The ways in which you wronged me are far too many to enumerate here. Out of all your grotesque acts and depraved fabrications, only one still haunts me. Only one gives me call to compose this letter, and tell you why I should have forgotten about you as quickly as you lumbered awkwardly into my life. There is one reason alone that keeps you from crossing the intangible border between hatred and complete indifference from me.
The fact that you were bitter holds no interest with me. Bitterness is to be expected. You had it made, and I snatched it all away from you. But by the end of this letter, I want it to be crystal fucking clear why I left you with nothing.
You looked up at me with feigned horror on your face, as the little blue line appeared on the Wal Mart brand pregnancy test. Inside I knew you were ecstatic. You had every reason to be.
That's why we had all those blood tests done. We had to be absolutely sure.
I wasn't thrilled. Even then, I couldn't think of a more unfit mother for my child. I suppose I should have thought of that sooner, shouldn't I? That's one of many lessons our deranged relationship taught me. I wasn't happy, but I was going to do what any responsible man would do: I was going to be supportive.
It was a decision we both had to make, but the final choice was undeniably up to you.
After late night discussions, I don't suppose you remember looking me in the eye and telling me you thought it would be for the best if we had an abortion, do you?
I'm sure you do. It's with everyone else that you conveniently skipped that part.
It was for the best, but you are an abomination. An ignorant, terrible excuse for a woman. I would sooner go childless than make progeny with a beast such as yourself.
That being as it may, don't you dare think for one second that this whole scenario didn't eat me alive. I couldn't have given less of a shit about you, but I loved what was going to be our baby... which is but one among many reasons it should have never come into the world.
The guilt and the pain were wracking. But I stood by you the whole time and offered you support. But there was no support for me. I think there is rarely, if ever support for "the guy". Maybe there's a reason for that. Maybe most guys don't really care.
I sure as shit did.
After all was said and done, I could barely look at myself in the mirror, but I made sure you had plenty of strength to carry on.
Despite all of that, this is the reason you have plagued my thoughts, rather than fading into obscurity:
When I left you several months later, on unrelated grounds, I expected you to be upset. You had been living with me for free. I took care of you emotionally and financially, and in some sick, craven way, I have no doubt that you loved me.
But what you did is unforgivable.
If you had run off to tell our mutual friends that I was lousy in bed, or that I was abusive, or that I had been cheating on you -- anything to redeem your shattered, and already nearly nonexistent self esteem -- I could have bounced back from it. It wouldn't have phased me a bit. The immature ramblings of an insipid, childish 21 year old.
You didn't tell them any of those things. You decided to get back at me the one way you knew it would affect me: You told them I forced you to have that abortion. You told them I hated the idea of that child, and that I threatened you on every level if you didn't do it.
If you ever had my heart to begin with, that would have broken it. My heart broke for that child that day. That it had to die at the hands of a petty, vengeful woman, unfit to live, let alone give life. That a piece of me was sacrificed to some bitter, desperate end of a stupid, worthless person.
The worst part is, you don't have the mental capacity to even come close to understanding that. To you, that's just another thing that happened in another state with another guy.
The most harm I could possibly wish you is that it would haunt you as it does me. If you had a heart, it would.
Our child is dead, Shannon. And in my mind, so are you.
Complete Indifference,
Pahl
