The Silent Tears of Polygamy

by Robin Johnson

  My wali said, “If Alec had said he’d divorce you and not Carolyn, I would have recommended that you put no more time and effort into the marriage.” He said, “I think you should divorce Alec, but I don’t think you are strong enough to do it now.”

  My wali said, “I’m concerned about your psychological and emotional well-being.” He further said, “If and when it is time for you to divorce Alec, you would know it.” He said, “You can’t do it unless or until God wills it.”

  “Alec may have a dark side, which could be one of the reasons that he’s with Carolyn,” my wali said. He said, God puts abomination on some people.” I said, “They could cater to their dark side all they want, just as long as he doesn’t bring his dark side to me.” “I’m not going there,” I said.

  There must be some reason his dialogue with her, her dialogue with him and her dialogue with me almost always was about sex. It may explain why one evening Alec was with me and he said, “We never have sex.” I didn’t know what he meant.

  I thought that he was lying and saying that he and Carolyn don’t have sex. Sometime later, I realized that he probably meant that he and I only make love and don’t have sex. There is a difference between the two. Maybe I don’t get all down and dirty with him the way he may like it and the way that she and he does it. It’s okay. He has her for that. She apparently relies on her sexuality for fulfillment in her life.

  Day in and day out, no matter what life throws at us, life keeps on going. The world keeps turning. We have to make our intent to sweat it out, or we lie down and say, ‘I give up.’ Well, I made my intent to sweat it out.

  It’s about two years now into this polygamous set up that I’m in. Today wasn’t one of my better days. I’m sure all wives in a polygamous marriage have sad days. Today was a sad day for me. I had been doing well for quite a long while, so it was bound to happen that I’d feel down sooner than later.

  It is how I woke up feeling today and I know why. Alec has been out of State on a business trip since Monday. It’s now Friday, so he has been away for five days. Since he was with me for three days before he left, he’d return to Carolyn for three days to adhere to the schedule.

  Gone were the days when I could be certain that come rain or sunshine, Alec would come home to me each and every time that he goes away. It had been a while since that changed but it was still difficult to bear. I’m not sure you ever really completely get used to the change. I kept thinking about Alec going home to Carolyn this evening.

  Even amidst my sadness, I’m getting better, seeing that I was able to call her house his “home.” I kept thinking that they would be reunited in sexual bliss. The thought took a hold of my mind and my thinking process. It was stubborn and wouldn’t let go. It tormented me. I kept fighting the thought by trying to remember God, but It was an intense battle going on in my head. It was a battle that I was determined to win.

  I knew Alec would call me when his plane landed, which was the norm for him. I had decided beforehand that I wouldn’t answer the phone. Yep, I thought to myself, I will ruin his weekend with Carolyn if he is unable to reach me.

  I knew if Alec called and I didn’t answer, he would be worried about me. He would wonder what could keep me from answering the phone. If I messed up his head by having him wonder about me and my whereabouts, there was no way he would be able to have a nice time at Carolyn’s. It sounded like a plan to me; although in my mind I knew it wasn’t quite right to do.

  I had every intention of carrying through with my plan. It was until the telephone rang. I checked the caller ID, and it was Alec. I wanted so much to answer, but I didn’t. After it rang enough to go into voice mail, he then rang my cell phone. Still, I remained steadfast with the intention that I had made to myself, and I didn’t answer. When it rang enough to go into voice mail again, Alec then called my home phone again. Still, I didn’t answer.

  Why wouldn’t he stop calling already? He was Alec, and I knew why. He’s persistent. While I had managed to ignore his calls thus far, something was different, and that was the fact that I didn’t like my intention. I couldn’t escape asking myself how I could intentionally hurt Alec that way. My conscience kept asking me, and I didn’t have a suitable answer.

  Again, he called my cell phone. This was his fourth attempt and this time, I hurriedly answered.

  It was just as I had assumed. Alec was back and wanted me to know it. He said his plane had just landed. I really had missed him so terribly, and I wanted him to come home so desperately. It was difficult talking to him on the phone and knowing I wasn’t going to be able to see him for three more days.

