest because Eddy never came home. The gates around the storage facility he managed had to be opened at seven and I went out and did that, but the office opened at nine and I wasn't about to do that too, not knowing where he was or how long I would be at the job. I called his mother and she came right over to run the office, and Eddy came driving in not too long after she arrived. He smelled of stale booze and cigarettes, and he wanted to sleep.

Three days later he once again stayed out all night with no explanation, and at that point I began packing my things in large boxes when he wasn't around and shipping them to North Carolina. When he finally figured out what I was doing I no longer cared, he didn't love me anyhow or he wouldn't be staying out drinking. By the end of the week my things were all packed and sent except for furniture that was mine, but that was a loss I couldn't avoid. I was driving to my sister's house in Colorado, and then Jesse was flying in to drive back with me since my car was old.

I ached inside, missing my husband and at the same time feeling the thrill of meeting my online heart throb for the first time. We both stayed fixed to the screens of our computers, and then him his phone so we would be in constant contact. His plane was delayed so he spent the night in the Denver airport only to arrive the next morning. The airport was humming with people who were happy to see a loved one or up with a business acquaintance for the first time. The only thing Jesse said to me when he saw me was that I was still blonde, and where was I parked. He was totally different than the man I had gotten to know online, and his manner was short and insulting. I couldn't believe what I was hearing.

We drove to my sister's house and he wanted a shower, so I let him use the bathroom in the hall. It was my sister's "project" and she had rubber ducks glued all around the top of the shower, a duck as a toothbrush holder, and assorted ducks all around the bathroom. He was very rude about that, indicating my sister was all but mentally ill for gluing rubber ducks on the wall. He wanted to go for a ride up by the lake, so off we went in my old car, leaving my dog behind again, which I hated to do. Once we got there, he kept saying rude things to me and making me feel as though I had made a huge mistake, but I was too far in now to change my mind, or at least I thought I was.

We left early the next morning for Wilmington, NC, and I felt my heart in my throat when we pulled away from my sister's house. He insisted we go a route he had picked, although it was a bit further than the one my sister told him to take. He was silent most of the way, other than to take the wheel once when there was a detour and I ended up on the wrong road. After that I let him drive until it was dark. I can't see to drive in the dark, so we pulled over to a rest stop where he decided we could get some sleep. My dog has a lot of fur and it is humid outside of Oklahoma City, so she was miserable as was I with the heat and humidity, trying to figure out how to lie down in a narrow back seat together and go to sleep. I could hear the engines of the semi trucks as they came and went from resting. I could not go to sleep and just as I thought I might drift off he got up and decided it was time to go.

I started to do the driving since it was light and my turn, but I was so tired I was dreaming wide awake. I finally pulled off the road at the next rest stop I came to, and told him he had a choice. He could either drive it himself, or he could entertain himself while I caught a few hours sleep so I could drive safely. He opted to drive himself and I dozed off immediately.

It was dark by the time we arrived at the duplex he called home. I was so tired it took all my strength to shower, but he insisted I shower, and then complained that I had used too much rose oil on my skin and it hurt his sinuses.. We slept in the living room on a made down futon, and it was not very comfortable. Every time my dog got up beside me, he would yell at her and make her get down, and she had slept with me since she was a puppy. I spent the next night sleeping on the floor so I could sleep by my dog, and he told me I believed in fairy tales and thought life should be the same way. He didn't have an ounce of compassion or empathy in his body, and I could not believe I had spent so much time talking to him online only to get this in real life.

He was jealous of my dog and wanted to go to the beach without her, leaving her in a hot, humid apartment with large, flying roaches to contend with. I would not go without her, so he decided she could go this one time. I heard stories on the way to the beach of how he and his buddies picked up girls in different bars, and how his female friend in Virginia had invited him to come up and go to a concert, which he thought he'd like to do.

I tried very had to ignore his behavior, thinking it was a reaction from leaving his wife and it would get better, but it only got worse. I purchased a television so I had something to do besides listen to the radio. I bought a bed, figuring he wasn't throwing my dog off my bed. I cleaned and I cooked, buying furnishings and trying to make a home, but he did nothing but paw me and make it clear everything was physical for him.

I packed my twenty year old car until it was low to the ground, leaving only the furniture I couldn't fit in my back seat. I unhooked the cable I had set up and stuffed the television in the back of my car, and then got inside and set out to return the cable equipment. The cable company was six miles from the Atlantic ocean, and I felt a slight unhappiness at leaving behind the beach, but I had to leave. I had to go home and decide what I wanted to do with my life, because I knew this wasn't it.

Goodbye Christa Drive, I said out loud as my dog and I pulled out onto the highway around four in the afternoon. We were back in Colorado three days later. Sometimes people are not the same online as they are in person. Sometimes they lie, and sometimes they are psychopaths in sheep's clothing. I am very careful now and do not even get involved with dating sites.