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WHO IS BEING PLAYED?

J ust after my birthday, I feel compelled to look at his phone again.

And I’m glad I do, because I see that just over a month earlier he texted the tragic girl that wouldn’t leave him alone. As in, while he and I were together.

Timmy:

Yo ho.

I’m out of jail and miss you.

I was bitter that you flew back then dipped… but I was being a dick and sorry

I hope everything is good and my phone has drowned so call Matty.

K love you bye bye.

If you need any of your stuff tell Matty to get a hold of me.

My stomach once again sinks like a stone, my chest feeling crushed. I retch.

From what I can see, she didn’t reply directly to his messages.

Four days later, she’d sent him a video. A random GIF, not at all suggestive.

For someone he apparently can’t stand, who he says he kicked out of his place, things just aren’t adding up. Did he actually kick her out for being ‘annoying’, or did she leave and he’s bitter about it? Both can’t be true at the same time. He told me one thing, and texted her another.

I feel upset, I feel betrayed. And I also feel like maybe that’s what I deserve for going through his phone. But, he said I could, and if he went through my phone he’d never find anything like this.

The difference is that I mean what I say and am open about things, and yet he seems to live in a world of deception and lies.

I confront him about it.

“What the fuck, Timmy?” I hold out his phone.

He looks at the message and seems genuinely surprised. “I don’t even remember sending that. I don’t know why I’d even send that to her because it makes no sense. That’s not what happened. I kicked her out, she didn’t dip out on me. I must have been drunk to send that. I just wanted her to pick up her fucking suitcase because it’s been here for ages and has caused enough problems between us already. I just wanted it gone.”

“You said you kicked her out for being annoying, but now you miss her? And you’re sad that she left? After you fucked her?”

“Well no. I don’t miss her at all. She’s a pain and I don’t like spending time with her. But I guess I was trying to be nice, and I figured you can attract flies with honey. If I sent her that, I figured she might finally come and pick her suitcase up.” He shrugs. “And, as you know, she did end up picking it up right after I got out of jail. So it’s not an issue anymore.”

I feel sick, but I also feel sick at myself for being in a relationship where I feel compelled to check my partner’s phone on the regular. But it’s because of the way he’s behaving. Sure, I’ve taken a peek at prior partners’ phones here and there in the past, just in case. But Timmy just seems to embellish and withhold information, and it’s in my nature to need to be well-informed. It’s also a protection mechanism. I don’t trust this situation between him and this person he allegedly can’t stand.

“You still messaged her behind my back.”

“Sorry, again, like I keep saying, I must have sent it to her when I was drunk. And I was just trying to figure out a way to convince her to get her stuff. I try to be nice to people. I figured that was better than saying ‘hey bitch, pick up your things or I’ll throw them out on the street.’ He rolls his eyes, as if I’m inconveniencing him by asking for the truth. As if I’m being the unreasonable one.

“By changing the course of history in your text? Did you actually kick her out, or did she leave you? Please be honest.”

“Oh, I definitely kicked her out.” He laughs, and there’s a cruel edge to it. “She’s so fucking annoying. Believe me, I didn’t want her here any longer. I can’t stand her, actually.”

“And you said if she did come back to get her stuff she’d have to suck your dick. That’s what you said in an earlier message.”

“It’s a figure of speech.” He rolls his eyes. “I say it to my guy friends, too. Shut up or suck my dick.”

I furrow my brow. The words coming out of his mouth aren’t computing for me. “I have never ever told any of my friends to suck my dick—or eat my pussy—if they talk. Especially if they’re someone I’d actually slept with. That’s just insane.”

He lets out a frustrated sigh and shakes his head as if I’m a complete idiot. “It’s a common saying around here. Calm down.”

Now I feel crazy. The rest of the day has been fine. Maybe I shouldn’t have said anything.

He hasn’t been running off behind my back or anything, and there’s no way they’ve been spending time together. I don’t see texts from her saying anything inappropriate. I’m just really hurt that Timmy reached out to someone who he—based on what he told me—can’t stand, telling them he misses them. And who he—based on his recounting of events—kicked out of Matty’s apartment. But to her, he tells a completely different story .

