You said her name. You took it upon yourself to talk about her. We were all in our own conversations and out of the corner of my eye I saw you stand up bringing all of our attention to yourself. And before you opened your mouth, I knew you were going to mention her. The second her name touched your lips I felt sick. More than that I felt a rage from inside of me that went throughout my whole body and I wanted to scream at you, to tell you that you had no right to talk about her. That anyone else in the world could speak about her but not you. But I didn’t say anything. I felt eyes on me from all different directions. Eyes that pleaded with me to keep my mouth shut and just let you have this moment. And so, I went against everything my head and my heart were telling me and I sat there while you talked about her.

You shared a story that was more about you then it was about her. You played us a scene from your life and cast her as an extra when she should have been the star. You tried to convey real emotion but to my ears it fell very short. And as you spoke of her, or tried to, I wanted to ask you if you were going to share another memory of you and her. A memory that she shared with me one day at her house, with tears in her eyes as she told me how you saw her one day and ignored her. And she couldn’t understand what she did to make you act that way. And I saw the sadness and the hurt in her eyes as she spoke and that was the day I lost all respect for you. Just like that, with one story, from one person, it was gone. You fell from the pedestal I once tried to put you on for all those years that I defended you and your actions. But that day, seeing tears in her eyes, there was no defense for you.

You started to talk about family and I laughed to myself as the bullshit just kept coming out of your mouth. I laughed because the truth is that the only family you care about is the one you made for yourself, not the one that was given to you. You only care about yourself and your world and we are not even a thought in your life unless it’s convenient for you. And she was no exception when she sure as hell should have been. And that cannot be forgiven so easily.

I sat there in my anger feeling like my head was going to explode. And I listened to your lies and your bullshit promises that you were never going to keep. You knew it, I knew it, everyone else knew it but you said them anyway as if we were supposed to believe that a big change with you was going to occur. Maybe someone was gullible to believe your words, but it wasn’t me.

I’ve tried very hard not to think about it after all this time but it sneakily makes its way into conversations and I remember how I felt. I push it down over and over again but it still finds its way into my head. And the feelings are as fresh today as they were back then. So, I’m releasing them onto this paper hoping it will help me to let it go. It’s over and done with, I can’t change it. And maybe it will help me, and maybe it won’t because the question that runs through my mind the most is ‘am I angrier at you for talking about her or at myself for listening?’.

Author: Lisa Ricco

I am a wife, a mother and a writer. Fear has held me back for too long and has robbed me of too much. Now is the time to take back control of my life. View all posts by Lisa Ricco