This open letter could have been laced with much more personal anger, if not for the fact that I bled out my hormones, and that you are someone my dear friend still care aplenty for.
Trust me, seeing a friend of mine in this much pain, I could have swayed this letter to be filled with so much bias-ness that my seething rage would bite you hard, but what’s the point of this, when you probably will wriggle your way out with all the slime in your hair gel, like you always do.
From your cruel, insensitive jibes at my friend, I am not sure if this letter would even get across to you in the way I wish it would without you getting overly defensive with your ego blindsiding you.
I can only extend as much civility to you in the hope that you could do the same to your wife, the mother of your child, a friend I have immense respect and care towards. This graciousness, is something I have learnt from her, especially how she has handled the abyss of grief you have created for her in the past one and half months.
The past is not what is important, never mind that you had cheated with someone from your property agency just when she was pregnant with your child, and decided to go ahead and marry you when you were gifted with the forgiveness of a big-hearted woman.
Yes, that was perhaps the pitfall of many women, to believe that a man could change for the better, for the sake of their children, and maybe to believe that they are indeed special, don’t we already know that?
Hurhur, I should know that very well personally.
Don’t you already know that, having the first hand experience when the bombshell dropped that your parents were getting a divorce because of your dad’s infidelity, and that your mum could no longer bear the pain and suffering to be emotionally tormented by such a man?
It is just a pity you decided to take after, and be that very same person who hurt your mum.
S told me, how it was perhaps the hurt from your past that you never did recover from, that you needed that validation.
Is that why you have unwittingly taken after a trait you resented deep down inside you, I don’t know, or maybe, do you blame your mum for what happened, that you try to test it out on the women around you, proving that flow of forgiveness and credits of love would never run out, and that it would have been possible for her to stay on for the sake of the family?
When S got in touch with me, she was helpless, and she was in so much pain, and yet she was a picture of stoic calm, still asking herself if it would be possible to forgive, and try to forget, and taking it as a phase that you would eventually grow out of.
She knew it was her choice, and that it was perhaps her initial forgiveness that might have spur your rampant ego that you would once again get away with it, unscathed, scotfree, and maybe it’s time she realises that the institute of marriage is something you have no respect for, and you have chosen to head to the other extreme, the wrong one I might add, with the chance you were given.
Feel free to correct me, it all started on the day when you didn’t return home, and insisted that you did.
Pardon me as I need to contain my chuckles, but as naive and stupid we may appear to be sometimes, but do you think any woman would NOT even realise when their partners didn’t return home?
Especially when the signs were there since December, but something she thought nothing of because you always had work as excuses.
It was until your excuses ran out that you decided to spin a lie that you slept in your BWM convertible cos it was too far for you to return home. And the lies didn’t stop from that day onwards. The flip was too abrupt, too incredulous, and anyone reading this right now could tell you too.
Even if she wanted to believe you, how could she?
And then, you decided it was okay to be more high profile, and all the public make out sessions with your mistress, you didn’t even care or be bothered who saw you, or if words spread.
When you could deny no more, the most incredible retort came from you when you got all riled up and defensive.
You expected S to accept your affairs, and that you would come back to her to be a husband, and a father.
Is that really the kind of role model you want to set for your 8 month-old boy, and that you would treat his mother this way, devoting your time and attention on someone else when he was barely 3 months old?
It was only 10 months into your marriage when you cheated. How to last a lifetime? I don’t know, but marriage is no child’s play… it means so much more to us, than it is to you.
You told her to suck it up, and you may justify it was just a fling and a moment of folly, but you did not stop when you were found out.
You chose the defensive way out, because you reckon she would once again forgive and forget, and buy everything you say.
Like how you want to work things out, and that it is your ‘destiny’ that the 2 of you would be together.
You were not repentant, on the contrary, you became more blatant as it was out in the open, and you jabbed your finger in her face to blame her for whatever that happened.
Didn’t you say she doesn’t dress up as she used to, didn’t you think she was becoming old and haggard, didn’t you say it was her bloody fault that she couldn’t keep her husband, didn’t you say it was her who made you do it, cos she was not good enough and words to the extent that she was useless as a wife?