“So she’s this insane that you think you can half suck up to her and she’ll do what you want?”

“Something like that,” he says, shrugging. “I just wanted her to get out of our lives.”

“By proactively contacting her and saying that you miss her, and you were angry because she left your apartment?”

He sighs. “I know, I know. Again, that all made sense to me while I was drinking. I’m sorry. Believe me, if I never see her again I’ll be very, very happy. Why would I do anything to fuck up what you and I have? You’re the only one for me, and she’s a complete mess. I wouldn’t touch her ever again with a ten-foot pole. Believe me.”

I look at him, but his face reveals no answers. “If you say so.”

The morning after I see the message on Timmy’s phone, I wake up with a knot in my stomach that feels like it’s taken up permanent residence. I try to shake off the lingering sense of betrayal, but the words I read— “I miss you” —keep looping in my mind, like an earworm I can’t dislodge.

I get out of bed quietly, leaving Timmy sleeping soundly beside me, and shuffle into the kitchen to get a glass of water. Usually, I find it refreshing, but today it does nothing to cut through the fog of unease. I stare out the window of Matty’s apartment, watching the world wake up, people going about their business as if everything is normal. But nothing feels normal for me anymore.

Timmy's excuses echo in my mind:

"I was drunk."

"I just wanted her to get her stuff."

"It’s better to attract flies with honey."

The words swirl in my thoughts, pulling me deeper into confusion. If she’s as annoying as he says, if he really kicked her out and can’t stand her, why did he reach out to her? And why does it seem like he’s still holding onto some kind of lifeline with her, even if just to keep the door slightly ajar, keeping her on the back-burner in case things don’t work out with me? The dissonance between his words and actions is starting to scrape against my sanity like nails on a chalkboard.

When Timmy wakes up, he immediately senses my tension.

He pulls me close, pressing kisses into the crook of my neck, murmuring sweet things that usually make me melt. But today, they feel hollow, like he’s trying to smooth over a crack in the foundation with cheap plaster.

“You’re still upset, aren’t you?: he asks softly, his arms tightening around me.

I nod, not trusting myself to speak without my voice cracking. “It just… it doesn’t make sense, Timmy. If she’s out of your life, why did you need to text her and say you miss her?”

He pulls away, rubbing his eyes like a child who’s woken up too early. “I already told you. I was drunk. It was just to get her to pick up her stuff, babe. That’s it.” His tone carries a trace of frustration, like I’m overcomplicating things.

“Okay, but it just feels... off.” I pause, trying to find the right words. “If I did that—if I texted some guy from my past and said I missed him—you would lose your mind. And you know it.”

He stiffens, his frustration now visibly bubbling to the surface, as if I’ve caught him in an awkward truth. “You’re really going to hold that over me forever?” he asks, as if it happened years ago, as if I hadn’t just noticed it the day before. “It was a stupid text. It meant nothing. I thought we were past this.”

It feels like every time he’s upset about something, he gets to keep mentioning it over and over again. But if I dare to bring something up, I have like a five-minute window before I’m ‘going on about something that happened ages ago’ and ‘rehashing the past’.

I swallow hard, feeling the familiar push and pull—the yearning to let it go versus the nagging suspicion that letting it go means ignoring my gut. Part of me wants to believe him, wants to push away all the discomfort and just enjoy the good moments. But the other part of me, the part that’s been burned before, knows that ignoring the signs only leads to deeper wounds .

He senses my hesitation and changes tactics. He picks up Sabre, showering him with exaggerated affection. “You know what you need? Bacon and eggs,” he announces, setting Sabre down gently. “Let’s start the day off right.”

I nod, grateful for the distraction, even though the pit in my stomach hasn’t gone away. “I’ll get it this time,” I say. As I crack eggs into a hot pan, I focus on the hiss and pop of bacon. Cooking feels like the only thing I can control right now. The food sizzling in front of me, at least, follows predictable rules.

Later, we decide to drive up to the other side of the Cay. The scenic route is supposed to relax me, but the car ride becomes yet another battle. I can’t play the music I want without him making snide comments. He complains about my choices, saying I have ‘terrible taste’, that I ‘always play the same songs’, and acting like he’s doing me a favor by tolerating them. When I refuse to stop at bridges for him to jump off, his irritation deepens, the air in the car thickening with tension.

