This is Going to Make a Great Blog Post For You

"So I'm surprised that you didn't invite her to stay" She said to KSL as he walked in from walking his ex out to the car.

She was honestly surprised that he didn't go harder for another round with her.  Lord knows he wanted to keep their "competition" up with whoever had sex last with him winning.

Instead he walked over to where she was standing, dropped to his knees, and wailed "I'm going to be alone forever."

Her eyes widened at the sudden juxtaposition of her standing over him.  In the history of their entire friendship this had never been a position they'd been in.  She wasn't sure that she was focusing on this fact in order to deter her emotions from what seemed to be happening, which was him suddenly falling apart.

She hesitated, then realized that he had no intention of leaving the floor anytime soon, joined him.  He was mostly half-hyperventilating/half dry sobbing, occasionally interjecting with "She doesn't want me," "I haven't been like this in 14 years," and "I've just been trying to hold it together for so long."

Since this wasn't really the best time to go for her phone and do a quick search for "what to do when someone is clearly having a mental breakdown" she just let him get it out and stood by him.  When she was high and upset, she knew it helped to have someone anchoring her to the earth, so she kept rubbing his back, then his arm when he ended up on his back on the floor.

"At least you know now I'm not making this up" he said in-between gulps of air.  This particular phrase stopped her empathy, and she knew she couldn't spiral into this with him.  On some level she now had to wonder if he was just, in a small way, doing this for attention.  Either way, her sympathy wasn't stopping whatever he was going through.

Through everything they had gone through, usually when she raised her voice he responded by calming down, so though she still held onto him she made an effort to steel her voice a bit more to get him to come around.

"This is going to make a great blog post for you," he said.  She pursed her lips, and took a deep breath.  It was amazing that through all his pain, anguish, he was still able to be petty and insulting.  Up until that point she had no intention of posting about it, but that changed her mind.

She decided that she needed a occurring line as well.  "Stop."

It didn't work.  She couldn't talk him down.  He told her to leave, and when she stood he begged for her to stay.  She resumed always keeping a hand on him but mostly letting him be.

She managed to keep his hysterics to a simmer, but only after he gave himself a bruise banging on their kitchen counter and putting a small hole through the wall.  After an hour she felt like she was failing terribly.  Every time it seemed like he was winding down it would ramp up again and she would have to yell at him.

She was worried that some neighbor was going to call the cops, but then she remembered all of the neighbors that they shared walls with and how garbage they all were and she stopped worrying.  They could have one night of keeping them up instead of the other way around.

Eventually his breath started to regulate, and she got him to a standing position.  He then transitioned into saying he was sorry over and over again.  She went back to telling him to stop, and he continued apologizing.  This was the hardest part to take, and her wall came down a little and she teared up a bit.  "You're okay.  You're gonna be okay." She repeated.

Her hand had moved up to caressing his face, which seemed to be calming him.  He laid his head on her shoulder, and she rubbed his back.  He seemed to be coming around to being in his right mind again, so as a friendly "you got through it" gesture, she kissed his temple.  It wasn't unusual at this point in their friendship to be okay with the occasional forehead/top of the head kiss.  Then he kissed her neck, and her heartbeat quickened with panic.

She pulled away and asked if he was okay to go to bed.  He said he was.  She asked if he needed her there for awhile, and he gave her a look that made her backtrack immediately, saying she was just worried he was going to put a hole through the wall if he was left by himself for awhile, or do something harmful to himself.  He said he would never go that far.  She decided that joking about him needing an audience to do anything wasn't well timed, and she watched him go off to bed.

She had a dull ache in her chest for days afterwards, as if she was unsure where to set down all that she had taken in.

Grief

Her mother had offered to come with her on the 4 hour round trip drive to the Ex's funeral with her.  They managed to not kill each other there or back, but there were moments of tension.  She'd emotionally thrown up a wall to deal with the day anyway.

She expected to attend the funeral, pay her respects, support the ex, feel like she shouldn't be there the whole time, and leave.

She didn't expect to feel everything that she'd feel. She got into town a little early so they stopped at a rest area and then went directly to the funeral home.

It was packed, and for a moment she panicked.  She needed to find a place for her mother to sit, at least.  She saw her ex and went to him for a hug.  He said there were still spots available so she ventured down the pew-like benches. 

She locked eyes with some of his best friends from the town, and she didn't know if they were going to ignore her, or hate that she was there.  They told her to sit down next to them and gave her a very warm hug.  She didn't expect sympathy, caring or love.  She was completely unprepared for that reaction.  Her wall came down in an unexpected way, and she cried in a way she didn't think she would at the funeral.  They somehow made it okay for her to be upset about this death.

They stuck with her through the funeral, and the wake afterwards.  She couldn't believe how much they treated her like nothing had changed, like the divorce didn't happen.  Even his brothers gave her a hug, and although the feeling was just them dealing with their grief.

The weather was so bitter cold, but her heart was warm from the not-rejection she experienced.  She just expected the reception to be as chilly as the weather.  She felt so relieved that she was wrong.