“It’s your fault you couldn’t keep your husband what. WIN ME BACK LAH!” you sneered.
It isn’t a competition she is in, and even if Y is keen on winning, it doesn’t mean S has to be in some sort of warped competition just to put you on some pedestal you don’t belong on.
This was how you treated my friend, a friend who has looks, the grace, can have any man she deserves just by being herself (and she chose you), a successful career, brains and a big, big heart for all the grace she extended to you despite so many years of heartache.
You asked her to leave her job so she could help out with your property business, and she gladly left behind the years of career she had built for herself. As she was serving her notice, you left her in the lurch, leaving her jobless, and theoretically husbandless.
But with her son being her priority, I saw how she drew strength, and put all her focus on just loving him, while coping all the pain you brought upon her.
She was apprehensive of what’s the next step to go, but she knew, despite days of convincing herself, she saw that it would just be the beginning of how you take her forgiveness for granted, and that Y isn’t the first, and certainly isn’t gonna be the last.
She wanted to leave, but you wouldn’t let her go, insisting you can work things out.
But how do you expect to work things out when the first thing you after you left your home is to rent a place and have Y over for your trysts (though she looks different without make up over supper, but it is hard not to recognise faces that hurt our friends), and on the other hand, constantly badgering S to move in with you so you could work things out into the rented place you are treating like a budget hotel?
How do you really expect her to live with this, pretend she doesn’t know, pretend she didn’t hear all the things people tell her, and even she wanted to work things out, you obviously were just paying lip service and mean nothing you said.
The mindgames you started playing tire her out. Swinging from the sensitive man you played out to be, to a defensive, egomaniac man with all the cruel words when you didn’t manage to sway her your way. The games that all guilty men play.
When the soft tactics don’t work, the hard way would, isn’t that what you think?
Let me tell you, it only kills. Not her esteem like you wish you did, so that she would have so much fear of losing you, because she could only think lowly of herself the way you wanted her to, but kill her hopes of you ever repenting, and act like a real, responsible man who made a mistake would.
You taunted her, again and again, just so you could gain the upperhand. Why are you piling on hurt after hurt on someone who stood by you and showered you with nothing but love?
And yet, you refuse to set her free, when she wanted to set you free to be who you want to be. What is that for? To upkeep the family man image that how you have it all in front of your partners and clients in your property business?
What’s the point of dropping by every single day to convince her you can work things out, when after you left, it was another woman you ran to?
I don’t know. Many people wanted to find excuses for you, for that you are her husband, and it is a marriage with a young child involved, nobody would want to see it end. But with all the things you did, you said, we could see our friend suffer no more.
I have to concede, you play a very clever game there. Going to Taiwan for business trip and arranged for Y to join you.
Y could even keep up with a very cool pretense when she went into your office and asked “Eh, D not here today huh?” when she knew full well where you were, and that she was joining you that very evening.
People in your agency are not stupid, they are only downplaying it and feigning ignorance for they were afraid of the mud you bring along with you into the company, but they still talk. And what Y did wasn’t quite wise on hindsight, cos it just makes her look as deceitful.
I have friends in property business, and the mortgage business (in the company Y works too, no less), and oh yes they talk. They are afraid of implications, not because they are stupid nor that they are condoning what you are doing.
You lost the respect of your peers once, and seeing that how you are a division director in the providence division (I apologise for an earlier mistake which your colleague has informed me of so not to incur the name of the wrong division) of your company, proud of your achievements and all, and teaching your teams about integrity, motivational factors, so what? It’s a downright mockery of all you sales people paint such a picture, when you know full well it was just talks and nothing you adhere by. Is it worth losing all the dwindling respect people have for you just because you want to push the limit of how far you can get away with it?
Where’s the credibility in all that training you preach to those who look up to you?
I asked S if she wanted to give you a chance, and I know deep down inside her, she wants to believe in the good of you. She told me how you are good at making people feel special, and she believed you fooled Y the same way. She didn’t even blame her, and thought that you realising your mistake, you would make a choice.
But alas, the choices you made, make it hard for us friends to see S swallowing all the humiliation you threw her way.
