The Divorce

outelocating to Washington, DC came after nearly a decade of service in the United States Army. I had done my time and now it was time for me to start my own life so to speak. Uncle Sam did his part in sending me on my way; my belongings were shipped overseas from Europe as well as my car, and I had a pretty solid resume to boot. I had all the tools to prepare me for what seemed like a smooth fresh start. It took me no time at all to find lodging and an adequate job working as a contractor. Professionally I was set. It was personally that still hung ominously overhead.

I suppose introductions are in order; my name is Joao Santos. I am a recent transplant to the great District of Columbia. I arrived at BWI in March of 2020 just in time for the pandemic and like most I have been trying to figure out a way to survive the COVID-19 pandemic while maintaining my sanity mid divorce. Yep. That’s me. Just your normal average 30-something going through that nasty seven letter word. No one really prepares you for that all too common causality of the 21st century: divorce. Everyone praises marriage as something holy and sacred and you never want for lack of inspirational speeches on why you’re making the right decision. So in the unfortunate circumstance when you are left to face the ugly head of divorce you find yourself at a loss for how to handle it…at least not without someone to talk to and share with.

Enter Tadeu Morais. He was an associate I met back during my tenure in the Army some three years ago now. We met during ALC or Army Leadership Course, the course to transition from Sergeant to Staff Sergeant rank. We originally bonded over our affection for our marriages (his came with a stunning wife and adorable son), and his desperate need for a peer review of an essay we were to write for the course.

“Hey, Santos?” came a voice I had never heard call my name before. I turned from the table my roommate and friends were having a small luncheon at in the barracks courtyard and nearly choked on my bottle neck beer. There he was in al his 5’10 grandeur clad in a dark gray hoodie, baggy jeans and some unassuming shoes. The man was attractive. His tanned skin was lumionous as his dark brown eyes waited for me to acknowledge him.

“What’s up?” I said in my best attempt to act aloof.

“Hey so I heard from one of the guys in class that you’re pretty good with writing?” he said taking a step closer to where I was sitting.

“Well. You shouldn’t listen to EVERYTHING the PNN rumor mill churns up. Not everything is the same caliber grist” I said grinning.

“Uh…yeaaah. I was wondering if you have time if you could look over my paper for me? I think it could use an extra set of eyes,” he replied.

“Oh yeah. I don’t mind. Whenever you want me to just let me know,” I responded.

“Okay cool. You mind looking now? I wanna get it edited if I need to and get it done,” he said quickly. I sighed heavily and finished my disgusting Budweiser and stood.

“Yeah. Beer isn’t really my thing anyway. Lead on,” I said as we walked from under the gazebo towards the building.

On the walk up I found out that he was from NYC. Mainly from his accent but also from the fact that he told me. He was in his early 30s, married 11 years, had an extremely cute son, super family oriented, and a bit of a firecracker though age had definitely done its part to mellow him out. I also took not of the suave manner in which he spoke and the slight allure of his walk. It wasn’t swag so to speak but more like seasoned self confidence which translated to down right sexiness to me. Of course, I didn’t (and most likely won’t) tell him this. Once we got to his room, he handed me his paper and I drew out a red pen from my uniform sleeve.

“Yoooo. He’s got the red pen!” Tadeu said laughing.

“Oh, you thought you were the first to solicit my assistance? Ha! You’re a bit late on the game here. Mostly everyone else already has my corrections to their papers done,” I said sitting at one of the two desks in his room. He turned on some music as I worked though to be honest I wasn’t paying much attention to the genre. No sooner had I sat down was the red pen already hitting the paper.

“Damn…that’s a lot of red” he said looking over my shoulder.

“Yes. It is. Why’d you wait so long to ask for someone to read it?” I asked incredulously as I finished.

“I had someone look at it. They said it was aight,” he said taking the paper from me.

“Do me a favor…never let them proof you again because that my friend was painful,” I said laughing.

“Oh, so you got jokes. No but foreal though. Writing? Never really been my thing. I’m better with my hands,” he said reviewing the paper that now had more red ink than black on it. I bit back my flirtatious retort. Did all straight men in the military secretly play with phrases they know will trigger us poor innocent and unsuspecting gays? The torment of it all.

After this encounter we met a few more times with mutual friends in ALC to go hang out in Sierra Vista and we smoked the occasional cigarette or two together. We didn’t really hang out much other than that though. My friends and I had concluded that I should give Mr. Man a wide birth because to be honest I was married, not blind and that man was trouble with a capital T.