  I held back tears, while trying to be strong. I shut down and didn’t say all the mushy stuff that I was feeling and thinking. I didn’t say, I missed you so much. I didn’t say, I wish you were coming home to me. I didn’t say, I love you or any of those things. I wanted more than anything to be free and say all those things that I was thinking and feeling, but I somehow managed to hold it all in.

  Alec said he was going to his mother’s home to check on her. He didn’t say it, but I sensed he wanted me to say that I’d go there as well, so he could see me. I wanted nothing more than to tell him that I would meet him there. I had missed him so much and for a moment I thought, why not go there? On another thought, I then got a feeling that it wasn’t the thing to do, so I refrained.

  Had he asked me to go there, I think I would have. I got a feeling too, that he didn’t want to encourage me. It would be easier for him had I asked if I could come there. I think we both wanted to see each other very much but didn’t want to do something that didn’t seem right.

  Although, in thinking rationally about it, I think nothing was wrong with it. Alec’s days are his to do with them whatever he pleases, if it pleases God. It wasn’t as though we were going to meet at his mother’s house to have romp in the hay. Nonetheless, it wasn’t God’s plan that we see each other that day.

  He said he was going to come home early to me on Monday because he took the day off from work. This was all too much for me, so I got off the phone quickly. I was becoming too emotional, and I didn’t want him to know it. I didn’t want him to hear me weeping. It took all within me to keep him from hearing my voice breaking before we ended the call.

  When I hung up the phone, I kept fighting with myself, trying to keep myself from falling apart. Alec wasn’t there to see my tears, still, I wasn’t going to release them. I wanted to be strong. Why? I don’t know.

  Usually, I could call my wali during moments when I was feeling weak and emotional, but on this day my wali was nowhere to be found. Then, I remembered what my Egyptian buddy Ahmad had said to me once. When we were discussing polygamy and how difficult it was for me, he said,

  “Make yourself busy.” “You have to keep yourself busy, he said.” “Try not to think so much.”

  With his words fresh in my mind again, I got an instant burst of energy. I wasn’t going to stay at home, cooped up all alone and allow my mind to take charge of me. Instead, I would take charge of my mind and control the direction of my thoughts.

  Armed with these thoughts, I got dressed, took a cab to my favorite boutique and did some shopping. I picked out some sexy, classy lingerie and intimate apparel that would make me feel super good. I wanted to wear it to surprise Alec. Getting out freed my mind to think about things other than him and Carolyn and all that they may be up to.

  Most importantly, I kept my mind tuned towards God and His remembrance and, praise be to God, I became happy.

  Let me tell you about my last regression, as the journey for Alec and me is all uphill from here. I had been doing good for a very long time. I hadn’t contacted Carolyn for a good long while, and I was very proud of myself. I was grateful to God for helping me, because I was certain I couldn’t have done it on my own.

  I told myself enough was enough. There was no use going over the past and matters that couldn’t be changed. It was like flogging a dead horse, and it was doing me no
good. It was doing the opposite. I had no intention of contacting Carolyn again. I made a decision to work with the cards that fate had dealt me and make the best of the circumstances.

  I was going to rise above the fray, and all forms of pettiness would be over and done with. But then, I got hit with the unexpected. Isn’t it how it usually works? I shouldn’t have been surprised.

  Where should I begin? Well, on this particular morning, I got up for Fajr (the Morning Prayer) and to see Alec off to work. It was a day that started well. It was off to a good start. He gave me a kiss and said he loves me. After saying our goodbyes, he went out the door to go to work. I was exuberantly happy, although he wasn’t scheduled to return to me for three days. A few moments later, a cell phone sounded. Alec had left. Why was his cell phone still here?

  I quickly looked for the cell phone with the hope of catching him before he was too far away, but I didn’t see it. After a while, I gave up and thought that I simply had been hearing things. Nevertheless, I went back to bed for a few hours.

