You can't hit the puppy...

I've mentioned before that I got a long email once from Smash's other significant ex.

While I thought that my heartbreak and this horrible situation was unique to me, apparently, we're both just that unique because all the lies, cheating, porn addiction and trolling for transvestites happened to her as well. Which is weird. Weird because it's so seedy you find yourself in an odd position of thinking "wow...this happened to someone else?" and weird because you think, "how did I miss this?" 

...and considering all that I do know...and all that I have learned...the real question is...how much did I miss?

and how?

it's the damn blue eyes and the sometimes adorable, usually awkward way he'd approach things. I found his attempts just adorable enough to look into his sweet eyes and forget that he'd hurt me. I'd look at the awkward way he was trying to perfect making me dinner...watching a video on youtube for perfect lobster tails or bringing over a bottle of wine that he thought was a unique grape, but i knew you could buy at the grocery store. He'd miss the mark so much he'd be on it. 

and then he'd look at me, with those blue eyes...and I'd think "You can't hit the puppy." 

and no matter how valid my reason to be angry was, I'd swallow it...

The very first time I caught him cheating, I tearfully called him out. I told him that he'd have to choose between the girl in the pictures and me. It was his choice, but he couldn't have both...He got wildly animated with tears in his eyes. He told me that I made him "feel feelings he hadn't felt in so long...and that he got scared." He grabbed my shoulders with both hands and made me stare right into his eyes...and softly said "I love you." 

I had only known him a few months at this time and bought it. I swallowed my anger and hugged him and said I love you too...and we curled up on the couch and he rubbed my shoulders and we both cried a little. 

and I stopped being mad, because you can't hit the puppy. 

Fast forward through five years of having a puppy. 

Right after my birthday, while the flowers he sent me were still blooming on my counter, I found that Smash had accidentally sent me not one, but two pornographic videos from the girl in the region. They were disgusting and depicted incest porn. I was floored. I was also angry. On the phone that night he told me "Honey, she's just some tramp that Pat's wife knows. I don't know her. I gave her my number when I was drunk. I'm sorry. I don't know why she sent the videos. "

Ummm...yeah buddy...

and I'm not really that stupid...you know? I'm really not. I knew that if she was sending those videos, he was sending something just as perverted. I just didn't get those in my inbox. I knew that he was telling me he loved and missed me and telling her to send him pictures. 

I knew it because it was a familiar game. God only knows what he told her about me...

When he was walking in the house coming home a few days before Christmas, I was standing in the doorway. It was "my" house by now and no longer "ours" and the room that had been his studio was now my reading room. But when he walked in, it still felt like he was coming home. I was standing there, hands on my hips...ready for a fight.

He walked in and dropped his bag and hugged me. He looked straight into my eyes and said "I'm sorry I hurt you. That girl, she's nothing. She's some slut. She's not cute, she's not you. You are everything, I love you." 

You can't hit the puppy. 

But funny how you know something and you're just RIGHT about it? I knew he was lying right then. I also knew that she'd be getting a little more than she bargained for when she got into him...I was right about both. 

Sadly, he's the same guy. He's doing the same things he did to me and to the one before me. For all the feelings I have towards this girl, she actually didn't do anything to me. I know how he is. He lied. 

and he's lying right now...i have my text logs and DM's full of pictures to prove it. I heard about some of the stuff that happened in Dallas recently. I can't imagine it's that different from any of the stuff that's happened before. You think you have him...because he's there, he's in your bed...

But darling, when he's not in your bed, he's in someone else's. Or on the computer with someone else. At some point you'll get obsessed and start looking at his phone. Find my number. Call me. I'll give you the straight shot on the truth of what is happening. 

You won't believe me...or you'll believe him when he says it's over with those other girls or that he doesn't know "why" they call... That I'm lying because I'm trying to hurt him. 

But it won't be over because it will never be over. I'm not lying because I have nothing to gain by lying. He's lying and you'll catch him and he'll mumble all the "right words" to get you to listen.

You'll find yourself staring into those blue eyes and swallowing your anger. 

Because you can't hit the puppy.