Leaving Salt Lake City

by Matthew Timion

  “That was us, Matt,” Robert’s wife responded. She was clearly agitated by what I was saying. “I’m not surprised I’m hearing this, honestly, Jessica has never been trustworthy." No one stood up for her. In a room filled with her closest blood relatives not a single one of them said, “Hey, that’s my sister you’re talking about!”

  “What about the story where a woman in church came up to her and asked when she was going to have a kid, right after the stillbirth?”

  “That was us

  too, Matt. That never happened to Jessica.”

  | TWENTY EIGHT |

  Seeing the Forest for the Trees

  Winter 2008

  I drove home from Jessica’s brother’s house in a weird state of amazement and bewilderment. What just happened? Who was this person I married? Every single thing I learned was a revelation. Every single thing we talked about made me question every story she had ever told me. I laughed.

  “What’s so funny dad?" Manny was still awake and curious.

  “Life is funny Manny." The profound nature of what just happened, along with it’s implications, had yet to sink in. I finally knew that Jessica was either completely nuts or a pathological liar. Being a pathological liar would also make her nuts. During the drive home I couldn’t help but wonder how much of my divorce experience was also fabricated. I had spent months trying to repair a marriage beyond repair. I had accepted the divorce was my mistake, somehow believing I did something wrong and someday, maybe, we could be together again. Finding out who she really was not only removed the possibility of that ever happening again, but it also removed a year of self-induced guilt for a failed marriage.

  Jessica wasn’t able to call much due to her deployment to the middle east. She was able to contact my son on Skype, which she did on a weekly basis. I still felt badly for her rape, but was that true too? I hated being the guy who had to doubt someone’s claim of being raped. I thought to myself, “She wouldn’t lie about that, would she?" I didn’t know. I needed to collect more information. I needed to figure out where I drew the line in the sand. Jessica called. I wasn’t about to bring up what I learned. I was still trying to process the new information.

  “Uhm,” she started, “I met someone.”

  “Really?”

  “Don’t laugh, but his name is Ricky Bobby. He lives in Kansas. He’s a Christian." She mentioned that Ricky Bobby was Christian because we were both atheists. She knew I wouldn’t want Manny raised in a religious home. Ricky Bobby, it turned out, was the guy she was sending pictures of to me.

  “Kansas?" Kansas was such a random place. Just a month before Jessica went on and on about how North Carolina was her definition of perfection.

  “I think I want to move there when I get back. He has a kid and I think he and Manny can be great together. He wants me to be a housewife, and we can have more kids.”

  I couldn’t believe my ears. She was going to keep moving Manny around the country. I had initially agreed for Manny to live with her for his stability, which I thought I couldn't offer him. Now she wanted to move herself again, with Manny, to Kansas?

  “Well, if you want to take some time when you get back to figure it out, I can keep Manny for a bit longer." It was a legitimate proposal. She laughed.

  “Nice try!” She laughed again.

  Jessica proceeded to email me pictures of her new beau. I had no idea on what planet it was okay to send pictures of your new boyfriend to your ex-husband, but I played along. She was definitely twitterpated with him, like a child is with a puppy. Whatever happened to her setting up base in North Carolina? Was her bouncing from one guy to the next normal for her? How would this affect Manny?

  I cannot remember who initiated the friendship, but somehow I became friends with Jessica’s former co-worker on Facebook. She worked with Jessica in the intelligence squadron in the Air Force years before. I had met her a number of times. I had to know what the truth was.

  “Did you guys really work together?”

  “Yes, why?" She replied to me in an online chat.

  “I learned some very concerning things about Jessica recently. I’m just trying to get the facts straight. Did you really deploy ten months a year?”

  “Yes, we did. But Jessica never did.”

  “I thought she was a member of your unit.”

  “She was, but she was in charge of the warehouse. She possibly deployed one month a year.”

  All of the stories of boarding her dogs for months at a time were a lie. All of the adventures she went on were a lie. It seemed that all I had to do was ask simple questions and the truth would be obvious. Why hadn’t I asked these questions before? Why was love such a blinder to my skeptical side?

  Still anxious and unsure of which version of the world was real, I put it all out there.

  “She told me she works for the CIA." I waited for a response. Did I hit a nerve? Perhaps she was calling her supervisors and a black SUV was going to roll up in my driveway at any moment. A few minutes went by.

  “Hahahaha”. She was laughing. “There is no way she ever worked for the CIA. She couldn’t even get into our unit because no one trusted her. We all knew she was full of shit.”

  The worst part of this experience, for me, was realizing that I had spent the last three and a half years in a lie. I felt like I had just realized that Mormonism was not what it claimed to be all over again. The difference, however, is that I did not buy a house with Mormonism. I did not share a bed with Mormonism. What was I doing? None of this made sense.

  I started calling friends of mine to find out if she ever told similar stories to them. A part of me was convinced that I had a serious mental problem. There was no way someone would lie about being in the CIA, having stillborn babies, how old they were when they moved to America, being an MMA fighter, or working in an intelligence unit. All of this information couldn’t be real. People like that don’t really exist. I began to question my own sanity.

