Warning: Domestic abuse and violence.
One night, Whisky and I were out in our local Deutschland club when a man offered to buy us both a shot of something cinnamon’y and highly alcoholic. Whisky hadn’t heard the “both” part, though. He’d pottered off to the toilet, then come back to find a German man passing me a shot glass, completely missing the shot on the bar that had been for him.
My darling husband stormed over, pushed me out the way, and hit that poor German man so hard that he flew across the dancefloor and two of his front teeth came flying out.
It was the first time in our relationship that I’d ever seen Whisky get physical with another man, and it scared me more than all the things he’d done to me already. The blankness in his eyes, the darkness, the way his face no longer looked like his face… it was the kind of terrifying that you remember for the rest of your life.
Somehow, the rest of the lads scrambled to get Whisky out of the club before the police came, and he got away with it. One of his “little accidents,” they said. I understood their defence, though; they would need to defend each other in a war zone at some point soon. They had to be a team… or one of them might not come back home again.
Little Accidents #2
A few weeks later, Whisky had another of his “little accidents,” but this one involved a bar stool and my foot in the same club. We were both stood at the packed bar, with people either side and behind us, and the barman came straight to me.
“What can I get you?” he said, his Deutsch accent thick.
I ordered drinks for my husband and I, not thinking anything of it. As soon as the barman’s back was turned, Whisky picked up the bar stool, with its thick, metal legs, and thumped it down on my foot. He’d only lifted the stool up by a couple of inches, barely noticeable to anyone around us, but the metal foot cracked down on my foot so hard that I thought he’d broken a bone or two. I was still trying to process it when he did it a second time, then a third.
Tears streamed down my face. It was agonising. Painful enough to cut the night short and go home. There was no way I could continue hobbling around on a cobblestone-esque floor in five-inch heels. So, I went home with one of the other WAGS… and my husband didn’t come home that night. I have no idea if my foot was broken; I never went to the hospital. It’s fine now.
Little Accidents #3
The Neighbour’s Husband had popped up to our apartment for beers and video games one Sunday afternoon, which was a fairly frequent occurrence. His wife was pregnant, and hormonal (apparently.) We were all messing around in the living room, laughing and joking, having a grand time as we got steadily drunk.
Out of nowhere, Whisky got up and walked out of the room. A few seconds later, he came back with his new BB gun under his arm. It was his newest hobby: collecting replicas, shooting little targets in the living room, and finding any excuse to go to the “gun shop” in town to look at and buy more.
The men played around with Whisky’s new toy, marvelling at this and that. There was tapping and clicking and moving of switches. We were all still laughing and joking, but then, Whisky turned to me and said, apropos of nothing, “Your mum’s ugly.”
The Neighbour’s Husband laughed, so I laughed too. I wouldn’t exactly say that my mother was a looker, but she definitely wasn’t a minger. I didn’t think?
“And your mum’s Black,” I quipped back, shrugging.
I don’t know why I said that. I’m not a racist person, or at least I don’t think I am. And I didn’t mean it in a racist way; more of a statement. Okay, yeah, my mum’s ugly… and what? I definitely shouldn’t have said it, though. I don’t get to decide what’s perceived as racist or not. Either way, I deserved what came next.
Whisky lifted the rifle replica BB gun, aimed it at my cheek from a few inches away, then pulled the trigger. Thankfully, the tiny plastic pellet didn’t embed itself in my face. It did cut the skin, though. There was blood that we needed to mop up, then a bruise that lasted for weeks.
The Neighbour’s Husband didn’t say a word. He just laughed, then stopped laughing, then I left the room to clear myself up. When we talked about the incident a couple of decades later, he said that he didn’t remember the incident at all, which is funny, because I remember every teeny-tiny little detail.
So many little accidents, so many ways to explain them away, so many little bruises to try and cover…
Just little accidents, though, I’m sure.
The next blog post in the dating timeline is this one: Orange Juice.
Thank you so much for reading my blog today! 🖤
Would you like to read all about The Ex-Husband’s story, right from the very beginning? You’ll find that right here.
You can also read all about my disastrous dating history, right from the beginning, right here: Table of Dating Contents.
Alternatively, why not have a little peek around here: