It Always Snows When We Break Up

Our last night was banal in the beginning. Routine in a lot of ways. But of course, it snowed. Just like the last couple of times we split up, strangely enough. I hate snow. I hate being snowed in alone. It makes me feel like I’m in a prison. Last time we broke up, it felt like my heart had been exiled to some remote Siberian outpost.

The banal part was that he asked me to take him grocery shopping so he could be ready for the predicted storm. We ended up standing in a line of about 15 surly last-minute panickers, stocking up as if they were going to be trapped for weeks.

The guy behind us was carrying a half empty basket and looked regretful. “I picked a bad time to just stop in and pick up eggs.”

“Pretty soon people will probably just be grabbing things off the shelves and eating them in line. The last thing to go will be the Tide Pods,” my guy said.

Me: “How did those things get invented anyway? Let’s make something that looks tasty and edible but is actually detergent. Brilliant idea.”

Even while I was joking and trying to keep things light, my head was heavy with the reason we’d met up in the first place — to discuss our relationship.

A little over a week ago, I found out he had been with another woman. I mean, we were TRYING to have a “friends with benefits” thing and both see other people, but this arrangement was SUPPOSED to be “don’t ask/don’t tell.” He violated that and hooked up with someone I knew. I knew her because he and I had been to a play party together, and I saw him fuck her.

We’d been to 3 parties together — I brought him into the whole kink lifestyle, and it had been amazing and fun. We would play together but at the end, do our separate thing and then come back together. It didn’t bother me, for the most part, watching him fuck another woman because I always knew he’d go home with me. I knew that because of “don’t ask/don’t tell”, it wouldn’t go farther than the play party with anyone else. Until it did.

I also thought all his other partners were closer to his own age. Because the reason we were trying to “keep it casual” is I’m 20 years older than he is. He’s always expressed an eventual desire to have kids. I gave him the freedom to pursue women his own age thinking at least I ‘d have him until he found someone. This play partner was close to MY age, however.

I wasn’t too happy about him picking up someone from one of our parties and seeing her alone. I know he didn’t intentionally set out to hurt me, though. So even though I impulsively and emotionally broke things off last week, I was back pedaling because he was incredibly apologetic.

Now we were in this relationship limbo. Caught between a rock and a hard place. I was in love with him, and during the tumultuous last week, he confessed he had feelings for me. We couldn’t go back to just being casual, but I wasn’t sure how we should proceed. I thought we were going to discuss and brainstorm options.

He bought me a Chinese dinner in return for taking him to the grocery shopping. He’s always been thoughtful like that.

We knew we needed to have “the talk”, but I think we wanted to put it off for as long as possible. At the grocery store, we decided not to pursue it until we ate. “It’s best not to discuss serious things when you’re hangry.” As we were eating, we talked about politics. Anything but the elephant in the room.

He wanted to show me something online. Then he said there was this episode of South Park I had to see.

I finally bit the bullet. “Now that we’ve eaten, is it ok to talk about what I came here to discuss?”

“We can’t be friends with benefits. We’ve proven that.” he didn’t really make eye contact as he was replying.

“Nope. And don’t ask don’t tell doesn’t work. What do you want, really?”

“I don’t regret our time together,” he said.

“I didn’t ask you that. I asked you what you wanted.”

“Well, you know I want to have a daughter. I’m not getting any younger. I think I need to start looking for someone closer to my own age. I know you said you would be okay with seeing me until I found someone, but I feel like that’s not fair to you.”

I felt a knife in my heart.

That old familiar pain again. When we’d split up before, we both racked our brains to come up with some solution whereby we could still see each other. We had even tossed around ideas of having some poly triad. He could find a younger woman to breed with, and we’d all live together happily. But then the realities of our monogamy-centered society intruded. How would he explain a poly family to his family of origin? Which one of us would he take to Christmas celebrations? How would we find this poly-friendly breeder? And so on. Neither of us wanted to let go, but it just seemed ultimately like some impractical bohemian fantasy.

What I call “the kid thing” is the albatross around the neck of many older women who fall for younger guys. I realize most age gap relationships have unique problems, but at least when the MAN is older, they’re still capable of giving their partner children.