How could we let our friend be in such a destructive marriage, and be around such a spiteful, immature man who cares nothing for her emotional well-being.
Be reasonable, and think, is it really fair to say it is her fault, even if it means at the expense of humbling yourself and admitting you are in the wrong? Is it even fair to trample her self worth when she was dealing with the hurt of your betrayal?
Her strength came through this time round, because she knows she just have to be a better mother to your child, and that’s all she cares.
And that’s why she wanted your lies no more.
Your words kill everytime. Like when she questioned you about your trip to Taiwan with Y just as you moved out, and just as S left her job, you could tell her it was none of her freaking business who you went Taiwan with.
She’s your wife, it’s her business, and you can’t be that selfish anymore.
What’s the point of playing a doting father on your facebook, posting clips of your son, and flashing all the purchases you put on credit, when it was all nothing but a facade?
So what you are a top property agent in a providence division of a reputable agency when people are doubting your credibility and responsibility, and what’s the point of letting you earning all that commission when you spent that money on woman who probably is charmed by all that material stuff you could afford, and not for who you really are?
S asked for a separation, and you brushed her off and said you would not go there, and you have no wish of granting her the freedom you so should her given her.
If she is really as bad as the venomous words you spat into her face, then why don’t you just agree to the separation she begged you for?
Granted, if you are really seriously and heavily invested in Y, then, this is the chance for you to grab it and run with you, and you could put 3 adults and a child out of the misery at once. I would give you my blessing, and I believe it would be a relief for S as well not to be going through the emotional coaster of broken, empty promises.
It is painful, to hear your promises, and your soothing assurances, and then within hours, you turn defensive and showed no trace of remorse, and you give hope, and you take them away.
You could prevent the hurt to your child by dragging this out till he is old enough to understand, like your parents didn’t.
If you are seriously into Y, and is willing to give up your family for her, then there’s nothing I can say, then do it, but don’t prolong the misery for everyone involved. Affairs of the heart are complicated, but you can’t expect to have the best of all worlds.
If you think your marriage was a wrong choice and want to justify that you truly feel for this woman, then just let our friend go.
But when S asked for alimony for the expenses of the child as she left her job, your taunts really make me doubt if you truly feel for this woman, or she is just another object to stroke that ego.
“Sorry, I have no money. I have no time to work cos I am too busy having affairs so no money lah!“. I might add your spanking new watch says otherwise.
No money can bring other woman overseas?
That smirk and sneer in your voice when you boasted, “I don’t need money to bed a woman, you know?”
Any excuses I tried to find for you, I couldn’t muster anymore. You really expect S to come crawling to you at the drop of a hat, just because you know the exact buttons to push?
I plead you, to let her go. If she is willing to leave you be and free of the commitment of being a husband to screw all the random women out there who are willing to drop their panties at your snap of fingers because they truly feel for you, or just because they can get business from you, then at least let her be free of the hurt you are bringing her, so she can lead a better life without you, and that she can find her self again.
Are you not tired putting up all these charades? How long more you want to torment her? She’s not a puppet.
I hope you look at the big picture, I am not expecting you to feel an instant remorse, or try to appease your wife, or try to win her back, cos all we think is the best for her, is for you to be out of her life.
I am writing this, because she is now away taking a break from all these heartache overseas, and I do not wish you hassling her the way you did with all sweet nothings and empty promises, only to break her heart again and again with actions that say otherwise.
You know she is heading overseas, and yet you couldn’t be bothered, maybe you are busy with work, or maybe just blatantly enjoying the freedom you assume she bestowed you.
A good woman might be there waiting for you once, twice, or more, but there can be a time a limit is reached and when you realise that, it is all too late.
You are a leader in your company, I really have my sympathies to those led by you, and I certainly do not hope they follow your examples.
***
As for you Y…
I am going to disregard what the property industry people say about you flirting your way to get business… and how your SMU peers verified that you are someone who is competitive and can’t take losing, and you are all set out to win, to prove that you have it in you.
For me, I believe women have it in them to be unscrupulous, but I also believe women who would disregard everything to pursue how they feel for a man, for love. I try to believe despite whatever said about you that you are the latter.