  Luckily everyone I talked to repeated the same stories to me. One person remembered Jessica telling her that Jessica had killed someone and was in the CIA. A number of people remembered hearing about Jessica’s time in military intelligence while she was on the ground during Shock and Awe. Everyone, including my mother, recalled the story of the two stillborn babies. This was the mother of my child. We adopted Manny together. I didn’t know what to do. And she wanted to move to Kansas to follow some guy named Ricky Bobby? I had had enough.

  My friends, and Krystal, the woman I was seeing, were very supportive. Most of my friends had refused to believe Jessica for years. They could see her for what she was. Why couldn’t I? They all responded to that question in the same way, that I was “blinded by love." I have heard that expression before, but it never meant anything until that moment. I finally understood it. To say I was devastated is an understatement. My friend Nadia then said to me, “Jessica is a very believable person. I believed her stories about stillborn babies too. It’s not your fault.”

  I have already compared finding out the truth about Jessica to finding out the truth about Mormonism. There is a distinct difference, however. Mormons legitimately believe in their religion. Despite scientific evidence, historical evidence, or just obviously non-Christian behavior performed by their church leadership, they believe it. To say that my Mormon friends had been lying to me during my years in their church would be untrue. Saying I was misled would be untrue. These people really believed what they were saying. I just got swept away in it years ago.

  Jessica, on the other hand, knew what she was doing. She had known that she was lying, or at least I hoped she had. She told other people's stories as her own over and over again. She consciously did it. She made the choice, and she let me live my life in a happy stupor never knowing any better.

  Finding out she lied was worse than finding out that Mormonism was hollow; it was like comparing an apple to an atomic bomb. There is no comparison. I had to confront her. I refused to let Jessica take my son to Ka
nsas. I refused to let my son be raised by someone who thought that lying was normal. Manny was too important for that.

  | TWENTY NINE |

  Confrontation

  Winter 2008

  During this time, my friend Nadia needed a place to stay. She had left her husband a year prior and couldn’t afford to stay in her apartment any more. Nadia had been there for me during some of my worst times. She was a constant in my life. Opening my home to her and her kids was never even a question. She only needed a place to stay for a month while she was getting back on her feet. I had a basement that was empty.

  I offered my basement to her for a month with the understanding that she would be moving out quickly. She and her three kids moved in. My house went from being empty to having myself, Manny, Nadia, and her three kids. I still also had my two cats. We tried to keep separate living spaces for a while, but it didn’t last too long. It was one big household filled with kids and animals. On top of this Krystal came by every night. She stayed over most of the time.

  I spent a while digesting everything I learned. I was trying to decide if I should spring my new knowledge on Jessica or if I should confront her in an email. Her family all told me they supported me because staying with me was what was best for Manny. Some of them told me that they felt Jessica had only wanted to be a mother when it was convenient for her.

  With my new roommates in the basement my cash flow was getting even tighter. I was starting to run out of the money I had made selling everything I had. I asked Jessica if she could send me some of the money she promised to send for watching Manny while she was deployed. She had originally promised to pay me three hundred dollars per month for watching Manny. Instead of paying money she sent twenty dollars worth of food every month. While the gesture was appreciated I would have preferred to receive help paying the heating bill. Instead I had twenty organic yogurts delivered to my house each week. After my request she sent a few hundred dollars, but then told me I shouldn’t expect any more.

  Life went on for a little bit and I was able to pay the bills, at least for that month. Manny had no idea just how broke we were and I planned on keeping it that way.

  One evening Jessica called Manny on Skype. They talked for a bit and then I wanted to talk to her. I was agitated, upset. She could tell. My plans to construct a massive email outlining all of the lies she had told over the years was melting away. I couldn’t hold it in any longer. My living room cleared as Nadia and Krystal knew what was about to happen.

  “Why are you being such a dick, Matt?" I’m sure Jessica’s confusion was genuine. After all, I had been a pushover with her for so long. I was suddenly talking back to her. I went for the throat.

  “Jessica, how old were you when you moved to America?" I went for the easiest lie first.

  “Ten, you know that.”

  “Then why did you siblings tell me you were four?”

  “Why were you talking about me?" She was yelling. She had always hated people talking about her when she wasn’t there. I finally understood why.

  “Answer the question,” I insisted.

  “I was ten, Matt. Jesus Christ. You already know this.”

  “So if you were ten, are you saying your brother moved here when he was eighteen?"

  “I guess.”

  “So he never went to high school in America?”

  “He did.”

  “You’ve told me stories about him in junior high and high school. You told me stories about him playing for the high school football team. Do you see how your math doesn’t add up?”

  “You’re right, Matt, it doesn’t add up. But that’s just how I remember it. I don’t know.”

  It was the same answer she had given me years prior. “I don’t know." I wasn’t falling for it this time. I started talking.

  “Why does your family have no memory of your stillborn babies?”

