A Beautiful, Terrible Thing

by Jen Waite

  The rest of the week felt like an eternity. “I need to come home,” I told Marco on the phone at the end of the week. “I’m going to see if we can leave today instead of tomorrow. I can’t do this without you.”

  “Babe, calm down, I promise you can do this.” Marco’s voice, husky with sleep, filled my ear. “You’re the strongest person I know. Just one more night. You can do this.”

  “I don’t know.” I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. “Just talking to you is making me feel better though,” I said. “How are things in New York? How is work?”

  “Honestly, it’s awful, baby. Even if you came back tonight, I wouldn’t be home till four A.M. My boss is still on vacation, and I’ve been spending seriously sixteen hours a day at the restaurant. It’s insanity.”

  “God, I guess we’re both equally sleep deprived.” I gave a dry laugh. “Why do people have children again?”

  “Legacy, continuing the bloodline, not having to die alone, all that,” Marco said. “Shit, babe, it’s noon. I gotta get ready for work. I’ll see you guys tomorrow, OK? I can’t wait. I miss you so much.”

  “I miss you, too.”

  “Wait, babe? Can you text me when you leave tomorrow? So that I make sure that I’m home when you guys get back?”

  “Of course.”

  “Oh, babe! One more thing!”

  “Yes?” I laugh into the phone.

  “Remind me to tell you something about the bed. It’s not a big deal at all. Don’t worry.”

  “OK, crazy pants.” I yawn big. “Anything else?”

  “I love you.”

  “I love you so.”

  AFTER

  TODAY I wake up, and instead of checking Marco’s Facebook and the Croatian’s Instagram, I Google “husband affair liar personality change.” I click one of the first websites that pops up. It is all about different types of lying. I read about compulsive (mindless, automatic lying) versus pathological (intentionally deceitful and self-serving lying) and white lies (lies that we all tell at one point or another) versus destructive lies (lies with the intent to hurt or deceive another). Marco is definitely a pathological liar, of that I am certain. It feels good to put a name to his specific type of lying, and I feel the tiniest bit of power seep back into my body as I scroll. Next I Google “pathological liars” and “my husband is a pathological liar,” and I read everything I can about these types of liars. Many of the articles advise that intense therapy may help a pathological liar but that even with a lot of therapy it is a long shot. Often these liars don’t want to be helped and will lie to the therapist. I read another excerpt that says if your partner has lied to you about something as serious as cheating, your finances, or an addiction, you may give him an hour or two, or at the most twenty-four hours, to come clean, and if he does not, then he has made the decision for you to end the relationship. I read that line again and again. He has made the decision for you to end the relationship because he has chosen that there will be no respect, openness, or true intimacy in the relationship.

  Ha, I think, twenty-four hours? I gave Marco an entire month in my confused, hormonal state. I let myself believe that he was suffering from burnout and spent hours researching symptoms and treatment, knowing deep in my stomach that something didn’t add up but terrified of failing my husband in his time of need. “Lying piece of shit,” I mutter to myself, and keep reading. The next article I click on is a psychologist responding to a woman who says she has been married to a pathological liar for twelve years. She desperately wants him to stop lying, but she has no idea what to do. The psychologist prescribes counseling and warns that the best route may be simply to leave and limit contact with her husband. In the last part of his response he says, “There is one type of pathological liar that I cannot in good conscience advise you to stay with under any circumstance and that is the sociopath. The sociopath cannot and will not change because he does not have a conscience. Your only recourse if you determine that your husband suffers from this personality disorder is to distance yourself from him and limit contact immediately or better yet go no contact.” I feel my blood turn to ice. Sociopath. I’ve heard the word before in the news relating to murderers and rapists, but I always thought of sociopaths like Santa Claus, prolific in stories but not in real life.

