I started to bring the bed parts upstairs, and she was sitting in bed and watching TV. The first thing I said to her was that I was setting up a bed in the other bedroom for her. She did not reply. I set up the bed and spent the night in the spare bedroom. Diva jumped off the bed Jess was in and snuggled up with me all night. She’s my furry little daddy’s girl.
The next day I went online to reactivate Jess’s phone. We had suspended the line while she was gone in order to save money on the phone bill. I didn’t see the line on the account and couldn’t activate it, so after work, I went to Verizon. It turned out that Verizon had deleted her account instead of suspending it. I don’t know why this was done, but someone at Verizon had screwed up when I’d changed the plan in January. We were paying $220 a month, and I had to lower this.
The only reason I did this for Jess was that Ray had told me I had to help her and show I was not intentionally trying to cause problems. It was a 100 percent given that she was going to bring on all sorts of false accusations, but the extent and the depths to which she would go were unknown.
At the Verizon store, they tried to get her old number back, but someone else had already taken it. I sent Jess an e-mail saying Verizon couldn’t get her number back. I added another line to the plan and got her a new number. They gave me a SIM card for her Galaxy S3 and told me that all she had to do was to put the new SIM in and turn on the phone. Her phone would reset with the new number.
When I got home about six thirty that evening, Jess was in bed watching TV, and I told her what had happened with her phone line. I set the SIM card next to her on the bed with the new phone number written down and told her what to do to get her S3 working with the new number. Jess wouldn’t take it and gave me a hard time.
She asked if the plan was under her name. I told her it was under the existing family plan; she had the exact same plan as Dad and me. (Dad’s phone was on my account to save him money.) She went on again about wanting a plan under her name and said she wanted unlimited data, but I told her that her old plan was not available and I was not getting her a better plan than I had. She kept complaining about wanting unlimited data, so I told her I was not going to go back and forth with her. I walked out of the bedroom. I came back up late at night. The SIM card was still where I had put it, so I took it. There was no way I was going to engage her or listen to her whining. She could use the same plan I had and was paying for or not; it was her choice.
Because Jess had camped out in the master bedroom and refused to go to the spare bedroom, I couldn’t remove the bedroom set until I got a replacement. In the meantime, I took the spare bedroom.
A week went by. Jess started complaining that she was sick, but I wondered if it was only more of her emotions taking her down. I took some containers of soup I had made from the freezer to thaw. I sent her an e-mail early in the morning when I got to work to say I had left them out for her. I had no love for her and didn’t like her at all, but I wouldn’t be an ass to her. She would use anything against me, and I wouldn’t give her any ammo to show I was being cruel or hateful to her.
I told many people that I was getting a divorce, and only a few were surprised. Some were unaware of the severity of Jess’s issues and didn’t know of her extreme behavior over the years. I had kept all that Jess had done to myself and confided in only a few very close friends. People said I had always treated Jess like a queen, and once they knew the full story or heard about my arrest, they were amazed I hadn’t filed for a divorce much earlier. I told them I had taken a vow to honor my spouse and never to speak ill of her in public. After people knew I had filed, they started telling me stories of things Jess had done and said they had never really trusted her.
On March 24, I saw Jess talking on a huge new phone but said nothing at first. A few hours later, I asked her what phone she had. She replied, “A Galaxy Note.” I asked if she liked it, and she went into a long-winded explanation about why she had bought it. She falsely accused me of not letting her use the SIM card I had brought home for her but then reversed and said the S3 gave her migraines because she hadn’t used reading glasses in a while. She started complaining about the data plan and then went into what would happen when the divorce happened; she didn’t want to pay restocking fees on her new phone to go on my family plan but didn’t want to pay all that money just for her one line. Blah, blah.
I told her it was her choice what she wanted to do. She could continue to stay on my plan or pay more for her own. I walked out of the room and left the SIM card for her. Two days later I saw the SIM card on my bed. I would go ahead and cancel her line on my plan later. It was unbelievable that a stupid phone had caused all this churn. Nothing was simple with Jess.
A week later Jess asked if I had changed the password for my TCF bank account. Damn straight I had. She asked for the password, but I said no, this was my account. She said it was ours, and she needed to see the balance so she knew how much she could withdraw with my debit card. She also asked if I wanted to hide anything. I told her I was not hiding anything from her; we were separated, and it was my account. I said she could use my ATM card to look at the balance before she took cash. I knew if she had full access to my account, she would probably drain it.
She would not relent and said, “We are not separated. We are still married, and it’s our account.”
I told her, “No, we are separated and have been since I filed for divorce; we are living separate lives and sleeping in different rooms.”
I told her I was tired and walked away from her. When I went to brush my teeth, she asked for copies for the last two years of tax returns, and I told her I would give her a PDF of each. She asked me to e-mail them. I said I would, and I did.
On Easter Sunday, I went over to Aunt Florence’s house and had a nice dinner with my family. While I was there, I got the Facebook screenshots my aunt had taken on March 10, before Jess had blocked the entire family.
Jess wrote, “Charles L. Cole gave my niece a wedding present with filing a divorce.”
