Trashley: Twenty-Five
Pic?
Ashley and I were having dinner before seeing the off-Broadway show Drunk Shakespeare when she showed me texts from Cecelia pleading for Ashley to come home so they could all be a family again. I felt sad for Cecelia. She was clinging to the life she had before the divorce, whatever that looked like. I’m sure she would’ve loved an extra set of hands and eyes and maybe some sleep too, while parenting their two young children alone. Everything I had gathered about Cecelia from my online investigation work made her seem like a good person. Like the kind who would cup a spider in the house and set it free outside. Yet Ashley had just told me she hoped Cecelia would die or slip into a coma.
Which is how I’d imagine their Dateline episode would begin ...
My days of lurking on Cecelia’s tweets were over, because she blocked me on Twitter. But to be fair, I blocked her first, but only on Instagram. I didn’t realize how often I checked Cecelia’s Twitter until it was taken away. I must’ve visited her page ten times an hour. Was I a stalker? I would read articles she retweeted and scroll through her favorite tweets to see what she had liked. I felt like she was sending me smoke signals all the way from Minnesota, warning me about Ashley. Cecelia’s tweets felt like a trail of breadcrumbs I had to follow that would eventually lead me to the truth.
She regularly interacted with a blog called The Chump Lady, which is dedicated to spouses who were cheated on. I started reading Chump Lady’s blog posts daily because people wrote to her with their cheater stories, and I thought maybe Cecelia would write in, too.
It wasn’t worth talking to Ashley about Cecelia’s tweets because she would scream, “I’m not a cheater!” at full volume, and my ears still rang from the last time she screamed. It sucked that Cecelia considered me the other woman because I would never do that. I would never have an affair with a married woman. Unless that married woman was Cate Blanchette. I would other-woman the absolute living fuck out of her.
After reading Cecelia's texts to Ashley, I had a new perspective about her: Cecelia was raising two young children alone and asking Ashley for help. I wanted to put Ashley in a cage and release her in Cecelia’s front yard. Go! Be with your family. Go home.
That night, Ashley and I went to Drunk Shakespeare, where we sat in thrones at the end of the stage and became part of the interactive experience. During the play, the actors asked me, the King, what I did for a living. “I’m a writer,” I said. Wow, cool story bro. When they asked Queen Ashley what she did for a living, she answered with the confidence of three white men, “I’m a Physicist.”
I sucked in my cheeks to avoid laughing out loud. The cast and audience ooohed and awed, and the smirk on Ashley’s face grew comically large. Her lips curled up at the end, and it reminded me of the look her Mom gave to co-workers when she told them her prized daughter Ashley was a professor at MIT, and Ashley’s girlfriend wrote for SNL.
As soon as she said she was a physicist, Ashley became the coolest person in the room, which reminded me that I needed to find solid evidence she did not, in fact, go to MIT. And proof she wasn’t a professor. But it was hard proving something that didn’t exist, similar to when a man is suspected of murdering his wife and everyone in town knows he did it, but police can’t bring charges without a body. I needed the body. Since we’d met, the only things that supported Ashley’s story were one sweater, two hats, four T-shirts, and one pair of sweatpants that said MIT. But that didn’t prove anything. You could buy MIT gear on Amazon today and be a fake Academic between a 12:00 and 4:00 delivery window tomorrow.
Our trip to New York was coming to an end. We hadn’t even been there a week, and so much had happened. I made a mental note never to travel to New York with Ashley again. The chaos and random women messaging me I could deal with (assuming it came with Hamilton tickets), but chaos aside, Ashley was way too slow. She trudged along the street like a tranquilized grizzly bear.
We ended the trip with a second performance of Hamilton, watching from the opposite side of the stage this time.
“I realized something,” Ashley said during intermission, “I’m just like Alexander Hamilton,” a bold statement. “Like when he writes the Federalist papers, that’s exactly how I work on my whiteboard when I distinguish the different varieties of electromagnetic waves since they’re composed of two waves that run along the same magnetically charged field yet run parallel.”
Big word alert!
“Interesting,” I said, but what I wanted to say was, “Are you sure it’s not because Hamilton cheated on Elisa with Mariah Reynolds?”
And if anything, I was the Hamilton of this relationship because I always write like I’m running out of time.
Ashley doubled down on being a Physicist since her ego-boost from the cast and audience at Drunk Shakespeare. She thought I was still buying it, too, even though we’d been dating since March, and it was now October, and I had yet to see her do one thing with Physicism, not even scribbling nonsense on a whiteboard or a bar napkin like she claimed she always did.
During the walk back to the hotel after Hamilton, we stopped to watch a pigeon stomping another pigeon to death. I’ve seen this sort of bird-on-bird violence before, and it’s one of those “only in New York” moments. While they fought, I narrated the entire battle.
