The Forgiveable Journey Of The Cheated

16. An Emotional Rollercoaster Headed for Derailment

Life goes on. Dan doesn’t put his foot down to squash Eve’s communication with Liam. He knows it is not something to impose upon her. Plus, generally speaking, Dan and Eve are haltingly making progress relationship wise. Dan finds it surprisingly easy to be very loving towards Eve and she responds positively to the affection. Two steps forward.

However, hearing Liam speak of his illness and the context in which the affair supposedly started are surprisingly disturbing for Eve and provoke some regression. One step back. She sends their sons to the movies in order to freak out on Dan while not worrying about the kids witnessing a potentially emotionally damaging scene. She lashes out, “How could you do this to me?! How could you do that to Liam?! You were breaking up families! You were destroying relationships!” She begins to sob. For once, instead of freezing up and getting frustrated, he listens and tries to be supportive. He realizes that in this fragile moment, despite his urge to get mad at her, walk away and shut her out, he cannot back out as usual. 

Her emotional fit is followed by another two days later. She is emboldened by Lisa who purports that Dan needs to see her anger. This makes sense to Eve. Her anger bubbles up, she leaves the house in a rage, and proceeds to write in the crust of dirt on the Toyota RAV "fuckmobile". Dan interprets her actions as a decision to leave him and he in turn gets upset. “Good!” she thinks. She enjoys seeing him shaken up. She takes advantage of his unusual display of emotions and informs him she wants the “I’m sorry letter”. 

He agrees if, in exchange, she stops writing to Liam. 

He reiterates that he thinks there is a link between their correspondence and her fits of anger. 

Is he that obtuse? She is upset because he cheated on her! Yes there is a link between throwing fits and opening the door to the backseat of the Toyota RAV to get groceries and having an image of Charlotte propped up against the other door with her legs spread open! To Eve there is no visible link between communicating with Liam and anger bubbles. In fact, Eve actually walks around with a grin on her face these days when thinking about her exchanges with Liam. It’s not a romantic feeling. Well maybe. He’s really not her type, but she likes writing to him. On top of it, she is happy with the general direction of her relationship with Dan. She knows she has to refocus on the now and the future: putting into place projects like a "honeymoon" in the south in April with no kids. She has to. Otherwise she will go nuts!

She cries every day, but happiness seems like a possibility to her. 

Liam also likes writing, but especially receiving messages. Sometimes he thinks that what she writes is just nonsense. She apparently has developed a possible thirst for alcohol similar to his given the series of drunk texting. He can imagine words fizzling up to her brain like soda water. Not the big anger bubbles that float crookedly to the surface and explode with irregularly spaced loud plops. Liam, now more used to his quieter post-Charlotte lifestyle and trying to date less outgoing or crankier girls, wonders if Eve’s verbalness would drive him crazy. 

But he looks forward to Eve’s messages and is trying to figure out how he feels about her. It’s not a romantic feeling. Well maybe. She’s really not his type. She’s also not available, at least for now. He is trying to focus on his own life, now that he has gotten out of bed during non-work hours. Eve’s kindness is welcome, but he still has some doubt about her intentions (Nick keeps telling him she is trying to get in his pants). His nostalgia for his previous life pre-hospitalization is ever-present, but he figures the initial shock of enlightenment will eventually wear off. 

He feels lonely and angry every day, and happiness still seems like an impossibility to him. 

As for Charlotte (no, I haven’t forgotten about her), well she has a mouth full of a certain part her new boyfriend’s body. It was sex at first sight when she had arrived at the airport for her trip to Mexico in December to mend her empty… uhhhh broken heart. Jake was going to the same resort as her. She figured why wait until they got there to get intimate, “Come on! It will be fun!” She tried to convince him to take her into the family washroom. He was willing to wait though because her daring was just a little too over the top and his crazy bitch detector was ringing in his head. Instead he tolerated the huge erection that almost drove him to masturbate in the airplane’s bathroom.