Set Fire To The Rain

Fireman Sucks!

The night Alyson left me, I opened our condo door to the empty cold echo of a lock chain tapping the doorframe.

Did somebody break in?

My heart dropped into my stomach.

First Alyson.

Now this?

The streetlamps outside my condo windows illuminated dust in the place of missing end tables, sofas, and Home Interior paintings.

No wonder it was so goddamn dark.

All the lamps were missing too.

"Alyson?"

No answer.

"Chula?"

Nothing.

I felt for the light switch on the wall and found all my clothes and watches thrown in a corner by the water heater.

Did she take my dresser too?

The footrest of my olive recliner stuck straight out, smothered with all my socks and boxers from the dryer.

Both my clean and dirty chonies mixed in all together.

My social security card, birth certificate, FDNY Employee handbook, electric bills, and pass due credit card statements were all stuffed in a purple plastic basket on top. It still had a price tag on it for the 99 Cents store.

Apart from that, and the missing $500 in stash I usually hid under the microwave, the rest of my stuff was there.

And everything Alyson owned was gone, including all the expensive necklaces I bought her on birthdays and anniversaries.

She didn't waste any time. Had she been cleaning out the apartment while she was still on the phone with me?

Didn't even throw away all the box shavings and shredded newspaper she'd left behind on the floor.

I'd waited 16 years for this moment.

Fantasized about walking in and dropping the divorce papers in her lap, before dropping all her pink and glittery shit on the doormat too.

Oh, to see her sweet angry face when she missed my height by a good 8 inches, forcing my little habanero to take me out with name-calling instead "Who the hell are you smirking at, pote 'e leche?"

But jokes aside, standing there in my doorway that night, I felt more like a deadbeat than a champion.

There was no victory in this, even if she had cheated on me.

What was I supposed to do now?

Succubus or not, she was home to me. This loveless marriage, our routine.

And it was easier to go home to her for 16 years than do the work of finding something better.

Happily-never-after had always been just me and Alyson.

And I wasn't ready to let her go yet.

So, I made dumb excuses for myself.

Maybe it was something easy I'd overlooked before. Maybe her leaving was something I could one day fix.

Maybe this was just another bender of her BPD, and I'd wake up out of a deep sleep with her on top of me the next morning, whispering, "Papi, let's not fight anymore. Te amo, ok?...But if you hang up on me like that again, I will chop your bicho into chorizo, understand?"

Ah, mi amor...

Maybe it was just me....

...It was definitely me.