Future Wife

[Trigger warning: substance abuse, suicide]

I had been living with my boyfriend Josiah for nine months (in North Carolina) when his older brother Josh hung himself from a tree in Florida. It was the end of January when Josiah’s brother Josh went missing for two days and finally a jogger found him early one morning and my boyfriend, Josiah and all his brothers and sisters and mother and father and grandmother were devastated, obviously. I had not known Josh, but I was devastated too.

Josiah went back to Florida for his brother's funeral and did not call me once to tell me how he was doing or how the service was.

The relationship between Josiah and I had been mostly good, or so I thought, up until then. Then it became fraught with conflicts and tensions. If I am being honest, the relationship was not great. Josiah was embarrassed to introduce me to his friends and did not introduce me to family. And he was still madly in love with his ex, the girl who came before me, Olivia.

Olivia was younger than him (and I was older than him) and they had lived together in Josiah’s house for four years. I was the rebound relationship. He never told me this, but I pieced it together after hearing him pine over Olivia and lament the fact that he had done everything wrong and was responsible for driving her away.

What had happened was: Olivia’s mother had moved down to NC and bought a house in the town over and she moved out, moved in with her mother, and they “broke up.” How broken up they actually were—never particularly clear to me. I got the impression that they still saw each other, still spoke to each other, still texted each other, and still slept together (occasionally). Josiah was never quite honest about his continuing relationship with Olivia. But of course, she reached out to him after his brother killed himself. And not long after that phone conversation (I was there when she called him and he never said I was there with him) Josiah made up several brutal reasons for asking me to move out. And then he dumped me.

She wanted to get together, and he hoped a reconciliation would occur between them and he didn’t want me in the way.

Josiah was a glassblower who worked from a studio in his home. He was very experienced at glass blowing and incredibly talented and he made a lot of good money selling his glare wares—pipes, bongs, and cups. He had even taught me how to glass blow or how to play around with melting rods of glass and I practiced bending the glass rods into shapes…mostly squares and triangles. I made a few glass sculptures and was proud of myself for being able to do that. It felt good to play with melting glass and to be with Josiah while he was working.

In truth, Josiah did not like blowing glass alone. He preferred blowing glass in the company of friends and girlfriends.

Josiah was a night owl. He worked late into the night and would crash into bed, drunk and high, in the early morning hours just as my alarm clock was about to go off so I could get up and take a shower and get ready for my full-time office job. I worked a 40-hour week and was often not “home” at his place so that left him the entire day (without me) to text other girls, skateboard with bros, take his beloved dog Tela for walks, and snowboard in the wintertime.

Towards the end of our relationship which happened to be in the middle of March (the Ides of March, it felt like to me) he accused me of stealing money from him. Then he found it in the couch. Had lost it in one of his black out drunken stupor binges. Then he accused me of tampering with (no, dismantling) the torch in his glass blowing studio. I never went into his studio without him and would never have dreamt of touching his things in any way especially nefariously. I was shocked and humiliated. It made no sense why he would think so badly of me. I had never done anything wrong to deserve that kind of vehement vitriol. He was adamant that I had done this horrible thing. Instead of realizing that he must have done it when he was stoned and black out drunk, he accused me instead. He also wanted to have a justifiable reason to dump me and evict me.

Then he accused me of stealing his precious homegrown cannabis. I do not regularly smoke, and I never touched his mason jar stash of marijuana. He sold some or gave some away one time and forgot about it. But he accused me of taking it and hiding it. Then one time, before I left the house he came over to me and patted me down, turned my pockets inside out, and said he wanted to make sure I did not walk away with any of his stuff.

I paid one more month of rent and the next day he asked me to move out. To preserve my self respect and dignity, I gave him back his key without a fight. He still had tons of my stuff in his house that he would not give me back. I realized that he had accused me of stealing from him because he was guilty of stealing and projecting onto me that which he was guilty of doing himself. After I moved out, I moved back home to my mothers house in a town one hour away. I was heart broken.