What the hell? Jess was clearly willing to lie and say even the most ridiculous things to get sympathy from others and portray me as an evil, heartless man. It didn’t surprise me though; it was her typical victim mentality run amok, and there was surely more to come.
One person replied, “That is so cold blooded! Hang in there.”
That person had no idea what Jess was like or how she could manipulate situations to make herself look like the victim.
Jess continued, “Chuck filed a divorce against me while I am away out of the country.”
She got that right.
She continued, “He used to demand me not to put private matters on Facebook…My whole family is shocked, especially my mom who has Alzheimer’s now so worries, sad and cried with me why didn’t Chuck file a divorce when I am there,…..I thought back, he had been wanting to leave the country….Well I am holding on tightly to the Lord and He is also holding me in his arms. Thank you for your support.” Jess was really ramping up the emotional blame game to portray me as a horrible person so that she could get sympathy. I knew this was going to happen and that there would be more to come from her.
My cousin Shelia asked how I’d been able to talk her mom through the process of taking a screenshot. Sheila had a surprised look on her face and said she was impressed I’d been able to do it over the phone, with her mom being so computer illiterate. Shelia laughed after I told her the story of how long it had taken to get the screenshot and save it. We laughed again when I tried to explain how to e-mail me the picture. When Aunt Florence had no clue how to attach a picture to an e-mail, I would not even try to describe how to do it over the phone.
The next day Jess left a Post-it note for me on the kitchen counter. It said, “Request for groceries. Raw almonds (no salt).”
I couldn’t believe she had the nerve to ask me to pick up her groceries. She did nothing with her pathetic life except lie around watching TV and surfing the Internet, and now she wanted
me to buy food for her? I worked a full-time job and had been putting in extended hours lately, plus making all my meals, cleaning around the house, and hitting the gym five days a week, and she couldn’t take time to get off her lazy ass, stop watching TV, and go outside to get her own snacks. I felt like telling her to get off her ass and get her own damned food, but I was not doing anything else to increase tensions. I ignored the note.
I showed my coworker Dale the note Jess had left. Dale sat next to me and knew much of what had happened over the last few months with the DV case and the divorce. We both laughed at how absurd it was for her to be too lazy to get her own snacks and to ask me to do it for her. He said that if a woman had done all this to him and they were separated but living in the same house, he would be bringing whores in just to piss her off. We laughed, but I said I couldn’t do that. He replied, “You’re a better man than me.” A part of me would enjoy seeing her in distress after all the hell she’d put me through, but I refused to toss aside my integrity and sink to her level.
Wednesday, April 8, at 10:00 a.m. was the motion hearing at the Washtenaw County 14b court to force the police to return my firearms. It had been four months, and they had ignored every demand from my attorney to return my property since all charges were dismissed on December 5.
At the hearing, Michael Vincent started by telling the judge the “essence” of the DV case, that there had been no “assault at all,” and that the case was dismissed. The judge was Charles Pope, the same one who had heard and dismissed the case. The prosecutor, Angela King, was present also. Michael said he had sent two letters to the sheriff and “got no response.”
Michael said, “He just wants his guns back, and he has no criminal history. There is no ongoing investigation; nothing is going on, and they’re holding his firearms.”
The judge asked, “Do you know why they have apprehended them?”
Then Angela King spoke. Michael leaned over to me and said this was the best case!
Angela said, “We don’t feel it’s appropriate for Your Honor to issue any orders regarding the release of any firearms because you don’t have any real information on what, um…whether it’s even lawful for Mr. Cole to have these firearms.”
It was clear now that Angela was the reason I couldn’t get my firearms back. She was grasping and making up anything in court in clumsy and feeble attempts to formulate valid reasons.
She continued, “Are they registered? Are they uh, uh, serial numbered on them, uh, does he have criminal release codes? There is a whole solutions requirements that, um, that uh, I don’t believe the court is um, in a position to, to state whether he should be or should not be released so I would submit that he suh, he should sue the sheriff if that’s who, you know, has possession of these weapons if they think they’re unlawfully uh, being um, um, prevented from having them released to Mr. Cole.”
Her bumbling and stammering response showed that she was trying to make up any excuse she could think of to keep me from getting my guns. It was unethical that she falsely claimed that my firearms might not have serials or were not registered and that I might have other criminal actions against me. She was clearly willing to contrive these wild stories in court to stop me from getting my property back. If I lied, that would be perjury. As I’ve said before, laws are for peasants. Michael was incensed and visibly upset at these allegations she made up trying to smear my character.
The judge asked, “Are they refusing to return them?”
Michael replied, “I have not gotten a reply from two letters. I do know that Mr. Cole has a Second Amendment right. I do know that he has no convictions. I do know, to my best knowledge, there’s no ongoing criminal investigations on him. I do know that if these firearms were stolen, like the implication about serial numbers, I’m certain that officers ran these through Link, that protocol.”