Fast forward to my arrival in DC some three years later. I am now settling well into the DC lifestyle; working a thankless 9-5 during the week while attending college courses in the evening, trying to maintain family relationships, raising a dog, and trying to squeeze time for your interpersonal relationships with your friends. This last part generally came in the form of video gaming or brunch. Please don’t underestimate the fervor with which Washingtonians approach brunch. It’s almost cutthroat. The crème of the crop here is that the beautifully sacred, anointed by G-d, holy marriage I was promised had also collapsed on me and I was amid divorce.

To my friends I would never talk about the hurt I felt by this change in my life. Why? They had all told me the I told you so’s at the start when I originally got married. This marriage was never supposed to be real. It was a business transaction that was supposed to benefit us both. Pre-marriage was messy as we did try dating seriously, it fell through due to me moving out of the country because Uncle Sam called, and we left it there. Or at least he did.

Though I thought I had dealt with it, being faced with divorce also forced me to face the feelings I had only shoved into a bottle and placed on the proverbial shelf. Well, the shelf collapsed, and that bottle smashed to the ground and let out those emotions Harry Potter prophecy style. What was wrong with me that it couldn’t be real? Was I only ever a means to an end (pre-nupitals)? He’s so much happier in life than I am. Is karma punishing me for something? Again, trying to deal with this alone at times has been too much for me to bear. I would cry in the shower so that no one would see. That was until about February 2022 when a surprise message from a welcome stranger came through my inbox.

I had posted a story on my social media and who should react to it but Tadeu Morais. We chatted a bit and the conversation turned to us trying to coordinate meeting up.

“You know I would love the chance to meet you. Like REALLY meet you. You can’t drop a semi-nude photo on a guy and expect him not to want to see what’s outside the frame” I said applying heavy flirt here. Hey. The universe sent him back my way. Why not shoot my shot?

“What do you mean?” came his confused response.

“Oh. Nothing. I was just trying to be fast. Lol. I’ll control my hormones and remind myself you are married. That’ll keep me respectful,” I said hurriedly.

“Ah. You men are all the same” he messages back jokingly.

“I actually kicked her out two weeks ago,” he responded after I didn’t respond right away. I was sitting down at my desk at work, and this prompted me to sit up.

“Wait. WHAT?” I messaged.

“Yeah. After ALC she foolishly had a relationship with a married guy that had 5 kids. Which I gotta give it to him. Smooth dude. Had her listening to the song from Kane Brown (What If). Well, we worked it out and I swallowed my pride because we have a baby together and I am a responsible father. I will do anything for my son,” he typed. As the messages came in, I wanted to badly to respond but the speed of his messages told me that this was something that he needed to get off his chest, so I sat glued to the screen.

“Then I went overseas- “he continued “-and it was barely two months that I was gone, and she got pregnant. She had an abortion because she ‘cared about her family’. So, it was now my fault somehow. I MADE her get the abortion. I told her to keep it or not it’s whatever I just don’t want to see you at the ceremony when I come back home. Again, we worked past that after I came back and once again swallowed my pride. 15 years together and she was always too tired to go anywhere with me but the minute I’m gone and this- “he wrote.

Next, he sent me two media messages. Once was a snapshot of her Tinder profile picture. It was incredibly tacky and made me internally chuckle at how little straight women had to do to pull men. Because if I had taken a picture like that I would have to move out of state and enter the witness protection program because Le Gaze would read me for filth! The next thing he sent was a video. I’m not sure of the context but I do know in the video there was a lot of yelling from her to him. Tadeu had a broom in his hand attempting to clean and was holding the camera aloft to capture everything. As he raised it I could see their son nearby watching as she crossed the room yelling at him. She reaches Tadeu and promptly slapped him which caused my stomach to flip. Tadeu did nothing in the video but take the hit and look anywhere but at his wife. He continued typing.

“She became abusive and after all that I stayed with her. It wasn’t until 3 months ago that I found out my rent, mortgage and everything had not been paid for 3 months. This is when I stopped it. Messing with me is one thing but messing with the roof over my son’s head? Nah. Not acceptable. Also had the guy she got pregnant with around my son, in my house that I BOUGHT for my family. No respect,” he finished.

By this point I had long since left the office. The weight of his revelation was too much for me to sit through in the office where I had to keep a straight professional bearing.