I went on vacation to Orlando, Florida, to visit my dad and his girlfriend at her house for the first time ever. My dad and Janet had been together for over ten years by this point. It was time I went to visit them. I had an enjoyable time. My father cooked my favorite Chinese food dish and took me to a Blue Angels air show, and I went to a Benson Boone concert by myself. During the trip to Florida, I texted Josiah that I missed him. He wrote me back: Do not text me anymore. Good Riddance!

I could not believe that he was so cruel and so cold after the loving time we shared but then again, his brother had just died tragically and unexpectedly, and he was not dealing with it in a healthy way. Is there a healthy way to grieve such a loss? If there is, I sure as hell don’t know what it is.

Months later, I heard from one of his friends that Josiah and Olivia went to visit Josiah’s mother and grandmother in Sarasota, together. Josiah had blocked me on all social media, but I used a friends to see his Instagram pictures. Josiah and Olivia standing with their feet in the ocean at the beach, watching the sunset. Or there were pictures of him and her in the car on the way there and he was smiling and I could see that he was so happy to be with her again.

Over the next year, Josiah reached out to me here and there, usually when all his other friends were busy or he needed something that only I could provide.

I was weak. I went back to see him again and again, hoping one day he would choose me. I hoped one day he would finally see my value, my worth. He already knew that I had forgiven him all the bullshit he put me through. That was my problem. It was easy for me to forgive and forget. I should not have forgotten the accusations he leveled at me. He never apologized. And we never got back together.

He would tell me about Olivia and how he wanted to be with her but how she was not there for him in the way he wanted her to be. She was busy living her life—the one without him in it. He had, after all, put her through all kinds of shit and she did not forgive and forget as easily as me.

We would have sex and sometimes it was passionate and hungry. Sometimes it was Josiah being a selfish lover and I got nothing out of it but the chance to be with him one more time.

I do not remember the last time. There was a last time. I think he pushed me down onto my knees and demanded a blow job. I obliged. I always did. I wanted him to love me, after all, and I would do anything for him, anything to show him that I cared, that I was there for him.

I heard he took Olivia to a concert. He never took me out anywhere. He never introduced me to many of his friends or family.

There was one rare time he took me to his best friend Jesse’s house. It turned out that it was Jesse’s birthday. We had not known. Jesse invited us to stay and drink and made a bonfire in his backyard. I was happy sitting beside Josiah. But Josiah was miles away. After his brother's death he started smoking crack regularly. He was burning through his life savings. But since he worked for himself and made his own money and provided for himself, no one could tell him how to live or what to do. He also drank a lot every day. He even got a DUI at two in the afternoon after hitting three parked cars and smashing up his truck.

He called Olivia for help, and she bailed him out and picked him up from jail. When I heard about it, I tried not to feel hurt that he had once again chosen her and turned to her. He called her his “best friend” to me. He would say I was his “whore.” I should have walked away from him after that. But I had no self respect, and I still loved him so much.

Josiah’s life had taken a turn for the worse. He was regularly smoking crack and started hanging out with bad people. He would call me up at four in the morning, drunk and high, and say, I am going to kill myself tonight.

I would drive the hour to his house from my place and try to be there for him. He would ask me to pick up some beer and cigarettes on my way over. I would, of course, because I loved him. He would tell me that he would pay me back. He never paid me back. Sometimes, he would be too high to function, and he would be paranoid and eyes bugging and wild and I would try to calm him down. Then he would inevitably blame me for freaking him out. Sometimes I would drive over at ungodly hours to save him only for him to not answer the phone or come to the door and I would drive the hour home, dejected, and worried about him. And embarrassed that I had fallen for his pity me charade.

One time he asked me why I wasn’t paranoid. I responded: because I know I am not that important.

He nodded like he understood and said, oh yeah.

My comment seemed to resonate with him and to shift something he long believed was true about himself, namely that he was important.

Now I feel so bad about saying that. After that, he spiraled even further down.

Josiah started hanging out with this girl Alyssa. I had never met her, but I could see that he was excited about her. He kept saying that Olivia did not want to be with him.

I told him she did want to be with him…when he got his shit together, they would be together.

