"I'm going out with the guys tonight," he said into the phone, and then waited for the slight hesitation, hardly discernible to the casual listener. He was not disappointed.
"Alright," she answered softly, as if she were surprised. As if this didn't happen every Friday and Saturday evening, along with any other time that they might have something planned. "Have fun." She was always quiet, but when she was upset like this, her voice dropped down to a whisper.
He was about to hang up. "Hey, why don't you call up some of your friends and go out?" he suggested. "It's been awhile since you've had a girls' night out, hasn't it?"
She pretended to consider it. "Maybe I will." They both knew that that wasn't going to happen. All of her friends, male and female, had abandoned her after he had taken over her life. All except two, that is, and those two were the girlfriends of his brothers, who actually spent time with their girlfriends. The two couples would be out tonight; they would be together.
He let the static buzz over the line for a moment. "Well, I hope you do. I'll see you tomorrow morning. Love you."
She hung up without answering. That wasn't her way at all. Something was very wrong.
He left anyway.
Somehow, the call early the next morning wasn't a surprise. "Mr. Hanson, your girlfriend is dead. Suicide. She left you a note."
He fetched the note to grieve over, like any good boyfriend would, but he was secretly glad that it was over. As he read the note while sitting on his bottom bunk, he started to cry. It was the first time in almost a year that she had been able to evoke any type of emotion from him. He read the last line again before crumpling the note and tossing in the waste basket.
"I have wasted the last two and a half years of my life on a man who will never give me what I crave. All I wanted was love; all I got was heartbreak. You have made all of my decisions since we met, but I am an adult now. I am stable. I am choosing for myself."
He never forgot her.
