Some Other Man

He was 5’8 – what the women considered short. He knew there was nothing he could do about his height but he could do something about how he looked. Protein shakes, 2 hours in the gym and weights were his daily companion. Some might say the gym was his lover. We of course know this is not true. In heartbreak and in joy, weights was what he lifted. The gym was where he felt he was in control of everything. But no amount of weightlifting could really fix a broken heart.

She was 5’3, not that it mattered. She didn’t think much of herself, but he thought the world of her. The way she laughed and the way she spoke were two things he loved the most about her. She had odd habits like never finishing her meal or leaving the crust of her bread. He loathed those things but in a weird way he loved them.

Tonight, he sat at the bar, thinking critically. The gym was closed as it was half past 8 so the next best thing he knew to do was to hit the bar. Just a few miles away she was at her bridal shower and tomorrow she would be walking down the aisle to marry some other man. He would be smelling her perfume, complaining about her waste of food and reminding her that she was enough. Some other man would hold her hands as they took evening strolls and some other man would call himself the father of her children. This same other man would meet her family for Sunday brunch – this other man, whom he did not know. This other man he couldn’t trust.

After his third bottle, the painting on the wall caught his eye; a lonely man was sat at a bar with a bottle in his hand and in the window, a woman and a child stared in at him. It was an odd painting to place in a bar. After all, the goal was to encourage people to drink more, not remind them of those they were hurting by doing so. It was probably the drink, but the woman’s eyes looked as though she was pleading with the man at the bar to come out and come home, and then suddenly it dawned on him. Perhaps the last time he saw her that was the expression in her eyes. He didn’t understand it at the time but now he did.

He closed his tab and headed straight for home. He would be the man she needed him to be. Tomorrow, he would go and save her – he would save her from some other man.

The sun was sitting over the mountains in the calming way it always did. The clock read a quarter to 9. His hand quivered so much that he gave up after his fifth attempt to close the first button of his shirt. His chest peaked through and you could see the gleam of the silver chain she had got him for his twenty-seventh birthday.

He knew it would be foolish to try driving to the Trinity Baptist Church in the state that he was in. It was of utmost importance that he arrive at the church in one piece. If there was ever a time she required him to be responsible, it was now.

He arrived just in time to catch her before she entered the church. She looked just like he knew she would on their wedding day; a white glistening mermaid gown with her hair neatly slicked back to reveal her perfect cheek bones. He wanted to call out her name but words failed him. As though she knew that a part of her was calling, she turned around and met his eye.

As they locked eyes, she handed her bouquet to her maid of honor and they walked towards each other as in the final scene of the greatest romance movie ever made. She threw her arms around him and he embraced her. It felt like two puzzle pieces connecting and for a moment the world seemed to stand still. “I love you” their hearts screamed to each other.

That’s what he wished had happened. That’s what he saw for a moment.

But in those few seconds that their eyes met, he saw it all. He saw the young girl he had fallen in love with when they were just 18. He saw how her heart broke when he chose to party instead of spending time with her. He saw how mad she was when she found out that he kissed another girl in a game of truth or dare. He saw how conflicted she felt when the pregnancy test came out positive and how she thought she would die after she lost their child.

Almost as though he was coming out of a trance, he realized it’d been 2 years. Two years since they parted ways and in that time she had grown. After thinking she would not be able to live, she was about to walk down the aisle. He did not need to save her. She was already saved. She was whole and she didn’t need him to take a piece as he had always done. He was no hero and he had never been.

She smiled her little crooked smile and turned back towards the church. He watched her go, realizing that true love wasn’t screaming out how he felt; true love was letting her go and be happy with some other man.