Sometimes, he would kick me out as soon as I arrived and say that I made him uncomfortable because I was so weird. In truth, he was the weird one.

I was just honest and not fake.

Josiah invited some other girl to live with him. She moved in and then moved out. He went through a few more roommates. He got into a fist fight with one of them. A man who was much bigger than him. Josiah had a black eye.

He never told me about anything that was going on in his life unless he was exceptionally drunk. Josiah was a dominant and aggressive man. But he was also a gentle and beautiful soul. A sweetheart when he was sober. He could be mean, but I liked that about him. At least he was honest. Unless he was telling lies.

He accused me of being dishonest about things, like about if I slept with his friend. I had not. But he didn’t believe me. Not that he even cared. If he ever cared about me, I didn’t know it.

The last time Josiah ever texted me was on a Friday morning, July 25th. I was at work.

He wrote: You wanna hang out?

I wrote him back: I am at work right now. But yes, I would love to hang out with you later.

Josiah was missing for a week. I texted him. When I called it went straight to his voicemail. One day Olivia reached out to me about him.

She said, I am Olivia. Josiah is missing. Can you tell us anything that might help us find him?

I wrote her back: Thanks for reaching out. Maybe he’s in a trap house? Sometimes we hook up and sometimes I give him a ride to Aldi. I love Josiah very much.

She wrote back: Well, I love him with my whole heart. If you know anything…he could be dead somewhere. I am in touch with a detective.

I said, please let me know if you hear anything.

The thing was, he left his dog behind. He would never leave Tela behind. He loved that dog more than life. He had just taught her to walk beside him off her leash.

I did not say, I love him with my whole heart too. I did not want to be in competition with Olivia.

They found Josiah in the morgue a week after he first went missing. He smoked crack that was laced with fentanyl and had a fatal overdose. His friend told me. I fell to my knees outside and wailed. I never heard from Olivia again. She kept his dog. She kept all his things. The next time I tried to send a message to his phone saying I will always love you, I saw that I had been blocked.

The obituary was painful. In it, Josiah’s relatives were listed and his favorite hobbies and a recent picture of him taken when he went hiking with Olivia. We had also gone on many hikes together. But he never wanted to take a picture with me. I always snapped one of him and Tela and he would flip me the bird and smirk.

In the obituary, Olivia was listed as his “future wife.” If they had plans to get married or were engaged, he never told me. We had been hooking up in the days before he died. But he was also hooking up with her, I knew because he told me, Olivia let me smash. And he said it proudly.

I had learned to accept what crumbs of affection Josiah was willing to throw my way. I had learned to accept him as he was flaws and all. It is ironic because he always pointed out my flaws and cringed. I accepted that I was never good enough for him. I accepted that he would string me along if I would allow him to. I accepted that he did not love me. I accepted that I was a placeholder in his life and he would spend time with me secretly while waiting for Olivia to be ready for him again.

I have heard it said that families and loved ones who lose someone tragically and unexpectedly (especially if drugs are involved) sometimes seek to alter the narrative surrounding their passing and to reshape the story of their lives. The future wife thing caught me off guard. He had even said in the weeks before he died, maybe I’ll choose you since you are there for me. It’s too bad you hate dogs.

He had once said that I hate dogs! I do not hate dogs. And I adored his dog, Tela. But it was another one of those justifiable excuses he made up for not wanting to be with me. I thought he was surely joking. But he was serious. He told his friends that I hated dogs. I told them it wasn’t true. I don’t know if they believed him.

I had been trying to let Josiah go for two years when he died. His death was the ultimate tragedy to me because of all the unresolved shit between us and the fact that he had kept me around as a secret in his life for so long. If he never loved me, then why did he keep me around?

I have a Polaroid photo of Josiah tucked into the mirror on my vanity and I say hello to him every day. Sometimes I even swear I see his eyes moving in the photograph and that perhaps he is watching over me from wherever he finds himself now.

I said goodbye in my own way. And now I must let him go. Let it all go. I will always love Josiah. And I miss him. But now let Josiah and his future wife live together in perfect peace and harmony. And I wish them the best even though I was never invited to the wedding.