I felt hurt.
I mean she reached out first, and then the moment I actually replied she just disappeared. Disappeared right when I was at my saddest. It would have been completely fine if she had just said something like "I'm sorry for your loss."
It just stung. I've known her for 9 years. Almost every year I'd wish her happy birthday and happy Lunar New Year. It used to feel genuine but now I just feel foolish.
I unbuckled my belt, stood up, and walked straight down the aisle to the back galley where the flight attendants were standing.
I told them a grown man was refusing to keep his body out of my seat.
One of them walked back with me, strictly warned him to stay in his own space, and he stayed on his side for the rest of the flight.
The absolute audacity of people on planes is wild.
I almost ignored it, but something in the timing made me glance down. It was a text.
Danny, this is Lisa. I know you probably don’t want to hear from me, but I need to say something.
I stared at it for a long moment before opening the rest.
She wrote that she understood now what she had lost. That Richard had never planned to leave his life for her. That what she mistook for excitement had really just been vanity dressed as passion. She admitted she had thrown away 8 years of marriage for 6 months of lies. She said I would never forgive her and that I should not, but that she wanted me to know she finally understood what I had been worth, what she had destroyed, and what kind of man she should have appreciated when she still had the chance
She still went ahead, claimed later she was desperate for the money, and cops busted the place while she was there with the kids. She got arrested and lost custody of her kids to her ex.
She later got out (cut a deal or didn't have enough evidence or something). But she couldn't get the custody back.
And she is blaming me for that. Losing custody. Because I didn't answer her call or knock or babysit her kids. Her argument is that she lost custody only cause she was endangering them.