You are a smart lady, I am sure, your academic record in SMU proved that. D is someone who is charming, and could make a woman feel really special. And all the material stuff may seem alluring to an impressionable young lady like you.
I have made mistakes in my life I am not proud of. I have heard things promised and seemed damn real but weren’t.
I have thought certain sacrifices were rightly made for what I believed I felt.
I am not sure at the end of it if it was eventually worth it.
He could have painted a picture with you, but it doesn’t mean he wouldn’t paint it with any other woman, maybe you already know it, and maybe you don’t. Maybe you already know where you stand, maybe you don’t.
I am not saying you have to think about the little baby boy you played with when you guys hang out together during business gathering.. because it is utterly broken to pieces that there simply isn’t any point for them to work things out.
You knew what you were getting yourself into, maybe he said he has no more feelings for S, and give him time, I have heard such said to my friends before, and their waits never turned in their favours.
He might have given you hope saying how he doesn’t love her, and he doesn’t even sleep with her (if you really have to know, they only stopped sleeping together when she found out) anymore, and has no intention of working things out with her.
I don’t know what he said, because he sure is a good sales person, and with the assurances and the way he manipulated S to give him another chance while still sleeping with you…
But if you are just wanting that sense of victory, then go ahead and claim it, cos no one is fighting with you (I don’t know if there is any other, but who knows if he is seeing someone else but claiming he is home visiting his family, or having dinner with his peers/family cos you wouldn’t even doubt him) and maybe only himself and you would think that there is a point of “winning” him like a trophy. If it is for the work, then I believe your abilities of achieving in your career go beyond that and you don’t have to resort to this.
Whatever it is, I just hope you know what you are getting yourself into. What he says may seem real, and only time can prove it to you, and even a longer time, before he takes you with granted and coming up with endless cover ups to cloud your judgment.
Take him and claim your victory if you so want, and if it is for real, and that he is in it for real, then get him to cut S’s suffering short, so you guys can start whatever you guys want, with no one have shit say in what you do.
Whatever you feel, justify whatever way you want, because affairs of the heart, is not what outsiders like us could really judge, can we? I wish you guys the best.
At the end of the day, my friend’s emotional and physical welfare is what I truly care about, and I wish you guys can set her free, which I believe you guys can.
In fact if I were to be a little selfish, I would beg you to keep him tight, the last thing I want is that when he loses his harbour in you, he would run back to S and tighten his noose around her like he is already doing.
***
I could have written more of what had transpired, but then it is equally emotionally draining on my part to sit through the abuse a dear friend had to sit through, and not that you would believe as he would probably boo-boo everything I gotta say down to a ruse set up by S.
I remember visiting S and as she tended to her baby, her mum chatted to me. I could see the pain in her eyes, and yet the determined way she would support her child through all these. It was the conversation that truly touched me.
I don’t know if I would be punching the guy who does this to my daughter, but her understanding.. and her views, make me realise how lucky Desmond is to have these people in his life.
This post has nothing to do with S, but after seeing how her hopes are destroyed again and again, and her voice went unheard, I just hope, something magical would happen for her and her baby.
And no, the something magical is not a change of heart in D because there is nothing we friends wish for, but for S to be freed of his chains. He could have valid reasons for all that self validations, but it isn’t something she or their baby should burden for the rest of their lives.
Regards,
Ting
(Edited: Wah, I am impressed by the CSI work of all you people, can dig them out from under the carpet and all and posted them in the comments. I am even willing to give up better interest rates even if it OXXX give me a good rate for mortgage! Okay, at least let me have ONE tiny spiteful statement in lah)
Edited again: One of his family members had requested me to remove his full name and details and even the comments.
But I have always maintained my stand that what I wrote, even if taken back, would not change the fact I said it. But because his cousin had emailed me, and I understand she is trying to help a family, that I will do it out of respect for her. Like I said, he is indeed very lucky, to have all the people in his life.
But, if I had never even altered or deleted comments about myself, I don’t see why I should censor any voice of public just because of him.
And gee, how did this post reach so many people, that was something I certainly did not expect.
