Sambuca: The Work Trip
How many times would you push your boundaries to the side for a man before you finally realise, they’re taking the almighty piss out of you? Because The Work Trip was another level of piss-taking, in my opinion, but I could never quite get Sambuca to agree with me.
Let’s just get right to it…
The drinking & the lie
Sambuca went out drinking a few times before he went away on his work trip, and it was something that we discussed – in great detail – beforehand. Hadn’t he said that he only drank a couple of times per year? We were at a handful of times in a few months at that point, plus a couple of fights/non-fights, depending on whom you believed.
“Listen, I’m looking for an excuse to quit, so I promise I won’t drink while I’m on the work trip – how’s that?” he said one night.
Really? For little ol’ me?
Shut the fuck up.
All of a sudden, Sambuca became a very serious contender for Boyfriend Material. Not only had he agreed to wait for me (while I also waited for him,) but he’d also agreed to quit drinking for me. I had to shake my head a few times to really believe it. Gosh, he really was something special.
“I want to make it perfectly clear that I will never ask you to quit drinking. Never,” I said.
“I would if you asked, though,” he replied. “And I still promise not to drink.”
“I never will,” I reiterated, whilst literally dancing with glee that he’d said that to me. Delirious wasn’t the right word. Batshit crazy with delusional happiness is probably closer.
There are several reasons behind why I would never, ever ask a partner to quit drinking for me, though. (Or any other kind of substance, for that matter.)
- They’ll resent me if they know I want them to quit, and they don’t.
- I’ll resent them when they don’t quit.
- They’ll hide it from me, getting progressively better at hiding it, each time they get caught.
- It’s not my place to tell anyone what to do with their lives, including whether or not they should drink.
- That kind of life-changing decision (which it is) should be made for personal reasons, not because some chick asked you to.
- Putting that decision in my hands is a cop-out and a half. I ain’t your mother. Make your own decisions.
- I’ve been there, done that, and gotten the rather painful t-shirt. Why would I want to put myself through that again?!
So, after promising not to drink while he was away on his work trip – for his benefit – he got drunk, lied about it, and made me feel terrible for being upset that he’d lied. He also grabbed a kid by the throat and got violent again, which he, of course, recanted the very next (sober) day.
But he’s totally not a violent man, remember?
The lie(s) absolutely devastated me. Why lie? Am I that much of a monster that he couldn’t just tell me? Am I really the kind of person that you need to lie to? Really? It made me really fucking sad. We didn’t lie to each other; it was one of the pre-agreed stipulations of “us.”
I like to think that I’m a pretty decent girlfriend. I don’t care where my partner is, as long as they’re safe and well, and I certainly don’t need regular updates about their day. I think being attracted to other people is healthy and normal, but decent human beings don’t cheat. I also think having separate lives and lifestyles is healthy, and we don’t need to be attached at the hip. I don’t believe in telling my partner who they can and can’t speak to/hang out with, and I don’t ask for much.
I just don’t want lies, betrayal, or deceit.
That’s all.
His behaviour shattered my illusions, but I guess that would’ve happened sooner or later. Doesn’t it always? All of a sudden, he was no longer the man who wouldn’t ever lie to me – because he already had. He’d lied about something Very Big, that meant Very Big things to me. I was genuinely heartbroken. I couldn’t understand why he’d done that, and I still don’t. It’s not like we didn’t talk about it… endlessly. He had gathered my trauma, then lined it up to use against me.
If he should’ve walked away after I blew him out a handful of times, I should’ve walked away after he promised not to drink, broke his promise, lied about it, then made me feel shitty for feeling some kind of way about it.
I called things off. Again.
He called things on. Again.
And then, it got worse.
The hairy legs
“I’m a bit jealous about that woman,” I said to Sambuca one day, after he’d talked about her a handful of times. “Can you reassure me, please?”
“Oh, I wouldn’t fuck her because she’s ugly and has hairy legs.”
Oh, boy.
Slagging off a woman that I’m marginally jealous of, just makes me more jealous. Why are you slagging her off now? You were quite complimentary towards her five minutes ago, so what’s changed? My interest? My question? The fact that I said I was jealous?
He’d spent more time with her, in bars and in bathing suits, than he had with me. I mean, we hadn’t met. That was my fault, of course… which he brought up, repeatedly. But he reacted so negatively towards that woman after I’d asked about her. It was awful, really, and it set my spidey senses right off.
From that point onwards, he refused to use her name in conversation. He actively avoided talking about her, even when I brought her up, at all costs.
All because I said I was jealous?
The night of the lost phone
I was losing the booze battle fast with Sambuca. He’d already broken the I-won’t-drink promise and did-but-didn’t have a violent altercation, and I was slowly turning into the “girlfriend” that nagged.
I fucking hate having to be that girlfriend.
I just want to be a cool girlfriend.
“Okay, you can drink,” I conceded. “Scrap the promise. Do your thing, get drunk, fight all you like, just leave me out of it.”
“Really?” he answered. “Are you sure about that?”
