The Last Chapter: Virginia

The only picture I have of my three weeks in Virginia

October 31, 2011. I left Buffalo the afternoon before. Cydney had left for Virginia the 15th, and I drove my fiance down the 22nd, and I went back up to work one more week. I punched out the 29th and rolled out. I stopped in Washington DC to rest at my friend Chase’s before making that last three hours in the morning.

My fiance had been in the hospital since the day I’d got there. All that week while at work her mother had been texting me telling me what to bring down and overall being annoying. My fiance’s best friend wanted to visit her in the hospital but wanted to make sure everything was cool because there was a situation with them and my fiance’s mom in which the courts and a no trespassing order was put on the house. She called me fussing at me saying that it was stressful on her with them having the number and them visiting. My thing was it wasn’t about her, it was about her daughter’s friends coming to see her. But I knew that woman stressed me out. We had an apartment in the uptown part of Newport News which was about twenty minutes away from Hampton which we loved because had my fiance been the way she was in Buffalo then she’d keep her parents out of our business. We had that all planned out.

Back to October 31. I left DC that morning thinking everything was going to be just fine no matter what because we had each other and this was going to just be the next stop in our story. It was a really nice drive. It was sunny and I was feeling optimistic about it. I hit I-64 where it goes from being a four lane to an eight line highway. The song playing in the car was “Brand New Day” by Buckshot and 9th Wonder. That’s exactly how I felt. I was ready to get back to my family.

I got a little lost and here is where I wound up.

I got to my fiance’s parents house at 2PM. As soon as I got there her mother pulled me into a back room and informed me of what was going on. In her being overly dramatic she told me how terrible things had got with my fiance and her cancer possibly progressing. They were doing tests, chemo every day, and radiation daily as well. She was also telling me that they had set up her funding for the apartment and additional monies for her and Cydney saying that they didn’t know where I was, and that while staying at the apartment I had to lay low because if anyone had gotten wind of it at the apartment or the social worker at the hospital then they could be in serious trouble and wouldn’t care that she had cancer and would lock her up. Something didn’t seem right and my feelings of optimism went out the window. By 2:30 I could feel my blood pressure going through the roof. I was getting a slightly cool sweat and could feel my heart rate go from flutter to “Aww shit, here we go.” My feelings were “Fuck it, I’m going to do whatever it takes for my family no matter what toll it takes on me.” I lived by that till death do us part for real.

I took some stuff to the apartment and we relieved to see there was already a couch there so I would just spend the night there. I was informed that it was ok for me to go up to the hospital in the evening/night time when the social worker wouldn’t be around. I went up there at around six. That’s when we took pictures of Cydney in her Halloween costume so her mother could see it. I then went to the apartment, chilled out, took a sip of some wine I had and just prepared for the shit because I knew it was coming.

The next morning I went to the in-laws so that my fiance’s mom could show me where to go and who to contact to apply for jobs. I got my applications, business cards, and listened to my fiance’s mother tell her side of the story about her issues with her mother, how her mother was sick, didn’t raise her, and was a liar. Once again I could feel my blood pressure rising and was leaning in the cracked window trying to get some air because it was getting that real.

We picked up a Uhaul to move everything into the apartment. While moving we were talking and we were talking about our plans, how the tags were outdated and I said I’d go to Atlanta tomorrow to take care of that because the car was still registered in Georgia. She was making everything difficult and stressful.

By the time I got back to the house my fiance’s father pulled me into the back room and I asked if there was a problem he said “Yes.” All I could think is what did this bitch tell him. I was being questioned about where was the money from my fiance’s account, how come she was paying bills if I had a job, if there was something going on in Virginia then why was I using her card in Buffalo but my fiance was in Virginia. I was told I’m not going to Atlanta to register the car and it would be in Virginia. They were trying to paint me as some loafer and that I was being disrespectful to my fiance’s mother.

I bit my tongue. In reality, we operated as a married couple. Two bank accounts or not all money was our money and we used it accordingly. I got paid roughly $400 weekly in Buffalo. I was buying breakfast, lunch, gas in the car, and four meals from different places in the city a night hoping my fiance could eat at least one of them. That plus clothing for Cydney comes out to about $350 a week. That’s where the money went. However, I just sat back, got disrespected and talked to like a child because my attitude was “Fuck it, I’ll do whatever for my family. I’ll take the abuse if it means being there for my family.”

Part Two will come next Thursday where I will talk about job interviews, actually visiting my fiance in the hospital, and what her mother told me I need to do if my fiance is on her death bed.