AUTHOR'S NOTE
**** Hey everyone ... thank you so much for reading! I am so flattered that my story has evoked such passion for poor Justine's plight. I feel that I need to explain a bit about who she is here before you read this next entry. As difficult as it is to admit, in a lot of ways, Justine is me ... I have lived most of this story. (So for those of you wondering who really falls in love with "a gay dude" it's me. :) Justine is growing ... her progress is slow, but in all of her turmoil, she is getting stronger, it is just not so easily seen. I guess this story for me is not so much about Justine's backbone as it is about her capacity to forgive love itself so that she can once again give as well as accept it for herself again. So if you are seeking Justine's courage, I think you will find it in her ability to forgive and open herself up once more. Thanks again for stopping by, and I do hope you continue to come back. <3 Jj. ****
AUTHOR'S NOTE
After discussing Ian all night I was not sure I had enough strength to walk down memory lane with Malichai again. It was beyond me why he even wanted to hear about my lost loves. It really was irrelevant after all. Hearts are broken everyday ... why should mine be so interesting? But, in my apathy, there was a part of me that needed to purge, I guess as we sat there beside one another amid out plates of pancake crumbs that is what drove me on to tell him about Stephen.
"Stephen L. Hamlin broke me down to nothing in the span of two of the longest years of my life."
Malichai sat at the table sipping a mocha latte as I cringed at the mention of Stephen's name. I felt bile bubble up my esophagus as I restrained a curse in his name.
"Wait a minute Justine, Stephen? Wasn't he the guy who came to the loft looking for you in New York?"
I had hoped Malichai had forgotten that night. It was not the first time Stephen had found me. Malichai and I were showcasing some of Malichai's art on this particular night, and Stephen decided he would crash the show. Let's just say, the brawl he and Malichai got into left most of Malichai's sculptures in pieces and Malichai's name as an up and coming artist questionable in New York for a while.
"Yes Malichai, the troglodyte is one in the same."
"Ha! Jesus Justine! You loved a prat like that? He was so boorish and well just angry ... hell he cost me thousands!"
"Oh come on Malichai, he was not fighting with himself. You both had an abundance of testosterone flowing that night. Besides, you were born and raised in the city, I thought you native New Yorkers wrote the book on angry and boorish?"
"Funny funny girl Justine ... touché ... so, what happened with you and Mr. Hamlin?"
I tucked into a seat next to Malichai as I made to tell him the tale of a jaded young girl who thought life would fall right in line for her after high school. It is the ultimate story of innocence lost, and cynicism gained. I think with Stephen was the first time I learned what it really meant to hate. To this day, I have not forgiven him.
I was a girl of twenty-one when Stephen and I happened upon each other at a discothèque in Mainz. He was with a group of American soldiers stationed in Germany; I was with a few friends as well, one of whom was utterly smitten with the coco colored American with the green eyes. She begged me to introduce her. I guess she figured my being American meant it was ok for me to accost fellow Americans for her in the interest of German-American relations. But when Stephen and I saw each other, it did not matter who we had come out with, we were leaving together.
After our first couple of dates I decided, like Malichai learned, that Stephen was rather uncouth. Every other word out of his mouth was a swear word, and little did he know, I noticed how he ogled passing women while we were out together. After our third date I decided our time together was time wasted, and had decided to move on. A few weeks past before Stephen and I spoke again, but when we finally did I saw a notable change in his manner.
He was, sweet. In three short weeks this sophomoric troglodyte managed to grow up some to reveal the makings of what I thought, in my short years, would be a good man and mate. We dated for a few weeks before my dumb twenty one year old ass let him move in. Our relationship ran hot and cold. When we were not fighting, we were canoodling and fawning over one another. It was not until I got pregnant about a year after he moved in that the relationship did a complete 360.
"Is it mine?" Stephen's old smug self came out again as he challenged my integrity and fidelity.
"I-Is it yours? Um ... I think my hearing is off ... what the hell do you mean? Is it fucking yours? Well it's not Hans's down the walkplatz! Yes you prick! This baby is yours!"
"Justine I didn't mean ...!