Well, no, actually, but I’ve got no fucking boundaries left, because you steamrolled through all of them, then went on to do whatever the fuck you wanted to do, regardless of my feelings, so what the fuck else am I meant to do here?
I should’ve walked away, but I didn’t want to lose him. Not yet. I wasn’t finished, not yet fully satisfied that we weren’t perfect for each other. Fuck the red flags; he had a dick that I wanted to jump on, every second of every day, plus he made me laugh like a hyena. Did I also mention that he was hot?
Maybe I’d been too hasty, too restrictive with the drinking thing? (That I’d never asked him to quit.)
“Yes, I’m sure. I just need you to leave me alone when you’re drunk and stupid, please. Drink all you like, but I don’t want to be a part of any of that,” I begged.
Out of sight, out of mind, right? What I didn’t see or know about, couldn’t trigger or affect me. Plus, we’d tried things my way. It had failed spectacularly. Maybe we should try things his way, instead.
Can you guess what happened, folks?
I bet you can.
That’s right: he went out, got drunk, repeatedly sent messages, ignored my requests for him please leave me alone, begged me to carry on talking to him, then… he disappeared when I gave up and agreed to talk to his drunken ass.
You couldn’t make this shit up, could you?
Don’t get me wrong, it was lovely and all that he wanted to speak to me when he was drunk, but it irritated the shit out of me. What did I say? Do what you want, just leave me out of it. He couldn’t even do that. After everything, all the boundaries I’d pushed to the side for him, he still couldn’t give me that one damn thing.
Never that job again. He’s that job.
Never someone from the blogosphere. Yep, I met him through the blogosphere.
Never a drinker…
After conceding, once a-fucking-gain, and talking to him throughout his drunken night and moronic messages, he went silent. No blue ticks for me; only grey ones. Delivered, but not read.
But he was online on another platform.
I waited for half an hour or so. He still hadn’t replied.
But he was still online on another platform.
I waited for another hour. Still nothing.
But he was still online on another platform.
I was fuming. Beyond fuming, in fact. Livid. Rageful. Filled with fury. All of them, and then some. I should’ve walked away then, too.
“I lost my phone,” he said to me, the next morning. “Then, I fell asleep on a bench.”
“But you were online,” I replied, sending him the screenshot that proved my point.
“Nah, I lost my phone, then I looked here, then I signed in, on that.”
Does it look like I was born yesterday? Bruh, you were online the whole damn time. Not all the time, though. On/off. Like it was being used.
I need to drink…
“It’s been really hard here, without you and the family and stuff. I needed to drink, to make it through,” he said.
Okay, fine… but why couldn’t he have just told me that? If he’d have said that, right at the beginning, when I told him, I didn’t want to date a drinker, we’d have prevented all of this heartbreak, all of the arguments, all the bullshit! I’d have said, “Okay!” and wished him well, and I wouldn’t be crying over yet another man.
And if he didn’t want to tell me right at the beginning, if he really wanted to pull the wool over my eyes to get his claws in (like he actually did,) why didn’t he tell me after he drank and lied about it? Why did he have to wait until the work trip was almost over, we’d been “together” for almost a year, argued non-stop, and he’d deceived me a little more?
I felt so… something. Disappointed, yes, but also a little like I’d been duped.
Was I far enough along in my own sobriety to date a drinker? Yes, it had been eight years since I’d last had a drink, but I’d almost drank one time because of one of our arguments. I didn’t, but I got so close to throwing away eight years of hard work for that man. Was I strong enough to not drink again? Would my resolve be quite so strong the next time around?
And aside from that, wasn’t that behaviour beyond cunty of him? If I had been a regular ol’ alcoholic, would he have been so blasé with me? Would he have rubbed his drinking in my face so much? Demanded conversation and attention? Ignored every single one of my politely-requested boundaries? He said no when I asked him exactly that, but what the fuck? Did I have the wrong sort of drinking problem for him?!
It was time for me to do some serious thinking.
I didn’t want to date a drinker, but could I date this one?
The unanswered question
I asked Sambuca who he’d gone out drinking with, the night of the lost phone, three times. All three times, the question went unanswered.
The first time, he sidestepped the question with such finesse, I didn’t even realise what had happened. The conversation strayed into another topic, and we didn’t come back to it.
The second time I asked, he started a whole argument. We ended up not talking for a day or so.
The third time I asked, he answered with (and I quote,) “Well, it’s not the friend I’m out with tonight.”
That’s very helpful, thank you. Now, what the fuck are you hiding, buddy? Because you don’t act that shady if you’re innocent, do you? Or are you acting shady for no reason, just to screw me up? I don’t get it. What’s with all the damn vagueness and avoidance?
We argued like mad for days after that night. In the end, I called it off.
But this time, like the fucking moron that I am, I apologised and asked him for another chance.
I deserve everything I get, honestly.
*shakes head*
The next chapter: The Social Situation(s) – coming soon.
Thanks so much for reading my blog today! 🖤
Want to read all about the Sambuca story? You’ll find that right here.
If you’re in the market for something a lil’ spicier, why not check out one of my smutty favourites:
