“I have to go film this ‘After the Final Rose’ thing soon,” I said.
“I don’t want you to go do that,” he said. He actually looked nervous.
Maybe he didn’t want me to leave him again. Maybe he just didn’t want me to see Jason, out of fear that it would rekindle the feelings that we had felt. I don’t know. It was just a small moment, and not enough to give me real clarity or comfort during a time when both of the major relationships in my life were in such a weird place. But it felt good to hear him say that he wanted me to stay, since it had been him telling me to go that had originally set this whole crazy odyssey in motion.
I remember thinking that night how I felt just being with Tye . . . not dating him, not wooing him, but just sitting and talking with him. And it felt great. It was a feeling I had never experienced with Jason. And to be frank, I didn’t even get to experience it with Tye when we had dated previously. He had never really let me into the place that he did that night on his roof. We were both vulnerable, and leaning on each other, and enjoying our friendship for really the first time.
The next day, I took off for Los Angeles to face the dreaded “After the Final Rose” taping. I was getting very anxious just sitting on the plane. I was about to face people who I hadn’t seen in months . . . most important the man who I was engaged to but had such an awkward relationship with. I had no idea what was about to happen, or what we were going to do. And the fact that my communication with Jason had basically ceased, I wasn’t getting much direction from him.
I began replaying the entire experience in my head. What I felt when I first saw Jason . . . reliving our first date . . . remembering our proposal. How would I feel when I saw him? Would it make me remember how I felt on the show? Would I get angry as to how things turned out? Would I be able to confront Jason about why he didn’t at least try to make this work? Did I even care?
So many questions were swirling in my head, and I just had a huge pit in my stomach. And it was so weird that Jason and I hadn’t talked at all about what we were going to do or say. The more I thought about it, the angrier I got. Why hadn’t Jason talked to me before we came here to film this? Aren’t I at least owed that? I mean, he friggin’ proposed to me! And here I was, having to face him after months, and talk about our relationship in front of the camera. I didn’t want to talk about what was going on, or wrong, in our relationship with cameras rolling. I felt they were conversations that needed to take place privately first.
I was sitting backstage, just about to walk on the stage with Jason and host Chris Harrison, and I had all of these emotions bottled up inside of me, which was the perfect combustible material for good TV. One wrong word was going to make all of my feelings come pouring out in a way that I was afraid I was going to regret later.
To start off the segment, they showed the footage from the day we got engaged in New Zealand. Now, keep in mind, the show was still airing at this time, so none of us had seen the proposal—neither I nor Jason. And watching it made me tear up. And I’ll be honest, I don’t know why. Part was sadness, part was embarrassment. . . . I was definitely overwhelmed, and the emotional ride I’d been on felt like it was about to explode.
I awkwardly walked out on stage . . . I didn’t even know whether I should hug Jason or not. And I was so upset that this was now going to be discussed publicly, that I was literally shaking. Chris set Jason up to start talking, and Jason launched into this big speech about how he’d wanted to give me everything when he proposed to me, but he now felt like things had changed between us.
He fidgeted in his seat while he talked, “I mean, our conversations over the last few weeks have been how things are different . . . How I feel like things are different. And we both just watched and saw everything that we’ve been through. Which every single moment of that experience, for me, was true. I completely fell in love with you . . . I knew on that last day that I wanted to give you everything. I wanted to give you my life, I wanted to give you everything you deserved. But I feel like things are different.”
My blood began to boil. He didn’t have the decency to say this to me off camera? He had to wait until I was thrown in front of millions of people? I could only shake my head in disbelief. I couldn’t believe we were having this conversation for the first time in front of millions of people!
Jason continued, “I came here to find somebody to spend my life with . . . I . . . We’re not right for each other.” He stopped, and waited for me to react.
“I don’t know what you want me to say when you sit there and say that, because I don’t believe you.” I was literally shaking from anger. Now I was angry that I had just watched this proposal, and heard him say how much he loved me, and wanted to give me everything, and couldn’t wait to start a life with me. . . . And now, it’s just changed. He had made a commitment to be with me forever. HE made the decision to ask me to marry him. HE was the one who had been through the experience before, and knew how easy it was to get wrapped up in the process. HE was the one who should have known better! And HE didn’t even want to fight for the relationship. I didn’t want him to fight for it now, but he didn’t fight for it when it was brand-new . . . when things had started to turn . . . he didn’t even try to see if it could work.
I continued on my rant, “I do not see how you can sit there and say what you said to me: ‘I love you,’ ‘I want to spend my life with you,’ ‘I want to make you happy’. . . and then the second, the second you start having doubts, you don’t talk to me about it and say ‘let’s work on this, let’s fight. I just put a ring on your finger, so let’s see what we can do to fix this.’ No, it’s ‘I’m just gonna pull away. Whoaa, things are different, and I don’t even want to try.’” My voice started to shake as I fought back tears. “Do you see where I’m a little irritated?”
I glared at him, unable to see anything likeable or good about the man who I had been sure, just a few months ago, was going to be my future husband.
“Of course,” he said calmly, “You have every right to be irritated.”
