All those little things about him that I loved when we were together, like the times he would decorate my car in whatever motif made him laugh that day, I would sit around and talk about as an example of his immaturity. The way he could go months without a hair cut, getting shaggy, I used as an example of how I obviously needed a man who could dress and look like he could take me out to a five star restaurant. I'd ignore the fact that, as shaggy as he could get, as unshaven and sloppily dressed, he could cook better than most chefs in those restaurants.

I dated other guys. Met this man who had established himself in his career field. Who looked good in a suit. Who had a new car he got detailed once a month. Who fit this mold of what I had always imagined my husband to be. We married. A big wedding, flowers everywhere, and he looked incredible in his tux.

We settled into our lives. Separate careers in the morning, coming home to a clean house (he had hired a maid). Dinner, usually take out. Sex. And then the sex slowed down. And then there would be nights he wouldn't come home. I would go out with my friends from work. I was convinced the marriage was working. Was perfect, in fact. We never argued, the bills were mostly paid on time, at his office Christmas party he would guide me around with his hand in the small of my back, possessive, and I would lean into him. We would go home, him, drunk, me sober enough to drive, and the sex would be decent but never... complete.

It was everything I had wanted, and hoped for. And then I found the pictures. He had left them out, almost as if he wanted to get caught. Shot after shot, poses, a naked woman, not me, him, her mouth on him.

From the wedding until the first appointment with my attorney had taken six years. Now I was in this airport with my best friend, flying with her as far as my parents, spending Thanksgiving almost single, and he was there.

Someone playing a bitter joke on me had put his gate across from mine. Not knowing he was coming we had already chosen our seats, facing toward the other gate, sun at our back.

Now he was there. Hair cut, in a nice outfit that he seemed to feel comfortable in. With his daughter. With a wedding ring on. It was funny how, when and if I thought of him, I never imagined him married. He was always out there, single, maybe dating, but always kind of alone.

I watched him with her daughter. Sam. He had laid on the floor, facing his daughter, facing me, and they signed. They signed. He would laugh and there was so much love coming from him that I Was jealous of this five year old girl.