  Later, after I woke up, did the hygiene thing and pulled myself together, I walked past the dining room table and there was Alec’s cell phone on it. On the face of the phone it displayed the name of the earlier caller, and it was Carolyn. The caller earlier that morning, at about 6:30 am, was her. It was the sound that was going off after Alec was gone. Hence the question, what should I do now?

  Why did Alec have to go and forget his phone, even though I knew it was unintentional? I immediately reached for the landline phone to call Alec to let him know that he had left his cell phone here. Now, Alec wasn’t here, but his phone was. Temptation is a very strong emotion, and I didn’t want to be tempted with going into his phone.

  I knew it would be wrong of me to snoop, as that would be invading Alec’s privacy and personal space. I paced the floor back and forth while trying to decide what to do. In that short span of time, the answer finally became clear to me. I had to see what she said. Part of the problem here was that it had been Carolyn who called, so my curiosity had gotten the better of me. Maybe I would have been able to show more restraint if it had been someone else.

  I tried to access his phone but, lo and behold, he had a password on it. It may have been why he didn’t call me to let me know that he had left his phone, knowing that I couldn’t enter it.

  I hadn’t a clue what his password was or could be. I got myself all worked up thinking of what I could find in his phone that would tell me about him, Carolyn and their relationship. You don’t know what I went through. I got myself so worked up in a panic, trying to get into his phone to the point that I had to take half of a Xanax pill for anxiety.

  I have Xanax because I travel a lot, as you know. I needed the anxiety pill to take before I could board the plane so as not to panic.

  My hands were trembling while trying to access his phone, so I needed the pill to calm me down. Maybe subconsciously I thought that Alec would return home to get his phone and find me in it.

  At that point, though, nothing mattered except gaining access to the contents of it. I tried a few obvious possibilities for the password, to no avail. To make a long story short, I hacked his phone. I found a way to crack the code. I knew exactly what I had in mind to look for, so I didn’t beat around the bush. Once I got in, I went to his incoming texts, looking for everything sent to him by Carolyn.

  My intention wasn’t to go through everything Alec had on his phone. The only incoming messages of concern to me were Carolyn’s. I don’t know what I expected, but it sure was not what I got. To my astonishment, I found approximately five tacky, nasty pictures of Carolyn, partially clad in flimsy see through lingerie. She was showing t.ts and A$$. One particular message was for him to do a certain thing to her.

  In one of the pictures, her naked boobs were hanging out and overtop of a tight sweater. In another, her butt was up in the air. In another, she had her legs gaped wide open. It was raunchy and raw. It was enough to make me barf. They appeared to be porn pics. I know Carolyn wasn’t a porn star, but those pictures that she sent to Alec’s phone could have easily passed for pornography.

  I had warned Alec about leaving stuff on his cell phone that no one should see. And by any reasonable school of thought, this fell into that category. He apparently had ignored me. I suppose he thought he didn’t need to remove anything, having put a password on his phone. I suppose he thought the password was supposed to take care of all possible breaches.

  I wonder why Alec hadn’t considered the fact that passwords were not infallible; they could be bypassed. I was now in what had been his password protected phone. Was I not? I could see that while Carolyn had been responsible for the raunchy pictures, she wasn’t the only one culpable. I read a message from Alec to her, saying that he wants to.... and wants to......to her.

  The text under one of the pictures of her bare breasts hanging out said, “Whose melons are these?” The date of the pictures was the date that Alec and I were having problem during our wedding anniversary. Those days we should have been at our closest, but we were far apart. Perhaps he had been hoping to get to her that day after receiving the porn pics of her on his and my wedding anniversary days.

  Anyhow, I decided to send a reply to Carolyn from Alec’s phone. For the one picture of her breasts hanging out, and I do mean ‘hanging,’ I wrote, “Those are not my Ana’s melons because hers don’t hang.” I wasn’t done yet.

  She thought it was okay to send raunchy pictures to Alec during my wedding anniversary days, so I thought it was only fair that she gets a taste of her own medicine. After sending that one picture, I then decided to forward all the pictures back to her with text under them, and I texted that I was going to put them on the Internet.