Pigeon one, “And this is for calling me fat!”
Pigeon two, “Ahh, my hair!”
Ashley laughed. As I spoke, a beautiful blonde woman in her late fifties stopped beside me.
“Oop, looks like he’s walking away…” I continued, “Oh no, he’s coming back for more!”
Stomp stomp stomp.
“Ha ha ha…” the blonde woman laughed.
“And the crowd cheers, Finish Him! Finish him,”
“Ha ha ha....”
“Oh dear lord in heaven, not the people’s elbow!”
STOMP!
The blonde lady loved my play-by-play, but as soon as she started laughing, Ashley stopped. Once the bird was dead, the blonde stranger pushed my shoulder and said, “You’re funny,” and walked away.
”What the fuck was that about?” Ashley said.
”What the fuck was what about?” I repeated, confused.
”Your confidence,” she glared at me. “Your confidence needs to be put in check.”
”I’m sorry, you have a problem with my confidence? Because I made a woman laugh? Are you dead ass serious right now?”
“Yeah, I am. It’s too much. I can make people laugh, too. I make them laugh all the time.”
Now that’s fucking funny.
“So you think having confidence is a bad thing? Because it’s not. I think you’re confusing confidence with ego.”
I wanted to give her an example: you peacocking at the Meatball Shoppe in front of my friend Jess and telling her and the server you make a lot of money. That’s ego. Making a stranger laugh when a pigeon murders another pigeon? That’s confidence.
Learn the difference, you daft bitch.
But I didn’t say any of those things because I didn’t want to ruin our last night in New York.
“I have the confidence of a small army,” I said, “Get used to it.”
Ashley glared at me and swallowed her anger like she had just downed a pill without water. Good.
We got back to the hotel, and I was bummed they didn’t have a room with two beds because I did not feel like sleeping next to whatever version Ashley was at the moment. The optimist in me said to chill and enjoy my last night in NYC since we were parting ways the next morning. Ashley was going to Minnesota to visit her kids, and I was going back to LA, which meant I would have a much-needed break from her and her incessant bullshit.
“Pic?” Ashley texted me when I got to my gate at JFK. This was her new thing. When we were apart, she would ask for an immediate picture of me, and I’d send a selfie.
I hated it, but I’d send her a picture anyway because I had nothing to hide. I was always where I said I’d be and doing what I said I’d be doing, unlike her. Every time she turned the location off on her phone, she had an excuse.
It’s because I was in airplane mode.
My phone must’ve done that when I updated it.
Huh, what are you talking about?
My dog ate my location.
Which reminded me, how was her imaginary dog doing?
My favorite thing was when Ashley acted like she didn’t understand how technology worked and asked me if I knew how to set a Google Alert, but then she’d turn around and say she was mining for Bitcoin and built her computer from scratch.
I was so happy to be home from New York. When I got to my apartment, I fell to my knees and kissed the floor. Freedom. Quiet. Chill vibes. How I missed thee. That night, I lit some candles, cozied up on my couch next to Perci, and watched Night Stalker: The Hunt For A Serial Killer, while drinking an entire bottle of Cabernet. Finally, a perfect night to myself.
Once I got back to the LA groove, I started to forget how awful Ashley could be. My brain played tricks on me because when I was around her in person, I wondered why I put up with so much bullshit. But when we were apart, I’d start to miss her. Damn you, brain, for cursing me!
I took advantage of my alone time and spent it working on a book proposal I had promised my agent a few months earlier called Alaska News Girl, about the three years I spent working as a teenage news reporter in Fairbanks and Anchorage, where I covered crimes and snuck into bars dressed as an eighty-year-old woman because she would never be carded.
Those were the days.
My phone buzzed.
—Pic?
I rolled my eyes into the back of my skull so hard they could see out the window behind me.
I took a photo sitting on my couch, working on my computer, with the TV in the background.
—Working on Alaska News Girl
Ashley didn’t respond immediately, which was weird since she had initiated our conversation. Half an hour went by.
—Are you okay?
I waited for her response. After more time passed, I messaged her a third time.
—Hello? Is this thing on?
Nothing.
The next morning, I found out why Ashley went radio silent, it was over someone I had dated five years earlier. “You were watching your exes show. I know you already know that.”
Since I had no idea what she was talking about, I looked at the photo I’d sent her. In the background, the animated show The Great North was playing while I worked on my book. I chose that show because it was animated and took place in Alaska. Ashley knew I always threw on animated shows when I needed background noise. Usually, it was Bob’s Burgers or The Simpsons, or, if I was high, Adventure Time.
“Do you still have feelings?”
“NO.”
