78. A DAY OF LOSS
My mom was in the hospital and I needed someone to talk to. I texted my girlfriend but only got a few one-word responses. About an hour later, she sent me a selfie of herself and asked what I thought about her new haircut.
It wasn’t like her to send these shallow responses, especially considering my mom’s health, so that made me suspicious.
The following weekend, I went to her house so that we could work on her yard together. I helped her plant a few things and fixed a few issues on the outside of her house.
I spent most of the day doing yard work. The next day, we had planned to go bike riding a couple of towns over. I asked if she wanted to spend the night at my house.
She said she just wanted to sleep in her bed, so I went home. At 4:30 that morning, I got a call from the hospital and saw my mom for the last time.
My girlfriend called me an hour later saying her car had been vandalized. She had been at her friend’s house. Apparently, when she was leaving, her car was spray painted and the tires were slashed.
I was a little out of it, but I knew things didn’t add up. I copied the picture she sent the week before to my computer and checked the metadata in the picture.
Her phone tags her pictures with GPS coordinates. She was at Tom’s house. She had been going there regularly over the past few weeks. Several of her selfies were taken in her car in his driveway.
I ended the relationship. She was dumbfounded. All she cared about was fixing her car and she didn’t even offer support with my loss. I ended up giving a eulogy to a bunch of empty chairs.
No one bothered to show up to my mom’s funeral. She sent a text months after to meet so she could apologize but that was over four years ago now.