  “You were talking about me to them?" She was livid.

  “Jessica, none of them know about your two stillborn babies. You would think that your family would know about this.”

  “What!?! Listen, there was a year and a half where I didn’t see them. I never told them about it." I didn’t buy this one either. I knew that she talked about her family trying to console her after the lost babies.

  “Bullshit." I called it like I saw it.

  “It’s true Matt. There is a lot about me they don’t know. Where is all of this coming from?”

  I continued pointing out more and more examples of her lies. Her defenses were no better than her previous attempts to answer questions. I saw right through them.

  “There is no way you will take Manny. I will not let him be raised by someone capable of this level of deception.”

  Silence.

  I continued, “The divorce isn’t even finalized yet. You haven’t even signed the paperwork. Expect new paperwork.”

  All that I remembered was her yelling back, “You cannot take my son away from me! He is all I have! What would people think of me if a mother cannot even raise her own child!?" I was so furious, so enraged that I cannot remember all of the conversation. I do know that true to form her concern wasn’t about Manny, but rather about how others would perceive her.

  After this conversation, she didn’t call for a while. I didn’t know when she was supposed to come home. I didn’t know what to expect. I had to prepare for a legal battle, and after a few phone calls I had some backup. The caseworker from the foster agency and Manny’s former therapist were both willing to report their observations about us. The observations were highly in my favor. I also had a number of friends willing to back me up and corroborate the stories, but the ex-Mormon group was dwindling in size. The caseworker and therapist had to be good enough.

  From that night on and over the next few months, I kept having a recurring dream where my father was still alive. In this dream my parents had faked my father’s death. There was a good reason for hiding my father’s continued existence, but I cannot remember what it was. In this dream I remember visiting my father in a rundown duplex. It looked like it should have been condemned. He was there like always, drinking, but still very alive. He didn’t look healthy. The confusion and pain I felt every time I had that dream caused me to wake up. I always had to take a moment to decide if what I dreamed was real or not.

  Unfortunately my father was not still alive. At that point he had been dead for over twelve years. I had never been a fan of interpreting dreams. The only thing that made sense to me was that my brain was comparing the deceit I had experienced with something greater. Being lied to for all of those years was as hurtful to me as if I had just found out my father were still alive, and it had all been a big lie. I was coming to grips with the fact that our entire marriage was fabricated. I never really knew her.

  I refused to let my son be raised by someone capable of that level of deception. I needed a lawyer.

  | THIRTY |

  Anticipation

  January 2009

  A month had gone by and I still had no idea where Jessica was. Was she so embarrassed that she just ran and hid? Was she so humiliated by me finding out about her years of deception that she would never show her face again? I hoped so. I hoped she would no longer be a part of our lives any longer.

  My houseguests needed to go. Nadia and her children were only supposed to live with me for a month and they had already stayed longer than that. It was taking them longer than anticipated to get their own place. If Jessica dropped by unannounced, which was something I was prepared for, Nadia and her kids living in the basement would be used against me. I knew that Jessica already thought that Nadia was a horrible person. I was certain she could argue that a household of kids and people would not be a suitable place for Manny to be raised. I couldn’t give Jessica any ammunition to use against me if this custody situation started to get any uglier.

  In the month that went by so quickly, I contacted a lawyer to rewrite the terms of the custody arrangement. It cost me $1,000, whic
h I really didn’t have. Money was becoming more and more tight and my $12 per hour job wasn’t cutting it anymore. Winter was upon us and there were so many things up in the air that I didn’t know what to do or how to fix.

  My friend Alan moved in, taking the place of Nadia and her kids. One extra person in my house was a lot better than four. Alan had moved from Salt Lake City to Chicago over a year ago and decided it was time to come home. Perhaps he would finish school. He was still looking for something in his life and he felt Salt Lake City had the answers. He moved into the basement and paid rent, which helped release some of the financial burden. He helped me by offsetting the cost of the house, and I helped him by giving him an affordable place to stay.

  Krystal was around more and Manny was really taking to her. Krystal was raised Mormon and still considered herself to be a member of the Mormon Church despite the drinking and sex. She fit into the Mormon version of “cafeteria religion,” where she could pick and choose what she wanted to believe. Mormonism for her was her cultural identity more than her religious identity.

  When Manny found out that Krystal was Mormon he was confused. “You can’t be Mormon,” he proclaimed. “You’re not brown." All of the Mormons that Manny had been exposed to were either Latino or Polynesian. As far as he knew it was another way of describing brown people.

  I am still surprised Krystal put up with my situation as long as she did. She really wanted a relationship with me. I can look back now and see a pattern of women who knew I was not emotionally healthy enough to be in a relationship. They still saw something in me so great that they were willing to wait it out.

  Krystal being around made everything a little bit easier. I never told her I loved her. I don’t know if I was capable of love back then. She stayed though, thinking long term. I sometimes wonder how different life would have been had I been emotionally available to return the feelings Krystal wanted me to feel.