It was just a mistake. I never should have done that to you.
In what world would that ever be considered a proper apology? The world is watching you, you traitor. And I wonder how you would feel being compared to your father, brother, or any other role model. Would you turn up your face in disgust and claim that you weren’t like them? Because your circumstances were different, and every decision you made to get to this point was… a mistake? You are not fooling anyone other than yourself.
It’s really hard to hear that you don’t forgive me. But I understand why.
No amount of pandering and false empathy can possibly change the outcome. Not when the person sitting beside you sees through the fawning—all the bullshit you do to garner sympathy, seemingly missing the point every single time. Perhaps you really do feel regret, and for that, I can sympathise. But it wasn’t that you were remorseful; it was that you were caught. And suffering the consequences of your own actions.
I thought I was the problem—that I was never good enough.
It’s not fair that society blames you for it.
Don’t pin it on her. This was your own doing. The lies, the cheating, the hiding. And still, after all this, you can’t seem to take responsibility for your sins. Past the tainted memories of pleasure—the feeling of her soft skin on your body as your fingertips travelled down her waist in the back of your car, forgetting any semblance of loyalty to your devoted wife. Was the illusion of happiness worth it?
We’ve made a lot of progress, but you’re still angry.
Do you truly understand what it feels like to be betrayed? I don’t believe men like you do. When you proactively pursue the other woman and specifically carve out time in your week to spend with her, you can’t say it was a mistake. I bet you enjoyed it. Her. Wherever you went, whenever you went. You may feel some type of way for hurting the person you so claim to love, but your actions? There is no convincing me that you feel any remorse.
They will forgive me. They have to. I’ve said sorry.
The taste of grace is so sweet, especially when you know the repercussions are severe. Only you benefit from the mercy of everyone you betrayed. They tiptoe around your sin, afraid to bring it up with a man who always claims that he is the victim. And that too is cowardly. But forgiveness doesn’t mean forgetting. When it destroys whole communities, how can you call the enablement of such loathsome behaviour, love?
How could you let him get away with it?
Even when you witnessed her in agony over the things you had done, did you finally realise the damage you caused when she broke down in front of you? For her to live through the reality-shattering consequences, to question everything, and relive the stories that play in her head—do you really understand what you have done? No matter how much you try to convince yourself, you are not a good person. And if you can’t own up to what you have done, maybe you never will be.
How could you do this to me?
Even months later, similar circumstances continue to traumatise me. Ned Fulmer’s reappearance in the public eye has stirred me far more than I thought. Of course, re-experiencing betrayal in a frightening parallel akin to my own wounds hasn’t helped me heal. The anger I once thought quelled by the months of work was just as easily undone by the words of a cowardly and immoral man who only knows how to live by the language of consequences. And I am repulsed by it.
Frankly, I don’t trust men. I haven’t in a long time. And I often wonder whether they are even capable of taking responsibility for their actions—whether they know what they’ve done wrong and how much they continue to hurt those around them. I’m not fond of the fact that my writing is still influenced by such nauseating individuals, and I am rather saddened by the fact that I can mix my own story in this one and still have it make sense. Why is it that tragedies like these tell the same story, rewritten with the same structure but in a different font?
I am not convinced these are people whom God has made in His image. But I am somehow still convinced of His goodness and grace—what a shame I live and die by such convictions. It’s hard to love the other when it seems all they do is hurt you.
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