  I Google “What is a sociopath” and bring up the first link. My breath comes in short, shallow spurts as I read the first paragraph on the screen. I read that sociopaths are not just murderers. They can be your neighbor, your coworker, a family member, or even your soul mate. In fact, many people who never used or believed in the term “soul mate” before use that exact word to describe their sociopathic partners. I think back to all the times I gushed to my friends and family, “I’ve never felt this way before. I don’t even believe in soul mates but I really think Marco is my soul mate!” My stomach flips and flops, and I keep reading. The article goes on to say that defining a sociopath is more complex than one may think; there is no one single trait used to “diagnose” a sociopath; rather, it is a personality disorder with a cluster of related symptoms. Because there are many traits used to classify a sociopath an individual must possess a majority of certain behaviors to fall somewhere in the wide spectrum of the disorder. My eyes quickly scan to find the criteria, or red flags, of a sociopath. As I read each trait, my heart beats faster, and the hair on my arms rises. Charming. Check. Impulsive. Check. No remorse, guilt, or shame. Check. Invents lies. Speaks poetically. Incapable of apologizing. Check, check, check. Before I delve further into my research, I hear Louisa waking from her nap next door.

  As I nurse Lulu my mind spins. Marco can’t really be a sociopath. We were together for five years, and I never saw any signs until now. Could he have really been “wearing a mask” for five years? No. It’s not possible. He had a mental breakdown and an affair. His mind snapped because he was exhausted and overworked and felt so much pressure to provide. Except, the nagging voice in the back of my mind says, a “normal” man would have owned up by now and at least given some sort of apology. It has been two months since I opened our computer and saw that e-mail, and Marco continues to not only play the victim but he is . . . mean to me . . . when he is not sending me “I love you more than anything in the world” texts, that is. I know that is not “normal,” but I haven’t been able to put my finger on exactly why. And then I realize, he is still trying to play both sides. Instead of letting me go and letting me grieve, or deciding that he made the biggest mistake of his life and doing everything to win back his family, he reels me in and then casts me out on a daily basis. I spend the rest of the day pondering this. I text Nat later that night, trying to put this nagging feeling into words, and she replies, “Right. He isn’t treating you like a PERSON with thoughts and feelings and needs. Even his ‘lovey’ texts are not actually about YOU and how he hurt YOU. They’re about him and how he ruined his life. He doesn’t say ‘My God, I can’t believe I put you through hell,’ he says ‘All I want is my wife back. All I want is my life.’ HIS wife. HIS life. Every single thing he says relates back to HIM.”

  She’s right. It’s like I am generic cardboard cutout “wife” to him instead of a real human being.

  Nat has finally put into words the feeling that I could not describe. Marco does not see me as a human being anymore.

  I pick my phone back up and turn on my bedside lamp. I read about personality disorders for an hour. My eyes grow heavy and blur. I know that Louisa will be awake to nurse soon, but I can’t stop. I am riveted. I finally feel a sense of control after spinning for months. Everything I read about sociopaths matches up with Marco’s behavior in the past couple of months. One article highlights that sociopaths hate being alone. I think about Marco going straight from Tania to me and then from me to the Croatian. I remember Marco saying, “I can’t be alone. You know I hate being alone,” as if that was a justification for him continuing his affair. The article concludes by saying
that a sociopath will repeat the same relationship cycle over and over again; lather, rinse, repeat. I Google “sociopath relationship cycle.” I click a link that leads to a page with a shadowy figure wearing a mask with the words “Idealize, Devalue, Discard” on it. I have not even read what this means and chills creep all over my body. Idealize, devalue, discard. I know instinctively that this is exactly what has happened to me, and I devour the article and then read it three more times.

