an affair of her own, as payback. ("That poor
boy," Gina says now. "I was sleeping with
him no matter what. He didn't know what
hit him." The affair lasted only three weeks,
but it did the trick.) It didn't hurt Bryan at
first, because he knew he deserved it. But
then she changed on him. She was no longer
devastated. She cut her hair and dyed it. She
lost weight and began dating. The intern,
meanwhile, was becoming less interesting
every day. Her youthful narcissism had
begun to show through. Her flirtation
devolved into shtick.
Ending the relationship proved to be
harder than he figured, though, mainly
because they saw each other every day. And
also because forswearing her did nothing
to resolve the abyss that yawned where his
marriage used to be.
The sheer size of the loss overwhelmed
him. It's not that he lacked the strength or the
willpower to become whole again. What he
lacked was the know-how.
All that most of us know of marriage is
what we've learned from our parents and
that's often not enough; marriage changes
from one generation to the next and what
worked for your parents may not necessarily
work for you. Also, your parents' marriage
probably wasn't perfect either. And even
supposing it was, chances are they concealed
the struggle to achieve that perfection for the
sake of preserving the family unit.
Bryan had often heard his parents fighting
behind closed doors. Now he was the guy
behind those doors. And he didn't know how
to escape.
So he bought a silver Mercedes, with the
idea that it would somehow elevate him
above his own shortcomings. And for a short
while it felt like it did.
Then Gina filed for divorce.
Five months later, his marriage gone, his
girlfriend gone, his world in tatters, Bryan
lay on the floor of his brand-new apartment,
curled in a ball as if trying to keep one last
errant spark of himself from vanishing with
the rest. The ugly furniture hulked around
him in the dark, offering no comfort. Serious
relationship distress compounds the risk
of major depression by up to 25 times, and
Bryan was feeling every multiple. He felt, in
fact, like he'd reached the end. Looking up, he
could just make out a bottle of rum on
the kitchen counter and it occurred to him
that with a handful of pills he could make
it official.WHAT WENT WRONG?
You could say the problem began the day he
walked out on Gina. Or when someone in the
company saw fit to hire that foxy graduate.
Then again, you might say it began at the
altar, the moment he said "I do," because
they were both so young. After all, research
indicates that the younger you marry, the
more likely you'll stray.‘‘If you’re a
workaholic
you’re 40
per cent more
likely to end up
divorced”