"I know exactly what you meant Steve! You think because you are away half the time on your 'military exercises' that maybe I got a little on the side and lucky for you slipped up right?"
"N-no Justine!"
"Well not so lucky soldier, you got caught up, the kid is yours!"
He packed his things that night and moved back into his military assigned apartment. I did not hear from him for two weeks, and when we finally did speak, I wished he had just stayed gone.
"Justine ... we need to talk."
"So formal, I'm not Justine any more? You're right; we do need to talk Stephen. The Doctor says I am about two months along now, I want this baby."
He did not speak for a long time. I thought the line had been disconnected when I heard him sigh as if he had the weight of the world on his shoulders.
"No Justine ..."
"Why?"
"Justine, we are not ready for a baby! I am getting ready to leave for PLDC to get my promotion in two weeks! After that, I am more than likely shipping out to Kosovo for a year or more! I cannot have a baby right now!"
Now it was my turn to hold the phone. I was in shock. I had become one of 'those chicks' ... you know the type used, abused, and through, but still ready for more, whatever he had to give ... it didn't matter, as long as he stuck around.
"What are you saying Stephen?"
"My friend and his girl used this Doctor in Frankfurt ... he is discreet. We could do a day trip, take care of everything and be back in Mainz for dinner.
I was dying inside. My blood boiled and rolled in my veins like a derailed freight train, and my head spun like a dreidel top. My mother had sent me to Germany to learn something about the world, but this lesson was one I do not think she had in mind.
"Steve, when are you coming home?"
I did not know it when I asked him, but my decision hinged on his answer. If he had said that he was not moving back in, I think I would have kept the baby to trap him, to trap us, together. Because even with all his faults ... I think I loved the idiot, at the very least, I was so obsessed with him, that I was willing to have his baby for the sake of forcing him to stay in my life. I think he knew this as well. He moved back in a week before the abortion, and threatened to leave again the night before we went to Frankfurt because I had changed my mind. In the end we did go ... and about a year more of fighting, and his infidelity, so did Stephen.
"Justine, Steve called me from K-Town last night ... "
Stephen's best friend since high school Greg had not even closed the door before he started talking. They enlisted together on the buddy program and had only been assigned to different units once in their whole time serving until Stephen got assigned to the hospital in Kaiserslautern.
"Oh yeah, what'd he have to say? By the way, do you know what charities are here in Germany? Do you think I could donate all our furniture or should I sell it?"
I had been packing all day. I was supposed to take the train to Saarbrucken the next day to elope with Stephen. He had asked me to marry him five months before, and I quickly accepted his proposal. Ever since that day I had been planning out my life as a soldier's wife. I dreamt of our home on post with our family of four, a girl for me and a boy for him, a dog names Shadow, a cat called Tabby; the whole bit.
"There is no point in you getting on the train ... you should just stay here."
I chuckled some as I put a silk blouse into my bag ...
"Do you think he will want his Kevlar coat? I know he probably has not gotten another one since he has been gone."
"Justine, you cannot go to Saarbrucken tomorrow ... he is not going to meet you ..."
"Shut up Greg! Just shut up!"
I think I had been holding back tears when I opened the door for Greg. He never came round unless it Stephen was home. I knew his visit could not be a good sign. And the last couple of times Stephen and I spoke on the phone he had been short, and the very last time we spoke, he hung up on me making like there was a bad connection, but I knew the connection had been fine.
"Justine, he got a girl pregnant in K-Town ... his dad flew in from the states to visit, and he and the girl found out she is pregnant during the visit. His dad insists he marry her."
"No! You are lying! He would have told me something!"
"Would he have Justine? Do you really think he would have told you? Yeah, he probably would, because he is such a great guy ... right?"
I looked at Greg and immediately my tears stopped. I would not give him and Stephen more fodder to laugh at, now along with Stephen's new fiancée. I lifted my chin to him and dared him to say more. No matter what he had to say, I did not want or need to hear it. I began to unpack while he was sanding there watching me. I wanted him to leave, but apparently he was waiting for a queue.
"Give this to him would you? I'd hate for him to freeze to death."
I held the Kevlar coat out by the collar as I banged the door into the wall snapping the door jam off as I showed Greg out.
