I knew it was over, long before it actually was official. If my life was a novel, there had been plenty of foreshadowing. The weekend before we separated, my then-husband asked me if I thought it was possible that there was more than one "right" person in the world for him or me. We were gassing up our van after getting groceries, a pretty mundane task. Not for a moment did I even think the question was weird. We had both matured a lot since those lovesick days, and I thought it was a fair question. Years earlier, I would have told him no, that there was only one true soul mate for each person (thus implying that I had better be his!). On this day though, hardened by the realities of marriage, torn between feelings I had held before and perhaps ones that never should have even existed, I told him I thought there was. He agreed. Love, it seemed, was not hard as steel, but malleable and changeable like a soft metal over the fire.
What had brought this on? Surely there was someone else? But I knew that though things had been smooth for what, maybe three days, that arguing now had become our language. Though we would always make-up, and though we would still “be intimate”, the meaning was lost on us. Hell, the last time we were “intimate”, we couldn't even do that without arguing. No, really. I will spare all the details, but let’s suffice it to say that resentment had finally crept, like a slow fungus, into all aspects of our relationship. We had become roommates, business partners with benefits; both escaping back to our own lives every chance we got. I knew in my heart that this was not like times past where one of us had left for a few hours or issued empty threats. This time was real.
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