The Importance of a Morning Coffee

I rushed out of the apartment and let the door slam behind me. I knew it might be the last time I visited this building, but I had to get out. I took the stairs two at a time, being careful not to trip and fall flat on my face. I was not the most agile when it came to getting out of places quickly. He did not follow me, and as I opened the main door, I dared myself to walk to my car without looking back at the second floor balcony.

I made it to the car, able to keep my promise, and slid into the front seat. The clock read 11:35 PM. My parents would definitely wonder why I had come home so late. I had told them that I was staying over at a friend’s house and they weren’t expecting me back until tomorrow afternoon. I sat there while the car warmed up and thought of what I was going to tell them. “Hi Mom and Dad, I discovered that my boyfriend was cheating on me. But not to worry, I’m better off without him, aren’t I?”

I decided that I was going to tell them what happened, and leave nothing out. I put the car into reverse and backed out of the parking lot, trying to keep my composure until I was safely in my driveway. It was about a twenty minute drive, mostly through country roads, and I had done it plenty of times before. This time, however, was a lot harder. The roads appeared wet and blurry and I instinctively reached out to turn the windshield wipers on before I realised that it was my own eyes watering. No, I would not let myself cry, not yet.

I couldn’t understand why he had done it. Was I not enough? Was she prettier than I was? I knew that there was no excuse, I had been raised to know my worth. I was a confident person, and I suspected my own pride was what hurt the most of all. I wasn’t the prettiest girl, and I could lose a couple pounds of course, but who couldn’t? No, this was not a justification. I had been a good girlfriend to him, that was definitely true.

The roads were completely empty around this time of night and the street lamps were not nearly bright enough for the darkness that encircled my car. I raised the volume on the radio to steady my thoughts and hoped that my parents were still awake when I got home so that I could tell them everything. 

Matt had fallen asleep early tonight. We had spent the whole day together, watching movies and eating pizza. About halfway through Die Hard 4: Live Free or Die Hard, he had dozed off on the sofa next to me. It wasn’t one of the best in the series, evidently. I untangled myself from him (he was always the best cuddler) and got up to put the pizza in the fridge. Although Matt was completely fine with eating stale day-old pizza, I could not let it sit out for the night. As I stepped over his feet, his phone let out a low buzz that meant, “You’ve got a text!”

I continued towards the kitchen to clean up. His apartment was not the cleanest, and I couldn’t help but try to tidy up or wash the dishes when I got bored. His phone continued to vibrate incessantly on the kitchen table. It was probably one of his buddies showing him a funny video or facebook post. Though I never understood when someone couldn’t articulate multiple thoughts into a single text. 

I glanced back at the table just as the phone was going to fall off the table from the movement of its vibration. I caught it just before it would have hit the floor. The last thing he needed was a shattered phone screen. Apple products are way too expensive to fix. As I placed the phone back onto the table the screen lit up and I spied a message from Stacey. Who was Stacey? 

The message read, “Hey Matt, thanks for staying over last night hun. I miss you so much already <3.” I couldn’t help but blink blankly at the screen as if I couldn’t comprehend what I had just read. He had been with another girl last night? He was always telling me that work tired him out and he just didn’t have the energy to hang out on a weeknight. But this was the real truth. There was no denying what this text meant, there was even an emoticon heart smack dab at the end. For a second I considered that she had just sent the text to the wrong person by mistake, but how many Matt’s would she be sending heart emoticons to?

I pulled onto my street and realised that I would have to think about how I would phrase this mess to my parents. “Hey guys, Matt and I are done….Matt cheated on me….Matt has another girl sending him heart emoticons and swooning all over him.” Nope, none of those sounded quite right. As I got closer to my house I noticed that the lights were still on in the living room, my parents thankfully had not gone to bed for the night. They were probably watching an episode of that late night real crime show that they loved so much. I thought it was a little creepy to enjoy watching stuff like that. We watched enough of it on the news already. 

My car shuddered as I parked in the driveway and turned the ignition off. I was finally home. The drive hadn’t been that long, but my thoughts felt as if they would never stop. It felt like there was an inferno of emotions swirling around in my head, just waiting to be freed.

I found my house key on the key ring and popped the car door open. I hesitated there for a moment with the door slightly ajar. I wished that I didn’t have to tell them this at all. But it had happened, and they would surely ask why I had come home so late at night when I was supposed to be out.

I finally got out and shut the door, slowly making my way up to the front door. It was unlocked. I turned the doorknob and walked into the front hall. My parents were sitting on the living room sofa, watching TV. They saw me enter and looked like literal deer in headlights. 

“What are you doing home?” My Mom asked, pulling her fuzzy blanket up closer to her face. She looked so warm and cozy huddled up on the couch. 

“I - uh...Matt has found someone else,” I blushed, looking down at my fidgeting fingers. “But I don’t want to talk about it now. I’m going to go to bed. I’ll see you in the morning.” I turned around just as they were exchanging worried glances. There was complete silence as I climbed the stairs and entered my bedroom. I closed the door and went straight for my bed. I wanted to get warm and cozy under the covers too. I pulled the covers up to my neck and laid there, replaying that evening’s events in my head. I didn’t want to keep thinking about this. At some point, I was lucky enough to doze off and my brain was finally able to get some rest.

***

The next morning I woke up to the smell of freshly brewed coffee. It was a wonderfully welcome smell, and reminded me of sitting in my favourite coffee shop while reading a good book. I got out from under the bed sheets and headed downstairs in my pajamas. When I entered the kitchen it was empty save for my favourite coffee mug and a little note on the kitchen counter. The note read, “We’re proud of you.” 

I realised my parents were talking about what I had told them last night. I had given them no details, but they knew. They understood what had happened and knew me better than I had thought. They were proud of me for realising that I didn’t deserve to be treated that way. I knew a lot of my friends might go back to their boyfriends after something like this and claim that they had forgiven them, or he had changed, or something like that. But after reading this note from my parents, I was not going to go back to Matt. I couldn’t do that. Instead, I decided to pour myself a cup of steaming hot coffee and finish our Die Hard marathon by myself.