  At the beginning of any relationship involving a sociopath, or psychopath (I read that the words are actually interchangeable), the victim, or target, of the sociopath is overvalued, idealized, placed on a pedestal. The sociopath has targeted this person for a reason and pursues said target with a single-mindedness that comes as close to love as a sociopath will ever feel. But it is not love, not at all. It is obsession, infatuation, a desire to possess and then destroy. Once the sociopath has zeroed in on a target and decided that she has something he wants, he will then “love bomb” her. Love bombing is a deluge of constant flattery and attention that may come in many different forms. This is how sociopaths seduce their targets. My fingers tremble as I scroll through this paragraph and read it again. I remember the beginning of my relationship with Marco. The constant texting, the overwhelming flattery and attention, my heightened emotional state. I remember chalking it up to “Latin charm” and feeling like the luckiest girl in the world.

  Another tactic the sociopath uses is called “mirroring.” The sociopath assesses his target and then reflects back to her exactly what she loves in herself and what she doesn’t even know she desires in a mate. The sociopath mirrors his victim so completely that the victim truly believes she has found her soul mate, her kindred spirit, her other half. He values what she values, copies her taste in music, clothes, even friends. His long-term goals align exactly with hers, and they excitedly make plans for the future.

  I think about Nat telling me that Marco became so sweet and gentle when he met me, a better father to Seb and a better man in general. She really thought we were one of those couples who made the other one a better person. He became kinder, more mature, and seemed to get his priorities straightened out, proving that the real problem that had driven them apart was his relationship with Tania, and now he was living up to his full potential. I believed that we lifted each other up and brought out the best in each other. I had found my other half in a tattooed single father living in New York City illegally for twelve years. In the least likely of people, I had found my fairy-tale ending. Is it possible that Marco was only mirroring my personality? Showing me exactly what I didn’t even know I was looking for in a partner? No, I think quickly, it’s not possible. This article says the average idealize phase lasts for a few months and then devaluing begins. Marco worshipped the ground I walked on for five years. I bite my thumbnail and Google “sociopath idealize lasts for years.” There are not many hits that match my search. I’m reaching. Marco can’t possibly be an actual sociopath. As much as I want an explanation for everything that has happened since January 20, as much as I need to make sense of my husband, my best friend, my protector fading from my life right after I gave birth, maybe there is an explanation that is far more common. He simply fell out of love and had an affair. Perhaps he is a cheater and a coward and that is all. Except I know it is not that simple. Most men who have affairs don’t lie about it to the point that they would rather go to a psych ward than come clean. Most men who have affairs don’t make up serious medical conditions in order to escape taking responsibility for their actions. And most men who have affairs don’t choose the timing that Marco chose. The exact moment our baby was born.

  I finally find an article about sociopaths who actually marry their targets and why this happens. Most often it is for a cloak of reputability, a nice backdrop against which they can live out their dark desires. The author of this article is adamant that the sociopath who marries his target cannot and will not be faithful for long, at the most a matter of months or just long enough to secure the marriage. I try to think as objectively as I can about our relationship. I imagine Marco cheating on me around the time we went to Bloomingdale’s and ate frozen yogurt. I remember our city hall wedding and his dimple as he smiled at me and said “I do.” I think about opening the Thirsty Owl and the nights we spent pacing around the living room. “If we can get through this, we can get through anything,” he said. No, no, no. If Marco is a sociopath, then he is the only sociopath who managed to stay faithful for five years before he lost control. At the end of the article the author explains that some targets provide such large sources of ego fuel that they may remain in the idealize phase for years, depending on what the sociopath desires out of the relationship. The article calls this “narcissistic supply” and states that all sociopaths are also narcissists. I read the next line: If a target is providing a constant stream of supply, they may be overvalued and idealized by the sociopath for many years. However, when their supply eventually decreases, they will be quickly devalued and discarded. Oh my God. Green card. Restaurant. Wedding. Travel. Reputability. Maine. Money. Family. I was an almost never-ending source of supply for Marco until I had a baby and suddenly, my stock plummeted. I would no longer be feeding his ego if I was taking care of a newborn.