My ex-boyfriend was Will Forte, who I had known since 2007 when we both worked at SNL, and he was a cast member. We reconnected when I moved to LA and dated in 2016. He has the honor of being the last man on earth I dated before I realized I was insanely gay. We ended things on good terms and are still friends. He even testified as a witness in my #MeToo trial. Will played a voice on The Great North, but I wasn’t paying attention to that when I turned it on. I turned it on because it was about Alaska, and I was writing about Alaska.
I circled back to the beginning of our relationship, when we talked about exes. I never mentioned Will because I didn’t want Ashley to feel intimidated that I’d dated MacGruber. Especially knowing how weird she was about celebrities and Hollywood. She could only know we’d dated by scrolling back on my Instagram to 2016.
I wondered how long she’d carried him around in her head, worrying that he might appear in a show we were watching, god forbid. We got on the phone and I assured her I only had The Great North on because it was about Alaska and nothing else. And I don’t know how she did it, but somehow, Ashley survived the close encounter I had with my ex. She did it!
Ashley FaceTimed me the following night. Her eyes reminded me of the girl who crawls out of the well in The Ring.
”Are you okay?” I asked, knowing she was not.
”I’m going to fucking kill Cecelia,” she said. “I’m going to destroy her.”
”Why? What happened?” I could tell Ashley was fresh off a tantrum.
”She was talking to someone on Bumble, and I have no doubt it’s some ugly fucking butch dyke, thinking she’s an alpha—”
“—So?”
“So? SO?! That is the mother of my children! She needs to spend her time with the kids! Not talking to some fucking butch lesbian name J.R.”
”So what, Ashley? SO. WHAT. She’s allowed to date whoever she wants. I get being jealous or whatever, but you literally live with me. So, what’s the problem?”
”I’m not fucking jealous,” she said, jealously. “I’m much better than some loser named J. Fucking. R.”
”Okay,” I said. “Whatever.”
Her voice was intense and loud. And I’m pretty sure she was growling like a cornered hyena and foaming at the mouth.
Since she was already mad, I felt like it was a good time to tell her I’d be going out to Joshua Tree with her mortal enemy, Kirsten, for five days while she was in Minnesota. I knew she’d be livid, but there was nothing she could do to stop me from going to the desert. She could strap a bomb to her chest and threaten to detonate the trigger if I went, and I’d be like have fun with that. The only thing that sucked was the fact we’d been sharing her Tesla since I returned my Audi when the lease was up a month earlier. I thought about buying my Audi, but once I got a little taste of dog mode it was all over, I took an edible one night and ordered a Tesla Model Y, for Perci. But it wouldn’t be delivered for several more months.
My therapist warned me that it was a bad idea to rely on Ashley to share her car. And now I understood why.
”Yeah? You’re going to Joshua Tree with my nemesis?!”
“I am. It’s a good time of the year to go, and it’ll be a full moon.”
“Well it’ll be pretty hard for you to get there without my car.”
”Seriously? You’re not even here. That would be like me telling you you couldn’t stay the night at the apartment because I was mad at you. I would never do that.”
I knew she’d be a cunt, but at least she was being a cunt thousands of miles away.
”Whatever, Ashley, I’m going to Joshua Tree. Get over it.”
We got off the phone and I went to bed. Between Ashley’s insecurities about my ex and Kirsten, and Cecelia messaging J.R., I couldn’t take much more of it.
The next morning, I packed for Joshua Tree, but when I walked over to Ashley’s car to load it up, the door wouldn’t open, and it didn’t recognize my phone.
I opened the Tesla app. You have been removed as a driver.
She actually locked me out.
And she wasn’t even using her car. She was in Minnesota for another week.
She had locked me out out of spite.
Next, she locked me out of Spotify.
Dumb bitch.
She was trying to control me from thousands of miles away. Anything she could do to block me from spending time with Kirsten. But, since I’m resourceful, I texted Kirsten to see if she’d left yet. She hadn’t, so I loaded my things into Kirsten’s car and we drove out together.
I couldn’t tell Kirsten that I was only riding with her because Ashley had locked me out of her car, because then I’d have to hear about it all weekend. My life used to be so carefree. I used to be able to do whatever I wanted with whoever I wanted and not have to explain myself. Being single slapped fire, I would never take it for granted again.
At least Ashley’s plan to keep me from hanging out with Kirsten backfired because now I was driving with Kirsten, which meant we’d spend even more time together. A thought Ashley couldn’t stand.
I reveled in her failed attempt to control me and reminded myself: only two months until Europe. And then I was out.
Was hoping the beautiful blonde woman on the street would turn out to be Cate Blanchett. :) Also, what a control freak – "Picture?" is 100% her making sure you're not with anyone else. Holy crap. HOLY CRAP. This story!
The absolute arrogance to say “that’s the mother of my children! She needs to spend her time with the kids. Not talking to some butch lesbian named JR.” I actually said “fuck youuuu” out loud after reading that. The lack of any sort of self awareness is astounding.