We discussed where to go for his one month clean celebration. I gave him several options. He chose the one where we could do an activity we both enjoyed – sifting through mine ore for precious stones. An acquaintance of mine who I had worked with over 25 years ago worked there. This was a man in his 70s – almost twice my age – with whom I have nothing more than a social media friendship, consisting solely of my asking him questions about rocks, and whom I had never had anything but a work relationship previously. We don’t even have each other’s phone numbers. You can probably see where this is going.
I rented an AirBNB, got us tickets to the dig, paid for all our food for the weekend, gas, drove, etc. He had no job, no money, no car, so of course everything was on me. Besides, we were celebrating his victory of one whole month off drugs and alcohol. Yeah, right. Not that money is everything, but it doesn’t help the resultant feeling that I paid over $1000 for this weekend.
He was acting strange from the beginning. He later admitted that he was on meth when we started out but hadn’t brought any with him so was coming down far away from his dealer by the second day – when we went to the location to sift.
On the three hour drive to our destination, he began to tell me, flippantly, how his abusive ex used to bring her husband to this exact hole in the wall town with fewer than 100 occupants to meet with some married friend with whom she was having an affair. He told me all about how she would have sex with this guy in their hotel while her husband and his wife were in the next room. I thought it an odd coincidence since this town is literally in the middle of nowhere. And why wouldn’t he have mentioned it before we were on the road? But why would he make this up?
I realize, in retrospect, he was likely setting the scene for getting triggered by the choice of celebratory locations so as to distract from the truth that he was actually still doing drugs. In retrospect, I realize that a lot of his acting out happened when he had done something to feel guilty about and he was likely creating a scenario of projection so he wouldn’t have to feel guilty.
The first night he was distant, strange. I chalked it up to still recovering from addiction. The next day we went to the dig. My acquaintance greeted us politely and explained the rules. Macuiltochtli seemed distracted, wasn’t paying much attention. My acquaintance asked him to help carry a bag of charcoal to his truck – a guy in his 70s asking the only male under 45 to help him lift something – not super suspicious imo. Macuiltochtli did it with a smile and gave no sign of being upset about it at all. My acquaintance disappeared to sit in his car since we were the only ones in attendance that day and I guess he figured he could trust us since he knew me. But Macuiltochtli began to break the rules and so my acquaintance politely reminded him the right way to do it. Macuiltochtli showed no sign of being upset by the correction.
When we went to leave, I asked if he wanted to say goodbye to my acquaintance. He scoffed and was irritated, saying why would he say goodbye to someone so rude to him. I was confused because I had seen no rudeness, so I asked what he meant and he referenced how my acquaintance had forced him to do manual labor and had corrected him on the rules. I thought it was a little over sensitive to react the way Macuiltochtli was, but offered no argument. I shrugged it off and just said ok go ahead and wait in the car while I pay up.
The whole drive back to town he was ranting about the rudeness of this guy and blaming me for not doing anything about it. I apologized if the behavior of my acquaintance had offended him, said I hadn’t noticed that he had been rude. He ranted about how could I not notice. I said it had just seemed to me like he was reiterating the rules, not being rude. That just made him more angry – that I didn’t feel the behavior had been wrong. I was distracted, so involved in the task at hand that I just must have missed it, I offered. So then he started berating me for first saying I did notice but thought it wasn’t rude, and then changing my story to I didn’t notice. I did hear the exchange, I said, but didn’t notice it was rude probably because I was involved in what I was doing. He then accused me of not paying enough attention to him and letting my “friends” mistreat him. I stopped responding and just let him rant at me the whole drive back.
Back at the AirBNB, he kept at it, now blaming me for bringing him here and putting him in a situation to be so abused. So I apologized again. I said I had no idea my acquaintance was going to make him feel uncomfortable and had he mentioned he felt abused when it happened, I would have taken him and left. But he made no sign of it. He said I should have noticed it myself without him having to tell me. This went on and on in circles so finally I excused myself to take a shower.
When I came out, he was raging. He accused me of getting in the shower alone (i.e., not inviting him) so I could masturbate to the thought of my 70-something acquaintance. He accused me of sneaking this guy into our AirBNB at night to have sex with him. He accused me of bringing sexy clothing on the trip to wear for this guy at night – he had found them in my suitcase. He ranted until I finally locked myself in the bathroom under the guise of having a bath. He continued to rant at me via text message.
He stayed up all night, making noise and continuing to send me angry texts. Finally at around 5 a.m. I had had enough and knew I didn’t want to continue to stay in this “romantic getaway.” I told him I was driving us back. He was livid. Pulled his t-shirt over his head and kept ranting at me for the entire 3 hour drive back home. He kept sending me ranting text messages after I dropped him off. Below are some examples – I call them “hate bombing.”
He was once again using my phone service and I knew the name and number of his dealer, so when I got home I did something I am staunchly against under normal circumstances, but given I had just spent over $1000 on a reward for staying clean for someone who had all the signs of being on drugs, I felt the circumstances were not normal – I checked his phone records. Sure enough, I saw calls to his dealer every few days going back the entire month. The whole “I haven’t touched drugs in a month” thing had been bullshit.
To top it off, I saw lots of calls and texts to a number I didn’t recognize, including several during the trip itself. I looked up who the number belonged to and found it was his first girlfriend, who he had just a couple weeks before told me a story about how he had had sex with her at the tail end of his abusive relationship and how great it was that he had “left cum all over her bed for her husband to come home and find.” Now I see he has been secretly contacting this person who he had given me this lovely mental image of his involvement with. I recalled then that on the drive back he had ranted about how “there are women asking to see me and so far I have declined because if I hang out with them one thing will lead to another, it always doe, and we will definitely fuck.” I realized THIS is who he was talking about.
I confronted him about it. He claimed the number belonged to a specific male friend. I knew that friend’s number and told him so also told him I know that number belonged to her. I canceled the phone and told him I would no longer be paying for his calls and texts to his drug dealer, and other women he’s obviously doing something he shouldn’t with, since if he wasn’t, why persistently lie about it? That’s right, he was using a phone service and phone I was paying for to get drugs I was rewarding him for not taking and to contact women to cheat on me with. Real gentleman. And I got to endure the following hate bombing as well. This is just a mild example of the kind of vitriol he spewed at me for 24 hours straight, first in person and then via text and FB messenger, and continued to on and off for several days later. Note that I wasn’t responding to any of this, so every time he seems to be asking to stop arguing, he’s only arguing with himself. It should also be noted that I never cheated on Macuiltochtli, never even looked at, flirted with, thought about, or remotely considered another man while I was with him. So these “indiscretions” he refers to don’t exist. I don’t even know what he was talking about, though it was probably some delusion he made up like my non-existent dalliance with an elderly acquaintance or the guy I supposedly shipped in from San Francisco.
Moral of the story: Meth is bad. If you ever had the chance to try it, decline. It will destroy your life and everyone around you.
notthekindofgirl 