Deployment and Cheating, Part 1

February 2005 Ronnie deployed on a Navy ship that was sailing around the world. We didn't say our good-byes on the best of terms. I remember hugging him in our apartment and telling him that I loved him. I also begged him to keep the drinking to a minimum and to stay out of trouble... he knew I meant girls... His friends drove him to base. I waved to him from the balcony of our apartment and then went on with my day. I don't even remember why I didn't drive him. Maybe I had to work that day.

Ronnie had started off the deployment with a phone call about once a week and sent me at least one e-mail a day. As time went on I was getting about one phone call a month and about one e-mail a week. The phone calls lasted less than five minutes and the e-mails were boring, generic and sounding a bit forced. For about 2 months I e-mailed him every day... When I realized that I was getting nothing in return my e-mails slowed down too.

March 2005 was when the 1st affair happened... well I guess it wasn't really an affair... more like a one night stand. I didn't find out about it until AFTER the deployment. Ronnie was distancing himself from me because he had cheated on me. He had told me that some guy from the ship had flown his girlfriend from the States into Guam, which was their first stop. He didn't care for this guy and wanted to prove to who-knows-who that he could get this guy's girlfriend to sleep with him. (His favorite thing to say back then...and probably still... is, "I do what I want.") I truly believe that he doesn't think he'll have any consequences for his actions. At least at the time he's doing it. And of course he was completely drunk at the time. They did it in the bathroom of a club... In a bathroom stall. Classy, right?

Back at home I was hanging out with my best friend at the time, Melissa. She and her husband had just filed for divorce. (I think she was really hurt when it happened. She did what I did when Ronnie and I got divorced... She went looking for male attention. Not saying it's right, but I think we both dealt with it the same way.) She and I would hang out in Pacific Beach a lot. (Lots of bars, tattoo shops and guys!) We hung out with a lot of guys she knew during that time. After we both turned 21 we would also go to a bar every now and then. When I wasn't hanging out with her I was working... Until the night I went over to a friend's apartment...

That night changed everything for me.