“What did I do?” I interrupted him.
He shook his head emphatically. “You didn’t do anything.”
I totally didn’t believe him. How could he decide to propose to me, and then suddenly back away because ‘things changed?’
“No, something happened! And you have yet to be honest with me at all, except to say ‘I’m sorry.’” I was not going to let him off the hook. He was going to give me some sort of an explanation. ‘I’m sorry’ was not going to cut it. I stared at him with such anger, until he began his explanation.
“So going back to that final day, what I realized is that I was falling in love with two people at the same time. At the exact same time. And maybe I wasn’t the right person to come and do all this, because I didn’t think there was any capacity in the world to fall for two people at the same time.” He kept looking down when he spoke.
What is he trying to say? That he loved both me and Molly equally? How then, can you make the enormous decision to ask one to marry you, when you are in love with another??
And them—BAM!—out it came! Attacking me like hundreds of knives stabbing my body.
“I still have feelings for Molly.”
Well there you go. How could I have been so blind? I was suddenly furious. It all suddenly made total sense to me. Of course he gave up on our relationship. He was starting a new one with someone else. I had tried very hard to make the relationship succeed, when all along he hadn’t really put anything into it. So, while I was shopping for his son and sending him funny texts, he was talking to another girl. And once again, I felt like the girl who just wasn’t good enough. My stomach started to hurt.
“Have you been talking to her?” I asked angrily.
“No,” he answered quickly. Too quickly for my liking. Well of course. Why would he tell me even if he had been talking to her?
“I mean, I think the worst thing in the world is to live your life with regrets,”
he said.
Oh my gosh! Just stop talking already!
“You’re such a bastard,” I said under my breath. I don’t think I’ve ever been as angry as I was at that moment.
He continued. “And I don’t regret anything with you. You are exactly what I was looking for when I came here. And I told you that. And that’s the whole truth. But I learned a lot about myself over these past three months.”
Umm . . . you mean the three months we were engaged?? You suddenly learned something about yourself? Please continue . . .
“I’ve grown as a person. There’s obviously no way I’m perfect. I mean, look at me.”
“Yea, I’ll second that . . . I’m sorry,” I scoffed.
Jason looked at me. “I don’t regret anything that’s happened between us. I know you do.”
“I do,” I snapped back at him. My turn. It was finally my chance to speak, and I let it rip.
“I trusted you with everything. To me, getting engaged and finding that person is a once-in-a-lifetime thing. And you took that from me.” I tried to continue to fight my tears, but they were coming at this point. “You took it. I wish more than anything that last day, you would have just let me go, instead of doing this to me. I’m so mad at you!”
“I would do anything if I could give that to you,” he said.
I held out the ring, and he took it from me. I didn’t believe anything he had to say to me anymore. The fact that he couldn’t give me some sort of a warning as to what I was walking into had infuriated me. To me, it was unforgivable. Even if he felt he loved Molly, why didn’t he just tell me that? Excuse me: tell me that privately. At least he could have given me a chance to react privately, and get my emotions in check before dealing with it on camera.
“I don’t get it at all,” I said. “Because none of it makes sense.” And in reality, it all did make sense. I was just his second choice.
Just to add salt to my open, bleeding wound, Chris Harrison gave us all a recap of what just happened.
“Just to clarify, you’re breaking it off with Melissa, and you’re going to pursue a chance—a shot—with Molly.” Thanks, Chris. We needed that clarification.
“I’m sorry for everything,” Jason said.
“You know, I’ve been through a ton of heartbreak,” I said. “You’ve been through a ton of heartbreak. That’s why I’m baffled by all this. I mean, it doesn’t make sense. You should know better than to do something like that. So, good luck in the future. Good luck with Molly. There you go. Don’t call me. Don’t text me anymore. Leave me alone, please. Thank you.”
I stood up and stormed off stage. As I walked to the limo waiting for me outside, I went over and over everything in my mind. Every boyfriend I’d ever had, except for Tye, had been unfaithful to me so that was probably my greatest fear when I got into a new relationship. I had actually opened up to Jason enough to tell him this. And he had still gone and done exactly the same thing to me—only he’d done it on national TV. I immediately went back to that place of wondering what was wrong with me that made this always happen to me, and how I could ever trust anyone.
I had not necessarily thought that my relationship with Jason would have worked out anyhow. I was happy with what had developed between Tye and I since Jason and I had fallen apart. But the fact that Jason had given up on us, and gone back to a relationship with another woman immediately after we got engaged, brought back the same old feeling that I’d never been enough, and that I would never be enough. I was very emotionally fragile right then. And learning that Jason had given in to his feelings for Molly—while I had been putting Tye off out of respect for Jason, and our relationship—broke me.
There was definitely no more Bubble now. And I hated the reality I was facing. All of America—my family, my friends, and Tye—were going to see me be this stupid girl who fell in love in two weeks and then just got absolutely humiliated on national television. My biggest fear, from that day my dad called and told me how nervous he was about what would happen if I went on the show, had come true. And now I was going to have to go home, and everyone was going to laugh at me. Again, I felt like there was no one I could trust. I felt utterly alone, and I was mad that I had gotten myself there.