Michael was an ex-cop and knew all the police procedures, and he was calling her out on her bullshit. Link is a system the cops use to check whether a firearm is stolen. He continued, “There is no reason for him not to get his firearms back. In, in, what’s, you know if this was a DV, a real DV, rather than according to the best stated facts, berries against the wall, what my client obviously denies that, but he’s perplexed by the criminal justice system. This man is an executive at an automobile uh, company, he’s got a spotless criminal record. There’s just no reason for this, he is perplexed.” Michael went on for a bit, saying what would normally be done and even joking to the judge, “There I go, thinking things would be easy.”
The judge said, “I’m going to force a response from the sheriff’s department as to why, if they do have a reason.”
Michael and Angela went back and forth for a while, with Angela, in a last-ditch, feeble effort, questioning the time line of the letters Michael sent the police. The judge stopped Angela from spouting her nonsense. He said that unless the police could give a legitimate excuse, he was going to sign the motion to get my firearms back. The judge went even further and said he was going to call them today. I thought, I’m glad I voted for him to be a judge.
I left the county building, but I had to go back in to get some paperwork I had left and ran into Angela. She told me that only the police should have guns. Right then it was clear to me why she was making things up for the judge. She would not follow the law; she followed her personal agenda in defiance of the law. People like that are dangerous, as they feel it’s righteous to violate law and constitutional rights based on their feelings and political leanings. Those types should be disbarred.
Her attitude toward firearms was very revealing, and I realized why she had gone after me with such zeal. I thought that because she knew I had an AR-15, she must have thought I was one of those “evil people” the radical left demonizes. She sure tried to destroy my life with no evidence or proof in the DV case; she’d relied only on emotionally charged statements Jess had made. I had the distinct feeling that she viewed me as a menace to society.
During the time since Jess had come back from Thailand, it had been really tense at home. I avoided her as much as possible and wouldn’t talk to her. We were leading completely separate lives in the home when she was there. She was spending less and less time at the house, and sometimes I didn’t see her for days. Jess would make snarky comments, but I ignored her and walked off. I ignored any requests she made of me unless they had to do with the divorce.
On April 11, Jess sent me an e-mail. She was looking for a GPS tracker I had used years ago when she was cheating on me.
She wrote, “I was looking for a tracking unit yesterday, but I couldn’t find it. This is a question, not an accusation. Did you happen to put the tracking unit in the Focus? Please let me know if you put it in the car. I will remove it myself. It’s against the privacy act. Thank you.”
This was my response:
There is no tracking devices or spyware being used on you at all. The difference now is we are separated, the marriage is over, so now I don’t care what you do now or what happens to you. I only had to use it years ago as a last resort since I still cared about you and wanted to know what was going because I knew you were not telling the truth. The tracking device was thrown out a long time ago.
Since we are separated and I don’t give a damn about you now, you are free to be a slut with any dirt bag you want. You did this before and lied about it in our marriage, so it won’t be a new thing for you. Just don’t bring them to my home.
The tracking device you may think is in the Focus now is just another one of your hundreds of false accusations. I won’t listen to any more of them, so do not ever email, text, or call me again. I won’t reply and will immediately delete any messages without looking at them.
I’ll make sure your mom’s pin reset for DFCU works, but after that is taken care of, I’m taking my name off her account to be free of it. It’s up to you and your sister to take care of her social security after that.
I thought the only reason she was asking about the tra
cker was that she was doing something she shouldn’t be. Since we were in divorce proceedings, I knew better than to install any tracking devices in the cars or on her laptop. When she was in Thailand visiting her family, I had wiped my PC, installed a SSD, and performed a fresh install of Windows to ensure there were no hidden key loggers she might have put on. There was no chance now she had anything on my PC, and I would not give her any passwords or even enable the guest account.
In the month she’d been home, there had been many times when she had not come home until past midnight, and many times she did not come home at all. I’d guess there was a 90 percent chance, based on her evasive behavior, that she was seeing another man. I was not even going to ask—she would lie about it anyway. This explained her asking about the GPS tracker. Ray and I talked about this, and he said this was a good thing. Seeing someone would make her happier and less prone to fits of rage and bizarre behavior.
On Sunday, April 12, Jess got back home around three in the afternoon. She had been out all night again. I was pretty sure she was staying with a boyfriend, since I’d overheard her talking to a guy on the phone. I could tell by the tone of her voice that it was more than a casual conversation.
I had a very busy Sunday. I did lawn work, replaced the Focus’s driver-side mirror, and replaced a liftgate gas strut. I worked on the liftgate latch, but I was going to have to buy a new one; the electric unlatch did not work anymore. I got all fluids topped off in all vehicles, cleaned the garage, worked in the shop a bit, and then finished and e-filed the 2014 taxes. After she got home, Jess stayed in bed, watched TV, and surfed the Internet on her laptop. It was typical behavior for her while I worked.
The next day I had an appointment with Ray. I dropped by his office after work to drop off a $2,000 check for her divorce attorney and to sign our countercomplaint to her attorney’s filing. I didn’t like having to pay for her attorney, but Ray said either I could do it now and look good or they would take it to court, force me to pay, and win. Because I’d filed first, her attorney responded and asked that “the Court provide for an equitable division of the property between the parties and an equitable distribution of the debt.”
Tales of the Crazy Page 20