These days, we older women do a damn good job of maintaining ourselves. We may look wonderful on the outside. We may be well preserved as fuck — I am often mistaken for being about 10–20 years younger because I have good genes and take care of myself. But on the inside, deep in my loins, I am pretty sure I have some decrepid, nonfunctioning eggs on crutches. Honestly, since I turned 40, it’s been MOSTLY much younger men who’ve approached me online or at bars and clubs. If looking like this means I keep getting my heart broken by them, maybe I should stop using Retin-A.

How could this hurt so bad, when I already knew this was going to be the ultimate outcome? Because this is what drove us apart before?

We met when he was 28 and I was 48. I did not intend for it to last over 2 years. It just did. We loved being together, so we just kept doing it. For months and months. Basically, we had a truly happy non-relationship relationship for over 2 years, with 2 3-month breaks in between. The first time we got back together, he slid back into my DMs wanting info about politics (I’m a political junkie). The second time I had some work I wanted him to help me with.

I’m pretty sure we both just came up with ruses to break no contact because we were missing each other so much.

I know this is for the best. Let’s face it. I’m going through things he shouldn’t have to confront for a long time. I survived cancer and had one of my breasts removed. One of my best friends from my college days just died unexpectedly of a heart attack. I can’t expect him to relate to any of those experiences. Nor should he be burdened by them.

But damn — other than the “kid thing”, the age gap didn’t really affect us. We mostly had drama-free, loving, wonderful times. I told him the first time we split up that even though he wasn’t my official boyfriend, he was the best boyfriend I’d had since my divorce. I still felt that way.

I couldn’t help thinking how much pain I’d been in the last 2 times we broke up. The more time we spent together, the harder the break-ups became.

“It has to be final this time,” I told him firmly.

“We have to go cold turkey,” he said, agreeing. I knew that meant no contact. Shit. This sucked so much.

He looked really sad. I couldn’t figure out how he could look as sad as I felt, when this was HIS decision.

I decided that since I was the older one, I needed to stay strong and put on a happy face. Just hide my pain. I beckoned him to come sit next to me on the couch.

“I’ve been wanting to hug you all week. Is this okay?” I pulled him to me when he nodded. It’s true-I had thought of nothing but wanting to hold him for days.

He rested his head on my breast, while I ran my fingers through his dark, thick hair.

“Your heart feels like it’s racing..” he pulled away.

“I guess that’s what it does when it breaks,” I said.

He looked crushed.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I’m just being honest. This is hard.”

He nodded.

Somehow we managed to watch the shows he’d wanted me to see while maintaining a respectable non-romantic, post-break-up distance and shared a last craft beer (craft beer is what we initially bonded about). It hurt to sit there like strangers when that couch used to hold so much cuddling.

His cats meandered and played together around us, occasionally slinking up for pets, and it hit me that I’d never see them again either.

At one point, I said, “Y’know, if you ever change your mind about having kids..they may seem wonderful when they’re babies, but just wait til you see your nieces and nephews hit the terrible twos..”

I was sort of joking, but he did seem to perk up. “If I change my mind, you’ll be the first person I call.”

“Assuming I’m single. Which I probably will be. Because..I tend to get involved with younger men, and it never lasts..” my voice trailed off as the irony hit me.

Finally, he said he needed to turn in, so I got up to leave.

“I’m going to miss you.” The look on his face when he said that will be forever burned into my brain.

“I’m going to miss you, too.” He had no idea how much.

We kissed just enough to show our affection but not so much that we would end up in bed together — you know how THAT goes — there’s always that impulse to do it just one last time for old time’s sake. Both of us were too mature and knew where THAT would lead.

I kept it together, though. As I drove home, a drizzly winter mix was falling. As I got home, it turned to snow. Then the dam totally burst when I walked through my front door. I bawled uncontrollably for three hours straight. I think I was even crying in my sleep. I remember briefly waking up groggy at 4am with my eyes all soggy.

When I got out of bed at 10a, I saw out my window that snowmaggedon had been a big bust. Just a couple of inches piled up, and the street outside had already been cleared.

Copyright 2018 S. Wade