Then, at a surf store, he tries to shoplift right in front of me. I catch him about to slip a pair of sunglasses into his board shorts. “Timmy, what the hell are you doing?” I hiss, my heart racing.

“Relax,” he mutters. “It’s no big deal.”

“Yes, it is!” I whisper fiercely. “Put them back.”

He rolls his eyes, but reluctantly returns the sunglasses to the display. “You’re such a buzzkill,” he mutters under his breath, and I bite my tongue to keep from snapping.

At the next stop—a coffee shop—he tries again. This time, it’s a cute espresso mug he has his eye on. I grab his arm before he can casually wander out of the store with it.

“Seriously?” I whisper, glaring at him. “What’s wrong with you?”

His eyes darken, his expression shifting into that familiar look of irritation mixed with defiance. “You’re overreacting. I know you like to drink out of cute coffee cups. ”

“That I pay for,” I say, through gritted teeth.

Apparently, me asking him not to shoplift is wildly offensive, and he spends the rest of the time being sullen and sulky, snipping at me over everything he can find to cause dissatisfaction.

I feel the urge to scream, to jump out of the car and run as fast as I can away from all of this.

It’s becoming all too much—the texting, the lying, the petty theft, the constant conflict. We’ve never been able to come to this side of the Cay without having a big fight.

The chaos clings to me like a second skin, suffocating and relentless. And no matter how hard I try to keep us afloat, it feels like Timmy is dead set on tearing our flimsy raft apart piece by piece.

When we finally get back to Matty’s, I’m emotionally drained, teetering on the edge of collapse. I don’t even have the energy to confront him anymore. Instead, I retreat into the bathroom, close the door, and sit on the toilet with the lid closed. Tears sting my eyes, but I force them back, refusing to cry.

This is all too much. The jail situation, the courts, an apartment I’m paying for but can’t live in, having to stay at Matty’s if I want to be with Timmy, and now some skank that he’s reaching out to behind my back. This has taken a wild turn and not in a good rollercoaster kind of way. My gut is churning, I’m grinding my teeth, and I feel on edge.

And whenever I stick up for myself, he gets even more enraged. I’m already upset about this texting situation, and he’s mad at me for being mad at him about it. So now he’s piling on thing after thing. Trying to engage in risky behaviors, putting me down, making excuses for himself, and getting mad at my reaction to his very questionable actions. I can’t even imagine how he would react if he saw a text where I said ‘I miss you’ to some guy I’d just slept with right before we met, and then made the excuse I was drunk. He’d completely lose his mind, more than he already has .

But I’m just meant to sit here and take it. And smile sweetly. And believe the words coming out of his mouth that his actions don’t match. I’m supposed to believe that he really cares for me and nobody else, and that the message had no feelings behind it. I’m supposed to believe that everything is fine.

And part of my body and my brain want to believe that. Because it’s so much more comfortable than constantly being on edge. About worrying about what he’s doing, and how he might not be acting in my best interest. Because every thought I have about him, about us, is how to keep strengthening our relationship. How to let these feelings go. Building us out of this hole that’s started to be dug. And it’s starting to feel like he’s standing right behind me with his own shovel.

I take a deep breath, pull out my phone, and scroll mindlessly, searching for anything to distract me from the turmoil swirling inside. But no matter how hard I try, the weight of everything—his lies, his temper, his risky behavior—presses down on me like a heavy fog.

When I return to the living room, he’s sitting on the couch, scrolling through his own phone as if nothing is wrong. He looks up and gives me a half-smile, as if to say, S ee? Everything’s fine. Why are you making a big deal out of nothing?

But everything isn’t fine. It hasn’t been for a long time. Maybe it never really was.

And yet, I cling to the hope that the move will change things. Maybe being away from Matty’s influence will give us the space we need to rebuild. Maybe things will calm down once we have our own place, once the distractions are gone, and it’s just us, working on our shared future.

Because if I don’t believe that... what else is there? If this relationship falls apart, what will I have left?