Living with Judas and The Last Supper

Well, it has been a month since my life fell apart.  I guess not my whole life, just the portion of it that has been the 28 years of marriage.  Funny how you can build a whole life around that.  Untangling it all is virtually impossible.  Just like untangling the old Christmas lights.  It's really just easier to toss them out and go out and buy new ones.  Oh, you give it a try for a while, but you know there is no hope.  You just go through the motions anyway to say you gave it the old college try before cutting your losses and moving on, I mean, buying new ones.

My husband moves out of our family home tomorrow.  How weird.  How very final.  It is for the best, of course.  His living here, with me and our daughters, while we all go through the repeated cycles of processing our grief and readjusting to the new world order just makes it more painful and awkward for everyone.  It will be a relief I'm sure, but still...it is so very sad.

There will be no more unwanted ghost in the house.  A ghost of the past haunting our hearts and making us remember.  Remember the good times, the history of us, our family.  Remember the pain.  Trying to hide the tears.  Going through the motions of unavoidable daily living while the man who betrayed you with a kiss (and more) so calculating and cavalierly is somewhere in the house. The astonishment that he thinks everything should be as before, and can't understand why everyone is so mad and avoids being in the same room as he.  He pouts and has an air of put-upon, while suddenly being very helpful around the house. No more trying to be civil, so the house won't be a war zone, despite every fibre of your being screaming to do the opposite. An unwelcome guest in your life now, for all the pain he's caused.  The future he's changed forever.

I look at him in amazment.  I wonder who he is.  This isn't the man whom I fell in love with and married.  Commited my life to.  I have no idea who this is.  I don't recognize him at all, in any way.  When did this happen?  I look back to see, and I can make out vague shapes of change that I didn't notice.  That only now make sense.  Things now conspicuous by their absence.  The other day I stumbled across a photograph of him as I remember him.  My heart leaped and I thought  "Oh, there you are!"  So incredibly sad that he is gone forever.  Replaced by this stranger.  I start to wonder if I'm insane.  Did it all really happen?  These 29 years that we've had together.  Did I imagine it all?  I couldn't have.  Not all of it.

I try to remember the last time we all sat at the table as a family for dinner.  We have been avoiding this family ritual now, and have done since it all came to light.  There is no earthly way we could all sit around a table together to share a meal.  There is no civility in me strong enough to do it, and I certainly would not subject our daughters to such an obscene charade.  So when was our last supper?  I have only vague memories of it, but I miss it just the same.  We didn't know that we were sitting with Judas at the head of the table, listening to him bless our food and asking how our days were. Didn't know that it would never happen again, like so many other things.

I remember our last kiss.  The last time he held me.  The last time we slept together.  Our last family event.  There was no warning for all of these "last" things, and I didn't know that he was Judas among us during all of them.  I didn't know to cherish them because they would never come again.  And so I missed them. I start to think back.  To try and remember when what we had was last real.  Try and separate the lies from the last truth that I know for sure.  Sometimes I think I have it figured out, but then again, I could be wrong.  I have been before.  They are as tangled as the Christmas lights, and I have to find out where the old ends so I can put them in a mental box marked "Old Life" and start building on the new.

I don't know if the first Judas ever got to enjoy his poisoned reward, or if he ever regretted his decision or sought forgiveness.  I know that mine will not get to enjoy a life with the woman he betrayed us with, because she dumped him.  It may have had something to do with the Facebook message I sent her.  A clarification of the status of our marriage, despite what she had been told, a thank you for using condoms so I can rest assured my STD test will be negative, a reminder that adultery is a sin, and a Merry Christmas wish from the wife and daughters of the man she is sleeping with.  It may have been a factor, but I'll never know.  I'm sure that being alone was not part of his plan, but he seems to have adjusted well.  He's taken to reading the Bible nightly, and going to church.  Seeking redemption and comfort that only God can give, because I certainly won't. 

He is eager to start his new life with no responsibilities.  Just he and his ego alone together at last.  So Judas will take his 30 pieces of silver tomorrow, and move to his new condo.  It seems so easy for him.  To just end one life and begin another.  Like the first never existed at all.  And that's why it makes me wonder...did it ever?