  The next couple of paragraphs are about the devalue phase. When the target is no longer useful or providing enough narcissistic supply, the dark void that is always lurking within the sociopath opens and he starts to methodically devalue the very traits of his target he once overvalued. Did Marco devalue me? I think back over the course of our relationship. I feel as though I went from being on a pedestal to being thrown away like yesterday’s trash. Is it possible to go straight from the idealize stage to being abruptly discarded?

  My eyes land on a long thread called “Psychopath Fetishes,” and, intrigued, I dive in. “Oh my God,” I say out loud while reading. The main fetish that comes up again and again is feet, Marco’s favorite. I always knew Marco had a thing for my feet, but it wasn’t until recently that Nat filled me in on the scope of his foot fetish.

  “Wait, I’m sorry. You were married to him, actually, you are married to him, and he never told you about his foot fetish?” she asked incredulously a couple of weeks ago.

  “Well, I mean, I know he likes feet,” I said. “But I guess he never really expressed to me how deeply he likes them?”

  “I would say that Marco’s foot fetish is his defining feature. Like, when I think of Marco, I think of his foot fetish.”

  Even in the dark despair and chaos of those first weeks, this information blew my mind. My husband had a fetish that defined him as a person, and he never told me? He had made several comments the first year we were dating about how he loved it when I wore heels, but, as far as I remember, nothing along the lines of “I want to suck on your toes all day and all night.” Or, “I will wither away and die if I can’t worship female feet.” That definitely would have stuck in my mind.

  “I don’t find it strange that he has a foot fetish; I find it strange that he never shared with me that he has a foot fetish,” I told Nat. “I’m pretty sure when you decide to spend the rest of your life with someone, expressing your most base desires and fantasies is important?”

  In the thread, someone mentions that many psychopathic fetishes and fantasies tend to run more toward the extreme. One of the examples given is a fixation on extremely “deviant” porn. Because psychopathic personalities are characterized by having low impulse control and needing constant stimulation, many, if not all, psychopaths are sex addicts and sexual deviants. Psychopaths have no real identity; the dark void within is always lurking. They are empty creatures, and so they will engage in more and more promiscuous and extreme behavior to feel anything at all.

  I keep reading, and when I see the word vore for the third time, I finally Google it. I read the Wikipedia article on what vore is, and I feel physically ill. Many psychopaths are preoccupied with vore,
or the desire to be consumed whole, like a snake eating its victim alive in one gulp. This is a sexual fantasy that cannot be acted out in real life for obvious reasons, but it is still a sexual fixation for many psychopaths.

  My mind is spinning, but now my eyes are so heavy that I can barely keep them open. I drift off to sleep and dream I am walking next to Marco on a wooden bridge high above beautiful mountains. We look down at the clouds and the green-and-brown earth below us. My dress stretches over my huge, round belly. We are laughing and holding hands. Suddenly, Marco lets go of my hand and turns toward me. His shining eyes are now dark and lifeless. “What’s wrong?” I ask. His arms reach out toward me, and with one shove I am falling, falling through endless air into oblivion.

  “Marco,” I scream. I am crying, but not because I am scared of falling. I don’t understand what I did to make Marco push me. “Marco,” I try to scream again, but air rushes into my lungs and the next words get lodged in my throat: “I needed you.”

  —

  THE next morning I walk into the kitchen with Lulu and pour myself a cup of coffee. I sit down on the couch next to my mom and say, “Did you look at the link I sent you last night?”

  I tell my mom about my reading and what I’ve learned. I mention another article about a woman who was in the idealize phase for three years and then she had a miscarriage and was devalued and discarded while she was in the hospital. “It’s like the mask drops when they are called on to be the nurturer in the relationship for once. You know, I never expressed it in words, but I think I innately felt like Finally, it’s Marco’s turn to take care of me, after I put so much into him for so long. And then instead of taking care of me, he had an affair.”

  We discuss this for a while, and the conversation morphs into all the tiny signs that Marco had started to devalue me that we missed. I am certain that if I can understand exactly what happened and why, I will be able to move forward. Otherwise I am afraid I will be stuck here, in this gray place, forever.