The party
"You didn't know it," said Erik. He looked questioningly and I didn't understand anything. I had just arrived, he had opened the door – and what did I say again? "Welcome to the separation party! The house is sold!" What did he mean? I tried to add up one and one. When Erik greeted me at such a theme party, it meant that his wife, one of my best friends … "Martha and I have been separated for half a year," he crossed my mind. And then he said again: "You didn't know."
The first hammer
Correct. This information had not reached me. But how could my girlfriend keep that from me? Something like that is said! I stood there in the entrance, looked at the wine bottle in my hand and felt incredibly stupid. Martha appeared next to him, visibly surprised to see me. Tears shot into my eyes, I silently pressed the bottle into her hand and left. A feeling tsunami raged in me, a chaos of thoughts.
Martha was clearly surprised to see me. She hadn't invited me at all, Erik had sent a circular email, apparently without her knowledge. And she certainly didn't want me with me, otherwise she would have had to tell me about the breakup. And hadn't she raved about her great, stable relationship just last week?
Limitless disappointment
On the way home on the subway, I felt fooled, much more: cheated. So far, only men had been able to do that. But you take that into account; Fraud is possible, the small print states all terms and conditions. But among friends? For the next few days I stepped into a hot wavering cocktail of anger, outrage and injury, with a dash of self-pity it was really edible. Again and again I chewed on this one question: "How could she cheat on me like that?" I was stuck in the wrong place. The approach would have been better: "Why did she do it?"
How it started with us
Martha came into my life ten years ago, at a time that couldn't have been more crappy. After a terrible breakup, I stayed with a friend who was traveling a lot. I had stored my things, I lived in strange male stuff, I was emotionally homeless. Until I met Martha at an event, the perfect rubble to work on my inner battlefield: eleven years older, rich in life experience, good humor, an open heart. We were in constant contact and even entered the dates of the others in the calendar, Dental prophylaxis, professional travel, family events. We were like sisters. She the big one I always wanted, I the little one, because her real sister had moved to Australia years ago. So sorry.
A few weeks after the party drama, Martha sent me a very sensitive email for her birthday, apologizing that she was overwhelmed, I would miss her if we didn't want to meet. I was reconciled from a standing start, so glad I had my big sister again. It was totally naive without a clarifying conversation, but it was in line with my family motto: If you don't talk about it, there has never been a conflict.
Martha said Erik and they had arranged a time-out to think about it. They wanted to restructure their relationship, work on a new We. Erik planned to travel through South America for a while; she wanted to clear her head in Morocco.
Happy in Marrakech?
From there she invited me: Whether I shouldn't visit her in Marrakech, it would be so nice if I came, but unfortunately there was no place for her host family, I would have to look for accommodation myself. Very much! It was a great moment when Martha and I fell into each other's arms against an oriental backdrop. And the best in that time. From there it got strange. Immediately upon arrival, she instructed me: she had a little haircut on her resume, pretended to be happily married, and Erik's daughter as her own. In Marrakech, she was researching a newspaper article. The latter sounded more like my life, because she is an audio book author, but I found the rest clever. Maybe I would have done it to avoid stupid comments or even advances.
However, she had also told the host family with the big house strange things about me: I would have invited myself because I missed her so much. In addition, I was in poor health, I needed rest and would therefore live in the hotel. Uh No. At first I left the lying trifles like this, I just didn't take them seriously. Nevertheless, that ugly feeling remained. Like a stone in a shoe. Not a big deal, but always present. But can one call such a harmless distortion of facts a lie at all? Was my lovely friend just a little bit tired? Martha clearly had gaps in her memory.
My inner lie detector deflected several times a day, for example when she told a guide that we were invited to good friends in the medina in the evening. "What's that supposed to mean?" I snapped at her later. "We don't know anyone in the whole city!" Martha shrugged. "So what. He shouldn't think we can't get along on our own." Aha. So was that your motivation? The impression of others? Maybe the beautified facts were like a filter on a selfie: it just looked better.
Always this DOUBT
Martha was constantly in need of explanations because I now put every word on the gold scales and went into confrontation if I didn't like it. I must have been incredibly exhausting for her in Marrakech. To this day, I see her waving goodbye, the relief of my departure in capital letters on my face. After landing I had doubts. Was my memory correct, or had I stepped into something while chasing discrepancies? But no.
All the misunderstandings between us, consternated looks from listeners when I said something that was already circulating in Martha's version, polite enough not to correct myself. Why also was mostly just small talk anyway. In this genre, a story doesn't necessarily have to be true, as long as it is likely. And entertaining. Martha knew a lot about her job, she constantly invented settings, decorated roles, was always the master of history. Maybe that had become a habit for her. But what did I do with this knowledge?
The catastrophe
A message from her popped into my hesitation days later: "Are you still awake?" Middle of the night. I called her, she cried. Erik and she had expressly agreed on a break so that everyone could come to rest. But now he has a new girlfriend. That had even been to South America with him. And he already lives with the. It was the worst betrayal she had ever experienced. We spoke on the phone until she fell asleep exhausted from crying.
In the following weeks I did everything I could to help her after the devastation of the emotional impact. It was definitely not the time to address my problem with her. Then I met Erik on the street: "How could you do that to Martha, she's finished!" Erik hissed back: "We have been apart for a year! You remember: the farewell party ?! After that, everyone went their separate ways. That was clearly communicated." But towards me Martha had clearly declared the "out" afterwards as "time out". Apparently her inner firewall had automatically re-labeled the event, four more letters and – zack! – Supergau turned away. For psychologists, denial is a classic defense measure of the subconscious. That's why Martha was so convincing in everything she did: she believed herself.
That’s it
When the worst was over months after this incident, Martha began to write down what happened in her words, but from Erik's perspective – for processing. At first I found that strange, then logical. So she had control over his point of view and again a certain say. I don't know if there was self-reflection, I didn't ask. Instead, I wondered if I couldn't just put up with their behavior. Now that I knew their idiosyncrasies, I could find a way to deal with them. But if Martha lived in another reality, where should we meet in friendship?
I didn't want to go to her world, she couldn't go to mine. Besides, my trust was gone, and I was definitely tired of it all. Martha was probably the same with me. For me, my know-it-all of my ingenuity remained just as much a stone in my shoe as her nonchalant handling of facts. Our contact fell asleep without big words. The silence between us has something very amicable and truthful to this day.
True is: Kirstin Bock changed the names of the participants and some facts so as not to expose anyone.
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