The Goodbye of a ‘Villain’ Part 1

Have you ever got into a relationship with a friend just to realise down the line that you shouldn’t have overstepped that mark? While my partner’s ex may have disagreed, I was never inside her brain to know her side of things, this is exactly what happened to my partner. They were good friends. Her ex was a good, selfless person. My partner got burnt in an exploding bonfire and lived there during her treatment, which is how and when they ended up taking things further, the development to more ‘easy’. But there were never any fireworks. Never massively a honeymoon phase. And during the couple of years they were together, they lost everything, including their friendship. They completely cohabited, my partner on the sofa every night by the end of the relationship.

They’ve been broken up over two years now, both agreeing it wasn’t working, and I’ve been with my partner a couple of months shy of two years. She moved two and a half hours away to be with me. They started talking again via text and Facebook messages every so often right at the start of our relationship. I can’t lie, I didn’t particularly like it. I did feel threatened. Two months into our relationship, me having issues with my partner’s side of the family not giving me much of a chance, she told my partner that I’d always have a family in her. Whoever my partner chooses to be with is her family. Once again, I struggled to understand. Why are you being nice to me? This is where my partner stepped in: ‘We were great friends before we became more. I guess it’s sad to think we’ve thrown a friendship away because of that choice we shouldn’t have made.’

My partner’s ex was ill, something we all knew she’d eventually die of. There were talks of us all going on holiday. She’d get to take her kids away but we’d be able to do the things with them she couldn’t. We had more energy. She invited us over for drinks, said we could stay the night. But we had financial issues, so were working seven days a week and couldn’t afford to take any time off. We said we would when we were in a more financial position.

They started talking more and more and then she ended up in hospital in an induced coma. My partner was on the phone to her daughter every day, checking on her, making sure she was ok. I was the only one who thought she’d survive. She did. And then she sent me a birthday card. At this point, I put my pride aside and took her words for what they were. I messaged her myself. And I’m so glad I did. I kept in contact with her while my partner went between her and her child. There was genuine friendship building. We spoke about us going to visit her. When the time rolled around, she said, ‘soon. I’m not feeling too well right now.’ Next time never happened. She died before it had the chance.