I spent the next few weeks hoping the rest of my plan had worked. Girlfriend was a very important part of this plan. I figured Oops would move in with her, I could retrieve the rest of my belongings and we could part alive and well. I was 27 years old and about to be "revorced". Thank you, Elise, we will make that an official word. Revorce: any and all dissolution of a marriage after a first divorce; or something Websterish.
And Oops did not disappoint. He was soon happily living with girlfriend, driving my car and promising he would get our revorce over as soon as possible and return the car. He had his eye on a new vehicle already.
I contemplated all the mistakes I had made. Men were far too important, I needed to depend on me. Dad was right about that, (yuck). Never, ever, ever would I be in someone's parade. Relationships would be on my terms only. I realized that it wasn't Elsie I hated, it was what he represented. That attitude of, I don't have to treat you with any consideration. Well now someone would most assuredly be treating me with lots of consideration because otherwise he might lose a face. And I was not going to waste time even thinking about a man who dared get married while I was suffering. My issue, not his.
I called Zelda. I had not been in touch with friends except accidentally for almost two years. I explained my little marital problems and asked if she would consider a roommate. She would, of course. That's what real friends do. She had moved to a smaller house in the same neighborhood we had lived formerly. She needed to clean out the extra room, it was her craft room. I told her I would sleep on the floor. I just really needed away from the parents. She had to work the next morning but said she would meet me at her house around 10:30 or 11:00 the next day and get me in there somehow. I told her I would bring sufficient clothes and my guitar, of course, and we could worry about furniture and my other belongings later. This was really freedom.
That Saturday morning I got up, put some stuff in the yacht and said adios to my parents. I told them I would be in touch and give them a phone number to reach me later. I had left to early to meet Zelda but that was OK, I was going to stop, get a package of cigarettes and a cola and drive around my favorite old Cowtown neighborhood and smoke a joint to kill the time. I stopped at a little convenience store, one I had driven by for years but never stopped. I pulled this huge beast of a car in the parking place next to a new shiny 280Z with a man just getting in it. He looked at the massive front end of my yacht to make sure I would not eat his Z car. As he drove away I chuckled at how much he looked like Elsie. Except for the fancy pressed clothes, the short hair and the very, very fancy car. Must have him on my mind.
I drove around and looked at the stately mansions off of 8th Avenue killing time and headed to Zelda's. She was coming in the back door as I was knocking on the front door. We hugged and chatted for just a minute and she said, "Elsie is on his way over here to drop something off". Great, the first man I was going to see from my "past" was him. Oh well, I'll be nice and ask about the wife and.......a silver 280Z pulled up in front of the house and THAT MAN got out of the car. The one from the convenience store. I was speechless. He walked in and smiled that damn smile with those damn blue eyes. Damn him, looking so good. "Wow", he said, "what are you doing?" "I just saw you at Jamie's". I said. "And you didn't speak?", he laughed, "didn't think is was me did you?"
Mercy, he had changed outside and in. I was about to be COURTED by Parade Boy. That weird motion I felt under my feet was the world shifting on it's axis.
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