I’m smarter than this. And I know better. And now I look like that girl. And I don’t want to be that girl.
I finally reached the safety of my hotel room and reached out for the best source of comfort I could imagine: I called Tye. He could tell I’d been crying.
“Why are you crying?” he asked. I could hear how upset he was from his tone of voice. I think it was his worst fear that I was going to see Jason again, and our old feelings would rekindle. Little did he know, he had nothing to worry about.
I didn’t even know how to begin explaining what I had just gone through. I began stuttering and stammering, and I’m sure I wasn’t making any sense.
“Wait, wait, wait. Now why are you upset?” he asked, sounding slightly upset himself.
“Tye, I’m not even going to tell you what happened on that stage,” I said. “I’m just, emotionally, going through a lot.”
“Was it because of what he said?” Tye asked. “Do you still care about him?”
“It’s not what it sounds like,” I said. “You can’t even begin to understand why I’m crying. I’m just so mad. I feel so set up. And I don’t need you to do this to me right now.”
It bothered him to see me upset over someone else who had broken my heart and made me cry like that. He hadn’t wanted me to go and see Jason again. And I’m sure he wondered if I was still in love with Jason, and if I was still emotionally invested in the relationship.
Of course, none of his fears was true. It wasn’t Jason. It was the whole process. I had just been totally lured into a trap and lied to. And I knew that people were going to be watching this show, thinking that they knew how it ended, and then there was going to be this huge bombshell. And I didn’t know how that bombshell would be received, especially because viewers weren’t going to know what had really happened, and they were going to think I got dumped. I had no idea what I was going to look like, or how I was going to come across. I was mad. I was hurt. I was embarrassed. I was confused. And I couldn’t explain all of this to Tye. I knew that, even if I tried to explain, nobody would ever be able to know what I was feeling up on that stage except for me. It was such a strange, unique experience to go through.
I laid on the bed, replaying the whole night over and over again. Feelings of anger and humiliation consumed me. How could I let this happen? I could only imagine what was going to happen when all my friends and family watched me get engaged, and then watched me get dumped. How was I going to able to face them?
And I couldn’t help but be furious with Jason. To not even have the decency to tell me about things before I walked out on that stage, to tell me in front of the world that he was still in love with Molly . . . it was mortifying. And to think this was someone who said he loved me and wanted to spend forever with me.
I guess he meant forever in reality TV years.
eleven
•
BACK TO THE BEGINNING AGAIN
When I flew home to Dallas the next day, I felt such a mix of emotions. I wasn’t sad or heartbroken over Jason, because I had come to see that, in reality, I was never actually in love with him. In the Bachelor Bubble, I had absolutely thought I was in love with him. But that world was far away now. I was actually very relieved that the whole fiasco was finally behind me. Well, I take that back. It still had to air on national television. But I was done having to live through it. I figured I could finally move on with my regular life and pretend that little hiccup had never happened. The problem was that my real life felt like a total mess again, which is exactly why I had gone on The Bachelor in the first place. It seemed like I was caught in a terrible pattern that I couldn’t escape. Things would be so great in my life, and then they would always fall apart.
When I got home, it was the strangest
feeling, because nobody back home knew what had happened. Not only was I not allowed to tell them what happened, but everyone in America, including many people in my life, were watching the early episodes of The Bachelor at that time. This meant that they were right in the middle of seeing me fall in love with Jason. I’m sure my friends could tell what was going on. Their biggest clue was the fact that I didn’t want to talk about The Bachelor at all. I would either change the topic or avoid it altogether. Even though I knew it would all come out eventually, I decided to prolong the inevitable humiliation for as long as possible.
I went about my normal routine, working at the liquor distribution company and trying to trust Tye enough to build a new relationship with him. I also began to make sense of what had just happened to me. The longer I was outside of the Bachelor Bubble, the easier it was for me to get some perspective. I really think that all of the qualities that had made my girlfriend decide to sign me up for The Bachelor— my vulnerability, my low self-esteem, my desperation to be in a serious relationship—were exactly what made me so susceptible to the Bachelor Bubble.
I had even talked about it on my audition tape. Not about Tye specifically, but about how I didn’t understand why guys didn’t want to be with me, and I didn’t know what made them not want to settle down with me. And how all I wanted was to be with somebody who showed me that they wanted to be with me, and yet, simple as that was, I had never found it. I’m sure I had a big bull’s-eye on my back during the whole audition process. I’m sure the production people took one look at me and thought they had found their golden girl.
Because I had been so heartbroken over a relationship in which I couldn’t freely express my feelings, while I was filming the show, I had said everything I was feeling to Jason as I was feeling it. I had no filter. I also came in wanting a relationship so badly that I took any little bit of attention Jason gave me and made it bigger than it was. I let myself get wrapped up in my feelings more than I logically should have. But, of course, I wasn’t thinking. I was acting out of pure emotion. And I, honest to goodness, thought I was falling in love with Jason. I really believed that it had become my destiny and that I was meant to leave Tye and go on The Bachelor to meet Jason.
My Reality Page 14
