Admittedly, I had nothing to do. That was the problem with not having many friends. Sometimes, it left lulls in a person’s schedule. I didn’t have class today, my edits did not come back yet, Luna was off on a date that she apparently didn’t need rescuing from, and my sister was on a trip with her husband. There was no way I planned on being the loser who went to hang out with her parents, so that left me alone. Do you know what lonely people do when they get bored? They troll the internet to live vicariously through everyone else’s life.

I should have never done that.

Hometown Billionaire Seen Having Heated Discussion with Former Flame

The picture that accompanied the headline was worth a thousand words, for sure. I just didn’t know what those words should be. I hated it. The feeling in my stomach at seeing my husband standing on a street, in front of what looked like a busy nightclub, arguing with the ex-girlfriend he was torn up about before. Once again, it made me look the fool. It also made me wonder what could have happened that they had that spectacular of an argument in public. The final thing it made me wonder, was why my husband hadn’t bothered to inform me that he had seen his ex, had a public fight with her, or anything else since this had happened the prior evening. I checked my phone again. Nope. No messages, voicemails, or anything else that might have given me a head’s up that this was coming.

“Damn you, Samuel Tucker!”

I took a screenshot of the headline and photo and sent it to Luna along with my own commentary.

Mina: No messages from him and I see this. I guess I was right to worry.

It took a couple minutes before she responded.

Luna: Oh no! Do you need me back there?

Mina: No. We’ll talk tomorrow. I’m going to take a long soak in the tub and then call it a night.

Luna: Maybe it’s not what it looks like.

I laughed about that. It looked like they were having a fight that he never told me about. That’s all that I really needed to know because we had vowed to be honest with one another, and to do so in a timely manner so one of us was never caught off guard. I should have known better because I was always the one caught off guard by what other people did.

I tried to follow my own advice. The bath sucked. I just sat there wishing I was anywhere else and trying not to think about drowning my sorrows in a bottle of wine. One thing my therapist had suggested was to try to get through things without the use of self-medication. She said far too many trauma survivors ended up seeking refuge in the bottom of a bottle or pills, or whatever unhealthy choice helped them to forget. She was right about that. I didn’t need to add to the problems I had in life, so I avoided the temptation to drink myself into a happier place. That also meant that I couldn’t just knock myself out with something and go to sleep.