  I didn’t’ hear from Alec or Carolyn. So, at the end of the evening, I emailed Alec to tell him that he had left his phone here. I asked when he would come by to pick it up. I received no reply, and I eventually went to sleep. I assumed he would come by to get the phone before going to work in the morning.

  The next morning, I woke up for Fajr (morning prayer) as usual. Before going back to bed, I put Alec’s cell phone on his nightstand in our bedroom, so I’d know if and when he arrives to pick it up. I was somewhat anxious about Alec not calling me, and he must have arrived at work by now. It was 7:45 am. I also hadn’t received any reply from Carolyn.

  I decided that I’d give Alec and Carolyn a jolt. I needed to get some action from them. Being ignored doesn’t sit well with me, and it was exactly what was happening. I took his cell phone and retrieved the picture of Carolyn’s legs gaped wide open. I wrote underneath the picture, ‘I’m going to give it to you really good.’

  I then proceeded to forward the captioned picture to her. Even though I hadn’t gotten any visible reaction or reply, I knew Carolyn was worried knowing I still had the pictures, and not knowing what I would do with them.

  After I had forwarded her the text, it was still early in the morning, so I went back to bed and I fell asleep. I woke up at around 11:00 am. After regaining clarity from sleep, I immediately looked over at Alec’s nightstand for the phone, and the nightstand was bare. Alec’s phone was gone. I had slept right through his coming here and going. He took the phone without me knowing that he was here, and had left. Daggone it. Sigh.

  Needless to say, I became agitated that he didn’t wake me. Alec had taken his phone while I was unaware, so I didn’t get to see his reaction or anything. So, what to do next?

  Alec, nor Carolyn knew that I had forwarded copies of all the nasty pictures from Alec’s cell phone to mine. I retrieved the one of Carolyn with her legs spread wide open. She had written, “Just for my fans eyes only.” “Your kitty cat (It’s not the word that she used, but you have an idea what it was) patiently awaits you.”

  Maybe I was old-fashioned, or I was just thinking in an entirely different way, but I couldn’t believe that she had said to the man who is supposed to be her husband that she has a fan club. Was she a prostitute? />
  I touched up her message a bit by adding the words, “I’m going to give it to you really good, because I’m a leg gaping ho.” I sent the picture from my cell phone to her and to Alec. Alec had come and gotten his phone, so it was possible that both he and Carolyn had thought it was going to be the end of that.

  Well, it hadn’t been, and it wasn’t. Now, thanks to the recently sent message, they were aware that I had copies of the pictures. And while I had them, there was always the question of what I would do with them.

  I then text Carolyn, and I said that Alec had come to get his cell phone. I said he was so angry at me for all that I had done to the point that he had sex with me. I said he was so mad at me to the extent that when we were having sex, I thought he was going to break me in half. I couldn’t stop laughing.

  It got a rise out of him because shortly after that, he telephoned me. Or maybe it got a rise from Carolyn but because she couldn’t pick up the phone to call me, the onus fell on Alec to do it. Anyway, he was polite and kind but very upset. He spoke of trust and blah, blah, blah, all the stuff that I expected to hear.

  He talked about how I don’t protect him. Oh, really, protection? Who wasn’t protecting who here? I asked him how he was protecting Carolyn or me when he keeps private stuff on his phone that others may be able to see.

  An argument could be made that my eyes couldn’t have seen them if I didn’t snoop. That was indeed true. Another thing that was also true was that I couldn’t have seen them if they weren’t there. My snooping bore fruit, so to speak, because Alec had not thought that something was wrong with him having that type of content on his phone.

  He said he was disappointed in me. He said it was wrong of me to torment Carolyn. He said I should have kept it between him and me and not involved her.

  So, because of this, I was the bad person here. I was the one in the wrong. I again spoke to Alec about my frustration and anger with Carolyn. It was nothing that I hadn’t said before but said it again that she dismisses me and pretends that I don’t exist, which is the underlying reason for my anger, hatred, and revenge.