The Weekend A Relationship Ends

June of 2015.

I was just watering some plants outside and thought of this one, so I decided to write it up on a Friday afternoon. It’s about a decade old, but still has some relevance or resonance, I suppose.

My ex’s brother got married in JAX on the first weekend of June ’15. It might have been the second weekend. Sue me for being wrong. After this weekend transpired, I wrote an article on my old WordPress called “Friends are the family you choose,” but it upset my former mother-in-law, so I had to delete it. Alas.

What had happened on this weekend was, we went to JAX for this wedding. My ex had a friend from high school who had settled there, and then, via random timing, other friends of hers from HS were going there that weekend. So me, my ex, my ex’s sister, and her then-boyfriend (all now married to different people) were staying at this friend’s house, and my ex’s brother (who was getting married) was staying at a hotel, as was the bride in this wedding. Them’s the logistics herein.

So, we get into Jacksonville and I actually really liked the husband of the girl we were staying with. We did a little wedding circuit together in ’12 to ’15, and usually ended up in beer bars in Nashville and Columbus and Baltimore and he was a good guy. Journalist. Little corny, but whatever. I’m also horrible in my own right, so I’m right there.

First day or so we hang out with her friend and this husband guy, and it’s fun. Bars, restaurants, appetizers, beers, good conversation. They have 1–2 kids now, and I cannot remember if they had a newborn at the time. I think they did, but it’s only casually a memory.

Some of my ex’s other friends come in town on Friday afternoon. One of them I went to college with and she actually dated a former roommate of mine for a while. I mentioned her in this joint.

Alright, so early Friday PM, we head over to this hotel. It’s just me and my ex. The first thing, and I mean the first thing, that happens is my ex’s brother says he “needs to make an announcement” up in the suite, and then tells my ex and her sister that Amanda (the bride) is only having one bridesmaid, so he’s only going to have one person, and he’s going to use his dad. Beautiful. I kinda think it’s weird when a guy uses his dad as the best man, but I get it, and in this specific case, his dad was absolutely a money spigot for him. I actually think his dad, who was a successful doctor in Miami, now lives 2–3 blocks from him in Jacksonville, so I can only reasonably assume the money spigot hath continued, but I don’t know for sure. My ex and I got divorced about two years after this story.

Now, at this point, my ex’s sister is absolutely obsessed with her brother. It’s her baby brother and she loves him so much, so she has a complete meltdown that she’s not the person at the altar with him. Leaves the hotel room, cries, the whole nine yards. Weirdly, my then-wife — who at best had a cursory relationship with her brother, if at all — also cries about this, in an Uber leaving the hotel. I tried to console her, but also didn’t understand the whole arc at the time.

We get back to the friend’s house and have a good time with her HS friends. Fun night.

Fun Saturday AM + early PM too. Now, ironically — and I only thought of this years later — my co-worker at this luxury travel company was texting me a bunch this specific weekend. We later had a fling. Odd.