“This woman is evil! I couldn’t imagine going through even a fraction of that. I am SO sorry Tadeu. I had no idea. I do know that you don’t deserve that. No one does especially not after 15 years! You stayed by her through all her health issues, all this crazy. I can’t imagine what you feel right now,” I said holding back tears of my own.

‘Women…” he messaged simply.

Catching his attempt to lighten the situation I said, “Tuh. On days like this I’m glad I’m a dyed in the wool homosexual.”

Though our conversation continued I had to immediately phone a friend and coordinate an emergency brunch. That weekend (coincidentally the weekend that would have been my anniversary) me and my good friend Felix met for food. He was in town for the weekend as he was passing through on his way back to Europe where he was stationed.

“Bitch. That’s a lot!” he said as we finished our food and started our post meal mimosas.

“Yes. It is,” I replied downing my first and pouring another.

“You gonna tell me his name, safada?” he asked me.

“Didn’t I tell you to begin with no? It’s personal to him. But I’m just wondering why it’s not talked about more often. You hear all the time women coming forward with their issues but men, gay or straight, seem to want to hold onto it more,” I said brooding. Felix was silent for a moment before responding.

“You and he are prime examples. I mean I KNOW you can’t just go telling everyone. Your situation is different but you could have at least told me. Told Nicole. You KNOW she is going to have your head for not letting her be there with you through this,” he said voicing a feeling I had been dreading for a while.

‘I know. I will pray she understands. Hell, even telling you involved you pulling teeth to get it out girl. I just need time to know how I’m going to constructively handle this instead of being a jumble of emotions,” I retorted finishing my second mimosa.

“Chile. Sometimes feeling and JUST feeling is what you NEED to do. You think too much. All that logic and books and cleverness is cute for Ravenclaw up in the castle, but this is Nocturn Alley honey. You gotta do a bit more than that here!” he said rolling his eyes. I followed this gesture up with an eye roll of my own.

“ANY way. Back to the question at hand,” I said chuckling.

“Well I think it has a lot to do with the fact that men feel it impedes on their masculinity. What will society think if a man comes forward and says he’s been getting mollywhopped by his wife?” Felix said.

“That he’s in an abusive situation and needs to get out of it! No one is going to think less of him for it!” I said getting inadvertently angry.

“Riiiight. Which is why you are so ready to tell you story, princesa,” Felix said raising a brow. I threw a piece of cantaloupe at him.

“But the juicy part of the story tell me about the nudes! This is what I’ve been waiting for!” he said eyes glinting.

“Tranquila garota!” I said laughing.

“Noooo! I need to see what has your panties moist!” he said trying to snatch my phone. I pulled it out of reach.

“Young man. No. These pictures were sent to the confidence and trust of my phone. But I will say that Tadeu is more man than any woman deserves. Because all of that equipment down there??” I said sipping my drink.

“I bet you was having heart palpitations on facetime with him the other day huh?” he asked sitting back.

“Tuh! No! It was just…hot in my apartment that night,” I said taking a gulp.

“SO yes. You were,” Felix came back smoothly.

“Okay. Maybe a little but the man is just naturally fine. And he wasn’t even trying. It’s not my fault he doesn’t know how to turn it off,” I said crossly.

“Let me find out you’re starting to like straight men now after your marriage ends,” he said in a joking tone but looking at his face I could see the worry written there.

“Don’t fret. I know forbidden fruit when I see it. My name is Joao, not Eve. I won’t take a bite,” I said teasingly.

“Good. Because I peeped while that man poured his heart out to you not once did he ask how YOU were doing. Don’t be a fool twice querida,” he responded. We finished our brunch and I took him to the airport.

After dropping him off I couldn’t help but wonder about our conversation and the events of my life over the past few years. What was truly so difficult about me voicing my struggle? Did I feel like I owed something to someone to be this perfectly put together person at all times? Where did that want come from? I know growing up the pressure was placed on me as the oldest to set the example. Always get good grades, have exemplary performance in anything I did, get a job, pay for my own first car, join the military. All things I was expected to do so the younger kids could follow suit. That carried over I believe into my adult life, wanting to be a good example for everyone. Now when I am a mess, I don’t know which way to turn or who to go to for help.
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What I do know is that for the first time in 4 years I am beginning to feel like myself. For the first time in four years, I am beginning to understand that in life you will have troubles. There is no way of avoiding them. The only way to get through them is going to be with the help of your friends….and maybe the occasional pair of strappy Giuseppe Zanotti sandals.