The sun was bright that day, and I was meeting friends for lunch, at a grill in Springfield, VA some two decades ago. I was always late to the technology game, so no GPS. I wrote the directions down, but was lost, the street seeming to crisscross in a way I could not compute.
I turned to my left to ask the driver in the white SUV where "Mike's" was and the minute our eyes locked it was as if time stopped. His eyes were a clear, other-wordly green I'd never seen before. It felt as if an eternity passed as my heart broke open and I felt him, almost like a memory of him from long ago came rushing back.
Regainig my composure in the breath that held eternity, I asked for directions, he smiled, gave them and I sped off--in the wrong direction. He sped off after me, and blocked two lanes of traffic, telling me to follow him, that he would take me to the restaurant himself. The thing about destiny is that it is what you make of it, made up of the choices, good or bad, that people make. Fate brought us together. What we did with it would be our destiny to make, for better or worse.
When we got to the restaurant, he said, "My friend Duncan works there. If he's your waiter, tell him TL sent you." I thanked him profusely, and was having a hard time pulling away and saying good-bye to my seemingly ethereal new friend.
I sat with my lunch dates "Kat" and her mother, telling them the story. We all had mystical, spiritual backgrounds, theirs was from Russia. I am from Brazil, with roots spanning the globe. This was a large restaurant, as I recall, with two floors, maybe more. We could have had any of a dozen-plus waiters.
As we were talking about my trip to them and my green-eyed escort, our waiter arrives. "Hello, I'm Duncan, and I'll be your waiter today..." We started laughing. Kat's mom says, leaning in, a bit of mischief in her chuckle, "Only us...three witches." Kat and I were wide-eyed, stunned.
Something told me to give my number to Duncan to give to TL. I later got a phone call. We spoke every day. We shared abuse histories, spoke for hours at a time, about many things. Days later, he picked me up for our first date--my favorite, sushi.
He was a perfect gentleman, opened my doors every time I got in and out of his truck and everywhere we entered or left, and paid for our meals. Our first kiss was pure magic, the stuff you tell generations of your children and grandchildren about. Much later, we spoke of what we would tell our children, that we hope that what happened to us would happen to them.
About nine days after that first fateful day, I felt an intensity that required I tell him something I never told any partner this early on--my entire abuse story. It was dark, painful and terrifying. But I felt he was my One, and he was speaking that way with me. I had to. Little did I know what he would do...
I was at my mom's house and asked him to meet me at mine, a 40-minute drive away. I was oddly calm, but my bones shook as they often did when I broached this topic, this deep. When he got there, I opened the door and he sat in the living room chair, the weight of what I was about to tell him caused me to collapse at his feet. Foster care, multiple rapes, the health issues I sustained, more.... Before I could get five words in, he got on the floor with me, this 6'1, 300-something pound man. "I'm not letting you sit on the floor like this and tell me this story, while I sit above you in a chair." By now, I was crying and he was lying next to me, looking at me eye-to-eye. He held me, gently, hands holding my face. "This is the last time you are ever going to have to tell this story." When I was done, he put his hands around my face and asked me to marry him. I lost it and said yes. He was the first man to know my whole story and walk through that darkness for me and refuse to let it win. He chose me over everything that happened to me in my entire life, that day, and let love win, or seemed to.
We shared a body that day, and it was different than anything, with anyone I'd ever known. He held me like he would never let me go. In that moment, I believed him, with everything I had.
Soon, he had to leave, walked out to his car for some appointment. I called my mom. She is my adopted mom, and the best ever. She told me. "You will have everything you would have just as if you came from me. You won't miss one event or advantage. I'll take it from here. You just be my daughter and his bride."
He called from the car, before he even pulled away from my house. "I miss you already. I don't want to go. I love you so much." I returned those sentiments, but something was rising, off in the spiritual distance that was odd and perplexing. There were moments when I couldn't remember his name, and it was not neurological. I have an array of spiritual gifts, and at that time, I was just beginning to learn, understand and come to terms with what they meant, really a lifetime endeavor.
That phenomenon is one of the things that happens when someone is lying or withholding information, I'd soon learn. I kept remembering and un-remembering his name. It was a warning, but one new to me so I didn't know what to make of it, just yet. I thought it might be overwhelm or nerves.
We were in love, but there was something very wrong and I was on the brink of finding out, with no idea just how bad it was...
P2 coming soon...